“Yes.”
He fidgeted and rubbed his cheek.
“Drink your coffee,” he said.
I added some sugar to it and stirred. He watched, taking a deep drink of his own.
“I went to the show tonight.”
“Did you?”
“Yes. I often do.”
“To see me?”
“Yes. To look at you.” The way he said it made me wet. He watched me. He wants me, that man right there. Oh my God. He smiled, perhaps sensing my anxiety. “Tonight, Lucy, we’ll mostly talk. Nothing too wild.”
I nodded, thankful to hear it.
“Answer me out loud,” he said. “I prefer it.”
“Yes, Matthew,” I amended, blushing.
“You have a lot to learn but I think you’re a pretty smart girl.”
“I hope I’m good enough for you.”
He took a deep breath, a very loud one. From the look on his face I half expected him to stand up and walk out. But instead he reached across the table. “Give me your hand.” I did, and he took it, and we could both feel it shaking in his grip.
“Don’t be afraid.” He spoke so quietly it was hard to hear above the hum around us. He turned my hand over in his palm, studying it like there were secrets there. “Just always tell me the truth. Okay? Always.”
“I will.”
“Are you finished?” he asked, letting go of me. “I’d like to go somewhere more private before we really talk.”
* * *
We went out to his car, and again his driver was missing in action. The first thing he did was roll down the windows.
“Lucy Merritt, if you ever show up to see me again smelling like a French whorehouse, you’ll be sorry you did.”
How embarrassing. I was already a fuck up. He kept the windows down the whole way to his house. When we arrived he pulled me to the sink in his kitchen. “Wash it off. I want to smell you, not some perfumed-up whore.”
I tried to wash all of it off, which wasn’t easy, partly because I was so distracted by his spectacular house. It was difficult too because it was mostly on my clothes, but I did my best. I guess it was all right, because when I came out, he sniffed me and muttered, “Good enough.” Then he took my arm and led me to a door in the hallway. “We’ll always play in the basement,” he explained. We made our way down the carpeted stairwell, and I guess I expected him to take me to a dungeon of sorts. Black and forbidding, tricked out with crosses and beams and chains hanging from hooks in the ceiling. But the room he took me to wasn’t a dungeon at all. It actually looked more like an art salon. Or a really cool and modern funeral home, done in crisp and textured neutrals.
He told me to look around, to look at everything. I walked around but I didn’t dare touch.
The walls were upholstered with fabric, velvety drapes in taupe. There were huge, comfortable sofas that I tried out, sitting down on them, and as it turned out, that was the only chance I’d get.
I didn’t know it yet, but only Matthew ever sat on them, while I knelt or lay supine at his feet, or bent over an ottoman with my ass in the air. But they were very nice and comfy, the matching ottomans scattered around the room in several heights and sizes. He pointed out the eyebolts near the bottom of each one. “I’ll strap you to these when I beat you or fuck you, sometimes.” I just nodded when he said it, like that was perfectly great. Oh, wow, Matthew, bolting me to an ottoman. That’s a spectacular idea.
When I was done drooling over the cushiony sofas and ottomans, he took me over to a large armoire in the corner. It had drawers full of leather restraints, straps and cuffs, sex toys and paraphernalia that made my eyes go wide. The many things he showed me in that armoire both shocked and titillated me. I was so hot by that time, I wanted him to take me then and there. I was really close to begging for it but I managed to keep quiet, the obedient little slave. He showed me paddles and crops and canes, and tooled leather straps just as thick as the paddles. He showed me delicate but painful looking clips and clamps. He put one on my finger to give me an idea how it would feel. It pinched a little, but nothing I couldn’t bear. “It will feel different on your nipples and your clit,” he cautioned me. I swallowed hard. Of course it would.
Then he showed me dildos and butt plugs and other toys that terrified me. They were far too large to ever fit up inside me. “You’ll like these best of all,” he said with a smile. He showed me a shelf full of lubricants, all different types. Scented, flavored, heavy duty, light duty. He showed me one bottle with a gleam in his eye. “This kind will make you itch, for when you’ve really been bad.”
Yes, my eyes must have been like saucers looking into that armoire. He showed me everything proudly, like the curator of some perverse museum. When I’d had a good look at it all he tilted my face to his. He looked into my eyes and I felt shy and exposed. It was very, very hard not to look away.
“Look at me,” he insisted. When my eyes were fixed on his, he spoke to me in a low voice.
“So what do you think, Lucy Merritt? If you’re going to be my lover, you’ll have to endure all these things.”
And the way he said lover made me absolutely thrill, and then that word endure, it sounded sexy as hell to my ears. I searched for my voice, for what to say. He pressed me some more, his voice goading me.
“Are you sure you don’t just want to run home? Climb back into bed with your worn out copy of The Story of O?”
“No. I want to stay here.”
“Okay then. Let’s stay.”
He led me to the center of the room, then walked away from me, talking over his shoulder.
“Face me. Take off your clothes. Everything. Put them over by the door.” I stood still for just a second, and then I did exactly as he said. I took off my sweater, my jeans, my shirt and socks and shoes, until I wore only my thong and bra, and then I looked up at him, my face flaming red.
“Everything but the panties,” he said from the sofa, where he sat watching every move I made. I removed my bra and placed everything by the door, thankful at least for the small scrap of fabric between my legs. As I walked, I had to make an effort to move my limbs. I had been naked for Pietro so many times, practically naked in dance costumes which left nothing to the imagination. But never, never had I truly felt as naked as I did now, and that was even wearing the panties he’d so graciously let me keep on. His intent gaze was terrifying and yet thrilling. I desperately hoped he liked what he saw.
He stood up and beckoned me back to the center of the room where he met me, looking over me long and critically. I burned and blushed. It was so intimate and embarrassing. My hands came up of their own volition to cover my breasts.
“Don’t,” he warned. “Don’t ever try to hide your body from me. In this room, when we’re together, it’s mine. Understand?”
I nodded and put my hands down, and felt my nipples grow hard under his gaze. I didn’t know whether to look at him, or look away, or look at the floor, or what. Then his hand touched my buttock, and I flinched.
“Stand still.”
Again he reached out to touch me, and this time, I was still as a statue for him. He ran his hand slowly all over my bottom, down to the underside of my cheeks and then further down to my upper thigh. Finally, he was putting those beautiful hands on me. He stood close, in my space, and I could smell him, feel him, his incredible maleness sending my own body into a chaotic, hypercharged hum. His fingers crept under my thong and he slowly pulled it down to the tops of my thighs, where he let it rest. He moved closer behind me and pressed against me. I stifled a moan. Though he was still fully dressed, I could feel his rigid erection against my ass.