On the Edge

by Jayne Ann Krentz

  “Decisions like you’re making aren’t made on top shelf tequila. They’re made on Jose Cuervo.”

  Two more shots and the tequila flames spread through her limbs like wildfire, until she practically ached to be touched when she left the bar. True to his word, Blue was waiting outside the lobby in his classic James Bond car with the motor running. She slid into the passenger seat.

  “I’m not like the other women you’ve dated.”

  “No, you’re not.” He shifted the car through its gears so quickly her body pressed back against the seat.

  She pretended it was his body pressing her back. “I’m going to be demanding. I like certain things and I won’t do others.” Best to get that out of the way now. She was something of a prude. The missionary position was reliable. If she was going to spend the next few weeks working with Blue, she didn’t want to look at him and relive kinky sex that she wouldn’t have done without tequila. “And I’ll need more tequila.”

  “We’ll see.”

  In no time they were rocketing onto the 405, heading north.

  “Where are we going?”

  “My place. I have a bottle of champagne chilling.” He gave her a sideways glance and an evil smile that brought to mind his intent – he was going to lick champagne out of her crevices.

  “That sounds messy.” And hot. Oh, so hot. But not business-like. “We probably shouldn’t pop that cork.”

  He laughed a bit maniacally. He was weaving in and out of traffic as if he was 007 and they were on their way to save the world, the engine revving with unspent power. “Close your eyes, Maddy.”

  “I don’t want to close my eyes.”

  “Close your eyes.”

  They’d reached the top of the hill, coming down into the valley by the exit to Mulholland Drive.

  “Why?” Her eyes were languid, drifting closed anyway just because she was tired and she was on the downhill side of tequila shots.

  Blue sighed. “Because I don’t want you to know where I live.”

  Her eyes shot open. “You don’t trust me?”

  “I don’t trust anybody.”

  That hurt more than she thought it would. “Well, that’s comforting considering I’m about to trust you with my body.”

  “There will be no avenging done at my new address. Close your eyes, Maddy.”

  “I suppose if I don’t know where you live I can’t submit to a future urge to show up at your door wearing only a thong and a sundress.”

  “I suppose not.” He sounded strangled.

  “All right.” Maddy closed her eyes and put her hands over them for good measure. “I hope the sheets on your bed are clean.”

  Silence. A turn signal. The powerful car’s acceleration cocooning her in the seat again.

  “And no dishes in the sink. I have a thing about dishes in the sink. Makes me want to clean them.”

  Another turn signal. A bend. A sloping curve. A bump.

  And then the sound of a garage door opening.

  “I feel as if I’ve entered the bat cave. Can I open my eyes now, Bruce?”

  “Yes, but stay in the car while I put Mr. J away.”

  His garage was empty except for the Cayenne. White walls. No tools. Why didn’t that surprise her? He wasn’t the type to putter around the house. Any puttering he did would be at the country club. Or in bed.

  Blue returned. Towering above the car, he stared down at her through the windshield, looking like a poster for her fantasies. Then he opened her door, lifted her up and tossed her over his shoulder.

  Me Tarzan. You Jane.

  “Hey, wait.” Maddy’s nose banged against his back, as her Tarzan fetish met up with reality. “Isn’t this supposed to be about me and what I want?”

  “No.” He shouldered open the door and carried her into the living room – comfortable looking beige couches, a beige Lazy boy, beige carpet and a big yellow blanket on the floor.

  “What? Your bed wasn’t made?”

  Blue laid her on the blanket.

  “No fire? No candles?”

  “Too cliché.” He unbuttoned his shirt as he left the room. “Don’t move.”

  “Where’s my tequila? At least give a girl some liquid courage.”

  The picture over the fireplace was a wave crashing into a rocky shore. Now that was cliché.

  Something popped. Glasses clinked.

  If there wasn’t tequila, champagne would have to do. Maddy raised up on her elbows and craned her neck to see into the kitchen.

  Blue appeared in the doorway holding a bottle of Dom Perignon and two champagne flutes. His shirt was gone, revealing some very chiseled muscle, including the top of an intriguing V, the bottom of which was covered by his waistband. “You moved.”

  “So?”

  “It’s not allowed. My rules.”

  “Blue’s Rules.” She snorted, vestiges of tequila still in her system. “Blue’s Rules of Attraction.”

  “So now we need a punishment.” Blue knelt at her side, depositing the champagne and glasses on a nearby coffee table. He poured golden liquid into a glass and offered it to her.

  It was dry and cold, not near as inhibition erasing as tequila.

  Blue sat at Maddy’s feet, slipped off one of her flats and started giving her a foot rub.

  Heaven.

  She gulped her champagne and lay back down.

  After a few glorious minutes, Blue gave the other foot the same treatment. But the entire time, he was stroking her with his eyes.

  Her body felt liquid. “I like the way you punish.”

  “That wasn’t the punishment. This is. Hold still.” He began to unbutton her white blouse. He peeled it carefully aside, revealing her plain white bra.

  Why was it that Maddy never had on the right bra when sex was at hand?

  And then Blue took a flute of champagne and poured it slowly over each of her white cotton covered breasts.

  The liquid seeped through the material and onto her skin. Cold. Sticky. He placed his lips over her breast, gently suckling champagne through the thin layers of fabric, pulling her nipple into his mouth, warming her up. And all the while, he held her gaze with his own. Daring her not to hide from the passion that was building between them.

  “Oh, my.” It was good to have a task master. She reached for Blue’s waistband, but he brushed her hand away.

  His mouth left her while he busied himself with undoing the side zipper of her black skirt, dragging the material over her hips and down her thighs. Every touch making her want him, all of him, however he wanted to give himself to her.

  Blue removed her panties next.

  “Now let’s find some of those crevices.” He poured champagne over her belly button.

  Champagne dripped around her waist. He licked her clean. Her skin tingled with the need to be touched. She arched her back, begging for what she knew was coming next.

  But instead of pouring champagne over the triangular thatch of hair between her legs, he took a sip, studying her body before lowering his mouth to one wet bra cup and squirting the still cold champagne out of his mouth through the fabric and onto her nipple.

  Maddy gasped.

  Another sip. Lips placed on her other breast. Another cold burst of liquid heaven. Her back was sticky with bubbly. Air came in ragged gasps. She arched again. A plea for release.

  His hand on her pelvic bone guided her back to the blanket.

  “This is punishment,” she murmured.

  Blue smiled wickedly, idly stroking her thigh as he took another sip of champagne. And then he parted her legs, kneeled between them, leaned down, and spread her apart with his fingers. His lips so warm. The sticky liquid so cold. A stream, stroking, soaking, putting pressure on a spot that sent her climaxing, had her grabbing his shoulders, dragging him to her for a kiss where she warmed his tongue with her own.

  She rolled him on his back, straddling him. “You. Are. Overdressed.” She gave him the same slow treatment he’d given her. A leisurely pulle
d zipper. The slow glide of trousers over bare skin. Boxers removed with roving hands. Until he lay beneath her in all his chiseled glory.

  “Condom,” he said weakly, gesturing to his pants.

  “In a minute,” she said tartly, reaching for the champagne.

  There was always a moment after incredible sex with an intriguing woman where Blue felt that restlessness, that niggle of thought urging him to get up, pull his pants on and leave.

  But Maddy had been lying in his arms on the living room floor with her hand stroking his chest for twenty minutes. The niggle hadn’t come.

  Before he could ponder why, she spoke. “I thought when women were with the infamous Blue Rule they got to choose how and when. There’ll be no more domination on your part.”

  Blue nipped her gently on the shoulder. “You probably came here with some plan about having quick missionary sex, and getting me out of your system.”

  Her eyes widened. “The savant speaks.”

  “I have plans for you, Maddy.” Blue stood, scooped her up, and carried her to the heated lap pool that lined his back patio, depositing her in the far end. The summer night was clear and warm. The moon overhead not covered by incoming fog. He turned on the filter. The current began to flow slowly. He rolled a condom into place. And then he lowered himself into the water and drew Maddy into his arms. She smelled of champagne, flowery shampoo and sex. Forced by the current, his body pressed against hers as he slid inside her. “I have a few things I want to try before we check off your missionary fantasy.”

  Maddy moaned as he started to slide and glide. “There is nothing wrong with soft sheets and horizontal sex.”

  “I’m not giving you what you want.” He spun her around until his back was against the hard tile, her body pressing against him from the strength of the lap pool current. She took advantage of the water’s flow, folding her legs on either side of his hips, flattening her soft breasts against him.

  Maddy’s breasts. Maddy’s hips. Him inside of Maddy. Both of them moving with the greediness of need.

  She was perfect. They were perfect. How had he not known this woman existed? How could he let her go come morning?

  The thought would have scared him if the tension between them wasn’t building, buzzing through him with brain numbing speed. He thrust deeper, pulling her hips closer, until her cry of release sent him over the edge. Together, they drifted to the bottom of the shallow lap pool.

  He pulled her to the surface, gasping for air. And still he wasn’t done with her. “Damn, this could go on all night.” He was already half ready for more. It had to be the long period of celibacy.

  “Come on.” Blue tugged Maddy toward the narrow steps. “I’m pruning.”

  “I hope not. If this is my Cinderella moment and I have to go back to being a pumpkin in the morning, I want the full-on, Blue Rule treatment.” She climbed out of the water, her body filled out and supple, not the stiff thinness of a woman who starved herself to fit into a pair of size zero jeans. “Look at those stars. We must be close to the ocean.”

  Blue followed her out of the water. “I’ll never tell.”

  She reached for him, efficiently ridding him of the condom. “Nervous yet? Want to switch to something more predictable, like the missionary?”

  “Nope.”

  Maddy laughed. The sound filled him inside like warm tea on a cold night – nothing too heavy, nothing too light.

  “I have all sorts of ideas that will unfurl all those chakras Senge thought were twisted. And not a one involves the missionary position.”

  She laughed again.

  A spastic bird was singing. Maddy reached to pull the covers over her face. Instead her hand landed on a sturdy arm.

  The night came rushing back to her. Blue had delivered on fantastic sex, none of which was missionary. But the night was done and it was time to step back into reality. She had her future to ensure and Poppa Bert’s albums to save.

  She rolled over and faced Blue, who smiled in the dusky light of morning.

  Champagne orgasms. Lap pool sex. Kitchen counter, pretzel-limbed lovemaking.

  Don’t use the L-word.

  It was morning. She’d promised herself that come morning she wasn’t coming any more.

  “Good morning.” His tone was an invitation. So not happening.

  She’d never be able to look at him through the camera lens without reliving the past six hours.

  “I think you proved Senge wrong,” Maddy said in her best Auntie Maddy voice. “Now that we’ve gotten beyond that, could I borrow a T-shirt to get home?” Her shirt and bra were probably still wet and sticky. And she didn’t want to poke through his drawers. That felt too personal.

  “You just woke up. Naked. In bed with me. Also naked. And you want to put clothes on?” Blue frowned. His hand drifted to her hip. “I don’t think we’ve proved anything.”

  “Seriously, Blue. I need to get home and start editing. I promised Ivan I’d have a rough pilot within the next two weeks.”

  “My manhood is in question.” Blue drew her closer, angling his lips to the hollow below her ear.

  “Okay, but if we’re doing it one more time, it’s the missionary position.” Maddy shifted out of his grip and onto her back. “Take me and be quick about it.”

  “Like you’re some vestal virgin? Or some bored housewife, making a grocery list while I get my rocks off? I don’t think so.” His hand found her nipple, rolling it into a taut bud. “I have a reputation to protect…according to you.”

  She’d gone about this all wrong. He’d taken her boring, sexual demands as a challenge, while she was using them as an emotional shield – an ineffectual emotional shield. He was a generous lover, even if he hadn’t granted her missionary wish. Add to that his being kind to small animals and misfits, like Ulani Mott, Winnie Tiegler, and her…he was practically perfect. Which in her world meant he could break her heart.

  Maddy tried another approach. “Don’t get me wrong. Last night was fantastic. But my brain is already starting to work and physical activity won’t turn my brain off.” Her heart? That was another matter entirely. Her heart was working overtime, trying to convince Maddy to succumb to his advances.

  He nipped her neck. His hand slid down her rib cage, sending shivers down her spine and disproving her statement as her mind went languidly blank. “Have dinner with me tonight.”

  “No.” A weak refusal.

  “Maddy?” His breath warmed her skin.

  “Hhmmm?”

  “What happens when you shut off that video editor in your head and start thinking of me?”

  “I’ll turn on Mr. Happy.” The vibrator she kept in her bedside drawer. “Or hop in the shower.”

  His hand stilled, then drifted lower. “I can perform better than any mechanical device.”

  “Yes, but Mr. Happy operates on my schedule and obeys my rules.” Blue’s rules were more like pirate guidelines.

  His thumb found a very sensitive part of her body and fell into a most intriguing rhythm.

  Maddy melted beneath the heat of his touch, her body surrendered, calling to her heart and signaling her soul that this was important – this heat, this feeling, this man.

  She tried to reject it, but she was panting, orgasm-needy, and hanging onto him. Words came clumsily to her lips. “I really need to go.” Who was she kidding? She wasn’t going anywhere.

  Her skin felt hot and tight. Every muscle poised to burst into flame. At his command. At his touch.

  He slid a finger deep inside her and simultaneously pressed his thumb on her bud. She combusted, falling apart so completely tears prickled her eyes. She should have been afraid. She should have been bundling up her heart in her sticky clothes and sprinting back to reality.

  Instead, she closed her eyes and hung onto Blue as he pulled her on top of him and slid inside, filling her up again, building the nearly unbearable heat into resolve-melting flames.

  “Next time you think about reaching for Mr. Happy,
” he whispered when he’d reduced her to ash once more. “Reach for your cell phone and call me instead.”

  L.A. Happenings by Lyle Lincoln

  …The billboard is up on Santa Monica Boulevard! The heartbreaking playboy is none other than Blue Rule! Is that why he needed a private session with Senge Tenzig? Has he been disappointing his ladies in the sack? I didn’t think that’s why his fan club was formed.

  Chapter 22

  The price of a night in heaven was often a day in hell.

  The calls started after he dropped Maddy off at her car, shortly after six a.m.

  “Blackie, I just read L.A. Happenings. Say it isn’t true.”

  The hair on the back of Blue’s neck started to rise. Blue jerked the wheel hard to the left to avoid getting on the freeway. Instead, he drove toward the billboard the Avengers had put up on Santa Monica. “It’s not true, Winnie.”

  “I didn’t think it was. You’re nothing like the rascal those women are after.”

  Blue wove through traffic, accelerating to make it through every light. The morning fog hovered above him. He could only hope it was so low no one would see the billboard.

  No such luck.

  Blue pulled over and looked into the face of doom. His face was huge on the billboard. His name clear in Times New Roman.

  “Shit, Blue,” Ivan said when Blue answered his call. “You’re lucky we’re in development or you’d never work in this town again.”

  Blue hung up.

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” Jack Gordon shouted when Blue took his call. “You’re the man every woman loves to hate? No wonder you can’t get the job done with Viv.”

  Blue hung up.

  “Blue, tell me who these Avengers are and I’ll make them pay.” Blue refused Ulani’s offer of Hawaiian muscle. At least she and Quinby were hitting it off.

  His phone rang again and again. It chimed to notify him of incoming text messages. Blue turned his phone off and headed for work, damage control on his mind. He’d need a press release. He’d have to work social media. And he’d have to spin it with Lyle Lincoln, whose bullshit meter was among the best in Hollywood. He’d use Maddy’s pilot to his advantage, perhaps spinning the billboard as part of her reality show’s promotion plan.