Suncoast Society
Liability
Kim has a trunkful of emotional baggage, but when she discovers BDSM, it’s like everything suddenly seems clear. She feels blessed that her long-time boyfriend, Cole, is willing to walk that path with her and let her explore what she needs.
Cole is definitely no sadist, yet his love for and trust in Kim means he has no problem turning her over to the handsome Dom, Mason. Besides, Mason’s a nice guy, and he’s gay…isn’t he? Doesn’t matter, because Cole enjoys watching Mason play with Kim. Doesn’t hurt that Cole has sexy fantasies of his own about Mason.
Mason recently moved back to Florida and didn’t expect to meet the newbie couple, much less get involved with them. Now he realizes this isn’t just for play, it’s for keeps. Unfortunately, when Mason’s jealous, overzealous ex decides if he can’t have Mason no one can, it means Kim and Cole still might lose the man they’ve both come to love.
Genre: BDSM, Contemporary
Length: 84,848 words
LIABILITY
Suncoast Society
Tymber Dalton
SIREN SENSATIONS
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
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IMPRINT: Siren Sensations
LIABILITY
Copyright © 2016 by Tymber Dalton
E-book ISBN: 978-1-68295-070-8
First E-book Publication: February 2016
Cover design by Harris Channing
All art and logo copyright © 2016 by Siren Publishing, Inc.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED: This literary work may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, including electronic or photographic reproduction, in whole or in part, without express written permission.
All characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.
PUBLISHER
Siren Publishing, Inc.
www.SirenPublishing.com
Letter to Readers
Dear Readers,
If you have purchased this copy of Liability by Tymber Dalton from BookStrand.com or its official distributors, thank you. Also, thank you for not sharing your copy of this book.
Regarding E-book Piracy
This book is copyrighted intellectual property. No other individual or group has resale rights, auction rights, membership rights, sharing rights, or any kind of rights to sell or to give away a copy of this book.
The author and the publisher work very hard to bring our paying readers high-quality reading entertainment.
This is Tymber Dalton’s livelihood. It’s fair and simple. Please respect Tymber Dalton’s right to earn a living from her work.
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DEDICATION
To Hubby and Mr. B.
AUTHOR'S NOTE
While the books in the Suncoast Society series are standalone works which may be read independently of each other, the recommended reading order to avoid spoilers and to not miss any backstory information is as follows:
1. Safe Harbor
2. Cardinal’s Rule
3. Domme by Default
4. The Reluctant Dom
5. The Denim Dom
6. Pinch Me
7. Broken Toy
8. A Clean Sweep
9. A Roll of the Dice
10. His Canvas
11. A Lovely Shade of Ouch
12. Crafty Bastards
13. A Merry Little Kinkmas
14. Sapiosexual
15. A Very Kinky Valentine’s Day
16. Things Made Right
17. Click
18. Spank or Treat
19. A Turn of the Screwed
20. Chains
21. Kinko de Mayo
22. Broken Arrow
23. Out of the Spotlight
24. Friends Like These
25. Vicious Carousel
26. Hot Sauce
27. Open Doors
28. One Ring
29. Vulnerable
30. The Strength of the Pack
31. Initiative
32. Impact
33. Liability
Some of the characters in this book appear in previous books in the Suncoast Society series. Kim and her boss, Emery, both first appeared in Accidentally on Porpoise (Placida Pod 1). All titles available from Siren-BookStrand.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Author's Note
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
About the Author
LIABILITY
Suncoast Society
TYMBER DALTON
Copyright © 2016
Chapter One
“There are only three ‘secret rules’ you need to worry about in BDSM.” Tony Daniels held up his hand and ticked off each point with a finger as he listed them. “Everyone must be a human, consenting adult. You’d think that’d be a given, but no, sometimes there are idiots who need all three points specifically clarified.”
The class of twenty-two people, and a few scattered others who’d joined them that Saturday night, chuckled in amusement.
Tony continued. “Secondly, everyone must either be having fun or getting what they need from the dynamic or play. And third, no one can be harmed by the play or dynamic.” Tony arched an eyebrow at them. “As opposed to ‘hurt,’ because some people will get a mite pissed off if you don’t hurt them during your play.”
More la
ughter, louder this time and sounding a bit more comfortable.
“So why do we do it? Well, there are as many reasons as there are people in the lifestyle. There is no easy answer to that question, because everyone’s different, and everyone has their own reasons. We are swimming upstream, here. We aren’t choosing to do this because it’s ‘easy.’ It’s not easy. It’s the difficult path. It probably took most of you a lot of deliberation and thinking to make the choice to come out here tonight. Walking along the straight and narrow path is the easy way, the ‘normal’ way. The socially acceptable way. That’s a no-brainer.
“But we’re not doing that. We could be at the movies or at a sushi bar or at putt-putt golf right now. We’re not. We’re here. Why? Because something inside us needs this, for whatever reason. Some of you might have always felt like this and thought there weren’t others out there like you. Or maybe your life circumstances were such that you couldn’t explore it until now. Or you stumbled across something—a book or movie, whatever—and something so deeply resonated within you that you realized it was something you’d never even known you were missing before. And once you were aware of it, you couldn’t ignore it.”
Mason Lange listened from the back of the social area side of the dungeon. He was seated at a table, next to Tony’s wife and slave, Shayla. He leaned in. Keeping his voice low, he whispered, “Kaden lives on.”
Shayla smiled. “I almost feel like I know him,” she softly replied. “I never met him. I wish I had. I didn’t move down here and meet Tony until a couple of years after Kaden passed.”
“That was Kaden’s newbie talk. Practically verbatim.”
“Marcia and Loren give the same variation of the talk when they teach it.”
“Kaden loved to talk to newbies. He enjoyed sharing this with people who were interested in it.”
Sitting in Venture tonight, it was hard for Mason to believe how far the BDSM club had come in the ten-plus-years since it first opened. He’d been there the night it had started as nothing more than an idea on Kaden and Leah’s pool lanai. He remembered the first night it’d opened, and now to see it expanded, double its original size and thriving, was fantastic.
A living legacy.
Mason had been one of the original Suncoast Society munch group members, around for the club’s opening and a regular attendee until a new job took him out of state. To Nebraska, of all places.
No, wasn’t much of a kink scene there. Not one that he’d found, anyway. Well, not much of a kink scene that had a lot of eligible gay males to whom he was attracted. What he found, however, was a pretty good paying job in IT for the past almost eight years.
The job and benefits, for him, were the only reasons he’d found worth living in Nebraska. He was sure it was a wonderful place, great people, all of that, but not exactly on his bucket list of places to retire to. At the time, he’d wanted the money and the benefits.
That didn’t mean he hadn’t kept a few headhunters in mind over the years. He’d looked for an opportunity to eventually work his way back to Florida. The native Floridian had despised the cold winters with a passion. He’d nearly wrecked the first time he had to drive in snow.
Mason moving back to Florida had kind of torqued Freddie a little bit, but it wasn’t like they’d been married. Hell, they’d only been dating for six months. Mason wasn’t even in love with the guy, much less wanted to live with him. Mason had told Freddie he wouldn’t object to Freddie moving to Florida, but Freddie would have to find his own place to live and a job so he could support himself. It wouldn’t be any charity, and Freddie definitely would not be staying or living with Mason.
Those conditions had sort of pissed Freddie off, which only sealed the deal for Mason. Not that Freddie had come right out and said he was pissed off. No, he’d acted all passive-aggressive and whiny, cycling back and forth between the two, trying to slowly chip away at Mason.
Okay, fine. Hell, Mason could count on both hands with fingers to spare the number of times he’d let Freddie spend the whole night with him, and the guy was going to take ’tude with him?
Nope.
Now that Mason had been back in Florida for two months, Freddie was suddenly hot to trot to find a job there and move. No coincidence that it was supposed to be another wickedly cold winter in Nebraska. He’d done more than hint around a few times already that he’d like to come visit Mason. Mason had quickly shut him down every time.
Mason knew what would happen. Freddie would come to “visit” and never leave.
No. Fucking. Way.
Freddie had never lived anywhere else other than Nebraska. Mason felt sure that the chance to get out of Nebraska was also playing a part in Freddie’s thought processes.
Not that he could blame the guy. Freddie’s family was a bunch of assholes.
And not because they were from Nebraska. They were originally from New York City, even more surprising. Surprising that they would turn out to be homophobic assholes, that was.
From outside, Mason heard the faint sound of a motorcycle pulling into the parking lot and shutting off. Within seconds, Leah burst through the door from the office lobby, spotted Mason, and let out an ecstatic squee that made everyone laugh as she rushed across the space and practically threw herself into Mason’s arms for a hug.
“Well, hello to you, too, sweetie,” he said.
Tony playfully cleared his throat. “Can I keep going, Leah?”
Leah’s face turned an adorable shade of pink. “Sorry.” She settled into a chair at the table on Mason’s left side, hooking an arm through his and laying her head on his shoulder.
On Mason’s right side, Shayla leaned around him. “Hey, what am I? Chopped liver?” Her smile and tone belied her words.
Leah’s face deepened in color. “Ohmigosh, sorry!” She draped herself over Mason to hug Shayla.
Mindful of not wanting to interrupt Tony further, Mason whispered, “Where’s Seth?”
“He’s—” The lobby door opened and Seth poked his head in, glancing around and homing in on his wayward wife and slave.
Question answered.
Mason lifted an arm in greeting and Seth walked in. He carried two motorcycle helmets and had a small bag slung over one shoulder. Quietly he joined them at the table, leaning in to hug Mason and Shayla before sitting on Leah’s other side.
This was the first night Mason had had a chance to get out and meet up with his friends. Between the move, the new job, and settling in, the past eight weeks had passed in a blur. He’d wanted to try to eat dinner with everyone at Sigalo’s earlier that evening, but he’d overslept from a well-needed nap.
Tomorrow night was the monthly Suncoast Society munch. He definitely planned to be there for it, to finally get a chance to reconnect in person with many of his old friends. Some of whom he hadn’t seen in years.
Since Kaden’s funeral.
Mason knew Leah far better than he knew Seth. He’d known Leah and Kaden through the Suncoast Society. He’d met Seth a few times at Leah and Kaden’s for vanilla dinners and gatherings before Seth knew about the other side of his friends’ relationship.
Mason felt shitty that he hadn’t been around for the three of them when Kaden was sick, due to his job and living out of state. But Mason was happy that Kaden had paired his wife and best friend together. A truly perfect match, one Mason wouldn’t deny was also bittersweet.
Mason knew Kaden had talked to Tony about all of this, because Kaden had talked to him as well. Unfortunately, living out of state meant he couldn’t make his friend any promises, although he would have done his damnedest to help out had he lived locally.
Tony’s BDSM101 class took an hour. Normally, it was a class Marcia or Loren taught, but they and their other halves were both taking a well-deserved night off from teaching at the club. They’d be at the munch tomorrow evening, as would a bunch of Mason’s old friends who’d agreed to attend to welcome him home.
When Tony finished answering questions, he ended th
e class, turned down the house lights, and turned up the music. Club members who’d shown up during the tail end of his class gathered their gear to start playing while Tony joined them at the table.
Mason stood to give the man a long hug.
“God, it’s good to finally have you back,” Tony said after they parted and he took the chair on Shayla’s other side. “What the hell possessed you to move out there in the first place?”
This had been a frequent subject of teasing on the other man’s part for the past eight years. “Well, you know. Temporary insanity, good benefits, excellent pay. Stuff like that.”
Tony grinned. “You could have kept working for me.”
“I know. Part of me wishes I had, too.” Mason shrugged. “Hindsight’s twenty-twenty, and all that bullshit. It’s all good. I’m finally home, where I belong, and I’m not leaving again.”
Mason had worked at Asher Insurance for several years before the itch to try to find a higher-paying job hit him. He’d left to work for a local financial company, which went out of business less than a year later.
Unfortunately, Asher couldn’t hire him back at the time because they had no openings in Tony’s department. Leading Mason to search elsewhere.
Now Mason was running a division of the IT department at the newly expanded headquarters of an online DIY travel arrangement company based out of Sarasota. They’d been in business for over seven years, with a lot of solid growth under their belt, including recently buying up two competitors and folding those operations into theirs. Not much chance of them suddenly shutting down the way his last Florida job had ended.
“So are you settled in?” Tony asked. “At the condo, I mean?”