The word 'disappointed' pounded into Kurt's brain. It was delivered in such a dry, Blaine-unlike voice that it caused the Sub to shiver out of guilt. The younger man's shoulders dropped. He would have stopped walking and crumble into himself if Blaine wasn't half-dragging him toward the car.
What now? Kurt thought. Maybe if he tried to talk to his Dom, to salvage the situation somehow... but he was scared that Blaine's reserved voice would be matched by his face, so he averted his eyes and allowed himself to be urged into the vehicle. The Dom joined him from the other side and the impact of the closing door made Kurt flinch.
And I did all of this for what? For seeing stupid Karofsky? It's great to see how fucked up my priorities are… the Sub berated himself.
"Kurt... look at me." Blaine spoke and Kurt felt a painful sting in his eyes – he would so much more prefer to hear one of the stupid nicknames he had been given by Blaine instead of his name.
"Kurt, look at me right now!" The Dom was getting impatient.
The Sub turned his head at the stern command. A single tear rolled down his cheek.
Blaine sighed. "You are making it very difficult for me to be angry at you." He reached Kurt's face and gently wiped out the tear. "But you understand we can't just leave it at that, don't you?"
The Sub nodded reluctantly. He was silent as he was afraid he would start crying the moment he would try to say anything. The last thing he wanted was start weeping.
"Tell me, what did you do wrong?" Blaine asked suddenly and Kurt's eyes widened, confused.
"Oh, I know, but I want to be sure you know too," the Dom explained.
"I deliberately spilled coffee on you," the Sub whispered. Having to say it out loud made him squirm from humiliation, but he knew he deserved that.
Blaine waved his hand. "Yeah, that wasn't exactly a pleasant event, but that's not the important part. What did you do after that?"
"I left," Kurt continued in a shaky voice. "Even though I promised to stay by your side."
The Dom nodded, confirming. "You made me really worried, especially after I managed to get April to tell me where you had gone." The Dom moved as if to reach for Kurt's shoulders, but after a moment of hesitation he rested his hands on the wheel instead. "And to see Karofsky of all people. The guy, who-"
"Bullied me?" Kurt cut in. "It's not like he could do that to me now, not without his high school popularity supporting him."
"He is also a guy who forcefully kissed you," Blaine argued.
Kurt raised his eyebrow. "So that's what this is about? I wouldn't let him do anything to me. And I'm sure he wouldn't..."
"Really? And how can you be so sure?" Blaine sceptically narrowed his eyes. "How can I not be worried about you wandering off when you have a tendency to drive gay Doms around you crazy?"
"So it's my fault I encounter possessed gay Doms all the time? And that includes you!" Kurt spat in a badly timed defence. He immediately realized that what he had just said wasn't fair.
"I… I didn't mean it like that," Kurt amended quickly. "I don't think you are even remotely like them…"
Blaine didn't look at him, but he slowly nodded. His shoulders stayed tense, though, as the Dom tried his best to hide how these words had hurt him.
"I know. I also don't think you are to blame for any screwed up Dom you encountered. It doesn't change the fact that I worry about you while you went away despite your promise."
Blaine turned forward to start the engine. "We better get home," he said emotionlessly.
The car left the parking space and smoothly drove back to Hummel-Hudson house. Blaine clutched the wheel tightly while Kurt was ostentatiously looking outside the window. Sometimes, one of them would glance at the other, but their eyes never met.
Of course Burt noticed straight away that there was something wrong. Surprisingly, he actually could also tell that it was Kurt's fault this time.
He watched, only mildly shocked, as his son disappeared without any greeting behind the door leading to his old room in the basement. "Ooookay... That hasn't happened since high school. Will you handle it? Is this still about that Dr Jordan, because it's not your fault. I can always throw Finn in there, so Kurt could rightly use that idiot as a scratching post. "
Blaine sighed. "It's not that... although the whole situation shook Kurt deeply, so I wouldn't discount the connection."
Burt waved his hand. "Kurt can be a drama queen, but whatever happened he probably feels worse about it than you. Don't let him bolt on you until you have a proper talk. And… don't be too harsh," the older Dom added with a softer voice.
Blaine felt weird as the older Dom's wariness of him took a step back as they both connected over their shared worry of Kurt.
"I could never be." Blaine was glad that Burt didn't ask what exactly had happened between them – he didn't want to remind the older Dom about Kurt's former bully.
Blaine quietly opened the door to the basement – fortunately his Sub didn't bolt it from the inside – and descended the wooden stairs. Kurt was lying on his stomach on the bed, his face hidden between his arms. Even if he had heard the Dom's steps he ignored them completely. Blaine recalled Burt's warning about his son possibly choosing to run away from this conversation. Well, that was not going to happen if Blaine had any say on the matter…
"I know you're not sleeping," the Dom said, looming over his Sub. "How can we fix what happened earlier when you don't want to talk?"
Kurt's shoulders jerked slightly, but he didn't answer.
"Ignoring me won't make the problem go away, Kurt." Blaine's voice sounded more distant now and Kurt figured out that the Dom walked further away from him. The sudden rummaging sound peaked the Sub's interest – he held his breath trying to recognize any sound – but he didn't lift his head from the pillow.
The quiet padding on the carpet betrayed that Blaine moved back towards Kurt. The Dom touched his Sub's hands that were clutching onto the pillow. "Are you just going to mope or are we going to talk?" His fingers circled Kurt's wrists and massaged it gently. "Kurt?"
The Sub mumbled something in response, but the pillow muffled his voice.
"Kurt... I need to see your face." Blaine pushed away a stray lock from Kurt's forehead and that was when the Sub realized something was definitely off, because he could still feel his Dom's both hands on his wrists. He quickly lifted his head and blinked rapidly seeing that Blaine's hands were nowhere near his. Kurt's wrists were encircled by soft but sturdy leather bracelets connected with each other with an additional leather strap and... chained to the bed post just above his head.
"What. The. Hell?!" Kurt glared furiously at Blaine, tugging on the restraints.
Blaine raised his eyebrows. "Prevention," he simply said.
"And now what?" Kurt inhaled sharply, steeling himself like for a battle. "You've got me imprisoned like a criminal. Should I expect whipping to happen soon?"
The Dom crossed his arms over his chest and watched his Sub as if considering. Kurt looked at him angrily, but his eyes were shiny and on the verge of crying. It was obvious that despite his desperate attempts to hide it the Sub was extremely upset about their argument. He still needed to understand the importance and purpose of listening to his Dom, though.
Blaine sat on the bed, next to Kurt's waist, and put his hand on the brunet's lower back. Despite the warm temperature in the room Kurt shivered.
"What are you doing?" He asked, panicked, bending his neck in attempt to see what Blaine was up to.
"Teaching you a lesson, Kurt," the Dom answered calmly. His hand slid lower, nudging at the belt of Kurt's pants. "First, I think that we need to get rid of these."
"No, we don't!" Kurt said quickly and jerked his arms to stop Blaine, but the chained bracelets painfully stopped him. "Fuck... Why did you even pack these?"
"I remembered how well you responded to a little restraint a while ago and I thought you might like these... but it doesn't matter now." Blaine's voice was tinged with a soft sadness. "You know… It would be perfectly appropriate for you to use a safeword now."
Kurt stilled. That did sound tempting.
As tempting as losing the rest of my pride, he immediately thought. Hundreds of Subs gets punished for less. Forget about being a Dom… resisting would make me too weak to even be a Sub.
Blaine sighed at Kurt's lack of response.
The Sub whimpered when he felt his Dom's hands sliding underneath him and starting to unbuckle his belt and unzip his pants. Blaine climbed onto the bed and straddled Kurt's hips between his tights. His fingers brushed over the brunet's body when he started to peel down the pants together with the briefs underneath. However, there was something clinical about his ministrations that took away any sexual aspect from Blaine's actions. Not being able to see his Dom's face unnerved Kurt even more. The Sub felt a rush of cold air sweeping over his bare ass cheeks and his breath hitched.
Kurt's brain made a quick math. The promise of the punishment plus my bare ass... His blue eyes filled with tears. "Blaine... just... if you are going to spank me..." his voice waivered there from humiliation. "With my dad upstairs... can you make sure he won't hear anything?"
"So you just now decided to talk… or rather negotiate? You should've thought about the consequences when you broke your promise of not leaving my side, Kurt."