by Alice Ward
Nobody was there, or at least visible through the peephole. That meant one of two things. Either the person had already left, or they were standing off to the side out of viewing range.
“This is weird,” I whispered into the mouthpiece.
“Hmm?” Owen asked.
“I don’t see anyone,” I said softly. I swiveled my head from side to side in hopes of spotting an arm or a shoulder, but all I saw was worn carpeting and bad wallpaper and my across-the-hall neighbor’s door.
He didn’t respond, and I wondered if I’d spoken too quietly for him to hear me. Deciding to take the chance, I undid the deadbolt and unlocked the door. I swung it open to reveal nobody. And then I looked around the corner.
There he was. Tall, dark-haired, and hungry-eyed.
CHAPTER THIRTY
Owen
“Hey, sweetheart,” I murmured, smirking slightly.
Tabby was ogling me, her enchanting eyes as wide as plates and her mouth hanging open in comedic fashion. I couldn’t tell if she was breathing or if she’d suspended respirations altogether, but I figured I’d wait until her lips started turning blue to jar her out of her freeze. Then, she emitted a rather strangled gurgle and gasped, “I think I drank too much.”
“That bodes well for what I have planned,” I chortled.
She stepped out fully from behind her door, revealing a t-shirt too large for her frame with the hem of plaid-patterned shorts poking out beneath the bottom. Her arms, legs, and feet were bare, and after a month without seeing her face-to-face, I was eager to lick and kiss every inch of that naked skin. Her hair fell loosely over her shoulders, swinging around her face as she shook her head in disbelief. The glasses I’d found so adorable since our first meeting were in danger of falling off the end of her nose, but she didn’t bother to push them back up into place again. I was glad. I’d missed her quirks and perfect imperfections.
“I want to believe you’re really there,” she said. She was still talking into the phone like I was all the way in Louisiana and she was seeing a doppelganger. “But I’m pretty sure I’m having the white wine hallucinations.”
“Yeah? Enjoy it while you can,” I advised, stepping forward. I curled my arms around her waist, pulled her none too gently against me, and claimed her mouth.
She tasted like heaven. The wine was still fresh on her tongue, and sweet fruitiness burst across my taste buds as I wound my tongue around hers. Most amazing, perhaps, was to realize that though I was definitely aroused, the physicality of the kiss was hardly the best part. It was her in all her Tabby-ness—having her there against me, knowing I could hear one of her snarky remarks straight from her mouth instead of through a phone, being able to witness the variety of emotions she went through upon seeing me at her door unannounced.
“Okay, so you’re real,” she panted when I pulled back.
I kissed her forehead. “That’s what I want you to think.”
She was still too stunned to appreciate my humor properly. Clumsily, she grabbed my wrist and twisted at the waist toward her apartment. “Come in,” she invited in a distant, dumbfounded voice.
I obliged her at once, reaching behind me to snag the handle of my bag as I did. The second I entered her apartment, I felt like I’d leapt out of reality and into my imagination. It was exactly what I’d pictured, with some help from Skype. Photos of all subjects and styles — black and white, abstract, portrait, minimalistic — were mounted on every available inch of wall as far as the eye could see. Colors exploded the eye, from the rich purple couch to the tangerine lampshades to her turquoise and sea green bedspread. A light whiff of vanilla and something floral hung in the air, and though the space was small it felt far from suffocating. It felt like Tabby — warm, comforting, and eccentric.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, closing the door behind us. The street noise was hardly muffled by our enclosure.
“Good to see you too,” I teased.
She turned to face me again, her hands on her hips and her expression spacey. “Sorry,” she apologized quickly. “I’m really happy to see you, really, I just didn’t expect to see you. And…” she regained the spunky flash in her eyes, “you scared the hell out of me. I didn’t know if you were some criminal waiting to jump me when I opened the door or something.”
“The criminal thing depends on who you talk to, but I will admit to wanting to jump you.” I flashed her a bright, overexaggerated beam.
“Uh huh. So?” she pressed. “What are you doing here?”
“There’s a new chef on the radar. He’s based out of Chicago, and I’m interested in backing his flagship.” She narrowed her eyes, and I added, “Any good investor knows it’s always best to get in early when you’re presented with a gem.”
Tabby made a disbelieving noise in the back of her throat and lifted her hands from her hips to cross her arms over her chest. “You’re here to check out a new chef?” she reiterated. I couldn’t stop my grin of silent admittance. A smile fluttered over her lips. “Liar.”
“Oh, yeah?” I challenged. My grin grew as I stepped toward her.
“Yeah.” She turned her chin up at me with defiance.
I darted forward to grab her, but she hopped out of reach in the nick of time. Lowering my eyebrows to adopt a ferocious expression, I growled and crouched into a pouncing position. She giggled, a thrilling sound of excitement and nervousness, and visibly battled between putting more space between us or holding her ground. Her contemplation took too long. I leapt at her, wrangling her by the waist before she had a chance to escape. I heard the effects of the alcohol in her delighted, terrified squeal as I lifted her easily and threw her over my shoulder.
“You should know I brought my tally sheet with me,” I revealed sinisterly. I cracked my palm across her turned up ass, eliciting another squeal from her. “And it’s time to cash in.”
“No!” she wailed through deep, rolling waves of uncontrolled laughter.
She tried to kick herself free, legs flailing madly and knees clocking my ribs, but I wasn’t going to give. It had been a month—thirty damn days—since I’d had my hands on her, and I wasn’t going to let go because of a little wiggling. I crossed the miniature apartment in long strides. As I passed the couch, she tried to grab for the backrest, but I jerked her away and rolled headfirst onto the bed. She tumbled off my shoulder in a ball and scrambled to the opposite end of the mattress. We stared at each other, poised like sumo wrestlers about to do battle, her whole body quivering with giggles she couldn’t stop.
Jesus, I was hard.
I snarled and lunged. Tabby rocketed backward, but I caught her by the ankle before she could scrabble off the bed completely. In one swift yank, I pulled her to me and crawled on top of her.
“Foolish girl,” I murmured, lowering myself to trap her underneath my body. “You’re not going anywhere.”
“Okay, okay!” she conceded. Her eyes were wet with giddy tears, and her sensual lower lip was trembling with adrenaline.
I took that lip between my teeth and suckled on it gently. She calmed beneath my oral caresses, and when I ventured deeper into her mouth, she responded eagerly. I slid my hand up her side to the bulge of her breast beneath the cotton shirt while our tongues danced, relishing the blessing it was to feel her again. Her arms curled around my shoulders, and her nails sketched trails in the back of my neck, releasing a sliver of the passion building between us.
“Owen,” she breathed, withdrawing from me to look up into my face.
I licked her jawline. “You rang?”
“I want you to show me.”
For a second, I didn’t move. The request was so vague it could’ve been in reference to any number of things, but I had a sneaking suspicion she was talking about something incredibly specific — something I both hoped and feared she meant. I raised my head to peer down at her and study her face. She was unblinking, unflinching. Stoic, even. There were no jokes now.
“Show you what?” I asked, a j
ittery sensation brewing in my gut.
“What you like. Your interest.”
There it was. We’d toed the edge of the conversation since we’d met, but we’d never looked it right in the face. In the course of my seeing Tabby, I’d indulged myself and my particular fancies in a myriad of small ways, but I had, for all intents and purposes, thrown the vast majority of my darker desires into a metaphorical closet and hidden the key until the right moment arose to bring them back out into the light.
Apparently, Tabby had found the key and was waiting for me to open that closet.
“I know you’re curious about it,” I said carefully, “but you don’t know what you’re asking.”
“No, I don’t,” she agreed. She scooted up on the bed until she was able to prop herself up on her elbows. I sat back on my heels with a sigh. “But I know why I’m asking, and that’s all that matters. At least, that’s all that matters to me.”
I leveled my gaze with hers. “Okay. Why are you asking?”
Her eyes softened, and a tiny smile played on her lips. “Because I want to know you, and that means knowing all of you.”
She was hitting me right where it hurt — the emotional leverage. It was actually quite an interesting juxtaposition. Had she just been one of the Club girls, I would’ve let her in on the big, bad secret the instant I got her in my bedroom, and I wouldn’t have any qualms about it because there were absolutely no feelings involved. Yet, when I cared for a woman and she cared for me, I was reluctant. I might have even been scared. Unfortunately, my fascination on the psychology of my issues was hardly something I wanted to indulge at the moment.
I was, however, considering obliging her request more than I ever would have in the past.
“Do me a favor,” I said. “Say the word ‘red.’”
She tilted her head in confusion but obeyed. “Red.”
“Good. Not difficult, right? So easy it’s almost stupid?” She nodded. I shuffled toward her and placed my hand over her mouth. “Now, say it again, and make sure it’s clear.”
“Red,” she repeated, muffled but noticeably louder.
“A little harder than before, but still a breeze, yes?” I asked. I kept my hand over her mouth as I spoke, so she merely nodded in response rather than answering against my palm. “Okay, hold your breath.”
Tabby gave me a quizzical look.
“I mean it. Hold your breath, and don’t let it out unless you absolutely have to,” I ordered.
She inhaled deeply, her shoulders rising with the swelling of her lungs, then stilled with her cheeks puffed out.
“Don’t let it out,” I said again. Then, I jammed my index and middle fingers through her lips and teeth until I reached the opening of her throat. She gagged immediately from the aggressive insertion, but I didn’t withdraw. “Say it.”
Her face was turning as pink as carnation petals, and she made an utterly incomprehensible sound that wasn’t reminiscent in the slightest of “red.” I raised my eyebrows, jostled my fingers slightly, and told her with my eyes to try again. She did, but the word still couldn’t be made out. All I heard was a humming groan of sorts.
I pulled my fingers out of her mouth and told her to breathe again. She exhaled in a gush, and more color flooded her cheeks with the relief of new oxygen. I waited until she’d collected herself before explaining.
“That last part was the best example I could give you of what engaging in my ‘interest’ is like,” I told her soberly. “It requires the utmost faith, along with absolute and unwavering honesty, because you will lose yourself. Literally, Tabby. You won’t know your own name. All the basic functions you take for granted on a daily basis, like breathing and speaking, will be taken away from you and put in my hands, and if your intent is to know all of me, I’m not going to hold back. There will be no mercy.”
She was silent, and I was unable to read her expression. I stared deep into her eyes, desperate to impart to her just how important this was for her to understand if we were to proceed. She looked right back at me without a glimmer of uncertainty.
“If you still want to know me,” I continued very clearly, “ask me again.”
Tabby’s lashes folded over her cheekbones. She sat up straighter and laid her hands in her lap. When she opened her eyelids again, she said with equal clarity, “I want you to show me.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
Tabby
The only light in the apartment was the orange glow filtering through the window from the streetlamp outside. My skin was covered in goosebumps despite the mild temperature of the summer night, and I shivered intermittently. The blankets beneath me were my only source of modesty. Lying at the foot of the bed were the pajamas I’d been ordered to strip from my body. I was overly alert, eyes wide to see the smallest movements, ears pricked to hear the slightest sounds. Anticipation flowed through my veins.
“You are going to scream for me.”
From the shadows, completely nude and wickedly erect, appeared Owen… yet, he wasn’t Owen at all. His flashing eyes were dark, hooded, fatal. The sculpted mouth from which I’d learned to expect witticisms and suggestive threats was still with unspoken promises to steal from me every last ounce of sanity I possessed. Each crevice on his lean, chiseled torso signaled warnings to me as he stalked smoothly past the window through the bath of amber light, and the muscles flexing in his arms urged me to get away now while I had the chance.
I wasn’t getting away. I was captivated, riveted to the spot where I lay with hands at my sides and thighs marginally spread.
“You are going to leave your body because it was never yours to have.” He reached the edge of the bed, and I felt his fingers come to rest on the top of my foot. “You belong to me.”
The fingers tapped… once, twice, three times.
“I want to show you something, and you will not make a sound. Am I understood?”
My head nodded of its own accord. Already, I felt as though my spirit had left my body and I was hovering overhead in the ether, watching the seduction.
He lifted his hand, and for a moment, I thought his demonstration was going to be with my omission. Then, a fingernail scaled my heel. I twitched, but the pressure he applied was well within my realm of tolerance. The nail journeyed north, venturing into the sensitive arch, and I nearly pulled my foot away instinctively. He didn’t take hold of my ankle or even shoot me a glance to remind me he’d commanded my silence. The lack of acknowledgement was perhaps more frightening than a stern detailing of the punishment I would receive if I disobeyed him. It indicated he was leaving me with a measure of control over myself rather than stealing it all from me, and in a startling revelation, I realized I trusted control of my body exponentially more in his hands than my own.
Higher that nail traveled, sliding experimentally across the ball of my foot and easing into the crease beneath my toes. A laugh started rising in my throat, and I swallowed hard to choke it down. He wasn’t done. A second finger joined the first to dance across the pads of my toes and dip into the webbing between them, and the tempo increased. I was overcome with a debilitating need to giggle, to release my ticklishness somehow, but I wasn’t allowed, and the unrevealed punishment was more frightening than the denial of reflex.
Faster and faster he scribbled. Jerks and jolts raced up my leg to my groin, and I felt moisture slipping from between my folds. I was going to break. I could feel it coming in waves, the loosening of determined threads. As if he sensed this, he brought his other hand down, and all at once, ten fingers rocketed across my sole.
I split apart, shrieking with bottled laughter. My knee shot backward to free my foot from his assault, and my thighs burst into flames. Owen didn’t react. He watched me giggle until the last chuckle died from my lips without so much as a wisp of interest. When I’d calmed, hiccupping a little, he placed both hands on the bed around my legs and leaned closer.
“You obeyed me as long as you could,” he said matter-of-factly. “You were able to
control your physical reactions and adhere to the single guideline I gave you. Your mind and your body were at odds, and you battled hard for your mind. But you lost.”
Fear fluttered in my belly, and I remembered the tally sheet. If he was going to punish me now, I was sure to suffer immensely.
“I told you before that tickling elicits involuntary response, that it’s primal,” he continued. “Do you remember?”
“Yes,” I whispered.
“That’s my ‘interest,’ so to speak. Involuntary response. My pleasure comes from taking you far beyond the boundaries of comprehension and coherence. Reason, logic, and rational response are advanced coping mechanisms developed to understand the world around us and our place in it, but the body is very much capable of discarding those mechanisms when forced. Our primal nature takes over when our survival is at risk.” His explanation was educational at face value, but the purr in his undertones made it more ominous, a foreboding description of what was to come. The space between my legs had become so wet that the air kissing it felt cold, and I shivered both with chill and terrified arousal.
He eased himself over me, crawling his way up the length of my body until his eyes were level with mine and I could smell the spearmint on his breath. Fire raged in his gaze as he lowered his mouth to my lips, and a tremor coursed through me as he shifted sideways to slide his tongue along my ear.
“I’m going to rip orgasm after orgasm from your helpless body,” he murmured softly. “I’m going to make you come over and over until you’re reduced to the quivering, feral animal you are. And when I’m done, when you can’t take any more, when you’re choking on your tongue and shaking more than a felon on the way to the electric chair, I’m going to fill you up and start all over again.”
If I’d had a chance to, I would have moaned from the sheer eroticism of his words, but I never got the opportunity. He closed his lips around mine, pulled my tongue into his mouth with his teeth, and slammed two fingers into my sex.
