by Cathryn Cade
At the last moment, Savoy came gliding through the crowd to claim the two seats to Carlie’s right. He was clad in a startling chartreuse Nehru jacket with black piping, and black slacks. His partner, a quiet man with a nice smile, wore a more traditional tux.
“Hello, everyone,” Savoy caroled. “This is James. James, my fabulous coworkers.”
Savoy rattled off everyone’s names. The two men sat, and, under cover of Jake answering a question from Gigi about his gym, Savoy turned to Carlie, his eyes wide.
“Sugar, look at you,” he breathed. “Is this the Jake of whom we have heard so little but wondered so much?”
Carlie nodded, smiling but wary. Savoy could be irrepressible. “Yes.”
Savoy gave Jake a once-over that said this was not his first look of the evening and gave a low growl under his breath. “Honey, that man is sex on a stick. When you’re finished with him, can I have a taste?”
Carlie rolled her eyes at him. “Since he’s straight, I’m not sure he’d agree to that.”
Savoy made a moue of regret, one graceful hand over his heart. “I am crushed. Stamped out like a cold cinder on the hearth of passion.”
“Stop it,” Carlie said, flicking his leg with her thumb and forefinger. “He’ll hear you. And so will your date.”
Savoy reached back to pat his partner’s arm without looking. “Oh, James knows I’m a shameless flirt. He’ll forgive me.”
“Carlie,” Gigi interrupted, leaning forward. “You’ve been working out at Jake’s gym, haven’t you?”
Carlie turned back to Jake and blushed hotly at the twinkle in his eyes. “Yes, I have,” she said. “It’s very well-equipped. You should try it.”
Gigi nodded. “We just may.”
When the conversation shifted, Jake leaned over, his mouth close to Carlie’s ear. “You think I’m sex on a stick too, baby?”
She groaned. “Oh, you heard Savoy’s every word, didn’t you?”
“Yup.”
“Well,” she said demurely. “I’ll say this—you have a very big stick.”
He laughed, a deep, rich sound. Under the table, his hand closed over hers and squeezed, warm and strong. Carlie grinned to herself.
Then Jake’s hand slipped up to encircle her wrist, and hot, secret awareness jolted through her. He was cuffing her, claiming her. She stared down at the tablecloth that concealed their hands, pressing her thighs together to quell the hollow yearning there.
Jake leaned close, his warm breath stirring the hair at her temple. “Look at me, baby.”
The chattering voices of her coworkers and their dates faded to a babble in the background. Slowly, taking as much time as she dared, Carlie lifted her gaze, up over the breadth of crisp black-and-white cloth, following the gleaming studs in his shirt front, one, two, three to his firm chin, the wide curve of his mouth and higher, past the crease in his hard cheek that said he was holding back a smile, and finally up to meet his eyes.
She lost her breath at the adamant glitter in their depths. A look that said she would belong to him again, and soon. That she already did.
He squeezed her wrist, his grip gentle but firm. Finally he released her, his own gaze slipping down over her face to linger on her lips. She licked them nervously and his smile unleashed, the corner of his mouth kicking up. Oh, she was totally giving herself away, and, being an attentive dom, he wasn’t missing anything.
“All right, you two, it’s time to eat.” Savoy leaned in, standing between their chairs. “Unless you’d rather get a room. I hear they have them here.”
Carlie straightened with a jerk, her cheeks flaming. Jake merely stood, looming over Savoy, who stepped back, dark eyes wide.
“Thanks,” Jake said dryly. He gave Savoy a look that made his amusement clear, but also that he would not tolerate much more.
He gestured for Savoy and his date to go first, then pulled out Carlie’s chair for her. He set his hand on the small of her back as they walked toward the buffet line. That gentle, heated pressure occupied so much of Carlie’s consciousness, she barely managed to concentrate on holding the plate Jake handed her.
The dinner was delicious, prime rib and salmon, with a bounty of hot and cold dishes on the side. However, Carlie’s nervous excitement took a toll on her appetite.
Jake watched with a frown as she set her fork down with her plate still half-full. “You’re not eating much, baby.”
“I’m fine.” She sipped her wine. “Just not very hungry.”
He eyed her closely, then nodded, accepting if not approving. “Just don’t keep this up. Don’t want any of those sweet curves to disappear.”
Then he smirked at her, probably because she was gaping at him. This was the first time in her memory anyone had castigated her for eating too little. Well, the second, if she counted him telling her to eat her chicken at Zellaby’s.
“Did you see Gerry?” Gigi asked Carlie quietly when Jake had returned for a second helping from the buffet line.
Carlie shook her head.
Gigi smiled. “He was here. Disappeared when you and Captain America walked in. Wonder why?”
Carlie shrugged innocently.
“That’s what I thought,” Gigi purred with an appreciative look at Jake. Yikes, hadn’t taken her any longer to figure out it was Jake who hit Gerry than it had Savoy. Carlie wondered how many other people here were putting two and two together. From the warm look in Yvonne’s dark eyes when she looked at Jake, it wasn’t hurting his ratings. Of course, no one here but Carlie knew that Jake was also a man who liked to tie women up and do kinky things with them. That would raise some eyebrows.
Over chocolate mousse topped with white chocolate linked wedding rings, Martin rose and said a few words about his lovely wife and EbiTeck, thanked everyone for coming, and then it was time for a local band to play. They started mellow, but after a short break, pumped up into some classic rock and roll.
“You want to dance?” Jake asked.
“Sure,” she said, surprised.
He turned to her on the dance floor. “Didn’t know I could, did you?”
She raised her brows at him. “Well, it’s not like you ever asked me to dance at the club.”
He gave her a look, and her cheeks burned again, as she recalled some of the things that dancers did at Club 3.
“I’ll ask you to dance there, if you’re sure you want to,” he promised.
She shivered. That had sounded more like a threat. What would he make her do? And what would she be wearing while they did it? Then she frowned as she remembered that she wasn’t certain she wanted to go back to the club to be with him.
“Come on,” he said, watching her closely. “Tonight is just dancing.”
She took his hand. To her surprise, Jake not only could dance, he enjoyed it. And he was pretty good at it. His jacket off, shirt sleeves rolled up, he two-stepped and even jitter-bugged. Laughing, Carlie let him twirl her around the dance floor, safe in his powerful grasp.
“Oh my gosh,” she said breathlessly, after the music ended with a flourish. “I haven’t danced like this in forever.”
She went out with Daisy and Sara occasionally, but they usually ended up on the dance floor together. Then she remembered dancing at Club 3 with Jake watching her, and looked up at him, uncertain again. Being with him here, in front of her coworkers and friends was wonderful, but when the evening ended, where would it take them? Back to what they’d had, hooking up at the club but living separate lives outside? Or would it lead to what she could finally now admit she wanted—much, much more.
The music slowed to a sad, romantic song by Bruno Mars.
“Christ, this song.” Jake pulled her closer. “Slow dance with me?”
Held against his big, hard body, his hand spread on the middle of her back, his other hand already holding hers to one side, Carlie discovered that she wanted desperately to be held close in his powerful arms. Without looking up, she nodded. He drew her closer, and moved backward, pulling h
er with him into a smooth, slow dance, as the singer sang about being too late to apologize.
He turned his face against her hair, and steered them into a shadowed corner of the dance floor. Every breath she took was Jake, his sexy, warm scent. Every move was him as well, his legs brushing hers through her thin dress. He pulled her hand to his chest and slipped both arms around her, pulling her close so that her belly brushed his groin, and she felt his erection through his pants. Her breasts pressed his chest.
“You feel so good in my arms,” he said, his deep voice a rumble under the music, his breath shivering deep in her ear. “Can’t believe I let you go. Words to this song hit me hard.”
Carlie listened, barely breathing.
“Want you back, baby,” he went on, one of his hands stroking up over her bare back and under her hair to cup the back of her neck. “Want you to give me another chance. You ready to do that for me?”
When he held her this way, Carlie wanted to agree to anything and everything. She leaned her forehead against his smooth jaw, struggling to remember why she’d even been angry with him in the first place.
“Are you going to hurt me again?” she asked.
His hands tightened. “Not like that. Swear it. I will treat you with respect.”
She took a shaky breath and tipped her head back to look up at him. Her heart melted along with her knees at the look in his eyes. He was focused on her, one hundred percent. “All right. I-I’ll try,” she said. “For now, anyway.”
He tipped his head down to hers and closed his eyes. “Thank fuck,” he muttered. “All I can ask for is now. That mean I get to kiss you?”
“Uh-huh.” She lifted her face, her gaze on his mouth.
His hands tightened on her waist. “Not here. But soon.”
She shivered. “Uh-huh.” As in, she was going to let him kiss her senseless and do whatever else he wanted if he kept looking at her this way.
He smiled slowly. “You keep this up, I’ll think you still wanna sub for me.”
She shivered harder.
Chapter Twenty-Three
“C’mon,” Jake said, his gaze going molten. “We’re goin’. I can’t kiss you the way I want, not without embarrassing you in front of your co-workers.”
His hand on her back, they thanked Martin and his wife, said good-bye to Gigi, Savoy and Yvonne, and left the party.
They drove to her apartment in silence, but it was a silence so full of expectation that Carlie felt as if they were having an entire conversation. Jake pulled her hand onto the console and held it in his, driving with his left hand.
At her apartment, he pulled into a parking slot and squeezed her hand. “Sit tight. Don’t want you trippin’ on your dress.”
Then he walked around, opened her door and helped her down. Carlie clung to his arm as they climbed the stairs, her legs trembling with anticipation.
Jake unlocked her front door, walked her in to check her apartment, and then paused before her in her quiet living room. “Ready for that kiss now. C’mere.”
His hands curled around her ribs, pulling her against his hard body. He cocked his head, his warm lips pressed down on hers, and sweetness swamped her. Leaning into him, she opened her mouth under his. His tongue swept in, and before she quite knew how, he was holding her close, one hand on her ass, stroking and squeezing through the slippery satin, his other hand on her breast. He seemed to have recovered completely from his aversion to kissing.
Carlie moaned as he thumbed her nipple. She managed to get one hand between them to cup the hard bulge in his trousers. Want and need fogged her brain, and a groan rumbled in his chest.
“Baby,” he ordered. “Either invite me in or let me go, ’cause I’m gonna come in my pants, and they’re rented.”
“Come in,” she begged, even though they stood in her apartment. “Please come in, Jake.”
“All the way in?” He leaned his forehead against hers, his hand leaving her breast to cup the side of her neck. “This isn’t just physical for me anymore, Carlie. Not sure it ever was, no matter what I tried to tell myself. Want to be your dom, but I also wanna be your man. Full time, wherever that takes us.”
She leaned into his strength, her own concentrated in holding on to him instead of floating away on a wave of longing so strong her knees buckled. More than physical, and so powerful it frightened her. If she wasn’t very careful here, she’d find herself believing they could have everything she’d dreamed of. And the next time he hurt her, she wouldn’t have the strength to run.
“I-I don’t know, Jake,” she managed. “I just know I want you now.”
She felt his anger and frustration, coming off of him in waves. But although his hand tightened for a moment, he loosened it with deliberate care and straightened to look down at her. “Then that’s what I’ll give you.”
Without another word, he turned and moved them toward her bedroom, where Carlie was treated to the sight of a big, virile man in evening wear in the midst of her frilly, feminine bedroom. She sucked her lower lip between her teeth and admired him as he pulled his black jacket off, and tossed it onto the rose patterned arm chair by the window, leaving him in shirt, vest and slacks.
“What?” He was undoing the top stud on his shirt, one-handed, watching her.
She clasped her hands behind her back, and shrugged, loving the way his gaze tracked the movement of her breasts in the silver gown.
A heady sense of power made her feel light as a balloon, drifting on the warm currents of their mutual desire. She was in charge of her own choices, at least for now. She could choose this, tonight, then see where it took them. Of course once he had his hands on her, he would be in charge, but that was her choice too, to give him control.
“This is a James Bond moment,” she told him.
When his brows went up in amused inquiry, she grinned. “You know, the big, dangerous agent man stripping off his evening wear in the heroine’s boudoir. Although Bond girls are generally deadly too, in their own way, so that’s different.”
His gaze was warm and wry as he unfastened his vest and pulled it open. “Oh, baby, never doubt that you’re dangerous. You got weapons that hit a man right where it counts.”
This sent a tingle down through her. So did the sight of his shirt opening, the crisp white pleats revealing an expanse of broad chest and the vee of hard abs.
“This gettin’ you hot?” he asked, his voice lazy. “Watchin’ me strip?”
She nodded, mesmerized by the sight of his zipper going down.
He chuckled, a warm sound deep in his chest. “Good. I like that.”
He pulled his shirt and vest open at once, and her mouth watered at the sight of his biceps flexing, then his powerful forearm stretching out to drop the garments on the chair.
He toed off his shoes, lifted each foot far enough to yank off his dark socks, and then pushed his pants and underwear down very slowly.
Finally, a naked, aroused Jake standing before her, his huge cock jutting out at her demandingly. He palmed it, and she stepped toward him, forgetting everything else.
“Can I—”
“No.” He sat on the edge of her bed. “Strip for me, baby.”
Ooh, his voice was hard, the humor gone. Her dom was definitely in the room. Her body reacted, a deep quiver of eager desire running through her, her knees melting, pussy clenching.
Eyes on his, Carlie nodded. “Yes, Jake.”
She reached under her arm and undid the hidden zipper of her gown. As he watched, she slowly pulled the straps from her shoulders and gave a little shimmy, letting it slither to the floor, leaving her standing before him in whisper-thin gray hose, a strapless black bra and a black lace thong. She bent to pick up the dress and toss it over a chair, then turned back to him.
“Jesus fuck,” he said prayerfully. He drank her in with his gaze. Under it, her nipples tightened to needy points beneath the thin lace of her bra, and she rolled her hips, pressing her thighs together to soothe her swollen pu
ssy. “Turn around.”
Carlie turned and heard a low curse. She felt his gaze like an electric current brushing over her ass, bare except for the thin strip of lace which bisected its fullness. Ooh, this was worth the hours of semi-discomfort of the thong riding between her cheeks.
He moved behind her, the heat of his body whispering past her side as he put his hand on her arm, turning her.
“I’m thinkin’ that’s enough stripping for now. Bend over the bed,” he commanded in his dom voice.
With a shiver of delight, Carlie did so, planting her hands on the bed and then arching her back, displaying her ass for him. Knowing that he was looking at her, that he could see a lot, made her tremble with pleasure and need.
“Beautiful,” he said. “Now let’s see if you’re wet. You wet for me, baby?”
“Yes.” She was going to melt in a puddle if he didn’t touch her soon. She dug her fingers into the soft quilt and moved in an enticing little shimmy.
“Be still,” he ordered, and she froze. “I know you want me to touch you, but only when I’m ready. Right?”
“Yes, Jake.” She held still with an effort, her breath coming in short pants.
“What?” His palm struck her ass in a sharp smack. It stung, and Carlie flinched. She also quivered with secret pleasure. Her dom was in charge again, and it was so sweet.
“Yes, Jake,” she said, louder.
“That’s right. Been waitin’ to touch you. Now I’m gonna make you wait. And you’re gonna do it like a good little sub, aren’t you, baby?”
She nodded quickly. Oh God, her pussy was clenching, arousal pulsing through her so hard she wanted to beg for his touch. “Please, Jake,” she whimpered. “I need…”
He spanked her again, a sharp slap on her other ass cheek. Then he moved closer so she could feel the heat of his skin against her bare bottom and thighs, feel his cock brushing her ass.
“You need to be mastered,” he said. “I decide what you get, and then I give it to you. Isn’t that right?”
“Yes, Jake.” Except that she couldn’t stay still when he was so close, when just a tiny roll of her hips would bring her in contact with his cock again. She found it, rubbed against the hot, silky length, sighing with pleasure.