37 - Beauty Queen from Mars

He was pouring coffee at the counter when Jon heard the subtle squeak of her tennis shoes on the kitchen tile.  Twisting around to greet her, his smile dissolved when he saw the war paint.  And he knew, without a doubt, that’s exactly what it was.

Her eyes were ringed in thick black liner that came out to a point an inch or so past the corner of her eye.  Then there was black on her upper and lower eyelids that faded into a pink that was darker than her contacts, and the thickest damn fake eyelashes he’d ever seen.  She’d also drawn a spider web that trailed down over the smoky smudge on her left cheek, which made her look gaunt.  He assumed the rhinestone-studded web was to go with that spider choker she was wearing from last night. 

Oh, and he couldn’t ignore her mouth.  Vibrant red in the center of both lips bled – yes, bled – out into a thick border of black.  All of it was topped with a shiny coat of something that looked like varnish.

She’s pissed and hiding behind the makeup to keep her distance.

“Coffee?”  Ignoring it was the safest thing to do. 

“Not yet.”  She leaned against the door facing, an expectant look in her eye.  “I want the groveling apology first.”

His eyebrow reflexively winged upward, and the humble attitude of repentance that he’d worked so hard to cultivate over the last twenty minutes… spontaneously combusted.  “Who says you’re getting one?”

“That’s it.”  Petey’s hands flew up in a gesture of surrender.  “I don’t know why I thought we could spend one night together, much less seven.  This is never going to work.  You’re operating under some secret set of rules that I know nothing about, because you pull them out of your ass at the drop of a hat.  Ever hear of communication?”  Her ponytail whipped behind her as she spun to leave.

Stop being a prick, Jon.  Getting turned on by her temper isn’t a reason to keep her pissed off.  Kinky sex, remember??

“Hey!”  One finger caught her belt loop in the millisecond before she escaped the kitchen, and he used it to drag her back against his chest.  He curled a hard forearm around her waist, anchoring her close before releasing the belt loop so that he could add the other arm. 

Naturally, she chose to struggle like a mad woman against his hold.  She was bowed in half and bent forward in an effort to break away when she felt…

“Jesus!  You do this on purpose, you horny SOB!”

“Shhhh…” he tried to pacify her while still dodging her surprisingly painful tennis shoes.  “Listen to me a minute.” 

But she had no interest in what he had to say.  She was more intent on bruising them both by flailing in his grip and shoving at his arms.  When she finally did land a blow, he only grunted and locked his wrists more tightly.  “Goddammit Petey, stop!”

His thunderous decree froze her in place and, after the initial shock, he could feel as much as hear the recitation commence.

Fuck!  You’re an idiot Bongiovi.

“Petey.”

The soft melodic phrasing of something that sounded more poetic than historic never paused.  She hadn’t done this last night.  Last night, she’d been a whole other creature – one that captivated him even more than this one did.

And she may still be here if you hadn’t –

He cut the thought off, preferring to spend his mental resources on a way to fix the problem rather than dwelling on the source of it.

“Petey,” he spoke directly in her ear.  “Sugar, listen to me.  I’m sorry, okay?  Yes, you’re beautiful when you’re mad, and I can’t help but respond to that, but I don’t try and piss you off on purpose.”

The quoted words were coming at a much more leisurely pace, and more quietly, but they hadn’t stopped.  She was still trying to ‘clear her head’. 

“We didn’t fight the last time you were here.  We didn’t fight last night.”  His chin came to lightly rest on the ball of her shoulder.  “Last night was incredible, by the way.  You, me, the sex, the talking.  We were almost acting like a normal couple.”

She was silent now, the words having trickled to a halt, but her slight body was still unyielding against him and her voice was even more so.  “But we aren’t a couple.  And if it was so incredible, then why in the hell did this morning happen?”

Somehow he guessed that ‘I don’t know’ wasn’t going to fly here. 

“Because I liked where we were last night and didn’t want it to be over.”

She didn’t speak, and he hoped she was internalizing what he said and taking it for face value, because that’s how he meant it.  There was no ulterior motive.  It freaked him out a little, but it was true.

“And what purpose was yelling at me supposed to serve?”

He shrugged helplessly.  “Sometimes I get mad before I think, and then I’m too mad to think.”

The sigh came all the way from her toes to the shoulder beneath his chin, and she leaned sideways, craning her neck to look at him.  “They have classes for that.”

“Yeah.”  Jon brushed his lips against the side of her neck.  “For some reason I always get kicked out.  They don’t like me bullying the instructors.”

She dropped her head back on his shoulder and continued to look at him from that angle. “You still owe me the biggest apology ever.  And stop being mean to me.  One of these days you're going to hurt my feelings."

“You’re right,” he agreed readily, putting enough space between them so that he could grab her hand, turn, and backtrack to the kitchen counter.  Pulling out a stool, he gestured for her to sit, offering a hand of assistance.  “And I’ll grovel over breakfast.  I don’t have a whole lot of kitchen skills, but I can throw together an omelet.  Interested?”

“No, not really, and stop looking all heartbroken.  I usually just have coffee in the mornings.”

“Coffee…” He worked up what he hoped was an endearing smile.  “… I can do.  I might even manage to get it weak and sweet enough to suit you.  Hang tight and I’ll give it a try.”  Puttering around the kitchen and gathering the necessary paraphernalia, he inquired casually, “So why didn’t you stay in bed with me?”

Up went that damnably condemning eyebrow.  “Was that painful for you?  Asking a reasonable question instead of bellowing like a psychopath?”

“No, smartass, it wasn’t.  Now are you going to answer me?”  Jon slid the coffee mug in front of her then turned for a spoon and the sugar.  “I think I did okay on the milk.  I’ll leave the sugar to you… Sugar.”  A flirty wink couldn’t hurt anything at this point, so he threw that out there, too.

“You never asked me to, for one thing,” she informed him with that ‘you’re stupid’ look that he was all too deserving of at this point in the game.  “And, even if you had, I couldn’t sleep in my contacts, so I was going to have to get up anyway.  I didn’t want to wake you when I crawled back in bed.”

“Well…”  Perching on the stool across from her, he set his coffee aside to cool.  “…as I less-than-eloquently mentioned earlier, I want you in my bed this week.  All night.”

“Now, see… that might be a problem.”  Finally finished stirring the sugar into her cup, she popped the spoon in her mouth to remove the extra droplets of sugar milk before setting it on the counter.  “Because sleeping with someone seems awfully… intimate.  I've never done it and don't know if I can.”

“You didn’t sleep with the Lone Lover?” 

“No.  It was too intimate for him.  I said conservative before?  Prude is probably more fitting.  So I’ve always slept alone, and don’t know if I want to try and force something different for a week.”

“Then let’s table that for just a minute while we talk about something else.”

“What might that be?”

Dropping his head forward, he ruffled his hair and gazed up at her from under his lashes.  “You mentioned rules earlier.  I think we need to set them for Kinkapalooza, because that recitation you did a few minutes ago?  I don't want to hear another one this week.  It makes me feel like I kicked a puppy."

She was engrossed in the caramel colored coffee before her.  "I can't help it.  It's how I cope with anxiety."

"I sorta figured that out.  That's why we need some general guidelines.  So you have an idea of what to expect.  It will make you less anxious.”

“That sounds good,” she acquiesced softly, fingers curled tightly around her cup.

"Okay then, I'll be real blunt about it.  When anybody talks about kinky, domination is the first thing that comes to mind.”  Jon extended his arm until he was able to pry one set of those fingers loose and twine them with his.  “Is that one of the things you liked from your books?”

A rosy tint bloomed beneath the black stripes of death on her cheeks, and his thumb began stroking against hers.  The woman coveted something called ‘kinky fuckery’ and she could barely say it without blushing. 

“Don’t be shy about it, Baby.  I’m one perverted fuck, so there’s no chance of you appalling me with anything that turns you on.   Give me some general ideas about your fantasies and I’ll go from there.  Domination.  Yes or no?” 

Her chin rose a fraction, and she looked him right in the eye when she said, “Yes.”

Jon would be lying if he said he wasn’t stunned.  She was willing to give that kind of control over to him?  He’d played this game with a couple of one night stands through the years, but they had known the score going in.  He’d chosen them for that particular reason.

And Dorothea?  She had never allowed it.  Her personality and will were too strong, she said.  He thought she didn’t get the fact that domination wasn’t about total domination.  Or maybe his wants hadn't meant enough to her, but that was neither here nor there.

“Petey, are you sure?” he asked gently.  “Do you trust me that much?  I can be a demanding man, and I’ll expect your complete submission.”  A lazy thumb stroked along her jawline, and he riveted his eyes to hers.  “Complete.  Submission.”

She blinked once, slowly. “You won’t hurt me though?”

“I won't hurt you.  Ever.”  That was a total no-brainer.  “I may spank your ass if you disobey me, but I’m not into canes and whips and all that.  I don’t need to inflict pain to get myself off.”

The wheels turned in that uncommon mind of hers as she digested this information.  He’d bet anything she was weighing pros versus cons.  Or – he smothered a dirty smile – maybe some of those scenes were in her recitation catalog and she was running through them. 

“I want the dominance.”

Well, well, well…

Jon very slowly angled toward her until they were practically nose to nose, and spoke in a deadly soft voice.  “Then your ass will be in my bed all night, every night as long as we’re doing this.  No exceptions.  Do you understand?”

“O-okay.”

“I believe the words you’re looking for are, ‘yes, Sir’.”  His cock was bulging with the amount of blood rushing through it, and his mind raced in a thousand different directions.   This had the potential to be momentous.

“Yes, Sir,” she breathed obediently, and he felt her hand quiver with the same rhythm as the pulse going haywire in her neck.

“Good girl.”  Brushing his lips over the back of her hand, he then leaned back into his own space.  “What else?  Toys?  Bondage?  I think role play is a little redundant since we don’t really know each other all that well yet.”  He hesitated before introducing what he thought might be the deal breaker.  “Double penetration?”

She sat up rigidly, as though someone had put a steel rod into her spine.  “No!  I don’t want another person involved.”

“No.”  He gave her a reassuring squeeze.  “There won’t be anybody else.  It would be just me, and maybe a toy.”

There went those wheels again, spinning more fiercely than before.  Was she deciding if that’s what she really wanted?  Worrying what he would think if she did?

“All of that is okay except…  I don’t know about double penetration.  That sounds painful.”

“It wouldn’t be, but like I said, this is your fantasy world and the rules are yours to set.  I got no problem with that.  Now.  On to more practical matters.  What time do you get home from work every day?”

“Somewhere between six and seven.”

He nodded, the necessity for planning details finally elbowing his rioting libido to the side.  Jon could almost sit comfortably now since some of the blood had made the return trip to the big head.

“You take the subway?  Train?”

“Both.”

 “I’ll have a car at your place by eight every evening, and then there will be a car to drop you at the train in the morning.  Or, if you want to go home first, the driver can take you there instead.  Your choice.”

“Okay.”  She was nodding agreeably now.  This was her thing.  Nailing down all the logistics and knowing what to expect.  This she could get on board with.  “I’ll assume you don’t want me wearing my makeup?” she inquired with a smile.

No, he didn’t.  Not really.  But he was learning to look past it.  She liked skulls, spiders and glitter.  It made no sense to him, but it didn’t have to.  Despite all that, she still stirred his hormones.

“You are who you are Petey.  ‘To thine own self be true’.”

She pulled her hand free, slipping from the stool and taking her cup to the sink, a distracted gleam in her eyes.  He hated it when she did that mental retreat thing.  It was like taking a step backward to the days of one word answers.

“Stay and watch football with me today?  I think there are a couple of playoff games on.”

But she was already shaking her head.  “No, I don’t think so.  I have some stuff to do.  Parental phone calls, laundry and the like.  I’d also like to…  prepare myself for this a little more.”

That sounded promising.

“Mentally?  Or is that woman speak for ‘I’m going to shave my legs’?  Because I have a razor,” he teased, sliding up beside her and tugging lightly on her ponytail.

Her eyes came back from wherever they’d gone and she actually smiled.  “Woman speak for shaving.”

“Well in that case…”  He cocked his head to the side, shrugging.  “…I’d be happy to lend a hand.  You know.  I"m just sayin’.”

There was that husky Petey laugh he’d been trying to coax out. 

She levered up on tip-toe and bussed his stubbled jaw.  “You thought I was mad earlier?  That would be nothing compared to what it would be like if you nicked me in a delicate area.  For both our sakes, let’s say you do your shaving, and I’ll do mine.”