A Dom is Forever (Masters and Mercenaries #3)(39)

“I take it very seriously,” she shot back.

“No, you take the choice of your partner seriously, but not the sex itself. The sex itself you view as something you have to give up to get to what you really want, and that’s companionship and affection. You can’t buy those with sex, Avery. Those will come or not, and it doesn’t mean a damn thing to any man. Not really. He’ll take sex from you even if he doesn’t particularly like you. He’ll take it because you offer it up so easily. Again—not the relationship, but the sex. You’re offering me easy sex. Sex where I don’t have to work, but I want to work because I do like you and I do feel affection for you. Do you understand?”

“You think I should ask for more.”

“No, I think you should demand more.”

“That doesn’t sound very submissive, Lee.”

He sighed as he touched her cheeks one last time and backed away. “You can stand up now.” He sank back on her sofa. It would do for what he wanted. For what she needed. “Come sit in my lap.”

She moved a little awkwardly, trying to pull the skirt down. “I can’t get it down far enough. If I sit in your lap, it’s going to ride up.”

“Sit in my lap, Avery.” He let his voice go hard and was happy to see her respond. She did what he wanted, though she took her sweet time doing it, trying valiantly to keep as much denim between them as possible. She settled in, holding herself up.

And that wouldn’t do. One little pull of his hand and the skirt was bunched around her waist.

Avery shrieked a little, but he kept her where he wanted her. “Lee, you don’t understand. I’m…I’m going to ruin your pants. God, I need to go clean up.”

“Oh, is my baby’s little * finally getting wet?” He put his hand on her knee.

She tried to cross her legs. “Yes, and it’s a lot. It feels very messy.”

He could smell her now. Bending over and presenting her ass had done something for her. So had dirty talk. Yeah, he could talk dirty. “Messy is good. I want that * dirty and ripe when I start to eat it.”

Her skin turned the prettiest shade of pink. “How can you just talk like that?”

“Like what?” He cupped her knees. “Stop shutting me out. Start talking to me.”

She relaxed a little, her knees falling apart and giving him access. “It’s the dirty talk. No one’s ever talked to me that way.”

“And you don’t like it?” His hand crept up, and he wondered if she would lie to him. She obviously liked it. He could feel the heat of her *. Her pretty eyes dilated when he started spouting a little sweet filth.

“I like it. I wouldn’t have said I would. I don’t like to hear a lot of cursing, but when you say it, it sounds different.”

“Because we’re in a safe place. Baby, there’s a huge difference between some construction worker yelling out about how nice your tits look and me telling you how I want to get my mouth on those same gorgeous tits and never leave them. There’s no disrespect in me telling you just how much I want to f*ck your little *.”

“I don’t know why.”

He didn’t pretend to misunderstand her. He knew damn well what she was talking about. “We have to work on your self-esteem, baby. I want to f*ck you because you make my cock hard. I want to f*ck you because I’m pretty sure you’re going to be the sweetest f*ck I’ve ever had. You’re going to be like sugar on my cock. I’ll be addicted to that little bit of sunshine after a while and no other * will do. But this is where I play the Dom card, Avery. I’m trying to go slow with that, but if you start in on yourself again, I will spank you. I hear one more word out of your mouth about how this body isn’t sexy and you’ll place yourself over my lap and take twenty. Do you understand?”

She shoved her head into his shoulder with a little cry. Her body shook.

He’d scared the hell out of her. His heart threatened to crack. He’d f*cked up again. He’d misjudged her. He’d been so certain of her natural submissiveness, but what if she couldn’t handle it? He should have played this vanilla. He’d taken the chance because he wanted her so f*cking badly. Liam, not Lee. Not some f*cking construct he’d come up with for his undercover work, but Liam, the screwed-up man he was needed her on a level he’d never known existed.

And now she would kick him out for being a brutal bastard.

Her face came up and instead of tears, he saw laughter and a pretty pink flush. She was laughing, her lips curling up in the sweetest smile. “Lee, you’re making me crazy. I think I’m a freak because that getting wet thing happened again when you started talking about spanking me.”

Her laugh filled the air for the first time all night, and it looked like she was having some fun. Fun with herself. Fun with him.

“Spanking can be very erotic,” he said, tightening his hands on her, pulling her back in. “It can also hurt like hell.”

Her voice was deeper, more intimate than before. Her eyes came up, questioning him. “How would you know?”

It was time for some real honesty. He felt himself smile as he stared down at her. It felt so f*cking right to have her in his lap. Like she belonged there. “I told you, baby. I’m trained. You don’t get trained at Club Sanctum without trying everything out. How can I know how to spank a partner if I haven’t been spanked myself?”