“I have to leave later tonight, and I want to know we’re solid. I need to know you’re with me all the way. I don’t want to find out, after I’ve gone, that you decided to try to hitchhike home,” Savage said.
Seychelle raised an eyebrow, trying to look as if she wasn’t nervous, but then she bit her lower lip, completely destroying the image of her calm. “I was thinking Uber, not hitchhiking.”
“I want you to tell me what you’re most afraid of when you think about sucking my cock.”
The moment he said the words, her eyes went wide with fear, but he pressed her palm tight into his thigh, his thumb continuing to stroke caresses back and forth over the back of her hand. He kept his gaze steady on hers. He hadn’t asked her to actually do anything to him. His jeans were on and zipped up. She was in her own chair, and there was no command in his tone at all. He had deliberately kept his tone very conversational.
Her lashes fluttered several times, drawing his attention to their length. He waited in silence while the fire crackled and the flames burned orange and red.
“I don’t want you to be disappointed in me. Or compare me to one of the other women and I fall very short.”
He considered her fears carefully. “Does that sound like something I would do, Seychelle?”
She shook her head. “I know it’s an irrational fear, but the moment you say the words to me, I hear laughter. I know that I’m surrounded by your club members and other women who have done this for you, and everyone is watching. You’re laughing with them.”
Savage really despised that she had feared his family, Torpedo Ink, would laugh at her. That he would. “You know where Campbell made his big mistake?” He kept his voice gentle.
She shook her head.
He reached out and slid his fingers into her hair. “He’s done his research and he’s been told I’m a sadist. Most sadists like to humiliate others. Because of my past behavior with the other women on these runs, he thinks I deliberately humiliated them. I didn’t. I don’t get off on that at all. The last thing I would ever want to do with the woman I love is to humiliate her. Planting a suggestion where I’m laughing at her because she chooses to give me pleasure by sucking my cock is absurd. I wasn’t going to do anything remotely resembling what I did with other women with you. You wanted to learn, and I thought it would be a fun surprise for you, better than your book, something we’d enjoy together. Definitely not humiliation—that isn’t my thing and never will be.”
His woman was listening to him, and this time when he deliberately used the words sucking my cock, she hadn’t tensed up or looked as if she might run. Seychelle was intelligent. Campbell might be able to plant suggestions, but she was too smart to be fooled for long. She was more than willing to work with Savage to undo any damage Campbell had done to her. She sat very still and let him continue to massage her scalp.
Savage had put her into intense situations, but he had never humiliated her. Even now, when they talked about her coming on the run and he knew he would need her, once he had sounded her out about changing up the rules they’d put in place, when he realized she would be uncomfortable, he tried to think of alternatives. He let her think about that.
“How do we get those images out of my head, Savage? I want them gone. I get nervous when you ask me to do new things, but I always want to try them. I look forward to trying them. I wanted your cock in my mouth, although looking at you, I don’t see how anyone can do that without choking to death. Still, you always are so generous with me, and get me off so many times when I try something new, so I suppose even if I didn’t succeed the first few times, I’d still win in the end.”
He wanted to smile at her telling him she might choke, but at the same time, he nearly groaned. Generous? Is that how she saw him? He was a greedy, selfish bastard half the time. More than half the time. It wasn’t like he didn’t see to her pleasure—he did. Over and over. But that gave him pleasure as well, and it was always on his terms.
“We just keep talking it out until you’re not afraid anymore.”
There was another long silence. Averted face. Biting lip. He rubbed his thumb along the back of her hand, and this time he made a little letter S over and over along the top of it. Waited until recognition hit and overrode the demons in her head.
“What if there was more to the suggestion?” There was real fear in her voice. “I’ve thought about that, and there could have been.”
“Baby, look at me.” His phone vibrated, and he knew that was Czar making the call, telling him he was out of time. Cursing silently, he pulled out his phone and texted back one-handed, fast.
Give me fifteen
“You would know. I have every confidence in you. You have to find that same confidence. You said so yourself: you’re stronger than he is. You’re afraid for me, and that’s what has you so shaken. You realized, somehow, that he planted the suggestion to be afraid of giving me a blow job, and that led you to the conclusion that someone here is going to try to kill me if they tried it. I think you panicked, Seychelle, more than you succumbed to his suggestion. You panicked thinking you might try to kill me.”
Savage hadn’t once changed the low, velvet tone of his voice. She responded naturally to that note. It always wrapped around her like a physical caress. Coupled with the way he wrote the letter of his name on her skin with the pad of his thumb, she calmed even more, her gaze finally lifting to meet his. Her lashes were wet, clinging together, making them dark and innocent-looking.
“I know something is very wrong with this entire situation, but I can’t think clearly. There’s too many other things in the way,” she admitted. She looked at him with trust. With that look that said he was her white knight and he’d sort through all of them with her until she could find the truth. It was buried deep, a suggestion that Campbell had managed to plant in her head. “I hate the idea that he managed to get anywhere inside me. I need him out now.”
Savage wanted him out as well. “No more than I want that, angel. Take a couple of deep breaths and clear your head so we can figure out what he’s done. You’re a thousand times more intelligent and a million times more talented. You know you are. He shook your belief for a moment, but you know better. We can talk this out. Think about what’s actually happening in your head, Seychelle.”
“That’s possible,” she admitted, her voice trembling. “I know, in the back of my mind, someone is going to make their try. I hear the laughter, the sound of women’s voices. Your club is right there, Savage. Maybe it isn’t me kneeling in front of you.” She was frowning. Confused. “Another woman is in front of you, kneeling.” Her eyes were closed.
Shit. That wasn’t good. He didn’t like where this was going. He could tell she didn’t like it either. Her entire body had gone stiff. Those long, wet lashes lifted, and he found himself looking into horrified eyes. Accusing eyes.
The phone vibrated again. Cursing silently, Savage glanced down. Sorry, Savage, out of time. Can’t give you fifteen. Need you now.
How could he possibly leave Seychelle like this? She was shaky. Vulnerable. Fearful of Campbell in her head. Already she was leery of his club and why she was there, other than for him. She knew that wasn’t the only reason. Now she had sick images of another woman kneeling at his feet. The club laughing at her. She already didn’t like or trust them. She didn’t believe they would tell her if he fucked up—and they wouldn’t. Reaper had nearly lost Anya over just such a thing, and it was Tawny who was trying to give him a blow job. This wasn’t good at all.