In the Dark--A Sexy Billionaire Romance

by Jackie Ashenden

  I leaned back slightly in the chair.

  The instructions hadn’t been clear about what I was supposed to do now. Just sit and wait?

  I stared at the blackness behind my blindfold. The air was cool on my skin, giving me goose bumps. I would have put the air-con up a couple of notches for comfort’s sake, if I’d had a choice. Clearly this guy, whoever he was, preferred a cooler room.

  Then I heard a soft click—the front door of the suite closing—and my breath caught. Was that the client? I couldn’t hear anything so either it wasn’t the client, and the door had shut on its own, or he was here, moving soundlessly.

  My breathing got faster. I tried to control it, sending my awareness out to see if I could sense anyone in the room—Traj could do this with uncanny accuracy when he was night blind. He’d told me once it was because he paid attention to the rhythm of people’s steps, the sound of their clothing and the way they smelled.

  I couldn’t hear anyone’s steps, couldn’t smell anything, either.

  And then—I don’t know what it was...some movement of the air, or maybe even a sixth sense I didn’t know I had—suddenly I was aware that I wasn’t alone.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Elias

  SHE WAS SITTING in the chair in the middle of the room, right where I’d instructed her to be. And she had the blindfold tied around her head, as directed.

  Except she was not who I’d asked for.

  The woman I’d chosen for the night from Company of Strangers’ extensive list had rich gold curls, an hourglass figure, deep golden skin and the kind of mouth men dreamed about. A generous smile. Melted honey, warm and sweet, in human form.

  This woman was not melted honey. She was all sharp, awkward edges, narrow shoulders, jutting elbows and skinny knees. Her hair was as spiky as the rest of her, short and black and dyed midnight-blue at the tips. I couldn’t tell much about her face, as she was wearing a blindfold, but it looked as sharp and angular as the rest of her.

  She wore a plain shift dress of dark blue silk, presumably to match her hair, that was cut on the bias and did good things to her slight curves. She’d paired it with a pair of black platform sandals with sexy black velvet ties that wound around her slender calves.

  It wasn’t all bad. She had lovely skin, smooth and pale as fresh cream, and the kind of wide, generous mouth that would fuel a month’s worth of fantasies. She also had more than a few tattoos, to which I wasn’t fundamentally opposed, and these ones were pretty. A scattering of stars over her right shoulder disappeared beneath the blue silk of her dress, and what looked like a long-stemmed, thorny rose wound around her left arm and bloomed on her left shoulder, dropping petals that also disappeared beneath her dress. They’d been inked with some skill, the colours vibrant against her skin.

  Her head had turned slightly as I’d come in, obviously hearing me enter, and there was something about the movement that was familiar to me.

  There was something about her that was familiar to me in general.

  But she was still not who I’d asked for.

  I’d had plans for the warm and lovely blonde, but now this spiky brunette had turned up, and I was annoyed. I wanted what I wanted when it came to my weekly nights with a woman from Company of Strangers and I did not like having to adjust. Especially when I hadn’t received any notification that the woman I’d initially chosen wasn’t available.

  The company knew my needs and I tipped generously. I was a valued client. I should have been informed about the change.

  ‘Uh...are you there?’ the woman asked, clearly forgetting my very-easy-to-follow instructions that she wasn’t to speak. Her voice had the slightest huskiness to it which, much to my added irritation, I found sexy.

  ‘You’re not who I asked for.’ My voice sounded harsh and gravelly in the silence of the room. It was always a shock to hear myself, even now, years after the fire. Smoke inhalation had wreaked havoc on my vocal cords, changing my voice completely.

  It didn’t bother me most of the time, because in my line of work I dealt with hard-asses every day, and sounding as if you’d been through hell was only an asset. Yet for some reason I was very conscious of the change now.

  It was difficult to fantasise about the old days, back when I’d had it all, when I sounded like the Creature from the Black Lagoon.

  She’d gone very still the moment I’d spoken, as if my voice had affected her in some way, and not in the way I’d wanted.

  Too fucking bad. Part of the reason I used Company of Strangers was to have sex that was uncomplicated and unencumbered by the usual bullshit you had to go through to get it. Flirting, charming, building a friendship, building a relationship... Yeah, I was done with that. I didn’t want a relationship. I didn’t even want to talk.

  Company of Strangers provided exactly what it said on the tin: company for people who wanted it. But I didn’t want company. I only wanted sex. No talk, no questions. A blindfold so they wouldn’t get distracted by the way I looked. So I would see neither pity, horror nor anything else that demanded an emotional response from me, and so they wouldn’t feel compelled to ask questions that I didn’t want to answer.

  Absolute and complete control over the entire interaction from start to finish was what I wanted, what I paid exorbitant amounts for, and that was what I got.

  It was never the same woman twice. They wore the blindfold, they sat in the chair and I told them exactly what I wanted. If they didn’t agree, they were free to walk away at any time. They were paid for the entire night, whether they walked away or not, and I always, always, got them off.

  But this wasn’t about them. This was entirely about me.

  Some nights I wanted to pretend that I was still the same man I’d once been—the golden boy, the star quarterback with a great career ahead of him. The guy who had it all: looks and charm and physical skill. Who could have any woman he wanted, and did, and sometimes more than one. The guy who women worshipped and men wanted to be.

  I would never be that guy any more. I’d left him behind in that hospital bed. These days I was charmless and scarred, my body shot all to hell. But you didn’t need charm or good looks when you were rich as fuck. Money was the perfect mask and it was a damn sight more reliable than empty concepts such as loyalty and love.

  Money bought me back my past, even if it was just for a night, and it certainly bought me pleasure. I didn’t have women falling all over themselves to have me any more, but I could pay them. And, even though I couldn’t throw a football any longer, light up a room with a smile, I could still make them beg. I’d always been good in bed, and those skills at least hadn’t deserted me.

  ‘Yeah, I know, I’m sorry about that,’ the woman said, sounding not apologetic at all. ‘Maggie was sick. I hope you don’t mind me filling in for her.’

  I leaned against the door frame, staring at her.

  Blue silk, black hair, pale skin, ruby lips...a regular inked-up Snow White. Not what I’d initially wanted for the evening, but not wholly bad. A thorny rose in amongst the soft silks and warm, jewel-toned rugs of the room.

  Then again, I’d chosen golden curls and warm, honeyed skin, to remind me of the cheerleaders at Stanford who’d once competed to be in my bed, and this woman was not in any way a cheerleader.

  ‘I do mind,’ I said flatly, still annoyed. ‘The company is supposed to notify me if my woman of choice isn’t available and they didn’t.’

  Her head cocked and again that sense of familiarity swamped me.

  Shit, I knew this woman. I didn’t know how or why, but I knew her. I was sure of it. She wasn’t someone who worked for Howard and Hart, the company I’d started with my best friend Trajan eight years earlier, I was certain. And she wasn’t a friend, as I didn’t have any except for Traj. A client of Howard and Hart, maybe? Or maybe I’d had her as a Strangers hire at some point before. But surely not? I’d hav
e remembered her.

  Whatever. If I knew her it was going to present me with a number of different problems.

  Firstly, if I did indeed know her, then perhaps she would know me. Although I wasn’t ashamed of the fact that I used a high-end escort agency on a regular basis, I didn’t necessarily want people all over my private life, either.

  Traj’s and my company was highly successful, providing body armour to the military and various other organisations—we’d patented a material that was light, easy to wear and better at stopping bullets than anything else on the market, and we were now branching out into commercial applications for the general public. I was also investing money in researching new treatments for burns patients, and it probably wouldn’t be a good look for my private bedroom fantasies to come out while that was happening. Questions would be asked, my past dragged up... Yeah, I didn’t want that.

  Secondly, I was sure that I hadn’t seen her profile on the Company of Strangers books, which meant she was a new hire. And, while that normally wouldn’t be an issue, it was an issue now because I didn’t know what were her list of dos and don’ts, and whether or not she had hard limits.

  Thirdly, Strangers had a whole raft of contracts that both employees and clients signed, and I liked to look at the signatures just to be on the safe side. Rules were important in situations like this and, as I played by them, I wanted to make sure the woman I’d chosen for the night also did. And I hadn’t checked hers out.

  Fourth, she was familiar. Again, a problem.

  ‘How weird,’ she said. ‘I don’t know why you wouldn’t have been notified. I’ll follow up on it tomorrow.’ Her mouth curled into a smile that made the blood rush suddenly hard in my veins. ‘Unless of course you want me to leave?’

  There was a hint of challenge in that smile and, while I wasn’t the football star I’d once been, I hadn’t lost my competitive edge. It was still there and it was still strong. It was partly why Howard and Hart had been so successful.

  When I played, I played to win.

  Suddenly golden curls and golden skin seemed a little less intriguing than they’d seemed a moment ago.

  ‘Not yet,’ I said, shifting my shoulder against the door frame and studying her properly this time. As if I’d actually chosen her.

  The light of the perfectly positioned spotlight illuminated her. Not beautiful, not like Golden Curls, but...arresting all the same.

  That short hair looked spiky but I bet if I put my hands in it, and gripped it, it would feel very soft. And her skin would flush beautifully with arousal. That huskiness in her voice would sound more pronounced too, with any luck, and it was always particularly erotic when they started begging.

  And they all begged. Every last one.

  I might be scarred all to fuck, but I could make a woman come like nobody’s business.

  ‘So...uh...you just going to stand there and look at me or what?’

  People always talked when they were nervous and it seemed as though she was no different. Odd. Surely Strangers would have sent her my profile so she’d know what to expect? And presumably she’d agreed to fill in for her friend because she was okay with that profile, in which case she had no reason to be nervous.

  And she was nervous. I’d got very good at gauging a woman’s mood, and her mood was important, because if she wasn’t into it, if she wasn’t enjoying herself, then she wouldn’t come. And her coming, and coming hard, was the name of the game.

  Sometimes they pretended, but I could spot a fake orgasm a mile off, and when they faked I generally called a halt to the proceedings. If it wasn’t genuine, it didn’t work for me and that was not what I paid for.

  ‘You’re nervous,’ I said, watching her.

  ‘No,’ she flat-out lied. ‘Of course I’m not. Just wondering when you’re going to get this show on the road.’

  ‘If you’d read my profile, you’d know. And you’re also speaking, which I instructed you not to.’

  Colour moved under her skin, a pretty flush of rose that got my reluctant dick stirring. One thing was for sure: she’d look beautiful naked and aroused, begging me to make her come.

  One of her narrow shoulders rose in a negligent shrug, pulling the material of her dress tight over one small, round breast. Making it plain that she wasn’t wearing a bra. ‘Hey, I’m a rule-breaker, what can I say?’

  ‘I don’t want a rule-breaker. You’re supposed to do what I want without argument. That’s the whole point. Did you even look at my profile?’

  ‘Oh, who cares about profiles?’ White teeth pressed against her plush lower lip as she bit it. ‘Come on, ace. Show me what you’ve got.’ Then she shifted, the light catching on the faint silver thread of the necklace she wore.

  A five-pointed outline of a star inlaid with tiny diamonds glittered at the hollow of her throat.

  It was familiar, that necklace. I’d given it to Vesta Howard-Smith, my best friend’s little sister, on her sixteenth birthday, and according to him she never took it off...

  Wait.

  Every part of me went very, very still as the air caught hard in my lungs.

  I stared at her. Stared hard.

  At her angular yet very feminine face. At the black hair cut into a short, spiky pixie cut. At her narrow shoulders and long, slender legs. At the determined tilt of her pointed chin. At that generous, pretty mouth...

  It’s her. You know it’s her.

  The last time I’d seen Vesta had been at that awful sixteenth birthday party her mother had organised for her. Her black hair had been long, and her face had still had some of that childish roundness, but not the rest of her. She’d been skinny and awkward and shy, her fingers perpetually stained by the ink she used in her drawings.

  She’d smiled at me the way she’d always done, as if I was her hero, because then I still had been. I’d been twenty-two and a football star, destined for million-dollar contracts and millions more in endorsements. The guy with a future all laid out ahead of him.

  Until the fire. I hadn’t seen her since then, no matter all the emails and texts and phone calls she’d once bombarded me with—attempts at contact that had gradually reduced over the years but had never entirely gone away. That I had mostly ignored.

  But I couldn’t ignore them now.

  Because it was Vesta sitting there in that chair.

  Vesta, my best friend’s little sister, to whom I’d once been as close as an older brother. Vesta, who I’d cut out of my life entirely.

  Vesta, the woman I was down to fuck.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Vesta

  HE WAS BEING very quiet. As if I’d shocked him, which was a strange idea, given he was the one with all the weird blindfold stuff.

  My heart was beating faster and, no matter that I didn’t want it there, the nervousness I’d felt earlier gathered tight in the pit of my stomach.

  Had I not answered one of his questions correctly? He’d said something about profiles, and I know Maggie had mentioned something about them when she and I had been discussing this, but I’d kind of blocked it out. I didn’t like spending too much time looking at a computer screen because reading made my brain hurt and looking at words on a screen was even worse.

  My own stupid fault, of course. I should have asked Maggie more about profiles and stuff, as she knew about my dyslexia, but even though I’d got better about asking people for help I still didn’t like having to. So I’d ignored it. Told myself I’d figure it out when the time came.

  But the time was now, and if I didn’t want him to know that I wasn’t authorised to be here, and that I wasn’t a Strangers employee at all, I was going to have to brazen this out.

  Luckily, I’d got very good at bullshitting people over the years.

  ‘Just so you know,’ I said into the silence, hoping to allay his fears about the fact that I hadn’t looked at hi
s profile, ‘I’m down for anything you want, okay? Anything at all, I’m game.’

  I really didn’t want him to send me away. I wouldn’t get another situation like this, not so perfectly set up for me and my specific fantasy. Oh, sure, the money I’d get out of this would be good, but it was the fantasy I wanted.

  Pleasure at the hands of a faceless stranger whom I could imagine was the man I really wanted.

  You couldn’t do that with a normal guy. Normal guys wanted it to be about them, and the ones who didn’t didn’t care about your pleasure, either—at least, according to the various sources I’d asked.

  No, it was this—the stranger. The blindfold. The pleasure.

  Only this could give me what I wanted, a chance to put Eli behind me once and for all, and I couldn’t let that slip through my fingers—not now.

  He was still quiet, but he was watching me. I could feel it, the pressure of his attention like a hand pressing down on the top of my head. The back of my neck prickled.

  The darkness behind my blindfold was absolute and I pretended it was Eli standing there. Beautiful, golden Eli watching me with his intense green-gold stare.

  I imagined him as he’d been the last time I’d seen him—at the terrible party my mother threw me for my sweet sixteenth, when she was still trying to make me popular.

  He was the only thing that had made it bearable, turning the party into something almost fun. Giving me a taste of what it was like to be pretty and popular. A taste of what it felt like to be wanted.

  He’d worn jeans and a tee, simple clothes that had fitted his tall, muscular figure so perfectly. He’d looked like a movie star who’d come down from the Hollywood hills to mingle with the common folk, not like what he actually was—the son of our housecleaner.

  Not that that had ever made any difference to me.

  He’d appeared when I was only five and his mom had come to work for us. He’d instantly made friends with Traj, which was hard to do, because Traj wasn’t an easy guy to be friends with. But Eli had managed. And then he’d made friends with me.