Dangerously Bad

by Eden Bradley

  “Yeah, he has, eh? Well, his brother Allister did most of the remodel, but Jamie’s too much of a control freak not to have had his hand in things. I’m fairly certain he made the coffee table himself from reclaimed wood.”

  “Huh. That’s what my coffee table is made of.” She glanced around the inviting room, taking in the modern furnishings set against the old ornate crown moldings and the curved archways, along with a collection of vintage hubcaps on one wall. “Definitely a guy’s house.”

  “Wouldn’t you be disappointed if you’d come here to find it filled with lacy doilies and . . . what are those called? Hummel figurines?”

  She smiled. “I’d be shocked. Neither you nor Jamie are the lace-doily types. Far from it. I’m not the lace doily type.”

  “No, just the lace-underwear type, which I happen to like. But”—he narrowed his eyes at her—“you weren’t supposed to wear any tonight. Did you?”

  “You’ll just have to find out.”

  He moved in and pulled her in tight, grabbing her ass through her silk dress.

  “Hmm. Nope. Can’t say I feel a thing. Good girl.”

  She couldn’t help the way her body went soft and liquid at the words, at the rough touch of his big hands, but he let her go and took a step back.

  “Now, off to the kitchen with you, wench, and watch the master at work.”

  “You’re a master chef, are you?”

  “Nah. I just like to brag. But it sounded good, didn’t it?”

  That made her giggle and shake her head as she sat on the stool he held out for her at the counter dividing the living room from the kitchen. It was a very male-looking space, too, with gray slate counters and pewter finishes. She liked it. There was a certain art to its simplicity.

  Duff immediately began to move around the kitchen, pulling cookware from beneath a counter, olive oil and cooking wine from a wood tray next to the stove, which faced where she was perched on her stool. He grabbed a jar of crushed garlic from the refrigerator, as well as a bunch of fresh, fragrant basil, a container of heavy cream and a covered bowl, then opened a bottle of sparkling water, pouring two glasses and setting one in front of her. She knew there would be no wine with dinner—like most respected players in the kink community, there was no drinking before play.

  “I hope you like pasta?” he asked.

  “Everyone likes pasta. And I’m not one of those girls who doesn’t eat.”

  “One more thing to like about you. What about spicy sausage?” He waggled a brow at her.

  “Was that thinly veiled sexual innuendo?” she asked, leaning forward, her chin in her hand.

  “Always with me, princess. But more specifically, it was a question about your taste in food.”

  “I like pretty much everything. Except okra.”

  “Haven’t I mentioned it’s a bad idea to tell a sadist what you don’t like?”

  “No. No way. I’m calling a hard limit on okra.”

  He mock-sighed. “If you insist. But I’ll hold it aside for later negotiations.”

  She smiled at him, and he gave her a wink and went to work slicing the sausage, then sautéing it in the pan while setting a big pot of water to boil for the pasta. She liked watching him work, seeing how deft he was with his hands, and realized not only had he not been kidding about knowing his way around a kitchen, but wow, did the man have great hands! He was so sure of himself on every level—even in the way he chopped the basil or flipped the pan to keep the sausage from scorching.

  “The secret,” he said, keeping his gaze on the stove, “is to keep all the ingredients moving. You don’t want the basil to brown, but to wilt the tiniest bit to release the flavor. And once I get the Alfredo sauce going, you can never let it rest, or it gets stiff.”

  “Sounds like more innuendo.”

  He glanced up. “Touché, lovely girl. But I like to think you hope so.”

  “I do.”

  He lowered the flame on the stove and moved around the counter, taking her chin in his hand and raising her face for a quick kiss. “You know, you set my blood on fire with your fire and sass. I like you, Layla.” He paused, looking down at her while her own blood heated and she had to cross her legs against the pressure building there. “Yeah, I do like you.” He gave her another brief, tantalizing brush of his lips before turning to move back into the kitchen and dropping some finely chopped garlic into the olive oil warming in a pan to start the sauce. He moved the garlic around with a wooden spoon, his brows drawn in concentration.

  Hmm . . . wooden spoon. Maybe he’ll spank me with it later.

  Something in her was loosening up. It was a process that had been happening since their first meeting. Maybe it was his good sense of humor, how he shifted from teasing to serious to pure, searing heat in seconds. Moments. He kept her head spinning, her gears shifting. And maybe it was calculated on his part, or maybe that was simply him, but it was working. Maybe a little too well.

  The alarms in her head started to shriek distantly.

  “Duff? Where’s the restroom?”

  “Eh? Down that hall.”

  She got up, trying to suppress the faint panic that had suddenly flooded her system as she made her way into the bathroom and closed the door behind her. The small room was as cozy as the rest of the house—small because most of the space was taken up by a big glassed-in shower stall done in green slate tiles. Standing in front of the mirror, she braced her hands against the edge of the sink.

  “What is wrong with you?” she asked herself quietly.

  The evening was going well, and each time she saw Duff she felt closer to him, the chemistry burning hotter and hotter. And maybe that was the problem.

  Was she running scared? Because there was plenty to run from. The guy seemed sincere, despite his playboy reputation. But more than that, she wanted him to be. Not simply so she could turn herself over to him and give herself completely to the power dynamic, but because she was definitely falling for the guy.

  “Oh, God,” she groaned. “I really am falling for him. Already fallen. Totally fallen. Shit.”

  Pressing her hands to her cheeks, she tried to swallow that admission. To take it in so she could either deal with it or reject it. But she knew damn well there was no denying what she felt. She really was falling for this amazing man, and she was freaking out because when a person fell, where did they inevitably fall to? And why was she reduced to a teenager under these circumstances? She wished she’d taken her purse into the bathroom with her so she could call Kitty. But that was absurd. She was a grown-ass woman who could handle any situation on her own. Wasn’t she?

  “Goddamn it,” she grumbled, turning the faucet on and washing her hands simply to have something to do, to calm herself down. “No need to freak out. Everything is fine. You’re here with one of the hottest men in existence. He’s into you, you’re into him. In reality, that’s as far as it’s really gone, right? You trust him. He’s an amazing Dom. And he’s cooking a lovely meal for you, so stop being such a drama queen.”

  She took a deep breath, patted her curls into place, squared her shoulders and opened the door, moving back to her stool at the counter.

  Duff was just setting their food down on the countertop, which he’d set with place mats and cloth napkins.

  “Fancy,” she said, trying to maintain a casual demeanor as she ran her fingers over the gray-and-white-patterned cloth.

  “They’re Jamie’s, but I do like them. Ready to eat?”

  “Yes. I’m starving, actually,” she said, realizing only then it was true.

  Duff placed a small bowl of grated Parmesan between their plates, then settled onto the stool next to hers, his big frame barely fitting—he had to turn to the side to find room for his long legs. But she didn’t mind—it kept him turned toward her.

  He still made her nervous. Or, more correctly, he
r own feelings about him made her nervous. But if she focused on Duff she always felt better.

  “So,” he began, “tell me more about your friend Kitty.”

  “About Kitty?”

  “Yeah. You can tell a lot about a person by who their friends are, don’t you agree?”

  “Sure.”

  “But first, take a bite and let me know what you think.”

  She did as he asked, swirling the creamy pasta onto her fork, making sure she caught a piece of sausage and a bit of basil.

  “Oh my God. This is amazing,” she said as soon as she’d had a chance to chew and swallow. “I’m impressed.”

  He dusted his knuckles on his chest. “Knew you would be.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Your ego never ceases to amaze me. But you really can cook, Duff.”

  He grinned at her, his dimples creasing his cheeks. “I know a few dishes. I’d like to learn more, if I can ever find the time.”

  “You could be practicing your cooking instead of having me here taking up your evening,” she suggested, teasing him, then glanced away when she realized how needy she’d sounded.

  He caught her chin in his fingers—something he seemed quite practiced at—and forced her gaze to his. His hazel eyes were glittering. “No. I couldn’t.”

  There was that damn melting sensation again. She would have found it impossible to tear her gaze from his if his features hadn’t softened as he released her chin.

  “Eat up, my lovely. You’ll need your energy tonight.” He took a sip from his glass. “So, about Kitty?”

  She busied herself with another mouthful of her dinner, giving herself a moment to recover from his heated gaze and the intensity of his words before answering. “What haven’t I mentioned already? She owns a successful salon. She’s worked so hard at it, and her business is really taking off. Recently she’s hired some new staff, and the marketing she’s done has really paid off. She’s a very savvy businesswoman. I have so much respect and admiration for her.”

  “I can see that. It’s good to have a friend you feel that way about. Good for her, as well. What about your other friend? Rosie? I’ve come to know her a bit myself, by the way—she did the tattoo on my forearm, which I think I’ve mentioned. And I’ve hung out with her and Finn a time or two. He’s a mate of mine, being that we’re the only giant foreigners at The Bastille. We get each other.”

  “Life has to be . . . I don’t know . . . different, being as big as the two of you are.”

  “Yeah. That whole thing where other guys feel some need to challenge us. To see if they can take us down. It gets old, but you learn to deal with it. We’ve both had to.”

  “I think it takes a pretty insecure man to behave that way.”

  “Agreed. Unfortunately, that doesn’t make it happen any less often. But back to Rosie. She seems like a pretty cool girl.”

  Layla finished her bite of food, took a sip of her sparkling water. “She is. We’ve been closer the last few months. I think we connected initially because of kink, then because we’re both artists. We can relate to each other in a way that’s maybe hard for other people to understand, even Kitty, as much as she loves me.”

  “I get it. No one friend can give you everything. No one partner, for that matter, which is something I’ve had to learn the hard way.”

  “What do you mean?”

  There was a long pause while he took a bite of his pasta, chewed and swallowed, then took another bite before setting his fork down and wiping his mouth. He cleared his throat. “Well. There was my ex, you know? I always felt she was too needy with me, wrapping her entire life up in mine, giving up her own interests and even her friends. And she really did do that—it wasn’t only my perception of the situation. But after things broke off, I saw that I’d been doing the same with her—putting too many expectations on her. It wasn’t fair of me. Particularly expecting her not to do what I was doing myself, yeah?”

  “My exes always made me wonder if I was doing that, but to be perfectly honest—and this is what I found after doing a lot of soul-searching—I was doing it, to some degree, because that’s what they wanted of me. Which is why I refuse to date any more musicians. They’re such narcissists, most of them. They want a woman whose entire life is them. They want us to sit around waiting for them to want us, or to need a meal, or sex, or to be soothed after a stressful day. There was nothing left over for me. And in the end even the sex was bad—awful, really, because that was all about them, too. And my stupid submissive side wanted so much to please them, wanted to make them happy, and I gave up too damn much of myself, until I had nothing left to give. Less and less in each relationship, which in the end wasn’t fair even to them, narcissists or not.”

  She stopped herself, her chest so tight she could barely breathe, and realized how much she’d said. “God, I’m sorry, Duff. You must think I’m out of my head.”

  He shook his head, his eyes narrowing, focusing hard on her face. Stroking her hair from her cheek, he said quietly, “No. Not at all. What I think is that you’ve just gotten real with me—vulnerable—in a way you haven’t before. No, don’t look like that. It’s a good thing. I understand more about you now. I needed to. For the sake of a clean connection within the power dynamic, but also just because . . . just because I needed to, lovely girl.”

  He leaned in, an inch at a time, a storm brewing in his hazel eyes. She felt that same storm. It was made up of need that was as much mental and emotional as it was physical. And she felt something going loose inside her. Breaking apart, some sort of emotional detritus falling away. It was freeing and terrifying at the same time.

  “Duff,” she started, not even knowing what she needed to say.

  “Yeah,” he murmured, moving closer. “I’ve got you, lovely.”

  Then he kissed her, and her mind went quiet as she lost herself in his soft lips, his sweet, silky tongue, his hands on her face. He kept kissing her, and her mind emptied out as he used his touch and his big body to take her over, bit by bit. It was the way his hand pressed against the side of her face, then her shoulder, his fingers stroking her skin, moving up and pressing the tiniest bit into her collarbone. The way his lips became more and more demanding, controlling the kiss, forcing her to follow his lead. The way his energy shifted, leaving her no doubt that somehow it was time to transition into the roles the kink between them required. Dominant and submissive. And there was no question about who was dominant here—nor would there ever be with him. The idea came as a relief.

  She had no idea how long they’d been there, with him kissing her and quietly manhandling her, but when he pulled back her head was buzzing, and she knew she was already going down into the ethereal plane of subspace.

  “Dinner is over, princess. It’s time to sate my other hunger.” He stood and held a hand out to her, and she took it as he helped her off the stool. “Come into my lair, lovely girl. It’s time for me to really see what you can take. Come and be mine for the night.”

  He led her down the hallway, and she thought he was taking her into the master bedroom, but instead he led her into the room next to it. She wasn’t really surprised to see it was a dungeon of sorts, with a spanking bench padded in black leather and a hard point mounted in the ceiling, with chains hung from it that ended in a spreader bar with padded leather suspension cuffs attached. There were a long padded table with eyebolts and wrist and ankle cuffs for restraint and a sleek modern wood armoire hung with floggers and whips, canes and paddles. And his violet wand and various attachments were laid out on a table. Candles burned in wall sconces around the room, and on a high dresser, lending soft, flickering lighting and a subtle scent to the room. It was a sensual den of decadence—a true lair. She had one fleeting moment to imagine how many other women he’d brought there. But she also knew none of that mattered, because now it was her there, in this place where he had gone to some trouble to set
up a gorgeous seduction. And despite the strong woman she was—or maybe because of it, she realized in a small flash—she was giving in to that seduction. Enjoying it. She would revel in it tonight, be in the moment. With him.

  When he led her to the center of the room and began to undress her, she stood quietly, shivering at every touch of his hands, at the slip and slide of her silk dress as he drew it over her head.

  “Ah, that’s perfect. You’re perfect,” he told her, running his hands over her bare body. “So delectably naked under your pretty dress. Even more naked, knowing there was only this thin layer of silk between us over dinner. While you were behind me on my bike. Fucking delicious.”

  “I know how to follow instructions,” she said through the languid haze settling over her.

  “Mmm, yes, you do.”

  He smoothed his palms over her naked breasts, and she closed her eyes, surging into his touch as desire rippled over her skin, then down deep into her belly, her sex.

  “Good girl. So good. So responsive when you allow yourself to be. I need you to allow yourself tonight, Layla. No, look at me.”

  She opened her eyes and his dark gaze met hers. There was simmering heat there. Stark command. Gears shifted in her head once more, and a part of her was a little afraid, but it was blanketed deep beneath the absolute need to cross over into complete submission.

  Did he really see the struggle she’d been going through with herself? Did he know how quickly she was losing that battle tonight?

  Except tonight it doesn’t matter.

  As he stared into her eyes a small smile crossed his handsome face—so damn handsome. Jesus God, had there ever been a man who looked like him?

  “Yes,” he cooed, “there you are, my lovely. Right there. Right here, with me. Yeah.”

  He ran his hands over her shoulders, his touch gentle, then down over her sides, grasping her waist, then grabbing hard, his fingers biting into her flesh until she had to suck a breath in between her teeth.

  “Oh, yeah, princess. Lord, I love to see that. Just let it go. You’ll have to, you know. Because I’m going to strap you to that table and there won’t be a damn thing you can do about it. We’re going to play with my wand. It’s going to hurt. This is your last chance to get out of it. Unless you call ‘red,’ of course.”