Page 63 of Please, Sir

“How do you feel?” he asks, still thick and weighty inside me. Basking in the glow of what we just did together, I don’t even want to move. Hell, I barely want to answer. What if this is some fated, beautiful spell I’m under and answering will break it?

His hands swim down my legs, coming to grip my hips gently. He guides me up the bed at the same time he pulls out, and when he’s finally not filling me, a burning sensation spreads through my groin.

Jake presses a hand towel there, immediately easing the sting.

“I’m okay,” I breathe, my voice coming out faint, almost small. That’s not how I feel, though. I feel incredible, the way a hit of drugs must feel, the way breaking the tape at the final race must feel. I feel like I’ve won, that submitting to Jake proved to us both that I am strong and capable. But his glassy eyes have me wondering if I ever had to prove that to anyone but myself.

“Okay?” he repeats.

I shake my head as he massages my lower abdomen, which feels heavenly after so much internal stretching. “More than that, I just… I don’t know. I don’t want to sound like too much.”

His hands halt movement, and his gaze narrows. “Too much?”

I move to sit up on the bed, to have a conversation with him where I can do more than stare with drool on my chin and hearts in my damn eyes. But he doesn’t allow me. Faster than I can move, Jake snakes an arm beneath me, moving me up to rest against the headboard as he crawls after me,eventually coming to sit by my side. Hip to hip, our heads turned to face each other, Jake’s gaze anchors me as he fits our hands together, grabbing me tightly. “Talk to me.”

CHAPTER

TWENTY-FOUR

Her hand fitsagainst mine with ease, like it belongs there. But that’s how it all feels with Riley. I got no business saying that, seeing as how this is our first date and we haven’t known each other that long. If I don’t say it, it doesn’t change that it’s true. But her eyes are heavy with unspoken cares and concerns, all of which I want to hear and help solve. I wanted to before we had sex, but I want to even more now.

I questioned if she’d bail when I showed hermy cabinet full of things I’ve made. I even started to concoct some version of the truth to use on Jo Jo if this all trickled out. Small towns are like that.

But Riley Rivers is a natural submissive to my born dominance. She’s comfortable being that way, and embracing that lifestyle. I hear it in her words and I feel it in her body, the way she melts for me, waits for me, desires me.

It’s the exact thing I wanted to feel, wondered if it was real, and longed for while making these toys. So many long lost and ignored urges pent up inside after what feels like a lifetime of solitude. Being a single father who does not date isn’t for the faint of heart. Loneliness penetrates even the biggest of muscles.

I had to simmer and stew over all the desires that pooled in my veins, knowing I wouldn’t be able to explore or exercise any of it for years. I always said I’d never date when Jo Jo was a kid. I didn’t want the instability for her. And eventually that stuck.

My urges, my desires, and my deepest needs as a man who enjoys pain and power exchange—they grew. They took form inside me, and I think they drove me to Riley in some way. I almost have to believe that because the idea of meeting a gorgeous woman who loves my daughter and wants to give herself over to me–that sounds too good to be anything but divine. Fate. God at work.

After a few minutes of silence, where I stroke my fingers along her palm and give her time to think, she sighs.

“Thank you for, you know, just letting me think for a second.”

“I’ve got nowhere to be,” I tell her, and then when I think of actually having to be somewhere else, my body tenses. How can her being here feel so natural so soon? Not even her being here but her and I.

“That was incredible. That was, I don’t know,” she admits, twisting to look up at me again. “It felt like…” She presses her hands to her lower belly, shaking her head slowly, as if she still can’t explain it, but my gut burns because I know exactly what she’s feeling. I feel it, too. “Doing and behaving exactly how I feel. Literally not allowing myself to think what if, or, I don’t know, put up any barriers between exactly what I want and getting it.” Her eyes swim, searching mine before she adds, “I wanted you to inflict pain. To use me. To make me feel pain and pleasure all at once. I wanted that in a way that I didn’t even realize existed until I met you—and it’s easy. So, when you asked me if I was okay, I didn’t wanna sayoh, hey, that was actually what I’ve been unknowingly searching for my whole lifebecause that’s… not what men want to hear on the first date.”

At those words, and at the adorable way she nervously bumbles through them, I laugh. “No, it’s probably not.” My laughter subsides. “But I like hearing it, even now, just retrospectively.”

Her smile slips into something more serious, and I take a moment to appreciate her effortless beauty.

“You’re the first person I used those with or… did that with,” I admit.

She lifts a hand, stroking her fingers along my scalp. A tingle runs down my spine, giving way to tightness in my groin. “You told me that, remember?”

My eyes fall to her lips, but I refrain from kissing her so that we can talk. “Yeah,” I remember, “I did. All I mean to say is, you’re the first woman—first since Janie. Period.”

She stills her hand, and her eyes intensely hold mine. “What? Seriously? No one-night stands in ten years? No sex for ten years?”

I shake my head, confirming my ten years of celibacy.

Her eyes open wide. “No way.”

I shake my head. “I wouldn’t lie about that.” I shrug. “I didn’t want to welcome instability into Jo Jo’s life, so I never dated. I never wanted to sleep with someone just for one night, so I didn’t sleep with anyone. Until you.”

“You’re the hottest and most fuckable cowboy in Bluebell,” she says, breaking into soft laughter halfway through.

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