Willing Sacrifice (Knights of the Board Room) (11 page)

Curling his fingers around her wrist, Max sucked in her two fingers, glistening with her honey. She stretched out the other fingers, stroking the five o’clock shadow, the cleft in his chin. Superman’s chin, a strong block that went with the strong face and powerful body. A man with a chin like that invariably lived up to it, a genetic indicator of character, courage. She noticed things like that, how often the physical feature appeared on police chiefs, career military men. The man who worked two jobs to support his wife and children. The lone homeless guy who dove into an ice-cold river to pull kids out of a car that had spun off the road.

Max took his time, stroking each finger with his tongue, caressing her palm with his thumb, holding her in that firm grip that did all sorts of things to her lower belly. He seemed to understand the complicated mix inside a Domme—at least this particular one. How the exploration of that intimate interplay of restraint and power could tease her senses, especially if approached with the delicate precision that he’d thus far demonstrated.

Squeezing her hand, he opened the truck door, then reached behind his seat, withdrawing a duffle bag and a thick blanket. “Stay there a minute.”

Moving to the back of the truck, she felt the dip as he stepped onto the wheel well and did something, probably arranging things for her comfort. For their pleasure. She slid behind the wheel, turned so she had her boots propped outside the truck on the running board, and gazed out at the dock. There was a bass boat tied up there.

“Whose property is this?”

“A friend’s. He’s in Afghanistan right now. I take his boat out sometimes, keep it maintained.”

Max jumped out of the back of the truck, came back to her. He leaned against the open door, studying her with those intent eyes that made the crisp night much warmer. “Why were you going to leave me?” he asked. “At the club?”

“Control. I don’t like to rush. Or take a step down the wrong path. This is a little like a roller coaster. Once you go over the crest of the hill, there’s no turning back.”

“There’s also nothing like the thrill of that ride.” He caught a lock of her hair between two fingers, massaged it between his knuckles. “What is that stuff?”

“Sculpting clay. It holds the hair in place, gives me a more severe, scary look.”

“Like you need to be more scary. Even Matt Kensington won’t cross you.”

“You don’t seem all that scared.”

His lips quirked. “Do you want me to be? I don’t think that’s the rush for you. You just like things done right, and you don’t tolerate sloppy work. Carelessness. Or inappropriate behavior. Just like him. You look at something and know how it’s supposed to look or act, how the picture is supposed to be framed. Structure, the way you do it, is how it’s supposed to be. You know it, and you don’t have patience for those who don’t get that.”

Reaching behind the seat, he unzipped her bag. As he leaned over her knee, she put her hands on his waist to feel the way his body moved, a simple pleasure. He came back with her street clothes, her casual skirt and cotton shirt. To her amusement, he’d left the panties and bra in the bag but retrieved her socks and canvas sneakers.

“I’ll go take a walk on the dock,” he said. “Why don’t you put those on? They’ll be more comfortable.” At her quizzical look, he added, “Control, right?”

He was a rather remarkable person, all in all. When she glanced around, he touched her face. “You’re safe here. It’s private. And I’ll know if anyone’s coming long before it’s an issue. All right?”

At her nod, he squeezed her knee and left her, headed down to the dock. Janet watched him, a tall, broad-shouldered man with a casually powerful stride. His head turned this way and that as he took in his surroundings. She noticed how deliberate he was in his movements, as if aware of the placement of each foot, the angle of his body, his position in relation to everything around him, including her.

Janet slid out of the blouse and shelf bra, pulling on the cotton stretch T-shirt. Without a bra, her nipples and small breasts were blatantly obvious, but she decided to indulge his less-than-subtle attempt to influence her clothing choices. She ditched the pencil skirt and put on the less restrictive one. She removed boots and stockings but left off the canvas sneakers and socks for the moment. She put all the rest neatly back in her bag.

Seeing her hair brush, she smiled. Unpinning her hair, she tossed it forward, running the brush through her dark tresses as they unraveled to their full length. The brush broke the hold of the sculpting product, making her hair soft again. As she straightened, she tested it, running her fingers through the strands, imagining Max doing the same.

When she looked for him, she found him sitting on the rail of the dock, watching her now. Putting the brush back into her bag, she braced herself on the running board to put her other bare foot on the wheel well. Then she swung herself over into the back of the truck. He’d unrolled some type of cushioned mat there, covering it with a blanket, then put the camo quilt on top of that. There was even a serviceable travel pillow.

“I don’t think this is the first time you’ve entertained a woman in the back of your truck,” she called out, taking a cross-legged seat on her bed, as dignified as an empress.

“Thanks to that prior experience, I’ve learned that women do not like lying on the steel slats of a truck bed, nor do they care for being naked when they’re cold.” As he came back toward her, she watched the lithe, sexual promise of his body like the gift it was. “A man’s lovemaking skills,” he continued solemnly, “as extensive as they might be, have no hope of impressing his female companion if her basic needs are not met. It’s not really fair, but that’s the other thing I’ve learned. Women don’t really care about fairness.”

“No, we don’t. It’s highly overrated.” Janet couldn’t suppress her smile as he leaned his elbows on the side of the truck bed. When he touched her hair, a look of deep pleasure capturing his features, she was ridiculously pleased with her decision to brush out the sculpting clay.

“Lie back for me,” he said quietly. “I want to see you. Pull your skirt up to your waist, let me see your beautiful legs. And everything else.”

She reached out, tugged at his T-shirt. “Only if you get rid of this. Every woman in the office wants to see you shirtless.”

He grunted dubiously at that. “This better not show up on YouTube.”

She would have smiled again, but that energy was returning, swirling around them, drawing things tighter. He shrugged out of the shirt she’d ripped open, then pulled the T-shirt over his head.

Oh my.
She’d been right. The way he moved, the obvious power he held, was mapped on the body. All smooth, rolling muscle, the gleaming dark-blond chest hair arrowing down between the sectioned stomach muscles. The angled muscles from hip to groin became even more noticeable when he pulled off the shirt, because his upper body lifted, dropping the slacks lower for a vital, pleasurable moment. He had a couple scars, she noticed. And a tattoo. She shifted to her knees, curling one hand on the edge of the truck so she could touch his muscled arm with the other, a demand to let her see.

He lifted his arm, revealing another amazing stretch of layered muscle and a soft patch of curling underarm hair. The tattoo was inked vertically on the stretch of rib cage under his right arm. Three skulls held on a trident. The top prong of the trident went through the crown of the middle skull, whereas the two side ones came out through the skulls’ eye sockets, their position angled accordingly.
Brothers in Hell
wound in a spiral along the trident’s handle.

She trailed her fingers over it. “A SEAL thing?”

He nodded, and she saw the shadows in his gaze. A brooding darkness, but one that enhanced this moment, sharpened it toward his intent as his gaze slid down her throat, lingering on her breasts, delineated so provocatively in the T-shirt. “Come here,” he rumbled in that husky tone. “I’m hungry.”

She was already up against the truck side, but understanding, she rose off her heels, standing on her knees. He snaked his arm around her, palming her ass to hold her in place as he closed his other hand over her right breast. Squeezing it firmly and pressing his thumb beneath the nipple, he tilted it up as he closed his mouth over it, through the shirt. Janet gripped his shoulder hard, her other set of fingers clinging to the side of the truck to give her an anchor as he suckled her hard, almost as hard as he had her throat. He knew she liked to feel the demand, no tentative brushes of lips or tongue. She liked to devour, so she wanted to be devoured.

He released her abruptly but held on to her hand as he put his foot on the wheel well and joined her in the back. Kneeling on the bed he’d made them, he caught her about the waist again, but this time to put her on her back, settling himself between her legs, his muscled shoulders and back beneath her grasping fingers as he cupped her breasts in both hands and got down to the business of suckling, biting, licking and generally driving her insane. She writhed beneath the press of his body. With her skirt rucked up to her waist, she discovered his washboard stomach provided sweet friction to her clit.

“I want you to come from this, and then I want you to come with my tongue in your pussy,” he muttered.

“Well, if you insist…”

When he chuckled, the vibration against her nipple made her cry out. It wasn’t a lighthearted laugh, but the sound of an incubus, knowing exactly how to pleasure her and where, dragging her down into the sensual darkness with him.

He gripped her thigh, encouraging her to wrap her legs around his body, rest her crossed heels on his ass, which flexed with his movements against her. “It’s all about your pleasure, Mistress.”

The whisper fired her blood. She raked her fingernails over his shoulders, tightened her legs on him, working her clit against him at her own pace. Meanwhile, he teased and nursed her breasts, squeezing and kneading, making the nerves ripple and ache, scream for more, sending out floods of sensation that drove pulses at all her erogenous points, and even beyond that, creating new ones. The track where she worked herself against his lower abdomen had become slick with her juices. If she lay on his stomach later, she’d smell herself on him, a feral marking.

He opened the slacks, shoved them and the briefs beneath off his hips enough she could feel the rise of his bare ass beneath her calves, but more than that, she could now rub her pussy all the way to his groin area. She didn’t feel the blunt stab of his cock, so she knew he must be keeping it pressed downward, out of the way for this part. She expected it was somewhat uncomfortable. The fact he was suffering for her just made her hotter.

Then he began doing something with his tongue, a quick lashing thing, alternated with the squeezes of his hands. When he followed with a deep sucking, punctuated by hungry murmurs in his throat, she was lost. She climaxed, a short, deeply intense wave, where she ground herself against him, crying out her pleasure to the night, all those stars becoming like shooting stars because of her glazed vision.

He kept suckling and squeezing, though she could tell his buttocks were pumping in rhythm with her, as if they were fucking in truth. But he didn’t push that agenda. He kept to the mission he’d described, waiting until she was shuddering with aftershocks to slide down her body, push his arms under her thighs, cup her buttocks in his two large hands, and put his mouth fully over her exposed cunt.

She screamed, the aftershocks pulsing against his lips. The tissues were so sensitive, but he slowed way down, making tender, slow licks along the labia, soft nuzzles on her clit that made her shudder. He was going for the slow build, so slow it was like a simple teasing aftermath, except his hands remained firm on her, his body taut with the desire he kept in check as he gave her pleasure, ramped up her desire again.

She wanted him in her arms, wanted to explore every inch of him, take his cock in her mouth, make him lose his mind as he was making her lose hers, but for now, this was also what she wanted.

All about your pleasure, Mistress.
So much of what she did as a Domme was calculated, holding the reins, watching the sub get more and more aroused while she figured out what slight adjustments would affect his reactions. It was an aphrodisiac all its own, but this… This was somehow a different form of service, where she had to calculate nothing, not worry about the reins at all. He knew what she wanted from him.

When she had a brain to think about it, she would be considering this carefully, but she had to give him his due. He’d said she wouldn’t be able to think much, and he was delivering on that promise.

Shuddering, she stared up at the stars, floating in a lull between the climax of a moment ago and the one he was taking her toward now. Her heels rested high on his back, and her hands, now that he was between her legs, had caught hold of the netting at the top of the truck. She assumed it was to keep things from sliding around. It helped her bear down against his mouth, a very pleasurable feeling. Looking down her body, she found he had amazingly thick dark-blond lashes, fanning his cheeks. He stayed intent on his task, rough stubble abrading the tender insides of her thighs in a way she loved. She hoped the redness would be there tomorrow.

She’d never thought about wanting to be marked by a man. Or even about owning him. She owned her subs, commanded them, at the club, but outside, she was Janet. She stood alone, confident in that solitary strength and power. She told herself this was want, not need, but she couldn’t deny the sharpness of the one was such she could easily mistake it for the other.