No In Between (8 page)

David loosens his tie. “The nature of law enforcement is ‘us, them, and everyone else.’ You never know what they are really doing or thinking. The objective of the interview is to get you to say something you don’t want to say.” He rests an elbow on the table. “I’m of the opinion that the journals, and anyone mentioned in the passages, have become their primary focus.”

“That would be Mark, Ryan, and Ava,” I supply, “but Rebecca never gave names.”

“Mark did say that Grant was all over him,” Chris says. “He’s even pulled away from the club to try to protect the membership.”

“You’d think that would mean Mark and Ryan would be communicating,” I observe, “but Ryan stopped by the gallery this afternoon and said Mark won’t return his calls.”

“Ryan had better not hold his breath for a returned call,” Chris suggests. “Mark’s attorney seems to be of the opinion that Ryan is going to do whatever is necessary to make sure he’s in the clear, including throwing Mark under the bus.”

“I met Tiger at the police station today,” I remind them. “So forgive me if I don’t put a lot of merit in his opinions. He acted like Mark needed a bodyguard to protect him from me.”

“Tiger didn’t get his name for nothing,” David assures us. “He’ll rip your throat out to keep his client on top, but in this case he was probably worried you’d make it look like Mark was asking you to prep him for his interview.” He takes a swig of his beer. “And that wouldn’t be good. Which brings me to your working at the gallery. I don’t recommend it, and I seriously doubt Mark’s attorney will, either.”

“I have to help out,” I insist, straightening. “It’s falling apart. The staff is scared. And I saw Mark tonight and he said nothing about it being a problem.” I turn to Chris. “He stopped into the gallery right before I left, and he wasn’t doing well.”

“I already had this argument with Chris,” David interjects before Chris can answer. “Mark isn’t my concern. You two are. He needs to hire someone else.”

I turn to Chris to state my case, but he says, “Relax, baby. I already told David we’re helping Mark out until his mother stabilizes. No one deserves to fear for a parent’s life while fighting for their own.”

“How is she?”

“She’s barely started her battle to beat cancer. The blood infection she got after surgery almost killed her.”

“When I talked to Crystal she said she was improving, so I assume that means stable?”

“From what I gathered.”

“My position on Mark is this,” David says, sounding like he’s starting a lecture that’s going to grate on every nerve I own.

“Save it,” Chris tells him. “Move on to another subject. Didn’t you want to talk about the bail hearing?”

The curtains are opened just then, and a waiter appears with a piping hot pizza and my diet soda. When we’re alone again, I ask, “What about the bail hearing?”

David picks up a slice of pizza. “Before I answer, just know this. I don’t approve of
either
of you spending time with Mark, let alone at the gallery.” He sets his pizza on his plate.

“The bail hearing, David,” Chris urges.

“Right,” he says. “The bail hearing. There will be no witness testimony, so you can both rest easy there.”

I blink in confusion. “I didn’t know it was even an option.”

“Bail adjustment hearings allow limited testimony in the interest of public safety,” David explains. “But the DA doesn’t seem to want to complicate the situation, which I think is smart. He has four witnesses including you, Sara, who say the defendant tried to kill you. We don’t need the defense to start character assassinations now. They’ll get to that later.”

Chris fills my plate, but food is the last thing on my mind right now. “What character assassinations?”

David swipes a napkin over his mouth. “Your honesty and character will be tested. It’s expected, but I think it’s going to get nasty in this case. I have an insider at the DA’s office who tells me the defense threatened the DA.”

Chris abandons a bite of pizza halfway to his mouth. “Threatened?”

David nods and swallows nearly half a slice in one bite. “Apparently the defense said in a not-so-subtle way that the press would”—he makes quotations marks with his fingers—“‘accidentally’ get a story about a seedy sex club, murder, and some kind of other bullshit mayhem. My insider’s choice of words, not mine.”

I’m reeling at the prospect that Ava could be set free. “You think they’re so worried about the press that they’d let her walk?”

David shoves aside his pizza, which tells me we’re now in serious territory. “Easing up on Ava at the hearing won’t stop her defense from going public after the bond is in place. That’s what I came here to talk about tonight. Even if they don’t like it, the DA is prepared for Friday to become a press frenzy. My guess is Ava’s folks will throw every name and diversion into the hat they can find.”

“Meaning me and you, baby,” Chris adds. “And being at the gallery is only going to put us more in the spotlight.” He turns to me, and there’s no missing the grim set to his jaw. “We’re witnesses against Ava, and because we aren’t involved in the four-way that group had going on, we’re the most credible. They could very well attack us. You have to be ready for this to be all about headlines. The club. BDSM. Me. You.”

“Right,” David concurs. “And while I can protect you from everything in the court system, I can’t protect you from the press unless they slander you.”

My heart lurches. Suddenly the scandal seems like a much bigger worry than it did moments before. “What about Chris and his charity work? This could ruin him.”

“Baby, I’m fine. I can handle my charity.”

“You can’t be sure of that,” I argue. “Lance Armstrong created Livestrong and they had to break free of him to survive.” I turn to David. “Can we threaten them with slander charges now?”

David grimaces. “That’s not an option.”

“Why? They could ruin Chris, and—”

“Sara, sugar,” he interrupts, his tone as condescending as it gets. “The detectives were wrong.
You’re
the one who needs to lay off the caffeine. Let me do my job.”

My jaw drops. Did he really just call me “sugar,” and tell me to let him do his job? I’m officially at my threshold for arrogant assholes today. Then his phone rings again, and he answers it without so much as a raised finger.

“Sara,” Chris says, squeezing my leg to get my attention.

I tear my gaze from David and look at Chris. “His
job
should include protecting your reputation and your career.”

“Baby—”

“Don’t ‘baby’ me right after he called me sugar,” I snap. “I’m going to the bathroom to deep breathe.”

His grip tightens on my leg. “He’s just high-strung.”

“If you try to keep me here, be warned that I have a very vivid fantasy in my head right now, which involves me dumping a pitcher of beer over David’s head.”

He grins and lets go of my leg.

“I thought you’d agree.” I head toward the restroom sign, go down a narrow hallway, and lock myself in the small room, where I lean on the sink. David’s dismissing the real danger the press could do to Chris. We can’t wait until it’s already happened to come up with a plan.

I’ve barely had time to think when a knock sounds on the door. “Sara.”

I unlatch the door and Chris enters, locking the door behind him. Certain he’s here to sing David’s merits, I say, “He’s an asshole, Chris. The press cyclone is going to hit, and we have to be ready. We have to get you cleared, and you have to go to Paris and do your charity event, away from all of this. Distance yourself from this nightmare. You
have
to.”

He backs me against the counter, his hips pressed to mine, and the teasing, sweet lover of moments before is nowhere to be found. His jaw is tight, his eyes hard. “Did you really just suggest I leave you to deal with this alone?”

“Yes, but—”

“You still don’t trust me.”

“What? That’s crazy, Chris.”

“It’s accurate. In the back of your mind, you still think that if something punches my buttons like Dylan did, I’ll leave. I told you. I’m not leaving, and I’m not letting you doubt us anymore.”

“I don’t doubt us.”

“You do. But we’re going to fix that and I’ve already figured out there’s only one way to do that, aside from me melting down and you realizing that I’m here to stay. I’ve taken things slowly to protect the trust between us, but we’re ready for what comes next, and I’m going to push you and push you hard. I’m going to tear down every inhibition you own until I own them. I’m going to make you crazy wondering what will be next and even crazier when it comes. I’m going to take you to places you think you can’t go, and find out you can. And when you say ‘I do’ to me, there won’t be any doubts or any barriers left. Are you prepared for what that means?”

“Yes,” I whisper. “It’s what I’ve been asking for.”

“Then we start now.” He turns me to face the counter, shocking me by yanking my skirt up and palming my cheeks. His eyes meet mine in the mirror. “I’m going to spank you. There won’t be any foreplay or fucking after. It’s going to sting. You will not cry out. When I’m done, I’m leaving, and you will bring your pretty little backside and sit down next to me like nothing happened. And when I’m ready, I’ll fuck you. Choose now. Accept it or not.”

The idea is horrifying and sexy, and I’m wet and aching and so many things at once that I can barely breathe. “I . . . yes. Yes, I do.”

He yanks my panties off and stuffs them in his pocket. His hand comes down on my backside and it’s such a shock, I barely swallow my yelp. Already his palm is on me again. I try to count. Three. Four. Five. Oh God. Six.

He turns me to face him, his hands going to the counter, not touching me. I’m panting in pain and pleasure, my knees weak. “Pull your skirt down and come back to the table. I want you there in two minutes. If you take one second longer, I’ll bring you back in here and spank you again. Understand?”

“Yes.”

He turns and leaves the bathroom.

Eight

It hurt in a bittersweet, arousing way, and while I felt exposed and vulnerable, I’ve come to know those things arouse me in ways I never thought possible.

Rebecca’s words replay in my mind as I grab the sink to steady myself, the ache in my backside radiating down my wobbly legs. I’m warm all over, wet between my thighs, and so aroused that Chris’s absence hurts far more than his hand. Until now, I had never understood what drew Rebecca to this kind of encounter. It’s like I am spinning terrifyingly out of control, and yet somehow it’s delicious in a forbidden, fantastic kind of way. Chris is pushing me. I want to be pushed.

His warning plays in my mind.
I want you there in two minutes. If you take one second longer, I’ll spank you again
. While the spanking isn’t such a horrible threat, my bottom is still ripe from Chris’s palm, leaving other parts of my body eager for the rewards of meeting his demands.

I yank open the door and rush down the hallway, stopping at the curtain, where I have a moment of apprehension and not because of what’s happened with Chris. Because I’d left here angry with David, who is too observant for my own good right now. Silently I lecture myself about being cool and unreadable, like that will suddenly change how transparent I am. Chris ends my fretting by dragging the curtain back and I am instantly captured in the smoldering embers burning in the depths of his hot stare. He studies me for a moment, satisfaction slowly lighting his eyes, and I can feel the heat of my cheeks that matches the burn of my body. He knows I liked what he did.
He liked
what he did. And he really likes that I followed his orders.

He reaches for my hand, pulling me into the booth, his touch downright scorching. “You’re late,” he reprimands softly, and this time I am happy to discover that David is, once again, on the phone.

“I was standing right here,” I point out as he reaches around me and shuts the curtain, then settles back in his seat, his body angled intimately toward mine.

“Good try, baby,” he says, pinning me in a sizzling stare. “But I know you know that isn’t going to work.” His lips hint at a curve and if a tiny part of me worried that a spanking in a bathroom would make me feel awkward with Chris, it hasn’t. In fact, as he brushes my hair behind my ear, his fingers linger on my skin and he says, “But I promise to kiss it and make it better,” there is a warm sense of expanding intimacy between us. As if we’ve climbed a wall and we’re finally standing on top.

“Get back to me,” David says loudly, ending his call.

Chris’s gaze lingers on mine a moment, and with evident reluctance that pleases me, he leans back against the cushion to face David, who is staring at us. And staring at us. Seconds tick by and my fingers curl into my palms with the sudden fear he somehow knows about my burning backside.

“I was a dickhead, Sara,” David blurts out, reminding me of what Chris had successfully made me forget. He’s right. He is. But thankfully he’s a dickhead who doesn’t seem to know my panties are in Chris’s pocket.

“Because you say you were a dickhead or because Chris says you were?” I challenge.

“Both,” he replies.

I give him a nod. “Then it’s unanimous.”

“Yeah well, I’m sorry, but that doesn’t mean it won’t happen again. I get passionate about what I do.” He grabs his briefcase. “And right now, I’m going to go do my job and compare case notes with Tiger. I can promise you he won’t be ripping this dickhead’s throat out.”

“You’re meeting with Mark’s attorney?”

“That’s right, sugar.” He winks and holds his hands up. “Don’t throw anything at me. I’m joking. No more sugar. I’ll stick to cutie or doll face in the future.” He glances at Chris. “I’ll call you in the morning with an update.”

“Call me tonight,” Chris says.

“It’ll be late,” David warns.

“That’s fine.” Chris motions to the table. “I got the food tonight.”

David grins. “Like I’d have it any other way.” He moves to the curtain and gives me another keen, unwelcome inspection. “You haven’t said much. That makes me nervous.”

“That’s the caffeine,” I counter.

He snorts out laughter and glances at Chris. “Witty, isn’t she?”

“Too much for her own good sometimes.” David grunts for no apparent reason and then disappears through the curtain.

Chris tosses money onto the table. “Let’s go, too.”

• • •

Chris and I chat with Marco as we collect our jackets, and the way Chris finds every opportunity to touch me makes me smile in ways that reach beyond the laughter his and Marco’s easy rapport sparks in me. When we finally step out into the chilly evening air, it’s hand in hand, an erotic charge in the connection of our skin, even in the air we breathe. But he doesn’t speak and he’s stopped looking at me and I know why. This is part of the anticipation of what comes next. He’s promised punishment. He
will
punish me. And just as he’d predicted, I crave the answer to what comes next. And while I normally welcome the sight of Jacob in our lobby, tonight I’m pleased to find his replacement is satisfied with a lift of our hands in greeting.

Once we’re in the elevator, Chris surprises me by letting go of me, punching in our floor, and then leaning on the wall. I take his lead and lean on the opposite wall. “You were late,” he reminds me. “You know what that means.”

“Yes. You told me.”

“What did I say?”

“That you’re going to punish me.”

“How?”

“Spank me again.”

“Yes,” he agrees. “I am.” But there is something about the way he says it that tells me this is not going to be “just” a spanking, if there is such a thing. It’s going to be more. It’s going to push my limits.

The doors slide open to reveal our apartment and Chris punches the button to hold it open, but his eyes stay on me. “Go into the living room and undress, and then sit on the couch.”

My lips part at the surprising command. “You want me to—”

“Yes,” he says, his tone firm. “I do.”

“And so I will,” I say. “And you know why?” I move across the elevator and slip my hands under his jacket to rest on the hard wall of his chest. “Because it’s not a lack of trust that I have in you, and that you think you see in me, Chris. It’s
your
lack of trust in you that scares me.” I start to pull away, but his fingers twine in my hair and he kisses me, deeply, possessively, so damn thoroughly that I’m reeling when it’s over.

“Go undress,” he orders, saying nothing in reply to my confession, and making none of his own.

I want to push him for something in reply, anything really, but the elevator isn’t the place. I zip out of the doorway and all but run through the foyer and down the stairs. I begin undressing, the moonlight and stars filtering through the floor-to-ceiling windows, casting the room and me in a soft glow. Stealing a sideways look, hoping to catch a glimpse of Chris, I do not see him, but music begins to play and I recognize the song as “Madness” by Muse. Aware that Chris makes every choice with a purpose, I listen to the words.

I, I can’t get these memories out of my mind.

And some kind of madness has started to evolve.

Mmmm. And I, I tried so hard to let you go.

Swallowing hard, I know he’s connecting the meaning of this song to the war he wages daily against his inner demons, and to his fight to protect me from the person he believes they make him.

More of the words repeat into my mind. And
Now I need to know is this real love, or
is it just madness keeping us afloat.
He’s telling me he’s afraid I won’t love him if I fully know him. It’s always there between us. He’s fighting it now for me, and for us, and it matters. It matters so very much.

I finish undressing, and then claim a spot in the center of the brown leather couch. Before me is a sea of stars dotting the black canvas of the sky, and I am reminded of the first night I’d come here, when I’d been enamored with the brilliant artist, unwilling to see him as more. We’ve come so far since then, and yet I feel as if we still have barriers to hurdle. And I want them hurdled.

There’s a tingling to my skin a moment before Chris, wearing only his low-slung jeans, appears to my right, and I feel that familiar punch of awareness. It burns and spreads, like warm honey in my blood, between my thighs. He affects me in ways I didn’t know another human being could affect another, and in this moment, in this instant where I feel beyond my body, nestled deep in my soul, I know he was right in that bathroom tonight. It terrifies me to think of how deeply him leaving again would cut me. But I also know I’ve made the decision to take that risk.

He walks to the coffee table and pulls it back several feet, giving us space for what I’m certain will be wicked torture. I see it in his eyes as he steps closer and does a sweeping, seductive inspection of my naked body; my gaze lands on the rectangular box he’s holding. He goes down on one knee in front of me and he sets the box on my legs. And while I know our games, and I know not to touch it as surely as I know not to touch him, I still have to curl my fingers around the leather seam of the couch to stop myself.

“Open the box,” he orders, and his eyes hold the dominance I’d seen in that bathroom mirror before he’d spanked me. But there’s a hint of something more, something that reminds me of the vulnerability I’d seen in him last night. He’s opened himself for me to see this, and it’s this willingness to give himself to me that spreads hope over my fears.

I reach for the box and my hand trembles with the rush of adrenaline and anticipation pumping through my body. He seems to understand, taking the lid from me and setting it aside. And then I just sit there, staring down at the pink, fluffy paddle inside.

“It seemed much less intimidating on the AdamEve.com website,” I comment.

His fingers slide under my chin, lifting my gaze to his, and I feel that tiny little touch in every part of me. I want him. I want him badly. “You can always say ‘no.’”

“No. I mean yes. I mean—”

He leans in and kisses me, and there’s a soft brush of his lips over mine, a sensual lick of his tongue before his mouth is gone and I am captured in the gentle command of his stare. “Pick it up and hold it. Get used to how it feels.”

I inhale and breathe out as I flatten my hand on the paddle, letting the fur tickle my palm. He reaches down and closes my hand around it, moving the box to set the paddle back on top of my legs. “It’s a different feeling than my hand.”

“Harder?”

“Different. Not harder. Lean back and hold your weight on your hands.”

Obeying him has become automatic and I do as he’s ordered, the position thrusting my breasts into the air. Chris’s gaze rakes over me, a hot sensual stroke I feel everywhere and yet nowhere. He does not touch me. It’s the fur paddle that contacts my skin, brushing over my legs, my arms, my belly, and finally, my sensitive nipples. He takes his time, missing nothing, returning to this place or that place. Warmth tingles through me, the tension in my muscles easing. More of that slick honey slides through me to settle heavily between my thighs.

But just when I forget that this is the prelude to what is defined as “punishment,” Chris lets the paddle fall away from me and he claims the cushion beside me. “Sit up on your knees and face my lap.”

I see where this is headed with a hard smack of realization. He wants me across his lap in the most vulnerable of ways. “Chris, I—”

“No thinking. Just do it.”

His tone is hard, sharp, even, and it’s as if he removes my options. I don’t know how or why it works for me, but it does, and I listen. I turn so that my knees rest against his jean-clad thigh, the muscle flexing beneath my palm where my hand rests on his leg.

He leans in and frames my face, drawing my gaze to his. “Have I ever hurt you?”

“No. No, of course not.”

“I’m not going to start now.” He runs his thumb over my lips, inching closer to rest his cheek against mine, his warm breath teasing my ear. “This position lets me hit certain spots that will please you.”

“And you know this because you—”

“Have experience,” he supplies, easing back to look at me.

“So you’ve done this to other women.” I know his past, and I try not to think about how I compare for fear it will drive me, and him, insane.

“I’m no Boy Scout, baby,” he reminds me. “You know that, but it’s different with you.
Everything
is different with you.”

It’s exactly what I need to hear and what, even in my most insecure moments, he’s made me feel. My hesitation evaporates, and with a deep breath, I lean into his lap, but Chris laces his fingers in my hair and drags my mouth to his. “You don’t have to do this.”

“I was just nervous. That’s all.”

“You’re sure?”

“Absolutely.”

He isn’t convinced, his eyes narrowing, probing. “I see fear in your eyes, Sara. I don’t like it.”

My fingers curl on his jaw. “Fear of being too vulnerable and needing you too much.”

“And my fear? It’s of
you
not needing
me enough
.”

His mouth lowers to mine, and I whisper, “Too late,” a moment before his tongue licks into my mouth with a long, drugging sweep that leaves me breathless, before he releases me, and I don’t hesitate to answer the question I see in his eyes.