by Nikki Sloane
I was going to come. Any second now. The climb kept going higher, and higher, and higher . . . My toes curled into points and my eyes slammed shut. The pleasure welled up, ready to erupt –
His arms were locked around my body, and this prison began to close in, stilling me. Denying the pleasure that was about to set me free.
“No, no!” I cried, my eyes fluttering open. “I’m so close. Please don’t stop.”
The tortured look on his face was heartbreaking, and gone a second later, as was the tension in his arm. Oh shit, oh shit . . .
Hands clench my hips and drove me on him. These fast, hard thrusts were each tiny orgasms, teasing the big finish that loomed. “Please,” I begged him on every thrust. “Please . . . please . . .”
I crested and screamed all the way down. When I lose control, I really fucking lose control of everything, including my voice. My heart slammed against my chest as ecstasy erupted from my core, deafening my mind. Only sensation remained. So much pleasure, it reached beyond bliss, and it lasted an eternity.
The sensation morphed into something new as he lost control after me. The pulsing inside my body narrowly avoided crossing over into pain since I was on total overload. He gasped and dug in his fingers, holding me while my body milked his orgasm from him. I moaned with each throb of his cock, clamping down on it with the muscles on my walls surrounding him.
He groaned. It was so sexy. Heat drenched us both and pressed us together as we slowly returned to earth. That was when it hit me.
Oh, holy, fucking shit. I’d been so selfish.
He’d wanted to go slow and make a long memory to hold him through the next year, and in my greediness, that memory was now less than ten minutes. Maybe less than five. I’d lost all track of everything.
He clutched me tightly to his heaving chest. I shrugged out of the jacket so I could touch him with my skin completely unhindered. My naked body wrapped around his and I gripped him fiercely. “Dom.” My voice was a ghost. “I’m sorry.”
He lifted his head and blinked his disoriented eyes. “Sorry?”
“I didn’t go slow.”
He’d said it himself. No way was he going to be able to recover for a third round anytime soon. My stomach was in knots. I couldn’t do this to him. I’d wanted to feel something, and now I fucking did. Crushing guilt. This night was supposed to be about him, not me. I’d stolen what he wanted.
In the quiet, there was only the sound of our breathing slowing, and I knew what I had to do. I climbed off of him.
“Wait,” he said, but I ignored it.
I picked his jacket up off of the floor and went to the table so I could set it beside his shirt.
“Come back,” he said.
Unsteady feet carried me to the silk robe hanging on the hook. My hand shook when I pulled it down and slipped it on, and turned to finally face him. He was devastatingly handsome, even when his face was full of confusion.
“Please get dressed.” My voice was hollow since I was terrified by what I was about to do. “I have to talk to my manager.”
He already had the condom off and knotted it, and dropped it into the trash. My eyes were fixed on him as he stood and pulled up his pants. I watched the muscles in his lean arms flex as he did the zipper and then the button, his gaze pinned on me.
My whole body shook. My stomach was lined with lead.
“Why do you have to talk to your manager?”
“Because the deal’s off.”
chapter
FIVE
Dom froze mid-buckle of his belt. “What?”
I took a hesitant step toward him, then another as my nervous hands tightened the sash at the waist of my robe. “Stay in the room, don’t leave until I get back.”
Because if he stepped out into the hall, that was it. The transaction was complete and Marquis would escort Dom to the payment room, where I’d never see him again.
The disorientation was clear on Dom’s face. “Why is the deal off?”
“Because I didn’t do what I was supposed to.”
I watched the confusion grow larger in his magnetic eyes. “Which was what? Give me the best sex I’ve ever had? Believe me, Paige, you delivered. And then some.”
My goddamn knees turned to mush. He stormed at me, a blur of skin stretch over muscle and pulled me roughly into his arms.
“What is this?” he asked.
Maybe he thought this was some sort of ploy. A shake-down for more money. I wasn’t anywhere near a good enough actress to pull off the fractured feeling I was sure to be displaying.
“I don’t want your money,” I gasped. “It will make what just happened . . . not real.”
My brain scrambled, desperate to find a way to come out the other side of this. I’d rather have this night as whatever the fuck it was, than my percentage of his thirty grand. I’d have to drive myself to the ER after I left here, because something was very, very wrong with me.
“I don’t understand,” he said. “I have the money. I mean, I got a huge bonus last month. I can pay–”
“Don’t, just wait. I don’t know what I’m doing.” I shook in his arms. “All I know is I don’t want you to be another client. Don’t take what we did away from me.”
Oh, god, I wanted these foreign emotions to get the fuck out. It helped that Dom looked at me now like I had two heads.
His voice was barely a whisper. “Real?”
“Terrifyingly real.” How was Joseph going to react when I told him what I wanted? How was I going to pull this off?
His arms were tight, crushing me to his sweat-damp chest. Beneath it, his heart was racing as fast as my own. A tight laugh rumbled in him, shuddering his shoulders.
“Well,” he said finally, “tonight did not go how I thought it would.”
“No fucking kidding. I wasn’t even supposed to be here,” I muttered, distracted with thoughts of the man upstairs with the bank of monitors behind his desk and an earpiece to alert him to any situations. Did Joseph know how big of a situation was brewing in Room One?
“Me, neither,” Dom said. “I was supposed to go out with my friend tonight, the one that got engaged, but apparently he’s sick.”
Any sound in the room faded from my ears.
It wasn’t coincidence. The man who leased Logan and Evie’s fabulous apartment, he lived temporarily overseas Evie had told me once. He was a friend of Logan’s, she’d said. This explained how Dom, who lived in Tokyo, knew about this exclusive and secret blindfold club. Dom’s referral had come from Logan.
Like I needed any more bullshit to think about kicking around in my head.
There was a sharp rap on the door and Nina’s husky voice rang out. “Everything all right? Can I get you two something?”
I had to go, time was running out. “Stay,” I ordered him.
Dom nodded.
Nina startled when I pulled the door open, stepped out into the hall, and closed the door swiftly behind me.
“Oh. Should I let Marques know?” she asked, eying my robe.
“No. I have to talk to Joseph immediately.”
There were three other girls on tonight, and two of them had already finished seeing their clients. Only Chantel was on the flickering bank of monitors behind Joseph. She was getting it in the ass with a ball-gag in her mouth. Joseph’s indifferent gaze swung away from the screen to land on me and his eyebrows peaked.
My manager was young and attractive. Thin, broad shouldered, and omni-sexual. He had a warm smile when needed, but otherwise maintained a professional veneer.
“This has been an interesting client for you,” he commented.
Tell me about it. “I need to ask a favor.” My heart beat so loudly, surely Joseph could hear it. “You have to cancel his contract.”
He laughed lightly, then sobered. “Payton, you can’t be serious.”
“Like a fucking heart attack.”
Joseph didn’t look angry, he looked completely lost. “On what grounds? Seems to me the
guy had a good time. He came twice.”
The tightness was back in my chest. It was hard to speak, to think, to breathe.
“Please, I know this is crazy but I can’t take his money. I’ll make it up to you.”
Concern flooded Joseph’s face. “Why can’t you take his money?”
“I don’t know if I can do this anymore. It’ll make me feel,” I gasped, “like a whore.”
That was yet another reason why I didn’t want Dom to pay. I’d spent my life dealing with assholes calling me all sorts of things that I let roll off my back. Slut. Bitch. Cunt. I didn’t care about those, but for some reason, when someone called a spade a spade, it cut deep inside me. Take the money, whore. The phrase repeated, over and over in my mind.
“Honey, no.” Joseph rose from his desk with alarm. “That’s not what you are.” He knew how damaging that word was to me. It was to all of his girls. “Don’t ever say that, but you know I can’t turn him away. If it got out, I’d have everyone demanding a refund.”
He had a point. “All right, I need my payment in full. Tonight.”
“Payton, that’s not possible. Maybe if I had some warning I could have made arrangements, but not at one thirty in the morning.”
“Bullshit. You can do it.” The profanity and tone wasn’t helpful, but I was coming apart.
I wasn’t about to screw Joseph out of his three thousand because I’d made this drastic and reckless decision. All I could do was give Dom back the rest, and consider the three grand as payment for the use of the room. That thought quieted the whore looping in my brain somewhat.
Joseph’s deep-set eyes hardened. “Yeah, maybe I could pull it together, but I won’t.”
“Why?” My voice broke on the word. I think my shattered self was unnerving to Joseph.
“The only reason you want that money right now is so you can return it.”
“Yeah, so what? It’s my money, I can do what I want with it.”
I’d never seen Joseph upset before. We’d had some intense situations, but he was always calm and collected through them. The man in front of me was not calm. His face flushed with anger.
“I can’t have the girls giving back money either. Same issue. This only works as a business, not a fucking charity.”
The walls closed in on me. “I can’t . . . please, Joseph. I need this.”
Even as I was falling over a cliff into the unknown, my thoughts were on the man waiting in Room One. I didn’t want to be gone too long and have him investigate where I’d run off to.
“What happened in that room?” my manager asked. “Did he threaten you?”
“No, no. He . . . I don’t know what happened. I lost control and it, like, meant something. It felt real.”
“It wasn’t real.” There was a shift in the man before me as his spine lengthened him to stand his full height. His voice was dark and shocking. “Get on your knees.”
What the fuck was this? Cold dread filled my belly. I craved command, and occasionally Joseph would satisfy that need when a client failed. Underneath, Joseph was ultra-dominant. We had a fucked-up, symbiotic relationship at the “office.” But now? Please, not tonight.
“What? Why?” I said.
“You shouldn’t have to ask why.”
“Joseph—”
His face streaked with authority, and in the darkened room, lit only by the monitor and a soft desk lamp, it was terrifying. Any other night, I would have been on my knees in an instant. I would have thought this was the hottest it had ever been with Joseph. Instead, I wanted to run.
“Payton, get on your fucking knees. Now. You’re going to suck my cock and forget all about him. You belong here. That’s what’s real.”
I wanted to cry, if I was capable, but I wasn’t. I didn’t cry. I understood why Joseph was doing this. His grip was tightening on me as he felt me slipping away.
Joseph’s hand undid his belt. It worked the button.
“No,” I whispered. “Please, no. I can’t do this.”
“I don’t want to lose you, but if you can’t do this . . . what are you doing here?”
He undid his zipper and shoved a hand inside his pants, stroking himself. My gaze drifted from his fly, working its way up to meet his eyes. This moment showed me that I couldn’t do this anymore. Any of it.
“I can’t.”
He stilled and took a deep breath. “That’s such a disappointment.” Hands did up his pants. “I’m sorry, I’m going to have to ask you to get dressed and Julius will escort you to your car.”
“No, the guy’s still waiting for me in the room, I need–”
“I’m no longer interested in what you need, Payton. You’re fired.”
The air drained from my lungs. “I get that, but I’m going back to that goddamn room first.”
“There’s no point.” Joseph tapped the earpiece he was still wearing. “Marquis took him to the payment room already. It’s over.”
I’d stormed to the door in the back and banged my fists against it when the cashier refused to buzz me in. There weren’t windows, so I couldn’t tell if Dom was still there. Julius hovered nearby like he was afraid of me. He was an enormous black man and built like a truck, but he was also a giant teddy bear. He had a not-so-secret crush on me, and even though I flirted endlessly with him, he never asked me out. He was loyal to Joseph’s no-dating, no-fucking policy between employees, even when Joseph himself was not.
My next plan was to get dressed as quickly as possible and wait for Dom outside the club. I hurried into the oversized cashmere sweater and leggings, yanked my knee-high boots on and rushed to get the buckles done. I snatched my purse and coat off the hook in the dressing room and thundered down the stairs.
The winter Chicago night air assaulted me, and I pulled my wool pea coat closed when I hit the street. It was empty.
“Where is he, Julius? Still in the payment room?”
He stared at the cracks in the sidewalk like there were naked women in them.
“Look at me,” I said.
“Where you parked at?” He set his hand in the small of my back, guiding me down the street. I tried to dig my heels in.
“Come on, help me out. I have to talk to him.”
Julius sighed. “Girl, he paid and Marquis put him in a cab.”
“Shit, no.” I dug for my phone in my purse, intent on calling Evie, but Julius’ face was haunting. “What? What is it?”
“Joseph . . . he, uh, wasn’t real happy with the guy.”
No, probably not. Dom had made Joseph lose one of his best girls, and Joseph wasn’t the type to let that go easily. Marquis put him in a cab. Not “got him a cab.” Oh, no.
“What did Marquis do?”
“He fucked him up. Only a little.”
Anger, coupled with more crushing guilt, turned almost immediately to concern. “Is he okay?”
“Yeah. Not rough enough that the guy would think about bringing charges, just enough for him not to come back.” A thick, muscle-bound arm wrapped around my waist in a brotherly gesture of comfort. “Marquis told him you skipped out.”
“Marquis’s a fucking asshole! I didn’t.”
“I know you didn’t, girl. This shit sucks for you, I’m sorry.”
We were suddenly at the door of my Jag. We’d been moving this whole time and I hadn’t realized it. I felt like a zombie when I produced my keys and unlocked the door.
“Damn, I’m gonna miss you,” Julius said, shivering in the cold.
I turned to face him, and threw my arms around his hulking frame. “God, me too.” I drew back so I could see his face. “You should have asked me out, you know.”
“Joseph don’t like his people–”
“Fuck Joseph. We could have had fun together.”
He gave me a sad smile. “Shit, girl, you would have destroyed me. Good luck to ya.”
Julius was so much smarter than he let on.
I didn’t need luck, though. I had Logan Stone. He’d given Dom the
details to this club and upended my life, which meant Logan also knew how to put me in touch with Dom. He owed that to both of us.
As the engine warmed in my car, I pulled out my phone and something sharp bit into my fingers. It had been smashed, the screen white with spiderweb cracks, and wouldn’t turn on. It wasn’t personal why he’d done this. I had passwords to the club website and phone numbers of the staff, but still. Fucking Joseph.
Even if I could find a payphone in this city, it’s not like I had Evie’s number memorized. I couldn’t drive over to their place because they’d never hear the intercom from their bedroom to buzz me up, and it was two in the morning.
I went home. I tried to contact her through email, then Facebook and Twitter, which I knew was pointless. Every hour that passed was making this worse. How had Dom been hurt by Marquis? Had he been hurt by my assumed rejection?
At four thirty I started to get really desperate. I drove to a Walgreen’s and bought a prepaid phone, then raced back home to comb through old emails on my laptop. At five thirty I had one terrible option. I had Amy’s number in an email chain Evie had copied me on between her and Blake.
Blake was Evie’s friend, not mine. For a long time, right up until the point Logan stepped into the picture, Evie had been in love with Blake. I had no idea why; the guy was so beneath her. He’d strung Evie along for months, even while he was living with Amy. Confused, he’d said. Bullshit. His dick wanted two women. The only confusion was why he couldn’t have both. He’d also let the W word pass his lips while addressing me. His apology afterward did nothing to help. I didn’t even acknowledge it.
It had worked out, I guessed, for Blake. Amy was preggo with Blake’s kid and they were getting married in a few months, shotgun-wedding style. It had most definitely worked out for Evie. There was no confusion who Logan wanted.
As I contemplated calling and waking a pregnant woman I didn’t really know, I kind of got mad at Logan. Did he realize what he’d done by setting Dom in my path? This was all Logan’s fault. My eyes burned with exhaustion as I’d been up almost twenty-four hours, and in my weakness, I was okay with assigning all of the blame squarely on him and not myself.