Slice of Pi 2 (8 page)

Coming around him like that would feel so good, with his body taut and straining at the ropes, desperate and needy. She could almost feel the thickness inside her. Thrusting two fingers now into her soaking pussy, she tried to replicate the sensation, but it wasn't quite good enough. Even so, it brought her right to the edge. She wanted to come, but she wanted him to wait. That was kinkier than she'd ever considered before. Holding off her own orgasm, she tried to focus on the way he had sounded, imagining that voice broken and desperate, asking her for his release.

She could give it to him, of course. That would be the nice thing to do. Or she could make him wait more. She could bring herself off, feel the delicious pleasure of her climax, and then straddle his face and make him lick her to completion again. She'd always been multiorgasmic, and this would be one hot way to take advantage of it. “Be a good boy,” she would tell him, “and I'll let you come tonight.”

Thinking of saying that, of having him completely at her mercy, was all it took for Iris to come and come hard. Her orgasm surprised her with its intensity, her muscles squeezing her fingers and her clit pulsing beneath her touch. Her mind went blissfully blank. She was left staring at the popcorn ceiling, feeling equally satisfied and unsatisfied. Yes, the orgasm was hot, but she wanted more. This felt like she'd opened some undiscovered part of herself.

She lay there for a few moments, panting audibly in the darkness, and then picked up her iPad again.

She needed to read absolutely everything.

6 

Owen hadn't heard from
Iris since sending her the list of books on Thursday, and he'd resigned himself to thinking she wasn't interested, which wasn't surprising to him as much as disappointing. But here it was Saturday afternoon and he had an email in his inbox with the subject line “Getting Together,” and his heartbeat was a low drumroll in his chest. He opened the email.

Hi, Owen. I had a great time on Thursday. Sorry I didn't write back. I guess I didn't realize I hadn't written until this morning, and I figured you should hear from me.

That wasn't a very good opening, despite the “I had a great time on Thursday” part. This sounded like a dismissal. He read on anyway.

I've been reading pretty much nonstop since you sent me that list. If you're up for it, I'd like to talk more. I'm coming home tomorrow morning and don't have any plans for the afternoon. Let me know if you want to get together and compare notes.

Iris

Compare notes? So she wasn't writing this off yet. He'd spent the last couple days convincing himself their encounter was a fluke he could only replay in his fantasies because he wasn't going to have it again. Between the busy state of the shop with a few October wedding cakes, and the general hubbub of business, he had put the whole situation mostly from his mind.

Well, not really. But he'd tried.

An email would be okay, but a text felt more immediate.

Got your email. I'm free tomorrow after two,
he texted
.
On Saturdays and Sundays, when the bakery was open until six instead of the weekday two-thirty, Juan joined him at noon and worked until closing. While Owen usually stuck around most of the day, he was technically off at one. For this, he could make himself leave on time.

Iris's reply came right away.
Meet at my place at 3?
And then an address.

Sure. See you then,
he sent back.

---

Punctuality was one of the qualities Owen prized, but he arrived at Iris's place a full fifteen minutes ahead of schedule and had time to kill. As he drove around her neighborhood he noticed a liquor store and went inside. He stood in front of the wine for a while. Was that too forward? Or even a good idea? Alcohol seemed risky for these conversations. Hard liquor was definitely out. He ended up picking up a six-pack of beer: innocuous, low-key, with just enough to take the edge off.

Owen pulled back up to Iris's complex, an apartment building in a nice part of town, just as the clock on his dashboard clicked over to 3:00. Perfect. He jogged up the path to the front door and pushed the buzzer for her number, then took the elevator up to the fourth floor, the top floor. She opened the door on the first knock.

Iris looked just as good as she had a few days ago lying on the white-sand beach in her cute striped bikini, even though she was fully clothed in jeans and a tank top.

“Hi.” Her smile widened at the sight of him as she stepped aside to let him in. “Oh, you didn't have to bring anything, but thanks.” Taking the beer, she closed the door behind him with one bare foot. He never thought of himself as having a foot fetish, but her bare feet and pink toenails drew his eye more than he thought they should. Iris held up the beer. “Sam Adams OctoberFest? I didn't know you could find that down here.”

“I didn't, either, but apparently Florida is in denial that it's hot as hell here all the time.” He looked around her dining room as she put the beer in the fridge. “Nice place.”

“Thanks. Take off your shoes and I'll give you the tour.” She wiped off her hands on her jeans and gestured around the room. “This is the dining room, as you can see, which is conveniently part of the kitchen.” She motioned for him to follow her into the next room. “This is the living room, where the living takes place. Very exciting.”

Owen checked out the homey-looking space, with its leather couch and chair, the coffee table, a few plants, and a TV mounted on the wall, lots of art on the walls that he wanted to examine in more detail. “Yes, very exciting.”

“The bedroom is in here.” Iris opened the door but didn't step through, and Owen understood he wasn't going in. At least not yet. She waved her arm at the space. “It's small, but it works. The bathroom's through here.” Tour over, she shrugged. “It's quite spacious, as you can see.”

Owen heard the sarcasm in her voice. He looked around again. Sure, the place wasn't very big, but it was open and not cluttered at all, which made it seem roomy. “I like it. It's the right size for one person. You wouldn't want to take care of a huge place, right?”

“I guess not. I had a chance to move to a two bedroom a couple of years ago, but I decided it wasn't worth the trouble.” An expression passed over Iris's face, something like regret, but she didn't elaborate, and then the expression was back to normal. Owen didn't ask. “Anyway.” Iris brightened. “Everything I've been reading says we should talk about our limits and interests first. There are questionnaires, but they all were, like, ten pages long and I got overwhelmed. So maybe we can just talk?”

Owen gestured to the fridge. “Mind if I get into those beers?”

“Yeah, I think I'm going to need one, too.” Iris smiled. “I'll get them. You go have a seat on the couch.”

As he sat down, Owen took a closer look around Iris's living room. Framed photographs decorated the end table next to him, which also held a weird abstract lamp that looked like it was made from a giant fish of some kind. An eldritch horror fish, he realized, remembering the wonderful terror of H. P. Lovecraft stories that he'd been into back in high school. Come to think of it, as he looked more closely, the eldritch horror decor was in more than just the fish lamp. She had some ghastly candle holders on another table, and a weird mermaid sea creature painting on the wall that looked less like a Disney mermaid and more like some kind of nightmare that was nonetheless beautiful. Her art tastes were rather macabre. Not gory, not like horror, all with a touch of sweetness, but not what he would have expected. He got up to examine a framed print more closely where it hung on the wall in the corner. It was a set of line art drawings of small children following a terrible beast, and the children looked ghoulish, with the beast leading them into some kind of cave.

“Is it weirding you out?” a voice asked behind him, and Owen started, not having heard Iris come into the room again.

“A little,” he confessed. “It's really good art, it's just . . . unusual.”

Iris handed him a beer and sat down on the couch. He followed, sitting as well, pulling one knee up to turn to her.

“I'm into horror and stuff like that, but I thought it would be unpleasant to have too much of it in my house, so I compromised with weird.” Iris shrugged. “It's a quirk of mine. I've always been into this stuff, though. Most of the art is mine. Well, the painting and the drawings. I know it's not that good, but it makes me happy to see it.”

“That's all you?” Owen looked back up at the print in admiration. He'd assumed it was done by a professional. “Damn, you really should have gone into art instead of HR.” He looked back in time to see Iris give an uncomfortable look that she tried to hide. He was quick to recover. “But you're at a game design company! Couldn't they hire you on as an illustrator or animator of some kind?”

Iris shook her head. “I'm not really good enough for all that. Plus, they have a full art team already, people with actual degrees in this stuff.” She paused, mouth opening as if something occurred to her, but then she closed her mouth again and shook her head.

He had recognized the hope that passed. “What?”

Iris shrugged. “No, it's silly.” She looked down and off to the side, staring at one of the pictures. He didn't want to pry, but he was also curious, so he stayed quiet and waited. After a minute, she said, “I was just thinking, they do hire freelancers now and then for side projects. I handle payroll and freelance contracts for them.”

“Oh! So maybe you could get into something like that.” Iris obviously had talent, albeit of the weird macabre kind, and he hated to see her seeming so down on herself without even giving her talent a chance. He had a sudden image of the cakes he baked for Halloween, the spidery art he drew along the sides, and wished he had the kind of artistic talent to illustrate like she did. “I should teach you to do that on cakes. I'd hire you out for all kinds of work this time every year.”

Iris smiled, still looking mildly uncomfortable. “Thanks, but it's just a hobby for me right now. I don't think I could compete with people who have had real training.”

Owen looked back at the wall art, its delicate balance of creepy and cute. “I don't know. It seems really good to me. Maybe you should go for one of those freelance positions when they come up, just see how it goes. It can't hurt, right?”

“Yeah, sure, maybe.” She looked away, her discomfort more palpable. “Anyway.” She took a long swig of beer and swallowed. “Interests. What are you into?”

“Oh.” Owen took a moment to reorient to the new topic. “I think it would be easier if you go first.” He didn't want to scare her off with a lengthy list if it turned out her limits were light bondage and discipline.

Iris gave him a sidelong glance, her one raised eyebrow communicating that she thought he was evading the question, but she didn't put it back on him. “All right.” She took another sip of beer. “I've read all the books you sent me.”

“All of them?” Owen was surprised, and impressed. He'd sent her a list of six books, and a couple of them weren't short.

“Yeah. I had a lot of downtime while it was raining on Friday.” With a wave of her hand, she dismissed his question. “I can only guess at what I'd be into, of course, because I don't have any experience in any of this. So, don't hold me to this list, okay?”

“No commitments. Got it.” Owen nodded.

Iris twirled her beer absentmindedly, moving the bottle in slow circles while she stared off into the distance, thinking. “I like the whole idea of being in control. That's a turn-on for me. Bondage seems fun, and so does spanking and everything that goes along with it. I like the idea of making a guy wait while I get what I want.”

Owen licked his lips. “Like orgasm denial?” He was careful to keep his tone neutral. This was his biggest kink, but he didn't want to turn her away by pushing too hard if she wasn't interested.

“Yeah. Orgasm denial. If . . . I mean, if you were into that.” She set her bottle down on the coffee table, right on a coaster. Iris was the type of person with coasters. That said something about a person's level of care. He was a coaster kind of guy himself.

“Honestly? It's my favorite kink. I've never been able to practice it with anyone before, so I don't know how it would be in actuality, but I'm really interested.”

She nodded to him, a smile playing about her lips. “I'm really interested, too. What else are you interested in?”

His turn. “I also like bondage and impact play. I'm not a real masochist, as in the pain itself doesn't get me off, but I'm into being controlled.” He considered. “I might be a
little
bit into the pain.” As he opened his mouth to say the next part, he felt a sudden swell of emotion, like his throat had gone tight. He dry-swallowed, then took a sip of beer. Better. “I want to please someone. I want to have an arrangement where I know that what I'm doing makes someone happy.”

Iris nodded, her expression softening. “But you make lots of people happy. Like in your regular life, at your job. Nothing makes people happier than delicious baked goods.”

It wasn't the same, and he struggled to articulate why, picking at the beer bottle label with his thumbnail. “I guess so. It's not really me who makes them happy, though. It's my cakes and pies and cookies. Plus, I'm too concerned with the whole operation, making sure everything is done perfectly and nothing gets forgotten, so I don't interact with the customers very much. I can't ever relax when I'm there. I have to make all the decisions.” He thought about his ideal sexual partner, all those fantasies he had about being dominated. “It's a turn-on to have someone take that control away. It's not that I'm lazy, I just want to shut my brain off. Serve and feel needed. Gain my pleasure from her pleasure.”

Iris looked at him, making direct eye contact, and licked her lips. She probably didn't do it consciously, at least it didn't seem like she did, but the action made his cock twitch. “I want to try this out.” Her eyes were alight with something mischievous and dark. He liked that look, the way it was simultaneously exciting and frightening. “I've spent the last few days reading those books, and I think that if I don't at least give it a go I'm going to regret it.”