“That’s better. You can take this. You chose to disobey me, so take the consequences.”
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I don’t… I can’t…”
I laid the belt across his ass even harder. He cried out again, the sound full of anguish, yet he couldn’t keep his hips still. I reached underneath him. As I suspected, his cock was rock hard and leaking. “You want this, don’t you?”
He whined pitifully.
“You knew what would happen. You knew I would find out you’d been in my office and that I’d give you what you longed for.”
“I… No!”
I spanked him again. “Don’t lie to me.”
“I didn’t want to get caught, but I…”
“What?” I asked, setting my belt down and digging my fingers into his ass, squeezing hard as he squirmed, trying to get away. I loved seeing his ass red from my blows and feeling the heat of his abused skin.
“When you… said you would punish me I… I imagined this, and…”
I slapped his ass with my hand. “I told you to tell me everything, and I meant it.”
“I wondered if I would like it. I wondered how it would feel. I wanted… I wanted you to spank me.”
I used my hand to smack his ass again and again until he was whimpering and begging for me to stop. His ass was so red, so hot. I pulled his cheeks apart and bent, running my tongue over his hole. He cried out then just like he had from the pain.
I blew warm breath up and down his crack, making him shiver. “Don’t come.”
“Please. Please I can’t. It’s too much.”
“You should have thought of that before you broke into my office.”
“Sorry. I’m so sorry. Please.”
I spanked him again before opening his ass so I could give him my tongue, pushing it in deep. He pushed back against me, trying to get more, but I held him still, tormenting and tasting him until I was so hard I had to have him.
He was sobbing now, desperate to come. I circled his cock with my hand, giving him light, teasing strokes. Precum ran freely from his slit. I squeezed the base, holding him back as I bent over him and whispered in his ear. “I’m going to fuck you now, and you’re still not going to come until I tell you to.”
He sobbed harder, muttering nonsense words, but I knew he was begging me to let him give into his need. I wouldn’t. I was going to draw this out as long as I could.
I let go of him and reached for the lube. Then I slicked myself up, knelt behind him, and traced his crack with the tip of my cock, teasing him as I squeezed his sore ass cheeks. His struggles only made me grip him harder, and the sound he made as I pushed my dick inside him was hypnotizing. Pain and pleasure were so exquisitely mixed in what was neither a scream nor a groan but something primal I felt all the way to my core.
26
Henri
I no longer knew if I wanted to fight Remington or submit utterly to what he was doing. I couldn’t tell the difference between pain and ecstasy anymore. My ass throbbed from the spanking, and his rough thrusts made me burn, but I was so needy, so ready to come. The sound of his rough breathing, the knowledge of how turned on he was, how much he needed to control me was intoxicating.
I wouldn’t have stopped him if I could. I wanted every minute of it. I wanted to know how far he would go, how severe my punishment would be.
Would he let me come soon? Would I survive if he didn’t?
He drove into me without mercy, pressing against my ass, but the pain diminished the longer he was inside me, and it was all I could do to hold back. “Close. I’m so close.”
“No,” he growled. “Not until I say. I own your body. I choose what happens to it.”
Jesus, why was that so hot? I didn’t really want to lose control of myself like that, did I? I’d fought so long and so hard. I’d taken care of my mother, and I’d tried to take care of all the debt I was left with. I’d refused help from anyone until I was so desperate I’d taken my cousin up on his offer, but was I really in control of myself out there on the street? At least with Remington I was making a conscious choice to give myself to him, and he could’ve done so much worse than edge me until I was nearly out of my mind.
He seized hold of my hips, his grip so tight it hurt. He tilted them, changing the angle so his cock pressed on my prostate with every stroke. I cried out, begging and writhing. I wasn’t fighting him now. I was fighting for more. I drove my hips back, needing him all the way inside. He fucked me so hard I had to grip the sheet to keep from sliding.
Then he said the words I was desperate for. “I want you to come now. Don’t touch yourself. Just let go and let me feel how much you need this.”
It took only seconds. I stopped fighting, and suddenly I was overtaken. The force of my release was painful. I cried out, snapping my hips as my ass clamped tightly around his cock. He groaned and wrapped his hands around my chest, pulling me up until I was sitting over his legs. He kept lifting his hips, driving into me. I wondered if my orgasm would ever stop as I felt the heat of his cum inside me. It was too much. I cried his name, and the world went dark.
27
Remington
I was shaking as I held Henri’s limp, spent body against me. I’d never experienced anything so intense. I’d thought our first time was incredible, but this… this had been beyond anything I’d ever felt. He’d reacted exactly as I’d hoped. The longer I’d tormented him, the more I’d forgotten it was meant to be punishment and thought only of how I could bring him more pleasure.
I ran my lips along his throat and nipped at his earlobe. “Cher, come back to me.”
He groaned, and his eyes fluttered open.
“Remington.”
His voice was filled with wonder when he said my name, and the look on his face was everything I’d dreamed of back when I’d thought I would find what Pop and Marjorie had, back before I shut that down, knowing my family responsibilities were too much for me to seek out love. Was I going to make the same mistake my father had made?
I lifted Henri off my cock, and he shivered.
“You’re going to be sore,” I said.
“Yeah, but it’s so good.” His voice was soft and dreamy.
I eased him down onto the bed and curled around him, not caring that his ass and thighs were sticky with my cum and his chest was covered with his own. I needed to hold him. I wasn’t ready to let go. I wasn’t ever going to be ready to let him go.
I didn’t know how things between us could work, but I wouldn’t send him away. Knowing I would find him a good job and make sure he had the money he needed to get a fresh start wasn’t enough. I needed him to stay with me.
No one else was going to touch him. I was going to pay his debts and shower him with everything he wanted. He was going to be my princess, and I would love him as thoroughly as he could ever desire.
I could no longer pretend I wasn’t in love with him. I would do whatever it took to make sure he felt the same. I suspected he already did. The way he looked at me, the way he trusted me, told me that. He was terrified when I’d found him in my office, but I sensed he was more afraid of being sent away than of me truly harming him.
Moments later, Henri was sound asleep, his breathing slow and steady. I got a washcloth from the bathroom and cleaned him up, but he didn’t wake. I wasn’t going to be able to sleep, not yet anyway. I was too charged up, too full of ideas and the intense feelings I had for Henri. I couldn’t deny them, but wrapping my mind around the idea that I was in love with him wasn’t easy. I’d never expected it to happen.
I lay next to Henri for a while, watching him sleep, listening to the sounds of the late-night partiers in the streets of the French Quarter. Eventually, I grew too restless to stay still any longer. I slipped into the little room where I kept my cello. I often used music to help me when I needed to think through something serious. I also played when I was either sad or extremely happy. It was as though I could express my emotions through music in a way I couldn’t
with words.
I began to play “Bayou Melody,” then moved on to other things, snippets of music I’d composed and a few haunting songs filled with longing. I felt more than heard Henri approach. I finished the song I was playing and looked up at him. He stood in the doorway wearing my robe, which was much too large for him. His eyes were wide, and he was staring at me as if enthralled.
“I didn’t mean to wake you, but I needed some music.”
“It’s beautiful. I wanted to ask you to play for me before, but I wasn’t sure if you’d want to. You’d never mentioned your cello, and I thought maybe it was private for you.”
“Usually it is. I rarely play for anyone. After forced recitals as a kid, I refused to perform. They were awful and made me nauseous every time.”
“It’s hard for me to imagine you having stage fright. You’re so confident.”
“It’s always best to seem confident when you do what I do.”
He moved closer. “Tell me about what you do. Please.”
“I think you gathered enough of that with your snooping.”
He looked down at his feet. “I’m sorry.”
“I know, and you suffered the consequences. I don’t think you’ll do it again.”
“I won’t. Next time, I’ll ask and hope you’ll answer me.”
“Come. Sit and listen.” He frowned, obviously disappointed I wasn’t revealing my secrets, but he did as I asked, sitting on the stool that was next to my chair.
I began to play my favorite song again, the one he’d known was so special I would use it as a password. I still wondered how he had guessed.
He watched me, seeming shocked and amazed as my bow slid over the cello strings, bringing forth music. Henri closed his eyes and swayed, totally under the music’s spell. His reaction made me want him again but this time gentle and sweet. That wasn’t how I was with men, but with him… with him I wanted that. I wanted everything. When I finished and set my bow down, he looked at me, and in that moment, I knew I couldn’t keep secrets from him, not if we were going to have what I wanted.
“I assume you’ve guessed I’m a mobster. My family has been involved in organized crime for generations. Like I told you before, I did kill those men. They deserved it, and I would do it again. They were connected to Gayle. I managed to reach them, but despite doing my best to hunt Gayle down, I couldn’t get to him. When I failed to stop him, I made a bargain with the devil.”
His eyes widened. “I wouldn’t think someone like you would ever sell their soul.”
I’d sell it to him. “I gave information to the cops. Basically the same thing. That’s how I got the murder charges dropped.” The shock on his face made me smile. “You didn’t expect that, did you? But that’s it. My biggest secret. Only two other people know. Well, maybe three.”
I had to assume Emilio knew since he’d likely discovered it for X. Why was I telling Henri all of this? I didn’t have to. I didn’t have to tell him a damn thing about me or my family, but I wanted to. For once, I wanted to share all my secrets. I held out my hand to him. “Come here.”
He walked toward me, and I pulled him onto my lap. He pressed his face against my neck and breathed in deeply. “I love how you smell.”
I wanted to devour him, but I simply held him. We would get to that, but I was enjoying this too. “Tell me more about you. What would you be doing if your mom hadn’t gotten sick?”
“I’ll tell you, but first I need to tell you about something I saw tonight.”
I tensed, not liking the fear in his voice. “What happened?”
“I went out in the courtyard to feel the night air, and there was a man looking in the back fence. He might have just been a curious tourist, but he looked familiar, like a man I used to see in my old neighborhood.”
I tilted my chin so I was looking at him. “Describe him.”
“He’s very tall, like, probably six five or so, and he’s got a bushy beard.”
Fuck. No way. “Stay right here.” I retrieved my phone from the bedroom and pulled up a picture of Charles Landry. “Is this him?”
He looked at the picture on the screen and nodded. “That’s him.”
“And he had a beard like this?”
“He did.”
Had Charles survived. That wasn’t what our intel said. I was going to have to dig deeper because no way in hell would I let him that close to Henri again if he was still among the living. “I’ll make sure my guards watch out for him.”
“Who is he?”
“No one you need to worry about. Now tell me about the plans you had.”
He looked like he wanted to protest, but he didn’t. “I was working on a design degree. I wanted to help people make their spaces beautiful but not like beautiful for a magazine, beautiful to suit their purposes, to make them happy at home, to make them want to be there. Your home feels like that.”
“Thank you.” I could tell that for him that was a very serious compliment. “How much school do you have left?”
“A year or maybe a year and a half, but I don’t know that I’ll go back. I’d have to find a job where I could earn enough to either save up for school or take classes while I was working. What are the chances of that?”
I wanted to tell him to choose a school close to New Orleans, and I would pay his tuition. I wanted to tell him he was mine, and I would support him from now on, but that was a rash middle-of-the-night, lust-fueled decision, and I didn’t make decisions like that. Lance used to, but he’d partly outgrown it, and Corbin… so far we hadn’t let Corbin make many important decisions at all. “I believe in you. You’ll find a way.”
He tried to smile. I could see the sadness in his eyes. Claiming him like that might be rash, but I’d known since… Fuck, I’d known since I’d told him to get in my car that first night that he was special. Still, I held back. He would argue with me if I offered to help him, and I didn’t want that. I didn’t want anything between us, no arguments and no barriers. I just wanted his body on mine. We’d work out the rest once I knew he was safe and I wasn’t under so much pressure to put the Landrys in their place, which was looking more and more like six feet under.
I stroked Henri’s back and placed a kiss on the top of his head. “What else do you want, cher?”
“I don’t know.” His words were muffled as he pressed his face to my shoulder.
“I think you do.”
He sighed. “It’s… silly and naïve.”
I used a finger under his chin to lift his head. His eyes were filled with a mix of longing, confusion, and need. “Talk to me. I told you my biggest secret.” I’d shown him parts of me no one had seen, not even my family. How was he able to make me so vulnerable? Did he realize what he’d done? If he did, he’d have more power over me than anyone.
“I want a man who loves me,” Henri said. “I want to get married with all the pageantry and overdone nonsense: rose petals thrown, doves released, fancy clothes, a champagne fountain. I want that whole dream, and then I want a nice house, a stable income, and… kids. I want kids.”
My breath caught. I’d never let myself consider the possibility of having children. Could I bring a child up in this life? Why not? My parents had done a fantastic job. Sure, their morals didn’t match cultural expectations, but they cared for us. Even though my mom hadn’t been super affectionate, I never doubted she wanted the best for me. Could I give that to a child? Would I risk the danger my children would be in because of who I was? Maybe.
“There’s nothing silly about your dream. It’s beautiful.” Could I be the man to fulfill it? Would I take that chance? I’d risked my life again and again. I’d stared down men who wanted to kill me and laughed in their faces. I’d been captured and tortured, and I’d survived it all, but could I give Henri what he wanted? If I couldn’t, wouldn’t it be best if I let him go? I wasn’t ready for confessions of love. I’d already bared too much, and I needed time to consider what I had to offer. We still had a week for me to fully st
ake my claim.
28
Henri
I couldn’t believe that after Remington had initially refused to discuss his family or profession, he’d confessed so much to me. I could use his secret to ruin him or blackmail him. He must not truly consider me a threat, or he never would’ve told me. If I tried blackmail, I’d never get away with it, and if I let his secret out, he’d kill me. I wasn’t going to do that anyway. He’d done the right thing, and why would I tell a secret that could easily get him ostracized from his family or even killed when he’d just listened to my silly fairy-tale dream for the future without laughing?
If only he could be the man in my dream. I knew better than to wish for that, and yet when he’d been inside me earlier, I’d felt like we were truly one. Our connection seemed magical, and I thought, really thought, he felt it too.
I cupped his cheek in my palm and rubbed my thumb over his rough stubble. “I want you.” That wasn’t anywhere near as much as I wanted to say, but it was what I knew I could get away with.
He kissed me. It wasn’t fierce and rough the way we’d been earlier. The kiss was soft, achingly sweet, and it made me long for my dream more than ever. As he kissed me, he untied my robe and pushed it from my shoulders. I shifted so I could drop it to the floor and straddle him. He licked and nibbled my neck as I pushed the waist of his sleep pants down until I freed his cock. I wrapped my hand around us both, which wasn’t easy with his size. I managed, though, stroking up and down, using our precum to make the way easier.
Remington groaned and held me tight as he kept kissing me. I worked my hips against him, rubbing our dicks together, even as my hand gave us the friction I craved.
It was wild and sweet and so full of genuine feeling. He wasn’t faking any of it. The way he looked at me with so much depth in his gaze, so much longing, so much need, told me he felt what I did. If only the world were different. If only our pasts weren’t what they were. I would cherish him and take care of him, his home, and his kids. I would be everything he wanted if only that were possible.
Remington Page 14
