Make Me (8 page)

His parents were talking about having gone north to see his aunt and that they had gotten into a bit of a row on the way home. Don mentioned that Phyllis had been a bit petulant, but that he had found the next rest stop and put an end to that in a hurry.

Phyllis had colored brightly and smacked Don sharply on the knee. “Enough of that. They don’t want to hear about that kind of thing from old folks like us. Besides, I want to get to know Jodi better. Where do you come from, dear?”

All in all, it was a very pleasant evening, even if Cayson did pull her upstairs earlier than she would have preferred. He practically dragged her to their room at eleven o’clock, saying that she needed her sleep. For her part, Jodi didn’t want to argue in front of his parents, but she also didn’t want them to know – or even suspect a little – about the tenor of their relationship. Even capitulating as she did said something she would rather not have said as she followed him up the stairs.

When Cayson closed the door she rounded on him, her finger wagging in his face even before she opened her mouth. But when she did, she found it covered by his. She found herself beneath him on the bed seconds later, and he had already made short work of her clothes. She was down to her underwear before she was able to get him to stop.

“I’ll scream, I swear,” she threatened, but he merely smiled that not quite right smile of his.

“If you do, you’ll have to deal with my mother coming upstairs and knocking at the door. And I won’t say a word. You’ll have to make up something plausible on your own. But I’d rather have you screaming for an entirely different reason...”

Jodi hissed at him, “That’s another reason why we shouldn’t be doing this – you know how loud I am!”

His smile turned into a truly evil grin. “Then you’ll have to learn to be quiet, won’t you?”

Oh dear God, his hands were already inside her underpants, fingers rooting and probing and making her quiver. Even after such a short time together, her body recognized him for what he was – her Dom, her mate, her lover.

“I thought I might like to teach you to be quieter. Perhaps this is the place to do it.”

Her panties vanished. Her bra sailed off her and landed hanging from a delicate strap off the bedside lamp, and she was already panting uncontrollably and he’d barely touched her.

“I don’t think I’ll ever get enough of you,” he said in a whispered groan against her breast.

“Please, Cayson, please!” she hissed, giving up the fight to control him that she’d lost longer ago than she’d like to admit. She lay open beneath him, reaching up for him, beseeching him with her hands and eyes and doing her best to suppress the urge to make the little – and not so little – sounds she usually made when they had sex.

Jodi loved the different positions they’d tried, and she knew that he liked to have her back to him, either while she was stretched out or doggie style, but her favorite was the tried and true. She’d confessed to him in a moment of weakness that it made her feel the most submissive to be beneath him, to have him take her, be on top of her, that she adored the weight of him on her and in her.

She hadn’t been trying to at the time, but she had inspired him to do just that seconds later. He poised himself at her entrance and gazed down at her. She was so unbelievably sexy to him – even in the most mundane of situations. But here and now, with her hair spread out messily on the pillow beneath her, breasts heaving, biting her lip trying to be quiet... He nearly came before he entered her. And he did so with such a slow, deliberate pace that she was practically clawing at him to try to get him to enter her fully.

He didn’t know where he found the strength, but when she got so wild, he stopped. “Who do you belong to, Jodi Thomsont?”

Her head rolled back and forth, as if she was going to deny him. He knew he was taking a big chance, that she could refuse him, refuse to name him when they were here, in the real world, as what he wanted to be for her, who she had let him be so completely that he could think of little else.

Cayson pumped back and forth just a bit, just enough to give her a taste of what he could do for her if she answered his question correctly.

Finally, her neck arching, hips reaching but finding no succor, she met his eyes, hers wide with unfulfilled desire, and whispered hoarsely, but with the truth ringing through her words, “You, Cayson. I belong to you.”

He pounded himself into her then, taking her as hard as he could, reaching down between them to rub that ever engorged button and watching her carefully so that when her time came and he knew she would no longer be able to control it, he put his mouth over hers and absorbed her scream into himself, then nearly passed out himself with his efforts to control his own urge to cry out at the mind blowing pleasure that arced through him.

When they’d had a bit of time to recover, Cayson arranged her against his side, where she liked to fall asleep, and then stretched himself out, both of them still huffing and puffing. She reached over and gave her hand to him, and he captured her wrist so that they weren’t holding hands as much as he was holding her wrist captive. He liked the symbolism of it and it seemed to soothe her, somehow.

“Can I ask you a question?’

She surprised him. She wasn’t usually talkative afterwards. She was much more inclined to fall asleep almost immediately. “You can ask me anything. I might not answer right away or even at all, but you can ask anything you like.”

She hadn’t expected such a long response. She was just looking for a yes or no, but it was nice of him to say that. She’d bet he’d never said it to anyone else in the world besides her. “Are your parents... do they... uh... well... ”

“Are you asking whether my stepdad spanks my mom?”

“Well, yeah. Was I kind of picking up on that in the living room, or am I imagining things?”

“No, you’re right.”

“Are you okay with that?”

He shrugged his shoulders. “I try not to think about it too much, and we haven’t really talked about it, although they know it’s an interest of mine and I knew it was one of theirs from way back when they first got together.”

“How’d you discover that?”

Cayson wiggled. Cayson never wiggled. He twisted and turned and opened his mouth but nothing came out, and she almost retracted the question.

Almost.

His guilt shone as if he had the word tattooed on his forehead and she was able to guess the answer. “You snooped!” she accused in a low hiss.

“
Not
intentionally.
Definitely
not intentionally. But I’ve been working on their computers for them for a very long time, and sometimes it’s inevitable that I see things. I did
not
go looking for what I saw, believe me.”

Jodi closed her own eyes against the idea. “Please don’t tell me.”

“I won’t. I’ll take that stuff to the grave.”

“Please do.”

There were another few moments of silence before Jodi spoke up again. “So am I the only person you’ve ever deliberately spied on like that?”

He took a long moment to respond, and she wasn’t sure whether that was good or bad. Finally, he answered, “Yes.” Then he turned towards her, holding her tight to him. “You’re the only person I’ve ever
wanted
to spy on; although I will regret to my dying day that it hurt you, I can’t regret doing it because it brought us here.”

She didn’t think she could argue with that, really. He was right.

When she didn’t say anything more, he tipped her chin up so that she had to look at him. “Do you forgive me?”

Somehow, she pretty much had. It seemed kind of... unimportant now, considering how close they had gotten. Not that she was going to let him off the hook that easily. No, sir. “Not quite. I’m definitely going to need to see a
lot
more begging for my forgiveness, pleading, general groveling at my feet... That kind of thing.”

Cayson snorted.

“That’s what I thought. You don’t grovel well at all, even when you
are
wrong.”

“No, sorry. Not one of my many talents. I don’t think it’s a forte of most Doms.”

Jodi didn’t want to talk about that aspect of their relationship right now, so she kissed him on the nose and turned onto her favorite side to sleep.

Cayson would have liked to press his point, but he decided he’d wait for a time when they were truly alone.

Jodi would have thought that they would stay for a few days, but Cayson had decided – while she was asleep, she guessed – that they needed to go home. Now. So after much hugging and kissing goodbye and promises to Facebook and text and email, to which Cayson spent the majority of the time rolling his eyes at the three of them – although he did allow his parents to hug him on their way out the door, they ended up back in L.A.

The scene was almost a replay of Cincinnati – he got their bags and tucked her into a limo. She could get used this kind of treatment! Jodi assumed – and she should have known better with him – that he was taking her home, but they ended up at his house instead.

She’d only been there a few times before, and he had barely deigned to usher her in; he had done or signed or given his stamp of approval to whatever stuff she was bringing, and had then practically thrown her out the door.

“What are we doing here?” she asked, following him into the house like a lost puppy. The place was decorated pretty much the way she would have guessed – minimalist in the extreme, and she disliked it intensely. It was cold – too much metal and glass, nothing personal at all about the place – no photographs, no artwork, no nothing.

“I don’t know about you, but I’m not ready for us to part company yet,” he said, backing her up against the door they’d just come in. It was a big risk he was taking, telling her that. It was about as close as he could come to laying himself bare before her, and he wasn’t sure if she’d get that.

He had her neatly trapped there, a big hand on either side of her head. Jodi put her hands between her butt and the door and leaned back in a manner that looked coolly casual. “I’m not sure how I feel, frankly.”

His head jerked sideways as if she’d managed to surprise him. And she had. Jodi wasn’t usually on the fence about much of anything, and she wasn’t at all shy about voicing her opinions. Lord knew, he’d heard an earful of them over the years about himself and everything else under the sun. Of course, they went right out the other ear, but still. He hadn’t expected her to be... neutral. He’d expected her to throw herself into his arms and beg him to take her. That was the outcome he had planned on, not this iffy stuff. This was the kind of thing that drove him crazy about other people.

“That’s not exactly right. I love how you touch me. I love submitting to you. I thoroughly enjoyed the time we had together in Canada.”

He smiled, a genuine, full on smile. “So did I,” he agreed, taking a step closer to her.

But her hand on his chest stopped him, and erased that beautiful smile. “Not so fast, honey.”

It was the first endearment either of them had used with the other, but he was pretty sure she didn’t mean it the way he wanted her to, unfortunately. Unless he was reading her tone of voice and body language clues wrong, which was entirely possible.

“I don’t love some of your behavior prior to us... getting together.” She always stumbled over what to call them and their relationship, such as it was. They weren’t really lovers – neither had said, “I love you.” She highly doubted that Cayson even had it in him to say it, and she figured if she said it to him, he’d run like a scalded moose.

He was frowning down at her, sighing audibly. “Yes, and I’ve apologized for that, multiple times.”

“Yes, you have. But—” She heard him sigh exasperatedly again. “Stop doing that!”

“What?” he asked, genuinely confused.

“You’re impatient and unhappy so you’re being a petulant baby while I’m just trying to figure out what the hell it is that’s going on between us!” She rarely shouted at anyone but him, but he seemed to inspire it in her sometimes.

“I don’t care what’s happening between us!”

Jodi looked as if he’d struck her, stiffening against him and beginning to withdraw, he could see.

He sighed again, knowing it was another point against him in her book. “You know I didn’t mean it that way.”

“Yes, I do,” she nodded, but she didn’t look very happy, regardless, and she was avoiding his eyes.

This time he took a step towards her when she wasn’t paying attention, plastering her back against the door then lifting her off the floor so that she had no choice but to wrap her legs around his waist, feeling his undeniable urgency pressing against her softness. “You know I don’t care about much in this world, Jodi. I live quite contentedly in my own little bubble. For a long time, the only other person in the world who could get me to smile or respond in any sort of a... human way, was my mom. She was the only other person I cared about. And then I hired you.”

If he had been any other man, his eyes would at least have been misty by now, probably. They weren’t, but now she had to look at him, and she could see in his eyes how earnest he was being. He meant every word he said, down to the bone.

“I knew you were just what I wanted the moment you came through the door, and that’s never changed. It’s never
going
to change for me. Things like this don’t happen in my life – ever before and never again. If you say you don’t want me, don’t want... whatever it is that you decide we have together, then I’ll never let anyone else this close to me again. It’s too...”

She wanted to supply ‘painful’, but that wouldn’t really work for him.

“Unsettling. You disturb me—”

She gave him a dubious smile.

“Well, in what’s probably a good way, but you know how I hate change.”

“Cayson?” Jodi asked, wiggling her bottom and thus her front against his erection, the hands beneath her butt responding immediately and grasping it with more purpose, helping her grind herself against him.

“What?” He was baring his soul here, and she was interrupting him with riddles.

“Shut up and make me.”

His brow furrowed. “Make you what?”

“Make me not care what it is we should call whatever it is that we have. Make me cum,” she whispered into his ear. Much more shyly, “Make me love you – I’m already more than halfway there, although Lord knows why considering how much you annoy me—”

He reached out and grasped the front of her shirt and tore it open, buttons popping everywhere. Her bra was just gone, to be found later under the couch, and he had her shucked out of her pants and panties in no time. Then he put her in exactly the same position as she had been, only he’d released himself from his pants and she found herself impaled on him to the hilt by sheer gravity, and the surprise was enough to leave her gasping even though her body was – as always – ready for him.

“Even I know that I should be making love to you gently and delicately after you’ve said something like that to me, but I always want you so badly, I can barely control myself.”

Jodi, barely able to breathe herself, caught his face in her hands and made him look her in the eye. “You don’t have to. There are no ‘shoulds’ here. We’re writing our own book. We’re not like any other couple before or after us, and we’ll make our own rules.”

When he could think better, Cayson knew that he would like the sound of them being a couple and making their own way in the world. But right now, all he wanted was to make her contract uncontrollably around him, which in turn would set him off. He devoted himself to her breasts while one of his fingers found her sweet spot as he thrust himself inside her. She came screaming and crying and groaning and arching and, seconds later, so did he.

Later, after they’d finally made it to his bed, he lay back with her draped along his side, his hand wandering lazily down her back.

“Ow!” Jodi cried, flinching away from his touch.

He’d just brushed over her scapula on the left side, and when he moved to the right, she flinched again. Grim faced, he ordered, “All right, onto your tummy.”

“What’d I do?” she asked immediately, but was smart enough to comply at the same time.

He knew she expected to be spanked, but she knew he expected her to obey him, regardless. “If you do something wrong, you’ll know about it, but right now I want to see—”

It was worse than he’d thought. He’d been so forceful when he’d taken her against the door, and then later the floor, and one of the walls in the way to the bedroom, that he’d created bruises on her back that looked painful and obviously were.

“I’ve hurt you; I’m sorry.” He sounded absolutely appalled at himself, his voice abnormally subdued and withdrawn.

Jodi took a much more philosophical and somewhat sarcastic view of it. “I wish you got this upset at the idea of bruising my bottom like you do my back.”

Cayson’s hand moved slowly to the area in question, his tone still one of abject sorrow. “Yes, but this is made to be spanked. I don’t like the idea at all of hurting you otherwise.”

Jodi smiled up at him as she turned onto her side again and resumed her usual spot. “Don’t worry about it. I don’t.” She sat up on her elbow and became serious. “Although I’m not in the least concerned, and I hope it goes without saying, if you ever hit me in a way that’s other than sexy – like punching me – you can figure you’re going to be dead shortly afterwards.”

He looked thoroughly appalled and mirrored her concern. “Yes, by my own hand.” He captured her face and made her look at him, wanting to have his say and know she was hearing him. “I would never, ever, do that to you, Jodi. Never.”

“I didn’t think so, but it’s something that bears saying, regardless.”

“I do
not
take after my father.”

She had wondered if his father had hit his mother too, and there was her answer. She was glad that he had consciously not patterned himself after someone who sounded like a truly awful role model.

He surprised her by wanting her to move into his house, she figured that it might make him a little claustrophobic, but he didn’t seem to be worried about it. He was already on to a new project and was more distracted than he had been since they’d been together, but he more than made up for it almost every night – even if all he did was take a break and make love to her.

He gave her complete license to remodel and redecorate the place, and she earned a thorough spanking because of his blasted generosity.

Because he knew that her needs and habits were very different from his own, he put her on a schedule that was pretty much the same as the one she’d had when she lived in her little house, which she was selling. She still went into the office at nine and left at five – although those hours had always been nicely flexible, and they still were, because he didn’t much care when she was there as long as she got her work done. It was probably stupid for him to send her out every day, but it gave him some time alone which he really needed to work – she was a horrible distraction when she was in the same vicinity as he was – and it got her out of the house, too.

Between work and selling her house, she hadn’t accomplished much regarding the refit of the house, although she took every opportunity to complain about how much she hated the décor.

One night, she was up later than he usually allowed – it was the weekend – and he had just finished a big project and was feeling pretty good, except that Jodi was obviously unhappy with her surroundings as he joined her on his modular black leather couch.

“Where did you get this furniture?” she asked.

“It came with the house.”

“You bought it furnished?” she sounded amazed and, frankly, horrified at the idea.

“I bought the whole thing sight unseen.”

Jodi couldn’t comprehend doing that, but then, she was emotionally invested in her house and would be in any house she chose. “Blech, on both counts.”

She thought he was pulling her close to his side, but that wasn’t where she ended up. “What? Why are you spanking me?” she whined from her position over his lap.

“Take a guess,” he asked, reaching for the hairbrush he had her keep in the living room so that he could indulge himself in one – or the other – of his favorite past times – brushing her hair.

It didn’t take even her very long to come up with the reason, especially after he began to tattoo her behind with the red, angry imprint of the brush. “No – but – wait – that’s not right!”

He stopped, because he was a reasonable man. Usually. And if she could give him a logical reason why he shouldn’t spank her for doing something he’d warned her not to in the past, he’d stop. “Why isn’t it right? Haven’t I told you at least five times to go and buy or do or get whatever you’d like to make this house more appealing to you?”

“Yes,” she replied forlornly.

“And have you?”

Jodi sighed heavily, drooping over his lap. “No, but—”

His hand was already up. “But what?”

“But I don’t think it’s the decorations. It’s this house. Can’t we move into my place, please?”

He had been through this with her before. His place was closer to their work and was much bigger, and he had one entire large room devoted to his computer equipment. She had no place like that for him in her house. Besides, it didn’t make any sense for them to live in a smaller place further away just because it was prettier.

“No. I might have another solution, though, but I’m not going to tell you until after your paddling for not doing as you were told in the first place.”