Idris guarded the stage for the entire show. He didn’t let his mind wander to Isla. He didn’t let himself imagine her putting on makeup. For him. Choosing her costume. For him. Lipstick on those plump lips. For him.

Fuck!

He had to get his head in the game. There were other girls in this club and they deserved his concentration, his protection. The crowd was rowdy tonight. Idris had already had to escort two drunk dipshits to the parking lot.

His manager, Greg, had been pretty surprised when Idris had told him that he was going to take his break during Isla’s set. There’d never been a night that Idris hadn’t guarded Isla. He’d made a point of it. But tonight, one of the other members of club security was guarding her. And Idris was watching from the back.

Knowing she was dancing for him.

Ricky ended her set with a round of raucous cheering and a mini tornado of dollar bills. She was good. Cute. But nowhere near Isla’s caliber.

Idris switched places with one of the guards and cut through the crowd to the back of the club. He didn’t sit. He wanted Isla to be able to find him in the crowd.

Crossing his arms over his chest as the lights dimmed and the men around him began to yell out her name, Idris planted his feet. And waited.

The first, eerie strains of a song came out over the club and the men quieted down. And then she stepped onto stage and there was an explosion of screams for her. Idris didn’t hear them though. All he heard was the music, a song he recognized. He was pretty sure it was called High For This. An old Weeknd song.

But he didn’t dwell on it. He let the music wash over him as he took in the sight of her. She wore a tight black dress about the size of a tube sock. She was fit, her arms sleek and strong, her legs muscular. But, Jesus, the woman had ass. And her chest. It was the kind of thing that wars got started over. Fuck, Idris would start one himself if these dickheads didn’t calm down and let her dance.

She ignored the men though, as she leaned her back against the pole, her eyes searching the crowd. When she found him, caught his gaze, Idris felt his breath physically pushed out of him. She kept her eyes on his as she started her first slide down the pole. Her arm twisting and seeming to defy gravity as she whipped herself around, her legs in a graceful stretch. Her heels were inches long, black, and pointed at the sky as she flipped herself upside down, her curves molded perfectly to the pole. She slid, controlled, strong, down the pole, her eyes boring into Idris’s.

A different man might have shied away from the intensity of it. She was intentionally making this personal. Like she was daring him. But Idris was not that man. He didn’t take his eyes off of her once. He didn’t blush or look away. He ate her up with his eyes. She was dancing for him, but he was the one telling her exactly what would be happening if they were alone.

She worked the pole like it was a man. Like she was sliding her body over a man who wanted nothing more than to make her come. She worked it like it was Idris.

And then the base hit, about a minute into the song, and Isla, sweaty, glistening, panting, ripped her dress off over her head. Her gorgeous, golden body was exposed all at once, just a clingy black bra and the tiniest g-string known to man covered her. And yeah, those heels. Those heels that were going to haunt Idris until the day he died.

The music ripped through him as she crawled forward, whipping her hair back and rearing onto her knees. She let her knees slide far apart, spreading for him while her hands made their way up her ribs, over her breasts. Her mouth came open, her hair in a messy spill everywhere. Idris thought of the secret, crooked part in her hair and took a half a step forward.

And then she was back up, twisting around the pole, her ass bouncing with the music. She was an athlete, he’d always known that. Not everybody could do what she did on the pole, but he’d never seen her ride it like that. Her body was a sinuous slide, a sexy, writhing, glistening, golden goddess. She was an orgasm in human form. A love letter to sweaty sex.

The tension of the room rose even higher as the men got rowdier, louder. He heard the tinny sound of a bottle being broken, men yelling. He barely registered it. Idris had never seen her this keyed in. This focused. Her mouth was open as she panted. Her eyes were lasers. Burning sapphires. She whipped her hair in a vicious circle, her ass working in a hypnotizing circle. One of her bra straps slipped down. She dipped forward and there was the perfect view of the hot, wet valley between her breasts. She had the men like wild animals.

There was shouting and a scuffle in one corner. The crowd surged in one direction and then back in another. There were too many men in the room. The song was close to over, she was close to disappearing back behind the curtain. Idris drank her with his eyes, imprinting the image of her into his brain like a brand. He was pretty sure he hadn’t blinked in about three straight minutes. He thought nothing could tear his eyes from her.

But then something did. Some dumbass, little-dicked poindexter was crawling onstage. The men had all pressed forward during her dance and Idris saw that the security at the edges of the stage was never going to be able to get to this dipshit.

Meanwhile, Isla was still dancing. She didn’t see the guy crawling toward her.

But no matter. Idris had already kicked one dude’s ass tonight. What was one more?

He parted the crowd easily. The men either jumped out of his way or were as easily swatted aside as if they were children. He saw two different fights breaking out across the room as he parted the crowd to get to her. He needed to get her the hell out of here. The room was starting to tremble with the tension.

It didn’t take more than eight seconds for Idris to have crossed the room, gotten to the edge of the stage. But at that point, other idiots had seen the first guy on stage and thought it was a good idea. There were now three dudes on stage and one of them was behind her.

Isla’s music ended and she turned to walk off stage but stopped still when she saw the drunken idiot on stage behind her.

Idris saw her spin, stare to the back of the room where he’d just been standing. Something inside him burst open, raw. She was in trouble and she was looking for him. To help her. It was that more than anything that had him stiff-arming about five dudes at once, ripping the first guy off the stage by his neck and whistling out to Isla.

She looked down and saw him. He would never, for as long as he lived, forget the momentary flash of relief that lightninged over her face when she saw that he was there, reaching up for her.

Isla immediately stepped over the second guy and reached out for Idris. He had her off the stage and up in his arms in less than a second. The crowd yelled and cursed as he shouldered his way out of the crowded room, gripping her to him. He heard more bottles being broken and screams following them. This may have started with Isla, but sure enough, blood was just boiling in that room now.

Idris didn’t look back or pause, he pushed his way through the line of security that guarded the dancers’ dressing rooms. They let him through and then held back the crush of men that tried to follow her.

Idris automatically bypassed the more public dressing room for the manager, Greg’s, office. No one was in there and he instantly kicked the door closed behind him, blocking out the noise of the club.

It was only then that he realized how he was holding her. His hands banded over her ass. With her legs around his waist and her arms around his neck. Her wet, hot skin pressed into him everywhere. She panted and gripped at him as if they were fucking. And if not for a few pieces of ill-placed clothing, they practically were. Her pussy, covered only in the g-string, was pressing into him like the gates of heaven. Or hell. He wasn’t sure. He was only sure that her hair was tickling over his arm, her face pressed into his neck.

He walked her to the desk and sat her on it. He needed to get his hands off her ass before he lost his mind and went ahead and willingly drowned himself in her pussy.

The second he set her down, her head came back and he was looking into those sapphire eyes. Burning. On fire. Not with fear like he thought they might be. But with desire. With lust. With need.

Her legs were still wrapped around his waist. But their arms reached for each other at the same second. His hands tangled in her hair and hers clamped around the back of his head.

Idris ignored the groan of the bruises along his chest and neck. They only intensified the acute rising of ecstasy within him.

He knew she expected him to slam his lips to hers with the same hardness that his hands tugged at her hair but he was intentionally soft. And thorough. He parted her lips and tasted her. And tasted her. She was the ocean, cool evening air, the wind rushing past his face on the highway. Somehow she tasted like all the best moments of his life rolled into one.

His tongue met hers and he realized that this wasn’t love. This was war. She was ripping her tongue against his, moaning into his mouth and wrenching at his hair. He plastered himself to her and she gripped him with her thighs so tightly that she was somehow back up on his hips, the desk a thing of the past.

Her breasts were smashed into his chest and his hands itched to take them in his palms. But he couldn’t bear to hold her any less tightly. Not now that he’d finally gotten her here. It had been too many months of assuming he’d never even touch her. He wasn’t settling for anything less than full body contact.

And then her teeth were clamping onto his bottom lip, her hips jutting forward at the same time. And Idris was lost. When he’d fucked her in his mind, there was privacy, time, atmosphere. But he supposed the top of Greg’s desk was as good a place as any.

Humans were just animals after all.

He laid her back onto the desk and crawled up over her. Tossing the computer, papers, a cup of pens all to the floor. He was crouched over her. And she was spread out under him, panting, her arms up over her head. And then he lowered his head to her again.

But she twisted her head away from him. Suddenly she was planting her foot in the middle of his chest - the woman had serious flexibility - and pushing him up. Away from her.

He wasn’t even close to being pushed, but he let her move him away. He saw something cross her eyes. Something like regret. Frustration. And even… fear.

He felt his stomach sink. It was one of the only things that would have him crawling off of her the way he was. He’d never want to scare her.

He wanted to protect her.

“Shit,” she scowled and jumped down off the desk. Some papers stuck to her back and she snatched them off, sent them cascading to the ground. They stood about two feet apart from one another, breathing hard.

It took a second, but she finally met his eye. Sapphire into emerald. There was another electric zing between them and she was stepping toward him again, sex in her eyes. But she stopped herself before she touched him this time.

She put one hand over her own mouth, as if she were holding herself back from kissing him.

And then she dropped her hand. “No.”

Idris didn’t say anything.

“I don’t need this shit,” she said. Her voice had the slightest waver to it. “This didn’t mean shit, okay?”

He still said nothing.

And she still wasn’t done. “We kissed. That’s it. You don’t own me. You can’t tell me-”

She cut herself off and Idris cocked his head to one side. What the fuck was she talking about?

She opened her mouth to say more but the door to the office swung open and Greg burst in.

“Isla, you sexy bitch!” he screamed. “That was fucking incredible.”

If the state of his trashed desk alarmed him, he certainly didn’t show it. He tossed a sack of money toward Isla. All the ones that she’d just earned. She set it on the desk as if she didn’t even want to touch it.

“Seriously,” Greg continued, completely oblivious to the atmosphere of the room. “I’ve never seen you dance like that. I mean, you’re hot all the time, but that was something else. And baby, I’ve got good news for you.”

Isla crossed her arms over her chest and turned to Greg. Idris didn’t take his eyes off of her. He was still trying to piece together what she’d said. About him owning her?

He got distracted for a minute, because it had a little fantasy playing out in his head. When he tuned back in, Greg was saying something that made Idris’s blood run cold.

“Isla, he’s willing to pay the big bucks for you, girl. Just a private dance.”

“She doesn’t do private dances,” Idris cut in, his blood suddenly boiling.

“She does for 10 large,” Greg shot back, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Ten thousand dollars?” she gaped, her eyes large. “Some dude wants to pay ten thousand dollars for a private dance from me?”

Greg considered turning his back on Idris, who was apparently mad about something, but he decided it was a little like turning your back on a grizzly bear, so he stayed where he was. “You heard me. He’s waiting in the private room for you.”

“She doesn’t do private dances,” Idris said again. Isla had made that clear on about a hundred different occasions. Why was Greg pressuring her so much right now?

Isla shot Idris a look that he couldn’t begin to interpret. She looked right into his eyes even though she was talking to Greg. “I’ll do it.”