Mastered: Ten Tales of Sensual Surrender by Kate Pearce, Portia Da Costa, Opal Carew, Marie Harte, Jennifer Leeland, Madelynne Ellis, Emily Ryan-Davis, Carrie Ann Ryan, Joey Hill, T. J. Michaels, Sasha White Read Free Book Online Page A

got rid of the panties and then lay back down, guiding her legs up over his hips so he could slide back in to the hilt. She let out a keening cry, arching up to him.
    “That’s my servant,” he murmured, kissing her jaw. He worked his way down from there, and her fingers tightened in his hair as he bit, taking a pull on that vein in her throat. He wanted her to feel the rush of lightheadedness, the reminder that her life was in his hands. Her pussy clutched him, a ripple of response, telling him the knowledge only made her want him to thrust deeper, drink harder.
    I would give you anything, my lord. My life is yours.
    Did she know he was in her mind? He didn’t say anything, wanting to know if she would say anything further. She didn’t, but he felt that sadness again.
    Finished, he closed the bite mark before propping himself on one arm to look down at her. She gave him a smile, touched his mouth, running her thumb over the residual blood there. She usually kept her hands to herself until he commanded otherwise, and he always discouraged intimate little touches like that in the aftermath. Had he let this go too far? He was about to say something to take them off this too-intimate track, but she spoke first.
    “I have the Helsinki figures processed,” she said. “Once you’re ready, my lord, we can go over them.”
    “All right,” he said. “Go back to the lab. I’ll get dressed and join you there.”
    He rolled off her reluctantly, watched her put her feet down on the opposite side of the bed. The curve of her back under her thin shirt was a vulnerable curve. She found her panties and skirt, slipped them back on, tucked in the shirt as well. She was talking, more information about the Helsinki data, but for once he wasn’t picking up on any of that. Just watching her body language. Stiff, unsure, the language of someone holding a great deal inside.
    Picking up her shoes, she nodded. “See you shortly, then.”
    “All right.” He watched her cross the room and leave him, closing the door behind her. He listened to her pad down the hallway in her bare feet, head up the stairs. There was a pause there, as if she put on the shoes, but when he put out a questing tendril in her mind, he found she’d stopped for other reasons. She had her temple against the wall halfway up the stairs, her hand gripped tight on the railing. He felt that squeezing ache inside her, then she shoved it down, continued up the steps.
    They’d gone through this in the first couple years, her adapting to the necessary reality of their relationship. He knew it had been painful for her, a difficult transition. So it was best to let it be, not re-open that can of worms. Human servants went through emotional ups and downs through the first fifty years or so of their service. All vampires knew this.
    But in his extensive demographic data collection on servants, he’d discovered something less widely known. There was a greater mortality rate for full servants in those first fifty years than in any other time of their 300 year lifespan. Nearly forty percent of servants never made it past the half-century mark in a vampire’s service.
    A little over eighteen percent were executed by their Master or Mistress. While being fully marked was a human’s choice, unfortunately the understanding of what carrying three marks meant often didn’t become clear until the deed was done. Because the vampire world operated in the shadows of the human world, and secrecy was of utmost importance, a fully marked servant couldn’t simply be released from service when they proved unsuitable. Such executions were done as humanely as possible, a cold comfort to the human, he was sure.
    He’d at least come up with a way to deal with that, a mark remover combined with a mind eraser that was fairly effective. It was tremendously disorienting for the human, but the secret of vampire existence was protected, and the servant’s life could be spared. Like most of his