Page 79 of Fierce

Pushing the Limits

I’d tell you what I ate for dinner, but I don’t remember. I don’t remember what we talked about, either. I only know that the wine was, as usual, at some other, more elevated level than anything I’d drunk in my past life. And that every sip of wine, every glance from Hemi’s dark eyes only made me melt a little more, grip my napkin a little more tightly under the table, and wriggle a little more on the banquette while he watched me do it.

Surely, though, restaurants of this quality didn’t serve dinner this quickly. It couldn’t even have been an hour before Hemi was saying, “Would you care for a sweet?”

“No,” I said, gratefully abandoning the pretense that I was interested in my meal. “Thank you.”

“Ready to go, then?”

I scowled at him. Teasing this much was totally unfair. “You know I am.”

I got his hint of a smile again for that. “Right.”

He raised a hand for the check, slipped his credit card immediately into the folder, and had it back within a minute, during which time he was thumbing his phone. And then he was finally leading me outside, and Charles was there to open the car door.

The second we were in the car, after checking that the window between us and Charles was still up, I said, “Do not even think about it. We’re not doing anything else until we can finish.”

“Want to finish, do you? How many times?”

“How...many...times?”

“This seems like a good night to find out what you’re capable of, don’t you think?” He tucked my hair behind my ear, his touch oddly tender. “You going to count, or shall I?”

“If we do that,” I said, doing my feeble best to keep some control over the situation, “you could be holding out for hours. Do you really think you’re capable of that?”

“Not if I make you take care of me first,” he said, and took my breath away. “Here we are.”

One of the grand historic apartment buildings on Central Park West, I registered fuzzily as a doorman held the door for us, as Hemi nodded to the man behind the security desk and led me to an elevator bank, his hand once again on my lower back, burning straight through my clothes. And that was all I noticed, because I was past caring.

He didn’t grab me in the elevator this time. He waited, unspeaking, while my pulse raced along with the floor indicator. I wanted to say something else, to ask, but I couldn’t think what.

When he opened the door to his apartment, I barely saw it. It was big, more like a house, furnished with more of those stark lines in contrast to the historic architecture. Modern furniture, black and white, plenty of leather, with splashes of accent color in walls and accessories. But I didn’t take that in, either, because Hemi had my coat and his own jacket off, had tossed them onto a couch, and was leading me by the hand into a master bedroom dominated by a massive low bed.

“Got anything you need to do,” he said, turning to me, “before I tie you to my bed?”

The rush of heat was so strong, I could feel the flush rising all the way into my face. “No.”

“Good.” He pulled out a drawer and took out some things I recognized, including the same red ties.

“I’d love to take my time undressing you tonight,” he told me. “But I want to see you on your knees in those undies even more.” He’d stepped forward, was sliding his hands under the hem of my sweater, and I sucked in a breath at the feeling of hard hands against bare skin. And then he’d pulled the sweater over my head, tossed it onto the bench at the foot of the bed, and was reaching for the zipper of my skirt and pulling it down.

“Oh, yeh,” he said when I’d kicked my way out of the skirt. “I was right. I’m going to enjoy watching you in those.”

I’d never been anything close to voluptuous. I’d always been too short, too small-boned, my curves too subtle for that. But his words, his touch, his hungry eyes made me feel that way.

He lifted my left hand, wrapped the ribbon around it three times, and tied the other end to the bedpost, and there was that surge again, making my knees wobble.

“Now you can’t get away,” he said. “But you can still take off your shoes, and you can get on your knees, too. And you’re going to do it right now. Show me you remember what I taught you before. Give me a chance to take care of you the way you need it, because I’m going to be doing everything to you tonight.”

I looked him in the eye, bent and took off my shoes, set them next to the bed, and lowered myself slowly to my knees. And then I looked up at him. “Sure you can take it?”

“Oh,” he said, “I think so.”

“Hmm. I can tease, too, you know.” I had my hand on his belt buckle, and I ran my fingers over the leather, all the way to the edge of the leather tongue and back. “You might not want to make me so mad next time. No telling what I’ll do.”

“Pretty saucy,” he said, “for a girl who’s on her knees.” But he didn’t sound quite as in control as he had a few moments ago.

“If I do anything you don’t like, you can take it out of me later, how’s that?” I pulled the tongue free of the buckle and rested my hand on the button of his gray woolen trousers, and couldn’t help the secret little smile of satisfaction at the bulge I wasn’t touching.

---