House Rules Page 4

  I inhale again, my first breath still unreleased.

  "You are the payment." Leaning in, he presses his lips against the side of my neck.

  The first kiss settles like a warm blanket over my body. The second one, a little lower down my neck, makes me wet. I want to move away from him, but I am already at the end of the couch.

  His hand skims across my thighs and I practically levitate with pleasure.

  I understand my body's reaction, but Luke's motivation eludes me. He has a casino full of beautiful women, showgirls, waitresses, call girls...half, if not all, of them would drop their panties or thongs in a heartbeat if he so much as smiled at them.

  Does he actually want me?

  Not possible. Quality and beauty surround him. The way the penthouse is furnished, his expensive suits -- all of it is here by his choice. Choosing me is inconsistent with his past behavior, so I am certain that some facet of his game is escaping me. No other explanation fits.

  He growls, the sound sensual but menacing. "Is that a no?"

  Glancing at him, I realize that I shook my head in rejecting the idea that Luke Masters finds me attractive. Now he thinks I am turning down the offer. I have to correct him before he withdraws it, but I can't admit why I made the gesture or how everything but my brain is enthusiastically screaming my acquiescence.

  Rule number 6 -- Know the rules of the game, the stakes and the quitting time.

  "What do you require?"

  "Thirty days of you." His hand eases over the swell of my stomach to find my breast, arousing the nipple once more to a sharp pucker. He kisses below my ear, his tongue sliding against the skin. "Whenever I want you. However I want."

  Finding the nipple erect, he manipulates it, pinching and tugging until my hips move in the direction of his hand. "I want your sweet, wet cunt and lush ass."

  His hand captures my chin and then he pulls my face toward his. "I need this oh-so-fuckable mouth quivering around my cock."

  He kisses me again, his tongue pushing forcefully past my lips to sweep against my upper palate. His fingers knot in my hair, drawing me deeper into the kiss. Heat unfurls across my chest and hips. My pussy, wet and wanting, twists around nothing, aching in a way I have never experienced.

  Panic douses the heat and I push at his chest. The force of his grip eases but he doesn't release me completely, merely allows me to come up for air.

  "You're saying you will save Rose if I have sex with you for a month? Is that right?"

  "I'm saying I'll do everything within my power to save Rose from Solandro. I will make your arrest warrant go away and you and Tommy will have whatever you want, within reason, during that period -- but I'm not asking for sex." Something unnameable flickers across his beautiful face and then he closes his eyes. "I'm asking for complete submission, for things you likely haven't experienced, Marie."

  That is a given. I have never experienced a kiss like Luke's, never had a man inside me, never had a man's mouth so close to that swollen and aching juncture of my thighs or had his hands teasing my breasts. We already are far beyond my experience level, but I can't tell Masters.

  He won't believe me.

  "I'm growing impatient, baby." His lips brush along my jaw as his hand squeezes my breast. "Tell me you agree."

  Eyes closed, my whole body shaking with the weight of Rose's life and my own lust, I answer.

  "Yes."

  ********************

  I return to the penthouse with Luke. He deposits me in an opulent bedroom furnished in the same dark colors and wood as his office. In the adjoining bathroom, he draws me a bath, telling me I need to sleep afterward. I am still standing completely stunned and just inside the bedroom door when the water is ready.

  "You've been awake and stressed an entire day, Marie." He cups my face with both hands and brushes his lips across mine. "I want you relaxed and rested so you can enjoy our time together."

  Nodding, I watch him leave. He is a complete enigma. Rich and powerful, he is manipulating me into a sexual relationship in which I must agree to his every demand. Yet he wants me to enjoy it. Chances are, I will. He drives my body crazy with the lightest touch. Wealth, power, and untempered sex appeal, he can also act kind and thoughtful -- the tea at breakfast was the same blend as the loose bags in my purse and I don't think that was a coincidence.

  Alone and naked, I sink into the water. My hands work on auto-pilot to clean my body while my mind spars with shadows. Again and again, I circle back to the same conclusion -- I want Luke, but I can't trust him.

  Too tired to keep fighting the situation, I finish the bath, wrap an oversized towel around me and return to the bedroom. In my absence, someone has placed a big, fluffy white robe on the bed and a semi-transparent, pearl colored baby doll nightgown. I lift the robe and nightgown in search of at least underwear, but there is nothing more.

  I examine the baby doll. The fabric is satiny smooth but iridescent. On the bed and in my hands, it is lovely and elegant, but at some point it has to go on my body. Standing with my back to the mirrored dresser, I pull the nightgown over my head. The hem falls slightly above the very top of my thighs. When I blindly brush a fingertip below its line, I feel my pubic hair.

  With trepidation, I turn to the mirror. The pale pearl hue blends pleasingly with my skin and the bust has enough ribbons and banding to hold me aloft. It is just opaque enough that I cannot see the outline of my areola, but I can see the dark hairline on my mound and the bottom of that triangle, which the gown does not cover.

  Feeling exposed, I suck a breath in and reality settles deep in my bones.

  In a few hours, Luke will see me in the outfit -- not just my thick hips, overflowing breasts and rounded thighs, but also that dark patch of fur and everything hiding behind it. He will part my legs and...

  Shame heats my cheeks while lust pinches my nipples to hard, erect points. I close my eyes, unable to continue looking at my body or contemplate exactly what Luke has in mind. I will orgasm, I am sure of that. However reluctantly or exuberantly, I will come. Nothing else is certain.

  Eyes still shut, I fumble my way onto the bed and under the covers, my body falling into an exhausted sleep almost as soon as my head hits the feathered pillow.

  ********************

  A soft tap against the bedroom door and the inward brush of its heavy frame over the thick carpet wake me from dreamless sleep. Masters enters, carrying a mug of steaming tea. Inhaling, I smell the mix of apple, chamomile and honey. I sit up, just enough to accept the mug without losing the bedspread and exposing myself to him.

  An approving smile on his face, he hands me the mug.

  "I have the same blend of tea." I blow away the steam, my brain almost as clouded as I watch him walk toward the dresser.

  "I know." He has shed his jacket, shoes, tie and socks at some point in the last few hours. The remaining clothes look like he slept in them. Turning one hand inward, he removes a platinum cufflink. He repeats the motion, the second one carefully placed on the dresser next to the first.

  I stare at six thousand dollars of precious metal casually placed, so absorbed by the absurdity of my situation that I miss the fact that Luke has turned to face me and is half finished unbuttoning his shirt.

  When I do notice, I can't take my eyes off his chest. Muscles, covered in warm brown skin tinted olive gold, ripple as he untucks the shirt from his pants. The play of light over his flesh as he unthreads the belt from its loops shows several scars. Those on his abdomen appear to be cuts or punctures, but, with the shirt off, I see a starburst of paler skin a few inches southeast of his left collarbone.

  "You were shot?"

  He doesn't answer, just undoes the button on his silk slacks.

  "Did it happen while you were in the Army?"

  "Was I?" He turns his back to me. Only his pants remain and he teases them and me inch by inch. Looking up from the slow unveiling of his silky briefs and the magnificent ass to which they cling, I catch him watching my
expression in the mirror. He licks his lips, his cheeks flushing as my skin heats in equal measure.

  I tell myself to look away, but don't. Instead, I watch and press for an answer. "You have a PsyOps coin on your desk."

  He pivots ever so slightly so that I cannot see his expression or the front of his body in the reflection. He steps from his pants then places his hands against the top band of his underwear. Intent on giving me a show, he strips them away, his hands and the fabric moving so slowly down his body he is basically caressing all that lean muscle and olive-gold skin.

  Watching him, my mouth floods, my tongue swells. He is a beautiful, teasing bastard who won't answer my questions while demanding I tell him everything and submit to him. He has a lot of nerve.

  He turns, hands overflowing as he seeks to cover his erect cock and heavy balls.

  I make a small, mental correction. He has a lot of everything. He is thick and long, his genitals every bit as impressive as the rest of him.

  "What are you thinking, Marie?"

  I lift a brow, somewhat stunned by the question. I am thinking that he is beautiful. That I can't understand why I am in his bed -- why he wants me in it. I think that he must get off on power and control, so that it is my need and vulnerability -- not my body -- that have rendered his cock so hard.

  I can't admit any of that, so I press my earlier question again. "I am thinking that, if the coin is not yours, it belongs to the man in the picture frame on your desk."

  His gaze darkens and his sexy prowl toward the bed stops. "You're very observant, Marie. Too observant, perhaps. The coin is mine."

  "And the man?"

  His eyes go dead for a second and I worry that I have pushed a little too far. He shakes it off and moves toward me. "I remember agreeing to help you, not answer your questions."

  Reaching the bed, his mouth puckers then curves into a smile. "And I remember you agreeing to give me your body -- completely."

  Running the tip of his tongue across his top lip, he slowly drags the covers down the bed. When he gets near the bottom of the baby doll's skirt, I start to draw my legs up.

  "Don't, Marie."

  My turn to lick my lips, nervously. I force my legs flat and watch the bedding slide over the gown's bottom hem. Seeing the triangle of hair, my thighs tense. I suck my bottom lip into my mouth and close my eyes.

  He stops tugging on the bedding. "Eyes open, Marie. I want you to see what I see."

  "I know what you're seeing," I bite out, my lids still squeezed shut. Without the fabric's cover, my fat thighs and plump calves are on display, the flesh dimpling and marked with faint lines where there is no natural give left in the skin.

  "I don't think you do, baby. Open them."

  My head spins and I hope he means my eyes and not my legs. Seeing his lean, beautiful body, I am not quite ready to proceed. I exhale all but the last of my resistance, open my eyes and stare at the ceiling.

  "If you won't look at yourself, look at me."

  I do and instantly regret it. His lips are parted. Languorous blinks track each inch of the resumed unveiling of my body. His other hand captures my attention as it moves along his torso -- first in a line up that gloriously thick cock, then the slow drag of three fingers across his muscled abs and up to the small, dark red bead of his nipple. Pinching himself, he draws a shuddering breath.

  My pussy contracts, the slow, inexorable tightening of muscle refusing to relax. Tighter and tighter my insides pull. With the sheet and blanket on the floor, Luke crawls onto the bed. With his muscular thighs straddling my plump ones, he forces his hands between my bottom and the mattress to capture the hem of the baby doll. He pushes it up over my hips, my body now wiggling in compliance and need as he peels the shimmery fabric from me.

  When he has me stripped, he moves toward the center of the mattress. "Spread your legs."

  My lungs the only muscles under my control, I breathe. The air sucks and pulls -- shaky in, shaky out.

  Luke eases his hand between my knees then gently pulls one leg toward him. When he has me spread wide, he fills the space between my thighs, his broad shoulders ensuring that my legs stay open.

  He rubs a stubbled cheek against my inner thigh. His lips follow. His nose brushes my pubic hair and then he repeats the bristly caress against the other thigh. He looks up at me, brown eyes unreadable as each hand pinches one of my labia and pulls them apart. He looks down and a space opens between his lips.

  His tongue darts out to run along the edge of his top teeth. "Are you this wet for all your lovers, Marie?"

  I close my eyes, certain I will cry if I look at him any longer. He will discover the answer to his question all too soon. If I tell him before then, he might stop. As much as I might try to fool myself or Luke later, I don't want him to stop. My pussy hasn't unknotted, neither has any other muscle in my body. I am one thrumming, throbbing mass of need coiled tight and ready to burst.

  He doesn't tell me to open my eyes as I expect him to. Instead, I feel his lips against my clit, the pressure so tentative I think he is deliberately testing my reaction. My mound lifts, my body yearning for more. He gives me more, running his tongue up the shaft and then angling his head to seal his mouth hot against my flesh.

  He sucks. The room fills with the soft, moist sounds of his devouring me. His thumbs trail down my needy slit to find the entrance of my cunt. Feather light strokes moving in opposite directions tease its rim until my moans join, then smother, his audible sucking.

  My hands, frozen at my sides since he finished undressing me, shoot down. I wind my fingers in his thick dark curls and groan. Luke lifts his head against my hands, as if letting me know he realizes just how very much I am enjoying his efforts.

  I look across the swell of my stomach to find him watching my face. Another acknowledgement flickers across the brown irises and then his eyes shut. His head sinks lower, allowing his tongue to make its first, exploratory push inside me. My fingers straighten against his skull and I wantonly push against the crown of his head. He nuzzles closer, unshaven face brushing against the sensitive flesh of my pussy and thighs.

  Cunt contracting, I gasp.

  Luke pulls back. Wet lips press against my thighs. His teeth gently dent my flesh as he leaves a love bite on each. Fingers stroke the shaft of my clit then slide to where my pussy weeps with need. A finger pushes in, my flesh crazy-sensitive and jerking in response.

  "How many lovers have you had, Marie?"

  I can hear the slight unease that tinges his voice -- as if he knows the answer and it bothers him. I wonder why he cares -- will my lack of lovers make him stop? Does it make me even less attractive or does he have a conscience buried somewhere beneath his carefully controlled façade?

  "None-of-your-business." Each word is a labor to expel because he hasn't stopped slowly stroking his thick finger inside me.

  "You're very narrow, baby." He eases a second finger in and traces the edge of something, not the outer perimeter but a very tender inner circle just an inch or so inside me. "You have had a lover, haven't you?"

  "Of course," I bite out. My body betrays the lie with a squeeze against his fingers. I shut my eyes, praying he didn't notice.

  "How many?" He pushes a little deeper, finding another sensitive spot against the roof of my cunt. He takes a little come-hither stroke inside me that curls my toes and makes answering him impossible. "I can tell it's no more than a few."

  Another stroke and I almost pass out.

  His lips return to my clit and the sweet suckling restarts. Licking, nibbling, he waits until he has driven me back to the point of distraction before he murmurs softly against my labia, "I bet your brother knows."

  He wouldn't really do something like that, would he?

  "Don't--" I start.

  "Then tell me." His fingers slide back to the inner ring and trace its edge. "Two?"

  "Yes…two. " My cunt gives another damning squeeze and I throw my hands over my face. "Please stop asking me questions.
"

  "Mmmm..." His tongue dips back down, filling and stretching my hole as he pushes deeper. With one big hand across my mound, he presses his thumb against the shaft of my clit, just above the hood and the tender glans it holds.

  He rubs a tight, continuous circle, bullying the sensitive pearl just below the hard press of his thumb. His tongue fucks in and out. My hips take up the rhythm, my hands returning to his head. Arousal takes control of my muscles, leaving me helpless to stop the unintentional scrape of my fingernails along his scalp as my fingers curl.

  Small mewling sounds contort through my throat, shaming me with how quickly I have capitulated yet again. I shake my head, dislodging the shame. His fingers and tongue feel too good -- a hundred times better than my rushed efforts to draw out a quick climax in the shower or the rare moments I have the apartment to myself.

  Tension building higher than I can hope to control, something flips inside me. I slam my head against the pillow, my hips pushing high up off the mattress. I grab two handfuls of Luke's hair, worried his sweet mouth will abandon my cunt before I climax.

  "Don't stop," I plead softly, the words almost breathless. "Please."

  Luke groans against me, inside me, the strokes and rubs of his tongue and thumb dominating my body and mind. He flicks, nibbles, and then I am spiraling down, plummeting hard into my release. He stays with me through every twitch and roll, every shake and shudder, his strokes and thrusts coming faster, more insistent until I collapse to the mattress in a quivering mess.

  My pussy throbs with hard contractions around his immobile fingers and even that threatens to set me off a second time. I am sated and insatiable, satisfied yet ready for more. I wiggle restlessly against his fingers and begin to bite my bottom lip.

  A plea of fuck me, fuck me, fuck me rolls through my mind and echoes across my body, but the words won't leave my mouth. Wanting, undeserving, I can only wait for his next command.

  Surging up my body, Luke captures my head, his fingers knotting in my hair with the same possessive intensity with which I just held his. His tongue invades the deeper recesses of my mouth, the curling licks almost as pleasurable as the ones he took inside and against my pussy. His thick cock pushes against my mound and wedges my labia apart.