Jesse followed his line of sight and his jaw damn near dropped.
Phoebe walked into the bar wearing the clothes he’d put out for her earlier that day. He’d laid them out with very little hope that he’d see her in them. A scarlet corset sat over a tiny spandex miniskirt that revealed far more than it covered. He’d left out the fishnet hose that had come with the outfit because he would rather see her legs. Her feet were bare, showing off the way her toes were painted a hot pink.
“Hi.” She stepped up to the bar. “Can I have one or is that something just for the Doms?”
Li eased off his barstool. “I’ll leave you two. Phoebe, you look lovely.”
She frowned. “Really?”
“Really. Welcome to Sanctum. Jesse, don’t let that one get too far away. Every unattached Dom in the place will be after her.” Li nodded toward the dungeon. “Big Tag is here with Charlotte. He’s doing some kind of exhibition where he spins around floggers like a bloody baton twirler. What’s the world coming to?”
Jesse sort of, kind of realized Li was walking away. His whole focus was on the woman in front of him. “You can have a drink. I suggest one before and one after.”
“After?” She tugged at her skirt as she tried to get on the barstool. “Does this have to be so short?”
“If you don’t like it I could exchange it for a thong.” He thought he’d been pretty damn kind to give her a sort of skirt.
“That’s worse.” She cursed under her breath.
He slid off his barstool, picked her up, and set her down. “There. Better?”
She wiggled a little, obviously trying to find some modesty. She finally settled on crossing her legs and looked as prim and proper as a woman in a corset could. “Not really. You couldn’t have given me some undies?”
His cock jumped at the thought that she was sitting right beside him and her pretty pussy was just a twist of that skirt away. “Nope. But the fact that you didn’t try to sneak any makes me think you’re already better at this than most of the other subs when they started.”
She straightened up. “I can follow orders when I think they’re reasonable. Or when I think I can’t possibly get around them. I thought about putting on some of my own underwear and then calculated the chances of getting away with it. They weren’t good. Someone would have noticed and according to that contract, you would have the right to spank me.”
“You liked it when I spanked you.”
“I…I…well, I was caught off guard and I don’t know how I felt about it. Seriously, can I get a drink?”
She could have stayed upstairs. There was still a bottle of wine left over. She wasn’t down here to drink. She was down here because she was curious.
He caught Mike’s attention. “Can I get the lady a pi?a colada?”
She shook her head. “I would prefer a vodka tonic.”
He frowned. “Really?”
“Sweetie, you might be able to drink those three thousand calorie drinks all day long and still look like a Greek god, but I can’t.”
Mike started making her drink but it bugged Jesse. “You’re beautiful, Phoebe. You don’t have to change a thing.”
Her hand slid over his. “I know you feel that way. It’s one of the things I actually really like about the men at the office. Not a one of you has a thing for stick-thin women. But I have to stay in shape. However, if you want to tell me I’m pretty again, I won’t hold it against you.”
“You’re gorgeous, baby.” He took a long sip of his drink. “Why are you here?”
She accepted her drink with a polite “thank you” before turning back to Jesse. “I’m curious. I shouldn’t be. If you asked a few months ago what I thought of this lifestyle, I would have said it was abusive.”
“That’s because you were ignorant about it.”
“There is that,” she conceded. “I was also afraid of it. I thought there was one way to love and be loved and I’d found it. My husband was very gentle with me, very protective. I couldn’t quite get the two ideas to mesh in my head.”
“What changed your mind?”
“I don’t know that it has. Not the intolerance part. I get that it’s not abusive. It’s a form of communication in the end. It’s a way for partners to state what they want in an environment that won’t judge them. I don’t hate that. I just don’t understand why you can’t just make love. Why does there have to be all the other stuff involved?”
At least they were talking about it now. Before, she would always change the subject, and he’d gotten the idea that she would never be interested and any sex life they had would be vanilla. He could have handled it, but they could be so much more. “I know what you’re saying. I kind of thought the same things when I hired on and Big Tag insisted I come to Sanctum. I didn’t get why I had to wear a set of leathers and spank some chick in order to be on his team.”