Page 7 of Caging Cessie (Submissives of Rawhide Ranch #20)
Cessie followed Leon down the steps to the Dungeon floor, her head bowed, her hand tucked in his as he led her through the other scenes.
The hum of conversation and giggles, the sharp sounds of spankings, and the fainter moans of pleasure turned into white noise.
Her focus narrowed to the measured pace of his steps and the solid warmth of his grip.
He led her to a bare stretch of wall between two armoires. Metal D-rings were bolted into the wall at various heights.
Leon stopped and turned to her, lifting a hand to cup her cheek. His thumb brushed across her skin, grounding her. She looked up, met his steady gaze, and nodded.
Without a word, he released her hand and reached into the small bag he’d had stashed under his chair and carried with the hand not holding hers.
She held out her wrists as he buckled the heavy, padded suspension cuffs around them.
Again, without speaking he tipped his head to the wall. She knew what to do, what would happen next. She turned to face the wall, shuffling forward until her toes almost touched, then raised her hands.
Chain clinked and his warm body brushed hers as he reached up over his head to loop a short length of chain through the D ring, letting the ends dangle.
Then he clipped her cuffs to the chain. The click of the fasteners locking her to the chain, and in turn to the wall, sent a shiver down her spine.
When he stepped back, she was left facing the wall, her arms stretched above her head, chest rising and falling with shallow breaths.
She focused on the soft sound of his steps as he circled behind her, getting things ready.
Then he gathered her hair—too long, she needed a haircut—in one hand. He twisted it into a tail, then tugged, forcing her head back.
Leon leaned into her from behind, forcing her head to turn so he could kiss her hard and deep. He ended the kiss with a punishing bite to her lower lip.
“Safe word,” he murmured.
“Pineapple.”
“Good girl.”
He carefully brushed her hair forward over one shoulder, leaving her back bare.
His fingers found the laces of her corset, tugging, loosening, until the garment gave way and slid from her body.
He could have undone the hooks on the front, but the ritual of unlacing her was important for both of them.
The cool air kissed her bare back. She heard the whisper of fabric as he knelt, untying her black skirt and letting it too fall away. He gathered her clothing, putting it in the same cloth bag he’d been carrying earlier.
Leaving her alone, naked, and exposed.
Cessie flushed hot under the scrutiny of unseen eyes. She could feel them—the other players, the voyeurs seated around the edges of the Dungeon, watching her. Watching him.
Facing away meant she didn’t actually know if anyone was paying attention to them, allowing her imagination to run wild.
Her bare skin prickled, her muscles tensing, but Leon’s hand found her lower back and pressed, firm and reassuring.
Back when they were meeting up almost every weekend to scene, getting stripped in front of the crowd had barely registered.
But it had been too long since she’d been vulnerable and naked in front of strangers, and she was tense with nerves.
His touch grounded her and she exhaled slowly, surrendering to it. To him.
There was a soft brush against her side—the tails of the flogger, whispering a promise.
Leon stepped back. “Color?” he asked, his voice low and rough. They used colors for check in, above and beyond the safe word.
“Green, Master,” she answered, her own voice shaking a little.
“Good girl.”
The first strike landed lightly against her upper back. A soft thud, the suede tails spreading the impact without pain. She knew what a flogging looked like—barbaric, harkening back to the savagery of life at sea.
But what it felt like was quite different.
He worked slowly, methodically. He started with her upper back, the strikes sometimes so soft that it tickled.
It was a warmup for both of them.
Then he moved to her thighs.
She kept her feet hip-distance apart and closed her eyes, focusing on the sensation—the weight of the flogger, the rhythm he built, the subtle variations in force.
The flogger snapped against the tender skin just below her ass in a strike harder than any that had come before. She gasped, the “thuddy” sensation blooming bright before fading into a delicious warmth.
Again. Again.
A steady rain of strikes, each one pushing her deeper into her body, further away from the noise in her head. It had surprised her the first time a Dom used a flogger on her where, unless it was being used hard, she didn’t feel the individual falls, but instead it felt like a dispersed, firm touch.
Once her thighs were warm and starting to hurt, he moved to her ass where he lingered, gradually building intensity.
The tails licked across her cheeks, the heat blooming there sharper, deeper, as he swung harder.
She whimpered, shifting her weight foot to foot, but the cuffs held her fast, a reminder she wasn’t in control.
And she didn’t want to be.
Leon worked her expertly, reading her body, knowing just how much she needed. What had been merely sensation turned to pain as he increased the intensity. Now she could feel individual lines of heat as the flogger tails spread out on impact.
Her breathing grew heavier, her muscles loosening one by one. The pain and heat from a good flogging was like the pain of a deep tissue massage. It hurt, but in a way you knew you needed.
Despite his choice of a toy that produced a thud rather than a sting, the skin of her ass was starting to burn from repeated contact. The fire in her skin wasn’t something to run from—it was an anchor, pulling her down into herself.
Somewhere along the way, her mind went quiet.
Cessie drifted, her world narrowing to the feel of leather and suede, the sting and thud of the flogger, the rough caress of air against heated skin. Her knees trembled. She floated.
Then she started to cry.
They came without warning, tears sliding hot and silent down her cheeks. Not from the pain—no, the pain was perfect. Necessary. The tears came from somewhere deeper, a release she knew she needed, but hadn’t been able to achieve on her own.
She barely noticed when the flogger paused. Barely registered the low voice of a stranger.
“Cessie?” the masculine voice said gently.
Cessie blinked, the world coming back into focus in pieces.
“Talk to him, baby.” Leon’s hand stroked her back, from mid to lower back, covering the skin he didn’t, and wouldn’t, flog.
A strange man was leaning against the wall so Cessie could see him. “I’m Drake, one of the Dungeon Monitors. You’re crying. Do you need to pause the scene or use your safe word?"
Cessie blinked, struggling for words. When they came, they tumbled out in a rush. “Please don’t stop him. I need him. I need this.” She swallowed, her voice thick. “This is the first time I’ve felt whole in a year.” She twisted to look at Leon. “Please, Master. Don’t stop.”
Leon’s thumb swept over her damp cheek. He nodded once to the monitor, who gave a brief smile and stepped away, satisfied.
"Good girl," Leon murmured, the words sinking into her bones. “You need more here?” He touched her burning ass.
She knew what he was really asking.
“I need more,” she said simply.
He stepped back. “Turn around.”
She turned, putting her back to the wall, the chain twisting above her. She blinked away the tears, then rubbed her cheeks against her arms to dry them. Now she could confirm that there were people watching her. Watching them.
It no longer felt embarrassing. It felt like it used to—like it was their privilege to witness her submission. She offered herself to her Master, and by extension to them because he allowed them to see her.
"Spread your legs," Leon said, voice cool and commanding.
She did, her thigh muscles trembling. Between the spread legs and the twist in the chain her arms were now pulled taut, and she had to brace her shoulders against the cool wall.
Leon lifted the flogger—the one with the gray suede tails, her favorite. He danced the soft tails across her breasts, teasing her nipples by brushing them with the very tips of the falls.
He stepped back, not moving until she looked at him.
She held his gaze for a moment, then submissively lowered her eyes.
She heard the whisper of fabric as his arm moved before she felt the light thud against her right breast, then her left. He alternated, careful and deliberate, the flogger kissing the soft, sensitive flesh, drawing gasps from her with every contact.
He paused every eight strokes, tucking the handle of the flogger into his back pocket so he had both hands free to pinch and roll her nipples. She moaned, the sharp sparks of sensation making her arch into his touch.
Then back to the flogger. He hit hard when he struck the undersides, lighter when he struck the upper curves or the nipples.
Cessie surrendered to it, her head falling back, her body a map of heat and ache.
She lived for the unexpected jolts of pain when one of the falls landed on her nipple just right.
“Where are you, baby?”
“Green,” she murmured. “Floaty.”
“What about this pretty pussy?” He stroked her labia with the smooth handle, sliding it back and forth until her slit parted, cupping the rounded end of the flogger handle which he’d used as a dildo more than once. He bumped her clit and her hips jerked in reaction to the pleasure.
“Please, Master.”
“Please what?” His voice cracked with command.
“Please flog my pussy.”
“Again. Louder.”
“Please flog my pussy, Master.”
The handle disappeared and she opened her eyes, wanting to watch. He stepped back, angling his body just so. Then he brought the flogger up in an underhand swing. Cessie tensed but didn’t close her legs. She stayed open for him.