Playing Knotty (16 page)

“The last tie I want to teach you is a basketing hogtie.” Emma was tracing the skin of her wrists with her fingertips the way she always did after he untied her. “You'll need some room for this, so feel free to spread out. Emma, please come kneel here.”

The basketing hogtie took a while to demonstrate, each step consisting of several complex knots, but the results were well worth it. By the time he finished binding Emma and showed how to adjust the “basketing” of the position, everyone in the group had begun experimenting with pulling and releasing the tensioning ropes. Ian knelt by Emma's head. “How do you want me to tie this?”

“Lots of tension.” She turned her head to the side to look at him. “Cinch it tight.”

“All right.” He pulled back on the ropes looped around her ankle ties, drawing her feet toward her upper back and making her back arch. When she let out a breath, he released the tie a bit. “Too much?”

“No, just right.”

He snugged it back those last few inches and tied it off, securing the harness before sitting back on his heels and marveling at her. He traced his hand down the curve of her spine, stopping right above the swell of her hips and then moving back up. “You're so beautiful,” he whispered. She looked over at him, eyes widening. He repeated it, confirming his words. “You're beautiful like this. Like a work of art. A sculpture. I wish you could see yourself.”

Emma drew her tongue across her lips, and he wanted to kiss them. “It makes . . .” She hesitated and he leaned in to hear. After a glance at him, she looked down at the floor. “It makes me feel beautiful.” And if he hadn't wanted to kiss her before, he
definitely
wanted to kiss her now. He wanted to show her how beautiful she was to him.

But this was neither the time nor the place, so he let the moment pass.

“Okay. You can untie me now.” Emma wriggled. “It's getting uncomfortable.” Ian began untying her, letting her body relax as he worked the rope from around her limbs. When untied, she rolled onto her side and sat up, rubbing her wrists reflexively as she always did. People in the room were still coming out of their bondage; they stayed on the floor for the last few minutes, and Ian answered a few specific questions from the group before officially ending the class. People hung around chatting for a few minutes while Ian packed up. Emma helped this time, having watched how he packed up the suitcases, but was interrupted by a hand on her shoulder: Salome and Francine. Ian continued packing his ropes, kneeling down to close up the bags and listening while trying not to make it obvious that he was listening.

“So, Emma, we wanted to say hi.” It was Francine who spoke, the shorter of the two women. She wore her blond hair in a single long braid down her back, probably to keep it away from the ropes, since she was the rope bottom of her relationship. “We've come to some of these workshops, and it's always neat when the model likes what she's doing. It makes all the difference.”

Ian sneaked a glance up to see Emma's reaction. She'd turned faintly pink. “Oh. Um . . . thank you.”

“So, yeah. We're going to a play party next weekend, and if you want to come, you'd be totally welcome. There are some people who would love to do scenes with you, I'm sure.” Francine looked up at Salome, who nodded, her ruby-red lips curled in a smile. “I think Ian's already scheduled to be there, but I wasn't sure if you were going with him.”

Emma looked down at Ian, met his eyes. He raised his eyebrows and shrugged, giving her the choice. She grinned at him, and even though she answered Francine, she was looking at Ian the whole time.

“Yes, actually. I'm going with him. We'll see you there.”

Chapter 18

T
he Orange Line
was moderately busy as it rumbled away from Sullivan Square, Emma and Ian pressed together in their seats, holding the suitcase handles. Emma watched the city slide by outside her window. The tension between her and Ian was palpable; she'd noticed it building throughout the evening every time he touched her. With no resolution, her body felt jittery, as if she'd drunk too much coffee. She kept expecting the tension between them to dissipate. They'd fooled around, they'd had sex, and yet each time she saw him, the electric current between them was switched on anew. Maybe this was what it was like to have real chemistry with someone.

They hadn't talked about the play party at all since Emma had accepted the invitation. She had expected Ian to say no on her behalf, but he'd given the choice to her, and she'd been feeling daring and reckless and beautiful. If Ian didn't want a relationship with her, at least she could share the intimacy of rope sessions with him.

“Do you want to come back to my place for a drink?” Ian turned to her as the train approached Downtown Crossing, his hand barely brushing hers where she was drumming her fingers on the top of the suitcase. (When had she started doing that?) “Just to talk about tonight and next week.”

“Sure.”

If he was surprised by her ready acquiescence, he didn't show it. The train rumbled away from her usual transfer at Downtown Crossing and headed on. Ian hadn't taken his hand away after touching hers, and through the next two stops, their fingers rested against each other. They weren't quite holding hands, but the proximity added to Emma's feeling of anticipation.

As they walked from their stop to Ian's apartment, the sound of suitcase wheels on the sidewalk seemed unnaturally loud. It was just after ten-thirty, and even though downtown would still be busy on a Saturday night, Ian's street was quiet. A light breeze rustled the last few persistent cherry blossoms, and just like earlier that week, Emma was bathed in a shower of petals. She shook them from her hair as they climbed the steps to the front door.

“Here, you missed a few.” Ian plucked several pink petals from her wild curls. His hand lingered, brushing her cheek, and she nearly leaned her face in to his palm. Stepping back, he let them into the building and the soft yellow light of the stairwell.

As on Thursday night, his apartment was spotless. Emma felt ever more aware of the perpetual clutter in her own small flat. “Do you have a maid service, or are you just ridiculously clean?”

Ian smiled, taking the suitcase from her and rolling them both into the living room. Before she could follow, he returned to the dining room and the fridge. “Cleaning calms me down. Plus, I can't really cook, so it's not like there's a lot of dishes or anything.”

“How do you eat if you can't cook?” Emma leaned against the wall near the kitchen and watched him rummage around in the fridge.

His voice was muffled as he answered. “I get a lot of takeout. There are probably a thousand restaurants within walking distance. Do you want a beer, or something stronger? I've got a few mixers in here. You like gin and tonics, right?”

“Beer's fine tonight. Anything not too hoppy.”

“I've got Allagash White.”

“That's fine.”

Ian popped the caps off two bottles and handed her one. Emma didn't drink a lot of beer, but this was smooth and sweet, with a surprising spice on the back end. Following Ian into the living room, she sat on the sectional next to him, not quite close enough to touch. He toed his shoes off and she did the same, drawing one leg up underneath her as she turned to him.

“Tonight was fun for me.” Emma picked at the corner of the yellow label on her bottle. “I'm glad I knew what to expect ahead of time.”

“Why'd you agree to come with me next weekend?” Ian skipped ahead in the conversation. “You know it's not a workshop, right? People will be enacting scenes. Some will probably be pretty intense.”

“I decided to try some of your ‘fuck it' mentality.”

He clinked the neck of his beer to hers. “Touché.”

“And what about you? What will you be doing at the party?” Emma put the bottle to her lips and took a long swallow, and Ian watched her throat work, his mouth opening slightly. Emma chased a drop on the top with her tongue before setting the bottle on the coffee table, knowing she was teasing him—and enjoying it.

“Well, I'm a rigger. So I'll be tying people up who want to be tied up.” Ian drank from his own beer.

“Everyone who wants to be tied up?”

“Usually only a few. Sometimes I just like to watch.” Now Emma was watching Ian's lips work the mouth of the bottle; it was karma for her own teasing that the temperature of the room seemed ten degrees hotter.

“Have you ever brought someone with you?”

“Yes.” Ian nodded. “A few times.”

“Who was she?”

“Different women each time. Mostly from the local kink group.”

“And what did you do with them?”

“I tied them up.” Ian smiled. “I thought that was the general idea.”

“Naked?”

He tipped his head to the side, studying her. “Two were naked. One wanted to wear lingerie.”

“And did you have sex with them?”

“No. They were intercourse-free play parties, just like this one.”

Hmm. Emma considered. “So you'll tie me up, naked or however, and people will watch?”

“That depends on you.” Ian rubbed his thumb over the swell of the bottle, drawing a line in the condensation. “Does that sound good? Or do you want something more than that?”

Emma felt a thrill run down her spine. “You said no sex.”

“I said no intercourse. There's a lot of ground between that and nothing at all. I could make you come. My fingers, my tongue . . .” He hesitated. “Or someone else's.”

Emma swallowed, knew that he could see her swallow. “And what about you? What do you get out of all this?”

Ian laughed. “You're kidding, right?” When she shook her head, he put his beer aside and ran a hand through his hair, still smiling in apparent disbelief. “Okay. Tying people up is . . . it's a rush. It makes me feel powerful. It's fucking
hot.
It's . . .” He trailed off, glancing over at the suitcases standing near the wall. Then he was on his feet, tugging her along by the hand and grabbing one of the suitcases. “Come on.”

“What? Where are we going?” She followed him, bewildered, almost tripping as he pulled her down the hall.

He flipped on the lights in his bedroom. “You're going to tie me up.”

Emma laughed at the absurdity of his comment, then sobered right away when he laid the suitcase down on the floor and opened it up. “Wait, you're serious?”

“Of course I'm serious.” He pulled out a few coils of rope, tossing them on the bed, then put the safety scissors on the nightstand. From the large armoire in the corner he grabbed a stack of laminated cards on a loose-leaf ring. Then he shrugged out of his gray button-down, stripping down to his black T-shirt. “Come on over here.”

“But you like tying people up, not being tied up.” None of this made any sense.

Ian raised his eyebrows, grinning. “What makes you think I don't like being tied up?”

“Because you run these workshops! You told me you like tying people up.”

“I told you I like rope play. And I do, and I'm good at rigging, so I'm usually a rope top. But that doesn't mean I don't like to bottom. Now come on over here and sit down. I'm going to teach you a few things.”

Mind reeling and trying to process this new information, Emma sat down on the edge of the bed with him. “Here you go. Let's start here.” He flipped through the cards, which were illustrated instructions on how to do the various ties. “Basic wrap. This one's easy. I use this one a lot.”

“I remember it. You taught this at the beginner class, right?” The finished picture looked familiar.

“Yes, and I use it for the over-and-back harness and the basketing hogtie.”

Emma looked over the card, at the steps laid out before her. She'd watched him do this tie a few times now, but she'd never focused on the individual steps. When she'd read it a few times, Ian handed her one of the smaller coils of rope from the bed. “This is a thirty-foot section of rope, which is about what you want. Come on, give it a try.” He held his wrists out in front of him, about eight inches apart. “I'll walk you through it.”

Sliding to her feet, Emma tentatively unwrapped the rope bundle.

“It's not going to bite you, Emma.” Ian's eyes twinkled in the lamplight. “Follow the steps. Lay the middle right over my wrists.”

He walked her through the instructions, reminding her to keep the ropes flat as she wrapped them first around his wrists and then around the rope between them. It felt strange to be on this end of the process.

“Good, good. Now twist them to tighten. Yes, like that. Not too tight; make sure you can fit a finger in between the rope and my hands.”

Emma checked, ensuring that his circulation wouldn't be cut off. She flipped the card over to see how to finish and tied off each rope through the last loop, as instructed. Ian slid his hands back and forth in the wrapping, twisting his wrists and testing the tightness. “Nice job. Clean and neat.”

“And you can't get out?”

“Nope. Snug as can be.” He looked up at her, his lips curling up slightly. “So if you took the ends up, you could tug me around.”

Was he asking for that? Emma hesitated, hands lightly brushing the loose, hanging ends of the tie.

“Go on. It's okay. I'll tell you to stop if I want you to stop.”

Emma wrapped the rope around itself and tied a double overhand knot, giving herself a handhold. Her heart was beating as quickly as if she were the one being tied. She stepped away from the bed and pulled, and he got to his feet easily. Unsure what to do, she backed away, leading him away from the bed, trying out the feeling of having this kind of power over him. He went along placidly, smiling.

Her back bumped into the wall. She hadn't realized she'd backed all the way across the room, but she was suddenly flush against it and he was right in front of her.

“See, you have to pay attention to these things when you're a rope top.” Ian tugged his bound hands out of her grip with ease; she was so surprised that she dropped the trailing ends of the rope. He lifted them up and over her head, using the binding to pull her close against him. “If you don't tie me down, it's easy for me to get the upper hand on you. And then we find ourselves here.”

He was so close, and even though he was the one tied up, Emma felt distinctly overpowered. She licked her lips, her heart leaping against her ribs. “Are you going to kiss me?”

“Do you want me to kiss you?”

Pressed like this against the wall, she could feel nothing but the long, firm line of his body against hers, and his lips were right there, his breath ghosting over her mouth. Her voice was barely a whisper. “Yes.”

He closed his mouth over hers, swallowing her sigh. Her head hit the wall and she didn't care, wanted to draw him closer. She tangled one hand in his short brown hair, the other wrapping around his waist. Behind her back, she could feel him twisting his wrists in their bonds, hands trapped like that because she'd tied them there, and
fuck
,
it was hot. His tongue teased hers, his breath sharp and spicy from the beer, and she went slack against him.

When Ian pulled back, lips pink and eyelids heavy, Emma took a moment to come back to herself. His wrists were still pressed firmly against her back, holding their bodies together, and he was definitely hard against her stomach. Reaching behind her to find the trailing ends of rope she'd dropped, she lifted his hands back over her head and ducked out from under his embrace. He watched her, his expression unreadable, as she began untying his hands. Her fingers wouldn't stop trembling.

When the rope was undone, she held it in her hands, looking down at the cotton, thoughts racing. Finally, she met his eyes. “What if I wanted to tie you down to the bed?”

Ian's eyes flashed, his smile broadening. “Then I'm going to need to get you more rope.”

The cat's-paw was deceptively easy, more a series of twists than an actual knot, but when Emma wrapped the first one around Ian's left wrist, she felt a sense of power surge through her. He knew what she was feeling; she could see understanding in his eyes, his dark eyes that were blown wide with lust.

She licked her dry lips. “You should . . . scoot to the middle of the bed.” It felt so strange to give commands, strange but good. Ian complied immediately, perching in the middle, waiting for further instruction. “Now . . . lie back.” When he paused, head cocked as if testing her, she put both hands on his chest and shoved, and he toppled back on the pillows with a huff of laughter.