Elijah calmly picked up the shared soda for another sip.
“If I was your Dom, that’s exactly what I would do.”
“What do you mean?” Her brow furrowed, and he saw that he had taken her aback.
Good. Just as intended.
“If we were together, you would give care of yourself to me. You would do what I said because you would trust me to fulfill your needs, and often your wants as well.” He watched as she inhaled sharply, her cheeks flushing beneath his intense scrutiny. “That includes telling me things that might be uncomfortable. I will never abuse any of the knowledge or trust that you give to me, but in order for me to take care of you properly, you need to be open.”
He continued after a pause. “You would need to give yourself to me entirely. And I don’t know that you’re entirely capable of doing that.” The more time he spent around her, the more Elijah wondered about it.
She was like a flame: beautiful, ever changing, dangerous.
He wasn’t sure he could stay away.
“I . . . I don’t know what to say.” Samantha pushed the tray across the table, having clearly lost her appetite. Her color was better than it had been in the club, thanks to the food and drink, and he was satisfied that she’d be able to make it home without passing out.
“You’ve seen a lot tonight.” Elijah stood and offered his hand to Samantha. She stared at it for a long moment, as if no one had ever offered her help before. Slowly she took it, and stood as well.
The naked length of her legs, capped by those siren red shoes, and the memory of what lay between them tested his patience sorely. He wanted to pick her up, to have her wrap those long legs around his waist while he pressed her against the diner wall, shoved her panties aside, and drove himself inside her, audience or not. In fact, the idea of having spectators turned him on even more.
The lifestyle had taught him, however, that the longer gratification was delayed, the bigger the reward. So he pushed down his base urges and did no more than rub a thumb over her hand.
“You’ll contact me tonight.” It would be a long, long wait until then, but he had no choice but to ride the wave of anticipation.
When she came to tell him that she would accept the commission—and he was sure she would—he would take it one step further. He would ask her for a night together at Devorar, his club, where he could take her further into her explorations.
“Here—” Reaching into the pocket of her cardigan, Samantha withdrew a handful of peso notes, which she tried to give to him. Elijah gently folded her hand back around them and pushed it away.
She opened her mouth, and he knew she was going to argue. He frowned.
“I like to take care of the woman I’m with. You would need to get used to that.” He enjoyed the way her lips parted in surprise. Silently she tucked the money back into the pocket of her sweater.
He could all but hear the gears turning in her brain. She’d been introduced to a lot over the last few hours, and Elijah knew that now it was time to give her some space to process.
“Come on. I’ll walk you to your car.” He just hoped that she would come to the right conclusion, because he was certain of one thing.
He wanted her more than he’d ever wanted anyone or anything in his life.
He was a planner, a strategist, and he had more than enough money to help him with his ideas. He would do whatever it took to persuade her that she wanted him too.
CHAPTER SIX
I
nstead of feeling tired when she arrived home from Pecado, Samantha had been filled with nearly manic energy. By two in the morning she’d had to go out to her studio, to try to capture her feelings in a glass piece that she planned to color the palest shade of pink to represent the evening’s encounter with Elijah.
She hadn’t had any success—hadn’t been able to concentrate on the work.
The bubble of glass on the end of her pipe began to hang lopsided. She cursed; she hadn’t been paying enough attention, hadn’t turned the pipe evenly. The result was thicker glass on one side than the other.
Sometimes this was a happy accident, something that worked into the piece she ultimately had in mind. Yet since what she was trying to create showed balance, a yin and a yang, this looked all kinds of wrong.
“Bloody hell.” Exhaling harshly, Samantha rose to take the pipe back to the furnace. There, she scraped the creation back into the melt, where it would become something else some other time.
Closing her eyes, she placed her hands behind her head and arched her back, stretching out the muscles that had cramped during her hours of work. She was sore, but it wasn’t anything she wasn’t used to.
The tender flesh between her legs, though—that was a new sensation. She pictured Elijah’s golden head as it had been that night, nuzzled at the apex of her thighs, and felt heat flash all over her body.
“Submissive.” Samantha whispered the word, then repeated it to herself more loudly.
Was that really what she wanted?
She thought back to her night at the club. She’d been startled by a lot of the things she’d seen—even appalled by some of the activities mentioned on the questionnaire that Angelo had had her fill out.
When Angelo had given her commands, she had felt herself respond, but it had been a mild sensation. Like when someone walked by with an ice-cream cone after she’d just finished dinner—there was interest, but not a deep desire.
Yet when Elijah told her what to do, it had been like a tsunami descending upon her entire being. She’d found that she had no choice but to respond. And more, she wanted to follow his commands.
She still wasn’t entirely sure how she felt about being spanked. Wasn’t certain she liked the idea of crops, or whips, or canes—even if the lashes were delivered by Elijah.
But being restrained—that had been a major turn-on. More than that, the manner in which Elijah had taken her in his arms after she’d had her momentary panic attack had filled something deep inside her. The way he’d wrapped her in a blanket, held her close, fed her—it had been strange and some kind of wonderful to be taken care of.
That
was what she wanted, more than anything she’d seen in the BDSM club. She wanted a strong man, a man who would take care of her without questioning her endlessly about it. A man who wasn’t put off by the fact that she could be argumentative and stubborn.
Elijah was that man. She was absolutely sure of it.
“I can do this.” Suddenly too warm, Samantha strode across the small studio and wrenched open the door. The early-morning air was cool, refreshing her and filling her with new purpose.
The man seemed to have gotten it into his head that she couldn’t—wouldn’t—submit. He was so stuck on it that Samantha figured it must be really important to him.
She needed to prove to him that she could do it. Her evening at the club had simply been to test the waters before she dove in.
She now felt ready—as ready as she would ever be.
She would accept his offer of the commission, because she needed the money for her sister and it could pay off the remainder of Beth’s student loans, as well as buy her diabetic supplies for a full year.
But along with the money, she had a request to make of him. She wanted to learn how to be a submissive, and the month it would take her to finish the piece of glasswork seemed like a perfect opportunity to ask the man she wanted to be with to teach her.
The idea of an entire month in Elijah’s care made her skin flush, made her ache in that empty place between her thighs.
She wanted a strong man. She was sure that Elijah was the one she’d been looking for, and she wasn’t about to let him get away.
• • •
“S
eñorita Collins is here to see you.” Elijah’s administrative assistant at the resort office, Lupe, knocked on the door even though it was cracked open. Her eyes were wide as she regarded him. “She’s very pretty.”
“She certainly is.” Elijah felt his spirits lift. He’d been filled with anticipation ever since he’d left Samantha at her car the night before. He’d managed to catch a couple of hours of sleep, but it hadn’t lessened the sensation.
He’d promised that she could have until the end of the day, and he’d built his business reputation by honoring his word. But he found that he couldn’t focus on his work, as images of Samantha in that lacy little nightie, legs and arms spread and in chains, kept running through his mind.
He hadn’t expected to hear from her until early evening at the very soonest. He certainly hadn’t expected her to show up at his office, but his body came alert at the very mention of her name.
“Bring her in, please, Lupe.” His assistant disappeared around the door again, and Elijah felt his nerves humming in pleasant anticipation.
Samantha appeared in the doorway, her face a study in nervousness.
“I didn’t think I’d hear from you so soon.” He wanted to rise, to pull her to him and reenact the kiss that had haunted his mind since the night before.
But for this to work, she needed to come to him. Though his muscles twitched, he forced himself to remain seated.
“I’m going to create your sculpture.” Though Samantha’s face revealed her tension, her voice was strong. Elijah savored the sound.
It took a very strong woman to submit. And he hoped she would prove strong enough.
“I’m accepting the commission, and I’m hoping you’ll do something for me at the same time.” She stepped closer to him. He cursed inwardly when he saw that she was wearing those red fuck-me sandals again, paired with a lacy white sundress that made her seem sweet and innocent.
He wondered if she was wearing anything underneath the sundress.
Her contrasts were driving him crazy.
“What is it you want?” Elijah watched the way her breasts quivered as she exhaled.
She stepped closer and planted her hands on his desk.
Samantha flipped her long braid back over her shoulder, and he caught a hint of her wildflower scent. His body was already conditioned to respond to the smell of her, the taste, and he felt his cock begin to thicken.
Elijah looked into those vivid green eyes, felt the pull of attraction.
Samantha hesitated for a moment, moistening her lips with the tip of her tongue, and his eyes tracked the movement.
“I want to explore my . . . my submissive side.”
Elijah felt his entire body clench with anticipation.
“And I would like your help.”
“I need you to say the words.” Of all the things she might have asked for, this had never crossed his mind.
“I want to know what it’s like to be someone’s submissive.” Her words were soft but sure. “
Your
submissive. At least for the time it takes me to complete the sculpture. And then I can decide whether it’s really right for me.”
He watched as she inhaled deeply, then sank her teeth into her lower lip. Next, in one swift movement she bent, fisted her hands in the hem of her sundress, and lifted it up and over her head.
She was gloriously naked beneath it. Elijah prided himself on always being in control, but when Samantha’s body was bared to him entirely, he felt his jaw hit the floor.
He stared, rising partially in his chair, his hands fisting with the need to touch. He was aware that she had spoken, but had to tear his eyes from the rose-colored nipples that had peaked under his stare while she repeated herself.
“I want to explore submission. And I want to explore it with you.”
• • •
E
lijah felt his breath leave him in a heated rush.
“Why are you asking for this?” He stood, getting a better view of Samantha, naked except for those red sandals, and his cock hardened to the point of pain.
It was what he wanted: Samantha, in his care. A month to explore whatever this was between them.
“You know why.” Her voice was soft, but she still looked him right in the eye. It was a reminder of why he had reservations over her submission to him, a reminder of the reason he couldn’t simply bend her over his desk and plunge into what he knew would be an inferno of slick heat.
If she wanted to learn what it was like to submit, then he needed to take the power away from her.
“Come here,” Elijah commanded, his voice pitched low. He saw something spark in the depths of her eyes, but there was no hesitation; she rounded his desk quickly until she stood before him.
“Bend over the desk until you can put your cheek on it. Put your hands behind your back.” Lifting his shirt, Elijah undid his belt buckle, then slid it out through the belt loops.
He knew that she heard and identified the sound, because she tensed. But rather than lashing that creamy skin with the leather of the belt, he looped it around her wrists and fastened the buckle, sliding a finger between the leather and her wrist to make sure the binding wasn’t too tight.
The night before had told him that pain wasn’t what got her excited. No, Samantha liked being bound—liked having control taken away and being told what she could and couldn’t do.
This was why he needed to teach her this lesson before he could accept her submission. He ached to have her as his sub, but he wouldn’t be doing either of them any favors if he didn’t see this last thing through.
Silently, he undid the zipper of his shorts, let them and his briefs fall to the floor. He stroked a hand up and down the length of his erect cock, then moved closer, letting his hips cup her naked ass, and his cock nestle into the cleft that divided it.
She moaned, the sound vibrating throughout her body.
“Do you like being caged in like this?” Deliberately Elijah arched his hips, pressing against her heated flesh. He swallowed a curse as his cock rubbed against her ass.
He wanted to slide it
into
her ass, and prayed that this lesson went the way he wanted it to.
She nodded her head yes, and Elijah bent over her, pinning her down.
“Do you like having control taken away from you?” Again she nodded, and without warning he worked his hand between their bodies and slid his fingers between her legs. Her hips bucked back against him and she cried out, but he didn’t do any more than hold his fingers still inside her.