Jeanine said, "One of us needs to go to the store."

I loved to hear my chocoholic say the code words for our little experiments in light, consensual bondage. Some of our most exciting sex was during these games.

She said it on Monday morning, an hour before the alarm was supposed to wake me for work. She won the coin toss, ending a two win streak for me. I was bound as usual to the four posts of our bed, and she rode my face into the sunrise. There wasn't time to reciprocate that morning. I went to work both tired and frustrated. Work turned into a double shift; I went to bed exhausted.

She said it Wednesday, after dinner. Again, she won the toss. Again, I was bound to the posts of our brass bed and blindfolded. Again, her thighs carressed my ears until she could take no more. While she caught her breath, the phone began to ring. When the answering machine picked up, my brother's voice begged me to pick up, if I were there. Jeanine released me, and I spent ninety minutes assuring him that the world had not ended; he would find another job; all would turn out well.

When my brother at last believed in himself as I did, and freed me from the bondage of the telephone, Jeanine was asleep.

She said it Friday when I walked in the door. The gods of chance favored her once more, and once more I donned the blindfold and wrist and ankle cuffs. This time, mindful of the fact that she had been on the receiving end of all the attention this past week, she offered to change places with me. Tempted as I was to take her up on her offer, I assured her that I was a good sport, and was certain that she would take good care of her slave, as she had always done in the past - we had plenty of time, didn't we? Surely there would be no interruptions tonight.

As usual when Jeanine won the toss, we started with her straddling my head. The only anomoly was that this time, she faced the foot of the bed. I became aroused just thinking of the possibilities. I began my oral ablutions with a little more vigor than usual in anticipation of Jeanine returning the favor. I could feel her hair caress me as she began to lower her head.

Her back arched as she approached her first climax, drawing her head further away from me. It only sweetened the anticipation. As she cried out in ecstacy, I redoubled my efforts, wanting to please her as I hoped to be pleased. Her cries turned into shrieks - this night held promise.

When I felt her squirming to remove her over-sensitive clit away from my tongue, I caught her fleshy lips in my teeth and continued to tease. If I would be satisfied - and her hair once again tickling my cock suggested I would - I would make sure she was compensated for it. She breathed great gulps of air, and I felt her exhalations hot upon my straining cock. Before she could completely recover, I sucked again on her clit, worrying it with my tongue. Jeanine cried out her pleasure in a piercing scream, which trailed off as she ran out of breath. Her body slumped over mine. Had she fainted?

If so, her faint was awkward, whatever it might have done for my ego. My face was covered by her moist, delicious pussy and only by tilting my head as far back as our bodies allowed could I gulp air through my nose, and a pillow interfered with that. The blindfold was slightly dislodged but I could not cry out, I was most effectively gagged. A silk scarf would never achieve what Jeanine had.

If the jiggling of my body would not rouse her, if my muted calls could not reach her ears, at least I was in position to do the one thing that never failed to awaken my sleeping beauty. I strained my neck for one more breath through my nose, then for the fourth time applied lips and tongue and gentle teeth. Even in her seemingly unconscious state, Jeanine began to respond - by pushing herself more firmly onto my face. It was becoming a race - would Jeanine awaken before I passed out? I felt a thrill of fear. If Jeanine did not awaken, there was a real possibility that I could be smothered.

Viewed abstractly, and through the shield of time, I would someday appreciate the humor of the situation. "There are worse ways to go," I could joke. It would someday be a hilarious memory - "Remember the time you almost loved me to death?", a jibe - "I smothered you with kisses, and you smothered me with...", a ribald tale to share with intimate friends.

That would be then, but this was now. My vision was becoming narrow, my lungs were on fire. The angel of death winked at me with one brown eye. I flailed, but the cords held my arms and legs immobile. Tears streamed from my eyes. Even as I felt my own consciousness slipping away, I did the one last thing that could possibly rouse my quivering Jeanine from her rapturous state.

I bit her.

I don't know how hard I bit her. I do know where. And Jeanine did release me from that glorious death grip. She rose up on her toes, one shoulder in the pit of my stomach (which did nothing for my ability to inhale) and wailed - then fell to one side clutching one hand to her breast and the other to her crotch, twitching. Her eyes were rolled up in their sockets. The wail trailed off into moans, but the twitching continued, and I could see when I raised my head enough that her fingers pinched her nipple and thrust into her pussy in time to the twitches.

The twitching finally stopped. Jeanine was not now conscious, if in fact I had awakened her at all. Her sleeping form, with a rictus of a smile, mocked my every attempt to wake her by calling her name. I was no freer now than in the minutes before, but I was exhausted, and resigned to my fate. When I at last caught up on my oxygen deficit, I too slept.

Days passed. Jeanine called in sick on Monday, claiming a "female problem." They did not ask for a doctor's note, which fact saved my life, as she had sworn my death if she had to explain her disability to anyone, including a doctor. I thought she was joking, but I'm relieved the issue was not put to the test.

From Saturday through Monday, Jeanine walked... funny. Not funny ha-ha, but funny peculiar. (Well it was funny, but one ha-ha might have cost me my hu-ha, so to speak.) Even when she returned to work on Tuesday, she winced when she walked, and mincing steps were all she could manage.

I did not press for my conjugal rights. Although this was the longest stretch of abstinence since we were together, discretion was the better part of apology. (Discretion and chocolate. Lots of chocolate.) We'd talked about it, on Saturday after, as Jeanine released my bindings. She let me know that this would not be a joking matter no matter how many years went by, that any jibe on my part would be met by a sudden frost, and that if she caught even a hint of repetition to any acquaintence, I would become intimate with the couch. And no amount of chocolate would make her change her mind.

Sunday arrived, over a week later. Jeanine took breakfast with me as she always had, and always does, and for a wonder, seemed like herself again. I served her favorite chocolate chip crepes. After I completed the dishes, we sat together on the sofa and watched a movie from the VCR. I placed my arm around her shoulder; she leaned her head upon my chest. It was a very pleasant couple of hours.

Jeanine said, "One of us needs to go to the store."

I could feel my heart pounding, as well it might. Lust and fear are equally effective at stimulating the adrenal glands, and I had both working overtime.

We turned off the television and adjourned to the bedroom, my arm around her shoulder, hers around my waist. I had made a single preparation for the day when Jeanine might utter those words again. In my pocket I carried a two-headed coin. At the foot of the bed, I fished out that coin, cocked it on my thumb, and tossed it to spin and land on the spread. I called...

"Heads!" Jeanine said.

I shut my mouth and looked with her at the coin, then snatched it up and returned it to my pocket. It was going into the next vending machine I patronized, and good riddance. The goddesses of chance have strange senses of humor.

The undressing was a solemn ceremony, with lots of eye contact and few smiles. I suffered the binding of my limbs to the four posts of the bed in quiet dignity. I wasn't sure I liked this game any more. Jeanine frowned, then released the cords binding my legs. She propped pillows behind my back and head, so that I was reclined, slightly. She used a single cord to bind my ankles together, and another to stretch them to the footrail.

Sex slaves are not supposed to speak unless spoken to - it was one of our rules. But Jeanine could tell I was bursting to ask why the change. she always tied me down the same way.

She sat next to me, and placed a hand over my mouth. That meant she expected me to try to interrupt, and didn't want me to.

"Nine days ago," she began softly, "you gave me the most intense orgasms I have ever had, or hope to have. And I nearly killed you in return." If she hadn't placed her hand over my mouth, I would have protested - but she was right (about almost killing me - we'd see about the other.) "I've come to like our little games, although I usually like it just a little better when you win the coin toss." Her hand pulled my head so that our eyes locked. "Fairly. Lose the double-headed coin," she added, sternly.

I slammed my eyes shut and nodded vigorously. Cheaters never prosper. I don't know how she knew, but I shouldn't have been surprised. She always knows.

"The thing is, I love regular sex with you, but when I get to the point where I'm too sensitive to continue, and I ask you to stop, or change around, you do - and its good, and I love you for it.

"But when I'm your slave and you get me to that point, you just keep on going - usually, it's even better. I can't ask for that. I really am too sensitive. The trip can be agony for a few moments, but I love it when you take me there."

She swallowed. "When it's my turn to play, I don't usually go there. When I reach my limit, I change on my own. I do something else until I'm ready again. Last time, you got me there so fast and kept going while I was out of control, that it might as well have been me in the ropes."