He looked down at her silently, his face dark with concentration. "I'm… sorry," she murmured.

She knew she shouldn't have spoken. Those were the rules of their club. Complete submission when playing their little games. Rhonda had only belonged to BISMAR for two months, hiding the meetings from her daughter. This was the first time she had actually let one of the members come to her home and do something to her. All the talk during their meetings about dominance and submission had made her more and more curious about doing something about those feelings stirring deep inside her. That was why when she had taken Cori to the farm, she'd returned to Los Angeles trembling and anxious. Jack Beddingfield was there at her doorstep waiting for her, his handsome face threatening and yet at the same time appealing…

"Uh!"

He rolled her onto her right side, tightening the knot a little more, then drawing her hands down until they were pressed against the small of her back. She heard him digging around in the black leather bag he had brought up with him from the first floor. Staring at the wall, she felt the mattress sinking behind her as he put something over her face for a moment. She felt him shoving it between her lips now, a rubber ball pushing into her mouth. When Rhonda tried to protest, she felt a knee in her back, the pressure making her open her mouth.

"Oh!"

The ball slipped in, fixed to her skull with two leather straps. Rhonda panicked. Perhaps the game had already gone too far. All the fine talk about S amp;M and the beauty of pain and discipline was starting to fade from her mind. There was the harsh reality of being bound, of having her arms pulled tightly behind her while this horrid thing was crammed into her mouth. She tried pushing it out with her tongue, gasping and jerking while tugging at the rope around her wrist. Nothing.