“Gold Room, all the way up and to the right. It’s ready and waiting.” He shot a fast, appreciative look at Angelina and glanced away, all business. He slipped a key in my hand. “Elevator across from the main hall.”
I took her hand, leading her through the pulsing energy of the enormous room. It was crowded, thick with people who were barely dressed… or not at all. And it was obviously Ladies Night. For lining the round walls of the hall, men were lined up, naked from the waist down and with black silk hoods over their heads. Every size and shape was represented, every cock, from the smallest to the largest, was hard and bobbing with anticipation. The women were free to make their selection and take their pleasure in any way they wanted, either privately or very publicly. I shot a look back at Angelina and smiled at the shock on her face. We slipped into the elevator and I unzipped her dress…
“What was happening out there?” she gasped.
“Ladies’ choice,” I answered, leaning in to breathe her scent. “I’ve heard they have gentlemen’s choice, too…” I untied the ribbon at her waist and slipped it through the gold bracelets on her wrists. Rewarded by the naked hunger in her eyes, I opened the door and closed it again behind us.
“But tonight is my choice, Angel. Only mine… and yours.” I peeled her gown off, leaving her in nothing but high heels and lace.
“And I have everything I want…
right here…”
24
Angelina
“I’m in love with you.”
The words lifted the thick, lush veil of my last intense climax and made me blink. I lifted my head with difficulty and stared at him, between my legs.
“I love this… too…,” I said, slowly, carefully.
He shifted his weight and rested his head against my belly. “No, sweetheart,” he said. “You heard me right the first time. I’m in love with you.”
His erection was pounding insistently against the side of my thigh. He’d taken me over the edge time after time, without any release of his own. “This is his cock talking,” something deep in my head whispered. Don’t pay attention… don’t let down your guard…
I ran my fingers through his hair, feeling the relentless need building again as he climbed my length and rested himself between my legs. His cock throbbed against my soaking clit, but he didn’t enter me. He rocked instead, sliding up and down along the outside, enjoying his power to arouse me.
“This is me talking,” he said with a wry smile, “not this…” And he thrust in deep and hard. “I’ll tell you the same an hour from now… a week from now… years from now, Angel.” He began a deep, stroking rhythm that made the whole room spin. “I’ve felt this way forever, sweetheart… since the very first time.” He hilted himself and rolled his hips between mine. “You’re the only woman for me… and I’m the only man for you…
It’s in this,” he said, burying his face in my neck, tangling his fingers in the forgotten ribbon that still bound my wrists and giving a gentle tug, “that you accept that you belong to me… with me…
That you accept that this is your nature, as well as mine… heart to heart and flesh to flesh… Every time I come inside you,” he said, speeding up his rhythm to a frantic pace… “And you belong to me a little more…”
I could feel he was hovering on the edge, and I was already halfway gone. The rushing sound in my head filled my ears and drowned his voice. I felt a rush of liquid heat inside and was lost in the wave that followed. My body clenched and squeezed, draining his essence and giving sweet release in return. He thrust until we were slick with sweat and satisfaction. He rolled us until he was resting on his back and I was straddling him, his cock still as hard as when we’d begun.
I felt lightheaded, almost outside myself. He smiled up at me, caressing my breasts tenderly. There was something… something echoing in the back of my mind… something that slipped out of reach just as the thought came closer...
“I still love you,” he said, softly.
I forgot to pick up a pregnancy test, I thought suddenly. “I love…”
He cut me off with a kiss, sitting up and wrapping his arms around me. He untied the ribbon from my wrists and used it to tie my hair into a long ponytail. “You’re not ready yet,” he said, leaning back to admire his work. His eyes were bright… knowing…
“You trust me with your body,” he said easily. “I want you to learn to trust me with your heart.
He stroked my cheek, holding my face between his hands.
“Somebody got in late last night,” Mattie said brightly, pouring me a mug of coffee. “Rexie said you two barely made it upstairs.”
I took a long, scalding swallow and smiled faintly. “Somebody needs to keep his mouth shut,” I shot back. “How did Violet do with Donna yesterday? And what did she think about our new member of the family?” Miri lifted her head and perked her ears.
“Donna said Will couldn’t have chosen better,” she answered. Violet stood up from where the puppy was chewing her toy and stood next to me. I tucked an arm around her and she didn’t pull back.
“She said the interaction is already starting to help her… That she was more cooperative during her session, more willing to try new activities. I scheduled her again for Friday…”
“I’ll take her,” I said, easing my little girl up onto my lap. She settled in comfortably, silent as always, and started to work her little fingers along the edge of the table as if there were invisible keys to play… music only she could hear…
“You’ve done so much for her, for both of us…” I broke off, feeling a wave of emotion wash over me. “I want you to take a long weekend for yourself… maybe go see that mountain of a boyfriend of yours…”
“Not my boy friend,” she snapped back, amusement shining in her eyes. “He’s my boy toy. I make the rules and he begs me to let him follow them.” For the first time in my whole life, I thought I saw a hint of blush on her cheeks. “He did mention something about a concert tonight… But it’s not my kind of thing at all…”
“Go,” I said, without hesitation. “Just go and enjoy… try following his lead, for a change,” I said, my mind wandering. “You never know what you’ll like until you give it a chance…”
She stood up, cup in hand and bumped me gently with her hip as she walked by. “Sounds like advice from someone who knows,” she said teasingly, disappearing into the hall.
“No shit…,” I whispered under my breath.
Miri and my daughter had become inseparable.
Violet was settled in at the piano, the puppy was upside down by her feet, snoring softly. One big ear was flopped over the top of Miri’s head like a bad toupee. I checked on them from around the corner. Violet was all focus, in that distant way of hers, My heart did a little roll in my chest and I went to check on the bread in the oven. The day had turned blustery and chill. There was nothing I enjoyed more than the warm, yeasty smell of homemade bread… and nothing I needed more than a quiet opportunity to try to sort through the last few weeks of my life...
“Angel?”
He knocked at the door and my heart thumped harder.
“I was going through a few of the odds and ends from yesterday…”
So was I, I thought. That you love me… that I love you, too… that it terrifies me and excites me all at once and I have no idea what to do with all that…
“I was glad to have an excuse to see you…”
And I’ve spent half the morning trying to come up with a reason, too…
“I haven’t opened the boxes for our room,” he said quietly. “I want you to do that… to show me what you chose…” He took a step closer.
What did I buy…? What am I doing…? He took a step closer and my whole body responded…
But this had your name on it.” He held out a white paper bag with A. Hollister scrawled in pencil… Perkins Pharmacy, Spring Street stamped in black ink… “I thought it might be something urgent…?”
Fuck… oh… fuck…<
br />
The pregnancy test…
25
Will
“For Violet?” I asked.
“I’m sorry…,” she said, shaking her head as if she was trying to clear it somehow. “What about Vi?”
“I thought it might be a prescription she needed,” I said, smoothing her hair back over her shoulder. I let my hand stray down her back… “Kids and medicines… you know…”
“No,” she said shortly. “Nothing like that… Violet’s just fine.” She took the bag and tucked it into a kitchen drawer. “Just something it’s a good idea to keep on hand… that’s all.”
“Who is that playing?” I asked, lifting my head, cocking an ear toward the living room. I recognized the piece as Rachmaninoff, one I’d learned as a boy but never mastered. “Does Mattie play?”
I took her hand and drew her along with me, pulled by the familiar song played in such an unusual way. The interpretation was like nothing I’d ever heard before. Innocent, and haunting, too...
“Mattie’s spending the night in the city,” Angelina said. “That’s my daughter.” Pride and hesitancy mixed in her voice as she held onto my arm. “Whatever she hears, she can play. The music is her voice…,” she whispered.
I moved closer, watching her tiny fingers move over the keys. Violet had neither the strength nor the reach to play as she did. And yet the music flowed anyway, almost like magic. Beautiful, unique… expressive far beyond her tender years…
“It’s impossible…,” I breathed, taking a step closer. I felt Angel’s hand on my arm, tense and protective.
“It’s just natural to her,” she said, quietly. “And private, too. It’s like she’s in a world all her own.” Her grip on my arm made me turn to face her. “It’s the way she expresses her feelings, Will. It’s a gift, but she has therapy a few times a week… to try to encourage her to express herself in other ways, too.” I could see so much love and concern… and fear in her lovely face as she went on. “She lives in a world of her own… so much of her life in a place we can’t share…”
I took her face in my hands and kissed her. Slowly, patiently… with a tenderness that made my heart swell. The beautiful love of a mother…
“Sometimes we share more than we realize,” I said against her lips. I tucked her behind me and knelt down next to Violet. “Can I sit beside you?” I asked her softly.
The girl’s hands stopped, hovering just above the keys and I felt Angel’s hand tighten in mine. Violet looked only at the keys and stayed where she was on the long bench.
“I learned this when I was about your age,” I said gently, using a single hand to play the simple tune. Violet sat, listening, but didn’t move.
“When I was a little older, I learned this part,” I said, reaching slowly up with the other hand to show her. I could feel Angel shift her weight behind me from one foot to the other. I knew I was pushing her patience, but Violet seemed calm, undisturbed. I eased myself onto the bench beside her, careful not to touch her. She didn’t move, didn’t react. From what I’d learned in my youth, dealing with an autistic schoolmate, I took it as a good sign…
I started the song again, this time playing it in all its complexity. It was beautiful, melodic. I couldn’t remember the name anymore… it had been too many years. But the feeling I did remember… and the emotion it evoked. When I was finally finished, and the vibration of the last notes disappeared, I sat without speaking, Violet’s hand still rested against the piano, waiting. And I began to play again.
I started from the beginning. Using only one hand, just as I had at first. It sounded too simple now, too empty after the richness of the whole piece. “What’s missing, Violet?” I asked her softly. “What does the song need?”
And I heard Angel’s breath behind me… a sudden soft intake, as Violet moved her right hand over the keys and began to play. In seconds, she had found the melody, was creating the harmony, almost without missing a note. Miri sat up next to Violet’s little legs and put her nose on the girl’s knobby knees.
And while we continued to play, Violet reached down with her free hand to gently stroke the puppy’s head.
26
Angelina
If I hadn’t been watching with my own eyes, I’d never have believed it.
The closest my daughter had ever come to a shared experience had been to allow me to feed her or dress her without a struggle or outright refusal. I gripped Will’s shoulders as much from gratitude as for the support. My knees were shaky underneath me and the dizziness was back. The puppy whined softly, needing out. Violet was watching her, a curious look on her face…
“I’ve got her,” Will said, standing up and catching me in his arms. “Come keep me company,”
Miri ran for the kitchen door as we followed after her. “You told me she could play,” he said, his voice hushed but excited. “But I had no idea… It’s the most incredible thing I’ve ever seen.”
I closed the door behind Miri and leaned back against it. “It’s not the music,” I said, staring up at him. “The incredible thing is that she played the song with you, Will. She’s been playing since she was able to get up on the bench by herself. But she’s never done anything with someone… as a team…”
“Fiercely independent… like her mother,” he teased gently, moving up to press the length of his body into mine. “Instead of trying to draw her out of her world, I thought it might work better just to meet her there.” He leaned into me and a thousand tiny flames inside started to burn.
“Spaghetti,” he said, dropping kisses down the side on my neck… along my collarbone…
“...what… What?”
“Does Violet like spaghetti? I make a helluva sauce… I not only cook, I wash dishes, too.”
“And you’re asking us to dinner…?”
“I’m inviting myself to dinner…” He continued his way down my neck and trailed his lips teasingly over the mounded tops of my breasts. The wind outside had started to howl in earnest. “It’s getting cold outside and the scent in here is amazing…,” he said into my warm cleavage. “You don’t really want to send me home without a taste… do you…?”
The man was many things.
Intense, seductive… persuasive as hell. One minute he was tying me up in a secret room, or fucking me into sweet oblivion in a sex club…
The next, he was washing pots and pans in my kitchen, looking right at home with a dish towel thrown over his shoulder…
“Violet’s fine,” I said, standing in the doorway, watching him. I’d just gone to check on her, and she and Miri were both curled up on the sofa, their full, round bellies lifting and falling in unison. “I’ve never seen her eat so much… I should probably get her tucked in for the night…”
He opened a drawer to put away the wooden spoons he’d finished drying and I caught a reminding glimpse of the bag from the pharmacy…
So close, and yet so far…, I thought wryly. Maybe in the morning…
“I’ll take her,” he said, as I shifted the growing puppy. Together, we carried them both into Violet’s room and slipped them into bed. Neither woke, but they curled into each other in a warm, familiar way. “She’s okay in her jeans and top?” he asked. “No peejays?”
“Once she’s asleep, she’s pretty much out cold,” I answered, leaning back against his chest. “Thank you for tonight… for dinner… and for being so wonderful with her. I know it might not seem like much to you…”
“It’s huge,” he answered back. “It means just as much to me to earn her trust, as to earn yours.” He led me out and I closed her door softly. The fire was starting to burn low in the fireplace and sheets of rain buffeted the roof. He wrapped me in his arms and kissed me until the heat between us felt like it could warm the entire house.
“Ask me,” he demanded, pulling back so he could look down into my eyes.
“...This is you… meeting me… in my world…?”
“Ask…”
“Stay with me…?”
/>
The soft flesh of my breasts swelled between his spread fingers. I leaned into his hands even harder and he cupped them, supporting my weight so I could roll my hips into his groin. I’d come over and over again. And his seed was warm and wet between our bodies. His cock was still huge inside me… my walls clenched against it in a deliriously sweet rhythm…
“I’ve never done this before,” I whispered, savoring the languid look in his dark eyes.
“I beg to differ,” he shot back gently. “And I should know…” He took a hold of my hips and rolled us together until the tables were turned. He teased me with his cock, in easy slow strokes. He smoothed my hair back and stared down into my eyes.
“I mean… this,” I bucked my hips lightly, “with my daughter in the other room.”
He smiled. “Parents do it all the time,” he whispered. “Just very quietly…” He pushed in deeper and I had to bite my lip. “It makes it even hotter, don’t you think…?”
“Play fair,” I warned him with a smile, although the word parent was running circles in my head. “I just meant…”
“I know,” he answered, rolling us onto our sides. He ran a rough palm leisurely over my nipples. It seemed so familiar… so comforting. “You’ve been mom and dad. And you’ve done an incredible job.”
“She’s been the most important thing in my whole life,” I said. “It didn’t matter that she wasn’t planned, or that we’ve had some extra challenges. I can’t imagine my life without her… without being her mother…”
And he moved his hand purposefully from my breast to my belly. “The same way I can’t imagine…
not being a father.”
27
Will
“Violet’s father,” I said pointedly.
“You saw how she responds to me. There’s a connection between us, and I think it’s more than just coincidence. I know she doesn’t know me well enough to talk to me yet,” I went on. “She’s young and bound to be shy at first…”
The Baby Pact_A BDSM Romance Page 9