Trees had fallen in the forest, this night; choices had been made.
I liked this way of doing things… almost as much as I liked the other way.
CHAPTER 11
RED
He stripped off his shirt, and slipped into bed well after midnight. I was half asleep and had been thinking about this entire, I-control-you problem. He might not let me go, and what could I do; how did you hold a man like this to an agreement? He had made the vet give us her house for the night, and I had zero clue as to where she was now.
These powers of his were insane, fearsome when I tried to imagine what he might do. He could bring down governments, start wars. Anything. And here I was worried about myself.
Teaching him was what he’d asked of me, and only now did I understand the burden of responsibility. The complications had been spinning through my brain for ages, and trying to go to sleep had involved much tossing and turning.
Weirdly, his return made me feel relieved, which might be because I was afraid of what he’d been doing.
A tank top and panties were my entire attempt at PJs, and I felt vulnerable in his presence.
“Where have you been?” Yes, that was a dumb question. It’s what a wife asks her returning husband.
Pfft, I raspberried my own subconscious.
In the light leaking in through a side window, I could see I had amused him – his mouth curved the smallest amount. On anyone else that would be nothing. On him? A smile? Hallelujah.
“I’ve been doing good deeds.” That growly rumble, I knew it so well, and it seemed as if he’d really said bad good deeds.
I wasn’t sure what those were, but my muscles wanted to run. That voice had often heralded orgasmic sex, terrible acts, and general mayhem.
“Your pill is due.” Overdue really. It was on his side table, along with a glass of water.
He propped himself on his side, drank the water, and swallowed the pill without protest. Then he turned over to face me.
Gravity, that minx, made the sheet slide to his waist, revealing a daunting array of muscles. Strands of hair fell lazily across his face, and I’d never figured out why that appealed to me, but… dayum, it did.
My ovaries did a tango, and I gave the quietest sigh. Fear and lust, such a contradiction.
“Good deeds? Is that the truth?”
“Of course. I would never lie to you. Hand on heart.” He did it too – put his hand there.
Liar. He would lie. He would definitely lie.
His eyes drifted lower, to my chest. “Hmmm.” The purr of his voice and his scent did more wrongful things.
“What good deeds, exactly? You wanted me to teach you how to be human. Let me judge.”
“I did say that. How about this aphorism instead? It’s the thought that counts, right?”
What a big word you have, sir. Once, he had let slip that he had trained as a lawyer. I could hear it in his vocabulary.
“Look.” From somewhere unknown, he produced a flower and held it before me. His fingers slowly twirled it. The dandelion gleamed with yellow as it revolved in the headlights glancing through the window.
A mesmer offering a flower? Again. I wondered what this gesture meant to him.
“It is the thought that counts,” I murmured. I chose my next words with care, licked my lips. “Could this possibly mean that you did something bad, accidentally?”
“I said it was a good deed. Maybe you shouldn’t look this gift horse in the mouth?”
“So many prover—”
He dragged me over to him and under him.
The kisses alone were enough to arouse me. His lips were on mine, opening me up, toying with his tongue. I loved the unusual playfulness. I was stirred, shaken, and wet, and beneath his weight and spread legs. The kisses worked their magic, then he dragged my hands upward and pinned them to the pillow. If my reaction had been some mesmer auto-response, it was no longer a surprise, and I decided I no longer cared.
Or not right now.
I loved it…
His hand wrapped about my throat as I writhed beneath him, with his erection pushing at me through our clothes. And I… I acted like a whore and wrapped my legs around him and ground myself at that hardness.
He paused, leaving me breathless and with him wearing a malevolent glare. “It’s not enough.”
What?
That hand tightened on my neck, and his teeth showed. He shook me, squeezed his palm across the furrow where my blood pulsed. A little more pressure and I might not be able to breathe.
Fuck. I shivered, knowing the fear he provoked was hot too. It seemed I had a fetish for being scared the fuck to death.
“I’m to do good deeds?”
I nodded and tried not to make choking sounds.
“Hmmm. You’ll stand at the wall then, panties off, shirt off…” Meticulously, he circled one areola through my top. “Naked for me.”
For once it was not merely an order. He towed me off the bed by my wrist, drew me to the wall, and leaned over me with his forearm planted above. His finger pressed on the center of my chest.
“Stay, little bitch.”
Little. I panted, waiting, hoping for more of this.
He stripped me, had me spread my legs, then gave my pussy an open-handed slap that jarred loose a startled pleasure. “Don’t touch yourself.”
How dare he. But I was gasping as he walked away and out the door.
Mouth open, eyes lowering, I stayed, palms on the wall, feeling where his hands had been in the lingering heat and the ghosts of lust feathering and throbbing from below. Below, where he’d slapped
