Paradise: The Masters of The Order Novel Two (32 page)

A tingle of excitement hopped up her spine. Nicolai Stavros,
the
Nicolai Stavros, was going to photograph her, Isabella Rey Meszaros, an oncology nurse from a humble Spanish family. She wasn’t an aristocrat or a celebrity or a model, but he was going to transform her visage into a work of art.

Nicolai didn’t move or speak, only stared and held out his hand waiting for her to accept his invitation. She understood that if she took it, she was allowing him to take her wherever his imagination wanted her to go. She’d seen his work. She knew that this man’s imagination topped anything hers could conjure. Her heartbeat picked up as she felt her mind hit a limit.

Jacques’s voice reached out to her. “There is no sin in being who you are, Isabella. Let Nico show the world how beautiful you truly are.”

Yes, Jacques is right
.

She wanted the world to see what a masterful artist like Nicolai Stavros could create with a woman like her. A sudden, overwhelming desire to give Nicolai anything he wanted came over her. She put her hand into his.

Nicolai smiled and it was almost humble. “Thank you again, Isabella.”

As she fell into his care, part of her thought that she shouldn’t want something like this, but she did. She wanted this life with Jacques, this life within the Order, and there was a promise in those crystal eyes. Nicolai was going to reach into her soul and expose the woman hidden inside, but he wouldn’t harm her. He wouldn’t make her into something she was not.

“If at any time you become overwhelmed, just tell me to stop and it ends.”

With no expectation of a reply, he unsnapped her garter and slipped his fingers under the band of her stocking, guiding the silk down her leg. He crouched and tapped one foot with a finger, telling her to lift it, then the other, and slipped off each shoe and stocking. His eyes ran over her body as he stood and stepped away.

Nicolai turned off the overhead lights in the studio, leaving only the photographer’s spots on, and began to move the umbrellas to adjust the lighting. She struggled to stand straight and still while the light changed around her, growing brighter, then softer. She watched his eyes roam over her hair, her skin, the curves of her body until he seemed satisfied with the way the light fell on her. Then he removed his shirt and shoes.

Madre de Dios
. Nicolai was gorgeous enough dressed. Undressed, he was…
delicioso
. Life within the Order was
delicioso
.

She held her breath as he sailed across the white floor holding a pair of satin stilettos. Opulent red with a touch of white lace at the toe and a thin ankle strap.

“A gift.” Nicolai’s eyes followed the single elegant finger trailing over the lace, then met hers as he stroked her cheek. “A small indulgence beneath your gown to evince the bride’s passion. Perhaps.”

“
Son perfectos
,” she whispered, touched by the intimate insight in the gift. An impeccable blend of sexy and elegant, the shoes captured her essence as Jacques’s lover
and
his bride. They would perfect her wedding ensemble. “
Muchas gracias
, Nico.”

Nicolai didn’t correct the informal address, only flashed his eyes with a quick nod, the barest hint of gratitude that she would wear his gift on her special day. Then he knelt on the floor and guided each shoe over her toes. She felt herself rise, the curve of her arches mirroring the curve of her back as she balanced her body on the sophisticated shoes.

“Keep your feet together and rest your hands on me,” he said as satisfied eyes ran from her heels to her neck.

Nicolai Stavros and his artist stare gave new meaning to the word “intense.” So focused, so reverent as he lost himself to his work. And so unbelievably stunning as he knelt half-naked at her feet.

Nicolai pressed his open hands on the front of her thighs and flexed his fingers as if he was touching a woman for the very first time. She watched his face, mesmerized by the awe in his eyes. His mouth was so close. She could feel his warm breath on her belly. His hands moved across her hips, over her bottom and back around her legs, which were parted just enough to let them run along the inside.

Her confidence faltered when he focused on the contours of her least favorite body part.
Why do Doms always have to go there?
The familiar clench of vulnerability and its accompanying ache answered the question.

As those firm hands continued to explore her, she had the impression that Nicolai was molding her, as if her body was a piece of clay and he was working the skin and the muscle to create the shape. With both hands gripping her thigh, he leaned his forehead into her stomach and kissed her navel.

“Would that these mortal hands could create such perfection.”

Okay, maybe my thighs aren't that bad.

Nicolai’s hands came to rest on her waist and he tenderly brought her to her knees. She stared into the depth of his eyes, heard his deep masculine chuckle when her eyes wandered through the chestnut waves of his hair, across sweeping grace of his broad shoulders to the hard lines of his torso. His lower body was covered, but his arousal was perfectly clear.

She sighed.
This man is a work of art
.

He picked up a strand of rope and began to brush it lazily over her shoulders, down her arms, across her breasts. The rope was soft, but thick and heavy. Its weight skimming over her body made her skin tingle. He coiled the long length loosely around her several times, then pulled it away with a slow, velvety stroke.

“Close your eyes. Let yourself float away with me,” he whispered, the sound of his voice like the velvet caress of the rope.

“Yes, sir.”

Nicolai snaked the rope between her thighs and she gasped when he pushed it up tight against her sex. He rocked his hand, forcing the thick length through her folds and driving a delicious desire deep into her body. The rope became warm and moist. Before the stimulation swept her into the magic zone, he stopped, leaving her with a familiar, vicious emptiness.

Does every Dom share the same bag of dirty tricks? How do they know the precise moment before satisfaction finds a woman?

She’d never been able to sneak an orgasm with Jacques, but God damn it, Nicolai hardly even knew her.

One hand on the shoulder guided her to lie across the floor; pressure from the other tilted her onto her belly. With both hands, Nicolai gently lifted her head, turned it to the opposite side of the room, and fanned out her hair. Then he put a hand over her bottom, pressing her mound against the cool floor. The sensation only enhanced the empty ache, making her thigh muscles tense and her vagina clench…
ah, sí
,
nothing but air
.

She could see Jacques sitting at the edge of the pool of light surrounding her. His smoldering eyes blazed with barely leashed excitement, vaguely reminiscent of what she’d seen in them before, but never quite like this. She could feel his admiration and imagined how she must look to him in this moment.

Hot. You look hot.

Jacques cleared his throat to cover his laugh. He’d read her thoughts and he agreed.

Nicolai bent her knee and began to run his fingers around her ankle, her foot, right over the shoe. Then he wrapped a rope over the same trail his hands had followed. She went liquid and let him manipulate her body. The touch of his fingers, then the touch of the rope, curling around her torso, her arms, above and below her knees. He was precise, arranging the bind to exactly mirror the path of his hands, making her feel the patience and care in each detail as he tied her.

The unspoken message was clear to the caregiver she was. Everything Nicolai did said,
I care about you. You are beautiful and precious to me
.

Okay, Jacques loves Nicolai and now, I do too.

Breathing as deeply as she could in the tight bind, she gave herself over completely, allowing Nicolai free reign over her body and the art he was creating with it. He worked slowly, weaving the rope into an intricate pattern that centered on her. His passion for what he was doing to her sang through his hands. They didn’t touch to arouse, but to be the focus of his artistry was arousing.

Deliriously arousing.

But it wasn’t only Nicolai who thrilled her. It was Jacques and the flames dancing in those liquid fire eyes. Everything was about Jacques. For Jacques. Always for her husband. She kept her eyes locked with his while Nicolai wrapped her in the red rope.

Nicolai stood with the ends of ropes in his hand. He pulled and she felt her leg lift, then her arms. Her torso still rested on the floor.

“Breathe, Isabella. Allow yourself to fall into the embrace of the tie.”

When he pulled again, she was lifted from the floor. Her muscles tensed, resisting the pressure. It hurt as the ropes constricted tighter with her full weight. The floor moved away as she was carried higher.

She tried to calm herself as the harness shifted her position, pulling on her limbs and drawing the tie tighter around her waist. Nicolai adjusted the ropes through the ring, varying the lengths to form the pose he wanted to see. Her thighs opened. Her arms stretched behind her. Her knees bent at the knee. The bow of her body sent her breasts jutting downward. Her head fell.

As her body settled into the suspension, Nicolai’s fingertips brushed along the delicate skin of her inner thigh. Back and forth. Back and forth. She knew he could see everything with her legs open so wide, but instead of feeling shy, she felt beautiful. The silken caress of his artist’s hands said he adored the sight of her, positioned as he wanted and suspended at his mercy. The pressure of the harness was met with a different pressure, deep inside, that pulsed in time with her rapidly beating heart.

After a moment, Nicolai moved next to her and brushed her hair up from her nape so it cascaded over the top of her head to hang down. “You have radiant hair, like fire. Burn for me, Isabella.”

A small push sent her into a slow spin over the floor as he moved away. She shifted slightly and the ropes ground into her bare skin. She yelped with their renewed bite and then something puzzling happened. The tension melted away and a warm, buttery feeling came over her. She felt her entire body loosen and grow warmer as if something was heating her from the inside. The torment of a moment before transformed into a smoldering seduction that thickened the molten pool between her parted thighs and morphed the ache in her dangling breasts into a titillation that burned hotter than the rope against her skin.

Nicolai adjusted the lighting in the studio again and she watched her red hair swirl above the white floor. The subtle changes in the contrast created the illusion of fire against snow.
Burn for me, Isabella
, Nicolai’s words sang through her mind as she floated through the air into a dreamlike state. Flames began to flick over every bend and twist of her body until she was nothing but liquid need burning in the sublime captivity of the erotic suspension.

Nicolai stilled the motion of her body with one hand under her belly; the other lifted her chin until she met his eyes. “Feel the heat, Isabella. Let it penetrate you.”

He began to touch her, so very gently. Skilled, graceful hands ran over bare skin and pressed against rope, blurring the line between torment and tenderness. He cupped one breast, enhancing the ache with light pressure. She closed her eyes, savoring the alternating sensations of hands and rope against skin as she swung with the gentle rhythm of Nicolai’s caress. The pain of the harness transformed into complete, utter, toe-curling pleasure.

When he stepped away, she whimpered at the loss of his touch, her body contorting with the force of her need to feel him near her again.

“Your passion burns like fire, Isabella, warming everything it touches.”

Nicolai kissed her shoulder and something tickled between her spread legs. Not a finger. Not a tongue. It was cold. Like ice against her heat. The unbearable chill made her wiggle and the binds cut tighter into her skin, scorching her anew. As the cold played over her femininity, it faded, her body heat stealing the chill. She fell back into the warm seduction of the bind.

“You are the fire that warms Jacques’s world. Every time he looks at your portrait, this is the sound he will hear. It is the sound of your limitless love and undying trust.”

She heard a small click and tiny vibrations began shimmering over her scorching sex. Nicolai moved the vibrations over and around, sparking the fire, then snuffing it. Suspending her on the edge just as he had suspended her body in the air. The next few minutes disappeared in a blaze of masterful hands and the masterful bind that burned away everything to leave her completely exposed.

Helpless, bound and pushed to her limit, a throaty wail filled the studio. Nicolai held the vibration over the perfect spot and she exploded like a firecracker. He pushed on the rope to send her suspended body spiraling through a decadent, violent inferno of a climax. Fire raced through her core and flared outward, igniting every rope as if to burn her entire body at once. Another spasm seared through her, and another, each heightened by the constriction of the harness as she writhed in its unyielding embrace.

Nicolai let her spin until her breathing evened and her body relaxed. She felt light, dreamy, sexy. The bind felt luxurious as if it was crafted to cradle her in ecstasy. Too soon, she felt herself being lowered, sated and loose, until she came to rest gently on the cool floor.