As she picked up a square of the chicken salad sandwich, she noticed he went for the PB&J first. Biting into her sandwich, she was surprised at the taste and freshness. "This is excellent. What deli did you get this from? I'm still new in town. I'll have to stock up."
"I made it. I make most my food from scratch. Ingredients come from the farmers' market near me." He bit into a carrot stick and gestured at her with the other half, his heels drumming lightly against the stage front as he shifted. "If you're not into cooking, there are ladies who bring home cooked meals for sale. You can stock up and reheat them. They have the market once a week during the seasonal months. I'll take you to it sometime if you like and introduce you to the folks who bring the best stuff."
"Oh. Well...hmm."
"We won't call it a date. Just being neighborly, since you said you're new in town." He winked. "If we end up getting naked after, that'll be because of my irresistible charisma. Like dinner and sex, only we'll do farmers' market and sex."
She laughed and he grinned. He leaned in and touched the corner of her mouth with his thumb, taking off a bit of the chicken salad. She reached self-consciously for her napkin, but noticed he put the tiny piece of salad to his lips, licking it away, which made her mouth tingle as if he'd done it to hers. Suddenly she remembered that weeks-ago fantasy of rubbing chocolate off her lover's lips, only to have him grasp her wrist and taste it from her fingertips himself.
"I'd love to see you in my rope and nothing else," he said thoughtfully. "Have you done any scening in the local group yet? Or did you have a regular Dom or hangout in New York? Logan said you'd come from there. What's your situation?"
She'd blanched at the forwardness of the first statement, but as he continued, she put it together. "Oh no. I'm just a theater manager. I'm just... I don't... I mean, I'm flattered, but I haven't..." She stopped and shot him a narrow look. "You're laughing at me."
"No. I'm pleased with you. You're flustered. Which heightens my interest in ways you can't even imagine." He'd drawn up one knee and had his work shoe propped on the edge of the stage, balancing that way with his elbow on his knee as he chewed his sandwich and studied her. Thanks to the short sleeves of the T-shirt, she noticed he had well-developed biceps.
She should be holding her own better in this conversation, using amusement and her tart tongue to put him in his place. Except he didn't seem to be joking, just considering his own reaction to her. He acted like someone who spent a good amount of time in his own head, which she supposed he probably did as a roofer. However, he didn't seem introverted, quite comfortable in the company of a stranger.
"I don't pigeon hole people to get them to fit my fantasies," he said. "But I'm getting the vibe that you are interested in all of this. Personally. Yet you haven't explored it a whole lot, have you?"
No, she hadn't. Having Marcus and Thomas show her around the scene in New York hadn't appealed to her. Ironic, since one long ago significant event with them had been the trigger to her dormant interests, but she'd felt self-conscious pursuing it further in their company. She'd done a lot of online looking, though. Followed by and integrated with some serious fantasizing, which she'd assumed ever since would be like most of her relationships: better as vibrator material than reality.
After the initial meetings with the cast members, Julie had done more specific Internet research on what she'd learned from them. Suspension, fire, liquid nitrogen, whips, knives, rope. Role play--everything from interrogation and Victorian drawing room scenes, to puppy and pony play. It kicked off her own personal and professional imaginings, though she kept the former firmly channeled into the latter.
"Logan's great at mentoring people who are curious," Desmond suggested. "If it's easier for you to take those first steps by calling it work, he'd do it under the guise of supporting what you're doing here."
"Don't do that." Her tone sharpened. "Passive aggressive jabs annoy me."
The genuine surprise in his face reassured and shamed her at once. "Easy, New York," he said. "It wasn't a judgment. Plenty of people interested in this like to approach it in a more detached way at first. It's a smart way of playing it safe, keeping it a little arm's length. Only an idiot jumps into the deep end without being able to swim. Or even knowing if they're going to like swimming."
"Yeah. True. Sorry. Weird trigger."
He picked up the tub and offered her some carrot sticks, taking a handful himself. "Let me guess. You had a boyfriend who liked to do that patronizing, 'I'm only telling you this for your own good, even though it suits my purpose to emotionally manipulate you the way I want you to be' thing. In the meantime, he made you feel like what wasn't working for your relationship was all your fault."
His wry humor made it difficult to hold onto offense at being so accurately read. She cocked her head, more sure of her footing, especially when he smiled at her. It went deep into his eyes and made a woman feel special. Danger, Will Robinson.
"So are you the reformed asshole who did the manipulating, or the recipient of the female version of it?" she asked. "Is that how you recognize the signs?"
"If I tell you that, I'll ruin the fog of sexual mystery that clings to me."
"I think you're safe. It's the carrot sticks that are keeping me enthralled." She smiled and his own broadened.
At a buzz, she looked for her phone, but he'd already shifted onto one hip and reached behind him to withdraw his own.
"Hold on, my butt's vibrating." He glanced at the message and grimaced. "Well, shit. Gotta get back to another job." He slid off the stage to face her. "I did go up on the roof before I came in. I can do you a decent patch job that will buy you another year until you get the theater up and earning some income. After that, Madison'll want to do the full replacement it needed five years ago."
He lifted his gaze to the ceiling. "You've had leaks in here during the recent rains, haven't you?"
"Yes. And two or three in the back rooms."
He nodded, unsurprised. "You'll want that patch job before we have any hard summer showers. I can do it next week, as long as weather cooperates. Sound good?"
He fished out a card and handed it over, his fingers brushing hers. His hands were callused, knuckles chapped and nails painfully short, cuticles predictably ragged. A working man's hands, the skin brown as oak bark. She found herself wanting to hold onto one of them, turn it over and explore his fingers, the lines on his palms. He smelled like male sweat and cinnamon gum, since he'd taken out a piece and was chewing it. He offered her a piece, which she took for later.
"The patch job will cost about a thousand," he added. "Logan's done some work for me, so I can cut Madison a discount and drop that amount off the full price when it's time to do the replacement. I'm going to tell her all that, but I figure she'll be asking you what you think."
Madison would be pleased to get the break. A stage and auditorium had already been part of the building, a big selling point when Madison was considering her options. The private school had built it for student performances. But it had no backstage, so a wall had to be removed and the classrooms behind the auditorium renovated to become the backstage area. Other rooms had been converted into a dressing area and storage. The auditorium had stepped seating in a crescent around the stage, and they expanded that, knocking out additional walls so it could now seat a highly optimistic four hundred. Until the theater provided itself with ticket sales, further major expenses were out of the question.
Des had packed up the remaining sandwiches as he spoke, though he left one block of wax paper holding the remaining square of the chicken salad sandwich and two squares of PB&J, as well as three carrot sticks. "You kept looking at the PB&J," he said with a wink, "so I figured you might want those two for dessert."
The PB&J was what she'd really wanted to eat, but had thought she might look childish for liking it.
"Finish the chicken salad and carrots before dessert," he said, as if reading her mind. "Be a good girl."
She stuck her
tongue out at him and he tsked. Shouldering his pack, he offered his hand. "It'll be a pleasure working with you, Miss Ramirez."
"Julie is fine."
"Yes, she is. In every way." His exaggerated ogle had her stifling a laugh, unsuccessfully.
"You're a terrible flirt."
"Actually, I'm very good at it. Your eyes are dancing, you're smiling and you look less tired and stressed now." His smile morphed into something else. "Seriously, don't hesitate to give me a call about the rigging. I'm sure Logan will have recommended good people for your cast members, but there are a lot of good guys out there who dabble in rope, and don't get enough training before taking it to more advanced levels. It's important to me that people do what I do safely."
Now his expression was as uncompromising as a police officer, which gave her all sorts of distracting fantasies. He was a fascinating mix. She'd taken his hand, and he was still holding it in a firm grip. As she met his penetrating look, she let the warmth that his hand spread through her take her a step away from sanity. "I've researched some of it online," she said with forced casualness, "but I don't have a real grasp of what it's like. From the inside, so to speak. Would you be willing to show me what you do? Using me as a subject, I mean?"
She was astounded she'd said such a thing. Maybe it was being immersed in this environment that had propelled her to a tentative readiness to dip her toe into a submissive experience. Or maybe it was Des. He was the first Dom she'd met, in person or online, who'd made her feel she could take that step.
Yes, she'd met him only a few moments ago, so it should be ludicrous, but she didn't feel that way toward the other performers, with whom she'd been working for several weeks now. It wasn't that they gave her the creeps. Far from it. They'd been recommended by Logan and Madison, and, as Des had said, their choices emitted nothing but good vibes. A couple weren't as experienced as the others, but they still had the right stuff for what they needed in this production.
Beginning and end of story, she felt like she could trust Des. His personality complemented hers, and she could double check things with Logan and back out if she was wrong. But she was already fairly certain Des was a pro at what he did. She was used to being around performers, and knew the real deal when she met them. He exuded a quiet confidence in his abilities. The overabundance of honest charm also didn't hurt.
Since he wasn't going to be in the production, there was no real conflict of interest. It also didn't have to be personal. A lot of people did the Dom/sub stuff as friends or BDSM club arrangements, sans the minefields that came with a relationship. That was a big thumbs-up for her. Exploring it from that safe paradigm would make it all the more fun for her. Right?
As he'd pointed out, such explorations would increase her understanding for the productions. Despite her defensiveness, he was correct. Keeping it professionally motivated would allow her to explore her personal interests in a safe way.
Though admittedly, his reaction to her request made those professional walls seem a little thin. His hand held hers with more than a hint of the strength he'd warned her about. It was evidence of a man's interest and desire, and she was far from immune to it.
When he stepped closer, his abdomen brushed her kneecaps where she sat on the stage. She had to fight a ridiculously powerful compulsion to spread her knees and invite him closer. He gave her another of those sweeping glances that made her aware of every curve she had.
"Use you as my subject to teach you about rigging?" He repeated her question. "I'd say that's a meeting I won't miss."
She covered her unsettled response with a sniff. "You really are a flirt."
"No, I'm not." He braced his free hand on the stage, the heel of his palm brushing the outside of her thigh. Betty's lush body, her helpless tied state, the pleasure in her eyes and parted lips, were distracting for more empathetic reasons now.
Though his jaw and mouth were relaxed, friendly and non-intimidating, that impression vanished when she met his eyes. "I just know what I like when I see it," he said. "I already like you. Not only because you're willing to let me tie you up, though I admit that just vaulted you from Miss America to Miss Universe."
She snorted. "They're far under my weight class."
His smile disappeared, and he stepped closer, somehow parting her knees and standing between them. Or had they simply given way before his obvious intent? Rough palms curved over her thighs. She'd been a New Yorker for most her life. People did not get up in her face like this. She'd shove them back in a heartbeat, tell them to piss off, demand what the fuck or...something.
Maybe it was because she was sitting on the stage, and she had always experienced a shift there, as if she'd stepped into a world where the dramatic and unexpected were more acceptable. She inhabited a world of quirky people who could be infected with that same virus when they were close to a stage. Things that would seem over the top and out of place outside the theater were just the standard within it.
Or maybe there was an entirely different reason he'd caught her off guard.
Her pulse thudded against her throat as his gaze held hers. If she'd doubted the Dom thing before, she didn't now. His captivating voice was a low croon, close to a growl, a thrumming note that her body answered with a hard quiver, coming from those chambers that were suddenly wide open to him.
"Sometimes women get self-conscious about the way their bodies look when they're tied up," he said in a deceptively conversational way. "Like when I tie an ankle to a thigh, and they think the thigh looks too spread out, or the flesh of their stomach is squeezed between two wraps."
His hands slid along her thighs, back toward her knees, a short, intimate stroke. "The things I could do with these thighs," he murmured. He lifted his gaze to hers, and she discovered his eyes could look like a new penny caught in the rain. "When we first meet one another, we're shells. The shell might be pretty, but what I learn about you when I bind you will take me to what's deep beneath that. I suspect your eyes will look like heated molasses when you're aroused."
His gaze slid down. "Your nice breasts would become a pillow, where I'd rest my head and listen to your heartbeat, because when I tie you up, your submissive nature will rise. You'll want to give me that gift, lie still to serve my needs and desires, because I think your instinct is toward care and compassion, serving a Master's needs beyond his cock or orgasm."
His gaze slid back up. "When I uncover that instinct, that's when the shell completely vanishes and I'll know just how beautiful you are."
"You don't really see someone until you see their soul," she said, surprised she could even form words, let alone try to sound like she was reacting to his words as if he were giving her an instructional lecture, not a personal mandate.
"Exactly. That matters way more than what I see in a two-dimensional way. It's the best way for you to get to know me better, too." He moved back, though his hand whispered along her knee, a hint of how he could touch her. Maybe would touch her. "Like just now. When I was talking about tying you in rope, and things were all quiet and intense, were you seeing the skinny guy with questionable taste in second hand clothes, or did you feel the touch of a broad-shouldered god hung like a moose?"
She burst out laughing, as she was sure he'd intended, for his eyes sparkled with humor. The laughter brought a rush of good feeling, that sense of ease again, which had a peculiar reaction with things that weren't at ease at all, but on full, anticipatory alert around him. "Maybe something in between. Damn, you're good."
"I'm good because I'm honest." She saw that flash of sincerity, the hint of dead seriousness, the gleam in his eyes that said he would do all of that and more to her if she opened the door. What's more, he'd proven he could do it in less than a blink. The realization stole her smile and her breath at once, leaving her reeling.
"You have my contact info," he said, shouldering his pack again. "Ball's in your court, Julie. But I'll be ready to hold onto it when you send it back. All right?"
The look he h
ad upon her now expected--maybe demanded--an answer.
Though an innate part of him, Marcus's Dom qualities always had a deliberate, calculated quality to them that was overwhelming. In contrast, this seemed second nature to Desmond Hayes, something he wasn't conscious he was doing. Remarkably, it made him even more potent to her.
"All right," she said. Was her voice breathless?
As he nodded and turned away, she had a feeling he'd registered it. The same way she'd recognized the answering heat in his eyes.
Good Lord, who was this guy?
Chapter Two
"Okay, who the hell is this roofing guy? Desmond Hayes," Julie added at Madison's blank look.
"Spiderman," Logan supplied. Madison's expression cleared in a blink.
"Oh, Des! Sorry. I've been dealing with so many contractors." Madison leaned back in the span of Logan's long arm. The couple were on the front porch swing at Logan's house, where the three of them were sharing an after work drink. Julie was sitting on a facing chair, shoes off and toes curled over the edge as she drew her knees up to her chest. Through the screen that protected them from the ever-present mosquitoes, she could see the manmade pond Logan had on the large rural property. The acres of surrounding open fields and forest formed a cozy cushion for the clapboard farmhouse he'd renovated.
"Des is a 360 degree experience, isn't he?" Madison asked with a chuckle. "First you just see this grungy handyman, a little on the skinny side, though those eyes are as deep as moon craters. Then he gets to talking in that voice like...it's hard to describe."
"Keep trying and you'll find yourself in all kinds of trouble," Logan advised.
Madison dimpled at him. They'd only been married a few months, and so they still had that newlywed miasma around them that could be as wondrous as it was annoying. But since Madison was the only person Julie knew who'd had a worse dating record than herself, it was hard for her to be annoyed or resentful. Just wistful.