A Harem of One [The Moreland Brothers 3] (Siren Publishing Allure) (23 page)

The Truth is the Light

Marq knew something about the amount of money that Jamison had socked away was very unusual. When he took possession of her accounts, she had a tidy nest egg of over a quarter million dollars. He didn’t ask how she had acquired the money. In fact, he assumed he had time to get to know all of her before they ended. But now he was forearmed and forewarned. The money he’d doubled for her to a total of five hundred thousand dollars was from a lawsuit presented to the state on her behalf. There had been prior complaints about the Fosters, the family that had taken her in, but no action was taken, and they were allowed to receive wards from the state with little to no further investigation. The social worker was the one who found a pro bono attorney willing to take the personal damages case after what happened to her. Jamison was too much like him in some ways. She didn’t touch the money at all, and the funds were left to rot away, moldering in a cache of banks for the last ten years. In other ways she was his polar opposite, even beneath the skin. She was a simple woman and settled for comfort over flashy lifestyles and cavorting. But she was the one for him, and he was going to retrieve his woman and bind her to him forever. There was no reason they couldn’t be together, even if he was a reformed playboy and she was strong beauty hidden in plain sight. He wasn’t leaving now. There were a few plans he was going to make first. He found the flash drives with his functional fetishes stored and called Charyn.

It rang long enough that Marq assumed that there would be no answer, but just as he was set to hang up the phone, his brother picked up the other end.

“Damn it, you better be dead or damn near it you cock blocker.” There was a light at the end of the tunnel, Marq thought as a hastily choked back laugh escaped his lips.

“Not quite. But I need your help.” Marq heard his brother breathing slow.

“Okay, hold on a sec.” There was a muffled groan, and he heard his brother speak, presumably to his wife. “You better not come, Makenzie, or I’ll spank you hard enough to leave you begging me for three days.” There was a cry of pleasure and tortured need before the lengthy cry went silent with only a whimper.

“So what do you need, little brother?” Charyn no longer sounded impatient. Instead, he sounded as if he had all of the time in the world.

Marq gave his brother the basics of what he wanted to do, and without delay Charyn agreed to help him any way he could. They made plans for the next night, but before he could hang up, Charyn stopped him.

“Oh yeah, Makenzie said your painting is finished if you want to see it.” With everything that happened, he forgot all about the painting he’d posed for with Jamison.

“Uh, okay, that’s fine with me.” He was torn between madly wanting to see Jamison’s skin once more, even if it was on canvas, and needing to run the other way to keep his sanity intact. The only reason he’d made the two weeks thus far was by not looking at their video, as he knew the sight of her would be more than he could take. He woke up too many nights with his cock up literally to test himself with the sight of what he presently didn’t have. Even with those thoughts Marq went to sleep like a baby, even though his plans peppered his brain intensely until the moment he closed his eyes.

The next day, he shipped a package before he found himself at Charyn’s house without much thought. It was a surprisingly sunny afternoon considering the meteorologist’s prediction of rain. He walked inside the house without knocking, and the first sight was Makenzie bouncing down stairs, flamboyant as always. She greeted him with a quick hug, which was scented warmly with her light perfume.

“Hi, Marq, follow me. By the way, Charyn will be down in just a minute or two. He’s doing something in the attic.” He didn’t speak, just matched her smile and allowed her to graciously lead him to her studio. As they progressed further into the house, his memories of Jamison the day they posed for Makenzie assaulted him. He couldn’t let them go, much the same way his heart had held on to her throughout their separation. When she opened the door, a large canvas greeted him, but the massive square was swathed in fabric.

When they were ten feet from the picture, Makenzie stopped and faced him.

“Close your eyes and no peeking until I say so. Okay?”

“Okay?” Marq closed his eyes and heard her move before the fabric rustled.

“You can look now.” Her tone was flat.

Curiously, Marq opened his eyes slowly and saw— he couldn’t even describe what he saw at first sight. The painting was perfect and direct in a way he’d never seen before. The canvas was propped high on the easel, which explained why it appeared before to be a massive ten-by-ten square. In actuality, it was a ten-by-five-foot rectangle. It was done in neutrals, black, white, and hints of sienna. There were small patches of color here and there on the canvas, a touch of rose on Jamison’s lips and a touch of gold where his hands met her flesh. The simplicity of the color scheme made the scene it created in more evocative than erotic, more emotional than mere sated lust could denote. It was, for lack of a better word, beautiful. It was from the last sketch made that evening, after he took her on the floor during the break following their first clumsy attempts at posing. Jamison was straddled over his lap, her head rested against his shoulder. Here she was looking at him, and her eyes were soft and held a tenderness no woman save his mother had ever gazed at him with.

The feelings that he was so sure she didn’t have for him yet were in her eyes, and he knew that he was going to get his way. In fact he could see and feel it now. His eyes were closed, and his head was leaned over toward hers. His face spoke of unparalleled satisfaction as his hands spoke of delicate greed cupped over her skin. The paint was luxurious in places. Sleek glistening strokes created the illusion of skin slickened with sex and the dew of sweat. There was something incredible about the way the painting came together. It was as if Makenzie had captured something more than him and Jamison. She showed him what he’d been waiting for. The painting showed him the one thing that could redeem his youthful transgressions and adult sins. Ever since the moment he was accused of being a rapist and exposed as a pervert due to his stash of personally taped porn, he needed to be absolved of his wrongs against women. He needed to be seen with more than desire and acquisition in mind. He needed to been seen for who he truly was and loved anyway. Marq wanted nothing more than that, and over the years he doubted he would ever find it. He saw everyone around him fall in love and watched his own parents love one another beyond life itself.

Their entwined pose reminded him of a myth he’d once read as a precocious child. In the tale an older couple met a weary traveler who needed food and shelter. The couple had very little, yet shared everything they had, their home and the little food and drink they had with the man. But no matter how much was eaten that night there was always more. When the traveler was replete, he asked the couple what the desired for their warm hospitality. They wanted nothing and said as much. But when pressed for an answer they wished to die together, so neither would be left alone. Their visitor was a god in disguise, and granted the couples wish. They never lacked for food or drink for the rest of their lives, until they died and were turned into a pair of trees that stayed intertwined for eternity.

The random thought made him realize he wanted that, too. Someone that loved him enough to die with him and he loved enough to do the same. Plus, he realized that his harem was just an excuse to hold himself back from what he really wanted. How could he make room in his heart, when he had a full bed? It wasn’t possible.

“So what do you think of my talented wife’s painting?” He was so transfixed by the sight before him he didn’t even hear his brothers footsteps.

“It could grace the halls of the Louvre.” He wasn’t lying, the bold choice of stark colors and technical perfection were astounding, not to mention the apparent emotions locked within the paint would catch the eye of even the most jaded of critics.

“Come on.” Charyn walked to the door, and Marq was hard pressed to peel his eyes from the canvas. He backed away until he was forced to turn away and leave. He was going to own that painting even if he had to beg Makenzie for it. When he climbed the stairs and reached the entrance to his brother’s dungeon, he felt just a hint of nervousness. This was so outside of his realm. But Jamison needed to know who was boss here. Not that she wasn’t his equal, but she had to learn a healthy respect for him and their relationship. Something told him his brother could help in that regard, and that was why he was here now. Even with that in mind, when he saw the full complement of bondage and domination tools, he was floored. Charyn must have understood the perplexed look he knew was on his face and responded to it.

“Yeah, we like a little of everything. But do you know why I personally enjoy this lifestyle, Marq?”

“Not really.”

“It allows me to give Makenzie everything I have and know that she is pleased at my will. I can use a force and roughness with her under the BDSM model in our play that many men might love, but are too afraid to try on their partners. The guidelines allow us to unlock every dark desire and know that if it was unwanted or too much that it can stop before going too far. It lets us be free within our rules and be anything that we want to be together for each other.”

Marq was at a loss. He’d always asked for what he wanted, and if his partner wasn’t interested, it wasn’t any skin off of his nose and said as much.

“I’ve never had a problem with just asking for what I want.”

“That’s true, and for a person in tune with their sexuality, they may be able to answer honestly. But for too many others, they are too ashamed to admit their needs aloud. Or for an even larger group of people, they don’t want to be asked. They want to be told or taken. So night after night, many women are unfulfilled because they crave being owned by their lovers and used for every unimaginable pleasure. Think about it like this, from childhood humans are ingrained to think the natural act of sex is dirty or wrong. Those hang-ups are hard to overcome and leave them with no options except to fixate on what they want being forced on them. That way they can feel pleasure without guilt or culpability.” Marq was shocked, to say the least. In his experience, he’d never thought a woman would like being used, per se. But the idea had merit. Jamison loved when he slaked his thirst on her unmercifully, especially the day he’d caught her on a date with D. She had never fallen apart the way she did that night when his jealousy had turned him into an animal slavering over her flesh as she tried to crawl away. Every breath she took wracked her frame, and his every pummeling thrust left her shuddering. She was nothing more than pure sensation made tangible via her flesh those hours of angry raw fucking.

“Nope, not fucking.” Marq looked at his brother. How did he read his mind like that?

“How did you—?”

“Uh, you said that out loud you know.”

“Damn, what part?”

“Just something about angry fucking. While that’s great, that’s not what this is about. It’s about giving and taking control. Nothing confuses a woman’s senses more than rough handling combined with the seduction of lovemaking. That’s how you gain control, through the confusion of the senses. Spank her, tie her up, and then put to her gently like she would break if you gave her an iota more. It’ll leave her crying by the time you finish with her.”

“Wow, you have this down to a science.”

“Yeah I try, but it’s more of an art.” Charyn laughed and held out a length of blond rope.

“We are going to start with a few basic knots that are easy to learn and can be used on nearly any body part. Watch.” He then showed him a series of loops using Marq’s arms as a model. “I’m tying your arms in front so you can see how to do it, but this method of restraint is more effective with the arms in back.” When his brother finished, Marq’s arms were pinned together with a grouping of loops that would band each arm from shoulder to wrist and met with center knots, leaving his hands able to clasp together. But there wasn’t much else he could do with the captive limbs, and he could imagine using this on Jamison as he wrapped fistfuls of hair in his hands while she was impaled on his cock.

“Okay, I like this one.”

“It’s one of our personal favorites, too. Now this position is only good for a half hour, forty-five minutes tops. Otherwise she will go numb and be in some pain. You have to massage her as well when she’s been restrained and use a good oil, not lotion.” Charyn then allowed Marq to use him as a model. It took Marq twice as long as it took his brother to complete however. But when he finished, his brother proclaimed the fit good and ties solid.

“You’d make a good Nawashi.”

“I don’t know about that.”

“The first time I learned to tie bonds, it took three times as long as you did to get the fit right. Mine were too tight, and it was hard for me to learn to be patient with my ropes and feel them along the way. So for you replicate the ties as well as you did shows me you have some potential. If you care to explore it.” Marq then began untying the bonds starting from the hand up. When he got to the elbows, he got a tap on the shoulder.

“I’ll take over from here.” It was Makenzie, and she had a wicked grin on her face.

“All right then, I guess I’ll talk to ya’ll later.” Marq walked downstairs in a much better mood. He was a man with a plan.