Tainted Love (Book 1) (26 page)

I take it all, loving being filled with him. This is such an intoxicating moment. Ben is deep inside my pussy and he stays there for I don’t know how long, relentlessly emptying himself into me.

When he is finished, he shifts out of me and collapses on
to the bed, enfolding my shaking body in his arms. He kisses me all over, squeezing me to him. His lips brush against my hair, my neck, my shoulders and he moans in appreciation. The whole thing is reverential.

Inhaling deep
ly, Ben whispers, “I thought I’d lost you.”

“You did for a moment,” I respond, remembering the past few days without him.

“I don’t know what I was thinking when I sent that text. I was being foolish,” he reveals, nuzzling my neck. “I was going out of my mind. When you told me to have a happy life, my heart broke in two. I made Simon follow you around just so I could know you were safe.”

“I was,” I say.

“You weren’t,” he objects harshly. “When Simon told me you didn’t want him following you around anymore, I was so pissed. How could you not understand that it was just so I could ensure you were safe? Things had gone from good to messed up with us too fast, I wanted to fix things. I had to come back and I’m glad I did, considering how I found you.”

“Why
did
you come back, Ben? Huh? Is it because I was at some frat party?” I argue, pissed off. There was no need for him to be jealous or stalk my every move when we were nothing. I scream inwardly at him because it’s then that I know he was only letting Simon drive me around because he felt guilty.

“I know what goes on at frat parties, Sullivan. I remember that much when I used to be part of a frat.” He sighs and shudders behind me.

“I was scared for you and with good reason. Look at how I found you? You almost fucking died. I almost lost you. How can I ever trust you to take care of yourself?” he chides.

“Why do you keep saying that?” I assert, annoyed, ignoring his last question, a rhetorical one at most. “You almost lost me? I’m nothing to you, Ben. Just someone you can blow your load in.” I pull away from him wanting to get up. He is so confusing.

Ben tugs me to face him and grabs my neck, holding me in place. I feel his intensity – if I don’t see it in his searing green eyes – when he says, “Don’t ever…fucking say that again.” His voice is stony and cold. A chill runs through me.

My heart pounds in my chest, but not because of fear. He loosens his grip, brushes the hair from my face and kisses my forehead.
What a 360.

“You mean a lot to me, Sullivan. And you know I hate this…arrangement.” He gestures between us and sighs. “I want to be more. I want to mean more to you than just a fuck buddy. But until then, I’ll take you any way I can get you, even though the thought of not possessing you completely drives me crazy.”

I want to tell him, I do. I want to tell him that I like him more than I can stand. That I secretly yearn to be more as well. That I want him to possess me completely. But I’m too scared.

When Ben and I resurface, we head into the kitchen where Rachel has prepared lunch. He had rubbed my aching bottom with baby oil after placing an ice pack on it and we ended up lying facing each other, studying each other. He traced my lips while I traced the beautiful contours of his face. He has such a strong jaw. So, by the time we were ready to get some much needed grub, the ache
from my spanking had subsided.

As we eat, I find out that I had been asleep for twenty-seven hours. No wonder I’m so hungry. And sex hadn’t helped my hunger plight either. My system had been pumped early Saturday morning and I was then sent home by sunrise, with the services of a private doctor. I thank Ben with a kiss and we eat the rest of our lunch hand in hand. It all seems very…comfortable, and the panic that I expect to have with this revelation never comes.

Ben’s kitchen is huge. It’s a beautiful, traditional kitchen with a modern flare. In the middle is a dark marble island, with matching high chairs, which contrasts against the white prominence of the room. His kitchen is well equipped with the usual appliances, but his large stove and oven catch my eye as the size of them are things you see only in a restaurant or on a TV cooking show. I can’t see Ben doing his own cooking though, and I wonder what he would need with a stove and separate oven. As a matter of fact, what in the world is he doing with a six bedroom house as a bachelor? Does he have a family that I don’t know about?

After lunch, Ben gives us a grand tour, holding my hand the entire time. Simone is more excited about that than I am, shooting me wide grins and quiet claps of glee. I shake my head at her joy, but inside I’m doing cartwheels. This feels good and I think I like this feeling.

Ben has a fitness center at the back of his house, with a basketball, tennis court and swimming pool. He explains that he decided against an exercise room as he prefers to work out with a trainer at a gym.

We walk by
a security room and he tells us that the grounds have 24-hour security and cameras set up at various areas. Ah, yes, a rich man has to have unnecessary security to maintain control.

Ben takes us back inside and into a room he calls the leisure room. It is a large space with a single black piano, a large oil painting of a mother lifting her child abov
e her, and a white chaise lounge. Everything in the room is white. Large white doors and windows and white drapery surround the room. Somehow, I am drawn to the almost bleak but serene nature of the room. I am drawn to the piano and immediately I want to sit around it and tap out a sad tune. Seeing the piano brings me back to days as a teenager when I was under the tutelage of Samuel Kissinger…while he was under me. All that aside, he was a great piano instructor.

I pull my gaze to Rachel and she’s shooting me a wry look with a knowing
smile. Yeah, she knows what I’m thinking about. She knows the story very well. She knows
me
very well.

After the tour, Rachel, Simone and I hug and say our goodbyes, saying they want to give us some more time to bang like feral rabbits. I roll my eyes at their insinuation. It’s not like I could leave anyway. For one, Ben doesn’t want me to leave; and two,
I
don’t want to leave.

“Hey, I’ve got
ta go into town. I could take Rachel and Simone home,” Ben suggests as we all stand at the garage.

“And what should I do until you get back?” I ask, rocking on my heels and toes.

“Make yourself at home,” he answers, smiling amusingly at me. “And keep out of trouble.” He kisses me on the nose and slips into another of his sleek luxury cars, a white Bentley Continental.

I wave to my girls as they head out with my friend with benefits and I smile. Last Sunday I was turning down Ben’s offer and today I’m standing in front of his house in a silk nightgown he bought me.
That reminds me, I have no clothes. I’d have to send Rachel a message to put some clothes together for school on Monday.

Inside, I wash up the dishes we’d left behind
and, afterwards, head into the master bedroom to bring some semblance to the sex-ruffled room.

I watch a bit of TV in the TV room, but I’m still restless. I miss Ben, or I think that’s the reason for my restlessness. I get up
and head for the leisure room, realizing then that something has been urging me there.

Sitting around the piano, I begin to caress it. My fingers tingle with the urge to play so I open the lid. Suddenly, I’m playing –
The Hymn of the Child on Awakening
by Liszt fleeing from my fingers. It’s not a sad tune, but the large painting in the room inspires it.

I’m surprised that I remember the piece. Even more surprised at how fluidly my fingers glide over the keys after not playing for almost four years. The last I played was for Jared after telling him a few details of my past. Hmm, maybe I should give Ben a few details as well. It’s the least I can do after he saved my life. That would be a big sacrifice for me though; letting him in like that.

I tap out the last notes of the Liszt piece and I hanker to play more. I start playing the live version of
Sacrifice
by Elton John, my favorite modern pianist. It is the version he played at the Amphitheatre in Ephesus, Turkey in 2000. Playing this piece, I feel like singing. My father, Marshall Keyes, loved when I sang this song while I played. God, I miss him.

We had a mutual love for Elton John. We had a mutual love for much of th
e same music: classical, oldies’ ranging from Ella Fitzgerald to the Motown Sound, Tony Bennett and old blue eyes himself, Frank Sinatra. As I play, I reminisce on days when Dad and I would dance our New York penthouse home down to
Shake, Rattle and Roll
; then waltz to Frankie’s
Blue Moon.
The Grammy’s were an event for us; one of the few times I was permitted to stay up late on a Sunday when school was the next morning – not that I ever went to bed early.

Smiling, I close my eyes and strike the keys with passion, reciting the Bernie Taupin lyrics in my head:

Cold, cold heart

Hard done by you

Some things lookin’ better, baby

Just passing through

And it’s no sacrifice

Just a simple word

It’s two hearts livin’

In two separate worlds

But, it’s no sacrifice

No sacrifice

It’s no sacrifice, at all.

“You play?” Ben is at the entrance to the leisure room, shopping bags in hand, gaping at me.

I stop playing immediately, my wits utterly shaken.

“No, please don’t stop. I didn’t mean to frighten you like that.” He walks briskly over to me, dropping the bags from his hands. “I just…I didn’t think you played. That was beautiful.” He was now sitting alongside me around the piano, facing me.

“There’s a lot you don’t know about me, Ben,” I say, looking down at my knotted fingers. I hate how he twists me up and gets me so nervous and self-conscious. Every time he’s close to me
, my heart races and I have an overwhelming urge to tell him
everything
.

“It’s not like I haven’t tried,” Ben murmurs. “But…” he continues quickly before I can raise any opposition. “I won’t force you to say anything.”

He won’t force me, I know he won’t, and I’m grateful for that. He needs to know, though. Something. Anything. And, as we sit at the piano, silence stretching between us by the second, I sigh, resigned and decidedly.

“The piece was called
Sacrifice
by Elton John, one of my dad’s and my favorite songs,” I reveal, taking deep breaths as I try to open up to him.

“I knew it sounded familiar,” he mutters, resting his elbow on top of the piano
and cradling his head. He wants to hear more and I’m going to oblige him.

“I started playing when I was 14,” I continue. “I was a troubled child and my mother thought that learning classical piano would stem my wild ways. Before that, it was dance and then it was art. Nothing worked. I had a rebellious streak and it even played out in my musical years.” I smirk, remembering all the wild times Mr. Kissinger and I had.

If Wilhelmina had known about our affair she’d have had a conniption! She was a great therapist, but sometimes she was just so clueless and much too overprotective of me. Could I blame her, though? She had every right to be overprotective considering my childhood, coupled with my wild, rebellious ways. I really did put that woman through the ringer. It was unfair. And here I am, putting her through hell again by disappearing on her. I shake off my introspection and I carry on with my divulgence.

“I couldn’t stand classical music. I always thought it was so boring
, when really, it wasn’t that at all. When I played those pieces, it always brought a kind of engulfing sadness out of me. I think that’s what she wanted. I’ve always found it easy to express happiness, but my darker emotions I’d always tuck away.” I don’t look at him while I’m saying all of this. I am in a reminiscent mode, looking distantly at the keys of the piano and caressing them.

“Oh, my gosh!” I exclaim,
smiling as a memory comes clear to me. “I remember playing Chopin’s Nocturne 19 in E-minor, Opus 72 no. 1 and, from the middle of the piece to the end, I was in tears.” I stop, remembering what brought on those tears. It wasn’t just the deep sadness of the piece. It was the memory of feeling like I was in perpetual darkness as a child. My eyes water as horrible childhood memories flood back to me.