Carnal Passions Presents
Reconstructing Meredith
By
Lauren Gallagher
This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents and dialogues in this book are of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is completely coincidental.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
Carnal Passions
A Division of Champagne Books
www.carnalpassions.com
Copyright 2011 by Lori Witt
ISBN 9781926996097
March 2011
Cover Art by Amanda Kelsey
Produced in Canada
Carnal Passions
#35069-4604 37 ST SW
Calgary, AB T3E 7C7
Canada
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Carnalpassions.com (or the retailer of your choice) and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
SMASHWORDS EDITION
Other Books by Lauren Gallagher
Between Brothers
The Next Move
Until It's Over
Light Switch
A Note From The Author
This book contains references to traumatic physical and sexual abuse, including rape and imprisonment, and the psychological effects thereof. While the abuse is not shown, it is discussed and may be upsetting to some readers. Please use your discretion.
- L. Gallagher
Dedication
To everyone who made this book possible,
Especially Steve, Kathleen and Lia.
I couldn’t have done this without you.
One
King. Queen. Jack. Ten. Nine. All spades.
Only a well-practiced poker face kept me from grinning. With a king-high straight flush in my hand, the only thing that could save any of my opponents was a royal flush.
Kristen, one of my girlfriends, eyed me from across the table, undoubtedly inspecting my expression for anything that might betray the hand I held. I just looked back at her, laid my cards facedown on the table, and folded my hands over them.
She laughed quietly. Why she still tried to read me, I didn’t know. My poker face was as rock solid as her own.
I looked to my left. Steve, tonight’s host, scowled at his cards. His visible frustration was too intense to be a bluff. He was probably thinking his shitty hand meant he was fucked. Which I supposed was true, but it was really my hand, not his, that meant he was fucked.
And it was about damned time, too. I was already down almost fifty bucks tonight, and most of that was in the pile of chips in front of Kristen. It was high time I got some of that back.
Matt, Kristen’s other boyfriend, tapped a five-dollar chip on the table. “Kris, you’re opening.”
She didn’t hesitate, picking up two fivers and tossing them into the center of the table. “Ten.”
Steve’s scowl intensified. He chewed his lip for a second, then threw in two chips. “Call.”
I did the same, minus the display of frustration. “Call.”
Matt raised the bet to fifteen. Kristen and Steve both raised their eyebrows. His five-dollar raise could have been cockiness or a bluff, knowing him. Still, I wasn’t worried.
Matt tapped the deck with two fingers. “Kristen, how many?”
She pulled two cards out of her hand and slid them across the table. Matt dealt two and sent them her way.
He raised his eyebrows. “Steve?”
“Four,” Steve muttered. They exchanged cards.
“Scott?”
I started to speak, but my cell phone vibrated in my pocket, startling me. As I pulled it out, I said, “None for me.”
I looked at my caller ID. The number was unrecognized, so it was probably a wrong number. I debated kicking it over to voicemail, but since they were calling at past nine on a weeknight, there was always the possibility it wasn’t a wrong number and was important. Keeping my voice as quiet as I could, I answered.
“Hello?”
“Scott?”
The woman’s voice raised the hairs on the back of my neck. It couldn’t be. Not after all this time.
I cleared my throat. “Yes, this is Scott.”
“Oh, thank God.” She was almost whispering. “It’s…”
My heart pounded. “Meredith?”
Kristen met my eyes from across the table, eyebrows up.
“Yeah,” Meredith said softly. “It’s me.”
I nodded. Kristen’s eyes widened.
To Meredith, I said, “This is… unexpected.”
Matt and Kristen’s voices murmured in the background, behind the blood pounding in my ears and the tense silence on the line.
“…someone you know?”
“…his ex-girlfriend…”
Meredith took a breath. “Listen, I know I’m probably the last person you expected to hear from, and…” She dropped her voice a little lower. “Scott, I need your help.”
If there were five words in the English language that could make me abandon a king-high straight flush when I was fifty in the hole, those were the ones.
“Hold on a second.” I pushed my chair back. To the other players, I said, “I need to take this. I’m out.”
Kristen shot me an inquisitive look, but didn’t say anything.
I ducked into the kitchen so I could speak to Meredith privately and not disturb the other players. “So, what’s going on?”
“It’s a long story. There’s—” She exhaled. “A lot’s happened in the last few years.”
Something cold wrapped itself around the base of my spine. Her voice was different somehow. I couldn’t decide if she sounded exhausted or on the brink of tears. Or both.
“Meredith, are you okay?”
She took another breath, and the raggedness of it only tightened that chill coiling around my spine.
“Meredith—”
“I’d rather discuss it in person,” she said quietly.
I swallowed. “When?”
“Whenever. The sooner the better, but it’s not a dire emergency.”
That allowed me a little bit of relief. Not much, though. I wouldn’t rest easy until I had the full story.
“What about now?” I asked.
“On such short notice? Scott, I don’t want you to drop—”
“Where are you? I can leave now, just tell me where you are.”
“It’s not an emergency,” she said. “I don’t want you to drop everything.”
“Do you need my help?”
“Yes, but—”
“Then let me help you,” I said. “Tell me where to be and when to be there.”
The breath she released was pure relief. I wondered if she’d worried I’d turn her away. I hoped she knew me better than that; whatever was in our past, I would never leave her high and dry.
“Can you meet me at my apartment?” she asked.
“Text me the address,” I said. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”
She said nothing for a moment, then whispered, “Thank you, Scott.”
After we’d hung up, I chewed my lip and stared at my now dormant phone. I looked up just as Kristen stepped into the kitchen.
“Everything okay?” she asked.
“Yeah. I have to go, though.”
“What’s wrong?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. Meredith says she needs my help, but fuck if I know what that means.”
She put her hands on my hips. “You think she’s in some kind of trouble?”
“No idea.” I slid my phone back into my pocket. “Hopefully it’s nothing serious, but if she’s calling me after all this time…”
“Think it has to do with her husband?”
That cold something wound itself a little tighter. I nodded slowly. “I’d be willing to bet it does.” I hoped it didn’t. I hoped I’d been wrong about him from the beginning, but I doubted it.
Matt appeared in the doorway. “Everything okay?”
“Yeah, I think so, but I have to go.” I grinned and ran my fingers through Kristen’s hair. To Matt, I said, “Guess you’ll have to take care of her on your own tonight.”
Matt chuckled. “I don’t think that’ll be a problem.”
“Didn’t think it would be.” I looked at Kristen. “I’ll make it up to you, I promise.”
“Damn right you will.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Don’t get mouthy with me, woman.”
“What are you going to do about it?”
I laughed. “I’m going to—” I paused when I put my hands on her waist. I squeezed gently, noting the stiff, thick fabric beneath her unassuming sweatshirt. Then I released a long breath through my nose. “You’re wearing the black corset tonight, aren’t you?”
She batted her eyes. “Maybe I am.”
“Vile temptress,” I growled, and leaned in to kiss her. My phone buzzed, probably signaling that Meredith’s text message had come through. “And on that note, I have to run.”
“Okay.” Kristen stood up on her toes to kiss me one more time. “Give her a hug for me.”
“Will do.”
“Love you.”
“Love you, too.” We parted with one last brief kiss. Then I shook Matt’s hand, cashed out my chips, said goodbye to everyone else, and left.
Steve’s apartment was on the second floor, and I was thankful we’d had poker night at his place this week. Several of the other players were on some of the higher floors, and the elevators in this place were painfully slow. At least from here, I could just take the stairs instead of losing my mind waiting for the elevator.
On the way down the stairs and out to the parking lot, my thoughts went back to my short, cryptic conversation with Meredith. What was going on? Why me? Why now?
I hoped against all hope it wasn’t what I thought it was.
We’d parted almost amicably after living together for a couple of years, and things were strained for a while after that. Time eased the resentment, though, and eventually our friendship had flourished. In the back of my mind, I’d held onto the hope that we might get back together, but I was content with friendship if that was the best thing for us.
Then she met Rich.
I gritted my teeth at the very thought of him. I punched Meredith’s address into my car’s GPS, then turned out of the parking lot and followed the directions.
Rich had sent up all kinds of red flags from the very beginning. I never actually met the son of a bitch, but when Meredith abruptly cut off contact with me after seeing him for two weeks, alarm bells went off in my head. She stopped returning my calls and blocked my e-mail address. Within a month, she’d stopped communicating with any of our mutual friends, and before the second month was up, she’d quit her job and moved out of state with him.
Last I’d heard, they’d married about six months later. That was five years ago, and to my knowledge, no one in our social circle had heard from her again.
I’d thought about her often since then. I alternated between being hurt and angry to worrying myself sick. For five years, I hoped she’d call, reappear, send a smoke signal to me, someone, anyone, but she didn’t.
Not until tonight, anyway. I white-knuckled the steering wheel. The bitter taste of resentment tried to work its way in, but I forced it back. Meredith was a proud woman. If she was willing to admit she needed help and she was willing to come to me for that help, then this was no time to bring up the past. And if Rich was the asshole I’d long suspected him to be, then I had no business holding any of this against her.
The clock on the dash showed a few minutes ’til ten when I pulled into an unfamiliar apartment complex on the other side of town.
“You have arrived at your destination,” the unemotional voice of the GPS announced, and my heart beat faster.
I locked my car and pocketed the keys as I looked up at the building and wondered what waited for me inside. On the way across the parking lot, I glanced around, and icy dread tingled beneath my skin. Aside from my own, there wasn’t a car in this lot that had been manufactured in the last five years. Maybe even ten. On every window of the aging brick building were black bars. Across the street, a rundown convenience store was backed up against a tavern with dark windows and bright neon signs. The place looked crowded for a Wednesday night, and it looked like one of the places that frequently appeared on the evening news with blue and red flashing lights in the background.
All of that added up to a place where one wouldn’t expect to find a surgeon living with his wife, which led me—and the knot in my gut—to believe she lived here alone. I hoped that had nothing to do with why I was here, but I was almost certain it was exactly why.
At the entrance to the building, I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. Then I buzzed her apartment number. A second later, the lock on the door clicked open. Inside, I pulled the heavy metal door shut behind me, the clang echoing up and down the deserted stairwell. I started up the stairs under the weak light of the only sconce whose bulb hadn’t burned out.
The hallway was somewhat better lit. At least enough for me to make out the weathered, faux brass numbers on each door.
Twenty-one. Twenty-two. Twenty-place where a three used to be.
Twenty-four. I steeled myself against whatever conversation awaited, and knocked.
My heart kept time with the muffled footsteps on the other side.
“No, no, get—” Her voice raised my pulse a few more notches. “Would you get out of the way?”
The chain on the door scratched, then rattled. The deadbolt ground, then clicked. I couldn’t breathe. I sent up one last prayer that this wasn’t what I thought it would be, and the door opened.
My heart dropped into my feet.
Meeting my eyes across the threshold, one hand on the doorknob and the other arm restraining an irritated orange tabby, was a shadow of the woman I’d once known. Her face was gaunt, shoulders poised as if she was ready to shrink back or recoil at any second. She smiled, but that didn’t mask the darkness under—or the worry in—her eyes.
“Wow,” she said softly. “I can’t believe how long it’s been.”
Forcing a smile, I said, “Neither can I.”
“Come in, come in.” She stood aside. The cat squirmed under her arm.
I stepped past her, glancing at the cat and chuckling. “Opinionated little creature?”
She groaned. “Oh, God, you have no idea.”
“Trust me, I do.” I scratched the cat’s ears. “I have one that drives me crazy.”
“Guess they’re good for that, aren’t they?”
“Sometimes I think that’s all they’re good for.”
She laughed, then set the cat down. It trotted out of the room, leaving us in awkward silence without our easy conversation piece. Meredith kept her eyes down, and as she folded her arms across her chest, her shoulders were bunched with tension. She chewed her lower lip, something unspoken furrowing her brow.
I opened my mouth to speak, but she suddenly gestured down the hall.
“Sorry, I’m being rude,” she said quickly. “Let’s go in the living room so we can sit. Do you want some coffee?”
“No, thank you.” Caffeine was the last thing I needed tonight.
I followed her down the hall into the small, spartan living room. She’d always had elegant taste, but what little she had in this room—a couch, a couple of chairs, an old television on an older makeshift TV stand—was probably all secondhand. The kind of furnishing of someone who’d had nothing to her name and probably not a lot of money, and just needed a few things to get by for the time being.
At her invitation, I took a seat on the couch. She sat on the other end, keeping a cushion between us. Completely at a loss for how to break the ice, I watched her hug her knees to her chest and look anywhere but right at me. Conversation had come so easily for us back then, but we were strangers now. I searched her face and body language for signs of the woman I once knew. A hint of her unshakable boldness, her wry sense of humor, something.
Nothing. I found nothing.
What’s happened to you, Meredith?
She finally managed to look at me. “Thank you for coming over. On such short notice and all of that.”
“No problem. You said you needed help, so…”
She bit her lip again, dropping her gaze to watch her fingers pluck away a phantom piece of lint from her pant leg.
Pulling my knee up onto the cushion between us, I turned toward her. “What do you need?”
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Then she faced me. “I need your help finding a Dom.”
“You—” I blinked. Of all the things I thought she might ask me tonight, that hadn’t even crossed my mind. “What?”
“I mean, assuming you’re still involved with the lifestyle?”
“I am, yes.” I eyed her uncertainly. “I didn’t think you were. But—” I shook my head. “That’s why you called me over here out of the blue after all this time? So I could help you find a Dom?” Anger surged to the surface, but I shoved it back. There had to be more to this. “What’s going on, Meredith?”
Shrinking away from me slightly, she ran a hand through her hair, and the hint of a tremor gave me chills. I wanted so badly to move closer to her, to put a hand on her knee or an arm around her shoulders, but something deep down told me she’d draw away. Not from me per se, but from any advance. Like a beaten dog flinching from the hand that tries to pet it.
“Meredith—”
She suddenly met my eyes, and amidst the fatigue and worry in hers, there was a spark of fierce determination. Finally, a piece of the woman I once knew.
She moistened her lips. “It’s a long story.”
“I know, you mentioned that on the phone.” I inclined my head slightly. “I have nothing but time.”
Swallowing hard, she dropped her gaze. “You probably heard I got married.”
“I did, yes.”
“Rich wasn’t just my husband. He was a…” She swallowed again. When she met my eyes once more, the faint shimmer of tears took my breath away. “Rich was my Dom. My… Master.”
A tremendous weight forced what little breath I had left out of my lungs. My shoulders fell. Short of telling me he was a mass murderer, there wasn’t much she could have told me that could have turned my stomach more violently.
I found just enough breath to whisper, “What did he do to you?”
She blinked a few times. Sniffed sharply. Fixed her gaze on her wringing hands. “I’d been thinking about being a submissive for a while. It intrigued me for a long time, but I wasn’t sure how to go about it, what it entailed, that sort of thing.”
Inwardly, I cringed. Jesus, if I had known, I could have guided her into it. Shown her the ropes like I’d done with Kristen.
Meredith went on. “Rich saw that in me. He saw that I was inexperienced, but wanted to be a sub. Even though I hadn’t said anything, he knew.”
I winced, not even caring if she saw it. I’d seen the sub in her too, but she hadn’t been interested in BDSM while we were dating. Either uninterested or simply not ready.
“So he…” She trailed off, closing her eyes as she chewed her thumbnail. “Long story short, he made me his sub. His slave, actually.”
“He forced you into submission,” I breathed.
She nodded. “It was hell, Scott. Every day, for two and a half years, it was hell.”
Rich, so help me God, if I ever get my hands on you…
“I assume you’re divorced now?” I asked.
“Yes,” she said. “I left a couple of years ago. I’ve only been back here for a little while, but the divorce has been final for almost eighteen months. Rich is out of the picture.”
“Good,” I said. “What I don’t understand, though, is why you want a Dom now.”
“Because he was right about one thing,” she said. “I am a submissive. I wasn’t ready to become one yet, I certainly wasn’t ready to be his, but I am a sub.”
“But, after everything he put you through—”
“I need someone who will help me pick up the pieces,” she said quietly. “I want to know what it’s like to enjoy being a sub.”
I swallowed hard. I knew what it was like to be a damaged sub. I’d been one years ago, albeit to a lesser degree, after a traumatic experience with a Domme before I became a Dom myself. But two and a half years of twenty-four/seven slavery with an abusive Master? How the hell did anyone pick up those pieces?
“Do you understand what it is I’m looking for?” she asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “But are you sure? I would think you’d need to spend some time with a therapist before—”
“I have.” She gestured sharply and shook her head. “I’ve been to four. They’ve all helped me grieve my so-called marriage and move past the abuse, but when it comes to the sex and the kink…” She shook her head again.
I sat up and moved a little closer to her, barely resisting the urge to put a comforting hand on her arm. “What do they say about it?”
“They all think I need to just focus on relationships, try to get back into a ‘normal’ sex life, that kind of thing.” She looked at me, and there were more tears in her eyes now. “Rich ruined enough things for me, Scott. He took away a few years of my life. He beat me, he raped me, he let other people—”
I flinched, sucking in a breath. “Fucking hell.”
“They think I should focus on dealing with the abuse instead of exploring kink, but they don’t understand that part of letting him go is taking back my sexuality and making it mine instead of his. I need to take this back from him.” Meredith put her hand over mine. The cool dampness of her palm raised goose bumps along my arm. “It’s a part of who I am, Scott, even if I never got the chance to explore it before him.” She sniffed, then cleared her throat. “You were the only one I could think of who’d understand, and you’re the only one I trust enough to help me find someone who won’t hurt me like he did.”
I turned my hand over underneath hers, lacing our fingers together. “What if I told you I know a therapist who understands kink?”
She blinked. “You do?”
I nodded. “She’s involved in the lifestyle herself, and she’s helped a lot of traumatized subs.” Squeezing her hand gently, I said, “If I give you her number, will you call her?”
“Will you—” She hesitated. “Will you go with me to see her?”
“If that’s what you want, yes.”
“It is.”
“Set up the appointment, then. I’ll be there.”
She smiled. “Thank you.”
I returned the smile, pretending this wasn’t all killing me from the inside out.
“What about the rest?” she said. “About helping me find a Dom? Will you?”
I said nothing for a moment, nor did I look at her.
She ran her thumb along the side of my hand. “Scott?”
“There’s only one Dom I’d let anywhere near you right now,” I said. “And that’s me.”
Meredith’s spine straightened and her hand twitched in mine. “Scott, we’re—”
“Do you trust me?”
She gulped. “Yes, of course. That’s why I called you.”
“Then let me help you.”
“But what about our—” She bit her lip, twin creases appearing between her eyebrows as a grimace threatened. “Our past?”
“It’s in the past,” I said. “I’ve never given you a reason not to trust me, though, have I?”
She shook her head.
“Which puts us well ahead of the game versus if I paired you with a Dom you’d never met.” I slid my other hand under hers.
“I can’t ask you to do this,” she said, dropping her gaze.
I lifted her chin. “I want to. I don’t care what happened between us before, I want to help you now.”
She closed her eyes, pressing her lips tightly together as if struggling to keep her emotions in check.
“If you’re not comfortable with me,” I said, “I can find you someone else. But I’ve guided inexperienced and traumatized subs before. And I’ve been there, you know that.”
“I know.” She opened her eyes. “And I do trust you. I’m just…” She bit her lip, looking away once again.
“You what?”
She blinked a few times, and a tear slid down her cheek. She reached up to wipe it away, but I beat her to it, brushing it away with my thumb.
I caressed her cheek. “Talk to me, Meredith.”
“There are…” She met my eyes. “There are scars.”
Sweet Jesus, what did that bastard do to you? “What kind of scars?”
“Ugly ones,” she whispered.
I moved a little closer to her and stroked her hair. “Do you really think I’d be repulsed by some scars? I’m not that kind of man, Meredith, you know that.”
She looked me in the eye, and when she spoke, her voice shook. “You haven’t seen them.”
“Doesn’t matter.” I touched her face again, then gently pulled her to me and kissed her forehead. “That son of a bitch hurt you, and I’m not about to let a few scars keep me from helping you pick up the pieces.”
She managed a slight but genuine smile. “Thank you, Scott.”
“You’re welcome.”
Ages-old habit took over, and before I realized what I was doing, I leaned in and kissed her lightly. It was only when my lips had been against hers for a few long seconds that panic swept through me. I pulled back, thankful I hadn’t gotten completely carried away and deepened the kiss like I’d very nearly done.
“Sorry, sorry,” I whispered. “I didn’t mean—”
“Don’t be.” She put her arms around my neck. When she spoke again, her voice shook more than before. “Do you know how long it’s been since someone’s kissed me like that?”
I shook my head.
She drew me closer. “Way too long.”
I wrapped my arms around her. “Do you want me to do it again?”
She nodded, and when she wetted her lips, a shiver ran down my spine.
I moved in slowly this time, certain with every inch I gained that she’d come to her senses and pull back. As the nearness of her breath warmed my lips, my heart beat faster.
Just before our lips met, she stopped me with a gentle hand on my chest. Another cool rush of panic surged through my veins.
“What? What is it?” I started to pull away, but she held me to her.
“It’s been a long time, Scott,” she whispered. “A long, long time.”
I ran an unsteady hand through her hair. “I know. If you want me to stop, I—”
“No, it’s not that.” She moistened her lips again. “I just want you to know that if you kiss me again, there’s a good chance I won’t want you to stop.” She swallowed hard. “At all.”
“So you’re saying,” I said, my heart pounding so hard I was surprised it didn’t add a vibrato to my voice, “that if I kiss you again, you won’t want to stop at just a kiss?”
“No, I won’t.”
I slid my hand around the back of her neck and drew her to me. “Thanks for the warning.”
Two
Meredith had never been a timid kisser. I’d always loved the way she combed her fingers through my hair and explored my mouth with her tongue like it was the first time every time. She’d had no reservations about shoving me up against a wall and getting the passionate, full-body-experience kiss she wanted. Though she was a natural sub and I a natural Dom, the assertive and sometimes aggressive way she’d kissed had always turned me on.
Those days were gone.
I couldn’t tell if she held the front of my shirt so she could push me away if she needed to, or if it was so I couldn’t back away. Maybe she just needed something to anchor herself. Her lips moved slowly, almost apologetically against mine, and I didn’t miss the heartbeat’s worth of resistance before she let my tongue part her lips.
A submissive kisser was one thing. Submission aroused me, but this timid, tentativeness broke my heart. Her ex may as well have punched her, thrown her down the stairs, and sent her to work with sunglasses and extra concealer. He was no less a monster than a run-of-the-mill wife beater. Her spirit was just as broken, her body just as abused.
I stroked her hair and held her closer. Sighing into my kiss, she melted against me, molding her body to mine as much as our current position would allow.
One hand released my shirt. A moment later, it came to rest on my thigh. As her hand slowly drifted higher, my pulse soared. This was a small advance, but an advance nonetheless. A flicker of confidence. The further her hand moved, the more passionate her kiss became, and the hand on my shirt pulled me a little closer.
Then, just shy of my cock, her hand stopped. For a few seconds, it lingered there. Her touch was lighter now, less certain, as if she might lift it away at any moment. The tentativeness returned to her kiss, and she loosened her grasp on my shirt.
I put my hand over hers on my leg. I didn’t hold on enough to force her to continue, but gave a firm enough squeeze to ask her not to retreat any further. I broke the kiss, but stayed close to her.
“Do you want to stop?” I asked.
“No. No, I don’t want to stop.” Her voice still shook.
“I don’t want to push you, Meredith,” I whispered, touching her face. “You’re calling the shots tonight, not me.”
“But you’re the—”
“It’s just me tonight. No dominance, no submission. Anything you want from me, it’s yours.” I kissed her again. “All you have to do is ask.” Curling my fingers just slightly, I hoped to coax hers into resuming their dizzying path. Her hand rested more heavily on me now, no longer in danger of pulling away completely, but not yet moving.
“There is one thing I want.” She spoke so softly, I wouldn’t have heard her if I’d been even an inch further away.
“Tell me.”
She closed her eyes for a moment. Then she took a breath and looked at me. “I just want to feel…” She caught herself and her eyes darted away.
Running the backs of my fingers across her cheek, I said, “Tell me, Meredith. Whatever it is.”
When our eyes met again, there were tears in hers. I had a feeling I’d be seeing a lot of that in the coming days, and for the hundredth time, I wanted to strangle Rich.
“I need to remember—” Meredith swept the tip of her tongue across her lips. “I need to remember what it’s like to be touched by someone who doesn’t own me.”
Make that a hundred and one.
“He didn’t own you.” I struggled to keep my voice steady. “You were never his to own.”
The ghost of a smile flickered across her lips, there and gone before it could reach her eyes. “Maybe not, but I’ve forgotten what it feels like to be wanted as something other than a possession.”
I kissed her forehead. “How long has it been?”
Her cheeks colored “Before Rich.”
“Really?” I blinked. “You haven’t…since you left him…”
She shook her head and shrank back from me, avoiding my eyes. “After the divorce, I just didn’t want to meet anyone, and I—”
“Shh.” I caressed her face. “You don’t have to justify it.” I kissed her gently. “I was just curious.” Raising her chin and lowering my own, I looked into her eyes. “I was curious, and I want to make sure I’m not pushing you too far.”
She smiled. “You’re not.”
I started to speak, but her hand moved again, this time sliding over the front of my jeans. I closed my eyes, exhaling as she traced the outline of my very erect cock with the side of her thumb.
“Trust me,” she whispered against my lips, “you’re not pushing me. I want this.” With that, she pulled me to her, and I lost myself once again in her kiss and her touch. Even when her hand left my lap and slid around my neck, my arousal didn’t diminish at all. I held her tighter, kissed her, hoped to God this didn’t stop any time soon.
“Your shirt,” she murmured, struggling to untuck it from my jeans. “Get it… get it off.”
There she was, the confident woman I remembered. I grinned to myself and pulled my shirt off. I was accustomed to being the Dom, and in time I would be hers, but that would come later. Tonight, if she was willing to inch out of the shell into which she’d been forced, I was hardly going to make a move to put her back into it.
Before my shirt had even hit the floor, we were in each other’s arms again. Her kiss, more assertive now, sent shivers down my spine.
When she looked at me again, she said, “I think we should go someplace more comfortable.”
“Wherever you want.”
We released each other and stood. She took me by the hand and led me down the short hall to her bedroom. There, she flicked on the lamp beside the bed. The cat was on the bed, so she evicted him and closed the door, cutting off the brighter light from the hallway and leaving us with only heavy shadows and the bedside lamp’s dim, warm light.
Alone with Meredith and near darkness, I wrapped my arms around her and kissed her again. She put her hands on my hips and came forward, nudging me back a step. Then another. Closer and closer to her bed, and my heart pounded. I was as nervous as I was aroused. Any of my past or present subs would have offered sworn statements that I didn’t even know how to get nervous, but I did.
And in a situation like this, did I ever. My God, I wanted her, but there were so many ways this could go wrong.
She gently drew her nails down my back, grinning into my kiss when I shivered. When she did it again, I broke the kiss and let my head fall back as goose bumps prickled every inch of my skin. I gasped at the softness of her warm lips on the side of my neck. She trailed kisses up to, then along, the underside of my jaw. I sucked in a hiss of breath when she nipped my earlobe.
“Like that?” she whispered.
“Oh, yeah.”
She shifted her weight to one side, then the other, and her height dropped a half inch or so. When one of her shoes brushed my foot as she nudged them to the side, I realized she’d kicked them off. I did the same and toed my own shoes out of the way so we wouldn’t trip over them.
She raised her head and met my lips in a hungry kiss. She pressed against me, urging me to take another step back. This time, my calf brushed the bed frame.
My God, we’re really doing this.
Breaking the kiss, I looked down at her, searching her eyes for any reason to believe we shouldn’t go any farther. I found none, though. All I found was an unmistakable desire that mirrored my own, and that was enough for me to cautiously proceed.
I reached for the first button of her blouse, and she recoiled slightly, but when I tried to lift my hand away, she stopped me.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“No, go ahead, I’m sorry, I…”
“Don’t apologize, Meredith.” I moved my hand from her blouse to her face, hoping she didn’t notice my unsteadiness. “Tell me what you want me to do.”
“I want…” She hesitated, eyes meeting mine, then darting away, then meeting them again. Finally, she closed her fingers around my wrist and guided my hand back down to the top button. “Please.”
I watched her eyes as I opened that first button. Then the second. Then the third. No uncertainty, no hesitation. Nerves, yes, but I had those too, and she gave me nothing to tell me to stop or slow down.
Another button.
Still another.
She helped me untuck her blouse from her slacks, then watched my fingers undo the last button. With her shirt completely open, I ran my fingertip along her collarbone, then down the ribbon of exposed skin between her lapels. She bit her lip and shivered, closing her eyes as her spine straightened. My finger grazed her breast before snagging momentarily on her bra, and she whimpered softly.
I reached up to push her blouse over her shoulders, but when her breath caught this time, I froze.
“Wait,” she said. She stepped back and shrugged her blouse off. When it was gone, though, she didn’t reach for me. She unclasped her bra, letting it fall away as well. Then she hugged herself, her shoulders bunching as they had when I first came through the door. It wasn’t modesty as far as I could tell, especially since she didn’t try to cover her breasts. If anything, she tried to hide from a phantom chill, one that seeped slowly into my veins as I watched her past try to drag her away from me.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
Meredith swallowed hard. “The scars I mentioned, they’re—” Her cheeks colored.
“What about them?”
“They’re…” With a sigh of resignation, she closed her eyes and gathered her hair, pulling it over one slumped shoulder.
“They’re on your back?”
Eyes still closed, she nodded.
A sick feeling rose in the back of my throat. “May I look?”
She hesitated, drawing a long, deep breath through her nose before she nodded again.
My heart jumped into my throat and my stomach coiled into knots. She turned around slowly, and I held my breath, bracing myself for whatever that son of a bitch had done to her.
As she turned, heavy shadows slipped off her body until her skin was finally visible in the low, warm light. I pulled in a sharp breath.
God damn you, Rich. Damn you straight to fucking hell with that shriveled piece of shit that passes for your heart.
I knew the pattern the moment I saw it. The parallel lines of different lengths and varying distances apart, but roughly the same thickness, were unmistakable. To the unknowing eye, it looked like an animal had clawed the hell out of her.
To someone more familiar, it was the pattern of a goddamned cat o’ nine tails, just like the one that had marked my own shoulder one distant, dark day in my past. I cringed. A cat o’ nine was for flogging, for raising a few welts and putting a sub into subspace. Not… not this. Not fucking scourging someone.
The scars went right across her spine, as if he’d hit her with no regard whatsoever for damaging skin or nerves by striking so close to bone. He probably hadn’t concerned himself with protecting her kidneys, either.
In spite of the urge to turn away from how badly he’d mutilated her, I looked closer. Some of the lines were scalloped along the edges.
“Meredith,” I breathed. “These were sutured?”
“A few of them, yes.”
“How did,” I shook my head, blinking in disbelief before looking again and seeing that, yes, the scars were still there. “The emergency room didn’t report it?”
“Emergency room?” She laughed bitterly. “He was a surgeon, Scott. He stitched them himself.”
My stomach lurched. “What ever happened to ‘first do no harm’?” I muttered.
Another humorless laugh. “Apparently he missed that lesson in medical school.”
I couldn’t look at the scars anymore. I put my arms around her waist and held her to me. “I am so, so sorry he did this to you.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“I know, but I can’t believe someone would do this.” I kissed her shoulder.
“Believe it,” she whispered. “Someone did.”
“So he did.” I kissed the side of her neck. “I promise you, I won’t.”
“I know you won’t. I was just afraid of…” She swallowed. “Once you saw them… if you…”
“Meredith.” I nuzzled her neck and held her closer to me. “You know me better than that. Did you really think I’d push you away because of some scars?”
She didn’t speak.
“Baby, look at me.” I released her so she could turn around. Once she faced me again, I wrapped my arms around her. “Honestly. You know me better than that, don’t you?”
Her cheeks darkened and she dropped her gaze. “Yes, I do. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to imply—”
“It’s okay.” I kissed her. “You’ll have to try harder than that if you want to repulse me. Like, getting a tattoo on your forehead that says ‘Scott Moore is a dick’.”
Meredith laughed, and that sound sent a rush of relief through me. She met my eyes. “Maybe I should cancel my tattoo appointment then.”
“Yeah, maybe you should. Now, come here.”
Tangled up in each other, we sank onto her bed. She was on top of me, giving my hands the freedom to explore her body while we alternated between lazy and passionate kissing.
Her every response was a battle between mind and body, between instinct and desire. One wanted to jerk away from my touch, one wanted to press against me and beg for more. Sometimes her kiss was hesitant, sometimes it was confident. I never knew if a caress would bring out a startled gasp or an aroused sigh. But still she didn’t want to stop, so I didn’t.
Together, we got her slacks unzipped and off, and to my surprise, she didn’t even flinch when I slid her panties over her hips. She kicked them away, then eased her naked body down on top of me. Her kiss was desperate now, hungry and demanding, and I groaned as she pressed her hips against my cock through my jeans. The more I touched her, tasted her, breathed her in, the more I physically ached to be inside her, but not until she was ready.
We shifted positions so she was on her back, and when I circled her nipple with my tongue, she whimpered with pleasure even as the hand in my hair twitched and threatened to pull me away. I closed my lips around her nipple, holding it between my teeth and teasing it with my tongue. After a moment, her hand relaxed.
I kissed my way down her belly, but just as I’d passed her navel, the hand in my hair tightened with enough hesitation to make me pause.
I looked up. “What’s wrong?”
“No,” she whispered. “Please… don’t.”
I pushed myself up on my arms. “Don’t what?”
“Don’t go,” she hesitated, her cheeks flushing with uncharacteristic embarrassment. “Down. There.”
“Okay, I won’t.” Promising myself I’d find out later what he’d done to her to make her ashamed and nervous of something she’d once lived for, I moved up to kiss her. “If you don’t want me to, I won’t.”
When I kissed her again, the breath she released was another sigh of relief, and it was all I could do not to ask her right then what had happened. But I wouldn’t do that to her, not now. She’d been through enough. For tonight, she needed some long overdue ecstasy.
I rested on one arm and let my hand drift down her side, pausing on her hip. “Is this okay?”
She nodded.
“Guide my hand,” I said.
“What?”
“So I know what you’re okay with,” I whispered. “Guide my hand.”
For a moment, she didn’t move, and I thought she’d frozen, that what I’d asked was too much for her. Just before I came up with a Plan B, her fingers closed around my wrist. She moved my hand down over her hip, then to her inner thigh. Neither of us breathed as she parted her legs for both of our hands.
She guided me to her pussy, laying my fingers over her clit. I curled them slightly and made slow, gentle circles, all the while watching her eyes. She kept her hand on my wrist, but she didn’t hold it now. She might not have even been aware of her own hand anymore. That, or she kept it there in case panic or pain suddenly took over and she needed to get away from my touch.
I circled her clit a little faster. She whimpered and her back arched, but she didn’t try to push me away. After a while, her hand lifted off mine and, a second later, came to rest on the back of my neck, pulling me down into a kiss. At first, a gentle kiss. Then deeper, more passionate, more confident. Then shy, uncertain. With a little more time, the confidence came back.
The heat of her pussy against my fingertips made my head spin. I was already painfully hard, and now that I was this close to her, I needed to be inside her. Soon, I hoped, and until then, I let my hand mirror her assertiveness. When her lips moved with uncertainty, I kept my touch gentle and slow. As she pulled me closer and kissed me harder, I teased her pussy, sliding two fingers inside her, inching deeper as long as her body language welcomed me.
Her breathing came in sharp, shallow gasps now, cooling the side of my face as she kissed me. Her pussy tightened around my fingers. Anticipation tingled at the base of my spine. Yes, baby, come for me. Don’t hold back, don’t—
She broke the kiss. “Scott.”
The single syllable of my name stopped my hand, my heart, my breathing. “What? Are you—”
“I want you.” She panted against my lips. “I want you to fuck me.”
Yes, yes, yes, you can have me. I swallowed. “Are you sure?” Please say yes. Please say yes. Oh God, baby, please say yes.
She nodded, pulling me down to kiss her again, and if her silent affirmative hadn’t reassured me, her desperate, demanding kiss did. And if that hadn’t convinced me, I’d have deferred to her hand, which slid between us to unbuckle my belt.
I pushed myself up, and we both managed to get my belt unbuckled and my zipper down.
Meredith’s hands stopped and she furrowed her brow. “Shit, I just realized I don’t have any condoms.”
“I, however, do.” I reached into my back pocket and pulled out my wallet.
“Oh, thank God.” Then she laughed. “Scott Moore, ever the prepared one.”
“Damn right.” I set my wallet on the nightstand and rolled onto my back so I could get out of my remaining clothes. Once they were off and the condom was on, I came back to her.
She rested her hands on my shoulders and parted her legs for me as I lowered myself to her, but alarm raised the hairs on the back of my neck when she screwed her eyes shut. The creases between her eyebrows reappeared. Every sharp, uneven breath she drew spelled out apprehension.
I leaned down and kissed her gently. “Are you sure about this?”
The creases deepened.
“Meredith?”
I started to back off, but stopped when she hooked her leg around mine.
Finally, she opened her eyes. “No. I want this.”
“Are you sure?”
She hesitated, then nodded slowly as she put her arms around me. “Yes.”
I kissed her again. Gently, just my lips against hers. “Do you want to get on top? So you can—”
“No. Just like this.”
I didn’t move yet. “I’ll go slow. If I’m hurting you, or you want me to stop, just say so.”
Taking a deep breath, she nodded again.
Resting my weight on one forearm, I guided myself to her with my free hand. I teased her pussy with the head of my cock, pushing in just a fraction of an inch before backing off. She tightened her jaw, screwed her eyes shut again, held her breath. Her fingers dug into my shoulders, holding on as if to still some trembling before it started.
I kissed her neck. “Relax, baby. I won’t hurt you, I promise.” Another gentle kiss just beneath her ear. “You’re completely in control.”
She released her breath. Her fingers loosened their grip on my shoulders.
“You okay?” I whispered.
She didn’t speak, just nodded.
Biting my lip, I slid into her. I moved slowly, stopping whenever she
tensed. Gradually, she relaxed and took me deeper with no resistance. It was my turn to stop breathing, but it wasn’t nerves or apprehension that lodged the air in my throat. I closed my eyes, lips parted for an exhalation that didn’t come, and lost myself in her. The heat of her body against mine, her cool breaths on my shoulder, the soft, familiar smell of her skin and hair, all of that along with the dizzying, overwhelming sensation of being inside her.
I pushed myself up again and looked down at her. She held my gaze as I took long, smooth strokes, and for a moment, all the reasons we were here disappeared. The past, the pain, the scars, all of it was gone, and it was only us. She was the woman I’d made love to just like this hundreds of times before. We were here because we wanted to be. Because we wanted each other.
She reached up to touch my face and I kissed the inside of her wrist, shivering at the warmth of her skin against my lips.
“Come here,” she whispered, and drew me down to kiss her.
We kissed, we moved, we melted against each other, and I didn’t break that kiss until a breathtaking tremor rippled up my spine. Then Meredith shuddered, and her whole body shook against me, her pussy tightening with the first waves of the orgasm she couldn’t quite release, and I’d be damned if I came before she did. Closing my eyes tight and clenching my jaw, I buried my face against her neck and thrust a little harder.
“You’re almost there, aren’t you?” I whispered in her ear.
She moaned softly.
“Come, baby.” You feel so good, baby, I’m losing it. I’m fucking losing it. “Let yourself go, Meredith, let—” My voice caught. “Let me feel you come.”
“Oh fuck, Scott,” she whimpered. Her nails dug into my shoulders, and I gritted my teeth to keep that delicious pain from sending me over the edge. She arched her back. Trembled. Exhaled. Oh my God, she was right there, right there on the brink, so close, so close, and I was ready to go down with her.
As soon as her pussy tightened around me, I didn’t stand a chance. She cried out, I groaned, and a shudder drove me deep inside her. My rhythm fell apart as I tried to keep thrusting, tried to keep breathing, tried to keep her orgasm going along with my own.
Then, as one, we exhaled and relaxed.
Another whimper escaped her lips. I kissed her cheek just as she pulled in a ragged breath, and my lips touched wet skin. Puzzled, I pushed myself up on my arms, and panic turned my veins to ice when I realized she was crying. She put her hand over her eyes, and little by little, fell to pieces.
“Meredith, baby, are you okay?” I touched her face, brushing away a tear. I’d seen women tear up after a powerful orgasm, but not like this. Never like this. “Baby, what’s wrong? Did I hurt you?”
She shook her head, but neither spoke nor took her hand away from her eyes.
My heart slammed into my ribcage as I caressed her face with a shaking hand. “Talk to me, please…”
Through her tears, she finally murmured, “Thank you.”
Three
Careful not to jar her more than I had to, I pulled out slowly. Then I shifted onto my side and held her close, stroking her face and hair while she cried.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered after a few minutes. “I didn’t… this…”
“Shh.” I kissed her gently. “Nothing to be sorry about.”
She sniffed, wiping her eyes. “I just feel so stupid.”
“What? Because you’re in bed with me?”
She laughed. “Yeah, that’s it. Of course.”
I smiled. “I won’t tell if you won’t.”
“You’re a dork.”
“I’ve been called worse things.”
“Oh really? Such—” She paused, then gestured past me. “Can you get those for me?”
I picked up the box of tissues from the nightstand and handed it to her.
“Thanks.” She pulled one out and dabbed at her eyes.
“No problem.” I kissed her forehead, then sat up. “I’m going to go get rid of this and be right back.” I kissed her one more time, then got up and went into the bathroom to take care of the condom. As I washed my hands, I caught my reflection in the mirror and paused. Even after—especially after—having sex with Meredith, the unsettled feeling lingered in my gut. I still couldn’t get my head around what she’d been through, and something told me I didn’t know the half of it yet.
Looking into my own eyes, I wondered. Am I cut out for this? Am I capable of helping her pick up these pieces? What the hell am I getting myself into?
I turned the water off. Still looking in the mirror for answers, I dried my hands and sighed. Time would tell if I was the right person to help her through this. Between now and that time, I’d do whatever I could for her, and resist the urge to hunt down that worthless piece of shit to show him the meaning of the word “punishment.”
For the moment, she was here, I was here, and I wasn’t about to let her see that this had already gotten under my skin.
I flicked off the bathroom light and went back into the bedroom. Sliding into bed beside her, I started pulled the covers up over both of us, but she stopped me, furrowing her brow as she looked at me.
She ran her fingertips down my side. “When did you get these tattoos?”
I glanced down. “Not quite three years ago.”
“What do they mean?”
“They’re Chinese,” I said. “The characters on my left side mean strength and wisdom.” I gestured at my back. “The four down my back are power and trust. On my right side, peace and passion.”
She looked at me, eyebrows raised. “I never thought of you as particularly spiritual.”
“I don’t know if I’d call it spiritual,” I said. “Those are just things that are important to me. And yes, I made sure they were all correctly translated and the calligraphy was done right.”
“I don’t doubt that.” She ran her fingertips along one of the characters. “These are really, really cool, though.” She laughed softly. “Maybe you’re not as much of a dork as I thought.”
I rolled my eyes, chuckling as I pulled the blanket over us and settled in beside her.
“So tell me,” she said with a playful smile, “what worse things have you been called?”
“Worse than dork?” I grinned. “Well, one of my girlfriends insists I’m a manwhore.”
Meredith laughed. “If the shoe fits…”
“Hey!”
“Scott, you can’t exactly protest being called a manwhore when you preface it with ‘one of my girlfriends’, you know?”
I shrugged. “Okay, point taken.”
“So you’re still into polyamoury, then?”
“I am,” I said. “I have a couple of girlfriends right now.”
She laughed again. “Only you could say that so nonchalantly, Scott.”
I chuckled. “Just doesn’t seem like that big of a deal to me anymore. I mean, I’ve been doing it for so long, it’s pretty normal for me.”
“For some reason, that doesn’t surprise me at all. So who’s in your harem these days?”
“You remember Kristen Locke, don’t you?”
“You’re kidding me.” She blinked. “You’re— I didn’t even think she was into kink.”
I shrugged. “She is now.”
“Do I know the other one?”
I furrowed my brow, trying to think back. “No, I don’t think you ever met Amy.”
“Hmm, doesn’t ring a bell.”
“Didn’t think so. Anyway, besides them, I had a couple of subs for a while. Tara and I still play every once in a blue moon, but we’re both so busy, we don’t see each other much anymore.” I rolled onto my back and she rested her head on my shoulder as I went on. “I was training Kasey to be a slave so she could find a Master, and now that she has…” I shrugged with my other shoulder.
Meredith shuddered. “I hope she’s found a good one.”
I trailed my fingers up and down her arm. “She has. I know him. He’s a good guy.”
“Good.” She laid her arm across my chest. “So, you had two other subs, but they’ve both moved on.”
“More or less.” I gave a quiet laugh. “Probably just as well. Amy and Krissy keep me plenty busy.”
She looked up at me. “This isn’t going to take away from them, is it? What you’re doing with me, I mean.”
“No, don’t you worry about that.” I smoothed her hair. “They’ll understand what I’m doing with you, and besides, Amy has her husband and Kristen has her other boyfriend, so I know they’ll be well taken care of.”
Meredith clicked her tongue and rolled her eyes. “Your world is a strange place, Scott.”