Purely Professional (9 page)

Max smiled, looking at her in the mirror. “That’s what I wanted to see.” He cupped her breasts in his hands and gently squeezed. She felt her head roll back against his shoulder, her eyes closing. “No,” he said into her ear. “Keep them open. I want you to watch this.” Bridget did as he asked, staring through heavily-lidded eyes at the picture they made, watching as he pinched her nipples between his fingers and rolled them back and forth. She was unable to stop herself from letting out a moan, a desperate sound, and she saw him smile.

“You like that.”

“Yes,” she breathed. He continued, massaging her breasts, pinching the nipples, tugging on them, gently at first and then suddenly hard. She gasped at the unexpected stabbing pain that yielded so swiftly to pleasure. He smiled knowingly at her reflection.

“You have to be quiet. We don’t want Suzanne coming back here to check on us, do we?” He pulled harder and she hissed, overwhelmed by the combination of pleasure and pain, reaching behind her to dig her fingers into his hips. “Or maybe you’d like that. Would you like to have her see you like this, panting in my arms like the slut you know you are?”

She wasn’t sure if it was the words he was whispering or his erotic, husky tone, but she had to bite back another moan. That was twice, now, that he’d called her a slut and she’d liked it, and maybe she should analyze that a little further, but now was
so
not the time.

“Stay here.” He brought the chair, then sat on it and pulled her back down by the hips onto his lap. Her legs dangled a little as he spread them across his knees and the corset forced her to sit completely upright, unable to slouch against him. They both faced the mirror. He reached around for her breasts and began pulling and twisting her nipples again. She kept watching them, breathing hard, constricted by the corset and incredibly aroused by that restraint. The public setting, the lingerie, the merciless assault by his hands, all of them were bringing her to a heightened state more quickly than she could imagine.

“I want you to come for me.”

“Here?” She panted, embarrassed and yet so turned on she barely cared.

“Here.” He pulled hard on her nipples again. She held back a yelp of pain. “I want you to do what I say, now, and I want you to call me ‘sir’ when you do.”

That simple direction brought a flood of wetness, wetness he could likely see in the mirror, barely hidden by the scrap of fabric of her panties.

“Yes, sir.” It was so unexpectedly hot she almost came right from that.

“Rub your clit. Keep your eyes on mine in the mirror.”

She tucked one hand under the waistband and found herself already swollen and drenched.

“You have a minute. If you don’t come within a minute, you don’t get to come today. Is that clear?”

“Yes,” she said breathlessly, suddenly even more aroused than before, if that were possible, dizzy with it. His hands continued their work on her nipples.

“Yes, what?” Max twisted hard, and she had to struggle not to cry out.

“Yes, sir.”

“That’s better. If Suzanne hears you, you won’t come for two days. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir,” she repeated. She rubbed harder and faster as he continued to abuse her breasts. Max began nipping at her neck, distracting her, and her hand faltered a bit, then continued.

“You have thirty seconds left.”

She rubbed even harder, gasping, climbing faster and higher, biting her lip in concentration. She wasn’t going to make it. She was going to get so close and be denied. At that moment, she heard him say, “ten seconds.” In response, her entire body spasmed, and she felt the irreversible climb begin.

“I’m going to come,” she breathed as quietly as she could, rubbing faster, her free hand gripping his thigh for balance, unable to look away from the scene in the mirror.

Max’s teeth closed down on her earlobe. “Come for me.” With the flood of pain and pleasure, Bridget came hard, the orgasm tearing into her. She pressed her lips together to keep from crying out, muscles quivering, toes curling against his calves. Her body arched, her movements beyond her control amid the indescribable pleasure. He stayed with her the whole time, holding her as she rode out her orgasm.

When at last she settled down, panting, she felt a flush of embarrassment along with her afterglow. She moved to get up, but he pulled her back down again.

“No. I want you to look at yourself. Do you have any idea how sexy you are?”

Bridget looked at herself in the mirror, at her wildly tousled hair, her heavy-lidded eyes, the flush that had spread across her face and neck, her sore, red nipples. She looked like a woman who had been thoroughly fucked.

Over her shoulder, Max was smiling, his gaze predatory. “I like this look on you. I want to see it a lot more. Get up, now.”

Bridget rose unsteadily to her feet.

Max traced a finger down the side of her corset. “Be careful taking this off. We’re buying it.” He leaned forward a bit, then hesitated, then leaned in more and kissed her again, as though he couldn’t resist. He gathered her to him, pulling her body against his, his lips moving masterfully against hers until her knees felt boneless again. Damn, the man could kiss. At last, he pulled away, his expression unreadable.

“All right. I’ll be out front.”

After he left, Bridget took a few minutes to gather her wits about her and then change into her regular clothes. She brought the pile of lingerie straight to the front desk, hoping she looked somewhat presentable and had perhaps lost the “I just got fucked” facial expression she’d been wearing in the dressing room.

“Max is in the restroom,” Suzanne told Bridget without looking up from her book.

“Ah, you’re done,” she heard from behind her as Max reappeared. He sorted through the pile and pulled out the first dark green baby doll she had tried on, then—of course—the black corset and a pair of matching stockings. “We’ll take these.” He handed Suzanne a credit card. She didn’t even quote him the price, just set the book aside and rang up the purchases.

“I can split this with you,” Bridget said quickly.

“Don’t start.”

When they were back in the car, she turned to him. “So am I supposed to call you ‘sir’ all the time, then?”

“No, just when I’m acting as your Dominant.” He shifted into drive. “Now, let’s go get some lunch.”

Max drove her to a café on the outskirts of town, a delightful European-style restaurant complete with striped awnings and a white trellis bedecked with flowers. He peered out the windshield at the sign out front. “I heard about this place from one of my colleagues. Never tried it.”

“You mean…at the college?”

He smiled. “Yes, at the college. I do have professional colleagues, you know. They aren’t all sexual degenerates like you and I.”

“You’re the degenerate, not me.”

Max grinned. “Keep telling yourself that.”

Bridget laughed, more out of surprise than mirth. The hostess seated them next to an expansive picture window that overlooked a garden just coming into summer bloom, and she took a moment to admire the view, then the menu. When the waiter came by for their orders, Max ordered a salmon tartine and Bridget chose an open-faced ham and swiss sandwich.

She sipped her iced tea, idly watching him fold his napkin into his lap, before finally striking up a conversation. “So, now will you tell me about yourself? You know more than you should about me, but I don’t know very much at all about you, and you completely avoided the topic at dinner last night.”

Max smiled. “Well, I suppose that’s only fair. Although you do know quite a bit about me. Everything I shared with you at Starbucks was true.”

“I want to know about your past. Where did you come from?”

He settled back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest, thinking. “Okay, here you go. I’m the youngest of three children. My whole family lives out in Washington State, and I visit them now and then, but I’m not really close to any of them. I grew up out there. I went to college out West, graduate school, everything. But when I wanted to get a job as a professor, the only tenure-track position was here in Connecticut. So I moved across the country and started teaching. Turns out I like it here, so I stayed.”

“And why English? What can you do with that, besides teach?”

“I
am
teaching,” he pointed out, smiling. “But I’ve always liked English. I was pretty shy as a kid, and a complete bookworm.”

“You? Really?” She laughed. With his casually sexy affect and constant flirtations, she couldn’t imagine him ever having been shy. “I can’t picture that. I thought you’d have been a jock or something.”

“Not really. I’m not much into sports, to tell you the truth. I got into martial arts back in college, but I never got into playing on a team. I prefer competing one-on-one.”

“I’ll bet you do.” She took a sip of iced tea. “So what were you like growing up? What kind of books did you read? Were you a geek?”

“Maybe a little.” He smiled slightly. “All right, a lot. I read everything I could get my hands on. Mostly fantasy, but the classics too. Books were my friends growing up. I was a bit of a late bloomer.”

“Don’t take this the wrong way,” Bridget said, hesitating, “but you’re a pretty sexy guy.”

He laughed out loud. “How could I take that the wrong way?”

“No, you didn’t let me finish.” Bridget laughed too. “I mean, you sound like kind of a dorky kid. But now you’re all…” She gestured up and down. “You’re so put together and
confident
. How did you develop that confidence?”

His answer came right away. “College. And my…extracurriculars. The BDSM scene. Being a sexual Dominant from a young age means I got a bit of an ego early on. Quite a switch from my younger days of being an introverted bookworm, I’d say. Eventually my ego got knocked back down a few pegs, but I never stopped being confident.” He leaned in and smiled. “The confidence also comes because I know I’m very good in bed. I can learn a woman’s body in one night. Everybody’s good at something. I’m good at sex. Too bad I didn’t figure that out until college.”

Bridget was saved from having to respond by the arrival of their food. The sandwiches were served on crispy baguettes, perfectly toasted and golden brown. Hers tasted delicious, salty and smoky at the same time. It looked like this would be two days in a row that she’d be eating food too good to complain about. Helen would be proud.

They ate for a few moments in silence before she broached the topic she’d been considering for a while. “So, back at Starbucks, I asked you about abuse, and you kind of bit my head off.” She took a bite of her sandwich and watched for his response. He didn’t say anything, chewing his own lunch, his expression unreadable. “What was that all about?”

Max seemed to consider the question, looking off to the right, taking a very long time to finish chewing. Finally he swallowed and set the baguette down on his plate. “All right. I guess that’s fair.” She noticed that some of the stiffness had come back into his shoulders. “So, after Vanessa and I broke up, I started dating this woman. Kirsten.” Her name rolled off his tongue as if he were tasting it, and the expression on his face spoke unfavorably about its flavor. “We worked together at an educational day camp. We were both teaching, we hit it off, so we started seeing each other. She didn’t know about my…proclivities, shall we say. We went out a few times, and things started to get a little more serious, so I sat her down and told her a bit about what I was into. Testing the waters, so to speak.” He rested his chin on his hands and gave her a humorless smile. “Let’s just say it didn’t go well. She was…well, ‘horrified’ describes it pretty accurately, I think. She called me a degenerate pervert and stormed out. That was Saturday night. On Monday, I get called into the office at work, and my superior politely informs me that I no longer have a job.” He inclined his head. “So there you go.”

“Wait, they fired you?” She set down her sandwich. “That’s ridiculous.”

“Apparently they were of the opinion that people like me shouldn’t be around children.” He took another bite of his sandwich, chewed thoughtfully, then swallowed. “I was given a lovely collection of pamphlets directing me to various therapists in the area.”

“I just…that’s…” Bridget shook her head, unable to find the words. “That’s bullshit. I’m sorry, but that’s completely unfair.”

“Yes it is.” He looked down at his hands, then back up at her. “I was really mad. I mean…
really
mad. I thought about fighting it, but I was a kid and had no idea what I was doing. Eventually I got over it. People are stupid.” He shrugged. “Now I’m more careful about who I tell things to. Still, when I hear people lump BDSM with abuse, it pisses me off.”

“Got it.” She felt a bit closer to him, some of the mystery resolved. “So…have you ever tried being a submissive? Or just always a Dominant?”

His shoulders relaxed a bit, and he looked off to the side, thinking, then back to her. “I switched—that’s what it’s called, switching—for Vanessa a couple of times to see what it was like, but it didn’t do anything for either of us. Even when I was little, I used to root for the bad guys in the cartoons, because they were so cool and commanding. And when the villain captured the princess and tied her up, well…I was
really
into that.” He grinned, and her stomach fluttered a little. “What about you? Did you have any deviant stories from your youth?”

One memory in particular came to mind, and she took a moment to sip her drink, feeling her face flush. “I used to like to play Houdini with my girlfriends,” she confessed. “I always wanted them to tie me up, and I would try to escape.”

“Interesting.” He raised his eyebrows, one side of his mouth twitching up.

“Only I didn’t always try very hard.” She smiled back at him.

He laughed.

She liked this side of him, the relaxed, loosened-up side. “What do you like best? What really does it for you?”

“You mean about BDSM?” He took another bite of his tartine and chewed it, seeming to chew the question as well. “I used to think I got off on the control,” he said after swallowing. “Making my partner helpless, knowing I could do whatever I wanted. But it’s not that at all.” He gently traced his fingertips across the back of her hand where it rested on the table. She watched the motion of his fingers on her skin, momentarily hypnotized, before looking back up at him. His eyes looked straight into hers. “It’s about trust. When she looks at me, and I see it in her eyes…she
knows
I can do whatever I want, and she trusts me to take care of her, to take her over the edge…” He let out a slow breath. “There’s nothing like that.” He held her gaze for a long moment.