The Tao of Sex

Chapter 6

“TAKE OFF YOUR TOP,” he said. “You must do the breast circles. That will help clarify and calm your yin energy.”

Tracy didn’t want to hesitate—she’d made her decision—but doubt still made her hands tremble. She looked into Mr. Gao’s eyes—a virtual stranger—and saw no softening in his expression. He merely challenged her to carry through.

She did. She stripped off her T-shirt. She hadn’t even put on a bra since the very idea had felt too confining. And now she breathed deeply. She let her lungs expand, lifted her breasts, and tried to be completely at ease with being half-naked in her kitchen across from an enigmatic stranger.

“We will begin with your breath.”

When he spoke, his voice sounded absolutely calm, even a little bored. But when she looked into his eyes, she knew he was far from serene. His gaze held hers with laser-point intensity, and she shuddered in reaction.

“Place your fingers near your nipples. Use three fingers and spiral them outward.”

An image of Zoe and her young, perky breasts flashed through her mind. Tracy straightened her back and felt her bulbous size Cs jiggle. She had always thought she had good-looking breasts—assuming they were appropriately lifted and shaped in a fifty-dollar Victoria’s Secret bra. But hanging free, they tended to…well, hang.

She sneaked a glance at Mr. Gao and wondered what he thought of her most feminine attribute. She was a lot larger than most Chinese girls. Was that a good thing? His expression gave no clue to his thoughts, but his gaze was trained on her chest.

“Size and shape are unimportant,” he said as if reading her thoughts. “I have seen old breasts and young ones, large and small, wrinkled and removed, even ones sculpted by the most gifted plastic surgeons.” He lifted his eyes to hers. “Beauty, joy, and most especially feminine power is a thing of the mind and of the energy. Do you wish to hone yours?”

“Yes,” she answered immediately. Such was the power of his focused attention she would have said yes to anything.

“Then be done with this self-consciousness. It is tedious.”

She blinked, startled by his cold tone. Didn’t he understand how hard this was for her? How confusing? She closed her eyes and tried to focus, but her hands still trembled where she placed them on her breasts.

Then she heard him sigh—the sound filled with very male frustration. “Give me your hand,” he said.

She blinked, completely confused. Then before she could react, he grabbed hold of her wrist and pulled it toward him. He was sitting across from her on an old wooden kitchen chair. His legs were braced wide apart, the soft cotton fabric of his pants stretched taut.

“You are beautiful, Tracy. But you hide yourself under ugly clothing and an angry exterior.”

“I’m not angry!”

He kept talking as if she hadn’t spoken. “But I see you clearly, Tracy. I see your beauty and your sexuality.” He leaned forward, his grip on her wrist too strong for her to pull away. “I see you, Tracy.”

He pushed her hand against his groin. His knees had narrowed enough for his pants to grow slack, but what she touched was anything but soft. He was hard. Iron-rod hard. Nothing so sleek or cool as steel. He was rough, powerful and thick against her palm, radiating a heat that drew her ever closer.

She had never touched a man like this before. The closest she’d gotten was the dildo her friend had given her on her twenty-first birthday. This felt so solid, so alive. She wanted to grip him, to take that life into herself, to do all those things she’d heard about but never done.

Then Nathan pulled her hand away. “That is the last time you will touch me, Tracy.”

Her gaze leaped to his face. “What?”

“Now you know I desire you. Your tigress energy calls to my dragon power. But you are not strong enough to meet me on an equal plane.” His voice dropped to a softer tone. “You are not ready, Tracy, and you never will be if you continue to doubt yourself and me.”

Unexpected tears welled up in her eyes. “I don’t understand any of this.”

“There is no need to try,” he answered. “For the moment, simply breathe.” He returned her hand to her breast, adjusting her fingers to press the inside edge of each nipple. “Now begin to spiral. Inhale on the upstroke, exhale on the down.”

He guided her hands, drawing them up and around her breasts. Each circle expanded, moving ever wider until she ended all the way underneath, stroking ribs as much as breast. Then he took her hands back to the beginning.

“Start again. Feel your breath flow in and out. Let it follow the stroke of your hands.”

“What does this do?” she whispered.

“It disperses your clogging energies. You are circulating your chi, throwing off negative energy. With every exhale, it leaves. With every inhale you draw in pure, sweet truth.”

She cracked her eyes, part of her wondering if he had actually said that with a straight face. He caught her glance, of course, and arched his eyebrow at her. It was a challenge—clear as day—and yet all she could think was that he was a beautiful, beautiful man.

“This will make me ready for you? For us to meet on an equal plane?” She didn’t have to elaborate as to what plane she referred to. She meant the horizontal, in bed, having fabulous sex plane, and he knew it. God, when did she start having thoughts like that?

His expression sobered. “It is one step on the path. Tracy, you and I will never be together. I am your teacher. We will never partner. That will be for another dragon, selected by you and the temple from an eligible pool of candidates.”

She frowned. “A temple? There’s a temple that studies sex?”

“Yes, in Hong Kong. I grew up there.”

She wasn’t sure if he meant that he grew up in Hong Kong or in a temple that studied sex. But there wasn’t time to ask as he leaned forward onto his knees, pressing his words into her as firmly as she pressed her fingers against her skin.

“And this is not about having sex. This is about maximizing your possibilities. You have taken a huge step—your tigress is awake. Your possibilities are endless.”

“Except you’re not one of those possibilities,” she said, her heart sinking to her toes.

“No, I’m not.” Was there regret in his gaze? She couldn’t tell. And before she could ask, he touched the back of her wrist. “Think only of now. Breathe.”

She obeyed because she always did when he spoke in that tone. It was his dragon power, she supposed, and she couldn’t fight it. So she closed her eyes and tried to concentrate as she moved her hands in a rough spiral. Inhale. Exhale. The refrigerator kicked on with an audible hum. It didn’t sound right. Just how old was that thing anyway? Would she have to replace it soon? How was she going to afford that?

She was supposed to be thinking about her breasts. They were just breasts. She moved her hands again. Kinda felt like a nice breast exam. Her friend Mary had recently had a mammogram. Her experience had been awful.

She heard another sound. Or was that a puff of air across her face? She was surprised that she didn’t feel cold—

“Bring your thoughts back to here.”

Tracy jumped and spun around. He’d spoken right behind her ear. How had she not heard him move? He knelt behind her, his arms wrapped around the chair back and her body, all without touching her.

“How do you move so quietly?” she demanded.

“I walk with my chi.”

“Of course, Grasshopper,” she drawled, completely unnerved by his presence. Now that she knew he was there, she felt his heat enveloping her, his breath as it whispered through her hair and tickled her cheek. “Can you—”

“Shh. Close your eyes and begin again.” He placed his hands over hers.

“I thought we weren’t ever going to touch.” Her voice trembled. And those fireflies were buzzing back to life.

“You aren’t going to touch me again. I will have to touch you. Especially since you have no experience in quieting your thoughts. Be here. Completely. Now.”

No choice, given how he had wrapped himself around her. His breath tickled, but it was his hands that held her attention. They were so large compared to hers, cupping around hers to join her fingertips at her breasts.

“Inhale,” he whispered.

She did. Her chest lifted into where he held her fingers. She touched—they touched—the skin right beside her nipples. Then he began to move her hands, spiraling them up and around. It felt so different from when she did it herself. His fingers seemed to extend not only around hers, but deep into her skin, as well. It was his heat, but it felt like so much more. Strength. Flow. Chi. Names filtered through her consciousness only to be scattered as they began the downstroke along the sides of her breasts.

His power preceded where their fingers moved. It slipped into her skin, lifting her breasts and opening them in ways she couldn’t imagine. She had expected the trailing fire of pressure behind their hands, but his strength pushed ahead and penetrated deep.

They circled again under her breasts, lifting so that his wrist accidentally flowed across her left nipple. Lightning shot through her chest straight to her womb, and her entire body shuddered. Beside her, she felt him gasp, as well, his arms jolting where they rested across her upper arms.

Then she heard him swallow. “Your tigress nips at me with her claws,” he whispered.

“I want to jump the nearest ready cock,” she murmured back, stunned that she wasn’t joking. Of course, the nearest cock was his.

He smiled. She felt his cheek lift against the edge of her ear and she heard laughter in his tone. “Many are ready, all will be willing,” he said, “but they will not satisfy you.”

“Why not?”

“Because the answer is here.” He pushed her hands into movement again. “In your own hands.”

“And in my bedside table.” An obvious joke, but she couldn’t resist. He made her nervous.

“In clarity,” he corrected. “Focus on what we are doing.”

As if she could do anything but feel him surround her, know that it was his hands guiding hers, and live each breath wishing they could continue what they were doing forever.

“Breathe,” he murmured, the low vibration of his word penetrating almost as deeply as his heat.

She inhaled with his upstroke. Exhaled with his down. Then another circle and her breasts felt like changed things. They were still breasts, but they were also energy—calm, quiet and very, very there. Like bright, golden little mounds on her chest, alive and new. She wanted to speak, she wanted to express how wonderful this was, but she feared breaking the spell. Each stroke made her chest—no, her whole body—a little brighter.

He lightened, as well. The weight of his arms on hers disappeared. Instead, he became part of her, an extension of her body. She knew his temple pressed against hers, and his chest brushed up tight to her back, but there was no added weight. There wasn’t even the fire that she had expected. He was simply part of her, and together they breathed as one, moved as one.

“Forty-nine,” he said. The sound blended into the air, folding around her without surprise or disharmony. “Those strokes dispersed the negative. Now we will awake the positive.”

“I thought my tigress was already awake.”

“Wait and feel.”

He held her hands by her sides. But this time, instead of curving under her breasts, he stroked over the top. She still inhaled as he moved, lifting her breasts into their joined hands. And as they spiraled in toward her nipples, she felt herself relax into total trust.

She would wait and see. And in waiting, she felt life pouring into her body and her breasts. She had no other word for it. She was alive before, but now she was alive! Or at least her breasts were. Before, her body had been a beautiful glowing landscape of serenity. Now that landscape was being stroked into Technicolor brilliance. She no longer felt hot. Though there was a blaze of hunger under her flesh, she expanded past her skin. She was wondrously, gloriously more. More awake, more alive, more here than ever before. And it was all from his touch. The circles continued, but her hands slipped away. She wanted him to touch her; she wanted his hands on her body.

His fingertips were larger than her own; they widened the gentle pressure on her skin and deepened the stroke of his energy. She felt him all the way to her spine. He was heat that had little to do with temperature—caressing her, stroking her.

“Yes,” she whispered. “Oh, yes.”

But after a few more spirals, she felt a growing discontentment. His spirals always ended near her nipples without touching them. He stroked her higher and hotter with each spiral, but would not quite reach the peak.

“More,” she whispered.

“Isn’t this enough?” he countered, humor lacing his voice. “Do you feel how your breath boils with fire?”

It did. She did. Every exhale released steam. Every inhale brought more oxygen to the blaze, but it wasn’t enough. Her hands had fallen away, down by her sides. With only the tiniest movement, she extended them backward so that she gripped his thighs.

He was crouched behind her, his legs braced on either side of her chair. She could reach—and massage—the corded muscles behind her, tightening her hands with his every stroke.

“You are not supposed to touch your teacher,” he said.

“Then stop me.”

He didn’t, though she felt the conflict within him. Then she began to move with his strokes. As he circled her breasts, she drew her hands higher on his thighs. At first it was a small movement, a simple shift of her wrists. But as he continued to flow around and around her breasts, she began to lengthen her movements. She extended her arms and grabbed him just above his knees.

His muscles were clearly defined there. The thin cotton fabric did nothing to disguise the lean strength of him. She knew she could grip her hands as tightly as possible and he would barely notice. She began with a grip, but as his thighs widened, her hands opened, making her touch more of a caress.

His arms tightened. The chair back creaked as he leaned harder against it, more fully into her. He no longer touched her with just the pads of his fingertips, but the full lengths of his fingers. And though he was careful not to touch her nipples, more and more of her breasts hummed beneath his stroke.

“Focus on the energy,” he whispered. “This is not sexual—”

“Shh,” she interrupted. His words were disruptive. Yes, she felt the energy expanding all around them. She was her body, but also so much more. And together, they were like a bright flame of light.

And contrary to what he claimed, it was also very sexual. Her breasts were pulsing with power that throbbed on a direct line to her womb. Even better, that beat seemed to echo through their joined energy, reverberating in her mind and through her hands where she stroked his thighs.

“Touch me,” she whispered.

“This is not sexual,” he began.

“Touch me!” she ordered, and she felt power echo through the words. Then at the peak of her stroke, she stretched one hand farther up so that she had his cock in her grasp.

She heard him gasp in alarm, and his hips jerked in reaction, but he didn’t move away. His body thrust forward into her palm and in that moment, she knew she had won. He had his dragon power, a force she didn’t even begin to understand, but apparently, she had her own strength. She could touch him, she could hold him and feel the heat of him like a sun. It arrowed through her hand all the way up her arm. It stroked across her palm, allowing her to measure the length and girth of him. And most of all, it allowed her to wrap her fingers around him and keep him right there, hard and hot.

She let her head fall back against his shoulder and wished that they didn’t have a hard wooden chair between them. Then she simply breathed, letting her lungs expand into his hands as they now spread around her full breasts, cupping them as a man would. He held her now, without circles, without intention, he simply held her as she held him.

“What now, Grasshopper?” she asked.

“The tigress wants to play, does she?” he answered, his voice a seductive caress.

“She does.” She pulled her hand upward a bit so that she could roll her forefinger across his tip. She felt the wetness in his pants and knew he trembled behind her.

“Then lean forward into my touch and spread your legs.”

She did, but she was still wearing her sweatpants. They felt hot and confining, but when Tracy shifted her free hand to release them, he tightened his arm, holding her still.

“But my pants—”

“I am going to penetrate you with my energy, Tracy. I will not touch you more than I am now, but my chi will. My masculine dragon power will dance in your cave until you quiver your delight. In this way, you will know it is real.”

“Really?” she asked, fear and excitement building inside her. “Is that really possible?”

She felt his face turn toward her neck, and then his lips pressed against her, right at the pulse point beneath her jaw. “Not only is it possible, Tigress Tracy, but it is only the beginning.”

She thought about telling him then. She thought about confessing how new all of this was. Sure the energy stuff was very unique, but did she tell him that no man had ever…That she had never…

His hands began to move again, and her thoughts scattered. Whatever she had done—or not done—in the past didn’t make a difference. This was about now, and she didn’t want it to stop. She wanted to learn what she had been missing all those years. And so she closed her mind to her other thoughts and let herself experience this.

His hands circled around her breasts, spiraling around until they nearly reached her nipples, but this time it felt different. This time, there was a dangerous tension in his movements. As if he really was a dragon wrapping around her body.

His hands tightened—not painfully but deeply. She was sure he could feel her ribs beneath her breasts, but his energy went further. It slipped around her nipples to coil inside her chest. With every pulsing compression from his hands, his power pushed deeper, like a living flame tunneling straight through her.

Beneath her hand, she felt his penis come alive, as well. It seemed to move, twisting and shifting in an echo of what she felt inside her. She heard his breath, deep and long, heating the skin at her neck, over her collarbone and down around her breasts. All was movement and flame—in her hand, deep in her chest, and rolling over her skin.

“What is that?” she whispered.

“Yang power. Refined, purified, and aimed like an arrow shot from a bow.”

“Aimed where?” she whispered, though she knew the answer.

“To you. To your core, Tigress.”

“I’ve never…” The words slipped out, but then were cut off in a gasp of surprise. He nipped the back of her neck. A shiver expanded from the sharp bite of sensation, only to be followed by waves of desire as his wet tongue stroked her skin. “Wow. Do that again.”

His lips curved into a smile. “Do not seek to instruct the dragon on how to stalk his prey.”

He squeezed her nipples—finally!—a single sharp twinge of sensation. Her thoughts had been on her neck, so the bolt of lightning caught her unawares, sizzling down that invisible cord to her womb and up another line straight into her brain. She couldn’t seem to catch her breath. She was leaning forward as he had instructed, but now she arched her back, curving her pelvis such that her inner core pressed down against the seat.

“Lean your head forward,” he whispered, this time from farther behind her ear.

She did, and her hair slipped across her shoulders to dangle before her face. The ends tickled the tops of her breasts, but her mind could not focus on that. Not with his hands still circling and now his mouth pressed to the base of her neck.

She frowned. Without her realizing it, he had slipped out of her grasp. He now stood above her and her hand rested again on his taut thigh.

“I want to touch you,” she said as she tightened her grip on his leg.

“You are touching me, and I am touching you. Do you feel my dragon stroking you?”

She shook her head, and her hair brushed across the backs of his hands before dropping on top of her nipples.

“Close your eyes and listen closer. You will feel it.”

She did, trying to hear over the rapid beat of her heart. She felt a presence inside her. An energy that throbbed and tingled deep in her core. Was that him? Rubbing against her womb? That was what it felt like—a thick, wonderful presence deep in her belly. Not physical, and yet she felt it so clearly.

And while she was focused so intently on the sensations in her belly, he bit the back of her neck. She gasped, arching in reaction. “Is that your dragon power? That…” She gasped again as the energy deep in her belly shifted—seeming to slide up and down inside her. “Oh, God.”

He didn’t answer except to swirl his tongue over the bite on her neck. Her entire body was trembling. It was wonderful and terrifying at the same time. She had never even imagined sex like this.

“Don’t think,” he said against her spine. His mouth had dropped lower now to just below the base of her neck. “Just feel.”

She didn’t have a choice as he nipped then soothed the nobs of her spine. Her shoulders trembled. Then he dropped another inch. She felt his lips tickling her skin, murmuring something against her secret vulnerability—the spot high between her shoulder blades. It was her secret vice and the reason she kept her hair long. She loved the feel of something touching her at the center point between her shoulders.

He knew about it. He knew how to brush his lips ever so lightly right there. No bites—that would be too much—but then he did something that made all the strength go out of her legs. He flattened his mouth against her skin and sucked. Once, lightly. Then again, harder. And then a third time—hard.

Pop! It felt as if he’d popped a cork, and out of the hole poured energy. It was a simple stream at first, tingling as it passed through her spine and into him. But then far below in her belly, his energy stroke thrust hard, pulsing in time with the suction of his mouth. It was a like a pump, pushing the power flow upward.

His hands began to move on her breasts, as well. He squeezed her nipples rhythmically—everything was timed together—adding power and strength to the river of current flowing through her.

Then her orgasm began. It wasn’t a ripple as she was used to on those secret nights alone. This was a full-body explosion that began with her womb, bringing her thighs along as she squeezed her legs together. Her entire lower body began to pulse in time with the compression of her nipples. She undulated from bottom to top where he pulled the power out with his mouth.

The contractions increased. More and yet more. She didn’t even have the breath to scream. He changed his grip on her nipples, pulling now instead of squeezing. She might have been horrified, but what it did to her breasts added to the power. Every stroke sent tiny fire bolts from her breasts to her core, adding to the orgasmic wave—there was no other way to describe it—that rolled up her spine. And it was still building.

Oh, God. Her fingers were throbbing. Her hair was on end. Even her brain was orgasming. And still it went on. She thought she was going to pass out from the pleasure of it all. Nobody could withstand this forever. She was going to have a brain aneurism or something.

Oceanic waves of pleasure crashed up her spine. More and more. She heard him gasp and the suction broke against her skin. It was just a moment until his lips returned, but it was enough to disrupt the rhythm. The internal pump continued, but his hands were no longer steady. He was shuddering!

She felt his tongue, swirling again at that wonderful place, and she felt the flow increase again, but not for long. The overall response was diminishing.

“No…” she whispered. And yet there was welcome relief, as well. A steady glow was replacing the waves, which were steadying into a sweet tremble. She was able to take a breath, and for a moment the increased oxygen added a surge to the contractions. But all too soon that faded. The current continued, tightening from a river down to a stream into a tiny thin wire still vibrating up her spine to his lips. How bright she felt! Like a wire filament in a lightbulb burning brighter than the sun. Then it, too, began to dim. A thousand watts. A hundred watts. A simple night-light of gentle warmth.

She collapsed forward, completely boneless. He took her weight easily. She barely noticed when he shifted her to lie sideways in his arms. Then without another word, he lifted her up and carried her from the kitchen.

She drifted in and out of consciousness as he climbed the stairs. It wasn’t that she lost herself into darkness. Her entire body still glowed. She simply lost awareness of the world as she floated in a bright sea of joy.

He set her down in her bed and stripped her out of her sweatpants with quick efficient movements. He left her panties on, though she would have preferred he take those, too. His hands were respectful, even reverent, as if what he did was a form of worship.

Tracy wanted to say something, but she didn’t know what. She wanted to thank him or hold him or ask when they could do that again, but she hadn’t the control. Instead, she let him pull the covers over her nearly naked body then brush the hair from her face.

The stroke of his fingertips across her cheek revived the fireflies for a brief second. They tingled in his wake, then quieted back into satiated ecstasy. She felt his lips then, a brief touch on her mouth followed by a long slow stroke of his tongue across her lower lip. It was the coup de grâce, and she roused herself enough to open her eyes when he pulled away.

“That…” She didn’t know what to say. It had been overwhelmingly incredible? Beyond imagination fabulous? Nothing fit, and she saw his lips curve in a very male smugness.

“That was just the beginning,” he said. “You are in balance for now. Yin and yang are equalized and so your body will be able to rest. Find me tomorrow if you want to learn more.”