Naughty Bits Part IV: The Highest Bid (13 page)

The blond stilled, glancing up at Tyler. Then he shifted his gaze right to her.

In those few milliseconds, Dana turned over thoughts of whether to meet his eyes, not meet his eyes. Smile, not smile.
Oh, crap
. This was what she always did. Worried about what she should or shouldn’t do, when all she wanted was to be completely swept away, where no choices were hers, except the one where she needed to say good night at the end of the incredible experience and head back to her real life. Even if she found her fucking romance novel, she had no delusions that it could be more than a one-night-only engagement.

This guy was perfect, because he had nothing in common with her—white, wealthy, likely an officer—but there was that irresistible vibe coming off of him. Drawing her like a bug to a zapper, which meant she might get disastrously burned. She wasn’t complaining—
I promise, Grams
—but nothing in her life had been a fairy tale. Was it too much to ask for one solitary night that
was
like one?

She got her answer when his eyes locked with hers. While she knew she was standing by the bar, people moving past her, music vibrating the floor beneath her feet, dim light strobing, it all disappeared. She’d had that spark of sexual connection with Masters before. It was always thrilling, a toe-curling, delicious shot of anticipation. But this . . . Her breath went short, and she suddenly wanted nothing more than to be near him. It was scary as hell. And yet she stood stock-still, like some dumbass golden-haired princess, waiting to see if the prince would take command, bring her out of stasis into full, vibrant life.

“There’s someone worth your attention at your two o’clock.”

When Tyler Winterman, part-owner of The Zone, put his hand on Peter’s shoulder, bent, and murmured that statement into his ear, Peter blinked. There’d been plenty of available women hovering since they arrived, and of course Ben had hinted they had someone special lined up for him. While Peter was down with that, he knew Tyler wouldn’t draw his attention to just anyone. So he looked. And the second glass of Macallan he’d been lifting to his lips stopped halfway there.

Holy shit.

For a second, he thought he was looking at Ben’s special arrangement, but because Ben knew Peter’s tastes, he wouldn’t have arranged for this girl. Not unless he’d reached ass deep inside of Peter and pulled out some unconscious dream he hadn’t realized he had. All the attributes that Peter usually sought weren’t obvious in this one. In fact, she wasn’t
anything
like the women who usually attracted his attention. Yet here he was, unable to look away.

She was a black woman, for one thing. While the beauty of dark skin had teased his gaze before, he’d never felt pulled toward it as he did now. He had the taste of toffee on his tongue, making it easy to imagine her skin tasting like a complementary caramel, or a swirling chocolate. Or perhaps something spicy, exotic.

He liked his women tall and well endowed, with tits that he could fuck with his cock, lubricated with his pre-come. Or watch the curves move with generous abandon while he fucked her from behind, in front of a wide, well-lit mirror. This woman was petite, with an athlete’s lean, hard muscle. The elegant slimness of her bearing made him wonder if there was Ethiopian in her background. She had a proud slope to her high forehead, the suggestion of sculpted cheekbones and a precise chin, though the rest was hidden beneath a mask. When light strobed over her face, he saw the mask was deep purple and green with dangles of amethyst and emerald beads framing the delicate jaw.

A simple, short sheath covered her body, the black fabric translucent, fluttering as she breathed. Despite the fabric and dim light, he could tell her breasts were a small but pretty set, the curves likely a good fit for his hands. She wore a jeweled harness that included nipple clamps, such that he could imagine those stimulated peaks pressing into his palms. A chain ran between the clamps, down to a navel glittering with a temporary catch bead that hooked another delicate chain low on her hips, traveling around to the back. The scrap of dark thong made her look almost naked until he took a closer look, and lingered in that tempting shadowy area.

When he eventually raised his gaze, he took it to her neck. All available subs wore a collar of some form, with an attached ring so that a Master might leash and claim them for the night, if both parties were willing. Hers was a high-neck ring collar, triple stacked, with a single steel diamond-shaped loop on it for the attachment.

As she waited, obviously knowing she was being evaluated, her eyes glittered behind the mask. Her lips parted. Slowly, she pivoted on one high heel. The five-inch stilettos made him bare his teeth in a feral smile at her clever attempt to add to her height. As she turned to face the wall, light shimmered across skin dusted with glitter powder. The sheath had an open back, draping down so he saw the delicate waist chain dropped a single teardrop pearl in the tender dimple of her tight, round ass. But it was what was tattooed across the small of her back, as precisely curved and sweet as a porcelain teapot, that got him to his feet. “Guys, I really appreciate the girl you got me, but there’s been a change of plans.”

As he moved across the room, he couldn’t take his eyes from it. The boldness of the tat was too masculine for her feminine frame, but it showed well against her copper skin in the club’s dim light. A twisted American flag, held in an eagle’s talons, with a script beneath it.

Your freedom, my life.
Armed services ink. When he reached her, he stepped in close. He could say it was because the music was loud, but he wanted to be damn sure that signal was for him. Keeping her cheek pressed to the wall, she left her lashes lowered in that shy invitation. As he moved in, she shifted her legs apart. Offering to be evaluated further. Peter suppressed a growl.

She had short, close-cropped hair, and that high ring collar went from the base of her neck to the point of her skull. It limited her head’s mobility, requiring an upright posture and dependence on a Master’s direction. That, and the automatic spread of her toned, lean legs, which tilted up her delectable backside, confirmed she was an extreme player, firing his blood further.

Peter knew a woman gave up a piece of her soul every time she gave her body. Usually he let them decide how much of a piece to give, because his desires ran toward the more hard-core, the ones who had it deeper in their nature than just adding kink to their lives. But getting into the mind of a full-natured sub meant tapping into more-than-inside-the-club-walls fantasies. So he usually settled for a club-only sub, had a good time fantasizing about the possibility of more, and then went on his way.

Until this moment. For some reason, this slim creature made him think of what really fired his blood—a woman that was all his, for always. A woman whose submissive nature was a match for his Dominant one.

Drawing a steadying breath, he touched her nape, drifted down her spine toward that marking that had called to him, though he noted she had a couple other tattoos as well, shadowed by the sheath. Trembling under his touch, she made a quiet noise. He leaned in, pressing his thigh against her ass, the sensitive crease, the hint of his knee finding treasure between her parted thighs. Her breath caught.

With that closely shorn hair, he could see the shape of her ears. Delicate and perfect, like the rest of her. “So what’s your rank, sweetheart?”

“Sergeant.”

He’d meant it as a jest, assuming the tattoo to be a leftover from an ex-boyfriend. At least he hoped so, because he didn’t mess with a woman who was still attached. But as he glanced over her again, he registered that the body he was looking at wasn’t aerobically fit. It was combat fit. “Well, seeing as I’m a captain, I outrank you.”

A smile teased her soft, full mouth, so moist from a burgundy lip gloss it made him think of an entirely different set of lips. “Yes, sir,” she murmured.

Unable to resist and wanting to test, he didn’t ask. He slid a hand between her spread legs. Soaking wet against the panel of those nearly nonexistent thong panties. She let out a harsh gasp, and his eyes sharpened. “Not used to a man just taking you over, are you, sweetheart? But that’s what you crave.”

She closed her eyes, biting her lip. Nodded, and his blood went to full boil.

“I want you tonight.” He usually had more finesse, but he made it a rough demand, no question, request or games. The urgency that gripped him now had nothing to do with the limits of time. “I want the collar and jewels off. They’re not mine.”

When she removed them, taking in a breath at the tug to the nipple clamps, she laid them on the bar for an efficient Maria to tag and place beneath it. Then she lifted her chin. Peter slid his fingers over the fragile network of arteries pumping at an accelerated rate and tightened slightly, creating a collar of flesh and bone. Her pulse elevated. “Good. Look at me.”

She did, and he was caught by that gaze, a pale green like summer grass, quiet lagoons and women’s springtime lawn dresses. Overwhelmed by dark, hungry pupils.

“Give me your hands.” He took out the short tether he’d been given as a guest Dom at the club and unwound it.

She held them out, but as he looped the tether around her wrists, the slim fingers found him under his untucked shirt, hooked in the waistband of his jeans, knuckles brushing his abdomen intimately. His lips twisted. “Interpreted that order in your own way, didn’t you? That’ll earn you some disciplinary action.”

When her eyes sparked, he knotted the tether to bind her to him. She kept her fingers where they were, and his aching cock was already chafing, straining toward that touch. Maybe she felt his heat, but her rising desire was as palpable as his own. He wasn’t going to take her back by his table, but straight to a room where he could see how much of a fight she liked. If her need to make a man work to be her Master matched his desire to prove he could acquire that target, it was going to be a hell of an experience.

“Is this a first time for you, sweetheart?”

Her voice was throaty, velvet sin. “I sure hope so.”

Keep reading for another preview of a sexy e-novella from Joey W. Hill

CONTROLLED RESPONSE

Available now from Heat

Forty-five miles. God, the only thing better than this was sex. Sex done exceptionally well. As Lucas crested the hill, pushing the burn in his legs, he snagged his water bottle to take a measured draught. Releasing the bike handlebars to coast hands-free, he shifted his hips to negotiate the inevitable curve. No such thing as a straight line or a flat expanse this deep in the Berkshires. Every downward slope followed by a challenging upward one. Like the curves of a woman’s body. Or her mind.

Ben had given him shit about hopping a charter here for the weekend when they were still figuring out how to make the numbers work for the Mancuso plant operation. But it was all bullshit, because Ben knew Lucas did his best problem solving while cycling, just as the legal advisor did it by finding the prettiest ass available and immersing himself in it. When they came back to the office Monday, Ben would fix the legal snarls, and Lucas would crunch the numbers into manageable pieces. Hell, Matt should save the money on their corner offices. Though Lucas had to admit he liked his Baton Rouge city view, with the backdrop of the Mississippi River.

It was time for a lunch break and a stretch, if he could find the spot his buddy Marcus had told him was right off the road around here. He was pretty deep in the Berkshire farm area, but tourists did have a way of finding the hot spots. Still, Marcus had stressed “hidden,” even giving him GPS coordinates for the exact location, give or take ten feet.

There it was. As he rolled across the shoulder, he saw the narrow deer trail. A couple broken twigs and some spoor suggested the brown-eyed creatures had passed through recently.

It was a short hike, so it worked as a good cool-down. The light racing bike was easy to carry, even with his gear. Marcus had said the glade would have a stream, soft grass for a nap, and a frame of trees for the sky that would make Lucas think he’d fallen into a nest made by Heaven itself. Marcus was a gallery owner, brushing shoulders with New York art types, so such metaphors were to be expected. Or maybe the description had come from Thomas, his spouse, or life partner, whatever they called it. It sounded like a good place and Lucas wouldn’t dwell on what they might have done there. To each his own, but his preference definitely ran to heart-shaped asses of a different gender. Skin like cream, and tender pink lips hidden like treasure between not-too-firm, not-too-soft thighs. Just like Goldilocks, he knew when they were just right.

Lately, it had been just okay. Some lovely ladies, intelligent, beautiful, and willing. Business associates on the same time schedules, which discouraged anything deeper on either side but ensured dinner dates and sexual release were no farther than a cell phone call. He was CFO for Kensington & Associates, after all, so he didn’t have trouble with that.

But maybe it was watching Matt, the head of K&A, with his new wife, Savannah, during the past year. The way they’d taken the leap of faith together, and their love just seemed to grow and grow. Not like a molasses flood, drowning everyone in reach in gooeyness. More like the quiet reassurance of the ocean’s murmur. Timeless, clean, overwhelming. Proof that there was a greater purpose here. Maybe Lucas was ready for something deeper himself. Maybe that was why he was cycling and Ben was hip deep in pussy by now.

As he stepped into the clearing, anticipating the tranquility, he came to a dead stop, his thoughts scattering like a game of 52-card pickup.

Marcus hadn’t mentioned the spot came with a half-naked girl on a motorcycle.

Either that, or Lucas had been run over by a minivan and didn’t realize he was dead, stumbling into everything Heaven should be. If so, he was profoundly thankful to the minivan driver.

He blinked. Yes, it was definitely a woman, stretched out on the curved seat of a Night Rod series Harley. At one time, she’d apparently been wearing black jeans with riding chaps over them, for they were in a crumpled pile next to the bike, leaving her lower body clad only in a pair of silky ivory panties. Her feet were braced on the handlebars, legs spread, ass snugged down in the driver’s seat while her upper body was arched over the hump to the passenger seat. The toned legs and generous ass were taut, for her fingers were tucked into the panties. Thanks to the blessing of filmy material, he could see their individual movements.

She was wearing a corset. Ivory colored as well, with one strap falling off her shoulder and elevating her breasts so they were accentuated by the slightest breath. Just a touch of lace at the low décolletage that tempted full exposure from the crescent stretch of her torso. The corset hooked in front, so would lie flat under the heavy white T-shirt she’d been wearing, also lying in the grass.

Tiny earphones for a music player were tucked into ears as delicate as porcelain, half-hidden by her hair, skeins of white gold long enough to fall over the top of the rear tire. A few strands were scattered across her face by the breeze, teasing wet, parted lips. Her bare feet flexed against the chrome bars as she apparently hit a good spot, biting her lip. Since her eyes were closed, golden lashes fanning her cheeks, he imagined she was deep in some fantasy, picturing her fingers as someone else’s.

Or perhaps she was thinking about someone watching her, getting hungrier for a taste of the pussy she’d teased into a wetness that had soaked the crotch panel. Someone who wanted to slide his hands under her, grip that delectable ass, and tongue her first through the saturated silk. Bite her clit through her panties. Women loved that, the buffer to stimulation that provided friction, helped warm them up, so that when he finally pulled the cloth out of the way and tasted creamed flesh, they would be writhing, begging.

God, he loved eating pussy. Second best thing to fucking it.

A gentleman—not to mention a smart man—would have backed away. But he couldn’t make his feet move. This was undeniably a gift from God, and he was a devout Methodist. Okay, at least when he went home to Iowa during Christmas and attended church with his parents. Regardless, there was a higher power, a higher order. Hadn’t he just been thinking that? Maybe this was an answer.

Yes, Lucas. In your search for a deeper relationship, God has sent you to a private photo shoot from Penthouse.

Hey, crazier things had happened. Like his spontaneous decision now to become part of her fantasy. As he moved forward, he hoped she wasn’t armed.

***

Oh, she’d so needed this. Cassandra didn’t like being away from home, but she’d had to come to Hartford to close this deal. Two days of managing the negotiation had been bad enough, but she’d had to deal long-distance with crisis after crisis at home, from the minor issues that came up with her younger siblings to a frantic call from the nanny saying her black-sheep brother had gotten as close as the security gate. Fortunately, the guard had sent him on his way. Everything was okay there, and she’d been waiting to fly home to Baton Rouge in time to listen to her baby brother Nate sing her a new song he’d learned. That had been before the general manager had put in a frantic call telling her the deal she’d just finalized had unraveled. Knitting it back together had involved a trip back to the Hartford office and some corporate diplomacy, along with a little tactical bullying of the key players for having almost dumped a sixty-million-dollar contract over some childish perceived insult.

That detour had kept her in the area an extra day, so when she’d passed the motorcycle dealership and saw that they did day rentals for enjoying the Berkshire scenery, she’d thought, why the hell not? She’d chosen the Night Rod and headed out with a map.

Finding this glade had been an extraordinary accident. Pulled over to take a break, she’d seen a pair of deer slipping into the forest. She’d brought a camera, wanting to take some pictures for the kids, so when she’d followed their path, heard the inviting rush of water, she found a stream with a small waterfall, a spot too far off the beaten path for anyone to find. Perfect. Even though she was far from home, the idea of being far from anyone, out of the eye of the world completely, was exactly what she needed.

It seemed sometimes that all she dealt with were children. She much preferred her siblings to those well into supposed adulthood. Was every man in the world looking for Mommy? Did any of them know how to use their brains
and
take charge, hold the reins comfortably? She’d met precious few like that.

As she’d sat in the grass, leaning against the comforting bulk of the bike, she’d closed her eyes, imagined that hard bulk as such a man. Lying back between his legs, the two of them enjoying the quiet beauty of the setting. His hands would slide up to cup her breasts, tease the nipples with relentless skill as he pushed her hair aside to kiss her throat, holding her fast as her legs moved restlessly in the grass, needing his touch between them, something he held just out of reach to drive her need higher.

In a house of five kids, with her responsibilities as their guardian, there was little privacy, even to do this. Often she felt like a bottle of soda, shaken to the point of near explosion. Jesus, she’d even resorted to adolescent metaphors for her sexual frustration.

She wanted to stretch her body out on the seat of the muscle bike, strip down to nothing but panties and corset, and make herself come, imagining herself as the pinup of some virile god’s fantasy, watched by him through the trees. She’d know he was there, so her movements would be provocative, blatantly carnal, until he couldn’t resist any longer and came to her. He’d turn her over the back of the bike, bind her wrists to the pedals, spread her legs wide over the rear tire, the sun’s heat on the chrome burning her flesh, and oh, God, she’d be dripping for his cock. But instead he’d kneel first, go to work on her with his mouth, until she was screaming, begging . . .

She’d put on her ear phones so she wouldn’t worry about every rustle of woodland creature, the snapping of twigs. No one was out here, and she didn’t want to care anyway. Truth to tell, it wasn’t a bad fantasy, imagining someone stumbling upon her. Someone whose name she didn’t need to know, who wouldn’t let her negotiate or get away with anything. Who would see through every ploy and sweep her choices away.

“Please, let me . . .” She knew she’d spoken it aloud, a whisper, though she couldn’t hear it over the hard bass line. When her eyes opened on a brief flicker to let in sunlight, they stayed open. Widened.

Apparently, some perverse nature god had answered her silent plea.

***

He was outlined by the mid afternoon sun, but the shadowing only enhanced everything she wanted to see. Tall, which she liked, because she was five-eight. Golden blond hair pushed back, highlighted with darkened streaks from sweat. He was shirtless, the muscles glistening as if oiled. She’d seen bodies with swollen and bunched muscle, but he was as compact as a spring. Flat pectorals, one or two faint veins following the curves of his biceps. The small silver medallion he wore, perhaps a religious symbol, fell in the ridged vee that divided the pecs and coaxed the press of her thumbs. There was nothing wasted on him. While the arms were muscular, she could see the architecture of his collarbone and rib cage, the frame it provided for the tight stomach that wasn’t a six-pack, just a slab of smooth muscle, with an indentation of navel that looked as firm. Tanned, he wore nothing but a pair of tight bike shorts and biking cleats, showing off a pair of calves and thighs also roped with taut muscle.

He was a young god by anyone’s standards, but the shorts and shoes said he was definitely of her species. A man who’d interrupted something embarrassingly personal.

She wasn’t the type to jump up shrieking over it. Kind of beside the point now, anyway. She
was
the type to tell someone to fuck off and let her get on with it, and watch him run in terror. But unlike some of the infantile examples of manhood she’d been dealing with the past couple days, he didn’t strike her as the bolting kind. It interested her, made her blood ratchet up a few degrees, her body obviously enjoying the view as she weighed what to do next. Or maybe she’d just see what
he
did next.

While she waited, her gaze lifted to his mouth. The lean, athletic face which matched the body confirmed he didn’t play—he competed. He had the long, sloping jawline she imagined an Egyptian prince might have. Lips with a touch of sensual fullness to them, and a short hairstyle, just the points of the strands scattered over his high forehead. A tapering to short sideburns. He had a hairstylist who knew his or her business, which said money, but the body was a hundred percent from the sweat of his brow. She liked the way the silver medallion lay on his bare skin. She wanted to taste the metal chain and the sweat of it beneath, the salt of him.

As he noted her regard, he casually dropped to a squat, his forearms propped on his spread thighs, fingers grazing the earth. Maybe because he could see her earplugs, he didn’t speak, but it intensified the moment, encouraging her to continue.

She had a Beretta in the backpack and knew how to use it. She’d also had self-defense courses, enough to know isolating herself was stupid, since the first line of self-defense for a smart woman was not to put herself in dangerous situations. But she doubted many psycho serial rapists went out on their bicycles in the rural Berkshires, seeking chance encounters with lone women.

His attention was on her lips now, her throat, sweeping down over the corset, a question in his eyes, for of course it wasn’t most women’s choice of practical underwear. But then he moved his gaze back to her hand. Though she’d frozen at his appearance, she still held two fingers inside the panties, lying on her quivering clit, the other two fingers on the outside, her thumb in the crease of her thigh.

Keep going.
He mouthed it, she was sure. From the look in his steady gray eyes, it wasn’t a request.

She stared at him.
Breathe slow. Even. Hold it steady.
The corset required that. Even an orgasm could get too out of hand, and she had a feeling it was about to, for as his lips formed the words, her clit shuddered under the bare friction of her still fingers.