by JA Huss
“Who’s in—Ow! Jesus fucking Christ, Mysterious! What the hell?”
“I told you stay put, didn’t I?”
“Paxton, you said you wanted to do this because it was—Ow!”
“Fun?” he asks. “It is fun. But when I tell you to stay put, Miss Cookie, I need to know you’ll stay put. Otherwise how do I know you’re safe?”
I turn my body just enough to look up at him. “You are punishing me?”
His fingers are tracing that pattern along my legs again. Teasing. Again. Because nothing even remotely comes close to touching my pussy this time. “I’m not punishing you. This feels too good to be punishment. I’m just showing you that you can trust me. So the next time I want you to do something that will keep you safe, you’ll do it without question.”
“That’s not fair,” I say. “You’re the one who left and didn’t send a message.”
“Which is why we’re having fun right now. And why you only have one ass cheek red instead of two.”
“You can’t threaten me, Paxton.”
“Do you want me to stop?” he asks, raising an eyebrow. “Really? Because we haven’t even gotten to the good part yet.”
I squint my eyes at him. “What good part?”
“The part where you come, of course. I came, now it’s your turn.”
“But you want to smack the come out of me?”
Another crack on my ass and I’m about to jump up when he leans over and traps me there beneath his chest. “Stop resisting, Cinderella. Just give in and trust me.” He leans closer to my ear and whispers, “Do you trust me?”
I relax and drop my head. “Yes.” Because I do. I know he’s got a plan here. And I know it ends with satisfaction. So why bother fighting it?
He rubs my ass again, his touch rougher, his circles over my skin larger. And then another smack. This time I suck in air and bite my lip, but don’t buck my back in protest because he’s got his fingertips between my legs and this time the light pass over my clit lingers and he plays with it.
“Whatever Victoria told you when you were alone in here with her needs to be forgotten. Do you understand?”
I want to say, What do you mean? Or, She didn’t tell me anything. But I know what he means and she did tell me something. He’s got every right to be suspicious. She’s asking me to help her do something none of the Misters will sign off on. It will put her in danger, it will put me in danger, and it might put everyone else in danger too.
“Deal?” Pax asks after letting me think for a few moments.
“Deal,” I say.
“Good,” Pax says, urging me to get up off his lap. He helps me, and then we both get up.
“I thought you were going to—” But he’s got me bent over the desk again before I can finish.
“Oh, I have no intention of denying you anything, Miss Cookie.” He lifts my skirt once more and grabs my hips and positions me by kicking my legs open. “I’m happy to fuck you now.”
His cock finds my pussy wet and ready. He eases into me way too slowly for how turned on I am right now. I can still feel the sting of his spankings. I can still imagine the tickle sensation of him playing with my clit. And it’s throbbing right now. My lower body is staggeringly weak as I wait for him to fully enter me.
His cock is rock hard, his girth stretching me, making me open my legs wider to accommodate him. He leans forward, takes my hands, and slides them along the surface of the desk until they are above my head. He tightly grabs both wrists with one hand and then both my long braids with the other.
“Hard?” he asks. “Or soft?”
I don’t even need to think about it. “Hard,” I say.
He pulls out, almost all the way out, and then rams himself back inside me with so much force, I slide forward on the desk. I grunt, but he’s doing it again, so the grunt turns into a moan, turns into a long, whimpering song of, “Yes, yes, yes…”
Our skin-on-skin contact makes a slapping sound. His large, hard balls are slamming against my clit. One hand is fisting the skin of my hip, while the other has my braids and he’s pulling my head back, and back, and back… until he says, “Open your eyes, Cindy. And watch what you do to me.”
I do. I open them. And his face is everything I ever dreamed of when I pictured myself with Mr. Mysterious as a teenager. Pure, testosterone-filled maleness. He leans down to kiss me, biting my lip, then my tongue, and then he says, “Come.”
I wail. His hand clamps over my mouth as everything I’ve ever wanted comes to fruition. Wave after wave of spasming orgasm. His fingers are there on my clit to bring it all home and the ensuing flood of wetness can only mean one thing.
I did, in fact, squirt all over Mr. Romantic’s desk.
Pax is laughing, I’m collapsed on the desk, my legs so weak, they tremble.
But then there is a loud ruckus outside the door.
“Shit,” Pax says.
“What? What is that?”
But Pax has let go of me and he’s pulling up his pants. “Get dressed,” he says. “Quick! It’s your brother.”
Oh, fuck.
I scramble around looking for my t-shirt, then hike it over my head just as someone pounds loudly on the door.
“Pax?” Oliver yells from the other side. “What the fuck are you doing?” The doorknob jiggles as he tries to open it, but thankfully it’s locked.
I glance around as I smooth down my shirt and make sure my girls are both tucked neatly into my bra. But then I catch sight of my reflection in the glare of the window and realize there’s no way out of this.
My hair is a mess. I look as well-fucked as any cheating wife I’ve ever followed after pulling a nooner with an illicit lover.
I whirl around to find Pax just as Oliver begins crashing his body into the door, trying to break the lock. I’m reaching for Pax, desperate to smooth down his hair as he straightens his shirt, when Oliver comes crashing through.
He glares at Paxton for a moment, breathing hard, nostrils flaring, eyes as angry as I’ve ever seen them. And then he looks at me.
And every bit of that evaporates. “Cindy,” he says, calm, pulling on the end of his shirt a little, like he’s trying to compose himself.
“Oli,” I say, smiling. Hoping like hell he’s not going to start shit. “What are you doing here?”
Oliver glances at Paxton, grinds his teeth and clenches his jaw for a second. “Just looking for my best friend.” He looks back at me. “Hey, Cin, we’ve got a few things to talk about here. Why don’t you go join the other Misses in the kitchen? I hear they’re making dinner… or something.”
My mouth opens in shock. “Did you just tell me to go to the kitchen?”
“Cindy,” Pax says. I look over at him and he shakes his head. “Go. I’ll catch up with you later.”
“Yeah,” Oliver says, cracking his knuckles. “He’ll catch up later.”
I sigh, resign myself to the fact that I was just dismissed, and walk out into the hallway where all the Misters are waiting, wide eyes, mouths hanging open—I get an angry look from Mr. Romantic as he figures out we just fucked in his office—and then I spy Victoria beckoning me at the bottom of the stairs.
I don’t look back when the office door slams and I pretend not to hear the yelling that comes after. I just follow Victoria through the bustling hotel, past the restaurant, and down a long hallway where we stop in front of one of those double swinging doors you find in commercial kitchens.
“Well,” she says. “I guess that’s the end of that friendship.”
“That’s not true,” I say, immediately irritated with her. “They’re best friends. They’re gonna work it out.”
“Hmm,” Victoria says. “A best friend doesn’t usually fuck the baby sister in his other friend’s office. But whatever. They can have their little fight. All the important stuff is going on in here anyway.” And then she swings the door open and I see all the other Misses, plus my big sister Ariel, huddled around a long stainless steel table.
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“Well,” Ariel says, once they all notice us. “Look who it is. The wandering princess has finally been corralled.”
“Don’t be dramatic, Ari,” I say, waving a hand at her. “But what are you doing here anyway? What’s all this stuff got to do with you?”
She grabs something off the table and holds it up in the air. It takes every ounce of self-control not to double over and get sick at the sight of what she’s holding. “What the—where did you get that?” I whisper, my hand over my heart as I stare at the shiny silver envelope.
“It came to the office in the mail, Cinderella. And it’s addressed to you.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight - Paxton
Both Oliver and I watch Cindy retreat through the door. I catch a glimpse of Nolan, Mac, Five, and West lingering just outside the door before she closes it behind her. And then we turn and face each other.
“Fuck you,” Oliver says. “Just fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you.” He pokes me in the chest with his finger each time he says it, but the last time he pushes with his whole palm and I have to take a step back.
“Look—”
“No, you fucking look.” Oliver snarls the words out. “You fucking look, asshole. My sister?” He pauses like he’s still unable to come to terms with it. “My baby fucking sister, Pax? Just what the fuck? Why don’t you just rat me out to the police while you’re at it? Huh? Or chop me up and feed me to the poor? Hey, I got an idea, why don’t I just fucking punch your lights out?”
The blow comes hard, smacking against my jaw. I’m not expecting it, so my head snaps to the side and my ear starts to ring.
The second blow clips my lip and blood sprays out onto Oliver’s white thermal shirt.
I see red. I duck my head and bull-charge him, straight into the desk. He goes flying over it backwards in some kind of circus somersault and actually lands on his feet on the opposite side.
I lean over.
He meets me in the middle.
Eye to eye.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” he asks.
“What the fuck do you want me to say, Oliver? I like her, OK? She came to me. I didn’t… like… seek her out or anything. She came on to me, man. At my fucking house in Malibu. I didn’t know!”
“That’s funny,” Oliver says, his rage about to spill over. “Because I distinctly remember you spitting out your drink at Corporate’s house two weeks ago when I mentioned I had a sister named Cinderella.” Oliver starts walking around the desk as he talks. “You didn’t think it was relevant then? Instead you decide to keep it a secret, tell fucking Perfect before me, and then proceed to bang her in Nolan ‘sick fuck’ Delaney’s office while everyone else is downstairs!”
He’s standing in front of me again. Fists clenching.
“If you swing,” I warn him. “I’ll swing back.”
He’s in motion before I finish and he connects with my cheek before I can block.
But OK. I get it now.
It’s a fight.
I swing back, clip him in the jaw just before he ducks, and then he rams me, head first, pushing me into the wall. Pictures fall off, and the door flies open. Nolan is standing there pointing at us as he roars, “Knock it the fuck off!”
But I barely hear it because Oliver’s next swing also connects, this time with the side of my head. My ear absorbs the second shot in less than two minutes and rings even louder.
Then Mac and West have me by the arms and Five and Nolan are pushing Oliver back to the other side of the room.
“That’s enough,” Five says, when Oliver continues to shout at me. “That’s enough.”
Oliver turns on Five then. “How long have you known about this?”
“Me?” Five laughs. “I found out last night. I came to you today. And now you know too. So don’t go mixing me up with the rest of this bullshit, Oliver Shrike. Remember who the fuck you are.”
“I know who I am,” Oliver says, swiping the back of his hand across his bleeding lip. “But”—he points to the rest of us—“I don’t know who the fuck these guys are anymore. I’ll tell you that right now. I have no fucking clue who you guys are. I think I’m done here. I think I’m out. Fuck you,” he says, pointing to me. Then Nolan. “And you and your sick shit. And you too, asshole”—to Perfect—“you and your do-gooder bullshit can just all go to hell.”
“What about me?” West says.
“You’re the worst of all of them, Corporate.” Oliver sneers his name. “You lie like a motherfucker. I hate liars.”
“Just calm the fuck down,” I say, shrugging West and Mac off me. “It’s not the end of the world. And you’re one to talk, dickhead. None of us are innocent, OK? Not even you.”
“Not even me?” Oliver says, spitting blood onto the floor of Nolan’s office.
“Nice,” Nolan says, taking a swipe at Oliver’s shoulder. “Nice fucking manners, Shrike.”
But Oliver doesn’t even notice. He’s glaring at me. His blue eyes are tiny slits of anger and he peers at me from under his messed-up blond hair. He’s a big guy. Not as tall as me, but a damn big guy. He looked like a linebacker even as a freshman in college. He looked rough. But now—with his biceps bulging against the tight fabric of his long-sleeved Shrike Bikes thermal, tattoos peeking out from underneath the collar, sweat pouring down the side of his jaw as he tries to contain his anger—he just looks… dangerous.
“It’s not the end of the world,” Oliver says, repeating my words. “To you. But I had one sister, Paxton Vance. One sister who was smaller than me all growing up. One baby sister who looked up to me as her protector instead of down on me like an annoyance. And you just stole her away.”
“Oliver,” Mac says. “Come on, man. It’s not like that and you know it.”
But Oliver shrugs him off when he tries to clap him on the shoulder. “How the fuck would you know?” And then he looks at all of us. “How the fuck would any of you know?” He points at Mac. “Do you have a little sister? Or you, Nolan? Who the fuck knows with West, he’s such a goddamned liar.”
“Hey,” West protests.
“I do,” Five says.
“I know you do, asshole.” Oliver doesn’t take his eyes off me.
“So I get it. Which is why I told you right away. But look, you’re best friends with Pax for a reason, right?”
Oliver just shakes his head.
“You know he’ll take good care of her.”
Oliver breaks his death stare at me to look at Five. “Take good care of her? Are you fucking kidding me?”
“Oliver—” I say.
“No.” He cuts me off. “No. You can’t take good care of her. You just fucked her, Vance. You just fucked her.”
“Look,” I say. “I get it. The office wasn’t appropriate—”
“No, shit, asshole,” Nolan says. “We are a fucking hotel, you know.”
“I can’t believe you guys,” Oliver says. “You think this is funny?” He stares at us. All of us, one at a time. And then his gaze lands back on me. “I’m not talking about fucking her, Pax. I’m talking about fucking her over.”
For a second I think he’s talking about me cheating or something. I’m about to protest when it finally hits me.
“You ask everyone if I’m normal,” Oliver says, pointing at West. “‘Why doesn’t he date anyone? Why doesn’t he have a girlfriend? How can a guy run a dating site and not have a girlfriend?’ Well, I’ll tell you assholes why,” he says, snarling the last word like a wild animal. “Because you don’t pack other people into your fucked-up baggage and take them on the trip. If there’s one thing my dad made me understand when all that shit went down ten years ago, that was it. You travel to your destination alone. You don’t bring anyone along for the ride.”
He looks back at me and everything becomes clear.
“You just got her involved, Pax,” he says, poking me in the chest so hard I have to take half a step back. “You just packed her bags and put her on a runaway train to nowhere. Wh
oever is doing all this, they’re gonna come after her too. So congratulations, Mr. Mysterious. You’re probably gonna get my little sister killed.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine - Cindy
Victoria snatches the envelope from Ari’s hand and flings it onto the table. It goes sliding across the stainless steel and drops off the edge onto the floor, out of sight. “She can worry about her junk mail later, OK? We have a serious fucking problem.”
“Wait,” I say, looking at my sister. “Do I get mail at the office often?”
“Nope,” Ariel says. “This is the first time that I know of.” And then she narrows her eyes at me like she’s got a follow-up question.
“OK,” a cute blonde woman says, refocusing our attention. “Look, we’re all on edge right now. None of us know what’s going on—”
“I know what’s going on, Ellie,” Victoria snaps. “I know exactly what’s going on.”
And then she’s rattling on a mile a minute about Liam Henry and that guy named Gori and the fact that her father was tortured to death.
Which totally sucks. Completely sucks. But I’m slowly edging my way around the table until the silver envelope lies like a bad omen on the floor next to my feet. I want to bend down and pick it up, but I can’t. Not without being noticed. So I kick it under the table and try to follow the conversation. Try not to think about what’s inside that envelope. Try not to imagine all the many, many ways this situation just got infinitely worse.
“What can we do?” Ivy asks.
“You’re not doing anything,” Victoria says. “You’re pregnant so you’re not doing anything. And you”—Victoria nods to the one called Ellie—“you’re just not cut out for stuff like this, OK? I need Cindy and Ariel.”
“Wait,” I say, finally catching up. “What’s Ariel got to do with this?”
“Jesus, Cindy,” Ariel says. “If you’d stop by home once in a while, maybe you’d know.”
