by Flynn, Poppy
Because, surely, if they were together for any length of time, Xavier would decide he wanted more than the degree of separation he was currently set upon?
Xavier nuzzled his lips against her neck. In the muted, early morning light, she could both see and feel the evidence of his overnight stubble. He was normally so impeccably clean-shaven that evidence of that little bit of scruff seemed strangely intimate. Like she was seeing a little bit of him that was hidden from the rest of the world.
It sent a shudder of longing skittering down her spine. She wanted to find out what other parts of himself he kept locked away from public view.
That was rapidly replaced by the drugging feeling of Xavier gently sinking his teeth into that erogenous spot where her shoulder met her neck and inching his hand seductively up her chest until he cupped one heavy breast in his hand.
"Mm…I can't remember the last time I woke up to such a delicious morsel, all soft and warm and just lying there ready for me to eat her up for breakfast." He chuckled as he laid a seductive trail of mixed nibbles and kisses all the way from her shoulder to that sensitive spot behind her ear.
"Well, as long as you're going to feed me too," she replied, twittering breathlessly as he rolled her beneath him.
Jeez! Was that really a giggle that had left her lips?
She didn't have time to ponder the fact before his lips took hers in a deep, thorough kiss.
What followed touched Grace on a far more profound level.
Xavier proceeded to make love to her as if she were the most precious creature in the world. He was slow and gentle, and Grace was stunned at the intense degree of pleasure he wrought from her body without so much as a single smack or the slightest hint of pain.
It wasn't something that she had even thought possible.
And yet he played her body as if it were a finely tuned instrument, cajoling her to heights she never believed achievable without the intervention of impact play.
He suckled at her breast as if he were worshipping their bounty while he slipped slowly inside her hot, wet channel.
His fingers were everywhere, sweeping gently over every inch of her sensitised skin like he was mapping out each rise and dip with his fingers and committing them to memory.
His body undulated languidly against hers, frustrating her with a subtle yearning, but throughout their joining, he refused to speed up or drive deeper. He just kept up a slow, languid pace that both touched and frustrated her in equal measure. It was unlike anything she had ever known.
But, finally, as she whimpered and writhed in quiet torment, the climax that eventually came upon her took Grace completely by surprise. It was like she'd been blindsided.
One moment, she'd been flailing in distraction, the next, she'd been hurled over the edge of a waterfall, floundering and gasping for breath as the orgasm washed through her with a force that she hadn't seen coming and which left her absolutely dumbfounded in its wake.
* * *
"Do you like eggs and bacon?" Xavier asked her ninety minutes later when she padded into his sleek, streamlined kitchen with its accents of black and steel, wearing one of his dress shirts.
She finished rubbing at her damp hair with a fluffy grey towel before perching herself on a high, leather topped stool at the shiny marble breakfast bar which was so much more relaxed than the formal dining room she had spied through the adjacent doorway.
They had cleaned up together in the shower, where he had soaped every inch of her body with the pleasant, spicy body wash that always reminded her of him.
Of course, one thing had led to another and they had ended up getting a lot dirtier before they had finally gotten clean. The memories still tickled the corners of her mind with a mellow fulfilment that Grace wanted to make her permanent reality.
"Yes, and I'm starving. All that exercise has given me an appetite."
She grinned at him when he winked at her lasciviously. It was yet another side of him that she'd never seen.
He looked so very different from the sadist she had come to know as he puttered around his kitchen dressed in worn jeans and a snug, burgundy turtleneck top which hugged the delicious contours of his torso.
But Grace liked what she saw, and she wanted to see a lot more.
"Have you managed to come to a decision about what we discussed at dinner last night?" he asked tentatively when they finally sat down at the casual breakfast bar that bisected his large kitchen. "Or have I kept you so busy that you haven't had time to think about it?" The grin that crinkled his face reminded her of a cheeky little boy, an analogy so far removed from everything she thought she knew about Xavier that she felt another fierce tug of yearning to get to know him better. A whole lot better.
But the kind of relationship he was suggesting wasn't one that was going to fulfil that desire. Was it?
Of course, on the other hand, the hard no, which had been her initial gut reaction had mellowed into more of a maybe.
Perhaps she needed to think of what he was proposing as the first step. Then, a little further down the line, when they were a bit more comfortable with each other, they could revisit their options.
Grace sighed and busied herself by adding cream and sugar to her coffee and stirring it thoughtfully before taking a fortifying sip.
Damn it, he was looking so damn hopeful too, those dark, smouldering eyes of his burning away the final little bit of resistance with their intensity.
Grace braced herself for the inevitable discussion. "I have to be honest; I can't say it's something I've ever had even the remotest inclination to try," she admitted, hedging her bets. "Plus, I don't really understand how it's going to work. You said remote 24/7. How can that even be a thing?"
"Well, for a start, our relationship would be exclusive."
Grace frowned at Xavier over the rim of her cup. "I thought it pretty much already was. I certainly haven't scened with anyone else since I started coming to Club Risqué and didn't think you had either."
Xavier nodded cautiously, a tiny indent forming on his brow, in between his eyes, which was not quite a frown, but more a mark of concentration. "Okay, officially exclusive then. Plus, we would both have a far more explicit understanding of exactly where we stand with each other. What is expected in each of our roles in our relationship."
"So, it would be a relationship then, even if we don't live together? Would it be a permanent one?"
Xavier tipped his head to the side and gestured with his upturned hands in a very Gallic shrug. "Well, as permanent as any relationship can hope to be, I guess."
If anything, that made things even more perplexing. On the one hand, Grace was buoyed by the fact that Xavier seemed to be implying this could be a forever thing and that he was fully prepared for that eventuality. On the other hand, would he really want to live all of the rest of his life in some parody of a committed relationship?
"What if things don't work out?" Grace voiced her biggest concern. "If I did agree, and I don't like the way it's going, where do we go from there?"
She pursed her lips and gazed at him seriously, conscious of how the light from the window behind him threw his features into a shadowed relief, preventing her from seeing his expressions fully. "How much say do I get in this scenario?"
Xavier held her eyes with his own. "Of course, there will always be the opportunity to negotiate within the parameters of our relationship. This isn't just about me, I want you to be happy too, Grace," he assured her sincerely as he took a bite of his breakfast.
Grace followed suit, using the eating time to try to get things clear in her head. Could she really be happy in the kind of relationship he was proposing? Even for a relatively short amount of time?
She might be a masochist, but if she was honest with herself, she was a submissive to a far lesser extent.
Contrary to popular opinion, being a masochist and being a submissive were not mutually exclusive. Just because she welcomed pain as part of her sexual makeup, did not necessarily mean
she also wanted to surrender herself to the control of a man.
She was strong-minded and had a successful, high-powered job that was probably equal to Xavier's. She was fiercely independent and self-reliant and had lived alone for almost the same amount of time as he had. She was more than capable of making her own decisions and really didn't know quite how she would react to someone making them for her, whatever the reasons. While she was turned on by a man's domination in the bedroom—or, more often, in the club—she wasn't convinced it was anything she would welcome in her everyday life.
And yet here she was, seriously considering something that was probably the very antithesis of everything she truly believed in.
And why the hell was that? Was she mad?
Grace couldn't help wondering if she was doing the right thing by consenting to this Master/slave relationship that Xavier was so set on. Her initial gut reaction had been 'hell, no!' and yet here she sat on the verge of agreeing.
Was it altogether fair to Xavier that, in her own mind, she was looking at his proposal as a possible 'stepping-stone', a way of promoting and cementing their relationship? An attempt to give him what he wanted, despite the fact that, in reality, it was a million miles away from her own wants and desires, in the hope that she would be able to renegotiate things into something somewhat more appealing later on.
Does that mean I am manipulating the situation? a guilty little voice asked in a whisper inside her head.
No, Grace decided. She was just choosing Xavier's scenario as a starting point, and at some point in time, they would compromise, just like any couple in any kind of relationship would do. That's surely what a strong relationship was about after all, co-operation and concession until both parties reached a mutually satisfactory agreement.
Okay, so she wasn't being entirely up front about her own desires to be a mother, preferably with the role of wife coming before it. But in truth, Xavier's rather unconventional idea of having a slave relationship in which the couple didn't ever live together, was so far removed from her own ideas that they weren't even in the same ballpark. So much so that now didn't seem like the right time to bring it up.
And if her conscience was trying to prod her with the whispered truth that hers wasn't even a lifestyle choice, well, right now, she chose to ignore it.
Chapter 11
Six weeks later, Grace could only think back on that conversation and imagine that she must have been completely blinded by sexual gratification, because whatever the hell was going on right now was nothing close to anything she wanted in her life.
Okay, so the sex was phenomenal, and Xavier took her to heights of satisfaction she hadn't believed could exist even within a kink relationship.
It would be true to say that, on a physical level, the two of them were so well matched that it was hard to imagine that things weren't perfect.
As a sadist, Xavier was the flawless foil for her own masochistic needs. He understood her in a way that no other man or Dom ever had before. Where her kink needs had been becoming more and more extreme before she had met him, in a vain effort to achieve the same level of satisfaction, Master X had proven that there was indeed more than one way to skin a cat. He was diabolically clever and imaginative and never failed to come up with new ways to make her squirm.
On an emotional level, however, things couldn't be more different.
Grace had tried to be patient, telling herself that it was still early days and that they had barely had time to settle into any kind of routine on which to build.
But the truth was the longer this farce continued, the further removed she felt from the budding relationship she'd felt so enthusiastic about in the beginning.
Tonight, was a club night, and Grace had come in early, hoping that the ambience and the environment would help soothe her frayed nerves and tattered spirits.
She rarely drank when she knew she was going to scene; she preferred to keep a clear head and didn't want the pain she so craved to be blunted by the effects of the alcohol. Besides, a good scene with a sadist usually did far more to satisfy and relax her than anything she might imbibe.
But tonight, she needed a drink…and didn't that say it all?
With a glass of wine in one hand, Grace adjusted the wristband that proclaimed to the world—as per club rules—that she'd been served one of her two-glass limit on alcohol, with the other. Then she made her way to a table which seated a couple of the other subs she had become friendly with during the past few months, happy for the opportunity to sit and chat.
"Hi, Gem, come and join us for a while," offered Luanna, wife of Master Baku, the Shibari expert.
Grace smiled back at the woman, who was just a few years her junior, but couldn't help the pang of jealousy she felt as her gaze was inevitably caught by the slight, telltale swell of her tummy.
"Thank you, Serenity," Grace accepted, taking care to call Luanna by her club name. The name suited her; Luanna really was calm and serene by nature. Exactly what Grace needed right now.
"Oh dear, you really don't look very enthusiastic tonight. Is everything all right?"
Next to her, Trinity, the club's assistant manager was on a rare break. "How are things between you and Master X? I heard you'd agreed to a 24/7 relationship with him." The tiny pixie-like woman looked around expectantly. "Although I don't see him anywhere."
"I arrived early," Grace confirmed. "I thought the atmosphere here at the club would help settle me."
"Oh, I'm sorry," Trinity said contritely, raising her hands in supplication. "I'm obviously mistaken about the M/s relationship. I do apologise," she said sincerely.
Grace waved the apology away. "No, you heard right, but we certainly don't live in each other's pockets."
"Master X and Gem have a remote 24/7 relationship," Serenity offered by way of an explanation, flicking her deep titian hair back across her shoulder.
Trinity frowned. "Oh, yes, I remember now. He did something similar with Fluff for a little while. How do you make that work, exactly?" she asked, tilting her head full of spikey, poppy red hair to one side.
"With more damn patience and skill than I obviously have!" Grace couldn't help retorting as she took an unladylike slug of her wine before slamming the glass forcefully back onto the table.
The two other subs looked at her with matching sets of wide startled eyes.
Grace sighed. "Sorry, I guess I'm a little more uptight than I thought."
"I take it things aren't going so well?" Luanna asked tentatively, giving Grace an encouraging smile. I'm always here if you need to talk, you know."
"Me too," Trinity chipped in. "And believe me, Serenity and I both know, first-hand, just how difficult relationships can be. Especially new ones."
"Thanks." Grace smiled at the genuine care she felt from the other women. "But I didn't come here to bring everyone else down with my woes." She exhaled audibly as she blotted at the sloshed wine with a paper napkin.
"On the contrary, Gem, getting everything off your chest and getting another opinion on whatever is going on can be a great help in allowing you to see things with a fresh set of eyes. Sometimes that's all the help you need to enable you to see just what things need to change."
Grace snorted inelegantly and shook her head. "God! Right now, I'm wondering what doesn't need to change! I'm not sure I'd even know where to start."
"You've always seemed so well suited," observed Trinity speculatively. "Surely, there's nothing with your kink compatibility?"
"No, I can't deny that if sex was all there was to it, then there'd be no problem whatsoever," Grace admitted, flopping back on the comfy padded armchair in a slump.
"Ah, well, that's a positive start, surely. Kink and sex are important components in our kind of lifestyle."
"I don't disagree, but they're not the only thing." She straightened slightly and crossed her legs in an effort to appear less boorish.
"So I'm guessing that maybe the Master/slave dynamic isn't working for you then
?" queried Luanna, watching her intently. "Is there something in particular, or is it the whole thing in general?"
Grace pondered the question, biting absently on her bottom lip as she did so. "I guess part of the problem is that I actually feel more distanced from Xavi since we entered this aspect of our relationship than I did before hand."
"You were expecting it to bring you closer together," Trinity observed. It wasn't really a question, but Grace answered any way.
"Of course, I did. Wouldn't you have had the same expectation from that kind of dynamic? Surely, there can't be anything that implies closeness as much as an M/s relationship, where the whole ethos revolves around one person being completely cared for by the other?"
"I agree." Luanna nodded with a gentle contemplation. "That would be my understanding too."
Trinity frowned again. "I hear what you're saying, but I guess that's what I meant when I asked how you made it work, since you're not living together. Is that why you're having issues with it yourself?" she asked frankly, leaning forward with her elbows on the table in genuine interest.
"I don't know, to be honest. Maybe that's part of it. But really, I'm not sure I'm cut out to mindlessly follow somebody else's dictates."
Grace leaned back, slightly uncomfortable with the attentiveness, and rested her neck against the back of the chair, staring sightlessly up at the ceiling as if it held all the answers in the universe, before sitting up and facing the two women again.
"I certainly don't think I've discovered anything worthwhile during this whole process. In fact, if anything, I feel like I've lost more than I've gained," she grumbled, picking up the crumpled napkin and scrubbing it distractedly against the tabletop.
"Xavier seems more distant. The times we spend together are far more regimented. There no longer seems to be any room for anything spontaneous or impulsive." Grace threw down the ruined tissue and flopped back again, plucking at her bottom lip, oblivious to the noise around her, the sights and sounds and smells of the club, her consciousness mired deep within her swirling thoughts.