22. Eleanor
22
Eleanor
Are we... vibing?
I’ve never been with someone who wanted so much from me. And it was a release like I’ve never known, just to give in and let him take it.
Sex has always seemed so transactional. Your pleasure, my pleasure, getting ourselves off and having fun together doing it. Even with guys who stuck around long enough to earn the illustrious title of Boyfriend, sex was, at most, an additional way to connect that felt good.
Sex with Mac is absolutely nothing like that. He acts like everything about me is his. My pleasure is his—his to give, his to take. Hell, with the way he’s so attentive, thoughtful and obsessed, so is my heart. I’m not sure I’m even protecting it from him anymore.
Because in truth, that’s why I kept my distance. I didn’t want to admit to myself that letting him in even a little would blow me wide open. And he’s so… much. So much power, and vitality, and intelligence, and physical perfection…
Yeah, I’m doomed. All I can do is hope he meant what he said about never letting me go, or at least that he means to keep me for a little while. Even beyond the next week, which is really my only guaranteed time.
He keeps me up so late that I spend most of the next day snoozing, missing him, and sneaking down to the kitchen in the elevator for snacks. In the late afternoon, I decide to give the well-equipped gym in the basement a try, in spite of the soreness in my legs and core.
It’s such a large space, and it feels cavernous as the motion-sensor lights come on. Being alone with so much big equipment is almost intimidating, but it’s better than accidentally making eye contact with Dimitri on the inner-thigh machine .
My workout is eerily quiet, since I can’t figure out how to work the complicated music system built into the wall, but it leaves me feeling sweaty and accomplished. Afterwards, I shower, spend some time carving out a spot in Mac’s closet for my stuff—feeling just a little silly doing it, knowing my days are numbered—and make my way back downstairs to start dinner.
Intentionally, I didn’t make too much food when I was meal prepping. I know people get weird about leftovers, and, quite honestly, I wanted to give myself something to do while Mac was gone. But I did make enough to get Mac and Wesley through a couple of days, knowing that I could easily make something ad hoc for myself.
So, when I open the fridge to assess where we stand, I’m completely stunned. All those meals I prepared yesterday are gone. Either I severely misunderstood how much food these guys eat, or… I didn’t calculate correctly for the number of people actually eating it. I have a reasonable idea of how much of that grocery order should be left, and a quick check of the remaining chicken and ground beef tells me that my suspicions were right. There’s no way Dimitri is cooking for himself.
As if the thought summons the man…
“You,” I hear, and whirl with a hand pressed to my chest in fear.
The fear doesn’t abate as I see Dimitri’s angry face. “Me?”
“You tell me these knives suck ,” he spits, emphasizing the American slang that sounds so strange in his accent. He places a canvas bundle on the counter with a distasteful look my way. “I come, take them to sharpen, only to find you know nothing. These knives are as sharp as you could want. Maybe they are too sharp? Hmm? You cut yourself? This is not my problem.”
I’d know that beat-up canvas case anywhere, even if I hadn’t just pulled it from my bags the night before. From here, I can even see my initials at the top, written in sharpie. I’d assumed Mac had taken them to the kitchen for me. Then, when I couldn’t find them down here, I assumed I’d simply missed them in our room somewhere.
“No, those are my knives,” I say. “Mac had them brought here from my apartment. ”
He looks down, but his scowl stays firmly affixed, like he doesn’t believe me or understand. So, I go to the knife drawer in the island and pull out one of the old, ceramic-coated ones for him. “These are the knives that were here.”
He takes it, and recognition dawns on his face. Setting it down, he opens up the canvas case, and picks up my 7” chef’s knife—the one Mac stabbed my table with. “These are very nice,” he says with some ill-disguised surprise. “Well-balanced.”
“Careful, I haven’t even used that one since I sharpened it—” I start to protest as he turns it around in his hand, but stop as he holds it with enough confidence that I know he’s not going to hurt himself. And when he presses his thumb to the edge of the blade and blood immediately wells, he just lifts his brows in surprise.
“You sharpened this? What did you use?”
Most people don’t smile when they cut themselves. And, frankly, anything other than a dirty look on his face feels out of place after how surly he’s been. I’m more than a little thrown off. “Dual grit whetstone. It takes some time, but… sharp knives are important,” I say slowly, defensively.
“I could not agree more.” He lifts his head, still smiling faintly, though the gravity in his tone makes it clear he’s not being facetious.
“I’ve cut myself much worse on dull knives.”
“That is what I always say.”
Encouraged by the change to his demeanor, I show him my index finger, where a scar curves almost all the way around. “Nearly lost this one.”
He sets down the chef’s knife gingerly—with reverence, almost—and holds out both his palms, then turns them over to show me the backs. They’re littered with white raised scars, some small, some longer than an inch. “Training knives, mostly, too dull to cut deep and just painful instead. This one, though, was from when I was surprised after just sharpening one. I also use a whetstone.”
“It’s all I can afford,” I admit, smiling a little. Are we… vibing?
“Pah,” he dismisses. “Expensive tools are for those who will not bother to learn the skill properly. Good results require patience, always.”
Mac enters the kitchen, covered in sweat. I’m a little bummed, since it appears we missed each other in the gym. Then I shake the emotion from my head. I look like a red-faced, sweaty monster when I work out—he doesn’t need to see that just yet. I let my eyes travel the length of him, pausing to admire how much more prominent the veins on his arms seem right now. That post-pump swell is making my mouth water.
His eyes are warm as he beelines right for me and lays a heavy kiss on my lips. When he pulls back, I can see Dimitri has picked the blade back up and is staring down the length with one eye.
“This woman has good sense, James. And good knives.”
Mac throws him a glance over his shoulder, then turns back to me with a self-satisfied grin. I want to knock that pretentious smile off his face because it was a compliment for me, no matter how he twists it to make it one about himself. “Mac stabbed my coffee table with that one. Almost ruined the tip.”
As Dimitri scowls at him, Mac straightens and shoots me a look of betrayal.
“How could you?” Dimitri asks. “You, of all people, who lets no one touch his weapons.”
“They were so expensive, too. I’ve been collecting for years. German, high carbon steel.”
“German?” he repeats disparagingly, immediately setting it back down. “I take back what I said. You have no sense at all.”
“What? You just said they were well-balanced.”
“Japanese, or you are wasting your time and money.” He approaches us and whips one out from his belt.
I freeze, and Mac tenses at my side, but the alarm melts quickly into admiration. The blade is short, more like 5”, and shaped like a dagger where it’s sharp on both sides. It’s an instrument of death, with a cutout pattern at the end meant for easy gripping in spite of a bloody handle, and the tip is almost razor-blade sharp, 10° at most.
It’s an odd feeling, knowing for sure that I’m looking at a murder weapon.
“Very nice,” I breathe, my appreciation honest. I want to touch it, but I’m also a little afraid to ask. And of it.
Mac swats at my ass and steps around to grab water from the fridge. “I’m going to make dinner in a minute,” I let him know as I watch him rifling through the drawers for something to eat.
“James, we will review the information from your watch today?”
Mac nods. “I’ll drop in after my shower, before dinner. ”
“Do you want dinner, too?” I ask Dimitri. I try to keep my voice light, like I don’t know he’s been eating my food already. I want to give him his dignity, so he won’t feel backed into a corner about it and turn me down out of spite.
Dimitri narrows his eyes at me, then shakes his head, his face a mask again. “No, thank you.”
As soon as Dimitri is out of the kitchen, Mac sets down the bottle he’d just gulped and swoops in on me. I reach up, expecting the embrace, but he uses the firm grip around my waist to lift me up and place my ass on the counter. I squeak, reaching for the edges to steady myself, and widen my legs as he steps between them.
“Hi,” he murmurs, staring straight into my eyes. The counters are a little higher than my waist, so this puts us almost level.
“Hi,” I whisper back. I grab around his neck and press my torso into him. “How was your day?”
“It fucking sucked because I wasn’t inside you.”
His mouth claims mine, and there’s nothing slow or sweet or gentle about it. The Mac from last night that wanted to savor the moment is gone; this version is raw with the hunger created by having already had a taste. His tongue plunges inside my mouth, and his hands press into the fleshy part between hip and ass, holding me still and tight against him so he can grind his pelvis against the hot, soft center of me. My skin tingles, and I shiver from the heat blooming everywhere in my body.
When he pulls away, I almost whine at the loss.
“I’m going to go take a shower. Care to join me?” he asks, reaching up to cup my jaw and run his finger roughly across my bottom lip.
I smile, and touch the pad of the thick digit with my tongue. Then, I pull back. “It’s getting late; I should start dinner. And I just took one.”
“Take another,” he urges, letting his thumb drag his hand across my chin so it can swipe down and circle my throat.
My pulse starts to race and desire floods my pussy, making the whole area pound in time. He applies pressure with just his fingertips, and moves in again, stealing my breath into his mouth and holding me still with his delicate grip. I’m so consumed, so frenzied, that I’m truly lost to my senses as they fill with him—his scent, his touch, his taste.
He pulls back, rubbing the side of my neck softly. “So? Shower?”
I have to take a couple deep breaths to recover. Then, I swallow against his hand with some difficulty. “Um, three in one day seems excessive,” I reply.
“Three?”
“I plan on taking one later tonight after I show you how much I missed you.” I ball the bottom of his shirt in my hands, looking down, transfixed, as it reveals a strip of hard flesh.
He grins. “You missed me, darlin’?”
“Yes, I thought about you all day.”
His eyebrows lift and the look is salacious. His fingers tighten just a hair. In response, I reach up and grip his forearm, feeling those veins under my hand. “And did you touch yourself?” There’s no censure, or approval. Just curiosity.
“No,” I say, and it sounds almost like an admission. He has to know I thought about it, right?
“Good,” he replies. His other hand trails over my hip and down my stomach, lightly running down the seam of my leggings. “It means you’ll be hot and needy for me.”
I moan a little at the feather-light touch. It’s nowhere near enough. Once he reaches the approximate area of my entrance, he starts an upward stroke, never applying enough pressure. At the top, just where my clitoris is, he changes directions again, back down. I shiver and squirm.
“I bet you’re ready now, aren’t you, baby? I bet if I checked, you’d be dripping wet, wouldn’t you?”
“Please,” I cry softly as my eyes drift closed.
“Please, what? Please fuck you here, on the counter?”
I just whimper in need because I don’t want that—anyone could walk in—but I’m so fucking turned on that I also kind of do. I can’t think straight. I know I’d let him, if he wanted to. Thankfully, based on previous statements I’m pretty sure he doesn’t.
“One day, maybe,” he says, letting me off the hook. “I’ll tell you what’s going to happen, though. You’re going to get down off this counter, go into the bathroom, take off your panties and give them to me. Then, I’m going to go upstairs and take my shower and you’re going to cook us dinner.”
Oh, God. He wants my panties? It’s so unbelievably fucking hot. And dirty. “What are you going to do with them?” I wrinkle my nose.
“What do you think? I’m going to take the edge off so I can last more than 30 seconds when I finally get inside this sweet pussy later,” he says with a little smirk, giving it a light slap that makes me jump and the blood rush to my clit from the gentle impact.
I heave a deep breath. He steps back just far enough that when I slide down off the counter, I end up dragging my whole torso against his and we both groan a little. I feel his eyes on me as I exit the kitchen. I’m not 100% sure where the bathroom down here is, but I vaguely remember seeing a closed door near the foyer that looked too big to be a closet.
I’m right. I enter the powder room, and close the door behind me. The tall mirror over the vanity shows me my wild state, and I laugh a little. A quick splash of water to cool my burning face, wet hands to smooth down my hair, and then I’m following Mac’s orders. I give the piece of clothing a preemptive sniff, mostly out of curiosity, and it smells like nothing but clean laundry and tangy desire. And me, I suppose.
I emerge a minute later, underwear in pocket, and hand them to Mac when I see he’s still alone in the kitchen. “Will I get these back?”
“Maybe when they lose your scent,” he shrugs. “That pajama shirt did after a week or so. You can have it back, now. Actually, let me wash it first. It’s probably sticky.”
My jaw drops. “You stole my pajama shirt? I was looking everywhere for that!”
He winks. “It’s under my pillow.”
I swat at him as he darts in for a kiss, laughing as he skillfully collects my wrists and holds me still to kiss me properly. Then he strides out of the room and I’m left to catch my breath. He’s such a whirlwind.
As I get started with dinner, I reflect on how strange today was. My life is so suddenly, so drastically different. I had a few moments where panic clawed at my throat—after my workout, when I’d seen the steam bath in the basement, and finding a gun in one of Mac’s drawers when putting my clothes away—that reminded me this isn’t just some vacation or honeymoon. Those kinds of triggers are probably going to stick with me for a little while, too.
Once the covered dish is in the oven, I wander down the hallway in the direction I always see Wesley coming from. Most of the doors in the hallway are open, except one. I knock, and wait until I hear, “Yeah?”
Wesley looks up, then does a double take in surprise. “Oh, hello Eleanor. Is everything all right?”
I let my eyes wander for a few seconds, stunned by the sight of so much tech I don’t even recognize. What on earth is that box in the corner, lighting up with rainbow colors? “Uh, yeah… everything is fine. I wanted to come find you because I’ve been thinking about ways to win over Captain Hulk,” I say, returning my focus to Wesley.
At that, he sits back in his chair, crosses his arms, and regards me thoughtfully. “Oh? Do tell.”
“I actually think Dimitri is coming around to me. He almost likes me, I can tell.”
“Don’t take it too personally. He doesn’t particularly like me, either,” Wesley briefly leans forward to retrieve the energy drink off his desk and take a sip. “Actually, I’m not sure he likes anyone.”
I grin. “Well, if this works, I’ll share credit with you. Because I have an idea, but I need your help.”
His smile is conspiratorial now. “What do you need?”
“About 15 minutes with an internet connection—supervised, of course—and access to your grocery delivery service.”
He smiles cheekily, then rubs his hands together. “This is going to be good.”