Pet: A Dark Menage Romance

Stranger laughed and shook his head, looking from one of us to the other.

“You two are both batshit fucking crazy,” he said, and I let a small smile break out on my lips as I stuck my tongue out at him. He stared at me for a long moment before running his hand through his hair and groaning. “I must be just as fucking crazy.”

The doorbell rang, and I exchanged a look with King, hoping it didn’t show how panicked I was really feeling.

“She’s early,” he muttered to himself, and got up to answer the door. Once again, I was left waiting alone with Stranger, and having him in the same room made me nervous as hell. Thankfully, the door to the playroom opened again, and in walked King, with someone all too familiar following behind.

“Maria,” I said, and she gave me a nervous smile before looking away.

“Angel,” King corrected me, striding into the room in front of my new friend. “Don’t call her by her name in here, Pet.”

My bottom lip trembled as he guided me to my feet. I could only stare as my friend laid out a sheet on the floor. She put on a white robe over her clothes, and her hair was pinned up in a hairstyle that didn’t show off her pretty curls. I felt so nervous it almost made me sick, and I could barely look at any of them.

Stranger was standing to the side of the room, as if he was pretending he wasn’t playing a role in this. King hovered over Angel as she prepared everything, and I almost felt like I was a part of a medical experiment. It made me shake so badly King came over and cradled me in his arms. I could see Stranger shaking his head with an incredulous laugh over his shoulder. But he still didn’t leave. None of us could, not now.

“Pet, I need you to lie down,” Angel told me with a smile. I didn’t know whether she was jealous or felt sorry for me, and I didn’t know which one I’d prefer, either.

I let them both help me to the floor, lying down on my back. My eyes went to Stranger for some reason, and my gaze begged him to help me. He muttered something under his breath as he came to stand closer to me. He kneeled down next to King, and the two men shared a grudging look of acceptance, each taking one of my hands.

“Everything is sterilized,” Angel told me in her calm, soothing voice. But it wasn’t doing much to calm my nerves, not this time around. “You don’t have to worry about anything. The pain will be intense but it will dull into an ache you will be able to withstand.”

I stared at her with my breath catching, and for the first time, I wondered if King had done this to all of his pets. Jealousy wracked my body so intensely I thought I would retch, and my eyes begged my master to tell me the truth.

“It will be okay,” he said softly.

“I…” I swallowed thickly, my head swimming with thoughts I couldn’t put into order. “Am I the first one to get this?”

He stared at me for a long time, and I tried to predict his answer, but I had no idea what it would be.

“Yeah,” he said finally. “You’re the only one, Pet.”

His eyes lingered on mine until Angel cleared her throat.

“Could I have the ring?” she asked softly, and I finally unclenched my fingers. My palm was covered in half-moon imprints from where I’d dug my fingernails into the skin. She took the ring from my hand, and we all watched, mesmerized, as she sterilized the metal.

I knew I could have stopped the whole thing if I wanted to. But somehow, I wanted to see this through to the end.

I watched Angel clean the ring and raise a small metal rod to it. I didn’t know what it was until she turned it on, and fire bloomed on the end of it. She heated up the ring, holding it up with something that looked like large metal tweezers.

“Jesus fucking shit,” Stranger muttered next to me as the metal glowed red.

That was when my body started to resist. Fear took over in its most primal form, and my back arched off the floor, gasping for air and crying out so pathetically I felt sorry for myself and what King would do to punish me.

“Pet,” he said softly. “Please, do you still want to do this?”

“Y-yes,” I cried out while my body begged for it not to happen. “Please, just hurry, do it now, hurry the hell up, please…”

My voice broke into sobs and they all just stared at me, Angel poised over my body with the brand ready.