“Trust you to remember that part.”
“It was one of my favorite parts. And not only because you said it while fucking me senseless.”
“So you continue to mention.”
“You seem like you need the positive reinforcement.” She scooted closer and laid her hand palm up on the table so he’d hold it. Such slim and delicate fingers. “Alec—is there some other reason you don’t want this? I mean, I know I’m younger than you are and I’m maybe not as sophisticated as other women you’ve dated. Is it that you’re only sexually attracted to me and you don’t want to know me other than that? Do I—” She hesitated. “Are you embarrassed by me?”
That dug into his heart. A muddle, indeed. “No, darling.” He squeezed her hand. “If we were to go public, I’d no doubt be the envy of every man alive.”
“Then let’s go public.”
“No.” He tapped the back of her hand when she opened her mouth to protest. “Not yet. The stakes are too high and I am already struggling with the guilt of debauching you. I shall never get over ruining your career prospects on top of it.”
“I’m the one who pushed for the debauching,” she pointed out with a sly smile.
“As I clearly recall. However, you would enjoy a ruined career far less. Still. Let’s come up with a workaround. What do you propose?”
“I want better communication.”
“I can’t talk to you at the office. Maybe at some point, but have mercy on me there.”
“Okay. Can we text?”
“It seems a very bad idea to have incriminating texts between us. What if someone happened to read them?”
“We’ll use an emoji system, like Kiki and I do.” She hopped up. “Where’s your phone?”
He told her, bemused by her rebounding energy. “I thought this code was to remain a secret,” he couldn’t help teasing as she returned with both phones.
She scooted her chair next to his and laid their phones on the table. “You shall be admitted to our society and taught the language of the gods. Woe unto ye who fails to treat it with honor. I need to add the emoji keyboard to your phone. Here.” She showed him her screen, which appeared to be an exchange of various smiley faces, a pair of girls kicking out their legs, a flamenco dancer and...
“Is that a jester?”
She laughed. “Exactly. That’s kind of an inside joke.”
She looked so gorgeous by candlelight. He tucked a lock of her hair behind her ear, limiting himself to that chaste contact for the moment. “Do I get to know?”
“Well, Kiki and her family belong to this church. Kind of a Universalist thing—I don’t really know—but they’re very much into embracing people of all kinds and bents. This one older gentleman in the church, who’s in his nineties, and so very well-meaning, was talking to Kiki about making sure that people know they’d be welcome. He told her that they accepted everyone—gays, lesbians, cross-dressers, trans-jestered...” She trailed off with a sparkle in her eye, waiting for him to get it.
“Oh dear.”
“Yeah. I mean, he’s a wonderful man. Only he didn’t quite get it. So it’s funny. We send it to each other, for a laugh.”
“You sent that to her just a bit ago.”
She nodded. “When I was changing clothes. To let her know I was happy and wanted her to have a fun evening.”
He trailed a finger down her cheek, golden pale in the soft light, realizing she meant it. That she wasn’t jollying him along by saying she hadn’t minded what had happened. But it concerned him that she didn’t take it seriously enough. That she was too naïve to know better. “It worries me that I seem to have no control lately. That’s my problem, my personal hell. I’m afraid of hurting you and that the only solution is to stay away.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
His confession took her by surprise, particularly paired with the haunted look in his eyes. He’d seemed more relaxed, amused by the emojis and her stories, better after he’d tended to her and satisfied himself she was fine. But he kept circling back to the same thing. Part of his obsessive nature, most likely. The negative aspect.
“Okay, I have three things to say to you and I want you to listen to me,” she said. He got that look—there, that was more him, offended at being given orders—and she returned it with interest. “We’re still under Morpheus so don’t try that. We’re negotiating, which means I get to take a strong stand, right?”
Despite the flicker of irritation, he gave her an amused nod and a wave to continue.
“First of all, I’m not made of glass. I’m flesh and blood and I heal just fine. Secondly, you’ve never been out of control. Not once. In fact, you pretty much ordered me to tell you to stop—are you saying you wouldn’t have?”
He looked affronted. “Of course I would have.”
“Exactly my point.”
“But I hurt you.”
“This might be a newsflash, which I can’t imagine how it could be, but I like that. No—I love it. Most important, if you hurt me in a way I didn’t love, I would say so. Give me some goddamn credit, okay? I might be young, but I’m not a complete idiot.”
“You’re not, no.”
“That’s right. Also, the whole point of me having safewords is that I should be able to tell you to stop and you’ll know I don’t mean it. It’s not fair that you changed that rule. I want to be able to beg you to stop and know you won’t. Isn’t that part of you trusting me?”
He closed his eyes briefly. “Right you are.”
“Thirdly—”
“Wasn’t that three already?”
“Yes, but you distracted me and forced me to add an extra. Finally, while I very much respect you and trust that you know what you’re doing in general, this staying-away-from-me solution of yours has not worked. Big fail there.”
“I beg your—” He bit it off when she grinned at him, then threw up his hands. “Fine. Finish your point.”
“I believe I will.” He looked so adorable, so flustered in a way he rarely ever was, that she climbed onto his lap, straddling him and sliding her hands around the back of his neck. Though suspicion glanced over his face, he reflexively set his hands on her hips. She feathered kisses over his cheekbones, scraping her teeth lightly over his five o’clock shadow. “I think we need more time together, not less. I want weeknights, too. At least a few.”
“No. That’s nonnego—ow!”
She licked the ear she’d nipped to stop him. “Morpheus. Negotiating, remember? How can that work if you pull the nonnegotiable card?”
“That’s not exactly how I’d intended you to use that safeword,” he muttered, sounding grumpy, but his hands slid over her bottom, stroking her skirt where her panty lines would be. He loved that she wasn’t wearing any, that much was clear.
“That’s how I interpret it.” She scooted a little closer, so the thrust of his erection through his jeans pressed against her mound. He hissed out a little breath. “Bottling up isn’t working. I think that’s what’s happening. You keep bottling up and repressing and then it...” she rocked her groin against him, “...explodes.”
“Is that what you think then?”
“It is. I want you to tell me something.”
“I appear to be at your mercy.”
“A heady sensation. Where did you go tonight, after work?”
He frowned. “After work?”
“I went by your office and you were gone, but I got here before you did. Where did you go?”
“Why do you wonder?”
Aha. Evading. She’d known something lurked there. “I’m gathering clues about you. Discovering how your fascinating, twisty mind works.” She leaned in so her stiff nipples brushed his chest. He didn’t show that he noticed, except that his hands flexed on her hips. “Tell me where y
ou went, what you did.”
“I...walked home. Through the park. And stopped to watch the ducks at the pond off 59th.”
“Just watched them?”
He shrugged, hands moving up to her bare back, stroking her skin, making her want to purr. “They won’t let you feed them, you know. Reminds me of home, when I used to walk home along the Thames. Before that, growing up, I’d walk on the beach when I had something on my mind. Being near the water—it helps settle my thoughts.”
“What had your mind roiled up?”
“You know the answer to that.”
“Yes, but it makes me feel better to hear that you’re as worked up about me as I am about you.”
He trailed his fingers down the bumps of her spine. “I find I think of little else.”
She kissed him, long and deep, the way he liked it.
“What’s that for?”
“A reward.” She smiled. “I like knowing that about you. I want to know something else.”
He groaned but waited for it.
“What is it about me that gets to you?”
“Fishing for compliments, darling?”
She wriggled and he pinched her bottom lightly. “I love compliments, so feel free. But no—I’m working on a theory here. While it does wonderful things for my ego to imagine that I’m simply so beautiful you can’t resist me, I don’t think that’s it.”
“No?” He lifted her hair to pull it over one shoulder, stroked her cheek on the other side, over her shoulder and down her bare arm, then cupped her breast through the light cotton. “But you are very beautiful.”
“Thank you. What else?”
“Sensual. Lovely. Intelligent. Full of vitality. How many need I list?”
“It’s a good list. I think there’s something else you haven’t said.”
He tensed. Still caressing her breast, but wary. “Do you plan to enlighten me?”
“All of this, what we do, the fantasies, dancing the lines of what’s right and wrong—it’s about the taboos, isn’t it?”
His thumb passed over her nipple, hand tightening on her, though he didn’t reply. She was getting to him.
“I think it’s feeling like you shouldn’t do to me what you want to do that’s driving you crazy. You see me as innocent somehow.”
“You are an innocent.”
“Not hardly. Certainly not as much as I was a week ago.”
He winced at that, so she took advantage of his distraction to unfasten his jeans and release his cock. He clamped hands on her wrists. “Amber,” he warned. “No using the Morpheus umbrella to break the rules.”
She licked her lips, deliberately, loving that he couldn’t help looking. “I know what happens when I break the rules. I’m telling you I want that. Make me less innocent. Cross my lines.” She squeezed and he huffed out a laugh, then forced her hands away and pinned them behind her back. Arching into it, she ground against him. She’d never stopped being wet for him, but moisture surged, hot, needy. He nipped her nipple through the dress. “Oh God, yes, Alec.”
“You’re incorrigible.”
“Is that another word for naughty? Are you saying I’m a bad girl?”
He hissed through his teeth, losing that reserve by the moment. “You’re baiting me.”
“We’re not at work. I’m wearing white, but I’m not a virgin. Except in one way.” She wiggled in his grasp and made a helpless sound. “Please be gentle with me.”
His face had settled into those rigid lines. “Are we done negotiating then?”
“Yes, Sir. I’m totally at your mercy.”
“Is that so?” He pulled on her wrists, making her arch further, his accent creamy. “Then I have a taboo or two to break.”
He lifted her off his lap, telling her to keep her hands clasped behind her back, then fastened his jeans, daring her to object. She wouldn’t though. He’d slid into his masterful mode, beyond the doubts that plagued him, and she flung herself after, her body a morass of need at the prospect of what he’d do to her.
Setting a firm grip on her wrists, he marched her to the bathroom—the bathing chamber—and made her stand in front of one of the chrome-framed mirrors. Untying her halter, he slowly lowered it, revealing her breasts, then unzipped the back of her dress and lifted it over her head.
“Don’t move,” he whispered in her ear and took the dress away.
She had no choice but to stare at her naked reflection—and all the iterations of her body from various angles, caught in the various mirrors.
And anticipate.
He finally came back in, carrying her hairbrush and a few other things, sexual tension riding the lines of his body. He’d changed into one of his black suits, wearing it with a black shirt and tie. It made her smile, knowing he’d listened to what she’d said and did it for her. His gaze flashed to hers. “Eyes forward, darling.” He showed her a crimson velvet jewelry box. “I bought something for you.”
“You did think about me.”
His gaze swept over her, making her shiver. “Every second of every day.” He opened the box and took out a set of cuffs, pale gold this time, and fastened them on her wrists and ankles. They were lined with a thicker, softer felt than the others and fit her snugly. Perfectly, even. “These suit your coloring better.” Linking the cuffs together behind her back, he studied her in the mirror. “Graceful. Made specifically for you.” He ran his hands over her breasts and down to her crotch, fingers dipping into her lightly, so she leaned back against him and moaned. “Mine,” he murmured, and kissed the bruise he’d left on her neck.
“Yes.”
“And now I’ll have more of you.”
“What are you going to do to me?”
He smacked her bottom with the back of the hairbrush and she gasped. “Speak when spoken to.” Reversing the brush, he ran it through her hair, expertly pulling it into a ponytail that he then braided tightly, weaving a gold chain through it. He draped it over her shoulder to dangle on her breast, letting her see the gold hook at the end. “I do enjoy long hair. Soon you’ll know why.”
The uncertainty began to get to her, the mind-fuck well and truly sinking in. He teased her nipple with the hook, smiling when she whimpered, then brought it behind her back, pushed her bound wrists up, and attached the hook to them. It made her arch her back and stretch her throat, her breasts thrusting vulnerably forward. He took something else out of the box, matching gold, dangling and catching the light in her peripheral vision.
Coming around in front of her, he teased her nipples into harder points. As if they could be. She tried to breathe into it, guessing what was coming, but the bite of the clamp took her by surprise. Sharp pain. Along with the swift, aching need that followed.
“Does that hurt?”
“Yes, Sir,” she gritted out, going with the truth. Hoping he wouldn’t freak.
“Good.” He slapped the clamped breast lightly and she sobbed a little. Both with the weakening sensation of erotic pain and the relief that he’d gotten his head on straight again. “Not so bossy now, are you?”
“No, Sir.” She bit her lip when he fastened on the other clamp and she gave in to the need to struggle against it, feeling on the edge of frenzy, her bound hands tugging sharply on the braid. “Please, Sir—I’ll be good!”
“Yes, you will. Because you’ll have no other choice.” He slapped the breast he’d just clamped, not hard, but in a way that made her nipples throb. “And you may as well resign yourself, as I’m far from done with you.”
With a hand on her wrists he guided her to one of the complex metal apparatuses, moving her slowly, but whatever dangled from the nipple clamps bobbed as she walked, sending shooting sparks that went straight to her rioting pussy.
“Don’t you dare come,” he warned, sounding cold and cruel.
“No orgasm for you, not for a long time yet.”
He released her wrists, from each other and the braid, and stretched her over the bars that faced yet another mirror. Fastening the cuffs so her arms spread forward and out, he bent her over another bar, adjusting the height so it fit under her hips and raised them high. When he spread her legs, fastening her ankles wide apart, she was forced onto tiptoe, most of her weight on her hips and wrists, the rest of her dangling helplessly. Picking up the braid, he hooked it onto a bar behind her head, forcing her to arch her neck again, meet her reflection. A chain of golden balls dangled from the clamps on her nipples, swinging with her distressed breathing.
Checking her position, he ran his hands over every inch of her, casually teasing her, adjusting the apparatus so she could barely move. Looking satisfied, he gave her bottom an affectionate smack, then took some lube from a shelf. Holding it so she could watch, he squirted some onto his fingers, gave her a significant smile, then applied it to her vulnerable anus.
She couldn’t help flinching at the unaccustomed sensation, reflexively trying to evade his probing fingers, which felt so strange going up inside her virgin passage.
“Alec,” she whimpered.
He met her gaze in the mirror, adding another finger and pushing it in, widening her. “You asked for this,” he replied in a severe tone. “You can beg and plead all you like, but I’ll have this from you.” He worked his fingers in and out of her. “I’m taking it and you can’t do a thing about it.”
Serious mind-fuck. The double message came through loud and clear, that he acknowledged her complaint and wouldn’t stop unless she safeworded. It gave her a glorious sense of freedom to let it all work on her. The pain in her nipples, the helpless immobility, the way he had her so wantonly displayed as he invaded her intimately, looking so severe and remote in his suit.
“Please stop,” she whimpered.
“But I’ve just started. It will get worse.”
“I’ll do anything.”
“Oh yes. Yes, you will.” He removed his fingers and wiped them. Then picked up a hose looped on the wall, coated the nozzle with lube and pushed it into her. “Dirty girl,” he whispered.
Under His Touch Page 22
