"I'm back!"
Robert replied with a noncommittal grunt. He sat in the study, focused on the screen of his laptop where multicolored lines of code refused to reveal their secret to him. A minute later, he flinched when ice-cold fingers found their way under his sweater.
"Hey!" He tried to shrug off the attack, but the slim fingers slid even further up his back.
"It's freezing outside. Don't be a wuss! Let me warm my hands a little."
Nina's head appeared next to his, her long, curled hair tickling his neck. Her diminutive height meant she did not even have to bend down to look over his shoulder.
"What you're working on?"
"Bug report. App crashed under load. I don't get how this function here could fail." Robert vented an irritated huff.
Her finger started kneading his tense back muscles. For someone so delicate, she was surprisingly strong. Must be all the hours she spent working out. He was just starting to relax when she suddenly withdrew her hands. Her finger pointed at the screen.
"What's that conditional doing?"
"Limits the number of concurrent threads allowed to access this block, so they don't exceed the cache's capacity."
"What if the variable becomes negative?"
"How? It's a counter."
"Overflow."
"Overflow?"
Oh, overflow!
He wanted to smack his forehead, but Nina beat him to it. She patted his cheek.
"Elementary, dear Watson. Join me when you're done."
He hated it when she did that. In less than five minutes, she solved problems he had wasted hours on. It made him feel stupid. But then, the only people who did not feel that way in her presence were those too dim to recognize they were outclassed. His insufferably brilliant girlfriend. Not to mention beautiful, adventurous, and affectionate. And definitely kinky. Must not forget kinky.
He closed the lid of his laptop, stood up, and stretched. Picking up his coffee mug, he crossed the hall and entered the kitchen. When he put the cup in the dishwasher, he noticed the filled grocery bags on the floor. Apparently, Nina had forgotten to put the ingredients he had asked her to get in the refrigerator. Robert was an excellent cook and strongly preferred the dinner he had planned for tomorrow to be remembered for something other than spoiled fish. He sighed. Nina could be a little self-absorbed at times.
So what!
While he put the groceries away, he contemplated how lucky he was.
When they had 'that talk' and she confessed her interest in exploring BDSM with him, he had been delighted. For him, it ran deeper than just an 'interest', and by now, there could be no doubt that it was far more than just an 'interest' for her as well. To his amazement, she had quickly seized the lead, and since then, he could only keep up with difficulty.
He smiled to himself. He still found it hard to credit, but he even felt obligated to curb her impetuosity at times.
Of course, as with everything, she excelled in the dominant role, but did not fancy it. She much preferred to play the bratty submissive and leave the dirty work to him. Robert did not mind. In fact, the arrangement suited him just fine.
Also, he had a pretty good idea of what need compelled her to submit to him. It must be exhausting to be that driven. Hell, at times just being around her left
him
exhausted. For her, submission was the antidote. It made her experience limits that only strict bondage could impose and allowed her to relax. He had soon discovered that she could stay tied up for hours, the more extreme, the better. She did nothing by half measures. Besides thriving on adversity, she obviously got off on pain, preferably combined with a healthy dose of humiliation.
Leaving the kitchen, he noticed a large empty bag with the logo of the Hi-Fi shop around the corner. His eyebrows lifted. Weren't they going out of business? Maybe she had snagged a good deal on the surround system he had his eye on?
"I see you've been shopping. What did you buy?"
"Why don't you come in and take a look."
Her seductive voice from the bedroom made him follow her suggestion without delay. The vision that greeted him caused a sudden drop in blood pressure in his cerebrum, temporarily incapacitating his speech center. Nina posed naked on the bed, her head propped on one arm. A satisfied smile curved her lips when she noticed his stare. Subtly shifting her hips, she directed his attention from her full breasts, flat stomach, and small waist to the perfectly smooth, hairless delta between her svelte thighs. His breath caught.
"Like what you see?" she asked innocently.
"What do you think?" His voice sounded strained. He fidgeted to conceal the sudden tightness in his pants.
She grinned mischievously. "Then don't just stand there. Make yourself useful."
Nina gestured at the large chest she had pulled out of the closet. The one with their naughty toys. On its top, an unfamiliar cable drum caught his eye.
"What's that?"
"One hundred meters of the finest speaker cable. Enough to tie me up and still have plenty left over to connect all of those surround sound speakers you're dreaming of."
"I want a wireless set," Robert interjected plaintively.
"Whatever. More wire for me then."
With fluid grace, she sat up and extended her crossed wrists toward him. "Please master, your slave needs to be punished."
"You got that right."
But first, he wanted to know what he had to work with. Robert knelt next to their toy chest and picked up the cable drum. The speaker cable consisted of two wires of woven copper, individually insulated by clear plastic, yet joined together to form a figure-eight-shaped cross-section. That would not do. Fortunately, the wires could easily be pulled apart. Once separated, the individual wires were thinner and consequently less comfortable than the rope he normally used, but that was not his problem, was it?
Putting aside the drum and cable cutter that Nina had helpfully already fetched, he opened the chest's lid and rummaged through its contents. The items he wanted to use soon wound up in a pile next to the chest. Some of his choices elicited suppressed whimpers behind his back. He acknowledged them with a malicious grin. While Robert freely admitted to a modest sadistic streak, by no means was it a mile wide as Nina claimed. Finally, he gathered the lot and dumped it next to her.
Biting her lip, she looked up at him.
"You plan to use all that? The pump gag? The nipple clamps?"
"All of it," he confirmed. "But especially the nipple clamps."
She acquiesced with a tiny nod of her head, a shiver of masochistic bliss running through her body.
"You're ready? All limbered up?" he asked.
"Is the pope a catholic?"
Her bold demeanor was spoiled by a slight tremor in her voice. He smirked.
"Will a sassy sub be put in her place? You bet!"
Robert picked up the heavy metal collar. It was a beautiful piece of engineering, made to measure and fitting her throat perfectly. On her tiny frame, it looked massive. The large ring at its front ensured that it served more than just decorative purposes.
The collar held a special significance in their play. Once he had put it around her throat, the negotiation phase was over. He was in charge, and she had to comply. Of course, she could still use her safe word to abort the session. It was a point of pride for them both that it had never come to that.
Nina raised her chin and allowed him to place the thick, wide metal band around her neck. She had tied her long hair into a ponytail, so he did not have to deal with unruly curls getting in the way. The collar closed with a loud click accompanied by a sensual gasp. He hooked his finger into the front ring and forced her to her feet. Leaning down, he drew her close until their lips met. They kissed passionately, their tongues performing a complex dance. When they finally disengaged, they were both out of breath. Nina had closed her eyes and was biting her lower lip again. Robert stared down at her flushed face. How he wanted to put that collar around her throat permanently.
"Turn around!"
She positioned herself with her back to him, then brought her forearms together until her elbows almost met. It was not easy to assume that pose unaided, and Robert was suitably impressed, but it was also a bit presumptuous of her. He took her arms by the wrists and slowly twisted them up her back to between her shoulder blades. She gave him a worried look over her shoulder and rose up on her toes to ease the strain.
"No, keep your feet flat on the floor!"