Saddled, chapters 13 and 14 (Patreon)

Chapter Thirteen

John pulled into the small parking area next to a nondescript storefront with blacked out windows. Across the street stood a line of new town houses, alternating between light blue and light gray siding. The two buildings didn’t match, but that seemed pretty common in Boston. At least in Maine most of the building looked like they were one good wind away from blowing over. The irony was that they would stand for another two hundred years, but the winters and the sea did tend to make the coastal towns look a little beat up.

Following the directions Elena had given him, John moved to the side door and rang the service bell. He leaned against the faux stone siding and waited. Several minutes passed before someone opened the small speak-easy window set into the door.

“Yes?”

“I’m John,” he said, still following Elena’s directions. Sometimes John suspected she was a frustrated mystery writer who satisfied her urge for intrigue by giving the rest of them cloak and dagger instructions. But since she was the boss, she got to do that.

The door opened. An older man with a bit of a paunch and graying hair opened the door. He was average enough that he would have been invisible in any crowd, especially in his gray t-shirt and jeans. “I’m Noah. Come on in.” Noah turned and headed back into the store. “Close the door behind you.”

John still wasn’t sure what sort of training Elena wanted him to report for. All she would say was that Davidson didn’t want company this week, but he preferred to use his retainer money to send John for practice. If the practice turned out to be sex, John was returning the damn money and telling Elena to shove the contract where the sun didn’t shine because he wasn’t having sex with this Noah.

Noah led them into the main room, and John recognized the track set into the ceiling. It was one of those things Davidson had in his barn—the thing he had attached John to by his harness. John stopped and crossed his arms over his chest.

Noah continued to a reception-style desk in the corner and picked up a narrow binder off the tall counter. “So, you’re John.” He looked up and gave John a slow smile. “You don’t actually have to stare me down.”

“I’m trying to figure out why the boss asked me to come here for training and what sort of training you think you’re going to give me.” John didn’t move forward even one step. He wanted to stay near the exit so he could make a quick retreat. Anyone who worked for Elena would respect a refusal; however, John was more worried about the general awkwardness that might follow. No one liked to be told they were physically disgusting enough that an assistant would rather return a fee rather than finish the contract.

Noah wasn’t physically repulsive by any stretch of the imagination. Most people would call him attractive in an older boy-next-door way. However, John was repulsed by the idea of letting Noah put his dick anywhere near him.

Noah’s smile grew wider. “She did warn me that you weren’t meek. That’s fine. My job is to give you practice in the gear, particularly the boots. According to the paperwork I got from the boss, you tend to drag your toes when you walk, and the concern is that you’re going to fall on your face at some point. So the goal is for you to practice walking without dragging the boots or losing your balance.”

“Walking?” Of all the explanations John had expected, that wasn’t even on the list. “I’ve been walking just fine for forty-five years.”

“And when wearing weighted boots, you’re not particularly good at it,” Noah countered. “And given how new you are to the scene, that’s normal. I don’t particularly approve of your client using a custom boot as heavy as the ones the boss had sent over. I would be happy to advocate for a lighter boot during training.”

John narrowed his eyes. “Stay out of my business.”

Noah slowly nodded. “Okay. I will officially keep my opinions to myself unless you’re dragging your toes. Your client suggested that a pop with a quirt would get your knees up; however, I won’t do that without your permission.”

This was the sort of question John didn’t want to answer. It was one thing to go along with Davidson when he was tied up and didn’t have a choice; it was another to talk about this under the glare of florescent office lighting. “I don’t care. You can say something or smack my leg, but I’m not getting naked in front of you.”

“Of course not,” Noah quickly agreed. “However, I do need to restrain your hands at your sides. If you practice with your hands free, you’re going to get the bad habit of using your arms for balance.”

“It’s not like I can fall down when I’m attached to one of those.” John gestured to the leads that hung down from the ceiling track.

“No, but I assume your client would eventually like to take you out. I understand he has a lot of land, so he likely has a number of carts or carriages.”

John’s stomach tightened at the thought of Davidson hooking him to a cart and driving him through the woods. He could imagine the mosquitos landing on his exposed skin, and that reminded John of the way Davidson had used the multi-tailed whip to chase away the bugs and warm John’s skin. That was not nearly as upsetting as it should be. “We haven’t talked about that,” John said.

“Most ponies get bored walking in a circle,” Noah said. “You don’t strike me as the sort to endure boredom for long.”

“Boredom was not a major concern,” John said drily.

Noah grinned. “Good for you two. The boss said you really clicked and enjoyed trying to kill each other. However, you may find you enjoy competing together against other people just as fun. But,” he said holding up his hand to stop John from answering, “that is probably a way down the road. Step one is to keep you from falling on your face.”

“What sort of competition are you talking about?” John asked.

A frown appeared and then vanished in a blink. “The pony community is fairly large, and I can see you competing well in weight pulls or races. If your client is the person I think he might be, he used to haunt the edges of some of those meets, but I’ve never seen him working with one pony.” Noah put the binder down and leaned against the counter. “If he’s investing a lot of money in you, be aware that this hole is pretty deep.”

“I don’t plan to go down that far,” John said firmly. He tried to ignore the way his skin itched and warmed at the thought of Davidson’s whip. Besides, Noah might be guessing wrong. Davidson didn’t seem the sort to want anyone else involved in his sex life.

“That’s a healthy attitude. Don’t go in too deep before you know what the terrain looks like, and that’s actually why I asked you to come here early. I have a favor to ask.”

John waited.

Noah had the audacity to look amused. “Not a talker, are you? Fair enough. Someone asked me to train his girlfriend, and I’m concerned she may get the wrong idea about pony play.”

John rolled his eyes. “Trust me, if she can’t handle it, Elena will pull her quick enough.” Because John did a fair amount of security work for Elena, he had gone on more than one home visit where either Elena or Helene nicely told someone that they were no longer welcome on the agency’s call list and that they should seek therapy. Sometimes that ended with screaming and John having to restrain an assistant before he or she could hit someone.

“She’s not one of Elena’s. A client is introducing his girlfriend to pony play.” Noah grimaced, clearly uncomfortable with the situation. “But he’s always worked with experienced ponies, so he asked for some help teaching her how to work in harness. As a trainer, it’s my job to make sure she knows more than how to look pretty in a harness.”

Noah’s discomfort made John pause. If the trainer with worried, that made him wonder what rumors he might have heard about the client. Usually Elena cut off questionable clients, and then blackmailed them into silence. “What can I do to help?”

“Provide a good example.”

John opened his mouth to object, but Noah talked over him. “She needs to see that someone can indulge in animal play and still demand respect. It was clear from the email I got that your boyfriend respects you and is concerned about safety when you play. I want her to know that’s a healthy relationship.”

John had a knee-jerk reaction to one word. “He’s not my boyfriend.”

Noah gave him a wearly look. “You know who I’m talking about.”

“He’s a client, not a boyfriend.”

“Yeah,” Noah said with a strong edge of sarcasm. “You know how Elena feels about ever discussion clients and sex. So I’m not going to call him that in front of this girl.”

He had a point. “Well, he’s not a boyfriend,” John said firmly. He refused to start thinking about Davidson in those terms. His brain was already undergoing major rewiring, so he couldn’t afford any additional emotional ties, not even to protect the agency’s secrets in front of an outsider.

“What is he then?”

John wished Noah hadn’t asked that because he had no idea what to say. He was an excellent distraction from the drama of Kevin’s bullshit. He was a generous client. He was too damn much temptation because John had never thought he would let one client have so much control over his life. And he was too damn good at sex because John had learned more about his body in one weekend than he had in forty-six years. Davidson was damn good. “He’s my fuck buddy,” John settled on.

Noah’s eyebrow went up. Just the one. “Right. Your fuck buddy is concerned about your safety when using the gear.” Noah didn’t hide any of his disbelief.

“My fuck buddy and I like to do as much damage to each other as possible,” John countered. “And given that we have a very competitive relationship, I’m not sure I’m going to be a good role model for anyone.”

“You’ll be perfect, if you’re willing to do this. She’ll see that everyone approaches pony play for their own reasons. She’ll see that it’s fine for her to have her own needs and that a submissive is not a doormat.”

“Call me submissive again, and I’m walking out,” John warned Noah. He might need money, but there were lines he wouldn’t cross.

Another flash frown darted across Noah’s face. “I apologize. I don’t mean that as an insult.”

“Yeah, well it doesn’t describe me.”

“But your fuck buddy is a dominant,” Noah pointed out.

“Hell yes. But we are more about competition so it’s like two dominants trying to fill the same space.”

This time Noah’s frown set up camp on his face. “That sounds a little horrifying and sexually incompatible.”

John shrugged. “It works for us.”

Noah rubbed a hand over his face, almost as if he needed to manually erase his expression. “Okay. Just to let you know, my background is as a switch. I know about the pony competitions because I won the cart races three years out of five, and I was in the harness pulling the cart. I have had less luck when I was the driver, but I’ve a dominant more than a submissive in the last five or ten years. I want this to see a strong player who can take the animal role. I don’t want to be part of her walking out of here and developing some skewed idea about role play. Seeing you playing a bastard is going to encourage her to find her own voice.”

John wanted to say no. It was bad enough that Davidson was asking him to practice with the damn boots in front of a stranger, but having some girl see him felt like too much. However, John could understand Noah’s concern. Elena made sure that her people knew that ropes didn’t give or take someone’s power; money was the real control. Even when John tied up some woman and fucked her, she was writing the checks and she had the real power.

“How serious do you think this danger is?” John asked.

Noah didn’t answer immediately. He took a breath and looked John right in the eye. “Elena thinks this client pushes the assistants too hard. He then comes to her with a fresh-faced, eighteen year old girl who has never done anything kinky, but who wants to be his human pony. You tell me—how worried are you?”

John’s skin crawled. Elena tended to have a pretty high threshold for what counted as too far with assistants. The agency had some deeply submissive assistants, and some hard-core masochists, and some actors who could face both with such talent that they should get Academy Awards. “And she’s still setting up the training?” John asked.

Noah’s smile was slow and sadistic. “She sent the client to me to make sure the training was done to my exacting standards. If you aren’t available, I know more than one mean as nails pony I can pay to come in and provide a complete education.”

John couldn’t imagine Davidson ever trying to manipulate a teenager into sexual acts. Hell, he’d come right out and told John what to expect and more than once he’d paused to watch John’s foot to see if John would signal out. He had never been subtle about his interests or his willingness to give John space if he needed it. “I’ll help,” John said.

Noah smiled. “Excellent. If the client really wants a strong pony girl, he’s going to get one. And if he is looking to abuse someone, we’re going to give him a surprise.”

Chapter Fourteen

John pulled against the restraints. When Davidson had put the harness on him, John’s heart had raced. He’d been angry and agitated and excited all at once. And later, that excess of emotion had turned to lust. When Noah had strapped John into a simple harness that held his arms down at his sides, John had feared that first hint of desire. 

Instead John was preoccupied with the fact that his back itched from the beads of sweat that slid down his skin. The shorts Noah had lent him kept bunching up in the crotch, and John’s boxers were sweaty and sticking to his ass. As John walked the large circle under the track, he felt the opposite of sexy. If Davidson had sent him here first, John would have questioned the sanity of anyone who did pony play for fun.

“Knees!” Noah yelled from the other side of the room. He stood at the receptionist desk talking to the girl who had shown up. She had huge dark eyes and black hair that hung to her waist. She was stunning, even if she was a little on the willowy side for John’s taste. He preferred a woman who could handle a rope and a pot hauler without having to ask for help.

“Yeah, yeah,” John said as he lifted his legs higher. He was going to be sore from this. Surprisingly, Noah was even stricter about John lifting his knees than Davidson had been. And the low board he’s put in the middle of the course didn’t help. John had kicked it over twice now.

The girl turned to look at John with wide eyes.

“We’re going to get you used to the equipment using the hot walker,” Noah told her. “Did you wear a sports bra?”

She nodded.

“Okay then, let’s go into the office and find some equipment that fit you,” he said. “But let me get John unhooked. I can’t ever leave someone bound unless I’m right there to supervise. Accidents happen, and ponies have to trust the handler to be there to take care of it.”

John narrowed his eyes at the suggestion he couldn’t take care of himself. Luckily he was walking away from them at the time so the girl didn’t see it. And because John understood what Noah was doing, he didn’t contradict him. The hot walker stopped, and John was saved from having to step over the board set on two small cones.

As Noah unclipped the leash, the girl wandered a little closer. “Have you been doing this long?” she asked John.

“Nope. I’m new at it, which is why this asshole keeps telling me I’m walking wrong,” John said with a glare in Noah’s direction.

“If you weren’t actually walking wrong, I wouldn’t have to say it,” Noah said with a wide, friendly smile. He unclipped the wrist restrains so that the D-clip dangled from the wrist cuffs.

“Whatever, shorty,” John said. With the hoof boots, he had a good six inches on Noah. 

Noah’s smile was slow and so wide that it made the sides of his eyes crinkle up. “You are so lucky I don’t have permission to whip your ass.”

John stretched his shoulder. “You aren’t ever getting that permission.”

“Fair enough.” Noah nodded before he headed for the office. The glass wall allowed John to see all the harnesses, bits, whips, and boots neatly lined up on hooks and shelves. “But you’d better start picking up those feet before I take a quirt to your legs, and I do have permission for that.”

The girl—Rebekah or Rachel—followed Noah after giving John a quick look. When Noah started talking to her, she hurried to catch up with him. “So how much activity do you think you want when you’re in harness?”

“Activity?” she swallowed. “Do you mean, like sex?”

Noah hesitated for a brief second. “That can be part of it, but I was more curious about whether you would prefer resting in a field, standing around listening to people talk about you or doing work in harness.”

“Oh. Um, I’m not sure.”

John had followed them and leaned against the open office door. Noah turned to him. “I hated being inactive for long. How about you?”

The only time John had spent in the stall had been when he was sleeping, and thinking back, the short time he’d spent in the pasture had been his least favorite part of the long weekend. “I want to be doing something. I’d rather be working out on one of those automated walkers or pulling a carriage than standing around.”

Noah nodded. “Given how physical you are, that doesn’t surprise me.”

“What do you think I’d like?” the girl asked. John was having a hard time thinking of her as old enough to be having sex much less kinky sex. John was definitely going to talk to Elena about this, and not just because she was a girl. John hated the idea of any young person being put in a position where they couldn’t protect themselves. His treacherous memory flashed to those parlor traps Kevin had ruined by playing with them. He must have been eight or ten at the time, so that would have put John at twelve or fourteen. Their father’s temper was a slow burn that rarely flared into open fury, but seeing all the equipment ruined had pushed him to a dark place.

And Kevin had been there in the middle of that storm. John had yelled for their mother and watched, helpless. Overall, John thought of their home as a happy one growing up. Their mother had a garden that produced obscene amounts of food. John and Kevin would eat more peas fresh from the vine than they would pick while Logan would sit in the shade and play or read. They’d run around the woods all spring until the weeds and undergrowth would get so thick that they couldn’t battle their way through it, and they would lash together fallen branches to make the world’s worst rafts. Most sank before anyone tried to climb on them.

However, John could remember a few darker times, and he flinched away from the way Kevin and Logan had suffered most. John had hated watching when either of them got a whipping, and on the rare occasion when their father completely lost his temper, John would stand frozen or would run to their mother. He wished he could remember more times when he protected them. And none of that excused Kevin’s behavior, but it did make John wish he had spoken up more. 

Now that he was an adult, he wasn’t about to watch some kid get in over her head.

Noah studied the girl for a few seconds. “You need to decide that for yourself.”

She blushed and nodded. “I get that. I’m not very experienced.”

“You’ll learn,” Noah said as he handed her a harness. “Put that on like a vest and fasten it in front.” She did as instructed and then he took some time to adjust the harness and talk to her about pressure blisters and fit. John turned his back and walked away. Not only was the bondage not hitting his buttons, the sight of a woman in a sports bra and shorts wasn’t causing a twitch.

Noah came out, and the girl was following. John should have remembered her name because thinking of her as the girl made him uncomfortable as hell.

“Are you ready to restart?” Noah asked John.

“The quicker we do, the quicker we can get this over,” John said. He let Noah clip the D-rings on his wrist cuffs to the harness.

“Why do you have his wrists at his waist?” the girl asked. She had her wrists locked behind her back.

“His fuck-buddy likes to bind him with his arms straight down, so he needs to learn to keep his balance in that position. Your boyfriend asked that we practice with your arms behind your back. As you get more flexible, we can talk about whether you would be okay with tighter bondage.”

“That’s really rude. Just because they’re gay doesn’t mean they’re fuck buddies,” she said with a sympathetic look in John’s direction.

A snort escaped before John could stop it. “The fuck buddies is because we don’t date or hang out. We fuck. And we try and we try to outsmart each other. You may have a boyfriend, but trust me, I don’t,” John said firmly.

The girl looked utterly shocked, and Noah attached the lead to John’s harness.

“Don’t assume everyone is looking for the same relationship or the same activities,” Noah said. “I have it on good authority that if John were in his pony mindset, he would be more likely to kick us than eat a carrot out of our hand.”

John looked Noah up and down. “I would definitely kick you,” he said.

Noah laughed. “You’re assuming I wouldn’t move out of the way.”

“You’re too slow to move that fast, old man.”

The girl blurted out, “That’s the pot calling the kettle black.”

John’s mouth fell open.

Noah laughed as he came over and hooked the girl’s harness to a lead that hung from the track right behind John. “Do you hear that?” Noah asked. “You’re the pot, old man.”

John narrowed his eyes. “I’m amending my earlier answer. I would kick both of you.”

The girl blushed.

“Well you’re not going to get the chance.” Noah walked over to the desk and started the hot walker at its slowest speed. “Okay, Rachel, let’s work on getting your knees up. You have the looks to be a show pony but you need to strut it a little. A show pony knows she’s gorgeous, and she makes sure everyone else knows it too.”

John stepped over the raised board. Because Rachel and Noah were behind him, John had no warning before the quirt caught him on the hip hard enough to sting. “Knees!” Noah said firmly.

“Oh, when I get out of this harness, I’m definitely kicking you,” John said, but he raised his knees on each stride.

“Then I’ll have to make sure you’re too tired to do much damage,” Noah said without an ounce of apology in his voice. “And by the time your fuck buddy hooks you to a cart, you need to be able to handle rough terrain without tripping over a twig, so keep your damn feet up.”

John sighed. He didn’t say it, but Noah did have a point. If Davidson harnessed John to a cart, there wouldn’t be a hot walker to take his weight if he tripped. His face would have a rough meeting with the ground. John had learned every skill he’d set his mind to, so he focused on keeping his knees high and preventing his toes from dragging in the dust.

Chapter 15: https://www.patreon.com/posts/saddled-chapter-19132781 

Chapter 16: https://www.patreon.com/posts/saddled-chapter-19490176 

Chapter 17: https://www.patreon.com/posts/saddled-chapter-19634666