Craving Flight (5 page)

Breathing around the wings beating at my heart, I moisten my lips between my teeth.

“Yes.”

“With just a hand or more than that?”

Thinking of what damage his substantial palms and strong fingers might do, I breathe, “A hand to start.”

He nods. “To start.”

“Yes.”

“But perhaps something more than that?”

“Perhaps.”

Turns out I don’t actually need to be hurt to get turned on. All I need to do is talk about it with his dark eyes laser-focused on me. Between my legs, there’s a growing heat and sensitivity. If he slipped a hand between us, he’d find me wet. But instead of reaching down to the apex of my thighs, he slides his hand toward the back of my neck, fingers twining in my hair and closing. It makes my lips part.

“And besides being hurt, are there other things?”

“Other things?” I try to look innocent, but the tightening at my scalp and the shake of his head tell me he’s not buying it.

“Don’t tease me. Tell me the truth. What else?”

The beat of wings about my lungs grows more intense and I struggle to breathe. “Restraint. I like to be restrained.”

“My little bird likes to be kept in a cage?”

“That’s not how it feels.” It’s difficult to explain, but even though I’m being controlled, even when—maybe especially when—I can’t move an inch, it makes me feel like I can fly away. Like the strings that keep me tethered to the ground have been cut and I can finally launch myself into the sky where I belong.

“It’s not, is it?” His fingers knead the nape of my neck as he studies me. “It makes you feel free.”

Perhaps my brain has been too crowded with anxiety or sensual thoughts, but this is the first time it occurs to me that Elan is neither shocked nor appalled by my requests and seems—dare I hope?—
conversant
in these matters? But before I can ask, he presses on.

“And how do you like to be set free? Rope? Leather? Chains?”

I get the urge to rub my wrists because I can practically feel the fetters as he talks. But that would be rude and besides, I wouldn’t be able to reach my hands around his broad back to touch. “Anything that won’t leave a mark the next morning?”

I curse myself for the desperate hope in my voice. I’d had to don long sleeves for days when Brooks left evidence of our play after I’d asked him not to. I should’ve known better about the handcuffs, but I let him. I didn’t want to tell him no after he’d actually agreed to try. Not smart.

“Anywhere? Or just where your clothes won’t cover?”

“Just where my clothes won’t cover.”

“Fair. There’s plenty of you left to work with.” If the eyes are the windows to the soul, I can see him turning this over and over behind his dark irises. Which brings me back to my thought.

“Have you done…this before?”

If the lighting weren’t low and his beard didn’t cover so much of his face, I might say he blushes. “I don’t particularly want to discuss it but the short answer is yes.”

“How did you know about it? And it’s kosher?” I hadn’t wanted to ask in fear that I’d be told it’s not allowed. Besides, my face probably would’ve caught on fire if I’d asked my kallah teacher or Rabbi Horowitz.

Elan smiles, a small laugh vibrating his chest against mine, the thick mat of hair scraping against my soft and sensitive skin. The rough contact makes my nipples harden against him and I wonder if he notices. “I had an excellent and very thorough chossen teacher and Rabbi Horowitz happens to be quite…liberal in these matters. He’s adamant about pleasing wives. Why do you think Bina’s so cheerful all the time?”

I break into a nervous giggle. Surely talking about the rabbi’s sex life is some kind of no-no.

“Enough talking for now, though. I think you might be ready for me and if not, I have some ideas.”

He rolls to the side and I immediately miss the weight of him spreading my thighs. I start to close them but he grasps above my knee and tsks. “Stay open for me.”

A whimper escapes my throat. What am I, some kind of animal? When he slides his palm along the inside of my thigh, I don’t care. If he wants me to be an animal, an animal I’ll be. He stops just short of where I’m throbbing for him, barely brushing the nest of curls, and then coasts his hand over my stomach and ribcage up to my breast.

“Hands above your head.”

Oh. I obey, resting them on the pillow. His gaze travels over me, stopping at certain points along the way, all the lush, forbidden places.

“Do you trust me to tie you?”

The truth is that it was far more frightening to confess that I want to be tied than the actual prospect of being tied is. “Yes.”

I expect him to stand, perhaps rummage under the bed, but he doesn’t. Instead he squeezes the breast he’s been palming. Softly at first and then increasingly hard until his fingers are digging into the sensitive flesh and I make a noise.

It’s funny, the things you know only about the people you’ve been intimate with. The sounds they make, how their faces look as they come. More small pieces of myself that I’ll surrender to him.
Take them, please. Just promise to handle them with care.

He continues to work at me, not heeding the sound and I’m glad. It’s beginning to hurt but in a way I like. In a way that, strangely, feels good. Then he grasps my nipple and pinches, the pressure sending a sizzle of pleasure straight between my legs where I’m exposed. The pressure is deliciously hard and he doesn’t let up. Just holds the sensitive peak between his fingers. The steady even pressure is a turn on as he stares at his hold on me. “Someday I’ll use clamps on you. Leave my hands free. But first I want to train you to my touch.”

Another ungainly squeak is forced through my throat because the idea is shockingly but undeniably arousing. Again he ignores it and then squeezes harder. Hard enough to make me squeal, hard enough that my back arches. Only when his free hand grips my wrists and forces them down do I realize my hands came off the bed. “Stay still. You’re mine to do with as I please and I want you to keep your hands above your head. And don’t close your legs. Open for me. Always open for me.”

His scolding makes me shamefully hot for him. Whenever Brooks deigned to do this, I always felt like he was pretending. Like it was a foolish game he didn’t really want to play. With Elan, it feels real and the authenticity fans the flames of my desire. It’s better than I’d imagined.

He toys with me for a while, leisurely in his actions like he has all the time in the world to make me squirm underneath him. And I suppose he does. Where else am I going to go?

He switches to the other breast and continues to torture and tease me until I’m tossing my head on the pillow. I only realize I’m sweating when he stops his torment and wipes away some strands of hair that have become matted to my face.

“Aren’t you a fun little plaything?” His gently mocking words make me even hotter for him and doubly so when he demands, “Answer me.”

“Yes.”

“Yes, what?”

My breath has gone short and if he didn’t have my hands pinned above my head I’d pinch myself. Is he—

“Yes, sir?”

“I think a stronger word is called for. Out there, we live as man and wife, as equals. In here, though…this is a different matter. We’ll have our own little contract that says you’ve signed yourself over to me and my wishes. You’re going to call me master.”

The bird inside me that usually flutters around, beating at my ribs and crowding my heart, sometimes hiding behind my lungs like a shy partridge—suddenly spreads its wings and the tips of the feathers catch on fire. And when I whisper, “Yes, master,” it bursts fully into flame, rising out of my chest like a phoenix.

“There you go,” he says, stroking my hair. “That wasn’t so bad now, was it?”

“No, master.”

The academic in me wants to slow down, take a step back, examine this from every angle. But the submissive part of me rejoiced in saying the word and I want to do it again and again. There will be plenty of time to think later.

“Good girl. You’re a quick learner, are you?” I flush, because only sometimes, as he well knows. But in this, I desperately want to please and it comes so much easier to me. Particularly with his guidance.

“Yes, master.”

“Yes. That’s how you should answer me whenever I ask a question. Do you understand?”

“Yes, master.”

He nods his satisfaction and then releases me, making me miss his touch immediately. Crouching naked by the bed, he delves underneath. The sound of something dragging across the hardwood floor reaches my ears. When he comes to his feet, it’s with several hanks of rope and I’m surprised by the muted, deep purple. It’s beautiful. And not something you have just for the hell of it.

I’d also be willing to wager those aren’t the only ones he has. My mind starts to dream up a rainbow of rope kept just out of my sight, but I’m called back by the soft fall of the carefully tied bundles on the bed beside me. He takes one up and unravels it, the long strands falling to the ground. I’ve seen pictures of the results of this kind of play, but never the process in person. I’m fascinated.

With the same skill and concentration I’ve long admired him for in his shop, he handles the rope, and moves to the foot of the bed where he grasps my ankle. “Injuries? Anything else I should know?”

“No injuries. I just…I need to be able to breathe.”

He sets to work without acknowledging my answer, wrapping and tying the line around my ankle, making a thick cuff out of strand upon strand, the cord winding higher and higher until it’s just below the curve of my calf muscle. Then he uses the ends to attach me to the bedframe and proceeds almost without pause to the other side, creating a mirror image and leaving my legs bent. It’s quickly made apparent why as he fashions more wide cuffs just above my knees and, tugs just roughly enough to make me gasp, spreads my legs wider before tying off under the mattress.

He bends over me with yet another hank of rope and sets to work on my wrists. The bonds are tight but not uncomfortable and I feel…held. Even when he’s not touching me.

“You look very pretty in rope, little bird. In the future I’ll take more time with you, but for now…” His eyes rake down my spread out and bound body. I’ve always thought of him as a bear, but perhaps wolf is more apt. “For now I want to be inside you. Inside my wife.”

He climbs deftly onto the bed, settling between my thighs on his knees. He’s so erect it looks almost painful. During one of our awkward courtship conversations, we’d had a perfunctory discussion of contraception. Yes, we both wanted children, probably sooner rather than later because I’m thirty-seven. No, neither of us had diseases. In that at least I’d been lucky. Brooks may have strayed from our marriage bed, but at least he didn’t bring anything back.

It’s the first time I’ve had sex with the intent of procreation. Or at least, without effort to prevent pregnancy. It feels more intimate somehow, knowing we could make a life, even though we’re essentially strangers.

He grips my thighs, fingers digging into me in a way that’s likely to leave bruises. If the rope and the tone weren’t enough to make me feel conquered, this touch would do it. I strain against the ropes, trying to make myself more vulnerable to him, as if he needs the help.

Soon, he’s leaning over me, propping himself up on a hand by my shoulder and finally, finally, he puts a hand between my legs, parting me gently and making an aggressively appreciative noise. “This is what you wanted. This is what you need. Isn’t it?”

“Yes, master.”

With my acquiescence, he pushes a finger inside, making it two when there’s no resistance. The rhythmic thrusts feel incredible and make me want more of him, all of him. Make me crave the heavy thickness resting hot on my thigh.

He doesn’t fuck me for long this way and I’m glad. Instead he drags his fingers from my body and plants his hand on the bed, containing me. Then he’s easing into me, the stretch making me aware of exactly how full I’ll be when he’s completely seated. Breached. Conquered. Possessed. That’s exactly how it feels when he’s in me to the hilt. And it gets better when he starts to move.

Moving slowly, he rocks his hips that are spreading my thighs even wider than the rope. When he seems confident he’s not going to hurt me, not really, he thrusts harder and the force is delicious.

I tilt my hips up to meet him, take him deeper inside. He takes it as an invitation and the thrusting changes to outright pounding. It doesn’t take long for me to be close and I realize he hasn’t told me… Am I supposed to ask? But perhaps he can tell, by some quickening of my breath, some change in the pitch of my encouraging moans, I’m nearly there.

“Fly for me, little bird.”

His low command trips something inside of me and I plummet down, my body seizing before rising up into an incredible climax.
Fly for me
, he said. And I am. The flight made more rewarding by his desire for it, his permission. I cry out, saying his name, as I pull at my bonds. He lets me ride out my orgasm, rocking up against him in an uneven rhythm to catch the last of it, scrambling for the aftershocks as if I’ll never come again.

When I’m limp and replete beneath him, he kisses me: my cheekbone, just above my eyebrow, my lips. I kiss him back, a languid press of my lips, a dreamy sweep of my tongue. But a stirring inside me reminds me I’m the only one who’s satisfied.

“Do you have anything to say to me?”

“Thank you, master?”

“Quick study indeed.”

His praise—or perhaps it’s my orgasm—makes me glow and I smile at him.

“Is there anything else you want from me?”

“I want you to come. I want you to use me, finish inside of me. Let me know I please you.”

“You do, Tzipporah, you do.” With that confirmation, he’s moving again, fucking me harder and faster than before. I wouldn’t be able to get off from this, but I sure do enjoy it. Especially knowing that he’s taking what he wants from me, not caring for my pleasure because I’ve been sated. With a last hard thrust that makes me yelp because he’s reached someplace so deep inside, he comes, his groan of satisfaction drowning out my desultory protest. The sharp pain is already fading into an ache and the next presses of him inside of me are less forceful.