Grounded (Up In The Air #3)

CHAPTER SEVEN

Mr. Muse

We chatted and ate and chatted some more. We had been talking and laughing for hours when Lana looked at her phone and groaned.

“I need to get to a meeting. Thanks for doing this,” Lana said, beginning to gather up her things.

“Thanks for inviting me. It’s nice to discover that James has some female friends that aren’t complete psychopaths.”

She threw back her head and laughed. She was a sight, with her blonde mermaid hair and her twinkling eyes.

We were just standing up from the table when I spotted James striding through the door of the now crowded café. People stopped in their tracks to watch him, myself included.

He only had eyes for me as he approached.

He wrapped an arm around my waist, gripping tightly, before he turned a dazzling smile on Lana. “We’ll walk you out,” he said.

We walked her out, flanked by our security, of which Lana had said not one word, and said our goodbyes. I was surprised when James led me to the car, and then followed me into the large SUV. It was only two p.m. I hadn’t imagined he’d get off work so early.

“Are you done for the day?” I asked him as he crowded me into the middle seat.

He buckled me in like the control freak he is, before answering. “I am.” He grinned. It was the most charming, incorrigible smile, the smile of a kid ditching school and getting away with it because no one could tell him no.

I traced his lips with one finger. “That’s good news,” I said softly.

“I pawned some meetings off on my VP. Meetings that were above his pay grade, so I may need to give him a raise. I want to watch you paint. I needed to see those dreams in your eyes firsthand.”

He fingered one of my earrings, his eyes as tender as I’d ever seen them. “Thank you for that,” he whispered, a catch in his voice.

I melted.

We went straight to the apartment. We found Stephan and Javier in one of the larger entertainment areas, playing video games and eating sandwiches. They were still wearing pajamas.

I laughed when I saw them.

Stephan grinned back at me.

Javier didn’t even look up. He was too busy trying to hunt down and kill Stephan’s character in the game. He wasn’t successful.

Stephan shot Javier’s character in the head within seconds, barely even glancing at the screen. He was the worst to play against. He never lost.

Javier cursed. “I almost had you!”

“Headshot,” Stephan pointed out.

James tugged at my hand, drawing my gaze to him. He grinned at me, a twinkle in his eye. “Well, we have to play a match or two. I’m playing hooky from work. Gaming is practically a requirement.”


“I’m on Stephan’s team,” I said quickly. If I was going to play, it may as well be to win.

James pointed at me. “You’re going to pay for that.”

And I did. We ended up playing for hours, and I got camped. James killed me, again and again, with no remorse. He apparently took it personal when I picked someone else’s team. Good to know.

Marion brought us food while we played, since we were at it for so long.

We won some matches, and lost some, but it was more of a contest between James and Stephan. Javier and I were hopelessly outmatched.

I elbowed James as he shot my army guy in the head yet again.

“This game is so sexist,” I complained. “I can’t believe that there isn’t even an option for me to play as a girl.”

“Do you think that if you were playing as a busty blonde it would distract me?” James asked, amused.

“It couldn’t hurt.”

He tossed his controller on the ground. I gave a little embarrassing shriek as he tossed me over his shoulder. “We’re done, guys. Buttercup wants to distract me. Consider me distracted.”

The guys called out goodnights as James carried me away, even though it couldn’t have been even six p.m. It seemed that they understood that if we went to our bedroom, we wouldn’t be coming back out.

I was surprised when James didn’t take me to our bedroom, instead heading to the studio.

“Will you pose for the nude?” I asked breathlessly, as he jostled me on his shoulder.

“Yes. With a condition.”

“What condition?”

“I want you naked, as well, while you paint.”

It didn’t seem fair to argue with that stipulation, but I still sort of wanted to.

My breath whooshed from my lungs in a rush as James suddenly dumped me onto the cushy divan that took up a corner of the studio near the window. He didn’t pounce on me, as I’d half assumed, and wished, that he would. Instead, he began to strip.

“Take off your clothes and paint me, Love,” he said with a heart-stopping smile.

I set up my supplies first, setting everything up just so. The sun was slowly setting, and the best of the day’s light had passed, so I turned on the bright overhead lights to illuminate the most beautiful man in the world lounging on a divan, naked and at my service.

I started to paint, forgetting that I was supposed to be nude, as well.

James had no qualms about reminding me. “Take the clothes off. All of them. Now.”

I stripped slowly and a little awkwardly. It was no strip tease. I didn’t think I had that in me. I didn’t doubt that I had something wild inside of me, but it just wasn’t that.

I wore nothing but my collar and my earrings as I began to paint. Surprisingly, I was able to jump right into the project, not nearly as distracted by my own nudity as I’d thought I would be. That was probably because I was utterly captivated by the man that had inspired the painting.

James watched me paint, as he’d said he needed to. It was hard to feel self-conscious, even nude, when someone was looking at you as though you were the most beautiful and fascinating creature on the planet.

I had painted most of his face and torso before I got distracted by the subject at hand. When I’d painted his chest, I’d wanted to touch his chest, to kiss it, and bury my face there. I’d felt a similar urge when I’d been working on the curve of his neck, and his abdomen, hell, even his hair. But when I started to work on that sexy little V shaped pelvic muscle, I got sidetracked in a hurry.

I felt myself licking my lips a lot, as I studied that area of his body. Felt it, but couldn’t seem to stop it.

As though it had snapped me out of the dreamy trance I seemed to go into when I lost myself in a painting, I suddenly felt the air against my bare skin, like the temperature had just risen ten degrees in the room. My skin felt hot, my breasts so heavy, my nipples hardening until they quivered. I knew with a certainty that I wasn’t going to make any more progress on the nude that night.

I set down my palette, reaching for another one. They were a luxury I’d never indulged in before. Generally, I mixed paints on whatever piece of plastic I found that was the right shape and size. James had a dozen for me here, in their own designated drawer.

I began to rifle through a selection of acrylic paints that were sorted by color. I found one named Turquoise, but it wasn’t quite right, so I mixed in just a touch of emerald on the palette.

“What are you doing? You mix mediums like that on paintings? I didn’t notice that on any of your work,” James asked, sounding surprised.

My cheeks flushed in pleasure. That he knew so much about my little hobby, that he studied what I did, it still surprised me, but more and more, it was only a good surprise. My natural instinct to doubt everything he said and did was turning into something else now. He didn’t lie. Not about anything. It was freeing for me somehow as I realized that. If he didn’t lie, I didn’t have to question every little thing he did and said. It was a liberating realization.

I grabbed a larger sable brush, dipping it lightly into the paint of my new palette as I returned to my easel. I stood as though I were going to paint on the paper, then brought the brush slowly to my own chest. I traced the large globe of my right breast with a light touch.

James sucked in a breath, sitting up to watch me. His cock had calmed down to semi-hard, for once, but it quickly stood at attention, inflating like a particularly wonderful toy.

I traced the brush down the middle of my abdomen, nearly reaching my sex before tracing to the side to paint one hip.

“Come here,” James said gruffly.

I had been intending to tease him a bit, but my body began to move instantly at his words, walking to him slowly, dragging the paintbrush to my other hip with a leisurely stroke.

He licked his lips. “Keep going,” he said, making no move to touch me even after I’d moved close.

I painted up my torso again, tracing my ribs one by one slowly, first one side and then the other. I dipped into my palette, picking up a generous amount of the turquoise. I painted the bones of my collar, being very careful not to graze my locked choker. I painted my other breast, moving the brush in wide circles over its roundness until I reached the rock hard nipple in the center.

James made a little, “hmm,” of approval in his throat, so I lingered there, painting small circles while he watched my brush move with rapt attention. I gave the opposite breast the same slow treatment.

James leaned back on his elbows. He patted a spot near his hip. “Put your foot right here. I want you to paint your thighs for me.”

I propped my foot at his hip, and he sucked in a gasp. “F*ck, I can see how wet you are from here.”

I painted down my body, down my hip and to my thighs. I painted the very upper edges of my thighs carefully, stopping just shy of my mound. I painted back and forth, back and forth, from the top of my inner thigh to my knee and back again, teasing him with the movement.

“Are you sore?” he asked, his voice thick.

“Sore how? From the roses?” I asked, painting an idle pattern down my shin, then back up my calf.

“I know you’re sore from the roses. I saw the marks on you. I’m talking about inside. Are you too sore for rough f*cking?”

“Hmmm. Only one way to find out,” I told him.

I moved over him, straddling his thighs, skimming over his quivering erection, finally settling myself against his taut stomach. I traced the brush over one perfect cheek. He tilted his face up to give me better access. I’d thought I’d done the color of his eyes justice, but as I saw the paint set against that tarnished color, I saw that I hadn’t even come close. His had little gold flecks around the iris, and his eyes were paler, a paleness that pierced, as though being lighter somehow gave them more substance.

“You have the most beautiful eyes in the world, James.”

He hummed in pleasure. He soaked up every little compliment I gave him like a sponge, which always surprised me, since I couldn’t imagine that he didn’t hear things like that every day.

I painted a thin line down his nose, then along his perfect jawline. I dragged the brush down his neck to his collarbone. I lingered there, enjoying just looking at him. I could never get enough of the sight of his skin, and no matter how much I got, I still felt deprived.

I painted little circles all over his right pectoral muscle, loving the hard and supple play of muscle under his skin.

I leaned forward to kiss the red Bianca over his heart before I painted there. As I bent forward, I felt his cock between my ass cheeks and I arched against the hard length, making solid contact. I circled my hips, rubbing my wet sex against his stomach, my butt against his twitching erection.

“When are you going to take me here?” I asked him, grinding back against him. “You said you would take every inch of me.”

He grabbed my hips, stilling me to do his own grinding. The tip of him dragged along my lower back as his length moved against my butt.

“Do you want that?” he asked. “I’ll hurt you more than I’m willing to if I just ram in with no prep. I plan to make you come so many times that every muscle in your body is relaxed before we try that.”

I rubbed against him. “Hmmm. That sounds nice.”

He let out a choked laugh. “It won’t be nice. It will be a lot of things, but not that.”

I moved my brush along his torso. He was so much more fun to paint than I was, with so many more angles, defined lines, and hard ridges. I loved the spot just below his chest, where a deep line defined the spot between his muscle and his ribs. And his abs. God, his abs.

My hips made little involuntary circles against him as I moved the brush lower and lower, over the rock hard ridges of his abdomen. I had to move my own body to work lower, and I groaned as I passed over his cock again on my way down. I rose high to rub my wet sex there. I groaned but kept moving to straddle his thighs. I shivered with pleasure when I saw his wet tip.

I painted his hips, and that perfect edible V, stroking my brush just shy of his jutting cock. When I began to paint slow circles on his thighs, brushing up against his scrotum, he snapped.

Hard hands gripped my hips, drawing me abruptly over his member. He let go. “Take me inside you,” he rasped.

I worked him into me slowly, enjoying the stretch as I pushed every perfect inch of him deep. A powerful shiver wracked my body when I was finally seated to the hilt.

James took the palette and brush from me, and after dipping the brush, began to paint me with leisurely strokes. The paint on my skin was already beginning to dry, and the wet paint he spread over me dragged deliciously over the first coat.

“Ride me,” he ordered.

My body began to move into a posting trot naturally. The exaggerated movements were perfect with his long, thick cock.

“How do your wrists feel?” he asked, moving the brush along a taut nipple.

“Good,” I said, my voice low and thick.

He snagged one of the wrists in question, studying it and then bringing it to his lips. “Good.”

He bucked against me suddenly, jostling me just enough to make me clench deliciously around him.


He groaned and gripped my hips, unseating me completely and sprawling me onto my back.

He stood above me, leaning down to hook a finger into the ring at my collar. He pulled me up slowly, carefully, until I stood beside him. He gripped my hair, pulling my head back. We watched each other for long moments. I honestly couldn’t tell which was driving him tonight, the Dom or my tender lover, there was such a mix of feelings in his eyes.

He broke eye contact to drag me to the window, one hand pulling my hair, the other my collar. He pressed me hard against the window, crushing my breasts against the cold glass. I gasped and shivered.

He pressed my palms to the glass, spread out wide from my body.

“Don’t move an inch,” he told me, moving away.

I saw him move to a spot on the wall beside the large window, then heard the whir and clank of something grinding metal. That sound made me think of the contraption he had used on me on the fouth floor, when he’d held me suspended to flog, and then f*ck. I loved that sound.

I shifted a little, wanting so badly to look around, to see what had made that noise. As it continued and got louder, I realized it was directly above me. It took every ounce of self-control I possessed not to look up.

I felt James move behind me again and then he was lifting my arms. I felt firm padding against one wrist right before the solid click of a handcuff held it captive. He pushed some sort of bar into my palm. “Grip,” he ordered. I gripped the bar tightly. He repeated the process on my other wrist, moving back to that spot on the wall just at the edge of my vision.

I gave a little yelp as the chains began to clank again, drawing me up until I was right on the balls of my feet. I had no leverage in this position, no control whatsoever. My eyes closed as I felt James at my back again. He pushed me hard against the glass. “I’m going to f*ck you against the glass, but you don’t get to come until you’re looking into my eyes.”

I whimpered, because I didn’t want to wait, because I was already on that fine edge, ready to come, and because I wouldn’t, not without his permission.

He gripped my hips, tilting them back so that my breasts pressed harder into the glass. My cheekbone stung where it dug into the window, but I just didn’t care.

He drove into me, stopping only halfway inside of me, and I moaned a protest. He worked the rest of the way in slowly, agonizingly, working my hips with his hands to control every inch of me that he penetrated.

He put his mouth to my ear when he hit the end of me, grinding hard. “Now remember, you don’t get to come until I’ve turned you around.”

I had some evil thoughts about the sadistic bastard as he began to pound against me, his hips slapping against my ass with the heavy movements. I could have come, wanted to come, within the first few thrusts, but he didn’t relent, dragging himself out then driving back in with fast thrusts. I cried out against the glass as he moved behind me, against me, inside me.

He didn’t stop, didn’t let up, thrusting relentlessly. I thought my body would betray me and ignore his command, my release building so powerfully that I didn’t know how to stop it.

He wrenched out of me, turning me on the chain with surprising ease. It must have been what the thing was designed for.

He gripped my hair in one hand, tilting my head back to look at his eyes straight on. His other hand moved to my ass. He pushed himself inside of me with the smoothest motion. He thrust once, twice, three times, and I was going over the edge.

“Come,” he grunted, but I was already lost. I knew my eyes showed my need for him, that vulnerable, raw thing that had become my feelings for him. His eyes were so tender, so loving as they absorbed the look in mine. It was a perfect and terrifying moment of absolute clarity. I’d never go back from this. I would be as lost as Lana if this ended, pining hopelessly for this man, if it all went up in flames.

The thought should have made me want to withdraw from him. My sense of self-preservation had been perfectly healthy before I’d met James, and I wondered now if it had deserted me completely, but as I came back down from my own little slice of heaven, I found it hard to summon up the energy to care.