Chapter 16
GAGE
She’s spread out before me, stretched, helpless. Her rib-cage rises and falls like she’s been skating lines for hours. Heat ripples from the tangle of her pubes, carrying the sea-salt scent of her pussy.
She moans when I slip in one finger. She’s wet, soaked, and she clenches her muscles around me, pulling me deeper.
She’s been so good, taking her punishment. She deserves a reward. She’s my babygirl, and I’m the only man who can tame her.
I add a second finger, pumping slowly, with a tap of my thumb to her clit each time the web of my hand settles home. She’s chanting something behind her gag—I think it’s more, more, more.
My babygirl is greedy, but I’m the one who wins. I add a third finger, curling at the end of each thrust, scraping at the tightest bundle of nerves inside her hot, slick hole.
Her hips rock off the table. Her feet flex above the stick. Her ribcage freezes as she holds her breath, as she wills me to free her, as she waits for sweet release.
I pull my hand away.
Her scream would break a lesser man.
She wants me. She needs me. But she’s running far too hot. I need her to hold on for a few more minutes.
I roll the stool back in case she tries to catch me with the stick between her feet. I only have to take six steps to reach the ice bath. The stainless steel monster beside it sends out a steady hum. When I slide back the door, I find a waiting mountain of ice.
I scoop a handful of cubes into a plastic bin kept there for just that purpose. Well, maybe not that exact purpose—I remember long nights spent icing sprained fingers, others when a trainer wrapped packs around my aching joints after particularly brutal games.
Aeryn is lying still on the table when I return. Her breathing has slowed to something deep and steady. She’s staring at the ceiling like she’s reciting recipes to herself, or maybe trying out a prayer.
Her fingers are still knotted tight around the bandage.
I settle on my stool again, rolling back between her legs. This time, I go straight for her clit, sucking, licking, scraping with my teeth. She writhes above me, and now I think she’s saying my name—Gage, Gage, Gage—begging.
She’s primed after all the other teasing, ready to go off in less than a minute. One last lick is all she needs to finally set her free.
I slip a cube of ice inside her.
She screeches at the cold, her ass rising off the table. I stand between her legs, setting one chilled hand across her belly, retrieving more ice with the other.
I trace her nipples, which I didn’t think could get any darker, any harder. I was wrong. I trail a melting cube across the furnace of her throat. I palm her mound, letting a handful of ice melt into her pubes.
When she’s cool enough, calmed enough, I cross the room and retrieve one last thing from a bowl on the counter. Her eyes are closed when I get back to the table.
She’s sobbing now, gasping into her panties, tears streaming into the halo of her hair. Her bra is pushed up under her chin. Her arms stretch over her head, sagging now, as if she’s given up.
But she still holds the bandage.
“Babygirl,” I say.
She lies there.
“Look at me, babygirl.”
Her eyes flutter open. She looks dazed. Confused.
But she watches as I rip open the condom’s foil packet. The fingers on her left hand, the empty one, flex as I roll the rubber onto my aching cock. She shifts her ass, pulling closer to the end of the table, splaying her knees even further apart.
I touch the tip of my cock to her entrance. She raises her head, as much as she can.
I mean to go slowly, to ease into her, but she’s too ready. The ice I put inside her has melted, smoothing the way, and I drive home so fast she shudders. The tendons in her neck stand out. Her eyes strain wide.
She clutches the bandage like it’s the last life preserver on a sinking ship.
“That’s it, babygirl.” I pull back, almost leaving the furnace between her thighs. “You can take it.” I sink back in. “You’re incredible, babygirl. You’re amazing. You’re so brave. So strong.”
My pace picks up as my words carry us both away. My fingers clamp tight on her hips. Her feet stretch. Despite my size, despite the ice, despite the bonds that have to be nearing her limits, she’s ready to fire in seconds.
I reach between us to find her slick clit. I wait for her to meet my gaze. I hold my body still for just a moment.
I pinch. She blinks. I slide home.
She clenches so tight around me that neither of us can move. Sunk to the hilt, I grip her hips as she bears down, as her eyes flare wide, as her jaw turns to granite. She screams into her gag, and her grip on my cock stutters loose, clenching and releasing like a second mammoth heartbeat.
I ride her for three more thrusts, my balls pulling tight. One last stroke, and I finally spill, holding her close as she clutches and drops, clutches and drops, milking me dry.
When I’m able to think again, my cheek is pressed to her belly. I can feel her breathing, fast and ragged. My thighs ripple as I stand, threatening to cramp from the strain of taking my weight.
I take care of the condom, tossing it into a stainless steel wastebasket beneath a container for sharps.
Turning back to the table, I go for her gag first, deploying a pair of angled first-aid scissors to cut through the springy bandage holding it in place.
I pull the cotton panties past her lips, dropping the soaked mess onto the floor.
“Babygirl,” I whisper.
For a moment, she just works her jaw, rolling her lips over her teeth. I smooth her hair from her forehead. I’m a Dom. I know how to be patient.
She rallies faster than I have any right to expect. “You’re a right bastard,” she says, before she has to swallow. “And that was feckin’ brilliant. Sir.”
I know she needs water, but she needs to get out of her bonds first. I scoop a melting piece of ice out of the bin at the end of the table and slip it past her lips.
Then it’s time for some careful work with the scissors, starting with the medical tape on her ankles, letting that stick clatter to the ground.
I take more time with her wrists, cutting away the stick that stretches her arms. Those are the muscles that have been working the longest. Even with my caution, she hisses as she finally lowers her arms to her sides.
I help her, so she’s spared the iron lockdown of cramps.
I ease her bra off her shoulders, tossing it onto her crumpled dress.
I try to take the bandage from her hand. She doesn’t need a safeword now. But she pulls it close to her chest and says, “I’m keeping this.”
I let her.
When she tries to sit up, though, I settle my palms on her shoulders, holding her steady on the table. “Easy, sweetheart,” I say. No more babygirl. Games are over now.
I help her to roll onto her side, to pull her knees toward her chest as she stretches out the taut muscles of her lower back. Only when she’s steady do I cross the room for my boxers.
There’s coconut water in one of the refrigerators, along with packets of the energy gel trainers squeeze down players’ throats to get them back in a game.
I grab the triple-berry flavor, the least disgusting of the bunch.
I retrieve a white cotton blanket too—the type that can be bleached dozens of times.
Helping Aeryn to sit on the side of the table, I cover her shoulders, then pull the blanket tight under her chin.
“Hold me?” she asks as I stand in front of her, taking the empty gel pack and settling the plastic lip of a water bottle against her mouth.
My heart squeezes hard enough to make me wince. “Of course,” I manage to say.
I’m the luckiest man in the world, getting to sit on the table beside her. As she curls into my side, I bury my face in her hair, pulling her close, holding her tight, content just to be.
The treatment room is quiet, but not silent.
There’s the hum of the ice maker. A softer purr from the refrigerator across the room.
The rasp of our breathing, easing as we both continue to recover.
I’m not sure if she’s still awake when there’s one new sound, the faint click of both hands reaching midnight on the industrial clock mounted above the treadmill.
“Hmmm,” she says, proving she’s still in the realm of the living. “Merry Christmas.”
I laugh. “And Merry Christmas to you. I owe you a present.”
“You bought me a present—that gorgeous blue dress from Gallagher Samson. A pearl necklace too. Pearl earrings.”
“And panties. But I’m sorry to say I ruined those.”
“I’m not sorry.”
She says it too quickly. I can make some sort of joke, tell her I’ll find her something to wear in the equipment room, tell her she got what she deserved for wearing panties without lace, tell her I’ll buy her replacements in Paris.
But I owe her more than that. She deserves to be taken seriously.
I try to pull away so we can have an actual discussion, but her fingers close around my wrist, holding me close. I could force the issue. I could walk across the room and pull on my jeans and my shirt, shove my feet inside my shoes.
But I let her win. I stay.
Still, I have to answer. “I’m glad you’re not sorry. But what are we doing here, sweetheart? What’s the plan?”
“I don’t have a plan.”
“You have a plane up in New York, waiting to take you back to Chicago in time for Reardon Family Christmas.”
“Oh, bollocks,” she says, but there isn’t any heat in her voice. “I left half a message for my pilot, telling him to fetch me here.”
“Half a message?”
“You walked in before I could finish. You hung up while I was leaving a voicemail.”
That seems like a century ago.
“I don’t want to wake him now,” she says.
“He’ll need to file a new flight plan.”
She shakes her head. “That’s not necessary.”
“I’m pretty sure neither of us wants to make a midnight run to Teterboro.”
“We don’t have to.” She shifts a hand to cover my heart. “He can take the plane back to Chicago without me. That is, if I can stay here. If you’re willing to keep me.”
It’s impossible. It’s insane. It’s everything I’ve wanted, from the moment I first saw her standing by the bar in the Great Room.
No—longer than that. This is what I’ve wanted since Logan Reardon first introduced me to his little sister, since she showed up at my rookie game, since I walked through the door of the house on Beach Avenue and found her primed and hot and needy and she let me be her first.
Her father won’t like it. Her brothers either. I have three businesses to run—the Aces, and my real estate holdings, and Kynk. I don’t have time for a woman, not a real relationship, not like the one I want with Aeryn.
No. Not want.
Need.
I need to be with Aeryn Reardon.
“Gage?” she asks, a shadow darkening her voice. I’ve taken too long to answer. Too long to tell the truth.
“Of course you can stay here,” I finally answer. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Her laughter sounds like Christmas bells. I kiss her, and she tastes like berries and daring, and that’s better than any gift I’ve ever found beneath a tree on Christmas morning.
She’s mine.
I’m hers.
It’s time for a new beginning.
Thank you for reading Sinful Mafia Santa! I hope you enjoyed Gage and Aeryn’s reunion story as much as I’ve enjoyed sharing it with you.