Because You Are Mine Part V: Because I Said So (2 page)

She made a scoffing sound, all the while studying him nervously. Was he
serious
? She recalled how he’d used the word
submissive
that night he’d spanked her in his penthouse. She didn’t like what the word implied about herself, and had been regularly pushing it out of her awareness ever since then.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said dismissively. This time, however, she couldn’t stop thinking about what he’d said, couldn’t stop recalling her exhausted disgust when a man on a date had to drink too much before he made a move on her sexually, when he behaved indecisively or immaturely. . . .

. . . when he acted the exact opposite of Ian.

His brow quirked up slightly, as if he’d seen the pieces lock together in her brain.

“Can we please talk about something else?” she asked, staring out at the people strolling by on the sidewalk.

“Of course, if you wish,” he agreed, and Francesca suspected his acquiescence was so easy because he knew he’d already made his point.

“Look at that,” she said, nodding to three young people whisking past the bistro on motor scooters. “I always wanted to rent one when I was in Paris. They look so fun.”

“Why didn’t you?” he asked.

She really blushed this time. She glanced around, hoping like crazy she’d see their waiter coming with their entrées.

“Francesca?” he asked, sitting forward slightly.

“I . . . uh . . . I . . .” She closed her eyes briefly. “I don’t have a driver’s license.”

“Why not?” he demanded, looking puzzled.

She tried to shrug off her mortification, not sure why she was feeling it so strongly with Ian about this particular topic. All of her friends knew she didn’t drive.
Lots
of people in the city didn’t. Caden, for instance, didn’t have a car.

“In high school, I didn’t really have anywhere I needed to drive
to
, and my parents didn’t push it. I opted out of driver’s ed,” she said hurriedly, praying he didn’t observe her sidestepping of the truth.

The truth was, she’d been at her heaviest when she’d been sixteen. She daily thanked God her body had been youthful enough to sustain the abrupt weight loss she experienced at eighteen. Much to her amazement, there had been no lasting scars from those weight-laden years of her life. The weight had melted off her as if it truly had been a traumatic experience she could heal from versus a measurable biological event.

But Sweet Sixteen had been Miserable Sixteen to Francesca. She’d been slated to take driver’s ed with three other girls in her gym class, three girls who—by a horrible stroke of fate—regularly bullied her. Gym class had already been a daily torture for her. The idea of spending an hour in confined quarters with three sneering girls hiding their laughter at every clumsy move she made, and a young male gym teacher vaguely sympathetic to the other girls’ disdain, had been too much for her. Her parents had suspected this was the reason for her avoiding driver’s ed, and hadn’t insisted she take the class.

They were likely just as mortified by the idea as she had been.

“By the time I moved to Chicago, there was absolutely no reason to get a license. I can’t afford a car, the parking, or the insurance, so it became a moot point,” she explained to Ian.

“How do you get around?”

“The El, my bike . . . my feet,” she said, grinning.

He shook his head once, briskly. “That’s not acceptable.”

Her grin faded. “What do you mean?” she asked, offended.

He gave her an exasperated glance when he noticed she’d once again taken umbrage. “I just mean that a young woman like you should have the very basics of control in her life.”

“And you think driving is a basic of control?”

“Yes,” he replied so matter-of-factly that a surprised laugh popped out of her throat. “It’s a developmental milestone, getting your driver’s license, no different than taking your first step . . . or learning how to control your temper,” he added significantly when she opened her mouth to argue. The arrival of their entrées temporarily postponed their charged conversation.

“There’s a reason for all the sayings, you know,” Ian mused a moment later, lazily watching her pour salad dressing onto her greens. “The ones about being in the driver’s seat, driving your fate, power driving . . .”

Her gaze flew up to meet his stare at the last, recalling vividly how he’d described his claiming of her at the St. Germain last night. His small smile told her he knew she was remembering.

“Why don’t you let me teach you how to drive?” he asked.

“Ian—” she began, feeling frustrated and a little helpless.

“I’m not saying it to control you. I’d like you to feel more in control over your life, in fact,” he interrupted, cutting his chicken fillet briskly. He glanced up when she didn’t speak. “Come on, Francesca,” he coaxed. “Be a little impulsive.”

“Oh
, ha ha
,” she said sarcastically, but she couldn’t help but smile at his goading. She melted a little when he grinned back, a devilish, sexy gleam in his eyes. “You act like you’re planning on teaching me to drive here in Paris after we finish lunch.”

“That’s because I am,” he said, picking up his phone.

***

They lingered at the bistro, talking, sipping coffee, and waiting for Jacob to arrive with the car Ian had requested.

“There he is,” Ian said, his gaze on a shiny black BMW sedan with tinted windows. She’d listened to him ask Jacob to lease an automatic-transmission vehicle and bring it to the bistro address. Now here was Jacob, not a half hour later. It was so strange to consider the things one could do on a whim when money was no object.

She couldn’t believe she’d let him talk her into this.

She smiled at Jacob as he handed Ian the keys. “Aren’t we going to drop you off?” she asked the driver when he turned to walk down the sidewalk.

“I’ll just walk to the hotel. It’s not far,” Jacob assured cheerfully before he waved and turned away.

Ian opened the passenger-side door for her. She was relieved that he wasn’t going to start teaching her to drive on the busy Paris streets. Even so, she was convinced that a disaster was about to occur.

“This is an extremely nice car,” she said, sitting on the passenger side and watching while Ian adjusted the driver’s seat for his long legs. “Couldn’t you have rented a banged-up car? What if I wreck this one?”

“You won’t wreck it,” he said as he began to drive down the shaded street. Clouds were rolling in, hiding the gorgeous golden sunshine they’d relished the entire autumn day. “You have excellent reflexes and good eyes. I noticed during our little fencing match.”

He glanced quickly to the side and caught her staring at him. She blinked, her gaze bouncing off him. She’d only seen him drive one other time—that night he’d yanked her out of the tattoo parlor. Maybe he was right about power and driving. He seemed utterly in control as he maneuvered skillfully through Paris traffic. She couldn’t remove her gaze from his large hands grasping the leather wheel, his touch light but sure, like a lover’s. For some reason, it made her think of what that crop had looked like in his grip earlier. She shivered.

“Is the air-conditioning too much?” he asked solicitously.

“No. I’m fine. Where are we going?”

“Back to the Musée de St. Germain,” he murmured. “It’s closed on Mondays. There’s a rather large employee parking lot in the rear, where we can practice.”

Francesca had a vision of ramming the car directly into the elaborate palace’s wall and couldn’t decide if she was glad or uneasy that Ian’s grandfather owned the property. It would be a miserable way for the venerable earl to learn of her existence.

Twenty minutes later, she sat behind the wheel of the sedan while Ian sat beside her in the passenger seat. It felt very strange—firstly to be in the driver’s seat, and secondly because the wheel was on the opposite side of the car than it would be in the states.

“I think those are all the basics,” Ian said after pointing out the key control mechanisms and pedals to her. “Keep your foot on the brake and shift the car into drive.”

“Already?” she squeaked nervously.

“The object is to make the car move, Francesca. You can’t do that while it’s in park,” he said dryly. She did what he’d said, her foot jammed against the brake.

“Now ease up on the brake, that’s right,” he said as the car began to inch forward in the empty parking lot. “Now begin to experiment with pressing on the accelerator . . . easy, Francesca,” he added when she pressed too far and the car jolted forward. She slammed her foot on the brake even more aggressively, and they both flew forward against their seat belts.

Damn.

She glanced at Ian nervously.

“As you can see,” he said wryly, “the pedals are very sensitive. Keep experimenting. It’s the only way you’ll learn.”

She clenched her teeth together this time and cautiously touched the accelerator. When the car began to respond to her subtlest urging, a thrill went through her.

“Very good. Now turn to your left and circle around,” Ian instructed.

She used too much gas on the curve.

“
Brake.
”

Again, she jolted them against the seat belts.

“I’m sorry,” she squealed.

“When I say
brake
, I mean apply your foot gently to the brake to slow down. If I want you to stop, I’ll say
stop
. You have to slow on a turn or you’ll lose control. Now again,” he said, not unkindly.

He was so patient with her for the next half hour, she was a little amazed, especially because she
really
was a spaz driver. Her jerky stops and accelerations smoothed out quite a bit under Ian’s tutelage, however, and she was starting to feel euphoric piloting the sleek, responsive vehicle.

“Now park in that end spot there,” he requested, pointing. Rain began to spatter on the windshield as she did a neat turn into the parking spot and cried out in triumph. “Very nice,” Ian complimented, smiling at her when she turned to him. “We’ll practice more when we get to Chicago. I’ll have Lin forward the rules of the road so you can study on the plane home tomorrow, and you’ll be ready to take the test in a week or so.”

She was so excited, she didn’t comment on his meticulous planning of the details of her life. She held onto the wheel and stared out the front window, grinning. Learning to drive had been a much more liberating experience than she’d imagined. Or was she just euphoric because Ian had been the one to patiently instruct her?

“You see, it’s not so hard,” he said as rain began to fall rapidly on the windshield in fat drops. “Turn on your wipers and lights. It’s really starting to come down. Here,” he said, pointing to the respective controls. “Good. We’ll just try one other thing before the storm hits full force. I want you to back out of the spot and turn the car to the left. That’s correct,” he said as she began to go in reverse. “Use your mirrors. No . . . no, the other way, Francesca.” She fumbled, confused as to how to move the wheel while going backward to get the desired result. Meaning to brake, she hit the accelerator hard at the same moment that she twisted the wheel in the other direction. When the car lurched, she slammed down on the brake, with the result that the car swung around on the wet pavement in a complete circle.

Electricity seemed to spark in her veins at the unexpected, abrupt exhilaration of movement . . . of losing control.

She whooped.

The vehicle came to a brain-rattling halt, causing her hair to fling forward onto the wheel when the seat belt caught her. She experienced a sudden, strange kinship with the car—as if it were alive and had just revealed a rebellious streak. She snorted with laughter

“Francesca,” Ian said sharply.

She ceased her laughter and looked over at him wide-eyed. He looked stunned and a little ruffled. “I’m really sorry, Ian.”

“Put the car in park,” he said briskly. Was he angry with her? He hated disorder, despised when she lost control. She followed his instructions quickly, feeling a little breathless and dizzy, not sure if her reaction came from the car whipping around in a tight circle or the glint in Ian’s eyes just now.

“I told you this was a bad idea,” she muttered, turning the key in the ignition so as not to cause any further unintentional havoc.

“It wasn’t a bad idea,” he said, his mouth set in a hard line. Her breath froze in her lungs when he reached for her, his fingers furrowing into her hair, turning her face toward him. The next thing she knew, he’d leaned over and captured her mouth. The adrenaline rush that had gone through her when the car spun around on the wet pavement was nothing compared to the surge of excitement at Ian’s unexpected kiss. She melted against his heat, his taste inundating her, the demanding thrusts of his tongue overpowering her senses. He applied a suction so precise, liquid surged between her thighs as if he’d somehow conjured it with his mouth. She was panting by the time he lifted his head a moment later.

“You’re so beautiful,” he said roughly.

“I . . . I what?” she asked, still bewildered and stunned by his kiss.

He smiled and stroked her cheek softly. “Get into the backseat and take off your jeans and panties. I have to taste you. Now.”

She stared at him openmouthed and then looked out the car window anxiously.

“No one is around. Even if someone did pass by or someone studied the museum surveillance, the windows are tinted. Now do as I say,” he said gently. “I’ll join you there in a moment.”

She unbuckled her seat belt, her breathing still erratic, and opened the driver’s-side door. A steady rain had started to fall, so she slammed the door shut quickly and dashed for the rear. She felt extremely awkward and excited when she got into the plush interior of the rear of the cab. Ian was still sitting in the passenger seat, his head lowered. She wondered if he was tapping his fingers on his cell phone, and felt sure that he was.

Slowly, she began to unbuckle her belt and unfasten her button fly.

When she’d removed her jeans and panties, she sat there feeling foolish. He didn’t move. Her pussy tingled against the taut, smooth seat. She shifted restlessly, wincing at the pleasurable friction of her sensitive tissue against cool leather. What was Ian
doing
? She opened her mouth to tell him she’d removed her jeans, but he abruptly whipped off his seat belt.