 
Martin / DROWNING IN RAPTURE / 84

DROWNING IN RAPTURE

Rapture Trilogy, Book One

Megan D. Martin

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Drowning in Rapture, Rapture Book One

Copyright 2014 by Megan D. Martin

Smashwords Edition

Edited by Kenya Wright & Rosa Sophia

Cover by Najla Qamber Designs

All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

http://www.MeganDMartin.blogspot.com

First Printing, 2014

For Colton/Coltan/Coltiana/Koletan/Luhtrelle/Felicia,

(I couldn't write this dedication without listing all of your names. Bahaha) I could never begin to express how much your crazy-ass friendship means to me. You helped me through some of the hardest times in my life, and for that I will be eternally grateful. If I'm ever down, you help pick me up. Thank you for all of your support and for all the nights we raided my closet and played dress-up (as adults, lol). To many more years of friendship! BYE FELICIA.

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea

By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown

Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

-T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

One.

"I can't believe you're really leaving." I studied Victor's handsome face.

"Aw, come on, Jewel, we've already talked about this." My best friend shoved the last of his shirts into one of his many suitcases.

"I know, but still...what am I going to do without you?"

Victor turned to look at me, his chiseled body flexing in the morning sun. It was just after eight o'clock in our high-rise Dallas loft, the earliest I had been up in at least two years.

"You know this is for the best." He smiled, but his eyes looked sad. His black hair fell across his face shadowing it.

Victor and I had been best friends since we first met at Rapture, an exclusive strip club in downtown Dallas, Texas. I'd gotten a job there just after turning twenty-one, when my dad kicked me out of the house for fucking my ex boyfriend's best friend on the lawn while I was drunk...in the middle of the day. Revenge was a card that had screwed me in more ways than one. I'd gotten it against Kevin, my ex-boyfriend, but I'd also lost everything I'd had to my name. Naturally, I had no choice but to turn to stripping. I blamed my dad for the job decision, after all, he was the one who paid for my boob job just after high school. What else was I supposed to do with my life? I wasn't good at anything but shaking my ass and fucking.

"Are you worried about the Rapture X party?" Victor asked. "'Cause Jimmy said he was going to put you with Shawn. I know he will take care of you."

Rapture X?

Shit. I'd forgotten all about that. It was those exclusive parties that made it possible for Victor and I to afford our high-rise loft in the city. Victor and I had hit it off right away at work. We did one strip show together on a Saturday night, which is what started it all. People went nuts over the two of us together. Women and men alike requested us as a pair, claiming the sexual tension between us was "so fucking hot" some even swore they came in their pants at the sight of our bodies writhing together.

After we'd sold out for the fourth weekend in a row, Jimmy, Rapture's General Manager, upped the already startlingly high cover charges and people lined up outside, desperate to get in. They came from hours away to see us, to watch Victor fuck me with his eyes and clutch my sweating body with his massive hands. We'd climb the pole in center stage, and I'd grind my body against his while he held me in mid-air. There was nothing we couldn't do together. That was just how it worked. I'd never trusted anyone so completely in my life.

Two months into our sell-outs a private business owner propositioned Jimmy to have us dance at his private party. The money was huge, ten grand a piece, just for the night! Only he didn't just want us to dance, he wanted us to fuck.

"Hey babe, you got everything?"

I glanced over and met Chris's dark brown eyes. He tucked his shirt into low-slung blue jeans. Him and Victor had been a couple for over seven years.

"Yeah, almost," Victor replied.

When Jimmy approached the two of us about being the centerpiece of the party, I'd scoffed at him. I was a stripper, not a prostitute. I didn't fuck for money, especially not a gay man. At that point Victor and I were already best friends. He was hot, sure, but I had never considered fucking him. He had a boyfriend, a hot one at that, but crazily enough those were far from my biggest worries. I was more afraid that he wouldn't be able to get off with me since I was a girl. I didn't want to be in the middle of a crowd getting the shit fucked out of me by someone who didn't like it. I knew I made him hard, I danced naked with him enough times to know he wasn't immune to a thick ass and fake tits.

As it turned out, Victor wanted to do it, and Chris didn't mind it either. They'd been saving to move to New York for years. Chris wanted to pursue his dream of being on Broadway only after he paid off his extreme credit card debt. Ten grand to fuck me was something neither man wanted to pass up on. Needless to say I'd agreed. The party had been a huge success, so successful that Rapture started putting on the parties every month up on the exclusive VIP floor. And for the last two years Victor had been fucking the shit out of every orifice I had once a month in front of a crowd of rich, ravenous people.

"But I'm going to miss you guys."

Chris came and wrapped his arms around me. He wasn't stacked with muscle like Victor, nor was he as tall, but his shoulder-length blond hair and dazzling smile made him one of the most beautiful men I had ever seen.

"It's not too late to come with us." He brushed a lock of my aqua-blue hair out of my face. I'd been dying my white-blond hair the light blue color since I'd started at the club. I'd wanted to stop, as I'd only done it for fun, but the patrons preferred it. They said it gave me an ethereal mermaid-like quality.

"You know I can't."

"Come on, Jewel, your grandma can take care of herself!" Chris whined.

"Obviously she can't." I rolled my eyes. "If she could I would've already been on the plane!"

Chris bit his lip, sadness engulfing his features. "I know, baby girl." He wrapped his arms around my slender form. Tears sprung into my eyes. No, I promised myself I wouldn't cry! I widened my eyes, knowing if I blinked the tears would come pouring out. I caught Victor's gaze, surprised to see his green eyes sparkling, jeweled with tears. He turned away from us and jerked his designer shirt over his head.

How am I going to live without them?

"Hey, Jewel, here's the new schedule." Patricia dropped a sheet of white paper onto my cluttered vanity. I was in the back of Rapture getting ready for my eleven p.m. show. This was my first time to dance at the club since Victor and Chris had moved. I'd spent the last four days in my loft feeling lonely. Aside from my gran, they were the only people I had in the world.

"New schedule? But I talked to Jimmy last week. I'm supposed to dance solo and then do a short with Cinna."

Patricia shrugged. "I'm just his assistant, Jewel. I don't make the schedule, I just deliver it." She walked off before I could say anything else, disappearing into the throng of half-naked dancers walking back and forth from the many vanities, to the shower room, dressing room, and stage.

I glanced down at the paper, its yellow color standing out brightly against my dark, make-up strewn vanity.

11:00—Jewel, Underwater strip

11:10—Jewel & the Ripper

The Ripper? What the fuck is this? I frowned and stood up. Where the hell did Patricia go?

I was supposed to do my underwater strip show like always, but Cinna, another female stripper with bright red hair, was supposed to join me for my partner strip for the night. It had been the plan for the last two months since Victor alerted Jimmy he was leaving. I stood up, the sparkling blue beads that hung from my outfit clinking as I rushed along.

I hurried through the crowd of other dancers and backstage workers. Some said hello, others offered their apologies for Vic leaving. I merely nodded at them. I pushed open Jimmy's office door, not bothering to knock.

"What the fu—oh, Jewel, it's just you." Jimmy glanced away from me and back down at the woman kneeling in front of him. I immediately recognized her as Matilda, one of the newer girls. The brown-haired stripper was topless with her mouth wrapped around Jimmy's average-sized cock.

"What the fuck is this?"

"Hmm?" Jimmy held on to the side of his mahogany desk with fat fingers, each adorned with a thick expensive ring.

"This schedule!" I waved the paper in his face. I'm supposed to dance with Cinna after my underwater routine.

"Schedule changed, please..." He let out a groan as Matilda took his length to the back of her slender throat. "Leave."

I narrowed my eyes at his bald head. He usually wore a fedora, but it lay on his desk. "Uh, no. This isn't what we agreed on. Who the fuck is the Ripper?" I pushed my freshly curled hair over my shoulder and placed a hand on my hip.

"New guy." Jimmy released his grip on the table and fisted Matilda's hair, shoving her head down on his dick.

"Who in the hell would call themselves the Ripper?"

Jimmy didn't respond, just kept pressing Matilda's head down roughly. The girl gagged and Jimmy grunted, pushing her head down harder. "Fuck, yeah!" he moaned. His hips flexed forward.

He's cumming. Thank the lord, maybe now I can get a straight answer from him.

Matilda swallowed and stood. Her mascara ran in rivulets down her face. Jimmy dropped a fifty on his desk after he shoved his limp cock in his pants. The girl snatched it up and darted from the office. Talk about being desperate for cash. I would rather be homeless eating dumpster food than sucking on Jimmy's fifty-year-old cock.

"Now, what is it, Jewel? I don't have time to argue with you. I'm a busy man."

I frowned at him, knowing my blue eyes held animosity. "I'm supposed to dance with—"

"Cinna, right. But that changed. Cinna is on now, her usual time. I hired a new guy to dance with you. Sales dropped when the schedule posted with you and Cinna so I remedied that by hiring someone else." He sat in his office chair and started typing on his computer.

"But I haven't practiced with him or anything. I haven't even seen the guy." I knew I sounded whiney, but I didn't care. Not at this point. Jimmy had been my manager for over two years. Getting thrown with some random guy was something that happened to the new dancers to see how they reacted under pressure. I was a veteran in this game. I didn't have to be tested anymore. "Not to mention he sounds like a fucking serial killer," I added.

Jimmy fixated his beady eyes on me with a bored expression. "The schedule stays. Sales bumped today alone when I advertised on the web that you were going to dance with our new mystery stripper the Ripper. We're talking numbers nearly as good as you and Victor pulled in the beginning.

"Mystery dancer?"

"The customers are curious what the Jewel of the sea will do without her Poseidon."

I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from screaming at him.

Jimmy eyed me, taking in my reaction. "We're all wondering."

Two.

At eleven p.m. I stood center stage, my turquoise, jeweled outfit glittering against my tan skin. Men and women alike stared hungrily at me only feet away from the elevated stage. I knew what they were seeing. I'd been in this business long enough to know what image I portrayed. I was the mythical mermaid, with aqua hair. My body was perfect. No one could deny that. I was curvy, not some stick figure like a lot of the girls who took their clothes off for money. My thighs were thick, but toned. My stomach was flat, an aqua blue ring hung from my belly button matching my waist length hair. A half sleeve of tattoos covered my left arm, the bright colors swirling around my bicep. The top I wore pushed the thick globes of my fake breasts together. My permanently hard nipples pressed at the bejeweled fabric. Glittering strands hung down from beneath my top and brushed against the exposed flesh of my stomach. The skirt I wore was knee length, and glittered as brightly as my top, concealing the sparkling g-string beneath.

I'd stood here before a crowd of hungry patrons hundreds of times, but I knew it would never get old. Victor's face niggled at my brain. Disappointment in missing my best friend swamped me, but I didn't let it consume me. I pushed it aside. I was the Jewel of the sea; losing my Poseidon wouldn't change anything. I would get through this dance with the so-called Ripper and call Luke Masterson tomorrow, the owner of Rapture. The millionaire would have a few choice words for Jimmy.

The electronica pop music kicked in and I jerked my hips to the side in a quick motion, before bringing them full circle and running my hands through my hair. It hung loose down my back and brushed against the top of my skirt. The crowd hooted in front of me, and a man yelled out something lewd that I ignored. The thrum of the beat picked up and I turned my body around in a fluid movement giving the crowd a view of my thick backside covered in the tight skirt. Groans from the crowd followed. I shook my ass, holding my arms above my head. The music built in cadence picking up with each second, spiraling through me like an orgasm.

Yes! Pink and blue hues of florescent light flickered across my skin. The cheers from the crowd started to fade away as I let instinct take over. At least that's what I called it. There was something about music that just sucked me in, pulled me down into its suffocating depths and made me its own, where I focused on nothing but that hot pulsing beat as it shattered around me.

When the tempo dropped my body did as well as I bent at the knees, my back arching like I was going under a limbo bar on the lowest level. I tilted my head back knowing full well I was giving the crowd an enticing view of my cleavage. Touching my hand to my mouth, I blew them a kiss from my bubblegum pink lips.

On the next thunder of music I was standing up writhing my body away from the crowd to the massive clear bowl at center stage. It was about six months into my gig dancing at Rapture that someone came up with the glass bowl idea. I was Rapture's Jewel of the sea, so naturally I should writhe in a giant glittering bowl of baby oil.

I climbed to the top of the clear steps and walked into the bowl. My feet sank into the oil. The silky touch of the liquid comforted me. I twirled around the pole in the center just as more oil fell from a spout above, to shower my chest and below in its glistening substance. The actual container only had a few inches of oil in the bottom. It would be half-way full by the time I finished. I shed my skirt slowly, letting it slide off my slickening thighs. The spout coated me in the warm oil and I gave myself over, letting the music own my body. The thick beat thrummed through my veins. It engulfed me completely, like meeting a long lost lover after years apart, ravaging me from the inside out until I was nothing but slick writhing cells.

I didn't come back to myself until the music started to ebb, signaling the end of my dance. This was usually when Victor came out to join me, entering from stage left. He would be shirtless, wearing pants that matched my outfit with a gold pitchfork in his hand, like Poseidon the Greek god of the sea. The idea behind the whole scene was that I was some precious jewel Poseidon had discovered on the bed of the ocean floor, and now he had come to ravish me. Tonight I didn't know what to expect.

No way did I anticipate the lights of the stage shutting off, but they did. A loud booming sound thundered from the speakers. I jumped, and several people in the crowd screamed.

"Poseidon is gone," Arnie, the club DJ, said over the loudspeaker. He had the perfect voice for a DJ, hell, for movies even. He could have narrated anything, especially a horror film, for how menacing his voice sounded now. "So who will save our Jewel of the sea?"

The crowd started to buzz. Some men yelled that they would, others said things I couldn't understand. My heart pounded in my chest.

Why am I nervous? Cause you have no freakin' clue what's about to happen.

"No one. Jewel will have to save herself from"—Arnie gave a dramatic pause—"the Ripper!"

The hard riff of a guitar shuddered through the building. Hot hands gripped my slippery shoulders from behind just as the lights flickered back on. I jerked in surprise. When had someone come up on stage with me? A thrum of anticipation tore through me like the slice of a knife. Hues of red and dark blue light flickered across my skin. I turned my head just as the riff ended in the song and another sounded. Death metal? Really? I tried to catch a glimpse of the man behind me, but couldn't.

"Didn't anyone ever tell you not to look back?" The intimidating voice growled against my ear, sending a shockwave of heat skittering across my body. I jerked my head forward. I knew that, honestly I did. When I first started working at Rapture they would throw me up on stage just to see how I would do, knowing nothing of the song or anything else. I learned the only way to react was to act as if everything was new, and yet planned all at once—respond like a practiced sex kitten crawling into bed with a new lover, hungry for his cock.

"That's better." He chuckled and leaned back. His hands were tight around my oiled arms.

I wore only my sparkling top and g-string. Victor was the one who always undressed me the rest of the way.

Is this man going to?

My pussy throbbed at the thought, drowning my already sopping g-string. His hot hands slid down my arms. I didn't look at them, but kept my eyes on the crowd. I tried to focus on their hungry gazes, tried to keep myself centered, like always. I could lose myself in the music, but when I did duo performances I worked hard to keep my focus intact, going over a continual checklist of things to be conscious of. My face had to be an endless mask of sex. My lips had to pout, my eyes had to beg for more. My body had to ooze waves of appeal that made men's cocks hard and women's cunts drip.

I had to be all of it at once. I couldn't be rigid or make a squalid face. It was harder to keep in place while working with someone, though Victor and I had mastered everything. I could anticipate his every move, even when he would fuck me at the Rapture X party. But now, I had no idea what to expect. I didn't even know what this stranger looked like. What is he going to do to me? My body tingled in unexpected anticipation.

Just as his hands reached my wrists, he released one. I felt bereft at the loss of contact. This was the only place he touched me. I could feel the heat of his chest, but he hovered inches away. I considered leaning backward, pressing my body into his. Just as I was about to, his hand returned to my lonely wrist, only it wasn't just his hand. A rough material brushed against my skin. The suspense got to me and I broke the code, and glanced down.

I gasped. Tattoos covered the lean hand, but that wasn't what elicited the reaction. A tan colored rope was in between the palm of his hand and my skin. My lips parted and a shiver prickled along my spine.

"The Jewel of the sea isn't scared, is she?" His hot breath feathered against my ear just as the slam of drums kicked in. He jerked my slick arms above my head and wrapped the rope around my wrists. The course feel of the material shocked me, and for a moment I knew my face betrayed my surprise before I masked my expression. "Keep your arms where they are."

The authority in his voice wasn't lost on me. Part of me wanted to disobey, who the hell was he to tell me what to do? Men didn't dictate to me. I chose to take my clothes off for money, men didn't make me.

I was about to jerk them down when my gaze focused on a face in the crowd through the dancing lights. Jimmy's beady eyes stared back at me from the front row. He wants me to fail. I'd never had anything against Jimmy, though he'd never liked me, not since I refused to suck his cock for a twenty in his office. He's looking for a reason to try and get rid of me now that Vic is gone. The realization was like a kick in the gut. I kept my arms just where this Ripper guy told me to.

Is that a look of disappointment on Jimmy's face? Take that, sucker.

"No fight from the Jewel? I'm disappointed," the Ripper said from behind me. I wanted to jerk around and slap him, and would have if I hadn't been trying to prove a point.

Muscular arms banded around my waist and lifted me up. A hard chest pressed against me. Material slid against my back. The Ripper is wearing a shirt? Victor always came out shirtless. Well, Victor also didn't have some sort of sicko serial killer nickname. I was lifted several feet off the ground before coming back down, though I didn't make it back into my oil pool. The rope binding my wrists caught on something. I glanced up in horror to see a hook that hadn't been on the pole before. What the fuck? When did that get put in? The arms released me.

The death metal pounded around us just as his hands trailed their way down my curves, only stopping at my backside. I fought back a moan that threatened to escape my lips. Why is he touching me like this? The crowd can't see. Both hands gripped the thick spheres of my ass. His touch was almost painful. A flood of white hot heat spiraled into my pussy and this time I did moan. He released me as soon as the sound escaped my lips, as if he heard my desperate cry. He couldn't, not over the music.

"Oh!" A sharp pain shattered across my ass and I realized he'd spanked me. My pussy started throbbing. I arched my back, wiggling my body in an effort to rub my moist folds together. My toes skimmed along the top of the warm oil. What the hell is going on with me? He severed all contact. I expected him to slap me again, but he didn't. Instead a massive form seemed to materialize in front of me. It's him. My eyes desperately tried to focus on the huge muscular body, but the florescent lighting made it difficult since he was wearing a black, long sleeve jacket with a hood. His face was shrouded in darkness.

He stood there for a moment, just staring at me, suspended there before him. What is he thinking? I needed to know, was desperate for the answer. What does he look like? As if my questions played across my face he reached up and fingered the edge of his hood with a tattoo-covered hand. After several moments he took his hand away, leaving the material in place. He shook his head once as if to deny the request I hadn't even made. The crowd can't even see his face. He's taunting you. The idea made me furious. Who the hell is this guy? What is really going on?

The Ripper stepped to my side and jerked something from his pocket. Silver flashed before my eyes. A knife. I opened my mouth to scream as fear overwhelmed me, but the knife sliced through the fabric between my tits severing the material completely. My breasts bounced out of the shells as the fabric fell to either side. The crowd moaned in unison, and for a second I thought the Ripper did too. He ran the dull side of his switch-blade between my breasts. I wanted to hate the feeling, be sickened by it, but I wasn't. The cool metal against my skin only amped up my awareness.

And just as suddenly as it appeared the blade was gone, disappearing back into his black jacket. He stepped up on something next to me. What is he standing on? He must have brought it in the glass bowl with him.

"I'm going to touch you and I want you to dance for me."

I turned my face to him, ready to tell him that the idea was absurd. How could I dance for him with my arms bound, dangling over a pit of oil?

"Not for them, Julia. For me."

"How do you know my—"

"For me." He bit the words out as if they were painful.

He knows my name?

No one called me Julia anymore. Not since I left home.

He grasped the breast closest to him. My sensitive flesh seemed to light up like a firework under his touch. I moaned and writhed my body.

"That's my girl. Just like that." He continued to knead my breast and I moved my body. He jerked one of the dangling pieces off my ripped top. Releasing my breast, he used both hands to graze the hard beaded strand down my stomach. What is he doing? I held my breath in anticipation. My gaze fixed firmly on the dark space beneath his hood, forgetting about the crowd in front of us. I could barely make out a nose and lips. When he got to the top of my g-string I sucked in a breath.

Will he take it off me? Will he touch my pussy?

He didn't do either of those things. He ran the strand of beads between my thighs and reached behind me, pulling the strand in front and behind. The cool beads glided against my oiled skin, slipped between my ass cheeks, and pressed the thin fabric of my panties against my pulsing clitoris.

"Rock your hips." I barely heard his demand, but I felt his breath against my face, the minty flavor making me desperate for a taste. "Now."

I shook my head. I wanted to. Good lord, I wanted to rub my clit against those thick beads more than anything, but I didn't even know what this guy's face looked like. I wouldn't come for a stranger. No way. He rubbed the strand back and forth in a quick motion. Pleasure spiraled through me. He nudged my face with his nose forcing my head forward.

His lips pressed hard against my ear. "Rock your hips."

"Push down your hood."

A feral sounding growl reverberated against my ear. He jerked the strand back and forth again. An orgasm built in my core. I gritted my teeth fighting the sensation.

"Show me your face," I panted.

"No." His voice sounded strained. "You're going to cum, right now, right here. For me. The Ripper."

He kept moving the strand back and forth slowly as he spoke. A large round jewel speared my clit over and over. The heavy metal music spiraled around us sucking me into its depths. The red lights flickered over my body. My nipples were so tight they throbbed right along with my pussy. Lost in pleasure I thrashed my hips against the beads, letting instinct take over. His breath came out in hot spurts against my neck, spurring my thrusts.

The hard music was working toward an end, I could feel it in my bones, just as I could feel the orgasm growing at the apex between my thighs.

"Now!" he roared against me.

The orgasm slammed into me like a hammer hitting a nail on the head. It reverberated through my body, just as the guitarist fired into the final riff. Utter ecstasy shattered across my skin. A whoosh of air left my lips, just as the song ended. The Ripper dropped the beads. I watched them fall into the shallow pool of oil below me.

I tried to wiggle my fingers and realized I couldn't feel them. Total numbness engulfed me from my fingertips to my toes. Utter silence filled the vast room with the absence of music.

"Ladies and gentleman...how about a round of applause for our Jewel and the Ripper!" Artie's voice sounded strained over the speaker system. A beat of silence followed his words before the crowd erupted in loud hooting and clapping. I stared out at them, stunned that they were all still there, that I was still on stage dangling over a vat of oil.

The crowd cheered harder when the Ripper stepped down from his spot next to me and climbed out of the bowl onto the stage. His bare feet left oil marks on the black floor. In a fluid movement he jerked off the jacket revealing his bare back in low-slung black jeans. He held out both arms, tattoos beginning at his shoulders and snaking down both sides in solid sleeves. Dark hair fell just past his shoulders.

In a quick movement he twisted on the spot, facing me. Ropes of chiseled muscle met my hungry gaze. A smooth chest, bare of tattoos. I let my eyes travel upward until the Ripper's spell-binding face met my eyes. High cheekbones gave way to firm lips and an angular jaw with the shadow of a day's growth of hair. Dark eyes stared up at me. A cold expression of hatred was painted across that perfect face.

And then he turned away, heading for the stage exit. He left me there, hanging from a hook on pole, dangling over gallons of oil, while the crowd went utterly wild.

Three.

"Cinna said it was the hottest thing she'd seen in her whole fucking life, Jewel, and she's watched us fuck," Victor said. "That's seriously saying something."

I rolled my eyes and stared up at my living room ceiling.

"It wasn't like that, Vic, seriously. I don't see why she made it out to be such a big deal," I muttered into the phone, glad that he wasn't around to see my face, which was burning with embarrassment.

I hadn't even made it all the way home from Rapture when my best friend started calling me. I didn't answer the first few times. I knew what he was going to say. I knew someone had called him and told him about how I fucked a piece of my own shirt and came all over myself. He didn't even use his hands. A shudder traced down my body at the memory.

"It is a huge deal, I"—a voice in the background cut him off—"yeah, even Chris got a call from Azelle. Azelle, Jewel, fucking Azelle who has never given two shits about you. She called and was excited to share the news. So, what does that tell you?"

I sighed and ran my hand over Weasley's head, my orange tabby cat, who was curled up next to me on the couch. An episode of Catfish was muted on the wall-mounted TV.

"I don't know, Vic, okay? I have no idea what it was, but it didn't feel like anything special to me." Liar.

"Uh huh. Sure. Whatever you say. Was he hot at least?" Is he hot? I almost scoffed at the question. He was more than hot, he was—I shut my thoughts down. I wasn't going to go there. No way. The look he gave me after it was over left an eerie feeling sitting in my gut. Like he'd done it all for some sort of sick purpose that I was unaware of. I hadn't seen him after the show either. Not that I was looking for him. I'd avoided everyone out of pure embarrassment, which didn't make sense, right? I'd been fucking my best friend in front of a crowd every month for the last two years. Hundreds of thousands of strangers had seen my naked body. Lots of them had watched me take Vic's cock into my hungry pussy and yet I felt strangely shamed that the packed club had watched me in such a private moment.

"He was hired on at Rapture. What do you think?"

Victor snorted. "Mmm-hmm. Avoid the question. Fine. I gotta go anyway. But don't think there's any chance I'm dropping this. I have an interview at eight in the morning."

I glanced at the clock. Three a.m. "What the hell? It's three here, that means it's four there!"

"I couldn't go to bed until I heard from you on how the night went. I was worried about you." A voice sounded on the other end of the phone that I couldn't understand. "We were both worried about you."

"Oh, gosh. Don't worry about me. Go to bed. Get ready for your interview. You're the ones who moved. I should be worried about you."

"I guess you're right, you taking care of old faithful?"

I smiled into the phone and rubbed my hand along the tacky flower patterned couch. "You know I am."

Vic had gotten the couch at a garage sale a few weeks after he moved out on his own when he was eighteen, over seven years ago. He'd paid five bucks and it was the first piece of furniture he'd ever owned. Even after he started making big money at Rapture and was dating Chris, he refused to get rid of it. I'd always loved the old thing even after I moved in, with all of its imperfections and dulled colors.

"I still hate Chris for making me leave her behind," Victor lamented.

"Oh, whatever, you do not." They'd left all the furniture behind and saved enough money to buy everything new, so I had a fully functional guest bedroom now, not to mention fabulous antique décor all over the apartment, courteous of their eyes for a good find and professional decorating skills.

"You're right, but only because I know you will take care of her." He paused. "We love you, Jewel. Take care of yourself, okay?"

"I love you guys, too. Bye." I hung up before I started blubbering like a baby. I missed them both so much.

No sooner had I pressed end that someone pounded on the door. The loud noise startled me and Weasley both. He took off to hide. I didn't rush to the door. I knew who it would be. The elderly and very kind Mrs. Bugsby rented the only other condo on the eighth floor. Her husband had passed away some years before and occasionally she would come knocking on our door in the middle of the night, spooked by a noise she'd heard. I didn't mind the interruptions. She was a sweeter, less crazy version of my gran.

I jerked the door open without looking through the peephole and found out the hard way that I was wrong about my unexpected guest. The towering body of a man stood on the other side of the threshold wearing dark jeans and a simple black jacket. The Ripper. His presence should have alarmed me, but it didn't. Instead my first reaction was wet heat shooting to my core.

His gaze traveled over my body, not cold like I last saw it...but hungry for something other than food. His black hair was wavy and contrasted perfectly with his olive skin. I sucked in a breath and my lips parted at the musky masculine scent that seemed to ooze from him.

"What are you doing here?"

Is that my voice shaking?

"I came to see my new partner." His deep voice rumbled like a well-oiled engine.

"Partner?"

"Yes. Didn't Jimmy call you? He's booked every weekend for the next six months solid because of our show tonight."

I blinked. "What?"

The door across the hall screeched open. "Is everything all right out there, dear?"

I stared at Mrs. Bugsby in her pink robe, her head full of curlers, and realized I was only wearing a pair of pink boy short panties and a yellow sport bra.

"Oh, yes. Mrs. Bugsby. Everything's fine." I moved to shut the door in his face, but his hand shot out, preventing it from closing.

"We need to talk," he said.

I frowned at the tattooed hand holding the door open. Talk?

"You're sure?" Mrs. Bugsby's voice wavered.

The word love stared back at me from just beneath his knuckles. Knuckles that had brushed against my skin just hours before. A hundred scenarios ran through my mind before I stepped back and released the door.

"Yes, thank you, ma'am."

"Okay, goodnight, dear." Her door squeaked shut as mine opened wider, and the Ripper walked in.

The Ripper, seriously. You work with this man. He's not a frickin serial killer...right?

"What's your real name? I refuse to call you 'The Ripper'." I said after several seconds of awkward silence.

He smiled, revealing straight white teeth, but it didn't reach his eyes. The hungry look was gone from them, replaced with the cold glare I'd seen at the club. Instinctively, I backed up a step.

"Cole," he said.

"Cole the Ripper? That's the best you could come up with?" I laughed nervously.

"Just call me Cole."

"Okay..." I let the word trail off.

He continued to watch me, his handsome gaze unnerving.

"What did you want to talk about?" I looked away and fidgeted with the bottom of my underwear. This man before me, Cole, had made me cum without even letting me see his face. He knew me intimately, yet I just now found out his name.

"You're going to be my partner permanently."

"Huh?" I glanced up and noticed his eyes were fixated on my worrying fingers. I stilled them instantly.

"You're going to be my partner."

I frowned. "You already said that. At the door."

"I know." His fists flexed at his sides. I took another step back.

Why did I let him in?

A distraught look spread across his face before he masked it. "We'll need to come up with some routines." His eyes darted to my chest. Unbidden, my nipples hardened painfully.

I found myself nodding. "Yes."

"Tomorrow night. After closing. Though I fear we'll have to wing tomorrow night's performance like we did tonight." His voice sounded rougher than moments before. He took another step forward, only this time I didn't retreat.

Wing it?

I opened my mouth to tell him just how I would not be winging it with him again. I still planned to call Luke Masterson, Rapture's owner, and dispute the new pairing. I'd been working there for too long for them not to give me some sort of courtesy opt out on this. I'd never complained once. He would understand. He had to. I couldn't work with the sexy man standing before me. I'd worked with some of the hottest men to ever grace the planet, but never had I been around someone like Cole. Even now, standing in my loft, his face a mask of coldness, after he'd had me fuck a piece of my own shirt in front of a crowd of people, I wanted to drag him against my body.

You don't even know him.

Which was exactly why this pairing was a horrible idea. The realization of what day tomorrow was surfaced in my mind. A rush of relief flooded me, when moments before I'd felt exactly the opposite. "Tomorrow is the third Saturday of the month."

"So?"

"So, I don't dance the third Saturday. I entertain at Rapture X after closing hours."

His brows furrowed and his fists clenched audibly, this time staying closed until the knuckles turned white. "You mean you fuck at Rapture X."

I narrowed my gaze, anger sparking under my skin. "Yes, I get fucked. What's it to ya?"

"Who's gonna fuck ya? Huh?" He took three long strides, backing me up against the wall.

"What difference does it make?" I'd never fucked Shawn before, but he had worked up at Rapture for the last year and had even married Kara, one of the bartenders. They'd both been eager for him to take Vic's place at the party. A crazy concept for me, though I guess ten grand for an hour was something they didn't want to pass up. I couldn't imagine being with someone knowing they were going to fuck someone else, for money or not. I would castrate any guy who tried, which was why I didn't date other strippers, or really date at all. No relationship ever worked out, at least not for me.

"Who?" His face hovered only inches above mine.

"Shawn."

"The guy that's married to the bartender?"

I nodded my head.

He shook his as if the revelation was surreal. He seemed almost normal in that instant, a serious contrast to the man I'd been exposed to all night.

"Do you want him to fuck you?"

I didn't. Why would I? Even when I fucked Vic every month it hadn't been because I truly wanted the sex with him, it wasn't because I craved his body, no matter how sexy he was. I did it for the money. The occasional orgasms he gave me were coincidental and had nothing to do with my reasoning. I wasn't about to tell Cole that. Who was this guy anyway, to barge into my life and demand I tell him anything?

I lowered my lashes and pouted my lips subtly. "You bet."

A torrent of emotions tore across his face. A feral sounding noise came from deep within his chest. He smashed my body back against the wall, pressing every inch of himself against me. His long hard cock speared at my belly through his jeans. I went utterly wet between my thighs.

"You've fucked him before?"

"No," I whispered staring at his lips.

What would he taste like?

I hadn't kissed anyone in such a long time. Vic and I never kissed when we fucked. It was an unspoken rule, and the few guys I'd kissed in the meantime were boyfriends that hadn't lasted long and even then it had been more than a year since I'd even bothered trying to date anyone. Not to mention the complications of Kevin, the ex who'd ruined me for everyone after him.

"But you will tomorrow night." He traced his fingers up my arm. "For money."

The last words left his lips like they were dirty. He took a step back. The cool air of my loft assailed my skin making me shiver uncomfortably.

Prostitute.

That's pretty much what he was calling me. My anger resurfaced. "I didn't ask for your opinion, or for you to come here. You're a stripper after all, you do take your clothes off for money just like I do, Ripper."

I stepped around him. I half-expected him to stop me, and pin me back to the wall. He didn't, and I felt slightly disappointed. "Clearly us working together isn't a good idea since you don't seem to approve of the other work I do for the club."

I reached the door and opened it for him. A clear message for him to get the fuck out. Cole walked slowly to the door. His big body moved effortlessly across my gray carpet. The image of him there amongst all of my things imprinted itself on my brain and a strange feeling swam around in my chest. I shook my head, ignoring it.

"You didn't seem to mind working with me tonight." His shoulder brushed against mine as he stepped out the door. "And you dropped this on your way out."

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a sparkling silver earring. I snatched it out of his hand and slammed the door in his face before he could see the heat stain my cheeks. At the distinct sound of chuckles on the other side, I pressed myself against the door and peered out the peephole, some sick part of me hoping to catch a glimpse of his smile.

Four.

"What do you mean he no longer owns the company? That doesn't make sense!" I shouted into my phone.

The other customers in line at Creamy Café inched away from me, some of them shooting dirty looks my way. I was tempted to give all of them the finger, especially with the way my day had been going. I'd tossed and turned in bed after Cole left my apartment the night before. Sleep hardly found me, and when it did, I was restless. I continued to wake up tangled in my silky sheets, sweating, with images of Cole's naked body swimming through my mind. I'd dreamed about putting his thick cock between my lips and sucking him to the back of my throat.

I wonder what his cock looks like? I never got to see it since he didn't strip completely the night before, but I was curious and my dreams proved it.

Is he circumcised?

I hoped he was. There was just something about a long, hard, circumcised cock that made my pussy clench with desire.

"Yes, ma'am. The paperwork was finalized over two weeks ago," Luke Masterson's assistant replied.

"What the hell? How am I just now hearing about this?"

"I have no idea."

"Well, how can I get hold of Rapture's new owner?" I stepped up to the counter and put my hand over the phone speaker. "Large caramel latte with extra caramel."

The female high school student on the other side nodded her head and took my debit card.

"I can't give that to you," said the lady on the phone.

"Why the fuck not? I have an issue that needs to go straight through him."

"Ma'am, this is family environment. Please take any personal phone calls outside," said a voice from my left.

I glanced over at the short middle-aged man wearing a headset and a tag on his shirt that said manager.

"Fine." I shoved my card back into my wallet and snatched my coffee from his hand.

"Any questions or concerns need to be taken up with Jimmy Rogers. He has the number to the new owner," the secretary told me.

"Fucking seriously? Why didn't you just say that to begin with?" I hung up the phone.

"Ma'am—"

"I know, I know, I'm going." I didn't even turn to look back at the manager who was no doubt storming toward me. I pushed the glass door open and walked outside. Just as I clicked on Jimmy's name in my contacts, my phone dinged signaling a new message.

Speak of the devil.

Angrily, I slammed the door of my little two-door Honda Civic. The chill of the night air brushed against my skin and I immediately pulled my sweater tighter. It was just after two a.m., I was running late for tonight's Rapture X party, and I'd managed to get no help with my predicament. Jimmy's text had been a group message to all of the dancers making us aware that he had to go out of town for a family emergency for tonight's party, but the show would still go on as planned. I'd called him repeatedly after that.

He can't just ignore me. This is serious! I won't be paired with that man. I refuse!

It was no use. He never answered and even Patricia, his assistant, had proved impossible to get ahold of. At least I don't have to do a show with him tonight. And there will definitely be no practicing. The thought of repeating what we'd done on stage behind closed doors fired explosive feelings in my abdomen that made my body shiver, and not from the cold.

My heels clicked against the pavement in the employee parking garage located in Rapture's basement. The Rapture X party was always held on the very top floor of the exclusive club. It was a vast ballroom fitted with expensive and luxurious decorations that one would expect to find in a palace instead of a strip club. Moving from the lower floors to the upper-most floor was like stepping from one world into the next, from black glittering walls with flashing lights to crème colored couches and marble floors.

Just as I was about to reach the lobby doors, a strange feeling fluttered across my skin. It was the feeling I only got when someone was watching me. I glanced around. The garage was full of cars, but I didn't see anyone else. I bit down on my lips and quickly pushed through the doors. The warmth of the lobby surrounded me.

You're just imagining it.

I took a deep breath. Kevin, my ex, had followed me for a long time, or stalked me, would be the better word. Eventually he had stopped, I assumed, when some other helpless soul had fallen under his radar. I still felt the sting of someone watching me every now and then. And those fears would come back, bubbling under my skin, sickening me. Just forget about it. You haven't seen Kevin in over a year.

I pressed the button to call the elevator. I glanced down at my bare legs and stilettos. I usually didn't dress until I got to the club, but tonight was an exception. I'd fallen asleep when I got back home from running errands and slept straight through the alarm on my phone. Needless to say, I'd taken about a two-minute shower, half-assed my make-up, threw on a tight black dress, and pinned my hair up. I'd lucked out that this month's theme was "Billion Dollar Sex" instead of something ridiculous like last month's futuristic Avatar theme. Vic and I had to spend nearly the entire day getting ready which included having our bodies air-brushed with blue paint. This month, pinning my hair up and slapping on some red lipstick nailed the part.

A bell dinged and a light came on over the elevator just before the doors opened.

"...but didn't you see the way she reacted to him? I can't wait to see what she does this time."

"Do you think she will show—" The chatter of the two women on the elevator came to a screeching halt when their gazes turned to me. I recognized one of them as Matilda, the chick who'd swallowed Jimmy's load the day before, and the other was one of the cocktail waitresses whose name I didn't recall. Both were wearing red dresses that hugged their figures.

"Oh, hey, Jewel." Matilda plastered a smile on her face and stepped off the elevator. "You look nice."

I wanted to claw her eyes out, not for the fake compliment, but for the fact that I knew her and the other girl had been talking about me. Chill out. They didn't even say anything bad. My conscience clearly thought I was ridiculous. Yeah, but even they noticed my reaction to him.

"Y'all leaving?" I managed to keep my feistiness inside. After all, Matilda was the one on her knees with Jimmy's pathetic cock in her mouth for fifty fuckin' bucks. The girl obviously had it hard enough as it was. The two shared a knowing look. I frowned.

What's going on?

"No way, we wouldn't miss this for the world," the cocktail waitress chimed in. Matilda elbowed her and the girl coughed into her hand.

"See ya upstairs, Jewel," Matilda said before they hurried off.

What the hell?

The elevator doors closed and then I was traveling up to the fifth floor. When the door opened my mind was still swimming, but luckily Shawn was standing in the lobby dressed in a suit flanked by his wife and chatting with two men I didn't recognize. Kara chattered away with the two as if they were at any normal social function and she wasn't about to watch her husband fuck another woman. I pulled my phone out of my purse. We only had about ten minutes until we were supposed to go on.

Why is he still out here?

Usually Vic and I would meet in the dressing room and go over anything specific we were planning on doing, or if there was anything we needed to discuss before it started.

Shawn probably doesn't know that's what you usually do.

I made my way across the plush lobby. Shawn's green gaze caught mine. "Hey there, Jewel. What are you doing out here? I figured you'd been in back."

I smoothed a smile over my face to keep the small group from seeing how confused I was. "I came to fetch you."

"Me?" He frowned and glanced at Kara.

"Yeah, we only have ten minutes." I pulled out my phone and indicated the time.

Shawn blew out a breath and shook his blond head. "Jimmy, that asshole."

"The new owner should fire him," Kara chimed in.

Huh?

"Okay, wait," I said. "What are y'all talking about?"

"Sales were so good last night that Jimmy changed the schedule."

Anxiety mingling with arousal washed across my body. I knew what he was going to say.

Fuck.

"He said he had already talked to you about swapping me for the Ripper when I talked to him earlier and that you were cool with it. I believed him," he said bashfully.

A man on Kara's right piped in. "Hell, I think we all believed it after last night's performance. That's the only reason I bought tonight's ticket. Hella expensive for being so last minute."

I turned to look at the older patron. He was one of the two who'd been chatting with Shawn and Kara.

"Never seen any performance like that before. Can't wait to see what the Ripper has in store for you tonight." He chuckled, and for the second time that night I wanted to claw someone's eyes out.

"I'm so sorry, Jewel. We thought he told you. I should have known he wouldn't." Kara patted my arm.

I shook my head, barely hearing Kara's sing-song voice. "You're going to be my partner permanently." Cole's words from last night rang in my head. All day I'd thought to avoid him, to get out of the situation. I didn't like not being in control, and I'd known that I could just call Masterson and get it taken care of. Even though that hadn't worked I'd been relieved to know that I got to avoid him at the club because of my late night performance...but no.

"I tried to get in touch with Jimmy today, and he never returned any of my phone calls." I sighed. "I guess this is why."

"Did you hear we have a new owner?" Kara asked.

"Yes, do you know who it is?" A flicker of hope sprung to life. If the new owner was here tonight, maybe I could get him to change it back to Shawn.

"Nope." She shrugged. "I heard it was a woman though."

"A woman?" I frowned. I hadn't expected that at all.

"That's what everyone is saying," Shawn said.

Great.

The flicker of hope immediately dashed away. Everything had fallen apart and I was right back where I was before with someone else in control. I didn't like it one bit...or do I? My body certainly did. The g-string I had on was already soaked, the damp material rubbing against my pussy lips.

You can still get out of this.

I turned away from the little group and headed toward the elevator. The doors were shut. Just take the stairs. The stairwell was nowhere near as nice as the festive lobby, but more like a concrete parking garage. I'd made it down one flight before I really contemplated what I was doing. I'm running? I'd never run from anything in my entire life.

My dad had kicked me out of the family. He quit on me, I didn't quit on him. My mom did the same. She left me at a young age with a father who didn't choose to start parenting until I was already an adult and it was too late. I'd taken care of my gran on my own for the last three years. Performing at Rapture X gave me the resources to take care of her without having to beg my dad for money. All the while I'd stayed away from the busted relationship with Kevin that had brought my life spiraling down to begin with. I'd done it all without complaining, crying, or running away when things got complicated. And boy are they complicated. If I didn't perform tonight, Jimmy would use this as grounds to fire me...and now that there was a new owner, it might just happen and there would be nothing I could do about it.

Before I could think twice I turned and raced back up the steps as fast as my heels would allow. I pushed through the thick metal door and promptly slammed into a hard muscular chest. I jerked back just as strong hands gripped my arms.

"Sorry I—"

My words died in my throat as I met dark blue eyes. Cole's gaze bore down into mine. "Trying to run, huh?"

The hatred that covered his chiseled features made me recoil. He let me go, but his body was tense as if he expected me to take off running for the stairs.

I should.

Unbidden, my gaze traveled over his form. I bit down on my lip at the sight of his brawny form clad in a black suit. The jacket covered his thick shoulders. A white tie wrapped around his neck. His hair hung loose much as it had the night before, though it appeared damp, as if he had just hopped out of the shower minutes before. Impossible. His suit was way too crisp, his tie fastened perfectly. The shadow of his beard had been trimmed close to his face. My cheek tingled at the memory of the rough hair rubbing against my skin. My heart jumped into my throat.

"Run? From what?" I furrowed my brow. "It's just sex."

I didn't wait to see his reaction, in fear that he would notice my breath had shallowed to near-panting. I moved past him quickly and headed to the changing room to put down my purse. He was right behind me. I could feel his stare on me like he was physically touching me with his calloused hands. I tried to ignore it, but couldn't and found myself rocking my hips back and forth as I walked. I could have sworn I heard a groan from behind me, but couldn't be certain, as we passed through the growing crowd of people.

Everyone was dressed fabulously, women in their most expensive dresses sipped champagne and men in tuxedos and bow ties crowded around chatting with one another out in the lobby. I knew the great ballroom would have even more patrons. Last month the lobby had been decorated immensely for a jungle-like appearance to go with the Avatar theme. This event was a big deal. A great late-night networking opportunity. CEOs from major companies came from all over the country bringing their favorite clients or potential clients.

"Jewel, here you are! Where the hell have you been?" Patricia's heart-shaped face came into view just as I rounded the corner into the secluded hallway that led to the dressing room. She had a headset on and wore a suit over her frumpy body.

"Sorry, I was running late." I pushed a lock of my aqua hair out of my face.

Patricia waved her hand through the air. "Doesn't matter. You're on." Her eyes flickered behind me where I could feel Cole's presence.

I ran my fingers through my hair. "I need to put my purse down and touch up my—"

"No, we don't have time!" Patricia jerked my purse from my hand and touched her fingers to her headset. "Yes, I'm with the both of them. They'll be at the grand entrance in less than thirty seconds." She made a hurry-along motion with her hand before moving off toward the dressing room.

"Looks like we're on." Cole's heated breath tickled my ear. I didn't look at him, my nerves already flaring.

Don't let him see how he affects you.

"Let's just get this over with," I said through clenched teeth. He didn't say anything else and I didn't glance his way. Not until we were standing outside the vast doors that led into the ballroom. The patrons had all been ushered inside awaiting our entrance.

"You're really dreading this?" His question took me by surprise. I glanced at him to see that he wasn't looking at me, but staring at the massive golden wrought doors before us. A muscle ticked in his jaw.

"No."

"You're not?"

Is that relief lacing his voice?

"It's a job, Cole. I try not to over-think it." I could have laughed if I wasn't so hyper-aware of everything about him. If I was doing anything, then over-thinking was definitely it. Since the moment I read his ridiculous stage name on that piece of paper, he was all I'd been able to think about.

"You should think a little bit though."

"Huh?" I glanced at him.

He nodded his head at my shoulder, a hint of a smile on his lips.

I glanced down and realized I was still wearing my black sweater. "Shit!"

The massive golden doors started to open as I jerked it off and tossed it onto a small side table. The ballroom came into full view. Chandeliers hung from the high ceiling, glittering in the soft yellow glow of the lights. For the first time in a while the room resembled itself on a normal basis. Abstract modern art decorated the walls and was in bright contrast to the pale colored couches and chairs. A dark marble floor looked flawless with the lights reflecting off it. Long wooden tables were covered in platters of food to both my left and right. Champaign fountains sat in the center of both tables, each over three feet tall with strawberries floating in the bottom tier. I licked my lips.

I could go for a drink right about now.

The crowd fell silent when they spotted us.

"Milady."

I glanced at Cole to find his arm extended toward me. I took it immediately slipping my hand across the soft material of his suit jacket. Shawn and I had briefly talked about how things would go down, though not in much detail. He had been to every Rapture X party. He knew the natural course of how things went, especially since this theme was simple. No hanging from ropes or fucking upside down while suspended from the ceiling.

"Look at her dress! I wonder where she got it!" a middle-aged woman whispered to a younger one. I smiled at them as we came down the stairs.

Thrift store find, baby. Three bucks.

"Hey honey, you wanna fuck me later? I'll pay you real good."

I didn't even make eye contact with the speaker. Men made comments like that all the time. The first time I'd been mad, but now I was immune. Cole's elbow tightened around my hand. I glanced up at his towering form. He didn't return my look, but a frown seemed to be permanently set in his handsome face. He's going to be buried in my pussy in less than twenty minutes. My heart jumped in my chest.

"I bet his dick is massive." Giggles broke out to our right.

I glanced over and saw three cocktail waitresses who were each holding trays of hors d'oeuvres, dressed in skimpy suit-like outfits. Jealousy stabbed at my insides. He inclined his head toward them and I couldn't see his expression.

Does he want them? Will he take one of them home after he gets his check tonight, and fuck them for pleasure instead of just a job?

The questions rattled me.

The crowd parted completely and we reached our destination. A large, antique desk covered in paperwork, a computer, a glass of water, and desk mate full of pens and other odds and ends. I hadn't been told we were going to fuck on a desk. It made sense though. Fifty Shades of Grey had opened up the world of BDSM, but more than that it had renewed the twenty-first century's love in the "sexy billionaire falling for the average girl" kind of romance, which is what the "Billion Dollar Sex" theme embraced. I was to be the lucky girl who got fucked on the billionaire's expensive desk.

He released my arm and walked around the desk. He looked so casual as he unbuttoned his jacket, slid into the black leather chair, and propped his feet up. He acted like he'd done it every day of his life. I stared at him in disbelief. This wasn't how Vic and I usually worked. Vic would undress me, get me down to my g-string, maybe play with my pussy a little bit, and then I would pull his erection out and suck it. Shawn and I had discussed following the same formula, but it didn't appear that Cole was interested. What does this mean?

"Are you just gonna stand there?" He quirked a brow and crossed his arms.

The patrons had crowded around, though there was at least ten feet separating them from us on all sides. A ruby red rope hung from waist-high black poles surrounded our little area. At least five security guards stood at the barrier for our protection as well.

As soon as he finished speaking the slow rhythm of an acoustic guitar flared to life overhead. The music was loud around us, but people who moved away from the center wouldn't be able to hear it as well if they weren't interested in watching us.

I stood there for a moment letting the sultry music wash over me. A raspy female voice started singing along with the slow beat. Instantly I knew what he wanted. He craved a show. I bit my lip.

He wants me to dance for him? I'll give him something that will make his dick hard for days.

I dragged my fingers up the smooth material of my strapless dress and wiggled my hips slowly. Men groaned behind me. Cole's dark eyes watched the movement. When I reached the top where the tight material pressed my breasts together he shook his head back and forth. I frowned. I had planned to slip the dress down slowly. He tapped the side of his head with his fingertips.

Ah, my hair, eh?

There was no mistaking the hunger in his gaze. I had convinced myself that I had imagined it the night before in my loft, but there was no denying it now. Desire burned there in his dark blue irises. That look enflamed my insides sending heat straight to my already sopping cunt. A sense of control slammed into me.

He wants this as much as I do.

Moaning, I trailed my fingertips up my chest, caressed my collarbones and brushed them against the side of my face until I reached the clip that pinned my hair back. Instead of pulling it out I dropped my hands and shook my head at him with a pouty smile. My I'm running this show smile.

I gripped my dress on either side of my waist and shimmied my body slowly while tugging down. The satiny material clung to my skin like a glove, so pulling it down without unzipping it was a hard task, but that's what I wanted. The fabric pressed hard against the large spheres of my breasts as I pulled, pressing them down. My soft, tan flesh bulged over the material. I kept my eyes on him the entire time. He didn't look away from me either. His body stayed in its relaxed position, his feet propped up on the desk, and his arms crossed though I could tell he was anything but relaxed. His massive body seemed tense like he was a lion ready to pounce on his prey.

My nipples pebbled, scraping against the smooth material, at the vision of him doing just that. A hiss escaped my lips at the erotic sensation. The beginning of an orgasm built in my core. What the hell? He hasn't even touched me yet! I tried not to let my surprise show on my face. This man had readied my body to cum without even touching me.

My breasts bounced free of the material. I sucked my bottom lip into my mouth and watched him drink me in. Does he like? I pinched my hard nipples between my fingers and let my head fall back, a moan escaping my lips. Suddenly, hot hands gripped my shoulders sizzling my skin. Mumbling low words, Cole stared down at me, and then focused on my lips. And for a second, much like last night, I thought he would kiss me.

He didn't.

Instead, he gripped the material pooled just beneath my breasts with both hands. A ripping sound followed. I stared down in disbelief at the front of my dress, which was now completely severed. He dropped the material on the floor like it was nothing but a hindrance. The crowd gasped.

"Ripper, huh? Now I know where you get your name," I teased.

He took a step back, ignoring my words, and leaned against the desk, tugging off his suit jacket. He tossed it on the floor with my ruined dress. He held up his pointer finger and twirled it, signaling for me to spin around. I obeyed, turning on the spot, rocking my body to the music. Giving him my back put me face to face with the crowd and only wearing my g-string. Men and women alike stood pressed against the velvet ropes. All of the men I could see had boners in their expensive pants. I gave them all a sly smile and tweaked my pink nipples with my fingers.

Something that sounded like a growl had me glancing over my shoulder. Cole still leaned against the desk, the murderous glare on his face targeted at the crowd. I completed my turn and cocked my head at him.

What's with that?

I moved toward him and before he could say anything I gripped the dark fabric of his expensive shirt with both hands and tore it open, though I wasn't quite as effective as he had been with my dress. Only three buttons popped free. My embarrassment at my lack of finesse didn't last long. He finished the job for me in a smooth move, ripping the shirt off. I stayed in sync with his movement and pushed the material down his shoulders exposing his flawless chest and tattooed arms. I leaned in and pressed my lips against the tan flesh of his pec. A red imprint from my lipstick was left behind. A thrill of pleasure soared through me at the sight. Like I was leaving my mark on him.

"Get on your knees," he growled.

My shins smacked against the floor, like he was the master and I was the puppet. A thrill of excitement pulsed through me. I pulled at his belt. The hard length of his cock stood at attention beneath the fabric of his pants. My mouth watered. Never had I anticipated seeing a man's hard rigid length like I did this one. After the belt, I fumbled with the zipper, and then his thick erection was there before me, a shade lighter than his olive skin tone. A broad mushroom-tipped head protruded at the end of an impressive thick length.

Circumcised, just like I thought.

A collective gasp sounded from all around me.

Women ogling him.

I didn't want them enjoying the view. I didn't want to share it, so I wrapped my lips around that pulsing length. Cole groaned and his hips jerked forward.

I sucked him deep into my throat trying to take all of him, but it was impossible. His fists clenched on either side of his hips as if he was holding back from gripping my head and forcing his cock deeper into my throat. I moaned at the image, wishing he would. I wanted to swallow him whole.

"Yeah, girl, suck it! I'm next in line!" The slurred words came from my left, but I paid him no mind and started bobbing my head up and down. Cole tensed.

"Yeah, suck it like a good whore," the man called out again.

"Sir, you're going to have to step back from the ropes," a security guard said.

"Nah, man. I'm just encouraging that whore to do what she does best!"

I bobbed my head faster.

Before I knew what was happening I toppled backward on the floor. My butt met the marble, Cole's cock gone from my mouth.

What the hell?

I turned my head just in time to see Cole's fist connect with a man's face. The guy went down like a sack full of bricks, collapsing in a messy heap on the floor. The crowd gasped, someone screamed, and everyone scattered back.

"What the fuck?" Two college-age men came forward against the retreating crowd.

"He punched Craig!" one yelled.

The other swung at Cole's face, taking him by surprise. His fist slammed into Cole's mouth, though it didn't knock him down. People gave them space, not wanting to get hit themselves. More guards appeared. Cole returned the guy's hit, slamming into his jaw with his clenched fist, sending him sprawling back on the floor. A crack sounded.

"Oh shit!" The other one retreated, clearly realizing the Ripper wasn't someone he wanted to fuck with. A security guard grabbed him by the collar before he could run. Astonished looks painted the faces of the crowd.

Yeah, cause none of them have ever seen anything like this here.

Cole turned around, his dark gaze met mine, only this time there wasn't hunger painted on his face, but some sort of vicious feral need. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth. He looked like an otherworldly beast with his dark eyes, long hair, and ripped to shit body. I sat where I had fallen moments before, watching him, completely enthralled with his fluid movements. His cock had gone limp in the fight, hanging out of his fly, but I watched it come back to life as he moved toward me, lengthening, hardening with each step.

He snatched me up off the ground. "You okay?" He grunted the words. I could only nod in response.

"Good." He balanced me in one arm and shoved a bunch of things off the desk.

"What are you doing?" Alarm laced my tone even as arousal coated my thighs.

"I'm going to give these people the show they came here for." He dropped my body onto the desk. I stared up at him in shock.

He's angry?

He moved between my legs and I realized he was taking his pants off. Leaning over me, he reached across the desk and grabbed a foil packet and tore it with his teeth, then shoved the condom onto his rock hard length. Chatter buzzed around us, someone yelled, but I didn't focus on any of that. The only thing I could see was Cole's muscular arms flexing as he rolled the condom over his length.

"He's still going to fuck her?" An excited voice rose over the crowd.

"Oh my God, look at his face."

"He's bleeding!"

Cole rubbed his hand over his lip, smearing the blood across his chin in his attempt to wipe it away. He gripped my hips and spread my thighs. He stared down at my bare pussy for two heartbeats before he thrust forward, stabbing his cock into my cunt. He filled me up with every solid inch of him. A whoosh of air left my lips at the rough impact. The walls of my vagina stretched to accommodate his wide girth. He didn't pause, didn't wait for anything, just started to move. Intense pleasure ripped through me. I was vaguely aware that the music still played over us, the sultry beat too slow for his fast pace.

"Cole!" I moaned and stared up into his dark blue eyes. The vicious expression on his face made me spread my thighs wider, desperate for him to consume me from the inside out. I don't know what came over me. I walked into this room knowing that I would fuck him, but I never expected to feel this way. To feel like if he stopped, a piece of me would die. I had to have him until it was over.

"You look at me when you cum." One of his hands gripped my shoulder while the other palmed one of my tits. Liquid smeared across my skin. I glanced down.

His blood.

The orgasm that had been building since the moment I'd laid eyes on him in the lobby came rushing to the fore. I was close, so fucking close. His relentless pace increased and I thrashed my head, the pleasure nearly overwhelming me. Strong fingers grasped my chin, forcing my head to stop.

"Only me."

Just as he spoke the last word the scarlet blood from his busted lip dripped from his chin. The crimson bead seemed suspended in mid-air just like the orgasm inside my body. The drop splattered in the valley between my voluptuous breasts. The hot liquid scalded me. I gasped. Overwhelming bliss splintered across my body, tearing me into millions of pieces. The entire time I stared up into those dark eyes, utterly captivated by the vicious look in them.

Ecstasy's clutch had barely loosened on my quaking body when Cole jerked out of me. I knew what he was going to do, and I was hungry for it. I sat up and slid off the desk like a limp noodle. On my knees I watched him jerk the condom off. Stepping forward he grabbed the back my head, sinking his fingers into my hair. He ran the other hand down his length once before a groan tore from his chest.

"Julia!" My name reverberated throughout the room just as thick ropes of hot semen shot out of his dick. I expected him to shoot it all into my mouth, but he squirted it onto my breasts, marking me with his seed. Each hot slash seemed to brand me, mixing with the blood that had trickled down my chest.

With a final groan he squeezed the end of his cock. A drop of cum clung to the tip. I leaned in to lick it away, desperate for a taste, but he jerked his hips back. A look at his face revealed his mask was back in place, an emotionless slate. A loud cheer of applause broke out around us, jolting me back to the present. People shouted. Women reached over the velvet ropes trying to brush their fingers against Cole's hard body. Security guards pressed against the crowd, yelling at everyone to get back.

Cole punched his legs into his pants while I stayed there on the floor, my chest covered in his fluids. Pens and papers were scattered around me. He didn't look back at me before disappearing into the crowd.

Five.

"It was okay? Just okay? Come on, Jewel."

"Yes." I wondered why I had answered the phone at all. I'd been avoiding everyone for the last week and a half since the Rapture X party and was pretty successful, but today I answered Vic's phone call.

"That's not what I heard," he said.

I barked with laughter. "Oh, yeah, and who told you that? I haven't even talked to anyone else."

I ran my hand over the rim of my coffee cup and glanced down at the outdoor coffee shop table. I'd isolated myself all last week. The club was only open Thursday through Saturday so I hadn't had to deal with anyone, not until I'd headed in to work on Friday night. By then my tumultuous emotions had rectified and grew into something more...anticipation.

"I heard from multiple people that he beat the shit out of three guys in the middle of the show, then came back and fucked you like you were the last woman on earth, while bleeding all over you. Sounds like a fucking movie, Jewel."

"Whatever." I dismissed it like those details didn't matter, as though I hadn't rehashed all of them over and over in my mind every free second I had. As if I hadn't laid in bed with my hand between my thighs playing with my wet cunt until I came...over and over to the memory of Cole working his length in and out of me.

"So, he didn't take on a horde of guys to defend your honor?"

"I don't know why he did it, Vic. What difference does it make?"

"What difference does it make? Are you kidding? It makes all the difference in the world. This is a huge deal, I don't see why you're being so blasé about it." Annoyance laced his voice.

"Oh my gosh, Vic. Shut up! It's my job. It was just sex!" I half-shouted into the phone.

The man sitting at the table closest to me glanced in my direction, clearly uncomfortable. I melted down in my seat, hiding my face behind my laptop. The reason I was being so blasé about it was because I'd shown up last Friday night, my body wired, excited, ready to face Cole, the Ripper, on the dance floor. My pussy had dripped with anticipation all day long. I'd spent hours perfecting my hair, even my make-up before heading in...only to find that the schedule had changed. Cinna was paired with me again, and I wasn't going to dance with the Ripper at all. He wasn't even on the schedule or at the club at all as far as Patricia knew and Jimmy proved to be equally elusive in his knowledge of the newest edition.

"Have you heard from him?"

"No." I hoped he couldn't hear the disappointment in my voice.

In all honesty I had expected to hear from him, but...I hadn't. He didn't show up at my apartment or anything. I'd expected him to try and set up a practice before last weekend, but of course we hadn't performed together, so it didn't matter anyway. Did he quit? Was it something I did? It was as if he had disappeared off the face of the earth. What did you expect? He was paid to fuck you. It didn't mean any more to him than earning ten thousand bucks. He's probably married happily with kids. The thought elicited a churning feeling in my gut.

"Seriously, you haven't heard anything?" Victor asked.

I'd received a bouquet of yellow roses and a bottle of Obsidian wine on the Sunday after Rapture X, delivered to my front door, but there hadn't been a card. The wine came from Obsidian Spirits one of the most high-end liquor stores in the world. They made their own special brand of every kind of liquor and it all came in obsidian glass mined from volcano ash. At first I was certain they were from him, who else would send me something like that? But I received nothing else, so that thought was quickly squashed. They were probably mistakenly sent to me.

"No, nothing. I don't want to anyway. You know I don't date other strippers."

"Oh, here we go."

"Ugh, don't start, Vic."

"Jewel, this guy rocks your world and you don't even care? You don't even want to know more about him?"

That was the problem. I did want to know more. After my performance with Cinna on Friday I'd asked everyone, all the dancers, waitresses, and bartenders. No one knew anything about him, in fact, I seemed to be the only one who even knew that his name was Cole. Everyone kept referring to him as the Ripper, and no one had seen him since he left me on my knees in the middle of Rapture X.

"You always rocked my world, Vic."

"Duh. But I know this is different. I can feel it. Plus everyone says so."

I chuckled in annoyance. "Since when do you listen to everyone?"

"Since you quit answering my phone calls over a week ago, Miss Thang." I could just see him rolling his eyes on the other end. My heart clenched. Man, how I missed him. He acted super nosy over the phone, but I knew it was because he was unused to our separation just as I was. We'd lived together for more than two years, seeing each other every day to cold turkey. If Vic and Chris had still been here they would have kept my mind off all this. But they weren't and I'd been trapped with my tumultuous thoughts.

"You're over thinking things again, aren't you?" Vic's voice barely registered. My eyes had fixated on a tall muscular body gliding up the sidewalk opposite of me.

Cole.

He moved across the pavement like some sort of god, wearing low-slung jeans, a black v-neck sweater, and stylish high-top boots. His long hair was tied back revealing the exquisite perfection of his square jaw. Black sunglasses covered his eyes.

"Jewel?" Vic asked.

"Huh?" I jerked and darted my eyes away from him.

"Did you hear what I said?"

"Uh, no. I mean, I don't think so." I glanced from my coffee cup to my purse and backpack.

Just grab your stuff and get out of here. Maybe he hasn't seen you.

"What's going on?" Vic sounded worried.

"Nothing." I looped the long strap of my purse across my body and glanced up. The door to the coffee shop swung closed.

Yes! He didn't see me!

"Obviously something is going on."

"He's here," I whispered urgently into the phone, gripping the styrofoam cup in my hand.

"Huh? The Ripper guy is? He's at the coffee house?"

"Yes!" I closed my laptop.

"You're going to talk to him, right?"

"What? No way! I'm getting the fuck out of here."

"Why?"

I glanced down at my lazy attire—a black Dallas Stars sweatshirt and yoga pants. My hair was twisted up in a messy knot on top of my head. I wore my glasses and no make-up since I'd been too lazy to shove contacts in my eyes. I looked like a straight-up mess. Part of me wanted to see the mysterious man who had taken my body like no one else had, but not this badly. I didn't want to scare him off.

"I look like shit, Vic."

"Are you wearing the sweatshirt? The hideous one I tried to throw away a hundred times?"

"Yes!"

"Get the hell out of there! I told you not to go out in public wearing that raggedy old thing."

"Working on it." I hung up the phone and unzipped my backpack.

"Thirsty?"

I sucked in sharply at the sound of that voice that rumbled with promises of hard punishing sex. I didn't dare look up, but stared at the tattoo-covered hand that held a white cup out to me. Them. That's what was written across these knuckles in Old English lettering. I'd noticed over a week ago that his other hand said love.

"Them?" The question was out of my mouth before I could think twice about it. When he didn't answer after a few heartbeats I glanced up at him. He looked even more handsome close up in the cold afternoon sun. Of course I knew he would. The sweater hugged his muscular form like a glove, adhering to his skin like it was desperate to touch him.

I know the feeling.

"Yes." He sat the cup down in front of me and I realized that I hadn't moved to take it from him. I had been holding my laptop awkwardly between the table and my backpack. He sat down across from me, holding his own cup. "Nice glasses."

The reminder of my ugly predicament rushed to fore and I immediately shoved my laptop in.

"I've gotta go." I stood quickly and banged my thigh against the side of the table. "Fuck!" I muttered under my breath.

Way to not look like a fucking idiot, Julia.

"I got them for my family."

I was in mid-turn when he spoke.

"Huh?" I faced him, holding my backpack on one shoulder.

"The tattoo." Cole held out his fist.

I glanced at the hand and then back to his face. His full lips were set in a blank line, the bottom one slightly puffy from where he'd been punched last week. His eyes remained covered by his sunglasses.

"Oh." I stood there indecisively, part of me wanting to run, the other wanting to know more. My curiosity gave in. "But...that doesn't make sense." I eased back into my chair, assuring myself that I would only stay a moment and then leave.

He placed his other fist on the table, revealing love. Next to his other hand it read, love them.

"So, you got the tattoo to remind you to love them...your family?"

He nodded once. "Sometimes it's hard to remember."

I checked his face looking for a hint of a smile, something to tell me he was kidding, but I didn't find it.

"It is," I conceded, reminded of the many failed family relationships I'd had.

Several heartbeats passed, filled with unnerving silence between us. I tried to focus on the birds chattering overhead or the people passing by on the sidewalk, but found myself unable to pay attention to any of them. His eyes were devouring me. I was certain of it. I couldn't see them, but they seemed to be swallowing me whole, burning my clothes away and engulfing my skin. I tensed, ready to leave.

"Do you go to school?"

"School?" I repeated, as if it was the first time I'd ever heard the word.

"Yeah." He motioned to my backpack sitting next to my feet. "College?"

I wanted to answer yes, desperately so. I wanted to say that I almost had my bachelor's degree in English, but I didn't. I couldn't say that, because it wasn't true. I'd abandoned those dreams. "No."

His brows rose. "I figured you would be, you're young, about twenty-three, right?"

"Yes. But no school for me."

"Why not?"

"Some things just don't happen like you plan."

He tilted his head. "Why not?"

"Well I—why do you even want to know anyway?" I ended in a huff. Who was he to ask me questions about my life?

"Just curious."

"Well, what about you? You look young enough to be in school too."

He couldn't be much older than I. Maybe twenty-seven at the most.

A bark of laughter escaped his lips, revealing even, white teeth. The sight captivated me and had me wishing he wasn't wearing the sunglasses. I imagined that his eyes crinkled in the corners, but I wanted to see for myself.

"Oh, no. I'm way too old for college."

I frowned. "You can't be that old."

"Thirty-four." The smile and all notion of his previous laughter left his face. He studied me intently, as if waiting for my reaction.

"Thirty-four? Really? That surprises me."

"Why do you say that?"

"You seem younger."

"So they say."

"So, how does it feel then?"

He moved forward leaning his elbows on the table. "How does what feel?"

"Being a thirty-four year old stripper?" I don't know what induced me to say it. In my head it didn't sound so bitchy, but it came out that way. Part of me wanted to clutch this man to me. The other...wanted to attack him. He'd taken control of me more than once. My precious control that I had over my body...he'd taken it like it was nothing. Like I'd never really had it to begin with and he only gave it back once I was boneless mush at his feet.

A tight smile spread across his face, not revealing any teeth. "I think the better question is, how does it feel to fuck one?"

Blistering arousal shuddered through my body. My fingers started aching and I glanced down to see that I was digging them into the table.

"Who the fuck are you?" I snapped.

The man at the table next to us must've heard me because he quickly got up and hurried away. A few passersby glanced in our direction.

Cole reached up and jerked off his sunglasses. His dark blue gaze bore into mine. "Does it matter?"

His answer took me aback. I hadn't known what he would say, but that wasn't at all what I expected.

"Obviously it matters."

"It didn't matter last Friday night, or Saturday."

"That's my job. Sometimes I have to do things I don't want to. That's life."

He leaned in farther sliding his hands across the table. "You didn't want to do it, Julia?" His voice lowered nearing a whisper. "You didn't want me to string you up on that pole and rub that little pussy?" A rush of arousal soaked my panties. "You didn't want to put my big, fat cock in your mouth?" Cole leaned in closer. His gaze holding mine so utterly that everything else seemed to melt away. "You didn't like it when I laid you on that desk and fucked you into next week?"

My nipples pressed painfully against my bra.

His gaze flicked to my lips and I realized I was biting down on them.

"You didn't want those things?"

"The body is just a tool with base needs." I tried to convince myself it was all my body's fault.

"Admit that you wanted it." Cole's voice rattled with some new emotion. The sound made something click inside of me and let me push through the lust that covered me like a wet blanket.

"You're an asshole." I stood and jerked my backpack off the ground.

What the hell is going on with me?

There'd been lots of times in my life where I had made horrible decisions and bad choices, but I had made them. No one else forced me to do anything nor had I ever allowed anyone to make those decisions for me. I accepted them because they were mine. But here I was around Cole for the third time and for the third time I already felt the grip on my control loosening and for who? A man I knew nothing about. Pathetic.

I turned on my heel and headed away from the table. It was the opposite direction of my loft, which was three blocks the other way, but I didn't care. There was no way in hell I was going to walk past him. Nope, I would just suck it up and take the long way. I'd made it about ten steps when I heard the pounding of feet behind me.

"Julia."

I didn't turn to look at him, not even when he got in pace next to me. "Just leave me alone."

"No, please—" He touched my shoulder. Warmth seeped through my sweatshirt and into my skin. I stared daggers at the point of connection. He dropped it away immediately. "I just...look, I'm sorry."

A lady with a group of children pressed past us causing us to step closer to the coffee shop wall.

The sincerity in his voice had me glancing up. He ran a hand over his jaw, over the trimmed couple day's growth of a beard that made him seem so rugged. The gesture appeared nervous. His gaze focused on the ground by my boat shoes.

"You're sorry?" I wanted to ask why, but for some weird reason I feared the answer.

"Yes." He sucked in a deep breath. "Look I..." He looked into my eyes. The expression there was nothing I had ever seen before. It was raw, vulnerable. "I want to take you on a date."

"What?" A bubble of laughter built in my throat at the absurdity of it all.

Here I stood in the middle of a busy sidewalk with a man I hardly knew. A man who brought me to orgasm without even knowing his name, a man who fucked me so hard that I nearly forgot my own. This same man wanted to take me on a date?

He wanted to wine and dine me? But why?

He'd already gotten the good stuff, and he'd been paid for it.

"Why?"

He furrowed his brow. "Because I want to."

"That can't be it—wait, you feel bad, don't you?" The idea hit me like a rock.

"What? Bad? No."

"Sure, whatever. Look, the sex was fine. We both got paid for it. It's over now. You don't have to take me on date or something to make yourself feel better."

A dark look swallowed his face and he took a step forward. "I want to take you on date, Julia, because I want to spend time with you. Not because I fucked you"—he reached out and brushed his finger along my chin—"or because I want to fuck you again." His words sent shivers down my spine. "But because you're a beautiful woman."

My heart clenched in my chest. Men called me sexy all the time, fuckable at best. Beautiful wasn't something I was associated with. Beautiful was something I could never be, but as I stared up into that dark blue gaze, captivated by the stormy color with his words floating there between us, I knew there was nothing that could keep me from going.

"Not a date. Just friends." I meant to sound firm, but failed miserably.

"Okay." A smile spread across his face illuminating his lips and brightening his eyes and I discovered I was right, his eyes did crinkle in the corners.

Six.

"Wear something...simple."

Cole's words just before we departed earlier in the day rang through my ears. Simple? What did that even mean? He'd left before I could ask. Leaving me there pressed against Creamy Café with what was certainly a dumb expression on my face. Surely he didn't mean the simple unstylish yoga pants and disastrous bun that I had been sporting.

Now I stood in front of the floor-length mirror wearing dark skinny jeans, brown-fringed cowboy boots, and a sleeveless white button up shirt that dipped low in the front. My hair fell loose in its natural waves. I smiled at myself, revealing my straight white teeth.

"Why did I agree to this date?" I asked my reflection.

He called you beautiful, remember?

I sighed. When had I become a sap?

You've always been a sap, you just got good at pretending you weren't.

If my mind was a physical person, I would have slapped her. She was right after all. I couldn't help the excitement that coursed through me and it wasn't just about Cole and the fact that he thought I was beautiful. I'd checked my bank account when I got back from Creamy Café. It usually took a little over a week for the payment for Rapture X to be directly deposited. I spent a portion of the ten grand on the care for my grandmother each month, and payment time was coming up. I received the shock of my life when the automated voice read my account balance. Fifteen thousand dollars had been deposited the day before.

Fifteen thousand dollars!

A soft knock on the door made my pussy clench. I gave myself a final once over. The knob was cool under my fingers as I turned it. He stood on the other side looking the epitome of all that was man. He leaned casually against the side of the doorframe, more casual than I had ever seen him, as if being here wasn't any such thing. I wished I could return his nonchalance, but how could I when the very sight of him enflamed all my senses? He wore brown loafers with black jeans. A long sleeve blue dress shirt fitted tightly to his muscular torso, with a black argyle sweater vest on top of it. His hair was loose about his shoulders, making him appear like some sort of twenty-first century Beowulf, there to sweep me away with a massive sword and gallant intellect. Well, his sword is pretty massive. I suppressed a giggle and let my eyes fall to his crotch.

"What's so funny?"

"Nothing." I shook my head, my smile fading at the sound of his rough voice. "You wanna come in? I just need to grab my purse and coat."

"I'll wait here." His gaze traced all over my body while he spoke.

Heat pooled in my core. I turned and hurried away before he could notice the arousal that was surely painted all over my face.

"Ready?"

"Yes," I said once I was out the door. I locked up, and followed him to the elevator. It opened revealing Randy, the elevator operator. He was tall and brawny, his dark skin stretched over killer muscles.

"Good evening, Miss Collette," he said once the doors were closed and we'd begun our descent.

I smiled at him. "Hey, Randy. I thought I told you to quit calling me that."

"You did." The door dinged and opened on the bottom floor. "Have a nice night." He winked at me.

I almost expected Cole to say something about the exchange. My ex-boyfriend, Kevin, would have. He didn't though, and we walked to the parking garage in silence, though his gaze was on me the whole time, never straying from my body. I wasn't usually nervous about men, hell, I took my clothes off for hundreds of them every week, but this was different. Cole's lingering eyes made me want to fidget and smooth my hair. Made me feel a little desperate, like I should pull out my compact and double check that my mascara hadn't smeared. I didn't do any of those things though. I kept quiet, nervous about breaking the silence.

"I'm parked right over there," Cole said. I glanced to my right in the dimly lit garage and spotted a large pickup truck.

"That one?" I motioned toward it.

"Yup."

I stared at the gleaming black paint and shiny rims. I hadn't been in a truck in years. "What kind of truck is it?"

"A Dodge Ram."

"Looks new."

"It is." He opened the passenger side door and helped me in. His warm hand slid against mine and I had the urge to jerk him to me. He pulled away before I could act on the impulse. He climbed in the driver's seat. "Just bought her about a month ago."

"Wow." I glanced around at the black leather interior. "Still smells new." I sucked in a deep breath. "You live on a farm or something?"

He chuckled and started up the engine. "No. Why do you ask that?"

"Well, where I'm from everyone who owns a truck uses it on their farm, like pulling horse trailers, hauling old junk to the back of the pasture. Stuff like that."

He laughed loudly, a full blast of sound that resonated in the air between us. "No, Julia. I don't live on a farm." He continued chuckling.

"You're laughing at me." The urge to laugh pressed against my cheeks and I felt my lips turning up into a smile.

"I'm not laughing at you." Cole pulled out onto the street. "I'm just enjoying learning about farm life." He shot me a wicked smile. "Don't tell me you're the farmer's daughter."

"Once upon a time, yes, I was."

"You act like it was a long time ago."

"Seems like it." The image of my dad jumped in my head. Leaving home seemed like a hundred years ago.

"Why do you say that?" Cole made a left at the light and I watched the muscles bunch under his shirt.

"Uhh, well." I looked away from him. "A lot has happened to me since I moved away from Sunder. It's a real small town, you see, about an hour north of here. It was a big change when I moved."

That was an understatement. I went from living in a town with a tiny population where everyone knew my business to the city where I was just a face in a crowd. At home I couldn't take a shit without the whole town knowing about it.

"So, you're a small town girl? I didn't expect that."

"No one ever does. It's the blue hair, I guess." I twirled a piece around my finger and stared out the window. The bright lights of the city glittered around us. The dark night sky was illuminated with them, and Reunion Tower, the massive ball in the sky that characterized Dallas, seemed to sparkle. I always loved looking out at it. I could see it from my loft window, such a beautiful piece of architecture.

"Where are you from?" I asked after a beat of silence.

"I was born in New Orleans, but I grew up in New York City."

My jaw dropped. "Really?" He nodded and looked at me. I snapped my mouth shut before he could notice.

"Well, yeah. Why?"

"I guess I am just the sheltered farm girl who thought you were from somewhere around here." I'd traveled with my mom and dad a couple of times as a kid before they split up, but that had been a long time ago, and I hadn't been out of Texas to anywhere that wasn't Oklahoma for at least a decade.

"You are far from sheltered." The easy going Cole who had been chatting with me, teasing me, only moments before disappeared. His nonchalant hold on the steering wheel became a furious grip. He didn't look at me, but stared out at the road as if he couldn't stand the sight of me.

"Wait, where are we going?" He took the ramp onto the interstate that led out of town.

"It's a surprise." His grip relaxed a bit.

"A surprise?"

"Yes." Cole looked at me again. The coldness I thought I'd seen in his eyes wasn't there at all, but a look of sadness I didn't understand. It called to something inside me that wasn't at all sexual.

"Trust me?" he spoke the last words quietly, almost as if he didn't want me to hear him.

Trust him?

He was joking right? But he wasn't, I could tell. He seemed to yearn for my answer and yet fear it all at once. A car honked and Cole jerked his head to stare back at the road.

"Forget it. I can just take you home," he muttered and put on his blinker.

"I trust you." The words tripped out of my mouth, stumbling over my tongue until they were hanging there between us. Where this newfound faith came from I didn't know. I wasn't the girl who trusted men. I had learned my lesson a long time ago. The only man I had fully trusted since I left home was Vic and even he had ultimately left me—friendship or not, he was still gone. But I meant what I said to Cole in that moment. I did trust him. I don't know how I managed it, or how he had earned it, but nonetheless it was there.

Cole turned his blinker off.

"Oh my gosh, are you serious?" I gasped as Cole pulled into the big parking lot of the Stars Center, a hockey arena where the professional hockey team, the Dallas Stars, practiced, and the junior league team played all of their games.

"Wait, are the Whirlwind playing tonight?" I bounced up and down in my seat. I was a die-hard hockey fan. There was no getting around it. It was the only sport I was educated in and I loved it.

"You've been here before?" He pulled open my door.

"Been here? Are you kidding? I've been coming here since I was kid! I haven't been in a few years though. How did you know?"

"Your sweatshirt."

"Sweatshirt?" I hopped down from the truck.

"The one you wore earlier. This isn't a Stars game, but I thought you might still like it."

He appeared almost sheepish with his hands in his pockets, eyeing me as if uncertain whether or not I was being serious.

"Heck yeah! My cousin used to play for the Whirlwind. At the time they were the best junior hockey team in the nation."

"He played in 2007?" Disbelief laced his voice as we approached the big building. "What's his name?"

"Wait, you follow junior league hockey?"

He laughed. "Yeah, I'm a big fan. I follow the whole league. Have for about seven years."

My mouth gaped open again. "You're kidding!"

"Nope. Who was your cousin?"

"Ryan McIntosh."

"No way!" Cole jumped back. "Gerald Raymond's goon? The one who plays for the Red Wings now?"

I smirked. "That's the one."

It was Ryan's connection to the sport that made me love hockey. I never missed a game that season, and my dad didn't either, even though Ryan got kicked out of most games on account of fighting too much. He'd become a legend in the junior leagues, taking care of the Whirlwind's best center, and when Gerald went pro, he wouldn't go unless Ryan came too.

"That's crazy. I had no idea."

"Well, why would you?" I chuckled.

He didn't respond, but pulled out his wallet as we approached the ticket window. He grabbed a hundred and handed it to the lady on the other side of the counter. "Hey Linda, how are you today?"

The older woman blushed, her cheeks turning the same shade as her short red hair. For a moment I wanted to reach through the little window and smack the dreamy expression off her face.

He's mine! I shook my head. Where the hell did that come from? The guy says he likes hockey and I'm already making claims on him? And he fucked you into the next century. I bit down on my lips and tried not to focus on his long fingers, how they were tan and the tattoos on the top of his hands stood out against the blue of his shirt.

"Hey, did you get paid for the Rapture X party?" Memory of the extra money in my bank account popped into my head.

He took his change and the tickets and handed me one. "Hmm?"

"Rapture X, did you get paid for it?"

"Oh yeah, I did." He averted his eyes.

"How much did they pay you?" I followed him toward the large glass doors.

He shrugged. "Fifteen grand."

"Eeek! Me too!" I looped my arm through his, acting as though it was a natural reaction in my excitement, but it was far from anything that innocent. The last hour in the car with him had been too much. His hot body was too delectable and the reaction of the lady at the window was more than enough to make me want to stake my claim. I'm seriously losing it. If he was alarmed by my touch, he didn't show it, but led me into the building, arm in arm like we'd done it a million times.

"That's not what you usually get paid?"

"No way, I usually only make ten grand." The spot where my hand brushed against his bicep seemed to heat to a thousand degrees. A shiver ran down my spine.

"Ten grand to fuck a stranger." His voice took on that condescending tone again.

I huffed. "I never fucked a stranger until you came along." I said it as a joke, but his face turned dark again. What's with him? I wasn't annoyed by his sudden turn to brooding attitude. If anything it made me more curious about him. Who was this guy? I wanted to know. In fact, I needed to.

"I don't want you to be alarmed when we get in here," I said.

"Alarmed?"

"Yes, I get very involved...and sometimes yell at the players and referees."

And just like that Cole's dark look was gone. A small smile spread across his firm lips, making me want to lean up on my tip-toes and press my own against them. I didn't though, because we walked into the arena and the cool air of the hockey rink pressed against my skin, exhilarating me.

The rest of the game went on without error. He bought us both pretzels with mustard, a wheat beer for me, and a red bull for him. I wasn't lying when I said I became involved in the game, as Cole soon found out, but I wasn't the only one. When one of the Whirlwind players took a stick to the face without a high-sticking call from the ref we were both standing, cursing, and blaming the ref for all the ways the Whirlwind were sucking tonight.

I spilled my beer twice and he bought me new ones. By the time we left I was buzzing pretty good. I'd only managed to consume three beers, but I was a lightweight.

"I can't believe they suck so bad now," I said in the truck when we neared my apartment. We'd shared good-hearted conversation the whole drive about the game, picking apart each period.

"I know, right? Embarrassing. Ten to nothing. Just depressing."

I nodded and eyed him from the passenger seat. Had any man ever looked so fucking hot? I was sure that no one had. He'd pushed his sleeves back over the course of the game, revealing his bulging, tattooed forearms. My eyes had been continuously drawn to the life-like portrait of a woman mixed in amongst the other designs on his right arm. She was alarmingly beautiful, even with the sad look that covered her face. A pang of jealousy wormed through me. Who was she? What made her so special besides her exotic beauty?

"Who is she?"

Cole glanced down at his arm and casually pushed his sleeve down to cover the piercing eyes of the woman. "Who?"

"The woman on your arm."

"No one."

I didn't like that answer. And maybe it was the buzz I had going, but I unbuckled my seat belt and slid across the center seat until I was pressed against his side. He tensed. Attraction sparked in the air between us. I ran my hand down his arm and noticed, with satisfaction, that his breathing quickened. I pulled his sleeve back again, revealing the woman. I traced my fingers over her cherubic face.

"She's beautiful," I said more to myself than him.

"She used to be."

His admission surprised me. "Not anymore?"

He laughed sadly. "Hard to be pretty when you're dead."

"Oh, Cole, I'm—" I started to pull my hand away, but he stopped me, placing his hand over mine.

"Don't do that. Don't say that you're sorry. Nothing's gonna change it. Whether you're sorry or not." The coldness of his tone made me tug at my hand. Jealousy stabbed at me this time. How could I compete with a dead chick? Wait, why do I even want to compete with her? I'm being ridiculous. He was still looking at the road. "Don't move away, please...I like you here."

"Who was she?" My tone was almost accusatory.

He sighed. "My sister. I don't want to talk about it."

Does it make me a bad person that I felt relief at this revelation? Jesus, what did they put in that beer? I'm losing my mind!

"Ask me a question," he said quickly.

"Huh?"

"Ask me about anything, but not about her."

I considered his words. "How did you know where I lived last week when you came to my apartment?"

"I think the better question would be, why did you let me in? You could have told your elderly neighbor you didn't want me there."

I bit down on my lips. "I didn't want to scare her."

"So you just let me in, even though you were scared of me?" His words were accusatory, as if he hadn't been the man in question.

"I wasn't afraid of you." I didn't have a good reason why, but that was the truth.

"You should be." He glanced at me when he spoke. His dark blue eyes appeared black in the dark interior of the car.

"I'm not."

He immediately moved his hand and looked back at the empty highway.

I trailed my fingertips up his arm again, reveling in his strength. In the club and at the party, I hadn't truly gotten the chance to enjoy him at my leisure. People watching all around really had a way of amping things up and making them anything but leisurely.

How long has it been since I've really just enjoyed a man behind the privacy of a locked door?

Well over a year, and even then, the sex with my last boyfriend hadn't even compared to what Cole and I had done out there for the world to see. The memory of that night shuddered through my head like it had many times in the last week and a half.

"I like touching you." The words escaped my lips unbidden.

"You do?"

"Yes." I nodded my head and inhaled deeply. His musky scent filled my nostrils. My pussy clenched in response.

"You know why they call me the Ripper?" His question surprised me. I frowned, but didn't pull away. "Because I rip women's hearts out. I break them. And then I leave."

"Is that so?"

"Yes." He ground the word out between clenched teeth.

"It's a good thing I'm heartless." I leaned in closer. "I've thought about you."

"You have?" His knuckles whitened on the wheel. The speedometer read sixty-five miles per hour.

I leaned in, until I was certain my breath tickled his ear. "Yes, every day." He shuddered. "I thought about the way your cock felt in my mouth."

"That's what you thought about?" He seemed surprised.

"Yeah, how I wished you'd shoved it down my throat. Every single inch of it, until I gagged." I licked his ear and let my hand wander down his chest. "Did you like it?"

"Fuck yeah," he mumbled.

I stopped my hand inches above his groin, where I knew his hard cock was concealed by his pants. The stiff erection pressed against the denim. My mouth watered. "Tell me what you liked about it."

He groaned, no doubt recognizing that I was going to make him work for it. At the same time, I felt anxious, ready to put my hands on him.

"All of it. The way your blue eyes looked at me while you took my cock into your mouth..." He trailed off.

"I wanted to suck it longer." I raked my fingernails against his stomach slowly. "I wanted you to grip the sides of my head and fuck my face."

Something that sounded like a growl tore from his lips.

"Do you wanna fuck my face, Cole?" I leaned back a little to study his reaction. His expression hardened and filled with hunger, like he was fighting desperately against some inner demon. After several heartbeats he gave a curt nod, as if he didn't trust himself to speak.

I popped the button on his jeans and slid the zipper down. I studied his face the entire time, but it didn't change. He never looked at me but stayed focused on the road. Do you like it, Cole? Do you want this as much as I do? I reached into the warmth of his pants and gripped his hard cock. We moaned in unison. I pulled his thick length out, revealing the steel encased in smooth velvety flesh. A bead of pre-cum formed at the tip. A flood of wetness coated the lips of my cunt at the sight.

I want to taste it. I need to or I'll surely die. I ducked under his arm and flicked my tongue against the tip, collecting the moisture. The salty liquid only made me ravenous for more. I wrapped my lips around the tip and took him into my mouth. He groaned above me and I slid down his length slowly, savoring every inch of him. He thrust his hips and his cock stabbed at the back of my throat, nearly making me gag.

I eased back a little and bobbed my head down. I was rewarded with a slap across my behind, and then a big hand gripped one cheek.

"I fuckin' love your ass." He groaned while I sucked him deeper. I was certain the crotch of my jeans were soaked from how aroused I was. He spanked me again and I moaned around his cock.

I kept working him at a slow pace and started using my hand, gripping the base while I bobbed my head at the same time. I didn't pick up the pace until I heard the click of his blinker signaling his exit. My loft wasn't far.

I plunged my head down onto his shaft without mercy, fisting him at the same time. I tasted more of his salty pre-cum and knew he was close. I released my grip on his cock and took him all the way in my mouth. His dick hit the back of my throat, gagging me. He groaned. The truck lurched, tires squealing, to a halt. In a moment of panic I was afraid we'd had a wreck, but the grip of his hands in my hair alerted me to what was really going on.

"You like gagging on that cock, huh?" He shoved my head down. "You like putting that big dick in your mouth." Wet arousal dripped from my core. He slapped my ass again, but his hand landed lower, closer to my throbbing pussy. "Oh, yeah, that pussy's all wet for me, isn't she?"

I moaned and tried to nod, but he pressed down on the back of my head again. I gagged. Bile rose in my throat in time with the building orgasm in my belly.

"Fuck yeah!" He thrust his hips up and slapped his open palm right against my throbbing pussy. My stomach heaved just as the orgasm sliced through me like a dirty knife, infecting my body with a desperation for more. Pleasure flayed my skin away as he filled me with his salty liquid. I swallowed everything, all of him, and the remnants of me until I was drowning in him, drowning in utter rapture.

Cole pulled me up from his lap and pressed his face into the crook of my neck. The bristles of his short beard brushed against my cheek as he buried his hands in my hair. My eyes focused to the dim lighting outside of the car. The parking garage.

"You are...like nothing I ever expected." He pressed his lips against the curve of my neck, sending a shiver down my spine.

"Hmm?"

He kissed my neck again. "I want to see you again."

A breathless laugh escaped my lips. "Why, because I give good head?" My voice sounded raspy, like I'd smoked all my life.

"No." Several heartbeats passed. He leaned back and looked into my eyes. "I like you. That's why I want to see you again."

Realization of the implications of what just happened slammed into me.

"No, I can't." I pushed away from him.

"What?"

"I can't see you again." I turned away and snatched my purse out of the floorboard. What was I thinking? I didn't do this. I didn't get involved with men like him. Strippers were a no go in my department. I was too jealous, too protective of what was mine. Sharing wasn't an option for me, even if it wasn't completely sexual. Women ogling his body, touching it while he shook that thick cock in their face. No! I couldn't handle it.

"What the fuck do—"

"This was supposed to be as friends. You agreed earlier," I said accusingly.

A bewildered look spread across his face. "What did I do that was so wrong?" My mind raced as I closed my fingers around the door handle. "You came over to my side of the truck and put your mouth on my cock," he growled the words, sounding like someone else, some sort of animal.

I searched for something to say and had nothing. He was right, but I wasn't going to admit that. Not in a million years. He reached for me, but I pushed open the door and avoided his hand, slamming the door behind me. Just as I came around the truck he emerged. I avoided him and headed toward the doors that led to the lobby.

"Didn't you have fun, Julia?" The pain in his voice threatened to suffocate me. Why did I even care? It didn't make sense, he was just some guy my boss paid to fuck me.

But that's it.

The revelation attacked me. He wasn't just some guy anymore. He'd become something more somewhere between love and them and flashing the middle finger at an unlucky referee.

Oh my God, I like him.

I didn't turn around or go back. I left Cole there in the parking garage alone.

Seven.

"Everyone will be getting a compensation pay." Patricia's nasally voice echoed from the other side of my cell phone.

"Is this a joke?" I could hardly believe my ears.

"You're just as surprised as I am. Jimmy received the information this morning from the new owner."

"But this is way too short notice to just shut down Rapture," I said.

"I agree with you, but they want to make some renovations. The first crew is already up here working on the stage."

"How much compensation?" Irritation hit me. Though that was pretty much the state I had been in since my date ended the night before. I'd tossed and turned all night, my silken sheets like burlap against my sensitive skin. Even though I orgasmed in the truck, I still craved more. I longed for Cole's hands on me. I wanted his cock inside me.

"I don't know, Jewel. Jimmy is supposed to get the spreadsheet with everyone's info. He will be sending out emails later tonight with all of that, including dates on how long the club will be closed, though the new owner says it will only be a week or two."

I ran a hand through my tangled hair. "All right. Thanks."

I hung up and got out of bed. It was after two in the afternoon. Sleep hadn't taken me until six in the morning and even then, it had been fitful. I glanced at my disheveled state in the mirror. My over-sized night shirt hung off one shoulder, revealing my colorful half-sleeve of tattoos. My garden. I had a pink lotus, several blue and purple hibiscus, a sunflower, and even some bluebonnets. All of them were wound together with green ink.

My mind jumped back to the tattoo on Cole's arm. His sister. What happened to her? My gaze locked on the outline of the black ink I tried hard to cover with my garden. No one else would notice it, but I did. Forever a part of me. Guess we all have our secrets.

I clenched my fists. Why am I thinking of him? I never thought about Kevin...or the fucked up relationship we had. I had moved on from it. It was over. Finished.

My phone chimed on the bed and I glanced at it. My alarm was going off. The word Gran spread across the screen.

"Shit." I snatched up my phone and turned the alarm off. I'd almost forgotten that I had told my grandma I would visit today. I never forgot about visiting her. She was the reason I still existed as a functioning human being. She was the only person who hadn't abandoned me.

All the more reason you shouldn't get involved with anyone, especially Cole. You're losing yourself again.

"No." I headed toward the bathroom. I would never lose myself. Not again.

Half an hour later I was in the parking garage cursing my Honda Civic to hell. The piece of shit wouldn't start.

"Go fucking figure." I kicked the tire with my Toms and winced when pain shot through my foot.

I jogged back inside certain that Leon, the front desk guy, would be able to help me. But he wasn't there. Seriously? I knew Randy wasn't in the elevator. It had been empty when I ventured down earlier.

I yanked out my cell phone and scrolled through my phone book. Who would I call? I'd never been faced with this issue before with Vic and Chris as my roommates. They had always been there if I needed a jump.

I don't even have jumper cables.

Cole's name popped into my head, before I realized that I didn't have his phone number. It never even came up. He just magically knew where I lived.

I came across Patricia's name and pressed send.

"Jewel."

"Hey, Patricia. Are you still up at Rapture? My car won't start and you were the closest person I could think of. Could you come give me a jump?"

Patricia sighed on the other end. "I'm kind of busy right now, Jewel." A bustle of male voices sounded through the other end of the phone. "Hold on." The voices became more muffled as if she covered the speaker with her hand. "All right. I'll be there in a few."

"Really? Thanks."

I leaned back against my car, annoyed, but it wasn't two minutes before a big, black diesel truck pulled up next to me.

"What are you doing here?" I asked when Cole hopped out.

"I came to give you a jump." He winked and pulled jumper cables out of the bed.

I bit down on my lips at the sight of his muscles flexing under a black designer shirt. His hair was pulled back at his neck in a rubber band, revealing his chiseled jaw.

"But I called Patricia."

"Yeah, I was in the office when you called." He popped the hood of my Civic.

"Why?"

He moved over to his truck and did the same thing. "Putting in my resignation."

"What?" My voice rose a notch as a wave of panic swept through me.

He can't leave. He just got here!

He glanced at me, the corners of his mouth curving into a sexy smile. "What, you don't want me to leave?"

"I didn't say that."

"No, you didn't." The smile left his face as he went back to hooking up the wires. "Get in the car and try to start it."

I climbed in not missing the feel of his eyes on my backside. I was in yoga pants again, though thankfully I'd refrained from wearing my Stars hockey sweatshirt. Instead I'd put on a plain pink sweater that hung off one shoulder. I turned the key only to hear a series of clicks. The engine didn't start. "It's not working."

"Try again."

I did, only to get the same result.

"Here let me try." He came around the car. I climbed out, which put me only inches away from him. The woodsy notes of his cologne met my nose. I almost sighed. I side-stepped to avoid touching him and failed. My arm brushed against his. Even through the cotton of my sweater I could still feel the heat of his skin.

Cole made no indication that he noticed I'd touched him. He climbed in the car and got the same result I did.

"Looks like you need a new battery. Or maybe your starter is out."

"Shit." I backed up. "Just great!" The urge to kick my tire grew.

"I have a friend who's a mechanic. I'm sure I could get him to work on it later today." He got out of the car.

"That doesn't really help me right now, though." I tried to keep the bitterness out of my words. I'd told Gran I would come today. I never missed a visit with her.

"Well, you're in luck that my chauffer services are available this afternoon."

"Oh, yeah?" I snorted and turned away from him. "That's okay. I'll figure something else out."

"Why? Where were you planning to go?" The edge in his voice had me turning back around.

"What difference does it make to you?" I put my hands on my hips.

"You have a date or something?"

I snorted. "Maybe."

Why is he asking me this?

His hands clenched at his sides. "Well, he must be a shitty date."

"Why do you say that?"

He took a step toward me. "I would never make my date drive to me." A cruel smile formed on his lips. "And I sure as hell wouldn't let another man help her if she was in a bind." He took another step, putting himself only a foot away. "So, whoever this asshole is, you should cancel and spend the rest of your evening with me, Julia."

I stared up into his stormy blue eyes. They seemed to bore into me and open me up from the inside out. My skin flushed at his nearness and liquid coated my panties.

I opened my mouth to turn him down. I could just say no and head back to my loft, be done with this whole situation and just go see Gran after my car was fixed. But something stopped me.

Why not have him take me? This would show him that he shouldn't go offering his services if he doesn't want someone to take him up on the offer.

"Okay."

He quirked an eyebrow. "So you're canceling your date?"

"Nope." I stepped around him. "You're just lucky enough to come along."

An hour and half later I slammed the truck door shut in front of Gran's little house.

"So, this is it?" Cole came to stand beside me. "You grew up here?"

"No. Did you see the big horse ranch coming into town?"

"The one with the circle C on the gate?"

"That's where I grew up."

"Nice."

We approached the red front door. "You don't have to come in you know." We hadn't left until I explained that I didn't actually have a date, at least not with a man. He'd refused to take me to meet any guy, but once he heard I was going to see Gran he had been more than happy to escort me.

"I know."

I knocked a couple of times before pushing my way inside.

"Gran?"

"Ms. Collette?" Lara, Gran's middle-aged live-in nurse, came around the corner.

"Hi, Lara. Is Gran doing okay?"

The older woman smiled. "Oh, yes honey. She's having one of her good days today." She glanced up at Cole. "Oh, you've brought a friend?" She sounded surprised, which made sense since I'd never brought anyone with me.

"My car broke down and Cole gave me a ride. Cole, this is Lara." They shook hands and Lara's cheeks turned a bright shade of pink. Even Lara is affected by him?

"I'll just step out for a bit while you're here." She hurried past us.

"Okay, see ya."

I moved down the hall, painfully aware of Cole's presence only feet behind me. It felt like his eyes were roaming all over my backside, caressing every inch of me. Part of me wanted to turn around and throw myself at him. Just say fuck it and do what my body demanded. The whole ride over had been torturous with his rock hard physique only feet away. I wanted to lick every inch of him. Tear his pants off and climb onto his cock.

The sound of cheering inside the next room squashed that idea. I pushed the door open revealing Gran's hospital bed. She was sitting up, her small form hunched over a bit, with Oxygen plugged into her nose. A cigarette dangled out of the corner of her mouth.

"Beat his ass, Red!" She yelled at the flat screen TV, where Jerry Springer was on.

"Hey, Gran."

"Come on, he cheated on your sister-cousin! He deserves it!"

"Gran!"

"Well, hey there, baby girl." Gran finally noticed me. Her light blue gaze met mine. She pulled the cigarette out of her mouth with a shaking hand and flicked her ash in a tray next to the bed. "I didn't know you were coming today."

"Yes, you did, Gran. I called you earlier in the week, remember?"

"Oh, that's right."

I leaned in and hugged her, pressing my nose against her short white hair. Her flowery fragrance mixed with cigarette smoke enveloped me, comforting me like it always did.

"Well, hot damn, who's this?"

I had momentarily forgotten about Cole. A streak of embarrassment enveloped me.

What does he think about Gran? About where I'm from? I wanted to slap myself again. Who cares what he thinks? He's a fuckin' stripper just like you.

"I'm Cole, ma'am."

I turned to see him holding out his hand. Gran stared at it for a moment before shaking it.

"I didn't know you had a boyfriend, Julia," she said once I had sat down in a lounge chair on the other side of her bed. Cole followed suit and sat on a couch by the door.

"Oh, Gran, I don't. Cole is just a friend. We work together."

"Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!" the TV shouted before going to commercial.

Gran stuck her cigarette between her lips.

"But you've slept together," she said through the side of her mouth.

"Gran!" I admonished. Heat crept into my cheeks. I risked a glance at Cole. Okay, so this was a horrible idea.

A smile tugged at his lips, as if he was holding back laughter.

Is he enjoying this?

"We haven't," I said.

"You're a bad liar, Julia. You always have been." She rearranged the front of her nightgown with shaking hands.

"Oh, Gran stop it."

"I'm right, ain't I?" She directed her question to Cole.

I expected him to be mad or to lash out. After all, I had seen him beat the shit out of three different men at once just for saying something he didn't like. He didn't though. Instead, he burst into laughter.

I took the opportunity to change the subject. "Anyway, Gran, how are you feeling?"

"Don't try to change the subject, Julia."

I crossed my arms. "That's none of your business, Gran. You know how I feel about you pry—"

"Oh, shut it, Julia. I thought you didn't date other strippers? Breaking your own rules now, huh?" Gran's cigarette dangled from her lips, the ash over half an inch long.

"Your Gran knows you're a stripper?"

I met Cole's shocked expression.

"Do I know that she's a stripper?" Gran guffawed and grabbed her glasses off the table. Once placing them on her nose, she turned back to Cole. "You think this girl could keep anything from her ol' Gran?" She grinned.

"Well, I—"

"She tried to keep it from me." Gran cut Cole off. "She tried to keep from tellin' me that piece of shit father of hers had kicked her out too, but I took one look at her and knew what had happened. I could see it in her eyes. The pain. I know that look well. The look of losing everything."

"Gran, seriously?" I stood up. Gran was a little kooky sometimes, but I hadn't expected her to give an outline of the shitty things that had happened in my life.

"What?" She turned back toward me. "You mean, you haven't told your boyfriend about your dear ol' dad? What about Kevin? Did you tell him about him?"

"Stop." A wave of panic traced through me. Kevin was the last person I wanted to talk about. I took a deep breath. "And Cole's not my boyfriend, Gran." I walked over and pulled the cigarette out of her mouth and stubbed it out in the ashtray. "You know they say you shouldn't smoke with your oxygen tank."

"He wants to be." Gran stared at Cole. I glanced at him. He wore a slightly confused expression.

"Gran, stop it. Seriously? What's with you today?" I tried to keep the aggravation out of my voice.

"You've had it rough, though, haven't you?" Gran said to Cole.

His expression hardened.

"Please welcome Katrina to the stage. Her boyfriend has a spicy secret he wants to tell her today!" The TV show was back from commercial.

Gran spoke louder. "You just want someone to love you without destroying themselves in the process. A real love that isn't splattered with memory of her blood."

Cole stood and pushed his way out of the room, but not before I saw it. Pain etched into his features, twisting his handsome face. The door slammed behind him.

"Gran—"

"You can give him that, honey." Her clear blue eyes, made larger with her thick glasses, stared up at me, beseeching me to understand. Gran said weird things all the time, she always seemed to know things without being told, but she'd never done anything like this before.

"What the fuck?" I stared at the door in disbelief that the last few minutes had happened.

"Huh?" Her gaze was already fixated on her show, forgetting I was even there.

"Why did you say that stuff?"

"What stuff?" She adjusted the clear plastic tubes running into her nose and lit another cigarette.

"Those things about Cole."

"Cole? Who's Cole, baby girl?"

Eight.

"Are you all right?" I climbed back into the truck about forty-five minutes later. Cole didn't say anything. Didn't even look at me. "Look, I'm sorry. I don't know what came over Gran. Her dementia has gotten increasingly worse over the years, and sometimes she spouts off like she knows everything, when she doesn't really know shit."

"You don't believe that."

"What?"

He put the truck in reverse and backed out of the driveway. "You don't believe it's all shit."

"What makes you say that?" I frowned, though he was absolutely right. Gran was a woman who went with her gut feeling. She called things how she saw them. She never lied, or said things just because she felt like it. Even the dementia hadn't taken that away from her. If anything it only made her more perceptive. I didn't want him to know that though.

"Because she was right about everything else." He ran a hand down his jaw.

"Oh, come on, Cole. You're a good looking guy. She just guessed about the sex. I don't bring guys with me when I visit her."

"So, why did you take me?"

"I didn't really have a choice, did I?" I folded my legs up into the seat.

"You could have asked me to wait in the car, but you didn't. You gave me the option of coming in to meet her."

"Would you have listened and waited if I asked you to?"

"Obviously." His hands had the wheel in a death grip again.

"Do you always do that?" I asked, annoyed.

"What?"

"Grip the wheel like it's a lifeline."

He relaxed his hands. A phone started ringing and Cole dug in his coat, extracting a white phone. The name Patricia lit up the screen.

"Hello?" He paused and I could barely hear Patricia's nasally voice on the other side.

Why the hell is she calling him?

"All right, I'll come by and sign them later. Thanks." He hung up.

"Why was Patricia calling you?" Jealously ate away at my skin as I spoke. I hated the way it felt, like a sickness ravaging me.

He gave me a half-smile. "I have to go in and sign the resignation contract."

"Resignation contract?"

"It's something I had drawn up since I broke the contract I signed with them. Just legal stuff. Nothing big."

I had completely forgotten that he had quit working at Rapture. "Why did you quit?"

He kept his eyes on the road. "This life just isn't for me."

"Life as a stripper?" I couldn't help but feel like his words were a direct shot at me. As far as I knew, everything he had done at the club had directly involved me.

"Yes."

"Huh." I turned away from him and stared out the window. The sky had darkened significantly while I was in Gran's. Blue-black clouds covered the sun and looked on the verge of rain.

"You ever thought about doing something else?" His question surprised me, but I didn't turn around.

"Nope." I wouldn't give him the satisfaction of admitting that I didn't want to shake my ass for money. He'd given off hints that he hated the profession and looked down on me for it. It made no sense before, but now it did. This wasn't what he wanted to do. He'd had to dance with me once, the other time he got to fuck me and yet the money still wasn't enough. There was no other job in the world he could get that would pay the kind of money we were making without having some sort of diploma and even then it was pushing it.

"You've never wanted to be anything more than just a piece of ass?"

"Excuse me?" I whirled around.

"Hey, now. Don't get mad. I'm just asking."

"Just because you don't think stripping is honorable, it didn't stop you from doing it, did it? It didn't stop you from fucking me on that table in front of hundreds of people, did it?"

A muscle ticked in his jaw and he cut his eyes at me. "No, it didn't." He sounded almost ashamed.

"But you wish you hadn't done those things, don't you?" My voice cracked on the last word, even though I tried not to let my emotions show.

What is with me? Why do I even care?

"I didn't say that." The words came out rough.

"You didn't have to." I turned away and pulled my knees to my chest.

Am I that bad? Even the people paid to fuck me can't wait to get away from me. Story of my life.

We passed most of the ride in tense silence until finally, I couldn't take it anymore.

"I wanted to be an English teacher, I'd started going to college to be one." I'd had so many dreams before my dad and Kevin had squashed them all.

"Why didn't you?"

I thought about his question for several minutes while staring at the ever-darkening sky. The dark blue faded into an almost black hue. I considered lying to him, telling him that I still planned to go, or that I had just turned to stripping because I thought it was easier.

He's leaving, what difference does it make if he knows the truth?

"I figured out that I'm only good at one thing."

"What do you—"

"I take that back, two things. I'm good at two things." I paused. "Stripping and fucking."

He laughed, but it wasn't like when he laughed in Gran's house. This was a sad laugh. "That's sad, Julia. What made you ever buy into that bullshit?"

I shrugged. "It isn't bullshit. It's reality."

"You don't believe that," he said angrily.

I snapped my head around. "What's it to you anyway? It's not like you can say much. You're more than ten years older than me and you're still a stripper."

He was silent again, back to gripping the wheel.

"What? You have nothing to say? It's okay for you to put me down, but that's it. When it comes to you, discussion is off the table? Or is it just that I am woman?" The thought slammed into me. "That's it, isn't it? It's okay for a man to shake his dick in unknown chicks' faces, but when it comes to a woman she's just shit on the street for doing it?" Anger clotted in my veins.

Why am I here? Why do I even care what he thinks?

I couldn't answer that question. He took a deep breath and put on his blinker to exit.

"Where are we going?"

"To eat."

I didn't say anything as he pulled up to the old diner right off the highway. I was hungry and mad, which made me ravenous for food. I didn't want to eat with him, but I didn't want to wait the thirty more minutes it would take to get back to my loft either.

"An animal trainer for a circus," Cole said as we slid into the worn booth inside.

"Huh?"

"That's what I wanted to be."

A burst of unflattering laugher escaped my lips, but his face remained serious. "You're not kidding?"

"No." He opened his menu.

I studied him. The anger that had been burning like a hot flame dimmed slightly as I watched him. "You like animals then?"

He nodded.

"Do you have any pets?" After I asked him, the ridiculousness of it caught up to me. Here I was sitting in a diner with a man I'd fucked. A man who had fucked my face with his long hard cock and yet I didn't know the simplest things about him.

"No. Just a fish tank. That's all."

"You wanted to be an animal trainer, but you don't own any trainable pets?"

"I like wild animals. Not domesticated ones." His eyes bore into mine as he spoke, sending a shiver down my spine. He leaned in, laying down his menu. "I like exotic, willful creatures."

His gaze roamed over my face. My lips parted feeling it like a physical caress.

"You like to break them?" The words were a whisper, slithering between my lips on their own accord.

"No."

"No?" That wasn't what I expected.

"I don't have to break something to make it mine."

A spasm of pleasure twisted my insides, flooding my panties with liquid heat. I leaned in, desperate to be closer to him. "What do you have to do then?"

"Y'all ready to order?" The loud southern accented voice broke the spell that had me clinging to the table, desperate to hear what Cole would say next. I jerked, slamming into the back of the worn leather booth.

A tight smile covered Cole's lips. "I know what I want, but I'm not sure about the lady."

I glanced down at my untouched menu.

"A burger. A cheeseburger and a water," I muttered and pushed my menu to the edge of the table.

I watched Cole order. He smiled at the young waitress and handed her our menus. His hand briefly brushed against hers. A spike of jealousy stabbed me in the back. What the fuck? I hated this. I hated feeling this way.

I looked away quickly, not liking where my thoughts were going. Droplets of rain had started to splatter against the window. The sky was even darker now, the storm finally here. The speed of them picked up before my eyes, rushing down from the sky and pouring onto the little diner with a soft thrumming sound. The truck and highway blurred from the obscurity of water. Everything was distorted.

"You okay?" Cole's deep voice was like a balm to my ears. One I wanted to snatch up and rub all over my body. The image of his cock squirting cum onto my chest flashed into my mind.

I cleared my throat. "Why didn't you become an animal trainer?"

"Well, you see, Julia. I found out that I'm only good at two things in life." He smiled and this time it reached his eyes.

Is he teasing me?

Full-on laughter shook my insides. I couldn't help it. The conflicting emotions inside me seemed to overflow until I was nothing but a wet mess.

"Things don't always work out like you plan for them to," he said after my laughter died down. I recognized this too was a repeat of what I'd said to him the day before.

"You can say that again."

Cole glanced out the window and ran a hand over his head. The tattoo of his sister stared back at me, with dark alluring eyes. Memory of what Gran said jumped into my mind for the first time since I got back in the truck.

"What did Gran mean when she talked about the blood?" I shouldn't have brought it up. I shouldn't have said a damn thing about it. Everything with me and Cole was so tense as it was, and for reasons I wasn't even sure of.

On cue his face darkened. "I thought you didn't buy into the things your gran said."

"You're avoiding the question." I noticed he did this more often than not. I would ask him something and he would redirect with something else. Not this time. I didn't feel afraid of him, or this image of splattered blood that Gran brought up. I should be afraid. But I wasn't in the least. Something inside of me knew he wouldn't hurt me.

"Who's Kevin?" The mention of my ex's name sent a rush of cold over my body and the memory of the white paper envelope. I'd forgotten about it too. My gran had given it to me as an afterthought just before I left.

"That piece of shit you used to date stopped by last week and wanted me to give this to you," she'd said when she handed it to me.

My name was scratched on the outside of the envelope in the uneven scrawl I knew so well. I hated Kevin. I hated him more than anything in this world, but I couldn't deny the thrill of excitement as my hands fluttered against the white envelope when she handed it to me. Kevin was bad for me. The worst anyone could be. He'd hurt me repeatedly, endlessly. I'd hurt him back, and he was still hurting me years after the fact. And sometimes I missed him for a moment, before all of the horrible truths of the past came rushing back to remind me why I finally left.

"That's none of your business," I said.

The waitress came and brought our food, though I was no longer hungry.

"Did he hurt you?" The absurdity of the question had me glancing up, meeting Cole's angry blue eyes.

"Again, none of your business."

"What did he do to you?" Images of the past jumped into my mind. Horrific stills of the times that ruined me.

The urge to vomit climbed up my throat. I jumped up from the table and rushed out the front door. The tinkling of the bell did nothing to calm the turmoil raging inside my body. The rain was pouring down and instantly I was soaked from head to toe. It was surprisingly warm for the time of year and I welcomed it, hoping it would wash it all away. I'd pushed the memories out of my mind a long time ago. I hadn't spoken Kevin's name out loud in more than a year, yet all at once he was trying to reappear in my life. Not to mention whatever I was starting to feel for Cole.

"Julia." Cole's voice came from behind me, but I ignored it and headed around the restaurant. "You can't just walk away from me!"

I stopped and spun around. "Yes, I can. I can do whatever I want." I went to walk past him and head back for the truck.

He grabbed my arm. "Why are you acting like this?"

"I already told you, it's none of your fucking business." I jerked my arm. He didn't let go. His fingers bit into my skin as he tightened his grip. He yanked me behind the restaurant and pressed me against the molded brick building.

I glanced around in panic taking in the dumpster no more than ten feet away and discarded, wet boxes. A field stretched out, beyond the building, wide open and empty.

"You don't get to play that card with me, Julia." His face was only inches away from mine. His wet hair stuck to the sides of his face.

"What's it to you, anyway?"

"Did. He. Hurt. You?" He pressed me harder against the wall.

"Fuck off." I tried to kick him, but he wouldn't let me go.

"Answer me!" he roared.

"Yes." Tears gathered in my eyes.

"Then I will hurt him." Cole mashed his lips against mine. I gasped as the rain pounded down on us. I wanted to push him away. I wanted to tell him that he was an asshole. I wanted to hate him for making me feel. But I didn't do any of those things. Instead I kissed him back. Our first kiss.

His hands gripped my shoulders painfully, I dug my fingers in his thick hair and opened up to him, letting his hot tongue twine with mine. He lapped against me with expert strokes that made my pussy throb. More. I need more! He thrust his rock-hard cock against me, stabbing my belly. I wanted it. I yearned for him. All of him. All of that stiff dick deep inside me. I was suddenly desperate for it. I tore at his shirt with my hands, wanting it off. It didn't rip like I hoped, so I fumbled with the button on his pants until his cock was free.

"Fuck, Julia," he snarled against my lips, released my arms from his death grip, and yanked down my soaked yoga pants. In a quick movement he spun me around and yanked my hips up. My hands slid against the slimy bricks just as he slammed into my aching pussy. Moaning, I fumbled against the wall for a better grip.

Cole buried his hand in my hair and pulled me up until his lips were against my ear. The heat of his breath came in time with his thrusts as he impaled me over and over on his rigid length.

"Do you know how many times I've thought of doing this to you?" he growled. "Do you know how many times I've thought of bending you over and fucking this pussy on my own terms?"

"Ohhh." I arched my back to take more of him, the orgasm already building.

"You want more?" He slowed his pace.

I thrust back against him, but he didn't speed up.

"Tell me what you want, Julia."

If I had been on the outside looking in at this god-like man bending over a blue-haired woman in the pounding rain against the back of an old diner, I probably would have thought it was crazy. Too impulsive, even for me. But I wasn't. I was that blue-haired woman getting the shit pounded out of her.

"I want you to fuck me until there's nothing left of me. Like it's the last time you'll ever fuck anyone."

A sinister sound tore from his chest. His cock pulsed inside of me and he slammed into me again, nearly knocking the breath from my lungs. I reached back and wound my arms around his head. The stubble on his face scratched roughly against my cheek.

The pleasure built in my core, growing with each thrust. I dug my nails into his scalp, afraid if I didn't that I would float away or he would.

"Who do you belong to?" I teetered on the edge of bliss when he spoke the words. "Say it."

"What?" I gasped.

"Who owns you. Say. It." His words were rough like gravel.

"You!" I shouted as carnal ecstasy ripped a path through me, destroying everything that I knew to be real and replacing it all with an unbearable pleasure.

He shuddered behind me, his cock spasming in my pussy. "Fuck, Julia." The hot liquid filled me up prolonging the pleasure.

"Hey! What the fuck is going on out here?" The southern-accented voice jerked me out of the place where only Cole and I existed. My shirt clung to me like a second skin and my pants were muddy and down around my ankles. I locked gazes with the waitress from inside the diner. She looked shocked and mad with her nose scrunched up. She didn't look so pretty anymore.

I should have been embarrassed or ashamed that I had just fucked a man behind a building next to a dumpster. But I wasn't. I stared back at that woman and smiled.

Nine.

The incessant chime of a cell phone brought me out of my coma-like sleep. I blinked heavily. My eyes met the smooth white surface of the ceiling above me and for a moment, panic seized my heart. Where am I? That was until the bed shifted next to me. I glanced over to be met with the sight of Cole's smooth muscular back. The last two days came back to me in a rush.

After leaving the diner, something inside of me had changed. It was like a dam had finally given way and the waters of desperation had rushed through me, filling my body, washing me away until I was nothing but a slave to it. The ride home had been quiet. I wanted to say a million things to him, but to comment on the sex, to acknowledge what had just happened between us would have somehow made it cheap.

I knew I didn't want to go home though. I didn't want to go back to my apartment, not if Cole wasn't coming in with me. I needed to do that again. I longed for him to fuck me. My life had been empty for a long time, even when Vic was home, I just hadn't realized it. I had been missing something. It wasn't necessarily sex. It was fucking that I'd missed. I'd missed being taken by a man who knew what he was doing, a man who was totally and completely absorbed in the act of filling my body with his for no other reason. I needed to be behind a closed door fucking a man who wanted me for me, not because someone was paying him money to do so.

I didn't even have to tell Cole this. He exited off the highway once we got into downtown Dallas and pulled into the Regency Crescent Hotel, the nicest hotel in the city. We didn't even make it up to the room before his hands were up my shirt and my fingers down his pants. I almost felt sorry for the elderly couple who caught us on the elevator with our tongues lodged in each other's throats.

Almost.

Once we were behind the closed door of the penthouse suite, I got my wish. Cole fucked me against the front door first, then on the coffee table, and on the kitchen counter. He'd taken me against the massive wall-to-ceiling windows that overlooked the city. He fucked me in all of these places before we finally made it into bed where we did it again. He'd cum all over me. As if he was desperate to cover every inch of me with his seed. To mark me and make me only his.

And that was only the first night.

I'd been here two days now and hadn't worn a stitch of clothing since the moment Cole had ripped them from my body upon entering the penthouse. We'd done nothing but sleep, eat, and fuck.

"Yes." His deep voice cut through the air of the room like a knife when he pressed the phone to his ear. The gruff tone made moisture pool in between my sore thighs.

"I'm busy. I'll get back with you." He paused. "I said, I will get back with you."

The anger in his voice confused me. Who could it be? He hadn't spent much time on the phone, though it had gone off a bunch of times the first night we got here. He had turned it on silent after a while and I quickly forgot about it. Not a hard thing to do when Cole's thick cock was in my mouth or my cunt.

He jerked the phone away from his ear and slammed it down on the dark-wood nightstand.

"Who was that?" A woman? I hadn't considered the possibility that he could have a girlfriend or a wife. A wife? The thought nearly made me dry heave. He couldn't, right? I didn't know where Cole and I stood. I didn't know if I even wanted to be standing anywhere with him, but I did know that I didn't want to share him with anyone else. If there was anything the last three days had taught me, it was that. I didn't want to acknowledge it, but I knew it was too late to ignore it. Cole was mine. I wouldn't share him.

"No one." He turned around, his thick muscles rippling in the morning sun that pilfered through the windows. His facial hair was longer and even more unkempt, but it only made him look more devilishly handsome.

"It sounded like someone." I sat up in bed.

"Oh, did it?" He crawled across the big bed until he was crouched in front of me. His greedy gaze roamed over my exposed skin. My pussy throbbed in response.

"It did...a woman?" I didn't know why the thought never crossed my mind.

Because you didn't care if he was with someone else before.

The idea of caring for him was like ripping a Band-Aid off an open wound. It was caring for someone that got people hurt. I knew that well enough.

"Why? Are you talking to other men?" He leaned in, his gaze searching mine with rage. His tattooed arms bulged under his weight and his cock was hard as rock, long and thick protruding between his thighs.

I bit down on my lip. "If I was?"

A rumble escaped his chest. His body tightened as if he was going to spring toward me like a lion pouncing on his prey. He didn't though, instead he looked away, his jaw ticking and his teeth clamping together with an audible clack.

I got up on my knees and wrapped my hand around his cock. "You like the idea of me with another man?"

Cole's gaze swung back to meet mine just before he pressed me back on the bed. His dick pushed hard against my belly.

"You're mine, Julia." His face was only inches away from my own. His words shocked me, excited me, and finally left me feeling lost.

"You're moving back to New York." I hoped the words sounded flat and not full of the emotion that was suddenly rampant through me.

"I am." He pressed his lips roughly against my bruised ones. We'd kissed as much as we'd fucked over the last two days. He seemed to relish taking my mouth with his while I took his cock into my pussy.

He buried his hands in my hair and thrust his cock against my stomach. I moaned into his mouth and clutched at his brawny ass. He trailed his lips down my chin.

"Do you have any idea how fucking sexy you are?" A shiver of pleasure trembled down my spine. He bit down on the exposed flesh of my neck. The pain triggered a burst of pleasure deep inside my core, pressing me close to the edge of an orgasm.

His lips made a burning path down my body before fastening over my bare cunt. The flick of his stiff tongue against my throbbing clit had me thrashing my head back and forth. I tried to buck into his mouth, but his hands splayed across my hips holding me captive. He ran his tongue over me again, slowly.

"More, Cole, more!" I squirmed.

He growled against me, vibrating my clit and sending sparks of ecstasy shooting through my body. I met his dark blue gaze. There seemed to be a million messages emanating from those pupils. I could have stayed there, staring into them forever, trying to decipher the cryptic message they conveyed, but he slipped a single digit into my pussy, swirling it around inside my tightness. Oh, yes! He flicked the tip against my g-spot. I tipped my head back and drew my knees up. He did it again and my orgasm bubbled, threatening to boil over with another stiff flick of his tongue or fingertips.

But he pulled out of my pussy and lapped at my clit with soft strokes.

"Please, Cole," I panted.

His damp fingers dipped lower until they were at the tight entrance of my ass. I clenched my cheeks. I moved to prop myself up on one elbow when he swirled his finger around the entrance. A shock of utter bliss skittered through my body.

"Ohhh!" I moaned when he pressed his finger into my tight hole.

The orgasm shattered across my skin and ripped me apart from the inside out. I undulated my hips and thrashed my head back and forth. Cole sucked on my clit prolonging the utter bliss until I was so sensitive I couldn't take it anymore. I pushed at his head and he released me, crawling up my body. He wrapped his arms around my shoulders and pulled me into his chest. I snaked my hand down to grab his hard cock.

His hand closed around mine. "No. I just want to hold you."

I sucked in a deep breath and glanced up at him. His eyes were closed, his handsome face utterly relaxed. We hadn't done this either of the two nights. I'd fallen asleep out of utter exhaustion.

I bit down on my lip and curled into him, my body fitting against his like we were made for each other. A few weeks ago I had felt utterly alone...and now? I didn't know what I felt.

"Tell me something about you." The words were out of my mouth before I could think about them.

"Hmm?"

"Tell me something about you that I don't know."

Which could be anything since I know practically nothing.

"She killed herself."

"Who?"

"My sister." He held up his arm. The sad face of the beautiful woman stared back at me.

"Cole, I—"

"Don't say you're sorry. No one can be more sorry than I am."

I rolled over and propped myself up on my elbows. "How old was she?"

"Too young."

I studied his face and glanced at the tattoo again. Her face was drawn with smooth sweeping lines of black ink. Her long hair was dark and fluttered around her like it was blowing in a wind that only existed in his flesh.

"I'm sorry." I said it anyway because I meant it...and I didn't know what else to say. "Why did you tell me?"

"What?"

"You wouldn't tell me before...why did you tell me now?"

He shrugged his shoulders and sat up.

Before he could get up I grabbed his bicep. "What are you going to do when you go back to New York, Cole? Will you become an animal trainer?"

For some reason I needed him to tell me that he would. That he was going to go back and follow his dream. I didn't know this man at all, but I didn't want him to go. The realization hit me in the gut like a sledgehammer.

He smiled sadly. "I don't think so, Julia."

I cocked my head to the side. "What will you do, then?" I wanted to shout "stay with me!" but I didn't.

"Look Julia, I—"

Ding ding ding ding ding.

The sound of Cole's phone killed the words in his mouth. He jumped up.

"Shit. I need to take this." He snatched it up and walked out of the room without giving me a second glance.

What just happened? The expression on his face was so sad before his phone went off.

I planned to stay in bed, but hunger clawed at my gut. I'd eaten the night before, but that was before Cole and I had gone to bed for the final time and hours before we actually went to sleep.

I climbed out of bed and padded into the living room. The sleek butter-colored furniture on dark marble met my gaze. The huge room was open with a bar separating the living room from the large kitchen. A dining room jutted off to one side and three other bedrooms as well. My uptown loft was nice, but it was nothing compared to this luxury. Cole had to be paying a fortune to stay here.

Where is Cole?

I glanced around as I made my way to the kitchen, but he was nowhere in sight. I frowned. He must've gone into one of the bedrooms. I shrugged.

I stumbled over something and caught myself on the counter managing to keep myself from slamming into the side of the refrigerator.

"What the fuck?" Pain ricocheted through my foot. I hobbled on one leg and glanced down to see an open laptop on the floor along with a mess of paperwork. Tentatively I put my foot back on floor and grabbed the laptop and paperwork and set them back on the counter. The image of Cole raking everything off the shimmery opaque surface before throwing my naked body on it, jumped to my mind.

"Well, shit. I hope he didn't break it." I ran my hand over the mouse pad. The screen leapt to life, clearly still in working condition. I turned to the fridge only to jerk back to the illuminated screen. Julia Collette was written under one of the files on the desktop.

Why the hell does he have my name on his computer?

I frowned and clicked on the folder. A hundred tiny little windows popped up on the screen. Some were documents, but most were photographs...photographs of me. I clicked on the first one.

I was walking down the street in the middle of the day wearing my favorite blue jean shorts and a tank top with my aviator sunglasses on my head. I frowned. This was taken during the summer. I hadn't worn those shorts in at least five or six months.

What is this?

A click brought me to the next picture. I was in the mall with Vic and Chris eating at the food court. Another click. I gasped at the sight of me down on my knees with Vic's cock stuffed into my mouth. Blue paint coated my body. I covered my mouth. The last Rapture X party Vic and I did together. Click. My body suspended in the air hanging from a vine hung in the ceiling with Vic pounding into me from behind. Click. Vic shooting his load into my mouth.

I continued clicking in disbelief as more moments of my life flew across the screen. There were moments I was certain dated to over a year ago, and pictures from mere weeks ago. Pictures of me hugging Vic and Chris goodbye at the airport. Fear slammed into me. I glanced around in panic. Cole was nowhere in sight.

I dashed back to his room in frantic search of my clothes. I had to get the fuck out of here. Now. Before he came back and realized what I saw. What would he do to me? The thought turned my insides cold, bringing me back to a place I never thought I would be again.

I shoved my legs into my wrinkled yoga pants without my underwear. My frantic search for my shirt turned up nothing, so I yanked a shirt off the top of Cole's suitcase. Luckily, I knew my phone and purse were by the front door, along with my shoes. I made a break for them, skidding across the expensive marble. It was only when I got the door that I eased it open and closed it behind me soundlessly. I mashed the button on the elevator a hundred times, but it still didn't come any faster. With shaking hands I glanced left and spotted a stairwell sign. I made a break for it. Luckily the penthouse was only four floors up.

I dialed a taxi service in my rapid descent. I made it to the bottom floor, breathless and more scared than before. Luckily my cab was already waiting on me, and I climbed in. Part of me expected him to come running out after me, telling me it wasn't true. That he could somehow prove the images I'd seen on his computer weren't real, but he didn't...and in spite of everything, that's what disappointed me the most.

Ten.

I don't want to do this.

I stood in front of the shoddy old mirror in my motel room, staring at myself in the new t-shirt I'd bought at Wal-Mart that said nerd across the chest and my yoga pants. I had a work meeting today that was mandatory. I'd been staying at a motel for the last day since I left the luxurious penthouse and the crazy man inside it. I didn't go back home...no, he knew where I lived.

It all made sense now. Cole had come to my apartment that first night without being told where I lived...he knew my name, my real name. He didn't call me Jewel, like everyone else at the club. He knew me, everything about me. Shit, he probably knew more than I did.

But why?

I stepped away from the mirror, grabbing my purse. I didn't have an answer for that question. He had called a million times and left as many messages in the last twenty-four hours. I hadn't answered or listened to them. I couldn't do it. Call me weak, but I didn't want to hear his voice. I couldn't listen to his lies. There was nothing he could say that would change the fact that he had been stalking me for the last year or more. He had been there next to me in so many instances and I hadn't known.

How did I not know?

I was stupid. Dumber than any person on the planet apparently.

Knowing nothing about him, I let him barrel into my life, into my heart. The damn organ ached in my chest. It pumped me full of the poison I'd let him infect me with. It ran through my veins ravaging me, destroying me from the inside out. It was my fault. I was the careless one. The one who made all the mistakes. He had avoided my questions at every turn. I knew nothing about him and I let my ignorance control me.

Stupid.

I hadn't called the police. I probably should have, but I didn't. The only phone call I'd made had been to Mrs. Bugsby about checking on Weasley, my cat. I didn't know what I wanted to do. If I was honest with myself, I knew that staying in the motel didn't really keep Cole from me. If he had been following me for the last year then I was certain he could have found me here. There was a slight comfort in knowing that there was a possibility that he couldn't. That because he was on the phone he didn't know where I'd gone. He hadn't shown up yet and I counted that as a win.

Calling the police would be the most intelligent thing to do, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it. I'd held my cell phone in my hand about hundred times to do just that, but found myself putting it down and cursing. Cole deserved to be in jail, but I couldn't do it. I just wanted to stay in that crusty motel room. I wanted to curl back up under the low-thread count sheets and cry for the rest of my life.

I stared longingly at the bed. I could miss this meeting. I'm sure it isn't really that important. But Patricia's annoying voice came back to me. "There's no way you are getting out of this. Jimmy said it is the most important meeting we've ever had. If you miss it you're out of a job."

Fucking fantastic.

Just what I wanted to hear. I had to return to reality at some point, but I didn't want to actually face it. Not yet. I was going to though, and I shut the squeaky door loudly as I walked out into the cold of midday. I could face the day. I had to, and besides, Cole wouldn't be there.

An hour later I sat in the large conference room at Rapture with the rest of my coworkers. I'd been nervous, but once I was there sitting amongst everyone familiar, I felt better. Patricia hadn't been kidding when she said this meeting was important. It wasn't just the dancers there. Everyone was present, from Jimmy to the daytime janitor, totaling what had to be over a hundred people.

"You sure you're okay, honey?" Cinna sat next to me, her flaming red hair curling around her face.

"I'm fine." I smiled at her. This was only the third time she'd asked me that question. "What's this meeting about?"

She shrugged. "Who knows. Ever since we got the new owner, everything has been turned on its head. I mean, who shuts down a club like this with no notice? That is just crazy. They have to be losing boo-koos of money and..."

I tuned her out. I honestly didn't give a shit about any of it. The image of Cole after he had licked my cunt 'til I came hovered in my mind like a distant dream. Had it only been yesterday that I was wrapped in his arms, wanting him to hold me forever?

"All right, everyone, shut the fuck up and listen." Jimmy's voice brought the room to silence. He stood at the front wearing the usual fedora on his bald head. His gut hung over his black pants and his Affliction shirt was too tight. "Now, I know you're all wondering why you're here. It's a really fucking good question." He rapped his rings against the desk he leaned against. "I don't have the answer, though. Luckily there's someone here who does."

The door at the back of the room opened quietly. I turned along with everyone else to gaze at the person walking through it.

It was Cole. I flinched at the sight of him. I wanted to drag my eyes away, to be disgusted with him, but I wasn't. I drank him in like he was the last glass of water in the middle of the desert. He wore a black pin-stripe suit with a white shirt and black tie. His hair was tied back, revealing his chiseled cheek bones. What is he doing here? Is he planning on staying? I almost laughed at how absurd the question was. He had probably never planned to leave. Is he even from New York? A spike of alarm hit me in the chest. Did he come here just to pester me? I couldn't talk to him. Not now. Not ever.

I expected him to sit down at the back, or for Jimmy to yell at him for being the asshole who was late. But neither happened.

"Everyone, I would like to introduce the new owner of Rapture: Cole Maddox."

My coworkers gasped in unison and my mouth gaped open as he switched places with Jimmy at the front of the room.

"Hello, everyone. I know most of you I've met at least once, briefly." His eyes met mine for a second before moving on. "You all knew me as the Ripper from the one time I performed on stage." He paused and smiled. "I kept my identity hidden from everyone because I wanted to see the inner workings of the club without being known as the dreaded 'boss'." He did air quotes. He actually did fucking air quotes. "I think I made a very good investment as everything seems to run pretty efficiently. I wanted to have this meeting to officially meet all of you and explain more about the renovations and plans I have for the club as we move forward..." He continued talking, but I ceased listening. If things had been complicated before he walked through the door to the conference room, then they were on a whole other playing field now.

My cheeks heated as embarrassment flooded my insides.

What the fuck is going on?

He couldn't be the owner, that just wasn't possible. Kara had said it was a woman. I sucked in a gulp of air as he continued talking and moving. His perfect lips smiling at everyone.

I can't do this. I can't just sit here and listen to this bullshit. I jumped up. I had to get out of there.

"Julia, please have a seat. The meeting isn't over," Cole said just as I got to the door.

I didn't turn around, not at first. I planned to keep on going right out that door, but two large men in black suits stopped me. I looked up ready to give them both a piece of my mind, but I knew them. Randy and Leon, the front desk guy and the elevator man from my apartment complex, stared down at me. Their faces were impassive. I shuffled back in alarm and banged into the closest chair. Do they work for him?

"Fuck," I muttered under my breath.

"Just sit down please, Miss Collette," Randy said quietly. I wanted to kick him in the balls, but when I looked into his eyes again, they looked sad as if begging for forgiveness. I was about to push past him, but he spoke quietly again. "Mr. Maddox wants to speak with you after the meeting. He will leave you alone after he speaks with you. For good," he added, as if he would personally make sure of it. Someone coughed behind me and I remembered that all of my coworkers were still in the room.

And for some reason, against all my better judgment, I sat down.

Eleven.

I squeezed my fists tightly in my lap as the door to the office opened. I'd been shuffled in immediately after the close of the meeting. Randy and Leon personally escorted me and I figured it was because they were afraid I would try to leave without meeting with...their boss? Strange way to think of Cole. There was no way I was going to try to leave though. I was too mad for that.

I couldn't wait to face Cole especially after the meeting. I sat there for thirty minutes staring at the man I'd taken to bed. The man who'd wormed his way into my life and heart. With each passing second I became more and more pissed.

"Thank you for meeting with me, Julia." Cole came around the desk and unbuttoned his suit jacket before sitting opposite of me in the leather chair.

"Excuse me?"

He gave me a tight smile. "You're angry with me."

I cocked my head as the fury quadrupled. "Who the fuck are you? Why have you been doing this to me?"

"Hey, now. There's no need to yell."

I jumped to my feet. "No need to yell? That's all you're going to say? You've been fucking stalking me!"

His hardened expression faltered for a moment before he hid it. "You don't remember me, do you?"

"What?"

"Of course, I knew you didn't. That was apparent right from the start."

"Wait, what do you mean...remember you?" My voice trembled.

What is he talking about?

"You don't remember the first time we met. Almost two years ago."

"I—we haven't met. Not until a few weeks ago." I took a step back from the desk.

"Yes we have. Two years ago, like I said." He unbuttoned each sleeve of his white shirt and began rolling them up over his tattooed forearms.

"But—"

"It was at the first Rapture X party. When you fucked Victor Marlin for the first time in front of the world. Ring any bells?" He spit the words like poison.

Of course I remembered the first Rapture X show. I had been so nervous that butterflies were eating away at my insides. I'd been dressed as a mermaid with sparkling stones covering every inch of my body.

"I took one look at you, with your blue hair, your jeweled body sparkling, and knew that I had to have you."

I sucked in a breath at the intensity of his dark blue eyes. Heat pooled between my thighs and I hated myself for it. Cole leaned forward on his desk. "I'd received a special invite to the party. I'd just opened my five-thousandth store worldwide."

"Store?"

"Obsidian Spirits."

My mouth dropped open. "The liquor store? The one that makes their own brand of liquor in those volcano glasses?" I covered my mouth with my hand. "You sent me the wine after the Rapture X party." I should have known.

"Yes, I opened the first one when I was twenty-one." He waved his hand. "But that's not the point. I went to Rapture X that night and I saw you. I watched Victor fuck you. I watched him cum all over your pretty breasts." His hands were clenched in fists on top of the desk. "And I decided I wanted you."

I opened my mouth to say something, but no words came out.

"I approached you after." He gave a short laugh. "I stood outside that dressing room for thirty fucking minutes waiting for you to come out. And I wasn't the only one. There were men, women, all of them waiting for you. I was disgusted by all of it. All of these people vying for your attention because they'd seen you fuck." He stood up. "And I hated the fact that I was one of them.

"You finally came out, wearing a soft blue dress. It was so sheer, I could see your pearled nipples through the fabric."

I bit down on my lip and took another step back.

"Running from me, Julia? You haven't even heard the best part yet." A sarcastic smile spread across his face. I thought he would move, but he didn't. He stayed on the other side of the desk. "Everyone wanted your attention. People were shouting your name, but I got to you first." He moved finally and came to stand in front of me. "All I could think about was taking you home and showing you how a real man could fuck you. Not some sham of sex like you were getting with Victor. I was going to bend you over my bed and give you a real orgasm that you wouldn't have to fake." I gasped as he stepped closer.

How did he know I faked it?

"But you didn't want me." His face hardened. "I offered you the world. I told you I would take wherever you wanted to go and we could leave right then. I would fly you to Australia, Hawaii, Paris. Anywhere your heart desired. Remember me now?"

My mind frantically went back over that first night...but it still didn't ring a bell. Men offered me ridiculous things like that all the time. Most of them were older men. "No, you couldn't have. I would remember you."

"You laughed in my face and looped arms with him, left me there in the crowd with the rest of the pathetic hopefuls. But you want to know something, Julia?" He leaned closer, only inches away. I tried to step back, but my leg bumped into the side of the chair. "It made me hard."

"What?" My voice was breathless.

"You walked away from me. Left me standing there confused, pissed off, and my cock was hard as a fucking rock."

"I—"

"Women never tell me no." He took a step back and leaned against the edge of his desk. "I left the club and went back to my hotel. I flew back to New York the next day. I wasn't going to do anything about it, but I couldn't get you out of my head. I stayed away for months, but you wouldn't go away. You stayed here in the back of my mind, plaguing me, until I had to see you again. And I did."

"When?"

"I came back to another Rapture X party and I watched you fuck him again." He grated the word. "You left before I could talk to you. But that's when I decided that I was going to do something about it."

"Do something about what?"

"About the incessant need that had been growing inside of me since I laid eyes on you for the first time. I hated myself. Do you understand that? I didn't want to want you. A stripper who fucks for money in front of a crowd of sick rich people." The words were like a slap across my skin and I recoiled. "But there was no helping it. You had trapped me."

I licked my suddenly dry lips. His eyes followed the movement.

"I had my men follow you."

"So, Leon and Randy worked for you all along?"

"Yes. Everyone at your apartment building works for me, because I bought it when I found out you lived there."

"You did what?"

"Yes."

"You bought my apartment building so you could keep tabs on me?"

His face faltered for a moment, no doubt hearing the disgust in my voice. "Yes."

"And you bought Rapture...wait, did you have something to do with Vic and Chris leaving?"

He didn't say anything.

"Oh, my God, you did!" I moved around putting the chair I'd been sitting in between us. "You did all of this...for what?" And that's when it hit me. I don't know how it hadn't come to me sooner, maybe it was because I was still processing the levity of it all. "You own Rapture...so you put yourself on the schedule my first night back."

He nodded tightly. "You asked me the other day if I liked breaking exotic creatures." He paused. "And I told you I didn't have to break something to make it mine."

"Okay?"

"To make something mine, I have to own every part of it." He stood, leaving his relaxed pose. "I owned your home, your work, the only thing left was your body. I strung your body up on that stage and I planned to make you cum without touching you. But your ass...I couldn't keep my hands off it." He growled. "I planned to make you cum for me and then reveal myself and show you that I could own you without you even seeing my face...but my plan fell through because you didn't recognize me. Going to your apartment that night proved it." He laughed bitterly.

"Who does that? What kind of person treats someone like this? I'm a person, not something you can buy."

"I didn't buy your body, Julia. You gave it to me." He waved his hand again. "Either way, I had planned to leave after that. I wanted to prove to you that I was more than just a random man vying for your attention, but since you didn't recognize me, things changed. When I packed my bag to leave I couldn't get you out of my head. The way you responded to me on stage...in your apartment. I knew you would be fantastic, but you exceeded my expectations. You were so responsive under my fingers. Even when I ran that blade down your skin...you shivered with want. I could see it in your eyes, you craved what I could give you.

"So I changed the schedule so I could be the one to fuck you. I hated myself for it. Every minute I hated that I had let myself go so far as to fuck in front of a group of people just because I wanted you. I hated that you made me stoop so low...but I did. It was supposed to be enough, you see." He ran his hand down his face. "But I found that I couldn't stay away after that night when I fucked you on that desk." He reached out to touch me, but I flinched away. He recoiled his hand and made a fist at his side. "I planned to leave, to let Jimmy run the business, but I couldn't. Not after the way you stared up at me in wonder with my blood and cum smeared across your skin. I had made you mine, Julia."

He took two long strides and backed me against the wall. He pressed his hard body against mine. I shuddered and pressed my hands against his chest to push him away, but instead I found myself gliding my fingers up and down the smooth material of his shirt, wishing it were his bare chest instead.

"I thought it would be enough. It had to be enough. But it wasn't." His dark gaze bore into mine. "The thought of you with someone else, the thought of someone penetrating the body I had claimed made me want to murder someone...and that was before I got to know you." He ran his hand down the side of my face. "Our date changed everything."

His words burned through me, weakened me. They made me want to cling to him, to yank his perfect lips against my own.

This man followed you, stalked you, invaded your privacy. He moved your best friend away. He made it so you had no choice but to fuck him and you want to reward him? My conscience punched me in gut. Haven't you learned your lesson from Kevin?

I shoved against Cole's chest, but he didn't move an inch. "Get away from me."

"You don't really mean that."

"Yes, I fucking do!" I shoved again and this time he took one step back, but not far enough where I could get away from him.

"You care about me."

I snorted. "Really? I care about you? I could never care for someone who looks at me as a piece of ass, which is all I have been to you, not to mention the fact that you have been stalking me and fucking with my life without me even knowing about it."

"Sometimes you have to do bad things to get what you want." He said the words so matter of factly I almost believed they were something a sane person would say.

"To get what you want, huh? Well, you got it, didn't you? You got to bend me over and fuck me just like you planned. I fell for your stupid game. I didn't even know I was being played." Hot tears built behind my eyes.

"It wasn't a game, Julia."

"It wasn't? Then what the fuck was it?"

"I got to know you. I found out that you weren't just some—"

"Some what?" I screeched. "Some piece of ass?" I laughed to try to fight the tears back. "That's what I am."

The words were meant more for me than for him. I'd told him so in the car. Stripping and fucking were the only things I was good at. For a moment he'd made me reconsider that about myself, yet he, more than anyone, was the one who believed it.

"You're not, dammit." He slammed his closed fist into the wall next to me. I flinched. "You're different. You're not like them," he growled.

"Is that what you're telling yourself to make you feel better about liking me? Oh, poor Cole likes a woman beneath his fabulous lifestyle. He likes a woman who spreads her legs for a living. A woman who grinds against strangers for money." I enunciated each word. "Well, you don't get to make yourself feel better about it. I am a stripper and I fucked you because I was paid to do it and you liked it. Better yet, you paid me to fuck you. That's worse than me fucking Vic. Vic and I mutually benefitted because we needed the money, but you had to own me. So you paid me fifteen grand to take your cock while everyone watched. You're pathetic."

I expected him to explode. To yell at me and make this easier for me to walk away, because that's what I was going to do. I was going to walk away from him before I started bawling.

He didn't though. Instead he leaned in and put his hands on the wall on either side of my face. "I don't care, Julia. I think you're missing what I'm saying. I don't give a shit about any of that. I would have paid a million dollars to have you on that table, my cock buried deep inside you if it meant I would get to know you the way I have in the last couple of days." He rubbed his nose against mine. "I've never felt like this before. When you left yesterday...I felt so lost." His voice cracked at the end. The sound almost broke me. Almost. "I want to take care of you, Julia. You don't need this job. I can provide for you and your gran. You don't need this life."

"Excuse me? And then I'd be what? Your paid whore?"

"No, that's not what I meant. You're not listening!" He pushed away from me breaking all contact. He squeezed his fists repeatedly.

"I am listening and that's what you're saying. But I'd rather work here than be that any day. I won't be kept by some man because he has control issues!" I huffed and turned away from him. I couldn't look at him anymore. I wanted to scrub my eyes and brain to get his image out of my mind.

I'd almost made it to the door when he spoke.

"I was going to tell you the truth. Yesterday. I had started to when my phone rang and when I got off the phone you were gone and I found the computer open to your file." His voice seemed to tremble, but I still didn't turn around. "Don't you see it?"

"See what?" I whispered.

"I love you, Julia." He was right behind me when he spoke, his warm breath caressing my ear. I shivered. The words targeted my heart. I wanted to turn around to pull him to me. No!

"What?" But I didn't turn around.

"Julia, I—"

"No." I shook my head. "You don't."

"Yes. I—"

"Don't fucking say it again." I lurched for the door, my hand wrapping around the silver knob. It was cold against my trembling fingers. The first tears fell as I swung it open. They were hot against my skin, so different from the cold on my fingers. I walked through the threshold. Each step was easier than the last, carrying me away from him. From Cole.

"Wait, Julia. Don't leave." His voice cracked.

"I quit," I said, and even though I desperately wanted to look back, to turn around and run to him, I didn't.

Epilogue.

It's been four months since I left Cole in his office. I haven't seen him since. I figure he left, that he went back to New York or wherever it is he calls home. Some fancy island off the Caribbean maybe. Even though he isn't around, I know he still watches me.

I'm smarter now and I notice them, the people he pays to keep tabs on me. They're around me all the time. I can feel them, their prying eyes. But they don't bother me like one would think. I take comfort in knowing they're there. That my meager existence still occupies his thoughts and time.

I wonder what he thinks of me now.

Getting paid minimum wage working the night shift at a gas station was far from the luxury life I'd lived. Funny, he thought I couldn't go any lower. Proved ya wrong, huh? Maybe that was why he hadn't been at the door of my new seedy apartment building, demanding to see me.

He hadn't called either. Was it wrong that I'd anticipated that? I thought he'd chase me, to make me see his side. He didn't.

The bell over the door at the gas station chimed and I glanced up, expecting to see a drunken patron. It was two-thirty in the morning, after all. But it wasn't. Cole stood there, his hair loose, stubble on his jaw.

He approached the counter with smooth fluid movements. I should have been mad. I should have been outraged that he would dare show his face anywhere near me, but I wasn't. I drank in his perfection, his lips that I knew so briefly, the dark pools of his eyes...and smiled.

Thanks so much for taking the time to check out Drowning in Rapture. I hope you love Cole and Julia as much as I do! If you liked the book (or even if you didn't!) I would greatly appreciate it if you left your thoughts on Amazon, Goodreads, etc. (And of course email me, and tell me about! I love hearing from fans.)

Look for book number two in the Rapture trilogy, Clinging to Rapture, in Fall 2014.

To learn more about the trilogy or Megan's other books, check out her website.

http://www.MeganDMartin.blogspot.com

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I couldn't have written this book without the love and support of my badass parents, Drew and Paula. I love y'all!

Special thanks to Kenya Wright and Rosa Sophia for being my awesome editors and telling me how it is! And to Najla Qamber for her amazing work on the cover.

Last, but not least, thanks to Jade Eby and Dee Little for being my no nonsense beta readers. I heart y'all!!!

