Chapter 26 Roman
ROMAN
I hate this.
Mina lowers into my lap like she was born to that place. The first time she came to me, she was all bright edges and stubborn courage, a woman daring herself to walk into the dark. Tonight, she is not naive.
She sees what I see. Corners that can hide a hand. Shadows that can hide a boy. She sells a smile to the room that looks like sin. She gives me a kiss that tastes like a vow. I feel the weight of both.
We make a spectacle because that is the job. This crowd lives for the show. It fills the blanks with its own hunger. I have used that hunger a thousand times.
I do not want to use my wife. Not now, not ever.
I have taken my pleasure in this chair with women who asked for nothing but to be chosen for an hour. Mina is not that. I want her like a man wants the reason he still gets up in the morning.
All the world is a stage, and the men nothing more than actors, or however the quote goes. But we are not actors, and while we may be on a stage, I am tired of giving people a show. More than that, I don’t want to show them my wife.
I slide my palm up her thigh and stop where it is decent. The room imagines the rest, and I let them. They don’t get the full sight of her. Not this time.
I bend to her ear. “Let me put up the walls.”
The switch sits under my left hand. One press and the panels would rise smooth and silent. The stage becomes a room, and the noise outside turns into a muffled hush of pulsing bass and moans. It also sets the trap for Vitaly.
I am tired of waiting for this.
She stiffens for half a breath. Then she shakes her head, small enough for only me to feel it. “Keep them down,” she whispers. Her voice is velvet and wrong. The request lands like a pebble in a still pond.
Odd. My instincts list possibilities. She wants to draw this out. She’s searching for Vitaly in the crowd, paranoid that he’ll get the drop on me or my security. Perhaps she’s in a mood.
Whatever the case, it is not my preference. I kiss the corner of her mouth. “I do not want to share you with them.”
“Share me,” she says, low and steady, as if the words do not cost her. “Use me. I like it.”
Since when?
Is this a mirror of her behavior on the island? That blow job that was damn near public? The sex against a tree that was public? Is she an exhibitionist, or is it something else?
I turn her chin with two fingers until she looks at me. The eyes I give her are not for the room. “I do not use you, love. You are mine. I am yours. We do not belong to them. We belong to each other.”
A shine lifts in her eyes. Not submission. Fear. She hides it fast, but I am built to read tremor the way other men read maps. Her voice catches on the next breath. “You told me pakhans don’t live for themselves. They live for their people. We do belong to them, so we should put on a show.”
Every word is right and still wrong. The logic fits. The reasoning under it does not. I search her face. Her lashes flutter once. She looks over my shoulder for the briefest slice of a second. That is the look of a woman counting down.
“What is wrong?”
She opens her mouth. Nothing comes. She swallows. Her throat works. She tries again. The effort hurts me more than anything she could have said.
Mina is unwilling to speak on this here. Very well. “Come with me.” I stand with her in my arms. “We’re taking this to another room.”
“What?”
The floor manager reads the shift and opens the path. The rope drops from a hook. A low table slides out of our way. Two guards take positions a beat closer than usual. I descend from the stage with her held against me, slow enough to sell possession, fast enough to keep the moment intact.
I take her to a room I do not enter often. The door lives behind a panel disguised as a wall mirror. The key is not a key. The lock reads body heat and fingerprints coded to it. Mine are coded to every lock in Rope.
Inside, the air is cooler. The light is clean, but low.
The equipment is not for amateurs. This is a place for negotiated play.
The walls are lined with specialty equipment I commissioned for a few high-roller members, and they visit Rope rarely, so I knew the room would be open tonight.
It’s a good thing too, because we didn’t negotiate anything. Not yet.
My wife and I need to have chat.
She looks around like she has been starving and just found a buffet table.
The door clicks behind us. I slide the bolt and throw a look to the ceiling plate.
The two men I trust most in this building will guard the outside.
No one will open this door for anything short of a fire.
No one will see her cry if she needs to.
I turn to ask again what is wrong. She comes at me before I get the words out. She is heat and urgency and a hunger that feels like a deadline.
She pushes me back until the backs of my legs meet a padded bench and then onto it, straddling my lap with the single-mindedness of a person who wants to tear a clock off the wall. It is reckless for her. It is reckless for me. It is also us.
My hands find her hips because they always do. My mouth finds hers because it must. But something is wrong. “Wait.”
“No,” she says into my mouth, and she makes the word an oath.
She moves like she has to keep something from catching up to her. I have known impatience and exhibition and the kind of show a woman puts on for an audience and for herself. This is not that. This is need, sharp and strong, wrapped in control that could fray if I tug too hard.
I do not tug. I go with it. I am a man with limited tools to soothe a terror when a woman will not name it. I will use the tools I have.
Her kiss shreds my will to persist with questions. Fiery, ardent. She kisses a line down my throat as she unbuttons my shirt to expose more skin. A naughty hand dips lower than her mouth, cupping me over my trousers, where she finds me hard and ready.
But something troubles my queen, and I cannot let her distract me from that. I take her hands from me, kissing the inside of her wrists before I speak. “Tell me what troubles you, my love.”
The fear in her eyes is back for only a flash. “What’s wrong is my husband won’t let me work off some of my nervous energy on his cock.”
I don’t buy it for a second. Her pupils flare when she lies, or when she pretends she’s okay when she’s not, and they’re flaring now. But she doesn’t want to talk about it at the moment, and I’m too far gone to deny her anything.
“Promise we talk about it after.”
She swallows. “Promise.”
With that, I unleash her, and I am delighted by the results. She yanks open my trousers, tumbles to her knees, and takes me deeply into her throat. The sight of this exquisite woman on her knees would make a lesser man come in two strokes.
I cup the back of her head in my hand and take her throat. Now that we’ve grown accustomed to one another, I’m less worried about hurting her. My wife is strong enough to take whatever I dish out.
She groans around my cock, and that’s all it takes for me to pull out and lift her to her feet. Her brows furrow in confusion. “What—”
I turn, bending her over the padded table behind me. That dress is in the way, so I lift the back of it. Black lace panties. Such a good girl. I pull them down and press on the small of her back so her ass sticks out for me as she bends forward.
Fuck, the sight of her like this is killing me. Her sex is wet and shining between her thighs, and it’s all I can do not to slam myself into her right the fuck now. But I will take my time.
I notch there, enjoying the slick, tight feel of her entrance and the way she whines for more, arching herself back to meet me. “Tell me what you want, wife.”
“Now! Fuck me n—oh, yes!”
I give her half my length to work on for a moment. She is primed and ready for more, but why not take my time with this? Why not enjoy it? This may be our last time together.
Perhaps I should make it sweet for her. Slow and romantic and meaningful. That’s where my heart is right now. I long for more time with this woman, and I may not have it. Such is the life of a pakhan.
The truth is, my end is nigh. So, I will not waste a single moment on what should be.
I slam deep, fitting into her soul where I belong. There, I pause, letting her body adjust to my presence. I feel it all—the way her pussy quivers around my cock. That deep sigh that relaxes her bones. The way she shakes with anticipation for my next move.
“That right there? That’s where you truly live, isn’t it?”
Her voice is a ghost. “Yes.”
I drag my thumbs up the sides of her spine before hooking my hands over her shoulders.
Once I am anchored inside of her, I begin.
I don’t retract completely—wouldn’t want to give her too much length to work herself on yet.
No, I give her only a few inches. Not enough to work her G-spot into a frenzy just yet.
I am unsheathed inside of her, only now realizing the risk of condom-free sex. Doesn’t matter, I suppose. We’ve risked it before. What’s one more time? And a bit of risk adds to it. Heightens each sensation.
I’ve never been much for gambling, but tonight is the night for such things.
I wind my fist into her hair for more direct control and hammer myself into her body. The sounds she makes set me alight. I’m almost there. But not before her. Never before her.
I pull out abruptly, and she whimpers with loss. But I turn her over to face me and hoist her legs up over my shoulders as I bend over her body. She’s folded in half, our eyes line up, and now I see her. Truly see her.
The fear. The love. The danger.
I don’t know what’s on her mind, but right now, I bet it’s me.
I thrust all the way in, giving her those inches she needs to come. “I want to see your face when I make you come on me.”
“Yes!” she gasps.
A stroke later, and her eyes roll back as she lets out a keening wail beneath me. I feel it when she comes, milking my length. It’s enough to bring me over the edge with her.
I have fallen with this woman, for this woman. Whatever lies on the other side of tonight, at least I had that.