The Reclamation (The Club Trilogy Book 2)

by Lauren Rowe

  I was shocked and scared and freaking out yesterday when we first discovered the break-in at my apartment, and, yes, I lost my mind with worry when we found out Kat’s apartment had suffered the same fate as mine, but after the initial shock wore off, I got to thinking about the situation, and I’m not sure The Club poses a genuine threat to me, at least not a physical one. If these guys were violent criminals, then why’d they even bother breaking into my apartment? It would have made a lot more sense to lie in wait for me and take care of things more definitively. My hunch is they were merely gathering information by taking my computer and then decided to trash the place as an afterthought. They’re just cyber-pimps, after all. Who’s ever heard of a violent cyber-pimp?

  I’ve definitely got to tell Jonas what I think about all this. But this morning just didn’t seem like the time to do it—especially after the way he reacted to Josh last night. I figure I’ll tackle that issue with him tomorrow—ever so gently—and, in the meantime, I’ll just tackle him. Whenever I get the chance, that is, because this morning certainly didn’t work out as planned.

  My big idea this morning was to lure Jonas into “oh no, maybe someone will see us!” sex at my apartment—a safe and seemingly easy way to invoke the spectator-hotness from last night’s sizzling dream. I planned to attack Jonas at my place before the campus police arrived, leaving the front door open a crack for Campus Johnny Law to enter. I imagined Jonas and me going at it, hot and heavy in my ransacked bedroom, maybe even with my bedroom door slightly ajar, both of us on the verge of pure ecstasy, until we—gasp!—heard the men in blue stomping around my living room. I imagined the police calling out to me from the other side of my bedroom wall, perhaps concerned for my safety, given the disarray of my apartment.

  “Miss Cruz?” they’d say. “It’s the police!”

  At which point Jonas and I would jolt apart, just in time to avoid being caught by the fuzz with our pants down (literally). The whole idea gets me going like crazy, just thinking about it.

  Unfortunately, though, my “Oh no, maybe someone will see us!” fantasy just wasn’t in the cards. When Jonas and I arrived at my apartment, the trusty campus police were already waiting inside—the superintendent had let them in, worried something had happened to me—and by the time the police left (after having written out a quick and meaningless report, as predicted), it was time to hightail it over to my contracts class.

  I look at my watch. We’ve still got a few minutes before class starts.

  Jonas places the laptop he bought for me on my desktop. He’s had it with him in a small carrying case since we left his house, but I thought he’d brought it with him so he could return it.

  “This is yours,” Jonas says, his voice soft but commanding. “I got it for you because I want to take care of you in every conceivable way.”

  Before I can respond, he continues.

  “If and when you get a replacement laptop through your insurance, you can give that one to your mom or donate it to a school or do whatever the fuck you want with it. But this one is yours, and only yours, Sarah, because I got it for you.”

  He looks exactly like he did when he tied those matching friendship bracelets around our wrists in Belize. I can’t help but look down at the multi-colored bracelet around my wrist and then at its match on Jonas’ wrist. And just like that, my heart melts like an ice cube on a hot skillet.

  “Thank you,” I say softly, leaning over to kiss him.

  His relief is palpable as he greets my lips with his own.

  When his tongue enters my mouth, my body bursts into flames. And when he brings his hands to my face and caresses my cheeks with his thumbs, my heart races and my breathing halts. I’m blazing hot right now, not surprisingly—I’ve been sexed up like a banshee all morning long, sense memories of last night’s intimate festivities (especially my unexpected transformation into Orgasma the All-Powerful) floating through my head (and several other parts of my anatomy, too). Holy hot dam, I’m on fire, ready to go off at the slightest touch.

  “Miss Cruz?” My professor’s voice rings out into the large lecture hall.

  I jerk away from Jonas and wipe my mouth with the back of my hand. Every eyeball in the entire class, including my professor’s, is trained on me. I can feel my cheeks blazing crimson.

  “Who’s our guest?” my professor asks, not a trace of amusement on her face.

  “I’m sorry, Professor Martin. This is Jonas,” I say. “He’s going to sit in on class today, if that’s okay with you.”

  “Well, hello there, Jonas,” my professor says, her voice softening as she takes in the glorious sight of him—she is a woman, after all. “You have a deep and abiding interest in contracts, I take it?”

  I’m expecting Jonas to be mortified by Professor Martin’s attention, but he surprises me by being smooth as silk.

  “As a matter of fact, I do,” he replies. “I’d be grateful if you’d allow me to sit in today.”

  “All right,” my professor says, her entire demeanor warming and melting before my eyes. “We go by last names here,” she says. “What shall we call you, sir?’

  “Mr. Faraday,” he responds, charisma oozing out his pores.

  Instant recognition flashes in her eyes. “Jonas Faraday—of Faraday & Sons?”

  Jonas nods. “That’s right.”

  “What a nice surprise for us, Mr. Faraday. Welcome.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You could teach this class, I’m sure. You’ve negotiated a contract or two in your lifetime, yes?”

  Jonas smiles and his eyes twinkle at her. “Maybe once or twice.”

  She addresses the entire lecture hall, her face suddenly beaming. “If Mr. Faraday is willing, this would be an excellent opportunity for you to learn about how contracts work in the real world.” She directs her stare at Jonas again, smiling. “Would you be so kind as to answer a few questions for us today, Mr. Faraday?”

  “I’ll do my best, Professor.”

  Professor Martin laughs—something I’ve rarely seen the woman do.

  “Wonderful,” she says, bubbling over with enthusiasm. “Why don’t you come on up here with me?” She pats a stool up front.

  Oh boy, it’s on like Donkey Kong. I can feel it. Jonas saunters to the front of the room, his butt a glorious sight in his jeans, his T-shirt clinging to his broad shoulders and muscled back, and I can feel half the class, men and women alike, swooning. When he takes his offered seat at the front of the class and smiles, his biceps bulging out of his short sleeves, the other half of the class falls under his spell, too.

  For the next hour, Jonas elegantly and artfully, and with mesmerizing confidence, answers every question the professor and students ask. With the most adorable twinkle in his eye, and the most thoughtful tilt of his head, and an occasional, sensual lick of those luscious lips, he tells us about how contracts work in the world of complex business transactions—how they’re formed, negotiated, and what really happens as a practical matter when they’re breached (as opposed to what our textbooks say happens). He tells us what role his own lawyers play when advising him regarding multimillion-dollar deals, and, most humorously, why he so often chooses to ignore his lawyers’ “impractical and deal-killing” advice and forge ahead, anyway.

  “As an entrepreneur, I’m all about stepping on the proverbial gas pedal with a lead foot—getting the deal done. The lawyers, on the other hand, or, as I most often call them, the effing lawyers—except I don’t say ‘effing’” —everyone in the classroom laughs, even Professor Martin, and so do I—though I’m laughing because it’s the first time I’ve heard Jonas use “effing” in place of his favorite word and it sounds comical coming out of his mouth—“tend to perceive their job as convincing me that a sane and prudent person would slam on the brakes. The thing is, in business, sanity and prudence are vastly overrated. The business world rewards risk-takers—the bigger the risk, the bigger the reward.”

  It’s objectively the most interest
ing and thought-provoking contracts class we’ve ever had. And the sexiest. The man is gorgeous. Irresistible. Magnetic. Masculine. Brilliant. He’s got the entire classroom in the palm of his magical hand. Every woman around me is swooning over this beautiful man—I’m pretty sure I can hear eggs spontaneously popping out of ovaries all around me. Even my professor can’t keep her inner fangirl from coming out.

  “Such an interesting perspective, Mr. Faraday,” Professor Martin gushes when time runs out. “And so well articulated. Thank you so much for joining us. What a lucky surprise.” She glances at me when she says the word “lucky” and I blush.

  It occurs to me that if Jonas were to ask Professor Martin to come home with him tonight and spread her creamy thighs on his crisp white sheets, she’d say yes. Or, more accurately, “oh, hell yes—let’s go right now.”

  “Come back and join us any time,” my professor coos to Jonas in the last moments of class.

  “Thank you for your hospitality, Professor,” Jonas says, flashing his most outrageously charming smile.

  As Jonas walks back up the aisle toward me, everyone applauds in appreciation—and quite a few of them also steal envious glances at me, too.

  Why her?

  What makes her so special?

  I can’t believe she gets to have sex with a man who looks like that.

  It’s as though I can hear their thoughts bouncing off the walls.

  He’s mine, I send back to them. Mine, mine, mine, mine, mine. It’s all I can do not to re-enact last night’s dream right here, right now, in front of all of them, right on top of Professor Martin’s desktop.

  “You were magnificent,” I tell Jonas when he reaches me at my desk. “So knowledgeable. Confident yet self-deprecating.” I smile broadly at him. “Ridiculously charming.”

  “Thanks. I hated every minute of it.” He takes the seat next to me.

  “No, you didn’t. You think you did, but you didn’t.”

  He rolls his eyes. “Is this the part where you tell me what I think I want isn’t actually what I want?”

  “You were in your element. You can’t fake something like that. You were brilliant.”

  “I would rather have been sitting here next to you.” His eyes are earnest.

  Damn, those eyes of his. They get me every time.

  “Let’s go to the library,” I whisper. “I’ve got something I need to do.”

  “Sure,” Jonas replies. But then he catches something in my expression that makes him smile broadly at me. “Whatever you say, baby—I’m all yours.”

  Chapter 11

  Sarah

  “Tell me about your dream,” Jonas says softly. “The one that made you come in your sleep.”

  We’re standing in the massive law library, deep in the bowels of the book stacks. He’s got me pinned against a metal bookshelf stacked floor-to-ceiling with thick legal tomes.

  He kisses my neck. “Tell me all about it, pretty baby.” His erection bulges inside his jeans. He glides his hand up my thigh, underneath my skirt, and onto my bare ass cheek. He lets out a soft moan as his hand gropes me and pulls me into him. “I love this ass.”

  I’m trembling with my desire for him.

  He nips at my ear. “Tell me what turned you on so much that you came in your sleep.”

  “I’m such a big girl now, aren’t I? Coming all by myself like that.”

  “You are a big girl. A beautiful, sexy, irresistible girl.”

  His hand moves to the cotton crotch of my G-string and caresses me lightly. I lift my leg up and around him, inviting him inside me. His fingers push the pesky fabric of my panties aside and brush lightly across my sensitive flesh.

  I shudder.

  He brushes his fingers lightly across me again, and when my pelvis thrusts involuntarily toward him in response, his fingers dip ever so gently into my wetness.

  I moan softly.

  “You like that?”

  “Mmm hmm.”

  I like that a whole lot, thank you, and a few other things, too. For instance, I also like the way every woman in that classroom looked at Jonas like they wanted to fuck him. And I like that they can’t have him because he’s all mine. And I like how, right before we left the classroom, he cupped my face in his hands and kissed me softly in front of all those staring eyes and then grabbed my hand and brought my thumb ring to his warm lips.

  Just behind me in the next aisle over, two students walk by. They’re chatting softly as they go. I turn my head and peek at them through the cracks between books. They keep walking past, oblivious to the well-hung cowboy and his horny little pony groping each other just a few feet away on the other side of the bookshelf.

  Jonas’ fingers continue working their magic on me. A loud moan threatens to escape my throat, so I bite his neck.

  “Ow,” Jonas says in surprise. “Jesus. Why so violent?”

  I stifle my giggle.

  Movement flickers in the spaces between the books and someone coughs behind us. We both freeze, grinning at each other like kids removing the lid off a cookie jar.

  Whoever it is, they keep moving down the aisle.

  “Come on, My Magnificent Sarah.” His fingers resume their exploration. “Tell me what turned you on so much.”

  I unbutton his jeans.

  “It was the most erotic dream I’ve ever had,” I whisper.

  “I like that word.”

  “Erotic?”

  He nods.

  “Erotic... erotic... erotic.” Each word is accompanied by a wet kiss on his neck. “Un sueño erótico.”

  He moans softly. Jonas loves it when I speak Spanish.

  I lick his neck where I bit him a moment ago.

  “Tell me.”

  I tell him about my dream and why it was so deliriously arousing to me—at least, I try to tell him. Talking is surprisingly hard to do when there are magic fingers massaging your wahoo and soft lips kissing your skin and warm breath in your ear.

  When I’m done talking, it’s quite obvious he’s turned on by my dream, too.

  “The red wine was dripping all over your skin?”

  “Mmm hmm.”

  “Over your clit?” His voice has turned husky.

  “Mmm.”

  “And I was licking it up?” He exhales a soft groan.

  “You were everywhere all at once.”

  “Licking you?” Oh yeah, he’s really turned on.

  “Fucking me, kissing me, touching me, licking me, eating me. All at once.”

  He grips my ass and pulls me into him. “Sounds like heaven.” His lips skim mine as his fingers move in and out of me.

  I’m panting. “But it was still you. Every mouth and penis and finger was yours. That’s why it turned me on.” I don’t want him to misunderstand and think I’m craving some sort of orgy, because I’m not. Even in my dreams, I only want him—one at a time, ten at a time, like a poltergeist, whatever, it doesn’t matter, as long as it’s him. I only want him. Jonas Faraday.

  My hand moves into his jeans. He exhales when my fingers find his erection. It’s enormous, ready for business. I yank down on the waistband of his briefs and peel back the front of his jeans, freeing his hard-on. He groans as his erection springs out of his pants.

  “You’re a human Jack in the Box.”

  He grins. “Only if you’re the box.”

  I bite his shoulder, stifling my laughter.

  He nips at my ear. “Back to your dream, baby.” His fingers continue manipulating me with astonishing precision. “The people watching—that turned you on?”

  “Mmm.” I can’t say anything more than that. His fingers have found the exact spot that makes me crazy. It’s all I can do not to scream right here in the library. My body has begun jerking and grinding like crazy. I’m on fire. “Oh, God, Jonas,” I murmur, my pleasure rising. “Yes.”

  A young woman enters our row, down at the end, headed toward us. We both briefly freeze. She stops dead in her tracks, a stricken look on her face, and qu
ickly strides away in the opposite direction.

  We both burst out laughing. I bury my mouth into his broad shoulder again, trying to silence myself.

  “We’ve scarred her for life,” Jonas whispers.

  “Sucks to be her.”

  Jonas’ fingers resume what they were doing. His fingers slide from my wetness to my tip and back again, over and over. I shudder.

  “You like that?”

  I nod enthusiastically. “Mmm.”

  “You like the idea of people watching us fuck?” he clarifies.

  Oh, I thought he was asking me about his magic fingers. “Mmm hmm.” My hand moves up and down his shaft. His tip is already wet—he’s ready to blow. I’m so turned on, I can barely stand.

  He lets out a soft moan. “Why?” He exhales. He kisses my lips and the pleasure zings me right between my legs—it’s as if a live wire runs directly from my lips to my clit. His free hand grazes my back and unfastens my bra from underneath my T-shirt. He pulls my shirt up and licks my breast. His tongue swirls around my nipple. My clit flutters violently.

  I moan. I can’t take it anymore. “Now,” I whisper.

  He ignores me, as usual. He lowers my shirt and grabs my ass under my skirt again.

  I grind myself into him. “Now,” I say again.

  “Why did you like people watching us?”

  I raise my leg even higher around him and tilt myself toward him. “Come on, Jonas, right now.”

  “Patience, baby.” He sucks on my lower lip and my entire body convulses. “You never learn, do you?”

  I shake my head. It’s true. I never learn.

  “First tell me why you liked being watched. Tell me why and I’ll fuck you.”

  I’m almost desperate now. I’m tempted to kneel and take him into my mouth—I want him inside me, any way I can get him—but I resist the urge. We are in a library, after all. “Because they all wanted you. Every single one of them wanted you.” I stroke him vigorously.

  He makes a primal sound and shudders. He yanks on my G-string under my skirt and pulls it down roughly, making me moan in anticipation.

  His fingers are spellbinding. Oh my God, he’s so talented. I can’t stand it anymore. “No more prelude, Jonas,” I whisper. “Do it now.”