Leather Bound (21 page)

‘I’m on my way home,’ he said.

‘I just need five minutes,’ I said. God, it killed me to plead like that, not just in front of Miss Pucker-Face, but in front of Kyle too. I needed to know if he’d help me, though, and I didn’t want to give him too much time to think about it.

‘Two,’ he countered.

I nodded.

‘Thanks, Cece. I’ve got this.’

He flashed her a smile. I wondered, briefly, if they’d slept together, and felt a pang of something in my stomach at the thought. It wasn’t jealousy so much as a hope that, if he was sleeping with anyone, it was someone I could warm up to a little more easily. Miss Pin-Up was cute, but she hadn’t exactly charmed me so far.

Cece nodded once, glancing at me over her shoulder, as if to remind me that I was still in way over my head and might be better off at one of those other establishments. I resisted the urge to flip her off.

‘In my office,’ Kyle said. He was looking in my general direction, but he wasn’t looking at me. His gaze kept sliding off to the side as though he couldn’t bear to keep it on me. Oh, this was going to be fun. What had started out as a clearly bad idea was now moving into the realm of ridiculously stupider idea. Times twelve.

He slid the wall panel and ushered me inside. The room behind the door didn’t look like an office so much as someone’s favourite reading room. It was surprisingly small after the spacious entryway and equally surprisingly cosy and private. A mocha-coloured leather recliner held centre stage, while tattoo equipment, books and art rested on either side on long cream-coloured shelves. Candles flickered around the room, filling it with the scent of cloves and oranges. Under that, the barest hint of sanitisers and, of course, my own lovely wet-wool scent. The walls were lined with tattoo images, most of them mounted and hung with simple black wires. Everything about the room said money and elegance. It was like no tattoo place I’d ever seen or even dreamed about. Kyle’s old shop was a rag-and-bone kind of place, build with a love of art and not very much in the way of funds. What had brought him
here
?

Kyle slid the door shut behind us. It locked into place with a heavy click. I wondered if it was soundproof. After all, in a lobby like Miss Pin-Up’s, it wouldn’t do to have the sounds of distressed clients flowing out.

‘Thanks for rescuing me,’ I said, once he’d turned to face me. I tried to keep my voice light. ‘I thought she was going to eat me.’

‘Who, Cece?’ He set the tattoo gun on the shelf without looking at it. He wasn’t looking at me either, though. He mostly stared at the floor. ‘Don’t mind her. She’s just a little … overzealous.’

‘Overzealous?’ The bite in my voice was more obvious than I’d meant it to be. Calling her overzealous was like calling a mother bear a little protective.

He lowered his voice. Maybe those doors weren’t soundproof after all. ‘Why are you here, Jae?’

No one called me Jae except Kyle. It hadn’t been that long since I’d heard him say it, and still the sound made a lump in my throat. I had to swallow around it in order to speak.

I swallowed. And then realised I had no idea what I wanted to say. I hadn’t made a plan beyond step one, which was to find Kyle and ask him some questions. I just didn’t know what questions to ask.

‘I miss –’ I clamped my teeth down on my tongue, hard. That was not what I’d meant to say. It certainly wasn’t why I’d come here. Not even in the most hidden recesses of my brain had that been my purpose in coming here. And it wasn’t fair. He was moving on. I was too. Yes, I missed him, but I needed to say something, anything, else.

‘I’m serious, Kyle.’ My instinct was to reach and touch his arm, to connect with him, but I forced my hands to stay at my side. He looked at me finally, straight at me, those green eyes intense. I’d always liked them, how they darkened slightly when he was aroused, how they looked almost white in the sunlight.

‘I need you,’ I said. Headsmack.

‘You need me?’ He took a step back, as though I was less ex-girlfriend and more poisonous viper material. ‘I don’t want to be an ass. But you kind of dumped me, Jae. Right after I asked you to marry me.’

‘Not right after,’ I said. ‘And I think it was kind of a mutual dumping.’

He made a movement with his head, the kind that asked if I was really going to argue semantics. I supposed I wasn’t.

‘I’m sorry about that,’ I said.

He sighed. ‘I know you are. We already talked about this. If I sound angry, I’m sorry. It’s just been a long day. And you were the last thing I expected to see. Seeing you out there, dripping all over Cece’s perfect floor in that form-fitting dress, made me realise how much I miss you.’

His body this close made me ache and clamp my teeth tight. I wanted him with the same urgency I’d always wanted him, but I refused to pull him into something. I refused to beat him up again with promises I couldn’t keep.

‘And how much my cock misses you,’ he said.

The low cadence of his admission, combined with the fact that my mind had not forgotten, at all, what his cock looked like, sent my lust another notch higher. I should not do this, I thought. I should not.

And then he kissed me, and I had no more thoughts that made any sense. Fuck, he kissed like a dream, an urgent hot dream from which there was no waking.

I pushed back, gasping like I’d been drowning, catching his gaze.

‘I can’t give you my love,’ I said.

‘I’ll take your lust right now,’ he countered, nipping at my chin, at the lobe of my ear. ‘Please let me take your lust right now.’

I dragged my hands across his flat stomach, over his hips. It was all so familiar and yet so strange. I knew where and how to touch him, but I also didn’t.

Thankfully, he was kind enough to help me.

‘Lower,’ he urged, pushing against me.

I undid his jeans and slid my fingers under the fabric. The tip of his cock was already wet, and I dipped my finger into the fluid and drew it lightly over his head until he shuddered. I wanted the length of him inside me. I wanted to feel the push of his hips as he slid into me. I wanted. I wanted. I wanted.

‘Please take this damn dress off me,’ I said. ‘It’s wet and cold.’

In a single move, he tugged the dress over my head, and then brought his heat to mine. The contact made me shiver, my teeth clanking together.

His fingers spread my legs, tugged my labia apart. I was wet already, coating his fingers when he dipped them into me. He brought his hand to his mouth, licked my juice from his fingers while I watched him.

‘Sweet,’ he said. ‘So sweet.’

‘Please, Kyle,’ I said. ‘Please, if you’re going to fuck me, please do it.’

He pushed himself against me, his cock nudging my hip, one arm wrapping around my back. He opened one of the drawers and pulled out a foil wrapper. I wanted to be the one who slipped it over his cock, who felt the pulse of his erection as he wrapped it, but he did it so quickly, I didn’t even have time to reach for him.

We fell back into the tattoo chair, me wiggling around the arm that threatened to poke me in the back. I spread my legs as best I could. He teased me with the tip of his cock until I was gasping and arching, nearly begging.

‘You’re beautiful, Jae,’ he said, looking down at me.

When he entered me, it was slow and sweet, a connection that carried our past with it. It made me want to cry and come all at the same time. Kyle’s eyes fluttered, but his gaze stayed on mine. I knew he was feeling the same thing I was. That this was goodbye.

I closed my eyes so I wouldn’t cry and focused on the feel of him against me and inside me. We moved together, slow and sweet, until we could no longer stand it. And then we fucked. Hard, fast, with an urgency that wouldn’t be curtailed or tamed.

His thrusts shoved us both half off the chair, until we were giggling and fucking, the pleasure increased by the contractions of my body from laughing. When he leaned down and kissed me, the pressure changed, the base of his cock snugging up against my clit with every thrust. I stayed still, riding the pleasure, feeling orgasm sneaking up on me.

‘Come for me, Kyle,’ I begged. ‘Please, I want to feel you.’

‘You first,’ he said. ‘You. First.’

With one hand, he snagged the hair at the very back of my neck and tugged lightly. The unexpected roughness, combined with that pitch-perfect stroke against my clit, was just enough. I came with a shuddering groan. Kyle followed a second after, giving me a second baby orgasm that felt like little tickly feet through my stomach.

Silent except for our heavy panting, we snuggled as best we could in the chair. No easy feat, but we managed. I wasn’t ready to leave him, because I knew that, when I did, it would be for the last time. We would move into that space that all ex-lovers moved into, unless one of them died early. A space of distance that was never quite closed by shared moments and memories, a space that was so very small and yet impossible to cross.

‘Kyle, what happened that night at the Cat House?’

He shrugged and shifted against me. ‘Nothing, really. Kitty and I danced on stage, and then I went off to some party. There was a lot of leather, and more than a little sex.’

‘And?’ I said.

‘And nothing. I went there, I made out with a cute woman and then I went home.’

‘What about the club?’

‘What club?’

‘Listen,’ I said. ‘I know you’re not supposed to talk about the club, but it’s me.’

He opened his hands in my direction. ‘I really don’t know. It was fun, but they were all a little too out there for my taste. I like my sex pretty vanilla, I guess.’

‘I never thought we were vanilla,’ I said. But looking back, I realised that wasn’t entirely true. As fun as our sex had been, it was pretty straightforward. Not that there was anything wrong with that, but I was discovering that I wanted, maybe needed, something more.

‘It’s OK, Jae,’ he said. He said it with the kind of smile that made me wonder if he’d found someone who matched his taste exactly. I grinned back at him, feeling my heart loosen a little in its constraints. If that was true, I was glad.

‘Have you ever done a keyhole tattoo?’ I changed the subject.

He shifted away from me, pulling himself up to stand without taking his eyes off me. ‘You know I have.’

I watched Kyle watch me. I could ask him again, beg him for the tattoo that I wanted, that I needed, but I knew he would say no. He always could stand up to me, when push came to shove. It was one of the things I’d always adored about him.

But I needed this. I had a plan, and I had no other way to get it.

‘Please, Kyle,’ I said. ‘I need one.’

‘For that job?’ he asked.

‘Yes.’ And for something more. But I wasn’t sure what.

‘Sorry, Jae. I’d give you the world. But I’m not tattooing you for some wild-goose chase you’re on. Especially not your first tattoo. You know me better than that.’

It was true. I did. I also knew Kyle well enough to know that once he’d said no to something that he believed in, there was little chance of changing his mind.

‘Just a little one?’ I said.

He eyed me.

I nodded. He was right, of course. Getting a tattoo was stupid. And I’d regret it as soon as it was done.

‘Have Lily draw you one,’ he said.

Which is something I should have thought of easily enough, but hadn’t. Stupid lust-addled brain.

‘Thanks, Kyle,’ I said.

‘Just be careful, Jae,’ he said.

‘Promise,’ I said.

All these promises. Not a single one of which I’d been able to keep so far.

* * *

I practically ran back to Leather Bound. If nothing else, I was getting my exercise this week.

The store was mostly dark; only the little lights at the back – what Lily called reading lights, even though they weren’t – were shining. I imagined her among the rows of books, coffee and cat by her side while she worked.

I slipped my key in the lock, still loving the ritual of it, even in the rush, and opened the door.

There were noises coming from my office. Not noises like ‘Hi, I’m Lily and I’m working’ noises. Noises like two people arguing, although I couldn’t make out any words. I tried to see if one sounded like Lily, but it was muffled. What were people doing in Leather Bound, much less in my office? We’d never had a break-in, but they weren’t unheard of in the area.

I looked around for some kind of weapon. Which then felt dumb. What was I going to do, take down an intruder with a bookmark? An ancient copy of
Ulysses
? Webster’s claws?

Don’t be a hero this time, I thought. There are no women heroines who follow a trail of noises in the darkness of a closed book store and have it end well. When you read books with those women in them, you yell at them, Janine. Just call the cops.

I slipped behind the counter, crouched down and pulled out my cell phone. I had my finger on the 9 when Webster brushed against my ankles, making me shriek. I dropped the phone and it clattered to the ground.

The voices from my office went silent.

I tried not to breathe in case they heard me. When the noises resumed, I exhaled hugely and patted around the floor, trying to find my phone in the dark.

From the enclosure of my office, I heard Lily’s laugh.

That loud, obnoxious, overly boisterous guffaw was the best possible thing I could have heard at that moment.

Lily’s voice came again, muffled with laughter, not in pain or fear. She said something that I couldn’t hear – the acoustics always did suck in here – and then laughed again. Low and breathy.

I grabbed the cracked-open office door, about to say something, when I saw Lily. Really saw her.

Bent over my desk, in a next-to-nothing black skirt. A skirt that was now even less than next to nothing because it was pushed up over her ass. She was clad in stockings of just light enough a grey that I could see her tattoos through them.

Behind her stood a woman in a three-piece suit. The woman had short black hair that tucked behind her ears and a pair of feather earrings as big as my hands. I couldn’t see her face, but she fitted into that suit like it was custom-made to swirl over her curves. Tight, but not too tight. So you could see everything and nothing at all.