CHAPTER SIX
brOOKLYN
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“Genevieve! Stop!” Lancelot cries as he follows me into the woods.
“No. Go. I can’t be near you.” I sob.
He whips me around and I close my eyes, so I don’t have to take in the handsome knight with his steel-gray eyes and powerful jaw. He pushes me against a large tree trunk and with two hands cups my face.
“I will not live without you.”
“You must.”
“I would die first.”
My eyes pop open. “You might, Lancelot! Then I could never live with myself. Don’t ask that of me.”
“Damn you.” He glances away but doesn’t release me.
I don’t want him to. His armor is cold against me, but the thickness of his thigh is warm and strong against my leg. I long to have his strong and ripped naked body on top of mine once more.
As if hearing my thoughts, his eyes drop to mine and drift to my lips. “What if there was a way?”
I shake my head and softly reply, “There isn’t. We had one night. Let that be it, Lancelot.”
“You belong to me.”
I know.
But Arthur is the king and my husband. What he wants, he gets. Including me. Instead, I nod, and say, “I am yours, my love.”
“Then call me and come to dinner with me. I promise to treat you like a queen, then fuck you like a naughty wench.”
My eyes fly open. I bolt upright in bed, looking around my room as my dream state fades and reality descends.
No Lancelot.
No twelfth-century woods of Camelot.
No...Travis.
“Holy hell.” I wipe the sweat off my forehead, and then down between my breasts.
Luna lifts her furry head and glares at me from the side of the bed.
Holy hell .
I can’t believe I dreamed about him. As Lancelot, no less. I’m sure he’d find that amusing. I’m sure he’d love to know I’m wet between my legs and aching to do something about it. Stubbornly, I refuse to.
Who is Travis Warner?
Glancing at my dresser across the room, I spot the black business card he gave me and flop back down on my pillows. My ankle reminds me that I was injured, so I roll over and reach for my bottle of pain medicine and take one.
“Goddamn it.”
Getting around Manhattan is not easy on a bum leg. It’s a walking city, but looks like I’ll be catching a few cabs for the next few days.
Look at the card.
I fling my arm over my eyes. I am not ringing him. I am not going out to dinner with him.
I am not...letting him fuck me like a wench .
My thighs press together as my pussy clenches, wanting very much for that to happen. If he can create a response in my body by simply kissing the back of my hand, then imagine what he could do if I were naked and spread out on a bed, completely willing.
Because I would.
But I won’t.
I chew my lip, trying to remember why I shouldn’t.
Oh yeah, I’ve given up on men. I refuse to be hurt again, and therefore I am not dating.
If we’d accidentally fallen into bed drunk, then awkwardly waved goodbye to one another between the hours of three and six in the morning, that would be fine.
Why shouldn’t I?
The man is unreasonably good-looking, clearly wealthy, and amusing in a too-confident-but-makes-me-smile kind of way.
Which probably does make me a bit of a wench, but at least I’m not getting my heart broken again. Clearly there is something wrong with me that men do not want to commit to, and until I can undergo whatever therapy I need, I’m just not doing it.
Dinner is a date.
Fucking is not.
Those are my rules.
Are you looking for a wench or a queen? Because I’m not joking, I am not dating right now.
Brooklyn, I promise I won’t ask you to marry me or to move into my castle.
Him and his stupid Lancelot analogies. Anyway, the well-known and fictional knight never had a castle, but I have a feeling Travis might. A very nice skyscraping castle.
Can’t say I’m not curious or mildly interested in a night of passion with him.
I snort at the lie.
God, I would love nothing more than for him to be here right now fucking me. I can barely remember having an orgasm from something other than my hand or dildo.
I scramble to the end of the bed, apologize to Luna, who glares at me for her second interruption of the morning, and reach out to get the card. Then, I climb back under the covers, and Luna snuggles up.
Staring once more at the black card with just his name and the mysterious A. I wonder what it means.
I’m an investigative journalist, so maybe I need to do what I do best and start looking. Of course he doesn’t know that, but there’s no way I’m going to call him without digging into who he is.
I open my phone and in thirty minutes learn that Travis Warner was an almost pro golfer and owns three of the top golf courses in America.
Well, that explains the Rolex.
The A on the back of the card? Aside from the name of the golf courses being called The Golf Alliance of America, I have a feeling there’s something else.
Call it journalistic intuition.
It takes another hour and a half of very deep digging. But I find it: The Alliance Club.
“Wow.” I lift my face and stare at the wall.
The asshole gave me a business card for his adults-only club. A fucking sex club.
“Unbelievable.” I drop my phone on my lap and shake my head.
I guess Travis wasn’t lying when he said he wasn’t going to ask me to marry him, or anything in between. I know I shouldn’t be offended...but I am.
I promise to treat you like a queen, then fuck you like a naughty wench.
I sit chewing one of my gel nails wishing I could show up at the club and surprise him. Tell him that I don’t particularly think much of his castle. If my ankle weren’t injured and I could afford the insane membership cost, I would.
But it is, and I can’t.
I toss back the covers and hobble to the bathroom to take a shower, and Luna follows. She sits on the shower mat looking sleepy while I turn the water on, then does one of those huge cat yawns, like she has an exhausting life and I’m just another thing she has to deal with.
My ankle isn’t too bad, I note as I step under the stream of deliciously warm water. It almost takes my full weight, so in a few days I’m confident it’ll be fully healed.
Showered and dressed, sitting at my dining room table a few hours later, I’m scrolling through emails on my laptop when my phone rings.
Jasmine.
“Hey,” I answer.
“What the hell happened last night?”
I groan. “I told Tony not to bother you with it.”
“Well”—I hear her crunch down onto something—“when your husband disappears around ten at night to pick up another woman, you ask questions.”
“I’m not another woman, I’m me.”
“Which I know because I asked. Hence my calling.”
I chuckle. “It’s nothing. I hurt my ankle and needed someone to help me upstairs.”
“That’s the entire story?”
I nod. “Yup.”
“No guy kissing your hand and calling you Genevieve?”
Crap. He heard that?
“Ugh, Tony is the worst wingman in the world. Tell him I will pay him back for this.”
“I heard you.”
“Am I on speaker?”
“Yes,” they both answer.
“Having my two best friends marry one another really is a nuisance.” I huff, lift my coffee, and take a sip as I decide what to tell them.
“His name is Travis Warner. He’s...he bumped into me at the bar and decided to play Lancelot. It was just a stupid joke between us.”
“Lancelot? How corny.” Tony groans.
“Sounds sexy to me.” I hear Jasmine’s voice trail off and go all seductive.
“Gross. Please don’t do sexy stuff while I’m on speaker. I had to watch you two flirt the entire time at college, and I’m still working through it with a therapist.”
Tony laughs.
“My point is, it sounds like he was flirting,” Jasmine says.
“Oh, he was flirting.” I take another sip of coffee then realize how wrong I am. Travis wasn’t flirting with me. He was like a predator playing with his next meal.
Me.
And I’m not entirely sure I’ll say no to him should the opportunity arise again in the future. The fact he owns a sex club is a giant red flag, which is perfect. He’s not someone I’d date or get serious about.
So if we bump into each other again...
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WHEN MY PHONE beeps a few hours later, I initially think it’s the grocery delivery company. Saturdays are for doing chores, and with an injured ankle, I can’t do my usual darting around Manhattan.
I ordered online and propped my ankle up while I did some work.
Swiping my phone, I shuffle to the edge of the sofa, preparing to push the button to let them into the building.
But it’s not my order.
Waiting for your call, milady.
A blush hits my cheeks as I reply. How did you get my phone number?
He rings instead of replying.
“How’s the patient?” His masculine voice fills my apartment.
“How did you get my phone number!” I ask a second time.
“Lancelot database—”
“Cut the shit, Travis. I never gave you my number.” I bite my lip, wondering if I should be worried.
“I took note when you filled out the documents at the hospital,” Travis replies. “I apologize.”
Blowing out a breath, I calm myself down.
Of course, he did.
It’s still inappropriate, but I get the feeling a man like Travis doesn’t get told no very often.
Or ever.
“I’m sorry, you scared me,” I admit, leaning back into the cushions.
“Understandable. And it wasn’t my intention. I...” Travis trails off for a moment, then he says, “wanted to know if you were okay. Fuck, I was expecting you to call.”
I smile, liking that I ruffled such a powerful man.
“I’m sure that doesn’t happen often.”
There’s silence. “I never give women my number.”
Oh.
Asking if he meets women at his sex club is probably not the way I want this conversation to go. For now, I’m not going to let him know I’m aware of who he is or what he does.
One could assume that he doesn’t participate in activities at the Alliance Club. I’m an intelligent woman, and having spent a few hours with Travis Warner, I have no doubt that he does.
I promise to treat you like a queen, then fuck you like a wench.
“And yet you have a card.”
“Which less than twenty people in the world have,” he replies.
“So why did you give me one?” I tuck my legs up and grin stupidly into the empty room.
I know I’m playing with fire, but I don’t care.
A part of me is thrilled that he’s so interested he memorized my number and called.
He could be a crazy stalker, but the psycho part that every woman has inside of us, who dreams of being kidnapped then thoroughly fucked, can’t help but be turned on by this kind of thing.
Travis is the epitome of the alpha tattooed rogue you want stroking his thick cock, telling you to get on your knees.
Oh god, don’t think of that right now.
An accidental moan escapes my lips.
“Jesus,” Travis rasps. “Brooklyn. Come out to dinner tonight with me.”
“Call me Brook,” I say, my full name sounding too formal. “And I told you I didn’t date.”
“Let me be very clear, this isn’t a date.” His voice is rough and confident, leaving no room for confusion.
My body is thrumming, my panties soaked. That image is still in my head, except this time he’s lying over me, sucking my nipples as his cock threatens to impale me.
Yes, please.
We both know I’m not capable of saying no to his invite, so when I don’t respond immediately, he takes it as a yes.
“Seven o’clock. No panties.” Travis hangs up.
Well, I’m not doing that...