by Eva Charles
“Is that chicken?” I ask, pulling away from her.
“Yes. Lemon chicken and rice pilaf.”
“Is that how you’re planning on killing me?”
She swats me on the arm playfully, and my dick jumps. Find your balls, JD.
“The only thing I’m hungry for right now is you,” I murmur, yanking her toward me. She plays along, jutting her hips forward, her belly rubbing against my lengthening cock.
“After supper,” she says, in a seductive little voice, “you can have whatever you want.” Whatever I want? Oh, Gabrielle you have no idea.
“Forget the food,” I urge, digging my fingers into her ass. “I want my dick in your sassy little mouth. Right now.” It’s coarser than I’ve been lately, and her eyes widen.
“Take off your clothes, Gabrielle. All of them.”
She hesitates for a few seconds, and then begins to undress, quietly. My dick’s hard, but I’m not feeling the sexy. When I start to have second thoughts about punishing her, I think about her being abducted, or worse.
“Get on your knees and take out my cock. You were a bad girl yesterday, and I’m still not myself. I need you to help me relax, to make it up to me for all that time I spent worrying about you.”
When she doesn’t immediately obey, I haul her to me and bury my hands in her hair, claiming her mouth, until she moans. “Julian,” she whimpers, but I don’t want to hear it.
My hand slides to her pussy, and I finger her hard, until she’s gasping and shaking. But I pull my fingers away before she comes. “On your knees, Gabrielle. I won’t ask again.”
She wets her lips, and kneels at my feet, unbuckling my belt, hands trembling. My cock leaks while her clever fingers work the zipper. I wind her hair around my hand, aroused by every move she makes.
She doesn’t free my cock, instead, she tugs at my trousers to pull them down. “No. I said take it out. The only bare-ass person here will be you.”
Gabrielle sits back on her haunches, and gazes up at me, her stained lips rubbing against each other. “No.”
I wrap her hair more tightly. “No?”
She shakes her head. “I will not suck you off on my knees while you’re fully dressed and I don’t have on a stitch of clothing. Not when you’re in this kind of mood. It feels—it feels—”
“Like a punishment?”
She blinks. “Degrading.”
“No more degrading than if someone kidnaps you, and rapes you, leaving you for dead. Take out my cock.”
She doesn’t budge, but I can’t let this go. Not after yesterday. Let’s do it your way Gabrielle—the hard way. “Fine. You want me to take my clothes off? I can do that. You want to play like that? Let’s play in the bedroom.”
I drag her down the hall. She’s tense and guarded, and she should be, because what I’m about to do won’t be pleasant.
“Are you going to spank me?”
“Not tonight.” I strip down bare. “Is this what you wanted?” I ask, tossing her on the bed, and covering her body with mine before she can answer. I suck a dusky nipple between my teeth and bite down until she cries out, and then I tweak the other roughly.
While she whimpers, I take both her wrists in my hand, and cuff her to the bed. There’s no play in the restraints tonight. I do the same with her ankles, spreading her legs wide so I can have unfettered access to her pussy. When she’s secure, I shove a pillow under her hips.
“What are you doing?” she asks breathlessly.
“Giving you exactly what you deserve. Maybe I should keep you here, bound like this all the time. Then I wouldn’t have to worry about you running around the streets of Charleston alone—an easy mark for anyone who wants to hurt you.”
“I don’t believe anyone wants to hurt me. The security is your way of controlling me,” she says softly. “And to ensure there are no other men in my life.”
“I don’t need Rafe and Gus to handle any other men in your life. I’m quite capable in that regard. But I’m jealous and possessive. You’re right about that. And don’t test my patience.” I warn, checking one more time that there’s no movement in the restraints.
“Please don’t leave me here like this. Please.”
I don’t say anything to reassure her.
“Will you respect the safe word?” she asks, with the twinge of anxiety in her voice.
I want to say no. That I won’t respect it because I want to teach her a lesson. Because I want her to submit fully to me. Because I want her to do every fucking thing I tell her to do. Because I’m sick and tired of her rebelliousness.
I wrestle with all these feelings while she watches me with wide eyes that are growing more and more apprehensive as the seconds tick on.
“JD?”
“Of course, I’ll respect your safe word. Always.” I slide my hand between her legs and stroke her hard little clit. “But I’m going to make you very uncomfortable. You’re going to pull on your chains and beg me for mercy. You’ll sweat and whimper. Your pussy will weep all over the sheets. But there will be no mercy for you. Not tonight.”
She shivers, and I feel the gush of arousal on my fingers.
“I think the better question is, will you respect the safe word? Will you use it only if it’s absolutely necessary? Or will you safe out the minute things aren’t going your way?” It’s a total dick thing to say. But I don’t give a shit.
She nods, and I lean over to kiss her cheek. “Good girl.”
I cross the room, and when I pull the artist’s brush and a blindfold from the dresser, I hear a gasp from the bed.
25
Gabrielle
JD places the brush and blindfold beside my head, so every time I turn my neck, I see them. He lays on his stomach, between my bound legs, and licks my pussy, avoiding the clit like it’s iced with deadly poison. He laves and bites, small nips, not hard, but not gentle, either. The moans form deep in my belly, and bounce free, one after the other, while his tongue teases.
He’s in a mood tonight. I shouldn’t have ditched security yesterday. I knew he’d be upset. I knew it violated the terms of our agreement, but— “Ahhh.” He holds my clit between his teeth, then pulls away, scraping the swollen flesh.
My stomach does little flips when he reaches for the blindfold. His eyes smoldering. Is it passion? Anger? I don’t know. But they’re the last thing I see before the silky fabric blinds me.
Before I adjust to the darkness, the brush is on my mouth, painting my lips. Then he works the evil bristles inside my mouth. “Suck,” he demands.
And I do.
Until he’s satisfied.
Until he runs the brush down my chin, between my ribs, down, down, down, until it hovers over my clit. Grazing the swollen bead.
I grab for the sheets, I’ll need fistfuls to help withstand the torment he surely has planned for me. My fingertips dance on the soft fabric, but I can’t grip even a tiny piece, the binding is too tight.
He lowers the brush. My muscles tighten. Every one. The bristles prick the sensitive flesh. It feels as though it’s made up of millions of pointed fibers. My legs shake uncontrollably, and as I arch my back in a final surrender, he pulls the brush away.
I whimper. “JD. Please.” It’s such a desperate, pathetic whimper.
“Remember this feeling. Remember it well the next time you’re tempted to put yourself in danger.” His voice is tightly controlled, but I hear the anger bubbling beneath the surface. My heart pounds, boom, boom, boom, and I instinctively pull on the restraints. But there is no slack.
JD pushes the blindfold up. It takes me a minute before my eyes adjust. His cock is in his hand. He’s stroking and squeezing. His eyes never leave mine. “Do you want this, Gabrielle? Do you want to milk my cock with your pussy? Do you?” I don’t say anything. I’m afraid of him right now. Just a little. I should use my safe word, but I don’t.
His pulls are shorter, harder now, his breath coarse and uneven. Without warning, he comes all over my belly and tit
s. I gasp loudly. JD stares into my eyes as long ropes of cum sail over my skin.
He will mark me like this, twice more, before the night is over.
I lose count of how many orgasms he deprives me of. How many he ruins. He’s vicious, without an ounce of compassion, masking my eyes whenever he chooses, and forcing me to watch when it suits him. And as he promised, I’m a sweaty, blubbering mess, floating in blissful darkness, among the gauzy shadows, where nothing touches me.
Wilderness. It was on the tip of my tongue, during those brutal seconds, before I began to float. But I never said it. And I’m not sure why.
He eventually lets me sleep.
When I wake, the cuffs are off, and I’m piled with soft quilts. He has juice for me, and salty crackers.
“How are you feeling?” he asks, sitting on the bed next to me, in a pair of well-worn jeans.
I test my legs, stretching them along the mattress. My muscles are stiff and sore. “Wrung out. That was brutal.” I begin to wonder why I let him do that to me. But I’m still too foggy to think clearly.
He nods. “Don’t ever ditch your security again. Don’t ever put yourself in danger like that.”
He pulls me to his chest, but my exhausted body finds no comfort there. And a small part of me wonders if I’ll ever find comfort in his arms again.
“How about a shower before you go home?” he asks, smoothing my hair.
Yes, a shower, my muscles beg. I would love nothing more than to huddle under a warm spray. I nod, and pull away, slowly lift my torso out of bed. JD guides me to the bathroom, and turns on the water in the shower.
I catch sight of myself in the mirror as the room begins to fog. I’m washed out, like someone coming down from a prolonged drug high. My drug was sex. The mirror is steamy, but I stare at my pale complexion and sunken eyes until the reflection disappears in the haze.
We get in the shower, and JD washes my hair, and carefully soaps every inch of my skin with sandalwood soap that smells like him. When I seem unsteady, he props me against his body and secures me with a strong arm. I feel his erection growing while he attends to me, but he doesn’t touch me in a sexual way. The shower is purely utilitarian.
After long minutes under the warm water, I begin to awaken, my body humming with desire. The feeling is no longer urgent, but it’s gnawing for release.
I sway into his thickening cock, but JD shifts away. When I do it again, he slaps my ass. Not hard. But it’s sharp. Like his words. “Not for you. There’s no relief for you tonight. And when I see you tomorrow, you’re going to look me right in the eye and tell me if you touched yourself when you went home. If you lie, if I even think you’re lying, we’re going to do this all over again.”
I gaze up at him. The light flickers in his steely eyes, not like fireflies on a warm summer evening, but like bullets during target practice. Why did you allow it get this far, Gabrielle? I wanted to placate him. I thought we could work out our feelings with sex. His anger. My regret. It was foolish of me to think sex was the answer.
“Wilderness,” I mouth. “Wilderness.” This time the word is loud and clear, echoing off the cold, white tile.
He freezes. His eyes all over mine. He doesn’t understand.
“The safe word isn’t just for when you’ve pushed my physical limits too hard,” I say. “It’s about pushing my emotional ones, too. You went too far. And I don’t feel like you’re done.”
There’s a ripple when he swallows, but otherwise, he doesn’t move.
“I didn’t use it earlier—I thought about it, but I could see how worried you were when you came in. How much you needed to punish me. I wanted to give that to you. And deprivation is brutal, but it brings its own kind of toe-curling pleasure. Eventually.” I stop for a breath. “I didn’t safe out while you were edging me, but I probably should have, because you demanded things of my body, in a way that I’m not sure was playful, or even arousing for you. I was confused at the time by all the sensation. But I can see things more clearly now. Everything you did in there, it was angry, and threatening—you’re still threatening me. None of this feels right to me, JD—it feels almost abusive.”
“I’m sorry,” he says quietly. “I’m sorry.”
I wait for more, for some kind of explanation or meaningful remorse, but there’s nothing. “That’s it? That’s all you have to say for yourself?”
JD turns off the water and grabs two towels from a hook outside the shower. He starts to dry me, but I grab the towel and finish drying myself. Right now, I don’t want him touching me.
“Yesterday,” he says in a heavy voice, “all day, even after I knew you were safe, I was apparently the biggest asshole on the planet. At least according to my brothers. Lally threw a spoon at me and kicked me out of my own kitchen. Patrick went home early with a migraine. And Smith offered to go a few rounds with me. I should have taken him up on it.” His eyelashes flutter gently. “After I knew you were safe, I was so angry with you. All day, and all night. Furious. I wanted to see you. But I didn’t trust myself to respect the boundaries. The safe word. Human decency. I was raging, Gabrielle. I couldn’t even talk to you on the phone, I was so pissed.”
He tips his head, gazing at me with those blue, blue eyes. “I thought I was in better control today. I should have cancelled tonight.”
His confession is staggering. I should be afraid of a man capable of that much anger. I should run out the door as far and as fast as I can.
But I don’t.
I know the difference between an abusive, out-of-control man with no respect for boundaries, like Dean, and a man who spins out of control, but who understands his impulses. Who respects boundaries. Should he have engaged in this little game tonight while he was still on edge? No. And while I’m not responsible for his actions, I shouldn’t have played, either.
“I think we both learned something today. When I was with Dean and things got out of hand, I couldn’t stop it. There were no safe words. We didn’t have that kind of relationship. And even if we had, no safe word would have stopped him from hurting me that night. You stopped bullying me when I asked.” JD winces when I use the word bullying, but that’s how it felt to me.
“When we play these games, the lines between reality and fantasy blur,” I say quietly. “It’s what makes them so seductive. We bump against the edges, so there are bound to be blips. You stopped the second I asked you to stop.”
“Gabrielle. I’m just agitated today. It wasn’t hard to stop. But I was furious yesterday. With you. Out of my fucking mind. It wasn’t a game. I don’t think there was a single boundary I wouldn’t have crossed. You should know that.”
I nod. “You understood that about yourself. You had enough control to think about it.”
“Don’t give me more credit than I deserve. I might have hurt you.” The pain in his face is overwhelming.
“I’ll take my chances.”
He steps toward me. “You’re a fool.” It’s a half-hearted warning, delivered in a strangled voice.
“We’ll see.”
I step into the mirror, and slide a wide-toothed comb through my wavy wet hair, occasionally glancing at his reflection as he watches me. The woman in the mirror isn’t a fool. She’s strong and smart. She knows what she wants. And the man standing behind her? The one she’s loved all her life? She wants him. With all his broken pieces. The nicked and dented fragments, and the twisted shards, beyond repair. Every one of them.
“Is there any chance I can get something to eat before you send me home?” I ask.
“I’ll fix something while you get dressed,” he says, slinging the towel around his neck.
When I get to the kitchen, JD’s barefoot, in worn jeans and a long-sleeved Gamecock T-shirt. His hair is damp. He doesn’t look dangerous. He looks young. And delicious.
I climb onto a kitchen stool and JD brings a tray of food over to me—chunks of cheese and smoked ham, and cubes of sweet pineapple.
“What happened to the chicke
n I made?”
“I tasted it. I think we’ve both been punished enough for today.”
I smile, and then laugh. A silly, out of control, exhausted-to-the-bone laugh. He laughs too.
“Gabrielle?” he says, wearily, even before our laughter fades.
“Hmmm?” I ask, biting into a bit of salty ham.
I’m still savoring the salt on my tongue, when he swivels both stools so we’re facing one another. He drags mine closer to his, until our knees touch. “The security isn’t there to put a crimp in your life. I would never do that to you. They’re there for your protection. That’s all. I don’t want to lose you.”
His voice is grave. The raw intensity in his face winds its way to my heart, and I reach up and brush the hair from his eyes. “I know.”
I know you believe it’s all about my safety. Even tonight. I know that. I just wish I could ease your worry.
26
Gabrielle
I’m in an abandoned corner of the hotel kitchen, polishing silver serving pieces I borrowed for the brunch tomorrow, when my phone rings. JD.
It’s been nearly a month since the night I used my safe word. I haven’t had to use it since, although he’s still bossy and controlling. That’ll never change.
“Hi,” I say, happy to talk to him, even though there’s so much going on in the hotel. “You’re on speakerphone, so behave yourself.”
“Lally cut her finger,” he says. “It sounds bad. She needs stitches, but won’t go to the emergency room.”
“Damn pig-headed woman. I’ll call her.”
“Gabrielle. I’m not in town. I need you to go over there and take her to the emergency room. I know the timing sucks, but there’s no one else.”
I look around the kitchen. There’s so much to do before tomorrow. I gave Georgie a few days off so they could spend the holiday with Wade’s sister, and two people I was counting on for help have called in sick. The very last thing I need right now is to go to Sweetgrass. “I’ll head over right now.”
