1001 Dark Nights: Bundle Fourteen

by Kristen Ashley

  So I’d let my heart get in it. He’d put that effort in but everyone had to take responsibility for their lives and I’d let him in when I knew I shouldn’t. I knew he was too good for me. I knew it just wasn’t my lot to get my something special.

  And although most of his behavior indicated he wanted to be in, there was that one important way it did not. The intimacy we would share to make all the rest of it concrete in my head. To understand irrevocably that he wanted all of me. Not to save me. Not to take care of me. Not to go that extra mile because he was the man he was to look after an employee, or just some woman that occupied a fringe of his life, who had the worst done to her that could happen.

  No, not any of that.

  To have me.

  Daisy.

  “Woman?”

  I focused on Smithie to see he was very focused on me.

  “You good?” he asked.

  I nodded, throwing him a dazzling smile.

  He wasn’t dazzled.

  His eyes narrowed.

  “Everything good with Sloan?” he pressed.

  “Peachy,” I lied.

  It was good. It was just that everything wasn’t good.

  “You need me, I’m here,” he stated and my heart that had started to go cold again warmed up a bit. “And if you gotta talk about guy stuff, LaTeesha is there.”

  I giggled a little bit and that made some of the concern drift out of Smithie’s face.

  “I need you or LaTeesha, I know where to find you,” I told him.

  He jerked up his chin.

  Then he swung out.

  I took another sip of my beer.

  Then I turned to the mirror and picked up my teasing comb.

  I was on in less than an hour. I needed to get ready.

  * * * *

  I slid down the pole upright, only one arm and one leg wrapped around it. My other arm was thrown out, my other leg extended up, my back arched, my head hanging back, my hair dangling.

  When I got close to the bottom, I arched back further, put one hand then the other to the stage, did a layout but ended it dropping and tucking into a backward, one and a half somersault.

  I ended that on my back, my hips twisted to the side, knees bent, legs tucked tight.

  I straightened my legs and swung them wide, up and over, letting them take my body with them until I was on my forearms and knees.

  I stuck my booty toward the end of the stage and felt the bills stuffed into my strings.

  I was singing with the song that was playing—Lil’ Kim, Christina Aguilera, Pink, and Mya’s version of “Lady Marmalade”—but I stopped just to give one of the men who’d tipped me an air kiss before I popped up, legs straight and wide, head hanging down between them.

  I slapped my hands to the stage and lifted up, throwing my hair back in a dramatic toss, turning and strutting down the stage in time to the song, swaying my hips.

  I made the end, turned, and swung my ass out, feeling the cash flutter at my feet. I stuck the tip of my finger between my glossed lips, looked over my shoulder, gave a wink to no one, then ran back up the stage.

  I launched myself at a pole, swung around it with body out, legs wide, through the ending of the song, finishing it on the floor in a front split, bent over, bared tits pressed toward the stage, head thrown back, mouth open.

  Before the lights went black, I slid my eyes sideways.

  Beyond the men standing up and cheering, I saw Marcus sitting in his booth, eyes on me, forearm on the table, fingers wrapped around his forgotten bourbon.

  His lips were curved up in a smile that through the dark, even when my heart was breaking, I felt in my coochie.

  He disappeared as the lights went out.

  The crowd shouted but I pushed up and quickly exited the stage.

  Holding out my robe for me, Brady gave me the grin that he always gave me when I left the stage, not leering and creepy, just appreciative.

  Once he helped me on with my robe, he followed me, close to my back, to the dressing room as the girls rushed by, Chardonnay and China giving me high fives as they went.

  I hit the dressing room door and turned back to Brady.

  “I’ll be out in about fifteen, sugar.”

  “All right, Daisy.”

  He opened the door for me, swept the room with his eyes, and closed the door after I went in.

  I stood staring at the door, breathing heavy, and not just from the dance.

  My eyes felt weirdly too dry.

  And I was wondering how I was going to do what I needed to do next.

  That was, get to Marcus’s place.

  And then let him off the hook.

  In other words…

  I was going to break up with him.

  * * * *

  In my ice-blue Juicy Couture tracksuit with its decal on the back of the hoodie that had peach and blue hibiscus flowers around a gold, interlaced “JC,” the same flowers on the front hip of the pants, I slid out of the cold Denver air into the warmth of the limo beside Marcus.

  I did this grinning up at Brady.

  “Thanks, darlin’.”

  He grinned back. “Not a problem, Daisy.”

  He closed the door and I tried to look at Marcus, but I had to do it quickly looking through Marcus.

  What I saw was that he was still in his suit, like he was always still in his suit when he came to see me dance, except on the weekends. This telling me he didn’t waste time going home to change.

  He came right to me.

  I wished I could believe the reasons behind what that seemed to mean were real.

  “Hey,” I greeted him quickly, then looked to the front, into the sunglassed eyes I saw in the rearview mirror. “Hey, Ronald.”

  “Yo,” he grunted.

  That was usually the most I got out of Ronald and that was all I got out of him then as he started us moving along the back of Smithie’s.

  I kept my eyes there, thanking the Lord my Porsche was in the parking spot closest to the elevators in Marcus’s garage (a spot Marcus insisted I parked in the minute he gave me the remote to his garage). That would make it (slightly) easier to get away once I did what I had to do.

  This was my thought until the side of Marcus’s forefinger and his thumb took gentle hold of my chin and he turned my head to face him.

  “Hey,” he said softly.

  “Hey,” I repeated my earlier greeting.

  “Everything okay?”

  I gave him the lie I gave Smithie. He’d learn it was a lie in about fifteen minutes, but whatever.

  I’d get this done.

  And I was Daisy.

  So no matter how much it tore me apart, I’d then move on.

  Which meant Marcus would be able to move on to a woman that suited him.

  That woman obviously not being me.

  That lie was, “Peachy.”

  He didn’t let my chin go, and in the streetlights that illuminated the interior of the car, he studied me.

  “You sure?” he asked.

  God, I hated that he could read me.

  I nodded, still held in his light grip. “Yep.”

  It took him another couple of moments to let me go. When he did, I looked to my knees.

  “You were great tonight,” he stated.

  “Thanks, sugar,” I muttered.

  “You’re always great.”

  “Thanks,” I repeated.

  “Party go okay?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Your friend like her cake?”

  I looked out the windshield and nodded.

  “Good,” Marcus murmured, sounding distracted.

  I drew in a breath.

  I let it go.

  Marcus fell silent.

  I did not fill that void.

  Ronald drove us to Marcus’s penthouse and he rode up with us and stood in the vestibule as Marcus let us in.

  “Thank you, Ronald,” Marcus said to him as I scooted in the door Marcus pushed open for me.

&nb
sp; Ronald had no reply.

  I looked out the windows at the lights of the city, the shadowed grandeur of the Front Range, hating it that was the last time I’d see that view and wishing in that moment something that gorgeous had never been given to me.

  Wishing that so I wouldn’t wish the same about other, more important things.

  I heard the door close behind me.

  I turned to Marcus.

  “Ready for bed?” he asked.

  “I’m leaving,” I blurted.

  That wasn’t how I’d wanted to start it.

  Then again, that was as good a way to start as any.

  His body in the subdued lighting of elegant sconces glowing low on their dimmers visibly tightened.

  “I’m sorry?” he asked quietly.

  “I’m leaving,” I repeated.

  “You’re…leaving,” he said slowly.

  “I…uh, yeah.”

  “Why?”

  I didn’t answer that.

  I said, “It’d be nice if you texted me a time when I could come back and get my stuff and arrange for someone to let me into your penthouse.”

  The air in the room changed.

  I ignored it.

  “Why?” he repeated, sounding more terse, in other words, demanding.

  “I just really need to go. Now,” I told him.

  “Without telling me why?” he pushed.

  I knew it wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right.

  But I guessed I didn’t have in me what I needed to have in me to do this fair and right.

  Not even for Marcus.

  Because I was leaving Marcus.

  “Can we just please make this easy?” I requested.

  “You wish to come back and get your stuff. This indicates you’re leaving and not coming back. Except to collect your things.”

  “Yes,” I whispered.

  “Why?”

  I swallowed.

  “Did something happen?” he asked.

  I shook my head.

  “Then why?”

  “Marcus, please.”

  “Tell me…”

  And then I jumped when he completely lost it and I’d never seen Marcus lose it, not ever, and definitely not with me.

  He did this leaning toward me and shouting, “Why?”

  “You don’t want me,” I returned.

  His torso reared back.

  “Are you insane?” he asked.

  “You won’t sleep with me,” I replied.

  “I’ve been sleeping with you for weeks.”

  “Right,” I bit out, losing it myself. “I’ll say it different. You won’t fuck me.”

  “No, Daisy, I’ll never fuck you.”

  My head jerked like he’d slapped me.

  “I’ll never fuck you,” he repeated and went on, “You aren’t that woman to me.”

  “Right.” It came out weak, broken, pained. “So, now can I leave?”

  “Christ, you don’t get it,” he clipped.

  “You’re right,” I returned. “I’m not gettin’ it.”

  “Daisy, we need to take this slow,” he informed me, sounding like he was seeking patience.

  “And that’s been your excuse since the beginning,” I shot back.

  His voice was low and dangerous when he asked, “Excuse?”

  “A man wants a piece of ass, it’s on offer, he has it, and it’s been on offer, Marcus, for weeks. So, you see, you not takin’ it tells me you don’t want it.”

  “You are insane,” he said softly, like he wasn’t even talking to me.

  “No. I’m not. I’m a woman falling in love with a man who doesn’t want me.”

  I watched his body jerk in surprise.

  “Daisy—”

  Honestly?

  I could take no more.

  And who could fucking, fucking blame me?

  “Fuck this!” I exploded, the emotion coursing through me taking control so I couldn’t stop myself lifting my hands in fists over my head and shaking them. I dropped them and shouted, “Just let me fucking leave!”

  “You called me, terrified.”

  Hunh?

  “What?” I asked.

  “That night. That night you called me and you were terrified. I’ve never seen anything like the state of you when I got to you. I arrived in your room, Daisy, you were curled into a corner, awake, but lost in a nightmare. Did you even know I was there?”

  “Of course I knew,” I snapped.

  “Do you know what you said to me?”

  That I didn’t remember, seeing as he was right. I was lost in a nightmare. Though I was worried I’d babbled on about building my castles.

  To cover that, I hissed, “I know you were there.”

  “Right,” he whispered, totally seeing through me. Then he declared, “He scraped your ass raw on that asphalt.”

  I winced and looked away.

  Marcus kept at me.

  “He did not fuck you. He did not bang you. He did not have sex with you. He raped you. Do you get the difference?”

  “Yeah,” I bit out sarcastically, turning back to him with squinty eyes, my face hard. “I was there, darlin’. I get it a fuckuva lot better than you.”

  “But he was inside you.”

  Oh God.

  I started shaking.

  “Stop talkin’,” I demanded.

  He did not stop talking.

  Oh no.

  He did not.

  “And I’m the man who has to come after that. How do I do that, Daisy? How do I do that and make sure you don’t go back there? How do I do that and make sure it’s good for you? Make sure I take you where I want us to be? Give you that at the same time keeping you safe? Give you what I want you to get from me? Make you understand what being inside you means to me?”

  I stood still, staring at him, frozen, but I did it still trembling.

  Though now for a different reason.

  “How, Daisy?” he pushed.

  I kept staring, trembling, unable to speak.

  Marcus was able to speak.

  “I talked with a woman called Bex who’s worked for years at a rape crisis center. She told me to be watchful, communicative, patient, and give it time. We need to give it time so I can be certain to give you what you deserve when I give you me.”

  “You don’t wanna fuck me,” I whispered.

  “No, I don’t want to fuck you,” he bit off.

  “You want to make love to me.”

  “Yes, that’s what I want to do and that’s what I need you to feel when I do it.”

  Oh my God.

  I was in love with this man.

  And he was in love with me.

  He was in love with me.

  “Marcus?”

  “What?” he clipped.

  “Please make love to me.”

  We stood staring at each other in the dim lights in his fabulous entryway.

  But all of a sudden I had my hand in his and was being dragged up an elegant winding staircase.

  I tripped.

  Marcus stopped, jerked my arm, and then I was flying through the air.

  I settled in his arms like a bride carried by her groom as he stalked up the rest of the steps and prowled down the hall to his room.

  “Seriously, really, truly,” I whispered to his hard jaw. “If you’re carryin’ me in this way to your bedroom, honey bunches of love, somethin’ needs to come to fruition.”

  He looked down at me when he cleared the doorway then he walked me across his room and slid me down his body so I could take my feet when he made it to the side of the bed.

  He bent to the side to switch on a light but straightened in front of me, right in my space.

  “Are you leaving me?” he asked.

  “Never,” I answered.

  That was when he kissed me.

  We fell back to the bed when Marcus pressed into me.

  I immediately went after his suit jacket.

  He went after the zip of my hoodie.

&nbs
p; He let me win and I shoved the jacket down his shoulders.

  He threw it off and then took down the zip.

  I yanked his shirt out of his trousers and dove in at the back.

  God, not for the first time I encountered skin that felt amazing.

  Through all this, Marcus kissed me.

  Suddenly, he rolled so he was on his back, I was on top, and he sat up, so I was forced to straddle him.

  My coochie liked the kissing.

  It liked the straddling better.

  “Baby,” I whispered.

  He pushed the hoodie down my shoulders.

  I tossed it away.

  His eyes holding mine, he went after the back clasp of my bra.

  His fingers there, and that was it.

  He needed me to give him permission. To let him know where I was at. To show him I was with him, only him, this was only him and me.

  God.

  Marcus Sloan.

  “Please,” I breathed.

  It came loose then the bra was gone.

  He looked at me exposed to him in his bed for the first time, not on a stage, and he whispered, “So beautiful.”

  God.

  Marcus Sloan.

  “Kiss me, honey,” I begged.

  His hands went up my back, into my hair, pulling my face to his, and he kissed me.

  He did a lot of kissing. In fact, he kept my mouth occupied with his lips and tongue the whole time it took him to get my clothes off, his clothes off (but he let me help with that part). And he kissed me the whole time he touched me, no, caressed me, his hands roaming, slow, gentle, sweet, over every inch of me.

  Finally, finally, he bent and took my nipple in his mouth.

  That shot so hot up my coochie, I slid my fingers in his hair, my neck twisting to the side, and I gasped, “Yes.”

  He worked me there just like he always worked me with his kisses these past weeks and everything he’d done that night.

  Slow. Gentle. Sweet.

  And just the same way, as his lips moved to my other nipple, his hand slid over my hip, over my belly and down.

  I opened my legs for him.

  His fingers slid through me.

  My lips parted, my hips lifted, his mouth went away, and I righted my head to catch his gaze.

  Watching me, his face dark and beautiful, he stroked a finger inside.

  And when he did, his face got darker, more beautiful.

  And hungry.

  My hands darted out and clutched his arms, my eyes drifting closed, I whimpered, “Marcus.”