The Deep End

by AM Hartnett

  She could feel the live wire of uncertainty running through him and wondered if the experience was the same for him when he introduced his whip, or the egg, or some other sinful device he had squirrelled away. As Taureau had done with her countless times, she gave him the opportunity to say no. Unlike Taureau, who was always sure that she would bite her lip and take whatever he had in store for her without complaint, she wasn’t sure what he’d do. She knew he could refuse and she wouldn’t push him on this.

  He bowed a little and rested his head in the curve of her neck and shoulder. His cheek was still damp and the smell of menthol from the shave gel was so strong she could taste it. He welcomed the tangle of her fingers with his, then slid his hand to the small of her back, turning his possessive touch into an embrace that begged for reassurance.

  ‘I’ll let you,’ he said at last, and his body quivered as he took a breath. He lifted his head and gave her a faint smile. ‘I’ll let you own me for a little while.’

  Grace still wasn’t completely sure of herself as she got down from the vanity and led him into the bedroom. She didn’t know if pushing him down and taking control would really turn either of them on. The electricity pinging through her body didn’t come from anticipating the act, but from the thought of them journeying together into this thrilling, unknown territory.

  At the bed, tradition was broken. Normally Taureau would pull her against him, cock stiff and throbbing against her back while he made his possession known with insistent fingers rubbing over her body. This time they faced one another. For a moment there was only skin on skin, hands and fingers exploring over each other’s body, and then Taureau bowed his head and Grace pulled him closer. Beneath the chest pressed against hers she felt that dominant animal stirring.

  He challenged her, pushed against her so the edge of the platform bed jabbed into her calves, and cupped her ass. He thrust his tongue over hers, and Grace allowed it. She allowed him to put her down on her back and hold her down, to thrust his legs between hers to open her up while he fucked his tongue in and out of her mouth. She surrendered to him just as long as it suited her, until he was like iron and her pussy was slick, and then she turned on him.

  Planting her hands on his shoulders, Grace put every ounce of strength into pushing him off her. His face flashed with surprise as she straddled him, and then settled into a curious resignation as she thrust his hands over his head.

  He kept his position as she reached for the black cord coiled in a spiral on the floor. She sat up and drew it taut between her hands, and watched the last of his apprehension chase hers away.

  A loop around one wrist and then the other. What a thing a knot was. There had always seemed to be magic in it when she watched Taureau’s talented hands bind her, but now that the power was in her hands she saw the beautiful simplicity of it.

  She ran her hands down his huge arms, across the prairie of his chest, and cupped his smooth face. ‘You’re mine now, aren’t you?’

  Taureau shifted his lower body until the thick cockhead butted against her wet flesh and the challenge returned in a twisting smile.

  ‘Have you ever done this before?’

  ‘I tried once.’ She rose up onto her knees and reached between them. ‘It wasn’t an experience I cared to repeat until now.’

  ‘Didn’t it do anything for you?’

  She ignored the question for a moment as she sank over him. Without his hands on her ass or her hips to guide her, Grace found herself giddy and free to take as much as she wanted. She closed her eyes, rocked back and took it all.

  ‘No, it didn’t,’ she admitted, and splayed her hands across his chest to keep her balance as she rocked forward and back. ‘He wanted me to own his ass – literally: he wanted me to peg him. I said I’d think about it and he started to whine and beg. That was the end of my brief sexual career as a Domme.’

  ‘I won’t beg you,’ he said with just a little taunting in his deep voice. ‘And you couldn’t own my ass if you tried.’

  ‘I don’t want to own your ass,’ she countered, and stretched forward until she only had the fat tip plugging her. ‘But, all the same, those are fighting words.’

  As Grace dismounted, Taureau’s cockiness wrinkled into concern. She didn’t venture far. She’d decided once she had him down and she wouldn’t abuse his trust: she’d move only where he could see her, she’d go slowly, and she’d go small.

  She slid open the drawer at the bottom of the wardrobe and collected one of the crops he’d used on her. His conflict was obvious, and she knew why: he couldn’t take pain like she did, yet he didn’t want to admit it, given the marks he had left on her ass with that same crop.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ she assured him as she returned to the bed. ‘I’m not going to hurt you. Open up.’

  ‘I wasn’t worried,’ he said with a relieved grin, and snapped down on the crop.

  There was a brief, hushed pause as they regarded one another. Grace swept her gaze from the rope around his wrists to his feet hanging off the end of the bed, and in her head she quickly made an inventory of playthings at her disposal.

  In the end, there was only one plaything she wanted, and that was the man on the bed.

  As he watched, she delved into the nightstand and drew out the small bottle of lubricant kept there. It was nearly empty, but that didn’t matter when there were three more: errands to the nearest drugstore had become as common as trips to the post office to get those wicked packages that were too large to be left in the community box. She flipped the top and turned the bottle over, and with a small squeeze she drizzled the glossy liquid over his cock.

  ‘You remember that first night I was here?’ she asked as she climbed on him again, this time seating herself on his thighs. She glanced at him and grinned. ‘Oh, that’s right. You can’t talk right now. You do a lot of talking. You never shut up in bed, Jacques. You can get so quiet on me sometimes, but when you’ve got me where you want me you can’t stop.’

  Taureau twitched his wrists inside the figure-eight she had made around them. She recognised the movement: he wasn’t trying to escape, he just needed to move. He lifted his head and looked down to where she had formed a slippery shelter with both hands and fucked the tip through a hot groove she had made.

  ‘You like that?’ she whispered, answering the wet grunt that sputtered around the crop. ‘I always get such a thrill out of giving a handjob, like I’m sixteen again and doing something my grandmother insists nice girls don’t do. Having a cock in my hand makes me feel like a pervert, and I just love it.’

  She worked that slippery shaft harder now. Taureau let loose another sound, not his usual rumble of pleasure, but a tortured moan.

  Grace kept her grip with one hand and slid forward. Holding his gaze, she rubbed two fingers along her slit, smearing the residue of lube into her own juices, then pushed up onto her knees and pressed his shaft against the soft, sticky flesh between her legs.

  He rolled his eyes up until she saw the whites and his legs grew restless beneath her. She moved against him in a rocking motion, as if she were riding him.

  She bent her head to look between her legs and nudged her fat clit with his cockhead. A few years ago she had splurged on a dildo that had a suction cup on the bottom. She’d promptly fixed it to a kitchen chair and for weeks it was her constant plaything, which she’d used with an assortment of vibes before she recognised her addiction and tossed it out.

  Now, with this pliant dildo of flesh and hot blood in her hand, Grace used him as she had used that column of silicone, gliding up and down, sometimes fast and sometimes slow. She got the best of it, she knew, with that hot underbelly rubbing against her clit. Taureau only got the privilege of staying hard, and it made her smile to watch him push his fingers into his palms as he endured it.

  ‘Oh, you could make me come just by staying hard like this,’ she told him, and recognised the desperation flashing in his eyes. How many times had he put that look on her own face? Dozens, wit
h his threats to withhold her orgasm if she bucked him too much for his liking, or just because he felt like it and knew the longer he made her wait the harder she’d come.

  That look made up her mind. She pressed down with both hands and held his cock against her as she shunted up and down. The throbbing flesh was better than anything a battery could power, and her climax began almost immediately. As all that heat and friction combined, Grace lost sight of her plot to keep Taureau suspended in her pleasure as long as it suited her. If she’d taken him into that raging red room with her and he’d erupted over her hand and pussy, it would still have been worth it.

  In spite of his bonds and the sweet torture she was inflicting on him, Taureau offered her his support. He bent his knees and gave her a seat on his thighs. Lifting her head to look at him through the curtain of hair over her eyes, she saw a damp, flushed face, flaring nostrils and a chest that rose and fell as if he couldn’t draw a full breath. He still clutched the crop between his teeth, reminding her of a vicious dog with a bone.

  She opened her mouth to speak, but quickly restrained the taunt she had planned. She had nothing to say to him, and the time for speaking had passed. She had triumphed. Though tinged with crimson frustration, his surrender was plain. Still he squirmed, but he was hers.

  And so she pressed her hands upon his chest, tilted her hips and took the ultimate possession of him.

  Her orgasm had watered down the cocktail of want and need in her bloodstream. She was still greedy for more, but she could wait. She would prolong his release as long as she liked, and it was tempting to do so, just to watch what she did to him.

  No matter what she did to him, whether it was a rough ride or she simply leaned over him and fucked the first few inches in and out of her pussy, Taureau strained in his bonds. Every muscle in his upper body seemed to shudder in rebellion, and she knew she couldn’t control his climax for much longer. Regardless of his intention to let her drive, he began to push his feet against the mattress. With the force of every thrust came the shifting of power, until she found herself straining forward to free him.

  As soon as he shook the black ropes free, Grace became the toy, the thing to fuck. He tossed the crop aside and clamped down on her waist. He held her upright as he fucked up with what felt like all the force in his body. She held onto his thick forearms and took it – what else could she do? – and found out just how far she’d taken them both with her body. Those fierce thrusts brought about an instant eruption. As his dick twitched and he shot against her, Grace rebelled against his hold on her and lurched forward, suspended as a second and much more powerful orgasm pounded her.

  After a moment of being suspended over him, Grace moved just enough to let his soft cock slip from her. Face down, draped over his chest, she watched him through sleepy eyes and saw him fighting the same battle against exhaustion.

  Defeated blue eyes met hers. He slung one arm across her back, trapping her with his dead weight, and threw the other over his head. The rope had left a ring on his wrist, and its presence reminded her of the crop, prompting her to lift her head to search of it.

  She found it wedged against him, and placed it before her across his chest.

  Taureau shook with a hoarse laugh, then stroked a trail of shivers up her back with his fingers. ‘You should put it out of sight. I might be tempted to use it on you later.’

  ‘I’m still a little sore,’ she said with a shake of her head.

  ‘Which is exactly why you should hide it.’ He rested his head back against the pillow and closed his eyes. Grace followed suit, grateful for the thump-thump-thump of his heart to lull her.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Dawn in Mont Carmel was so beautiful that Grace admonished herself for having never dragged herself out of bed to experience it. The clouds were tinged with cold in the violet sky, tempering the stars until they were faint points of light.

  Of course, waking up at midday with Taureau’s warm body curled around hers was good enough reason to stay in bed, and she would have loved to repeat that daily ritual.

  His low grating snore should have been the rhythm to put her back to sleep when she first woke, but when she opened her eyes that morning it was because he jostled her while getting out of bed.

  It had happened overnight. The change had come like fog creeping in. The change in atmosphere, and the sense that something was happening, brought her out of sleep. Suddenly cold, Grace had burrowed deeper under the covers and sought his warmth, but found his back to her and his body stiff. He wasn’t asleep. He was coiled tight, back taut but shuddering every few moments, in time with quiet sniffling sounds.

  Unsure what to do, Grace had just stayed where she was, trapped in helplessness. She didn’t know what had happened. After they’d made love they’d spent the rest of the day puttering around the house and yard together. There had been no tension, and Taureau’s mood had been as light as hers.

  Now there was this agony in the bed they shared. While she’d slept, he’d cracked open. The blackness had poured out and surrounded him. Grace didn’t know if he’d been caught unawares or had let it in. Either way, now that the mistrust had been chased away this toxic thing had crept in.

  She’d slipped into sleep for a little while when her body couldn’t take the exhaustion any longer. The sun came up and Taureau got out of bed. Whatever demon he had battled silently through the night had won. She knew when he went into the closet to dress that he wasn’t coming back, and when he left her alone she got out of bed.

  By the time she had dressed and pushed her feet into her flats, she had heard him leave the house. She listened but didn’t hear the grind of the motorbike. He had shut himself away again.

  The sense of wrongness filled the house. The acidic feeling in her stomach grew as she unloaded the cafetière from the dishwasher. Unsure her stomach could take her usual strong cup, she made tea instead, then stepped outside.

  And she sent a text to Reeve to return. She hoped it would be another false alarm, but she knew in her blood that she would be leaving Mont Carmel that day.

  His eyes were on her from behind the curtains of the gable window. She felt his gaze, and stared up for minutes at a time, waiting for him to take the invitation to join her, to lope from his electronic fortress with his hands dug into his pockets and slide into the Adirondack next to hers.

  Not long after the stars vanished into the morning blue, Simon appeared, shambling through the door in jeans and a T-shirt with an unlit cigarette hanging from his mouth. She suspected he’d sprung out of bed with her message and just got into his car.

  He tossed his smokes onto the small table and reached for her teacup.

  ‘It’s cold.’

  He grunted and drank it down in two gulps, then leaned over the back of the other chair and lit up.

  After a moment of listening to him snuffle away the sleep, Grace reached out and took the cigarette from his fingers. ‘Thanks for coming.’

  ‘No problem.’ He scrubbed his face with both hands, then rested his chin in them to watch her puff on the rest of his smoke. ‘Has he gone for a ride?’

  ‘Nope.’

  She took one last drag, then crushed the butt beneath her foot. ‘I don’t know what happened. Everything seemed fine yesterday after you left, or I thought it was. I guess I don’t know anything. I just know it’s done.’

  She glanced at Reeve. He looked up and squinted in the morning sun. He said nothing, and she growled as she got to her feet.

  ‘Tell me what to do. How do I … what happens next?’

  ‘You go home. You go back to your job. You forget about this place.’

  Grace gaped at him. ‘Go back to my job? Forget about this place? What is wrong with you?’

  ‘There’s nothing else you can do, Grace. You can’t stay here for ever, so the only thing to do is to leave.’ He picked up his cigarette pack, lit another, then leaned back against the house. ‘He wants you to stay. He’s counting on being able to keep you
without having to do anything. He got you here without having to do much of anything. If you leave, he has no choice but to let you go or do something to keep you. If he wants you, he’ll have to face up to the fact that he wants more than his loneliness and solitude.’

  ‘And if he doesn’t?’

  ‘I’m not your shrink, and I’m not his. You won’t know what will happen until you leave him.’

  ‘You sound like a crappy women’s magazine,’ she grumbled and wrapped her arms around herself. It wasn’t the chill in the air, but the comfort that came from being wrapped in something of Taureau’s.

  He took a long draw from his cigarette, then flicked the ashes from the end. ‘I’ll wait for you inside.’

  She watched him stamp the smoke out and turn to head back in. She wanted to freeze time so that he stood mid-stride and she could take all the time in the world to mull over every aspect of leaving and staying, but, once he had gently closed the door behind him, Grace’s stomach lurched.

  What was the worst that could happen if she just refused to leave? Would he have Reeve pick her up and carry her out of the house? Or would he just shake his head and let her stay?

  She knew what would happen if she didn’t leave with Reeve. One day she’d call him again. It would be an endless cycle until she finally did leave.

  She loved Taureau. She didn’t understand it and didn’t trust herself with it. How could she love someone when he’d only given her the pieces of himself he didn’t hide? How could she love someone so guarded? He shunned the chaos of being alive and took solace in being alone even when she was there with him.

  Grace knew she could love a broken man, but she couldn’t continue loving someone so content to stay broken.

  As she headed towards the guesthouse, she prayed that he wouldn’t let her do it.

  Just as she suspected, Taureau was leaning next to the window. He didn’t even try to pretend he hadn’t been watching her. He just waited and gazed as she came up the stairs. She stopped, hand on the banister, waiting to see if he’d say anything, and when he didn’t she took a seat and hugged herself to be rid of the disappointment.