Chapter 22
Ford
“Tell me your safe word,” I demand, reaching for the items I left on the dresser after securing her ankles with the leather cuffs, her feet delicately arched in her heels. She’s entirely exposed and at my mercy, even with her clothes on.
“Liar or red.”
“Liar or red, Clark,” I correct, my lips twitching.
She nearly sneers, and I wonder if she’s fighting the urge to call me Sir in the same way I’m craving to hear it on her tongue again.
I don’t press the issue when she remains silent. With the satin in hand, I smirk before removing her ability to see, eclipsing her hazel gaze. She could stop this with a word, take back control of the situation, but she doesn’t.
The blindfold is as much for me as it is for playing with her sensations since it’s becoming nearly impossible to hide my erection from her.
When I had Sloane up here, it did nothing for me.
It wasn’t until I began to speak to Genevieve that my cock perked up, lengthening as I imagined I was speaking into her ear instead of the submissive tied up in front of me.
Keeping my footsteps stealthy, almost imperceptible, I lift the long-handled feather to the inside of her knee. When the gentle kiss of the light material grazes over her skin, her body stills, and I wonder how hard it is for her to fight the urge to test the restraints.
“Do you know what this is?” I wonder aloud, the feather tickling her skin.
“A feather.” Sir, I add in my mind.
Damn, who have I become? The version of myself from just a year ago would’ve balked at the notion of having a woman call me Sir, but now, that’s all I can imagine, especially coming from her.
I hum, taking a risk as I sweep the tip of the feather beneath the hem of her pencil skirt. She presses her full, red lips together, and I resist the call to claim her mouth.
Behind me, the heat of the attention of our audience of one keeps me in line.
Drifting the feather along her collarbone, I notice the way Genevieve’s nipples press against the inside of her lace bustier.
Not for the first time, I wonder what she looks like beneath her clothes.
Are her nipples a dusty rose shade or darker?
Lighter? Are they sensitive? I wish I could find out.
“What about this?” I ask as I run the new tool over her inner arm, having swapped the feather for the pinwheel, featuring small, metal spikes.
Her lips part, a gasp escaping as the sharp pricks descend from her elbow toward her shoulder. Her voice is raspy when she replies, “A Wartenberg wheel.” Sir.
Another rumble of approval vibrates in my chest, and I begin toggling between the pinwheel and feather, the sensations warring on the battleground of her porcelain skin.
Has she drenched her panties yet? Her breathing is ragged, and jaw is still tight, ticking, and I hope that means she’s dripping for me.
As I abruptly abandon the items, she guzzles down oxygen, her chest rising and falling deeply, but I keep the reprieve brief. Drawing the dragon tongue back marginally, I allow the leather end to bite at her right inner thigh, then her left.
“Holy shit,” Sloane mutters from behind me, and I can hear the wanton desire in her tone. Is she touching herself? The breathlessness of her voice makes me think she might be.
Genevieve shifts then, the chains binding her to the X rattling as she tugs on her restraints, desperately seeking…
something. Her shoulders drop a little, though, and I realize that her resolve is slipping more by the second, especially when I tap her between the thighs with the tongue of the whip as I ask, “Do you feel good yet, doll?”
I’m not sure what prompted me to call her doll, as it’s not a term I’d use at this point in my life, but it felt right, my mouth forming the word on some kind of instinct.
Fuck, it’s killing me not to know just how ruined her panties are, not to dip my hand beneath that skirt of hers and find out for myself.
Unfortunately for me, she gnashes her teeth, gripping what tethers of absolute control remains of her with both metaphorical hands.
I draw the whip back again, letting it pop her over the pussy once more, and her head falls back, a thin sheen of sweat dotting her skin and glistening like an erotic mirror ball in the low lamplight.
A moan rattles in her mouth, and the sound nearly has me coming in my goddamn slacks, but the need to see her fall apart with nothing more than my whip against her panty-covered clit is too enticing to focus on anything other than her rapture.
Drawing the whip back, I let it fly, nailing her between the legs one last time, even if I can’t see her swollen cunt for the angle and layers of infuriating fabric separating us.
Just when I think she may shatter before my eyes, her legs trembling and breath catching, she calls out, “Liar.”
Her voice is strained but strong, and panic seizes me, my blood rushing in my ears and my body flashing hot. Immediately, I drop the whip, reaching for Genevieve’s wrists as I frantically scan her face as I attempt to decipher what went wrong.
Is she hurt? Scared? I thought for sure she was about to come, but what if I missed something? Did I push her past a limit? I should’ve asked her about those before suggesting I cuff her to this cross. I made a mistake, and the idea that I might’ve hurt her has my stomach clenching.
As I remove the blindfold, her hazel eyes are wild and frantic, but not in the manner Sloane’s were earlier. If anything, she appears…guarded, and I’m not sure what to make of that.
“Are you okay?” I ask after unbuckling the restraints. My palms find her cheeks as I tilt her head to look up at me. Her chest rises and falls heavily, and I’d give a fucking kidney to know what she’s thinking.
When she dips her chin in answer, I decide that’s going to have to be good enough for now.
“I’ve stopped, and you’re safe,” I inform her carefully. “I’m going to lift you in my arms now.”
When I do, her plump lips part just enough that I can see the bottom of her two front teeth.
Clutching her tightly, I cradle her in my arms, and I swear she curls into me, but I could’ve imagined that.
Instead of going to the couch where I took Sloane, I move to the bed, settling against the headboard with Genevieve still in my embrace.
With her head tucked just below my chin, pressed to my chest, I think about how easy it’d be to press a kiss to the top of her head. Suddenly, that’s the only thing in the world I want.
But this is the last lesson Genevieve is giving me, and I need to find a way to keep her from walking away. Not just because I haven’t gotten any of the information I’ve been tasked with retrieving, but because I want to know what her lips taste like.
I’m in a fuck ton of trouble.
“Can you talk to me?” I question, my register low as my fingers continue to glide over the soft strands of her bleach-blonde hair.
Just then, Sloane appears next to the bed, holding out a bottle of water with a small smile on her lips and a slight blush to her cheeks.
I take it from her and nod, hoping it’ll dismiss her from the room so Genevieve and I might have a moment together.
However, she doesn’t leave. In fact, she perches on the end of the bed.
As soon as the mattress dips, I know I’ve lost Genevieve entirely.
Her body tenses, and she sits up fully. I have no choice but to let her edge away from me, making the six inches of space between us feel as vast as the Atlantic Ocean.
I offer her the water, and she takes it from me, propping herself up just beneath the circular mirror.
“Are you okay?” I repeat my question.
She sighs, but I can’t decipher if it’s a huff of annoyance or the sound of resignation. “Yes, of course. I’m…fine.”
“Are you sure?” Sloane pushes.
Genevieve’s lips purse, but she doesn’t snap at the doe-eyed woman. Instead, she nods. “I wanted to see how Ford would manage if I actually safe-worded.”
What? That can’t be right…can it? I handled things with Sloane just fine. There must be more going on here, but what? And is she actually okay?
Even Sloane’s eyebrows furrow, her lips curling upside down, but Genevieve speaks again before either of us can say anything. “I really think that the two of you will be just fine without me.”
Panic races through me as my mind whirs, scrambling to create a reason why I would need to keep the Madam around.
I can’t bail on the FBI without the intel, and I can’t get that without her.
She keeps shutting down every avenue that leads to her, blocking me out and walling me off.
I thought maybe I could talk Genevieve into giving us a few more lessons, but evidently not.
The hard glint in her eye tells me that’s off the table.
I’ll have to find another way to get to her.
She must read the turmoil written on my face as anxiety about being on my own with Sloane, because she declares, “You’ll be alright, Clark. You’ve got a lot of promise as a Dom. I’m not worried about your capabilities.”
I can’t even respond before she’s continuing.
“And you’ll take care of him, right?” she directs at Sloane, who nods, a grin on her face.
Great.
The only woman I’m interested in taking care of me, slips off the mattress, straightening her shoulders as she passes Sloane, squeezing her shoulder. Gazing at me, she pins me to the bed with a gentle smile that wraps itself around my ribs. “See you around, Superman.”
“Samuel Choi is in custody,” Jackson explains through the burner phone’s speaker.
Pinching the bridge of my nose, I nod, settling back in my seat as I swirl my scotch around absently, the smell of smoke and fire wafting to my nose. “Not surprising, based on those headlines this morning.”
“She leaked that intel.”
He doesn’t have to tell me who the she in question is. After all, there’s only one person we’d be discussing during this check-in call.
The trajectory of this conversation has me running through every spoken word from our lesson last night. Had there been a natural way to probe Gen for information? Was there enough time to have snooped a bit more? Could I have gotten her to slip up and leak intel accidentally?
I needed to take some time to establish trust with Genevieve and Sloane. It’s not as if they’d naturally tell me what I needed to know, and with Jackson pushing me harder to wrap this up, the window to ask questions is rapidly closing.
It’s next to impossible to execute a successful op without smoothly infiltrating the intended mark’s environment and the fact that I’ve been pushed to do so pisses me off. That’s precisely how a target gets spooked, and someone ends up with a bullet in their brain.
“How do you know that?” I ask dubiously.
“Choi told me himself in interrogation this afternoon and he passed a polygraph.”
I bark a laugh. “Everyone knows those are inadmissible in court, and for good reason.”
“Don’t need it to hold up in court, just need to know if he’s a lying sack of shit. He claims she’s the only person he told about his wife’s side hustle.”
“A side hustle that funneled millions into her pocket, and presumably his,” I mutter, squeezing my eyes shut tightly. Goddamnit, I’ve underestimated the ruthlessness of this woman. “You believe Choi?”
“You can’t be serious, Crawford! Of course, I think it came from Allison. How close are you to getting your hands on her client list and, more importantly, that list of secrets?”
“Not close.” Right now, Drake is the only one who knows that Genevieve has already let me go as a client and as an apprentice of sorts, so now my only door to her is through Sloane…unless I can come up with a new plan.
“How long do you need?”
Doors are shutting in my face. I’ve done my own digging, looking into her bank statements and following paper trails, but they’ve led nowhere of substance. Genevieve has done a good job of covering her tracks and ensuring that she won’t be caught. Her thoroughness is frustrating.
“I don’t know. How long does it take to build rapport with someone?
” I snap caustically. For what must be the nine thousandth time, I curse myself for accepting this assignment, but I’m too far gone to give it up now.
I can’t bear the thought of placing Genevieve in someone else’s care.
Her demise is mine, perched in my palm like fragile flower petals that I’ll inevitably crush.
I won’t let another man be the one who snaps those cuffs around her wrists, and I’m a sick son of a bitch for that, but I can’t.
More calmly, I add, “I’ll get you what you need.”
“Crawford, Aubrey wants the op completed as soon as possible so Percy can claim he kept his promise to weed out the corruption in this city within the year. You have a month to get those lists of secrets and contacts from Allison.”
I grunt a response and hang up. There’s nothing left to say.
If I need more time, I’ll find a way to get it, but I hope it won’t come to that.
I’ve always done things above board, providing more than enough information to put the criminals away.
If I’d been shadier, I might not have gotten shot, but I wanted to play by the rules. I don’t plan to let them down now.
As I sit in my study, surrounded by the smell of burning wood coming from the hearth and the faint scent of old books in the air, the taste of whiskey on my tongue, I formulate a plan. For the first time in my life, I decide I need to step into the dark and get my hands dirty.