Never Have I Ever (19 page)

“Thank you, Sir,” I said at last. Every time he said that word it fueled the fire inside me.

Without another word Noah backed away and walked out of my office. The door was left cracked open. Tish and Q walked in not ten seconds later. As Tish settled into her seat, she looked at me, then at the door.

“You okay girl?”

I nodded and lied, “Yeah, just a stomach ache. I’m fine.”

“Who was that?” she asked.

“That was Noah Wellington,” I said. “And I think I can safely say that we have nothing to worry about when it comes to the grants.”

I thought about my current state of vulnerability and just how turned on I became doing something so simple yet so taboo against my better judgment just to please Noah. As I moved to sit down and round out my day, wetness trickled down my thighs and clung to the material of my pants.

Up until Thursday, the combined efforts of the toys inside of me brought me genuinely close to snapping. They were a constant tease even though I was allowed to remove the plug every other day. Anal sex scared me, though I had tried not to show that fear to Noah.

Not just the pain aspect, but also the repercussions and possible health issues which could come about if something went wrong. Before him I would never have given a second thought to the idea. I outright refused a couple of my previous boyfriends that luxury, in fact.

With that in mind I decided early on that two hours every other day for the plug wouldn’t be enough. If I was going to be ready for him when he came home I’d have to get used to the feeling completely by then. I alternated days, but left it in for several hours more than was required for my own benefit. Perhaps, I thought, it would hurt less that way. Once I was able to work it into me on my own—courtesy of an insane amount of lubricant—the pain was not so bad. It stung and stretched me at first before it dulled into discomfort and then finally the oddest sort of pleasure.

Not a single hour went by while at work in the observatory or in class that I didn’t have to resist the urge to touch myself. Between the subtle electric pulse of the vibrator making me slicker than sin and the strange uncomfortable delight of the plug it became a struggle not to slip away from my duties and just have it out with myself in a bathroom stall until I came half a dozen times. When I teetered too close to the edge I would slide a subtle hand between my legs and regrettably turn the intensity down.

Each and every time I moved I felt the vibe slide in and out of me, adding to the delectable albeit frustrating feeling of being filled. Only the thin cotton of my panties prevented the toy from escaping my pussy. At the end of each day the crotch of my panties was soaked through. I must have gone through thirty dollars in batteries since Monday.

I was still not allowed to orgasm. In fact, I hadn’t heard a single word from Noah since he left the States Monday afternoon. Had it not been for the reminder he left me in the form of this torturous week I would have thought he was a dream.

Talking to people became a huge task in and of
itself
. In the back of my mind I kept thinking that they knew what was happening to me. I thought they could see it scrawled on my face or hear the noise of the vibrator pulsing through me. So far I was lucky. Nobody mentioned anything.

After I got home every night, I would eat dinner and study for a couple of hours before I finally took the vibe and the plug out, cleaned them, took a shower, and went to bed.

On Thursday it became ritual. It became a little less menacing and a little more comfortable to have these distractions in me the entire day. Of course, Thursday was an off day so it was only the vibrator that I had to suffer through.

I was on my bed that evening, my books and laptop splayed out before me as I tried to concentrate on what would probably be the last study session I’d receive before finals. Cocoa curled up on the corner of the bed and flapped her fluffy tail lazily over the edge. She was glaring at me. She could probably feel the vibrations through the comforter.

The awkwardness was just beginning to reach a point where I was about to kick her out of the room to stop the staring when my phone rang to life. A rush went up my spine when I saw the Caller ID said
Noah
.

I couldn’t answer it fast enough for my taste. “Hello?”

Noah’s voice crept into life, rattled and husky, over the line, “Hello, my pet.”

My blood ran cold. He didn’t sound well. Not as if he was sick; more like distressed. I waited a moment before I said anything and just listened to his side of the phone. His breath was ragged, almost as if he had been crying.

“What’s wrong, Sir?”

“Not a thing,” he said. He cleared his throat, perhaps knowing that I could hear the forlorn tone in three simple words. “All’s well. Fun fact for you: Oscar Wilde died in this dreadfully trendy hotel I’m staying at.”

I smiled. “Is that why you sound so upset? Is Oscar Wilde’s ghost haunting you?”

For a second it seemed like he wanted to laugh, but it soon transitioned into the release of a long sigh. I heard the shifting of cloth on the other end of the line like he was lying down in bed. “It’s been a long trip already, sweetness. I just needed to hear your voice.”

“You’re kind of scaring me here.”

“I promise it’s nothing to worry about. How are your finals going?”

I didn’t like the shift in topic, but felt the urge not to press him about it. “One down and three to go since one of my professors counted my project for the observatory as a final. All the others are next week. How’s Paris?”

“Boring,” he said it as if it should’ve been a given. He wasn’t there for vacation but for business so the sight-seeing would probably be pale at best. Noah went on, “And stressful. And I’d like nothing more than to have you here just so I could keep you captive in my hotel room to torture and fuck mercilessly between meetings.”

I let out a little moan and clenched my legs together as his voice turned me on. A moment later I snickered at the thought of the haunted hotel.
“While Oscar watched us the whole time?”

“Hey, the man’s been dead for over a hundred years. Since watching people go at it is probably his only means of entertainment I’d go so far as to pull up a chair for him.”

“How thoughtful of you,” I taunted. Never mind the Louvre, the Eiffel Tower, the cafés, the tunnels, the food, or the cultural experience; nothing sounded more alluring than just existing in the same room with Noah at that moment. “With or without the ghost of a dead novelist, the idea of being tied up in your hotel room is a heavenly one.”

Why hadn’t I gone with him again? Oh, right: Fuck reality.

I heard that Loki-like smile on his face through his words. “I love the anxiousness in your voice, pet. You’ve been following my commands like a good slut then?”

And there was that word again. It never truly got to me until it was spoken from his lips. “I have, Sir. It’s been so goddamn difficult.”

“Tell me; is the vibrator in you right now?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Good girl. I’ll let you in on a little secret to encourage you.”

“What’s that?”

“I haven’t touched myself during this trip at all.
Which,
let me tell you, is an epic fucking undertaking for me.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’m saving every last bit of this pent up sexual tension until I get back. You won’t be able to walk for a week by the time I’m done with you.”

“Saying things like that only makes me hotter.”

“That’s why I do it. However, I have an assignment for you this weekend. Do you have any plans for Sunday?”

“Not that I recall.”

“Good. Keep it that way for me.”

“What sort of assignment?”

“I must have some secrets for the moment. I’ll let you know more on Sunday. Needless to say, it will push your boundaries more than you’re used to.”

A little buzz of anticipation for the unknown spiked through me. “I’m up for a challenge.”

“That’s what I like to hear. For now I think I’m going to let you go while I can still resist making you play with yourself until you come for me over the phone. I’m already rock hard just from talking to you. I adore the sounds you make too much, I think.”

“I’m flattered and proud that I can do that to you.”

“As you should be.”

There was a pause between us,
then
I asked, “It’s pretty late there isn’t it?”

“Oh yes, very late.”

“And you're sure there's nothing wrong?”

“Not in the least bit.”

“Sir, before you go,” I trailed off, uncertain of what I wanted to say apart from an excuse to prolong the end to our dialogue and the comfort of his voice.

“Yes, sweetness?”

“I just—I miss you
is
all.” It was sappy. It was cliché. It was everything I hated in telephone conversations. But it was true.

“Have a good night, my pet. I won’t leave you wanting for too much longer.”

The line went dead. I pulled the phone away from my ear and stared at the screen until it reverted to its black mirrored state. Did I imagine his change in tone at first? In the end he transitioned into his usual domineering self, but I could have sworn he sounded troubled when I answered.

After a while I managed to slog through studying and, eventually, the rest of the week.

***

“
WHAT?!
”

Both Declan and Anya stared at me from across the café table with their respective mouths agape. It wasn’t the reaction I anticipated to telling them I slept with Noah. They weren’t angry
so
much as astonished. I shrank back in my seat and pulled my coffee to me like a shield, unable to fathom what they may say if I decided to tell them just how much sex we had or that absolutely zero percent of it was vanilla.

It was Saturday; my last respite from class until I dove head-long into finals. And it was a beautiful day; the kind of day with a late spring breeze and sparsely clouded skies that
poets
write about. I had chosen to spend it with them. Could they not have at least sounded a little more thrilled with my good news? Anya was the one who encouraged me to go to the party where I met Noah, after all. She berated me for not seeking out a relationship in the past two years. By all accounts she wanted me to get laid if nothing else. Except that the whole idea of just getting laid became something else. It developed into something more than I thought possible. I supposed it wasn’t at all what either of them expected.

“You slept with him? As in, you spent the night?” Declan finally managed to ask.

I laughed with a touch of nervousness, subtly eyeing the small crowds of people walking past us in the open air of the sidewalk that afternoon. “More like the whole weekend?”

“That’s impossible.”

“I’m fair sure it wasn’t a dream, Declan,” I said. The vibrator inside me made me certain of that if nothing else.

He swallowed a mouthful of coffee and waved his hand from side to side as if to discount anything and everything I just said. “You don’t understand. Noah doesn’t let women stay over. He always, without fail, every time, makes them leave. He fucks them, but never sleeps with them as a rule.”

Setting aside the fact that Declan failed to warn me about that particular fact before I went home with him I was sensing a story behind Noah’s reasoning. Still, it made me feel a little special.

I sat up straight in my seat and shrugged. “Well, I did,” I said with a touch of pride.
“Twice.”

“He also doesn’t date,” Declan noted. “What the fuck did you do to him?”

Besides indulging our fantasies and experiencing the best sex of my life?

I decided against saying that.

“I’m not sure. But we went for drinks Saturday night and I didn’t leave his apartment until Monday morning. He even made me breakfast. It was sweet.” I pulled a cigarette from the pack in front of me and lit it. When neither of them said anything I pulled the cigarette from my lips and pressed for a reason. “Why do you both have that look on your faces like I just shattered your childhoods or kicked your puppy?”

Declan ran his hand across the top of his shaved head and stared at Anya with wide eyes and a worried expression. They exchanged a knowing, however uncertain nod.

“Maybe he’s gotten better?” Anya said to Declan with a strange and tense sound in her voice.

“Oh my God, he’s got a
hamartia
doesn’t he?” I was joking Saturday night when I asked if his fatal flaw was a multiple personality disorder. Now I was staring daggers at my best friends and waiting for them to tell me that maybe he in fact did have a fatal flaw. “Declan? Talk to me.”

“I’m not sure if he’d want me to be the one to tell you.”

“Too late,” I snapped. “Tell me what’s going on.”

“You’re really going to make me tell you, aren’t you?”