Firebird (13 page)

He pulled away. He slapped her sore cheeks and pulled her up so her head fell back against his chest. He held her there, reached around, and pinched first one nipple, then the other. She was still painfully sensitive from the orgasm. She made some plaintive sounds, but he only pinched them both harder and held them until she settled into the pain.

“Good girl. I do what I want to you, don’t I?”

“Yes, Sir.”

He nuzzled her, breathing down the curve of her shoulder. “I hurt you even when you haven’t been bad. Then I fuck you like a little slut, and the harder I fuck you, the harder you come. Isn’t that true, girl?”

What other answer was there? “Yes, Sir.”

“‘Yes, Sir. I love to be hurt and then fucked like a slut.’”

She repeated it nice and loud, the way he liked.

“Get dressed,” he said when he finally released her. “We’re going out.”

* * *

He sat across from her and stared, his face set like stone. She looked back, looked down, looked around the darkened restaurant, a small, authentic Chinese place. Tinkling ethnic music came over the speakers. Prosper didn’t know if it was actually erotic or only sounded erotic because of the way she felt. She took a deep breath and tried to calm the agitation surging in a part of her body that felt like her heart. Not her real heart, but that cartoon heart that pounded a foot out of the character’s chest when they fell in love, two curved arches tapering down to one point.

“So.” Jackson leaned back and looked away from her. She couldn’t read his expression. She didn’t know him that well, not yet. And he wasn’t one of those men who wore his emotions on his sleeve. “So,” he said again, turning back to her.

She wrung her hands under the table. “Are we still playing?”

“I don’t know. You tell me.”

“This doesn’t feel like a game to me anymore.”

“No, it doesn’t. Not to me either.”

She ducked her head as the waitress came. Jackson ordered for both of them, tempura and
mu shu
with Chinese wine. When she left with the menus, he rubbed his face and leaned on the table.

“Listen, I have to be honest with you. You know I’m only here until we mount the ballet. That won’t change. It can’t. I have too many important things lined up back home.”

She nodded, then caught herself, whispered, “Yes, Sir,” and wondered if she’d ever be normal again. If she’d ever be able to nod her head or shake a negative without hearing his sharp
answer me
fire in her brain.

“You work in a company here. Most of the great companies are here, so this is a great place for you to be. Look, I just think we need to be real here. This can only go so far.”

Prosper nodded. “I know. Sure.”

“Unless…” He paused, then fell silent. “I don’t know.”

She needed him to guide her. She needed him to tell her the next steps, and she would do them. But he said nothing more for a long time. He left her with her thoughts and with a terrible fear of saying the wrong thing. She was so afraid of saying the wrong thing that she said nothing at all. They sat there together, silent, until the cheerful waitress reappeared with the food. Prosper watched him smile at the server, help her arrange the dishes on the table.
No strings attached
. No matter how he made her feel, they had gone into this with an agreement.

He began to eat, but she had no appetite. She pretended to eat, pushing her food around on her plate. Jackson took a sip of wine and then leaned forward to look at her with that same inscrutable look on his face.

“When I dance with you, it feels different than anyone I’ve ever danced with before,” he said. “Why do you think that is?”

“I don’t know. But I feel the same way. You make me feel…” Her voice trailed off. She was going to say something stupid.

“Feel what? Tell me.”

“I don’t know. I only know that I’m scared to be with you and I’m scared
not
to be with you.”

He was quiet a long time. Then he drained the rest of his wine and said, “Yeah. Me too.”

He turned the topic to safer things: company politics, upcoming ballets, details about the Firebird costume she’d been fitted for earlier in the week. Later he didn’t take her back to his home again, although he insisted on walking her up all three flights to her door. She reassured him that the screams and thumps coming from the apartment next door were nothing unusual. She couldn’t help thinking of Jackson’s neat, quiet house.

Big bed, clean sheets, Jackson right there every night. But she reminded herself it wouldn’t work out anyway, living with Jackson. He would see her as she really was: neurotic, imperfect. He’d see her with her morning bedhead and see her rubbing her aching feet every night. See her waxing, plucking her brows, flossing. She imagined them standing side by side brushing their teeth. Oh Lord, no.

“Sunday night, then?” he asked as the yelling from the neighboring apartment reached a fever pitch.

“Yeah. That sounds good.”

He rubbed his mouth, then pulled her close, gave her ass one last squeeze. “I’ll see you at rehearsal.”

“Sure. Yes. Okay.”

He kissed her and then fixed her with a familiar, stern look, leaning in close to breathe down her neck.

“No touching what’s mine, girl. Don’t dare.”

“No, Sir,” she whispered next to his ear. “I won’t.”

* * *

She was graceful, irresistible, even in the smoky bar, even trying to balance a tray while being jostled and groped by strangers. She was beautiful no matter what. He had yet to look at her and not feel drawn to her side. But no, he wouldn’t go to her side like he wanted to. He was hiding like a pussy, back in his usual corner, the corner she never waited on and couldn’t see from her cluster of tables. But he could see her. He thought he could see her through a dead man’s fog, if for no other reason than her Firebird hair. He could smell her out of a mob scene. He would breathe her right into his body if there was a way.

Jackson thought again of how to proceed. Their meetings were more incendiary each time, the partings more excruciating. The veneer of impersonality, the strict, finite roles and interaction more and more impossible to bear. He thought about asking her to move in with him for the hundredth time. He even thought of which contacts in Chicago might have a place for Prosper to dance. Then he thought about how moving in together was always the beginning of the end.

But Jesus, the girl was dragging, tired from late nights. He’d actually talked her out of taking on extra nights at the bar and told her to give up either Friday or Saturday night, but she’d refused. He wished he could forbid her outright to work. He wished he had the right to control every part of her life. He would take much better care of her than she took of herself.

He could do it if he wanted. He could take more control of her. He could ask her to move in, ask her to consider a more encompassing D/s relationship. Not 24-7, but something more than the two short evenings a week they had now, the evenings that flew by and always left him craving more. He was fairly certain she would say yes, that she wanted more too. But like any good submissive, she deferred to him in everything. And he, for some inexplicable reason, was choosing to drag his feet.

He waved off the waitress when she came to his table. He didn’t come here to drink. He looked past her to Prosper. Then Jackson noticed a rough-looking patron standing near the bar. The slimeball eyed Prosper up and down, flexed his arms in his muscle shirt. Jackson thought if one more guy groped her, he would lose his mind. But she moved by without incident. Then time stood still as Jackson watched the fight start.

From nowhere, from everywhere, it exploded. Bodies grappled; chairs knocked over. Fists and drinks flew through the air. Jackson catapulted off his stool and crossed the dark bar like a man possessed. Any bystander in his path was thrown out of the way. Somehow as the crowd re-formed around the combatants, Prosper became trapped in the line of the fight. He saw her bumped, saw her fly into the bar and crack the back of her head. She went down like a limp doll. He roared, and even the descending bouncers couldn’t keep him away. He pushed and wove until he got to her and was confronted by another familiar face. Blake was lifting her from the floor, shielding her from the unruly crowd of bodies. When he looked from Blake back to her, all he could see was the blood.

* * *

Jackson stared while they put her on the backboard. God, there was so much blood. The cut wasn’t large, but it was deep. It was the neck brace, though, that stole his breath away.

They carried her out through the kitchen, past the cop cars where the young men who’d been fighting were being pushed into backseats. Blake pulled Jackson past as if he knew the thoughts going through his mind.

“Let the cops take care of them. Prosper needs you. Come on.”

In the cab on the way to the hospital, Jackson grilled Blake on what he’d seen of the fight.

“Did she hit her temple? How hard did she fall?”

“They’ll do scans and stuff at the hospital, I’m sure. But uh, I actually heard her head hit the bar from where I was standing.”

Jackson winced. He was thankful for a moment he hadn’t been that close.

Blake’s leg bounced in agitation. “I wish I could have helped her.”

“I saw you. If you hadn’t been there to help, she might have been trampled on top of everything else. Don’t beat yourself up.”

No, Jackson was doing enough of that himself. He should have forbidden her to work, should have taken her in. All the times he’d seen her groped and tripped and bumped and jostled, and he’d done nothing. All the bruises he saw on her when they scened that he knew weren’t from him. And now she was in a neck brace on a backboard, bleeding like hellfire. All because of his selfish fear of getting involved.

At the hospital Jackson bit his nails while Blake leafed through magazines in the waiting room. After twenty minutes or so, Blake turned to him.

“I was right all along.”

“Right about what?”

“You like her. You’re going out with her. You’re fucking, yeah?”

Jackson turned away. “Why do you say that?”

“Because you’ve just about bitten every fingernail off. And because you were at the bar.”

“You were at the bar too.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Pointlessly, I guess.”

Jackson’s eyes narrowed. “You go there to see her? You have a thing for her?”

“Do you have a thing for her?” Blake shot back.

“She’s dancing the lead in my ballet. I have a vested interest in her.”

Blake snorted and sat back. “Vested interest. Is that what they’re calling it now? It would look pretty bad if it got out.”

“It’s nobody’s business.”

“The secrecy is part of the fun, right? I mean, I suspected, but there was really no way to tell. I figured if you were going out, she wouldn’t be working at that bar three nights a week and living in that roach-infested hole down from the theater.”

Jackson tensed but pretended indifference. “I don’t know. I’m not real involved in her personal life.”

Blake rolled his eyes. “Nice. Sport fuck your ballerina. Vested interest, my ass.”

“Look, you don’t understand.” Jackson shut his mouth and turned away. It was none of Blake’s business, and he certainly wouldn’t appreciate the finer points of their relationship.
We have a Dom/sub arrangement, no strings attached. We meet two nights a week.

The nurse came out, picked through the crowded waiting room to where Jackson and Blake sat.

“Excuse me. Are you the gentlemen who brought in Prosper Ware?”

Jackson was already on his feet.

“Yes—”

“Is she all right?” The men spoke at the same time.

“Yes, she’ll be fine. The doctor will be happy to speak to anyone who’s family. Are you family? Husband? Partner?”

“We’re work acquaintances,” Jackson said. He ignored Blake’s snicker.

“I’m actually her partner,” Blake said, but Jackson was already following the nurse toward the wide double doors.

“Her family isn’t local, but she works for me. I’ll be helping her home when she’s discharged, so I’d love to speak to the doctor about what’s going on.”

Blake tagged along, undeterred by Jackson’s irate glance. “So will she be able to leave tonight?”

“I don’t think so,” said the nurse. “We’ll probably keep her overnight just to be safe, but as far as serious damage—”

“Her neck? Her spine?” Jackson asked.

“All perfectly fine,” the nurse reassured him as they neared Prosper’s room. “She told me she was a dancer. I’m quite sure she’ll dance again. She’ll just need a few days of rest.” She smiled at Jackson, but his gaze had already moved past her to the pale figure sleeping on the bed. His heart clenched to see how small and vulnerable she looked. She had a large white bandage wrapped around her head. He moved closer and was relieved to find her face relaxed. No tiny tension lines. Her chest rose and fell in a regular rhythm. He wanted nothing more on earth than to gather her close. She had to sleep though. He didn’t want to wake her.

The doctor came by soon after, and Jackson caught most of the important details. CT scan results, aftercare for the stitches, seven good days of rest. He listened, but his mind was only half there.

“Can I stay?” he asked as soon as the doctor was finished. He didn’t know why he posed it as a question, because he had no intention of leaving her side. Fortunately the doctor nodded.

Blake let out a long sigh. “I have class in—” He peered at his watch. “Ugh. Four hours. I’ve got to go. But I’m glad she’s going to be okay.”

Jackson extended his hand to Blake. “Thanks for your help. And about me and Prosper—”

“I won’t tell anyone. For her sake. Not yours.”

“I appreciate it.”

With Blake gone, it was quiet. Jackson stared at Prosper in sleep. Her eyes were ringed by dark circles, and her face looked peaked. No, it wouldn’t do. He wouldn’t have her living this way. He settled beside her in a chair and waited for her to wake. It was time to say the things he needed to say.

Chapter Eleven

Prosper woke with a start in the darkened room. Weak light came from the gaps around the blinds and fell across the shaggy blond head next to her hand.
Jackson.