by Blake Wilder
“Oh?” I asked, making my tone and expression blasé.
“We need to add a timed element to this.” He moved into the room.
Okay, so this was Declan my crime coach rather than Declan the bad guy who I’d been caught stealing from.
“A timed element?” I asked, relaxing a little. “Like a deadline?”
He sat down on the bed next to me, making the mattress dip toward him. “Yes. You can’t spend too much time on this. You need to be moving faster.”
“I thought I needed to be subtle.”
He nodded. “Subtle. And quick.” He reached out and rest a hand on my thigh just below the hem of my dress. He rubbed it back and forth.
Goose bumps broke out over my entire body.
“Okay. So how do I do that?”
He ran his hand up a little higher, under the edge of my dress. “You’ll figure it out.”
“No tips?”
“I don’t think you need my tips. You just need the right motivation.” His hand traveled higher.
I shifted my thighs apart without even thinking about it.
“If I make you come before you get your hands free, you only get my fingers in your pussy,” he said, running the tip of his index finger over the lace edge of my panties. “If you get free before that, you get my cock filling you up.”
My body went hot and tingly in an instant. I mean, there wasn’t really a losing scenario there, but now that I’d had him inside me once, there was no way I’d ever think his fingers—no matter how talented those fingers were—were enough.
I started sawing harder against the tape.
He gave a low chuckle. “Subtle.”
I blew out a breath. “You can’t really see what I’m doing can you?” I opened my legs further. “Aren’t you distracted by other things right now?” His hand being that close to my pussy—where he could clearly feel how all of this was affecting me—had to be enough to give me a little leeway with my movements up above.
“I am,” he agreed, slipping his finger under the edge of my panties and running it back and forth over bare skin only centimeters from my clit. He reached up and tugged on the front of my dress over my breasts. With my hands over my head, there was nowhere for the straps to go, though. His gaze met mine. “I’ll buy you a new one.”
“Wha—”
But a second later, he pulled out a pocketknife and cut through my dress straps.
My startled, and slightly annoyed, protest was forgotten when he pulled the front of my dress down, baring my breasts.
He rolled one nipple between his thumb and forefinger, then gave it a tug.
Heat shot through me and I forgave him. Just like that. The bastard had ruined my dress and I forgave him the second he touched me. I was in so much trouble.
“Sorry about that,” he said, with a completely unapologetic grin.
“Sure.” But I was now wiggling against the sheets.
He dropped his hand from my nipple. “Okay, so now, if you’re not subtle enough with cutting through that tape, your gorgeous tits are going to bounce and I’ll notice.” He moved his hand so that his middle finger brushed over my clit and I gasped. “And remember, you’re on a timer now.”
I began moving the tip of the paperclip against the tape again, trying to hold my upper body as still as I could.
Dec’s hand was also moving, though. He slid his middle finger over my clit, circled, then slid into me, igniting sparks of want and need.
I bit back my moan, afraid that it would cause my chest to move, but my eyes nearly rolled back in my head as he stroked me. He built up the perfect rhythm, pumping in and out, then switched it up, rubbing over my clit with the perfect pressure and speed. At first, I worked hard to focus on my bound wrists, the pull of the tape on my skin, the feel of the paperclip separating the fibers in the tape. But damn, the guy was good. My pussy throbbed with the need to be filled and I was fighting to keep the words, “please just fuck me now” from spilling out. A tiny corner of my mind figured that Dec actually wanted me to break free of the duct tape before I came because he definitely wanted to fuck me. Each time, just as I thought I would shoot over the peak, he’d change it up again, sliding two fingers into me, stretching me as he hit that spot that made me pant. But he didn’t stop. He kept tormenting me in the most delicious ways.
Then he really upped the ante. He started talking.
“Do you have any idea how fucking gorgeous you are when you’re at my mercy? Especially now that I know you can take everything I can give you? When you’re on the verge of begging for my cock?”
I kept moving the paperclip against the tape, but honestly, I was starting to really not care much about how I got my orgasm. I just wanted it. Soon. Now.
“Dec, I—” Just as I was about to beg, the tape gave. My hands fell apart and I reached for him.
He gave a little growl and jerked up, tearing his pants open, rolling on a condom, then pulling me to the edge of the mattress. I thought he was going to thrust deep and hard but he paused, took my wrists and lifted them to his mouth. He kissed the red marks where the tape had pulled on my skin. Gently. Affectionately. In the midst of our dirty game of captive and bad guy, he paused to be sweet.
Dammit. I felt my heart flip as I thought I really like him. I was really in trouble.
But I promptly forgot about anything but how huge and hot and amazing he was, because he took my hips and thrust deep and hard.
“Yes!” I yelled. My entire body felt a mix of relief and a bone-deep need.
“You are absolutely perfect,” he said gruffly as he started moving. Fast.
He pounded into me. I was climbing toward a hard orgasm within minutes and as it crashed over me, I heard him shout my name and the hard, hot pulses of his orgasm throbbing through me.
Dec fell forward, catching himself with his hands on the mattress and putting his mouth to mine.
“Fucking incredible,” he said before kissing me deeply.
I wrapped my arms around him and arched into him.
Fucking incredible, indeed. And I wasn’t just talking about the sex.
Dammit.
Seven
I talked Olivia into staying the night. It wasn’t hard. I just made her so tired that driving even the short distance back to the hotel seemed like a lot of work.
Exhausting Olivia was the most fun I’d had in a very, very long time.
The sex. Yes, absolutely. No question.
But the woman made my mind work. I loved it. Did I think that she would really need to know how to pick locks, escape from duct tape, climb through a bathroom window, or hang suspended from the underside of an open staircase? No. Definitely not.
But I easily talked her into every single scenario, no matter how far-fetched, and she gave them her all. Though she certainly didn’t seem upset about the times I “caught” her and made her pay for trespassing.
We’d worked—and played—until nearly 3 a.m.
It was nearly noon now and I was just waking. The blackout shades on my windows were one of the best things I’d ever bought. Clearly Olivia was also a night owl. Just one more thing we had in common.
Now as I lay next to her naked form and thought about all of the additional things she’d need to fake practice for the art heist that was not going to happen, I realized that it was going to take a very long time before I got my fill of Olivia What’s-Her-Name.
I frowned. I still didn’t fucking know her real last name.
I looked at the silky bare skin of her back, her red hair spread out over my pillow, and thought of some delicious ways to “talk her into” telling me her last name. I was just reaching for her when I heard the chime from my phone.
For a few seconds, I pondered ignoring it, but it was almost noon and I was supposed to be meeting Warren Maxwell with Jordan and Lance, the other guy playing private security guard. Lance was also an agent, but I knew that Jordan hadn’t shared a lot of details about me with him. I appreciated that. I di
dn’t need Lance paying more attention to me than he was the guys at Maxwell’s poker game. I wanted to get this job with Maxwell done. It had gotten complicated the second I’d sat down across the poker table from Olivia. I was going to steal that painting from him. I was also going to ignore the statue that the Egyptian was interested in. I couldn’t walk out with two pieces of art at the same time and I couldn’t risk going back a second time. I was going to have to give my payday up for Olivia. I’d have to find another way of getting the money for the inner-city clinics.
I shook my head as I reached for my phone. I was giving up my job for Olivia? A woman I’d just met and who didn’t even trust me with her last name? That was crazy. If any of my buddies had told me they were doing the same thing, I would have called them idiots.
I pulled my phone from my pants on the floor and checked the name.
It was Jordan.
I answered as I slipped out of the bed so I wouldn’t wake Olivia.
“Hey.”
“Where are you?”
“Home.”
“Why? Is there a problem?”
“No problem. Something just came up last night.” I stepped into the hallway and pulled the door partially shut behind me.
“Yeah, she came up to your chin or so.”
I paused. Then I sighed. “You checked the security cameras?”
“When you aren’t where you’re supposed to be, yes.”
“You could have just called me.”
“You could have lied to me about what was going on,” Jordan countered.
“I wouldn’t have lied.” I had no need to lie about Olivia.
Just what Olivia was in Vegas to do.
Or more specifically, what I was planning to help Olivia do. I wasn’t sure Jordan would care if Olivia took the painting back from Maxwell. Hell, he might agree that she deserved to have it back. Maxwell was a slime ball. Jordan definitely thought so.
“Well, you need to make her breakfast and then get your ass back here. The meeting is in three hours and we need to prep.”
I scrubbed a hand over my face. “For fuck’s sake, we’ve prepped. What more could we possibly need to go over?”
“This has to be tight,” Jordan said. “I don’t want any fuckups. I want this done tonight. I’m sick of this guy.”
I grinned. Jordan was the point man, of course, which meant that he was the one interacting with Warren Maxwell the most. Maxwell thought Jordan was the head of the private security company Venture and that Lance and I worked for him. So Jordan was the one Maxwell called whenever he had a question or a demand. He had far more demands than questions. He was also a suspicious son-of-a-bitch. You had to be when you were in a business like he was, but he was keeping Jordan on his toes. Jordan had started with a team of five, including me and Lance. Those five people did everything from set up phony websites for our phony company and our phony credentials to forging documents to digging into Maxwell’s past to tracking Maxwell and his team to making sure that Jordan’s phony office space was stocked with the sparkling water and candied almonds that Maxwell liked.
The team had gone from five to fifteen and we were still hopping. Warren Maxwell was very connected to a lot of very shady people and his upcoming poker game was going to bring a huge number of them together under one roof. The FBI was practically salivating over the potential takedowns tonight.
Jordan was feeling the pressure. I don’t think the guy had slept a full night in a month and he ate Tums like they were candy.
“You’re giving me time to make her breakfast?”
“Of course. Don’t be a dick. Make her something good too.”
I laughed. “Frittatas it is.”
“Bring me some.”
“You got it.” I paused. “You okay? You sound especially stressed.”
“I’ll be fine after tonight,” Jordan said.
“Tonight is going to go off without a hitch,” I told him. “We know everything there is to know about Warren Maxwell. We know exactly how things are going to go.” With the exception of how exactly I was going to steal the painting that the woman I was falling for needed back in her life.
Wait. The woman I was falling for?
Fuck.
But yeah, that explained why I was going to do the job she needed done rather than the one I’d planned to do.
Dammit.
Hey, I know how to put others first. Remember all the charity stuff I do? The less fortunate that I give part of my “earnings” to? I care.
But I’d never been in love.
This was probably going to fuck a lot of things up.
I sighed. Apparently loudly.
“Are you okay?” Jordan asked.
“Yeah. I’m good.”
“I got a look at the woman you left the casino with last night. There is no way you are not good. Unless she’s a psycho. Are you tied up? In a bad way? Do you need rescued?”
“Fuck off,” I told him. “Everything here is great. She’s not a psycho. All the tying up was very consensual.” I couldn’t help the smug grin on my face, even if Jordan couldn’t see it.
“God, I’m so fucking jealous,” Jordan said with a groan.
This was the thing with me and Jordan—we were actually friends. He was a good guy. We happened to work on opposite sides of the whole law thing, but we sincerely liked each other.
“You need to get laid,” I told him.
“I do. I really, really do,” he agreed. “Another reason to get this job over with. I need some down time.”
Down time. I liked the sound of that. If Jordan took down time, I took down time. He was my handler. I worked when he worked. And I kicked back when he kicked back.
Maybe I could convince Olivia to spend a little more time in Vegas. Maybe a lot more time. Kicking back with her sounded like heaven. Though working and plotting and planning with her had been a damned good time so far too.
“Okay, so we get the thing at Maxwell’s done. We make sure everything there is clean and neat, and then we take vacation,” I said.
“You make it sound so simple.”
“It can be simple,” I said confidently. “We know what we’re doing. We’ve been studying the people connected to Warren Maxwell for months. We know who will be there and what they want. Once they’re inside that house, we’re golden. All the bad guys—and girls—” There were a few female bad apples in Maxwell’s crowd too. He was an equal opportunity scumbag and we were certainly not going to discriminate based on sex when it came to locking people up. “—will go to jail and we’ll be praised and lauded and rewarded.”
Jordan laughed. “Don’t get your hopes up too high about that praise and reward. But yeah.” He blew out a breath. “You’re right. We have a solid plan.”
“We do. This will all be over in twenty-four hours.”
“Okay. Now go make some fucking froufrou egg stuff, kiss your girl goodbye, and get in here.”
“You’re still going to make us go over everything again?”
“Yes. Definitely. Maybe a couple of times.”
I groaned. But there was nothing left to say but, “Fine. I’ll see you in an hour or so.”
We disconnected and I turned back for the bedroom for some clothes. I’d get started cooking before waking Olivia for brunch. I glanced at the clock on the bedside table. Okay, lunch.
But then I glanced at the bed. The empty bed. The bed where I’d left Olivia sleeping. Frowning, I looked toward the door to the connected master bathroom. The door was open and I didn’t hear anyone moving about or water running. Still, I went to check.
The bathroom was empty.
I turned in a circle, as if there would be a clue as to where Olivia had gone. I’d been right outside the door in the hallway. My back had been to the bedroom door but there was no way she could have slipped out past me without me noticing.
Was there?
I started for the hall, intent on searching the house when something caught my eye.
The curtains blowing at the window. The open window.
This was Nevada. It was the desert. It was hot. Almost all the time.
I didn’t leave windows open.
I beelined for the window and was just leaning out when I heard my car start in the driveway.
She’d fucking snuck out of my bedroom window and was stealing my car.
Ironically, I’d taught her about escaping through windows and crawling along roofs. Oh, and picking locks. She had to have gone in through my front door, grabbed my car keys, and snuck back out while I was on the phone. I hadn’t taught her to hotwire cars. Yet.
Unless she already knew.
Why the fuck had she just snuck out and stolen my car? After last night? After everything she’d told me? After we’d made a sort-of plan? I’d intended to expand on that plan today. Including the part about how she wasn’t going to be the one stealing the painting and I was.
And now she was gone.
I could call the police of course. But I wasn’t going to. I knew where she was staying and I knew why she was in Vegas. I just needed to figure out the best time to track her down.
But first I needed to go to my meeting with Jordan. For one thing, I wanted to go over everything again so I could figure out the best way to nab Maxwell’s painting in the midst of everything else that was going to go down. For another, I had to. Jordan would come after me—or worse, send someone after me—if I didn’t show up for that meeting. That would add the unnecessary complication of pissing Jordan off. I had to have him fully focused on Maxwell and trusting me to do my part tonight if I was going to have a chance of getting away long enough to grab the painting.
But I wasn’t worried about going to work before going after Olivia. She wasn’t leaving Vegas without that painting. She would very likely check out of the hotel and into another, thinking that would cover her tracks. But she didn’t know that I had access to all of the security cameras in the entire city.
Okay, access might be pushing it, but I had the ability to distract Chad, the guy who had access to the security cameras for the entire city, and tap into them if needed.
But I didn’t think I’d need to. Olivia was going to show up in my path again. I knew it. And we were going to clear up whatever the hell was going on.