Wanted

by J. Kenner

  "Please," I said, because I was so very close now. "Please, I want you touching me."

  "I want that, too," he said. "But right now I'm enjoying this particular view. And from the way your pretty pink cunt is glistening, I think you're enjoying it, too."

  I bit my lower lip, both in silent protest and in agreement.

  "So tell me, Angie. Are you enjoying it?" His smooth voice was like an oral seduction.

  I nodded. Right then, I couldn't manage words.

  "You like me looking at you?"

  "Yes," I said, though I'm not sure I actually managed a word.

  "Does it make you hot, knowing I can see just how aroused you are?"

  "Yes," I said, my fingers continuing their dance.

  "Come for me, baby." His command was low and full of heat, and as his words washed over me, the orgasm building inside me unfolded, filling me up and growing and growing until it had no choice but to burst free. "I want to watch you explode and know that I took you there without even having to touch you."

  As if he'd commanded it, my body seized up and then shattered. My climax ripped through me in time with his words, destroying me so thoroughly I wasn't quite sure I could ever get myself back together again.

  When I finally lay there, calm but breathing hard, Evan was sitting beside me, his hands caressing me, his touch more like worship than exploration. "You're amazing," he said, then closed his mouth over mine and took me in a kiss so deep and consuming it almost had me coming again.

  I tried unsuccessfully to silence the drum-like pounding of my heart so that I could speak when his mouth left mine and he sat up again. But my pulse wouldn't settle. I'd never experienced anything like what he'd just given me, and all I wanted was more. All I wanted was everything.

  "Please," I managed to say.

  "Please what?"

  "I--I want the rest. I want everything you promised."

  "Do you?"

  I started to sit up, but he shook his head, a gentle hand keeping me on my back. "There's something I need to know," he said. "Do you wear pantyhose or stockings? Maybe tights in the winter?"

  The question baffled me. "Um, yeah."

  "Where?"

  "In the dresser. Left side, middle drawer." It was only after he'd eased off the bed and was opening the drawer that I realized what he intended to do.

  "Evan, I'm not sure that's such a--"

  "I'm sure," he said, and I had to nod. For now, at least, that was good enough for me.

  He held two pairs of winter tights in his hands as he moved around to the foot of the bed. Gently, he lifted my left leg. I closed my eyes as he did, letting myself surrender to the sensuality of the moment. The way he slid my leg toward the edge of the bed, leaving me scissored and even more exposed. The way the knobby cotton felt as he encircled my ankle with one foot of the tights. He pulled it tight, then tested the knot by slipping a finger between the material and my skin.

  "Does that feel okay?"

  I opened my eyes to look at him, and was so overwhelmed by the intensity with which he was looking back at me, that I could manage only a single, simple nod.

  His eyes crinkled with his smile, and he took the tights and pulled on them until all the slack was taken up and my foot was almost brushing the edge of the bed. Then he knelt down and disappeared from view. If it weren't for the persistent tugging on my leg, I would have had no idea what he was doing. As it was, I realized that he was using the tights like a length of rope, and he was tying me down to the bed frame.

  He repeated the process with the other leg until I was trussed up and spread wide. Completely open to him. Utterly at his mercy.

  I bit my lower lip, grateful that my hands were free. I trusted Evan, I did. But the thought of being that exposed, that vulnerable ...

  Well, it was both exhilarating and unnerving.

  Then he moved back to the dresser and withdrew another pair of tights.

  I didn't even have to ask. I knew. "Hands," I said.

  "Above your head," he confirmed.

  I complied, taking only enough time to draw in a ragged breath before doing so. He bound my wrists together and then somehow managed to restrain them so that there was no way I could pull my arms down to cover my body.

  "I want to touch you," I said in mild protest.

  "And I very much want you to. But later. Hush now," he said when I opened my mouth to reply, then silenced me with a kiss.

  It was, I thought later, that kiss that had launched me into space. Because it started the chain reaction. It was long and deep and had the effect of melting me, making me soft and malleable, my body little more than a repository for sensation. And then he exploited that state by slowly--painfully slowly--trailing a line of kisses down my neck and over my collarbone.

  When he reached my breast, he closed his mouth over me and drew me in, scraping his teeth lightly over my nipple, then using his tongue to drive me absolutely crazy with his mouth as his fingers traced lazy designs up and down my other breast.

  Every touch seemed magnified. Every lick more intimate, every caress more sensual. It was as if by tying me up he'd flipped a switch in me, and since I couldn't maneuver my body in order to absorb or deflect sensations, I had to adapt to completely and wholly experience them.

  I moaned in both pleasure and anticipation when his mouth abandoned my breast to spread kisses down my belly.

  "Oh, god, Evan," I whispered, writhing as much as was possible against my bonds.

  He murmured an unintelligible reply against my skin, and then his lips were grazing the top of my pubic bone, and then straight down--no slow build, no tease upon my inner thighs--just a full-on assault on my senses as his tongue flicked over my clit on his way down, down, down.

  I arched up, pleasure coursing through me, as he thrust his tongue into me with at least as much power and skill as his fingers had worked upon me earlier. His hands were on my hips to hold me in place, and his mouth closed over me, tasting and teasing, his tongue laving me. And his own groans of pleasure only made the waves inside me build faster.

  "Do you have any idea how incredible you taste? How much you have exceeded every fantasy, every expectation?"

  But I didn't care about sweet words right then. "Please," I begged, my hips bucking with insistence. "Please, don't stop."

  "Never," he said, and pressed his mouth once again to my slick cunt.

  He played me, nipping and licking and sucking. And with every touch and every stroke I could feel the waiting orgasm building like a swell of waves growing before a storm. Higher and higher until there was nowhere else to go, and I went soaring off into the night sky, then crashed down like so much froth upon the shore.

  "Oh, god," I said, because I couldn't seem to manage anything more articulate. "Oh, god, oh, god."

  He slid up my body and held me, but kept his hand cupped around my sex, his finger idly stroking me. I didn't know if he was purposefully trying to keep me on edge, but I didn't care. Right then, he could do any damn thing to me he wanted.

  "That was amazing," I said, turning my head to receive his gentle kiss. "But you haven't--I mean, it was very lovely for me a million times over, but aren't you a little bit--"

  "Frustrated?"

  "Well, yeah."

  "Very," he said. He pulled his hand away from my sex, then made me shiver as he traced lazy patterns around my inner thigh where my panty line would be. "But this was about you."

  "Oh." I considered that. "I like the way you think."

  He laughed.

  "So will you untie me now?"

  "Sweetheart," he said in a voice so laden with promise it almost made me come again, "I'm not even close to done with you."

  fourteen

  I woke in pitch-black, sweetly relaxed and completely sated. Evan had made me come twice more with mouth and hands, focusing so keenly on my pleasure that everything else faded away. Reason. Rationality. The whole damn world.

  What he hadn't done, though, was what he'd pr
omised--he hadn't fucked me. He'd focused entirely on me, making me exquisitely aware of my body, of each millimeter of my skin, of every nerve that had the power to send sweet pleasure twisting through me. He'd used me up, and when I was finally limp and lost, warm and sleepy, he'd gently untied me, pulled me close, and held me as I drifted off.

  Now though ...

  Well, now I was awake. And I wanted the pleasure of watching him come. I wanted the feel of him moving inside me--and when I slid across the bed to find him, I had to fight down the sharp stab of fear I felt at realizing he wasn't there.

  "Evan?" I sat up, telling myself that gone didn't mean gone. He could be in the bathroom. He could be on the phone. He could be anywhere.

  But I wanted him beside me.

  I sat up, then padded into the bathroom. He wasn't there, but I grabbed my robe off the hook behind the door, wrapped the terry cloth tight around me, and headed out into the hallway to look for Evan.

  I found him in the darkened living room. He'd pulled on his slacks, but remained shirtless. The only illumination in the room came from the glass and chrome case that held the copy of Da Vinci's Creature Notebook. I stood across the room, lost in the shadows, and watched as he stood over it, looking down at the pages, with the soft light from below making his face and the intricate vine tattoo glow in a way that seemed almost magical.

  I stayed perfectly still. The moment seemed strangely private. After all, until very recently, Evan had believed that notebook would be his, and I couldn't help but wonder if in some small way he was angry at me. The thought troubled me enough that I took a step toward him. "Evan?"

  He looked up at me, but I wasn't sure that he saw me. He seemed faraway, lost deep in thought. Then his expression cleared and he smiled, holding out his hand in an invitation that I eagerly accepted. "Hello, beautiful. You look rested."

  I tilted my head up to receive his kiss. "You, sir, wore me out. But in the best possible way."

  His dimple flashed, the charm of it contrasting with the wicked gleam of the scar across his eyebrow. "I'm very glad to hear it. Are you hungry?"

  "Mostly for you," I said. I expected him to laugh and was disappointed when the smile that touched his lips seemed forced and didn't reach his eyes.

  I cleared my throat. "The truth is, I'm starving."

  The moment I said it, I had to acknowledge that it was true. I couldn't remember the last time I'd eaten.

  "Unless there's a grill, I'm a terrible cook," he confessed. "How are your culinary skills?"

  "Worse than yours," I admitted. "I'm not allowed near a grill unless I dial ahead and put the nearest fire station on notice."

  "Apparently we won't be having souffles as our late night snack."

  "How does a frozen bagel with cream cheese sound?"

  "Can you operate a toaster?" he asked.

  "I can not only work a toaster," I bragged, "I can even manage a pot of coffee. French roast," I added. "That's your favorite, right?"

  "Sweetheart," he said, with a smile that soothed all my worries, "you've just made my evening."

  I managed to pull together a feast of toasted bagels, cream cheese, strawberry jam, and fresh blueberries in heavy cream. We sat at the cafe-style table in the breakfast area and as we ate in companionable silence, I glanced around this kitchen that was now mine. Even here, fine art decorated the walls. Alan had told me that a crew would be coming soon to crate it up and move it to the foundation's storage facility, and I couldn't help the pulse of sadness at the knowledge that these lovely canvases would be hidden away, lost in some sort of warehouse until whoever ran the foundation found a home for them.

  "What's the matter?" Evan said, and I looked up to see that he was peering at me over the rim of his coffee cup, his brow furrowed as if he was pondering some knotty problem.

  I gathered myself and used my knife to smear jam on top of my cream cheese. "Nothing. Just thinking."

  "Deep thoughts, apparently."

  I laughed. "I don't know how deep," I said. "Just melancholy."

  He reached out and brushed his fingers over my hand that still held the knife. "Tell me."

  "I was just thinking about all this," I said, glancing pointedly at all the art that filled the room. "Jahn used to tell me about his plans for the foundation. About how he was operating it only on a shoestring, but that when he died he wanted to see it blossom." My words were very matter-of-fact, but inside I was all twisted up. The thing I'd shared most with my uncle was our love of art, and the knowledge that all these wonderful paintings were going to go away only made the pain from Jahn's loss that much more brutal. I sucked in a breath and let it out slowly, willing myself not to cry. "I knew this was coming--the transfer to the foundation, I mean. But I never expected it to happen so soon."

  "I know." The words were simple, yet held so much meaning. He did know. He'd loved Jahn, too. They'd connected just as Jahn and I had, and I wondered if it was art that they'd shared, or something else entirely.

  I took a sip of my coffee. "Why did you stick around? After you finished Jahn's seminar class, I mean."

  He leaned back in his chair. "Complaining?"

  "Hardly. No, I was just thinking about connections. Jahn was my uncle, but that's just an accident of birth, you know? It was the art that really drew us together. I guess I was wondering what it was for you."

  "I enjoy art," he said, "but no, it's not my passion. Not the way it is for Cole. And art wasn't your uncle's first passion, either," he said.

  "You don't think so? What was? Business?"

  He didn't answer immediately. Instead, he got up and moved to the counter to pour fresh coffee. There was nothing awkward about his movements, but I had the impression that he was measuring his words.

  Finally, he turned back to me with an enigmatic smile. "Your uncle liked to win."

  "I know. I mean it pissed him off so much when Neely acquired the Creature Notebook that he went to a hell of a lot of trouble to commission a copy."

  "True enough," Evan said, but there was something in his voice that made me think that he wasn't talking to me so much as acknowledging a private joke. Or maybe he was just trying to hide his irritation. Under the circumstances, it was probably indelicate of me to mention the notebook.

  "I'm sorry," I said.

  As always, he understood what I meant. "Why do you think he changed his will? He knew I wanted it. And the time we spoke of it, he was very clear that he wanted me to have it."

  "I don't know," I said honestly. "He never mentioned it to me at all. Not as a bequest, anyway. But he knew I loved it and that it was my favorite of all his pieces. And I think--" I hesitated, then rushed recklessly on. "I think he wanted me to know that he trusted me and that he loved me."

  Evan was watching me intently. "Something happened. Something about the time that he changed his will. What?"

  I glanced down at the table. "I fucked up. Jahn helped me out." I lifted my head to look at Evan, and realized he was a little blurry. I blinked, and was mortified when I felt a tear snake down my cheek. "Shit," I said as I brushed it away. "I just--I felt bad. I think the notebook was Jahn's way of telling me it was all okay."

  "Angie--"

  He was reaching for me, but I pushed back from the table and stood up, determined to get this conversation back on track. As in, not about me or my secrets. "So why you?" I said brightly.

  "What do you mean?"

  "Why was he going to leave it to you? Wouldn't it make more sense to leave it to Cole?" I'd turned to the coffeepot as I spoke, but I caught a sharp movement in my peripheral vision, as if my words had jolted him.

  "Why do you say that?" His voice was low and measured, and I had absolutely no idea what button I had pushed.

  "Just because art is Cole's thing. I mean, he did that whole internship in Rome, and he teaches classes at that community center." I shrugged. "I dunno. It just made sense."

  "I suppose it does," Evan said.

  "So why did you want it?"
<
br />   He focused on spreading cream cheese on the second half of his bagel, and for a moment I wasn't sure he was going to answer. Then he said, "Because the notebook means something. It represents something huge."

  "The missing dragon shield, you mean? Or something more?" The story was that as a youth, Da Vinci had painted a fabulous dragon on a shield. It was so incredible that his father had not sold it to the original buyer, and it had disappeared into history. But I didn't think that Evan was talking about a lost artifact.

  "It's a reflection of how Da Vinci looked at the world. He saw things that weren't there. He looked beneath the surface. He looked at the world the way it really was, and it didn't scare him."

  I stared at him in unabashed amazement.

  "What?" he asked.

  "It's just--I can't believe you said that. It's exactly what I love about that notebook. About most of Da Vinci's work, actually."

  The corner of his mouth curved up for just a moment before his features settled back into an expression of bland indifference.

  I frowned. "Evan?"

  "I want to buy the notebook from you, Angie."

  "You what?" Surely I hadn't heard him right.

  "I want the notebook. I need it. To be honest, I need it more than you do." His voice was calm, like a businessman in the midst of negotiations.

  I wasn't calm at all. "Are you fucking kidding me? I just told you how much it means to me."

  "And it's served its purpose. Whatever message Jahn was sending you, he delivered it. Giving me the notebook doesn't change a thing."

  "It changes everything," I said. And then--with the same shock as an unexpected slap in the face--I understood.

  "Oh, shit." With a jolt, I pushed back from the table, the screech of the chair against the tile underscoring the horror I felt. "You son of a bitch," I shouted. "You fucking bastard! Is that why you changed your mind? Why you gave in at Destiny? Why you came here tonight? So you could try to seduce the damn notebook away from me?"

  His face reflected shock, but I had no way of knowing if it was a reaction to my accusation or to being found out. And I was on too much of a roll to stop now.

  "Well, fuck you, Evan Black. It's mine." I wanted to slap his face, but instead I grabbed my coffee cup and hurled it across the room. It shattered on the floor, sending dregs of coffee to splatter on the gray tiles and neutral beige walls.

  I gasped, then turned to run from the room. I wanted to throw myself onto the bed and cry. I wanted to kick Evan Black in the balls. I wanted to race out of this building that right now felt so damn confining and just get lost.