BOUND: Together

by Cynthia Dane

  But like I said… she made me want to be a man, and if there’s one thing I learned from my father and the tutors he hired to masculinize me, it’s that men take what they want, or go down making it known what they want.

  Deep down, I knew that wasn’t the kind of man Natalie Chen wanted.

  But what if it was the kind of woman she wanted?

  The man Natalie saw when Sherman finally let her in was the only man I could be. A suave bastard who let his hormones run amok and made sure she felt them on the other side of the room.

  I daresay it worked. She walked in, wearing that infuriatingly sexy black dress, her hair a slight mess and half of her makeup gone. I didn’t care. She was still so gorgeous, like a crowned princess descending from her lofty balcony to greet me with world-saving kisses and a token of her affection. In my fantasies, we didn’t have to exchange words. She would approach me; I would embrace her. We’d kiss. We’d make love, and when she discovered what my body was made of, she wouldn’t bat an eyelash.

  But there was that other fantasy that said she would never see the truth, because what did I have to hide? I was a man, wasn’t I?

  I can look back now on this moment and realize what a mess I was. But that’s the thing about hindsight. No matter how clear things were back then, the events were still comprised of broken glass.

  Let me touch you, Natalie. Those were the thoughts I broadcasted as I slowly approached her, my hands in my pockets and my gait nothing but pure, raw masculinity. She brought that out in me. I was beyond a butch lesbian or a drag king. I was a man, damnit. One with needs and the bravado I didn’t deserve. Let me show you what you’ve been missing your whole life. Ha! I really was full of it, wasn’t I?

  “Is there…” Her gaze never left mine as her throat dried and she blushed so hard I hoped that lovely tint would consume her. “Is there anything you need, Mis… Mister Mann…”

  Whispers. She knew what this was about, didn’t she? That wasn’t fear in her eyes, either. That was wonder. Disbelief. Arousal.

  We were in trouble now.

  “Sir?” she squeaked, and I recognized that tone as well. Natalie read the room. She took in information, always the diligent, hard working woman whose brain never shut off. I could make her scream in pleasure, and she would still keep calculating. I could dedicate my whole life to helping her turn off that wonderful mind of hers. For only a little while, of course.

  God help me. I was in so deep. No woman had done this to me since… Brooke. Even then, I don’t think I ever responded to my ex-fiancée like this. I thought I knew what sexual desire and infatuation felt like with Brooke? Perhaps it was for the best we broke up. Because I would’ve never discovered this side of myself, otherwise.

  “You have no idea,” I said, struggling to maintain my masculine demeanor when every inch bringing us closer eradicated another batch of my brain cells, “what kind of thoughts rip through my mind every time I look at you.”

  Her lips slightly parted. My tongue desperately wanted to be between them.

  “You wanted to discuss something with me?”

  Did she know she had a purr in her throat? Because I wanted to know how to make her purr even more than that.

  “Yes.” Let me list the things we needed to talk about, Natalie. Let’s start with how I had longed to thread my fingers through your silky hair. Preferably, while my lips were locked upon yours and my tongue dove deep into your throat. “We really should discuss something.”

  Natalie was a treat until the very end. “Afraid I can’t help you if you don’t speak up, sir.”

  I laugh at it now, but back then, all I could think about was how she played with me when she said things like that. Her damned professionalism was going to end me. Didn’t she want me? As much as I wanted her? Could she possibly tell me that I was wrong?

  “You want to help me? Then stop tormenting me every time you look at me.”

  “Excuse me?” She took a step back, a new gasp racking her chest – one of accusation, of offense, of Damnit, Eric, you really fucked up. “I don’t know what you think…”

  “I don’t think,” I interrupted her. Having lost the last of my sanity, there was no turning back. I was about to expose myself. Lay my heart out. Lay my loins out. If she didn’t want me, now was the time for her to tell me. Sure, I would’ve damaged our professional relationship – and I’d probably have to reassign her to some other office to keep the peace – but I would know. I could end my misery. No longer would I stay up half the night replaying events with her, wondering if she felt it for me. “I know. You look at me like a woman who wants me on a visceral level. How do you think I look at you?”

  That was the moment I could have lost her.

  “Like someone who wants to fuck me senseless.”

  I couldn’t let her see the elation swelling my heart. Nor was she allowed to sense my apprehension that I would still find a way to ruin this.

  Don’t swallow.

  Don’t shift feet.

  Don’t raise the heart rate.

  I indulged in one short breath before saying, “Then we have a mutual problem, don’t we?”

  “I suppose so.”

  “How do you suggest we fix this problem?”

  She cast her eyes downward. But before I made any assumptions about her, Natalie snapped her head back up and met me face to face. “Like adults.”

  I couldn’t hold myself back anymore. That countenance of determination was an invitation to kiss her.

  So I did. She didn’t push me away.

  Chapter 14

  NATALIE

  He slammed me onto the couch by the living room window. His mouth never left mine.

  I had never been so desperate for someone before. If we separated, if I faltered, I would succumb to the worries in my head that I wasn’t good enough, that this truly was a terrible idea that I would regret for the rest of my life. One night’s worth of pleasure wasn’t worth the regret for life.

  Brooke had been right. Yet when I thought of her, the man she once called her lover ripping the bust of my dress, I was more incensed to fuck Eric Mann.

  “Do you want me?”

  “Do you want me?”

  No time or room for real answers. There were kisses as hard as slaps to the face to leave behind.

  He wasn’t gentle. I didn’t want him to be gentle. I wanted it hard and fast, because that was what I was accustomed to and because I wanted to feel the raw power behind his sensible businessman’s façade.

  I wanted him to fuck me as if our lives depended on it.

  A part of me wanted it to hurt. Pain would be just retribution for what I was doing to my career. If I insisted on doing this, on ruining everything I had ever wanted before the day I started working at Mann-Garret, then I would make sure I felt that biting pain that came with my mistakes.

  The thought turned me on, anyway.

  We were going straight to hell. I didn’t care. Not even when I debased myself enough and begged him to fuck me. At least my voice was powerful enough to make my desires clear.

  I wasn’t a demure intern whom he could take advantage of and make do whatever he wanted in the bedroom. I was a grown woman in charge of her own sexuality. Yeah. That was it. This grown-ass woman wanted her lover to slam into her pussy. Right. Now.

  Eric hesitated. Agonizingly so.

  Debasing myself had never felt so right. I didn’t even question how strange it was for him to feel that hard. Or big, for that matter.

  Something was wrong. Something didn’t add up. Something I didn’t care about as long as I got the sex I craved.

  “Fuck.” A soft whisper caressed my lips. “You’re going to undo me, Ms. Chen.”

  “Please.” Laughter spilled from me. Laughter I never intended to let him hear. “You better call me Natalie if we’re doing this. Ms. Chen is someone else.”

  “Natalie…” He squeezed my breast. I don’t know when they both came out of my dress, but there they were, my nipple
s poking through the thin black fabric of my formal-wear bra. “You get off on making people like me lose control, don’t you?”

  “It’s a bonus.” Why were we stopping? Did he need more enthusiastic consent? Yes, yes, yes! Take me into the bedroom and make a dishonest woman out of me! I wanted it all. Beneath him, on top of him, in front of him… how many ways could I take it before the sun came up?

  “There are things about me you don’t know…”

  I laughed again. “Do you think I care right now?”

  “I’m serious. Maybe…”

  The bedroom door opened. A figure draped in a black toga-dress and stepping in seven-inch fuck me pumps wandered down the hallway and scared me half to fucking death.

  “Oh my God!”

  Eric jumped off me, his face as white as the curtains. The woman who emerged from his bedroom could only spare us a bemused smile.

  “So this is who you turned me down for, huh, Eric?” The woman screamed escort. Perhaps the only reason I thought that was because of the rumors Aiden Webb fed into my brain. “Anyway, I need to head out. Don’t worry. I’ve got a ride.”

  “Jesus…” Eric, clinging to the edge of the sofa while I lay there like an idiot with her tits hanging out, stood up. “I’m so sorry. I forgot about our appointment.”

  “Obviously. You were going to leave me in there to rot. But now I see why.” The expensive Californian escort spared me another smile. “Fresh meat is always the tastiest.”

  “It’s not like that…”

  “It’s fine, honey. Show her what you’ve shown me and you two will have a great time.” She twiddled her fingers, silky black hair brushing against her exposed back. “Kisses. Call me next time you’re in the area.”

  The suite was deathly silent after she left.

  “Was that a…” It was all I could think.

  Eric smacked his hand against his face and rocked between both of his feet. Even after that ridiculous interruption, I still wanted him. I didn’t care if he had fucked an escort before calling me. My morals were left on the streets of San Francisco. We could say I didn’t love myself enough. We could also say I loved myself too much.

  “You need to go.”

  There it was. Shame.

  It’s funny how people, especially men, can make you feel it so quickly. One minute you’re dry humping on a couch that costs more than your college education, and the next? Made to feel like a trashy slut.

  I couldn’t put my tits away fast enough. I also couldn’t bear to look at him – or Sherman, God – on my way out.

  What had I done?

  Chapter 15

  ERICA

  “The fuck did you do, Erica?”

  He knew it. Maybe he had heard it. Even with an earpiece in his head, he was definitely eavesdropping on what I did with Natalie, because he needed to know – for security purposes, of course.

  “Don’t call me that right now.”

  “Fine. What the fuck did you do, Eric?”

  He slammed the door behind him. There I was, sitting on the couch, my zipper undone and half my shirt spread wide open. At least my binder looked like an undershirt.

  “You knew she was in there, didn’t you?”

  “I thought you did as well. Was wondering why the hell you wanted Ms. Chen in here when you had an escort tied up in your bedroom.” Sherman sighed. “What did you do?”

  I didn’t dare look him in the eye.

  “What the fuck do you think I did?”

  “I think you made an idiotic mistake.” He crossed his arms. “Because you’ve been thinking with your dick all night.”

  I looked at the door, imagining Natalie coming back in with a smile. I knew she wouldn’t. I had embarrassed the shit out of her. She must’ve felt so…

  Used.

  My mind was too locked into the teachings of my childhood to cry. Boys didn’t cry. Grown men certainly didn’t cry. I was a man, wasn’t I? If my father saw me crying, he would’ve smacked me upside the head and called me a wuss like my dead sister.

  So why did I cry?

  ***

  One day later, I sat in the back of my Mercedes with Natalie beside me. We had disembarked from the chartered plane from San Francisco, and by God, it was the closest we had physically been since we dry humped on my hotel couch.

  You could cut the tension with a knife.

  We hadn’t said a single word since the night before. Nothing aside from curt greetings and the occasional yes or no when pertinent. The worst was having to ask her to take an email I remembered at the last minute. Otherwise, I put as much distance between us as I could muster. I was embarrassed. She was horrified. We were both ashamed.

  What terrifying horrors I had wrought upon us.

  Because this was my fault, you know. The only reason we dealt with this situation was because I could barely keep my fake dick in my pants. The horny little bastard. He may have been made of silicon, but I’ll be damned if he didn’t have his own damned brain set to ruin Eric.

  The least I could do was offer her a direct ride home. So that’s what I did when we deplaned at the airport and Clyde was already waiting for us. No sense making Natalie take a taxi. As awkward as our situation was, I felt it even more uncouth to leave her to fend for herself at the airport.

  I know she felt it too. That mutual yearning. That insatiable lust. “Unfinished business,” is what she later called it. Even though we were both mortified by what had happened, we desired to touch again. To kiss. To hold. To get beneath my bed covers and climax.

  As Clyde pulled off the tarmac, asking us how the trip went, all I could think about was pulling Natalie’s legs apart and diving face-first between them. I had a privacy partition, damnit. Should it really be that difficult to spare us five minutes to get rid of the sexual tension? Sherman was a big boy. I didn’t care if he glared at me in the rearview mirror, as if to say, Don’t you fucking dare, Eric. He hadn’t called me Erica in over twelve hours. He knew who I was. Who I would continue to be until I unleashed that side of myself, preferably on Natalie.

  I glanced in her direction. She met my gaze. Behind those glistening amber-hued eyes was the memory of the five minutes we had all to ourselves the night before. It was fate. She must have sensed it as well as I did.

  This wouldn’t go away before we were forced to work together again. My need to touch her was as great as her need to be touched. It was now, or never.

  “Ms. Chen is coming home with me,” I informed Sherman. He lifted his head, sunglasses once more meeting my gaze in the rearview mirror. “Have the house prepared for Beta Status.”

  Sherman and I have known each other for so long that we don’t need more than five seconds to wage battle, and one of us can do it behind a pair of thick sunglasses. Trust me. He silently castrated my fake balls in that rearview mirror. Not only had his job become that much harder, but he knew I was being a huge fucking fool and listening to my cock again. He knew what it was like, right? He was a man. He understood.

  Right?

  “Beta Status it is, sir.” He dialed a number on his phone and relayed the orders to home security. They were to get my house ready for a visitor right now.

  Security is such serious business in my life that we came up with clever ways to remodel my house based on who was coming to dinner. Alpha Status meant someone who knew of my situation was coming, and no changes were necessary. My doctors, Brooke, my mother… very few were on that shortlist, but it was the easiest one to maintain. Beta Status, however, meant someone close to me who did not know the truth was coming. Pictures had to be hidden. Documents left astray cleaned up and put in their proper place. Anything in my personal chambers that said Eric Mann has tits had to go. My staff would get to work the moment the order came through. I did not doubt that Margot, my head housekeeper, would personally see to my bras and binders left on my bedroom floor.

  Because I intended to take Natalie there. To my bedroom. To fuck her.

  Even so, we rode in silen
ce. Natalie texted someone, but I didn’t press her regarding who or what about. It wasn’t my business. (Even though it rather was.) We had reached the point where we didn’t need words. All we required were heated, furtive glances that announced we knew what would happen as soon as we crossed my closely-guarded threshold.

  I raised the privacy partition. Clyde let out a low chuckle while Sherman’s jaw tightened.

  They could fuck off. Not the first time either one of them dealt with me acting like a teenager in the backseat of my own car, nor would it be the last. I didn’t care if Clyde thought it adorable and Sherman wanted to rip off my head. This was my date. This was my potential girlfriend. I’d stick my tongue down her throat and feel up her tits if I damn well pleased.

  Not like she didn’t want me to. The fact Natalie was such a willing participant emboldened me. Even if this turned out like it had with Brooke, I could at least confidently say that Natalie had been attracted to me. On some level. Enough to forego professionalism and everything we should be doing so we could say that we had made love.

  Perhaps that was not the way to think of it. I had to be careful, after all. I was willing to have my heart broken again if it meant spending one night with the woman I wanted. But I had to remind myself that it didn’t have to be love just to have my heart broken.

  People, I have discovered, find new and invigorating ways to destroy you. Love doesn’t have to be a part of that equation.

  “This is what you want, yes?” I had to be sure. If I were to put my heart on the line again, I needed to know that Natalie Chen wanted this to happen. Her consent to embroil herself in my world must be absolute.

  She grabbed the collar of my jacket with a firm grip.

  “Absolutely.”

  There was never a hint of uncertainty when I was with Natalie. She was a woman born to know what she wanted and figure out how to get it. For all I knew back then, she had set her sights on me and decided she wanted me first. Perhaps I had stumbled into her intricate plan of seduction. Perhaps I was the most willing victim she had ever discovered.