Tamed Read online

  Tamed

  Copyright © 2019 by Tanya Chris (www.tanyachris.com)

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author.

  Note: the first four chapters of this book were originally published in an anthology titled Come, Play. This version of Tamed includes five new chapters.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Thank You!

  Chapter 1

  It wasn’t fair.

  Jake had been eavesdropping on a pair of Doms down at the corner of the bar, and the one closest to him was exactly who he’d been looking for, but of course he already had a sub. Some lucky bastard named Earl. From what Jake had overheard, he and Earl were pretty similar. Big, the Dom kept emphasizing, and surly. Big and surly—that was Jake. If his size didn’t turn Doms off, then his attitude did.

  “You’re too big to play brat,” the last one had told him, abruptly ending their scene. And yeah, Jake had been pushing back. He always pushed back. He needed to push back. Maybe it was because of his size, but he had to know that the Dom had it in hand. That the Dom had him in hand. And this guy, the guy at the corner of the bar… sigh.

  “Sounds like you’re enjoying taming him,” the Dom’s friend said.

  “You know I am, but only because it does him good. He’ll be happier for it. Once he knows who his master is, he can relax, not be on guard all the time. He’s been taught to fight, and I don’t want to break him of that completely, but he needs to know there’s a place he can stop fighting, where he can just lie down and let me be in charge.”

  God, it sounded so good. To stop fighting. To lie down and let someone else be in charge. But Jake could only do that if the someone was worthy of it, was tougher than him, could make him feel safe.

  There’d been a time when he’d been a scared runt of a gay kid, not yet grown into his body and eager to submit. But a few bad experiences had gotten his hackles up, and six years in the Marines had pumped him up to a size most men wouldn’t mess with. He’d about given up on finding someone who could handle him long term, so he settled on coming to places like this, dressed the part in cuffs and a collar and nothing else except a pair of leather booty shorts he felt ridiculous in. He negotiated scenes with obedient formality, then fucked them up by turning into a brat as soon as things got heated. The Dom would get scared—and scared was not an attractive trait in a Dom—and Jake would push even harder because the Marines had taught him to press his advantage, and the scene would devolve from there.

  After developing a reputation that kept even the crappiest Doms from wanting to scene with him, he would move to another club or bar. But there were a limited number of leather bars and BDSM-clubs, even in a place as gay-friendly as LA, and he was about through them. Meanwhile, there stood Mr. Perfect Dom only a few stools away, rhapsodizing about his good boy, Earl, and it made Jake sick.

  Lucky, lucky Earl. Where even was Lucky Earl? If Jake had a Dom like this one, no way he’d leave him alone in a club to get picked up by some other needy sub.

  “Discipline,” the Dom was saying. “It’s all about consistency. If you have one rule one day, and another on another day, it just confuses them. Leniency may seem loving, but it’s the worst thing you can do.”

  Discipline. Now there was a thing Jake didn’t have. Since being freed from the externally-imposed rigors of life in the Marines, he’d found himself rudderless—struggling to accomplish much of anything, frequently letting small but important tasks like paying bills or filling his car with gas slide until not doing them had negative consequences wholly out of proportion to the effort it would’ve taken to do them in the first place. Sometimes he thought about re-upping, just to get back to a structure where he felt safe and could be productive again, but no, he couldn’t bear taking part in endless wars that didn’t defend anything except oil money. He needed to find a way to settle himself into civilian life.

  “I could introduce you.”

  “Huh?” Jake shifted his focus to the bartender who’d appeared in front of him.

  “Eduardo? The guy you been staring at?” Andi flicked her bar rag toward the man in question. “I could introduce you.”

  Eduardo. Now he had a name to go with the face. It sent a shiver down his spine—the name smooth but dangerous, matching the faintly hissed esses and the darker coloring. Eduardo’s trim beard was shiny black, the hair on his head short with a hint of curl. He could be ex-military too, the way he held himself so straight, standing at the bar with one foot up on the footrail in a pose both casual and alert, smaller than Jake by a few inches and more than a few pounds, but not exactly small.

  “Sounds like he’s taken.”

  “Not that I know of,” Andi said with a shrug. “He plays around a bit, but I haven’t seen him with the same guy more than once.”

  Rather than being excited about that for his own sake, Jake was pissed for Earl’s sake. Eduardo had been talking like he’d brought Earl home, put time into him and made him feel like he had a master. And now Eduardo was here trolling for a new playmate? It wasn’t right to tame someone if you didn’t intend to keep them.

  Jake frowned into the remains of his club soda. “Not interested,” he told Andi. Mr. Not-that-Perfect Dom could go fuck himself.

  “Could’ve fooled me, but hey, your choice.” She left him and went straight to the Doms at the corner.

  Jake’s attention went with her, even though he didn’t want it to. Eduardo was drinking club soda too, a sign he’d come to play, or at least was leaving himself open for play, so Andi must be right. The other Dom ordered a beer, and she went off to fetch it for him as Jake asked himself why he should care if Earl’s Dom was stepping out on him.

  Jake had come looking for a playdate tonight. If Eduardo could give him anything like what he wanted, well, what did he owe this Earl person anyway? Exactly nothing. Eduardo could have a whole bevy of subs waiting at home for him. It had nothing to do with Jake getting what he needed for just one goddamned night, please.

  He flagged Andi down. “Maybe I’m interested.”

  “Please. You were drooling. Let me see if they’re okay with being interrupted.”

  There was some quiet conversation, then a dark head turned Jake’s way with a lifted eyebrow and a devilish smile. Eduardo waved him over, and the brat inside of him considered disobeying even though he’d sent Andi over for the specific purpose of getting the chance to serve. Why was he like this?

  He squelched the brat and answered the summons, his footsteps ploddingly slow as he made a point of his reluctance. It was enough to earn him a disapproving frown.

  Eduardo’s friend clapped him on the back. “I’ll leave you to it, then.”

  “Don’t be silly. We hadn’t gotten around to discussing that deal you wanted my advice on, and you might as well meet our new friend. Perhaps he’ll decide he prefers you after all. He seems to regret his choice already.”

  Jake dropped his eyes respectfully. He didn’t regret his choice. He was just a problem.

  “So, Jake,” Eduardo said, “let’s get a look at you.”

  Jake had never felt stupider in the leather shorts than he did turning around in obedience to Eduardo’s commanding finger. He was too big for shorts, too blond for leather. Leather looked better on someone like Eduardo, dark and commanding, but Eduardo was dressed in a pair of slim-fit jeans and a faded t-shirt, the picture of nonchalance. If it hadn’t been for the tiny pair of handcuffs dangling from one ear, Jake wouldn’t even have been
sure he was in the scene.

  “Very nice,” Eduardo said approvingly to his backside. “You’re a big one, aren’t you?”

  Jake’s shoulders moved toward his ears. Yes, he was a big one. This was the point where Doms told him they only worked with subs smaller than themselves. Because a Dom needed to maintain control. Which was true. It was just… Jake couldn’t help how big he was. Or his attitude either, which was surging up to suggest that Eduardo could go fuck himself again.

  “Don’t get your hackles up,” Eduardo said. He moved in close enough that Jake could feel his breath wash over the back of his neck. “You’ve been hurt, haven’t you?”

  “Not hurt,” Jake insisted. Not in a long time.

  “I wasn’t talking about pain. A lot of things hurt worse than pain. In fact, pain can actually feel quite good, hmm? When it’s deserved.”

  Jake’s knees weakened. The urge to rebel softened just a little. He deserved to be punished, deserved it so badly, and if only someone would give it to him…

  Eduardo tapped him lightly on the shoulder to command him to face forward again. “We’ll have to talk through what we’re going to do, but for now I want to finish my conversation with my friend, so can you be a good boy for me and wait?”

  Jake thought about it for a moment before deciding that yes, he could wait. He could be a good boy for Eduardo. He nodded, and the approval in Eduardo’s smile was worth any amount of wait.

  “Excellent. Then go on down to your knees for me.”

  Jake lowered himself to the floor at Eduardo’s side and obeyed the firm direction of his guiding hand as it pulled him face-first into his thigh. Jake’s mouth nudged at the bulge of Eduardo’s groin.

  “There, that’s it. Don’t slobber on my pants though. No mouthing, just rest.”

  Jake chafed at not being allowed to taste. Eduardo smelled so good.

  Above him, the two Doms went back to chatting. They weren’t talking about Earl now—he didn’t think he could’ve borne it if they were—but about a business venture the other was kicking off. It seemed Eduardo was a lawyer, or maybe even owned a whole law firm. He gave his thoughts on this subject as confidently as he’d talked about training a difficult sub earlier. The details of the deal eluded Jake. The words were just so much buzz, a background noise easily kept at bay.

  He was content for a while, slipping into a subby space from the earthy smell of Eduardo’s crotch and the firm command of his hand, but eventually his restlessness came to the surface. When were they going to do something? Had Eduardo forgotten about him? This wasn’t what he’d signed up for. They hadn’t even discussed what he’d signed up for—not safewords or limits or anything.

  Maybe he should stand up. Yes. He should definitely stand up. He should tell Eduardo to go fuck himself—

  It was the third time he’d mentally told Eduardo to go fuck himself in the space of half an hour, which was exactly the reason Doms didn’t want to play with him. But, fuck. How long was he meant to kneel on a tacky barroom floor and be ignored?

  He started to stand up, but Eduardo dug his fingers in a little deeper, a soft tch coming from under his breath. It was no more than that, no formal acknowledgement of his presence, but somehow it was enough. Rebellion died away, and there was only this.

  He hardly noticed when the friend took off except that Eduardo patted himself on the chest to call Jake to him. Jake went up higher on his knees, bringing his head to rest on Eduardo’s abdomen. Eduardo ran his hands through his hair and rubbed at the shell of his ear, his nails scratching lightly over Jake’s skin.

  “How was that?”

  Jake found himself nodding, a little too deep under to make words happen. Once he’d stopped thinking about how much he didn’t want to stay still, the staying still had come easy, and now it was as hard to move as it’d been not to earlier. Eduardo took his nod as an answer, continuing to stroke him gently but firmly and regarding him with dark approving eyes.

  “You did very well. I’m pleased.”

  The flush of pride that went through Jake almost did him in. No Dom had ever been pleased with him at the end of a scene, only sometimes at the very beginning, before things got away from him.

  Except, wait—

  This wasn’t the end of the scene, was it? They hadn’t even done anything. But Eduardo was tugging him up onto his feet and handling him dexterously onto a bar stool. He asked Andi for a glass of water and a brandy.

  “The drink is for me, though you can have one once you’re feeling more yourself.”

  “Are we done?” Jake couldn’t help allowing some petulance to slip into his voice.

  “For today.”

  “But we didn’t do anything.”

  “We did plenty. We got to know each other. We had a little scene, which we hadn’t negotiated, but I think we worked through it well. What do you think?”

  Andi came back with the water, and Eduardo held the glass up to Jake’s mouth until Jake wrenched it away from him.

  “It was all right.” He put the glass down, mostly empty. He’d definitely been thirsty.

  Eduardo waved to Andi for another, then sipped at his brandy with a look that suggested he was waiting for Jake to go on.

  “I liked being at your feet. It felt like a start.”

  “It was an excellent start.”

  “But not enough.” He was caught between an endorphin haze and dissatisfaction. He wanted to get beaten, to have a proper scene. That was why he’d come to the club tonight. Not to spend an hour doing nothing except kneeling.

  “That’s for me to decide.” Eduardo slid a business card out of his wallet. “I’m not a fan of long conversations immediately prior to a scene, but I am a fan of not doing something to someone they haven’t consented to, so fill out one of those kink checklists you can find online and email it to me. Once I’ve had a chance to review it, we can set up a second session.”

  “But—”

  “Or you can find a different Dom. I won’t negotiate with you. I’ll respect your boundaries, but I won’t negotiate. That’s all you need to know about what kind of Dom I am. Understand?”

  Jake understood. He wasn’t going to get his way tonight. If Eduardo could be believed, he wasn’t going to get his way ever. Which, if that were true, was exactly what he wanted.

  So why did he feel so angry?

  It wasn’t fair, that was all. He deserved a scene.

  “We don’t have to negotiate anything,” he suggested. “We could scene, and you could just do whatever. I don’t have boundaries.”

  “But I do. And I just gave them to you.” Eduardo threw back the rest of his brandy in a single gulp that had to burn. “Since you’ve recovered enough to be difficult, I believe we’re officially done. Think about it, Jake.” He tapped Jake on the nose like he was a misbehaving puppy and walked off in a flourish of masculine grace.

  Jake put the card in his pocket and finished his water. Then he ordered a drink. He wasn’t scening tonight apparently. He’d been given his orders.

  Chapter 2

  Kink lists were stupid. They were stupid because they were full of things Jake was supposed to like or not like or not like but be willing to do, and what Jake really wanted was to not decide any of that.

  He knew what he liked in a general sort of way. He liked spankings. That was, he liked the idea of them. But he wanted the spanking to be something he didn’t want, for it to not be about him rubbing off on someone and them rubbing off on him while both of them pretended it was for discipline when really it was for getting off.

  He did get off on being spanked, sort of, but once he started getting off on it and noticing how the guy spanking him was getting off on it too, the whole thing got ruined. He would start fighting, the guy spanking him would ask for a color, and the phoniness would grow until the only real part was the part where he was fighting—disobeying because his Dom couldn’t make him obey.

  He didn’t care about the trappings of it all—what position
he was in or whether he had a gag or a butt plug. Whatever his Dom wanted, as long as his Dom wanted it and chose it and made him take it. All he cared about was that punishment be real, not a game whose rules they’d agreed to beforehand. And that seemed impossible to convey using a list that’d been specifically designed for agreeing to the rules beforehand.

  He’d been trying for two weeks now—pencil in hand—marking and then erasing and then marking again, writing something next to a box to try to explain, and then crossing the explanation out so hard Eduardo would never be able to read it.

  He was about to print out a fresh list and start over when the uselessness of it all hit him. If it hadn’t been Eduardo, he wouldn’t have tried so hard, would’ve just randomly checked boxes for things he didn’t hate too much, or things he particularly did hate, and handed it over without giving a fuck. But he’d liked that hour he’d spent at Eduardo’s feet, liked the way Eduardo talked about Earl and how he’d tamed him, how he’d made Earl docile and content. And so Jake had tried, really tried, to get the paper filled out right.

  But it wasn’t ever going to be right. He couldn’t do a kink list just like he couldn’t do anything. He drew an X through the page and wrote EARL across the top in big block letters, then folded the list down into a little square so he wouldn’t have to look at it again.

  Instead of emailing it to Eduardo as instructed, he staked out the club where they’d met, tipping Andi extra to keep her eyes out for him. When she finally pointed him out, he was in the middle of the club floor chatting with a woman dressed like a sub. Seeing him with yet another sub made Jake so furious he stormed over and shoved the square of paper into his chest without so much as an excuse me. Eduardo caught his wrist before he could stalk away. He didn’t say anything—just pointed at his feet with an arched eyebrow.

  Jake wanted to kill him. Just, really, what the fuck? Did this guy think he could get away with that after Jake had spent two weeks trying to fill out that fucking form? Did he really think Jake was going to kneel at his feet because he pointed to them?