No Good Deed - Marie Sexton Page 0,20

he didn’t want to make Charlie self-conscious. He didn’t want to do anything that might cause Charlie to change his mind. Instead, Jonas clung to him, kissing him, pushing as close as he could get. He loved Charlie’s body. He wanted nothing more than to be skin-to-skin with him.

Their one night together had been all Jonas’s doing. Not that Charlie had ever said no, but he certainly hadn’t been playing the Dom back then. Jonas had started it. Jonas had pushed for it. It was Jonas who pulled Charlie into the bedroom and started undoing his pants. He’d been so desperate to feel some kind of tenderness. Sex with Gray in those last few months had become nothing more than a transaction—one that left Jonas with his back stinging from the crop and his heart empty. Jonas could have been anybody in those final months. Gray loved doling out pain—maybe loved it more than the sex itself—and Jonas had been a person who allowed it, but there was no fondness between them. No sweet caresses or soft words. Just pain, and the feeling afterward of having been used. Gray might as well have masturbated onto a soiled tissue for all the affection he showed Jonas.

But Charlie had whispered sweet things in Jonas’s ear. Charlie had lovingly touched every bit of him, telling him how many times he’d dreamed of making love to him. Charlie had told him that he was special. That he mattered. It was as if each touch, each word, each slow, exquisite thrust had given Jonas back some lost bit of himself. Somehow in that one night, Charlie had taken all the broken pieces of Jonas and put them back together into something resembling a human being again.

Now, Jonas wanted to give every bit of that reassurance back. Charlie was worried about his weight, but Jonas loved everything about Charlie, including his size. He loved how warm and solid he was. He loved the strength of Charlie’s hands as they dug into Jonas’s hair, and the roughness of his beard as he attacked Jonas’s neck. He loved the way Charlie seemed to perfectly navigate the line between gentleness and force, between being a partner and being a Dom.

Jonas unzipped Charlie’s pants and slipped his hand inside. Charlie moaned as Jonas wrapped his fingers around Charlie’s erection. He grabbed Jonas’s wrist, pulling it away from his cock.

“Oh my God,” Jonas groaned. “Please don’t tell me you’re changing your mind again.”

“I’m not. Just debating how I want this to go.”

He grabbed Jonas’s other wrist too and pinned his hands behind his back, squeezing hard enough to elicit a gasp. Pain didn’t necessarily turn Jonas on, but the show of force left him breathless.

“I told you that I left the scene when I went to Seattle, right? Six straight years with nothing but plain old vanilla sex.”

Charlie pulled back enough to meet his eyes. “You trying to tell me you’re not into this anymore?”

Jonas grinned. “No. I’m trying to tell you I’m really fucking sick of vanilla.”

Charlie laughed. “Guess you’re in the right place, then.”

He kissed Jonas again as he pulled him into the bedroom and removed Jonas’s shirt.

“You too,” Jonas said.

Charlie hesitated, a flicker of doubt shadowing his eyes.

Jonas slid his hands under Charlie’s shirt. “You’re gorgeous to me,” he told him. “Trust me. Seeing you without your shirt isn’t going to change my mind.”

Charlie sighed and pulled his shirt off, although he turned away as he did it. He went to the armoire in the corner. From the top drawer, he took a length of silky, white rope.

Jonas watched him, breathless with anticipation. Charlie looked amazing, the very picture of masculinity—tattoos on his strong arms, thick, black hair covering his chest and most of his stomach, an alluring bulge in his pants, and that white rope in his big hands. Just looking at him made Jonas’s knees wobbly.

“You know the drill,” Charlie said. “You can always tell me to stop.”

Jonas grinned. “We have to start before I’d need you to stop.”

Charlie laughed. “Hold out your hands.”

Jonas complied, and Charlie wound the rope around and around his wrists. It only took a few seconds—Charlie obviously had the technique down. It wasn’t tight enough to hurt, but an exploratory tug told Jonas he’d never get free on his own.

“What’s your word?”

Jonas’s mind went blank. He hadn’t had to worry about a safe word since Gray, and somehow using that safe word seemed wrong on every level. He didn’t want anything