Rules of Seduction

by Joya Ryan

  She moaned and matched his pace with her fingers, spearing her sex in time with him plunging into her mouth.

  He held her tight, used her how he wanted, and she let him. Got lost in it. She didn’t have to think, have to move, she just had to please him and take his pleasure as her own.

  She hummed in satisfaction, something he seemed to like, because he continued to surge into her mouth, over and over, the way he would if he were fucking her.

  She sucked and licked and took him deeper than she thought possible into her mouth and throat.

  He gently stroked her throat. She knew what he wanted. He was close and wanted her to swallow him down.

  She worked herself to her own release faster, harder, just as he did her mouth. Her orgasm split through her and lit her up like lightning. And just as she’d hoped, the sight of her pleasure drove Myth over the edge.

  His body tensed, and his fingers in her hair tightened as his hot release flooded her.

  She swallowed quickly, trying to keep up. He was huge in her mouth, and his orgasm was hard and powerful. She took him down, further and further, until she felt him shudder. For a moment, she thought she heard him murmur her name, and a part of her stilled at how familiar the voice sounded.

  But that couldn’t be right. The blood was pounding too loud in her ears. She didn’t know what she’d heard.

  His breaths rained heavy over her as he slipped from her mouth. He cupped her face in his hands and just waited. Was he looking at her? Cherishing the sight of her? She hoped so. He delivered a kiss to the side of her mouth, then the other side, then brushed her lips.

  A thick gasp cut off her windpipe. It was the slightest touch, but he felt like…

  Nolan.

  No. She’d hoped that any kiss would crush those kinds of crazy thoughts. That Nolan couldn’t possibly be Myth. That Nolan would never hide the truth from her.

  She had to be sure. Had to get a better taste, a better feel of him. And she’d do it without her sight.

  She did the most dangerous thing she could…she blindly reached out for him.

  He didn’t deny her, just swept her up in his strong embrace and laid her back on the mattress. She felt his movements. He never strayed far from her as he adjusted so that he sat with his back against the head board, and she straddled him. His cock bobbed between them.

  He ran that hard length between her folds, along her clit, and she felt like her skin would burst into flames. She was feeling him, skin to skin.

  His hand slid along her body, over her back to her hips, then her ass. He rocked her into him. Never breaching, but feeling.

  He dipped his head to lick her breast, then sucked a nipple into his mouth. All his touches, his caresses, were raw and gentle and consuming. So much power was right beneath her, and she felt him focus that power on her, giving her the freedom and the safety to feel however she wanted.

  With every sweet stroke of his hands, she allowed herself to wonder again…could this loving touch truly be Nolan’s?

  She had to know. It was tearing her up inside, just the suspicion. She found his face with her palms and then held his face and kissed him.

  The way his mouth opened for her. The way his heat instantly enveloped her, invited her to open up and be consumed by him. The perfect way he slid his tongue over hers.

  She knew.

  She squeezed her eyes shut, because right then, the blindfold could keep out her vision, but it couldn’t keep out the truth. There she sat, surrounded by the one man she’d fallen in love with. The one man who’d lied to her.

  She needed to pull away now. Leave him before she lost any more of herself this man.

  But she couldn’t think beyond the warmth of his arms. Was she trapped again? No. She’d finish this. One final time to prove that she could live in this last moment without losing herself. One final time with him to say goodbye. Then she would disappear from his life forever.

  He was who she wanted. Who she’d been falling for every time they’d been together. He made her laugh. Challenged her. Made her strong side stand up, while bringing out her submissive side, all at the same time. He was her source of hope. The catalyst for her happiness.

  But she’d had this feeling before, and she knew that however much kinder Nolan was than her ex, it wasn’t him that was the problem. She’d created the boundaries at Serve to protect herself, and as much as it hurt her to think that this would be their last time together, she knew that if it wasn’t, she’d never recover. She’d give him everything she was and everything she would be.

  He didn’t break her kiss as he grabbed a condom, then reached between them and rolled it on.

  “I need you so much,” she said. And that was the problem.

  There was a rip of a condom wrapper, and with a firm grip on her hips, he guided her to his cock.

  She wasn’t in pain, she was destroyed, mourning what she was missing. What was on the other side of her emotional boundaries.

  So many times she’d imagined Nolan’s steely blues gazing at her as he entered her. So many times she’d thought of him when she was with Myth. And now that she knew, she couldn’t pull away.

  He began to slide her down his shaft. She imagined Nolan’s face as he inch by inch disappeared inside of her. When he was buried to the hilt, a small moan escaped her, and with it, a broken sob.

  His fingers traced her cheek as if to ask, “What’s wrong, love?”

  She could almost hear his voice. It was him. Her Nolan. And they were connected in every way possible, except in reality. She might know it was him, but they were still inside Serve, inside a fantasy, and it was breaking her in half. She was buzzing with pleasure, with need, with sadness.

  “Please, don’t stop,” she whispered and clung to him tighter.

  He thrust up and took all the space she had to give him. He wasn’t just taking over her body. He had her heart and soul, too. Nolan had it all. He’d had it from the beginning.

  He loved her, all while betraying her.

  She hugged him as he pumped harder, faster, bringing them both to the brink. She rocked her hips to meet him. Wanting him so much, but knowing she couldn’t keep him.

  Her chest felt like someone had ripped her heart out while her body screamed for release and pleasure. He was with her, and she felt complete yet devastated all at the same time.

  She’d thought she could do this. Relish a single time with the real him. But she could feel her boundaries falling away the longer he stayed inside her. She needed to finish this soon.

  She clung tighter, whipped her hips faster.

  His big body tensed with his release, and she followed him down, her own body forsaking her and giving in to the most intense pleasure she’d ever felt, all while her world rained down in pieces around them like tattered bits of paper. So easily destroyed.

  It was too much. The intensity. The connection. It was everything she’d wanted, but now with her fantasy fulfilled, she realized how wrong she’d been to think she could separate a fantasy from reality. She’d gone into this thinking she had control. That her hard limit would keep her safe.

  But she’d never had power. Not when Myth had been Nolan all along.

  From the beginning, Nolan was the only one who’d had power. The one who’d set her fate.

  Controlled her fate.

  She pulled him toward her into a final kiss. She held his mouth against hers, no need for anything more than the soft touch of her lips to his. She wanted to stay like this for a moment longer.

  But the game, and the fantasy, were over.

  “Nolan,” she whispered.

  The second that single word passed her lips, he pulled away from her. “You knew?” he asked.

  She slid the blindfold off. “I do now.”

  “I wanted to tell you. But I thought…”

  “It doesn’t matter,” she said. “Not anymore.

  His expression fired off a mix of devastation, fear, and…hope.

  He didn’t un
derstand. And she didn’t know how to explain it to him.

  He pulled her close to him and held his face against her neck. “Now that you know…you need to know everything. How I feel. I want you to be mine,” he rasped. “Say you’ll be mine. Just mine.”

  She swallowed hard. She knew what he meant, and it terrified her to her foundation, the level of commitment he was seeking. It was all the reminder she needed that every fear she felt was justified.

  She couldn’t take this need. This hunger for Nolan. Not a fantasy. The real man. She’d been down that road before, and this heavy desperation could mean only one thing.

  She was weak. Reverting back to the woman she once was. The one that had lost herself to a man.

  “I can’t,” she whispered. “Not now. Not ever again.”

  …

  Nolan couldn’t believe what he was hearing. It was everything he’d feared and everything he’d worked so hard to avoid. But here it was, a woman he’d sworn to protect, instead revealing that he’d hurt her. Deeply, irrevocably. And she was about to leave him forever.

  Only now did he realize what he’d asked her in the heat of the moment.

  Be mine.

  He’d asked the woman who was terrified of losing her real self to a man to give herself to him. And he’d only given her reasons not to trust him.

  “Ava, please—”

  She shook her head and lifted herself off him. She stepped back and gathered her clothes in a bundle in front of her, and it said something about her desperation that she ran to the door without first dressing.

  “Ava,” he said again.

  She stopped at the door and turned back to him.

  “I can’t just let you go,” he said. “Not like this.”

  But even as he said the words, the look on her face told him he’d said the wrong thing.

  “You have to,” she said. “If you ever felt anything for me, please. Let me go.”

  She left the room and closed the door behind her.

  His heart stilled as if slapped with wet cement.

  She was gone, and the only thing left behind was the blindfold on the middle of the floor.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Today should be a great day. Ava was pitching to a major company. But she’d slept last night at her desk. Okay, “slept” wasn’t the right term. After walking out on Nolan last night, all she’d done was lie awake, thinking of him.

  After a cold shower and change of clothes, she at least looked the part of a confident marketing analyst, even though she felt anything but.

  She couldn’t think of Nolan now. Or last night. But she was just sleep deprived enough to lack the will to numb the memories of him.

  Get it together.

  At the doors into the presentation room, Gina stopped her and put a hand on her shoulder.

  “You sure you’re up for this?”

  I have to be.

  Because if she could make it through today, she could make it through anything. She would know once and for all that her future and her fate were hers to command. To control. Her love for a man—a beautiful, wonderful man—wouldn’t be the thing that caused her world to collapse.

  “I’m fine,” she said. “Let’s go get this account.”

  Gina smiled. “That’s the woman I hired. Okay, let’s do this.”

  She and Gina went into the presentation room and met the head executives of Xspot Inc.. Gina gave them a brief introduction, then threw Ava a quick wink, turned off the lights, and left the presentation to her.

  She turned on the projector and clicked through to the first slide. And then found herself at a loss for words.

  So much had happened recently, and she didn’t feel like her feet were quite on the ground.

  She knew why: Nolan.

  She looked at the clicker in her hand, then at the handful of CEO’s and CFO’s in the room. The executives were sitting around the table, waiting for her to say something, anything, and it was all she could do not to sweat through her dress.

  She swallowed and forced herself to begin. “We’ve done extensive research on the best strategy for your company and how to launch your products and take Xspot Inc. to the next level,” she started. “We’ve prepared a number of slides to demonstrate our strategy and assure you that signing the Wayne Firm for your marketing team is the right choice.”

  She clicked through to the next slide, a collection of sex toys. Among them? A blindfold.

  She’d been trying for a long time to regain her strength and confidence, and she’d finally gotten to a place where she hadn’t felt blinded.

  Except she had been blinded. Literally, figuratively, in every way that mattered. The blindfold and the anonymity were supposed to set her free, allow her to indulge in her fantasy with no real world consequences. She’d been a fool to think that she could so easily escape her fear.

  The realization came to her suddenly. The presentation. The slides. Her prepared speech. They were all wrong. Too carefully orchestrated to inspire the executives. If she wanted this to work, she needed to speak from her heart.

  She pressed the power button on the clicker and shut the projector down, and then she went to the side of the room and turned the lights back on.

  Gina’s mouth dropped open with horror, but Ava went with her gut and returned to the front of the room. The executives of Xspot Inc. were watching her with anticipation.

  “The truth is…numbers and projections only get you so far. I believe that for your company to truly take off, consumers need to understand your products on a visceral level.”

  Gina glanced at the executives, eyes wide. They hadn’t yet given a sign if they were buying a word of what Ava was saying, but it was too late now to question her decision. She had to finish this.

  “You sell a fantasy,” she said. The CEO sat back in his chair, eyes on her, waiting for her to continue. “It’s not about a single product or the launch of a new line. It’s about showing customers what they want, maybe things they thought they could never have, and telling them ‘yes’ to choices they never knew were options. Whether it’s a sexy piece of lingerie or a naughty toy”—she shimmed her shoulders a little, and a few chuckles rang out—“the end result is the same. Power. Giving your consumers the power to choose their own fantasy and the freedom to explore it in the real world. That is what your products offer. That is what we want to sell and market for you. And that is what I believe won’t just expand your customer base, but will create longevity in those customers for many years to come.”

  Everyone’s eyes were on her. She gave a gentle shrug and delivered the final line that summed up more than just the meeting she was standing in. It summed up her entire world for the past several weeks.

  “Everyone wants to live in their own personal fantasy. Xspot Inc. offers them the chance to turn that fantasy into reality.”

  …

  “Wow, man, you look like shit,” Oliver said as he strolled up to Nolan at the bar.

  Nolan didn’t look up. Kept his eyes on his glass. He had one mission: find the bottom of the bottle. “Why are you even here?” he grumbled.

  Oliver lifted his chin toward the bar where Eliza sat. “Role play night.” The grin that took over his friend’s face was genuine. He had his woman. Was happy. “What’s the matter with you?”

  “I lost her,” Nolan said.

  “The woman you’ve been dual personalitying with?”

  Nolan nodded.

  “What are you doing here talking to me when you should be getting her back?”

  Nolan’s chest felt like it was falling in on itself. “I don’t know. I don’t what I think.” He looked around. Maybe he’d run to Serve because it was what he knew. It was his routine. Maybe deep down, he knew this was where he belonged. A myth of a man, not a real one worthy of Ava’s life. “Jesus…” The truth hit him, and fuck, it hurt. So damn bad he thought God himself was squeezing his lungs. “I really lost her.”

  “Back up,” Oliver said. “It
can’t be that bad.”

  “I lied to her from the beginning. I was playing both parts without her knowing.”

  “I thought she wanted anonymity?”

  “She did. But I wanted her. Put myself in her path on purpose. She deserves better than that. Better than me.”

  Oliver stared at him, but Nolan just wanted to fade away. That would be better than feeling overwhelmed by the memory of her body, her skin, her smile.

  “You need to pull your head out of your ass,” Oliver said, and Nolan’s stare darted to his friend. “You want this woman? You fight for her.”

  “You don’t understand,” he said. “Fighting for her is exactly what drove her away. The more I showed her I wanted her, the more she pulled away. Until now. She’s gone.”

  “Look, if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that our minds can be assholes and get the best of us. You said she wants freedom? So give her what she wants.”

  “Walk away,” Nolan said with a nod. That’s what he should do.

  “No, I mean support her in what she needs. You can figure out how to do that. If you really love her, there’s a way. But that’s the question, man. The one you need to answer. Do you love her?”

  Nolan frowned at the floor.

  “I do,” he said. “With everything that I am.”

  “Good! Then go get her,” Oliver said, slapping his back.

  Yeah, Nolan knew just what he needed to do. If there was a shred of hope she’d forgive him, he’d take it. He may not know where she was, but she’d have to come home sometime.

  Meanwhile? He would make sure he was ready for her.

  …

  Gina hung up the phone while Ava sat on the other side of her desk, trying not to fidget too badly. “Holy God,” Gina said. “I almost had a heart attack when you went off script, but it was a brilliant move not letting me in on your plan. I got to experience the magic the same way they did.”

  “Did they buy it?”

  Her boss looked at her and smiled. “They loved your presentation!”

  Ava’s eyes shot wide. “Really?”