Page 12 of Flogging Faith
“Great, thank you,” said Bex, and she caught hold of Faith’s hand and ushered her ahead, down the corridor to the playrooms.
The lighting was purple and amber here too, but when they entered room four, Faith noticed a remote with instructions for changing the lighting.
“Can we have low-level standard lighting?” she asked. “No one really looks great in amber, and for sensory reasons, I don’t really like having the lights turned all the way up.”
“Go ahead, pickle, and adjust the lighting to how you’d like it.” Bex was over by the St. Andrew’s Cross, fiddling with the attached cuffs. “I love the fact that this is a smaller cross. It’s not going to be too tall for you at all!”
As Faith watched, Bex undid her blazer and tossed it onto the couch in the corner. “What’re your aftercare needs?”
“Huh?” Faith couldn’t think about anything other than having that lusciously curvy body pressed up against hers. The spread of Bex’s hips, the swell of her stomach, the size of her thighs… everything about her was utterly transfixing.
“Aftercare, pickle, what aftercare needs do you have?”
“Oh,” Faith blinked furiously in an attempt to refocus her mind away from “holy crap Bex is gorgeous” thoughts. “Ummm… water? And cuddles. Maybe blankets too?”
Bex nodded towards the couch, which was covered in blankets, and had a couple of unopened bottles of water on the floor. “Damn, this place really is good! Now, to the armoire!”
The armoire was made of a dark cherry wood, that seemed to shine as they approached it. “Usually, I’d use my own flogger,” said Bex, “but I didn’t like to assume we’d be playing together this evening. Let’s have a look at what they have to offer.”
When opened, the range of toys made Faith’s eyes widen, and even Bex gave a low whistle.
“We don’t have to use all of them, do we?” asked Faith, eyeing a particularly vicious looking cane nervously.
“Not at all, pickle,” said Bex as she moved to stand behind Faith and wrapped her arms around her.
The little breath Faith let out was one of relief. There was something in her that said finally when she was in Bex’s arms. Something that felt right.
Bex froze up in that way Faith was coming to recognize as slight panic, and she wriggled backward until they fit together perfectly and said, “No need to panic. This is lovely.”
“It is,” said Bex. “It really is.”
Neither of them spoke for a few moments. They just stood there, Bex’s arms enveloping Faith in her Bex-ness, breathing steadily.
“There are so many things this evening could be,” said Bex, eventually. She sounded nervous now, and Faith was relieved to realize it wasn’t just her. “The potential is almost terrifying, because whatever it is, I don’t want to fuck it up. I don’t want to fuck this up.”
Faith twisted around in Bex’s arms and then leaned in and kissed her hard. “This evening will be what we make of it. I trust you. We’ve got this.”
CHAPTER 8
The enormity of Faith’s trust felt like a huge weight. Topping someone wasn’t a responsibility Bex ever took lightly, but somehow this scene felt more delicate, more fragile than any she’d taken part in before.
It was, she thought, because she cared so much. She hadn’t even known Faith for twenty-four hours, and yet everything in Bex’s body was yelling at her that she was home.
If she hadn’t done as much therapy as she had, it would probably have been wildly triggering.
Home wasn’t something Bex really considered much, on a day-to-day basis. If anything, she usually tried to avoid thinking about it, because home was mushy peas and fish and chips on a Friday night, plonked on the sofa in her dad’s house, watching crappy panel shows and swearing at the tv. It was union rallies with her dad shouting for workers’ rights and teasing her about her job as a management consultant. It was every football match she’d ever gone to, singing rowdy songs on the terraces with her dad.
Home was her dad.
And her dad was dead.
It shouldn’t be possible for a woman she barely knew to bring all of those memories, all of those feelings associated with home flooding back, and yet somehow Faith had done just that.
“Bex?” Faith asked. “Are you okay?”
She met dark eyes and smiled. “You feel… familiar,” she said, not wanting to say Faith felt like home, because Bex knew that was wild talk. “I don’t know how, or why, but it feels as if?—”
“As if I’ve known you all my life,” finished Faith. “Yes, I feel that too.”