"Well, I don't know. I don't know anything about you on a personal level, do I? I thought you were my straight-arrow boss, and the next thing I know, you're flinging me onto the bed, we're having rough sex, and you're confiding that you only let yourself go with other men. How many other men have there been?"
"Not many," he grunts. "I was happy in my marriage for a long time. I'm not saying that I didn't occasionally fantasize about losing control, being with another guy, but life is about more than just sex. Most of the time I was busy with my job. I certainly never felt any attraction to the gay scene—let alone the S&M fringes of it. I don't understand the fascination with stuff like this." He gestures at the cupboard full of whips. "Any power you need to obtain through using threats like these is meaningless—just for show. If I had to tie you to my side and beat you to keep you there, then where's the power in that? Only a bully or a coward needs those trappings. Sex games are a different matter—I can see how people might get off on using the contents of that cupboard as erotic props, but not at this level, not the way they're used here." He throws himself down on the bed, his arms behind his head and I stare at him for a long while, fascinated by him and what he is saying.
"Lenny said that you had the soul of a top," I murmur. "I think I know what he means now."
"Oh, Lenny's full of shit." Skinner grins across at me. "I'll admit there's something erotic about the exchange of power—you needing to give yourself up to me, and me needing to claim you, I admit that—but we're equals. Nick and Saunders are equals, too, although I'm not sure either of them understands that. They both get what they need from each other."
"You seem to have more of a handle on this shit than I would have imagined." I lie down next to him on the bed, my head on his lap. His fingers find my face, and he strokes me softly.
"I do. It's instinctive. Men play games like this all the time—only usually they're competing for status, or women, or even money. You were different. I noticed that straight away. You didn't play like the other guys, but it took me a long while to figure out where you were coming from. You're my counterpart, Fox. We fit each other. These people have reduced the concept to dom and sub, but it's a lot more complex than that. That's just playing at it. We've lived it."
"Yes," I say simply because it's the truth and I don't care that it's a freaky concept anymore. Five years in denial is long enough for anyone.
"And I may have threatened you because I needed to keep you under control to stop exactly this sort of thing happening, but I have never wanted to hurt you."
"Are you sure?" I grin up at him, teasing him. "Lenny said you had the patience of a saint, and must be itching to throw me over your knee and give me a good spanking."
"Oh, yeah. Well, I've wanted to do that, obviously." He grins back.
"What?" I sit up, outraged.
"Everyone wants to do that, Fox." He pulls me back down again. "It's a standard response to you, and I've had to suffer some of your worst excesses, so I think I'm entitled."
"Everybody?" I look at him, startled.
"Oh, yeah. You know that guy with the dark hair from Internal Investigations? The one I have to call in every time we do an inquiry on you?"
"Yeah." I can picture the guy, the one who once asked me why I was so paranoid.
"Well, sometimes when we're having one of our usual heated discussions about you, he'll slam the palm of his hand down on the desk over and over again, and I have no doubt at all as to what is going through his mind. I can empathize with that."
"Shit. Everybody..." I say, still appalled by this concept.
"Yeah—take Scully, for example. She must have hairbrushes and slippers with your name on them in her apartment. I bet sometimes after you've ditched her in yet another way-out location, she goes home, puts one of the throw cushions from her couch over her knee, takes aim, and..."
"No!" I laugh out loud at the mental image this conjures up.
"You think I'm kidding?" He holds me down and kisses me. "Dream on, then, Fox. Dream on."
His arms are a comfort, and he doesn't let go all night. I try not to think about the morning. I guess there's a small section of my brain that is convinced that we'll be rescued by the team before my date with destiny in the library.
* * *
I'm woken up by him undressing me—I had fallen asleep still fully clothed in my 'escape' outfit.
"What time is it?" I murmur.
"Ten," he whispers.
"What about breakfast?" I try to get up but his arms are heavy, holding me down.
"I don't think either of us is hungry. We have an hour before we need to be in the library. Let's make the most of it."
There's something different about him, but I can't put my finger on what it is. He finishes unbuttoning my shirt, and then moves on to my pants.
"I'm not in the mood," I tell him, pushing him away, feeling a pit of nervous fear opening up inside me. I roll off the bed and go to the bathroom for a piss, returning to find him sitting on the side of the bed, a strange, thoughtful expression on his face.
"Come here," he says, beckoning, and I do as commanded. "Kneel down." I find myself between his knees, and he takes my head in his hands and looks deep into my eyes. "Do you trust me, Fox?" he asks.
"Yes. With my life," I inform him honestly.
"Good. Then I need you to do something for me, something you'll find hard."
"What?" I tense and his fingers soothe me.
"I need you to give up everything to me and I need you to follow me somewhere you don't want to go."
"I don't understand." I'm transfixed by the darkness in his eyes and the hardness of his hands against my face as he holds me too tight.
"Yes, you do. You're mine." His hands move away from my face and down to my shirt. He pushes it off my shoulders, and it slides to the floor. "I can do what I like with you." He kisses me behind the ear, and I feel my body responding despite myself. "Can't I?" he whispers, his hands on my fly, unzipping, removing my pants. "Well?" he urges insistently.
"Yes." I can feel myself drowning when he talks to me like that. I've forgotten about the library, about everything but him and the way he smells, and the way he's kissing me. I'm hard before he's even got me fully naked, and he drags me bodily onto the bed.
"Listen to me, then." His voice is low, gruff, throaty, and so damn sexy that I'm transfixed. I can feel his hard-on digging into me, and my own cock is stiff and ready. "I'm not giving you any release yet. You can't come unless I tell you that you can. Do you understand?"
"Yes," I moan, feeling his lips pressing against the back of my neck, gentle despite the vice-like grip he has around my body.
"I mean it. You have to do that for me. It's important."
"Yes. Okay." My breathing is coming hard and fast and as far as I'm concerned, there's just him and me in the whole goddamned universe at this point.
"Good. There will be a reward for that, Fox. Trust me." He loosens his grip, and his fingers find my nipples, fondling them gently. "But you'll have to wait for the reward. It'll be later, much later—and better than anything you can dream of."
"What is it?" His questing fingers are still playing with my nipples, and I groan and lean back against him, trying to impale myself on the hardness I can feel in his groin.
"Not yet. I'll tell you later." His lips travel down my back, and his hands stay on my chest, their caress insistent, endless, sending shivers of heat through me. I can't stand the pressure in my cock and I move my hands down to touch it. His own hands go into action immediately, stopping me before I get there, holding my wrists tightly in front of my body.
"No," he says firmly. "Obey me."
"I want to," I whimper.
"You must. If it's too much, then I can tie you, but I'd rather you obeyed me because I asked you to."
"I'll try." I feel as if my whole body is a sensitive mass of receptors. My skin shivers at the slightest touch of his lips or fingers. Every part of me has been turned into an erogenous zone.
"Give in to me," he whispers, his fingers playing me like a violin, plucking at my strings to make the most beautiful music.
"I do. I have." I lie back against him and feel his fingers inside me, thrusting. "Fuck me," I whimper, and he laughs.
