Hard Justice: The Asylum Fight Club Book 3

by Bianca Sommerland

  “Mmm, that sounds nice.” Jamie shivered, leaning into Noah as they headed toward the porch. “And it looks like she’s got the fireplace going. That and a dozen blankets and I might thaw out in time for bed.”

  “I hope so.” Noah leaned over, grazing his lips over the curve of Jamie’s ear. “Your cold feet aren’t what I want between my thighs tonight.”

  A flush spread over Jamie’s cheeks. “But...this is your mother’s place. We can’t—”

  “We’re staying in the guest house.” Noah let out a soft laugh when Jamie worried his bottom lip, arousal deepening the blush even more. “There’s been a time or two I’m sure my mother heard something. Curtis can be quite loud.” He brushed his lips down Jamie’s throat. “With your voice, I bet you can be even louder.”

  Lips parting, Jamie glanced toward the guesthouse, which could barely be seen through the thick trees that separated it from the barn, but a few lights on the bottom floor had been left on, meaning either his mother or one of the teens had gone over to get it ready for them. Where Ezran stayed now when he visited, his mother’s solution to keep Charlie and him apart when they were both here. Charlie had gotten kicked out of his last school and now attended a boarding school further upstate. Noah hadn’t spent much time with the boy, but from what his mother had said, he was doing better.

  She’d asked Rhodey to help her with him. Not to train him—Thank God—but whatever Rhodey had said to the boy got him to adjust his attitude.

  No surprise there.

  The front door opened and his mother beckoned them inside, hugging him as though he was still fragile, as she’d done the last few times he’d visited since he’d become mobile. Cupping his cheek, she looked into his eyes, smiling at whatever she found there.

  “I’m so happy you decided to come tonight to make up for missing the holidays.” She snickered when Noah opened his mouth. “It’s all right, I understand. But you’re looking much better. That makes me happy.” She turned to Jamie, wrapping him in her arms. “My poor little beach boy. Did all those scarves and mittens help? The socks? Jared forgot the chunky knit blanket I had Ethel make for you, but you can bring it with you today. It will definitely warm you right up.”

  “Yes, please.” Jamie rubbed his hands together when she stepped back, blowing on them as though he’d spent the past month roughing it in the North Pole. “I love it here, but snow is much nicer on TV.”

  “I can imagine.” Tracey got them both some house slippers while Garet came over to take their coats.

  He grinned and gave Jamie a fist bump, cheeks going red when Noah gave him a one armed hug. “Ezran will be here in a bit. He’s bringing more firewood to the guesthouse in case you need it.” He glanced at Jamie. “Sorry we can’t get you palm trees and sunshine, but you won’t be cold tonight. There’s even a heated blanket on the bed.”

  Jamie gave Noah a sideways smile. “No cold feet.”

  “Good.” Slippers on, Noah schooled his features, shifting his focus from how unsuited for the weather everyone—including Jamie—seemed to think he was. He took Jamie’s hand and brought it to his lips. “You think you can brave the arctic tundra a little longer? My gift may be late, but it’s been waiting here for you the whole time.”

  “Sure…” Jamie’s brow creased. He looked down at Noah’s hand, wrapped around his. “It’s really not that bad. Just takes some getting used to.”

  “That’s right.” Tracey nudged them both toward the stairs. “Go on, I can’t wait to hear what he thinks.” Her hand lingered on Jamie’s shoulder for a moment as he glanced back at her. “You’ve been very good for my son, Jamie.”

  “I have?” Jamie looked confused when she waved him on. He quickened his pace to keep up with Noah. “But I didn’t do any… Oh…” He sucked in a sharp breath as they stepped into the first room at the top of the stairs. “Did you do all these?”

  The room had been closed for two years, no one besides Noah’s mother going in to keep dust from collecting. For some reason, even when he’d returned here after prison, he couldn’t bring himself to do more than take a glance inside before finding other, more important things to do.

  Noah took in his studio, trying to see it as Jamie was, the peaceful feeling he’d once found here returning. He looked over the wall of charcoal sketches from when he’d been practicing the human form as a teen. They’d been done during his breaks from Rhodey’s ‘training’ and many were made from dark, angry strokes, but as he’d progressed, he’d learned to use his time in here as a way to create something beautiful. Something softer in a world that had become so harsh.

  Another wall held some oil paintings and watercolors. He’d noticed Curtis staring at the bare spots on the walls where the paintings he’d made for the bar had once hung. He’d considered bringing a few of these to replace them, but...he wanted to make something new. The paintings were almost a way to say he truly belonged there. And he couldn’t visualize them yet.

  A shelf and his craft table took up the third wall, the shelf full of art and sketchbooks, along with tubes where he’d put some of his work that he wanted to keep, but neither he or his mother had any place for.

  In the center of the room was an easel on a stand, covered in a sheet. What he’d worked on during his last few visits. He crossed the room and pulled the sheet away,

  Behind him, Jamie gasped.

  “I haven’t wanted to paint anything since I got out of prison. Not until you told me one of the things you missed about L.A. was the sun.” Noah stood back as Jamie approached the painting, so many emotions passing over his expressive face, it was difficult to tell which one was the strongest. “That’s what my mother meant. I couldn’t see the colors in the world the way I used to—I’m not sure I wanted to.”

  Jamie turned to him, tears wetting his lashes. “What changed?”

  “I realized I wanted to give them to you.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Sweat poured down Jamie’s face, spraying from his hair on his snap-turn. Reed and Garet executed the sequence in front of him, taking center stage on the dance floor. The choreography to one of the three songs they’d been practicing for weeks had finally become automatic, morphing three into one with a beautiful synchronicity that Jamie had only experienced before with Danny and Trevor.

  He let his gaze linger in appreciation on Reed’s sure-footed steps, his hips twitching, feet light. Garet, at his gangly teen stage, had serious moves, but didn’t yet have Reed’s self-assured swagger. Still, they were both fucking owning the dance floor. The song trailed off and they held their positions for a beat longer than the music.

  Jamie leaped up, fist in the air and came back down with his “Whoop!”

  “Dawg, I thought we’d never get that.” Laughing, Garet fist-bumped Reed and turned to Jamie with a giant grin. “That was some sick shit, man.”

  Breathing hard, Jamie shook his head, grinning. “I wish Matt had joined us. He could do this no problem, the way he moves in the ring.”

  Preferring to spend his time at the Community Center, Lawson’s boy had declined to be in on show they’d planned for the Dance Club’s official opening—a surprise they’d managed to keep from everyone but Curtis, Lawson, and Doc, whose permission Jamie gained while Noah had been away.

  Looking around at the club, its shiny new bar stocked to the gills, high top tables surrounding the dance floor and DJ booth, Reed swiped a towel at the sweat trickling down his face. “I can’t believe you managed to get a stripper pole installed without Noah and Curtis seeing it on the books.”

  “Oh, that was easy.” Throwing himself onto an L-shaped couch near the DJ booth, Jamie grabbed his water bottle and drank deeply. “Lawson kept a separate set of books and I gave him an account to draw from.”

  Reed and Garet exchanged a look, and Jamie blushed. He hadn’t thought much about throwing his money around before Noah. It was just a fact of his life. Everything the guys had at The Asylum came from a lot of sweat and hard work. H
e’d never realized what a pampered princess he was until coming here.

  He smiled, sheepish. “I wanted to do something nice as a thank you for everyone putting up with my bullshit.”

  “You seriously don’t have to apologize, dude.” Slowly unwinding the wrapper on a lollipop, Reed rolled the stick between his fingers, considering. “You could be the biggest douche in the world, and I’d be good as long as you made Noah this stupid happy.”

  Garet laughed, leaning back on his elbows. “Yeah. I loved your music before, but it’s even better now I realized all the songs you wrote were about being in love with dudes.”

  Leaning over, Reed lightly whacked Garet upside the head. “Shut up.”

  “What?” Rubbing his head, Garet sat up. “What did I say?”

  Jamie laughed, checking the time on his phone, and sobered, ass clenching.

  “Shit.” He’d kept Noah waiting ten minutes longer than he should have. “I gotta shower and change. Doc said he’d take your shift in the bar at eleven. Garet, I’ll let you in the back door at five ‘til.”

  “Remember to bring the thing!” Reed called after him.

  Waving, he trotted out of the dance club, into the ring, and pushed through the double doors into the bar on his way upstairs. The Asylum’s members had already started to arrive, some playing pool, others clustering around a guy who’d brought pictures of his newborn baby girl to show off. Doc caught his eye, crooking his finger.

  Jamie slowed, gaze lowering automatically as he went up to his temporary Dom. “Yes, sir?”

  Doc tapped his cheek with two fingers. “Up.”

  Eyes widening, he looked up, meeting Doc’s ice-blue eyes.

  Doc nodded once, sharp. “Forgiven.”

  Words he hadn’t known meant so much to him outside of his punishments by Noah’s hand rolled over him. Eyes prickling at the corners, he swallowed down a lump and nodded. “Thank you, sir. For everything.”

  Doc’s mouth softened, almost a smile. “Break a leg tonight.”

  From any other man, in any other place, that would have meant good luck. Coming from Doc, he could never tell. The man might actually mean it.

  Gaze narrowing, Doc cut him a look. “Don’t ruin it before we’ve even begun.”

  “Sorry, sir.” Hands up, Jamie stepped back as Noah came down the stairs, stopping at the bottom step, arms folded. “Sh—ugar.”

  The week after Christmas celebrations at Tracey’s had been a blur. Between fight lessons with Matt and chores around The Asylum, he’d spent hours with Noah in their bedroom, modeling for a series of nudes for a painting his Dom planned. Jamie wasn’t sure how he felt about having a giant nude of him stretched across canvas, but he’d enjoyed the sexy times that had resulted.

  He loved watching Noah’s face, a pencil between his lips as he smudged charcoal across his pad. The way his fingertips flew in sure strokes, like the licks of his flogger across Jamie’s skin.

  ‘I’ll be your canvas anytime.’

  Noah had looked up slowly, pupils dilating. The throaty invitation had led to a wicked session in the empty dungeon, Noah stretching him out on the St Andrew’s Cross to paint a blush in fiery lines across his shoulders and ass. He hadn’t been allowed to come, which of course hadn’t stopped him. Nothing could make him hold back when Noah touched him. When his man looked at him that way.

  The cock cage he wore now was an uncomfortable reminder of that failing, but one he didn’t mind. Like his collar, it reminded him of his Dom’s hands on his body, his control wrapped around his throat, fisting his dick, even when he wasn’t there. Except he was supposed to get the thing off tonight. Fifteen minutes ago, in fact.

  He groaned, going to the bottom of the stairs.

  Noah looped his finger in the ring of his collar and turned, pulling him gently up the stairs behind him. The tug at his throat had his dick hardening in the cage before they’d reached the dungeon landing and started ascending to the third floor. He hissed as the cage bit into sensitive tissues, but for some fucked up reason his dick decided it liked the abuse and swelled more. By the time Noah had taken his pants down and had him ass up over the couch arm for his spanking, his balls felt like ripe grapes about to split their skins.

  “Fu—” The first smack cut off his swear. A blessing.

  Just like that first day, and every time after, when Noah’s hand landed on his ass, his hips rocked forward, adding friction and force that pooled in his abdomen in a fucked up dance of pain and desire. All he could think as Noah’s open palm impacted his skin was that the man couldn’t be too pissed if he issued this punishment.

  Fisting the edge of the leather couch cushion, Jamie bucked upward. Noah’s fingertips between his shoulder blades pushed him back down. Muscle aches in his thighs tightened in an entirely different way. God, could he actually come from a spanking in this contraption? Not if the strap snugged around his balls had anything to say about it. Still, Jesus.

  His forehead rolled along the couch cushion as the ass beating continued, and things became a little less...pleasurable. Then, a lot. What was it he’d said about preferring spankings to that damned penny? He took it back. Every single word.

  Ow. Ow. Fucking. Ow. Dude. Stop.

  His hand flew up on its own to cover his ass. Noah moved it aside with a swat and continued, rocking him up on his toes. Three more, and then silence except for harsh inhales and exhales.

  Noah leaned down, lips close to his ear. “Stay right there.”

  A shiver ran down his spine, the chill pooling in overheated muscles. At least his dick had calmed the fuck down. Footsteps retreated, drawers opened and closed in the bedroom. Ears pricking up, Jamie followed every movement until Noah returned to stand behind him.

  Oh hell. What now?

  “You seem to have trouble remembering I exist.”

  Jamie shook his head. “No—”

  A solid smack on sensitive skin shut him up.

  “Let me help you.” Something cold and slick pressed against his ass, nudged at his hole. “This should be difficult to ignore.”

  Pressing his lips together, Jamie whimpered, desire and fear mingling to form their uniquely potent cocktail in the pit of his stomach. Noah widened his cheeks with one hand and bent low. Wetness hit his hole and the object returned, pressing forward.

  Metal… A plug…

  He squeezed his eyes tight and scrunched up his nose. It shouldn’t be harder to take than Noah’s dick, but he tensed as Noah worked the plug into his hole without any foreplay, twisting and turning until it hit his prostate and sent blood screaming back to his dick.

  “Oh fu—dge. Sir…”

  Fingers ran through his hair, tightened, lifting his head so he looked into smoke-kissed gray. Oh yeah. That was better. His Dom was as turned on as he was by the moment. The punishment had been real, but it was one of those few times when a phoenix had arisen from the ashes left behind in the wreckage.

  Tapping at the plug, Noah sent a jolt of electric pleasure up Jamie’s spine. He sighed into a kiss that stole whatever breath he might have used to cry out. The kiss ended and Noah released him with a growl. “You’ll wear the cage until tomorrow. Don’t make me find you again, or this will seem like a massage.”

  Jamie stood, yanking his jeans up past his awkwardly jutting dick and winced. How in the name of submissives everywhere was he supposed to dance tonight...like this? “Permission to shower, sir?”

  Noah’s nose twitched. Humor reached his eyes, but his mouth remained stern. “Please.”

  In his pocket, Jamie’s phone burbled. His hand went automatically to the button, silencing it as he walked away.

  “Answer it,” Noah called after him. “I didn’t have Wren fix that so you could continue to let messages build up in your voicemail. I tried to call when you were downstairs and the bloody thing was full.”

  Sighing heavily, Jamie yanked the phone from his pocket and brought it to his ear. “Go.”

  Noah cut him a look at the ters
e greeting. He’d always used it, a way to answer without letting on it was him. Looked like he’d be changing that up too in the near future.

  His gaze skated away as the person on the other end said, “About fucking time. Why the hell haven’t you returned my calls?”

  Jamie turned away, ducking into the bedroom and closing the door behind him as he went into the bathroom. No way did he want Noah to hear this conversation, because there was going to be swearing. Lots and lots of swearing.

  “Frank.” He bit off the man’s name. Jesus Christ, he had a performance to think of. “Why the fuck would I return your calls?”

  “Look, kid. We’ve been through too much together for you to shut me out. I have a stack of opportunities here, just waiting for when you get back, but they won’t last forever.” He pictured Frank pacing, one of the thin cigars he loved hanging from his lips. “People who want to talk to you. You’ve gotta give me a chance to explain.”

  Noah would flay him alive for talking to the man, much less entertaining offers from him. Even if he didn’t have his Dom holding his leash, he knew better than to ever trust Frank again. Too much had happened to him under the man’s so-called care. Watching Tracey with Garet and Ezran, what her affection and attention had meant, had set up an example for him, and he’d spent a lot of time thinking about the kind of people his parents should have been, and if not them then Frank, who’d been responsible for him for almost as long as he could remember.

  “You were like a father to me, asshole, and you used me like a motherfucking pimp, whoring me out to work for whoever you wanted.” His anger flowed, unchecked, and his hand shook. “You think I’d want to let you use my ass like that again after what you did? That’s fucking rich.” He glared at the phone, his finger over the red button, tears leaking down his cheeks. “Don’t fucking call me again, scumbag.”