Page 80 of The Cartographer

Prowling around him while I think is its own torture. For him. Not for me. I could do this all day. The way his muscles shape his body, the gorgeous crest of a shoulder, the flawless curve of his ass, how the dim light reflects off his skin. I reach out a hand, skate a finger from the rise of one shoulder up to the nape of his neck and then back down to the other shoulder.

“I’m going to hurt you, Hart.”

“Yes, sir.”

“What are your plans for the next few days?”

“I’m going to be watching the kids while Kendra’s at school, and apartment hunting, sir.”

Good to know. They’ll be climbing all over him, asking to be picked up, generally treating him like an animate jungle gym. I don’t want him wincing away from the children.

Something temporary but excruciating it is.

“Stay,” I tell him and stride out the door, breaking into a lope when I know he won’t be able to hear my footfalls anymore. Sure, I want to torture him, but I’m torturing myself at the same time and that won’t do. I want him now. I want him an hour ago.

He glances at me when I come back through the door. If we’d done more work, I’d chastise him. Things being as they are, and how they will be, I don’t bother. We’re both humming with adrenaline, and I can excuse this small faux pas. This time. Someone else can beat the impulse out of him.

I lay the case on the bed, and his eyes zero in on it. It looks like one of those metal cases hitmen carry in movies or perhaps the nuclear code some poor schmo has cuffed to his wrist. The tools of my trade are slightly different but no less powerful for that.

Hart stares at me while I remove item after item from the case. Most of them I won’t use on him, but he doesn’t need to know that. The intensity of his gaze is heady, and I can practically hear the questions he’s beating back.What is all that stuff? What are you going to do to me? How are you going to make me feel?

I take it as a compliment of the highest order that he doesn’t seem afraid, only curious, and I lay out the items in an order designed to interest, not terrify. A glass globe, a fixture that looks vaguely like a flogger made of tinsel or perhaps a limp pompom, an innocent-seeming length of tubing, a small rake, and a length of rope.

He looks perplexed but not anxious as he stands there, his hands resting at his sides while his cock…well, his cock is doing anything but relaxing, despite his uncertainty. He’s marvelous.

So I take the last bits I’ll need out of the kit—the base and the cords—and that’s when his eyes widen. Yes, what had looked like relatively innocent articles now look more threatening, the tools of a mad scientist. I take up the base and go to the wall, finding a conveniently placed outlet. I’ve never actually used this in here, and for a second I get stuck on that. Why am I doing so now?

That’s not the point. The point is I have this striking man at my disposal, and I’m going to make good use of him, oh yes, I am. So I trail back to him, hefting the base in my hand and enjoying the way his gaze stays glued to me, the way he’s trying to decipher what the fuck it is I’m going to do. The velocity at which thoughts are racing through his brain is almost palpable. I can feel his amplified attention, and it’s lovely. If only everyone I worked with telegraphed their feelings as clearly as Allie, I’d have a simple job indeed.

Turning the piece of equipment over and over in my hands—as if I hadn’t been demonstrating this the other day, as if I weren’t a goddamn expert in its applications and didn’t have twenty other attachments downstairs—I delight in the way I get him, finally, to shift his weight to one foot and then back again.

So satisfying to have unnerved him.

I pick up the globe and affix it to the base, knowing it’s showy as fuck but its bark is far worse than its bite. Or can be at any rate. I want to make Hart howl.

Plugging the thing in and fiddling with the dials more than strictly necessary, the smell in the air changes. Such a strange thing to notice, but there’s a distinct acridness to the scent of him now. A whiff of fear no one else would notice, but I do. It makes my mouth water. That hint of distress confirms exactly how much power I have over him—it’s not a small amount. I control the very composition of his sweat, and it makes me want to lick him. But not yet, not yet. After I have him glistening with it and crying out, that’s when I’ll taste it, when I’ll allow myself that small and delectable pleasure.

Without having to look at him, I know he’s focused on my every move and take advantage to stun him. Flipping the switch and pressing down on the pedal on the floor, the globe lights up a fiery violet, and Allie’s eyes spring open.

“What the ever-loving—”

“Violet wand,” I say, not appearing to pay much attention to him when, in fact, every ounce of me that’s not focused on the safe operation of the machinery is directed at him. “Thought this would be a fun way to torment you this evening.”

Oh yes, another shift of his weight and a tightening of his muscles.

“It looks quite threatening, doesn’t it?”

He responds to my musing with only a grunt I read as a reluctant agreement. That’s when I allow my gaze to trail up his body to his face, plastering a smirk on my own countenance. God, he’s fun to toy with.

“Don’t worry, Hart. I’m not going to hurt you…too much.”

He’s practically vibrating now, and I decide he’s had enough anticipation. I want him to still feel it upon my approach. I don’t want him so frustrated he’s aching to get it over with. Boredom and annoyance aren’t useful to me.

“You don’t have metal in your body, right? No piercings, no replaced joints? No pacemaker or anything of the sort?”

His eyes don’t leave the wand as he answers. “No, sir.”

As much as I can appreciate he’s preoccupied, this is important. Really, really important, so I snap, calling his attention to my face. Hopefully my stern expression and my bitten-off words will convey the import of this information.

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