He blinks in surprise. His hard expression seems to soften. “Is that what you want?”
“Yes, Sir, please.” I turn around and bend over, spreading my legs wide.
Please let him buy it. Please let him buy it, I whisper silently.
My prayers are answered in the form of a sharp slap across my bottom. Pain has never felt so sweet.
“How could I deny such a request?” Liam says. There’s a merciful hint of humor in his voice—he thinks this is all a game.
Oh, if only he knew.
He grabs my arms and roughly pulls me upwards. He pushes me back toward the end of the hall, toward the open door of his sex room. My legs stumble forward obediently, willingly.
Here we go.
When we are back inside the room, Liam grabs the hem of my dress and flings it upward. He tugs it over my shoulder blades and then tosses it to the floor, stripping me naked once more.
“Get onto the bench. On your hands and knees,” he says, nodding toward the black leather bench in the corner of the room. The sides of the bench are studded with metal rings. I’m not sure what they’re for, but I imagine that I’ll find out in a moment.
I walk over to the bench. When I crawl on top, I discover that the leather is soft and plush. Liam follows me a moment later, grasping a set of leather cuffs, similar to the ones he used to tie me to that wooden X only a week ago.
He secures my wrists first. Each cuff has a large metal clasp, like a lobster claw, which he fastens to nearby loops on the bench. He moves to my ankles next, spreading them out wide.
I wait there with shallow breath as he steps away, returning a moment later with a final piece: a leather collar, with a single metal clasp hanging from the center.
“Raise your head,” he instructs. I oblige.
The collar wraps around my neck snugly. It’s surprisingly soft. Liam pulls the clasp downward, bringing my head down to the edge of the bench. He snaps the clasp around the loop, locking me into place. Finishing the pose.
And now—I wait.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Liam turn to the wall, where an array of whips and paddles and other thrilling objects are mounted in an elaborate display.
“So many choices…” he murmurs.
I hear the click of something being removed from the wall. I try to twist my neck to see what it is, but the collar holds fast.
A hard object slides across my rear, caressing the left cheek. It’s broad and flat—the paddle, I’m guessing.
“I haven’t punished you yet. Not like this. I had planned on easing into it, but you have a tendency to make it so difficult for me to follow through with my plans,” he says, slowly tracing the curve of my bottom with the paddle’s edge. “And I have to admit—I’ve been very curious to see how you’d react.”
His tone is laced with anticipation. My curiosity is piqued; I want to ask him why he’s so excited about this, what’s so appealing in strapping me down and using the paddle on me.
But in this room, as the submissive, I don’t get to ask those questions. Not now.
“Now, since this the first time, we’re only going to go to ten. You can count to yourself if you want, but only silently. I don’t want to hear a sound from you.”
And then he begins.
One. I feel the hard slap of the paddle across my bottom. This kind of pain feels different from the strike of his hand. The impact is wider, larger. I can feel it radiate across my skin.
Two. The pain deepens. But before I have a moment to recover—
Three. Four. The paddle comes down hard again. The heat of the impact is spreading down my thighs, up my spine—
Five. Six. Liam’s free hand finds my waist, holding me in place as I begin to squirm.
Seven. I can feel my bottom turning red and raw, or at least I think I can. Each strike of the paddle seems a little more acute than the last.
Eight. I bite my lip to prevent from groaning.
Nine. His palm slides up the curve of my back, fingers reaching into the wild mane of my hair. He pulls at the roots, just enough to make my head tingle. From top to bottom, my skin is buzzing.
Ten. That’s it. It’s done. I dig my chin into the corner of the ottoman, my chest heaving. I hear the click of the paddle being returned to its place on the wall. Seconds later, Liam’s hands begin to stroke my rear, caressing the skin.
His fingers slip downward, in between my cheeks, down to my sex. After the paddling, every inch of my skin feels ultra-sensitive, and as he begins to rub back and forth gently against my clit, I feel a rush of pleasure course through me. My mind is light, awash in endorphins.
Ah. Now I understand why people enjoy this.
It’s unlike anything I’ve ever felt. I let out a low, long moan. As Liam continues expertly working his fingers against my clit, the feelings of ecstasy intensify, until finally an orgasm rolls through me in a body-racking shudder.
He reaches around me to unclasp my restraints, one by one. Now freed, I sit up shakily.
“You’re drenched in sweat,” he tells me. “Come on, let’s get you washed up.”
He takes my arm, gently helping me off the bench and across the room. I hesitate when we reach the doorway, glancing down at my naked body.
“No one’s home,” he says. “Don’t worry.”
I nod. We walk down the length of the hallway and into Liam’s bedroom. The room is tastefully decorated, but spartan: a bed, a wooden-framed mirror, a dresser, and not much else. But what catches my eye is the beautiful painting above the bed, colored in soulful blue hues. I lean forward, wishing I could take a closer look.
But we’re only passing through. He walks past the dresser and pushes open a second door, which leads us into the master bathroom. Liam walks over to the pedestal bathtub and turns on the faucet.
While I wait for it to fill, I cast a few glances around the room. It is elegant and modern, with clean white tiles and textured grass cloth walls. An elegant pendant lamp hangs from the ceiling. It feels more like a spa than someone’s personal bathroom.
“I could just take a shower, if you want,” I say, pointing toward the glass-paneled shower behind us. “It would probably be faster.”
He shakes his head.
“A bath is better for sore muscles. And trust me, you’re going to have those,” he says. “Here, it’s ready.” He offers a hand to help me step over the lip of the tub.
I take his hand cautiously, curiously. I still don’t know what to make of him. One minute, he’s feral, rippling with power and pure sexuality. Mesmerizing me. Consuming me.
And the next moment, there’s a gentleness in his touch. A softness in his blue eyes.
He seems to swing back and forth between the two, fierceness and sweetness, like a pendulum. And I’m still scrambling to find the rhythm of the motion.
I slide into the water. It’s the perfect temperature: warm enough to feel soothing, but not hot enough to scald me. I sink downward until only my head and shoulders are above the surface.
Liam withdraws something plastic and wrinkled from the cabinet in the corner of the room. He finds the nozzle and blows into it; after a few puffs, I see what it is—a plastic bath pillow.
Not the kind of thing I’d expect a man like Liam would own.
“Thanks,” I say as he tucks the pillow behind my shoulders. I glance up at him appraisingly. “You’ve done this before, haven’t you? This kind of relationship, I mean.”
“Once,” he says. “But it’s been a while.”
“Was it your idea?”
“No. It was hers, actually.”
I use my palms to scoop the water over my shoulders. It feels soothing as it trickles down the back of my neck.
“Why did you do it?” I ask softly.
He pauses. “With her?”
“With this kind of relationship. With being a dominant. What drew you to it?”
The corner of his mouth flicks with amusement. “I always figured I was a cliché, actually.
Business executive working an eighty-hour week, up to his ears in contracts and correspondence, needing to find a way to reclaim some control. You know, blow off a little steam.”
I gaze up at him. I’m not sure I believe him—not entirely, anyway. His eyes are too dark, too haunted, to belong to someone who’s just “blowing off steam.”
There’s more to it than that. I could feel it in the urgency of his hands on my skin, in the force of his body against mine.
It’s a need.
“All of this is a result of contracts and correspondence? That’s what pushes you over the edge?” I say, cautiously attempting to push against the walls that he’s built so carefully around himself. “But you’re the boss. You could make someone else deal with all that stuff if you wanted. You’re already in control.”
A muscle in his jaw twitches.
“Am I?”
I lean forward; the pillow slips into the water behind me. I can feel the plastic seam brushing against my back. I ask him, “What do you mean?”
His pale eyes meet mine. “Let’s put it this way: when your whole life has been mapped out for you since birth, there’s not a lot of satisfaction to be found. You might be the one giving orders, but they were never your orders to begin with. You still have someone to answer to. You always have someone to answer to.”
The beginnings of a sardonic smile plays at my lips. More than most people, I know what it’s like to unsuccessfully resist your own fate. Why do I get the feeling that, in another life, under different terms, Liam and I might actually get along?
Of course, my fate was sealed much later than his. It was the trial that irrevocably twisted the course of my life. Sometimes, when I’m having a bad day, it’s tempting to blame my parents for somehow getting tangled into this mess in the first place. Or to blame the judge for being so quick to punish them, for stealing away the only childhood I’d ever had. Or—
“Your parents?” I breathe out.
His eyes narrow. “You ask a lot of questions.”
My heart skips a beat in my chest. Quickly, I say, “I just want to get to know you, that’s all.”
The stubble on his jaw catches in the light when he smiles at me. He walks over to the wooden chair beside the bathtub, which holds a stack of fluffy, folded white towels. He removes the towels and takes a seat.
“I want to get to know you too, Sophia,” he says. “I hardly know anything about you, except that you’re beautiful, and you’re witty. And that you’re more fearless than anyone I’ve ever met. And you won’t be in town for very long because of your family.”
My eyebrows shoot into the air. I can feel my breath catch in my throat. How does he…?
“Who was it that you said you were visiting?” he says. “Your…uncle?”
The breath escapes me in a long, relieved sigh. Right. I had told him this at the country club. I had nearly forgotten.
“And his family,” I lie. “But I can stay in town for as long as I want.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” Liam says. His muscular shoulders shift forward, bristling with energy. “Let’s discuss the contract. I meant to open the evening with that, but I got…” He pauses, a smile playing across his lips as he searches for the word. “…sidetracked. It’s a bad habit.”
He reaches out to run his fingers gently around the curve of my ear, then down my cheek. His thumb grazes my lower lip. There’s a sudden, warm twitch between my legs. Even here in the warm water, I can feel my nipples harden.
“Well,” I say slowly, “there are worse habits to have.”
Liam laughs softly.
“Did you read the contract?”
I nod.
“And what did you think?” he prompts.
“It was…” I pause, attempting to collect my thoughts. “It was a lot to take in. This is new territory for me. But I think I can learn. If you’re willing to teach me.”
“I’m definitely willing. That’s what this is all about,” he says, trailing his hand down my neck. As he traces my collar bone with his fingers, I shiver. He asks, “There was nothing…objectionable…in the contract?”
I shrug, and the water splashes around me. “I don’t think so.”
“See? You’re fearless,” he says approvingly.
He puts a hand on the back of my neck, rubbing his fingers into the stiff muscles. I lean into his touch, closing my eyes as the tension dissipates from my shoulders.
We spend the next few minutes like this, listening to the sound of one another’s breathing, as his fingers continue to press into the heat of my skin.
My mind drifts back to the question about the second account, and to the urgent call he had to make. I shift in the tub uncomfortably. It sounded like he didn’t know who had talked—but I had inadvertently made it clear that someone had. I press my eyes closed more tightly, further retreating into my own dark world, silently praying that I haven’t just done something terrible.
“What’s the matter?” Liam’s voice cuts through my thoughts.
I open my eyes suddenly, blinking back the bright light. Liam’s stubbled, angular face comes into focus. His brow is knitted in confusion.
“It’s nothing,” I say quickly, glancing down at my hands.
“Sophia,” he says, “if this relationship is going to work, you’re going to have to be open with me. About everything. If there’s something I’m doing that you don’t like, and you don’t tell me…”
When I look back up at him, his eyes are a tumbling storm. As I gaze into them, that’s when I see it: the blue, flitting look of vulnerability. It’s like a shadow, lasting no more than a split second. When he blinks, the shadow has vanished, as if it had never been more than a trick of the light.
But I’m not fooled so easily. I know where he’s been.
More than anyone, I know what it’s like to live with that dark fear. That lurking doubt.
I reach for his hand, lacing my wet fingers through his. He shifts in his seat, but doesn’t pull away. I can feel the incredible power of his body in the strength of his hand, in every twitching muscle. It’s electrifying.
“You’re not going to scare me away,” I tell him.
And then, for the first time since that fateful encounter at the country club, his eyes light up.
6
I am flailing. Flying. Adrift in a sky of strange dreams, as people’s faces waft before me like storm clouds: my parents. Miranda. The Hawthornes. Liam.
His eyes are an ocean. I perch at the edge. There are shifts of movement down below, sending trembles across the surface of the water. I can hear the swoosh and splash of the figure in the depths, surging towards me. I take a half-step away, frightened.
A hand bursts upward, breaking through the quaking surface. The fingers are splayed out. They curve inward, clenching, as if hoping to hold onto something but finding nothing there.
I lean back in curiously. The figure is mere feet away from me. I’d only need to outstretch my arm…
My limb unfolds slowly, laboriously. Hand after wrist after elbow, my arm extends. I’m so close—
RIIIIING.
I awake with a jolt. I find myself surrounded by beige walls, and after a hazy second, remember where I am. The hotel room. Right.
I look down. The duvet has been kicked to the edge of the bed. My legs are tangled in the white sheets, which are drenched with sweat. I put a hand on my chest to discover that my heart is thumping.
Was it the sudden ringing that’s got me so worked up? Or was it the dream?
I roll over and grab the phone from the night stand.
“Hello?” I say into it groggily.
“Are you really still sleeping?” Miranda’s voice pipes from the other end of the line. “April, it’s almost noon.”
I glance at the clock. So it is.
“I got home late yesterday. Long night,” I explain.
“Oh, really?” Miranda says knowingly. “I wonder—what could you possibly have been doing, you saucy minx?
”
“Are you ever going to stop calling me that?”
“Not likely,” she replies with a giggle.
I roll to the edge of the bed and attempt to shove away the tangled sheets. Sleepily, I shuffle over to the desk and begin to fix myself a cup of coffee. This hotel’s powdered coffee may be the worst I’ve ever had, but it’s still better than nothing.
“How are things going over…wherever you are these days?” I ask.
“Miami.”
“Right. Miami. How’s your handsome heir? How’s that going?” I mumble, stifling a yawn.
“Badly,” Miranda replies curtly. “Kevin wasn’t as dumb as I thought, unfortunately.”
“Ah,” I say. “I thought you sounded a little more miffed than usual. Glad it’s not something I did.”
“Very funny,” she says. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter. I’ve still got this scheme going, and it’s going to more than make up for damn Kevin.” Her voice turns eager. “So, how was last night? Do you have him wrapped around your little finger yet? Is he going to introduce you to his parents?”
I shake the foil packet of coffee clumsily into the paper filter, attempting to gather my thoughts despite my morning stupor. Last night was…illuminating. There was a sweetness, a sincerity, to Liam that I had never seen before. That I had never thought was possible.
But more unexpectedly—I realized that, in certain ways, he and I are not that different at all.
“No, Miranda, I don’t have him…wrapped around my finger,” I say, grimacing as I say the words. It’s curious—the guilty feeling in my gut, which was no more than a slight annoyance when I first came back to New Orleans, is turning heavier. Harder. Like a rock settling to the bottom of my stomach.
“Well, then you better get moving. Just ask him to take you to Sunday dinner with the family, no need to over-think it,” Miranda urges. “Now that we’ve got our new partners on board, everything is set into motion. I need you to introduce me by the end of the week, at the very latest. If you linger too long, the whole scheme could fall apart.”
“Just ask him,” I echo. “You make it sound so easy. But what if he says no?”
“Listen,” Miranda says impatiently, “you’ve been dating him for—what? A few weeks already? Don’t tell me that he doesn’t have some kind of feelings for you by now. And hey, if he says no, I’m sure you’ll find a way to convince him otherwise.” There’s a teasing lilt to her voice in that last sentence.
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