by Lila Munro
Steele Clips: A Compromising Position
written by Lila Munro
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First Edition
©2013, Rebel Ink Press, LLC
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What reviewers and readers are saying about Lila and her work…
Private Pirouette:
“Definitely grab a copy of this book. It’s beyond 5 Book worthy, and the best book I’ve read in the month of September. I’m keeping this book on my to-read-again shelf and can’t wait for another Lila Munro book! Well done, Ms. Munro!”—Reviews By Molly
“Piper is independent as hell and Alec is, on the surface, your typical horndog Marine. But that’s the surface. Lila lets you into their lives to see what they’re made of. Reminded me of Suzanne Brockman’s stories. I really enjoyed this one.”—Author Donna Steele
Assumed Master:
“ASSUMED MASTER engages readers, holding us captive until the last page, as we wait to see if Julie can find her HEA after such a tragic loss. Readers will cheer her on and find strength in knowing there can be such a love after such a loss.”—The Romance Reviews, Reviewers Top Pick
“I never felt as if it was outside my league like some other BDSM stories. Not saying that it is a manual to try it. I am saying that I could have met these people next door. I never felt as if it was impossible to live their relationship in real life and this is, I think, the best compliment I can give to Lila Munro. I was “there”. I could breathe the emotions. I could understand the insecurities. Lila Munro made me cry at page 4 for Peter’s sake!!! And that is not very often that an author does that!”—Mary’s Naughty Whispers, Top Pick
A Slower, Lower Leap:
“Those wanting a story that leaves a warm and fuzzy feeling with fall for A Slower, Lower Leap by Lila Munro courtesy of its to die for hero. Lila Munro is a master at writing sweet and sexy romances and has done so once again with this story of what really defines love.”—The Scarf Princess
“If you’re in the mood for a heartwarming, emotional story, that’s exactly what you’ll get in A Slower, Lower Leap. I laughed, I cried, I swore…the book had me feeling a whole bunch of emotions, but that’s exactly what I want in a great story.”—Nikki at Storm Goddess Book Reviews
At Your Service: Tammer
“The chemistry between Tammer and Nina is off the charts; so much so that is bothers her that she is attracted to him. The sex scenes were hot and spicy. I found this to be a wonderfully written story. Overall, I enjoyed the concept behind this book and I really hope that there will be more stories to come in the near future. I can foresee many tales that could be told.” V Rainey—Night Owl Reviews, 4 Stars
Prologue
Latch on and don’t let go. That was my mistake…
Connor Sandoval’s own words came back to haunt him and often. Had it really been over a year ago he was hunkered down with his partner on a mission in Afghanistan giving advice he wasn’t even sure he was qualified to give? Honestly, if he had no idea how to make a marriage work against all odds, what made him think he could explain it to someone else?
It was after that tour in the Middle East his team had rotated back just prior to Christmas to find Drake O’Malley had a gift waiting for him wrapped up in a pink baby blanket. Everyone knew Meg was pregnant except O’Malley and even though the entire team was sworn to secrecy on the matter, they’d all tried at some point to convince the man he and Meg belonged together regardless of what either of them thought. After Meg nearly lost the baby and her life, they were married over the next summer right before they were all shipped back out.
Now here Connor and what was left of his team were eight months later back in Kuwait awaiting transport to the states yet again. They were down two team members, O’Malley was going home with a busted knee, and Connor had never felt his mortality as keenly as he did now.
Where the hell did time go? How long had it been since he’d made the very mistake he’d warned O’Malley about? Had it really been seven years since he’d signed the papers turning what Connor thought was a temporary threat into a divorce reality?
Time was precious. And too much time had been wasted.
Even though he and Jodi were divorced they’d somehow managed to snap back into the day to day business of being friends and lovers after the proceedings were finalized. They simply didn’t live together. They cared for each other deeply. It just never seemed to be enough to hold them together.
Yes, too much time had been wasted. It was either time to figure out how to make it work as more than friends and lovers or cut bait and run. Life was too short and if Connor were being honest, he’d never stopped loving her…
Chapter One
Jodi Sandoval stepped out of her car, the heels of her thigh high boots clacking against the pavement with a hollow ring and a puff of white mist floating from between her parted lips. It was amazing to her how a hundred miles in any direction in North Carolina could produce such vast differences in the weather. Even though it was the dead of winter, it had been close to sixty degrees along the coast, now here she was an hour and a half due northwest and the temperature hovere
d at the freezing mark, the bone dry cold needling her lungs.
With her purse slung over one shoulder, she strolled around the back of her fiery red Camaro and popped the trunk. She bent her tall, slender frame over and pulled her toy bag out before easing the hatch shut, hitting the lock function on her FOB, tossing her keys in the side of her handbag, and turning toward Steele Image.
To the regular passerby’s eye, it was just another brick building in the warehouse district. If one didn’t know what they were looking for or have a friend of a friend to put them on the guest list, the members only club would be as inconspicuous as the wind. Hell, the owner was as off the radar as one could get since being burned by the government years ago and driven underground. His clubs weren’t just clubs. There were a way to recruit operatives or those who’d just had it working for the government with the shitty hours and even shittier pay.
With a flick of her long, dark curls over her shoulder, Jodi took a few short strides and walked through the big wooden door checking in with the security guard before removing her knee length leather jacket and allowing him to hang it behind the counter. Handing over her purse for him to lock up behind the counter, she signed in and headed through the interior entrance. She made one quick stop in the ladies’ room to adjust her corset and tight leather skirt and make sure her cherry red lipstick was still on her lips before slinging her toy bag across her shoulder and proceeding to the bar room.
As her eyes adjusted to the dimness around her, Micah Williams approached her from the left.
“I’m really glad I caught you before you left for Charlotte for the weekend,” Micah said. “He’s not doing good at all, Jodi.”
“I can see that,” Jodi answered, looking to the far corner of the room where her ex-husband sat, a wall of shot glasses upturned on the table he occupied alone. She’d wasted no time in getting ready and coming at Micah’s request, but it seemed as fast as she could get there wasn’t fast enough. “I can also see I’m too late. How long’s he been at that?”
“A couple of hours.” Micah steered her to the nearest booth and handed her into one side of it then slid in across from her. “This last mission really fucked him up. You’re the only person I knew who’d know what to do for him.”
“Of course I was,” she said, rolling her eyes, the corners of her mouth twisting down. “Well, unfortunately, in his condition it’ll have to wait.” Jodi looked toward the corner again to see Connor lay his head on the table and close his eyes. “Looks like he’s safe for now. What the fuck happened over there anyway? I’ve been out of pocket on conference and just got back a couple of days ago. I knew y’all had made it back, but the only word I’ve been passed so far was there were casualties.”
“Yeah, we lost two. O’Malley won’t be going out again for a while. He took a hit and fucked up his knee. His wife doesn’t know whether to jump for joy or feel guilty. You know they got another kid on the way.”
“So I heard and trust me, I know how she feels. I’ve had those conflicted moments. One in particular I’d rather forget,” Jodi said, remembering the day she’d signed away her marriage, chalking it up to a civil mistake. A waitress slowed, looking in on them with a questioning glance before stopping altogether.
“Mistress Jodi,” the girl said, beaming. “So good to see you again. Been a while. Can I get you anything?”
“Yes. A room. Jack on the rocks, lemon. Make it a double. Anyone interesting about?”
“Tyler Jenkins,” she said, winking. “He’s in the back milling around. Never ran into anyone else quite like him really. Would you like me to have Connor put to bed in your room, Mistress?”
“Please. And should he come around, don’t tell him I’m here.”
“Yes, Ma’am. Anything for you, Sir?” she asked, turning to Micah.
“Blue Moon, Abbey Ale, sugar.”
With that she scooted off, stopping at two more tables to pick up empties on her way to the bar allowing a Dom or three to touch her.
“So, how are things at Lejeune?” Micah asked, leaning back and watching the door.
“Hectic. Non-stop carousel ride of troops in and troops out. Three-nine just got back, three-six is leaving. Division will be rotating next,” Jodi said, watching Micah’s eyes. They were clouded but with what she wasn’t sure, worry or internal anger. With him it was always a tough call. He was one of the hardest people to read she’d ever met. He could mask himself as easily as a chameleon changed colors. “What’s her name?”
“Ani.”
“And is Ani questionably late or is she just being blatantly disobedient in her tardiness?” Her question hit a raw spot as she noted a flicker of hurt spark then die in his pupil.
“Blatant,” he forced out over clenched teeth.
“What did you do?”
“What makes you think I did anything?” Micah said, taking the frosty bottle the waitress was handing him.
“I know Tops and I know bottoms. Chances are you’re either being too demanding, not attentive enough, or she wants a commitment and you won’t budge.” She picked up the tumbler the waitress had just set down and took a long swallow before continuing. “Her happiness is dependent on you and if she’s not happy, well, she loses sight of how to please you. Then guilt sets in followed by anger and before you know it, blatant. So, how are things up this way? Aside from loss of life, injury, constant rotations, wallowing, and blatant disobedience?”
“You surely don’t mince words do you, Jodi,” Micah said, shaking his head and taking along tug off his beer.
“Why bother?”
“I suppose things with the Army are as hectic as the Corps right now. Troops in, troops out,” he answered, still eyeing the door with a steely glint in his eye. Then an amused spark rose, melding with the heat. “Well look who just showed up.”
Jodi turned to find someone she’d not seen in a while or played with in ages gracing the door. A true master at his craft, Simon LaVonne was nothing short of a subs erotic dream, or nightmare depending on his mood.
He smiled and shook his head as he approached their booth, his stance as confident as Jodi ever remembered. Tight black jeans clung to cut, defined thighs and soft, black cotton molded over rippling biceps and abs. When he propped one hand on the back of the bench seat and leaned in, a heady mixture of pheromones, spicy after-shave, and crisp winter air flew off him stabbing Jodi with a bolt of want.
“Jodi Sandoval, as I live and breathe,” he rasped, shooting her one of his drop to your knees and open wide wicked stares. “Which end of the whip are you into tonight?”
Jodi glanced across the room to see two DMs helping Connor out of his seat and leading him away to the back of the club where they’d make sure he was comfortable and check on him occasionally until she went to bed later, probably much later.
She’d been wound tighter than a coil spring all week and a familiar, itchy feeling crept all over her skin, embedding in her pores to find its way into her very being. She needed serviced. And Tyler Jenkins and his toe fetish just weren’t going to cut it. Jodi needed to be hit, repeatedly, not have her feet worshipped. But, did her ex-husband need her worse than she needed right now?
Surely playing until he woke couldn’t hurt. Her own nature required she take the edge off and be thinking clearly when she took Connor to task later.
“The receiving,” she murmured, letting herself fall under the spell which was Simon’s gaze. “Sir.”
Chapter Two
“What are you doing this far north anyway, darlin’?” Simon asked, taking her offered hand and helping her to her feet. “Damn, just look at you. How long’s it been?”
“I, um, had business,” she said, shooting Micah a look she hoped said keep your damn mouth shut while draping her bag over her right shoulder. “And it’s been a while. Six months since you serviced me. Three months since I was serviced period. It’s only been a few weeks since we saw each other, though. Remember? Who won that little drinking contest at Quantico that
night anyway?”
“Ah, yes. As much as it wounds my ego to admit it, I do believe you won the battle of the Three Dollar Hookers. This business wouldn’t happen to have a name would he?” Simon continued, leading her through the bar and into the back where the steady beat of the White Stripes bounced off the walls echoing with the whimper and pleas of subs being given their dues.
“He would,” Jodi answered, her eyes drifting shut, the smell of sweat, leather, and sex enveloping her, gathering in a tight ball of pent up, frustrated desire in her womb.
“I heard Connor was a bit fucked up. Still won’t let another Top touch him after all these years?”
“No and won’t admit when he needs me, either. Micah called when he realized what was going on,” Jodi explained, allowing herself to float along behind him. God, how she needed this.
“I see. Where’s he at?” Simon asked, stopping at a station where a single chain was strung through an eyebolt in a beam overhead. The chain dangled a few inches from Jodi’s head, but was secured to the wall where it could be shortened or lengthened to suite the players.
“Guess.” Tossing her bag to the floor, she pushed it out of the way with the pointed toe of her boot under the bench lining the wall.
“Your regular bed?” He turned loose of her hand so she could begin undressing.
“Yes, and you don’t have to tell me how crazy the whole thing is. I’m well aware of it.” She unzipped her skirt and let it fall to the floor then picked it up and took it to the bench. “Like the boots, Simon?”
“Love the boots. Please, keep them on. They’re giving me wood.” He glanced up from where he’d been busy opening his bag and pulling a few things out, a paddle, a flogger, a crop, a coiled whip, and a set of his signature red leather cuffs. “And loving someone’s not crazy. Now the way you two express it, not completely conventional, but who am I to talk? Need help with your corset?”
“Yes, please.” Turning her back to him, Jodi held her hair up allowing Simon to loosen the ties so she could unhook the front. Once naked, she knelt to get a clip from her bag and secured her hair on top of her head. Nothing worse than having it tangled up in a whip and nearly ripped from the scalp.