36 #2
"The usual, gorgeous," I finish, grabbing her by the waist and pulling her in. The table is cold and it wrings a sigh out of her that shoots straight to my chest. I’ve got her flush against me, skin burning under my hands. Ready. Me too, even if my stomach is doing flips like a chea p? ass circus.
My hands move over skin I know by heart. I’m not searching; I know the route and I don’t get lost.
She tosses half a joke, a little cocky. I cut it off with my mouth. She shuts her mouth and laughs under her breath; then the laugh dies and her chest starts rising fast. She offers me her neck without a word, a clear offer. That neck is familiar territory now—no cheap poetry.
"More serious," I order in her ear, my voice rough, my mouth very close.
"Got it, boss," she answers, and that whisper turns me on; that one actually revs me.
I loop the trench coat belt around her wrists and tie a simple knot.
It doesn’t tighten. The neat cross of her hands looks gorgeous, a gesture of surrender that feeds my ego shamelessly.
She could slip free in a second; I know it, and it gets me high that she knows it too.
She doesn’t. She holds still, eyes locked on me.
I trace her face with my fingers, follow the line of her jaw, the corner of her mouth, the curve of her neck.
I draw her with my mouth and my body, no dumb rush.
"You remember when you asked me to make it hurt a little?" I ask in a silk-soft voice.
"I remember your hand never shook."
That memory heats me up. I take her chin firmly, make her look at me with two fingers on her jaw. Alaska the complainer, Alaska the clever one, Alaska the scrapper; today a different version shows up: a present without a bow, willing discipline.
"And here I was wanting to use the strap-on on you," she ventures. "Make a citizen’s arrest."
"After," I promise. "When you earn it."
She looks at me with hunger and mischief. I set the pace. I rein her in when she starts to race; I ask for words. Obedience costs her, talking annoys her, her pride aches. She does it, pretending she isn’t.
"More," she murmurs. Her voice comes out broken and clear.
"Ask properly."
"Please."
"Please what?"
"Please don’t stop."
I don’t stop. I run my hands over her arms, her ribs, her belly. I kiss her collarbones, bite her shoulder soft, slide my tongue through the hollow of her throat. I grip her thighs, spread her knees, hold the back of her neck.
I give, I release, I put her back in line. I tell her when, where, how much. I don’t steal anything from her; I give it back with extra. I try to get serious for a second and I’m terrible at it; I end up laughing into her neck.
"You’re really smart," I tell her, and she looks a little thrown. "Too smart for me."
"No." She laughs, drowning in pleasure. "You’re the smart one. I follow you."
"Bullshit." I bite near her ear. "You wanted this. Does it hurt?" I ask at her neck, and I press on her bound wrists.
"I like it," she whispers, and she melts for me into a long sigh.
I loosen the knot just enough for her to move her hands a little. I kiss the marks it left, clean and red. She looks at me with that mix of pride and surrender that makes me swallow hard. I run my thumb over her lower lip and she sucks it without shame.
"Let me put the strap-on on and I’ll do it however you want," she murmurs, stubborn even when she’s begging.
I ignore her and strip her completely. I run my palm down her back, top to bottom, and count moles.
One, two, three. She trembles; so do I. She looks at me, nods.
I keep going. And I don’t stop until she asks for water, and then more, and then brings up the strap-on again.
And me, playing hard-ass, I’m already opening the damn case. My act never lasts long.
Outside it’s late; the clock says eleven.
Inside, it smells like warm skin and a half-snuffed candle.
I’m back in a place I’d written off, once off-limits; now air comes in, there’s light, there are clear exits and everything is under control.
It’s an old game, yeah, but with new rules and a pleasure that floods me.
I’m not who I was; I’m who I can be with her, and it blows my mind.
I help her to her feet, careful. I slide my palm from her nape to her waist. I take her to the varnished wooden wall; her heat hits the cool board and she lets out a sigh that punches through my gut.
I pin her wrists over her head with one hand; my fingers circle those fine bones and I feel the sweet tension, the exact pull.
With the other I set a rhythm—slow, steady, mean as hell—the kind that shakes a tremor loose and fogs the eyes.
I wring a moan out of her, patient. There’s no violence; there’s control and hunger.
No audience; just us and this private fever.
Her hair sticks to her forehead and I feel like a low-rent queen of the block painting a gorgeous tableau in six feet of kitchen.
"Were you going to wear it?" I ask, pure mischief.
"Maybe."
She smiles, defeated and proud at once, eyes bright, mouth wet.
"Another day. Today you don’t get to call many shots."
"Yeah," she says, and that "yeah" lands hot inside me.
She doesn’t move a single extra muscle. Back straight, mouth set. Her fingers, though, won’t stay still; they barely tremble, slick with sweat. She sighs and holds my gaze. On the outside, ice. Inside, everything comes undone, and it all reaches me.
Sometimes you can tell she’s an escort by trade.
She gets under people’s skin without asking.
She adjusts the tone, the pace, the distance.
She clocks what I want before I can name it.
She fixes my posture with the slightest touch, opens her mouth at the exact second, pins me with her gaze and I go clumsy.
With me, she doesn’t overdo it, doesn’t put on a show.
She pushes, she provokes, she yields, and fuck, I love it.
“Nat.” Her voice shakes. It hits me straight. “I love you.”
The words punch through my chest and knock the air out of me.
I kiss her without thinking. Hot lips, teeth bumping, a tongue that asks and gives.
Mint and us. I kiss her because I want to, because I’ve missed her without knowing it.
That kiss calms me and lights me up at once.
Then I breathe, go back to the tone, the pitch she wants, the game.
“To the table,” I order, my voice lower than usual.
She obeys with that irony of hers that doesn’t annoy, that heats, that feeds my hunger. She drags the chair without shame, throws me a sidelong grin that sets my ears on fire. My head finally clears; the guilt steps aside.
I don’t need to spell out the play-by-play.
What comes after is pure connection, the kind that leaves your legs weak and your mind blank.
Inevitable, brutal, clean, right. We stay stuck together for a while, breathing hard, salty sweat, skin that doesn’t want space.
I try to talk and only a silly laugh comes out; I’m pathetic and glorious at the same time.
I rest my forehead on hers; I feel her heat and the rush of her breath. She laughs a little, a rough laugh that undoes me. Her cheeks are flushed and there’s a mark from my mouth on her neck that fills me with a shameless, street-level pride. She’s exhausted, and so am I.
“So, Officer?” I pant, voice wrecked. “Am I getting a ticket?”
“You’re acquitted,” she says. “For good behavior.”
“Now, be calm.”
“Boring,” she teases, and pinches my thigh.
“Shut up.”
I bring her water; she drinks and looks at me.
It makes me laugh, because she looks such a disaster she can’t even boss her own bangs.
She sits on the wooden floor, back to the wall, legs stretched out, fingers toying with the edge of the rug.
Me, across from her, legs crossed, I silently count the adrenaline dropping and the return to calm.
The treehouse smells like sex and a candle just blown out; the fogged-up window gives us away—the temperature really climbed.
“It turns me on like crazy what a smartass you are,” I say, honest.
“It turns me on that you admit it,” she answers; a smile slips out that finishes me. “And…” She lifts the harness with two fingers. “It turns me on that you denied me today. I love your no’s. They’re a challenge, a promise that later a bigger yes will land.”
I admire her. She also scares me—more than a little. I don’t say it; I don’t need to. She knows, she feels it. She lays her head on my knee. I stay still, enjoy her weight and her warmth. I brush aside a strand covering her eyebrow, lick my lips, breathe normal again.
“You’re gonna laugh,” she confesses, with that voice that reaches all the way down. “On my way here I came up with three scripts in case you went full Tibetan nun. I had jokes, I had a Plan B, I had a tearful speech. I didn’t need any of it.”
“No. You brought me back. Don’t let me go again.”
“I won’t.”
We stay quiet a while; the silence turns warm, easy.
The treehouse cools a little and I close the window.
When I come back, Alaska’s put on the trench coat, nothing underneath and unbuttoned, and I’m tempted to pin her to the wall again, kiss her until she forgets where she is.
I hold back; I owe her calm, I owe her this space.
“I have to tell you something,” I start, and it’s not the moment, but the truth shoves: the thing with Irina, the guilt, the urge to confess everything and let the chips fall where they may. “I can’t promise you that—”
“I know,” she cuts in gently, with a smile that disarms me. “I know. But not today. Today I need you simple.”
“Simple?” I ask, one eyebrow up.
“Yeah. You’ve already been boss, teacher, merciful executioner, and intense girlfriend. Today…” She grins, brazen. “We’re not done.”
“We’re not?” I ask, softer than usual.
She drops to her knees on the wood with a quickness that surprises me and takes me by the waist.
“Today you’re in charge until I say stop.”
My heart lands a dry blow and steals my breath.
That line was her gift on day one, and I’ve kept it secret ever since.
It hits me again, clean, a straight promise.
I lean in. I light her gaze with mine. I don’t blink.
I go serious, because this game is serious and it’s ours.
I take her wrists with clean resolve, pulse going a mile a minute, and feel the click in my head: focus.
And before I get my voice back to the tone she wants, I ask the only thing that needs asking to make everything right, clear, ours:
“Safeword?”