Xtreme (7 page)

He handed her a pair of stiletto heels whose uppers were little more than thin strands of leather cord knotted together. Gratefully she pulled them on, avoiding contact with the disgusting floor.

“Now get on your knees and service me.”

Chelsea looked desperately around the room. It afforded privacy, that was true, but little else in the way of comforts. Wadded tissues were stuck to the floor, along with a sticky substance whose source she didn't dare guess at.

“Please,” she whispered, despite the throbbing ache in her cunt, her desperation to touch him mounting with every passing second “Not here. Take me somewhere. Take me—”

She stopped, having been about to say “home.” But they didn't have that luxury. Neither of them had a home to go to, other than the little apartment where she'd been holed up with Smith.

“I'll take you with me as soon as you earn it,” he said. He slid his hands up the dress to where her nipples were outlined against the fabric, thumbing them with his fingertips, sending sensation radiating through her body and making her moan. “You can pleasure me in here, or you can let me show you off out there. Your choice.”

“Show me…?” she whispered. Was that all it would take? Oddly, she felt slightly disappointed: all he wanted to do was parade her through the bar wearing the dress and heels? She had thought…but no matter what she might have expected. She would do anything to avoid having to touch the floor, to avoid brushing up against the disgusting trash can and graffitied walls.

She made her decision. “Out there.”

He nodded, seemingly unsurprised. “Fine. But before we go, I have a gift for you.”

He reached into his collar and brought out a leather band. It was expertly crafted, the stitching along the edges of the butter-soft leather even and tight, the buckle sculpted of silver. But it was too large to fit her wrist and much too small to be a belt, and she looked at him questioningly.

“My property,” he murmured, betraying his own excitement in the tenor of his voice. “You'll wear my collar.”

Then, very gently, he lifted her hair away from her neck and slid the band around. It glanced teasingly against her skin, settling against her collarbones until he picked up the ends and clasped them. He slid the buckle slowly over the end of the band until it was just short of tight and fastened it. Then he turned her in his arms so she was facing the mirror.

She gasped.

Chelsea had always known that men enjoyed looking at her. It had been a painful knowledge, having its roots in the early trauma of the photo sessions with Roy. In time, she learned to use her looks to get the attention she wanted when she wanted it, but she never would have called herself beautiful.

Until now.

Her hair fanned out over her shoulders, and her eyes blazed with lust and excitement. Her lips were swollen and ripe, her skin pink with heat and need. The dress was merely a backdrop for the collar, she saw now. It clung to her body like a second skin, the neckline leaving a perfect slim crescent of skin under the collar. And now she
saw something she had missed before: a silver plate attached to the front of her collar was engraved with his monogram.

“I have never collared a woman before you,” Ricardo murmured. “I doubted that I ever would in my life. But after Boris died I…” he paused, collecting himself before he could go on. “I was forced to consider that I could lose you. I will not allow that to happen. And it has…hastened this pronouncement, Chelsea. I love you. I do not say that lightly.”

Then he kissed her—the softest brush of his lips, the faintest stroke of his tongue. She melted against him, longing to lose herself in the embrace, but he held her off.

“And now you shall show all those other men that you belong to me.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

He opened the restroom door and stepped aside, holding it open for her. He took her hand and held it as a dancer might lead his partner and she stepped through, the narrow skirt of the dress making it impossible to take any but the smallest steps.

One of the men glanced over and saw her and did a double take, nearly falling off his stool. Then he let out a wolf whistle that silenced conversation. All eyes turned to see what had caught his attention, and the bar went silent except for the raucous, tinny music coming from the ancient jukebox.

Then the song ended and the silence was total.

“Well, fuck me,” one of the old men growled. “I ain't seen pussy like that since 'Nam.”

Chelsea's hand tightened on Ricardo's arm. Surely he would punish the man for disrespecting her like that? She knew the power in his muscular arms, his large hands; she both feared for the man's safety and—in that unfamiliar, dark place inside her where the taste for vengeance lived—was excited by the prospect of seeing him thrown to the ground. Not injured—she only wanted him humiliated as she had been.

Except…

The way her body was responding was not the agony she might have expected.

Long ago, in that dank little room where Roy Huber had forced her to pose, where the flash of his camera had felt like a hammer to her soul, she'd had no protector, nowhere to turn. Each time the camera clicked she felt like a tiny piece of her was taken, as though she was slowly being worn down to nothing. Her body ceased to be her body, her “special, private places”—the term her mother had taught her before she got so sick and had to stay in bed all day with the medicine that made her eyes glaze over and stole her ability to speak—were no longer special. In fact they were no longer hers: the camera stole them from her. Occasionally Roy Huber would show her one of the pictures he took, and all Chelsea saw was a stranger, a little girl she had never seen before, huddled in misery.

Here, in this bar, she did have a protector. Ricardo would never allow any harm to come to her. He had made that promise from the start, and Chelsea believed him. But the proof was also in his hand on the small of her back, his watchful eye, the fear and respect he commanded in other men without saying a word.

She was wearing a beautiful dress and heels that made her taller than nearly every man here. Her relentless workouts had made her feel strong and capable. She could fight, she could run, she could choose what happened to her.

And so far, she chose to stay. The feeling of all those eyes on her was…intoxicating. It wasn't that she was attracted to them. It was that—

“You may choose,” Ricardo said. “You will allow one man to approach. To honor you.”

She whirled around, open-mouthed. “To do what?”

“Whatever I decide. Chelsea, please do not forget, you have your safe word. This is all in your control.”

The first night they had spent together, Ricardo had given her a word—
magnolia
—and promised her that if she uttered it, he would immediately stop whatever he was doing. At the time, she'd been startled by the coincidence, as she had grown up on Magnolia Drive. But since then she had come to understand that it had not been a coincidence. Ricardo, with his seemingly limitless resources, had known everything about her before he ever caressed her.

Now he wanted to display her. As with so many of the new experiences Ricardo introduced her to, she didn't understand intellectually why anyone would enjoy them. But her body already knew. It already yearned.

“I can't choose,” she said, to buy herself time. “You choose.”

His hand went to the back of her neck; his fingers found the collar under her hair. He pulled, just hard enough to cause her to gasp. “
Querida
. Really, have you forgotten so much? Do you really think I will allow you to give me orders?”

“N-no,” she whispered, and the pressure was released.

Several of the men were murmuring to each other, their gestures indicating what they were discussing, the things they wanted to do to her. Even the bartender was leaning back against the liquor shelves, her arms crossed, a predatory grin on her face.

“Then you have five seconds,” he said, “or I shall begin taking volunteers.”

She looked wildly from one man to the next. Old ones, decrepit ones, men missing teeth, men who looked like they hadn't showered or shaved in ages. In the very corner of the room, sitting at a table by himself with a half-empty pitcher of beer, was a man of about forty with his hair cut short, his face clean-shaven, a plain T-shirt and jeans that, though worn, were clean. His boots looked like he'd walked a thousand miles in them. His arms looked like he'd done it while carrying thousand-pound weights.

“Him,” she said desperately. “Over there.”

“All right. Stay here.”

Chelsea was still wondering where he thought she would go as he went to speak to the man. They had a brief exchange, the man looking over at her before nodding and pushing back his chair. Ricardo dropped coins into the jukebox, and they both walked over to her.

Ricardo signaled the bartender as the first pounding bars of the song came on. “Another for the house,” he ordered. Then he took a seat on the nearest barstool. “Darling, this is Daniel,” he said. “He's on leave from the Army. Perhaps,
mi corazon
, you could show him how you value his service to this magnificent country by dancing for him.”

Daniel stood in front of her, his expression veiled, his mouth set in a grim line. He looked neither threatening nor all that happy. What Ricardo had said to convince him, she had no idea.

The music pounded, the beat reaching through the floor and into her body. Was this some private joke, this stranger's way of mocking her? A spark of irritation spurred Chelsea to stand straighter, to look disdainfully down her nose.

Daniel was actually fairly good looking, and if she'd met him in other circumstances, she probably would have found him downright attractive. The effect was heightened by his lazy, amused confidence. He didn't seem the least bit intimidated by Ricardo or by her. In fact, he didn't seem all that interested.

Chelsea's nipples swelled against the silky fabric of the dress as she contemplated making Daniel pay attention. What would it take, she wondered, to wipe that smug look off his face? It wasn't the need, the hunger that Ricardo's touch gave her, but an entirely new sensation—a desire to play the game, to engage in a match of courage, to see which of them would blink first.

It damn well wasn't going to be her.

She locked eyes on Daniel and began to circle her hips in time to the music. She matched each pulse of the bass line with her body, and as she grew comfortable with the rhythm, she added sinuous motions with her arms.

Chelsea had never gone to nightclubs with girlfriends—hell, she'd never had that kind of girlfriend. But there had once been a time when she danced.

When she'd run away from home, she had been taken in by two kindly salon owners in Chinatown, who allowed her to stay in the back room and gave her a job. They also acted as surrogate fathers, and after dinner they sometimes turned the radio up loud in the living room. Chelsea closed her eyes and let the music flow through her and found a tiny pocket of joy, spinning and whirling in the little apartment above the salon.

Now, in the center of the disgusting bar, she did not close her eyes—she kept them locked on Daniel's—but she let the music flow through her and relinquished control of her body to the rhythm. As she shimmied and rocked her hips, moving ever closer to him, she occasionally spun so that she could see Ricardo watching her. And Ricardo was watching very closely, a satisfied smile on his face.

Daniel's composure began to slip when she was only a foot or two away from him. She moved her shoulders suggestively, moving sylph-like around him, tossing her hair and running her hands up and down her body. When the song ended, she bowed deeply, turning away from him so he had a magnificent view of her ass. She could feel her skirt riding up high on her hips and her breasts falling against the dress. When she stood up again, she was breathing heavily, her hair cascading around her shoulders—and Ricardo was standing directly in front of her.

“Very good, my pet,” he said. “You make me proud.” Then he grasped her gently by the shoulders and turned her toward Daniel. She was close enough to Ricardo that her buttocks pressed against his groin, and she could feel his arousal pressing against her cleft. Her body clenched with need and it was all she could do to stop herself from rubbing against him…and then she realized that she had not, in fact, stopped herself. The dance had only heightened her need, and her swollen pussy longed to be touched, used, fucked.

Through her needful haze, she watched Daniel shift awkwardly, and she allowed her gaze to travel down over the few dark hairs peeking out of his shirt, his muscular chest, the worn fabric of his jeans—and the stunning outline of a rock-hard, enormous cock straining against it. She looked back up at his face in time to see him lick his lips nervously.

“Did she please you, my friend?” Ricardo asked calmly.

You could have heard a pin drop in the room. Chelsea was vaguely aware of the men leaning forward for a better view, the bartender snapping a photo with her phone, a photo that had little chance of turning out in the smoky haze and inadequate lighting.

“Yeah,” he choked out.

“Then I invite you to show her.”

Chelsea felt Ricardo's hand move to her shoulder. He caressed her neck before sliding the thin shoulder strap slowly down, past her shoulder, down her arm, as it fell away from her skin. The silk grazed her nipple, sending maddening flights of sensation through her, and she pressed her ass harder against Ricardo. Was he really going to allow this stranger to look at her—to touch her?

Her cunt ached at the thought. Hot moisture pooled and dampened her inner thighs as the other strap slid down. The dress settled around her hips, her breasts bared and exposed. Ricardo slid his hands down her arms and grasped her hands. His grip was light, but she knew that if she resisted it no longer would be.