A Down and Dirty Christmas: Spend Christmas on the Naughty List

by Valente, Lili

  Dakota’s forehead furrows. “That’s normal, Garrett. I know how scary it is to feel that way, but it is, I swear. After Bo died, I used to dream about finding the man who put that bomb on the side of the road, and all the things I would do to make him pay for taking my brother away from me.”

  “But you didn’t actually go looking for him,” I say, wishing I could skip to the end of this, but knowing she needs—and deserves—the whole story. “You had the sense to keep your revenge fantasies in your head where they belong.”

  “Oh, honey…” She rubs her hand back and forth between my shoulder blades, but her touch offers no comfort.

  But that’s as it should be. After the things I’ve done, I don’t deserve comfort.

  “I tracked down Roger’s brother, the one who bailed him out of jail the day before he killed Alyssa,” I confess, getting the words out as quickly as possible. “And I beat the shit out of him.”

  Dakota makes a pained, sympathetic sound I also don’t deserve, so I hurry on. “Then I called in some favors at city hall to get the officer who told Alyssa a restraining order wouldn’t do her any good fired. After that, I went to visit Roger’s mother, the one Alyssa said used to whip him until he was bloody and bruised when he was a kid. I told her she was the reason her son became a jealous, wife-beating, murdering psychopath. I kept at her until she was sobbing, and then I sat there and I watched her fall apart, hoping maybe her tears would fill up the hole inside me.” I shake my head. “But they didn’t.”

  “Of course they didn’t.” Dakota kisses my shoulder. “But you were in terrible pain. You’d lost someone you loved to senseless violence. What you did is understandable, Garrett. And it’s forgivable.”

  I swallow hard. “You know I’m not great with forgiveness.”

  “No, you’re not.” She kisses me again, this time closer to my heart, making my entire body ache with regret.

  She is the same kind, generous person she’s always been, even now, with a man who showed her absolutely no mercy.

  “Things got worse after that,” I say, the lump in my throat growing thicker. “When I ran out of people to punish, I started blaming myself. And drinking. A lot. I reconnected with some old college friends, who also enjoyed drinking a lot, and we spent the summer dividing our drinking between Manhattan and the Hamptons. Until one morning, I woke up with a raging headache, in bed with a woman I couldn’t remember fucking, and realized what a piece of shit I was.” I exhale sharply. “And at that moment, looking into the mirror at that stranger’s house, all I could think about was you.”

  “Because I gave you raging headaches?” She’s obviously trying to lighten the mood, but it’s not time for that yet.

  I turn to her, staring down into her still guarded eyes. “No. Because I’d hurt you the same way I hurt Alyssa. But you were alive. And I realized it wasn’t too late to do something more productive than taking my rage out on my liver. That I could give forgiveness a shot, instead.”

  “So you forgive me?” Her brows lift skeptically.

  “I’m the one who needs forgiving.” I take her hands in mine, a flicker of hope flaring in my chest when she allows me to hold them. “It took four years, losing my sister, and a trip to rock bottom to get my head on straight. But I finally get it. I finally understand that love is more important than my alleged values, or my pride, or the fact that it scared the shit out of me to realize I couldn’t tell when you were lying and when you were telling the truth.”

  “I was always telling the truth, Garrett,” she says, her eyes shining. “I never set out to use you or deceive you, it just…happened.” She winces. “I know that’s the world’s weakest excuse, but it’s the truth. I was so young and so swept up in what was happening with us—with falling in love, and all the new things I was experiencing with you—that I wasn’t thinking clearly, not about anything. If I had been, I would have bowed out of writing the story a long time before I finally made that call to my editor. I promise you that. I swear it on Bo’s memory.”

  “It doesn’t matter.” I run my hand gently over her head and down to thread through her sleep-tangled curls. Touching her again after so long feels like a miracle, one I’m hoping will stick around after I drop my last bombshell.

  “It does,” she insists. “It matters to me.”

  “I’ve had a lot of time to think lately, Kitten. And I’ve come to realize what they say about forgiveness is true. It can’t change the past, but it can open up the future.” I tighten my grip in her hair. “That’s what I’m interested in. I want the future with you, not the past.”

  Her eyes widen before closing tight, shutting me out again. “Jesus, Garrett. You have no idea what you’re saying.”

  “I do,” I insist. “And I know it’s a lot to ask after so many years apart. But being here with you tonight, it doesn’t feel like years. It feels like picking up where we left off, before all the mistakes.”

  She shakes her head slightly, keeping her eyes closed. “But it’s not. I can’t forget, Garrett. I can forgive—I already have, I think—but I can’t forget. I just can’t, no matter how much I might want to.”

  “I’m not asking you to forget.” I bend closer, bringing my face level with hers, willing her to look at me and see the things I see, all the reasons we owe it to ourselves to try again. “I’m just asking you to give me another chance. I’m not the man I was before. I know how to listen. And I know good rules can bend without breaking and the rest of the rules were shit rules to begin with.”

  Her lips press together, forming a discouraging seam at the center of her pretty face, but I push on anyway.

  “And I know that I am never going to love anyone the way I loved you. The way I still love you.”

  She looks up at me, eyes wide. “You realize you’re scaring the shit out of me, don’t you? Do you know how hard it is to even think about letting you in again, after how much it—” She breaks off with a shake of her head. “It hurt so much, Garrett. So fucking much. Losing you felt like dying.”

  “I’m so sorry.” I kiss her forehead and speak my next words against her skin. “I would do anything to go back and do things differently. But I can’t. But it’s not too late, baby. We can break through again, together. I know we can if you’ll just give me the chance.”

  Chapter Eight

  Dakota

  I still know him so well.

  And right now, I know exactly what he has in mind.

  He’s thinking of the way it used to be, and how the game was the only way into those secret, private places where I wanted him so desperately but couldn’t find the controls to open up to him on my own.

  But I’m not sure I want him that close. I hurt for him, and I yearn for him, yes, but I don’t trust him. Not like that. I don’t trust anyone that much anymore, and I haven’t for years, not since he slammed the door to his heart in my face.

  My throat works as he kisses my forehead again. “I don’t know if I can,” I whisper.

  “You can, baby. I know you can. And if you can’t, you always have your safe word. You remember it.”

  “Avocado,” I say, with a nervous laugh. “Still the least sexy word I can think of.”

  “Not when you say it.” He pulls back, his gaze drifting across my face to fix on my mouth. “You could make a grocery list sound sexy. I’ve missed your voice, the way it gets rough around the edges when you’re begging me to let you come.”

  I close my eyes. “Garrett, I—”

  “So why don’t you get on your knees, Kitten.” He kisses my cheek, then my other cheek, and then my lips, slow and deep, until my entire body is humming at his frequency. “Let me prove I’ve still got what it takes to top you.”

  I squeeze my eyes shut tighter, breath coming faster, even as the high-pitched voice in my head warns—Don’t do it. He almost killed you the first time.

  And maybe the voice is right.

  Maybe I won’t live through Garrett again, but I’m tired of living without him
. Safety is a prison, a place where Love, Trust, and Passion have all been locked away in separate cells to rot, and I’m sick of it.

  Fuck safety. I’m breaking out with the only man who has ever made me feel completely free—even when he had me tied to his headboard.

  “I’m only promising tonight,” I say as if that will make a difference. But the words, and Garrett’s nod to indicate he understands my condition, are enough to silence the last wheezing protest from the Voice of Doom.

  And that’s all I need to make it okay to sink to my knees at Garrett’s feet, sitting back on my heels and folding my hands in my lap the way I always used to do at the start of the game.

  He places a hand gently on my head, his voice hushed as he asks, “Are you ready to play, Kitten?”

  “Yes, Sir.” My lids flutter closed again.

  “And how do you want me to push you, beautiful?”

  “Hard, Sir,” I murmur. “I want you to push me hard.”

  Chapter Nine

  Garrett

  I smooth my hand over the top of Dakota’s silky soft hair, heart punching at my ribs, every bit as nervous as that first time on Martha’s Vineyard.

  Back then, I was anxious because it was my first scene, my first chance to prove I had what it takes to top a woman, to pleasure her with pain and satisfy her with deprivation. At nineteen, I was terrified of embarrassing myself, of losing control in one of the many ways teenage boys are known to lose control. The fear of coming too soon had been so strong I could taste it, rusty and sour on my tongue, every time I brought my leather whip down on my lover’s ass.

  But now, the stakes are so much higher, and embarrassing myself is the least of my worries.

  After over a decade as a Dominant, I know that there are far worse things than an ill-timed orgasm. The physical stuff is the least important part of this game. It’s trust, communication, and mental stamina that matter most, and I’m not sure how well any of those things are faring at the moment.

  I’m not sure I can trust Dakota to let me know what she needs—or what she doesn’t—and I don’t know if I’m capable of maintaining the mental distance I need to set boundaries for two people. Yes, I want to give her the push she needs to open up to me again, but I don’t want to hurt her in the process.

  Hurting her again is the very last thing I want to do.

  “I need your help, beautiful.” I slip my fingers beneath the delicate bone of her chin, tipping her face up until her hooded eyes meet mine. “I need you to keep your safe word close and use it as soon as you feel the least bit uncomfortable. It’s been a while for us, and I want to be sure you stay safe.”

  “I’ll be safe.” She lifts her hand, wrapping her fingers lightly around my wrist. “You’ve never hurt me. Not like this, anyway. I trust you, Garrett, or I wouldn’t be down here.”

  My throat works as I silently pray her faith in me—in us, when we’re together like this—isn’t misplaced. “Good. Then take off your shirt, Kitten. When I get back, I want you naked, on your back, with your knees bent and your legs spread for me.”

  “Yes, Sir,” she says, the honorific sending a rush of adrenaline dumping into my bloodstream.

  As I start toward the bedroom to fetch supplies from my dresser drawer, she pulls my undershirt over her head, moving instantly to obey, the way she has since the beginning. She’s a natural submissive, as effortlessly obedient in bed as she is proud and uncompromising out of it.

  When Dakota and I first got together, Tennyson swore it would never work. He couldn’t believe that the feisty, smart-mouthed woman he’d met at the party of a mutual friend was capable of giving up control as completely as a Dom/sub relationship requires. He didn’t seem to understand that women contain multitudes inside of them, that they are ten different people on any given day—mother, daughter, sister, lover, warrior, healer, friend—and that Dakota is even more vast than most.

  She is strength and submission, fire and rain, a conqueror and a supplicant all wrapped into a fascinating, one-of-a-kind woman who destroys me every time she kneels at my feet.

  I know this time will be no different. I just hope we can knock down a few of the walls standing between us before we exhaust each other again.

  I return with my flogger and a velvet bag full of clamps to find Dakota in position, and something primal inside of me growls in approval. To see her bare and vulnerable, willingly defenseless against anything I choose to do to her, sends blood rushing between my legs until I’m as hard as the steel clamps I spill into my palm as I tip the bag upside down.

  “When was the last time you played with these?” I kneel beside her, laying the clamps on her stomach, where her pulse flutters beneath her navel, that faint jerk and tremble the only sign that she’s anything but calm and ready to submit.

  But the pounding of her heart assures me my instincts are right. We should start slow. Slow, but firm, because my girl doesn’t like it gentle. Gentle is what scares her the most.

  “With you, Sir.” Her tongue traces the curve of her top lip as she exhales. “I’ve only ever done any of this with you.”

  The confession makes my already pulsing cock throb and my heart ache. Anger at the self-righteous fool I was four years ago rushes through me, followed quickly by a renewed determination to make this better.

  “That makes me happy.” I trace the outer edge of her nipple with my fingers—first one and then the other—until both are puckered and hard, straining up from the soft swells of her breasts. “But it makes me sad, too.”

  “Why’s that?” Her breath catches as I pinch her left nipple tight between finger and thumb, giving her a taste of what’s to come.

  “I hate to think of you going without something you need.” I pluck a clamp from her belly and bring it to her taut flesh, tightening the screw until I’ve captured one pink tip between the felt pads. “I wish I could go back and change the past, but I can only do my best moving into the future.”

  “That’s all any of us can do,” she whispers as I clamp her other nipple, spinning this one tighter than the first.

  “Does that mean you’re considering a future with me, beautiful?” I spin the dial on the first clamp again, until she sucks in a breath and her shoulders tense.

  “I don’t know, Sir.” She arches her back, forehead wrinkling as she pushes her clamped nipples into the air. “All I can think about right now is what you’re going to do with the rest of those clamps.”

  “I’m going to do things you won’t expect, of course,” I say, lips curving as she bites down hard on her bottom lip. “I don’t want to bore you.”

  She shakes her head slowly. “No danger of that. I never know what you’re going to do next.”

  “Good.” I lean in, kissing her forehead as I gather the clamps still on her stomach. “Then let’s keep it that way. On your hands and knees, Kitten. I have plans for your ass.”

  She rolls onto her side, moaning softly as she shifts her arms.

  “Are these too tight?” I reach beneath her, catching one clamp between my fingers, pulse spiking as she moans again in response.

  “No, Sir.” She tilts her hips, lifting her ass into the air, making it impossible to look anywhere but between her legs, where her hot little pussy is already wet for me again. “They’re just right.”

  “Perfect.” I gently flick each clamp before skimming my palm up her thigh to the place where the curve of her bottom begins. “But I think you can take more, don’t you?”

  “Yes, Sir.” She grunts softly as I smack her ass, using enough force to leave a faint red handprint behind on her pale skin. “Oh, yes, Sir.”

  “Yes?” I smack her again, harder this time, dick twitching as she cries out in response.

  “Oh, yes, Sir. Please, Sir…”

  “Don’t worry; I’m going to spank you, Kitten,” I promise as I pinch the fleshiest part of her back side between my fingers. “I’m going to make your ass burn, but first, we’re going to see how many of these you can
take. Are you ready?”

  She nods, and her shoulders inch closer to her ears once more.

  “Try to relax,” I murmur as I affix the first clamp and start on the second, moving in a curve from her outer cheek toward the more vulnerable place between her legs. “The more tense you are, the more extreme these are going to feel.”

  “Is that a promise?” she asks, making me smile.

  “It is.” I spin the dial on the third and fourth clamps tighter. “It absolutely is. And you know I keep my promises.”

  Her next breath catches in her throat as I slide a finger down the center of her sex, pressing lightly against her clit.

  “And what about this beauty?” I tease the already firm nub, making it swell beneath my touch. “Is she ready to slip into something a little less comfortable?”

  Dakota arches her back, granting me easier access to her clit. I pinch the bud in approval, loving the way she gasps as I spin the final clamp into place.

  “Oh my God.” Her thighs begin to tremble. “Oh my God, Sir.”

  “Too much?” I tap the clamp with my finger, summoning a pained, pleasured groan from low in Dakota’s throat that makes it imperative I get out of my pants as swiftly as possible. Even loungewear is becoming too restrictive at this point.

  “I need an answer.” I push the pajama pants down and step out of them, allowing my swollen cock to bob free.

  I’m already so hard that the head of my dick is more purple than red, but I’m not anywhere close to finding relief. There will be no relief for either of us until I push Dakota as hard as she asked to be pushed.

  “No, Sir.” A hiss escapes from between her teeth as I cup both of her ass cheeks in my hands, lifting and squeezing in soft, slow movements I know will send fresh lightning bolts of pain zinging up her spine. “Oh God, Sir, I feel so heavy.”