Protege (27 page)

It was his turn to look away. Lowering his gaze, he sighed. “And with Brys?”

“When he touched me, I wanted to draw back. When he filled me, I wanted to shatter. When he told me to kneel . . . I just couldn't.”

His lips pressed to her head. “You said you enjoyed last night.”

“There came a point where nature won. My body overpowered my mind and I felt the pleasure of their touch. But, Jude, I hated it because it wasn't you. I only wanted to please you, so I shut my eyes and did my best to convince myself it was you, not them.”

Something dark shifted inside him, filling his loins and calling on every possessive part of his being. His breath turned labored as he tried to make sense of everything she'd just said, how aroused her confession made him on an emotional level. There was nothing physically stimulating him. Only the sound and meaning behind her eloquent words.

Dear God, it would be so easy to love her. But if he were to consider this, it wouldn't be a game. It wouldn't be a stepping-stone to prepare her for another man. He wanted her—all of her—and he didn't want to share.

The clock in the foyer chimed and on cue there was a knock at the door. That would be Brys. Urgency crowded him as every certainty he'd held two minutes ago evaporated and he lost his footing.

He felt adrift and clueless as to what to do, his mind scrambled. He needed to keep his head and not be misled by instinct.

But what was this incredible hold she had on him? It wasn't her sweet southern draw or her soft body. It wasn't the way she cooked for him or made his bed every morning. It was something without a name.

Seeing her with the others last night hit a nerve, one he no longer had the patience for. It called out his demons and made him aware of just how much Tiffany's betrayal had scarred him. Most of all, it had infuriated him because on some level it proved that Collette was not as solely devoted to his ideals as he'd hoped, but that wasn't the case at all.

“Why didn't you safe-word?” he suddenly asked as the doorbell rang.

She glanced toward the hall, fear visibly riding her as hard as it rode him. They were running out of time.

She shrugged. “Because I was mad at you and because, at the same time, I thought it was what you wanted and I can't shut off my need to please you.”

He grabbed her face and held her so she was looking at him. “Listen to me, Collette. I never want you to do something that you don't want to do. That sort of visceral reaction you had, that is
not
okay with me. That you forced yourself to tolerate something physically or emotionally unpleasant when its only purpose was to bring you pleasure goes against everything I want for you.”

“That's not completely true.”

He frowned as the goddamn doorbell rang again and now his phone buzzed, notifying him of a text. “What do you mean? Ignore the door.”

She swallowed. “It was supposed to determine if I'm okay with sharing. I'm not. Not if you aren't right there with me. The moment you stepped away, I felt . . . lost.”

His phone began to ring. “Damn it.” He placed her on the bed. “Just . . . I'll be right back.”

Regret flashed in her eyes as she nodded and lowered her gaze to the floor. He pulled his phone out as he took the stairs. “I'm on my way.” He hung up. Brys was an impatient son of a bitch.

When he opened the door the other man grinned like the Cheshire cat on his way to a big vat of sweet cream. “It's six. I'm here to collect my sub.”

He ought to punch him. First of all, she wasn't his sub. She wasn't anyone's until she was put through the system. “There's been a change of plans.”

It gave him smug satisfaction to watch the other man's smile fall. “What are you talking about? I've already made arrangements—”

“Well, unmake them. Collette's staying at the château.”

Brys scowled. “You can't do that. Ezra faxed me the contract and I already signed—”

“It's just paper, nothing more, until she signs. She won't.”

“That's coercion, Jude.”

“I've done nothing to coerce her, you have my word. If you don't believe me, you can ask her yourself. She's staying here and continuing as my protégé.”

His eyes narrowed. “Where is she?”

“She's—” He turned and stilled, spotting her just out of Brys's line of vision at the top of the stairs. She looked stunning, her lips parted and her breath coming quickly. She'd likely heard everything he'd said and was relieved. “Where she is isn't your concern. You only need to know that your service is no longer needed. I thank you for your help and apologize for any inconvenience. Now, if you'll excuse me—”

“This is bullshit. I want to speak to her—”

Brys moved to push the door open and Jude caught his arm, his grip unbreakable. “You will do no such thing,” he snarled, his voice laced with the unrefined necessity to protect her. “This is my home and she's mine to protect. If you think for one moment I'd let you approach her while your control escapes you, I seriously question your judgment. Now, I will only
ask
one more time that you remove yourself from my property and enjoy the rest of your night. Next, I'll be telling you, and you'll realize just how much you've underestimated the authority I hold.”

He released his arm and Brys jerked it back with a scowl. “Others will hear about this.”

“Good. Then they can inform you just how insane it is to question my edict. You're here at Fernweh because I allow you to be, Brys. Never forget that. Good night.”

He shut the door and waited a beat for his temper to cool. Her steps echoed as she slowly came down the stairs. Without turning to face her, he sensed her approach. She waited for him to address her, her control and patience again impressing him.

Her trust seemed impermeable, her devotion evident in everything she did. He'd never known a submissive with such a specific desire to please
him
, not just a generic authority figure setting demands. Her effort was for
him
. It was intoxicating to be handed such a priceless gift.

He wondered if time would present an inconsistency in her devotion, feared it might. But the unequivocal truth was that she said she loved him and he was starting to believe she actually did. It was believable, because it was becoming clear that he was definitely falling in love with her.

Collette wasn't sure what was happening. She never saw him act so passionately forceful. Every submissive part of her wanted to go to him in that moment, collapse to her knees, bare and exposed, and present herself to him. But the way his shoulders shook with each breath, and the fact that he had yet to face her, gave her pause.

She waited, dressed in the clothes she'd packed from home, as everything she wanted seemed so close yet still out of reach. He'd said she was staying. That was what she was sure she heard, but the longer he stood with his back to her, facing the door, the more her mind started to play tricks on her.

She wondered if she'd misinterpreted his meaning. It was too much to depend on without some sort of promise from him, anything that told her he'd let her stay for the last two weeks.

“I'm not an easy man, Collette,” he murmured.

She didn't respond because she sensed there was more.

“I can only teach you so much before my personal judgment skews what should be solely about you and your desires, your experiences. I've never done this before and it's more challenging than I anticipated.”

Her chest lifted with each deep breath. “Then show me how to be what
you
want,” she suggested softly. “It doesn't have to be only about me and what's on paper.”

“You're asking for something that'll be impossible to reverse. Once I make this about me, I won't stop. I'm greedy and my demands are more than what you've experienced. It'll become real.”

That was all she'd been after. This superficial aftertaste of everything thus far, his constant detachment and insistence that she stay attuned to the fact that this was only temporary, was agony. Maybe everything wasn't a science or a mathematical equation based on percentiles and fetishes. Maybe there was actually such a thing as love. A need so great it made compatibility possible, even when people were polar opposites.

There were exceptions to every rule. “I understand,” she said.

He sighed and held out a hand, still not facing her. Her feet moved slowly and her arm lifted. Her fingers glided against his as she squeezed. And then the world tilted on its axis and everything came tumbling down in beautiful, chaotic disarray.

Twisting, he jerked her to his chest. His mouth crashed over hers, devouring and demanding as he curled her into his body and pressed her against the door.

His hands were everywhere, tearing at her clothes, shoving down her pants and panties. She'd never been stripped so fast in her life. His clothes were yanked out from under her grip as he tossed them away.

Every time their mouths ripped apart he came back to her twice as hard, as though he had to make up for that little blip of lost time and catch everything he released before it slipped out of reach.

His palm crushed her breast as he shoved his thigh between her legs. Tearing his mouth away, he abruptly turned her, pressing her palms against the door and stretching her arms high over her head.

His knees urgently knocked at the space between her own and her feet stepped out. Her palms remained planted high on the door as he gave them a warning press. He spread her folds and filled her in one swift thrust, causing her to rise on her toes and cry out his name.

His hand traveled up her belly, pulling hard at her waist as he thrust again. He groped her breasts, bit her shoulders, and squeezed the flesh of her thighs. She'd never been taken so roughly in her life, nor had she ever felt so wanted, so possessed, so needed.

“Collette.” His husky call was an opiate to her lust, tickling her dazed mind as she was carried away on a cloud of need and desire.

Her body jerked against the solid door. He fucked her without reserve or apology. Every emotion, every flaw was there, exposed in those vulnerable moments of raw need for her to feel.

It had never been just a job to him. He had too much depth to see this as something shallow. He might not love her, but he liked her, wanted her, and that—she suddenly understood—was why he'd pushed her away and separated them with walls. His boundaries were crumbling and he was finally letting the real him show through.

Her mind wouldn't stop spinning as this became clear, an untangling ball of yarn that unknotted all the tension inside her and spun new complications, puzzles she had yet to figure out but looked forward to solving. This was real and with the awareness that the facades were gone, came the liberation she'd been waiting for all along.

Her entire body broke into a sweat as her mind flashed with vibrant shades of white. Her muscles locked and pulsed as though outside her command. And as he filled her, everything inside her loosened and snapped like a bolt of lightning, breaking free of the glass that had caged her all these years.

There was no time to worry about presentation or impressions. Her body simply took over as her body coiled and held him greedily, his seed pumping into her. Her mind was so high that coming back to earth was a free fall she didn't need to think about landing.

Everything was soft and jelled together in a rhythmic play of muscles tightening and blood flowing. It was the most peaceful place she'd ever visited, and shocking that it was inside her all along. She only needed him to take her there.

He lifted her and carried her up the stairs. Her eyes never opened, her consciousness funneling in and out. They were in the hall, then his room. She smiled at the familiar scent of his sheets.

He pulled her close—warm, so very warm. And then he simply held her, not like he'd done before. This time he held her as if she were precious and dropping her would absolutely devastate him. He held her like he would never let go. He held her like he
needed
to hold her.

She sighed, her nose pressing into his chest as he laid kisses on the top of her head. “My peach,” he whispered.
“Mine.”

She smiled. Yes, she was his.

***

“My mother's retired but was incredibly successful from the start of her career.”

Her hand brushed over his brow as he softly told her about his family. She hung on every word, craving the welcome into every crevice of each secret he held. “Are you close to her?”

He shrugged. “In a sense. She never neglected me, but she also never cuddled or held me as a young child. I had au pairs since I was six weeks old.” He gaze turned unfocused. “She was a very career-driven woman, strong.”

“Did it bother you, the way she was? Is that why you're drawn to submissive women?”

His gaze held hers. “No, because in truth, I think it takes more strength to be submissive than it does to be anything else. Your battle to trust is internal. No one can ease the struggle for you. It's beautiful, something that's always captivated me. I think, deep down, my mother craved someone strong enough to gentle her, someone she could trust to protect her long enough to show her internal softness. It saddens me to think she's never found him.”

“Maybe she has and just hasn't introduced you.”

“Perhaps.” He pulled her closer, his fingers twirling the end of her curls. “Do you remember your mother?”

“She was gentle. I remember that. Mostly I remember how much my dad adored her, maybe because I rehashed those memories so much as a child, trying to make sense of everything. Sometimes I wonder if I exaggerated them in my head over time. No matter what, they don't compute with his actions, but I know he loved her. Maybe he loved her too much. Her going to someone else killed him. It made life worthless.”

“Do you forgive him?”

“No.” She likely never would. “My mom's dead. She can't suffer anymore. My dad will die in a prison cell. But I have to live my life never knowing what it is to have a normal family. He took that from me. I blame him for every bad home I was forced to endure. She may have destroyed their marriage, but he destroyed my childhood. I don't think any other time shapes a person more than those years.”

“It must have been very difficult.”

She didn't want pity and was glad his comment struck her more as sympathy. “It was, but I lived through it.”

“Tell me your best memory from when you were in foster care.”

She thought of moments that were happy, but so many of those moments were borrowed, herself an outsider permitted to look in and steal a bit of the emotion vicariously. She tried to think of a moment during her adolescence when she was truly happy, and it hit her.

“One family took me to visit my dad. They didn't tell me where we were going and I remember being scared at the sight of the prison, thinking it was the scariest orphanage I'd ever seen. But then I realized where we were, and my dad was suddenly there. At first I didn't recognize him. His hair had whitened and he looked thinner, yet brawnier than he'd ever been at home.”

“What did you do?”

“I let go of my foster mother's hand and I ran to him.” She smiled, recalling how hard the earth pounded under her feet and how she willed her legs to get her to him faster. “He held out his arms and swept me up and I breathed him in. I'd forgotten the scent of his skin, but in that moment it came back to me, more familiar than ever.”

He was silent as she relived the moment in her mind. Looking into Jude's eyes, she explained, “You probably think it's crazy for me to love a murderer, especially the one who killed my mother. Maybe I am. But they're all separate in my mind and I can't mingle them. He is and will always be my dad. His punishment, it's between him and the courts and his Maker. I don't want the responsibility of such a thing.”

“Spoken like a true submissive.”

She grinned. “I don't. That sort of authority terrifies me.”

Leaning close, he kissed her forehead. “And what will you do if your Dom loses his way, peach?”

His words spoke of so much more than a simple question should. Her breath caught as she looked into his eyes, seeing how much emphasis he already placed on her response.

“I think I'd get lost with him, but if he was truly
my
Dom, we'd find each other in the dark and somehow make our way home.”

He kissed her, soft and gentle, rolling her to her back. His body fit over hers, a welcome weight she was already addicted to. He fit himself inside her, slowly bringing her to a state of fulfillment, emotionally and physically.

“Home,” he whispered, his hands gently holding her face as he kissed her again.

He made love to her with tender ease. Perhaps it wasn't love, but it felt as if it were. With no barriers between them and the way his eyes held her as much as his arms, she was surrounded by him, his essence, his strength, and the heat of his touch reached deep inside her, blanketing her heart.

In that moment, he was not her Dom. He was simply Jude. He was vulnerable and human, and she wanted to protect him as much as he desired to protect her. Same as the need rested inside her to serve, he harbored a need to protect.

How adrift he must have felt, losing his wife. It broke her heart to imagine him, so powerful and controlled, feeling so inadequate. But what human being, man or woman, Dom or sub, didn't know that emotion? She didn't believe there was a person on this earth who hadn't experienced the hollowing fear of not being enough and the actuality that sometimes they simply weren't.

Because she was a teacher, it was her duty to educate students, not just French or reading, writing, and arithmetic, but actual life skills. She, like every teacher, was charged with the responsibility of teaching children right from wrong, kindness and understanding.

Whenever a teacher discovered a bully, there was an internal dilemma, two sides of the coin. Those who can't show love usually need it the most and have the hardest time accepting it. Their broken hearts and battered minds don't accept that they could be deserving of such gifts—without force—and they can't trust the sincerity of what they've never truly known.

Meeting Jude was the first time she felt grounded in a long time. She wasn't sure why or how he'd made the storm inside her settle. She only knew that he had, and the thought of letting him go and losing her ground again terrified her beyond measure. She couldn't go back to that lost place. She just couldn't.

Clarity came the longer she thought about it. So long as she gave him the submission he needed to exercise his dominance, he would not lose himself in the moroseness of life. They could hold each other still and thereby set each other free.

***

Over the following days so much became clear. It wasn't that the stories she'd read online were wrong, it was that Jude was right. Right for her. He wasn't the typical Dom, not the sort she'd read about or saw in videos. He was gentle and required very little to take command of her and elicit a response.

She reacted to his tenderness with pure eloquence. Once they really began to explore one another on a personal level, forgetting the paperwork and lists that needed to be checked, they became poetry in motion, so fluid, gliding beside one another, catching each other's glances and raising each other up, it was too much to convey in a report.

There were moments that he was straightforward, specifically instructing her on something as simple as how to place her hands when she presented herself to him. Now, when she kneeled for him, she did so with confidence, knowing his clear instructions were reliable. He'd told her exactly how he liked her best, and she did it.

His guidance was given without harsh criticism, and he always praised her when she achieved whatever it was he asked. His praise was the air she breathed, the heat warming her lungs and guiding her heart.

He was her anchor and so long as he led her in a way she could follow, she was secure, trusting he would not reject her if she didn't get something right the first time.

The more he explained, the more curious she became. She wanted to know the rationale behind every desire he had. Sometimes he was cheeky, teasing her about simply enjoying the sight of her body a certain way, but other times there was a very direct explanation regarding safety, which she hadn't considered.