Mutual Release Read online

  She smiled and went up on tiptoes so she could reach his lips, surprising him with her forwardness. Her mouth was soft; her tongue breached his lips and made him suck in a breath. At the same moment he gripped her so hard she gasped. “That’s more like it,” she whispered when he grabbed her hair and gave it a slight pull.

  She was no sub. But he needed to get laid so bad he was nearly blind with it. He’d take vanilla, now that it was being presented to him. And he would leave it that way, forever. He would never go back to that previous life, no matter how “tame” Jack claimed they could make it.

  He ran his hands down her waist, to her hips and ass, clutching her as he walked her back so she was propped against a large tree trunk. Staring into her eyes, he resisted her signals, the ones that screamed “take me, show me what you’ve really got” to his psyche. He ran a shaking hand down her face and tried very hard not to yank her hands over her head and pin them to the tree she leaned against. He bit the inside of his cheek, grunting when she sighed and put a hand on his zipper.

  “Do what you want, Evan… please.”

  He kissed her then, dove into her, winding his hands in her hair and tasting every nook and cranny of her lips. She squirmed, pressed up against him. But he maintained control. He would not go to the dark room that had opened up in his head and was beckoning him, whispering its evil and reminding him he had no choice. He had to be what he was meant to be when it came to sex. He ripped himself away from the girl, breathing heavily, and took a few steps backward, nearly falling over a shrub.

  “Evan… are you okay?” Karen pushed herself away from the tree and closed the gap between them, but he held up a hand.

  “No, Karen. I… can’t. I can’t explain it, either. You are amazing, beautiful, sexy, and I want to…” He put his hands on his hips and looked down, the internal struggle making it impossible to breathe. He glanced back up, saw the sympathy in her eyes. “No, don’t feel sorry for me. I’m no good. I’m… bad. I’m an asshole, and I will do nothing but cause trouble for you.”

  But despite his warning or maybe because of it, she launched herself at him, wrapped her arms around him and bit his earlobe, forcing every nerve he had, not already at attention, to start tap-dancing with anticipation. Women. Tell them you’re no good and they were all over you. It made no sense to him.

  “I know, Evan. I sensed it. I want bad. I want you to be bad… with me.”

  “Damn it, Karen, you don’t know what you’re talking about.” He disentangled from her, clamping down on the raw pain that started in his balls and made its ominous way up his spine. He could practically feel her, taste her, knew she’d grip his cock so tight he’d come in seconds, and he wanted nothing more than the simple release of a killer orgasm right this minute. “You don’t want anything to do with me.” He turned away, his hand on the tree as he called on skills he thought he’d purged, the ones that made his body soften and his brain quiet. “Trust me. I’ll only hurt you, somehow.”

  “Okay, well, thanks for dinner, anyway.” The disappointment in her voice was clear. But relief stole over him, thinking she’d finally gotten the message and would leave him be. “Don’t be so hard on yourself though.” Her hand grazed his arm, made its way up his neck and around, cupping his cheek. He leaned into it, wishing he could give in, could let this potentially incredible girl be something for him that he needed. But no – never again. He had to…

  “Holy shit,” he groaned when the lovely, funny, sexy girl he’d really not given much thought to other than to admire her tits during class dropped to her knees on the grass and had his jeans unzipped and his throbbing cock between her lips before he could even react. It wasn’t the public nature of the act that shocked him. They were in a small grove of trees, on a nearly deserted, dark edge campus. It was the pure ecstasy of a woman’s lips and tongue along his sex, even the slightly dangerous and forbidden sensation of her fingertips tracing the underside of his balls, that made his mind go utterly blank.

  Not a shred of control remained as he fisted her hair hard and fucked her mouth, thankful for wherever she got her blow job skills as his cock slid down her throat, providing an even tighter glove.

  “God, God, God,” he muttered as he spread his legs and let it go, just as her fingertip reached his ass and slid deep, triggering the sort of bone-shattering orgasm he’d been without for…

  “Fuck me…” he grunted and came for what felt like an hour, shuddering and making her splutter with the force and volume of his release.

  He looked down, saw his hands tangled up in her hair, his fists white-knuckled from pulling so hard. “Oh, Karen, I’m so sorry.”

  Guilt flooded in to replace the lust that retreated, chuckling, mocking, and reminding him he was a weak asshole for treating her like that. She stood and wiped her lips with the back of her hand, her eyes shining.

  “You have no reason to be sorry.” She just stood looking at him, color high in her cheeks. He could read her every signal, and his poor aching shaft would not soften no matter what he did. He sighed and zipped himself up, wincing in pain. “I had a feeling you needed that.”

  “Oh, well, um, yeah.” He ran a hand through his sweaty hair. “I did. Thank you.” He leaned on the tree before he collapsed to the ground. “Still, though, Karen, I can’t let you do this… not with me.”

  “Why don’t you let me decide what I want to do with or without you?” She stepped closer and kissed his cheek. He closed his eyes and his mind to the obvious need that suffused the air around her.

  He grabbed her hand, put it to his lips. “Okay. I will. So… what’s next, blow job queen?” He smiled, and forced the evil to the corner of his brain – the one that wanted to throw the girl over his shoulder, fasten her to his bed with leather belts, and tease her pussy with ice, wax, his teeth, a flogger, until she screamed for him to finish her. No, he would not be that, do that, anymore. He could do this thing like everyone else. He had to, or he’d lose his soul forever.

  “How about you do a little payback first, eh, hair-trigger boy?” She traced her hand along his still-hard cock, making him shiver.

  “Yeah, I didn’t make a good first impression did I?”

  She smiled up at him and suddenly he could see it as clear as day – his vanilla girlfriend, his life denying his true self – and it was fine. He kissed her for real then, tasting himself, and loving the way she molded against him. She wanted to trust him. And he wanted to be trusted.

  “Allow me to reintroduce myself,” he mumbled around her lips, sliding his hand down to her skirt, yanking it up and finding the edge of… “Oh, nice. I love a girl who believes in going commando.” His finger found the sweet nub of flesh that rose to meet him. He pressed his palm along the entire warm heat of her sex, pressing the heel of his hand to her clit so she could have that contact as he slid a finger into her wet depths.

  “Ah… ah… yes…” She sighed when he yanked up her shirt and got at those amazing breasts, flicking open her bra with his free hand and sucking a large nipple between his lips. She arched into him, moaning his name as he licked, sucked, stroked, and finger-fucked her to a lovely wet climax. “Oh… now that really is more like it.” She sighed as he put his hand to his lips, closing his eyes as he savored the glorious taste of her.

  His head pounded and he had to move away before he flipped her around and smacked her ass while he fucked her for real, reddening her pink flesh and yanking harder on that nipple. He shook his head to dispel it. Get a grip, Adams. This is vanilla. This is what you have to be now. He looked up and saw her straightening her skirt, reassembling her bra. Ignoring the fog of deeper, darker need threatening to roll through his brain, he narrowed his eyes, clenched his fists, and counted to twenty.

  “You okay?” she whispered, touching his face and making him flinch.

  “Um, yeah. Sorry. Let’s go.” He put an arm around her, the smell of their mutual lust coming off them in waves as he walked her to her apartment.

  Chapter
Nine

  “Dude, you have to tell me – you are spanking that sweet ass on a regular basis?” Jack passed him a beer as they sat on the porch of the house they now shared. “And are those tits as nice up close as they are from here?”

  Evan glared at Jack Gordon. The man was walking testosterone, attracting men who wanted to be him and women who wanted to do him everywhere he went. But he was utterly unthreatening, in a reversal of what Evan was used to with personalities like that – like Damian’s. He liked Jack. And didn’t care he was a nosy SOB at times. “No, I’m not. And yeah, they are. Better actually, thanks.”

  He sipped, quelling the urge to ask Jack to take him to the club like he’d promised. Jack had not offered since they’d taken up residence in the rattletrap excuse for a house not far from campus. Karen camped out in his room most nights, then would get up and make coffee before heading back to her own tiny apartment. They could hardly keep their hands off each other. But it was a whole lot of glorified copping feels, frequent blow jobs for him, since she claimed not to like it “as much” for herself – all in all a bunch of tame sex. He was numb, exhausted in mind and body. And deeply unsatisfied. She sensed it, too – she was a sharp girl and asked him about it once, when they lay in the dark, post vanilla playtime. “Do you ever want to… experiment? I mean… I’ve always wondered what it would be like to be tied up and… stuff.”

  His face had flushed, his brain had flamed hot, and he leapt from the bed, yanking on his underwear. She lay back in all her glory, those luscious nipples pointed to the ceiling as the moonlight cast a shaft of light across her smooth skin. Evan bit his lip, ready to show her, give her what she wanted. Then he stopped, went into the bathroom to splash water on his face a few times.

  When he returned to bed, he wished she would just leave him to his tangled thoughts as she curled into him. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to freak you out. I know you wouldn’t do that to me. And I’m happy with us the way we are.”

  Her breathing had evened out as he held her, staring at the ceiling and forcing out the images of her lush body, bound, striped from his flogger, those sensitive nipples clamped, and his cock pounding into her from behind. He would never be free of this; he knew it. It was either face it for once and for all and purge it, or live a lie. Because he knew if he kept on his current path he would ask this lovely, if slightly high maintenance, woman to marry him and settle… which was something he’d once promised himself he’d never do.

  “Yo, earth to POTUS.” Jack snapped his fingers in front of Evan’s face.

  “Don’t fucking call me that.” He stood, stretched, and ambled back inside.

  “Why not? It’s apt. I can see how you came pretty naturally to the leadership role – in everything.” Jack stood leaning on the doorway, his dark blue eyes intent. Evan frowned at him.

  “Spare me, okay? I’m just a guy. Gonna be a lawyer. Got a great girlfriend with big tits. We have a lot of sex. Lucky me. Now if you will excuse me, I have got to study.”

  But Jack moved fast, with the grace of a natural athlete, and blocked him, putting an arm across the door to the kitchen. “You are coming with me tonight. No more excuses. You are like a fucking too-tight tripwire. It’s time we released some of that tension the only way you can – and you know I speak the truth.”

  Evan crossed his arms over his chest and studied the other man. Jack had coal-black hair and blue eyes and was at least three inches taller than Evan, who was no small guy himself. He was the quintessential Master Dom, the sort of personality who was in charge all the time, no matter what. And he’d told Evan that, had described how he handled his playtime even now that he had a semi-regular girlfriend. Jenna was a fellow law student too: curvy, vivacious, smart, and, according to Jack, the most natural sub to his Dom he’d ever found.

  Something about her rubbed Evan the wrong way, but he never gave it much thought. He was busy getting his law degree, fucking his girlfriend like a missionary, and pondering how he could get out of the rut without crossing the Rubicon again – the one that took him to a place he craved and which terrified him at the same time.

  “No. Thanks. I… can’t. It’s complicated. You wouldn’t understand, Mr. Perfect.”

  “Fuck that shit, Adams. I am hardly perfect. Doing this thing, acting on my gut need to control, pleasing my sub by putting her in a place she needs to go… just because I can? It’s a total goddamn buzz. But it’s more than that. It’s something I need, I have to do. I’ve fucked my fair share of women. But this?” He ran his free hand down his face. “This is different. Better. And you are no different. You owe it to yourself to…”

  Evan shoved Jack’s arm down and stomped into the kitchen, put his shaking hands on the sink, and stared out onto the parking lot that passed as a backyard. “Fine! Jesus, Gordon, if you’ll shut up about it, I’ll go.” He had to close his eyes to keep the images at bay. Finally, he was going back. And it would be safe. He could do this without turning into a monster – he hoped. “But I am not taking Karen.”

  “Suit yourself.” Jack shrugged and grabbed another beer from their nearly empty fridge. “Jenna’s out of town anyway this weekend. We’ll go without them. That way you can see this scene is not as threatening as you seem to think.”

  Evan stared at him. Jack and Jenna were as much an accepted couple as he and Karen. And here they stood, talking about leaving their girlfriends behind to go out for a night on the town – to a club where they would tease women to orgasm, women who were not their girlfriends. Until they could each stand it no longer and would fuck the strange women, hard, bringing tears, most likely. Then they’d part ways, in some cases never even having seen the women’s faces, drink a beer, and go home. Sick. “This is sick,” he whispered, staring at Jack’s retreating back.

  “No, it’s not. It’s an honest acknowledgement of what we are. Jenna knows I do it, and she’s okay with it. You should tell Karen, though, so there are no secrets that could bite you in the ass relationship-wise. You know?” Jack flopped in the chair on the porch and grabbed his book, preparing to study.

  Evan stared at him another minute, then jumped in the shower, forcing thoughts of rough, raw, barely controlled sex out of his head.

  “Hey.” Evan rolled over and answered his phone, still amazed at the technology that had allowed them to go from landlines and long phone calls to small devices and typed out conversations. He sat, wincing at the soreness in his abs and the small stripes on his forearms from the kickback of the flogger. “Uh, Karen? That you?”

  “Yes. It is. Where the hell are you? I thought we were having breakfast. It’s our anniversary, remember?”

  “Oh, fuck.” Stumbling out of bed, Evan glanced at the calendar on his dresser. “I’m sorry, babe, I… Ow, shit!” He jumped around like an idiot, biting back more curses, when his toe connected with the corner of the trunk he’d bought to keep all his new toys. Toys he had yet to share with the woman he still claimed as his girlfriend and with whom he continued to engage in very tame sexual activity. Even now, a solid year after resuming his newfound secret life as a Dom, who’d just been promoted to Master, which had done nothing but force him to compartmentalize ever further with Karen. “I am so, so sorry.”

  He saw Jack out of the corner of his eye, headed down the hall to the bathroom. Last night’s intensity rolled through him, making him shudder. The club’s owner, a fifty-something Domme with long red hair and an attitude a mile wide, was ecstatic with them. Between him and Jack, she’d nearly doubled her weekend take, as tales of their prowess grew along the underground BDSM gossip chain. Surreal was the best word Evan could come up with as he dropped into a chair, head in his hands, trying to shove all his lives back into their proper cubbyholes.

  Karen’s voice faded, becoming not unlike those adult voices on the “Peanuts” cartoons. The energy it took to maintain daily life – year three of law school, part-time job at a local brewery, thoughtful and gentle boyfriend to Karen by day, half of a pair of “dream Doms”
by many nights – was taking its toll. Gordon seemed no worse for wear, but he didn’t work during the school year. He made enough every summer working his ass off for his father’s construction company to glide him through his off-season. But he did pay two-thirds of the rent, leaving Evan with the remainder, at his insistence.

  Just last night Evan had nearly lost himself between the thighs of a hot older blond woman, so like Caroline he had ended up falling asleep holding her after their bondage and wax play, calming her like he had once done for the woman who’d been the first to show him his real power. Yvonne, the redheaded club owner, had whispered in his ear and pointed him towards the woman the second she was led in, bound and nude but for a corset and high heels. Then found him still wrapped in her arms at five this morning and had hustled them both out. The woman wouldn’t meet his eyes even when he told her to, and he’d felt like six tons of shit all the way home. And now he’d managed to piss off his girlfriend on top of everything else?

  He rubbed his face, hard, forcing some focus. “Okay, okay, stop. I get it, already. I fucked up. What time is it, anyway?” He glanced at his watch, suppressing an inner groan at the one p.m. hour. “I’ll come and get you. Let’s go… do whatever you want.” He was a stuttering mess, unable to force last night’s memories out of his head like he usually could.

  Jack and Jenna were on a “break” and so that guy was on a serious tear, ramping up his act by about a thousand. Evan knew the other man was sick in love with the controlling bitch and wished she would just cut him loose before he lost it. He worried about his friend, but had been told once in no uncertain terms that it was none of his fucking business, so he didn’t bring it up again.

  “I don’t want to do anything with you, you selfish ass.” Karen’s words snapped him back to the crisis at hand. “I mean it. We are done. You’ve turned into a total stranger to me. And we… we can’t…” Her sobs interrupted, and Evan felt his heart nearly stop.