The Submission Gift

by Solace Ames

  “No, I’m going to go freshen up a little,” she said, fingers tightening around the cold bottle. “I’ll be right back.”

  In the refuge of the bathroom, she washed her face, brushed her hair, emptied the pockets of her bulky cargo pants, and successfully resisted the silly impulse to smell her armpits. This is your home, she told herself.

  And your husband.

  She wondered if they’d been touching each other on the couch. If they’d kissed. On the mouth. Oh, God. Crazy wrong...and so fucking hot her knees buckled. She leaned against the counter and gasped a lungful of air, sobbing without crying, throbbing between her legs while her throat tightened in pain. And it was the wrong kind of pain, the kind that made her feel small instead of setting her free.

  You wanted this. You wanted Paul. Touching what’s yours.

  Jay slipped in and closed the door behind him. “Are you okay, baby? I feel like we’ve got a category five emotion-storm in there. I’m sorry. Maybe I should have asked Paul to leave and come back later for dinner.” He put his hand on her back, lightly stroking.

  “I’ll be all right. I promise. I’m not as good at—at talking about this stuff as you are. I really don’t want him to go.” She was afraid of letting Paul in, and even more afraid of letting him out.

  “Okay, then. I’ll take the lead for a while when it comes to the talking. Let you catch your breath.”

  Relief washed over her and left her feeling clean at last. She nodded to Jay, and he kept on, marvelously calm.

  “When we got back here, we had some lunch and then we held hands and watched a movie. And we talked. I told him about how we got together. You know, our origin story, except it had a fucked-up Sureño wannabe instead of cosmic rays.”

  It was an old joke of his, but it still made her smile. “I’m not even going to think about how that changes anything. I’ll just walk out there with you and drink my soda.” She looked up into her own reflection and Jay’s.

  They were good together.

  She nodded again—to herself—turned away and walked out the door, Jay right beside her.

  And clattered into a chair, and almost dropped the bottle. “Fuck that hurts,” she gasped. “No, Paul, don’t get up, I just stubbed my toe. My fault. My fault for the stupid mood lighting.”

  “I’ll, um, diplomatically turn the light back on,” Jay said.

  Paul laughed, and the sound was so bright and clear and real that last week at The Ankara Café came back to her in full-body memory. How they’d swayed, and smiled, and been with each other beautifully, back and forth to an easy rhythm. She could almost taste the strawberry smoke.

  Jay flicked the lights on. “Maybe Paul could give you a massage. Like a foot massage, if your toe isn’t too traumatized.”

  “That’s a great idea,” Paul said. “You’d be helping me keep in practice, Adriana.” The sound of her name, the way he leisurely rolled the syllables, destroyed her all over again.

  She sat sideways next to him and facing him, keeping her eyes downcast. The textures and surfaces of things pressed against her skin with maddening insistence. The ridged corduroy of the couch, the stiff canvas of her pants, the warm, tight cotton panties squeezing her hipbones.

  “Here we go,” Paul said, circling her ankle and gently pulling her feet onto his lap. She went pliant for him because that was what her body wanted—no, needed—in this moment. His touch sent slow fire through her nerves, so good she wanted it to burn forever. He ran the ball of his thumb along the arch of her sole with brilliant steady pressure.

  “That’s good,” she whispered, and eased back so that she lay flat. “It’s really good, Paul. Thank you.”

  He kept up the strokes that melted her muscles and curled her toes. “This isn’t going to be easy, the three of us. There’s no model, no template, no Valentine’s cards.” He sighed, not sounding sad or world-weary, more...accepting.

  The ceiling was so white it hurt her eyes, so she closed them and soaked in the warmth that rose through her body.

  Jay’s voice drifted in. “Yeah. I get it. The sex was the easy part.”

  “And that has its own complications,” Paul mused, as he switched from her right to left foot, keeping the pressure steady, and the pleasure as well. “A certain relationship between pain and power that we don’t share in the same way.”

  Jay was silent. Like her. Together, floating in silence.

  Paul spoke again, a little deeper and lower this time, as if he already knew they were hanging on every word. “I don’t want to change you. My own tendencies don’t lie in that direction. I’ll conform to you. Frame you.”

  “I don’t really understand that,” Jay said, sounding hesitant.

  “Adriana?” Paul called, and she rose up, opened her eyes and looked into his, and did, somehow, understand.

  “I’m glad you know what you want,” she said quietly.

  “You will, too,” he promised, and then looked toward Jay, who stood stark and glowing in his crisp white shirt against the backdrop of the black, silent television. “Come to the bedroom. I’ll show you.”

  Yes.

  They followed him.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The first time Paul had come to them, Jay had been fighting with himself. Hold back. Let him touch her. She wants this.

  This time, he didn’t have to fight.

  Paul placed the back of his hand under her chin and tilted her head to bare her throat, then without any hurry began unbuttoning her shirt. Every separate motion, a word. And the words formed a message of polite but unmistakable entitlement.

  Jay absorbed the sight, took in the message. He could barely read the signals of his own body, because what was going on in front of him was so goddamn intense. Getting hard while another man unwrapped Adriana like she was his expensive Christmas present wasn’t something he felt ashamed of, but the knowledge he should be ashamed of it floated in the back of his mind. Weird knowledge that he couldn’t quite forget.

  Jay still didn’t understand what Paul wanted from them. But he was willing to learn. Very willing.

  “Not one of Jay’s,” Paul said, stroking the strap of Adriana’s plain gray sports bra. “Take it off for me, please, and the rest of your clothes.”

  She nodded, still keeping her head tilted up toward him at the angle he’d set, her full lips slightly parted, soft and dreamy.

  Paul beckoned to Jay without looking at him.

  Your turn.

  Jay could deliver a smart-ass remark. He could do a lot of things, could even say “Have fun, baby” and walk right out the door, because the money was gone and so were the rules.

  But he went to stand beside her. Beside his own bed with the sky-blue quilt. Looked up, like Adriana, into Paul’s implacable malachite eyes, and felt the thrill of Paul’s hand at his throat.

  “I get off on love,” Paul said through a charming crooked grin. “Among many other things. But love...” He trailed fingers down Jay’s throat to his collar and started unbuttoning. Repeating the ritual. Jay’s heart raced faster at every tiny pop and tug. “It’s like fire. So hot. Calling me to play.” Paul ran his hands over Jay’s naked shoulders, pushed the shirt off, tugged it down. The cuffs were tight enough that it couldn’t fall to the floor, and the effect seemed to please Paul—of course it would, since Jay’s hands were loosely trapped behind his back. Jay didn’t really process what Paul was saying, too distracted by the rustle of Adriana stepping out of her clothes. Nice, deep sounds from Paul’s mouth, something about love.

  Paul leaned forward, looming down on him. The peppermint-cinnamon smell of his breath confused Jay—oh, he’d lent Paul a spare toothbrush after lunch, that was why he smelled like home—Jesus, he’d probably taste familiar too and suddenly Jay was dying for the proof.

  “You’re waiti
ng very well,” Paul said, and touched Jay’s upper lip with his forefinger. More messages, and easier to understand. Hush. Follow my lead. I’m not ready to use your mouth, not yet. “Adriana, I’d like you to take the rest of his clothes off, then stand next to him.”

  Behind Jay, Adriana took away his shirt, unbuttoned his pants and pulled them down along with his boxers, her hands skimming his thighs. Paul’s game was hellishly frustrating, but every intimidating moment had a reward, like this amazing feeling of being surrounded and centered and defenses stripped away all at once.

  Paul took his hand away from Jay’s face and guided them to stand side by side. The silky smooth curve of Adriana’s hip pressed against his, strands of her hair tickling his shoulder. Jay’s left hand found her right. Their fingers twined together.

  Jay wasn’t afraid for her.

  “Yes,” Paul said simply. “This.” And he gripped Jay’s erection with no warning and no message other than mine, the harsh pleasure wringing a broken moan from Jay’s throat.

  A moan that Adriana echoed—Jay looked down to see Paul cupping her sex in his other hand, middle finger sinking into her slit.

  Fuck her. Fuck me. Oh God.

  “Now kiss each other.”

  Yes. Jay had traced Adriana’s lips with his tongue many times, but never with such deliberate, conscious art, making it beautiful for Paul. She was more passive, opening readily for him but too far gone and shivering for much else. Jay pushed, licked deeper, Paul’s aggression flowing through him.

  Their circle tightened. Paul’s fist tightened. Jay bucked his hips against Paul’s thigh because, goddamn it, Paul wasn’t pulling or pumping—he was a sex god, but he obviously wasn’t an ambidextrous sex god. Adriana was getting more action on his better side, and moaning into Jay’s mouth.

  “You’re getting greedy,” Paul whispered in Jay’s ear, and bit at his earlobe, nothing painful, just a light press of teeth.

  Jay broke the kiss and gasped for breath. “Oh yeah? Well you’re—you’re...” a hypocrite. Unfair. Making Adriana come. Wicked handsome. All of those, yes.

  Paul granted him one long, hard pull and then let go, broke the circle, took Adriana in his arms and sat down on the bed with her cradled in his lap. He didn’t make a move to take his clothes off, and Adriana curled naked against him was a fantastically erotic sight. Jay knew she loved this, being made to feel vulnerable, and that made him love it too, in his own way.

  She rubbed the back of her head against Paul’s shoulder. Angled her body with oh-so-conscious seductiveness. Jay watched in a haze as Paul cupped her breasts, not quite touching the proud buds of her nipples, no, fingers splayed around them. Caging them. Framing.

  For Jay.

  “That’s right,” Paul said, as Jay came to the bed. “Show me.” Several fingers on his right hand were shiny under the low light, trailing wetness across the swell of her breast.

  Jay knelt down and kissed her there. He tasted the richness of her skin, licked up the tart tang glazing her breast and covering Paul’s fingers.

  “He’s got a brilliant mouth,” Paul murmured into Adriana’s ear. “Such a good cocksucker. Just like you.”

  Satisfaction flared through Jay like furnace heat. He gripped the edge of the bed, suddenly dizzy. When he found his balance, he pressed Adriana’s nipple between his lips and flicked the stiffened tip of his tongue over it until she whimpered. He knew how much pressure she liked, how sensitive she was—very, she couldn’t even handle nipple clamps—how too much would make her laugh miserably and tremble away, but she was arching into his mouth now, straining against Paul, her creamy pale skin peeking through Paul’s fingers, and crying out in happiness.

  Jay moved his attention to her other breast, circling and sucking and gently probing.

  “Oh, you—oh...”

  “What do you want, Adriana?”

  Jay wondered if she could answer Paul. Jay certainly couldn’t. Yes, he wanted to fuck or feel someone inside him, but that would come in due time, at Paul’s pace, and for now the moment was full and perfect.

  She could barely put words together. “I can’t—yes...”

  Paul moved his hand to stroke the side of Jay’s head. The slight, guiding pressure sent that whole side of Jay’s body tingling, spoke to him lyrically. It wasn’t just do what I want, Jay, no, it was I accept everything you are and everything you want.

  Jay followed the cue and knelt lower, looking up at Adriana’s gorgeous, wet-tipped, trembling breasts. Then down, lower, down to where Paul’s hand had returned to cradle her mound, massaging open her outer lips. Fingers sliding her open. Framing. He understood now.

  He mapped her with his tongue until his mouth was sticky with her juices, reveling in her taste and the sobbing sounds he drew from her. Paul was filling her with his other hand, crooking a finger inside her, sliding it in and out. Jay licked and sucked higher, around her tender hooded pearl, working with Paul to methodically take her apart.

  “Can you hold off for a while, Adriana?” Paul asked. “I wonder if you can.”

  “Nn—”

  “I love hearing you say no. Like our last time together. There’s something—” Paul’s voice finally cracked there, descended into a growl for a moment, “—very final about it.”

  Jay didn’t like to think closely about what they’d done back then, but he was too wrapped up in sending her to heaven with his tongue against her clit to give a damn about this no thing, she was almost there—

  “No,” she moaned. “No, no, no, no, oh God, no—”

  She came, clenched hard around Paul’s fingers, and so lovely wet—I did this. We did this. “Yes,” he whispered against her sweet smooth naked lips.

  Paul’s fingers—they went everywhere, it seemed—traced Jay’s teeth and slipped into his mouth. Jay sucked and curled his tongue around them, loving the sensation, welcoming the penetration. He wanted something thicker—Paul’s big blunt cock pushing into him—but fingers were good, too, and Jesus fucking Christ did Paul know how to use them.

  Someone’s knee pushed against his shoulder and their constellation slid apart—not violently, but the lack of touch woke a fierce urgency in Jay. “Are you really going to keep your clothes on?” he complained as he climbed onto the bed. “Now that’s just unnatural.”

  “Wait,” Paul said, and maybe he meant to say it in that scary-intense, quasi-magical command voice until he ruined it with a laugh at the end. “No, wait.” That last directed to Adriana, who’d gone for his belt buckle.

  “Really?” she asked, and paused there, smiling, the pink tip of her tongue peeking out. “So you don’t want—”

  Jay joined the assault and went for Paul’s shirt buttons.

  “I give up. I completely and totally give up.” Paul fell back and flung his arms to either side in a gloriously hedonistic imitation of Christ on the cross. Jay tried to keep a serious face—too late. “Why are you laughing?” Paul’s voice was innocent and mock-wounded.

  Jay shook his head. “I’m going to hell. Soy hombre pecador. Never mind. It’s a Catholic thing.” Faint metal sounds—the clink of a belt’s tongue, the rasping of a zipper. Adriana, sighing happily. “I’m sorry we jumped the gun on your psychosexual whatever.”

  “That’s all right. I’m ready to fuck, anyway.” Magnanimous as a prince.

  Jay leaned down and kissed his lips, his jaw, his neck, running greedy palms over the muscular expanse of his chest. Every part of me is available to you, Jay remembered. On one level he couldn’t believe this was happening, that a man this ridiculously fucking manly was hung up on him, and on another level it was natural and untroublesome and no one had to prove a damn thing, least of all Jay.

  “Jay can go first,” Adriana said, also magnanimous, also adorable. His heart felt so big right now he could barely breathe.

 
“Suits me.” Paul broke out the voice again, deep and growling and drawing on a power somewhere between menace and promise. Suddenly Jay was on his back against the bed, Paul looming over him. “Remembering the last time I had your ass? Fuck, I can’t wait to get back in you.”

  “Sure,” Jay gasped. “I’m ready. I mean...” He clenched and released as he spoke, his body anticipating the challenge, the invasion.

  “Adriana, could you get him ready for me? I think I’d like to watch that.”

  Her yes sounded like a bell, high and pure.

  Paul moved over slightly and guided Jay’s knees upward, had him hug his knees to his chest. “Are you going to be okay like this?” he asked, in a softer tone.

  Jay closed his eyes. He loved sex so much, over the years he’d pushed through a tangled mess of hang-ups by sheer force of will, but he wasn’t immune to shame, and it was biting at him a little right now. Easier to close his eyes and focus on Paul’s voice. “I’ll be fine. I can’t do hip snapping kinds of motions. But it’s not—this’ll be fine. Probably good for me. Like dancing.”

  Paul didn’t ask him to open his eyes. Just kissed his forehead, stroked the back of his knee and said, “Good.” Every touch sank deep inside him, going beyond nerves—or was that even possible? Jay didn’t know. He fell into a pleasant daze contemplating it.

  “Jay?” Adriana chimed. The sound of her voice soothed him, how it complemented Paul’s baritone. Her hand on his thigh was instantly recognizable. She played her fingers over his skin, swirling in circles, spiraling closer to the seam where he felt as if he was stitched together, her instrument, her beloved doll.

  A cool slickness spread across his cleft now with every finger stroke. “Yes,” Jay said under his breath. “Yes, yes.”

  “You look wonderful,” she said, running her fingertips up and down the achingly sensitive flesh of his hole. His cock lay burning hot against his stomach, and he wanted her cool hand on him there as well.

  “Beautiful,” Paul added, right against his ear, making him shiver. “Inspirational. Jay, do you mind if I call you boy, or girl, or baby?”