The Reward

by Jade A. Waters

  “Hi.” I melted with the slide of his hands up my back.

  He gripped my shoulder blades and tilted his mouth down until it hovered an inch from mine. “I’m glad you’re here.” Dean’s last word was muffled in the desperate kiss he took of my mouth. His tongue danced sweet, electric circles with mine that warmed against the foggy, cool air sweeping in from the coastline beyond his house. Sometimes with him, I felt like no chill could deter me. Not with the glide of his hands over my back, or the press of his pelvis up to mine while we continued to kiss as if we never wanted to part. When we did, Dean guided me inside. He slammed the door before bestowing me with a wetter, deeper kiss, and ended it with a suck of my top lip.

  “How drunk are you?” I teased. Under the brighter entry light, I took in the ruffled state of the short, dark hair he’d had cut for the impending wedding.

  “Still a bit drunk.” Dean frowned. “But fully functional, I assure you.” After I snorted, he said, “Also, I have a surprise for you.”

  “You do?” I cocked my head, and he gave my hand a tug to lead me up the stairs behind him. Seeing him like this made it difficult not to chuckle. Tall, dark, handsome Dean was always in control, even at his most playful. That was why our relationship had been filled with a perfect blend of sweet and crazy intense encounters that ensnared me and captivated me to jump at whatever he commanded in his endlessly intoxicating sexual challenges.

  But Dean this tipsy?

  That was something else entirely. He struck me as extra mushy, extra lovey. Amusing and adorable as all hell.

  Once he took a snug grasp of the stairwell and grinned back at me, I tried to stifle another round of laughter.

  “Maya, Maya, Maya... I’m much too out of it to tackle your sassiness tonight.”

  “That’s too bad,” I said with a coo. We’d reached the landing, and he weaved his arms around me, pressing his body to mine in a tantalizing clutch. While he walked me backward into his room, he stared down over me with that grin locked on his face. “You guys must’ve had a lot of fun.”

  “We did. Did you?”

  “Uh-huh. You know me on a dance floor.”

  Dean narrowed his eyes. “I don’t. I think I want to take you out on a dance floor. Why haven’t we done that?”

  “We kind of have.”

  “No. I want to take you dancing.” Dean tripped over the rug beneath us, the bumble putting us almost at his bed. “We should do that.” His smile turned lusty and his hands squeezed my sides.

  “So what’s this surprise?” I asked.

  Dean kissed me. The pressure came soft and light, but his hands on my waist were doing a number on my skin, lighting it up with the magic of his touch. He whispered, “You’ll see in the morning.”

  “You’re going to make me wait till morning? That’s no fair!”

  “It’s plenty fair.” Dean scooped up my hands to kiss my fingers one at a time, and after he settled my pointer finger between his lips, he gave it a teasing suck with a sway of his head. “I promise I’ll show you then. Now, though...” He pushed me abruptly back, and I bounced on the bed as he dropped to his knees. “I changed my mind. I said I wanted to be inside you, but I think tonight I just want to taste you.”

  “Is that all?” I teased. Dean kissed one knee, then the other, his fingers sliding up my calves. This man spoiled me, that was for sure, and when he clucked his tongue at my comment, I parted my legs for him.

  “I love you. And in the morning...” He didn’t finish. The intense look on his face impelled my hands above my head, where I laced my fingers like he loved to see. His hands were somewhat clumsy, his fingertips slow with his state—but he knew what he was after, and his breath stilled while he started to shove up the skirt of my dress. “I want to see you more, Maya. The weeks, they’re too long...” He paused to unbuckle my heels, and I focused my gaze on him, trying to understand whatever he was saying before he mumbled, “How the hell do you dance in these?” I chuckled with his toss of each shoe in either direction, but the hot gust of air he breathed over my inner thighs rendered me motionless, tingles blessing every inch of my exposed skin. Dean crept the hem of my dress high enough to reveal the tiny beige thong covering my sex.

  Once he buried his face between my thighs, I moaned. “Jesus.”

  His fingers were quick to shove aside the thin strip of fabric, his mouth hot on my clit when he took a hard suck and slipped a finger deep inside me. I clenched my eyes shut, parting my legs farther, my body heating fast with the eager flicks of his tongue before he added another finger. He groaned against me, and I gasped. But he didn’t stop thrusting his fingers along my walls as he lifted his head and spoke in the gruff, low tone I loved.

  “This,” he said, curving his fingers up with a nod toward my cunt, “your taste. I’ve been daydreaming of it in this miserable wait you put me through.”

  “Yeah?” I whimpered.

  Dean licked his lip and groaned. “Yeah.”

  I lowered one hand down to thread my fingers into his hair, and he dove forward again, taking a huge suck of air before swallowing me up. If I’d thought Dean had been sexy and suave when I’d first met him, winding me up and figuring out what riled me like he had, the fact that he knew my body as well as he did had me writhing against him in seconds now. He stared at me and slipped a third finger in, and I clasped my hands together in a plea while he filled my pussy with heavy, deep thrusts. The storm of his eyes demanded I give in to the circle of his tongue, because Dean was a master at lapping me up, smothering my clit in a relentless suck and pounding his fingers in me.

  Yeah, I gave in. Easy.

  My walls shook; my heart thumped. “Fuck!” I cried. The force of my orgasm had me clenching my thighs around Dean’s face, but he kept sucking, licking and moaning, fucking me with his fingers to ride the spasms of my cunt. He didn’t stop when I begged for him to, instead pushing me on, his eyes riveted to my face while I withered into a whimpering pile of weak flesh at the power of his hold. It wasn’t until I clutched my fingers so tight together they’d almost gone numb and the frantic cries bursting from my throat turned to hoarse wheezes of air that he pulled away, his fingers leaving me empty.

  Dean took a hard smack of my hip, and I jerked atop the comforter with a squeal. “You’re getting punished for all your sassy comments in the morning,” he said.

  “Yes, please.”

  Dean looked as frazzled and tipsy as he had when I’d arrived, but a sparkle touched his eyes, his hair more ruffled and my juices smeared over his lips and even the tip of his nose. He sat on his knees beside me to grasp the hem of my dress. “Let’s get you out of this ridiculously sexy little thing and naked next to me, hmm?” He wrestled it over my head, then eased off my pushup bra and panties before stripping off his own clothes. After he pulled back the covers and ushered me in, he wrapped me in his arms with his chest against my back.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to tell me about the surprise yet?” I asked.

  “I’m sure, lovely.”

  I pursed my lips, but between the dancing and the orgasm that had turned me into mush, I didn’t know that I had the energy for whatever he might have been up to in the first place. Behind me, Dean’s body slackened, his breaths windier. “The light’s on,” I whispered. I curled his fingers up between my breasts and closed my eyes.

  “Uh-huh,” he muttered.

  We never did turn it off before we both fell asleep.

  Chapter Two

  I woke to the shift of the mattress once Dean crawled back under the sheet, his body coming to rest behind mine. He traced his fingers in a leisurely trail over the tattoo along my side. For a couple of minutes, I lay there, enjoying the coast they took over the single Greek word I’d had for all these years. It was my motto, my conviction and what I’d always sought after my troubled past: ελε�
�θερία. Freedom.

  I savored the sweetness of Dean’s fingers over the scroll as though he knew, like I did, how much of that I’d found with him. When he shuffled the slightest bit, I flexed and pointed my toes. I didn’t want to walk on them yet, but I needed to get out of bed.

  Dean caught my hand when I sat up, his voice a quiet, soothing sound. “Where are you going?”

  I peeked over my shoulder at him. Even with his hair tangled like it was and with the sheet stripped halfway off his chest, he looked as sexy as ever in the subtle light trickling in through the window from the overcast sky. The sheer curtains of his bedroom didn’t subdue the light’s reflection off the gold accent wall behind us, which deepened the rich tan Dean’s skin had hung on to from all the sailing he’d done in the bay over the summer. It made his dark features more rugged.

  “I’m off to the bathroom, and to use your toothbrush.” Dean winked after I said it, and I added, “It’s not my fault this time, though. Somebody booty-called me in the middle of the night!”

  Dean snickered. “I don’t mind. Just come back quick.” He rolled onto his back and hooked an arm under his head, his face sweet.

  I jostled his leg and stood. “I will. How are you feeling?”

  “Definitely hungover.”

  “Ah, poor baby,” I said. Dean kept his eyes locked on me in my slide around the end of the bed, that playful smile consuming his mouth. “What?”

  “I’m glad you came.”

  This man did a number on my heart. We’d been together over a year, and he could still make it rumble in huge, delighted bursts. I scurried off to the bathroom with that thought filling my head, and once I returned, I paused at the side of the bed and rubbed my hip while I lifted Dean’s watch from the nightstand.

  “Jesus. It’s eight-thirty,” I said, my eyes wide. It was a stupidly early hour, considering how little sleep we’d managed.

  Dean clasped my hand and gave it a tug. “Selby wants you at eleven, right?”

  “Ish.” I followed his lead into the sheets to drape myself over his chest, luxuriating in the time he took to run his fingers through the disarrayed strands of my hair. The heavy makeup I’d passed out in had held up well save for a few smudges, which I’d cleaned up in the time I’d brushed my teeth. Dean didn’t seem to care, trailing his fingers down my cheek and over my bottom lip, his eyes lighting up when I caught his hand to kiss it.

  “Do you want to see your surprise?” he asked.

  “Uh, yes.” I laughed. “I don’t know why I get one, but—”

  “Because I love you.” Dean thumbed my nipple, then caressed the skin of my thigh. The gentle grazes spread a hum of warmth through my veins. The light in his eyes piqued my curiosity, and intrigued me with his point toward the mahogany dresser in the corner of the room. “Go look in the second drawer.”

  I peered between the dresser and him, confused. Had he hidden something there? Dean didn’t say anything more, so I rose and walked across the rug to the dresser. I grabbed the handle and pulled it open, but I found nothing inside.

  I glanced back at him, an eyebrow raised.

  Dean said, “It’s for you.”

  “The drawer?” He nodded, and my grin returned, unrestrained. I spun around to face him, taking in the blissful view of him there in the sheets, propped up on his pillows and beaming. “You’re giving me a drawer?”

  “Yes. I cleared one out in the bathroom, too.”

  “Oh my God,” I murmured. The thrum of my pulse lifted upward, sending heat into my cheeks. “When did you do this?”

  “While I waited for you last night.”

  I pictured his tipsy self cleaning out drawers. His natural dominance had drawn me in as much as his charm when I’d met him at Selby and Alex’s Memorial Day barbecue last year, and it was what fueled this infinite electric connection between us. But his incredible sweetness?

  That was what spread sensation through me, the burst of giddiness gathering me up in the best kind of embrace. I pattered back to crawl under the sheets and against his hip, and Dean took my hand again.

  “I want more of you. More time. More of this.” I stretched myself out next to him and Dean kissed my forehead and lips, stunning me with that magnificent sparkle in his eyes. “Maybe this can make it easier for you to stay over more. Will you leave some things here?”

  “Are you kidding? Of course I will. I love that you did this.”

  “I know the drive is exhausting, but not seeing you more is killing me.”

  I radiated happiness from head to toe. “Me, too.”

  “Okay.” Dean sat up. He lifted his finger to the top of my shoulder before drawing it down to my wrist. “Now that that’s settled, you’re going to help with this hangover of mine.”

  “Am I?”

  Dean’s gradual lift of his head gave me a sense of exactly how I might help in this regard, and a shiver danced up my neck when he raised his body over mine until I lay flat on my back and he could straddle me. “Yes, you are. And I think you owe me for being extra sassy last night, don’t you?”

  I shot him my coyest grin.

  “That’s what I thought.”

  Dean moved fast. He grabbed my hands and pushed them up by my shoulders, the back of my wrists grazing the bed strap he’d refastened to his mattress the last time I was over. He used it often to secure me to the bed, and though Dean hadn’t pinned me down yet, I left my hands in place without any instruction. With the fire that spiked in my belly, the rough strap texture chafing my skin and the way Dean raked a gaze over my mouth and breasts, I was ready for anything. Everything. His cock hardened with the seductive rub he made against my mound.

  “You know you were terrible, don’t you?” he began. “Teasing me for drinking. For wanting you as badly as I always do.” He ticked his head back and forth with a cluck of his tongue. “And teasing me for having a hangover, too. Shame on you, naughty girl.” Dean crawled diagonally on the bed, his cock dangling like a treat in his perch above me. I tried my best to stay in place but stretched my neck in an attempt to reach him, to no avail. The distance was too far, and I wasn’t pushing my luck. When I huffed out a breath, Dean smiled and opened his nightstand drawer, withdrawing two coils of rope I’d become rather fond of. Against the small movements of the bed beneath me while he shuffled around, it was impossible not to feel the building thrum of my pulse, or to ignore the slick arousal wetting my folds. Dean dropped one coil of rope at the end of the bed and set the other beneath my elbow before nudging my legs apart and settling between them. “Do you know how I’m going to make you pay for all of that?”

  My stomach fluttered in the most delectable way but I played along. “Mmm. I don’t know. How?”

  Dean lifted the rope near my arm and started to uncoil it, the fibers grating as they passed each other. He paused to raise my hand and began winding the rope around my wrist. The coils came to rest against my skin, firm but not too tight, and I watched the weave of each strand beside the next in the same manner he’d tied me many delicious times before. The sun flickered its burgeoning light outside, brightening and dimming the room in alternating waves, and when it shifted dark again, Dean’s hair appeared almost black, his face over me more shadowed with the unshaven state of his cheeks. “Isn’t it obvious? We’ll do it slowly. Scandalously...”

  “Oh, dear,” I whispered, surrendering to his steady motions. He bent my arm at the elbow to lead the rope through the metal hook on the strap behind me, and the gritty sound of it made me squeeze my knees together. Dean’s eyes danced between his work on the knot and my face, and he skimmed his lips over mine as he moved on to the other side. There, he wound the rope around and around, testing the space between the coils and my skin, then securing this side in place, too. After he finished, he planted his fists in the sheets and tilted forward to kiss me full force, his
hips arched up in a teasing grind that allowed the length of his shaft to tantalize my swollen folds. He sucked me into his kiss, and I groaned, the taste of his just-brushed mouth matching mine. While he stretched out, crushing me with the intoxicating weight of his body, I sucked in a breath—but once he popped away from the kiss, I couldn’t help but egg him on. “How much longer are you going to make me wait?”

  “So impatient, lovely girl.” Dean pulled his body back too fast, stealing away his scent. His kiss. That kiss of his had won me over long ago, as had the smile he flashed me again, his mouth lifting at the corners in a boyish manner that contradicted the man I knew him to be. “These long legs of yours are probably sore from last night, aren’t they?” He dragged his fingernails down my thigh and along the sides of my calf as I confirmed. “But I think they need to be bound, too. I want you caught.”

  I closed my eyes, relaxing into the pin of my arms and the feel of his fingertips. He lifted my right ankle first, kissing the side of my foot, and I focused on the movements of the bed and the sudden roughness of the other rope coil he wound around my ankle. His fingers charged every inch of my leg while he lowered it to the side, his breath raspier like it always got when he bound me. It was the sweetest tease before he shocked me with a drag of his fingertip along my pussy lips. I jumped and opened my eyes, moaning at his touch until he grabbed onto my other leg. “Meanie!”

  “You love it.”

  I tilted my head into the fold of my arm to watch his weave of the rope around my other ankle to cinch them both together. It captivated me how much this could excite me, how every time he tied me, cuffed me, bound me and fucked me, this throttle of excitement overtook my veins and incited the fervent beat of my heart.