Maybe I misjudged Hank all these years.
Maybe he’s even more interesting than I first imagined.
Maybe we’re more alike than I first thought.
I dance and watch his amazement grow. He cannot unlock his eyes from the curve of my waist as I roll my hips forward and back, and then again, as I shimmy my shoulders, the soft swell of my breasts lush against the silk fabric of my top. I am an enchantress in that moment; I can feel it just as surely as a dog feels its owner’s energy through a leash. In our case, the leash is invisible.
Given our history, I find it incredibly amusing that right now, I am the alpha. I was always the alpha. It just had to be in the right situation. I met a man who was a dog handler once; he introduced me to this soft, fluffy little Maltese and told me that when he first had the dog, it displayed dominance and aggression over him and all the other dogs in the house. Then he demonstrated the alpha roll and told me that no other Maltese he had ever met would allow a human being to do that to it.
Watching him alpha roll that dog was a huge turn on. I had him eat me out by sitting on his face in one of my special chairs, the kind that’s like a throne with a hole in it. By the time I was done, he was short of breath and his quads were aching, but he knew who was boss. And he liked it.
Side to side and back and forth. I slide my hands down my thighs and use the flats of my hands to slide my skirt up, revealing my ankles and allowing the long slits of it to give flashes of my creamy skin underneath. A highway to heaven that is off-limits to anyone who I do not invite there first. A quick glance up reveals that Hank has turned a peculiar color and is unable to stare at me directly anymore; he’s got his eyes down and his shoulders are turning in a little. I recognize that pose. We’re back to the dogs again—when a dog is submissive, it stops puffing its shoulders out and acting important. Hank can feel who is in charge here, and it is certainly not him. What an interesting change that must be for someone who is a Navy SEAL, someone who is used to being the pack leader and directing others.
He forgets that we are two of a kind. And he has always, but always, underestimated me. And if you know who I really am, you realize how dangerous that is.
* * *
What you want and what you end up getting are often two entirely different things.
For example, when he came home on leave, the last thing Hank Leigh wanted to do was to go to some seedy little club in the middle of nowhere. However, when he learned that Iliana Reed was in town, his natural sense of curiosity got the best of him. After Iliana had dropped out of Stage 3 of their training, neither he nor George had heard from her again, and it had been a good four years since he had seen her last. He was given leave for two weeks and had rushed back to his childhood home, only to find that while everything looked exactly the same, everything was exactly different at the same time.
It was his mother who mentioned that Iliana was back. Nobody knew exactly where she had been over the past few years, but she had returned right after her mother had died and taken back over the house. During the day, she worked in the pet shop over on Main Street, and as soon as she would close the store down for the night, she could be seen hopping into her car, a sleek black beauty, and driving in the direction of the town fifteen miles east, the one that was hopping with nightlife fit for a major urbanized center. She was young and entitled to a life, particularly after such a harsh tragedy, his mother reasoned aloud to him, but for God’s sake, nobody knew where the girl was going and where she was coming from. It was a small town and people talked; Iliana sure was a strange one was how Hank’s mother put it, probably thinking she was diplomatic as all hell.
Hank couldn’t deny that last one, though. Iliana had always struck him as just a little bit left of center in the least political meaning of that particular phrase. She was a loner even during their SEAL days, which was strange because their training focused on creating a unit, people who would support each other and work together to complete their missions. But there was always that thing about Iliana, the way she would look at their training officers that made it perfectly clear she would never display that humility that is considered the proper character for SEALS.
George, one of the other recruits and also hailing from their home town, had seen it a little bit differently. “She’s a girl, man,” he would whine to Hank every time Hank would try to bring up Iliana after she left. “It’s rough on us, but imagine what it’s like for the women, with their delicate lady parts and whatnot. A SEAL has a passion for excellence; maybe she just had a passion for cookies.” Hank would grind his teeth and try to focus, instead, on how good the other man was during their missions; his nervous energy would slough off and he would be alert, focused, and hypersensitive to the positions of his team.
Hank didn’t pause to think much on why he wanted to see what Iliana did with her nights. He spotted her at the pet store one day, looking as shockingly young as she did during her SEAL days, but he couldn’t come up to her and greet her. He was not a man who liked to stand much for unnecessary awkwardness, and that was all he could picture happening if he went up to Iliana and talked to her. Because the truth of the matter was was that all the questions he had for her would not be ones that were appropriate. Where had she gone after the SEALS? If she hadn’t wanted to be there, why did she join them in the first place? Was it weakness that caused her to leave, as George had always theorized, or was it something else? Back when he knew her there, she had always had this look about her like she was waiting for the next hit, the next dangerous training session because she didn’t care if she lost the skin off her teeth as long as she could prove something.
What are you running from? Hank wondered as he drove behind Iliana, making sure to stay three cars behind her on the highway to avoid being spotted, although he knew it was a stretch to imagine that she had been alerted to his presence in town as he had been to hers.
His mind had been a pleasant blank before he had pulled into the shady little darkened parking lot outside the club. Iliana had pulled in and dimmed all her lights; it was already dark out, so he couldn’t see into the car, but she stayed in there for ten, maybe fifteen minutes. When she emerged, his heart almost stopped. Gone was the uniform of chinos and a T-shirt she wore at the store. The woman who stepped from the shiny black car was an ethereal creature if he had ever seen one. With her bird-like slim build and loose flowing hair, encased in silk, leather, and velvet, all black against the pale ivory of her skin, she looked like a dark fairy setting out for a night of frolicking amongst demons.
It never even occurred to him that she might be one of the demons herself.
It is only when he comes across the list of rules that Hank gets his first inkling of what type of club he has wandered into.
1. No booze and no penetration.
2. Everything must be consensual. If you see someone who intrigues you, by all means, ask, but wait until they are finished first.
3. Leave your street clothes at the door ($2). Paddles, cat-o’-nines, and other items available for purchase at the rear end room under the EXIT sign.
What is inside almost offends his sensibilities, but then he pulls himself up short. There are men in skintight latex suits being led on leashes held by women whose dark makeup gives them a slightly vampiric edge. Gorgeous women of all shapes and sizes, wearing collars or not, are being attended to by men. There are indeed paddles up for sale near the back exit of the club, and the line to obtain these toys moves fast, although it is easily ten-deep. The whole place reminds Hank heavily of a dungeon, the kind where he and George ended up on one of their missions; they ended up having to extricate the women there and lead them to shaking, relieved safety. Unlike that mission, however, the women here look as if they feel completely at ease. There is no familiar bar-buzz, seeing as the place sells non-alcoholic drinks, only, and there is a surreal feel to the space; this is where fantasy goes to live, and there is a group of people on a centralized platform suspending what looks like a
bed onto a complicated pulley system. A closer look reveals that what he thought to be the bed is actually a very large box filled with straw; in the center of it lays a nubile young woman, her ankles and wrists bound together, a black satin gag tied around her mouth.
His first instinct is to run to her, untie her, and punch everyone around her, but he notices that her eyes are burning with excitement and not fear; he would know fear anywhere, and this most certainly is not that. As men’s hands reach out and stroke her, she arches her back and leans into the caresses; Hank sees one of the men draw out a riding crop and slide it gently over the rounded expanse of her bottom. He lifts his arm, but before he can bring it down, Hank turns away. He is the interloper here; he has seen many things over the course of his lifetime, and he knows better than to interfere, especially when the rules of the club are so blatantly clear. There must be over a hundred people in this club; if none of them are running away screaming, then why should he panic over some sexual deviance? As it is, he avoids making eye contact as he uses his peripheral vision to scan for Iliana.
He stops stock-still.
There, on the dance floor that consists of a reflective surface and many blinking lights, a slim-hipped young woman sways.
He is riveted to her, the fall and rise of the top of her skirt riding low, the way the natural grace of her arms waves in time to the music. It is as if he has been transported back in time, when kings and noteworthy men would call upon the beautiful women in their royal households to dance for them, to serve them. She cannot see him, her eyes are downcast, but he watches her, trying his best to ignore the feeling of dirty rising up within him. He survived Hell Week, for Pete’s sake, that fourth week of SEAL training where candidates sleep for about four hours a night and run more than two hundred miles the next day. He should be able to stop from staring at a woman.
The dance is over much too fast for his taste, as loathe as he is to admit it. Hank watches with regret as Iliana goes back to her seat, next to a man who looks as brutish as any I have ever seen. Is this actually her type? He looks as though he can choke a horse, and the idea of the man doing anything to her wiry little frame puts Hank ill at ease. He does not notice as he begins to gradually draw closer and closer to the couple. The man leans over and whispers something in Iliana’s ear, to which she laughs, the liquid in her martini glass swishing softly. Hank draws closer and closer, not thinking of what he is going to say and do—how will he even justify being here?—and then he sees the man put his hand on Iliana’s thigh.
Hank feels himself darken, his focus narrowing on that possessive hand claiming the ivory-skinned thigh. He does not fully know what goes on in a place like this, but there is something so off-putting about what he is seeing that without even thinking about it, he comes over and clasps a firm hand on the man’s shoulder.
“Unhand her, you pig.”
The man looks up at him, confused. “Sorry, friend, do I know you?”
“You’ll know what my fist tastes like if you don’t get your fucking hands off of her.”
Dark eyebrows furrow. The man looks back at Iliana, who appears to be completely complacent at the sudden appearance of her ex-SEAL buddy in a BDSM club. The Dom does not know her history, however, and has some questions. “Are you with this man?”
She glances up at Hank, amused. “No.”
“Do you know him?”
“Yes,” she replies, sipping the martini he has had refilled in her absence; he is demonstrating good care, which is important to her.
“Do you want me to leave?”
She shakes her head no.
The Dom looks up at Hank. “It appears the lady wishes for me to stay.”
Hank’s mood is not benefitting from this conversation. “I don’t know what you’ve threatened her with, but if you don’t get your hands off of her, I’m going to hit you. I have training. I wouldn’t get me angrier than I am.”
“Look, clearly you’re new here. Perhaps you don’t know the rules—“
The man does not have time to finish before Hank takes a swing at him.
In seconds, the club’s security has rushed to the scene. It has taken three men, each one the size of a truck, to pin Hank down, but they have managed to subdue him, however temporarily. While he is on the ground, Iliana approaches him and kneels, making sure he can hear her every word.
“Hank,” she breathes, soft but firm at the same time, “You don’t know what you’re doing here. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
He looks up at her, catches the cobalt-blue eyes of supreme confidence and mild embarrassment. It takes him a minute to realize that it is on his part. By the time security drags him out of the club and tosses him out onto the curb, the hot rage within him has passed. In its place lays only an overwhelming curiosity that is far stronger than it was before. So she recognized him, then, just as easily as he had recognized her. He supposes the scars he acquired over the years of service have done less to mar his appearance than he had first imagined. He rubs his jaw, feeling where it made heavy contact with the floor just a few minutes before and thinks about the way Iliana looked on his way out of the club, her small, leather-clad frame at the heart of the hustle and bustle of the screwed-up fantasy of the dungeon around her.
Tomorrow it is, then.
* * *
“Whoa, looks like they sucker-punched you a good one!” George crows, almost knocking over his tall glass of ice-cold lemonade as he leans over to rub the sore spot on Hank’s jaw. “Who was it this time?”
Hank winces as George’s hand catches on a particularly tender spot. “Security at a club.”
George frowns and sets his glass down on the porch table; Hank watches as fat beads of condensation slide down the length of it and plop heavily onto the wood, staining it forever. “I thought you don’t do clubs anymore,” he says to him, scratching at his stubble.
“I don’t. I heard Iliana’s back in town, so I decided to see what she was up to.”
“So the girl goes clubbing. What’s it to you?”
“Wasn’t a regular club.”
George’s light green eyes seem to perk up with interest. “Old girl’s a rug-muncher, isn’t she?”
“Shut your prejudicial trap, asshole. She’s not a lesbian.” Is she? Based on what he saw last night, it’d be difficult to rule anything out with Iliana; then again, she’s always been a bit of a mystery.
George raises his hands in mock self-defense. “Truce, truce, man. You know I’m just kiddin’ around. I wasn’t raised with any of these new-fangled terms the youngsters use. I’m accepting of whatever wherever.”
This much, at least, is true. For all his blustery talk, George is one of the least judgmental people Hank has ever known. Early on in their training, there was a scandal with one of the recruits who turned out to be gay; now it was no longer as much of a problem, but just like in the army, there was a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy that left the recruit completely in emotional and, sadly, physical shambles when the other trainees found out. It was George who had stood up for him, telling the others to back away and standing in front of the man’s shivering body, held fetus-like until the room was clear. Hank thinks on this for a moment, wondering whether or not to divulge the truth of the night before to him.
“It was a BDSM club.”
George blinks once, twice. “Like some of that kinky shit?”
Hank nods. “Went home, did some research on it. It’s all about power plays and pain, some dominance and submission bullshit. Scared the hell out of me.”
“That because you’re afraid a little girl can control you? Sorry, buddy, but from your past relationships, I’d say you were used to being led around by the balls.”
Hank laughs aloud. George has a point there. When he’s in a relationship with someone, he tries to do everything for them—cooking, cleaning, watching out for emotional needs. The difficulty comes when women find out that underneath that bad boy Navy SEAL exterior of toughness, he’s actuall
y a sweet guy inside. Maybe he should refrain from laughing at Iliana’s choices. At least she’s being honest about what it is she wants out of a relationship; Hank wonders what it would be like to stop hiding from what he really feels inside and just be with somebody who accepts that the uniform he wears is just that—a shell, a casing for the real man within.
“Greetings, gentlefolk,” comes a soft female voice laced with sarcasm. “How have you been?”
Iliana is a sight to behold. Gone is the dark makeup, the leather-clad long legs. She is long beige pants and a blue button down tucked in at the waist, the kind of clothing that looks good only on women of a certain body build. George lets loose a cry of joy, heaves himself off the porch swing, and grasps her in a huge bear hug.
“Lady love! How have you been all these years?”
Iliana laughs aloud at his exuberance and winks at George from her smashed position in the huge SEAL’s arms. “I’m fine, George, just fine. Working over at the pet store now, taking some weekend pre-requisites at Marymount for vet school.”
“That’s terrific!” The conversation goes on for many minutes without Hank joining in; George’s enthusiasm is contagious, but he still feels apprehensive about speaking to Iliana. He never fully knew her during their SEAL days and after last night, he’s quite certain he does not know her now. Gone is the loner girl from boot camp; in her place is a shining, happy woman whose sense of self shines through her every action.
“Ever going to look at me again, Hank?” she asks, breaking through his reverie.
Hank flushes. “I…it’s not every day I get thrown out of a public place, Iliana.”
“I know,” she says, looking at him with kindness. “You thought you were protecting me. But I don’t need protection, Hank.”
“He was touching you.”
Now it’s George’s turn to look concerned. “Someone was touching you?”
“Yeah, I turn around and one of those freaky jerks is putting his hand on her leg like she belongs to him or something.”
ROMANCE: CLEAN ROMANCE: Summer Splash! (Sweet Inspirational Contemporary Romance) (New Adult Clean Fantasy Short Stories) Page 29