“Jake?”
Before Kathryn could squeak out another word, Jake flung her over his shoulder like a tawdry burlesque-dressed sack of potatoes. Any hope for protest, or explanation, was impossible. Her time at Club Lazarus seemed to be over.
“How about a little help?” she begged Julian.
“I’ve got a better idea,” Jake said to his number one fan. “You and Kathryn came here in the Maserati? Keep it.”
“Really?” Julian the traitor said with delight.
“Yup. For the next week. Locker number and combination, kitten. I assume that’s where you left the car keys.”
Jake wasn’t asking. It was a demand. Her delayed response resulted in a terse swat on her left ass cheek.
“Okay, okay,” she said with a giggle. “Locker number seven. The combo is four-three-two-one.”
Jake’s entire body stiffened, freezing at the ridiculously over simplified code. “Have I taught you nothing?”
“Apparently so,” Julian said, handing him the collar. “Later.”
As Julian scurried away, Jake took a deep sigh and stomped in the other direction.
“Jake,” she choked out upside down, not pausing his determined stride one little bit.
It was another voice that stopped him. An unnerving voice that Kathryn recognized.
“Jake?” the sugary voice called after him.
“Shit,” he muttered under his breath.
“Is that you?”
At the sound of that singsong voice, Jake turned around in a perfect military about-face as Kathryn’s mind spun.
That voice. I know that voice. God, tell me that’s not—
“Hey, Chels,” Jake said, shifting Kathryn on his shoulder so her short-skirted ass was now in a peek-a-boo stare-down with his ex-fiancée’s face.
Kathryn noted that in the midst of everything, Chelsea Anders, the woman desperate to be known as Chelsea Russo, happened to recognize Jake easily despite his mask. Instinctually. Annoyingly.
If my nips and vagina can pick him out of a lineup, that counts. Right?
“Wow, you look amazing,” Chelsea gushed, cozying up so close to Kathryn’s fiancé, if she were any closer, she’d be licking Kathryn’s butt instead of kissing Jake’s.
Yes, Jake. You look amazing. Now put me down. How about a proper introduction? As. Your. Fiancée.
“Thanks,” he had the audacity to say. Brazenly, he followed it up with, “So do you.”
Great. I’m jealous, pissed off, and now all I can wonder is what she’s wearing. And if she looks better than me. I’ve been downgraded from nineteen-year-old to flat-out middle schooler. What the hell?
Kathryn struggled to be set down, which did nothing but earn her another terse smack. This time on the right ass cheek. The mild yelp that left her lips melted to a smile as Jake’s warm hand soothed and massaged the cheek he’d barely punished. Right in Chelsea’s flawless face.
“Look, Chels, I can’t chat. This one’s a little antsy for my attention.”
Between the deep baritone of his voice that rumbled through her body, and his large, soothing hand resting on her butt, the man wasn’t wrong.
He turned and took two steps for the door before Chelsea hustled ahead of him, blocking his path.
“Can I . . . join?”
Appalled, Kathryn stiffened. No, she can’t join!
“No. You can’t join,” he said, chuckling when this was no laughing matter.
So many questions. Gee, Jake, why would Chelsea Anders think she could join? Is that what you two used to do? Threesomes? Foursomes? More-somes? No judgment.
Even in the private recesses of Kathryn’s mind, it sounded like judgment. But it wasn’t.
Hesitation? For sure. Uncertainty? Yes, because isn’t that what a sex club is about? Pushing boundaries? Blurring the lines of commitment like the fog smoking off the San Francisco Bay?
Had the idea of two men at the same time ever crossed her mind? Technically, yes.
But in my defense, I’d only imagined it with Jake, and a very different version of Jake—the evil one you can tell by the goatee. But Jake with me and another woman? Another woman who isn’t me? Who happened to also have a history with him, including his last name? I might not judge, but consider it one hell of a hard damned limit. Where’s my preference sheet?
“Good-bye, Chels,” Jake said, the gravity of his tone unmistakable. Decisive. Final.
“Okay.” Chelsea sighed with a whimper of regret. “See you around.”
“See you around,” Kathryn mocked under her breath once they were through the main doors and safely out of earshot.
Her snarkiness earned her one last playful smack on the ass and the gruff order, “Not now.”