my knees in front of him, but I don’t bow my head. I stare up at him defiantly.
“What will it take?” I shake my head, beseeching as a terrible thought strikes me. “Or was it never about that? It doesn’t matter how much I change or open up? You never meant to do the same. To bend for me or meet me in the middle.”
I choke out the next words. “You only ever meant to break me and then leave me that way.”
He lets out a roar that echoes off the stone walls. “No! Never!”
And then, to my shock, he pushes the chair back and drops down to his knees, right in front of me and his hands are on my face and his lips are on my lips. They aren’t gentle. They aren’t kind.
His lips crush mine. Begging. Punishing.
For once, for once, my hands aren’t tied down. And I want to tear off that fucking mask he uses to keep as the last barrier between us. I want to, so badly.
But I’ve just been telling him he can trust me. So I won’t prove otherwise the first chance I get. Instead, I wrap my arms around his neck, so close to the elastic tie of his mask but not touching it. His breath catches. Does he realize? Does he finally realize all I have given and would give for him?
His hands are on my wrists the next second like always, though, clasping them both in his huge grip. In one swift motion, he flips us so that I’m on my back on the sumptuous rug, the fire burning bright and warm beside us.
My naked nipples pebble in the chill air even as the warmth from the flames dances over my skin. My back arches into his touch as he runs a hand down between the valley of my breasts and my sex clenches in anticipation.
“Let me see you,” I gasp, wriggling to get free of his grasp. Because while he let me feel him yesterday, he was zipped up before I could even look over my shoulder at him. He never lets me see anything, know anything about him. And I can’t stand it anymore. I need something from him. I need him to give an inch even if I really want a mile.
A rumbling growl of dissent starts in his throat but I shake my head. “Just your clothes, I mean. I want to see you.” What he’ll let me see, anyway. But I’m starting to hope this is a process, in spite of what I said a few minutes ago. Maybe because I’m just fooling myself?
Or maybe because I hope, in spite of himself, he has bent for me. I’m not sure what he intended when he first brought me here, but from the vulnerability I now glimpse in his eyes, I suspect this isn’t it.
He’s been so tender and caring. And commanding and dominant. Obviously, there’s been plenty of that, too.
But even now as he hovers over me, my hands held solidly in place, his strong thigh between mine in a way that drives me crazy, I’ve never felt more free. He’s introduced me to myself these past days. I was only living half a life and I couldn’t even see it. It was a rude awakening, that was for damn sure, but would I go back to being asleep?
Especially when being awake means I get to be with him?
No. Not for anything in the world.
“I want to see you,” I say more quietly, even as I wriggle against his thigh.
He cracks a small smile. “You want to see my body?”
“Gods, yes.” It’s all but a groan as he tweaks my raw right nipple, and then the left. They’re still so tender but the memory of earlier and the brief twinge of pain has my sex lighting right back up again.
He arches an eyebrow. “Only good girls get treats. Can you leave your hands where they are? One twitch and this little experiment ends.”
I nod fervently. “I promise. I won’t move an inch.”
He caresses a hand down and teases between the lips of my sex, and then he circles my clit with his glistening fingertip. I arch so violently at the first spike of pleasure. He immediately pulls his hand away and waves his finger in my face. “Ah ah ah, don’t make promises you can’t keep.”
I can smell my own scent on his hand, and even after all we’ve done together, I still feel my