by BJ Wane
“My friends, whom I’d known for years, put their social standing before me. It hurt, Sandie, the way they turned two-faced on me. My parents, not as much because they’d always been social snobs.”
“I guess I can see why you might hold back. But remember, Julie stayed away from Jackson, and then held back from him almost too long. They wouldn’t be as happy as they are now if she hadn’t confronted her past and brought it out in the open.”
“Miles and I don’t have a history to hold us together the way they did,” Hope reminded her. The other couple’s bond went back to childhood and had remained strong despite their six-year separation.
“No, but I think you’re selling him short by not trusting he would stand by you. Hell, he teaches people to defend themselves in any way they can, which is all you did.”
That was all I did. Hope repeated that all the way home, and off and on for the next two days. Receiving her new best friend’s unquestioning support went a long way toward bolstering her courage. Even though both Miles and Sensei McCallum emphasized running as soon as you freed yourself from an attacker, they also taught them to use whatever means necessary to save themselves. It wasn’t the struggle for her life that resulted in the gunshot that killed Craig she worried he wouldn’t understand, but the reason for Craig’s rage at her in the first place. She refused to make excuses for herself for getting and staying engaged to a man she didn’t love. Her growing dissatisfaction with her looming future was what had ultimately led Hope to agreeing to that night out. Actions may have consequences, such as Craig getting shot when he attacked her, but so did certain inactions, for which she remained the guilty party.
Like Craig, Miles deserved to know the truth about her, and as she waited for him to arrive to pick her up for the overnight engagement party cruise, she vowed to explain how she got her scar the next time he asked her. If nothing else, maybe she’d learn what trauma befell him that had resulted in his marred cheek.
“She’s fitting in nicely.” Sean joined Miles at the rail and nodded toward Hope where she was playing shuffleboard with Sandie, Krista and his guest, Leigh.
Miles didn’t need his friend pointing out the obvious. Hope got into the swing of things almost as soon as they took off from the marina over an hour ago. She hadn’t balked when he’d stripped her swimsuit top off and had given him a puzzled frown when he let her keep her swimsuit bottoms on. He liked to keep her guessing. “Yes. It’s helped being friends with Sandie first.”
Sean chuckled. “So, Sandie has been good for both Zach and you.”
Miles’ lips twitched. “Yeah, I guess you could say that. Still can’t believe he’s tying the knot already.”
“I’ve got to admit, that one took me by surprise. Dax, not so much.”
“That’s because you’re the only one of us who knew what was going on with him and Krista.”
Sean shook his head, his grey gaze sweeping over to the barbeque where Dax, Zach and the Carlsons were responsible for the tantalizing aroma of grilled steaks permeating the air on the upper tier as they bobbed on the calm water. “I only knew a short time before all of you. He can be as close-mouthed as you.” He returned his assessing eyes to Miles. “Have you told Hope about your parents yet?”
“No,” Miles answered, his tone clipped.
“Look, I don’t want to pry…”
Miles snorted, and a genuine grin split his face. “Since when?”
“Okay, maybe I do,” Sean admitted with easy candor. “But, you’ve got the same look on your face when you’re watching Hope as both Zach and Dax, and now Jackson, when they’re eyeing their girls. Take a page out of their books and don’t wait too long to clear the air between you two.” Miles frowned, and Sean held up his hands. “All done with the unsolicited advice. Let’s go have some fun.”
Miles watched Sean join the guys at the grill then was drawn to the peal of Hope’s laughter. Bending at the waist, her full breasts dangling then swaying as she pushed the shuffleboard cue stick and sent her disc sliding into a ten-point slot, she shot up with a grin of success and high-fived Krista. He never knew she had a competitive streak, and watching her play was almost as enjoyable as watching her come apart. Almost. The urge to hear another kind of exultant cry from her propelled him across the deck. Snatching a brownie out of the tray sitting on one of the tables without breaking his stride, he took a huge bite, indulging one hunger as he reached for Hope to settle another craving.
“You won. How about a reward?” Grasping her elbow, he took the stick from her and handed it to Krista without taking his eyes off Hope’s flushed face.
“A brownie?” Hope asked, eying his treat with longing.
“No way. This is mine.” Spinning her around, he placed her hands on the rail. “Bend over and don’t let go.” He loved the way she obeyed immediately, her small, indrawn breath of surprise and anticipation and the way she automatically shifted her feet apart without having to be told. Miles shoved another bite of the rich, decadent dessert into his mouth as he delved inside the front of her swimsuit bottoms. With a deep, three-fingered thrust into her slick sheath, he brought her to her toes with a sharp cry. “Steaks are about done, so be quick.”
“Okay,” she returned in a breathless tone right before her damp muscles contracted around his fingers and her cry of release spilled out across the wide expanse of blue ocean in front of them.
“Damn, Hope, that was almost as good as my brownie.” Helping her upright, he spun her back around, kissed her long and deep, then swatted her ass. “Come on, I’m hungry.”
Shaking her head at his playful mood, Hope followed him over to the table and wasn’t surprised when he yanked her down on his lap. The take-charge way he had bent her over the rail then brought her to a quick climax while calmly eating a brownie had been a freaking turn-on she still shuddered in pleasure from. Troy and Trevor sat across from them, their date nestled between them looking as comfortable with her full nudity as Hope now felt going topless in front of everyone. Had she known how much fun it could be parading around outdoors naked, with the light ocean breeze caressing her warm skin and the appreciative looks from several men stoking her inner heat, she might have succumbed to Miles’ interest a lot sooner.
Miles piled one plate with food then handed her a fork. “We’ll share. Dig in.”
Shifting against his hard thighs, she was much more interested in the bulge poking her butt than eating, but figured she’d need the calories for later. She hadn’t been with the whole group since Jackson’s fundraiser for his animal shelter a few weeks ago, and that had not been a play party. She marveled at the ease with which everyone took the decadence going on around them, the smiles of encouragement, open displays of interests and underlying respect from all the guys. They liked their sex raunchy and kinky, but it was obvious they held the women in high esteem, even when they had them draped over their laps for a punishing spanking. The combination of strict dominance and genuine caring was a heady duo, and Hope knew she’d fallen under Miles’ spell as surely as Sandie had under Zach’s.
“Any dates planned yet?” Troy asked when the last of the group, Dax and Krista, joined them. The table would have been crowded with the seven men and six women if most of the women weren’t perched on the guys’ laps.
“We’re planning a small ceremony, in about a month.” Dax glanced across the table toward Zach. “What’re your plans? Want to make it a double?”
Zach shrugged. “Whatever Sandie wants.”
“Since when?” Sandie asked with a raised brow of disbelief.
“Hey, I’ve told you, I’m only the boss during sex.”
“You keep telling me that, then turn all cranky when I do something, like get a job,” she reminded him. Zach shoved a forkful of potato salad in her mouth.
“It’s fine with me, if you want to make it a double,” Krista said. “As long as it’s low-key.”
“Low-key is good. I second that,” Miles put in.
“In case y
ou haven’t figured it out yet, Hope, Miles doesn’t like to be around crowds, present company excluded,” Jackson told her.
“I’m not big on crowds either,” Hope admitted, much preferring smaller groups like today’s to the large parties she and her friends in Atlanta used to throw. Of course, she wasn’t sitting around half naked at those parties like now.
“My mom wants me to have a big wedding back home, but I already nixed that. Regardless of what Zach says, I know he’d complain about a big wedding. So, it’ll just be her, my brother and Marchand, mom’s new guy, who’ll be coming from Arkansas,” Sandie said.
“Thank God.” Everyone laughed at the relief in Zach’s sigh.
Chapter 12
Anticipation and excitement overrode nerves and any lingering shyness as Miles led Hope across the playroom toward the webbed swing in the corner. She barely noticed Jackson binding Julie between the floor to ceiling poles or Sean wielding a crop on his date’s buttocks where he’d strapped her down on a spanking bench or the Carlson brothers tandem fucking their guest on the curved sofa. Krista’s soft cry reached her ears as Miles stripped her swimsuit bottoms off, but she didn’t look around to see what her friend’s master was doing to her.
Clasping her waist, Miles lifted her onto the mesh seat and as the apparatus swayed, she made a quick grab for the dangling restraints. “Relax,” he said. “It’s perfectly safe.”
The swing might be safe, but Hope could no longer claim she was safe from succumbing to Miles’ gruff, overprotective personality and the dark intent in his midnight eyes. He closed his hand around her right ankle and, with his eyes on her face, slowly lifted her leg up and out until he could wrap the cuff at her shoulder around her ankle. She cast a frantic glance around the room when he reached for her left leg, the cool air-conditioning bringing up goosebumps along her inner thighs as he spread-eagled her in front of everyone.
“It’s a good thing you’re limber,” Miles commented as he ran his palms up and down her legs in a caress meant to soothe but which instead stirred her already simmering arousal.
“This is embarrassing,” she muttered even though she couldn’t deny how turned on she was at that moment.
“Then I should give you something else to concentrate on.” Bending down, he retrieved a few objects from his bag and when she saw the ball gag and small bamboo spanker, she tightened her hands around the straps.
“Um, Master C, what’re you planning?”
“Nothing you won’t like. If you want me to stop, release this.” He placed a bright red ribbon in her right hand then pinched her jaw until her mouth opened.
Her pulse picked up speed when he slid the ball gag into her mouth then secured the strap around her head. If he hadn’t left her hands unrestrained, she wasn’t sure she wouldn’t be dropping the ribbon already. This way, if she embarrassed them both by panicking, she could rip the gag out of her mouth herself.
“Good girl.”
The warm approval in his voice and eyes went a long way in easing Hope’s tension and when he bent his head to draw one nipple into his mouth, an increase in her arousal cleared the rest away. She should’ve known it was the calm before the storm. The sounds of erotic play emanating around the room fell by the wayside when Miles released her puckered tip with a plop then snapped the flexible bamboo spanker right on it. She squealed behind the gag, her eyes watering as she glared at his smug expression.
“And here you’ve been so good.” With a mock sigh of disappointment, he flicked the evil wood strip on her other nipple then proceeded to travel down her quivering abdomen, up her spread, elevated thighs and back down to her upraised buttocks, leaving small stings in his wake. Only the way he teased her labia and protruding clit with light grazes from his free hand kept her from dropping the ribbon.
Teetering on the edge of climax, she strained toward his hand, pleading with her eyes for more. “What? You’re ready for more so soon?” At her nod, he gave her one of his rare smiles that lit her up from the inside out. “Okay, but you should be careful what you wish for.”
Miles dropped the spanker into his bag and snatched the lube. Placing the nozzle at her anus, he squeezed while releasing his cock into his other hand. “Remember, all you have to do is let the ribbon drop and I’ll stop. Only take as much as you can,” he warned her as he sheathed himself then positioned his cock head at her puckered back hole.
Cupping her buttocks, he lifted her ass and pushed past her tight sphincter hard enough to breach her untried orifice before pausing to let her adjust. Her hands tightened to white-knuckled grips and her chest heaved, but her flushed face and dilated eyes as she looked down to where he penetrated her indicated nothing but arousal. When she lifted her eyes to his and nodded, he breathed a sigh of relief. As much as he wanted to be the one and only to take her ass, he would stop here if that had been what she needed.
Watching for signs of stress, he tunneled into her dark channel one slow inch at a time, stopping when he had about half his length embedded inside her. “You good?” he asked, his tone gruff with lust. At her vigorous nod, he breathed a sigh of relief and pulled back. “Then come with me.”
Releasing her buttocks, Miles leaned forward and plucked at her reddened nipples with one hand while thrusting three fingers inside her pussy with the other. As usual, her quick response inflamed his senses and drove his own climax forward far sooner than he would have liked. Setting up a rhythm of short, jabbing strokes, he pummeled her ass and managed to keep up teasing flicks on her nipples and deep plunges that grazed and pressed against her clit inside her pussy. The bombardment drove her up and over, her soft mewling cries and ripples of her vaginal and anal muscles were enough to send him following her into the pleasurable abyss.
“Hold on, Hope.” After disposing of the condom, he undid the strap behind her head and removed the gag. As if it was the most natural thing in the world, her lips fell on his hand in a sub’s gratitude for her Dom’s attention. He doubted she knew the significance of the small gesture, but he did, and it sealed his fate. Releasing her legs, he helped her up, saying, “Let’s go to our stateroom.”
Hope rolled over without opening her eyes, the soreness making itself known bringing to mind every way Miles had tormented her last night. The games had been fun, in a diabolical way, and the intensity with which he had taken her in the fucking swing still left her shaken with lingering pleasure. It hadn’t taken her long under his black-eyed regard to set aside her mortification at being displayed in such a lewd fashion in front of everyone, but she’d been reluctant to let go until his pummeling strokes rendered her powerless to keep from it. The endless pleasure had racked her body, blurred her vision and stolen her air, and she’d loved every second of it.
Sliding her hand across the bed, she searched for him only to come up empty. Blinking open her eyes, she saw the bathroom door stood ajar. Catching a glimpse of his taut buttocks that drew a sigh of appreciation, she took a moment to watch him unnoticed as he shaved at the sink, enjoying the view of his long legs, lean hips and broad back before she noticed the tattoo adorning his shoulder. Unlike the black outline of a skull and crossbones on his left bicep, this one was a bright red rose perched atop a vivid green stem sprouting even greener leaves.
Curious, Hope slid out of the comfortable bunk and felt the roll of the yacht beneath her bare feet and heard the faint hum of the motor propelling them back to the marina. She saw her sundress draped over a hook on the back of the stateroom door but ignored it as she padded naked across the soft carpet to lean against the door jamb of the compact bathroom.
“Good morning.” Her voice emerged a husky whisper when their eyes met in the mirror and he took a slow, appreciative sweep of her nakedness.
“Morning. Did I wake you?”
“No.” Her gaze shifted to the rose tattoo again, and her heart turned over when she made out the letters ‘MOM’ etched along the curved stem. In that split second, she tumbled the final stretch into love with this complic
ated, overbearing, over-protective man. Her voice emerged even more hoarse when she said, “That’s a beautiful tribute. You must have loved her very much.”
His jaw tightened, and a cold look entered his eyes before his taut shoulders relaxed and he cocked his head. “Yes, I did. She would’ve liked you.”
Picking up a small towel, Miles wiped the remaining lather off his jaw before turning to face her. Bracing his hands on either side of her head against the jamb, he caged her in with his big body. The tickle of his chest hair against her still sensitive nipples shot arrows of heat straight down between her legs. Will I ever be sated with this man? It was beginning to look doubtful.
“This Saturday night is an annual fundraiser for the Y. Go with me.”
Her mouth turned up in a small smile. “You could ask.”
“No, I can’t. You might say no. I’ll pick you up at six. It’s formal.” Pushing away, he stepped around her with a teasing, full-body brush against her body and a small quirk of his own lips. “We’ll dock soon. Better get dressed.”
Shaking her head at his high-handedness and her easy capitulation, Hope grabbed her sundress, slipped into the bathroom and closed the door. Leaning her hands on the counter, she lowered her head and tried to calm her racing heart. She didn’t know if the date thrilled her so much because she’d just admitted she loved Miles, or simply because it would be their first time together that didn’t include sex. At least, she didn’t think it would, since they would be attending a posh gala with about a hundred other people. She’d heard of the big event that benefited the youth of Miami but knew few details other than those.
By the time she’d washed up and pulled on her dress, she was feeling a little uncomfortable with what she assumed would be an astronomical price for tickets to this fundraiser. She knew nothing about Miles’ finances but couldn’t imagine he’d be able to afford to put out a lot, regardless of his good intentions to support youth programs other than those at his gym. Doing a quick mental run-down of her personal account, she decided to at least offer to pay something towards their night out.
