Take the Heat: A Criminal Romance Anthology Read online

  She was certain he was addressing her, but Manuel answered as he stood and turned, “Fuck, yes.”

  Dev applied the lube he’d retrieved from his bag and gripped the other man’s hips. With a few prods of his cock, Dev seated himself to the root. They shuddered in unison.

  Their position, she realized, was for her vantage. The profiles and curvature of their muscular bodies rolling as one set off an explosion of sensations through her body. The pounding beat of desire concentrated between her legs and spread outward, shivering over her belly and tightening her nipples. Her breasts felt heavy and full, jogging with the heave of her chest.

  Manuel pulled on his dick in desperate jerks, and Dev controlled the pace of their rocking, lips tracing the rigid lines of Manuel’s shoulder. It was beautiful and erotic, and her body responded as if she were there between them, bowing and trembling and glistening with sweat. Her lungs labored to keep up.

  Two pairs of eyes roamed her face, then narrowed on the spasmodic flex of her cunt. She yanked at the tethers, needed her hands to assuage the chaos of pulsations assaulting her pussy. She ground her ass against the bed, sliding in the wet spot.

  “She wants us to fuck her.” Manuel accelerated the slapping motion of his fist, his head turning to capture Dev’s mouth. They licked aggressively, lips spread wide, tongues warring and flicking.

  Dev broke the kiss, met her eyes. “Do you want Manuel to fuck you?”

  Sweat dampened her lip and forehead. Her pulse roared in her ears. Fuck, she was burning with the need for Dev to touch her, to pump his fingers in and out and massage that place that would release her from this urgency.

  “Remove her gag.” Dev slid a hand over her thigh, and the heat from his skin licked a fiery path along her slit. She clung to the lust in his eyes and the noisy gasps stumbling from his lips.

  When Manuel pulled the towel from her mouth, she was mindless, hips circling in the air, empty, so fucking empty. “Please tell me you’re not gay.”

  A sensual smile tipped the corners of his mouth, and he thrust his hips, curling his fingers inside her. “Horny, Joni.”

  Arrgh. She needed to reestablish the lines, remind him she was Internal Affairs and they would both be arrested, but that wasn’t what came out. “Fuck me. Please, I want you to fuck me.”

  “Me or him?” Dev rotated his pelvis against the arch of Manuel’s ass and traced two fingers around the opening of her pussy.

  Every minute movement was a jolt of electricity. “You. I want you. Deeper.” She lifted her ass, tried to grind her folds against his touch. “Please, Dev.”

  His fingers tunneled in, slipping to the knuckles, launching her higher, higher, toward the precipice. Waves of pleasure built, strengthening with each stroke along her inner muscles. The tang of her arousal chased her inhales. Moisture seeped around his hand and leaked down the crack of her ass. Just a few more thrusts—

  The fingers vanished, returning to Manuel’s hip.

  “No, please.” Beyond the edges of her desperation whispered a scolding voice, Stop begging. She didn’t care. She didn’t want him to reach his crest with that man. She balled her hands and lowered her chin and her voice. “Fuck me, Dev.”

  He pressed his lips against Manuel’s nape, and for an ice-cold second, she thought he’d rejected her. He raised his hand and smacked the man’s ass. “Consider your debt paid.” He pulled out and discarded the condom.

  The pressure swelling her sex and the rope holding her down were a combined hell. As Manuel dressed, she jerked and pulled on the restraints until Dev crawled between her legs, his shoulders pressed against her thighs. She tumbled into the steel cage of his eyes, and his grip on her waist told her he was teetering on an equally tortured edge.

  He lowered his head and circled his tongue around her clit. Silk and heat. Wet and desire. She devoured that first touch of his mouth on her sensitive flesh. The movements were slow, controlled, propelling her to the top of the tide where her release gathered, waiting for a spectacular crash.

  The door slammed shut, and Dev sat on his heels, leaving a chill in the absence of his mouth. “I need to wash up. Be right back.”

  “No, wait.” She didn’t want to be alone with her thoughts. Didn’t want a single second to doubt.

  He disappeared behind the bathroom door, the fucking sadist. The whoosh of the faucet filtered through the room. Was he purposefully giving her time to cool down?

  She closed her eyes, her body thrumming for relief. If his aim was to show her the thin and perilous line between seduction and coercion, he’d succeeded. He’d violated a number of laws to seduce her, and his approach could very well be considered coercion through compulsion and duress.

  When she opened her eyes, he was standing at the foot of the bed, jaw loose, abs contracting, his cock long and hard in his hand. Her pulse raced.

  In the next heartbeat, he was on her, straddling her waist, eating at her mouth. His whiskers scratched her chin as he dragged his lips over hers. The steel bar of his erection slid a trail of fire along her belly.

  His hands framed her face, and he kissed with such ardor, the whip of his tongue so relentless and consuming she felt it in every fiber of her body. Her blood heated, grateful and greedy, as she tried to match his pace. He reached for the cuffs on her wrists, her arms pulled free, the intensity of his kisses unyielding.

  Then he raised his head, mouth puffy and wet and worry lines creasing the corners of his eyes. He slid backward and flicked the quick release on each of her ankles.

  She lifted her hands, pulled her legs together, the pang of reality slamming into her chest. She was free. Was that it? He was done with her?

  He knelt on the edge of the bed, an unreadable expression softening his prominent jaw. “Whatever you decide to do, I have no regrets. Watching you soar to such a glorious high was worth the consequence.”

  Whatever she decided to do? Her swollen lips tickled at the edges, and she leaped on him, squeezing her thighs around his hips. He landed on his back, his hands skidding over her breasts, their mouths locked in desperation. His urgency burned hers to an unbearable fever.

  She curled her fingers around his steel length and rasped, “Condom.”

  He pointed at his duffel bag even as his cock prodded her opening.

  Fuck. The separation from his body heat was torture, but she returned swiftly, unrolling the latex with trembling hands. By the time she climbed atop him, he was flexing his ass and fucking the air between them.

  Hovering above him, her smile caught in the bite of her teeth, she lined up her body and slid down his length. The exquisite stretch of his girth bowed her back and swallowed her thoughts, her oxygen, her entire world.

  He let out a groan. “Fuuuuck, Joni.” The hot grip of his hands covered her ass, controlling the movement of her hips as he rocked himself inside of her.

  The powerful strokes of his cock spiraled a frenzy of sensations through her. She leaned forward and curled her tongue into his mouth, reaching deep, trying to consume him, to own him, but he took over.

  He was ravenous, working his tongue against hers, furiously licking, sucking, devouring her lips. He kneaded her breasts, his balls slapping against her ass with each ruthless thrust. Her head swam in mindless pleasure. They were passion and fire, wanton and reckless. She was undone.

  The coil of tension in her pussy unraveled, firing sparks through her body and flexing her toes. She threw her head back and let it go. “Ahhhh, Dev. I’m coming. Oh God. Fuck, fuck, fuck…”

  As her shoulders continued to hitch and shudder, he flipped her to her back and fucked her hard and fast. A moment later, he shouted through his climax.

  They collapsed on their sides, face-to-face, breathing noisily, sharing sated smiles. He drew her to his chest, and within a few minutes, his eyes drifted closed and his breathing deepened.

  She stretched to the side of the bed that met the wall, and retrieved her handcuffs from beneath the mattress.

  Eyes clo
sed, he murmured, “You’re unlawful in bed, Joni.”

  She looked at the cuffs in her hand, looked at his confident, sleepy face, and grinned.

  Slipknot

  Sheri Savill

  Leather. Sexy and tight. Perfect. Yep, this is the one. This is the one I’m taking.

  Mia took a deep breath and, in one smooth move, rolled and tucked the metal hanger—and the soft black leather miniskirt still clipped to it—into her black shoulder bag. Right over the open zipper and down into the gaping hole at the top of the purse, all without a hitch.

  Thank God the fucking price tag didn’t catch on the zipper track.

  Once it was all pushed down inside the darkness of her purse, she rested the crook of her elbow over the opening again, for extra camouflage, in case prying eyes should happen to look too closely as she left the shop. Four hundreds dollars’ worth? Really? The tiny skirt was easy enough to conceal. It was an obscene price for a leather mini, anyway, she rationalized. Even for a skirt as sexy and well-made as this one, that was too much money. She could smell the richness of fine leather wafting from the other skirts still on the rack in front of her as she glanced sideways again. All quiet. Not a soul in the shop but her and the guy behind the counter. And he was still gone.

  God, that was really just too easy.

  She felt her lips pursing together a little in spite of herself, barely suppressing her self-satisfaction. Still, no reason to be cocky. She’d planned this carefully enough in advance. Stupid thieves were always being caught because they didn’t think things through, or they became too brazen, too greedy. The news was full of dumb criminal stories. She’d resolved not to be one of them.

  Mia shifted her weight a little in her black heels and then took a few small steps down the aisle toward the ball gags, crops, hoods…glancing sideways again toward the cash register, now bathed in the soft greenish glow of a banker’s lamp on the counter. The dimmer-than-usual lighting meant that Flesh Factory—the largest kinky sex emporium and BDSM equipment supplier in the city—was empty, about to close for the night, which was exactly what she had counted on. But even as the last customer of the day, she’d taken no chances and sent the lone employee—friendly, handsome, ever-so-helpful “Michael”—on an errand to the stockroom to check for fence-net thigh-highs she knew he wouldn’t find. They didn’t even carry them anymore. She knew the stripper-wear section well and pretty much owned one of everything they sold by now.

  She continued to pretend to browse, exhaling another slow breath. It was exciting, breaking the law. She’d done it. And now the leather skirt was hers. All that was left to do was make a hasty yet friendly exit shortly after Michael returned, apologetic and empty-handed, from the goose chase she’d sent him on.

  The short, low-cut white dress she’d worn tonight—no bra, of course—had been extra insurance that she’d have his cooperation. The idea was to disengage his brain while engaging his cock, and she’d noted earlier, with pleasure, that her chosen outfit had indeed done just that. The bulge in Michael’s jeans confirmed it more than once, even before she’d made a point of bending to examine sale items set on a low shelf. Oh, but men were so easily entranced, so easily guided. And she knew now that her bare pussy and the twin curves of her ass just peeking from under the tight white fabric of her dress had done the trick with Michael. Plus it just made her feel sexy and like a bad girl; the playful exhibitionist side of her submissive tendencies, she supposed, now helping her steal a skirt.

  Her thoughts snapped back to the present. A voice. Michael’s.

  “Sorry…Mia, was it? Looks like we don’t even carry those anymore. I can call the supplier tomorrow, if you want, and see if we can special order them. That could take a few weeks, though. You probably don’t want to wait…” He shrugged and turned a key in the register, locking it for the night.

  She smiled at him.

  “Oh no…Michael. Sorry for the trouble. I just thought—”

  He was still aroused, his erection huge and straining in his jeans, and he was making no effort to hide it now. He’d come around the counter and was looking her up and down, his dark eyes taking in her nipples, the corners of his mouth turning up, approving. His eyes then moved down to her long tanned legs in the black heels.

  “Love the white dress.”

  “Thanks. Look, it’s late and I’ve already kept you from closing up on time. I gotta get going. But thanks again for checking on the fence-net stockings.” Her elbow squeezed the shoulder bag in closer to her body as she turned toward the exit. Another rush of satisfaction flooded her. She’d just scored a premium leather miniskirt and was about to walk right out the door with it and leave a hunky guy with a huge hard-on.

  “You have a good night, then,” she heard his husky voice calling behind her. The red neon of the “open” sign in the front window flickered a little, buzzing, and then went black. Maybe he couldn’t wait to get her out of the store. Probably wants to jerk off.

  Her hand closed around the doorknob when she sensed someone moving up quickly behind her. Before she could turn, a large hand encircled her throat as an arm clamped around her belly, pulling her backward. It happened so fast.

  A deep male voice—not Michael’s—breathed into her ear.

  “Where the fuck do you think you’re going?”

  * * *

  She went limp. And aphasic. Unable to summon even a fight-or-flight response. Blurry edges of thoughts flashed and then retreated. The hand around her throat allowed her to make a low, garbled noise, but she couldn’t scream. This was real; this was happening. She felt a second set of strong arms grab at her arm. The purse was ripped away from her, sent flying.

  If they had a knife, she never saw it. Her feet dragged in the high heels, struggling to find solid ground as two men moved her across the floor like an awkward piece of furniture. The pain of their bruising grips kept her gasping, even as instinct for survival told her to yield. A new rush of fear exploded in her as she felt a cold rush of air—the white dress shoved up her thighs, way up. Her bare pussy and ass were exposed and vulnerable.

  “Fucking thieving little slut doesn’t even bother to wear panties. I’ve had to watch this cunt for an hour, putting on a show in the front.” Michael’s voice. His tone told her this wasn’t just about the theft of the skirt.

  A door swung open, and she was shoved through the threshold and into a dim room she assumed was the stockroom—the same room she’d sent Michael to earlier while she’d swiped the skirt. She stumbled across slick dark tile, tripped in the heels, and fell to her knees. She crawled a few feet to a wall, instinctively, as if cowering near a vertical surface would somehow shield her from them. She looked out at the two men who hovered near her, feeling like a cornered animal. Their leering expressions unnerved her as much as the thought that she was now alone with them and out of range of any help. Who would hear her even if she did scream? Her purse was gone, left in the other room, the cell phone inside it. Her breath came in shallow pants, her chest rising and falling. She dipped her chin, lowering her eyes to look at the dark tile before her, focusing on her breathing, trying to calm herself, to think. She’d try to talk her way out of this.

  “Fuck you. You can’t prove shit!” she spat, looking up at both men. Fear made her go on the defensive and spew bravado—or at least what she hoped passed for such. What the fuck did they want with her? So she’d swiped a skirt. Big deal. These guys didn’t exactly look like they’d walk a grandmother across a busy intersection. Why didn’t they just call the cops? She could explain it all. It was a misunderstanding. A big misunderstanding.

  The second man’s eyes narrowed. “I’d shut up and do as you’re told if I were you, you shoplifting slut. You’re going to pay for that skirt you stole now. Just not…in cash.”

  Even in the semidarkness she could see that he was strikingly handsome. Dark shoulder-length hair and a goatee, a muscular lean frame that had to be at least six foot three. His veined forearms were covered with black
and gray ink. Both men were fumbling with buttons at the waistbands of their jeans and moving toward her.

  Oh God.

  Mia squinted, still trying to get her bearings. Her gaze fixed on an object just a few feet from her, centered in the amber of a small spotlight mounted on a crossbeam above it: a heavy polished wooden bench of some kind. Two vertical posts had thick metal cuffs dangling from each just a few inches from the floor. Spanning between the posts, at about waist height, was a black padded surface just wide enough for a human body to be folded over, ass out, bound and helpless. Mia’s pulse raced again.

  Lengths of rope, whips, canes, and every other kind of kinky implement imaginable were arranged on the dark painted walls and displayed on shelving. All organized, yes, but not packed or boxed or marked for sale. This wasn’t inventory. This was a working dungeon. She’d never seen so much kinky equipment in one room. Only in pictures on the internet. This was real. Mia’s eyes strained to adjust as a muted golden glow—sconces on the walls—came up slightly.

  “Let’s get this show going, Cade. I’ve had a hard-on for this bitch for an hour already.” Michael’s voice was hard-edged, quiet but strained. “I want her to suck my cock. Now.”

  “Good idea. I’m gonna handcuff this little whore.” Cade’s rough grip pulled her to her knees and spun her. She gasped as she felt metal grinding into the flesh of both her wrists, cutting into her skin. Then she heard a clicking sound as the cuffs tightened, binding her wrists together behind her. Pain radiated from her wrists as she tested the metal. No use.

  Both men walked around her, predators eyeing their prey before taking it as their own. They stopped in front of her, moving in closer to her face as they unzipped and freed their cocks. A hand reached down and brushed a thick strand of her blonde hair off her cheek, almost tenderly.

  “Open. Suck.” Michael’s voice was calm, but his hard cock shoved past her parted lips and into her mouth. She held still, unsure, hearing the roar of her blood rushing in her ears.

  “Don’t make me say it again.”