Protege(92)

Her eyes were closed, her mouth open in ecstasy, his fingers softly probing. She was so close.

“Your pain is mine to manage, but your pleasure’s my gift to give. Let me help you in a way that sets you free but isn’t solely about the pain.”

“Please,” she breathed, lashes lowering.

“You will not come. Not until I deliver seven. Count them.”

He slapped her sex and she gasped, not expecting him to spank her there. “One!”

“Do not come.” Slap.

“Two!” She gritted her teeth and panted, her bottom lifting as her body gyrated, already searching for the next delicious sting of heat.

He pressed a firm hand to her belly, lowering her to the table. “Be still, peach.” Her * was so wet, the third slap connected with a delightful thwack.

“Three.”

His fingers wedged deep as her sex contracted. “Do you feel it, the release that comes with pleasure when it mixes flawlessly with pain? It doesn’t have to hurt, sweetheart, but when it does, it can hurt so good, a deep ache that tightens everything inside you and then suddenly . . . we’re free.” He withdrew his fingers and smacked quickly over her stimulated flesh.

“Four! Five! Six!”

Dragging his tongue up her inner thigh, he whispered, “All is forgiven, Collette. What came before and what has transpired since we met. I am completely pleased with my beautiful sub. You may come.” His hand came down and her entire body arched as she came, hard and with abandon, her voice crying out his name in an unburdening wail.

He rubbed her sex, her arousal spreading everywhere as more accumulated. She was frantic, twisting and calling his name as he wedged his fingers into her pulsating channel. He rode every jolt, stretched every quaking shiver, and pulled her from one orgasm to the next.

Her arousal coated his fingers as her body jerked and her legs shifted, her calves trembling as her toes curled and her feet flexed and arched.

“Such breathtaking abandon,” he rasped, pulling her onto his lap.

She straddled him, her mouth sucking on his neck as she lowered herself to him, his length sliding deep.

“Yes,” he growled, grabbing her wild hair and tipping her head back. “This is what I need, Collette.” Holding her hips tight he yanked her down on him, filling her completely. Everything felt different, more intense, tighter.

He pulled her hair, stretching her back and stilling her movements. “Look at me, Collette.” He waited for her eyes to focus. “Why do you love me?”

The fire in his eyes softened as the intensity shifted. The moment didn’t weaken. On the contrary, it thickened as he allowed this pause for unguarded honesty.

“You’re my safety,” she confessed, her voice a raspy whisper. “You’re kind and good, and patient even when I know I’m being a handful. You make submission effortless, Jude. I don’t want to serve someone else. I want to serve you. Because you look at me and you don’t see my weaknesses as problems. You just see me, all of me, the good and the bad, and you help me become more. You make me want to be more than I’ve ever wanted to be. When I’m with you I feel like I’m breathing for the first time and I know what life with you can taste like. I’m so hungry for that life, Jude, but I can’t take what you won’t allow.”

Vulnerability flashed in his eyes as he cupped her face with such loving tenderness. “Do you need me?”

She sucked in a breath and confessed, “I don’t think I’ve ever needed anyone more.”

Leaning forward, he gently kissed her lips. “I can’t hurt you, Collette. And I can’t promise a life to someone who needs things outside my limits.”

It clicked then. She’d thought the need rested in some form of penance. No one had ever given her something without taking something in return. Yet here he was, this incredible man she loved, offering her all the security she ever wanted with only one request, that she not ask him to hurt her. She chuckled, her mouth smirking and her eyes wet with tears. “Yes. I can live with that.” Though he wouldn’t say it, she felt his love in a way she’d never felt anything before. It surrounded her and protected her. That was what she needed above all else. “Jude?”

“Yes?”

Her lips pressed tight, knowing this sense of security might crumble without the cornerstone she desperately needed. “Do you love me?”

His face lowered as he softly whispered, “Collette, I’ve tried so hard to do what’s right.” He shook his head, a pained smile twisting his lips. “Sweetheart, I’ve been loving you since the day you told me you make your own panties and spoke French in that southern drawl. For a month I’ve been trying not to love you, but every day you prove to be the perfect woman for me. It didn’t matter what I wanted. I need to love you and I do very much, peach.”

Her lips trembled as she stared into his eyes. “What about my application?”

“I invented the formula, Collette. I know it by heart and I know you the same. We belong together. Every struggle only proved how much, because whenever I see you hurting or upset, it calls to my need to make you whole again. And when we’re together, in sync, communicating all those vulnerable needs and meeting them with the grace of a pendulum in constant swing . . . I know I’m exactly where I’m meant to be.”