“Jesus. How much did you charge him?”
Michelle’s grin was pure evil. “Twelve thousand dollars.”
“What?”
“Hey, he wanted the liquor included.” She lifted the cat mask and held it over her face. “Whaddya think?”
Geena just glared. “I cannot believe you are stripping for my fiancé’s stag party.”
Michelle’s eyes gleamed at her through the slits in the mask. “You’d rather have some complete stranger who won’t keep her girls off the merchandise? Besides, I wasn’t gonna dance tonight, anyway.”
“Thanks.” Geena give her a quick smile. Then she pounded the tabletop with her fist. “That son of a bitch! Can you believe the nerve of that man?”
“Oh, c’mon, I’m sure it’s just coincidence.”
“No, it’s not.” Geena glowered. “He did this on purpose.”
Michelle stared at her. “Gee, that’s paranoid.”
“Yeah.” Geena snorted. “You didn’t see him yesterday. He was such an asshole.”
“C’mon, what would be the point? Just to embarrass you?”
“I wouldn’t put it past him.”
Shrugging, Michelle dropped the mask to the table. “Maybe he’s got a thing for Russ.”
“No.”
Michelle raised a skeptical eyebrow at her flat denial. “Twelve thousand bucks. That’s a lot of dough, Gee.”
“No.” Geena shook her head, remembering that predatory gaze and her own instinctive reaction. “No way is that man gay.”
As she mused, she picked up the mask and turned it over. Michelle shrugged again. “Well, I’ll keep an eye on him tonight, and try to figure out what his deal is.”
“Yeah, that might—” Geena broke off, staring at the mask in her hands. A slow, scheming smile curved her lips. “No. I will.”
“Gee, I don’t think that’s a good—”
“C’mon, Chell! You said yourself you didn’t recognize me!” Not to mention that the idea of taking her clothes off in front of Flynn Davies was doing interesting things to her blood pressure. But Chell didn’t need to know that. Hell, she didn’t even want to admit it to herself.
Michelle sat back, staring at her. Geena raised the cat mask to her face, and gave her friend her most winning smile.
Michelle shook her head warningly. “You’re gonna regret this.”
“Chell, you’re the best!” Geena clapped her hands together like an overexcited kid.
Michelle laughed. “Spying on your fiancé, sneaking into his stag party...What can I say? You appealed to the romantic in me. C’mon.”
She stood briskly, and Geena glanced up at her. “Come on where?”
“You really think you’re going to fit into one of my costumes?”
* * * *
Not that the costume Chell borrowed for her was all that much better a fit, Geena thought nervously as she tugged at the bra strap. If she so much as bent over, she was going to tumble right out of the damned thing.
Michelle stood back, looking at her critically. “You know, a little more on top and I bet you could make double what you do at the bank as a stripper.”
Geena snorted. “Forget it. I am not buying myself bigger boobs.”
“Suit yourself.” Michelle grinned wickedly. “All I know is, every time my cup size goes up, so does my tax bracket.”
Geena rolled her eyes, trying to hide the tension she felt, and followed Michelle out of her office. Down the hall she could see the other strippers in their cat masks filing into the short, shadowed corridor that let to the stage.
The Kit Kat Club, unabashedly named after the club in Cabaret, supposedly belonged to a corporation and Michelle simply managed it. More gentleman’s club than strip joint, it turned a strong profit in business lunches as well as the nighttime bar crowd. The Club’s grilled swordfish sandwich with hot pepper chutney was legendary.
Geena had long suspected that the corporation was Chell, but she’d never inquired. Michelle certainly ran it like it was her own, at least. The place was spotless. A five-foot wide runway stretched half the length of the room, surrounded by tables with real linen tablecloths. The stage proper was draped in maroon velvet curtains, except for the back wall which was lined with floor-to-ceiling mirrors. Both the mirrors and the brass rail along the runway were polished to a gleaming brilliance.
Crowded into the stage wing with the strippers, Geena peered anxiously out through a gap in the curtains. She could see Russ, looking distinctly uncomfortable, sitting with Flynn at the very edge of the runway while some two dozen friends and coworkers whooped and hollered behind them.
Michelle came up behind her and snuck a peek over her shoulder. Geena felt her stiffen. “Oh my God. Is that him?”
Geena didn’t have to ask who she meant. Flynn was dressed tonight in jeans and a button-down shirt. The sleeves were rolled up, and Geena could see the ripple of muscles in his forearms and shoulders as he turned, grinning at a comment from a drunken man behind him. Embarrassed, Russ tried to rise, but Flynn tugged him firmly back to his seat.
Chell leaned close against her shoulder, her eyes glittering. “Jesus, Gee. You forgot to mention he’s totally edible.”
Geena shifted uncomfortably. “He’s not that gorgeous.”
“Right.” Michelle shot her a look. “And I’m not that busty.” She peered back out through the curtain. “Christ, I’d let him fuck me with a ten-inch dildo. Not that he needs one, I bet.”
“Chell!”
Michelle grinned and jerked her head as the music changed to a Def Leppard tune. “Come on, girls, you’re on.” Sliding Geena’s mask into place, she whispered quickly, “Relax. You’ll be fine.”
Kissing her cheek for luck, Michelle strode back out toward the bar, and Geena swallowed, cursing herself soundly as the first of the strippers slid through the curtains and onto the stage. The men’s hollers immediately redoubled at the sight of her enormous breasts, jiggling beneath the flimsy fabric of her camisole.
What sort of dumb-ass idea was this? What the hell was she doing, crashing Russ’s bachelor party? Geena stood, paralyzed by indecision, watching as masked girl after masked girl moved past her and paraded out onto the stage, their long legs gleaming in the colored lights. Russ was going to recognize her the second she stepped out between those curtains, and he would never forgive her. He’d dump her, despise her, hate her forever…
Then Flynn leaned close to him, grinning as he whispered something in his ear. Russ frowned. That did it. Geena stepped onto the stage, strutted to the center, and froze.
The lights glared down, casting everything beyond them into shadow. She could feel unseen eyes staring at her, hungrily studying her nearly-naked flesh. The women around her immediately went into gyrations, swinging their hips, thrusting their sequin-covered breasts out at the whistling men, and taking turns parading down the runway. But Geena could only stand there, sure that the moment Russ looked at her, he’d recognize her.
Panicked, she turned to bolt off the stage, and found herself confronted by her reflection in the mirrored back wall.
She stared in amazement. Beneath the blank face of her half-mask, her body shimmered in an iridescent green corset. Gleaming sequins traced the upward thrust of her breasts. Feathers tufted her shoulder-straps and the top of the false corset—Michelle had showed her the velcro up the back, allowing her to rip it off with one swift tug.
At the time, Geena had wondered nervously if she’d have the courage to do it. Now, though, drinking in the sight of her own reflection, she felt a growing heat unfold in her belly. She was staring at a stranger, an exotic and utterly erotic fantasy woman. Behind the sequined cat-face she was a cipher, all curved gleaming flesh, her personality erased by the expressionless mask.
She had never imagined she could look like this. She trailed her hands up her sides, acutely aware of her body in a way she’d never been before. Not her, Geena, not her thoughts or dreams or inhibitions. Just the warm, wanton, hal
f-naked flesh, with its own dreams, its own desires...
No one would recognize her. She barely recognized herself.
Entranced with her image, she moved closer to the mirror. Slowly, wonderingly, she ran her hands over her body, caressing the dip of her waist, the rise of her ribcage, the full, rounded curves of her breasts. Her nipples tingled beneath the scratchy fabric, and Geena rubbed them lightly, feeling her body loosen and her movements becoming slower, smoother, and incredibly seductive. Placing her hands on the mirror, she arched her back, displaying her ass to the men behind her.
There was an erotic intensity in those watching eyes. The sensation carried with it a strange and wholly unexpected sense of power. She could feel them, all of them, sitting there beyond the lights, their gazes fixed on her. It was as if she were alone on the stage, the center of all that enrapt attention.
And she could do whatever she liked. She could tease them, taunt them, torment them as she wished. She could make them ache for her, make their cocks pulse torturously, make their heads spin and their balls swell painfully with unspent come.
Behind her mask, Geena smiled.
Turning, she strutted to the edge of the stage and stepped onto the runway. The sensation was even stronger here, with men surrounding her on all sides, their eyes glittering avidly in the semi-darkness, their gazes tracing her neck, her breasts, and the generous curves of her voluptuous ass.
As her eyes adjusted to the lights, Geena realized Russ wasn’t even looking at her. He was sitting at the very end of the runway, scowling as he watched a long-legged blond writhe before him. The stripper turned, placing both hands on her ass and cupping her cheeks as she gyrated less than a yard from his face, and Geena felt a sudden, hot spurt of jealousy.
You’re gonna regret this.
No, she wouldn’t. She wouldn’t. Determinedly, she suppressed the emotion, and strutted on her four-inch fuck-me heels to the pound and blare of the music. The hungry, approving gazes of the watching men brought with them an unaccustomed sense of sexual self-confidence, and she lengthened her strides. Let little Miss Long Legs gyrate as she chose. She, Geena, was queen of the runway tonight.
The blond must have heard her approach, because she blew Russ a kiss and moved aside, making room. Geena looked down, meaning to catch Russ’s gaze, but instead found herself staring into the piercing emerald eyes of Flynn Davies.
They pinned her, gleaming, flicking down to her chest and over her half-naked body before rising again to her masked face. Under their scalding scrutiny, she felt utterly exposed, unable to breathe, trapped in a moment that seemed to stretch out forever.
God! What would it be like to be at this man’s mercy? Her nipples tightened further at the mere thought, poking out against the thin, scratchy fabric covering them, and she felt a rush of liquid heat beneath the tiny strap of her g-string. Uncomfortably aware that she was simply standing there gawking, Geena jerked her hips in an awkward figure eight.
The music pounded in her veins. Her pulse thundered in her ears. What the hell was he, this man who was her fiancé’s oldest friend? This man who could practically make her come just by looking at her?
Danger. That’s what he was. Danger, and trouble.
Well, she wasn’t about to let him win this encounter. Slowly, Geena softened her motions, rocking her hips in a lazy, alluring sway. Why, after all, was she letting him intimidate her? He didn’t even know it was her and, safe in that anonymity, she let a seductive smile curve her lips. Holding Flynn’s gaze, she reached behind her back, grabbed the velcroed sides of the corset, and pulled.
Flynn’s eyes widened appreciatively as her creamy-smooth breasts tumbled out. Chucking the corset into the audience (to the delighted whoops and wolf-whistles of the men), she slid her spread fingers up the curve of her belly, then around her outthrust breasts to the hard points. Licking her lips enticingly, she stared into Flynn’s dangerous green eyes as she squeezed her nipples lightly, and saw his lips part in arousal.
Covering her breasts with her hands, she spun away as if in disdain. Then, looking back over her shoulder with a flirtatious pout, she gave him a saucy wink behind her cat mask and tilted her ass invitingly as he dropped his gaze to her crotch.
Flynn’s eyes glowed with enjoyment as she bent further, thrusting her ass toward him. She was deliciously aware of the thin strip of fabric between her thighs, covering her swollen nether lips, just a scant few millimeters of cloth between his gaze and her cunt.
She barely saw Russ as he shifted uncomfortably. All her attention was fixed on those green, hungry eyes, watching her like she was a snack about to be devoured.
You’d like that, wouldn’t you, Mr. Flynn Davies? You’d like to have me spread out before you, open, helpless, vulnerable.
Yes. And she wanted that too, wanted it with a fiery abandon that both frightened her and inflamed her senses.
Straightening, she turned back toward Flynn and stroked her fingers teasingly over the sequin-covered mound of her mons. At the jolt of fire that shot through her clit, she tossed her head back and ran her hands up her torso. Standing in nothing but her g-string and four-inch heels, Geena felt like a goddess, electric with sensual power, practically glowing with the heat of her arousal.
Never in her life had she felt so completely exposed. It was intoxicating. Exhilarating. Lifting her ribcage, she thrust her breasts forward, enjoying the way Flynn’s nostrils flared in response.
His whole body was rigid with sexual tension as his eyes devoured her, following every move of her hands as she cupped her breasts, then massaged them, not four feet from his face. Sliding her fingers around their lush curves, Geena enjoyed their firm weight, then flicked her thumbs over her erect nipples and let herself gasp at the sensation.
Two spots of color burned high on Flynn’s alabaster cheekbones. Smiling in triumph, Geena pinched her nipples between her thumb and forefinger, and heard his quick, harsh intake of breath.
She could see the bulge in his jeans, and felt her own lust flare like a beacon in response. Straining forward, she drew her shoulders back, displaying her tits right in front of him as she tugged at her nipples, tormenting them, twisting them...
Russ stood in disgust, and his sudden motion yanked Geena back into self-consciousness. Flushing, she dropped her hands, but Russ didn’t even glance at her. He glared down at Flynn. “I hope this amuses you. I’m going home.”
As he turned away and strode for the door, Geena froze in horror. God, what was she doing? Here it was, mere hours before her wedding, and here she was, fondling her tits before a complete stranger!
She was grateful for the mask that hid her mortified blush, and even more grateful that Flynn hadn’t noticed her sudden distraction. He’d risen immediately, following Russ. A few of the men looked after them, their brows wrinkled in consternation.
She could see the two of them, just inside the door. Flynn was speaking earnestly, his hands making small, calming motions, but at the moment Geena really couldn’t care less what he might be saying. All she wanted was to get out of there.
Disgusted with herself, she straightened and strode back up the runway, making room for another girl to take the limelight. When this one, a particularly curvaceous redhead, captured the men’s attention by lying flat on the runway and spreading her thighs, Geena gratefully ducked through the curtains and stood trembling in the wing, her heart hammering in her chest.
“Quite the show you put on, there.”
Geena shrieked. Too late, she clapped her hands to her mouth to contain the sound as Michelle slid out of the shadows and favored her with a smirk. “I had no idea you were such an exhibitionist. Any time you need a job...”
“Ha ha ha.” Geena pulled off the mask, feeling her breath hitch painfully as her throat tightened with tears. Shudders of reaction shook her as she slumped back against the wall. She felt like she was going to be sick.
“You were right, Chell,” she said shakily, “this was a really bad idea.”
“Hey. Hey, it’s okay.” Grasping Geena’s chin lightly, Michelle peered into her brimming eyes. “Nobody recognized you. The girls don’t even know who you are. And they wouldn’t care, anyway. No harm done, kid. Right?”
“Yeah. Right.” But Geena’s voice cracked, and even as she said it, she knew it was a lie.
There was a fire inside her, a sharp, private heat that still throbbed in her crotch, unabated. And it wasn’t Russ who had started that fire, was it?
No, it wasn’t.
How could she move in with him, how could she marry him, knowing that each time they made love she’d be imagining Flynn’s emerald-green eyes watching her ravenously? Knowing that their dark hunger was matched by a hunger of her own, by a craving inside her for Flynn’s dangerous touch?
Chapter Four
“Well, you were right about one thing,” Michelle said, taking a quick peek through the stage curtains. “Whatever’s up with your Mr. Davies, one thing he definitely isn’t is uninterested in women. I thought I was gonna have to peel his tongue off the runway rail. Him and every other guy in the joint. Jesus, Gee!” She chuckled ruefully.
“Yeah, if only it worked on Russ.”
Michelle watched her, her eyes dark with compassion as Geena angrily fought back her tears. “Honey, has it ever occurred to you to wonder whether...” She stopped short. “Never mind.”
“What? Whether he’s gay?”
Michelle shook her head briskly. “No, look, you’re just overtired, that’s all. Why don’t you go ahead and go on home, get some sleep. Things’ll look better in the morning.” As she moved away, she glanced back over her shoulder with a wicked smile. “And I’ll keep an eye on Flynn for you. Scout’s honor. A very, very close eye.”
Geena stuck out her tongue by way of response. Michelle grinned and left.
Ducking out of the stage wing, Geena walked quickly down the service hall that led to the stripper’s dressing rooms and the kitchen beyond, mulling over what Michelle had—or rather, hadn’t—said.
The Mighty Flynn (Siren Publishing Menage & More) Page 3