Every Which Way

by Sasha White

  “Well, I’m not loving, and I’m sure as hell not dying.” Janie’s mouth formed a thin line as her thumb tapped out a rapid beat of annoyance on the tabletop “In fact, I’m barely screaming, if you know what I mean.”

  “Yeah, I know what you mean.” Angie leaned forward and lowered her voice. “I’m kind of going through a dry spell myself.”

  “It’s not that I’m going through a dry spell, exactly.” Janie took a moment, trying to find the words to express what she was really feeling, but how could she explain it to her friends when she didn’t understand it herself? “Lately, the guys I’ve been dating just seem... I don’t know…boring, I guess.”

  Maria bit into her cheeseburger and chased it with a sugary soda. “Boring how?” she asked.

  Janie took in a breath, prepared to fire back an answer, but ended up blinking dumbly at Maria when she came up empty again. Honestly, she didn’t have a clue as to what her problem was. Her relationships were exactly what she wanted them to be, purely physical, no strings. She kept an emotional distance, didn’t do commitments, and made that clear to her lovers up front. Thanks to the first two men in her life, her father and brother, she knew the opposite sex were untrustworthy and caused nothing but heartache. To think otherwise only led to pain and letdown.

  The sudden silence around the table brought her back to the question at hand—boring how? Three pairs of eyes focused on her, waiting for an answer. She gave them the only thing she could come up with.

  “In bed, of course.”

  “I thought you said the last guy you were with had a huge—”

  “Maria,” Eden gasped, cutting her off before she offended someone in the cafe. Eyes wide, Eden stole a quick glance at the patrons seated around them. “Shh, someone might hear you.”

  Maria simply shrugged and held her palms about nine inches apart, letting her hands do the talking. “Is this better?” she asked.

  Eden grabbed her friend’s arm and lowered it. “No, it isn’t,” she said, laughing in spite of her obvious effort not to. “Stop that.”

  Janie grinned at the blush staining Eden’s cheeks but knew that underneath that sweet farm girl persona, Eden liked to get her kink on in the bedroom. After watching her friend go after the hot cop she had wanted for so long and seeing how happy she was now that she’d gotten him, Janie decided it was damn well time she mixed things up, too. Maybe then she could figure out what was really going on inside of her and why she was so discontent with her sex life. She jabbed her fork into a piece of celery and looked around at the restaurant guests as they enjoyed their lunch in the warm afternoon sunshine.

  “Maybe you’re going to have to go for a different type of guy,” Maria suggested.

  “That’s exactly what I was thinking.” Janie nodded toward Kaden Ward, one of the cameramen on the set, as he sat alone at a corner table, reading as he ate a sandwich. “What about him?” Dressed in steel gray, loose fitting clothes that likely made maneuvering around the set more manageable, he adjusted his dark sunglasses and flipped the pages in the book, completely oblivious to everyone around him.

  “I know you’re looking for different,” Eden began. “But he’s dressed in sweats and looks like one of those guys who spends his nights playing video games. Maybe that’s too different.”

  Angie, who had been quietly enjoying her salad, took a sip of water and eyed the cameraman over the rim of her glass. “He does have that whole gamer boy vibe about him, doesn’t he?”

  Janie nodded and took note of his overlong dark hair that fell forward to cover most of his face as he leaned over his book. Even though he’d been her cameraman for months, she’d yet to get a really good look at him. “Yeah, I know he’s not like the guys I usually go for, but maybe I need to shake things up a bit.”

  “With a gaming nerd?” Angie asked. “I was thinking more along the lines of a cowboy.”

  “Cowboy?” Janie asked, noting the wistful look on her friend’s face. “You’re not in Texas anymore, Angie. There are no cowboys here in New York. Besides, maybe he’s not nerdy.” Janie took a sip of her soda and studied him a bit longer. “Maybe he’s just shy or likes to keep to himself.”

  Maria swallowed the last bite of her burger, wiped her mouth, and casually glanced over her shoulder to get a look at him. She made a doubtful face when she turned back around. “Uh, he actually looks like the kind of guy you’d eat alive.”

  Janie ran her tongue over her lower lip. “We all need to eat, Maria.”

  “You know what I mean,” Maria said, chuckling.

  Yeah, she knew. Janie liked to be the aggressor in the relationship, the one calling the shots. The guys she dated didn’t seem to have a problem with that as long as they were getting a piece of the action. Which was a good thing, because Janie needed to take the reins for her own security, her safety. No way would she ever give a man power over her again.

  She thought about her mother and how she had chosen to stay in an abusive relationship. After graduating high school, Janie wanted to leave home, to get away from her father and brother, but there was no way she’d leave her sick mother alone with them. After her mother had died a little over three years ago, Janie had hitched a ride from Kansas to New York to get away from her drunken father’s emotional abuse and an older brother who was following in his footsteps. Staying in charge made her feel secure and in control of her life.

  Pushing those dark thoughts aside, she let her glance move over the guy who’d been quietly watching her from behind the camera lens. Outside of work, she hadn’t seen him with any women, and he did seem to keep to himself while on the set, even off the set, considering he was sitting at a four-person table, eating and reading alone.

  Maria narrowed her eyes. “Wait, isn’t he the set’s cameraman?”

  “That’s him,” Janie said.

  Maria lifted her hand and did air quotes. “But aren’t ‘on set’ romances prohibited?”

  “Yeah, but technically, it wouldn’t be a romance because all I’m looking for is a little,” she made her own set of air quotes, “‘off set’ sex.”

  Just then, her phone pinged, and she pulled it from her purse. The second she saw who the message was from, her stomach tightened, the salad she’d eaten threatening to make a second appearance. “Oh, God,” she murmured, her voice as shaky as her hands.

  “What?” Eden asked.

  Janie swallowed hard and held her phone out for her friends to see.

  “Oh, no,” Maria said when she saw the message from Simon, a man who used to work maintenance on the set and continually stalked Janie. “He’s at it again?”

  Janie set the phone down and pushed it away from her like it was diseased. “I haven’t heard from him since he got fired a few weeks back.”

  “Don’t you still have a restraining order against him?” Eden asked.

  Janie nodded. “Yeah, and I’m pretty sure it covers phone messages.”

  Eden touched her arm. “I think you should change your number again.”

  She fought back a tremble. Everything about Simon took her back to her teen years when she felt so defenseless. “I will.”

  Marie took the phone and stored the message from Simon like the officer had told Janie to do after reporting the stalking incidents a few months back. Hating the way he made her feel and determined to take back control and not let Simon invade her headspace—ever again—Janie circled her index finger around her right ear. “That guy is bat-shit crazy. But enough about him,” she said, turning her attention back to Kaden.

  “So, you’re sure you won’t get in trouble at work?” Maria asked again, clearly understanding Janie wanted to switch topics.

  “Like I said, I’m not looking for romance. All I’m after is a good time.” Janie lifted her eyebrows. “And beneath those sweats, I bet he’s got good time written all over him.”

  “Then I guess there’s only one way to find out,” Maria said.

  Janie’s gaze swung back to Kaden. She tapped her
fingers on the tabletop speculatively. “You think I should go for it?”

  Maria shrugged. “If you’re looking to mix things up with a gaming nerd in sweats, then, yeah.”

  It was true, she wanted to try something different, and the set’s cameraman was nothing like the well-groomed, movie star guys she normally gravitated toward. But truthfully, there was something about his cool indifference that drew her attention. Even though he outwardly seemed shy and withdrawn, everything in the way he carried himself, from the way he could be so still to the way he moved, intrigued her and spoke of a deeper confidence—and he was reading a book! God, the only thing the men in her life ever read was a script. They could barely carry on an interesting conversation without rehearsed lines. Then again, it wasn’t like she wanted anything deeper from them.

  Oddly enough, as she thought about getting naked with her cameraman, a fine shiver moved through her. She looked him over again, taking in the hard angles of his chin, the self-assurance in his posture. Would he fold to her demands in the bedroom or would he turn things around on her and insist on taking the reins? Her throat tightened, and a wave of heat settled deep between her legs at that last thought. Strange, really, because she’d never hand herself over to anyone.

  As if feeling her gaze on him, he lifted his head. He removed his dark glasses, and when steel gray eyes that matched his clothes met hers for the very first time, it nearly sucked the oxygen from her lungs.

  O-kay…

  “I guess if you want to shake things up, he’s probably the guy to do it with,” Eden said, breaking the hypnotic hold he seemed to have over her. As her pulse jumped into her throat, Janie tore her gaze away from the cameraman and turned to Eden. Eden nodded and gave Janie a thoughtful look. “I think you should go for it. If you don’t, you’ll never know what you’re missing. He’ll be the one you always wonder about and think…what if…” A warm smile moved over Eden’s face, and Janie suspected she was thinking back to her own seduction of bad boy cop, Jay Bennett.

  Janie arched her brow. “As you all know, I’ll be at the beach tomorrow to shoot the pin up calendar for Devious Woman.”

  Maria grinned. “You. The beach. A bikini. Sounds like the perfect set up to get gamer boy out of his clothes.”

  “And into something else.” Janie said, a deliciously naughty idea forming in the back of her mind. “Specifically, me.”

  Oh yeah, tomorrow she definitely planned to shake things up, and with a little luck, maybe, just maybe, her cameraman would know how to work a woman’s buttons with the same skill he worked his camera’s.

  * * *

  With the late evening sun glinting off the rolling waves, Kaden Ward got down on one knee and snapped a picture of the gorgeous pinup girl in the vintage style, yellow polka dot bikini. He pushed his damp hair off his forehead while she splashed in the water, and as she arched her long, sexy back in a seductive manner, it was all Kaden could do to keep his shit together. Even though Janie had been instructed to act sexy, to play up to the camera, Kaden got the distinct impression that there was more going on with her than met the eye. Everything in his gut told him she wasn’t just performing for the camera, but instead, playing up to the cameraman.

  He’d been filming the cast of Devious Women for months now, watching all the beautiful girls from behind his camera lens, but there was something about Janie Monroe that always drew his attention and had him thinking she might be the one—the one girl who would fit nicely into his and Tate’s lifestyle.

  As their director, Cameron Phillips, gave orders to Janie, urging her to mimic the famous pinup girl poses from the fifties, she adjusted her sexy rockabilly bandana over her dark wavy hair and smoothed her hands over her hips. Kaden snapped off a few more pictures and shifted his stance, uncomfortable as his cock reared up for a front row viewing.

  She looked hot in that classic, pinup halter top and high-waisted bottoms, and the way she puckered those painted red lips had him aching to pull her into his arms and smudge that artfully applied lipstick—with his mouth, his tongue…his cock.

  She flattened herself in the damp sand and laid out her long, curvaceous body. With her sweet ass up in the air, she folded her legs at the ankles and gave him a playful look. His hands shook, eager to go over there and touch her body, feel her soft curves, spank her luscious backside…

  Janie Monroe.

  Christ, he hadn’t felt this aroused in years. As he thought about how this woman had watched him yesterday, intrigue and curiosity in those sexy green eyes of hers, his mind traveled to his best friend, Tate. Even though he and Tate were from opposite sides of the tracks, and Kaden was the brawn while Tate was the brains, they’d been best friends since Kaden stood up for Tate on the playground, knocking the schoolyard bully to his ass. Despite their differences, an instant friendship had been formed, and over the years, Tate’s house became Kaden’s sanctuary when Kaden’s old man went on one of his many rampages.

  Now here they were, some twenty years later, Tate’s dot com company providing them with a Manhattan mansion, cars, motorcycles, everything a man could ask for except the right woman to fit into their lifestyle.

  Of course, Kaden wasn’t looking for anything other than a physical relationship with her. Been there, done that. A few years ago, he and Tate had both fallen for the same woman and brought her into their small family. But Sondra had run off with another man, breaking it off with them through text. Now they were just looking for a girl, a submissive in the dungeon, one who accepted their lifestyle and the fact that they shared everything.

  The director came up to him, pulling his thoughts back. “Hey, Kaden.” He shook the cell phone in his right hand as Kaden lowered his camera and stood up. “I have a bit of an emergency. Can you take over here until I get back?”

  Kaden nodded and let his camera hang from the strap around his neck. “I’m on it.” Once the director disappeared down the beach, leaving him alone with Janie while the rest of the cast lounged at the nearby beach bar, he stepped closer to her, his pant legs dipping into the cold water.

  The sun beat down on her fair skin as she splashed water across her chest to cool herself down. He looked her over, taking in the pink tinge on her cheeks. Since it was in his nature to take care of those in his charge, he frowned, worried about her well-being.

  “You looked flushed. Do you want to take a quick break?” he asked, even though they’d soon be losing the sun.

  She trailed her hand down her long throat, and Kaden watched a fat droplet of water follow the path until it disappeared into her cleavage.

  “I’m okay, just hot,” she murmured seductively, wetting her lips in a way that made his cock throb. “But I’m not one to let a little heat get in my way. I’m all about completion and will do whatever it takes, no matter how long it takes, to get the job done.”

  Kaden studied her, taking in the coy, yet calculated look on her face as she blatantly flirted with him. “Is that right?” he asked. There was no mistaking the real meaning behind her words. They were no longer talking about work. “So you’ll do whatever it takes, no matter how long it takes?”

  She fluttered those fake eyelashes that made her already too big eyes look cat like, completing the sexy pinup look. “Absolutely,” she said. “I’m not a quitter.”

  Even though she’d long ago caught his attention, and he suspected she’d be the perfect playmate, without a sign, something to tell him this dominant woman would not only bend to his rules but would happily put her body and trust into his hands, he kept her at an arm’s length. He cleared his throat and worked to get himself together before he tossed his camera aside, took her home, and showed this sexy pinup girl what it really meant to be pinned up.

  “You must be hot, though,” she said, her sexy tone gaining his full attention. She ran her hands through the water. “Perhaps you’d like to get out of those clothes and join me for a swim.”

  As much as he liked the sound of that, he knew it was neither the time nor
place to get naked with her. No, when they undressed together, it was going to be in a place where he could take his sweet time with her, a place where he could slowly coax the submissive out of her and show her what he suspected she secretly needed.

  “I’m fine,” he said, having practiced restraint in the dungeon for many, many years.

  She shrugged casually, and when he grabbed his camera, she struck a pose, jutting her luscious tits out in a way that beckoned his mouth and turned him on in ways he hadn’t felt in years.

  “How’s this?” she asked.

  “Bend your back a bit more.”

  She did as he requested. “Like this?” There was a teasing look in her eyes as she put one finger into her mouth.

  He cleared his throat. “Yeah, just like that.” He moved closer, and when he caught her sweet floral scent, he swallowed a moan. He bet she tasted as sweet as she smelled.

  “Everything okay?” She blinked up at him with innocent eyes, like she wasn’t using everything in her arsenal to arouse him. “Am I doing this right?”

  “Yeah, you’re doing everything right.” He snapped off a few more pictures. “Give me something else. Give me another pose. Something suggestive and sexy.”

  She paused and pursed her lips like she was in deep thought. Then she planted her hands on her hips and met his glance straight on. He lowered the camera.

  “What?” He studied her carefully. What was she up to?

  There was a long pause, and then in a low, barely audible voice, she asked, “How do you want me?”

  Ah, Jesus, there it was…there it was! Finally! Exactly what he’d been waiting so long to hear from her.

  His heart beat once, twice, then began to pound faster against his rib cage. He drew in a quick breath and let it out slowly, the Dom in him responding to the subtle hints of submission he heard in her voice, to the way she was putting control into his hands when control was something she held so closely. Oh yeah, he saw the guys she went after, saw the way they wagged their tails to her every command. She was a take-charge kind of girl, one who needed to be in power, but those words, and the way she delivered them, was the sign he’d been waiting so long for.