Coda (Songs of Submission #9)(8)

I felt like a piece of shit for missing the hard, bruising sex. It was different with Gabby. When I’d wanted to go out but had to watch her, I’d felt burdened. I admitted it to myself but did what I had to do anyway. I always felt like shit about that too. But with Jonathan, I so ecstatic he was alive that I didn’t even realize how much I’d missed him until he asked me if I was happy.

“What’s wrong?” Jonathan asked in the back of the Bentley.

He’d just f*cked my ass raw in the studio, just hurt me badly, and I’d begged him for every stroke. I’d never felt closer to him than in those minutes of pain. But on the way back, after I came down from my high and we had a bathroom break, I remembered why the last six months had been so hard.

“Nothing.”

He stroked my arm with his fingertips. Perfect pressure for the gathering of electricity, as always. “Nothing?”

I shook my head, more at myself than at his disbelief. Nothing, my ass. Something. Everything. “That was a lot of exertion back there.”

Exertion wasn’t just a word but a keyword. Code for unreasonable fear. Secret speak for death. Terror in a few breaths of syllables and the tongue rubbing on the back of the teeth.

“You’ve been told a hundred times—”

“I know, please.” I dismissed him. “I know.”

He grabbed a fistful of my hair and turned me to face him, and my scalp became a center of pleasure. “You’re shutting down.”

I couldn’t deny the truth. Not after he’d torn me open. For those minutes in the studio, when he commanded me, I’d forgotten to worry about him, and he was again my master and king. When he pulled my hair, I wanted to be ripped apart again, just for the release from thinking about him dying.

“I’m not,” I said. “I’m just—”

“Open your legs.”

I was pissed he’d ask at a time like this, and relieved. I spread my legs across the leather seat. Not far enough for him apparently, because he pulled my head back and yanked my knees farther apart. I gasped when a bullet of arousal shot through me.

He pressed four fingers between my legs, where the panels of my jeans met. “I am not going to die f*cking you.” He scratched the fabric, and I felt the tease through the layers.

Was this the time to answer honestly? Shouldn’t we talk over dinner or in bed? Or across a desk surrounded by pens and blotters and serious things?

“You might. You could.”

“I won’t.” He pushed against my crotch, and I pushed back as if I had no control over my body.

“You might,” I gasped when he undid my jeans. “And you deny it, and it’s a lie you tell yourself. I’m tired of walking around and pretending it’s not a problem, because it is. It’s a big problem. It’s all I think about.”

He slid his hand past my waistband until the tip of his middle finger reached my clit. He barely pressed on it, just rotated around the slip of skin at the top. “You never told me that.”

“I have to be strong for you. You chase me out of the house to work, and I think it’s because you don’t want me to see you weak. And, oh God, Jonathan, I’m going to come.”

“No, you’re not.” He reduced the pressure and intensity until I could only feel the outer edge of his hand’s heat. “Pull your shirt up. Let me see your tits.”

I yanked up my shirt and bra, and he leaned down and sucked on a nipple so hard and fast, it hurt like hell. I bucked under him.

“I’m going to die before you,” he said, taking a last nip before putting his face to mine. “Way before you. You want to spend the time worrying? Or f*cking?”

Which? Was that the only choice: this dichotomy of soul-eating pain or soul-revealing pleasure? I waited too long to answer apparently, because he circled his fingertip over my clit again, barely touching it. I groaned. I wanted to say f*cking, to tell him what he wanted to hear, but when he had me like this, I couldn’t tell one of the thousand untruths about my feelings. I couldn’t say what would make him happy for the sake of saving him from stress.

“Which is it, goddess?”

“I’m going to come.”

He brought his finger down my folds, to where I was wettest, leaving my clit kissed by nothing but the damp air in my jeans as he brought the rest of me to life. His outer fingers touched the welts he’d left earlier, setting them on fire.

“Which is it?” he asked.

“Fuck me or let me come,” I whispered.

He pulled his hand out of my pants. The loss was painful.

“You are not stopping,” I groaned. “Don’t even—”

He held my face, putting his nose to mine. “You only talk when your cunt lets you. From now on, I control when you talk. And today, you talk.”

The car stopped in front of our house, and the gate clanged closed behind us.

“You’re a son of a bitch.” My body arched toward him, making a lie of my words.

“Before I was in the hospital, you could hold yourself together. Now you’re calling me a son of a bitch for doing what it’s my right to do.”

I glared at him, hating him and loving him at the same time, pain and pleasure always hand-in-hand with my king.

“Button up,” he said, pulling my shirt down.