How precious did that Grace appear
the hour I first believed…
JHAY
Monday nights at Empty Cage were b-o-r-i-n-g. Very few customers came out to blow their dough on Mondays, so the strippers are usually found curled up in a booth, freezing from the air-conditioner, while watching the club entrance for the next lone customer who walked in so they could pounce on him.
I glanced over to the stairway leading up to Chad’s office. No sign of the boss’s goons. No sign of him. Maybe he was shaken up from dodging a bullet earlier in the day and wouldn’t bother showing up?
Sitting bored-out-of-my mind in a booth at the back of the club to shield off the chills from the blasting air-conditioner, feet pulled up and tucked beneath me, I yawned for maybe the hundredth time.
This chase was starting to debilitate me. After following Chad undetected for the past three weeks, I’d finally, finally gotten the perfect opening to take him out. My plan, everything, was fucking perfect. A clean takeout. I’d set up camp on the roof of a high-rise across the hotel building he was having a meeting in, had the clearest fucking shot of him, counted down to zero to pull the trigger…then some moron had jumped right in the fucking way.
Pissed, I’d fired anyway, if only to shoot the goddamn imbecile who thought his partner’s life was more valuable than his.
The brave thing to do was keep post and aim for another shot at him. The smart thing to do was Usain Bolt it from the scene.
I went with smart. Because Chad was, well, Chad. He was a fearless, ruthless demon, and if he’d gotten even a glimpse of his shooter, it wouldn’t have been pretty for me. He would’ve found me before I could even think to leave the country. And even if I did manage to escape him by the skin of my teeth, and ran back home without getting the job done, it still wouldn’t be pretty for me.
For one, The Voice didn’t take failures lightly. And two, I wouldn’t gain my freedom.
So, I ran, and decided to strike that down as another failed attempt at eradicating Chadrick Niiveux’s existence.
Hence I was back to square one. And I had no damn doubt it would only get harder from here on out, because now that someone had tried to lodge a bullet to his brain, he was likely going back to having no shadows or footprints.
See, over the past three weeks, all of a sudden, he’d developed a pattern; leaving traces, which made it easy as lying to trail him, easier for me to plan, know where he was going to be and at what time.
I’d found it strange at first, considering I’d been studying him for all of six months and had never once gotten that kind of opening. It almost seemed as if he was deliberately leaving himself open. And I didn’t question, didn’t hesitate. I saw the opening, I took it…
And I failed.
I wanted out of this life. But knew I’d never get an out unless I succeeded.
My nightly shivers were coming back. Since Sydney had left, I’d been sleeping by myself and the loneliness was haunting me. Driving me insane. For sex, I screwed around with the club girls, and ordered call-girls a couple of times.
Otherwise, I was stuck being alone. Feeling claustrophobic in my apartment, as sleek and spacious as it was. And, mentally, it was taking a toll on me.
Catching sight of the tall Indian stripper—the only one allowed up the stairway when Chad was at the club—approaching me, I uncurled my feet from beneath me.
This particular stripper watched me constantly—not in a sexual way—and she thought it wasn’t to my knowledge that she did. I long deduced she was a spy for Chad.
As she reached up to my booth, I straightened up and put my slut face on.
“Hey, Blood.”
I didn’t answer. Instead, I made a show of biting my lip and raking my eyes up and down her body. Though she wasn’t really my type. She was too lithe, too soft. I liked women who had a bit of firmness in the right places. But, hey, for all I knew she would probably be a better fuck than ‘my type’.
Around my height, she had extremely long, jet black Indian hair, dark eyebrows and even darker lashes. And to say her lips were full and sexy was an understatement. They were damn near eatable.
Indian Girl shifted in a wave of nervousness, watching me with careful eyes. “Um, I—”
“I’m bored and horny,” I cut in. “Let’s fuck in the back room.”
Eyes widening a small fraction, she quickly glanced around as though checking if anyone overheard our convo. Then she licked her lips, uneasy, bosom notably rising and falling heavily as a result of the change in pace of her heartbeat. “I’m sorry, I don’t do gir—”
Faster than she could think to defend herself, I shot up and grabbed her arm, twisted it behind her, then slammed her face-down on the leather-covered seat in the booth.
Stretching my body out along the back of hers, I swept her long mane over her shoulder and bit her lobe before whispering in her ear, “I don’t ask women to fuck me. I tell them to, and they just do it because they can’t fucking resist me. Like you won’t be able to, tonight.”
She wiggled beneath me with a muffled protest, but I kept my body over hers in a sturdy but passionate way to create the illusion to others who might be watching that we were making out. “What’s your name, pretty Indian?”
When she stubbornly didn’t answer, I pulled on her twisted arm and she yelped, but the club music was loud enough to drown it out.
“I asked you a fucking question.”
“Nadia,” she squealed into the seat. “My name’s Nadia.”
“Are you a spy for the boss?”
“No,” she said right off the bat.
I pulled her arm tighter. “Tell me the fucking truth. Are you a spy for the boss?”
She whimpered. “No.”
“Then why are you the only one allowed upstairs?”
Her answer was slow in coming this time. “I…have sex with him.”—Too late to be true—”We have an arrangement, and whenever he comes here, it’s only for me to fulfill his sexual needs.”
This was possibly the worst lie I’ve ever heard. But she was loyal to her boss, and I could tell no matter what I did, she would in no way spit out the truth about spying for him. Despite not attracting me physically, her loyalty flattered me. If I hadn’t already shot my chance by twisting her arm, I could’ve tried coaxing her to replace Sydney. Spy or no.
I released her arm, and she let out a loud exhalation, sagging beneath me. But I wasn’t done with her. I wanted her tonight.
Snaking my hand around to her pelvis, I urged her up until she was on her knees. Placing my palm flat on her stomach, I pressed her back against me and kissed across her shoulder blade.
When she didn’t protest or fight me off, but instead emitted a soft moan, I drifted my hand down her stomach and teased my fingertips along the edges of her lingerie bottom. Still, she didn’t fight me off, her breathing kicking up.
Recognizing a green light when I saw one, I dipped inside her lingerie bottom and was surprised to find her soaking wet.
Smiling at the discovery, I brought my mouth to her ear again. “So you’re a spy for the boss, and you secretly want me.”
She denied neither.
Slowly, gently, coaxingly, I licked up the side of her neck. I needed her to forgive me for hurting her, so I could steal her from under Chad, make her my new bitch. Piss him off. “You want me to take you in the back, don’t you, Nadia? You want to feel my mouth on you, kissing you, licking you, petting you?” As she opened her mouth to answer, I added, “The truth.”
The breath she drew in was frail and shaky as she answered, “Yes…but…”
“But what, Nadia?”
“The boss,” she breathed out in a heavy exhalation as I rubbed my fingers over her clit, and back. Over, and back.
“He sent me…He sent me for you…”
My fingers stopped working. Chad was here? “What?”
Trying to regain her composure, Nadia delivered the message less breathy this time: “He wants you to meet him in the Chill Room. He’s already there waiting for you.”
My heart pounded, hard, loud, and I felt the sudden urge to run. Fast. Because the pounding of my heart wasn’t from fear or fright. But from something else entirely. Something I couldn’t quite name yet. Something I didn’t understand. “W-why?”
“I don’t know.”
Shoving her down again, I flipped her over on her back and straddled her. She wasn’t scared this time, however. She was turned on, dazed. “You’re his spy. And I know the boss is a dangerous man. So tell me the truth. Am I in danger?”
Nadia’s eyes glazed over, her face nothing but a picture of sex and hunger as she watched my lips, hers parting.
“You want me to kiss you, Nadia?”
She nodded.
“Answer me with the truth and I will. Am I in danger?”
“No. You’re not.” She shook her head to emphasize. “You’re so very not.”
I didn’t keep my promise.
After making a quick trip to the dressing room to ditch my minuscule weaponries which would raise questions should I be frisked, leaving only my all-purpose knife tucked in my boot, I freshened up—don’t ask me why I was freshening up—and headed straight for the Chill Room upstairs.
The Chill Room was where the wealthier customers who came in groups and wanted to party privately, or have an unconventional business meeting—talking figures while a stripper rubs her tits in your face kind of unconventional—went whenever they dropped in at Empty Cage. The stairway to the Chill Room was on the opposite of the stairway to Chad’s office. And the strippers had no business climbing these stairs unless they were requested by the occupants of the Chill Room.
But I was requested, wasn’t I? By the boss himself.
I was shocked to find there were no securities standing guard outside the door. The hallway was ominously isolated, as a matter of fact, with only the thumping club music vibrating through the walls.
Stopping at the door, I took a deep, prepare-for-the-worst breath, before turning the doorknob.
Chad’s presence was tangible, commanding, dominating. Sitting upright on a long sofa banquette that stretched along the walls around the room, his feet were splayed apart, palms resting flat on his knees, shoulders squared, eyes staring straight at me.
He appeared so…kingly. Like he owned the damn universe.
It took a minute for my eyes to adjust, as the Chill Room was all red. Red walls with red, suede sofa banquette running along the walls, red carpeting and red lighting. And at a more intimate level, the music volume was lower than the rest of the club.
When my eyes adjusted to the all-red theme, I closed the door behind me. Quietly.
“Hello, Blood.” His voice was so fucking deceiving with its smooth, soothing, caressing waves. He was a monster. And a monster had no business sounding like that.
So unfair.
“You wanted to see me?” I said, skipping the fake pleasantries.
His smile broke through the red glow. White and blinding. And it reminded me of a slim sliver of light I used to chase in the dark when I was younger and imprisoned.
That white smile of his was…promising. It moved something inside me. It whispered words to my soul in a language my mind didn’t understand.
“You made me an offer. You forgot?”
There were things happening in my body now. Things only women made me feel. Not men. Men made me feel nothing but disgust.
But just like that night in the parking lot, I was being undermined and overpowered by these…things. Reason and purpose were being shoved out the back door, while insanity and irrationality snuck right in.
No. Fuck. No.
“That offer has long since expired.”
It wasn’t. That offer was never a part of my act; it was never fake. That offer was very real when I made it. An expiration date? What expiration date?
But it would be stupid of me to throw caution—and my freedom—out the door just to get fucked by the first and only man I’ve ever desired.
Head tilted to the side, that damned smile still on his face, he said, “Is it?”
“It very much is.” I turned to leave. “Now, if that’s all you called me here for, I’m just gonna g—”
He was faster than me. Like a vampire with super-speed, he was at the door before I could even open it. “Renew it,” he ordered.
My heart thudded. Once. Everything on pause. “What?”
“Renew the offer.”
I stared up at him. In this darkened red glow, his eyes seemed deadlier, his face harder, more frightening.
Beautifully frightening.
“No.”
Shoving his chest in my face, he brushed the back of his knuckles along my cheek. A touch so soft, so gentle, a sigh betrayed me, and my eyes fluttered closed.
I’ve never had a man touch me this gently before. The man who used to touch me, take me, was rough, abusive. He called me horrible names and yanked my hair. He bit into my skin and left me with temporary marks. Something to remember him by, he used to say.
Gentle, no. He was never gentle. Soft, no. He never was.
When I opened my eyes, Chad was watching me.
His eyes were no longer threatening, but warm. His face no longer frightening, but sympathetic, like he could somehow see my shame.
Irritated by this, I knocked his hand away from my face and tried to land him a punch with the other hand. But he caught my fist in his palm. Firm and easy. My other hand balled in a fist and swung up to punch the side of his head. And he caught that, too. Swift and easy.
Both my fists in his palms, I bent my right foot and aimed to knee him in the groin. But as smooth as the east winds, he shifted, and I missed.
That’s when I realized he’d let me beat him in the parking lot. Because I was no match for him. Silly me.
Crossing my forearms like a pirate’s sign, he spun me around and dragged me back against him, so my back was to his chest.
By this time, my chest was rising and falling in short heaves. But it wasn’t from the fight, and it wasn’t from fright. It was from want, need. It was because his body was so hard and hot behind mine. It was because he had an amazing scent. A mixture of male and musk, inevitability and destiny, love and war, answers and hopes. That scent, his scent, was spellbinding, convincing, coaxing.
And I sighed, letting my body relax, soaking it all up.
Chad hummed in approval, his chest vibrating with the sound. Uncrossing my arms, he brought them up and locked them around his neck.
As he trailed his fingers down my sides, I moaned and pushed back against him, feeling his erection, hard and probing.
I was so consumed. My mind foggy. Nothing but lust, desire and need. The dagger in my boot being a faraway reminder that I shouldn’t be doing this. Shouldn’t want this. That this was not the purpose of my being here.
But reason was hiding. Irrationality was upfront and personal. And I wasn’t going to stop.
In this moment, I wanted Chadrick Niiveux. Not dead, but alive. As alive as his cock behind me.
He was soft, and tender. And soft and tender was what I craved. His touches weren’t anything like I thought they would’ve been. His touches were different. They changed me. They changed my thoughts, my dreams. All I wanted to do was lose myself in him.
Lips dropping to my ear, his hot breath caressed my lobe as he said, “Renew the offer, Blood.”
And I did. Nodding easily, I told him, “Renewed.”
Before the word was fully out of my mouth, he spun me around and collided his hard, dissolute lips with mine.
Looping my hands up around his neck again, I pushed up against him and freely opened my mouth, letting him in.
Invited in, he entered, and roamed. Searched. Found. Stole. Invited in, he claimed, and owned.
This felt good. So good. So much better than in the parking lot. So much better than any other kisses I’ve ever had. This was the ultimate. This topped all. And all I could think was: I want more. So much more.
As if he could read my mind, Chad broke the kiss—much to my dismay—and swept me up off the ground. He carried me over to the sofa banquette and deposited me on my back, crowding down over me in the same flow. In no time, our lips were connected again.
His movements were sure and confident, like he knew just how badly I wanted him. Like he knew…everything.
Reaching a hand behind my neck, he tugged the strings of my costume bra and undid the knot. To help him get rid of it completely, I arched up my back and he reached behind me again and pulled the strings there, too, tossing the bra aside.
My nipples were hard and hot, like lava rock.
With hooded eyes, Chad studied my breasts for several heartbeats before reaching up to cup them in his hands, his thumbs and forefingers twisting my pink nipples. “You’re so fucking perfect.”
I didn’t know what to say to that except, “You’re gonna hurt me?”
Movements paused, he raised his eyes to mine, and, for a while, we just stared at each other.
I was patient for his answer. I needed to know this would feel good. I needed to know he wouldn’t hurt me, force me, or bruise me like Mr. D used to. I needed to know I could trust him…with my body.
“Never,” he said at last. And this was an answer I knew wasn’t too late to be true. Because I felt every bit of truth and promise behind it.
Never, he promised.
I would, though. Oh, how I would hurt him.
Nonetheless, he didn’t return the question, so there was no need for me to lie to his face and promise him I wouldn’t hurt him either.
Squirming from the heavy ache between my thighs, I undulated beneath him, arching up, begging him to put his mouth on me.
Obliging, he lowered his head and sucked a nipple into that sinful mouth of his. And I let out a sound somewhere between a growl, a grunt, and a groan. Far from ladylike.
This moment was… I could not believe I was willingly giving myself over to a man. How did this happen? I came here to assassinate this man, and here I was writhing hotly beneath him like some desperate slutbag.
Skillfully, his tongue made swirls around my nipple, while his hand kneaded the other. But I wanted more. Just…more. My mind was like a blank slate, with only one word floating around.
More.
More.
Heatedly possessed, I reached between us and began undoing his shirt buttons with a feverish impatience. To help me out, he drew up and doffed the shirt, tossing it in the same direction as my costume bra.
Hard, defined, and deeply inked, his chest left me with my mouth hanging. Tattoos I couldn’t make out in the dark crept around from his back onto his abdomen, some crawling down both his arms. I tried to avoid looking at the silver chain around his neck. My mother had given it to him. And it’d become a part of his skin; he never took it off. Ever.
I wanted to touch his pectorals, but he didn’t give me the chance to admire him as he lowered back down and plunged his tongue in my mouth. Kissing me harder this time.
With ginger fingers, I reached up and touched his pectorals. He felt good. His skin taut and warm. Getting braver, I opened my palms and smoothed them down to his abs.
Being like this with a male, so sensual, was all new for me. Why did it feel so damn good to touch him?
Chad snuck his hand down my costume bottom, finding me wet and eager.
A moaned slipped from my mouth and straight into his when his long fingers slid back and forth in experienced and adept motions over my swollen, slippery clit.
“So fucking ready for me,” he hissed against my lips, a flow of air rushing through his nostrils.
Wasn’t so sure about that. My body might be ready yeah, but my mind wasn’t. Because as we drew closer, as our bodies got hotter, as much as I needed this, I could feel the panic coming on.
Slow and deliberate, Chad slid a finger inside me and I slipped into another world. His finger was longer, thicker, more stimulating than a woman’s. His finger was there, so gentle, stroking me in no rush, but taking his delicate time to make me feel.
Then it was gone, and he was pushing up onto his knees. Feeling cold at the loss of his big, warm body shielding over mine, I shifted a little, and focused to see he was just undoing his belt buckle. Not abandoning me. In no hurry, at his own pace, he undid his pants and shoved them down his hips.
Apparently he wasn’t an undergarment kind of man, because he was commando as his cock stood erect; long, thick, and curved towards his abdomen. And he was hairless in this area. Completely clean-shaven. A gasp escaped me. I couldn’t help it, because, hell, could he get any hotter?
A stark contrast to the big, disgusting Mr. D who I was forced to take inside me.
Chad’s cock was larger, stiffer, with veins trailing in crooked lines up to the underside of his very red head—red and shiny and…suckable.
This was such a different experience. So different. His cock didn’t repulse me, didn’t make me feel afraid. Actually, I was giddy to know what it felt like.
Reaching out, I touched it with tentative fingers. It was so hard, yet soft. So venous, yet smooth.
“You like it?” he asked, a sprinkle of amusement in his voice. No doubt amused at how I was staring at the thing like it was something magical.
To show him how much I liked it, I braced up on my elbows and licked his engorged red head, resisting the urge to suck the whole thing in my mouth.
Taking a condom from his pocket, he eyed me scrutinizingly, then asked, “You ever done that before?”
No I haven’t. Have I sucked a lot of pussies? Yep. Have I ever sucked a cock? Nope.
This was new, Chaddy Chad. All new.
Lying back down, I replied, barely a badass, “No questions allowed, boss.”
Heeding, with no more words, he just watched me as he tore the packet open and rolled on the condom, smooth and leisurely. As though he came to some sort of conclusion, his eyes narrowed a little as he asked, “How many men have you ever been with, Blood?”
One. And it was by force. Always by force.
“I’m a damn stripper. Why don’t you take a guess?” I snapped. “And I said easy on the fucking questions. You’re ruining the mood.”
“You shouldn’t swear.”
Says the cold-blooded murderer. “Fuck me.”
“I will.”
“Now.”
Still with the wordless watching, the studying, his face was so goddamn unreadable it was maddening.
Grasping his cock, he fixed it at my core, then paused and locked our eyes, just in time to catch me sucking in a short, panicky breath.
I wanted this. I really did. But I was scared to bits and pieces, and fighting hard not to let Chad’s shrewd eyes discover this. Folding my lips, I tried to mask it off, meeting his stare square on.
He said, “You’re a tough girl, Blood, and you got a lot of talk. But I can see right through your veneer.”—He pushed in an inch, and I winced.—”I’m gonna let you own me tonight. I’ll start slow, and you’ll control how it goes from there. The increments, the momentum, it’s all your call, okay? So you don’t have to be afraid.”
“Your instincts are off. I’m not afraid,” I lied.
But he didn’t call me out on the fib, he just inched into me, little by little. And I held my breath, concentrating on the feel of him filling me.
Nothing like with Mr. D. No, that man would’ve rammed into me with a great force. Tear me open in pain more than pleasure.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I tried shutting out all the memories of the past, and focused on this new, addictive feeling. This so good, so different feeling.
Filling me to the capacity, Chad paused and commanded, “Open your eyes, Blood. Look and see that it’s me. It’s no one from your past. I’m not gonna hurt you.”
But I kept them closed, because I knew who he was. And he was someone from my past. And he did hurt me once. He took everything from me. And here I was letting him fuck me. How fucking sick was this?
Yet I couldn’t talk sense into my brain. This man consumed me. He made me want more…more of everything.
“Blood, open your eyes, look at me, and believe me.”
This time, I did. I opened my eyes and looked up at him, and once again, I felt the truth. He wasn’t lying. He wouldn’t hurt me.
But it didn’t matter, because I would hurt him.
After all this, I would have to kill him.
“Move,” I ordered.
“How?”
“Slow.”
He moved. Flexing his hips backwards then pushing back into me, picking up a steady rhythm. It was fucking heavenly. To have a man inside me and was actually enjoying it, was something I never believed possible.
Wrapping my arms around his neck, and my booted legs around his waist, I thrust up my hips and whispered, “A little faster. A little harder.”
Chad obeyed, clamped his mouth down on mine and fucked me as I directed, making me feel tingle and belly-swirls that I’ve never felt before. His cock was huge and potent inside me. Driving me up a mountain I’ve never climbed before.
So good. So fucking good.
As unprecedented pleasure reared up within me, I panted in short bursts of breath, “Harder, Chad. Faster. This feels…This feels…”
With a pleasing groan, Chad leaned up and unwrapped my legs from around his waist, pressing them down to my chest. “It feels what, Blood?”
“Really good.”
“Just ‘really good’?”
My hips rolled. “Please, come back inside.”
Once again, his smile brightened the room. Like my silver lining of light. He thrust back inside me, and as I asked for it, he gave it.
Harder.
And faster.
He was fucking me for me. Not for himself. I could tell by the way his dark, observing eyes watched me. I wanted him to enjoy it. Because this may be the first and last time we ever get to fuck.
Yet at the same time, I couldn’t stop to make sure he enjoyed it, because my joints were seizing, and my vision was transforming into nothing but a burst of stars, my mind obliterated of everything and all things.
Then my mouth tore open as broken screams flew through it, my whole body stiffening and juddering at the same time.
This was a different kind of orgasm than an orgasm stimulated through the clitoris. This was more intense. More crippling. More joint-numbing. And I enjoyed every fucking second of it.
I could feel my muscles clenching around Chad’s big cock.
“So tight…” he groaned, pumping into me over and over, keeping my legs pressed to my chest. “It’s almost hard to believe…”
I wouldn’t tell him that it was because a cock hadn’t been inside me since I was sixteen, or that toys were prohibited in my girl-to-girl fuckings.
He didn’t need to know the reason behind my tightness.
A feral noise erupted from him, and he threw his head back and came with a stiffening force. His tatted, ripped body plus the veins bulging in his neck made him look like a glorious beast bathed in red sunlight.
Drained and enervated, with a weight so great, he slumped down on top of me and pressed his face into my neck, his breathing sharp-edged.
Sated, and still on a euphoric high, I brought my hands up and raked them through his hair in a tender way I knew I shouldn’t. I kissed his shoulder in a passionate way I knew I shouldn’t. I let myself enjoy him in a selfish way I knew I shouldn’t.
I shouldn’t.
I shouldn’t.
But I couldn’t help it.
Killing him…killing him was going to be hard.