by Lisa Wells
I’m blocking your number.
She fumbled with her phone to find the place to block him. Her finger hovered over the “block this contact” option. A smart woman would block his number. Forget he existed. Just like she’d managed to do over the past ten years. Sort of. Well, not really. But that was beside the point. Another text came through.
Let me teach you kink. You won’t regret it.
Then again…she could respond to just one more text.
Liar.
Chapter Fifteen
Ian chuckled, and his palm itched to feel the soft, creamy expanse of Kinley’s bare bottom. “Well played, Kinley Foster,” he muttered under his breath. “Very well played.” He slipped out the back entrance, hoping the speaker didn’t see him leave and take it personally. The only reason he’d come was because he’d observed Kinley entering the session and had followed her.
He’d love to make a scene and drag her back to their suite. Make good on his promise to spank her. Unfortunately, he was due to take pitches for the rest of the afternoon. And as a respected agent, he couldn’t be seen causing scenes.
Besides…anticipation never killed a man. And Kinley needed time to process the fact that he planned to spank her.
And they would need rules.
“Hi,” said a smartly-dressed black lady, interrupting his thoughts as they both stepped into an available elevator and pushed the buttons for their designations.
The door closed and the elevator voice said, “Going down.”
The lady laughed. “Sorry. My dirty mind always takes it wrong when I hear his voice saying going down.”
Ian chuckled. She was nice looking. Middle-aged. “And now it will strike me as inappropriate every time I hear it.” He searched for her name badge. She wasn’t wearing one. Which could mean she wasn’t a participant of the conference, or it could mean she was an agent or an editor hoping not to be caught in an elevator with an author anxious to pitch to her. He often took his badge off when he wasn’t in one of the session rooms. Funny, she didn’t look like anyone he normally did business with, and it was a small industry.
She held out her hand. “I’m C. Southern. If I’m not mistaken, you’re I. Hartley.” She had a nice southern drawl to go with her last name. Her accent reminded him of an author he represented who lived in New Orleans.
He shook her hand. “You’re not mistaken.” Was she a new editor? He didn’t recall seeing her before. “Are you a writer?” He went for the safe question. Of the twenty-four hundred participants at the Romance Lovers Conference, over a thousand of them were writers.
She laughed. A booming noise. “Not exactly. But this week I’ve found myself branching out. Offering my services to a writer who is trying to broaden her experiences. Bless her heart.” She gave Ian a quick look and then stared straight ahead.
Ian had the feeling the woman was up to something. He just couldn’t decide what. “I also find myself helping a writer this week.”
The woman gave him a sideways look. Ridiculous beads on her eyelashes caught his attention. A tiny smile lifted her lips—a smile that was both mysterious and mischievous.
She was definitely up to something. What?
She rummaged in her purse and pulled out her phone.
The elevator stopped, and the door slid open.
“This is my floor,” she said, while pushing buttons on her phone. She gave him another quick glance before placing the phone to her ear. She stepped out the door. “Hi, glad I caught you. You’re never going to believe who I rode—”
The door shut.
Ian took a step back and leaned against the wall, chuckling at where C. Southern’s phone conversation took his dirty mind. Who did she ride last night? He glanced down and noticed a pink card on the floor. She must have dropped it when she pulled out her phone. He bent down to pick up the card. Flipped it over. An invitation.
Fantasy Bashes
By
Charlie & Dan
Must have this card to attend.
RSVP for details.
1800-300-6969
Chapter Sixteen
“Just one moment,” Kinley whispered into the phone, stepping out of the session on dialogue and into the hotel’s busy hallway. Writers carrying matching conference bags were congregating in small groups, supposedly waiting for the next session to begin. But in actuality, Kinley guessed they were ogling a photo shoot of male models in the adjacent conference room.
Kinley did a little ogling herself.
A male model left the photo shoot. Two women vacated a bench to follow him. Kinley grabbed it. “What’s up?” she asked, tugging off a boot and rubbing her toes. What possessed her to bring this particular pair on her trip? They weren’t comfortable.
Sexy, but not comfortable.
Oh yeah. She’d brought them to wear while out searching for men to have one-night stands with, all in the name of keeping her New Year’s resolution to have sex this year. While her hiatus had given her time to write the book she always wanted to write, she’d missed dating. Missed sex. Had decided to be a woman that dates around. Not settle for one guy at a time. She admired women who went after sex with the same gusto men did. She wanted to be one of those women—a woman with no sexual hang-ups about doing what she wanted.
“You’re not going to believe who I rode the elevator with just now,” Charlie said. She sounded out of breath. Giddy.
“The Pope?” Kinley searched the hallway for Ian, only half-listening to Charlie. Where had he gone? Had he been serious? Had she? What happened to her grudge against him? Was her hate dissipating? What about her self-preservation?
“Bless your heart. You do try to be funny. I saw your man.” Charlie’s loud booming voice pulled Kinley back into the conversation.
Kinley’s breaths shortened and her stomach tightened like someone had just shoved her body into a pair of Spanx. “My man?” Please let her be misinterpreting the comment.
“Yes. Your man.”
“How do you know what my man looks like?” She asked the question quietly. Trying not to jump to conclusions. Did she even have a “my man?”
“Ummmm…” There was a short pause as if it dawned on Charlie that Kinley didn’t sound peachy. “Dan and I dropped by the Club last night.”
Kinley threw an internal conniption. Son of a—damn it. “You guys spied on me?” Her tone must have leaked anger, because those around glanced her way. Unable to force a fake smile, she turned her head so they couldn’t see her face.
First her brother interfered in her life and now Charlie. Why couldn’t people let her be an adult without a shadow guardian? “Why would you do that to me?”
“I thought you might need Dan to hit on you if no one else did.”
“Do you know how insulting that is?”
“No.”
“Well, it is. You were afraid all your hard work wouldn’t be enough for me to get a man’s attention.”
“Bless your heart. That’s not what I thought. I just wanted you to win the bet. I’m sorry if I took my role too far.”
Kinley relaxed her grip on the phone. Charlie meant well. Just like her brother. “Fine. Just let me handle things from here on out.” She exhaled, letting go of the tension. She was being too sensitive.
“Honey, I don’t make promises I might have already broken. Anyhoo…he was really uptight. I couldn’t tell if he was wound up in a good way or a bad way. You know what I mean?”
Already broken promises? “What—”
“Whoops. Can’t hear you. It’s noisier than a swinger’s party on Bourbon Street around me. We’ll talk later.”
The phone went dead. What had Charlie done? And what was that about a swinger’s party?
Chapter Seventeen
Three craft sessions later, Kinley’s toes were toast. Time for a change of shoes.
She stepped into the crowded elevator. “Fifteen,” she said to the designated floor-button pusher, another conference goer.
How did Ian interpret her las
t text? She’d called him a liar. Did he see that as an invitation to spank her?
Or as a joke. A droll joke.
Like the time she put Nair in his roll-on Icy Hot dispenser his senior year during football season.
In no way had she been trying to solicit…
One of her mom’s mom-isms popped into her brain. If you can’t be honest with your own brain and heart, why should anyone else be honest with them?
Truth was, spanking and kink aroused her curiosity. And who safer to experiment with than Ian?
She scanned her key card in the door, crossed her fingers he wasn’t in the room, and opened the door.
No such luck.
“Ian,” she said in a strangled voice.
He stood in the entryway wearing a smile. A sexy smile that caused the air to whoosh out of her.
His thick hair was wet from a shower. His chest was bare and beautiful and absilicious—just like she remembered when he and her brother used to peel off their shirts after football practice. A pair of jeans hung low on his hips. “I was wondering when you would show up for your punishment,” he said in a voice that scored a twelve out of ten on the sexy radar. Maybe a thirteen.
Shivers and quivers swept and swirled through her, leaving wobbly legs in their wake and a whole lot of sexual awareness toward the blue-eyed rake. She placed a hand on the wall for balance.
He was so freaking handsome. And sexy fearsome.
A blend of stranger-danger and promised wickedness.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” She fought an urge to turn and run. He was Ian. Only Ian.
She swept past him and glided into the living area, lifting her chin in an attempt to appear in control.
“Oh, I think you do.” He came up behind her, rested his hands on her shoulders, and lightly massaged.
She sidestepped away. The guy was like a sexual magnetic field to her girly parts. She couldn’t reason clearly around him with that going on. “I’ve done nothing that deserves punishment.”
He chuckled, a male sound of confidence. “Are you sure about that?”
She set her purse and conference bag on the table. “I’m afraid you’re going to have to tell me what you’re talking about.” She took a seat on the arm of a wingback chair.
He leaned against the doorway. His head tilted sideways, his cornflower blues caressing her face. “You won the bet.” His words sounded thick.
She gave him a wide-eyed look. “You said it wasn’t possible for me to win the bet.” She was glad her heart was on the inside of her chest and not the outside where its thrashing would be visible.
He swallowed, drawing her attention to his Adam’s apple. “I was wrong.”
The admission curled her toes with desire. “What do I get for winning?” The tune of Alice in Wonderland’s “I’m Late” came to mind. I won, I won, I won, I won, I won. No time to gloat, or say you lost, I won, I won, I won. She silently sang the revised words.
He sat down on the coffee table across from her and took her hands in his. “You’ve been taking that dialogue advice from your morning session to heart, I think. Between last night and your comments this morning and in our texts, you’ve been very fickle, Kinley. So let’s try some on the nose dialogue. No more games. I want to have sex with you. The question is, do you still want me to teach you about sex?”
Her throat went dry. “You want to have an affair? Between us—two consenting adults? For the duration of this conference?”
“Yes.”
She moistened her lips and looked at her lap. “Okay.”
“Okay what?” His voice was raspy.
She bent over and pulled off her boots. “Okay, I want to have sex with you. For research. But I don’t need you to help me get an agent. Teach me what you can about sex, and then it will be up to me to incorporate it into my writing. When this conference is over, there won’t be a need for us to ever be in contact again.” She couldn’t quite look him in the eyes when she said the words. Not yet. She needed time to process. And then there was her brother to consider. But she didn’t want to think about that now.
There was a long pause. “That’s not my preference, but if it’s yours—”
Which part of it wasn’t his preference? The part about not needing his help to find an agent? Or the part about not seeing each other again? No doubt both. “It is.” She kept her gaze focused on his chin.
“And do you still want to learn about non-vanilla sex?”
In a distant part of her brain, she knew this was a crazy idea, but in the forefront of her brain, things were coming up kisses and orgasms. “Of course.”
He hissed out a breath. “Tell me exactly what you want to try.”
Chapter Eighteen
Ian forced himself not to grin like a boy whose parents just told him they were leaving him home alone for the weekend. Kinley Foster just agreed to non-vanilla sex for the duration of the conference. “Non-vanilla can mean a lot of things. For instance—whips.”
She wiped her hands on her skirt. “No whips. But blind folds, handcuffs, sex toys, and spanking are all good.”
That was good to hear. He could never mark her beautiful skin with a whip. “I like your list. Anything else?”
“Maybe. I’ll let you know when I’m definite.”
Interesting. What did she want that she was afraid to ask for? “I think we need a few rules. About the spanking.”
“Like what?” She sat haphazardly on the chair’s arm. Like a bird ready to take flight if spooked.
He scooted the coffee table he was sitting on closer so he could have a good look at her face. At her eyes. “Like if you call me a liar, there will be consequences. A spanking. In fact, you’ve already earned a spanking.”
“Already?” She fell off the arm of the chair into its seat cushion, all arms and legs and monkey grace. “Why? How?”
“Because you called me a liar. I’m not a liar. I don’t lie. I will never lie to you. EVER.” He leaned in closer. “And you should know, your act of innocent alarm is wasted on me. I know you too well.”
“I have no idea what you’re inferring.” She pulled her glasses down until they perched on the tip of her nose. “I should get a pass on earlier. How was I to know that was grounds for being spanked?”
God, she was sexy. Even when she wasn’t trying. He stood and walked to the ceiling-to-floor windows. “I’ll take your request under consideration.” He didn’t see her triumphant smile, but he could feel the heat of it burning his neck. He turned around.
“What are the other rules?” she asked with a neutral expression.
“I’m in charge. For the rest of the conference, I’m the dominant, you’re the submissive. You do whatever I tell you to do. I’ll keep in mind all of the things you listed that you want to do.” When he thought about last night, about her soft body pressed against him, his groin tightened—so he did a few multiplication tables to cool himself off. Six times six equals thirty-six. Seven times nine equals sixty-three.
She wrinkled her nose. “And if I don’t do what you tell me to do?”
He met her gaze. “There will be consequences.”
She ran her tongue over her top teeth. “What kind of consequences?”
“You’ll see.” He strode toward the bedroom. He was due downstairs and needed to get dressed. “By the way, why did you come back up to the room?”
“For more comfortable shoes.” She grabbed her boots and purse and followed. “These hurt my toes.” She held up her boots to show him.
“Why did you wear them?” He took a shirt off a hanger and slipped it on.
She set everything down beside her suitcase and peeled off her tights. “Because that’s what women do when they come to conferences. They show off their new shoes to one another.”
Eight times five equals forty. He did the math while walking toward her.
She took a step back until the wall stopped her retreat.
He reached down and slowly pulled her
dress up, his hand caressing her naked thighs during the upward movement. When he reached her center, he ran his finger under the elastic edge of her panties. “Button my shirt.” For the life of him he couldn’t remember what two times two equaled.
She did, her breasts rising and falling rapidly.
He placed one hand on the wall beside her head and leaned in. “I’m going to enjoy spanking you.”
She licked her lips, and her fingers stalled, hovering over the buttons.
“Finish buttoning my shirt,” he ordered.
She fumbled her way through the rest of the buttons. “All done.” Her words held a soft, breathy quality.
“Where’s your vibrator?” he asked.
She gave him a sultry look that set his blood on fire. “Which one? I have three.”
He groaned and turned away from her. Two times two is twelve. “The one you had last night.”
“In my purse.”
He picked up her purse and took the vibrator and the remote out.
He glanced at the little purple toy and then handed it to her. “Put it in.”
Her thick lashes flew up. “Now?”
He nodded and sat on the edge of the bed. “While I watch.”
She placed one foot on the bed beside his hip. She slowly raised her dress so that her lace panties were on display, then moved her thong out of the way and slowly slipped it in.
Did she always maintain a waxed canvas? Or was that just for the conference? For him? He liked the idea of her doing something just for him. He leaned back on his elbows, held up the remote, and turned it on with the push of a button. One plus one equals sex.
She kept her leg on the bed. Her eyes grew heavy.
He increased the speed. “Look at me.” In all of his life, he’d never seen anything more beautiful than what he was seeing right now. Nor knew so little about math.
Kinley slowly leaned forward. She reached for the button of his jeans.
“What are you doing?” he asked in a husky voice. “I didn’t say you could touch me.”
She nibbled her bottom lip. “May I touch you?”
