by Helena Maeve
Direction was all good and nice, but I liked him forceful. I deliberately avoided lingering where he bid me. Instead, I delivered sharp, lazy flicks of the tongue along the underside of his shaft, never properly satisfying him. Eventually his finely crafted control stretched to the limit and snapped.
When it did, the sting of his reproof was on me.
“Feeling rebellious today, are we?”
I glanced up, as innocent as a politician in court, and fluttered my lashes. I’d dated men who mistook my recalcitrance for a teachable moment. I’d also dated men who were too meek to make me deliver when I floundered. Ashley was nothing like that. Before I could blink, he had my head arched back by the scruff and his tail bone on the edge of the seat, angling just right to work his cock into my open mouth.
“Enough,” he snapped when I made to turn my head, and the reprimand slid deep into my bones, like a key unlocking a door I didn’t even know existed.
He shoved in harshly, hissing out a breath when my teeth accidentally scraped along the underside of his shaft. I knew he didn’t like that—most men didn’t—but he let me adjust rather than berate me for the mistake. Somehow he knew I didn’t do it on purpose.
I barely had time to fill my lungs with breath before he had me take him deep, my nose bumping against his belly. I closed my eyes and told myself not to panic. Ashley would never give me more than I could take. I trusted that. I trusted him.
Sure enough, after a long beat, he eased out with a soft sigh, using my mouth the way I intended him to. I clutched my lacy negligee between strokes, wishing he’d let me blow him in earnest even as I gave myself over to the bizarrely freeing sensation of having no control at all.
Let him fuck my mouth the way it pleased him. Let him rip choice out of my hands. There would be other opportunities to go down on him for my own amusement—maybe even tonight, if I could pry him away from his laptop.
I lost track of time under Ashley’s hands.
He was never gentler than when he was torturing me. Every rough thrust was tempered with a stroke of fingers down my spine or a word of praise. I had a hard time focusing on one without becoming mired in the other. By the time he pulled me off, I was tethered to the sound of his voice, hypnotized and willing to do anything he asked. My gaze sought his.
“Over the desk,” Ashley growled.
I couldn’t obey fast enough. Legs quaking, I rested my elbows on the desk and pinned both hands flat to the glossy wood. I pushed the laptop a little further up the desk so it wouldn’t get smashed. Ashley’s work was important, although occasionally I wanted nothing more than to sever our Internet cable and lock us both in the bedroom.
I figured I was permitted some leeway to be possessive as long as I left the acting on baser urges to Ashley. He was decidedly better at it.
I found myself nearly horizontal on the desk, his breath hot in my ear as he bunched up the fabric of the negligee. Another second or two, and I was certain the flimsy scrap of lace would give way. I was right. The first tear sent a flood of heat roiling through my veins.
“Is this what you want?” Ashley muttered. “When you dress up like a whore, when you come in here, looking to tempt me… Is this how you want to be treated?”
He snaked an arm around my waist, hoisting me back against his broad body. I felt his cock settle between my buttocks and nearly shoved back. That wasn’t what he wanted. It wasn’t what I wanted, either. “Yes,” I gritted out. “Yes, fucking—” A sharp cry tore out of my throat as Ashley struck my hip.
I started forward, but forward there was only the unforgiving edge of the desk and behind me there was Ashley—unyielding, uncompromising Ashley, digging his fingers into my hot, stinging flesh. I whimpered.
“You can take it,” he purred and I believed him even though we’d only just started to dip our toes into pain-play and I was still getting used to the idea that it was okay to feel my cunt throb when he spanked me. He kissed my cheek. “You want another?”
“I want you.” It wasn’t a challenge if he asked.
“Pull your panties down.”
I bit my lip. “You do it.”
Ashley rewarded me with another hard smack, both cheeks now throbbing when he leaned in to brush his cock against my tender skin. “I said take them off.”
My defiant streak desisted as I fumbled to tug off my underwear. I was soaked and I was eager for him, and playing games just didn’t seem worthwhile anymore. I should’ve known Ashley would disagree the minute I felt him walk his fingertips down my slit. “Look at you… Wet and ready for me like a little slut.”
Not so little. I jammed my knuckles into the desk, trying hard not to ride his hand. I knew that the moment I gave in, he’d retreat. He liked to make it impossible for me to find satisfaction until he was well and ready to let me have it. He liked taking charge of my orgasms. And I would’ve been lying if I claimed I didn’t get off on him getting me off.
“Open your mouth,” he ordered. I didn’t hesitate, though I anticipated the slick, familiar slide of his fingers into my mouth. “That’s it. Suck them like a cock. Show me how talented you are, girl…”
It was girl or sweetheart with him. Sometimes little slut if I misbehaved. Never bitch or cunt. I didn’t like those all that much. Although in fairness he could’ve called me anything as long as he did it in that low, dark voice, like velvet on a bed of needles. I was helplessly in his thrall when he spoke to me like this. Case in point, I sucked his fingers with everything I had, even choking on breath when he removed them.
I parted my thighs in anticipation, shivering as he traced his spit-slick fingertips down my spine. I didn’t need him to finger me, I was ready and very much willing, but I wasn’t going to turn down the offer, either. I adored his hands. We’d spent many a night while Ashley was recovering from his concussion engaging in mutually satisfying manual play. He was one of those rare men who didn’t seem to mind if a fuck didn’t involve his cock in my pussy.
This morning was slightly different.
I didn’t realize it until he anchored one of my knees to the desk and pulled me back into his lap. He slid in easy, effortlessly, the stretch of penetration stirring a groan from deep inside my chest. Then I felt it—his thumb nudging against the tight rosebud of my anus, circling in slick little circles.
“Oh, you son of a bitch…”
Ashley laughed, fucking into me with short, sharp little thrusts. “What was that?” He stroked a hand up my back, folding his fingers around my nape. “Say it again.”
“You’re a son of a bitch,” I choked out. He knew that turned me on. Just the memory of the last time we’d tried anal made my inner muscles clench like a vise around his cock.
At least his breath caught—small mercies.
I had come to the office intent on seducing him and here I was, clinging for dear life as he effortlessly ratcheted up my pleasure with every passing second. I slid a hand under my body and pinched my right nipple as hard as I could. The shard of pain slithered into my bloodstream and sank down into the pit of my stomach, where instead of beating back my impending climax, it only fanned the flames.
Ashley must’ve felt it, too. His casual strokes became a not-so-casual pressure against my tight opening, inching his finger past the clench of muscle as he plowed into me with his cock. This was his way of teaching me a lesson—the kind we both enjoyed and I pretended never to grasp.
It worked every time.
He didn’t have to order me to come and I didn’t think to ask permission. I detonated around him with a guttural, unladylike noise, juddering against the table as my back arched. My body seized taut as I drew out his release alongside my own. One shoe clattered to the ground as I bucked and shuddered apart. I would’ve tipped right out of the other if not for Ashley to catch me and hold me still.
“I’ve got you,” he panted, “I’ve got you.”
“I know,” I choked out.
Ashley nodded against my shoulder, his breath gusting
hotly on my skin. He withdrew slowly, tempering my shakes as best he could with the stroke of a gentle hand.
“This is probably the orgasm talking, but, uh…feel free to interrupt me any time.”
“Careful what you wish for,” I mumbled as we slid apart. I didn’t want to move, but pins and needles were beginning to arc down my right leg and I desperately needed a shower if I was going to make it to work on time. I straightened slowly, aching from the waist down. “Hit harder next time.”
“Yeah?” Ashley palmed my hip. “Like this?”
I wasn’t ready for it and the sharp swat evaporated the breath in my lungs.
“I said next time.”
“I’m off duty…” The proposition that hovered in his eyes couldn’t have been easier to discern. He wanted to have another go. My pussy throbbed as the thought settled at the forefront of my mind, but it wasn’t as simple as giving in to Ashley’s desires.
“I have to work,” I grumbled.
“Not for another couple of hours,” he pointed out. But my dithering didn’t leave him cold. He smoothed down the folds of my negligee after a beat, smiling crookedly. “We don’t have to. I’m being greedy.”
“Yes, you are.” I like greedy.
After a moment’s thought, I hopped onto the desk and tipped back onto my elbows. “Vibrator’s in the bottom drawer…” Christening every room in the loft meant that we intentionally forgot one or the other toy all over the place. They came in handy for moments like these, when time was not on our side and we still couldn’t get enough of each other.
Ashley leaned in and caught my mouth in a slow, possessive kiss. I let him lead. There was nothing I liked better than being at his mercy.
* * * *
It happened rarely enough that a few minutes’ delay in the morning didn’t raise any eyebrows. Still, out of regard for my position as the ‘new girl’, I stayed an hour over my shift to make sure everything was put to rights for tomorrow morning. I didn’t text Ashley to let him know. I figured he was probably sleeping. My workdays were his downtime since we’d moved to New York—he worked better at night, after we fooled around. It was an arrangement I could live with.
My real worry was for Lawrence. I couldn’t gauge tone through his texts and when I crossed busy Fifth Avenue to the coffee shop for our regular meeting, I all but expected to find him gone. He wasn’t.
He looked up when I entered and beamed a wide, toothy grin. “You’ve only been here a couple of months and you’re already angling for a promotion, huh?” He submitted gamely enough to my kissing his cheeks, European-style. “What can I get you?”
“Whatever you’re having,” I answered offhandedly. “But I can get it myself…”
Lawrence was already up, weaving seamlessly through the crowded tables en route to the counter. I was left with his schoolbooks and the dregs of his latte. Heavy tomes with titles like The Accountant’s Handbook and More than Numbers took up most of the narrow wooden table, pages marked with Post-its. I tried not to pry, but my curiosity was piqued.
“Speaking of people angling for a promotion… What’s all this?”
“Oh, I’m just getting stuff together for work tonight.” He flashed me a smile as he returned with the coffee. “I was thinking, at the end of the semester… I might try to go back to school myself.”
“You want to get your accreditation?” I was hopeful. Ever since we’d relocated to New York, Lawrence had become slightly rudderless. He had an apartment not far from where Ashley and I lived, and he was trying to get his life back together, but I knew what grief looked like.
He slid the books into his messenger bag and shook his head. “I kind of want to go into teaching. I know it’s not a lucrative profession, but—”
“You should do it.”
I reached across the table and gave his hand a squeeze. He had no one else to support him. It was up to me to carve out any and all misgivings in favor of being his unflinching cheerleader. It wasn’t as though either of us had any family we could confide in.
“Maybe,” Lawrence said, folding his hands over the table. “It’s not definite. I’m still thinking…”
“Right. But I think you’d be good at it.”
His smile was tepid. I knew better than to push the point. “So, uh, when do they get here?” he asked, fiddling with a shirt cuff.
I glanced at the quirky cuckoo clock above the cash register. My grandparents would be getting ready for their flight right about now. I had the day off tomorrow to pick them up from the airport. Hornets swarmed in my belly at the thought.
“There’s still time for a change of heart,” I muttered around a scalding sip of coffee.
“Do you think they would?”
I shook my head. I’d had a call from my grandmother earlier in the day to confirm. She was looking forward to seeing me. I didn’t really know what to do with that information.
Lawrence rolled his eyes at me. “Sounds like she misses you. Is that so unusual?”
“For normal people, no, but Grand-mère is more lizard than human. That reminds me—you are still coming to dinner tomorrow night, right?”
I had made reservations at one of Ashley’s favorite restaurants in an attempt to start off the visit on the right foot. It was no guarantee against the whole thing backfiring. My grandparents had proscribed the United States after the funeral. I didn’t expect an overnight change just for my sake, but with Lawrence present, we might avoid another meltdown.
“I’ll be there,” Lawrence said, crossing his heart.
“Thanks.” I hated to admit it, but I breathed a little easier knowing I would have reinforcements. “And don’t be nervous. They’ll love you.”
Lawrence smiled, but his expression was guarded. “I hope so.”
“Worst-case scenario, you can join me in being a disappointment to the family name. Doesn’t get much worse than a shop girl whose name was plastered all over the papers four months ago…” Not for people to whom privacy and dignity were paramount. I fingered the plastic lid of the cup. “Ashley’s making progress with the book.”
“Yeah?”
I nodded, trying to gather my thoughts into some semblance of order. I wanted Ashley to write our story both because he seemed to need some way to process it and because I wanted to set the record straight about what had really happened twenty years ago. We had evidence enough to go around—court documents, interviews with the families of the victims, including Barnes, plus my own account and Lawrence’s—but the greater concern was how to handle the things only we knew.
There were many versions of the truth floating around. My father’s had gotten traction in the years before Donna Barnes had resurfaced. Harry Pruitt’s was its own self-serving narrative.
“I haven’t told him,” I murmured, dropping my voice an octave.
“Why not?” Lawrence didn’t sound surprised, just curious. I didn’t blame him. His life was as much a mystery to me as mine was to him. We’d had less than a year to get used to each other and we had so much more to learn.
“Ashley loves me. I don’t know if he’d love me knowing…”
That Pruitt wasn’t my father’s accomplice, that he’d never lifted a finger against a woman until he’d broken my nose on that dirt path in the middle of nowhere, Kansas. His pet victim was his own son and he’d wielded his power over Lawrence through the very woman who had brought us both into this world.
Lawrence didn’t dig any deeper than that. “And the journal?”
“Destroyed,” I replied quickly. “Like I promised.” We’d made a deal the day after Special Agent Velasquez had let us both go.
Mom was gone and so were the women she’d helped Kane abduct and murder. It wouldn’t do anyone any good to dig up the past.
My father could open his big mouth if he wanted to try his hand at being a celebrity. Once Ashley’s book came out, Kane’s story would become a farce. It would be just one more far-fetched attempt on the part of a convicted murderer to scape
goat one of his victims. I doubted he’d take that leap. He had protected his ex-wife for twenty years.
Just like Harry Pruitt.
With her raven hair and her beguiling black eyes, Laure Reynaud must have been some woman. Lawrence and I carried her in our blood—a ticking time bomb, a lodestone that lured good people into our orbit.
We stood together outside the café, our shoulders brushing as we worked up the nerve to part ways.
“See you tomorrow night?” Lawrence asked, audibly hopeful.
“With bells on.” I hugged him tight for just a moment and breathed in his scent. Then we broke free of one another, the gap between us swiftly widening from an inch to a foot. Distance was just an illusion, though. Even an ocean apart, we’d always been bound together, fighters forged in venom and blood.
A fine misting rain dusted the pavement, gusting in from the East Side. I popped my earphones in and queued Wedding Bell Blues on my iPod as I started down the street—toward Ashley and our home—my mother’s easy laugh chiming in my ears.
Also available from Totally Bound Publishing:
Feint and Misdirection
Helena Maeve
Excerpt
Chapter One
Imogen contemplated whipping out her phone to check the time. If anyone saw—if the bride saw—she’d never hear the end of it. The tux had already raised a few eyebrows, but most of the guests had seemed content to chalk it up to eccentricity and moved on. Only Imogen’s mother had pursed her lips tightly and said “how nice”, in the kind of voice that implied the reverse.
She was striding toward Imogen now, a slice of wedding cake in one hand and her indignation clasped firmly in the other. It would’ve been too much to ask that she leave it at that.
Imogen cast about for an escape—or failing that, a glass of liquid courage. Finding none, she dug her oxfords into the ground and smiled with false cheer. “Good cake?”
“The icing is runny and the sponge is too sweet,” her mother said, reverting to Vietnamese as she often did when criticism was forthcoming. She was all about saving face, if not necessarily Imogen’s. “You didn’t bring a date?”