Next, she showed me an industrial kitchen, as well as a smaller and more home-like second kitchen, saying that I’d use the secondary kitchen for my day-to-day needs. There was a breakfast nook off the secondary kitchen, tucked up against more floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the city.
There was a single door set at the end of a short hallway just off the secondary kitchen. “What’s through there?” I asked.
“His quarters. The door is always locked, and that is the only area that is off-limits to you,” she said, gesturing for me to follow her.
She took me up an internal elevator to an open area with an indoor pool. The ceiling was glass, revealing the night sky. Through a door off this room were a sauna, a full bathroom, a massage room, a weight room, and a dojo, complete with sparring dummies and a rack of wooden practice weapons of all kinds.
Finally she led me back down the main floor and halted outside a pair of French doors, not far from the kitchens. “Through this door is the dining room, where he awaits you. If you are ready?”
Eliza held up the blindfold. I nodded, and she moved to stand behind me, tying it around my head. Once more, the world went black, and I was reliant on my other four senses.
“I feel I should say…I have worked for him for twenty years, Miss Kyrie. He is a good man. He has his own strange ways, and likes things just so, and he demands excellence in all things, but…he is a good man. I know you must be afraid, but please, you do not need to be. If there is anything I am able to do for you, you have only to ask. I am the chef as well, so if you wish any particular foods or would like a specific dish, just ask me. You have only to call for me via the intercom, and I will respond.” She patted me on the shoulder, and then I heard the door open and her hands took mine. “This way, please.”
She led me about fifty steps, my heels echoing on a tile or marble floor and far-away walls. “Miss Kyrie, sir.”
“Thank you, Eliza.” His voice came from my left, approaching over soft footfalls. “We will begin with the first course when you’re ready.”
“Very good, sir.” Eliza’s footsteps receded, in the opposite direction from where we’d come, and then a door opened and closed.
I felt his hands on mine, engulfing mine, pulling me forward several more steps, and then he pulled out a chair, guided me in front of it, and settled me down with his hands heavy but gentle on my shoulders. When I was sitting, his hands remained there, thumbs massaging between my shoulder blades. I was tense, I realized, and his strong, gentle pressure felt wonderful. Too wonderful. I almost moaned aloud, but managed to hold it back.
“So tense, Kyrie.”
“I’d say I have reason to be a little tense, don’t you?”
“Mmm. I suppose you do, at that.” His palms ran down my arms, and his thumbs worked into the knots around my spine with smooth, powerful, rolling strokes. Jesus help me, that felt good. “Are you hungry, Kyrie?”
My stomach gurgled, answering for me. He laughed, and I heard a chair scrape across the floor beside me. “How’s this going to work?” I asked. “You can’t expect me to eat with this blindfold on.”
“You’ll see,” was his cryptic response.
A few seconds later, I heard a door open, and plates were set down before us. I smelled soup, beef stock possibly, and fresh-baked bread. Eliza left, and I fumbled in front of me for a spoon, found it, and then hunted for the edges of the bowl. I found it, only to jostle it so scalding liquid sloshed onto my hand, causing me to jerk away and curse.
“Kyrie, Kyrie. So impatient. Give me your hand.” His voice was equal parts amused and disapproving.
I hesitated, and then held out my throbbing hand. My palm rested against his. I heard a utensil clink against glass, and then something intensely cold slid over the burned flesh at the web of my hand, between thumb and forefinger. I hissed in surprise, and then moaned in relief as the ice soothed the burn. After a few seconds, he set the ice cube on a tray or plate of some kind, and a cloth dabbed at my skin, drying it. And then my hand was lifted, and I his lips touched the burned place on my hand, kissing it. I felt a blush run through me, shuddering down my spine.
“What—what are you doing?” I asked, my voice squeaking.
“This…” he answered, between kisses. “Does it feel better now?”
“I—I…yes…” I breathed.
The touch of his lips was tender, sensual. The ice had soothed away the burn, leaving a faint tingle, and then his lips skated across my skin, warm and moist, and I couldn’t stop a shiver, couldn’t stop a gasp. His lips moved from the web of my thumb to the back of my hand, no longer soothing now, but kissing for the sake of kissing. Oh, god. He was kissing my hand? No one had kissed my hurts since I was a tiny child. My mother was never the kiss-it-better type, even on her best days. And my father, well, he’d been loving enough, but was often absent, working all the time.
Now the kisses moved across my knuckles, around the edge of my hand. I swallowed hard past the distraught lump in my throat, but still couldn’t catch my breath. Another kiss, to the knife edge of my hand. He turned my palm face up, and his lips touched the center of my hand. My fingers curled involuntarily and touched a stubbled upper lip, then brushed against his nose. His skin was so warm, soft yet rough, a perfect contradiction of manhood. Lips brushed over the heel of my palm, to my wrist. Oh, god, oh lord, oh shit. The touch of his lips was…overwhelming, gentle, sweet, insistent, and almost erotic. I was panting in shallow breaths, and as his lips kissed my forearm, it finally happened. I moaned. I couldn’t stop it, couldn’t believe it had happened. The sound was blatant arousal, breathy and sensual. I felt more than heard his rumble in response, and he pressed a kiss to the inside of my elbow, a place no lips had ever, ever touched. I was rocked to my core by the electric heat that flushed through me at the feel of his mouth just there. He felt my reaction, and kissed me there again. I exhaled, tipping my head back on my neck and fighting for composure. But I had none. Not even a shred. His fingers threaded through mine from behind, his palm resting on the back of my knuckles, and his other hand cupped my elbow, holding my arm out for him.
Another embarrassingly breathy moan slid from my throat as his lips touched my bicep, moved to the inside, that soft and tender flesh there. Hot soft wet lips, kissing me so intimately, so tenderly, I couldn’t prevent the sound from escaping me. I’d never been touched this way, never been kissed this way. His lips hadn’t touched mine, hadn’t touched me anywhere at all but my hand and arm, and yet I was more aroused than I’d ever been in all my life. I was shaking from head to toe, hot all over, mouth hanging open, barely breathing.
“Kyrie…Kyrie…so gentle, so responsive. Do you feel that? I know you do, my sweetest thing. I know you feel it.” His voice was a low, murmuring thread, his breath touching my shoulder now like a sun-hot wind. “It’s lightning, isn’t it? Pure lightning, arcing between us. Every time my lips touch your perfect skin, you blush and you shiver. I’ve barely touched you, barely begun to kiss you, only just learning the secrets of your body, but already you react so beautifully. Kyrie…Kyrie…you are so beautiful. Such a precious thing, and I simply cannot wait to make you sing, to make your body hum and shiver for me.”
I had no breath, heard no sound but his voice and the poetry in his words. If I’d heard anyone else speak that way, I’d mock and scoff. It would sound so contrived, but somehow with him, with his rich and melodic voice, it sounded perfect, natural. And his words, god. I couldn’t help but react to such statements. I felt my spine arch, felt my head turn to the side and my neck curve away, offering the column of my throat to him. No one had ever said such things to me. I’d been called sexy, hot, pretty. One guy had even called me “deliciously fuckable”; I’d had mixed feelings about that one. I’d been told I had a “bangin’ body,” and I’d been told I had fantastic tits. Once, I’d been told my eyes were lovely. That was a good one.
But…this was different. His voice, a deep murmur in my ear, thick with sincerity, rife
with something like awe…it took his poetry to a new level. It made what should have been a fairly common and trite compliment—“so beautiful”—into something different, pushed it into a new realm.
And…he couldn’t wait to make me sing? Make my body hum and shiver for him? What the hell did that even mean?
But I had a suspicion. I did feel the lightning. I couldn’t deny that. Mere kisses along my arm, and I was moaning. If he could elicit that reaction from such simple touches, what could he get from me with more intimate attentions? I shuddered as the thought ran through me.
His lips—now skimming along the ridge of my shoulder and into the curve at the base of my throat—smiled on my skin. “Yes…you feel it. You feel what I could do to you. What I will do to you.” He trailed kisses up my neck, one…two…three…and then his lips were on my jaw, nearing my chin—is he going to kiss me?—his lips slid up, up, paused just beneath the corner of my lips. “You want me to kiss you, Kyrie? Don’t you? You’re afraid, but you do. I can feel it in you, sense it in you. Ask me, Kyrie. Ask me to kiss you.”
His lips hovered, just barely touching my flesh, at the corner of my lips. I trembled all over. The words bubbled up in my throat, crashed against the wall of my teeth. Kiss me. Please kiss me. I clenched my jaw, squeezed my teeth together to stop the words from coming out.
“No? Not yet, hmm?” His breath touched my cheek, and then his lips descended, ever so briefly, to the swell of my lower lip. He kissed me so softly, so quickly, I might have imagined it. And then I felt a nip, sharp teeth catching my lip, and I gasped. “Very well. I can wait.”
I breathed out as I felt him move away, and then I heard a spoon clink against china.
“The soup is going cold. Open up.” His voice was neutral once again.
“You’re going to feed me?” I hated how weak my voice was, how affected I sounded.
“Yes, of course. Now. Open up. It’s beef barley soup, and it’s to die for.”
I hesitated, and then the clenching gurgle of my stomach had me parting my lips. A spoon slid against my mouth, over my teeth, and I closed my lips over it, tasted, swallowed. “Mmmm. You weren’t kidding. That’s amazing.”
“Eliza is one of a kind. No one cooks like she does.” I heard him take a mouthful of soup for himself, and then the spoon nudged my lips again. “Would you like some bread?”
I nodded as I swallowed, and then felt something scratch my lips. I smelled fresh-baked bread, opened my mouth for it, and tasted the rich, light flavor of a baguette. He’d dipped it in the soup, softening it, and I took the bread from him, bit, chewed, relishing the flavors.
Thus it went, him feeding me, taking some for himself. It should have been awkward, but somehow it wasn’t. His fingers, as he fed me, would brush my lips, my cheek, and I didn’t flinch at his touch. Once I nearly nuzzled into his hand, and then scolded myself for being ridiculous.
But it was so surreal, so absurdly romantic and strange, that I couldn’t fathom my own reactions, couldn’t help being swept away, just a little.
I heard the door swing open, followed by the sound of wheels rolling over the floor. “Was the soup to your satisfaction, sir, Miss Kyrie?” Eliza asked as she removed the bowls and set down something else in front of me.
“It was amazing, Eliza,” I answered, “thank you.”
“Indeed,” he said. “Truly wonderful, as always.”
“The main course is salmon,” Eliza said, “freshly caught and baked with herbs. Beside it you will find hand-made garlic mashed potatoes and green beans.”
“Ah, Eliza, this looks excellent,” he said, his voice smooth with appreciation. “And the wine?”
I heard a cork pop, and liquid being poured. “This is a ’96 pinot gris,” Eliza said. “It is from the winery in France.” She said this last part as if describing something he would be familiar with.
“Ah, perfect,” he said. His next words were addressed to me. “I own several wineries throughout the world, one of which is in Alsace-Lorraine. While I own it, I made sure the original family continues to run it, seeing as they have been making wine there for more generations than I can number.”
He took my hand in his, and pressed a wine glass into my palm. I curled my fingers around it, brought it to my nose, and sniffed. “I don’t know much about wine,” I admitted. “I know you’re supposed to sniff really good wines, but I don’t know what I’m supposed to smell.”
He chuckled. “Perhaps another time we will endeavor to teach you the finer points of wine appreciation. But tonight is not that time. For now, simply enjoy it.”
I lifted the glass to my lips and took a small sip.
Holy fucking shit.
This was as much like the wine I was used to as a Ferrari was like a 1989 Ford Escort. I made a little noise of appreciation, and took another sip. This time, I held the wine in my mouth, swirled it around my taste buds. I’d seen things on TV or in movies where some wine snob, usually wearing a beret and a frilly scarf, took dainty sips and then used absurdly unlikely verbiage to describe the wine, things like hints of verdancy and overtones of oak. What bullshit, I’d always thought. Only, with this wine, I really could taste countless different flavors, undertones and hints and notes. I couldn’t identify them, or describe them, but I could taste them.
“Wow,” I ended up saying. “That’s…amazing.” Lame, totally lame.
“You’ve never had real wine before, have you?”
I shrugged. “I guess not. I mean, I’ve had wine before, obviously. But I’ve never had a bottle that cost more than, like, twenty dollars.”
“Hah.” His voice was openly derisive. “That is not wine.”
“Well, it’s what I’ve had. I can definitely taste the difference, though.”
“That’s good. If you’d said something like ‘wine is just wine,’ I might have had to rethink things a bit.” He laughed, making it a joke, but I wondered if he’d been serious.
“You’d just send me home, then?” I felt for the surface of the table with my empty hand, and carefully set my wine glass down. “Maybe I should’ve pretended to not taste the difference, then.”
“It was a joke, Kyrie.”
“Was it?” I turned my head in the appearance of looking at him. A habit, an empty gesture.
His warm fingers brushed a wayward strand of hair away from the corner of my mouth. “Yes. It was. I like nice things. I am extremely wealthy, so I fill my home with the best of everything. But all of it is just…things. In themselves, they mean nothing. I enjoy expensive wines because they taste better than cheap wines. But it’s still just wine.” His thumb slid across my upper lip, and I had to stop myself from turning into his touch, from nipping at his thumb with my teeth. “And tell me the truth, Kyrie. Would you really go home? Just like that?”
I had no answer. I tried subtly to move my face away from his touch, unnerved by my own intense reactions to him.
“Would you?” His voice sharpened. “Answer me, Kyrie. If I told you that you could return home, right now, without breaching our accord, would you?”
I pulled in a shaky breath, flattened my hands on the table. “I—”
“I don’t think you would.” His voice was close, his breath hot on my ear, speaking just above a whisper. “You feel it, Kyrie. If I kissed you right now, I do think you might faint. You’re barely breathing as it is.”
“I’m breathing just fine,” I lied. “Would you? Let me go home right now?”
“No, I don’t think I would.”
“Why not?” These two words slipped, breathless, from my lips.
His breath moved, warming my ear, then my cheek, and then, oh god—I felt his lips on my skin, mere centimeters from my mouth. “This is why.” As close as our faces were, I still barely heard him.
My heart was pounding, hammering, thudding in my chest, sending blood pulsing in my ears. My skin was tingling, my hands shaking. Nerves, anticipation…fear? Parsing what I felt was impossible. I only knew I dreaded
and needed in equal measure the feel of his lips on mine. So close. Yes. There, please. A kiss, a single kiss.
I’d only known this man for a matter of perhaps two hours, yet his lips were grazing mine, and he wasn’t breathing, either. How was this possible? I didn’t know his name. I didn’t know what he looked like. I only knew the sound of his voice, the feel of his hands. He could be sixty years old, he could be ugly, he could be so many things. But somehow, in that moment, barely an atom’s breadth between our lips, it didn’t matter.
“All you need say is ‘yes,’ Kyrie.” I felt his words, heard them, but just barely. “Say yes.”
No. No. No.
“Yes.”
A huge, warm hand cupped the back of my head, a palm rested on my cheek, fingers threaded into my hair, nestled against my ear and along my jaw, cradling my face, drawing me to him. It took but a mere shift of my head, acquiescing by tilting my chin up ever so slightly. Why was I allowing this kiss? I shouldn’t. But…I was. I had to. And it was just a kiss.
I’m such a liar.
It wasn’t just a kiss.
It was power. Control. Acknowledgment of his demands. Conceding to his game.
Oh…what a game. From the moment his lips met mine, I knew he was a master of this, the art of seduction through a kiss. Slow, hot, wet, insistent. His lips moved on mine, his hands held me in place, not allowing me to pull away until he was ready to let go. He kissed me as if he had something to prove, and indeed he did. He proved to me that this kiss was only the beginning.
I’d been kissed before. Many times. There were awkward and sloppy kisses, those tension-fraught moments of fumbling intensity as a teenager. There were more skilled kisses, passionate and intentional. There were kisses that stole my breath, kisses that merged seamlessly with the shedding of clothes and the joining of bodies.