Own (Command Force Alpha #1) (27 page)

“Yes, Sir. That’s much better.”

“Good. In situations like…this one, you will always have permission to ask for a break to neaten up.”

“Thank you, Sir.”

He pushed her hair aside and looped the bathrobe tie around her neck, ever so loosely, so that he could hold both ends. No knot. He wouldn’t risk it. Her labored breathing was more than enough of a thrill. “Katsu, this is your leash.”

“Evan, Sir…?”

“What happened to Master?”

“Because I want to speak to Evan.”

He moved away and inhaled slowly. They were new. They were here and now. She’d used the equivalent of a red light, and she’d done so politely.

“Yes, Kat?”

“I feel really uncomfortable with being treated…” she swallowed, Evan felt the tug work its way up the tie he held in tense hands, “…like an animal.”

He knelt to level their faces and tucked her perfectly groomed hair behind her ears. “I understand. What I’m going to ask of you won’t change. But what we call it can.”

Concentration showed in the way she drew her eyebrows close and nibbled her lower lip with her fucking adorable overbite. “Rope? I know it isn’t. But a rope can bind people to people.”

“As opposed to a leash binding an animal.”

She exhaled slowly, like relief. “Yes, Sir.”

“Done.” He stood and grabbed steadiness with every cell in his brain and every muscle in his body. “Katsu, this is your rope.” He gave the tie a little tug. “Feel how I have control over you?”

“Yes, Sir. I can’t go anywhere you don’t want me to.”

“That’s right. Now, come this way.”

He led her slowly, so slowly, toward the glass in the middle of the room. Because Kat couldn’t see him where he paced beside her, just behind her, he pressed his free hand around his cock. He was so goddamn hard. He wished he’d kept his briefs on, because his arousal made him feel almost as vulnerable as Kat must feel as she crawled inch by inch toward the glass. When she moved too fast, he tugged the tie. When she slowed too much, he loosened his grip. She read every cue. He pressed harder on the base of his throbbing prick, but it was too much of a temptation. He stroked himself a couple times. Sight and sensation merged to burn through his veins like acid. Only years of excruciating self-control made him drop his hand.

Katsu reached the glass, with her face hovering over it.

“Drink. No hands.”

She shuddered. She hesitated. It must’ve struck that same nerve, being treated like an animal, but this time she managed the task without voicing her misgivings. Bending low, giving Evan the most delicious view of her ass and glistening pussy, she put her lips to the rim of the glass and drank what she could manage.

“Good. Very good. I know how hard that must’ve been for you.”

Her only reply was a slight nod.

“I appreciate when you do difficult things for me. It makes me feel like I’ve chosen the right girl to serve me. Are you the right girl to serve me, Katsu?”

“I am, Sir.”

“I know. Now stay right there.”

He positioned himself behind her and knelt. How easy it would be to sink into her. He’d put a condom on the nightstand—a string of them, to be honest. Grab one. Roll it on. Bliss.

No.

He laid the ties
just so
across her back, so that they formed a symmetrical pattern of white against her honey skin. She shivered. Then he opened the bottle of lotion. “I’m going to soothe these red marks. They must sting still. But the price is that you relinquish all say in how I come. This is a moment where I’m giving you a choice, Katsu. You can have my hands rubbing lotion on your stinging ass, or you can choose how I come.”

A sad little noise hitched from her chest. She bowed her head, not toward the glass but out of what looked like defeat. He didn’t want defeat from Katsu. Somewhere, he’d gotten it wrong. What had he done to misjudge her?

He wasn’t going to ask. He could figure this out.

I know her.

That was a shot to the heart. He
did
know her, well enough to think this game of theirs was serious, that he had awareness enough of both their passions to make the whole thing come together. It was a shot to the heart because he’d never felt closer to her. He knelt behind her, where a robe tie decorated her lithe back and she’d just sipped from a glass on the floor. But he was taken aback so hard by the realization that he almost called it off. He understood, then, why she’d felt the need to make a joke and break the spell. The spell was as dangerous as it was intoxicating.

Snippets of words from their previous conversation came back to him with the crystal clarity of having listened to a recording a hundred times.

I tried to be normal… Telling them what I like…

There’s a freedom in having no choice.

She didn’t
want
to choose. The thought snapped into place with the assurance of a missile locking on target. It snapped into place—and he understood it fully for the first time.

Evan uncapped the bottle and smoothed sweet, slick lotion over her backside. His handprints had left her red and slightly swollen. He liked having marked her, claiming her, but he liked caring for her just as much. She moaned and even backed into his touch—enough to slink right to the edge of his rules, yet not enough to make him feel that she’d disobeyed. When her skin shone with a pink glow, she was practically purring.

“That’s better, my sharp little shark. So much better.” With the lotion set aside, he picked up a condom and walked to the settee. The velvet felt amazing against his bare, hot back. He let his knees sprawl to show off how ready he was for his woman.

His woman.

He pushed that thought away.

But she
was
his…for the night.

“Look at me,” he ordered, voice tighter than he would’ve liked. Kat raised her head and gasped. Passion clouded her eyes and made her breathe in great gulps. “Do you like what you see?”

“Very much, Sir.” She swallowed, bent her neck and seemed to find a deep well of strength as if she were readying to face a firing squad. “Shall I choose now?”

Her words were strangled. She would do it, if he demanded it of her. It would ruin her fun. It would put her in a place of uncertainty and doubt. Maybe even fear. He never wanted that for Katsu. Not ever. That she appeared determined enough to try was enough.

“I’ll choose. Because you don’t like that, do you? Choosing?”

Relief washed over her expression as if she’d stepped into a shower, where hot water and steam evaporated her cares. “How do you…?” She shook her head before recapturing his gaze with clouded eyes. “I don’t want to choose, Sir. Thank you for taking that burden from me.”

“You’re welcome.” He idly stroked his cock, admiring the shape of her breasts and ass in that submissive position. So much perfection. “I’m thirsty, Katsu. Crawl to me. Bring the glass of water with you, however you can manage. I’ll have made up my mind by the time you kneel between my legs.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

Kat could have taken a moment to collect herself. The impulse was there, flitting through levels of her subconscious she didn’t want to explore. The levels she
wouldn’t
explore. Things down that deep could break her heart.

Yet making order of her thoughts…that would defeat the purpose. She wasn’t incapable. She wasn’t some fucked-brainless dimwit. Submission didn’t work that way.

She didn’t want anything but the free-floating feeling Evan was giving her.

She crawled back to the glass of water, slowly and carefully. The perfectly arranged ties of terrycloth moved a couple bare inches, but they didn’t fall. He hadn’t told her to keep it on. He hadn’t needed to. She wanted to present that perfection as a gift.

Lifting slightly, she knelt shallowly before the squat tumbler. Since the water had come from the tap, no cool condensation had collected on the sides of the glass. Even now there were choices. How she could grip it, whether she’d use a single hand, or…God, even nudge it along with her nose.

She wasn’t ready for that. She held the glass balanced in both hands, scooting on her knees, carrying it before her like a novitiate bringing her offering to an altar. Her knees rubbed against the fine nap of the carpet. Sweat sprang up at the small of her back, where the ends of the bathroom tie still dangled.

This was…hard. Beyond hard. All her walls were down, and by asking for such a simple word as
Sir
, Evan had effectively asked for complete control. That wasn’t the hardest part. The amazing thing was that she’d given it. All to him. All for him.

He was handsome, and strong, and so damn smart, but that wasn’t the whole of him, or
most
of him. The real Evan was the way his gaze tracked her every movement, and the way his lips parted with silent amazement. He probably didn’t realize the way he was looking at her. Throughout most of this, most of the time, he’d appeared fierce. Intent. But as she crawled toward him carrying a simple glass of water, he was…thunderstruck.

She’d done that for him. To him.

He spread his knees an extra inch as she made the last approach. Lifting the glass above the level of her head, she dipped her chin and let her ass sink down where it nestled on her upturned heels. She knew what she must look like.

She didn’t care—not for the sake of her pride or anyone else’s judgment. Those were motes in the storm that swirled throughout the hotel suite. Kat only cared that she presented Evan with the perfect, pretty picture of servitude that would excite him.

He took the glass from her, as his knuckles stroked over her cheek. The touch was feather soft but intimidating. There was so much more he could do to her. For her. With her. If Evan asked, she would do reckless things. She would stand nude on the hotel suite’s balcony, or walk downstairs to the bar and order a drink for him in only her bra and matching lace panties. She’d do whatever it took to keep that contented, pleased smile on his face.

“I’m impressed,” he said in a voice that verged on a purr, despite the undeniable erection rising up between them. Kat realized then, it wasn’t an orgasm that he needed. It was that she’d handed him the glass of water he sipped from.

After those scant sips, he held the glass over her shoulder. She thought briefly about taking it from him, but he hadn’t said so. Instead, she waited patiently while air slipped in and out of her lungs. She didn’t have to worry about breathing anymore. Air was hers, like a long-lost sense suddenly returned.

Evan drizzled the water across her tits, no more than a drop at a time. She gasped when the first rivulet struck her skin. The temperature hadn’t seemed extreme in the glass, but compared to her overheated skin, it was as cold as ice cubes.

She hadn’t thought that her nipples could bead any tighter, but they did. Pleasure crisscrossed out from that singeing cold. Her pussy pulsed as she subtly clenched her thighs against the swollen pressure.

“You’re beautiful, Katsu.”

Water cascaded down her breasts, across her stomach, pooling at her knees and disappearing into the thick carpet. “I am when you look at me.”

He dropped the tumbler and wrapped both hands around her face. His kiss was flaring and sudden. If she could climb inside him, she would. With silent orders, he lifted her up and up. She was forced into a halfway position, too high to kneel but not quite enough to stand.

He curved an arm around the small of her back and pulled her flush against him where he sat. There was so much steadiness in him. His hands were made of oak and his will forged iron. He gave her no choice but to bend her knees exactly where he wanted. She was spread wide across his lap. Open.

He liked her open and exposed.

“Upright, shark.” He framed her ribs with those big hands. “Sit up and let me look at you.”

She wanted to squirm. He demanded so many difficult things. Her body was a thing she owned, a piece of her puzzle and something that usually pleased her. Under Evan’s intense scrutiny, mere flesh became more. It was an extension of her desire to please him. Her stomach pushed in and out on rapid breaths, and her breasts rose and fell to the same rhythm. She was panting. When had that started?

Her mouth was dry, despite her slurped sips of water. Possibilities existed in the space between their bodies, but those possibilities couldn’t include forever. There was no future with Evan.

Yet she obeyed. She didn’t move. Couldn’t look away. Couldn’t squirm back from the way he examined her. He traced the blades of her collarbones, where she could barely feel his feathery touch, before he moved to the arch of her shoulders. She wanted to beg him to touch her breasts, to cup her flesh in those big hands.

He traced the muscles in her upper arms instead.

She was his—in every sense those words could be twisted to mean.

She knew it when he touched her lower lip and dug into that tender place. Daring, she licked the tip of his finger, curling her tongue around it. The taste of the lotion was almost sweet, so she licked again, desperate to find the taste of
him
.

Part of her expected protests to burst from her mouth. Curses. Demands of her own. Or complaints wrapped up in the pretty package of begging.