Second song second chanc.., p.13
Wrapped Around Your Finger, page 13
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Want
Alex spanked me while Jack watched, and I felt as if I’d slipped back through time. Back to the beginning. Enough days had passed since Alex had last placed a hand on me that I was nervous from the first strike. Nervous because I’d seen what awaited in my very near future. Nervous because I wondered what else Alex and Jack had discussed about their “intrusion” fantasy.
I also wondered why I’d assumed that Jack wasn’t in touch with Alex. Why had I so easily been able to push Alex from my mind, to ignore his very existence?
Now, I couldn’t ignore him at all. He used his hand repeatedly, and then, when I began to seriously feel the heat, he lifted the paddle and gave me a hard, fast ten. Too fast to count. Too quick to comprehend. I wanted to behave—not for him so much, but for Jack—and I did my best not to squirm or kick my feet. Alex didn’t have to hold me in place, and his left hand was at his side. I don’t know why, but I found myself holding on to his hand tight with my own left hand, gaining some sense of strength from that strange bond between us.
What was the bond?
We both loved Jack.
But the connection went further than that. We’d both been hurt by Jack, whipped by Jack. We both had a taste for pain—no matter if Alex was more comfortable switching from bottom to top and back again than I would ever have been. We both were transformed by the first blow, or perhaps by the promise of the first blow.
I felt electricity running between the two of us, and suddenly I knew what I required to get through the rest of the evening.
When Alex was done, Jack waited. He’d given me instructions, and he wanted to see if I would follow without a struggle. Obediently, I took up my position on the bed, but I locked eyes with Alex, and he seemed to read the expression on my face. Coming forward. So close. Offering both of his hands to me. I gripped them and lowered my head, hoping that Jack would allow this. Hoping that he’d give in to my needs. Would this equal weakness to Jack? Or strength? My body was tense, my muscles alive and waiting.
Jack didn’t speak. I held my breath, feeling the heat starting within me, having no concept of what that new toy would burn like, but desperately trying to find the strength somewhere deep in myself to wait unbound, to wait unfettered.
There were no words. Jack didn’t tell me to prepare myself. He didn’t admonish me to behave. He simply started, and I felt as if my world had been turned upside down.
When Jack let the first strike land, I gasped. The sensation was so unlike anything I’d felt before. Truly different from your average cane. I shook all over and then tried in vain to find that place inside myself that allowed me to disappear. To dissolve. But Jack was on me again, lining a second blow right before the first, and there was no time. I shut my eyes so tight that ultraviolet stars exploded behind my lids. I squeezed Alex’s hands as hard as I possibly could, undoubtedly causing him some mild discomfort. Still, the pain floored me. Had I experienced worse? Probably. No—definitely. But sometimes the quality of the pain doesn’t matter. The ability to hide, or to seek, or to find that shining glow within yourself—that’s what matters. And you either succeed or you fail.
I failed.
Jack hadn’t told me how many strokes he would land. He might have planned on five. He might have planned on fifty. Didn’t matter. I pulled away.
“Samantha.” This was issued in a warning tone. I opened my eyes to see Alex looking at me curiously. He was surprised by my behavior—or misbehavior.
“I can’t—”
Why? I don’t know. As Jack had called me plenty of times, I’m a pain slut. I should have those words tattooed on my body—or branded on my ass. PAIN SLUT. I lose myself. I slip down into the sticky mess of it. But this was different.
He struck again, before I could turn, and I realized why he’d let Alex hold my hands. Alex wasn’t merely giving me something to grasp on to, he was keeping me in place, even after Jack had told me I wouldn’t be bound. Hell, I’d bound myself. I felt trapped, desperate, the pain ripping through me.
“I can’t,” I said again. But those two words contained no meaning. I could do anything Jack asked of me, and he’d asked me to take this. But for some reason, the fight that had gotten into me, the reason I’d fled down the hall, that spirit hadn’t left me. And I found the will to struggle.
Alex’s grip transformed, from holding my hands, to holding my wrists, and crazy as this sounds, when he did that, my whole world changed once more, righted itself. From lost in pain, to lost in desire. Touch my wrists. Oh, yes, baby, touch them. I say this, again, in that hushed, confessional tone that draws people in close to me: my wrists are the most sensitive part of my body. This explains why I own so many pairs of cuffs—leather, metal, traditional, heavy, high-end, utilitarian. I looked up at Alex, and saw the expression on his face. He was enjoying himself, the smug bastard. I looked at his body, and saw his hard-on, easily outlined against his slacks, and wanted something more.
Wanted Jack behind me.
Wanted Alex in front of me.
Wanted payment for the pain.
Or for the pleasure.
Just plain wanted.
Jack let go of the cane at five. He climbed onto the bed, hoisting me onto my knees, preparing to take me from behind. He didn’t give me a word of instruction, but I knew instinctively what to do. I fumbled with my hands, pulling open Alex’s fly, releasing his cock. As Jack slid inside of me from behind, I drew Alex’s rod into my mouth and began to suck, still feeling shattered. There’s no better word for the jagged sensations crashing within me. But with the two men bookending me I also felt somehow more like a winner than a loser.
You stone-cold Doms out there are saying that I should have asked for permission before using my mouth on another man. How dare I? Who did I think I was? I respect that. I ought to have looked over my shoulder and asked Jack if I could blow Alex, if I could part my slicked-up lips and let him inside the warm wet heaven of my mouth. But Alex simply being there seemed sign enough that Jack wanted the boy to claim his space once more in our bedroom, that he wanted Alex back in our bed. And Alex’s hard-on was sign enough that he wanted my mouth to pleasure him. And the three of us became entwined in that silver-lit room. In the center of the bed. With me, the link between them. Bracketed by my two handsome men.
Alex thrust forward, and I drank him down. Jack drove his cock into me, and I enveloped him, welcomed him. I was being used by my two men, and I could not get enough. The sounds I made, the whimpers around Alex’s cock, the moans when I paused in the blow job long enough to take a breath—those sounds were musical. The melody of arousal, the harmony of total bliss.
I used one hand to cradle Alex around the root, holding him firmly while I tricked my tongue up and down his sensitive skin. Then I sucked him down once more, so that he was the one to moan. He was the one to sigh.
Jack was able to watch Alex’s expression, and he could see how hard I was working to please his boy. More than that, he could feel for himself how wet this situation had made me. My body let him know—and more specifically, my pussy let him know—that I was beyond turned on. I clenched around him. I tightened on him. I squeezed and released again and again.
Alex came first, and I made the instant decision to drain him, swallowing every drop of his essence as he flung his hips toward me. Jack strummed my clit, so that I climaxed next, setting my face against the rumpled sheets and feeling as if I might dissolve into golden nothingness. Jack was last. He pulled out and came all over my hot, hurting ass, and then he rubbed his palm along my curves, as if delighting in the sensuous slide of his semen on my skin.
What’s a happier ending than that?
Or if not an ending, then a beginning.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Day Six
I was the first one up in the morning. You don’t believe that, I’m sure, as I seem to be able to sleep like the dead, dream through anything. But I was up and out into the kitchen, to brew the coffee. To shower. To dress. Up and ready when first Jack, and then Alex emerged from the bedroom, a strange situation. An odd sensation. Who the hell did we think we were?
I’ve read articles on how to conduct a ménage. Supposedly, it’s always best to use the third party like a tool. To have no emotions invested. But this wasn’t any one-time deal. We were not so much a ménage as a triangle. And the main point of interest wasn’t me, the way your average threeway would be conceived by your average romance writer—but Jack.
Jack was the focal point. Jack was the shining star. Jack was…staring at me in an unusual way. “You made the French roast?”
“I’ve made coffee before,” I told him. I brewed several pots a day when I worked for Jody, who appreciated his java hot, fresh, and black. Wasn’t like I didn’t know how to handle a Mr. Coffee.
“And you’re showered?”
I pursed my lips at him. So I was up early. He didn’t need to fuck with me. Except he was Jack. So he did.
“Everything okay?”
What was he asking? I looked at him, feeling confused as to the proper response. Sometimes Jack’s questions ran deep. Sometimes they were simply questions.
“Fine,” I told him, and as I said the word, I flashed back to the night before, to the way we’d ended up. No longer with me the connecting rod between my two men. No more pretending. Three lovers in bed. With hands everywhere. And mouths. With limbs overlapping. And pleasure like I had never felt before.
Yes, I had been in ménages previously. Yes, I had shared a bed with these two men as well. But there had been an honesty in the prior night’s actions. An opening of a forbidden door. A diving into the turquoise deep end. A…
“You want to talk about anything?”
I shook my head. I didn’t. I felt free. For no reason at all. Jack stared at me for another moment, and then he sipped his coffee and ran a hand over his short black hair, and stretched. He wasn’t tense. I could tell that from every motion. He seemed pleased that I was awake, pleased to share the early morning sunlight with me.
“Show me,” he said.
“Show you…” I echoed, not comprehending.
“Take down your jeans, and show me.”
I turned around, lowered the faded denim, lowered the black satin panties, and Jack’s fingers played immediately over the stripes still there in bold relief. The stripes left by his brand-new cane. There was pain in every touch of his fingertips on my naked skin, and there was bliss in each stroke as well. Jack played me so easily. So damn well.
“Day Six,” he said before he headed toward the shower. “Don’t forget.”
And now I was nervous. Now, my feelings changed. I hadn’t forgotten, but I’d thought Jack might let me off. After the toy he’d used the night before, I had hoped he might give me a pass.
I can hear your laughter at that.
I told you, I’m a liar. I’d known he would never go back on his word. How could he? He’d never break my faith in him. I pulled up my jeans as Alex wandered into the room, searching for the coffee, looking sleepier than either Jack or myself. We had a big bed. Everyone had enough room. But Alex didn’t appear rested. He snagged a cup and headed out to the balcony, clad only in his black pants, no shirt. I followed him out and we stood and looked down on Sunset in silence. In only a few months, we’d created an uncomfortable history together, constantly testing each other, trying to gain the upper hand. Who had the power now? I had no idea. Alex sat down on one of the chairs and looked at me.
“We’re spending the day together,” he said finally.
“Yeah?”
His eyes gleamed. “Yeah. Day Six. Jack has everything planned.”
He must have had everything planned from the start. Why wouldn’t I have believed that Jack choreographed each day long before Day One had ever arrived for me? Why did I never seem to catch on, to catch up?
I looked at Alex again. Day Six. He’d said the words, too. So he knew, as well. He knew that Jack had spent the past five days making sure that my ass was well punished before I fell asleep. He knew all about it. And with that statement, he climbed back on top. Alex wasn’t the one lowering his jeans to show off a well-tanned derriere. Alex wasn’t the one clamping his thighs tight together in anticipation of whatever might be planned for the day. No, Alex already knew. He knew what I did not. He knew the progression of the day’s events, and he knew the outcome.
But I suppose I knew at least that much, too. The outcome? Me, over the lap of a dominant man, being spanked. Didn’t know which hand would hold the paddle, or if a paddle would be employed. Didn’t know if the spanking would be long and hard, or merely a wake-up call before sex. Didn’t know whether I would cry or I would come. Or both.
I took a deep breath and looked back down at the boulevard.
But I did know this. It was Day Six. And I couldn’t wait for the answers to all of my questions.
Chapter Thirty
Breathe
Jack went to work, and Alex stayed home, and I wrote. I’ve penned more than one thousand stories by now but am pathetic about keeping track of when each one was written. I have a portfolio, and I can take a guess. I was writing exclusively for a New York publisher at the time, as far as novels go, but I submitted the shorts to several publications. (Online wasn’t really a big market yet. Yes, I’m that old, believe it or not.) I don’t know what Alex did while I wrote. Puttered around. Read the paper. Made himself invisible. He reemerged only after I’d finished, seeming to sense I’d completed that task. (Jack never compromised my writing. He was insistent that what we did together would not interfere. In truth, what we did together only helped. How could I not be a better writer when I was living out my fantasies in real life?)
“He’s meeting you for lunch,” Alex told me. “And he wants you to dress pretty.”
Pretty.
I try not to use that word too often in my work. What does “pretty” mean? Something different to every person. When I was a masseuse at a skin-care salon in Beverly Hills, we were required to wear pink and floral. That’s what “pretty” meant to my boss. As you can imagine, I pushed the limits. Pink floral—skintight pants from Betsey Johnson and an itty-bitty halter. But what did it mean to Jack? I looked at Alex, hoping for clues, but he shrugged and went back to the living room.
My closet was filled with costumes. Even my everyday clothes had a theatrical air since I shopped mostly at vintage and thrift stores. Would a ’60s cocktail dress be considered pretty? Would a white lace-trimmed vest count? I stood for what felt like an hour in front of my wardrobe, trying to decide, finally landing on a white pleated skirt, white blouse, white jacket. It was pretty, without a doubt.
Because I’m a rebel at heart, I wore the outfit with my patent-leather Docs, then I fixed my hair and makeup, and went out to find Alex.
He gave me a once-over and nodded, before leading me out of the building. He was my chauffeur today, a role he hadn’t played in some time. But he didn’t appear to mind. We hardly talked on the way to the restaurant. I had the feeling that he knew a secret, and he didn’t want to give away a single clue. We drove all the way out to the beach, to a high-end restaurant, and Alex dropped me at the valet stand and pulled the car away, without any further instruction.
Feeling nervous for no real reason, I headed into the building.
Jack was waiting for me at the bar, and when he saw me, he smiled. So I knew I’d done something right. “Lovely,” he said, as he came to my side. “And a skirt like that. Couldn’t be more perfect.”
I’m smart enough, or I was well trained enough, not to ask “for what?” Perfect for what? I waited, knowing all would be explained in time. Trusting Jack that much. Trusting Jack always.
He didn’t take me to a table; instead, he squired me to a corner of the bar and ordered us each a drink. “I don’t have too long,” he told me. “Maybe an hour. I didn’t want to waste it on food. Not on Day Six.”
I pressed my thighs together.
“We’ve done a lot together,” he continued, sipping his drink. Jack never appeared affected at all by the alcohol. Not even by a midday drink. For me, the liquor went to my head, as Jack must have expected. “But we’re falling behind in one of the ways I most like to play.”
I continued to stare, feeling one of Jack’s hands on my leg now. Feeling his fingertips slipping underneath the hem of the short skirt.
“Can you guess?” he asked.
Fuck. He wanted me to talk. I’m always so much better at listening. And what could he be going on about, anyway? As far as I could tell, we covered quite a lot of fantasy ground during our sexual exchanges. There were toys and costumes. Clubs and ménages. What didn’t we do?
“I like to give you spankings when you earn them,” Jack said, and I wished like hell he would lower his voice. He was talking in a normal tone, and although the bar wasn’t full, there were people around. Jack didn’t seem to give a damn. Did he ever? “And I like to spank you when I’m in the mood, or when you’re craving one. But I think that I’ve failed you in this way…”
Failed. What was he referring to? I had no idea.
“You’re not being punished enough in public.”
I was going to leave a wet spot on the stool. I was going to soak my panties and my skirt and leave a puddle behind.
“We started off fine,” Jack continued. “The garage at Jody’s office. And we’ve had our fun in alleys, and the occasional parking lot. But my feeling is that you’ve grown a bit complacent. You don’t think I will spank you when we’re out…”
As he spoke, I wondered whether he was right. Was I complacent? Did I ever feel like I could get away with anything with Jack? No. Not really. But Jack had a prestigious job, and I tended to believe he wouldn’t do anything that would come back to haunt him. He didn’t care if I was flushed with mortification, but he wouldn’t bring the embarrassment on himself. Why would he?
