Chapter 1 – Five and a Half Years Later
CHIARA
FIVE AND A HALF YEARS LATER
“Are you here alone?” a man asks from behind me, his voice crackling in between the exploding music.
I twirl my red straw around in my virgin strawberry daiquiri, crossing one leg over the other. My thigh-high boots tug around my knees as I lift my drink and take a sip, completely ignoring him.
“You look too good to be drinking all by yourself.” His lips are dangerously close to the curve of my ear, and the timbre of his tone is smooth, yet deep. Just what I like in a man. “How about I join you?”
Without waiting for a reply, he takes one of the swivel stools beside me, waving over the bartender and ordering a whiskey neat.
I continue to ignore him, my gaze transfixed on the mirror above the bar ahead. His eyes capture mine through it, and something in me catches on fire—that familiar knotting in my gut, the tensing and throbbing of my core.
My tongue takes a leisurely swipe of my lower lip as I hold his attention, and he doesn’t dare waver.
His hand slides across the bar, all the way to mine, his fingers brushing over the top of it.
“A ring, huh?” he drawls, looking right at the side of my face as he swipes across my glistening six-carat diamond.
“That’s right.” My response is cool, indifference slinking between each word, the complete opposite of the desire swirling within me.
“And where’s this husband of yours?” A crooked smirk captures the corner of his mouth as he faces me.
I can make out the hunger beating within him through the mirror. His fingertips graze the top of my hand, just enough to send tingles shooting down my body. This shouldn’t turn me on as much as it does, yet here we are, and I’m enjoying the fuck out of it.
“He’s off running his businesses.” I don’t dare look right at him. It'd be too much, too intense. “He’s quite the busy man.”
“What kind of husband leaves a pretty thing like yourself all alone? Especially at a place like this?”
It’s then that my eyes flick to meet his, unable to stop from glancing at the face of this quite attractive man. I’m not at all ashamed to admit my gaze wanders down his dark blue button-down, admiring the material showcasing the thick ripples of the muscular form he conceals underneath.
Even in the dim lighting, I can easily make out the hills of his large biceps and his toned shoulders. I try not to stare, but my eyes are suddenly drifting down his chest and to the abs hiding beneath.
Another devilish smirk lines his sinful mouth, and I pull in a deep breath, attempting to quiet the vicious way I want him.
Would he take me bent over this bar for all to see?
A shuddered exhale escapes my heavy lungs. Immediately grasping my drink, I drown in a long, cold sip, needing it after that visual.
His eyes scan over the top of my hot-pink strappy shirt that my tits are nearly spilling out of. When his gaze tiptoes back to my face, I pop a brow, my lips curling with a tiniest of smiles.
“Like what you see?”
“Very much.” His chest expands as he drags a heaving breath, those eyes pinned to mine. “Your husband is a lucky bastard.”
My toes curl within my high heels and my core clenches, wanting what I shouldn’t.
Needing it.
My attention returns to the mirror as I pick up my drink, downing almost the entire thing and practically slamming it back on the counter once I’m done.
“So, what brings you to a place like this?” He throws another question at me.
“You mean a gentleman’s club?” I flash him a grin.
He nods once.
“Well, seeing as I own it . . .” I swivel around to him. “It’d be strange for me not to be here.” I lean into my seat. “I’m here almost every day. Question is, where have you been?”
“I guess fate brought me to the right place at the right time.” He props a hand between my thighs, pulling my chair closer to his.
My breath stills in my chest, warmth permeating my pores while he drags me nearer.
“Lucky you,” I manage, and our connection only intensifies.
His jaw strains as his gaze swings down to admire my lips. “You bet your ass I am.”
He gives my mouth a long, hot stare, and I badly want to show him just what my mouth can do when I’m on my knees.
“So, are you having a good time around all these beautiful women?” My fingers flitter across my chest, not in a way meant to flirt, but from the nerves beating across my prickly skin.
His gaze fastens to mine. “I certainly am. And she’s quite beautiful.”
My heart lurches as my stomach flips. How does he do that?
“Flattery will get you everywhere.” I keep my tone casual, not wanting him to know how much this is affecting me, though he probably does.
“Is that so?” He leans over, that lustful mouth brushing against the shell of my ear. “Because I’m quite good at it.”
I grab his shoulder, my nails biting into the hard flesh.
“What else are you good at?” I tease with my slinky tone.
Smoothly, he draws away, climbing off his seat and coming to stand in between my legs as he spins my chair around in one quick motion until I face outward.
His palms come to rest on the bar behind me, caging me in within the steely frame of his towering body.
He bends to the crook of my neck, his warm breath skittering over my flesh, my nipples tightening.
“Fuck,” I mutter low.
But I know he’s heard. I know he can sense my body’s weakness for him.
“Dance with me and find out,” he rasps into my ear, and the rumbly pitch of his voice pebbles my nipples.
“This isn’t really the type of place people dance in.” I can barely say that without panting. “Unless you’re naked and onstage.”
“Oh, baby . . .” His large palm envelops my hip, the fingers of his other hand dipping into the inside of my inner thigh. “That’s not the kind of dancing I was talking about.”
For a mere moment, I hesitate. I can’t possibly do this. I can’t go with someone who isn’t my husband. I know what he wants from me. Dom would punish the hell out of me if another man dared to touch me.
I rise off the chair as he moves a step back, giving me his hand.
My free one creeps up his arm, and his muscles flex under my touch, our eyes boring into the other’s as I tighten my grasp.
“Did I mention my office is soundproof?”
He chuckles, low and deep. Suddenly, something savage flashes in his eyes and he grasps my jaw in the span of his wide hand, bending his mouth into mine.
“I’ll enjoy testing out its limits.”
I go breathless, my inhales filled with gasps even as he pulls me out of my daze with the drag of his hand.
He leads me out into a long corridor, the subtle melody of the music now so light, we can hear our own breathing.
“I don’t know if I should be doing this.” I exhale a shabby breath, causing him to stop, to turn, to yank me until I smash into his solid body.
Both hands fist my hair, roughing through it, his lips hovering over mine. “But you want to, don’t you? You like being bad.”
His knee pushes into my pussy, and without feeling any shame, I ride him, the wave of pleasure growing the deeper he drives into me.
“Say it,” he demands, tugging at my strands. “Tell me you want this. Tell me how bad you want my cock inside your tight little hole.”
When all I do is groan, he removes his knee.
“Damn it. Don’t stop,” I bite back.
He yanks my head back, those heavy-lidded eyes greeting me, the storm within them brewing. “Then say it. I want to hear how bad you want to fuck me behind your husband’s back.”
“Y-yes . . .” I groan, needy and desperate.
He throws me up against the wall, forcing his hard body into mine, molding us perfectly as though somehow this is right. He drops one of his hands, roughly undoing the button of my jeans and practically ripping the zipper down.
“Are you wet, sweetheart? Is this pussy dripping for something new?”
“Yes. Oh, God,” I whisper-cry when his fingers dip in past the zipper, flirting inches away from where I desperately need them. “Please . . .”
My hips arch, trying to take what he’s denying me.
His deep-chested chuckle sends a quiver down to my core.
“Use your words.” He drops his hand from my hair, now clutching my jaw within it.
Did I mention large, manly hands like his are my kryptonite?
“Please what?” His mouth lowers, perched close, our breaths tangled in heated desire.
“Please fuck me. Touch me however you want.”
In a mere blink, his entire palm slips inside and cups my pussy. I can feel how soaked I am as he easily glides his hand up and down.
“Yes . . .” My lips part on a moan, and my eyes want to close, but I keep them open, wanting to look at him as he touches me.
“No panties, huh? You’re a very bad girl, aren’t you?”
“Always,” is all I can manage when two fingers replace his palm, stroking both sides of my throbbing clit.
A jolt zaps into my back, my gut. I don’t even know where exactly, but I feel everything at the same time, like I’m wired.
“Fuck!” My whispery shout lands around his jaw as he growls in approval, working his fingers faster.
“What would your husband say if he caught us? My hand taking what’s his. What you’re easily giving me, like my personal plaything.”
“He’d kill you,” I confidently manage through the gritting of my teeth.
And it’s true. If another man were to touch me, Dom would break him in half before shooting his dick off.
“He can try,” the man says, removing his fingers from me and dragging my jeans down.
“What are you . . . ?” My eyes pop wide, my pussy aching for him to finish.
Aligning our gazes, he continues to undress me until my pants are around my knees. All I do is grow hotter all over, circling my ass against the wall, needing him to release me from this torturous state.
“Turn around,” he demands. “Palms against the wall and spread those thighs.”
My chest trembles with scattered breaths, my brows bending in shameless pleasure.
“Now.”
“Here?” I question, though still doing as I’m told, looking at him from over my shoulder.
“Here.”
He presses into me, wrapping a hand around my throat, clutching it tight, while his fingers return to my clit, stroking slowly. A series of moans barrage out of me.