The Dom Project (16 page)

“You don’t understand what you’re asking for,” he managed to say, warning her off him, always, always,
always
pushing her away, protecting her, protecting what they had, drawing a hundred lines and boundaries between them like chain-link fencing even before the formality of the contract.
Because if I didn’t cage myself this way I would destroy you.
All your plans and all your boundaries and all your lists
,
and I’d be like some wild unstoppable hurricane
,
ruining all your precious order and fuck me
,
I’d probably love it.
“You can’t handle what you’re asking for.”

But this time she didn’t shy back, the way she had when he’d called her Robby and thumped her on the shoulder all those years ago, sending her reeling so far back from him he’d nearly lost her. This time she squared her shoulders, eyes flashing, as confident and courageous and absolutely fucking crazy as Irina Mareau ever was, and she said, “Try me.”

So he reached out, gripped her lovely slender hips and pulled her against him. He’d do more than
try
her, oh yes, so much more.

No going back now.

He never wanted to.

* * *

This is really happening.
No going back.

Her world split in two. The past fell away. It was a violent moment and it shook her to the core but she wasn’t alone anymore. John was here too, standing at the same precipice. Holding her. They’d jump over the edge together.

She breathed him in deeply—so clean and good and
rich
, she could almost taste him—and fought against the wall of his body to get at the ties of her robe because one more second apart from him was too long.

“Robin. You—”

She couldn’t move anymore. He scooped her off her feet, lifted her to meet his mouth and kissed her like he was saying goodbye, like lovers at a train station in a sweeping black-and-white epic. And crushed his arms around her shoulders as he deepened the kiss even more, until it became something darker and sweeter and hungrier. No visual could hope to capture this. She wanted to feel him everywhere. Her skin, her mouth, her cunt throbbing with heat that he’d never fully claimed—
everywhere
.

She wasn’t aware they were walking until suddenly her legs were up around his waist, holding herself to him as he carried her...where? The nearest wall, she realized when her back crashed against it and a picture frame rattled.

“How strong would you say all that yoga makes your legs?” He asked, breaking their kiss with a roguish grin. She’d never seen him this way, all tightly coiled control but wild around the edges, his midnight-dark eyes staring unblinking into her own. She made him this way and she loved it,
gloried
in it.

“Strong enough.”

For the first time, he didn’t second-guess her. Didn’t say,
What’s your safe word?
or
We’re going to try something new now
,
okay?
Just trusted her grip on his waist to keep her from falling and let her go. She fell back against the wall as his newly freed hands reached for the deep V of her half-open robe and swept it free of her body.

They moaned in unison—John’s a possessive growl, her own higher and wanting—when John’s large hands engulfed her breasts. His fingers were cold and hard against the aching softness of her flesh, and she arched into him, seeking more pressure, more sensation. When he squeezed her right nipple between the V of his fingers, she sang out as she breathed, so weak with the pleasure she could barely stand it anymore.

He swept his hands down abruptly so he had a firm grip on her ass, then kissed her ear and whispered, “Up you go.”

Up where? Wasn’t she practically to the ceiling already?

No, because the next second her thighs were wrapped around his head, his hands on her hips holding her upright. God, his face was right between—

“John!” She almost screamed
no
, terrified of falling, but the second she felt his hot breath against her spread-wide inner lips, it turned into a silent shock wave of
yes yes yes
. Fuck gravity. She trusted his shoulders to bear her up, his arms to hold her, his clever mouth to finally give her the pleasure she was dying for.

And there it was, wrapped up in wet heat and dirty-sweet hunger. He lapped at her, invaded her, tasted her to the fullest, and the feeling centered between her scissored thighs was so pure, it had her pierced through, floating in joy. The slightest shift set her clit rocking against his stiff probing tongue—
make me come
,
make me come
, no more time for
please sirs
—and thank God he’d grown his hair out a bit from the brush cut he usually favored, because she had two fistfuls of his hair, drawing him in right where she wanted him. His mouth pressed hot and open over her mound.

He moved against her.
With
her.

Arching back against the wall
hurt
, but the screaming, soaring sense of fulfillment swallowed up every other feeling.
John
.
John is doing this to me.

Closer than she’d ever imagined.

Higher.

Oh God
.

She kicked and screamed at the very height, at the intense climax that echoed the violence of their first coming together.

Then sobbed and moaned softly as he brought her down. So giddy and boneless she could barely tell which direction was up anymore, she slid down, down, always cradled in his arms. She tasted herself on his mouth when they kissed, a salty tang that brought her back from that sated place and into the present with him: the present where John was
waiting
.

She wanted more. More of him. More of everything. She struggled with the waistband of his jeans, her fingers still clumsy but regaining strength. As soon their kiss ended, she gasped for air to speak the words, to make him understand at last. “When I saw you tonight, when you were—it was—I’ve never—”

“See all you want,” he said. “
Sweetheart
.” The way he said that, half-cruel, half daring her to love it...she would have fallen to her knees if he wasn’t holding her so tightly.

Not that she needed to, because a second later he took her down himself, until they lay tangled on the carpeted floor. He straddled her waist and finished what she’d started, yanking down his jeans and underwear until the thick bar of his erection cast its shadow between her breasts.

“Is that what you want to see?” he asked, fingers cupping his sac, rubbing the base of his shaft, totally shameless. She’d always loved that, and always wanted to
be
like that. And now it was happening, everything she’d thought she’d never have. She reached for him. He grabbed her wrist. “No,
tell
me.”

“God, yes. You’re—I want to see you come. Right here.” And because she wanted to, she drew on the profound structure of the contract, broken now but still a part of them. “
On
me. Please. Sir. Please.” She pulled her hand away and threw her arms out to either side. Arched toward him, baring her throat and licking her lips, the pose embodying the pinup he envisioned her as. Inviting him with every inch of her body.

“Oh, you know how to make me. Fuck, yes.” He wrapped his fist around his cock and gave it one low, slow pull, skin stretched tight over hard flesh, perfectly smooth except for the faint ridge of one vein running up the underside. The thrill of seeing him so close set her skin on fire, had her yearning to trace that line with her tongue—

No. She wanted to focus on
seeing
.

Seeing him claim her.

He pumped again, faster this time. His face was in shadow, his jaw locked in concentration. Under his tight black T-shirt, she could see his abs rolling with mounting spasms.

“All for you—
ah
—sweetheart,” he gasped, and this time it wasn’t taunting at all, just the easy, affectionate pet name the word was meant to be. And simultaneously an apology, an acknowledgment of her hurt, a promise that everything that came now would be so much better.

There wasn’t a split where she saw his climax before feeling it—everything tumbled together, wrapped up in the convulsive moment when his come dappled her trembling chest, one warm, slick stripe painted upward right between her breasts. She didn’t flinch. There was no fear, no shame, no line between sex and love. When a thinner streak fell higher, across her collarbone, she swept her fingers across it, then sucked the tip of her forefinger.
Now see me.
See how much I want you in me
.

“Robin, Robin, Robin,” he chanted. His collapse was slow and measured; first he swayed above her, chest heaving with deep breaths, then he pulled off his shirt and lowered himself on top of her, supporting himself by his elbows, blocking out all the light. He kissed her lips, her cheeks, her fingers, swept her hair aside and kissed her forehead and kissed her lips again, his hunger still matching her own.

“Aren’t you going to take my picture?” she asked once both their breathing had slowed a little. She’d meant it as a tease, or maybe to calm the swell and surge of emotions and bring it back to the casualness of what went before.

But John just leaned up on his elbows again, looking down on her face, dark eyes
studying
her, and said, “This time, I don’t need to.”

* * *

He turned on the tap, put the washcloth underneath it and waited for the water to warm, thankful for this minute alone to calm down and figure out what the fuck was going on—thankful, but already missing Robin. It was hard to get any sense of perspective when all he could think about was her waiting naked in the next room. Maybe touching herself.
Goddamn
.

Maybe he should fuck her first, and think about the implications later.

Yes
,
because that could never go wrong.

No. He’d gently clean her off, and then they’d kiss some more, and then he’d see about spanking her. And
then
he’d fuck her. The implications bit kept getting pushed further down the chain of events until it was in danger of falling out of his mind entirely.

The water ran hot. He squeezed the washcloth, releasing some of the pressure building up in his hopelessly Robin-soaked mind. How could they go forward after this? The contract represented a simple forking course, a set of mutually exclusive options. Now that he’d touched her, tasted her, come all over her like a fucking porn star
at her command
they were lost in a maze of infinite complexity.

They had to stay together through it. Friends. Lovers. Master and...whatever she wanted to call herself. It didn’t matter, as long as they were together. They had to—
no
. Robin would leave him behind, if she decided that was best for her, and he had to accept that.

He turned off the tap and decided that tonight wasn’t about what
had
to happen, only what he could
make
happen.

He loped out of the bathroom, door slamming behind him, and oh God, her angelic face, the longing that brightened into pure happiness as he looked into her eyes...

They came together more peacefully, this time, but the attraction was no less magnetic—he was barely able to breathe until he’d folded her warm, lithe body into his arms, until he could feel that she was here and she was real, not just some delirious fantasy wish-fulfillment.

“Please stay,” she whispered.

It broke his heart, that she’d think he’d leave her. “Of course.” He stroked her hair, the back of her shoulder, traced downward until he cupped her hip bone.

Together, wordlessly, they moved to her bed. He cradled her in his lap and wiped her neck and chest with the warm cloth. Followed its damp path with his lips, tasting fresh water and skin.

“This is really happening,” she said, a little dreamy, and he was glad to hear the insecurity had fled her voice.

“I’m still kind of in shock, myself. I didn’t bump your head, did I? Am I a figment of your imagination right now? Because this is a
very
realistic fantasy if it is.”

“Mmm, no, because if this was one of my fantasies about you you’d have three fingers in my pussy by now.”

He could
not
believe prim, uptight Robin, the same woman who scolded him about having a messy email in-box, was sitting here saying those things to him. God, he could listen to her talk dirty all day. Maybe now he could have that wish granted. All the sweet little
yes
, sirs he’d had her saying on a regular basis were sexy as hell, but this? He could have her begging in such exquisite detail for all the things he could do to her. Have her do to him.

Make her beg to suck his cock. Say it just like that:
Please let me suck your cock
,
sir.

What had gone on between them today...it opened up all new possibilities. New games. New challenges. New ways for them to experience and surprise one another.

“So tell me some more about these fantasies,” he said, trailing one, two,
three
fingers along the curve of her outer thigh. “They sound very detailed.”

“Oh, I don’t know. You might have to persuade me to—to share those details.” Her breath fluttered over his ear as she whispered, and it made him shudder with want. Oh, he could persuade her, all right.

“How about I tell you mine, first? See if there’s anything in there that sparks your interest.”

As a dom he didn’t, as a rule, do give-and-take like this, more you-give-and-I-take, but for Robin, today, he’d make an exception. She’d given him so much today, gone so far outside the limits of her comfort zone, she deserved for John to give something of himself in return.

She twined around him, running her fingers up and down his back, all while making a
hmm-I’m-thinking
noise, feline and utterly charming.
Here
,
pussy
. “Tell me one. Nothing too basic, like a blow job. You know I’m good for that. Or maybe you don’t know yet, but...”