CHAPTER NINETEEN
I SPENT MOST of the morning pacing, watching the hours go by while I tried to figure out why I didn’t find Emile and decrypt his cryptic statements to find out what the fuck was going on around me and uncover a reason to let go of my skepticism.
Either Calind had mind-fucked me hard, training me to obey him, or I didn’t meet with Emile because I wanted to avoid hurting Calind. Instead of spending the rest of the day in my head, I surprised Calind with a visit.
The forward facing acres of the vineyard were ripe with grape vines and orange trees. The Victorian estate, between the vineyard and the lush garden, served as a restaurant, bar, and wedding venue.
“May I help you?” asked Cyan in the upper level of the estate. She glared at me as though I was a Monday on a Friday.
“I can figure out where I need to be.” I tried to bypass her desk.
She shot up from behind her desk to stand in front of me. “I think you should leave before I call security.”
“Okay, I’ve had about enough of you.” I walked up to her, invading her personal space. “You’re doing way too much, and it’s time I knocked some sense into you.”
“You can try it.” She goaded me with a sneer, proving she new exactly who I was. “It won’t change anything. You can’t get him to fire me. I’ll always be by his side, and no matter who you are to him now, you won’t matter to him once I’m done making sure he sees that you’re beneath him.”
My hand raised to slap the bitch out of her.
Calind cleared his throat, alerting us to his presence in the doorway of his office, located to the right of his bitchy assistant’s desk. He looked delicious in his dress shirt and slacks. A deep side part divided his hair, molded backward. “Cyan, I believe you need a reminder of whom you’re speaking to—my wife.”
Cyan put on a flirtatious smile and moved away from me. “I’m sorry, Mr. Glace. I didn’t recognize her and thought she was another admirer from downstairs coming to see you.”
“Take your break,” he barked at her and glanced at his watch.
She pouted as though she were a child who didn’t get what she wanted for Christmas. “Yes, Mr. Glace.”
Without setting his gorgeous brown eyes on me, he disappeared inside his office.
“Wife?” A smile of pride stretched my face as I entered his office and closed the door behind me. “Think it’s the first time you’ve called me that to someone else.”
“Did you need something in particular, Regan?” He sat behind his massive desk, keeping his eyes on his work. “As you can see, I’m working.” He looked more pissed at me now than he was this morning. So much for hoping he’d bend me over the desk for fun.
“Well, yes, you work here, don’t you? I doubt you’re here just to nose-dive into Cyan’s pussy now and then. By the way, it’s official. I hate her. ‘I didn’t recognize her?’ Liar. How many times have I run into that bitch already? You should’ve heard the bullshit she said to me.”
He busied himself with the various tablets on his desk, ignoring me.
“Calind?”
He sighed in aggravation and lifted his eyes to regard me.
“I thought about it, and you were right about Emile.” I mumbled, having a hard time admitting he was right in any capacity. “I won’t see him again.”
He stopped pretending to preoccupy himself with work and quizzed me with his eyes. But they were investigating me for the wrong fucking reason.
“Good to know you have so much faith in me, Calind.” I slumped in the chair opposite his desk and rubbed my temples. “No, I didn’t avoid meeting him because I thought I couldn’t control myself. I don’t want to fuck him.” I crossed my legs, rocking the top leg over the bottom. “When did this happen? When did you devolve into such an insecure man?”
He sat up straight and faced his work, unmoved. “I’ll see you at home.”
“Not after this bullshit, you won’t.” I jolted up and headed for the door.
“What do you expect from me?” he asked, verging on raising his voice.
I spun on my heels with my eyes full of fire. “I should’ve known. It was a stupid thing to want. You’re a man, like any other. Can’t rid yourself of your tree-pissing nature. I knew this would happen.”
His eyes darted up at me with a crushing intensity. “Mind you, you wanted this. You salivated for it. I’ve given you more than I’ve ever given anyone.”
“I had to go along with an ultimatum to get what I wanted, remember?”
His jaw clenched and ticked with tension. “Is that correct? You think I forced you to marry me?”
“That’s not what I’m saying. No one forced anyone to do anything.” I rubbed my head again. “Why are you so pissed, when I told you that I won’t meet him?”
He returned to his work, ignoring me.
“Hey!” I lunged forward and slammed my hand on his desk. I hit a tablet and made the screen go wonky. “I’m talking to you!”
He stormed up, pushing his chair back with such force, it broke apart upon impact. The wall behind him cracked into a curious pattern.
“What the hell is it, Regan?” he snarled with a heavy accent and uninhibited anger. I could’ve sworn the veins in his hands pulsated in an odd-colored hue. But as soon as I thought I saw it, it disappeared.
I retreated, staring between the chair and the wall while walking backward.
Holding on to anger instead of fear, I added, “You know, maybe I should meet up with him and fuck him. Might as well, right?”
His expression shot darts in my direction. I was too angry for his intimidation to faze me, and left with a slam of the door.
I GOT IN the car, and I didn’t stop driving until three hours flew by and I saw the garish lights of the Las Vegas strip. Anger could make you do strange shit.
I went to the same club Calind took me to a few months back, Switch, and didn’t understand why my internal compass directed me there.
The bouncer allowed me inside the club for free. After gifting me their top line champagne, the hostess escorted me to a private suite where the best dancers waited to give me a show.
“I remember you.” A familiar voice loomed behind me.
I turned around and took a few seconds to place the face with a name. “Evani, right?”
She gave me a smile and pushed her breasts against mine in a hug. “What can I do for you, beautiful?”
“I’m looking for Kay. I want a lap dance from her.”
“I’m sorry, she doesn’t work here anymore.”
“Do you know where she went?”
She shrugged. “Don’t have the slightest idea. I’m sure I can satisfy your needs.”
Given her rapport with Calind, it might’ve been an awful idea. Plus, I wondered what the hell happened to Kay that made her quit.
Evani slipped her hands around my face. Her brown eyes pierced into mine. She kissed me, erasing trepidation and any rational thought.
She traced my collarbone. “You should go home, Regan, but not this way. I have something for you to wear that will make Calind forget the spat you two had today.”
“How the hell did you know—”
She pressed her lips to mine, erasing more of my thoughts. A chanting inside my head grew louder, telling me to follow wherever she led me.
My eyelashes fluttered, attempting to recover from whatever the hell it was she did.
It was of no use.
OUR HOME WAS dark except for a small light emanating from the bedroom, and the solar lights illuminating the pool.
Evani guided me through the foyer. In a short and tight dress without underwear, I shuffled behind her.
Smiling, she stopped shy of the bedroom door and pulled me beside her. Her attention remained glued to the open door of the master suite. “He’s waiting for you, and we shouldn’t make him wait much longer.”
I slipped my hand in Evani’s, and we moved into the bedroom.
Calind was sitting up in bed, a tablet on his lap. He went commando underneath his lounge pants. The way his heavy, long eyelashes fell across his cheeks stirred me.
Evani sauntered around the bed to slip her hand into Calind’s, making him open his eyes.
“Evani,” he mumbled, gliding his fingers through loose strands of hair. He didn’t appear surprised to see her. They stared at each other, conducting a silent conversation, and Evani gave him an appreciative nod.
An understanding dawned on me. “You’re tricky.”
Calind’s gaze landed on me. “I wanted you home. Can you fault me?”
“I wanted to be home with you,” I told him.
“I was angry at myself, not you.” His eyes never left mine as we exchanged silent words of regret.
“Why?” I asked.
He pulled me onto his lap, pressing his forearms against my back to bring me closer. “It’s not a sentiment I can verbalize.”
As he kissed various places on my body, he positioned me to lie stomach-down across his lap. His fingers walked up the inside of my thighs and up my dress. When his fingertips met my wet lips, I moaned for more.
The tapping sound of Evani’s heels receded, becoming the only noise in the bedroom before everything went silent.
Calind’s fingers rocked against my slit, and moved up to the hood surrounding my bundle of nerves. He brought his fingers together, squeezing my clit. “Your tight little pussy is dripping all over my lap.”
“Because it’s very ready for a hard fuck,” I rasped.
He stood, careful in his movement to flip me over on my back. Holding my head off the pillow, he lowered, brushing his mouth against mine.
He held my pussy open and flicked a finger over my receptive clit. His fingers slid up the opening of my pussy and circled over my bundle of nerves. He pinched the soft nub and rocked back and forth, eliciting a moan that gave rise to Calind’s erection against my thigh.
Leaning forward, he sucked my bottom lip and sank his teeth into the sore flesh.
His mouth joined his fingers in between my legs. The pleasure threw me to the brink. I shook hard, quaking the headboard against the bed while Calind’s tongue whirled at a breakneck speed around my clit.
He sucked my clit and thrashed his fingers inside me. I cried out to the ceiling, and melded with the bed. A fire burned from the inside, ripping me apart and leaving me weak.
Calind held my thighs and widened them. As he kissed my ankle, he spread my lips apart and pushed his hardness inside of me.
We made eye contact as he penetrated me. His body remained still, but his cock damn near vibrated within me, massaging my walls, expanding me. There wasn’t an inexplicable external pull, yet having him fill me and witnessing him rest his eyes on me as if I was his five-course meal felt more intense than ever.
He wrapped his hands around my thighs as he moved in long and hard strokes.
I bucked against the movement of his hips. The pleasure was too much. I wriggled and writhed below him, my body wanting an escape. He caught my hips and brought my body back underneath him to push the full extent of his length inside me.
“Fuck!” I called out from my trembling mouth.
He lowered, resting his torso against mine. “I’ve barely started, sweetheart,” he hissed against my lips, and ran his tongue along the crease of my mouth. “Can you handle more?” The thrust of his hips, deep and hard movements while rotating in circles, weakened me.
My legs shook as they surrounded him. “Yes.” I threw my head back, exposing my neck to him.
He shoved my legs to open wider. My knees fell to either side of my body, and Calind fucked me even deeper, hitting a soft wall and massaging it with the motion and vibrations echoing throughout my body.
He slammed into me, eliciting harsh, slapping noises. He grabbed my chin, forcing my head in line with my spine.
His lips pressed against my ear. “I want you to repeat, verbatim: ‘Calind, this pussy is yours.’”
It took a minute for his demand to register, and when I understood and could repeat it, he punished me with an even faster and harder pace, pushing me into sensory overload. I screamed it loud enough for an echo to bounce off the walls.
Calind covered my mouth with his kisses, making me moan inside his open mouth.
“I’m gonna come,” I whimpered into his mouth.
“I know.” He tightened his grip on my body, and plunged inside me faster.
I threw my head back and shuddered hard. My body expelled with a messy chaos, sending me floating on dizziness and aftershocks.
He flipped me over and adjusted me until my legs dangled over the edge of the bed and my breasts smashed against the mattress.
The feeling became more intense than before as the friction hit against an elusive internal zone. In tears, I whimpered and cried. My body couldn’t stop shaking against the fits of an orgasm that didn’t want to subside.
I squirmed underneath him, weeping and cursing at the same time. I couldn’t think beyond trying to remain conscious. My legs soon gave way as my body sank onto the bed.
He grabbed the crown of my hair and pulled my head upward until my neck arched at an awkward angle. “Say it again.” He punished me with a harsher pace.
I said what he wanted to hear repeatedly, hoping it was enough to assure him. His hand clasped against my throat, pulling my back against his body. He plunged inside me again, rigid and fast, slamming against me with each shove.
He cursed, and an explosion kept me at a peak. Slipping his other hand against my groin, he held me. I slid my hands over his, dropping my head in exhaustion.
No crazy thrall. No clouded brain. Still, there was no other man who could do what he did.
He pressed his lips against my ear. “He tempted you.”
“He didn’t,” I promised, weak and trying to shake my head, denying that Emile mattered.
“You were close. The next time you ever feel the temptation, I want you to remember what you said in your throes of ecstasy. Know that this—” his hand cupped my pussy, “belongs to me.” He took a dramatic pause. “If you ever betray me and give someone else what is mine, there would be no coming back from it.” His lips raked the nape of my neck, making me quiver. “I would punish you until there was nothing left of you.”
Nobody else existed inside our world but him and me. I needed and wanted nothing else—well, besides the one thing I couldn’t have: time.
I felt sorry for myself and my predicament. Calind plucked me out of the dark place when he leaned in my ear and whispered, “I’m not done wrecking your body yet.”