Fortune Annabel Joseph (life books to read .TXT) 📖

looked into his eyes and spoke with a knowing intensity that shook him. “Yes. And yes.”

* * * * *

When he walked in, he didn’t see her. She wasn’t in the living area and she wasn’t in his room. He went to the other room, her room, and pushed the door open slowly. She was sitting on the bed fully dressed, her hands clasped in her lap. She looked over at him and it wasn’t a happy or welcoming look. He thought, despite Elena’s uncanny reassurances, that they didn’t have a future after all, that she’d only come back to pack her things and leave him.

“Hello, Kat,” he said softly.

“Hello.”

He swallowed and cleared his throat. “How’s your finger?”

She looked down, blinking rapidly. “I guess it wasn’t tetanus after all.”

“That’s good to hear.” He crossed to her, reached down for her finger and looked at the nonexistent injury. “In my professional opinion, this is going to heal up just fine.”

She gazed up at him, the tiniest hint of a smile. “I’m glad to hear that.”

“I’m glad you’re here.” He dropped her hand and ran his fingertip down the side of her cheek. “I’m sorry, Kat. I’m sorry I pushed you. It was wrong of me to try—to try to force you. I lost my temper, which is the worst thing a Dominant can do.”

She looked down and away. “I… I’m sorry too.” She stopped, wringing her hands together. “See, I…” She stopped again. Her face crumpled into unexpected tears. He knelt down and put his arms around her.

“Kat, don’t cry. It’s okay.”

“No, I…” Her eyes met his then skittered away. “I just… You have to know… I don’t know why I’m like this. I like you. I missed you. I really missed you. And…”

She drew in a shuddery breath. He rubbed her back and pulled her closer. “You don’t have to explain. Don’t feel you have to make excuses, because you don’t. I’m your Dominant, yes, and you’re my submissive, but you’re still Kat. If you need time and space, I don’t have any right to push you.”

“But I— But I—” She took his hand, twisting it in her own. “I want you to push me. I need you to. Otherwise I’m too scared. I wanted— You know, the last two days, I wanted you to come drag me back.”

He shook his head. “I won’t keep chasing you. You can’t keep running away. That’s not how it’s supposed to work.”

She looked down again, wiped away the last of her tears. “I think I’m just too messed up for you.”

“Yes. I’ve thought so all along,” he teased gently. “But I can’t stop hoping against hope that we can make this work somehow. I’ve been folding cranes, Kat. For a wish.”

“For us?”

“Yes, for us.”

She pursed her lips. “You know I don’t believe that stuff.”

“Yes, I know. Only one of us believes. But I still want you to stay. And I don’t want us to limit things by arrangements and inflexible time frames. Let’s just…live.”

“Live?” She looked at him. “Does that involve…like…you know…”

“Lots of hot sex? Endless fucking? Tonight it will, anyway. Yes.”

“Okay,” she said with a tremulous smile. “Okay then. Let’s live.”

They started fucking right there in her bed, stopping midway to stumble into his room for a condom. Kat had never been fucked quite this way, simply fallen on and despoiled like a sacrifice. Instead of Ryan’s staid walls, she thought there should be trees around them, wilderness and wildness. Fire and drumbeats. At least there was the multicolored mass of cranes in the corner, hanging down like leaves or vines.

“Can we fuck outside sometime?” she gasped in the middle of a particularly animalistic thrust.

“Yes!”

And they did fuck outside. He took her camping and they fucked huddled in a tent while snow fell over their heads. He took her to meet his parents—they were exactly as he described them to her—and they fucked. Well, upstairs. Later. In private. He gave her a collar for Christmas and they fucked. She never moved out and they never discussed the one-month agreement again.

The first BDSM party came soon after the collar. It was a turning point for Kat, the point when she realized she felt more for Ryan than simple lust. The party took place at a dungeon downtown, a dark smoky space where everyone was half-naked—or totally naked—and no one seemed to have many inhibitions. It was a private party, invitation only, and it had a holiday theme. There was a kinky Santa giving spankings and lots of little elves running around wearing butt plugs and clamps.

Kat was nervous and overstimulated. She knew that Ryan knew all these people, but she knew no one at all. He held her hand tightly as he led her though the throngs. She had on the collar he’d given her, a simple black leather circle with a little lock on the back and an O-ring on the front. Normally it meant sex to her, Ryan’s control and ownership of her. Now it felt more like protection. She knew Ryan’s needs and wants and she trusted him. But there were a ton of other Doms around that she didn’t know and didn’t trust. Worse than that, there were a lot of subs and slaves she didn’t like.

She didn’t like them because of the way they looked at Ryan. They didn’t just look at him. They talked to him, touched him and flirted with him. They all knew him. Most of them were a lot more scantily dressed than her. Ryan had approved of her little black dress and stockings but she felt childish next to the other women in their fetish wear. Maybe that had been his intention all along.

Aside from that, Kat got turned-on. When Ryan propelled her to the back of the space, to a bed with attachment points and vinyl sheets, she didn’t resist.

He bent her over the footboard, which was obviously designed for fucking since it was at just the right height. He pulled