The One Worth Finding (12 page)

“
What about you?” he shrugged.
“How long since you had sex?”

“Eight years.” She said. She knew that
her smile looked forced.

He leaned forward, clasping his hands in
front of him. Such beautiful hands, his fingers slim and long, the
bones delicate. Elegant, but masculine hands.

“Who was he?” he asked
softly.

For a moment, Tara couldn’t talk, rendered
speechless by the pressure of her memories and the sweet compassion
of the man before her. A man she couldn’t let into her life.
Because she belonged to another one. No matter how much she loved
Dr. Aaron Harte, he could never be hers.

“
My husband.” She finally said,
her voice eerily calm
. “Jeff. We were married four years. The best four years of
my life.”

“Was he your sub?”

She swallowed.

“
Yes,” she whispered, “his need
for anal stimulation wasn’t anywhere near as strong as yours. But
he found pleasure in it. And like you, he had his eyes on his
Domme’s needs more than on his own. He knew how much I loved to do
it. So he indulged me. I knew how much he loved the whip, so I
became a pro at using it. That’s what I’ve been doing at the club
all those years, you know? Whipping strange subs. I met their
needs.”

She didn’t have to finish that thought
for Aaron to know that nobody had met her needs.

She could see how much he wanted
to touch her, and part of her wanted it
, too. Part of her wanted to scream
at him to take her away, to bring her to a place where her demons
couldn’t follow. But she knew that wasn’t possible; it was a fairy
tale, nothing more.

“What happened to Jeff?” he finally
asked, and she knew she had to tell him.

She expected absolute trust, didn’t
she? He deserved no less.

“
Car accident,” she said, “eight
years ago. A drunk driver- crashed into his car. My husband died
five days later at the hospital.”

She saw her pain in his eyes,
felt their souls touching and thought
, no. No God, please. It can’t
be.

“Tara.” He whispered, and there was no
need to say more.

She knew what he felt, had seen inside him
since they’d met.

“
He was everything I had,”
s
he said.
“And after he was gone, I was empty. Dead. Void. And that can never
change. I always knew it was the end. That there was nothing coming
for me after that.”

He put his hand on hers, and the
contact became her lifeline, became everything that kept her from
crashing. They made small talk while they ate, but always, always
his hand came back to hers, holding her for most of the evening.
Giving her something she’d thought lost.

When they said goodbye in front of the
apartment where he was staying, they kissed long and soft and
infinitely gently.

“
Goodnight,” he said warmly,
nuzzling her ear, gushing sweet
, hot breath against her clammy skin.

“
Thank you for the wonderful
evening,” she replied, “and Aaron, don’t enema tonight. I want to
help you with that tomorrow.”

He nodded slowly.

They separated, and she felt bereft,
the cold felt like impending death. She shivered.

She opened the driver’s door of her
car and watched him ascend the stairs to the house.

“
Aaron,” she called out to him
and almost gasped when he turned around. So, so beautiful. “I’m
glad that you came here, that we met. No matter how short our time
together is… it’s good to know I’m not dead. I’ll be forever
grateful to you for showing me that.”

And she got into her car and drove off
before he could answer, hardly able to see the street in front of
her for all the tears that were blurring her vision.

Aaron lay on the side of his bed fully
dressed and felt so cold his teeth where chattering. He knew it was
nerves, nothing else.

Three days. Three days of happiness,
then everything would be over. He had no idea how he was doing it.
How he could still want to be charming and sweet and acting like
the man in love he undoubtedly was, knowing full well that in three
days, his heart would break. Inevitably.

But he couldn’t turn his back on her
now.

He needed to enjoy this as long as it
would last. If he would die in three days, so be it. He’d have this
one week, one week of bliss, one week of knowing that he wasn’t
hopeless. That somebody out there truly wanted him. He would never
love again, of course. But he would keep the memory of the feeling
in his heart, and maybe, it would make him a better man. When he
closed his eyes, he would remember how she had looked at him, and
maybe someday, the sadness would fade and only the happiness
remain.

He would sit by the fire, creaky
and grey-haired, with
Grace’s grandchildren on his lap and tell them
about the beautiful woman he’d loved all his life. The only one
who’d ever captured his heart.

He closed his eyes.

He didn’t feel like talking to anyone
tonight, and for once hadn’t answered Sam’s call.

He just wanted to be alone and wait for
tomorrow, when their souls would melt into each other
again.

Flowers, their bright red grayed by
the darkness.

It was so cold at the cemetery. She had
lit a match to read the inscription on Jeff’s tombstone.

Beloved husband.

Now she was fighting a lonely battle.
Free. She wanted to be free. Didn’t want to sacrifice the soul
she’d just found after living all those years without
one.

She cried and raged and shook like a
leaf. Knowing it was to no avail.

Wind howled in the trees, and she
wallowed in the cold and the slight fear the dark, morbid place
ignited in her.

It was a senseless struggle, a fight
she knew she would lose. She wanted to curl up on the grave and
freeze to death in the icy winter air. But she knew it wouldn’t
change anything.

She could never be free
again.

Chapter 10

She tried to keep her distance
wh
en she
picked him up at the subs’ apartment the next morning, tried to be
cold and aloof, and failed miserably.

He was so cute, so bewitching, always
talking to her with his head slightly tilted, staring at her
dreamily like a boy in love; he just made her smile with his
sweetness and adoration, and she almost forgot all the suffering
that made her so sad and unavailable for the precious hours she
spent with him.

She was grateful. For someone who so
rarely laughed, it felt unbelievably good to let her guard down for
once. To allow herself to be swept away by a man who was actually
three years her senior, but seemed so much younger than she was.
His face was youthful, ageless, his charm easy-going,
weightless.

She simply refused to reject him. Not
today. Not before he had to go.

They entered the club next to
each other, and she felt so close to him she thought everybody had
to see it,
she was watching the doorman like an enemy who might shout
her feelings to the world.

“Aaron,” she said quietly, “just
remove your shoes and socks, please. I want to undress you
today.”

The doorman nodded when she threw him
a questioning glance.

“
That’s okay, Mistress Tara,” he
said, “he’s committed, so you call the shots with him.”

Committed. Why had the word never sounded
so good? She closed her eyes briefly and forced a calm
nod.

She led Aaron into one of the
bathrooms that could be used for playing. She would find everything
she needed right here.

“
Stand.” She commanded, and he
obeyed. Her hands pushed the open jacket from his shoulders. He
didn’t move an inch.

Slowly she lifted her fingers
to
the collar
of his shirt and started to unbutton it, one by one, reverently
stroking the delicious naked skin she revealed. So soft, hot under
her touch, trembling when she hit an especially sensitive
spot.

Mine, her mind screamed,
MINE.

She felt her touch going urgent. She
bared his upper body and kissed his chest.

“
I want you to open up for me
tonight, pet,” she whispered, “want you to bare your soul and
accept my penetration.”

She discarded his shirt before her hands
wandered to his waistband and opened the single button, pulled the
zipper down. Touched his cock through his underwear, so hard
already, twitching in arousal. His breath was labored now. His
chest hair tickled her nose.

“
I know you’re not dirty. You’re
meticulously clean, everywhere, as is this perfect ass that’s MINE,
but I want to use the enema as a readying procedure for what we’re
gonna do today. To accept my fist, you have to trust me completely,
you know that. Do you have this kind of
trust in me, little sub?”

“
Yes, Ma’am,” he said, his voice
full of emotion, “I trust you with my life. Do with me as you
please.”

“I will.” She breathed and pushed his
pants and underwear down. “Step out of your clothes and bend over
the sink, pet.”

He did as he was told. He always did; his
fierce obedience touched her heart. He would fulfill her deepest
wishes. How could she not love somebody like that? She shooed the
thought away and retrieved the enema bag from the cupboard,
connecting it to hose and tube, closing the clip. She filled it
with moderately hot water, added castile soap and turned towards
him.

“
You ready, pet?”
she
asked.

“
Yes, Ma’am.” He answered meekly
and expertly turned to bow over the toilet, resting his folded arms
on the closed lid, raising his buttocks high into the
air.

She used some lube to ease the passage of
the tube, and pressed it inside him. He didn’t say a word, only his
breathing deepened with arousal when the sheer contact ignited his
sensitive nerves. She needed this arousal to make him soft and
receptive when she started fisting him, so she welcomed
it.

She opened the clip of the hose
and heard his soft gasp when his bowels stretched under the water’s
pressure, giving him a sense of utter fullness, making his cock
swell even harder. But he was a pro at this, he took deep, calming
breaths, concentrating on keeping the tension of his lower body
that would help him to keep the liquid in for
several minutes. The sensation
of being filled to the limit increased and his arousal made it hard
to keep still. She administered the enema slowly, taking her time,
and he was grateful. Both were silent during the procedure, no
words needed. They both knew each other so well by now, they could
guess each other’s thoughts. Only five days. But the trust was so
deep, he’d never trusted somebody as much as he trusted
her.

When he’d taken all two quarts
of water, she stopped and reached around his torso to gently
massage his stomach. He groaned
with delight, but it took all his
concentration to hold the water in. She kissed his back, let her
nose play with the curls in his neck, and he inhaled every bit of
tenderness, storing it away for lonely times to come. The minutes
trickled by and finally he heard her voice next to his
ear.

“
That’s enough, little one,” she
whispered, and he straightened slowly and opened the lid, carefully
sitting down. He pulled the tube himself and slowly started to
evacuate, releasing the tension in his stomach, taking more
thorough, quiet breaths while he emptied
himself completely. Since he repeated
the procedure every night, it wasn’t messy at all. He wiped his
genitalia with a warm, wet washcloth and got up with a sigh, softly
smiling at her.

“I’m ready, Ma’am.” He said, and she
nodded.

They went into her dungeon, taking his
clothes with them, and she ordered him to kneel on the spanking
bench. He felt his buttocks stretching wide and enjoyed the feeling
of openness, willingly relaxing for her penetration, her
possession.

He was hers, and he would be
hers forever. It didn’t matter that she rejected him, intent to
stay forever faithful to the sub she had lost. He would do the same
for her, stay monogamous,
and remember her for the rest of his life.
Secretly waiting for the day when she might accept him as her sub;
he knew he would never stop hoping. It would be a part of his life
from now on. He had no idea how long it would take him to get over
the worst pain of losing her, and he didn’t envy his friends who
would have to watch this. He was glad to have them though; he
couldn’t stand to be alone. Alone like she had been all those
years.

He heard her collect her stuff,
fill a bowl with lube, probably retrieving some gloves. They
couldn’t do it without th
ose inside the club, but he would have loved her
to fist him with her bare hands. Well, he could always hope that
she would do it one day.

She stepped between his spread legs
and he exhaled thoroughly, releasing all tension his muscles might
hold. Only his erection pulsed fiercely against his stomach,
knowing what was about to happen.