Primal (5 page)

She leaned her head back, closing her eyes and sinking into the sensations ripping through her body. The hits sped up, sometimes three or four in a row, sometimes harder, sometimes softer as he alternated between her breasts and her thighs. The outside of her thighs, then the inside, creeping up closer and closer to her aching, clenching pussy only to jump back to her breasts. Pain, pleasure, pleasure and pain, more pleasure blending with the pain as he played her body like a maestro.

Then he was there. His hard chest pressed against her heated skin, one hand sliding down her belly and between her thighs. He swiped a finger the length of her slit, parting her folds and planting the heel of his hand against her aching clit so that her hips to jerked, and she opened her eyes to see him staring at her. It was as if her body was there simply to connect her to him.
 

He lowered his head, his mouth slanting over hers, his tongue thrusting into her mouth at the same time his cock thrust home deep inside her center. Her insides clenched, spasming around him as he pumped fast and hard until she burst apart into little pieces. If it wasn’t for Ian pressing her tight to the cross, she was sure she’d have simply floated away into the ether.
 

When Ian thrust hard and bit down on her neck to muffle his own guttural groan of triumph, she came again, waves of pleasure washing over her, taking her away.
 

She was vaguely aware of him pulling out of her body, making her moan and whimper at the loss.
 

“Shhh,” he crooned, his hand cupping her cheek and his lips pressing against hers. “I’m not going anywhere, baby.”
 

She fought to the surface, opening her eyes to see him smiling at her, soft and full of satisfaction. “Beautiful.”

She smiled, a languid heat making her mellow. “Thank you.”
 

He said “My pleasure,” and she realized she’d spoken out loud.
 
He thought she’d been talking to him, when she’d really been thanking God for bringing Ian back into her life.
 

No matter, she thought. He’d done good, too.
 

Adam watched as Ian smoothly and efficiently undid the restraints and lifted Veronica off the cross. He set her on her feet, wrapped a blanket around her, and had her sit on one of the chairs next to the wall while he put his toys away and sprayed the cross down with the bottle of cleaner that was provided at each station.
 

The others who’d been watching the couple’s first club scene had moved away, to give them privacy, but Adam stayed where he was. He knew Ian was aware of him, but the man paid him no mind, instead he stayed focused on his task, and on his sub.
 

His sub.

It was clear to any who had watched them that the couple was connected. The synergy between them was the kind of thing you rarely saw, but everyone in the lifestyle searched for. Adam had never searched for it. He’d never let himself think he could ever connect with another that deeply. But now, as he watched Ian go back to Veronica and pull her into his arms, all he could think about was Olivia.
 

He didn’t know her. Didn’t know anything about her other than she was a doctor with a hippie friend, good taste in cars, and a laugh that made his dick stand at attention.
 

No, that wasn’t true. He knew more. He knew she had the brains to see her situation clearly, and the courage to fight even though the odds had been against her. But what he really wanted to know was
 
did she really have the courage to come see him sometime.
 

There was no denying the attraction between them. She’d found his dark side sexy last night when he’d saved her, but would she feel the same in the cold light of day? And if she did, and she did come to him…how would she react when he took complete control over her body? Because something told him he wouldn’t be able to hold back with her. Not a bit.
 

The next couple of days were full of tiresome details for Olivia. The police contacted her to make sure she still wanted to press charges, her mother got mad because she’d refused to chair some social committee that would help her meet “men of the right caliber”, and every single client asked her what had happened to her face.

It was natural for people to ask what happened when their Dr. had a big scrape and purple bruise on her cheekbone, but it wasn’t natural when they raged over it.
 

“It’s all right, Barbara,” Olivia said, holding up a hand to hold her client at a distance. “Aside from the small bruise you see here, I wasn’t hurt.”
 

“But you could’ve been, Doc,” Barbara Wells said as she paced the width of Olivia’s office, visibly upset. “You shouldn’t be out alone at night. It’s too dangerous.”

Olivia sat back, considering her patient. Barbara was a forty year old lawyer who had been a hostage in a bank robbery. There had been no physical trauma to her during the event as she was one of eighteen hostages, all who made it out of the crisis with no injuries. The bank’s insurance was paying for all of the hostages to receive trauma counseling, and until then, Olivia had thought they’d all come through it fine.
 

Now, as she watched the other woman in her office, she realized that Barbara might be better off with a different doctor. A male maybe, who could make her feel safe. Someone she wouldn’t identify with so easily.
 

“The world is a dangerous place, Barbara. The key is to be smart about limiting the dangers.”

Barbara came over and sat on the loveseat beside Olivia’s armchair. “But you’re a smart lady, Doc. And look what happened to your beautiful face,” she said as she reached a trembling hand toward Olivia’s face.
 

Working to keep her features schooled, Olivia leaned back, away from any contact. “It’s important to remember that, yes, there are dangerous things and people out here, but you also have to remember that there’s good, too. A good man helped me, just like good people rescued you and the others from the robbers at the bank.”

“A man helped you? What man?”

“Just a passerby,” she said, unwilling to get personal with a client. “Now, let’s talk about you, Barbara. How’s the new job working out?”

She listened and asked questions, gently pushing Barbara toward the steps of the plan they’d created in their first session to help her get her life back on track. When she’d left, Olivia wrote up her notes and then called a couple of colleagues who would be a good fit for Barbara. The woman needed to feel safe again, and seeing a Dr. with a bruised and scraped face wasn’t going to help.
 

For the rest of the day, Olivia tried desperately not to think about the man who made her feel so much more than safe. It was no use though. Three days and three nights go had gone by since she’d met Adam, and each one of those days she’d thought of him, and each night she’d dreamt of him.
 

Never had she wanted a man like she wanted him, and she didn’t even know him. It was crazy, and that was something coming from a clinical psychologist who understood crazy.
 

The psychologist in her said to get over it. He was a white knight fantasy, an effect of the shock and trauma of being attacked and nearly raped.
 

The woman in her said she go for it. Live a little and indulge her dormant wild side for once.

She rarely indulged in anything anymore. Somehow, her life had become work, work, and work with the occasional dinner date that ended in mediocre sex to satisfy the human need for touch. It wasn’t enough anymore.

So, later that afternoon, after her last client of the day left, she closed her files and left the office.
 

It was early Wednesday evening by the time she parked in the same lot she’d dropped Adam off late on Sunday night and turned her car off. She took a deep breath, picked up her phone, and dialed his number.
 

He answered before the second ring and, at the sound of his voice, everything she’d planned to say fled her brain. “I’m here,” she said.

Fortunately, they still seemed to be on the same wavelength. “Are you sure?” he asked.
 

Was she? She wasn’t a stupid woman. By all accounts she was, in fact, very smart. Intellectually, what she was about to do wasn’t so smart, but instinctively, she knew she could do nothing else. This man got to her.
 

“I’m sure.”

A relieved sigh gusted over the phone. “Where are you? Exactly?”

She told him, and a few seconds later she saw him round the corner of the warehouse in front of her. Heart pounding she disconnected the call and climbed out of the car to meet him in the lot. He strode forward, his powerful body covered in loose jeans and a white T-shirt with an unzipped hoody over it.
 

She was way overdressed in the suit she’d worn to the office that day, but she hadn’t taken the time to go home and change. She’d left the office early, and still had to battle rush hour to get there. After three days, she hadn’t wanted to wait any longer to see him again.
 

“How are you?” he asked.

She smiled. It was funny how those three words were so common, yet sometimes they meant so much. The concern in Adam’s whiskey-colored eyes made it clear he meant his words; they weren’t just some polite nicety.
 

“I’m good. No after effects at all. Except the headache of having to go in and formally press charges, that is.” She smiled ruefully.

He nodded.
 

They stood there, face-to-face, in another parking lot, not speaking. It was weird. Normally the silence would feel uncomfortable for her, but with him, she didn’t mind. Just being with him somehow made everything feel normal. No, not normal. Right. Being with him, sharing space with him, felt strangely
right
.
 

Then he spoke. “Why did you come?”

“Um.” She licked her lips, suddenly unsure. Maybe it was all in her head. Maybe he didn’t feel the same pull she did. Maybe—

“Are you here just to get laid, or are you interested in me as a man and a person?” He stepped closer, reached out to grasp her hand and her wildly careening thoughts calmed. “I’m asking because I want to know if you’re staying for dinner after I fuck you so hard you’re gonna have trouble walking tomorrow?”

Her breath caught in her throat. If any other man had spoken to her like that she’d have slapped him so hard his head spun, but the flicker of tenderness lurking beneath the heat in Adam’s intense gaze made his coarse words an incredible turn-on.

Who was she kidding? Everything about the man was an incredible turn-on
 

Olivia pulled herself together. “Dinner after sounds good,” she said with a grin.

He tugged on her hand, and she followed when he turned and strode back toward the building. Adam pushed through the front door of the warehouse but stopped halfway through the next.
 

“Close up for me, Bash. If you need me, you know where I’ll be.”

She caught a glimpse of a boxing ring and a young guy skipping rope before the door closed and Adam led her to a door she hadn’t even noticed to the left in the entryway. He shoved a key in the lock, opened it, and led her up the narrow set of stairs there without saying another word. When they reached the top, he let her hand go and kept walking while she stalled, checking out the open-space loft of the converted warehouse.
 

It wasn’t that big, maybe a thousand square feet, but it had a rough beauty to it. Sort of like the man himself, she thought as she watched him stride across the concrete floor to the huge bed against the far wall. He’d let go of her hand when they’d reached the top of the stairs, and she realized it was for a reason.

He still wasn’t a hundred percent sure of her. If he was, he would’ve walked her right to the bed himself. Instead, he stood next to it, watching her, waiting for her to go to him on her own.
 

“I feel like I need to warn you,” he said.
 

“Warn me?” she asked as she glanced around the loft, taking in the shelf full of books, the closet and bathroom doors, the comfortable sofa and arm chairs, and the big metal cabinet in the far corner than had a large lock on it.
 

“You’re a lady, with a capital L, but I don’t want a lady in my bed.”

Her gaze snapped back to him. What the hell? He didn’t want her?

“Don’t misunderstand me,” he said, as if he could read her mind. “I want you, but I won’t be treating you like a lady, and I need you to know that all you have to do is say No, or Stop, and I’ll stop.”

“What will you be treating me like?” she asked.
 

“A woman who’s passionate enough to match my hungers with her own.”

Oh, Lordy. Breathe, Olivia.

“And what do you hunger for?” she forced out in a breathless voice.
 

He smiled, and it had enough of the devil in it that a little tingle of unease ran up her spine. “Control,” he said simply. “Complete sexual domination of my partner.”
 

“Sounds…wonderful,” she said, meaning it. Like most women, she had fantasies of submitting to a strong man who wanted nothing more than to give her pleasure. She was strong and in control all damn day long. Giving up control in exchange for pleasure sounded good to her. And there was no doubt in her mind that Adam would give her pleasure.