by Cecilia Tan
“Then that’s a no.” I kissed her on the forehead. “At least that’s what I’ve been taught. If she doesn’t give you an enthusiastic yes when you offer cock, that’s a definite no.”
“It’s not that I don’t want you. I do! I’m just…my head’s all a jumble.”
I wondered if it was the same jumble as it had been during the paddling scene in the dungeon. I bet it was. “I know, sweets, I know, which is why we’re talking about it instead of me just flattening you to the bed and fucking you all the way to Long Beach.” I kissed her again.
“But that does sound kind of good,” she murmured. And then she ran a hand up my thigh and discovered how hard I was. “I can’t leave you like this. My pride won’t let me.”
“I think you could do with an orgasm or two to clear your head, too,” I said. “Here you go, my girl, roll over, on your face. Get a hand under there so you can finger yourself. We’re going to have the world’s quickest quickie pseudosex.”
“Pseudosex?”
“Yes.” I eased the thong off her and then grabbed the bottle of lube she’d set on the side table. I drizzled it at the base of her spine and the settled my cock between her ass cheeks. “How fast can you come? Because I’m going to be done in five minutes, tops.”
“It won’t take me that long.”
“Then come as many times as you can, and that’s an order.” I began to rut against her. Fuck, that felt good, her curves squeezing sensually and the hardness of her tailbone meeting my boner.
Maybe a minute later she was crying out like she was there, or at least very close, and I ramped up my own speed. Then her cries went to a completely different level and I knew she was coming. Sweet music to my ears. I let my own voice free, groaning and swearing as I rubbed against her. Some people would say this wasn’t sex. Some people think it’s only sex if the cock goes inside somebody else. Some people are stupid.
When I came I jetted all over her back. Does anything feel better than those seconds when your cock is coated in hot come and everything’s throbbing and perfect and the head of your dick is like the motherfucking center of the sweet sweet universe? If anything does, don’t tell me, because I think I found nirvana right there.
When I got my breath back and could tear myself away from kissing the backs of her perfect shoulders, I eased myself carefully off her. “Stay still,” I warned her. I grabbed a hand towel from the lube drawer and wiped up most of the mess on her back. “Don’t move.”
I threw the goopy towel in the hamper in the bathroom and then returned with a damp washcloth and another towel. I sponge-bathed her and then rolled her over onto the towel, then cleaned a little between her legs.
“You’re amazing,” she said. “You didn’t wreck the suede.”
“Did you want me to? It seemed too nice to spooge all over.” I lay down next to her on my side, propping my head up with my hand. “We need to talk about what was going on there.”
“Going on where?” She gave me one of those naïve eye-blinks. “Everything’s fine, Chino. Really. Everything’s great. That was great.”
“Yeah, but I want to know what was going through your head.”
“Oh, you know how it is,” she said. “Emotional stuff comes up sometimes. It doesn’t mean anything. Really.”
I toyed with her hair. She wasn’t telling me the truth. But was it because she was lying to me or to herself? Was this what she was desperately trying to believe—that nothing was wrong and everything was perfect? “You sure seemed like you were going through something.”
“It’s nothing, Chino, really. Didn’t mean anything.” So much for gaining her trust and getting closer. This was the second time we’d been through a scene followed by her claim that nothing had happened. Her insistence felt like a door slamming on my fingers. “Yeah,” I said, and was surprised how rough my voice sounded. “Totally meaningless sex. That’s what it was. Meant nothing to me, either.”
I pushed away from her, cursing myself. You stupid shit. You’re falling for her—no, be real, you already fell—and she knows it. That’s why she’s backpedaling so fast and shutting down on you emotionally. She doesn’t want the L-word hanging like a ball and chain around her neck. No modern independent woman does. Not from a clown like you.
Chapter Eight
MADISON
Oh, shit. I knew hiding my feelings had been a bad idea, but if I’d known how bad, would I have still done it? I’d only thought it would be bad for me and I’d be able to tough it out. It hadn’t occurred to me it would hurt him. Not like that. Oh shit oh shit oh shit.
Chino had not struck me as a “sensitive” guy. He wasn’t emo like Mal or an impulsive, flighty adventurer like Axel. I was sure he was a down-to-earth, down-and-dirty guy. Which meant if he was pulling back this hard, this fast, I’d really hit him where it hurt.
I tried to grab him but he slipped from the bed so quickly I missed catching his arm. He went to my window, the one that looked over my neighbor’s back courtyard, but his eyes weren’t focused. Was he looking into his past, or into the shreds of a future I’d just dashed?
I was scared to find out. “Chino,” I said softly. But he didn’t move, as if he hadn’t heard me. My brain churned for a way to take back what I’d said, or to fix it, or for something new to say to bring back the joking, nothing-bothers-me man I thought I knew.
“I’m sorry,” I tried.
“Don’t be,” he snapped.
His anger hit me like the burn of the rubber flogger. That wasn’t something I could just take without snapping back: “Why, because you’re in charge of my emotions now, too? Gonna tell me when to smile?”
“No, I’m not going to fucking tell you when to smile.” He turned to face me, confusion twisting his features. “I’m just the…the…what do you call it. The catalyst for you to have your little revelations, your mind trips.” He made a spiraling motion beside his head. “It’s no concern of mine what the fuck goes on in your head, right? I’m only supposed to be interested in you for your body, is that it? I’m just supposed to show up when you call so you can make your videos and get it over with? It’s not supposed to mean anything; okay, fine, I get it.”
“No, no that’s not it at all.” I sat on the edge of the bed, folding my hands in my lap. “I’m…I’m not trying to shut you out.”
He came a few steps closer to me, as if unsure whether it was safe to approach. “I need to know if you’re still interested in doing this.”
“In…playing? Testing out toys with you? Having a relationship?” There, I’d used the R-word. Time to find out if he was allergic to the idea.
Or if I was.
He pulled on his jeans and zipped them up, then sat down next to me. “Let me say it another way. Madison, what are you interested in?” His tattoos seemed to have a depth to them in the lights I’d set up, his skin a glow. I wanted to touch him.
I reached out tentatively for his hand instead and was bolstered when he didn’t pull away. I realized it was going to be easier to answer his previous question—the one about what was going on in my head during the scene, than to answer this one. “I’m sorry. I should’ve said something about the blindfold.”
I felt his pulse quicken in my hand.
“I…I left it in the box because I didn’t want to use it.”
His voice was gentle. Quiet. Confused. “Why didn’t you just say so?”
“I didn’t want to…make a problem. I didn’t want to seem like I was a bad bottom or like I need special treatment.”
“Special trea…” He trailed off, his confusion deepening. “You do realize I’m interested in playing with you, not some generic idea of a perfect sub?”
“I know,” I said quickly. “But I mean, seriously, I didn’t want you to…even know about the blindfold thing.”
“Why?”
“Because blindfolds are supposed to be…easy. Basic.” I gestured at the box on the floor. “I mean, they’re even used by vanilla people to spice thing
s up. It’s why they’re in a kit like that. Any beginner c-can do them—” My throat tightened.
“Maddie.” He was squeezing my hand rather hard. “If they’re a problem for you, there’s nothing wrong with that. Every person’s different. You should’ve told me.”
“I…I know. But what if I’m just a b-bad submissive.” My voice quavered and I felt myself suddenly on the verge of tears.
“‘Bad submissive’? Who the hell told you that? Maddie, you’re a dream, a—”
I couldn’t hear what he said, as if the static in my mind screaming at me that I’d fucked up was louder than his words. I started to hyperventilate instead of cry, trying to keep my tears in check at all costs. Why? I didn’t know. Probably for the same reason I hadn’t just told him in the first place.
“I’m afraid,” I told him. Afraid to cry? But why? Was I afraid of what might happen if I did?
He put his arm around me carefully. “Because I scared you? With the blindfold?”
Right. That was where this had all started. Why did I avoid blindfolds? Could I even explain it? “I guess I’m scared to trust anyone with them.”
His arm tightened almost imperceptibly. “I thought…I’d been doing pretty well earning your trust until then.”
“You were! You are.”
“You can always talk to me, Maddie. You can tell me to turn the camera off. I need you to talk to me. Or the only way for me to learn your danger zones is going to be by stumbling into them like this.”
“I know.” I really did know. But if it had been easy to say what the pitfalls were, they probably wouldn’t have been pitfalls at all. “I want…” I tried to say, but the words wouldn’t come. “I want to…”
“Want to what, sweets?” he encouraged me gently.
Want to kneel at your feet. Want to give you everything. But I can’t. “I want to try,” I managed. “I want to try to…submit.” My heart spasmed as I said the word. “For real, I mean.”
He pulled me close and kissed me on the hair, the gentle affection finally making my tears spill from my eyes. I blinked as they fell into my lap.
“You’ve never really done it before?” he asked gently. “You’re so experienced.”
“I’ve gone through the motions with a lot of doms but I never really felt it, no,” I said, my breath coming in shaky gasps. Admitting this to myself was as hard as admitting it to him. “Because I’m pretty sure a lot of guys will put up with me talking back or pretending to be obedient for the sake of the scene but the ones who are looking for ‘true’ submission get turned off and move on real fast.”
“Okay, whoa, hold on. Anyone who is more concerned about whether you’re a ‘true’ submissive instead of whether or not Maddie submits is an asshole as far as I’m concerned.” The motions of his hands were soothing, even as his voice picked up some fire. “Especially anyone who only played with you because you were pretty.”
I felt a spark of my own fire in response. “Oh, like you weren’t attracted to my looks?”
“I am very, very attracted to your looks,” he said sagely, kissing the tear tracks on my cheeks. “But I’m jaded to them, too. I’m a rock star, Maddie. I have supermodels throwing themselves at me constantly. Trust me, your looks were not what got my attention.”
I blinked. Now I was curious. “What did get your attention?”
“That you stood up to me and pushed back whenever I made a bad joke or whatever. Most girls would have just giggled and glossed it over.”
I felt a weight in the pit of my stomach, though. “But talking back has always been my problem. I can’t just…lie there and take it the way doms want. I’m not that good.”
He tipped my face up with his fingertips under my chin and I bit my lip to keep from blubbering at him. “You’re not a bad sub because you can’t take everything. You’re not a bad sub because you want to see what’s coming. Don’t trust me yet? That’s not a bad thing. That’s not even disobedience. That’s just you, sweets. That’s just you.”
He kissed my eyelids—one, then the other. “No wonder you were so tense, if you were trying to just put up with it. No more blindfolds, okay? Should we get rid of rubber floggers, too?”
I forced myself to focus on the toys. The review. Yes, let’s talk about that instead of me. “I…I was surprised how much it hurt. I don’t think it’s appropriate for a beginner play kit.”
“Definitely,” he said. “A lighter gauge of rubber maybe, but this was too heavy. Did I show you?” He held out his forearm where he’d given himself welts.
I ran my fingers over them in sympathy and his whole arm broke out in goose bumps. “I was…afraid you’d be angry if I couldn’t take it.”
“What? Why? I mean, I see why you might fear that but why would I be angry about that?”
“Some doms would be,” I said with a shrug. My voice sounded a lot calmer now. Thinking about work helped me focus. “I can take a lot of pain, you know? But this one just wasn’t for me.”
“Good to know,” he said. “You know, the submissive in a D/s relationship, not just the dom, is allowed to…no, is supposed to express some preferences and set some boundaries.”
Well. Now he’d used the R-word, too. “I know. I guess I wasn’t sure if we were in an actual relationship yet.”
“It’s starting to feel like one,” he said. “But I guess I can see how you might think, four days…that’s kinda fast.”
I nodded. “I…I think we need to slow down.”
“If it’ll keep you from freaking out, I’m all for that,” he said. “You tell me. When should I see you again?”
Oh. Right. Trying to get my brain in gear with real world stuff took a moment after being in scene space. “This coming weekend. Sakura invited us to a small play party in Palm Springs. They had a couple drop out at the last minute—Ricki and Axel, actually—and so there’s a bedroom free.”
“Oh, really.” He couldn’t hide his amusement and pretended to be contemplating it. “Sounds like fun. But are you sure going away together is slowing down?”
“It’s almost a whole week,” I said, and he didn’t call me on it. “Besides, I thought it might be good for me to get away from the club.”
“I agree with that thought.” He yawned and stretched. “You feeling all right now?”
“Yeah.” My little flip-out was over and I was feeling like I was on solid ground again. Like Chino and I were on solid ground. I wondered if the reassurances were going to stick this time or if my suspicions were going to creep up again. I still hadn’t forgotten the way he’d switched off his phone or brushed off my questions about where he lived. He was holding something back from me, but I pushed it to the back of my mind. Chino was better than that. Better than the exes who had lied or cheated. Or at least I truly wanted him to be.
His voice was grounding. “What are you going to do about the other video you need to turn in ASAP?”
“These vlogs were supposed to be solo,” I teased him. “I’ve got a couple of things I can try out in the bathtub, that sort of thing.”
He took it well. “All right. I’ll see you this weekend, then.”
“You don’t have to rush out, you know,” I told him.
“Yes I do, sweets,” he said with a laugh. “If I stay much longer we’ll end up going another round, and you literally just said you want to slow down.”
Right. Yes, I did. I wanted to slow down and at the same time I wanted to spend every waking moment with him. Which definitely meant it was time to slow down. Going overnight to Palm Springs with him was going to be a big enough step to take for one week.
Chapter Nine
CHINO
When I first got into the rock-and-roll business, I knew an older guy who had toured the world in a lot of famous bands. He was kind of a mentor and kind of a dick, so shall remain nameless, but one time he said to me, “Sometimes you get wild with a girl, but the next day you think to yourself: Was I the only one enjoying myself?”
“What do you do if you think that?” I asked.
“Leave town.”
That bothered me a little when he said it, but a lot more as time went on. The Rough got famous, and more and more girls were throwing themselves at us. Each of us dealt with it in our own way. Mal had a roadie interview each girl about whether she was really into kink. Samson preferred taking on two or more at a time so there’d always be witnesses and no mix-ups about romantic pair–bonding.
Me? I made it up as I went along but I usually stayed far, far away from the really kinky stuff when I hooked up with groupies or random women. It was safer for everyone concerned, including me. It’s one thing to have morning-after syndrome when all you did was have sex. When you tie her up and put bruises on her, though—man, if she didn’t like it and only went through with it because you’re a rock star and she was trying to please you? You’re up shit creek without a paddle. Not only would something like that suck for her, it’d wreck me with guilt, not to mention open the door for some of the worst lawsuits, blackmail, or tabloid situations you can imagine.
But over the course of the week since we’d first played, I had to keep checking the temperature with Madison, trying to figure out how she was feeling. It wasn’t that she ran hot and cold—not at all—but I could feel the swirling emotions around her, and something deep down that she wasn’t letting loose. This was a woman who was trying to figure out her shit. Smart, beautiful, honest, special. It was easy to want a beautiful woman, but I liked her, too. I liked not just fucking her or dominating her; I liked talking with her, being with her, being near her. I liked her smile, her mind, her way of speaking, her attitude. Come to think of it, there wasn’t anything I didn’t like.
But that question had nagged the back of my mind. Was she only doing it because she wanted to please me? Did she feel like she had to because of my position in the club or in her world? I felt that push of resistance from her every time and then a surge of ecstasy when she gave in—was that my drug? That feeling of conquering her?