Chapter Five
A good Dominant
“Mon amour.” Her soft murmurs poured out against his neck, uncoordinated movements of her hands pushing ineffectually at the blanket he had wrapped around her shoulders only minutes before. Her breathing was finally evening out, but short pants of air still hit his skin with each soft exhale, carrying her quiet mews of subsiding pleasure. “Don’t leave me.”
“Shhhh. I’m here, Aurelie. You did so well, baby.” He brushed his lips against her temple, slowly stroking up and down her back with his palm. “So well. Proud of my Aurelie.” She was in his lap after a session, bundled up to help minimize the shudders and shaking that came over her after their scenes went particularly well as it had tonight. He held a chilled glass of juice to her lips, tilting it slightly to give her a sip of the sweet liquid. “Now drink. No worries, I’m here, baby, right here. You’re with me.”
“Kevin, do not leave me,” she whispered. Peering up at him, eyes wide, her smeared and smudged makeup was a testament to the exacting emotional toll their play this evening had taken from her. But he knew it wasn’t his continued proximity tonight that worried her. His internship was up in two days. Fini. There were no delays in sight, no reason for the school to retain him, so two days after that he would be on a plane bound for Chicago. Four days to US soil again. Four days to life after Aurelie.
“Shush now, I’m here. Just relax. We’ll sort the rest out later.” They both knew there was nothing to sort. Her family and job were here, his were in America. As thrilling and exciting as the past two months had been, there were no alternatives. He liked her, loved her even, but neither were foolish enough to think they were in love.
That night he slept curved around her, drifting up from sleep occasionally to find her awake, staring at him in the shadow-filled room. Each time, when he would have spoken, she quieted him with a finger to his lips or by leaning down to brush her mouth across his. Her face hollow with exhaustion the next morning, she had come to a place of acceptance at least.
Kevin worked hard to make the next three nights memorable for her, pushing the boundaries of what he found comfortable, seeing the thrilled excitement in her eyes as she looked up at him. Now, bike sold, bags packed, he sat eating a pleasant dinner with her in bed on his last night in France.
“You are good, you know?” She stretched out her long, elegantly shaped legs, crossing them at the ankle. Arranged just so, she controlled her body in ways he never could map out. “The answer to my unspoken prayers, yes, but I did not expect you to be so good.”
“Yeah, yeah, that’s what all the girls say. ‘Kev’s a nice guy.’ Right. Thanks.” He scoffed, leaning over the edge of the bed to place his empty plate on the floor.
Her carefree laughter surprised him, and he glanced up to see her smiling broadly. “I did not say you were nice, mon ami.” At the look on his face, she lifted a hand, wagging her fingers at him playfully. “I did not say you were not, wipe the sad from your lips. You are nice, but Kevin, that is not what I said. I said you are good.” She laughed again, the softness of her amusement lingering in the air. “A world of difference between those statements.” At his puzzled look, she sighed and shook her head slightly, inexplicably saying, “Babe in the manger.”
Pulling her legs in to curve around her body, she straightened her spine, sitting tall, turning to face him. Totally focused on him, like she did when they were…playing, so he knew what she was about to say mattered to her. This was important. “You are good at the Dom/sub thing. Very good, in fact.”
“Dom sub?”
“Oui, mon ami. Dominant and submissive.” She indicated herself with one scarlet-tipped finger. “I am submissive. It is what I like, what I want.” She drew a shuddering breath, and he watched as her skin washed with goose bumps. “What I need.” Cheeks flushed, she looked at him thoughtfully, and her tone turned cautious when she said, “And you are a Dom.”
“No, I’m not,” he said, trying to decide if he should be offended. No way was he like those men in the clubs she’d dragged him to, getting off on the screams of their victims. Stalking around in their squeaky plastic pants, fists wrapped around wooden batons with leather strips tied to them.
“Oh, yes. You certainly are. You just didn’t know it. Perhaps it is that you still don’t understand, but you are a Dom. It was a happy coincidence for me that you were gone astray in pain, lost so far inside yourself that night I found you on the streets that I could influence you to be mine, because I needed a Dom. Needed you.” With a sweetly wicked grin, she leaned in, resting her cheek against his shoulder. “All Dom.” Her voice dropped an octave as she said, “My Dom, at least for these two months.”
“No, I’m not.” Yeah, definitely offended. “I’m not like that, Aurelie. Not at all. I don’t want to subjugate women, humiliate them. I love women, I’d never treat one that way. Not you, not anyone.”
Her head tipped back as she laughed, and he watched the line of her throat, seeing the muscles slide and move underneath the skin. His blood rushed faster through his veins as he remembered what it felt like to cup that fragile column in his palm, to tighten his fingers around it until she could only sip at the air. Her gaze fixed to his throughout, trusting, waiting…submitting. His eyes closed when his cock woke and stirred, uncoiling slowly, fattening at the memories, and still he dismissed the idea. I’m only like that with her because it’s what she wants.
“No,” she murmured, “you would never hurt or humiliate a woman for your own pleasure.” With a hum at the back of her throat, she turned her face into his chest, rubbing her cheek over his nipple. “But for her? Oh, my. Yes. You are entirely focused on her pleasure, learning her needs. My needs. Bringing me pleasure. You instinctively know that to bring your sub pleasure gives it back to you tenfold. You are brave enough and strong enough in here”—she patted his chest with one palm—“to give her what she needs and wants, holding back on your desires until hers have been thoroughly met.” Her teeth nipped at him sharply, then she looked up with her vixen smile. “And then you take her to even greater heights by exposing your own yearnings.”
She sighed and sat up, reaching out to lace her fingers with his. “And that is the truth about a good Dom, a real one, as opposed to the posers we found in the clubs. A good dominant is whatever his submissive needs, and will know what his submissive needs even without their request, because in them he sees the desire that magnifies his own.”