Close Cover (Masters and Mercenaries #16)(41)

“You look perfect with my rope your only clothing, nothing between us. Do you want to fly, ma chèrie? Because I will take you there,” he said as he tied off the last rope that would connect her to the rope he would suspend her with. He’d attached it carefully, her safety his highest concern. It was attached at two points on her “flight suit,” forming a triangle that would hold her up and let her float.

“Yes. I want to fly,” she said, her voice tremulous.

He pulled on the rope and she was in the air, her lovely body hanging and dependent on his craftsmanship. He pulled her up so she was roughly at the height of his chest. He could reach down and touch her, caressing her skin through the ropes. She was facing up, unable to see what he would do to her, only able to hear his voice. “My ropes leave marks, tiny indentions to prove I was here, but they will fade to memory. No, my mark will not stay on this perfect skin because I would leave no scars to mar you. But remember the feeling, remember the care when you are alone. When I am far from you, remember how I lavished you with affection, with worship.”

He sighed, a blissful but bittersweet breath. He could smell her arousal and see the way she relaxed, giving over to the experience. He looked up at her, at the beautiful way her luscious cheeks pressed against the rope. She was safe and secure, and he’d done this for her. He reached up, letting his fingertips trace along her body, skimming from flesh to rope and back again, loving the shudder that went through her body.

“I have worked this rope a thousand times before, and yet this one is new. This one is fresh, and I want to hold it, too. I want the marks on my skin, to make them indelible so I do not ever forget this first night. This first night, one of a handful I will spend with you. One of a handful of nights, of scenes that will feed my soul for the rest of my life. Looking at my angel, flying. Not free for now, but safe and warmed and cared for in my ropes.”

He finished the poem that ran through his head by going on his toes and managing to capture her lips with his. He knew some of his counterparts would tease him for the poetry that he sometimes wrote down but mostly left in his head, but those words were as much a part of him as the way he fought or how he did his job. He accepted them, used them when he needed to.

How many times over the next forty years would he form words in his brain that spoke of her? He forced the thought out of his mind. He had to live in the now when it came to her. This whole damn night before he’d taken her in here had been walking a tightrope. He’d planned on talking to Will in the locker room, but he’d missed the man and then he’d been sure Will was going to out him. Not that he was doing anything wrong. The relationship was real and the job was real, and the fact that he was involved in both didn’t make either less important.

“How do you feel?” He meant the question to come out in a patient tone, but he kind of ended up growling the words her way. There was something about the words playing through his head that made him anxious.

“I feel good, Master Remy. I like suspension, but I wish your hands were on me,” she whispered. “I like this, but I like being close to you more.”

The words in his head started to shift from pretty poetry about emotions to something more primal, dirtier, and yet still very much how he felt. “For some subs, this is what they want. They want to sit here in suspension and float for a while. Others, well, they want things a little different.”

“I want whatever gets your hands on me. Please. But nothing, I mean nothing, ever made me feel as close to you as your words. It was beautiful. I never heard you talk like that during a scene. Were you quiet about it with the others?”

Oh, she needed to understand. “I’ve never done that in a scene. The words run through my head, but I never shared them with a sub. And honestly, what would have come out of my mouth with other subs had nothing to do with the things you make me feel. All my life these words have run through my head, but I never felt like I had to say them until tonight.”

“If you don’t fuck me hard, I’m going to die because I’ve never wanted a man in my life the way I want you. I want the poet and the Dom and the, god, I want the dirty, filthy lover I can’t get enough of. You say you’ve never done that before. Don’t you stop now. Give me all your dirty words, too. I want them.”

He let his hands find her breasts. He’d bound them tight to make sure she would feel them, be deeply aware of them. “This is the sweetest fruit there is, your feminine beauty. Never have I seen anything I wanted more. I worship here.” He tweaked her breasts before moving under her. He had to shift her slightly to get those pretty nipples in his mouth, but he moved back and forth, licking and sucking them. “These buds are the softest flowers…” He stopped because his head was suddenly filled with words he couldn’t speak.

I see children here.

I see life here.

I see future here.

He stepped back, desire churning inside him, but there was more. He knew what lust felt like, what pure molten sex felt like when it rolled through his body in a volcanic state. This was something more. He wanted her but more than her body. He wanted her soul, her future, every ounce of love she had to give. It wouldn’t last. The love inside her would grow and multiply as she grew their children. As her body bore their future, she would love more. Her love would be endless, growing forth from their children and grandchildren and sparking beyond.