Quick Note: Thank you to everyone who has read and reviewed. I tried to reply to some of the reviews, I've been perfecting the next few chapters in a rush to post them! Please vote on the poll on my profile.

Remember: only a few of these characters are mine, the rest are respectfully borrowed. This story has adult situations and is not for everyone.

Enjoy!

He scooted us to the edge of the bed, stood up, and reached for my hand. I took it without hesitation and followed him into the living room. He sat down and helped me to my knees in front of him.

"I want us to do two things. One you are familiar with and the other you will begin to get used to. " He explained and I nodded. He stood up and I moved out of his way. He leaned down and pulled out the chest from the night I was punished, from under the table. My stomach dropped. I didn't think I'd like what was in that box. He put the chest on the table. He first pulled out the pair of handcuffs I was getting to know so well. He placed them down near me. He then pulled out a metal pole. I began to get very wary. He then pulled out two more poles, each with a cuff at the end. He looked at me for a moment and put the first metal pole back in the chest and shut it. Finally he attached the remaining two poles together so that there was a cuff at each end, looked at my body, and adjusted the now-single pole until it was a length that he seemed to like.

"I'm going to cuff your hands and spread your legs apart. You have been doing well keeping them open for me. I'm not restraining you because you are in trouble. I'm doing so because it pleases me to do so. You have given me your body. I'm choosing to limit how much the body I own can move."

With that, he moved to restrain me and I let him. I didn't really like being tied up – I'm too controlling. Once again Eric was right, I had agreed to this. I should have been used to the handcuffs by now. I hated those things. My hands rested comfortably by the small of my back. He put the bar between my knees. I guessed the other metal piece could have made it longer and it would have gone between my ankles. He then went back and reopened the chest. Oh god, what else?

He pulled out a leash and my eyes got wide. I looked at him accusingly but before I could say anything he spoke. "I know you do not like this. We discussed using a leash as a serious punishment in public. There will be no public humiliation tonight or any other night without serious cause. I will put this on you now, because I can and want to and because you are mine. If you truly dislike it, I want you to remember that it could one day be used as punishment in a public setting. This experience might help you behave."

His clear words almost made me cry and my chest began to get tight. There was humiliation in this – although not public. I already feared one day being punished publicly like this. "Shh, you are fine little one." Eric interrupted my thoughts, sending calm feelings at me through the bond and stroking my cheek with his fingers. When he moved to chain the leash to my collar, I didn't fight. But I didn't lean in for him either. I wasn't going to help. He held the handle loosely and sat back to look at me. I was on my knees, leashed, and restrained. He looked pleased and very aroused. He began to tug the leash and I was forced to move my head forward. I came with in an inch of his crotch. I needed to stabilize myself and he gave me time to find a steady stance with my bindings on. I had to kind of shuffle forward with the bar between my knees and it was awkward.

"What are you going to do for me? What do you think I want from you?" He asked.

"I'm going to suck your cock. You want me to suck you." I replied automatically. Eric seemed to be getting off on explicitly talking about the things we were going to do. Part of me was too, but it was hard to admit that sometimes. He had that sadistic light in his eyes that he often got, and that told me he was also getting off on my discomfort.

His fangs popped out. "Can't I have a little more enthusiasm from you?" he demanded. "Whether you approve of my methods or not, everything I have done tonight has been for the purpose of keeping you safe!" I raised my eyes to his in surprise and then I felt what I had seemingly tuned out ever since he had gotten home. His words were angry but his feelings were hurt! I felt it now as though it was being shouted at me. How had I missed it? I had been so busy wallowing in self-pity because he had used those awful handcuffs and put a leash on me that I hadn't considered him at all. It was a very strange dynamic that we had between us. This little humiliation that I suffered was also a huge turn-on if I would admit it. So I had no reason to be mean to Eric. His angry words belied his vulnerable feelings. Even as he asserted his dominance over me he needed my reassurance.

"I don't know what to say Eric," I told him softly. "I know you hate apologies." His eyes were blazing at me and now I understood his desire to humiliate me tonight. I leaned in and rubbed my cheek against his thigh. "I love you," I breathed at him. "Will you forgive me?"

He shivered and thrust his hips forward, anticipating what he now knew I wanted to give him. "That's much better," his voice had become softer, huskier, and he licked his fangs. "Now, I want you to start slow and work on taking me to the back of your throat. Be mindful of my leash, I'll tug on it and help direct you." He was back to being Master. "I might put my hands in your hair again. You know I won't cut your air off. Are you ready to show me your love and submission?"

"Yes." I whispered. He slipped his wrist through the handle of the leash and used his hands to release his cock. He was so hard it looked painful. His head already had precum seeping from it. I leaned forward and placed my lips against him. I kissed him gently. I moved over a quarter of an inch and kissed again with a bit more force. I moved again and added a touch of my tongue. I tasted him and he moaned. I looked up and he was watching every move I made. I let my tongue snake out and swirl around his head. I felt him tighten the leash.

"Good girl… kissing time is over."

I leaned down and took him in my mouth. I started off slowly by sucking him and only taking the first comfortable 2 or 3 inches. I kept up for a few minutes and then went for more. I didn't let him past the beginning of my throat. He was moaning and playing with my hair. I kept going and made sure to use my tongue on him. I felt the leash tighten and him tug at it.

"I want you to have more. Inhale on 3, I'm going to move my hips." He told me, holding my head in place with the leash. His other hand came to rest on my head. He didn't allow me to object. I felt fearfully but remembered our conversation – I trusted him. It might feel bad, but it wouldn't harm me. "1, 2, 3."

I inhaled and his cock pressed to the back of my throat for a few seconds. I didn't choke. He let it slip back, but kept the tip in my mouth. I tried to breathe out of my nose. It was hard to get used to. "And again."

I didn't want to do it again, but when he got to 3, I took him again. This time he held me still and my eyes watered. The next time I coughed and gagged. He let me lean back.

"Its alright, lover. This happens sometimes. I want us to find a rhythm. Don't worry about the tears or compulsion to gag. Try to hold back the urge – you aren't being choked, make your mind tell your body that."

I looked at him and nodded. There was no malice in him. He began to tug me back to his cock. I took him in my mouth again and began to rub my tongue on his frenulum. He let me pleasure him for a bit before we searched for a rhythm where he tested my throat.

It got better, but my eyes still watered and I fought the urge to throw up. I gagged around his cock. His hands in my hair became rougher and more insistent as he held me. I wanted this to finish, but he kept going for a while, showing me what he enjoyed most. I knew I needed to learn to do this automatically for him without his coaching. He finally loosened his hold on my hair and the leash.

"Very good, little one. Now you can finish me off how ever you please. I want to watch you swallow my cum, make sure you look in my eyes when I cum in your mouth. I'm not going to warn you before I do it."

I shivered at his words and quickly went to work. Within a few minutes, I felt him getting close and heard the noises he made get louder. I looked up and caught his eyes. I stopped sucking him, suddenly lost. The intensity there shocked me. I regained my senses and went back to my task. I only closed my eyes after the first rope hit the back of my throat and his eyes closed. He roared his release. I took everything he gave me and kept his cock in my mouth, sucking out the last few drops.

"I'll never tire of you taking care of me this way, Dear One. And you only seem to be improving. I'm going to help you on to the couch and we're going to discuss the people you know."

I enjoyed his praise. In some ways, I was really becoming a good slave/pet. I wanted him to tell me how well I did, even if all I did was suck him off. I couldn't see myself as one of the fangbangers at Fangtasia who actually became someone's pet, not just a meal, and enjoyed having their heads rubbed like a dog. If we ever did that, it would be me acting the part for the sake of appearances.

Eric lifted me to my feet and steadied me. He helped me twist my body and fall back on to the couch. He offered me support as I found the most comfortable position. He rose and grabbed my blanket. I smiled as he helped me cover up. It was chilly when you were naked. "Stay here." He commanded and walked away.

I almost wanted to say something snippy, since my hands were cuffed and my legs were equally immobilized, but decided against it. I didn't need another punishment right now. He came back carrying his laptop and set himself up beside me.

"I have access to all of your social networking sites. I also have your e-mail address book and have taken the liberty of having your paper rolodex typed up for me. This should cover just about everyone. I know some people are related to you by how you categorized them or referred to them. Some I'm not sure. I'd like to know your relations and if you are not related, what type of relationship you have." He paused to look me. "Contact with certain people will be terminated or highly supervised. I'm not interested in people lusting after what is mine."

I didn't like where this was going.

"Don't you trust me?" I asked.

"This isn't about trust. It's about how we look and how I feel. It doesn't look well to have my human associating with men she's taken to her bed. It makes me jealous to think men who want to bed you will have the opportunity to flirt with me. I don't want anyone to even look at you and think about your body. We are not negotiating this. This is how it will be."

His voice was hard as steel. I stared back at him, considering my words carefully. "We need some compromise. I submit to you ; I'm not a robot."

"Nor do I want you to be. But this isn't a matter we can compromise on. Before you think of asking me to let you associate with anyone you fucked before, you also need to consider their safety." Wow. No beating around the bush there. "Now let's discuss your contacts."

I nodded, biting the inside of my cheek. Why argue about a broad topic? I was saving my fight for specific people, absolutely sure it was going to have to come down to that.

"First I tried to arrange everyone by friend or relative. But I couldn't figure out which main category to put certain people in or how exactly they were related to you. Can you see the screen?"

He tilted the laptop and I turned my head. "Yes."

"So far, is everything correct?"

"Yes." I kept looking. He had the name, home address, and contact information of everyone in my family.

"Now what about these people? I think they are your kin, but I'm not sure how they are related to you." Everybody on the list he was now showing me was considered family, but not all were related by blood. I had to give him credit. He had ferreted out everybody; not all of these names, addresses, phone numbers, and email addresses had come from my information. I wondered if he'd thought I wouldn't notice.

"Well do you want the technical terms or how I see them?"

Eric looked at me like I grew two heads. "They are your family or not."

"Not necessarily. Some are only related by marriage, some are cousins of my cousins but consider me a cousin because of our mutual relation. And my cousins' children call me 'auntie' because I'm older – just as my Aunt Kelly is really my cousin, but since her kids are older than I am, she's more an 'aunt' than a cousin. And Greg isn't really my cousin, his mom and mine were besties and I called her 'auntie." I stopped explaining and looked at Eric. For the first time, my Vampire seemed to be speechless and baffled. I wondered if he'd had these kinds of dubious family relationships when he'd been human. It was hard for me not to laugh, but he was taking this very seriously and I didn't want him to feel disrespected. But, if he could have seen the look on his own face! Priceless!

"Okay. I see that it is more complicated with you… In general, though, these people are more family to you than anything else? Is that right?"

"Yep."

"Now, out of the people who are not your blood kin, is there anyone here who you've ever thought of in a romantic or sexual way?"

"No, they are my family."

"Now I will turn the tables. Is there anyone here who has ever thought of you in a romantic or sexual way, whether you returned the feeling or not?"

And there goes the king of loopholes, tying up all of his. "No…" I thought about how my cousin's ex-husband and I flirted. It was always joking – for sure on my part!

"Dina." His voice was near a growl. There was the damn bond again, tattling on me. He knew I was leaving something out.

"I've goofed around - verbally - with some people not blood related… but it was only joking."

"I see. Are you certain?"

"As much as I can be."

"That answer does not satisfy me, Dina!" he said in a hard voice. "I am trying to determine whether or not any of these people are a threat to me, and…"

I couldn't help it. I had to interrupt him. "Eric! Threat? Are you kidding?" He was definitely unhappy that I'd cut him off so I hurried to explain. "Nobody is a threat to you. NOBODY!" I enunciated each syllable. "How can you even think that? You really don't trust me do you?" I felt like crying and I really wanted to hit him up side the head. Maybe he'd been smart to tie my hands.

He folded down the laptop cover and looked at me, reaching out to touch my face. "It isn't you that I don't trust." His voice and eyes had softened. "I don't want to put you in a situation where you might have to fend off unwanted advances in my absence. Someone I can't banish completely from your life can be controlled if I know I have to control them. That is why I need to know how each and every one of these people feels about you."

Tears were still threatening, wetting my eyelashes. I looked down. He reached for me and pulled me into his embrace. He held me like that for several minutes while I got my emotions back under control. I knew that we were just getting started, though. My nerves would be jacked by the time we were done. "What would you do to control someone like that?" I asked softly. I had to know before I exposed anybody to it.

"A meaningful glare during introductions," he said honestly. "Taking them aside and letting them know that I know about what happened and it better not happen again. And there's always glamour if I can't avoid it."

"You wouldn't hurt them?"

"Not unless they did something improper," he promised, still holding me close.

I believed him. "OK then. There was some silly back-and-forth, like I said, verbal only. My cousin's husband. James Parrott." I turned red, embarrassed. "It was just joking. We did it in front of her sometimes. She knew."

I couldn't tell what he was thinking by the way he looked at me. His face was a puzzle to me. He eased me back to where I'd been sitting before he'd pulled me into his arms, turned the laptop, and started typing something. "Thank you for trusting ME," he said, then paused long enough to lean in for a lingering kiss. I thought we both felt better by the time he pulled away. "Can we go on?" He asked gently. The only way to satisfy him would be to answer all of his questions, and dawn would come eventually. I sighed and nodded. He adjusted the blanket where it had fallen and uncovered my breasts, then opened the lid back up and searched a few seconds to find the place where he'd left off. "And in this picture… is this boy your cousin? He looks very friendly with you for being your kin." Eric showed me a photo from my Facebook.

"He is a cousin by marriage. And he's very drunk in that picture. We were all hugging for the camera. It's not sexual, it's just inebriation."

"And what else did he do while he was drunk, besides hug you in this picture?"

"Spent the majority of the evening with his head over the toilet bowl." I replied, on the edge of being cocky.

"So this is not someone I should ever consider allowing to drive you after a night out?" Eric's next line.

"Eric, I'm older than he is. He's a baby to me and he showed that by drinking like a goof that night. He's happy with his girlfriend on their campus, over 1000 miles away. He's not a 'sexual threat' nor would I drive with him if he was that drunk." I nearly scoffed at this idea of a 'sexual threat'. I understood Eric's reasoning and his overprotectiveness after Bobby, but I still thought this was overkill.

"You are assuring me that everyone on this list," and he showed me the list again, "is part of your… extended family, then? There is nobody here who would ever try to compromise you? And the 'back-and-forth' with Mr. Parrott was harmless?"

I took a good look, just to be sure. When you said something to Eric, he considered it to be gospel and he had a perfect memory. "Yes, Eric. These people are my family that I hope you will want to meet someday soon." I hoped my hinting wasn't that obvious.

"Let us move on to the men in your life who you admit are not part of your family." He said blandly. Admit? What did he mean by that? He made it sound like I was on trial for something! Was I stupid enough to think I wasn't? Of course I was, now that I thought more about it... because as far as he was concerned I'd either humped everyone I talked to or they wanted to hump me. Oh, and forget about innocent until proven guilty! I was guilty by reason of someone finding me hot! I cursed Bobby Burnham to the fiery depths of hell for causing this overprotectiveness in Eric. But, then again, Eric was more possessive than most Vampires according to Leila. Not all of this was Bobby's fault.

"I am going to start with the ones you have had the most contact or conversation with, or who you have more pictures of than others."

He showed me a list he composed and we went through it. Once again I noticed that he had way more information than I'd had, like extra email addresses or home numbers in addition to the cell numbers they'd given me. I admitted that some of them liked me. I promised him I didn't reciprocate the feelings. He felt the truth through the bond – especially when I recalled how I upset I was when one of those friends tried to kiss me. The rude act nearly ended our friendship. Eric took down every word I said and named several names, telling me that I was not to ever contact them again or respond to any contact from them. The people on this particular list weren't that important to me so I agreed without protest.

"Let's move on to this young gentleman," Eric said sarcastically, raising his eyebrows at the word "gentleman." He made a couple of clicks and a picture came up on the screen. I wanted to dive under the blanket when I saw it. The picture was from last halloween, me with a guy named Buzz. We'd gone dressed as a pirate captain and his fair maiden captive. My dress had been torn in strategic places to up the sex appeal. The picture depicted me on my knees before him. In one hand he held up plastic chains that had been attached to my wrists, forcing my hands above my head, while his other hand was cupping his junk. The pirate was about to show his captive exactly what he wanted from her. I could feel how hot my face was - it must have been beet red! Eric stared at me with his eyebrows raised, an expectant smile on his face that did not make it to his eyes.

It didn't help either that there were several other guys in the picture all making rude gestures at the camera, like they were waiting for their turn. They had come dressed as "crew." We'd planned out the costumes as a group, thinking it was hilarious at the time. A few of the guys had also brought their girlfriends, dressed similarly to me, but none of those girls was in this picture.

"Where did you get that picture Eric?" I whispered. There was a much more respectable-looking picture of Buzz and me at that party on my Facebook page, but I hadn't posted this one.

"I have my sources," he said quietly. "But I am not the one who has some explaining to do here, am I?" Uh-oh! Eric was getting quiet. I had come to fear his whispers more than him yelling.

"His name is Buzz," I told Eric, staring at the laptop's keyboard. "We dated. For a while." I wasn't sure how much information he wanted, but apparently it was more than that.

"I was aware of his name, Dina," Eric asked me, all business, his Dominant voice starting to show itself even though he was speaking softly. "Why is he called that? Buzz." He said it a couple more times as though trying to sound it out. "And by the way, let me be very clear about this. I will not be angry with you for liking or being with other men before you had me, but I do expect you to tell me the absolute truth. Leave nothing out. If you lie, or tell me half-truths like you did with Bobby, I will punish you. If you disliked that punishment, you will surely love this one." He meant that sarcastically, obviously. I swallowed nervously.

"How much detail do you want Eric?"

"I will ask you specific questions, and I expect complete answers."

"Alright…. we dated. Not very long. It was Halloween. …just a joke."

"How was that a joke?" He waited and I didn't know how to answer. "You don't seem to like me putting you in revealing outfits and chaining you up."

"Eric, it was a costume; a character. And the chains were plastic! Halloween with a bunch of friends lets you get wild. The other girls had similar outfits and some more revealing than mine."

"I still don't see how that makes it okay. You humans – one night makes you act like someone you aren't and you feel it's perfectly fine… I am not going to allow you to see this "buzz" again."

"Fine… we hardly talk anymore. I'll tell him goodbye as soon as you give me my computer."

"No." Eric said calmly.

"What do you mean 'no'?"

"You will not have any contact with him again. Ever."

"But Eric, I have to…"

"NO, Dina. N – O! And do not give me some pathetic excuse about hurting his feelings. I do not care about his feelings."

"And what about mine?"

"You still have feelings for him? Did you lie to me just now?" His eyes watched me closely looking for any sign of deception.

"No! I don't want to see him again but I can't just disappear! He will wonder…"

"HE will wonder?" Eric demanded. "I thought you said you did not care for his feelings!"

"Will you stop twisting around everything I say?" I finally yelled at him. His eyes were huge, and angry, but I had to speak my piece. "I'm not the kind of person who just walks away without a word. I have to say goodbye! I need to tell him why or he will think…"

"Once again, I do not give a flying fuck what he thinks!" Eric snapped. "You do not have to do anything, and you will not contact him again. Do I make myself clear?" I hesitated, staring at him. I couldn't believe how cold he wanted me to be. "DO...CLEAR?" he demanded again, enunciating every syllable in his quiet and deadly tone. He had leaned forward and his face was an inch from mine. My hands wanted to put distance between us, but the fucking cuffs kept them in place. His fangs had dropped at some point, further proof that he was upset. I had no choice but to give in.

"Alright, Eric," I said tiredly, refusing to meet his eyes. "You make yourself perfectly clear." I wanted him to know that I wasn't happy either. He picked up my chin with his fingers, forcing me to look at his face.

"I get that it does not feel right to you, Dear One," he said softly. "But you do not need the distraction during your training. It is time now to focus on us. Will you do that for me?"

When he put it that way I felt bad. He was giving me all of his time and attention, and I was worried about some old boyfriend. I decided to give him the full disclosure he wanted. "His real name is Jared," I told Eric. "His friends have called him 'Buzz' since high school because of some funny haircut his mom gave him. We met at school and dated for three, maybe four months. I had sex with him a few times. I haven't seen him since November, a few weeks after the party in that picture. He went back to Atlanta, where most of his family is from, after his grandpa died. Our emails just kinda tapered off. I don't know if we would've seen each other again or not when he came back. I wasn't in love with him or anything." I raised my eyes to his, the message in mine being "the way I love you." I didn't say it out loud though. I hoped he knew.

He smiled and kissed my forehead. "Thank you," he said, happier than he'd been a minute before. "Was that so hard?" I didn't respond. This was going to be a long conversation.

Eric switched to another program he had open and typed something, his fingers flying so fast that I couldn't make it out at all. Then he switched back to the document with all of my information. "Now I want to know about this one." He showed me a picture of me, in a tankini, being held bridal style by a very tall, very tanned, very buff guy. I couldn't help it. I giggled. Eric wasn't amused. "What is the giggle for?" he wanted to know.

"That's Evan," I told him. "He's a lifeguard. I've known him like forever. We grew up near one another. He used to hang out with my older cousins."

But this wasn't the kind of information Eric wanted. "When was the last time you fucked him?" To his consternation, I busted out laughing. He gave me the biggest "you'd-better-have-an-explanation" look I had ever seen, which made me laugh even harder. But I felt through the bond that he was gearing up for another angry outburst, so I nixed the laughter.

"I was just remembering the last time I saw him," I told Eric. "I had a little accident - a nip-slip, and he put both hands over his eyes and cried like a baby!" I giggled again.

Eric looked like he was only just barely holding on to his cool. "Great." he said without the slightest bit of enthusiasm. "Just exactly what is a 'nip slip'?" He said it like it was a foreign language. "And why would it make a man that size cry?"

I realized belatedly that I hadn't told Eric the punch line. "Eric, Evan is gay!" I couldn't help but laugh again. "A nip-slip is when your boob falls out of your outfit accidentally. You know? Nipple-slips out?" Eric was lousy with current slang.

His eyebrow went straight up. "Your breast fell out of your clothing in front of him?" I nodded. "Then what did he do?"

I decided that full disclosure meant the gay friends too. "We went to his cousin's wedding reception together. His cousin is a royal bitch, embarrassed that he's gay. Said he couldn't come if he brought a male date. Evan's friends with her husband though, and he was one of the groomsmen. He asked me if I'd go with him. We were out on the dance floor and I had a backless dress on. A little two-year-old ran out and plowed right in to me, and I fell right on my ass!" I laughed again, red-faced and remembering. "Evan got down to help me up and noticed what had happened. That was when he covered his eyes. But after a second he came to his senses and by then I had covered up. I don't think anybody else noticed; they were all busy dancing and drinking, and making sure the little kid was okay. Nobody even offered to help me up except Evan."

I laughed again, remembering and shaking my head. Eric was actually smiling at this story.

But then his expression turned cloudy. "Dina, are you sure he is gay?"

"Gayer than a three dollar bill, why?" I asked.

"I read his emails to you."

I burst out laughing again, earning a heavy frown from Eric. "That's just our thing, Eric!" I explained. "We've been doing that for years. Who really says 'I want to straight-marry you'?' I would never really say those things to somebody I was into. I know you read all my emails; did I talk that way to anybody else?"

"No, you did not."

"See? Don't worry about him Eric. He's harmless." And then I got another idea. "Do you think Sean has, you know, somebody?"

Eric looked uncomfortable. "I have no idea."

"Can I ask him?" I knew Eric would want to know if I was going to talk to his new day man about something like this. "Please Eric, will you let me? Evan is so nice, and Sean is cute, and…"

"You think Sean is cute?" Eric demanded, jealousy flooding the bond as he frowned at me.

"Please don't hurt him Eric! He is cute! His ears stick out too far but he has pretty eyes."

"I am not sure if I approve of your looking at my day man's eyes!"

I was flattered to have made Eric jealous but didn't want him to hurt Sean. "Eric, I'm a grown woman. I have eyes. I don't look at Sean like… THAT… because you said he's gay. But I do look at you that way." I batted my eyelashes at him, hoping to put him in a better mood. Feelings of jealousy made him unhappy; I'd sensed that since we'd sat down to discuss the subject of my contacts. I didn't want Eric to be unhappy.

Eric leaned in to kiss my lips and then ran his fingers through my hair a few times. He'd taken it out of the elastic after he'd sat me here on the couch with him. Eric's eyes laid his soul bare to me in that moment. I saw his hurt, his insecurity (Eric!), his need for love – MY love, his feelings of ownership and possession, his passion for my body, and something that he hadn't identified as love (yet) but it still made my heart sing. If Eric was any indication of all Vampire men, they were much more emotional and vulnerable than human men. They also hid it ten times harder. I wouldn't give away his secret. This was for me alone. But then he looked away and went back to business.

"I would like you to tell me about him." He opened another picture on the computer.

I froze. Hardly anyone would recognize this man from this picture…. because all you could see was his erection. Besides the crippling fear of Eric's reaction, the only intelligible thought I had was that Eric was much bigger. I had befriended the man in question online and we began a little romance. He was far more forward than I was and sent me this picture. I told him he wouldn't be getting one of me until we knew each other better. Our first meeting consisted of lunch near Shreveport and he was very funny. We talked on the phone for over two hours the next day. We went out a few more times, but didn't sleep together. He was the first bright spot I'd had in a very long time. I'd tried not to get too excited. I didn't want the let down and even though we got along wonderfully, we were both so busy! Sometimes we only had quick text and no real talking for near week-long intervals. But then three Vamps had walked into Merlotte's and I became Eric's. He was probably wondering what had happened to me. I hadn't been allowed to get into my Facebook or instant messaging, and Eric had my cell phone.

"We went on a few dates." I said, very cautiously.

"You went on a few dates?" Eric said disbelievingly. "I find a picture of another man's cock on your computer and all you have to say is that you went on a few dates?"

The look he gave me would have frozen me solid if I hadn't been covered by a blanket. He wrinkled his forehead, raised his eyebrows, and stared at me with a stony silence riddled with disapproval and disbelief, waiting for my answer. I shivered. I was way into dangerous territory. This was a very current, budding relationship that had been completely interrupted and knocked to the side by my involvement with Eric. I tried to gather my words. He couldn't – he wouldn't hold my past against me. Even if this past had only happened days or hours before Eric had walked into my life. I had to be honest.

"Eric this was before you and me… He sent me the picture because we met online and he was being way too forward with me. I told him I didn't know him well enough to send him one of me. I'm embarrassed to say that I saw his penis before I met him in person. We talked about sex a few times. He was very open, but respectful when we went out together. Eric, I did not sleep with him!"

"You expect me to believe you didn't fuck him?" he snapped. "Dina you have a picture of his dick! If you didn't, than how were you so easily able to recognize his dick in a picture?"

If I'd been in the mood for laughing I'd have thought how much this reminded me of discussing this subject with one of my older uncles, who didn't understand how people communicated in the 21st century. Eric was very progressive in keeping up with the times, but this reminded me just exactly how old he really was. Strangely, that didn't creep me out at all. He probably couldn't fathom an emotional connection via the internet any more than he thought I could see a man's peen and never actually nail him.

"Eric, I promise you – I never slept with him. We weren't together long enough. I knew it was him because most people don't send me dirty pics! Nobody has ever sent me a picture of their penis before in my life! Believe it or not, most men don't pull me out of a bar and say they are going to have sex with me either!" I said, thinking about his bold actions the night I called him.

When he answered me, I knew he hadn't gotten the fact that I'd been referring to him.

"I wouldn't put that past one of these ya-hoos around here!" he said, still glaring at me. "So, you didn't fuck him. What was the status of your... relationship... when you came to me?" He paused as though he couldn't think of the right term, like there was something dirty or shameful about the time I'd spent with this man.

"Uh… Semi-active. We were having a hard time getting together. I worked and went to school. He worked overtime. And he wasn't close enough to just shoot over for a quick dinner or coffee. It wouldn't be worth the time driving" I stopped for a moment. "Eric, I don't appreciate you being so upset with me. You have a sexual history too might I add. And by the way – you were the only man to come into a bar, tell me we were going to have sex and proceed to take me home without thinking that you might be a little presumptuous!" I really wanted to wave my hands around and wag my fingers at him. It was hard to yell with my hands restrained!

"I was perfectly within my right to take you home to have sex!" he said quietly, his voice hard. "You were mine, by your own choice. Your own words! I could have stripped you and taken you right there. Be glad that I have some civility in me." Then he stared at me for several minutes, his face without expression, his eyes cold. He was silent for so long that I started to worry. What was he going to do? Finally he spoke. "You will not contact this man again, under any circumstances. He is dead to you, and you are dead to him."

He went to that other program again and started typing, obviously dismissing the subject. I was outraged.

"No!" I said. His head whipped around. "First of all we can discuss the rights you think you have and had to me later! I'm not done with that…. But Chris is not dead to me. I will tell him I found someone else. You can write it out and send it for me. I don't care. But he will get an explanation. That's the only way I'm going to be able to forget about this."

His movements slow and precise, Eric closed the laptop lid and set it on the opposite side of him. Then before I took another breath, I found myself on my back on the couch cushions, Eric looming over me, his fangs prominently displayed. "What did you say to me?" he said in that quiet tone of voice that told me he was more than angry. I had to think fast. Was this fight worth whatever punishment he was bound to hand me?

"I said no, Eric! I'm your Bonded. …Not your doormat. I have to stand on this. I want us to talk. Eric, please, you are hurting my arms!" I tried to appeal to my status and hopefully gain sympathy for my pain.

For a few seconds he pushed me down further into the cushions, compounding the pain in my shoulders and wrists where the handcuffs mercilessly bit into them. Then he took me by the shoulders and sat me up, but didn't cover me back up with the blanket. He put his hand on the center of my chest, holding me there while his other finger came up to point in my face. "You are right. You are my Bonded. And as my Bonded you will do as I say!" His voice had changed to THE VOICE, his eyes beginning to glow as they often did when he was emotional about something. "I am also your Master, or have you forgotten that? I know exactly what my rights are when it comes to you. Perhaps I need to be more firm in exercising them." He paused for a moment to let that sink in, and I was genuinely afraid of him. "You will have no contact WHAT-SO-EV-ER with this man, ever again, and you need to consider where your priorities should be. That is my final word." He glared at me until I dropped my eyes. Then he pulled the blanket up and tucked it back around my shoulders, retrieved the laptop and went back to typing.

I pushed my fear aside. I needed to be rational – did I want to keep going or let it go? I searched my mind for a way to talk to him without getting punished. I hoped my status would help, but maybe… maybe I needed to phrase it better.

"You said as… Your Bonded I could always talk to you – without fear of punishment. How are you holding true to your words to me? You told me this when I first agreed to be yours in all ways." I kept my voice low and didn't hide my sadness.

He closed his eyes and sighed, once again setting the laptop aside and turning to me. I flinched back as he drew close but this time he didn't grab me. "We have talked, Dina, and you have told me what you want. I have not threatened you with punishment. I cannot, I WILL not allow you to contact him. When I asked you to be mine in all ways, you agreed to submit to me. You gave your mind, your body, and your will to me. I hold you to that. .Go." He enunciated those last words, but his demeanor was not nearly as fierce as it had been. But still, he was adamant and did not seem to be willing to consider my point of view.

"I'm not satisfied with that. From what I understand, I have a special place in your life. We can't just end this because you want to. This isn't about me and another man. This is you and me communicating. And this is you refusing to grant me a goodbye with someone who was very kind to me. He doesn't deserve the hurt and neither do I." I took a breath and waited. I couldn't come at him swinging, bound as I was. But even if I did, he'd only push me down, literally and figuratively. I had to remain calm, but not back down. I was still exploring the parameters of our relationship. If Eric didn't want a brainless slave, then he would have to respect my convictions.

He looked like the top of his head might fly off any minute with steam coming out of his ears. He had a way of scrunching his face up when he was really angry, and he was doing that now. Jealousy and suspicion rolled over me through the bond like a tsunami, and I couldn't find higher ground. He closed his eyes, breathing heavily even though he had no need to breathe. It must be a habit. "Dina, we are communicating," he spat through his fangs. "You are communicating to me that you want to have one last contact with a former love interest, and I am communicating to you that I will not allow it. What part of my communicating is unclear?" He opened his eyes and looked at me; his gaze intense and emotional. Something was going on behind the anger. Did I want to find out?

"The part where I explain that I'm not like that – I want you. You, Eric! Only you! I show you my love and devotion to our relationship everyday. I'm sitting here chained up and naked for God's sake, because I am yours! You have my love, and complete submission. …Eric, you like that I'm nice. You may hate that I dislike violence, but you enjoy my niceness. I can't just drop off without a goodbye. He was a nice guy – he doesn't deserve that. He was also very nice to me in a time in my life when I was feeling… a little low. I needed someone and he was there for me. I owe him a 'goodbye' and it will hurt me if I don't. You should trust me. Honestly… why are you so up my ass about a 'dear john' letter?"

I tried to control my emotions. It was hard with his mixing in there. My normal tactics in a situation like this would be to yell and become unrepentantly indignant, but I was trying to not do that. I had to work with Eric – this was truly about our communication. Our relationship was new and we had to work out these kinks. I accepted him for who he was, he should do that much for me.

"Up your ass?" he repeated, traces of his ancient accent now coming out. "Dina, I have not even begun to get up your ass. You will surely know it when I do!" He glared at me, the threat very much evident in his eyes and the tone of his voice. I shivered beneath the blanket. He noticed that, reached over, and slowly pulled the blanket away from me, leaving me completely bare to his gaze. "You forget that you are here for my pleasure, not the other way around." he continued, tossing the blanket aside.

"Do you know why I chain you naked? Spread you wide? Because it pleases me to do so. You are a beautiful woman, Dina, with a beautiful body. A body that you would hide from me on every occasion. If you were unbound you would try to cover yourself with your arms and hands. You struggle with keeping your legs open to me; I feel the turmoil through the bond." His voice was low and intense, every syllable rich with emotion. His eyes were hard, predatory, possessive, and still angry.

He went on. "It pleases me to have you helpless before me, unable to flee, unable to fend off my advances. I can touch you..." and he reached out his hand for me. I flinched back, afraid of what he might do. He hissed at me through his fangs. "You have just earned yourself a punishment, Lover." This time he came at me at Vampire speed, and I had no time to back away. He grabbed both breasts and began to fondle them roughly, flicking the nipples with his fingernails. Traitorous things that they were, they stood straight out, begging for his attention.

"As I was saying, I can touch you whenever I want, in any way that I want, and you are powerless to stop me. This pleases me very much. Normally I seek to give you pleasure, but..." He pinched both nipples hard, using the Vampire strength in his fingers, and I cried out in pain. "Sometimes a little pain is called for." The pain went away after a few seconds, only to be amplified times ten when he let go. I screeched and whimpered, afraid to say anything that might make him do it again. I felt degraded by the way he had handled me but tried not to show it. I would not let him use my lack of clothing to try to shame me into giving up my argument.

"I cannot let you see him, Dina," he told me again. "You do not wish for him to die, do you?" His expression was sober, his voice clear, free of anything that might make me think he wasn't absolutely serious.

"No!" I blurted out with more emotion than I meant to. His eyes narrowed. "What do you mean?" I had to know even though it might damage our relationship.

His next words were heartfelt - he was speaking from a place inside where he rarely went. I drew in a deep breath and had to blink my eyes to stop the tears that wanted to fall. "And do not think that I would let you see him alone. I would not be able to. You bring out something in me - and it has nothing to do with my dominance over you - that makes me crazy with jealousy at the mere thought. It is partially because I am Vampire, but the greater part of it is my feelings for you."

That was as close to an "I love you" as I had ever gotten from Eric - him confessing that he was capable of killing another man if he got too close for Eric's comfort. Surprisingly, I wasn't horrified by his admission.

"Fine. Then you have to make this right. Do not hurt him – it's not fair and it would hurt me. Write him on my behalf… something to… to conclude this." I was searching for words. Eric had suddenly left me with none. Somehow I had to get it through that thick head of his how selfish he was being. I had to think that it would matter, or had I completely misjudged him? The Eric I thought I knew wasn't a complete dick, as he was being right now.

He just stared at me - no expression on his face at all - but his eyes told me he probably wanted to throw me across the room. Or throw me down and fuck me. That was the problem. I couldn't read him at all. I couldn't feel him in the bond. He had to be able to shut it off when he didn't want me to know what he was feeling. Now wasn't the time to ask. I started to fidget under his scrutiny, uncomfortable with my lack of clothing, with his admission that he did this to me because he knew I was uncomfortable baring all to him, so to speak. It made me perceive myself with a severe disadvantage to him as he sat there looking oh-so-handsome in his comfy track suit.

Now I knew that he did it deliberately, part of his determination to dominate me sexually, even when we weren't having or talking about sex. I was frustrated but really tried to hide it. It wouldn't help. He was already overreacting because of his jealousy. If there was ever a time to keep my cool, it was now. But it wasn't easy!

Finally he spoke. "So, let me get this straight. This man who could not send you a normal picture of himself, instead disrespecting you by sending you his penis, means something to you." God, would he never get over the fact that Chris had sent me a picture of his junk! It wasn't that big of a deal in this century! Shit, when he had been born they might as well have still been dragging their women around by the hair and hitting them with clubs to fuck them! (The thought of Eric doing that struck me as hilarious.) I opened my mouth to lay into him again, but he held up his hand, silencing me with one warning look.

"He means enough that you defy me, your Bonded and Master, risking the possibility of punishment to do so, over a simple goodbye." The tension thickened in the room. The way he said it made it sound like I was either stupid or insane. "I am still absolute in my final word. You will not see him again." My heart dropped like a stone. This was going to be another repeat of the same argument we'd been having for an hour now. I tried to say something, but he gave me the same look again. I sighed and looked down at the fabric of the couch, feeling defeated. "But, it is not my desire to hurt you. I haven't had this kind of affection for anyone like I do you, except for my child Pam."

He reached out and touched my face, tilting my chin up to make me look at him. I still looked away, unwanted tears starting to fall. He touched one and tasted it, an act that always endeared him to me. "I do not like your tears over dealings with another man. But I do like your tender heart, as you said." He moved closer and put his arm around my shoulders, his other hand pulling me closer into his chest. Then he put his hand over my heart. "I will give you a compromise, if that is acceptable." I tried to raise my head to look at his face but he held me where I was.

"I will glamour this man for you. He will believe that you did say goodbye to him, but he will also lose any thought of sexual or romantic feeling for you. He will believe that you are happily married and will not entertain thoughts of seeing you again. If he sees you in a public place, he will not acknowledge you and will walk in the other direction. This is my compromise. I will not have this man in your life, Dina, even accidentally. And if you see him, you must promise me that you will not call out to him or attempt to engage him in any way whatsoever. This is the compromise I offer you. You will take it or leave it. I tire of this argument, and further defiance will result in punishment."

He looked at me, his mouth a firm, hard line, but the muscles of his jaw were tight. His eyes were again intense and emotional. This was affecting him too. I realized once more, that Eric might be collected and guarded but he was far from an apathetic creature. I had stood firm and received some rough consequences for it. It was time to accept what he gave me and shut up.

"Thank you." I said, thickly. "I can do that."

He held me against his chest for a few more moments, once bending down to lick the tears from my face. I was surprised that he would be so tender with me after such a terrible argument. But that was my Eric. After this, he would probably never bring it up again. "Good. Lets move on with your other contacts," he said, sounding tired.

We went through the rest of the guys. Some were fast and a few needed time for talking and clarifying. We argued at a few points, but both wanted to compromise after the intensity of our last spat. Eric was adamant that if they had sexual feelings for me, I couldn't be alone with them and he would oversee our communications. I also had to assure him I didn't reciprocate said feelings. I think some of these guys living in different states eased his mind. Since I didn't plan on ever cheating and accepted he was in charge, I reluctantly agreed. I also took some time to absorb what he was saying to try to find any loophole he might have left. This was both so I could try to do some of the things I wanted and to avoid being punished. Eric was to the letter and honest to his word. We finally moved on to women. I figured this would be a cake walk.

Eric had a whole different document for the women in my contact list. There were a lot more of them than men and I wondered how he could keep track of all this information. I guessed if there was one good thing about being a Vampire it was that they seemed to have perfect recall. Of that I was envious! I could imagine all the work I could get done with those skills. After scrolling through his document too quickly for me to even see what he had in there, he stopped, made a couple of very decisive clicks, and turned the screen to face me.

"I would like you to tell me about this young woman here," he said without expression, giving me no clue as to what he might be after. The picture was of a slim woman with long dark hair, bright blue eyes, and a bright white smile of beautiful, perfect teeth.

She was on a beach with a lot of people in the background, wearing a yellow bikini. I very nearly smiled at the sight because I remembered it well. Spring break, just under a year ago. I stopped the smile, but had no control over the flip-flop my heart did. "Before you say anything," Eric continued, "she left a response to your post about the positive feedback from your Neuropsychology presentation, and I quote: 'I remember that your ORAL skills were quite good the last time I saw you. Want to hook up for Mardi Gras next year?' Now, you will tell me the absolute truth about your relationship with this woman." He looked at me expectantly, again giving me absolutely no clue as to what he did or didn't know.

"She was only kidding… she's very blunt and cheeky." I began and trailed off. I didn't think he would have such a stick up his ass about chicks. I saw his unhappy expression and decided I really, really didn't want to be punished yet again. "We met briefly and stayed friends online. There is nothing romantic about us. –" He cut me off.

"Nothing romantic? Dina, my slang may not be good as you have pointed out, but I know what she is referring to. "

I gritted my teeth. "As I said – not ROMANTIC. It was just a little sex between friends. Not even really sex-sex. Just… ya know, fooling around some." God, I couldn't believe I was discussing this.

"Dina, tell me the truth. You didn't think I would ask you about your female lovers, did you? You had hoped to gloss over them and flirt with them behind my back. Now you're surprised that I'm asking about them." He stared at me, his eyes flashing. I saw the hurt and pain in his eyes along with the anger. He truly thought I wanted to have relationships outside of this one!

"Eric," I said softly. "No, it isn't what you think. I don't think of any of them that way any more. They are in my past and you are my future. There were strong friendships there along with the occasional sex. It was never done to look for a life partner. It was more, female closeness. I know that's hard for a man to understand, but..." And there he cut me off.

"It does not matter to me whether you considered them as life partners or not. You had sexual relations with this girl, who I happen to know by the way. Amelia Broadway, isn't it? She's a friend of Sookie's."

"I didn't know you knew her..… I thought you may not care with women as much. Its different – just in general. No competition because men and women offer different things. There was maybe only one or two girls I actually dated. And one for sure I have no contact with. Everyone else was just friends I enjoyed bonding with – sharing pleasure with. Half of them were always set on only dating and marrying men. Nothing would change that." I hesitated, no one ever made me so lost for words. "I didn't lie to you."

I never wanted to hurt him. I had no interest in anyone else. Not only was I faithful, but Eric gave me more than anyone ever had. Sexually, he was unparalleled. I was exhausted and sometimes literally sore from his appetites. He also cared for me and accepted me in way no one else had. He didn't get emotional or use the L word like I did, but I didn't doubt his affection. Sometimes I doubted I was capable of ever loving someone after being hurt in the past and being so strong willed – could I really let someone that close to me and share myself? I realized this was probably more the pain of loss talking than anything else, but this thought lingered with me for a long time. Eric proved to me I could love and I could give myself to someone. I hoped he felt my love for him.

He looked at me for a long time as if trying to figure something out. I wasn't lying to him. Hell, I couldn't! If I did, that damn bond would have me wrapped up in all kinds of punishment! Eric was absolutely it for me. If we ever broke up, I didn't know if I would ever see anyone again. Finally he spoke. "I believe you, but I want this made clear. You will cut off all communication with her. I felt your feelings for her when you saw her picture. I will take no chances. But, I will allow you to write one last time to say goodbye. I will of course read it before you send it, and you will make it clear in no uncertain terms that you cannot see her again."

"Even though I have no emotional interest in her beyond friendship? And what if we run into her – you know her, we travel in the same circles." I said, surprised how he was taking this. He had my body, heart, mind and soul. A friend who I enjoyed some oral sex with was no threat to our relationship.

"This is just like the argument we had about your male... interests!" he raised his voice a few notches, threw aside the computer roughly, and stood up. He walked around the living room a few times, running his fingers through his hair. Finally he stopped at looked me, and I was ready for the shit storm. "You may not have noticed, but I have! You are trying to compensate for everyone's feelings in this situation, except for mine! Does it even matter to you that I am Your Bonded? You think I am being selfish, well maybe I am a bit selfish, and possessive, but there is a reason for that. Don't you understand the reason? I need you, Dina! The thought of losing you is like a thousand stakes through my heart, and I feel that these people are a threat. Trust me, I will avoid traveling in any circle with Bill and Sookie, so I doubt that we will encounter Miss Broadway. I could ban you from contacting her this last time, but I thought I was giving a fair compromise by allowing it. But it is never enough for you, is it?" He stood there looking defeated, and my heart ached for him. I wanted to stand by my convictions, but at what cost?

"Eric…its not that. Of course I think about your feelings – but they are misplaced. You can trust me. You ask me to trust you. I've never had anyone try to take away people in my life for any good reason. I can't imagine anyone would find it healthy… I, I would never hurt you. I just want you to trust me too. I wouldn't leave you." I took a deep breath, feeling yet another crying jag coming on. "If you really need me to say goodbye and let it go, I will. I just want your trust, because it hurts me not to have it." I desperately wanted to hold him. "Eric, don't you have any idea how special you are? There is NO ONE on this earth who could ever compare to you in any way, shape, or form. How can you even think that I would consider doing anything with someone else when I have you?" The tears had started to fall and I could not stop them. "Will you please come here? I need to feel your touch."

"Dina, it is not a matter of trust, or at least not trusting you. I do trust you!' He came over and knelt in front of me, his hands on my thighs. I wanted to scream at him to get rid of the damn spreader bar but I knew it would do more harm than good to make that demand right now. His head was hanging down onto his chest, his beautiful golden hair barely touching my skin. He looked up at me and I saw that pain in his eyes, and I felt like a thousand stakes had penetrated my heart. "My trust for you is absolute. It is them I do not trust. I also fear for my reaction if one of them were to embrace you or touch you inappropriately. I might be unable to control my instinct to protect, at the very least, let alone if it struck a chord of jealousy with me. Someone could be badly hurt, or even killed, before I stopped to consider what I was doing!" He hung his head and I was finally able to understand one of his reasons for wanting these people out of my life - their own safety! But what shocked me more was that his feelings for me would be what brought it out! I cursed these damned restraints for the ump-teenth time as, unable to reach out to him, I leaned forward and awkwardly brushed my face against the top of his head.

He cupped my face with his hands and kissed me desperately, like his life depended on it. As we looked into each other's eyes, a new level of understanding grew between us. I now knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that it was not just the urge to possess me that he felt. He would stop at nothing to protect me, take care of me, fulfill my needs, satisfy me, encourage me, help me live up to my potential and try to realize my dreams. He wasn't going anywhere. Ever. The bond told me that, what little of it he now let me feel, and so did his eyes.

Nearly overwhelmed, I took a deep breath and tried to convey back the same message. To the best of my ability, I would do the same for him. "I don't think either of us wants to hurt each other. If Amelia's and my history threatens you, I'll cut ties. I'm not terribly close with her. I am less okay giving up childhood friends I might have slept with. I hope you will trust that many of them are married to other people now and none of them live in this state. Is that enough for you?" I asked, praying we didn't fight again.

He stared at me again with that look that I had come to understand was a look of assessment. He was trying to decide how to deal with my stubbornness in the wake of his determination to have the final word on everything. I wondered if he was regretting bringing such a strong-willed woman into his life and hoped he would continue to compromise with me. "I am struggling with this," he finally said. "To me, it does not matter if it is a man or a woman. If you have had sexual relations with someone, I want them out of your life. How long you have known the person has no relevance to me. Do you see where the problem lies?"

He cupped my cheeks and stared at me with a fond but troubled look on his face before moving back up to sit next to me on the couch. He turned his body to face me and maneuvered me so that I was sitting sideways more-or-less "indian-style" with the damned bar proving very inconvenient. He grabbed all the decorative pillows from the other furniture and propped them behind me to give me a comfy place to lean. He seemed to need contact; he put his hands on my knees, alternately moving them up to caress my thighs, or down to touch my calves.

"The final say here will be mine but I need you to help me understand why I should not cut your ties completely to all of these people."

"I... I don't know if I can explain this to you. Do you have anyone besides Pam that you love? Anyone from your past, who you don't see often but never want to lose? Do you still reminisce and enjoy reading about what's happening in the places you are from? Does the promise to remain friends forever mean anything to you?" I paused, not really expecting answers from him. "I understand how you feel. I am with you 100% about people who I might have had romantic feelings for or could picture myself with if I didn't have you. But that simply isn't the case with most of the people I know. I do know you are okay with casual sex between yourself and fangbangers even while you're with me – I'll be honest and say that I wish you didn't think that way. I am okay with sex between friends who care about one another but would only do that before I was with you. Trust me when I say it means nothing in regard to our relationship. Even our sex is different, because I love you and have given you the ability to cut ties with people I love no matter how much it hurts me. I don't think you have any idea of just how much more I've given you than anyone in my past, and I'm not even talking about the Dominant and submissive part of our relationship. That's a whole separate issue."

He tilted his head to the side and gave me that appraising stare. It was starting to make me nervous because he continued to keep his side of the bond almost completely closed to me as well. "When I took you as mine I had no intention of altering my lifestyle in any way because of your presence in my life. I make no promises but I will tell you that I am reassessing that plan. I believe you asked me not to 'rub your face in it.' I stand by my word. I want to cause no hurt to you because of my activities away from our home." My heart sank and soared at the same time. He was considering giving up the fangbangers! I hoped he would make his decision in favor of that. It humiliated me as his Bonded when everyone knew that he cheated on me at will and I had no choice but to let him do it. I guessed he had a reputation to uphold. "But that does not change your position. You are mine and will not be involved with others, male or female, unless I bring them in to our relationship! We will handle each person in your contact list as we go along. Let me think on Amelia and I will come to a decision later." At this point, that was all I could ask.

He settled back down with the computer. We marked off which girls I had 'relations' with, how I and said girl felt about one another, and if they were seeing or married to someone else now. Eric decided he needed a day or so to think things over. He said he planned on letting me contact my family tomorrow and we would feed them the same story my facebook told. As far as anyone knew, I took a new job as his personal assistant. Due to the inconvenience, that propelled me to quit school and re-enroll later, I was given an advance and used it for a vacation.

I didn't have a lot of reception and rarely turned my phone on. I had minimal access to the internet as well, but really wanted some down time. I was about to embark on long hours working for a difficult man. Eric agreed he could be difficult. I nearly snorted – talk about an under statement. He said we'd tell we began to date later. We could weave a great little fable about a workplace romance. He assured me I wasn't really lying – we were acting more than anything else. After all, he joked, it was at my work that our relationship had begun.

And it was certainly better than the alternative: the truth. I don't think anyone would react well to me becoming a 24/7 submissive to a 1000+ year old Vamp. I was too caught up to notice, but Eric told me I was hungry. Once again this bond was fucking weird. Since when did I need someone else to tell me I wanted food?

"I am going to cook for you, Love," Eric announced.

"You are what?" I stared at him incredulously. Eric was a Vampire! They didn't cook!

"Trust me," he said, smiling. He rearranged the pillows to my liking, and I was basically reclining lengthwise on the couch, the spreader bar still inconveniently keeping me open wide for him. But the way he arranged the pillows took a lot of the strain off my shoulders, neck, back, and wrists. I wished he would just take them off! What was his purpose in keeping me restrained this long? Apparently I would have some time to ponder this, because he put the TV on to the channel where they talk about crimes and how they were solved (we found that we both enjoyed this), gave me a couple of lingering kisses on the lips, and headed for the kitchen smiling enigmatically.

Trust him. That was all he was ever asking for, wasn't it?

EPOV

She looked skeptical as I got up and headed into the kitchen. I chuckled to myself. She was going to get a huge surprise! She didn't know I'd gone to cooking school for a while in the 1980s as part of a bet with Pam. A bet that I had won, of course. We had both attended different classes and at the end had cooked for Mr. Cataliades, my lawyer, and his family. We'd just bought a restaurant and Pam had made a snide remark about me cooking for the customers myself. Cataliades had been there going over contracts with us. He was the perfect taste-tester because he had a very sensitive palate and was aware that we were Vampire. He wasn't afraid of either of us and would judge us both equally. I had made the best tasting meal, which had required Pam to act as the head chef in the kitchen for two weeks. She still refused to laugh when I teased her about it. We still owned the restaurant - a very classy and upscale place that catered to a lot of different palates. We were very popular with Supes for that reason. Not many places around Shreveport offered deep-fried Elk Brain "poppers" or Moose Tartar with the moose specially flown in from Canada. We were particularly busy immediately before and after the full moon, when the animal urge is strong. We did not stock the restaurant supplies ourselves. We had three managers, one shifter, one werewolf, and one were-lion (very rare and we were lucky to have him). They did the physical running of the restaurant and reported to my day man. That job had been Burnham's, but it now fell to Sean. I would have to take Dina to my restaurant soon and have them spoil her, see what kind of damage Burnham might have done, and fix it.

Earlier I had taken a New York Strip steak out of the freezer and defrosted it in the microwave. I had left it partially frozen so that it would not spoil and now, as I removed it from the microwave, it was just slightly cooler than room temperature. Quickly I added coarse salt and freshly ground pepper to the meat, both sides, and left it to rest on the plate.

"Eric? Do you need any help?" she called from the other room. I could hear the nervousness in her voice. She probably thought I was going to make her a blood shake or something along those lines.

"No, I do not, but thank you!" I called back, rolling my eyes. My culinary skills were significantly better than what she must be imagining. I got the burner going with the frying pan and oil, glad now that I had opted for professional-grade appliances and cookware even though I did not use them for myself. It would heat in a matter of minutes, but in the meantime I got out the mashed potatoes from the refrigerator. I regretted not having time to make fresh, but I still had a number of things that I wanted to do tonight before the dawn forced me into slumber. I scooped a serving-sized portion into a microwave bowl and held it up to my face. My sense of smell was a thousand times better than it had been when I was human. Food was no longer appetizing to me, but my culinary courses had taught me that I could memorize the exact smell of foods and seasonings, measurements of spices and other additions, and the way the colors of foods changed as they cooked. These potatoes were fairly good but needed more seasoning. I melted some butter, taking the time to chop a very small amount of fresh chives and parsley. I mixed these, along with a small amount of salt, into the potatoes and set them aside. I could tell that the pan for the steak was hot enough; tiny wisps of white smoke swirling above it. I picked up the pan and rolled it around to coat the bottom with the oil and then carefully laid the steak in the center before setting it back down.

The emotions coming from Dina through the bond were quite lively. I could feel her fretting, and I wondered what exactly was giving her the most trouble. Now was one of those times when I wished I had Sookie's telepathy. I had been brutal in cutting quite a few of her facebook and other contacts out of her life. She wanted to be able to say goodbye to them and explain, but I saw no need for that. She would never see them again and so had no need to fear any type of confrontation at a later date. She had argued about letting them down easy, but I didn't give a warlock's ass about their feelings. She was mine now. If anyone wanted to dispute that they would have to take it up with me and not her. I almost hoped one of them would come to Fangtasia one night and see us together, and decide to say something. It would give me great satisfaction to crush them. I didn't mean that literally, because her tender heart would break if I physically hurt anyone who wanted to challenge me for her affections. But they would receive no easy letdown from me. I didn't apply this attitude only toward the men. I knew full well that Dina was bisexual and had had female suitors as well as male. The overtly male part of me had briefly considered letting her keep contact with her female paramours so that I could engage in sex with both of them together. But I'd quashed that idea almost immediately. It would be unfair to her, and I was not about to play second fiddle for any woman who predominantly wanted to be with my Dina and was only with me because she had to be in order to be with Dina. No, that would not be happening, ever.

My darling Dina had sought to pull the wool over my eyes when it came to her female contacts. She had tried to play them off as "just friends." It was well within my right to punish her for this. My blood was boiling under the surface but she had no idea. When we retired to the bedroom for the rest of the night, I would make perfectly clear how I felt about things.

She had purchased broccoli on our last shopping trip and had cut it up sometime, probably while I rested. I measured out a perfect serving and put it in the microwave to steam. I'd turned the steak over midway through the cooking process and now felt it with my finger. Medium. Perfect. I took it out of the pan and put it on a covered plate. It would cook to medium-well while it rested. My Bonded might prefer her meat rarer, but I would not cook it that way for her. I was very conscious of food-borne bacteria and would not risk her health. I quickly made a pan sauce with some organic beef stock - I was not going to feed her anything with alcohol in it either, unless she was getting tipsy for the purpose of us getting tipsy together when I drank her blood. I had done it before with Fangbangers whom I felt comfortable with. It was quite an enjoyable experience and I looked forward to our doing it together.

I sliced the steak into bite-sized pieces, plated the potatoes and sauced them along with the meat. I added a generous piece of butter to the broccoli and seasoned it with something called "Jane's Mixed Up Salt." She used that a lot to season her cooked vegetables. I decided to take the salt with me in case she wanted a bit more. "Dina?" I called to her.

"Yes Eric?" she responded immediately. I smiled. I had sensed her sleeping in the bond over the last 15 minutes. She was tuned enough to the sound of my voice to wake and answer me. That pleased me greatly.

"What would you like to drink?"

"How about a pop from the fridge?" she asked. "Is that okay?"

"Anything you want, Dearest!" I called back. I would give her no indication of my true mood until we went to bed. I opened the refrigerator and located a can of Pepsi. It was a strange drink with a bubbly texture called carbonation. Obviously, no such thing had existed when I was human. There were times when our water wasn't clean so even the children drank mead or wine. I had taken a sniff at this Pepsi once. It irritated my nose. But Dina loved it. I got out a glass and filled it halfway with ice, then poured the drink down the side like I had seen her do. She said it was to avoid the foam bubbling over and out of the glass. I took her word for it. I got a straw that bent, and headed to the table where she usually dined. I set everything down and went to collect her.

She looked sleepy when I entered the room but smiled brightly at me. If my heart was still beating, her smile would make it skip. It always sent a warm feeling through me because I knew that particular smile was reserved only for me. I had seen her smiling and laughing when interacting with friends, but never the way she smiled at me. I smiled back. "Are you ready to eat?"

"Yes, if you'll let me out of all this stuff," she shook her bound hands behind her and swayed her knees back and forth, "I'll come in with you."

I smiled devilishly. She had been wearing my handcuffs and spreader bar for quite a long while this evening, but I was not quite ready to set her free. I didn't do as she asked. Instead I picked her up and put her over my shoulder, spanking her ass soundly. She shrieked at me. "Behave yourself Lover!" I warned her. "You are still at my mercy!" She made a sound of frustration and I chuckled quietly. I set her down in the chair that I had prepared earlier. I had attached leather cuffs to the front chair legs, and I fastened her ankles to those. Then I took a very wide strap and wrapped it around her middle, just under her breasts. At the back were several adjustable buckles which I tightened enough so that she couldn't bend forward. When I fed her, she would have to wait for me to bring the food to her mouth. She had absolutely no control over the situation and I knew this would frustrate her immensely. But this was part of the training. She needed to learn to depend completely on me for what she needed. If I had to tie her to a chair and feed every meal to her, so be it. She would give up this incessant need to control every situation and relinquish it to me.

"Eric, it's too tight!" she protested. "I can hardly breathe!" I took my fingers and felt the strap. I could put two fingers between it and her skin without it being overly tight.

"Breathe deeply for me, now!" I ordered her. She took a couple of shaky breaths. "No," I said in a calmer voice. "Breathe. Here. I will do it with you." Just like I had when she had been punished, I knelt, put my hand on her chest, and sent a wave of calm at her through the bond. I began to breathe loudly through my mouth and continued to do so until her breaths matched mine and she had calmed. "Do you see? It is not too tight. You are fine." I stood up and folded my arms, staring sternly down at her. "You need to learn not to..." I searched for a modern term to say what I meant. "...not to freak out when I bind you restrictively. This is nothing compared to what I will do in the future. We are working slowly toward a goal here. I need your cooperation. Give up this need to control everything. Relax and let me take care of you. Trust, Dina. I need your trust." She blinked up at me while I lectured her but when it was time for her to respond, she looked away. "Look a me, Dina!" I demanded.

She brought her gaze back to mine but dropped her eyes again. While I enjoyed this act of submission, I wanted her to tell me how she felt. Before I could order her to speak, she did. "This is overwhelming… I don't know if I'm doing well or not. We are working toward how I feel about my body. We are working toward you binding me worse than now. We are having you take my friends and family from me – potentially at least, since you are still debating. I don't know if you are expecting too much or I am not doing this well enough." I waited a moment and tried to think of how I really felt. "I trust you. But I don't always know exactly what we are aiming for."

I felt a lot of mixed feelings coming from her and realized that I had caused this turmoil within her. On one hand she was frustrated and angry, feeling almost rebellious. On the other hand she was confused, sad, but also hopeful. I did not want to break her the way many Vampires did their humans, and realized that if I didn't tread lightly, I could have that same kind of result. "Perhaps I am not open enough with you, I don't share the goals we are working toward with you so you don't know why we do some things. While I feed you, I want you to ask me all of the questions you have been suppressing. You have no need to fear punishment. And, before you ask, I will not remove your bindings so that you can feed yourself. It gives me pleasure to provide you with nourishment, because you get pleasure from it too, and also because you nourish me in every way. I appreciate this very much. Your willingness to share your blood with me, as much of it as I have wanted, means a great deal to me. You are sacrificing part of your life's force so that mine can continue. This is generous beyond measure and I respect you for it." I took the cover off the dish and held my hand above it. It was still warm. This was a special dish for keeping a meal warm when someone was delayed in eating. I had purchased several for her. I took up a bite of steak and dipped it in the potatoes and gravy as I had often seen her do. "Open!" I ordered gently. She accepted the food and her expression became rapturous.

I watched her chew and felt her enjoyment. She relaxed when she knew she wouldn't be punished. I was still going to exert my dominance over her and doubted she would enjoy that. I tried to decode her emotions as they rolled through our bond. It must be so hard to feel so much. I honestly didn't remember. "So how am I doing… Are we close to these goals I know little about? Are we on schedule?" she asked after she swallowed.

I stopped to think about her question. I hadn't really designed a rubric for our relationship so I could "grade" her. My little academic seemed to think everything was pass/fail.

"And by the way," she continued, accepting more of her meal from me, how did you learn to cook like that? Are you hiding Bobby Flay in the kitchen?"

"Who is Bobby Flay?" I demanded sharply, set off by the mention of a man who was not on her contact list. Was she hiding him from me? If so, why? To my consternation, she laughed.

"Eric, I don't know Bobby Flay!" she continued laughing. "Haven't you ever seen the Food Network? He is a very prominent chef who specializes in meat. Your steak is amazing. I was teasing you!" She looked at me apologetically, her lower lip sticking out just a bit. Well, I had overreacted.

I smiled sheepishly, then turned cocky and cupped my crotch with my hand. "I have some meat for you that's better than anything he'll ever serve!"

She winked at me, licked her lips, and said flirtatiously, "Oooohh, I think I'm a lot hungrier than I was a minute ago!"

We smiled at each other, enjoying our playful banter that always cleared the tension in the room. I leaned in and kissed her hard, a kiss full of promise, and threat. I let my fangs scratch her and licked up the blood. I felt and smelled her arousal. I reached down with my hand and plunged two fingers deep inside her. It was sudden and she gasped, but she was already wet for me. I wanted to bend her over the kitchen table right now and fuck her, but we had things to talk about. I brought my fingers to her mouth, and she opened for me automatically. I pushed them deep into her throat where my cock had been earlier. To my delight, she suppressed her gag reflex and cleaned them easily with her tongue.

"There are many things that you are doing very well on," I told her as I fed her. "One thing that pleases me very much is your ability to withstand the restraint that I put you in as I make it tighter, more restrictive, and hold you that way for longer periods of time. It serves two purposes. One is to teach you that your body is mine and I will do with it what I please. The second is that I simply enjoy it. I want you to enjoy it too. With time, you will feel a sense of security in my bindings because they hold you to me. You may not believe me now, but it will come." She pressed her lips together as I said this, probably remembering her punishment more than anything.

"I do not tell you this often enough, but your blood is sacred to me. I will repeat myself because it is very important to me. And you give it to me freely, not only what I need, but also what I want. Many Vampires do not appreciate this gift from their humans, but I do. I respect you and hold you in the highest esteem for your gift. You give me your life's essence so that my life's essence does not fade away. I will protect you, and yes I will be very possessive of you, because you are literally my life. There, I have told you twice. I do not want you to ever forget. Ask me specifically, one at a time, the things you worry about. I can better answer that way."

"Well, I was going to ask about modesty, but… How is you feeding from me different than the offers you get from fangbangers? They would love to feed you." She asked confused and curious.

I knew she knew she was always more than a fangbanger and how sacred our bond was. I had to put this delicately as to not hurt her feelings. My prejudices and view of humans was a sore topic for My Dina. "This may be difficult for you to hear, but I will tell you the truth. Vampires in general do not think highly of the humans around them who preen and prattle off to us what they want. They want us to fuck them, drink from them, turn them. Please understand that I have lived on this Earth for a thousand years. Humans die. The lifetime of a human is very short to someone like me." I tried to keep my voice soft and gentle because I knew she would take this personally. She did not know that her life would go on past the lifetimes of everyone she knew. She did not know that I was going to turn her. Now she looked down at her lap, her feelings hurt because of my words. I had to make it right.

I leaned forward and put my hands on her thighs, caressing them with my fingers. "Yes, you are human, but those harsh words don't apply to you. I was attracted to you the moment I met you. You are very beautiful, but at first I thought you must not be very smart when you took on those fanatics to save that baby Vampire. He didn't know how to defend himself yet, to use his fangs, his speed, his strength. He still thought like a human. You saved his life. He wanted me to tell you how grateful he was but I was reluctant to approach you."

"Why?" she wanted to know, finally looking into my eyes.

There was another secret that she didn't yet know. "I will tell you later." I let my voice and my eyes tell her that the subject was dropped - for now. She seemed to accept this – but I felt her anxiety and irritation. I was proud she held her tongue. The reason I was reluctant to approach her was that I had very serious thoughts about kidnapping her, taking her against her will because I wanted her. But I knew I couldn't do that. I couldn't risk having her hate me or do something destructive to herself if she thought she couldn't get away from me… I wondered how she'd react when she knew I had considered taking her and spied on her. It wasn't terribly uncommon to steal a woman you wanted. It still happened in a number of places in the world. I doubted she'd handle the information well.

"In his defense, they did have silver." She began. "How am I doing with the things you want from me? Specifically the bondage and my modesty?"

I once again had to be delicate. I wanted her to simply 'get over it'. I honestly couldn't say she wasn't trying, it was just so very difficult for her. I would never get her body hang-ups nor the idea that she wanted to cover herself when I'd seen every last inch of her. Pam hadn't had as many issues overcoming modesty as my little one and she grew up covering most of her body in layers of clothes. I truly didn't understand her perspective nor the contrast between her and Pam in the issue. I wasn't judging; I was just perplexed. I sighed. "With regard to the bondage, you are getting stronger very rapidly. Even when you've taken my blood, there were injuries from the day before- such as at your doctor's appointment. Marks from ropes, handcuffs, leather things, are easier to heal with you taking less blood. Your body is getting much stronger and you are not panicking as much as when we first started. I think we need to restrain you every day or at least most days, so being bound isn't an unnatural state to you. I promise you, I have plenty of experience and our bond to rely on, there will never be harm done to you or risks taken with your life." I felt her recoil as I told her my plans to start binding her daily. I had already felt anger and irritation when I voiced my views about humans and told her to wait with her question. So far, she hadn't argued with me and had controlled herself well.

"First I feel compelled to make one comment," I told her. There was something I was afraid she didn't grasp. "What we are doing now, and will do in the next few days, weeks, or even months, is not necessarily going to be 'normal' for us. We have to work our way around to what feels right. So, if I say today that I'm going to do something, like binding you every day, we may find that it doesn't meet the need we were trying to get to by doing it, and stop. Does that make sense?" She looked at me with that straight-mouthed-brows-down-over-the-eye look that always meant there was something she wanted to say but either feared or was reluctant to say for another reason. I held my finger up briefly, which just made the look on her face more intense. "To give you answers specifically about the two things you mentioned, I am reasonably pleased but not 100% happy with the way things have gone. Before you think you need to defend yourself, the fault, if that is the right word, belongs to both of us. Dina, you are remarkably high spirited, and I like that about you. But that high spirit leads you to question and challenge me in areas where you should be trusting me and accepting what I teach you. Your modesty will only go away with time; there is nothing we can do to change the course of that. You may always be more modest than I want you to be, but you may always be more modest than I want you to be, but I do want you to know that I have to plans to willingly put you on display without proper clothing for others to see. You may take comfort in the fact that I can prohibit anyone, even a king, from touching or speaking to you. If we are put in a tough political situation, we will do what we must without allowing anyone else your blood or body to use – but they could possibly ask to view you. Or, if you put me in a position where my control over you was questioned, I would have to reestablish my dominance in front of those present. That is a warning to heed. With regard to the bondage, you are becoming more flexible and able to withstand it for longer and longer periods, which is good. We will continue to work on that. You are sexy when you are bound, but I also show it to teach you that your body is mine to control and only by my will are you able to move around unrestrained. This translates out to every other part of our relationship in different ways." Now that I was finished, I hoped she would say whatever it was causing her face to become so red trying NOT to say.

"Why is everything so overwhelming with us sometimes? Ugh…okay, when will things get normal? Is this trial and error? Do you have a plan?" I watched her straining, both physically and emotionally. She needed to stop fighting her bonds. It only made me realize she needed to be restrained more often, until it was natural for her. I knew she wanted a regular routine and to feel stable. Eventually that would come, but it was going to be a long hard road getting there.

"That depends on how long it takes for you to become comfortable submitting to me. You still fight me and question me – not like this. Not us talking, but you do rebel at times. Even now you are moving against your restraints. They are meant to keep you how I want you. You should embrace them… I have a plan and it changes as the situation calls for it to."

"Embrace my restraints?" her eyebrows shot up in what I thought might be a good imitation of myself. "I don't understand that at all!"

"The restraints I put on you may bind your limbs so that they cannot move, but they also serve as a metaphor for how you are bound to me. When a submissive shows no objection to her bonds it signifies her trust. You, on the other hand, show mild objection to the restraints, which shows me that I do not have your trust completely."

"But I do trust you!" she cried out, interrupting me. Clearly this was one point about which she was completely confused and frustrated.

"Do not interrupt me again!" I corrected her mildly, not wanting this to escalate into another argument. "Yes, you do trust me. You trust me not to hurt you, you trust me to drink from you, you trust me in many ways. But the deep down trust, for example the kind of trust that would have you walking into death with open eyes trusting that I would get you out the other side alive, that I do not have. If I took you to the top of a high cliff and asked you to jump, would you? Think carefully before you give me a knee-jerk answer here."

She turned her thoughts inward for a moment and I could see the wheels turning, but finally she would not meet my eyes, and I had the answer.

"This is what I mean, Dina. You know that I am a thousand times stronger than you. You know that I can fly. You know that I could easily catch you and bear you away to safety, but you would be unable to take that last step. That is the trust that we are missing, and that is the trust that I want."

"You're going to ask me to jump off a cliff someday?" She wondered, still mildly confused by the issue.

I reached out to touch her face. "I don't have any plans to, but never say never!" I smiled, trying to make a joke. Her answering smile was small and she dropped her eyes again. I decided to drop the subject and continue on with her question. "Your restraints, I hope, will also become a source of security to you." There was that look of consternation again. "Think about this. Why are those restraints on you right now?"

"Because you put them there," she said, shaking her head. "Beyond that I have no idea."

"If they were not there, what, or should I say who, might also be missing from your life?" It only took her a few seconds to get this one.

"You mean you would leave me if I didn't let you do this to me?" she cried out.

I sighed. "No. That is not at all what I mean. But it is me putting them there, isn't it? If I weren't here, neither would they be." I paused to give this some time to sink in. She nodded after a few minutes, and I thought I was finally making sense. "I know it is true that other relationships don't involve so many extra complications. But I am a true dominant, and this is the type of relationship I desire. It makes me very very happy that you agreed to do this with me." She still couldn't lean forward in her chair so I got to my knees in front of her, wrapped my arms around her, and kissed her lips softly. Then I kissed her a bit harder, and finally I kissed her fiercely, showing all of my dominance and possessiveness in that one little act. When I released her, we were both breathing hard. Her eyes were dark, and she looked at me with undisguised lust. I smirked at her, leaned in again, and bit her neck. She moaned as soon as my fangs pierced her flesh. I knew just how to touch her and used my fingers to bring her to a hard climax in just a few seconds. As soon as she came the taste of her blood changed, and it made my cock strain against my pants like it would climb out itself if I didn't release it. I reached down and adjusted it painfully. I was saving my lust for when we went to bed. Before we did that, I needed this talk out of the way. As I licked her wound closed and healed it, I laid my head on her chest to hear her still accelerated heart, loving the power I had over her. She had plenty of power over me too but I chose not to always show it. She rested her cheek on top of my head and we both remained still and silent until we were calm again.

"Come lover, I want to take you to bed." I began to undo her from the chair. I was going to continue to show my dominance. I had an urge to do so because of how she argued with me tonight. I had been calming myself so I wouldn't be too rough with her. I had to be responsible with her. She had entrusted her body, health, and safety to me. I wouldn't pull a dominance move or punish her while I was still so angry. I still remembered my anger at her defiance and the thought of her wanting contact with those who had known her body. I would endeavor to make her know I owned her. Our mating would be a true claiming tonight.