by Harper Sloan
My whole body jerks back as if I had been slapped, staring at him like he was absolutely insane.
"That's absolutely insane," I tell him, voicing my thoughts.
"No, that's me not giving a shit and wanting it gone so I can get out of this place and sell it and all this shit some hand with care placed around each room. Woulda left this shit in and sold it with the house, but for some reason I'll never understand, you're here, and I still just want it gone. You don't need five days when I'm taking a two mil hit, babe. That would waste your time and mine, and I'm not a huge fan of wasting my time. Way I see it, you win, and I get a cold mil for some shit I didn't buy nor care about. So you get this shit outta here, and all I need is that."
"Thorn, I can't in good conscience accept that."
"Then dirty that conscience up and laugh your tight little ass all the way to the bank. Don't give a shit as long as it's gone, and I don't have to do anything to make it that way."
"This is insanity."
"Insanity would be tossing it all at the Goodwill drop-off. I'm making money. You're making money. Only thing sweeter than making money is doing it while I'm getting my cock wet, and babe, that only happens when my stock rises at the same time my cock does." He steps closer, and I back into the island, my chest burning as I hold my breath. "Course, never had four mil worth of shit to sell to a woman who makes my cock rise without even trying."
"Thorn," I whisper, placing my hand against his hard chest with the intention of pushing him back. Only, the second his warmth burns through his shirt and hits my skin, I can't move an inch.
"Ari," he mocks, his eyes bright.
"I, uh, the paperwork ..." I close my eyes and focus on my breaths and the words my mouth can't seem to form. When my heart slows enough that I won't die of a heart attack right here in heaven, I look back up at him. "You're breaking my brain, Thorn. Please step back so I can think clearly without my body trying to die on me."
The corners of his eyes crinkle as he continues to gaze down at me, but he does step back. My arm falling down to my side.
"As much as I wish I could have this room cleared out for you tomorrow, it will take at least until late Monday. I'll need to meet with you beforehand to have some legal paperwork signed for the sale due to its size. But my lawyer is an old family friend, so I can have that by tomorrow around dinnertime, if you wouldn't mind meeting me to take care of that. I won't be able to get the cashier's check until after those are signed, so late Monday is the best I can offer you."
"Want this shit gone, but it's hardly a hardship to wait a few more days if that means I've got a few more opportunities to try to make you want me as much as you want this shit around you," he says, his deep voice thick with desire.
"Good heavens, you don't stop, do you?"
"Not unless you beg, babe."
"I think it's best we went back to keeping things professional, Mr. Evans."
This time, it isn't a ghost of a smile on his lips. Oh, no. Not this time. If I thought he was handsome before this moment, I was a fool. Because Thorn Evans giving you his full, unhindered smile and a gaze so thick with unspoken promise as it washes over you and creates a fire of the desire you already felt ... well, that expression on him turns him from sinfully hot to heart-stopping and irresistible instantly.
"It would take me five minutes to get you to beg me for it, Ms. Daniels. Admit it."
Offended at the thought that I'm easy, I narrow my eyes. Finally. At least anger is an emotion I've had plenty of practice dealing with. "I'm not sure what kind of women you're used to, but I promise you, I am not that type of woman."
"Maybe three," he oddly says, ignoring me.
"Three, what?" I snap.
"Minutes, sweetness. Three minutes and you'd be begging me for all this shit and my cock."
My mouth flounders, and I gasp.
"Though, pretty sure I could get that in less than a minute and get you doin' all the work while I watch from my back."
My arm is up, palm cracking against his cheek before I have the ability to do anything to stop it. "I think we're done here."
I walk around him, ready to find my way out and let him find someone else to take all of this off his hands even if it kills a little part of my lux loving soul. When his hand curls around my bicep--not painfully, but firm enough to make me stop--I look over my shoulder with a frown. For a man who was just slapped, he looks almost gleeful.
"One minute, Ari. Give me a minute and if you aren't ready to beg me for it, when those sixty seconds are up, you can take this shit and not give me a penny for it."
Walk away, Ari. Walk. Away. No amount of money is worth being some man's whore.
Spinning away from his hold, I jerk my arm free and step toward him with a roll up to my toes, getting my face as close to his as I can. His scent overwhelms me. The subtle notes of his cologne fog my rational thought, making me drunk with need, and I sway slightly before correcting myself.
"Thirty seconds," I retort, my jaw tight with stubbornness.
I'm not sure who I shocked more--him or me. I have my answer, though, when I see victory flash in his eyes. Oh, my God ... what have I done?
"You're on," he agrees, his eyes alight with the promise backed up by his devilish grin.
I nod, incapable of anything more. I stand there in shocked silence as he takes my phone, his thick fingers moving quickly over the screen. I vaguely hear a chime from his pocket and before I can so much as blink, he's handing me my things.
"Tomorrow, I'll text you. Paperwork first, then you beg."
I gulp, jerk my head in what I hope resembles a nod of agreement, and then ... I flee.
The King
"You're going to fucking what?" Wilder questions again, frowning at me from the doorway of my office.
"Not a big fan of repeating myself, Wil."
"Yeah, well, it isn't every day my friend tells me he's just made the stupidest bet in his life. A friend, I might add, that I used to think was the only man savvier in business than I am. For fuck's sake, Thorn, you're about to throw away a million for a chance at pussy?"
"Not a chance, Wil. Guaranteed pussy and a million. Not really sure how you see that as the losing end."
"No pussy is worth what happens when you can't pull this shit off. How the fuck are you supposed to make her spread her legs in thirty seconds?"
I lean back from the paperwork I had been working on all morning and fold my arms over my chest. Wilder holds my gaze, searching for answers I'm not fucking giving him.
"Look, I'm sure you can meet this chick for dinner and just tell her you were kidding, get your cash, and be done with it."
"Not happening," I tell him firmly. Just the thought of not tasting Ari Daniels's sweet body is enough to piss me off. And just the thought of her sweet body is all it takes for my cock to swell uncomfortably in my pants.
"Pussy isn't worth that much work, Thorn."
"Hers is."
"I bet it isn't."
Leaning forward, I brace my arms on my desk and look over at my friend. "You ever known me to waste my time on shit I know I can't get?"
"Not the point, man, and this is not even close to the same thing."
"I don't see why not."
"Maybe because she's a fucking person and not something that can be bought or bribed? Or, I don't know, maybe because you're being a stupid fuck. No matter how much you want to sell the old bitch's shit and get that house on the market, risking any profit is just stupid."
"It's not like I need the cash, Wilder, and you know it. Once I sell the damn house, I'm looking at thirty more of those millions you're so worried about me betting."
"You might not need the money, but just because you're not hurting for cash doesn't mean you should be careless about it. Again, I stress, she's a fucking person. A person who, I'm sure, has real feelings and emotions. Not that you've ever been with a woman who was capable of that, and I know it's been a while since you've felt those things yourself, but
they do exist for the majority of the world's population."
"You make it sound like I'm a fucking monster."
He shrugs.
He fucking shrugs.
"I want her. Simple as that. Not sure I see what, in that, makes me a fucking monster. I'm not going to abuse the woman. I'm not into the kind of pain that can hurt her. I'll make sure it's worth begging me for my cock, and not only will I still get my fucking money, but she still gets what she's after. Win, win."
"Not even close to the point. Has it been that long since you've had to work for something other than the easy bitches that fall all over you?"
"I'm forty-one, Wilder, not exactly new at this. I've had to work plenty hard over the years to get laid. Not sure why you feel the need to beat this out of me, but something's different about this one. If it takes a bet to secure my ability to find out what that is, then so be it."
"You could try asking her on a fucking date and seeing what that different is all about in a conventional way."
"I don't date."
"Yeah, I know you don't, but I think that bullshit about never wanting anything serious went flying out the window the second you were willing to toss away a million fucking dollars for some chick you don't know shit about. Makes me wonder, though, Thorn. Did you even stop to think that maybe, just maybe, she might be the one person who's capable of making you rethink the things you've always believed impossible? If you're already, in this short time, breaking all those damn rules of yours just to get in her pants, she might be something you've never considered possible for you?"
"Why are you busting my fucking balls so hard over this?"
He throws his arms in the air before dropping them to the desk and leaning over it. "This chick's friends with Megs and Mel. Those two don't even work every night, and the one night their sister finds them working at Barcode, she was ready to throw down World War III. Do you really think if you fucking treat that girl's friend like a woman who essentially needs to pay to get fucked that wrath isn't going to come tearing shit up again? I guarantee you, she does, you'll feel that shit in here at The Alibi even if a parking lot separates the two fucking buildings. So, Thorn, forgive me for not wanting to deal with the fallout when you eventually fuck up if you don't take a second and figure out what the hell this is."
"Is it too much to ask for you to just shut the fuck up and trust me?"
"Yeah, it really is, man."
"Then I guess we agree to disagree."
"You're a fucking idiot."
"So you've said, Wil."
"Jesus Christ." He rubs his hands over his face, then drops down into the chair. "Well, tell me the plan at least. Might as well help you so you don't fuck it up as badly as you could without the help."
I lean back, adjust my cock, and tell him my plan. When I finish, he isn't pissed anymore. Now, he's just shocked.
"It's been what, twenty years since you've gotten up there, Thorn? I don't think I need to point out the obvious here and tell you that you might be a little rusty."
"Not exactly something you forget how to do."
"Says the man who fired that redhead chick just last week because she returned from maternity leave, and I quote, 'was stumbling up that fucking pole like she'd been snorting crack all day and fried every goddamn brain cell in her head, preventing her from knowing which end was up.'"
I shrug my shoulders.
"She was fucking rusty, not high!" he bellows.
"She wasn't rusty. Saw the bitch snorting that shit right after her disaster on the stage myself. You don't get rusty from pushing a kid out. You get rusty because your brain is replaced with powder."
He shifts forward, looking at me with disbelief. "Twenty years. That is rusty, my friend."
I stand, then walk over to the wet bar situated on the solid back wall of my top-floor office. The walls to my right and left have windows that allow me to look down at the floor below. Below the left window, the hottest women in Vegas get naked for anyone willing to throw cash their way. The right, men who make those Magic Mike chumps look like children ... and exactly where I'll be tonight after I sign the paperwork Ari Daniels brings me.
After swallowing two fingers of brandy in one gulp, I turn to my friend. "Let me ask you this, Wil. You think, all that easy pussy you yourself said I have falling on my cock, I get that shit because I forgot how to move my body? You don't forget that shit when it's just as easy as breathing, and that, brother, is something you know damn well."
"Fucking some chick isn't the same as getting back up there and stripping for a room full of them, T."
"And that is where you're wrong. Fucking is just like stripping, only instead of your cock floppin' around in the air with your skin soaked with fucking oil, your skin gets soaked by the sweat of a woman just as desperate as you are to have your cock drenched with her come."
"Sometimes, I wonder how you've made it this long without one of your women killing you in your sleep."
"For one, I don't have 'women.' Second, rule number seven is never let them spend the night."
"Fucking idiot," Wilder mumbles under his breath, standing and walking out of my office with nothing more.
I turn my attention to the window on my right and look down at the stage, the room empty except for the staff setting up before the doors open in a few hours. Rusty, my ass. I went from a boy to a fucking man on stages like that. When all the other kids my age were hating their time in high school, I was lying about my age so I could take my clothes off on stage for dollars and fuck cougars in the private rooms for a lot more than that. I worked my way up until I was the fucking best, having no choice when it meant keeping the roof of a shithole apartment over your head and having more than bread for dinner in the cabinets. It was sheer luck that I went from being no one to being the king. It was worth every one of those twenty-plus years that I fought through hell to get to where I am now. Worth every fucking second.
And there isn't anything that a king can't get.
Including a woman who stirred up shit that makes not one ounce of sense aside from the need driving me to take her.
A woman I've been thinking about since she made me fucking burn when I saw her across Wilder's bar, only to become an obsession when, almost a month later, I unknowingly walked right into her store.
I'll quench the thirst for her first, and then I'll figure out the rest of that shit I don't understand after.
Red. Now.
With a flick of my wrist, I toss another dress, sending it sailing over my head to join the collection of rejects on the floor around me. When I catch the reflection of my haphazard and anxious expression in the mirror across the room, I give a huff and study myself with a critical eye, looking for something else to panic over but come up empty. My cheeks are flush with a natural blush, eyes wild, and hair all over the place while I stand here in my best lace freaking out about a thirty second bet.
My day started easier than one would think if they would have witnessed the insanity of my actions since walking into my massive closet.
It started off perfectly. I was relaxed, completely forgetting about the "I'll text" from Thorn until the infamous text came through, telling me where to meet him for dinner. That's it. A simple text with just the location and time.
And after that, I was a hopeless case of nerves, not letting myself text him back for fear I would back out of going.
I met with Joseph, my lawyer, for lunch, and together, we drafted the paperwork Thorn would need to sign, making sure to add a clause about the stupid bet. One that protected me, should he win, and for a reason I don't even understand myself, one that protected Thorn, should I win. Thankfully, Joseph was ever the professional and didn't utter a word about the changes. Heck, even if he had, I know there wasn't a chance I could explain it to him in a way that he would understand. How could anyone? Oh, yeah, it's just to make sure I still get four million worth of product to resell no matter if I find him inside my body later tonight or not. No big deal. Th
ankfully, I was safe from having to stumble over that scenario.
Piper started calling just after noon, but I managed to put her off without much effort by promising to fill her in on all the details tomorrow--even if my stomach pitches at just the thought of sharing Thorn. I might not understand what I was feeling toward him--or him toward me--but for the first time in my friendship with Piper, I wanted to keep it to myself for a little while. It made absolutely no sense. Thorn wasn't mine to keep, yet keep is what my heart beat for me to do. I think Piper was easy to put off because she had her own stuff going on with Matt again. No surprise there. Matt was being his normal pain-in-the-ass self again, keeping her distracted. I have no doubt that, had she been thinking clearly, I wouldn't have gotten off the hook that easily.
After my meeting with Joseph, I had to run into Trend to place the supply order I had completely forgotten about the day before. I didn't stick around, trusting my staff to handle things, as they always do.
Then, with nothing left to occupy my time, I had the genius idea to clean my house from top to bottom. I usually enjoy my time spent cleaning the home I take great pride in, but that genius idea was just plain stupid. It was nothing but more trouble than it was worth because it just ended up pissing off Dwight, my orange tabby cat, to the point of no return. That meant tonight when I went to bed, he would get his revenge by torturing me all night. In the past, that could mean anything from biting at my feet every time I drifted off to attempting to smother me with his body while I slept. With Lord Dwight, you never knew what you were in for when he had his cat eyes set on revenge. Or murder.
If all that wasn't stressful enough, it ended with me standing here in my underwear, freaking out about looking good for a man who may end up getting me in a position I haven't been in, in years ... and because of that, I spent the hour before my time tossing all my best outfits on the floor and grooming myself to the max--shaving, buffing, and moisturizing every inch of my skin. I've never been more thankful that I kept up my waxing appointments even after I had no reason to put my lady parts through that pain. If I would have had to add that to my shaving ritual, I would probably still be in the bath.
I walk over to the large black island in my spare-room-turned-master-closet-of-the-century and open one of the many drawers under the sleek granite I keep full of the best undergarments money can buy. Screw it, if this bet is going to end up the way I think it will, I might as well go all out and give myself something that makes the seven-year dry spell worth it with a night to remember and a sore body to walk away with from it. It's time. And who says I have to let him into my heart just because I'm letting him into my body?
