The to-do list is never far away. Scarlett is a woman with an agenda.
I’m a man with one too.
We are gathering intel, making decisions, and prepping to visit more inns tomorrow.
After the detour at Monet’s home, we return to the task at hand.
Assessment.
Due diligence.
Back at the inn, we check out the entire grounds of the hotel, taking photos for Cole, sending them along to him. We wander across the property, drinking in the view, getting a sense of the spaciousness, how it feels, how it looks.
What would it be like to be a guest and wander across this section of the vineyard adjacent to the hotel?
How would it feel to wake up in the morning, fling open the doors, and stroll across the grounds?
Would this inn inspire you to post a review on travel sites? Show photos all over social media?
Since other guests are snapping photos and sharing them, we decide that yes, in fact, this hotel elicits that sort of reaction.
Like the spies or mystery shoppers that we are, we canvas the inside too. We walk up and down the hallway on each floor, check out the stairwells, visit the pool. The platinum-blonde beauty by my side taps away on her tablet the entire time.
“Always the notetaker,” I say.
“Notes are good for both of us,” she says.
“They absolutely are.” I tap the side of my head. “I’m recording every single detail up here.”
“And what is your conclusion so far?”
“I love it,” I say, holding her gaze, and I’m not just talking about the hotel. I’m talking about the whole experience of being here with Scarlett. The things she’s shared with me. Getting to know her better. Understanding her. I love knowing her, and that’s a terrifying notion except that we also have built-in safety precautions. We have an escape plan—that’s what will make this work. We’ll stick to it.
Of course we will.
Once our afternoon of intel-gathering is complete, Scarlett says she needs to change her shoes.
“You’re switching to bedtime slippers already?”
“Au contraire,” she says with a flirty grin as she sails into our suite, rustles around in her suitcase, and finds a pair of sapphire-blue heels.
She slides into them, and my mouth waters.
“You’re stunning,” I say as I roam my gaze over her body, savoring the shape of her long, lean legs, imagining how they’d look draped over my shoulders.
“You’re not so shabby yourself.”
She ditches her wig next, brushing out her hair, looking fantastic as herself again.
We head to the veranda for cocktail hour—another opportunity to get a sense of the property.
Because one thing that cocktails do is loosen lips.
Soon enough, as Scarlett sips a glass of Chenin blanc, she’s making small talk with another couple. A blonde named Elodie, who looks like she could be Kristen Bell’s stunt double, and her glasses-wearing hipster wife named Hazel, who reminds me of Kerry Washington. They’re from Las Vegas, they say.
Scarlett introduces herself as Violet, saying she worked in retail, and asks the others why they’re here.
Elodie sets a hand on her wife’s shoulder. “We’re newlyweds. Just like you two,” she says.
Scarlett smiles. “Is it that obvious?”
The blonde leans closer to us, adopts a wry grin, then points to Scarlett’s hand. “Patently. The way you look at each other—like there is no one else in the world. Also, I love your ring. It’s so daring. So bright,” Elodie says, and flashes her own ring, bright and blue. A sapphire.
“Some women like it loud. Some women like it bright.” With every word Scarlett shares with this couple, it’s like my business partner is revealing more of herself.
To me.
And I gobble it up, taking notes the same way as before when we were analyzing the hotel balconies.
Hazel clears her throat, weighing in. “So when did you two get married?”
“Three days ago,” I chime in. “In Paris, where we live now. The ceremony was held in a small little passage—Galerie Vivienne. Mosaic floors. Stained-glass ceilings. Iron latticework,” I say, painting the scene and seeing it vividly, a small, private affair.
Scarlett jumps right in with the ruse. “It was gorgeous. Just friends and family,” she says, and my heart thumps harder. She imagines our pretend wedding the same way. This . . . delights me.
Elodie brings her hand to her chest. “You look so happy together. That’s so wonderful. How did you meet?”
Elodie is hitting on all the details Scarlett and I haven’t practiced. I suppose I didn’t think we’d be queried over them. But that’s the joy of role-play. It involves improvisational skills.
Scarlett seems to savor this thrill, her lips curving into a grin, her eyes twinkling. “You’ll probably never believe this,” she says in a whisper.
“Oh, try me,” the blonde says eagerly.
Scarlett shifts her gaze back and forth then drops her voice to a whisper. “We met at a club. One of those risqué, after-dark type of clubs.”
The blonde’s eyes widen. “A sex club?”
Scarlett laughs, nodding.
Holy shit. My pretend wife has quite an active imagination.
“The funny thing is we work in the same building. But we met after-hours at a sex club. It turned out we had a lot of the same predilections,” Scarlett says with a lift of her eyebrow, a naughty little gesture.
Hazel’s face goes a little red, but she sits up straighter, higher. “That’s great that you have so much in common.”
“And when I found out he was in the same building, I kept finding reasons to go to his office. One thing led to another . . .” Scarlett says, tossing me a dirty glance, crafting such a gorgeous, seductive tale.
I pick up the thread from my improvisation partner, playing along easily. “Darling, are you truly going to tell them about all the things we did in my corner office?”
Elodie’s eyes go wider. “I know I’d love to hear. Wouldn’t you, babe?”
Hazel laughs, a little embarrassed. She adjusts her glasses, then lifts her chin. “Fine. I’d love the dirty details too.”
“Mmm. I had a feeling you would,” Elodie says.
Scarlett runs her finger along the rim of her wineglass, dipping her head then raising it. “Let me just say we had the hottest sex of my life on his desk,” she says.
My blood surges, heating as my wife opens the door to her fantasies.
Then she kicks it wide open with a stiletto-heel boot. “And there was nothing ordinary about it. I’d never felt anything like it before. I was dominated. And it was everything. I wanted the roughness. I wanted the pain. He made me feel alive. He made me feel desired. In the previous relationships I’d been in, I’d never felt that way.”
Holy. Fuck.
Scarlett just unspooled her dirty dreams.
In my lap.
She laid them all out for me to see.
I see them. Oh hell, do I ever.
Elodie waves a hand in front of her face. “My God. I think I’m getting turned on just hearing about the two of you together.”
Hazel leans in closer, kisses her neck, and whispers in her ear, “I can help you with that, sweetie.”
“You better.” Elodie gives her wife a kiss, then adds, “And on that note, I think we’re going to have to go back to our room.”
Hazel grabs her drink, swallows it in a down-the-hatch fashion, then clears her throat. “Thank you for getting my wife worked up. We’re heading upstairs.”
Scarlett laughs playfully, then waggles her fingers. “Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”
“I’ll do everything you’d do,” Elodie says with a wink, then they scurry away.
Scarlett tosses back the rest of her wine and sets down the glass.
My gaze pins hers. “Let’s do all the things you would do.”
As we walk down the hall to our r
oom, I slide a hand around her waist. “You have a little bit of an exhibitionist in you,” I whisper.
“Apparently, I like it when strangers think we have the hottest sex ever,” she says.
“They don’t have to think it. Because I know it. Because we do.”
She stops, drags her nails down my chest, and grabs the waistband of my trousers. “We do. It’s raw and it’s primal, and my husband can’t get enough of me.”
I growl, desire pounding through my body as Scarlett makes all of her wishes clear. She’s communicating her fantasies. Letting me know she’s never had the kind of sex that she wants. She’s never been worshipped. She’s never been ravaged. I cup her cheeks, gripping her face hard. “You’ve never been fucked good and hard by a man who wants nothing more than to have you.”
“No. I haven’t.”
“That’s about to change.”
We open the door and go inside.
17
Daniel
Inside the room, I pounce. I grab her wrists, pinning them above her head.
She trembles, her body vibrating with need. “Did you do that on the veranda to get me all worked up?” My voice is dark, smoky.
She grins like a siren. “Did it work? Did it get you worked up?”
I slam my hips against her, letting her feel the length of me. “Every second I’ve spent with you today has made me want what I’m about to do to you now.”
“What are you about to do to me now?” She’s breathy, her voice laced with wanton curiosity.
I drag my nose along her neck, inhaling her scent. It drives me mad with lust. She’s wearing the perfume I gave her. When I reach her ear, I draw her lobe between my teeth then nip.
She murmurs, a sign for me to bite harder. I nibble on her earlobe, and she gasps. “The way you smell reminds me that you’re mine,” I whisper.
“Because you gave it to me. Because you want to mark me.”
“You want to be marked.”
She thrusts her hips closer to me, her pelvis seeking me out. I slam my body against her again so she can feel what she’s done to me.
With her arms high above her head, her wrists pinned in my left hand, I drag my stubbled jaw across her face, my kisses trailing over her cheek. I reach her lips, dust a kiss there, then claim her lush mouth, hard and devouring. It’s a kiss that makes my brain hazy, that makes every cell in my body heat up.
I drop her wrists, pull back, and gaze at her lust-struck expression, her glossy eyes. “I know that you want it rough. But the question is, how rough do you want it, love? How hard do you want me to fuck you?”
She swallows, her lips trembling, then she lifts her chin. “I want to feel it tomorrow. I want it to blot out everything I’ve ever felt before. I want it to be the only thing I feel.”
Desire thrums through me. I run the back of my hand down her cheek. “Like I said, my wife is dirty.”
“So dirty,” she whispers, then I claim her lips once more with a ruthless kiss.
I’m not gentle. Not in the least. I devour her mouth, kissing her hungrily. I consume her, tugging her bottom lip with my teeth, making her moan, making her growl. I travel along her neck again, biting as I go. She arches against me, her nails dragging down my back. I listen to her every cue. I slide my hands along her stomach and up over her breasts, reaching for the top button on her blouse.
I tug at her blouse, then rip it apart, and she gasps.
I shake my head, pressing a finger against her lips. “Don’t say a word, love. I’ll buy you a new one tomorrow,” I say.
She gives a quick, eager nod, then whispers, “Tear all my clothes off. I don’t fucking care. Tear them off like it’s all you want.”
The corner of my lips curves into a grin. “I don’t have to do it like it’s all I want. It is all I want.”
I yank her short skirt, tugging it down her legs, letting it pool at her heels, where she steps out of it.
She wears only the shoes, a white satin bra with lace trim, and matching knickers. I grab at the middle of her bra. Twisting it. Making the fabric squeeze her tits together, pushing them up above the cups. My dick throbs harder as I stare at those gorgeous globes. “You bought this for me to rip it off, didn’t you?”
She nods, panting out a yes.
“You want me to ruin this gorgeous piece of lingerie?”
“Yes.”
I tug at the satin fabric, yank it hard, then I grip the hook, jerking it off, not caring what happens to it.
I free her tits.
I grab them, squeezing and twisting, and she tosses her head back, moaning and groaning, her noises rising higher, growing even more desperate.
“My God, you love when I play with your tits, don’t you?”
She bows her back, arching, and moans, “Yes, like that. Just like that.”
I give her everything she wants. I want it too. The wildness of pleasure, the roughness of sex, the intensity of us coming together. I treat her tits like they’re toys, like I can do anything to them I want. I knead them as I bend my neck, drawing one delicious nipple into my mouth and biting hard. She yelps, grabs my face, and shoves me back against her chest.
I suck and devour her breasts, giving it to her just the way she wants. Her hips thrust against me as I nibble greedily. She moans, a delicious series of oh Gods and yeses. Finally, I release her tits, rise up, thread my hands into her hair, and kiss her neck again, dragging her head back, pulling hard.
She yelps.
Every moan she makes is a symphony, and I want to play her body, hear all the music she can make.
She’s better than the violin.
She’s sexier than a Beethoven concerto.
She’s more alluring than any Brahms.
I bring my lips to her ear. “You want to be ruined, don’t you?”
“I do,” she says.
“I’m going to ruin you by fucking you the only way you should be fucked.”
“And what way is that?” she asks on a savage pant. I lower my right hand, thread my fingers into the waistband of her knickers, grab them, and pull roughly, watching as the satin tightens against her pussy.
Tugging on the fabric, I turn it into a sex toy, pulling it up and down, back and forth over her wet clit.
She grabs my shoulders, thrusts out her hips, and moans.
“You need to be fucked by a man who wants you. By a man who is consumed by you and only you,” I tell her as I work the lace fabric up and down over the delicious rise of pleasure.
“I do, I do,” she gasps, savoring every tug and pull as I use the lace to get her off the way she wants me most.
Her fingers curl tighter on my shoulders, digging in, hanging on. Her eyes are closed, her lips are parted, and then she’s screaming out in pleasure. “Yes, yes, yes.”
I pull up the white satin, twisting it harder, dangerously close to sending her to her first orgasm.
Her hands go tighter around my shoulders.
“I bet you can come in seconds,” I grunt.
She gasps wildly, then she’s crying out, moaning and groaning and falling apart in pleasure.
Panting, gasping, murmuring.
My skin crackles with lust.
My dick has never been harder.
It’s thumping against my trousers, eager to bury itself in her.
I growl in her ear. “You’re so fucking dirty. Look at you coming in your own knickers.”
Her mouth parts, and she breathes out hard. “Do you like knowing you married a dirty woman?”
“I like treating you like the dirty woman you are. Now turn around, raise your ass, and tell me how much you want me to smack it.”
“So much,” she says, trembling as she turns around, presses her palms against the wall, and offers me that beautiful ass. I raise a hand high in the air, then bring it down hard on her flesh.
She shakes, crying out.
Then the other cheek.
She moans and groans.
I grip the flesh of h
er ass, squeezing it roughly as I gather all her hair in my other hand, pull it to the side, then tug it. “That’s what you want, don’t you? To know that I’m as wild as you are?”
She practically cries as she nods. “Yes.”
“Then let’s get you down on your hands and knees. Leave your shoes on.” I tug off her knickers, sliding them down her legs. She steps out of them and kneels on the floor, sapphire heels still on.
“Watch me as I take my clothes off,” I tell her.
She stares like a hungry creature with ravenous eyes as I unbutton my shirt and unbuckle my belt, tossing them carelessly onto the floor behind me. Shoes and socks go next, then trousers, then my boxer briefs. I’m down to nothing.
I take my cock in my hand, shuddering from the pleasure. “Do you know how badly I want to come on your face right now?”
Her eyes float closed for a second, and she shudders. “Tell me how badly.”
I slide a hand over her hair, coiling it around her skull, my dick sliding along her lips. “I want to come in your hair, on your back, on your face, but I want to come inside you even more. When my cock is in you, I’m going to own your body. I’m going to ravage it. I’m going to leave marks all over you,” I say as I bend, reach into my trousers on the floor, and grab a condom.
I get behind her on my knees, sheathing myself, then press a palm between her shoulder blades. “Down to your elbows. Lift your ass. It’s better for me to fuck you ruthlessly.” I savor the view in front of me as Scarlett obeys every command, offering herself, giving me the most fantastic view in the universe, her wet, needy pussy practically begging for my body. “Are you aching for me?”
“I am.”
I slide my hand between her legs where she’s wetter and hotter after her orgasm. She arches and moves with me as I slide my hand up and down, savoring her slickness.
“This is how you need to be fucked. By a man who wants you.”
“I want you too. So much,” she says, like she’s begging.
My eyes eat her up, enjoying the feast of her body as I line up behind her.
She lifts her hips higher, giving herself to me. I rub the head of my cock against her wetness, a sharp, delicious burst of pleasure surging through me.
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