by Dakota Gray
“Not my fault I'm good at what I do.”
She shifts and her skin brushes my cheek again. “It is when you know damn well the woman is looking to settle down.”
“I never lie.”
“You never turn a woman away either.”
“They're all adults.” I don't fuck women who need help. Genuine help. Telling her that feels too much like defending my life choices. I, also, don't make a woman believe I can love her. That's cruel.
She huffs. “You have every intention of destroying her world.”
Red flashes over my vision at the accusation. “And what are you going to do about it, Sugar?”
She laughs—I'm not sure if it's at me—and I fucking feel the sound in my every bone. “You want a taste of me, Nathan?”
She's needling me, and I nip her earlobe. She moans, pressing a hand to my chest, but not to push me away. After all that we circle back to what I want in the first place.
I ask her, “Where do you want to go?”
She grabs my hand and shifts closer into my space. My fingers brush between silky thighs, soft inner skin and then there's wet heat. I glance down, shocked and fucking ecstatic that Stealth and Heels is a fucking freak. In a room full of people, with her friends twenty feet away, she's put my hand up her skirt. She's taking the lead and I don't mind that.
My cock loves it.
So I close my eyes as she guides my hand to my favorite place on a woman. Is her clit thick and long or short and pert? Full lips or does everything sit out to greet me? No two pussies are alike and I love it. Live for that shit. Will she be chocolate brown until the pink begins? Because no matter the flavor, every woman is pink on the inside. I want to see what I'm feeling. Since seeing isn't an option, I'll take what I can get.
All I know is that she's swollen and wet. Her cream has a nice consistency. I can practically taste her salty tang. She doesn't gasp when I caress her to get my fill.
Seconds pass, but the moment seems to suspend forever before she pushes my hand away. I step back to check for a flush that must have darkened her cheeks. Nothing. Just assessing eyes.
I lift my hand to wave my finger beneath my nose. I can't describe her smell, but she can suffocate me if she wants to. I'll die happy, and they will not be able to close my casket on the postmortem erection. It will defy science.
A groan spills out while I slip my finger between my lips as she watches, a smile curling her mouth. Tangy and sweet and fuck me.
“You like?” she asks, nothing coy in the question, just preening.
Based on her smell and taste, she should preen. “If you'd let me, I'd sit you on the bar and make you squirt.”
“Just with your mouth?”
“Yes.”
She studies me again, sizing me up, and then she scrunches up her nose. “Pass.”
No. Really. What the fuck? I clamp my mouth shut because it's dropped open at her rejection.
“But it's been interesting, Nathan.”
What. The. Fuck.
I go to say her name and trip on Stealth. I close my eyes and tighten my jaw. When the urge to shake her passes, I glare down at her. Takes another second for me to clap, slowly, 'cause she's played me well, and there's fuck all I can do about it. She's had her moment and she should shine in it.
I'll forget her when I find someone else more willing. It won't be tonight. Tonight all I will be able to do is taste her. No amount of scotch will wash her out of my mouth.
And, really, what the fuck? Someone—likely a pissed-off former lover—who knows me, my past, and my fetish sent Stealth to fuck with me. There's no other reason for Stealth to walk up to me, let me get my fill, and then walk away. This is revenge—served wet and sweet.
“Tell whoever sent you I fucking hope they get fucking crabs.”
She laughs then picks up her drink. “Cute and funny. You had potential. Night, Nathan, and have a nice life.”
I respect her mercenary tactics too much to wish her a long walk and a short cliff.
But give me time.
~CHAPTER TWO~
I sit up like the recently undead at exactly 4:59 a.m. It's a ritual from my army days I can't shake yet—up and at 'em before some asshole with a God complex wakes me. Doesn't mean I'm a morning person. I almost throw my alarm clock across the room when it goes off a minute later.
I breathe and take a mental inventory of myself and my surroundings. The deep throb in my shoulder is there. The shrapnel is gone, and so will the ache, once I work out the kinks. Only other thing aching is my cock. I need to piss, and...I shake my head and swing my feet from under the covers onto the carpet.
Darkness spills through my curtains so I can only make out the shadows of furniture—dresser, chair, nightstand, closet door. Some of that darkness is swirling inside of me.
Breathe.
I need coffee and to punch something, in that order, or there would be blood in the goddamn streets. No surprise, right, coming from a vet? I served in Afghanistan. Five tours under my belt, and then I didn't reup. That doesn't mean I'm naturally violent. Army doesn't teach regular soldiers hand-to-hand.
No. I need to punch the shit out of something because, despite the copious amount of scotch I'd downed the night before or that I'd trolled the club in vain hopes of finding a decent replacement for Stealth, I woke up and her taste still colors my tongue.
I washed my hands and brushed my teeth thoroughly before bed and there she is, fucking haunting my mouth in the morning. It's all in my head—I'm aware of that. Doesn't change a goddamn thing.
I need to run, sweat, and punch something. Maybe kill a cow with my bare hands then eat it. Then I can forget her, and the phantom taste of her pussy will leave me the fuck alone.
For the next hour my thoughts bounce between “I'll forget Stealth,” to “Fuck her, and not in the good way.” Eventually I find myself at Tarek's job. The London-Berg Gym sits on the outskirts of town and caters to the middle class and healthy.
My friend is on the weight-room floor walking a couple of clients through personal training. For a man who spends his life working out, he's not bulky. His arms aren't short-looking from too much muscle and there's still a neck visible, though both are covered in tats. His dark brown skin has a sheen of sweat when he meets my gaze. A nod of acknowledgment is thrown my way, and then his focus is back on his clients.
I hang back by the free weights to stretch first and to see if Duke is answering his cell this week. He's an attorney at a top firm and a slow week for him is sixty billable hours. Sometimes we don't hear from him. Tarek and I take turns saving his soul and sanity, but that only works if Duke answers his phone. Today he doesn't.
I stuff my phone back into my pocket, irritation twisting inside me. I'm only calling him for one reason—not to check up on him, though he needs it. Not to see if he can escape the office for a few hours. And, yeah, he needs that.
It's about her, and I should have fucking moved on by now. What's done is done as long as I ignore the gnawing ache in my gut.
I can sweat her out of my system, drip her out of me like a toxin. Or that's the lie I try to convince myself into believing. I hit the bench press. Three sets of ten at two hundred and forty pounds. Yeah. I'm trying to die, but I can still taste her, so death is the least of my worries.
“I don't know how many times I've told you to have a spotter.” Tarek comes into view and takes the position above my head.
All I can really see are flashes of his brown skin, muscles, and gray sweats. He's the good guy of our group, which probably isn't saying much. As a friend though, he's as solid as they come.
“Yeah,” I reply. “Teach the people in your gym the proper way to spot is to not have their nuts on my forehead.”
My friend laughs because he knows exactly what I mean.
The gym isn't bad. The high end equipment is more than serviceable. Three floors to the gym itself and two Olympic-sized pools, but the majority of the people here are hardcore stay-at-home mom
s and men who like the idea of weightlifting and big muscles.
Tarek rests a hand under the bar. “One of these days you're going to rearrange your face.”
“Still will be prettier than you.” Sweat leaks into my eyes.
I'm on the second to last set, and my hold isn't as firm as it needs to be. Should have brought my gloves. Shouldn't have let her trick me. Should have asked her who ratted me out. Should have pinched her clit instead of caressed it.
Shoulda, coulda, whatever. Fuck her.
“Have you heard from Duke?” I ask.
“Yeah. Why?”
Clearly I'm not going to exorcise the damn woman from my thoughts. This is hour twelve where she's had center stage in my psyche. I don't live in denial. She isn't going anywhere until I can exact some kind of revenge, or at least know more about the evil, sexy...jackass.
But I only tell Tarek, “I need to hire one of his paralegals.”
“For what?” Suspicion fills Tarek's tone.
The last time I did...well, we don't talk about it. “Long story.”
And I don't have half of it. Hell, a fourth of it. Who sent Stealth to fuck with me? How did they know I'd like her taste?
My memory isn't what it used to be, but it is better than most people’s. I run through the faces of her club friends and try to tease out any memory of seeing them before. And nothing. Stealth doesn't have the kind of face I'd forget, and I never forgot a woman's signature taste. Her name is negligible. Really, dead weight.
With a growl that peels my mouth over my teeth, I finish the last rep. Tarek grabs the bar to notch the metal into place. I sit up, using the edge of my shirt to wipe the sweat out of my eyes since I forgot to bring a towel. For a moment there's just that stupid gym music filling the silence.
“What the fuck crawled up your ass?” Tarek asks. He steps back from the bench press, his gaze hard on my face.
“Nothing.”
I don't check to see if he's bought the lie. He's told me more than once to stop fucking with women's heads because one day karma will drop kick me in the nuts. I don't see what I do that way. I'm simply giving my lovers what they want, their deepest desires. Don't women want to lose control with a man who has alpha tendencies? Don't they want the best sex of their life? That's all I provide—the best sex a woman could want.
No shame or excuses. No need to pretend like she wants a relationship to get good sex. The women who do want a relationship, I avoid. Women who start to gaze at me as though I can be that honey-I'm-home guy, I drop—kindly.
If my motto changes, or I meet a woman who makes me reconsider my moral code...Who the fuck am I kidding? Normal women, women who like relationships don't date perverts.
Beside all that, there are other important things to talk about—like tracking Stealth down. “If you manage to get a hold of him again, tell him I need him to call me ASAP.”
“No. I won't. What is it?”
I build up my best “fuck you” glare and launch it at him. Tarek folds his arms over his chest and waits. We've been friends for close to a decade. The normal shit that works to get people to back up bounces off him.
I sigh. “I've pissed someone off and they are out to get me.” I sound like a goddamn drama queen.
“They are out to get you?” His voice pitches low. “You are aware how paranoid that sounds, right?”
Yeah. I do. I pinch the bridge of my nose and try to breathe and think like a normal human being. “Like I said, long story. Someone put my dick on a pike, and I just want to know why.”
I shake my head at the second dramatic announcement. I doubt I'll ever see Stealth again. Women are better at revenge. They don't do victory dances or come back to top themselves. They come in, do the mental damage that requires therapists to fix, and leave for good. She wished me a nice life and went back to her friends. And, no, I didn't watch her with them after she walked away. Fuck her.
But she left the club maybe twenty minutes later.
And that doesn't matter. I want to know who sent her into my path, and I'll exact my own revenge on both of them. For Stealth, all I need is ten minutes and she'll never be the same. And the person who sent her? I don't know.
Why am I dead sure Stealth's revenge was a team effort? Women run in packs. They do not go to the bathroom alone. You lie, cheat, or hurt her in any way, and guess who is driving the getaway vehicle when it's time to fuck up your car's paint job? Stealth knew too many details about me to not have a co-conspirator—one I’d fucked.
I'm upfront about the kind of relationship I'll have, sure. Doesn't mean jack shit sometimes, and that means the list of potential co-conspirators could be too damn long for me to slog through.
I scrub my hands over my face and my skin feels tacky from sweat.
Tarek remains silent for another full ten seconds. “Told you so. If I hear from Duke before you, I'll tell him to call you, but you should let this go.”
Let Stealth get the last hooray while her taste makes a home in my mouth? My insides clench at the thought. What if I can never shake her?
“You know I can't,” I spit out.
I'm not OCD or anything, but it's hard to walk away from things normal people probably can. I don't suffer from road rage, but I'm that news story where things somehow escalate. You know the kind of story. Backed up traffic, one driver gets cut off, the other driver flips the bird, and it all ends with jail time because one driver couldn't just shake the slight the fuck off.
I'm the someone who can't shake it the fuck off. I can fixate and I like to excel at anything I expend my energy on. That quality made me a fantastic soldier.
Not important. Who the fuck is Stealth?
I press my palms into my eyes with shaking hands. I have jitters like a goddamn junkie. “Please have him call me.”
Yeah. Reduced to begging. At least my eye isn't twitching. There is hope for me yet.
“What did this woman do?” Tarek's tone of voice says it all.
What can I say that would make sense to an outsider? She refused me? She took away my arsenal? She called me on my shit? Reminded me that no matter how gently I break things off or how clearly I state my intentions, there's collateral damage sometimes. Those are niggling worries in the back of my mind. At the forefront it's her. Just her.
“She gave me a taste of something I haven't had, and then she walked away. And it was all to fuck with me.”
There isn't a flicker of empathy in Tarek's face. “Isn't that what you do?”
“Every woman I take to my bed leaves satisfied.”
He shrugs. “If you say so.”
“What?” I rise from the bench press, my fists balled. “What is this Obi-wan knowledge that you're pretending to have?”
Tarek steps up into my face. “I know I'm not the one sitting here with my balls in a knot. How about you?”
“Have him call me,” I bite out.
“You know what will help?”
Here we go again. He believes all I need is less free time. He's right, to a point, but... “I'm not going to work for you.”
“If you did, you'd be able to teach these men how to spot. No nuts on your forehead.”
The tension that had my every muscle bunched gives way as I laugh. “You're an ass, and, no, I'm still not working for you. I'll find something to do. I'm not a fan of sitting around and spinning on my thumb anyway.”
He spread his hands. “Clearly you need something to distract you.”
I put my hands on my waist and glance up. He's right. I know it. I received my honorable discharge a year ago and went home—to Georgia—for close to two months. I had nightmares, sure, once everything caught up to me. A few steps further, and the shrapnel flung from a homemade IED would have cut my life short. The guy in front of me got that fate.
I'm...lucky. I have a pirate scar on my face and a lifetime prescription to exercise daily to keep my shoulder from going stiff. On top of that, my mother babied me for those two months before I settled back into
California.
So what life I have left, I need to do something meaningful with. I'm not looking to strip again. I have zero interest in doing security work. My degree is in computer engineering, and maybe I should use that for something more than wall decoration in my home.
I will. I'm not wasting a moment.
I don't consider it wasteful to hunt down Stealth and make her pay.
*****
It takes two long days before Duke hits me back on my cell. I'm rabid by then. Not sure if I make much sense to his paralegal. I just recall telling her to get her hands on Fade's security videos. Check the parking lot for the woman's car and, if she can, send me any video she gains access to.
She does.
I text Duke and let him know he should give his paralegal a raise. He tells me I should get a life and he'll call me later.
I would like to say I watch the security feeds with a blank face, cold heart, and an even colder gaze. Like I said, I don't do denial. I'm on the footage like flies on shit.
Dragging my chair closer to my bed, I adjust the brightness on my laptop. The playback is grainy, but I easily find myself in the crowd. I watch the exchange straight through without mental comment. To my surprise, the whole back and forth lasts about thirty minutes from beginning to end.
I switch views, this one closer—the camera has to be behind the bar. I come into view, drumming my fingers on the counter after a minute of waiting, and looking preppy as fuck in my polo shirt and halo of dirty blonde hair.
At the other end, Stealth pays me no mind. The redhead leans and says something to Stealth. Covertly, Stealth scans the club. Her brows go up, and I know that expression. She approves of what she sees.
My blood turns to ice. I fist my hands against the keyboard. She hadn't known who I was—not on sight. I'd been a man she wanted to fuck. Proof of that is how she abandons her group of friends, her drink, and sidles right next to me. The entire bar was up for grabs and she drifted to me.
What the fuck did I say to her to change all that?
In the vid, my back straightens. I'm trying to pinpoint the scent. My head tilts to the left—it's her. A short, curvaceous woman in a black dress, red heels and fragrance I want to taste.
