by Emily Snow
“You’re shivering,” he points out, his voice a low seductive growl. He pulls up to the gate in front of Mr. B’s sprawling house and turns to me. “Am I making you nervous?”
“I'm not nervous, I'm just—” He immediately cuts me off by giving my thigh a sharp slap that reverberates through me, sending a tight pulse to the juncture of my thighs.
“That, Lucy,” he says with a cocky grin, “feels like a shiver to me. But if you’d like, I’ll be happy to test my theory that I can make you come from right where you’re sitting before we go inside. And I promise you, you won’t be able to pretend you’re not shivering by the time I’m through with you.”
I’m sure I won’t, and that’s the worst part about it. There’s a part of me that’s willing to spread my legs open for him right here, right now, and I wouldn’t give a damn who saw. While he announces our presence in the intercom by the gate, I take the opportunity to catch my breath. Flipping down the visor to examine myself in the mirror, I press my palms to my pink cheeks in the hope that my flush will disappear before we go inside.
“You’re very, very quiet,” Jace points out as the gate swings open.
“And you’re dirty.” He moves his dark head up and down in agreement. “Actually, you’re just plain nasty.”
“I’m not denying a fucking thing and neither should you because you like it.” His fingers stroke a path along my skin as they trail up my thigh. He doesn’t stop until he’s a centimeter from the center of my panties. He makes a strangled noise. “Your cunt is so warm. So ready. I want to see you come.”
“You should focus on seeing the driveway before you mow down a car.” Tsking at me, he skims his knuckles over the scrap of lace covering my sex. I can’t help but feel a little smug when it affects him, and he sucks in a breath through his straight white teeth.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” he breathes. “There's barely anything there.” As he guides his Challenger up the driveway to Mr. B’s mansion, I allow a smile touch my lips.
“It’s better than going commando.” He looks at me with a wicked gleam in his eyes, and I swallow hard. Shit, what the hell have I just wiggled myself into?
“Not at all,” he drawls, and his voice takes me to paradise. I swear I can listen to this man speak all day and he would never lose my attention. Parking his car, he extends his free hand toward me and crooks his long fingers. “Give me your panties, Lucy.”
I clench my knees together. It doesn’t do much to help because he’s already laid claim to what’s right between them. He drums his fingers impatiently against the outside of the lace.
“Why?” I demand. Intense blue-gray eyes clash with mine, and when I don’t budge to oblige him, he shoves my panties to the side and circles his middle and index fingers roughly around my clit. My head falls back against the headrest behind it, and I arch my back, sinking my teeth into my bottom lip to hold back my moan.
“So that whenever I look at you tonight,” he starts, and steals the breath from my lungs when he gives my sex a stinging slap with his fingertips, “I can imagine you coming, screaming my name, looking at me the same way you're doing right now.”
“And how is that?” I demand between pants as his fingers pick up speed. He doesn’t even try to slip them inside of me, but then again, he doesn’t have to. He has me right where he wants me, and it’s exhilarating and breathtaking and just a little scary.
I grip the center console and the door handle, my toes curling inside of my black satin pumps. A few feet away from where Jace is teasing my body into a state of pure bliss, a couple walks up the steps to B’s front door. For a moment, I startle, terrified that they might see us. Might see my head thrashing from side to side and the flush of my skin.
But as I try to pull away, Jace stills me. He dips his mouth to my ear and growls, “They’re not paying you a goddamn bit of attention, Lucy, so let go.” Then, lightly brushing the tip of his thumb nail across my clit, he takes away my ability to fear, to overthink. The orgasm hits me rough and hard, leaving me unable to form a coherent sentence.
Jace gazes down at me and shakes his head incredulously. “You do that so fast, love,” he murmurs.
“You do that so fast, love.” Even though I know his statement about how quickly I climax isn’t an insult, my thoughts instantly ping to my ex’s parting words about my future with a man like Jace. And shame pours through me because Tom had pointed out how lacking I am in bed. Now, I’m wondering if Jace thinks the same. Because I want to please the man sitting next to me, I want him to close his eyes and think of me as the woman who rocked his world, the one he can’t get enough of.
Not the fuck buddy who gets off in five minutes flat.
“Why are you looking at me like that?” he demands, thinning his slate blue eyes.
“I … come in literally seconds,” I admit. I run my tongue over my lips and shift uncomfortably in my seat. “You've been with women who can probably last all night, and you wear me out after a couple rounds.”
He arches an eyebrow, his expression hovering between amused and utterly confused. “Are you giving me shit for fucking you well, love?”
“No. Ugh, yes. It’s just something my ex-husband said when he showed up to my mother’s house.” His features darken at the mention of Tom. “It’s … it’s nothing.” I scrub my hands over my face, but he catches them in his, turning my palms up towards his mouth. He kisses the inside of each wrist, his lips soft and unhurried.
A jolt of electricity speeds through me, leaving me dizzy.
“Your ex-husband deserves to have his cock handed to him. If I were unhappy with you, if you didn't satisfy me in every way imaginable—and I do mean every way—do you think I'd be here with you right now demanding to slip your panties in my pocket?”
I let those words sink into my head for a few moments before I avert my stare to the dials on the AC, embarrassed of myself for admitting my insecurities. What happened with Tom had left me feeling inadequate—like I'm not enough to satisfy anyone—and the words he tossed my way before he left haven’t stopped bothering me. In my head, I know it’s an archaic way of thinking, that I shouldn’t care about satisfying anyone but myself, but my heart is a different matter.
It’s so fragile. So easily manipulated.
I release a tremulous sigh, and Jace moves his lips slowly along the insides of my wrists again. “I want you, Lucy. So goddamn much there's a part of me that's considering starting this car, taking you home, and spending the night telling you just how incredible you are.” He lifts his gaze until we’re eye to eye. “I don’t think just right when I’m near you, but I can’t stop. I don’t want to stop.”
Nobody has ever said anything like this to me before, and for a moment, I feel that hopeful throb deep in my chest as heat spreads through every angle of my body.
“I know we can’t leave,” he says. “Because even though my Lucy is an absolute beast, the old Lucy’s in there too. The one who rode my ass for shirking my responsibilities when we were kids.”
“I should have kept my nose in my own business.”
Releasing my wrists, he frames my warm cheeks between his large hands and bends his head to scorch my lips with his. “We’re here only for a few minutes,” he promises. “Only to watch B show off the new table to his guests. After that, your ass is mine, so be ready.”
Hell, after what he did just moments ago, I'm already tingling in anticipation. I reach to open my door, but his rough fingertips close around my wrist. I look over my shoulder to see him shaking his head. “Panties first, love,” he orders.
I roll my eyes toward the ceiling of his Challenger as I lift my hips slightly to shimmy the lace down my legs. Once they're balled up in his fist, I give him a look of feigned surprise. “What, you're not going to sniff them?” I tease. But my throat goes dry when he thumbs the center.
He slides the lace into the front pocket of his jeans. “Sniffing knickers is for thirteen-year-old boys. I just like knowing there’s noth
ing beneath that red dress, so that at any time, I can make you come again. I like knowing that I have your panties in my pocket and no other man in that house can say the same. No other man can say they own your body.”
“So you're claiming my body for your own now?” My voice, thick with emotion and lust, doesn’t even sound like my own.
He rubs his palm over his stubble. When he lowers his hand from his mouth, my pulse jumps at his smirk. “You’ve been mine since that very first night.” He turns off the ignition and lets out a frustrated sound. “Let's get this the fuck over with so we can get on with the real fun.”
TWENTY-SIX
LUCY
The first—and only time—I went to one of Mr. B’s parties, all I did was stand around numbly, gawking at what was happening right in front of me. I don’t want to be that person this time, so when the homeowner himself answers the door, I force myself to relax. To my relief, he’s dressed in black lounge pants, his lack of a shirt showing off his impressive abs. He looks more like he’s ready for bed than for a night of debauchery. I step inside, recognizing a couple from the last party as they take off for the downstairs of the house.
“Ms. Williams, welcome back,” B murmurs as soon as the door is closed behind us and securely latched. He strides over to where Jace and I wait in the middle of the entryway. I come dangerously close to losing my balance when he drops a kiss so close to my mouth I can nearly taste his toothpaste. As soon as he pulls away, I feel the warmth from Jace’s body press against the back of mine.
I cast an anxious look over my shoulder, sucking in my lower lip at his strained expression. Returning my hazel gaze to the other man, I clear my throat. “Thank you for inviting me, we’re so excited to see the launch of your Sexy Susan.”
B’s lips quirk and he casts a curious look at Jace. “My Sexy Susan? You’ve given it an official name, Exley?”
“Our office manager, Daisy, calls it that,” Jace interjects, and B nods his head in understanding.
“Like always, I was completely satisfied by the craftsmanship. Seeing it in use will be the highlight of my evening.” He wanders his gaze over me, unashamedly taking in the form-fitting red dress and mile-high, strappy heels Jamie had talked me into donning. “Do you indulge, Ms. Williams? One of my guests, Andrew, is very interested in—”
“She doesn’t,” Jace snaps, and our host’s eyebrows arch. I recognize the name B just said—Andrew’s the man who showed up at EXtreme wanting to order custom manacles. Jace had regarded him icily during their appointment, and his reaction is just as cold tonight. I skim my teeth over the inside of my cheek, staring up at him with wide eyes as he slips from his spot behind me and pulls me close to his side. He lays a possessive hand on the base of my spine. Tingles burst through my skin, through my veins, but he doesn’t seem to notice that I suddenly can’t breathe as he casts a tight smile at his client.
“I’ll be sure to let Andrew know she’s not available.”
“That’s a pity,” B says, cocking his head to one side to flick his dark gaze between Jace and me.
“Right, well Lucy’s indulgences are very singular.” Slate blue eyes momentarily dip to mine. Jace’s gaze is soft and sinful and full of the promise that those singular indulgences will rock my world tonight. “Sadly, we can’t stay long since tomorrow is a work day. Lucy gets very, very tired.”
B presses his lips together and steeples his fingers against them. “Again, that’s a pity,” he says before launching into a conversation with Jace about an idea he came up with the other night. When he uses the term “pussy pump,” I check out of the conversation. I look away to the flower arrangement behind his couch. This time, it’s vivid pink orchids. I admire the flowers for longer than necessary before I eventually bring my focus back to our host.
Thank god their discussion has shifted gears; Jace is in the middle of explaining his plan for a new line of tables just like B’s—only smaller.
“You’ll still be the only man in the world with a piece like yours, though,” Jace promises, assuring our client that he’s won the pissing race where spinning sex tables are concerned. I have to agree. If hadn’t seen B in action the first time I came here, I’d swear the massive table he commissioned was overcompensating.
“I fucking better be the only one with a table like that.” As if he’s just now noticing the intimacy behind Jace’s touch, he smirks. “The two of you?” He doesn’t sound surprised, and Jace responds with a shrug. “No wonder you won’t share with Andrew.”
An angry noise shoves from the back of Jace’s throat and then he responds to B in a low, dangerous voice. “Where Lucy’s concerned, I don’t share. I’ll have to tell Andrew that too.”
I don’t have a chance to turn my face up to his and study his expression because B informs us that he has a few things to attend to before he shows his guests his table. He tells us to help ourselves to whatever we desire—apparently, there’s a bar downstairs that I hadn’t noticed the last time we were here because I was too distracted by all the naked, gyrating bodies.
Just before he excuses himself to the third floor of the house, B pauses on the staircase, looks over his shoulder, and grins broadly. “You’re welcome to use any of the suites in private … if you’d like.”
My mouth falls open as he retreats, and I’m still blinking rapidly when Jace ushers me toward the steps leading downstairs. “That was … strange,” I whisper, following closely behind Jace. “He wanted you to share me with Andrew? I thought he was married.”
At least, that’s what he said when he got the quote for the monogrammed cuffs—he wanted them for his wife, whom he claimed to have married just seven months ago.
Jace pauses a few steps from the bottom and looks up at me. “He called me about you right after I brought you here. I told him you were unavailable. As for his wife—she wouldn’t have given a fuck. They were the couple with Sonora that first night.”
Oh. Oh. I vibrantly recall the mask-wearing couple occupying the Kink Playground during the first party. And the way they’d approached Sonora after Jace showed them how to hook her cuffs on the giant metal X—like predators pouncing on prey. That Andrew had gotten in touch with Jace about me…
I cross my arms over my chest and shudder. “That’s sweet of you to look out for me,” I whisper. Jace reaches up to me, feathering the calloused pad of his thumb over my cheek until my breath becomes nothing but a delicate sigh.
“My motivations were purely selfish at the time,” he admits. “I’ve wanted to be inside you from the moment you stepped into my office—hell, since high school—and I’d be damned if I let someone I knew touch you instead.”
“I like that you’re selfish.”
“Good, love. Because it’s not going to stop—not when it comes to you.”
I’ve got to admit that I'm surprised that the bartender manning the bar is fully dressed, but I'm still a bit skeptical as I ask him for a shot of tequila. “I promise you,” Jace says, pressing his full lips to my ear. “There's no DNA on top of this bar, so you’re safe to take a drink.”
I whip my head to the side to look at him, my mouth falling open. He responds by tucking his finger beneath my chin and snapping it shut. “Careful doing that, Lucy, or I’ll take B up on his offer and carry you off to one of these rooms.”
“I didn't even think that for a second,” I argue, leading our conversation back to his first comment. It seems safer than acknowledging that he’s just propositioned me after what happened not even a half an hour ago in the front seat of his car.
“Right. Well, I can promise you there’s no Molly spiking your drink either.” My eyes narrow into tight slits, so he smirks and grins. “They bring their own and are very stingy with it.”
When the bartender hands me my shot, I toss it back and give him a bold look. “Stop trying to shock me.”
“I'm not trying to shock you at all. I'm just being honest with you.”
I request one more shot, for good measure,
and then I follow his lead to an open room where, thank god, nobody is engaged in the act. Plush sofas and cushy armchairs surround the dimly-lit space, and several people are seated around, their heads bent together as they speak.
We choose a loveseat closest to the arched doorway, and when Jace pulls me close to him, I stare at him, my gaze questioning. “What is this place?”
He works his lower lip between his thumb and forefinger, as if he searching for the right way to tell me something awful, before finally saying, “You remember those mixers you went to in college?”
“Sort of.”
“That’s what this is. Some of them plan their evening well in advance, but many like the thrill of a surprise.”
I feel like a prude when I admit to myself that I’ve always put so much planning into the act of making love—or sex. Jace was a first for me. I’d wanted him, to the point where simply being around him had affected my body, but I never thought we would act on it. And now that we have, now that we still are, I don’t want the thrill to stop.
“Which one did you prefer?” I ask softly.
He skims his teeth over the corner of his lower lip, tilting his head to one side. I reach out to brush a dark lock of hair away from his forehead, and he catches my hand in his. I release a shuddering breath when he slides his tongue over the pulse point on my wrist. “Do you really want to know that?” he challenges.
“I want to know everything about you.” He considers my statement for a lengthy pause. Lowering his gaze to my bare leg, he spreads his hand over my skin, kneading his fingertips until my thighs clench. He still has my panties in the pocket of his jeans. When I realize this, desire pools in the pit of my stomach. “Jace?” I whisper.
“The few times I indulged,” he starts, “I went for the thrill of it.”
“Weren't you worried?” When one of his eyebrows arches, I add, “I don't know, random sex just seems so…”