Deviations: Submission Read Online Free PDF

going to move you, Noah.
    Listen to my voice, boy." Carefully, talking softly the entire time he pulled Noah onto his lap.
    Cradling the distraught man, Tobias kept talking, stroking his hair softly. "Noah, come back, sweetheart. You were beautiful, boy." He waited for the man to calm, his touch and 31

    Deviations: Submission
    by Jodi Payne, Chris Owen
    voice soothing and constant. It occurred to him that the last time he'd used that particular tone he'd been dealing with a sow who'd had a run in with a fox. The comparison didn't really seem apt.
    As Noah's sobbing subsided, he became heavier in Tobias'
    lap. "I'm sorry, sir," he apologized and cleared his throat.
    "Shit," he swore again and took a deep breath, exhaling it heavily. He seemed to be Noah again, though his voice was still unsteady, even a bit timid. "If it pleases you, sir, may I have a sip of your water?"
    "Certainly. Stay here." Tobias leaned over, depositing Noah back on the pillows. "Lie or sit however you wish," he said as he fetched two of the bottles, opening them on the way back.
    He sat down beside the pillows and looked at Noah, trying to catch his eye. "Are you all right?" he asked, passing him a bottle.
    Noah kept his eyes down, and chose to kneel, even though it wasn't asked of him. Refuge in the familiar, Tobias suspected. Noah took the bottle gratefully. "Thank you, sir, yes, sir, I'm fine. You are very skilled. I'm sorry." He took a sip of the water and sighed.
    Tobias drank from his own bottle, trying to decide how to handle this. He had a lot of experience with tears, with catharsis, with anger from subs when they broke, but nothing like the disappointment Noah was showing. He'd fought a battle with himself and lost, and no matter what he said, Tobias wasn't ready to believe that Noah was entirely fine.
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    Deviations: Submission
    by Jodi Payne, Chris Owen
    "Apology accepted," he said, using the same soothing tone. "And thank you. It was a pleasure to watch you. Your submission was beautiful. Your failure to hold the ball, however, seems to bother you much more than it does me.
    Tell me why."
    Noah tilted his head to the side and bit his lip, looking thoughtful. "I'm not sure, sir. It started out a stubborn need to prove something to you, I suppose, but then as I gave over I stopped remembering why I shouldn't drop it and just had this awful feeling that whatever I did, I had to hang into it, anything but let myself drop it. So when I heard it drop, and even now, sitting here, it felt like, it feels like failure, like I let you down, like I let myself down. I don't know. It's not about the safeword itself, it's about finding limits."
    Tobias thought about that for a moment and leaned back, shifting so his legs were out straight in front of him, his ankles crossed. His trousers weren't even creased, he noticed, and Noah was red, sore and come splattered. "Limits are important," he said slowly. "You know that. You set them when you play, you live by them in your work. What you are doing, sweetheart, is trying to find yours, to test yourself to get beyond them without knowing where they are. How long has it been since you've had a steady Dom?"
    "Close to eighteen months, sir," Noah told him. "But he was too-he was hesitant, uneasy with really pushing me. I haven't been truly challenged since before him. More like two years? This was good, sir, it felt good. It felt ... honest.
    Clarifying. It's just serving to strengthen my conviction that this is the right path for me. Finally, something." He 33

    Deviations: Submission
    by Jodi Payne, Chris Owen
    swallowed back more water and sighed. "I used to know myself so well, but..." Noah shrugged. "You're right, I'm not sure I know where my limits are anymore."
    With a shrug of his own Tobias said, "That's because they've changed. They change all the time, Noah, and if you've gone years without a true exploration of them, of course they've changed. You've grown, you've learned, you're a new person. It