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12 If Handcuffs Could Talk

By Marilyn (Ranger Hunters) and Kevan

Uploaded by Alfonsina.d

Rules of the Game (Mal)

"Here are the ground rules." Az sat forward in the armchair, forearms resting on his knees. His expression was serious; his gaze fixed steadily on me. "They are not negotiable."

Ground rules? Not negotiable? Okay, this was different. I'd never had a set of rules for having sex before. This could be even more interesting than I'd anticipated. Or it could take all the fun out of it. Have to wait and see. I nodded for him to continue.

"Everything each of us does is done willing. If you do not consent to something—in part or in whole—it does not happen to you. You can stop anytime you want, because it's too much for you or you're not enjoying it or for any other reason, and you do not have to say why. All you need to do is say 'safeword' and everything stops. It's up to you whether we continue after that or not. If you choose to stop, there is no judgement. You're still welcome to the guest room and breakfast."

I nodded.

"I am not into heavy pain or degradation. I will use a cock ring to help you with control if you need it but I would rather not; I prefer to teach you to manage your own body and orgasms. I will put you in restraints at times, usually cuffs of some type, especially in the beginning. The ones I use are padded. You may get bruised, but you won't get cut. In the past, I used fabric ties, but Rav has a habit of shredding those."

I looked over at Rav who was sprawled crosswise in a second armchair, one foot on the floor, the other leg slung over a chair arm, his hair sweeping down. He was smiling lazily, watching me like a half-asleep panther.

"I am not into dominance as it is commonly construed." Az continued, "My pleasure comes from your pleasure, from the exchange of control and trust, as well as physical sensation. I have no interest in forcing your submission or doing anything that is not pleasurable for you. However, once we begin, you are mine until I say we're done or you choose to stop. I am the director; not you. It is up to me to learn what pleases you and give you that—more intensely than you've ever had it before. I will find your boundaries and I will push you past them."

Considering how far out on the edge my boundaries already were this was sounding more interesting by the minute.

"There is no drinking alcohol once we begin. If you are anything more than slightly buzzed, you do not participate. I don't want any outside influences on what you are thinking, feeling, and experiencing. Nothing that would inhibit your judgment or your ability to stop if you need to."

Az sat back in the armchair. "Agreed?"

"Agreed."

"Are you good with 'safeword' or would you like to choose another word or phrase?"

From what Az had said, I didn't see the need for a safeword, but maybe it was a case of better safe than sorry. "Safeword is fine. No confusion."

"Good. Rav will show you how to prepare yourself." Az stood up and walked through a door on the same wall as the guest room, closing it behind him."

"His studio," Rav explained. "He'll be along when he's ready."

"Ready?" What the hell did you have to do to get ready to have sex? I mean, just take off your clothes, right?

xoxoxox

In the bedroom, Rav removed his necklace, wrist cuffs, and ear studs, placing them in a tray atop a small chest. "No jewelry. If Az wants you in any, he'll put it on you." He pointed at my watch. "That counts."

I took it off and put it in the tray along with the two necklaces I was wearing.

Rav stripped off his pants, leaving him nude, and laid them over a rack standing under a window. "You can leave yours there too. Beats trying to find them on the floor later."

He headed toward the bathroom. "Come on, let's see how much work we have to do."

I obediently removed shirt and pants, my shoes having been discarded in the other room.

As I stepped into the bathroom—which could have been used as a not-so-small bedroom—Rav shut a drawer in a ceiling-height cabinet and turned around, holding what looked to be a large shampoo container in his hand.

"Turn around," he instructed.

Again, I obeyed.

"Not bad." Rav sat the container on a counter and ran his hands over me, quickly and efficiently, as if frisking me. Definitely not sexy touching; this was business. He picked up an elastic hair tie off the counter and gather my hair back into a short ponytail that lifted it off my neck.

"Uh, Rav…"

"Body hair. Have to get rid of it all. Arms, armpits, legs, back, front, ass, balls, everywhere." He squeezed some liquid from the container into one hand, knelt, and started smearing it on my leg. "Ten minutes, then into the shower and all gone. No fuss. No pain. Make yourself useful and start on your arms."

Bemused by this point, I took the container, squeezed some of the liquid into the palm of my hand and started applying it to my arm.

xoxoxoxoxox

"Spread your legs," he instructed when we were almost done. "Make sure you get your balls, your whole groin area good, and your ass crack."

"I was hoping you were going to do that part for me so I could enjoy it."

"Mal, if I start touching you right now like I want to touch you, we're not going to be done when Az is ready and he's going to be pissed and that's something I don't want to have happen."

"I thought Az said he's not into pain and dominance."

"He's not, but he can—and has—decided that there's not going to be any fun tonight. I don't know about you, but I'm not in the mood for spending the whole night alone in a bed with only my hand for company."

I spread my legs and got to work.

Ten minutes later, Rav had the shower turned on, the multiple heads sheeting warm water all around the huge enclosure. Just looking at it was giving me ideas.

"Do you and Az ever play in the water?" I asked

"Oh, yeah. That shower is almost as good as the bed."

As I opened the glass door and started to step in, Rav handed me an enema bulb.

"You need instructions?" he asked, cocking his head to one side.

"Think I got this one," I replied as dryly as I could.

xoxoxoxoxoxox

"Right-handed, correct?" Rav asked when we returned to the bedroom.

"Yeah."

"Good, then get on that side of the bed," he pointed.

"Why good," I asked as I crawled onto the indicated side of the bed.

"Because I'm left-handed. Makes it better when you both have your dominant hand restrained. More challenging."

Rav climbed up on the other side of the bed, reached under the pillows banked against the headboard and drew out two wide bracelets attached to chains that were maybe twelve inches long that were in turn attached to one of the vertical iron rods in the headboard. As promised, they were padded on the inside. He fastened one around my right wrist.

"How fast do you normally come?"

"What?" I wasn't sure I'd heard him correctly.

He laughed. "Come. Ejaculate. Orgasm. How quick do you normally come? I'd rather not put a cock ring on you early on. I'd rather Az and I get a feel for your tolerance without it, but I can if you tend to be sensitive and come real easy."

"I've never had complaints and I'm usually not the first one to come."

"Good to know." Rav straddled my hips.

"Key," I asked, mindful of what Bobby had done to Rav.

"In the tray on the chest."

The chest was on the opposite side of the bedroom, far out of reach. "So I get loose how? When you decide it's time?"

"You get loose when Az decides he wants you loose." He leaned forward, braced over me with his arms, long hair falling around us like a curtain shutting out the world. "Let me do all the work. Just enjoy. Let me worship your body."

"What—"

He lowered his body until his lips almost brushed mine. "I've been wanting to do this for months." And that was when I discovered the incredibly sensual kiss he'd given me while demonstrating what he'd done to Bobby was elementary school and Rav held a PhD in kissing.

After plundering my mouth and lips, and nearly melting my mind, Rav moved to my ears, tracing with his tongue along the outer shell, and then to a spot just behind my ear that he teased with lips and tongue. I'd never known that to be a particularly erogenous part of my body before, but he taught me it was. Closing my eyes, I let Rav explore, let him work his magic on me. By the time he worked his way down my neck to where it met my shoulder—a spot I already knew was an erogenous zone for me—I was struggling not to moan out loud. A struggle that must have been apparent because he stopped his sweet assault on my collarbone and lifted his head.

"I want you to moan," he said softly, his lips barely touching my ear. "I want you to scream."

Blindly, I reached with my free hand and grasped his hip, intending to pull him closer if that were possible, but he caught my wrist and pinned it to my hip with his knee as he partially sat up. The loss of his body heat, the cool air of the room against my chest, had me opening my eyes. I tried reaching for him with my other hand, but the chain wasn't long enough for me to reach him.

"No," he said quietly but firmly. "My turn. I get to explore you." He traced a finger from my temple down my jaw and throat, ending in the hollow at the base. "Tell me what feels good, what you want more of. Tell me what you don't like. I should know just from your reactions, but the first few times with someone you can miss signs, so tell me. Talk to me. Make noise." He moved my free hand and raised it over my head. "Hold onto the headboard or a pillow if you need to, but no touching until you have permission. This is me learning your body; you get your turn next. If you can't behave, I'll cuff your other hand too and I don't want to do that because it makes it difficult to explore parts of you and I intend to explore every inch of you." He leaned forward again, his lips touching mine. "Let's try this again."

xoxoxoxox

True to his word, Rav explored every inch of my body. Suckling my fingers. Massaging my arms and chest. Mapping every response of mine, even the tiniest intake of breath or twitch of skin. By the time he reached my waist, I was floating on a sea of sensation, half-drugged from what he was doing. Rav had somehow brought me to a state where my body felt both languorous and aroused. I managed to open my eyes, wanting to see him touching me, see his hands on me. His lips and tongue and hair.

Az stood beside the bed, arms crossed over his chest, still clad in drawstring pants, watching. My arousal kicked up a notch. Having him watch but not participate was a definite turn-on, especially given the intensity with which he watched, cataloging every minute reaction of mine.

I turned over onto my stomach without realizing how Rav had asked me to. Certainly, he didn't speak. He applied the same attention to my back, returning to my hands and fingers, down my arms, across my shoulders. Massaging. Exploring. Kissing and licking. My spine, my ass, my legs, my feet. Missing nothing.

When he turned me back over, he slipped a small pillow under my hips, raising my groin. I watched as he slowly explored his way back up my legs. Now, as he explored, the languorous feeling permeating my body morphed into a subtle tingle, a low-level energy current swirling inside me that spread, following his hands and lips until my entire body hummed quietly with it.

Before he touched my genitals for the first time, Rav paused and spread my legs, bent them at the knees. I was totally exposed to him, vulnerable in a way I had never been before. I didn't have much body hair naturally but the removal of what little I had elevated my feeling of vulnerability. The feeling was incredibly arousing. I was acutely aware of my wantonly displayed body and my helplessness, my dependency on him. Mesmerized, I watched as Az drizzled warm liquid from a flask onto my genitals. Sex as I had known it to this point in my life was far behind me and there was no rear-view mirror, not with Rav and Az.

Kneeling between my spread legs, Rav cupped my testicles and began massaging gently. His eyes were dark, mysterious, bottomless pools that captured my gaze. "If it gets too intense, take deep breaths," he instructed me calmly. He moved one hand to massage the pubic bone above my cock while the other slipped down to stroke my perineum. I gasped when his fingers swept across a spot no one had ever touched before except in passing and thrust my hips upward as my cock hardened. Rav backed off, returning to my testicles, slowing and lightening his movements. "Deep breaths," he reminded me.

When I relaxed, my cock softening somewhat, muscles no longer tensed, Rav began stroking up my cock. One hand, from base to head, and release. Then the other hand, from base to head, and release. The rhythm unhurried, his grip firm but not demanding. Then he changed direction, stroking from head to base. My cock responded. Again, he backed off, returning to the massage until I relaxed and my impending orgasm receded. This time I remembered to take deep breaths without prompting. Rav continued, alternating stroking my cock with massaging the head of it, fingering my newly discovered pleasure spot, bringing me close to orgasm again and again, backing off each time, not denying my release but prolonging my anticipation and pleasure. I floated on an ocean of sensation, bobbing up and down on waves of pleasure.

Time became irrelevant. Nothing beyond this room—this bed—existed. Nothing beyond Rav's hands and what they were doing to me. My cock hardening, softening. My orgasm building, ebbing. Again and again, Rav brought me to the brink of orgasm then drew me back from the precipice. I had thought nothing was better than orgasm, but this… this was better. This was surfing a never-ending crest of that wave of exquisite need and pleasure that comes just before orgasm.

And then, Rav didn't back off. When I drew near the precipice, he allowed me to spill over it and I came, not screaming as pleasure was torn from my body, but moaning loudly as it washed through my entire being. I wasn't aware of what Rav was doing—I was far beyond thought, rational or otherwise—but whatever he did, it prolonged my orgasm until my body was wrung out.

Someone removed the pillow from under my hips and released me from the handcuff. Rav moved up beside me, molding his body to mine, holding me, kissing my forehead and temple softly, murmuring words in a language I didn't know.

Az drew a sheet up over us as I shivered and bent to kiss my cheek. "Magnificent," he said softly.

xoxoxoxox

I must have drifted into a light sleep because the next thing I was aware of was Rav kissing me and telling me to wake up. Reluctantly, I left the warm, drowsy aftermath of my most awesome orgasm and opened my eyes.

Rav smiled at me, his dark eyes soft, one hand cupping my face. "You're gorgeous when you let go. We're going to have fun."

"Fifteen minutes," Az said as he walked out of the room.

Gorgeous? Let go? Fun? Fifteen…what? My confusion must have been apparent, because Rav made a sound that might have been the beginning of a chuckle but was more of a deep purr in his chest, then leaned over and kissed me. Not as gentle as before but not a kiss designed to arouse either.

"That was an appetizer. I'm pretty sure Az wants all twenty-one courses tonight as delicious as you were in that one, and he wants the next one in fifteen minutes," he said.

Appetizer? Twenty-one courses? If what Rav had just done to me was an appetizer, I wasn't sure I'd survive a second course, much less the twenty-first. He couldn't be serious. Could he?

Rav climbed over me and out of the bed, slapping my ass along the way.

"Fourteen minutes now to clean up. Get a move on."

xoxoxoxox

The Day After (Mal)

The first thing I saw when I opened the stairwell door and stepped into the hallway was Lester. Inwardly, I groaned. I had been hoping not to run into anyone on my way home and if I had to run into someone Lester would be last on the list. Why hadn't I used the stairs closer to my apartment? Because I didn't want to walk all the way across the garage to get to them, not as tired as I was. Bad decision. Now I had to cover that same distance down the hallway, while dealing with Lester.

I was exhausted—mentally and physically. Twenty hours with Az and Rav had totally depleted me. Physically, I was sated like never before. Az had done things to me I'd never dreamed of. He'd used every part of my body—with my willing consent. Consent? Hell, I'd begged him to. He'd had me in positions I would have sworn were impossible. And Rav—anytime I had a chance to have sex with that man, I'd jump on it. And him. Together they wore me out. Multi-hour sessions in the gym didn't leave me so sore and spent; and they certainly didn't leave me craving more. Mentally, I was adrift, still caught up in the magic of the sexual exploration we'd done and my new understanding of sex as a mental art. Az was a master of sex and Rav—lucky bastard, he had Az full-time—was a virtuoso.

Maybe I could pretend not to notice Lester. All I wanted was to get to my apartment and crawl into bed and sleep every minute I could before I had to be on shift tomorrow.

When I drew even with Lester, he whistled.

"Damn, Mal, you look like something the cat dragged in. Where've you been and what have you been doing? Or should I ask who have you been doing?"

Ignore him, I told myself. Maybe he'll let it drop and go away.

No such luck. Lester threw an arm across my shoulder. I couldn't help but wince; my shoulders were sore from being handcuffed in some creative positions. Of course, he noticed the wince.

"Ooh, this has got to be good. You're in yesterday's clothes, didn't make it home last night, haven't shaved, you can barely walk, and you're sore." He leaned in and sniffed my neck. "Although you have recently showered. So, tell me. I want all the details."

"Piss off," I growled.

"Nope. Not until you tell me what—and more importantly who—you've been doing since you left here last night."

"Not going to happen." I threw his arm off my shoulder and headed for my apartment, already pressing the button on my keychain fob that unlocked the door. I had the door half open when I heard him yell.

"I will find out, you know!"

When hell freezes over.

Crossing to my desk, I gingerly lowered myself into the chair, logged on, and pulled up the software that tracked the RangeMan SUVs. It took me only a few keystrokes to alter the tracking data on the SUV I'd been using to make it look as if it had not left the garage in the last twenty-four hours. Then, I did the same to my personal tracking data. Being the administrator for all the RangeMan systems had its advantages. To be safe—it never paid to underestimate Lester because he could be determined and devious—I changed all my personal passwords as well as the admin passwords. He couldn't hack into the system and find the new ones without tripping an alarm and me being notified, but I felt safer just in case planets had aligned in a once-in-a-thousand-years configuration and he'd somehow gotten hold of one of the old ones.

Just as I was getting ready to log out, I saw Lester log on. He went straight to the SUV tracking application and pulled up the data on the SUV I'd been using. Good thing I hadn't wasted any time modifying it. He must have run straight down to the garage and gotten the number of the vehicle I'd taken. Next, he pulled up the tracking data on my whereabouts. It's standard for every RangeMan employee to have a tracker with them at all times. It was a condition of employment that none of us minded. If you got in trouble, the cavalry knew where to ride to the rescue. It had saved lives more than once. At least Ranger didn't insist on subcutaneous trackers—yet.

Imagining Lester's frustration on finding nothing in the tracking data, I headed to bed with a smile.

xoxoxoxox

"Okay, that's it," Ranger announced, "unless anybody has anything else we need to discuss this morning?"

Finally. The usual status meeting at duty shift changeover had lasted only fifteen minutes but my aching muscles needed to move. I wasn't naïve enough to think my shifting positions frequently had gone unnoticed but none of the guys would say anything if I didn't mention it. Hopefully.

"Well, I'm not sure this is an issue, but I found something odd in the SUV tracking data."

Damn Lester! What's his angle?

Ranger just raised an eyebrow. That's his signal to hurry up and get on with it.

"I was doing a comparison on the SUV logs and the tracking data, and there was one that didn't match up. The tracker says it was here all weekend, but the odometer log data shows it was driven quite a few miles during that same time."

Damn. Damn. Damn. I hadn't remembered the SUV's performance log or I would have modified that too. Az and Rav really had scrambled my brains. I was going to strangle Lester.

"Could there be a bug in the tracking software?" Tank asked.

"More likely in the SUV's onboard system since there was only one out of sync data point on one vehicle. I'll check it out." I said, trying to put a lid on this and nail it shut before anyone dug deeper.

Ranger nodded.

"Oh, I'm sure you'll be able to find the problem," Lester said, tilting his chair back and smirking. "It's the SUV signed out to you this weekend. The odometer log data says it traveled ninety-four miles. Half on Friday night; half late yesterday afternoon. That's forty-seven miles each way. Covers a lot of territory."

Bobby turned to look at me. He knew what was forty-seven miles away. A beach house—with handcuffs. I refused to meet his eyes.

Ranger eyed me speculatively for a few seconds, then nodded. "Take care of it."

The meeting broke up and I made my way down to the gym as quickly as my sore body would allow. I needed to do some serious stretching, or I wouldn't be able to move later on. Bobby had offered to do some light sparring with me to work out the kinks and then have lunch, and I had accepted his offer. I wasn't too worried about Ranger. He might—probably did—know precisely how far away each employee that maintained an outside residence lived from the RangeMan building, but he generally didn't pry into anyone's private life. Besides, lately he was too busy playing Dungeon Master in his private sex dungeon.

xoxoxoxox

Lester was walking out of Shorty's with a pizza box in his hand when Bobby and I pulled into the lot at lunchtime. He saw us and smirked as he slid into a SUV and drove off.

"If you want to beat the crap out of him, I'll hold him for you," Bobby offered as we walked inside and sat down at the table in the back that Shorty kept reserved for us.

"I don't need anybody to hold him."

"No, but that way I get to help."

"Why don't we take turns beating the crap out of him? You get Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I get Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. For about a month."

Bobby laughed. "I like it."

We ordered and talked about the day's assignment until our food arrived.

He waited until we were halfway thru eating before he asked the question I'd known was coming.

"So, you went to a beach house in Spring Lake?"

Denying it was not an option. Bobby already knew. "Yeah."

"From the way you're moving, I'm guessing you didn't stay in the guest room."

"Good guess."

He smiled. "I've been wondering what deal Rav made with you to get him loose."

"Not what you're thinking. I traded him a handcuff key for the answer to one question."

"Oh?" Bobby looked surprised.

"Yeah, I wanted to know what he'd done to you to make you want to get revenge." I shrugged. "I was curious." I'd also been curious about Rav and seized the opportunity but that wasn't something Bobby needed to know. "He said the answer was better with the special effects and they were better at his place, so he invited me to dinner."

Bobby's smile turned into a grin and he shook his head. "Gotta give him shit about being predictable. First time I went out there was a dinner invitation."

"With Rav cooking, it's worth the drive."

"Damn straight. He make cioppino?"

"No, paella. Best meal I've had in a long time."

"He show you what he did to me?"

"Yep. Showed me what he did with your handcuffs, kissed me like he kissed you, and made me the same offer." I paused to wipe a smear of pizza sauce from my chin. "Bobby, you're straight. I understand that you don't find men attractive but, being bi, having Rav and Az invite me to share their bed is like two Victoria's Secret angels inviting you to have sex with them. How long would it take you to say yes?"

"About a second."

"Well, I'm a computer guy, we deal in picoseconds. That's about how long it took me to wrap those cuffs around Rav and tell them I don't do guest rooms." I eyed Bobby and thought about how Rav had teased him, how Az said Bobby half-liked the kisses despite himself. "You know, as good as Rav kisses, Az is the wizard of sex. He—"

"No, no, no!" Bobby held up both hands, palm out toward me. "Too much information. I do not want the details. I've spent enough nights there to have heard Rav scream more than once. I do not want to know what makes him scream."

"You sure?" I teased. "He's got a really good reason to scream—lots of reasons. Az is pretty creative."

"Mal," he threw his balled-up napkin at me. "You are a sick puppy."

"No, Breeze is a sick puppy. I'm just a handsome bisexual guy that got his brains fucked loose."

"That's it," Bobby stood up and grabbed the check. "I'll pay for lunch if it'll get me out of this conversation."

xoxoxoxox

Sighing in relief at the end of my shift, I walked down the thankfully empty hall toward the door to my apartment. I needed more sleep. I was guessing another day at least before all my aches were gone and I was back to normal. I was about ten feet from my door when I noticed there was something on it. What the—?

Handcuffs. Someone had duct taped a set of handcuffs to my door. And a post card showing the beach in Spring Lake. Shit! Somehow, someone had found out. Had to be Santos, but how had he done it? And exactly how much did he know? I was standing there pondering when Lester leaned a shoulder against the wall beside the door. He looked pleased with himself, like a cat who'd not only eaten a canary but also polished off a bowl of cream.

"Az and Rav? I'm impressed. Do I get all the details now?"

"Les, do you remember what I did to Bobby?"

"Ah, ah, ah," he admonished, waggling a forefinger. "Can't touch me. I haven't done anything. You, on the other hand, altered company software records, so Ranger would not be happy with you if he found out. No telling what he might decide to do."

Unfortunately, he was right.

"Come on, man. You know I'm going to get the details eventually so just tell me about sex with Rav and Az. And the handcuffs—I wanna know about the special effects."

"Santos," I pulled the duct tape off the door and attached it—and the handcuffs—to his bare chest. "I have no idea what you're talking about." Before he could react, I managed to get inside and shut the door in his face.

Thanks to the soundproofing, I couldn't hear anything, and I refused to turn on the speaker that allowed me to hear what was happening outside the door. Not going there. I was headed straight to Denial Land; I was sure Steph wouldn't mind the company. I was not admitting anything to Lester. I don't know how he'd found out what he had, but if he wanted details, he could ask Rav or Az. That, I would like to see. I could probably make a small fortune selling tickets to that encounter.

xoxoxox

thanks as always for reading and reviewing ... and as always, reviews are forwarded to Kevan