Binding Agreement Read online

  “I know. You don’t do this kind of thing.”

  She shook her head.

  “But you will now. With me.” It wasn’t a question. “Let’s get the voir dire out of the way. I’m not harboring any unsavory diseases. I’m guessing the same is true of you.” He waited for her to nod then added, “Do I need to use a rubber?”

  “No, I’m…I’m on the Pill.” She couldn’t believe she was having this discussion with a complete stranger. Everything was happening so fast.

  He cupped the back of her neck and pressed a kiss to her forehead, his lips warm and firm. “You can leave at any time. I won’t stop you.”

  What a strange thing to say, she thought as a knot of trepidation settled in her gut.

  He sat back and looked her over. With one hand he gathered her T-shirt at the waist. He twisted it in his fist, tugging to stretch the material tight over her breasts. Her nipples prickled. He stared. Boldly, unapologetically.

  When his other hand came up, she thought he was going to caress her. Instead he ripped the material away from the neckband, exposing one breast. Kay flinched, her pulse thunderous in her ears. How could she have thought his eyes kind? she wondered, staring at him. She could boil in those eyes.

  His movements were leisurely, as if he had all the time in the world to enjoy her. He tugged on her hair, pulling her head back over the rolled arm of the sofa. His other hand slid under her back to lift her, sharply bowed, like some pagan offering.

  She couldn’t see him, could only stare at the ceiling as his scalding mouth closed over her nipple. She jerked and cried out. He suckled her hard while she writhed and bucked as if to pitch him off her. Her hands clawed at his shoulders, his flesh hard and unyielding under the soft waffle-knit shirt.

  Finally he lifted his head and hers. “Tear the rest of it.”

  “Wh-what?”

  “The shirt. Rip the other side.”

  As if she were a detached observer, she watched her hand grab hold of the material still attached to the neckband. She pulled, but it refused to come free. Patiently he waited. She brought her other hand up and, using both, managed to tear it.

  He said, “Good.”

  Lying before this stranger fully dressed but with her breasts flagrantly bare, Kay felt a surge of alarm. What was she doing? She’d never done anything like this in her life. She’d never even imagined it.

  You’re doing what you promised yourself, the small, brave part of her returned. Taking risks, living life. She just hadn’t known it would be so scary.

  I want…I want…

  I want this man to make love to me. I want him to keep looking at me this way. With an intensity that both frightened and inflamed her.

  He pulled her to a sitting position and drew her arms up to link her hands behind her neck. She felt her breasts lift, felt strands of hair tangle in her trembling fingers. He sat back and studied her—her form, her expression and, she suspected, her level of compliance.

  “Very nice,” he said at last. Rising, he pushed the coffee table well away from the sofa. “Stand up.”

  She did, dropping her hands to her sides. He replaced them behind her neck and gave them a little squeeze, a wordless reprimand.

  She said, “How—”

  “Don’t speak. Unless I ask you a question.” His tone was dispassionate. “You may make other sounds if you can’t help yourself, but no words. And don’t move when I’ve positioned you as I want you.”

  Kay was torn between outrage and curiosity. Between her self-protective instincts and her burgeoning arousal.

  I can leave anytime, she reminded herself. He won’t stop me.

  He watched her face, watched the clash of conflicting emotions she couldn’t hope to conceal. Finally he said, “Take off the pants.”

  She hesitated for a moment, then dropped the sweatpants and kicked them away. She replaced her hands behind her neck.

  This seemed to please him. A small, satisfied smile creased his face. “You’re beautiful. I don’t think you know that.” He reached out and brushed the backs of his fingers slowly down her abdomen, from her waist to the top of the tawny triangle. Her stomach muscles quivered. She felt the ghost of his touch in her most intimate places.

  “Turn around.”

  She did. He tore her T-shirt from hem to neckband. She felt him spread the fabric, felt the brush of his fingertips and the humid caress of his breath on her back as he looked at her.

  He laid a hand on her shoulder. “Kneel.”

  Her heart stuttered as she dropped to her knees in front of the sofa. His hand pressed on her neck, pushing her down until her torso rested on the seat cushion. The nubby upholstery scraped her burning nipples with every breath.

  He drew her hands together behind her back, turned her head to the side and carefully brushed tendrils of blonde hair off her face. She could only imagine he wanted to see her expression when he did whatever it was he intended to do.

  “Open your legs,” he said.

  Her breath rasped in her ears as she obeyed.

  “Wider. That’s right. Arch your back.” His palm pressed on her waist, urging her to tilt her hips, to angle her pussy outward. She’d never felt more vulnerable. Her thighs trembled with strain as she fought the impulse to close them.

  “Remember. Don’t move,” he said, kneeling behind her.

  She waited, breathless. When she felt his fingers lightly skim the damp curls between her legs, she twitched away.

  He seized her linked hands as he continued the whispery caress. “Be still.”

  Through sheer grit she managed to do just that, but when his thumbs converged there, when they pressed outward on the lips and she felt her pussy unfurl before his eyes, the battle was lost.

  “I said be still!” His long fingers dug into her buttocks as his thumbs spread her wider still. Her clitoris felt like a tiny beating heart under his remorseless gaze.

  Panting, she grappled with her need to slap his hands away. To leap up and run out into the night. Never had she been so brutally exposed. She felt engorged where he stared at her, flooded with her passion, a spectacle for his titillation. As was her face, which no doubt reflected every nuance of her internal struggle.

  I can leave anytime. I can leave anytime.

  “Your cunt’s so wet,” he said. “You’re more than ready for me.” One finger thrust deep then swiftly retreated, wringing a choked sob from her.

  She heard the metallic rasp of a zipper as he moved between her legs and kneed them as wide as they would go. His strong hands anchored her hips as the smooth, broad crown of his penis parted her slick folds, bulled past the tight opening, and drove hard and deep.

  Kay screamed, the pleasure so acute it was close to torture. He stretched her wider, touched her deeper, gorged her more abundantly than she’d ever thought possible.

  He recoiled and plunged to his full length, responding with a full-throated groan as she ground herself against him. He held her in a bruising grip lest the next whisper of movement set him off. Kay smiled as she experienced her first moment of triumph over this despotic man now wrestling for control of his body.

  Unable now to move her hips, she squeezed his cock from within. He sucked in a sharp breath. She did it again, harder, and heard him mutter something between a prayer and a snarl.

  His voice was hoarse. “You want this to be over before it’s started?”

  “What’s the matter, can’t handle me?” the brave, reckless part of her asked. She strained to see his face, without success.

  He slapped her bottom and she yelped. “I told you not to speak.”

  “Unless you asked a question. Which you did.”

  “Which you must answer simply and directly, not with an impertinent question of your own.”

  “I don’t think I want to follow your rules,” she said.

  “You have no choice.”

  “Make me.”

  “Simple enough.” He tore a strip off her tattered shirt.

&n
bsp; “Don’t!” Not a gag!

  “Will you be good?”

  She nodded.

  “Say it.”

  “I’ll be good.” She almost added, you prick! but thought better of it.

  He laid the strip of cloth next to her face where she’d have to look at it. Very slowly he retreated, holding his rigid cock poised at the entrance. Only when she whimpered and pushed back against him did he flex his hips, impaling her once again. His movements were lazy, unhurried, despite her attempts to increase the tempo.

  She rocked into his thrusts, maddened by the position he’d chosen, which denied her clitoris direct stimulation.

  “Do what you did before,” he ordered. “Squeeze me.”

  She shook her head no. She had no intention of boosting his pleasure while she suffered agonies of frustration.

  “Did I mention I expect complete obedience?” Slipping his hand under her breast, he found the stiff tip and pinched it. Hard. Kay gasped. She squirmed, wordlessly begging him to stop.

  He asked, “Are you ready to obey me?”

  She nodded.

  He slid his hand out from under her. “Now, do what I told you to. And keep doing it.”

  She did. He seemed to swell inside her with each contraction of her muscles. When his big hands guided the movements of her hips, she followed his lead.

  Casually he said, “I haven’t decided whether I’ll let you come.”

  Kay bit back a sob. Her frustration was a living thing. It had tiny, sharp teeth that nipped at her pride. Shamelessly she met his pistoning hips, the cadence now quick and fierce. Desperate little cries escaped her. She was so close…

  Her fingers were locked behind her back, half numb. He pried her right hand free and pushed it under her. “Get yourself off.”

  “No!” Not in front of someone else! “I—I can’t.”

  Briskly he replaced her hand behind her back. “Then I’ll finish now, and you can go home and play with yourself.”

  Why don’t you do it for me? her mind screamed, knowing he could satisfy her in seconds if he wanted to.

  He let himself go, hammering into her with a vengeance. Kay heard his rough exhalations, felt her own body tighten as he neared his peak. Never had she felt more thoroughly possessed, as if she were merely the vessel of his pleasure. Politically incorrect perhaps, yet she couldn’t deny the strange thrill that swept through her.

  With a final victorious shout, he bucked violently, jetting his hot seed deep within her. She winced at the keen, stabbing pleasure his release brought her. But of course, it wasn’t enough.

  He slumped over her, his breath hot, his chest a bellows. He placed a trembling kiss between her shoulder blades then pulled her hair aside to kiss her neck. Kay gave a little gasp when he withdrew from her body. She heard him zip his jeans, felt him lift her so that once again she found herself sitting next to him at the end of the sofa.

  His breathing was still fast, but then, so was hers. His dark gaze flicked over her. Pulling her nearest leg onto his lap, he wedged her into the corner of the sofa. He lifted her right hand and placed it between her legs, then draped his arm over the sofa back and waited.

  The tingling soreness in her pussy only magnified Kay’s unappeased hunger. Tentatively she moved her fingertips, glided them over the slippery, swollen flesh. Her breath caught as she quietly crossed a mental threshold. She averted her face and deepened her touch, quickly finding her rhythm.

  “Look at me,” he ordered.

  “Please, no,” she whispered.

  Gripping her chin, he made her face him. Strangely, his eyes once again looked kind. “Look at me,” he repeated, and sat back to watch, one hand resting on her thigh.

  This night is my great sexual adventure, she consoled herself as her mouth parted and her breathing grew shallow. Every woman needed one outrageous memory, something to tuck away and relive at her leisure.

  Her hips rocked in cadence with her fingers. She’d thought her natural inhibition would dampen her arousal, but instead his bold stare excited her.

  “Stroke your clit,” he ordered, his blue eyes smoky as he watched her masturbate. “Slower.”

  Kay bit her lip, stifling a moan of pleasure.

  “Fuck yourself with your fingers,” he said. “Three of them. Put them in.”

  She did. He orchestrated her movements, telling her how fast to thrust, when to tease her clitoris, when to pause and back away from the climax building within her. Again and again he brought her to the brink, only to deny her the release she needed more than air. Kay was writhing, whimpering, practically begging him to let her finish.

  Finally he said, “Come. Do it now.”

  Her whimpers turned to sharp cries as her orgasm swooped in for the kill. Her body bowed sharply as she ground her fingers into her pussy. He covered her hand with his own, pressing hard to prolong her release. She was left weak and trembling, and he pulled her onto his lap, soothing her, stroking her back.

  When her heartbeat returned to normal, he said quietly, “Second thoughts?”

  She shook her head. She didn’t regret anything.

  “Good,” he said. “Because I’m not finished with you.”

  Chapter Two

  His words arrowed straight to her core. She felt a shiver of anticipation, along with a healthy dollop of fear. “You said I could leave anytime,” she reminded him.

  “And if you’re not prepared to surrender to me completely, that’s exactly what you should do.” When she hesitated, he added, “Just so we’re clear—submitting to my demands will be harder than you think. Maybe the hardest thing you’ve ever done.”

  She’d submitted to him already, and yes, it had been hard, but the rewards had been worth it. Never in her life had she felt so sexually alive. She wondered how much more intense it could get and suspected she’d experienced only the tip of the iceberg.

  John was studying her closely. “Do you know what a safe word is?”

  “I…I think so.”

  “You say this one word and the action stops. I release you.” Tenderly he brushed stray hairs off her face. “Without that word, no amount of screaming or begging will get me to stop.”

  “Screaming and begging?” She reared back. “What are you planning to do?”

  “Whatever I feel like.” He smiled at her alarmed expression. “You’ll suffer no permanent damage.”

  Kay swallowed hard. “What…what’s the safe word?”

  “You pick it.” Idly he caressed her breasts. “That way you’ll remember.”

  “Felicia.” It was the first thing that came to her. “She’s…she’s my cat.”

  “Felicia it is.” Abruptly he asked, “What’s your name? Your first name only.”

  “Kay. Why just my first name?”

  “It’s all I need,” he said. “Anything else is more than I want to know.”

  “What about you? Do you have a name?”

  “John.”

  “John. Uh-huh.” The sort of common name one might pluck out of thin air for the sake of anonymity.

  “But you won’t use it,” he said. “You’ll call me ‘Sir’.”

  Kay started to ask if he was kidding, but his implacable expression turned her mute. She tried to remember when she’d last had occasion to call someone “Sir” and drew a blank. She said, “I don’t mind knowing last names.”

  His features tightened. “I’m not going to let you into my life. And I don’t want any part of yours.”

  She felt like she’d been punched in the chest. “Why?”

  “This subject is closed.” Something dark passed behind his eyes, something with fangs that gave him no rest. Then he blinked and she wondered if she’d imagined what she’d seen in that brief instant—the pain, the emotional exhaustion.

  John stripped her of the shredded T-shirt, leaving her completely nude. Then he set her from his lap and rose. “I have to make a couple of calls. Business. Go to my bedroom and wait for me there.”

  Sh
e started to leave and he barked her name. She turned to face him.

  He said, “I expect a proper response when I give you an order.”

  She experienced a moment of panic. “Yes…Sir.”

  That appeared to satisfy him. He jerked his head. “Go.”

  Kay was exquisitely conscious of her nakedness as she climbed the stairs and reentered the master bedroom. She’d never been with a man like John, a man determined to dominate. He knew what he wanted and was accustomed to getting it, certainly in bed and probably in his work and social lives as well. She’d been unprepared for her own response to his take-charge attitude, her helpless arousal.

  I can leave anytime, she reminded herself. All she had to do was mention Felicia—the most comforting presence in her humdrum life.

  She peed and washed up, eyeing the burgundy terry robe that hung from a hook on the bathroom door. She lifted it from the hook. It was heavier than she’d expected. An embroidered monogram caught her eye—JRP in a blocky diamond pattern. The large central R obviously stood for his last name. The J made her think he might not have fibbed about his first name after all. She slipped her arms into the robe and tied it closed, enveloping herself in its cozy warmth and in the scent of him, the heady aroma of the man himself mingled with the now-familiar aftershave.

  She sat on the bed and waited, her excitement spiking higher with each minute that passed. The bedroom door was open and she heard the deep rumble of his voice downstairs as he spoke on the phone. She couldn’t make out words but recognized the measured tones of a man talking business. Then a clipped, cordial sign-off.

  Kay’s pulse skittered. She pulled the collar of the robe over her nose and inhaled deeply. The scent of him was both an aphrodisiac and a comfort. She let out her breath slowly, straining her ears, listening for the sound of his footfalls.

  His voice drifted up the stairs again. He was on another call! Kay groaned, certain her heart would give out before he finally joined her. She couldn’t take the stress of anticipation. She shot to her feet and padded out of the bedroom, listening for a moment at the top of the stairs. “Precedent.” Blah blah blah. “Motion.” Had he forgotten she was up here?