Auden walked around to the other side and opened her door, an unrepentant smile on his face. “Come on, freshman.” He put his hand out to her. She took it, still stewing in her righteous indignation, but then he slid a hand onto her backside and pulled her to him. “If it makes you feel better, I’d take you right here on the hood of the car for all the world to see if you were into it. You might have a baby exhibitionist streak.” He touched his forehead to hers. “Mine is full grown.”
Her eyes widened.
“But tonight,” he said, brushing his lips against her ear, “I want you all to myself.”
CHAPTERELEVEN
Auden felt the weight of responsibility pressing down on him as he led O’Neal upstairs. The two sides of himself were warring—the small-town kid who wanted to do the right thing, who wanted to make this experience sweet and special—traditional—for O’Neal, and the other side of himself that was frothing at the mouth at the thought of having her fully under his tutelage, that student/teacher dynamic a kink he hadn’t realized he had until O’Neal showed up. That was a different flavor of dominance than he was used to. Most of the women he played dominance games with were older than he was and more experienced.Helearned fromthem.Those women could’ve played the role of the eager student if he’d asked, but O’Neal embodied it.
Her putting her trust in him was both the ultimate gift and a heavy burden. He didn’t want to screw this up for her. He’d already let things go too far in the car. Bringing her to the edge of orgasm while Len was driving had been sexy as hell, but it’d also been out of bounds. O’Neal didn’t know enough to realize that the dynamic he and Lennox had was outside the norm, that most guys weren’t going to finger her in front of their roommate. And if they did, it would be because they were using her for entertainment, objectifying her.
Auden didn’t pretend that his and Len’s kink for sharing was noble by any means, but he liked to think that the woman was an equal partner in it, someone who also got off on the sharing aspect. O’Neal probably didn’t even know menage was a thing, much less know enough about it to decide whether or not she was into it. He’d only gotten lucky that she hadn’t been horrified that Len had been there.
“You okay?” O’Neal asked, her hand twitching in his as they made their way up the stairs. “Now you’ve gone quiet.”
He looked over at her, her face silhouetted by the cloudy night sky, and smiled what he hoped was a reassuring smile. “I’m good. Just lost in thought.”
They reached the landing in front of the door. She turned to him, a little wrinkle appearing at the bridge of her nose. “About what?”
He sighed and grabbed her other hand, facing her. “Just that I need you to promise me that you feel comfortable telling me no at any time. Literally any time.”
Her brows twitched upward. “You don’t think I would?”
He pressed his lips together, trying to find the right words, trying to smooth that jagged worry that kept cropping up inside him. “I just…I know you like me. Maybe had a little crush when you were younger?”
A flicker of panic crossed her face. “Uh…”
“It’s okay. It’s fine. I just, you’re so new to all of this, and I’m in the driver’s seat and I don’t want you to feel like you have to…impress me or prove something to me. Or be a certain way. I don’t want you to ever think…well, he asked me to do this thing or that thing and other women probably do this and so I should because that must be the way things are. Or whatever. I’m not explaining myself right.”
She frowned, her gaze searching his face. “Okay…”
She sounded confused, and he hated that he couldn’t get the point he was trying to make to come out the right way. “I guess if we’re calling what we’re doing lessons, I want your first lesson to be to only say yes to things that honestly turn you on or excite you. And if you’re not sure and we start something and you decide in the middle of it—nope, not for me—you need to tell me. Immediately.”
A self-conscious laugh escaped her. “What are you planning to ask me to do, Aud?”
He didn’t smile. “We’ve barely even started, and I asked you to let me touch you in front of my roommate. That’s not a typical thing people do on dates.”
“I figured.” She stared at him for a long moment. “Why’d you do it then?”
He swallowed past the constriction in his throat, not wanting to say it but knowing he owed her that much. “Because the things I like…aren’t always typical.”
The glimmer of surprise was there for a moment, but she covered it quickly. “Oh.”
“I’m not going to—that’s not what I plan for us. I want to make you feel good. I want to show you the basics, give you those first experiences. But I’m asking for your promise because in the heat of the moment, like in the car tonight, I might get carried away and push boundaries. This wholeteach mevibe you’re throwing at me really presses my buttons. Likereallypresses them. So I need to know you’re not just going to go along with something if you’re not into it. Do nothing that you don’t want to do. I need to be able to trust you as much as you need to be able to trust me.”
She stared at him for a long moment, and he could tell her genius brain was trying to put the puzzle of him together, but it couldn’t—she didn’t have the right pieces. Finally, she stepped closer to him and kissed his cheek.
“I promise.”
He let out a breath and lifted their joined hands to press his lips to her knuckles. “Thank you.”
“And I’m okay,” she said. “What happened in the car wasn’t something I expected but…it helped me turn my brain off for a little while. I don’t know how I knew, but I knew Lennox wouldn’t look if he promised he wouldn’t. I felt…safe to just experience it. Because you were there. I wouldn’t have done that with anyone else.”
“Yeah?” A warm sense of satisfaction coursed through him, filling him up.
“Yes. I doubt your ego needs any stroking, Auden Blake,” she said wryly. “But those times in my life when I did let myself think about what certain things might be like, what they would feel like, when maybe I tested a few things out on my own…” She flashed an embarrassed smile. “You were the one I pictured doing it to me.”
He gripped her hands, the admission like gasoline on a fire. O’Neal sneaking touches in the dark, trying to find pleasure, wishing he were the one lying next to her. Part of him worried that she could get complicated feelings about him after this if she’d been into him for a while, but the more selfish part of him was just rolling around in the knowledge that, in some ways, she’d already been his. He touched his forehead to hers.