Page 19

This time Rowan does hide behind his drink. Hides whatever the fuck his eyes are doing that make it extremely obvious to everyone around him that he’s got a thing for Mal. Malcolm. Whatever.

As the minutes tick by, Rowan grows anxious.

That sudden drop in his stomach he’d felt last night when Mal texted him now settles in slowly, not a roller-coaster plummet but a gradually rising tide. Something he only really notices the longer he waits, the longer he watches other club members dance and flirt and pair (or triple) off toward the back rooms. As the thumping bass fades out into a different thumping bass.

When Mal finally arrives, he’s almost twenty minutes late and is the most dressed down Rowan’s ever seen him. He still looks good, still looks hot, but now he looks comfortable. Fucking… domestic , almost. In a long-sleeve gray Henley and some form-fitting black joggers. Usual boots nowhere to be found, instead replaced with navy-and-white Saucony sneakers.

It’s kind of unfair how he can pull off both the dressed-up and laid-back looks effortlessly.

“Hey,” Rowan greets. “Thought you might’a been ditching me.”

“Sorry, hit some traffic. C’mon.”

His tone is off. Tight, maybe. Definitely a far cry from the cockiness Rowan’s used to from him.

“Everything okay?”

“All good.”

Rowan knows immediately that it’s a lie, and as Mal turns to lead them back to the private rooms, he grabs his forearm to tug him back to face him.

“Mal, you sure you’re up for this?”

The blue and white lights flash across his eyes, highlighting sharp cheekbones and plush lips. A furrow in his brow that Rowan wants to smooth over with his thumb.

“Yeah,” he says, features relaxing as he heaves a sigh. “Had a rough couple’a days. Just wanna forget about shit for a while.”

Rowan searches his face. What he’s looking for, he can’t say, but he doesn’t see anything immediately concerning. And he can’t exactly blurt out, Do you have a sister who was abused by her boyfriend? Because he may be dense at times, but he’s got some sense of timing.

“Okay,” he says instead, once again letting Mal lead the way to the Gold Room.

AS HE’S done each time the past few weeks, Mal tosses his bag onto the bed and quickly pulls out their chosen supplies for the night: a black, padded blindfold, cuffs, and the clear masturbator he’d mentioned. It’s only a few inches long, with an opening on either end and smooth ridges lining the inside. Rowan picks it up and turns it over in his hands. The opening is small, sure to be tight around Mal’s cock.

Mal pulls out a vibrator too—a smooth black silicone one that’s roughly egg-shaped, with two buttons on the bottom for controlling the speed. Rowan knows that Mal doesn’t like vibrators in his ass, but that he likes them everywhere externally. And Rowan absolutely plans on using that fact to his full advantage.

The cuffs are the same as they’ve used a few times now, but rather than a clasp that connects them together, Mal brought a matching set of thigh cuffs as well. That gets Rowan’s heart rate going for the first time tonight, worry over Mal’s well-being momentarily pushed out of the limelight.

“Want your thighs cuffed?” Rowan asks, though it seems obvious.

“Yeah,” Mal replies, taking the cuffs from Rowan and turning them to show the D-ring on either cuff, each with a longer clasp already attached. “Makes it so I can’t use my hands. Changes it up a bit.”

“Gonna have to get creative with positions, I assume.”

“Not as much as you’d think. I’m pretty flexible, so most positions are still on the table except me basically standing upright.” He pauses, snorts a quiet laugh that lifts Rowan’s mood. “’Less you wanna fuck Nosferatu.”

“Well…,” Rowan muses, once again taking the cuffs from Mal. “You do have the same complexion.”

“Oh, fuck off, Campbell.”

He turns away from Rowan, but Rowan catches the smile on his face before he succeeds in hiding it. Rowan snorts, going to grab a new bottle of lube from the supply table while Mal fiddles with the blindfold.

“You wanna wear that the whole time? And the cuffs?” Rowan asks, returning to Mal’s side.

“Can put ’em all on at the beginning, but bind me after we get warmed up.”

“’Kay.”

Thinking forward to what they have planned for the night, Rowan adjusts the sex bench opposite the bed so that the back is upright and there is plenty of room to accommodate them both. They haven’t used it together yet, and hell, Rowan’s never used one before, and it takes a moment fiddling with the metal pins to get them to lock in position, but he figures it out quickly enough.

Everything is in place. They know what the plan is. Rowan’s got a good sense of how things are gonna go, but…

He hesitates.

Because this part he’s a little unsure how to navigate. It’s been easy enough to strip Mal down or order him to strip himself and get right to it. But while he’s grown considerably more comfortable being an asshole, to put it bluntly, he’s not quite as sure how to do this .

How to be gentle . Well, gentl er . But not too gentle. They’re not making love here, for fuck’s sake. And Rowan’s a little worried that he’s gonna slip and skirt that line rather than continuing to play his usual dominant role.

He wants to kiss Mal. Fuck, he keeps coming back to that, but what could possibly be a better way to praise Mal than with his lips and tongue?

Stop it , he tells himself. You’re just gonna let yourself down.

It’s then that Mal takes initiative and gets things started. He can clearly tell that Rowan’s a little out of his depth with this, and he toes off his own sneakers and socks and nudges them under the platform of the bed.

Rowan snaps back to himself. Right. He’s got a job to do. He’s here for a reason. To help Mal let loose, and in turn to let loose himself.

Exploration. Fun. Orgasms. He’s got this.

Rowan unbuttons the two fastened buttons on Mal’s Henley, revealing a sliver of his toned and tattooed chest. He grabs the hem of the shirt, keeping his touches light, tugs it slowly over Mal’s head, and this time, tosses it on the corner of the bed rather than the floor.

Whatever’s going on with Mal, he doesn’t want to do anything to make him feel worse. He wants to make him forget for a few hours.

As he kneels to tug down Mal’s joggers, he’s met with the unexpected sight of cherry-red silk and lace.

“Oh…,” he breathes.

A rush of heat shoots straight to his cock, making him light-headed and glad as hell that he’s kneeling.

“You wear these for me?” Rowan asks him, dragging his joggers the rest of the way down and coaxing Mal to step out of them, eyes trained on Mal’s panties the whole time.

“Yeah,” Mal tells him. “Said you’d like ’em.”

“I do. Look so good on you.”

With a palm to each hip, he turns Mal around, still kneeling behind him. Drinking in the sight of those perfect cheeks framed in lace.

He’d read something once about how a Dom should never get on his knees for his sub. But that person clearly didn’t know what the fuck they were talking about, because down here, he feels invincible .

Feels untouchable as he runs his hands over Mal’s asscheeks, squeezing and watching the skin turn white against the bright red of the panties. Feels alive when he slips his fingertips under the lace-trimmed bands and sees the tiny pink indents where they dig into Mal’s skin.

As he tugs the fabric to the side, Mal starts to press back against him, hands planted on the bed in front of him.

“ Uh -uh,” Rowan scolds. “You just stand there and be good for me.”

For once, Mal listens the first time. And if he hadn’t already made it clear that tonight wasn’t going to be their usual, Rowan would have been able to tell from that fact alone.

Before he leans in, his gaze drops to the two snakes tattooed on the back of Mal’s ankle, side by side, one slightly smaller than the other. His mind races, but he buries his face between Mal’s cheeks and lets himself forget.

The panties get in the way of him fully going to town, so he keeps his touches light and slow as he works him open, the feel of him against his tongue by now a familiar one that Rowan can’t get enough of. Like the small gasped exhales Mal makes each time Rowan’s tongue flicks over his hole or his lips seal over it.

With one final lick, he rises and slips the panties back in place, the fabric forming a perfect crease between Mal’s cheeks.

Rowan secures the cuffs around Mal’s wrists first, the motions easy in their familiarity. The thigh cuffs are the same as the wrist cuffs—black leather lined with short fur—but these are larger and have four D-rings around each cuff.

“How high do you want ’em?” Rowan asks. There’s no worn hole like the wrist cuffs, which tells him that maybe Mal hasn’t used these as often.

“Around my tattoo.”

Oh.

The delicate strip of lace tattooed around his right thigh, midway up. Rowan had almost forgotten about it, having seen it so often, but it’s the perfect height for the cuffs. As he secures the first cuff over the swell of his quad, it completely hides the lace, leaving only the tattooed knife showing on the side. The second one follows, and the sight of Mal’s wrists and thighs wrapped in leather kicks up his heart rate a notch.

“Okay?” Rowan asks, slipping a finger in each cuff to check the tightness.

“Yeah.”

The blindfold is next. It’s sitting on the bed, right in front of Mal, who picks it up and wordlessly holds it behind him.

And he’s not bound yet—hands still free and clear. The blindfold has an elastic strap rather than a tie. Mal could easily put it on himself. But Rowan takes it from him, pulse thrumming in his fingertips as he grabs the smooth black fabric and stretches it over the crown of Mal’s head. As he places it over his eyes, the softness of Mal’s hair tickles him as he adjusts the strap above his ears.

In front of him, Mal’s back rises in a deep breath that Rowan traces with his palms. Feels the solid muscle beneath his hands and the goose bumps that follow.

“There we go. All ready for me now.”

With much less force than he normally would, he pushes Mal’s chest flat on the bed and nudges his legs apart wider than his hips. And goddamn, the sight of those strong thighs bound in leather and those plump cheeks framed in bright red panties? Going straight to the vault of Rowan’s spank bank.

“Look delicious like this,” Rowan tells him, squeezing and spreading his asscheeks apart and watching the fabric pull taut, a wet spot in the center from his tongue mere minutes ago.

He tugs Mal’s hips back from the bed enough to free his cock from the panties, Mal gasping softly and dipping his head forward as Rowan pumps him to full hardness. The silk feels amazing against his hand, and he can only imagine how it feels against Mal’s ass and balls.

“Much as I like seein’ you in these, they’ve gotta go,” Rowan tells him, shucking down the panties and letting Mal kick them off. “Next time, wanna see you get ’em filthy. How’s that sound?”

All Mal does is moan softly.

“Tell me, Mal.”

“Yeah,” he replies, voice already husky.

“Good. Next time you feel like gettin’ pretty for me, I’m gonna ruin ’em.”

From there, he clips Mal’s wrists to his outer thighs and hefts his right leg up onto the bed, then digs back in to pick up where he left off. Mal moans, arches his back, and ruts against the bed as Rowan teases him with his lips and tongue until his jaw aches and his cock is straining in his jeans.

It’s only then, when Mal’s half incoherent in his noises, that Rowan grabs the vibrator. Pulls Mal’s cock back from under him, already flushed and starting to leak at the tip—leaking more when he touches the tip of the vibrator under the head.

“Mmm, fuck !”

“Tell me whenever you’re close. You’re not gonna come till you show me how good you can be for me.”

The vibrations fill the room, drowned out only by Mal’s moans when Rowan drags the vibrator across Mal’s shaft. Lets it linger under his balls as he strokes over his hole with his thumb. Pushes the tip in and tugs at his rim while he slots his tongue in alongside. All the while seeking out every sensitive spot on Mal’s cock and balls with the vibrator. Finding which places make him jump, make him gasp, make him moan the loudest.

In no time at all, Mal gasps, “Fuck, gonna—”

As soon as the words reach his ears, Rowan’s pulling away from Mal completely, feeling the other man shake on the bed. Listening to him curse then heave a sigh. Watching him clench his fist and tug at his cuffs.

It’s as hot as it is endearing.

“That was only the first one, Mal. Got plenty more where that came from.”

“ Hnn ….”

With that he touches the vibrator to Mal’s hole, slick with spit and quivering wildly as if trying to keep up with the pulses. But Rowan doesn’t let it linger, trailing it back down to his cock, delighting in the jerk of Mal’s hips and the continued clenching of his hand.

“Hold yourself open,” Rowan tells him.

“Can’t…,” Mal starts, half muffled from how he’s pressed into the bed.

“Try.”

He flexes his fingers, reaching toward his asscheek, fingertips barely able to dig in without the cuffs straining around his wrists.

“ Can’t ….”

“I got you,” Rowan assures, unclipping his wrist from the side D-ring and reattaching it to the one in back, giving him another few inches of slack to spread his cheeks wide and show off more of his hole. “Perfect. Stay like that.”

“Oh!” Mal cries out when Rowan squirts a dollop of lube on his hole and sinks in two fingers, keeping the vibrator firmly pressed against his underside of his cockhead.

He’s slick and warm, and Rowan’s fingers practically vibrate as much as the toy in the excitement of being inside Mal again. He works him open farther, stretching and tugging and gliding his fingers in and out, brushing against his prostate simply to feel Mal clench around him.

“Take my fingers so well, Mal. Look at you, already wanting more, huh?”

“ Yeah .”

“Take this,” Rowan tells him, prying Mal’s fingers off his ass and slipping the vibrator into his hand. “Against your hole.”

Mal’s back muscles flex as his shoulders pinch together and he settles the vibrator against his hole, a soft moan following.

“Good. Keep it there.”

Only when the hum of the toy dampens from Mal’s grip on it does Rowan move away and start stripping his own clothes. Not for Mal’s enjoyment, thanks to the blindfold, but because the pressure against his cock is driving him crazy and the heat radiating off of Mal’s body might give him heatstroke. By the time he’s shucking down his briefs, he catches Mal silently pulling the vibrator away from him.

“Mal…,” he scolds. “Thought I told you to tell me when you’re gonna come?”

“I….”

“That better not be an excuse. Do it again and you’ll be punished, understand?”

His voice is low when he replies, “Yes.”

Rowan guides Mal’s hand with the vibrator back to his hole while he strokes over the back of his neck and his shoulders, feeling the dip of his spine as his palms explore his back. Reassuring, hopefully. They didn’t discuss any kind of punishment tonight. Mal knows that, but he listens to the empty threat nonetheless.

Rowan climbs on the bed, settling to Mal’s right and gently guiding Mal’s face toward him.

“Open,” Rowan says, running a thumb over his slack bottom lip.

Mal’s lips barely part, hot breath ghosting over the tip of Rowan’s cock, a mere inch away.

“Mmm. Suck,” Rowan instructs, slipping his cockhead into Mal’s warm mouth. “Pull off if you need to.”

He normally wouldn’t give Mal the reminder—their understanding of one another’s boundaries and limits already familiar enough. But tonight, Rowan thinks he may need it. The way he’s responding so easily to everything Rowan says is similar to when he’s in or nearing subspace.

So Rowan doesn’t fuck his face like he wants to. Keeps his thrusts light and lets Mal’s lips dictate the suction and his tongue trail over his shaft however he pleases. Even with his limbs occupied and his sight taken away, his mouth is as talented as ever. Rowan pets his cheek and feels his cock bulge through with every press of his hips.

He could stay here forever, letting Mal suck his cock all soft and slow, but it’s obvious that he’s grown numb to the vibrator alone, and that won’t do. So Rowan pulls out, takes it from him and adjusts the clip back to the side of his thigh. He slips back onto the floor and hefts Mal’s other leg on the bed, flipping him onto his back in the process and drinking in the sound of Mal’s sharp inhale.

With little effort, he urges Mal to squirm back on the bed, following and settling between his legs.

“Wish you could see yourself like this,” Rowan tells him, feeling the taut muscles of his thighs as he spreads his legs and presses them against the bed as wide as they’ll go. “All spread out for me. Look fuckin’ perfect.”

Mal draws a shuddering breath and dips his head back into the bed. For a second, Rowan’s gaze is pulled in by the bob of Mal’s Adam’s apple as he swallows around nothing. His fingers itch.

But he snaps back to the moment, once again annoyed at being so easily distracted by the man in front of him. When he’s not even trying to be distracting, for fuck’s sake.

In this position, it’ll be much easier to bring Mal to the edge over and over again.

He starts with the vibrator again, pressed lightly against Mal’s balls as he strokes his shaft, hard as he’s ever been in his hand.

Finally he grabs the masturbator. Squirts a generous dollop of lube inside it and a trail of it along Mal’s shaft that makes his stomach quiver. Touches the opening to Mal’s tip and slowly, slowly slips it over his cock, sheathing it all at once.

“ Nnnggg !” Mal groans.

“Feel good?” Rowan asks, starting a slow rhythm with the masturbator even as Mal’s hips start fucking up into his fist.

Rowan sees him nod, but he reminds him, “Words, Mal. Tell me.”

“Yes, fuck ….”

“Good. I wanna hear you. Don’t hold back. I’ll know if you do.”

With that lingering between them, Rowan sets to work, tightening his grip and pumping the toy over Mal’s cock in long, teasing strokes. Tossing the vibrator aside and sinking two fingers into Mal’s hole once again.

“Ooh! Yes, shit ….”

“That’s it.”

Rowan’s entranced by Mal’s cock emerging from the masturbator. Slick and pink and hot even through the silicone toy. With all the attention he pays to his ass in their sessions, his cock is perfect in its own right. And now the way it penetrates the toy and the way his hips roll up into every thrust has Rowan’s mind running wild imagining Mal inside him .

Their roles are pretty well established, but they’ve both made it clear that they get an itch to change things up every once in a while. Fuck, he can picture it perfectly—ordering Mal to fuck him exactly how he wants. Not letting him come until Rowan’s had his fill. Letting him finish inside—something no one’s ever done.

But Rowan’s traitorously wandering thoughts are jolted back to the present when Mal’s hands strain against the cuffs, trying to reach his cock, only to be stopped by the rattle of the clasps.

Rowan huffs a gentle laugh.

“If you really wanted, you could reach.” He pulls the toy off nearly completely, teasing at the tip of Mal’s cock in short, barely-there strokes. “Use those muscles of yours to twist the cuffs around and make me go faster. But I can tell you wanna be good for me and keep your hands to yourself. Isn’t that right, Mal?”

The noise that Mal makes is somewhere between a growl and a whine, sitting low in his throat as he flings his head back against the bed in frustration.

“Answer me.”

Now Rowan does pull away completely. Fingers still pumping away inside, though he should take that away too. But—

“Yes.”

“Yes what?” Rowan presses, slipping the toy over the head of Mal’s cock for barely a second before pulling off.

“ Nng , fuck… wanna be good.”

A flutter of pride swells up inside Rowan. “I know you do. So you just lie back and quit trying to run the show.”

Mal’s mouth works like he wants to say something else, but he doesn’t. He bites his bottom lip and lets his body relax, even lightening the furious clenching of his hole around Rowan’s fingers.

“Good. Now where were we?”

This time, he’s not expecting an answer, and he doesn’t wait for Mal to offer one before stroking fast and tight around his cock with the toy, the slick sounds bouncing off the walls of the room. He adds a third finger too, pumping them in as fast as the friction will let him.

And Mal’s gasping and his back is arching off the bed and his thighs are shaking and his fists are clenching by his side and he cries out, “Gonna…!”

And Rowan pulls off.

“Fu-fuck, please !”

“Uh-uh. Again.”

WHEN MAL curses, Rowan knows to speed up both his hands.

When he moans, he knows to slow down with the masturbator and press his fingertips firmly against his prostate.

When he writhes, he knows to suck the tip of his cock into his mouth and roll his balls in his hands.

When he can do little more than whimper and mumble some variation of “I’m gonna come!” he knows to pull away completely.

Sometimes he’ll leave his fingers buried inside to feel the heat around his fingers and the quivering of his muscles, but he holds them still. Nothing more than a placeholder for his cock.

Mal gets louder each time his orgasm is ripped away from him. A beautiful symphony of moans and gasps and whines that Rowan draws out from him like a conductor, and he feels on top of the world.

And Rowan makes sure to tell him how perfect he is with each one. How good, how gorgeous. Makes sure to pinch and roll his nipples as he comes down from the near-high and stick his fingers in his mouth to let him taste himself and keep his mouth busy.

By the sixth denied orgasm, Mal’s skin is flushed pink and glistening with a sheen of sweat, and he’s more than earned his release.

“You choose,” Rowan starts, watching Mal’s chest heaving. “Come like this, or come on my cock?”