An Expert in Domination Read Free Page A

In. Out. Good. Keep that rhythm. Concentrate on that; focus on it. And yes, I’m going to hit you. But keep doing it anyway.”
    She breathed. A couple dozen leather tails flew against her back, more a caress than a blow. Was it the breathing that caused that? She looked behind her and saw that he was swinging the flogger with only a fraction of his strength. He had said something about warming her up. She relaxed. She could take this. She didn’t need any special breathing techniques. It was even pleasurable, although she wouldn’t admit it to Remy. She was still pissed at him.
    “Sophia,” Colby said sharply, “keep paying attention to your breath. Your mind has wandered.”
    He was right. She breathed. He kept up a rhythm thudding against her back and started talking to the crowd again. “This is one way to use breath to help process pain, and it works pretty well, but in part it works because it moves the bottom’s focus away from the pain itself. Now, if the top gets off on just swinging a flogger, that’s one thing. I sometimes tell people who think I’m all about pain that I’m a sensuous player. The feel of the whip handle, the cool metal of clamps. Sensuous, right?”
    People laughed.
    “Well, it is sensuous on my end. But if it was really all about that, I wouldn’t need to play with another person. I could just happily caress my floggers at home. So there’s something else going on, which is that I enjoy the effect I’m having on my bottom. So if the way my bottom is processing what I’m doing to her is to ignore it or to feel it less, that defeats the purpose. It’s a good thing for a bottom to have in his or her toolkit, when things get too difficult to process any other way, but it’s not really the point of the exercise.”
    What a nice way to say you’re a sadist.
    “So, what I want you to do now, Sophia, is to continue to breathe, but rather than focusing on your breath, focus on the sensations you’re experiencing. Focus on the way the flogger tails feel on your back. And while I want you to breathe in and out the whole time, I want you to gather the image of each touch of the flogger building on the last, each time you inhale, and when you finally feel you’ve absorbed as much as you can, imagine yourself exhaling it all out. Can you do that for me?”
    Sophia nodded. Colby had the kind of voice that made her want to please him, but what he was saying made some sense to her too. He might be a sadist, but he’d obviously thought a lot about what the people he played with were experiencing. Had he ever been on the other end of the whip?
    “Good girl. Here we go.”
    He built up intensity, and while he kept talking, it wasn’t to her. He was speaking to the tops now, describing the different ways to swing the flogger efficiently. She didn’t really pay much attention to what he said, although it seemed as much about saving wear and tear on the top’s muscles as it was about maximum force.
    The flogger thudded hard against her back, and she decided it was time. She exhaled, but it wasn’t quiet. She told herself she hadn’t screamed. It wasn’t that the last blow had been so hard, although it had been the hardest, but that everything had built up, just like Colby had said.
    “This is energy work,” Colby said to her. “Energy building up, energy releasing. That was lovely. You held all that within you and let it go. How’d it feel, letting it go?”
    It felt good, she realized. It was more than just that it felt good to have the building-up stop, although that was part of it. It was like a weight off her shoulders. She didn’t know how to describe it, though. “Good. I think.”
    Colby smiled. “Does that make you a masochist?”
    She shook her head. “I don’t think so.”
    “You’re right. There are people who just enjoy the pain, but they are the minority. Well, in most crowds.” He grinned. “Maybe not this one. But most people enjoy the release. They can learn to