*
I was correct about how much our meal cost. Even between the Animal Style Double-Doubles, well-done fries, and shakes we ordered, it was less than one room-service cheeseburger. I’ll happily keep my mouth shut about how taking the car pushed us over that.
Hart slurps at the last of the Neapolitan milkshake in his cup for longer than necessary, and I ask him over the cheaply laminated tabletop if he’s nervous about something. He scowls at my mischievous questioning as he wipes his fingers on yet another paper napkin. We dispose of our trash and head out to where the car is waiting.
“I’d say fuck you, but—”
“That’s not going to happen. Ever.”
He should know that upfront, and I know I needed to be clear about that. Still, I don’t like the way his chin drops toward his chest as he draws back.
“What is that, some bullshit Dominant thing?”
If only. “Absolutely not. Being penetrated has nothing to do with submission.”
Not that it can’t be used that way, but it completely depends on the person. I know plenty of Dominants who like penetration. Like anything else, it depends on how it’s framed. Some things are harder than others to shape that way, but I guarantee I could make almost any act a dominant one given the right circumstances and participants.
“It’s just not something I do, and if you decide it’s not something you do either, that’s a hundred percent fine. But at least let me try to convince you sodomy has its perks.”
I’d gleaned from some of our conversation on the plane that, while Allie’s been with men, he’s never bottomed. When I suggested that might be something we tried while on our little jaunt, he hadn’t seemed averse, and it’s been in the back of my head ever since. Getting inside this gorgeous man would be a dream come true, and I want him to want me there.
“I think you’re the only person on the planet who could say that with a straight face.”
“Doubtful. I could name a handful of people off the top of my head.” We’ve pulled up to the hotel, and our driver’s climbed out and is coming around to my door. “Let me take you upstairs and prove it to you.”
The elevator ride up to our suite is the most deliciously tension-filled thirty seconds. Hart’s leaning up against the railing, his fingers curled around the edge, his nailbeds turning white with the pressure. I’m resting against the opposite wall, studying him.
My Hart’s so tense. Yes, I want him buzzing with anticipation, but also with desire and curiosity. I’ve got my plans, certainly, but this is one of those things you don’t rush. I’ve seen far too many people who’ve had bad experiences and sworn a thing that can be so exquisitely pleasurable and intimate off their lists because one fuckwad ruined it all. That’s not going to happen to Allie. I won’t let it.
When the elevator pings and the doors slide open on our floor, I gesture him out and admire the way the muscles bunch in his back and shoulders under that goddamn shirt. I hope he can feel the way I’m looking at him. If he can’t, it’s not for lack of trying on my part. If intensity were heat, I would’ve burned his clothes off by now. I want him feeling the weight of my gaze, how heavy it is with my desire for him. Preferably without a whiff of how much responsibility is settled on my shoulders.
I’m going to be his first, and it’s a charge I don’t take lightly.
The way he stops at the door and waits for me to slip my keycard out of my pocket is somehow charming, and I let my hand drift to his lower back as I usher him inside. Clicking on the Do Not Disturb signal, I take the only deep breath I’m going to permit myself. It’s go-time, and I need him not to sense my nerves. Not that many people do. There aren’t a lot of benefits to not being able to sweat, but muting a symptom of tension is one of them.
“Naked and face-down on the bed, Hart.”
There’s only the briefest hesitation before he’s moving on my soft command. No questions, no protests, and it swells my heart with happiness. A measure of the trust I’ve earned. He’s anxious but I don’t think afraid, and he trusts me enough to allow me this incursion into his very core. The sound of clothes dropping on the floor is music to my ears, as is the faint rustling of bed linens and the whisper of skin sinking into the plush duvet.
When I walk through the door, he’s lying as instructed, and I take some time to admire him. The perfect arch of his buttocks, the pleasing curve of his calves, and how his legs are slightly spread instead of clenched together. Lovely.
I take off my watch and empty my pockets, drape my coat over a chair, eyeing him the whole time. He’s not watching me, but he’s straining for any sound. I toe off my shoes, not being quiet about it because I don’t mind giving him some hints, and then I roll up my sleeves. Retrieving the things I’d like from the bathroom, I come back to where Allie’s still lying prone on the bed, keeping his breaths carefully measured.
The moment he hears the small snick of me opening the bottle in my hands, he tenses. For nothing, but he doesn’t know that.
Straddling his hips, I let my weight sink down on him protectively. I pour some oil on my hands and reach for his shoulders, slicking my hands over his hard body. He makes a startled noise, and I shush him.
“Relax, Hart. I’m going to make you feel good. I promise.”
So I do, kneading his muscles carefully, feeling out the grooves and knots. Working at the tense places and smoothing out the fibers until they’re loose and pliant, how I’d like him. He feels good under my hands, and it gives me the opportunity to study all of the ink he’s branded with. I do my utmost to keep the massage moving apace so he doesn’t notice how closely I’m studying the pictures, the patterns. He must know I’m looking, but perhaps not that I’m memorizing, obsessing. What does it all mean?
The amateur ones among the numerous marks reek of butchery and improvised, no doubt unsanitary tools, and I use the feel of his ribs rising and falling leisurely beneath me to mark my breath so he doesn’t know how agitated I’m getting, thinking about how he got those. Possibly what he had to do to earn them. My gentle Allie, unwinding so beautifully at my touch. It’s hard to imagine him engaging in unnecessary and excessive violence.
On the other hand, it fits. Hart’s got loyalty pumping through his veins and a need to please. His gang and the military both offered a certain thing: rules. He could make sense of his world and do his best to do what was right in that space. Which may or may not have been within the bounds of the law.
Loyalty, though—that’s one of the qualities I prize most highly. I want him to swear allegiance to me, adopt my rules as his code. I want to be the one he wants to please. To have him regard me as his authority, as someone worthy of following into battle. Or perhaps more importantly, into the extraordinary world of submission.
After I’ve worked my way up for the first time from his hips to the back of his skull, I slip my hands back over his now-glistening skin to just above the rise of his ass.
“Have we gone over the rules, Hart?”
He turns his head to the side. “There are rules for anal sex?”
His lazy drawl of a question makes me smile. “I wasn’t talking about those rules, but as a matter of fact, there are. Only three: lube. Lube.”
“And the third thing?”
“More lube.”
He snickers, his muscles momentarily convulsing. “Got it. What are the other rules?”
I dig my thumbs into some particularly stubborn spots alongside his spine, and he groans. “I won’t go over them all right now, but you ought to know the first at least.”
“Rey Walter’s Rules of Conduct for Polite Society?”
He says it in a posh accent that makes me shake my head. “Hardly. These are rules for my clients.”
“I’m not your client.”
“True,” I say, easing the slight tightening around his shoulders. “Clients and lovers, then. You like rules, Hart?”
I appreciate the beat of consideration he takes before answering. “I like knowing expe
ctations.”
Ah, yes.
“That’s convenient because I like setting expectations.”
“So what are these rules of yours?”
“Rule number one: You never have to do anything you don’t want to do.”
His ear twitches. “Never?”
“Within reason, of course. There are going to be things I ask you for that you don’t particularly want to give, but you’ll hand them over anyhow because you want to please me.”
“Then how—”
“I said within reason. If there’s ever anything you’re absolutely dead set against, you’re allowed to have boundaries. As am I.”
“Like not getting fucked?”
My jaw tightens involuntarily, and I have to consciously loosen it. “Sure. Like that. The point is you’re allowed to say no and you’re allowed to change your mind. If something upsets you, I want to know. No one—not anyone—has the right to force you into anything. Do you understand?”
“Not even you?”
He’s teasing, so I reach behind and pinch his firm buttock.
“Not even me. Of course it’s fun to play that way sometimes, which is why god invented safewords. So you can yell and whine and protest—‘please, no, anything but that’—because it’s fun, and still I’ll ‘force’ you to do it.” I’ve put verbal air quotes around force so he gets it. From the slight shift of him underneath me, he more than gets it. “Does that sound like fun?”
“Maybe,” he grants and shifts more.
“So would you like to pick a safeword?”
“That’s a lot of pressure,” he mumbles from where he’s pressed his face into the pillow.
“A lot of people use colors. Red stops everything immediately, yellow means you’re approaching your limit or you need to check in, and green means go. We could start there.”
“’Kay.”
He’s silent for a few minutes. Is he regretting this already? What’s going through that head of his? He’s not gone rigid so he’s not terribly upset, but it’s sending me into a fit of pique not to know.
“What’s on your mind, Hart?”
“Just thinking about rules.”
Interesting. I wait for him to expound, to give me more of the information I so desperately crave, but he stays silent, pensive. I’m generally excruciatingly patient, but I don’t get the feeling he’s withholding on purpose, merely not convinced I’d be interested. I am. Very much so. “And?”
“Your rules are different from the ones I’m used to.”
I’d hope so. I’ve been accused of leading a cult, but surely my rules are preferable to the ones he’s experienced before. “Tell me.”
“When I was a kid, the first thing I learned from the guys I ran with was, if someone messes with you, you fuck them up so bad they won’t even think about doing it again.”
That tidbit pulls me up short, and I hope he doesn’t feel the stutter of my hands over his body. I don’t ever want him to think he’s surprised me. I don’t want him to ever feel as though he can’t share something with me because I’ll be horrified. No, it’s important not to blink.
And it makes so much sense.
“What else did you learn?”
“Don’t look people in the eye. Don’t smile. If someone yells your name, you sure as hell don’t stop. Especially after dark, especially if you’re not on your own territory. Learn the geography of the neighborhoods and keep track of where people are—dealers, clients, cops. Never act scared, and whatever you do, don’t back down.”
What a world. If everyone followed those rules, it could only end badly. I get the feeling Allie expected to die young. Like he’s living on borrowed time. Much as I am. I want to give him some structure, some expectations, because he does well knowing where the limits are. Not that he’ll always follow them, but I hope he will.
“Well, how about for now you just follow mine?”
“You’ve only given me one.”
“Let’s start there. You remember what it is?”
“I never have to do anything I don’t want to do.”
“That’s right. I hope you take it seriously because I need to trust you to tell me so. I won’t ever harm you on purpose, you have my word. But though I like to pretend I’m omniscient, I’m not actually, so you’ve got to help me out. Promise?”
“Promise.”
“Now that’s settled, let’s get started.”
I climb off him and disrobe. Not a teasing strip, but not in a hurry either. Solid, confident. I try to project it from every pore. I’m experienced and adept. Believe in me. When I’ve stripped down to my skin, I grab a couple of pillows and direct him to raise his hips so I can slide them under, covered with a hand towel from the bathroom. A touch humiliating, perhaps, to have his ass elevated and exposed, but it’s not for shame’s sake. In all my years of deflowering assholes, this is what seems to work the best, how many of my clients and lovers seem to think is most comfortable. I want to make this easy on him.
“Tell me how you’re feeling.”
“Nervous. Embarrassed.”
“Why embarrassed? There aren’t a whole lot of things that have turned me on more than knowing I’m going to get to work my way into that ass. You’ve got nothing to be embarrassed about.”
I stroke his neck, the back of his head, run a thumb behind his ear, and he stretches so I have more space to pet him. Lovely. When he’s practically purring, I settle myself behind him again, press my hips, and yes, my erection, against his nicely spread cleft. I rock against him, enjoying the choked whisper of a gasp he lets out.
“Does that feel good?” I ask, though I know the answer perfectly well.
“Yeah. Yeah.” His voice is feathery with strain and desire, so I give him more. Press harder with longer, firmer strokes. Give him a better idea of what he’s in for. It’s not so long before he’s pressing back against me, and I know if I were to reach underneath him, he’d be hard and perhaps slick with pre-come. The idea that he’s making a mess on the hand towel draped over the pillow because he’s literally dripping with want, well… If I want to get to the headliner of this evening’s performance, I need to stop dicking around with the opening act.
As I withdraw, he whines, and I reflexively smack the side of his ass, hard, producing another choked inhale. Oh, my Hart likes to be hurt. How could he be more perfect? “You can complain if you like, just know that’s what’s going to happen when you do.”
I’m almost sorry when he doesn’t make another sound. Perhaps something else he’s afraid to admit? Maybe those tats weren’t so painful after all. Though it probably depended on the circumstances. Masochists are tricky creatures, though some would argue not half as tricky as sadists. Possible, but sadists are my people. I can’t even fathom the other side, but god bless masochists. I’d just be a monster without them. With them, though, I get to be a teacher, a mentor, a patient and thorough instructor.
Now it’s time for my latest pupil’s lesson. I reach for the lube and a finger cot, slipping the thing on before greasing it up and then anchoring his hip with my other hand. Then, then, I rub my fingertip over his hole, stroking the tightly closed bud.
“There are a few things that will make this easier,” I instruct, trying to sound more like a lover than a professor, though I’ve given this lecture dozens of times.
“Three things?”
I’m amused he remembers from earlier, but… “Not just that, though I will be using copious amounts of lube, I assure you. No. What will make this easier is if you relax for me. Take deep breaths. Make yourself soft, accepting. Let me in. Some people say to bear down, but—” He squeaks, and I smirk. “Yes, that’s why I don’t like to say that.”
It raises the humiliation factor, probably because you’re reminding your penetratee you’re putting something in where they’ve traditionally only had things come out. Not pretty things. A muffled sentence comes from the pillow Allie’s buried his head in.
“What was that, Ha
rt?”
He turns to the side and huffs, squirming a bit against where I’m still stroking him with one finger.
“Isn’t it…gross?”
Ah, yes. A concern a lot of people have, though I wasn’t sure if Hart was so self-conscious he’d be one of them.
“Well, I will be putting my fingers and my cock up your ass. So is there sometimes shit involved in this process? Yes.”
He groans and not in a sexy way, returning his face to where it had been obscured by the down of the pillow.
Before he can protest or try to roll over and stop this before it starts, I continue. “However, you don’t need to worry, for a bunch of reasons. First, I’ve seen more bodily effluvia in my line of work than you’ll see in your lifetime. Piss, shit, tears, vomit, blood, saliva, sweat, breastmilk, some things I won’t name. I’ve literally seen it all. So the odd smear of poop isn’t going to bother me. Second, I’ll be wearing a condom when I fuck you and I’ve got finger cots for before that. They’re like condoms for your fingers.”
I press against his slick hole to emphasize my point and also to see how tense he really is about this. Not bad. “Third, it’s not going to turn me off if that’s what you’re worried about. The idea that you’re literally letting me inside of you is far too hot to let anything wither the hard-on I currently have for you. I could go on, but that should be sufficient.”
He nods into the pillow. I could press him more, browbeat my acceptance into him, but the best thing to do is to prove it. He’ll believe me if I prove it. So I add more of the lubrication to my finger, slicking it over his cleft until he’s about as slippery as I can get him from here. Then it’s time to ease inside.
I press gently but insistently at his entrance until he relaxes enough to let me in, and then I work my way forward by an inch, enjoying the sight of my finger inside him and knowing no one else has ever had the privilege.
“That’s good, Hart. You’re doing really well.” I lavish him with more praise while I keep working in, adding more lube whenever my path feels anything but slick. Back and forth, easing him into the feeling of being penetrated and the movement of being gently fucked. When he’s taking me inside easily, his deep breaths getting shallower, I check in with him again.
The Cartographer (The Compass series Book 6) Page 12
