Rude Awakening

  A Total-E-Bound Publication

  www.total-e-bound.com

  Rude Awakening

  ISBN # 978-1-78184-065-8

  ©Copyright Natalie Dae and Sam Crescent 2012

  Cover Art by Posh Gosh ©Copyright August 2012

  Edited by Stacey Birkel

  Total-E-Bound Publishing

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Total-E-Bound Publishing.

  Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Total-E-Bound Publishing. Unauthorised or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution.

  The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.

  Published in 2012 by Total-E-Bound Publishing, Think Tank, Ruston Way, Lincoln, LN6 7FL, United Kingdom.

  Warning:

  This book contains sexually explicit content which is only suitable for mature readers. This story has a heat rating of Total-e-burning and a sexometer of 2.

  This story contains 147 pages, additionally there is also a free excerpt at the end of the book containing 8 pages.

  RUDE AWAKENING

  Natalie Dae and Sam Crescent

  One man, one woman…both having a rude awakening. Will Ruby’s ex-Master succeed in his kidnap plan?

  Harry Knowles has taught subs for years but hasn’t found a subservient woman he’d like to spend the rest of his life with…until the beautiful Ruby comes into his life, stumbling onto his property in the snow and collapsing from exhaustion. He takes her into his home and nurtures her, showing her that the BDSM lifestyle she’d previously been living wasn’t what BDSM is all about.

  Ruby has run from an abusive relationship. Having shared the past few years with a sadistic man, she’s skittish and unsure of herself, but Harry encourages her to blossom. He teaches her not only the true meaning of BDSM but also to love herself—something she’s failed to do in the past.

  Their life has the promise of being idyllic, but her former lover, a man known only as Master, has other ideas on that score…

  Trademarks Acknowledgement

  The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmark mentioned in this work of fiction:

  Twilight: Stephenie Meyer and Summit Entertainment

  Prologue

  Master clenched his teeth, furious at how she’d given him the slip. Margaret Savage—the common bitch he’d taken in, the woman he’d vowed to turn into a submissive lady—had gone out into the snow dressed inappropriately. He shouldn’t be so surprised. Not a smudge of common sense in that head of hers, and why would there be? Why had he thought he could introduce any? She’d been brought up by a single parent on a run-down council housing estate. Hardly the kind of childhood where she’d know what was what. Not like women from his circles, those who were bred to do as they were told and understood how to behave. Still, Margaret was a fun adventure, part of a mission where he’d envisaged himself dragging her from rags to riches—riches she’d have to earn by being a good girl in the bedroom…something, along with learning common sense, she hadn’t quite mastered.

  Oh, he’d known this would be a frustrating task. Trying to change someone, change what was ingrained in them, wasn’t as easy as his close fellow Master friends made it out to be. God, yes…you could teach submission to one who was willing to learn, but some of them happened to think they had a right in all matters, a right to speak up when something wasn’t to their liking. It didn’t help that there were men like Harry Knowles, who bleated about submissives needing to have their own voice—a safety net where they could stop play and basically gain control. What was the point in that? How could you be a Dominant yet allow your submissive to call the shots? It didn’t make sense, went against everything he felt a D/s relationship should be. Submissives with a voice, indeed.

  Uh, no. Not in his world.

  Margaret had proved…stubborn right from the start. He’d chosen her because of her obvious need to be dominated. The way she’d lowered her head when he gave her an order in the library where she worked gave ample indication she longed for a hard Master. But he hadn’t liked the confident air she’d had about her, strutting to the bookshelves to seek out the books he’d requested. That wasn’t how he wanted any submissive of his to present herself. She’d needed a lashing, a good lesson in how to behave when around him. So he’d laid the groundwork, played at being the man of her dreams, and once she’d moved into his home, he’d changed the rules. He’d had to shut up her ever-questioning mouth and take her down a road she hadn’t travelled before, one where punishments sat on every corner and stop lights—for him—didn’t exist. He didn’t stop when she asked him to, when she shouted or screamed out a safe word. No! What right did she have to expect that of him? To expect him to cease whipping just because she’d decided she didn’t wish him to continue? She’d agreed to be his submissive, for goodness sake, and yet, when it came down to it, she quite clearly wanted to back out.

  Silly little bitch.

  After she’d lived with him for some time, he’d managed to make her solely reliant on him, changing her way of thinking a little so that she at least did as he asked, when he asked. She’d barely noticed the way he had done it—slowly, softly—and he’d congratulated himself on a sneaky job well done. But lately things had changed. She’d become strange, hard to read, and that hadn’t sat well with him. Hadn’t sat well at all.

  This evening, as he’d ordered her to strip, she’d stared at him with defiance in her eyes. Oh, yes, she’d masked every other indication of insubordination very well, her body movements as they usually were, her mouth firmly shut against a tirade of questions she would undoubtedly have asked when they’d first got together, but those eyes…

  Yes, they’d quite given her away.

  How she’d escaped was a blur. One moment she’d been there, yielding under his fisted grip in her hair as he’d dragged her across the room towards the bed, and then the next she was gone, whippet-fast, long black hair flying behind her as she yanked open the bedroom door and fled down the stairs. Master had chuckled at that, knowing she would cower in the living room corner or try to squeeze into the kitchen larder in order to hide from him, hide from the beating she knew would follow.

  He’d gone downstairs and searched the house for her, only to find she didn’t occupy her usual spots. Found her winter boots still standing beside the front door as though a phantom wore them. Saw her coat still hanging on the hook beside his, her handbag next to it. The front door was slightly ajar—so slightly, he’d almost missed it but for the chilling breeze that snaked through the gap.

  Hmm… Master had become angry then, striding to the front door and swinging it back, spotting her footprints in the deep snow. He’d told himself she would be back, that the biting cold on her bare feet would send her scurrying home, but after an hour had passed with still no sign of her, him pacing the foyer with a crop in hand ready to swipe it across her face the minute she returned, he realised she had more mettle than he’d given her credit for.

  She would pay for that indiscretion.

  And pay dearly.

  Chapter One

  Harry Knowles stood at the living room window of his large, secluded
house, staring out into the darkness. Bored and feeling the huge need for a decent sub in his life, he gnawed at the inside of his cheek. The BDSM club wasn’t producing the kind of sub he wanted lately—the women all insipid, inspiring nothing but tedium inside him. He wanted—needed—a challenge, a woman who had a unique brand of subservience, who knew how to do as she was told yet didn’t obey without question. Someone who voiced queries, let him know what she wanted. Someone who employed a bit of dominance outside the bedroom—or dungeon—walls.

  He wasn’t holding his breath. After years of searching for the perfect partner, he’d failed to find one who even came close to matching his desires. The future didn’t look very bright, and with a sigh, he resigned himself to a life of bedding women who weren’t quite the ticket.

  Winter had come on with a vengeance. Snow covered the grounds, his vast front lawn a blanket of white spotted with the odd indent from birds searching for worms in the cold, packed earth beneath. His gravelled driveway had been cleared when the first soft coat of snow had fallen in Manchester—his gardener, Len, had attached the snow scoop to the front of the Land Rover and shoved it to the sides. But since this afternoon, the drive had gained another thick layer of white, although two deep gouges marred the once-pristine expanse since Harry had driven over it as he’d arrived home from the office.

  He sighed again, relieved it was Friday, that he wouldn’t have to preside over his employees at his law firm until Monday. Yet the weekend stretched ahead, an interminably droll two days of him rattling around his house with nothing more to do than watch television or read thrillers.

  His brother, David, lived in America close to their parents, so there was no chance of getting together with him and shooting the proverbial shit. Harry didn’t mix business with pleasure, so employees coming over for dinner was out of the question, and the men who frequented the BDSM club… No, he didn’t enjoy their company enough.

  He didn’t enjoy anyone’s company much.

  What the hell have I become? A successful businessman with no one to spend the money on or share my life with. Christ, this wasn’t how I thought my life would be.

  He clamped his lips together, annoyed with himself for walking down the road of self-pity. He had much to be grateful for, he knew that, yet a gaping hole sat in the middle of his life like an elephant in the room, taunting him every chance it got.

  You’re alone, Harry. Thirty-two years old and alone.

  His thoughts turned to what he must appear like to other people. Stiff-backed, somewhat prickly, a man to be respected. A man who didn’t let anyone in. His standards were perhaps a little too high in all areas. Maybe he needed to loosen up a bit, let his guard down a touch in order to get what he wanted. No woman found an uptight man attractive, no matter how appealing the packaging was. Oh, he’d heard whispers at the club from women he passed, who thought he hadn’t heard their lurid remarks about his muscled physique and how they wished he’d whip them into shape. One woman had even gone so far as to mutter that burying her nose in the hair around his cock haunted her dreams.

  Such things disturbed him, made him feel a prize to be won, a trinket dangling from a sub’s arm—someone to be paraded as a good catch, looks, body, money and all. He prided himself on being able to spot a gold-digger a mile off, and perhaps that was his problem. He always suspected that was what they were after, so closed himself off, fucking them only with his cock and not his mind.

  A slew of snow sailed down from above, startling him out of his pity party. He leapt back, feeling stupid, heart thumping at the sudden ferocity with which the snow had fallen. The roof was clearly overburdened. He moved closer to the window, peering out and seeing a stack of snow that almost reached the outside windowsill. If the weather kept up like this, Len would have his work cut out for him come Monday morning.

  Harry turned from the window and stared around his living room, the opulence nothing but just the contents of his home to him. To others it would appear the height of elegance, all dark red walls and rugs, two deep-seated leather sofas in cherry hide, their backs studded with buttons, sitting opposite one another, a highly polished walnut coffee table in between. A real fire crackled in the grate, the fireplace a huge monstrosity he’d had installed with the image in mind of him and that special woman in his life sprawled on the rug in front of it—touching, caressing, exploring.

  How was it he’d attained every other dream except that one? Was he being greedy in wanting the icing on the cake—a woman to love and adore, to share his wealth and life with?

  It seemed he was.

  He huffed out another sigh and turned his back on the room, returning to the window. Trees as tall as ten men bordered the edge of his property, so far in the distance they appeared merely bushes. The clouds, heavily pregnant with snow, made the sky appear a mid-grey instead of the true night-time blackness they shrouded. Moonlight somehow filtered through them, though, touching the grounds with fingers of silver, bouncing off the whiteness covering it. A few specks of snow danced, as though afterthoughts to the deluge that had teemed down not an hour since, and he prayed no more would fall tonight.

  Something white ghosted out of the trees, a wisp of movement that darted for a moment then disappeared. Another chunk of snow falling from the branches, perhaps, or a figment of Harry’s imagination. A chill sped up his spine and he shivered, wondering why he felt so cold when the fire blazed. Staring at snow would do that. Despite being enveloped in warmth, when looking out at the scene before him, he knew full well how to imagine being frozen out there. The chill dispersed, and he shrugged, spinning on one heel in search of where he’d placed his brandy earlier. He spied the cut-crystal glass on the walnut sideboard beside the door, a few mouthfuls of liquid still inside—liquid that would ensure the chill was kept at bay.

  He strode over and picked up the glass, downing the brandy in one gulp, pleased at the fiery burn that spread through him. He poured another and took it to the window, cursing himself for the torture he was inflicting by idling away his evening like this. Boredom—it filled every fibre of him, taking a firm grip and not letting go.

  Mind over matter. He knew all about that and pushed himself to think of something interesting to waste away the time. He could go out to the club, select a woman and book a dungeon for a few hours, losing himself in sex and control.

  But it doesn’t work out like that, does it? I want more. Something… Christ, just something more.

  He stared at the tree line, and damn, there it was again, that flick of white. Were there red squirrels in the treetops, scurrying across the branches, dislodging snow? Instead of disappearing, the smudge of movement increased, darting left to right, growing arms that spread out to the sides.

  Was that a damn person out there?

  Harry pressed his nose to the glass, annoyed when his heated breath misted the pane and obscured his view. He stepped to the side and looked out again. Yes, someone was out there, he was sure of it. Stomach knotting, the chill returning, he tossed the brandy down his throat then glanced at the trees again. The shape was still there, larger now, as if whoever was out in such foul weather was making for his house. He left the window and placed a guard in front of the fire, then picked up his mobile and slipped it into his trouser pocket.

  Out in his large foyer, he opened the built-in coat cupboard and took a sturdy pair of boots from the shelf, pulling them on and tucking his trouser hems inside. He selected a heavy black coat—fine wool that kept out the cold when he turned up the collar—then wound a grey scarf about his neck. He slipped his hands into black leather gloves and, on instinct, grabbed another of his coats from a hanger and draped it over his arm.

  He closed the cupboard door and took his keys from a hook beside it, putting them in his coat pocket. He went back into the living room to look out of the window, and although the shape had gone, he decided to go outside and check anyway. That smudge had grown arms, he was sure of it, and even if it turned out to be his imagination, he
couldn’t live with himself if…

  He left his house, a blustery, spiteful wind shunting him back a step, as though trying to prevent him investigating. The strength of the cold was an utter shock to his system, and he shoved his hands into his coat pockets and took a lung-freezing breath to steady the tingle of nerves swirling in his belly.

  Harry trudged through the snow towards where he’d last seen the shape. It was a way ahead—damn him for having such a big front lawn!—and he kept his gaze on the spot, snow gripping his boots in what he felt was an attempt to stop him walking.

  What were those fanciful thoughts all about? Wind and snow didn’t have minds of their own, and he’d be damned if he was going to allow his idle brain to conjure scenarios that couldn’t possibly exist. He pushed on, determined to reach his destination, his stubbornness lending him the strength his legs needed to wade through the snow.

  He was almost there so took his hands from his pockets and shook out the spare coat, dashing away the stray flecks that had attached to the material. He peered ahead at a large indent, the inside walls of it about forty centimetres high. Beyond it was a channel gouged into the snow, a wavy line where someone had struggled to walk from the tree line. His heart stuttered, banged against his ribs so hard the bones felt tender, and he released a ragged breath that puffed out as a white cloud.

  As he neared the edge of the indent, he stared down to see a woman lying on her side, her hands closest to him, arms stretched above her as if she’d reached out to the house. Her long, black hair fanned out in snow-clumped hanks, and he’d swear the ends were frozen. All that covered her was a denim mini-skirt and a red V-neck sweater. A collar surrounded her neck, cheap black leather, and it appeared to be too tight, the skin around it chafed. Legs, bent at the knees, were red raw, the woman having possibly crawled a short way, or even all the way from the trees. And no shoes on her dainty feet either. Shock and surprise rendered him unmoveable for a moment, even though his mind screamed that he reach for his phone and call for help.