Even Better (Stripped #2.5) Read online

  Blue stares at me hard before a slow smile spreads across his face. “You want to do more with West, don’t you?”

  My cheeks heat. “No.”

  “Fuck yes, you do. But not tonight. He can fuck his fist tonight and dream about the pussy I’m getting.” He pats the pile of pillows. “Now bend over. You’re going to need the support.”

  A jolt of pure lust has me rushing to obey. I feel so exposed when he props me up this way, my ass and pussy on display. And I’m even more vulnerable when he gets behind me and slides his cock inside. My mouth opens on a silent scream. As much as I crave his fullness, it’s still a shock every time.

  He drapes his chest over my back, and it’s like I’m being held down. Even if I got myself into this, it makes me want to fight. And I do squirm, testing my boundaries, seeing how much give I have. Not much.

  “Shhh.” Blue runs a hand down my side, from my breasts to my thigh, like I’m an animal he’s soothing. Or like an animal he’s training. “Relax, beautiful. This isn’t going to be quick.”

  I don’t tell him that I thought it would be. I’m so worked up even though I just came, and he’s rock hard inside me. I figured we’d fuck fast and furious—and at first that’s what we do. He pushes inside me, deep and merciless, more focused on getting himself off than me. He doesn’t touch my clit. He just uses my pussy to pleasure his cock.

  He comes with a low groan. “Fuck, baby.”

  My hips work against his, trying to get off in the precious minutes before he pulls out. A rough slap on my ass makes me freeze.

  “We’re not done,” he says, and only then do I realize he’s still hard inside me. Even though my walls are bathed in his come, even though he has my hips slanted so it’ll slide down into me, the right way, he’s still fucking. I squeeze my muscles, and he grunts in appreciation.

  “How are you doing this?” I moan, clutching the sheets in my fists. I’m about halfway to collapsing, only the pillows holding me up. He’s still hard and thrusting and furious behind me.

  “It’s you, beautiful. You make me this way. Always have.”

  I shudder. “Need you.”

  He freezes for a long moment. When his hips move again, they snap with an urgency he didn’t have before. He’s lost some of his rhythm, some of his charm. He’s only a rutting animal now, a beast. I feel mounted, I feel violated, and it’s so hot I have to bite the pillow to keep from making a sound.

  “No.” His hand wraps in my hair and pulls. “Let me hear you. Let him hear you too. Give him something good to listen to while he works himself raw.”

  I don’t want to, I’m fighting it, but then the angle changes and his cock hits that place inside me—the one that makes me cry out. There’s no one to cry to, no one to save me. Only Blue with his beautiful, merciless cock. Only West on the other side of the wall, probably getting off to the agony.

  Chapter Four

  There are a couple of ways I wake up. One is with Blue over me, between my thighs, thrusting inside me, my body slick, already prepared for him while sleeping.

  This morning I wake up with his tongue buried in my folds, legs spread wide. He swipes over my clit, and I moan, rocking up to meet him in sleepy undulations. My orgasm is swift and powerful, leaving me shaking and begging him wordlessly to stop.

  He gives me one more lick that has me gasping with too much sensation.

  Then he pulls himself up beside my collapsed body, his cock still hard. “Morning,” he says in that low sleep-roughened timbre.

  I can only sigh out a response and hope it sounds coherent.

  He strokes my breasts, plucking at my nipples, playing with them idly. “I was thinking, since West has to go to the club today and he doesn’t have a car yet, maybe you can go with him. Show him around a little.”

  Even in my drowsy, sex-drenched state, I have to laugh. “You’re just saying that because you have a meeting across town.”

  I go back to the Grand on the regular because my best friends are there. Well, mostly Candy. Blue isn’t a fan of my trips there, and he usually finds an excuse to visit the club on those days so he can watch over me. The men who work for him run security in the club, and they do a great job, so it’s completely safe.

  He shrugs. “Better than me pulling up the security cameras from the Grand when I’m in the middle of a meeting.”

  “That’s a little creepy.”

  “A little,” he says. “But damned if I’ll trust those assholes with you.”

  Any annoyance I might have had melts away. It says something about how much he trusts West that he would let him be a substitute guardian for when he’s not around. But then, last night said something about how much he trusts his friend too.

  He trusts him with me, and that makes me feel strangely precious. “Fine, I’ll take West. But it’ll be awkward for the both of us.”

  He pushes up and studies me. “You sorry about last night?”

  I can’t help that my cheeks heat. Damn, have I regressed? Actually I’ve been taking my clothes off for boys for about as long as I can remember. It was a survival mechanism when I grew up in a shitty part of Tanglewood, bounced around in the foster care system like a pin ball. Maybe this is some kind of delayed shame mechanism, now that I don’t need to expose myself to live.

  “Not sorry,” I say slowly. Because I’m not. And I can’t deny that it excited me, that I was a little extra wet to be watched. “West is a good guy. He didn’t make me feel…cheap.”

  Darkness flickers behind Blue’s eyes. “I want to smash the face of every man who ever made you feel cheap. Except I’m one of them, aren’t I?”

  Cheap would be too simple for what he makes me feel. Hungry and humble. Beautiful and raw. “It’s not like that. I guess I just…”

  He waits like he’d wait forever for me to speak, patient and still. “What, baby?”

  “I guess I just don’t know where I stand. With you and him. With this place.”

  “Fuck.” Before I can blink, he pulls me into a tight hug, all the air pushed from my lungs—and I wouldn’t drag it back for the world. This is what I want, to be wrapped up tight. This is what I need, to know he won’t let go. “I’m a fucking asshole if I ever let you doubt it for one second. You’re with me. That’s where you stand. He’s my friend, and if we want to have some fun with him, that’s fine. There’s not a chance in hell that can come between us, got it?”

  My heart is pounding. “It’s just…you didn’t tell me about him staying here. You told me after the fact. I don’t mean to sound ungrateful but…well, even the doorman knew to let him up.”

  There’s utter silence while I hold my breath. His expression is hard, unforgiving. Then it cracks like granite—and underneath, I see remorse and a painful hint of uncertainty. As if he isn’t sure I’ll forgive him. “You’re right. I should have told you. No, I should have asked you. I’m sorry.”

  I shrug, feeling uncomfortable in the face of his genuine apology. I’ve never really been apologized to before. No one’s cared enough to do that until Blue. “It’s okay. I mean, it’s not really my place.”

  “It is, damn it.” He runs a hand through his hair, frustrated. “This is your place as much as mine now. I just got too set in my bachelor ways, and West feels so much like family that I guess I didn’t realize he wouldn’t be for you.”

  I make a face. “Hopefully not too much like family, considering.”

  He gives me a wry look. “And just so we’re clear, you have nothing to be grateful for. You’re here because I want you here. If you wanted to leave, I’d do everything in my power to get you to stay. In fact, it’s probably best we don’t get into details, because it might qualify as more than a little creepy.”

  My heart gives a thump. Maybe that would scare off some girls, but I’m not like them. I’ll never have their kind of blind confidence, not after what I’ve seen. I’ve been shuffled around and shoved out of so many places, I barely know what it’s like to sit still. The Grand was th
e closest thing I had to a stable environment—and even I know how pathetic that is. Having a man tell me he’d do anything to keep me means more than a hundred sweet whispered words.

  I climb onto his lap, feeling his hard cock against my thigh. “And if I want to stay?”

  “Even fucking better,” he murmurs, his gaze trained between my legs.

  Just a lift of my hips and he’s notched against my pussy. Large hands grasp me, holding me down. With a grunt, he pushes upward, hard cock splitting my slick skin. I moan against the invasion, struggle just enough to know I can’t get away.

  The glint in his eyes says he likes the fight, so I wriggle again. His hands tighten, ten points of pain along my skin. Then we roll, and he’s on top of me, thrusting inside me, fucking me into the bed until I can’t see anything but his face, can’t feel anything but his body. I’m wrapped up so tight I can’t imagine ever being free again—and he’s right, so right. It’s even fucking better this way, exactly where he wants me, exactly where I need to be.

  Chapter Five

  “Thanks for the ride,” West says.

  I hang a right at the street light. Blue’s condo is in the rebuilt part of Tanglewood, convenient to the glossy high-end shops and even the nursing home with Mrs. Owens. The strip malls grow a little darker, a little more run-down as we head toward the Grand. The club is on the cusp of downtown, between the new and the old—like the looking glass leading into a different world.

  “No problem,” I say after a pause. “And speaking of, Blue mentioned that you were planning to buy a car. We could take a look this afternoon if you want.”

  “That would be great.”

  And another awkward silence descends. Damn.

  We’d gotten along so well, but after last night…

  The farther we get from home, the more storefronts are boarded up, the more graffiti decorates the old brick. They’re from a time when buildings were made to last, and so they continue to stand, testament to a different era, reminders of all that we’ve lost. The Grand is one of the few places that can attract a crowd for several blocks, perverted and dark, but a revival just the same.

  I clear my throat. “Listen, about last night…”

  “I shouldn’t have stayed,” he says, sounding contrite.

  “Um, what?”

  “I knew I was intruding on personal time, and it wasn’t a great impression to make on you. On anyone, really, but especially you. It’s obvious how important you are to Blue, and that means you’re important to me too.”

  I chance a glance at him and find his expression completely earnest. “You know we knew you were there,” I say. “It wasn’t like we just started banging and you popped popcorn or something.”

  He grins, a little sheepish. “Maybe not, but I enjoyed every second of the show. But that doesn’t change the fact that I had met you only a couple days before then.”

  “I’ve taken my top off for complete strangers. As you’ll see when we get to the Grand.”

  “And they stayed strangers. I’m hoping to settle down here, which means I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable around me.”

  That’s kinda sweet. And strange. I’m not used to men trying to be honorable and shit. Even Blue took me for his own selfish reasons, something I continue to find hot. It’s nice being treated like I’m someone worth knowing, from a man who’s not trying to get me into bed. Well, assuming he’s not trying to get me into bed.

  “Thank you,” I say uncertainly, pulling into the parking lot.

  His watchful gaze takes in the landscape, from the bums peeking around the corner at my car to the dry, crumbling fountain in front of the club. Maybe another woman would be intimidated by it, but I worked here too long, was fed and protected by this place, to ever really fear it.

  “What do you think?” I ask, even though I’m nervous to hear the answer. Anything he says to condemn it would probably be true, but for some reason I want him to like it.

  I guess in the same way he wants me to like him.

  He steps out of the passenger side and leans on the car frame. I follow suit, my ballet flats crunching the gravel beneath me. It smells like gasoline and smoke and a faint sweetness that must be the anemic honeysuckle plant along the gate. No one ever waters it, but it refuses to die.

  “It’s stark,” he finally says. “And still somehow elegant. I’m trying to imagine Blue coming back from deployment to this and deciding to make it his home.”

  I raise my eyebrow. “Isn’t that what you’re doing?”

  He chuckles. “Sure enough. Though in this case I have you and Blue to ease the way.”

  My gut twists, knowing how uncertain he must be feeling. He looks confident on the outside, his stance sure, his gaze assessing. But I’ve seen him vulnerable and worried. It’s a kind of intimacy. I was the one with my nipples bared. I was the one who climaxed in front of him. But he let his guard down for me, and in some ways that must have been harder.

  “I’ll help you any way I can,” I tell him, and that’s a promise I intend to keep. Not just because he’ll be working at the Grand, which still holds a piece of my loyalty. But because there is an invisible string between us, tied to our vulnerability, strung taut through the man we both care about. Blue.

  Chapter Six

  “He’s hot,” Candy says.

  We’re sitting on the bar of the Grand, watching Oscar, the new head of security, show West the ropes. There are key cards and procedures. There are cameras, both hidden and in sight—though they’re only on the floor and the lobby. And there’s a shit ton of paperwork.

  I shrug, hoping I sound casual. “It’s the military walk. Confidence mixed with strength.”

  “That’s part of it. And the way he’s quick to smile. There’s not enough smiling around here.”

  There’s almost no smiling around here, at least not the real kind. Girls flash fake smiles, and the customers are too busy humping our legs to notice. Their legs, not mine. I have to remember I don’t work here anymore.

  And as for our fair leader, Ivan is severe. Harsh. I’ve definitely never seen him crack a smile. I’m not even sure he knows how.

  “You didn’t used to care about that,” I tell her.

  “I used to get high more,” she says, sounding wistful.

  “Well, I’m proud of you. It’s not easy to kick the habit.”

  That earns me a smirk. “I figured I’d try out the good girl angle for a little while. Like you.”

  I have to laugh. “Like me? You must have me confused with someone else.”

  “Really,” she says, drawing out the word. “So you were out with me every night, drinking and shooting up and—”

  “You know I wasn’t.”

  “Proved my point. People may have taken one look at us and judged—believing my white lace and your red lipstick, but that was never the truth.”

  I’m blushing now, for reasons I can’t explain. “But it was the truth, at least about me. The things I’ve done—”

  “Putting out so you didn’t get raped?”

  My eyebrows go up. “Excuse me?”

  “Don’t sugar coat. Not with me. That’s what happened. You did what you have to do to survive, just like Blue did while he was overseas. There’s no shame in that.”

  Shame has weighed me down my entire life, so heavy it threatens to break apart the only thing I’ve ever valued. “You had your reasons,” I say, turning the tables.

  Her smile is dark, knowing. “Sure, I did.”

  “Reasons like…Ivan?” I ask, though it isn’t quite a shot in the dark. We’ve never discussed it, not in detail, but those two have been circling each other since I first got here.

  “He’s part of it,” she admits.

  I slant her a look. “Only part?”

  She seems offended. “You’re my best friend. I would have told you if we’d… you know.”

  “You mean you haven’t had sex?” Now I’m surprised. And even more surprised to hear her say we’re fr
iends at all. It’s not like her to admit it. “You always spent time with him in his office.”

  “Business,” she says, her cheeks turning faintly pink.

  I don’t quite believe her. They may have discussed business. I know she advocated for some of the girls who were too scared to speak to Ivan themselves. But I doubt that had been the only thing to ever happen down in that basement.

  “Candy,” I say.

  “Lola,” she says back, mocking, using my stage name instead of my real one. “Do you want to hear all my dirty secrets? Do you want me to confess?”

  The word comes out loaded. Confess. I wonder what’s under that word, if I could peel it back. I wonder what it means to her.

  I shake my head. “I’m no priest.”

  “Good,” she says, her voice hard. “Why are you here, anyway? Why do you keep coming back to this dump when you could be fucking that fine piece of man back home?”

  There’s that caustic little girl I know and love. “We come up for air occasionally. And anyway, I thought you might miss me. We’re best friends, you know.”

  She responds with a middle finger in the air, and I can’t help but smile.

  “Maybe I missed you,” I tell her.

  Her expression softens. Well, as much as it can for someone with perpetually huge anime blue eyes. She’s a walking, talking doll, dressed up in pink lace. “Of course I miss you. Things are changing around here, and I don’t think I’m ready for it.”

  My heart clenches. “I have a few things I’m not ready for myself.”

  “Let me guess… One of those things is five foot ten of hot ex-military man.”

  There’s something in her voice, almost like she knows something. “Blue is six-two.”

  She smiles. “I didn’t mean him.”

  My face gets hot. “Well, you better mean him. He is the only ex-military hot guy I’m doing. Or any other guy, for that matter.”

  “Of course.” Her voice has gone completely singsong, proving she doesn’t believe me a second.