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They ate in silence for a brief interval, giving the delicious salad the attention it deserved. Then he asked, “What things give you pleasure?”

  “You mean, in bed?”

  “In bed or out. What warms your soul?”

  She considered. “Well, I like performing, singing onstage.”

  “What exactly about performing do you enjoy? The adulation of a crowd? Making a public act out of your private emotions? Touching their hearts and minds?”

  She blinked. “I never really thought about it. Are those some of the reasons the performers you know like performing?”

  “Don’t dodge the question.”

  “Yes, Master Rikard.” She bent her head, staring at the half-eaten salad while she puzzled out what she enjoyed about singing onstage. “I think it’s the challenge. I like working hard to get it right, and the audience reaction is like a grade, telling me how close I came to doing it.”

  “Ah. So as your Master, I should set challenging tasks for you, and provide feedback so you know whether or not you succeeded.”

  The flesh between her legs began to pulse, hot and wet with arousal. Her breasts tingled, the nipples tightening, and her breath came in short, quick gasps. She loved to learn new things. The constant training was the best part of her job. But it had never occurred to her that a skilled Master would want to train her.

  “Oh, yes,” she whispered. “Please, Master.”

  “Very well, then. Here is your first task. Finish your salad.”

  A muffled sigh escaped her lips as Gayle picked up her fork.

  “You don’t think it’s a challenge? Perhaps if I tell you, you aren’t allowed to make any noise while you eat?”

  She looked up at him, her mouth opening to ask what he meant before she realized that would be disobeying his instruction. Instead, she shook her head.

  “I’ll just have to make it more challenging, then. You eat, and I’ll tell you all the things I plan on teaching you.”

  He began with the simple things, that he would teach her how to speak to him with proper deference yet still giving him all the information he needed to care for her, and how to sit beside him so that he could touch her at his leisure. He would teach her how to remove her clothes so that each item stroking across her flesh enflamed her desire. He would teach her how to position herself so that she was completely open to him, her hot, wet pussy his for the taking, and how she would beg him to take it.

  Gayle felt the moisture growing between her legs, instinctively spreading her legs as wide as her tight leather skirt would allow. She wriggled against the cushion, struggling for relief. At least, if she’d been wearing underwear, the friction of the cotton or lace against her swollen clit and wet lips would have offered some pleasure. But she was bare beneath her skirt, with nothing to rub against.

  A soft whimper broke from her lips.

  Rikard’s hand slapped the glass tabletop, making the plates bounce. “No!”

  She jumped, her wide-eyed gaze locking on his face. Was he angry? No, he was smiling.

  “You made a noise,” he said. “Perhaps this is a challenging task after all?”

  She nodded vigorously.

  “Finish your salad. We will begin again. And since the task is more challenging than you expected, I think you deserve a reward if you complete it. What reward shall I give you?”

  His blue eyes glittered with desire, and the ambrosia of power, as he pondered his answer out loud.

  “You seem to be having trouble sitting. Perhaps I should investigate, and do a thorough probing between your legs to determine what is causing the problem.”

  Gayle bit her lip to keep from moaning. Hot liquid ran down the inside crease of her thigh, to pool beneath her ass on the supple leather of her skirt. She wriggled her hips, imagining his gloved fingers pressing between her folds, slipping inside her, stretching her opening as he slowly added fingers, until his entire hand forced its way over the ridge of muscle into her vagina.

  Her vision was blurring, her breath coming sharp and fast. Her nipples were so tight they hurt. And all she could do was shovel strawberries and lettuce into her mouth as fast as possible, to end this torture.

  “You’re not savoring your food,” Rikard warned her. “If I think you’re not appreciating it, I’ll have to give you a second helping.”

  Gayle wanted to scream in frustration, but she didn’t make a sound. She slowed the pace of her eating, her trembling hand making it difficult to carry the salad to her mouth, and slowing her even further.

  She’d never felt so turned on in her life.

  “Very good.”

  She glowed, warmed by his praise. All she wanted was to please him, to make him happy. Then he would reward her. But pleasing him was its own reward. He’d gone to so much trouble to put together a nice lunch for her. The least she could do was enjoy it properly.

  Her tongue swept out, licking the dressing from her lips. Looking deep into his eyes, she opened her mouth and sucked the dressing from the tines of her fork.

  His eyes darkened, and she could hear his labored breathing in the silence of the kitchen.

  “You seem to enjoy that salad dressing,” he said, a rough huskiness marring the smooth fluidity of his voice. “Perhaps I should anoint you with it, drizzle it on your breasts, let it drip onto your thighs. Then I could lick it off you.”

  Gayle fisted her free hand, her nails digging into her palm. The sharp pain distracted her from phantom sensations of liquid running across her skin, followed by a warm, wet tongue.

  Triumphantly, she popped the last slice of strawberry into her mouth, and laid her fork down with a clatter.

  “Excellent,” Rikard purred. “You have done very well. And that was a challenge, indeed. Come here.”

  He held out his hand. Gayle rose, unsteady on quivering legs, and tottered over to his side. He drew her onto his lap, her leather skirt squeaking softly as it slid across his leather pants. His gloved hand cupped her hip, anchoring her yet burning her with the heat of his banked passion.

  His velvety voice was low and strained as he asked, “I know I said I would not touch you sexually until we’d established trust, but am I right in thinking that’s what you want me to do now?”

  She nodded.

  “You may speak now. Your challenge is completed.”

  “Yes, Master. Please. Touch me.”

  “Where?”

  “Put your fingers inside me. Make me come in your hand.”

  He smiled tightly, recognizing his own words. Then he reached beneath her skirt, his gloved fingers trailing lightly up the inside of her thigh. They were soft, and warm, and everything she’d dreamed of.

  Gayle’s head tipped back and she moaned, arching against his supporting arm behind her back, lifting her hips and spreading her legs. His fingers brushed her clit, and she gasped, jolted by a sharp rush of pleasure. He worked his way between her folds by touch, guided by her breathy moans. Then his fingers slid over the edge of her opening, and she cried out, “Master!”

  He pressed two fingers inside her, thrusting up to the second knuckle.

  “Yes! Yes! More!”

  A third finger joined the other two on the next thrust, stretching her to the edge of pain. His thumb worked her clit, sliding over and around it, his glove wet with her fluids, as his fingers stroked in and out. He found her nerves and pressed them against the bone, wrenching a scream of ecstasy from her.

  “Beg me,” he rasped, his breath hot against her neck. “Beg.”

  “Please, Master. Please. That feels so good. Touch me. Deep. Deeper. Ahhh.” A rush of pleasure blanked all thought for a moment.

  “Beg!” he growled.

  In a flash of insight, she knew what he needed her to say. He wanted to fist her, the way she’d imagined earlier, but he wouldn’t risk hurting her unless she gave her permission. “I want you. All of you. I need your whole hand inside me. Please, Master. I’m yours. Take me. Take me now. Please. Make me scream for you. Only for you.”


  His shuddering breath told her she’d guessed correctly. Gently, he stretched her opening even wider, until the muscle burned. All four of his fingers slipped inside her, to the first joint. The second. And still he stretched her, wider and wider, until his knuckles thrust past her opening.

  She gasped, the brief pain swirling streamers of red and black through her vision.

  Then his hand was inside her, filling her as she’d never been filled. His fingers stroked the walls of her vagina, rubbing and circling, as slowly, slowly, he reached deeper and deeper. Her muscles clenched his fist, seizing and releasing him again and again. Each time, he moved just a little bit further inside her.

  She was going to go insane from the pleasure. He was killing her. She never wanted it to end.

  “Please, Master. Please. Please.”

  She didn’t know what she was begging for, to have him put her out of her agony now or to keep her writhing in his lap for hours.

  Then the tip of his middle finger brushed her cervix, and she exploded. She screamed, a wordless howl of ecstasy, as she bent back over his arm, lifting her hips in a final thrust against his fist. The force of her shudders pushed his hand out of her in a wet rush, as if she was in the final stages of giving birth, and she screamed again as his hand stretched her opening on the way out.

  He held her, cradled against his soft poet shirt, as she sobbed into the warm cotton. And continued sobbing, helpless to stop the tears. She felt the tension that rippled through him as he realized this was more than a simple release.

  He brushed the hair away from her face, tipping her head back to look at him.

  “Gayle, look at me. Did I hurt you?”

  The fear in his voice only made her cry harder.

  “Gayle.”

  She shook her head no. Then yes. “Just a little. It was worth it.”

  “Then why are you crying?”

  “Because I’m twenty-six years old, and I never knew an orgasm could feel like that. If it hadn’t been for you, I never would have known. I’d have grown old and died, thinking I knew what good sex felt like. And I would have been wrong!”

  Rikard chuckled in relief. “Oh, is that all?”

  A giggle slipped out between sobs, then another, and soon she was laughing instead of crying. She slapped weakly at his chest, until he caught her hand and stopped her. Slowly, her laughter faded.

  She wiped roughly at her eyes.

  “God, I probably look a fright.”

  “I think you’re beautiful.”

  She stared up into his incredibly blue eyes, shining through the black leather of his mask. The moment stretched out like a note held impossibly long at the end of an aria.

  Then her cell phone rang.

  “Oh! Where’s my purse?”

  Rikard pulled it from the back of the chair she’d been sitting in and handed it to her. She fumbled for the cell phone, flipping it open and pressing the button to answer the incoming call.

  “Sorry it took so long. I couldn’t find my phone.”

  “I was starting to get worried,” her friend Carrie answered.

  “No, everything’s fine here.” Gayle covered the phone with her hand and whispered to Rikard, “My safety call.”

  “Take the call. I have to prepare the next course, anyway,” he murmured.

  Deftly, he slid out from beneath her. He cleared the table of the salad plates and forks, and carried them to the sink. She heard the clink of plates and a rush of water, followed by the throaty whoosh of a gas range, and the soft opening and closing of kitchen cabinets.

  “Gayle?” Carrie asked. “You sound kind of funny. Are you sure you’re all right?”

  “I have just had the most amazing orgasm of my life,” Gayle whispered.

  There was a moment of silence. “I thought you were having lunch.”

  “We are. The orgasm came after the strawberry salad. It was to die for.” She turned and looked over her shoulder into the kitchen. Rikard was spraying oil onto a griddle pan. He’d taken the cover off the platter he’d placed on the counter earlier, revealing two red slabs of meat, liberally coated with seasonings. “I think we’re having steak for the entrée.”

  “You had sex right there among the salad plates?”

  “No, it wasn’t like that.”

  “You did it on the floor? Up against the wall?”

  “On a kitchen chair, actually.”

  “Gayle, honey, are you listening to yourself? You aren’t a ‘sex on the first date’ kind of girl.”

  “Technically, this is our second date.”

  “And you slept with him less than an hour into it! The man is messing with your head somehow. Maybe calling him a Svengali wasn’t so far off the mark.”

  Vigorous sizzles came from the kitchen, along with a heavenly aroma blending Asian spices and seafood. Gayle moaned, her mouth watering, and closed her eyes to better focus on the delicious smell.

  “Good grief! Is he touching you now?” Carrie demanded.

  “No. He just put the steaks on the grill. I think they’re tuna steaks. They smell so good.”

  Rikard called, “Two minutes.”

  “I’ve got to go. The food’s almost done.”

  “I’ll call you back in an hour.”

  “There’s no need. I’ll be fine with him.”

  “Uh-huh. Then you won’t mind me calling back in an hour.”

  “Okay, but if I don’t answer right away, it’s not because something’s wrong. It’s because we’re having incredibly hot sex and I don’t want to stop to answer the damned phone.”

  “Hey, you asked me to do this for you. Don’t get all snotty with me just because I’m doing what you asked me to.”

  “Oh, Carrie, I’m sorry. I know, you’re just trying to help. But that’s what I’m telling you. I don’t need your help on this anymore.”

  “Humor me. Okay?”

  “You’re wasting your time. But if it’ll make you feel better, fine. Call back in an hour. I have to go now. Lunch is almost ready.”

  “All right. But tonight, after you get home, you’re giving me the whole story about what went on during this date.”

  “Deal.”

  Gayle closed the phone and stuffed it back into her purse. She hadn’t realized Carrie was such a worrywart.

  Although usually Carrie was incredibly laidback, unless it involved a shoe sale. Maybe there was something to her concern. Now that Gayle thought about it, she was acting out of character. She normally took forever to make important decisions, preferring to thoroughly research all the aspects of whatever she was deciding. She should have spent hours debating the pros and cons of having sex with Rikard, instead of just opening her legs and melting beneath his touch.

  And letting him fist her! Never mind that it had been the most mind-blowing experience ever. The point is, she hadn’t even kissed him yet. She’d jumped right in to the kinky sex, with no thought other than satisfying the raging need churning within her. That definitely wasn’t like her.

  The sizzling stopped, and she heard the rapid strike of a knife against a cutting board. Then Rikard carried two plates to the table.

  “Take your seat,” he prompted.

  She blushed, realizing she was still in his chair. Hanging her purse over her chair back, she switched seats.

  He set her plate down on her charger, then put down his own plate and sat. She’d guessed correctly. A slab of tuna steak, coated in red, brown, black and white spices, rested on a colorful bed of sliced cucumbers and radishes. The tuna was sliced in ten narrow pieces, each one shading from gray through pink to a hint of red, then back to gray. A golden brown sauce was drizzled decoratively back and forth across the entire plate.

  Gayle closed her eyes and inhaled the sharp aroma. Her eyes watered, and she blinked rapidly.

  “Does this have a lot of pepper in it?”

  “Wasabi.”

  “Pardon me?”

  “Wasabi paste. It’s Japanese. And very strong.
Really opens up the sinuses.” He smiled. “If hot foods aren’t to your taste, just avoid the sauce. But you ordered chai at the café, so I figured you’d like it.”

  A warm glow suffused her. He’d paid attention to what she’d ordered at the café, and used that to decide what kind of lunch she’d like. He really meant it when he’d said he wanted to care and cosset any woman who became his submissive.

  Carefully, she separated one of the slices of tuna. Feeling his eyes upon her, she lifted the fork up and slid the fish into her mouth.

  Flavors burst to life on her tongue. The sauce held a hint of acidity—soy sauce or vinegar—and heat, which must be the wasabi. But the tuna itself was seasoned with warm spices like cinnamon and ginger, and the unexpected taste of licorice, as well as the more prosaic salt, pepper, onion and garlic.

  Gayle groaned. “Oh God, that’s good.”

  “Try the vegetables.”

  The radishes and cucumbers were crisp and crunchy, perfect counterpoints to the sharp sauce. “Fabulous.”

  Rikard relaxed and picked up his own fork. “I hope you’ll have room for dessert.”

  She gulped and swallowed her mouthful of tuna and cucumber. “There’s more?”

  When she’d fantasized about him serving a three-course meal on her body, it had been just a fantasy. She hadn’t seriously expected such a lavish lunch.

  “Of course. But if you’d prefer, I can show you the rest of the house first, then we can come back for dessert later.”

  “After I’ve worked up more of an appetite?” she teased.

  He laughed. “I’ll show you the playroom. Then you can decide if you’d like to work up an appetite or not.”

  His molten gaze scorched the skin of her neck and chest, her nipples tingling and tightening as his attention slipped lower. Her pulse beat, slow and heavy between her thighs.

  “I want to play,” she whispered.

  Chapter Four

  Rikard smiled at Gayle’s admission. “We can play after lunch. But we’re supposed to be learning about each other. Tell me about some of the productions you’ve been in.”

  He listened attentively, asking pointed and intelligent questions, as she described her theatrical background. She’d had lead roles in a slate of standard musicals—Annie Get Your Gun, Oklahoma!, Fiddler on the Roof, My Fair Lady,and Camelot—as well as innovative and experimental works like Merrily We Roll Along, which started at the end and went backwards to the beginning, and archy and mehitabel, the story of Don Marquis’ literary cockroach and the cat who befriended him.