“Like?” she asked, smiling down at me.
“Ah, sì.” I closed my eyes and relaxed, loving the sensations she was building inside me. “You had me worried for a second.”
“Worried how?” She moved her silky hands down my sides then back up to my shoulders.
“I don’t know. Talking about before. Everything’s different now.”
“Everything is different. But I’m not. And you’re not either. And if there’s one thing I know about you, Luc”—her heat surrounded me as she leaned down and brushed her lips against mine once more—“it’s that no matter how gently you can make love, deep down, you are not and never will be a vanilla lover.”
She drew back from my lips, and I blinked into the darkness, confused by her last statement. Then a lighter flared, and I realized what else she’d been hiding next to my hip. The other object she now had in her hand.
A candle.
“You said something else to me. When we were in Venice. When I was struggling with our relationship and the things you wanted from me.”
I sucked in a breath as she held the candle a foot over my chest, letting the flame melt the wax around the wick. Beneath her, my muscles tensed, and I grew rock hard.
“You said you weren’t a sadist. That what you did wasn’t for pain but for pleasure. To train my mind and body to surrender to someone who only wants to please me. You were telling me the truth then. Only, this last week? You haven’t been living that truth. You’ve been denying that part of you that I fell for in Rome and Venice. And until you let that Luc come back to me, things aren’t going to get better. Not completely.”
She looked down at me, the golden glow from the flame illuminating her soft features and heated eyes. “I want that Luc back.” Her fingers tipped the candle so the melted wax rolled right to the edge and hovered. “Don’t you want that Luc back too?”
I clenched my jaw as I stared up at her, fighting an urge that was so primal, so engrained in me, I couldn’t tell if I’d been born with it or if my sick House had corrupted me along the way.
Every day, I fought the urge to dominate her sexually. To take her in any and every way I imagined. To force her to enjoy all the perverted things I liked. I’d tried to do just that when we’d first been together, and she’d balked along the way. And she’d been right to balk, because one person bending the other to their depraved will wasn’t love. It wasn’t a healthy relationship. And it wasn’t the man I wanted to be. Not anymore.
“No.” My voice was thick, gravelly, sounded nothing like my own, but I held my ground and didn’t look away from her eyes. “I don’t want that.”
She inched her hips back, until her sweet little ass bumped against my aching cock. “Feels to me like you do.” She reached back with one hand and grasped my shaft, massaging my length until I groaned. “You haven’t been this hard in quite a while.”
If she kept stroking me like that, I just might come. “That’s”—I cleared my throat—“biology. You’re sitting on me naked.”
“Really? So if I were to drip this wax onto your chest, it wouldn’t make you hotter?”
Oh holy fuck...
“Tell me no and I won’t do it.”
Her eyes held mine, hot and challenging, and when I didn’t answer, only clenched my jaw and curled my hands into fists above my head, she bit her lip and tipped the candle so a droplet of hot oil splattered over my left pec.
A hot sting, like being snapped with a rubber band, shot through my skin and echoed all around my nipple, causing me to suck in a sharp breath. Arcs of electricity shot outward from the spot and torpedoed straight into my groin, and even though I willed it not to, my cock grew even harder and pulsed against her ass.
A knowing smile spread over her face, and she whispered, “I thought so,” just before she moved the candle to my other pec and let several more droplets fall against my skin.
Each sting of pain was immediately followed up by a pulse of pleasure that only made me harder. And the little vixen knew. She knew and was getting off tormenting me.
And, sweet mother of God, I loved it.
I closed my eyes as she dribbled wax all over my nipples and pecs, even along my belly, careful to avoid any areas with hair. Gripping the cuffs pinning my arms to the headboard above, I tried like hell not to rock my hips up against her every time I felt that sharp stab of hot pain, but failed miserably. I was growing hotter by the second. All I could think about was fucking her hard and deep. And I was suddenly grateful I was restrained, because if I wasn’t, I knew I wouldn’t be able to hold back that primal urge that was screaming for me to toss her to her stomach and show her just what an assertive Dom I could really be.
She leaned to the left, and I heard a click. Opening my eyes, I realized she’d set the candle on a plate on the nightstand at my side. She placed her hands on the cool wax stuck to my chest and leaned down to kiss me, and when her lips met mine, I opened at the first touch and sucked her tongue into my mouth until she groaned.
“Mm,” she whispered against my lips. “You liked that.”
“Climb over me, angioletto. Let me make you feel good.”
“Nope.” She pushed away from me again. “This isn’t about me. It’s about you.”
She slid down my body, and I sucked in another breath, confused why she was doing this. “Natalie, I don’t want kinky sex. I just want you.”
“But you like kinky, dirty sex. You told me that multiple times.”
Her hot breath washed over my groin, and I closed my eyes and breathed deeply, knowing I absolutely liked my sex kinky and as dirty as possible, but I didn’t want to like it that way. I wanted to be normal. I wanted to be the opposite of what I’d become.
“Just...” I ground my teeth, searching for a way to get her to give in to me. “Sit on my face.” That would be kinky enough for her. “Let me taste you.”
“Nice try.” Her lips skimmed my inner thigh. “Maybe later, though.”
Before I could argue, something rubber encircled the base of my cock and tightened around my testicles. I lifted my head to try to see what she was doing and was distracted by a buzzing sound and series of vibrations that lit up my dick and echoed all through my balls.
“Santa madre di Dio,” I gasped. “What the fuck is that?”
“Something on the edge of vanilla. I’m working through the box slowly.”
“Cristo Santo.” I knew exactly what it was. It was a vibrating cock ring. And holy hell, those vibrations were about to set me on fucking fire. “I don’t...merda...need this, Natalie.”
“I think you’re lying.”
She wrapped her fingers around the base of my cock. And then I felt her tongue, teasing the tip, swirling all around the head until I thought I’d go mad. But it wasn’t until she closed her mouth around me that I nearly lost it. When I felt that unmistakable wet suction combined with the body-shaking vibrations, the last of my restraint buckled. Biology took over, my body and mind fueled by only one thing: raw, primal need.
I jerked my arms down. The left chain snapped, freeing me. A growl echoed through the room as the bed shook, one I knew came from me, but the sound didn’t stop me. I grasped Natalie by the arm and jerked her beside me. She gasped, the sound of her shocked breath spinning around me, but even that wasn’t enough to stop me.
I closed my mouth over hers and kissed her hard, tasting her pleasure, her pain, even her fear. Yanking the other chain with one hard clank, I pulled back from her mouth, flipped her to her belly on the mattress, lifted her hips, and thrust deep the second her sweet little pussy brushed my aching cock.
She grunted. Pushed back against me. And arched her back while I drew out and shoved in hard again and again. My fingertips pressed into her hips as I held her, fucking her faster, my body driven by something I couldn’t control. My skin was on fire. My blood like lava. Vibrations ricocheted through every cell, pushing me higher. I tried to stop, knew I should stop, but couldn’t. The only thought I could focus on
was more.
“Oh yes, Luc...”
She threw her head back, and the second she screamed and I felt her pussy spasm around me, my release roared through me like a freight train barreling through a tunnel at a hundred and twenty miles per hour.
I wasn’t sure what happened next. My face was pressed into the pillows, Natalie was beneath me, her silky hair brushing my cheeks. And there was a faint buzzing somewhere close, along with the weirdest vibrations echoing through my lower body.
“You were right,” she whispered near my ear. “You didn’t need that at all.”
Memories whipped through me, along with another dose of guilt when I realized what I’d just done. “Cazzo.”
I rolled off her back, but she turned into me before I could push her away and pulled me close.
“Let me go.”
“Not on your life.”
Fuck. Fuck! I’d just proved to both of us I was exactly like the animals who ran my fucking House. I reached for the leg she’d just hooked over my hip. “I don’t want to hurt you worse, Natalie. Let me go.”
“Do I look like I’m hurt, Luc?”
I faltered because...she didn’t sound hurt.
“Look at me,” she said again. “And tell me if I’m hurt.”
My gaze slowly slid her direction. In the candlelight, I saw her hair was rumpled, her naked body holding me still covered in a thin sheen of sweat, but her features were relaxed. And her eyes... They had that euphoric glaze to them I recognized well, the kind of glaze that told me she’d just had one whopper of an orgasm.
I had no fucking clue what had just happened. “I...”
She pushed up on her elbows and pressed her lips to mine. “I missed that.” Wrapping one arm around my neck, she pulled me down so I was on top of her. “I really missed that.”
I let her drag me into a warm, wet, toe-curling kiss, but my brain was still mush. And when she rolled me to my side, grinned like the Cheshire Cat, and reached between us to tug the cock ring free, I let her, still trying to figure out why she wasn’t upset and why part of me felt so good when another part was whispering I shouldn’t.
The buzzing shut off, then Natalie pressed her gorgeous, naked body against mine and perched on her elbow as she grinned at me. “You look confused, bello.”
When she called me handsome, I absolutely melted. It was a stupid reaction to an innocent term of endearment, but I couldn’t stop it. “I don’t...” I looked up at her, loving the way she was gazing down at me as she picked at the dried wax on my chest, wanting only to get closer to her when she should be pushing me away. “Why aren’t you upset?”
“Why would I be upset?” she asked with a laugh.
I lifted my arm where the fuzzy pink cuff was still locked around my wrist, the chain dangling. “Because I fucking lost it and attacked you.”
Her smile widened, and she leaned down and kissed me. “You lost it because you wanted me. And you didn’t attack me.”
“I threw you on the bed and...” My throat closed, the words dying on my tongue with the reality of the way I’d forced myself on her.
“Luc, look at me.” Her finger tugged my chin up, forcing my eyes to hers. “I wanted that. I wanted you to lose control and take me.”
“Why?” I whispered. “Why would you want that? No one should want that.”
She slid down so her head was on the pillow next to mine, our faces close together, and skimmed her fingertips across my jaw. “Because I love it when you want me so much you can’t control yourself. It makes me feel wanted. Special. Yours.”
My heart thumped hard against my chest, and I lifted my hand to her arm, needing to touch her. Needing to understand even more because everything was suddenly jumbled in my head. “I do want you. I always want you. I just... I don’t understa—“
“You needed that.” This time, when she looked at me, there was so much honesty and truth in her eyes, it brought everything else to a standstill. “You needed to let go like that and see that nothing bad would happen when you did. And I needed to feel safe. Which is exactly how you made me feel.”
“Safe?” That made no sense at all.
“Yeah.” Her lips curled in the sweetest, most special way. “You make me feel safe when you’re in domineering, alpha-male mode. Women are taught that we’re supposed to be these tough, independent creatures who don’t need anyone else to survive. And I believed that for a long time. Then you came into my life and opened my eyes to a whole new world. And I fought what was in me for a long time. I thought giving in to what someone else wanted made me weak. But I realized... It didn’t make me weak at all. Loving you, giving you what you needed, actually made me strong. It made me powerful because what you needed most was for someone to love you and trust you completely. And I do.”
She drew close and skimmed her fingertips over my jaw. “I trust you with my mind and my body and every part of my heart. And I know you’ll never hurt me.”
I couldn’t breathe. The things she was saying, the way she was saying them... It was as if she climbed inside my soul and made herself at home. “I wouldn’t. Ever.”
Her lips curled again. “Which is why I can let go with you, Luc. I’ve never been able to do that with anyone else. Not even with myself. I didn’t even know I could before you. But now that I do...I need it. When I feel like the world is crazy and upside down, one firm touch from you, one sexy order, one domineering look fixes everything because I know in a matter of minutes nothing else but you is going to matter. All that will matter is what you plan to do me and how it will make me feel. I don’t have to think. I don’t have to plan. I can let go, give you total control, just be and enjoy. And I know you’ll make me feel good, you’ll make me feel safe. And after, the world won’t seem as crazy or messed up, because I have you.”
I stared at her, completely moved by what she’d just confessed. She made everything I liked, all the dominant urges I’d been fighting, sound...pure. And honest. And wholesome. Not dark and dirty and vile as I’d always believed.
I didn’t want to think my family had finally corrupted her. I didn’t want to believe they’d had any kind of influence on her. But I needed to be sure. “Don’t you...” I swallowed hard. “Aren’t you afraid I’m like them?”
“Never. You are not like them. Do you hear me? What they do is for power and control. What happens between you and me is about pleasure. And trust. And love. And I love you, Luc. I love the soft, tender man you are, and I love the dominant, creative lover who’s pushed me in ways I never knew I’d like. And I need both sides of you. It’s who you are. It’s who I fell in love with. And until you stop denying that part of you, we are never going to heal from what they did to us. I won’t let them take that part of you away from me. I need you. I need all of you.”
I lifted my mouth to hers, overwhelmed by her words, by the love I felt for her. And when she pulled me in and whispered, “Let me have all of you,” I rolled her over and gave up the fight. I gave up everything I’d been holding on to—all the pain, all the anger, and every bit of shame I’d been carrying with me since that night.
I gave myself fully to her. And in the process, I gave myself permission to start over.
Chapter Ten
Natalie
I let Luc sleep in. I knew he hadn’t gotten much rest the last few days, so I didn’t wake him when I crawled out of bed. After our conversation last night, I knew he wasn’t just physically tired, he was mentally and emotionally wrung out as well.
Marco and Felicity had left some time after dinner, so the house was quiet as I moved around making tea and straightening up. Aside from the cold, I kind of liked Scotland, what little of it I’d seen, and I could get used to living on a beach. I’d always lived in a land-locked state. The rolling waves had a calming quality I found I needed, especially now.
As I sat on the patio with my knees drawn in and a blanket wrapped around me, watching those waves, I thought about Luc and our conversation last night. I wasn’t
sure how much it had helped—or if it had helped. Yes, we’d made love again, but it had been sweet and tender, and although we’d both needed that emotional connection after everything we’d discussed, I still wasn’t sure if I’d gotten through to him. If I’d made him realize I loved every part of him, even the parts he didn’t think were loveable.
The screen door opened at my back, and I glanced over my shoulder to see the man I’d just been thinking of moving down the steps toward me, already showered and dressed in jeans and a soft blue sweater, looking sexy and every bit the man of my dreams. “There you are. I was starting to think you’d run off.”
“I was trying to let you sleep.” I handed him some of my blanket as he sat next to me on the outdoor couch, moving close just as I wanted him to do.
He wasn’t content just to be close, which made me smile. He pushed me forward so he could slide behind me, then pulled me in so I was completely surrounded by his strength and heat. His lips brushed my temple as he held me tight. “I sleep better when you’re next to me.”
“Mm.” I sighed and relaxed into him. “I’ll remember that.”
We sat in silence for several minutes, listening to the sounds of the water lapping the shore, and I closed my eyes and told myself, no matter what, we were together. We could get through anything so long as we held on to each other. I believed that. If I was patient, if I gave him time, the Luc I knew was in there would find his way back to me.
“I was thinking about driving into Edinburgh,” he said softly near my ear.
“You were?” My eyes came open, and I looked out at the water. “What for?”
“Felicity left a name on the counter. I called, and they can see me at two p.m.”
Shocked, I pushed up and turned so I could face him. “You called the counselor?”
“Yeah.” He tucked a lock of hair behind my ear, looking nervous and completely unsure. “I’ll go alone if I have to, but I was kind of hoping, maybe, you’d go with me?”
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