The Cartographer (The Compass series Book 6)

by Tamsen Parker

  “Because it hurts like fuck?”

  His curse earns him another strike, and he hisses through his teeth. Meanwhile, I have to contain my own noise of pleasure. I can feel the blood heading south, because it may hurt like fuck, but it’s also hot as fuck.

  “That’s certainly one reason.”

  Thwack.

  “Another is that the nerves in your feet are glorious things.”

  Thwack.

  “How’s that?”

  He cracks an eye open to glare at me, but I don’t fail to notice he’s getting harder as well.

  “They never go dead. Not like some other areas of your body. At some point, if I were to keep beating you elsewhere, you’d go numb. What fun is that? None.”

  Thwack.

  “The other nice thing is that, in fact, I can keep hitting you with exactly the same force…” I hit him again, the cane making contact with the middle of his foot. Not the ball and not the heel, but the center of him where it’ll give the most impact. Provide the most sensation. “…but it will feel as though I’m hitting you harder. Are you finding that to be true?”

  Thwack.

  He chokes out a small noise, and joy rushes through my system. I’ve been told this is quite painful, and while I’m not hitting him so hard, it’s a sensation most people have never experienced and the novelty of it can put even the most experienced masochist off-balance. Hart’s not terribly experienced. No, I am his sole experience. I’m his entire world, and if that’s not a heady sensation, I don’t know what is.

  With the next strike, I notice he’s broken out in a light sweat. I want to lick the product of my labors off his skin, taste the salt of his pain and his effort, perhaps bite him before sucking the pain away. Not yet. If this were a different day, I might stop. He’s perhaps had enough for an introduction. That’s not what I’ve promised him, though. I’ve sworn to give him a distraction, to make him forget, and while he has at this second, I’m going to make this last.

  “The other delightful thing is no one can see what I’ve done to you.”

  Thwack.

  “But you’ll feel it.”

  Thwack.

  You’re going to feel me for days. Every time he takes a step, every time he stands, every time he slips on a shoe. I’m not doing any permanent damage because I’m not hitting him hard enough to even get close, but he probably doesn’t feel that way.

  He’s trembling now. I’ve almost got him. Eyes clenched closed, jaw set, and muscles rigid. He doesn’t tell me to stop, though, doesn’t say the words. Perhaps because he wants to prove himself, but he can’t. Not this time. That’s not what this is about. I want to break him, and I’m going to. Because deep down, he wants to be broken.

  I hit him again and again, sometimes pausing to pace and lecture him further about the history of it—fascinating, if disturbing—and to give him time to dread the next blow. His knuckles whiten as he clutches the clips at his wrists and the tendons stand out on his neck. I want them between my teeth, want to feel the harsh beat of his racing pulse against my tongue. Drink up his pain and swallow it. Keep it. These small moments of almost delirious pleasure.

  Delirious isn’t quite right because I’ve still got full control of my faculties. Have to with something so delicate. With the next crack of the cane against his soles, he lets out a ragged cry. I’m close.

  Thwack.

  Give it up, Hart. Give yourself to me. All your pain, all your hurt, all of you.

  With the precision of a percussionist keeping an entire orchestra on task, I hit him repeatedly, and finally, finally, he yells. A sound that comes from his core that reverberates through my bones.

  I have him. I’ve made him mine.

  With three more carefully measured cracks, he’s done for. Those resolutely held-back tears stream over his face, and beads of sweat roll down from his temples to join them. A sheen of perspiration covers his neck and chest, probably at the juncture of thigh and hip too, if I checked there. So much evidence of what I’ve done to him. Salty, slick proof. It’s the best thing on earth.

  There’s a vague pull somewhere deep inside me in a place I don’t like to acknowledge. That piece of me wants more. More sweat, more tears, more pain. That piece doesn’t particularly care about Hart; all it cares about is more. I’m not a beast with no sense of control or decorum, though. I’m a man, control refined and distilled until it makes up 99.99 percent of me, and that small, ugly piece isn’t winning today. Because I care about Hart—very much—and he’s had enough.

  I set the cane aside, tucking it away where he can’t see it, and I go to him. Release the ropes around his feet and carefully, slowly unwind the bonds from between his toes, fixing his ankles. I cosset him with streams of kind words and soothing caresses while I work, because after all that, this is when he starts to struggle. After his feet are free from their bondage, I climb over him to settle in a straddle just below his hips so his straining cock rubs at the crotch of my trousers.

  Leaning over him, I grasp his wrists in my hands. Not that my fingers can circle them, but I can hold him well enough. He could perhaps launch me right off him if he wanted to, but I bet the pressure feels good, reassuring, and he stills underneath me.

  “Open your eyes, Hart. Look at me.”

  His eyes snap open at my order. They’re wild, the pupils dilated, and he’s blinking more than he usually does, tears still sliding down his cheeks. Overwhelmed. I wait for him to focus on my face, and then I lean down deliberately and take what I came for, running my tongue along his neck where it meets his jaw and up to the hollow behind his ear.

  The brackish liquid pooling there is more satisfying than the finest scotch. I’d like to bottle it. Instead, I take another swipe, then nip at him before reaching up to his wrists and undoing the clips, making sure to hold his wrists down when he’s been released. Too much freedom can be jarring after something like that, and I don’t want him to feel lost.

  So I hold him down and kiss him, press my lips against his until he opens for me, and I slip my tongue inside his mouth where he tastes not so much of salt but of humanity and desperation. I’d devour him if I could. He kisses me back—challenging, almost hostile. That’s fine. I can handle his belligerence, but I don’t think that’s what he wants. So I tighten my grasp on his wrists, kiss him harder, and rock my hips against his until our cocks are rubbing at each other through the summer-weight wool of my trousers.

  I’ve done a lot of filthy things with countless people, but somehow this frottage is one of the most intense experiences I’ve ever had. Not being buried balls-deep in some willing and lovely sub, not orchestrating all the moving parts of an orgy, not Matthew wrapping his incredibly talented lips around my hardness, but this graceless display of pure need. It hadn’t been my plan because it’s terribly uncouth, but suddenly I want to make him come like this.

  Rubbing against him, I free my mouth and trail open-mouthed kisses down his neck, enjoying the lingering saltiness of his skin and the flex of the tendons in his wrists under my hands. I find that succulent rise of muscle between neck and shoulder and I bite—hard. So hard I worry I’ve misjudged the pressure of my jaw and might break the skin, but no, barely not. That’s when he comes against me and makes this thrilling noise. It sounds involuntary in its crudeness, and the authenticity of what I’ve made him feel pushes me over the edge, my orgasm roaring through me at a rate that should make a person dizzy.

  The sound I make is barely more human than his, and I have to admit I’ve said his name. Along with some expletives, naturally, but the word I still feel in my mouth is Hart. At least I haven’t said Allie. I don’t know if he’d ever forgive me for that.

  As the fog of orgasm clears, I realize I’ve come in my pants. Not that this will be the first time my dry cleaners have dealt with this particular bodily fluid—luckily, Gino is a saint, a very talented saint—but it’s almost always someone else’s. What kind of grown man dry-humps his way to an explosive climax? But tha
t’s precisely what we’ve done, and I have to laugh as I dip my head to Hart’s, resting my forehead against his and tilting to kiss him a few times.

  He kisses me back, and his breathing settles beneath me.

  “Are you ready for me to let you go?”

  As the words leave my mouth, there’s a nagging ping in the back of my brain. I’m not ready to let him go.

  The corner of his mouth curls up, and his chest convulses in a chuckle. “No.”

  I can’t muster a word—embarrassingly grateful for the reprieve—so I give a clipped nod and hold on, conscious of, but not really minding, the cooling untidiness in my pants. I can put up with it for a while longer to fulfill my obligations. Because that’s what Hart is. My responsibility.

  *

  Kendra and the kids stay at my place for a couple of days until Matthew finds them an apartment to rent in their neighborhood in Oakland. Matthew and Kendra get along well, and she’s accepted his offer to help her find a house once the insurance comes through. The fire department determined the cause of the fire was some faulty wiring, so it’s a matter of paperwork.

  Allie stays too, in the room he usually does, although he acts as though he’s never done so before. I expect him to be tetchy about all the help, but he gives in some in the face of the impossible. If it were just him, he never would, but for Kendra and the kids? Anything. Including giving me something I’ve been wanting for months. I’m under no illusion he’ll stay after they go, and he doesn’t.

  Which is maybe not all bad. My mother’s here again, and while I put her off about meeting Allie the first time, if he were staying with me, that would be impossible. As things are, she’s peeved with me he’s not joining us for dinner.

  Matthew sets a plate of sea bream, potatoes, and asparagus in front of her, and she claps with delight. “Matthew, why aren’t you a chef somewhere?”

  He beams, but slides a look to me.

  “Don’t tempt him, Mother. I hear kitchens are hell to work in, but still probably more pleasant than being in my employ.”

  “Nonsense, I’m sure you’re a delight. Isn’t he, Matthew?”

  Matthew’s face shifts ever so slightly, the way it does when he’s about to tease me. He doesn’t do it often, but when he does, he gets a kick out of it. So be it. “That depends on your definition of delight.”

  “That’s quite enough out of you two. Matthew.”

  He smiles at me, knowing I’m not even a little piqued, and turns on his heel to go back to the kitchen. He’ll clean up and then head home to Peter. I don’t need him for the rest of the evening.

  When he’s gone, my mother drums manicured nails on the tabletop. “Are you still seeing that man?”

  That man. Most times, I’d have to flip back through my mental snapshots to figure out who she’s talking about, but not this time. It’s Allie. It’s been Allie. “I am.”

  “Why isn’t he here?”

  “Because he’s with his sister and his niece and nephew.”

  “Ah, yes, family man.”

  She takes another sip of wine, and I level her with a glare over the brim of my own glass. “Your point is?”

  “Men like that are in demand. If you’d like to hold onto him, you may want to make that clear sooner rather than later.”

  For the most part, my mother stays out of my business. She knows what I do for a living, knows my predilections, and insists she’s not a prude, but I’ve made it clear I don’t think it’s prudish to not want to hear in detail about your son’s sex life. We’ve come to a happy place about how much or how little I tell her, but apparently light badgering is still on the table.

  Holding onto Allie? As much as I’ve enjoyed having him here for the past few days and wanted to ask him to stay—wanted to ask them all to stay—I can’t. It’s clearly my mother’s butting in that’s making me irritable and not being unable to have something I want.

  “That’s fine.”

  “Is it?” She takes another sip of her wine, lipsticked mouth resting on the crystal rim of the glass.

  I know that look. Fuck, I had to learn it from somewhere. I want to tell her to take her “is it” and shove it, but I have a great deal of respect for my mother, so I won’t. I’ll merely tell her the clenched-teeth truth. “Nothing would delight me more than him finding someone who can love and value him as much as he deserves.”

  There’s only a smidge of self-effacement in stating so blatantly that person isn’t—cannot—be me. The look on my mother’s face when I say that says it all. She reaches across the table to pet my hand that’s not clutching my goblet like a life raft. “Of course not. You always want the best for everyone. I just thought it might be wise to consider that what might be best for him and, you know, you might to be for you to be together.”

  Her blue eyes meet my dark ones, and I can see a piece of myself in her. I could tell her to take a sip of her own medicine. I’ve never known my mother to date, even after I left home. Or if she has, she’s never introduced her partners to me. She’s a grown woman, and in this, I’ll leave her be. That doesn’t mean I’m going to take her intimations lying down.

  “Fine. Next time you’re in town, I’ll arrange a double date. Me and my man and you and one of San Francisco’s most eligible bachelors. That work for you?”

  She narrows her eyes. “You play dirty.”

  I smile and cock an eyebrow, offering her my glass to clink. More true than she knows and I’m not even sorry about it. “I learned from the best.”

  There’s the ring of our glasses meeting and a choreographed simultaneous sip, and then with an unspoken agreement, we both move on to discussing her next travel plans. Florence is lovely this time of year.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

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  Being able to hold a man’s hand while walking down the street is one of my favorite things about living in San Francisco. It’s one of the few places in the world I allow myself the pleasure. Such a small, innocent act so many people are allowed to take for granted. It’s nice to feel like a full citizen, not some second-class freak.

  Allie’s hand is relaxed, his thick fingers threaded between mine. He’s lovely to be with. There’s less pedestrian traffic than usual around, the streetlights illuminating mostly empty sidewalks and empty cars. A quiet city, which is nice in some ways, but not so much in others.

  One of those ways is heading right for us. Two men in nondescript dark sweatshirts with their hoods already pulled up, though it’s not cold. I don’t like how they look at us, and it’s too soon to say what’s setting my spidey-sense tingling. Homophobes who are going to shout slurs—what the fuck did they think they were going to see walking down the street in San Francisco?—or maybe small-time criminals looking to relieve us of our wallets. No fucking way are they getting my watch. Possibly just some guys with terrible fashion sense, but I’m not going to risk it.

  I nudge Allie with my elbow. “Possible trouble, twelve o’clock. Keep walking.”

  His chin drops in acknowledgement, and I can sense how his body changes next to mine. His code-switching is quite something. I’ve never seen anyone so adept at transforming himself. One second, he was my relaxed, compliant lover, and the next, he’s become a looming threat. If I didn’t know any better, I’d be afraid of him. I do, though, so instead I’m in awe.

  The two of them block the sidewalk, and I tug Allie’s sleeve to step into the street and around these morons. But the ringleader steps in front of us, blocking our path, and I hold up my hands. If they’re spoiling for a fight, there’s only so much I can do to stop them from getting it. Which wouldn’t be a problem, because I doubt they’re as highly trained as Allie at hand-to-hand combat—Hart could lay them flat out by himself and I’ve got more than a little training in martial arts—but Allie can’t fight.

  If it gets serious and the cops show up and we get arrested… I like to pretend I live in a world where everyone’s equal and life is fair and it’s easy for me to do that. Yes, I re
ad as Latino and the off-person will be a dick about that, just as the occasional idiot will be a bigoted homophobe, but I also swim in privilege. That’s what you get to do when you’re a good-looking, wealthy, connected, educated man and a smooth-talking one at that.

  I could walk away from this. One phone call is all it would take to get me out of pretty much anything, but Allie… Fuck. If he ever wants to rejoin the military or have a hope in hell of getting a better job than what he’s been able to since he got out, he can’t have a record. I fucking hate it, but these guys are white and Allie’s black and, as disgusting as it is I have to think that way, I have to.

  One of the guys takes something out of his pocket, and it glints in a streetlight. Knife, maybe? I’m not waiting to find out.

  “Hart. Get out of here.”

  His head whips around. I love the step-to-it-iveness, but there’s no time to admire his response. “I’m not going—”

  “Yes, you are. Get out of here now. This is an order. If you don’t run as fast as you can in the opposite direction, as god as my witness I’m never touching your dick again.”

  I’m trying to make light.

  “I’m not leaving you. There’s two of them and one of you. It’s not that I don’t think you could handle yourself in a fight, but—”

  “Listen. They’re stupid. I’m wily like a fox. Plus, I know how to defend myself.”

  “Rey.” His voice is a plea. He’s stuck between a wall of would-be muggers and betraying his loyalties. I don’t envy him that.

  “Get out of here now. Don’t worry about me.”

  He will, though. I know he will. The anguish lining his smooth features is impossible to see without wanting to soothe it. Help him.

  “I swear to you, Allie, they literally cannot hurt me. But if you get arrested and charged with assault, you could go to prison. The military would never be an option for you again, and finding a job would get a hell of a lot harder. For any of those things, I would never forgive myself.”