Page 20 of Ashes to Ashes

As the beginnings of a few salty tears stung my eyes, I bit my lip to keep myself from crying. “Only snippets,” I admitted on a pained whisper. “Not this,” I added with a sob as I tried to ride his trouser-clad erection. If he didn’t make me come, and soon, I was seriously considering jumping off his lap and doing it myself. I didn’t know how much more of his teasing I couldtake.

With his other hand, he gripped my hip and held me steady so I couldn’t rock myself to completion. “I didn’t give you permission to come,” he growled and nipped at my shoulder, the bite a punctuation mark to his statement. “Such a bad little girl. I think you might want to be punished.”

Incoherent with longing, I shook my head frantically and then my tears began to fall. “You’re punishing menow.”

“Oh sweetheart,” he said, his voice like honey. “This isn’t punishment, this is anticipation.”

“I’m dying, Ash!” I cried. “Why are you torturingme?”

“How bad do you wantme?”

“Bad,” I croaked. “So fuckingbad.”

I tried to ride him again but his grip on my hip was firm. “Tell me what you remember about that night or I won’t let youcome.”

“You motherfucking fiend!” I cried, slamming my palms against his broad chest. “Why are you doing this tome?”

Ash’s arms came around me like a vice, and he held me tight to his chest. “I promise you Rae, if you do things my way, you will come like you’ve never come before.”

“I don’t need to come like I’ve never come before,” I argued. “I just need to fucking come.” I wiggled against him, creating enough space to twist my wrist and snake my hand down to against my belly. I’d almost reached my weeping cunt when he grabbed ahold of my wrist and raised both my hands betweenus.

“Oh no you don’t,” he growled. “I thought I made myself clear: you come when I say you come. And for that little stunt, I’m going to make you wait longer.”

“Fuck you,” I whispered, all the fight going out of me. “I hateyou.”

“You don’t hate me,” he responded, shaking his head. “You adoreme.”

“I wish I’d never metyou.”

He maneuvered my hands around my back, and holding both wrists in one of his hands, he said, “That’s not true. You wish you’d met me sooner.” His words were spoken with the confidence of a man who had a woman at his mercy.

He traced a finger up my belly and over my sternum until his hand rested flat against my thudding chest. “If you think your heart is racing now, imagine what it’ll feel like when my cock is buried deep inside of you. When I’m in so far and buried so deep, there’s nowhere else for me to go. When you’re so full of me you think you’re going to break apart. Imagine what it’ll be like when you’re down on all fours in front of me and I’m slamming into you, my balls smacking against your pussy and my handprint glowing on your pink, heated flesh. Imagine how fast your heart will beat when I lay you out like a feast and dine on your exquisite cunt, when I nibble on that beautiful little clit of yours until you you’re not sure if you’re in heaven or in hell. Imagine how hard it’ll beat when I take you farther than you’ve ever gone before.”

As Ash spoke, the sound of his voice calmed the angry fire burning inside of me and stoked a wholly different one back to life. With just his words, my desire raged to the fore, the skin of my thighs prickling with awareness, with memories. I’d felt his head between my thighs once before, his beard abrading that sensitive skin. I knew what it was like to have him feast on me, like he was a dying man and I was his last meal. Between his words and my memories, my lust built, my stomach clenched, and my pussy quivered.

I don’t know what Ash saw on my face in that moment, but whatever it was, it pleased him. “Yeah, just like that,” he crooned. “Let go,” he commanded as he rolled his hips beneath me, the friction of his wool trousers against my exposed center rough and tantalizing. “Remember what it was like when I fucked you before, when you fucked me back,” he encouraged, slipping a long, thick finger inside of me, brushing up against my g-spot, pumpingfast.

I screamed for my life as my orgasm hit. “Holy shit, I’m coming.” The words came out as a roar as the massive wave—a tsunami of feeling—washed over me and then crashed to shore, leaving me shattered like a million pieces of sand scattered at Ash’sfeet.

When I opened my eyes, he was licking my juices from his finger. “So fucking sweet.”

I collapsed against him in a fit of exhausted giggles.

* * *

Having spentmost of my life on stage, I didn’t regularly feel exposed under the watchful gaze of an appreciative audience. If anything, I reveled in being the center of attention. And yet, as Ash and I sat across from each other on the private jet to Portland I ducked my head and stared down at the book in my lap, letting the fall of my hair shield me from hisgaze.

What had happened in the car—what I’d let him do to me—kept coming back to me. Obviously, I wasn’t a prude about sex, but I struggled with how I’d literally begged him to let me come. How I’d let him reduce me to nothing but a needful bunch of nerve endings. He’d commanded me, and pushed me past my limits. He’d made me feel out of control; like I had back when I would have done anything for my next drink. In his lap, I would have done anything for my orgasm.

And I couldn’t ignore the way he’d needed to control the situation, to control me. There was something about him and his needs I didn’t understand, and until I did, I would be wise to tread carefully. I’d never been with a dominant man—the idea had never appealed to me—and now, having glimpsed what that might be like, I wasn’t sure I liked that side of him. Orme.

Physically speaking, for as relatively tame as it had been, it had also been one of the most erotic experiences of my life. But, given how carefully my sobriety needed to be managed, I couldn’t give up the reins of control the way he’d want next time. I’d spent far too long being out of control that the idea left me unsettled. And yet, my body still thrummed with the memory of the way he’d played me like a finely-tuned instrument.

“I can see the wheels turning in your head,” Ash remarked.

I closed my book and set it aside. Folding my hands primly in my lap, my legs crossed at the ankles, I decided to attack the problem head on. Hiding from things, or staying quiet and hoping something would change on its own, was never a smart idea. We needed to discuss the situation like mature, level-headed adults.

“You pushed me back there.”

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