First Kiss (Emma's Arabian Nights, #1) (8 page)

She was tired of being alone.

So tomorrow night she’d go to Ryan’s place in normal street clothes with some kick-ass lingerie underneath. She’d judge by his reaction how the evening was going to work. As she changed out of her chain skirt, she couldn’t help a small smile at the memory of her night, and a tiny part of her began to hope, even as she wondered what the hell she was doing.

Ryan glanced around the coffee shop until he found his business partner, Justan Hall, sitting in a back booth with his laptop open and a look of intense concentration on his face. Anyone who didn’t know Justan might think the big, intimidating man with his short, navy blue Mohawk and heavily muscled body was plotting murder while he glared at his computer screen. Ryan knew his friend was probably taking down some hacker who’d dared to try and access one of the networks their firm was hired to protect.

After grabbing his own coffee, Ryan slid into the booth across from Justan and opened his own laptop. With a few keystrokes, he joined Justan on the cyber battlefield and frowned at the information flying across his screen.

“Fucking Chinese hackers,” he muttered as he helped Justan shore up the network for one of their overseas clients.

Justan merely grunted. Twenty minutes later, both men sighed and leaned back from their computers, grabbing for their coffee in an almost simultaneous move.

“Those motherfuckers are getting bolder by the day,” Justan said as he set his cup down then rubbed his eyes. “But enough about that bullshit. How was your date with Beat Me Betty last night?”

“Ha ha, asshole.” Ryan grinned at the other man. “She was…just…wow.”

Laughing, Justan leaned back and stretched his arms over the back of the booth, displaying the full sleeve Celtic tattoos exposed by his green ‘Byte Me’ t-shirt.

“Look at you, blushing like a little school girl. Did she spank you and call you a naughty boy?”

Ryan’s mind flashed back to standing next to Tanya, watching the young woman react to Emma’s touch as she was spanked. His cock immediately filled with blood and he had to shift to adjust himself. “No, but I did get to see her spank a cute little pink-haired female submissive.”

Interest flared in Justan’s dark eyes. “Do tell.”

“That’s all the details you’re getting out of me, you lecherous old bastard.”

“I did some digging on the dungeon where your lady works and found some interesting stuff.”

Unease curdled through Ryan’s stomach at Justan’s suddenly serious expression. “What’s up?”

“Well, first off the owner, Moira, is one fucking hot piece of ass. If I had a submissive bone in my body, I’d be worshiping at her perfect little feet. Wonder if she’d ever consider switching. By the way, Tanya, the cute pink-haired girl, is Moira’s permanent submissive, but Tanya’s dating a guy who is also her Master.”

“How do you know that?” Justan merely raised an eyebrow and Ryan blew out a harsh breath. “I told you I didn’t want you snooping.”

“Please. That was hardly snooping. Besides, you should be more worried about what I discovered about one Mistress Emma Simonov.”

“What?” Ryan asked as dread filled him.

“Did you know she’s supporting her parents? That she lives in a dump and has been looking for a job for over two years now?”

“What?”

“Yeah. Her parents lost their jobs and their retirement benefits in one fell swoop when the city they worked for went bankrupt. She’s paying off their mortgages and supplementing their income with her work at Kiss of Blue.”

“Mortgages? As in more than one?”

“Yeah. They had to take out a second one to send Emma’s sisters to college. Then her dad lost his job, her mom lost her job, and when they both lost their retirement benefits, they were basically fucked. What little savings they had got burned through in the first six months. I don’t need to tell you how hard it is to find decent employment right now, let alone when you’re in your sixties and living out in the fucking boonies. Emma’s sisters help out as much as they can, but no one in her family is rich and without Emma, her parents would be homeless pretty quick.”

“Fuck.” Ryan rubbed his face, trying to clear his head of his emotional response enough to really think about this situation. “Is it really that hard for Emma to find a teaching job?”

“Around here? Hell, yes. Think about how many teachers are graduating from all the universities in Michigan. Now add in the fact that the teachers with tenure positions are staying at their jobs as long as they can because, more often than not, they’re the ones that are bringing home the bacon and the health insurance. Oh, I’m sure she could get a job at some shit-ass tiny town school or in the ghetto, but from what I’ve learned about Emma, I don’t think that fits her profile. It sure as hell wouldn’t pay enough to help keep her parents afloat.”

“I’ll take care of them,” Ryan said abruptly. “Shit, you know I have more money than I can spend. Paying off their mortgages and giving them a monthly allowance wouldn’t even faze me.”

Justan held his hand up. “Hold your horses there,
kemosabe
. Do you really think Emma is the kind of woman that wouldn’t flip her shit if she found out you did that behind her back?”

“What are you talking about? She’d be happy to see her parents taken care of.”

“Oh, I don’t doubt that. She’s not stupid. But you’d blow any chance you had with her right the fuck out of the water. If she was one of those women that liked being a damsel in distress, she might let you get away with riding in on your white horse to save the day, but she isn’t. That woman is about as independent as they come, and if you did that, you’d lose not only her trust, but you would also damage her self-respect. Don’t think that she does her pro-Domme thing only because of the money. She loves it and she’s very good at what she does and has a select and very loyal clientele to prove it. Besides, how would you explain knowing about her parents? You’d come off as some kind of stalker.”

“You’re the fucking stalker.”

“True.” Justan leaned forward. “Face it, Ryan. Your woman is going to expect things out of you that I don’t know if you have it in you to give. I know you, and I know that you’re an Alpha dog that’ll tear anyone apart that gets near your bitch. But you have to face the fact that she is going to be with other men, and she is going to enjoy it, because that’s who she is.”

His stomach clenched with anger. “So you think I’ll never be enough for her?”

“Honestly, I have no clue. Can you deal with the idea that whatever she did with you last night is something she’s probably already done a hundred times with some other dude? Or that the next time she works, some stranger will be making her climax all over his face?”

The thought of Emma being with another man, doing the things she’d done with Ryan last night, sent a wave of possessive jealousy roar through him.

“Watch your fucking mouth.”

Justan rolled his eyes. “Don’t get your panties in a bunch. I was merely saying that for Emma, being a Domme isn’t just a bullshit role to earn a buck. Whatever it is that makes someone a Dominant, that woman has it in spades and she knows it. She’s been active in the local scene for years, even before she went pro. If you plan on really being with her, you need to realize that she’s going to push your comfort zones.”

“Bullshit. I trained with a Domme and did some crazy ass shit with her. There isn’t anything Emma could want that I couldn’t handle.”

“What about bringing another man, or woman, into the bedroom with you?”

Ryan struggled to keep his expression blank. “I could deal with it.”

Shaking his head, Justan sighed. “Give me a fucking break. If another man as much as looks at Emma, you’ll go ape shit. You need to wrap your caveman brain around the fact that your sweet Emma won’t be satisfied with a vanilla relationship. She’s a wild one, you lucky bastard, and if you want to keep her happy, you’re going to have to learn how to share.”

“Fuck.” Ryan ran his hands over his head.

“I don’t see what the problem is. You shared the Mistress you trained under with her husband. And we’ve had more than one crazy night with a woman between us, so it’s not like you wouldn’t enjoy it.”

“Yeah, but that was different.”

“How so?”

“Well…I didn’t love the women I shared in the past.”

“Oh buddy, you are so fucked.” Justan laughed.

Scowling at his friend, Ryan took a sip of his cold coffee before setting the cup back down. “What should I do?”

“How the hell would I know?” Ryan glared at Justan, whose usual mocking smile faded. “Look, life is short and nothing’s guaranteed. You need to weigh the risks versus rewards of your actions against the facts as you know them, then plan your course of action.”

“So you’re saying I need to create a flow chart of my relationship?”

“That’s not a bad idea.” Justan grinned and some of his natural cockiness returned. “I think that if you can get a handle on your jealousy, you just might have a chance with that badass bitch. And if you ever need a backup, you can always call on me.”

“Asshole,” Ryan muttered.

“Oh, come on. You know that I know how to keep it strictly physical. Emma is hot as fuck, and I won’t lie and say I’m not more than a little curious as to what it would be like to bottom to her. But she’s your dream girl, not mine. I will tell you this, if you ask her to choose between you and her job right now, you’re going to lose.”

The truth of his friend’s statement hurt and Ryan tried to fight off the depression threatening to engulf him. He finally had the chance to be with the woman who’d been haunting him for most of his adult life, and he didn’t know if he could handle her. The thought of anyone touching Emma made him see red, but Justan was right. If Ryan wanted to win her heart, he’d have to show her that he would love and accept her for who she was, no matter what. Starting out a relationship with the intent of changing someone never worked.

Justan reached over the table and clasped Ryan’s shoulder, then released it. “Hey, don’t look like someone just kicked your puppy. It isn’t a hopeless situation.”

Frustration filled Ryan. “Why the fuck can’t anything be easy in this world?”

“If it was easy, you wouldn’t value it. Now when are you seeing this chick next?”

“She’s coming over to my house later today.”

Shock widened Justan’s eyes. “Wow, you got her to see you outside of the dungeon already? Does she know who you are?”

“Yeah, I got her to agree to come over, and no, I don’t think she knows who I am.”

“Well then, you need to tell her.” He shook his head. “But I wouldn’t be surprised if she flips out on you. Shit, I’d be pretty fucking pissed if someone lied to me like that.”

“I didn’t lie to her.”

Justan raised an eyebrow in a sarcastic expression even Spock would have envied.

“Okay, maybe I omitted a few thing, but I wanted to prove that I could bring her pleasure. That I could submit to her.”

“And did you?”

The memory of the desire burning in Emma’s beautiful blue eyes and the liquid evidence of her need glistening on her inner thighs beneath her short chain skirt made Ryan’s cock surge behind his fly, causing him to shift to adjust himself. “Oh yeah.”

“You really got off on bottoming for her?”

“Doing what she wants, knowing that she’ll tell me exactly what she needs, what she desires is fucking unbelievably hot. I’ve always gotten off on pleasing women, always been attracted to strong women who know what they want. Being under Emma’s control last night and submitting to her blew my fucking mind. Just because you’re such a control freak in bed doesn’t mean all of us are.”

Justan gave him an unexpectedly sober look. “It’s not about control, it’s about trust, and I just haven’t met any woman I trust enough yet to give up my soul like that.”

“Your soul? Dramatic much?”

“Don’t kid yourself. In a true Dominant/submissive relationship, a good Domme will demand all of you. Your heart, your mind,
and
your soul. I haven’t met a woman that I’d trust with my car, let alone my soul.”

“Well, I trust Emma.”

“Why? You hardly know her.”

“Because…,” his mind floundered on how to put his feelings into words. “Because I just do.”

Justan shook his head with a bemused grin. “You’re so fucked.”

Ryan flipped him off. “You’re just jealous.”

Instead of giving him a sarcastic comeback, Justan studied Ryan a moment before nodding. “Maybe I am. But you, my pussy-whipped friend, need to worry about how you’re going to get Emma to see you as more than a client. Wine her, dine her, and for fuck’s sake, tell her the truth. She might forgive you for hiding it from her last night if you come clean, but if you stretch it out any more than this you’ll break what little trust she has in you. Did you know you’re the first client she’s ever seen outside of the dungeon?”

“How do you know that?”

Justan grinned his patented crooked grin that made women spread their legs with a sigh. “Because I’m a nosy bastard with no respect for other people’s privacy.”

Leaning forward, Ryan glared at his friend. “Stay the fuck out of her personal life, Justan. No more snooping.”

“You’re one of my best friends, Ryan. I just don’t want to see you getting hurt.”

“No more, got it? Your sisters may let you get away with cyber-stalking their boyfriends, but I’m telling you, Emma is off limits.”

“Testy, testy. Fine, I won’t try to keep you from getting your heart ripped out of your chest and stomped to bits by a pair of stiletto heels.” He gave Ryan a wounded look that was as out of place on his harsh face as a mean junkyard dog trying to give puppy dog eyes.

“Asshole.” He glanced at the time and sighed. “I’ve gotta go. Emma will be at my house in a couple hours.”

“Take her out on that big ass boat of yours, hang out with her, give her a chance to relax. She hasn’t dated anyone seriously since she started pro-Domming so give her some romance without being all clingy. Seduce her, please her, and take it slow. Make her want you as much as you want her.”

“Thank you, Dr. Ruth.” Ryan stood and slipped his laptop back into its carrying case.