Transcendent (2 page)

With any other woman, in any other situation, this pose would mark the moment of my surrender. Tonight it's simply the next phase in Cole's.

“Fuck me,” I order.

In an instant he's on me, over me, his erect cock pushing unerringly into my slick folds. When that granite-hard shaft strokes into me, forcing its way over nerve endings stimulated to the point of torment, when his hips slam hard against my pelvis I cry out, the sound sharp and shockingly helpless in the air of this private, silent room. He growls and knocks me flat on my back, bearing down on me with his full weight as he does it again, again. I palm his red, welted ass and grip hard. He gasps against the pain, but doesn't break rhythm.

The discipline required to take what I give him sends a sharp electric current searing through me. I explode. All the pent-up tension releases in wave after wave of obliterating pleasure that wracks my body. I strain under the sheer mass of Cole, pinning me to the mattress so I can disappear into the void.

When I slip back into the rasp of wet silk against my back and the intimacy of his hips between mine, tremors are rippling through Cole from shoulders to knees. He's hard inside me, hard against me. The right word from me will call his orgasm from his cock and end this.

“Sit back,” I command, omitting the
please
, making my voice as crisp as I can given the satisfied purr humming in my throat.

One second stretches into two and the red-blooded American male in Cole looks down at me, his carved torso streaked with sweat, his mouth somehow both full and hard, the line of his jaw taut. He could easily ignore my command and spend into my body. Instead he pushes back, wincing as his cock withdraws from my cunt.

“On your knees on the floor, please,” I say as I get up. My dress falls back into place as I walk into the kitchen to pour another glass of water.

He's in position when I turn around, sitting back on his heels, erect cock gleaming, hands behind his head. The manacles left no marks, and I marvel at his strength, his discipline. I offer him his glass, as I sip from my own.

“Thank you, Miss Banks.”

While he drinks, I seat myself on the bed, legs crossed, the skirt slipping with my movements, one heel dangling from my toe. “More?”

He sets the glass on the floor at arm's length. “No thank you, Miss Banks.”

I nod and study the flush, hot and strong on his throat and cheeks, his face completely vulnerable yet utterly male, absolutely transfixed with sexual need. I dominate Cole, true enough, but through his surrender, he owns me. In my lonely bed I dream of these encounters. I spin little fantasies about us, about him, who he is outside of this room. Finding a man caught up in the typical alpha male chest-beating is simple. A man who can control his own impulses, explore the furthest edges of his masculinity, and fuck like a dream ensnared me. But for tonight only, he's mine to do with as I please. There is never any promise of another night.

We are not finished. I hook my heels in the sideboards of the bed, knees spread wide. Then I edge up my skirt, slowly drawing it up to the crease where my hips meet my thighs, exposing the silk stockings and pale cream garter belt holding them on. As I lift my skirt, the scent of arousal and fucking rises into the air between us. I slide my fingers around the back of his skull and bring his mouth to my cunt.

He begins with the soft opening to my vagina, hardening his tongue to first circle, then gently probe. Until instructed otherwise, he will either fold his arms behind his back or leave his hands on his thighs and use only his mouth. With one hand braced behind me for balance, I knot my fingers in his sweat-dampened hair and succumb to the pleasure coursing through my veins. Cole is pure, undiluted male kneeling between my legs, tongue lapping at my cunt. There is nothing I can do to him that will make him anything less, even when I say, “Lick my clit.”

He does, circling it so that tense heat pushes under my skin, up through my abdomen to my fingers, down my thighs to my toes, which curl in my pumps. I'm close, my head lolling back as I push against his mouth. I let my head drop forward and open my eyes. The muscles of his back are rigid with excitement, and I can imagine the state of his cock, erotic ache verging on agony.

“Use your fingers,” I demand. Cole works two fingers into my cunt and strokes in time with his tongue, but he isn't rough, doesn't rush. He coaxes me to the precipice, then over. Orgasm tears through me and my low cry, breathy and gratified, echoes in the room. He lightens his touch just enough to prolong the ebbing pleasure, sitting back only when I tug on his hair.

His hands once again lock behind his neck. I straighten and begin to unfasten the tiny, fabric-covered buttons holding my dress closed. His gaze roams hungry and desperate over my revealed skin while his cock throbs in time with his pulse. If I touched it, wrapped my hand around it, I'd feel no give at all, just rigid steel under sensitized skin.

It's an odd feeling to undress in front of a man knowing he has none of the typical male prerogative to touch what I expose to him. I shimmy out of the dress and unhook my bra, then stand with my stomach mere inches from Cole's face to take off my garter belt and stockings. He moves only once, pressing a kiss into the damp skin just above my mound. The gesture, at once flirtatious, possessive, and a little bold, surprises me.

“That was very nice,” I say as I use my index finger to trace his wet, swollen mouth, the mouth I've never kissed. Kissing him is a risk I'm not willing to take. “I want to come again.”

Another shudder. “Yes, Miss Banks.”

I lie back on the bed again and beckon him into position with one preemptory index finger. All lean, shifting muscle, he crawls over me, aligns his cock with my swollen pussy, and slides inside. I let my hands roam his back, my fingertips finding and exploring the welts lining his ass as he begins to thrust.

I wait a few strokes, then give languid little directives. “Slower,” I say. “Your cock fills my pussy so nicely, Cole. I want to savor every stroke, feel you stretch me.”

“Yes, Miss Banks.”

His voice is low and strained, his entire body taut as he maintains the excruciating pace I demand while I whisper dirty, descriptive language into his ear and sink my nails into his reddened ass. Because I can, because he has asked me to torment him, I squirm under him, press my breasts to his chest, adjust his position until he's exactly where I want him. I give him no respite. Instead I make him fuck me slow and hot and strong until I'm lost in the sensations, lost in the sheer heat and power of his body at my command, until I'm lifting my hips with each stroke, trembling with need, my cunt slippery with my juices and our mingled sweat. His only concession to what this costs him is the slightly agonized tone of his groans as he labors under the spell of my pinching fingers, my wicked mouth, my hot, slick body, all working together to drive him crazy while he continues his unrelenting pace for my pleasure, my pleasure . . .

My pleasure. I implode around his cock, head back, throat straining, legs spread and my pelvis pressed to his. I take my pleasure in the most biblical, old-fashioned sense of the phrase. Oh, yes, I take it at his expense.

After the last ribbon of sweet, hot satisfaction flutters along my nerves, I ease back onto the mattress and open my eyes. He's poised above me, his gaze focused on my throat, his cock steel-hard inside me, but his face is changing, as if the sweat trickling down his cheeks and along his jaw etches fault lines into the mask he wears when we're together.

I brace my hands on his chest. “That will be all, Cole.”

A moment's hesitation. He inhales as if to speak, then he sits back and allows me up.

“Yes, Miss Banks.”

The quiet edge to the words gets my attention as I sit up and tuck my legs under my bottom. He's kneeling, his big hands braced on his thighs, his head bent. The edges of the fantasy begin to blur back into reality. For the first time he looks directly at me, and the ferocity seething under the subservient mask glints in his eyes. In that instant something I lock away in the most secret part of my soul flares to life, then I slam shut the door his glance just opened.

But now I am in dangerous territory.

Now I am curious.

“Why do you do this?” I ask again.

He strips off the condom and leans forward to drop it in the trash can. “Because it makes me hot,” he growls as he sits back. “Why do you do it?”

I have a ready answer to his challenge. “I'm five feet tall, Cole. With me any man can play master. A man who can sublimate his desires to my will and test the limits of his stamina and fortitude is far more intriguing. And you didn't answer my question.”

His hands flex against his thighs, and his gaze shifts to the Manhattan skyline. “Because it's the purest adrenaline rush ever,” he says in a low voice, as if he's admitting something. He is, but not to me. To himself.

I know he fears this as much as he needs it. Humans avoid what they fear. Cole squares up and stares pain down, and that unflinching courage makes
me
hot.

I look at the bike jacket, advertising a brand of speed bike, at his hard body, the set of his shoulders, remember the suits. “NYPD? FBI?” I ask, continuing the longest conversation we've ever had. He wouldn't be the first.

He flicks me a look through thick brown lashes. “Marine Corps.”

That explained the stance, the willingness to push himself beyond endurance, but not the suits. “And now?”

“Trader for Cooper Bensonhurst,” he said.

Trading on the stock exchange is fast-paced, stressful, and extraordinarily competitive. Every day is about the thrill of the kill. When traders bet well, they win big. A wrong bet means millions of dollars in losses.

“You're an adrenaline junkie,” I say. “And I'm your current fix.”

“You're tiny,” he says distractedly. “You're . . . delicate. You strap me down, then you whip me and all I can do is endure the pain dished out by a hundred-pound woman dressed like she's walked off the
Mad Men
set, wearing pearls, fucking pearls. And then you make me fuck you!”

Of course I do. That's why he's here. That's why we're both here. We have unique needs, hard to meet. “You liked the pearls,” I point out.

“They drove me insane,” he growls. “You whipped the hell out of me, strapped me to the bed on my back, stripped to nothing but the pearls, and rode me like a cowgirl. Remember?”

“I remember.” I came four times before I sent him on his way. I still dream about it, and this sudden, personal conversation is making me light-headed. Details of the real Cole break against me like thunderclaps. In response, lightning flashes in my body, illuminating my needs, my fears.

“No control, no choices, no decisions. Just torment, all from a woman I could snap in two. The pain gets me so hot, so high, I float away. I feel the marks for a week.” His voice is a low purr, and his erect cock pulses as he speaks.

Adrenaline junkies are always searching for a new high. I stop myself from folding my arms across my chest, instead looking around the room for my dress to avoid meeting his eyes. “What's the next rush?” I ask, keeping my voice light.

“This isn't the only thing that turns you on,” he says as he shifts to the edge of the bed and stands.

His certainty halts me in the act of sorting out my dress. I have so many conflicting sexual urges it's sometimes difficult to breathe. I've long since given up trying to reconcile them, or find one man who can satisfy them. “Hardly,” I say as I step into the full skirt and push my arms into the sleeve holes. “You?”

“Oh, hardly,” he drawls.

The invitation is clear. My fingers steady on the buttons, I tilt my head and consider this proposition to transform our shadowy, intimate encounters into something ocean dark, ocean deep. “What do you have in mind?”

He laughs. It's deep and rough and fucking sexy as it tumbles into my ears and along my nerves. Then he nods toward the wrecked bed. “Find out.”

That's a challenge, not an answer. Equally intriguing is the fact that Cole's sentence structure and cadence is becoming much less formal. It's faster. The words run together like whiskey pouring out of a bottle, the flickering heat making my cunt clench. Right before my eyes he's transforming into someone completely unlike the man who waits for me on his knees. I'm absolutely, utterly transfixed.

I watch him dress. His clothes, removed within minutes, are immaculate while I look like I'm the one who was bound, whipped, and fucked. He pulls his jeans over the raw, reddened flesh of his ass and thighs, yanks the T-shirt over his head, and shrugs into the fitted motorcycle jacket I find sexy as sin.

But something breaks open inside me when he collects his belt from the floor. I watch him slide the dark leather through the loops in his jeans and fasten it with two quick movements.

Cole's seduced me as he dressed, and he knows it. He flicks me a grin and steps into his boots. “What's your name? Your real name.”

I push my hair back from my face. Telling him this makes me the vulnerable one. Fear wars with curiosity as I speak. “Marin Bryant.”

He flips the dead bolts and holds the door open for me. “Cole Fleming,” he says, and holds out his hand.

After what we've just done it's absurd to shake his hand, but I do it anyway. I slip my hand into his. He wraps his long, strong fingers around mine, and smiles. He holds me in place for a heartbeat too long, then I tug free. He studies me for a moment, then nods slowly, as if to say
game on.
All gentleman now, he gestures into the hallway.

“After you, Marin.”

With that I take a step into the unknown.

 

The first rule of combat was to gain and maintain tactical advantage, preferably covertly. On the surface, Cole had orchestrated a seduction: a bed stripped to the bottom sheet, pillows mounded at the headboard, the floor lamp in the corner casting soft shadows on the maple bureau. He'd maneuvered Marin Bryant into his apartment, into his bed, and under him.

The perfect opening position.

Stretched out beside her, he let his gaze sweep her from head to the toes of her bare feet. She wore white jeans and a white cashmere V-neck sweater, and her black lashes, opaque sea green eyes, and full mouth were startling bursts of color in her pale face.

She seemed as cool and untouchable as moonlight.

His next move was to rest his hand on her taut abdomen. Immediately she countered, laying her hand on top of his and looking right into his eyes. “What do you have in mind for me tonight, Cole?”

His heart leaped against his rib cage. Only at the very end of the last of their nine previous encounters had his gaze met hers, so for him the effect was as stunning as the first seconds of a firefight. Marin, however, submerged all emotion under her maddeningly tranquil surface. Controlled in speech, controlled in movement, controlled even at the moment he fucked her full-throttle into a gasping, shuddering orgasm.

Sometimes control was a prison.

He didn't answer her question, too absorbed in watching her, assessing the situation as the seconds passed, adjusting his response. Despite the casual question and her seemingly unruffled exterior, she was rushing the scene, something she hadn't done before. He focused on the rise and fall of her stomach under his hand. A little rapid, a little shallow.

Keep it slow. You know how effective that tactic is.
“What do you think I want to do?”

“Restrain me,” she said without inflection, a living, breathing statue carved from alabaster marble. “Black leather, not handcuffs. Then put me on my knees to suck your cock.”

That amused him, the corners of his mouth lifting as he slipped his hand from under hers to brush her fine blond hair back from her face, exposing delicate bone structure and skin so luminous he could chart the stages of her arousal by the blood rising in her throat and cheeks. He stroked her cheek with his fingertips and watched the heat he knew burned inside deepen the pale pink to rose. With his index finger he traced the swell of her lower lip, then dipped inside to touch the tip of her tongue.

The temperature of the air between them shot up ten degrees. Her pulse, visible above the V of her sweater leaped at the base of her throat as her tongue darted out to taste him.

Such mixed messages. She was an enigma, a quest wrapped up in a five-foot-tall, slender woman.

He trailed one finger down to her skittering pulse. “That's a tempting offer, but I've got ten inches and a hundred pounds on you. I don't need to restrain you.”

Not a hint of reaction in her face, but a leap of blood under his fingertip. Her gaze sharpened as she took in his body as if seeing it for the first time, noting shoulders and hips, lingering at his hands, which were big enough to hold both of her wrists. If he were so inclined.

“What do you need?” she asked.

Asking the question subtly changed the dynamics. She'd never asked before, so here they went, over the cliff, into thin air. “To touch you. However I want to. For as long as I want to.”

A charged stillness followed, quiet enough to hear the ebb and flow of traffic on Fifth Avenue, ten stories below, and the rush of blood in his ears. Such a simple word,
touch,
encompassing so much. Their previous meetings, arranged by Lady Matilda's Introductions service at Marin's request, involved exploring the pleasure found in searing, unavoidable pain.

Wary for a number of reasons, he used only his first name but Marin came to their encounters shrouded in a character, Miss Banks. The experience was so all-consuming it took him three meetings to realize Banks was a pseudonym and another six to discover the fine seam in her defenses, curiosity.

Is this the only thing that turns you on?

Hardly.

She'd paused after that single word. Sometimes silences were as informative as words or tone. This one wasn't hesitant. Marin owned her sexuality without reservation; the possibility of more and varied sex with him didn't crack her.

What do you have in mind?

Find out.

For nine heated nights
touch
was limited to restraints of leather on wrists and ankles, to sweat-soaked cotton sheets and his belt on bare skin, to his cock in her cunt, to thrusting and grasping, the smack of flesh against flesh, to agonized gasps and groans. Suffering, erotic and real. Then simple curiosity undid Miss Banks and, for a split second, ignited Marin.

He wanted more than a split second. Getting it was the problem.

At his statement, she reacted much as he anticipated, breathing halted, muscles tensed and poised for flight. It took visible effort for her to inhale and say, “You need to touch me.”

Need
didn't cover it. “Yes.”

“You touch me every time we're together.”

“According to your rules,” he countered. Rules she'd established to protect herself. He wouldn't dismantle her physical or emotional walls.

By all means, keep out the rest of the world, or at least the rest of the male population of the world. But not me.

Intensity sat familiarly on his face, but its tight grip on his heart felt unusual. Urgent. “Be daring, Marin. Find out what I have in mind.”

Clearly this wasn't what she'd expected . . . but he put enough of a taunt into his tone that she wasn't calling a halt to it.

His next move was a feint. He lowered his mouth to hers. As expected, she turned her head ever so slightly, her gaze flickering between his mouth and his eyes to gauge his response.

He adapted, brushing his lips against the heated flesh of her cheek and using the rough scrape of his stubble in counterpoint to the occasional flick of his tongue. When she turned her head to the side with a sigh, he set his mouth to the hollow under her ear.

A tiny, secretive shudder rippled through her. It was amazing what a precision stealth assault could accomplish where air strikes and heavy ordinance failed. “Put your hands above your head and leave them there.”

“That has nothing to do with touching me,” she said without moving.

True, but it had everything to do with surrender. “Surely you understand the concept of setting a scene,” he murmured into her hair.

She turned her head to meet his gaze. Again, that heart-stopping jolt. Then, defiance in every line of her body, her mouth set in a firm line, she lifted her hands over her head, palms up, fingers curled, the movement as elegant and impassive as a ballerina's. He sat up and straddled her hips, then trailed his fingers gently over the cashmere and down her sides in sweeping movements, stroking the fine material clinging to the lines of her body. The tension in her body eased ever so slightly with each pass of his hands. Her full lips parted as sensation lapped at her resistance.

Then he switched tactics, increasing the pressure of his touch, catching the cashmere between his fingers and using it to caress the skin of her arms, then her shoulders, then abdomen. Eyes heavy-lidded, she undulated, then stiffened up again, as if reminded of her determination to defy what he made her feel.

He avoided her breasts entirely until her nipples peaked under the material, then stroked only the gentle swell of the undersides. Nothing came between his hands and her skin except the sweater.

“No bra?”

“I'm barely an A cup. You know that,” she said. The words held a hint of Miss Banks' green-apple-tart tone but were low, distant. Absorbed in what he made her feel, despite the set of her body.

So the lacy bras and garter belts were part of the costume she wore for their encounters. He filed away this detail of the real Marin. “I like you like this,” he said. “Bare. Accessible.”

Another soft, distracted sound, but she went silent when he used the backs of his curled fingers to pet the sides of her breasts. The first time he grazed her nipples she gasped and the second time she arched into his hands like a cat. He kept the material between his thumbs and forefingers as he pinched and rolled the swollen peaks.

She grew taut underneath him, her body quivering with resistance. Her eyes opened, closed, opened again, fighting to stay alert and distance herself from what she felt. Another firmer pinch and she let out a whimper, bit her lip, then curled her fingers into the sheet above her head. His cock strained at his zipper, but he ignored his need and focused on the subtle battle she waged inside. Protracted, gentle touch generated an entirely different kind of need in Marin. Hotter. Softer. Languid. Her lips were pink and swollen from her efforts to muffle the noises growing throatier as the minutes passed.

Watching her sink into desire and fight it every step of the way sent hot lust cracking down his spine. He focused his attention on her breasts and nipples and let sensation work against her trembling body until he couldn't stand the barrier between them and pushed at her sweater.

“Off,” he commanded.

She'd followed orders frequently enough to automatically obey the tone, and let him pull her sweater over her head. He smoothed the tousled hair back from her face then deliberately bent to her nipples, patiently seeking the right combination of teeth and tongue to make her quiver with the effort of not reacting. She moaned when he abandoned the pink, swollen tips to press a line of kisses down the center of her body. With little effort he worked her jeans down and off. He kissed each hipbone, the taut skin of her abdomen, the bottom of her sternum, then shifted back to her side, leaned his head on his doubled arm and slid his fingers over her bare mound.

The soft folds between her legs were wet and swollen. He didn't gloat, just trailed her slick juices up to her clit and began to circle the taut nub, all the while taking in the way she struggled to lash down her increasingly undisciplined response. The abrupt, halting movements of her hips were completely unlike Miss Banks' smooth, fluid responses, and blood dotted her lower lip. She'd bitten it.

He bent down and tasted the hot copper tang of her blood. “Stop fighting me. Stop fighting yourself,” he said. “Let this happen.”

“I'm not . . . I can't,” she said on a desperate sigh, but her hips lifted into his hand and her thighs tightened as she said it.

“It'll be good,” he murmured. “You know it will.”

But a part of him wanted her to hold out. He'd seen her come more times than he could count, fucked her as ruthlessly as he'd ever fucked a woman, but he'd never seen her battle the riptide of pleasure's onslaught and lose.

A few more strokes along her swelling clit and sweat broke out between her breasts and in the delicate crease of her thigh. Suddenly, as if the prolonged caresses snipped a taut-strung wire, the tension in her body shifted from resistance to red-hot need. She pulled up one leg, giving him a little more room to maneuver, then her other leg came up and dropped open against his hip. Primitive male possessiveness surged in his chest as the delicate scent of sweat and female arousal drifted into the air.

Cole clenched his jaw to keep from ripping open his jeans and plunging into her. Hard and fast would get him physical release, his and hers. He wanted more. He kept the pace and the pressure, watched the familiar blood flush bloom on her collarbone, spread up her throat, into her cheeks as she arched, then went rigid and succumbed. Her clit pulsed under his fingertip as she tried to stifle her moan of release. Then the tension eased from her body, leaving her slack-limbed on his bed. He lightened his touch, then stopped moving entirely, simply resting his hand on her mound.

On the surface, it was such a simple experience, surrendering to a relentlessly gentle touch, but already they were off the map, physically and emotionally. He kept his body relaxed, his breathing even and waited for the results of the skirmish.

Marin's muscles bunched and she scrambled to her knees at the foot of the bed. “We're done.”

Success.

He grabbed for her, his fingers closing around her delicate wrist. “We're not done.”

Ten inches taller and a hundred pounds heavier
hung in the air. He kept his gaze level, watching fire and fear snap in her eyes, and tried to look like a badass motherfucker who'd use physical strength to his advantage.

A long moment passed before her gaze went semi-opaque again; her shoulders straightened and her arm slackened in his grip as she pulled her serenity around her like a mantle of snow. “What did you hope to prove with that?” she asked. “We both know you can make me come.”

He cursed mentally, because he could work with Marin in flight or fight mode but not on emotional lockdown. “You don't think that was different than our entire history to date?”

It was, and they both knew it. She lifted her chin and shrugged, distancing herself.

Keep her curious. Guessing.
He let her wrist drop. “The deal was I touch you however I wanted, for as long as I wanted, but if it's too much for you . . .”

The taunt hung in the air, along with
Find out.
Marin was too smart to manipulate but too adventurous to walk away from a mystery. “Why?” she asked obliquely.

“Undress me,” he said, tying the answer to her compliance.

A long moment passed, then she knelt in front of him and began to unfasten the buttons on his shirt. He waited until she was focused on the task, then spoke.

“I saw you dance Thursday,” he said.

Searching her real name on Google gave him a shock equivalent to the one he felt when Miss Banks walked into the room their first night together. Marin Bryant, aka Miss Banks, was a principal dancer at the peak of her career with a modern dance company, and in a heart-stopping moment of realization when he clicked through reviews in
Time Out New York,
the
Post,
and the
Times,
the puzzle pieces of who she was and what they were about clicked into place.