Plain and simple—Adam saved his life.
Damián cleared his throat, then noticed that the offensive music had stopped. He looked up at the stage and saw the lead singer waiting for a response from him. When had they finished playing?
“Thank you. We’ll be in touch soon.” The rote response rolled off his tongue after an afternoon of horrendous auditions. As the band packed up its equipment, he looked down at his appointment sheet. He had a few minutes before the next audition.
Since coming to Denver, he’d managed to put memories of Savannah, and all the pain she’d caused, behind him. When he was awake, at least. She still intruded on his dreams, but at least she was a better night visitor than the images from Fallujah.
Damián still couldn’t believe he was a Dom now. He even found himself enjoying some of the scenes with the submissives he was training. But he had to rein in the beast in those scenes, for fear of hurting someone—well, someone who didn’t want to be hurt, anyway. There were some nights he just had to decline a scene because he knew the rage was too close to the surface.
Of course, being the resident sadist, all the masochists found their way to him at some point. Even with them, he only indulged if he knew he could keep himself from going too far. Nothing compared to the euphoric high he got when he was in hyper-vigilant Dom space, tuned into the sub’s every breath, every gasp, every scream.
But, since he’d started working with the submissives in training, he’d learned he still knew how to please a woman without inflicting severe pain. While it didn’t do anything for him sexually, he’d long ago learned that sometimes it wasn’t about him.
Working at the club also gave him plenty of time to pursue the other things he loved, too. He’d been hired at a local Harley shop several years ago and finally had managed to fully restore his own classic. He never felt freer than when he was on his hog. When the physical therapists had told him he’d be able to ride again, they’d given him the motivation he needed to get his ass in gear and do what they told him to do.
He heard the door open behind him and turned to watch as a tall, slender young woman approached. He hoped she could hold his attention better than the last performers had.
“Come in, Miss…” he looked back down at his sheet, “Paxton. I’ll give you a few minutes to get ready. If you have a background disc, just put it in the sound system over there.”
Damián watched her prepare. Her long, wavy hair hung loose to her waist and she wore a medieval-looking dress with pointed sleeves. Her low-cut front exposed the inner sides of her breasts. No bra. Interesting look, although he’d like to see even more skin if she performed in the club.
Hell, at this point, he just hoped she could sing. So far, they hadn’t found anyone he’d want to hire. He looked back at her e-mailed resume. Her background indicated she was way overqualified. What was a Manhattan club singer doing in a small weekend private club like this one? Maybe she was like him, just needing a new start. Or maybe she’d lied on her resume.
When he glanced up at her again, he watched her bite her lower lip. Her eyes widened as she surveyed the room—homing in on the unconventional furniture, complete with chains and manacles. Hadn’t she understood what the ad in the alternative paper meant by a private club? If she thought the room looked wild now, she’d never make it through a night of debauchery this weekend.
Then she noticed him watching her. He continued to stare until she became uncomfortable and looked down at the floor. Shy? Or submissive?
It would be interesting finding out. Interesting indeed.
* * *
Karla nibbled at the inside of her lower lip. What kind of club was this? She’d been so rushed to request an audition when she saw the online ad while waiting for her flight at LaGuardia. She really hadn’t paid much attention to the reply other than to get the address and time right. With her flight delayed, she’d changed into her costume in-flight, which had been an interesting feat. She’d barely arrived in time for the audition.
Karla looked around the room. She’d never seen anything like this place. A private club. For what? Or did she want to know? There was a full bar and stage area, right in the middle of someone’s house. And the furniture! A few tables and chairs were scattered about, but what caught her attention were a number of ottomans positioned around the stage—each with manacles and chains attached to them. Talk about a captive audience.
A center pole in the middle of the house’s great room sported several thick eye bolts—and more chains and cuffs of varying heights spaced at regular intervals. Along the wall were any number of implements of torture whose purposes she didn’t even want to think about.
She cast nervous glances at the Hispanic man in the Harley-Davidson vest sitting at a table between the center post and the bar. While he studied her paperwork, she noticed that his shoulder-length hair was pulled into a ponytail. His moustache and goatee gave him the look of a—well, if she needed to put a word to it—“sadist.” Or what she’d imagine a sadist would look like.
Then he looked up at her and his black eyes bore through her, causing her stomach to drop with a ka-thunk. Unsettling. No longer able to maintain eye contact, she looked down at the floor. Maybe she should run while she still had the chance.
No. She needed this job. She looked up again, but her eyes gravitated to the center post first. Her stomach quivered, sending a jolt to her clit.
Oh, my!
“Miss Paxton?” Her attention returned to the intimidating man. When he stood, she realized how tall he was. Almost as tall as she remembered Adam being, although even Adam probably wasn’t as tall as she remembered. She was only about five-six when they’d met. Everyone looked tall to her then.
“Are you ready?” His voice was stern. No smile. Would this man be her boss? Would she be able to work with someone who put her nerves on edge like he did?
Well, it’s not like you have a lot of options. The market for Goth singers was pretty small, especially in an isolated city like Denver.
“Y-yes.” She drew her shoulders back. Why did she feel she should bow down before him? Lord, he intimidated her.
“I’m Damián Orlando, one of the owners of the club. Just call me Master Damián.”
Her hand shook as she adjusted the microphone to her height. Master Damián? What had she gotten herself into this time?
“Nice to meet you, sir.”
He smiled as if satisfied with her response. Why did the thought of pleasing him seem so important to her? “Begin whenever you’re ready.”
She walked over to the sound equipment and queued up her music. When she returned to the mic, his intense gaze sent butterflies into frenzied flight inside her stomach. Shoot! She missed her queue.
“I’m sorry. May I start over?”
“Certainly.”
Come on, Karla. You need this job. Don’t blow it.
She went back to the CD player to start Track One again. Deep breath. She ran her clammy hands against the brocade dress covering her thighs, then returned to the microphone center stage. Unable to sing while he stared at her with that all-consuming gaze, she closed her eyes and felt the music flow through her.
For you, Ian. She almost felt as if Ian was watching over her. Not the sadist club owner in front of her, but her brother.
Then she sang Tarja’s I Walk Alone, as if she really could bring Ian back.
* * *
Adam closed the checkbook and crossed to his filing cabinet to lock it away. Aerosmith’s I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing blared from the speakers. He’d been trying to drown out the noise from the auditions, but that song put him even more on edge. Damn. One of Joni’s favorites. She’d play it almost every night he was home on leave.
They said time would heal the pain of her loss. Nine years had only managed to dull it. Rather than the sharp knife point he used to feel jabbing into his heart, the pain now felt more like his heart being squeezed in a vise.
God, I still miss you, Joni.
A par
ticularly discordant note from the latest audition brought him back to the present. He hoped he hadn’t made a big mistake with this whole live music thing. He’d barely been able to hear himself think while trying to concentrate on his bookwork. How the hell would he be able to focus on his sub during Dom/sub demonstrations with that racket in the background?
Of course, there were the private rooms, but he liked to do demonstrations in the great room for some of the newer Doms. He usually worked with Grant as his sub. She’d shown up at the club six months ago, after hearing about it from Damián. She usually topped submissive women and men—but she liked to switch things up with her former master sergeant. Unfortunately, she wasn’t submissive so much as subordinate. Not the same as what he’d shared with Joni, but he didn’t expect to find that kind of woman again.
Now that his accounting was done and the bills paid for another week, he opened the door to his office and went back to the desk to check his e-mail account. If anyone had told him while he was in the Corps he’d become a keyboard jockey in retirement, at his laptop several times a day to keep his business records up to date or to cruise the Internet, he’d have shot them for a fool.
During a lull between his classic-rock station’s tunes, new music wafted through the door from one of the acts auditioning in the bar. Nice. A woman’s voice. He actually understood the words. For some odd reason, thoughts of Karla Paxton came to mind. He still pictured her as a pink-haired Goth, although she’d sworn to him in her letters that had just been a rebellious teenage phase.
Karla had written to him as promised since he’d said goodbye to her at the airport that Thanksgiving weekend. She’d often send something she’d made, including the most incredible chocolate-peanut butter brownies he’d ever eaten. He felt guilty, as though that thought was disloyal to Joni. She’d never been too interested in cooking or baking.
Then, during Karla’s senior year in high school, he’d received an MP3 player with a few songs saved on it that she’d recorded. Nearly every night in Fallujah, he’d lain awake in his rack and listened to her sweet voice through his earphones. She’d kept him sane, especially after the disaster there, reminding him there still was innocence and beauty left in this fucked-up world. Somewhere.
He’d been so proud of her when she went on to complete a music degree at Columbia. Thank God she’d found a safe way to get to New York without having to pull another runaway stunt.
He drew his brows together. Why hadn’t she replied to his last two letters and numerous e-mails? That wasn’t like her. If they didn’t both keep such crazy hours, he’d have called to check up on her. Adam decided if he didn’t hear something this week, he’d make sure she was all right. He worried about her singing late at night at that club in Manhattan. Although she said she’d taken martial-arts classes after her encounter with Dickwad and friends in the Chicago bus station, she was still a tiny little thing.
The voice of the woman in the great room called to him like a siren’s song. The quivering lilt reminded him so much of Karla’s voice on her MP3, but then the woman auditioning belted out the chorus in a well-trained adult’s voice. She stirred something in Adam. He picked up the remote and muted the stereo.
“I walk alone. Every step I take, I walk alone.”
Damn. Adam stood up, drawn toward the open doorway where he could hear her better. His hand drew instinctively to the scar on his neck. What the fuck? He forced his hand back down to his side.
The hallway to the great room wasn’t that long and before he knew he’d even moved, he found himself standing at the side of the stage. The woman’s thick, black curls hung in disarray over her shoulders and back. She looked as if she’d just tumbled out of bed. His cock throbbed at the thought of holding her beneath him by fists full of her gorgeous hair as he buried himself deep inside her.
Jesus. What’s gotten into you, old man? She’s a little young for you, isn’t she? Okay, a lot young.
Still, unable to take his eyes off her, he circled around behind the table where Damián sat. He hadn’t had a gut-wrenching response to a woman, well, since Joni. Sure, he’d participated with Grant in demonstrations for various scenes and techniques and occasionally took a submissive under his wing until she hooked up with her own Dom. But that was merely physical. No emotional attachments. Exactly as he planned to keep it. No one would ever stir his interest in being a committed Dom the way Joni had.
“Go back to sleep forever.”
He stopped and stood in front of her, about ten feet away from the stage. Eyes closed, tears spilling down her cheeks. His chest tightened. He fought the urge to go up on the stage to pull her into his arms to comfort her.
Little girl lost.
A distant memory sent his hand to massage that spot on his neck again.
“No one can help you.”
Tall, probably five-ten. She looked a little gaunt. Dark half-moon circles curved below her eyes. They didn’t look like make-up, although it was hard to tell with a Goth. Her breasts filled out the dress nicely, her curves exposed. Lovely breasts he wanted to press his lips against. Her hips flared beautifully under the loose dress, as well. At least she wasn’t gaunt all over.
If they hired her, she’d definitely need to wear something a little more provocative than this Maid Marian costume.
He tried not to think about removing the dress to expose her body to his gaze. But his mind had other ideas. He imagined taking her nipple between his teeth and tugging at it. With her gaze cast downward, much of her face hidden by her hair, he found himself wanting to push the curls away from her face so he could look into her eyes.
When the song ended, she drew several deep breaths, her breasts rising and falling gently.
“Well done, Miss Paxton,” Damián said.
No. Couldn’t be. No fucking way!
As if in slow motion, Adam watched her brush away the tears and raise her gaze to Damián’s. She smiled. Just as he remembered, except that her blue eyes didn’t sparkle anymore. Then her gaze shifted as she noticed Adam for the first time. Her smile faded. What little color she had in her face drained away.
“Adam?”
When she swayed on her feet, he rushed to the stage and caught her in his arms before she collapsed. His heart pounded. Had she been sick? Was that why she’d lost so much weight? Adam felt a vise of a different kind around his heart as he lifted her and carried her to the loveseat near the windows. He laid her down, propping her head and upper back against the armrest and pillows there. Kneeling beside her, her framed her face with his hands, hoping to infuse some of his warmth into her. Her face was so cold.
He reached for an aftercare subbie blanket from the basket beside the loveseat and wrapped her in it. Her body began to tremble.
“Adam? How did you know I would be here?”
“I didn’t.” When she looked even more confused, he added. “You’re in my club.”
Her eyes widened and skittered from the chaining post in the center of the room to the manacled ottomans. Good thing she couldn’t see the theme rooms. She shouldn’t be in a place like this. Damn. Shifting from horny perv to paternalistic thoughts did nothing to shrink the raging hard-on in his jeans.
“So, I gather you two have met.”
Adam had forgotten about Damián. When he turned to look up, his surrogate son held out a bottle of water. Adam noted a bit of disappointment in the younger man’s face, but didn’t want to think about Damián taking Karla under his thumb.
Mine.
Where the hell had that thought come from? Karla was just a kid. Hell, he was old enough to be her father, as he’d told her all those years ago when she’d professed her love. Adam took the bottle, then opened and handed it to Karla. “Yes. A very long time ago.”
“He was my knight in shining armor.” Adam didn’t appreciate the look of hero-worship on her face. He’d never been anybody’s hero and didn’t plan to start now.
“I did what anyone would have done.” She quirked the corn
er of her mouth, as if to say “bullshit.” No, she wouldn’t use language like that.
When her full lips wrapped around the bottle, he tried not to think about them wrapped around anything other than the lip of that damned bottle. Still, his other head ignored his paternal censors. What in the hell was he going to do? No way could he hire her and have her so near while he entertained perverted thoughts about her.
“When can you start, Miss Paxton?” Damián’s words felt like a sucker punch to his solar plexus.
Shit.
“Wait here,” Adam said to Karla. Then he stood and turned to Damián. “I need to have a word with you.” He knew Damián followed him to the bar without having to look, then turned to face him. “She’s not working here.”
“What?”
“She doesn’t belong in a place like this.”
“What’s that supposed to mean? This is a decent club compared to most. Besides, she has a great voice. We need her. The other acts were crap. She’s the last one on my list.” Adam remained silent and Damián rattled off the list of reasons they should hire her. The younger man then pulled out his trump card. “You gave me hiring authority. I’m hiring Karla.”
What the fuck am I going to do now?
“Who the hell is she?”
Adam shook his head, then ran his hand through his hair. He wouldn’t go back on his word to Damián. Maybe he could just make himself scarce and avoid her. Just how the fuck do you plan to do that? This is your god-damned club.
Adam sighed. “Forget what I said. Make sure she’s okay. Then send her to my office to fill out the paperwork.” He needed to get his dick under control, even if he couldn’t control anything else anymore. Not trusting himself to go anywhere near her, he escaped to his office.
Good God, what the hell are You doing sending her here?
Then again, maybe it wasn’t God’s fault. Maybe he was being punished for all the things he’d done wrong in his life.
* * *
Adam doesn’t want you here.
Karla couldn’t mistake how quickly Adam had run away from her. She’d made a royal mistake coming to Denver. Tears stung her eyes as she sat up on the loveseat, swinging her legs to the floor and pushing the blanket away. At the back of her mind she wondered why you would have blankets in a nightclub. Well, she was in Denver. Maybe it got cold here at night.
Masters at Arms Page 17
