‘You told him I was your girl,’ I mention, plugging in the coffee machine.
‘What you say?’
‘The security guy. You said, “Stay away from my girl.”’ My efforts to replicate Dimitri’s accent are only partially successful.
‘You want him to try again?’
‘Do you think he would?’
‘Not now. Not if he thinks I am your boyfriend. He fears me.’ Dimitri says this with a casual air, as if it’s perfectly normal for thugs of brick shithouse build to cower before him.
‘I see. Well, thanks. Actually, yeah, thanks for all of that. I should have said that before. Head’s not quite straight yet. Not that I needed saving or anything. I could quite easily have whacked him in the groin with my paperweight.’
Except that wouldn’t have occurred to me, in my creeping panic.
Dimitri humphs and scoops coffee into the filter, not dignifying my pathetic bravado with an answer.
‘That’s going to be quite strong.’
‘Uh-huh. Strong coffee. What we need, right?’
‘What’s the question?’
‘Question?’
‘You said you came back here to ask me a question.’
He turns and leans on the counter, primping his moustache so that the ends are perfectly symmetrical. ‘If I want to be professional dom, I need to practise,’ he says.
‘Oh, that.’ I still think he’s barking up the wrong tree. Surely there aren’t that many people who would pay for a bloke to abuse them?
‘I will like to practise with you,’ he says.
I bite my lip and watch the first few drips of coffee fall into the jug. ‘Practise … When you say practise, you mean …?’
‘You submit to me, right? I do all that whips and bondage on you. Maybe other activity too, is up to you.’
‘I thought you said you’d had all these kinky girlfriends. Didn’t you learn anything from them?’
‘Ah, I say that for benefit of that vampire man. I never have a kinky girlfriend.’
‘Oh.’
‘So, you are interested? If not, is fine, I can ask the Trixietots.’
‘No, no, no. No need. No. Don’t do that.’
He smiles, a kind of evilly triumphant smile. ‘I knew that will work,’ he says. Those piercingly keen eyes crinkle, lasering into my soul.
I clatter the coffee cups crossly. ‘I’m not jealous, if that’s what you’re thinking.’
‘Yes you are.’
‘What makes you think that?’
‘Come here and I show you.’
My wrists, suddenly limp, can’t deal with the coffee cups any more. I glance over at him, guarded but strung taut with excitement.
‘Come on,’ he repeats, with a tilt of the head. ‘Over here, Rosie.’
It reminds me of that blurry, swoony moment before he spanked me. My pussy reacts accordingly. The command in his voice lures me to him; as soon as I am within reach, he places me between his feet and laces his fingers together around my waist.
‘I think you are attracted to me,’ he says in a low-down whisper that tickles my ear and, correspondingly, my crotch. ‘You know why?’
‘Go on.’ I try to keep a sardonic edge in my tone, but the tremble betrays me. ‘Enlighten me.’
‘Because a girl who lets a man do this …’ He unlaces his fingers and pats my bottom, gently, but providing such a potent reminder of what happened earlier that my knees buckle. He pulls me in tighter, keeping me upright in arms that imprison as well as support. ‘Really wants him to do this.’
His moustache prickles my upper lip and our noses rub together. He is giving me plenty of time to say no, plenty of time to duck back or sideswipe. I’m not doing any of it.
‘Do what?’ I whisper.
His answer heats my lips. ‘This.’
And we kiss. I put my hands in his hair, his bushy thick mane of dark-brown hair and sink my fingers into the richness. His mouth is hot and soft at first, then more demanding, his tongue forging through to tangle with mine. When his hand slips up inside my top, I feel the cold metal of his bangles chill my skin and I wriggle a little against him, causing him to hold me firmly with a hand on my back until I am still and his travels continue. The fabric of my top rises with each new incursion until it bunches just beneath my bra and both of Dimitri’s hands are planted on the exposed portion of my back.
He gives my lower lip a tiny nip and breaks the kiss.
‘We can lose this,’ he says, shoving the top up, over my breasts and up my arms, which I raise without question.
He kisses my mouth once more, fulsomely, then lowers his head so that his lips graze the side of my neck, turning it to gooseflesh. His palms rise to cup my breasts in the accursedly boring workday bra I am wearing. He moans onto my neck, a low keen of lust, and flicks his tongue out to wet my skin. My nipples struggle against the stout cotton, pushing themselves out for his fingers’ attention, which is readily given. I rub my nose under his ear and give the ear lobe teasing bites. He moans even more, his voice vibrating down through my tissues, all the way to my bursting clit.