by Drew Jordan
His lips tickled my ear and I shivered. “Do what you want.” I was afraid, but the fear was sensual, the anticipation titillating. This was going to hurt and I was going to enjoy it. I was alive and I had found a greater plane of existence here with him. Gone was the vanilla day-to-day of the retail employee who sleepwalked through life.
“I need to ground myself, get myself under control.”
That meant he was probably going to step away from the bed. I was disappointed, but I didn’t really mind. I would just wait for him. I would wait indefinitely for him.
His weight pulled back and I saw out of the corner of my eye him going over to where he kept his weapons. He pulled a knife down off the rack and tossed his hair back out of his eyes. I stiffened, not sure what his intention was. But I would have to accept whatever he gave. That was the decision I’d made. That was the relationship we had.
By giving over total control to him, I felt like I had more freedom than ever before. I had to lose myself to find me.
It was a truth as blinding as the sun dappled snow outside the cabin.
He wouldn’t hurt me in a way I couldn’t handle. His intention was not to kill me with the knife and I had to fully trust in that. I had to. He had held my life in his hands from the minute the plane had hit the ground and he had never failed me. My life had value to him, and whatever the knife was for, it wasn’t to murder me.
Trent returned to the bed and tied my ankles together. Every rough slide of the rope chafed my skin and made my nerve endings tingle. It felt like my skin was alive. Everywhere the rope touched, he followed with a soft brushing of his fingertips, soothing my flesh, soothing me. Goosebumps rose, a trail in his wake. Before he tightened the ropes, he raised my feet, knees bent, and shifted my legs apart with a soft lover’s touch, cupping the curve of my backside briefly. He was such an intriguing mix of soft and hard, tender and rough. He had a body filled with physical power, muscle and strength, and callused, scarred skin. There was no hesitation on his part to use his strength, yet he always tempered it with a feathery touch or a sweet word or a gentle kiss.
It was an intriguing combination I couldn’t resist, nor did I want to. So while he was in check now, I knew at any second he could shift and I would feel the sting of a slap on my ass or the hard twist of my nipple between his fingers. Or the blade of his knife.
“You feel in control to me,” I said, giving him a smile over my shoulder.
“I’m getting there,” he murmured.
It was then I felt the cool glide of steel over my bare ass as he ran his knife where his fingers had just been. I swallowed hard, caught off guard. I’d seen the knife. It was big, lethal. I felt panic pluck at my arousal, and I fought the restraints without meaning to.
“Shh. I’m not going to hurt you, Laney. I’m not going to cut you. Not unless you ask me to. And you might ask me to before we’re through.”
He had no idea the effect his words could have on me. “I won’t ask you for anything. I’ll beg.”
With a short laugh, he moved the knife up my back, along the ridges of my spine. I pictured him driving the tip through my vertebrae, to the hilt, pining me to the bed. My blood would spill down my sides and soak the mattress and I wouldn’t even be able to jerk and convulse and fight to get away because I’d be paralyzed. That was the irony of course. He wouldn’t do that to me because he didn’t need to use violence to keep me still and at his mercy. Not really. The domination was an agreement, a consensual concession to his control, and while I hadn’t always obeyed, I was learning. Getting more skilled at it.
So I concentrated on relaxing the tension in my body, letting him move the blade over me without wincing or struggling. He used the knife to shift my hair off of my neck and teased the tip over the delicate flesh at the back of my ear. He traced my jaw, never applying any pressure, so it felt as smooth as a melting ice cube. Across my lips. I involuntarily sucked in a breath. I wasn’t scared. I was turned on. I wanted to bite the knife, to pull it between my teeth.
He didn’t react and just moved on to my opposite shoulder, down my bicep, past my elbow and over my wrist. The blade traced each of my fingers and I shivered. It almost tickled. But in the way of a spider crawling over you, implying danger. I didn’t shake it off. The cool steel disappeared though and I waited for its return.
It didn’t. I heard him exhale sharply, but I couldn’t see him. A few seconds later, something warm dripped onto my back. I jerked at the unexpected sensation and I wondered what it was. Candle wax? It didn’t harden though. It rolled.
“What is that?” I asked.
“My blood.”
I tensed. “What? Why, are you hurt?” It was a stupid question but I didn’t know a different one to ask. It was just incomprehensible. His casual tone. The drip, drip. Like the blood on the plane. That was an uncomfortable thought.
“No. I cut myself so I could do this.” His fingertip dipped into a droplet and smeared it.
“Do what?”
He didn’t answer immediately but instead dragged the blood across my skin, curving up and down in a series of swirls.
“Are you drawing me a picture?” It was a disturbing thought, yet not one I recoiled from. He had bled for me, for whatever reason. He’d taken steel to skin and sliced through it.
“No. I’m giving you my name.”
The words settled over me and I processed them slowly. His name. He was writing his name on my back in his blood. He was claiming me, and giving me what I had always asked for. The truth of who he was. Letters that would tell me what to call him. Yet I already knew I had his name just as surely as he had mine. Tied together, forever. But I reveled in the gesture. It was sexy, and romantic. When he took me from behind, he’d see his name drying, staining me. Becoming visible on the outside the way it was already seared on my soul.
“I accept it.”
“Good.” His touch left my back and he shifted his arm to where I could see it. He’d sliced up his forearm, not a deep wound, but a straight two inch cut, the blood flow slowing now to a sluggish stream.
“Didn’t that hurt?” I asked, wishing I could touch him, soothe him. I didn’t get to touch him enough. He held me at bay with the ropes too often.
“Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding,” he murmured.
I shivered, the scent of his blood filling my nostrils. “Who said that?”
“Khalil Gibran. He’s a writer.”
So the man who had no books save one was well-read. The enigmatic quality of him now felt like something to look forward to, a peeling of his layers, rather than a frustration. We had endless days and nights and if he could give me his name, eventually, he would give me all of him.
“I’ve never read him.”
“Taste my blood, Laney.” He teased the cut over my bottom lip.
It didn’t bother me. In fact, I flicked my tongue out to taste, curious. I wanted to take whatever he would give me. “What did your pain allow you to understand?” I asked.
“That I belong here, in the bush.”
“With me?”
I could see him nod out of the corner of my eye.
“Yes. With you.”
Kissing the tip of his finger, I descended on it, wanting to capture his essence, his scent. His blood. Wanting to be as intimate with him as it was possible to be.
“What does your pain teach you, doll?”
“That I’m not as weak as I thought. That I’m strong.” I sucked his finger, drawing it deep into my mouth. I had never tasted his cock, never wrapped my mouth around his thickness. I craved that, wanting to tease him the way he teased me. But I wouldn’t unless he wanted me to. Unless he told me.
“You are strong. It’s your greatest asset.”
“What’s my biggest weakness?”
“Self-doubt. And a tendency to be petulant.”
I made a sound of protest. But I couldn’t really deny either. He was right.
“But you’re
learning. Growing.” He pulled his finger out of my mouth and wiped the moisture down the curve of my breast. “I am too. I’m learning patience.”
That amused me. I wouldn’t have classified him as patient. But I thought about how I would react to someone completely invading my space and decided he was an impatient sort of patient, impossible though that was.
I closed my eyes as he reached up and undid the knots holding my wrists tightly behind my neck. My shoulders relaxed, the pain easing. He didn’t touch my ankle bonds, but instead just rolled me fully onto my side, then onto my back.
“Don’t you want to see my back?” I asked. “See your name on me?” In blood.
I did. I wished I had a full-length mirror so I could stand up and gaze over my shoulder. I had always been content with my body, not in love with it, but not hating it or desiring to change it the way so many woman were. I always thought it looked fine, but nothing extraordinary. It had only been since I’d been here, with him, that I had felt the full force of my sexual essence. The seductive qualities of my body. How every inch was erogenous, valuable, tempting to him. I felt sexy, in a tangible way, whereas before it had just been an awareness that certain men, in certain circumstances found me attractive.
Now I understood there was a whole new level. Beyond the pain, was the ultimate awareness and we overwhelmed each other in the best way possible. It was so intense to be with him that I wanted him to rein me in, so I didn’t tear off chunks of my flesh and hand them to him to covet.
Thoughts like that scared me.
I scared myself far more than he scared me.
He shook his head. “Now I want to see your blood.”
“You’re going to cut me?” Fear and excitement overlapped each other, in an erotic embrace. “Where?”
His finger rolled across my neck and I shivered. “I’d like to here, but it’s far too dangerous. I can’t risk actually hurting you, not when we’re so far from town. I don’t want to hurt you.” He cupped my cheek. “I want to keep you forever.”
Turning my head, I kissed the palm of his hand. “I want that too.”
The knife lowered, shifting down, down. I sucked in a breath, the anticipation of pain huge. As he passed each body part I thought he might cut and it remained unscathed, I felt relief. Yet disappointment. I’d thought he would tease the tip into my breast, or give me a matching slice on my forearm to his. But instead, he eased it over the mass of curls I now had between my legs and I swallowed hard, desire making me damp, nipples tight. It would be the worst kind of pain I was sure and I opened my mouth, ready to protest. I couldn’t. He wouldn’t.
It was just a whisper of steel over dewy curls then it was gone. He didn’t want to hurt me. He’d said so himself.
Instead, his tongue flicked over my clit and I jerked at the unexpected pleasure. But immediately following, there was a sharp pain on my inner thigh. I sucked in a breath, tears forming in my eyes. He distracted me from it by using his tongue on me again, as I felt both the pain and the pleasure. The wet trickle of my warm blood felt strange, like an itch, something that needed to be wiped and blended with my damp arousal. It was a confusing thought, everything was confusing.
I went down into some unknown head space, a weird sort of vacancy of thought, of strumming nerves and high pleasure, of intense pain and muddled consciousness. All I knew was him. And all he knew was me. I could hear the tenor of his breathing change as he reached down, flicked his tongue over my blood, then back to my clit. We were elemental, at our darkest origin, blending into one mysterious and off-balance creature.
“Come for me,” he urged. “Without my mouth on you. Without me touching you. Come for me just by the sound of my voice.”
I shifted restlessly, not sure how to achieve that. Wanting to.
“Look at me,” he commanded.
I did. His cool eyes were fiery, intense. “Imagine my tongue on you, imagine me sucking your clit. Can you feel it?”
“Yes.” It was as if he were touching me through a gossamer shield, obscured, distant, but still very real. It wasn’t, of course.
Nothing could be real. None of this seemed real.
Yet this moment, this life with him, was more real than anything that had happened to me in all the other millions of seconds I had existed before this.
“Now come, Laney.”
So I did. Our gazes held, his grip on my thighs tightening, his thumb slipping across my blood. My body seized and let go and I achieved perfect obedience.
The corner of his mouth turned up and I knew the purest bliss I’d ever experienced.
Both Alaska and the stranger had taken my life and plunged it into an icy river and made me feel when I hadn’t even known I’d been numb.
I smiled back, proud of myself.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“Dress warmly.”
Yawning, I slipped out of bed naked and stretched in a way that would make his eyebrows lift. It did. I smiled as I watched his eyes rake over my breasts. “What are we doing today?” I asked as I went over to the sink fully naked to start brewing some coffee.
I rubbed absently at my inner thigh, where my cut was starting to heal, itching as it scabbed and pulled. I had shown him something that night inside of me and he had changed in the days since, loosening up, talking more. I had changed too, reveling in my body, in him, in my role as mistress of the cabin. I had become more domestic, learning how to feed him. Learning how to please him.
Nudity was liberating, made the mundane tasks of cooking and cleaning more interesting, plus he had been right. I was starting to get used to the cold. There was something elemental about having it cool my flesh. It kept me limber, moving quickly. Aware of all my joints and how much effort was required to do my daily tasks. I had been to Mexico a few times, where the heat robbed me of ambition, made me lazy, complacent, relaxed to the point of not caring about anything other than the sun on my face and the drink in my hand. But here, I was embracing the cold, because it got my heart pumping faster and forced my step quicker.
“We’re going to town.”
I glanced over my shoulder, surprised. “We?” It had been days. I thought he’d abandoned the trip. Certainly I wasn’t expecting him to take me with him.
“Yes, we.”
He was already in his jeans but his chest was bare. He wasn’t the only one whose gaze could wander. I lowered my eyes, taking in the length of him. He was the hottest thing in the cabin, by far. “I didn’t think you wanted me to go with you.” I poured the grounds in the coffeemaker.
Why was I debating it with him? I should keep my mouth shut and just take advantage. But I was suspicious. I couldn’t help it. I didn’t want to get my hopes up and then be disappointed. I didn’t want to escape him, not now, not ever, but I did want a razor and tampons and maybe some sugar for my coffee. Panties. He had promised me panties. Mostly though, what I wanted wasn’t stuff, it was to see other people, even if I didn’t speak to them. Maybe eat a slice of pizza. Hear the news on the TV at a bar. Sip wine. See something other than these four walls. I wasn’t totally acclimated. It would take a long time to get used to the lack of variation in my scenery, but I knew I would eventually. It was just an adjustment period.
In the meantime, I might be able to satisfy all those cravings with an afternoon in town.
“I always wanted you to go. I just didn’t trust you.”
I turned the coffeepot on and turned around. Leaning back on the counter, I asked, “And you do now?”
“Yes.” He had moved in front of me and he tipped my chin up and gave me a soft kiss. “I do. You’ve earned it.”
A shiver rolled through me and it wasn’t from the frigid temperature. It was because it made me giddy to please him. In only three days, I had fully brought that look back- the one that made it clear that he wouldn’t be done with me for a very long time, if ever. That was the look I wanted. One of fierce need, desire, attraction, obsession. Love.
“Thank you,” I murmured.
“I’ll be good, I promise.”
“I know you will be. Just keep your hat on and your head down.”
“I can do that.” I put my arms around his neck and kissed him fully, opening my mouth for him. “Mmm. What do you want for breakfast?”
“Tongue.”
“Coming right up.” He wasn’t being flirty. He didn’t mean a French kiss from me. He meant caribou tongue from the animal he’d taken down the day before when he’d gone hunting. “Can you get it from the shed for me?”
“Of course.” He pulled on his boots and opened the door.
Immediately, he brought back the tray of ice he’d set out the night before. It didn’t seem like someone who lived in the Alaskan bush would want to make ice cubes but he did faithfully. He put them in his coffee, two per each cup, to cool the scalding liquid down. It was a curious habit but it had become endearing to me. But now he broke routine.
As I bent over and pulled out a saucepan to cook the tongue, his hand slid between my ass cheeks and settled right where he could cup my sex. I went still. “Well, hello,” I said, flirtatious. He wasn’t usually a morning sex kind of man but I wasn’t going to object.
His hand disappeared briefly and he commanded, “Don’t move. Stay bent over.”
“Yes, sir.” I waited, anticipating his cock thrust hard into me. My body went damp for him at the thought.
But instead of the warm skin of his erection, the cool wetness of an ice cube slid between my cheeks and deep into the heat of my vagina. He followed it with a second one and I sucked in my breath, startled by the sensation.
“How does that feel?” he asked, sounding curious, but sleepy still. Like he wasn’t really fully awake and was just playing. Like when men tugged at their balls as they emerged from sleep.
“Interesting.”
“Let me know when they melt. I’ll go get the tongue.”
“Should I stay still like this?” They already were melting a little, and slipping downward, gravity too strong.