by Chloe Liese
Zed’s mouth twisted as if I’d irritated him. Like he’d wanted to catch me unawares.
“Good.” He swiveled his seat—a habit of his apparently—and I imagined his thighs flexing as he did. A rush of arousal flooded my knickers. “That’s all we need then, unless anybody has anything else?”
Somebody did, of course. I tried to focus on the papers, flipping through my portion to triple check it was exactly how I wanted it, while one of the older fellows blathered on about the socioeconomic writeup. I felt Zed watching me and glanced up to meet his gaze. He didn’t blink, eyes locked on me as he answered his coworker.
Too intense. I looked away first, gaze down on the proposal once more. Papers shuffled and chairs scraped as people filed out. I tried to be as nondescript as possible and blend in with the exodus, but failed.
“Ms. MacGregor.” His voice had an edge that made it impossible not to stop and turn his way.
“Mr. Salvatore.”
He leaned in, palms splayed on the table, staring into me. “Have dinner with me tonight.”
I laughed. Loudly. His face didn’t change, but for his striking eyes that blinked slowly like an unamused jungle cat.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because you’re a foodie. And I know all of Boston’s best kept culinary secrets. You won’t be disappointed.”
I clicked on the brakes and folded my arms. “You know nothing about me. Why would you—”
“I know what you taste like. I know that you’re freakishly smart and you’ve got a body that I can’t stop thinking about fucking. That you liked when I kissed you. That’s enough to start.”
My swallow echoed in the room. “I don’t think it’s wise. We’re not well-suited.”
Not what the pheromones say.
Sod off to the fucking pheromones. We were terrible for each other.
He pushed off the table, stalked toward me. Pressed a hand on each of my push rims and slid his nose along my jaw. “Bullshit.”
I was throbbing and I couldn’t breathe right. This wasn’t sane. And it wasn’t simple neurochemistry at work. It was something infinitely more complex, more dangerous.
“We’re pheromonally compatible,” I conceded. “But that’s the extent of it. We’re going to kill each other if we try to have a civilized conversation.”
“Who said anything about conversation?” He was teasing. His lips whispered against my neck and heat danced over my skin.
“I did. I don’t eat in silence.” I breathed in unsteadily. “You’re European, signore. You understand. The meal is…well, it’s an important part of the day.”
One faint kiss against my skin and I gasped. He stood before I could formulate words. “Okay then, it’s decided. We’ll take our time, eat, and I’ll make you come.”
I shook my head. “I didn’t agree to any of it.”
“Seven o’clock, unless that’s too late.”
I frowned.
He stood back. Eyed me analytically. “You’re an early bird. Six, then. I’ll pick you up.”
I rubbed my face, warring with myself. New Nairne should turn him down and seal the breach he’d created. But Old Nairne reared her fiery head and loved the fresh air and vitality his persistence ushered in.
I meant to say no but instead I said, “You don’t even know where I live.”
He laughed. “You obviously don’t know enough about me, fragolina. Do some Googling. You’ll be glad you did. And keep your phone on you this afternoon.”
He swept up his messenger bag and strode toward the door. I was about to tell him he didn’t have my number either but thought better of it. Obviously, he did. Or he would. The man had resources and a frightening in on personal information.
“This afternoon?” I asked. “What for?”
He paused at the door. “If I tell you that, it ruins the fun. Six o’clock, MacGregor.”
The door slammed behind him and I sank in my chair. “For fuck’s sake.”
As promised, he’d made use of my mobile.
Zed: Dress for upscale but not fine dining.
Blouse and jeans is what you’re getting, Salvatore.
Zed: No jeans, MacGregor.
Leggings then?
Zed: I’ll clarify. No denim. No pants. Dress or skirt.
“High-handed twat.” I folded my mobile shut and squirmed in my seat. He talked like he expected obedience. Well, he was in for a treat then. I smoothed my pleated skirt that ran midcalf and cuffed my jean jacket. I wasn’t wearing denim on my legs, but I was wearing it somewhere. Bastard needed to be put in his place.
My quiet little neighborhood of Brookline was growing still with the evening. I waited outside the front door of my flat, watching the sun set over Amory Woods. Burnished gold kissed a horizon of fading leaves and whispered the promise of change.
When I’d left Europe, I knew I couldn’t live somewhere without seasons. I needed frozen earth, fiery autumns, lush summers, and blue-sky springs. Surroundings that spoke to seasons of existence. My new life’s unfolding felt somehow tied to this wooded sanctuary and its changing beauty.
I’d come here fresh off a winter’s months of agony and surgeries, to a spring of relearning the most fundamental aspects of autonomous living. Then my summer, killing university, loving my career trajectory, seeing the fruit of my future ripen from the shit of my past. Now fall, the time to harvest all I’d worked for and earned.
Amidst all that was good, I still grieved sometimes, even as I took actual steps toward my old body’s ability. Even if I walked independently one day, it would never be the same. I would never be the same. I could amble a short distance. Feel heat and pressure. Managed not to piss myself most days, and I could crawl across a room. Progress, they said. It’s monumental progress.
Fuck progress. I wanted my legs in a dead sprint. I wanted my old body tearing up the pitch. My body had broken. That had been hard to accept. But at some point, I had to see the value in who I was from here on out, pressurized by the carbon of circumstance, the tensile wonder of steel. I was sheer bloody strength. I’d been broken but now I felt unbreakable.
A black Ferrari ripped through the twilight and slowed to a quiet purr in front of me. When Zed got out and circled the car, my hands went white around my push rims. Tensile. I was strong and agile. I could handle him.
He sighed as he took in my presence. “What part of ‘I’ll call you to come out when I’m here’ did you miss?”
Maybe not. My palm already itched to slap him.
“None.” I moved forward and bumped his shins on purpose. “I like watching sunsets. And I don’t like being told what to do.”
His mouth pursed and he glared at me. “That much is obvious. Despite your best efforts to irritate me, you look lovely.”
I brushed lint off my jean jacket and smiled. “Thanks.” He stood tall and straight. Dark jeans—the hypocrite—slate button up, black blazer. My mouth went dry. “So do you. Especially the denim.”
He opened my door without taking his eyes off me. “Come on, wiseass. Let’s go.”
I transferred over, pulled my legs in, and reached for my wheelchair, but it was up in his arms already, one tire being popped off.
“How did you…?” He disassembled it faster than I did.
“There’s this thing called the internet. I looked it up.” He tucked my chair in the bonnet and dropped into the driver’s side. “Speaking of, did you do your homework, too?”
The engine roared to life and a rush of adrenaline flooded my system. I loved a fast ride. My little hand-controlled car was a sad replacement for what I’d driven in Paris.
“I did.” He didn’t need to know I’d already looked him up weeks ago, though today’s search had uncovered some new gems of information. “Quite the world you hail from. I’d never heard of the Winter Hill Gang before. Who knew the Irish and Italians could get along so well?”
Zed laughed. “My parents.”
I stared at him in profile. Long nose with
a bump on the bridge that tipped his appearance from refined into rugged. Lips that weren’t too full. Dark, thick lashes. Cheekbones with a drop-off sharper than the bluffs back in Scotland. He smelled like some kind of sexy soap and rain again, and I wanted to lean into him like a hot bath.
“The politics of your life must be complex.” That was understating it. I’d read everything from conspiracy theories that he led his family’s territory of the New England Mafia, to op-eds about his golden image public service, and everything in between. He held an edge of danger, but when I was around him, I never sensed evil. Danger was one thing—the potential to do violence, the ability to enact harm. But the impulse for it? The blackness in a soul to violate the soul of another? My instinct said he didn’t have it. And since the Dark Days, my whole debacle with a psychopathic man in Europe, I had a pretty keen radar for these things.
He glanced my way, then back to the road. His body was forever calm, no movement undeliberate. A jungle cat, shoulders rolling as it stalks through the grass. “They are. I’ve figured it out fine, though.”
I stared at him. “You don’t seem to court danger. Everything about you is above board. At least that’s appearances.”
Zed smirked and drove us toward the harbor. “I’ll say this. My path’s a little sticky, and sometimes there’s more to circumstances than meet the eye. Now, what about you? Why are you here?”
My fingers laced together while I stared out the window. “MIT’s the best for my studies. And I needed out of Europe for a while.” Another understatement. I’d fled the place, and the Dark Days were the last thing I wanted to talk about.
His fingers drummed the steering wheel and he stared intensely at the road, like it might give him the information I hadn’t. We stopped in front of some place where the scent of wine and herbs infused the air. My stomach growled.
He smiled as he pulled the keys out of the ignition. “You approve then.”
I went to smack his arm, but he caught my hand and interlaced our fingers. The restaurant door opened, and light poured out abruptly like the flash of a camera.
“Will there be press?” I hadn’t even ticked off my usual list of worries as we drove here. The man was a PR hot commodity. Of course, there’d be press.
“Would it matter?” His thumb dragged along my palm and I wanted that touch elsewhere. Further south where I ached, since he’d ripped open my self-containment.
“A little. I don’t like paparazzi. Had a bad experience when I lived in France.” I tried to withdraw my hand.
He frowned. Squeezed it tightly. “This place is off their radar. It’s one of the reasons I chose it. You’re safe here. Whenever you’re with me, don’t doubt that.”
He let go of my hand and threw open the door. Tossed the valet his keys and popped open the bonnet. He promised safety like he had control over the indiscriminate forces of life. Like he could shield me from whatever might come. He was arrogant and his pledge was preposterous. I shouldn’t even entertain believing him.
For some odd reason, I wished I could.
Ten
Zed
Her eyes caught candlelight like gemstones. Jade. Emerald. Glittering dark. She drank her whiskey and hummed while she scanned the menu. We needed to talk about her body’s mechanics, because I’d told myself I wasn’t touching her until I knew more, and I couldn’t go much longer without contact.
“I ordered ahead,” I said. “Prix Fixe.”
She glanced up at me. “You just ordered without my input? What if I don’t like what you chose?”
I shifted in my seat until our knees knocked. Better. “Without your input, yes. But I certainly considered what I thought you’d like.”
She stared at me like I’d told her the moon was purple.
“Humor me,” I said. “Try what I picked, and we can go from there.”
Her head tilted to the side. “Are you…are you always like this?”
“Like what?” My jaw clenched as I braced myself for her contempt.
She leaned her elbows on the table. “Controlling doesn’t seem adequate.” Her tone was observational. Curious. A scientist poking around her environment. Judgment suspended, for now.
I picked up my wine and spoke into the glass. “Dominant.”
She froze, then leaned closer. “I’m sorry, what did you say?”
Even the littlest things that obeyed my need for order and regularity satisfied me. It scratched an itch, setting the base of the glass on its circular imprint on the tablecloth. “You heard me.”
She glanced around and dropped her voice. “Like whips and chains and—”
“You don’t have to whisper. This place is safe. And no. I don’t need props or any of that bullshit. I can use them, but they’re not necessary. It’s more about the lifestyle.”
She swallowed. “You’re a sadist?”
“No.” I drummed my fingers on the table and looked her over. “I tend to fuck rough, but I don’t want to hurt you. What I need is control. That’s it, really.”
Nairne’s eyes went to the ceiling as she threw back the rest of her whiskey. “That’s it really,” she muttered. “You’ve got to be joking me. Do I look like controllable material?”
“Not one fucking bit, which is why you’re presenting a real problem for me.” I leaned an elbow on the table and slid my other hand beneath it, up her skirt. So much for having a talk before I touched her. She was too tempting. I knew she wouldn’t speak freely here, so I did things old school—read her as I went.
Her eyes shut and then blinked slowly open. She liked it. My hand went higher and grasped her lean thigh. Her skin was impossibly smooth. Touching her made my cock stone.
“What’s the problem?” Her voice had gotten fainter. Smokier. Aroused.
“I have to have you, Nairne. And you want me, too.” She didn’t even bother denying it this time, which was nice. “But you’re the antithesis of what works in my life.”
I watched her throat as she swallowed again, and imagined how it would feel to clasp her windpipe, drill into her with those long legs draped over my shoulders.
“Then why do you want me?” She shifted her leg slightly so that my thumb grazed the edge of her panties. Even while surrendering herself, she vied for control. Topping from the bottom. Saw that one coming from a mile away.
“I haven’t figured that out yet,” I admitted. “Neither have you.”
Her breath stuttered. “Meaning, this is a very bad idea,” she rasped.
I couldn’t stop staring at her lips.
“Pretty much. But against my better judgment, I’m taking you anyway.”
Her eyebrows lifted. “Taking me? As if I’m yours to possess.”
Dinner was set down and I kept my hand right where it was. I wasn’t dignifying her doubt with a spoken response. Nonverbals held more power.
I ate and drank one-handed, as she sat there devouring lapin a la cocotte and keeping the kind of composure no woman should have when a thumbnail stroked her clit over the fabric of her panties. Pure serenity, as I played with her in a trendy Provençale restaurant. She had to have some kind of kink to her. No straight-laced, vanilla woman would sit in public, silently, as she dissolved into a puddle of soaking arousal under my touch. Outside Henderson’s she’d said her response to me was anomalous—poor judgment, traitorous hormones. Anomalous, my ass.
I took a bite of food and chewed methodically. Swallowed. Sipped my wine. This had to be a dream. I touched her because I wanted to, but I’d been prepared for a war of words. Instead, this. I was baffled.
“Like it?” I asked.
She kept her eyes down and nodded. “Yes. You chose well, thank you.”
Eyes downcast. Composed. Like I wasn’t torturing her on the edge of orgasm.
The pad of my thumb increased its pressure and swept back and forth against her swollen little bud. I could do this all night. Like a fucking metronome. She was fascinatingly disciplined. Her panties went from politely damp to drenche
d and she bit her lip when I slipped my finger beneath the soft material. She felt incredible—bare and hot. Silken. Wet.
She chewed her bite and took a sip of water. When she set down the glass, I picked up my pace, making her arch forward. She hid it behind a gentle stretching of her neck. Left. Then right. Nothing else. She kept her eyes down on her food and her mouth shut. I expected a lot of things for trying a stunt like this on her, but her silence was not one of them.
Nella’s words echoed in my head. There’s something inside of her that fits with you, that makes sense.
Her cheeks grew flushed, and she couldn’t keep her breath steady anymore. Her fingers curled around the napkin as her eyes sunk closed. A deep inhale through her nose halted before it left her mouth in a silent rush of air.
She’d come right against my hand and hadn’t made a fucking sound. My cock was in hell, and my balls were so tight that sitting was torture. Her smile was a study in oxytocin release as she took another sip of water. I’d never seen a woman surrender and look so regal every second of the way.
“I think there’s something you’re not telling me,” I said. “You took that too well.”
She grinned and set down her glass. “I thought about telling you to piss off, but you know what the hell you’re doing. I figured I’d rather enjoy myself.”
I brought my thumb to my mouth and sucked her juice. Tasted the honey tang of her cunt. I could have come just from that.
Her eyes widened and her cheeks grew darker as she watched me.
“Enjoyment’s the whole point, Nairne. Yours. Mine. That’s it right there.”
“That so?” She cleared her throat and set her silverware down. “Can’t say that’s what I’ve gleaned from the reputation of the lifestyle.”
I tossed my napkin over my plate and sat back. “That’s because you’ve probably never met someone who’s actually in it.”
“Like you.”
“Like me, yes.”
Her eyes narrowed and she folded her arms. “What’s wrong with just being with me the…normal way? Getting to know each other. Regular sex.”
