I was halfway to the cabin when my phone rang, jolting already overstimulated nerves and a sense of urgency that had me lead-footing the gas. I eased back and pulled off the road, irritated that what I needed most would have to wait a little longer. It sure as fuck wouldn’t wait until Friday night… I fumbled for my phone and answered without looking.

“Chase,” Sutton’s voice was too close, too smooth. “So how was she?” he asked. “And why the fuck didn’t you set a wager on her?”

“I’m not in anymore, and you know it,” I said, clenching my jaw. “What the fuck were you doing, anyway? Watching us from the goddamned window?”

“From the street, actually,” he answered casually, undisturbed by my outburst. “Right across from the workplace and in broad daylight… I’d have put down fifteen thousand against, all on my own. If I hadn’t gone for her myself…”

“Fuck you, Sutton,” I shot back, well beyond simple anger now. “I’m not competing and she’s not a fucking pick. Not for me...and sure as hell not for you.” I only just managed to keep my voice down. “You leave her the fuck alone. In fact, leave us both the fuck alone.” I could hear his soft laugh as I spoke. And just before I hung up on him, I heard him answer back.

“I’ll see you at the party, Chase,” he laughed, the confidence in his voice more infuriating than I could bear. I threw the phone onto the seat behind me and ground the gas, leaving black rubber on the road and a cloud of dust behind me.

* * *

By the time I got home, the rage I’d aimed toward Sutton had turned inward and was a slow and steady burn in the center of my chest. I’d fucked up by touching Emily and I knew it. Worse still, it had only stirred the embers I’d been trying to extinguish for more than a year. One touch of the sweetness waiting between her thighs had my need for her raging out of control. I’d been seconds from giving in, from sliding into the van beside her and leaning in to taste her the way I needed to. It had taken everything in me to stop when she’d pulled away. Even when I knew damned well that she deserved so much better…

I tossed down a cold beer in two long swallows and headed out into the fading twilight. “I was right, wasn’t I, Emi,” I said out loud, watching the tall tops of the trees sway gently overhead. “You’re still innocent to all this… no matter how it excites you in the moment. But you need a man who can give you what you need… Deep and lasting and meaningful. Not a fast, hard fuck in the back of a goddamned van.”

But even as I said the words, my cock stiffened at the image. The fact that she’d stopped me, right on the edge of a climax that would have left her ready and shaking had only excited me more. She was a delicious, fucking challenge like I’d never experienced before. And the challenge was as powerful and erotic a factor in the game as any other…

I unzipped my confining jeans, finally free to give my painful cock the room it needed. Getting Emily so close to climax had done the fucking same to me. The cool air hit my hot flesh like a touch and my muscles clenched… my cock bobbed heavily, insisting on release.

I knew I had to stop whatever was happening between me and Emi in its tracks, before it got dangerously out of hand. Oh, I could still have dinner with her on Friday, but not at the club where I’d intended to take her… with a crowded dance floor and dozens of dimly lit seating areas. It was almost too easy to fuck a girl there. No, I’d bring her up here to the cabin instead. It would be a real chance to start fresh with her… a chance to get to know her, instead of just a chance to get inside her. The sick truth was, that she’d be less of challenge to me here, with the two of us alone together. It had always been easier for me to resist a woman when the thrill of getting caught was gone. It was like I’d always wanted the danger of being seen, more than I’d actually wanted the woman herself. It was fucked up, I knew, but I needed that excitement… And Sutton was counting on it, to lure me back in. He’d made a point of targeting Emi, no doubt because he wanted her, but mostly to ensure that I showed the night of his party. He was using her, as a gauntlet to throw down in front of me.

I’d been watching him for the last year, as he ramped up… taking bigger and bigger risks. I was dead sure he had a night planned that would take even his extremes to the extreme. He would force me to attend, if only for damage control. Because even when I’d been in the game, it had always been me drawing the final lines, calling it over, when the risk was too great. But Sutton had made it personal now. He knew I wanted Emily… and he wanted her too.

I peeled off my shirt, in spite of the chilling air, and sat down in an old wooden Adirondack. I spread my legs out on either side and my naked rod stood straight, wet on its huge dark head, waiting… waiting…

The last of the seasons crickets chirped lazily in the silence, as I tried to sort the riot of emotions inside me. Somewhere deep down, I knew that my first priority had to be keeping Emily safe from the Competition. If I couldn’t talk her out of taking the job, I’d have to show up at the party to keep Sutton at a safe distance. Sorting out whatever other feelings I was having would just have to wait. But it frightened me, more than I cared to admit even to myself… because no matter how determined I was to keep Emi safe, I wasn’t entirely sure if the greatest danger came from Sutton… or from me. Or how much of the desire I felt was simply the longstanding habit of competing for the win… But so long as I just didn’t touch her again, what did it matter…?

So I just imagined leaning down under the tablecloth… at the club on Friday night. It was a fantasy that I could never fulfill, but still, I could almost see her, almost feel her creamy smooth thighs under my palms as I knelt under the table, hidden from everyone but her. I would spread her sweet thighs apart and ease her little panties down to the floor. While she watched the dancers on the floor and struggled to keep a sweet look of innocence on her face, I would pull her hips to the edge of the seat and use my mouth to open her up to me. She would taste of honey and spice as I licked up every drop of her sweet desire…

I wrapped a hand around my rigid cock and pounded myself to a climax that emptied me. Every spasm, every rhythmic pulse heightened my sense of her… until I was sure I could feel her, sure I could taste her. No matter how wrong I was for her, I wanted every thick jet to be coming inside her… deep inside her frantically clenching, sweet and delicious pussy… I needed her to want it.

I wanted her to love it…