“I’ve changed the place up over the years.”
“It’s just lovely. I may never want to leave if I lived here.”
“Jen, I may never let you leave if you lived here.”
Once he’s led me through the beautifully modern kitchen and down the hallway, we reach his bedroom, and I’m even more in awe. Ground-length windows with another set of French doors in between, which he opens, line the entire back wall and lead out to a second patio overlooking a large pond and a picturesque view of the open countryside. He catches me by the hips when I turn to stare outside.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?”
“God, yes.” I sigh with serenity and sink into his body that’s pressing against my back, while my eyes soar upward at the millions of shiny stars. “You’ve got your own little piece of heaven on earth out here.”
“There’s absolutely nothing that compares to being out in the country, especially after the sun goes down.” He wraps his arms around my hips, and even with his earlier words still twisting my belly into knots, a sense of contentment and ease warms me at the thought of living this kind of lifestyle. “Think you could ever get used to sitting outside and watching the sunset, listening to the sounds of wildlife, and gazing at the stars? Or will you always prefer the dark gloom of smog, row after row of buildings, the calming serenity of heavy traffic?” There’s humor in his voice, and he nuzzles against my ear. “This is home. I can’t see myself ever leaving. City life could never satisfy me like the country.”
I lean my head back into his chest with another feeling of calmness. “I’m sure living here would be pretty easy to adapt to. It’s definitely peaceful, almost hauntingly so. You don’t see chupacabras out here, do you?”
With his warm breath against the nape of my neck sending chills racing down my back, he says, “Haven’t seen one as of yet, but you never know in these parts.” I can feel his smile against my skin. “Tell me what would make you happy, sugar. What are you looking for in this crazy life? The big house? A husband? Kids and soccer games?”
There were days when I used to daydream of being out here, relishing the life of a rancher’s wife, tending to a big garden full of homegrown vegetables, and learning how to make homemade jams and jellies while having a slew of kids. Rylee once told me she’d bet her last dollar that Jason would end up a famous country singer with a Barbie wife and Keith and I would have at least five children together.
You’re such a motherly type. I bet they all have names beginning with K.
My throat tightens. We had such fantasies, such big imaginations.
Keith motions me to a small deep blue sofa in front of the windows, and I take a seat and gaze outside at the endless land that seems to go on forever while imagining what it might truly be like to live this kind of life. Big house? Marriage? Children? It’s not something I’ve given much thought to the last years living in the city, but of course I want those things.
I pull my knees underneath me and blink toward Keith. “Who wouldn’t want those things? Isn’t that what life is about? Don’t you want kids one day?”
He settles in beside me then lifts my palm and kisses each knuckle, a gesture that’s intimate, personal, raises goose bumps over my skin, and heats everything in my core. “I’m not an easy man to love, Jen. Marriage and kids aren’t something I foresee in my future. My life is far too complicated to ever be a good role model to a child.”
An explosion of hurt feels like a kick to the heart, and my gaze drops to the ground, where I zoom in on an invisible shadow. How could Keith be anything but a positive influence to a child? Fun, smart, successful, caring, he’s everything that makes a good parent and, for me, impossible not to love.
“That’s not true, Keith. Not even close. Who couldn’t love you?”
With his finger tipping my chin up, he stares at me for a long minute with eyes soft and warm, like a man who loves profoundly, like a man full of feelings and sensitivity. My strong controlling rancher is nowhere to be seen as he gazes down at me with nothing but gentleness. Then he says the words I’ve been dying to hear for over a decade.
“I owe you an apology, sweetheart—actually two. Hell, probably more. But first, for taking damn near fifteen years to give it to you. And second, for not knowing who I was back then and not knowing what I really wanted. That afternoon … in the barn, I did things to you I’d never done before. Christ, Jen.” With his face tightening in a wince, he runs the pad of his thumb under my bottom lip. “It’s a fucking wonder I didn’t seriously injure you. I left that day, changed, and damn near gutted. I’m so goddamned sorry. I was just a kid—a stupid kid that had no idea what he was doing, or why he craved what he did. I was a ticking time bomb just waiting to ignite, so I did what I thought I needed to do and ended things before I did something I’d regret for the rest of my life. I couldn’t have possibly given you what you needed. Damn sure not what you deserved. Fuck, I don’t know that I could ever give you what you deserve, sugar. My needs are complicated at best. The only thing I know for certain is that when I love, I love hard.”
Lips trembling, I take one then two deep breaths and tug my face away from his hand that’s still on my chin while preparing myself for an answer I’m not entirely sure I can handle. “Did you ever love me … hard?”
Something unsettled and unreadable passes over his face. Time seems to creep, excruciatingly, as I wait for him to respond. He peers down at me with eyes dark and disturbed, his jaw clenching, his body stiff and strained, his expression a beautiful, dignified mask of feelings. “Sugar, I loved you more than you could ever realize. And way before that day in the barn.” He pinches the tip of his nose then grabs my hand, pulling me from my seat and against his chest and the raging beat of his heart. “Trust me when I tell you there are things in my life that you wouldn’t understand.”
My heart sinks at his words. Why does everyone keep telling me that? I’m not a damn child. Keith is a Dominant. What’s not to understand? My God, is he some kind of serial killer? A mobster? Does he have more than one wife spread over the country? Is he a brutal sadist?
Frustration beats so heavy inside me that I want to scream, grab him by his shirt, or pound on his chest until he stops beating around the bush and just finishes saying whatever he’s struggling to tell me.
“What does all that even mean? You lead a Dominant lifestyle. What’s not to understand? That you molded me into the woman I am today—a submissive woman? That you were my first love, whom I accepted from day one, even being oblivious to the whole Dominant-submissive life at eighteen years old? That I’ve changed my entire life to return to you? Jesus, I never challenged you, Keith. Not once. I knew I wanted you … on any terms. I still do.”
Fingers shove through his hair harshly, roughly, his gaze dark, troubled, and unsettled. Of course, he can give me what I need. I’ve known that since the first day he introduced me to Domination.
That day changed my life. It changed my needs.
“It was always you, Keith.”
A blood-chilling darkness suddenly blankets his eyes that cuts through me like sharp razors. “You sure about that, Jen? Since you’re hell-bent on hearing the truth, I’d like the same courtesy. Was I really your first love? And if so, was that by choice or by consequence?”
Outraged, I draw in a deep breath and stumble back with his burning hard stare like a piercing sharp knife to the ribs.
“Yes, Keith.” My words come out in almost a hiss. “You absolutely, positively know you were my first. You also know I wanted you to be my last. I understood your needs then, just as I do today. Just as you do mine. You need control, power, discipline. You need submission. I need submission. And even after all these years, and knowing damn well that you and Jason are hiding something from me, I still trust you. Explicitly.”
Mentioning Jason brings on a flicker of something unreadable in his eyes, maybe a touch of warmth, maybe a touch of softness, but something that has me feeling bold and desperate. Brazenly, I r
each for his cock and cup the head through the denim of his jeans, where he hardens against my hand with exquisite perfection. My core clenches, the flesh between my legs swelling with need and insatiable hunger.
“I want this, Keith. I—I’ve wanted it, and you, all my adult life. Dammit, I want to kneel before you. I want to bow before you. I want to give you what you need, what we both need.”
“Jen.” His tone rings with caution as his gaze slides from my eyes down and over my breasts. “You have no idea what you’re getting yourself into.”
Trembles race up my spine while a soft whimper fills my throat. This is what I’ve dreamed of for years, fantasized about dozens of times. His unmistakable Dominant behavior feels natural and gratifying. It’s everything I want and need. For a long minute, we stare at each other, his eyes flashing with warning, his jaw beautifully clenching. Yes, he has issues that I’ve yet to learn about, that I need and will learn about, but for now, it’s just us. And this. No problems. No controversy. No worries about past times or times to come. Just two consenting adults’ needs and desires, and a resolution to this aching, unyielding hunger that’s been lingering between us since we were in high school.
“Then show me. Just show me, dammit.”
He leans over me with a groan rising up his throat and grips my neck, tightly, possessively, like he’ll never let go. Like he wants to choke me to unconsciousness. “Scotch,” I whimper as his grasp hardens. “It’s my safe word.”
He searches my eyes and squeezes a little tighter then releases me, his gaze dark, beautiful, fixated. Instantly, I’m doing what I want and what we both need and sinking to my knees, promptly, compliantly, slowly freeing the top button on his jeans then lowering the zipper.
“I want you, Keith. I always have.”
Silky smooth, with wide veins and a thick broad crown hovering, fluttering, and leaking arousal right above his belly button, his cock is divine. It’s hard like steel and warm against my lips.
“Ah, Christ, sugar.” His fingers bite into my scalp when my lips slide over the weeping tip.
With his wide root between both palms, my tongue twirls, teases, taunts, then dips into the leaky small slit. A quiver ripples through his body with a carnal-sounding groan lifting up his neck. Triggered by his sudden desperation, I’m positive that he is everything to me that defines pleasure, perfection, masculinity, and I’ll give him anything he needs. Anything he demands.
“Swallow me,” he orders in a raspy tone that sounds like sex and suffering. His fingers viciously roll through my hair, then pull and tug, while I squeeze his root and take his full length into my mouth and draw him in and out graciously, incessantly, while his delectable male scent and salty taste fills me with hunger, greed, and an aching pleasure.
When I flicker the underside with my tongue and squeeze the root a little more forcefully, he tangles his hands in my hair to hold me in place. “That’s it. Just like that. Just. Like. That.”
A whimper escapes my mouth, and his hands leave my hair and return to my esophagus, this time harshly, uncomfortably, and it feels like a flash of something electric pulsing through every inch of my body. Arousal seeps down the flesh between my thighs as he delves deeper, his thrusts becoming more aggressive, more unrestrained, more desperate. With my knees throbbing and my eyes watering, I struggle to swallow, but I tighten my lips and breathe in his scent then pull him in deeper, my concern only on him and his pleasure, his needs, his wants.
“Fuck, yeah.” He’s watching every move I make with dark bronze eyes, his hips rocking, his hands steering my pace.
My God, I want to please him on such a level. There’s nothing I want but this day, this moment, and the sericeous softness of his heated flesh and blood between my lips.
“Holy fucking shit. Enough.” He releases his grip from my throat and slides his glistening silky cock, which is hard, heavy, and spanning to just underneath his navel, from my lips. Quickly and impatiently, he yanks his jeans back up then pulls me from the hard floor and closer to his face, his expression a tangled web of confusion. “Jesus, things weren’t supposed to be this way. Everything is … just different. Everything has changed. I’ve changed. I’m not the man you think I am. Fuck … I’m no good for you, Jen. I’ll only end up hurting you. You shouldn’t be here. You deserve more, and better.”
His gaze is warm, sincere, but troubled in a way that hurts me deep inside and has me seconds from bursting into tears. Feeling vulnerable and defenseless, I glance away for a few seconds, unable to look in his eyes as a sick dread hammers in my chest. There’s something he and Jason are keeping from me. Something big and deep and powerful. Something that’s making Keith pull back from a perfect moment.
“Keith, what’s happening here? What kind of game are you playing? What aren’t you and Jason telling me?”
“Christ, Jen.” His lips fall to the center of my forehead for a lingering kiss, and then he finds my eyes. “I—I’m just trying to tell you that I want you today more than I ever have. That’s the only reason I bought that damn museum.”
His confession feels like confusion and chaos, contradiction and conflict. For a long minute, he gazes up at the ceiling while I listen to the sound of his breathing returning to normal. “I hurt you once.” His lips return to my forehead and remain there. “My God, the last thing I want is to hurt you again.”
“Then don’t.” With my voice a whisper, I widen my legs and silently urge his attention to where I need to be touched. Where I’m dying to be touched. I’m no longer fretting over my feelings or worrying if I’m doing the right or wrong thing. I’m doing what’s right for me and what I believe is right for us. “Please,” I plead softly, but boldly, shamelessly, and determined. “Let me in your life, Keith. Share what you’re hiding with me. Let me give you what you want, what you deserve, and what I need.”
Warm pleasure washes through me when his lips brush mine. “Christ, Jen.” He takes my cheeks between his hands. “You fucking undo me, woman. You always have. As much as I know I should, I can’t say no. Not now. Let me see you, baby girl. Take your clothes off.”
I take a deep breath and remove my slip-on sneakers, slowly, then my leggings and spaghetti-strap tank top. Since the top has built-in support, I’m wearing no bra and stand in front of him in nothing but white lace panties.
He inhales with a groan and stares down at me while the sweltering sweep of his hand moves up the length of my thigh, which has my nipples tightening and my sex clenching so firmly that I’m fighting to stand still. With eager fingers, he shoves at my panties and forces them down with a desperate “now” sliding from his lips in that commanding, authoritative way that’s absolute Dominant perfection. Then I feel the sting of his palm smacking hard against the sensitive spot on my ass cheek where it meets my inner thigh. Every muscle in my body tenses at the fiery spark of pain, nerves fluttering low and deep in my belly. I almost come from the sensation.
“That what you want? What you need?”
“Yes.” I whimper with a shiver racing down my spine, every vestige of fear and insecurity from everything he’s been trying to say, everything he’s still not told me, everything I want and need to learn, disappearing. His touch is strength. Authority. Ecstasy. And nothing else matters now except for us. Right here. Right now.
Another hard, cold smack across my right butt cheek has my feet lifting from the ground, my fingers curling. “Then show some respect.” Keith runs a rough hand over the red-hot flesh of my ass with a hungering look in his eyes. “I asked you two simple questions. Is this what you want? What you need?”
“Yes. Yes, Sir.”
“Then touch yourself, Jen. Put your hands on your body just as they were when I walked inside your bedroom. Rub your swollen little clit and fuck that sweet pussy with your finger.” He slides a hand over my ass, which still stings, then lowers it and runs it through the arousal seeping from my sex, which has me whimpering with need. “Don’t you dare come unless I say.”
&nbs
p; His finger rubs my clit for an instant then teases the puckered opening of my ass. Another whimper falls from my lips as the tip gently plunges inside. “Do you want me in this tight little hole?”
God yes. I’ve never wanted anything so badly. I’ve never wanted to please a man so deeply. There’s nothing I won’t do. Nothing.
Keith drops a kiss onto my forehead. “Answer me, woman.”
I do want him there. Hard. Deep. Plunging through muscle. Breaching nerves. Generating pain. Triggering pleasure. I just want Keith … absolutely everywhere.
“Yes, Sir. I want everything you did back then. Everything … and more.”
Whimpers rise up my throat as his eyes darken. I graze my swollen clit then push a finger inside my sex. I want to be controlled. I want the sweet sting of pain. I want to be on my knees. I want you inside me—everywhere. I want nasty, immoral, rude, and indecent. I want sugar and sin.
His finger slides right through the ring of muscle, and it feels so damn good that my body arches and pleasure spirals all the way through my toes.
“Oh, Keith.”
“That’s right, baby girl. Relax into it,” he utters with his finger breaching the very depth of my most personal place. “Let me make you feel good.”
He eases out then slides right back in, his breath hot against my neck. When he lowers his second hand and pinches my clit, my knees almost buckle. Whimpers that are almost full-blown cries rise up my chest, and I push back inside myself deeper, frantically, and search for that magical cushiony spot and the quivering in my belly brought on seconds before climaxing. His finger slides deeper, thrusting, taking, possessing, and I’m pleasure, pain, agony, and sweet bliss, only seconds from erupting. Sensations are everywhere—my breasts, my clit, my pussy, my ass.
“Oh, God.”
“Don’t you dare.” Keith slides his finger out of me and flashes me a harsh, severe look of caution. “Your orgasms are mine.”
It’s right there, hanging on by a thread. My sex is hot, quivering, almost unbearable and dying for release, for his touch. I reach for his shoulder with my other hand for leverage as warm lust spirals inside my stomach.
Call Me Sugar Page 7