The Girlfriend (The Boss) (35 page)

He nodded miserably.

“Do you want my help?” I asked.

He’d been so withdrawn and solitary lately, that I was surprised when he said, “Yes. I don’t know how you can help, but I just... I need you.”

I didn’t know how I was going to help him, either, but I had to do something. It was the first chance I’d had in a long time to do anything that felt remotely useful. I pulled my shirt over my head and shimmied out of my jeans and underwear, then stepped into the shower with him.

I felt along his hairline gently, amazed as the strands clung to my wet fingers and came loose without any pressure at all. “It was just ready to go, I think,” I said, trying to be cheerful about the whole thing. “Here.”

I reached for the towel hanging on the bar, away from the spray. I wetted the corner and gently rubbed it over his scalp. “Is that painful?”

“No,” he sniffed. “My head has been itchy all day, it’s actually a bit of a relief.”

“Well, I can tell why it’s so itchy.” The hair rubbed away from his pale scalp as easily as if I were wiping up a mess on the kitchen counter. “Do you want me to shave the whole thing, if you’ve got patches?”

“It might be best to wait for the doctor’s approval on that. Knowing how heads are, you might nick me and I’d bleed to death in seconds.” He laughed a little, and I was so glad to hear humor there. It didn’t matter that it was buried beneath layers of self-pity. All that mattered was that it was still there. He was still the man I loved.

“Good point,” I giggled, and I leaned down to kiss his cheek. The inevitable divide was happening between us again, but it was less painful this time. I knew what to expect, and I was finding new ways to battle against it and cope with it. “Maybe he can give you some extra iron and vitamin K, and we can pierce your ear at the same time. I’ve always had the hots for Mr. Clean.”

Most of his hair came right off; only a few patches remained.

“I bet Josh can take care of those,” I said, trying to remain cheerful. I got out first, quickly toweled and dressed, then helped him. When he saw himself in the mirror, he stopped as still as if his own reflection had turned him to stone.

I put my hand on his arm and squeezed to reassure him. “It’s not that bad. And it’s not forever.”

He took a shuddering breath and nodded.

I helped him to bed and got out some pajamas for him, but he waved me off. “I think I’ll be daring and sleep in the altogether tonight, if you don’t mind.”

“Ooh, never.” I slid beneath the covers and curled up beside him. He lifted his arm to put it around me, and I nestled against his bony shoulder.

He turned his head, and let out a whoop of shocked laughter.

“What!” I startled, sitting up.

“My head. It’s very...” he turned his head on the pillow and giggled like a little kid. “It’s ticklish.”

“Really?” That was actually... “That’s adorable.”

“Oh? I’m glad you find it so.” He reached up and gingerly placed his palm between his scalp and the pillow. “I can’t sleep like this all night.”

“I have an idea. Sit up.” I slipped the pillow from behind his head and pulled off the cover. “I trust you to do this without smothering yourself in the night.”

He looked at me like I was a crazy person as I worked the opening of the pillow case over the top of his head. “There.”

“This isn’t - “ His eyes widened as he lay back down. “Oh. This might work. I look a pillock, but it seems a fair trade.”

“It’s only for tonight. Tomorrow I’ll see about getting some stocking caps you can sleep in.” I planted a kiss on his brow, below the light blue band of satin embellished pillowcase. “I’ve always sort of had a thing for garden gnomes.”

He caught my hand and squeezed it before bringing it to his lips. “You’re completely mad, do you know that?”

“Mhm.” I wouldn’t tell him about Holli and Deja tonight, or my little meltdown over the apartment. It seemed so totally insignificant now, in the face of what Neil was dealing with. “But if I wasn’t, you wouldn’t love me.”

I was about to turn out the light when Neil pushed up on his side and pulled the pillowcase from his head. He half-laughed and twisted the edge of the fabric in his hands. “I know that I’m physically weak. And I know that I look like a newly hatched baby bird... but...”

I leaned back on my elbows and frowned. “Neil, I don’t care how you look—”

“No, no, this isn’t an emotional crisis. I just feel dreadfully unsexy right now. And I know I look it. But we haven’t... in a long time. That is, I was hoping... could I watch you come?”

His bashful request took me aback. When Neil wanted something sexually, he didn’t have a problem asking for it. As kinky as I’d become under his tutelage, he could still shock me. If he was being timid about asking to fool around, it was only because he thought I might reject him.

My heart twisted. He was asking permission.

That isn’t how this works.

A pulse of excitement teased me between my legs. I knew how to fix this. I smiled slowly, leaned down, and pressed my lips against his. We hadn’t been doing much kissing lately, because we were trying to be careful about not getting him sick. But he was already vulnerable; I didn’t need him to dwell any more on how ill he was.

I reluctantly pulled back. “Stay right here. I have an idea.”
 

Hopping from the bed, I sprinted into the dressing room. I’d left the toy cabinet unlocked when I’d retrieved the camera. My laziness assisted me in springing the surprise.

When I came back to the bed, I was wearing my collar and nothing else. I dropped an armload of toys on the end of the bed.

He pushed himself up to sit and ran a self-conscious hand over his head. “I’m not sure—”
 

“You might not be up to it, physically, but you can still fuck me.” I plucked a bottle of lube from the pile of silicone and plastic on the bed. “For you.”

Catching it out of the air, he laughed. “All right. What’s the game?”

“Fuck me. I’ll do all the work, you just tell me what to do.” I looked over to the delicate, powder-blue and dark wood chair in front of the fireplace. I pulled it to face the end of the bed, far enough back that Neil’s view wouldn’t be blocked, and sat myself down. I slid my hands down my thighs and slowly eased them apart.

Neil’s breath audibly left him.

I dipped my head and caught the nail of my index finger between my teeth. “So... are you in?”

“Go downstairs and get the video camera.” I heard my Sir’s voice in the command, and my body throbbed.

I grabbed my robe off the back of the door and hurried downstairs, through the dark center stairwell to the second floor. I was back in a flash. My heart pounded, and not just from running through a dark, slightly creepy house. If Neil recorded me, there would be evidence of my total surrender to him. I wasn’t ashamed of myself for anything I did with him, but it was so intimate.

I knew he wouldn’t ever let such a video fall into the wrong hands. And the thought of what he would do with it...

I wanted to be the last damn woman on that video camera.

“Here.” I passed it to him and went back to the chair, toying with my collar. “Tell me what to do, Sir.”

The little light on the front of the camera came on, and I took a breath, paralyzed, aware that I was staring right into it.

Neil settled back on pillows he’d arranged in my absence, and moved one to support his arm as he held the camera. “Sit down.”

I did as he told me, sitting primly on the edge of the chair, my hands in my lap, palms up.

“Sit back, and spread your legs.”

The low, carved arms prevented me from parting my legs too far.

“If you put your feet over the sides, can you touch the floor?”

I raised one leg slowly, deliberately flashing a perfect view of my cunt. I took my time getting myself positioned just right. Not even my big toes brushed the carpet. “No, Sir. I can’t touch the floor.”

“Very good.”

Neil’s gaze scorched every anticipatory center of my brain as it traveled a slow path from my spread pussy, up to my breasts, to where I stroked a fingertip along the bottom edge of my collar.

He was back. Dominant Neil wasn’t gone, just hidden beneath layers of sickness and fatigue and body image issues. The fact that he could be pushed aside by such seemingly trivial matters was alarming proof that below his controlled, calm exterior, Neil Elwood was just a human being like the rest of us.

But not when we were together like this. When I was under his command, he was anything but ordinary.

“You’re already wet,” he observed casually. “I can see it.”

I took a shaky breath. He hadn’t given me a command yet. I sat before him, completely exposed, the video camera dispassionately documenting every long second while I waited, my arousal growing with every heartbeat.

“Take the fingertips of your right hand. Starting at the wrist of your left hand, draw them up, slowly, until you reach your shoulder.”

My fingers trembled as I dragged them up my arm with a feather-light touch. When they skated up over the curve of my shoulder, he said, “Now follow the line of your collar across your neck. At the bottom, please.”

My chest flushed. When my fingertips reached the hollow of my throat, he stopped me. “Do the same, with your left hand, to your right.”

It was slow, excruciatingly slow. It was the best kind of torture.

“What are you thinking of, Sophie?”

“I’m thinking of that time we had Skype sex,” I said with a little giggle. “I’m thinking of watching you come all over your stomach while you watched me.”

“You may stroke the outside curves of your breasts with the backs of your fingers. Don’t touch your nipples.” A faint smile softened his stern mouth. “Did you like being on display for me?”

“Yes, Sir.” My throat was suddenly parched, probably because all the moisture in my body was between my legs.

“Do you like it now?”

“Yes, Sir.” The light touches were torment. My breasts felt full and heavy, and the sensation grew worse the closer my misbehaving hands strayed toward my nipples.

“Sophie,” he warned, and I quickly corrected myself.

“Do you know what I’m going to do with this video?” he asked as I continued my stroking. I shook my head, my eyes drifting closed. The cool air on my hot, exposed clitoris made me want to squirm against the chair. He breathed in through his nose. “I’m going to watch it and jerk off, of course, but I’m also going to make you watch it. I’d love to restrain you, so you couldn’t look away, and force you to come again and again while you watch yourself doing what I’m going to make you do tonight.”

“And what’s that, Sir?” I wanted to know, but I dreaded it all the same.

He didn’t answer. He just said, “You may touch the undersides of your breasts as well, now.”

I skimmed my fingers over the sensitive swells, my breathing speeding up. I rocked my hips a little in the chair.

“Don’t get ahead of yourself.” He reached below the blankets and I realized he was stroking himself with his left hand, lazy movements I couldn’t see.

I pouted a bit. “You know, it’s not fair that you get such a good show, and I don’t get to see anything.”

“I never said this was going to be fair.” He said nothing else, just watched for several long minutes as I teased my aching breasts. Just when I thought I would scream with impatience, he ordered, “Make wide circles around your nipples.” I did as he asked, and he watched me for a moment before continuing. “I’m going to count backward from ten, and for every number you’re going to make those circles smaller. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Sir.”

Slowly, he counted down the passes of my fingertips over my skin. I brushed across the puckered line of demarcation between the pale skin of my breast and the rosy, delicate areola. With every narrowing circle, my nipples grew harder, into stiff peaks I swirled my index finger around as Neil reached “one.”

“Now pinch them, between your thumb and forefinger.”

I did as he ordered, my head dropping back with a moan. I arched my back, forgetting in a second of bliss that I was under his control and not my own. I wasn’t sure if I could move or not.

“Do you want to move?” he asked, and my whimper in response elicited a chuckle from him. “You can, if you’d like. Keep pinching, though.”

I rolled my hips, the motion both relieving and intensifying the ache in my pelvis. I wanted him. That was the absolute worst part about getting my mental health back on track— I had a libido and missed the sex we weren’t having.

“Is there a vibrator in that pile of toys you brought out?” Neil asked. I nodded. “Stop what you’re doing, and get it. A dildo, as well.”

I swung my legs down and went to the end of the bed. I picked up a forked JimmyJane vibe and one of the dildos I’d brought out, a life-like one about seven inches long.

“Excuse me, but if I’m going to be fucking you, at least give me some credit,” he laughed, and I picked up another, slightly larger one. “No, none of those will do at all. Go back to the cupboard. You’ll find purple one in there you might like.”

“Um. Okay?” I gave him a smile coupled with a furrowed brow. I hadn’t seen any purple ones, just...

The moment I opened the cupboard, I saw it. It was what I would have called magenta, instead of purple. It was also just about as long as Neil was, and slightly thicker. Which meant I needed to carry the damn thing with two hands.

“You’re kidding, right?” I called, giggling as I exited the closet.

He grinned that malicious Dom grin of his and slowly shook his head. “As you were.”

My tummy fluttered as I scooped up the vibrator and carried it and the dildo back to my chair. I laid them between my legs, perilously close to the edge of the seat, and returned to my assigned position.

“Lay it on your chest, between your breasts, so it doesn’t roll away from you,” Neil instructed, but how the thing would roll I had no idea. At the base, a disturbingly detailed magenta scrotum curved down to a suction cup. So you could use it in the shower, obviously.

Man, I really had to go through that toy cupboard more often.

I did as Neil told me, the weight surprising against my chest. There was something decidedly filthy about reclining there, my legs spread, with a huge magenta dick nestled between my breasts for later use.