07BarteredPainThe BillionairesWifeARE (3 page)

What was he going to think? Was
he going to somehow blame me for this? Would this negatively impact his
business? I worried my lip between my teeth as he laid the tabloids down on the
desk and studied them. Then he looked back to me.

"Your tits look
amazing," he said.

Fucking wow.
"That's
it?" I asked him. "That's all you have to say?"

An expression of genuine surprise
crossed his face. "What do you want me to say?" he asked.

I threw my hands in the air.
"I don't know!" I cried. "Something! Anything!"

"I did say something,"
he told me. "I said your tits look amazing."

Never before in my life had I
wanted to slap someone more.
"And
that's all you have to say about it?"

He squinted down at
the terrible photos of us in our private moments. "I wish they'd got a
shot of my ass," he said. "It's pretty great, too."

Exasperated, I
stamped my foot. "Really?"

"Well, there's
nothing else to really do about it other than make the best of it," he
said.

I was feeling less
and less good about this with each thing that fell out of his mouth. "I
thought you might want to sue them or... or something."

"Why would I do
that?" he asked me. "This is free publicity. I'll be on the receiving
end of many back-slaps the next time I attend a business function."

"Yeah?" I
said. "Well Katy couldn't even look me in the eye when I came in
here," I told him. "It's different for me."

That seemed to have
an effect. A frown shadowed his eyes. "Katy?" he said.
"Really?" He pursed his lips and thought about this. "Do you
want me to fire her?"

"What? No!"
I'm not
that
vindictive. "I just... I feel totally humiliated.
You
might
not have any friends or family, but I
do,
and the next time I see them
this
is
all they're going to be thinking about."

"I have a
family," Anton said. His voice faltered slightly, and I realized I'd
touched a nerve. I tried to wave it away.

"It doesn't
matter. Didn't you think about what could happen when you chose those places to
fuck?"

For a long moment,
Anton stared at me. His green eyes, so startling and brilliant in his handsome
face, were thoughtful. "No," he said at last. "No, I didn't. And
you're right. I should have."

Slightly mollified, I
crossed my arms. "Yeah... well... think about it next time."

He smiled at that. To
my surprise, he pushed back from his desk and stood up. "I can't guarantee
that," he told me. He rounded his desk, his smooth, predatory gait calling
to something primal in me. I was such a sucker.

"Why can't you
guarantee that?" I asked him. He drew close, looming over me, and I was
reminded of our very first encounter here in this office, when he seduced me.
He hadn't made me come, only touched me, stoking a fire inside that was so violent
and out of control that I had to quench it myself the moment I was alone. Even
now, just thinking about it, I was turned on.

I didn't want to be.
I wanted to think rationally and calmly, but it felt like the moment Anton had
entered my life that my reason had taken a flying leap off a cliff. And I liked
it. I really didn't like how much I liked it.

I was losing myself
in Anton.

Glittering green eyes stared down
at me. "I'm sorry, Felicia," he said. "I will do my best in the
future to remember the potential consequences of acting on my, ah, more
exhibitionist impulses."
He
extended a hand, running his fingers down my cheek. I gazed up at him,
uncertain what to say, wanting only to fall into his arms. It would be easy to
do so. A strong man is hard to resist.

He leaned down and kissed me,
stealing my breath. His mouth was hot and soft, but undemanding. Gently he
nibbled and massaged my lips with his. My body heated at the tenderness in his
kiss, reveling in the feeling of his arms as they circled around me. Large,
warm hands traveled up and down my back, cupping my ass, tracing my spine. His
body met mine, soft against hard, and I was melting against him.

He pulled away for a moment,
cradling my head in his hand. His eyes, desire-drugged, explored my face, as though
looking for something there. "You make me forget myself, Felicia," he
whispered.

"Oh," I said.
Inexplicably, tears stung my eyes, but he was already kissing me again,
obscuring whatever sweet, soft revelation I was about to uncover with the magic
of his touch, and I closed my eyes.

His body moved against mine and
he broke away again, planting kisses against my throat, his hands smoothing
over my breasts, circling my ribcage, as if he could hold all of me in the
palms of his hands. My own fingers tangled in his rich, dark hair, and I
couldn't help but sigh as he lowered himself to the floor, kneeling before me.

I was wearing a skirt again, a
heavy wool thing, and again I wore no panties. I was so thoroughly his that I
didn't even think about it now. I was so trained to want his touch that I
almost never wore jeans any more. The realization sent a tiny spark of
apprehension through me, but then Anton ran his fingertips lightly up the backs
of my thighs and I pushed it away, unwilling to examine it.

Slowly, he lifted the hem of my
skirt and planted a warm, chaste kiss on my mound, letting the skirt fall over
his head as he moved his hands to my ass cheeks and began to massage them in an
insistent rhythm. The rhythm of sex, of thrusting. I moaned as his tongue
escaped his mouth and dipped into the delta of my thighs, hot and wet against
the nub of my clit. He took up a soft, relentless pattern, thrusting his tongue
over my clit where it hid, mashed between my closed legs, until my knees
weakened and I parted for him.

Pressure on my hips had me
backing up into his desk, and he lifted me up until I sat on the edge. Parting
my thighs with the palms of his hands, he exposed me to the cool air, my
soaking pussy quivering with the sudden change in temperature.

"Lean back,"
he instructed. I did so, placing my palms flat on the desk behind me as he
spread the lips of my pussy with one hand.

I watched as he
studied my inner folds, almost clinically, but the darkening of his eyes told
me all I needed to know. If I reached one foot down, I would find an erection
as hard as a rock in his trousers.

"You are
beautiful," he said then, breaking the tense anticipation of the moment.
Placing one long, lean finger on my clit, he traced small, slow circles around
it with the tip. Each stroke sent a shudder through my body, and I couldn't
resist. I was putty in his hands. Throwing my head back, I let him circle,
circle, circle me, commanding my pleasure with a single point of contact. I
sighed and moaned, spread out on his desk like a banquet, until his tiny,
sweet, merciless circles spiraled out, out along my limbs, curling in my belly,
and I came in small, short bursts.

He stood, undoing his
trousers with a practiced motion, then reached up and helped me out of my
skirt, letting it fall to the floor as he inched my shirt up over my stomach
until it bunched beneath my breasts.

“Lie back,” he said,
and I did. Defying him didn't even cross my mind now. All I wanted was
pleasure—his and mine. His hands circled my ankles and brought my legs up,
perpendicular to my torso, and pressed them together so my pussy was open and
exposed to him. Languid and content, I lay on the desk as he coated his cock in
my slippery juices, preparing myself for entry.

But he didn't enter
me. Instead he slid his cock between my legs, letting it glide against my
sensitive clit, and began to fuck my thighs. His arms wrapped around my knees
like iron, and I gripped his desk as he pleasured himself with my body. The
soft head of his dick slipped against my clit over and over again, my world
narrowing to the point between my legs. His belt buckle slapped against my ass
with each thrust, and I writhed, aching for him to fill me. He
was
like
a drug. I
was
an addict.

Then he stuttered in
his stroke and grunted, thrusting harder. Warm cum spurted from his cock in
quick, short bursts, spattering up my stomach, marking me as his. I wiggled,
needing completion, and without comment he reached down and plunged a finger
into my pussy, pumping me hard and fast as his cum cooled on my skin, his cock
still rigid and hard on my clit.

I strained and
arched, and within moments I was coming a second time, the world melting around
me, my body melding with his.

When I was finished,
he lowered my shirt down over his cum and plastered it to me. He helped me to
my feet and steadied me as I worked my skirt back up over my trembling legs. I
closed my leather jacket around my upper body and tied it in place so no one
would see the stain on my shirt. Anton kissed me again before releasing me.

"I'm sorry,
Felicia," he said. "I will be more mindful in the future. In the
meantime, I'm betting you should update that blog of yours and tell all. I
wouldn't be surprised if you made some sales out of this."

Why was everyone
concerned about my sales? I hadn't put hand to clay in almost two weeks and I
was married to one of the richest men in the world. I didn't need to agonize
over my art any longer. And I didn't have any ideas anyway. Anton had
anesthetized the turmoil inside me. There was nothing for me to say at the
moment.

I nodded and gave him
a smile. "All right," I said. "I'll do my best."

He showed me to the
door, gave me another kiss, and I left. I held my head high the whole way home.

*

Anton wasn't home yet
when my mother came barging into the second floor reading room where I was
camping out with a fire, a blanket I'd liberated from my still-packed things,
and a mug of Irish coffee while I scrolled through my emails and texts from all
my friends. Contrary to my fears, very few people I knew seemed to have lowered
their opinions of me. Most of my art friends expressed envy at the publicity,
and my former coworkers at the bar were mostly surprised that I was so kinky. I
didn't bother to correct them, because as far as I knew I had always been kinky,
I just hadn't known it.

I looked up when my
mother entered the room, her feet meeting the floorboards as though she held a
personal grudge against trees. "Felicia!" she exclaimed when she saw
me curled up in an armchair. "Felicia,
what
are you thinking?"

The whiskey in my
coffee was making me feel quite good, so I smiled at her instead of shying
away. "I'm thinking I should get another cup of coffee," I said.

She stared at me,
dismayed. "Felicia," she said again, "you are on display all
over the internet and on the newsstands. Everyone is peering into your most
intimate moments with your husband. Your husband is treating you without
respect. Did you know he was into this sort of... perverted sex play before you
married him?"

Well, I had signed a
prenup that had explicitly detailed all of Anton's favorite kinks, so
technically I suppose I had known. "Yes," I told her.

She threw her hands
in the air and collapsed in the armchair across from me. "Really?"
she said.

I nodded.

She put a hand to her
eyes and shook her head. "I can't believe this is happening."

Annoyance ran through
me. "Why?" I said. "Because it makes you look bad to all your
country club friends?"

She glared at me.
"You know that is not true, Felicia. You
know
I have only wanted you to be
happy. I have only
ever
wanted you to find love with a
good
man."

I sighed. For all her
faults, I knew this was true. She really did want me to be happy. She just...
didn't realize that people could be happy in different ways. Was I happy now? I
didn't know, exactly. I was, at the very least, content to see where this
hedonistic relationship could go. And if I wanted to end it in the future, I
could. But I could lean on Anton. I could depend on him. And, weird as it
sounded, I trusted him. I'd trusted him since I'd first read through his
contract. A man so open and forthright with what he wanted and what he wished
to do to me... it was refreshing. No surprises with Anton.

Well, none except the
small vulnerabilities he let me see, sometimes inadvertently. All things
considered, arranged marriages could go a lot worse. A
lot
worse.

"I don't know,
Mom," I said. "I enjoy Anton's company. He's... he's not a bad
husband."

A pained look passed
across her face. "That's what you have to say about him? He's
not a bad husband?"

I was aware of how it
sounded, but I didn't want to commit to more than I knew I was able. My growing
affection for Anton was well-guarded. I took it out at night when he slept
beside me and turned it over in my mind, letting myself explore its edges and
contours before putting it away again. It was small now, but with care it could
be something very real.