by Eden Bradley
“I can give you baking lessons if you’re interested.”
“No thanks. I’ll leave the art up to the artist. Tell me more about Vienna.”
She chewed a bite of her omelet, washed it down with a sip of coffee. “What do you want to know?”
He shrugged, shoving another forkful of waffle between his lips. “I don’t know. Whatever you want to tell me. What did you love about the city?”
“The history, I guess. It’s everywhere. Ever present, if that makes sense. It’s in the architecture, which is gorgeous—the museums and the opera houses and the cathedrals. In the old cobblestone streets. In the way people go about their lives there, for the most part. I mean, there are really sleek, modern structures that rival contemporary architecture anywhere in the world, like the Haas Haus. Have you ever seen it?”
“You mean that big mirrored building? I’ve seen pictures. Looks incredible.”
“It is,” she agreed. “It’s stunning. But despite places like that there’s still a sense of antiquity about the city. Sort of like there is here. I guess that’s why I felt so at home in Europe.”
“What else?”
“About Vienna in general? Or about the architecture?”
“I just want to know about your experiences in Europe. It must have been amazing to see so many countries. To live in so many places. I couldn’t have done it. I can’t bear to be away from New Orleans for too long. You’re braver than I am, Allie girl.” He put his fork down and turned to her. “In a lot of ways.”
His gaze was steady, deep somehow. It made her breath catch in her throat.
“I’m not,” she protested weakly.
“But you are. It takes a lot to be a sub. Don’t think I don’t know that. It takes strength. Courage.”
All she could do was blink for a moment. “Thank you for saying that. It does. In my experience not everyone sees it that way. But . . . you and I see a lot of things the same way. We always have.”
He nodded slowly. And in that moment she felt something blaze between them, their mental as well as physical chemistry like the sharply burning edge of ozone in the air.
He took her hand and lifted it to his lips, brushed a hot kiss across her knuckles. Her body shivered in answer.
“You are one beautiful girl,” he said, a sense of wonder in his voice.
She smiled. He smiled back, his strong white teeth framed by his wicked goatee.
She’d always loved a goatee on a man. Loved that evil edge it gave a man’s face. And on Mick’s face . . .
“More coffee for you two? Yes, and drink it while it’s hot,” the waiter asked and answered in the same breath, already pouring, bringing them both back to the world around them, full of sound and the warm scents of breakfast cooking.
Mick shook his head as he lifted his cup, one corner of his mouth quirking. “If these waiters only knew who they were bossing around,” he said quietly, humor in his low tone. He took a sip, set the cup down and picked up his fork once more, spearing a piece of waffle and offering it to her lips. “Here, have a bite before they get cold. And before we cause a scandal in the middle of this restaurant.”
She grabbed the fork. “In the interest of not causing a scandal,” she said, slipping the bite of waffle into her mouth. “Mmm, good.” She finished chewing. “Can we get out of here now?”
“You insatiable girl.”
“Luckily you like me this way.”
“Lord, do I ever.”
They finished up and paid the bill, and soon they were in his truck, moving back through the city toward the French Quarter.
Mick took her to his place, and they parked in the garage he rented for his truck a few blocks from his house. They walked hand in hand down the street, and it was sweet strolling with him through the sleepy Sunday city that smelled of ancient wood and brick, flowers and spices, along with the familiar edge of decay from the tropical air. Sweet, and yet her heart was racing, her body burning for him just from the feel of his big hand around hers. From knowing it was Mick she was walking with. From knowing what would happen when they got to his place. They reached the second block, having walked in silence when she turned to him.
“Why so quiet?”
“I’m concentrating.”
“On what?”
“On not tearing your clothes off in the middle of the street.”
“Oh . . .”
Heat shimmered through her, reached deep into her belly, in between her thighs to that warm spot that was nearly always just a little wet for him. It was tingling now. Needy instantly.
She gripped his hand tighter, and they both moved faster until they reached his door, where he let her hand go long enough to fit the key in the lock before taking her hand again and pulling her inside. He kicked the door shut behind them and grabbed her, yanking her body in tight and kissing her hard.
She moaned into his mouth as he opened her lips with his wet, seeking tongue, and her hands slid into his hair, holding him closer. In moments they were both panting, their bodies pressed close together, hips moving in rhythm.
Mick pulled away. “Fuck it,” he growled as he yanked her tank top over her head, and she was grateful she’d gone without a bra today. His gaze lingered on her bare breasts, making her feel all the more naked for him.
She helped him slide his T-shirt up. It caught on one arm, and they both yanked together, the fabric ripping before they were able to work it free. She groaned as she slid her hands over his chest, over his flat, hardening nipples, leaned in to taste his skin.
“Christ,” he muttered. “Come here, baby.”
He wrapped a hand around her hair and pulled her head back, biting into her throat, then sucking at the skin, while with the other hand he unbuttoned her jeans and shoved them down her legs. He slid a few fingers under the edge of her underwear, and she heard the tearing of lace as they came off.
“God . . . yes, Mick.”
She went for his jeans, and his hands were there, too. He shoved them down around his ankles. They got stuck and he kicked off his boots, the worn denim of his jeans slipping off easily, and she found his big cock hard as granite, her fingers wrapping around it.
He filled his hands with her breasts, squeezing, caressing. Her body was on fire, desire a fierce blaze, building so quickly she couldn’t think straight. She didn’t want to. All she knew was this panting desperation, this tearing of clothes, the need to touch and taste and feel.
He bent to take one nipple into his mouth and she surged into him. He licked until it was hard, began to suck while she moaned and held his head, her fingers digging into his scalp. When he bit her she only sighed. And began to stroke his cock.
“No.”
He grabbed her hand and pulled it away, and before she could protest he turned her around, had her on her hands and knees at the bottom of the stairwell.
“Can’t wait to be inside you,” he said from between gritted teeth, picking her up and moving up a few steps.
“Don’t wait, Mick. Come on.”
She reached back for him, digging her fingernails into his thigh as he gripped her hips with firm, hurting hands. She welcomed the pain, welcomed his command. She spread her thighs wider.
“Hang on, baby,” he ground out as he plowed into her.
“Oh!”
But it was all good—the pain and the pleasure as he thrust into her in one long, hard stroke. The hard surface of the old wooden stairs pressing into her knees. He pulled back, stabbed into her. She swore she could feel the tip of his cock ramming against her G-spot over and over. Pleasure speared through her, desire rising to a dizzying height instantly.
“Come on, baby. I’m going to fuck you so hard. You can take it. Tell me,” he demanded.
“I need you, Mick. Fuck me hard. As hard as you can. Please,” she gasp
ed.
He bucked into her so hard she would have collapsed on the stairs if he hadn’t been holding on to her. And along with the exquisite pleasure was the warm sense of yielding to his command, like lightning filtering through her veins in small electric jolts.
“Oh, fuck, baby girl. You feel so. Damn. Good.”
He rammed into her, again and again, bringing her to the edge.
“Not yet,” he ordered her. “Don’t come yet.”
“God . . .”
But she bit it back, forcing her climax to hover at the precipice. He reached around her and pinched her clit.
“Oh!” She shook her head, her hair flying around her face.
“Not yet,” he ground out, his body shivering so hard she knew he was fighting it, too.
She inhaled, struggling against sensation that threatened to overload, her sex squeezing his big cock with every punishing stroke.
“Gonna come.”
“Please,” she begged.
“Wait.”
To her surprise he turned her over until she was sitting on the stairs. He wrapped her legs around his waist, pausing with the tip of his cock at the opening of her hungry, aching sex.
“Mick,” she breathed.
“Look at me, Allie.”
She locked her gaze to his as he reached under her, lifted her, and impaled her.
“Mick . . . oh . . .”
Her arms went to his shoulders and she hung on while he surged into her.
“Ah, baby girl.”
Something shifted. He tilted his hips, in, then out. Slowly. Excruciating. Wonderful, as pleasure coiled inside her, waiting. And his glittering, gray gaze never left her face.
One big hand cupped her ass, and with the other he reached between them to press on her swollen clitoris.
“Now, baby. Come for me now.”
His voice, his command, triggered her climax. She came, and came apart, her orgasm rippling over her skin, deep into her belly, her sex. Sharp and soft all at the same time. Hard yet liquid. She was shaken by the intensity of his gaze on hers.
“Say you’re mine. Allie,” he demanded, his voice rough. “Say it.”
“Yes. God . . . yours. Always.”
“Mine.”
His body went stiff all over and he plunged into her, shaking as he came.
“Mine, my girl,” he muttered, his mouth going beautifully soft with pleasure.
The reverberations seemed to go on forever as they trembled together, coming and coming. And she saw it in his eyes, in his pleasure-torn expression.
Love.
There was no mistaking it—naked on his face, all of it written there as if in indelible ink, as stark and raw as she felt at that moment herself.
Love him. Always.
She loved him. With all her heart, with every cell in her being. And it was a love strong enough to hold up to the years, the times he’d broken her heart. But even broken, the love had remained. Had only grown stronger in knowing the man he’d become.
Tears stung her eyes. She blinked them away even as her heart dared to soar.
Love him so damn much.
He loved her back.
She’d known it in some cerebral way. But now she felt it. And that was something entirely different.
She blinked. Blinked again in wonder. “Mick.”
He tilted his head, his brows drawn together as if he were thinking very hard. Then he leaned in slowly and kissed her mouth. He pulled back a few inches, then kissed her lips once more. Then her cheek, over and over as she melted into his touch. Then her temple, her ear, her hair, before pulling back to look at her again.
His hand went around the back of her neck, cradling her head in his palm.
“Allie . . .” He paused. Started again. “I love you, Allie girl. My girl.”
Her heart twisted in her chest, wanting to sing, to leap. “I am your girl.”
“You love me,” he said. It was a statement, not a question.
The tears welled in her eyes, making his face swim before her. She blinked them away. She needed to see him. “I do. I love you.”
“I never stopped,” he told her. “Never. I was just . . . stubborn. Stupid. I never gave you enough credit.”
She pressed a fingertip to his lips. “Shh. Don’t. You never gave yourself enough credit, either. But we’re here now. That’s what’s important.”
He nodded, kissed her fingertips, took her hand in his and held it to his cheek. “How can I ask you to forgive me for what I did to you? You loved me, and I didn’t believe in either of us enough. I fucking hurt you.”
“Yes. You did. But it’s time to put all of that behind us. We have to if we’re going to be able to hang on to each other. If we’re going to be able to love each other.” She slid her hands down over his shoulders, gripped the bulging muscles of his biceps. “Mick, tell me you can do that. Tell me you’ll try.”
Suddenly her heart was thundering in her chest. What if he didn’t know how to let himself love her? What if he couldn’t let the past go and move forward with her? Simply saying he loved her was only the first step.
“I don’t have any other choice. Not now. I love you, my baby girl. I love you. I don’t know how I’ve lived without you all these years.” He stroked her hair from her face, his fingers lingering there. “You’re mine now. The way you always should have been.”
“Mick . . . can we really do this? Can we really start over? I’m not foolish enough to think we’ll be starting with a clean slate. No one does that. We can’t pretend the past never happened—”
“I don’t want to. You’re as much a part of my past as you are my present. As I hope you’ll be of my future.”
She smiled, stroked his cheek. He turned his face into her palm and kissed her there. Softly. Lingeringly.
“But things may come up that we’ll have to deal with,” she said. “We have to communicate with each other.”
“You know I kind of suck at that sometimes. If it’s kink related, I’m all about the transparency, but the emotional stuff . . . that’s a lot harder.”
“I know. I promise I’ll cut you a little slack. For being male, if nothing else.”
“Oh, will you now?”
She grinned up at him. “I will. I’m generous like that.”
“I’ll show you generous, my girl. I’ll be generous all over your fine ass.”
“Promises, promises,” she teased.
She yelped as he picked her up, threw her over his shoulder and started up the stairs.
“You’re a caveman, Mick Reid!”
“Tell me you don’t love it.”
“I . . . plead the Fifth.”
“Ha!”
“Where are you taking me?”
“To bed, where I can do terrible things to your gorgeous body. Do I hear more arguments?”
“Um . . . no.”
“No, what?” he demanded.
“No . . . please?”
He laughed. “That’ll do.”
They reached his bedroom, where the afternoon light was seeping through the curtains, illuminating it with the kind of soft golden sunlight that made dust motes dance in the air. His muscles flexed under her palms as he bent and laid her on the bed. He was so beautifully built. She’d always loved the breadth of his shoulders, his narrow hips, the pale gold hue of his skin. She loved the wicked gleam in his eyes, the cocky half smile on his face. The mix of bad boy and occasional tender lover and the sadistic streak that ran through it all.
“What are you going to do with me?” she asked.
He rubbed his chin. “I’m working on it. I just had a mind-blowing orgasm and told you I love you. I might need a minute to recover.”
“Mind-
blowing?”
“Every damn time.”
“Really?”
“Don’t think that gives you any bargaining power.”
“Doesn’t it?” She batted her lashes.
He chuckled. “All right, I give up. You know damn well it does.”
“I rather like that idea.”
“Don’t get too comfortable with it. I’m still the Dom.”
“I’m pretty sure you won’t ever let me forget it.”
“Damn right,” he said as he lunged for her.
“Mick!”
“Shh.”
He flipped her over onto her stomach and straddled her, pinning her down with his legs while he found the ankle cuffs he kept attached to his bed, and shackled her with lightning speed. Immediately he began to spank her, a quick, sharp volley of slaps. They came too quickly for her to have time to convert the pain. She was overloading, squirming, panting. He smacked her harder—her ass, the backs of her thighs. The pain built and built. She couldn’t give herself over to it—it was too much, too fast.
“Mick!”
“My name is not a safe word, princess.”
She almost laughed, but his hand came down again and again, fast and stinging like crazy. Her flesh was burning hot.
“Do you need to safe-word?” he asked, still spanking her.
“Mick,” she said, her breath rasping in her lungs as she struggled uselessly to get away from him, from the padded cuffs holding her ankles so securely.
“Yes?”
He smacked her again, impossibly harder.
She did laugh, then, as the lovely brain chemicals broke free and swarmed her head, her body. She went limp all over.
He stopped, unbuckled the cuffs, turned her over and held her in his arms.
“Lord, I love to see you like this,” he said quietly, almost reverentially. “Your pupils wide, your cheeks flushed. Your lips . . . so damn beautiful. I always love you, but when you’re like this, yielding to me so completely, well . . . that’s when I really fall for you all over again. Every damn time. Because I know you’ve given yourself into my hands. You make yourself so vulnerable it makes my chest ache. And I have never said anything like that to anyone in my life.” He paused to stroke her cheek, her jaw, her throat. “Love you, baby girl.”