by Yvette Hines
She maintained eye contact with him as long as she could as she turned and displayed her back for his inspection. Her breathing was now heavy, matching the pace of her heart.
She heard him rise and felt the heat of his broad form behind her. His touch was light, barely gliding along her back.
Her skin was sensitive and it felt alive every where he caressed her. One finger slid along her spine and electric currents followed in his wake. Air rushed in and out of her lungs on a low moan. She was on fire under his hands.
He unsnapped her red bra and pushed it off her shoulders until it fell away. She wasn’t shy, he’d seen her naked before. Had made love to her all night. However, she felt revealed, open; like he could see more than just her body, but her soul. Quakes rocked her body with the revelation.
“You are bruised here.”
Before she could wonder about the spot he found, his lips met the edge of one of her shoulder blades. The warm pressure of his mouth calmed the tender area.
“And here.” He kissed the top of one shoulder. “Also here.” The same gentle pressure touched her hip above her pants.
He licked around the bruises on both her forearms. However, his tongue didn’t stop there it continue to her back. Brad’s large hands slipped around her waist and cupped her breasts.
She pressed into his gripped as he palmed the flesh and squeezed her nipples. While his hands were busy, his tongue stroked down her spine until it met the edge of her pants. He dipped lower and fondled the crease of her ass with the tip of his tongue.
Her eyes slid shut as she arched her back to him, begging for more of his touch.
Following the earlier path he took, he laved up her spine. At the base of her neck he pulled her against him. As she lay flushed to his body, feeling the soft material of his sweater against her skin and the strong beat of his heart against her back, he kissed along the side of her face.
He held her like that for long moments, allowing her to experience his strength and care.
She was shocked when he stepped back and took her hand, leading them both to the couch. Dragging her down beside him, he placed one of her throw pillows onto his lap.
“You’ve had an eventful night, talk to me.” He patted the round cushion.
She would have preferred that they take all the sexual tension in the air between them and moved it to the next stage, but instead she laid her head down and curled her legs up on the couch.
“What do you want to talk about, Sir?” she asked.
His fingers scraped, light and slow along her arm. “You. Tell me about your family. Where you’re from? I can detect a light accent…is it Boston?”
“Maine.” She licked her lips, a little nervous. She never talked about herself. Doing it now with her emotions feeling raw and open was almost unbearable. However, she let the words flow from her.
“How did you end up in North Carolina?” he asked.
“College like most people here. I went to North Carolina A & T. Going on my seventh alumni year. I’m also the oldest of nine.”
“Damn. You don’t say? That’s something you don’t hear a lot from people in our generation.” He chuckled.
She laughed with him. “That’s true. I do shock a lot of people with that knowledge.”
“Are you and your family close?”
“Too close. Being the oldest I was constantly responsible for my siblings when my parents weren’t around. My father is a science professor and my mother stayed at home. She home schooled us, but had us all in community activities from soccer, dance, basketball, field hockey and choir. Whatever my siblings and I wanted to do. So, you can imagine she was always running one child to something or another and one I was old enough, she’d leave me in charge. I didn’t hate it. There’s no resentment.
Like I said, we are close and I love my brothers and sisters. But, when I completed all the requirements to graduate high school I just wanted to be away. Not care for anyone else for a while. Freedom.”
“How did that work out for you?” He took her bun a loose and began to massage her scalp.
She sighed. “Too well. My senior year of college I went to a play party with my roommate and fell in love with the lifestyle.”
“Did you have to decide whether you were a submissive or a dominant?”
“No. Not for a moment. The first time I saw a woman cuffed to a St. Andrews cross being flogged, I wanted to be in her place. Twenty minutes later I witness her Dom providing aftercare to her with such tenderness and difference, I knew it was where I should be.”
They were both quiet as Brad continued to stroke her body.
He was the first to speak. “In the vanilla world you always hear about how people in the lifestyle are in it, especially those that submit, because they have father issues or were abused in some form as a child.”
“That’s rare situation in the community. My father was not only a great provider, but loving. He would read to all of us at night; mysteries and fantasy stories. One chapter at a time and make us all talk about what happened and what we thought would happen next.”
“Like an old black and white sitcom.”
“Yup. The Mitchem family is just like that.” She smiled in memory.
“How’d you get the name, China Doll?”
“Shortly after I moved to the area, I met Genuine. He owns Strong Blends upstairs and down stairs. He offered me a job and with that access to the dungeon when normally an unattached sub would have to be sponsored by a Dom.”
“Serving coffee.”
“And it pays very well, with benefits and everything. I was comfortable so I stopped looking for something to use my Business degree. I was still dating my boyfriend form college, a man that didn’t want any parts of the lifestyle.”
His hand paused for a moment. “He wasn’t even willing to try for you?”
“No.” That reminder still caused her pain. She thought when he saw how much it was a part of her, how much it meant to her, Stanley would join in; especially since he had claimed to love her.
She continued, “My ex was really big into collecting old Pin Up Girl’s cards and memorabilia. There were pictures of Black women too; pin up girl, performers and feather dancers. Elizabeth “China Doll” Dickerson and Jean Idelle were his favorites. Mine, too.”
“So, you took on the persona of something that he adored in hopes that he would do the same for you?”
Shocked that he understood her motives so well, she looked up at him.
He smiled and kissed her softly.
“That’s right. However, he refused. He didn’t care if I participated as long as no sex was involved. So, I learned to live a dual life, just like others in the lifestyle. However, I didn’t hide it from my family or other boyfriends. My family was very supportive as always. As you can imagine Stanley and I didn’t make it for long after that. But, I didn’t only keep the name China Doll, I kept my boyfriends vanilla and to keep a Dom from wanting more I only sought those who were attached. Over the years it all seemed to go well…until….”
“Reel. Do you think maybe somewhere before him it wasn’t going so well?”
She heard his question. It was the same question Master Pam had asked her. The identical thing she had been pondering herself for a while. “Maybe.”
“What happened between the two of you? Was it always so…volatile?”
Her fingers followed the seam of the pillow. “No. We were together only about six months. But, in the beginning he seemed to be just what I wanted. He held to our contract and what I wanted firmly. Then his wife’s cancer took a deadly turn. I asked him if he needed us to break for a while. He denied that. At first it appeared to help him cope. I will say that toward the end of her struggle, he’d call me up late. We’d meet at one dungeon or another. I didn’t mind. But, I noticed our scenes were becoming more intense. I’d have to start using my safeword more and more. That’s when I started trying to discuss releasement.”
She became lost in m
emory of the last few weeks.
“What happened on the night we met?” Brad asked, his voice low and comforting.
“He told me to enter the knife play room. That was a hard limit for me. Not to mention there was something in his eyes, like he was physically before me but gone inside. It scared me. Really scared me. I refused to go and when he grabbed my cuffs to pull me in, I activated the release buttons and ran. You were like an oasis when I spotted you at the door under the mistletoe; looking as if you didn’t know if you should stay or go.”
He chuckled. “Oh, no…I’d firmly decided it was time to go then.”
She smiled to herself, glad he hadn’t left.
His hands stilled. “Would you ever consider moving away?”
“If the right thing ever came along. But I don’t foresee that happening anytime soon.” That was the reality of her life at the moment. No matter what her heart wanted she could no longer live her life straddling a fence. Every time she slipped the landing hurt too much.
Unsure how long they sat there in the silence, soon she felt Brad patting her shoulder.
“Okay, off to bed for you. I’ll take up residence on your couch for the night.”
She sat up. “You’re staying?”
“I said I was.” Standing, he pulled her up and gave her a light shove in the direction of her room.
The only bedroom in her house. She admitted to herself she felt a little dejected. After revealing more to him than she’d ever shared with anyone else, she wasn’t sure what she expected. Certainly not being sent to her room like a child.
“The couch is a pull out. The sheets are clean. There’s a spare blanket in the bathroom linen closet.”
“I’ll find it. Thanks.” He toed out of his shoes.
She allowed her gaze to roam from his sexy bald head, over the perfectly trimmed goatee, his broad shoulders and wide chest. Taking in his hips and muscular thighs encased in slacks she committed his body to memory.
When her eyes met his again, she noticed he had been doing the same thing to her. Seeing more since she was only dressed in her pants.
Ignoring her tight nipples and throbbing sex, she said, “Good night.”
“Nite.”
In the dark, she removed the rest of her clothing and crawled into bed nude. She needed the coolness of her sheets tonight to calm her heated flesh.
As she drifted off to sleep, she could hear him talking on his cell phone. He’d used his sister’s name as he apologized that he would be keeping her car all night.
She was happy that he didn’t give details of what had went down at her apartment, just letting them know everyone was safe and he’d see her in the morning.
~YH~
Awakening with a jolt, Gabriella could feel her heart racing and still see the nightmare as it faded away. Her body was throbbing in all the places she’d been bruised by Reel’s actions. She tried to lie back down and forget the anger in the man’s voice, or the violent way he had touched her. However, she couldn’t shake the experience from her mind.
With concentrated effort she focused on the man that had been there for her, Brad. She wasn’t sure if she would have been able to fight Reel off, no matter how hard she would have tried. The uncertainty of what could have possibly been a different ending to the situation made her shiver.
As she lay there huddled under her blankets, she recalled that her victor was still with her. Still under her roof.
To the victor belong the spoils. William Learned Marcy had said and she believed there was truth in that statement.
Brad, had come to her aid, but he’d gotten no reward for his efforts.
In the past, she never considered giving sex to a man in compensation before. However, this was really about her. She needed him. Sexually. But it was more than that. She had deep feelings for this man, her hero of the night. Like a deer after water, her body thirsted for him. Her heart yearned for him.
Getting out of bed, she padded silent on the carpeted floor to the living room. She saw his clothes neatly folded in the chair to the side of couch.
Standing beside him, she stared down at his sleeping form. His chest was bare and she hopped that meant he had needed to sleep nude like she had.
She recalled how deeply he had slept the night they’d had sex. He hadn’t even stirred when the phone went off. She wondered how far she could get before he awakened.
Lifting the edge of the covers she got in beside him, aligning her body with his. She started kissing his chest and felt him wake with a start.
“Shh. It’s me.” She placed a calming hand on the center of his chest and guided his body back down to the mattress.
“Gabriella?” His voice was rough with sleep.
“You expected another?” She whispered, jesting.
“Are you okay?” He brushed her hair away from her face and peered down at her in the low light coming from over her stove in the kitchen.
Leave it to him, she thought, to be concerned about her when she had designs on his body.
“Just tonight let me love you.” She pleaded as she dragged his underwear over his hips enough to free his growing erection.
Taking his warm flesh in hand, she stroked it, feeling him become harder in her hand. She tongued his tip and heard him groan.
Drawing him deep into her mouth, she enjoyed the silk covered steel texture of his cock extending longer in her mouth. It expanded as more blood flowed into it, widened her lips along with it. She suckled and licked him, loving the taste and texture of him. His spicy scent was a balm to her emotions.
Once his shaft had thickened and grew to the point she needed her hands and mouth to pleasure him, she rose. Straddling his hips, she caressed her slit with his broad crown. Whimpering with pleasure as the hot tip caressed her wet sex, setting her clit on fire with a simple touch.
Guiding him into her body, she almost came at the feel of him sliding along her walls. Shaping her pussy to his specs, he made her his.
When she was seated fully on him, Brad sat up and wrapped his arms around her hips; he pressed her down further. She cried out as he connected them completely.
Holding her close, he allowed her the lead. Let her ride him. However, he didn’t permit her to break eye contact.
Folding her legs around his hips, she gave her body to him. Gyrating her body, she shared her heart. Meeting each of his thrust, she gifted him with her soul.
I love you. She screamed silently as her body climaxed around him.
He groaned and gasped as if her orgasm had been his.
They continued, in the same fashion, slowly and steady; connected on so many plains she lost track.
She’d heard people speaking of tantric sex. Rumors of a spiritual, erotic connection between two people; where they reached multiple gratifications without excessive stimulation; solely by their bond.
Now, she understood.
By the time she had her fourth and final climax and Brad joined her with his second. She was both renewed and exhausted.
He kissed her deeply, sliding his tongue into her mouth and sharing his pleasure with her.
When they parted, she curled along his side and rested her head on his chest and listened to the strength of his heart beat. Soon she found herself in a dreamless sleep.
chapter nine
Stretching, she awakened to the smell of coffee. Yawning, she rubbed her eyes and attempted to get her bearings. She realized she was asleep alone on her couch bed. Immediately, recalling Brad should have been beside her, she looked toward her bathroom. But, the door was open with no light coming from it. She turned to the chair and noticed his clothes were gone.
Remembering the coffee scent, she got up, scooping his shirt, now hers, from the floor, she put it on as she walked to the kitchen. Hoping to find him there.
Moving through the alcove that led into the small but spacious area, she could easily see he wasn’t there. Dejected, she glanced over to the coffee pot as it finished its percolation cycl
e. He must have set the timer.
Glancing at the clock on her microwave, she saw it was nine thirty. She was grateful she worked the afternoon shift today and still had two hours before she had to leave.
A small piece of paper under a coffee cup, from her to-do list tablet that was magnetized to the refrigerator, caught her eye. Crossing the cold tiled floor to the counter where it lay. She slipped the paper from under the empty cup.
Gabriella,
I know you’ll probably get all that you can drink at work. However, I wanted just for once you would have the experience of someone serving you. You deserve more than you’ve had in the past. Get the restraining order, today. I don’t see this as the end for us. My number is below. Use it.
Yours always,
Brad Crenshaw
Her eyes weld up with tears and instantly they spilled over. She felt the weight of his words and heard the command in his voice in her heart. She would obey one of his wishes. However, Brad had left his number, but she knew she wouldn’t call him. This was truly it for them. The knowledge shattered her inside and made her ache.
She’d never cried over a man before. There was just something about Brad that made her do a lot of things she’d never done before. Wiping the tears from her face, she poured herself a cup of coffee.
Last night, had been a beautiful experience. Her body even now was throbbing and tender from their lovemaking. And it didn’t escape her mind that they hadn’t worn a condom. There was no pregnancy concern for her. She’d been on birth control for years. However, the memory of feeling his bare shaft inside would stay with her for a long time.
Adding creamer to her coffee, she drank. She allowed the heat to warm her from the inside out, hoping it would keep away the chill of loss. Not to forget the night, but to fortify herself for the coming days, weeks…lifetime without him.
There wasn’t time to wallow in the grief. She had to move on. First thing on her plate after she showered and dressed was to go to the police station to fill out the report and get a restraining order. She’d never lived a life where she constantly looked over her shoulder and she wasn’t going to start now. Reel may have lost his wife, and his mind, but she wasn’t going to allow him to take his grief out on her. Maybe through this a judge would force him to get counseling.
