The rug was a confession against his knees. Every shift of weight ground the weave into his skin, and he couldn't decide if the burn was penance or just more of the same punishment he'd been taking all night. His mouth was still pressed to Cassidy's cunt, his tongue moving in the same desperate lap, and the taste of himself was still there—salty and wrong and somehow exactly what she wanted him to swallow.

The red light blinked in the corner of his vision. Small. Unblinking. Hungry.

He tried to look away from it, but there was nowhere to go. His face was buried between her thighs, her slick heat against his chin, her fingers knotted in his hair so tight his scalp ached. Every time he slowed, she tugged. Every time he hesitated, she pulled him harder against her, and he had no choice but to keep licking, keep lapping, keep cleaning up the mess he'd made inside her.

"That's it, baby," Cassidy cooed, and her voice was honey and broken glass, the same voice she used when she was really enjoying herself. "Show Marcus how grateful you are."

Derek's tongue stuttered against her. Grateful. The word landed in his chest like a stone dropped down a well, and he waited for the splash that never came. He was grateful, wasn't he? She'd unlocked the cage. She'd let him inside her. She'd given him that much, and he'd ruined it in thirty seconds flat, come like a teenager in his first pair of boxers, and now he was here, on his knees, licking his own failure off her skin while another man watched.

And still his tongue kept moving.

The taste of her was salt and musk, the particular sweetness of her arousal layered over the bitter trace of his own cum. He'd never tasted himself before tonight. He'd never imagined he would. But here he was, and the worst part—the part that made his stomach turn even as his cock twitched uselessly against his thigh—was that he didn't hate it. He hated that he didn't hate it.

"Look at him go," Marcus said from the bed, and Derek felt the weight of the man's gaze like a hand on the back of his neck. "Like a goddamn Hoover."

Cassidy laughed—that real laugh, the one that meant she was genuinely amused—and Derek felt his face heat. The sound of it was worse than any cruelty she'd doled out tonight. Cruelty was a choice. Laughter was a reflex. And he was funny to her. That was the truth of it. He was the funniest thing she'd seen in weeks, and she was going to enjoy him until the joke got old.

"He's always been good with his mouth," Cassidy said, and her fingers tightened in his hair, pulling his face harder against her. His nose flattened against her clit, and he made a small, strangled sound that she ignored. "He just forgets how to use the rest of himself."

Marcus shifted on the bed, and Derek heard the creak of the mattress, the rustle of fabric. He didn't dare look up. He kept his eyes fixed on the dark hair between Cassidy's thighs, on the slick skin of her inner thighs where his own cum had dried into a faint white sheen.

"Make sure you get his face when he cries," Marcus said, and his voice was low and amused, the voice of a man who was having the time of his life. "That's the good part."

Derek's eyes stung. Fresh tears blurred his vision, hot and immediate, and he hated himself for the way they came so easily. He'd always been a crier. It was one of the things Cassidy liked to tease him about, one of the things she'd weaponized against him in a hundred small ways. And now he was crying on camera, his face wet and red, his mouth working between her thighs like he'd been born for it.

"Please," he whispered, the word muffled against her skin. He didn't even know what he was asking for. Please stop. Please let me stop. Please don't make me do this anymore.

"Please what, baby?" Cassidy's voice was syrup. She didn't ease the pressure on his head. "Please keep going? Because you're doing so well. Marcus, isn't he doing well?"

"Best I've seen," Marcus agreed, and Derek could hear the grin in his voice. "Real dedicated."

The praise was worse than the mockery. It was worse because some part of him—the broken, desperate part that had been starving for her approval for years—wanted to believe it. Wanted to believe that if he just kept licking, kept pleasing, kept being good, she might look at him the way she looked at Marcus. She might touch his face like she touched Marcus's chest. She might want him the way she wanted a man who could last longer than thirty seconds inside her.

But she wouldn't. He knew she wouldn't. And the knowing was its own kind of cage, one that had no key.

The phone shifted in her hand, and Derek heard the soft click of the camera refocusing. She was zooming in. She was getting closer. She was going to have this forever, this moment of him broken and obedient, his mouth on her cunt, his tears dripping down his face, and there was nothing he could do to take it back.

"Marcus," Cassidy said, and her voice had that particular warmth in it, the one she only ever used with him. "You should see his face. He's so pretty like this."

"I can see," Marcus said, and Derek heard the bed shift again, the sound of a man settling in to watch a show. "I got a front-row seat, sweetheart. I'm not missing a second."

Derek's jaw ached. His tongue was raw from the same motion, the same lap, the same desperate rhythm. He'd been at this for what felt like hours, though it couldn't have been more than a few minutes. Time moved differently when you were being watched. Every second stretched, every breath echoed, every tear that fell was a small, wet punctuation mark on his shame.

And still, he didn't stop.

He couldn't stop. That was the thing. He could tell himself he was doing this because Cassidy held the key to his cage, because she'd threatened to leave him, because he had nowhere else to go. But the truth was simpler and uglier than that. The truth was that he wanted to be good for her. He wanted to be worth something in her eyes. And if the only way to be worth something was to kneel and lick and cry while she filmed it, then he would kneel and lick and cry until she told him he could stop.

"You know," Marcus said, and Derek felt the man's eyes on him, heavy and amused, "I think he likes it."

Derek's tongue faltered. "I don't—"

"Sure you do." Marcus's voice was easy, conversational, like he was discussing the weather. "Look at you. You're hard again. Or you were, before you came all over yourself. You get off on this, don't you, buddy? Being put in your place?"

Derek wanted to deny it. He opened his mouth to deny it, but the words wouldn't come. Because Marcus wasn't wrong. He wasn't entirely wrong, and that was the horror of it. There was a part of him—the same broken part that craved Cassidy's approval—that felt something when she pulled his hair, when she called him baby, when she made him kneel. Something that wasn't quite pain and wasn't quite pleasure, but lived somewhere in the space between, where shame and need tangled together until he couldn't tell them apart.

"He's blushing," Cassidy said, and her voice was delighted. "Look at that. He's actually blushing."

The phone moved, and Derek knew she was adjusting the angle, trying to catch the flush on his cheeks. He tried to turn his face away, but her fingers in his hair held him in place, and he was left staring up at her through wet lashes, his mouth still pressed to her skin, his shame laid bare for the camera.

"Say thank you," Cassidy said.

Derek blinked. "What?"

"Say thank you to Marcus. He paid you a compliment." Her voice was patient, almost kind, and that was the worst part. She wasn't angry. She was never angry. She was just amused, and he was her entertainment, and she was going to squeeze every drop of humiliation out of him before she was done.

Derek swallowed. The taste of himself was still on his tongue, and he could feel Cassidy's wetness on his chin, a slick sheen that the camera would catch every time he moved. He was a mess. He was a wreck. He was on his knees in his own sweatpants, his cock soft and sticky against his thigh, his face wet with tears, and he was supposed to say thank you.

"Thank you," he whispered, the words barely audible.

"Louder, baby." Cassidy's fingers tightened in his hair. "I don't think he heard you."

Derek's throat closed. The tears came faster now, hot and humiliating, and he could feel them tracking down his cheeks, dripping off his jaw, falling onto Cassidy's thigh. He was crying on her. He was crying on her and she was filming it and Marcus was watching and there was nowhere to hide.

"Thank you," he said again, louder this time, and his voice cracked on the second word.

Marcus laughed. It was a warm, genuine sound, and Derek hated how much it made him want to die.

"See?" Marcus said. "He's learning. That's all we ask, isn't it, sweetheart? A little gratitude."

Cassidy hummed in agreement, and her hips shifted against Derek's mouth, a small, casual movement that reminded him he was still supposed to be working. He resumed licking, his tongue finding the slick folds of her cunt, lapping at the mixture of her arousal and his own cum that had pooled there. The taste was familiar now, almost comforting in its wrongness, and he hated himself for how easily he'd adapted to it.

"Good boy," Cassidy murmured, and the words sent a shiver down his spine. "That's my good boy."

He was her good boy. He was her good boy and he was on his knees and he was crying and he was licking his own cum out of her cunt while another man watched and he was her good boy and that was the whole of it. That was all he was. That was all he'd ever been.

The red light blinked in the corner of his vision, and Derek kept licking, kept lapping, kept being good, and wondered if this was what it felt like to drown.