CONTENTS
About This Story
Title Page
Copyright
Praise for Blasphemy Series
Hot Contemporary Romance by Laura Kaye
Dedication
Mastering Her Senses
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
BONUS CONTENT
Eyes on You
Acknowledgements
Bound to Submit
Ride Hard
More Hot Contemporary Romance
About Laura Kaye
Mastering Her Senses
He wants to dominate her senses—and her heart…
Quinton Ross has always been a thrill-seeker—so it’s no surprise that he’s drawn to extremes in the bedroom and at his BDSM club, Blasphemy, where he creates sense-depriving scenarios that blow submissives’ minds. Now if he could just find one who needs the rush as much as him…
When an accident leaves Cassia Locke with a paralyzing fear of the dark, she’ll try anything to get help. Ready to fight, she knows just who to ask for help—the hard-bodied, funny-as-hell Dom she’d always crushed on—and once stood up.
Quinton is shocked and a little leery to see Cassia, but he can’t pass up the chance to dominate the alluring little sub this time. Introducing her to sensory deprivation becomes his new favorite obsession, and watching her fight fear is its own thrill. But when doubt threatens to send her running again, Quinton must find a way to master her senses—and her heart.
New York Times Bestselling Author
Laura Kaye
Mastering Her Senses
FIRST EDITION February 2017
MASTERING HER SENSES © Laura Kaye.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
No part or whole of this book may be used, reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work via electronic or mechanical means is a violation of international copyright law and subjects the violator to severe fines and/or imprisonment. If you are reading the ebook, it is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. The ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share the ebook, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. Please do not participate in piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional and/or are used fictitiously and are solely the product of the author’s imagination. Any similarity to persons living or dead, places, businesses, events, or locales is purely coincidental.
Cover Art by The Killion Group
PRAISE FOR THE BLASPHEMY SERIES
"Laura Kaye shows her mastery of the BDSM world. I'm eagerly anticipating more in this bold new series!" ~ Cherise Sinclair, NYT Bestselling Author of the Masters of the Shadowlands Series
"Smoldering and sexy, Laura Kaye's Blasphemy series is everything I look for in a romance. Haunted heroes and strong heroines populate this one of a kind club and I can't wait to see the big bad Doms fall one by one." ~ Lexi Blake, NYT Bestselling Author of the Masters and Mercenaries Series
HOT CONTEMPORARY ROMANCE
BY LAURA KAYE
Blasphemy Series
HARD TO SERVE
BOUND TO SUBMIT
MASTERING HER SENSES
EYES ON YOU
Raven Riders Series
HARD AS STEEL
RIDE HARD
RIDE ROUGH
RIDE WILD
Hard Ink Series
HARD AS IT GETS
HARD AS YOU CAN
HARD TO HOLD ON TO
HARD TO COME BY
HARD TO BE GOOD
HARD TO LET GO
HARD AS STEEL
HARD EVER AFTER
HARD TO SERVE
Hearts in Darkness Duet
HEARTS IN DARKNESS
LOVE IN THE LIGHT
Heroes Series
HER FORBIDDEN HERO
ONE NIGHT WITH A HERO
Stand Alone Titles
DARE TO RESIST
JUST GOTTA SAY
Dedication
To all those searching for their light in the dark…
Mastering Her Senses
Chapter One
Quinton Ross was in his happy place.
Standing behind the bar at Blasphemy, the club he co-owned with eleven of the coolest assholes he’d ever known, he surveyed the roomful of wonderfully kinky people wearing a whole lotta nothing. Totally his jam.
And the fact that he’d get to play with one of them later? Seriously, a man’s life didn’t get any better.
Well, having a submissive of his own…that could be better. Theoretically.
Except he’d never found someone with whom he felt like he fired on all cylinders. Someone who was into the same kinky play he was, but wasn’t looking for a twenty-four/seven arrangement, because that wasn’t his style either. Someone who loved the outdoors the way he did, and for whom a fun weekend consisted of camping and hiking and maybe even an afternoon of skydiving. Someone who didn’t mind stepping outside their comfort zone, whether that was in the bedroom or traveling to a new place where maybe you didn’t even know the language.
Syncing that way with someone was harder than it seemed.
But, whatever. He had a great life as it was. He never lacked for company or partners around the club, and no submissive ever left him anything but fully satisfied. He made damn sure of it.
“Hi, Master Quinton,” came a feminine voice from further down the counter.
He turned to find a blond-haired woman with a sleek, silver prosthetic arm leaning against the marble of the ornate bar. Kenna Sloane. And right behind her stood her big mountain of a Dom and one of Quinton’s best friends, Griffin Hudson. “Aren’t you looking lovely tonight, Kenna,” Quinton said with a smile as he made his way to where Griffin was sliding into a seat and pulling Kenna’s slim hips between his legs. “And am I wrong or is this some snazzy new hardware?” He nodded at her arm. She’d lost everything below her right elbow while serving with the Marines in Afghanistan. If she and Griffin hadn’t been fuckin’ fated, Kenna might’ve been Quinton’s kind of woman.
Adventurous. Brave. Willing to push life to the extremes.
But they were fated, something the diamond on her finger and the platinum collar with its unique interwoven knot sitting at the hollow of her throat both indicated. Loud and clear.
Kenna smiled, so much more comfortable here at the club—and seemingly in her own skin—than she’d been when she and Griffin had first reconnected a few months back. “I have a couple different sockets. And a girl has to coordinate,” she said, holding it up to the almost sheer sparkling silver halter top she wore.
Chuckling, Quinton nodded and clasped hands with Kenna’s Dom. “Master Griffin, how the hell are ya?” Their wrists bore matching leather cuffs with embroidered Gothic M’s. Every Blasphemy Master—the experienced Dominants who owned the club and took turns running and monitoring it—wore one.
“Never better, my friend. Never better.” The skin crinkled around Griffin’s dark eyes as he spoke, his smile coming a million times easier than
it ever had before. Quinton guessed that was what happened when you were not only able to correct one of the biggest mistakes of your life, but find a submissive who was also your soul mate in the process.
Lucky fucker.
“I know that’s true,” Quinton said, winking at Kenna. She ducked her chin but was smiling bright enough to light up the whole room. And that was saying something, given the size of Blasphemy. Located in the renovated remains of an old church, the massive rectangular nave formed the central part of the club. Filled with lots of seating and play areas, it had a soaring ceiling, massive stained-glass windows all around, and a performance and demonstration stage where the altar had once been. Themed rooms and other private spaces stretched off from the main floor. In addition to the very private and exclusive Blasphemy, the public front of their business—Club Diablo, a three-story dance club in a renovated warehouse—stood across a courtyard.
And Quinton provided hands-on management over it all.
He’d been with the clubs from the beginning, and had used his savings and the money he’d made selling a small but successful bar of his own to purchase his ownership stake in Blasphemy. The deal got even sweeter when his partners had offered him the job of managing the bars and all the food service at both clubs. Food, drink, and sex all tantalized the senses and therefore were equally high up on the list of things he loved, and always had been. Given his prior experience, he pretty much had full control of the operation. Just like he liked.
Griffin placed an order for him and Kenna, then asked, “You have a scene set up tonight?”
Quinton got busy making their drinks and shook his head. “No,” he said with a grin. “But I’m looking forward to the thrill of the hunt.”
Griffin chuckled. “Good luck with that.”
The quip on Quinton’s tongue died when a flashing red light under the bar’s edge caught his eye. An emergency in one of the rooms. He glanced at the tag over the light to determine which one, then slammed the drinks down in front of his friends harder than he’d intended. “Shit, G, sorry. Emergency in the dark room. Get someone to cover?” he said, moving without waiting for an answer. He knew Griffin would have his back.
Quinton moved as fast as he could without calling undue attention. Their members knew that the Masters and a team of other Doms who worked as monitors responded to all sorts of problems around the club. Some were as mundane as an equipment malfunction and others more delicate situations involving disputes between players in a scene. Hell, a few months ago, Quinton had responded when Kenna broke down during a bondage scene, and Griffin had called for help extricating her from his intricate ropework. Sex at the extremes was bound to run into a few issues, which was why consent and safety were hallmarks of BDSM and Blasphemy itself. But none of them wished to distract players from their pleasures with worry or curiosity, either.
Off the main floor, Quinton picked up his pace as he moved down the long hallway off of which most of the themed play rooms were located. The dark room was at the far end. Master Wolf came up beside him. “Hey, man,” he said.
Quinton gave him a nod. “Didn’t know you were on tonight, Wolf. Good to see you.”
A little taller than Quinton, the guy had dark blond hair, the brightest green eyes you’d ever seen, and a chiseled Scandinavian face that turned heads all over the club. “Running the security control room. Relieving Isaac because the baby’s sick,” he said, referring to Isaac Marten, their head of security operations, who had a two-month-old son.
“Damn. Sorry to hear that,” Quinton said as they closed in on their destination. The dark room was actually a series of three interconnected rooms. In the center was a pitch-black bedroom, accessed only through two changing/waiting rooms on either side of it—one of which let out into this hallway, and the other which let out into a different hallway so that the players couldn’t run into each other before or after the anonymous scene. The dark room was very popular, and given Quinton’s interest in sensory deprivation, it was one he’d used many times.
He heard someone in distress before they even got inside.
Quinton and Wolf burst through the door to find one of the monitors trying to calm a woman curled on the floor, gasping like she couldn’t breathe. She wore a slinky bronze dress that bared most of her legs.
“What happened?” Quinton asked, grabbing a blanket from a shelf and going to his knees beside her. He tucked the soft fleece around her.
“I don’t know,” the monitor said. “I sounded the alarm but she told me not to call an ambulance.”
“She just freaked out. I swear. Hard anything happened between us,” a shirtless man said from the doorway to the dark bedroom.
Quinton hadn’t even noticed him there, but Wolf was already questioning him. He nodded to the monitor, a Dom in his forties, and then peered up at Master Wolf. “You all clear out. Debrief him and get his information.”
“You got it, Q,” Wolf said, motioning the other men out into the hall. “Call if you need help.”
As they left, Quinton brushed the woman’s shoulder-length brown hair back off her splotchy face. “We need to get your breathing under control or I have to call an ambulance.”
“No…no…I…it’s…” Clenching her eyes, she shook her head and growled as if in frustration.
Damnit, he needed to do something for her. The part of him that needed to care and soothe decided. He scooped her off the floor and carried her to the couch. Everywhere they touched, her pulse hammered against her skin. If this was a panic attack, it was one of the worst he’d ever seen.
He sat with her in his lap, the blanket still wrapped around her, and cradled her so that they were facing each other. “Breathe with me, little one. Do you hear me? Look at me and breathe with me.” Striking hazel eyes with flecks of gold cut to his. Almost familiar…
Focusing, he exaggerated one breath, than another, and another, until she struggled to match her rhythm to his.
Satisfaction rolled through him as the woman’s body calmed. Her breathing evened out. Her pulse slowed. Her muscles lost their tension.
“That’s it. That’s good. Just watch me and breathe with me. Don’t stop. We’ll kick this thing, don’t you worry.” He stroked his hand over her hair, wanting to soothe her. The color was so rich it almost matched the bronze of her dress. Her hair was beautiful and soft. As was the rest of her, all golden skin and pretty curves. Her weight felt good in his arms. She turned her face into his hand, just the littlest bit, and he stroked her hair again. A jagged scar ran along her forehead and into her hairline over one eye.
The scar triggered the oddest thought: That wasn’t there before.
His gaze cut back to those eyes. Hazel with the gold. And he suddenly knew he’d seen them before. Years ago. Right here at Blasphemy. A name clicked into place.
“Cassia?” he asked. Cassia. As in Cassia Locke, a submissive he’d flirted with quite a few times and was once supposed to play with…but she’d stood him up the night of their scene.
“Y-yes, Sir,” she whispered. “H-hi, Mas-ter Qu-quinton.”
So she recognized him, too. Did she remember that night? He shook off the thought. Their history wasn’t something to deal with just then.
“Hi yourself, kid.” He gently scratched his fingertips against her scalp and concentrated on taking slow, deep breaths that she mimicked. Studying her, Quinton noticed another scar on her right shoulder. Her hair was much longer than the almost boyish style she used to wear. Finally, Cassia went limp in his lap, and her ease unleashed a satisfaction in his blood. “Feeling better?”
She gave a long sigh, the sound exhausted and defeated. “As better as I can feel after utterly humiliating myself. Sir.”
He shook his head. “No such thing happened. Not as far as I’m concerned.”
Her gaze skittered away.
“Did I tell you to stop looking at me?”
Cassia’s eyes snapped back to meet his. “No, Sir.”
Her obedience unle
ashed even more of that satisfaction. The attraction of BDSM, to him, was as much about the psychology of it as the physicality of the acts. Her reaction—that obedience—represented an ingrained instinct, a need to serve, a desire to surrender. And that fucking heated his blood.
He arched a brow and nodded. “Good girl.”
She shifted in his lap, but kept her eyes on his. The movement reminded his body that he’d been planning to find a partner for later, but he locked that shit down tight. First, because she’d been through something tonight he didn’t entirely understand. And second, because given that she’d stood him up and never bothered to follow up to explain, he wasn’t sure what to make of her anyway. Which meant he needed to know.
“Now, tell me what happened,” he said, nailing her with a stare. “And tell me the truth.”
Chapter Two
Could this night suck bigger donkey balls?
That was the tenor of the thoughts running through Cassia Locke’s head as she stared at the man who’d just willed her out of one of the worst panic attacks she’d had in a long time. A Dom who was also the sexiest man she’d possibly ever known in her entire life. And that was saying something given the guys her biker brother, Jagger, hung out with….
“Cassia?” Master Quinton arched a brow over light brown eyes that could sometimes appear almost hazel, and other times, darker. It took everything she had not to squirm under that stern Dom look, especially since it hadn’t been that long since she’d returned to the BDSM club scene after everything that’d happened. She’d nearly forgotten how powerful a look like that could be. And it didn’t help her that Cassia was kind of a big Chris Pratt fan, especially after that whole riding-a-motorcycle-with-dinosaurs thing in his last movie, and Master Quinton could’ve played the actor’s seriously hotter stunt double.