"I need a watch." I held my old watch out. The face was even cracked. How had I not noticed that sooner? Had it just happened? "And some groceries. And some paint, paper, and canvas."

Painting was my favorite hobby, and I had a room full of paintings to prove it. I was dabbling with oils lately, but watercolors and acrylics had always been my strength, and were more affordable in general. I needed to stock up on almost all of my supplies.

"Perfect. I've been needing a frame for that mountain landscape you made me. It's going in my living room. It's my all time favorite."

I smiled at him fondly. "You don't have to do that. I won't feel bad if you don't hang it up. I paint things for you because I like to. You don't have to decorate your entire house with my junk just to humor me."

He sent me a bewildered look. "You think that's why I've covered my entire home with your paintings? To humor you?"

I shrugged, feeling self-conscious. I hadn't gone to art school, had no training whatsoever, so I always questioned if people were sincere when they complimented my work. Stephan deserved better than my doubting him, though.

"I love your paintings, Bianca. Every time I look at any of the ones I have displayed, I feel joy. They help make my house a happy, healthy place for me. I think of where we've come from, all that we've been through, and the astoundingly beautiful things you can create, and it never fails to amaze me. It makes me hopeful about the future."

I flushed a bit, but smiled. "I painted that mountain landscape because it made me think of you. It was so strong, and stark, and beautiful. And every color I used in that painting, I got from studying you. I used the color of your hair and skin for the desert mountains, and your eyes were the sky. It's very nearly an abstract portrait of you."

He laughed, a carefree, joyous sound.

We're in a good place, I thought. We'd overcome so much, and left so much of the bad stuff behind. Over the years, the lingering dark shadows of our pasts seemed to be fading from us, more and more.

"Well, now I love it even more," he said. "You know how much I love pictures of myself."

I laughed, because it was pretty much true. Both of our houses sported portraits of Stephan, some his idea. He liked to pose for me, and he was a great subject, waiting patiently for hours if I needed him to.

Our houses were only fifteen minutes from the airport, just off of the 215 west. It was an ideal airport location, with a new track of houses and a short commute.

Seeing my small house still made me smile. I'd opted to keep the all-desert landscape that my yard had sported when I purchased the house, figuring it was for the best to forgo the gra.s.s, since we lived in the desert and we were often out of town.

Stephan had stubbornly refused to stay content with rocks and cacti, planting a small row of flowers along his front steps and a compact square of gra.s.s in the front yard. So far he was winning the battle against the desert, his gra.s.s still green and his flowers blooming as we pulled up.

"I'll text you when I wake up," I told him, walking the scant distance to my house.

I punched in my alarm code. I had splurged and purchased the best security system I could afford. It was important that my house feel like a safe place for me, so the peace of mind the system brought me was well worth the cost of it.

I unlocked the gated door, and the two locks on the actual door. I did the same routine on the other side, padding to the inside security panel and punching in my code.

I had thirty seconds to get the code in before an automatic alarm went off and the security dispatch station would give me a call, and put out a call to law enforcement. I had made the timer particularly short because it made me feel more secure.

I headed back into my bedroom, satisfied that the house was secure for my nap.

The last few days had been overwhelming. I barely got undressed before I was laying on my bed, and asleep in an instant.

I awoke in a near stupor, bleary eyes taking long moments to read my bedside clock. That couldn't be right, I thought. It was showing 3:44 p.m. I had crashed just before 10 a.m, with the intention to sleep for two hours. Dammit. I'd forgotten to set an alarm.

I was digging my phone out almost immediately, texting Stephan.

Bianca: I'm so sorry. I overslept. Errands on monday?

He had responded by the time I was done in the bathroom.

Stephan: No worries. Monday sounds great. Got a hot date tonight?

Bianca: Seeing James. Not a date.

Stephan: Well, good luck, B. Let me know if you need anything. I'll see you in the morning.

Bianca: Kk. We r leaving at 5:45am in my car, right?

Stephan: Yep I set to work packing, and then re-packing my small flight bag for the DC turn in the morning.

A turn was when we flew somewhere, usually on the east coast for us, then turned around and came immediately back. It was the best way to work a lot of hours on our job, but it could easily be a fourteen hour or longer day if we had even a slight delay. This turn was a part of our set weekly schedule, but we often picked up extra turns on our days off to get overtime.

My mortgage was reasonable, and fit into my budget, but I was trying to replenish the savings I had depleted almost completely in order to put a down payment on my house, and then the extra costs of a few upgrades and repairs to the house.

It made me very nervous to live paycheck to paycheck, so I was quickly trying to rectify the situation. I would have three days total off for the week, and planned to pick up extra hours on at least one of them.

I hung the work clothes that I had uncharacteristically strewn all over the floor into a dry cleaning bag. I had many uniforms, but at least half of them needed a trip to the dry cleaner.

I gathered them up and put them in my car, planning to stop by on the way to James's house. We got a small dry cleaning allowance from the company. They wanted us to look polished on the job, but it didn't cover even half of the cost that I spent at the cleaners. Perhaps it was all of those extra hours I worked that wracked my dry cleaning bill up so high...

I showered and washed my hair. I shaved just about every part of my body, the actions giving me a feeling of antic.i.p.ation that they never had before. I always shaved my legs. But I'd never done it for a man before. I felt odd, so unlike myself.

I rubbed oil and then lotion into my skin, and left my hair to air dry. I could do some painting outside while it was wet. Las Vegas in the late spring was like nature's hair dryer.

I wore a baggy old teal-colored cotton sundress outside to paint. It was comfortable and I didn't really care if it got some paint on it, so I often wore it and several other threadbare dresses when I painted.

My backyard was small, but it had high walls. This made it fairly private, so I could wear what I wanted. I hadn't worn underwear. I often didn't if I was just puttering around the house by myself, but today it felt different.

I moved my easel around, and felt the brush of my b.r.e.a.s.t.s against my threadbare dress in a completely new way. It was like James could do foreplay without even being present. I was priming myself for him with no effort on his part. It wasn't fair for anyone to be that wickedly attractive. I kept picturing the way he had looked at me while he put that handkerchief to his face, brazenly inhaling it. I shivered at just the thought. I kept thinking about his spanking threats, as well. In fact, I thought of that the most.

Would he do that tonight? Would he spank me and then take my virginity? And tie me up? In what order? I squeezed my legs together just at the thought. The not knowing was a pull to me, even if it did frighten me.

If I was honest with myself, being frightened was a pull for me as well. I knew James could take me to some dark places, but I would find pleasure there, and I wanted that.

I had a board mounted with some watercolor paper that I had prepped before I left. I began to paint with an uncharacteristically short amount of prep. Usually I did a lot of sketching and planning, taking pictures and pinning them up. But today, I just painted. I knew exactly where to start.

I mixed some blue, a bright azure with a watery aquamarine and then added a touch of green. It didn't take long to mix exactly what I wanted, a vivid turquoise blue that I shaped into a pair of eyes that I couldn't get out of my head.

CHAPTER TWELVE.

Mr. Dominant I got caught up painting, and so lost track of time. When I noticed the time, I cursed. I was actually running late, which I never did. Now it had happened twice in two days.

That can't become a habit, I thought. It was h.e.l.l on my nerves.

I knew it wasn't a date, but I still had to take some time and care with my hair and makeup, lining my eyes with a soft brown, and putting a double layer of black mascara on my lashes. The effect was dramatic for a bit of makeup. I added a light gold shadow to my eyes, and stained my lips with a dusky red.

I smoothed my hair out, and left it down and straight.

I wore a short black dress with violet flowers splashed across it. It was a little transparent, not see-through enough to need a slip underneath, just enough to hint at the figure beneath. It was sleeveless, with a scoop neck that showed more cleavage than I usually preferred.

The thin black lace bra I chose clearly outlined my nipples. I wouldn't normally pair the two together, but it seemed appropriate for a night like this.

I found one of my lacy thongs that matched the flowers on my dress. Someone would probably be seeing my panties tonight, so why not have them match?

As I studied my reflection in the mirror, I reached a hand up, gripping my breast, ma.s.saging it and plucking at the nipple until it showed clearly through the thin dress.

What am I doing? I wondered, even as I inched my dress up to my hips, running a finger inside my panties. I'm late, I thought, but even so, began stroking myself.

My phone rang, and it startled me out of my strange little trance. I answered in a breathless voice. "h.e.l.lo?"

"Where are you?" James's voice bit at me with no preamble. He sounded harsh, almost angry.

I looked at the clock. It was 5:49 p.m. I was supposed to be at his house in eleven minutes.

"I was just about to head out. I'll be there in about twenty minutes, if I don't make any wrong turns."

"What's going on? You sound strange. And you're going to be late. This is one of many reasons why I wanted to send a driver."

"I'll be right there." I had started stroking myself again, the sound of his voice turning me on, even angry, perhaps because of that.

"What are you doing? Why do you sound so breathless?" he asked, his own voice changing to a purr.

Oh G.o.d, I thought, he knows what I'm doing. "Nothing," I told him, but I hadn't stopped.

"Are you touching yourself?" The purr had an edge to it now.

"No," I said, because I just couldn't admit it, even though I couldn't stop. What came over me when I got into this man's...o...b..t?

"Do you remember what I said I'd do to you if you lied to me? I believe that's three times now. Don't make yourself come. Your c.u.n.t is mine, and so is your pleasure. You're not allowed to come unless I say so."

I just moaned.

This time his voice barked at me. "If you don't get into your car this second, I'm coming there, and then I won't let you come for hours."

I was obeying, letting my dress drop and grabbing my purse, moving swiftly to my garage.

He didn't say another word, just hung up on me. I pulled up the GPS on my phone and started to drive.

There was almost no traffic, so I made it there in an even fifteen minutes.

As I pulled up to the ma.s.sive gates surrounding the palatial compound he called a house, they swung open immediately, then closed behind me.

I loved my car. It was a 2008 civic, a very reliable little car, and I'd gotten a great deal on it. But it sat out in the Vegas sun when I went on trips for several days a week, and the black paint job had become faded. I suddenly became conscious that a car like mine would stick out like a sore thumb in a place like this.

I tried to shrug it off. This affair was going to be brief and memorable, and I didn't need to waste a second of it worrying about our drastic lifestyle differences.

I parked as close as I could get to the elaborately carved front door in the ma.s.sive circular drive. There were no other cars in the driveway. I figured they were parked in the huge attached garage that seemed larger than my entire house.

The front door opened before I took even one of the steps that led up to it. I froze when I saw James.

He was shirtless, wearing just a pair of black athletic shorts with white stripes down the sides. His torso was a work of art, his golden skin ripped up by tight muscles along every inch of it's long, lean length. I couldn't see a hint of hair on it, and I had a feeling it wasn't from waxing.

His shorts hung dangerously low on his lean hips. His hips and his s.e.xy pelvic muscles stuck out starkly, shaped into a defined V, and I wanted to lick every inch of him. His shorts were baggy, and the shadows weren't in my favor, so I couldn't make anything else out below that but knees, calves, and feet. Even those were spectacularly s.e.xy, long, with starkly defined muscles running along his calves.

"Get in here," he said by way of greeting, his voice gravelly and rough. I'd been standing and just ogling him for a good five minutes.

I obeyed, just brushing past him. He sucked in a harsh breath at our almost contact.

"I had dinner ready, but that's going to have to wait. You're a little minx, you know that?"

I didn't know that, so I just shook my head, looking around at his intimidating entryway.

I sooo don't belong here, was my first thought, as I eyed up all the marble floors and clean columns, and the double stairway leading to the second floor. It was beautifully decorated in desert colors, with heavy, expensive looking vases and artwork.

"I gave my entire staff the night off, so we're quite alone," he told me, as though that was my concern. The thought of his staff hadn't even occurred to me.

I walked up to one of the stairways, running a finger along the heavy dark wood of the rail. The room had the feel of a modern twist on a southwestern decor theme. It was tasteful and lovely, but I just felt overwhelmed.

I didn't like the idea of being with someone this rich. Someone who I had nothing in common with. I forgot for a second what I was even doing there.

James stepped up behind me, not touching, but unbearably close, and I remembered then. Oh yeah, that.

"Where's your bedroom?" I asked bluntly. Perhaps it would be less intimidating than what I had seen so far. I highly doubted it.

A strong hand fell on my nape, squeezing, then ma.s.saging. I leaned into the contact. Even his simplest touch was pleasurable.

He grabbed my hair there, pulling the strands together into a ponytail. He used it like a handle. Or a leash. He pulled me, not ungently, up the stairs by it. My chin lifted up with his handling. It was firm and controlling, but with no pain. Yet.

We pa.s.sed by eight doors in the long hallway to his bedroom. His room was on the very end, the door already opened.

He took me just inside of it, stopping to let me take it all in.

The room was softly lit and colossal. Double doors opened into a well lit bathroom on the opposite side of the room. The walls were a medium taupe, the colors themed to the desert, similar to the rest of what I'd seen of the house.

His bed was ma.s.sive. I'd never seen a bed like that. It had to have been custom made. It had a ma.s.sive four poster frame, made up of heavy dark wood that was intricately carved and nearly reached the high ceiling.

It was topped by a heavy, latticed top of the same wood. It was patterned and carved into a piece of art. It was beautiful and frightening. It was a bed made for beauty and pleasure. And bondage and pain.

I picked out the more alarming little details slowly, as I took in the entire ma.s.sive bedroom. Restraints were hanging, attached to the latticed top. And more were fastened to the posters themselves, laid out neatly against the crisp white sheets.

"Are those ropes?" I asked in a breathless voice. There was some kind of cushioned ramp in the middle of the bed, in a sandy beige that matched the carpet. I wasn't sure what it was for.

"Yes," he answered, and didn't elaborate.