Which couldn’t happen soon enough.
“Shit,” she blurted. “I’m…sorry. I’m mucking this all to hell. I’ll just go. Just—just let me up.” She wrestled her wrists and ankles at their cuffs—but the only thing that actually moved was her blindfold. She grimaced and blinked as Sexy Beast pushed the covering off her eyes. The lighting in the playroom wasn’t glaring but it seemed that way after spending fifteen minutes in darkness. “Look,” she bit out, “we tried, okay? And—”
And every thought in her head vanished, as the sudden lighting change gave her a deeper look beyond his mask.
Straight into his eyes.
“Oh, my God.”
How was his stare such an eerie match for Dan’s, too?
Okay, not an exact match. The color was a shade or two darker but the staunch focus of those twin blues…it socked her in the middle of her chest, just as Dan’s always did. And ohhhh, yes…clenched at her sex exactly the same way, too.
“Oh, my G—” She couldn’t hold back the repeat button—until something jabbed into her right wrist. She looked to see that she’d reacted on pure impulse, reaching to attempt unveiling him again. The wrist cuff, secured to the chain, stopped her. In the same moment, Sexy jerked backward, as if trying to rip the thought out of her head.
“I’m sorry,” she stammered. “You just—it’s just—” She let her hand fall. Her head tumbled as well. Not that it mattered. From the moment this man had first kissed her, her world had tilted inexorably off its axis.
“Just what?” Sexy fanned his fingers over her abdomen as he softly prompted it.
“Nothing,” she defended. “Nothing. It was crazy.” A breath whooshed out, thick with more tears. What the hell was wrong with her now? “Maybe this is all crazy.”
His fingers tightened. “Whoa. What?”
“I mean it,” she stressed. “I’m not…just not…” Her eyes squeezed shut. Not having the help of her hands as a shield…it was scary. Intimidating. More unsettling than being naked. “Maybe…I shouldn’t be here,” she confessed. “Not tonight.”
Not ever.
She didn’t need to share that particular tidbit. “I’m all over the place. My head feels like it’s in a cloud.”
There. Task surely accomplished now. It was lame enough to be sincere but still dumb enough to turn off any world-weary Dom wanting a drama-free play session.
Which apparently, he was
not.
Well,
hell
.
Tess’s chest flipped over as he lifted his other hand to her face, realigning her gaze with his. Other parts of her body instantly took up the tumbling act.
Ohhh, God
. It was a replay of the first moment he’d approached her. Dizzy attraction. Swoony lust. Feeling small next to his bulk but huge at the same time, the sole center of his attention.
“Clouds?” he murmured then, his voice a strange ribbon of sensual promise. “Ohhh, little rose. You’ve barely touched the sky yet.”
Shit.
She didn’t know she’d given the word volume until her dry rattle hit the air. “Ugh,” she followed in a murmur. “I’m real smooth now, right? Take foot, insert in mouth.”
He shot out a gentle
tsk
. “Not on my watch, beautiful. I believe I have better plans for that mouth.”
“Holy
shit
.” Forget blushing. Her face became a furnace. “Errr—for the record, that’s all
good
‘shit,’ okay?”
He chuckled. “You
did
sanctify it.’”
She shifted a little. Only a little. His fingers felt even better than his voice, so steady against her skin that she didn’t care that his gaze had retreated back into shadows of mystery. She didn’t dare risk dislodging them. Letting her eyes slip shut again, she pushed her face closer toward his hand.
“Holy
fuck
.” He gritted it while tucking his fingers into her hair. The animalistic edge of it made her lips curl up.
“More sanctification,” she whispered. “So that’s a
good
‘fuck’, Sir?”
“Sure as hell counting on it, red.”
She let out a little animal sound of her own as he pulled harder at her strands, positioning her for his kiss. Her growl became a groan the moment his mouth meshed with hers, and for good reason. It felt better, tasted better, resounded deeper than all his other kisses, searing her alive from the inside out. His tongue burned her like brandy, and his moan turned her blood into mist. No. Into clouds. The clouds he promised to take her to…
He pulled away all too fast. A whine crawled up her throat but she managed to rasp, “Does this mean you still want to do all this?”
“Still
want
to?” His hand slid from her hair, flattening to the dais on the other side of her head. “Hmmm. What part of ‘still want to’ might you be referring to, sweet rose? The part about how I’m going to tear your panties from your incredible little body next? Or the part about doing that just so I can stuff my fingers inside you, because getting inside your mind has made me need your body in the same way? Or the part about feeling your cunt soak my skin as I tell you it’s been a long damn time since I’ve met a subbie like you?”
Shaky sigh. Searing lust. Both flamed through her nipples, her pussy, her toes, and beyond. Dear God, did the man know his way around pillow talk—and there wasn’t even a damn pillow in sight.
“L-like m-me?” she managed.
“Gorgeous,” he clarified. “Fiery. Fascinating. Amazing.”
“Can I pick the ‘all of the above’ option?”
His lips grazed her hairline, heated and determined. “But you haven’t heard
all
the options.”
Gaaahhh
. “All the—options?”
“Wait.” He pushed back a little, angling his head in contemplation. “Hold on. ‘Option’ may not have been the best word for it. Should’ve just used ‘commands.’”
“Commands for what?”
She didn’t expect the extended pause before his reply. Or the long strokes of his hands inside her splayed corset, framing her body in pure heat before arriving at the apex of her thighs. With his thumbs denting her panties, he finally said, “For the part where I tell you to pick which toy to use on you tonight, to make you scream the loudest for me.”
Holy.
Shit.
It deserved an encore.
“Oh,” she squeaked. “Right.” Only
that
part.
His burnished hair gleamed in the light as he ran hands down her inner thighs and over her knees—before leaning back and yanking one of the pins out of the spreader bar. With an accomplished tug, he lengthened the bar. A high gasp escaped Tess as her legs jerked wider too. New parts of her pussy, now exposed to the air, zinged to life. Her thighs constricted. Her womb clenched. Her mind spun and whirled, almost disengaging from her body, flying higher…higher…
Little girl…you’ve barely touched the sky yet.
Was he kidding? How much better could this get?
“Well? Let’s hear it.” His charge was masterful, its ribbon of gentleness traded for a blade of demand. “Time to open up again, Odette.” He splayed hands to her inner thighs, opening her more, exposing her deepest, hottest vulnerability to him. “Talk to me.”
She swallowed deeply. Okay, he really
had
to be kidding. Talk to him, when he had her quivering and needy and mushy like this? When all she could think about was getting those fingers back on her pussy again?
“T-talk? About what?”
He gave her another dark, deep hum. “You know what. It’s all inside you, aching to get out. It lives in the place where you hide all your deepest fantasies. Now open the door and tell me. In your most wicked dreams, the ones that fill your mind when you touch your pussy late at night…what’s your Dom doing to you?”
“Besides what
you’re
doing?” Like teasing his fingers along the inner seam of her thong. Like brushing his fingers across her skin, strings of erotic butterfly kisses, dancing his fingertips around the bloom of her sex, driving her to the brink of sanity…
Until delivering a swift smack to the tender triangle.
“Oh!” Tess cried. “What the—”
“
Tell me
.” Screw the blade. He lowered a full verbal scythe. “And don’t gape at me like that. You didn’t come here for the easy shit, girl. You could have bypassed Max’s intake process for any of the happy-shiny BDSM circuses on the Strip.” He cupped her now, smashing the fabric into her sex, making her moan from the illicit excitement. “You’re soaked, little rose,” he growled. “I feel this. Every drop of this. I smell it, too. You’re in heat from just the idea of what I can do to you after a trip to that toy cabinet. So hear this: if you don’t tell me what you want me to get when I’m there, I’ll fill in the blanks with
my
preferences. How about clamps for your gorgeous tits? Yeah. That’s a good place to start. I really like clamps…so maybe another set that’s made to spread your pussy wider for me, so I can tease every inch of it just the way I like.” His smile spread when her eyes popped at the first and her mouth dropped at the second. “Yes? Okay, both of those, then.”
“Wait!”
She blurted it desperately but not reluctantly. There was no point arguing what his suggestions did to her, since his hand was still mashing her panties against her core, proving him completely right about her arousal. The sharp silk of it scented more of the air with every passing second—heightened by his nasty words, his feral grin, and the power beginning to pour off him in discernible waves.
Holy hell. A thousand
wows
. What he could do to her. What he
was
doing to her…
She tried to swallow. Yeah,
right.
Her body barely remembered to breathe, it was so amped and hot and pulsing and turned on.
She was either in for the biggest slice of heaven or the biggest splash to hell. And right now, the promise of the former far outshone the risk of the latter.
“Flogger,” she exclaimed. “I mean—a flogger, please, Sir. That’s—that’s what I’d like you to use on me. Please. Oh, please.”
He canted his head, an approving move. “Beautiful, sweet rose.” He scooted back again, but not before tucking a pair of fingers into the top of her thong and twisting. As he left the dais, the garment followed.
Thwack.
It snapped off her body in one sharp instant.
Tess blinked, unable to hide her wonderment.
Sexy smirked, spreading what remained of the panties between his long fingers. “Liked that too, did you?”
Her jaw worked on air for a second. “That’s only supposed to happen in movies.”
“That so?” His twisting lips pulled his stubble into roguish angles.
She scraped her brain for something witty to fling back at that, but her brain stalled for at least a minute. What other explanation was there for the fact that he now stood at the end of the altar, braced legs positioned between hers, black leather flogger in hand—and a sinful smile on his lips?
“What movie am I from now?” He twirled the falls over her left foot. Tess shivered from the ticklish tease, wondering what he was really thinking. Between the mask and his dark gold scruff, he was unreadable—but utterly sensual. She was damn grateful he didn’t slide the blindfold back down. Beholding him now, with his grin widening and his broad chest flexing, she really wondered if there were hidden cameras capturing every magical moment of his movements. Her pussy clenched all over again, thinking of someone watching the security feed from this playroom, an envious voyeur to their illicit exchange.
“Hmmm.” She sighed as he brushed the leather over her right foot. “Good question. Hero in disguise. There’s a lot to pick from there.”
“Hero?” He glided the strands up her leg, stopping before they got to her trembling sex. “You sure about that?” Twirl. Twirl. The falls fanned out, brushing so close, making her tissues shiver…and moisten. “Maybe I’m the diabolical villain, instead.”
“Oh, Sir.” She pushed up her hips as high as she could. “I can only hope.”
He didn’t twirl the flogger anymore. With a
whoosh
, the strands arced, gaining power before he brought them down across her upper thighs. Tess cried out, but more in astonishment than pain. Every sensation was just as she’d imagined…and more. A slight sting followed by a subtle throb, then a suffusion of heat. Her muscles softened—just before he struck her again. And again. And again. Each time was as perfect as the last. Sting, throb, heat. Sting, throb, heat.
After half a dozen strokes, the
whoosh
became more pronounced.
He brought the flogger down. The leather smacked louder, harder on her legs.
Fireworks
.
Tess moaned. Sexy emitted his most luscious growl yet.
“Damn. What a beautiful rose you really are.” He reached down, petting the skin he’d just heated, his fingers moving in broad, strong sweeps. “Pink and tender, like petals folding back. And soon, I’ll know the nectar of your pussy.” He leaned in, fondling the lips that were now swollen and moist around her deepest core. “So sweet,” he praised. “So glistening and ready for me. I want to see more of it, little one. Bear down for me. Convulse your cunt. Give me some more sweet cream.”
She obeyed because she had no choice. Because with every sweep of that flogger, he’d sealed more cells of her body to his will—and now, with every syllable from his lips, he bent her mind deeper to his command. His magical mouth entranced her even more as he sucked on his fingers, growling from the taste of her sex on his skin. Tess fixated on his movements as she tightened her tunnel, clenching for him over and over, finally rewarded by the dark groan that escaped past his locked teeth.
“Fuck,” he uttered. “
Yes.
”
An answering sound tumbled out of her, needy and wild, as he unbuckled her from the spreader bar. He didn’t bother to free her ankles from the cuffs themselves. Instead, he gripped the pads as leverage, shoving her legs high, splaying her sex for him.
A higher cry burst off her lips. She’d never been on display like this for a man before, so wide and vulnerable, positioned for one purpose alone. As a result, every rational thought in her head was incinerated, replaced by hopes that became pure pleas.
Take me. Use me. Fuck me.
“So good,” her Dom grated, biting his way along the inside of one thigh until he hungrily tongued her slit. “So damn good, rose.”