The last year of school was a blur as Evan’s family fell apart, he lost his vanilla girlfriend, and both young men dealt with the stress of contemplating the real world and real jobs. During a brief Jenna-inspired break when Jack had exploded in fury at her and sent her away after she refused to come with him to Ann Arbor to meet his family, he had very nearly let her go for good.
But he was programmed by her somehow at that point—if anything more so than she was to respond to his commands. He needed her, his Jenna fix, the way she would obey, yet mock him at the same time. Addiction was the word that sprang to mind more than once at the club when they were making a public show of it with floggers, hot wax, hard metal and loud, enthusiastic orgasms.
Sometimes at home after a long day of class, eating a quick-fix dinner and drinking five-dollar bottles of wine before studying together, he’d catch himself looking at her, in a haze of needy lust that he mistook for love. So when she did obey him and stayed away after he came back from Ann Arbor he went nearly insane from withdrawal.
Finally, he went to a party and caught her there, making out in the corner, letting some asshole fondle her tits. Jack was not terribly surprised by her behavior, which shocked him even as he walked right up to them. Jenna opened her eyes when he cleared his throat, their dark blue depths telling him one thing—she knew he’d be there and was putting on this little slut show all for his benefit.
That look on her too-perfect face was one he never forgot. It was a cross between pity and smugness. It took all he had not to yank the dude off her and backhand the bitch into the next room. His inner Dom rose, choking him, making the room fade when they locked eyes. That was his neck, those were his tits, that was his ass and she was …letting…someone else touch them.
He caught the glint of her collar, the thin chain he’d given her as a symbol of their relationship—or at least what he thought was their relationship. That tore it. He really should have walked away then. But he simply could not. Something about her compelled him, made him crazed with lusty possessiveness. He may not have wanted her all the time but by hell, no one else was going to have her either. It was sick, but he didn’t figure that out until it was too late.
He pulled the guy off his woman with ease, keeping his gaze on hers. She stood, chest heaving, eyes full of tears but with that evil-looking, bitchy smile on her face. “Jack,” she said, putting a hand to the chain at her neck. “What do you want?”
“Nothing more than what is mine already,” he said, surprised at the calm tenor of his voice. Because in his head he was howling, roaring with fury. And his cock was so hard it made him wince when he took another step toward her and reached for her arm. “Let’s go now, Jenna. We need to have a little chat.” He guided her out, hand planted in the small of her back, firm, and in control.
He drove them to his house in complete silence, opened her door, and helped her out. Without a word, he took her jacket and hung it up before turning to her. She stood, jaw set, eyes flashing, daring and mocking him at the same time. Her look was not so much “bitch” anymore but it was definitely not the “sub” he required. None too gently, he yanked her to him, threaded fingers in her thick curls and pulled hard. She hissed but didn’t speak.
He used his other hand on her neck, his vision dimming as he imagined the utterly unimaginable. “You are very lucky,” he whispered, keeping his fist in her hair and his fingertips against her pulsing jugular vein. He leaned in and bit her shoulder hard, making her shiver. “Very, very, very lucky,” he slid his lips up her neck, slowly tightening his grip in her hair, “that I am a nice guy.”
When he finally smelled what he required from her—fear—he let go. And left her standing there, staring at the floor. “Go down on your knees. Now.”
She obeyed him, shaky, sniffling, sufficiently afraid so that he knew he’d made his point. “Stay there, Jenna. Think about what you did. And what I should have done to you. And what I won’t be doing for you.” He looked down at his trembling hands. He had very nearly choked her. He, Jack, the guy who loved women, who did not harm anyone to the point of danger.
He looked at her, hating her guts at that moment. She did this—her constant contradictory behavior—the willing sub, the eager slave, then the whiny, overly dramatic bitch keeping him on a knife’s edge of horny frustration when all he wanted was a little stability. And that little stunt tonight, letting that guy paw her while she still wore his collar? He took a deep breath and walked away from her.
He left her there all night. He heard doors open and shut, assumed Evan was in for the night. But his roommate knew not to interfere. They respected each other’s proclivities, even though Jack realized Evan did not care for Jenna at all.
When he woke with a jolt, he grabbed his phone and saw it was nearly five a.m., his usual weekday alarm time. After staring at the ceiling for a few minutes, he got up, went out to the foyer where she remained, now on her hands and knees.
Reaching down, he gripped her arm and helped her to her feet. Knowing her legs would be screaming in pain by now he led her to the kitchen and got her water and a painkiller. She took it, swallowed the water eagerly, clutching the glass with two hands like a little kid.
The look she flashed him when she handed it back for more bordered on self-satisfied, but he let it pass. When she’d finished the second glass she sighed and looked at the floor. Jack pondered her for a moment, and let the fact that he was half inclined to let her go right then for good hit his nervous system.
“Don’t make me leave, Sir. Please,” she whispered, her voice rough. He tilted her chin up, still in turmoil, his heart at odds with the increasingly powerful messages from his brain. He had every intention of denying her sex, the rough punishing play she adored with ropes that burned and whips that striped and wax that sizzled. He closed his eyes a split second, getting a grip on his urge to shove her out the door and out of his life. “Jack,” she said clearly. “I…I’m sorry. I l-l-love….”
“Shh.” He put a finger to her mouth, unwilling to hear her say it because he knew she did not. She loved herself and what she got from him, pure and simple. He did love her, however. That was the shitty part. And that breathless dual realization made him even angrier.
She looked up at him, huge blue eyes watery, color high, her need clear. Without thinking or speaking he picked her up and carried her to his room, dropping her without ceremony onto the bed. He stood and watched her a minute, pondering his own utter stupidity as he reached down and ripped her dress in two, his breathing loud in his ears. “You will never do that to me again, do you understand? Jenna?” He put a hand to her neck, squeezed, then let it trail downward, horny and pissed off all in one thick emotional stew.
With a grunt, he shoved her over onto her hands and knees, trussed her, wrists bound to her ankles, bare ass up in the air. He reached into the trunk of implements pulling out the first thing he found, the cane—a simple wooden rod.
That night was first and last time he ever wielded the harsh instrument. Every time he smacked her she squealed, then after about ten strikes she sobbed, then screamed. Jack’s hands shook, his body pulsed, and his brain rejected what he was doing to her. But he dropped the stick, gripped her hips hard, and shoved himself into her.
Because there was no denying that he was so turned on he could hardly breathe.
She was exposed and wet after the lashing even though she was sobbing into the bed cover. He fucked her hard before finally reaching around and down to stroke her until she yelled his name and came with the now-familiar pulse and spasm around his cock. Then, he stopped, pulled out of her, and fisted himself. The orgasm had him teetering on the edge but there was something he had to do first.
She dropped to her side as he untied her, noting she had pulled against the ropes again, bringing bloody streaks to her wrists and ankles. “Sit up,” he commanded. “Suck my cock.” She was not a huge fan of this activity. Something she’d made clear from the beginning.
She got
up slowly, shaking, wincing when her well-spanked ass hit the bedspread. That look was back—the one he had hoped to beat out of her but realized he was totally kidding himself about. He sighed as she fisted him, swallowed him, cupped his balls, and traced beneath them with a finger.
He fisted her hair and pounded down her throat. Then as quickly as he came, he pulled of her mouth and stood there, staring at her.
“I want you to leave,” he said, pulling on his jeans and turning away. Her hand on his back made him turn. The sweet Jenna was back, the one who did whatever he asked—as long as she got her way. He smiled and ran a finger down her red face, feeling manipulated and too tired to think about it anymore. “I told you to leave. I don’t like…what you’re doing to me. Go…away.”
“I don’t want to leave, Jack. Ever,” she said simply, pulling him back to the bed. And he let her.
The night after their uneasy and very rough reunion, they sat watching a movie. Jack was exhausted in mind and body. He put a hand on her hip as she lay draped over his lap. The vision of them together was so clear he had to close his eyes to it.
This must be it—love—the give and take, the understanding and the miscommunications. God knows, he wasn’t perfect. Why would he expect her to be? He craved this, the intimacy, her company, her warm body next to his every night. At the end of it all he wanted to be sitting here with her watching a movie. She rolled over and put a hand to his face. He gripped her wrist, kissing the rope burns she loved giving herself.
“Jack,” she sighed sliding up and straddling his lap.
“I love you,” he said simply, tucking a lock of her hair behind her ear. She stared at him, opened her lips to speak but a sudden urge over took him. He kissed her and didn’t stop kissing her until he had her pinned beneath him and he was on top of her, inside her, owning her, or so he told himself.
He woke later alone and stumbled into the bed, remembering she had her bar exam study session the next day and had gone home to get some sleep. He lay staring at the door of his room and realized he never gave her a chance to answer, when he’d told her—had used the “l” word for the first time since blurting it out to Mindy all those years ago.
And he had not let her say it the night before. Mainly because he knew she’d be lying. His trust level was low. But in some crazy backward-ass, emotionally-needy way he wanted her more. Something empty in him had opened up, something he wished he understood but didn’t, not until the next week—graduation week.
“Hey,” Jack said, watching Jenna move around the kitchen, aggravated that she wouldn’t settle. The jeweler’s box pressed against his thigh reminding him why he was here. It held a ring, a nice one, one he’d be proud for her to wear.
She turned, put her hand to the thin platinum chain that he’d given her about six months before, declaring her as his to the world. He touched the box. Something was bugging him, but he’d determined to do this. He had a job lined up back in Ann Arbor and had every intention of bringing her, his fiancée, with him. If this is what it took, this is what he would do.
There was no real logic to the move and he knew it. But he was going with his gut for a change. Something about the finality of this week—graduation from law school, the end of what he considered three of the most important years of his life as he had learned so much—mostly about himself. “Would you hold still a second please?”
She let him pull her close, and threaded her fingers in his hair for a minute. Then stepped back with a look of shock when he held out the box. For a minute, he was surprised. But when a terribly familiar, ugly expression dropped over her face and into her eyes, he blinked.
They froze, a strange tableau, before she burst out laughing. Jack sat back, confused, his brain doing a little “told you so” song and dance. She kept laughing. He kept staring.
“Oh Jack.” She fingered the expensive chain around her neck. “This is just so…oh my god.” She dissolved once more into giggles. Fury forced him to his feet. She stared up at him, the “ugly Jenna” look in place. The one he hated but thought he could live with if just to have some stability, some normalcy, some kind of “This is what we need to be regular people.” That was all he wanted, really, all the Dom and sub bullshit aside. And now?
“What the fuck, Jenna,” he said. She glanced up from her laughing fit.
“Oh please, get a grip, Jack. You….” She stood, wiping her streaming eyes. “You and I? No way. I’ve had too much fun with…you know, the guys upstairs.” She pointed to the ceiling indicating the two younger men upstairs who he’d rented the place to. “We had a nice little time while you were dicking around in Ann Arbor. Oh sweetie, you thought I would marry you?” She reached for him. He smacked her hand away before she could touch him.
“Get the fuck out,” he said, not looking at her. His brain had shut down. His body was tensing up in a way that did not bode well for her.
“Oh, come on, Jack. Let’s just not do this.” He kept his distance, the rumbling in the back of his skull ready to explode.
“You fucked my roommates? Did you take on Adams too?” He rubbed his neck, attempted not to shove her into the wall. “Let’s not do what, Jenna? Be grownups? Jesus. Go, leave the chain on the counter.” He walked out, every inch of his skin on fire. A strange sense of relief claimed him then morphed into fear—raw, abject terror at being alone again.
No, you stupid idiot. You utter fool. Women are bitches. Cooking, cleaning, and fucking was right. His father was right. He shut the door of his bedroom, didn’t slam it, refused to give her the satisfaction. When he heard her car squeal out into the street he walked back to the kitchen, saw the ring box and the chain on the table. With a roar of rage he flung them both against the wall.
Evan was out, god knows where, so he made three phone calls and within thirty minutes the house was full. He had a hot woman on his lap and a bourbon bottle in his hand. It was the last thing he remembered for a while.
When Evan found him the next morning he’d passed out on the floor, and it took getting his stomach pumped to revive him. Not something he would ever do again; lose it like that over a woman. They sat in the car after he’d been released from the hospital and had reassured both Rob and Suzanne he was alive and fine, and sans the bitch they all hated anyway.
He groaned and put his head against the side window. The monumental fact of his complete idiocy consumed him. He’d heard it all last night, all the times Jenna was at her “study group” but was instead fucking some other guy, countless other guys. He had been played. She had topped him in an impressive and very public way—humiliated him, utterly.
The glass was cool on his face. But he didn’t think he’d ever recover from the horrific moment he’d allowed himself to feel something beyond the physical and had his heart handed to him, still beating and dripping blood, by the very woman he’d given it to for safekeeping.
Evan spent a bit of energy trying to convince him not to lump all women into the same group as that evil slut he’d actually considered “wife material.” After he’d assured Jack that he, Evan, had not laid a finger on the woman. Jack believed him. Evan Adams was the most straight-up dude he’d ever encountered despite his freak show tendency to switch and go sub to older women.
He snorted. Wife. That was rich. He would never marry. Not if it meant being willing to compromise as he’d been prepared to do with that cunt. His chest hurt, and his throat felt like it had been ripped out thanks to the tube they had to shove down it. No, he could thank Jenna for that too.
“Goddamn it.” He pounded the dash, furious at himself for even saying her fucking slut name in his head. A dark shadow curtained his vision, bringing with it an angry restlessness he hadn’t felt in years, not since he’d discovered what made him tick, what got him off, and what he’d neglected, in service to that whore.
“Starting over,” he said to the window, as he sat in the car with his friend. “That is job one now.”
“Yep,” Evan agreed, climbing out of th
e car. Jack watched him head to the house wincing when he tried to swallow. He had a job lined up for himself, and one for Evan if he wanted it. After what that guy had been through he’d let the job search lapse so Jack, in his typical take-charge way, had found him something. They were both headed back to Ann Arbor, and the “starting over” time began right now.
Chapter Eleven
The dark room felt familiar, so many of the sights and sounds the same. He’d found a new club, run by none other than the former NFL star Kyle Summerlin. The Suite was in downtown Detroit, not far from that first, much smaller and less well-appointed place where he’d learned his way as a sexual Dom—or more realistically, the only way he knew to truly calm his nerves.
He knew of Kyle already, from his Chicago club days, but met up with him again at a big-time fundraiser for a politician he hardly gave a shit about but had been dragged to by his woman of the moment. The men had hit off immediately, and once Jack realized “The Suite” that his Chicago friends told him about and Kyle’s place were one and the same, he procured Kyle’s cell phone number and an invite to his club. After he screwed and then summarily dumped the woman from the party, of course.
Because that was the one thing that defined him lately—screwing and dumping random women—and he liked it. Or at least it made him happy. It kept him on an even keel. Having his first million in the bank helped, and he could thank his own resourceful, hard-working self for that.
He sat, sipping tea and pondering just how much had transpired for him in the last few years. He had stayed away from the whole BDSM scene for a while, trying to wrap his head around what the hell had gone so utterly wrong with Jenna.
The job he’d found in real estate title law was mind-numbingly boring which left a lot of time for self-contemplation. Finally, after signing one gigantic commission check too many he enrolled in the next real estate licensure class, on a total whim, out of the same sense of boredom and non-direction that had led him to law school in the first place.
What to Read After FSOG: The Gemstone Collection (WTRAFSOG Book 3) Page 24