by Force, Marie
“Thank goodness she’s all right,” Stella says, gripping my arm.
I cover her hand with mine. “It’s okay, Stel. You can say what you really mean. Thank goodness it was only food poisoning.”
“That, too,” she says with a warm smile. The Godfreys were close friends with my parents back in the day, before everything in my family went to shit, before my parents’ epically ugly divorce and my mother’s slide into addiction put a wedge between them and most of the people in their lives—including me.
We eat and drink—well, they do, I abstain because I want my wits about me for later—and we celebrate Natalie. Flynn makes a big production out of presenting her with the keys to his silver Mercedes sedan, which is now hers.
Watching them, I feel a kernel of hope take root deep inside of me. If they can make it work, why can’t we?
My partners are thrilled with the title we’ve settled on for the new film, and when we’re all sitting around the outdoor fireplace after a delicious steak dinner, Jasper makes a toast to Addie, who “saved our arses” with her great idea.
She blushes in embarrassment, but her eyes sparkle with pleasure at the well-deserved attention.
“Does anyone else love the way ‘saved our arses’ sounds so filthy when he says it?” Ellie Godfrey says.
“Me,” Leah says, raising her hand.
The other women, including Addie, follow suit.
Jasper flashes a leering smile and waggles his brows. “I got a lot of filthy words where those came from, ladies.”
Everyone else laughs, but I notice Ellie watching him the same way I imagine I look at Addie. I’d be much more interested in wondering what’s going on there if I didn’t have my own dragons to slay.
“So who else is counting the days until we leave for Mexico?” Kristian asks.
A chorus of “me” follows his question.
“I am so ready for a fucking break,” Kristian says. “We can’t keep up this pace.”
“You wimping out on us, old man?” Flynn asks.
“Hardly,” Kristian drawls, “but you’ve got to admit the last couple of years have been rather punishing.”
“I can see how all that Oscar gold would be a major drag,” Addie says, drawing laughs from everyone.
Kristian raises his glass to her. “Touché.”
“I agree with Kris,” Marlowe says. “I’m ready for a vacation. The Mexico trip couldn’t come at a better time.”
“Glad you agree,” Flynn says. “Addie gets all the credit for throwing it together.”
“That’s shocking,” Jasper says in a teasing tone. “And here I thought you were doing this for us.”
“Har-har,” Flynn says. “As if.”
We all have a good laugh at Flynn’s expense, which is one of our favorite things to do. He says we keep him humble, and we say someone has to. The truth is, his fame has never gone to his head. In many ways, he’s exactly the same guy he was before his career took off.
I give the party another hour before I’m ready to ask Addie to give me one more chance. I intend to make this chance count, except I can’t find her. She’s not in the house or out by the pool. “Where’s Addie?” I ask Flynn when I’ve done a thorough search and come up empty.
“Oh, she left a while ago.”
I can’t believe she actually left without having said a single word directly to me while we were there. Has it really come to that? “Where’d she go?”
“She didn’t say, just that she had an appointment.”
“Who has appointments at ten at night? What’ve you got her doing?”
“It’s not for me. I have no idea where she went.”
Marlowe and Natalie come into the kitchen, bearing plates and glasses from the pool deck.
“Do you guys know where Addie went?” I ask them.
They exchange glances.
Marlowe is the first to look at me. “Um, well, I know, but she asked me not to tell you.”
“She specifically said, ‘Don’t tell Hayden’?”
Marlowe looks at Natalie, who nods.
“That’s what she said,” Natalie confirms.
“Then you definitely ought to tell me.” I can feel my blood pressure rising by the second.
Marlowe considers that. “Hmm, well, I suppose we could—”
“No, Marlowe,” Natalie says. “She told us not to.”
“I don’t care what she said! Fucking tell me! Right now!”
“Watch how you’re talking to my wife, man,” Flynn says.
“Sorry,” I mutter and force myself to chill the fuck out so I can get them to tell me what I need to know. “Please, I need to find her. I have to tell her… I… Please.” I can’t believe I’m about to break down in front of them, but that’s what’s going to happen if someone doesn’t tell me what I need to know. Right. Fucking. Now.
“You know Devon Black?” Marlowe asks.
All the oxygen leaves my body in a big whoosh that has my head spinning and my heart racing. I fucking know Devon Black. “What about him?”
“She’s gone to Black Vice for—”
I have no idea how that sentence ends, because I’m out of there the second I hear the words Black Vice. I swear to God, if Devon Black lays one finger on her, I’m going to rip his fucking head off and shove it up his motherfucking ass.
Flynn comes after me, calling my name, but I ignore him and tear out of his driveway as if the hounds of hell are chasing me. The only thing I can process at the moment is the all-consuming need to get to Addie before it’s too late. If she lets Black or anyone else touch her, I won’t be responsible for what I do.
I know exactly where Black’s place is because I’ve been a guest there. He’s a friend, or at least I thought he was. If he’s training Addie—
Christ, I’m going to be sick, but I don’t have time for that, not when she’s got at least a half-hour head start on me. When I think about what can happen in thirty minutes at a BDSM club, my entire body is gripped with agonizing pain. This is my fault. It’s my own fucking fault that she’s gone somewhere else for what I wouldn’t give her.
I take the hairpin curves on the road that leads back to town going much faster than I should, but I can’t bring myself to slow down. Not when Addie might be doing something foolish and risky.
Black’s a good guy, I tell myself. He won’t let anything happen to her. But he might touch her or let someone else touch her, and that would count as something happening to her—something that shouldn’t happen with anyone but me. I push on the accelerator, endangering myself and anyone who has the misfortune of sharing the road with me. I’ll take the time to feel badly about that later, after she’s safely back in my arms where she belongs.
Thank God Black’s place isn’t far from Flynn’s. I pull up the long driveway twelve minutes after I leave Flynn’s, my tires screeching when I come to an abrupt stop. “Leave it right there,” I say to the valet. “I’m not staying.” I push past him through the main door.
A woman runs after me. “Sir, excuse me! You can’t go in there!”
Devon Black comes through the doors that lead into the club.
“It’s fine, Melanie. Mr. Roth is my guest.”
“Where is she?”
“Who’re you looking for, Hayden?”
“Addison York. I know she’s here.” I head toward the doors that lead into the club, but he stops me with a hand to my chest. “Don’t fuck with me, Black. That’s my woman in there, and anyone who touches her is a dead man.”
“My club, my rules. Now unless you’d like to be physically removed from the premises, I suggest you calm the fuck down.”
“I’m not calming down until I see her.”
“Come with me.” He takes me by the arm and jerks me toward a doorway to the right of the main doors. We enter a dark corridor, and I’m afraid of where it will lead. We stop at a large window that looks down upon a room where Addie is seated at a table across from a man. She’s wearing a black
silk robe, and her hair is tied back in a ponytail as she pores over paperwork.
“Take me to her.”
“Not yet.”
“I swear to God, I’m going to rip your fucking throat out.”
“Try it. The entire place is monitored. You’ll be dead before you can get a hand on me or anyone else in my club.”
Rage throbs through my veins like an extra heartbeat. As always where Addie is concerned, I’ve lost control. Am I going to be forced to stand here and watch while another man indoctrinates her into the BDSM lifestyle? My chest is tight, and I’m having trouble getting air to my lungs. It’s quite possible that I could be having a heart attack.
Sweat rolls down my back as I watch the woman I love talk and laugh with another man. He’s shirtless, tattooed and has muscles on top of his muscles. Is that what she prefers? Is that who she really wants?
No, she wants you, and you pushed her away. You let her think she wasn’t good enough for you or strong enough to be what you need. You did this to yourself.
I flatten my hands on the window as if that’ll somehow bring me closer to her, allow me to touch her instead of the guy who’s making her laugh. Then Black hits a button on the wall, and I can hear her. I can hear her going over the checklist of possibilities with another man. It should be me asking her how she feels about clamps and plugs and restraints and rope.
This is all wrong. It’s so very, very wrong.
I start to scream and bang on the window, my palms flat against the glass, but she can’t hear me. No, she can only hear him as he talks to her about safe words and the traffic-light system and the importance of articulating her needs to her partner.
I’m her partner. Me. No one else. I realize tears are running down my face, and I don’t care that I’m crying for the first time in my adult life in front of someone I barely know. My heart breaks at the thought of her doing those things with anyone but me.
“Please, Devon,” I say in a soft whisper because that’s what’s left of my ravaged voice. “Don’t let this happen. Get her out of there.”
He presses a button on the wall. “Andre, please bring Addison to my office. She has a visitor.”
“Yes, sir, Mr. Black.”
“Come with me.” He leads me through another series of corridors until we reach his office, where he offers me a drink that I decline.
I use the hem of my shirt to wipe the tears from my face, lest she see the wreck of a man I’ve become because of her.
Black and I coexist in uncomfortable silence for five full minutes that feel like hours before a knock sounds at the door.
“Enter,” he says.
Addie comes in first, and I go right to her, wrapping my arms around her sweet body and burying my face in her thick blond hair. As her familiar scent fills my senses, the tears begin to flow again.
I’m aware of Black leaving the room and taking the man named Andre with him. Good riddance.
Her arms come around me, holding me as if she still loves me. “Hayden? What’re you doing here?”
I lift my head from her shoulder to look into her eyes. “What am I doing here? What’re you doing here?”
“Devon is the friend of a friend. He offered to help me learn about the lifestyle.”
“What friend of yours is a friend of Devon Black’s?”
“Now, Hayden, you know I can’t tell you that. I signed a confidentiality agreement.”
“Whatever you signed here is null and void. You’re coming home with me, and I’ll train you. I’ll teach you everything I know, everything you want to know. We’ll leave no stone unturned, no kink unexplored.”
“Is that what you want? Or are you saying that so I won’t do those things with Andre?”
“You could really let another man touch you after what we’ve shared? I thought you loved me.”
“I do love you. The only one I want is you. But you wouldn’t teach me, so I found someone else who would.”
Hearing she still loves me is the sweetest relief I’ve ever experienced. “I’ll teach you, and I’ll do it because it’s what I want more than anything. It’s what I’ve always wanted, but I was afraid…”
She brushes the dampness from my face. “Of what?”
“That I’d scare you so badly you wouldn’t love me anymore.”
“I’ll always love you. That’ll never change.”
“Do you promise?”
“Yeah,” she says, kissing my face and then my lips. “I promise.”
“Will you come home with me, Addison?”
“Yes. Take me home, Hayden.”
Chapter 16
Our plan worked exactly as we hoped it would, but I’m unprepared for how undone Hayden is when I encounter him in Devon’s office. I feel sick that something I did reduced my strong, confident man to tears. When I agree to go home with him, he picks me up and carries me out of Black Vice, cradling me to his chest as if I’m the most precious thing in his world.
I’m about to tell him that I need my things from the locker downstairs when a member of Devon’s staff appears with a bag that is tucked into the backseat of Hayden’s Range Rover. He puts me into the passenger seat and belts me in. I’m still wearing the Black Vice silk robe I changed into before my meeting with Andre and still holding the paperwork we were reviewing when Devon summoned us to his office.
I want to take a pause here to assure you that I never intended to allow Andre—or any other man—to touch me. I wanted information. I wanted to understand the process of entering into a Dom/sub relationship so if I got the chance to explore that with Hayden, I’d have a better appreciation for what it entailed.
The thought of any man but him touching me that way is unfathomable to me. In another life, one in which Hayden Roth doesn’t exist, I might’ve found Andre attractive. I might’ve wanted to explore some of the things we talked about with him. But Hayden is the center of my world, and he’s the only man I want touching me intimately.
It’s funny to think that a week ago, before he kissed me and I decided to seduce him, he was always my fantasy man, the one I would choose if I could have anyone I wanted. But now that I’ve actually experienced the reality of him, I can’t imagine allowing another man to ever touch me again. And I realize I need to tell him that before this goes any further.
“Hayden.”
“Yeah?” He grips the wheel tightly, his gaze intently focused on the road as we drive to Malibu. I wondered if he would take me to his place in town or if we’d go to the beach. I’m glad he chose the beach.
“I need to tell you something.”
“Okay.”
“It’s going to make you mad.”
“Okay.”
“I had no intention of doing anything with Andre.”
He glances over at me, seeming to gauge whether I’m telling him the truth or not, and then he returns his attention to the road. “Then what was that about just now?”
“It was about showing you that I’m more than willing to be what you want and need.”
“So it was a setup?”
“Sort of.”
He’s silent for a long time, leaving me to wonder what he’s thinking. Is he pissed off? Will this change his mind about taking me home and teaching me about his lifestyle?
“So Marlowe and Natalie were in on it?”
“Possibly.” I hate to throw my friends under the bus, but I’m determined to be truthful with him.
“And Black? He knew about this, too?”
“Possibly.”
My stomach is twisted into knots as I wait to hear how he really feels about what we did.
“And Flynn,” he says. “Of course he was part of it, too.”
“Don’t be mad at them. They were only trying to help us get over this hurdle so we have a chance of making a go of it.”
“I’m not mad at them.”
“Oh. So you’re mad at me, then?”
He shakes his head. “I’m mad at myself. I should’ve had more fait
h in you from the beginning. What happened tonight… That was my own fault. I drove you to it.”
I can’t go another second without touching him. I release my seat belt and reach for him. “Hayden, I’m sorry. I hate that you were so upset by what you saw at the club.”
“It nearly killed me to see you having that conversation with another guy when it should’ve been me.”
“You’re the only one I want. You’re the only one I’ve ever felt this way about, and I’ll never feel this way about anyone but you.”
His arm comes around me, holding me tight against him. I feel his lips brush over my hair. “Same goes, baby.”
For the first time since we hatched our crazy plan last night, I’m able to draw air into my lungs without a sharp pain of dread in my chest. This could’ve gone so wrong in so many ways, but it had gone exactly right.
“You need to let Flynn know that you won’t be available tomorrow and possibly the next day, too.”
Never has one sentence ever packed a greater wallop. “Oh, um… Okay. What about your deadline?”
“I’ll make the deadline. Don’t worry about that. You have far bigger things to worry about right now.”
“Such as?”
“How I’m going to punish you for what you put me through tonight.”
Every nerve ending in my body, especially the ones between my legs, tingle with awareness and anticipation. “Punish me?”
“Uh-huh. We’ve got a lot of options to choose from, but that sweet ass of yours is going to be mine one way or the other.”
What does it say about me that I practically begin to pant with lust at the thought of him “punishing” me? Not to mention what the gruff, confident tone of his voice does to my system, which is already going haywire. My nipples are so tight they ache, and my clit is throbbing. His hand slides over the silk that covers me to cup my ass. He squeezes my cheeks, and lets his middle finger dip into the valley between them, and just that is nearly enough to make me come.
Dear God, what have I agreed to?
We arrive at his stunning home in Malibu, which is one of my favorites of all the incredible homes I’ve gotten to visit during my tenure as Flynn’s assistant and friend. I love the sharp angles, the huge windows, the breathtaking daytime view of the Pacific, and the contemporary design. Though I’ve been here many times, I’ve never been upstairs, which is where he takes me upon entering the house.
