Once they went upstairs, Tyler left her to take a quick shower in his room and let her pack up her tea set. When they reunited in the kitchen area, he found Sarah had finished preparing their lunch. The clean smell of pickles and mustard drew his gaze to the deviled eggs contained in a wicker basket on the table.

Marguerite stood by the table in a light cotton dress. Tyler stopped for a moment in the doorway, looking at the way the light from the window filtered through, outlining her body. She turned at the noise of his approach.

"Where are we going now?" she asked.

"A surprise." He cocked his head. "Take off the dress. I want you naked." Marguerite saw Sarah through the open archway to the kitchen. The housekeeper's fingers paused briefly over her task, but then she kept on slicing vegetables, keeping her attention on the counter.

"Marguerite." His voice was a low caress. "Obey me." Marguerite untied and lifted the dress over her head, feeling cool air touch her skin.

She hoped Tyler would take them out of the kitchen before Sarah had to turn. He seemed in no hurry though, his gaze coursing over her slowly. She wondered if he was deliberately putting her in an uncomfortable position to regain some of the control he'd lost with her unexpected invasion into the range area. The satisfaction she should have felt at that idea held little staying power, however. As she stood before him naked, feeling his gaze caress her, her body responded, moistened. Her back instinctively straightened, displaying herself to him, her chin lifted in challenge.

Even if his motives were petty, after a few charged moments she was certain physical desire had taken the upper hand for both of them. Her nerves vibrated as if he were stroking her. Her gaze swept down over his erection pressed against the jeans, clearly revealed because he wore a golf shirt tucked into them. Drifting from that pleasing sight to his hand hooked in his pocket, her eyes dwelled on the rough knuckles, the lean forearm. It made her remember how his hand had held the gun. The strength and steadiness.

He stepped forward at last, clearing his throat gruffly. Picking up the basket, he took her arm. "Come with me before I fuck you right here," he muttered.

The west wing of the house had a solarium that exited into a very private garden surrounded by hedges and wrought iron. A bed of green grass surrounded a smaller wishing pool. The centerpiece of this one was a Chinese goddess, water spilling out of a vase in her hands. Bright pennies glowed in the bottom of the pool and Marguerite saw there was a small complement of uncast coins in a shallow earthen bowl on the stone ledge.

"Is that a reproduction?"

"No, she's from the eighteenth century, Lamaistic period. I like some of the other depictions of her as well, but bronze is my preference for gardens." He spread out the blanket. "I thought this was an appropriate place to bring you, based on her story."

"There are a lot of stories about Qwan Yin."

"Yes, but I have my favorite. Would you like to hear it?" After a moment, she nodded and his eyes warmed on her, making some of the earlier tension ease. "Qwan Yin was a devout Buddhist in her human form, one who demonstrated great sacrifice and boundless love during her life. There was no question she'd earned the right to enter Paradise when she died. But just as she was about to enter the gates, she heard a cry of anguish from the earth below. Unable to bear the thought of not answering that cry, she turned away from Nirvana and found immortality instead as the Goddess of Mercy."

"I don't think my subs think of me that way."

"I think you'd be surprised. Mercy has many forms." He eased her down into a sitting position on the blanket, putting the basket in between them.

"No way out." She gestured to the fence that had no gate.

"And why would I want a way out?" He unpacked the basket. "Food, sunshine and a naked woman for company. Beauty in every direction I look." Though she noted he didn't seem inclined to look anywhere but at her.

"Maybe I was thinking your guest would need an escape route."

"Nonsense. All women desire to be in my company." He winked at her, though she still noted a bit of strain around his mouth, keeping him from a true smile. "I'm charming. And if that's not true, at least I'm filthy rich." She choked on the bite of egg he put between her lips. She managed to swallow, wiped her lips as delicately as possible with her fingers. He didn't offer a napkin, apparently preferring to watch the way she removed it with her own hand. "I can't decide if you're just completely self-aware, or an arrogant bastard, or both."

"Does it matter? I want you to lie on your back, angel. Look up at the clouds." Once she was settled, this time he put the entire half-egg on her tongue, making it an awkward moment to chew and swallow without getting yellow yolk around her mouth. He collected the excess with his fingertips and inserted them between her lips so she could lick the rest off.

"What's the verdict?"

"Delicious." Cicadas were singing their rasping song as the day's heat soaked into her skin, joining the heat spiraling up from her insides. She wanted to reach up, thread her fingers through his hair, draw his lips down to hers where she lay on the blanket.

Her eyes lingered on his mouth. When recognition of what she was doing darkened his gaze, she tore hers away.

"Exactly my thought." This time he took the deviled egg, turned it upside down and spread the filling over her clit and pussy lips. She squirmed at the cold but then he distracted her by moving down to the end of the blanket. Lifting her legs onto his shoulders to pull her hips up to him, he sat on his heels and began to eat the filling.

Rather than trying to stroke her the way that would arouse her using the egg as the excuse, he used her pussy very functionally as his plate, methodically sucking and eating each portion of the filling, licking where needed to get all of it. Her hands and arms lay loosely above her head, the only place for them. She closed her eyes, immersed in the feel of his mouth on her, his utilitarian use of her body. His to do with as he wished. For some reason the thought of that alone could shoot her up a spiral of hard, unrelenting arousal.

He ate his salad on her stomach, drizzling the dressing over the spinach leaves. He gave her bites of it, getting the greenery on his fork with modest pricks that made tiny imprints in her skin. Then he split a sandwich with her, making her eat it from his hand as he watched every movement of her body, the liquid arousal on her thighs, the heightened pulse, the parted lips.

Objectively as a Mistress, she realized he was training her quite effectively to reach full arousal quickly and then stay there, so that she could think of nothing but the demand of her own body, the desire to have him fulfill it. To fulfill him. So it seemed the most natural thing in the world when a crust of bread fell to lift it toward his mouth, wanting to feed him. Serve him.

His eyes were molten gold on hers as he took it, sucking on her fingers while her body trembled, caught in the charged silence.

"Would you take off your shirt?"

She barely recognized her own voice. He nodded, stripped it off, then leaned forward over her, one hand on the opposite side of her shoulder, then the other, bracketing her. Slowly, slowly he moved on top of her, settling his thighs in between her spread ones with a nudge to accommodate himself. His hips were against hers, his bare stomach touching her quivering one, his chest on her bare breasts. He bore his weight on his arms so as not to crush her, going to one elbow to stroke her face with one hand, touch her lips.

"Ask me to kiss you. Marguerite." Her lips parted involuntarily but her lashes fluttered closed. "Look at me."

"Just..." Why wouldn't he just overwhelm her and do it? Do what it was so obvious she was aching to have him do?

"There are limits, angel." His voice had gotten low, a dangerous rumble.

"Yes." She opened her eyes. "There are. And you keep pushing them. This isn't about you and me. I'm not stupid, or gullible. I know you don't push this hard and personally with another Domme under training."

"No, you're not stupid," he agreed. "You knew it would be about more than that between you and me. Yet you chose me. So just say it. I know you want me to kiss you." She shook her head, not meaning no, meaning something else that was welling up in her, that his constant barrage on her body was drawing forth from her.

"Damn it - "

"Just stop asking," she burst out. "Just take. Please...just take over. I can't...give.

You just have to take what you want."

Tyler stared down at her a full ten seconds, felt her heart pounding beneath his, the taut urgency of her hips pushing against him. He lowered his lips to a fraction above her mouth and she didn't move, her eyes staring into his, pleading in a way her voice could not. She couldn't ask but it was obvious how much she wanted. And he could deny her nothing, whether she realized it or not.

"You never answered me, about pregnancy."

"I'm safe. And I can't have children."

He saw a wealth of memory and pain behind the simple statement but he could tell she didn't want this moment to be about that. He capitulated, plunged, covering her mouth with his, swallowing the near sob of relief she made as he fisted his hands in her hair roughly. Taking over, he scraped at her with his teeth, stroking her tongue with his, cognizant of her body rubbing against him, her pussy so wet he could feel it through his jeans, making him lose his mind and restraint.

Her hands were on his head, his neck, digging into his shoulders, his back. He didn't want to pull back but he did, catching up one of her hands and putting a kiss on her palm before he stood up to remove the jeans. He stripped while standing between her open legs, tall above her. He looked down at her clear pale eyes fastened on his every movement, her hair spread out on the ground around her, the moonlight color gleaming silver in its marriage with the sunlight.

"Put your arms back above your head," he said roughly. "Leave them there." He wanted her lying beneath him, completely his for the taking. But she didn't move, just trembled and looked at him with those hungry eyes. In them, he saw a combination of desire and fragility so powerful he wondered if he could ever get enough of her or let her leave the house. He was overwhelmed with a desire to fuck her senseless and protect her both.

She couldn't say the words but she was able to form them with her lips.

Make me.

It wasn't in her to surrender to a Master, as much as he knew she wanted to surrender to him. But her desire was making them both insane.

He wanted to be gentle with her. He wanted to take her hard. Even knowing that he was going down a path he shouldn't go down, he acted.

She anticipated him, lifting her hand to block him. But as capable as she'd proven herself to be, she was no match for a person with his training. Not combined with his superior strength which, if she'd had any doubts on the difference in their ratios, he ended it in a split second by catching one wrist in either hand, bringing himself down on her. His knee inserted itself between her thighs and, using the bucking of her body, he slid himself into her.

She was so tight that even with her slickness he felt the resistance, the infinitesimal stiffening and then her attempt to compensate and relax after pain had already been inflicted. He stopped, holding her down while her shuddering reaction gripped him, stroked him, made him want to spill himself into her. Instead he eased forward, millimeter by millimeter.

"Just do it," she gasped. "Just fuck me, hard." He shook his head, bent and brushed a kiss along her clenched jaw. "There's not enough of anything in this world to make me hurt you. We're not going down that road just so you can keep yourself from me. God, you're so lovely. You feel like everything that will ever be good, perfect." He pulled back out, then eased in, slowly. "Ask, angel." She was panting. "No, not like this. Hard. I don't want it this way."

"One, you don't have a choice. Two, yes, you do want it this way. You're so close to coming your eyes are glazing." His voice dropped, his eyes burning into hers. "You think I don't feel your cunt clamped down on me, rippling? The way your body is moving, tightening, gathering itself?"

"Get off me." She practically snarled it. "I didn't agree to this."

"No. You wanted me to rape you so you could keep me at arm's length." He let go of her wrist, caught her chin and jaw in firm fingers to make her look at him. She began to raise her hand.

"You move that arm, I'll strap you to my bed and prove to you what you really want for the rest of the weekend."

The fingers curled into a fist but it stayed put after an obvious battle with her own will. He moved again, another slow stroke, then another. Changing his grip, he rested his body wholly on hers, pressing her down, lifting his hips. Sliding out, back in, slight adjustments of angle, deep, slow strokes to the hilt each time, stretching her open. He let her feel the press of his body against her opening, his testicles against the crease of her buttocks. Wrapping his fingers in her hair on either side, he held her face still, his forearms against her arms, his thumbs at the corners of her eyes. Making her look at him as his expression became more intent and hers became more panicked.

"You'll come for me now," he whispered, fierce, brutal in his need, his body tense, his muscles hard all along the length of her body as he fought to hold back. "I'm your Master, Marguerite. I am, always have been, always will be. That's what has terrified you from the beginning. I'm the man who's supposed to love you, take care of you, be with you. We knew it the first time we met and you've avoided me ever since. Come for your Master."

He didn't know where the words had come from. But he looked down in her face, felt her body quivering beneath his, so strong and vulnerable at once and knew there was no going back for him.

"It's not all about taking," he said. "It's about giving, too." Her body arched helplessly against the weight of his, her hips suddenly moving of their own accord. Her head fought his hands as she tried to look away but he was having none of it. Her reaction swept over her face, that wondrous combination of panic at the lack of control and intense sensual pleasure that women felt so deeply.

Those silken limbs lifted and clamped over his hips now of their own volition. He gritted his teeth, trying to hold on one more minute, just one more minute...

She screamed, a tearing sound as poignant as a death cry. Her pussy spasmed around him, urging him to spill his seed into her.

"Touch you..." It was almost incoherent but he heard her in his heart and let her go so her arms could wind around him, her face bury into his shoulder and chest. Only then did he let go, closing his arms around her, driving into her again and again with ruthless tenderness, wanting her to be his. His.

She came for a long time, as if a dam had released in her body. Even after the initial deluge the water kept flowing, her mouth making soft cries against his skin with every wave and ripple. Her hands held him close, shaking, desperate. He kept stroking inside her as long as he could, long, dragging movements that made her shudder with every degree of friction in a way that he knew would have him hard again in no time.

But that was the problem. There was no time. He saw it as she laid her head back on the ground at last, looked up at him with eyes that were even now withdrawing from him, seeking escape. Her hands moved wistfully over his shoulders, the slope of his chest, taper of waist, buttocks. But then it seemed her mind reined them in, for she stilled, drew back. "Please...I need to breathe." He complied, not calculating the mistake of breaking the connection she could not deny. She sat up, rose, not even lifting a self-conscious hand to her hair or to brush grass off herself. It reminded him of how she'd shut herself down right after the mugging, turning to walk to her car as if nothing untoward had just happened. He rolled to his feet, pulling on his jeans, ready to head her off.

"I can't complete the weekend, Tyler. This has gone farther than I wanted it to go."

"Damn it, Marguerite - "

"No, I'm not blaming you for what just happened. I asked you to cross the line. No matter how I asked for it, in what way, I did ask." She shook her head and there was a quality in her eyes, a desperation he could not ignore. Not as a lover, a gentleman or as a friend. He thought himself at least two out of the three when it came to her.

"I've done what I was supposed to do and then some," she said with quiet dignity.

"You can't ask more of me. I've got nothing left to give. All right? Please just let me go.

We're done."

She stood before him, a remote queen with his semen tricking down her thighs, mixing with her own climax, her eyes somewhat wild, dangerous, belying the even tone of her voice. He read body language well enough to know that this time she meant it.

She needed to go and would go unless he used an unacceptable level of force.

Apparently seeing in his face that he understood, she inclined her head.

"I'm going to go in and gather my things. I'll meet you at the car if you want to see me off. If you don't, I'll understand."

She turned and left him, her body moving a little less gracefully than usual, revealing the physical strain he'd put on her in the past two days.

For his own part, he felt as if he'd just witnessed a car collision where the passenger walked away apparently unscathed but with internal injuries she refused to have treated. He had to fight every primitive instinct he had to stop himself from going after her, grabbing her up and imprisoning her in his room until she learned to accept him.

Somehow, as criminal as that sounded, letting her go left him much more uneasy.

* * * * *

Marguerite did not look at herself in the mirror. At first. She gathered her things, put back on the trousers and masculine-style shirt she'd worn, which Sarah had been kind enough to press and bring up for her. When at last she used the mirror to arrange her hair and face, she didn't focus on the expression of the woman reflected there, though she couldn't help but notice the shadows under her eyes like bruises, the taut set of her mouth. She'd survived worse than this. She'd be fine. She applied a little makeup to cover the shadowing, brushed and braided her hair, put on lipstick and adjusted her slim belt around her waist. Shouldering her overnight bag, she took the stairs down to the main level. Through the window view she saw him leaning against her car. He also was dressed in the same clothes in which he'd started the weekend. As if they had just started. Or it had never happened.

But it had. The damp cloth she'd applied between her legs, stirring up his scent, the soreness and searing reaction when she pressed her fingers where his cock had penetrated her, told her that. Even now, seeing him, a knot formed in her throat, her body yearning, wanting him in a way she could not permit herself to want. And there was no way to make him understand it.

Then she noticed the ficus tree in the front entranceway with the fairy lights. As Sarah had noted, the glass ornaments hanging from the branches were inexpensive trinkets, though quite pretty in the way they reflected the tiny lights. Thoughtfully, Marguerite plucked off one figurine that seemed to have the most replicas on the tree and stepped out onto the front porch.

He watched her approach with his serious, unsmiling regard, as if he saw everything she felt on the inside. Maybe if he did, he would understand that he needed to let it go at this.

When she got almost to him, he reached out, took her empty hand.

"Stay with me," he said, making it a soft demand, not a question as he drew her into his arms.

Marguerite pressed her forehead to his chest, closing her eyes tightly.

"No," she whispered. "I can't."

She pulled back, opened her hand. Tyler looked down at the crystal image of a heron she'd taken off the tree.

"It's beautiful," she said. "The long, graceful legs, the tiny head and slender neck, the silver tone of the glass. You look at it and you want to touch it. You can, lightly." Her hand closed over it and his gaze snapped to her face as the glass cracked. "But that's all you can do. Look at it, enjoy its appearance, its performance." She opened her hand, revealed three pieces. "Do more than that and it shatters." His brow drew together over the welling of blood where the glass had punctured her skin in two places, forming a pool in which the tiny pieces lay, turning them crimson. He turned her hand, made her drop the figure to the dirt and pressed the hem of his shirt into her palm.

"You're not that fragile."

"Yes, I am. I know what I can and can't have to stay the person I need to be. But thank you for this weekend. You're right. It was definitely enlightening." She tried to force a rueful smile to her stiff lips, was unsuccessful under his shrewd regard.

"You're determined to go, so I'll let you go. For now." He looked at her, hard. "I care very much for you, Marguerite, and I respect you tremendously. Do you understand that?"

She swallowed, looked away, then made a conscious effort to look back up at him.

"I want to believe that."

"Then do, because it's true," he said bluntly. "You've made this a special weekend for me." He put a hand under her chin, his thumb caressing her lips, his eyes very close to hers. "I'm going to keep doing my damnedest to win you over but I need you to hear something I'm going to say to you, understand it fully. Are you listening?" She nodded, just a twitch of movement under his touch.

"You are very important to me. It doesn't matter if you never accept me or what lies between us. If you need me, I'm here for you. Tomorrow, ten years from now, it doesn't matter. And you know me well enough to know I don't make idle declarations of commitment."

No one had ever offered to be her champion. Anything that came out of her lips at this moment would be an artificial gesture with no warmth, just something to cover the fragile condition of her psyche, her rising desire to just get away, to go, to drive, be in motion. She wouldn't insult the gift of his words in that way. But not saying anything would be an insult on its own.

"You don't need to respond," he said quietly, demonstrating his penchant for reading her thoughts. "The offer is there now and forever, whether or not you acknowledge it. But before you go, I'm going to ask you to do one more thing. It's simple and if you do it, I'll consider your mentoring requirement fulfilled." She suspected his definition of simple and hers were very different, particularly since at the moment it felt like the ground had begun to shake beneath her feet.

"What...request?"

"I want you to ask me to kiss you and mean it, rather than me making you do it. If you do that, I'll let you leave."

There were times that a request could be more potent than a command. Apparently Tyler was intuitive enough to know that, damn him. She inclined her head, feeling like she made the gesture in slow motion, wrapped in air as thick as pillows.

"Tyler, please kiss me." It came out as a whisper of sound.

Bringing his body close up against her, he put his hands on her waist. Moved them around to the vulnerable small of her back to press her breasts to his chest. His lips hovered over hers, his eyes golden lights flickering like the warmth of a welcoming fire, lulling her, hypnotizing her.

"Tyler."

There was no question, just his name, and he seemed to understand that. He closed the distance, settling his lips on hers, the heat of his mouth seducing her to part her lips, welcome him in. Her body melted into his with a sigh that seemed to come from every nerve, every cell, saying this is where she wanted to be, where she wanted to belong.

The kiss might have gone on five minutes or five hours. She lost sense of time, wrapped up in the tenderness of it, so unsettling. It acknowledged the totality of her, of their experience together. Completely shattering the careful illusion she was building that there was nothing hugely personal about this weekend, nothing she couldn't walk away from.

The hand she'd settled uneasily on his chest went up to the open collar of his shirt, feeling his pulse fiercely beating in his throat, the muscles along his jaw shifting as his tongue caressed hers, her mouth, her lips. As her fingers tightened on the back of his neck, the power of his grip increased and a noise escaped her, betraying her desire and longing in that one soft cry. She pulled away.

"Marguerite - "

She shook her head, moved around the back of the car, tossed her bag in the second seat and tucked herself in behind the steering wheel. He stayed where he was though she could feel it emanating from him, all he could and would offer to her. Just like the night at the club. Things that could destroy her and she wouldn't care. But she cared about him, so she turned over the ignition and sped away, not allowing herself one look back.