The Businessman's Tie (The Power to Please, Book 1) (15 page)

I spoke quickly. “But that won’t be necessary. I want to say
yes to your offer, but I need to clarify a few things first.”

“Wonderful. Anything you want. Just ask.”

“Okay, you said five nights to explore these new feelings.”

“Yes, to explore your submissive side.”

“Right. Well, what would that involve? I mean, I’m not sure
about —”

“You don’t need to worry about what we’ll be doing. I’ll
make those decisions. I can assure you it will be extremely sexual. Extremely.
I’ve thought about doing all sorts of wicked things to you.”

He paused for a moment. “I’ll be your guide and I’ll do my best
not to push you further than you’re willing to go. But you can always say no.
If I do my job right, you won’t need to.”

“I don’t know how this works, though.”

“That’s what part of the time will be for. I’ll tell you
what you need to know, when you need to know it. It’s my responsibility to
guide you, and I take it seriously. Trust me, Nonnie. You won’t regret it.”

I shivered again. No, I couldn’t imagine regretting time
spent with Michael. Well, as long as I didn’t break some stupid rule.

“Okay then,” I said. “Yes, let’s do this. I’m ready.”

“I’m pleased. I wish I could drive to your place and start
tonight. But, unfortunately, there’s some business we have to attend to first.”

He asked me a few things about my sexual history, similar to
the questions Gibson had asked me, though less detailed and fewer in number. He
wanted my email address and said he would sometimes use email if he had special
instructions for me, or needed some information.

Lastly, we arranged to be tested for STDs and agreed to
share the results with each other. It was this detail that would keep us apart
for several more days, since Michael preferred to wait for the results so we
could be confident when we were together.

“I’ll be thinking of you,” he said before we hung up, his
words loaded with that heady combination of desire and danger.

I told him I’d think of him, too. I meant what I said. The
next several days would pass slowly.

I had done it. A rush of excitement filled me.

He had said, “I’ve thought about doing all sorts of wicked
things to you.”

Five nights with Michael, doing ... extremely sexual things.
But what, exactly? I craved to know.

One thing I knew for certain, had learned the lesson the
hard way from Gibson Reeves in that hotel room: whatever Michael and I did, it
would be what Michael wanted it to be.

I savored the anticipation of it. The rousing flashes of
fear.

He would take and I would give.

Whatever The Playboy wanted.

Read on for a preview of

The
Playboy’s Proposition

The Power to Please, Book 2

Excerpt from

The Playboy’s Proposition

The Power to Please, Book 2

Chapter 1

I wanted to be swept away in a grand and passionate love
affair. I wanted it to wrap itself around me and raise me out of the monotony I
had made of my life, of myself. I needed that perfect love to vindicate my
past.

My past was an embarrassing cliche. Raised by parents who
lost interest in me around the time I began to form my own opinions of the
world, I sought reassurance of my worth from others. When I discovered the
appeal of my youthful sexuality, I believed men could provide that worth.

It wasn’t long before I discovered how mistaken I was in
that belief. By the age of eighteen, I was pregnant. I thought my boyfriend was
more than gallant when he proposed marriage, and it made me love him. When I
miscarried the baby not long after our wedding, I stayed with my new husband.

Not that I had much choice, really. My parents had kicked me
out when they learned I was pregnant, attacking me with accusations and
character affronts which assured I wouldn’t speak to them for years. I was on
my own. No money, a high school diploma, and a husband who believed he would be
a rock star one day.

I learned how to survive, took shitty jobs that barely kept
a roof over our heads and food in our mouths. And because I needed to believe
that I could have a better future, I took night classes at the local community
college.

By the second year of my marriage, I learned why my husband
actually married me. It hadn’t been for the sake of our baby, or to provide for
us; it had been because he wanted someone to take care of him.

I remember him storming around our one-room apartment,
berating me for not making enough money for him and his band to go on the road.
It was all my fault, he said. All my fault because I hadn’t listened to him,
hadn’t done what needed to be done.

He wanted me to give up night school and become a stripper.
Better money, he said. I didn’t need school, he insisted, because he would be a
star soon, and you didn’t need a college degree to be the wife of a rich rock
star. All I had to do was to sacrifice for him now, and I would be repaid
later.

I was actually proud of myself for telling him no, that I
wanted to stay in school, that I would stay in school no matter how much he
yelled at me. I told him to get a day job to make the money to go on the road.
He kicked the furniture and stomped out of the apartment. I didn’t see him for
a week.

I find it hard to accept, now, that I was proud of telling
him no. I’m disgusted with my past self that I allowed him back into my life,
let him stumble back into my bed, drunk and stinking after a week on the
streets doing God knew what. I should have thrown his ass out the door.

I could say no to his demand that I become a stripper. I
couldn’t say no to the marriage.

So many wasted years, supporting a man I loathed, and who
loathed me in return in spite of my efforts to appease him. Not his fault,
though. My fault. I knew the truth by year two of my marriage. That it took me
eight more years to finally unload him ... well, that was on me.

I desperately needed to shake the blame for those ten years
of bad decisions and lost chances. I longed to banish the taint of my failed
marriage, of failed dreams.

I was now twenty-nine years old. I had a college degree, a
decent job, a place of my own, and a sense of urgency to claim a different
destiny. Divorcing my husband was only the first step. I needed something more
than a job and an apartment. I needed what I had never had.

A great love, a great passion. That was what I wanted. To
float away in undeniable desire. Love could do that for me. And if not love,
then passion alone could surely do, for now.

Two men offered me passion, Michael Weston and Gibson
Reeves. Michael, tall and lean with the charm of a continental playboy. Gibson,
who I still thought of as The Businessman, tall and muscular, with a handsome
but inscrutable face.

Both of them, dominant males who saw something in me I
hadn’t known was there. A sexual submissive, driven to be taken by their power.
Me, into BDSM. Were they right about me? I didn’t know, for certain, but I
wanted them to help me find out, was more than excited by the prospect of their
special assistance.

Michael proposed five nights to explore my newly-discovered
kink, and I had accepted. As for Gibson, I wasn’t certain what, precisely, he
might have planned for me. After the fiasco of my “interview” at the Frederick
Hotel, he simply said he wanted to see me again. For one night only? More than
that? I didn’t know. But if things didn’t work out with Michael, it was likely
I would be calling Gibson to find out exactly what he had in mind.

For now, my immediate future passion lay with Michael. And
oh, how I anticipated seeing him again, although I had no idea what to expect.
All I knew was that Michael would be making the rules.

My job would be to please him, to see if by pleasing him, I
pleased myself. I did not take my job description lightly. I swore to myself
that I would do my best.

We had completed our agreement to take mutual STD tests, and
now were waiting for the results. The wait was excruciating. Time passed in
slow motion.

I attribute this to the phenomenon of time passing normally
until you decide there is something you want to do. At that point, the universe
conspires to slow the rotation of the Earth, the solar system and the Milky Way
itself, resulting in a few days of normal time stretching into the length of a
month. Stephen Hawking has probably written something about this. If he hasn’t,
he should.

I slept poorly, often awakened by sexy dreams starring Michael
and sometimes Gibson. This might not have been a bad thing if I could have
stayed asleep all the way through the grand finale of my dream. But no, every
time I was getting ready to orgasm, I would wake up. It was frustrating beyond
belief, and possibly another result of the universe conspiring against me.

Finally, after an age, our test results came in; we were
both clean. I would see Michael that night.

I received an e-mail from him telling me to be ready at 7:30
that evening. He didn’t say what we would be doing, only told me to dress
casually.

At precisely 7:30, he knocked on my door.

I took a last look around my apartment. Everything was tidy,
though the place wasn’t much to look at. I had lived here for over nine months,
but I never seemed to find the time or inclination to decorate. There was
little in the apartment beyond the basic utilitarian needs of furniture to sit
on and a bed to sleep in.

When I left my ex-husband, I didn’t take many belongings
with me. I wanted to leave everything behind me, and I pretty much did exactly
that with the exception of some old photos, my clothes and shoes, and general
necessities like toiletries. Everything else could be replaced with something
new, something not contaminated by my old life.

I rented the second apartment I viewed. I would have rented
the first one I looked at if I hadn’t seen a cockroach in the kitchen. My
current place was clean, free of bugs, had a new paint job, and was in my price
range. Sold.

It wasn’t a large place, with only one bedroom, a small
bathroom, and a large open-room design that was a combination living room,
dining room and kitchen. As I glanced around the living room, I noted how bland
it all was. I wished I had spent some time and money on it, put something into
it that would show something about me.

My heart beat quickly when I opened the door to Michael. He
looked wonderful, even better than I remembered. His shiny black hair was
pushed behind his ears and curled at the ends right above his shoulders. He
wore a blue silky shirt and a tight pair of faded jeans. He smelled of musk and
the outdoors.

He was tall and made my apartment seem smaller than normal.

He smiled at me and said hello. He held my hands and kissed
me gently on the lips. I kissed him back, a little shyly, then gestured him
into the room and shut the door behind him. I squirmed a bit when he looked
around the room, but he made no comment on the place.

He said, “You look beautiful.”

“Thanks. You look great, too.”

He frowned. “It won’t do, you know.”

“What won’t do?” I asked.

“The pants you’re wearing. They’re forbidden, I’m afraid.”

“Do you have a grudge against pants? I thought these were
pretty nice ones.”

He tsk-tsked me, then said, “Right out of the gate and
you’ve already broken a big rule. I was afraid, after our first time, that you
might be a difficult one. You’ll have to be punished, of course.”

“That’s not fair. You never told me not to wear pants.
Anyway, you’re wearing jeans, so what’s the big deal?”

He chuckled, and said, “I’m teasing you. I just thought you
looked pale, and now there’s some color in your cheeks.”

“I think you like keeping me off-footed.”

“Off-footed. I’ve never heard that one.”

“I may have just made it up.”

“Then I must be making you nervous.”

I thought, nervous maybe, but most likely, you’re making me
brain dead, which is what happened to me the last time I was with you.

I changed the subject and asked, “Would you like a drink?”

“No, thank you. Those pants actually are going to have to
go, you know. From here on out, you don’t wear pants when you’re with me,
unless I specifically tell you to.”

To think that I had been worried he might be critical of my
apartment, when he only had eyes for my apparel. I said, a tad snippy, “Okay, I
guess. I can change into a skirt if you’d like that better.”

Two minutes and he’d already annoyed me. It was difficult to
stay annoyed, though, seeing the sexy way he was looking at me.

He said, “One idea I’d like you to become accustomed to is
that all your holes belong to me, and I should be able to access them as easily
as possible. Pants make access difficult, therefore, no pants.”

“My holes,” I said.

“Exactly. Your mouth, your pussy, your asshole. They’re all
mine.”

I wondered how long it would be before I wasn’t surprised by
his bluntness. It was something of a struggle to keep up.

I said, “I see. What about my nose and ears? Those have
holes.”

“Those are mine, too, but I’m not likely to fuck them.”

“Ugh.”

“Your disgust doesn’t bother me. In fact, it kind of turns
me on.”

“What about my breasts? They aren’t holes, so are they
mine?”

“Oh no,” he said, passing a wolfish gaze over my chest.
“Those are definitely mine, too.”

“Do any of my body parts still belong to me? How about my
wrist? I’m kind of partial to it.”

He took me by the arm and raised my wrist for a light kiss.
“Never. It’s mine. Everything is mine.”

Tingles spread up my arm from where his lips touched my
skin. “Funny. I don’t remember putting myself up for sale.”

“Scandalous! You aren’t for sale. You’ve given yourself to
me, and I’ve happily accepted.” He looked into my eyes. “By agreeing to be my
sub, you’re allowing me to do as I please with your lovely person. Yes, I know,
there are limits, and I’ll respect yours as they come up. But still, you’re all
mine.”

Michael’s light blue eyes seemed to darken when he spoke of
owning me. I couldn’t look away. I said, “I suppose we should talk about those
limits.”

“There’ll be time for that later. Right now, I want you to
take off those pants.”

“Right now? Right here?”

“Yes, right now. Take them off.”

“You’re just saying that to get me off-footed again.”

He said, “Not true. I really want you to take your pants
off.”

“It’s kind of sudden, don’t you think? I mean, you just got
here and all.”

“Maybe it’s a test.”

A test. Of my obedience? I had sworn to myself, going into
this thing, that I would approach the situation seriously and honestly, that I
wouldn’t back away from anything that wasn’t truly dire. This wasn’t dire. Far
from it. In fact, his command had unloosed more than a few zippy twinges down
low in my belly.

I took a deep breath and, savoring a moment of feeling super
daring, slipped off my shoes and pulled off my pants, tossing the pants onto a
nearby chair.

Michael approached me then reached between my legs and
slipped his fingers under my panties and into my slit. His fingers were warm
and electric on my flesh. Gulp.

His fingers slid easily into my folds and I realized I was
already damp. I wasn’t surprised by it. I had been in a half-state of arousal
ever since I told him I wanted to see him again.

Michael smiled and removed his hand. He said, “I had a
certain plan in mind for us this evening. But now that I’m here, I think an adjustment
might be required.”