Bartered Desire: The Billionaire’s Wife, Part 4

Ava Lore

Copyright 2012 Ava Lore

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This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons either living or dead is purely coincidental.

Bartered Desire: The Billionaire's Wife

by

Ava Lore

Part IV

I couldn't breathe, couldn't think. Anton's hands were all over me, and the corset cinched around my waist made it impossible to draw air. I saw stars as he half-removed, half-ripped the wedding dress from my body, revealing my bared breasts and soaked panties. His hot mouth descended on my throat, his teeth sharp at my jugular. For a wild, oxygen-deprived moment, I wondered if I'd married a secret vampire, and he was now going to devour my virgin flesh. Except I wasn't a virgin. Well, except for my ass, and judging by the way his hands were massaging it he was quite interested in ensuring that I didn't remain virginal there for very long.

The thought landed in my brain like a meteor, sending shock waves through me as he scraped his teeth against my collarbone and then retreated until he was kneeling on the floor of the limo beside where I reclined on the seat. Reaching out, he gripped my chin in his hand, gently, but with hidden steel behind it. Heated green eyes stared into mine.

“I'm going to fuck you now,” he said. “And you are going to scream.”

I licked my lips and nodded. There was really nothing for me to say. He already knew how to make me scream, and I wanted his cock snug inside my pussy so badly that I would have done anything for it.

“Turn over.”

Swallowing hard, I did so. Rough hands gripped my hips and slid me over the soft leather of the seat until I was kneeling next to him, bent over the cushions. The dress I'd worn, much worse for the wear, hung around my waist. I still wore my stockings and panties. The little bullet-shaped vibrator he'd used to drive me to orgasm during our wedding ceremony still snuggled against my clit, and the mile-high satin stilettos remained on my feet. I wanted to reach back and remove them, but I didn't dare move without his permission. I didn't want to give him any excuse not to fuck me.

He ran a hand over my ass, as though judging a fine horse or a dog. It made me feel reduced, but also deliciously vulnerable. Anton Waters was going to fuck me, and there was nothing I could do about it except, perhaps, say no. And maybe not even then. The abdication of responsibility was almost freeing.

Fingers moved my soaking panties aside, and the little vibrator fell to the floor of the limo with a thump. I found myself sad that it was gone. It had been good to me. Then Anton placed a thumb at the slick entrance of my pussy and my whole body quivered with anticipation.

“You are so ready,” he whispered. “I'm glad.” Then he placed his other thumb on the other side of my cunt and began to part my slick lips, exposing my tight, aching channel to his gaze. I swallowed and let my forehead fall to the seat, struggling to stay still as the limo picked up speed beneath me.

His thumbs dipped farther inside, spreading me insistently, leaving a gaping emptiness inside me that I needed to fill. Slowly he ran his thumbs over my inner walls, giving me pressure, but not fulfillment.

I bit my lip and tasted blood.

Then his thumbs slid up and began to coat the tight entrance of my ass with the juices of my pussy.

I wanted to cry. Just fuck me, fuck me in the cunt! I wanted to scream, but I forced myself to be silent. If he knew how much I wanted it, he wouldn't. I knew that as surely as I knew my own name.

As though reading my mind, Anton chuckled. “Don't worry, dear,” he said, his words a mockery of our relationship, “I will not leave this sweet little cunt wanting any longer.”

I heard him moving behind me. A drawer opened and shut. Champagne? Now? God, if he didn't mount me in the next five seconds it would be hard for me not to turn the tables on him again, the way I'd tackled him and sucked his cock dry in the dressing room back in New York...

Then the memory of his face afterward—full of fear and loss, devastated and abandoned—rose up and ruthlessly quelled the impulse.

No. No, I couldn't. I couldn't be responsible for that look. Not on his face. Not on anyone's face. Never again.

Then something smooth and rounded was pressing against the tight hole of my ass, and thought fled.

“What are you doing?” I groaned, lifting my head and trying to turn to see what he had in his hand, but before I could, he wound up and smacked my ass hard enough to make me cry out.

“No peeking,” he said, sounding amused. The swollen lips of my labia smarted with the impact, but when his soothing fingers returned to my pussy the pleasure somehow felt even better. The object poised against my puckered entrance pushed forward, and I was surprised at how easily and eagerly I parted before it.

Panting, I let it enter me. It was bigger than I'd thought, stretching me out, a long, aching scrape against tight inner walls. Wider and wider it went, and I gasped and forced myself to relax around it. All the while, Anton played with my pussy, tickling my clit, stroking my slippery folds. Stars spun across my vision as I tried to get enough air, but the corset held me fast, and all I could do was lie helplessly against the seat of the limo, my hands clenched into fists, my forehead plastered to the leather with my own sweat.

Without warning, the thing in my ass suddenly seemed to slip past the tight ring of muscle, and my body closed around it. An anal plug. Of course. It filled me up—even if it wasn't quite where I wanted to be filled—and I squirmed with need. Without even knowing it, my hands drifted down my body. My breasts lay heavy on the seat, my taut nipples rubbing over the leather and sending shivers down my arms. My fingers crept down over my stomach until I found my clit and began to massage it.

I didn't get very far.

Anton's heavy hand came down on my ass again, and I yelped. He clucked at me, like a teacher scolding me. “Felicia, my bride, I said that I would fuck you. I will decide when you come.” And he reached down and grabbed my wrists.

Too aroused to protest, I let him wrench my arms behind me. Easily he held me in the grip of one hand, but I wasn't inclined to fight him. The sound of the drawer opening came again, and I wondered, in the part of my head that wasn't starved for sex or air, what kind of kinky dungeon limo this was. Did this stuff come standard for bondage fetishists? Or did Anton have it specially made?

I felt the unmistakable caress of leather on my fingers and I knew exactly what he was going to do. I'd seen it when I'd looked up some of the terms of his contract on the internet. I licked my lips and held my breath.

Gently he worked a long, thin leather sleeve over my hand, past my wrist, up my arm. Then he put another sleeve over my other hand. The material warmed with the heat of my own skin. When they had reached as far up my arm as they would go, he pulled my arms together and fastened them to each other with leather straps, securing them in place. I was now helplessly immobile. My pussy burned with need and arousal.

Anton's hand slipped over the lips of my labia. “You're so wet for me,” he said. “Do you really want me that much?”

It seemed impossible that he could think otherwise. “Yes,” I said. “Yes, I do.”

“Tell me.”

He seemed to love it when I talked dirty.

“I want your cock in my cunt,” I said. “I want you to fuck me until I can't walk.”

To my shock, he spanked me. Hard.

“No,” he said, and his hand smoothed over my ass again. My filled ass and empty cunt both quivered at his touch. “Tell me that you want me.”

But how can I? I wondered. I don't even know you.

One finger entered my pussy and I clenched around it, whimpering.

“Tell me, Felicia.”

I grappled for coherent thought as his finger slowly began to pump, in and out, in and out.

“I want you, Anton,” I said at last. “I want you. Please. Don't...” I couldn't think of what he might want me to say. “I want you to fuck me.”

A second finger entered me, and I collapsed completely against the seat. The limo went over a bump, and Anton reached out to steady me. Then I realized what he must be thinking.

“I want you to catch me,” I said. “I want you to hold me up and hold me down. I want to talk to you about dumb shit while you try to read your quarterly earnings report.”

He laughed, and I heard the surprise in his voice.

“I want to learn what you like. What you want.”

“Yes,” he said after a moment. “I'd like that, too.”

And though he didn't say anything about learning what I wanted, he seemed to know that already.

His fingers retreated and I heard his clothes rustling, shifting, unzipping.

Then the soft head of his cock was pressed against my slick folds, and I almost cried with happiness as he slowly, inexorably, pushed forward.

My body parted for him like it had never done for any other man. All his teasing, all the terrible, terrifying, mind-blowing orgasms he'd given me, all of them had prepared me for him like nothing else could have. I felt every millimeter of his cock as he filled me, each vein and ridge as he slid inside.

“Anton,” I panted, and then he was fully seated in me.

I felt him from the inside out. His flesh burned inside me, and I wanted nothing more than for him to ride me until I couldn't walk, make me come until I couldn't even feel any more. The hem of his shirt brushed against my ass and I felt the fine fabric of his tuxedo pants grazing my thighs. His balls tickled my clit as he gave his hips an experimental rotation, grinding against me, and I moaned and shuddered.

“You are very beautiful, Felicia,” he said. “I am glad you married me.”

Then he started to fuck me.

It was torture. Sweet, delicious torture, but torture all the same. His cock filled my pussy and the plug filled my ass, but the way he moved was so slow, so lazy and unhurried that I wanted to scream in frustration. And I would have, too, if it hadn't been for the fact that he angled his cock downwards and with each thrust he rubbed over something inside me that set me alight, something I had never felt before. With every long, drawn-out push of his cock he speared it, and each push sent stars pinwheeling across my field of vision.

Sweat broke out all over my body. My toes curled. Something opened inside me, falling to pieces with every nudge of his hips.

I saw nothing but stars. I heard nothing but my own cries and Anton's ragged panting behind me. My arms and shoulders ached, my knees rubbed raw against the floor as he fucked me. Every time he pressed into me, he sent me one step further toward the edge. I could feel the great howling void just a few steps beyond my reach, and fear scrabbled at the back of my brain. If he pushed me over, I would fall. I would disappear, swallowed up by it. I would cease to exist.

And yet I wanted it.

“Please,” I begged him begged the universe. “Please, I... I don't... I'm going to...”

He leaned over me. His hard chest and firm abs pressed against my bound arms, twisting them into an even more painful position, but all that did was make the pleasure of his erection moving inside me even more acute.

His arms came around me, his hands grasping my shoulders. Gently he began to massage the muscles there, and kisses fell on my back, soft and caressing.

“Felicia,” he said softly. “You are going to come.”

I didn't want to. I can't say why, but it seemed to me in that moment that if I fell from the cliff in front of me and coming closer with every thrust, that I would change forever. Become another person. Pleasure loomed, threatening to transform me. But all I could say was: “Please.”

One hand left my shoulder and moved down my back, dragging a shudder of need in its wake. In my ass, I felt the pressure of the plug he'd placed in me increase as he pressed on the base, moving it inside me.

I couldn't take it. Moaning, I squirmed. I felt like my whole body existed only to squeeze down on his cock. I flexed my inner muscles as he pressed against the base of the plug, letting it slide over my inner walls. I knew he could feel it from the other side. I could feel his cock and the plug reaching for each other as his thrusting picked up pace. My forehead, slippery with sweat, slid easily over the leather seat. My arms were on fire. My pussy filled, tightened.

“Fuck me,” I muttered, and I couldn't tell if it was a command or a curse. “Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me—”

His other hand dipped between my legs and found my clit.

“You are going to come for me,” he whispered fiercely, and I heard need and desire and something else in his voice, but I was too far gone to understand what it was. “You are going to come for me in five thrusts.” His thumb and forefinger went around my clit, and I shivered and writhed as he pinched me. I wanted to cry. I wanted to die. And all the while his cock pumped me, plundered me, turned me inside out.

“One,” he said, and thrust. I felt it in my curling toes. His fingers on my clit began to pump, moving the loose skin over it, as though he were stroking me off. He withdrew.

“Two.” He thrust again. I felt it in my arching back. He slicked my clit with my juices, then flicked the tiny, exposed nub. I shrieked. He withdrew.

“Three.” Another thrust. I felt it in my laboring lungs. His fingers circled my clit. He pressed the plug into my ass. I couldn't breathe. He withdrew.

“Four.” He thrust so deeply, I thought I could taste him. My clit was on fire, a slippery, aching point. My pussy quivered around his cock. I shut my eyes, and the emptiness in front of me loomed, just beyond my reach.

“Five,” he whispered, and his cock shoved me over the edge with one last push.

My throat closed around a scream as every muscle in my body contracted. There was nowhere to run, nowhere to hide from it, and I was falling, coming, so hard and so violently it was pain. Pain and release. My pussy clenched around his cock as I bucked wildly beneath him, forced to feel a terrifying pleasure from which there could be no fleeing.

“Yes,” he hissed, his voice fierce, and in my throes he came, shooting his load in hot, sticky spurts inside me as his hips twisted and twitched, out of control. Then he bent and covered my body with his and we both cried out with the force of our pleasure.

His hands crushed me against him until, after an eternity, the raging storm seemed to pass us over, leaving us exhausted and marooned, trying to catch our breath. After a while—I couldn't say how long—he slipped out of me, his erection softening.

Cum dripped out of my pussy and down my leg, and I groaned as he slid the anal plug from my ass. Then he undid the bonds holding my arms, his touch almost tender, and I let the sleeves fall from my arms. Cool air hit my skin and I breathed a sigh of relief as, at last, I let myself slide down and sit on the floor of the limo. The vibrations coming up from the road were almost too much for my hypersensitive flesh, but I found that if I rolled to one side, letting my hip rest on the floor, that I could endure it without too much danger of coming again, though the corset bit into my waist and made it even harder to breathe.

My body was exhausted. My brain was numb. Distantly I wondered how I was going to get out of the limo, considering my state of dishabille and the fact that I didn't think I had any other clothes with me. Maybe someone had kindly packed up the clothes I'd left folded in the dressing room? Sure. Why not? I'd go with that and hope it was true, because though the thought of stepping out of Anton Waters' limo in a ripped wedding dress was arousing, I'd almost had enough arousal for one day.

Without warning, the pressure around my ribcage eased, and I looked back, startled, to see Anton kneeling behind me, undoing the corset.

Oxygen rushed into my lungs, and it was such a relief I wanted to cry.

Strong arms snaked around me and lifted me up, placing me gently on the seat. I could barely stay awake, let alone haughtily tell him I was a big girl and could get up all by myself, thank you. My body was no longer under my control. My limbs were noodles and I could only passively observe what was happening to me, as though I had been drugged. Perhaps I had. By sex. Maybe Anton had a cock that squirted heroin. A magical cock.

I was feeling a bit delirious by now, so I barely registered when Anton sat down next to me, then pulled me against him in a comforting embrace. Reaching up, he began to run his fingers through my hair, and I shivered. My skin was bare, and my pussy was leaking his cum all over the seat and the dress still hanging around my waist in tatters. I suddenly felt cold, and snuggled into him. His fingers paused in their slow stroking, then started again. He rubbed his other hand over my arms, then gently placed me back on the seat. I protested feebly at his withdrawal.

“Don't worry,” he said, and his shaking voice was like sandpaper over raw nerves. It made me squirm, and it wasn't all pleasant. He must have seen how I was feeling because he didn't say anything more, simply reached behind him and opened the door I had heard him open while we fucked. The sound triggered a strange sensation in me and I inhaled sharply, not knowing what to do with this new information. Swallowing, I tried to focus on him.

Piercing green eyes studied me, gauging my reactions. I saw there was a hidden panel behind the limo's front seat where he had stored all his toys. Reaching in, he pulled out a blanket and what appeared to be a candy bar. I didn't even want to know what horrible orifices he was thinking of putting that candy bar in.

As it turned out, he was only concerned with putting it into my mouth. After swaddling me in the blanket—a luxurious, warm, fuzzy thing that almost swallowed me whole—he unwrapped the candy bar and broke off a piece. Gently he coaxed my mouth open and placed the piece on my tongue with trembling fingers, like a sinful sacrament. Then he closed my jaw and resumed his seat beside me, his arms falling around me and pulling me close. He planted a soft kiss on my hair.

We stayed like that for a while: Anton feeding me chocolate and occasionally kissing the top of my head, and me floating in a strange, indefinable state that I'd never felt before.

Finally the limo slowed, then jerked to a stop, and I roused myself enough to look out the window. We were in an underground parking garage. There was no natural light, and that was fine with me. I didn't want anyone to see what I must look like.

“How are you feeling, Felicia?”

His warm voice startled me, but this time it didn't hurt. For a moment I pondered the question, probing my brain and finding it, surprisingly, intact.

“I... I think I'm okay,” I said, turning to him. “That was, uh... really intense.”

He smiled at me, though it was hollow and strange and didn't quite reach his eyes, and I had the strangest sensation of falling, as though I were seeing an entirely different Anton Waters than the one I knew. Admittedly, I didn't really know him, but it was a startling experience. It only lasted for a moment, though, because I looked away.

“You entered a place we like to call subspace,” he told me, and I realized his voice was still shaking, as though he were nervous. I gave him a sidelong glance and tried to assess his mental state, but I didn't know him well enough to read him.

“Who calls it that?” I asked him.

He shrugged. “The BDSM community,” he replied. His voice was stronger now, more sure. “I am surprised it happened.”

I'd read about the toys he wanted to use—hell, they were meticulously detailed in our prenuptial agreement—but I hadn't read about anything that sounded like 'subspace.' “What's that?”

He shrugged. “It is simply a state of incoherence and abandon.” His brow furrowed. “You were able to lose yourself.”

Yeah, that felt about right.

Next to me, Anton stood up. Thankfully I was able to stay relatively upright and snuggled further into the blanket.

As it turned out, someone had packaged up my old clothes for me, and Anton retrieved them and helped me put them on, though it was probably like threading a spaghetti noodle through the eye of a needle for the most part. Then we got out of the limo together and walked—me with shaking legs and him mostly holding me up—to a private elevator. I leaned on him as we ascended, and when the elevator doors dinged I was about ready to go to sleep on my feet.

Anton half-carried me through the sumptuously appointed penthouse suite, which was nice enough that I was actually able to notice it as I stumbled through it on my way to bed. Gold and cream covered every surface, and floor-to-ceiling windows looked out onto the strip drenched in the syrupy golden light of the setting desert sun.

Then we were in the bedroom and Anton was undressing me with warm, tender hands, and I could only let him, the soft pleasure of his touch radiating out over my fatigued body. When at last I was completely nude, he laid me down in the bed and coaxed me to drink a few sips of water before I let myself sink into the pillow, which was soft and white as a cloud. Less damp, though.

The last thing I remembered was Anton slipping a blanket that radiated warmth under the covers with me and smoothing the hair back from my forehead. Then I was asleep.

*

At precisely midnight I snapped awake. My whole body hummed with energy, though my brain was a little behind the times. I had to force myself to survey the room and remember where I was.

In Vegas, I thought. In Anton Waters' private suite. And you're married to him.

Congratulations.

Licking my lips, I sat up and the soft comforter fell away from me. Beside me, a body shifted, and I started.

Looking down, I was barely able to make out Anton's form in the dark. He was bare-chested and fast asleep, and though I sort of wanted to study that incredible physique a little longer, what I really wanted to do was take a piss.

Yeah, I know. Romantic, right? Great wedding night.

Slipping out of the bed, I tiptoed quickly across the floor. My eyes were adjusting quickly to the light, and I managed to find the door that led out of the room and into the living area.

It wasn't quite as impressive in the dark, but the view of the strip was better. Lights twinkled and danced outside the window, and I had to repress the urge to go stare at them. I had to find a bathroom, fast.

I winched my legs in and danced around the room, my eyes darting this way and that, trying to find a door that might maybe have led to a bathroom. My only comfort was that if I did pee all over Anton's floor, at least it was marble and easily cleaned up. I'd have been in real trouble if it was carpeted. At last I found a door next to the kitchen and wrenched it open, thanking the heavens when it revealed a lovely little half-bath. I dove inside and sat down.

As the relief of finally being able to, well, relieve myself washed over me, I found less worldly concerns begin to rise up and come to the fore.

Such as... well, what now?

I was now married to Anton Waters. I was now his wife, and I still didn't really know anything about him. Except that he had a seemingly magical cock that could make me do anything he wanted. That was not a good thought to have. Reaching down, I wiped myself, and felt the residue of our fuck-session in the limo. Yuck. I needed a shower. A hot shower. And I needed to talk to someone.

I flushed, washed my hands, and exited the bathroom. In the light of the strip, the suite was illuminated, if not as bright as day then at least to the brightness of a full moon. Squinting, I poked my way around, hoping against hope that someone had given me more than three seconds' thought and brought my purse up. At last I spotted it on the kitchen counter, snugged into a corner and looking very out of place on the fine granite. Digging inside it I sighed with relief when I found my phone.

I flipped it on and found it still had quite a bit of battery left. I hightailed it back to the half-bath, shut the door, and called Sadie.

She picked up on the third ring.

“Hey, girl,” she drawled. “How'd dress shopping go?”

“I'm married,” I blurted.

She didn't answer for a moment. Then: “What?”

“I'm married,” I repeated.

“What?”

“Married, Sadie. Married.”

“I fucking heard you the first time!” she snapped. “What I want to know is... What? And... like, how?”

“I don't know,” I snapped back. “It's all kind of a blur.”

“Jesus fuck, Lis. When I said you needed to get married in the next twenty-four hours before I drunk-blabbed it, I didn't fucking mean it.”

“Well it wasn't my idea,” I said, and I briefly outlined the sequence of events that had led to a sudden elopement in Vegas.

“So what you're saying is you gave him a blowjob so amazing that he had to marry you right then and there?” Sadie asked when I was done.

“No!” Memories of Anton's traumatized face flashed across my mind and I shuddered. “No, nothing like that. It was like a spur of the moment thing, I guess.”

“I guess,” she said. “You didn't tell me you were sleeping with him already.”

“I'm not,” I said. “I mean, I wasn't. I... shit, I don't know. All I know is that he is super hot and we were kind of all over each other since the first day we met. But we didn't do, like, The Deed until after we were married.”

She started to laugh. “You waited to have sex until you were married?” she howled at me. “Oh my god, that's rich.”

“Shut up! It wasn't my choice,” I said. “I'd have fucked him five minutes after meeting him if he'd let me. And we've done other things.”

“You didn't tell me that before.”

“It didn't seem important.”

“You really are a ditz,” Sadie said. “Of course it's important. He's really into you. You don't think that's a big deal somehow? Like, I don't know, it might have an impact on your marriage?”

Okay, truthfully, I hadn't really thought it out that far. And it hadn't seemed like the sort of thing you needed for a stable marriage. Huge libidos, I had always thought, seemed like they were less likely to make a marriage work. Just look at my parents.

“I don't know if he's into me or just wants a wife,” I said.

“I thought you were going to talk to him about that or something.”

“I don't remember.”

“Shit.” I heard her sigh over the line. “You don't remember a lot. What, does his semen contain some kind of mind-altering drug?”

I hesitated. “Maaaaaaaaaaaaybe,” I said.

“Jesus. What time is it there?”

“Only midnight.”

“You'd better go wake him up,” she said. “You need to ask him why he wanted a wife in the first place.”

“But what if he drugs me with his cock again?” I asked nastily.

“Then bottle that shit up and sell it,” she said, and hung up. Sadie liked to hang up at dramatic points in conversations. She said it kept her life more like a Hollywood drama and less like a seedy, unfinished biopic. I said it was really fucking annoying, but what did I know? I was a ditz.

I shut my phone off and sat on the toilet seat for a moment, trying to gather my thoughts. When that didn't work, I resolved to have a shower. Showers always helped me think. Also I was extra gross.

But when I tiptoed back into our bedroom, I found myself slowing down and trying to decide what to do. If I took a shower in the bathroom that had to be around here somewhere, he was probably going to wake up and want to fuck me. And for the first time, I found myself not wanting that. The experience we shared in the limo was still too new, too raw and at the surface. I just wanted to take a shower and go back to sleep. So what turned men off from sex?

I smiled. Talking.

I scrambled into bed next to Anton and gave him a hard poke in the side.

He woke almost instantly, inhaling sharply and twitching out of sleep so violently that I almost felt bad for him. Almost. In the dim light, he turned and blinked at me.

“Felicia,” he said. “What's wrong?”

“Why did you want a wife?” I said.

He blinked again. “What?” he asked.

“I'm curious. I want to know why you wanted to marry someone you didn't even know?”

Sagging back into his pillow, Anton rubbed a hand over his face. “Felicia...” he said.

I knew that tone of voice. The worst tone. “Nuh-uh,” I told him. “You said you would listen to whatever I had to say.”

“Yes, but I never promised to answer your questions.”

Fuck. He was right. And there was nothing I could do about that, was there?

“Fuck you,” I said. “Eat a bag of dicks. I'm going to go take a shower.”

I barely heard him say, clearly amused, “How big of a bag?” because I'd finally spotted the bathroom over his shoulder on the other side of the bed. I scrambled out and stalked to it, not caring that I was naked. It was too dark to see much. I opened the door, switched on the light, and let the door slam behind me. Just so he knew he was dealing with a mature and measured person.

The bathroom was just as ridiculous as the rest of the suite. Shaded lamps on the walls softly illuminated granite counter tops and marble flooring. A huge tub sat next to the vanities, and an enormous glass shower stall that was probably the biggest pain in the ass to clean dominated one corner of the room. I made a beeline for it and turned the water on, making sure it was steaming hot before I stepped inside.

The jet of water hit my skin and I felt myself finally relaxing. Not relaxing as I had after the orgasm Anton had given me in the limo—that had been, looking back, an almost frightening experience—but as though I were finally centering. I reached out and grabbed the soap, and the scent of spearmint and rosemary tickled my nose. Gratefully, I began to scrub myself down, letting the hot water soothe my tense and aching muscles.

The sound of the door opening made me tense up again.

“Dammit!” I said, turning and glaring at Anton through the glass doors. “Can't I just have a shower in peace?”

He looked amused as he began to disrobe—a short task since he was only wearing a pair of silken boxers. “I thought you wanted to know why I wanted a wife?” he said.

I scowled at him and stuck my head under the shower spray. “I do,” I told him. “Are you going to tell me?”

He didn't reply, simply opened the shower stall and stepped in.

Of course. What a dick.

My haughty ire probably would have had more impact if I 'd been able to keep myself from snatching a peek at his naked body.

Yeah, I thought as I tried to keep my glance cursory, and what a dick it is.

I won't lie. Anton Waters had a very nice cock, and I kind of hated him for it. Even flaccid, it looked thick and meaty, just the kind of cock you'd want to play with and coax into standing at attention. Even for the few seconds I stared at it, it twitched at me.

Okay, maybe I stared at it for more than a few seconds. Can you blame me?

With a hmph, I turned away and started to lather my skin. In Vegas it was still warm, and I was coated in a lovely layer of slimy residue from sweating before—and during and after—the wedding. Turning the entire force of my attention to the task, I rubbed vigorously and tried to ignore Anton.

Which proved to be hard to do when he reached out and pried the soap from my fingers.

“Ass!” I told him. I whirled around and stared him straight in the eye. “I was using that!”

He smiled at me, that faint smile again, but this time I thought I detected a hint of teasing behind it. “Why do it yourself when it's so much fun for someone else to do it for you?” he replied, and began to soap me up.

I didn't stop him. I liked his hands too much, and besides, I was tired, and his hands were nice.

Gently he lathered his hands and began to run them over my body. Even if I hadn't been crazily addicted to the way he fucked me, I would have appreciated the gentle massage he gave. His fingers seemed to know exactly where to go and what to do when they got there.

Slowly, gently, he smoothed soapy circles over my skin, digging his fingertips into the fleshy parts of my muscles that he ran across, letting them grind together, then relax under his touch. First he traveled down my arms, then up my stomach. Unwanted warmth gathered in my core, but I studiously ignored it, forcing myself to breathe deeply and slowly as he worked his way up, skirting my breasts. His palms cupped my shoulders, and he watched me intently.

“I could eat you up,” he said, his voice low and husky.

I knew he could. He would swallow me alive if I let him. And the frightening thing was that a part of me did want him to consume me. I just wanted to fall into him and let him carry me, let him screw me into incoherence, and then I wouldn't have to think any more. I could just be.

But what would I be afterward? And what would he make me into, when I could no longer resist?

“Why did you want a wife?” I asked him. My voice was loud and flat in the shower stall. The sound of the falling water deafened me. “It seems like you could just marry anyone you wanted.”

“Of course I could,” he said. He seemed utterly fascinated by the way the water ran over my breasts. His big, warm palms slipped from my shoulders and migrated over my back while I tried not to melt. “It was simply cleaner this way.”

“Cleaner?”

He moved in, the heat of his body rolling from his skin. “Marriage is a legal contract,” he said. “I wanted a woman who would enter into it as such with me. I don't require love. Simply a companion. It seemed unfair to ask someone who wanted to fall in love to fulfill the role.”

That brought me up short, planting a wiggle of worry in my stomach. I did want to fall in love. Just not necessarily with him.

“But why?” I asked. “Why do you want a... a companion? You could find someone who was already into this stuff without all the song and dance, couldn't you?” I could tell I was pushing against some sort of barrier, one that he kept erected for a reason, but that I couldn't help but scratch at, like a barely healed wound.

His eyes hardened. “That is none of your business,” he said, and I quaked as the touch of his hands grew rougher. He reached down to my hip and grabbed a handful of flesh there, squeezing until I winced. Then he smacked me, lightly, and I felt the impact reverberate up my body, traveling up my torso to my breasts. They jiggled under his burning gaze.

“Let's make a deal,” I said. “I do things for you, and you talk to me.”

“Things?” he said. “What sort of things.”

Jeez. How the hell did I know? He was the experienced freak here. I was merely a freak-in-training. “Use your imagination,” I hazarded.

His mouth quirked. “I can already persuade you to do whatever I want, sexually.”

“Then maybe I could persuade you instead.”

He tilted his head, and wet dark locks fell against his forehead. “Interesting,” he said. “You want to try to turn the tables? Switch me from dom to sub?”

I shrugged. “How about this: if you don't reduce me to an incoherent mess of sloppy orgasms, I get to ask you whatever I want and you have to answer me. Truthfully.”

“What's in it for me?”

I smiled at him. “Someone to listen to you,” I told him. “And a happy wife. I've heard that's very important.”

Anton chuckled at that, then he pulled me to him and his mouth descended on mine.

Desire rose up in me, an inferno that I couldn't tamp down, no matter how I tried. It spread like wildfire over me, sweeping away my determination. My skin slipped and slid on his, our thighs, our chests, our arms and legs and cock and mound, all were smashed together in the hot, soapy steam. His kiss lifted me up as he nipped at my lips with his teeth, but somehow I found the strength to resist him. My pussy and ass were still aching from our earlier encounter, and I was tired.

He drew back and looked down at me. “Already attempting to bargain with me?” he asked.

Beneath his words I heard a knife balanced on edge, and I hastened to assure him this was not the case. “Not at all,” I said as he ran his hands down my sides. Somehow I was on my tiptoes, my arms around his neck. How did these things keep happening? “I'm just...”

His hands squeezed my backside, and I gasped, stumbling into him. His hardening erection slid against my abdomen.

“I still want to fuck your ass,” he said conversationally.

“Yes,” I said. “I... I think I want that, too.”

“Then turn around.”

It took all my strength, but I managed it. “N—no.”

He stilled. “What did you say?”

“You said I could say no,” I told him. “So... no.”

He seemed to think about this. “I did say that. What would you like to do instead?”

I sighed and let my forehead fall against his shoulder. “Sleep.”

I could feel the confusion radiating from him. “Sleep?” he said, as though it were a foreign word he'd never heard before. “You mean... sleep sleep?”

“Yeah. I'd like to get out, dry off, get in bed, and fall unconscious.”

He didn't say anything for a moment. “I don't suppose you'd let me fuck you while you're asleep, would you?” he said.

Indignant, I drew back, ready to give him a piece of my mind, and he laughed. “Relax, Felicia. I would never.”

“That's goddamn right. Which reminds me, shouldn't I have a safeword or something?”

His mouth twisted. “Yes, you should,” he said. “Especially given how you responded to me this afternoon. I've been very irresponsible not to give you one.”

I raised my eyebrows, waiting for him to bestow upon me the word that would keep me safe from whatever horrors he wanted to visit upon me.

He smiled. “How about... Jonathan?”

I made a face. “My dad's name? Ew. Ew, ew, ew. No, that's gross.” I gave him a little shove as he laughed at me again. “You are gross, Anton Waters.”

“I never claimed otherwise,” he told me. “Fine, you pick.”

I chewed my lip and absently drew away from him, letting the water cascade over me and wash the soap away. “How about... Trixie?”

This time it was Anton's turn to make a face. “Trixie?” he said. “What kind of name is that?”

“My first dog's name,” I said defensively.

“Well, it'll definitely stop me in my tracks,” he said. “Very well. Trixie it is.”

“Good,” I said, washed the last of the soap from my body, then pushed past him and got out.

“Where are you going?” he wanted to know.

“To sleep!” I told him, grabbing a towel and exiting the bathroom.

I was already snuggled in bed and half-dreaming when he slid under the covers with me. He reached out and pulled me to him. I didn't resist. Laying my cheek on his bare shoulder, I reveled in the warmth we shared and kept my eyes firmly shut. I wouldn't be tempted by the hard thighs pressed against mine. Not at all.

“I have to return to New York tomorrow,” he said after a moment. “I canceled meetings left and right to come here.”

“Hmm,” I said. Meetings. Boring.

“We'll need to make living arrangements,” he continued, and I heard an edge come into his voice, a bit of a strain. “I meant to discuss them with you before we wed, but...”

He trailed off. I was beginning to suspect that he was feeling a little embarrassed about his hasty decision to marry me without any kind of notice to anyone, let alone me. His need to control everything around him was a weakness, and I knew I could use it to find the answers I sought.

Anton cleared his throat. “Anyway, my schedule is packed tomorrow afternoon. I've arranged for an assistant to help you organize your things and plan out the next few weeks while we settle in.”

I saw an opening. “I actually have an assistant,” I said.

“You do?” He sounded amused.

“Yes. And by assistant, I mean a friend who needs a job.”

He was quiet. “Very well. I will give the job to your friend. Conditionally based on performance.”

Oooh, that would go over well with Sadie. “Done,” I said. Hey, she needed rent.

He continued. “And we'll talk about the honeymoon this weekend...”

My ears perked up at that. “Honeymoon?” I said. “Where?”

He ran his fingers through my hair. An affectionate gesture. I yawned. “Anywhere you like,” he said. He was starting to sound far away. “And I think we should still go shopping for your wedding boudoir.”

“Boudoir?” I mumbled.

“Yes. You'll need toys and things that are all your own.”

A fetish and sex toy shopping spree all for me. How romantic.

“Well,” I said, “I already liked that buttplug you used. We can keep that. There. That's one thing off the list.”

“You like it?” Anton said, and he sounded far away to my foggy brain. “We will keep it. Consider it one of my wedding presents to you.”

Who the fuck gives a buttplug to the wife they barely even know as a wedding present? I wanted to ask him, but I was too tired. Besides, I already knew the answer: Anton Waters did.

Anton Waters did a lot of strange things. And I wanted to know why.

But for now, I needed to sleep, so I drifted off, nestled against Anton's chest, listening to the beat of his heart.

I slept like a baby.

* * *

To be continued in Bartered Submission: The Billionaire's Wife, Part 5!

About the Author

Ava Lore was raised by wombats and lives to corrupt the innocent. When she's not writing erotic romance, she spends her time thinking about writing erotic romance and drinking enough iced coffee to kill a musk ox.

Discover more titles by Ava Lore at Amazon.com.

You can email Ava Lore at authoravalore@gmail.com. She yearns for your approval and always loves to hear from fans. Want more BBW? More Billionaires? More aliens? More menage? Something entirely different? Let her know!

Other Titles by Ava Lore

Maddy Takes a Memo (BBW Billionaire Menage Erotica)

Maddy Calls a Meeting (BBW Billionaire Menage Erotica)

The Billionaire's Wife (A Reluctant BDSM Erotic Romance):

Bartered Proposal: The Billionaire's Wife, Part 1

Bartered Seduction: The Billionaire's Wife, Part 2

Bartered Bride: The Billionaire's Wife, Part 3

Her Alien Abductor: Galactic Concubine, Part 1 (Alien Erotica)