Exploration
Glennon
“We’re going to start at the beginning, and I’m not going to tell you left or right or anything. We’re going to navigate the labyrinth, just like the newbie you are.”
“But I don’t want to miss anything,” she complained.
“Glennon.” They’d exited into an emergency-door hallway and were making their way to the lobby. He stopped her, his hand pulling her gently so she stopped moving forward and had to turn to look at him. “You don’t need to see everything tonight. We have all the time in the world to explore.”
Holy hell. He’d declared it. He’d claimed her to his co-workers, his friends, anyone at large, really, who saw them with his hand on the back of her neck and his protective stance.
But that didn’t mean permanent, let alone long-term.
That meant “right now.” By saying “all the time in the world,” he told her he was all in.
He wanted her with him for the long haul.
“Triumph,” she whispered. She could feel the sting of tears behind her eyes that she didn’t want to let fall.
She hated crying. It made her eyes red, along with her nose, and she was not a delicate crier.
She wailed and shook, mostly because she held it back so long that when she finally let go, it was like a hurricane.
It was not an attractive look.
“I mean it, Glennon. I know I said I wanted to see where this goes, but I’m pretty sure we’re close to there. Whether it’s here with me, piloting out of one of the other clubs, or somewhere else. Whatever’s going to make you feel safe and secure. I’ll follow you wherever you need to go.”
She threw her arms around his neck and clung to him. “Wherever you are is where I want to be. I’ve been falling so hard, trying to fight it because I’m so fucking scared of what happens next. But every moment I’ve had with you makes it all worth it, even if it ends tomorrow.”
His hands ran up and down her back, instantly calming her. “It’s not going to end tomorrow, little spy. I promise.”
Pulling back from where she’d buried herself in his neck, she claimed his mouth, stroking his tongue with hers. His hands clutched her waist tight, then loosened slightly to rest on her hips. When she came up for air, he raised an eyebrow at her.
“While I’m happy you’re thrilled about my commentary, don’t get used to leading. That’s my job.”
With a laugh, she stepped back. “C’mon, Mr. Big Bad Computer Dom. Show me your club.”
He snorted. “Just wait until I show you my keystroke.”
Groaning, she pulled on his hand to get moving. “That was worse than your jokes.”
His smile spread across his entire face, and his hand rested in its new home at the nape of her neck as he guided her into the lobby, her eyes even wider than before.
Triumph was right. There was no way to truly describe Elysium. You just had to experience it.
After securing drinks, they sat through the opening greeting where a gorgeous Moulin Rouge-style singer entertained them with a song.
At one point, she felt eyes on her, and she turned to see that Triumph was paying no attention to the singer.
Instead, he was focused completely on her, watching her reactions.
His attention continued throughout their time in the labyrinth, where she got them lost several times. If she did it on purpose once or twice, he never let on whether he knew or not.
He danced with her in the Big Top, swaying in the center of the floor despite the fast pace of the music, and the entire time they stared into each other’s eyes like they were the only ones in the crush of the dance floor.
She stuffed herself with Chicago-style pizza from the food truck, narrowly avoiding a splatter of sauce on her new dress, and ate three orders of the tequila-flavored cotton candy.
Her absolute favorite place was the arcade, with carnival-style games that were impossible to win.
Games where they raced to shoot water into a clown’s mouth that inflated a balloon until it popped; the derby game, where they rolled balls up an incline to move metal horses in a race against eight other people; and the strongman tower, where Triumph used the sledgehammer to hit the weight and send the puck flying to the top to ring the bell.
She felt sixteen years old again on one of her rare adventures with friends to a traveling carnival.
He pulled on her hand. “I have one more place we need to go. This is sort of fun and sort of work. I’ve got a panel that sticks in the House of Mirrors that I need to check on.”
They passed through the entrance, and she immediately felt disoriented. It truly was a house of mirrors. Every panel in the hallway they walked into was a ten-foot-tall reflective surface that bounced back endless images of them.
“Breathe.” He rubbed her back in gentle circles. “Look down at your feet on the floor to acclimate yourself.”
When she did, she saw that the glass floor was not reflective.
Instead, the panels lit up designs underneath the glass.
Those did not move, and it allowed her to reset herself.
Only then was she able to walk forward. To keep from becoming disoriented again, she trailed a knuckle along the mirrors so she didn’t leave fingerprints. “This is wild,” she commented.
“Someone gets lost in here every night, and we have to rescue them. Sometimes it freaks them out, so we put a warning on the entrance, but people don’t always understand just how off-putting it can be.
It doesn’t help that the walls randomly move, and the time between movements is also random, so even if you could memorize the pattern you walked, where once there was a turn, it might not be there anymore. ”
Just as he finished, there was a chime, and some of the panels began to randomly move, forming new hallways and closing off others.
“Luckily, I’m pretty good at most of the maze since I designed the program, so usually it’s me going in to find them.”
The chime sounded, and the walls shifted again. The way back was now cut off.
“Holy crap on a cracker! How is it possible for anyone to get out of here?”
He grinned. “Getting lost is half the fun. Right now? We’re in a box. No entrance or exit. We’re stuck here until the next shift, which should be in about sixty seconds.”
A mischievous twinkle lit up in her eye. “A box, huh?”
He pursed his lips. “What are you thinking, little spy?”
“I’m thinking, I get about forty-five seconds to be kissed stupid.”
With a growl, he pulled her tight to his chest and gave in to her suggestion. Her pulse pounded with every lick, every nip of his teeth, every movement of his hands across her lower back, and finally to cup her ass.
“Do you know how badly I want to make you come right now?” he whispered as his mouth made love to her neck. “If we didn’t have a dozen cameras pointed in here… I bet I could make it happen in less than sixty seconds.”
“Fuck,” she moaned. “Yes. Do it.”
The chime sounded again, and he looked as disappointed as she felt that he wouldn’t get to slide his hands up her short skirt to get to where her new panties were totally soaked through.
“If we were at Shadowlands, I would. I would want everyone to watch how good I can make you feel. But here? I don’t want to share you.”
She looked up at him. “Then maybe you should take me upstairs.”
It took less than a second. “Fuck checking the panel.”
He grabbed her hand and headed to his right, dragging her along behind him. He quickly navigated the changing panels, emerged from the exit, and swiped a keycard at an emergency exit, slamming through the door.
She laughed, breathlessly. “Triumph, slow down! What’s the rush?”
Guiding her past him to the stairs, he gave her ass a powerful smack right in her sit spot, and then he swiped her up into his arms. “I’ll kiss the bruises and make it better when we get upstairs.”
He took the fire stairs two at a time, all the way to the fourth floor. He was breathing heavily when he got to the interior entrance of Tripoli’s apartment, and she wasn’t sure whether it was from the exertion of the climb or from his need for her, raging out of control.
Didn’t matter. He wanted her, and she was going to get more of what she’d been hoping for since Colombia.
She hoped a lot more.