LATER, LAZING on top of him in their sex sheets, time slowed.
“It’s like a game,” she said.
“What’s a game?”
“This,” she said, stroking his arm. “I have this to leverage, you have that… back and forth…”
“It’s how the world works.”
She laughed. “No, it isn’t.”
“Everything is barter. We do what benefits number one.”
“Going after Evander tonight wasn’t looking after number one,” she said. “You could’ve been hurt or killed. And don’t you always say your loyalty is to your family before anything else?”
“The family is my number one.”
“With Burl and Biz in prison, your dad dead, the McDades are falling fast,” she said. “Do you still speak with Score, Play, and Razer?”
“Aye.”
“And you took over everything Doherty that didn’t go down with the ship. Your families are connected now.”
“I have boots on the ground and a hand on the wheel. Whisper’s head of her family.”
Not that there was much of it left.
“Easy to do, I guess, with a McDade like Razer at her back. What’s she like?” she asked, sitting up on him. “I’ve heard some incredible things about Whisper Doherty. Did she really murder a woman for smiling at her husband?”
“Almost,” he said, running his palms up her torso, over her breasts and back down. “She’s possessive.”
“It’s incredible.” Her hands rested on his, moving with his as they caressed her. “Two combative families, both such extreme personalities… it’s a wonder their marriage has lasted this long.”
“She’s possessive, sure, but McDades have a jealous streak. Raze has put bullets in men for looking at his wife. Crippled them for touching her. She plays to it. Woman’s fierce.”
“Not all McDades,” she said, her hips undulating as his cock awoke beneath her.
“Not all McDades, what?”
“Have a jealous streak.” Or Connel just didn’t care about her enough to get jealous. “You don’t.”
“Don’t test that theory, baby,” he said, squeezing her breasts together.
Resting her hands on his torso, she lifted and dropped just a few inches, mimicking what they’d done twice already.
“We had sex with two other people,” she said. “You weren’t jealous then.”
“No?”
“Is that what you want? You want your other girls here? They’re dancing in the club.”
If the club was still open, time meant nothing in that room.
“You need them?”
“No,” she said, rocking against him. “Even when I was with them, all I thought about was how bad I needed you inside me.”
“They’re your extras, babe. Not mine.”
“You’ve been with both of them in the past, haven’t you?”
“Yeah,” he said, tormenting her nipples with his thumbs. “Been with a lot of women.”
Given who he was, that was no surprise.
“You just have to pick and point, don’t you?”
“Aye,” he said and sat up, wrapping both arms around her to hold her close. “I can give you any woman you want.”
Because he’d already said men weren’t allowed near her.
“I wasn’t thinking that,” she said, parting her lips when his teased without making contact. “You torture me.”
“I could do that,” he breathed. “You want pain, baby?”
“This is pain… wanting you so much.”
Especially while his solid cock pressed against her pussy. Her hips reacted, writhing and wriggling, stimulating her hormones, igniting her endorphins.
“Tastes good, doesn’t it?”
“So good,” she groaned.
His sly pleasure shivered through her. “Doing something wrong feels good.”
“Feels dirty.”
“Because it’s naughty,” he taunted, squeezing her ass in both hands, pushing up against her. “I’m a bad guy… and you’re supposed to be a good girl. Why you want a guy like me, naughty girl?”
Clenching her inner muscles, she could feel her wetness surge. “Naughty?”
“Mm,” he said, kissing her once before whispering against her, “so naughty. You’re a naughty girl.”
“Don’t naughty girls get punished?”
His grip stayed tight, but he leaned back, assessing her. “You want me to punish you?”
“Yeah,” she panted. “You want me to be a good girl?”
“I like you dirty,” he said, vaulting off the bed, her still in his embrace. “Even dirty girls need to be taught.”
She’d been nervous crossing the living room without clothes, but he didn’t think twice about going downstairs without a stitch on either of them.
Strat could be in the office. Niall. Anyone. And they were just—
He didn’t go through the curtain to the office. He rounded in a U-turn to open the mysterious door adjacent to the bottom of the stairs. Blue and pink lights flickered on in the new room, bathing everything in a purple hue.
He put her on her feet.
Where were they? What was…?
What she saw was… Huh, an intriguing space.
Bigger than she’d have thought, the room was lined in black leather, literally. All except for a flare of red leather on a closed door to the left. Tiered seating curved around the far wall, facing a central platform. The stage held a frame with chains running through eyebolts. Winches, padlocks, cuffs, ropes. In the center a padded leather bench, no, like a pommel horse, with its own cuffs and chains.
“Oh my God,” she said, walking a few steps before spinning around to address him.
The wall behind him distracted her. Racks of toys. Strap-ons, paddles, vibrators, beads, plugs, ropes, and a row of open boxes filled with all kinds of condoms.
“Interested?”
“Geez, do you get these wholesale?” she asked, going past him to touch the edge of the leather covered box. Twirling, she leaned back against the bar at her back, smiling at him admiring her. “Guess the stories are true…”
“Always with the stories,” he said. “Wanna try it?”
She glanced at the toys and ran her fingertips along a crop. “Play with the guy with no rules,” she said, taking the crop from the rack, running it through her fingers as she returned to him. “Why not?”
“There are rules in this room,” he said, taking the crop and her hand to lead her over to the platform.
“Is the door locked?”
“That’s up to me.” Guiding her to the end of the bench, he used his body to press her against it. Bending to push her head out of the way with his, he traced his lips across the pressure point above her clavicle. “My favorite nook,” he breathed. Though she dammed her lips, a mew of arousal rolled in her throat. “That’s it, purr for me, baby.”
“Conn…”
“Try to manipulate me with that and I’ll gag you,” he said, thrusting his hips against her when hers pushed back. “Hands behind your back.” When she followed orders, something warm and soft coiled around her wrists. “Now the rules… I am only master or sir while we play.”
Heat pulsed downward. Already swollen and wet, she wanted speed. “Yes, sir,” she said, subduing a laugh. He yanked, and leather bindings tightened around her wrists. Painfully tight. And when she tried to fight them, there was no give. “Conn—”
“Not so funny now,” he said, hooking her hair back over her shoulder. “Sir or master.”
“Sir,” she said as he ran his fingertips from the back of her neck down to her ass. The tickle caught her breath, slinking up her spine to shimmer through her scalp. “Oh…”
It was difficult not to make sounds when he indulged her with those slight touches that rocked the floor beneath her feet. And that was before the pressure of his body left hers and his tongue touched the groove at the top of her ass to slither up with a feather’s pressure, so lazy and scintillating that her breathing dropped, slowing to match his pace.
He got all the way to the nape of her neck. With a kiss, he exhaled, and a shiver crossed her shoulders.
“Relax,” he whispered against her as his hands slid onto her shoulders, easing her forward, bending her over the horse.
The cool leather roused her nipples. “Yes, sir,” she said because it felt good.
She frowned when he grabbed her ankle, picking her leg up to clamp metal around it.
“Next rule, everything I say goes. You take orders and don’t question me.”
After locking one ankle in place, he did the same to the second. Only him, the metal, and the horse held her up. The very tips of her toes were the only part of her that made contact with the floor.
“Conn—”
He thwacked her ass with the crop. The sudden biting pain dislodged a yelp from her throat.
“Sir.” She almost said his name again, but… fixating on that buzz, on the tingle of discomfort it was… she laughed. “Do it again!”
“No,” he said, running the end of the crop across her ass and up her body as he walked around the horse. “Safe word first.”
“I want this. I want to do this with you. I have never been so crazy with a guy, never—”
“Safe word,” he said.
The stalk of the crop made harsh contact with both ass cheeks.
Okay, that was worse. She hissed through her teeth, closing her eyes to the sting. Stop. Pause. Neither of those worked. They needed a safe word neither of them would ever say in the casual—or not so casual—union of their bodies.
“I can’t think of anything.” Tossing her hair as best she could, she turned her head over to seek him out. Except, mmm, she was pretty much eye to eye with his cock. His naked, very interested in proceedings, cock. “Come closer.”
Her hair fell over her eyes repeatedly; she kept trying to toss it out of the way. Her playmate didn’t come any closer but stroked her hair away from her face with the end of the crop. Except he wasn’t looking at her eager expression. His focus slunk up and down her body, absorbing her prone position, his power over her.
A whole new kind of pain took over. Like withdrawal, her stomach cramped, and she whined, desperate to reach out and sate her addiction.
“Dingo,” she said when it leaped to mind. His attention found hers. “Isn’t he the one who interrupted our first night?”
A straight yet satisfied slant to his lips inspired such freedom. Stepping forward, he pressed the head of his cock to her mouth.
Though she opened wide, he only drew it around her lips. “You’re hungry.”
Distracted by attempts to catch him in her mouth, she missed the movement of his arm. Three short, hard strokes changed that. They tensed her, clenching her muscles. What did it say about her that the sting of his punishment firing through her was so enlivening?
“Don’t you worry, baby,” he said, pushing himself into her throat. “I’m gonna take good care of you.” Sucking on him, she sought his eyes as he undulated within her. “Want me to try the paddle? Gag that mouth? Fuck you ‘til my balls are empty.” He pulled out. “Answer me.”
“Yes, sir,” she said, sucking in her saliva to swallow.
“And when we’re done,” he said, tossing the crop aside to stroll around her.
With her ankles locked, she feared pushing too far either way in case she fell from the bench. But she wanted to see him, to know where he’d gone. She closed her eyes when he caressed her ass, stroking her with a delicate touch he wasn’t known for. When his lips touched her butt, right at the sorest point, she smiled.
“Sir,” she said on an exhale.
“I’m gonna take care of you,” he said, still smoothing his rough fingers across her flesh. “Real good care of you.”