Room Four

Nina was already on her knees when Marcel closed the door.

The room was nothing like a dungeon in a film. A bed, a chair, a hook, a bag he had brought himself. She was thirty-eight. He was forty-seven. They had met twice for coffee and once to write the list, and the list was in his pocket now because she had asked him to keep it on him.

She had spent the train here with her hands folded, looking like a woman on the way to a meeting. Under the dress she had nothing on. That had been her choice, made in her own flat, and it had kept her wet from the second stop.

"Colour," he said.

"Green."

"Remind me of the edges."

"Hands and belt. No face. No closed throat. I can come. You decide when. Red stops it. Yellow slows it. I want to be fucked after, not patted on the head."

"Good."

He walked a circle around her. Nina kept her eyes down because that was the version she had asked for, and because the waiting made her wetter than the first touch would. Marcel's fingers tipped her chin up.

"You booked this. Say why."

"I spend all week being reasonable. I want an hour where I do what I'm told and get used hard for it."

"Then take the dress off. Fold it. Kneel again."

She did. The air was cool on her bare cunt. Her nipples tightened. Marcel looked at her like inventory and she felt the look between her legs.

"Hands on the chair."

The first slap was a question. The second was the answer. He spanked her until the skin warmed and her breath went thin, counting under his breath, checking her shoulder with two fingers between sets. Nina pushed back. He noticed.

"Greedy already."

"Yes."

"Ask."

"Please hit me properly. Please use the belt. I want to feel it tomorrow when I sit at my desk and nobody knows."

The belt came next, folded, the sound of it worse than the first strike and then exactly right. Three. Four. She said yellow on the fifth because the sixth would have blurred, and he stopped at once, palm on the heat, voice level.

"Good girl for saying it. Breathe."

She breathed. The sting settled into a throb. Her cunt was slick enough that she could feel it when she shifted. Marcel waited until she said green, then gave her two more, lighter, and put the belt down.

"On the bed. On your back. Hold the rail. You don't let go until I say."

She held it. He did not tie her yet. The holding was the order. He went down on her until she was shaking and told her not to come, and she didn't, barely, cursing into her own arm while his tongue worked her clit and two fingers fucked her slow. Every time she got close he stopped. The third time she actually laughed, desperate.

"Please."

"Not yet."

He stood, undressed, and she saw his cock, thick, already wet at the head. He stroked it once, looking at her hands on the rail, and pushed into her in one long stroke. Nina's grip tightened. He fucked her deep and talked to her in the low voice he did not use in cafes.

"This is what you booked. Take it. Don't let go."

"I won't."

He hooked her knee up and the angle turned mean. She came anyway, sudden, apologising and not apologising, cunt gripping him, the rail creaking. Marcel laughed once and did not stop. He fucked her through it until the apology turned into another please, then came with his hand on her throat, not squeezing, just there, the weight of it. She kept her hands on the rail until he said she could let go.

After, he brought water and checked the skin. Pink. Nothing that would need a story at work. He sat on the edge of the bed and let her lean on his thigh while the shake left her legs.

"Too far?" he asked.

"No. The yellow was right. I wanted to know you'd hear it."

"I heard it."

Nina sat up. Her thighs were wet with both of them. She felt used in the exact way she had written on the list.

"Same room next month," she said. "Add the cuffs. I want to fail at holding the rail and have you fix it."

Marcel folded the belt.

"I'll book it," he said. "And you'll text me tomorrow. One line. Not a review. Just that you slept."

"Bossy."

"You booked bossy."

She was not quite done. Marcel saw it. He waited until she set the glass down, then pointed at the floor.

"One more. Mouth. You don't have to. The hour is yours either way."

"I want to."

Nina slid off the bed and took him in her mouth while he was still soft, tasting herself on him, feeling him thicken against her tongue. He did not hold her head. He let her set it. When he was hard she sucked him properly, spit on her chin, eyes up, the pink on her arse still warm when she shifted. He came with a hand on her shoulder and a warning she ignored, and she swallowed because she had decided to.

She smiled, wrecked, and drank the water.