by Anna del Mar
“Clara?” he said. “Are you listening?”
“Sure, yeah.” I struggled to deal with the lust explosion. “I’m listening.”
“If at any time you feel uncomfortable,” he said, “say your safe word and I’ll stop.”
My stomach squeezed. “Do you really think I’ll need a safe word with you?”
“Every person needs a safe word,” he said. “What’s yours?”
“I—I don’t know.” I had to think about it. “I’ve never needed a safe word before.”
The fire in his glare reminded me that he thought I should’ve had a safe word collection when I met with Mark Walker. It also promised I’d need one if I was going to be with him. “Pick one.”
My mind refused to work. “I’m drawing a blank here.”
“Then let’s go for the obvious,” he said. “How about red for stop, yellow for caution?”
“Easy to remember.”
He wrote down the words on the paper, then pushed it my way once again.
I looked at him, then read through the rumpled page one last time before I signed my name at the bottom. I watched as Noah folded the paper and tucked it into his pocket.
“I thought you didn’t believe in confidentiality agreements.”
“You’re right, I don’t.” His stare never left my face. “But if you need my name on a piece of paper, then you’ve got it.”
I don’t know why, but the words were as hot and sexy as the look he gave me. They were exactly what I needed to hear. I thought I might swoon, but his hands returned to my waist, claiming my body as surely as he’d just claimed my mind.
“Talk to me.” He cased my face with his hands. “What are you thinking?”
“I...um... I worry this...agreement...might be...hard, to execute, I mean.”
“It will be immensely hard, especially for you,” he said. “You’re a control freak and I know submission will be a huge challenge for you. If you want a fresh perspective on kink, I’ll give it to you, but I won’t make it easy for you, because without the rigor, there’s no struggle and without struggle, there’s no discovery.”
“Whoa.” My throat was parched. “That sounded deep and mysterious.”
“This is serious, Clara,” he said. “You signed that paper and now I want to be your master, teacher, guide, partner, lover. I want to be your all.”
The fervor in his eyes warmed me all the way to my toes. It was a pledge, a monumental offer. The moment called for an articulated response.
I squeaked. “Okay.”
He kissed me, a soft, deepening contact that filled my mouth with his tongue and his flavors. Any fears I might have harbored dissipated in the air, at least until his tongue retreated and he pulled his lips away from mine. He planted a light kiss on my forehead and held my hands between his.
“I’ll need your passwords for your calendars,” he said, “both work and personal.”
“But...why?”
“So that I know where you are and what you’re doing at all times,” he said. “So that I can plan ahead. And to make sure we can manage this when you’re not here, on Avalon.”
“We’re only talking three weekends.” Surely I could manage that? Surely in three weeks I’d know all I needed to know.
“You said three weeks.” An uncompromising note sharpened his tone. “That puts me in your life 24/7 for three whole weeks at my discretion, not yours. I’ll expect you to be here at every practicable moment and for sure every weekend, but I also expect to know your whereabouts when you aren’t here, and to have access to you the rest of the time, whether pre-planned or on demand.”
I croaked. “On demand?”
“Yes, ma’am.” He pinned me down with his stare. “Anything less than that is a deal breaker for me.”
The question was getting old, but I asked it all the same. “Why?”
He let out a weary sigh. “Because, Clara, I mean to make the most out of our time together and you can’t expect to treat me or our relationship like a light switch you turn off and on.”
Holy shit. I knew from my research that some of these agreements were pretty involved, but the thought that I was entering into a full-fledged relationship with Noah had my emotions oscillating wildly between panic and jubilation.
“You should know that I’m not very good at the relationship thing.”
“We’ll see about that.” The kiss he planted on my lips bowled over my objections.
I sighed. Such high confidence on defective me.
“Are you on birth control?” he asked.
I raised my arm, pulled up the sleeve and pointed to the tiny scar on my upper arm. I’d been, after all, engaged to be married only a few months ago.
“Excellent,” he said. “No babies for now.”
No babies...for now? My brain went into a spin cycle.
“And just to be clear,” he said, recalling me from speculation alley. “This is an exclusive relationship. I’ll arrange for the blood screenings. When the time comes, I want nothing between your skin and mine. Do you have a problem with that?”
“Um...err...um...” What could I say? “No?”
The bulge in his pants echoed the excitement growing in me. Just talking about our arrangements made me drip like a soaked sponge. Would he use restraints on me? Would he tie me to his bed? Would he set me up in some of those lewd, provocative poses I’d come across during my research?
It was nuclear meltdown again, localized between my legs.
“One more thing,” Noah said. “A test run. To seal our agreement, to prove that this is something that you can do, and to make sure you really want to do this.”
“Okay,” I said cautiously. “When?”
“Right now,” he said. “Right here.”
The look he gave me had every cell in my body vibrating. I sucked in my breath. I’d boarded the ferry yesterday morning with zero enthusiasm and modest goals. Now my goals had radically expanded, a new thunderstorm towered on the horizon and, despite my best efforts to keep my emotions under control, hope mushroomed in my heart like those billowing clouds.
“Clara?” Noah’s stare darkened. “This is not what it was before. Do you understand that?”
“I do.”
Talk about cutting my expectations to size up front, but I had to be realistic. He’d defined his fuck-buddy relationship before as a practical agreement. Designed to blow off steam. To cope. That’s sort of what we were going to be. Fuck buddies. Right? Two people strung together by a sexual agreement. At least until further notice.
Noah’s voice startled me. “Take off the robe.”
“Here?” I was suddenly feeling irrationally shy and modest. “How about downstairs? Bedroom?”
“I call the shots, remember?” His voice hardened. “And you haven’t earned a soft mattress beneath your back yet. You’ve got a ways to go.”
No bed? The breath caught in my throat. The way he stared at me had my belly fluttering and my brain on hold. A bed with Noah in it had been at the top of my aspirations seconds ago. It was hard to turn away from a dream.
“But—”
“No discussion,” he said. “For the next three weeks, your sex life belongs to me. I won’t say it again. Take. Off. The robe.”
His stern tone. His undeniable authority. The agreement we’d made and the promise of his hands on my body. I forced myself to breathe. My fingers fumbled with the robe’s belt. When I finally managed to undo the knot, the belt fell to the floor. I bent over to pick it up.
“Leave it,” he said. “Shed the robe. Now.”
I straightened on my knees, but it took some effort. I hesitated before I slid the robe from my shoulders and down my arms. It rustled quietly as it fell on the floor. I stood before Noah wearing only my bra an
d panties.
“You know what to do next.” He clasped his hands behind his back and waited impassively, despite the impressive bulk tenting his sweats.
The flush ignited my face. “You... I...um...you want everything off?”
He nodded. “Quickly, please. I don’t like waiting.”
I reached behind my back, unhooked the clasp and caught the cups as they slid off my breasts. I clutched the lace in place for a few seconds, working through the insecurities that plagued me. For an instant, I wished I’d gotten that boob job that Mother had suggested so many times. To make them perfect, she’d said.
“Clara?”
Too late now. I had a memory of Noah loving my breasts once upon a time. I clung to that memory, shut my eyes and let the bra drop. My nipples were already hard, but as the air hit them, they tightened and lengthened into a pair of sharp nubs that added to my mortification.
“Jesus.” He stared. “You’re as stunning as I remember.”
I swayed on my feet, relying on his praise to keep me standing.
“Your panties too,” he said. “Hustle now.”
I rolled my panties down my legs and stepped out of them.
“Stand straight.” His eyes caressed my body as thoroughly as a pair of experienced hands. “I want to look at you.”
I stood very straight as he circled around me, flushing under his scrutiny. Staying still while I was naked was hard. I wanted to suck in my belly, photoshop all the flaws in my body and fidget like a self-conscious little girl. Instead, his gaze wandered over my body as he slowly took me in, sparing no part of me the shock of his perusal.
He came to stand behind me. His warm breath gusted over my shoulder. He was so close. Every hair on my body stood on end. He planted a row of kisses across my shoulder. The feel of his lips tightened my nipples. I shivered in place, breasts trembling on my chest, pussy moist with the sweat of my erotic heat.
“When you’re naked with me,” he murmured in my ear, “you’ll always be proud of your body. You’ll show it off, standing tall like the centerfold you are. You’ll offer yourself to me, like this.”
He seized my hands, fitted them under my breasts and encouraged me to hold them up like a pair of precious gifts.
“Perfect,” he said, inspecting his handiwork. “Legs.” He tapped my heels with his toes.
I inched my feet apart.
“At the very least, my hand has to fit between your thighs.” To demonstrate, he placed his fist at the crux of my legs until I adjusted my stance to the right width. “Better.” He rubbed his knuckles softly against my bush. “I need access to your pussy, all the time.”
I shivered as he turned his wrist, opened his hand and caressed my sex. I fit into his palm as if custom made. I closed my eyes, tilted my head back and sighed when he rubbed me, a slow, soft, overpowering caress that had my pussy salivating and my mind spinning in the darkness.
“When I kiss you,” he murmured, recalling me from pleasure’s intimate lair, “you’ll part your lips and open your mouth to me.”
He turned my head to one side and brushed my lips with his mouth. I separated my lips as he required and was instantly rewarded. His tongue raided my mouth while his fingers played havoc with my sex. I swooned and had to lean against him in order to keep my feet.
He groaned and broke off the kiss. “Hell, Clara, we’re going to have to work on endurance.” He swept me into his arms and plopped me down on one of the chairs. “But right now, I need to get a taste of you.”
He slid me down on the stool and brought my ass to the edge of the cushion. I had no choice but to perch my arms over the chair’s low back, wrap my fingers around the chrome bar and hold on. He parted my knees and, lowering his face between my legs, splayed my labia with two fingers and exposed me to his mouth.
I shuddered when his tongue lapped at my pussy, long, delicious strokes that laved my folds and glided along my cleft. His tongue lingered, teasing and cajoling my slit like an eager suitor. His lips settled at the top of my sex and suckled my clit with the kind of extraordinary finesse that showcased a combination of talent, practice and expertise.
I leaned back in ecstasy, shocked by the sheer power of his mouth on my pussy. My spine arched over the chair’s chrome bar. My legs instinctively widened to accept his mouth’s worship. Lord help me. My eyes centered on the ceiling, where the polished cedar planks whirled around the skylight like a carousel, or was it me, spinning with sheer pleasure?
“I always wondered what you’d taste like,” Noah murmured between my legs. “All these years. Now I know. You’re a fucking delicacy.”
My reply was a moan of erotic delight. He hadn’t done this to me fifteen years ago. I supposed we’d both been too young and inexperienced back then. In fact, not that it was a long list, but no man I’d ever been with had feasted on me like this, as if he’d been starving for months and my pussy were an all-you-could-eat buffet. The stubble on his chin rasped against my skin as he licked and suckled every inch of me, neglecting nothing, lapping up my moisture with the sort of gusto that allowed for no limits or inhibitions.
Note to blog: guys, you need to learn how to do this.
“Christ, Clara.” Noah’s breath blustered over my pussy. “We’d make millions if we marketed your juices.”
I pressed my lips together and whimpered, a frail, weak wail, a suitable sound for a meltdown. Was he going to drive me insane before he fucked me?
He reached up and caught my nipple, twisted it and lengthened it between his fingertips, milking even more need out of my body, turning me into a boiling pot of desire. The incredible sensations racking me restored my hope in my body’s ability to feel pleasure. I found myself at the edge of orgasm several times, but every time I went for it, Noah scaled back in a tantalizing, tormenting tease.
“You’ll need to ask me,” he muttered between my legs.
“Ask you what?” I mumbled, nearly delirious.
“Permission,” he said. “To orgasm.”
Permission to orgasm? I looked down on the man gorging on me. “Are you joking?”
“I’m not joking at all.” He lifted his face and met my gaze, lips glossed by my moisture, chin wet with my pleasure, eyes pitch-black and brimming with intensity.
I wasn’t completely ignorant. After all, I’d done my research and read about common BDSM practices. But right now, I was experiencing a case of reality shock. Moreover, for a woman who hadn’t had an orgasm in a long time and was now teetering at the edge of one, the idea of having to ask for permission to come seemed particularly perverse.
I was about to make some sort of an argument, but it was hard to think with Noah’s thumb massaging my clit and his tongue dipping in my well. My knees drifted in as I went to sit up, but Noah’s stare pinned me in place. Even though he was the one presently on his knees, I had no doubt that it was he who was in control as he braced his hands under my thighs and spread my legs farther apart, splaying my body on the chair to ensure maximum exposure and minimum decorum. Modesty came back to pester me. The fire igniting my face spread to my chest. He stood up, perched his hand possessively over the rise of my pubis and dared me with his eyes to challenge him.
I’d just been put in my place. Literally and figuratively. My extreme state of nudity mortified me, but my body had never felt so alive. Under Noah’s blunt gaze, my sex bloomed and my nipples peaked. The power shifted, drained from me to him, like all that blood flowing from my brain directly to my pussy.
With my power went the need to make decisions, the pressure to do the right thing and the conditioning to behave properly. Instead, my body vibrated with an ancient, primordial force that drove my sexual urge to submit, to roll on the earth and expose my most vulnerable parts to the alpha breeder.
Note to blog: submission is the most seductive, subversive act I’ve eve
r tried.
“You offered me your sexual submission.” Noah caressed my pussy as if it were a skittish pet. “You offered it freely and I accepted. You’re my sub and I expect you’ll behave accordingly. I want to make sure you understand what that means. In simple terms: you belong to me.”
His eyes perused my body, along with his hands, which flowed all over me, leaving a warm trail. He cupped my breasts and kneaded them as if molding my flesh into his own creations.
“Your beautiful body?” he said in a quiet, seductive voice. “It’s mine. I get to touch you when and where I want to. I get to cause you need and pleasure. I get to do things to you that you may never allow from anyone else. I get to rattle your normal.”
He kneaded my breast, then leaned over and suckled my nipple. It stiffened like a Crayola point between his lips. I moaned as he drew harder right before he let go. His breath cooled my wet skin as he spoke while planting little kisses around my areola.
“From now on,” he murmured, “I get to undress you when I see fit and I get to keep you naked for as long as I want. Your body will be in a constant state of readiness, always willing and eager. Is that understood?”
I bit down on my lips and nodded.
“Words, Clara. I want words.”
“Yes,” I said.
“Yes, what?”
“Yes, Noah.”
“That’s my quick study.” He bent over me, shifted a hand to my pussy and, while stroking my clit, kissed me before he broke off his mouth’s sublime contact. “Your pussy?” He cupped my plumped sex and gave it a little squeeze. “It belongs to me. It will always be prepared to be presented and handled at my command. Understood?”
“Yes, Noah.”
“You’ve got a sweet little cunt here.” He teased my slit with a knuckle, eyes fast on my face as I struggled not to writhe. “It’s a work of art and it’s mine to caress, train, tease and fuck as I please.”
My pussy flowed, slick as a jar of cream. The use of the word “cunt” excited me beyond belief. There was no affront to his use of the term, no judgment; just the satisfying knowledge of knowing that he craved me, and a new sense of physical carnality that redefined my sex as a tool for pleasure.