Submit and Surrender (16 page)

“Yes,” she said.

“You are mine,” he said.

“Yes!”

“Now come as many times as you can,” he said.

With a growl, he plunged into her again, and Adra screamed. She came immediately. She came insanely. She wasn’t sure if she ever stopped, or if that low, buzzing hum was just the base note of the longest orgasm of her life, or if what would happen next was that she might actually die. She had no idea what was happening to her. And she didn’t care, as long as Ford kept doing it to her.

And he did, until sweat began to trickle down his forehead, until his own fingers dug into the carpet beneath her, until he dropped his head and kissed her roughly. Then he pinned her hands above her head and, with a feral growl, gripped her neck with his teeth and finished them both, fucking her with wild, senseless abandon until they both lay sweaty and limp on his living room floor.

Adra loved that feeling, with Ford on top of her. Loved how he covered her, how she could bring her hands up the broad plans of his back and never quite reach everything, how she could barely see over his shoulders while he breathed her in. It was the first time she felt like she was drowning and enjoyed it.

She had no idea how much time had passed.

She didn’t care.

It was Ford who moved first, Ford who would have been waking up to his Dom responsibilities. Adra was content to lie there for the rest of time, really, but Ford stirred, nuzzled her, licked her neck, pushed himself off of her so that he could see her face.

So that he could stroke her cheek.

So that he could kiss her.

So that he could take care of her.

Adra was still floating somewhere high in subspace when he gathered her up, carrying her again to a comfy couch, wrapping them both in a blanket. Even as things were still kind of fuzzy, she remembered being gratified by the fact that they were both naked this time, and she found herself burrowing into his chest, toying with the fine hairs she found there. She didn’t even remember to worry about it all.

“How are you?” he asked, after a while.

“I’m excellent,” she said, and sighed softly.

“Still coming down?”

“I don’t even know,” she said. “It feels different. Easier. The drop isn’t so hard.”

“This was intense,” he said, stroking her hair. “Was it too much?”

Just like him to make sure.

“It was perfect,” Adra said, looking up at him. She meant it. “It was exactly…it was perfect. I would tell you, Ford. I wouldn’t hide it just for your approval. I’m not that sub.”

“I know you’re not,” he said gently.

“How did you come up with that, on the fly,” she murmured.

“I’m that good,” Ford said, shrugging.

She smacked his chest, but what was she going to do, argue with him?

“How are you outside of the scene?” he asked, suddenly serious again.

And she was now very, very aware of their closeness, all over again. Only this time, it didn’t bother her. She knew it would later, but at the moment her body simply did not have the energy to freak out anymore.

Ford was a very smart man.

“I’m ok,” she said. “I am, really. This was…this was perfect, I meant it. I feel kind of amazing. You may have killed a whole bunch of brain cells, but they were all the bad kind, so I think it’s a win.”

“Is that how that works?” Ford said, and snaked his hand up her stomach to play with her breasts. Adra sucked in her breath but couldn’t fight a smile. “I’m going to have to kill a whole lot more.”

“We’re outside a scene,” she said in mock disapproval.

“We are well into cuddle time,” Ford said, gently rolling a nipple between his fingers. “And you are mine, anyway. I’m gonna do this whenever I want.”

God, that sounded good. How could she fight that?

She bit her lip.

“You keep doing that, we’re going to be in a scene again pretty quickly,” Ford said.

“Oh my God, you’re going to kill me.”

“We’ll die happy, though.”

“Hush,” Adra said.

He smiled at her.

And then they sat like that, together, Ford holding Adra, the two of them wrapped in a blanket. Together. And it was…it was comfortable. It was peaceful. It was nice.

No, it was beyond nice. It was—

“I have to call it,” Ford said softly.

“Hmm?” Adra said.

“The cuddle clock.”

Had it been ten minutes since he’d first asked her if she was ok? Really? It felt like…it felt like nothing.

Then Adra remembered what he’d said. “The cuddle clock?”

“You heard me.”

“You’re making fun of me.”

“Of course I’m making fun of you.” Ford smiled.

Then he kissed her on the cheek and lifted her up, gently setting her on her feet.

Adra got to keep the blanket. Which meant that Ford didn’t.

She let her eyes wander.

Jesus Christ.

“Let me show you where you’ll be sleeping,” he said, and took her by the hand.

Adra didn’t take her eyes off his perfect ass even once. She kind of just…couldn’t believe it. That he was real. He was one of those mythical people who actually looked better naked. Better than “better,” even—he was perfect. He was her ideal.

Adra shook her head. That was not a helpful thought.

“Here you are,” he said, opening a door to a large bedroom that was, objectively, lovely. Soft lighting, white on white high-thread count sheets and a comforter that looked like an actual cloud, a sitting area with those plush chairs that made you want to take a nap. And a bathroom. A beautiful en suite bathroom with a standing tiled shower and an oversized hot tub.

“This is your
guest
room?” she said.

“Get used to it,” he said. “Hey, did you actually remember to pack any comfortable clothes?”

Adra tore her gaze away from the bathroom and was confronted with Ford’s nudity again. She lost her train of thought.

“Eyes up here,” Ford said.

“What? Um, no, now that you mention it,” Adra said. “I was just kind of…”

“I’ll put something out for you,” he said, smiling down at her while she made every effort to make eye contact. “I thought we could do a movie.”

“Nothing sappy,” she said, perhaps a little bit too quickly.

“Really? You think I’m gonna pick out a sappy movie? Me?”

“I’ve seen your DVD collection, you bleeding heart.”

“You know I’m gonna remember that, right?”

Adra smirked. “I was hoping.”

“Get your ass in that shower before I regain my strength,” Ford said, and whisked away the blanket. Adra ran into the bathroom laughing.

And when she got out, the first thing she saw was a pair of Ford’s sweatpants and one of his t-shirts, both of which she would be swimming in—and she didn’t care. They smelled like him, and they were the most comfortable things she’d ever worn. And when she wandered back to the TV room, she found that Ford had fixed them some food and had the movie all set up.

“Here,” he said, handing her a bowl of stir-fry. “You like spicy beef, right?”

“When did you learn to cook?”

“I didn’t. I learned to dial.”

“Well, good job dialing,” she said. It smelled amazing, and Adra realized she was starving. She took her bowl and a fork and plopped down on the world’s most comfortable couch, ready to relax.

“So what are we watching?” she asked.

In response, Ford sat down on the other side of the couch and picked up the remote.

It was
Clueless
.

Adra stared at him. “You own
Clueless
?” she said.

Ford looked at her haughtily. “It’s an American classic,” he said. Then he smiled. “Someone told me that.”

Yeah, Adra had.

The thing was, Ford had never seen it before she’d made him go. And she really had gone through his DVD collection back when they used to hang out together all the time. Ford definitely hadn’t owned
Clueless
before they’d had their…little mistake, and stopped being friends for far too long.

She was still staring at him.

“You want something else?” Ford asked, frowning. “It’s this or
Die Hard
.”

“No, this is fine,” she said, blinking back the world’s stupidest tears. “This is great. It’s perfect.”

“You sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“Ok, then,” Ford said, and leaned back in his corner of the couch, his feet up on an ottoman.

Adra suddenly had no idea what to do with herself. It was obviously very important to observe the rules of the cuddle clock for mental health and general sanity reasons, but she found that she was almost terminally conscious of the physical distance between them. She wasn’t watching the movie; she knew it by heart anyway. She was watching Ford out of the corner of her eye.

It was torture.

It was worse than not being allowed to come.

Why couldn’t she think about anything else but how far away his leg was from hers?

She must have been sitting up ramrod straight, the tension obvious in every line, because when Ford looked over at her he kind of laughed, reached over, and pulled her into the crook of his arm.

“Friends are comfortable with each other,” he said.

“Right,” she said. “You watch movies with Roman like this?”

“I’d watch movies with Lola like this,” Ford said.

“And then you’d be dead,” Adra said.

“I didn’t say it would be a long-term plan. Are you gonna relax?”

Adra sighed, heard it turn into laughter, and shifted down until her head was in his lap.

“I guess so,” she said.

She lay like that through one and a half movies, with Ford’s hand in her hair, alternating between a kind of nervous, aroused tension and utter contentment, until finally, finally, she fell into what must have been the least restful sleep ever.

Only when she woke up she was in that beautiful bed, and it was morning. And she was alone.

She felt enormous relief paired with a vague kind of grief. She didn’t know what to call that weirdo feeling, but felt certain that there must be a word for it.

Staying with Ford was going to be interesting, to say the least.

Ford allowed himself a smile as he walked through the Volare compound on his way to Adra’s office. He’d left her a surprise there, and he wanted to be there to see her reaction. It had been a good couple of weeks for both of them.

Well, not entirely. The tabloid fascination with Adra and Derrick hadn’t let up, fueled by Adra’s apparent disappearance and Derrick’s refusal to talk to the press. That part sucked, in theory. In reality? It didn’t seem to bother Adra too much. Or maybe she just didn’t have time to think too much about it.

Possibly because Ford was doing his best to make sure she didn’t have the time to think much about anything.

They’d managed to keep their arrangement a secret, too, though Lord knew how. The sex was fucking insane. Each and every time Ford thought they couldn’t get higher, couldn’t get any closer, and then they did. It was a miracle it wasn’t stamped on their faces every morning.

Nights were another matter.

Ford was being careful. So, so careful. He was so attuned to Adra that reading her was easy for him, and he knew when to back off. He could feel her boundaries. And one of them came up every night.

She needed her own bed. Ford didn’t push it. He didn’t like it, but he understood it, and he didn’t push it. She would come around. She hadn’t even tried to find another accommodation; she didn’t want to go anywhere.

And Ford was damn grateful for that.

Because he’d been around long enough to know when he was falling in love. Whether that was a good idea or the stupidest thing he’d ever done was another question entirely. They both kept their distance, Ford because he was being careful with Adra, Adra because she was scared. They danced around the biggest facts of their lives, of their pasts, almost as if their pasts—and the scars that came with them—were the final frontier. After that, what the hell was left to keep them apart?

Ford wasn’t even convinced it mattered now, at least not to him. The time he spent with Adra was so special that it was like all that other crap, the stuff he’d carried with him for years, it just ceased to exist. Boom. Gone. Like the past was some long forgotten country that he’d finally gotten to leave.

He was smart enough to know that it was crazy, in a way. But he’d be damned if he questioned it too long. And he fervently hoped that it would be his privilege to give her the same gift, if she’d let him.

If she’d talk to him.

Because there was something still getting to her. He knew. He could see it eating away at her.

But he wouldn’t push. He cared too damn much to push. Adra would come to him when she was ready.