The day after Kate's humiliating first anal experience was not going the way Steve had expected. He'd pictured a day out with Alice, giving her moody ice queen girlfriend a chance to cool down. A day alone might have softened Kate's mood from actively volcanic to merely coldly furious. From there he might have had a chance to apologise and stroke her ego, even if it meant deflecting the worst of her resentment back towards Alice.
He was starting to understand their complicated three-way relationship, at least as far as it extended to appeasing Kate, but he didn't understand why she'd allowed herself to be degraded. That was a worrying gap in his knowledge when navigating such dangerous ground. Instead of sullenly ignoring him, as he'd half-expected, Kate had waited until Alice had settled in her little office space, then invited him to join her in the car. Well, the words had been an invitation, the tone had been an order.
Kate had driven them away without explanation. At first he was afraid that she was driving him directly to the train station, determined to erase any trace of her humiliation. She'd kick him out and stop any further contact with Alice. Instead, she'd kept on going, leaving the town behind and continuing along winding country roads, past endless fields of sheep into ever-rising green hills.
Barely a word had passed between them for over half an hour, her responses clipped and polite, but utterly uninformative. Finally they pulled up in a tiny parking area at the foot of a mountain. Kate pulled out a thermos from her bag, pouring a hot coffee for them both, and then sat there looking out the window. Steve blew the steam away and took a careful sip, pretending to enjoy the view while covertly studying her expression.
"So..." his voice came out a little high and he stopped, starting again. "So, I was half expecting this to be a gun."
Kate gave a thin smile, but said nothing.
They'd arrived at the car park early, far earlier than Kate liked to do anything, and were the only people there. A rugged landscape of fields, dry stone walls, gorse bushes, and little streams stretched out before them. The mountain loomed in the rear view mirror, dark against the white sky.
"I assume we're not about to go hill-walking," he said. Alice was the keen outdoorsy type. Kate preferred to get her exercise in an air-conditioned gym, and that purely out of vanity rather than enjoyment.
"I wanted some time alone with you," Kate said mildly, her eyes still firmly on the landscape.
"Oh." That was nice. In fact, it made him feel warm and fuzzy. He was starting to like Kate more than he'd expected to. He wanted her to like him the way Alice did. Of course, it was also suspicious, and possibly dangerous.
"I suppose you think that you're in charge now?"
Ah. There it was. It probably shouldn't have come as a surprise that Kate wanted to tackle this head-on. Steve took another sip of his coffee, considering his response carefully. If he said the wrong thing now then a one-way trip back home might be the least of his worries. He'd handed her enough blackmail material to ruin his life a few times over by now.
Setting the coffee carefully on the dashboard, Steve turned to face her, taking her hand. Kate turned her head to look at him, a flicker of surprise appearing in her pale eyes. "I'm not in charge, Kate. The only reason that thing happened is because you let it happen."
He thought his voice sounded more sincere than anxious when he said it. He hoped it did.
"That thing?" Kate's eyebrow was raised, her voice faintly mocking.
"The sex," Steve said carefully. "Over the table."
"You mean when you dressed me like a clown and fucked me up the ass?" Kate could have been discussing the weather for all the emotion in her voice, but he wasn't fooled. Technically, it was Alice who'd made her into a clown, but it didn't seem wise to correct her. He had, after all, happily gone along with the ass-fucking part.
"You're still in charge," he said firmly. "You own me, Kate."
"Do I?" her expression seemed pensive, but she sounded as bored as ever.
"Completely," he squeezed her hand. "Even without the blackmail, even without the threat of losing access to Alice, I'm yours to command." He hesitated, unsure if it was the right thing to say. "I want to be yours as much as I want Alice to be mine."
Kate sighed, taking her hand back. "Get out of the car and strip off."
He got out of the car. Once you started making promises to Kate it was always best to see them through. No hesitation, no excuses. The only safe route was directly through the fire as fast as you could manage it. He stripped off, looking around as he did so. Previously, being alone with Kate in such a remote location seemed threatening, now it seemed like the promise of safety. Still, the outdoors community tended to be early risers, and he could vividly picture a Range Rover appearing on the road below, packed full of walkers in bright Gore-Tex jackets.
The passenger window rolled down a little with a whine, followed by the loud clunk of doors locking.
"Post your clothes through the window," Kate's voice was still calm and detached.
Fuck. Okay, he knew this was coming. She was going to punish him. Through the fire, Steve, he told himself, no weakness. He followed her instruction, watching the last of his clothing fall onto the passenger seat with a sinking feeling in his belly.
Kate smiled, drinking her coffee, looking at his exposed body. Although they'd enjoyed glorious summer weather so far, the morning was cold and overcast, a chilly breeze brushing invisible fingers across his skin. He was aware that he'd broken out in goosebumps and that his cock had shrunk down to an acorn.
"Are you sorry you made a fool of me?" she asked.
The urge to apologise, to grovel even, was instant and overwhelming. Maybe if he was pathetic enough, she wouldn't drive away and leave him here. But he held back the impulse. Kate liked honesty and she liked courage, so long as it didn't get in the way of what she wanted.
"No," he forced himself to sound confident. "I don't regret it at all. Being inside you was heaven. I got to do something that no one else can even dream of. Seeing someone as strong as you submit to me like that...it was amazing."
There was a long silence. As usual with her cold, blank expression, it was hard to tell if he'd offended her or impressed her. Then she turned the key in the ignition and the engine growled to life. Resisting the urge to flap at the glass like an idiot took as much willpower as he'd ever exerted, but Steve forced himself to remain still. Kate looked at him for a few moments more, then leaned over to pass his coffee out the window.
"Stay right there. I'm going for a drive."
And then she was reversing, executing a turn which carried her out of the lonely car park and back onto the winding road. Steve watched the little car get further and further away, heading back towards the main road. He could see other cars passing down there and his guts clenched at the thought of one coming his way. The landscape was steep and wide open, offering no better cover than low walls and shallow ditches. Even if he could walk down, he had nowhere to go and no idea of how to get back to Alice's place.
Alice had no idea where he was either. Could he find a phonebox and reverse charges, call in a rescue? God, when was the last time he'd even seen a public phone? With no better option to hand, he wrapped his hands around the warm mug and drank his coffee.
