Page 29 of Hard Discipline

The praise and the rough note in his voice makes me shiver in delight, and so I narrow my focus, taking him even deeper so the head of his cock is brushing the back of my throat, then sucking him hard. His hips shift as I do it, his fingers tightening in my hair, all the lazy relaxation in him gone as pleasure takes hold.

Lucas liked a blow job, except he always closed his eyes when I gave him one. Sometimes I used to wonder if he was imagining someone else rather than me, but I never had the courage to ask him. Mr. Fairfax, though, catches me beneath the chin and forces my head up so I have to meet his blue gaze.

“Watch me,” he orders. “I want to see you swallow every fucking drop when I come.”

The way he says that makes my whole body turn to flame. I couldn’t look away from him if I tried. I’m lost in the dense blue of his gaze and suddenly all I want is to make him come and come hard. Give him the best blow job he’s ever had. Suck him harder, take him deeper than anyone ever has, so he’ll remember who did this to him. So he’ll never forget me.

So I do and my eyes water as he thrusts into my mouth. But I can still see what I’m doing to him, how the pleasure burns like a flame in the blue of his eyes. And I see the moment he comes apart too, his face hardening and every line of him tensing. “Fuck,” he snarls. “Jesus fucking Christ, sub.”

Then he’s coming hard, hot, salty liquid filling my mouth. And I’m swallowing him down, swallowing all of him just as he ordered me to, my own body shaking as much as his.

There’s a moment of panting silence afterwards while I rest my head against his thigh. I can hear his breathing begin even out, his fingers idly tangling once more in my hair.

I close my eyes, my cheeks wet with tears from the brush of his cock against my throat, but also just…. from him. From the thought of his loneliness. The thought of his grief and his pain, and the incredible loss he experienced. I don’t know why it hurts me so much. I don’t know why he matters, because he shouldn’t. We’re just having sex, not deep, heart-to-heart chats.

Mr. Fairfax lets out a breath and reaches down, pulling me up and into his lap. I’m facing him, my legs spread on other side of his lean waist. It’s amazing sitting on him, both of us naked, skin to skin. His face is relaxed, the remains of the orgasm glowing in his eyes, and I want to touch the lines at the corner of his eyes, lines of experience, of pain and grief. There are lines around his mouth, too. It’s so hard. He doesn’t smile a lot, I can already tell, and that hurts me too.

“Magnificent, sub,” he says, his voice roughened. “That was fucking magnificent.”

His praise warms me all the way through until I’m glowing like a lightbulb. It’s probably stupid to feel so pleased with myself, but I do. “Thank you, Master,” I say. “And thank you for allowing me to care for you.”

His blue gaze is hot and he’s looking at me as if he’s never seen anything like me before in his entire life. He’s not so much a scientist now, wanting to dissect me, but a man looking at a lottery ticket and finding that all the numbers are winning ones.

I’ve never been looked at like that in my entire life.

He’s silent a moment, then he says. “Why did you hide yourself away? Let the world pass you by?”

I shouldn’t really be so surprised at how he keeps asking me unexpected questions and doing unexpected things, since he’s been doing that all night. Yet somehow, I’m still shocked by the question. I’d thought he’d forgotten what I told him.

I’m unable to hold his gaze so I look down, trying to think of the least pathetic answer, but then he takes my hands and places them on his chest, palms down. Beneath his hot, velvety skin, his muscles are rock hard and I feel the slow, steady beat of his heart. “Look at me, sub,” he orders softly, covering my hands with his and holding them against his skin.

Reluctantly, I lift my lashes to look him in the eye. “I was afraid,” I say simply. “I was afraid of everything and everyone. It was so dumb. I couldn’t go to college, couldn’t do anything but sit in my apartment with the door locked.”

His hands over mine are warm, his chest against my palms hot. I love touching him. “Why do you say it’s dumb?”

“I mean, it is, isn’t it? My parents didn’t understand what was wrong with me, how I could throw a Yale scholarship away like that just because of an assault. But they didn’t understand.” I swallow past the lump in my throat. “No one did.”

He’s quiet, just gazing at me. Then he says, “When Gabrielle died, I shut myself away. The only place I went to was the office,the only thing I concerned myself was work. I buried myself in it, cutting off friends, cutting off my son. You said that I wasn’t the one who died, and you’re right. I wasn’t. But it felt like it for a long, long time.”

“That’s different,” I begin. “You lost your?—”

“And you lost your belief in yourself,” he interrupts gently. “What I’m trying to say is that we both lost things that were important to us. Which doesn’t make us dumb, only lost.”

I don’t know why those words hit me the way they do, like a cannonball to the foundations of my soul, shaking me. I stare into his blue eyes, seeing not the Dom, or Luc’s father, or the CEO of a massive company. Seeing only the man, grieving, hurting, alone….

“I don’t feel lost with you,” I say before I can stop myself. “I don’t feel afraid. With you, I feel found.”

Something shifts in his eyes and it looks like regret, and I know immediately what he’s going to say. He’s going to remind me that this is only one night, that there can't be more than this, and I shouldn’t get attached. But I have a horrible feeling it’s too late for that for me, and I have to get these words out. I have to tell him so he knows. “And… I want to find you too, Gideon. You don’t have to stay lost if you don’t want to be.”

The expression on his face shifts again, his blue gaze flickers, and I know I’ve said too much. He’s going to say something now, perhaps send me away, and I can’t bear it. I don’t want to end it like this, so I lean forward and press my mouth to his.

He must know what I’m doing, yet he doesn’t move, still holding my hands pressed to his chest. But he doesn’t kiss me back, either, and it hurts. In fact, everything about this is suddenly exquisitely painful. I shouldn’t have said anything. I’ve ruined the moment, been too open, been too-full on. So I do the only thing I can.

“Please Master,” I whisper against his lips. “Let me choose another toy.”

16

Gideon

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