Chapter Three

I attempted to keep quiet after dinner. For at least a few days. He sent a picture of a tea glass on his work desk.

-Using the honey you gifted me. 

I responded with a picture of focaccia. About seventeen minutes later I called the restaurant from my work phone instead. Eventually getting him after being juggled through a few employees. 

“Did you still need a temp to do some of the after-hours prep?” I asked him.

“Good to hear your voice again,” he said, not answering. I heard him being particularly silky and wheedling. Wondered if he was alone in his office or just using that voice out on the kitchen floor. I was melted.  

“You too. But did you?” I asked. 

“I could, yes.”

“I could just help you out for a while,” I offered in a rush. It had been hard to find someone for this position. Besides, this seemed like a very good and viable excuse to get him alone. 

“Mmm,” he hummed, as though he were truly weighing the proposal.

“I guess you could use some teaching,” he mused.

“Offering a master class, chef?” I asked.

“Let’s call it free labor– I need some help with the gnocchi,” he said.

“Oh, I see what this is. Pawning the worst possible job off on me just because you’re handsome,” I said, playing betrayal.

“Oh, I don’t know, probably making the tomato risotto is the worst job,” he said and then let us fall into silence for two beats. “Handsome, huh?” he asked. 

“It’s the worst job,” I sighed back, ignoring his last question.

“I promise it’ll be fun, honey,” he said. I laughed and hung up. I didn’t doubt him for a minute. 

****

I genuinely didn’t know how to dress for this after-hours, free labor/class. I was a little worried it would turn out his sous was there too. Not that I wouldn’t just enjoy some time and repartee with him but at this point, I wanted more. 

I didn’t want to wear office-appropriate work clothes. But I also couldn’t wear pumps–not safe or well suited in a kitchen. Also, would it be too presumptuous or slutty to wear sexy underwear? I ended up going with my own version of his uniform— a jean skirt and a button-up. In a bow to how thirsty I was though, I wore the jean skirt I owned with a zipper straight up the back. 

Monday night they weren’t open for business, so at least we didn’t have to start late. I knocked on the door, rapping knuckles against the closed sign. It sprang open like he’d been waiting on the other side for me. With something folded over his arm, he pulled me through and locked the door again. 

“Hey, honey. Good to see you. Got you something since you’re helping me out of a bind,” he said, extending his arm toward me. I laughed, shaking it out– a twin to his own apron. Pulled it over my head, beginning to adjust the straps, noticing it had the same embroidery and smelled like him. 

I followed him into the kitchen again. It looked huge without all the bodies and bustling. Without the steam and smoke, it seemed dormant. There were six freestanding stainless steel countertops, two by three. The one in the middle and closest to the office and back wall was where he’d been working. He started talking me through the recipes and tools. His plan, what he’d completed. He asked if I’d ever made them before or rolled before, and I responded in the affirmative. Though obviously not at a professional level, nor in the volume we meant to do tonight. 

“I’m not looking for a speed run, anyway,” he said. “Precision is better than hurrying.”

We fell into an easy, quiet rhythm. Once he’d laid everything back out for us to work side by side he turned on music. He had a rather well-appointed sound system in the kitchen. Surround speakers. Unlike me, who liked silence in my own kitchen, he liked to always have music playing.

“Especially when the team isn’t in total turmoil, or I’m here late or early… the kitchen… it just sounds too quiet alone,” he explained. I compared that little difference between us. I truly enjoyed how extroverted he was. I liked how much he liked to talk; how he held forth, how he told these humorous stories. I liked how he remembered everyone’s name and said them frequently like it gave him joy to mention friends and acquaintances. I liked how he bobbed and swayed to his music. I liked how he sounded truly bereft at the idea of an empty kitchen. The other side of me felt myself sliding away from him. I needed a great deal of alone time, and quite a bit of quiet. I didn’t understand his hunger or need. I thought it was fascinating and enchanting right now, as I was getting to know him. I wondered if it would become exhausting if I spent more time with him. Regardless, I was having a lovely time. 

We had fallen into a rhythm. He didn’t chatter. We talked a little, when something occurred to one of us and laughed frequently but mostly just cut and rolled. He outpaced me but it didn’t seem to matter. We had just become an organic machine, working simply and effectively together. For a little over an hour, we kept cranking through, adding to such an almighty mountain it was almost humorous to me. I was impressed with both of us, even with the slight ache in my wrist and the fingers of my right hand that we were nearing the end of the chore. It was late, but I hoped he’d offer a midnight snack or something. I didn’t mind having a late night with him. I was willing to sacrifice sleep to spend a longer evening with him. What was a tiring workday in comparison to being with him a little longer? 

His hand was once again on the small of my back suddenly. Noticing the heavy warmth, the span and length of his lovely fingers. 

“Remember,” he said, voice quite suddenly back in that silky, convincing tone he’d use. “Slow is smooth.” His hand slid all the way down the outside of my thigh, as low as his arm could reach. “And smooth is fast.” He said it all as though still giving directions to me. But his hand felt purposeful. The purpose quite obviously, to me, seduction. I was panting, crushing the little pillow of dough against the pasta form. I kept still, turned into prey just waiting to see what he was going to do next. What implicit, threatening flirtation. Where his hand would land next. Sliding back toward the middle of my back I felt his thumb and forefinger fumbling with the zipper pull at my waist.

“Does this zipper work?” he asked rhetorically. Bending forward until he could touch the opposite zipper pull at the hem of the skirt, by my knees. Starting from the bottom he unzipped it to only a few inches from the waist, nearly entirely off. I glanced sideways at him, all my face suffused red. Lips seemed almost swollen with it. 

“Oh good, it does,” he chuckled, likely seeing my breathless desire. I still didn’t move toward him. And I had no want or power to move away. Just still waiting to see what he was going to do next. Loving this merry kind of seduction. I couldn’t recall when I’d been this aroused, a whirling sort of overwhelmed want that reminded me of earlier years. Entranced with his confidence and play. His hand wrapped around my thigh, fingers on the inside, sliding up slowly along that tender skin. I shivered and he stopped then, looking askance at me. I just nodded at him open-mouthed. I couldn’t speak over my pistoning heart or the blood barrelling down between my legs. The knuckle of his thumb came to rest just barely touching my underwear.

“I didn’t tell you to stop what you were doing,” he said, lazily sliding that thumb from side to side against me. “I was just wondering about this zipper, I’ve sated my curiosity on that front. So you can keep working. We’re doing the special for tomorrow after all.”  

I attempted, through a pounding heart, to keep working. Shocked by the command and unable to not respond and give in utterly. I’d have to think about this whole thing when I wasn’t falling apart, melting into his fingers. I was enjoying this game but shocked that I was. Further, the command to “keep working” felt like a sort of restraint. Something that got him off. An excuse to leave me unable to touch or tease him back. More fingers came into play as I slowed further. Still separated by cotton, but my wetness made my swollen clit easy for him to find and tease. He was unerring, hands just as clever at this as any other task they undertook. I was angling my hips back and upward, desperately trying to get more pressure, not just the gentle back and forth.

“This is in the way,” he said. No longer silky, no longer teasing. Deeper than his usual speaking voice, almost a growl. Hooking an index finger at the waist of my underwear and tugging them down to a little above my knees, restraining my legs. I wanted to spread them wide, lift my spine, and open myself to him entirely. But I couldn’t spread them any wider than the barrier now created by the elastic. Already on the edge as his fingers finally touched bare skin. I whimpered, bracing myself on my forearms on the edge of the counter and dropping everything in my hands with a muted clank. 

“I can’t,” I moaned.

“Can’t what?” he asked, his pace unchanging. 

“Can’t keep doing this. I’m about to come all over your hand,” I said, caught between begging and accusing him. His free left hand snapped up and swept everything down to the end of the counter and then went to the space between my shoulders. Pressing down quickly and forcefully between my shoulder blades, pushing the side of my face against the blessedly cool steel. 

“Then do it. Go ahead. All over my hand,” he said. I cried out as I did, almost before he finished speaking it seemed like. My legs became liquid and the only thing that kept me standing was barking my knees against the cabinets under the counter as they buckled. He gripped the back of my neck like a kitten.

“Desk, desk, desk,” he directed, shaking me with every repetition. On the last, he ripped down underwear and skirt in one jerk. He began duck walking us to his office. I stumbled clumsily through the bar door, turning around in the pitch dark, trying to see him without light. Backing up until the curve of my ass slammed painfully into the outside edge of his desk. Nearly growling once more he overbalanced me further by bully-pushing against my breastbone, so I rocked backward into a sitting position, the desk being a little too high for me to fall onto. Bending slightly he grabbed the middle of my thighs and thrust me onto the lid of the desk. He sat while impatiently tugging on that same banker’s lamp, lighting us and the desk, but not bright enough to illuminate any further. The corners and even the bookcase behind us remained in darkness. His face was already between my legs before I noticed my precarious position. Licking me, starting slow just as he had with his hand. He had barely begun when he groaned against me. It wasn’t a sound of lust so much as impatience, or thwarting. 

“You’re a flailing, wild little darling, aren’t you?” he asked, almost muffled by me. I didn’t realize how I had almost instantly flung my arms out as soon as his lips had touched me. Trying to cling to anything, endangering whatever was on the desk to be unceremoniously tossed to the floor in my struggle. Words failed me and I only whimpered. Though I didn’t expect that he truly was waiting for an answer. His hands finally stopped gripping my thighs. I felt as though they bloomed upward suddenly without the crushing pressure. They would be marked tomorrow. He reached up and out blindly.

“Hands, hands, hands,” he said in the same commanding tone. My fingers left the edge of the desk, where I’d been digging my nails into the edge to take his hands. I expected he would let our fingers lock together, keep me still with a handhold. But he pressed my palms flat against my hips and then caught my wrists in the space between his thumbs and pointer fingers, clasping them at my waist. Keeping my hands trapped and caught at my thinnest part, and sealing both my hands and me in place. Unable to move backward, away from his mouth, or even forward to press into his tongue. He restarted, slow again but then looked up at me. It was so much like that initial unbidden image I’d had of him in my office that I came helplessly once more.

“Good, but we’re not stopping,” he grunted. I keened and tried to move, in any direction. Away from him, to one side or another. Any movement. I didn’t realize I’d actually been saying words until he stopped. Looking up, barely moving his face away from me, tongue on his bottom lip, almost puppy-ish.

“No?” he asked. Asking me if I needed to stop. I wasn’t sure if I’d been asking for that, or anything human at all. I knew I’d been whining. Either don’t stop or I can’t take any more. 

“I don’t know if I can come again,” I said, sounding near tears. He gave one long slow swipe.

“Are you sure hon? I feel like I just got a taste of you so far. Are you sure you can’t give me another?” he asked, back to that wheedling voice. I couldn’t help but laugh, trying to take in a big enough breath to do so. I lifted my hips in acquiescence but still finished quickly on him once he got back to work. I gently pressed him away, palm on his forehead. He released me, but I still felt his thumbs pressing into my soft belly, and his fingers gripping around my waist though he’d taken his hands from me.

“Sit down, relax honey, I’ll be right back,” he said, waving toward his chair, pulling me upright with hands around my wrists. I flopped bonelessly into his chair, worried but unable to do anything about the fact that I was probably making a mess on his leather. I could have fallen asleep, dimly lit as it was, physically tired and beyond satisfied. I heard him humming, turning up the radio and clanging around the kitchen. The part of me that would ordinarily leap to help clean up was simply too exhausted, too peacefully unable to move. 

I must have dozed a little because I startled when he slid a plate onto the desk. Basic, easy, sausage onions and peppers. Didn’t know I was hungry until I saw it, stomach rumbling once I smelled it. He seemed just as relaxed as if he hadn’t made me orgasm three times to a mind-numbing degree. We ate, silently, and I could sense a little self-satisfied smirk about his face. He pulled the plate away from me, while my fork was hovering over it. He finished chewing.

“What do you want?” he asked. I wasn’t precisely sure what he was asking about, but I took a strong guess.     

“More of this,” I said, shrugging. 

“What? Food? Oral sex?” he asked back. I laughed.

“Yes. But I guess you likely have more than only dinner and oral sex in mind,” I said. He grunted and scooped up another forkful for himself. I tried reaching for more with my own fork, but the plate was tugged further away.

“It seems to me, Cal, that finger fucking me over a counter and eating me out on your desk is a tame evening for you. If I’ve gotten to know you at all. And I reckon maybe I know you at least a little. It seems to me that you have something far worse in mind,” I elaborated, frustrated, nose tipped up to smell the food. He pushed the plate back toward me, reward for the answer.

“Obviously I want to do terrible things to you, honey. I’m asking you what you want,” he said. My throat dried up with a mouthful of food. I’d never had a man say that. Least of all with his seriousness. One who looked so hungry for and so interested in my answer. 

“I liked what you did. I liked how you did it. I liked being used. I wanted to be fucked like you fucked me. I want you to make me even when I say I can’t any more. I want to see what terrible things you can do to me that are going to make me come until I cry. Again,” I said. Wholly honest, not even feeling vulgar, just truthful with him. Easy to lay it all bare with him, after being laid bare. Like a satisfied predator he made a sound like a rumble from somewhere between his throat and chest.

“That’s what I was hoping to fucking hear. You said it better than I hoped for, hon. Come back to me here later this week, will you?”

“Yes of course I will,” I answered, feeling close to saying vows. 

We cleaned up together. I was weak-legged but felt fantastic. Like I’d had a full spa day, I was that unwound and delicious feeling. He showed me a spot to hang up my apron. We walked out together, saying quiet good nights. While I was well satisfied by the time he was out of my sight I was already thinking about when I’d get him again. 

Chapter Four

When I came through the doors a few days later he was sitting in the dining room, in the center at one of the tables. I was already feeling a little giddy because of the hour. Another little worry, the hours he kept were necessarily bizarre. I got the distinct impression he slept neither well nor often. I would come home from work, nap, and wake up later after lock-up at the restaurant to see him again. I was happy to do it, but oddly adolescent too. 

Still getting used to the empty silence of the dining room after-hours. He had just the one table set, with two chairs. All the others had theirs upturned on them, without their tablecloths. It spoke to his utter comfort in the space– if I had chosen a table to sit at, I would have picked one in a corner, tucked away. I sat across from him, and he slid a glass of tea toward me. There were just the two glasses, a dish of sugar cubes and my apron folded on the table. He had clearly finished closing and cleaning up just before I had arrived. I’d even watched the other closers leave as I walked down the dark street. He was still wearing his apron and had a kitchen towel tucked through a belt loop. Something vaguely familiar was tucked into the hip pocket of his jeans as well. With an embarrassed start I realized it was the underwear I’d been wearing the last time we were here together. I had managed to get redressed, stumble into my skirt and get home, but hadn’t even noticed that I was otherwise bare. Perhaps he noticed me noticing or had just seen me go pale and he smiled gently. Not his little smirk, not that teeth-bared bait. A smile that was an embrace, like being enfolded by sleep, a promise of total protection. I settled into my chair, reaching for my glass. Used the wee little stainless steel tongs to get my sugar. He smiled as though unsurprised I only used one to his three. I kept my eyes on him, feeling the usual little what’s he planning? What’s he up to? that was becoming the norm. 

“I know you were pretty tuckered out the other night,” he began. I snorted, put down my cup. My sudden realization that he still had my underwear proved his point, but it was a rather cute way to put it. 

“But I still had some things I wanted to discuss with you,” he finished. An odd moment of seriousness from him. My eyes narrowed. I wondered if this was going to turn into a relationship conversation. Thinking again about how much he enjoyed company. He was nice, and likable. And obviously wildly sexy, but I didn’t really know him at all. I was concerned he was about to get sentimental or needy. I wasn’t particularly interested in something that required more from me than changing my schedule slightly and having sex. Wasn’t interested in dating or deep conversations. But how could you possibly say to someone “I want to fuck you but you seemed like you only just took off a wedding ring, and I’m not interested in much beyond your prick?” How did you do it and sound nice? How did you say such a thing and still get to have sex with the person? 

“I need honesty,” he said, and I geared myself up for a breakdown. 

“For example,” he continued. “I like hearing you beg. Like the other night. Cry even, and whine. If you’re not, how do I know I’m doing my job right? But if I am doing my job wrong, I need honesty. I need you to say ‘stop’. Can you do that?”

I sighed and I hoped he mistook the relief of it for shock instead. Granted, I’d never done the kind of sexual play he seemed to enjoy. I enjoyed it too. I trusted him as well as I could. But I’d never had this kind of conversation with anyone else, or any partner before. 

“I can do that,” I said instead. Had I cried the last time? I wondered. I didn’t want to puff up his ego by admitting that no one else had made me whine, cry or beg. That I’d never needed to have a conversation about a safe word. We both took another sip, making eye contact over the rim of the glasses.

“I mean I want to fuck you,” he said, putting the glass back on the table, rotating it slowly. “With my hands, and toys, and cock and tongue.”

It felt as if all the blood rushed into the lower half of my body. I opened my mouth, unsure of what I was going to say, but he held up a hand, quieting me. 

“I’m hardly done, so be quiet,” he said. “I want to hurt you in ways you’ll like. Tie you up, hit you, fuck your mouth and make you come until you pass out.”

My breath caught, and I almost coughed it back out. It felt as though my clit was throbbing. Almost full images seemed to accompany his words (threats?) but would not fully stabilize in my mind.

“Yes, I want that too,” I croaked. He nodded sharply.

“I want to bind you up and slap you and make you drool and defile you utterly. I want you to say yes, give in to me, like it and ask for more.”

My back arched against the chair as if there was a hook in my chest tugging me across the table to him.

“Yes, I want that too,” I agreed.

He pushed the apron across the table to me.

“Put that on, hon.”

I started to drop the neck straps over myself with admittedly trembling hands, but he shook his head no.

“Absolutely fucking not. I said put the apron on, I didn’t say anything else should be on you. Come meet me in the kitchen,” he said, jerking his head back toward the door. He snapped his fingers the way he did when he’d forgotten something, tipping his chin upward in that ah-ha way he did. “Oh, since you wore those slut shoes, you can leave those on. Those, I like.” 

My toes curled inside my stilettos, something between excitement and shame making the heels feel taller and thinner. I’d seen him glance approvingly at my various inappropriate shoes before. I always dressed “right” for work, but I liked a sexy shoe. Since I so frequently just sat behind a desk anyway, I decided it was all right to give myself a little pleasure and fun with something no one would see anyway. 

He stalked off through the swinging door and I walked stupidly toward the restrooms. Cold and fearful and totally, insensibly aroused. Divested myself of all my clothes, tied the apron on and walked rapidly across the dining room to the kitchen with my clothes overly-neatly folded in my hands. He was leaning against a counter, arms folded against his chest as I approached. It seemed as though the brushed cement floor would slide out from under my heels as they clicked across, sounding louder than seemed possible. Miserably aware of how bare my backside was, how short the skirt of the apron was. Every shift exposing flesh. Hips sliding back and forth with every step forward, breasts nearly bared with movement of the linen. 

I stood a few feet from him, trying to keep very still, and standing very upright. I usually stood with my left hip cocked, weight on my right foot, but I couldn’t do that this time without exposing the whole of my left side to him. Further my thighs and ass had never felt this cold before. Because when had I ever been to this level of nudity in such an open space? He sighed, gesturing me closer with his fingers closing toward his chest. I took another few steps toward him. When I was within arms reach his hand snapped out, grabbing the center of the apron over my breast bone. Pulling in a fistful, letting the linen bunch between my breasts, so they fell out to the side. Dragging me forward, even closer, with enough force so that the neck strap bit in at the nape, the buckle catching against my hairline. Alarm at his athletic quickness had me dropping my pile of clothes to the floor. I gasped over how quickly I’d been caught, how much I wanted him. His knuckles still pressing into my chest, flexing and working against my heartbeat.

“Nice to finally see these,” he said, brushing his thumbs across both nipples. I was shivering with both cold and excitement. How even in my “slut shoes” he could loom over me. He had slim, musician’s fingers, but his hands were large too, and could reach across quite an expanse of my flesh.  He didn’t stop stroking though, and my knees crumpled again. His grip was too strong to let me fall. Bending forward he pressed his lips to my right breast and then looked up at me again. He obviously was a studied flirt, who enjoyed it, but I wondered if he was aware of the physical effects he had. If he knew I particularly liked that, if he knew what an image he cut with his eyelashes, his eyes. His always looked warm, syrupy and happy. He had my attention entirely.

“If you wore a low cut shirt to work,” he said, rolling his thumbs under the curve of my breasts, lifting a little. “I’d always think about tugging it down. Just leaning over your desk and biting your tits while you sat there.”

Something between a gasp and a sob escaped me and I arched further into his hands. Distracted wondering if he’d already somehow known how sensitive my chest was? Even other men had managed to bring me to the brink of orgasm by touching my nipples. But he seemed to know me far better and be more willing to push me than other men. Strange that he already seemed to know how to play me. He suddenly pinched and pulled downward, forcing me to bend at the waist, and give into the movement. I braced my hands against the counter beside him, shocked again by the cold. He let me go, swatting at my backside, lazily, without any force.

“Bend over further, honey. And spread your legs.”

I did, feeling but hoping he couldn’t see the tremble going down my inner thighs. I felt the arch in my foot in a way I never had before, wearing these shoes. Straining to stay on my toes for him, hoping nothing would make my heels slide out from underneath me. It seemed as though I was warmed by the heat coming off him, in direct contrast to how nude and chilled I otherwise was. I found myself standing even more on my toes when he spanked me twice in rapid succession. It didn’t hurt, though it startled me and I bounced against the counter. The flush of blood suffusing my skin also helped to warm me up. Skin becoming rapidly pink. I fought against myself, getting back into position, when his thumb and forefinger slid into a lock around my already slick clit. Against my will I started forward like an animal. I meant to stay still, stay bent and legs wide, but I couldn’t handle the overwhelming and sudden thump between my legs without movement. Because I liked submitting, and liked the exposure. Even the tender and safe humiliation. So I wanted to be still and take more from him. His hand still between my legs he bent over me. The first time we’d actually been body to body, nearly his whole length against mine, more than just a couple of points of contact. His clothes felt rough against my bare skin, all of him was thick and heavy and warm. His teeth sunk in where my shoulder connected with my neck. Pinning me. Making it so that another jerking move in any direction would tear my flesh or bruise me further. I breathlessly shrieked. Happy to be an animal, his jaws grinding down into me. His hand became rough and fast, and he barely relaxed his jaw. I struggled a little against his teeth, feeling his breath puffing on my shoulder. I was dropping deeply into his rapidly rubbing hand. I came with another little shriek, imagining I must have blood splattering all over the counter from my shoulder. He knew that my legs would fail me again, and he grabbed and lifted me with a grunt onto the counter. My hands sweatily skated along the steel as I got pushed up and onto it. I was moving so quickly and out of my own control that I wasn’t on my hands and knees so much as face and knees. Even more open to him than before– and I liked it. I tried looking over my lowered shoulder to find him, but my hair fell loose from its few remaining clinging pins and blinded me. Tapping me with his knuckles I lifted myself a little higher.

“You came too fast, and you came from being bitten like a little animal,” he growled. “I’m going to beat your clit numb so that doesn't happen again tonight.” 

In any other circumstances I might have tried to find words, or even argue with him. I didn’t want to. I wanted to see how that felt. I wanted to keep seeing what he’d do, what noises I’d make. So I just slid my knees further apart, dropping my cheek to the counter. Ass raised for him, head lowered. A stinging slap landed almost directly on my slippery and full clit. As I cried out I raised myself back up on my palms, one hand flying to my hair to pull it out of the way. I craned my face around again, holding sheaves off my face to see what was happening. I knew that hit couldn’t have been from his palm. Too snappy, too direct to be his hand. Wearing something like a jolly sneer he waved a metal spatula well within my sight and slapped me again. My face crashed back down with the force, and I was sure I must have bruised my cheekbone in my shocked movement forward. My legs trembled holding me up as I lost count. If my ass had felt pink, everything between my thighs felt red. He stopped, brushing his fingers gently down my hips.

“I think every time I hit you it sounds… wetter,” he teased. Something wonderfully cool and smooth slid between my legs which felt like a pile of stinging, swollen wounds. My hips lifted again, apparently I’d already forgotten the assault and was just hungry for more stimulation. It remained cool and soothing against my clit. Just as I was getting into a rhythm, sliding down into orgasm and panting, he pulled it away. I whined, and he thrust whatever it was into me, still cold enough to jolt. I glanced over my shoulder again with the dim realization he wasn’t using his fingers. Seeing his hand working behind me I figured out it was the handle of the spatula, rounded and cold. I’d never been penetrated by anything other than fingers or dicks. I was ashamed and appalled by how turned on I was. Though it was slim it seemed like the walls of my vagina were clinging to it. His free hand latched over my hip bone, helping me rock back and forth. 

“You’re going to come all over this, aren’t you?” he asked.

“I don’t know if I want to,” I panted.

“You don’t want to?” he asked, quickly withdrawing.

“Wait!” I said, rocking further back.

“You’re wet, little darling, and it sounds like you’re going to come…” he pretended to say in confusion.

“I’m wet for you,” I pleaded, hoping he’d understand what I meant. That he knew how badly I wanted him to just finally strip and lay me on my back and bury himself in me. 

“Oh, I know you are honey,” he said so gently that I unraveled. His other hand circled my waist and started touching my offended clitoris again. I came involuntarily, pubis dropping into his palm as I spasmed around an aluminum handle, entirely against my will. I’d meant to hold out and see if he’d give in to me. Neither movement stopped however, when I finished. I began weeping tearlessly against the counter, my face hot and flushed feverishly. 

“Guess the beating didn’t work,” he sighed. “Let’s go ahead and get one more out of you.”

My belly dropped to the counter, like a slithering little worm, my fingers fisting around the edge, trying to keep myself from flying out into the atmosphere. Finally, he released me as I flattened entirely, the clattering of the spatula to the floor barely calling me back to paralyzing embarrassment. Grabbing my ankles he slid me across the counter, having gone from cold to sweating, it was pretty easy to do so to me.

“Relax on the floor for just a second,” he said, lifting me down so gently I could have begun crying in earnest. I wanted to cling around his neck and feel how warm he was, feel the grain of the chambray of his shirt, but I was let go of too quickly to keep a grip. 

He hummed as he deep cleaned the counter, throwing the spatula into the trash barrel in the corner in a boyish, practiced overhand throw. I shuddered, unsure if it was because I was beginning to get clammy on the floor. Cooling down and left to cool down alone. Or if it was seeing the instrument of my torture thrown away like that. So simply and without thought. Or if it was because I wanted even more. I was exhausted but still hoping the session wasn’t over. Not sure what I wanted concretely but him. I wanted to see him naked, I wanted to be against him and I still wanted him inside me, in a forlorn sort of way. Granted, all the blood that had rushed between my legs had since left, leaving me tired out and rather useless. But it was like a dinner that hadn’t been cooked; not entirely satisfying in some unnameable way. 

He finished his wiping down, still humming and dried his hands on the towel still securely twisted through his belt loop. He knelt beside me on the floor, pushing me down onto my back. Undoing the top two buttons of his shirt as he settled beside me. I’d never seen him less than entirely buttoned up and was totally entranced by his light skin and dark body hair. Quietly disappointed as I saw he didn’t play to go further than those first two. Apparently just getting comfortable. Sliding onto his belly, flat on the floor he wrapped his arms around my thighs, his hands around my hips and buried his face between my legs. He was gentle and slow, the intention seeming to me more for cleaning and soothing, rather than provoking. I almost thought I could fall asleep, naked except for a bunched up, sweaty apron on a cement floor. Being lovingly licked, slowly, lulled into dumb relaxation. 

This last orgasm came with a sigh and I slid out of his arms, and he let me. Trying to turn on my side, the way I always slept, hands going under my cheek. When I started getting cold again, and he noticed me shivering he tugged me into a sitting position. Holding me under the armpits like a large doll, and laughing.

“I didn’t think I could actually make you pass out. If you can get dressed by yourself, hon, I’ll make you some dessert,” he said, still laughing. I thought he was just pleased with himself, but it was more like the laughter you gave to an unbearably cute thing. I got up, stepping into my pants, wearily confused and trying to remember how I put on a bra. Listening to him opening and moving things around on the gorilla racks lining the walls of the kitchen. Finally I managed to get dressed and slumped back to an exhausted seat on the floor. 

“You’ll be more comfortable in my office. There’s actual chairs in there,” he called, still laughingly. I sighed heavily and flopped my way into his office. Dropping into a chair, somehow. Once again he hip checked his way through the door, where I sat in the dark. I leaned forward, turning on the desk lamp as he set down a faddy little tray, with steaming mugs and truffles.

“Cocoa,” he said as I reached for the one closest to me. I grunted a thanks or an understanding, distracted when I noticed he was waving something in front of me. Had my reflexes been better than totally dazed I would have attempted to snatch the item back. It was the underwear I’d worn in. I still reached out for them, one-handed. 

“Oh absolutely fucking not, I’m getting together a collection,” he said, stuffing it into the same hip pocket, beside the first pair. I huffed at him, he just laughed back. We indulged in chocolate, instead of arguing. Talking together but gentler, or slower than we usually did. Watching each other drink and eat. He asked me once if I was okay. I brushed him off.

“I want… I need to be able to talk with you too,” he said. I sighed, hiding my face by taking another sip. 

“Too?” I questioned, hoping to distract him.

“I need to talk with you, if we’re going to have sex. I need to fuck and talk, too,” he said. I sighed again.

“We are talking,” I said, stirring in my chair, once again wondering where he was going with all this. Didn’t want to be asked to sleep over, didn’t want to be asked on a date. Didn’t want to talk about my feelings or the excited ambivalence about the kind of sex he gave me.

“I’m having fun with you,” I said. I watched his face go carefully blank. Wondering what he was hiding from me by smoothing out his usually highly expressive face. “If I were to be having anything other than fun with you, I would be certain to make you aware of that. If you were concerned,” I finished. 

“Good enough for now,” he sighed. 

We moved back into more comfortable territory. Gossiping about coworkers and clients. Cooking. I liked how everything with him was a story. And it always had a punchline. He made me laugh all the time. He held forth, but he always seemed to like the part best where he could make you laugh. That’s when his eyes lit up. When we wound down he walked me to the door with his hand on my lower back. I watched him lock up, shake the handle the way you do. And then pat the door a little goodbye. I wished I was already home, still tired out.

“‘Night hon!” he called once I was a few yards down the sidewalk. I waved at him, hoping we hadn’t woken anyone else on the street up.