Her Secret Pleasure (9 page)

I didn’t know myself.

My breasts rose and fell close to his face and periodically he lost himself and kissed them through the thin fabric. I panted with the effort of riding him and slowly my tension unfurled and I felt him, really felt his engorged cock filling me with each stroke.

His thighs quivered and I felt him expand inside me. A little throaty noise escaped from his lips. I must not have been doing an adequate job of proving to him what I wanted because impulsively he captured me around the waist and twisted me onto my back on the couch.

He took me, harder than I expected, rolling and thrusting, each time grunting and swallowing my name.

There was a hint of agony in his voice that broke my heart. I wrapped my arms around his neck and my legs around his waist and gratified him from below. I didn’t want to hurt him, it had all gotten so confused, but I had the power to put it right. I kissed his face, his mouth, his eyelids and begged him to make me come. He sped up, greedy for my approval, and aggressively took me with a pushing, pounding need.

I came crying his name, my face buried in his neck.

My heart stayed quietly out of it.

9

____________

Davis picked me up at five and I didn’t make him wait. I was a little fool, dressed up in a knee length grey cotton dress, one of the few fitted articles of clothing I owned. It had been a gift from Maris who’d had it tailored to fit my size. It made my waist look smaller, but the princess cut made my breasts seem larger and more round. I wore the same grey knit socks I had the night before since they already had paint on them.

“Do you want me to stop and pick you up some dinner, Miss Mahoney?” Davis asked.

“No thank you. I don’t think it’ll take that long to finish the mural. I’ll grab something on the way home.”

“Mr. Castle instructed me that you were not allowed to walk home alone tonight. I’m supposed to return when you’re finished painting to take you home. I’d be happy to drive you anywhere you want for dinner, Mr. Castle’s treat.”

I blinked, surprised at the kind, older eyes in the rear view mirror. “Zach told you I couldn’t walk home alone?”

“Mr. Sean Castle.”

“Oh.”

I settled back in my seat and gently touched the scratch on my cheek. It had looked red this morning, but did not look like it would leave a scar. I’d cleaned it as Sean had instructed. It made sense that he wouldn’t want a repeat of last night.

“That’s okay, then,” I added in case Davis had the wrong idea of my appreciation for his help.

“Good. I would not want to see you hurt again either, if you don’t mind me saying.” His kindness made me smile and I turned my blushing cheeks away to stare at the rushing traffic beside us. He took a different way and bypassed most of the worst of the homebound drivers and we made it to the club sooner than I’d expected.

There were many more cars in the parking lot when we pulled up.

“Interviews,” Davis informed me as he held the door open. I nodded and followed him into the lounge, which was full of young women and two young men waiting with resumes in hand. They stared, some scowled, as I was escorted directly past them and through the coveted gated doors into the restaurant beyond.

Once inside, I heard Zach and Taylor's voices echoing from the silver room. I cringed and exchanged a look with Davis that told me wasn’t a big fan either.

“Do you have your cell phone on you, Miss Mahoney?” Davis asked. I nodded and handed it over. He punched his number in and handed it back. “Call me as soon as you’re done.”

“Cross my heart.” I hesitated before going back to my paint supplies. “Is…is Sean here?”

“No, Miss Mahoney. I don’t know that he plans to be.”

I nodded, but it was hard to lock down my disappointment.

At the ladder I slipped off my shoes, dropped my jacket and bag and got to work.

Some of the lavender and soft white lights were turned on in the ceiling, muted by the sheer fabric that draped from it, but I finally got to see the effect the painting had on the room. It made the space feel bigger, endless. Here there’d be girls in red dresses flirting shamelessly with wolves.

The hours went quickly and the interviews thinned until the last one had been judged and Taylor followed Zach out of the room, naming off the
yes
es and the
no way
s, but he wasn’t listening. He had his face buried in his phone with a small, curious smile. I waved but he hardly saw me as he left the club.

Instead I was left with Taylor who called Sean and complained bitterly about Zach’s management style. The more time I spent with her, the less beautiful she became.

And that made me wonder what Sean had with this woman. She seemed so opposite of everything that made him
him
.

Eventually she too left, frustrated when Sean wouldn’t agree to meet her for dinner. I tried not to listen, tried to call up my night with Marcus, how he felt when he touched me, how I felt when I came. It was so much harder than it should have been.

The night drug on until the last person left and quiet descended around the dark space. With the restaurant lights on, I felt the atmosphere, the moody fairy tale and promise of pleasure and temptation. I felt it trace my skin and tickle the backs of my legs. People were going to fall in love with Wonderland.

I also realized, in the quiet once I was alone, that Sean was not coming.

A third night was unacceptable so I pushed the hours until midnight came and patiently ticked by. The end was in sight, the shadows creeping out of the painting, highlights of trees and
something elses
hiding in the dark spaces between them. I was high up in the branches when the familiar sigh of the kitchen door echoed in the quiet space, punctuated only by the
whisk whisk
of my brush.

I felt him without turning to see him. Didn’t need to. The air changed, and I felt the heat on my skin spread as his eyes swept down the curve of my body to my bare knees and the sliver of bare thigh peeking out from beneath my skirt. There was no surprise between us when I turned my eyes on him.

“I wasn’t going to come,” he said as he stepped closer.

“Then why did you?”

He shook his head.

Despite looking down at him, he seemed larger than life to me in this magical space. His shirt clung to his body, gave me brief hints of the curve of his muscles beneath. His black cargo pants hung a fraction too loose on his hips. He stared at his hands and I could see from here his hair was slightly damp, the curls he usually brushed out kinking a little to emphasize his unkempt, handsome features. I wanted to run my hands through his hair. I wanted to kiss his water warm skin.

This was hopeless.

“I’m almost done.” My voice made him look up and frown. We knew we had no excuse to continue this once I finished.

Sean stepped closer to the ladder so he was right beneath me. He said nothing but hesitantly set his hand on the back of my calf and traced the knit pattern of my socks. His eyes climbed, every inch a struggle not to run and I…I held my breath and watched. When his fingertips skimmed the tender skin at the back of my knee the wet heat between my legs shot up my spine and burned out the logic centers of my brain.

Sean’s breath caught and a moan escaped in an exhale. He drew his fingers up my thigh and brought my skirt with them. He skimmed a horizontal line across the back of my thigh that caused me to flinch in pain.

“Kara,” he exhaled. “What is this?”

I swallowed and gripped the edge of the ladder. I didn’t trust my knees with his hand on my body.

“You know what it is.”

His thumb drug across the line, it hurt, not bad, but I felt something else too. A forbidden thrill pulsing between my legs.

“Did he do this?” Sean asked, his voice hoarse and low and full of…
something
. Need. Want. Something inarticulate and necessary.

“Yes.”

“With what?”

I shivered as his hand traveled from the outside of my thigh to the inside, dangerously too close to the moist cleft hidden behind a thin strip of cobalt lace.

I could barely speak the words.

“His belt.”

“Tell me.” He commanded. He begged. With his eyes and the strength in his hand that covered the mark and gripped me. “Tell me everything he did.”

“You don’t want me to do that.” I couldn’t swallow with my heart crammed into my throat. There was no way we would survive this. “Sean. I can’t. You don’t really want that.”

He shook his head and leveled those cool blue eyes on me and I was done. His trembling subsided and his dominant side took over. His shoulders tightened. His body seemed to take up the whole room. When he spoke, he demanded obedience.

“Tell me, Kara.”

Nothing in me would ever disobey that voice.

Somehow I made it down the ladder with his arms around my waist. I was shaking as he led me through the purple door into the room I hadn’t been in where plush booths and lounge couches filled the space. Pillows of such sumptuous textures, colors, and shapes begged to be fallen into. Whole spaces were created on the floor in corners Moroccan-style around ottoman-like tables. The ambiance was cooler here, more berries and wines and deep blues. Hidden star lights lit the room from above.

Sean brought me to one of the floor booths and we sank into the pillows. He carefully laid me back so that my hair splayed out around me and I could stare up into a black ceiling dusted with twinkling pinpoint stars. Every once in a while a dot would zip across the make-believe sky leaving stardust in its wake. He sat at my feet and expertly stroked his hands across my socks before unrolling them to bare my toes. He swept his fingertips from my ankles up the arch of my foot and began massaging it.

“How long have you been his?” Sean asked in his low, dreamy voice that had always inspired my fervor to please him, but I didn’t know exactly how to answer the question. Had I ever been Marcus’s? Truly?

“Marcus and I met about five months ago,” I finally said, and the answer seemed to satisfy him.

“Tell me how he came to make that mark on you.”

I had a hard time meeting Sean’s blue eyes. Even in the dimness, they seemed to have a light of their own. “He knelt me naked in front of an ottoman, then proceeded to wrap my wrists and legs with rope. He tied me to it so I couldn’t move much.”

I closed my eyes, remembering the night while Sean’s deft hands stroked my calves and feet. I had no doubt if Marcus found out about this that would put an end to our relationship, but I also felt like maybe we’d already passed that point. The ease with which Sean drew me under his spell made it clear I couldn’t get that back with Marcus. Not after this.

“Go on, Kara.”

“It took him a long time to knot me. He liked to make them tight, and you know how much I like to be tied down.” He moaned softly, the memory a pleasure for us both. “He removed his tie and slipped it between my teeth so that I would be gagged but could still make lots of noise. He’s a lot like you in that respect. He loves to hear me scream.”

Sean’s breathing quickened and he reached up my body to the edge of my skirt and proceeded to slowly push its limits up my thighs. Before he could completely expose me he backed off. His hands felt strong, powerful against my skin.

“I loved when you screamed for me,” he murmured. “It was one of the few times you really let go.”

Pleasure radiated up from his touches and for a moment we were back in college again, in his bed with my arms tied to the headboard and his hand holding me down while he masturbated me to my second orgasm. My whole body had become so sensitive that even the pleasure was painful and still he tortured me with his fingers until he had me screaming his name. I’d lost my voice for a week.

“He touched me first,” I whispered. “He intended to torture me, to force me to the brink of pleasure then take it away. But I lost my head. I came when I wasn’t supposed to.”

A hiss of breath caught between Sean’s clenched teeth and his agile body shifted and climbed onto me, knelt with a knee on either side of my hips. I arched myself, surprised by his sudden aggression. I moaned and twisted beneath him. Even in the dark I could see him gazing down at me with unrestrained hunger. His heavy body pinned me into the pillows and I felt the growing hardness trapped between his body and my belly and I knew we were close to a tipping point we could never take back.  

Sean settled his hand against my throat and stroked his thumb along its delicate curve. The touch was light but sent intense warnings through my body.
I can take you
, it said.
I can reclaim you and you won’t stop me.
His pressure against my throat delivered doses of rapture to the pulsing pleasure between my legs. I squeezed my thighs and fought ceaselessly to control what Sean so easily unleashed.

“More,” he commanded. “What did he do to you for your disobedience?”

“He spanked me,” I responded softly. The words sounded foreign in my mouth. I’d never said them out loud, even though I’d enjoyed them many times from both Marcus and Sean. The words sounded torturously forbidden but they brought no shame. “My thoughts were somewhere else when he pulled his belt and folded it. I don’t remember how many times he brought the leather down. He’s always careful not to leave marks, but something pushed him a little out of control and this time he hit a little too low, a little too hard and left that one mark across the back of my thigh. That’s when I came back up. That’s when he dropped the belt and took me.”

A moan of pleasure rumbled deep in Sean’s chest. He spread my fingers and increased the pressure and I arched myself into him, tucked my head back and offered my body. I could feel him yearning for me, the size of his erection biting into my hip. Yet he held back. He fought every instinct to cross the line.

“What was it,” he murmured, his voice drugged with want. “What was it that pushed him over the edge to mark you?”