"You bet your gorgeous ass." He took her to the back stairs, pushed her gently ahead of him, even as he muttered, "And I want to see you work that all the way up to your room."
She glanced over her shoulder at him, and he didn't want the ponytail. He caught her around the waist, holding her there with the chaps and whip slung over his shoulder so he could pull the tie free, comb his fingers through her loose hair, see how it framed her profile. He buried his nose in the thick strands, pressed his cock up against the lower curve of her ass.
"I could fuck you right here, on all fours."
"Why don't you?" she whispered, and there was something in her blue gaze that challenged him.
His resolve faltered, something out of sync, but a surge of testosterone shoved it away.
"Walk," he ordered.
She smiled then and did just that, proceeding up the stairs and working that denim molded over her buttocks to the point his dick could have used a lot more breathing room. Or maybe not. He just wanted to sink it into her tight, wet pussy.
As the door to the apartment closed behind them, he dropped the whip and chaps on the floor, grabbed her waist and turned her so she faced him. Wrapping his fingers around her wrists, he pressed her against the wall. Her breath caressed his face as he lowered his head and captured her lips in a hot, hungry kiss. He invaded her mouth with a hard thrust, the delicious taste of her bursting on his tongue like heavenly elixir. He sucked, he glided, he drank, the heady flavor going straight to his head and his groin.
When he had fed to excess, when he was at the point of taking her up against the wall, he forced himself to step back. He lifted her in his arms, realizing how much he'd wanted to do that again, though just like last night he was surprised to find she was heavier than she looked. Nothing he couldn't handle, but what looked like maybe one hundred ten pounds had more density to it. Like the woman herself.
Placing her on the bed, he closed his hand around the fragile bones of her wrist, bemused. But he had more pressing things to do than contemplate that. Trailing his mouth along the line of her jaw and down her neck, he placed tiny nips on her skin here and there, soothing them with his tongue.
Yeah, she liked that. Particularly when he was nipping at her neck pulse, biting her. Those blue eyes honed in on him, and her lips parted. For the first time he saw the tips of her fangs, rather than just feeling them. Maybe they were filed teeth, whatever. He wasn't into any of that body modification stuff, but on her...hell, anything about her got him hot, apparently.
Her skin was like the petals of a flower, but sweet as vanilla to the tongue. He wanted to lick her all over, every inch of her. Plunge his tongue into her cunt and lap every bit of her incredible juice. Drive his cock into her, burying himself to the balls, feel the clasp of her pussy around him like a wet vise.
He yanked at her t-shirt, tugging it upward so he could find a breast and pinch the bud of her nipple between thumb and forefinger. He wanted--
Jesus. This was all wrong.
He wanted what they had the night before. As hot and aroused as he was now, it was nothing compared to the peak of excitement he'd reached then. It was like the first time he'd made love to a woman the way a man should, versus breaking his cherry in the hormone rush of being a teenager, quick and over in an instant. Yeah, he'd gotten off in both cases, but there was no comparison to the quality, the lasting value of the one experience versus the other.
As the thought stabbed into his barely functioning brain, another followed. He was not in control here, not in the least. Good Christ. What made him think that was even a possibility? Selene was permitting him to exert his power. Allowing him to do as he wished. Proving it, he realized he was staring into her eyes, his chest rising and falling fast, but other than that, he'd gone still as a stone. Waiting.
Last night, doing her bidding, he hadn't felt trapped. When he gave her the reins, she had made him feel as if he was giving her a precious gift, as well as freeing himself. That was what had heated his blood and made his cock swell to painful proportions.
He pushed himself back and sat on his haunches, his legs still straddling hers as he studied her eyes. Watched her face. Waiting for instructions?
Selene made no attempt to rearrange her clothing. He might have thought none of this had affected her, except for the rapid beating of her pulse at the base of her throat and the flush that suffused her pale skin.
"Are you through with your little charade yet?" A laugh bubbled up from her throat, a sound that eased his sense of wrongness in an instant, the trapped feeling. "Had as much fun as you want?"
His mouth was so dry he had to swallow twice before finding enough moisture to speak. Male pride meant he wouldn't answer the first question, but he responded to the second one without hesitation.
"Not yet," he said.
"Get up," she ordered. "Strip off every bit of your clothing. Now," she added when he hesitated.
With his gaze still on her, he left the bed, toed off his boots and pulled off his clothing, tossing it to the floor.
"Put on the chaps." Her voice stayed low, but there was no mistaking the power in it.
Quinn eased the leather onto his body, making sure he didn't catch any of his pubic hair in the edges or trap his cock in an uncomfortable position. When he fastened the single button at the top he let his arms fall to his sides and waited for what came next.
Selene slipped from the bed and walked around him, her eyes darkening as they coursed over his almost naked body. She trailed her fingers against the taut muscles of his buttocks, letting the tips trace the crevice separating the cheeks. When he clenched his ass to hold her there, she pulled her hand away and gave him a light slap.
"Do you want my fingers in there, cowboy?" she teased. "Touching that tender skin? Probing the darkest opening of your body?"
"Yes." The word escaped from his mouth as if on its own.
"Perhaps if you are a very good boy I might give you a treat." She bent, holding her hair back with one hand to press her lips to first one cheek then the other. "But you must be very, very good."
When she was standing in front of him again he saw that she had the single-tail whip in one hand, caressing the leather of the handle with the other. The tip of her tongue touched her pink lower lip, moistening it in a way that made him think of her pussy. Her eyes took in every bit of his body as if she was devouring him, resting for long moments on his penis protruding thick and heavy from the chaps.
"The whip handled properly is a valuable instrument of pleasure." She made the statement as if she were telling him how fine a particular liquor would taste. "Turn around and place your hands on the wall."
His heart rate accelerated, and his feet seemed stuck to the floor. Selene's smile this time was hungry. "Do you trust me, Quinn?"
Did he? Fucking damn, he must to get himself in this position so willingly.
"I'll take your silence as a yes. So do as I say. Hands against the wall."
His palms were sweating as he pressed them against the wood. His pulse pounded so hard he could hear the roar of blood in his ears.
"No safeword discussion?" he ventured.
"There's nothing safe about playing with a vampire."
He heard the hiss and crack of the whip. His whole body tensed against the strike, jolting to register pain.
But nothing had touched him.
"The sound itself is quite arousing," Selene said. "When you hear it, the tail is only contacting air. When you use the whip on your cattle do you always hear that crisp noise?"
He shook his head. "No."
"Right. Because most often it's the whip splitting the air that catches their attention and urges them to do your bidding. So remember, the sharper the sound, the farther away from your body it lands."
Quinn drew in a deep breath and let it out. His testicles throbbed in cadence with his pulse and he knew pre-cum was dripping from his cock. Anticipation had never been so arousing, especially for something he had neve
r experienced before.
Twice more she split the air with the whip, but then he felt a sting on one of his buttocks like a small pinch. His muscles tightened and heat roared through his body. Again he felt the kiss of the whip, applied with the same intensity. Any pain was immediately replaced by a rush of endorphins that fed his burgeoning lust.
He anticipated the next bite but when nothing came a groan rumbled up from his throat.
"There." He could hear her smile in her voice. "See that, cowboy? Just a tiny taste and already you want more." She ran her fingers over the spots where the whip had landed. "Small kisses bring small pain. We don't want to rush things, do we?"
Yes. Yes, we do.
He ground his teeth together, shocked at the explosion of desire both his situation and the whip itself provoked.
"I see you disagree. Let's move it along a little, shall we?"
Before he could prepare himself, the lash bit into him again, harder this time, the sting greater, the burn hotter. Selene was silent as she gave him a series of four strikes. Adrenaline surged through him, mingling with the rush of endorphins. The surroundings faded away until all he was aware of was the needle bite of the whip and the insane pleasure it brought. When she stopped, the pain was so stimulating he wanted to beg her to keep going, unbelievable need consuming him.
"The pain gets overridden by intense pleasure, doesn't it? My cruelty unlocks things inside you. Things you need, Quinn. I love watching it happen. Turn around, cowboy. See what I'm talking about."
No more whip?
Flummoxed by the truth of her words, he wanted to protest them, but his mouth couldn't seem to form the words. Facing her, the combination of hunger and pleasure in her eyes nearly did him in. Without touching her, he had aroused her to a need almost as great as his own.
She had removed her own clothing and stood naked before him, her nipples darkened to the color of an heirloom rose. She held the whip curled loosely in one hand and with the other she ran her fingers between the lips of her cunt. When she lifted them they were glistening with her juices. She moved forward and painted his lips with the liquid.
"See how you affect me when you do my bidding?"
His nostrils flared as the scent drifted up to him.
"Lick your lips, bronc. Taste me. If you are very, very good I will let you fuck me with your tongue." She took a step closer, her next words whispered. "And your cock. But only after I show you how intense the pleasure of the whip can be. I want to drive you to the point where you're entirely under my control." Pressing a hand against his chest, she held him place as she dipped her head, licked one of his nipples, causing him to shudder. Her hand slipped up, collared his throat, squeezed. "Let's see how high a level we can take you." She licked the other nipple. "Trust me to know just how far to go this first time. Tell me you understand."
"Yeah. Yes. God, yes."
She lifted her head, her hair brushing his flesh. "Did you make yourself come since you saw me last?"
"Couldn't help it. Woke up with a hard-on so bad I couldn't have ridden my horse without scaring him."
Her lips curved. "Far be it from me to traumatize your horse. But we're going to set a few rules going forward. You want to masturbate when you're not with me, you have to call me. I want to listen to you do it. If I don't answer, you do it for my voicemail. I want to hear every dirty thought going through your head as you're doing it." Her voice dropped to a whisper as she rose on her toes, nuzzled his throat, pricked him with one of those filed teeth of hers. Funny, though, they hadn't seemed so prominent when she was working the bar, flashing that mesmerizing smile of hers. "So I can listen to your voice later when I'm masturbating," she said.
"What if I want you to call me when you do that?"
"Tough. You can just imagine it, until we're together. When you're good, I might occasionally let you watch. You understand me, Quinn? If you need to jerk off ten times a day, you'll call me ten times a day. But if you call and I say no, you'll just have to figure out how to help your horse cope. Your climax belongs to me, every drop."
He swallowed as those fangs pricked him again. "You're hungry," he muttered, cupping the back of her head. "Do what you gotta do."
He couldn't explain what the hell he was doing, playing into whatever delusion she had about that, but he had a burning need for her to nourish herself from him. She stilled at his comment, her fingers spreading across his chest, lingering there before she pushed away.
"Maybe later. You're not a marked servant, and I want you to conserve your energy. For now, I have other hungers to satisfy."
He blinked, not sure what to say to that, but she wasn't in the mood to explain herself.
"Stay just like that." She paced back again, slid the whip through her fingers. "Another night, I'll tie you up tight, and make you watch the lash come at your front. Let it kiss your thighs, your ball sac, your nipples. You'll come from the pain and my command alone. Would you like that?"
"Yes."
She cupped her breast, ran the whip handle down her body and then, mother of God, it disappeared inside her. She hummed, dropped her head back on her shoulders, rotated her hips with the movement, her thumb sliding over her swollen clit.
"I can do that for you," he said hoarsely.
She cracked open an eye, a lock of blonde hair falling over her blue eye. "Better than the handle?"
"Hell yes."
"Hell yes, what?"
"Yes...ma'am."
"Nice. I don't always need that, but I do love the way you say it, cowboy." She drew the handle out, touched her lips to it. "I expect you'll have to oil and clean that now, but you'll remember where it's been." She set it aside and sauntered toward him. He fisted his hands at his sides.
"On your knees, wonderful man."
He sank there, his head tilted up to watch her approach. As she stepped in front of him, she reached out, stroked his hair back. He closed his eyes and didn't think he'd ever felt so aroused...or at peace, under that oddly soothing touch.
"You've worked so hard for what you want, Quinn. I listen to people, and I know they respect you, look to you as a leader in this community. Your opinion counts, because you've earned it. But you have no woman, no family close by. Don't even seem to really have many close friends. Why is that, Quinn? Why do you prefer your silent pastures to being around your own kind? Keep your eyes closed. Tell me in the darkness. It's easier that way."
He wasn't sure anything would make it easier, but he kept his eyes closed. "Why do you need to know?" he asked, fighting the tense weight in his chest trying to disrupt the moment.
Fortunately, she continued to stroke him. By keeping his eyes closed he felt he was back in that erotic dream state from this morning, her voice like a ribbon of silk weaving around him.
"You're not a man who talks about his emotions. I like those traditional qualities to you. You're a man's man, Quinn. But to do this right, I need to know the emotional makeup below the surface. Why you do certain things and how it will affect what goes on between us. So I'll push to get to the root of who you are." Her voice took on an edgy purr. "I can be gentle about that, or not-so-gentle. Because it's to give us both pleasure. But I want truth from you, always. Tell me."
God help him, his mouth was already opening to let the words spill out, as if the stroke of her hand was a sorceress's compulsion.
"I'm not sure I can make you understand," he began. "When I was growing up we lived in the foreman's house on the ranch where my dad worked. Our home was the noisiest place in the world. At least it felt that way to me. There were four of us, all boys, and I was the youngest. I was kind of an accident, so my next oldest brother was about eight years older than me. We never really connected as siblings. We barely even keep in touch with each other."
"I'm sorry. That must make you sad sometimes." Her voice was a calming caress.
"I got used to it. If someone wanted to be heard, shouting was the only answer. Then there were the hands, just as wild and no
isy as we were. There was no place to get away from it. I think I was the only one in the family who ever found it...jarring. Distressing. Privacy was nonexistent. Everyone was in your business all the time."
"I can understand that." Her voice was edged with hidden meaning.
"My dad was a hard man. He raised us the way he'd been brought up, with a lot of shouting and a good strapping with a belt when we misbehaved. It seemed a day hardly passed without one of us feeling the leather on our backsides." He shook his head as if to clear it. The ranch had always been a maelstrom of sound, exploding around him with the force of a tornado. "I felt, I don't know, I guess you'd say I got lost in it all. And Dad and I just never saw eye to eye on anything. We were always at each other's throats when I was a teen. It came to blows a couple times, made my mother cry over both of us, because we couldn't get along."
"Oh Quinn." But her tone stayed low, as if raising it beyond a certain level would fracture his thoughts.
"I'm not sure how my mom ever stood it. She was an amazing woman, and the only one who could keep order. Who could make my dad shake in his boots."
Selene's lips curved in a knowing smile. "I think I would have liked her."
"Yes. You probably would."
"But then you left home," she prompted.
"Yeah, to try to be something more than part of a crowd. Only being on the rodeo circuit wasn't any different. The only thing that changed was the geography. All that shouting and screaming. The noise of the animals and the competitors just invaded your head and swelled in your brain. The ever-present crowds. For a long time I never had the money to stay in a motel so I slept in my truck. Let me tell you, that's no place to get away from the constant sounds of the rodeo."
He paused and let out a slow breath. A muscle ticked just beneath his left eye. "You say my kind. I don't even know what my kind is. I just know the silence of the land, even with the cattle, is the first peace I've known in my life. It's like being in a healing place."
She stroked her slim fingers over his forehead. "Peace can be found in many ways. Perhaps giving control to me, allowing me to lead this dance, will be a kind of peace for you. A place where you don't always have to call the shots. Where you can just be. Will that work for you, Quinn?"