A shiver. “Yes. God help me, yes.”
A half-step from begging, and the image of her undone, insensate with lust and need and a thousand other things, drove him over the edge. Jas jerked their hands over his shaft with a rough groan, riding the throb that centered on his dick but echoed through him.
He spurted on her face, the lush bow of her mouth and the pink flash of her tongue. She licked her lips as come dripped off her chin, and he milked his cock on her breasts, thrusting against the soft flesh and taut nipples.
Noelle swiped her fingertip over her chin and brought it to her mouth, lapping up the taste of him like she couldn’t get enough.
His ears ringing, Jas pulled the towel from across his shoulder and held it out to her. “When I can stand up again, I’ll walk you home. Keep your clever fingers out of your panties, though—no coming tonight.”
She blinked at him, clearly torn between disappointment and fascination. “Why not?”
“Because tomorrow you get your cuffs. Your first ink,” he explained. His gaze strayed past Noelle, over to where Ace had the fight groupie squirming on his lap, her hands tied behind her back. “Our resident tattoo artist has been dying to get you strapped in his chair. Dying to get his tongue in you too.”
Noelle blushed as she clutched the towel and shifted, rubbing her thighs together like she was trying to relieve arousal. “That would make the tattooing difficult, I’d think.”
“Your own reward,” Jas said softly. “Get through both tats and we’ll make it all better, honey. I promise.”
She rubbed the towel over her breasts in silence, shivering every time the fabric rasped over her nipples. “All right,” she whispered finally, casting the towel aside. She crawled up into Jasper’s lap, straddling his hips and pressing her tits to his chest. Her face went to his neck, nuzzled trustingly against his throat. “Tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow.”
Chapter Eight
Jasper hadn’t been exaggerating about the straps.
The odd chair had been adjusted to a mostly upright position with platforms stretched out on either side for her arms. As soon as she settled into place, Ace grinned and wrapped a thick leather strap over her elbow, tugging it tight before buckling it into place.
Restrained. She twisted a little, and Ace laughed and toyed with the second strap closer to her forearm. “What do you say, brother? Is she a squirmer?”
“You should know.” Jasper leaned against the open archway separating the room from the area of storage and machinery in the back. “You had a front-row seat to the show at Dallas’s party the other night.”
A snort, and Ace winked at her and took his time buckling the second strap. “Too bad Lex isn’t here to hold you down this time. You’ll have to settle for leather and steel.”
From the smug way he ogled her nipples as they poked against her thin top, it must have been obvious that the harsh bite of leather aroused her just fine. Noelle swallowed and tried to keep her voice casual. “I don’t mind it.”
“I bet you don’t, princess.” Ace dropped to a stool and jerked his head at Jasper. “Why don’t you take care of her other arm while I check out her bar code?”
Jas crossed his arms over his chest. “Afraid she’s gonna punch you in the head once you break out the needles?”
“Maybe.” Ace leaned forward and lowered his voice. “Jas is a real stubborn jackass, you know. Can’t tell him to do a damn thing without him deciding to do the opposite.”
Because he was a man who took orders from no one—except for Dallas. Jasper’s confidence was intoxicating in a world that seemed fluid, lawless. “I wouldn’t know,” she murmured, drinking in the sight of Jas with his muscular arms draped over his chest and his expression stern. “I don’t give him orders.”
He stepped forward and dragged his thumb down the inside of her elbow before beginning to buckle a strap. “Because you’re smart, honey. Ace doesn’t understand smart.”
Ace’s laughter drifted over her, but Noelle couldn’t look away from Jasper as he fixed her elbow in place. Helplessness had been her constant companion since she’d stumbled through the gates of Eden, but this wasn’t frightening. This was giving over control, putting herself in his hands, and it made helplessness her own choice.
She drew in a deep breath and wiggled against the seat. “What does Ace understand?”
“Sex. Simple control.” Jas pulled the strap taut. “The moment, but not what comes after it. After everyone comes down.”
Coming down had been the sweetest part of the previous night. Not that Jas had let her get off—she was still strung too tightly after no relief and a night of erotic dreams—but he’d stroked her and petted her as she eased away from the edge, turning the sharp scorch of frustration into a slow-burning promise.
Jasper moved to the second strap, and Ace swabbed something cool and wet over the inside of her wrist. She started to glance back at him, but a soft buzz filled the room as pain jabbed into her wrist.
It hurt. It hurt the same way as when her mother had pinched the inside of her arm in punishment for using unladylike words, vicious little twists that left her bruised under her prim, long-sleeved blouses. Noelle clenched her free hand into a fist and dug her teeth into her lower lip, remembering Jasper’s words.
A reward. All she had to do was endure the pain.
Jas stroked her brow, trailed his fingertips over her temple and into her hair. “Filling in the bar code will probably hurt the worst.” His voice was low, even. “But it’s all you have to do today. If he finishes and you want to go for the full cuffs, that’s okay. But you don’t have to, not yet.”
Slow breaths. She snuck a peek at Ace, but watching the needle stab into her skin made her woozy, so she turned back to Jasper, leaning into his touch. “Dallas is okay with me having the cuffs?” Surely it couldn’t have been a week already, though the days and nights blurred together in a haze of liquor, smoke, and sex.
“He changed his mind about the wait.” Jas smiled. “My guess? You were right, and Lex went to bat for you. He doesn’t tell her no.”
No, he didn’t seem to. Noelle closed her eyes as the spot where the needle pierced her wrist began to burn. “Tell me what they mean. What will happen if I take them.”
“It’s O’Kane ink. Once you have it, you are the gang. Anyone hurts you, they hurt all of us. They hassle you? They answer to everyone.”
Ace swiped at her wrist again. The burning worsened, but the pain melted somehow between her arm and her brain. Her heart beat faster as he spoke, his words drifting over the hum of the needles. “You’d be one of us, princess. Everything you need taken care of, as long as you put the gang first.”
“I can do that,” she whispered, pressing her thighs together. God, being touched was supposed to be the reward. What would Jasper think if he pried her knees apart and found her aroused?
“You’ll belong to Dallas, same as we all do.” Jas stroked the inside of her unmarked wrist. “Then, when you’re ready, you can belong to someone else in a different way.”
She’d met a girl in the bar who wore ink like a collar around her throat. Anyone who looked at her knew she was taken. A more primal version of the wedding bands worn in Eden, but with the same significance. A woman belonged to her partner.
At least out here, the men seemed wary of pissing off their women.
Ace started another line, and Noelle sank her teeth into her lower lip as the pain intensified, and the pleasure along with it.
Jas gently freed her lip from the bite of her teeth and licked it. “Getting better?”
Every bit of warmth rushed to her center, as if his tongue had granted her permission to feel. She moaned and arched as much as she could, and the leather straps digging into her arms only made it more delicious. “Yes,” she whimpered, finally understanding Rachel’s words.