He reached down to wrap his hand around my cock, and I shuddered silently as he gave me a couple of slow, easy strokes. My thighs quivered with the effort of staying still.
Ellison let out a low chuckle. “You can move now if you want to.”
Another wave of relief spread over me, cool and refreshing and tingling all the way to the tips of my fingers and toes. “Thank you, sir,” I gasped before I’d even realized I was saying it. “Thank you, thank you. Oh god, thank you.”
Once I’d said it I couldn’t stop repeating it—this vast, endless ocean of gratefulness was surging up inside me and spilling out through my mouth and through every pore in my body. I just had to tell him, had to thank him, needed him to know how much I loved his hand on my body.
I fucked up into his hand, spilling my gratitude for him, and a short time later—maybe seconds, maybe minutes, I had lost track entirely—the curling tension in my body snapped like a spring and my cock pulsed hard between his fingers. I painted long white stripes across my chest and belly as my hips twitched and my lips betrayed every thought in my head.
My babbling finally slowed, and I drifted gently back to myself as Ellison released me and produced some cloths to clean us up with. I made a feeble grab for one of them, which he ignored as he swabbed the mess off my body. He stretched out on the bed next to me, and I automatically rolled toward him and wrapped myself around him like a monkey clinging to a branch. All my self-doubt over who should be touching who had evaporated, leaving only the touch-starved, needy part of me to plaster myself to Ellison’s body.
Ellison chuckled softly and wrapped his arm around me, tucking me in closer. His embrace was warm, encompassing, strangely protective even though I was covering most of his body, my feet extending far past his on the bed. His thumb drew gentle circles over my bicep as I settled against him, my heartbeat slowly returning to something approaching normal. “How are you feeling?”
I considered the question for a moment. My ass was sore, both from the flogging and the fucking, and my heart felt like it had been tossed around, wrung out, and left out to dry in the sun, but overall…I was thoroughly used and loving every bit of it. “I feel good,” I said, burrowing closer into his side. “That was…amazing. A little strange. But I’m not…you know, traumatized or anything.”
“Good.” He planted a gentle kiss on the top of my head. “You have a very strong reaction to the threat of orgasm denial. Tell me about that.”
I groaned. Couldn’t I just…not like something because I didn’t like it?
Of course not. Not with Ellison.
“It’s, um…kind of a long story.”
“I’ve got time.”
I sighed. “Okay, so…the last person I seriously dated was this guy, Dan. When I met him, he seemed almost too perfect. He was hot, and brilliant, and he had these exciting stories of traveling the world and meeting stars and musicians and…he was just one of those really outgoing, sociable, type A sort of people. I couldn’t even believe he was interested in someone like me.
“Well, he seemed really into me at first. But after a few weeks he just started getting distant—emotionally, and especially physically. He’d say ‘oh yeah, let’s go do something fun together,’ and then he’d spend the whole time pretty much ignoring me while I scrambled for his attention. When we had sex, it always felt like it was him grudgingly humoring me.
“Still, we ended up getting pretty serious…or at least acting like we were. But it was like he was just going through the motions. He’d never say ‘I love you,’ he’d just say ‘you too’ if I said it to him. He never initiated sex. And the more I tried to beg and strain for his attention, the more distant he got. Which, okay, it’s not like desperation is an attractive quality, but…he was supposed to be my boyfriend. He was supposed to care.”
The petulant tone in my own voice grated on my ears. I took a shuddering breath, trying to bring back emotionally mature River, who had processed all this shit and gotten over it. That guy was great.
“Eventually I realized that he liked having me around, but only because he liked having a fan. He liked having someone who was obsessed with him, but he didn’t really want to have a boyfriend. He didn’t want to be a boyfriend.
“Anyway, the issue wasn’t really about sex, but sex was kind of inextricably linked to the whole thing. So…I dunno, I just get a little freaked out at the idea of you withholding…affection. Or orgasm. Not that ‘affection’ is really…I mean…”
“I understand,” he said, giving me another kiss on the top of my head. The soft press of his lips settled some of the squirmy unrest in me, and I let myself be soothed back into a pliant mass. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Thanks,” I mumbled into his side. I liked the idea that he was trying to remember things about me, even if they were embarrassing and incredibly revealing of my many and varied personal problems.
“Apart from that, was everything else enjoyable? Did you get what you’d hoped to out of it?”
“More than I’d hoped.” I wriggled against him, feeling the way the heated skin on my ass pulled with the motion. “I never thought I’d actually enjoy getting hit like that,” I said, stretching my fingers over the smooth plane of his chest. “I mean, if you’d told me ten years ago that I’d enjoy what we just did, I’d have been horrified.”
Ellison blew out a quiet laugh. “Tastes change over time. I never used to think I could enjoy hurting another person—and now look at me.”
I tilted my head up to see his face, but he was gazing up at the ceiling. All I saw was a low angle of his jaw and the hint of his profile. A sudden urge welled up in me, a desire to know how he looked from every angle, to learn every curve and line of him, and every twist of his thoughts. “Do you enjoy it? Inflicting pain?”
“I do,” he said, his fingers deceptively gentle on the skin of my arm. “I enjoy the reactions it brings out of people, the noises and the movements. I enjoy knowing that I can make a person move the way I want them to, just by hurting them a certain way. I enjoy the…violent release of striking skin. I like seeing the evidence of my attention written on someone’s skin, and the knowledge they’ll come back for more if I’ve done it well. It’s a complex and many-layered experience.”
I found myself being carried by his words, by the rise and fall of his voice and the passion behind them. I didn’t feel like I understood, exactly, but it didn’t seem all that strange. It wasn’t the twisted cruelty I’d always imagined motivating bedroom sadists. It was just a sort of power and pride thing. That was easy enough to understand.
“Did you…” I hesitated, not sure I wanted to know the answer to the question on my tongue. “Did you get what you wanted out of it?”
Had I been able to offer him enough?
“I did.”
“Even though you had to hold back?”
“There’s so much more to enjoy about this than just hurting you, River.” Ellison’s fingers tightened in my hair, and my reaction was as instant as it was automatic. My eyes rolled back and my mouth fell open to let out a ragged gasp. He leaned in, and I reached for him with my lips, helpless to control my desire for him. When he spoke, his voice was light and teasing. “Oh, is there something you want?”
“I want to kiss you.” No hesitation, no fear. Only need.
“I love how hungry you are for me,” he said as I strained forward against the pull against my scalp, desperate for his lips on mine. “I could do anything to you, as long as I give you a taste of me.”
“Please,” I whispered, my voice barely audible. “Please—”
His tongue swept out, tracing slowly across my lower lip and then my upper. He kept my head in place with his firm grip, and his tongue flicked into my mouth, testing and tasting, but sending a very clear message: I was to take what he gave me, and nothing more.
I shuddered with every stroke of his tongue, whimpered at the brush of his breath over my lips. I could have died of pure want. Finally, when I w
as inches from breaking down and begging for the second time tonight, he finally leaned in and pressed his lips to mine; a real kiss, a balm for the fire inside me.
I melted into it immediately. My whole body went soft and pliant, giving way to him as my lips did. I let out a long, heavy sigh through my nose, and flicked my tongue against his as it thrust into my mouth. My cock was about as spent as it had ever been, so the kiss didn’t escalate into anything overwhelming and needy. We just…kissed, long and slow and deep, for a long time, Ellison’s hand in my hair, my body wrapped around his.
He let out a contented hum as he pulled away, and I shivered, tucking myself in even closer to him. It was like all the jumbled pieces in me had been settled back into place, all my jangling nerves smoothed and straightened, and I could finally, finally relax.
It was so nice here, wrapped up in him. I could almost let myself believe it was real tenderness. But this was just “play,” it was just a fun diversion. Still, it was nice to imagine those arms circling me even without hours of kinky shenanigans beforehand. Was that even a thing he did? Or did hugs only come at the price of pain?
Ellison’s voice was low and sleepy when he spoke again. “You’re welcome to stay the night if you want to.”
The invitation stirred a mix of emotions in me—gratitude for the offer, and regret that I couldn’t accept. How wonderful would it be to fall asleep in his arms like this?
“I’m…I can’t.” I let out a small sigh as I traced my fingertips down the center of his chest. “I can’t sleep in other people’s beds. My brain won’t shut up, and I stay awake all night and feel awful in the morning.”
I realized after I said it that he hadn’t had to draw it out of me with infuriatingly patient invasive questions. I’d simply volunteered the information, because I thought he would want to know. Was he already training me to like what he liked?
“I understand,” he said, and his voice was so steady and agreeable that maybe he really did. “Well, stay as long as you want, then.”
Some hedonistic little part of me wondered if sticking around long enough would lead to him pushing me down and fucking me into the mattress again, but the truth was it didn’t really matter. I was thoroughly worn out, mentally and physically, and I really did want to sleep. Just…a little later. It was nice here in his arms. “I’ll stay a little while.”
Tucked against his body, I drifted lazily in my own head, finally free of the thunder of confusing thoughts that had plagued me all night. I wasn’t getting anywhere near sleep, but it was calming. It felt like somewhere I belonged. Almost like being at his feet.
After a while I noticed his breathing starting to slow and steady out, and I held back a sigh. As much as I wanted to revel in him, I needed to go. I tried to carefully disentangle myself from him, but he jerked awake at my first movement. “Sorry,” I murmured. “I, uh…should be going.”
He nodded silently and followed me to the living room where my clothes had been abandoned so hastily earlier. He sat on the couch and watched me dress, and I felt the familiar creeping embarrassment setting back in. Even though he was naked this time, there was still a sort of power in his position—like I was on display for his pleasure.
When I’d finished dressing and putting myself back into some semblance of order, he looked me up and down with an approving smile, then pushed himself to his feet. “So, uh,” I said, suddenly back to full-on awkwardness, “thanks for…you know…”
“Thanks for what?” The corner of his mouth curled just a hair’s breadth higher.
I closed my eyes with a sigh. “Thank you for…dominating me,” I said, swallowing. “For fucking me, and for hurting me, and for…for cuddling with me.” I looked at him, my cheeks burning. God, I hoped that covered everything he was looking for.
“It was my pleasure,” he said, and pulled me in for another brief kiss, all tender lips and sweetness. “Drive safely.”
“Yeah, right. Uh, goodnight.” I gave him a ridiculously awkward little wave and slipped out his door into the night. The air was cool against my skin, and it should have been soothing, but it only made me even more aware of the heat burning under my clothes where he’d flogged me. I rubbed my hand absently over my ass as I walked to my car, wondering if I’d have marks in the morning. What might they look like?
The drive home was a surreal trip. I rolled my windows down and let the wind blast me in the face, but the whole way there I was strangely calm and still, my calm untouchable. Maybe this was subspace. Or maybe it was just the afterglow of getting spectacularly laid. Either way, I hoped Ellison would give me more of it soon.
9
Ellison went quiet for almost three days after our…date? Scene? I had no idea what to call it, besides “absolutely mind-meltingly hot.” I spent the entire time trying and failing to be totally cool about it; I lost count of the number of times I picked up my phone and sat with fingers hovering over the keyboard, composing messages in my head, only to groan in disgust and toss the phone aside.
“Why are you doing that?” I could almost hear Ellison asking me in that cool, controlled voice.
Because I crave validation, Fantasy Ellison. Because you blew my tiny, repressed little mind; you rocked my slowly-expanding world, and I don’t have a clue if it meant anything to you.
If I contacted him, he would probably text back, but that wouldn’t do anything to soothe the fear that settled on me like spiders crawling on my skin. If I’d happened to be a suave, sophisticated, shockingly knowledgeable and insightful Dom who’d just had a disappointing experience with a sub who had no fucking clue what he was doing, I knew what I’d do: I would just stop texting him, and let him take the hint.
Ellison wasn’t me, though—obviously—and doubt nagged at me any time my mind went still for more than a minute. Maybe by not texting him, I was giving him the impression I’d had a terrible time. Maybe he just had a different style of communication. Maybe being stubborn wasn’t doing me any favors and I needed to stop being such a fucking coward.
Well, that last one went without saying, but knowing that didn’t change the fact that it wouldn’t mean as much if I was the one to contact him first. It wasn’t unreasonable to want to know he was thinking about me, right?
Rationalizing stubbornness: River Burke’s primary talent.
It wasn’t easy, but I did my best to throw myself into my work. I spent hours tinkering with my plot outlines to very little effect, made a bunch of changes to the script for the next few pages, and went through a solid six months of the archives to fix Marius’s scar. That was a much less emotionally draining thing to obsess over than whether or not Ellison thought I was a hopeless basket-case.
Mariah, in her usual bulldozing fashion, demanded that I get out among the living, so I agreed to meet her for coffee. I showed up at the coffee shop early to work a little—maybe a change of scenery would help jar my brain loose and let me see what I was missing in the story.
As soon as I got to the coffee shop, I was reminded why I hated working in coffee shops: other people. All the tables against the walls were taken, so I had to sit where any passerby could see my laptop’s screen—that put anything art-related right out, so I resigned myself to even more tinkering with my outline. With the font size turned way down, of course.
I didn’t have high hopes when I started, but after the espresso hit my bloodstream, a plan started taking shape in my head. So of course, that was when Ellison decided to text me.
> ELLISON: I can’t help but get hard thinking of you on your knees. Even when I’m teaching a class.
I swallowed hard, my heart racing. Somewhere deep in my brain, my id leapt in the air and clicked its heels together. He did think about me.
> RIVER: Pics or it didn’t happen.
I stared at my phone for a while, drumming my fingertips against my teeth, but it stayed frustratingly silent. One of my nails clicked against the enamel of my front tooth and I looked down; I was going to have to clip it when I g
ot home. Yet another weird neurosis that Ellison would no doubt examine in detail if he were here.
I turned back to my outline, which was about a thousand times less interesting than it’d been about 30 seconds ago, but I was saved from having to think about it when my phone buzzed again. My eyes flew wide open when I saw what was on the screen. My hand shot out to snatch the phone up and flip it over as I glanced around to make sure nobody was glaring at me—or worse, winking. I seemed to be in the clear, so I carefully pulled the phone into my lap and turned it over.
And…wow. That was definitely Ellison’s cock.
I hadn’t had a chance to properly admire it either time I’d seen it before, and this picture showed that it was definitely worth admiring. It lay on his belly, the tip flushed red, his pants open and his thumb hooked into the waistband of his underwear, dragging them down to expose the glorious length of it. My mouth watered at the sight of it, at the thought of tracing the shape of the head with the tip of my tongue, of breathing in the scent of him as I licked up his shaft and opened my mouth to receive it.
In the background I saw a foot-high stack of papers and a sliver of institutional carpet. My eyes widened again.
> RIVER: Oh my god, you’re not in class right now, are you?
And then because I didn’t want him to think I was ungrateful:
> RIVER: Either way, I love the picture.
> ELLISON: I’m in my office, trying to relieve a little tension before I have to teach again. Where are you?
> RIVER: In a coffee shop, trying to get a little work done. Which doesn’t seem to be happening.
> ELLISON: Sorry for distracting you.
I was in the middle of typing out some too-long and probably incoherent “no, it’s really okay” sort of reply when another picture came in. This one showed his pants shoved low on his hips and his hand firmly wrapped around his cock, thumb stroking over the tip. I thought I could see a faint pearl of moisture there, but it may have just been wishful thinking.
Truth By His Hand Page 13