Catch

by Kenyon, Toni

  Tamsen ran her entire hand up under his towel, her efforts rewarded when she struck his solid shaft. She brushed his towel aside in one swift movement and feasted her eyes on his nakedness. Such a thrill, knowing she turned him on so much. She wanted him, wanted him badly, and nothing would to stand in the way of her having him.

  Licking her lips in anticipation, she lunged for that soft, sacred space between his legs.

  Tonguing his sack, she felt him shiver in response. She suckled one ball into her mouth and ran her fingernails up the underside of his dick, hearing him moan and feeling the balance of his body physically relax under her hands and mouth.

  "Too good, Tams," he whispered. Matt caressed the top of her head, stroking her hair, the way she'd stroked Azriel. She'd purr too if she didn't have a mouth full of his balls.

  Matt leaned back against the crumpled bedding, as she continued her suckling. "Aw fuck!"

  His surprised scream brought Tamsen to a sudden halt; he was lucky she didn't clamp down with her teeth and do permanent damage. At the same time a yowl came from Azriel and a black streak of fur shot toward the bathroom.

  "Fucking animal." Matt was furious. "It was lying nearly under me on purpose, I'm sure of it. Do you know how disconcerting it is to lie on something furry?"

  Tamsen couldn't help laughing.

  That seemed to incense him more. "I'm serious. The frigging cat hates me."

  "Don't be silly. He does not."

  "I am not being silly." Rage began to cloud his eyes. "I'm sick of the time we have together being interrupted by..."

  "By what, Matt?" Tamsen's anger rose to meet his, pent-up frustration and hurt welling to the surface.

  He scowled, his beautiful lips set in a harsh line. "Don't push me, Tamsen. I might say something I'll live to regret and I don't want to do that."

  Fury spilled from her gut. "What, something like if we'd stopped the last time the phone rang and I'd talked to Gina she might not have hung herself? Something like that, Matt?"

  "Stop it, Tamsen!"

  "Why?" No chance of her holding back the torrent now - the dam had burst. "The truth hurt, does it, Matthew?"

  She could see the veins bulging up his arms as he gripped the duvet, the tightness in his jaw as he ground his teeth together. She wanted to rip at his skin, tear at his throat with her nails and see his skin ripped and bleeding the way Gina's had been when she clawed at the rope in her death throes.

  She spat, "You may as well have tied the rope and kicked the chair out from underneath her."

  "Tamsen, that's enough!"

  "You're just so fucking composed, aren't you?" She moved her face to within inches of his, close enough to see the perspiration forming on his top lip. "Mommy's got you so well trained you aren't even in touch with what you're feeling. How long did it take, Matt, to squash those horrible feelings, bury them and pretend they didn't exist?"

  His eyes started to bulge as he continued to fight with himself. Tamsen wanted him to fight with her; she wanted to hurt him as much as she hurt - as much as Gina must have been hurting when they both ignored her.

  "Don't bring my mother into this." He could barely sputter the words out.

  "Why, Matt? She's so firmly ensconced in your life I'm surprised you didn't invite her in here this morning to watch."

  "That's enough. I don't have to listen to this crap. I'm out of here."

  She laughed, an almost hysterical laugh. She could feel her control slipping away. "Don't even think about walking away from me, Matt."

  He looked at her then - not really at her, more through her. "If I stay in this room one minute longer, woman, you are going to get hurt - " he stood up and made a movement toward his walk-in-wardrobe " - and you've been hurt enough."

  "Big fucking man. Walking away. What a hero." The voice didn't even sound like hers anymore. "I told you, no one walks away from me."

  She grabbed him by the arm, swinging him around to face her. He opened his mouth to say something else, but the words were lost in the resounding sound of her stinging slap. She caught him square across the left cheekbone and his face started to redden, even before she registered the pain in her right hand.

  They both stood looking at each other, Matt dumbstruck, Tamsen feeling immediate release from pain and torment. She lifted her hand to hit him again.

  "You fucking bitch. You're as psycho as..." He stopped, as if he were hearing himself for the first time.

  He intercepted the next blow, grabbing her wrist before her hand found its target. The impediment enraged her further and she clawed at his chest and neck with her free hand. He made short work of pinning her arms to her sides.

  "What are you trying to do?" His tone had softened, a look of pity and ᴚconfusion on his face.

  "I want to hurt you."

  "You need to stop. I don't want to hurt you."

  She hesitated, looked down at the small space between their bare feet, "Maybe I just want to hurt myself."

  "Why would you want to hurt yourself?" The puzzled tone in his voice matched her own.

  She shrugged. "It's hard to explain. If I hurt myself I think I’ll feel better."

  "That's insane. It doesn't make any sense."

  "I know. But I think I'm prepared to try anything at the moment."

  He let go of her hand and slapped her, hard, on the buttock.

  She jumped. "That hurt."

  "That was the idea." He had a strange look in his eye.

  The sting from the slap ate away her anger and frustration. "Do it again."

  He obliged, slapping her even harder on the same spot. Calmness overcame her, the sting radiating outward and upward, its energy devouring her frustration and despair.

  Matt released her other hand. She noticed the red finger marks on his cheek and a wave of remorse flushed through her. She reached up with her face, standing on her tiptoes, willing him to lower his cheek to her so she could brush the marks with her lips and kiss the hurt away.

  She said, "I want you to hit me again." Her voice was low, raspy and full of desire.

  He didn't look confused anymore. "You mean, like spank you?" His tone was matter-of-fact.

  "Er, I'm pretty sure that's what I mean." She felt a flush of embarrassment run up her breasts.

  "I could really hurt you, you know?" As if he needed her to be aware of how much, he viciously twisted her nipples.

  Her breath caught in her throat and she became immediately wet in response to his cruel touch. "I know. I want you to."

  Matt released her tortured nipples and a fresh rush of pain ran through her breasts. Nausea and excitement fought for control. Excitement overcame any resistance.

  Sitting down on the edge of the bed, he pulled her toward him. She knelt between his knees and he cupped her face in his hands, lowering his full ripe lips to hers. He suckled her bottom lip and she moaned, the sound vacuumed from her mouth by his.

  "You sure about this?" He sounded calm in a detached sort of way.

  She nodded. She needed something - anything - to take the pain away. She'd discovered a long time ago that physical pain gave her relief and needed Matt to understand. As an adolescent she'd scorched herself with hot water. A sensible way, at the time, to deal with the pain of growing. Huge water blisters forming on her inner thighs. They'd taken weeks to heal and years for the scars to fade.

  Matt found himself lost and appalled at Tamsen's request. But on some perverted level that he didn't understand he wanted to do this for her. He loved her enough to understand her pain while still not comprehending how beating the crap out of her ass could bring relief. Was willing to trust and let her take him there - a huge step for both of them.

  She had crawled up into his lap. Her breasts were draped warm and snug over his left thigh; her bare ass, with its one pink and tender looking cheek, hung over his left. The sight of her like that, submissive and waiting, was more of a turn-on than he’d ever imagined it would be. He could feel the blood rushing to his cock and w
as embarrassed.

  She pointed out, "You're enjoying this, despite yourself."

  "I think you should shut up before I lose my nerve."

  She wriggled over his growing erection, the movement making him even harder.

  He pawed and stroked her buttocks. She had a fine ass and he'd loved it from the first moment he'd seen it. "You’ve done this before?" he asked, hoping she might have.

  "No. Now would you hurry up before I lose my nerve."

  The first stinging slap hurt his hand. The force vibrated through her body and he felt it, almost as if he'd hit himself. Warming to the task, he slapped the other cheek, enjoying the sound as much as the sensation.

  Another slap on each cheek and his hand began to ache. He could only imagine what Tamsen must have been feeling. Circling the warmed mounds of flesh with his fingers, he couldn't resist dipping a finger down lower, just to see if she was as turned on as he was.

  "Nice," Tamsen moaned. "You have no idea how good you're making me feel."

  His finger hit her slickness and his cock immediately responded by throbbing. "I have an idea. You're soaking."

  Deciding a second round was in order, he rained stinging slaps on her backside until he could barely feel the force of each. She moaned every time he slapped her, gripping his ankle with her hands. The harder and faster he slapped, the tighter she gripped. Fingernails dug into his skin, yet he couldn't - didn't want to - stop. Her backside reminded him of a pre-dawn sky, bright pink with small slivers of purple bruising forming.

  "God, Matt! Enough! Please stop." Her protests brought him out of his frenzy. He was panting, small beads of perspiration gathering on his upper lip. His hand seriously ached now.

  Tamsen struggled to lift herself up off his knee. He still had a raging hard-on. She clambered up into his lap, her face flushed, enough to set off another stream of longing and desire in him.

  "I so want to fuck you." No use denying the last few minutes turned him on immensely. He was still unsure about that, but not enough to kill the desire to be inside her.

  "Fuck me." Wild eyes and a face streaked with tears were no deterrent. "I want you to come in me."

  Positioning her hips over his hard cock, he lunged inside. Her hot buttocks slammed into his thighs as she tipped her head back, moaning in pure delight.

  The sight of her being gripped by an approaching orgasm was more than he could stand. Driving her down onto himself over and over, he merged with her and the wonder of the moment.

  "Matt, I'm coming. Come with me - please."

  He didn't need asking twice.

  "Danni!"

  Where could she be? It was the second time he'd called for her. Matt scratched the back of his neck; his collar and tie just seemed too damn tight since his return, adding to the claustrophobic feel of the entire office. Undoing his top button and loosening his tie, again he wondered how Gina had managed to hang herself. He couldn't erase the vision of her corpse from the theatre of his mind and it disturbed him more than he was willing to admit.

  "Dan-"

  "Calm down, Matt." Danni strode into the room, looking nearly as flustered as he felt.

  "Where the hell have you been?" He couldn't hide the impatience in his voice.

  "Helping the new receptionist."

  "Well, get someone else to help her."

  "There is no one else, and the feeling around here is that since you were responsible for the last one walking out it gets to be my problem to train the new one." She glared at him.

  "It wasn't my fault."

  "What? That she walked out or that she hung herself?"

  Danni had voiced the question he'd been hiding from for over a week.

  He'd managed to get through the clean-up of the apartment, steadfastly refusing to let Tamsen do it. Bringing in commercial cleaners, though he was certain the goddamn, awful urine smell would never come out of the carpet. Even prepared to have the entire apartment recarpeted if it came to that.

  He'd managed through the funeral. Been the great boyfriend. Held Tamsen's hand while she sobbed. Helped her cope when the circus passing for humanity - aka Gina's friends - wept and wailed. Succeeded in putting that question out of his mind while they lowered the casket into the cool, dark earth. Even managed not to think about an eternity of hell and damnation for someone who’d committed the cardinal sin.

  Now, two days after the funeral, when life should be trickling back to normal, the question had been asked. Only this time he hadn't done the asking.

  "How's Tamsen doing anyway?" Danni asked, a hint of shame haunting her face.

  "Getting by." He was sick of fielding calls about Tamsen. What about how he was doing? His life looked much the way his desk did - drowning in a sea of crap and most of it not even his.

  "Jeff Sinclair wants to come in at two o'clock to go over the franchise agreement he couriered to you yesterday."

  "What agreement?" Matt surveyed the manila folders piled high on his desk and realized he hadn't a clue what terror lurked between their covers. His gaze drifted past Danni and her fervent search through the mass, to the view of the harbor beyond.

  Hundreds of times he'd surveyed the view in his years sitting at this desk, but today it looked different. Inviting. Fresh. Today he saw an ocean vista as if for the first time, through new eyes. His mind wandered to happy memories of the family bach, up at the Island. He'd not thought about going there for years.

  "Here it is." Danni put a garish plastic courier pack in front of him. Obviously she'd received and opened it though he was certain he'd never seen it - or its undoubtedly toxic contents.

  "Haven't looked at it. Tell him what you like, but I'm going home." He stood up and went to the back of his door to collect his suit jacket.

  "Matt, please. You can't keep doing this to me." Danni burst into tears.

  "What is it now?" He'd done nothing but deal with weeping females for days. His mother - crocodile tears, but still tears. Tamsen, tears of grief and anger. And now Danni. He felt all cried out.

  "I don't know how to deal with you anymore. It used to be easy." She collapsed in a little businesslike heap in his chair. Even her emotional outbursts were competent and organized.

  He searched his pants pocket for the perfectly ironed handkerchief he knew would be there. Too many years of an overbearing mother who’d insisted no son of hers would leave the house incorrectly dressed - handkerchiefs being an essential item for the properly groomed man – combined with his own anal inability to let go of the archaic practice.

  He passed the handkerchief to her. "Come on, Danni, I can't have you fall apart on me too. You're my rock."

  "Well - " she snuffled, wiping foundation off her nose and leaving a brown trail across the fresh linen " - if I'm your rock, I'm a crumbly one at the moment."

  "Let’s both get out of here. I'll take you for a coffee downstairs and we can talk."

  She brightened a little. Tears gleamed in her eyes, reminding him of the sun shining off the ocean below. "What about Jeff?"

  "You can ring him when we're done." He gave her a quick hug. "I don't know. You're having a breakdown and still worrying about my clients. What would I do without you?"

  Danni snuffled again into his handkerchief and sent him a half smile. "Survive. You always will, Matt."

  He was beginning to wonder about that.

  The new receptionist eyed Matt suspiciously when he told her he'd be gone for the rest of the day and that Danni would be out for at least an hour.

  He stopped at the aquarium on his way out. "I can only see four fish." He searched thoroughly, making sure none were hiding in the long weed. "What's happened to the rest of them?"

  Danni went pale. "They keep dying."

  "Of what?"

  "I have no idea and we didn't want to bother Tamsen, what with everything she's been through."

  Matt checked the fish again and, sure enough, one of the surviving four had a disconcerting horizontal lean.

  Danni pointed
the tilter out. "That one looks like it's on its last legs too."

  "Well, considering fish don't have legs that's quite a problem, don't you think?" He didn't try to disguise his sarcasm, then immediately felt guilty. Danni looked ready to cry again.

  "I'm the only one who hauls them out of there when they die," she snapped. "It's not in my job description and I don't think it's funny."

  "I'm sorry." He hated himself sometimes. "Come on, let’s get out of here and find some coffee."

  "Shoo!" Marguerite waved a Harrods tea-towel viciously in front of Tamsen, chasing Azriel from his warm sunny spot on the oak dining room table. "It's just disgusting, that flea-ridden animal sitting on the table. I can't imagine what Matthew was thinking when he allowed a feline on the premises. He knows I don't like cats."

  Tamsen leapt to Azriel's defense, as she'd been doing from the moment they walked in the door a week ago. "He's not flea-ridden and I expect Matt thought you'd have pushed off home by now."

  "I'll thank you not to take that attitude with me, young lady."

  "I can take any attitude I like with anyone." Tamsen picked up Azriel, who instantly began purring. "At least I'm a welcome guest."

  "And you're suggesting I'm not?" Marguerite looked appalled. She had a nasty way of sucking in her nostrils when angry, an expression Tamsen had become accustomed to over the last few days.

  "I'm not suggesting anything. Think what you like."

  "What I think, young lady -" Marguerite's eyes narrowed and gave her face an even more pinched look " - is that you are a scheming, gold-digging harlot who is getting in the way of my son's reconciliation with his fiancée."

  "Get over yourself, Mom. If he wants to be with Angie he's more than welcome." Tamsen, feeling on the upper, pressed her point home. "What you don't seem to get - " she moved closer to the older woman, a sense of the young cat dominating the aging queen " - is it's his choice, not yours. The sooner you accept that relationship's as dead as my best friend, the sooner you can go home and leave Matt to live his own life."

  "What you don't understand, young lady, is that I am home." Marguerite let out an almost hysterical laugh, the sound taking Tamsen by surprise. Azzie leapt out of her arms, inflating to full fluff-ball status before his feet hit the polished kauri floor.