“Let me know when you’ve recovered.” His voice lowered to steely concern. “And you will not come. Do you understand?”
It was a command, so I had to obey. The sharp edge of my desire dulled considerably. I waited a few more breaths to be certain, then shakily said, “I’m all right, now, Sir.”
“Good.” He slipped his hand away carefully. “Get on the bed. Hands and knees.”
I climbed up, grateful to be off my feet. I planted my palms shoulder-width apart and spread my knees just a little. There was no room for artistic interpretation, here. If he’d wanted me to arch my back, he would have told me. If I were supposed to lean on my elbows, he’d have said. As he hadn’t, I did only what he’d asked.
I heard his zipper open and the rustle of him removing his pants before the bed dipped behind me. I wanted to see him. I loved the way he looked holding his huge cock to guide it into me. I loved the hunger in his eyes the moment he entered me for the first time. He could never hide that, no matter how deeply into his role he’d fallen.
But he hadn’t given me permission to look at him.
I steeled myself at the first touch. Neil was so extremely well-endowed, I sometimes had a difficult time believing he actually fit inside me. There was always a possibility he would take me roughly right from the beginning, giving me no warning or time to prepare myself. Not that I needed a lot of preparation; I was so wet my thighs were slick. He pushed in, just past the head, and I moaned.
“Do you want this cock, Sophie?” he asked, pulling out and sliding in again, no farther than he had before.
“I do, Sir.” It took everything in me not to push back on him and take him as deep as I could.
“Then, beg for it.”
I took a shuddering breath, my pussy clenching involuntarily on him. He was so hard the fluttering contractions of my muscles around him almost bruised me. “Please, Sir. Please fuck me. Please let me have your cock.”
“How eager you are,” he teased. “Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?”
“No, Sir.”
“And why aren’t you?”
My mind flashed back to the first night we’d spent together, our all-too-brief rendezvous that had fueled my fantasies for the six years after that we’d been apart. “Because you told me not to be, Sir.”
“Never be timid about your own pleasure. Don’t be ashamed to come.”
He twisted his hand in my hair and pulled my head back as he slid into me, all the way. So deep that it hurt, but so slow and gentle I never wanted it to end. And when we were joined, he slipped one hand under my chest to urge me up. I looped an arm around his neck to keep myself stable, and he turned his head to kiss me, his tongue sweeping into my mouth to stroke against mine.
Then, without warning, he reached up and jerked my hand away. He pushed me hard against the mattress, crushing me with his body. “Tell me what I’m going to do to you, Sophie.”
“I-I don’t know, Sir.”
“You know,” he growled against my ear. “Tell me.”
I didn’t want to guess wrong—not because I was afraid of what he would do to me, but because I didn’t want to disappoint him. And it was difficult to figure out where my desires ended and his plans began. I didn’t want to engage in transparently wishful thinking. “You’re going to fuck me, Sir?”
“How am I going to fuck you, Sophie?”
“Hard,” I answered automatically, because it was the first word that sprang to my mind. I followed it up with a breathless, “Rough?”
“Very rough, indeed.” He withdrew almost entirely, poised tantalizingly at my opening. “Give me your wrists.”
He held them in one hand, firm against the small of my back—the way he sometimes would when he spanked me. I was completely immobilized by both his grip and his body pinning me.
Then, he did exactly as he’d promised.
The pain was intense, unrelenting, transcendent, as he fucked me. Some strokes were short, teasing my opening over and over before suddenly slamming as deep as he could. There was no pattern to his movements; I couldn’t brace myself from one thrust to the next. I wept aloud, perspiration gluing strands of hair across my eyes and into my mouth. I twisted and thrashed, but I was entirely at his mercy. The panic of being restrained that way, the clawing fear at not being able to move my arms or legs coupled with the agony as he used my body wound sinuously together into a rope that bound physiology and psychology tightly together.
Neil pulled out to dip his thumb into my cunt, coating it with my juices. His hand wrapped around my face, and he forced that thumb past my lips. “Taste yourself, Sophie.”
I moaned in appreciation and swirled my tongue around him, the same as I would have done if I were sucking his cock. He jerked his hand away then entered me in one quick, violent thrust. I screamed, this time; I couldn’t help it.
“Shout all you like,” he teased cruelly. Spreading me with one hand, he forced his thumb, lubricated with my own spit, into my ass.
I screamed, again, but this time, for a decidedly different reason. The humiliation I associated with anal shot my arousal to immeasurable heights, and my cries of pain melded into cries of bone-shaking, skin-prickling pleasure. I practically vibrated from the tension of my impending orgasm. He quickened his pace inside me, and I climbed higher, higher, nearly there—
With a shocked groan, he drove deeper and flooded into me.
It clearly took him by surprise. It took me by surprise, too—enough that my release never happened. He hardly ever came before I did, unless it was on purpose. But he hadn’t warned me that I would be denied, and I’d done everything he’d asked, hadn’t I? My heart raced, my mind flipping through every depraved act we’d engaged in, scrutinizing it all for some serious infraction.
He recovered quickly, pulling out of me when every last shudder had subsided. I was about to beg him to let me come, to promise that I would be better, that I would give him anything, that I would never defy him, again. I didn’t have to. He flipped me onto my back and slid two fingers into my still aching cunt, angling them upward to press hard against my g-spot. I rode his hand, arching my back as he worked his thumb over my clit. The wet sucking sounds as he pumped his fingers made my breath stall in my lungs—I didn’t want my gasps to drown anything out.
“You did an excellent job, Sophie,” he murmured. “You may come, now.”
After years of submission to him, those words were as sure as any touch. My body curled up from the bed, every muscle tensing, and I came, my thighs clamping shut to quiver around his hand. Relief and pleasure flooded through me, and proof of it flowed onto his hand. Every system in my brain went offline, my circuits overloaded with an onslaught of shocks to my nervous system. My mouth opened, but only a strained rasp escaped. Time hung suspended until I fell back to the duvet, writhing in the slow, sweet return to reality.
“Another one?” he asked, his fingers still inside me.
I shook my head weakly. “No, Sir.”
“And what if I told you that you’d have as many as I wished to give you?” he challenged me.
On any other night, my answer might have been different. But tonight, I said, “I would safeword, Sir.”
“Ah.” He withdrew his hand gently. “Shall we get you cleaned up?”
I nodded gratefully and let him help me up. When I got on my feet, his arm lingered around my waist, and I leaned against him, not trusting my shaky legs. Having sex like that was like running up and down a flight of stairs to the point of exhaustion.
“Shower or bath?” he asked as he helped me stagger to the bathroom.
Usually, my automatic answer would be my bathtub. I loved it so much, Neil had actually bought it from my old landlord and had a replica commissioned for our London townhouse. It was my favorite spot in our current residence, and though our love affair would inevitably lead to varicose veins, I treasured every moment of our illicit trysts.
But it wasn’t sized for two, and I wanted to be in my Sir
’s arms more.
“Shower. And will you wash my hair, Sir?”
He kissed the top of my head. “I’ll do anything for you.”
And he really would.
****
The last time I took Neil to my hometown, it had been for Christmas. Calumet, Michigan in the dead of winter is a lot different than in June, and I was excited for Neil to see it. The lush green trees filled the fresh summer wind with the scent of pine, and usually, all of the snow had melted.
As long as we’d missed the first swarms of mosquitos, it would be a pleasant trip.
We flew into the nearest airport that could handle our private jet and took a rental car the rest of the way to the Keweenaw. Well, we took two rental cars, because my mother and Tony had come with us, and Neil could only travel so far with his mother-in-law.
“It isn’t that I don’t like her,” he repeated for at least the twelfth time since we’d left the airport. “She can just be…”
“A little much. I know.” I checked the review mirror and frowned at the pickup tailgating us. I gripped the steering wheel tighter. “Ride my as—”
Neil cleared his throat.
“—teroid, why don’t you?” I corrected myself. “Isn’t she asleep back there, anyway?”
Neil twisted in his seat and looked back at Olivia. “Dozing.”
“You shouldn’t be talking about my mom like that in front of her, you know. You’re so worried about me swearing,” I grumbled.
“I’m sorry. You’re right. Rebecca is a part of Olivia’s family, too. I should keep my criticism to myself.” He managed to go almost a full second before adding, “But did she really need to paint her toenails on the flight?”
“I get it from somewhere,” I singsonged.
The drive from Marquette to Calumet was an easy three hours of tree-lined highway, broken by the occasional small town. But Olivia had already spent most of her day in transit, so she hit her limit right around Baraga.
“Why don’t we stop at Grandma’s first, instead of going all the way out to the cabin?” I suggested. We’d rented a gorgeous property right on the lakeshore in Gay, but that would be another half hour of driving. “That’ll give Olivia some time out of the car.”
Neil looked uncomfortable at the thought. “We can’t just drop in on your family unannounced.”
“Sure we can. It’s not unannounced when you’re coming from out of state. And she knows we’re supposed to get here today. Besides, she’s expecting Mom and Tony.” And I kind of wanted to be there when Grandma met Tony. Mom was finally in a serious romantic relationship, something my family had kind of written off.
Which was shitty. While my relatives were loving and supportive, they seemed to think my mom had thrown away her entire romantic future by having me when she was a teenager. I remembered someone had called her an “old maid” when she was twenty-five. And it hadn’t helped that I’d successfully run off all the men she’d ever tried to date.
My stomach grumbled, and I went on, “And at least we can get something to eat at grandma’s.”
Neil looked like I’d just suggested I would pee on her rug. “You can’t just show up at someone’s home unannounced and expect them to feed you, Sophie, that’s rude!”
“It’s not rude! It’s Grandma’s house.” I lowered my voice so I wouldn’t wake Olivia. We only had a few more miles to Calumet, and I wasn’t going to spend them with a screaming toddler. “Besides, Mom and Tony are going to be staying there. Her hospitality has already been imposed upon.”
My grandma lived in the house I’d lived in after I was born, before she and my grandfather bought Mom the trailer I grew up in. The place looked pretty much the same as it had back then with the exception of the new slider door they’d installed when I was twelve and the bathtub surround that had finally been replaced to stop the wall from crumbling. My background and Neil’s couldn’t have been more different if we’d grown up on other sides of the solar system. This was something I was keenly aware of as we pulled into the driveway.
The door wasn’t locked—it never was—so I pushed it open and stepped inside. Neil followed hesitantly with a listless, sleep-bewildered Olivia on his hip. “Shouldn’t we ring the bell?”
“No. Take your shoes off,” I told him, kicking my Marc Jacobs espadrilles onto the plastic carpet protector by the door. I popped off Olivia’s pearlescent blue Mary Janes before setting her on her feet. I took her hand and led her toward the slider. “Grandma? We’re here!”
“You are?” a voice called from inside. I helped Olivia up the step into the dining room. The ancient floor shook as Grandma hurried out to us. She pulled me in for a tight hug. “I thought you would have stopped at the Ambassador with your mom and her fella.”
“No, Neil needed a little break,” I said, and heard him make an offended noise behind me.
“Oh, it’s okay, Neil,” Grandma said, moving on to hug him before he could react to stop her. “Becky can be a little much, sometimes. I’m her mother. I know that.”
“Yes, well.” He cleared his throat then leaned down to pick up Olivia, presumably because her feet had touched the ground for more than two minutes. “This is my granddaughter, Olivia.”
“Isn’t she a little doll?” Grandma smoothed Olivia’s downy white-blonde curls before adding, “I was so sorry to hear about your daughter. That’s a terrible thing, losing a child.”
“Yes.” Neil cleared his throat. “Thank you for the lovely plant you sent to the funeral home.”
“It was no trouble at all,” Grandma assured him.
I was impressed that Neil had remembered it. If the purple azalea hadn’t been blooming in our conservatory at the moment, I wouldn’t have.
“And you’re feeling better?” she asked. “Now that you’re out of the hospital?”
Neil’s inpatient treatment for his suicide attempt had happened a year ago, and we didn’t really talk about it much, anymore. It wasn’t that it was a taboo subject, but it was far more personal than he would have preferred to share with a relative stranger—or a stranger who was a relative.
Still, he handled the question with grace. “Yes. And again, I have to thank you for the lovely card.”
She’d sent him a card in the hospital? He’d never mentioned it, but it didn’t surprise me. It was such a grandma thing to have done.
Grandma’s eyes widened suddenly, indicating a mental gear shift. “Say, have you eaten, yet?”
“Nope.” I shot Neil a triumphant look. “Can we raid your refrigerator?”
“Well, heavens, yes.” She bustled into the kitchen, and we followed. “Are you gonna stop at Pat’s before you head out to the cabin?”
“Who’s Pat?” Neil asked for clarification. His voice had the same tight, bewildered note to it that I usually only heard when he was around my mother.
“The grocery store. We’ll need to grab food and stuff for the cabin.” I went to the cupboard and got down a sippy cup and a plate that had been through more than one grandkid, and some plates for Neil and me, while Grandma pulled things from the refrigerator.
She dropped a large Country Crock container on the counter and popped the top off. “There’s ground baloney in here, and I got chips. I think I’ve got some 7-Up on the porch. Let me go check.”
Neil peeked over the top of the container warily. There was no way he’d ever eaten a ground baloney sandwich in his life. “I assume the green is—”
“Pickles,” I informed him cheerfully.
It was kind of fun being on this side of the culture shock, now and then.
Chapter Three
Since my graduating class had been all of a hundred and twelve people and over half of them had scattered to the winds, it didn’t make sense to have a huge to-do at a big venue. On Friday night, Neil and I left Olivia with my mom at my grandma’s and drove to The Michigan House, a restaurant and bar in downtown Calumet.
“Do I look okay?” I asked as we stepped out of the car. I sto
od on the sidewalk and straightened the lace trim at the neckline of my black silk and white polka dot Dolce & Gabbana dress. It looked a little retro, cool enough for the editor of a fashion magazine but not too showy.
Neil put on his most patient face, though it appeared quite labored. “Beautiful as always, darling. Just as I told you five times in the car, and ten at the house and—”
“Okay, point made.” I shook my hands at my sides to calm my nerves. “I just haven’t seen most of these people since graduation day. It’s a little intimidating.”
“Once you get inside and start catching up with people, I’m sure you’ll see all your worries were completely unfounded,” he promised. “Now, I, on the other hand, am about to walk into a gathering of people in their twenties and spend the entire night explaining that I’m not someone’s father.”
I took his arm and gave him a little nudge with my hip as we started across the street. “Oh, don’t be like that. I’ll be with you the whole time, and I’m not going to let anyone forget that you’re my trophy husband.”
The Michigan House is a lovely old hotel from the city’s mining heyday that now served as a restaurant, with a few vacation rentals upstairs. The ancient wooden bar sported a mural and tall columns, framing it like some kind of altar, and the patterned tile floor reminded me of the subway. Our party was in a dining room with mint-green walls, an impressive fireplace, and a ceiling festooned with plaster medallions. If not for the antique bric-a-brac all over the walls, it could have been a room from our London townhouse. Small round tables flanked the perimeter, and Rosie Green, who’d barely changed a day since high school, manned the one at the door. Voted “Friendliest” in our superlatives, she’d been the driving force behind the yearbook committee and all of the marching band fundraisers, so it was no surprise to see her heading up the sign-in tonight.
“Sophie Scaife!” she squealed, leaping out of her chair. “I can’t believe it! I saw you on the TV just the other day!”
“Hi.” I returned her hug awkwardly; we hadn’t been close friends in school, but apparently, absence had made her heart grow fonder. “How have you been?”
The Sister (The Boss Book 6) Page 3
