Divine Solace (Nature of Desire 8)

"I'm sorry, Gen. I'll go. The last thing I want is to make you uncomfortable." He spread his hands, a conciliatory motion. She sensed no resentment or passive aggressiveness in his tone, nothing but a sincere apology. "If you want, I'll come back tomorrow and help you with your kitchen. I'll just stay somewhere else."

"You can just switch it on and off. Nice for you."

In response he stepped forward, snagged her wrist. She tried to back up a step, but he followed her. The stove was warm against the backs of her legs. She shook her head at him, but then he put her hand right below his belt. Beneath the jeans where she hadn't allowed herself to look, she felt a very substantial erection.

Her gaze shot up to his face. Immediately, he moved her hand to rest in a half curl on his bare chest, his own fingers loosely clasping hers before he let her go and stepped back to the other side of the table, as if he thought she might perceive what he'd just done as a threat, since he was a stranger in her home.

Yet she hadn't perceived it that way. Just a very confusing signal that fired up her already aroused libido.

"No. I can't switch it on and off," he said. "But I'm a submissive, Gen. It means that no matter how aroused I become, I act only on the commands of my Mistress. Or the woman she is allowing to command me. You can touch me however, whenever you wish. You can make me walk around your house naked the entire weekend. I might be literally dying to fuck you, but until you want that, demand that from me, I am only what you want me to be."

Whatever he saw in her face started him back around the table. She watched him come, emotions warring inside her. His voice had become huskier during the explanation, and now his breath was warm on her face, his mouth close to hers again. "The more you deny me, hold yourself back, the hotter I get, the harder I work t

o please you. I want to please you."

Like all women, she'd been the recipient of creative come-ons, where the male tried the "this is really all about you" kind of lines when they all knew it was about getting himself off. This wasn't that. This was beyond description, the way Noah's body canted toward her, yet she could feel the aura of self-restraint. Her will alone held him back.

"How many..." She had to lick dry lips to talk. Leaning away from her, he snagged one of the glasses of wine he'd poured and offered it to her. She took a sip, then a swallow. Three of them. When she set it aside, her hand went back to his chest, the other resting on his hip. Her fingers hooked on his jeans waistband. She told herself it was just a place to put her hands while he waited for what she'd say. "Is it just any woman she cares to share you with? How do your feelings figure into it?"

"Rather significantly." He seemed relieved she'd gone from attack mode to wary curiosity. "Mistress Lyda has never shared me outside of a club setting, Gen. Even inside it, it's directly under her supervision, and mostly foreplay type stuff." He met her gaze. "Sometimes I'll take a strap-on from one of them, but since I've belonged to her, she's never wanted me to actually fuck, I mean, have sex, with another woman."

She should have brought Chloe and Brendan home with her as well. She could have said the kitchen was a two-man job and Brendan would have been happy to pitch in. The three of them could have had a slumber party on her living room floor, with her as a safe fly on the wall, listening and learning. Rather than being right in the crosshairs of this discussion, expected to respond intelligently to things she knew nothing about.

"Sorry. I handled this badly." He was watching her face. "We can rewind all the way back to you coming into the kitchen and start over if you like."

She shook her head. His distress over upsetting her was enough to bring some balance back. That and his forthrightness about it. She had no doubt he was telling her the truth. In fact, she suspected when Marguerite had told her he would answer anything honestly, she'd meant he was incapable of lying. Pushing away an uneasy feeling about that, she got a grip on herself.

"Okay, so she's never given you to anyone else. Why me? Why this weekend?"

He gave her a searching look, as if ensuring she was okay with the conversation, not just placating him. "I'm okay," she told him. "I want to know. You just took me off guard. You didn't do anything wrong. But more wine might be good."

His eyes twinkled, and that made things feel better. When he pressed the glass into her hand, she dared herself to follow her feelings on that. She wrapped her fingers over his, holding them to the glass so he didn't draw away. She wanted to know what he would do.

A peculiar stillness took over his expression, a look that stole some of her breath, such that she had to find it again to sip the wine. He adjusted his movements to her, so she could raise the glass to her lips with her fingers still overlapping his. His gaze was on her face as she lowered her eyes to what she was doing, took a reassuring gulp. When she loosened her fingers, he took the glass away, set it aside. Reached out and brushed a drop of the wine from the corner of her mouth.

"You didn't answer my question," she said. "Why me?"

"Lyda asked me how I felt about you," he said. "I said I would be anything she agreed to let me be for you this weekend." He gave her an amused look. "It was the Goth discussion. It made me hot."

She snorted at that, then made herself push him away. His proximity made it hard to think. She really needed to think. "Can we just...ease back? Please? This isn't my world, and to say I'm over my head is an understatement."

"Sure. Why don't we eat?" He moved back to the chair, pulled it out for her. In answer, she pointed him to his chair.

"As much as I appreciate the gentleman routine, I'm safer getting my own self seated."

He grinned at that and complied, moving to his chair, though she noted he waited until she was seated to take his own chair. Her little dining set was a four-seater, small enough that his foot brushed hers before he adjusted his legs out of her way.

She was thinking of something else he'd revealed, close up to her like that. "Do you have a tongue piercing?"

"I do." Fortunately, he didn't open his mouth to waggle it at her, something she found quite non-appealing. When she remarked on that, he made a face of agreement. "Yeah. Women enjoy what I can do with it more than the looks of it. Not so different from another part of the male anatomy, right?"

His comical look toward his lap made her chuckle. "I think women tend to find it more exciting...aesthetically, when they're aroused," she agreed. "When they're not, it does look a little odd. But that's not casting stones. I'd say the same about female genitalia. Wouldn't you?"

"Absolutely not." He used the tongs to dish salad into a smaller bowl for her. "I could stare at close-ups of pussy all day long."

"Which explains a great deal about cinematography in the porn industry," she said dryly.

He winked. "True."