Chapter 6: The First Command
The book closed with a soft, definitive thud.
Nora didn’t move it to the coffee table. She simply let it rest on her lap, her fingers splayed across the cover. The golden light cut across the room, highlighting the dust in the air, making her skin look gilded. She watched me over the space between us, her expression unreadable.
Minutes passed. The only sound was the distant buzz of a lawnmower somewhere down the street.
“Stand up,” she said.
I did. My knees felt unreliable.
“Come here.”
I took the two steps to stand in front of her. She was still curled on the couch, looking up at me. Her eyes traced a line from my face down my chest, my waist, and back up. It was a clinical inspection. My skin prickled.
“I want you to undress me.”
The words didn’t compute at first. They were just sounds. Then they arranged themselves into a meaning that sent a shock through my system, cold and hot at once. I just stared.
“Now, Ethan.”
My hands lifted. They were strangers’ hands, shaking badly. I reached for the hem of her cotton sundress where it rested on her thighs. The fabric was soft, warm from her skin. I gripped it, my knuckles white.
“Look at me while you do it.”
My eyes snapped up to hers. Her gaze was steady, a deep ocean I was drowning in. I pulled the fabric up, over her knees, her thighs. She shifted, lifting her hips slightly off the cushion to help. The dress slid over her waist, her stomach. I saw the pale curve of her belly, the hint of a rib. I was pulling a curtain back on a secret world.
I paused, the dress gathered at her chest.
“All the way,” she murmured.
I bunched the fabric in my fists and drew it up, over the full, heavy swell of her breasts, and finally over her head, pulling her long hair free. I dropped the dress on the floor beside the couch. It lay there, a puddle of flowered cotton, mundane and absurd.
She was naked.
The afternoon light worshipped her. It painted the slopes and valleys of her body in tones of honey and cream. She didn’t cover herself. She didn’t move. She just watched me watching her, a slight, almost imperceptible smile on her lips. My breath was gone. My whole reality had narrowed to this vision and the screaming ache in my groin, an impulse I was already, violently, forbidden to act upon.
“You may touch me,” she said, her voice a low hum. “But only where I allow. Do you understand the difference?”
I managed a nod, a jerky, broken movement.
“Use your words.”
“Yes.” It was a croak.
“Good.” She took my right wrist. Her fingers were cool and firm. She guided my trembling hand to her breast, pressing my palm flat against it. The weight was profound, the skin impossibly soft. I felt her nipple harden against my palm. A small, sharp gasp escaped me.
“See?” she whispered. “Just touch. Simple.”
It wasn’t simple. It was an earthquake. Heat radiated from her, from the point of contact, flooding up my arm, spreading through my chest. My fingers twitched.
“Easy,” she chided, as if calming a skittish animal. She held my wrist, controlling the pressure. “Just feel.”
She let me stay there for a long moment, letting me drown in the sensation, letting my shame and desire wage war on my face. Then, slowly, she drew my hand down. Over the plane of her stomach, the muscles tensing slightly under my touch. Lower.
She stopped my hand just above the thatch of blonde curls.
“This is where you prove it,” she said, her eyes locking onto mine. Her breath hitched, the first crack in her composed facade. “Prove you can follow orders.”
She guided my fingers down, pressing them into her. She was wet, slick with an arousal that stole the last of my rational thought. The intimacy of it was devastating. My fingers were inside her, and she was controlling their every movement, her hand over mine, showing me a slow, deliberate rhythm.
“There,” she breathed. Her head fell back against the couch cushion, her eyes fluttering closed for a second before snapping open to ensure I was still watching, still obeying. A flush spread across her chest. “Just like that. Don’t stop.”
I was a puppet. My entire universe was the heat and wetness under my hand, the sound of her breathing quickening, the sight of her body arching subtly into my touch. My own need was a brutal, throbbing pressure, a demand I had to choke into silence. Every nerve was on fire. Sweat beaded on my temple.
Her free hand came up and gripped my shoulder, her nails biting through my t-shirt. Her hips began to match the rhythm she was forcing my hand to make. A soft, broken sound escaped her lips.
“Do you want to stop?” she whispered, her voice thick.
“No.” The answer was immediate, torn from me.
“Do you want to touch yourself?”
God, yes. The thought was agony. “No.”
“Liar.” She said it with a dark delight. Her eyes gleamed. “But you won’t. That’s the rule.”
Her grip on my hand tightened, moving me faster. Her breaths came in short, sharp gasps. I was reduced to a single function: the instrument of her pleasure, my own humanity irrelevant. The power was all hers, absolute and intoxicating.
Her body went rigid. A silent, shuddering wave moved through her, and her hand clamped on my wrist, holding me deep inside her as she pulsed around my fingers. For a few seconds, the control she wore like armor shattered, and raw, unfiltered sensation took over her face. It was the most beautiful, terrifying thing I had ever seen.
Then it passed. The veil descended again. Her grip relaxed. She gently pulled my hand away.
We stayed like that, frozen. Her, naked and spent on the couch. Me, standing over her, my glistening fingers hanging at my side, my body screaming in revolt. The smell of her, of us, filled the space between us, metallic and sweet.
She reached for the crumpled dress and pulled it over her head, smoothing it down her body with a casual efficiency that obliterated what had just happened. She was Nora again. My stepmother.
“You can go wash your hands now,” she said, not looking at me. She picked up her book again, reopening it to a random page. Her voice was perfectly even, as if commenting on the dishes. “Dinner will be at seven. Don’t be late.”
I stumbled out of the living room. In the half-bath under the stairs, I turned on the faucet and stared at my hand under the cold, rushing water. I scrubbed until the skin turned red. My reflection in the mirror was a stranger’s—eyes wide, face pale, lips parted in a permanent state of shock.
The water couldn’t wash away the feeling. The rule echoed, louder now, a taunt. You will not touch yourself.
The ache between my legs was a physical pain, a raw, demanding void. She had shown me heaven and then personally locked the gate. I leaned my forehead against the cool glass of the mirror, my whole body trembling with the effort of not breaking the very first rule she had given me.
From the living room, I heard the soft, steady sound of a page turning.