Three-Part Harmony (6 page)

“Really?” she finally got out. “And why is that?”

“There’s a stack of glossies for the radio station promos tomorrow. I need your sig on them.”

“Oh.” Only by sheer force did she keep her disappointment from bleeding on her flippancy. “Fine. Cool. Whatever.” She thrust the bag into his hand on her way to the desk. “Hand me a Sharpie while you open your present.”

“Present?” The Composure King cracked a little. His tone warmed like honey in the sun. “What’s the occasion? Did I forget my own birthday?”

“No.” She sat down at the desk.
Eyes on the pictures. Eyes on the pictures.
“Not your birthday.”

“Wow. It’s beautiful. Italian silk in red. These are my favorite ties.”

She concentrated on regulating her breathing. And restraining her retort to her head.
You think I don’t know that?

“So…if not my birthday…why?”

Because maybe it’ll pull open whatever door I slammed in you?

The arctic air-co kicked on again. Cars honked on the boulevard. All that noise filled the atmosphere—paling in comparison to the cacophony of tension between them.

Finally, David dug into that pause with a muttered oath. Then gritted, “Fine. I’m not going to drag it out of you, Dasha. Let me get your pen, and you can be on your way—”

“Fuck you!”

She instantly longed to pull back the words, never uttered in the five years between them. Until she saw the glints in David’s eyes, stabbing her from across the room, almost as if
congratulating
her.

“Fuck you,” she repeated, fighting for an even keel to her voice. The effort was hell, considering her barricades were rubble now. “Okay, David? Are you happy? I’m pissed as hell at you. How’s that for a reason? How dare you! Haven’t you noticed a second of my confusion these last two weeks? My agony? How I’ve been trying to understand things better, to learn what you need from me as a submissive and a lover?”

His gaze gleamed silver bright now. “I’ve noticed every second.”

“Then what the hell? You’ve just chosen to, what, wait me out on this?”

He took a long breath, but damn him, that maddening poise stayed intact. But then Dasha looked closer. A vein pulsed in his jaw. When he spoke again, his tone was strung a degree tighter.

“Hadn’t been my first choice. But a lot of times, the right one isn’t.”

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?” She bolted up, needing to pace. To give him a physical demonstration of her fury and frustration. “I don’t get this bullshit, David. And nowhere, in anything I’ve read, does it say I have to put up with it.”

The twitch disappeared as he tilted his head. “You’re completely right,” he said with steely calm. “But that’s been your choice to make.”

Dasha wondered, for a strange second, if the reason he stared so hard at her was the bruise she certainly sported across her forehead now, the one from beating her head against his wall of cryptic crap. “Damn it, David!”

As fast as the words left her, he shot a hand out and vise-gripped it around her arm. “You want to cut through the shit?” His voice went from Zen to savage in the same stunning heartbeat. “Then let’s do that, Dasha.”

Suddenly, he’d flipped the workout towel off his shoulder and had it around her nape. He twisted her in place with it, their faces now inches apart. “The choice
is
yours, Dasha. But you’re going to make it right here, right now. I’ve been waiting for you to finally come to me, freely and on your own, and it’s been a goddamn torture session. So yeah,
I’m
sick and tired of this bullshit too.”

A shiver coursed through her. “You’ve been waiting for me? Why?
Why?
After what happened in New York?”

“What happened in New York was amazing. But it was also new and emotional and a huge change, especially for you.” His nostrils flared on a harsh breath. “If
I
initiated anything with you after that, I knew it would unravel everything we talked about. I’d never know if this was something you really wanted.

“You think I didn’t want to talk things through with you? To pull you into some dark corner, suck the air from your lungs with my mouth, and ask how you’re doing? To make you repeat everything you’ve been reading to me, feeling your pussy pulse around my finger while you do?”

She felt her jaw pop open. “Oh.”

“Yeah,” he countered. “Oh fucking oh. That’s what I’ve been up against, about a hundred times a day—all the while dealing with the crew, the dancers, the press, and the
world,
talking about you every minute as if I can’t stop thinking about you submitting to me once again, opening for me…
fuck
!”

His grip on her nape felt like feathers when compared to his stare. His eyes held her captive, a pair of relentless shackles. “So now,” he said through locked teeth, “you know exactly what the choice is, don’t you?”

Dasha managed a tiny dip of her head. And a shallow gulp. “Yes. I do.”

“Good. And now you’re going to make it, one way or the other. You’ve danced around this bush for two weeks.” He pressed a thumb up into the bottom of her jaw, digging just deep enough to keep her captive, his touch a steady burn. After a moment, he slid it to her mouth and pressed in, prodding her lips apart. “So open this delicious mouth of yours and give me the words.”

She tried to shift her mouth around sound, but her heartbeat throbbed in her throat. Her arms and legs had turned to yarn. And her whole womb pulsed, dancing to the beat set by his animal tone. Yearning for him more with every passing second. God help her, needing his total control.

“I want to give you a world of magic, Dasha. A place where you’ll be set free, your body and your mind pleasured like you’ve never known.” He stroked the corner of her mouth now, the pad of his thumb capturing the tears rolling there. “But you know there’s a price. You know I’ll demand more from you than you’ve ever given to a lover before. Because I’ll be more than your lover.”

“I—I know.”

He leaned closer. He smelled amazing, full of musk and man. “Then say it. What will I be, Dasha?”

“My Dominant.” It came out a rasp, and she wasn’t ashamed. She actually longed to say it again…yet wondered how she ever could. Her body was falling into an abyss, but her mind clung stubbornly to the cliff. Still, she finished, “My Sir.”

Though his gaze glittered in pleasure, his tone remained granite. “Is that what you really want? Or…would you prefer a Sharpie?”

She struggled to breathe. But basic actions felt a thing of the past now. Oh, who was she kidding? Life as she knew it had started to change two weeks ago, on that backstage floor in Madison Square Garden. The match had been struck. The fire had been ignited.

And yet…she’d only just been singed a little, hadn’t she?

If she did this, what else would the fire burn away inside her? And how much of it?

But if she didn’t, could she live in the cold again?

That contrast never seemed clearer as he ran his thumb across the flesh of her lower lip. The contact was a branding iron, its wake a trail of ice.

“I’m scared,” she admitted.

“I know.” His own mouth hardened. “And I can’t promise that’ll go away.” A heavy breath escaped him. “It’ll likely get worse.”

“I…know.” Again, the admission felt terrible. And exhilarating.

“But I won’t give you any more time to think about it either.”

“I don’t need any.” She inhaled deeply, then smiled as she let out the breath. “I’ve decided.”

* * * *

She reminded herself of those words—more specifically, the conviction with which she’d given them—just a half-dozen hours later. She’d meant every word then. And yes, no matter how loud the thunder in her heart, she did now too. She just had to keep reminding herself of that. She wanted this with David, and she trusted him.

The mental sticky note was a necessary measure, thanks to how he’d responded to her next action. She’d given him a gentle kiss, pulled the towel from him, then dropped it to the floor, using it as a cushion on which to kneel. She’d gone even further too, pressing her forehead all the way to his shoes. According to all the BDSM manuals, for lack of a better thing to call them, that should’ve been enough for him to order her to the bedroom, followed by all the Total Power Exchanging he—and she—could make come true.

Instead, David had gone back to being His Majesty of Inscrutable, telling her he wanted to give her a “surprise,” and that it would take a few hours for the proper “setup.” Her instructions would follow during the afternoon, he’d said. They’d consisted of a single note of four lines, arriving in a plain, sealed envelope to her suite. She now held that note in one slightly shaky hand.

In the other hand, she held on to the sole item he’d directed her to come with—besides her naked body. Dasha let the floor-length cloak hang against her fingers, the garment feeling important and weighted as the tension in her stomach.

She’d made a promise. She intended to keep it. Even if her nerves chomped through every inch of her bloodstream—which, right now, seemed very, very possible.

He wasn’t nervous. He was
not
going to call it that.

As he stepped off the VIP elevator at the Viceroy’s spa level, David mentally wadded up the word and tossed it behind the compartment’s closing doors.

Like that did any good.

He’d just meditated for ninety minutes. He’d summoned every Zen technique he knew to calm the Daytona 500 of his bloodstream, and still came up with the one result he didn’t want. A memory.
That
memory. The sight of Dasha, so tearful and beautiful before him, showing him she was ready to begin a journey that scared the shit out of her. And, in the process, never filling him with more pride, desire, and adoration.

All of it hit him again, three times more intense, as the elevator chimed and she appeared beyond the doors. Her hair formed a golden cloud around her face, a luminous contrast against the long, black velvet cloak in which he’d told her to arrive.

Down, he ordered the cock now slamming against his black leathers. Out loud, he said a simple, “Good evening.” He smiled and crooked one finger, beckoning her to him.

Despite an obvious gulp, his valiant little submissive obeyed, pacing over. Her bare feet didn’t make a sound on the shiny marble floor of the spa’s main lobby.

David reached and gently pried her fingers from where they locked the cloak around her. “Let me see.” He gave it a hint of threat. “Arms at your sides.” She flushed but complied. He nudged the fabric aside with the backs of his fingers, revealing her complete nudity. He took her in from head to toe. Pert breasts and coral nipples. Tapered waist and slender hips. Long thighs and delicate feet.

He was the luckiest goddamn bastard on the planet.

“Absolutely gorgeous.” He pressed a long kiss to her lips. “Thank you for coming as I instructed.”

She tried to smile. Tried. “David—”

“Excuse me?” he interrupted.

“Sir,” she fast corrected. “Um—we’re—” Her stare scurried from him, scouring every corner. “This is…uh…really public.”

He gritted once more against the pain in his groin. Her frantic rasp got him harder than the silkiest come-on lines he’d ever gotten.

“Breathe, sweetheart. I’ve made appropriate arrangements, so the three of us won’t be bothered. But, D, a note for future—” He reached and stripped the cloak completely off her. “You’ll get naked for me whenever I tell you, wherever I tell you. And you’ll know that I’ll always make your safety, as well as your anonymity, my first priorities. Are we clear about that?”

She swallowed again—but along with the trepidation in her eyes, he now saw unmistakable arousal.

“Yes, Sir,” she murmured. She parted her lips as if to utter something else but then bit them, hesitant.

“What?” David asked. “What do you need to say?”

“Um…you said…the three of us?”

As if the question were her cue, a figure appeared in the doorway that led from the spa’s treatment rooms. He turned and smiled at the woman standing there. He’d never noticed it until now, but she looked like a dark-haired version of Dasha. Long, curly, dark cocoa waves framed a heart-shaped face of expressive features. She held her gorgeous figure with perfect posture. He would likely have fallen hard for Laurelle at one time, but one most dominant aspect of her personality stopped him. Make that
Dominant,
capital
D
.

“
Ma chere!
” the woman greeted, striding over in her tailored white medical smock, matching pencil skirt, and white high-heeled Mary Janes. If it wasn’t for her dramatic eye makeup and dark red lips, she could’ve passed for an efficient assistant in any medical building in the city.

“Good evening, Mistress,” David said in return, dutifully kissing both her outstretched hands. Out of the corner of his eye, he didn’t miss Dasha’s furtive glance, filled with curiosity and jealousy in the same little move. He tried to ease both—as much as one could to their newbie, naked submissive—by pulling her close. “It’s great to see you again. Business has been good?”

Laurelle returned Dasha’s scrutiny with an appraising stare of her own. “
Oui,
” she said. “But better tonight, I think. She is stunning, David.” She said his name with the exotic flair of the French Polynesian isle from which she came.
Dahhh-veed.
“And you two are beautiful together.”

“
Merci,
” he returned.

“You say she is…new to things?”

“Yes,” he answered, smiling down at D as he did. “She’s very new, though the two of us have been friends for a while. I care for her…very much. So naturally, I wanted this to be memorable for her.”

“Ah,
magnifique.
And she is called…”

“D,” he supplied, returning Dasha’s glare with a firm look of his own. Her outrage was understandable; she stood in the middle of a five-star spa reception area, exposed to a complete stranger who might be hiding devices that could instantly export images to the paparazzi or worse. “Just D,” he emphasized, pressing a kiss to her forehead, “when she’s with me like this.” He squeezed her shoulder. “And she understands that trust is going to be a huge factor in tonight’s proceedings.”