The Pretend Boyfriend 3 (Inhumanly Handsome, Humanly Flawed Alpha Male)

by Artemis Hunt

  The Pretend Boyfriend 2 (Alpha Male Erotic Romance)

  The Pretend Boyfriend 2 (Alpha Male Erotic Romance)

  Midpoint

  THE PRETEND BOYFRIEND 3

  By Artemis Hunt

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright 2013 by Artemis Hunt

  Cover art by Artemis Hunt

  THE PRETEND BOYFRIEND 3

  1

  Samantha Fox proudly surveys the layout of their new gym. The place she and Brian rented used to be a tropical-themed restaurant. Ceiling-to-floor windows surround almost every façade of the area, and the building itself is oddly shaped – with rooms sticking out everywhere like sore appendages from a misused mannequin.

  Sam jokingly calls it an octadecahexagon. Whatever that means.

  Presently, the restaurant turned exercise mecca is filled with rows and rows of leased gym equipment. The treadmills line four spacious windows, followed by a layer of elliptical cross-trainers and exercise bikes. In another section, the weight-lifting MultiGyms rub shoulders with the rowing machines. Racks of shining new dumbbells stack against several inner walls, and there are FitBalls and skipping ropes and exercise charts paraded everywhere in carefully arranged hegemony.

  The shiny new staff they hired comprises of twenty young men and women – all fit, all nicely built, all attractive, all almost tanned. The men are muscle bound without appearing steroid-amped. The women are smooth-skinned, radiant and slim.

  Brian Morton curls around an elliptical trainer, watching Sam with a strange light in his eyes. Watching her. Not the glowing younger women. This makes her proud as hell, and she beams even more radiantly than her workers. He wears a black wife beater over faded blue jeans, but there’s no doubt from the way he carries himself that he’s the boss in this place.

  Or co-boss, since he’s letting her call the shots.

  “I’ll remain a silent partner,” he teased her earlier.

  “Oooh, how silent?” she asked him.

  He grinned as he shimmied down her naked, prone body. He parted her thighs.

  “As silent as I will be while doing this.”

  He lowered his mouth onto her wet pussy, and started to lave her clit and inner labia. Her fists bunched the sheets as she closed her eyes to savor his wicked tongue. He took her clit in between his lips and nibbled the burning piece of flesh gently.

  Ohhhhh, she wanted to cry out. But silence had to be maintained if she wanted to prove a point to him.

  They were in his new bedroom. He had bought an apartment in another part of Chicago. Although it was still roomy and comfortable, it was a downsize from his previous luxury penthouse.

  She had been anxious about him. “Are you OK?”

  “I still have all my hair and teeth, and last I checked, my balls are still descended. So yeah, I’m OK.”

  She punched his arm. “I mean financially.”

  “I had to give up the ten thousand dollar hookers and the Dom Perignon-laced orgies,” he deadpanned, “but other than that, I’m OK.”

  “You sure the funding for our gym came from the loan your bank manager friend gave you?”

  “Absolutely, positively, one hundred percent as sure as the fact I have an oversized penis. We can do lunch with Harold and he’ll let you see the documents yourself if you don’t trust me.” He managed to look miffed.

  “I trust you.” She didn’t want him to put out in any way to help her. She was glad he seemed to have recovered his ribald spirits. It was nice to listen to his snark again, which had been muted for so long.

  And now, here they are – in a gym they co-own.

  Sam takes in all the eager faces of her new staff. My new staff, she proudly thinks. She has never run a company or even a division in her entire life. She has never managed people before, at least not directly under her. She’s as nervous as a bird with a fractured wing.

  What if I fuck up?

  “You won’t fuck up,” Brian had assured her. “I’ve managed plenty of people in my time. I’ll show you the ropes, though for my consultation fee, you’d have to put out.”

  “Put out?”

  “Yeah.” He grinned. “Sex four times a day.”

  It’s amazing how much he has helped her, even though his own situation is grim.

  She faces the staff – the receptionist, the trainers, the recruiters, the cleaners . . . hell, whatever it says on their business cards. She beams.

  “So, guys, have we delivered the flyers to every home and apartment in the vicinity?” she says.

  “They all went out last week,” the receptionist confirms.

  “Then tomorrow we officially open,” Sam says. “Bring on the bubbly!”

  Everyone claps and cheers. Champagne bottles pop. Brian smiles at her, and she experiences tingles all over. He’s letting her run the gym completely, and she hopes she won’t let him down.

  2

  It has been three months since ‘the incident’, as Brian refers to it. He is aware that after the court case, his freedom might be taken away from him for a good ten years or so – if he is convicted. And there’s nothing the hell he can do about it.

  Because you deserve it. You are your father’s son.

  No, don’t even think about that. Live in the moment. That’s right.

  He takes a deep breath and concentrates on the present. He takes in his surroundings. Their new gym. They had named it ‘SHAPE’.

  Sam is briefing everyone and she is just about finished.

  He has been having post-traumatic stress disorder, which has caused him to ‘hang out’ permanently with Sam, and not any other woman who gives him the once over.

  And there have been plenty of women who have made known to him that they are willing to spread their legs for him anytime. Waitresses. Real estate agents, especially during the time he was hunting for a new, downgraded apartment. But he can never be sure if they are checking him out for his looks and suave sophistication, or because they recognized his face in a newspaper. Hell, if they recognized his face, they should be running away from him, screaming – not toward him.

  Anyhow, he’s hesitant to pursue those longing, come-hither glances – just in case one of those women might sue him for eye contact.

  This is the main reason why he has managed to remain monogamous to Sam, he tells himself. He has not been mono-amorous since he started having sex in the tenth grade. Not that he had told Sam he was sleeping only with her. It would ruin his reputation, and he has to preserve it where Sam is concerned lest she gets ideas.

  Something in his chest squirms when he thinks of her. Something he doesn’t want to (is afraid to) acknowledge. He’s happy when he’s with her, even with the weight of the world straddled upon his shoulders.

  It’s almost as though she’s enough for him. And all the trappings the world has once offered – money, unlimited sex with anonymous strangers – seem to fade into obscurity. He wonders why he needed them in the first place.

  Like this new trainer at the gym, for example.

  He had let Sam do all the hiring because the gym was more her thing than his. More importantly, he wants to lay low for a while. He’s afraid that his (public) involvement may send out the wrong perceptions and cause disrepute to the gym.

  Besides, he doesn’t want to be partial to hiring only curvy blondes.

  The trainer’s name is Lydia. She is a brunette
who has streaked her hair purple. It’s a deep purple that is almost black, so you can’t tell the purple tints apart unless she stands under some fluorescent light.

  After Sam has given them all her pep talk, Lydia sidles up to him.

  “So,” she says casually, “I hear you’re Brian Morton. You own this place.”

  “Along with Ms. Fox, your employer. I’m the silent partner.”

  She’s smiling at him in a coy, seductive way, and he smiles back – carefully. Wouldn’t want the staff to think one of the partners is standoffish.

  “You’re famous,” she says. “Everyone here is talking about you.”

  “All the more reason for you to stay away, else I might do something you’ll regret,” he deadpans.

  She laughs. “I’m not afraid of you. No one here is. We all know you didn’t do it.”

  “Whatever happened to guilty unless proven innocent?”

  “You can’t scare me.” Her eyes rake him up and down. “You know, you’ve got a good body. But I can make it even better.”

  “How?” he challenges her. It’s not an encouragement. He’s not even flirting. He just wants to see where this goes.

  “I could be your personal trainer. Five times a week. For free. Call it up sucking up to the boss.”

  “I’m not your boss. She is.” He jerks his chin towards Sam, who is talking to one of the hunky trainers. A twinge of irrational jealousy strikes him, and then it passes. He has no right to chide Sam for talking – or doing anything else – with someone else she finds attractive. After all, they are both free spirits, and he has as much claim on her as she has on him.

  “But you’re an equal partner.”

  “Who told you that?”

  “She did.” Lydia jerks her head towards Sam. “She seems to think very highly of you, and she mentions you any way she gets. She refers to you as ‘her partner’. Does it mean more than I think it does?’

  “Office gossip is so passé.”

  “We’re not in the office.”

  He uncurls himself from the handlebars of the elliptical trainer. “I’ll think about your offer.”

  “Please do.” She smiles at him winningly again. “You know where to find me . . . anytime.”

  Not too long ago, he would have considered her offer tempting. But not right now. Sam averts her head to glance at him. She is laughing, and her cheeks are rosy. She is the very epitome of health, and a spool of obvious desire for her tightens his balls.

  Damn.

  Why is she laughing so hard with that hunky trainer? Doesn’t the kid know that she’s the boss and he should be hands off? Damn his perfect pecs and white teeth. Damn that mass of blond hair. Why does he have to wear it shoulder-length and romance novel cover-style?

  Maybe I should have been involved in the hiring process after all.

  Still, Brian has to smile back at her. Make her think nothing affects him. And it shouldn’t, of course. He must be getting maudlin in his fall from grace. He must erase all petty thoughts and ridiculous jealousies. Him – jealous of a twenty-one year old hunk who’s trying to paw at the luscious female boss. What are his sensibilities coming to?

  The staff is getting ready to go. After all, they don’t open until tomorrow. Blond hunk detaches himself from the Stairmaster, upon which he is draped like a muscly cloth, and follows the rest to the reception area. Holding her notepad, Sam comes over to Brian.

  “Berating the staff?” he asks her lightly.

  “Motivating them. It’s what you taught me, remember? His name is Thor.”

  “Thor?” he repeats, crinkling his brow.

  She laughs. “I know. Not exactly a name for a gym bunny.”

  “On the contrary, it fits him to the tee. Or lack of a tee.” He’s giving Thor, the gym god, his dues. See how Sam will respond to that.

  She taps her notepad. “Brian, in anticipation of our opening, Fitness Worx ten blocks down is giving a recruitment discount.”

  He nods grimly. Gyms are competitive in Chicago, and if it weren’t for Sam’s lifelong dream, he would avoid gym businesses like the plague. Still, some pigheadedness in him is determined to make this a success, even if he knows fuck all about it.

  She sighs. “We’ve only had ten sign-ups pre-opening.”

  “Maybe it’ll get better when we actually open tomorrow. We don’t have a brand name like Fitness Worx. We don’t have twenty-two chains and their marketing muscle. We’re starting from scratch. Hell, I don’t expect us to break even for three years.”

  “Three years is a long time,” she says. “We’ve done everything. Put out the flyers, the banners to let everyone we’re here. Everything.”

  He squeezes her shoulder. “Let’s not worry about stuff till we have to worry about it, OK?”

  They are alone in the gym now. Unless Thor is waiting for her outside. And unless Lydia has in mind to waylay him in the men’s locker room.

  Sam’s wide eyes gaze at him, and it’s a look – which he is trying to deny, and which she isn’t very good at concealing – of adoration. His heart wrenches. Lately, he has taken to feeling that way too about her. Not that he’s going to let it stick. Not that he isn’t going to quash it down like an ice-cream cone down a gullet on a parched summer’s day.

  He smiles languidly at her. His hand on her shoulder slides down to her bare arm. She wears a sleeveless white tee above pink slacks. She has let her hair grow longer, and her brown curls are now below her shoulders. She looks good this way.

  He says, “What do you say we check out the steam room?” He teases out a lock of her curls. He can do this forever – play with her hair.

  “Hmmm, wouldn’t do to have it jam up on us opening day,” she murmurs.

  Smiling, they shuffle to the steam room, which is located beyond the changing rooms and locker area. There are two saunas altogether – one for men and the other for women. They stand outside the men’s sauna. He leans over, grabs her face in his hands and starts to kiss her hungrily. They haven’t had sex since . . . uh, when was it? This morning?

  He’s ravenous for her now, believe it or not. The skin around his balls contracts, and he feels the warm blood rush into his dick – empowering it with the familiar outpouring of fluids and rapidly rising tissue.

  She seems to be as equally hungry for him. She grabs his waist, her hands roaming up and down his back, as she attacks his lips. One palm goes to the front to cup his engorged cock and balls. She fumbles for his zipper as she drinks in his mouth. They are both entwining their tongues around each other’s – a sensuous interplay of need and wetness.

  His zipper rips.

  He didn’t wear underwear today, and his cock springs out like a Jack-in-a-box. She catches the thick, warm rod of flesh and clutches at it. Then she starts to massage it with firm, pressured strokes – back, forth, back, forth. His hands are squeezing her breasts, and he’s reaching for her top and pulling it off, breaking off the kiss momentarily. Her eyes are dark with desire and her mouth is slightly open and panting.

  They tear each other’s clothes off in haste, leaving their piles of discarded clothing on the floor. She ignites a fire within him like no other woman has before, but he will be damned if he ever tells her that.

  They step into the steam room and shut the door behind them with a slam. The room has no lock upon it for obvious reasons, and if Lydia or Thor had decided to stay back and wanted to come in to speak to their bosses, they would be in for a very hair-raising eyeful.

  The steam room is lined with wooden benches. The moist heat immediately wraps around their naked bodies. Beads of water coalesce upon his skin and hers. His palms upon her body gather a film of moisture, and he pushes two of his fingers into her open pussy – already wet and throbbing with need.

  She gasps against his mouth. Then she descends, her knees buckling as though she is succumbing to gravity. Her tongue flicker against his nipple. He pulls in a sharp breath. She knows his trigger points so well, and she knows that his right nippl
e is more sensitive than his left. And so she concentrates her clever tongue upon it while the fingers and thumb of her right hand plays with his left.

  He lets her lave his nipples while his hands slide up and down her back and dampening hair. She spends an inordinately long period on his nipples. He savors every oscillation of her tongue, marveling at how skillful she has gotten with that appendage in such a short period of time.

  He raises his chin and closes his eyes as she descends even further. She’s going to apply that masterful tongue on his nether regions now, and he will never protest against that. He sucks in his breath and waits for the first contact of her hot tongue upon his weeping cock. He isn’t disappointed. Her wriggling tongue settles upon his cock head immediately, and he feels his buttocks clenching as she closes her warm mouth around his hard, straining crown.

  Ohhhhh. His balls tighten as she sucks him in.

  Her inner cheeks are silky. They feel like a cocoon enwrapping his ultra-sensitive column. The sordid sensations unfurl and rush around his groin like a maelstrom. He basks in the adoration of her mouth as she sucks and sucks at him. His fingers trawl her damp hair.

  God, but she has such a talented tongue. She can get him off just like this if she’s not careful.

  When his balls are full to bursting and the skin around his cock is too tight, he carefully disengages her mouth from it.

  “You’ll make me come,” he whispers.

  She pauses in her fellatio briefly and looks up at him with a sly smile. “I thought that was the point.”

  “But I want to stick it into you and fuck you till you scream,” he says, still in that smoky whisper.

  She likes it when he talks dirty to her.

  “Then do it, lover boy.”

  He laughs softly. Their bodies are covered with a sheen of sweat. He seats his bare buttocks on a smooth wooden bench and lets her straddle his hips. He stares deeply into her eyes and holds her waist as she navigates her pussy above his cock.