by Penny Wylder
I wonder if he had something to do with it.
I steel my heart. Push through the doors into the restaurant.
He glances up when the bell jingles, and his eyes light up at the sight of me, a smile spreading across his face. He half-rises from his chair by the time I make it to his table, but I pull out the other seat before he can reach me and drop into it, bypassing a hug. I can’t get distracted, and I know I will if I let him touch me. I need to talk about this with a clear head, to get straight answers.
“What’s wrong?” Zayne asks, after taking one look at my expression. I can’t imagine what I look like right now. Murderous? Scared? On the brink of tears?
I feel like all three at once.
In response, I pull out my phone. I tap on the screen and open the website and I pass it to him without a word. My throat aches, and my eyes sting. Something about this feels worse than knowing my office saw the photo. Zayne was the intended recipient of this picture, so why does it bother me for him to see it again?
That’s not it, I realize. What bothers me is the caption, the comments under it. The talking-to my boss gave me earlier today. The way the whole world is judging me for sending a semi-nude selfie to a guy I cared about. Care about. Or was starting to care about, anyway.
I shake my head, and clear my throat, because Zayne still hasn’t said anything. “Well?” I ask.
He finally lifts his head, eyes wide. “Clove…”
“I only sent that photo to one person,” I say, my voice getting louder, heated. “My phone has been with me ever since. I really don’t see how else anyone could’ve found that photo, unless…” My throat closes up. I can’t finish that sentence.
He doesn’t make me. His eyes meet mine, serious and heavy. “Unless I sent it to them.”
I swallow around the lump that’s forming. “Did you?”
“Clove…”
I close my eyes. I can’t watch him. Can’t make eye contact, not if he’s about to tell me that he just fucked over my entire life, all for some sick revenge porn scheme.
His hand closes around mine, and I flinch involuntarily, because that touch still floods me with desire, a heat that’s impossible to ignore.
“I would never, ever do something like that to you. Or to anyone, really. But especially not you.”
I open my eyes. Find him staring straight at me, his expression still as deadly serious as ever. I nod, and blink hard as my eyes sting once more, threatening tears again. “But…”
He shakes his head, squeezes my fingers tighter. “We’re going to fix this, Clove.”
“How?” The tears threaten to sting at my eyes again. “My company is already trying to track down this person. Whoever did this, they were smart. Really smart. They covered their tracks, and if a professional in the industry can’t find them, there’s no way we can.”
“Sure we can.” His eyes go hard and distant, focused on the window outside instead of me now. “Because I know who it is.”
I tug at my hand, freeing my fingers from his, startled by the sudden fierce anger in his eyes. “What do you mean?”
“There’s only one person who would do this. One person who’s already done this before.”
“What are you talking about?” I shake my head. “Zayne, you’re scaring me a little bit.” I’ve never seen him look like this, so intense and furious. It’s not directed at me, but still. Who knew what kind of anger was hiding underneath his bright, smiling exterior?
“There’s… This has happened to women I’ve dated before.”
My shoulders tense. Now I feel some of that anger flooding over into me. “Wait. You’re saying you knew this was a possibility?”
“I didn’t know that—”
“Women who have sent you sexts before have had their photos leaked publicly?” I press on, leaning into the table, eyes on his.
He meets my gaze reluctantly. “A couple of times, yes.”
“And you didn’t think you should tell me that before you asked me to send you a half-naked selfie in a bar bathroom the other night?” I lower my voice to a hiss, all too aware of the other customers in here, the stares we’re already starting to attract, because even at whisper-volume, I can’t contain the fury in my tone.
“It hasn’t happened in years, so I thought—”
“Who is it?” I interrupt.
“Clove, I can’t—”
“Who is doing this to me? You must know, if you’re the one the leak is coming from. Did they hack into your phone, whoever it is?” A sudden, horrible realization sinks into my stomach. “Oh, god. Are you involved with someone? Are you cheating on them, is that why?”
“What? Clove, no, of course not, you saw my apartment.”
True. That was a bachelor pad if ever I’ve set foot in one.
“How can you accuse me of that?” He shakes his head, genuine hurt in his eyes.
But I can’t sit here and listen to this from the man who just knowingly let me walk straight into a trap. Whether the person doing this to him is in the wrong or not, he knew about it all along. He knew and let me fall for it.
I push my chair back and surge to my feet. “If you won’t tell me what’s going on, I’m going to have to find out myself.”
“Clove, please, let me handle it. I’ll talk to her.”
“Her, huh?” I lift an eyebrow and skewer him with another glower. “Well, while you’re doing that, why don’t you have a long think about why you don’t even trust me enough to tell me about my new stalker, too.” Without another word, I snatch up my purse and sweep out of the restaurant, shoulders squared against the outside air.
8
It’s a nice day outside, balmy and just warm enough, but not so hot that the pavement feels like it’s going to cook me from below. The kind of day I’d normally enjoy at an outdoor café for lunch with Andy and Celeste. Instead, I’ve been banished from my company, relegated to the backseat, moping around my home while trying to figure out how to fix my trash fire of a life.
I make a beeline for my apartment and ignore another pang of latent, frustrated sexual tension as I cross the threshold and pass the doorman’s desk. Paul is still there, of course, waiting for Zayne to start his shift. Tonight, if I have any reason to leave my building, I’ll have to walk straight past him. Stare at his smug expression, those knowing eyes, that smirk of his, all the while knowing that he helped ruin my life. And worst of all, he won’t even tell me why.
Her.
Some woman is doing this. Some woman connected to him. He says it’s not a current lover, and I believe that, if for no other reason than that he’s right, I’d have seen some evidence of another woman around his place. A toothbrush, possessions lying around, something.
But who else would want to destroy him so badly? A scorned ex? Maybe someone he did something similar to? Did he ever put up revenge porn of another woman?
Or is he a much better liar than I think? Maybe this is all him. Maybe it’s all part of his fucked-up plan to ruin women’s lives. To fuck them senseless, make them fall for him, and then cut them down… Why?
For fun?
I think of the words on the website. Slut. He called me that, but in fun, sexy, possessive tones that made it sound hot as hell. I liked it when he called me that in that setting, when it was just me and him. Is this his real kink, though, getting off on sleeping with women and then humiliating them in public?
There are a lot of screwed up men in this city, after all. I should know. I’ve gone on dates with more than a few of them.
I ball my hands into fists, dig my nails in to keep myself alert as the elevator doors ding open on my floor. There’s something stuck to my door, a note about a package delivery it looks like. I ignore it. No time for that right now. I sweep inside and head straight to my computer. First things first, I need to start doing some damage control.
I check the policies section of the dating app’s website first. There’s nothing about what to do if someone leaks photos sen
t via the app without your permission, but I write a long email to their contact person anyway, just in case it helps. If nothing else, maybe they can beef up their security in the meantime and help stop this happening to some other poor, innocent girl.
I have to click into Zayne’s profile to send them all the details on what happened, who I sent the photo to and how it was leaked. Doing that sets off a riot of feelings in my gut all over again. Because right there on the cover photo is him, gazing at me with those damn blue eyes, so impossible to tear mine away from. Even pixelated on a screen, he’s hot as hell.
I’d thought, crazy as it seemed, about deleting this app after this weekend. I’d thought, why do I need it? I’ve already found a guy who’s way better than any of the other losers, and it turns out I already knew him in person. I didn’t need this stupid app to help us hook up.
But now? I don’t even know how to feel. A crazy person stole my image from his app, is threatening me, publicly harassing me, and he doesn’t even trust me enough to tell me what’s going on. How can I reconcile that with the guy I thought I was falling for?
My heart sinks into my stomach. I read this all wrong. I misread all the signals. He’s not into this, not the way that I am.
My throat clenches hard as I click away from his profile. But closing the window doesn’t help remove the memories. They surge up again, brought to the surface by the sight of that image all over again. Yesterday, it was only yesterday. It feels like a different era. A completely different life.
We’d finished lunch and we were playing a game at his dining room table. Poker. He was trying to teach me the rules, but I was abysmal. I kept betting on nothing hands, going all in on a pair of twos. So he changed the rules.
“Strip poker now,” he’d said with a grin, gaze fixed hungrily on me.
“Okay,” I agreed, and I didn’t tell him that I already planned to continue sucking. Even more so now.
He dealt another hand, but this time, for once, I had decent cards. I hesitated, double-checking. But no. I was right. I had a good hand. So I placed a bet. Zayne rolled his eyes and matched it.
“You have to fold sometimes,” he pointed out. “You can’t go all-in on every hand and expect me to believe you’ve got something when the last five times you didn’t.”
I shrug and raise again. “Never know,” I said. “The tides could have turned in my favor.”
“Poker isn’t the only thing you need to practice, Clove,” he admonished with a wink. “You need to work on lying, too.”
“But isn’t that what you love about me? My innocent guile?” I raised again, and he matched again, and I could feel the win creeping up on me.
“I suppose. Then again, maybe I’m wrong. Maybe all along you’ve been pretending to be innocent and slow at this game, building me up, so you can sweep in like a shark at the right moment and claim victory once and for all.”
My heart skipped a beat. “Oh? Is that so?”
“Maybe.” His gaze caught mine. Held firm. That smirk of his widened. “So tell you what, Clove. Why don’t we raise the stakes even higher? Why don’t we make this truly interesting?”
“What did you have in mind?” I asked, hands carefully folded around my cards, trying to give nothing away. I had a full house. There was no way he was going to beat me, not this time.
“An hour of obedience,” he replied, one eyebrow lifted. “The winner gets to command the loser to do whatever they want for one full hour. No backing out.”
I shivered. The command in his voice sent a jolt of desire straight through me, all the way to my belly, and through to my tightened pussy. Part of me suddenly wished I had a bad hand. What if I lost? What would he do to me? But the other part wanted, fiercely, to win. To see this sexy, handsome, hunk of a man kneeling before me, at my beck and call. I could make him do whatever I wanted. Make him kneel in front of me and lick me until I came again and again, then make him fuck me right here on top of the table, knocking the cards off around us on the floor… I could make him take me to the shower and wash for me, perform for me, slowly run his hands all over his muscled body, touch himself wherever I wanted him to touch himself… I could drive him mad, the way he’d been slowly driving me mad this whole weekend.
“Deal,” I said, and I hoped my voice didn’t give away my winning hand, the quiver of excitement almost too much to disguise.
Zayne grinned. “So, you accept this raise in stakes?”
“I do,” I replied.
“Good,” he answered. “Consider us both all in, then.” Then it came time for us to reveal our hands. I spread mine on the table with a smirk. His eyes widened, his lips parting for a moment. I resisted the urge to laugh. He really didn’t know what I had up my sleeve.
“You’re getting better at this,” he muttered, a begrudgingly appreciative tone in his voice. But then he lowered his hand and spread his cards in response, grinning.
Royal flush.
Shit.
“You’re impossible,” I groaned.
He laughed. “Admit it, you love it. Now, I believe my hour starts now…” His gaze swept over me.
“Unfair,” I added with a pout.
He lifted an eyebrow, suddenly stern. “Did I say you could speak?”
I snapped my mouth shut, though I continued to glare at him.
He laughed. “Mm, the sore loser look doesn’t suit you. Stand up, Clove.”
I rose from the table, pushing the chair back as I did. His gaze swept down again, over the casual T-shirt and pair of his boxer shorts I’d donned for dinner. We didn’t stand on ceremony that weekend, not with all the stripping we’d been doing whenever possible. His gaze lingered on my top.
“Take off your shirt.”
I stripped it off without a word and dropped it beside the table. I had no bra on, having already lost that in a prior round, so my breasts were immediately exposed, my nipples hardening in the chilly evening air.
He stood up and raised a hand, and I tensed in anticipation of his warm touch. But he didn’t quite touch me, not yet. He let his hand hover an inch from my chest, tracing circles through the air just inches from me.
“Touch your breasts,” he said.
I lifted my hands to cup my breasts from beneath, and squeezed them, massaging them lightly, pressing them together between my palms.
“Harder.”
I clenched my fists around my skin, watched the way my nipples hardened even further at the sensation.
“Now run your hands down your body, slowly.”
I trailed my hands down my sides, as slow as I could, tracing my ribcage, my waist, my hips. I hesitated at the boxer waistband, looked up at Zayne.
“Take those off too,” he said, his voice gone low and dark with lust. I could tell from the hard bulge in his pants that he was enjoying this every bit as much as I was.
I pushed the boxers down slowly, letting them snag on my hipbones before they finally fell to reveal my mound. They dropped to my knees, then my ankles, and I stepped out of them easily.
“Spread your legs,” Zayne said.
I swallowed hard, but obeyed him, standing with my feet shoulder-width apart.
“Arms out, too” he added.
I spread them wide to either side of me, feeling like I was on display.
When he finally touched me, I couldn’t help but jolt with the surprise of it. His warm skin against mine felt like an electric shock, his rough palms grazing my nipples before his hands clenched around my breasts and squeezed, the way I had a moment ago, but harder, rougher. I began to rock in place slightly, unable to help myself, swaying toward him with every rough grope of my breasts.
“Hold still,” he commanded, and it took effort to still myself, to balance on my feet in one position and let him take whatever he wanted from me.
He ran his hands down my back next, stepping closer to do it. He was close enough that the bulge in his boxers grazed my belly, and I sucked in a deep breath at the sudden skim of his cock aga
inst my bare, flat stomach. His hands, on the other hand, kept moving, running down the plane of my back, tracing my spine to my ass, which he gripped so hard I was sure he’d leave bruises. He pulled me up against him and crushed his cock against my belly so I was pinned there against him, my arms and legs spread, trying hard to keep my balance, to keep breathing normally, to keep my racing heart from driving me wild, right over the edge.
Fuck, I was soaking wet already.
He slapped my ass as he stepped back, an appreciative grin on his face. “Good girl,” he murmured, stepping aside to walk slowly around me. “Are you enjoying yourself, Clove?” he asked, his voice a whisper at my ear as he paused beside me, and trailed one finger along my outstretched arm, raising goosebumps the whole way along. “You can answer,” he added when I didn’t reply, because I’d learned my lesson about the speaking thing once already.
“Yes,” I breathed, and he chuckled, a low, dangerous sound. Fuck. What was he going to do to me?
I hoped it was anything. Everything. I wanted him to take me, possess me, own me. I wanted him to fuck me until I couldn’t stand up straight anymore.
He dipped a hand between my legs and massaged my thighs, from the outside to the inner thighs, as rough and harshly as he’d massaged my tits moments earlier. I gasped as his fingers grazed the groove where my legs met my hips, then slid higher, higher, until it took every ounce of self-control I possessed not to cry out, to beg him to touch my pussy, finger me, fuck me until I screamed.
Finally, he pushed one finger along my slit, sudden and strong. I could feel him sliding along me, slick with my juices. I felt wetter than I’d ever been before. He must have noticed, because he laughed again, still that low, dark laugh.
“Someone’s hungry for me,” he murmured against my earlobe, lips grazing my skin. “Do you want me to fuck you, Clove?”
