Katarine knelt at my feet. "Welcome home, sir."
Her soft voice held a trace of mirth; her full red lips curled catlike as she tried not to smile. I held my tongue; feeling something amiss, I waited, knowing she would speak again.
"Did you have a good day?"
A little more uncertain this time; she must have interpreted my silence as disapproval. I chose to answer. "Fair."
Reassured, she smiled up at me. I laid my hand against her cheek and rubbed my thumb against her lips; she kissed it, eyes never leaving mine.
"Although," I continued, "I must admit I am a bit mystified as to what you're up to." I smiled a little as she widened her eyes in mock innocence, a touch of guile crossing her face like cloudshadow over a sunny meadow.
"What do you mean?" she asked, voice a touch too innocent, eyes too big and blue. She was aware that she was fooling no-one.
I merely considered her, watching the guilty smile break free. Her eyes dropped; she lay her head against my knee and giggled, very softly.
"Sir, do you know what day it is?"
I thought about this. "No," I answered honestly; I hadn't a clue what was special about today.
"It's Angela's birthday," she told me.
Katarine had known Angela, a dark-skinned, dark-eyed brunette since high school. "I see," I replied, though my expression and my tone indicated that I had missed something; I failed to see the relevance. Always alert to my moods and my nuances, Katarine continued.
"She's been a bit down recently," she told me, her smiling face a non-sequitur in light of the words she spoke. "I think she just needs…" she trailed off, blushing.
I knew what she meant, but insistent me does not settle for the unsaid. "She needs what?"
"A good fuck," she replied quietly, grinning now and blushing fiercely.
Katarine knew that I had had some warm steamy thoughts about her friend Angela but had kept them comfortably on the level of fantasy.
"Perhaps you should tell her that," I replied, refusing to nibble the bait.
More fool me.
"I did," she replied. "And you know, she agreed with me…and so I decided to give her a birthday present. Angela?" she called through the doorway, and in walked the woman in question, wearing only lipstick.
Angela looked incredible. Her dark hair, unbound, brushed the tops of her shoulders as she moved with hipshot feline grace, heart-stopping thighs crossing and uncrossing before a black-black patch of hair as she crossed the room. Her breasts, not overlarge, bore the last ghosts of summer sunfreckles; her flat belly sported a light line of babyfine hair between her navel and points south. My jaw must have dropped; to say I was taken aback would be a vast understatement; yet I was taken even further aback when Angela—a woman I would have though unsuited to submission—knelt at my feet, head lowered.
I looked at Katarine, who blushed yet deeper but met my eyes with her own. "And this birthday present would be…?" I barely managed through a mouth dry as dust.
Her coquettish grin was her only reply.
Shaking my head a bit to clear it, I touched Angela's shoulder. "You do know that I expect a lot from my lovers?" I asked her, a bit skeptical.
Angela raised her head and looked into my eyes.
"Yes, sir," she answered, and her voice, so unlike her normal speaking voice—so quiet and a bit uncertain, so like the perfect sub—made me almost immediately rock-hard.
"You know I may ask you to do anything at all?" I asked her.
"I will do anything at all," she replied. Her voice broke a little. She was aroused; I could see now that her breathing was rapid and her pupils dilated, and as I watched her nipples stiffened, perhaps in response to her own words. I smiled a little and addressed Katarine.
"Your friend seems sincere," I told her.
"She is, sir," Katarine replied. I could see her responding as well.
"Has she done this before?"
"No, sir," Angela replied, and I turned to her immediately.