by Ines Johnson
There was no look of triumph on her face. Her eyes, glowing with pride and awe a moment ago, looked sad. Like a curtain of night had been pulled down over her brightness.
“There was an amendment,” she continued. “Emet and I came to a compromise. Bonded pairs can elect to have the insemination procedure only if one or both males agree to it.”
“That sounds wonderful.”
She shook her head. “My Mother didn’t think so. She withdrew my sponsorship in the Sisterhood and turned me out of the house. I’m a discard.”
Adom’s mouth couldn’t work to form a coherent sound. He’d never heard of such a thing.
“But, Emet said that I might stay here.”
Adom gulped audibly. Had he heard her correctly? Lady Alyss, under his roof, within his reach at all hours of the day? The hope in his chest dared not ask her to repeat herself because the dream was too sweet.
Lady Alyss watched the undulation of his throat and her darkened countenance turned cloudy. “He thought you might need me. For the paintings. At least until the gallery opening. Then I would find my own way, my own place. It can’t be too hard,” she looked away from him, straightening her shoulders. “Mothers discard their sons all the time.”
Lady Alyss was high bred and used to everything being handed to her. He knew she wasn’t a woman used to asking for favors or help.
“Stay as long as you like,” he offered. “Stay forever.”
She turned back to him with a look in her eyes that had his cock twitching madly in his pants. Adom took a step back, away from her desires and his own. Where was Emet?
“Why don’t we get started on the next painting?” She stood and reached for the laces on her dress.
Adom’s eyes riveted to her fingers which worked the laces as he tried to work his tongue to stop her.
“I’m finished,” he finally managed. His voice was louder than he’d intended and she jerked back at the force of his pronouncement.
“Finished?”
He wobbled his head in a semblance of a nod and then pointed to the covered canvases in the corner.
Alyss looked over her shoulder at the canvases, her fingers still on the laces of her dress. Adom spied the swell of one lush breast peaking through the fabric. He took another step back. But it was really more like half a step, and he wondered if the half counted because he hadn’t set his heel down.
Alyss turned back to him, her hand still taut on her laces. “There’s nothing else you’d like to work on?” Her eyes darted over to the rig, the meaning of her words crystal clear.
Adom swallowed. He looked to the door. Where was Emet? The blood was rushing from his brain and going southward.
“Nothing at all?” Her voice was a plea. Her tone begged him for the ropes. Did she have any idea what begging did to him?
But he couldn’t.
At least not without Emet present to help temper his desires.
“Unless,” her hands fell back to her sides. “You don’t find me attractive in that way? I know some men only like other men and don’t care for women-“
“Alyss, you are the most beautiful creature I’ve ever seen in my life. I haven’t stopped thinking about you since the first time I laid eyes on you. I dream you. I wake and then have to paint you. For the last few months it’s been the only way I could find peace.”
“Then why not?”
How could he explain to her? “I don’t trust myself…with you.”
“I trust you. I trust you completely. I let you tie me up. I stood naked in front of you. I trusted you when you let your husband taste my maidenhood. I never thought I’d ever want one male, let alone two. I loved the way your hands felt on me that first time I posed for you. I wanted more then. I want more now. Please, Adom?”
Her lips parted, her hands stretched out, just like in his painting.
What if he could?
It wasn’t like his last time with a woman. Alyss liked the feel of the ropes. She ached for it. He saw it in her eyes even now.
He reached out a hand and ran it down the side of her face. She leaned into his touch. He cupped her face with the other hand. She whimpered and tilted her chin up to him. Her eyes opened again. The sea of trust assaulted him.
He could do this. He could please her. He just needed to pace himself.
She reached for him then and pulled his head to hers. Their lips crashed. Adom felt his control slip. He pulled away from her. She moaned her protest.
They regarded each other, both panting.
Adom stepped away. He went to his drawer and pulled out a length of rope. When he turned back to her, Alyss’ eyes flared at the rope.
“You trust me?”
She nodded, her eyes hooded, breaths panting in anticipation.
Adom coiled the rope in his hands. “I would never do anything to hurt you, Alyss.”
“I know.” She held out her wrists, eagerness in her stance.
Adom smiled. She mimicked the expression. And best of all things, she meant it.
He approached her and began to bind her.
First her hands. He bound her wrists together. Then he took her to the small cot he kept in the room. She frowned as he led her away from the rig. He laid her down on her back. With her wrists bound, he looped a rope through the center of those bindings and lassoed the single rope to the metal bars.
Then he set on her legs. He spread her thighs wide. Then he bent her knees. He bound her ankles to her thighs, setting her feet flat against the mattress so that her hips stayed open.
She was panting, and he hadn’t yet touched a single erogenous zone.
Adom stood over her. Now that she was at his total control, bound hands stretched above her head, legs tucked open wide, he allowed himself to kiss her. He bent down and devoured her mouth. Alyss arched her head, her back, but she didn’t struggle against the ropes. This pleased him. When he pulled away, she bit her lip to hold in the whimper.
Adom bit at her breasts. His tongue painted a path over the two globes. Her body arched off the bed. His hand drew patterns down her stomach until it reached her wet heat. She was soaking with need. With her legs spread wide open, he traced the contours of her labias, never taking his eyes off her face. He’d painted her core, he traced it from memory.
When his head came near her face, Alyss tried to capture his lips, but he wouldn’t have it. He hadn’t seen her orgasm up close. He wanted more details. He made circles, avoiding her clit. Her heels dug into the bed. Her hips tried to anticipate his moves. He found her clit and flicked fast and light. Alyss’ ass came off the bed. Only her bound wrists and feet remained in contact with the mattress.
His eyes zeroed in on details. He hadn’t captured the crinkles in her eyes and at the side of her mouth. He studied every crinkle until Alyss came down from the orgasm. When her eyes opened, he saw she was already pleasure drunk. She didn’t realize this was just the beginning of their journey.
His head disappeared between her thighs. She could hold still no longer. She trembled, trying to back away from him. Adom ignored her. She’d soon learn that after the first orgasm they got easier.
Her next orgasm was deeper. Adom could tell because instead of rising off the bed, her hips ground into the mattress. Her moans were guttural. She tried to close her legs to ease the sensations, but the ropes prevented it.
Adom placed two fingers inside of her. He searched until he found the soft patch of nerves at the front of her core. Her eyes went wide, her breathing shallow and loud. Adom stroked, first in a soft circular pattern. And then his fingers stroked upward and hard. Alyss screamed. Adom’s palm filled with her juices as she leaked her sweet essence.
He waited the briefest moment for her to catch her breath before doing it again.
And then again.
By now his cock was throbbing. Alyss’s eyes were dazed. Her body was completely pliable.
Adom undid the drawstring of his pants. It had been years since he’d been inside of a woman. Alyss
, though dazed, still looked at him with complete trust and desire in her hazy eyes. Adom leaned in and kissed her lips lightly. She sighed against his mouth. Her arms and legs slack with a ton of give in the rope. She lay open for him, welcoming him into her world.
Adom stood and went to his chest of toys. He dug around in vain.
On the bed, Alyss became agitated. “What are you looking for,” she demanded. Her voice was huskier than he’d ever heard it.
“A contraceptive ring.”
“You don’t need it,” she said.
Now Adom worried she was in delirium.
“I’m not fertile today. I’m not ovulating.”
Adom looked at her with doubt, hesitancy.
“Growing up in my family, I would know. Trust me.” She threw his words back at him.
Adom returned to the bed. Still looking into her eyes, he placed the head of his cock at her entrance. “Say ‘please.’”
“Please,” she whispered.
Adom went in a little further. Then he waited.
Alyss’ eyes were closed. Her hands gripped the rope. After a moment of bliss, she opened her eyes to see what the hold up was. Adom quirked one eyebrow.
“Please,” she said again.
He went in a little further. This time, she winced. He’d reached the barrier of her maiden hood. They both waited for the discomfort to subside.
“Please,” she begged. And then, “please” again, and again until he was buried inside her to the hilt.
Adom stroked her into bliss. She came twice more before he allowed himself to explode into her. He poured himself into her sweet heat and knew heaven on earth. Her orgasm gripped him so hard he saw stars. This was the way it should be, the way it should always be.
Adom pulled the bindings on her ankles and flipped her over. The single rope allowed her wrists and upper body to rotate 180 degrees.
“Adom,” she panted. “I can’t.”
Adom peered down into her upturned face. He stared into the single glazed eye of her profile. The gold churned liquid fire.
“I want to please you Alyss. Let me take you higher.”
“But I can’t.”
“You can. Trust me. I want to make you soar, just like in the painting. You are so beautiful when you sail into orgasm.”
She closed her eyes and buried her head in the mattress. Adom grabbed her plump ass and brought it to his hips. He aimed his cock and entered her in one stroke. He reached around and grabbed the swollen lips of her core. Her body jerked. The muscles in her back pulled taut. Adom traced them with his fingertips itching for his brush.
He pumped into her, deep and slow, swiveling his hips in an effort to touch every part of her. He felt her walls caving around him. She panted a chorus of high pitched pleasure, one melody ending and another immediately taking its place. Her head arched back exposing the column of her neck. Her upper torso stayed arched off the bed.
He made her climb again.
She panted, her breaths fast, faster than the beating of his heart. This time when she crested her mouth opened wide, but no sound came out. Her body jerked, trying to pull him down into the crash. Adom refused to go. He wanted more, needed more. Needed to take her higher, make her soar off into the clouds. Together, they would paint the sky.
He spilled into her again as her orgasm gripped the life essence out of him. After he came down from his second orgasm, he withdrew from her. His cock might’ve been limp, but his desire for her still burned bright. He wanted to taste the canvas they’d painted between her thighs.
But when he removed his hips from the haven between her legs, he saw she wasn’t moving. Her body lay prone, faced down in the bed.
“Alyss,” he called. She didn’t move.
He untied her wrists. She didn’t move.
He unbound her legs. She remained still.
He turned her over. Her limbs flopped like dead weight.
Panic rose in his chest. “Alyss,” he shouted.
Her face was slack, her eyes closed as though she were in a deep slumber. He gave her shoulders a shake. Still, no response.
“No, no, no.” Adom grabbed at his temple, staring down at the limp body sprawled out below him.
It had happened again.
Chapter Sixteen
“The Education Bill? You want me to head it up?”
The Male Voice stood at Emet’s desk. The other males had long gone home. Only the two of them remained.
“You impressed me today with your compromise. Most of the ladies feel it's their way or no way. You got a lady to listen to you.”
The praise was great for Emet to hear, but the assignment wasn’t exactly the one he wished. “Education? Are you sure I’m the right man for the job?”
“You were thinking of something else?”
“I have ideas about the Right of Separation Bill.”
“The Divorce Bill?”
“I think we need to expand it for more than divorce.” Emet thought back to the look in Lady Alyss’ eyes after the nasty encounter with her Mother earlier this afternoon. “I think it needs to focus on other forms of separation. The right of bonded males to separate from their wives in the case of neglect, infidelity, and abuse. And to part with their fair share of the financial resources from the bond. But also the rights of young men…and young women to separate from their Mothers or female caretakers in cases of duress.”
Emet waited while the Male Voice levied that intense gaze upon him. He’d seen the gaze cause older advocates, men who’d been in this office much longer than he had, falter and back down. Emet had grown up with monks who would sit and stare at each other for hours. He could easily win a staring contest. But this was neither a competition nor a meditation.
“The rights and livelihoods of women does not fall under the jurisdiction of this office, Emet.”
Emet inhaled the Male Voice’s words and allowed them to rest on his tongue before responding. In the end he had to shake his head and spit his rebuke out. “I have to disagree with that. These offices, every chamber in this compound, was formed to reach for what’s best for this society. We spend so much time fighting against women, instead of working with them. And they do the same. They accuse men, all men, of the faults of our shared past. Then, in some cases, they repeat those same faults. Wrong is wrong, regardless of whose hand strikes the raw deal.”
The Male Voice stared at Emet once more in quiet contemplation. Emet inhaled and held the breath. He held it for as long as he could until-
“All right, Emet.”
Emet’s breath came out as a gushing sigh.
“I’ll give you the Rights of Separation Bill, but…”
Emet had been jubilant with the first half of the Male Voice’s sentence. With that one, small, three-lettered word it was as though the upbeat violin concerto turned from jubilant to ominous. Emet didn’t know how the Male Voice knew, but he was certain the older male would lecture him on what he saw today of his relationship with Lady Alyss.
Emet headed him off. “It’s not what you think.”
The Male Voice raised a single eyebrow, much like Emet’s brother Jian would often do in their youth. Jian, the most devout of his brothers from the Pleasure Temple, would indulge Emet in philosophical and spiritual arguments from time to time. Whenever they came across a debate that allowed the intrusion of faith over fact, Jian would raise an eyebrow in triumph knowing Emet couldn’t logically argue against the ethereal.
The Male Voice arched his eyebrow in the exact same way, and Emet had to concede because what was going on between him and Lady Alyss defied any sense of logic. By all rights, the woman was an enemy to the Male Movement. Just because she’d come into harm’s way didn’t mean her mind had changed about the plight of man-kind.
“She’s a good person.” Emet looked around the room. The words spewing from his mouth made him certain Adom had stepped into the space. But no, that was his voice defending the woman whom he had not trusted for a stone’s throw j
ust two days ago.
The Male Voice raised the other eyebrow to join the first. This was a feat Emet had never encountered with Jian.
“She is,” Emet insisted. “Deep down. She just doesn’t know any better. She’s been with that family her whole life. She doesn’t know things could be different. None of them know things could be different. We have to show them.”
The Male Voice smiled at Emet. It was a pitiful smile. One he remembered from his first days at the temple. As a new arrival, he’d told Elder Gerry that his parents would come back for him. Elder Gerry smiled, just like this.
“You saw what happened today between her and her Mother,” Emet said.
The Male Voice’s eyes darkened with that memory. Though they fought against women in this office, no male would ever welcome nor condone the harming of a female.
“For generations that family has been on a mission,” said the Male Voice. His tone was less a warning and more contemplative. “I’ve seen Lady Regyn and Lady Angyla manipulate any and everyone to advance their cause.”
But Lady Chanyn had not climbed aboard her family’s initiatives. And Lady Merlyn had stepped off the track later in life.
“Lady Alyss didn’t manipulate me. I thought that was her game at first, but…I can’t explain.” Really, how did Adom infiltrate this room. His idyllic voice kept coming through Emet’s logical person.
The Male Voice put a hand on Emet’s shoulder. “I’ve come to trust your judgement, Emet. I’ll trust you have this matter in hand, and that it won’t come back to hurt the cause and the men of this office.”
Emet wanted to plead Alyss’ case, but he didn’t see a way through with the Male Voice. Besides, he didn’t need the male’s permission to support her. And Alyss was no longer a factor in the Sisterhood. She’d said so herself. So there definitely was no manipulation.
Emet rose to leave the offices while the Male Voice stayed behind. The Voice was often the first in and the last to leave. Emet opened the doors of the chamber to leave and nearly bumped into a young lady.
“I beg your pardon, sir.”
It wasn’t often that Emet heard a lady apologize. The young lady ducked her face and didn’t meet Emet’s eyes. Recognition dawned on him.