Coda (Songs of Submission #9)(35)

“Put your fingers inside yourself.”

I slid two fingers in me and groaned.

“Shh. Over your clit. But don’t come yet.”

I didn’t know how it would be possible. My clit was swollen and soaked. I touched it gently.

“Would you like to come?” he asked.

“Yes, please.”

“Move your fingers very slowly, and don’t make a sound. I want to see how your body moves.”

I moved my finger in circles.

“Slower, not enough to come. Not yet.”

But it didn’t matter. I was on the edge. The dam burst, and I came, first bending over, mouth open, face rigid, then arching my back until I was leveraged on the edge of the desk and thrusting my * at the camera. When I came down, looking at him with my hair disheveled and my hand cupping the throbbing mass between my legs, I smiled.

He shook his head. “You are in so much trouble.”

“I’m sorry, I couldn’t—”

“No talking. When I see you, be ready for the spanking of your young life.”

He winked and cut the call. I was left staring at a dead iPad.

I wanted to go home. I wanted his arms around me, his sharp scent, his cruel hands, and his unforgiving mouth. I held my phone as if I was testing its weight. I could book a flight right now and show up naked on our doorstep.

But what if the tightness in my stomach was the flu? Everyone was getting it. But it didn’t feel like any flu I’d ever had, because it was just tight. No more, no less. Like a butterfly’s torn ligament. But if I had it, I couldn’t go home.

Between my legs, the words Jonathan’s Property was scrawled in Sharpie. I was his, and I wanted to go home to him. Could I go home the day after tomorrow for a weekend? And if so, should I? I could have the flu. I could be carrying it. No, I couldn’t go. I couldn’t risk his health, because complications were a cotton candy funnel rolling around the edge of the drum. It looked like nothing, then not too much, then an insane cloud of pink sugar before you even blinked, and we were back to dying at Sequoia.

I couldn’t go home if I was sick.

The phone buzzed in my hand. It was Quentin.

—Omar’s got it. We’re off for a week—

I could go now. Tomorrow.

—Ok got it—

I tapped the phone to my upper lip, looking out over Lexington Avenue. So many people everywhere, in a city that never sleeps.

—Do you have the number for a doctor who keeps late hours?—

—Sure. You all right?—

—I’m fine just want to see if I have this flu thing. I want to go home and can’t be sick. Pls don’t tell Jonathan it’s a surprise—

An address and number came through. I believed I was being diligent about my husband’s health, but I knew that no matter what the doctor said, I was going home. I’d rather talk to Jonathan through a wall than a phone line.

chapter 22.

JONATHAN

I cut the call because I was frustrated and I couldn’t show it. Watching her come thousands of miles away wasn’t good enough. Her willful obedience drove me to distraction, and her accidental disobedience made my palms sting with the longing for her ass under them. I wanted to mark her with my own hand. Make her come with my body. Fill her with myself, and there I was in my kitchen, with a dick hard enough to crack the granite countertop.

This wasn’t working. A thousand times this wasn’t working.

And why? Because I didn’t want to travel. Because the thought of being too far from Sequoia froze me solid. And a plane? I couldn’t get the image of my heart jumping from my chest out of my mind, and the thought of isolating myself on a plane made that image play and replay until the organ squeaked out a puddle of blood in the leather seat.

But being away from her wasn’t working either. She was getting recognized for her talent, and that meant she was becoming desirable to a certain kind of *. She was trustworthy. I didn’t have to assert myself. I didn’t have to lay claim on her. I was an intelligent man with a wife who had laid down her life for him. I knew she’d never betray me. I could feel the fidelity in her heart.

But I did need to assert myself, and the thought of men who wanted to f*ck her breathing the same air as her made me boil. I was a child. An unreasonable, hateful brat.

All true. And so what?

I was hungry, and the fridge was empty of anything I wanted. I snapped out my box of pills and the last jar of chimichuri.

If staying close to her and keeping those men off her meant I got on a plane and went where she went and did what she did, then my anxieties about traveling would have to just shut the f*ck up. I took a handful of pills and choked them down with warm tap water. Then another, swallowing more frustration than vitamins, more anger than medicine. My body was going to reject this heart just because my mind was rejecting everything I’d held on to for months.

That picture with Omar. If I trusted her, why had it burned me? Why did it feel like a punch in the gut?

Because I’d left her alone. I’d deserted her. She didn’t need a leash. She didn’t need a reminder of her vows or commitments, but I’d assumed she didn’t need or want my presence. I’d accepted that because it was convenient for me. I didn’t have to go anywhere if I made it her fault I wasn’t going. I’d been responsible for that picture and the state of our current discontent.