“You are. Take the shirt off.” I plant a quick kiss on her forehead and back away. “And pull down your bra.”
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
Rae
ISCRAMBLE TO OBEY. Not because I want to, but because I have no choice. This isn’t about what I want. It’s what I must do. The simplicity of it satisfies in ways I’d never imagined.
As if the look and feel of the General weren’t enough, as if his smell didn’t wrap me in something safe and scary and weirdly wholesome, there’s this sense that I’m here for his pleasure. No thinking. No planning. No responsibilities at all. I obey, I react, and I soak up all the praise, and I please him.
I don’t think I’ve ever felt so free.
The second I take my shirt off, the air changes. It’s cooler. I’m more vulnerable. The only barrier is my plain cotton bra, which I scramble to pull down, exposing myself as if it’s my entire job. Exactly what I was made for.
And the worst part? It’s that Grant’s not even looking. He’s turned his back to me while he grabs things from his desk, and it’s awful how badly I crave his attention.
He turns to look at me, and against all expectations, he’s holding my trench coat belt and nothing else. “You okay, Sunny?”
I look down at my own body, my explicitly presented breasts, and fight to hold back a giggle that somehow gets out anyway.
“Is this funny to you?”
“I don’t know.” I shake my head, nerves turning fear into hilarity, bubbling up until a choked laugh shakes my shoulders. “I’ve never done this.”
“You’re doing great, sweet girl.”
His hand, warm and firm, nudges my chin up. I keep my eyes closed as it lowers to skate over my left breast, strokes the side, the bottom curve. My right breast now, caressed, gently, lightly, the touch an exploration. A message.This is good, it says.This is right.
Both hands now, just butterfly touches, the backs of his knuckles, the side of his thumbs. No pressure, just skimming, barely there. When his breath hits me, warm and humid, my eyes open on their own, and what I’m staring at is the top of Grant Bowman’s head. Big, thick brown waves, messy after a day of running his hands through them. There’s a cowlick, a sweet swirl that I’d never have seen without the bird’s-eye view, and for some incomprehensible reason, it makes my pulse pick up speed. Like he’s shown me a secret part of him. A touch of vulnerability in this fantasy scene. A soft underbelly that I’d never have known existed.
The moment his breath touches my skin, I’m lost to the connection again.
His mouth is hot silk around my aching nipple. My eyes roll back. “Oh god.”
Pulling, pulling, and soon nipping with his teeth, and then over to the other one, and his hands are on me, and I am moaning, and my hips have taken on a whole rhythm of their own.
When he comes up for air and tells me I’m beautiful, I believe him. I trust him.
“Here.” He reaches around me, and it’s only after there’s a tug at my hair that I realize it’s my belt that he’s winding and winding into something intricate and almost solid. It takes a while. Longminutes during which I float, suspended. At the end, he says, “Touch,” takes my hand, and shows me the thick rope he’s made of my curls, containing them and, if my imagination’s anything close to right, also providing something for him to hold. My body likes that idea as much as my brain does.
When Grant rises to gather the rest of the items from the desk, I am full of sensation, my blood pumping thick and warm, my muscles aching for something. Anything.
He’s back with the little wooden craft pins, picks one up, opens it, lets it snap closed, picks up another, and then uses them to tease my breasts. Just exploration and touch until he reaches my nipples, presses the clips open, and gives me a long look before letting one, and then the other, close gently over the tips.
I gasp at the pinch. The two tiny pings of pain are enough to send everything else into a hot tailspin.
Another moment of eye contact, Grant’s steady gaze gauging my reaction before bending to place a kiss on each gently pulsing point. He frames my breasts, admiring his work, and pleasure sparks through me, as light and airy as bubbles in water.
“All right, Sunny. New rule. You ready?”
“Yeah.”
At his side-eye, I quickly amend my response to “Yes, sir.”
“Good. No more errors, okay?” He lifts the ruler. “Or I’ll have to use this.”
“Uh… Yeah…” I nod, spacing out with my eyes on the transparent plastic.
A light thwack to my breast startles me into a squeal and turns the heavy weight in my belly into something hot and syrupy. “Sir.”
