“Yes,” he answered, dashing my hopes, seeing he did that and openly fighting a grin which made me wonder why he fought it since I could see him fighting it.
“Well, Axl and I got interrupted during burrito bowls,” I shared.
“Tragedy,” he teased.
I rolled my eyes then told him, “And Lottie danced my ass off so I’m hungry.”
“Don’t you want to see the stuff?”
“I’m already suffering from repeated whiplash with all things Brett. Innocent of killing a cop, guilty of having a guy murdered at my back door, putting me in danger, helping me achieve my dreams. I don’t want to walk in there and fall in love with a Sub-Zero and then have to fight my need to ask him over for a dinner you will cook, only to have someone aim a bazooka at your loft causing an explosion we narrowly escape.”
“Good call,” he muttered through a chuckle.
Sadly, I wasn’t being funny.
Though I was glad to make Boone laugh.
“And just by the by, we had a thing with Hattie, which was after Axl and I talked things out. So he and I are all good. But he is not all good with Hattie. So heads up, you might need to take your boy’s back on that.”
“What thing with Hattie?”
“She’s a really, really good dancer. Ballet. Classically trained.”
“Yeah?”
“And Axl saw her dance.”
He leaned back on an “Ah,” not fighting that grin.
“And then she messed up, had a very alarming reaction, he saw it, went right to her, tried to be there for her, and she fled the room. Whoosh!” I added to that final bit a dramatic swoop of my hand.
Boone wasn’t smiling anymore.
“So…yeah,” I finished.
“It’s gonna be good it’s just you and me and the weekend because no drama happens to you when it’s just you and me and a weekend.”
Yeah it was.
So good.
“Go eat,” he ordered, and bent to touch his mouth to mine. “I gotta go back to work.”
I didn’t go eat.
I went to say hi to Hawk, Joker and Tack, collected Axl, and we went back to Chipotle and ordered the same damned things.
* * *
“You do know I’m gonna have to put an end to this,” I announced.
It was that evening, after dinner.
We were doing the dishes and then we were going to watch a movie.
Or, some ID channel if I could talk Boone into it. I hadn’t had my true crime fix in weeks.
“Put an end to what?” he asked, scraping some leftover garlic mash into a bowl, mash that, in the hands of Boone, would probably be a toe-curlingly good latke-style something at Sunday brunch.
“You helping me do the dishes,” I answered.
His eyes came to me. “Why?”
“You cook.”
“So?”
I shoved a plate in the dishwasher and turned fully to him. “We have balance. You cuddle. I cuddle. You tell me I’m gorgeous. I tell you you’re hot. You order me to suck your cock. I suck it. You can’t cook and help do the dishes. It fucks with our balance.”
“Ryn, I like being with you.”
So freaking sweet.
Still.
“Boone, your house is one room, minus the bath and laundry. You can be with me sitting on the couch and picking a movie.”
“I like the way you smell. I like the way your hands move, even putting dishes in the dishwasher. I like shooting the shit with you, and not doing it shouting across twenty feet of space. I like being with you, Ryn. And I don’t give a fuck I’m dumping mash into a Tupperware while I do it.”
Seriously?
Seriously?
No wonder he had a hero complex.
He was top to toe to brain to heart awesome.
To explain the vastness of my feelings about all he’d just said, I snapped, “You’re totally fucking up our balance!”
He laughed and caught me in his arms, which sucked because my hands were wet, and I couldn’t touch him.
“Just let me do what I do,” he said quietly.
“Whatever,” I replied.
“And I’ll let you do what you do,” he went on.
“Yeah, you get to be the dream guy and I—”
“Do not fuckin’ finish that,” he growled on a hefty squeeze.
I shut up.
“You have a real problem with not being what you’ve decided is perfect, Kathryn,” Boone stated irately. “He gave you that, your dad did. He laid that on you. And if there is nothing I say from this point on that you hear, you need to hear this. You are a dream, Ryn. And that isn’t about you being gorgeous or having a great body or sucking my cock when I order it. It’s about you being tough and funny and sweet and too goddamn generous and not letting anything slow you down. It far from sucks you dig me as much as you do. But it’s clear I’m fallin’ down on the job of sharing how much I dig you and why, Ryn, when you say shit like you were just gonna say.”
I stared up at him.
“I don’t know how to help you let what he gave you go, but he lost out, Ryn. He did.” He said that on another tight squeeze. “I know it’s hard for you to see it this way, but you missed out on a dad who was an absolute dick. But he missed out on having you. And if I didn’t hate the guy’s guts for what he landed on you, I’d feel sorry for him.”
All he said was all Boone was.
Fabulous.
But that last was a surprise.
“You hate Dad’s guts?”
“Yeah.”
“Boone, you haven’t met him.”
“I don’t need to. I don’t want to. And I hope I never do.”
Whoa.
“But, Boone, hating isn’t good.”
“Would you be copasetic if my dad was like yours?”
I saw his point.
“Yeah.” He saw I saw his point.
“Okay, I’m awesome and you’re awesome, so freak-out canceled. We still have balance,” I decreed.
Boone scowled at me a second before his face cracked and his lips tipped up.
“Jesus, you’re cute.”
“I’m also ordering latke-style something with that mash for Sunday brunch.”
He started laughing.
I rolled up on my toes and kissed him while he did it.
We started making out and maybe I got Boone’s hair a little wet with my hands when we did.
He was Boone and I was kissing him.
So he didn’t mind.
Chapter Eighteen
Bad Teacher
Ryn
By the next Wednesday, I realized no matter how many YouTube videos I watched on reskimming walls, it was not as easy as it looked.
Which bought me a chat with Hound who said, “Listen, sister, you got a big project here. Don’t take on shit you don’t need to take on. The walls are fine. Prime the fuckers, paint ’em, and move on.”
That was the extent of our chat.
But on closer inspection, I saw he was right.
And on deeper reflection, I realized in a few words Hound had shared valuable insight with me.
If I was going to chase this dream, do this, and do it as my living, I was going to have to make those kinds of decisions.
I wasn’t building houses.
I wasn’t perfecting houses.
I was flipping them.
And if something didn’t need to be fixed, there was no reason to fix it.
And especially no reason to spend time and money fixing it.
So off we went to the paint store in order for me to get a few more paint chips so I could be certain about the color palette I was going to use on the place.
Then, after tacking them all up and wandering the house for half an hour, I earned my second chat with Hound.
It was far shorter.
“Jesus, I’m losing the will to live.”
He then took a Sharpie, drew big arrows on the wall to the colors I’d picked before I’
d gone out to give myself the opportunity to look at other colors.
Lesson two from the Great and Wise Hound.
Don’t waste time with indecision and second-guessing.
Then he said, “I’m going to the paint store. Alone.”
I had a feeling this was so I wouldn’t get near the paint chip display.
I also had a feeling that was a wise decision.
Last, I had a feeling that Hound was going to donate paint to the project because I had another feeling there was no way in hell—since there was no longer a reason to be off to the paint store except to buy paint—he was going to let me pay him back.
By the by, while Hound was at the paint store, I got a call from Tack.
After greetings, he didn’t beat around the bush before he said, “Got a friend who paints, skims and muds. You want me to see if he’d be down with a part-time apprentice for a while?” Pause. “After your shit is sorted, that is.”
Did I want that?
Free wall-skimming lessons?
“That’d be awesome, Tack,” I told him.
“Got it. Let you know.”
Then he hung up on me.
Totally loved the Chaos boys.
At that point, since I was at a crossroads with what was next, and I needed to sit down with Boone now that we had a lot of “nexts” that could happen what with Brett’s deliveries, and we needed to make a plan on how to tackle it, Mag took me home. This after we swung by my place for me to spend half an hour watering my plants and to get some important provisions.
The “home” Mag took me to (after mine) was Boone’s place, where he and I spent the vast majority of our time.
It wasn’t that he didn’t like my pad.
It was that he did not like my kitchen and refused to cook in it unless I let him yank out the carpet.
I totally heard him about the carpet.
But I didn’t need two home improvement projects, and frankly, I preferred Boone’s pad because, first, it was awesome, and second, he had fantastic stoneware and third, no one had been murdered at his back door and not only because he didn’t have a back door.
And now Boone was home, Mag was off with a “Later” to both of us, and time was nigh for me to give Boone my version of a gift.
Roses were awesome.
But I was hoping to knock his socks off with what I had in mind.
So after I gave him a welcome home kiss and a careful once over to see he wasn’t worn out by his day, and he asked me if I was down with homemade pizza for dinner (I so was, just…later), he got out the bread machine (yes, Boone had a bread machine, was my guy awesome or what?) and I got my ass in the bathroom.
This was a risk.
It wasn’t my role to instigate this.
But my experience was, if I wanted to play, I went out and found someone who also wanted to play, so the guesswork of me being in the mood to play was unnecessary.
I didn’t know how that went when your man was your Dom.
But we were going to see.
And how we were going to see was me walking out of the bathroom in a super-tight, plaid pencil skirt that hit me about three inches above the knee, a cap-sleeved white blouse, buttoned all the way up to the throat, my hair pulled up in a sexy-school-marm bun, clear-lensed black-rimmed glasses on my nose, and four-inch, spike-heeled, patent-red pumps on my feet.
I could hear some sort of kitchen apparatus whirring.
Boone had changed from work outfit of cargos, boots, and skintight tee to home outfit of jeans, a more worn skintight tee, and at a guess from experience, bare feet.
He was doing something at the counter, but when he heard the bathroom door open, his head came up, his gaze locked on me, and his body stilled entirely.
I walked efficiently to him, my heels ticking on his wood floors.
He turned only his head to watch as I came to his side.
I stood there and said reprovingly, “Mr. Sadler, we need to talk about your grades.”
Boone stared at me.
I stared back, my heart pounding.
Boone stared at me more.
Okay, shit.
So, answer: not my place to instigate.
Then I was bent over the counter, one of Boone’s hands in my back, the other one going up my skirt.
Oh yeah.
It was a tight fit, but he was clearly determined and managed to get his hand between my legs and run his fingers through the swollen lips of my pussy.
“Wet,” he whispered.
He flicked my clit.
My hips jerked.
Obviously, I wasn’t wearing underwear.
Bad teacher.
“Kathryn, this isn’t the way we do things,” he growled.
Uh-oh.
Maybe I read his reaction wrong.
He stroked my clit.
But that felt really right.
“Teacher’s gonna get a lesson,” he murmured.
Yes.
My legs started trembling.
“Stay where you are,” Boone ordered before he took his hand off my back, his other from between my legs, and then my skirt was yanked forcefully up over my hips.
I thought I heard it tear.
I definitely heard my whimper.
Boone ran a hand over my ass.
“Unless I tell you to keep your legs tight, you open for me, Kathryn,” Boone instructed.
I opened my legs.
He slid his hand back between and cupped my sex.
I held still and waited.
He didn’t move.
I held still and waited some more.
He slid his hand back, and quick as a flash, it landed on my ass with a delicious sting, making my hips jerk and my legs lock.
I closed my eyes slowly.
Yes.
Let the lesson begin.
* * *
We were in bed.
I was reverse cowgirl, leashed, the silk wrapped around Boone’s fist, and he’d just finished guiding me riding him to the orgasm he let me have, and continue riding him to his.
He’d spanked me bent over the counter.
Then he’d lifted me on it, shoving me down to my back, and eaten me on it.
Not allowing me to come, he’d taken me to bed, my skirt was gone, my blouse too, my glasses were long gone, the lacy demi-cup bra I was wearing was yanked under my tits, and the pumps remained in place on my feet.
And the road to where we were right then was long, and in the end, immensely gratifying.
With tugs on my leash, I rode him gently before I felt his grip firm in a manner I knew he wanted me to stop and do it full of him.
I did.
He drifted his free hand over the small of my back, ass, hips, up my spine before he murmured, “Climb off, Kathryn.”
He loosened his grip on the scarf and I climbed off.
He sat up and ordered, “Face me and straddle.”
I moved astride him.
He looked me over, eventually lifting my tit at the underside where the bra was bunched, bending his head to it and sucking my nipple into his mouth.
I mewed and my thighs spasmed against his hips.
He let my nipple go and tipped his head back to look at me.
“Way fuckin’ better than Mrs. Steiner.”
I smiled at him.
He pulled the scarf to the front, tugged it, and I bent my face to his.
He lifted his other hand and filtered it through my hair, holding me at the back of my head.
“You’re gonna wait for me to make you dinner, then you’re gonna eat pizza naked and collared, then we’re gonna see how you do tied up, baby.”
Wednesday night fuck-a-thon.
Yippee!
“Okay, Boone,” I whispered.
His eyes moved over my face and he muttered like I wasn’t there, “And you don’t think you’re a dream?”
“I give good sub,” I bragged flippantly.
Boone caught my eyes. “You give good everything
, Ryn. I didn’t even know I’d been harboring that fantasy until you walked out of the bathroom. Then you walked out of that bathroom and I thought my dick was gonna explode.”
Nice.
“I think we need to talk about all the various things you never got to do as a young buck Dom, thinking you’re a freak and holding the urges at bay,” I suggested.
“We are absolutely going to do that.”
I smiled at him again.
He tugged on me again and brushed his lips against mine.
When he gave me slack, allowing me to pull away, he said, “Clean you up and see to dinner. Dough’s probably pushed open the door of the machine by now.”
I didn’t know what that meant, but I didn’t care if the dough was ruined and we had to order pizza (though I figured Boone’s homemade stuff was the bomb).
I just wanted him to have sustenance so he had the energy to rock my world.
Again.
“All right,” I agreed, though that was unnecessary.
“Climb off, lie on your side, baby. Leg hitched,” he commanded.
I obeyed.
Boone cleaned me.
Boone made pizza while I watched from this same position in the bed.
Boone made me get on my knees and take a face fucking while it was baking.
But I didn’t eat the pizza naked in his bed.
I still had my bra and shoes on.
And Boone fed me.
Then he tied me up.
And yeah, I already knew it was going to be.
But it was a dream.
* * *
A phone ringing woke us both up.
Boone shifted, muttered, “Mine,” meaning it was his phone, and I settled back in, half on him, half plastered down his side.
Then Boone took hold of the tail of the scarf and lazily stroked it, at the same time stroking down my back, as he greeted casually, “Hey, Dad.”
I shot up to sitting and nearly choked myself.
Boone gave me a part-surprised, mostly-worried look as he let go of the scarf at my back.
“Hang on,” he said to his father. “You okay?” he asked me.
I was not.
Boone was stroking my leash while answering a call from his beloved dad.
“Yes,” I lied.
He put pressure on my back to make me lie on him again and then returned to his dad. “What’s up?” Then, “That was Ryn.”
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