by Lesley Young
Of course, I had not helped his mood either.
“So where are we staying in Ayers Rock?” I said just as he hung up, generating excitement around the notion he was on vacation, and therefore, perhaps, truly free of all potential risk. I rubbed his hand, allowing the sensation to permeate my being.
His eyes flashed at me, then he smiled, evidently relieved, and told me about the plans he had made for us, animation spreading across his beautifully handsome face.
• • •
Most people don’t realize how big Australia is: it took us three and half hours to fly from Sydney to Ayers Rock—a total distance of 1,345 miles.
Jace had booked a resort called Longitude 131°—exclusively. After learning that, I was immediately tossed into a stew pot of remarkable ego-boosting feelings.
This was about me. He had done this for me.
That became crystal clear as we drove toward the majestic, unusual geological formation in a line of four-wheel-drive vehicles, red desert dust plumes ballooning behind us. Jace pointed to a lonely, narrow line of fifteen white-tented buildings set in the gateway to the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park. He told me this was the closest accommodation to the park.
I glanced at him, not quite believing. He was watching me, wanting me to be pleased, wanting to see my amazement. I gave him my best alien impersonation. He shot me a broad grin.
When we closed in, it became clear the fifteen tents were actually square one-bedroom buildings, with tent-like wooden roofs covered in white tarps, elevated atop the rust-red dunes. We would be sleeping in the desert without actually camping (a great relief; camping was clearly for our ancestors and a necessity I am certain they did not relish). We would watch the sun set and rise on the mysterious rock formation from a large, crisp white bed through floor-to-ceiling windows.
The resort website I had looked up on the plane boasted that it offered unheralded peace. I believed it to be true. As we stepped out of the vehicles and were greeted by five members of staff—the manager, the chef, two housekeepers and concierge—I felt an unusual sensation bathe my being along with the heat of the sun-baked earth.
When I mentioned this to Jace, alone in our air-conditioned “tent,” he agreed with me.
“I can feel a solitude I have never experienced before,” I added, standing on the wood plank floor in front of the screen, having opened up the great windows to listen to the sound of the desert. And I withdrew inside. “It is indescribable,” I heard myself whisper.
Because Longitude 131° was located on the non-tourist side of the rock, we were truly away from most of humanity.
Silence. My favorite sound.
This was my new favorite place.
Jace stood behind me, arms wrapped around my waist. “It feels . . . sacred,” he murmured.
“Yes,” I agreed, straining to make eye contact with him. “That’s it.”
He squeezed me tighter and kissed the side of my neck.
I knew—glancing back out at the open, wide expanse of red-dust land, dotted with a scattering of short green sprays of shrubs—that there were no cameras on us, that there were no threats surrounding us. We were truly alone. We were truly safe. And I realized how I had never really felt safe before. Not like this. Not even when I fell deep into his eyes.
I turned around, quickly, inhaling his scent, running my hands over his body, up on his shoulders, his chest, down his arms, heaving for air.
His arms loosened around me, sliding down. He was giving over—perhaps sensing in that moment that I needed him to, badly.
Yes. It was my turn to express a feeling to him.
When I glanced up and took in his serious, knowing face, watched him lick his full lips, my mind started buzzing with static, my vagina clenched and my chest expanded with a deep, dire burn.
Yes. I needed him to understand, to experience the flames of the fervor, the angry, ardent zeal to consume his body, to own him, to hurt him even, to squeeze him, pinch him . . . my eyes flitted over his face, his arms, his chest. I needed to . . . what? What had come over me? I was ablaze with lascivious fury.
I wanted to fuck him.
I wanted to possess him.
Yes. That is it!
I pushed him back, hard.
His brow knitted, but anticipation lifted his mouth, and in the upturned corners was a challenge. Yes, he wanted me to try.
I backed him up toward the bed, pausing to yank off my top, leaving my sheer white bra on. When he hit the edge, I wasted no time, rabidly shoving up his top, reaching, and he helped me lift it over his head, staring at me the whole time with . . . excitement. Yes.
I dropped to my knees before him. He made a soft noise, not a gasp, but a heavy, raspy breath.
I rubbed my face against his jeans longingly, where his penis was growing erect, and his hands cupped my head softly.
I bit his cock lightly through his pants. He made another breathy moaning sound. Yes.
I wanted to make him weak, weak with need, weak with pleasure, and I wanted him to suffer . . . from the weakness . . . because pleasure was not real without the burn—the burn of desire I was feeling.
“Charlie,” he uttered, a hitch in his voice. Oh, he was weak already and it fed my own wet, aching burn. My hands were gripping his hard butt, and I ran them up and down his thighs, rubbing my face side to side on his lustful instrument, bringing my hands up, undoing his jeans, raising my eyes up to his.
Reverence rained down on me, fueling my certainty.
My cock. He was mine.
I pulled his pants and underwear down quickly, freeing his penis, which fell down like a tree. The scent—woodsy, fleshy—made my clitoris clench up tight. I slipped my finger into my pants, under my thong, and rubbed my budding nerve plexus, briefly, to appease it, and I sucked in air, moaning, releasing my clenched jaw. More. I needed more.
He leaned over to remove his boots and take off his pants. I closed my eyes from the relief of the pleasure spreading out inside from my fleshy bud, which I rubbed light and fast, but . . . I opened my eyes again, quickly, not liking not seeing him. I might go crazy from the sexual frenzy smoldering inside. Yes. To have him. I stopped rubbing myself only to finish removing my pants, frantic, on the floor, getting back to my knees as he stood back up.
I ran my hands up his strong calves, taking in a breath to gain back control of myself, admiring his knees, his bulging thighs, loving the sensation of hair under my fingertips. Man hair.
“Charlie,” he said again, and I glanced up.
His head was tilted sideways, and there was a look of pain on his face.
Oh. I was teasing him.
I let my gaze fall on his cock. And I stared at its bulging veins, smooth skin, folds . . . the vulnerability . . . the mystery . . . the power.
My power.
“Charlie,” he hissed, his hand spread over the top of my head, tremulous with a need to control.
But I would not let him.
I leaned in and licked the side of his shaft and he groaned. It did not taste like anything. It was warm and hard and smooth under my tongue. I licked the other side, and the front, and grasped it with one hand. He was breathing out raspy sounds of approval. I lifted up its weight, and licked his left testicle. I wanted to put the whole apparatus in my mouth, all of it, somehow, in some way. And I mewled at the impossible prospect.
“Oh God,” he exclaimed, making strained gasping noises.
His cock in my fist felt so thick, so strong, so needy, and I pointed it at my mouth. I kissed the tip, and tasted a salty liquid. Semen had come out the top! I did not know that could happen before ejaculation.
“Charlie! What the fuck,” he hissed, his fingertips digging into my head, and I thought he might force my head the way he wanted it, but . . . he did not.
I slipped the tip of his penis in my mouth and worked my lips softly as though it were ice cream and I was getting it all over my mouth. He groaned with relief and desperate need, spreading his feet wider.<
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I glanced up to see he had thrown his head back, then he brought it back down and locked his eyes with mine.
“Yeah, look at me,” he choked out. “Keep lookin’ at me.”
I opened my mouth and took his cock in deep, staring up at him. When it hit the back of my throat, I pulled away, drawing a string of saliva in my wake.
“Yes, again,” he said, gently holding my head.
I slid it back in, and, holding the base, my lips taut, I sucked it, pulling my head back, and I realized how much work I had cut out for me. He put his hand over mine at the base of his shaft and fisted it in time with my mouth, showing me. I sucked and slid it in and out of my mouth, over and over, moving my hand with the rhythm, my neck and mouth straining from the effort, making sounds of uncontrolled delicious pleasure, humming onto flesh. I had never felt so empowered, so delighted with debauched repletion.
He growled out, both hands on my head now. Stronger, harder, he pressed me onto his thrusting hips, choked me with his sudden unleashed need, which seemed to make him even greedier.
I yanked my mouth away, eyes running, rising up, seeing instantly his confusion, his need, unfulfilled.
I stood up and pushed his chest—hard.
I needed to balance the scales once again, my burn searing inside of me.
He frowned, and I found myself mocking his frowning face, like he does to me, and, after a flash of anger, he smiled, perhaps understanding, and sat down on the bed. Together we crawled back up it, me on top of the length of his body. I straddled him, and shifted my thong aside.
Gently, slowly, both of us watching, I rubbed my slick body along his hard shaft, rocking back and forth, back and forth, the promise of the length, the girth that awaited, combining with the pressure on my clitoris . . . I gasped and glanced into his eyes and shook my head in disbelief. Disbelieving the high I was experiencing.
He laughed then, knowingly, pleased, hungry, reaching up and tugging my bra down enough to free my breasts. He pinched my nipples in his fingers, and I felt, then, how strong I had to be to truly possess him. How maybe, maybe I never would properly. Maybe he would always be stronger that way.
“Fuck me,” he ordered. I glanced into his . . . desperate eyes.
“Fuck me,” he said again.
In my blindness, a shadow appeared.
“Condom,” I uttered.
Bending his knees to gain leverage, he grabbed my hips, and pulled me down on his head momentarily.
“We need a condom!”
“I’m clean, Charlie. I swear to God.”
“But it’s not safe,” I gasped, as he played with my clitoris. He already knew that—we had talked about the fact he wanted me to go on birth control before he left for Vegas.
His eyes glittered madness, and a force of something I had never felt before hit me like a wave. “I don’t care,” he uttered. He steered my hips on him again, his fingers deep in my soft flesh. Panic abated my burn. I pressed against his arms and tried to lift myself away from him.
“Jace, no,” I said. We froze in a moment of competing force, me pulling away, him holding me in place.
For a moment, I felt him demanding of me, silently. His will. I was . . . confused.
He pursed his lips, groaned, shoved me to the side, hard, stood up and went over to his suitcase. He came back to the bed with a condom in his hand, and kissed my mouth hard, lying us both back down, side by side.
He must have lost his mind for a moment. I wanted to restore the balance. Go back to where we were.
So I forced my body onto his, straddling him again.
“I like being on top,” I ground out, between kisses.
“Oh ya do, do ya,” he muttered, allowing me the control. I heard him rip open the condom, and felt his arms wrestle down below between my legs with the task. I tasted his mouth, feeling the faintest hint of stubble, licking his front teeth, swallowing his saliva, breathing his breath. I wanted to hold him down so hard, forever, and take his breath away.
“All set,” he murmured, his hand back to holding my head close to his.
“Now fuck me, ay,” he ordered, kissing me. He wouldn’t release me so I could find my way to his head, instead saying, “Here,” and raising his hips, pressing the head of his shaft into my folds, steering it with his hand.
I shifted my hips down, closing my eyes to feel, my hands on his chest for balance. Gently pressing down, enveloping the top, his hand on my neck, his mouth on mine, I moaned. I filled up my sensitive flesh, slowly stretching it, giving myself exactly what I needed, so badly—sitting all the way down on his cock. I moaned louder. He choked out, “That’s it.” Releasing my neck, his hands grasped my butt cheeks and ground me down on him. I could not breathe right. His penis reached all the way inside me, hitting some point that made me flinch with intense pressure.
Barely able to move, I gently shifted my hips around on top of him, experiencing, exploring, the pangs in my pelvis making me shut my eyes tight, and he moaned, “Yes.”
He pulled my knees up, gesturing with wild eyes for me to plant my feet flat on either side. I did that, and, squatting on him, I lifted myself up. He squeezed his eyes tight with pleasure and opened them.
Pure greed.
“Fuck me.”
And I did. I slid myself up and down on his penis using every muscle in my body to build toward the pleasure I wanted, I needed, deep below. But I could not just take from him or keep my eyes closed. I needed to see his pleasure.
A smile ripped across his face and he was staring at me like he could not believe I was real, watching my breasts shake, my face tense from pleasure and strain . . . His dazed obsession with me made me burn hotter, and I shifted harder and faster, needing more, more, more . . . but it was not enough.
My leg muscles burned with fatigue and cramp, and I whimpered out after all the intense labor, falling down full on him for just a moment—just until the muscle burn went away, I told myself—wet with sweat and my own juices. He pushed my feet back out and pulled me forward, so my breasts hung in his face, and he sucked one briefly. He bent his own knees, dug his heels in and drove into me with full force and speed, the likes of which I could never achieve—what I needed so badly.
Our skin slapped together, marking each moist, fleshy penetration, louder, quicker, harder, the ecstasy mounting.
“Yes,” I told him. He was nourishing my burn, and I shook all over from the sexual pleasure.
Oh! Not yet! I fought to stretch out the feeling. His hand clasped my neck, and I found his eyes, watching me, and he knew, he knew I was trying to take more, and his eyes willed me to, but that alone—
I came as I looked in his eyes, and I knew he was coming too, that he had been waiting for me.
He was the North Star in my night sky of bright white lights just then. They were shining down everywhere, and sprinkling all over us, as I yanked up and arched in a muscle spasm, letting it in all over, feeling it, holding onto it as tight as possible, and then unable to stand it any longer, shuddered, tingling, slumping forward, limp.
Delirious, making soft noises, I slowly shifted my hips on his cock, yet still, eyes half closed, feeling more powerful than I ever felt in my life, stretching out every last second of the . . . otherworldly grace floating away from us . . .
Between the panting, it struck me that we could not get closer to such a beautiful thing more often without being physically intimate—I should like to have it at my disposal whenever I wished.
The thought flitted away along with the last of the electrifying sensations.
I was exhausted.
Lying on top of Jace.
Jace Knight. I did not know him solely by name. He was so much more complex than that.
He did this to me.
I did this to him.
I leaned up and smiled.
“Don’t get used to it. I prefer being on top,” he said, exhaling raggedly. I could feel his heart pounding through his chest and into mine. My face was tu
cked into his neck, my legs still straddling him.
“You will have to share,” I said, kissing his mouth. He glowered, but it was not sincere, patted my butt cheek, lightly, and I eased off of him. He curled up right away and swung around, stood up and headed to the bathroom. When he returned he slid in beside me again, smiled at me, and I was reassured. We lay side by side, staring up at the ceiling. I felt my own wetness, but before I could get up, he said, “Stay for a bit, ay? I want to stare at you.”
I was glad to get lost in his caves, too.
“I love how you don’t hold anything back from me,” he said after a few minutes, rubbing my arm. “I try to do the same for you, you know.”
I wondered what he meant.
“You don’t keep anything from me,” I said quietly, realizing that that may not be true. “Not when we make love,” I added.
“What do you mean by that?” He clouded up.
I sat up.
I’d done it again. Why was I poking him, trying to hurt him? “I need to clean up.”
He followed me into the washroom. “What did you mean by that?”
I stood in front of the sink; he filled the doorway. “Jace. I want to clean up.”
“So wash yourself, what do I care. I want to know what you meant.”
My heart was slipping, and the terrible sense I had of wanting to stay and wanting to run pressed in around me.
I took off my thong and wiped myself with a wash cloth. My cheeks burned. He watched me with a strange look in his eyes, as though he was bracing for the worst. When I was done, I faced him and held his stare.
I pulled at the courage I needed.
“I need to ask you a question that is likely to create a negative emotion in you.”
He waited, not giving me any reassurance, crossing his arms over his chest. We stood a few feet apart, naked. I had never felt conscious of my body before and I was not then, but I did feel vulnerable, emotionally, yes, that was it, and maybe as a result, I wished to cover myself. I grabbed the white robe hanging on the door and tried to get some air into my lungs. I could not allow myself to ignore the latest accusations leveled against Jace by Sullivan. I needed to fight my lust, my affection so that I could focus on my safety. I needed to be clear on Jace’s choices, not to judge, but so I could make my own.