“Thank you for bringing me here,” she said when we finished eating. “And for showing me around Oslo. It’s a beautiful city, and I know this trip is costing you a lot.”
“It’s nothing.”
She gave a little laugh and looked out at the harbor. The cold pinked her cheeks, or maybe she was blushing. “It’s nothing to you, with your big, fancy architectural business, but it’s a lot to me. I never imagined...” She pursed her lips and blinked. “I’ve never really thanked you for everything you’ve done. Not just this trip, but everything. I’m sure these words are way too late in coming, but your generosity changed my life. So…thanks.”
Her shy, clumsy gratitude made me feel ridiculously pleased. She was so close I could have kissed her. I didn’t.
“If I had to pick a life to change,” I said instead, “I’m glad it was yours. You’ve capitalized on everything I’ve done for you. You impress me every day.”
“I impress
you
?” She shook her head. “That’s difficult to believe. You’re the most impressive person I know.”
“You don’t know enough people.”
“Seriously...” She put a hand on my coat and my whole body tensed. “You do these amazingly difficult things, and you make it look easy. You design buildings, you create bridges out of thin air, out of your mind and your imagination. You make all this money and you use it to help people, not just Norton, not just me. You give money to dozens of charities in dozens of countries.”
“I’m not perfect.” She ought to know that better than anyone else. “Don’t make me into a saint.”
“Not only that, but you speak Norwegian like a native. You just...” She moved her hand, waved it in the chilly air. “You just speak it, and everyone understands you.”
“My grandmother made me learn it. It wasn’t that hard.”
“What other languages do you speak?”
“French. Spanish. German. A little Mandarin.”
She put her head in her hands. “I don’t know,” she said between her fingers. “I don’t know how you do all this stuff, how you’re so good at everything. I guess you’re a genius.”
“I’m not a genius. I got lucky. I was born to rich parents and I’ve always had everything I wanted.”
Except for you. I don’t have you.
She shook her head, just sitting there bent over with her forehead on her knees. A whole minute went by. I wondered if she was crying. I took off one of my gloves and touched her nape. I don’t know why I did it. Because I’m not a genius.
She sat up and looked at me, but she didn’t say anything like “Stop” or “One hundred percent professional.” I curled my fingers around my glove to keep from touching her again, touching her cheek, her hair, her knee that was so close to mine, encased only in department store jeans.
“Are you cold?” I asked.
“Sort of.”
“Do you want to go back to the hotel?”
Her lips parted like she was going to speak, but then the lower one trembled. I couldn’t hold her gaze. I could only watch that trembling lip and think about kissing it.
“I don’t want to go back to the hotel,” she said.
She blinked, the winter sun shining through her lashes. And I know,
I know
, she was the first one to lean toward me. She was the one who opened her hands on my coat and slid them up to my collar, and shook back her hair and looked at me, but I was the one who kissed her, nipping that trembling lower lip between my teeth. Thoughts rampaged through my brain.
She’s kissing me. Pull her closer.
Her hair, her warmth, her scent. She’s skittish. She tastes like berries and marzipan.
People walked by us, right by our bench, but she seemed oblivious, and I didn’t care. I scooped her into my lap and held her cold cheeks between my palms, and simply existed in the reality of her embrace. Her hands slid inside my coat and around my waist. I kissed her harder, clasping her to my front. My cock went rigid, trying to fight out of my pants even in near-freezing weather.
So that was all I’d needed to do to melt her reserve. Bring her to Norway, feed her cake by the harbor. Ask if she was cold. I wasn’t cold at all. I burned. I was on fire after all my waiting and lust.
Kiss me. Touch me. Berries and sugar. Starshine, with sun through her lashes.
She pressed closer to me, moving her thigh against my cock. I wanted her thighs around me. I wanted to be inside her pussy, making her arch and cry with lust.
This isn’t professional
, I thought as her fingers traced my spine. But we were never meant to be professional together. We were meant to connect on a much more animalistic plane.
“I know you said you don’t want to go back to the hotel,” I managed to say between kissing her. “But I think we ought to go back. I think we need some privacy.”
“Privacy,” she breathed. “Yes.”
“Naughty girl,” I said in a low voice. “Naughty intern, throwing herself at the boss.” I grabbed her hair and pulled hard. “Do you know what happens to sexy, naughty interns like you?”
She gazed at me. “Something bad? Something awful?”
“Absolutely.” I squeezed one of her breasts until she gasped, hurt her right through her coat and bra and sweater in front of everyone. “Bad, awful things that you absolutely deserve.”
I barely remembered the cab ride back to the hotel, barely remembered the route we took or the few words we exchanged. Price gave orders to the driver in Norwegian, but all I recognized was the name of the hotel. Maybe he told him to hurry. I wanted the driver to hurry before I regained my sanity.
Not that I thought Price would allow me to backtrack at this point. He held my hand until the cab pulled up at the hotel doors, and only let go to pay the driver. He hurried me through the lobby to the elevators and took my hand once again as soon as the doors closed. His fingers felt warm, firm, encompassing. Demanding. If I tried to back out now, he’d insist upon my attendance. I was already under his power.
Our scene had already begun.
He took me down a silent hallway to his door and keyed it open, then tugged me inside and led me to the center of the room, over by the window. His room looked very much like mine, only neater. The bed was made, the sheets turned down. Everything was white in this hotel. The pillows were white, the counterpane was white, the sheets were white, the padded headboard was white, upholstered in tufted linen. I felt conspicuously dark as he moved about the room, setting down his room key, kicking off his shoes and shrugging out of his coat.
He hung our coats up in his closet, and then he turned to me with such purposeful resolve that I shied away.
“Don’t shrink from me,” he said. “You fucking face me.”
But his rough voice and force made me shy away more. I snatched at my sweater as he drew it off, taking it over my head and flinging it sideways. My jeans were next. He pulled the button hard and parted the zipper by ripping it open. He yanked them roughly over my hips. They were slim, tight-fitting jeans but he got them off by pure intent, tossing them away with a grunt.
He stopped then, and raked a glance over my body, my silk panties and bra. I knew he wanted to touch me. It frightened me that he declined to do so. Was he afraid he’d hurt me? I was afraid he’d hurt me. Why had I decided to do this after protecting myself all this time?
I could still run away. He’d never let me out the door, but I could lock myself in the bathroom, or barricade myself in the closet and scream until someone came to help me.
I didn’t scream. I didn’t run, but my body moved away from him on instinct. I saw his hands come up, to hit me or grab me. He didn’t do either, just caught me from behind, wrapping one arm around my waist. The other caught my chin, pressing my head back into the curve of his neck.
“Going somewhere?” he asked.
I shook my head. “No. Don’t. Don’t hurt me.”
I meant that I wasn’t ready yet, that this was happening too quickly, or that maybe I hadn’t thought things through. I wanted him to do bad, awful things to me, but with Price, I never knew how bad and awful they’d be. I clutched at his arm where he held me pinned against his front. My shoulder blades slid against his sweater as I squirmed to get away.
“Listen to me, starshine,” he said in his patient and terrifying voice. “I’ve waited weeks now to touch you. You made me wait, you made me suffer, never letting me have you. Now I’m going to have you. I’m going to take you until I’m done with you, and until I’m done, you’re going to do whatever the fuck I say.”
My breath came in pants. “I... I’m...”
I’m afraid.
That’s what I was trying to say.
His fingers tightened around my jaw and slid down the front of my neck. “
Yes, Sir
,” he said. “That’s your line. Say it.” He gave me a shake.
“Yes, Sir.” I sounded weak, whimpery. I sounded every bit as scared as I felt. I still clutched at him, like he might relent.
“Put your arms down, Chere. Stop trying to get away from me. You heard what I said.”
Oh, yes, I’d heard.
Until I’m done, you’re going to do whatever the fuck I say.
Later, I’d masturbate to those words. I’d picture his face as he said them, although he wasn’t letting me see him now. That was always part of his control, to make me feel blind and helpless. I put my hands down at my sides, releasing some of the tension in my body.
I could feel his muscles respond behind me. His arm left my waist and moved up to my bra. He pulled the cups down so my breasts were exposed, lying on the shelf of the folded-over satin. He slapped each breast and pinched my nipples. I rose on my toes and reached again for his arm.
“Put your arms down,” he repeated, in a voice that dared me to disobey.
I held my hands stiff at my sides as he pinched my nipples hard as any nipple clamp ever did. His fingers tightened around my neck as I moaned and wrenched my head from side to side. I bowed out my middle, trying to get away from the pain.
“Ow. Please,” I begged. His sweater was soft against my back, but his muscles were hard and his hands were hurting me.
“Push your panties down.”
The agony of his touch compelled me to obey. I slid my fingers under the waistband and jerked them down over my hips with frantic tugs.
“More,” he said impatiently. “Push them down to the middle of your thighs.”
The fingers at my neck went tight again, and I scrabbled to comply, shoving them down with my fingertips. I could feel the unyielding girth of his cock through his jeans, pressed against my bare skin. I imagined him unzipping his fly with that intent, angry look of his, pulling out his monster cock, and then...what?
“Please,” I whispered, not even sure what I was asking for.
“Shut the fuck up. I tell you what to do and you listen. That’s how our thing has always worked. Now, part your pussy lips.”
“What?”
“Did I stutter?” His fingers tortured my nipples, first one and then the other. “Part your pussy lips with your fingers.”
I reached down and delved between the hot folds, ashamed by my crazy wetness. His rough orders, the nipple torture, his hand threatening to choke me, all of it had me creaming myself. My fingers went immediately to my clit.
“No.” He let go of my nipples to give me a short, sharp crack on the ass. “Did I say to touch yourself? I said to part your pussy lips, not to rub one out. Have you forgotten how to follow directions?”
I gave a soft sob and nudged my labia apart to hold myself open. It was so humiliating, so cruel to make me do this. It was also so fucking hot. I was suddenly twice as wet as before.
He made me stand like that, tits out, panties down, exposing my wet, needy clit, burning all over my body in a blush while he massaged my neck and kissed me, and nibbled at my ear. “This is how you should be all the time,” he said, sliding his arm around my waist again. “In my control, with your sex open to me, and your body open to me, all wet and ready for me. Doesn’t this feel good? Doesn’t it feel right?”
I shook my head, blinking back tears. “No.”
“Sometimes it’s hard to admit what you really want. That’s why you need me. I take away the choice, and make you accept all the filthy, dirty cravings inside you.”
The grip around my middle loosened. His hand slid down. I could have pulled away then. I could have escaped, but I didn’t move. I felt paralyzed with need, with lust. With shame.
He touched me one place, one single, specific, slick and swollen place. He laid a fingertip atop my clit and my knees almost buckled. One touch, one second of pleasure, and his finger was gone.
“Oh God.” The words burst out of me with angry frustration.
He released my neck to cover my mouth. “Quiet,” he snapped. “Not one word. Keep holding yourself open. I didn’t tell you to stop.”
I complied, knowing I’d die if he didn’t touch me again just that way. He did, several times, but never long enough to satisfy me more than a second or so. I moaned behind his hand.
“This is what happens to girls who tease, and say no,” he said. “They get taught lessons. Look how wet you are.” He left my clit to slosh his fingers through my drenched pussy. “You told me you didn’t want this. You told me you didn’t want sex, that you wanted us to be one hundred percent professional, but feel how wet you are. If you don’t want sex, why are you humping my hand?”
I whipped my head back and forth, voiceless, breathless, humiliated by his demonstration of my hypocrisy, but too worked up to care. He returned to torturing me, delivering fleeting, electrifying caresses and pinches to my swollen clit, chuckling when I bucked helplessly against his hand. I knew he’d only give me what he was willing to give me, and he was punishing me at the moment, so it wasn’t very much.
Why had I chosen this? Why was I subjecting myself to his whimsical sadism, his torturous scenes? Just to feel his power and have his cock, and earn those magical orgasms if he deemed me worthy?
Yes. Good God above, yes, that was why. I held my pussy lips open for him like an obedient masochistic slut, dreaming of sex and kisses and poetry. I forgave him for everything that came before: the secrecy, the desertion, the binoculars, the machinations with my internship. I forgave him and cursed myself for denying our bodies the pleasure they could have enjoyed for weeks now. I deserved the torment he was heaping on my poor, exposed sex.