Check out all the chapters by clicking HER(fix)E
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: NEW EYES
Max sighed, stepped out of her car, and slammed the door shut. She turned to glare at Donovan’s. Between her job and making sure that Hallie’s shop would be ready to open on time, she was beyond stressed and was more than ready to tear someone apart.
And she had a target in mind.
It had been two weeks. Two weeks of phone tag. Two weeks of unanswered emails. Two weeks of no answers. And Max was tired of it.
She’d agreed to work on this with him because she thought that she’d be working with him on this. But, no, every time she’d called him, he’d been resolutely stoic. All he ever said was that he was working on it. God only knew what that meant. He never went into detail, got evasive if she asked. Just kept promising that he would fix things.
He’d assured her, in almost every voicemail and email, that Wayne had made no move to release the photos. As if that were a comfort. There was still—would always be—the possibility of it. Wayne could send them to her family. To her boss. She’d be living with this over her head all the time. And she just couldn’t live like that.
So she’d come to Donovan’s tonight. Because she hated—fucking hated—that the terse, tailored, irritating attorney could make her so angry by avoiding her when she never wanted to see him again. That he could make her wish he’d talk to her—write, call, see, whatever—when she was still so hurt.
So, yes, she’d come for answers. She’d come for him.
With large, dark, tortoise-shell, cat-eye sunglasses and a trench coat that made her feel like something out of a bad noir film, she stepped into the club, flashing her bracelet, not caring if it sent up flags like it had last time. Kind of hoping it would.
Slipping off her coat and glasses to reveal the black halter dress beneath, she headed for the bar and ordered a steadying drink before asking where she could find him. The bartender simply handed her a drink and shrugged.
“He’s probably in the playspace,” a familiar voice said behind her.
“Play,” Max said skeptically as she turned, “space?” Was that what they called the back area? Playspace? It sounded so innocent, childlike, when she knew it was anything but.
Beside her, drink in hand, was the same tall, leather-clad behemoth from before.
Max swallowed hard. Took a sip of her drink. “Rand, is it?” she asked, remembering Kat mentioning him.
“Max Wells,” he acknowledged with a smile and a nod. “You’re looking for the big man? Like I said, he’s probably in the playspace in back.” Pushing back from the counter, he offered, “I could take you back there, if you like.” His smile widened to show teeth, “If you promise not to hit me. Again.”
Max blushed, embarrassed by her behavior. Which, of course, didn’t stop her from straightening her spine, lifting her chin imperiously, and blustering, “You deserved it and you know it. So that’s really more up to you than me.”
For a moment, they just stared at each other, until his hard face cracked into a genuine grin, and he laughed loudly. “Fair enough,” he said. “Fair enough. Come on, I’ll take you back.”
So she followed him, allowing him to lead her with one hand on her back, just between her shoulder blades. So long as that was the only place he put his hands.
He led her through the crowd and to a door in the back. They entered into a dimly lit hallway. The walls were plain, gray, and unadorned, doors scattered along its length.
It was odd. She’d seen this area from above, seen it spread out labyrinthine before her. It’d seemed so strange, almost mythical then, a sumptuous feast of sexual delights. But here, on the ground, it just seemed so...ordinary.
As they passed rooms, she could hear pleasure-filled moans and energetic grunts. Pleas and orders given in harmonic rhythms, one layered over another. Whispered words muffled by the walls and shouts that rang through the cavernous hall.
“There,” he said, bringing her back to the room that had started it all.
Max walked slowly up to the mirrored room, seeing him, tall and imposing as he tied his hair back, the blond strands coming loose of their band. His sea deep eyes were focused on a petite, Hispanic woman cuffed naked to a tall post in the middle of the room, silver metal gleaming against her tanned skin.
He was still fully dressed; his own sun-kissed skin was hidden beneath a crisp white dress shirt, unbuttoned at the throat, and creased dress slacks, wrinkled from a long day and, obviously, whatever he was up to.
“Looks like he’s with Reena tonight,” she heard Rand comment behind her. “She’s fun. She likes it when you whisper dirty talk in her ear.” He leaned in and murmured into Max’s hair, his breath a hot tickle against her flesh, “Makes her cream all over herself. How about you?”
Max stiffened, but didn’t comment. She wouldn’t rise to this man’s bait. “Has he been with her often?” Were they involved? Had he cheated on Max with other women? Or was he cheating on other women with Max?
“They play occasionally,” Rand answered. “But then he only plays occasionally.”
“What does that mean?” she wondered.
Rand smirked. “All the women know that he doesn’t play for keeps.” He touched her shoulders, holding them in his massive hands. “Don’t they?”
Max sniffed and shrugged out of his grasp. “How many partners does he have?”
“I don’t exactly keep a tally,” the bald man said. “But all men like variety. He just seems to like it more than most. Let’s see here, I know there’s Pip and, of course, little Reena there. There’s Sara and Lynn and Lisa and—”
She waved her hand. “Forget I asked.”
“Don’t think he sleeps with them all,” Rand commented idly. “Might, but I doubt it.” With a shrug, he said, “Man has to sleep, as in actual rest, at some point, am I right?”
Max twisted her lips into a smile. “Thank you so much, Rand, for all your help.”
He chuckled. Stepping back with his hands held out, he said, “Here’s your hat; what’s your hurry? Right?”
“Like I said,” she repeated, “thank you.” She turned her back on him, dismissing him completely, and took a deep breath.
The brisk businessman was in the process of blindfolding the woman, whispering in her ear and making her shiver. Max wondered what he was saying.
“You’re a pleasure to look at.”
Her teeth set on edge as she saw him back away from the woman.
“I like looking at you.”
Her breath caught as he methodically unbuttoned the constraining material so the fabric framed his lean, golden form.
Max swallowed hard.
“I want to touch you.”
He flipped open the briefcase laid on a table off to the side and she leaned in close, inspecting the perfectly packed implements inside the professional business case.
“Tell me you want me to.”
He grabbed a long-handled piece with long leathered lengths that spilled from the wooden handle like a waterfall. A flogger, she thought, recognition working like a non-native translating a foreign tongue.
She held her breath as he gripped the handle of his tool purposefully with one hand, the other one sliding soothingly along the now gathered tails. Holding it at full-length, he paced around the other woman thoughtfully, a patient predator. Studying his prey, he stalked her, his feet silent as he moved.
Max understood how Reena must feel as the bound woman turned her head one way and then the other, her ears ready and alert as they tried to place him. But, Max well knew, he was a ghost when he wanted to be. A shadowed phantom following you in the dark. Max intimately knew the heightened panic mixed with overwhelming anticipation filling the woman now. She knew the confusing, heady rush of fear and lust as they fought to overtake the other.
He suddenly stopped. Behind her, his arm stretched back to aim, like an archer. The grace of his movement awed Max as he let the tails go, letting them flow in a stream from his grasp. The leather struck, blooming as it hit, leaving a cluster of harsh red lines striping her skin. The woman, back bowed and head tossed back, made no sound beyond an almost inaudible gasp of air. She panted for a moment as he leaned in. His hand smoothed over the marks he left, as he whispered again in her ear.
Max watched, curious, as the woman straightened again, planting her feet and gritting her teeth, her jaw set defiantly. Wordlessly daring him. Taunting him. Max grudgingly grinned at that.
His lips curled too as he pulled the long, leather lengths back again, this time taking a step back. Fascinated, she watched the tails fly once more, this time exploding in midair before raining down her back with vicious snaps.
The woman jolted, her whole body tensing from the stinging blow. Again, she stood still as stone. A statue frozen as a chemical cocktail of endorphins and adrenaline and God only knew what ran through her, her rapidly heaving chest and the slightest shiver of her body the only signs of movement.
He gave her a moment, talking softly to her as he moved around her. Max caught the shudder that shook the woman’s shoulders a second before she straightened again—resolutely unflinching.
A flurry of fluid motion struck as he wielded the flogger against her again and again without stopping now. Max stared, horrified yet intrigued, as Reena’s small form jerked and writhed under the flogger’s unforgiving attention and welts began to rise, red and angry, on the woman’s skin.
Max shook her head. Why would anyone do this?
“Want to give it a go?” Rand’s husky voice asked from behind her again.
WANT MORE?
No comments:
Post a Comment