by Katia Rose
“Impressive, right?” Ace asks, sweeping his hand around the dingy hallway.
“I’m just surprised you don’t have a line of fan girls waiting outside the door.”
He pats me on the head. “I have my number one fan girl right here.”
I narrow my eyes. “Do or say that again, connard, and I swear I will actually bite you.”
“Oh, I’m counting on it.”
He fishes his keys out of his pocket, and I follow him into the studio apartment. It’s dim, lit only by the streetlamp spilling in through the open window, but he doesn’t turn any lights on. I expected a typical bachelor’s living habits, and while the place is cluttered, I wouldn’t call it a mess. It’s more of a nest. The room is a cross section of Ace’s life: guitars and sheets of music, leather jackets and tattered books. A black and grey tapestry hangs on the wall over his bed.
He hears my soft breath of laughter and gives me a questioning glance.
“It looks like a poet lives here,” I explain. “I’m imagining you writing by candlelight in the dead of night, with a quill.”
He moves farther into the room. “Can’t say I’ve used a quill before, but these”—he stoops down and pulls a box out from under his bed—“are from when I used to not be able to pay the electricity every month.”
He tilts the box so I can see all the mismatched candles inside, then sets two of them down on the table beside his bed and grabs a lighter. The snick of the lighter sounds before the flame glows, painting his face in red light and wavering shadows as he gets the candles going.
“Candles?” I joke. “Are you trying to seduce me?”
He doesn’t answer—just takes a seat on the edge of his bed and leans back on his elbows, watching me.
“Spin around,” he orders. “I want to see you in that dress a little longer.”
I drop down and undo the tiny buckles on my shoes, prolonging every movement as I straighten up and step out of them. I hold my arms in first position and do a few chaîné turns, moving from the door towards the bed. I land just close enough that he can lean forwards and catch the hem of my dress, tugging on it to pull me closer until I’m standing between his knees.
He runs his hands up the skirt of the dress, along my thighs and then over my hips up to my waist. My breath hitches.
“The way you move...” he begins, but he doesn’t finish the sentence.
I settle one knee on the mattress and then the other, straddling him. He grips my hips and starts to trail kisses along my chest, over the tops of my breasts. The cut of the dress means my skin is covered there, but I can still feel the heat of his mouth. I dig my fingers into his hair.
His hands slide from my hips and up my back, until he meets the clasp of the halter strap around my neck. He pauses, waiting for me to object, and then he unhooks it. The dress slides down my chest a few inches, and he tugs it the rest of the way until I’m exposed to him.
Any insecurity I might have felt is wiped away when I hear his gasp, followed by the groan that seems to come from somewhere deep inside him. He’s staring at my body like the candlelight reflecting off it has him under some kind of spell.
“You are perfect,” he growls, and then his mouth is everywhere—biting, licking, and sucking until I’m moaning and squeezing his shoulders so hard I know I’m going to leave marks.
His teeth graze my nipple and I hiss, letting out a string of French expletives when he reaches up to pinch the other one, hard. Before I know what’s happening, he’s got me pinned underneath him on the bed. The skirt of my dress has risen up so high that my lacy pair of underwear is showing. Ace notices, straightening himself onto his knees and telling me to stay still as he hikes my skirt up even higher.
He drags the back of his hand along his mouth. “God, even just looking at you...Fuck.”
“Take your shirt off,” I tell him, before adding a hesitant, “please.”
He smirks as he grabs the bottom of his t-shirt, pulling it over his head. I watch the muscles in his chest and arms strain and ripple with the movement. He’s lanky and limber, but everything is toned to perfection. The raven’s wings tattooed on his skin lift and then lower as he tosses his shirt away.
In one supple motion, he lays himself down on the mattress between my thighs and throws my legs over his shoulders. His face is level with my navel now, and the warmth of his breath on my stomach sends sparks shooting through every part of me. It’s been almost a year since I’ve been with anyone, and my body is quickly tensing up into a hair trigger of desire.
Ace kisses lower and lower down my stomach, flicking his tongue against my skin every once in awhile and making me gasp. He meets the band of my underwear and keeps going, kissing between my legs over the fabric. My back arches.
“You’re wet for me, Stéphanie. I can taste you already.”
Even I’m not sure what I mumble in response to that.
He hooks a finger around the lace and tugs it to the side, then swears at the sight of me bare for him. I can feel myself dripping, and when he slides a finger inside me, I grind down onto him without thinking. He makes that same menacing laugh from earlier and slides a second finger inside while I fuck myself on his hand. I don’t care that I look like a desperate animal right now; I am a desperate animal. Nothing matters except this primal urge to feel full, to be filled.
Nothing matters, that is, until he flicks his tongue against my clit and I almost scream. I clap a hand over my mouth and writhe on Ace’s mattress as he licks and sucks and pumps his fingers in and out of me with a slow, steady rhythm. I hear him groan when I clench around his fingers a few minutes later. The sound shoots straight through me. I sit up on the bed, yanking on his hair until he moves his mouth away and looks up at me.
“Enough!” I order, my chest heaving. “I didn’t come here for gentle, Ace. I didn’t come here for nice. I want this to hurt. I want it to burn.”
He sits up in front of me, staring at me with a look of intense concentration, before he lunges towards me and twists my hair around his fist, tugging my head back and then shoving the fingers of his other hands in my mouth—the fingers that were just inside me.
“Suck.” His voice feels like it’s everywhere. “Suck harder. You taste good, don’t you?”
I suck his fingers like that’s my only purpose in life. Right now, it feels like it is. When he lets me have my mouth back, his fingers are coated in spit. I can feel more of it drying on my lips.
“Now stand up and take all your clothes off.”
He gives my hair a sharp tug before he lets me scramble off the bed. I shimmy out of my dress, then slide the drenched scrap of lace down my legs, bending over to step out of it. Ace is sitting on the edge of the bed once more.
“Do that little twirl again,” he orders with a smirk.
I feel a flash of vulnerability and embarrassment, but somehow that only makes me even more aroused. After a few faltering breaths, I put myself in first position and do another set of chaînés. It’s all so deliciously perverse.
I’m dancing for Ace. Naked.
I can’t keep the satisfaction off my face when I stop and find him staring at me with a slack jaw, one hand absently stroking himself over his jeans. I drop to my hands and knees between his legs and look up at him.
“Let me suck it.” I don’t recognize my own voice. “Please.”
He doesn’t look like he can move right now, so I reach for his belt buckle myself. I get his jeans undone, and then he takes over, sliding them down enough that he can pull his cock out. He’s thick and hard. I can see the muscles in his arms twitch as I settle myself in closer to him.
I lick him once, from his base to his tip, and watch his head drop back. After that, I stop teasing. I stop taking my time. I just suck him, bobbing my head up and down to take him as deep as I can with rapid thrusts. Spit drips down the length of him, and the sounds my mouth is making right now are obscene. It’s vulgar and dirty and everything I need. I move faster.
“Fuck. Oh, fuck. Jesus Christ.”
Ace holds my hair out of the way, and I feel his hips start to buck as he keeps hissing curse words. I take him so deep I choke and have to stop for a moment.
“Holy fuck, Stéphanie.”
His glassy eyes meet mine. I try to take him into my mouth again.
“Wait.” He stops me. “Get on the bed.”
I do as he says, moving to lay on my back. He interrupts and orders me to get on my hands and knees, facing the wall. I shiver, bracing myself for whatever comes next. I hear him moving behind me and then the dull thump and clank of his jeans hitting the floor.
“This ass.” I yelp at the sharp slap on one of my cheeks. “And this fucking pussy. Do you know what a pretty fucking pussy you have?”
I feel him spreading my lips apart from behind me.
“I could stare at this pussy all day. I could get off just from looking at you Stéphanie.” He slides two fingers inside me and I moan, dropping my face onto the blanket. “But I’m not just going to look at you tonight. I’m going to give you what you asked for.”
Without any warning, his fingers start thrusting in out of me, so fast and hard that this time I really do scream. He’s curling them just right, hitting the exact spot I need him to, and the pace and pressure are so overwhelming I see white-hot streaks at the edge of my vision.
“Your cock!” I shout. “Please, Ace. Do it with your cock. Je t’en supplie.”
It’s not an exaggeration; I am begging him. Every last scrap of composure I have is gone. He lets out a sound that’s close to a growl, and I hear the drawer in his bedside table slide open. A moment later and he’s behind me again, his hands clamped around my hips as I bite down on the blanket.
“This is what you want?” He leans into me so that his cock presses against my folds.
“Oui oui oui. S’il te plait, oui.”
The head of him finds its way inside me. When he gives the first thrust to get himself deeper, I feel my body tense. I haven’t had anyone inside me for so long, and he’s big, stretching me wider than I think I can go.
“God, you’re tight. I don’t know if—”
“Fuck me,” I interrupt him. “Fuck me now.”
He pushes all the way inside and holds himself there for a moment, while I gasp and squirm in front of him. When the pain finally subsides enough that it turns into pleasure, I start to rock against him. He takes the hint and begins to thrust, building up speed until he’s going as fast as his fingers were a few minutes ago.
“Shit, you feel good.”
“Harder!” I keep demanding, over and over as he fucks me raw. “Go fucking harder, Ace!”
He does, slamming into me with so much force I know my knees would buckle if he weren’t holding my hips up, but it’s not enough. I need to feel this—really feel it. I need to be so swept up in this moment that nothing exists beyond the sensations in my body. I open my eyes just a slit and watch the candle flames dance, casting twisting shadows on the wall behind them.
Suddenly I know what I want.
“Ace, the candle.”
He keeps thrusting. “Hmm?”
“The candle, Ace. Get the candle.”
I feel him start to slow down. “Stéphanie...”
I slide away from him, and he groans as he’s forced to pull out. I flip around and find him standing there with his cock at attention, giving me a wary look.
“I told you I wanted this to hurt,” I insist.
“I know, and fuck me, is that ever a sexy thought, but that shit takes trust. A lot of trust. Me dripping molten candle wax on your skin isn’t exactly casual.”
“Are you saying this is casual?”
His reaction is instant. He grabs my thighs and pulls me to the edge of the mattress so he can wrap both his hands around my neck. He doesn’t apply any pressure, just holds them there, my veins pulsing under his palms.
“No,” he says sharply. “I don’t know what the fuck this is, but it’s not casual. Nothing about what I feel for you is casual. If this is what you want, I’ll give it to you, but I need you to be sure.”
I place my hands over his, forcing him to squeeze.
“I’m sure. I want this. I trust you.”
We stay posed like that for another moment, a profane tableau of lust, and then he lets go of me and picks up the short and stubby candle. I settle down on my back, close to the end of the bed.
“You say red if it’s too much, okay? You say red, and everything stops.”
I nod my understanding. The flame is mesmerizing. It’s all I can focus on as he approaches. Trails of dark wax have already congealed on the candle’s sides. Ace holds one hand cupped underneath and pauses at the edge of the mattress, standing between my legs.
“I’m going to blow it out so it cools a little,” he explains, before snuffing the flame out with a huff of air.
“I want you to do it while you fuck me,” I demand.
I swear I see his pupils get even wider when I say those words.
“You want me to safely handle a burning hot candle while I’m fucking your pussy?” His laugh almost sounds nervous. “That’s asking a lot.”
“I trust you,” I repeat, and then I spread my legs even wider.
The bed is high enough that I’m level with his cock. I use my hands to guide him inside me, and we both moan when we’re joined again. He’s busy holding the candle up, so I do most of the thrusting, lifting myself onto my forearms so I have the leverage I need. I work myself back up to the frenzy he had me in before, until I’m pulsing around him and I can feel the tightening sensation gathering deep within me.
“Do it,” I order. “Do it on my chest. Now.”
The rivulet of wax is the only thing I see as Ace holds the candle over me and tips it to the side. Then there’s nothing but pain— cruel, immediate, and all consuming. I clench my teeth and dig my nails into my palms, the candle’s fire still dancing on the backs of my eyelids as I close my eyes and wait for the drops of wax that just fell between my breasts to cool.
When I’m finally able to concentrate on something other than the pain, I find Ace pumping in and out of me with something close to fury as he gasps for breath.
“Shit. Shit. You got so fucking tight. You liked that, didn’t you? Your little cunt clamped right down on my cock.”
He’s barely holding himself together. The candle shakes in his hand and another drop of wax lands on me. My body jerks as his cock plunges in me again.
“More,” I gasp. “I want more.”
I’m so close now, teetering right on the edge. Ace tips the candle over again, and this time wax splashes on my stomach. I cry out and collapse onto my back, panting and squealing as the wax continues to burn. I don’t know who I am anymore. There’s just pain and desire and desperate, aching need, and all of it burns, so hot I wish I could crawl outside of my own body to escape it. It’s too much. It’s far too much.
“God. Oh, god.”
Somewhere above me, I hear Ace calling out as he thrusts get slower but ruthlessly deeper. The small part of me that still has a grasp on reality realizes he’s as close as I am. He grunts, and then I hear the sound of the candle hitting the floor.
He leans over me, pinning my wrists above my head. The new angle is a hundred times more intense. Sweat drips from his chest onto my wax-covered skin. He shifts his hips so he’s pressing down on my clit, and I’m gone.
I’m a supernova. I’m a dying star. I’m a blinding flash of earth and dust and fire, and then I’m just silence.
14 Trouble I’m In || Twinbed
ACE
When the room reappears around me, the first thing I notice are the freckles on her back: four of them, all about the size of thumbtacks. Two are right beside each other, just between her shoulder blades, and the other two lie a few inches apart along the ridges of her spine.
I didn’t see them when we were fucking. I barely saw at all. I just felt. It was like being on drugs—the sing
le-minded concentration, the inability to tell where one sense ended and the others began. Scent and sight and sound were all one pulsing stream of information feeding my brain until I thought it would combust.
This girl. This fucking girl.
I see her shiver, lying on her side facing away from me, and something roars to life inside me. I wrap my arms around her, flipping her over and pulling her into my chest. I tuck her head under my chin and tangle my legs up with hers. She whimpers.
“Hey,” I say. “You okay?”
She nods. I rub my hands up and down her back. We’re both sweating and the air of the room around us is stifling, but I feel an inexplicable need to warm her up.
“That got pretty intense,” I comment, when she doesn’t make any attempt to speak.
She nods again.
“Yeah.” Her voice is raw. “Yeah, it did.”
“Too intense?”
“No. No, it was...everything. I just need a minute to come back.”
She presses her body harder against mine, and I hold her tight. I’ve never felt like this after being with someone: like I can’t let her go or she’ll slip away, and that if she slips away it will be the end of my world. Something close to terror creeps up my spine as the full impact of that feeling hits me.
You’re in over your fucking head, Ace.
Then Stéphanie sighs, and I stop focusing on anything other than giving her what she needs.
“Stay here,” I tell her, before disentangling our bodies and climbing out of bed. I shut myself in the bathroom and get rid of the condom before splashing some water on my face. I let the sink run until it’s warm, and then dip a towel underneath the stream.
I almost trip over a guitar case when I walk back into the room. I curse under my breath, not at the pain in my foot, but at the threat to the instrument. I’d take much more than a stubbed toe for the sake of my guitars. I bend over to assure myself that everything’s okay, then make my way back to the bed.
Stéphanie is right where I left her, only now her knees are tucked up to her chest. She looks so damn tiny lying in my bed alone, like a wild, wounded animal that slipped in through the window at night.