CHAPTER 31 #2
When Zeke went upstairs, I followed him.
When he went into his bedroom, I was there, too.
I waited until he had gone into his closet to change.
When he returned, I was standing beside his bed with the chastity device in my hand.
He cast a quick look at it, but then ignored me, walking around to the other side of the bed.
I was serious when I told him we weren’t sleeping in the guest room.
So, to prove my point, I got into bed when he did.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he growled, his black eyes slamming into me.
“Going to sleep.”
Case didn’t seem quite as eager to earn Zeke’s wrath, but he finally complied, climbing into the bed behind me.
Zeke flopped back on the mattress, pretending to ignore us. I knew he couldn’t, because for the four weeks we’d been with him, not once had we slept in his bed. Not like this, anyway. The time he dressed me up like a dog didn’t count as far as I was concerned.
“Get out of my bed,” he said, but there was no conviction in his tone.
“No.” I didn’t care what he did to me at that point; I wasn’t backing down.
I knew Zeke would toss us out at the first opportunity, and I wasn’t going to let him do it.
Not without a fight. He needed to know we wanted more from him than to simply be his playthings when he wanted to entertain himself.
“Fuck toys don’t argue,” Zeke stated, his tone harder.
“We’re not your fuck toys right now,” I clarified.
He bolted upright, then shot out of the bed. “The hell you’re not.”
This was the Zeke I could work with. The man behind the mask.
The man who needed more than to beat on people.
Beneath that crusty outer layer was a man whose heart beat the same as mine did.
A man very much like me and Case. A man with feelings.
One who needed to know we were there for him.
Not because he commanded us to be, but because we wanted to be.
Knowing this could backfire on me in a big way, I inched out of the bed on Zeke’s side and came to stand toe to toe with him. I had to look up into his face to do it, but I didn’t care.
“Right now, I’m not your fuck toy,” I told him. “And you’re not my Dom.”
His eyes searched my face as though he was looking for the lie.
“We’re here because we want to be here, Zeke,” I stated, lowering my voice. I reached up and placed my hand on his wrist. “I’m sorry Matt hurt you. And I’m sorry he showed up tonight. But I’m not gonna let him ruin this.”
“There’s nothing for him to ruin,” Zeke said, but his tone had softened. “We all knew this was going to end at some point.”
“No,” I argued. “We didn’t. Perhaps you did, but Case and I … we don’t want this to end.”
I knew I was assuming Case felt the same way I did, but I didn’t care about that, either. I knew Case on a primal level, and I knew how he felt about Zeke without him having to tell me.
“What do you want from me?” Zeke asked, his words softer than I’d ever heard them.
At some point between seeing Matt at the club and right this minute, Zeke’s armor had been stripped away. He wasn’t the Sadist, and we weren’t his fuck toys.
“We want all of you, Zeke,” I told him. “Not just the man who forces us to wear chastity devices because he owns our dicks. Not just the man who comes up with creative ways to get us to come.”
I moved my hand up Zeke’s arm, surprised when he didn’t pull away.
“Believe it or not, we’re not submissives all the time, either. Right now, I’m just a man, Zeke. Just like you. And I…” I swallowed back the emotion. “I don’t like the idea of not having you in my life.”
“I didn’t agree to this,” he said, his eyes still searching my face as though he was seeking the truth.
“That’s fair. You didn’t. You warned us up front that you weren’t in it for a relationship or for commitment.” My hand moved higher, and I gripped his bicep. “We agreed to your terms, Zeke. But somewhere along the way, it changed.”
“Not for me,” he countered.
Case appeared beside me. “Liar.”
Zeke’s eyes shot over to him. I couldn’t read his expression, but I could tell he was trying to figure out what the point was. Why we were being persistent about this.
“We didn’t abide by your rules, Zeke,” I admitted. “We couldn’t. It’s not possible when we had the opportunity to get to know you.”
“You don’t know me,” he snapped.
I kept a firm grip on his arm and closed the space between us. We were so close he couldn’t keep his eyes on my face. His beard was brushing against my lips.
“Look at me,” I demanded.
He shifted his head down, and when he did, I kissed him.
At first, I thought he would shove me away, but he didn’t. Zeke merely stood there, his lips firm, his hands still hanging down to his sides.
“Tell me you didn’t feel anything,” I whispered when I pulled back.
I felt Case shift, his hand sliding over mine when he moved to stand behind Zeke.
“I didn’t,” Zeke said, but there wasn’t any truth in his words.
Case’s hands slid between my chest and Zeke’s.
He was wrapping his arms around Zeke, holding him in place.
Not because he thought he would bolt, but because he wanted to be as close to Zeke as I was.
I couldn’t blame him. This thing between us might’ve started out as a game, but it wasn’t a game anymore.
Now came the hard part.
Convincing Zeke to take a chance when I could still see in his eyes that he wasn’t going to give an inch.