Burning Offer (Trevor's Harem #1) Read online

I force myself to speak, and I say the crassest, most sledgehammer thing I can think of.

  “What, are you going to rape me?”

  His head shakes. Slowly. He hasn’t touched me. Goddamn him, I don’t think he’s going to. His eyes are brown, deep, confident. Exactly as I saw him in my mind, the last time he fucked me.

  “Touch me, and I’ll kill you,” I say.

  I can hook my fingers into his eyes. I can bite. I can’t remember the number of times I had to fight as a kid. And I’ve had bastards as boyfriends who undid the old me; hell yes, I have. It won’t happen again. Fighting isn’t about strength. It’s about how far you’re willing to go, how insane you’re willing to be. My last boyfriend broke my fucking leg. And I’ll be damned if anything like that will ever, ever happen again.

  But Alexander just stares at me. Inches away — close enough for me to smell his scent and feel his heat. Close enough that I can see the rising and falling of his slab-muscled chest.

  I feel like a bomb is about to go off. I don’t know what this man is doing to me, but I can’t stop looking him over, from square jaw and asshole’s smile to broad shoulders, from fine leather shoes to the obvious bulge of his cock. I’m furious. I’m ready to attack. To offer retribution for what he’s refusing to do next. But there’s nowhere for that anger to go.

  When he finally makes a move to grab me, I’ll knee him in the crotch. I’ll scratch. I’ll scream, and then I’ll yell.

  But instead, his lips form a cruel little smile and he says, “You’re not so fucking tough after all, are you, Bridget Miller?”

  Then he backs up a step. Away from me. And before I know what’s happening I’ve closed the distance between us. Wrapped my hands behind his ass and pinged his crotch into mine, compatible parts meshing with frustrating fabric between them. I feel his length press sidelong against my slit, and as our mouths mash together, he finally responds and grinds into me hard. I’ll come right here. Right now.

  But a second later, it’s all hot breath and hands as our mouths come apart. He turns me around and presses me against the alley wall, his big hands pawing my breasts through my dress. I’m barely aware of the fact that anyone could walk by the alley or through the door at any time as he pins my arms to my sides and slips the straps of my dress from my shoulders. I didn’t wear a bra; my girls aren’t big enough to need one. His bare hands easily cover each from behind, and then I’m against the wall again as he hikes up my dress, sliding my panties down past the swell of my ass. Just far enough, once he forces my legs apart, to let him run his fingers between my folds from behind, to my clit, making me gasp.

  “Say you want my cock,” he growls.

  My face is against the brick. I’ve lost track of his hands, but I hear zipping and a rush of fabric, so I assume he’s taking himself out behind me. My breath is coming fast and hard. His hands are back on my ass, between my cheeks, slipping inside my dripping wet pussy.

  Then his voice is right by my ear. In my hair. Where he was that night, when he made me come across miles of phone line.

  “Say you want my cock.” He demands it, sounding almost angry, his voice full of resentment and barbed lust.

  “I want it,” I say. I’m barely coherent. I don’t know who I am, but I am definitely not myself. I’m bare from the belly up with my tits against an alley wall, a stranger’s rough hands between my legs, pussy soaking. The need is intense, like something burning. I can feel his body’s rhythm as he pumps his cock. I haven’t seen it, but I swear I can sense it, inches away, its heat pulsing at my wet entrance.

  “Say it right.”

  “I want your cock!” I don’t even know what I feel. Angry? Humiliated? Incredibly, unbelievably, impossibly aroused? How long since I’ve had a man inside me? How badly have I wanted it, needed it?

  “Tell me you want me to fuck you.”

  “Fuck me!”

  Am I panting? Crying? I don’t even know. I only know that if he doesn’t fuck me soon, I’ll collapse.

  I feel the hard pressure of his tip, and then he slides roughly inside, filling me completely. I fucking swear, I almost come right away, just from relief. But then he starts to thrust, and his hand is on my back, pressing me harder to the bricks. He fucks like a sledgehammer, like a grudge. I come up on my toes a bit each time his balls slam against me, my pussy gripping him like a fist. Our sounds are wet and rushed. Primal. For a second, it occurs to me that he’s not even using a condom and that’s a problem, but then my first orgasm claims me and I collapse, practically falling. He holds me up, still fucking me, using me like a doll. Then he pulls out, and I feel a splatter on my back like hot glue.

  It’s on my ass. On the small of my back. On my dress, by the feel. And damn if I didn’t feel something land in my hair.

  It’s a long minute before I return to my senses, and then reality lands like a guillotine’s blade. I’m mostly naked in an alley, some hot stranger’s seed spattered all up my back.

  And despite the distraction, nothing is better.

  I’m still out of money.

  I still can’t tell anyone why I need it, or even that I need it.

  I should feel ashamed. And I do … sort of. Mostly, it’s lost in another sensation. Of having only a taste of something I’ve been needing, and now about to be left without.

  Alexander, or whoever, is zipping up. I didn’t even see the cock that just fucked me, and for some reason I want to see it more than anything else in the world despite all that’s still wrong.

  “Wait,” I say.

  But now he has his coat. His hand’s on the club door as I pull my dress both up and down in a hurry, trying to hide what I’ve done.

  “You’re tighter than I always thought you’d be,” he says.

  Then he’s gone, and I’m in the alley alone, my panties still at my knees, pussy still shamefully craving more.

  Only then do I remember something he said.

  You’re not so fucking tough after all, are you, Bridget Miller?

  But I never gave him my last name, and there’s no way he could possibly know it.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Bridget

  Of course, there’s come all up my back. It’s like he was saving up and did it on purpose, by the looks of things. I had to slide sideways through the door then back along the wall and into the ladies’ room to see it. There was a pair of sandaled feet in one of the stalls when I entered, so right now she’s probably wondering what I’m doing in here considering I didn’t rattle the toilet paper to wipe the seat and probably seem to be hanging out. But whatever. If strange thoughts from some girl in a bathroom are the worst thing I’m facing, I’ll count myself lucky.

  I lower my straps and rotate the tight dress so I can see the back. Which is significantly fucked up. I wait out my bathroom roommate and then the one after that until I can finally come out and use the sink to clean off what I can. That shit dries white like deodorant, so I have limited time. Plus, I can only check my hair by feel, and part of me is sure I’ve got a big loogie hiding back there like Ben Stiller in There’s Something About Mary.

  So I compose myself, rush with my we back to the coatroom, and steal someone’s jacket — one with a hood, for good measure. What the hell; it’s not the first time I’ve had to steal for survival, though these are decidedly different circumstances.

  I scan the club before leaving to verify what I’d already been certain was true: my mystery man, having duly fucked his conquest, has got the hell out of Dodge.

  Jesus. I don’t know how to feel about any of this. Everything is a horrible soup. I suppose I should feel used and humiliated, but this is my first one-night stand — assuming ten minutes in the alley counts as a night. I’m too confused to feel anything dire; it mostly has the aura of a dream because everything is so surreal. And holy shit if I’m not still a little horny — if (and add this to the list of things I’d never admit) cutting through public with evidence on my back somehow gives me an exhibitionist thrill.


  I reach my car, sure everyone has been watching the entire time and has seen everything. I strip the coat, toss it onto the adjacent car’s hood, then text Abigail my regrets, telling her that I felt suddenly sick. She’ll forgive me. She knows how I am.

  Although right now I’m wondering if anyone knows me at all.

  Then the chills hit. It’s cool outside and I’ve got a few spots on my back from bathroom water, but I’m shivering far beyond what seems warranted. I key the engine, and soon it’s hot enough to run the heater, so I blast the heat, rubbing my arms for warmth, trying to curl up. But it doesn’t help. I have to let the moment pass, and only then do I drive home, eerily certain that Brandon will be waiting with crossed and judgmental arms.

  But no one’s there. Of course. The gig was nearly an hour’s drive from my place in Inferno, so by now it’s after midnight. Only the kitchen light is on, the way I leave it, and the place is a graveyard.

  I close the door and lock it. I take a shower then stopper the sink and soak my dress with some stain stick and detergent. I’m shit with laundry and domestic stuff and would have made some sexist a horrible 1950s housewife. Maybe the come will lift right out. Or maybe I’m ruining it. I don’t have the energy to care.

  Once safely in bed, my eyes fall on the phone across the room. I’m one of the few people I know who has a hardline instead of just a cell, but of course that’s necessary for my secret source of income. There’s a hands-free headset beside the phone. I usually wear it so I can amuse myself while talking dirty to the men who call me. Only once was I glad to be hands-free for a different reason.

  Alexander.

  How did he find me? Another sleazeball who called my service and wanted me to coach him through rubbing one out. I only remembered him because he’d somehow pushed all my buttons — buttons, in fact, that I was surprised to find. I didn’t mean to get aroused while working, but on that night it had just happened. And I remembered his name the same as his voice. The voice I’m still, even now, hearing like a whisper in my ear.

  I close my eyes. I need to sleep.

  But I can’t. And it takes me a while to put a finger on why. At first, I think I’m replaying tonight to flog myself with regret. Then I realize I’m preoccupied for a deeper reason. I slip my hands inside my panties and rub myself to a utilitarian orgasm. And after that I finally drift away.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Bridget

  In the morning, I notice my phone again and the headset beside it. I mentally run through the list of people who’ve seen the inside of my place, wondering if all of them see things as obviously as I do now.

  Who still has a hardline phone these days?

  Who needs a hands-free headset with their hardline, other than a pro who uses her phone for work — a lot?

  Girlfriends always tell me they’re jealous of my voice. To me, even when I hear it played back, I sound like someone speaking through a mouthful of gravel. But Archive and my other audiobook clients seem to like it fine, and thus far that deep, growly voice has made me a pretty good living. Not enough to buy me a proper studio, of course, and not enough to take care of the whole Linda situation by a long shot. But without all my additional complications, I’d live a pretty good life based on this mouth of mine.

  And that makes me think of the phone again.

  Because not only does it now seem obvious, to anyone who cared to look around my apartment and ask a few simple questions, that I do phone sex on the side — it’s also the pun about making money with my mouth that jars my thoughts. Because that’s what hookers do.

  Not that I ever blew anyone for money.

  Except that I sure described doing it, all the time.

  “Shit, Bridge. Give yourself a break,” I say aloud.

  Because this is all stupid. It’s all self-pity. So I’ve done some dirty talking. What’s the harm? And so I fucked some stranger last night. Who cares that I didn’t know him? It’s not like he’s the only one who got what he wanted in that dark little alleyway. It’s not like he took advantage of me. I wanted it just as badly. Worse, I’d bet. I haven’t been laid since Keith, and at least “Alexander” didn’t hit me like he used to. Last night was, sadly, one of the best relationships I’ve ever had. I just have to get past the societal conditioning saying such things are forbidden, and that the women who do them are whores.

  It’s okay for men to do it, though. Fuck a stranger in an alley, and you’re a dude, high-fucking-five.

  That thought right there is enough to snap me out of the deepest part of my funk. I needed sex; it felt good; I have no regrets. I suppose I should head to the doctor for tests just to be sure since he didn’t wear a condom, but otherwise this is

  no

  big

  fucking

  deal.

  Goddammit.

  And so I roll out of bed, feeling proud and confident for the thirty seconds it takes to reach the living room. Which is where I see the embossed invitation, propped up where I left yesterday, after I gave up trying to solve its riddle.

  The thing arrived sealed in an envelope bearing no marks save my first name, handwritten in fancy script. And the invitation itself was … well …

  Fighting an odd, creeping sensation, I pick it up and unfold the five sections that accordion down like an especially fancy wedding invite. I’ve forgotten the small card in the middle, so I watch as it flies away and vanishes under my wobbly table.

  I ignore it and focus, willing the invitation to make the sense today that it refused to make yesterday. It’s almost entirely blank, despite its five sections. Elaborately embossed, with small silver accents.

  I hold it horizontal, and it seems to show a relief of an enormous, sprawling mansion. There are small, shiny spots where the windows belong. Yesterday, I set the invitation down, unfolded and sideways, upright on the table. Then I sat across the room on the couch to watch TV, pretending I was no longer curious. But my eyes kept returning to the card, and it was as if those little accent windows were watching me.

  In the middle fold, when the card is held vertically, are the words:

  You Are Invited

  2 p.m., April 17th

  Castleview Hotel Private Conference Room C

  $1,000 Paid For Attendance, No Strings Attached

  * Bring A Day Bag *

  And, because the whole thing is clearly absurd, the sender thought to provide a phone number below the day bag line just in case I want my foolishness spread into to a second medium.

  I threw it away when I got it.

  An hour later, I pulled the invitation from the trash. Just in case.

  An hour after that, I did a reverse search on the phone number, which I assumed would be the Castleview’s front desk, or an offshore number for scamming people, like that Nigerian prince does.

  It turned out to be the number of a bank in Charlotte, North Carolina.

  One that, after some research, I realized wasn’t just some normal bank. It was a high-level investment firm called Brigham Assets. An investment account bearing a minimum of one million dollars was required before they’d even talk to you.

  But even more than that, the number was a specific extension, a Brigham Assets personal banker named Paul Germain. Google kept placing his name in Forbes and the New York Times, in the company of names like Warren Buffett.

  I did some work, ignoring the whole stupid mystery. But I kept staring at the invitation throughout. Some fool (possibly me) had unfolded the thing and placed it behind my microphone arm and mixer to taunt me while I recorded.

  An hour or so later, I finally called Paul Germain.

  Who was very polite.

  Who greeted me by name before I gave it to him, as if I was famous.

  And who refused to tell me anything at all about what the fuck was going on, beyond this being a legitimate invitation from a respected party, and that if I chose to accept it, I would, in the esteemed Mr. Germain’s opinion, be wise to do so.

  And the $1000 “p
aid for attendance, no strings attached”?

  Yes. That will be honored promptly and verifiable by any third-party financial institution you care to employ as your agent in this matter.

  But what is the meeting about?

  That is a matter of some confidentiality, I’m afraid.

  Do you really think I’m going to just show up somewhere for no reason, with no information, just because I get a fancy card in the mail? Then I corrected myself. Except that it wasn’t in the mail. It was left on my damned doormat.

  My client is providing the attendance stipend and hosting the session in a public venue to reassure you that all is “on the level,” as the saying goes. We understand that a leap of faith is required. The one thousand dollars — which is payable simply for showing up, and is yours to keep regardless of whether you stay or how long you stay — is compensation for that leap. But it is of course your choice to accept or decline the offer, and if you choose not to appear, you may discard my client’s invitation and consider the matter dropped with no hard feelings.

  I paused, trying to make sense of all of that. Then: Why am I supposed to bring a day bag?

  I’m afraid that is confidential.

  Just give me a hint.

  I’m afraid I can’t.

  Well, fuck you very much, Paulie Boy.

  A pleasure speaking with you as well, Miss Miller.

  Germain waited for me to hang up. I could hear him sitting in polite, well-bred silence until I did. There was a minute ticking in the interlude, and I imagined a small but handsome clock sitting on his polished-wood desk. Some little sliver thing with exposed clockwork made in Switzerland by elves or some shit, worth more than every car I’ve ever owned put together.

  You still there, Mr. Germain?

  Yes, of course.

  Well. Okay. Bye.

  Have a nice day, Miss Miller.

  I hung up and folded the invitation back into a harmless rectangle. I’m not sure, even now, why I didn’t throw it away.