“You speak as though you’ve had a lifetime of suffering.”
Silently I tally up everything I’ve been through. My mother’s death, my father’s grief. The illnesses that have shaped my entire life. My own striving for love. “I’m not saying I’m the only one who’s suffered. Or that I’ve suffered more than most.”
Logan remains silent and I keep babbling. I feel like I’m having such huge revelations and I want to share some of it with him.
“Socrates says if all the world’s suffering was laid in a pile, most people would choose their own portion. I wouldn’t change my life for anyone else’s. But I’ve been numb for too long.” I lock eyes with him. “I’m ready to be awake to my life. Even for the parts of it that hurt.”
He doesn’t say anything for a long moment. He just stands there, ice blue gaze searing straight into my soul.
Then suddenly he starts stripping out of his shirt and my mouth goes dry. Crossing the room to a sink, he washes his hands, then returns to show me the needle.
I can’t stop my smile. “I’m not afraid of needles.” I’ve encountered enough in my lifetime.
He shakes his head and starts to sterilize the needle. “This will earn you twenty patents,” he says gruffly, still turned away from me. The muscles of his back are as chiseled as the stone walls of his castle.
When he comes to my side, I grab his hand. “No.” He is missing the whole point.
His nostrils flare and his gaze is a blade. “This is happening, Daphne.”
I drop my hand and soften my voice. “That’s not what I meant. You don’t have to give up patents for this. I want it.” I want you. But I’m not quite brave enough to say that yet.
For a moment he’s frozen except for a slight widening of his eyes. The blue of his iris is a thin circle of ice. Then, in a growl, “What game are you playing?”
“No games. Not any more. I want to do this.”
“No patents?” The furrow between his brows is etched deep, he’s so confused.
“No.”
He stares at me a long moment. See me, I plead silently. See us. What we could become.
“This doesn’t change anything,” he says, and pinches my nipple in preparation. I watch him, not the needle, as if I could communicate everything I’m thinking telepathically.
I want this. I’ll do anything...for you.
Because it’s true, I want to be awake. I don’t want to be numb or frozen anymore. But there’s more to it than that. I wouldn’t have woken up to just anyone. I want the man in front of me. My first crush. My first love. I want it all, with him.
I’m a silent observer as Logan bends over me. I see him and the room as if I’m a ghost by the ceiling. A young woman prone on the table, her hair spread in a dark halo around her head.
The pinch, when it comes, feels far away. Logan adorns my left nipple with a tiny barbell with green jewels. His eyebrows are furrowed again, but this time in concentration. Then he sterilizes everything and repeats the process with my right.
He lets the needle clatter onto the tray. “It’s done.”
I come back into my body, sucking air into my lungs. My nipples throb. But so does my clit. My full ass only emphasizes how my pussy is empty.
Logan examines me thoughtfully. His fingers come to my cunt and slide inside. “Wet,” he says hoarsely.
I stare at him as if I can see past the mask. “Always.” For you.
He presses a button and the table starts to lower. I jolt. Now what?
He kneels and tugs my legs down, dragging me to the edge of the table until I’m straddling his face.
I rise up on my elbows. “Wha—?”
“You’ve earned this.” His voice is muffled between my thighs.
The mask is cool when it touches my skin. Soon it’s slick with my juices. I grab his hair and cant my hips, rocking into his mouth.
“That’s it, baby. Grind it out.” He angles his head and probes my pussy with his tongue. A minute more and it’s too much. My toes scrunch and I cum, screaming.
He rises over me, his chin and mask shiny. Grabbing his shirt, he mops his face.
I lie back, insides still quivering. The pain in my nipples is a million miles away. “How many?” I gasp.
He raises a brow.
“How many patents did I give up in exchange for that orgasm?”
He licks his lips, which are glossy with my essence. “None.”
My heart stops for a second. I smile, and he returns it. Just a small quirk beside his lips, a tiny parentheses, but it’s enough.
This doesn’t change anything, he’d told me. In that moment, we both know he’s wrong.
Seventeen
Present Day
Logan
She lies on the table, her body a delectable offering to a cruel god. Green jewels sparkle at the reddened tips of her breasts, the tan cleft of her ass.
She spent the day training her ass for me, stretching it until she crawled in here with a plug so large it pushes her ass cheeks apart. It’s got to be uncomfortable, but when I twist and tug on it, her pussy weeps. Her juices drench my hand. Needy little thing.
Needy enough not to want patents in exchange for what we just did. Is this just some new game? Another way for her to manipulate me?
I frown briefly even as her eyes smile sleepily at me. I drop my hand. “You should rest.”
“No,” her voice rings out. “You need to claim all of me.”
“You want me to fuck your ass?” My hand returns to the plug, pushing and pulling to make it stretch her back hole. My cock strains against my zipper.
“You promised.”
“I did no such thing.”
“You implied.” Her eyes flash indignation. I trained my ass all afternoon long...for this?
I pull on the butt plug, drawing it out of her. Her middle tenses and she sighs when I push it back in. Oh, she wants it all right. She’s not faking that.
“I won’t be gentle,” I warn. She doesn’t get to tease the beast without consequences. Which she well knows.
“I can take it.” She’s confident. Still, her eyes widen when I shuck off my jeans. My cock is thick and pulsing. I grab her right hand and bring it to my cock. Her slender fingers barely fit around my monster dick. Did she forget so soon how big I am?
I grit my teeth as she jacks me, and my toes curl into the stone floor. Fuck, her touch feels so good. I want to grab her and fuck her hard. To finally be inside her body again. Her eyes are so welcoming. Her skin flushed. Her pussy weeping its juices for me. My hips jut forward towards her hips, needing contact even as something else inside me clenches, holding back.
“Can you, Daphne? Take all of me?” My voice comes out harsh. Almost cruel.
Daphne’s not affected in the least. Eyes hooded, she only tries to reach for me with her left hand, but I pin it back in place.
Control. I have to stay in control.
I thread a hand in her hair and bring her to her knees before me.
“Suck me,” I bark. I widen my stance and my cock bobs in front of her face. “Make it good.”
She opens her mouth and swallows the head of my cock eagerly. Too eagerly. Halfway onto my dick, she chokes, her eyes watering. I loosen my grip, allowing her to control her own movements. She pulls off and gasps, but forces herself back onto my cock, gobbling me down like a starving woman at a feast. I hit the back of her throat, and she gags, but keeps fighting to stay on.