18. Paige
Paige
Aiden Slade has left a black-and-gold book on my pillow and is pretending not to watch me notice it.
The attempt would be more convincing if he weren’t leaning against my bedroom door with his arms folded, his gaze following my hands.
“Is this why you insisted on carrying my wine in here?”
“You might have spilled it.”
“I have successfully transported beverages between rooms for years.”
“Then I protected the book.”
I slide one finger beneath the edge of the tissue paper and lift the hardcover free.
This is the anniversary edition. It has a black cover beneath the jacket, gold foil stamped across the spine, illustrated endpapers, and the bonus epilogue unavailable anywhere else. I picked it up twice during the signing event and put it back both times because the price was ridiculous.
Then it sold out.
I look at Aiden. “Where did you find this?”
“The bookstore had one transferred for an event that got canceled.”
“You went back and asked?”
“I went back and kept asking until someone looked in the stockroom.”
Of course he did.
I open the cover carefully. The hotel lobby from the story stretches across the endpapers in rich shades of black, gold, and deep red. It is exactly as beautiful as I expected.
“You remembered the gold edges,” I say.
“You liked them better than the silver.”
“I never told you that.”
“You looked at the gold edition every time you passed the display. You barely glanced at the other one.”
The man notices how I load my dishwasher, that I take one sugar in my coffee, and which special edition I cannot stop touching. Then he acts on those details without expecting me to prove I’m grateful.
This feels far more intimate than the gift should.
I run my thumb over the foil title. “You investigated a romance novel with the intensity of a livestock emergency.”
“Livestock is easier.”
“Cows don’t have digitally printed edges?”
“They refuse to discuss them.”
I laugh, the sound sharp enough to ease the tightness in my throat. Aiden crosses the room and stops close enough that his thigh brushes my knee.
“You said this one was your favorite.”
“It is.”
“I read it.”
“You have a troubling obsession with fictional men.”
“This one was less useless than the others.”
“High praise.”
“He still spent too much time deciding what she needed.”
My smile fades. “You noticed that too.”
“I’m learning.”
His fingers trace the gold skyline without taking the book from me. “I also found the pages you marked.”
Heat blooms low in my stomach. “The tabs were extremely subtle.”
“They were yellow.”
“They coordinated with the cover.”
“They led directly to the only scene where the bastard followed instructions.”
“The scene has other qualities.”
Aiden’s gaze pins me in place. “What can he do that I can’t?”
“Own a hotel.”
“I own land.”
“People cannot order room service to a pasture.”
“I’ll work on it.”
Aiden waits.
I close the hardcover and rest it on my lap. “You bought me a book. You don’t have to challenge the hero to defend your position.”
“I’m not defending anything.” He settles one hand on the mattress beside my hip. “Tell me one thing you’ve read and wanted but never asked for.”
My pulse stutters in my throat. “Kidnapping by a duke seems logistically difficult.”
“One honest answer, Paige.”
“What if I don’t want to answer?”
“Then we open the wine and read the bonus epilogue.”
His expression doesn’t change—no flicker of disappointment, no teasing edge to his mouth. He is offering a genuine choice, and he will let me keep my fantasies if that’s what I want.
I reach for my worn paperback on the nightstand.
I open to the first yellow tab and hand him the book.
In the scene, the hero sits fully dressed while the heroine straddles his thigh. His instructions are simple: her hands at her sides, use his body for her pleasure. He only watches, talking her through it, refusing to touch her until she asks.
Aiden scans the pages without speaking.
His thumb presses into the spine. His gaze shifts toward the wide reading chair beneath my window, then returns to me.
“You want to use me while I watch,” he says.
“That isn’t a question.”
“No.” His voice drops, rough and controlled. “The question is whether you want to ask.”
“I do.”
Aiden’s focus narrows on my face.
I set both books on the bed and rise. “Sit in the chair.”
He crosses to the reading nook without taking his eyes from me. The chair is wide enough for me to curl sideways with a book, but Aiden fills it when he settles against the back and plants his boots on the floor.
“Like this?”
“Almost.” I step between his knees and push one leg toward the center. “I want your thigh.”
His hands close around the chair arms. “And my hands?”
“They stay there until I ask for them.”
His jaw shifts.
“I also don’t want you holding me down. If I ask you to hold me, I still control how I move.”
“You control all of it.” His voice is already strained. “If you want to stop, we stop.”
“I know.”
“Say it anyway.”
“If I want to stop, I’ll tell you.”
“Good.”
The fictional version never accounted for this feeling of exposure, the raw vulnerability of giving instructions aloud. Aiden waits while I slide off my shorts and underwear. He watches without reaching for me.
I leave my shirt on for now.
I place one knee beside his hip and bring the other over his thigh. The coarse denim presses against my bare pussy when I lower myself onto the solid muscle beneath it.
Aiden’s fingers tighten around the chair arms.
“Comfortable?” he asks.
“Ask me again when I figure out how to do this without falling.”
“You can hold on to me.”
I set my hands on his shoulders. He stays still.
“That better?”
“Yes.”
I move experimentally.
The denim drags against my clit, the firm pressure of his thigh making my stomach tighten. I adjust my hips, searching for an angle that feels better.
“What did he say to her?” Aiden asks.
“You read it.”
“I want to hear you say it.”
“He told her to use him.”
“That’s all?”
“That was most of it.”
“He needed three pages to tell her to ride his thigh?”
“He was building anticipation.”
“He was wasting time.”
I rock against Aiden’s thigh again. “You’re jealous of a man who doesn’t exist.”
“I’m jealous that he gave you the idea first.”
“He didn’t get anywhere near this.”
Aiden’s eyes darken. “Show me.”
I move again, slower this time. The rough denim rubs over my clit with each roll of my hips.
His hands stay wrapped around the chair arms.
Knowing he’ll obey makes me bolder. I find a rhythm and use his shoulders for balance, pressing down harder as I slide forward.
Aiden looks between us. “You’re getting my jeans wet.”
“You sound upset.”
“I’m trying not to grab your ass and grind you down harder.”
“You were given instructions.”
“I remember.” His fingers flex against the chair. “They’re becoming inconvenient.”
I rock forward again, and the angle sends a sharper pulse through me.
A moan slips out.
“There,” he says.
My fingers dig into his shoulders. “What?”
“You liked that.”
I repeat the movement.
Another broken sound leaves me.
Aiden’s mouth curves. “Do it again.”
I rock over his thigh while Aiden watches. The pressure builds, but I have to work for it. My legs tighten. My shirt clings to my back. He chooses stillness because I asked for it.
“Higher,” I say.
“Tell me how.”
“Lift your heel.”
He raises it slowly, bringing his thigh tighter against me.
Pleasure sparks through me, hot and sharp. I moan and grip his shoulders harder.
“Right there?”
“Yes.”
“Then take it.”
“He doesn’t know how pretty you look chasing what you want,” he says, his voice a low rasp. “Or that your mouth falls open right before you make that sound.”
The sound escapes me exactly as he predicts.
A slow, deeply satisfied smile curves Aiden’s mouth.
“Arrogant,” I whisper.
“Accurate.”
I move faster, abandoning any attempt to look composed. His thigh stays firm beneath me while everything blurs but the friction between us, his steady gaze, and that voice telling me everything he sees.
“You wanted him to watch,” Aiden says. “I’m watching every fucking move.”
My body clenches around nothing.
“He got words on a page. I get you wet against me.”
“Aiden.”
“Do you want my hands?”
I almost say yes. Then I recognize another want beneath the need to feel his hands.
“Not yet.”
An approving smile flickers across Aiden’s mouth. “Then make yourself come.”
The order pushes me closer. I rock harder, my knees gripping the chair and my fingers clutching his shirt.
“That’s it, Paige. Make it feel good.”
The pleasure pulls tight enough to make my movements uneven.
“Now,” I gasp. “Hold me now.”
His hands leave the chair and close around my waist. He keeps me steady without directing my hips, giving me strength while I choose every stroke.
“Use me,” he says. “Take every bit of it.”
I grind down against him.
The orgasm finally shatters through me, a sharp pleasure coiling tight from the relentless friction. I press my forehead to his, my body still moving, dragging out every pulse against his thigh. Aiden’s grip stays firm at my waist until the trembling eases.
He presses his mouth beneath my ear. “Still think fiction did it better?”
“I haven’t completed my evaluation.”
Aiden laughs. “Of course you haven’t.”
I lift my head.
Strain marks his face. He’s hard beneath the jeans I’ve been moving against.
I slide from his thigh and stand between his knees.
“Hands back on the chair.”
His eyebrows rise, but he obeys.
I open his jeans and free him. He exhales through his teeth as I wrap my fingers around his cock.
“Paige.”
“You wanted to know whether I could ask.”
“I remember.”
“Now I’m giving the instructions.”
I start to turn toward the nightstand, but Aiden catches my wrist.
“Wait.”
I look at him.
His eyes remain on mine. “You didn’t reach for a condom.”
“I wasn’t going to.”
Every muscle in his body goes still.
“Paige.”
“I’m on birth control. I take it every day, and I was tested after my last relationship. Everything was negative. There hasn’t been anyone since.”