Hero (16 page)

I reach over her shoulder for a stick of butter. My fingers gouge out a soft chunk, and I slide her bottom half off the edge of the table. Watching her face, I circle my arm around and touch between her ass cheeks. Her eyes widen and legs flex around me as she tries to look down.

I hush her while keeping her head on the table by her hair. My mouth lowers to the crook of her neck while I massage butter over her anus. She protests with a throaty noise, clenching and pushing against me. I continue my assault without penetrating, rubbing her as I slide leisurely in and out of her stretching pussy. I spread the butter everywhere, coating between her cheeks before I insert the tip of my finger in her asshole.

“Good girl,” I murmur as she unclenches. My thrusts are controlled so she’ll feel every ridge of my cock. My finger works itself deeper. “Such a good girl.”

I reach across the table again to pluck the nearest candle from its holder. Her eyes follow as I blow it out, and she instantly starts struggling, her head shaking from side to side as strangled noises escape through her gag.

“Shh, don’t—” I’m cut off by her attempt to scream. I pluck the thong from her mouth with my teeth, fling it aside, and lock my lips on hers. Her entire body tenses as our mouths press against each other. She puckers her lips into mine, and I respond by opening her up with my tongue and slipping it in. When I moan, her arms circle around my neck, asking for more. I tilt my head and take her mouth, devouring her with a fervor that surprises even me. Her mouth is as warm and soft as her pussy, and it tastes equally as good.

As I kiss her, I flip the candle around. It’s a nice size, smaller than my cock but big enough that she’ll feel it. I lower it between her legs, gliding it through the butter. It slides easily, but she whimpers so pathetically that I break the kiss to watch her face as I press the wide tip against her tight bud.

“You can’t,” she says. “You can’t do this.”

“Push out a little.”

“Please,” she begs.

Impossibly, I grow harder inside her. My dick wants to fuck, and it won’t wait much longer. “Now,” I instruct as I insert it.

Her face screws up as I slide it in, and she pleads with me with big eyes.

“You’ll thank me when you come,” I mutter, worrying the candle deeper. My body is on fire for release, and it’s taking all my restraint not to let go. Filling both her holes as she squirms is draining me of any self-control. I shove the candle deep and let go to fuck her with an intensity she’ll feel for days. I let myself get lost in her pussy, taking whatever I can from her. She’s so wet and slippery that the large room echoes with our slapping skin. I keep pounding, even as she shudders and shakes out her orgasm, clawing for me. She latches onto my straining forearms, her fingers digging into my skin as her body bucks off the table and her mouth screams my name senselessly.

The sight of her is too much, and I pull her into my final thrust, claiming her with an animal growl and what feels like every drop of cum in my body.

Her body is limp on the table, her eyes shut, and for a moment I’m terrified that I’ve hurt her. But she heaves an enormous sigh before looking at me. I release her hips, leaving ten red marks in her otherwise flawless skin. I ease the candle out of her, toss it, and fall forward to cover her body with mine. “Feels good with something in your ass, doesn’t it?” I ask against her cheek.

She only shivers and tries to form a barrier between us with her arms, but I won’t budge.

“If you don’t want to get fucked, don’t wear a dress like that to dinner.”

“I don’t understand,” she responds. “What’s it matter if you don’t find me attractive?”

I laugh in a short gust and lift my head to look at her. “Come on, Sparrow. Don’t play stupid.”

“You said you didn’t want me. In the basement.”

I stare back at her as dangerous thoughts hammer in my head. I’m tempted to tell her that I’ve never felt a woman like I have her these last twenty-four hours. I want to tell her that there was never a time, even as a young girl, that I didn’t want her for myself. I want to ask her how it’s possible anyone wouldn’t find her attractive. But I’ve already crossed too many lines. Instead of holding her closer and kissing her, I deny the urges and pull out to stand up.

“You can go. We’re finished here.”

“What about dinner?”

“I’m utterly sated, but I’ll have Norman bring you something.”

“You’re not going to eat with me?”

Considering I just shoved a candle up her ass, the surprise in her voice is oddly sweet. “I just did, Sparrow. And I have plans.”

She shifts into a sitting position, glancing around as her hands cover her breasts. “What plans?”

I arch an eyebrow at her as I tuck my wrinkled shirt back into my pants. “That’s a brave question.”

She cocks her head, watching me dress. “What plans, Cal?”

“Cal,” I say, shaking my head at her boldness. “Lyla-from-work plans.”

Her passive expression is not the reaction I expect. “Are you guys dating?”

“No.”

She exhales. “Oh.”

“Just fucking.”

When I look back at her, her jaw is working side to side alarmingly fast. “I knew that already, but I thought maybe now . . .”

“You knew? About Lyla?”

She nods. “She told everyone.”

My jaw sets. She looks uncomfortable, so I pull off the dress shirt I just straightened and hand it to her.

She tugs it over her head quickly. “What about me?” she asks as she maneuvers her arms through the sleeves.

“You?”

“You’re, you know, with both of us?”

I can’t suppress the bark of laughter from my mouth. “I’m not fucking you, Cataline. It shouldn’t have even happened once.”

“So you don’t find me attractive,” she says.

I purse my lips and free her mass of hair from the shirt’s collar, letting it fall on her back. “It’s not about that, Sparrow. I’m fucking more women than Lyla, and you should be thankful you’re not them. If you thought I was rough with you, that was child’s play.”

There’s a moment of crackling silence as she stares at me openmouthed. Suddenly she bursts into tears and jumps off the table, pushing me aside as she runs from the room.

I’m left looking after her for a few moments, and all I can think is,
What the fuck?

———

Lyla looks dull. Blonde is the wrong color for her—it washes her out, giving her an ashen look of desperation. She’s always looked dull, but it’s particularly obvious tonight as she stares back at me from her pink comforter, spread eagle. I flip the light switch but remain where I am.

“Calvin?”

I turn the lights back on. “I’m not in the mood, Lyla.”

“You’re not?”

“I’ll call you another time.”

“But . . . I can invite Sabrina if you want? You liked that before.”

I snort. “Did I?”

“I can call her right now. Or if not her, I know another girl. Fifteen minutes max.” When I don’t respond, she asks, “Or would you rather just sleep?”

“When have we ever just slept?”

“Well, never—”

“And we never will. If we’re not fucking, we’re not anything.” I nod my chin at her. “Did you tell people at work about us?”

“No . . .”

“No?”

“Not really.”

She closes her knees and blinks. The bedroom looks like it belongs to a teenage girl. Even Cataline is too old for so much pink. I just shake my head and leave.

Cataline
. It’s not the first time I’ve thought of her since the dining room earlier. Suddenly nobody sounds good but her. Lyla distracts me, but when she loses that ability, I have no use for her. And right now, it seems there’s no distracting me from my feisty captive. She’s stubborn and mouthy, and it pushes my last button. She writhes underneath me, trying to disguise her pleasure. I’m starting to believe I enjoy making her submit more than her submission itself. None of it makes sense.

Cataline brings out the darkest, sharpest angles of me. The only other people I let see that side of me are criminals. And whores, or girls like Lyla, who take it rough. Sometimes I go too far, but they never stop me. The thought of going too far with Cataline taps into an emotion I rarely, if ever, experience: fear. If I lose control with her, I could hurt her. And it would only take one time to break her.

Some nights when I’m restless, I sleep with my eyes open. I read. My books are dreams I never want to wake up from. I’m in the library, between the pages of
Les Misérables
,
when there’s a noise in the house. I sit up in my oversized chair. Keys jingle, and my palms sweat.

After learning about Lyla two nights earlier, I ran straight to the shower to scrub any trace of Calvin from my body. I scowled into the steam as I rinsed his touch from my hair. He didn’t deserve what he took, but I was lost to him anyway. For him I came in a burst of wild energy, like a wave smashing fast and hard against rocks.

Everything is still a moment and then Calvin’s leaning in the library doorway. His hair is disheveled, and his normally flawless suit is rumpled. “Nobody should have to work this late on a weekend, not even me,” he says as he loosens his tie and unbuttons his collar. “What are you doing up?”

I’m suddenly speechless, so I just lift the book in my lap and show it to him.

“A true bookworm,” he says with a lopsided grin. It’s half-assed, but it’s the first genuine one he’s ever given me. Without my camera on me, I’m mentally memorizing this moment. “That one should keep you occupied for a while.”

“You’ve read it?”

“You look surprised.”

“You don’t seem like the book-reading type.”

He laughs. “I don’t sleep well either.”

“You have demons too.” Even before I finish the sentence, I cover my mouth as though that might bring the words back. “I’m sorry.”

He enters the room slowly with his hands deep in his pockets. My head is vertical when he reaches my chair. I recoil as his fingertips sweep hair from my face. “Do I scare you, Sparrow?”

“Yes.”

“Good.” His fingers graze down the side of my face, and, shamefully, I incline my head into his hand. It’s clear by my heated exhale how badly I want to be touched.

“I’m sorry I’ve never told you,” he says with a pause, “that you’re beautiful.”

My lids are leaden under his adoration. In the wake of his ghostly touch is pebbled skin, a changing of tides, a carnal need born of something different than lust. If he were to hurt me in this second, I would forgive him just for this feeling.

“Beautiful?”

“If I were . . . normal, maybe . . .” His hand is cupping my jaw now.

I want to look into his eyes, but I’m afraid doing so would end this moment. “What are you hiding, Calvin?”

“Nothing, Sparrow. Everything you see is everything I am.”

He’s warning me with what I know is truth. His hand withdraws, leaving me bereft, so I let myself look. I didn’t notice before that he’s wearing his glasses. There’s no emotion in his eyes.

“I should get to bed,” I say before I can find out if I’ve done something to upset him. When I stand, he doesn’t move. We’re so close, our distance can only be measured by heat. I keep my eyes fixed on the floor and swallow so loudly it makes me blush. I don’t know why I’m suddenly in trouble, but I know where it will lead. “I mean, if I’m allowed.”

“Are you asking my permission?”

I nod down. His hand contracts into a fist, and I brace myself for ripped clothing, or some variation of the other night’s performance. The surface of my skin burns in a way that I’m certain I’m turned inside out, and I don’t know if I’ll scream or melt when he touches me.

“I like you like this,” he says.

It’s not until he steps back that I exhale the breath I didn’t know I’d seized. “That’s it?” I ask.

“Obedience will get you far, Cataline. It’s what I’ve been trying to teach you.” He turns around to exit the library but stops and looks back. “That is, unless you were hoping for something else? It’s late, but I’m always up for an impromptu lesson.”

“No,” I choke out, shaking my head.

He answers with an exaggerated smirk. “Okay, then. Goodnight.”

In bed, I can’t keep my fingers out of my underwear. When I pull them out and smell them, I smell him. I taste myself for him, gliding my fingertips from the back of my tongue to the tip. The night he took me from the street, I turned from person to possession. Now I worry that when he entered my body and stole what I wouldn’t give him, I became his possession from the inside. I pretend my hands are Calvin’s and let them take me somewhere I want to be—even if it’s only in my mind, even if I would never admit it: with him.