Roxy Harte (11 page)

“Please, please, take me inside,” I beg. “After the storm…”

He presses a finger to my lips. “It isn’t going to happen. You and I are going to face this storm together, right here on this rock.”

“No, no, no!” I cry out. “Take me inside!”

He pushes a bit of bamboo between my teeth, securing it to my face with rope. He takes another picture, a close-up of my face. “I promise to keep you safe.”

I shake, I cry, I roll around on the top of that rock as well as I can, tied front and back, but it doesn’t make him release me. Pulling the camera from his pocket, he shoots and shoots, thunder rolls, lightning strikes. He is lucky, not a single drop of rain to ruin his camera. I wish it would pour. Maybe then he would stop photographing me and take me inside.

Rumble.

The thunder rolls, loud and seemingly directly over head just before the sky seems to open, dropping buckets of rain. I receive my wish for pouring rain, but still he doesn’t take me inside. He aims and shoots, even when my hair is plastered to my face, cold water dripping off my face faster than it rains, pounding rain hitting my body.

Rumble, rumble.

I hate the rain, I hate the thunder, and I hate the lightning. He knows these things and yet he keeps shooting. I close my eyes, crying in earnest, afraid. Shaking so hard the rope bites into my arms and legs.

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Hyperventilating.

It is only when I start screaming that he puts the camera away and sits beside me on the big rock. He holds me, wiping my wet, dripping hair out of my eyes. His own wet hair blows into my face. With each strike of lightning, I scream against the bamboo in my mouth, his holding me not making a difference.

He pets me, strokes me, and speaks softly to me. I can barely hear him over the thunder. “It’s beautiful,”

he says. “Look at the next strike, feel the energy of that strike.”

I look, a jagged streak piercing the black sky. I flinch in his arms and close my eyes against the brilliant flash of light.

“Beautiful,” he says, lowering his face to mine, kissing me above the rope that holds the bamboo in my mouth. “You are beautiful, Sophia, more beautiful than the sky. When I pull the pictures up on the computer, you will see that I do not lie.”

He kisses me again, turning my face to him. “Open your eyes, sweetheart. See me here with you.” I open my eyes for him and he captures my gaze, his look so intense, so passionate, that I can’t look away. I don’t squint my eyes closed on the next strike of lightning, seeing only a flash of brightness across his features. “You are so beautiful. Thank you for trusting me.”

Holding my gaze, he kisses my forehead, my wet nose and in the midst of his kisses, locked in his gaze, I forget the storm, forget my fear.

Rumble.

He begins to untie the rope pattern, releasing first my mouth from the bamboo bondage, replacing the exotic wood with his mouth, kissing me hard, harder, like a man possessed. I kiss him back with equal fervor, enjoying his mouth, his tongue. His hands follow the rope, releasing my legs, my body, my arms.

Free, my arms go around his neck, I want to hug him and kiss him, but he stops me, pulling me into his lap so that my back is against his chest. In silence, he holds me on the rock, rain pouring over us, pointing at each lightning strike, kissing me on the temple, and the silence between us is good. With each strike of lightning, I feel the tightness of his arms holding me. With each strike, I know I am safe with this man.

“…I wish you to know that you have been the last dream of my soul…all a dream, that ends in nothing, and leaves the sleeper where he lay down, but I wish you to know that you inspired it.”

-Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

Thomas

She is beautiful when she’s sleeping. During the ten weeks she’s been mine, it seems I spend a lot of time watching her sleep, not because she sleeps excessively, but because I can’t sleep. I don’t want to sleep—I want to watch over her, memorizing how her eyelashes flutter in dream, how her lips part in sigh. When I stroke her skin, she rolls into me, seeking me, my touch. Even in sleep, I can draw her to me.

The right thing to do would be to go to Garrett now, with the truth, the whole truth. If I only knew what that truth was. I only know that one of us is going to get hurt, him, her, me.

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“I love her,” he said, when we met at her house, waiting for her to come home from the hospital. We stood outside the kitchen on the back porch, a warm summer day, the sound of lawn mowers and children playing floating over the back privacy fence with the breeze.

I’d answered nonchalantly, “It’s obvious.”

There was a painful moment of silence while we both stared at the overgrown backyard, grass high, flowerbeds weedy from lack of attention. He broke the silence, admitting, “She’s fascinated by you…and you’re fascinated by her.”

“Yes. There seems to be a chemistry that draws us to each other.”

“That’s what worries me.”

“Don’t worry, it’s going to be fine,” I’d promised him and it should have been fine. I never expected to fall under her spell. I never expected to feel anything other than what I’ve ever felt, which is as close to feeling nothing as possible and still be considered human, and there are days I am not human.

I shouldn’t have assumed that anything normal could come of my Mastering her; after all, she made Garrett fall in love with her when we had all come to believe that Garrett would never love again. He loves her and she loves him. Knowing that should make a difference. It doesn’t. I have fallen in love with her and Garrett needs to know that. If I were an honorable man, I’d tell him, before one of us gets hurt.

Maybe tomorrow, or the next day. Or, I could wait until this wears off. Why cause a problem if there is no problem?

Soon, she will return to him and all will be right with the world again.

I stroke her cheek and she opens her eyes. “Lord Fyre?”

“Do you want to play, sweetheart?”

She smiles, sweetly, naughtily, the corners of her mouth barely curving. God, she is so sexy when she smiles at me like that, it touches something in my core. Smiling and stretching, making still sleepy sounds that wrap around me, making me want her desperately. Nodding, she says, “Let the games begin.”

I smile at her, laughing lightly at her pure, innocent enthusiasm. Her smile brightens, though if she knew what I had planned for her she might not be smiling at all. She might be terrified. But she isn’t terrified, she trusts me, and it is her total trust that has lured me in. I’m in love with her. Lightly, I ask, “Can you swim?”

* * * *

Kitten caged is a beautiful sight.

Cuffed and shackled to the inside of a shark cage, she eyes me warily. I am in a wet suit, she is naked.

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The water is going to be cold. That I plan for us to go into the water didn’t cause her much alarm. That I am suited up with an oxygen tank and she is not has her slightly nervous. Okay, she’s scared shitless. I can see it in her eyes, even through the mask I put over her eyes so that she will be able to see clearly under water. She handles scared shitless very well—just one of the many things I love about her.

“Ready?” Bob asks, a note of unease in his own voice. The only point in my favor is that when I drag him out on these excursions I pay him very well for his time and I haven’t killed anyone. Scared us, me included, a few times, but nothing we haven’t lived to laugh about.

With my nod, he hits the controlling switch that will swing her cage out over the side of the boat. It is only when she hangs suspended above the ocean, her feet getting wet, that she cries out, “Lord Fyre!”

I smile and wink, Bob drops the cage with a splash and we watch as it slowly settles into the waves, she only waist deep.

“You asked me if I could swim,” she tries to joke, twisting her wrists in her shackles, trying to get free.

“I want to remind you, Lord Fyre, that I can’t breathe underwater.”

“Trust me,” I call out to her. “It’s all I ask.”

The cage continues to sink, leaving her chin deep. “Oh shit,” she says, still trying to tug free.

“Inhale, Sophia!” I command, screaming over the noise of the boat just before she goes under.

Bob glances at his watch nervously. “What was the plan from here?”

I pat his back. “I’m not going to let her drown, brother. You take care of the fresh meat. I’ll take care of the girl.”

Adjusting my tanks and regulator, I prepare to enter the water. Watching him pull fresh, bloody meat from a sack, I drop into the ocean, taking only a second underwater to get my bearings on the cage. It has been less than two minutes—she isn’t struggling in the water. She hangs suspended, eyes closed. For a second I am nervous, my own breath catching. Wrapping my hands around the metal bars, I enter the opening in the top of the cage quickly, joining her inside the cage. It is only when I touch her that she opens her eyes. Her lips curl up in that naughty smile that could bring me to my knees in worship if I would let myself. I take the mouthpiece from my lips and press it to hers, helping her to get it just right.

She inhales. I kiss her on the cheek, running my hands over her stretched body, feeling her ribcage expand with air. I caress her softly and she shivers in my embrace.

Holding my own breath, I rummage inside my waist pouch for the weighted nipple clamps I brought along for our underwater scene. As I attach them, her eyes grow wide. It is only when our cage is bumped that I realize it is not the pain of the clamps causing her anxiety but a shark. Moving behind her, I wrap my arms around her waist, holding her, absorbing her trembles as the shark pounds into our cage a second time.

I play with her beasts, teasing her nipples, pulling on the clamps while together we watch the shark’s graceful path. Her head falls back against my shoulder, relaxing. Trusting me. It feels as if we spend a long time like that, me passing the breathing regulator between us, enjoying the peacefulness of the world underwater, though really very little time passes.

Even the shark seems peaceful, swimming in a path in front of us, back and forth, back and forth. In a
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strange way, even with the freedom of the entire ocean, it seems he paces before us, waiting. I realize the woman in my arms is also waiting for the
what next
, though she hides it in false indifference. I feel the truth of her nervousness in the pounding of her heart. I think the shark too feels her fear.

Together we wait for the climactic
what’s next
.

Fresh meat falls near the shark. With a high-powered kick of his tail, he makes a grab for the meat, smacking the cage hard with his body. The cage shakes us. This close, his teeth glisten menacingly.

Several sharks join him and suddenly Kitten and I are surrounded by grey ghosts that bob and weave through the water, their singularity of purpose evident. Their struggle for possession of the meat fierce.

Kitten shakes hard in my arms.

I love her fear, soaking it in as it rolls off her in waves.

Kissing the back of her neck, I lick and stroke her with my tongue before sinking my teeth in softly. She jumps in her bonds, feeling my teeth. Keeping my eyes on the sharks, I kiss and nip her neck and shoulders, causing her to be jumpy in her restraints. I tug her nipple clamps, wanting her to feel the quick jolts of pain from my bites and the weighted clamps while she watches the sharks fight.

Two sharks collide with our cage and she struggles in her bonds, breathing harder.

Taking the regulator, I force her to hold her breath. She struggles hard, her fear making her panic, even though I am still near. Her eyes are wild, the sharks very close. The next drop of meat hits the side of the cage, snagging on the cage and we are shaken hard in our confinement as the sharks battle it out for the large piece of meat.

My heart pounds with pure excitement. I know she must be going out of her mind. I quickly inhale, exhale, then inhale again slowly and evenly, filling my lungs with enough air to hold my breath again before passing the mouthpiece back to her. I want her to enjoy this moment. There is nothing like pure terror to increase sexual response and I want her to know that feeling. Sinking to my knees and then swimming between her legs, I take her clit into my mouth, rolling my tongue over her while the sharks battle over the meat. A feeding frenzy ensues.

Reaching for the nipple clamps, I tug the weights, making her dance in her cuffs.

Bondage underwater is so much different from bondage above water; weightless, the tension normally placed on muscles and tendons disappears. Likewise, underwater orgasm is mind-blowing. Muscles contract and it is an almost painful experience, like an underwater muscle cramp, everything just feels more intense, harder.

When her body flexes and folds in on her, I realize an orgasmic wave is crashing through her. My lungs scream, wanting air, and seemingly in answer the regulator floats down to me. Sophia spat it from her mouth, either mid-orgasm or on purpose, I will not know until I can ask her above the water. Releasing her clit, I shove the regulator in my mouth and breathe, but not wanting her orgasm to stop, I pump her hard with my fingers, the muscles of her vagina wrapping around me harder than when on dry land, her terror making everything more intense.