Chapter 38

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

LAYLA

"Your friend. How is she?" I ask when Liam pulls his phone from his pants.

It dings a few times, and he shakes his head as he reads over the messages. He types out one of his own and hits send before responding, "Still alive, but not good."

"I'm sorry." I fidget with the strands of the flogger in my hand before hanging it back on the hook before me.

"Nothing for you to be sorry about. Now, what do you want to know?"

My eyes span the room, and I exhale, "Everything."

"Come on." He lures me to a section of the wall covered with paddles. Wood. Leather. Studded like a dog collar. Spiked. All of them so vastly different.

"And people actually like this?" I ask as I run my fingers over the needle-sharp tines of the paddle.

"Plenty of them," he chuckles .

I mull over his response.

"Have you never been paddled before?"

"No."

"Spanked?" Liam asks, his face immediately displaying genuine disbelief when I shake my head.

He's so shocked, you'd think he was asking if I've never had carrots.

"My life before meeting your brother seems to be turning a more tasteless flavor of vanilla by the day," I answer, causing him to laugh.

"Can you show me?" I lift a soft, black leather paddle from the wall.

"That does not sound like explaining," Finnigan calls from the doorway.

"Shut the fuck up, Finn," Liam shouts. Gripping my hand, he flips it palm up and lowers his voice. "Palms up and hold them still."

I eagerly nod my head, and he rubs the leather against the meaty part of my palm.

"They all feel different," he explains. "Paddles can feel like a firm thud or a sharp sting, based on their weight and what they are made of. This one is soft and has a little flex. It'll be a little of both, a light slap with a little sting."

Holding my hand still, he hits the fleshy part of my palm. It feels just like he described. It hurts, but it isn't painful .

We work our way around the room, and Liam continues to demonstrate the feel of the toys that he can against my palm.

"And this?" I lift a long rod with a wooden handle from the wall. "What does this feel like?"

"The cane? Definitely not a thud. It's a sting, more correctly, a burn." He smirks. "I once dated a woman who described it as the bite of a thousand fire ants. Needless to say, it was not her favorite."

"Maybe another time for that one." I hang it back on the wall, my palms still stinging from the hefty wooden paddle Liam swung moments ago.

"That was usually her reaction, too," he quips.

Looking around the room, I find Finnigan still watching from the doorway. I turn to face him. "And you?"

"I say fuck no to the cane and pretty much everything else in here."

"I meant, your interests," I clarify, laughing.

"Not this fucking room," he emphatically responds with a raised brow. "And I can't show you nearly as clearly as Liam."

"Why not?"

He takes his time closing the distance between us with slow, methodical steps until he is standing right beside me. Keeping his voice low, he whispers, "Because if I took you over to Central Park, Tristan would have my arse for leaving the club. "

"Oh!" My exclamation is short as my brows furrow in confusion.

"And if that weren't enough, he'd fucking kill me for chasing you through the woods and fucking you when I caught you."

I suddenly understand his hesitation.

They show me around the remainder of the club before leading me back up to the lounge. Taking our seats again, I ask, "So, you all work here? All five of you?"

"Y…yeah," Liam stammers for a second before answering. "We all work here with Tristan. Obviously, we all have our niche in kink, and we are helping to ensure there's a good balance at the club."

"And we all own a piece of the pub next door," Finnigan adds.

"The name of the pub. What does it mean?" I ask the two of them.

" Deartháir means brother in Irish," Liam answers.

" Rud ar bith do mo deartháir was a bit too long for the sign," Finnigan shares before leaving the room, as though I understand a bit of what he just said.