JoBeth & Amy #2: The Start of Something New

JoBeth & Amy: Story 02 – The Start of Something New - CHAPTER 6

*Note: This story got a little longer on me than I expected - it is not completely edited, so if you see any little errors in there... that's why!*



*WARNINGS: This story IS FOR 18+ ONLY! If you don't like adult situations, don't read any further!! This story will eventually contain BONDAGE, a sexual situation, and will involve a suggestive bit of girl/girl fun...*



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Finally giving in to what she’d struggled all day to suppress, JoBeth slid her hand under the waistline of her panties, gently teasing her fingers between her wet folds. Through the waves of pleasure already flowing through her body, the brunette felt another rush of excitement from hearing her longing moans muffled by both the ballgag strapped firmly between her lips and the hood that she’d laced tightly over her head. The smooth leather of the hood that Amy had given her felt delightfully warm against her skin, adding to the haze of bliss that was quickly building in her mind and crowding out everything other than thoughts of Amy.



JoBeth hadn’t intended to spend her Tuesday afternoon trying to satisfy her pent up sexual frustrations, but after Amy had ambushed her after class, it had been the only thing on her mind. The blonde had snuck up on her on her way out the door, pulling her aside to ask if she would have the chance to return the kiss from the night before. Amy’s soft whisper in her ear and the question itself had almost turned her into a quivering, blushing mess right on the spot.



For the rest of the day, JoBeth had been distracted by fantasies of all the different ways she wished that Amy would return the kiss and more. Getting back home had been hard enough, and the moment she’d gotten back to her dorm room, she’d locked the door behind her, tossed her bag on the floor and grabbed the hood and gag out of their drawer. Her boots and cargo pants had quickly found their way to the floor and she’d felt her cheeks flush with excited warmth as she climbed onto her bed.



Once she’d buckled the ballgag in, JoBeth tugged the leather hood down over her head with a grunt, getting a small thrill at the sound of her own muffled voice. Settling the hood over her features, JoBeth sought out the ends of the laces and found the first hole. Her practice with them over the past few days let her pull the laces though their grommets faster than ever and in moments, she’d tied the ends of them into a tight, final knot, securing the hood in place.



“Mmnnnh…” JoBeth moaned softly, sinking into the delightfully tingly warmth that was spreading through her body. “Ahmmy…” [Amy…] she added with a small giggle, wrapping herself in memories of the rush she felt from being around the brilliant blonde girl.



Her other hand trailed up and under her shirt, pushing her bra aside to tease her already hardened nipple. Wishes that it was Amy there playing with her body swirled through JoBeth’s head, adding to the seemingly insurmountable frustration she felt at not being able to share this with her in the same way they had just a few days ago. Biting down onto the soft rubber ball, JoBeth grazed her fingertip over her clit, causing another, slightly louder moan of arousal.



While she’d wanted to tell Amy she could take her right now, they hadn’t been able to do anything after class about the whispered question. Despite her disappointment of not being able to at least reply to Amy, the flirting glances and shy smiles during class told her that they were both feeling the same attraction to each other. There was nothing that would bring her down from the heights of elation she’d felt from knowing that Amy liked her too and there was no way she was going to just leave Amy alone. If she could get Amy past her remaining worries and get her to know that it would be okay, they could see where this could go.



The promise of being able to be with Amy as more than just a student or a friend brought her back into the moment and JoBeth let out a loud moan into the gag. Rolling onto her side, JoBeth held her legs apart and plunged her fingers back between her folds, reveling in everything she felt from the cool of the pillow through the leather hood to the intense heat of her arousal.



“Nnnnh…” she sighed, glad that the blindfold kept her in darkness. She didn’t want to see anything other than Amy there with her. The idea that Amy had been the one to take her and hold her only for herself added to her sense of bliss and until they found a way to use them together again, JoBeth wanted to use Amy’s toys and explore this curious new realm that she’d introduced her to.



Something about losing control, giving herself to Amy, turned JoBeth on in ways that she’d never been before. Through all the excitement and stimulation she felt from the experience, there was a new, carnal yearning inside her to be in Amy’s control. Part of her wanted nothing more than to be able to surrender herself to Amy’s own desires, knowing that she could just be there and trust the blonde to care for her, to make her feel good and to never do anything that she didn’t want.



After all they’d been through in the past week, JoBeth knew deep down that Amy cared for her. She could have done so much more, but the way that she’d treated her with so much deference and respect on Friday and in class told her just how much Amy cared. Of all the little things that drove her wild about the blonde, that one stood out above all the rest. The brunette knew that if there was a time when she could let Amy take her captive again, she would be treasured and loved in ways beyond her wildest dreams, and in ways that she couldn’t wait to return in kind. That implicit trust she already felt between them made her every nerve tingle with anticipation.



Her fingers slipped deeper inside and her muffled sounds grew louder behind the gag. The haze of bliss in her mind was threatening to overwhelm her as she rose closer to the peak of orgasm. “Aahmyy…” [Amy…] she moaned, her mind spinning through the dozens of things she wanted to scream out loud and tell the older girl.



It felt amazing to use Amy’s hood and gag while she masturbated, but without the only partner she wanted there with her, it hadn’t been quite enough. Teasing her nipple between her fingers, she tried to imagine Amy’s touch against her skin. Her hand between her legs stirred the mounting waves of pleasure ever higher and as they crashed relentlessly over her, JoBeth gave in and finally felt the ecstasy of orgasm take her.



With a loud groan, JoBeth held her fingers still and she felt herself tighten around them, the heavenly sensations of climax coursing through her body. For a moment, the whole world dropped away and all she could think about was Amy’s brilliant, adoring smile for her. She couldn’t wait to see it again.



Her gag served its purpose well and she clenched her teeth around it, moaning deeply through her arousal. Her lusts were still unfulfilled but JoBeth could at least set them aside for now to bask in the temporary warmth of bliss. She longed to reunite with Amy, but without her, she had to enjoy what little release she could find on her own until they found a way to be together.



Catching her breath, JoBeth let her fingers slide out from between her folds, her soft moans from behind her gag dissipating into the quiet of her room. Being gagged gave her an odd thrill that she couldn’t quite explain, knowing that her power to voice her thoughts and needs herself was gone. With Amy, she didn’t think she would need those particular abilities. She knew that if Amy did have her gagged, her every want and need would be taken care of.



“Gmmmf…” she giggled, pushing against the ball with her tongue. She found it incredibly kinky and erotic to have her ability to speak taken away, but beyond that, the rubber ball doubled as a rather fun chew toy. JoBeth felt her face lighting up with embarrassment at the thought, but that didn’t take anything away from her enjoyment of the gag. Besides, Amy seemed to love hearing the noises that the gag caused her to make even more than she did herself and JoBeth thought that was certainly reason enough for her to keep wearing it.



‘Because Amy likes it’ was reason enough to do quite a bit so far as JoBeth was concerned and while they weren’t going to meet up again tonight, it had been a blast spending time with Amy at the library the night before. It had given her something to look forward to all day and was easily the most enjoyable study session she’d ever been a part of. Not only had she come up with a veritable ton of new ideas for her paper thanks to Amy’s guidance, but she’d also had a wonderful time just talking about everything with Amy and trying to catch her secreted, longing glances at her while she was working.



Being the object of Amy’s attention and desires excited her more and more as she got to know the older girl better. She loved every second of it when she did spot Amy looking at her. Her plan to tease Amy with the leather cuffs had worked out brilliantly as well and Amy’s slightly flustered reactions to them throughout the evening had been absolutely adorable. The way that Amy had gently held her wrists together just before the end of the night only reinforced JoBeth’s certainty that Amy was trying to suppress her feelings for her.



It had certainly been pretty suggestive, but JoBeth didn’t mind it at all. It told her that Amy did want to have her again and that was something she approved of. Amy’s touch had been so warm and caring that it filled her with a happiness that still hadn’t worn off and she knew that she could trust Amy with anything. One day soon, she hoped that she’d be able to let Amy know that she could trust her completely in return.



Slipping her hand back out from under her panties, JoBeth laughed quietly to herself, figuring that she’d have to change them before getting to anything else that evening. With a sigh into the hood, she refused to succumb to the frustration she felt at how she couldn’t find the sexual release that she needed on her own. She wanted Amy and Amy alone and something told her that Amy was feeling the same way about her.



As the fleeting warmth and rush of orgasm slowly faded, JoBeth turned to thoughts of how wonderful it would feel to be wrapped up in Amy’s warm embrace. Happily sinking into the very pleasant distraction, she couldn’t help wishing that they would find a way to share this with each other again soon.



Through her opened window, JoBeth heard the chimes of the university’s clock tower start to ring off in the distance. The familiar sound drifting over campus was muted by the leather of her hood, but she could still easily make out the bells that signaled the end of the school day for many of the students and faculty, with her friend Tara chief among them.



The chimes also meant that it was time for their cafeteria a few floors below to open. Their dorm had a suite-style layout that meant she shared a bathroom with the girl that had become her closest friend at the university. While JoBeth was always glad to have Tara’s company for dinner, the redhead was a creature of habit and she did like eating early.



Rolling over onto her stomach, JoBeth let herself enjoy Amy’s gear for one last moment. Soon, she’d have to start getting ready for dinner and the pleasant but inevitable hours of homework time with Tara that would begin right after it. After the brush with Amy earlier, she’d made sure to get back from class early enough to spend a bit of time trapped in her little fantasy world under the hood, but it was about time to start getting ready for that familiar knock on the door.



A wish that Amy was the one who was about to come knocking on her door flashed through her mind, sending a tingle rushing over JoBeth’s body and a small, pleasurable shudder. If she knew that Amy was coming, she’d leave the hood and gag on, hoping that Amy would grab her and take her from there. Just the idea of answering the door like that turned her on. Wondering what the look on Amy’s face would be if she was suddenly presented with such a sight caused JoBeth to break into another giddy laugh around her gag.



After her time with Amy and her sudden introduction to it, she’d grown very attracted to the idea of being bound, blindfolded and gagged by someone she trusted. Knowing that she’d given complete control to that person, to Amy, excited JoBeth in ways she wanted to experience again. The low buzz of arousal that had stayed with her all week returned again in full force and JoBeth gave a quiet, lamenting sigh into the ballgag trapped between her lips before she was startled by the sound of Tara knocking on her bathroom door.



“JoBeth?” Tara asked through the closed bathroom door.



Snapping instantly back to her senses, JoBeth reached up and pulled the straps for the hood’s blindfold and the panel that covered her gag out of their buckles. “Hmmff?” she exclaimed, turning her attention to the laces and hoping the noise sounded enough like a question to give her at least enough time to get out of the hood. Listening as best she could for Tara’s reply, JoBeth pulled the knot at the nape of her neck free and started loosening the hood.



On the other side of the door, Tara could make out some soft, rustling sounds emanating from her suitemate’s room. She’d become pretty close with JoBeth, but she hesitated reaching out for the doorknob. She’d never felt comfortable walking into other people’s rooms without knowing that she was invited and despite how curious the sounds were, it didn’t sound like anything was wrong.



Deciding to wait another moment, Tara leaned in closer to the door, hoping to hear a little better. “Hey, Jo, it’s me…” the redhead continued, speaking up a little louder. “Are you in there?”



“Yhh,” [Yeah…] JoBeth tried to reply, the ballgag still effectively muffling her. Even with just the gag left on, the rush of nearly being caught made the corners of her lips curl up into a mischievous smile. The brunette thanked her lucky stars that she’d decided to leave the locks off this time, allowing her to get the hood completely off quickly. Tossing it lightly onto her pillow, she grabbed her pajama bottoms off the foot of her bed and stepped gingerly into each leg. “Ah’ll bhh rhhh ffhhr!” [I’ll be right there!] she added, pulling the waist of the comfortable pants up to her hips.



Tara’s eyebrows furrowed. “Sorry, I didn’t understand that…” she apologized, trying to interpret the strange, garbled sounds of JoBeth’s reply. She pressed her ear against the door, tucking a few strands of her hair out of her way. “Is everything alright?”



Reaching back behind her neck, JoBeth unbuckled the straps of her gag with a laugh. “Mm hmm,” JoBeth affirmed, pulling the drool-wetted ball out from behind her lips. Flexing her jaw, she’d noticed over the past few days how the discomfort she felt after wearing the gag had lessened considerably each time. Taking a tissue to wipe off her chin and the gag, JoBeth set the gag down and a smirk danced across her lips. With a bit of excitement, she chalked it up to the fact that she was starting to get used to it and considering her hopes for the future, the brunette thought that it was good practice for when she would be able to play with Amy again.



“Hang on, Tara, I’ll be right there,” JoBeth added a moment later. Trying her best to brush aside the kinky fantasies that had sprung to mind, she couldn’t help being amused by being able to speak clearly again. Strange as it was, the gag was growing on her.



With the momentary concern gone, her anxiousness faded and a sense of relief swept over Tara. “Okay,” she replied, a smile finding its way to her lips. Taking a step back from the door, she contented herself to wait for her friend.



JoBeth had quickly found Tara to be a sweet and endearingly curious girl, but she also knew that she was far too polite and shy to ever open the door on her own. Beyond her initial fright at the knock, she hadn’t had any fear that Tara was going to walk in and see her having a bit of very personal time, but the idea was still there. Deep down, JoBeth really liked the prospect of sharing that new part of herself with someone she was close to. With someone that loved her.



Calling up the image of Amy’s caring smile in her mind, JoBeth’s blush grew warmer on her cheeks and a delightful glow settled over her. The haze of desire and pleasure was still buzzing inside her and the brunette tried to shake it off, setting it aside for the lovely evening of dinner and work ahead.



Walking over to the bathroom door, JoBeth paused in front of it to take a deep, centering breath. Taking the handle in hand, she gave it a turn and pushed the door open a little. “You still in here, Tara?” she asked, poking her head into the bathroom and being careful to make sure she didn’t hit the other girl with the door.



“Hey,” Tara replied greeting JoBeth with a smile. She’d moved off towards her own room and was leaning against the doorframe while she waited. “I was wondering if you wanted to head down to the cafeteria…” she said softly, gesturing behind her towards the hallway and the elevators beyond.



Pushing the door all the way open, JoBeth nodded. “Sure,” she chirped, taking a step into the bathroom and offering Tara a smile in return. “You know I’m always game,” she added. “Just let me wash up here first?”



“Of course,” Tara said, standing up and turning to watch her friend as she turned the sink’s faucets on and splash a little water on her cheeks. JoBeth looked like she was happy, but her face was lit up bright red. “Hey, Jo? I know this is a totally random question, but did you just get back from the gym?” she asked a moment later, her eyebrows furrowing with curiosity.



Scrubbing the last of the soap off her hands, JoBeth hoped to get her telltale scent off her hands without attracting Tara’s notice. “Hmm?” she asked, looking over at the redhead and a little confused by the question. Flicking most of the water off her hands and turning off the water, she grabbed her hand towel off the rack to finish drying her hands. “What do you mean?”



While she’d never liked prying into other people’s business too much, Tara felt much more comfortable when she was with JoBeth. Taking a step closer, Tara let her curious nature get the best of her. “Well, your face is all red, and you’ve got some weird marks there…” she trailed off, pointing at JoBeth’s cheeks. “Are you feeling alright?”



“Oh! No, I’m really fine,” JoBeth laughed, hanging the towel up and heading back into her room to grab her ID. “I was, uh… just trying to fix something before you got back…” she explained, walking over to her messenger bag to retrieve her wallet so they could head downstairs.



“Fix something?” Tara asked, following JoBeth into her room. The cryptic response was more than enough to pique her interest and she wanted to make sure that her friend hadn’t gotten hurt by anything. “What do you…” she started, glancing around the room and quickly spotting the hood and ballgag that were still out on JoBeth’s bed.



Standing back up, JoBeth turned around to find Tara looking incredibly puzzled. “You ready to go?” she asked, walking over towards her friend before finally noticing what she was looking at. While she didn’t feel particularly self-conscious about the toys themselves, JoBeth’s blush deepened on her cheeks thanks to what they represented to her. “Guess not,” she chuckled.



“What are those?” Tara asked, pointing at the two leather toys while her attention shifted back to JoBeth. “Are they what you were trying to fix?”



The brunette shook her head, laughing quietly to herself. “No, no,” JoBeth replied, crossing the few feet between her and her bed. “I was using them to try and help fix something…”



Even more confused than before, Tara followed JoBeth over to her bed, sitting on the other side of the two subjects of her inquiry. Leaving the strap-covered leather pouch on bottom alone for the moment, she focused in on the red ball with a strap running through its middle. “Can I…” she trailed off, looking up at her suitemate hopefully, reaching out to pick one of them up.



“Yeah,” JoBeth said, nodding encouragingly. “Go ahead.” If there was anyone she could talk to on campus about Amy, the toys and everything else they entailed, Tara was her girl. With it out in the open like it was now, it was as good of a time as any to see if Tara would be willing to listen. “You can ask about them if you want, too,” she continued, watching her friend pick up the ballgag.



Studying it for a moment, Tara turned the ball over in her hands before looking over at JoBeth’s encouraging smile. With all of her focus on her studies while she was growing up, she’d never really thought about any kinds of adult toys, but she had seen a few movies and TV shows that had people with these sorts of things in them before. “It looks kind of…” Tara paused, trying to think of the right word. “Kinky…” she finished, causing her suitemate to break into a laugh.



“Yeah, I can’t really deny that,” JoBeth said, taking the time that Tara spent studying the gag to use the two elastic ties on her wrist to pull her hair into her twin ponytails.



Her friend’s laugh was a tremendous comfort to her, helping Tara to feel a lot less nervous about asking. While she’d seen things like them, the two objects weren’t anything she’d ever come across before herself. If JoBeth had them and thought that they were fine, that was good enough for her. “What’s this one called?” she asked, deciding to forgo any guess and instead handing it to JoBeth with an arched eyebrow.



“Honestly, I’m not one-hundred percent on this,” the brunette confessed with a chuckle. “I’m pretty sure it’s called a ‘ballgag,’ but I haven’t exactly done a lot of research on it…”



Tara eyed the gag curiously, focusing in on it with the same scientific interest she felt whenever she encountered something new. “A ‘ballgag?’” she asked, repeating the word just to hear the sound of it. “What about this other one?” she continued, picking up the leather pouch and holding it up, trying to determine what side was its front.



JoBeth had to suppress a laugh as she watched Tara turn the hood over in her hands. She’d have been in the exact same position trying to figure out what it was no more than a week ago. “That one’s a ‘hood,’” she said. “I don’t think it really has a special name for it or anything…”



“A hood?” Tara asked. “Like, something you’d wear?”



“Well, yeah,” the brunette confirmed, watching Tara’s reactions closely. The look on Tara’s face didn’t show any disgust or that she was bothered by her new discoveries and it helped JoBeth to feel comfortable continuing the conversation instead of steering the redhead downstairs in hopes that she’d forget about the whole thing. “Actually, they’re both meant to be worn.”



“They are?” Tara asked, her eyebrow peaking skeptically as she flipped the hood over again, trying to figure out how anyone could wear it. It did look like a mask that would fit around someone’s head, but she couldn’t help but notice that there wasn’t any opening for a person to see out of without removing part of it. “How?” she asked, looking back up at JoBeth.



A knowing smile danced across JoBeth’s lips and her heart started to beat a little faster. “Mind if I borrow that back from you?” she asked, prompting Tara to hand her the hood.



“It’s yours,” Tara replied with a small chuckle of her own.



“Thanks,” JoBeth said, glad to know that Tara was still with her and not struggling to keep from being creeped out. Turning the leather hood over, she pulled the blindfold and gag panels off before inserting her hands through the hole for her neck, holding it up for Tara. “It’s supposed to look like this, sort of,” she said, first checking to make sure that she was holding it the right way before turning to see Tara’s reaction. “You know, just on a person instead of my hands.”



“Ohh…” Tara sighed, smiling at JoBeth’s comment. Now that it wasn’t laying flat, she could easily visualize how it would look on someone. “That makes sense…” she added, looking back down at the two pieces that JoBeth had pulled off of it. “Then those two..?”



Setting the hood down, JoBeth picked up the two discarded panels and handed them to her friend. “One of them can be a blindfold, and the other one goes over the mouth, if you want them to…” she clarified, letting the concept sink in for Tara.



Taking the hood from JoBeth, Tara thought that it could easily be construed as something vaguely sinister. It could serve to hide almost everything about a person’s identity if all the panels were attached but at the same time, the leather looked so soft, supple and almost inviting. If anyone had simply described the hood to her a few days ago, she’d have thought that it was incredibly weird. Seeing it in person and having describe it made it seem a lot less intimidating.



“It looks so…” Tara trailed off, not sure how to describe what it was making her feel. A part of her wondered if it could be exciting to be so hidden from the world, trapped where no one knew it was her. She could let her inhibitions go, be free to do things that would never have the courage to do if anyone saw her and free to feel anything she wanted.



Watching Tara inspect the hood, JoBeth couldn’t help but smile. The effect that the hood was having on her suitemate was obvious already and JoBeth knew that Tara would probably be okay with talking about this stuff with her. She should have known that the shy, polite and quiet girl might share at least a part of her own new, kinkier interests.



“Looks like you’ve made a new friend,” JoBeth teased, sensing Tara’s nascent fascination and shooting the redhead a playful grin.



Snapping out of what had turned into a new and rather embarrassing fantasy, Tara looked up. She’d never imagined anything nearly like wearing the hood in her life and despite how oddly excited it had made her, it also had her wide-eyed and hoping that she could hide what she’d been thinking.



“Hmm? What?” Tara asked quickly, knowing full well that the bright red blush on her cheeks made her completely transparent.



JoBeth just chuckled to herself, shaking her head. “Oh, nothing…” she sang innocently. She decided to let the moment slip by without mortifying her best friend but JoBeth was glad to know that she wasn’t the only one that had a strange affection for and an attraction to the hood.



“Ah, sorry…” Tara said, trying to shake off the sudden rush of both arousal and being caught having a few dirtier thoughts. “I was just thinking about something…” she trailed off, setting the hood down beside her and picking up the two detached panels.



With a knowing giggle, JoBeth nodded. “I’ll bet…” she teased, amused and a little glad to see Tara’s blush brightening on her cheeks.



“I don’t know what you mean, Jo…” Tara tried to counter with feigned innocence, looking back down at her hands. The panel that covered a girl’s mouth seemed simple enough, but that wasn’t the one that had caught her interest.



Taking the blindfold in hand, memories of a few long-ago birthday parties and piñatas that her parents had bought for her suddenly sprang to mind. The one thing Tara always remembered from those times wasn’t so much the candy and the fun of trying to break them open to get to it, but the kind of excitement she’d felt from not being able to see while she’d swung the bat.



Any fear she’d had of missing and flailing wildly would immediately fade once the cloth was tied over her eyes. After being spun around and once the bat was in her hands, so long as the blindfold was on, she could let go and joyfully swing away. Until now, it had never occurred to her that it actually meant something, or that it was something that people other than herself might enjoy in another, much more grown up context.



It took a surprising amount of effort for Tara get herself to stop wondering what it would be like to wear the hood herself and get back into thinking about what JoBeth was trying to tell her about. Setting the two panels back down on the bed, she looked over at her smiling friend, hoping that she didn’t look like she’d gotten a little bothered in an awkward new way.



Trying to figure out how she could explain her reaction, Tara thought for a moment about what she could say. “It looks kind of… nice…” she finally said, breaking into a shy chuckle. She never had been particularly good at hiding what she felt and if JoBeth was going to share this with her, Tara thought that it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world if JoBeth saw a glimpse of what it was making her feel. “I’m guessing that the panel things go on after you tie the laces?”



“Yup!” JoBeth nodded, pointing at the small loops on the sides of the hood. “Then the buckles go through here if they’re supposed to be on,” the brunette continued, her ponytails swaying gently behind her as she shifted on the bed closer to where Tara was sitting. If she was right about what Tara was thinking, she wanted to try something with her.



“And this one? The ballgag…?” Tara asked, still becoming familiar with the term.



“The gag is a bit more obvious,” JoBeth replied with a smirk, picking the ballgag up off the bed. Leaning in close to Tara, she raised the gag to her best friend’s lips.



“Aah...” Tara gasped, her cheeks turning a faint shade of pink. JoBeth’s sudden demonstration had her heart beating a little faster but she didn’t make any move to pull away, knowing JoBeth wouldn’t do anything that would hurt her or that she didn’t like.



JoBeth was just a few inches away from Tara, keeping the ball pressed lightly against her friend’s lips while she held the ends of the straps loosely behind her head. “You just put it in your mouth and then you can buckle the straps behind your head to make it tight,” JoBeth continued, holding it in place for a moment before pulling away. “See?”



“Yeah…” Tara squeaked, having nearly lost a piece of her composure when she’d felt her warm breath against the rubber ball. The method of JoBeth’s explanation had taken her by surprise and while she’d known what a gag was, she hadn’t made the connection with how the rubber ball could be used as one until just a moment ago. “Does it work..?” she asked shyly, drawn in by how intriguingly unusual JoBeth’s new toys were proving to be.



A half dozen of her own experiences with it flashed through JoBeth’s mind, inciting another playful grin. “Oh yeah,” she nodded, having noticed the change in Tara’s demeanor since they’d sat down. “It doesn’t really make you that much quieter if you want to shout or something, but it does make you pretty hard to understand.”



With a hard swallow, Tara nodded. “Huh…” she sighed, not immediately sure what to make of the ballgag. The rubber ball looked fairly large and she wasn’t sure that she could even fit it in her mouth, but like the blindfold, there was something about it that she liked. Gathering herself, she nervously met JoBeth’s gaze. Her interest was already aroused and while she felt an inexplicable attraction to the gag JoBeth held in her hands, she couldn’t quite bring herself to ask her next question.



Noting Tara’s hesitation, JoBeth simply smiled, holding the gag up to her own lips. “Here,” she started, trying to settle her own nerves. “I’ll show you,” the brunette finished, opening her mouth to accept the rubber ball once more. A moment later, she pulled the straps tight behind her neck and looped the buckle back through itself, securing the gag.



JoBeth felt her cheeks lighting up a pale shade of crimson once the ball was settled firmly in her mouth. She was gagged in front of her best friend. The excitement and thrill that came with it wasn’t quite the same as the one she felt with Amy, but it still felt intense and wonderful to be able to share the experience of wearing Amy’s gag with someone that did have her trust. “Ffhee?” [See?] she asked, trying her best to sound intelligible around the muffling ball.



Tara nodded, laughing at the sound of JoBeth’s voice. “I see what you meant,” she replied, much of the nervous tension she’d felt now broken. “I guess that explains those marks on your cheeks…” she observed, trailing off once she realized just what they meant.



Recalling JoBeth’s initial garbled response, everything suddenly made a lot more sense. “You were wearing that when I knocked on the door, weren’t you?” Tara asked shyly, her voice dropping into a near whisper.



“Mm hmm,” JoBeth nodded, figuring that while she had the gag on, she’d be far easier to understand if she could keep her answers simple. She didn’t think that Tara would understand her garbled gag-talk as well as Amy had been able to.



The redhead’s cheeks turned a brighter shade of pink and Tara felt a strange warmth inside her when she looked at the ball strapped in her best friend’s mouth. As weird as the idea had seemed initially, the fleeting thought that it looked surprisingly cute spun through her mind and Tara found herself liking it a lot more than she thought she would.



Brushing the small tingly feeling aside, her curiosity reasserted itself. JoBeth didn’t seem very distressed by the gag itself and she certainly didn’t look like she was in any physical discomfort. “You can breathe alright with that on?” she asked, tucking a few strands of hair behind her ears before cocking her head a little to the side.



“Mm hmm!” JoBeth chirped, her lips forming a smile around the gag. Holding up her pointer finger, she signaled for Tara to wait. Reaching back behind her neck, JoBeth pulled the straps free from the buckle and in another moment, the gag was off.



“Aaah…” she sighed, making sure she hadn’t accidentally drooled on herself. Setting the gag back down in her lap, she looked back over at Tara. “So that’s the ballgag,” she declared with a smirk. “And to answer your question, it’s actually pretty easy to breathe around it or with your nose, as long as you don’t try to do too much,” JoBeth elaborated, taking advantage of being able to speak clearly again.



“Makes sense,” Tara chuckled, not quite sure what to say. JoBeth seemed to be so comfortable with being gagged, like she was already used to it. She thought that it would be really scary to not be able to talk in the wrong circumstances, but at the same time, while they were in JoBeth’s room, it seemed reasonably safe. The idea that someone would enjoy being gagged was both strange and illicit, but it looked like JoBeth enjoyed it. Still not sure what all the new emotions swirling through her meant, Tara simply let her gaze float back and forth from the gag to JoBeth’s smiling face.



Taking a moment to calm back down from the small rush the gag had given her, JoBeth watched the small, shy smiles that flickered on Tara’s face. “Well, now that you know what they are… What do you think?” she asked.



“The gag looked kind of cute and the hood was neat too, but…” the redhead trailed off. “Isn’t it scary?” Tara finally asked, giving voice to the single most prominent question she had.



JoBeth nodded slightly, no longer grinning. “Yeah,” she said honestly. “It can be.”



Tara’s brow furrowed and she was still not quite sure what to make of the gag. “But you’ve worn both of these things at least a couple of times already, right?”



“Yep,” JoBeth confirmed with a quiet laugh. “I have.”



Each time Tara tried processing everything that JoBeth had introduced her to in the last few minutes, she reached the same conclusion. “So you like it, then..?” she finally got out, asking JoBeth the same question she’d started to ask herself. “The whole blindfolds and gagging and everything, I mean…”



JoBeth felt the same nervousness she’d felt when she’d followed Amy to the café’s counter the night before, trying to figure out what she could say without sounding stupid. She’d only figured out that she liked this sort of stuff four days ago and while she wasn’t embarrassed about telling Tara, she hadn’t thought about how exactly to explain how she felt about it.



“Yeah,” JoBeth replied, deciding that starting with the truth was a safe bet. Her smile was a mix of nerves, shyness and giddiness at having someone she could talk to. The fact that Tara was willing and seemingly interested was a tremendous help. “I think I do.”



Tara didn’t break JoBeth’s gaze, letting her friend’s statement sink in for a moment. It felt good to know that the thoughts she was having about the two peculiar toys were the same ones her closest friend had obviously had already. With a single statement, JoBeth had made her feel a lot less weird for thinking them. “I guess they could be kind of fun…” Tara finally admitted, breaking the momentary silence between them with a small laugh.



Crossing her legs in front of her, JoBeth rocked back and forth for a moment, a mischievous smile crossing her features. “Oh, you wouldn’t believe how fun they are…” she started, remembering the excitement and mystery of when she’d first started testing the bonds Amy had trapped her in. “But I think it’s really important who you’re with…”



Furrowing her brow once more, Tara leaned back onto the pillows propped up against the bed’s headboard. “What do you mean ‘who you’re with’?” Tara asked.



“Well, for me…” JoBeth trailed off, trying to figure out how she could explain. In the past four days, she hadn’t needed to put the experience into words because she just knew. It was something that happened to her and now that it had, there were a lot of things that weren’t ever going to feel quite the same.



“It’s like if I know that I’m alone and I can take them off myself, they’re nice and all, but that’s not really my favorite way to use them...” she continued, remembering just how different it had felt when Amy had locked the gag on her a few nights before and hoping that Tara was following along. “When I’m somewhere that I feel safe not being able to talk and when I’m with someone that I really trust, that’s when they’re really… powerful.”



Tara felt her heart beating a little faster as JoBeth spoke. “Powerful?” she asked, already having a bit of an idea of what JoBeth was referring to.



With a quick nod, JoBeth smiled back at her suitemate, her thoughts drifting from the experience itself back to her beautiful blonde crush. “Yeah,” she said quietly, feeling that delightful warmth that Amy brought her washing over her again. “When I’ve got the gag or the hood on, it’s like I can give in to the other person and be okay with them being in charge of me while I’m not able to talk or even see…” JoBeth trailed off into a small, bashful grin.



“I’d only let someone do that if I trusted them, though. Only if I knew that they cared for me and that they would never do anything to hurt me,” JoBeth continued, wrapping herself up in the faded memory of Amy’s embrace and feeling her cheeks light up with another bright red blush.



Tara swallowed hard once more, knowing full well what it was that she was feeling now. It was the same excitement and faint arousal that JoBeth looked like she was feeling and a little to her surprise, she was warming up to it. “That sounds like a pretty sensible set of requirements…” she said, trying to sound casual while her voice betrayed some of the thoughts she was struggling to contain.



“Yup…” the brunette agreed. Smiling earnestly, JoBeth glanced away for a moment, too shy to finish her thought while looking Tara in the eye. “And when you have that trust with another person and can feel safe letting them have complete control over you, it’s liberating… and it’s actually really… exciting,” she finished, feeling that intense warmth that accompanied her memories of being with Amy stirring deep inside her again. Squirming in place a bit, JoBeth chuckled at her realization that if Tara wasn’t there, she’d already have the hood, gag and maybe even the cuffs back on again.



Letting everything JoBeth had just told her sink in, Tara sighed deeply, wrapping her arms around one of JoBeth’s pillows. “Wow…” she mused, drawing another small laugh from her blushing suitemate.



“Yeah,” JoBeth agreed, leaning back and propping herself up on her hands, happy to wait and let Tara think for a few minutes. It felt like half of the weight of world on her shoulders had been lifted off now that she’d been able to talk about what she’d felt and what it had meant to her. She’d had enough trouble trying to figure out just what she liked about it and how she felt about it, and it had actually happened to her. The last thing the brunette wanted to do was to rush Tara while she tried to wrap her mind around it.



What JoBeth told her sounded incredibly familiar and the analytical part of Tara’s mind was struggling to keep up with the part that wanted that same experience for herself. The blindfold, the gag, the loss of control to another person all sounded so wonderfully liberating. JoBeth had called it a ‘liberating experience.’



JoBeth was one of the smarter people she knew and they’d become quite close in the past few weeks. Even back on their first night in the dorms, JoBeth had managed to put all of her nerves about moving away from home at ease within the first hour alone. The cheerful brunette had made her feel welcome and comfortable in a way she’d rarely felt around others growing up and while they’d been talking later that night, when JoBeth had told her that she liked girls instead of boys, she’d felt safe enough to admit that she did too.



Tara had never told her deepest and most intimate secret to anyone that she’d ever gone to school with. She’d done her best to keep it hidden from all but the few girls she’d met and seen while spending her summers with her grandparents, but JoBeth was so open and inviting that she knew she’d found someone she could confide in. After that, Tara felt a bond of friendship between her and her suitemate that she wouldn’t trade for anything. If JoBeth really liked this kinkier stuff, she reasoned that there couldn’t be much wrong with liking it herself.



The way that JoBeth had described it made something that sounded naughty seem almost exhilarating. Some of what her friend had described was astonishingly familiar and the more that Tara thought about it, the more she saw of those same feelings in herself. She felt that strange tingle strengthening inside her when she looked at the blindfold laying just a few inches away on the bed and how she’d always felt a strange thrill when she’d had one on. It just hadn’t ever occurred to her that there was something more there.



Her natural curiosity already had her wondering what else was out there that she could try and if she would like it just as much as she liked the blindfold. JoBeth seemed to love the curious red ballgag and she couldn’t deny that it was intriguing. Like JoBeth had said, not being able to see or speak or move without the approval of someone she trusted sounded amazing. Her worries, concerns and desires could all be hidden away behind the hood or a blindfold and she could be free from any of her inhibitions.



Clearing her throat, Tara tore her attention away from the leather toys and looked over at JoBeth, still sitting patiently just a few feet away. “They’re… nice.”



With a laugh JoBeth picked up the hood, holding it lightly and gazing at it for a moment. “I’m a little biased, but I like them…”



“And all that stuff you were talking about…” Tara trailed off, still hugging the pillow close to her chest. “About being able to give control to another person? To someone you trust..?”



Letting her hands drop into her lap, JoBeth looked over at Tara with a soft smile. “Yeah?” she asked, still happily remembering her first of what she hoped would be many nights with Amy.



What closeness they had wasn’t quite enough to balance out the embarrassment Tara felt, but she had to speak the question on her mind. She could feel her cheeks burning red, and she had to break her gaze away from JoBeth before she could gather the courage to just ask. “Well, they way you were talking about it… it kind of sounded like you’ve done that before..?” the redhead finally got out.



JoBeth broke into a shy giggle and a grin pulled across her lips. With a blush of her own that rivaled Tara’s, the brunette gazed off across her dorm room. Tara had always been supportive when they’d talked about things and she’d not only handled her unexpected discovery of the toys really well but been thankfully open-minded to the rather unusual idea that she’d been trying to explain. So long as they were talking now, JoBeth thought that there wouldn’t be a better time to just let it all out in the open and see where everything landed. “Maybe I have…” she confessed, her suggestive, teasing response barely above a whisper.



“You have..?” Tara asked. In a flash, a few of the pieces of what JoBeth had said and what had happened in the last week started to fall into place. “Wait a minute…” she pressed on, sitting back up on the bed and fixing her suitemate with a curious look.



Arching an eyebrow of her own, JoBeth looked back at the redhead. “Hmm?” she asked, cocking her head playfully to the side. One of the first things that she’d learned about Tara over the course of their friendship was that the girl loved very little more than to figure things out. She wasn’t about to lay everything out at once, but Tara’s last question had let her give the other girl enough to start connecting the dots.



Setting the pillow aside, Tara brushed aside the new, confusing but very appealing ideas she’d been introduced to as the mysteries in JoBeth’s life the past few days started to coalesce in her mind. “You said that when you’d gotten these, you didn’t know what they were called, right?”



“Right,” JoBeth confirmed.



“And you said you hadn’t had time to do any research about them…” the redhead continued, trailing off to think for a moment. “We’ve both been slammed with midterms these last two weeks, but… When did you get these?” Tara finished, picking up the gag and two detached panels of the hood.



With a mischievous smirk, JoBeth turned to face her friend, crossing her legs in front of her. “I got them last Friday, but I didn’t really ‘get’ them as much as they were kind of…” she trailed off into a small laugh. “Well, they were kind of given to me.”



“They were given to you?” Tara asked, furrowing her brow while she tried to figure out just what JoBeth’s clarification meant. “Really?”



JoBeth nodded. “Yep.”



“Huh…” Tara sighed. JoBeth did live right next door to her and they spent a fair amount of their time together both for classes and just hanging out, but she’d been gone last weekend. “Friday night was when you were gone all night, wasn’t it? When you said that you were heading off to that mansion on the far side of town for a story you wanted to submit to the paper?”



With another chuckle, JoBeth nodded her agreement. “Uh huh. I was hoping to get a few pictures of the place.”



When they’d talked on the phone Saturday, JoBeth had been positively giddy. She’d just figured that she’d gotten the pictures, but JoBeth hadn’t shown them to her since. “And that’s when you got these things?” Tara asked. “Who gave them to you? Were you with someone there?”



JoBeth looked away shyly, knowing that she was blushing ever brighter now. “Kind of.”



“Yeah? Who was it?” Tara pressed.



She wanted to be honest with Tara but she had the same fear that Amy seemed to have about what they’d done, and just how they felt about each other. With the wrong approach, JoBeth figured that she would have to steal Tara’s phone to prevent a phone call that she did not want to be made. If she was going to tell Tara what had really happened, she’d need to take it slow. “Uhh…” she started, trying to figure out just how to break the news that she’d technically been kidnapped without causing too much alarm.



“Well, I got into the mansion just fine, but while I was poking around the place, I kind of got a little caught…” JoBeth said hesitantly, trailing off when she saw Tara’s shocked reaction.



“You what?” Tara exclaimed, feeling a sudden rush of worry and fear at the revelation. “Oh my God, JoBeth, why didn’t you tell me?” she continued, tossing the hood’s panels and the gag aside as she scooted closer to JoBeth on the bed.



Unable to resist a laugh, JoBeth shrugged. “I don’t think I was supposed to broadcast that I’d been caught, Tara…” she said, taking one of Tara’s hands in her. “Besides, everything was okay… I called you on Saturday didn’t I? I’m fine.”



“But…”



With a reassuring smile, JoBeth interrupted her worried friend. “Tara, I’m right here, aren’t I?”



“Yeah…” Tara conceded. Nothing in the last few days told her that JoBeth was hurt or upset, but that didn’t mean that she was still hiding something. “You didn’t get hurt, or… or…”



Squeezing Tara’s hand, JoBeth locked eyes with Tara, wanting to make sure that the flustered redhead believed her. “Tara, I promise you I’m okay. Nothing like that happened at all,” she said soothingly, letting Tara take a few breaths to get hold of what she’d just told her.



JoBeth was sitting right next to her, and she’d said she’d come back home early the next morning. They’d talked a little after noon on Saturday, but she’d never even thought that her best friend could’ve been in serious trouble the night before. Her train of thought was derailed and replaced by a stream of consciousness that had nothing but concern for JoBeth. “You’re sure you’re okay? What happened?” she asked, her voice shaking a little.



“I’m sure,” JoBeth replied, giving Tara a demure smile. “I just got caught and… they kind of tied me up a bit,” she continued, breaking into a small laugh. The warm, red glow on her cheeks had returned along with her memory of how it had all happened, and just how silly it all sounded now.



Tara couldn’t quite shake her confusion about JoBeth’s unexpected reaction to what seemed like very scary and unsettling things. “You got kidnapped and you’re okay with it?” she asked softly, a note of disbelief in her voice. Shaking her head, the intellect she prided herself on wasn’t helping her in her struggle to find a way to make sense of what JoBeth was telling her.



“It really wasn’t that scary,” JoBeth answered earnestly. “And I’m really fine, Tara. No one hurt me. They just needed to keep me out of the way for a little while…”



Her friend’s answer helped to set her a mind a little more at ease, but all of the questions she had were still running through her head a mile a minute. “You don’t need to go see a doctor or anything, do you?” she asked. She knew that JoBeth had the good sense to take care of herself, but she couldn’t help making sure anyway.



JoBeth shook her head, offering her same reassuring smile. “Nope. But I would have if I did.”



“Good…” Tara chirped, content that her friend was telling the truth. JoBeth said that she was okay and she was back home safe and sound, so if she was going to get kidnapped for a night, Tara couldn’t think of a better way that it could have happened.



Shifting over on the bed, JoBeth moved towards the headboard, beckoning for Tara to follow her. “Come on up here, Tara,” she said invitingly, leaning back against her stacked pillows and patting the spot right next to her. While she looked a bit frazzled, Tara didn’t hesitate to collapse next to JoBeth a moment later.



Rolling onto her side, Tara took a minute to let her racing mind slow back down before she looked up at JoBeth. “What did they do to you? Do you know who they were?” she continued, feeling better about pressing on with her curiosity now that she was satisfied that JoBeth was alright.



JoBeth smiled, the question bringing to mind her first meeting that night with her ‘blonde doctor.’ She must have subconsciously registered Amy’s perfume right at the start, as whatever initial fears she’d had certainly hadn’t lasted long. “It was really two girls that actually caught me…” she said, another giddy smile forming on her lips. “And they were actually…” she trailed off, fighting back another giggle. “They were really nice.”



Tara’s eyebrow shot up at the sentiment, and JoBeth knew she’d struck another chord of disbelief. “Hold on a second…” she interrupted, propping herself up on her elbow. “You’re telling me that your abductors were nice?” the redhead asked incredulously.



“Yeah,” JoBeth laughed. “As hard as that might be to believe.”



The concept wasn’t quite registering for Tara, no matter if JoBeth was okay or not. “But they tied you up!” she exclaimed, her brow furrowing quizzically.



“I know,” JoBeth chuckled.



“And…” Tara started, finally remembering what they’d been talking about just a few moments before. JoBeth had told her how much she liked the blindfold and being gagged and that she’d gotten the new leather toys on Friday night.



The sudden understanding on Tara’s face was apparent. “And I kind of liked it…” JoBeth said, giving a confirming nod to match the deep crimson blush on her cheeks. She squirmed a little on the bed, trying to ignore the insistent warmth between her legs. It was the first time she’d fully admitted it to anyone. Somehow, that made seem so much more real.



“You did?” Tara asked. JoBeth understood that her question was rhetorical and let her just try and think for a moment. Her friend had been kidnapped and tied up, but considering everything they’d been talking about and what JoBeth had just told her, Tara knew that JoBeth was okay. She hadn’t been hurt during the whole ordeal, but had instead been discovering something new. From the sound of it, it was something wonderful. “You liked being tied up like that?” she asked timidly.



JoBeth could only smile at her friend, offering a slightly embarrassed grin. “Uh huh,” she said though a shy laugh. “The two girls were both wearing surgical masks, so I couldn’t see their faces that well, but there was one girl that stayed with me most of the time. She was the one that actually tied me up…” JoBeth elaborated. “And she was just kind, funny and really nice about it…”



One of the redhead’s eyebrows shot up dubiously at the sentiment. “How can someone be nice while they’re tying you up and kidnapping you?” she asked. While she wouldn’t deny that what JoBeth had described to her sounded almost exciting, Tara wasn’t quite connecting with the way that her friend made it sound so playful and fun to be held against her will.



With a shrug, JoBeth’s nostalgic smile grew brighter. “I don’t know,” she admitted, still not able to explain just why she’d loved it so much. “She just was. Something about her made me feel safe…” she trailed off, turning to meet Tara’s inquisitive gaze. “And I knew that she wasn’t going to let anything hurt me while I was there, so… it was okay.”



“You knew?” Tara asked.



“The same way that I know the sky is blue, Tara,” JoBeth said. “Even though she’d tied me up, I knew that she’d protect me, so I didn’t have to worry,” she finished. She’d wrapped herself in that same absolute certainty that she’d felt coming from Amy that night ever since she’d gotten home on Saturday morning, and Amy had done nothing to prove otherwise. “While she was with me, I never got scared.”



Still a little exasperated, Tara couldn’t get how something like that wasn’t terrifying. “Jo, if that happened to me, I would’ve been scared out of my mind!” she protested, collapsing back down onto the bed.



Rolling onto her side, JoBeth curled up a bit as a dreamy smile sparkled in her eyes. Her ‘blonde doctor’ had been so warm and kind from the start that had set her completely at ease and once she’d found out that it was Amy, her Amy, it had all made perfect sense. “Not with this girl…” she laughed, unable to suppress a giddy grin.



“She was that amazing?” Tara asked, feeling her heart soften at seeing her friend looking so happy. “Something must have happened between you two…” she trailed off, feeling a smile of her own tugging insistently at the corners of her lips.



JoBeth toyed with the corner of one of the pillows idly, not willing to deny what Tara had said. She’d wished that they’d had the time to do more and she wasn’t going to let anything stop her from finding that opportunity with Amy again. “She was more than amazing, Tara,” the brunette said, her cheeks still a rosy shade of pink. “I don’t know how else I can explain it, just that I’d never felt safer before. I know it sounds terrifying, but she was there with me. I knew that she’d protect me.”



No more than ten minutes ago, the idea would have been completely incomprehensible to Tara, but everything JoBeth was saying was so earnest and sincere that her doubts were melting away. “You knew you could trust her that much, huh?” Tara asked, though the answer was already apparent in JoBeth’s smile.



“Yup,” the brunette nodded. “I did.”



Strange as it was, if JoBeth said she was okay and that she believed she could trust in her captor so completely, that was enough to satisfy her worries. The ordeal was over now, and Tara hoped that her best friend would never have to go through something like that again. Thankfully, JoBeth was back home, safe and sound. There wasn’t anything else she could think of to ask for.



Feeling a bit more at ease, Tara let out a soft sigh. “Well, you’re okay now,” she observed, resting her head on top of her arm. “And you came back the next morning, so I guess she ended up being worthy of your trust…”



“Definitely,” JoBeth giggled.



Her friend was safe and, from the sound of it, she’d had a heck of a time that night. The way that JoBeth talked about it made it sound completely extraordinary and she was starting to wonder if she’d ever be able to experience anything quite like it. “She sounds like a pretty special girl to have earned it so quickly and certainly…” Tara said, smiling dreamily.



Amy had her all tied up in knots in more ways than one and all JoBeth wanted was to just be able to tell her how she’d made her feel. Judging by the tone of Tara’s voice, JoBeth figured that the thoughts running through Tara’s mind probably weren’t that different than her own and if she was going to break the news of her kidnapper’s identity, this would be as good a time as any.



A mischievous glint sparked in her eye and JoBeth realized how she might be able to do it. Just flat out dropping the bombshell would probably make anyone react badly, but in the few weeks they’d been friends, she’d never seen Tara walk away from a mystery. The redhead was certainly a quiet girl but she was incredibly astute and open-minded. If she could find a way to warm Tara up to the idea and get her to see Amy the way she did, she might be able to help her figure out how to deal with how complicated her crush had become without causing a miniature explosion of panic.



The image of Amy’s smile bubbled up in her mind once more and a playful smirk danced across her lips. Hoping that she wasn’t about to get her beautiful blonde crush in trouble, JoBeth squeezed the pillow tightly to her chest and started to speak.



“Well, she is…” JoBeth said longingly, trailing off tantalizingly and hoping that Tara would take the bait.



Tara saw the glow that seemed to be emanating off of her friend at the mere mention of this mysterious girl and it brought a smile to her lips before she realized exactly what JoBeth had said. “Hold on a second…” she said, rising back up onto her elbow. “She ‘is’?”



A wide grin pulled across her lips and all JoBeth could do was chuckle innocently at the question. “Yeah…” she replied a moment later.



Her brows furrowing, Tara sat all the way up on the bed. She fixed her friend with a curious gaze, puzzling over the sudden nagging thought that had leaped to mind. She’d figured that, despite the story and feelings that it had spawned, JoBeth didn’t know who’d grabbed her that night at the mansion. If not, there wasn’t much sense in using the present tense to describe her kidnapper unless her assumption was wrong.



“So you knew who she was?” the redhead asked, cocking her head to the side and letting her analytical side temporarily take the wheel.



Meeting Tara’s gaze, JoBeth hoped for a second that she hadn’t guessed wrong in mentioning anything about Friday night. If Tara took it the wrong way, she wouldn’t know what to do with herself if she caused Amy any kind of misfortune. She needed to make Tara sure that understood what Amy already meant to her. “I didn’t know at the time,” JoBeth replied, shaking her head slightly. “I just knew that she was my nice captor lady,” she added with a small laugh.



That much made sense to Tara, but it still didn’t explain everything she wanted to know. She didn’t like the idea of crossing any lines that JoBeth didn’t want to cross, but it was too much for her to resist. “But you do know who she is now..?” she asked tentatively, hoping that she hadn’t said something that she wasn’t supposed to.



With a shy nod, JoBeth felt her cheeks reddening again and that comfortably familiar pleasant warmth that accompanied her memories of what had happened between her and Amy since Friday. “Yeah…” she replied with a barely contained smile, shifting slightly on the bed.



Tara’s heart leapt into her throat and she felt a sudden rush of excited energy. “You do?” she chirped. “Did you call the police? Have they caught her?”



Sitting up on the bed, JoBeth turned to face Tara. If Tara didn’t understand how she felt, the whole situation would spiral out of her control and she was not about to let that happen. “I need you to hear this, Tara,” JoBeth started, taking Tara’s hands in hers.



A little thrown by JoBeth’s serious turn, she noticed the slightly worried look that had taken over her suitemate’s features. “What’s that?” Tara asked, trying her best to stay calm in the face of all the hundreds of other questions that were spinning through her mind.



“Tara, I’m not calling the police about it,” JoBeth said, looking Tara straight in the eyes.



“What?” Tara asked, not following JoBeth’s logic. There was no reason that JoBeth shouldn’t call the police, especially if she knew who one of the culprits was. “Why not? Why wouldn’t you call them?” she asked, cocking her head to the side in a mix of both confusion and disbelief.



Squeezing Tara’s hands once more, JoBeth refused to break and look away. She needed to be certain that Tara agreed with her and she wasn’t afraid of telling Tara anything that she needed to know to feel comfortable with her decision. “I know this might sound strange, but it’s because I don’t want her caught,” the brunette answered earnestly, waiting for what she figured would be an onslaught of questions from Tara.



Trying to put together everything that JoBeth had told her was proving to be no small task for Tara. Just a little while ago, they were going to be heading downstairs for dinner and the next thing she’d known, JoBeth had introduced her to things she’d never have expected.



“You don’t?” Tara asked softly, arching an eyebrow.



“I have a good reason for it, but yeah… I don’t,” JoBeth confirmed with a shake of her head, happy to wait for Tara to figure out just how to react.



Lost in thought, Tara finally looked down in her lap. JoBeth was still holding her hands supportively and her mind was running a mile a minute. She tried to trying to wrap her mind around this latest revelation and why JoBeth would have to not want to tell anyone other than her. Her friend had been kidnapped, tied up and held captive for at least half of a night by someone and it was utterly bizarre that she didn’t want to do anything about it, even though she knew who that person was.



Based on what JoBeth was saying, it was like she wanted to protect this mystery girl. She’d told her that she’d been nice, kind and that she’d done nothing but treat her well during the whole ordeal. If JoBeth had figured out who she was, there had to be something there.



The nascent spark of a thought flashed through Tara’s mind, bringing with it a notion would bring everything back together. If JoBeth really felt the way she said she did about her whole experience, there was only one possible explanation for why she’d done everything that she had in the past few days. She couldn’t help thinking that it was an outrageous conclusion, but as she thought about it more, it was no stranger than anything else that they’d talked about together. It made too much sense for it not to be the truth.



With a deep breath, Tara summoned up the courage to look JoBeth back in the eye and ask the single question she had to know the answer to. “The girl from Friday night…” Tara trailed off, her voice barely above a whisper. “You like her, don’t you?”



“Yeah,” JoBeth nodded behind a blushing smile. It felt a little embarrassing to admit that she liked a girl that had held her hostage, but if she could explain to Tara that it was Amy, a girl that she’d already had a crush on for weeks, it might feel a little less odd. Above all, she appreciated Tara’s calm reactions so far. She was proud of her friend for dealing with all the odd surprises that she’d thrown her way in the last few minutes and she wasn’t about to disrespect that by telling her anything less than the complete truth.



Her initial suspicion confirmed, Tara’s curiosity only deepened. “After everything she did to you?” she asked, her brow still furrowed incredulously.



She knew that her assertion was going to sound very strange until she could paint the whole picture for Tara, and JoBeth hoped that she could keep Tara from slamming on the brakes too soon. “She didn’t do anything bad to me,” she countered, trying to sound calm and reasonable.



“But she tied you up!” Tara said, pulling her hands away from JoBeth’s. “She kidnapped you!” She couldn’t quite shake the feeling that her friend might be suffering some kind of short term stockholm syndrome after all that had happened.



“I know, I know…” JoBeth replied, holding up her hands defensively before letting them fall into her lap. “But it’s not like she kept me for long and she really didn’t do anything to hurt me, Tara,” she continued, leaning a little to the side to try and meet Tara’s gaze. When her friend finally looked back at her, she saw only warmth, caring, and concern in the redhead’s eyes and her fears that Tara was about turn on her faded.



With a small smile of her own, JoBeth was able to get Tara to reciprocate just a tiny bit, and seeing it helped her feel comfortable to keep talking. “There’s that smile I like to see,” she teased, breaking the momentary silence that had fallen between them and prompting a giggle from Tara.



“All she did was make it so I had to stay there a while. Other than that, we just talked for a bit,” JoBeth added, drifting off into her own wonderful memories of the night in question. “And she kept an eye on me to make sure that I was okay…”



From everything her JoBeth was telling her, Friday night sounded like it was more fun than frightening. “She did?” Tara asked, her worries starting to turn into genuine interest and wonder.



With a small chuckle, JoBeth thought back to how amusing it had been to watch Amy in the warehouse that night, occasionally stumbling into something while she tried to stay within sight. “Yeah,” she said, grinning and giving a quick nod. “Probably one of the best dates I’ve ever been on.”



“Really?” Tara laughed, propping herself up on her hands. She was certain that there was something more to the story than just happening to meet this random girl on Friday night for JoBeth to be so happy about it.



“Really,” JoBeth echoed with a longing smile. “Probably the best date I’ve had, actually. She was caring, attentive, curious and interested in me…” she trailed off, very aware of the glowing redness that had taken over her cheeks. “And, uh… In case you can’t tell, I was more than a little interested in her…”



“Seemed a little like it,” Tara said softly, her own lips curling into a smile in return. Reaching up, she tucked a few stray hairs behind her ear. Imagining what Friday night must have been like for JoBeth and her ‘other girl’ had spurred a few warm feelings to start swirling inside her and that was aside from the strange allure the hood and gag held for her.



Nodding, JoBeth wouldn’t deny it. “Yeah,” she chirped, thankful for Tara’s open mind and content to let the girl think for a minute. JoBeth watched Tara’s attention flick over to Amy’s toys and she saw the same distant smile that she figured she had every time she thought about using them and the person she’d gotten them from.



The faint sounds of their fellow students returning home from classes wafted gently in through the opened window and the two girls paused for a moment again. The sudden interest that the two leather objects had sparked in Tara had become unexpectedly deep and her next question spilled out almost without thought.



“So after she let you go, she gave you the things she’d tied you up with..?” the redhead asked quietly, turning to look back at JoBeth.



That whole part of the night was still a blur in her mind, and it was the one part that JoBeth wasn’t quite sure how to explain. “Kind of,” the brunette shrugged. “I ended up falling asleep…”



“You fell asleep?” Tara interrupted with an amused laugh.



“I know!” JoBeth replied, joining Tara’s laugh and shaking her head. “But like I said, I just felt safe there. And besides, you know me, Tara. I can fall asleep pretty much anywhere.”



She couldn’t deny that the statement was true, and Tara had seen JoBeth fall asleep in quite a few places during their late-night homework sessions. “Yeah you can,” she chuckled. “Good thing I’m usually there to wake you up and get you into your own bed!”



Thinking back to the few times in the library, once in the cafeteria and a bunch of times in random places between her own and Tara’s room, JoBeth laughed along with her. “And I love you for that, Tara,” she replied, playfully tossing one of her pillows at Tara.



Catching the pillow, Tara dropped it into her lap and scoffed at the brunette. “Still doesn’t explain how you got these things, though,” she said, inclining her head towards the objects in question.



Letting the moment of silliness pass, JoBeth stretched back onto her side. “When I woke up, I ended up finding out that she’d left me so I could get out on my own…” she explained, taking one of her other pillows and using it for support under her arm.



“She was gone?” Tara asked, already paying rapt attention to the next part of JoBeth’s story.



With a nod, JoBeth confirmed Tara’s supposition before losing her battle to resist another shy smile that had bubbled up from her memories of the night. “And after I got myself untangled, I kind of brought everything home with me…” she finally admitted with an embarrassed grin.



Tara’s jaw dropped and a surprised expression crossed her features. “You stole them?” she exclaimed in a harsh whisper.



“What?” the brunette protested, perking back up defensively. “I mean, she’d put them on me, didn’t she? And I was the only one there, so it’s not like she was coming back for them or anything… I didn’t want to leave them there…” JoBeth continued, figuring that if there was a person she could explain herself to, she was sitting on the other side of her bed. “And besides… I kind of like them!” she declared, watching Tara’s own blushing reaction.



Squirming a little in place, Tara felt a small bit of relief knowing that she wasn’t along in liking the two strange things. “You do?”



With a devilish smile, JoBeth glanced over at the hood and gag that lay unobtrusively beside them. She’d watched Tara’s reactions to the toys when she’d been explaining them and the redhead hadn’t done anything to dampen her inkling that she wasn’t alone in liking them.



“Uh huh,” JoBeth chirped, looking Tara straight in the eyes. “And you can’t tell me that you don’t think they’re a little exciting…”



Biting her lip, Tara couldn’t honestly deny JoBeth’s claim. “Okay, so maybe I do…” she admitted, shifting away shyly. Before she gave too much away, she wanted to get back to the subject at hand and find out why JoBeth hadn’t called the authorities after last weekend. “But you know who the girl is, JoBeth,” Tara continued, looking back over at her friend.



“I trust her, I like her, and she did nothing but honor and protect me, Tara,” JoBeth replied. “I’m just returning the favor.”



What JoBeth said made sense to Tara in a way. If JoBeth knew who her kidnapper was, that girl had to know who she was as well. If that was the case, she’d have had ample opportunity to try and hurt her friend again already, and that obviously hadn’t happened. That only left a question that she wasn’t sure she should ask and she was a little afraid that it would cross a line that JoBeth didn’t want to explain.



Sitting back up, Tara fidgeted with her hands. Trying to figure out if there was a way to approach the difficult subject without upsetting JoBeth, she decided to see where the direct route would take her. “Well,” she started tentatively, finding the courage to look over at JoBeth again. “Can I ask how you found out? Did she tell you who she was or something?”



Taking a deep breath, JoBeth readied herself to tell Tara everything. For the few weeks that they’d known each other, the girl had proven to be a trustworthy friend and after all they’d just talked about, she didn’t think that Tara would stop being one. “No…” JoBeth said, sitting up on the bed once more and turning to face her suitemate. “I actually figured it out myself.”



“You did?” Tara asked, arching a curious eyebrow.



“Yeah, on Sunday…” JoBeth trailed off with a smirk. “It made a ton of sense when I did, too. It helped me figure out why I knew I could trust her so quickly…”



JoBeth’s cheeks lit up in a blush and Tara watched the brunette as it was her turn to bite her lip shyly. “Am I allowed to know who she is?” Tara asked, hoping that she wasn’t pushing too hard.



Every fantasy and desire she had for Amy flashed quickly through her mind, filling her with both warmth and a small fear. Once she told Tara the name, she couldn’t ever take it back. JoBeth fixed Tara with a stern gaze, locking eyes with the redhead. “You have to promise me that you won’t tell anyone if I tell you, Tara,” she said firmly.



“I…” Tara started.



“Promise me,” JoBeth pressed, unwilling to compromise for anything less. “If she gets arrested, I won’t press charges and I’d have to do something really bad to you... And I don’t want to do that…” she continued, letting a little bit of her fears slip into her words. “Sorry…” she added a moment later, not meaning to scare or threaten her closest friend.



“It’s okay…” Tara replied, resting her hand on the flustered JoBeth’s knee. Knowing that JoBeth was just as afraid to tell the story as she had been for JoBeth’s well being prevented her from being upset by the brunette’s outburst. She felt a deep sympathy for JoBeth and Tara figured that the story had to be just as hard for her friend to tell as it was for her to hear.



The fact that JoBeth would trust her with such a secret filled her with an appreciation and affection for the other girl that she’d rarely shared with anyone. Everything else could be damned. She cared about JoBeth and if that meant promising to keep a secret, Tara wanted to.



“Alright,” Tara said, smiling warmly at JoBeth. “It’s between you and me only.”



“Pinky swear?” JoBeth asked, breaking into a tiny smile of her own.



“I promise,” Tara laughed, holding up her pinky finger.



Snagging the other girl’s proffered finger with her own, JoBeth let out a deep, relieved sigh. She felt a hundred pounds lighter knowing that Tara trusted and believed in her judgment in the admittedly unusual circumstances. “Thanks,” JoBeth smiled, letting Tara’s hand go to fall gently back into her lap.



“Like I wouldn’t,” Tara said warmly. “You’re my best friend, Jo. I can’t just leave you hanging.”



Having Tara’s support and understanding felt wonderful, and she hoped the other girl knew she wasn’t taking her for granted. “Aww…” JoBeth cooed. “You know I’d do the same for you, Tara…”



Nodding, Tara swatted JoBeth playfully on her knee. “You already have…” she replied, thankful that she’d managed to luck into having a roommate like JoBeth. She wouldn’t tell another soul if JoBeth didn’t want her to, but her curiosity over the identity of JoBeth’s mystery girl still tugged strongly in the back of her mind. “But about the girl…”



Laughing, JoBeth leaned back a bit to rest on her hands. “About the girl,” she echoed.



“It sounds like you already knew her…” Tara continued, based on all the little hints and allusions that JoBeth had been making while they’d talked about Friday night.



Gathering her own courage, JoBeth glanced over at her desk where the pictures that Amy had left her the next morning were tucked away between her notebooks. “You know our English class?” she asked, feeling the blush returning to her cheeks.



Her brow furrowed again and Tara wondered what one of their classes would have anything to do with it. JoBeth had told her that she was attracted to one of the TAs from the class, but beyond that, neither of them knew anyone else in the large class. “What about it?” she asked in return.



“Well, our TA in there…” JoBeth paused for a moment, her lips curling into a shy smile. “The one that I’ve had a crush on since the first day of class..?”



“It was AMY?!” Tara exclaimed, cutting the brunette off mid-sentence.



The smile on her face had turned into a loopy grin, and JoBeth gave a small nod. “Yeah…”



Her mind was spinning with both the sudden surprise and how much sense it made. It explained the trust and familiarity that JoBeth had mentioned perfectly and the attraction they shared for each other was fairly obvious to anyone that was paying close attention to them in class. “You’ve been head over heels in love with her since the first day of class…” Tara mused, suddenly able to connect all the threads that had been dangling for the past few minutes.



“Maybe a little bit…” JoBeth confirmed with a giddy laugh.



Amy had struck her as a very sweet and nice girl in class and she finally understood JoBeth’s reasons for trusting her and not wanting to get her in trouble. “And she was the one that tied you up on Friday?” Tara asked, still coming back from the loop JoBeth had thrown her into. With a simple nod, JoBeth answered her question.



While the kidnapping still sounded bizarre, Tara figured there were far worse people out there that could have captured her friend. In class, JoBeth had been as forward as she could be with her flirting and Tara thought that Amy would have had to at least suspect that JoBeth liked her while she’d held her hostage.



After everything they’d have gone through together, Tara couldn’t believe that the trust and affection that Amy and JoBeth had for each other was anything less than mutual. She’d seen them smiling and blushing at each other all during class for the last two days, even more than their usual. She just hadn’t known why. “And you were with her last night again…” she observed, causing JoBeth’s blush to deepen and another slightly embarrassed smile.



“At the library, yeah…” JoBeth laughed, remembering how curious Tara had been when she’d been bouncing off the walls for twenty minutes after she’d gotten back to the dorm.



Dubiously arching her eyebrow, Tara tossed the pillow she was holding back at her suitemate playfully. “Were you really at the library?” she asked with a note of skepticism in her voice.



“Yes!” JoBeth cried, catching the pillow before it hit her in the face. It felt so good to finally have someone to talk to about Amy that she couldn’t help but laugh. Tara was still smirking at her with an amused disbelief and JoBeth gestured over at the stack of books on the corner of her desk. “I have the books I checked out to prove it, too.”



Tara tried to wrap her mind around the ramifications of a teacher not only accidentally kidnapping a student, but continuing to see her. She already knew that JoBeth hoped that Amy liked her in return and that they could find a way to see each other outside of class, but this was on a whole new level. “Holy…” she sighed before JoBeth spoke up.



“You hate swearing, Tara,” the brunette interjected, bringing Tara out of her thoughts and back into the moment.



“But this is big…” Tara said, a small spark of wonder shining in her eyes.



Smiling back at Tara, JoBeth clutched the pillow tighter to her chest. “I know…”



“You have a huge crush on her…” Tara continued.



Intimately familiar with all the new fantasies and feelings that their first night together had given her, JoBeth felt the blush on her cheeks deepen. “It might have gotten a little bigger lately,” JoBeth chuckled, biting her lip bashfully.



As the pieces of JoBeth’s story fell into place in her mind, all Tara could do was run through the facts that she knew and keep them in order. “She tied you up…” the redhead sighed, glancing over at the hood and gag that were laying beside her.



Tara’s observation brought back the memory of being held in the blonde girl’s bonds and in her loving arms, filling JoBeth with the same heat and arousal it always did. With a bright grin, JoBeth bit her lip again, trying to hide that a wonderful tingly feeling had started up deep inside her.



“I liked when she tied me up,” JoBeth said shyly, squirming a little.



Seeing JoBeth’s adorable reaction to her statement brought a smile to Tara’s lips. The whole idea that anyone might like being tied up was almost funny, but the way that JoBeth had talked about it and the strange emotions that it had sparked inside of her helped her to understand the appeal it had.

With a playfully wicked smirk, Tara watched JoBeth’s whole face lighting up a pale shade of red. “And you want her to do it again…” she teased, feeling a small trill of her own at the notion.



Remembering full well what she was doing when Tara had first knocked on her door, JoBeth nodded, laughing her reply. “A little bit...”



Tara let out a laugh of her own, really starting to enjoy the conversation. They’d managed to find a place of trust and open discussion that felt both comfortable and nice and the fear she’d felt about saying something wrong had left her completely.



While the subject was pretty bizarre by any standard she might have had, Tara felt comfortable that JoBeth was telling her the truth. It was obvious that JoBeth liked Amy, pure and simple. The trust, the affection and the familiarity between them that night that would have let JoBeth feel so safe had to have been beyond amazing. All she had to do was look at JoBeth on the other side of the bed to see that it had her friend positively glowing. She could tell why JoBeth would want to be with Amy again, and anything that made JoBeth that happy was going to be fine with her.



“You were with her again last night…” Tara said, prompting a grin and a nod from JoBeth.



“Yep,” the ponytailed brunette chirped. “And you saw me when I got home!”



“Yeah I did,” Tara smiled. “You were all giggly and giddy when you got back. It took you half an hour to meet me back on Earth!” she chided, causing JoBeth to lob the pillow back at her with a scoff.



Tara caught the pillow, flashing a grin back at her. “Can you blame me?” JoBeth asked.



Tucking the pillow under her arm, Tara shook her head. “Nah,” she said, stifling a small laugh. “But it makes a lot more sense now!”



“Glad I could clear that up,” JoBeth giggled, her smile sparkling in her eyes.



In the momentary pause of their conversation, another thought occurred to Tara. “Does Amy know that you know it was her..?” she asked before adding with a laugh, “Did that even make sense?”

With a chuckle, JoBeth nodded. “I know what you meant, and I’m not sure if she does…” she trailed off into a small giggle. “But… I do know she likes me too…”



Tara thought back to the dozen or so walks home after class in the past several weeks when JoBeth had asked if she’d thought Amy liked her too and another smile crossed Tara’s features. “You’ve thought she’s liked you for a while now…” Tara pointed out.



“Heh, yeah, but now I know she does…” JoBeth replied, happy to concede the point considering what had happened the last two times she’d been alone with Amy.



Wondering if there was still more to JoBeth’s story, Tara couldn’t help pressing on. “How’s that?” she asked, arching a curious eyebrow.



The tingling warmth stirring inside her sparked a little hotter when she thought about the reason how she knew what Amy felt. “Well…” she trailed off, blushing again. It seemed such a silly thing to be embarrassed about, but it had been so absolutely wonderful that it still gave her blissful chills four days later. “We kind of… kissed.”



“What!?” Tara exclaimed. “And you’re just telling me this now?” she asked, pretending to be scandalized, much to JoBeth’s amusement.



“Hey, I had a lot of stuff to tell you, you know…” JoBeth countered, drawing a conciliatory shrug and a smile from the redhead.



Pulling the pillow into her lap, Tara let her hands rest gently on top of it. “I suppose,” she allowed. “But I still want to know everything!”



Laughing softly, JoBeth propped herself up on one hand, reliving the breathtaking moment in her mind. “On Friday night…” JoBeth started, glancing over to the gag that lay just within arm’s reach and well aware of the blush brightening her cheeks. “Before she put the gag on me, we kind of had a kiss…” she finished, unable to suppress a grin as she looked back over at Tara.



Tara let out a delighted laugh, swatting JoBeth lightly with the pillow. “I can’t believe you kept this secret from me, you meanie!” she protested.



“Not like I wanted to!” JoBeth replied, taking Tara’s swing against her arm with an embarrassed laugh. More than anything, she was ecstatic to finally have someone that she could talk to about everything that had happened. Tara had been a godsend, sharing in her happiness and elation. “It was hard to keep it all in!”



A warm, affectionate smile spread over Tara and she tucked a few strands of hair back behind her ear. It meant a lot that JoBeth had trusted her with what she had. In the brunette, she’d found a steadfast and true friend. “Well, you don’t have to any more, Jo…” she cooed, resting her hand on JoBeth’s knee.



The warmth of Tara’s friendship made her genuinely glad that the sometimes shy but incredibly sweet girl was her friend. “I guess I was just afraid of what you’d think…” JoBeth replied, resting her hand on top of Tara’s. “And after I figured out who she was, I thought that if I told you, you might want to turn her in…” she trailed off for a moment.



“She’s our TA,” Tara offered, understanding JoBeth’s concern. As weird as the situation was, she couldn’t imagine someone as nice as Amy seemed doing anything terrible. “She’s really nice. I like her, and I like that you like her…”



Stealing her pillow back from Tara, JoBeth held it close to her chest. “I like her a lot,” she replied, looking shyly back at Tara and biting her lip. “But besides that… Thanks for being so cool, Tara.”

“No problem,” Tara laughed, giving a small, deferent nod. “And hey!” she added excitedly, giving JoBeth a playful nudge and drawing a grin from the blushing brunette. “You kissed Amy!”



“I know!” JoBeth squealed, losing herself to a laugh and falling down onto her side. It had been a moment she’d dreamed of time and again since then and it’d been magnificent even before she’d known that she’d shared it with the girl she’d been crushing on.



What little tension that remained in the room had completely deflated, letting the girls relax and simply enjoy the moment. The new and deeper affection Tara felt for JoBeth had her ready to do whatever she had to prove herself worthy of her trust in the future, but right now she wanted nothing more than to share in her friend’s happiness.



Now that she knew that Amy was JoBeth’s mystery girl, the reasons why JoBeth had reacted the way she had to her captivity and everything after it made a lot more sense. “No wonder you trusted her…” Tara said through a chuckle. Sliding the two leather objects out of her way, the redhead lay down on the mattress, joining JoBeth and facing the blushing girl with a smile. Propping herself up on her elbow, Tara watched a wide grin pull at the corners JoBeth’s lips. “You must have known deep down who she was on Friday…”



A giggle slipped out and JoBeth gave her pillow a squeeze. “Maybe,” she mused, thinking back to Amy’s sweet perfume, her gentle touch and the most beautiful blue eyes she’d ever seen. JoBeth wanted to experience it all again with the blonde when they could toss aside all their worries and pretense to simply be together.



“Well, you said that you know she likes you..?” Tara asked hopefully. She figured that there were fairly large barriers standing between JoBeth and Amy already and if she could, she wanted to do what she could to keep JoBeth from losing the battle against what she imagined had to be immense frustration, at least until they found a way to get past them.



Her blush glowing brightly on her cheeks, JoBeth grinned. “There was the kiss…” she agreed with a laugh. “And how she gets all blushy and shy around me sometimes…” the brunette added, biting her lip demurely.



Thinking back to their review session just a few nights ago, Tara had noticed that JoBeth was being unusually forward with Amy and their bright blushes at the time had made her wonder if they’d both come down with something. “That’s true…” she said as her lips curled into a smirk. “I didn’t really think anything of it, but I did notice you two on Sunday… You told me it was because you’d run up the stairs!” she chided her friend, giving JoBeth a mock scowl.



“I know, I’m sorry…” JoBeth laughed, rolling onto her back. Staring up at the ceiling, she gave a deep, contented sigh. “That’s when I’d figured out it was her,” she explained, turning to look over at Tara once more. “I’d kind of given her a few hints that I knew right before you got there and she got almost as squirmy as I was…” JoBeth added with a chuckle.



Tara had witnessed that squirminess firsthand on Sunday and again in class the last two days. She’d spotted their shy smiles and occasional flustered stammers and she was certain that JoBeth wasn’t just seeing things. “Yeah, she totally likes you…” she teased, causing them both to fall into another round of barely contained laughter.



Brushing her bangs off her face, JoBeth turned to gaze up towards the ceiling with a relaxing sigh. After the past few days, after the pictures Amy had taken and their time together in the library, she’d been nearly certain about her own assessment of Amy’s feelings towards her, but to have Tara agree with her was both vindicating and a relief.



“I think she does…” JoBeth said, her still-beaming smile reflected in her eyes. “I mean, I guess I kind of surprised her with it, but she did let me kiss her on the cheek last night…” she trailed off into another wide grin.



Her happiness for JoBeth was growing by the minute and Tara felt sure that if Amy was reacting the way that JoBeth described, they would be able to find a way to at least try being together. “She definitely likes you, Jo…” Tara laughed, curling her forearm beneath her head and resting on top of it. “But I have to ask…” she trailed off, her natural curiosity about what her best friend had shared with her crush sparking up.



Rising out of the new, faint haze of elation that had spread over her, the brunette turned to look at her friend laying on the other side of her bed. “What’s that?” she asked.



A shy smirk accompanied her arched eyebrow and Tara felt her cheeks lighting up a shade of red at asking, but her interest had long since been piqued. “Is she a good kisser?” Tara finally asked, prompting JoBeth to fall into a small chuckle.



“She’s amazing…” JoBeth confirmed. Biting her lip, she tried to hold back the rush of giddiness that the simple memory of their kiss brought with it. “I practically melted in her arms…”



“Amy’s that good, huh?” Tara laughed.



With a quick nod, JoBeth continued. “Even better… I didn’t want her to stop!” she chuckled, remembering how exhilarating Amy’s lips had felt pressed against her own. The taste of the blonde girl and how it had taken her completely by surprise had her longing to kiss Amy again and she wasn’t ashamed to admit it.



“And it’s such a 6th grade thing, but for a little while at the library last night, we were holding hands again…” she trailed off into another bright grin.



The brunette’s joy was infectious and Tara was happy to give into it and share in JoBeth’s excitement. With all the flirting and everything else, she didn’t see any way that the amazing feeling could fail to grow into something more for her friend. “Yeah, you’re totally in, Jo,” she said with a supportive grin for her friend.



With a genuinely thankful and appreciative smile, JoBeth felt touched that Tara was pulling for her. “Thanks for thinking so, Tara…” she cooed, reaching out to squeeze Tara’s hand gently. “And I hope so… She’s…. I just like being around her.”



“I don’t blame you,” Tara replied, smiling at JoBeth’s honest sentiment. She could tell why her friend was attracted to Amy. The blonde was smart, funny, confident and pretty by her own standards, let alone anyone else’s. Being able to combine that with their flirting and the surprisingly deep, instinctive trust between them sounded positively divine.



Glancing up at the two leather objects of Amy’s that JoBeth had brought home, Tara reflected on how JoBeth had described the wickedly exciting way that she’d felt safe using them, thanks to that trust she shared with Amy. The sight of them had an unusual warming effect on her while she wondered what it would be like to wear them herself and she was well aware that it was making her blush.



When she looked back over at JoBeth, Tara caught her gazing up at the hood and gag as well. A mischievous grin curled up the corners of her lips and she watched the rosy glow on the obviously distracted girl’s cheeks darken. “And it probably doesn’t hurt that you really want her to tie you up again, don’t you?” she teased, inciting a laugh from JoBeth.



JoBeth knew she’d been caught, but Tara’s amazing and supportive response to everything that they’d talked about made it feel surprisingly good to be able to admit it. There was only one girl out there that she would feel safe giving complete control to and now they both knew that it was Amy. “Like you wouldn’t believe…” the brunette laughed, feeling that faint tingling sensation start to rise up inside her again.



“That ‘a girl,” Tara replied with a playful smirk, setting off another short fit of giggles. She was glad that JoBeth hadn’t discovered this new kink with a seedier, less reputable crowd. If she was going to let someone else have that kind of control over her, someone that she liked, someone trustworthy and kind was the best possible option. They would have to do a bit of work to get around the barriers, but Amy was someone that her friend could have a real, adult relationship with.



The question of exactly how JoBeth and Amy would be able to have a relationship brought her back to the same roadblock that she figured had been frustrating JoBeth to no end for the past few days and weeks. All of the desire and potential was there, if only there was some way around the roadblock comprised of a bunch of silly rules.



“It does suck that she’s a teacher though…” the redhead trailed off, giving a commiserating sigh. “That’s not going to be easy to figure out…”



“Tell me about it,” JoBeth agreed, pursing her lips tightly together pensively. “I’ve been trying to think of something, but like you said… it’s not an easy one…”



The problem had occurred to her several times an hour since they’d parted on Monday night and she’d gotten no closer to figuring it out herself. She knew that hoping that something would happen all on its own likely wouldn’t get her anywhere, but with Tara, she had someone to talk to about it, and there was a good chance that they could think of something together that hadn’t occurred to her alone.



In what little time Tara had considered the problem herself, nothing had jumped immediately to mind. If it would help her friend find the sort of happiness she thought it would, it was a worthy challenge, and one worth figuring out. “Well, between us we should be able to think of something!” Tara said, optimistic of their collective chances. “We’re pretty smart, most of the time…”



JoBeth flashed a smile, nodding. “That we are,” she chuckled, feeling very glad to have her friend’s encouragement and support.



“Has Amy said anything yet?” Tara asked, her eyebrow arching curiously. She was sure that JoBeth hadn’t missed anything obvious, but when she had a problem that needed solving, she always liked to start at the beginning.



Shaking her head, JoBeth propped herself up on her elbow once more. “No, nothing yet…” she lamented. The lack of any progress on that particular front was frustrating, but she couldn’t deny that the reasons behind it were legitimate. “I think she’s understandably afraid that I’d bust her or that we’d get in huge trouble or something if we got caught…”



The notion that Amy would be fearful of the potential consequences of any improper contact between herself and a student was logical. Tara was sure that JoBeth would be willing to do anything she had to that would ensure that Amy was never found out, but there was no way they would control everything out in public.



“I’d be pretty scared of that too, if I were her…” Tara seconded. Twisting around, the redhead crossed her legs in front of her and sat back up on the bed. “If she got caught and fired for dating one of her students, despite the fact that you’re both adults, there’s a pretty good chance that she’d have a hard time getting hired anywhere else again.”



JoBeth had reached the same conclusion a hundred times herself and while it only stoked her frustrations, it did make sense. “I know,” she sighed, draping her forearm over her face. “I get where she’s coming from, and I hate that I’ve got her so worried…”



“But you want her even more,” Tara pointed out.



With a small giggle, JoBeth peeked out from under her arm to glance over at her friend. The girl was perceptive enough on her own and JoBeth couldn’t claim to have been anything but transparent about her desires for the blonde. “Like you would not believe, Tara,” she smiled, feeling another blush warm her cheeks.



A pensive look crossed over her face and Tara paused for a moment. Knowing how JoBeth felt about Amy and based on what she knew of their time together on Friday and Monday night, Amy had to be feeling the same way. If a little extra care was all that they’d need to be together, she didn’t see any reason why they couldn’t spend time together if they were out of the public eye.



“Why not just tell her how you feel?” Tara asked.



Disappearing back behind her forearm, JoBeth’s smile reflected the faint sense of dejection she’d had every time she’d asked that same question of herself. “I’ve tried…” she trailed off into a deep breath. “It’s not quite so easy…”



Shrugging, Tara wasn’t content to settle for dismissing the idea. “Why not?”



Sliding her arm up to her forehead, JoBeth turned to answer Tara’s reasonable question. “What if someone hears us, if we’re seen?” she asked in return. “If they know she’s a teacher, it’d look pretty bad. It could blow up into some big seduction scandal and we’d both get screwed… And not in a fun way,” JoBeth continued, letting a little of her frustration vent out. “There’s just too much that could go all kinds of wrong…”



Reaching out and taking JoBeth’s hand in hers, Tara tried to offer the best supportive smile she could. “Well, you know that I wouldn’t say anything,” she said softly.



“Thanks, Tara…” JoBeth replied, giving her friend’s hand a quick squeeze before sitting back up on the bed herself. “It’s hard to show, but it really means a lot.”



“Hey,” the redhead chirped. “You’re my best friend here. What did you expect me to do?” she asked, a faint rosy glow finding its way to her cheeks. “I know you like her and I know that she’s a nice girl. I just want you to be happy, Jo…” Tara added, trailing off into a shy smile.



A wide, happy grin spread across JoBeth’s lips and she couldn’t resist leaning over to wrap her friend up in a hug. “You rock,” JoBeth said, giving Tara a squeeze and prompting a chuckle from the other girl as she returned the embrace. “You know I feel the same way about you too, right?” she asked, pulling away to look Tara in the eye.



Blushing brightly, Tara gave a nod in reply. “Yeah…” she said, struggling to find her voice quickly. Tara counted herself incredibly lucky to have a friend like JoBeth around. She was someone to care about and who cared about her in return and Tara hoped that they’d be friends for a long time to come.



Tara watched JoBeth let her go and scoot back to sit on the other side of the mattress, feeling honored by the brunette’s trust. She felt safe and comfortable with JoBeth and they’d shared a few intimate secrets in the past, but nearly all of them paled in comparison to what JoBeth had just told her. She wanted to do her best to maintain that newly forged bond between them.



“I guess you kind of already figured it out, but you know we can talk about this stuff if you need to, right..?” Tara asked hesitantly before her confidence was boosted by her friend’s appreciative smile.



“I do,” JoBeth said, affectionately patting Tara’s knee.



“Good,” Tara quipped, tucking a few strands of hair that had fallen loose back behind her ear. “Because there’s no reason you should have to be alone on this…”



Spurred by her assertion, Tara reflected back on something that JoBeth said a few moments ago about the biggest problem standing between Amy and herself. Any rules issues coming down from the school would be easily negated by the fact that they would both be consenting adults and by making sure that Amy wasn’t directly responsible for any of JoBeth’s grades, but she imagined that other people would be liable to judge and not approve at a quick, first glance. Suddenly, a few ideas connected in her mind and she looked over at JoBeth uncertainly.



“So, that said…” she started quietly, trying to gauge her friend’s reaction. “Can I ask you something else?”



Chuckling, JoBeth flashed a welcoming smile. “Of course, you goof. Ask away!”



With a small laugh, Tara set aside any worries that it was something that JoBeth had already considered and pressed forward with her idea. “You said that it’s really a lack of privacy thing that’s keeping you two from being able to talk, right?” she asked.



“Mostly…” JoBeth sighed, thinking back to the time they’d had at the library. Amy’s flustered reactions each time she’d brushed her arm against hers or leaned in a little closer than necessary had been adorable and she’d wanted to do more than just hold Amy’s hand under the table. Despite the café being mostly empty by the time she’d left, she hadn’t felt comfortable doing anything that could have appeared improper.



In the basement of the mansion, the other girls that had seen them were likely to keep their mouths shut as best as she could figure, but JoBeth hardly expected that kind of situation to present itself again. What they needed was a place that they could go where they’d be away from prying eyes and left alone by anyone that might interfere. “I mean, hotels are a little out of my price range, so the options are kind of limited.”



Tara thought that the brunette’s reasoning was sound, but it wasn’t taking into account the new possibilities that JoBeth had opened up after bringing her in on the secret as well. “You just need a place where you can talk to her without anyone interrupting you, right?” she continued, hoping that her suggestion might change her friend’s vaguely sad and distant expression.



Her interest piqued, JoBeth perked back up a bit. “Yeah?” she asked, looking over at Tara with an arched eyebrow.



“You know that I wouldn’t ever say anything about you and Amy, right?” the redhead asked again.



Tara’s acceptance and approval made her feel so much better about everything and JoBeth wasn’t sure if she’d be able to convey in words just how thankful she was to have it. “I know,” JoBeth replied with an appreciative smile.



With a faint blush and a sheepish smile, Tara glanced over at the closed door that led to their dorm hallway. “Well, on our floor, it goes ‘stairway, my room, your room,’” she explained, drawing a line on the bed between them to try and illustrate her point.



“Yeah,” JoBeth agreed.



Pursing her lips, Tara paused for a moment before finally giving voice to her suggestion. “What about asking her if she’ll come over here?”



“What?” the brunette asked, a little thrown off by the idea. Stopping for a moment, JoBeth wrapped her mind around the concept, puzzling out how she might make it work.



“Think about it,” Tara started optimistically. “If you two stayed here in your room, the only person that could possibly find out is me, right?”



Giving a non-committal nod, JoBeth wouldn’t dispute the point. “I’ll admit that it makes sense hypothetically, but… I don’t know…” she trailed off, wondering what sort of excuse she could find that would get Amy to come over to her dorm.



Undeterred by her friend’s unenthusiastic response, Tara wasn’t about to let JoBeth pass up a chance to be able to talk honestly to the girl that she liked about how she felt. JoBeth didn’t look like she thought the suggestion was a joke, but she wanted to get the girl on her side. “I’m serious,” she reiterated. “We could sneak her in if we needed to and it’s not like anyone is watching our doors. Why not bring Amy over here?”



“But how am I supposed to convince her to come, though?” JoBeth asked, letting a touch of exasperation slip through.



“Based on what you’ve told me, I’m not really sure that you’d have to do much convincing, Jo…” Tara replied, flashing a smirk.



Breaking into an irresistible small laugh, JoBeth felt a blush forming once more. She wouldn’t have wanted to keep something like that secret from her best friend, but if Tara was in on it, it was technically possible. JoBeth had spent two days thinking about everything that she’d told Tara, reaching the same conclusion that it probably wouldn’t be that hard to get Amy to come over with a simple excuse.



“Alright, I’m pretty sure Amy likes me, and she has to know I like her,” JoBeth allowed with a sigh. “But she’s legitimately afraid of us doing anything wrong and I don’t want to put her in a bad situation, Tara…”



The resigned and upset look in JoBeth’s eyes was almost heartbreaking. Tara reached over to take JoBeth’s hands in hers and gave the girl the most encouraging smile she could muster. “You don’t have to, Jo,” she said, ducking a little to follow JoBeth’s gaze. “Just let her know you want her so much that the rules can go screw themselves. After that, if Amy isn’t on her way over here inside of five minutes, she’s not worth your time.”



Behind an affectionate smile, all the warmth, appreciation and love JoBeth had for the shy, supportive and wonderfully kind girl that lived in the room next door welled up inside of her. Pulling Tara into an embrace, she thanked the school for giving her such a fantastic suitemate. “Tara…” she cooed, giving the redhead a squeeze.



Chuckling, Tara laced her arms around JoBeth’s back, patting her gently on her shoulder. “I mean it, Jo,” she said quietly. “Tell her that, and that you two have a safe place you can talk.”



As she let Tara go, thoughts flickered through JoBeth’s mind of what she really hoped she’d get up to with Amy after finding a private place to talk and a shy, impish grin found its way across her features. “And what if it turns into more than a talk..?” JoBeth asked mischievously, falling onto the pillows propped up against her headboard.



A few ideas of what JoBeth was implying sprang to mind and Tara felt a blush lighting her own cheeks to match JoBeth’s. Watching her friend curl up a little on the bed, she imagined what she might want Amy to do to her and her mind wandered into thinking about what it would be like to be in that same position with someone that loved her and that she loved and trusted in return. The notion would have seemed bizarre to her just a few hours ago, but now, she couldn’t deny that there was a kind seductive appeal to it.



“I’ll just have to turn my music up, then…” Tara replied with a small, chuckle of her own. “And I’d expect a full report afterwards, missy!” she added with a playful swat to JoBeth’s knee.



The light, liberated feeling that had come with finally being able to talk with Tara about what had happened between herself and Amy still hadn’t worn off and JoBeth didn’t think she’d be able to resist telling Tara about any new developments anymore as it was. “Of course,” JoBeth laughed. “I promise.”



“I mean it,” Tara chided, wagging her finger at the brunette. “No more of this secrets nonsense. You know that I’ve got your back and this is way too big for you to be keeping all the fun to yourself…”



With a small, sheepish nod, JoBeth brushed a few strands of hair back off her face. “I’m sorry about that part,” she sighed. “I didn’t want to keep it from you… It’s just…” the brunette trailed off, searching for the right words that could explain why she’d done what she did.



“You were worried what I’d think…” Tara finished. She hadn’t meant to put JoBeth on the spot, and the last thing she wanted to do was cause her friend additional stress over an already difficult subject. Patting her knee gently, she offered her best reassuring smile. “It’s totally alright, Jo.”



“You know that if anything happens, you’d be the first to know,” JoBeth said, a tentative smile replacing her slightly worried expression.



Grinning, the redhead bobbed her head in a quick nod. “Yeah,” Tara answered, hoping to swing JoBeth back into her usual, positive and happy self. Glancing over beside her at the hood and the ballgag that JoBeth had introduced her to almost half an hour before, the tingling, excited feeling that they’d given her began to stir inside her once more before she caught JoBeth taking a long, desirous look of her own at the two kinkier gifts that Amy had given her.



Unable to resist the opportunity, a wicked grin crossed Tara’s lips. “But more importantly,” she started teasingly, catching JoBeth’s attention. “Are you going to tell her how much you liked her toys?”



“Oh, I think she already knows that,” JoBeth laughed, the blush on her cheeks brightening to a deep shade of scarlet. Between their suggestive conversation before the review session and wearing the cuffs to the library, JoBeth was pretty sure that she’d gotten the message across to Amy.



“Good!” Tara chirped, leaning back and propping herself up on her hands.



While they’d been talking, JoBeth hadn’t missed Tara’s attempts to hide her own reactions to the toys. She was certain that the redhead was intrigued by the leather toys and that she’d been more than a little turned on by the idea of them while she was explaining what they were. With a playful glimmer in her eye, JoBeth arched her eyebrow at Tara. “Should I ask her if she has any more of these toys that you can try?” she asked, causing the other girl to turn a bright shade of pink.



“What?!” Tara exclaimed, her heart leaping into her throat. JoBeth had caught her red-handed. “What gave you that idea?”



“Oh, nothing…” JoBeth sang innocently, rolling onto her back to gaze up at the ceiling. She felt lighter and more relaxed than she had in days. The frustration and desire she held for Amy was still burning strong inside her but the repressive, overbearing weight of keeping everything about Amy a secret was delightfully absent.



With a deep sigh, JoBeth closed her eyes for a moment. They’d come up with a plan for her to find time with Amy and while it was a simple one, it was also just plausible enough to work. She even had a co-conspirator. “Wow…” she breathed, enjoying the sense of relief that their idea had given her. “I feel like three tons just fell off my shoulders.”



Gathering her composure, Tara hoped that JoBeth would let her tease go unanswered. Until she was able to figure out just what her feelings about those two decidedly kinky objects were, she was happy to focus on the fact that JoBeth had made a world of progress with the girl she had a crush on and there was a very good chance that it was mutual.



A small laugh escaped and Tara cocked her head off to the side. “You’ve got a crush on Amy…” she sang behind a wide smile.



“Just a little one,” JoBeth replied, looking over at her friend with a grin and bashfully biting her lower lip.



“You totally want her to tie you up again,” Tara pressed, still grinning away herself.



Rolling her eyes with feigned chagrin, JoBeth couldn’t be happier to suffer this particular brand of Tara’s teasing. “I’m not living this down tonight, am I?” she asked with a smirk.



“Not a chance,” Tara confirmed with a nod and a beaming grin of her own before her stomach gave a sudden and loud growl. “Ahh…” she squeaked, covering her stomach with her hands. Their unexpected conversation had completely distracted her from the fact that she’d been starving ever since she’d started walking back from class.



Sitting up on the bed, JoBeth quickly glanced over at the glowing red numbers on her alarm clock. They’d been talking for quite a while since Tara had come to call on her and JoBeth was feeling quite hungry herself. There was no reason to postpone eating any longer and she knew Tara was discreet enough to not ask anything inappropriate while they ate.



Still needing to make a quick wardrobe change, JoBeth crawled down to the foot of her bed and gave Tara a wry smile. “Well, while you think up some new questions and lines, should we head down to the cafeteria?” she asked, prompting an excited smile from Tara.



“I thought you’d never ask,” she laughed, sliding off the bed. “I just need to grab my stuff,” she added, heading into the bathroom that connected their rooms.



Walking over to her dresser, JoBeth laughed quietly under her breath and slid open the top drawer, pulling out a fresh pair of panties. “Give me a moment, Tara,” she called out to her friend, closing the drawer and darting out of sight through the bathroom before stepping out of her pajama bottoms and panties.



“Sure,” Tara replied, fishing her meal card and keys out of her backpack. Standing up, she caught a glimpse of herself in her mirror and noticed that her blush hadn’t completely faded yet. Strangely exciting ideas kept bouncing through her imagination of what she would do if Amy did end up having more of those curious leather toys she could borrow through JoBeth.



With a quick shake of her head, Tara tried to throw off the decidedly naughty fantasies that were stirring inside her, but deep down, she knew that they weren’t going anywhere. The notion of being able to give herself completely to someone she loved and trusted, to be able to just let go and be free of all her worries had connected with her and she couldn’t deny its appeal.



Tara couldn’t help feeling a little excited about all the new developments between JoBeth and Amy on top of her own unexpected discoveries, but there was no need to rush anything that night. They both still had studying and homework left to do and considering how they typically worked on it together in one of their rooms or the other, there would be plenty of opportunities to ask JoBeth a few of the questions that were still spinning through her head.



Buttoning the waist of her cargo pants and fastening the belt around her hips, JoBeth finished her quick change of outfit. Checking that her door was locked, she slipped into a pair of flip-flops and took a quick glance in the mirror to make sure that everything was in order. Tucking her meal card in her pocket, JoBeth grabbed her keys and walked though the bathroom into Tara’s room.



“Ready, Tara?” JoBeth asked, darting around the corner to find the redhead sitting on the edge of her bed with a bright blush on her cheeks. Holding back a grin, JoBeth had a guess that their little talk had wound up striking quite a chord with Tara.



Hopping up off her bed, Tara grabbed her key off the bed beside her with a smile. “You’d better believe it,” she answered. “After you?” Tara invited, gesturing towards the door.



Unlocking the deadbolt, JoBeth opened the door and stepped out into the hallway. “You know what they’re serving tonight?” she asked, turning to watch Tara lock the door behind them.



“Whatever it is, they’d better have extra!” Tara replied with a grin. Sliding her keys into her pocket, she matched stride with the brunette and they started down the hallway.



Wrapping her arm around Tara’s shoulders affectionately, JoBeth pulled the girl closed. Her confidante and usual dinner companion had proven herself to be one heck of an understanding and supportive friend. “Well, my dear, I say we get down there and find out,” she declared confidently.



Lacing her arm around JoBeth’s waist, Tara nodded her agreement. “Yes Ma’am,” she chuckled, rounding the corner and approaching the bank of elevators.



After pressing the call button, JoBeth launched into a story about what the goofy and heavily accented teacher’s assistant in her math class had done earlier that afternoon. Still arm in arm, the two girls happily chatted away, heading down towards the cafeteria and the rest of the pleasant evening ahead of them.



*End Chapter 6*