Paradise: The Masters of The Order Novel Two

by Verne, Jillian

  “Great. Wake me out a sound sleep and then ruin my perfectly justified bad mood by reminding me of the first time I made love to you. You’re going to be the end of me, Isabella.”

  He half-smiled, then kissed her breathless. But she didn’t want to kiss - well she did, but not at this precise moment - she wanted to talk first.

  “Jacques, wait,” she said past his tongue. “I have to tell you something.”

  He eased back, glancing down with a look that said, you actually woke me up to talk?

  “I know the answer,” she said breathlessly, still winded from all that jumping and kissing. “I’m perfect. We’re perfect together. They both show that.” She lifted the rings and the choker. “I want to keep them both.”

  Jacques ran a hand through his hair and said, “You sure, Isabella? I don’t …what are you staring at?”

  “Sorry, I was distracted.” She shook off the vision of him on their first morning together. Dios mío, her sex god had great hair.

  He gave her a puzzled look and went on. “Your family is important to you. I know you care about what they think.”

  “I’m yours, Jacques. If my family can’t love and accept me as I am, so be it. I’ve lived my entire life trying to figure myself out. I mean, I know, but I always felt guilty. I wasn’t supposed to want the things I do. I didn’t think the things I dreamed about could be reconciled with the other part of me so I spent my days as a celibate nurse taking care of everyone except myself.

  “There were always two people in my head: the woman I thought I should be and the woman I was. One person can’t be two things, right? Well I was wrong. I can be a lover and a wife. Your lover. Your wife. One woman who is perfect just the way she it. There’s no sin in that. Life is too short to deny what makes you happy. You make me happy. The whole me. I’m through with the limitations of how I used to live. I just want to live as I am.”

  He smiled the proud, humble smile of a man very much in love and lifted the choker to place it on her neck, then slipped the rings onto her finger. “Perfect together,” he said with a kiss, then moved away.

  Isabella squeezed her thighs together as she watched her sex god husband saunter to the armoire. The one that held all of his fun toys. When he turned back, he changed slightly. He was no less loving, but now the look in his eye was tinged with lust. He rubbed one hand over the stubble shading his jaw, hid the other behind his back and grinned. “But we have to do something about all that bouncing, my naughty wife.”

  She threw her arms above her head, giggling like mad.

  *****

  Jacques yanked Isabella to him, crushing her softness against his harder frame. Somewhere between the endless lip lock and their frantic sighs, his plans for her evaporated. He didn’t bind her or keep her from touching him. He craved her touch with a fierceness he couldn’t explain even to himself.

  When her hands stroked over his bare chest and moved lower to take him into her silken grasp, he lost himself to her. He didn’t know where his need for control went and he didn’t care. He only knew he wanted her to keep touching him.

  “I belong to you, Jacques, in every possible way. Please, tell me what you want,” she whispered against his lips.

  Without opening his eyes, he answered, “Whatever you want, Isabella.” He moaned as her hands left his shaft and pushed against his chest.

  “Really?”

  His eyes popped open. No, not really.

  For some inexplicable reason, he’d just taken a quantum leap into the unknown. He’d never allowed a woman free reign during sex. Marriage was one thing; that was something else entirely. But as he looked down into those excited eyes, all he could say was, “You belong to me as much as I belong to you.”

  Dangerous words, but he couldn’t call them back. He didn’t want to, any more than the look on her face said she wanted him to. Those words were the God’s honest truth. He’d known it before and now, she knew it too. He would never deny his fiery angel anything.

  For a moment, Isabella only stared up at him as if searching for something. He stared back, revealing nothing of his thoughts, and waited, stunned by the arousal that came with surrendering to the will of another person. He wouldn’t necessarily say it was his preferred modus operandi, but he wouldn’t deny that he was turned on either.

  A dark look passed across her eyes as she put both hands on his shoulders to urge him onto his back. When he complied, sweet reward, her naked body rose over his in a straddle, her sumptuous bottom planted squarely on top of his raging and very awake erection.

  “If I’d known marriage would have this effect on you, Mr. Meszaros, I would have asked sooner,” she said with a very sexy grin as she rolled her hips over him.

  “Au contraire, Mrs. Meszaros, I asked you,” he grinned back.

  She pressed her palms over his pecs, her fingernails digging tiny half-moons into the skin. “Do you think it wise to contradict your Mistress?”

  Holy fuck

  Isabella wasn’t planning to simply make love to him. She was actually going to top him. His mind froze with a momentary panic as his traitorous body strained upward seeking its Mistress’s mysterious depths.

  Her hand came down hard on his chest. “No taking what I'm not ready to give.” She placed a finger on her chin and looked away as if remembering. “I seem to recall hearing that somewhere,” then shifted her full weight back over his dick.

  He swallowed hard against the mind-bending arousal as he forced his backside to stay pinned to the mattress. Isabella had said she was through with the limitations of her old life. Well maybe he should take a page from her marriage playbook and be through with his. When she picked up the discarded cobalt restraints, “maybe” became a resounding “definitely.”

  She tied his wrists to the bedposts, all the while watching his reaction to make sure he was alright with what she was doing. It felt strange to be so vulnerable, but he trusted her. He relaxed his body, content to go with it. When she slid down his torso and sucked him deep into her mouth, he nearly came with it too. He would let her tie him up anytime she liked if this was what she did to him afterward. His eyes trailed over the place where they were linked, watching her lips coast up and down his shaft as it disappeared and reemerged against a backdrop of creamy breasts and red hair.

  Paradise. Total fucking paradise.

  He felt the tension build in his balls. As they pulled up and his dick began to spasm with the rising stream of a fabulous release, her fist shot around his cock in a merciless vice. Her thumb pressed hard into the indentation at the top, stopping the orgasm short and shoving the fire back down into his throbbing balls. His entire body bowed with the pain of her denial.

  She tsked, “No without permission, my love.”

  He groaned loud, kicking his head back, and pulled hard against the restraints.

  Isabella didn’t move or speak. He looked up through his aroused haze to meet panicked eyes. She may be on board with playing this game, but she wasn’t a true top and his reaction scared her.

  “It’s fine, baby. It’s great. You’re doing just fine.”

  She gave a shaky nod, but didn’t move, not a single inch, her eyes begging for direction. He felt himself relax as he slipped into a more familiar role and dropped his voice to a more commanding tenor. “Let me inside your body, Paradis.”

  With the encouragement, she eased over him and sheathed him in her ready heat. He savored every gasp of pleasure, each sigh that poured from her lips as she rode him with delicious abandon. When he felt his orgasm looming again, he stilled beneath her, wanting this to last for as long as possible, and top or bottom, no way he would let go before she found satisfaction.

  She was so close. He felt the quickening of her body, her walls clenching tighter around him. Her breathing ratcheted up and she became more frantic, grinding and writhing on top of him as she sought release. Deeper, faster, until her features blurred in his vision with the effort to himself hold back. All she had to do was sa
y the word and he would erupt like a volcano inside of her.

  His hands clenched into tight fists, every muscle tensed and his teeth ground together so tight that his jaw locked, but he held on. Relief washed over him when Isabella started to moan.

  But the sound wasn’t the sound of pleasure. It was the sound of desperation. He shook his head to regain his focus and his eyes fixed on the choker at her neck blazing against her sweat-soaked skin as she strained above him. Every doubt he’d harbored about putting that symbol of his possession on her disappeared. Isabella was right. The necklace was a perfect symbol of who she was. His, so thoroughly his, that even with reversed rolls, she needed his command.

  “Perfect together, Isabella, we’ll come together,” he whispered and rocked up, thrusting his hips higher as she thrust down.

  That was all it took. She went liquid around him, bathing him in her sweetness, and he exploded within her. They jerked and moaned with each other until he finally went limp against the mattress with her body sprawled boneless on top of his.

  He wanted to wrap his arms around her, but he was bound. Forget the game. He needed to wrap his arms around her. She hadn’t attached the cuffs properly and he slipped his wrists free with ease. No objection as his Paradis snuggled into the embrace. He pulled the sheet over them to keep her from getting a chill.

  When their breathing returned to normal, she eased to his side and wiggled in until every contour of her body found its home against his. He closed his eyes and let the rightness of her lying next to him, sated and happy and in love, flow through him. He began to drift off.

  “Well that was different,” she said in a sleepy voice.

  He turned his head and kissed her hair. “Different good or different bad?”

  “Good, but I don’t think I’m suited to be the Domme. It’s exhausting. I was tense the entire time worrying about you. It’s much more fun letting you worry about me. Is that selfish?”

  “No, Isabella. It’s the way I prefer it too.”

  She began to fiddle with the wedding band on his finger as silence filled the bedroom. Something was weighing on her mind, but sleep was weighing on him.

  “Something on your mind, angel?”

  “Does this bother you?” she asked.

  “It tickles a little, but no. It doesn’t bother me.”

  “Not me playing with your ring, silly. Your ring. Does it bother you to wear it?”

  “Not following, Isabella,” he murmured.

  “Well given your, um, preferences, I thought maybe a mark of possession like this might not suit you.”

  The words snapped him out of his sleepy haze. “Is that how you see this ring? Your mark of possession on me.”

  “Please don’t be mad.”

  Mad. That was the farthest thing from his mind. He was blown away. “I’m not mad, Isabella. That’s the most beautiful thought. I never thought about it before. I guess because I never thought I would be married. Now that we are, I will always think of this ring that way. Thank you, my beautiful wife, for honoring me with your mark of possession.”

  He felt his words sing through her, making her happy.

  And hot.

  She pressed her chest into his ribs and began to run her hand over his torso.

  “Trying to top me again, are we?” he asked in the voice that would make her even hotter.

  His coquette wrapped her leg over his thigh and rubbed just enough to let him feel her wetness. “Whatever makes you think I would do a thing like that?” she purred in her sexy, sultry midnight voice as her hand slipped beneath the sheet and started fiddling again.

  In a single, fluid motion, he rolled her over, pulled her arms taut above her head and pinned her body beneath him. He grinned down at her lying exactly where they both preferred her to be.

  “Hands, my fiery angel. What are we going to do about those naughty hands?” he tsked, then kissed her breathless while he slipped her wrists into the cuffs still attached to the bedpost.

  Guess married life means no more sleep.

  Not that he would ever complain.

  21

  The Wedding Gift

  Jacques looked up from the computer screen, scanned her once, then again as Isabella walked into his office.

  “To what do I owe this pleasure?” he asked with an appreciative leer.

  “It’s a surprise.” Isabella leaned over the desk to enhance his view, letting the sexed-up body language and the low-cut red dress work their magic.

  “Love the dress, Isabella.” He reached for her hand, wrapping his long fingers around hers to pull her closer, but his voice was apologetic. “And I love that you’re always trying to spoil me, but I can’t rearrange my schedule. Not today. Sabin called this morning and damn near ordered me to clear the deck. Another crisis in New Mexico. Our Korean backers are threatening to pull their financing. We have a crash session all afternoon to deal with…”

  “No, you don’t,” she sang.

  Rueful eyes ran over her cleavage. “Sadly, I do. If it’s as bad as Sabin implied, I won’t be home until after midnight.”

  Jacques rarely made it home before midnight. The man worked so hard, but work was the last thing on his agenda for today. She leaned in and laid a kiss on his lips. He didn’t resist and slipped his tongue exactly where she wanted it.

  Before the kiss got too heated, he pulled back. “I’m sorry, Paradis. I promise to make it up to you.”

  “You don’t have to meet with Sabin,” she cooed, flashing the same look he always gave her when she resisted one of his naughty suggestions.

  “From your lips to God’s ears,” he murmured as his tongue licked over them, “but I do.”

  “I spoke to Sabin,” she managed before the seduction of what Jacques was doing to her mouth overtook her plan to seduce him.

  “Mmm?” Jacques’s eyes drifted closed as that wicked tongue traced the border of her lips.

  “He told me to tell you something.”

  One suspicious eye opened.

  “Have fun.” She gave him an innocent shrug and a coy smile, adding, “I had to make sure your schedule was clear. For the rest of today, you’re all mine.”

  “I’m yours for the rest of eternity,” he said with the same coy smile. “No crisis?”

  “Nope,” she replied with a playfully patronizing shake of the head.

  “No Sabin, no Koreans this afternoon?”

  She shook her head again slowly.

  Then a glint of understanding flashed in his eyes. “Are you kidnapping me, Mrs. Meszaros?”

  “I thought I should return the favor.” She nipped his lip to lure him away from any lingering thoughts of work.

  Lust filled his gaze as Jacques got fully on board with whatever she had planned for his gloriously unscheduled afternoon. “You and that cowboy together are a dangerous pair. Very sneaky, Isabella, and very naughty.”

  The way Jacques said the words announced that he was contemplating his own brand of danger for their afternoon and a low ache of anticipation squeezed in her belly. Talk about encouraging a girl to be naughty.

  His hands moved over her shoulders and began to circle down to her breasts.

  She stood abruptly. “Sneaky yourself. Come on. We have to go.”

  She tugged him into a stand and started backing them toward the door before Jacques laid her over his desk and they both forgot all about her plan for his afternoon.

  “What’s my surprise?” he purred without a trace of innocence.

  “You’ll see,” she said with a smile that told him her tingling lips were sealed and took a step back.

  “Then lead on, my Spanish seductress. Lead on.”

  For someone who liked control, Jacques certainly seemed to enjoy giving it to her almost as much as she enjoyed taking it. She led him out of the building into the waiting limousine, struggling to resist his skillful attempts to seduce her secret out of her. He kept it up throughout the entire ride, but she wasn’t budging. What she had planne
d was too important. And too intimidating to put into words. If she did, she might chicken out. Gracias a Dios, the traffic was light or she wouldn’t have made it to their destination without spilling every scintillating bean.

  Sabin wasn’t the only one willing to get into the game of seducing her man. Nicolai agreed to her sexy scheme with more playful enthusiasm than her playful cowboy.

  Who knew?

  Jacques’s cousin was fast becoming one of her favorite people. No one loved Jacques as much as Nicolai did, with the possible exception of her. The look of unadulterated delight on his face when Jacques announced that they were married belonged in a Shakespearean sonnet. And it was hilarious to see Jacques dressed down so completely at having done it without inviting Nicolai, but they would fix that. Everyone would be at their wedding in Barcelona. Unless Nicolai and Julianne eloped, however, there was no stopping Nicolai’s brooding at Jacques having beaten him to the altar.

  Nicolai agreed to what she asked with a single caveat. “If we do this, Isabella, you must allow me the freedom to discover your true essence. I want to see inside your soul and immortalize what I find there in the art we create together.”

  Immortalize. That was the pivotal word. Nicolai would immortalize her for Jacques, leave him with the eternal image of his wife, young, healthy and in love. Jacques may hate her for her lack of hope, but he would hate her more for leaving him with nothing but shadowed memories of time spent waiting for…she shook her head to free herself from the sad trail of her thoughts.

  She wanted to believe in the angel like Jacques did, but time had whittled away the magic of the moment they’d shared on the steps of Sacré Cœur Basilica. She’d looked into too many haunted faces not to recognize the looming demon: the false hope of the words “cancer survivor.” She wouldn’t taint her time with Jacques, however long their forever might turn out to be, so she didn’t express her fears to him. If she left him, he would have happy memories.

  And this.

  When they arrived, Isabella allowed Jacques to open the door of Nicolai’s gallery and guide her through it. He may have let her lead him here, but forget being hardcore, her man was chivalrous to the marrow. If she’d touched that handle, he would have gone apoplectic.