by Cara McKenna
“Tight and deep,” he said through a labored breath. He sped up, setting an even pace, hands stroking her ass and thighs as his hips found their rhythm.
She craned her neck to meet his eyes, unreflected. “Flynn.”
“God, I love your cunt. You’re so fuckin’ hot.” One hand left her flank to reach around and tease her pussy and he brought his thumb back to her ass, slick. He slid it inside, rougher than before, the feeling intensified tenfold by the thrust of his cock.
“Oh God.”
“That’s right.” He pushed the digit in deep and kept it there as his cock pounded. “I’d fuck your mouth too, if I could.”
Laurel turned back to the mirror, adrenaline whirling through her body, making her feel crazed and unafraid. She clenched her thumbs tight around the tape and thrashed her hips.
Flynn missed a beat but started right back up, harder than before. “You keep still.”
Laurel moved again, walking a knee forward only to get yanked back.
“I said don’t fucking move,” he warned, cold eyes trained on her face in the mirror.
She let the feelings crash over her, fear and excitement heating her from the inside out, the chemical rush in her brain compounding it all, getting her high. She struggled again, this time trying to break away for real, needing to feel how easy it was for him to stop her. Both his hands shot forward as he leaned over her, grabbed her behind the elbows and folded her arms up beneath her, her shoulders and head coming down, chin landing just above her bound fists with a soft thump against the towel. He pushed down on her back, pinning her as the fucking turned harsh, each impact punctuated by the slap of his damp skin against hers. Laurel turned her head, willing to put up with the uncomfortable position if it meant she could see his face. She saw control in his eyes, cool beside the hot flush of his skin.
“Don’t,” she whispered.
“Shut up.”
She moved the only bit of herself she had power over—her legs.
“Don’t make this hard,” he warned, keeping her in place with his weight.
She gave a desperate thrash and his hands left her back. He shoved her knees together and widened his stance, clamping his thighs beside hers and locking them. She had a second to put up a fight with her bound arms before he pinned them down again.
“Now you’re gonna get it,” he said.
Laurel made a fearful, breathy noise and was rewarded with a few violent thrusts. “Stop,” she panted. “Please.”
“I said shut up.”
“Please, stop.”
“Fine. Gets me hot when you beg, anyway.”
She alternated pleading with helpless noises, the role-playing arousing her more than she’d imagined possible. Flynn felt godlike behind her, insanely strong and powerful. His dick drove deep, over and over, the heat built with every excruciating minute, sweat making their skin slippery, exertion changing his breathing and voice and rhythm.
“God, yeah. I can’t wait to shoot in you, bitch.”
Laurel sensed him getting close. Her own body was as tight as she’d ever been without touching herself. The sensation was maddening but ecstatic and the second he let her go she was going to get a hand free and tease herself over the edge.
She made a couple useless attempts at struggling, too excited by his arousal now to put on a good show. One of Flynn’s hands left her back, his damp palm sliding across her stomach, fingers finding her clit. She bucked and yelped at the contact.
“Yeah, that’s right. I knew you loved it.” He fucked her fast, rubbed her clit and drew all the heat of her body into a pounding, swirling mass against the pads of his fingers.
“God, Flynn.”
“Good. Come for me. Come all over that big dick I’m fucking you with.”
She groaned as the climax rose, the sweet burn tingling up her thighs and bursting open against his fingers, around his cock.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” He pounded her deep and fast as the orgasm tossed her, teased her clit lighter and lighter as her cries died away.
“Good girl.”
To her surprise, he let her go. His thrusts stopped and his hands left her. He stood. “Can you get up?”
Laurel oozed out a delirious breath and rocked back onto her knees, registering the crick in her neck and the blood pooling in her fingers. She opened her hands and the tape fell away. Flynn helped her to her feet and she looked to him for instruction.
“Wanna lie down? On the bed?”
“Sure.” She sat on the mattress and shimmied herself into the center on her back. Flynn climbed on after her and got his knees between hers.
“Feel okay? Not too roughed up for me to finish?”
“Oh,” she said, “you better fucking finish.”
His brows rose. “Guess that’s a yes.”
“I want to see you come,” she said, all the urgent desire from before her climax bubbling right back up.
Flynn angled his cock between her thighs and she watched as he drove inside, slow, filling her.
“God, you’re big.”
“That what you like?” he asked, starting to fuck.
“I guess I do.” She reached down to circle her thumb and finger around him, squeezing to feel how stiff and thick he was. “And you’re so hard.”
“You can have this big, hard cock anytime you want,” he promised, hips hammering fast. “Say my name.”
She did. She said it again and again as he drove himself to the edge. She took in the strong arms locked at her side, his slick chest, his face as he lost control.
“Fuck, yeah.” He yanked himself out, leaning back to strip off the condom and jerk himself home with a rough fist. He came hard with a strangled noise, come lashing her belly in warm ribbons until the aggression waned, fading like a plume of smoke.
“Fuck.” He composed himself a moment, panting, then left the bed to grab the towel so he could wipe Laurel’s skin. He tossed it aside and collapsed onto his back next to her.
She listened to his racing breaths. “Wow.”
Flynn laughed, the sound turning into a brief coughing fit. He cleared his throat. “Yeah,” he said. “Wow.” He folded his arms under his head and Laurel did the same and they both stared up at the vents.
At length, she turned to study his face. “So I did okay for my inaugural night?”
He returned the scrutiny. “Yeah, that was fantastic. You liked it then?”
She nodded.
“Good. I hope you’ll give me a call sometime.”
Laurel decided she rather liked Flynn’s unambiguous style of flirting. “And what you said before—it’s still okay if I crash here? My legs feel like their bones fell out.”
“Sure. Just be prepared to get up real early. I can run you back home before I start work.”
“You can just dump me at the nearest T stop.”
“You live ten minutes’ drive from my site, dummy. I’m not making you take the subway. Damn thing’s always derailing and catching fire anyhow.”
“Fine then.” She yawned deeply. It was probably only nine but she felt as if she’d been up all night. “I don’t suppose I could borrow a T-shirt to sleep in?”
“Course. Just gimme a minute to recover.”
She studied his face. “You know, you’re really a very nice man.”
He laughed. “That orgasm must have fucked you up in the head.”
Laurel smiled. She was mindful to obey his non-cuddling rule but inched her top half over a little so their shoulders touched. She felt sleep drawing its cloudy veil over her brain. “Thanks.”
“What for?”
“The fucking,” she said through a yawn.
“You’re welcome.”
She closed her eyes and breathed him in, the musky smell of their sex and the subtler ones of his apartment and sheets. “I’m definitely going to call you,” she murmured.
“Good. I hope you do.”
“Definitely,” she said again, dreamy. She felt Flynn leave the bed, h
eard a drawer scrape open, then cool cotton flopped over her arm and breast.
“I’m gonna take a shower,” he said. “Looks like you’ll be out cold when I get back.”
“I wouldn’t put it past me.”
He wandered off and Laurel heard the fan kick on in the bathroom. She managed to fumble into the shirt and under his covers. His sheets smelled of him, and Christ it was heavenly. She had just enough clarity leftover to think of something that intimidated her more than anything else Flynn had offered tonight.
I like him.
She liked him enough that knowing he could be with another woman tomorrow would sting if she let it.
But right now, he was hers. Until he dropped her at her door the next morning, she was the only one who got him. She smiled into one of his threadbare pillowcases and let the smug comfort of the thought carry her into sleep.
Tonight he was hers. Tomorrow could go fuck itself.
6
“Hey. Sub shop girl.”
Laurel opened her eyes to find Flynn standing beside the bed, dressed.
“Rise and shine, kiddo.”
“What time is it?”
“Five-ten,” he said. “You got time for a quick shower if you need one.”
“Can I use that time to sleep?”
“Sure.”
Flynn wandered away and Laurel buried her head deeper in the pillow, but she didn’t sleep. Her pulse spiked as she registered what they’d done last night. Then it slowed as she realized there didn’t seem to be any reason to panic.
After a minute she tossed the covers aside and sat on the edge of his bed, looking around Flynn’s apartment. It was dark, just the light above the stove switched on. The city beyond the windows looked purple and sleepy, sunrise hidden by a hundred tall buildings to the east.
Flynn was on the couch, lacing his boots. Laurel padded to the coffee table to grab her purse. She caught Flynn’s eyes dart to her breasts in the tee she’d borrowed then a glance at where its hem brushed her upper thigh. She smirked at him.
He smiled and went back to his laces and Laurel closed herself in the bathroom.
She scrubbed her face and freshened her makeup, finger-combed her tangled hair and thought its messiness looked rather fashionable. She dug out her travel toothbrush and got her mouth in order, lifted up the shirt to check for any marks on her body and didn’t find any. She pouted, a bit sad about that.
Her clothes were still slung over the easy chair, including the panties she’d lost on the floor by the bed. She cast Flynn a glance before stripping off the shirt, pleased by his rapt expression as he watched her, his hands clasped politely between his knees.
“Subtle,” she teased, adjusting her bra.
“You sleep okay?”
“Yup.” She pulled her tank top on then her jeans. “Very roomy in that bed.” She sat down across from him and slipped on her flats. “Okay. I’m ready.”
Flynn went to his dresser, found a checked button-up and slipped it on over his tee shirt, grabbed his key ring off the counter and clipped it to his belt. Laurel followed him out. She stole glances at his face as they rode the elevator down, looking for signs of awkwardness or regret, but he was tough to read. He unlocked her side of the station wagon first then dropped into the driver’s seat.
“Thanks for the lift,” she said, feeling suddenly shy.
“Thanks for the hot sex,” Flynn replied, paused a moment, then grinned at her. He flipped his headlights on and started the engine.
“You too.”
“Still not traumatized?”
“I don’t seem to be.”
“Good.”
Laurel stared out her window as he steered them down the near-empty streets of South Boston, thinking it was a strange time of day, lit like dusk but with none of its energy.
She turned to him as they drove over the first bridge. “Can I ask you a question?”
“You just did.”
“Have you always known that’s how you are? Like, in bed?”
“No.”
“When did you figure it out?” she asked.
“Well,” he said, “maybe I sort of knew, when I was younger. But I wasn’t one of those guys who was into that kind of stuff.”
“What kind of stuff?”
“You know, like if those fucked-up Saw movies had been out when I was a teenager, or websites with creepy-ass rape fantasy shit on them, I don’t think I would’ve been into it. I sort of knew what turned my crank, but I didn’t like that it did. Call it Catholic guilt, maybe. Plus like I said, it’s not a fetish. Less rough stuff can get me off, so I sort of shoved it away in the back of my skull.”
“Until?”
“Until I was about twenty-two, and I was dating this girl, and one night she asked me to boss her around and hold her down.” Flynn stopped to let a woman cross the road with her dog. “And I dunno, it was like a switch got flipped. Like a switch attached to my dick flipped on and I fucking caught fire.”
“Wow.”
“Yeah. I didn’t know anything about safe words or any of the rules people use when they’re into D/s stuff, and eventually I think I just freaked her out, asking way too often if we could do that again. It totally took over the relationship and she dumped me and said I was a sick-o and a sex fiend and to go fuck myself. Which was fair. I can see how being too eager about wanting to pretend-rape your girlfriend could be creepy as fuck.”
Laurel nodded.
“That wasn’t, like, an epic breakup. I mean, we’d been going out for a couple months. But she demonized me enough that I got insecure about how things ended and I shoved it all down again, worried I was some kinda latent rapist.”
“When did you get all well-adjusted with it?”
Flynn pushed a breath through his nose, expression thoughtful. “When I was twenty-six, I think it was. I started seeing this woman—not dating, just sort of friendly sex. Kinda like with you.”
That gave Laurel a warm little jolt. To hear that the two of them were something.
“She came with another guy to the fights one night,” Flynn went on, “and she saw whatever it is about me, and I got to her, I guess. So she approached me after a couple weeks and we started hanging out and messing around. She was a couple years older than me and about ten years smarter about sex, and she was the first woman who ever asked me, ‘So what are you into?’ And I was honest, for the first time. And she was into it, and she sort of set me straight about how rough stuff is supposed to work.”
“Ah.” Laurel tried to ignore the knot of jealousy tightening in her gut. “How long did that go on for?”
“It was kind of random, like we’d hang out every week or two, for quite a while. Six months, maybe.”
“Why did it end, do you think?” she asked.
“She moved to San Francisco.”
“Oh. That’d do it.” Laurel stared out the window, wondering what this mystery sex goddess looked like. “Were you in love with her?”
He didn’t answer immediately. “I thought I was. Not while we were hooking up, but when I found out she was leaving I was pretty upset. I thought she was the only woman on Earth I’d ever find who’d let me be how I wanted in bed, and it felt like something monumental was being taken away. But I mean, I didn’t try to follow her or anything. And eventually I learned that those magic words—what are you into?—are all you really need. You just keep askin’ people that and eventually you find someone who fits with you.” He looked at her pointedly.
“Yeah,” Laurel said. “Or maybe you don’t know you’re into something but then you stalk some stranger all through the Financial District until he gives you the address to his shady underground boxing syndicate.”
“I hear that works too. Anyhow, I’m at a point now where I know what I like, and I can admit it’s a deal-breaker if a woman I’m getting to know isn’t into it.” He stopped at a red light. “I’d rather go without and be lonely than not be how I really want with someone.”
Sh
e felt a laugh bubble up but turned it into a huff. “You get lonely?”
He glowered at her a moment before it melted into a smile. “Course I do. I don’t drink, so I don’t get shitfaced and start cryin’ and singin’ with my drunk-ass guy friends. Sex is… I dunno, it’s, like, the realest sort of human experience I got, aside from fighting. It’s hard, going without. I got nothin’ against sitting up ’til one a.m. playing canasta with my sister, but it’s not exactly a satisfying substitute.”
Laurel nodded again and studied the waking city as they drove down Atlantic. “I’d like to come watch you fight again,” she said. “Is there a Saturday night when Pam’s not going to be there?” She’d put off thinking about sharing this man pretty well until now.
“I can talk to her on Friday, tell her to take Saturday off.”
She nodded, the politics of the thing feeling uncomfortable and awkward. “What time does it usually start? Right at eight?”
“Pretty close. But I never fight before nine, nine thirty. I’m like one of the main-event type guys, I guess. They do all the younger guys first, the more amateur kids. Not that I’m a pro or anything.”
“Are any of the guys who fight there pros?”
“Sure. Not, like, major, but we’ve got a few regulars who make some money off it. There’s a guy from Dorchester who won the Golden Gloves a couple years ago, middleweight. He gets some paid fights. Gets his ass kissed and his balls cupped when he comes back to town.”
“Do you ever fight him? Oh, or are you in different weight classes? You must be a heavyweight.”
He raised an eyebrow at her. “You been doin’ your homework?”
She grinned, busted. “You’ve got to weigh at least two hundred pounds.”
“Two-eighteen. And weight classes don’t count for shit in that gym. Everybody just steps in with whoever else is up for it. Within reason. And yeah, I’ve fought him.”
“Wow.” She looked him over again, wishing she could see his arms. “What class would I be, if I boxed?”