Shiver

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Exactly what any self-respecting woman would do in my position.” I typed a quick, succinct text:

  Can’t tonight. Busy.

  Watching me type, Sarah nodded her approval. I had been tempted to comment on him acting like a dick, but I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing how much it had bothered me. Moments after I sent the text, my phone beeped again. It was yet another message from Blake:

  Busy doing what?

  Well, Sarah and I had plans that involved Netflix, popcorn, and a bottle of wine. I could tell him the truth that I was having a girl’s night with Sarah. A girl’s night could be anything from a movie night to a club crawl—he deserved the annoyance of not knowing what I meant. As I was debating exactly what to type, another message from him came through:

  Where are you?

  I thought about replying with something like, ‘My location isn’t important—our worlds don’t mix outside the Vault, remember?’ But it would only sound bitter. Would sound as if I wanted more from him when I truly didn’t. I simply responded:

  Out with Sarah.

  In a matter of seconds, there was another message:

  Where are you, Kensey?

  Teeth grinding, my thumbs furiously tapped on the screen as I responded:

  Got to go. Speak soon.

  Dismissed. I smiled, knowing that would gall him, since he seemed to think I should answer to him. With that, I dropped my cell back in my purse and waited while Sarah paid for the bangles she’d chosen. Happy, she stuffed the small bag in another store bag. That was when my cell rang.

  Oh, now he calls.

  “Think that’s Blake?” Sarah asked.

  “Probably.” I ignored the chiming and chatted with Sarah as we made our way down the escalators to the food court on the ground floor. We both found a table and settled there with takeout boxes from the noodle bar. I was so hungry that I almost groaned with every bite. Of course, I probably would have been enjoying the meal a whole lot more if my cell phone didn’t keep sporadically ringing.

  Sarah rolled her eyes. “Take pity on him and answer it.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “What he did was shitty, but I don’t think it’s something you should take personally. This is a guy who probably never has to explain his actions to anyone. He’s used to having what he wants when he wants.” Using a napkin, Sarah wiped her hands. “I’m not saying that’s okay. He needs to understand you won’t stand for that shit. You’ve made your point. I’m sure he heard it loud and clear. But you won’t know unless you take his call and hear what he has to say. There could be a perfectly good reason why he hasn’t been in contact. Maybe he was in the hospital or something.”

  Since I’d recently felt tempted to put him in a damn hospital myself, it was hard to be understanding. Still, I pulled out my phone as I told Sarah, “I need a minute.”

  She grinned in a way that made me nervous. “Take all the time you need.”

  Casting her a suspicious look, I turned sideways in my seat as I answered, “Hello.”

  “Where are you?” It was a deep rumble that made my stomach roll.

  “Hello to you too. I told you, I’m out with Sarah.”

  “You and I have an arrangement.”

  “Yes, but that arrangement doesn’t include me hanging around on the off-chance that you’ll call or text,” I stated, firm yet calm. “If you want me to meet you at the Vault, you need to give me some advanced notice.”

  “I did,” he clipped.

  “An hour is not enough notice. And I’m not cutting my time short with my friend for no good reason.”

  “I’ll fuck you into oblivion—that’s a good reason.”

  My pulse spiked. “You know what I mean, Blake. And since I haven’t received a word from you in two weeks, I’m not feeling inclined to—” My phone was suddenly snatched out of my hand.

  “Hey, Blake, it’s Sarah,” she said into the phone, smiling sweetly at me. “I’m guessing from what little I heard that you’d like to see Kensey tonight … Yeah, see, we agreed to spend the day together, and she’s loyal to the bone. She really won’t drop me for a guy but well, if I went along with her to the Vault, it wouldn’t be an issue.”

  My mouth dropped open, but her smile just widened. I probably should have seen this coming, considering she was quite the opportunist.

  “I don’t plan to try and move in on your action,” she assured him. “Being a third wheel is never fun. You guys could go your way, and I’d have my own bit of fun.” A pause. “Understood.” She held out my phone. “He wants to talk to you.”

  I snatched it out of her hand and gritted out, “What?”

  “I’ll see you at seven-thirty. Rossi will be waiting for you outside your apartment.”

  “Giving me an extra half hour to get dressed still doesn’t class this as ‘advanced notice.’ I spend more time debating over what to wear than I do getting ready. And I’m still not sure I want to see you.”

  “It doesn’t matter what you wear, baby, because I have every intention of taking it off. You’re pissed at me, I get it, but I can’t talk about it right now. We’ll talk later, face to face.” The line went dead.

  I glared at the girl who was no longer my friend. “You did not just do that.”

  She held up her hands in a gesture of peace. “Hey, look, I get that you were making a point to him—it was a point you needed to make. But why miss out on a sublime sex session just because he acted like a man and did something supremely stupid? With this Ricky Tate business, you need a distraction; you need something good. Blake Mercier is a hell of a hot distraction.”

  I snorted. “You just want to see the club.”

  “I admit, I wasn’t being purely selfless, but I do want you to have fun. You’ve been stressing like crazy lately. What better way to burn off stress than a night of hot sex? And it will give us an excuse to wear the dresses we just bought. Come on, Lyons, get with the program.”

  I sighed. “Fine, I’ll go.” If for no other reason than I was curious about why he’d been out of contact.

  Squealing in delight, she did a little clap. “Let’s go get ready.”

  We went back to my place, got ready in record time, and left at 6:55pm—it was the best we were able to do, with such short notice. Rossi, who gave a whole new meaning to the term ‘road rage’ whenever anyone got in his way, then drove us to the Vault.

  Before he could take us through the private garage, I said, “Just drop us here. I’d like to go through the front entrance and see what the main floor is like.”

  Sarah’s eyes lit up. “Ooh, yeah!”

  Rossi looked reluctant, but he shrugged his shoulders and pulled up outside the club’s entrance. When he grabbed his phone, I figured he’d be calling Blake with news of our change of plan, but I didn’t comment. Instead, I climbed out of the car and walked to the door with Sarah.

  It was only as I was showing the doormen the membership card Blake had given me that I realized I’d fucked up—Sarah didn’t have a card, which meant she couldn’t get inside. Shit. I was about to call Blake, but then the doormen waved us through. My brows lifted, but I didn’t question it. Just took Sarah’s hand and urged her inside.

  The place was, as Cade would say, buzzing. Dark, loud, and crowded. On the huge stage, large black speakers flanked the DJ booth. Multiple people tended the long bar that ran almost the entire length of one wall.

  Multicolored beams of light lanced the air and seemed to move to the thumping beat of the music—a beat I could feel in my chest. Streaks of neon laser lights illuminated the dance area, which was a little hazy, thanks to the fog machine.

  Swarms of people danced, jumped, snapped photos, and ground against each other. The DJ egged on the hooting crowd, demanding they ‘make some noise.’ Oh, and they did.

  “Is this fucking amazing or what?” asked Sarah, smile bright as the sun.

  A cluster of giggling girls p
ast us, carrying highball glasses with glowing drinks, and headed to a seating area that—

  “Oh, shit!”

  My head snapped around at Sarah’s curse. “What?” I tracked her gaze. And my gut twisted. Blake was near the bar, standing intimately close to a tall brunette, their faces almost fused together. Bastard.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Fury. Betrayal. Humiliation. Jealousy—all of it blew through me. My stomach hardened, and my palms itched with the need to slap his gorgeous face. It wouldn’t be so gorgeous by the time I was done with him.

  If I wasn’t so busy fantasizing about the myriad of wonderful ways I could kill the bastard, I would have been disconcerted by just how much this hurt me. I found it hard to trust, but I’d agreed to exclusivity, trusting him to keep his word. Apparently, that had been a mistake.

  Intending to give him the verbal lashing he deserved, I made a beeline for them, shouldering my way through the crowd. Was she the reason he hadn’t contacted me over the past two weeks? Had he found someone else but been too chicken shit to tell me? Or maybe he’d planned to bed us both until he got sick of—

  I frowned as I got a closer look at them. They weren’t kissing. No. In fact, he was hissing angrily in her face. And she was glowering at him, practically spitting words at him. They were arguing, not having an intimate moment.

  The woman took a deep breath and laid a hand on his upper arm. Blake shrugged her off and tipped his chin toward the door. That was when he saw me. The mask of rage on his face melted just a little. Her eyes snapped to me, curious, and I realized she was much older than him.

  The moment I reached Blake, he slid his hand around my nape and pulled me close, radiating tension and anger. “Everything okay?” I asked.

  “Fine.” His mouth moved to my ear. “You look stunning, as always.” He started to lead me away, but then the woman spoke.

  “Don’t be rude, Blake, introduce me to your friends.” She presented me and Sarah with a bright smile. “I’m Laurel, Blake’s mother.” He growled, and she amended, “Stepmother. But I think of him as my son.”

  Yeah? There was nothing maternal about the way she looked at him. The fond smile seemed fake and practiced—especially while her eyes gleamed with embarrassment, frustration, and a greediness that disturbed me. She looked like a woman who’d just been thoroughly rejected. As for the way Blake looked at her … so much distaste in his expression.

  Her mouth thinned at Blake’s proprietary grip on my neck, but she flashed me another polite smile as she asked, “Who might you be?”

  “A friend of Blake’s,” I replied, reluctant to give her my name.

  Blake pulled me flush against him, protective. “Greg will escort you out, Laurel.” A bald, heavily muscled guy sidled up to her with a tired sigh that told me they’d done this dance before.

  Her face tightened. “I don’t need an escort.” She smoothed a hand down a very revealing dress and forced a smile for me and Sarah. “Hopefully we’ll meet again.” She then teetered her way through the crowd on ridiculously high heels, pointedly ignoring Greg.

  “Well,” said Sarah. “She’s a gem, huh?”

  Blake let out a long breath. “Sarah,” he greeted simply.

  “This place is awesome,” she told him, excited.

  He released my neck and held his hand out to me. “Come.” It was an order, not an invitation. And that chafed a little, but I placed my hand in his. The lines of strain eased on his face, and his mouth quirked in masculine satisfaction.

  Really, I should give him a ton of shit for summoning me here before I went along with anything he wanted, but this really wasn’t the place to talk. Plus, that scene with his stepmother had somewhat disturbed me, and that distracted me from just how angry I was with him.

  Sarah stayed at my side as he guided us past the seating area and over to a door marked ‘Private.’ A swipe of his card unlocked the door. A small passage led to an elevator, and Sarah seemed to be fighting the urge to excitedly clap her hands when Blake pressed the ‘down’ button. I rolled my eyes.

  “Don’t rain on my fun, Lyons,” she playfully scolded as we stepped into the elevator. As Blake pressed ‘B1,’ she asked, “What’s on ‘B2?’”

  “Function rooms,” he replied.

  I glanced at the ‘B3’ button, which had a keylock. “And B3?”

  “Stock.” There was something about the way he said the word—or maybe it was his hesitation to answer—that made my brow furrow.

  With a soft chime, the shiny doors slid open. Blake splayed his hand on my back and steered me forward.

  Casual as you please, Sarah walked right in like she’d been there dozens of times before. “Love the décor.” She gave us a little wave. “Have fun.”

  I frowned. “Wait—”

  “I won’t leave without you, I promise.” She pranced away, gazing at everything with over-bright eyes like a kid in Disney world.

  “She’s into BDSM?” Blake asked me.

  “She’s not entirely sure yet,” I said. “I guess you could say she’s here to do some research. Possibly experiment.” I turned to fully face him. “I’m surprised you agreed to let her come.”

  “I wanted you with me. I did what I had to do to get you here.” His head tilted as he brushed my hair away from my face. “Still pissed at me?”

  “Yes. Can you blame me? You said you’d call. You didn’t. You also ignored my text. Then, when you did finally get in touch, it was to order me here by text. A very formal, curt text. And then you had the nerve to be angry with me for making plans instead of waiting at home just in case you deigned to contact me.”

  I waited as he absorbed my words, seeming … uncomfortable and out of his element. It struck me that he’d probably never been in this situation with a woman before.

  “It was unfair of me not to call when I said I would,” he said. “I left for Chicago on the Friday—it was a last-minute and long-ass business trip. Things were hectic, and there were a lot of fuck-ups I had to fix. That meant there were a lot of texts and calls I didn’t get a chance to respond to during that time, not just yours. My focus had to be on getting things back on track.”

  And since I liked that he gave things his full attention that way, I couldn’t even be mad about it.

  “If it seemed like I was coldly ordering you to come to me tonight, I apologize. I don’t expect you to not make plans. I just want to be part of them.”

  “Whenever you give me advanced notice about meeting up, I do make you part of my plans. But this time, you didn’t. And it pissed me off. I might not have a life as busy as yours, Blake, but that doesn’t mean I sit around doing nothing.”

  “Noted,” he assured me, laying a kiss on my mouth that was light and soothing. “I’ve missed this mouth.” His fingers skimmed over the cuff on my upper arm. “I like this. I like this a lot.”

  The cuff was much like an Egyptian gold band, though it didn’t have the head of a snake. It looped around my upper arm and was dotted with lots of red stones. I traced one of the red stripes on his black tie. “And I like this.”

  “Good.” He gave me another soft kiss. “Hungry?”

  “Not for food.” I was still bloated from my box of beef noodles.

  His lips curved. “Just a drink, then.”

  Once we were seated on what had become our usual sofa, I glanced around, looking for Sarah. She was sitting at the bar, looking in her element, flirting with a broad-shouldered guy with Mediterranean olive skin and short, tight dark curls. “Who’s that guy Sarah’s talking to?”

  “That’s Bastien.”

  Ah, the friend who’d called him a few weeks ago and sent his mood plummeting.

  Blake drew his fingers along my arm, making me shiver. “He’s been trying to buy this place from me for years.”

  Surprised he’d tell me anything about the guy, considering I’d gotten the impression that Bastien was a topic that was totally off-limits, I blinked. “But you won’t sell?”

&nbs
p; “No.” He paused as a waiter appeared, took our orders, and then just as quickly disappeared. Blake draped an arm over the back of the sofa and doodled on my shoulder with his finger. He put his mouth to my ear. “I like the little sprinkle of freckles on your shoulders. It’s like someone’s dusted them with cinnamon. Makes me want to lean in and take a lick.”

  I raised a daring brow. “Then why don’t you?”

  “I think I will.” He licked a line from my shoulder all the way to my earlobe. “Don’t know what lotion you use, but your skin smells amazing.”

  I flinched at the hard dig of his teeth. “Ow.”

  “Just marking my property again.”

  I snorted at the audacious fucker. “What made you decide to make this floor cater to people who are interested in BDSM? I mean, you’re not into it, so why bother to do this?”

  He shrugged. “I saw a niche.”

  “Niche?”

  “Since erotic novels and movies have become so much more popular, it’s made a lot of people aware of and curious about BDSM. But, like your friend, they’re not so sure it’s really for them. They’re nervous about walking right into a BDSM club because they’re not entirely sure what goes on there and they don’t know how they’re supposed to act.”

  I nodded, since it echoed what Sarah had said to me.

  “The Vault isn’t a BDSM club. It’s a normal club, and that makes members feel safer. When they step off the elevator, they don’t walk right into the thick of things. They walk into a lounge where they can simply have a drink and a meal, talk with their friends or like-minded people, and not have to take it any further. If they do want to walk further down this path, they can do so.”

  “But how did you see the niche?”

  “It was actually through Bastien. He used to go to a BDSM club. I don’t know if the owner keeps it dark and dingy on purpose to create a certain atmosphere, but Bastien complained about it; said he thought it gave newcomers the wrong idea and made BDSM seem dirty or forbidden. He also said that many women who walked in there were only curious because of the Fifty Shades trilogy and that not many of them stayed long, because the books only begin to touch on just how many kinks are out there. Some were freaked out and intimidated by the things they saw.”