His Little Black Book

by Thea Devine

  When he wasn’t there, she exercised, read, watched TV, shopped, and went to museums, always notifying him where she would be just in case he stopped in. Just in case he needed that five-minute respite for release.

  She supposed that his intensive surveillance was just a precaution; he was protecting himself and his investment. It amused her to think that their sex time was an investment for him. And that he felt he had to ensure that another man wouldn’t try to claim her or even put a sexual move on her.

  “God, Nipples, if they ever knew what was under your clothes…I can’t take that chance.”

  She never could convince him that the thought of his sex drove any other man right out of her mind. She could endure almost anything for the pleasure he gave her, for the pure erotic thrill of his existence in her life.

  Sometimes she thought she was in love with his manhood. Often, it struck her she really was living the mistress life.

  She talked to Delia sometimes, but not often to MJ. MJ was cloistered with her Harold, wholly immersed in and insane about him, and not willing to go into detail about their sex life.

  MJ said only that they had sex often. He treated her right, not like that freak who’d almost destroyed her life. Harold was amazing, strong, deliciously demanding, and totally loving.

  She didn’t tell them that Harold was every bit as controlling as Dallan, only he was a master at it. She was deeply in love with everything he did to her, but she couldn’t admit that either—or that her world revolved entirely around the moment he would arrive at the apartment and dominate her. She loved him and she didn’t care what anyone might think or say.

  Delia was practical enough to know that there wasn’t much she could do about it. MJ would have to just work the thing out herself. If she crashed—well, Brooke had wisely kept her apartment for just such emergencies.

  Not that Delia needed looking out for. Sonny was a handful in every possible way, but she wasn’t deeply invested in him.

  And maybe that, more than anything else, kept him coming back: that he couldn’t quite get a handle on her, even with all the sex, all the erotic play, his cute little sex nicknames, his lavish gifts. She was still a little bit removed, as if she were enjoying it all from a distance.

  It was probably the best stance to take. Hadn’t Brooke cautioned them never to fall in love with these guys? Never waste your time on anything that doesn’t get you something in return. Be aloof, elusive, and mysterious. Have no expectations, and you will be given everything: apartment, allowance, clothes, jewelry.

  And now I’m a mistress of a powerful older man who can’t get enough of me. And I love having sex with him, and taking care of him.

  And that was enough…wasn’t it?…for now.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Another perk of being a mistress was that Brooke ate at the best restaurants. Actually, she ate from the best restaurants, because Thane always arrived with a catered dinner.

  The advantage of his bringing food was that he could get naked immediately. Although she really would have liked a night out, she understood that he couldn’t take his mistress out in public without attracting attention.

  But the isolated intimacy came with unexpected consequences. To her dismay, as fall verged into winter, she started wanting more and more of his time. She wanted him all the time, even though she’d always known that wasn’t possible.

  How had this happened? This was not proper Mistress Code. This was female hormone code, built into the DNA. The more he’s with me, the more he must want to be with me, just like I want to be with him.

  Shit. I hate this.

  Worse, he kept bringing gifts—lingerie, shoes, clothes—bribes, she thought, even as she swore that all she wanted was him.

  “You have all of me I can stuff into you,” he told her.

  “It’s not enough,” she whispered.

  “It is what it is,” he said callously. “And you waste fucking time even talking about it.” The worst thing was to waste fucking time.

  MISTRESS CODE ADDENDUM

  A mistresses does not complain.

  A mistress is grateful for every moment and twists herself into a pretzel, mentally and physically, to accommodate her lover.

  A mistress’s purpose is to please her lover and to never make demands.

  A mistress eliminates the words “when will you” from her vocabulary.

  As in, when will you come again? When will you have more time for me? When will you be available for the holidays?

  Oops. Banish the word “holiday”.

  Blast the Code.

  She called Delia. “What are you doing for Thanksgiving?”

  “Same as you, I guess.”

  “Then let’s get together and do a turkey. At the apartment.”

  “I’d rather eat out. And I was thinking that if Thane finds out you kept that place, he’ll absolutely believe you’re doing someone on the side.”

  “Damn, I never thought of that.”

  “Get it sublet, then. Something short term that won’t raise his suspicions.”

  “I’ll think about it. Anything from MJ? Should I call her?”

  “Call her. Harold must have family obligations on Thanksgiving, too.”

  But MJ wasn’t answering her cell. She was swimming in an orgasmic miasma, her body strapped in gold-studded leather, suspended from a ceiling harness with her legs spread apart and Harold naked, prone, and massively erect beneath her, fondling and stroking her wide-open cunt. “Ah, my Surrendra, there’s no one like you.”

  “No one like you,” she whispered. “Harold…Harold—” She was breathless with the need for penetration. “Please, Harold…”

  But he waited…and waited…and just when she thought she would never feel him inside her, he got to his feet, pulled her legs around his waist, and drove between her legs.

  It was so much better when her cleft was level with his hips. She loved that harness; with her legs spread so wide, it intensified every feeling. And she loved the bull-nosed way he took her. He had an unchained lust to drive as deep into her as a man could go. How could she not love that he wanted her body that much?

  By the time he was done with her, she felt boneless and sated, yet yearning for more of his rugged possession. And then he enjoyed standing there afterward, embedded in her, and she felt so connected, she really believed that if he removed himself, she would lose a vital part of herself.

  “I have a present for you,” he said when they were cleaned and dressed.

  “Oh, Harold.” He had been too generous already. “I can’t imagine anything I want more than you.”

  “I know that,” he said, handing her a wrapped box. “So this is for the times when I can’t be here to fuck you.”

  She opened the package and unwrapped the tissue to find…a penis. A pliant latex penis, the size and thickness of his. She held it up and gave him a dewy look. “Thank you, Harold.”

  “My pleasure, Surrendra. Would you like to insert my penis now? Let’s try it.”

  He washed it first, coated it with jelly, and then slowly prodded it between her legs. She gasped as it penetrated, shocked at how full she felt, how thick and realistic it was.

  “Wear it until I come back.” It wasn’t a playful suggestion; it was a command.

  She lowered her eyes. “Yes, Harold.”

  He was looking at the hunk of latex between her legs and getting visibly hard beneath his trousers, and she thought it was better that he hadn’t seen her satisfied smile.

  The thing Delia loved about being a mistress, besides the blow-away sex, was the fact she could indulge herself with all kinds of froufrou and see-through lingerie, satiny gowns that flowed and draped like water, and sexy little high-heeled mules, which she always wore when she was at home. Even though Sonny had her scheduled for only two days, he might walk in the door at any time of any day or night.

  She liked to have tidbits for him to nibble on before he nibbled on her, and she always stocked his fav
orite wines and beer because she liked taking care of him.

  She liked to be occupied, as well. Sonny must never think she was sitting around wishing he would come. That would be a deal breaker, if he believed that he was the center of everything for her.

  Delia understood perfectly that she had to have an inner life that had nothing to do with him, and she reveled in the fact that all this leisurely indulgent activity was interrupted for obscenely delicious sex.

  It was the best fantasy world ever. Delia never wanted it to end.

  Plus, her apartment was delightful. She kept plants on the terrace, she tried new recipes in the kitchen, she kept the place beautifully clean—and once in a while, she felt bored.

  But once a week, without her having to do a thing, groceries arrived from Dean and Deluca and fresh fruit and veggies from Citarella. This was sheer heaven. Who needed more than this?

  She didn’t need presents or tokens of affection, and he rarely brought them. But one day, he handed her a little box.

  “Sonny.” She put it aside, put her arms around him, and began kissing him. What was better than kissing him?

  “Go on, open it.”

  She was wearing a silk dressing gown so whisper thin that she might as well have been naked. She sat down, crossed her legs so that the hem fell back and her lower torso was bared, and opened it.

  Inside were a pair of heart charms dangling from three thin, interlocking wire circles. There were no posts—not earrings. She held one up. Gold, at any rate.

  “Sonny?”

  “Nipple adornments.”

  “Oh, Sonny…” she murmured as she shrugged out of the dressing gown, looked at him from under her lashes, and slipped one on.

  His body jolted. She slipped the second one over her other nipple.

  “Spread your legs right there, I’m coming in.” He ripped open his belt and pants, and ripped down his zipper as she purred, “It’s like a little Sonny caress on my tit.”

  He barreled between her legs, then lifted her against the wall.

  She wound herself around him, whispered sweet luscious things in his ear. He was so big, the nipple rings were so erotic, he was so generous, so filling…She knew everything erotic to say to a man like Sonny; every way to tweak and twist his earlobe, his mouth, his tongue, how to hold him and cradle him even as she was his erotic plaything, so irresistible that he couldn’t hold himself back.

  The nipple rings fell from her breasts as they sank onto the floor and kissed and coupled until morning.

  MJ did not join them for Thanksgiving dinner, which they had at the Union Square Café.

  “Why not?” Brooke had said. “Why not somewhere high profile, elegant, festive, and familylike. Even if it costs the earth.”

  Delia was worried about MJ.

  “You’re always worried about MJ. What is it about her?” Brooke asked.

  Delia hedged. “Can’t you guess?”

  Brooke raised her neatly plucked eyebrows. “She gets too needy?”

  “Think about that bastard Baines.”

  “He was just a shit. A controlling, freaky shit.”

  “Yeah, and?”

  Brooke’s expression sagged a little. “Oh. Don’t tell me—MJ wants a controlling shit to run her life?”

  “Pretty much,” Delia said. “And I guess she found one.”

  “At Maîtrise?”

  “It takes all kinds. I don’t think we’re talking hard-core S and M, and I’m praying this guy knows how to wield his power in a way that she won’t get hurt.”

  “She did say he might see her tonight.”

  “And might is the operative word. We live on operative words. Call you, hope, might, just in case, maybe I’ll come…you know the drill. He probably won’t come, but that’s the nature of that game: to hype her up so much that when he shows, she shows her gratitude in unimaginable ways.”

  Brooke held up her hand. “Please. My appetite.”

  “Well, let’s be candid here. How much do you give up for Thane, and how much do I give up for Sonny? Don’t they make demands? Aren’t there things they want that you’d never have done for anyone else?”

  “For itinerant sex? Never. But yeah, there are things…” Like the giant photographs of her nipples hanging over her bed—as if he was a teenager with a porn magazine, except his porn was in his bed and on the wall.

  “Right,” Delia agreed. “So who’s to say MJ’s things aren’t as valid as the things we do, in the interest of keeping the interest of the men who can afford anybody and anything they want.”

  “Yeah. I hadn’t thought of it like that.” We’re things…“But somehow it doesn’t ease your worry.”

  “Because MJ is obsessive about this secret. She thinks it’s aberrant, and she really believed there would never be anyone else who—”

  “Guess she was wrong.”

  “I hope she guessed right,” Delia said

  “Did we guess right?” Brooke looked around at the couples and families and the soft holiday ambience. “Are we going to be alone at Christmas, too?”

  “Uh-oh—something’s getting to you.”

  “Isn’t it you?”

  “Hell, no,” Delia said emphatically. “This is the best fantasy. He can come or go as he wants to, as long as I get the apartment and the perks. I don’t care if he can’t make the family holidays—I’m not family. I’m the holiday treat.”

  “That’s how I thought I’d feel about it, but now I’m not so sure.”

  The waiter interrupted them, setting down oval plates of turkey, trimmings, vegetables, and gravy.

  “Yum,” Delia murmured, digging in. “Okay, why aren’t you sure?”

  Brooke inhaled deeply. There was nothing like the aroma of turkey and stuffing. It was comfort food for her in a family that never offered any comfort. She had always spent Thanksgiving with her best friend, whose mother invited over the “abandoned” teens—the ones whose families were separated, in transit, in conflict.

  “Because sex begets wanting more sex. The more we have sex, the more I want. I just want it all the time. It goes against everything I ever believed. Totally not Mistress Code.”

  “You’re in love with his manhood.”

  “Shut up. No, I’m not.”

  They ate in silence for a bit.

  “You so are.”

  Brooke made a sound. “And you’re not—with Sonny’s, I mean?”

  “Better his man root than him. I’d be destroyed if I fell in love with him. No, a couple of nights of bed bumping are fine with me. Along with all the goodies.”

  “Okay, so I just have to train myself to look at it like poker night. Penis poker. And I’m the one who antes up.”

  “And it’s natural, on the holiday that reeks family and apple pie, that you’d feel like the shadow wife. Do you ever think about his other life?”

  “Do you?”

  Delia shook her head. “Honest to God, I’m fine with it. Like you said: Get what you can, while you can. Sonny’s willing to give, and I’m willing to get. It’s perfect for me—for now.”

  Brooke leapt on that. “You see? For now!”

  “You never thought it would be forever, either.”

  Brooke looked at her. “I wonder if the families know.”

  “Please—they have to. Their husbands have a regular excuse to be away from home two nights a week? What else could it be?”

  “I sometimes think they’re skulking around spying on us. If they’re not, they should be.”

  “And I think it’s just the opposite—that the Mistress Club is set up to guarantee the family never gets a whiff of what they’re doing. These guys cover their tracks like a blizzard. Vanessa is the lion at the gate; there’s no way anyone gets past her. You worry way more than I do.”

  “Of course I do; I’m contingency girl. I want that escape route ready when this whole mistress thing explodes in my face.”

  Brooke disliked those huge nipple photos, but there they stayed, affixed
to the headboard. They drove her nuts because she had to look at them, too.

  But how did you tell your lover that you didn’t like him looking at pictures of your nipples?

  You didn’t. Humoring him was part of the price. Whatever Thane wanted, he got. Even pictures to carry around with him.

  “I want those nipples erect for me every minute.”

  “That’s impossible; they get irritated. They need a break because you never give them a rest.”

  “Thank God I have pictures. They’re always hard in the pictures. I’ll just fondle the pictures instead of your nipples.”

  He was incessant about her nipples, even when he was mounted and rocking deep inside her. Sometimes she didn’t know what more she could give him. Sometimes she wondered if he was getting enough.

  Was he getting bored? Restless? Nothing had changed. But she kept wanting more, and then she started thinking that maybe tomorrow this whole thing could come to an end altogether.

  Maybe—maybe—maybe—

  A mistress’s life was all about maybes and questions, all keeping her off balance, every answer an unknown.

  MJ had discovered one thing about wearing a latex penis: You had to be naked. It didn’t work if you were clothed, or even erotically dressed.

  But you didn’t need anything else except a man’s length to fill that heat between your legs. She was loving that sensation maybe even more than Harold had intended.

  My little secret…

  She loved it too much. She was curled up in a chair, just enjoying the thick, filling feel of it, and the way her nipples tightened with arousal and her whole body felt thick with erotic heat.

  “So, you’re enjoying the penis.”

  She jolted out of her erotic reverie. “Harold!”

  “Harold’s been good to you while I’ve been gone.”

  Why did he seem displeased? A little spunk is needed here, she thought.

  “Harold is exactly where you decreed he should be.”

  He shrugged out of his jacket. “I did, didn’t I? Is he as good?”