"Before puberty, or after?"
Lauren slanted a smile at him. "Before. "
She brought the glistening pale yellow vegetable to Josh's lips. When he had his mouth half open, she murmured "Wait. "
She traced it over his top lip, moistening the curve with a light sheen of soy sauce, as he had done to her.
"Now," she said.
His eyes were on her face, measuring, and she inclined her head. "Open your mouth wider. "
He did, sending a jolt of electric energy through her vitals. She placed the food on his tongue, already wet from saliva that she hoped was not entirely from a hunger for food. His lips closed on the fork, the soy sauce she had left there compressing between them. The lubricated tines withdrew with the same silken ease of a man withdrawing himself from a woman's aroused body. As she anticipated, his tongue automatically touched on his top lip after he swallowed, collecting the sauce. His eyes never left hers, and she wondered that she could have every considered gray a cool color. It could become molten steel, simmering with the fires of the forge, anticipating becoming an instrument to serve the needs of its master, or in this case, mistress.
He was not a docile sub, which delighted her. The heat in those eyes could compete with the re-entry atmosphere of the earth, and she felt it building in the furnace of his body. He would become dangerous if pushed, and the anticipation of it shivered through her.
* * * * *
"This game is like a circus," Maria had told her once, during one of their many infamous "Corner Table Conversations", as Lauren had dubbed them. That was when Maria had a break and the two of them found a corner table in the shadows. Sometimes it was a time for Maria to hold her hand while Lauren had yet another post-Jonathan meltdown, but usually it was a chance to exchange wisdom and watch others together. The waitress followed the interactions of the other club attendees with the diligent attention of a NASA researcher.
"Are we that ridiculous?" Lauren asked, too swamped at that point with bitterness to hear the undertone.
"You're thinking clowns, honey. " Maria said, her kohl rimmed eyes crinkling, the moist, full lips curving up. "Think of all the sensual, dark undertones of a circus. The life of the people involved, set apart from the rest of the civilized world in a mysterious society of their own. Those who walk the tight rope and run the trapeze, who must trust their partners completely. The delicate interplay between the animals and those who go into the cage with them.
"Like you," she ran a sharp-nailed finger lightly down Lauren's face, tracing the tiny tab protecting the entrance to her ear. "You're a lion tamer. Jonathan belonged in the poodle ring. "
Lauren snorted with laughter, and Maria's teeth showed, but it was a half smile, most of her mind focused on a more serious point. "He was eager to please, never messing up, working for treats, regardless of whose hand gave them. "
Lauren's eyes darkened, but Maria kept on. "You were looking for the lion, the one who obeyed because he knew the reward for obedience was you. Not some treat from your hand, but you, everything, body, mind and soul. He knows he's bigger and stronger, but he'll concede your dominance and lower his eyes because you make him want to do it. Even so, he'll still occasionally test you, because that's the nature of the lion. That's what you were wanting, and that's the only thing that's going to work for you. "
* * * * *
Maria hadn't needed to tell her that finding that man would involve a game of high stakes.
She took a bite herself, and her eyes fell shut as a savory marriage of onion, pepper, soy and a mysterious dash of other spices awoke her taste buds. "This is marvelous. How did you make something this good in a half hour?"
"Well, technically, you can reach orgasm in less than a minute, and think how wonderful that is," Marcus, pointed out.
Josh grinned, and Lauren conceded the point with a wave of the fork. "I'm getting very little food here,"
Josh nodded to the plate.
Lauren snorted and slid another forkful of sauteed vegetables into his mouth. "Marcus, we're waiting for your wicked tale. "
"A wicked tale," Marcus mused, took a chunk of French bread from the board on the table, and smiled.
"The word itself calls it to mind. When I was seven, I had a dog named Winslow. "
"Winslow?" Josh turned his head and Lauren bumped the fork against his chin, splattering his left pectoral with brown sauce.
"Oops," she took her index and middle fingers and wiped them over the spot, gathering up the moisture.
Her fingernails scraped his warm skin. She caught one of the drips alongside his nipple and traced the curve as she scooped up the liquid. The crinkled skin around it became taut at her touch and she brought the fingers toward her lips.
Josh reached out and manacled her wrist, pulling her fingers away from her mouth and taking them to his, drawing them into the warm cavern and sucking off the brown liquid, tracing his tongue lightly over the delicate skin between the two fingers. The movement of his tongue was not like the flick of a flame, but a slow pressure that rubbed each taste bud against the crevices of her finger joints like moist sand trickling over bare skin.
Lauren managed not to swallow her own tongue, barely. She began to draw her hand away. Her heart bumped up into her throat when he did not respond to the pressure, holding her slim wrist captured in his grasp for the space of several irregular beats before his grip loosened. Lauren tapped her moistened finger against his bottom lip reprovingly. "It's my card, Josh. I'm feeding you. "
"It rather looked like that's what you were doing," Marcus observed dryly. "Do you want me to continue, or can I just enjoy the floorshow?"