Can’t do a thing.
A small sob escaped her and he crushed her in his arms, crushed her to his big, muscle-packed body.
“It’s all right, lovely. You did well. Yes. So good.” Stroking her hair, he held her even tighter. “So, so good. I know it was hard on you. You’re too used to being in charge. But now you know bone deep that with me, I am the one in charge. Always. Soon you won’t fight it anymore. And it’ll be even better.”
She tried to push him away, even though every cell in her body craved his touch, wanted to be enfolded in his arms. But her mind was like a siren, shrieking at her that she’d let this go too far. Her yielding. Her submission to this man on so many levels. She’d allowed herself to want this. To need this. And it all spelled danger in bright red capital letters.
He pulled her in closer, her breasts pressed against his chest, until she swore she could feel his heart beating against hers.
“Shh, Layla,” he murmured. “Don’t crash on me.”
“I’m not,” she protested, hating that her voice broke.
“No? What, then? Tell me.”
“It’s just . . . this!” Her throat tightened, the words wanting to choke her. “Fuck, Duff. I gave over too much. I can’t do that. I can’t. This is not good.”
He let her push back a few inches, until he could take her chin and tilt her face so she had to look at him. His dark brows were drawn, and for some reason she noticed every sharp line of his bone structure—his carved cheekbones, his sculpted jaw. He was too beautiful. But it did nothing to calm her mind, which felt as if it were going off in sixteen directions at once.
“Layla. You are crashing. Look, I know this was a lot for you, but this is the only way it can be with me. I am thoroughly dominant, whether it’s sex or real kink, and there’s a very thin dividing line between the two for me. I’m a primal, and it seems you are, too, yes? The biting and scratching and rough sex. Taking you down. Yeah?”
She nodded, her throat still tight. “Yes.”
“Does it not feel natural to you?”
She nodded once more. “It did. It does.”
“I felt it from the start. Trust me, we wouldn’t be here otherwise. But something in you responds to that wild creature in me. Ah, I know he’s a rough one. I keep it under control—to an extent. There’s that dark part of me . . . I’ll never be able to dial it back entirely. I don’t want to. And once I start fucking, there’s only so much I can do aside from simply being who and what I am. Which is why negotiations are so important. I’m saying this so we know we understand one another.”
“I know.” She shoved her hair back from her heated cheeks. “I know. I’m not saying you did anything you shouldn’t have, or that I didn’t agree to. But, Duff, it’s been a long time since I’ve been with anyone—the few men I’ve slept with or the women I’ve played with—where I haven’t been the aggressor. Not since my last relationship.”
“Tell me about him.”
“What? Now?” She gave a small, helpless, spurting laugh. “You’re still inside me.”
He shrugged, a grin lifting one corner of his mouth. “Call it pillow talk.”
“Shouldn’t at least one of us have our head on a pillow?”
“Taken care of easily enough,” he said, leaning down to grab a throw pillow from the floor and shoving it under her head. Slipping out of her, he slipped the condom off, twisting the end of it and setting it on the floor before sliding an arm under her shoulders and settling in beside her.
She shook her head, but she was calming down between his straightforward manner and his good humor. That didn’t make it any easier to talk about him—the straw that broke the camel’s back. Fucking Jimmy. But she also knew Duff wouldn’t let her get away with making any excuses.
Pulling a long breath into her lungs, she took in the scents of sex and the sandalwood candles she kept all over her house and a touch of the soft New Orleans air. Exhaling slowly, she decided to simply start talking, rather than planning what she was going to say. It was too much to figure out, with her brain still fuzzy and her body still hypersensitized from the sex. And she knew how easily she could start overanalyzing.
“Jimmy and I broke up fifteen months ago. He was another damn cheater. He cheated on me with everything that walked. He’s a musician and he tours a lot, and I should have known better than to think I could date another musician and have him not cheat on me. Crazy, right? But he was a Dom, and claimed to be operating under the Safe, Sane and Consensual credo, and he had me fooled into thinking he was someone who took that seriously. But there was nothing safe or sane and certainly nothing consensual about him sleeping around. I heard rumors, but I didn’t want to believe it. Not again. Then one night . . .”
She had to stop for a moment, swallowing hard, and it hurt, but not the way it used to. Thank God. “One night I just sort of got it, finally, and I started searching, and I came up with a ridiculous ton of photos online. Girls who took pictures of him in their beds, for God’s sake. At a couple of dungeons. On his tour bus. In hot tubs. He had no shame. It was as if he wanted to be busted, and looking back I think he really did—or he simply liked to challenge himself with it, and maybe me. Testing me to see if I’d put up with it. And like an idiot, I hid my head in the sand for a while and I did put up with it. I had myself convinced that I believed all the crap he spouted about being a true, responsible Dominant. When I confronted him, he said I’d always known who he was, and all this shit about him being the boss, or had I forgotten that part?”
“Such bollocks,” Duff muttered. “‘Being the boss’ is not what a Dom/sub dynamic is about. That crap cheapens it. Bastard.”
When she glanced up she found his jaw clenched tight. And something in that moment in which she felt his protectiveness made her body relax the tiniest bit, made her feel as if he really did give a damn. As if he truly was different.