Trading Tides (6 page)

A knock at the door spared me an answer. We both turned and it broke the moment.

"Um, Iris? There's a delivery for you at reception."

I felt a modicum of guilt at the relief that flooded me. Dan shrugged and I dashed ahead—I've never been good at turning men down. How do you casually drop into a work conversation that you're seeing someone—or at least, that there is someone you're dating, who's on your mind all the time, even if his hands are never on your skin.

"Delivery?" I asked the UPS guy, who was leaning against the desk to flirt with our receptionist.

"Iris Ellis?" At my nod, he handed over a thin cardboard tube. I signed for it, a sprinkle of disappointment in the dragging flow of the pen. We were sent film posters and promotional material all the time, and I took a moment to feel stupid about the rush of excitement on my way over here.
 

Then I saw the shipping label.
 

There was the familiar, powerful sweep of straight lines, the long, smooth curve of the final s. I bit my lip, cradled the tube against my chest. My cunt contracted, just once. Arousal, however, was too closely linked to my tear ducts that day, and I avoided Dan’s eye as he ambled past me. I didn’t want lunch with him, I didn’t want anything he could have given me—and so I turned my back, and slipped into the closest bathroom, locking myself in a stall.

My hands shook when I tried to pry open the lid. It finally gave with a hollow pop and I stared into the dark hole. I couldn’t see a thing. Then I upturned it. I listened to the sound of something soft sliding over cardboard, held my breath. Then my fingers closed around a smooth, long object. I blinked, forced my eyes to focus on the flat leather strap. It had a warm, reddish hue, looked worn and worked, and it wasn’t hard to imagine his long-fingered, chapped hands on the handle, staining, darkening the leather.

I swallowed hard, pressed the strap to my lips. It was cool against the heat of my skin, and I reached into my pants just to feel my fingers curl against my cunt.

Paul.

I whispered his name out loud, “Paul.”

It choked me, just for a moment, and then I forced my fingers out of my pants and fished for the letter inside the tube. It was a regular sheet of printer paper with just a few words scrawled onto the center of the page.

Take a long lunch.

Find your favorite restaurant. Don’t order, don’t touch yourself, don’t try your present.

Text me for your next instructions.

-Paul

My hand was the first thing I stared at. I worried my bottom lip with my teeth until it hurt. It was dishonest, but I washed my hands before I left, scrubbed them long and hard and with a lot of soap. They felt too dry when I gathered up my things and found the last member of my team still in the building, sitting by her desk with her salad. I told her that I might be back a little late and to take the minutes for me while Dan finished showing them websites for inspiration.

I don’t know if it was my flushed, excited face or the sudden squeaky pitch, but I thought she looked at me strangely. I didn’t care. I didn’t even care that the strap and the instructions could only mean that I was going to be punished for the night before. I deserved it, didn’t I? I welcomed it, even, if that would make me feel less awful, less like we were fighting a losing battle in a room that was slowly disintegrating around us.

***

 
The cold was bracing against my cheeks. It hadn’t snowed since that night of Thai food and fingers pushed deep into my ass for his viewing pleasure, but moving into April had brought nothing but cold winds and rain. I checked my watch, tried to concentrate. My favorite restaurant was a small curry place from which you could look out over the less interesting part of the Thames, where it was brown and muddy and not framed in verdant tree-lined paths and famous landmarks.

A bus would take me 15 minutes, at least, so I hailed a cab, shivering and holding onto my bag a little too tightly. I tipped the driver too much when we got there five minutes later and I stumbled onto the pavement. The wind blew up my hair, and I hugged my coat around myself as I sought shelter in the restaurant. The air smelled hot and spicy, and I asked for a corner table, somewhere a little bit hidden—just in case.

I texted Paul even before I ordered a drink, and the phone was still in my hand when it whirred to deliver his reply.

Paul:
Go to the bathroom
.

I stood, swayed on the spot and took a deep breath. The tapestry on the wall slid in and out of focus: golden thread weaved into colorful patterns. I touched the side of my head, then directed my steps towards the bathroom in the back. My hand slipped into my bag to wrap around the leather. It was cold, and it felt both reassuring and absolutely terrifying.

The bathroom was empty except for the middle stall, which looked occupied—or maybe out of order. I pulled out my phone again, started to type a message.

My thumb was hovering over the letter S for Sir, when the room went dark around me.
 

I jumped, clutched my phone harder, and just as I decided to use its light to guide me back out, I felt a hand sliding over the small of my back. I gasped. A second one clamped over the back of my neck and bent me bodily over the counter, gasping and stunned, as my phone clattered into the sink.

“P… Paul?” I squeaked, heart hammering in my chest.

“Were you expecting somebody else?”

I exhaled, and a modicum of relief flooded through my system, loosened painfully taut muscles. I watched the blue light of the phone screen as it reflected off the white ceramic sink, and let my body rest against the cool surface, fingers fanned out wide.

“You’re… here.” I breathed, and his grip on the back of my neck loosened a little. “You came.”

“I told you I’d come and fix you, pet,” he rasped gently, so close to my ear that I felt his breath stir my hair. “You sounded like you needed me.”
 

I’d thought, somehow, that his voice was the one thing that phoning allowed me to have, but it took him being so close again to realize how wrong I’d been. There was a world of difference, an ocean of depth and layers, sediments of rock and earth that no phone line managed to transport. Tears sprung to my eyes, and I sniffed pushing myself back against him.

“I do. I did. I do. Sir.”

He slid his hand over my back; I sucked a sharp breath through my teeth when he reached my ass. He clicked his tongue twice.

“Trousers,” he admonished, a smile in his voice. He reached around, plopped open the button and pushed his hand deep into my panties.

"That's how I find my girl..."

"Wet." I whispered and he hummed in reply, thrusting his groin against my behind. I shuddered, cunt contracting against his fingers.

 
He'd just taken a breath to continue, when someone pushed open the bathroom door. They made a noise of surprise, searched for the light switch, then left again.

“Come on, baby girl,” he whispered. His hands closed around mine, I could still feel the moisture. He waited long enough for me to close the button of my trousers and grab my phone, and then pulled me along and back into the bright colors of the restaurant. I stared at the back of his head, the spot where the tips of his hair brushed over his sweater, at the beautiful slope of his shoulder, and held my breath until he turned around.
Paul.

VI

The brackish smell of the distant sea smacked against our faces as we jogged across the street and down to the river. His hair was flapping in the breeze.
 

I still couldn't believe he was actually here.
 

I hung onto his hand and let him lead. It was easy once I'd heard his voice, looked into his eyes. That feeling, the one we'd tried to recreate in more ways than one over the last weeks—here it was, heady and immediate: my mind cleared, my stomach grew warm and hollow and my feet stopped touching the ground.

We reached the riverside, breathing hard and holding hands. He pressed me against the high-water wall. It reached just up to the small of my back, and I bent backwards when he kissed me, hard, his hands in my hair, on my face, holding me, finally, holding me.
 

The stubble of his beard brushed over my chin, his lips, his eyelashes. He still smelled of the sea, even though he'd carried it so much further than the wind here in the city. I touched his chest, pressed my palms against his sweater; wanted to make absolutely sure that he was really there.
 

"Paul..." I whispered when the kiss broke, breathless and staring at him. "You..."
 

I realized I had no idea what to say, that my head was empty. I just wanted to look at him, to soak him up inside of me: his smile that crinkled around his eyes, his cheekbones, his lips—redder now and slightly bee-stung after he'd kissed me. Almost of their own accord, my fingers reached up to run along his strong jaw, rubbing gently against the grain of his stubble. He'd been clean-shaven the last time I saw him, and I reveled in the new sensation, looking up into his storm-green colored eyes.

"How?"

He chuckled; there was a hint of mischievous pride in his eyes and something inside ached with longing. Wrapping his fingers hard around my wrist, he brought my palm to his lips, nuzzled into the smell of my hand and then kissed the ridge under my fingers. He pressed it against his lips, never breaking the blazing eye contact between us.
 

We didn't breathe; I think our heartbeats aligned, and then he let go of my wrist. He lifted me onto the high-water wall and pushed himself between my legs. I wrapped them around his waist, pulled him closer, and the last few inches between us disappeared. I felt his breath on my cheek, his warmth all the way through the layers of clothing, and the wind tossed my hair into his. Tendrils entangled, reaching, trying to bind us together.

"Easy," he whispered, brushing the pad of his thumb over my cheek, then my nose, my lips.

"But your work... the long drive..."

"I'm American," he said, with a crooked grin. "I'd drive three times as far to take care of a girl."

I laughed, scrunched up my nose and poked his stomach. He let me do it twice before he stopped me, wrapping his large hands around my wrists and pushing them both behind my back and sending me spiraling down into a different place in my head. My features went slack with surprise and desire, my lips opened, breathing shallow.

"You only made it difficult when you hailed a cab and I had to jog back to my car to follow it." He growled against my neck. His nose touched my skin, then his lips, and his teeth. I whimpered, tightened my legs around him. "I felt like James Bond."

When we laughed this time, I could feel the difference. It was softer, more held back, both of our thoughts already elsewhere.

"Did you bring it?" His teeth found a hold in my skin just as I tried to answer and he bit hard enough to make me moan. Shivering, I squeezed my eyes shut.

"Yes, Sir," I breathed. He pressed my wrists together behind my back, so that he could hold them both with one hand. Then he pushed my jacket down over my shoulder to nip at the base of my neck.

"In... in my bag."

He growled in assent, but didn't stop. He breathed me in, kept me upright and licked and bit his way up my jaw and over my chin until he reached my lips and we could look into each other's eyes again. A surge of longing washed over me at the strong, tender expression on his face. His hand tightened around my wrists and then he kissed me, hard and claiming, and I was his again.
 

Truly, really, actually his.

***

He tugged at my wrists, pushed them hard against the small of my back, and I knew without being told that I was to keep them there when he let go of them and reached for the bag that still hung off my elbow. A smile slid over his features. I held my breath, quivering, and he produced the strap. It looked even better in his hand than I'd imagined, like it was made for him, became a part of him the moment his fingers wrapped around the handle.

He brought it to my face, and I gasped, shivering. He ran the cool leather over my cheek and down to my lips. My gaze darted to the road behind him, the Thames-side path to his side, but we were alone in the chilly midday wind, and I relaxed a little.

"Do you know why I sent you this?" he asked, using it to sweep a few flyaway strands of hair out of my face.

"P... punishment?" I asked, both tremulous and excited, "because of how I... because of yesterday?"

My face fell when he let the strap sink. His hands smoothed over the cool paths the leather had traveled on my skin. He shook his head, then lowered it until his forehead rested against mine.

"No," he repeated quietly, into this small, intimate space between us. "No, baby girl, not to punish you."

He kissed me again, softer this time. I leaned into him, felt his tongue move against mine. Without the heated frenzy of him claiming my mouth, I appreciated other sensations. He tasted like coffee and chocolate, and I imagined him on his long drive into the city, a thermos and a pack of cookies on the passenger's seat. My fingers itched to touch him, to run through his hair and hold him close, but I kept them at my back, pressing them together harder. His nose brushed against mine and he wrapped his arms around me. I was enveloped, warm, felt small and held and perfect.

"Not to punish me?" I whispered, lips nipping at his chin, at his jaw, anywhere I could reach.

"No. Not to punish you," he echoed. He pulled me off the low wall and took my hand again. He looked at it and I raised my brows, until he drew something from his pocket.
 

It was more leather, and it brought on another twinge of need between my legs. This time, it was a broad, dark cuff and he fixed it wordlessly around my wrist. It was padded in a softer, warmer material on the inside. I smiled at the sensation, until I saw his hand disappearing into his pocket once more. There was a tinkling sound, like that of metal. Glinting when he pulled it out, smooth and snake-like, a chain curved around his hand. His eyes met mine; my knees went weak and I staggered back against the wall.