I can see exactly what Dante’s thinking, and a small, mean part of me thinks I should just wait. Let it all play out and watch Bill dig his own grave.
Men like Dante don’t show favor to thieves. And for tonight, he’s made it clear to everyone in the room that I’m his for the taking.
I haven’t missed the signs. You’d have to be blind for them to go unseen.
It’s been the most barbaric, power-driven foreplay I’ve ever experienced. Each time I turned someone down, he gave me his approval. I watched his intentions blister his face every time someone leaned in too close or brushed my shoulder.
And every time a man mentioned my name to him, I could tell, because they would always look at me one last time before pretending I didn’t exist.
They weren’t allowed to consider me anymore. Not after Dante said so.
I’ve loved every minute of it. Because for tonight, I want to be owned.
My unwelcome guest puts his hand on my waist, causing my head to swing down to where he’s touching me. I look at his smug face with irritation and smirk.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you, Bill.”
“Why? Do you bite? Because you know I like that…” he whispers, tugging me in toward him.
Dick.
“No. But he does.” I point, watching Bill’s face drop as a very pissed-off Dante stalks toward us.
Bill’s hand falls from my waist, and I reach down to smooth out the fabric.
“I’d get going before he gets here,” I offer, taking another sip of my wine.
He nods, stepping backward before turning to head to the door as I smile against my wineglass.
Dante slows as he approaches me, glowering over at where Bill is leaving the bar. “Someone I need to kill?”
“No, tough guy.” I laugh into his amused face.
His eyes crinkle in the corners as he grins down at me, taking the wineglass from my hand.
“Tell me something, beautiful. How come you turned down everyone who asked you to dance tonight?”
His tongue darts out, running along his bottom lip as he traces his fingers softly down my arms and over the top of my hand, intertwining our fingers.
I stay planted in my spot as he takes a step backward.
“How come, Sarah?” he growls, pulling me forward, forcing me to take a step closer.
“As if you don’t already know,” I tease.
“Humor me.”
“Because I don’t follow any man’s lead,” I answer bravely as we almost seal against each other.
Dante brings my hand to his lips, pressing a soft kiss on the top before he turns it sideways and bites, making me jump, a small gasp escaping my lips.
“We’ll see.”
His free hand brushes over the curve of my hip, settling against my flesh exposed by my backless dress, as his other releases my hand and snakes around my neck to grip me at the nape.
My fingers curl around the lapels of his tux, lost in our bubble, as my chest begins to rise and fall with the delicious bite of sexual tension.
We stand in silence as he holds me in place.
“We’re dancing,” he grits out.
I shake my head and grin, opening my mouth to protest, but Dante gives my body a little jerk, cementing me against him and making me wet.
“I wasn’t asking.” Holy fuck.
Our bodies begin to sway, pressing against each other in just the right way. He’s fucking me in front of a room full of people, and nobody’s the wiser.
Dante leans his face down close to my ear, his tongue running over the sensitive lobe before he whispers in a low, gravelly voice.
“See, following is easy. You just needed the right man to lead.”
Dante’s hand is burning a permanent mark into my back as we walk through the lobby of his building. We barely made it through the song before he had me whisked away into the car.
The entire ride back we drove in silence, his hand on my thigh, indecently high where he kneaded and stroked his fingertips deliciously close to my center.
I felt feral—I could’ve mounted him right there and rubbed up against him until I came. Jesus, he’s making me crazy.
He leads me into the elevator, giving a nod to the attendant. A couple tries to enter but is stopped, and they gawk in confusion toward us as the doors close them out.
Dante stands silently with that sexy damn smirk and leans forward to enter a code on the pad. The metal box begins to move as he pulls his phone from his pocket and types out a quick message, glancing up to the corner of the elevator as he finishes.
My gaze follows his just in time to see the tiny red blinking light go dim then black.
Did he just have the cameras turned off?
His hand leaves my back as he shoves both hands in his pockets, reclining back against the wall and turning his head to look at me.
“Take off the dress.”
My eyebrows shoot up as I look back at him. “I’m sorry, what?”
Dante’s jaw tenses. “Don’t make me repeat myself. Take off your goddamn dress. Leave on the garters. I want you naked in my home.”
He jerks his chin for me to start, and as much I want to say “fuck off” …I want to say “fuck me” more. Dante’s filth is right up my alley.
My hand reaches for the strap of my dress, pushing it off my shoulder as I grin. “The cameras?” I question just to be sure.
“Off,” he answers, running a finger delicately over my collarbone. “I’m gonna fucking destroy you tonight, Sarah.”
“Promise?” I breathe out haughtily, letting the other strap fall, taking the dress down my frame.
He rises to his full height, pushing off the elevator wall, and lets his eyes roam my body, now only covered in lace panties and garters.
“Perfection.”
My nipples pebble against the cold that sweeps over my bare chest as Dante lifts a hand, his finger finding my mouth and pushing inside.
I suck, pulling in my cheeks as the elevator dings. The doors slide open to reveal the entrance to his penthouse. He takes a step out, blocking the door with his foot, and pulls his finger from my mouth.
He traces the wetness down over my neck and chest as my head falls back, all the way to my nipple, circling the hard bud.
I hear him laugh appreciatively when I shiver.
“Walk inside to the living room and sit…ass on your feet. Tonight, you’re mine to do with as I please, without question. This is the only time I’ll give you a choice. The minute you set foot in this house, that’s my permission until you say your word. You understand?”
My eyes connect with his, and I take a confident step forward, gripping his chin and pulling it down to look at me.
“I understand completely…until I say stop. You’ll dominate, and I’ll submit. But you understand that you get tonight and only tonight?” I purr as I release him, and he nods slowly.
“Make it count,” I dare as I saunter the fuck out of the elevator and straight into hell.
One week later
MY PHONE BUZZES FOR THE five hundredth time, causing my shoulders to tense as I hit ignore. I need to change my number. But I know that’s just another Band-Aid until I’m found again and old wounds are torn open.
It’s been three years this time: three years of bliss.
And now it’s over. It’s crazy how my life changed for the better and the worse in one night.
The vibration starts again just as fast as it ended. “Go the fuck away,” I breathe harshly, turning off my cell and throwing it into the bottom of my desk drawer.
Closing it with more force than necessary, I take a deep breath and try to calm my nerves before reaching for one of the many portfolios I have strewn across my desk.
Work. I need to focus on work.
The stacks of unvetted potential members in front of me seem never ending, but it’s only because I’m trying to get as much done as I can before I disappear.
For the first time in a long tim
e, I allowed myself to care about something, and I don’t want it to go to hell when I leave.
When, not if, I leave.
The thought makes the tightness grow in my chest again.
My time is ticking here, and I hate it. I don’t want to leave Chicago. My apartment. My people. The life I was beginning to live.
Jesus, I’d just finally started to let myself breathe again and desire something. Goddammit.
The calls started the night I left Dante’s apartment. I was on a high put there by a man I was determined to keep as a one-night stand, but even as I left him sleeping in his bed, I knew that would be a fight I might not win.
And I was okay with that.
But then all possibilities leapt off the side of his building, crashing to a bloody death as soon as my phone rang.
When I answered, the familiar voice on the other end said, “One step closer,” before the line disconnected.
All good things come to an end. That’s the saying.
And when my family finds me here, they’ll make sure to bring all the bad with them and end my peace.
Family is the wrong word to describe them.
They’re the worst of the worst—desperate for power and corrupted by greed. I grew up with petty criminals, con artists, and thieves. Men with no loyalties and no interest outside of their own. It was “eat or be eaten” in our house, especially after my mom died, and I got really tired of being chewed up and spit out, so I escaped.
I ran.
Ran as far away as I could from that Boston ghetto, landing first in California, then Louisiana, Florida, Utah, Oregon, and now Chicago, Illinois.
It’s been eight years of changing locations every time they get wise to me. It always starts with calls and then they find my location.
But I’m a ghost each time.
New name, new look, but the same me. At least I hope she’s still in there…deep down, hidden under all the necessary survival. My eyes stare off into my office as my thoughts settle in—I haven’t stopped in eight long years.
A huge part of me hoped they’d forgotten or lost interest this time. Sooner or later, they have to give up. Whether it’s because they tire of this game or they’re behind bars, I just have to keep running long enough to outlast them.
The hard part to swallow is that I’d started to believe I’d really escaped this time. Found the one place they’d never find me. I thought I’d won. Despite my past, I’d let myself build a small life, making friends with people instead of living anonymously.
My biggest mistake was letting the one man I knew better than to touch, put his hands all over me.
Girls with secrets like mine don’t get a happily ever after.
I fucking know better. The cruelest thing I’ve ever done to myself was have a taste of a man that’s left me with cravings.
The landline on my desk rings, making me jump and a small surprised breath suck in between my lips. My hand instinctively reaches for the handle, but I draw back, chewing the inside of my cheek and staring at the phone.
There are only three people who have this number.
The three people who own this business.
One of which I’ve been thinking about all week.
I wait, staring at the phone as it rings and rings, then finally stops. Tapping my nails against the desk, I narrow my eyes, hating that I’m actually entertaining thoughts about Dante.
I feel like such a chick. And I hate it.
I don’t like feeling regret or hope or any of the bullshit that people who grow up in fancy houses with loving families feel. Each time I do, it just morphs into anger, which fuels my hate for everything I don’t have.
And right now, what I don’t have is time, but I’m greedy. The moment he finished with me, I wanted him to start again and never stop.
Thinking about it makes heat crawl up my skin, my arms erupting into goose bumps. I reach up to rub the back of my neck, tilting my head to the side.
“Fuck,” I breathe out, rolling my shoulders.
I’m a girl with secrets that need to stay buried and skeletons that have to stay hidden, and Dante—he’s the guy I can’t seem to keep a straight head around.
Not that he’s tried to pursue me.
I was just pussy to him. I made sure of that.
I can’t be mad. But I am…at myself. And maybe him, but I won’t admit that because that makes me way too weak.
I’ll never be that for any man.
Then again, the last time I said that, I ended up trussed up and spanked.
My tongue darts out over my lip remembering how he held me still and kissed my lips softly, whispering, “Good girl,” into my mouth.
“Look at you,” he croons “You were made for this.”
Dante runs his tongue over my neck, sinking his teeth into the curve of my neck where my shoulder meets, marking me again.
My ass stings from where Dante’s palm left me red and begging for him to fuck me.
The pain is sensuous and erotic, and my eyes droop heavily from the sensations that’ve made my clit swollen and desperate.
Dante reaches down between my legs, rubbing his large hand on the inside of my thigh, close to where all my need has pooled.
A moan rips from my throat, my hands pulling against where I’m strung up. Thick black leather cuffs have my wrists bound together and locked in above my head.
I’m helpless and at his mercy.
Who am I kidding? I was at his mercy the moment he laid eyes on me.
“I promised you a reward,” he murmurs, as his mouth travels down my body, “but I’m selfish, so this is as much for you as it is for me.”
Dante reaches above my head and unlatches my wrists, my arms falling heavily to my sides as my chest still heaves from the teasing he’s been inflicting over the last hour.
His strong hands grip my waist, hurling me into the air and over his shoulder like a rag doll. I squeal and laugh loudly as he walks his naked frame over to the bed in his room.
My tongue traces the symbols inked on his back before being jerked back over his shoulder into his strong arms. He’s holding me like a man holds his bride, except this man is looking at me like I’m his dinner.
“Don’t. Fucking. Move.” He growls, curling me like a barbell, with his muscled arms, bringing my pussy directly to his face and diving in.
A breath leaves my body as the memory dissipates from my mind like a slow, delicious burn. Damn. The memory of him leaves me almost as flustered as the man himself.
“Jesus,” I say to myself. “Get it together, Sarah.” I squeeze my thighs together.
I pick up the phone receiver and punch in the voicemail number to check to see if a message was left.
Nothing.
It was probably just a wrong number.
I look at the clock. Seeing it’s 1:00 a.m., I give my head a little shake, trying to refocus on the file in front of me, but it feels impossible. Between not sleeping and overworking, I’m exhausted.
Closing the portfolio I was trying to read, I sink back into my chair and close my eyes for a moment to let them rest.
I can feel myself drifting, my eyelids impossibly heavy. There’s no way I could open them now if I tried. My breathing begins to slow, so I take a deep breath in and let out the tiredness that’s settled into my bones.
The small hum that comes from the minifridge next to my desk acts like a sound machine, coaxing me into sleep.
I’m not sure how long I’ve been dozing, so when my eyes shoot open, my mind takes a minute to catch up. Somebody slammed a door.
I sit in the silence second-guessing myself, stock-still and waiting for another sound.
Another loud bang echoes through the room, and my spine straightens, the tiny hairs on my neck standing on end as I hold my breath.
What the fuck? Someone’s here.
My mouth opens to call out, but I close it just as quickly, hearing shuffling and a deep thud vibrate through the walls.
Get
up, Sarah, my mind urges.
Thoughts begin filling the gaps left by fear, willing my feet to move as I scramble from my chair and make my way to the slightly ajar office door.
Who the hell could be here? Nobody that’s supposed to be.
My eyes shoot to the clock, seeing it says 2:00 a.m. Shit. I need to stay calm. Stay fucking calm. But I have every right to be afraid.
Nothing good happens in the middle of the night. Nothing.
I slowly push the door closed, twisting the handle so that the lock doesn’t make a clicking sound, and flick the already dim light off in my office. With my back pressed against the wall, I think of all the scenarios that could happen.
None of them end with me making a new friend.
Whoever just busted in the door isn’t here with any kind of good intention.
I start to slowly walk in the darkness of my office, familiar with the layout, as my eyes adjust to the blackness. The clanging of metal on metal has me holding my breath again, freezing in place.
They’re in the prep kitchen. It’s an empty space about twenty feet from my office used as a setup for caterers when we have parties.
And where we have knives.
I need a weapon.
Damn, my gun’s in the bottom drawer with my phone. Fuck.
My mind starts to reason with me, rationalizing the threat. Maybe it’s a homeless guy looking for food?
Chicago winters tend to make people on the streets pretty damn desperate, and now that we’re at the beginning of December, it seems reasonable…maybe.
I can handle this. I can scare him off. That’s all this is.
I begin to walk again, feeling for the desk and guiding my way around it. Jesus, my pulse is thrumming so fast I’m almost scared it can be heard. Rounding the desk, I squat down, running my hands over the drawer handles until I find the one I need.
The drawer opens smoothly without a sound, something I’m grateful for, and I reach inside and pull the loaded Glock from where it’s hidden along with my cell.
Pushing the button on my phone, I wait for the screen to light up. I’ll call for help and hole up in here until it arrives. It’s going to be okay, and if I have to, I’ll take care of myself.
I’ve done it before. I can do it again.
Depraved Page 2
