BoardResolution (7 page)

“I can smell her, now,” Jon spoke from the end of the table.

“Same here.”
Peter responded directly in front of her. “She’s got a sweet pussy, just as you said, Lucas.”

“I want her to come, Matt,” Lucas said, lifting his mouth from her just a fraction.

She shook her head. No. No… But hadn’t she just wanted that?
But no, not like this, not when everything was up to them.

“I think she’s refusing you, Lucas.” Matt’s cool voice came from the end of the table again. “Make her come in the next two minutes. Despite her best attempts to resist.
Mouth only.”

“Done,” Lucas said softly, and moved in to close the deal.

She expected him to redouble his physical effort, had tensed and braced herself against it, and so was surprised when there was a pause, the noise of wheels. He’d taken a seat in a chair, pulled it up between her legs. The fine hair over his temples brushed the inside of her thighs as he moved in close again.

“You know…” He administered a tiny lick on her clit that made her shudder. “Eating pussy is my very favorite thing to do with a woman. I love the smell, the taste, the feel of her thighs as she sits on my face. I love squeezing her ass in my hands as I shove her hard against me, taking away her choice, pushing her into that pleasurable abyss. I love to listen to her scream as she falls. I love knowing when she falls to the
bottom,
it will be my arms there to catch her. We’ll be here to catch you,” he whispered huskily. “All of us.
Stop being so afraid.
Don’t you know how much you mean to Matt, to all of us?”

She made a noise of forceful and furious protest against the gag.

“Didn’t sound flattering, Lucas.” Ben spoke this time.

“One minute,” Jon warned.

“More than I need, though nowhere close to how much I want.”

Lucas put his mouth over her clit, sucking her back into the heat and wet. He began to lick her, strong, sure strokes, not too fast, pushing up against the volatile area, starting at the bottom, pushing up on it again, scoring her lightly with his teeth.
That bite
and push again, as if pressuring that tight bud of flesh was like nudging a switch.

Things were happening inside her, things that defied description. A spiral of reaction that had strings drawing taut everywhere, her whole body starting to hold itself tight as if in some form of self-imposed paralysis. Her breath darted in and out through her nose, her teeth sinking into the ball. Something gathered, gathered, just out of reach. No, she couldn’t reach for it…couldn’t stop herself from lunging for it…

“Come for him, Savannah.” Matt snapped out the order.
“Now.
At my command.”

The orgasm exploded from somewhere between Lucas’s mouth and her pussy and erupted through her. Going over that pinnacle, her brain reversed its will. Instead of freezing her in place, now she was wriggling gracelessly, helplessly. In her suspended restraints, screaming against the gag, she made words that could only be heard in her own mind, shocking her.

Touch me…touch me… Never stop.

She wanted Matt. But he could not hear her wish with the gag, and what little mind she continued to control told her to be glad.

It wasn’t just about the battle of wills. If she threw open the door to her heart, he could deny her. Leave her with her wishes echoing against the walls, empty and desolate, like a house where everything was gone, leaving only the harsh regret of memory. Like a child being told that little girls who ran to their Daddy to get hugs wouldn’t amount to anything except a takeover acquisition for some man.

She felt suddenly like the men in the room were all weapons turned against her, the sword of Eden, turning in every direction, shining upon her weakness, her every shortcoming.

With so little sexual experience, she didn’t know if this was normal, this flood of overpowering emotions that made her feel completely adrift on an unfamiliar ocean. Flailing, she tried to pull herself out of that darkness, onto the far more rational thought that this was similar to eating too much
chocolate,
or taking one too many Valium to help her sleep. Those things made her body no longer in her control, subject to macabre dreams or frenetic nervous energy she could not rein in. It was a physical, chemical reaction. It said nothing about herself, who she was or what she truly wanted.

Lucas kept his nose and mouth pressed hard against her pussy, continuing to eat her out. Running his tongue over her clit, he dipped into the well between her legs, making a noise of pleasure at the taste of her come on those sensuous lips. His hair brushed her thighs, the planes of his face touching her as he continued the soft nibbles through the hard aftershocks. She bleated at each touch like a lost sheep, a sheep
who
in this moment had no doubt who the shepherd was who held her fate. She wanted to see Matt with the fervor of a dying wish, and her hand clutched into fists to keep from dropping that kerchief, from begging with her body what her mouth was thankfully prevented from saying.

No. She wasn’t that far gone. This was a whole new situation, like the first time she handled opening a plant on her own. There would be some weak moments, some stumbling as she figured out her approach to get the upper hand with the players who didn’t think she had the right to the upper hand.

There is no situation in life that cannot be explained by the same principles we use in business.
Geoffrey’s voice resounded in her mind, hammering the point home. “If a person is making you feel something you don’t want to feel, take the reins away from them. If you can control yourself, you can control the
situation,
bring the tiller back to your hand. Keep your wits about you and wait for the opportunity.”

Sound advice, though she was certain even her dispassionate father could not have predicted this situation. And somehow, hearing his voice in her head now, thinking of applying his logic to this situation, swept her with a desolation that made her wish to be free of them all, her father and these men and Matt, in her bed with the covers over her head. And then the most unnerving thought of all intruded on the image.

What if Matt were there, putting his knee on her bed, lying down on top of her covers, curving that powerful body around her? Scooping up the covers and her into the heat and warmth of him, providing a shelter that was simply that, a place to draw strength and sanctuary, demanding nothing she was not willing to give? Or take it a step further…accepting something she’d always wanted to give but had been afraid to offer, mainly because no one had ever come right out and asked for her heart.

Get a grip, Savannah.
He’s won the round, that’s it.
He wasn’t proving anything except that she could enjoy oral sex, like any independent, healthy woman. What woman in her right mind wouldn’t enjoy this, even if she had been dragged kicking and screaming to it?

It meant nothing.
Nothing.

Abruptly the gag was removed and a mouth was on hers, hard, hungry, as Lucas kept up with his soothing and stirring kisses along the insides of her quaking thighs. All her arguments shattered, because it was Matt’s mouth on hers, Matt’s scent filling her nose, Matt’s warm skin so close, that rough, handsome jaw that she ached to touch.

Sheer fulfillment flooded into an emptiness yawning open in her chest like a wound. His lips were the healing touch, reassuring her, yet spinning her off her axis once again so that something within her screamed in fury and desperation. Giving in to it, her lips pulled back from her teeth in a snarl and she bit, latching down on his bottom lip.

Instead of him jerking away, allowing her to rip and tear at him as he was ripping and tearing at her insides, his hands cupped the back of her head, holding her still. Despite her painful vise on his bottom lip, he kept his mouth crushed over hers, his tongue plunging along her clenched teeth, his own lips persuasive, gentle.
Responding not with matching ferocity, but with devastating tenderness.
When his touch slipped forward to caress the sides of her throat, her cheek, she realized she had let go. The acrid taste of his blood lingered on her tongue.

“You’re doing beautifully,” he said in a whisper against her, his breath touching her cheek just below her mask. “They all love you, don’t you know that? You can’t do anything to drive us away. We’re your family.
Your lovers, your friends, the adversaries that challenge and stimulate you.
Your real social life, not the theater and charity events, the occasional dinner with a man just for show.”

She shook her head. No. She would not let this outrageous situation become that personal. She wanted an end to it, to go home.

Which meant she had to admit they had broken her, that she was as soft and vulnerable as Matt claimed she was.
Capable of being hurt, manipulated. That he affected her so strongly that she couldn’t see this through to the end he had planned.

She went rigid, refused to let her body respond. After a moment, she heard a sigh, felt him draw away.

“Do you know it’s often the women who are strongest in public that most desire a man’s Mastery behind closed doors, Savannah?”

She shook her head, in protest or denial she couldn’t say, but she had no words with her body throbbing with the aftermath of the climax and the sense of loss his withdrawal caused. Lucas had pulled back as well, and now stimulation came in audible form only. Matt’s voice, hearing the shifts of their bodies around her, the rustle of clothing, the sound of their breathing.

“You have this overwhelming desire to surrender, to submit to a man strong enough to Master you. It’s like an aphrodisiac to the man who senses it. I know the exact moment I recognized it in you. It was like a punch in the gut.
Or a light bulb going on.”

She heard the smile in his voice, and cold fingers gripped her vitals. Just by speaking the word, he had evoked the memory. A memory she had replayed over and over in her mind, not understanding why it was so fascinating to her. But he had known, and now so did
she
, despite her strongest desire to deny it.

“I know you remember it.” His voice took her back with him to the uncomfortable recollection. “I know I do. I’ve relived it every day since it happened. It led us to this moment. Didn’t it?”

* * * * *

He’d come back from the dinner break early, ostensibly to make a couple of phone calls, but there was always the possibility that he would see Savannah and could spar with her for a few enjoyable moments.

It made him
frown
, though, knowing he would find her in her office. She went on business luncheons, attended banquets and gala events with the right escorts, but never did he see her sitting on the edge of one of the downtown fountains, eating a sandwich and taking in the pigeons’ play, engaging in idle people watching.
Or, even more shocking, out with a girlfriend, laughing, having some female conversation.
Doing some playful male-bashing.

“She’s not a woman, she’s a fucking robot,” he’d heard one competitor say. “Geoffrey Tennyson didn’t spawn
her,
he had her built in one of his plants.”

It had made Matt angry, and he’d made sure to scuttle the man’s plans for overseas expansion with him. Lucas had pointed out it was an emotional, rather than a fiscally intelligent act, and he had not disagreed with that assessment. Nor had it erased his satisfaction in doing it. He wondered often if Savannah realized she had a circle of devoted knights trying to protect her from harm when she wouldn’t even let them into the inner circle of her life. Geoffrey was gone, and what protection the man had provided, as well as the damage he had done, was gone. She was as alone in the world as a person could get. He wanted her in his world, and she wouldn’t even give him an opening to make a move in that direction.

He rounded the corner, his peripheral vision sharpened so he could see if she was in her office. The door was open, her desk light on. And she was standing on top of her desk.

She hadn’t taken off her shoes, and he assumed it was to give her extra height to reach her objective, though he shuddered to think about her stepping on her unstable wheeled office chair in those skinny heels.

He detoured. Determining in a few strides what she was doing, he quickened his pace.

Apparently a bulb had burned out in the incandescent ceiling lighting she preferred to fluorescent. Anal-retentive plague that she was, she was changing it herself, rather than waiting to have a maintenance person with solid shoes and a ladder do it tomorrow. She was on the ball of one foot, the other off the ground, straining, her right breast clearly outlined against the fabric of her turquoise turtleneck. The ceiling was too high for her to use one hand to steady her upper body, and as she worked to free the panel over the light fixture, she was precariously balanced. When it came free with a jerk, she overbalanced.

Matt got there in time to clamp his hands on her hips, his palms curled over the hipbones, his fingers on the soft curves.

“What are you doing? Get down from there.”

She was flustered, and he didn’t often get to see that. She backed out of his hold, and he nipped the panel from her fingers, taking it to the floor.

“I’m trying to change a light bulb.”

“I can see that. Get down.”

“I just need to—”

“Get. Down.
Now.”

Instead of coming back with another sharp retort, he saw something incredible happen.
A moment of confusion.
Nervous tension.
Something came over him, too, an instinct, and the remarkable feeling that a door had just swung wide open. And he wanted to test it.

“You heard me, Savannah,” Matt said softly. “Come here.
Now.”

It was a long moment. Then she shifted her gaze away from his,
down
, and moved toward his reaching hands, her neck and cheeks flushed.

Still reeling from the revelation, he almost missed his cue, but he recovered in time to take her elbow as she reached down for him. He gripped her waist and she put her hands after a brief hesitation on his shoulders, curiously docile as he lifted her clear of the chair, pushing it out of his way, and lowered her to the floor.