by Deva Long
fourteen
“Have another glass of wine, Grace.”
“No thanks. I can think of better ways to spend twenty dollars.”
“I told you, your money’s no good here. This is all being charged to my room.”
I glared at him. “That makes me very uncomfortable.”
Jack got up then. “I’m comfortable letting Karl pay the bill and I’m going to bed. You two don’t hurt each other or I’ll have to call Detective Cale back.”
Karl waved him off with a grin.
I saw my opportunity. “I should go too.”
“I would really appreciate it if you’d stay a bit longer, Grace.”
Nikki Minaj took her turn on the playlist, singing Super Bass.
Every time he said my name, my heart beat faster. “Get out of here, get out of here,” the angel on my shoulder said keeping time with the beat. “He’ll think you’re easy if you stay.”
“Don’t leave here now,” Satana responded, hitting the same rhythm. “Let’s be easy, baby.”
Jack waved and almost ran through the door as the waitress arrived with another house white for me and another vodka Martini for Karl.
“Too late now, don’t be rude and leave on fresh drinks,” my little devil cackled. Saint Monica just blew her bangs from her face.
“Do you have a boyfriend?”
“What?”
“I’m trying to figure why you are trying to get away.” He bowed his head, then looked at me from behind his brows like my little nephew after he’d spilled grape juice on my carpet. “Most people don’t run away like I have a something wrong with me.”
He pushed a curl back from his eyes.
“At least not until they know me better.”
“You do have something wrong with you, you’re rich and you’re handsome. You’ve got a motorcycle and a worn leather jacket with a winged hammer on the back. I could fall for you hard and I don’t want anything serious now.”
Of course I didn’t say that out loud.
“I’m just tired. I’m still not fully recovered.”
“In the photo on your blog you are standing next to a guy. Is he your boyfriend?”
What photo is he talking about? Then, I remembered. Leslie showed the picture to me that morning. She’d used a picture from the beach demo to illustrate how bad my day had turned out. I didn’t blame her, good drama sells ad space and we needed the money.
I’d been standing next to Pablo as he posed with a paddleboard.
I blushed. “No. He’s a customer. He advertises with our paper.” This is silly. “Why?”
“So no boyfriend?”
“No boyfriend, no husband. I’m making something of myself before I get serious.”
“You’re straight, though? Men seem to scare you.”
This is too intimate a conversation to have in a private room surrounded by wine.
“You scare me.”
The blood rushed to my face. If I was red before, I was a stoplight now.
His eyes got wide for just a second. I looked at my fresh glass of wine. I took a sip.
He reached out and lifted my chin. I caught myself flinching, but looked up at him anyway. “Don’t look down.” He drew his hand back.
“When I can see your eyes, I can tell what you are thinking.”
Oh god I hope not.
“Yes. I can.”
I wanted him to kiss me.
“It’s too soon,” my Angel shrieked.
“Yay, it’s been way to long,” my devil said as she danced around on my shoulder.
I took another sip of wine to distract myself.
“Do you always get so personal, so quickly? I don’t really know you.”
“No. I tend to be impersonal. This is different.” He sucked a martini olive off its bamboo sword .
He’s got great lips.
“Have I offended you?”
“No.” You’re just driving me crazy.
“But you’re kind of arrogant.”
He bit his olive hard. I smelled his cologne. Sharp, tangy, but not cheap. A bead of sweat ran between the cheeks of my ass.
“I like being in charge.”
“I can tell. You treat everyone like an employee.”
“Not everyone, Grace. Kidnappers, for instance, I treat like vermin.”
He tossed his head back when he said the word, like he was tearing something with his teeth.
An odd word, vermin.
He looked at me, catching my eyes.
“I’m glad I sailed by last night.”
I flushed again. Yes, you saved me.
“A man like that, a man who rescues people, is a good man,” my angel said.
“Do you have a girl friend?” I blurted. I took an inner step back from my emotions. If I kept responding like that, he’d sense that I cared.
He smiled. “Nope. No girlfriend. Entanglements aren’t really my thing.”
“A relationship is an entanglement to you?”
Six points of light from the chandelier sparkled in his eyes as Karl looked at the ceiling. “Aren’t they to you?”
He looked back and ran his finger along his cheekbone. I wanted to follow his finger with my lips.
“Tell me about your childhood. What’s your father like?”
Great, he’s getting even more personal. I took another sip of wine. Got to make this glass last so he doesn’t order me another.
I mentioned already that I’m no wine connoisseur. I buy the one with the best looking label under ten dollars. This one had an aftertaste of something that reminded me of an oak forest. With a few bay trees growing amongst them. I heard the scream of a hawk.
“I was adopted. I never knew my birth parents.”
“What about your adopted parents?”
I didn’t adopt them. So my rich hero can make mistakes.
“They possessed everything a middle class family should have. Except kids. So they picked up my brother and me. More to fit with their friends than anything like love.”
I never called them mom and dad, and they never called me kiddo or pumpkin head.
Just Grace. Grace is the name I came with. Tom once told me that they’d tried to rename me Mary, but every time they called me that I’d screamed.
Karl reached over the table and took hold of the napkin I clenched. He tugged. I let it go. He replaced the cloth with his hand and looked me in the eye.
Is he going to kiss me? He ran his other hand through his hair, parting the thick strands like surfers on golden waves.
Will I let him?
He looked into my eyes.
Oh yes I will.
“Grace, I’m sorry about your parents.” Shit. What I took for attraction was something else instead. No one had ever pitied me that knew of. Not too my face.
“I got over it a long time ago,” I snapped.
Then I stood up to leave. Again. “But why, the night is just getting interesting,” my devil wailed.
I opened my purse and grabbed a wad of twenties. I tossed them on the table.
“Thanks, Karl, but I really have to work tomorrow.”
He looked at the money like someone just killed a puppy.
“Keep your money.”
“I told you, I’m not comfortable with that. I pull my own weight. Thank you for rescuing me.”
I ran my hands through my curls. They didn’t get any straighter, but the gesture relaxed me.
“Tell Jack I said good night, and I’m glad he’s not going to jail.”
Just as I was grabbing for the door, a new song started. Though it sounded like classical music, all violins and pianos, I recognized the tune as something from the Stones. The version playing did not have words but I could hear them in my head as I identified the melody. Sympathy for the Devil.
“Wait.” A simple four letter word.
This was it. Run now or turn and never leave this man.
At least not under my own power.
I turned.
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Something dripped down my leg.
Karl stood and walked around the table toward me. His eyes caught mine and he held my stare as he moved in. He strode so smoothly all I could think of was moonlight. Like I was being stalked by radiance itself.
His face was neutral: not smiling, not frowning. His eyes spoke his thoughts though, and they told me how much he wanted me. His gaze traveled along my curves as I turned the rest of the way toward him. I put my hands up, into my hair and thrust my chest out.
My insistent nipples poked hard against the lace of my bra.
“Take that off.” His voice was firm, yet soft. A command, not a request.
I untied the knot behind my neck that held my dress up. I yanked on the strings and released the bow, my thin green shield swirled to my waist, showing my lighter green lacy bra. I flicked my hip and the cloth flowed the rest of the way to pool itself around my feet, revealing my lack of anything else covering my sex.
He moved forward and cupped my left breast. My boob fit his hand well. His fingers grasped me and I swooned backwards, lips open. He gave me a light kiss, flicking his tongue inside my mouth. He grasped my nipple, pinching. An electric pain shot from my chest and I whimpered, “Yes.”
“Is this OK?” He backed off, looking at me. His mouth set in a line, like he was daring me to take what he wanted to give me, but his eyes showed concern for me.
“I can say no?”
“You can always say no, Grace. Just say stop. I’ll stop right away. Whatever I’m doing.”
He pinched me harder.
“Does this feel good? Are you saying stop?”
“Yes.” He released me. “No, I mean not no, yes, it feels good. Keep….doing that.”
“This?” He pinched again, even harder.
“Yes. That’s…good.” That angel voice in my head said it shouldn’t be, but I was listening to my sweet devil at the time and she’d pressed her own breasts forward, cooing, “Take me.”
I did the same.
He reached up and grasped my wrists, holding them above my head. He made me feel crazy, I never acted like that. I shouldn’t have wanted him to hold me, to kiss me. To pinch me.
I shut my mouth on a moan.
He kept my wrists pinned with one hand and ran his other hand down my back, his nails touching me just enough to raise shivers, not of pain but of a sensation close to it.
He ran his fingers along my bottom, grabbing the skin, kneading like I was made of bread.
I needed him to touch me harder, and I pressed into him, gasping.
“You’re trembling.” He whispered in my ear, his breath crashing on my eardrum like waves on the beach.
“I know.” He kissed me there. I struggled against him, trying to lower my hands to caress his head and pull him closer.
“No.” He said the word like he spoke to a pet. His tone made me gasp. I don’t like it at all when someone gives me orders, but I didn’t mind when he did.
He put his leg between my thighs, his rough jeans rubbed my sensitive skin. He pulled me closer by my bottom with one hand, still holding my wrists with the other.
I rubbed myself against him. I tried to reach him with my lips, to kiss his face, but I couldn’t touch his skin the way he held me, his own lips dancing along the side of my neck.
“You’re teasing me.”
“Yes. I like teasing you.” His teeth nibbled my neck, then lower. “Keep your hands there,” he growled and the vibration rolled through my body.
“Yes, Sir,” I whispered. What’s gotten into me? I’m never like this.
Not with anyone. But with him it just felt right, like he was the golden man from my dreams. The man in my darkest fantasies who would one day sweep me off to the home of the gods themselves.
I kept my arms up as his teeth found my nipple.
“Why do you like teasing me?”
“I’m excited to feel you like this.” He bit me. “Is this alright?” He asked around my flesh.
“Yes, please, yes.” I made a noise like a singing dove. “Harder.” I whispered.
Karl obliged and my nipple caught fire, all my senses circling around it, burning with a sensation that shot straight from my chest to my slit, vibrating in time with my other point down there.
His nails bit into my ass again while he abandoned my left nipple and headed for my right one. The one throbbed in anguish from the absence of his teeth while the other throbbed in anticipation as his jaws drew near.
But then he stopped, and looked up at me displayed before him, thrusting my chest out and grinding my naked seeping pussy on his leg.
“What—,” I gasped.
“My life’s complicated, Grace. I’m complicated.”
He licked where he had been biting, my nipple now swollen twice its normal size.
Ice ran through my fiery thoughts. He’d told me he was single. Something else was wrong then.
“Do you have a disease?” I sucked in my breath. “Are you contagious?”
“I’m not sick, no. I’m not contagious.” He backed away and I dropped my hands to rub my sore breasts. “Let’s talk some first.”
Jesus! I’m all fired up and now he wants to chat. I hope he’s not turning into another nice guy.
I dropped my hands and held them out.
“Only if you’ll get naked too.” I reached for his belt. “Or I’m putting my dress back on.”
Karl let me undo the belt, then he grabbed the buckle and tore the leather out of the loops in his black pants. He ripped off his shirt, literally, buttons dropping to the floor. He held the belt in one hand while with the other he peeled off his boxers.
“Why are you keeping that belt?”
“In case I want to use it.” Again he growled, and again my sore nips and my needy pussy trembled.
He jerked his head to the right pointing with his chin toward a door on the far side of the room. “There’s a good place to talk.”
Without looking back he started walking toward the door. A new song started up on the sound system. Cutting through a jagged, sexy beat a throaty voice wailed asking a man to give her a reason to feel like a woman. Her voice rose up through the floor, up my legs, into my chest, the beat pounding in time with my heart.
He went through leaving the door open before I could take the first step, and I had to trot to catch him.
Karl sat on the bed. He’d fired up a candle and the flickering light played over his naked chest. For the first time I saw his pectorals were covered with fine light colored hair. In the candlelight his fur glowed a translucent scarlet like the sunset through waves. I smelled cinnamon from the candle.
He had a black wolf’s head tattooed on each of his arms. The art was blocky, stylized. Not realistic but rather native looking.
The belt lay curled like a snake to his right. He patted the left side of the bed. “Sit.”
Again a command. I struggled to keep my mouth closed as I tried not to stumble walking to him and then sitting close, feeling the heat of his thigh.
I looked at him, leaning into his arm. I wasn’t panting that hard.
“I have certain things I want in a relationship.”
“And you always get what you want.”
He laughed. Good, I can make him do that.
“Life’s too short to live with what you don’t want.”
“That’s a great motto if you can afford it.”
His smile made shadowed pools below his cheeks. I wanted to dive into them.
“I can afford all my mottos.” He squinted, making the swimming holes even deeper and more inviting.
“What do you want?”
“I don’t know for sure. I met a hot guy. He rescued me from pirates. He turns me on. I’m seeing where it goes.” I kissed his shoulder. “I’m not usually like this.”
I’m not at all like this.
I was actually a virgin, though I’d had Bill Clinton sex. Oral, both giving and receiving. A few guys had even managed to put their cocks
near my pussy, though like it was some evil knight’s forbidding keep, they’d all shivered before my fleshy gates. A dorky frat boy who got so drunk he went soft while squeezing on the condom and then rolled over and fell asleep. My friend Jason, who was so sweet that looking at him preparing to ride me with gentle care dried me right up and I had to tell him to stop.
“Before we do anything we’ll regret in the morning, I want to tell you some things.” He placed his hand on the belt. “I like to be in control.”
A blade of fear pierced my mood. What if he’s a strangler?
I drew back. “I’m not sure what you mean? I like to be in control too, most of the time. I’m very independent. I’m not looking for anything serious.” Or life threatening.
“Got it. Nothing serious.”
He fell back on the bed, arms spread, palms up. He looked cute and sweet when he did that.
“I know I worry too much. I’m a type A and concern’s one of my things.” He raised himself on his elbows, his belly muscles rippling.
“Let’s stop playing around. I feel something strong between us. You feel it too. Chemistry. No matter what we say we want, this is not going to be a fling.”
I was shocked to hear a man talk this way. So open. Almost too open. Not that I’d had that much experience. I looked around and decided.
My first real time should be like this, in a charming room, with a handsome man, after a lovely meal. OK he’s a bit kinky, well I’ve read enough books and seen enough cable TV for that to be more spicy than shocking.
And he was also right. That I lay here, naked on his bed, aching for him to touch me, to rub me, even to…bite me, again, was proof.
I drew one leg up and turned toward him, flattened my belly and poked my chest out. “OK, you’re right on target. I feel…special around you. What you did,” without thinking my fingers found their way between my legs, “your thing gets me going like no one’s done before. You’re like that roller coaster, the Cheetah, going faster than a person is supposed to go, but the speed is fun.” I glanced at the belt.
“Even that.” My fingers rubbed my nipples, getting some of my juices on them.
“Good. I like you, Grace. By the gods, I need you now.”
