Dylan urged me through the door to his bedroom, his palm spread widely across my lower back. “In you go,” he said firmly.
I stepped into the dark room, lit only by the light coming from the bathroom door.
Dylan moved behind me, to the side, and stood me in front of a leather club chair. I waited as he poured himself a glass of water and placed it on the table next to the chair after taking a long swig.
“What? No more Scotch?” I asked, following his eyes as he circled me, coming to stand behind me.
“I want my senses about me for this. You were bloody gorgeous tonight,” he said into my ear, his fingertips stroking my arms. “So perfectly yourself. You didn’t let them get to you, and it was fucking thrilling. I want to reward you. I want to sink into you. I want to goddamn consume you,” he said slowly, taking his time, and I gulped in anticipation. “And no more talking,” he said softly, finally settling into the chair before me and gazing up at me. “Undress.”
I giggled a little. “So it’s going to be that kind of night.”
He tsk-ed at me, wagging his finger as he sat down. “Shh, damsel. This will be better if you follow instructions.”
My skin was singing—it felt like there were a million little weather systems moving in the air around me, all electric, all feverish. My breathing was picking up.
I walked up to him, put my hands on the armrests of the chair where he sat, leaned over, and kissed him slowly on the lips. No tongue, just firm, warm lips.
“Can you unzip me at least?” I whispered, our faces centimeters apart, the air between us warming. Our eyes met, and my little challenge added heat to this game. He was getting ready to devour me.
I stood and turned, so my back was to him, and I felt him rise behind me. He dragged the zipper slowly down my back and slid his hands into the dress. They were so warm and felt so big, like he could grab me fully around my middle. His thumbs stroked my underarms, and the subtle movements caused a ripple, a shiver of anticipation.
The dress, now loose, slumped off my shoulders, making room for his hands. He unclasped my bra, and it fell into the dress. Then he pushed the whole thing off my arms and down my body, so it hung in front of me, and my bra spilled to the floor. “I think you can handle the rest yourself.”
I shimmied out of my dress, kicked off my heels, and turned to see Dylan shrugging off his jacket and rolling up his shirtsleeves. “On the bed, damsel.” He smacked my ass—hard. I smiled, eager, scurried to his majestic four-poster canopy bed, and perched myself on its edge. I bit my lip between my nervous teeth and sat on my hands. My hair, grown in the last couple of months, drifted around my shoulders. The pit in my stomach and the round ache between my legs were getting sharper, firmer, more demanding. I wanted his hands on me, all over me. He was taking this too slowly, like he was stalking his prey.
Dylan reached into his bag, parked by the base of the bed, and lifted out a long coil of velvety-looking fabric, wider than rope, softer looking. “You game for this, sweetness?” I nodded hungrily, shamelessly. “Good. Then up at the headboard. Now.”
I crawled on all fours and turned back to look at Dylan stalking me. “Thought this through, did you?”
Smack.
Another crisp slap to my ass.
Right, no talking. But if that was my punishment, I might have to keep rebelling. I couldn’t stop the eager smile forming on my face, and Dylan shook his head. “Incorrigible.”
I got to the top of the large mattress, and Dylan removed all but one pillow from the headboard. He lifted me and placed me square against it, so my ass was on the fluffy pillow, raised, and my back was flush with the upholstered headboard.
“Arm out.” Dylan spoke with precision and pointed to my left arm. I couldn’t help but just stare into his face, taking it in. The late-in-the-day stubble, the flustered bits of hair haphazardly arranged on his forehead, the sharp definition of his shoulder muscles and biceps, not to mention his pecs and abs, the bare light of the room highlighting every delicious shadow on his torso. I drank him in.
I had remained still, arms at my sides, wanting to prolong whatever devilish plan Dylan had brewing but also simply because I was already lost to this feeling, this closeness, this electric air in which we were floating. One of his free hands landed on my pussy, and his mouth hovered by my ear. “You need a reminder of who gives instructions around here and who follows, baby?” He inserted a finger into me and crooked it, hitching right into that spot, my ignition. I threw my head back and mewed. “Arm. Out,” he instructed again.
I flung my arm out to my side. Dylan swiftly tied one end of the long piece of fabric to my wrist, testing it to make sure there was enough slack for comfort, then looped it around the post of the bed behind me, tugged it but didn’t tie it down anywhere. What was he doing? He quickly arranged my right arm the same way, so my breasts were projected out, my upper back was cushioned against the headboard behind me, and my legs were stretched out on the bed before me.
Then I felt a tug on my left arm. Dylan lifted my left leg by the knee and wrapped the soft fabric around my thigh, just above my knee. He tied a similar knot, leaving some slack but getting my knee at just the right height, just the right angle away from my body.
Oh god.
Thirty more seconds and he had me just the way he wanted: arms splayed and thighs spread, my feet resting on the mattress, my pussy on full display. Suddenly that soft bathroom light felt like too much. I’d never been this restrained before. Or this exposed without any hope of hiding.
“I can’t imagine this is typical Humboldt Park behavior.” I smirked at him. “Aren’t the ghosts shocked right now?” I heaved out. My breath felt short, like my vulnerability was registering in each tiny corner of my lungs.
Dylan smiled and shrugged. “It’s an old house. I’m sure the ghosts have seen plenty.”
A sheen of sweat, purely from anticipation, and the tiniest hint of fear—the good kind—coated my forehead.
“Dylan,” I started breathily.
“Shh, baby.” He trailed one finger down between my breasts, landing it right in my slick slit. “So wet for me. I love this little pussy, you know that?” I gasped and threw my head back only to be stopped by the high headboard. “Watch—I want you to watch everything.”
Fuck, I was so primed. Just by virtue of being tied up this way, exposed to him, the very fact of my inability to do anything to curb my arousal fueled it. I looked down to see his finger sliding in and out of me, spreading my wetness, and I had to close my eyes. I was raw, on the brink.
Dylan was still fully dressed and I was trussed up like some kind of trophy on his wall. He removed his finger and leaned back over the bed to retrieve something else and returned with a small pink vibrator.
“Dylan, I can’t handle—”
“You can,” he said matter-of-factly. He switched on the toy—I could hear its subtle hum—and he slid it into me. I wanted to writhe; I wanted to squirm. But I couldn’t even lift my ass. I clenched my stomach muscles, trying to do anything to cope with the sudden sensations, but nothing worked. I had no purchase, no control. Dylan placed his broad palm between my breasts. “Shh, baby.” He was cooing, calming me like I was a spooked horse. “Just take it.”
The vibrations weren’t enough to get me where I needed to be. Instead the vibrator sharpened everything, urged me to the edge of the cliff while also holding me back. There was nothing tender about this, nothing sweet. It was brutal and passionate and the hottest thing that had probably ever happened to me.
“Dylan!” I begged, but in response to my begging, he retreated, got off the bed. “What the—?” I objected. “Where—?” I moaned.
“Shh.”
“Dylan! Stop fucking shushing me and start fucking fucking me!”
He slapped my thigh, making me jolt. Then the man had the nerve to say “Tsk, tsk,” shake his head, and actually leave me there, wanting. He went into the bathroom and closed the door! I was about to kill him. I felt sweat run between my breasts and wished like hell I had the use of my arms, not just to relieve the tickle of sweat rivulets on my body but also to be able to touch myself.
Dylan emerged from the bathroom only in his trousers, and I thanked all that was holy that he was back. But then he lifted the club chair and placed it at the foot of the bed. He retrieved his water and sat down, legs crossed, and looked like he was settling in for a goddamn movie or something.
“You have to be kidding me,” I breathed. “Please.”
“What’s the rush, baby?” He leaned forward, elbows on his knees. “You’re fucking beautiful like this. I could watch you all night.”
“No,” I groaned. “Dylan!”
My pleasure was pulsing through me, none of it enough, all of it delicious. Thankfully he had no intention of torturing me indefinitely, which was good, because I was a hair away from charging him with the crime of orgasm denial, which had to be a real thing.
“Okay, okay, baby, I got you.” Done teasing me, he said the words softly while crawling onto the bed and approaching me on all fours. He kissed his way up my leg and landed at the crux of my leg and my sex. I was breathing so hard. I needed him inside me. A hundred desperate snarky protests rolled through my mind, but they all remained just out of reach. I couldn’t focus enough to speak. All attention was on us, on the feverish anticipation coursing through me.
He withdrew the vibrator, inciting as much relief as yearning, and replaced it with his tongue. “God, baby, you’re drenched. You taste so fucking sweet.”
Dylan proceeded to do that thing with his tongue, and in a flash I was thrown into oblivion. Had I been able to move I surely would have knocked him out with my pelvis. The pinpricks, the starbursts, the goddamn supernovas that were dancing over my body took me over. I crested, but the craving was still there. The orgasm was no match for the need he’d created—no orgasm would have been. It was so good, but it wasn’t enough.
“More!” I cried.
“Oh, you’re getting more,” Dylan said sternly, playfully, and before I knew what was happening he dragged his finger through my wetness and plunged it into my rear. I groaned—it felt fucking amazing. I felt so possessed. He fucked me there with his finger and went back to work on me with his tongue.
“No, I want you,” I begged. “Not fingers. Not your mouth.”
In a second, Dylan untied the fabric around my thighs, freeing me. He hurried out of his trousers and deposited me firmly on top of his hard, waiting cock. Moving like some kind of gymnast, he had me riding him in the blink of an eye. My wrists dragging lengths of velvet rope, my hands gripping his shoulders, and his hands on my hips, I leaned back and took him as deeply into me as I could.
I know I started to scream, because Dylan pulled me down to him, covering my mouth with his own. “Shh, baby. I love your screams, but they’re only for me.” I kissed him to stop myself from making noise.
Dylan pushed me onto my back and quickly flung my legs over his shoulders. The moment he thrust into me, that one perfect moment when he hit me square-on, the deep need I’d been a slave to broke into a thousand pieces. I have no idea how long it went on or when Dylan came. It was satiation embodied, and I was lost to it completely.
When the world finally came back into focus, I had collapsed into his firm muscular side, my head on his chest, most of my body draped over his, and he was gingerly untying the fabric from the easily accessible wrist on his chest. When he was done, he rubbed it tenderly and kissed it.
Then he lifted me effortlessly and repositioned me on his other side, giving him access to the other wrist. When I was completely disentangled, he moved me so I was draped entirely on top of him, my legs between his own, my front pressed into his, my cheek resting on his firm chest. I was dreamy, barely lucid, and relishing our contact. My hands were tucked under his back, and he was drawing slow, lazy circles on my back.
“You all right, damsel?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“You handled tonight beautifully, baby.”
“Which part?” I asked, and I could feel his chuckle vibrating in his chest.
“All of it, you cheeky thing. I know my parents aren’t the easiest people to be around. You even got my mum to laugh—I haven’t seen that in a long time.”
“I did?” I hadn’t noticed her laughing, which was probably a testament to how odd and foreign and formal the whole evening had felt to me.
“You did. When you were telling them about your trip to Peru in college, that story about the salt in the tea. You were brilliant.”
“I don’t know about that, and I am still pretty sure your parents don’t like me.”
“You let me worry about my parents. You’re right where you belong, Lydia.”
“What? Naked and pressed up against your male member?”
“Precisely,” he said, and I scoffed.
* * *
“I can feel your eyelashes on my skin.”
Dylan’s words startled me—I had been sure he was still asleep. I was just waking up. The sun only just slipping between the heavy drapes in his ornate childhood bedroom, a column of brightness in an otherwise dark room of red-and-gold brocade. Dylan’s whole body was cleaved to my own, as though we’d tried to maximize contact in our sleep. His breathing was steady, and his heavy, broad hand heated the expanse of my back.
“And now I can feel your smile,” he continued and moved his hand into my hair as his other hand went to rest on my ass.
“Shh,” I said, wanting to fall back into sleep. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m sleeping.”
“Babe, it’s already eight, and it would be wise for us to get downstairs,” he started and rolled to hover over me. “I don’t want to stay here all day—I want you back in London, where I can coax that pretty little cunt of yours into submission. Again.”
“Funny,” I said and closed my eyes again, not wanting to move from my current position.
“Come on, damsel. Let’s clean you up.”
“You know,” I said, remembering the night before, “I can exact my own torture.”
“I’m counting on it,” he replied, then he stepped back, taking a deep breath as though to calm himself down. “Let’s dress, damsel. It’s time for breakfast.”