Darkest Desires (The Club #14)

by Nicole Blanchard

  Wow, really? My surprise must show on my face because she adds, “Most of our members don’t like to advertise their membership—for good reason. You’re going to run into people from the community and this isn’t the kind of club you’d like to advertise to your family members.” Her eyes twinkle, “Keep your mouth shut and all.”

  “I understand,” I say as I hand my phone over. She logs it and clicks at her computer.

  “Guests are allowed on the first floor. If you’d like to go higher, you’ll need to be escorted by a member. Most of the general rules are common sense and you’ll see them posted or you may ask a DM—dungeon master—if you have any questions. Just be respectful.”

  Nodding, I lift my hand when she gestures for it. She takes my pointer finger and presses it against an identifier pad, then keys into the computer again.

  “If you do decide to become a member, you’ll go through our two owners, Mr. Mak and Ms. Fremanis. If you went to the munch, you’ve met Tally—Ms. Fremanis.” Done with the business on the computer, the hostess smiles again. “Would you like a booth or a spot at the bar?”

  “Bar, please. Thank you.”

  She gestures toward the inside of the club, and I take the first step inside.

  Music pulses and colorful strobe lights flicker on my right over a dance floor full of writhing limbs and sweat-slicked skin. To the right of the generous dance floor is a full bar with a smattering of tables situated in front.

  I beeline for the bar and order a white wine, gulping it like water when the bartender sets it in front of me. Too much more of this twisted anxiety and desire, and I’m going to turn into a raging alcoholic.

  With my wine glass held in front of my chest like a shield, I turn on my mahogany bar stool to survey the rest of The Club. I’m seated on the end corner of the bar, closest to the dance floor. Heat pours off the mass of bodies in waves, and I lift the thick curtain of hair off my neck and let it drape around my shoulder.

  On the other side of the dance floor, I can see the tops of a pair of frosted glass doors. Shadows of bodies flit across the surface and V.I.P. is affixed to the front in gold lettering. Opposite the V.I.P. section is a wall of booths. It takes a moment for me to realize the walls between the booths are removable, allowing for larger parties. There’s one such party going on at the farthest booth, and features a group of members in various states of undress.

  Everywhere I look, I find carnal scenes, making my heart beat fast in my throat. I wipe my palms on the material of my dress and order another white wine. The second glass helps steady my nerves and by the end, I’ve joined the bodies on the dance floor, enjoying the heavy bass and frenetic pace. Hands and bodies brush against me, so quickly that I can’t make out who they belong to.

  God, yes. This is exactly what I need. Time to blow off steam. A little fun to forget everything else I’m running away from. A moment of reprieve before I figure out what the hell I’m going to do next.

  A pair of strong arms wrap around my waist and large hands coast down my ribs to settle on the flair of my hips. They grip me with reassuring firmness, an anchor in the sea of bodies surrounding us.

  I peer through lids, heavily weighted with lust and excitement, to find a couple kissing passionately in front of us. Heat spears through me, violent and true. When the man draws his hands down and under the fluttery edge of my dress, I gulp deep breaths, but can’t seem to find my equilibrium.

  “Don’t think,” he whispers, his voice gruff in my ear. His breath tickles, entices, and I shiver against his hard length. “Just feel.”

  And I do. I feel everything. From the fast racing pulse of the music, echoed by the thud of my heartbeat, to the searing flush of heat coating my skin, burning me from the inside out, to the raw tease of his whiskers on the curve of my neck. Behind me, his chest is firm and broad. Powerful. Strong. The kind of man who can overtake, overpower, and overwhelm you. I’m instantly, shamelessly wet.

  His hands delve higher, teasing the tender flesh of my inner thigh with the tips of his fingers, the edge of his nails. If he goes any higher he’ll no doubt find the evidence of my arousal. I refocus on the scene in front of me, trying to gain some handle on the wild spinning room and I notice the couple in front of us is no longer kissing. They’re watching, eyes glued to the hand underneath my skirt.

  I freeze against the stranger behind me, unsure if I should run to the exit…or let him continue. Based on my body’s response, I’d let him do a whole number of things. Anything he wants.

  And I want it. Isn’t that why I came here? To explore this side of me? The side frantic couplings in the dorms and endless nights of missionary never seemed to satisfy.

  “If you’re uncomfortable, we can move to a more private booth,” he says against my throat, his fingers still teasing my thigh. His voice is low, so low I have to strain to hear him over the pounding music. It’s secrets and sin, a dark silk colored with temptation.

  The first thing that comes to mind as I worry through my indecision is Mikhail. Which is all sorts of crazy. But his kind voice and troubled conversation was endearing. He’s exactly the sort of man I should be going after. A kind man who has his shit together. A good man.

  Just when I open my mouth to protest and pull away, the stranger behind me lifts his fingers to the strip of cloth framing my pussy and the words die a pitiful death in my throat. Surrendering, I twine my arms up and around his neck, pulling his warmth closer to my back. The woman in front of me smiles encouragingly, as both she and her partner watch the stranger’s hands play underneath my dress.

  “Do you want me to make you come?” he asks, his deft fingers slipping underneath the edge of my panties.

  My legs tighten around his wrist reflexively to keep from melting to the floor. His free arm wraps around my waist to keep me standing. Barely.

  “Here?” I don’t know if I’d rather he whisked me away to a secluded corner, or if I want the anonymous couple in front of us to witness the erotic display. I’ve always loved being on stage, performing, but this takes it to the extreme.

  “If you want.” His fingers trace through my wetness. “We can stay right here. Let them see you.” When I don’t say anything, he continues, “You aren’t attached to anyone, are you?’

  “No,” I manage, licking my lips and breathing heavily. Just hearing the word from his mouth is enough to make the word a moan. Master.

  The fingers around my waist flex, and he exhales. “Would you like to be mine for the night?”

  My pussy ripples with need, achingly empty. When I manage to speak, my voice cracks, which shocks the hell out of me. Thousands of performances. Speeches. Do-or-die auditions and I’ve never fumbled a line. Missed a mark. But one touch from this mystery man and I’m damn near struck senseless. At a loss for words. “I’m not s-sure exactly what that means. This is my first time here. Doing anything like this.”

  “It means you let me decide what you want, because I’ll give it to you. It’s my responsibility to learn what you like. What drives you.” He slips a finger into me, wrenching a broken gasp from my throat. Working it in and out of my tightness, his voice grows gravely. “What excites you. What makes you come undone.”

  My hand grips his around my waist. “You mean things like this?”

  He drapes my hair over my shoulder so his lips can press against my neck. “Yes, and other things.”

  Images flash like quicksilver through my mind. “Like what? You want to hurt me? I’m not so sure I’m into pain.”

  “I’m only interested in your pleasure,” he says. “And we’ll discuss any particulars if you’re interested in doing a scene in one of the private rooms.” The couple in front of us still watches with hungry eyes. His fingers are moving more insistently now, urgently, inside me. “I would never do anything you didn’t want. And The Club has a safe word as a precaution.”

  “What’s the safe word?” I ask.

  “Red.”

  “So all I have to say is red if
I want you to stop?” I can’t imagine anything he could do that would make me want him to stop.

  “That’s it. We’ll both walk away, no feelings hurt. No strings.”

  It’s getting harder to process his words. My thoughts are sluggish. My blood supply having retreated to other, more pleasurable locales. “What’s in it for you?”

  “You,” he answers, as though it’s that simple.

  And maybe it is.

  Maybe I’ve been so caught up in making the right choices, doing the right thing, that I’ve simply forgotten to enjoy myself, my life. Even in areas like sex.

  Especially areas like sex.

  For so long I thought the desires I had to be taken, to be owned, were something to be ashamed of that I buried them deep down inside of me. I got tangled up in relationships like the one I just got out of in order to prove that I’m normal.

  Maybe I’m not.

  Maybe I’m not normal, and maybe that’s okay.

  “Let me give you this,” he says.

  Needing simplicity. Needing someone else to take charge, take the choices out of my hands for a while, I say, “Yes.”

  Chapter 5

  He guides me from the dance floor to one of the more private booths alongside the opposite wall of the main floor. There are people everywhere, the whole room is packed wall to wall with them. But the one person I want to see, the one who moves behind me, then pulls me into his lap, hasn’t yet let me see his face.

  When I turn to catch a glimpse, he lays his hands on my shoulders. “Not yet,” he says. “This isn’t about me. There will be plenty of time for that. Later.” Those hands skim down my shoulders and along my arms when I don’t protest.

  “You aren’t going to tell me who you are?”

  “Not yet,” he repeats.

  “Then what do I call you?”

  “If you need to speak you may call me sir.”

  “Okay,” I say, already squirming in his lap, needing him and his hands. His fingers tighten on my arms in warning and I amend, “Yes, sir.” Saying it here, in this setting doesn’t feel as silly as I imagined it would. It feels…right.

  “Did you like having them watch you?” he asks, his touch light now, his fingers dancing along my wrists. When I can’t find the words to answer, one of his big palms comes to cup my neck, applying pressure there.

  For a moment, I fight against being restrained, even in such a small way. My head instinctively jerks to the side, trying to break free of his hold, but he’s implacable, and I don’t move him an inch. His other arm winds around my waist to hold me firmly in his lap. I can’t escape him, can’t escape his demands, his questions, or the truth.

  “Yes. Yes, sir. I liked it.”

  His lips ghost up the side of my neck and his hand returns beneath my skirt. “Good girl,” he murmurs.

  The couple from the dance floor appears, no doubt at a signal from the commanding man behind me. They sit on the plush bench to our right and continue their conversation, like I don’t have a man’s hands mapping my body right in front of them.

  “If you get uncomfortable or want to stop, what do you say?” he asks.

  The words flit around my mouth, but I can’t seem to draw them out of the growing fog in my thoughts.

  He drapes my thighs over his legs, spreading them in suggestion for the couple across the booth and causing my breathing to become shallow. He moves his mouth back to my ear. “What do you say?”

  “R-red,” I whisper back, my mouth dry.

  He rewards me by putting his hands back underneath my dress. My head tips back against his shoulder as he goes right back to where he’d been on the dance floor, his fingers under my panties, except this time he adds a hand on my breast, cupping and squeezing its weight, tweaking my nipple over my dress.

  I glance at the crowd milling about the rest of the floor and find the couple in our booth isn’t our only audience. There are several upturned faces—not all—but a good few turned toward our display.

  “Uh—”

  I start to say, but he leaves my breast to put a suggestive hand over my mouth. “Remember what I said? I’ll take care of you. Just enjoy it. You shouldn’t feel bad for wanting the things you want. Just like I don’t. You’re a beautiful woman. You deserve to be wanted. You deserve their admiration.”

  “What do you deserve?” I say, then hastily add, “Sir.”

  “A beautiful woman that no one else can have but me. A woman who chose me out of a roomful of men.”

  His fingers are quick and efficient, undeniably talented, but I’m as interested in his words as I am in his actions. “I don’t even know what you look like,” I say through shuddering breaths. “I don’t know anything about you.”

  “The only thing that matters right now is how you feel. Now be quiet. No talking until you come. We don’t want to punish you on your first night here, do we?”

  I open my mouth to respond and then slam it shut. The inability to talk, to worry, only leaves room for feeling. Having people watching on all sides is like being in front of a dozen different mirrors. My reactions to every carnal touch and nip and stroke is reflected on their faces, with their bright eyes and rosy cheeks.

  Moans are coming from the couple in our booth now as they fondle each other. They aren’t watching so much now as madly making out. I did that, I think. I made them mindless with need. My limbs tighten around his knees as my response spins wildly out of control.

  “That’s it, girl,” he says in my ear. “They’re all watching you. Wanting you. You see how much you turn them on?”

  His finger slips inside me as his thumb strokes the bundle of nerves at the top of my sex. He adds another finger, stretching me wide. He’s gonna take me over. Wreck me completely.

  Even as I fly apart, fall to pieces, I wonder how I’m ever going to be able to come back from this.

  Then, I wonder if I even want to.

  My thoughts and dreams are filled with everything that happened last night as I prepare for my date with Dr. Mikhail Alexandrov. Even though I’ve performed on a nightly basis for years, I’ve never done anything on the level of what I did with the stranger at the The Club. My cheeks haven’t stopped burning since I returned home.

  “I can’t believe he cancelled on you,” Mom says as she watches me put the finishing touches on my makeup.

  I push thoughts from last night from my mind, certain she’ll see the evidence on my face. “C’mon, you know as well as I do how hectic the E.R. can be. The last thing I want to do is make him go out on a blind date after the night he had. Besides, we both enjoy the theatre. We’ll probably have a better time going to see the play than having dinner anyway.”

  “He’s not taking you to dinner?” she says, her brows lifted.

  I sigh, remembering why I left home at eighteen in the first place. “Yes, Mom. He’s taking me to dinner. I’m just saying this feels more personal, like he actually asked me instead of it being a setup.”

  “You won’t regret it. He’s a good man. He—”

  I cut her off. “No, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know anything about him so I can form my own opinions.”

  She smiles. “You’re going to have a great time.”

  “I’m sure we will.”

  “Remember what I said about grandbabies!” Her laughter follows me out of the front door and into the balmy evening air.

  A sleek, expensive looking dark SUV waits for me at the curb, right on time. Even though the windows are tinted and rolled up, I prickle with a heavy awareness. With a calming breath, I walk down the sidewalk and pull open the passenger door. Pulling it open, I take a deep breath and plaster a smile on my lips.

  It takes every ounce of training I have to keep the smile fixed on my face.

  Because he is gorgeous.

  Make your mouth water, make your knees weak, take your breath away kind of gorgeous.

  “You must be Stella,” he says with a grin.

  “I must be,” I say as I climb i
nto his SUV.

  He holds out a friendly hand and says, “So nice to finally meet you.”

  “You, too.”

  And it is. His dark brown hair is trim and tidy, the bottom edge brushing against the top of his leather jacket. The collar of his white button-up shirt is neatly pressed and accentuates the dark line of his defined jaw.

  My hormones must be on high alert because I want to kiss that space between his shirt and his jawline in the dark hollow of his throat. I study him out of the corner of my eye with a few furtive glances.

  His eyes are the deep, clear blue of the Atlantic Ocean laid in striking contrast to the dark slash of his lashes and eyebrows. His lips are full, his teeth white and straight under his boyish grin. The rest of him, I notice, is all man.

  He navigates through traffic with an easy confidence, his corded forearms flexing, his body angled toward me as we make polite conversation.

  “You didn’t have to take me to the theatre, Mikhail,” I say. “I’m happy to do something else.”

  Shaking his head, he glances over at me. “No, this is perfect. When I moved to the U.S. my grandpa and I used to go to movies and plays to help learn the language. Some of my favorite memories are in a theatre.”

  “You’re close with your grandpa?”

  “Very. He and my grandmother moved over with my parents from Russia when I was young. We all lived in the same house until my parents could afford their own.”

  My own grandparents threw my mom out when she informed them she was pregnant with me and unwilling to marry my father.

  “Thank you for humoring my mom. I know how pushy she can be. I promise I’ll try not to be one of those horror stories you tell to your friends about, the blind date gone wrong.”

  He slants a heated look my way. “So far it’s going absolutely right.”

  He makes me wait until he can jog around the front to open my door for me. I study him, wondering if he’s being for real, when I step out the door. His scent wraps around me—all pine and spice—and I resist the urge to step closer into the circle of his arms to inhale it some more.