by Lynda Aicher
Not with Jake.
She could see herself becoming addicted to what he’d given her. To the feelings he’d stirred. But mostly, to the warm cloak of protection that had wrapped around her and calmed her inner angst when she’d let go and trusted him. And he hadn’t let her down. No, he’d exceed all of her expectations.
Cali let the strangled groan escape her tight throat and squeezed her eyes closed. Now that she’d had a taste of what submission under the hands of an experienced Dom like Jake could be like, she wanted more. The reality was better than any of her deepest, dirtiest dreams.
Fantasies she never shared with Peter. The man she should have been able to share everything with. It was easy now to look back at her marriage and see all of the errors they’d both made. She was just as much to blame for the distance that had grown between them over the years. He might of have pushed her away, shunned her sexually, but she was the one who’d stopped fighting for the passion. Complacency on both of their parts had led to their eventual divorce.
A divorce she’d accepted as inevitable years before she’d finally asked for it.
Years she could have insisted on marriage counseling, or tried harder to breach the growing gap that had settled between them. It was when she’d stopped trying, though, that all intimacy between her and Peter had died. The simple fact that he hadn’t care enough to instigate it had been the final blow.
It’d been a one-way street that she’d gotten tired of traveling.
And now, she was on a new road. One she didn’t think she had the courage to continue down.
Cali swore into the silence, the sudden noise bouncing off the walls to smack at her. She released the grip on her hair and slowly straightened, swiping at the tears lingering on her cheeks. She inspected her rumpled outfit, the sexy one she’d bought specifically for that night.
It was doubtful she’d ever wear it again.
The sex had been amazing. But Jake was right; it was the connection she craved. The control he exerted over her would feel empty without the bond that went with it. One he’d cultivated so subtly that she’d been snared before she realized the trap had been set.
He’d made her feel special, safe, for the first time in years. But she couldn’t romanticize it. She was just another sub to him, nothing different. And it was doubtful that he’d want to pair with her again. Not someone as old and inexperienced as her. Hell, he owned the club. He could have any sub he wanted, whenever he wanted.
A spark of jealousy tightened her gut with surprising force. She puffed out a small laugh. Obviously she wasn’t a random-sex kind of girl. And after experiencing submission with Jake, she couldn’t see herself with any other Dom. She certainly couldn’t go back to his club and let her desire override her pride. She was way too old to live in a world of illusions and dreams, and lusting after an unattainable Dom wasn’t on her list of humiliating behaviors to model.
Yet she couldn’t help but wonder where Jake would take her if they paired again. Would he push her more? Strap her to a bench and spank her? Or would he use something else on her, like a crop or even a whip? Take away all her control...
Cursing again, Cali jerked to stand and forced her legs to move toward the bathroom. What she needed was an icy cold shower to wash away the night and the emotions it’d stirred up. She’d tried. She’d gone after a dream, had been daring for once in her life. She could check it off and call it good.
Now, if she could only wash away the memories of Master Jake, maybe she could move on and put the night behind her. Forget her kinky desires and go back to life as usual.
If that were even possible.
* * *
The door crashed against the wall, the sound pounding through the room, causing the man behind the desk to flinch then duck his head when he saw Jake. The fucker practically admitted his guilt with that move.
“Something wrong?” Seth tried to act cool, leaning back in the chair.
“Cut the shit, Mathews,” Jake slammed the door closed behind him and stalked over to brace his hands on the desk. “You set me up.”
Seth cocked a brow and frowned. “Don’t know what you mean. Set you up how?”
“With Cali,” Jake bit out. He pushed from the desk and spun to pace the interior of the small office. His frustration hadn’t cooled in the hours since Cali left and the club finally closed. Instead, it had brewed and festered until he was now ready and itching for a fight.
One with fists would be nice.
“Cali?” Seth questioned. He leaned forward to rest his elbows on the desk in an awful attempt to look confused. As if the man didn’t know exactly who Jake was talking about.
“Don’t fuck with me. I’m not in the mood.”
Seth leaned back and raised his hands in a gesture of truce. “Not fucking with you, man. What’s your deal?”
Jake exhaled sharply and closed his eyes, giving a silent count to ten, the practiced attempt at forced calm having zero affect. He fisted his hands on his hips to keep from striking his long-time friend and business partner.
Soon-to-be ex-business partner, that is.
“Where’s Dek?” If Jake was dropping his news, he wanted to do it once, with both men in attendance.
Seth cocked his head, eyebrows furrowing as he tried to follow the change in topic. “He went home. You know it’s his night to head out early.” Seth pushed the chair back, the wheels giving a protesting squeak before he stood and came around to lean against the desk. He crossed his arms over his chest and nailed Jake with a hard glare. “What’s wrong?”
“You fucking in my business, for one,” Jake growled.
“How? What did I do to ‘fuck’ in your business?”
“Don’t play stupid. You practically shoved Cali at me.”
The confused look on Seth’s face hinted at honesty. “The newbie cougar I asked you to interview tonight? Her?”
Jake gave a nod, a tint of clarity starting to penetrate the edge of his red haze of anger to show just how irrational he was acting.
“What the hell?” Seth gave an angry shake of his head. “Second interviews are standard on First Friday if any one of us requests it. Club policy. Nothing more to it.”
Was Jake overreacting? Damn, it had all seemed so clear earlier. “Then what was wrong with her application that warranted a second interview?”
Seth shrugged. “I didn’t say there was a problem with the application. If there was, it would have been rejected. I only asked for another opinion on placement. I told you that. Despite her age and divorced status, she didn’t come across as a real cougar.” He ran a hand through his hair. “So, did Marcus fit for her?”
“No,” Jake said too quickly. Shit. What was wrong with him?
Seth grinned but wisely kept his mouth shut.
Jake turned his back to his friend and moved to lean against the far wall. “I escorted her myself. Marcus is a fine Dom, but Cali needed something different.”
“Something you could provide her?”
Jake ignored the hint of doubt—or was it mocking?—in Seth’s voice. “Fuck you. I did my job. Something you should try doing.”
“Right,” Seth scoffed, his hands bracing against the desk. “I’m not the one looking to bail on the business in three months.”
And there it was. The real elephant in the room. The one all three partners had been dancing around in anticipation of the looming December date.
He turned, his attention darting to the wall of security screens currently displaying the cleaning crew as they scrubbed and sterilized the place, preparing it for the next day’s business. He noted that a few of the third-floor rooms were still occupied, reserved by members for use until morning.
Jake finally met Seth’s sharp scrutiny. There was anger in the deep brown eyes. But he also detected the hidden hurt. That bit of betrayal Jake always saw whenever he took off. It didn’t matter if he gave fair warning of his departures, because someone was always hurt when he followed his gut and moved on.
His anger faded behind the guilt he’d been trying to avoid. “It’s not like you didn’t know I’d leave,” Jake said as he tried to push off some of the responsibility. “There was a reason you made me sign the five-year contract.”
Seth’s lips thinned, the tight line doing nothing to detract from the sharp angles that attracted so many to him. After a tense minute he sighed, his shoulders sagging with the release of the tension. “Shit. I’d hoped I was wrong.”
“So I just confirmed it for you,” Jake stated. No sense in leaving the possibility open now that it was out.
Seth nodded, a simple signal of acceptance. “You have to tell Dek yourself,” he said after a pause, then smiled. “I’m not stepping in that shit.”
Right. Dek. Jake had to smile as well. Of the three men, Dek was the most volatile. Part of the reason the man headed up more of the behind-the-scenes portions of the club. Dek was a security guru and had personally installed every camera, lock and alarm in the building. He also saw to the security staff, recruiting bouncers from his extensive and sometimes scary list of acquaintances from his years in military special ops.
“Yeah,” Jake finally agreed with a snort. “Can’t talk you into being there?”
“Hell, no. Your shit, your wading.”
Too true. But it didn’t make the prospect of doing it any more enticing. “I’ll take care of it this weekend.” Might as well get it over with so they could all deal with the changes that would need to be made. “This doesn’t mean I’m dropping everything, Seth.”
The other man gave a non-committal shrug and moved to sit behind the desk once again. “But you’ll be gone. Like it or not, that means changes for all of us. And for the club too.”
Damn, Jake wouldn’t let the guilt sway him. He would only damage things more if he stayed. “Sorry.”
The curt apology wasn’t enough. It was never enough, but it was all he had to offer.
“Look, I need to finish the books before I head up tonight,” Seth said dismissively as he turned toward the computer screen and clicked the mouse. “We can finish this discussion after you’ve talked with Deklan.”
Jake bit his tongue and nodded. There was nothing left to say. He left the room, the soft tapping of keys following him into the hall before the door closed and cut off both the sound and the man.
It held a finality that he wasn’t quite ready for. There were still three months before he could leave. Three months to make the other men understand.
Shit. Jake thumped his fist against the wall. Not only had Seth forced him to play his hand before he was ready, the other man had completely avoided answering Jake’s questions about Cali.
Double fuck. When had he ever let Seth beat him in a verbal sparring match?
Never—that’s when. Jake was truly off his game to let that happen. And who was to blame for that?
The image of one Cali Reynolds leaped unwanted into his mind. Her body spread naked and waiting on a sheet of black that made her skin look like caramel and cream. His dick hardened instantly.
Damn. It was definitely time to get the hell out there.
He was becoming too comfortable. Too settled. Wanting and wishing for so much more than he could have. It was time to go before the shit landed. It was better to control his own destiny than let it hit him from behind.
He rubbed his hands over his tired eyes, trying once again to focus his mind and temper his thoughts. With a sigh, he moved down the hall toward the back storage area. He opened the door and flicked on the light. The room was littered with broken equipment, the standard cleaning supplies and other random stuff that got shoved into the room. But the area along the back was his workspace. Nobody put anything there without his permission.
He walked past the junk and let the wood and grease smells of the workshop calm him as he went through the process of getting his tools and turning on the bright work lights. He was currently in the middle of two projects: a modification to a pommel horse he was still tinkering with, and a more complicated revolving cross that would allow the sub to be bound and then positioned at various angles by the Dom.
The simplicity of working with the wood and metal soothed him in a way few other things did. He was in charge of the equipment at The Den. He loved the challenge of taking standard stuff and making it better, tweaking it until it suited the needs of both Dom and sub. He took special requests, thought of his own and repeatedly hunted the internet for new ideas. It was just one more thing that distinguished The Den from other clubs.
Working with inanimate objects was way preferred to dealing with his emotions. Wood and metal didn’t talk back, didn’t disappear and leave you to fend for yourself. No, the materials would meld and form to his control until it became exactly what he wanted. Sometimes they would struggle and fight, resist his vision, but the end product was always his.
Right now he needed to lose himself in the work. To stop thinking and just forget, before heading upstairs to his loft. It wasn’t like sleep would be happening anytime soon. Not when thoughts of Cali Reynolds continued to haunt his mind.
Chapter Eight
Jake fisted his hands on his hips and waited, the plain white door before him the last barrier of protection from the anger he had to face on the other side.
Or was it really the disappointment he was dreading?
The door swung open—it was time to wade the shit.
“Hey, Dek,” Jake said, trying to remain casual. “You busy?”
Deklan grunted then turned and walked back down the hallway. The fact that the door remained open was Jake’s signal to follow the man. There’d been a number of times the door had simply closed in his face—a very effective, non-verbal fuck off.
A small part of Jake had been hoping for the closed door, if only to put this off.
Stepping into the condo, he shut the door and took a deep breath. It wasn’t like Dek would physically hurt him. That wasn’t the problem. No, Deklan had much better ways to make a person feel like a minuscule piece of shit without having to raise a fist. Often without saying a word.
Jake walked down the hall into the living area. No matter how often he was there, he was always mildly surprised at how sophisticated the room looked. Decorated in rich browns and blacks, the abstract artwork and polished silver sculptures strategically placed around the room spoke of a complexity Deklan rarely showed to anyone. Immaculately clean, if it weren’t for the large flat-screen hidden behind the closed doors of the maple entertainment center, he’d swear he walked into the wrong condo.
“Beer?” Deklan asked from the kitchen.
“Sure.”
Jake crossed the room and took a seat at one of the leather bar stools that sat beneath the counter separating the two spaces. The inclusion of a physical barrier between them was a deliberate move on his part.
Dek twisted of the top of the beer and handed it to Jake. After taking a drink of his own, Dek gave him a level stare. “So?”
Right. A man of few words, Dek always implied more into everything he said.
“So,” Jake said. “You talk with Mathews?”
“Every day. You?”
Jake hid his smile behind his beer bottle. The man wasn’t going to make it easy for him. Not that he blamed Dek. At six foot five, Deklan Winters didn’t have to make anything easy for anyone. Six-two himself, Jake never felt overly intimidated by his friend, but Dek could definitely make a man squirm.
As the oldest of the three men, Deklan took the role of big brother and protector seriously when it came to Seth and Jake, which also made disappointing him that much harder.
Jake let the cooling fizz of the beer run down his throat. “Dick.”
Dek cupped himself and gave a profane tug. “Yup, got one.” He lifted an eyebrow. “You?”
“You should know. You’ve seen it enough.” The club didn’t allow for modesty.
“That inferior piece of equipment you carry?” Dek snorted. “That hardly counts.”
&nbs
p; Jake smiled, some of the tension leaving his shoulders. The familiar banter settled the bundle of knots that had formed in his gut. “Not all of us need to carry a fucking Uzi to feel like a man.”
“No. Only the most skilled get the Uzi.” A devious smiled curled over Dek’s lips.
“Oh, really? I thought it was only those who need to overcompensate for their lack of skill who required an Uzi?”
Dek grunted. “Lack of skill, my ass.” He took another swig of his bear then set the bottled down and leaned onto the counter. His beefy arms spread wide, showing the strength and muscles that bulged under his T-shirt. Dek had lost none of his military-earned physique since he left the service six years ago.
It’d been at Dek’s post-military party that the three friends had crafted their plan for The Den. Their mutual interest in the more extreme side of sex sprouted from their teen years, when the three boys had found a safe haven in a BDSM club, of all places. The club proprietor gave them a place to sleep, income for cleaning the club and, most importantly, a sense of safety. All with the strict rule that none of them could participate in any club activities until they were eighteen and legal.
Jake glanced over his shoulder and nodded toward the closed doors of the entertainment center. “No football?”
Dek shook his head. “Packers have a bye.” Being a Green Bay Packer fan while living in Minnesota Viking territory could be a dangerous prospect for a less confident man. He leaned in. “Why are you here, Jake?”
Direct. The man was always direct.
Unable to hold Dek’s searching stare, Jake stood and grabbed his beer to the stand beside the tall windows of the sliding glass doors. He leaned against the wall and took in what appeared to be a party of sorts happening in the courtyard behind the condo.
Jake had avoided this conversation for two days. It was Sunday afternoon, and they both had to be at the club that night. It was better to get everything out before they all met again.
