Hard Time

by McKenna, Cara

  I wasn’t going to give him anything—not a request, not a plea, not an order. Nothing more than my grasping hands on his arms and back, irrefutable proof that I wanted this. But as for what shape this would take? He was in charge of that.

  He was always taking me where I wanted to go. In this bed. In his truck, to the lake on that moonlit night, or to the airport, wherever I asked. I didn’t want a chauffeur tonight. I wanted a kidnapper. Needed him to grab me and take me where he ached to be, and show me he trusted that I could take it. I needed him selfish. But that meant I couldn’t tell him so.

  His body was like I’d never felt it. Hard all over, from his thighs through his belly, to his shoulders, all down his locked arms—like I’d seen it from my office window at Cousins, those times I’d secretly watched him. The groans warming my skin were nearing a crescendo, and I could finally hear what I wanted from him. That same frustration I felt.

  A rasp of teeth at my jaw, then a growl. “Where are they?”

  I nearly came from that alone.

  “The drawer,” I said, and waved a hand toward my bedside table.

  He leaned way over and when the reading lamp came on, I studied the muscles that moved along his side, beneath his ribs. Watched him breathe. The rustle of cardboard and a rip of plastic brought my attention to his hands.

  He sat back on his heels, wrapped condom between his lips. He shoved his jeans to the tops of his thighs, thumbs dragging his shorts down with them. His arousal stood between us, a welcome threat. I could see his heartbeat there in tiny tics as he got the wrapper opened. Under my palms, through the denim, his thighs were hot and hard as rocks baking in the sun.

  I watched this man sheath himself. He’d never looked stronger, or bigger, or more dangerous, and I’d never wanted him so badly . . . Yet I could never have been with him like this, those first few times. He’d earned it with all that deference and care. And I’d earned it by giving him the chance to make me trust him.

  He rolled the condom flush to his base and gripped himself there. “You want me all pissed off, don’t you?”

  My lips parted, but no reply came.

  “Fine,” he spat, and moved to the side, freeing my legs. “Turn over.”

  I did, settling on my hands and knees, heart thumping hard with excitement, nerves, everything.

  He was against me in a breath—cock and hand between my thighs, the other palm on my butt. The penetration couldn’t have been rough if he’d wanted it to be; I was too wet.

  He drove in deep and smooth, all the way, moaning as his hips met my ass. I felt both hands at my waist, trembling faintly, then all at once, he found his self-control. He planted his knees a bit wider, the fronts of his thighs brushing the backs of mine. One broad palm slid to my shoulder. It curled tight, holding me in a way that brought fire to my cheeks and an ache to my sex.

  His thrusts began. Slow and mean, punctuated by a rough little thump each time our bodies met. A thump, and a grunt. I was silent, so focused on how he felt. His jeans slipped lower, bunching against the backs of my legs. I could’ve killed for a view of that—of impatience personified, of his gorgeous bare ass, denim pooled around his strong thighs.

  It didn’t feel impersonal this way, not as I might have guessed. As intimate as if we were staring into one another’s eyes. I missed his voice, though.

  Until it cut through the darkness and straight into my core.

  “This what you need tonight?” he asked, words stilted by the impact.

  “Why’s it always about what I need?”

  “Because that’s what gets me off, Annie. Being what you need.” One hand slid around my hip, dipping low, fingertips tickling my mound then finding my clit.

  I sucked a raw breath, head dropping from the shock of it. “I need . . .”

  “Yeah?” Those lethal fingers moved in tight, cruel circles.

  I swore, lost in the pleasure.

  “Tell me. Tell me what you need.”

  “I need to . . .” I wasn’t even sure how to put it into words. He slowed behind me then stopped, and his fingers became nothing more than a warm weight against my clit. The other hand was tender, stroking me from my ribs to my thigh, calming the frustration building inside me. As always, just what I needed.

  He let me go, sliding out slowly. “Turn over.”

  I did. And that was what I needed, really. An order. A sense that I was his, not the other way around.

  I lay back as he got his jeans kicked away, then he brought us together on our sides, his sheathed cock hot against my belly. Only that part of him felt impatient, the rest of him perfectly placid. He stroked my hair and touched the tip of his nose to mine.

  “I don’t feel right about this,” he murmured, “with us angry.”

  “I do. I want you that way.”

  “Why?”

  “I . . . Because I want to know what you feel like when you’re not just . . . catering to me. I want to know how you feel when you’re selfish.”

  He brushed his lips over mine. “You afraid of what you might find?”

  I shook my head against the pillow, more certain about that answer than anything else we’d discussed this evening. “No. I’m not.”

  “You get to see that, sometimes, me being selfish. After I’ve gotten you off.”

  “But never before.”

  “That’s just how it works,” he whispered. “Ladies first.”

  “Says who?”

  He blinked. “Manners.”

  I sighed, head sinking deep into the pillow.

  He traced my ear. “What, baby?”

  “Fuck, I don’t even know.”

  “You want to see me angry?”

  “Yeah.”

  “To prove what? That I’ll never hurt you, the way he did?”

  “No. I already know that.”

  “To prove I won’t hurt you, the way I hurt that piece of shit back home?”

  “No, of course not. Just show me something . . . something more than just how . . . How fucking good you are.”

  What the hell was wrong with me, needing proof of an ex-con’s flaws? Or maybe that was the disconnect. Maybe this fight had driven home for me exactly how vast the divide was between this man and the one who’d committed that crime. Or maybe . . .

  Or maybe, I wanted proof that this man could do something just for himself. He doled out pleasure for me, vengeance for his family. Maybe I wanted another taste of the man who’d come on to me in Cousins, surrounded by guards and cameras and prying eyes. Who’d wanted something badly enough to put us both at risk to get at it.

  “Please,” I said softly. “Let me see you angry.” So much for driving him to selfishness. This was still all about me getting what I asked for.

  “I’ll give you what you want,” Eric said softly. “But I won’t pretend I understand it.”

  “I don’t understand it, myself. But yeah. Give me that.” Give me what I feared you maybe wanted from me, way back when we met; feared even as if thrilled me. “Be greedy. Use me.”

  “I won’t hurt you.”

  “I’m not asking you to. Just do what you want—what you’d do if you just needed to get off.”

  Sounding resigned, he took a deep breath.

  I touched his hair, slipping a curl behind his ear. “It’s what I want, okay?”

  He kissed me in response. First a soft flirtation of lips, then deeper. Far deeper. I felt my body being turned, the cool covers finding my back, but our mouths stayed sealed together. Between us he was touching himself, rousing his cock or checking the condom. His breath flared as he shoved a leg between mine, then the other. He let my mouth go to sit back on his heels. For a long moment he stared down at me, his body looming even curled in on itself, hands resting on his thighs, chin dipped. I quashed an urge to ask if he was upset.

  H
is hands slid to my knees and he raised his head, taking me in. My sex first, then upward, along my belly and breasts to my face. I let him study whatever it was he was after, trying to pinpoint the look in his eyes. Not hunger . . . not that primal. Some sort of fascination, as though he were searching for something.

  “I only know one way to make this all about me,” he said.

  “Okay.”

  He left the bed, stripping the condom as he strode to my dresser. The vanity mirror pivoted on its stand, and Eric tilted it down. Beyond his shoulder I saw myself, sitting on the bed.

  He climbed onto the end of the mattress, kneeling in profile to the watching mirror, and gripped his cock, stroking softly. Those dark eyes caught mine, and he nodded to the covers before him.

  With the condom gone, I could guess what he needed. I came to him, sitting on my hip. Brought my face close. He smelled of latex faintly, and far more potently of sex. From so near, I could make out the way his hand trembled, wrapped around his shaft. He gave himself a long, slow stroke.

  “This used to be my favorite thing,” he murmured, eyes moving over my face. “When I was younger. Before I cared so much about what a woman wants. Before I got put away and realized how much I’d missed out on, thinking sex was all about getting my own needs met. Back when I didn’t know shit.”

  “I want it to be all about you, tonight.” Like that letter he’d written, the one where he’d told me what he’d imagined for his birthday.

  “Suck me, then.”

  The shiver that roused was so deep, it shut my eyes. I opened them, finding him still stroking, still waiting. Ready—a droplet glinting at his crown. I braced myself on my forearm, reaching for him with my other hand. His own hand moved, circling in a lazy frame at the root, presenting his cock. I felt a warm weight on my head, fingers in my hair. Things I’d fantasized about—things I’d felt with him before, even, yet it took my breath away. A new act entirely.

  “Taste me.”

  I did. Brought his head to my lips and lapped him, the flavor pungent from the rubber and lube. It faded with the next pass and the next, until it was Eric, only Eric.

  “More.”

  I gave it. I took him between my lips, welcomed the first couple of inches only to be given a measure more, courtesy of his hips. Not enough to gag me, but plenty to catch me off guard. Yet I’d asked for this. For my catering lover to get pushy. So whatever was in store for me, I welcomed it.

  The hand on my head was restless, fingertips rubbing my scalp, palm urging me to take more. Just as I got into the rhythm he was setting, the next correction came.

  “Harder.”

  The word had my throat tightening, but I obeyed, rewarded by a harsh gasp from above. I stole a peek, but didn’t find his eyes on me—not directly. On the mirror. At the pornography we were making together . . . or that I was making for him.

  “Suck me harder.”

  I don’t know why that excited me, but it did. I’d needed this man’s gentleness for so long, in order to trust him. Now that the trust was implicit as a natural law, I wanted the opposite. To explore a man’s cruder desires, maybe. To explore the rougher aspects of maleness that I’d been so scared of, for so long. Maybe somewhere along the way, I’d turned terror into taboo. Whatever the reason, feeling a man’s bossy hand on my head and sensing his stare refracted off that mirror . . . I could have been getting head myself, for all the fire I felt between my legs.

  “Yeah,” he muttered, fingers tightening around my hair. “Suck me.” His hips began to make demands, thrusting faintly. I could feel the change in him, like clouds drawn over the sun. Felt him shift from excited to crass in a near instant.

  I worked to find the best position, to take what he was feeding me, to keep the suction up, keep my teeth covered, keep from gagging. The hand making a ring at his base dipped lower, three fingers seeming to press along his balls.

  What did he see in that mirror? His younger self, getting serviced by some anonymous girl? Or was the muscle and the ink too much to edit out?

  Maybe he saw us as we were. Maybe he saw through the gruffness of it—saw himself giving me what I’d asked for. Was that what he wanted right now, despite the role he’d adopted? To please me?

  “Deeper,” he breathed.

  Deeper now meant as deep as he could go. Beyond the point where I was giving pleasure, beyond the point where I could act as anything more than a vessel. I hadn’t done this in ages—let a man in my throat. I couldn’t say I’d ever done it especially willingly. I’d had it sprung on me, and I’d submitted, thinking maybe this was simply what oral was. I’d never made a craft of it. I’d endured it only, feeling ugly—my face sometimes left beet red from the gagging, snot making it difficult to breathe.

  For Eric, I’d do more than endure. I’d invite him there, not merely suffer the intrusion. But that required some honesty. I drew back, against the urging of the hand on my head, and he slipped free.

  “I’m not good at this,” I told him, finding his eyes on my face from miles above. “At going deep. But I want to be, for you. So just go slow at first.”

  A single nod, though his lips parted and closed and he swallowed. He was holding back words. Reassurances, probably, or an offer to rescind the request. They never came. Instead he said only, “Get on the floor.”

  I did so on shaky, half-asleep legs, then he tossed me a pillow for my knees and came around the side of the bed.

  “I do anything you can’t handle,” he said, “you just pull away. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “We’ll just try, real slow.” He reached for the mirror, tilting it way down, framing whatever he saw from so high above me. “You see if you can find a good angle. If you do, then maybe I’ll speed up. But anytime it gets to be too much, you give me any sign at all and I’ll stop.”

  “I know you will.”

  “Good.” He stroked my hair lovingly, then the hand I’d put on his hip. “Now suck me.”

  I took him in my mouth once more, so much easier on my knees.

  “Nice and hard. Good . . . Goddamn, I think you like that, sometimes.”

  I told him with my mouth, I fucking love it.

  “Yeah. Fuck. Do it like you want, baby. Get comfortable, then I’ll show you another way.”

  For a minute or more I took him for myself, using my lips and tongue and hand, showing him my hunger. Slowly, so slowly, he joined in with his thrusts, stealing the reins. As he fed me more, I grew passive. Eventually both his hands were on my head, cradling, then holding me still.

  “You’re doing so good,” he moaned. “You’re perfect.”

  It wasn’t easy. It wasn’t pleasurable, not physically. But there was something about it, something about the surrender and the submission, the servitude, that turned me on. Something about feeling used by him . . . feeling dirty, little more than a stranger.

  His hips sped. I gagged, but only softly. No stinging in my sinuses or tears ducts like I’d felt with other guys, no burn in my cheeks. No suffocation. Only the dark, thrilling size of him, filling me in such a threatening way. His smooth head, stroking the back of my throat. His eyes on me, surely.

  “I’m getting real close, sweetheart. Relax for me.”

  I tried. I didn’t quite succeed. As his head bumped my palate, I closed up. He eased out, giving me a few seconds to get loose. He drew my attention off the discomfort, running his slick crown back and forth along my lower lip.

  “Again,” he warned, and pushed back inside.

  Better this time. Gentle fingertips tilted my chin up, and the angle was smoother. I welcomed him all the way in before my throat constricted, and again he eased back. The palms stroking my hair felt nearly patronizing, but I craved it, same as the dirty feeling.

  “Again.” He eased back in, all the way. In place of the gagging response, I felt only him. The scary si
ze and threat of him, in such a vulnerable place in my body. Also his length, his girth between my lips. The scent of his skin and sweat. The sound of his tight breathing from so high up.

  He drew back, then gave me more of the same. Slow. “Good girl.”

  His kind, stroking hands transformed, fingers tangling in my hair again. Not rough, but not sweet, either. His hips grew restless, a little faster with each thrust, grace ebbing. I gagged. We paused. He gave me more, and I took it.

  “Close your lips up tight, if you can.” He sounded so excited, and I wanted to please him so bad, it ached. I did as he said, embracing how ugly my breaths sounded, wheezing in and out of my nose. He’d never felt so big, or so crass, or so dangerous. No man ever had, during sex.

  And I hoped no other man ever would again, no one except Eric.

  “You look good,” he told me. I could tell from the angle of his voice, he was watching in the mirror. I tried to picture us that way. Wondered if I didn’t need my imagination. I opened my eyes and sought the reflection. It was tilted for his pleasure, so he could watch my mouth on his cock, and what I saw was his face. His neck taut, features strained, his eyes black in the low light. I saw them widen, caught by mine.

  “God,” he muttered, his thrusts stuttering a moment. My gaze was affecting him, surely as anything my mouth was giving.

  I grabbed his hips, digging in with my nails, and he responded, giving me more of his cock. He was losing it now—I saw it in his narrowed eyes and his parted lips.

  In his letter, he’d admitted how he’d wanted to come in my mouth. To let me taste it. I waited for that now, anticipating it, craving it. Expecting it.

  His entire body shook. “Fuck, Annie. I’m gonna come.”

  Good. Do it. With an almighty groan he pulled back—pulled out. Air flooded my mouth and throat, and I watched with surprise as he fisted himself, stroking hard and fast just below his head. Hand jerking, he gasped, cupped my shoulder in his free palm, and let go. His release was long and hot, basting my collarbone and the tops of my breasts.