Red Hot Alphas: 11 Novels of Sexy, Bad Boy, Alpha Males (Red Hot Boxed Sets Book 2)

by Jo Raven

  He looked up, meeting my gaze with dazzling blue. “Sorry, tryin’a be gentle.”

  “You are? Why? Don’t you like delivering pain?”

  “Not particularly. I do hurt subs when it’s what they want, but I’m no sadist. I build perfect fantasies and fulfill desires here. But even if I did enjoy it, this isn’t the kind of pain to get me hot. I do like whipping, spanking, and impact play, but it’s best if those things delight a sub.”

  “What! That isn’t pain to you? Whipping sounds torturous. I still find it disgusting and brutal.”

  “Well, it’s not like genital torture, electric shock, or blood play. That’s what I’d consider pain. When I whip, it’s done because it’s craved. I have beautiful form and precise strikes that I practice three times a week to maintain. I could hack up a back if I wished, but I prefer to zing and zip across skin or leave indentations.”

  “You told me it was like anything from a dragonfly to a tiger claw. A claw? That sounds painful.”

  “Well, some people like to get scratched, not just on their skin, but deep in their soul, and the whip is the only thing that can ship them to their ultimate ecstasy. That’s a beautiful truth to know and admit to. Every sub should get some impact play, I feel, even if it’s just the lightest bit that can be tolerated. It’s damn fun for both parties.”

  “What’s impact play?”

  “Striking with hands or objects, which could be anything from rubber bands to floggers. That’s taking someone on a sensual journey, not making them bleed or scream for the sake of it. Dishing out extreme pain or torture isn’t the thing that tickles my fancy.”

  “What does tickle your fancy then?”

  “Worship and devotion.”

  “Hmm. So it’s all about you?”

  He chortled, “Of course.”

  “Pretty damn selfish.”

  “Isn’t everyone?”

  “No. Some people actually do aim to put others first.” I bit my lip. “Um, just curious, when would a spanking, like, be delivered, under your, um, domination or whatever?” I had to work to emit a breath because my lungs locked up.

  His mouth tilted slyly. “Under my domination?” Gosh, he made me so sick! He grinned wider and chuckled, which only spiked my loathing for this jerk. “When a girl misbehaves. Sometimes subbies need a spanking to feel pardoned. Some women like to work spanking into a scene, but it’s not true punishment then, even if the scenario depicts it as such. Real infractions shouldn’t get to slide without correction. Letting a naughty girl, who willfully did something bad, go unpunished is a disservice to all.” With my hand cleaned, he said, “Want a bandage? It’s not oozing, but it’ll give you a buffer.”

  “If you have one that fits. Thanks. What would constitute a real infraction?” The applied bandage wrapped around to the front. His soft drag across my palm zinged electricity through my body, and I pressed my lips together, then cursed myself out at the idiotic urge to kiss him.

  “Disrespect. Lying. Brattiness. Not completing an assigned task or obeying an agreed-upon rule, to name a few.” An unfamiliar song played on his phone. I took a deep breath as he picked up. “Kay. I’m still dressing her wounds. Give us five.” He hung up. “Cops are here.”

  I nodded numbly. “I’m nervous. Never been a fan of cops. I also really don’t want anyone to find out I was here.”

  “Yeah, I’ll bet.” He rushed to finish my head. Mintiness hung on his breath and the flecks of sea glass in his eyes mesmerized me. “Just a little scrape. Not bad. Head wounds just bleed more garishly.” I melted, watching the bulging of his biceps and the rise and fall of his chest as he dabbed my forehead with one hand and held my chin like crystal in the other. “Some police frequent here, so they know all about discretion, but I can understand why a self-righteous, little saint like you wouldn’t want people knowing you’re bad, or, heaven forbid, kinky.”

  “I’m not bad. And definitely not kinky.”

  “Oh, the fucking web you weave, you repressed, little freak. You say the things you think you should say so your inner slut won’t show itself, but it’s a flimsy facade I can see right through. Every blush and sigh gives you away. I bet anything this is the most action you’ve gotten all year and that you’re smoldering with desire now and I was totally wrong about your inner, dry desert. That, Pet, is bad. I’m performing a medical service here not aiming to make you sauce up for a slam. Are those panties wet?” He peeled his glove off as he stood and chucked it in the trash with the scraps. But he was quickly back in front of me, crouching like a tiger about to pounce, wearing that smirk I so totally loathed.

  I swallowed tightly. “No. Of course not!”

  “Right.” He clutched my calf and arm, spun me, and shoved me onto my back. He released my calf but pressed on my sternum, pinning me to navy-blue leather.

  My breathing went spastic. “What are you doing? Get off me.”

  The action flipped my skirt up, and he bent over me like he intended to hold me down all day … or plant his lips on mine. I’m not sure if he even knew the warm heel of his hand was on my breast, but I sure did. Heat flared out along my pelvic floor.

  “Prove it, sweetheart.”

  I flicked my tongue. “No. I’m not proving anything. Get your hands off me, Jason!”

  “I will, as soon as you prove to me you’re bone-dry. Slip a finger into that tight hole, pull it out, and show it to me.”

  “No. You’re disgusting.”

  “You won’t because I’m right.”

  “No, because it’s crude. I don’t even know you.”

  “Come on, Shayna. We both know you’re slick in the slit and bad, bad, bad.”

  “I’m not that bad. The police are waiting for me. Get the frick off me!” I bashed his chest and groaned that it was as solid and beefy as it looked.

  Jason jerked me up, hands clasping my shirt, and sat me up in a slouch. Crouching in front of me, he gripped my ankles and pushed my knees back towards my ears. “No. Show me. You don’t want me to know how slutty you really are, but I know.”

  “I am not slutty.” I was fluttering and so, so hot.

  “So says the naughty fibber. Do it! Show me.” He wasn’t gonna let me go.

  My pulse and respiration sped out of control as I obeyed, tucking my fingers sideways into my panties. Not only was I hyper-aware of the stark evidence that would damn me in his eyes, this was also turning me on, his forcefulness, his physical strength, his insistence, that impish twinkle of certainty in his eyes. I was wet right in the folds but did as he asked and drove in deeper. I started quaking when I glided two in all the way. The whole time, he watched my face, rather than the dreadful dip. My walls squeezed at my digits. Bone-dry? Ha. I was drenched. Maybe wetter than ever. All because he fondled my thigh and face a little. I wanted to die, and my cheeks ignited when I extracted glossy fingers and presented them to the sentencing judge with the chiseled-rock jaw.

  His eyelids closed as he sucked my accusers clean with a sexy tongue swirl and a throaty moan, which made my slim cavern squeeze like never before. “Mmm. Already knew you were wet. Could smell your sweet, sweet honey, Sunshine.”

  Zappy sparks bounced in my abdomen and especially below it.

  “Bad. Girl,” seeped out of him like a devious snake. He raked fingernails down my exposed inner thighs then backhanded one. “But, you can learn to be good with some painful discipline.” Um, I don’t think his idea of ‘good’ matched mine. When he said it, it sounded so, so dirty.

  “Well, it sure as hell won’t be from you! Get off me.”

  “Fine.”

  My mouth watered and my legs wobbled as he stood and yanked me up, a clasp on my forearm. I snatched his waistband to catch balance but nearly fainted when my thumb slipped into a scant patch of hair behind a metal button, unfairly reiterating his point about my supposedly loose morals.

  “See? Slutty.” He chuckled. “Goin’ for gold already?”

  I clenched my hands when he ripped them off his
body after they kinda sorta got glued there from shock. “Shut up. You’re probably only plated.”

  “You. Wish.”

  Still gripping my wrists, he smirked. “Let’s go, bad girl, before I ruin your appetite for all other men.” He let me go and walked ahead, leaving me with a longing to see more of his divine body and experience firm discipline at his hand.

  I scowled, and my hollow fluttered with naughty whispers to be filled with more than my own lame fingers. I couldn’t recall a guy ever affecting me this way. And I hated it. I mean, yeah, he’s hot, but I couldn’t even stand Jason. He’s an egotistical, selfish, brutish beast. Not to mention worldly, decadent, and overall nasty. I cleared my throat to dispel the itchy tickle and followed after him. I honed in on his sculpted butt to avoid scenes of sadomasochism I wasn’t yet ready to absorb. The bellows were plenty.

  Jason brought me into parlor with Victorian scalloped furniture, a vibrant ruby red, and shut the pocket doors. He motioned for me to sit, which I did, but I bobbed my heels and fused fingers together.

  “We’re in the Red Room.” When he hung up, he bent down and his hot, minty breath swept down my neck like a dryer-fresh scarf. “Just so you know, sweetheart, the name’s not from the decor. Plenty of bun reddening happens in here. I can plant your tummy to the ottoman, start you off with a nice blush?”

  “No thanks!” I crossed my arms.

  He clutched my chin, tilting my face up. “You’re gettin’ some damn pink. If not now, I’ll catch ya later. Naughtiness always needs to be dealt with.” He straightened up, grinning like the devil, his thumbs hooked into his back pockets.

  Screw you. My breath was hitching from arousal when a Hispanic male cop and short-haired female came into the room with Tex. The bartender quickly left, closing the door behind him. I cleared my throat and introduced myself. Questions rushed at me. I gave the details I remembered, and the female scribbled in a notepad. My pulse quickened. “Tex said something about home invasions? Is it possible I’ve been targeted or that he’ll break into my place too?”

  The woman nodded. “Perhaps. We’ll keep an eye out. All those victimized were female and alone at the time. You live in town?”

  “No,” I groaned.

  “You gave your P.O. Box, but I’ll need your home address too. Can’t promise anything, but we’ll see about beefing up patrol on your street with your local department, all right?”

  “Thanks. It’s something at least.”

  After more back and forth, they left, and I started panicking. I’ll be all alone! I bent over to try to steady my breathing. I cracked and started to cry.

  Jason knelt in front of me. “Hey.” He lifted my drooped head and swept tears away. “It’ll be okay.”

  “How do you know? I’m so scared. Addison and Logan are away, so I’m all alone. I can’t go back there. I can’t. But I have no credit cards or phone, or car for now ’cause he took my keys. My landlord has a key so at least I can get in, but I’m a wreck. I can’t even think right now.”

  “You have a spare car key though?”

  “Yes. Back at the guest house.”

  “It’ll be okay. Just sit here, or at the bar, and I’ll take you home when I finish my shift, okay? I’ll take care of you. Don’t worry. We can pick up your keys and some of your stuff. I don’t have a ton of extra cash, which is why I’m not going away for my vacation starting tomorrow, with the exception of an out-of-town wedding on Friday, but I can put you up in a hotel for a few nights. How’s that?”

  “No, I can’t let you do that. Why would you do that for me? You don’t even like me.”

  He stroked my hairline. “I don’t like it when clouds cover up sunshine.”

  I puffed out a little laugh. “Thanks, Jason, for helping me feel better. I really appreciate your offer. It’s more than generous, and I will pay you back, I swear.”

  “I don’t really care if you do or don’t. Just want you to feel safe, okay?”

  I nodded, and he slid fingers down one of my twists. What was it with him and my hair?

  Hmm. Maybe the devil with the bleeding tattoo wasn’t so brutish after all.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Jason

  Geez. This place oozed feminine gaggery. Me spewing chunks was seriously a strong possibility. Addison didn’t seem like a lacy-frill kind of girl, so the purple rain and extreme chickification of this otherwise nice pad was probably due to Shayna’s poorly attuned tastes.

  As I thumbed through CDs, a nasty scent wrenched my gut. Looking up, I noticed a vase filled with the oddest shit. Bark swirls, weird flowers, purple cones, small cage balls. What the hell! I snatched it off the top of the bookcase and took a whiff. Ukk, yep. Putting it back, I envisioned Little Miss Sunshine up on her toes on a footstool, her bubble-yum ass so tight as she strains to reach it. Oh, she’s naked too, so the lift gave me a nice view of everything pretty and pink. Crap! Ever since she flashed me those wet fingers, bad girl that she is, and I tasted her nectar, I’ve been aching to tie her legs apart and go in for a dive. I chastised my idiot heads for even going there. This little twit with a stuck-up attitude that should be flogged out of existence was the very last thing I needed right now.

  I resumed snooping. Even without labels, I knew Addison’s box was the one with black lace over white, and Shayna’s, the one with Walnut Grove purple flowers. This chick liked purple to a sickening degree and was so Pollyanna I could vomit, but she did have eclectic taste in music. Props for that, kid. No Gaga or Katy in sight. With Bon Jovi, Daughtry, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, Billy Joel’s Fantasies & Delusions, Ella Fitzgerald, Cab Callaway, and Kenny G in her box, I leafed through the rest with the hope that one of mine would be here. Most sales of my eclectic, hard-to-label jazz/rock were digital downloads, but I have sold about 500 physical copies of each of my four self-produced albums. Nope, she didn’t own me. Yet. Shit! Doing it again. Why do I give a rat’s ass whether this snotty spitfire likes my tunes or not? With her toned legs and Nutcracker tastes, bet she’s a dancer. I got fuzz-brained thinking about rigging her in slutty poses for my video. Her suspension contortion could be sick. Whatever. She’d never in a million years go for that. She, with nauseating religiosity dictating her every move, struggled just to show me freaking juicified fingers.

  The unsurprising sniffles coming from her room triggered my deep-seated compulsion to nurture. Damn. Knew she’d crumble. This girl would be the death of me. For some shit-brained reason, I wanted to take care of her and save her from her own misguided notions. Her naivety and innocence not only made her nut-crunchingly annoying but also vulnerable to corruption and abuse by pervs.

  She, thankfully, had unraveled those silly braids that kept asking me for yanks and left the uniform of scandal on the floor. Sunshine was curled in a ball in a shirt and full-bottom, nylon panties. Her jeans never made it on and her suitcase only contained half the things she’d torn out of her bureau or closet. The rest were in a messy heap beside it.

  The blond, tiny creature looked like Thumbelina on a purple sea. Her comforter, a bright, shiny land of marshmallow puffs, contrasted with her disarray. Even as a snotty mess, she was still a sexy bird with a wee body to caress and bite to toe-curling orgasm.

  I stalked in, yearning to see her without the minimal clothes she’d managed to put on. I couldn’t stand seeing girls break down. Nestling beside her, I felt bumbly as I spooned her and stroked fingers through her waves. “Shh. Don’t cry, Scuzzball.”

  That made her laugh, but it spun out in a quiet, sob-laced trill, like she was afraid to just belt out. Bet it sounded more like a melody in its full glory.

  Smelling strawberry, I tucked my nose into the nape of her neck and ate up her scent. Her shiver at my poking beak invited me to rake her with my fingers, so of course, I went for it. I’ve touched a lot of women, but Shayna’s skin was evocative of dew-kissed rose petals, that velvety softness you wish you could wrap up in, especially on cold nights when twisted nightmares are plaguing your mind. I kissed her
shoulder and caressed her. “You will be okay.”

  “How do you know? I’ve never been attacked or mugged. I feel so vulnerable and stupid.”

  “You’ll deal … because you’re strong.” I wasn’t entirely sure of that, but it seemed like a decent mood-boosting thing to say and it was all I had on the fly.

  “Ha. I’m the wimpiest baby alive.”

  “Everyone has the strength to take on anything. Think of all those kids who face cancer like lions or women who find the courage to finally break away from abusive assholes. Sometimes people don’t know what they’re capable of until they’re pushed, or they need to be shown their strength or have it unlocked within. But know this, Sunshine, it’s there, and I already see it.”

  She pulled her face out of her arm cradle and turned my way. “You do?” I let her thread her legs with mine, but it made my pulse scuttle.

  “You said, ‘Screw it!’ to your inhibitions to come get what you needed. That’s gutsy.”

  “Maybe. Why do you call me Sunshine? Is that a nickname for your pets?”

  “No, that’s your nickname. You’re like a warm summer day, sweet-smelling and breezy, but you can also scorch those around you with jagged whips of your tongue.”

  “Thanks!”

  “It’s true, but I like that duality. I can take the heat.” I did like it. I liked it a lot. I was used to ladies falling at my feet on command without hesitation. I don’t think I’d ever tell her, but I liked that she tried her little heart out to resist wanting to devour me and had some moral ground too. That, as well as her likely unbreached heavenly realm, begged for straining and stretching. If she were to ever play with me, she’d fight me on so many things, and, uuuhhh, that freaking jolted my nuts.

  “Jason,” she mewed, “you know you just want real whips of my tongue.”

  “Shayna! Can’t believe you said that, but now you’re talking my language.” I flattened her onto her back and straddled her pelvis. I pinned her down, cupping the crooks of her neck that felt tighter than drums. Glossy blueberries looked into my soul. “I am pretty hard up because I only give that gift to worthy women. I haven’t met such a deserving treasure in ages.”