It's been a year since Clark and Daniel found one another, and the bartender and the professor have found harmony.
However, Clark's work for Lucian Gray, the New Amsterdam Mayor's son and leader of an underground vigilante network, still continues, and it isn't without danger. Clark knows it's only a matter of time before the risks become too great for Daniel to bear, and his prediction comes true when a BDSM scene turns into a captive discussion.
What happens when the men must balance life's passion with true love?
"I guess it wouldn't be." Daniel shook his head. "Get up on the bed, Clark," he said, and Clark loved the rueful inflection.
"Of course, Sir," Clark said obediently. He took his sweet time, walking with an exaggerated saunter and crawling to the center of the mattress with a deliberate arch to his back.
A hearty sigh erupted behind Clark's ass, and Clark glanced at the wide mirror mounted on the wall above their headboard, smirking. Daniel finished stripping, and got a glittering length of chain from the box of toys. It jingled when Daniel wrapped it around one forearm. Nothing in Clark's world said, "I love you," quite like that tell-tale clank. Shuddering in anticipation, Clark turned his back to the mirror and knelt on the bed. Daniel fished out leather suspension cuffs and a handful of other hardware, tossing everything but the chain onto the bed by Clark's knees.
A pole with a hook on the end stood by the solid headboard of their reinforced, king-sized bed frame. Daniel used it to feed the end of the chain through one of the eye-bolts in the ceiling. Daniel had hired a contractor to connect the eye-bolts to an extra beam that ran across multiple ceiling joists and could support more than five times Clark's weight. It came in handy when Clark talked Daniel into the sex swing. Daniel's extra attention to detail meant that when they played in the bedroom, they didn't have to worry about accidents and explaining any broken this-or-that to emergency room staff. In Clark's experience, that always proved awkward.
Pulling down the high end of the chain, Daniel matched the ends and let them hang. Picking up the cuffs, Daniel got onto the bed, and Clark didn't have to ask for the reassurance he required before the restraining began. Daniel gave Clark another lingering kiss, and the small voices in Clark's mind that wondered what in the hell was going on and if it was really a good idea quieted instantly.
"Hands, please?" Daniel asked, and Clark complied. A groan made it past his lips at the polite plea, the simple word that made it possible for him to hold out his wrists to another human being and let that person bind him.
"Yes, Sir," Clark said, quieter now as Daniel locked the leather into place. Clark stood knee-deep in waves of submission that he wanted to dive under to seek the bliss at the bottom of that vast ocean.
Clipping a quick-release bolt to each of the cuffs, Daniel kissed Clark's palms and said, "Hands over your head, please?" with his lips moving against Clark's skin.
"Sure," Clark said, and he couldn't tell if he spoke out loud or not. Daniel's soft laugh gave it away, and Clark felt a blush rise to his cheeks. Ignoring it and the way desire shot down his spine and bloomed in his balls, Clark reached so Daniel could fasten the cuffs to the lengths of chain. The rig required Clark to stay kneeling upright, and wouldn't let him rest on his heels without his arms taking the weight. Daniel's hum of satisfaction made Clark bite his lip to stifle words that would probably prove embarrassing.
"So ... my Clark," Daniel mused.
"Yes, Sir?" Clark managed.
"Do you know who called me at the office today?" Daniel asked, calmly, while attaching metal to metal.
"Uh," Clark said before he could stop himself. He looked up at his own hands, back at Daniel's peaceful veneer, and tried to think with a brain that was pissed at a pitstop in Guessing Game City. "N-no? Sir?"
