Stepping Stone

by Dakota Willink

  Gripping her hips, I pushed my tongue down harder. Encouraged by her response, I thrust my tongue into her well of honey, not wanting to waste a single drop of her desire. She pushed against my mouth and pulled at my hair. I ate her like a starving man. And for her, I was. I would never get enough of her taste. Her scent. A groan escaped me, as I wanted nothing more that to bury myself in her heat.

  “Alex, wait. Stop!” she cried out. Her frantic and broken scream made me pause.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked, alarmed by the desperation in her tone.

  “What we did,” she said in between pants. “I loved it, but I need to feel you where you belong. I want you inside me when I come.”

  I breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Now that, my sweet angel, is an easy request to fulfill.”

  I loved that she wasn’t holding in her desires. She wasn’t keeping anything back. She was just being Krystina. It was then that I realized how much strength that it took for her to relinquish all the control over to me and to trust me so implicitly. I had dominated her in the most intimate of ways and she barely uttered a protest. She simply gave.

  It was time that I gave back in return, and not just in the physical sense. I could bring her to new heights all night long, but that wouldn’t be enough of a repayment for what she gave me tonight.

  I moved up along side of her and pulled her tight to me. In one swift motion, I turned onto my back and dragged her across my chest. Her hair fell to the sides, curtaining our faces that were mere inches apart.

  “Ride me, Krystina. Take control.”

  Her eyes widened in surprise. The shocked look on her face made me smile.

  “You want me…” she trailed off.

  “Yes, angel. But don’t get used to it,” I joked.

  Her stunned expression turned dark, and her eyes burned with a need that I couldn’t describe. Her pupils dilated with a provocative and sultry glow, as she slid her hands down my stomach and wrapped her slender fingers around the base of my cock. Positioning her body above mine, she slowly lowered down.

  The groan that passed my lips came from the gut, deep and guttural as she took me fully. I felt her constrict around me, encircling me in pure ecstasy. She was like the smoothest of silks, wrapping me in her warmth. I could have spent the rest of my life inside her and died a happy man.

  When she began to move, I couldn’t stop my eyes from traveling the length of her. Her eyes were closed and her head was thrown back in unabashed bliss, her tits bouncing with every drive. She was like a goddess as she rode me, her pace destined to drive me over the edge.

  I was so close, but I couldn’t come yet. Not without her. I wanted her orgasm first. This was supposed to be all about her. It was no longer about pushing her limits, but about her pleasures. Her needs. I had taken, but now I had to give as much as I took.

  “I’m right there, Alex,” she breathed. Her eyes looked glassy, sluggish almost, as if she were caught up in another world.

  “I’ll wait for you, angel,” I promised. My cock throbbed and pulsed, just aching to explode. The pleasure was like liquid gold running through my veins.

  “Meet me there,” she pleaded.

  Her desperation almost broke my sanity and I nearly lost control. The beautiful goddess above me would be my undoing.

  I’m lost in her. In this. In this moment.

  I thrust up hard against her, matching her movements while she drove me to an unbelievable height. Our gazes locked and I felt her tighten around me. I pushed up one more time and she cried out my name.

  “Alex!”

  “Give it to me. Give it to me now, Krystina,” I croaked out, my voice sounding raspy even to my own ears. “Let go.”

  At my words, she went off like a bomb and her scream of pleasure sent me over the edge. Instantly, my body went taut, straining so tight that I thought I would burst apart at the seams. There was a flash of white, before everything went blank. She continued to grind against me, never stopping despite her own climax, jetting my release into the deep recesses of her core.

  Krystina collapsed down on top of me. I could feel the way her heart raced in her chest, matching my own hammering pulse. I traced small circles along the line of her spine, as a feeling of warm contentment settled over me.

  I really do love this woman.

  The words were on the tip of my tongue. I wanted to tell her so badly, but I knew it wasn’t the right time. A part of me wondered when that right time would be, as Krystina had never given any inclination that she shared my sentiments.

  It’s too soon. I can’t tell her yet.

  Eventually, her breathing returned to a normal rhythm and I turned to shift her weight to the side. She barely moved on her own accord, having already fallen into a dreamlike slumber.

  I should wake her. She needs water.

  I knew that she had reached subspace while on the spanking horse. Her lithe state afterward told me as much. Aftercare was something that I never wanted to neglect with Krystina, as neither one of us knew how hard she could potentially crash. But as she lay there, her breasts rising and falling with every breath she took, I didn’t have the heart to wake her.

  Instead, I pulled the comforter and sheet out from underneath her and spread them out over the both of us. I spooned up along side of her and brushed a curl from her forehead. I watched her for a long while, wondering what it was that I did to deserve someone like her. She was feisty and spunky, and everything that I thought I would never want. Yet, she was exactly what I needed.

  I closed my eyes and settled into her warmth. Within minutes, I fell into my own peaceful sleep.

  CHAPTER 20

  Ten. Eleven. Twelve. Three. The one is missing. I think it is supposed to say thirteen.

  Almost there.

  I reach the door that has the number fifteen and place my hand on the nob. It feels sticky. Justine must have forgotten to wash her hands after eating the sucker from Grandma.

  I twist the door handle and go inside. Everything is quiet.

  Good. Quiet is always better than yelling.

  I hear a noise. It sounds like Justine crying. I hate when she cries. I need to find out why she’s upset.

  I go to the kitchen. She’s not here. Maybe she’s in the family room.

  I see her little feet peaking out from behind the couch. She’s hiding.

  He hates that.

  “Justine,” I whisper. “We are not supposed to play hide and seek in the house.”

  I go behind the couch to get her. Her face is all scratched up and blotchy. There is red stuff all over her cloths.

  "Justine! What happened?"

  "I don't know," she says. She picks up Dolly and squeezes her. I see something shiny.

  "Why do you have dad's gun?"

  "Mommy's going to be so mad. I ruined my shirt!"

  I shake her and Dolly falls out of her hands.

  "How did this happen?" I ask her again.

  "Alex, do you know where my blue dress is? The pretty one with the flowers. Mommy likes when I wear it."

  She looks weird. What is wrong with her?

  "Justine!"

  I shake her again, but she isn’t paying attention. He did something to her to make her act funny. I know it.

  This is his fault. I need to find him.

  I hear Justine humming mommy’s favorite song. I need to help Justine.

  I need the gun first. He can’t hurt me if I have the gun.

  There it is.

  I pick up the gun.

  I see him lying on the floor. Lazy bastard is probably sleeping.

  That’s what grandpa says. Says he’s a lazy bastard.

  “Hey!” I yell to him.

  He doesn’t answer.

  I walk around to the other side of him. I need to wake him up. I need to tell him not to hurt Justine anymore.

  He’s awake. His eyes are open.

  “Hey!” I yell again. He doesn’t answer me again.

  I’m angry.
So angry. I hate him.

  People who do bad things need to be punished. He did something bad to Justine. He does bad things to mommy. Like the time he banged her head against the floor and made blood everywhere.

  He needs to learn a lesson.

  I point the gun at him.

  “Alex!” I hear someone call. “Alex, wake up! It’s just a dream!”

  Krystina.

  I bolted upright and the room tilted. My heart was racing at a fevered pace, fueled by absolute rage. I glanced down at my hands.

  Large hands. My hands. Not the hands of a child.

  But more importantly, the hands that I looked at were empty. I breathed a sigh of relief.

  No gun.

  I shook my head to chase away the images that belonged to a ten-year-old boy. When my vision cleared, I saw Krystina sitting in the bed next to me. From the light of the moon that was coming in through the windows, I could see her expression. She looked severely alarmed.

  “I apologize. I didn’t mean to wake you,” I mumbled and shook my head again.

  “Alex, what was that all about? You were yelling your sister’s name and you were saying that you hated him. Who do you hate?”

  I ran a hand over my face and through my hair, trying to rid myself of the disturbing dreams that haunted me.

  “It was nothing,” I tried to dismiss. But as usual, Krystina pushed.

  “Your father?”

  Fuck this.

  I threw the covers off and got out of bed.

  “I said it was nothing. Just forget it,” I said harshly. “Go back to sleep.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “To the den. I need to work on my speech for Friday night.”

  “Your speech? Alex, it’s barely four in the morning,” she pointed out skeptically.

  I felt edgy. Unbalanced. My temper was ready to flare up at any given moment. I had to get away from her, away from this burning need to lash out at someone. Anyone.

  Get it under control, Stone.

  I took a deep breath and went around to her side of the bed. I kissed her lightly on the forehead and tried to adapt a more patient tone.

  “I know what time it is. Please, just try to go back to sleep.”

  Not waiting for her response, I left her and I made my way to the den where my home office was situated. I sat behind the desk and leaned back in the chair.

  Dammit! I usually wake up before the dream goes that far. If Krystina hadn’t been there…

  A chill raced down my spine.

  But she was there.

  The fact that she heard me talking in my sleep was disturbing in itself. But I was more bothered by the amount of anger that I felt when I awoke from the dream. I was filled with hatred of the worst kind, and I had this unexplainable need to physically harm something or someone. It was another reminder of why I wasn’t good for Krystina. I felt like a ticking time bomb that was waiting to go off at any moment. I was a threat to her safety.

  I need to get a goddamn grip.

  I was no stranger to the nightmare, but I was concerned by the frequency as of late. The dream that had come almost daily as a child had eventually dissipated throughout my adult years. I grappled with trying to find a reason why they were becoming more regular after all this time.

  I glanced at the bookshelf that was against the wall to my right. It was full of old college textbooks, as well as modern psychology studies on the many complex ways the human mind works. I had spent hours on end, scouring those books for answers. My fingers itched to pick one up again.

  However, I was too keyed up to delve into research at that moment. I knew that the dream was too fresh for me to take an unbiased stance on the material. Until I had the right frame of mind to research what the trigger may be, a distraction was in order. I needed to take my mind off the past, my nightmares, and all the ways it could affect my relationship with Krystina.

  I reached behind me and turned on the stereo. Linkin Park streamed through the speakers and I quickly switched it to a classical music station.

  Mozart’s ‘Jupiter’. Good. I could use something a little more relaxing.

  Turning back to my desk, I fired up my laptop and opened a blank plain text document. My speech for the charity gala still needed to be written, and I couldn’t think of a better time to do it.

  “Alexander.”

  I looked up and saw Krystina in the doorway. She was wearing one of my t-shirts, her hair falling in loose curls over her shoulders. She looked beautiful standing there, perfect in every way. She took my breath away.

  I don’t deserve her. She’s not safe with me.

  I pushed aside the nagging worry that I may someday unintentionally hurt her and focused on the words that I had spoken to Krystina earlier.

  Live in the present.

  I flashed her an easy smile and was careful to keep my tone light.

  “I’ve always considered myself a silk and satin kind of guy, but you look damn sexy when you wear my t-shirts. Have I ever told you that?”

  “Don’t try to avoid the issue,” she said gently and shook her head. Walking over to me, she sat down on my lap and fingered a hand through my hair. “Talk to me.”

  I embraced her in my arms and squeezed tight. She felt so good. Soft and warm. And such a sharp dissimilarity to what I had been feeling just a few minutes before.

  After a moment, I pulled back and looked into her rich chocolate eyes. They were full of patience as she waited for me to speak.

  “Angel, it was just a nightmare. People have them.”

  “Not like that, Alex. Whatever that was, it wasn’t normal.”

  “You’re right. Normal people don’t have nightmares like that. But we’ve been through this. You already know that I’m not normal,” I said bitterly.

  “Alex…” she trailed off. “Your childhood was horrific. All things considered, I think the fact that it still bothers you is a very normal thing.”

  None of it is fucking normal.

  I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I knew that I should tell her about the dreams. She deserved the whole truth and she had the right to know what she was getting into.

  “Krystina, when I told you about my past, I didn’t tell you everything.”

  She pulled back, and her brow formed the shape of a V. I fought the urge to smooth the wrinkles away. I preferred it when she smiled. If it were up to me, she’d never frown again.

  “What didn’t you tell me?”

  “I’ve told you everything as best as I can remember,” I began. “This might sound strange, but I think my memories are muddled by my dreams. The dream that I had tonight is a reoccurring one. I’ve had it since I was a child.”

  The sound of the gun shot rang through my mind; the smell of gunpowder prevalent in the air. I shuttered and tried to will it all away.

  “What’s the dream about?”

  I pinched the bridge of my nose and I wrestled with trying to find the right words to explain the sequence of how it all happens. I had come this far and I knew that I had to tell her the rest. Even still, I couldn’t help but feel like I would gag on the words that I had never before spoken out loud.

  “The dream is very similar to my memory. There’s only one difference. In the dream, I didn’t come home to find my father already dead. I’m the one that shot him,” I choked out.

  There. I said it. It’s finally out in the open.

  “But, Alex. It’s only a dream,” she said softly. “You said yourself that the police never found out who shot him, and that Justine has no memory of it.”

  I stared at her in shock, astounded by her innocence.

  “Krystina, don’t you understand what I’m saying? I think there is a very real possibility that I was the one to pull the trigger. Not my mother. Not Justine. Not a random criminal. Me.”

  She stood up and began to pace back and forth in front of my desk.

  “Tell me the details of the dream.”

  “Angel, I’d rath
er not get into it. At least not tonight. Another day maybe.”

  “Fair enough. So, we’ll look at a different angle. There was an investigation, right?”

  “Yes,” I told her, not sure where she was going with her line of questioning.

  “Did anything ever come out about your mothers whereabouts?”

  “No. It was like she just vanished. Her picture was all over the newspapers; the police questioned everyone we knew. They came up empty.”

  I recalled that time period, and how hard it was for Justine and I. The school had been informed and teachers were questioned. It was only a matter of time before our classmates caught wind of it. Justine came home crying more often than not.

  Kids are so damn cruel.

  I, on the other hand, had started skipping school all together. Overnight, I became a problem child for my grandparents who were just trying to do their best with the hand they were dealt. Bitter and resentful, I was a recluse during my teenage years. After discovering my desire to hit women at the tender age of sixteen, I deemed myself unsafe to others. I trusted no one, including myself. If I hadn’t met Sasha, the girl who introduced me to the world of BDSM, I may have never gotten my life under control. At eighteen, she became my only outlet for years of pent up anger, and put me back in control of my emotions. By the time I was twenty, I had mastered the art of balancing patience and self-restraint with power and control. It became my identity and my way of life.

  Until now.

  Since meeting Krystina, everything felt out of balance and my carefully honed instincts were awry.

  “There had to have been something. Some little clue as to where your mother went,” Krystina said, tearing my thoughts away from that dark period of my life.

  She stopped pacing and came to stand before me. I could see the way her mind was turning, like she was trying to put together a puzzle that came with missing pieces.

  “There’s no use trying to figure it out. I’ve tried. I wish I had the answers, but I don’t. She may be dead, or she may still be out there somewhere for all I know.”

  Krystina tilted her head to one side and looked curiously at me.