by Chloe Adler
I crane my head around. “What?”
She continues rubbing, moving down my back, pushing into my sore muscles with the heels of her palms. “You know my secret, Dom. You’re the only one who does. You don’t think I’m a freak, you haven’t treated me any differently, and most important, you haven’t told anyone else.”
“Why would I? That’s what friends do, Iphi. I’m honored that you trust me with your secrets.”
“Let me finish.”
I nod.
“There’s something between us, something more than friendship. You’ve mentioned it too. Maybe it’s a physical attraction because we’ve never gone there, and maybe if we do we’ll find out that we’re only meant to be friends. But that’s something I need to know.”
I want to interject but I keep my mouth shut because she asked me to.
“You were right to call me out before. I’ve been hiding for so long . . .”
She stops massaging me and shifts her body. I shift mine as well to sit next to her, both of us facing forward again.
“I’ve hidden behind my,” she hooks her fingers in air quotes, “ ‘gift.’ I act like I’m perfect.” She shakes her head. “I saw everyone else’s faults, everyone’s lies and dirty secrets . . . and no one saw mine. It gave me a false sense of superiority.”
I lower my chin, encouraging her to continue.
“But you called me out on that, in a kind way. And seeing that part of me, the ugly part, you’re still attracted to me?” She turns her head to the side, peering at me through one soft curl.
I can’t lie. Not to her. I wouldn’t even if I could. “More than ever.”
“So if we don’t explore it, this lightning between us, we’ll always wonder. There’ll be sexual tension sizzling around us every time we’re together. Unexplored and unmet. I’m sure you’ve experienced that before with other people. At the very least it’s the road to a frustrating friendship . . .”
“What about Cas? Rhys?”
“They both agree and give us their blessing.”
I clench my thighs together, trying to maintain some sort of balance, lest I tumble off the couch at her words. She turns my body and takes up her previous position behind me, rubbing my back again.
I quake beneath her fingers.
Her hands move lower and I roll my shoulders to distract myself as her fingers brush my waist. She leans forward and places a single kiss behind my ear, pressing her warm lips to the sensitive spot and holding them there. When she breaks the kiss, my cock is impossibly hard, stiff as though she’d been kissing it and not the side of my neck. She nuzzles her nose into the same spot. “Do you want to explore with me?”
Oh god yes! I nod my head slowly, not wanting to spook her with my eagerness.
Her tiny hands encircle my waist and wind along the crease between my upper thigh and groin. No matter how hard I clench my mouth together I can’t help but groan. She forces my legs open with her hands and rubs the insides of my thighs through my loose slacks. I force myself to remain perfectly still even though I want to turn around, throw her on the couch and ravage her. But I can’t. This is her choice and I need to let her lead.
I sway backward when her hands move from my thighs up to my throbbing cock. She grabs it with both hands through the material of my pants, pulling it tight around as she fists me.
“Just as big and hard as I imagined,” she breathes into my ear and my head falls back against her shoulder.
With one hand she strokes me and with her other she moves beneath to cradle my sack.
I groan low in my throat.
“You want this?” she asks though I have no idea why, she can tell how much I do. “You want me?”
I bite my lip, chewing on it to keep from shouting out.
“Say it.” Her voice is low and husky, dripping with arousal.
“I want you, Iphigenia. I’ve always wanted you.”
“I know.” Her soft voice slides over me with gossamer wings.
Slowly she removes her hands from my cock, raises herself to her knees, wraps one hand around my neck and cranks my head back even farther. Her fingers weave through my hair. The sweet taste of her lips on mine fills my senses until my mind is blank of everything except her. Only her. Always her. The girl I’ve always assumed to be submissive is anything but—with me. She sucks my lips in greedily and I open my mouth to hers, a warm tongue flicking in and then quickly back out again. The taste of roses and bright warm sunlight trips delicately over my tongue. I’m used to being in control of sexual trysts, but I’m so far out of control I have to grasp the edge and back of the couch to keep myself from lunging at her.
“I know,” she murmurs against my mouth, “but for our first time, I get to drive.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Iphigenia
I love that Dominic is letting me lead, even though it’s not in his comfort zone. Part of the reason I chose to do it this way is to test him. Not in a cruel way, just to see if he wants me badly enough to do what I say. What I plan to do to him is anything but cruel. He’s always in control, the one who helps others, the one who listens, analyzes and offers solutions. Has he ever given up his control to another? Has anyone ever focused so intently on his needs, on solving his problems? The way he’s gripping the couch tells me no. I don’t even have to probe his emotions to know that much.
The man is wound tighter than a coiled rope and I want to unwind him from his center out. This will take more than a simple fuck, more than a slow or furious one. Dominic has never been teased or played with. He’s never been worshiped. He’s so busy seeing to others that he doesn’t truly feel seen himself.
This is why we work so well together. I’m the only one who can truly see him. And no matter how much he tries to hide from that, it’s what he craves. Plus, he’s the one who can truly see me. Makes for some delicious vulnerability.
I probe his mouth with my tongue, pausing occasionally to lick the sides and nibble his top lip. Dominic’s entire body softens in my arms as he lets go and I seize the moment by dragging the sheepskin rug draped over the back of his couch and throwing it onto the floor.
“Don’t move,” I say and he turns toward me, then freezes up tight, looking like a rabbit caught between the crosshairs.
I jump off the couch and spread the rug out on his hardwood floor and then I climb on top of it, my legs tucked underneath my bottom. While he watches, I slowly unbutton my blush-pink blouse. Very slowly. After the first three buttons I pause and cup my breasts through the thin fabric, pinching my nipples. A snarl catches in his throat. His eyes never leave me.
“You want a taste of these?”
Dom bites his bottom lip, hard.
“Come get ’em.”
I expect him to leap off the couch, knock me on my back, pull out my tits and ravage them, as unstoppable as a waterfall crashing over a cliff. But he doesn’t. He slides down slowly, like the trickle of a warm spring over a rock, and arranges himself on his knees in front of me, waiting.
“Your turn.” I move my arms back, hands on the rug behind my butt, holding myself up and on display. For him.
His dark hair is tousled from where I grabbed it earlier and I have the silly desire to lick the side of his face, all the way to his hairline. I refrain. His head hovers over me, gazing into my eyes. His deep green eyes darken, like the lights dimming on our own personal stage. Hands work at my buttons without haste while he holds my gaze. One, two, three, four, five. All the way down until it gapes open in the front. He pulls the sides open, like a curtain, and only then does he break eye contact to look down.
“You are exquisite,” he says, moving his hands up to cup my breasts over my bra. He arches forward and kisses the tops, where they peek out of the cream colored lace that covers them. Those lips are so hot they scorch, or maybe it’s because my nerve endings are on fire. He slips a finger underneath the bottom of my bra, caressing me there back and forth. Moving his head down, he grasps a nipple through t
he lace with his lips instead of his teeth, holding it there and rolling his lips around it.
Gasping, my head falls back and I move my hands away from my ass, arching my back into a backbend from the knees.
“Goddess,” he growls against my chest, “you are a goddess.”
I know he’s not commenting on my contortion move, but since I’ve been working on just that, I beam.
“Pants off,” he growls low in his throat, like a lion. Like Caspian? Does Dom have a lion shift too? No time to wonder as he unbuttons my jeans and slips them over my hips, which I keep raised in the backbend. He pulls each leg off, slowly, and then buries his face over my panties. A matching cream-colored set. He inhales and groans, wrapping his arms around my hips and pulling me toward him.
“You smell like heaven, pure heaven. Sunlight and clouds, rainbows and angels.” His voice is muffled because he’s still buried in my center. He licks me, through my panties, lapping over my entire crease, then exchanges his tongue with the heel of his palm, pressing firmly. “Sit down,” he commands and I comply.
Through the haze of lust I remember he was supposed to let me lead. Wasn’t that my stipulation?
I can’t honestly remember right now because his finger is moving underneath the elastic band of my panties, the crease between my thigh and my leg. Slowly, his finger moves. Achingly slowly, and I want to scream and buck and insist that he touch me there, but I don’t. I lean my head back and clench my teeth instead.
He follows his finger with his tongue, along the band, excruciatingly slow. My nerves are on fire and my center burns hot. I press myself into him, urging him forward but he pushes me back down and sits up.
I look at him, those hooded green eyes, that five o’clock shadow, his tousled hair and I want to eat him up. I want to lick every single inch of his hard body, but first I want to see how hard it really is.
He takes my hand and places it on top of my panties. “Touch yourself, over the cloth. I want to watch while I strip for you.”
Oh. My. Goddess! My words have left the building. My words have left the planet. I may never find my voice again.
Embarrassed because I’ve never touched myself in front of anyone before, I hunch my shoulders and look away from him. He crooks a finger under my chin and brings my gaze back up to his.
“Just over the cloth, light circles. Nothing to be ashamed of, you’re gorgeous. Your body is gorgeous. Touching yourself is gorgeous. It turns me on just imagining it. Please. For me?”
You can do this, Iphigenia, you want to do this. Tentatively, I cup my hand over the entire area and hold it there. The heat emanating from my core burns through the thin satin.
Dominic stands above me, his legs wide, eyes darting between my hand and my face. He licks his lips, his long tongue moving across the seam, slowly, back and forth. “Use your fingertips.” His voice is almost a whisper.
I do as he says and trace the area above my clit, the mons, with just my fingertips. I’m so turned on that a jolt of fire shoots straight into my clit and I moan and arch.
“That’s it.” His eyes are heavy again and he slowly unbuttons his shirt.
I continue the touching, tripping over the satin and playing with my waistband and the elastic at my thigh. Just one finger dip, just one flesh-on-flesh touch . . .
“No.” His voice is firm. “Do not touch yourself underneath your panties.”
I startle and he smiles.
“Save that for me.”
Oh yes please! “Soon?”
“Soon.” He shrugs out of his shirt and circles one of his own nipples with a finger. “Show me how you like it, Iphi, over your panties. Touch your clit for me.”
He doesn’t have to ask me twice. I press harder now, no lingering touches anymore, and rub my clit through my underwear. The area is so sensitive and tender that if I keep going I know I’ll come. Watching Dom watch me is too much. I never thought I could be so turned on by having someone watch me touch myself. Not someone. Dominic.
I focus on his body. He’s not as broad as Rhys or sun-kissed like Caspian. Dominic might even be considered skinny, but his stomach is iron-board flat and ripples with muscle. He has chest hair too, dark and spread in a soft layer over his defined pecs. I reach one hand up, stretching toward him.
A lazy smile spreads across his face, raising his cheeks and turning them into tiny round apples.
I groan and arch my back. “If I keep going, I’m going to . . .”
He bends down and puts his hand over mine, stopping my ministrations. Then he hooks a finger on either side of my panties. I lift my bottom so he can pull them down and off. He brings them to his nose and inhales deeply, moaning as he does so before tossing them aside.
“One sec.” He disappears from my line of sight for a few seconds and returns to stand over me once again. One hand is closed in a loose fist, the edge of a condom wrapper sticking out.
He unbuttons his jeans and steps out of them. Straddling my legs he presses his hard groin against my wet center, surging against me. I reach my hands up to touch his chest, winding my fingers through the hair there and he leans forward to kiss me, taking my mouth in his. His lips are soft, tender. Not what I was expecting after the buildup of so much intensity. I move my hands to his head, pulling his mouth to mine. Crushing it to mine.
He cradles my body and rolls me over so I’m sitting astride.
“I know you want to drive and I want to let you.” He licks his lips, plump from kissing me.
I touch his face, rubbing my palms over his stubble, framing his perfectly square jaw.
He keeps those sea-glass eyes on mine. “I’m yours, Iphigenia,” he whispers into the air between us, which crackles like a lightning storm. “Take me, leave me, use me. Use my cock. Come all over me.”
He hands me the condom.
I tear it open with my teeth and sit back on the tops of his thighs. I slowly roll the condom down over his length, biting my lip in concentration. Maybe one day I’ll get the hang of this. He moves his hands down to help me, finishing the job. My face heats at my lack of experience, but he pulls me down to kiss me and I focus on his warmth and the heat that’s rekindled in my center.
While kissing him I wind my hand down between our legs and guide him inside of me. I gasp at the perfect fit, the way he expands to fill my needs. He fists my hair and pulls me closer. I fist his back and ride him, my hips taking over. He groans in my mouth and leans his head back, eyes closed. I sit up and rake my fingernails down his chest.
“Yes,” he cries out, his hips working to keep up with mine.
I drop to bite his nipples and let my inner wild out.
“Oh, Iphi,” he moans. “Yes! Use me, use my cock.”
No more encouragement needed. I set the pace, riding him hard, panting and grinding, and then slowing to bite and scratch. I’ve never done anything like this and I freaking love it. I love that he’s letting me explore and use him. That he wants me to.
I rock my hips forward and grind my clit against the base of him. Shivers and tingles, like flashes of lightning, shoot up from my core. I lose myself in the sensations as my orgasm builds.
“Look at me, gorgeous.” His voice is deep and raspy but commanding.
My eyes shoot open. He’s watching me with fierce intensity, a bonfire in his eyes.
“Touch yourself while you ride me, princess. Come all over my cock.”
I reach my hand between our legs and press against my clit, watching him watch me. The orgasm shoots through me wet and raw. Dominic roars, his cock pulsing, his eyes glued to mine. I bend down and join my lips with his, our kissing spurring us on further as we come together.
Chapter Thirty
Rhys
In Caspian’s house, Nolan and I sit at the stone-and-wood kitchen counter that flows between the kitchen and living room like a creek. Cas insisted we all go to his house, since he recently scored a butt-load of groceries. His words, not mine. I need something to take my mind off what may
be happening at Dom’s and food seems a good choice.
He makes us sandwiches. Turkey for himself and me. Nolan gets a veggie bristling with lettuce, cheese and tomato.
Always the dichotomy. A vegetarian blood drinker. Even when he was a little boy, he never ate meat. Not that he needed much, thanks to being part vampire. Thorn took to feeding him junk food for a while, mostly cheese pizza and chips. But when I was finally old enough to know better, I vetoed that. I saved up whatever money I could make doing odd jobs and bought my brother fresh vegetables and fruit.
“Did Dom need to perform a psych eval on Iphi or something?” Nolan asks, after swallowing a bite of sandwich.
Caspian and I exchange looks. Thorn, perched at the end of the kitchen counter and eating crickets, looks up with one half in and half out of his mouth. Tiny legs pump the air as if attempting to swim away. Sorry, buddy, that’s not going to happen.
“Something like that,” I answer and take another bite of bread.
Nolan narrows his eyes. “Why are you guys lying to me? I thought . . . shit, forget it.” He drops his sandwich on the plate. “I should have known. That was all lip service because Iphi was in the room, right?”
“No,” Caspian says.
“Of course not.” I reach out and clutch Nolan’s wrist. “It’s just we have no idea what exactly is going on over at Dom’s right now.”
“They wanted some alone time.” Caspian shrugs. “To talk.”
Nolan looks between us. “But aren’t you two worried? Isn’t she your girl to share?”
Thorn, oblivious, tosses his head, and his dinner shoots across the room. Taking advantage of its escape, the critter hops behind the couch to hide.
Caspian walks to the other side of the kitchen counter, placing his own sandwich plate between ours. “It’s an unorthodox arrangement, yes, but we prefer the title ‘girlfriend’ over ‘our girl to share.’ That just sounds a little too crass, brother.”
