Pretty in Kink (22 page)

Each word tore down her defenses and rang as truth. The
bliss of release hovered nearby for the taking. But she needed to hear it one
more time, to make sure she truly believed him.

“So you
really
didn’t submit them to the magazine? Or
copy them?”

“I already told you this how many times? No. To both. I took
them back to the store within minutes of bringing them home.”

She dragged her nipples over his, making desire snake down
and coil in her womb. All it would take is one more up-and-down movement, one
more stroke and the delicious ache would spring out and burst through her
system.

Just a little bit longer, Britt. Seal your trust for good
before you take him and yourself over the edge of insanity.

“You could have copied them and sent them in to the magazine
later…”

“I could have.” He drew back and drilled his gaze into hers.
His nostrils flared. “But I wanted you to myself. In the flesh, not just to
drool over in pictures. I didn’t copy them or enter them in the contest, damn
it.”

She held on to that last sentence with desperate hope. His
next words preserved his fate.

“I would never do that to you, Britt. Never. The last thing
I want is for millions of people to see what’s mine. It was only for me. You’ll
never truly be anyone else’s baby but mine.”

“Oh Diego,” she whispered, kissing him. “I think that’s the
single most romantic thing you’ve ever said to me.” She’d pushed the temptation
beyond their boundaries, started to move on him, to stroke them both off.

But he stiffened. “I have to get my arms around you. Let me
loose. Now.”

She paused, realizing she’d reached her limit on being a
Domme. Britt wanted him in control now. She wanted to be ravished by him.

Grinning, she asked, “Okay, what’s the safe word then?”

He jerked against the chair. His teeth gnashed together.
“Britt, I said let me loose.”

She tapped her fingers on his shoulders and hummed, “Safe
word…”

“Goddamn it, pink. Did you hear me?” he demanded when she
started to giggle. “I said pink.”

“All right, all right. Technically that’s my safe word, but
we’ll let it slide, think of one for you later.” Britt planted her feet on the
floor and slowly unsheathed him. They let out a groan in unison and she glanced
down to see his cock coated white by her juices. It made her wild with lust and
she couldn’t wait to release him, to see what he’d do with her once he’d been
freed.

She located the cuff key and moved behind him. First she
unlatched one, then the other. The cuffs jangled against the metal chair and
tumbled to the carpeting. Within a split second, he jolted from the seat and
had her captive in his strong arms.

“I think you deserve a spanking for that, you naughty little
girl, but it’ll have to wait until another time.”

He filled her up before her back hit the mattress. Air
hitched in her lungs, trapped by shock and sudden bliss. Her fingernails clawed
at his back. She hooked her ankles together along the small of his back, mad to
draw him in deeper still. If she thought the instant shock of his wild response
had taken her breath from her, she hadn’t expected his thorough kiss. He
devoured her, punishing her for her cunningness and deceit. His tongue plunged
inside her mouth even as he drove his cock time and time again into her sopping
pussy. Diego gripped her ass cheeks, pulling her cunt hole open so he could
pound her with relentless speed. His hips pistoned between her legs, his balls
slapped her anus. The violent passion raged through him, through her.

“Diego,” she whispered. “Oh god, Diego.”

Emotions roiled through her system, tearing at her heart and
soul. She arched up, accepting his domination, rejoicing in it.

“Babe…ahh, my pretty, kinky baby.” His perspiring body
stiffened. She felt it too, the rapture of climax storming closer, seizing them
both with relentless power.

One hand came up and fisted in the hair at the nape of her
neck. He clutched her, burying his face in her tangled locks as he groaned out
his release. Just when his explosion detonated and his hot cum spilled inside
her, bliss burst through her blood. Centered at her pussy, it rippled out in
upsurges of pleasure. The orgasm went on and on, washing through her, reaching
her fingers and toes, and starting all over again from her center.

He clutched at her with desperation, his arms so tight it
nearly punctured her lungs. “Don’t ever leave me, please don’t ever leave me.”
He pressed his hips against her while the last tremors of her pussy massaged
his shaft.

The impassioned words and his tone made her world stop
spinning. They tugged at her heartstrings and sent a wave of joy through her
soul. Still, she didn’t quite know what to say, except, “I won’t, I promise I
won’t.”

But the question? Would
he
tire of
her
once he
finished reenacting all those poses and getting her out of his system? The
thought of it darkened her elation. As if to underscore her apprehension, Diego
withdrew and turned onto his side. With his back to her, she tried to fling
some odd sense of foreboding from her mind. Sated yet empty inside, she flipped
the blanket over their naked bodies and snuggled against him. She lay there for
a long time listening to his exhausted slumber, knowing she was a fool.

The following morning after they’d gone to Diego’s for breakfast,
Britt hugged her coffee mug and strolled to the open slider in the dining room.
An arid breeze laced with the sharp aroma of sea and newly mown grass ruffled
the curtains as she stared out at the aqua waters of a bright, clear morning.
White-tipped waves lapped the beach. Fronds on the palm trees clacked in the
wind while seagulls squawked and tottered across the sand in a race with the
surf. Sailboats dotted the horizon, Jet Skis hummed and zipped through choppy
waters and a man and woman jogged together up the beach.

She stepped through the door and slid into a chair at the
patio table. The drone of the approaching mower drowned out the pounding of the
surf below. She sipped, eyeing Diego over the rim of her cup as he took one
last pass on the riding mower, smoothing that sloping green carpet, putting the
final touch on the grid pattern he’d created. He wore nothing but jeans. His
torso glistened with sweat and his muscles flexed as he steered. He’d tamed his
hair with a red bandana tied around his head. His strong-boned face seemed to
glow with exhilaration while his eyes twinkled. He looked happy, as if he’d
laid his demons to rest, which in turn gave her joy and a brand-new contented
feeling.

Even now, just watching him from afar, he could stir her sex
like no other man in her past ever had. He took her breath away and kept her in
a constant state of arousal. One look at that quiet, smoldering gaze, one sense
of that volatile energy that surrounded him, and she got lost. She’d grown to
love the reckless, hard shell surrounding the tender man inside, and wondered
why she’d never been drawn to his type before now. How Lexi and Doris couldn’t
see the man as she did puzzled Britt too. But then she’d lived it, and she
wouldn’t be giving him up for anyone or any reason.

No matter if he’d entered her pictures in a contest or not.

Mowing completed, he maneuvered around and guided the
machine toward the garage. Britt scanned the yard one last time and closed her
eyes to soak in the rays. The warmth permeated her clothing, making her long to
head out on his boat and sunbathe all day. But she had an early-afternoon
shoot, and Diego had mentioned needing to run some errands. He’d already said
his long, breathtaking goodbye to her, and it wouldn’t do either one of them
any good for her to seek him out and suggest they both play hooky today. Maybe
tomorrow, she thought with a cheery glow blooming inside her chest.

Propping her feet up, she set the cup aside and relaxed,
closing her eyes on a sigh. God, how she loved waking up to the salty scent of
the ocean, adored his sun-bathed home and its well-tended, large yard.

Britt’s eyes popped open. She blinked as a thought occurred
to her. Her sandals plopped onto the deck with a thud. “And it’s true. I do
love him.” Lexi had insisted Britt had fallen in love with Diego, and Britt had
even admitted to it. But
falling
in love and loving were two entirely
different things. One was a journey to the other.

And she had just arrived.

The realization struck her like one of those waves, at first
shocking her with its force, then soaking her in a cool, soothing bath she
couldn’t deny. Her hand fluttered to her chest. She rubbed the ache that
started there. All this time, all that kinky, unconventional sex they’d been
having, and she’d gone and fallen in love with him then allowed herself to
simply love him?

The corners of her mouth curved up. The bubbly giggle
erupted so fast it made her giddy. “I love Diego.” It felt good on her tongue,
right.

Around the corner of the house, she could hear him tinkering
in the garage. She knew he’d be heading out soon for his errands, but she
didn’t want to let him go without telling him.

Britt rose, turning in a fog and leaving the cup on the
patio table. “I-I can tell him in person,” she muttered, her stomach knotting
with nerves. She passed through the door, shut and locked it behind her. He’d
be gone soon. Maybe she should just wait until tonight. Britt paced back and
forth, wearing a path between the dining nook and the living room.

“Or maybe,” she said with a sly grin, “I should write him a
note.”

Coward.

She laughed at herself even as she slipped into his office.
She inhaled. His smell filled the space, the faint odor of motor oil melding
with the aroma of leather and smoke. Even though he’d quit smoking, she still
detected the faint scent of it. An empty beer can remained on his desk. She
picked it up, crushed it and tossed it into the trash can. Her gaze scanned the
motorcycle replicas lining the shelves, the scatter of paperwork across the desk
and the photo of the little toddler he refused to talk about.

Where was the boy? She still couldn’t bring herself to pry
it out of Diego. It hurt that he’d chosen not to confide in her or to elaborate
on his son. But he would someday. One day he’d open up to her about this
mystery child, and then she would know all of Diego.

Britt would love to meet the boy, maybe hold him and watch
Diego interact with his son. Even though Carolyn seemed to be a lunatic, Britt
wondered if maybe she had custody and refused to let Diego see his own son. If
so, that would have to change. Britt’s heart ached for Diego. She’d seen the
haunted look in his eyes when he didn’t know. She knew he thought of his son
and longed to hold him, to play pitch-and-catch with him on his back lawn as a
father should. Maybe, just maybe she could one day persuade Carolyn to let go
of that strange animosity she had toward Diego and allow him to finally see his
son.

But for now, she had a note to write. Butterflies stirred
once again in her stomach. She sat in his leather seat, loving the worn surface
against her skin, the squeak of it as she settled in, the sense that she shared
it with him. That he surrounded and embraced her. Their relationship had
progressed so far that Britt didn’t feel the slightest bit of guilt or sense of
meddling as she pulled open the top drawer to search for a pad of paper.

She smiled when she saw the Post-it note where she’d jotted
down her new cell phone number for him. With her near-naked body plastered all
over the magazine and distributed to millions of subscribers, she’d gotten over
a hundred prank calls from men spouting lewd comments about what they’d love to
do with her, to her. She knew expensive software existed that could track cell
phone accounts and the names of the owners and assumed that’s how they’d gotten
her number. She shivered at the memory of those sickening voices, men who’d
gone to such lengths to harass her.

But she’d been able to set up her new account under an alias
name, and it made her feel safe now that the number had changed and that Diego
was the only man aside from Rufus who knew it.

Besides her note, there were pencils, Sharpies, a letter
opener, several invoice stamps, a couple of boxes of staples. She moved on to
the three drawers at her right. The top one contained receipt booklets, invoice
pads, a box of his company business cards, a stapler and a few miscellaneous
sheets of scribbled-on paper.

“There has to be a pad of paper somewhere in this desk.” She
grinned and pulled open the second drawer. But her smile faded. Her heart
ceased beating. Oh yes, a pad of paper did indeed sit right on top of several
other items.

One being a very familiar item.

The corner of a snapshot peeped out. Britt swallowed, blew
out a breath. A replica of her own unique, black, strappy heels were revealed
on a foot that looked very much like her own.

Her world closed in around her, funneling into that one
drawer, that one crinkled picture. Nausea swirled around in her gut, mixing
with disbelief and heart-wrenching pain. Britt drew in a long, trembling breath
as she reached for the corner of the photo. Her hand shook. Bit by bit, she
pulled it from beneath the paper pad.

“Oh my god, please no.” Anger, panic and sadness warred with
one another in her head. Her teeth ground together as she stared at herself
tied to Lexi’s four-poster bed with a vibrator sticking up between her closed
thighs. Her gaze rose. She glanced out the window and watched as Diego pulled
on a t-shirt and rolled his bike toward the end of the driveway, prepping it
for his trip. The chrome glittered in the sun and shot rays around the man
she’d just admitted she loved.

The scheming, deceitful, lying bastard she’d thought she
loved—until now.

I would never do that to you, Britt. Never. The last
thing I want is for millions of people to see what’s mine. It was only for me.

“You liar.”

Her gaze snapped back down to the drawer. She swiped at
tears, yanked the notepad out and winged it across the room. It slammed into
the wall and hit the floor with a thud.

She remembered this one, distinctly recalled tossing it in
the fire. But yet it existed right under his roof.

Which meant he’d
copied
it.

She riffled through the drawer, searching for more of the
packet, negatives, something. And here she’d at first gone and blamed Lexi for
them surfacing in the magazine. It made her feel like a horrible friend. She’d
even considered Doris as a suspect, could have cost her her career and her
relationship with her agent. And all along it had been Diego who’d submitted them
to the magazine.

It
had
to be him. He’d promised her he hadn’t copied
them or entered them in the contest, but with this bit of evidence, how could
there be any other explanation?

Since Lexi’s confessions of losing the pictures, and Diego’s
denials, Britt had been holding out hope that maybe someone else in the photo
shop had somehow gotten a hold of them and turned them in to the contest. No,
she hadn’t wanted it to be either Lexi or Diego.

But it had been him.

“You lied to me. You promised me just last night you didn’t
copy them and you didn’t submit them to the magazine. But you really did, you
asshole. You fucked me over big-time.”

She should have known better, she fumed with self-disgust.
She should have gone with her gut instincts, but instead she’d gone with her
sexual drive. She’d seen a few prior issues of that type of magazine in the
rack next to his lounge chair in the living room. They’d even discussed her
mortification at being exposed between the cold pages of a BDSM publication.
Yet she’d continued to waver and believe him. Then not believe him. Then
believe him, then—

She growled to herself as she rummaged through the drawers
and let the humiliation eat away at her. Even when he’d reenacted several of
the poses with her, she’d been gullible and so damn seducible.

She’d even gotten to some sick place in her head where she’d
enjoyed the idea that he had seen them, and that she could control him somehow
by allowing him to reenact the poses.

You stupid fool!

He’d professed just last night that it had been nothing more
than an obsession on his part, but she knew now with every cell of her body
that he’d done way more than become infatuated with her. He’d gotten a hold of
her private pictures and had used them against her. And he’d even made tens of
thousands of dollars off her body! He’d lied to her, and all the while he’d
been seducing her into his bed and his wild lifestyle.

She heard the rumble of his bike as he fired it up.

“Oh no you don’t. You can’t get far, you bastard. You’re
going to pay.”

Britt held tight to the picture and shoved the drawer shut.
She folded the crinkled snapshot, stuffed it in her pocket and marched into the
living room. Her gaze darted around the room until she located her purse, then
she slammed the door behind her and started down the front porch steps. Too
late. He hadn’t seen her. Looking far too sexy, he took off in a flurry of
screeching tires and the roar of an engine.

“You son of a bitch. You’re
not
getting away from
me.” She sprinted to her car, digging for her keys as she ran. Squalling out of
the driveway in pursuit of “Scoundrel”, she could see him up ahead, and she
refused to let him out of her sight.

He followed the coast road for a bit, then turned inland on
a county road, skirting the northern edge of town. Diego weaved in and out of
traffic, but Britt didn’t lose sight of him. Her eyes drilled holes into the
back of that muscle-packed body. She could just picture herself wrapping her
hands around his thick neck and squeezing the life from him. She gripped the
steering wheel and stomped on the gas to keep up with him when he turned left
onto a side street. Britt almost lost him, but caught sight of him turning into
the parking lot of a church. A church? Diego?

There were a few cars parked in the lot, but not many. She
glanced to the opposite end. Was that the car she’d seen Carolyn standing by at
Diego’s house the night she’d shown up and seen them making love in the hot
tub?

Aw shit. Maybe she should leave?

Or maybe they were back together, meeting here on the sly?

She lifted her chin, breathed in and gathered her courage.
“No. Too bad if she’s here. I’m not waiting to confront him.”

He’d parked in a spot near a line of palm trees and a
walkway that disappeared around the building. She held back and idled her car
behind a copse of low palmettos on the street and waited until he dismounted
his motorcycle and followed the sidewalk.

She pulled into the lot, found a spot opposite his and
leaped from the car. Hands fisted, she darted across the lot and took the same pathway.
She slid the picture from her pocket and gripped it in her trembling hand. It
wasn’t the place, but she’d get her point across as calmly yet succinctly as
possible. She’d dangle the picture in front of his stunned face, prove to him
she’d no longer be his toy puppet. She’d storm out of here and never look back.
The fantasy of it all moved through her mind in movie frames. Her whole body
quaked with the anticipation of seeing the look on his face when she revealed
she’d found him out.