Rebecca's Lost Journals, Volume 4: My Master (Inside Out #1.4)

Rebecca's Lost Journals, Volume 4: My Master (Inside Out #1.4)

Lisa Renee Jones



Journal number . . . ?

(It’s been so long since I wrote, I don’t remember), Entry number 1





Friday, May 4, 2012

7:00 a.m.

I

woke up with tears streaming down my face, lost in a dream, unsure where I was . . . a dream, or was it a nightmare? How can anything “he” is in be a nightmare? But how can it not be, if I’m this tormented in its aftermath?

I was standing naked in my Master’s private chambers, in a room filled with red and white roses. They were everywhere, the scent of them sweet and seductive, the smell of romance and passion. My skin was ivory perfection, more beautiful than I ever remembered it being. My hair was dark silk that flowed down my shoulders. I didn’t feel like Rebecca Mason. I felt like someone else. Someone compelling and enchantingly sexy.

He entered the room, standing before me fully clothed. It was part of his power, him being dressed. Me being naked. I liked his power. It excited me. It made me burn. To be possessed by such a man, this man, was everything I wanted, everything I craved.

He held out his hand. “It’s time.”

Nervous excitement shot through me. Yes. I will be his. And then, suddenly I was at the door of a large room with an octagonal stage. There were theater-like seats filled with rows of people. I felt a sudden surge of panic, a need to turn and run away.

“I’ve never claimed anyone as mine publicly,” he said softly, stroking my hair. “Only you.”

A knot formed in my chest and my belly. This was his way of showing me commitment; maybe the only way he knew how to show it. He was claiming me and asking for my acceptance into this community, and both things meant something to him. I had to do this for him, no matter how uncomfortable it made me feel.

He stepped forward, heading down the aisle leading to the stage, and I knew to follow, to keep my head down. I was his submissive, his slave, and he was a respected Master among what he considered his peers. I understood the dynamics, even if they weren’t easy for me to navigate—not in public. Not during any of the times when he involved other people in our time together.

I was glad to have my head down, relieved not to have to see the eyes I felt like heavy, wet blankets on my skin. I didn’t want these people to see me. I didn’t want them to want me, yet I felt the lust and hunger of those watching me, clawing at me, suffocating me.

Once I was on the stage he turned me to face him, his hands sliding to my face, his eyes finding mine. “Do you know how proud I am of you? How perfect you are?”

The rest of the room faded away. There was only him, and the moment he turned me to the crowd and announced me as his. He then pressed on my shoulders and I knew to kneel down, lowering my head, my hands outstretched, palms flat on the floor as he’d taught me. A long line of people began to line up to come to the stage and, one by one, they touched my hair, my back, my arms. I could feel myself shake, and not from arousal. He was sharing me again, and it shook me to the core, no matter what the reason, no matter what the rules specific to this club said, that this was part of my being accepted publicly. I tried to fight the shivers running through me, but I couldn’t. I slid into a dark place in my mind but it wasn’t shelter enough. Every touch of a stranger’s hand sent another shiver down my spine, and my eyes burned until tears streaked my cheeks.

And that’s when I woke up, crying as I had been in my sleep, the scent of roses teasing my nostrils (so very real, though it was imaginary), my gaze sweeping his bedroom, where I’d been sleeping with him for months now. It took a moment to realize where I was, and why I was alone. He was out of town and would be until Tuesday. “He” being my lover, my Master, and, I fear, soon my heartache. The bed was empty without him, the house emptier, but clearly my dreams and my thoughts were not. They were rich with a growing sense of unease.

I’m in the living room now, his living room, a cup of piping-hot coffee beside me, and the television is on, but my efforts to stop my mind from racing aren’t working. Now, for the first time in months, I’m forcing myself to do more than jot down random thoughts here or there as has become my habit, or rather lack of one. I’m going to start writing down what I feel again, and face what is bothering me.

And I know there is plenty bothering me. The nightmares of my mother trying to kill me have been back for a month, but now I’ve apparently decided to keep things interesting and have nightmares about the man I love. Who doesn’t love me.

There it is. No more analysis needed. One journal entry, and I’ve solved the mystery that isn’t a mystery.

He. Doesn’t. Love. Me.

It’s that simple, and yet it’s complicated in so many ways, starting with the fact that I know he cares about me in the way he believes is the ultimate showing of affection and commitment. He simply doesn’t believe in love. He believes in belonging, in ownership . . . in contracts. I’ve often thought that he trusts what is in ink more than he trusts what is in his heart or mine.

I can understand this. I can. Let’s face it, my mother loved me, but she lied to me. She lied in ways that I believe affected the very core of who I am.

Looking back now, I think the security of a contract was part of what drew me to our arrangement. I know he has something in his past that makes him need that security, too, though he tells me this lifestyle is nothing more than who he is and what he enjoys. There is more in the depths of his eyes, though, more to who he is. I’d thought I’d discover what that is, who he is. I thought we could heal together. I thought we’d find love together—but he says love is a facade that twists people in knots, and yes, he’s gone so far as to say that it destroys.