Chapter 2: Suspended in the Storm
The grey morning light did nothing to soften the edges of the world. Sadie woke alone in her tangled sheets, her body a map of tender aches and sharp, sweet memories. The space beside her still held the impression of Rhett’s body, the pillow smelled of Jace’s cologne. The storm had settled into a steady, dreary rain.
She found them in her kitchen, a surreal sight. Rhett was silently making coffee, his large hands meticulous with the French press. Jace leaned against the counter, scrolling on his phone. They looked like they belonged there, a fact that unsettled her more than the previous night’s activities.
“Sleep okay?” Jace asked, without looking up. His smile was all easy morning affection.
“Like the dead,” she lied, her voice rough. Every muscle protested as she moved.
Rhett handed her a mug. Black. He’d been paying attention. His eyes scanned her face, reading the wariness there. “Get dressed.”
“It’s my day off. I’m planning on doing fuck-all in these pajamas.”
“Not today.” He finished his own coffee, placed the cup in the sink. The finality in his tone brooked no argument. “We’re going to my place.”
A thrill, dangerous and unwanted, shot through her. “Why?”
Jace pushed off the counter, his eyes alight with a secret. “Because the garage is more interesting than your apartment, Brooks.”
Rhett’s garage was a cathedral of grease and grit, a long, single-story structure detached from his small house. It smelled of motor oil, cut metal, and rain-soaked concrete. A custom motorcycle, a sleek beast of black chrome and raw power, sat on a lift in the center. Tools hung in precise lines on pegboard. It was a space of pure function.
Except for the new additions.
Her breath caught. Suspended from a heavy beam in the cleared corner were ropes, pulleys, and a set of wide leather cuffs. They hung, inert and ominous, against the grey light filtering through the high windows.
“What is this?” Her voice was smaller than she intended.
Rhett didn’t answer. He simply walked to her, his fingers hooking into the collar of her sweatshirt. He pulled it off over her head. Jace was there, kneeling to tug her leggings and panties down her legs. The air in the garage was cool, raising goosebumps on her bare skin. They worked in a silent, efficient tandem that left her naked and exposed in the middle of the ruthless space.
“Hands.” Rhett held one of the cuffs.
She hesitated. The memory of the belt, of her helpless pleasure, warred with a surge of primal fear. This was different. This was premeditated.
“Sadie.” Just her name. A demand and a promise.
She lifted her wrists. The leather was cool, supple, and thick. He buckled them securely, not tight enough to cut circulation, but with absolutely no slack. The same was done to her ankles with separate cuffs. Jace attached carabiners, the clicks sharp in the quiet.
“Ready?” Jace asked Rhett.
Rhett gave a single nod. He took hold of a main rope. Jace grasped another. Together, they began to pull.
The sensation was one of terrifying, gradual surrender. Her arms were drawn up above her head, her ankles pulled wide apart. The tension increased, taking her weight, lifting her clean off the concrete floor. She was suspended, spread-eagled and utterly open, her body a taut line. The pressure on her joints was a stark, inescapable reality. She was pinned in mid-air, a butterfly under glass.
Rhett approached, a black silicone vibrator in one hand, a narrow leather strap in the other. He didn’t speak. He pressed the bulbous head against her pussy, nestling it firmly over her clit. She flinched at the contact, still sensitive from the night before. He looped the strap around her hips, threading it through itself, cinching it tight so the device was locked in place, a relentless, intimate pressure.
His thumb found the switch. A low, deep hum emanated from the core of her. It wasn't enough to push her, just a constant, maddening presence.
Then he picked up the flogger.
It was beautiful in a brutal way: multiple falls of heavy black leather, tapering to soft tips. He ran them through his fist, testing the weight.
Jace circled her suspended form. His hands, warm and familiar, glided over her stomach, her ribs. He cupped her breasts, his thumbs brushing her nipples into tight peaks. He leaned in, his breath hot on her neck. “You look perfect like this. All ours.”
The first stroke of the flogger came without warning. It landed across the tops of her thighs with a sound like a sharp exhalation. The pain was bright, stinging, followed immediately by a wash of heat. She gasped, jerking in her bonds, which only made the vibrator shift minutely against her clit.
“Count,” Rhett said, his voice flat.
Before she could process the command, the second lash fell, parallel to the first. The bite was sharper.
“One,” she choked out.
He struck again. “Two.”
He established a rhythm. Methodical. Unhurried. The falls kissed her ass, the backs of her thighs, the sensitive curve where cheek met leg. Each impact was a spark that leapt across her nerves, merging with the persistent buzz between her legs. Pain and pleasure swirled together, indistinguishable, building a fire in her belly. Her skin began to sing, a chorus of heat and sensation.
Jace’s mouth found her nipple, sucking hard, his teeth grazing the peak. His hand slid down her belly, through the coarse hair, his fingers slipping into her alongside the relentless silicone pressure. She was soaking wet, her cunt clenching around nothing. The dual assault was unraveling her. The garage, the rain, the world faded. There was only the stretch in her shoulders, the bite of the leather, the clever fingers inside her, and the hum on her clit.
“Please,” she begged, the word a ragged tear. “I’m close, so close, please let me…”
Rhett’s arm descended again, the flogger landing with particular precision on the undercurve of her ass. She cried out, the sting a white-hot counterpoint to the gathering tension in her core. She was right there, trembling on the precipice, her muscles coiling.
Rhett lowered the flogger. He stepped close, his body heat radiating against her tortured skin. He looked at Jace and gave a slight shake of his head.
Jace slowly withdrew his fingers.
Rhett’s hand went to the strap at her hip. His thumb found the switch.
He turned it off.
The sudden absence was a violence. The deep hum ceased, leaving a ringing, desperate silence in its wake. The physical release she’d been hurtling toward vanished, snatched away, leaving her throbbing and empty. A sob of sheer frustration ripped from her throat. She hung there, quivering, every nerve ending shrieking, the marks on her skin flaming red against her paleness.
“Fuck you,” she wept, the defiance pitiful and broken. “Fuck you both.”
Rhett moved. He didn’t touch the vibrator. Instead, he unbuckled his belt, freed his cock, thick and already hard. He positioned himself beneath her. With one hand guiding himself, he pushed up and into her with a single, powerful thrust, filling the devastating emptiness.
She screamed, a raw, shattered sound. It was too much, an overwhelming invasion of sensation. He held her there, impaled, not moving, letting her adjust to the brutal fullness. His other hand came up, his rough palm smoothing over the hot, marked skin of her ass in a gesture that was almost an apology.
Then he began to move. Short, deep pumps that jolted her entire suspended body. The world narrowed to the slick, tight friction of him inside her, the ache of her shoulders, the ghost of the flogger’s kiss on her skin. He fucked her with a grim, focused intensity, his eyes locked on where their bodies joined. Jace watched, his own hand working over his jeans, his gaze hungry.
Rhett’s pace quickened, becoming harder, more driving. The sounds were obscene: the wet slap of skin, the creak of the ropes, her broken whimpers. He was chasing his own end, using her body to find it. She felt him swell, pulse, and then with a guttural groan that seemed torn from his very core, he came, his release hot and flooding inside her. His hips jerked through the last waves, his forehead pressing against her stomach.
He stayed there for a long moment, breathing heavily. Then, carefully, he pulled out. He didn’t look at her as he fastened his jeans. He went to the ropes and began to lower her, slowly, gently, until her feet touched the cold concrete. Her legs buckled. Jace was there to catch her, lowering her the rest of the way, cradling her against his chest as Rhett undid the cuffs.
The blood returning to her wrists and ankles was a painful prickling flood. She was a shuddering mess, marked, used, filled. Jace held her, rocking slightly. Rhett returned with a soft cloth, warmed somehow, and began to wipe the sweat and tears from her face with a tenderness that belied everything that had just happened.
No one spoke. The rain tapped on the metal roof. Sadie closed her eyes, her cheek against Jace’s shoulder, Rhett’s hands moving over her skin. She understood the lesson now. This was his language. This claiming, this brutal care, this was how he said what he couldn’t speak. And the terrifying truth, blooming deeper than any mark on her skin, was that she was starting to understand it perfectly.