toward it. I saw the quick scurry of a mouse at the very edge where light melted into darkness between me and the door, and jumped back.
The fire caught with a crackle, he moved behind me. “Don' t worry. They stick to the shadows.”
“That' s a comfort,” I said, striving for a dry tone, but it came out sounding as high-pitched and squeaky as the mouse itself.
“I told you to get naked.” His tone was hard, the harshest I' d hear from him so far.
It marked the opening of the final act.
His fingers threaded through my wet hair. When he squeezed, twisted it around his fist, water ran down my back. There wasn' t time to respond. Holding me by my hair he stripped me, peeled soggy clothes off the way he might peel an apple before he sank his teeth into the sweet flesh beneath. I grabbed at the tatters, tried to press them to me, but he kept going, unfazed. My clothes came apart with the muted shriek of cotton fibers snapping, the sound rippled through my skin and straight down to my pussy. He spun me around to face him, one hand in my hair, one hand on the waistband of a denim skirt so old and threadbare it was almost translucent. We both knew it would be gone with one quick tug.
He let the tension linger, drew it out the way a director might draw out a moment with spooky music and panning the camera in for a close-up. He leaned in, nose two inches from mine, when that last rip came.
I' d imagined how this moment would be so many times. During the days I was working up the nerve to play this game. I' d fantasized about this moment during the hunt and on the boat. I' d thought I' d fight harder when I was skin to skin with a hunter, be immune in some way to the primal beat of passion that immobilized me more effectively than rope, or chain, or the evil little black leash he wore on his belt.
Here in the firelight, I was a woman wanted by a man, wanting him back. We played the game we were supposed to be too civilized to play. The game of catch me if you can. I played because there was something erotic about a man who was smart enough to outwit me. Strong enough to take me. A holdover, I guess, from the days when those were the skills a mate had to have to keep a family safe and fed. Those instincts, our primitive needs, were off the leash now.
His gaze was a palpable touch, sliding over my body, the skin burned under his stare. My nipples tightened when his eyes lingered there, pussy wept when the gaze dropped lower, focused. I dropped a hand to shield myself from the heat. He pushed it away. I pushed back and the tussle I was craving started. There wasn' t much to be done against a man his size. That should have frightened me. It turned me on. Only a second ago I would have said it was impossible to reach a higher level of turned-on.
His stubbly cheek scraped my skin. His scent, male and spicy, made me want to press my nose to his neck and just breathe him in. It' s hard to fight when your limbs are going to jelly, when your breath is coming so fast it makes you dizzy. When his fingers find your pussy and buckle your knees under a tide of pleasure.
I resorted to the only weapon I had strength enough to wield. He didn' t have much chest hair, a few crisp curls in a tiny patch just below the indentation where his collarbones met.
I caught one in my teeth and yanked.
“Ouch.” He rubbed his chest with one hand and glared. Annoyance gave way to a gleam in his eyes and a demon' s grin. Then a hard slap on my bottom wrung a startled
“Ouch!” from me.
We went down together. At first the feeling of falling terrified me, but I should have known he was in control. I landed on top and was rolled under him.
You know those dreams you have where you want to fight or run and scream, but your limbs won' t move and no sounds will come? That' s what this felt like when his weight pinned me and his hands spread my legs to take his hips between them.
His mouth was over mine, tongue fucking me, while his chest ground against my breasts. My nipples were so hard they hurt. His zipper scraped my pussy, his weight pinning my hips to take the torture. Through it all I wanted more. I wanted that cock of his locked inside my throbbing heat. I wanted to lock him in the thrill of my muscles the way he had me locked in his. I wasn' t going to admit it.
“Pig,” I taunted.
“Slut,” he murmured against my lips.
“Get off me.” I did my best to sound sincere, but when you' re breathless with lust it ruins the effect.
He' d shifted to work his hands between us and dip his fingers into me. I closed my eyes, bit my lip to hold back a whimper.
“That' s not what you want,” he said.
“What?”
“You don' t want me to get off you.”
He pressed fingers soaked in feminine honey to my lips. When I refused to open for him, he licked them clean himself, his eyelids dropping as he savored. He sucked and glanced sideways as he did, his expression reminding me of a mischievous boy who' d gotten away with swiping a fingerful of frosting from a cake.
His hand dipped between us again. This time to undo his pants, uncovering just enough to fuck me without undressing all the way. That was unexpectedly erotic.
There' s vulnerability in being naked. Vulnerability he' d demanded from me and didn' t allow for himself.
The head of his cock bumped impatiently at my pussy as it found the way in.
“Hold tight,” he said. That first thrust ripped a cry from me. So did the second.
He propped himself on his elbows, and I could see in his face the barely leashed animal need to take and take hard. “You want me to go easy?” he panted.
I ripped another hair from his chest with my teeth.
He hammered me. From that point on, it was as if I were outside my body watching a more primitive me take over. My fingers in his hair, pulling. Teeth biting, nails scratching to spur him on.
His body slammed mine so hard my bones vibrated. I wanted that hard, fast battering ram of a man' s cock driving me out of my mind, driving out everything but the hump and bump of two bodies clawing their way toward a climax.
When he finally said, “Beg me, baby. Beg me to fill you with cum,” I did.
I pleaded. When his cock jerked inside me, filled me, I cried out and gave myself up to the mindlessness of my own orgasm. His face was pressed between my breasts. His hand clamped down on my right shoulder. His fingertips so hot his grip was like a brand. I might have paid more attention to that sensation, but I was straining toward that final release, that floating stretch of peace when my mind went silent, that time when there are no thoughts. The thoughtless time never lasts long enough.
The lamp had gone out and the fire was nothing but a patch of glowing coals in the darkness. His weight left my body. I heard him moving around. I don' t know what I thought he was doing, maybe getting a blanket to cover us, or a pillow of some sort before he lay down. Depression was settling in fast on the heels of bliss. I didn' t want to come down, return to earth. Fantasy time was over and reality waited.
It wasn' t until I heard the door latch lift, cringed and turned my back to a cold blast of air that I realized I was being abandoned. Or was he just going outside to get something? The door slammed shut and I scrambled to my knees. Mice in the darkness being my first fear, I fumbled with the fire, the poker and sticks of wood, until I had a good blaze going again. When there was enough light to see a matchbox next to the lamp, I lit the wick too, turning the flame high enough to reach the top of the chimney.
On the floor beside the rug lay his shirt, neatly folded, and a red silk rose he' d placed on top.
Abandoned.
He' d never even asked my name.
I hadn' t asked his.
“What the fuck?” I said to the empty room.
I kicked the pile. The fake flower rolled into shadows and the shirt landed in a rumpled heap.
I left without either.
Jolie was not going to think about it. She would lose herself in work, concentrate on that and the hell with the rest of it. She grabbed a desktop tower from the front shelf.
Wi-Fi problems the service ticket said. She set the tower on the back bench so she could hook up the test
