“Um. Well, what I’m looking for…I suppose…is a discreet relationship with someone I can trust who will…guide me. You see, I’ve just finished a long contract for a client, and I have a few months off before I start my next assignment. The past few years have been pretty stressful.” She managed a tight smile.
“I understand,” said Olivier before sipping his champagne and appearing to think her words through.
Did he understand? How could he? Or had he guessed that stressful didn’t even come close to the reality of the past two years. Yes, her last contract, with the French division of an investment bank, had made her tear her hair out at times, but she’d successfully steered the company through a tricky period of transition and her client had been impressed enough to recommend her to his company’s US office. The work had exhilarated her, she’d embraced the long hours, the adrenaline of advising communications directors and fielding questions from international journalists.
Maybe he already knew about her new job. Maybe he knew about Jody from Mimi.
“My next client doesn’t need me for a few months, so I’m having some downtime before I head off to the States,” she said.
“America? Wow. A high flyer.”
“Not really. It’s less glamorous than it sounds.”
“Said with typical British understatement.”
“Oh, don’t worry, I can do overstatement too. In fact, I’m bloody brilliant at it, if I do say so myself.” Lisa laughed, and Olivier’s eyes gleamed, making her believe that, yes, he really found her lame joke amusing. Shit. This was bad. Even if she hadn’t wanted a Dom, she’d still have wanted to leap on his gorgeous body. There was a spark between them, a connection between minds and hearts as well as lust and sexual tastes. Sure, she wanted to enjoy his company and have a like-minded, funny, intelligent man to share the next few months with—but she was determined to quash any other feelings.
“Before we go any further, I’d like to make it clear that I’m not looking for another relationship,” she said. “A short-term fling with a stranger; someone who expects no commitment, is perfect for me, and also, I’ve wanted to try out this…this kind of thing for quite a while, and when Mimi hinted she knew someone who might be able to help… She said that you were trustworthy and discreet, and that you never get involved with your partners, not in that way.”
He looked at her steadily, perhaps a little surprised at the way she’d laid her cards on the table so plainly. Lisa knew she’d sounded stiff and uptight, but she was so out of her depth here that she’d had to retreat to her normal self.
“Bien. Mimi must have already told you that I don’t do long-term either, nor any of the clichéd hearts-and-flowers stuff. It would give me great pleasure to take you on, and of course, the arrangement will be purely businesslike in one sense. But you do realise that it won’t be like your usual contracts?”
He looked at her intensely, clearly having picked up on her obsession with the relationship being businesslike.
Lisa felt a little shaky inside but answered him confidently enough. “What do you mean?”
“That whatever challenges you’ve faced in your work, I promise that I’ll have greater ones for you. Along with intense pleasure, of course…” His brief touch on her forearm was as soft as a butterfly landing on it, almost as if he was showing her he could and would be gentle as well as harsh. “There will be times when you can’t or won’t want to meet my demands.”
That seductive accent, like velvet underpinned with steel, had her toes curling. “And when those times come, there will be consequences. Consequences that you’re not sure you like or want to accept but that I won’t hesitate to impose. I expect nothing less than total commitment from you, and I accept no excuses. There is no room for negotiation in this contract, do you understand?”
Chapter Two
Oxygen returned to Lisa’s lungs. Olivier’s words were unequivocal, yet hearing them was the vocal equivalent of having warm syrup dripped over her flesh. In any business situation, of course, his orders would have been met with a polite but firm set down. Lisa would have left him in no doubt that she would not be intimidated. Instead, his commands set her pulse fluttering and fanned the glow between her legs.
“I understand.”
“Tres bien. Now, why don’t we find a quiet place to talk, and we can arrange the next step?”
He held out his hand to indicate she should lead the way to the vestibule at the side of the main gallery. Did that mean she’d passed his test, or was there more to come? As for butterflies in her stomach, a whole colony had taken flight now. She’d had no idea before now how badly she wanted—and feared—what Olivier could offer.
Grabbing two fresh champagne flutes from a passing waiter, he followed her through the guests to the entrance of the salon. Once outside, the buzz receded and her heels echoed as they clicked across the marble floor, making her even more conscious that she’d left the mainstream behind.
The room, with its high, painted ceiling, was deserted apart from one other couple entwined around each other on a velvet banquette in the centre of the floor. One wall was lined with tall windows, with long crimson drapes closed against the night sky. Olivier headed for one of them.
After he'd handed her the glasses, he opened the curtains, and Lisa saw a deep alcove with a window seat. He gestured to the padded velvet seat. “Please, sit down.” Then he took the glasses from her and placed them on the window ledge.
Though relieved to have solidity to support her watery limbs, she shivered a little as he drew the drapes behind them, shutting out the rest of the world. Lisa placed her hands in her lap as she’d trained herself to do, to hide her nerves when she was under pressure. Yet, she was painfully aware that this wasn’t a press conference or a boardroom meeting and that the nerves making her hands tremble came from the anticipation of intense pleasure as well as fear of the unknown.
“Nervous?” he asked.
Lisa guessed that there was no point denying it or lying to him and that he must want her to be nervous. That was a huge part of the game for both of them: the anticipation and fear, the building of the excitement. “Yes,” she admitted, determined he know she knew exactly what they were both doing here.
“And I guess ‘nervous’ is a new experience for you?”
“Not new, not at work so much these days. You need to develop a cool head and a thick skin when you’re handling PR crises for big companies. But…I confess it’s been a while since I had this kind of situation to deal with.”
“A while?”
Lisa gave a sigh and smiled. “Okay. I’ve never had this situation to deal with before.”
“And are your skills and experience helping at all?”
“Not a lot.”
Now it was Olivier’s eyes that crinkled at the corners. His low laugh was warm and genuine, and once again Lisa asked herself how he could be a Dom. She wasn’t naive enough to expect him to stride into the exhibition in leather with a whip in his hand, but he was so…normal and friendly—apart from being a sexual magnet.
“Can I ask a few questions before we um…get started?” she said.
Olivier took a sip from his glass. “Bien sur. Ask away. I want us both to be clear about this arrangement before we go any further.”
“Mimi said you’ve lived in Paris for years and you speak French like a native, but you also sound like—well, like me, at times.”
“That’s because I’m only half French. My mother lives in Provence, but my father was British and we went to school in England.”
“We?”
“My brother Alex and I. Maman wanted us to have an English education and to be bilingual, so she packed us off to boarding school.”
He said the last line with such a perfect English accent that Lisa giggled. “Now I understand. So you live and work in Paris?”
“Yes. You probably know I have a gallery on the Left Bank?”
“Yes, Mimi told me, but I’ve seen reports o
f some of the exhibitions you host in the press. She says you support young and up-and-coming artists and fund scholarships at one of the arts schools.”
A twitch of the mouth showed he was a little embarrassed by the praise. “I do what I can.”
“Do you paint, yourself? Mimi says you went to the Slade School of Fine Art in London after you left school.”
“Mimi says a lot. And I’m sure you know a lot more about me than your questions imply.” A frustrated edge had crept into his tone, though Lisa wasn’t sure why, but then he continued smoothly enough. “You’re obviously a skilled communicator or you wouldn’t have been so successful in Public Affairs.”
“I do what I can.”
He raised a glass to her. “Touché. So what else does Mimi have to say about me?”
“That you have an apartment in one of chicest arrondisements.”
Tiny droplets of champagne glistened on his lips as he spoke. “Chic? I wouldn’t say that, but I do hope to see you there very often from now on.”
Lisa downed a large gulp of her own wine.
“I will be seeing you there, won’t I?” She hesitated, and Olivier took the glass silently from her hand and placed it on the stone window ledge. As he did so, his cool fingers brushed her hot ones, and every nerve seemed to fizz with sensation. “Shall we get to the point or do you have any more questions for me?”
She hesitated. So many questions crowded into her mind at once, she could barely pull one out of the tangle. Most were questions she was afraid to give voice to. Dark, kinky, forbidden questions that she couldn’t ask, even with Olivier sitting so close his breath feathered her collarbone. Light pressure on the inside of her wrist made her aware that he held her hand in his now, his forefinger massaging her pulse. They were angled towards each other on the window seat, and Olivier withdrew his fingers from her wrist and slipped his arm around her back. At the touch of his fingers on her bare flesh, Lisa almost leapt off the seat. She tensed for a split second, then closed her eyes, giving in to the sensation of his fingers stroking her. It had been so long since a man had touched her, so long since she’d responded to a man like this. Not since Jody… And when he’d betrayed her, she’d ended up in pieces. But that wouldn’t happen, because this was an arrangement, a pleasurable contract where both of them knew exactly what they wanted. She was safe and yet not safe from Olivier, and the contrast sent a thrill like electricity through her body.
“How does that sound?” he whispered.
His fingers circled the small of her back, then slipped lower between the soft fabric of her dress, resting on the skin over the cleft of her buttocks. Millimetres away from the most intimate contact.
“Intriguing…”
“Intriguing? That’s a neutral response. I can promise you the most intense experience of your life. Some moments, I hope, will be gloriously pleasurable, but some will be hard to bear. You’ll wonder how you got through them, but you will, and you’ll be proud you did.”
Still with one hand resting on her back, his lips touched her throat, and she tipped back her head. Need thrummed between her thighs.
“Is that what you expect from me?” he whispered.
Desire pulsed through her like electricity. “I expect to do as you wish, Olivier.”
He captured her chin tightly between his fingertips and jerked her head up. Her eyes blinked open. She was stunned at the switch from gentle to harsh. “Hmm. Smart answer. I like your style, but I have to tell you now that while you think you will try to do as I wish, I know that you will fail. You’re not a natural submissive, and you never will be.”
He let go of her chin, leaving her trembling with shock. “Then why are you taking me on?”
“Perhaps I shouldn’t. In fact, I probably ought to walk away now, but I also love a challenge, and watching you fail is going to be fascinating. I can see that there will be a lot of consequences.”
“You bast—” She bit back the rest of the expletive, but it was too late. His eyes shone with triumph and provocation.
“What? What were you going to call me? Say it. I can see your nostrils flaring, your fingers clenched ready for the fight. You hate me already for making you lose control.”
Lisa screamed silently, torn between the urge to let her true feelings out or throw back icy politeness. “I have nothing to say to you.”
He blew out a breath. “Nothing? Cherie, you think you’re acting so coolly, but your ‘nothing’ tells me more than you can imagine. I’m going to help you free the Lisa you’ve imprisoned inside this polite, capable facade. The angry, rebellious Lisa I want to drag out of you, kicking and screaming.”
He ran a finger from her throat to the top of her cleavage, leaving a fiery trail of heat. Lisa’s fight-or-flight instincts were battling so hard, her fingers dug into the seat pad as if it were his flesh. In this moment, she hated him for how desperate he made her feel.
“You’re so angry that don’t trust yourself to respond to me, I can tell.” He leaned forward and placed his lips to her ear, his hot breath feather-light against her neck. “And I can understand that, but even more than your anger, there are things you want to know, that you have to know.”
Her resolve collapsed like a building that had stood too long on crumbling foundations. Her reply was hoarse. “Yes, I do, but…I don’t know how to ask them.”
“That’s okay, cherie. Do you want me to help you?” His words soothed her like a balm. “Shall I ask your questions?”
She hesitated and then gave a raw reply. “Yes.”
“Tres bien. Let’s start with Lisa Archer’s number one question, the one that’s bugging her so badly she can hardly keep still in her seat, the one that’s making her pulse jump about like crazy and making the tiny pair of panties I know she’s wearing damper by the second. The question that has occupied her mind almost every waking minute since Mimi set up this meeting is: ‘Is this man really going to dominate and discipline me, and will there be real pain as well as pleasure?’”
Shock sucked the breath from her lungs. Directness she’d expected, but this was brutal.
“Well?” he asked. “What is your answer?”
Her reply fluttered out on a sigh. “Yes…”
“To the discipline, the pain or the pleasure?”
“All of them, damn it!” she snapped back, then glanced at the curtains, wondering if at any moment someone might pull them open and expose her, Olivier and their secrets.
As if he’d seen the anxiety in her eyes, Olivier pulled the brocade curtain more tightly shut. He rested his fingers on the nape of her neck, and the fine down rose. They trailed down her spine, caressing every vertebrae, and lingered on the bare skin above the back of her dress.
“Shall I go on?”
Unable to form words, Lisa nodded.
“Your next question is, ‘Will this man tie me up and restrain me?’”
Her reply came out on a sigh. “Yes.”
Her eyes were riveted on the long, strong fingers that now rested on her thigh. The warmth of his palm seared her flesh through the flimsy fabric.
“‘Will he tell me to get on my knees and suck his cock?’”
Lisa closed her eyes, her lips parting as his fingers slid beneath her dress and moved upwards before resting at the lacy edge of her panties. “Yes…”
“‘Go down on me until I beg for mercy?’”
Her nipples, already stiff, felt as if they would burst. “Yes, please.”
Tugging her panties aside, Olivier slid the tip of his finger between her labia. Hot shards of desire shot through her pussy as he pressed lightly on her clitoris. She closed her eyes as his voice drifted into her fast-dissolving consciousness.
“You have a new question to ask, non?”
“Yes…”
As one finger rested on her clit, his other hand lifted her hemline up her thigh, and she fought for breath.
“And that question is, ‘Will my Dom expect me to bare my beautiful breasts and pussy t
o the world?’”
Her eyes flew open. “No!” Immediately she regretted her cry. Someone would surely hear.
He put his mouth close to her ear. “I think that it would be very good for you to share the beauty of your body with others.”
She shook her head. “I…no…I couldn’t go naked in front of other people.”
He slipped his fingertip inside her, and her response was an instant rush of arousal.
“Cherie, you’re creamy at the mere mention of it, so I can tell public nudity is one of your fantasies, even if you’ve locked the idea away more securely than a treasure in the Louvre.”
She squirmed against the seat, with lust and shame in equal measure. How could he do this to her? Probe her deepest desires and fears in this way. In public too? “How would you do that to me? You said you weren’t into the club scene, and I don’t want anyone else to know about our arrangement. Oh God…”
She bucked her hips as Olivier ran his finger through the thick juices of her sex. “I have a few ideas, but I need your answer. Will you consent to be bared in public if I demand it?”
Bared in public. That implied that she would be forced to be naked against her will. The idea horrified and tantalized her so much she gripped his arms like a vise. Olivier stroked her clit, stoking her need like a fire. “Please…” she begged.
“Stop or carry on?”
His finger stilled, and she was bereft. She knew what her choice was. Agree, or he would not bring her to climax. Perhaps he would simply walk away altogether. Her breathing was hoarse, his finger holding the power to give intense pleasure or send her away from him, cheated and unsatisfied.
“Well? Do you agree to be bared if I so choose?”
“Fuck you, but yes!” The words came from the gutter of her soul, but she didn’t care. She craved release like she never had before.
“Fuck me?” He tutted. “What language for a lady to use. A respected professional too. Some Doms would consider that more than enough grounds to punish you right now, but I’m not sure our hosts would appreciate me administering a thrashing to your pert derriere in their salon.”
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