by Lilia Moon
I check to make sure our resident practical joker hasn’t left any other surprises, and then I tuck everything away under the velvet slipcover that puddles to the ground, making the bench look like nothing more than a luxurious place to lay out and take a nap.
I’m so ready. Where the fuck is my sub?
Chapter Fifteen
Scorpio
I march into Fettered like I own the place, which isn’t hard because the front door’s wide open and there’s music blaring loud enough to cover the sounds of a dozen women stomping around in their army boots.
I swear, if I only get one orgasm today, Harlan is a dead man walking.
I peer into the darkness of the lounge and don’t see anything except for a chalkboard sign sitting prominently on the end of the bar where I can’t possibly miss it, covered in Ari’s distinctive, stylish handwriting. He’s back in the private rooms, last door on your left. It’s the only one that will be open. Good luck, and don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.
I snort, even though nerves have just entirely, thoroughly landed. I pick up the piece of chalk she left conveniently at the bottom and scrawl a note. I need a list of what those things are. Then I grin to myself, because I can already hear her laughter.
Which seems like the right way to pay her back for making sure I feel loved this morning.
I dust the chalk off my hands and continue the walk that started in the dark hours of last night and left me restless and wanting and totally sleepless in my own bed. The music fades as I swing through the doors into the dungeon. It looks a bit strange, empty of people and full of sunlight. I don’t look too hard at the equipment, but I do see a set of tools lying out and a sprawl of lug nuts laid out beside one of the chairs.
A repair in progress. Somebody got themselves out of the way so I would do this walk alone. I swallow and wonder just how many people know what’s about to happen. My Dom, making a statement.
My Dom. Holy fucking hell.
I shake my head and snap my shoulders straight. He didn’t exactly do me wrong last night, and I have at least some idea of what’s going to happen in this room. Which might not actually be making things any easier. My frustrated nocturnal fantasies were full of cuffs and velvet and strong, talented hands stripping me naked.
At this rate I’m going to come before he touches me.
I get to the door on the other side of the dungeon. The one I’ve never passed through, the threshold I’ve never crossed. What lies beyond is member-only territory, and only after they’ve jumped through a bunch of hoops, because Fettered is obnoxiously careful with their people.
I’m getting a pass on all of that because the man who’s waiting for me is Dom gold.
My legs are the kind of jittery they were for my first really big gigs, and I know that if I don’t get moving I’m in big trouble. I push through the doors and find myself in a hallway that could belong to a classy hotel. The doors have discreet signs, but I don’t stop to read them. I can see the one that’s open, and it has my full attention.
I don’t feel myself walking anymore. I only see the room widening in front of me as I get closer. Rich brown floor and rice-paper walls and a smell that’s straight out of a fantasy I didn’t even know I had. And the bed. I stop just inside the doorway, gaping at it. It takes up half the room, a maroon-and-chocolate paradise covered in silk and velvet and something that might be fake fur of the really spectacular kind.
I want to peel off all my clothes and dive in.
And then I feel the breath at my neck. The hands closing on my upper arms to stop my instinctive spin. The heat of the man right behind me, but not quite touching.
My entire body quivers.
A low chuckle at my neck. “You like?”
I’m not sure what he’s asking about, but I like it all. “Is it bad to say I want to live in that bed?”
His hands lift off my arms, and all I have holding me up is his breath. “That can happen. After.”
I’m losing track of his words. Everything in me is focused on the back of my neck.
A finger touches, feather light, just below my ear and traces down to my collarbone. “How’d you sleep?”
I moan, putting every bit of nine hours of frustration into the sound.
He closes the inch between my back and his front, and suddenly I’m enveloped in the energy of aroused male. One arm wraps around my waist, pulling me in tight, and the other one tweaks my nipple hard enough to hurt—and to drive a thrum of sensation right down to my toes.
This time the sound I make is entirely desperate.
His hold gentles. “I’m going to strip you naked, right here, so that I can see your beautiful breasts and every inch of this sexy skin. I’m going to torment you today, Scorpio, and these nipples of yours are right at the top of my list.”
He’s playing with the one he just tweaked, and the other one is dying for his touch. I reach up to move his hand.
He growls. “I touch what I want, and only what I want. You take what I give.”
The gravel is back, and even though his words totally piss me off, they also make me whimper.
Chapter Sixteen
Harlan
I have an armful of temperamental, seething, wildly aroused sub, and I’m pretty sure I’ve never been happier in my life.
Or harder.
My cock is going to totally hate me for this day.
I slide the shirt she’s wearing off a shoulder and bite the skin I see. She jumps in my arms, and then soothes as I run my tongue over her skin. She’s so damn soft, and she tastes vaguely of salt and spice. I contemplate the layers she’s wearing and decide I’m too damn impatient for all of this to go slowly. I pull the loose shirt up over her head in one swift move. She sways on one shocked intake of breath and I catch her, my hands wrapping around her forearms.
I’m happy to do it. I want her unsteady. I slide one hand around to her belly. The other travels down her spine, annoyed by the tank top that covers way too much skin.
My sub wasn’t looking to make this easy.
I peel this one up more slowly, keeping my attention on the small muscles of her back, the ripples as she takes small, panting breaths.
I can already smell the arousal on her skin. I pull her against my chest and run both hands up under the tank to cup her breasts. They’re soft and luscious and if all I got to do for the rest of the day was stand here and hold her like this, it would be a day worth having.
Her whimper snaps me back into gear. Her legs are shaking, enough that she’s leaning back on me, looking for help staying on her feet.
I know what I’ve got in my hands. I need to know if she knows. I lean my head down to the side of her neck and take a lick because I can’t freaking resist. “Scared?”
“No.” Her breath hitches in, begging for my touch. “Drowning.”
Good. I want her going under. I reach my hands for the nipples that have been taunting me for days and give them a firm squeeze. Dom pride lands hard at the cry that shoots out of her. I slide the tank top up and over her head. “I want to see, beautiful.” I run my hands over her newly naked skin, shaping her into my chest, dropping her head back to my shoulder.
And feel her steadying.
That isn’t something I’m going to let happen. Not when I’m chasing her surrender. I drag my finger slowly along her waistband. “I’m going to watch you as you come for me.”
She’s almost there, just on my words.
I start working her nipples again, first one, then the other. Giving her rhythm. Learning just how much pressure she likes, how much speed. Where the line is between what she thinks she wants and what she needs.
She’s writhing against me—but not to get away. She’s pushing back with her ass so that she can arch into my hands, and my cock is fucking slayed that I’m not going to let him out of captivity. I keep up the relentless pace of my hands. At this point I don’t know if I’m doing this for her or for me, because watching her nipples get all rosy u
nder my fingers is sweet damn torture.
I can hear how close she is. How much she needs this. How totally lost she is in my touch. I clamp my fingers on both nipples and roll them hard and she shoots over like I’ve launched her out of a cannon. The music she makes as she goes hits me deep where I live as a Dom.
I hold her against me, melding her body against mine, stroking her gently until her bones start remembering where they live. I circle a finger around one of her nipples, then the other, then a swooping spiral down to her pants. Same baggy jeans as yesterday, and after I undo her belt it only takes a heartbeat and a quick lift to step her out of them.
She’s putty, but she’s aware putty now. Coming back to me. Ready for more.
Good, because I’m not nearly ready to be done.
I run my hand under the sexy purple lace of her underwear and cup her heat. I just hold there. The next time I tip her over that edge, I want her lying down. This is just the in-between. A time for her to feel me holding her, to listen to my breath, to come back into hers. Her heart is beating into both of my hands, and it’s outrageously sexy.
I wait until it slows, and then trace a finger over the edges of her lace panties. “See the curvy bench over there? Go lie down on that, on your back.”
It takes a moment for the words to register. She lifts her head off my shoulder and glances over at the bed, clearly confused. “Why aren’t we using that?”
Today I’ll give her a little latitude with the questions. “More freedom of movement for me. Less for you.”
Her eyes widen.
I let go of her and walk over to the bench. “Stop talking. Come lie down.”
She manages to make it to the bench without her legs giving out, and collapses automatically onto her back, her eyes pinned to mine. I stroke a hand down her breast, over her belly. “Good girl.”
Her whimpers are killing me.
I slide her up a little, so that she’s got her head on the pillowed incline. Just enough tilt to make it easy for her to watch. “Hands up by your ears.”
She’s less sure what’s going on now, and that’s good. We’re heading off her script and onto mine. I guide her hand into one of the leather cuffs that are positioned just above her ears. Milo’s genius magnetic attachments—they hold like steel and everything releases with a single flip of a switch.
All Scorpio needs to know is that I’m shutting down her wiggle room.
I tighten the cuff slowly around her wrist. This is one of the places where sub rubber hits the road, and if she’s got triggers around being restrained, we’ll find out now. I keep my eyes on her face, on the throbbing pulse in her neck, on her nipples. The cuff tightens on a small intake of her breath, nothing more.
I move around to the other side, keeping everything slow. This time she moves her arm to help me, so I get this cuff on faster. She tugs against them and then freezes, her eyes shooting to mine.
My sub is learning. “Go ahead. See how they feel.”
She doesn’t mess around. A couple of good sharp tugs, and then a small smile.
Oh, yeah. This is going to be combustible.
I stroke a hand down her body again, just because I can, and slide the lacy scrap of purple off while I’m at it. Then I reach for her knees, bending them up and opening them. I hear myself growling as I drink in the sight of her wide open for me. I brush two fingers through her wetness. “My fingers smelled like you all damn night.”
She jerks hard against the arm restraints.
I grin and slide my hands down her legs all the way to the ankles. I push the magic buttons that add a couple of new curves to the sides of the bench to support her legs. I make sure they’re bent and open to give me all the access that I want, and then I slide on the ankle cuffs. Scorpio can see these going on, and the small, panting sounds she’s making are going straight to my cock.
He has no idea how bad this day’s going to get for him.
“Legs comfortable?” I wait for her nod, and then I pull up the wide, buttery leather straps that go around her legs and situate them mid-thigh. This is a lot of restraint for a beginner, but all her cues say she can do this. I keep watching her eyes as I put them on. She’s surprised, but not scared.
Good. I don’t think fear is her edge.
Immobility might be.
I make the last minor adjustments, using every damn bit of Milo’s ingenuity to make my sub comfortable. Then I lay a hand on her knee. “If anything feels painful or uncomfortable or you get a cramp, you need to let me know right away.”
She nods. “Yes, Sir.”
Damn. That’s not something I ever ask for from a sub, but I like hearing it from this one.
I stroke her, using my hands to let her know she’s pleased me. Her eyes haze.
I grin and reach under the bench. We’ve covered the three photos she brought me. Now it’s time to see how she rolls with a Dom who wants to know every damn thing about what turns her on.
Chapter Seventeen
Scorpio
I have just enough time to see the thing in his hand. It looks like black spaghetti—or like a flogger someone shrank in the wash.
And then he flicks his wrist and black spaghetti reaches for my skin.
Hot rain.
That’s all I have time to think, and then there’s more of it falling and my skin is on fire with sensation. Tracing the sides of my body, up my outer thighs and over my hips and circling back down again. Each time he makes the trip around, the circle gets wider. Edging toward my breasts, over my belly, raining on the insanely sensitive skin of my inner thighs.
And I can’t freaking move at all. I can feel myself trying to thrash, trying to move out of the hot rain, trying to move into it, desperate for wherever this is trying to take me. It goes on for seconds, for hours, for long enough that time folds and I have no idea where I am anymore.
Sensation. Kissing my skin, lashing it, becoming it.
It’s not orgasm—that isn’t the mountain we’re climbing.
He’s circling my breasts now, in a taunting figure-eight that knows exactly where it’s headed. I close my eyes, unable to watch the craziness of my nipples reaching for the rain.
I hear the sound, the one that I somehow know is the flick of the black spaghetti in his hand, coming for me again. It lashes over my right breast, and for one crazy moment I almost can’t stand it. And then his hand is there. Gentling. Steadying. Reminding me who controls the rain and who can make it go away.
His thumb strokes my cheek. “Open your eyes, beautiful.”
I struggle to make my eyelids work. They feel cast in concrete. The first thing I see when I finally get them open is his face, looking at me like I’m the most gorgeous thing he’s ever seen.
He trails the soft strings of leather across my nipples. Stroking this time. “Keep your eyes open for me.”
The almost inaudible snapping sound, and the rain is falling again. On my belly this time, and then a slow, inexorable march up my ribs. It’s not as sharp anymore—more like a heat that’s swelling all over my body.
Harlan reaches for one of my nipples, rolling it in his fingers as he rains down fire on the other.
I’m so far beyond orgasm it’s not even funny. I’m somewhere else, and I’m drinking hot rain with every pore I have.
He growls, a sound full of approval and pride and heat that lands right behind the rain and soaks into every inch of my skin. The lashes are coming faster now, the skin that hasn’t felt them desperate and parched and begging.
If I could move, I’d show him where.
And then it stops, black spaghetti falling silent on my belly. I stare at it, bereft.
The low chuckle beside me yanks my eyes to his face. Harlan stands there, grinning at me like an idiot for a moment that lasts way too long, and then his hands are stroking me. Touching all the places the rain fell and all the places it didn’t. Soothing.
Reminding me that there are things that are even better than hot rain.
&
nbsp; Chapter Eighteen
Harlan
I slide the baby flogger off of Scorpio’s belly and realize I might have a new favorite toy. Sharpness without pain. Sensation without having to control every damn movement so precisely that I sometimes have to remind myself to breathe. A wave that my sub rode hard and furious and deep for me, and I can barely contain the hot, hard pleasure that she’s mine.
I let my hands travel over her a little longer than absolutely necessary. I’m anchoring her back into me, into touch, checking that she’s not straining hard enough to hurt herself. Her muscles ripple happily under my stroking. She hasn’t nearly hit her limits with the restraints yet.
Good, because I’m not nearly done playing.
And this time I want to play with her head a little more.
I look up and find her watching me, and I give her the gaze touchstone she needs. Subconsciously or not, she nailed her desires in the photos she chose. Face up, all the way. It’s a lot more intense, and most subs instinctively head for the comfort of facedown and the back of their own eyelids.
Not mine. She wants to see her Dom.
She wants to see me.
I reach for the small warmer on the side of the bench and pull out the lube. Time for sensations of a different kind. I squirt out a tiny amount and reach for the nipple closest to me. A test on skin that won’t be as sensitive as where I’m headed next.
She smiles and arches a little into my touch. Her eyes start to haze and then snap open as the particular side effects of this lube kick into gear. I can feel it on my fingers too. Warm, insistent tingling.
I give it long enough to make sure she isn’t going to have any kind of reaction I don’t want and then fill up both my hands with her luscious breasts, working in the lube and enjoying the tingle and the flush it raises in her skin. Her eyes are glued to the motion of my thumbs.
I grin. I won’t pull out the mirrors today, but someday I’m going to let this woman see me touching her every damn where.
