by Raine, Alice
‘So, it’s soundproof in here, eh?’ I tried to give Nathan my most salacious smile. It immediately registered, because his expression lost its worry and instantly transformed into something darker and infinitely more tempting.
‘Hm-hmm. Check this out.’ Stepping back from me slightly, he cleared his throat and spoke. ‘Music. Play the Beastie Boys playlist.’
As if the house was obediently following his commands, just like I so often did in the bedroom, the room suddenly filled with the opening guitar riff of the Beastie Boys track, Sabotage. As the loud drum beats followed, Nathan wiggled his eyebrows and spoke again. ‘Music. Volume up. Level 15.’ I winced as the music suddenly became almost ear-splittingly loud, but then Nathan pulled open the bedroom door and waved his hand in the direction of the exit for me to step out. As soon as I was outside, he grinned and pulled the door shut, leaving me alone in the empty dressing room area.
Silence.
My ears were ringing from the sudden quiet. ‘Wow.’ I couldn’t hear a thing. Not a peep. Placing a hand on the door, I smiled as I felt the bass beat vibrating the wood slightly, but other than that there was no indication that the room beyond was filled with loud music.
It really was soundproof.
As my palm lay on the door, it suddenly shifted as Nathan opened it again from the inside, and once more my ears were filled with the deafening strains of the heavy music.
‘Music off,’ Nathan called, and like a perfectly trained submissive, the room obeyed and we were suddenly enveloped in complete silence.
‘That’s pretty impressive,’ I remarked, flushing slightly as I imagined what the builders must have thought when given the instruction to build a soundproof room just off the master bedroom. Thank goodness I didn’t have to see any of the workmen around any more; that would have been so embarrassing. Mind you, I bet Nathan hadn’t even blinked an eyelid when he’d given the instruction. My man had no shame at all when it came to his kinky tendencies.
Nathan held out a hand to me, which I immediately took and let him pull me into his arms. ‘ Most of the house can be voice controlled – lights, heating, music, that sort of thing. Once we’ve moved in, I’ll programme the system to recognise your voice, too.’ Cradling me against his strong chest, he kicked the door shut behind us. Slowly and purposefully, he dragged his tongue along my bottom lip, leaving me to melt pathetically in his arms.
‘So, as you’ve just seen demonstrated, in this space no one can hear you scream.’ His eyes narrowed as he spoke, giving him a dark, purposeful expression. I couldn’t help but let out a nervous giggle which burst up my throat, accompanied by my eyes popping open in amusement at his humour.
‘You’re seriously attempting to quote Alien to me, seconds after I’ve discovered that you’ve designed a purpose-built sex room for us?’
‘Mmm-hmm,’ he murmured, ‘I was also thinking that as William is with Marion today maybe we should test the soundproofing out … you know, just to be on the safe side …’
Oh goodie. I was hot, horny, and being held up by my man, and it seemed that he had every intention of helping me ease the throbbing between my legs.
‘Come on then, Nathan, make me scream. I dare you,’ I taunted recklessly, giving him my most sassy eyebrow wiggle.
‘You dare me?’ he repeated my words, his excitement at my challenge obvious in the raised tone to his voice. ‘You … Dare … Me?’ Each word was punctuated with a mild thrust of his rock-hard groin against my stomach, before he took a step back and folded his arms across that lovely broad chest of his. ‘Really?’
As his stance widened into something far more domineering I was reminded that playing games with Nathan was serious, adrenaline-raising stuff. Gulping nervously at the spark of challenge that danced in his eyes, I desperately tried to keep my cool and nodded as casually as I could manage.
‘I see. Well then, Stella, that’s an offer too good to refuse.’
Chapter Thirteen – Nathan
Seeing as we were in a room filled to the brim with all my favourite sex toys, I think Stella had assumed I was intending to make her scream by selecting one of my favourites and putting it to good use. But no. I’d decided to go in a different direction, and using my very lowest, most seductive voice, I asked my girl to strip naked and bend over the end of the bed. She did it unerringly, of course, like the perfect little sub that she was when we were together like this.
Building the tension for a while always drove her crazy, so I began shifting several toys around, knocking the handle of a flogger on the wooden cupboard and jingling some cuffs so she would be able to hear the noises but not know which I would select. The anticipation was half of what made our scenes together so intense. If I was on top form, then both Stella and I would be practically gagging for it by the time I finally sunk inside her willing body. Not that I’d let that show on my face, of course, although Stella was now well aware of the affect she had upon me.
My lips pulled into a smile as she started to fidget on the bed, a perfect indication that my plan was working superbly. Stepping closer, I used my foot to nudge her ankles wider, and I watched her shoulder muscles tense lightly as she realised that things were about to get started.
Her breathing changed. She was already panting and I’d barely even touched her. That made me feel smug as hell, until I realised my own breathing was heightened, too, and gave an ironic roll of my eyes. Stella was no doubt waiting in anticipation for the slap of a flogger, or the sting of a crop, so I decided to shock her and adopt a completely different strategy today. Skipping all the toys, I dropped to my knees behind her, gripped her arse in my hands, and then hit her core with the lash of my tongue instead.
I tried to always be full of surprises. That was how I liked our sex life to be. It kept things fresh and meant we never took each other for granted.
It certainly seemed to surprise the hell out of Stella today – that was for sure – because I then proceeded to go down on her like a man possessed. This wasn’t about punishment, this was just us christening the new house, so I set about eating her out and making her come over and over again, licking and nibbling at her quivering flesh until her legs gave out and she sagged onto the mattress, crying and begging for me to stop.
I did.
Eventually.
‘Fuck me, Nathan, I want you inside me …’ Her voice was groggy as she attempted to top me again, and I smiled. Her bid to order me around was sweet, but laughably bad. It didn’t stop me from following through and sinking inside her hot little body, though. After all the build-up, it didn’t take me long to chase my own climax and after just a few minutes of deep, hard thrusts I felt my balls tighten, shortly followed by my own release shooting from my tingling cock as I yelled out her name and then collapsed forwards onto her damp back.
After we’d both laid there panting for a while, Stella turned her head to the side and grinned up at me lazily. ‘Wow. Just wow,’ she murmured, her voice scratchy and raw.
My body felt leaden from my powerful climax, but somehow, I gathered the energy to slide from within her and drag us both onto the bed. As I pulled the sheets around us I smiled smugly. Stella had challenged me to make her scream, and I think I’d done a bloody magnificent job of it. The proof was in her whispered sentence, because it seemed she’d yelled my name so loudly that she was now hoarse.
As we lay together recovering, Stella giggled in my embrace and brought her flushed face up so I could see her amused gaze. ‘When you first showed me the door to this room I’d assumed this was going to be another nursery. How very wrong I was!’
A nursery? Absorbing her words, I blinked several times but could dig up none of the humour she was currently feeling. In fact, my chest started to tighten, and my throat felt like it was being gripped in a vice.
Fuck.
Did Stella want more children?
I peeled her from my arms and shot up the bed to rest against the head board, squeezing my eyes shut as panic started to ove
rwhelm me. I loved William to pieces – he had completed our lives in ways I’d never imagined – but seeing Stella in so much pain during her labour with him had nearly finished me off. I seriously didn’t think I could go through that again.
‘Nathan? Are you OK?’
The squeaky wheeze that came from my throat was probably all the answer Stella needed, because she was up the bed and beside me in less than a second, her fingers flitting over me supportively before finally resting upon my wrists. My hands had clenched into fists, but she gradually eased them open and softly began to massage my palms.
‘Let’s do a countdown, hmm?’ Without waiting for me to answer, Stella started to draw in long, slow breaths through her nose and release them from her mouth. The fact she knew I needed this was just mind-blowing. I’d never expected to be so in tune with another person, but Stella was incredible. She didn’t push me on why I was having a minor meltdown, but skipped right to what she knew would help me.
Closing my eyes, I timed my breathing with hers and did my calming countdown from five to zero. Then I did it again, just to be sure.
When I felt marginally more in control, I opened my eyes and found Stella gazing at me in concern. ‘Do you want more babies?’ I croaked.
She raised her eyebrows in surprise. ‘That’s not what I said, Nathan. I had just jumped to the wrong conclusion about what this room was going to be.’
It wasn’t like a soundproof sex room was a regular feature in many houses, so I couldn’t blame her for that, I supposed. ‘But do you want more?’ I pushed. ‘ Because I want you to be happy, and I don’t want to let you down, but … but I’m not sure I can go through that again … You looked so pale, and there was so much blood …’
Stella hadn’t actually let me go down the business end during her labour. Apparently, she was worried that watching the birth might affect my desire for her. She clearly underestimated how much I loved not only her, but sex, if that was what she thought. I’d still seen the blood on the midwife’s hands, though, and watched as Stella had yelled in agony. It had quite literally ranked in the top two worst days of my life – the other being the day I’d found Nicholas after his suicide attempt.
‘Honestly? I’m not sure I do,’ Stella said finally. I watched her face carefully to see if she was just saying what I wanted to hear, but from her full eye contact and unwavering expression it seemed like she was telling the truth. Giving a shrug, she smiled and made a funny face that helped me relax a little. ‘I’ve never been one of those women who craved kids. I was always kind of ambivalent on the subject, really, then William came along. Don’t get me wrong, he’s incredible, and I couldn’t imagine our lives without him in it … but…’ She paused and reached up to cup my jaw, smoothing her thumb over the stubble as she smiled softly.
‘This will probably sound really selfish, but I really like how our lives are now. We’re doing great and he’s such a well-behaved baby, but what if we had another one and it was a nightmare and never slept, or ate, and was always ill? We’ve been so lucky.’
The biggest breath I’ve ever held rushed from my lungs with such force that my lips actually vibrated together, making the most ridiculous noise in the quiet room. It acted to ease the tension between us because Stella laughed out loud and leaned forwards to place her lips on mine in a reassuring touch.
‘Can I assume from that horse impression that you are quite relieved by my statement?’
‘I am. I feel the same. I love William so much, but your labour was …’ I shuddered as the images flooded my mind again. ‘Hard for me.’ It was the biggest fucking understatement of my life, because I’d literally felt like I was going to have a complete breakdown in that labour room. ‘ I felt so out of control.’
‘And we both know how much you love control,’ Stella quipped, with an amused glance towards our cupboard of toys. I joined her in a smile, then rested my forehead against hers as I tried to get my hammering pulse to calm down.
‘We’re so great together now, Nathan. If either of us ever changes our mind we’ll talk then, but for now let’s just appreciate what we have, yeah?’
I appreciated Stella and Will more than she could ever understand, and more than I was capable of articulating in words, so I did what I always did when I wanted her to know how much she meant to me – I told her with my body. Closing my eyes, I nodded and placed a long, slow kiss on her lips as I dragged her body into my lap and held her close. ‘Deal.’
Chapter Fourteen – Stella
Since we’d both had a free day today, Rebecca and I had decided on an impromptu shopping trip to look for any baby bargains for her, and so I could get a last few bits and pieces for the new house. Rebecca was just over five months pregnant now and Nicholas had been his usual overprotective self, dragging a reluctant Nathan out to accompany us. Luckily, after we had lingered in several girly shops they had become completely uninspired by the idea of shopping and had left us to it.
The brothers had headed off to have a coffee at our local deli, grumbling about women and shopping and leaving Rebecca and me in shopping heaven looking at baby clothes and household gadgets.
We parked outside the Hampstead house where Nathan and I were living, and as I unloaded our bounty of bags and boxes I ushered Rebecca to the front door and asked her to find the key in my handbag. I wasn’t as overprotective as Nicholas might be, but with her bump visibly growing now I still didn’t want her carrying all the bags, so while she unlocked I shuttled the shopping to the door.
Carrying the final package up the front steps, I found her holding a roll of paper in her hand as she grinned at me. ‘I’m still not convinced that Nicholas is going to like this wallpaper that I picked out for the nursery.’
I had to agree with her. Nicholas had given two instructions regarding the decorating ideas: no yellow, and something calming. Nothing too busy or patterned. Rebecca had abided by the first rule, because apparently yellow had been the colour of Nicholas’s boyhood bedroom and the colour still occasionally triggered some unpleasant memories for him.
The pattern stipulation, however, had gone out of the window, and the roll she held featured a Noah’s Ark inspired design with cartoon images of practically every animal I could name, all splashed across a vivid background of waves and, of course, a boat.
It definitely couldn’t be described as calming, but I was sure Nicholas would come around. Eventually.
‘Get a decorator to put it up while Nicholas is out one day,’ I suggested with a cheeky grin as I pushed the front door open and began to drag all of our bags into the hall.
Once we’d shoved the door shut we left our bags and headed straight to the lounge so I could see William, and we could check if the brothers were home yet. Marion was great – as nannies go we couldn’t have found better – but I still missed my little man desperately when we were apart.
As we entered, I found Marion by the far wall, cradling Will and staring across at me with a strange expression on her face. She almost looked as if she was going to pass out, and her gaze flashed back and forth around the room unsteadily. Blimey. Was she coming down with something?
I rushed across the room in case she actually did fall over and held my hands out for Will.
‘Marion? You look really pale. Are you all right?’ She blinked at me several times, not saying a word as she handed my boy to me and let out a shaky sob. Barely a second after I’d taken Will in my arms, the door that joined the lounge to the kitchen opened and another middle-aged lady joined us.
Did Marion have a friend over? Was that why she looked so worried?
I was about to reassure her that it wasn’t a problem, when I heard Rebecca gasp behind me. I watched in confusion as an older man also entered the lounge. Unlike the woman, the man I instantly recognised, and I copied Rebecca’s horrified gasp, taking in the icily blank eyes of Nathan’s father as he stared across at us smugly.
Mr Jackson.
My entire body tensed, recoiling away from
him as my muscles clenched with fear and my heart rate increased so violently that I felt dizzy.
God. Forget Marion possibly passing out, with my light head and suddenly weak knees I started to think that I was going to fall over.
It was a hell of a lot to take in, but we were closer to the door than he was, so I gripped Will to my chest and was about to spin on my heel when he raised his arm and I heard a metallic click that sent a sickening shudder to my stomach.
Wincing, I replayed the noise in my head and froze. That had sounded just like a gun being cocked. Not that I’d ever encountered a gun in real life, but it was a noise I’d heard frequently enough when binge-watching episodes of CSI.
‘Don’t even think about running,’ he threatened in a low, smug tone that made my skin crawl with dread.
Swallowing around a lump of fear in my throat, I turned my attention back towards Mr Jackson and flinched when my suspicions were confirmed. He did have a gun in his hand. Fuck! It was small and black with what looked like a silencer on the end. I was no expert, but it looked real enough to make me freeze on the spot.
The last time I’d seen this vile man was when he’d turned up outside Nicholas and Rebecca’s house to taunt his sons. Nicholas had thrown him out, then Nathan had punched him when he’d found out that he’d been screwing with his business. We’d assumed he had just wanted to come back to wind the brothers up again, and had then disappeared to get on with his life, but it would seem we were wrong.
I’d never in a million years thought I’d see him ever again. Yet here he was. Standing in my living room with a gun aimed at my head.
Holy shit, this was insane. It was so surreal it felt like a movie. A really bad movie, where you had a sickening feeling that it wasn’t going to be an all-singing-all-dancing happily ever after for the cast.
Closing my eyes for a second, I tried to get a grip on my tumbling thoughts, but it was no good. I was in a room with my precious baby boy, my pregnant best friend, and an insane gunman. There wasn’t going to be any rationalising this into something less dramatic than it was.