by Adira August
He fought the wave of nausea that washed through him when she'd referred to his "devices." He concentrated on her eyes, wide with her uncertainty that he might find her foolish. Alight with excitement that they could have something special, unique between them.
Sweet, sexy woman. "I imagine I can think of something," he told her. "When all this madness is resolved, you'll have to go treasure hunting."
She stood on her toes and kissed him lightly on the mouth. Then she moved out of his arms and wrapped herself in her robe.
"Maybe I'll look for ideas in the kitchen. That's also, coincidentally, where all the food is." She grinned at him and held out her hand. He took it and let her lead him out of the room.
He stopped in the doorway and pulled her tightly into her arms, kissing her deeply. He felt her let go, every muscle relax as she kissed him back. Mine. He broke the kiss and touched her swollen lips.
"I love you, you know," he said.
"Yes, I do," she said, looking lit from within at his words. "But you haven't had my cooking, yet, so that's subject to change."
The look she gave him was so full of adoration, he didn't need her to say anything else.
After breakfast, they dressed and set up with their laptops, one at each end of the TV room sofa. Avia checked in with J.J. and wrote a detailed account of her adventures at the courthouse and a briefer account of her contact with the police.
She was scheduled to meet with Dane at noon, Eustace was taking her to his office.
Ben grumbled before he turned his phone back on, saying no one expected him to be working, anyway, he should still be in Macau. He had one-hundred twenty-six voicemails and ninety-six texts. He stalked off into the bedroom and when he came back, he'd changed out of his sweatpants and t-shirt and into suit pants and a white dress shirt, he wore with the sleeves rolled up and the collar open.
She raised her eyebrows in inquiry. "Work uniform," he said, and then he got to work. His phone synced to the big TV screen, along with his computer and he paced and took calls and texts and had meetings. No one could see Avia, but she heard it all. She understood very little.
He spoke to union organizers and mine operators and factory managers and financiers and lawyers. He made decisions on the spot, for the most part, spoke with total authority and gave orders in rapid-fire, no-wasted seconds speech. Asked a question or given a comment he didn't want to answer or think was useful, he simply ignored it and moved on as if the party hadn't spoken.
Avia was trapped in a room with a powerhouse of a man of superior intellect and driving ambition, controlling his world and the worlds of others. She knew now what his speech on the terrace meant, that he didn't have time for the minutiae of her life. Ben Hart didn't want a high maintenance woman who needed him to entertain her.
" ...if you were my submissive, it would be my absolute pleasure to find the time. Just as it’s been my pleasure to push everything aside these two days to spend with you.”
She finally appreciated how much that meant and determined never to be part of what taxed him but always what empowered him. Unfortunately, her resolve was already being tested, as he paced and turned and stood with one hand on his hip, his pants slung low on his hips.
Every time he moved past her, his cloud of energy swept over her, his scent lingered behind. Every time he ran his fingers through his unruly curls, or rubbed the back of his neck, or threw his head back on the couch, exposing his strongly muscled neck, he ratcheted up the heat between her legs.
She shifted and squirmed, her nipples ached. She surreptitiously rubbed them against the edge of her laptop. But it only made things worse.
Finally she went into the nearby bathroom and leaned back against the door, and clawed her skirt up, plunging her hand into her panties, finding her clit. The orgasm was brief and unsatisfying. She was soaked.
I'm in the penthouse of the sex toy king without a vibrator to be had.
She made her way quietly to her room and into her dressing room, closing the door. Normally, she would have locked it, even alone in her apartment, such was her reserve about her sexual needs. But this time, since he had the right to enter wherever she was, she didn't. And maybe it would be better if he did find her.
She took off her wet panties and sat on the floor, against the wall. She pulled her skirt well up, giving herself access to her vulva.
Positioning the small dressing chair between her legs, she bent her knees and threaded her feet behind the two front legs. There - she'd created an effective spreader device, and put herself in the position Ben liked best to see her in. To torture her in.
Reaching under her sweater, she folded down her bra cups, leaving her nipples to rub against the sweater fabric when she pulled it back down. She could see herself in the triple standing mirror, if she wished, but she let her head fall back against the wall, closing her eyes.
She imagined he had her there, his fingers torturing her nipples through her sweater, telling her what a bad girl she'd been.
She pinched and pulled her nipples though the fabric. Her thighs tightened against the chair legs and she pleaded with him in her mind to let her come, please, please, Master, I can't stand it. But she wasn't to beg and he turned her over onto his lap, and used the blue plastic hairbrush on her bare bottom, stinging her in layer after layer, relentlessly as she struggled uselessly against him. He said he'd make her come while he spanked her, so she'd know he controlled her completely.
Her finger found her clit and she teased herself along the insides of her swollen lips and then her hips were bucking and her back was bowed, her head arched back as she came, hard. So goddamned hard, she thought, with the image of his cock plunging into her as she came. Her body convulsed again as her core seized and finally, she went limp.
She let herself flop onto her side on the floor and push the chair away with her feet. I just had a better orgasm masturbating and thinking about Ben than most of the orgasms I had with actual men.
Okay, any orgasms I had with actual men, she amended to herself.
When her breathing was normal, she pulled out her cell. Eleven o'clock.
She took her time cleaning herself up, changing into clean panties and picking a new outfit. The skirt had a wet spot and the sweater was puckered in two conspicuous places.
The store had sent one business outfit with pants. A charcoal grey wool blend, lined, conservative. It had a long coat and a simple white blouse with a wide shawl collar that lay nicely on top of the coat collar. The coat and pants had pockets and that sold her. She wouldn't have to carry a bag at all.
She found Ben in much the same position he'd been in when she left, listening to someone on his cell, though his headphone. She gathered up her laptop and moved to the kitchen counter, finding an outlet, and plugging it in. She'd decided in future not to work in the same room with Ben, he was way too distracting.
She was perched on a barstool, checking her email one more time before logging off, when two big male hands leaned against the counter edge on either side of her, and Ben's very quiet voice spoke in her ear. She felt the heat of his body and his energy surround her.
"Turn around," he said.
She swiveled to face him.
"You left," he said. "You changed clothes."
She tried to sound casual and not like she wanted grab his cock through his trousers. "I'm leaving in a few minutes to meet Sergeant Dane," she said.
"Why are you in the kitchen?"
She leaned back to look up at his face, so close. His hands hadn't moved.
"Because I need to concentrate."
The planes of his face sharpened, his eyes a darkened, "Did you forget we don't lie? Ever?"
"That's absolutely the truth," she said. "And I don't think you have the right to every single thought in my head."
"I do when they're about sex. One last chance. Why did you leave?"
She could see the pulse throbbing at the base of his throat, the swell of his pecs disappear under the open
front of his shirt. The veins and muscles of his forearms on either side of her.
"Watching you work was turning me on, which is very distracting. I'm here so I can concentrate."
"Look at me," he said. She did. Her clit was awake again, her panties damp. "Did you go someplace and masturbate?" He asked with a slight smirk.
It was exactly what she had asked him on the terrace of the Keep the day they met, after she'd asked him to take off his clothes. She gave him the same answer he gave her.
"Yes," she said.
Damn it! He dropped his head, thinking. What he would normally do is ask her why she hadn't told him what she needed. She would say she didn't want to bother him. Then he would punish her for taking the decision on herself. That would arouse her pretty thoroughly.
Then she would relate to him how she masturbated. In detail. Perhaps a demonstration. By that time, she'd be desperate to come. He'd let her beg and then make her come over and over, until she begged him to stop.
Cementing his control was critical if he was to give her what she needed. But he couldn't give her what she needed right now. His aversion was like some kind of post traumatic stress triggered by anything sexual.
He wouldn't force himself to touch her. He loved touching her, she was a drug to him, a need. He worshipped her body, her passion, her intense sensuality.
He would not taint that.
Then he remembered her hairbrush. Not a toy. Not from his catalogue. He could ask the question and spank her and let it go. A simple nonsexual discipline. Her collar was new. It would be reasonable to be lenient.
He straightened and put his hands on his hips. "Why didn't you tell me what you needed instead of leaving to take care of it yourself?"
"Because there's something wrong and I don't know what it is. But I do know you don't want to have sex right now." She stood to place a hand on the side of his astonished face.
"If I said anything," she went on, "You would have told me the truth. And it's clear you don't want to talk about it. And I won't pressure you or be another thing that's a burden to you.
"You have the absolute right to control our sex life," she said. "But, Benedict, I have the absolute right to love you."
She felt the tears slide down her cheeks in response to the agonized look on his face as it crumpled like empty burlap as she spoke.
Her arms went around his neck as he grabbed onto her and buried his face in her shoulder. She held him and stroked his hair and said nothing. He sighed deeply and let her go, brushing her waves into place with his fingers.
"You need to go and I need to work," he said.
"Will you eat while I'm gone or should I bring us back something?"
"I'll eat. I want to get out of here. Let's go back to the Keep. We'll get ready for Talia and her guy to visit."
Her first instinct was to protest she needed to work. Then she just didn't care. "Okay. You eat and work. I'll grab a cheeseburger. This shouldn't take long." Her cell sounded. Eustace had the car ready.
She kissed his cheek at the elevator. He stopped her as she got on.
"I want to tell you," he said, again looking like his pain would overwhelm him.
"You will," she said. "When you're ready. … Shall I stay? I can cancel or have him bring the papers here."
"No, I have a shipment of tungsten tied up in a conflict minerals dispute," he said. "Find out where the investigations are and bring me back information. I have to go deal with politicians."
He touched her face and his cell rang. The elevator door slid shut.
Noon
Sergeant Hunter Dane showed Avia to an interview room, telling Eustace he'd have to wait by the entrance to the squad. Eustace took up his station, making sure he kept Avia in sight and knew which room she entered.
The interview room was small and drab and windowless. There was no one-way glass window, but there was a microphone.
"No," she said and turned to walk out.
Dane stood in the doorway, blocking her exit. "If you could just sit dow-"
"-I said no," Avia interrupted him. She moved forward. He didn't move at all.
Avia looked up into his face, so close she could count his eyelashes. He smelled of leather and something familiar. Ivory soap? He wasn't wearing his jacket. The straps from his shoulder rig lay smooth in the valleys between shoulder and chest, tightening his dark blue t-shirt across his pecs.
He thought he saw her pupils widen. Her lips opened, her full, soft lips. All he had to do was pivot slightly and push her against the door jamb …
She narrowed her eyes, turned her body and squeezed past him into the bullpen.
He remained in the doorway. "You refuse to sign a statement?"
"Where's your desk?" She asked.
He pointed to the corner desk nearest the window. His desk butted up against Upham's. She sat in Upham's chair and waited.
Hunter slapped the files he was carrying against his thigh a few times. Walking across the bullpen, he stuck his head around the door to his Lieutenant's office. "You going out to lunch?"
"Right now, why?" She asked, shutting down her computer.
"Use your office for an interview. It's the reporter on the Hart cases."
She grabbed her purse and stood up. "Stay the hell out of my drawers, Dane." She hurried out. Hunter left the files on her desk and walked the length of the room to Avia, gazing out the tall window.
"Ms. Rivers, I have a private office over here?" He made it a question, but pointed very firmly. She cocked an eyebrow at him. "The privacy is for your benefit."
She stood and walked toward the office, making notes as she did. He noticed she was wearing some kind of suede boot with heels and shiny black laces up the back. They started right above the heel, as if she had to open them up to get the boots on, the shoe portion hugged her foot so tightly under her slacks.
It was sexy. So was the way the heels made her rear sway when she walked. That's one nice behind, he thought. He'd noticed she was still wearing the the choker necklace closed with a padlock. Dominant/submissive. He was pretty sure he knew what Hart was doing with that behind.
Irene Mackin had been a masochist who used to be a companion of some kind to Hart. Men like that didn't change their preferences, which meant Rivers was, too. He thought about how to play it as he sat her in the visitor's chair to his right and took the Lieutenant's, diagonal to her.
She seemed to be staring at his weapon, the butt clearly visible under his left arm. Hanging underneath was his cuff case. The steel edges of the cuffs gleaming in the light. He thought either or both could be a magnet for her attention.
Leaning forward over the desk, he reached out, stretching his arm to give her a clear, close-up view of his Colt and the cuffs. He looked through the old coffee cup that held pens and pencils for a few moments, finally selecting a black ballpoint.
Hunter had a fine body and he knew it. He lifted and worked out on a body bag every morning. He made money on the side as a model for a photographer that put stuff on stock photo sites. Hunter had no problem posing as long as his face wasn't shown.
He let Avia take a good look while he pretended not to notice. Finally, he sat back and opened the file.
"You pose nude, don't you?" She asked without preamble.
"I'm sorry?" He asked, startled.
"Nude. For book covers. I saw you on a book I read when I was researching an article on erotica for women. You have a scar. Do they like that? The photographers? The women? That whole 'bad boy' thing? You're the one with the tattoo of the panther across your left shoulder blade, right? Or did they photoshop that in?"
Hunter Dane blushed. He could feel it. He coughed to cover it up. Avia Rivers made notes.
"They like getting pictures with the Colt?" She made another note. "That's the 'special combat' version? Overpriced, but the fancy grip looks great with your jacket. You ever actually been in combat?"
He ignored her and spread some papers in front of her. "I wrote up the in
formation you gave myself and Detective Upham, in person and over the phone. If you'd just read that over, and let me know if you have corrections. If you agree that the information is accurate as far as you know, fill out that form and sign."
She ignored the papers, and turned over a fresh sheet in her notebook. Then she looked up and cocked her head, giving him a slow, mischievous smile.
"C'mon. You did all those gymnastic across the desk to flash your six-pack at me, not to mention your cuffs. You know you want to show me your tattoo. There're no windows in here, just lift the shirt." She took her lower lip between her teeth and gave him a slow, seductive blink.
Wait … is she …?
"Look, Hunter," she said, her voice hard. "You don't know shit about what's between Ben and me and you can stare at my ass and imagine whatever you want, but disabuse yourself of the notion that I'm some vapid airhead with an I.Q. lower than my bra size who salivates at the sight of handcuffs and leather straps like Pavlov's dogs at the ding of a bell. And, by the way, I can outshoot you with that thing."
Sergeant Hunter Dane shifted in his chair to take some of the pressure off his semi. He really wanted to shove this woman against a wall.
"I'll do the statements," she said. "But, first, I'd like to know the status of the cases as of this moment."
He tapped the pen on the desk, considering. He sighed.
"We executed a search warrant last night on the residence and law office of Randall Leonard. We recovered some evidence. Lab analysis and autopsy results are pending," he said.
"You question him, yet?" She was still making notes.
"I can't comment on any specifics of the case," he said.
"Uh-huh," she said as if expecting this answer. "And Jane Doe?"
"Statements, first," he said, placing the pen in front of her.
She cocked an eyebrow at him. He cocked right back.
Avia felt her body responding to Hunter Dane in ways she would rather it wouldn't. At all. He was playing her, and she, him. But he was also spouting testosterone like a virility volcano and stretching the short sleeves of his t-shirt to the breaking point with his biceps.