4. Don't Give Me a Piece of Your Preciousness

Wrapped Around Your Finger

Don't Give Me a Piece of Your Preciousness

“Lover, brother, bogenvilla

I don’t know why”

Tori Amos, “Cruel,” from the album “From the Choirgirl Hotel”

I watch him, amused and somehow disappointed. I expected defiance from him. But I meant what I told him. I don’t want to break him. At least, I don’t think so. When did this start getting so complicated?

I follow him to the bed, standing beside him. “Sit up.”

He does so in a swift fluid motion, that lock of hair falling over his face again and he impatiently pushes it aside, swinging his legs over to rest his feet on the floor as he looks at me expectantly.

I freeze, staring at his nude form. His body could easily have been sculpted from ivory marble, could easily have been the inspiration for such a sculpture even with the scars. His expression is not so much wary now as waiting. There’s still a slight smirk on his lips, though… almost as if he’s daring me. Is he so sure he can’t be broken? Everyone has a breaking point. Including me. Shall I… no. I won’t descend into that particular abyss. Having him is enough. Although, some little voice whispers to me, it would be a shame to disappoint him…

“Undress me.”

He blinks. This is a first from me. He studies me, and I study him. Let him wonder if I’m picking up the gauntlet he threw down. His fingers reach up so slowly it’s as though a chronos spell was cast upon them. His movements are tentative, as though he’s having to make a conscious focus to do what I asked. His knuckles lightly brush against me as he unfastens buttons, pulls down zippers, slips bits of silk and lace off my expectant body. When he’s finished he’s careful to look anywhere but at me.

“Very good,” I purr. “Lie down again. On your stomach.”

A spark of fear lights his eyes. But there is still no refusal. Only a wild dark look as he moves.

I remove a bottle of massage salve from the nightstand; scoop some into my hands, rubbing them together to warm the salve before I begin to rub his back. My touch makes him gasp, but he keeps still. He pretends it isn’t affecting him, but I know better. The signs are there: the relaxing of his muscles, the slight change in his breathing. Cruciatus is a harsh spell. Why else would it be an Unforgivable? And despite what he might think, I don’t enjoy him being in pain. This isn’t the first time I have massaged him. My hands work their way down, caressing his buttocks and the curve of his spine, slipping his legs apart to rub his thighs before continuing to his lower legs and feet.

He has been completely silent all this time after the initial gasp. I turn him over and repeat the process, watching him closely. His eyes are once again closed; the dark curved lashes a stark contrast to his pale face. I press a quick flurry of kisses on his cheeks, his lips, his eyes. He sighs.

“Is the pain gone?”

“Yes.” He peers up at me. “Is it over?”

I smile. “No.”

“I didn’t think so,” he mutters. His expression changes. “Can’t you just take me and be done with it?”

“And deny myself the pleasure of a slow buildup?”

“Seeing as how your pleasure is my degradation, I’m all for moving it along.”

“Not going to ask me to stop?” He did that once. Only once.

“I might,” he said, “if I thought it would do any good.”

He has that tone again, the one that try as I might I can’t quite place. My hands go still.

He laughs mockingly. “Has your exalted courage failed you?”

“Hardly,” I retort.

“Going soft, that’s what your lot does best, isn’t it? All that bravery just to show mercy at the end. Weak.”

“Stuff it.”

“Can’t you stand to hear the truth?”

“I said shut up!”

My blood is roaring in my ears. Guilt is forgotten, gentleness is forgotten.

I take possession of his mouth. There is no room for him to protest. My lips rake over his in a gesture of ownership, the anger melding with the desire until they are a heated blur. When I finally stop his eyes are glazed, his lips swollen from the force of my fury. My fingers are tangled in his hair, holding his face still as I look at him.

“You can insult me all you want, but don’t you ever—EVER—say anything about my house again.”

I give him no chance to reply; I renew the onslaught on his mouth, leaving both of us gasping for breath and still I go on. He could do something: he’s not bound in any way. But he does nothing except lie there and let me plunder his lips with my livid kiss. How good this feels, even as a part of me seems to recoil. More. I want more, yet it feels as if I could have everything and that would still not be enough, or would be too much…

At length I pull away. That look on his face, the mix of apprehension over my actions and satisfaction over goading me. Well.

I run my thumb over his mouth, gleaming wet from my kiss, tender to the touch. He winces slightly. I pull on his lower lip, tracing patterns with my nail until his lip quivers. Only then do I trail my hand down. His nipples are hard. I move lower.

He reacts in the usual way, by shutting his eyes.

“NO.”

He looks up, his reluctance obvious. “Look at me,” I continue. “I want to see you while I do this.”

Now he’s shivering again. I usually allow him the luxury of shutting me out of himself. This is going to be different. My eyes never leaving his, I continue with my caress. He hardens again. I slip my hand to his testicles, lifting them, stroking them as my other hand pumps his shaft. His eyes are a kaleidoscope of emotions: anger, shame, vulnerability, and yes, that perverse desire all spiraling and exploding out.

Still holding him at attention, my other hand goes even lower, finding his opening, gently pressing a finger at the entrance. He draws in a sharp fast breath. The word ‘no’ seems poised on his lips. Yet he doesn’t utter it. Not even when I slip the finger inside. He hisses, he clenches, then exhales gradually and relaxes. Two fingers. His eyes almost roll back in his head. I feel a surge of satisfaction.

A moment later I withdraw from him, muttering a cleansing charm under my breath as I lift his arms up beside his head. Not to restrain him, but so I can straddle him. My fingers clench his chest slightly as I center myself over him. I can feel my arousal leaving a moist oval of heat on his stomach just before I lift myself, moving to his hardness and thrusting against it until he’s sheathed inside me.

He almost turns away, but remembers in time. I have never seen this before. It is written in a language I can’t understand, what crosses his face. These lines are alien to me. The harder I stare the closer it seems I might be to deciphering them, only to discover that they continuously alter, dissolving from one enigma to the next. I will not ask. I’m not entirely certain I want a translation.

I pull myself slowly upward until I’m almost free of him, then plunge back down, taking all of him into me, feeling my walls spasm against him, coating him with my musky fluids. Despite my earlier decision to watch him I close my eyes as I settle against him and begin grinding my hips with long deliberate strokes. I feel him shift slightly, hear his shallow pants, and know that his body has given over even if the rest of him hasn’t.

This submission fuels my already scorching hunger. My movements become less controlled, more primal as I continue working my hips, the built-up need taking over, demanding satisfaction and not being willing to wait. The tightly wound coils within me burst, and I scream out, the rush of orgasm catching both of us by surprise with its quick ferocity. I cling to him, riding the waves as they wash over me, my muscles clamping down on him like a vise, milking him until he, too, climaxes, moaning as he does, but whether or not it is a sound of despair or unwilling pleasure I cannot be certain…