Claimed (4 page)

Without another word, Mary left the room, leaving Presley wondering what would make her owe Dmitri enough never to charge him for her services when she wasn’t a member of Club Sin. More important, who was Charles?

* * *

Wednesday nights at Mickey’s sports bar had become a tradition for the Masters of Club Sin, even if only three—which included Dmitri—had attended tonight
.
In front of him, one large flat-screen displayed the football game. Booths were to the left, but he and the two other Masters sat atop wooden stools in front of a thick oak table in the center of the bar.

Dmitri inhaled the aroma of the greasy food wafting from the kitchen down on the right. He enjoyed the loud banter in the pub and was more than pleased that half of the week was behind him.

Each day took longer to end than the one before it, since Presley had stayed heavy on his mind. All her innocence and her beautiful reactions to him had trapped him in desirable and dominant thoughts, making his days long and nights too short.

He finished off his last buffalo wing, wiping his fingers and face with a napkin. Whereas his stomach felt bloated from the obscene numbers of wings and two beers he’d consumed, Aidan’s head of jet-black hair was bowed to his plate. He ate enough food to feed a small village.

After Aidan all but inhaled another chicken wing, his gray eyes flicked to Dmitri. “How’d it go with that sub, Presley, on Sunday?” He shook his head in mirth, holding a new wing in front of his face. “Cora talked about her so much when I had a scene with her last weekend that I had to order her to silence.”

Dmitri chuckled, lowering his beer to the table. “She’s skittish, but there’s potential.” At Aidan’s long look, Dmitri’s lips parted to elaborate that he didn’t mind a bundle of nerves, when in front of him, Kyler interjected, “’Bout damn time you got yourself a new sub.” His messily styled light brown hair dangled over his forehead, and his blue-green eyes stared Dmitri down in a measured way. “Allow yourself this. Train her. Don’t ask one of us to do it.”

If anyone else had given him such a sharp order, Dmitri would spit out a few choice words, but Kyler was a close friend of eight years. They’d met at the club Chains
,
when Dmitri was twenty-five, first entering the BDSM scene. Their friendship stuck, possibly because Kyler was so straight with him. “This is your business because . . . ?”

Kyler gave his
don’t fuck with me
cop look, which he’d mastered after twelve years on the force. “Just making sure your head is screwed on straight.” He grinned. “But if you’re stupid and pass on her, give her to me. The shy ones are always fun.”

Dmitri shook his head at Kyler’s knowing smirk. That look always meant he was up to no good, and Dmitri didn’t need the reminder that he hadn’t taken on another submissive since his last sub, Katherine, four years ago.

Although he was well aware, he enjoyed the freedom of not being tied down and hadn’t met a woman he wanted to claim. He’d met many he wanted to command and fuck, and that was exactly what he did with them. A relationship hadn’t been his top priority. Partly because deep down he craved monogamy, and he hadn’t met a woman who gave him enough satisfaction as a Master to fully commit to her.

Even Katherine, to whom he’d been committed for three years, couldn’t find fulfillment in both the dungeon and an emotional relationship. She had craved to be a twenty-four/seven slave, which Dmitri didn’t want. He liked to dominate in the bedroom and dungeon, not out of it. Meshing the two worlds had proved impossible.

Besides, he wouldn’t open the doorway for Kyler to voice an opinion he didn’t want. Turning to Aidan, he asked, “Cora and Presley seem really close, don’t they?”

“They live together,” Aidan stated.

Dmitri sat back on his stool, folding his arms over his black T-shirt in surprise. “I didn’t think Cora had a roommate.”

Aidan bit into his chicken wing, then shrugged. “From what I heard, it’s new and unexpected.”

Now, that interested Dmitri. “Presley told me she moved here from Apple Valley, but she never mentioned living with Cora.” Could there be more to that than he knew? She had talked about an ex-boyfriend, even if she didn’t seem interested in discussing it with him. “Wonder why she never told me about that.”

“Got nothing for you.” Aidan took another bite of his wing. “Cora knows better than to talk to me about someone else’s personal life.”

Dmitri didn’t know what to make of why Presley had left off that detail, but he made a mental note to revisit the thought later. He examined Aidan. These two men were his closest friends, but just as Dmitri had been single these past four years, Aidan had been unattached for five. “How are things with Cora?”

Aidan smiled. “She’s behaving, as always.”

“She’s good for you.” Kyler took a long sip of his beer before he lowered the bottle to the table. “Not so good for me.”

“I trained her.” Aidan’s brows drew together with a frown as his eyes narrowed on Kyler. “She’s used to my rules.”

Kyler snorted, picking up the burger off his plate. “Keep telling yourself that.”

Aidan lowered the chicken wing and glared. “Voicing your opinion when no one wants to hear it is getting old.”

Kyler grinned. “Only bothers you because I’m right.”

Dmitri couldn’t argue that point, and clearly, neither could Aidan, since he stayed quiet. Where most would be modest and say nothing, Kyler always stated the obvious truth aloud. Dmitri didn’t mind. He appreciated the solid nature of Kyler, who had the habit of smacking the truth in his face.

With the continuing silence and Aidan’s glare deepening, Dmitri interjected gently, “Cora does seem to do best with you.”

Aidan froze midway from taking another bite, and his eyes narrowed on Dmitri. “Like I said, I trained her.”

Dmitri saw through the bullshit, as did Kyler, since he snorted again before he dug in to his burger. Aidan’s interest in Cora had been why Dmitri never played with her himself. Aidan cared for Cora, even if he didn’t want to admit it, and that meant she was off-limits. Of course, Kyler always said if Aidan was too stupid to man up, he wasn’t going to deny himself a sexy sub.

The crowd in the pub erupted into loud cheers following a touchdown, and Dmitri raised his beer to his mouth. The crisp, cool liquid rushed down his throat. He understood Aidan’s choices, but he leaned toward the same thoughts as Kyler. Aidan missed out because it was all too clear that Cora responded to him best because she wanted to. She offered her submission to him in ways she didn’t to anyone else.

He wouldn’t point out to Aidan why he avoided the truth. Although he suspected it had something to do with Aidan’s past, and his last submissive, who died in a car accident. “You’re good with how things are?” At Aidan’s silence and raised brows, Dmitri laughed. “You don’t plan on answering me?”

“Nope.” Aidan finished off his chicken wing, and his gaze became challenging. “You want to talk about what’s going on with Presley?”

Dmitri frowned. “Nothing’s going on.”

“I’m surrounded by fucking dipshits,” Kyler mumbled before he took another bite of his burger.

Aidan smirked. “Not fun, is it?”

In fact, no, Dmitri didn’t like the position he found himself in, but Aidan’s point was moot. “I haven’t even taken her into a scene,” he defended. “How could anything be going on? I just met the woman.”

Kyler dropped his burger to his plate and gave Dmitri a hard look. “Did you put a rush on her documents and ask me to print off her police report instead of going the normal route?”

Dmitri’s frown deepened. “And?”

Aidan wiped his mouth with the napkin. “Why?”

“Because I have the means to rush her documents and call in a favor.” Dmitri stared down his friends, annoyed to his very bones. “That makes me a dipshit?”

Kyler returned the harsh look with one of his own. “Have you ever given a sub such treatment?”

“When in the hell did this become about me?” Dmitri scowled, folding his arms. “I worried that if I made her wait, she might get herself worked up and suffer because she’s skittish. That’s it.”

Kyler retorted, “Why do you care how she feels?”

“Because as the owner of Club Sin—” He nearly said
I owe her that,
but what did he owe her? He wasn’t even her Dom yet, nor had he made any agreement with her.

In the face of the hard looks from his two closest friends, he swallowed his argument. His behavior
was
unusual, especially for him. He’d never rushed documents and never cared enough to worry about a submissive outside the dungeon. Of course, he’d never had a sub as innocent as Presley, but why was he being so gentle with her?

Normally, he wouldn’t care so much about
her
in the emotional sense, and he’d give a personal thought to her only if he had her in a scene. Then he’d worry about her emotional state, because that was his duty as her Dom. Now he had no reason to feel an attachment to her.

Exactly as he told her, in the dungeon, her life was his business. Out of it, her life shouldn’t interest him.

Only problem?

It did.

He’d gone out of his way to ensure that she was comfortable. He’d gone out of his way to hurry things along to get her in the dungeon. And he’d gone out of his way to make certain she’d come back for more by promising a kiss.

He wanted to command Presley. He wanted her kneeling at his feet and staring up at him with that slight intimidation and hot excitement. He wanted her to awaken under his touch like he’d seen her do. He wanted to be the one who introduced her to BDSM and shed those nerves, igniting a passion in her that she’d never known. The thought of all that made him ache and crave to fuck her until they both were drenched in sweat.

At whatever expression had crossed Dmitri’s face, Kyler inclined his head, smiling from ear to ear. “Good for you, Dmitri. At least you’re man enough to admit it.”

Aidan thumped Kyler’s arm with his fist. “Bastard.”

Surrounded by his friends’ laughter, Dmitri didn’t share in their amusement; his only focus now was experiencing that rich hunger to claim her submission.

Chapter Four

On Friday evening, happiness rushed through Presley, since she was back in Vegas; not that her three-day visit with her parents hadn’t been great, but Vegas had become home. She gazed through the window at the Las Vegas Strip as hordes of tourists passed by the glass window of Scores sports bar. She chuckled at their doe eyes while they took in the sights, knowing she probably looked the same four months ago.

Now she had other concerns, including the fact that tonight was
the
night she would get up close and personal with BDSM. She’d gone to Dr. Schmidt’s office straight from the bus station—the envelope of her clear test results in her purse—and once she got home, Cora had dragged her back out to celebrate tonight.

“What’s your pleasure, miss?” a masculine voice said.

Turning away from the window, Presley spotted the bartender with the cute smile and regretted the ability to drink herself stupid. Tonight would be much easier if she were shit-faced, but Club Sin had an alcohol ban. Submissives needed to act on their own accord, not be driven by alcohol, or so Cora had told her. “Two Cokes, please.”

“Comin’ right up.”

As the barkeep fetched the drinks, Presley noticed that the man next to her on the stool reeked of whiskey. Maybe no drinking was a good thing. Nothing would be sexy if she smelled like that. She wanted to pour on the sexy tonight, or at least try to, with her best imitation.

“Presley.”

Her stomach dropped at
that
voice. She peeked sideways to find brown eyes surrounded by thick eyebrows, a thin face with spiked sandy-colored hair, and even the charmed smile that once captivated her.

Why hadn’t she thought
he’d
be here?

As a couple, they’d hung out every Friday night at this sports bar, which had been exactly why she’d avoided it for the last three months, until Cora had forced her to come tonight. Drawing in a deep breath for bravery, she said, “Hi, Steven.”

Her high school sweetheart leaned up against the bar in front of her. The cologne he wore now smelled too strong, tickling her nose. Even his voice didn’t hold the same sweet edge she remembered. “How are you?”

The last time she’d seen this face was when she’d packed her bags and moved out of their apartment. Eight years she’d spent with this man, sharing a life and dreams of a future. Five months ago, he had moved to Vegas because of a promotion with the software company that employed him, and a month after he put a ring on her finger, she’d followed.
I can’t live without you. The long-distance relationship isn’t working. Come to Vegas with me. Be my wife,
he’d said when he proposed. Three months ago, she’d thrown the ring in his face and left him.
May Sin City swallow you whole!
“Doing just fine, thanks,” she said.

“How’s work?” He smiled. “Your family?”

“Both are good.” She swallowed her disgust as she watched Steven take a big gulp of his beer. She hated the sight of the lips she once kissed. “How about you?”

“Lots of overtime, but the money is good.” Spinning the bottle in his hand on the bar, he continued to give her a charismatic smile. “Why haven’t you been around?”

Oh, I’ve been getting my documents together so I can watch men and women be flogged, whipped, and have sex in a dungeon.
“Been busy.” To dig at him, she added, “I’m actually dating someone.” A total lie, of course. The Dom who trained her—Cora had explained that she’d be assigned to one—wouldn’t look to her as girlfriend material. But Steven didn’t have to know that, and the lie poured deliciously off her tongue, making her feel better and showing him she was desirable.

His eyes widened, incredulous. “You have a boyfriend?”

I’ll have a Dom.
“Yeah, it’s new.”

The bartender brought over the Cokes, and Presley picked up the glasses, plastering a huge fake smile on her face. “It’s nice to see you again. Take care.”
Rot in hell, bastard!

She’d turned to walk away from him when Steven grabbed her arm with a rigid expression. “I hadn’t heard you were dating.” Glancing around the busy pub, he must’ve noticed Cora on the other side of the bar, because his jaw clenched. “Who is it?”