by Lexi Blake
“Anger, no. She can express that readily. Hurt? Vulnerability? Those are different. You’re a good guy, Will. You recently came off a bad relationship.”
“If by bad you mean she tried to set me up for murder, then yes, it was bad.” It still sat in his gut. How stupid he’d been. Naïve and foolish. He didn’t want Bridget to ever find out how dumb he’d been.
“You’ve still got a lot of anger and I don’t want you taking it out on Bridget,” Kai explained. “She seems like an easy target because she’s so prickly, but underneath she’s quite soft. You know she’s the black sheep of her family, right?”
She never talked about her family from what he could tell. “Why?”
“I think it has something to do with her chosen profession.”
The sex books. Her father was probably a stick in the mud and didn’t like that his daughter wrote sex for a living. “Her father is a public figure. I’m sure having a daughter who writes porn is a liability.”
Kai’s eyes widened. “Do not call it that if you want to hold on to your balls.”
“Porn?” What else was he supposed to call it? Girl porn?
“Yeah, they take offense,” Kai said. “Read her books. If you want to know who she is, read one of her books. I don’t think you’ll call it porn then. And you might have some more sympathy for her.”
He hated feeling restless and that was what this whole conversation was doing to him. The last thing he wanted to do was cause Bridget harm. “You really think having a short-term affair will hurt her?”
Kai nodded. “I think she needs more.”
“All right.” He wasn’t a bad guy, but he had to be better. “I’ll find her a date. Any way you could go to Hawaii next week?”
“I would love to. I genuinely like Bridget, but I’m not ready for a relationship either so I’ll keep my hands off her. I think you’re doing the right thing, Will. Give it some time and you’ll find the other side. You’ll come out of this and you’ll be ready for something real.”
The door opened and Will turned, ready to see Taggart or McKay.
“Will?” Bridget put a hand over her eyes, obviously adjusting to the bright light of the afternoon.
She was here. She was standing there in a white shirt and jeans and those strappy sandals she liked to wear. Her dark hair was loose and flowing.
He was a good man. He always did the right thing. He stood up. “Hey, I’m glad you’re here.”
He trusted Kai. Kai knew what he was talking about. When Starr had called two nights before, there had been rage in his gut at the very thought of her. He wasn’t in a place to give Bridget a fair shake. She needed someone who she might have a shot with. The very fact that it had run through his head that a woman didn’t give a damn about anything but sex was proof positive he wasn’t thinking straight.
She brushed her hair back and seemed to steel herself. “I tried calling you. For a guy with two phones, you don’t answer a lot.”
“It’s in the locker. I was playing basketball. Keeping your phone in your pocket is a very good way to destroy it. Despite what Taggart will tell you, McKay hits pretty hard.” He was putting off the inevitable. He didn’t want to break it off. When he told her he was letting her go, she would retreat. She wouldn’t brush it off and tell them they could be friends.
He didn’t want to be her friend. Damn it. He hated being a good fucking person in that moment.
Of course, it likely wouldn’t matter because from the grim look on her face, she’d come to give him her answer.
“Well, I probably should tell you this in person.”
Getting rejected sucked even when he’d been about to reject her in the first place. He hadn’t realized how much he’d counted on her saying yes to him. Since the moment he’d seen her, he’d plotted and planned on having her, and now that restless feeling threatened to take over. He would have to throw himself into work, but he’d taken all that time off. Still, letting her off the hook was the right thing to do. “You don’t have to say it.”
He would let Kai take care of her, and she would have a good time. She wouldn’t get any orgasms out of Kai, and Kai would likely only talk to her about the lifestyle in an academic fashion. He wouldn’t tie her up so she would know what it felt like to take her Dom’s cock up her ass.
Damn it. He was fucking hard again, and masturbating was a poor substitute for the real thing.
She closed her eyes, and her shoulders came up around her ears. “Yes.”
Well, he’d known it. “I was talking to Kai and we thought…” What? “Yes?”
Kai stood. “Bridget, Will and I have been talking.”
“About how great it’s going to be to go to Hawaii,” he said quickly. She said yes. Yes. She’d said yes to him even knowing what the boundaries of the relationship were.
“What happened to being a good person?” Kai asked under his breath.
Good people apparently didn’t get inside Bridget. His cock had heard the word yes and his conscience had become an unnecessary thing. She’d said yes.
He was going to be her Dom.
He moved into her space, a lightness he hadn’t felt in forever taking over. Thinking of nothing but getting close to her, he wrapped his arms around her and lifted her up, hauling her close as he pressed his lips to hers. “You said yes.”
Her arms found their way around his neck, and she smiled the first pure smile he’d seen from her. It was joyous, without the edge of cynicism that seemed to accompany everything she did. He’d put that smile on her face.
“I said yes, but I thought you would be cleaner,” she said, wrinkling her nose. She didn’t push him away though. She seemed perfectly content to dangle in his arms.
“Don’t worry about that, baby. According to Taggart, it’s just a little manly sweat and I promise to shower before tonight.” He kissed her again, lightly with no real intent but showing her affection.
He had time with her.
“Tonight?”
“Dinner. My place. We have a contract to write.” The minute her signature was on that sucker, he would be all over her. Not that he wasn’t already. He finally put her down, but kept his hands on her waist, unwilling to give up contact.
Her eyes lit up. “I have a hundred questions about contracts. Do you have a standard? Or do you write a new one each time? Will we be going over hard and soft limits? When I joined Sanctum, I had to sign a contract. Will it be like that one?”
Being in a relationship with a writer was going to be different. Bridget was full of an infectious curiosity. Her enthusiasm flowed into him, and something that seemed boring and formal might be fun. Starr hadn’t asked a single question about their contract. She’d signed and then spread her legs and he’d thought that meant she loved him.
He stopped himself because he wasn’t going there. Kai was wrong. He wasn’t trying to take out his anger on Bridget. It was pure lust and she’d said yes. Besides, he had something to give her. He had knowledge. “I’ll answer every question you have. I’m your Dom for the next couple of weeks and I promise I’ll be an open book when it comes to the lifestyle. We’ll play and you’ll get lots of material for your books.”
She blushed, a pretty pink staining her cheeks. “Okay. I’ll see you tonight.”
He watched her walk away, a hunger deep in his gut. He couldn’t remember being so fucking hungry.
“So, you decided to go a different way.” Kai was looking up at him with judgmental eyes. “I take it that was an argument between your conscience and your penis, and your penis seems to have won.”
“What can I say, Doc? My penis made a logical argument.” He stared at the door and couldn’t stop thinking about the evening to come.
Chapter Four
It was surreal, but she was staring at a contract that had been written for her. A real live D/s contract with her name on it. It was different from the training contract she’d signed when she’d been allowed into Sanctum because there was another name fille
d in.
William Christopher Daley. Her Dom.
Damn it. She had to stop thinking that way. He wasn’t hers. Except he kind of was for the next few weeks. He was hers and he’d written in a couple of lines about monogamy. For the duration of their relationship, they would only sleep together.
Could she really sleep with him? It wasn’t that she didn’t want to. She totally wanted to. She simply wasn’t entirely sure it was a good idea.
She glanced over to where he stood finishing up the dishes. He’d cooked for her, grilling steaks out by the condo pool before bringing her inside for a very cozy dinner where they talked about innocuous things. He told her about his job. She talked about how she’d met her friends. At the end of the meal, he’d given her the contract and told her to read it while he cleaned up. She’d stared at the pages, the words familiar but meaningless since her brain was on the man who wrote them.
They were so different. He could cook. She could barely heat water. She didn’t even drink coffee because she found the machines irritating to deal with. He was obviously neat and perfectly organized. She was usually a bit of a mess, her walls peppered with sticky post-it notes containing plot ideas and reminders about her schedule. How could this work?
“Do you have a question about the contract?” He closed the dishwasher door and walked back into his super-neat living room.
He sat down across from her on the love seat and she struggled to form a coherent sentence.
“Do you use the same contract every time?” There. That was semi intelligent.
“I’ve only signed three contracts. The two prior to this one came before I joined Sanctum. That is a standard Sanctum contract with revisions specifically for the two of us. When I was allowed my membership, I was also allowed use of the contract and the checklists Ian and Alex developed. I keep it on my computer where I do the revisions, and once you’ve signed it, I’ll scan it in and send it back to Ryan. He runs Sanctum for Ian. He keeps a copy of all the contracts. Should we go over your limits?”
The list of hard and soft limits that would let Will know what he could and couldn’t do to her. Like flogging and spanking and anal play.
She wrote a lot about anal play, but she’d never cared for it. The one time she’d tried it, it hurt. But she had to wonder if it would be different with a Dom. “I already filled it out.”
She’d read the contract. At the end of the day it was simply a document that stated the obvious. She and Will would have sex and she could say no at any time. He could punish her for infractions, but all she had to do to stop it was to use her safe word. He could dominate her but only as long as she let him. It was a consensual relationship but with everything on paper and with a definite time limit.
She picked up the pen and signed the document, handing it back to him.
He took it and laid it aside. “Tell me about your prior relationships.”
She frowned. “What about them?”
His brow arched in a way that let her know he was annoyed. “Polite is going to work so much better with me, sweetness. And I would prefer a ‘Sir’ when you ask me a question or answer one of mine. It’s in the contract.”
Crap. She hadn’t meant to be rude. “Sorry. Sometimes I think my voice comes off as impolite. I wasn’t trying to be rude. I was surprised by the question.”
His brow rose higher.
“Sir.” That shouldn’t be so hard to remember.
“I wanted to know about your prior boyfriends. From what I understand, you’ve never had a D/s relationship.”
“Though I do play a sub on TV.” Well, she wrote about them.
His lips curved faintly. “I’m serious, Bridget.”
That was apparent. He really had that Dommy vibe happening. From the moment he’d let her in his condo, he’d kind of oozed authority. He always seemed in control, but tonight all that willpower was focused on her, and it made her both uncomfortable and a little hot. A lot hot. Her nipples might chafe if they didn’t go down soon.
What should she say about her former loves? “They kind of sucked. The relationships that is. I haven’t had a ton.”
“Of men you would call boyfriends?”
Of men at all, but she nodded anyway. “I had a boyfriend in high school, but he was approved of by my father so I didn’t sleep with him.”
“Why were you with him if you weren’t attracted to him?”
“It was easier than fighting. I needed to keep the peace at home for Amy’s sake. There were events to go to that I needed a date for and Nick obliged. We were only friends, but we told people we were dating.”
“So you didn’t have a real boyfriend at all during high school?”
This was starting to sound like a counseling session, but she was willing to go with it. “No. I didn’t fit in at my school. It was a prep school and I always felt out of place. I liked Nick because he didn’t fit either. But his father was my dad’s lawyer so he was acceptable. No. I didn’t have a boyfriend until college and he was unacceptable to say the least.”
“Did you care for him?” Will’s question sounded more academic than emotional.
“Did I love him? I don’t know. I thought so at the time. There was definite lust going on. He was a bad boy on a motorcycle. He was a bartender at this dive off campus. Tall, dark, and handsome. I was crazy about him. Right up until we actually slept together and I realized he didn’t believe in anything but getting off as quickly as possible.”
“You lost your virginity to this man?” He was so serious, as though he was trying to figure her out.
He should know how simple it had been. “Boy, really. I did. It was awkward and painful, but I thought it would get better. I was with him for about six months and then I found him with one of the waitresses at the bar. But not before I overheard him telling his real girlfriend that I was good for extra cash.”
“That must have made you angry.”
To say the least. “I spray-painted his motorcycle pink. He wasn’t thrilled, but I couldn’t care less. I was alone for a while then. I dated some, but I didn’t have a serious relationship until Benjy. I lived with him for five years until I finally realized he didn’t give a damn about me except that I paid the rent and he could follow his bliss. He was an actor for a while and then he decided to play drums in a band. Yeah, that was successful. Screaming for Georgia. I still don’t know what that means. He either really liked Georgia or really hated it. Or maybe Georgia was a girl. People name their kids Georgia, right?”
He utterly ignored her musings. “How did you come to the conclusion he didn’t care about you the way he should?”
“Uhm, I ended up in the hospital and he didn’t even bother to show up. I don’t think he even realized I was there for a few days. I would have had to take a cab home except Chris stayed with me the whole time.”
“What were you in the hospital for?” His eyes had narrowed, leaving him looking like a gorgeous hawk scenting prey.
She didn’t want to talk about it. She didn’t want to talk about that day Serena’s ex-husband almost killed her. “It was nothing. A minor incident, but he should have been there.”
“It wasn’t minor if you were there a few days.”
She shrugged. “The point is I knew he wasn’t really in love with me. Especially since I later discovered he’d spent the entire time I was in the hospital with his girlfriend. He was hanging around because I would pay for stuff. Story of my life. How about you? When was the last time you were in love?”
His dark head shook. “I don’t like that word so I don’t use it. I’ve never been in love. My last relationship was with a woman who was using me as well. Something we have in common.”
She should have known a man as seemingly distant as Will wouldn’t like the word love. Again, the story of her life. “That’s not a good thing to have in common. I think hobbies and a shared love of classical music are more like what we’re supposed to look for.”
“I don’t like classical music. I
find it annoying.”
“Really? More of a rock guy?” She loved the way his face flushed slightly. He would be so much fun to tease. “Country. Oh, you’re a country boy.”
“I grew up with it,” he conceded. “Why don’t you come sit in my lap?”
“Because I have a perfectly good seat where I am.” She couldn’t help it. It kind of popped out of her mouth. Sarcasm was her default state.
“This isn’t going to work if you won’t touch me. Now tell me why you don’t want to sit in my lap.”
She did actually. She wanted to cuddle against him. “I don’t know. You don’t seem like the type who likes to snuggle.”
He thought about that for a moment. “I need affection as much as the next person. And honestly I could say the same of you. You have a hard wall around you. You don’t seem like the type of woman who gives affection at all. I suppose I wanted to see if I was wrong.”
“I’m affectionate.” She was with her friends. She wasn’t the type of woman who randomly hugged a stranger. That was more Serena and her friend Avery’s specialty. They would find a strange woman crying in the bathroom and suddenly they were her besties while Bridget felt uncomfortable and kind of wanted to leave. When she was upset, she wanted privacy and it seemed best to give others the same.
“You shook hands with Mitch after he flogged you,” Will pointed out.
Yes, that had been the slightest bit awkward. “I guess I didn’t know protocol for thanking a Dom.”
“It depends on the Dom. I would want more than a handshake. I would want you to kiss me. Now I want you to sit on my lap.”
Damn it. She was going to do it even if she felt like an idiot. She’d pretty much told this man she would have sex with him. Not pretty much. Had. How was she going to sleep with the man if she didn’t touch him? “I’m a little heavy.”
His voice was suddenly hard as granite. “Don’t even start that shit with me. I don’t want to hear what you don’t like about yourself. Either get in my lap or we can call it a night and start over again tomorrow.”
