Corporate Cowboy (4 page)

“Or what, Emma.” His breath wafts over my face. Hot. Moist. Something flutters in my belly.

I open my eyes. “Or…”

His lips bear down on mine. My mouth is open. He angles across my lips, and my chest expands against his. He flattens himself against me and tightens his grip on my wrists. I am wide open, my hands pinned above my head and my body flush with his.

He probes, and like a traitor to my own convictions, I moan with pleasure as his searching, darting tongue mingles with mine.

His lips sucking, capturing…

I curl my fingers downward around his hands. He shifts and growls deep in his throat. “My God.” He bursts backward and hisses the words. Then he releases my wrists, his hands moving to my face, holding me very still. He kisses me again. Raking his mouth over mine, his bite is firm and intentional, trailing down my neck.

I pant. “Mr. Parker. Gage. Sir.” I don’t know what I am saying. “Stop.”

He halts and exhales, long.

For the lengthiest moment, we remain, standing in the elevator, with only the awkward cadence of our erratic breathing filling the space. He rests his forehead against my shoulder. My arms slowly slide down to my side.

“Thank you.”

He pushes back and stands upright. He looks at me with those dark, lancing eyes, takes another deep breath and lets it out. “All right.”

I cannot look away. I am captivated by him and how he just made me feel. Something shifted between us those past few minutes. Perhaps something shifted in me. I no longer want to push him away. I want him closer. My chest longs to press against him again, feeling his heart beat unsteadily next to mine. Frightened and intrigued, I want to run away, and into his arms, in the same moment.

“The elevator. How?” My speech is incoherent.

Gage picks up his briefcase and with that one motion, pulls himself together. I, on the other hand, am a reckless mess. He still has not taken his eyes from mine.

“Emma,” he begins softly. “Do you know what it means to be submissive?”

I’m speechless. “I… I do. I think.” Suddenly I feel a little embarrassed and unsure of myself.

He nods and steps back. “Hm. I see.”

We stand, gazes locked, for several long seconds. Then Gage says, “Emma, I will start the elevator in a moment, and it will take us to the twenty-second floor. The only meeting today is between you and me, and it is not a matter of hotel business. It is a matter of business between us. Personal.”

He pauses, searching my face.

“You want to make arrangements to fuck me.”

One corner of his mouth jerks into a grin. “Yes.”

“And what makes you think that is what I want?”

The corner jerks higher. “Emma, it’s written all over your face.”

“I don’t think—”

“Don’t think, Emma. Just react. Life is more fun that way.”

“What exactly is it that you want, Gage?”

“I will explain that in detail once we get to my office.”

“Why can’t you do it now?”

“Because I don’t conduct business in elevators, Ms. Lavender.”

“Do you fuck in elevators?”

He stares into my eyes. “Sometimes.”

“Oh.”

He steps closer. “Emma, I’m going to push that button now, and you have a choice. It is entirely up to you. When we get to the twenty-second floor, I am getting off. You can get off with me and we can discuss next steps, or you can stay on the elevator and go home. The choice is yours.”

“And if I choose to go home?”

He shrugs. “Nothing. I’ll leave you alone.”

I sense that is far from the truth. He will not leave me alone. “Truly?”

“Of course.”

“And if I choose to follow?”

He moves closer, his gaze probing, his breathing quick, in and then out. “Then you choose to give yourself up to me for a short time. There will be terms. Do you understand what I am saying, Emma?”

I don’t, entirely. But I understand enough.

Then you choose to give yourself up to me. There will be terms.

Fifty Shades
? I’d read the book, seen the movie. Who hadn’t?

I lift my chin, not entirely sure why I am going to say this next word, but I know I am going to say it. “Yes.”

He holds my gaze for a moment then reaches over to the panel and hits a button. The elevator shimmies and rises.

Gage steps back and straightens his jacket. Suddenly, I am aware of how disheveled I feel. I glance down and smooth my clothing, and then pick up my bag from the floor. I don’t remember dropping it.

“My glasses.”

Gage reaches into his jacket pocket and hands them to me. I fumble and push them back on my nose.

I face the door. Give him my back. Watch the numbers. Twenty. Twenty-one. Twenty-two.

The doors swoosh open.

Gage sidles past me and walks into the lavish lobby. I watch him and listen to the heels of his boots echo on the hard, polished floors, as he moves into the depths of the empty space. He doesn’t look back to see if I follow.

The elevator doors start to close.

I must decide. My sex life so far has been average. In some ways, far less than satisfying. What if this is the one chance I’ll have to experience something different? Something more?

You will give yourself up to me for a short time.

Do you know what it means to be submissive?

I put my hand out to stop the elevator doors and step into the lobby. I am about to find out.

Chapter Four

Gage knew by the time he and Cole had finished their breakfast on Saturday that a weekend of castrating calves was not going to hold his attention for long. They’d not even finished breakfast when his brain drifted to thoughts of taking Emma.

Before he’d left the house, he’d called and texted way too many times.

Later, when she finally picked up, her sleep-softened voice made his cock ache—but the seductive lure also tempered his anger at her not being readily available. He tried to be rational but found himself impatient. Already the stirrings of what he needed from her, what he wanted from her, to do to her, and for her to do to him, were roiling inside.

Of course, his impatience was unwarranted—she didn’t belong to him. She had no idea he wanted to possess her. And their employer/employee relationship had not yet been established.

Still, he was irritated at her avoidance. And that’s what it was—avoidance. She’d ignored him by turning off her phone.

Dammit. The longer the day wore on, he realized possession was exactly what he wanted—to possess her mind, body and soul. That notion ate at him like battery acid. He only wanted to possess women for a weekend. He was a short-term guy. Nothing permanent, ever. But Emma was different, and that notion surprised—and frightened—the hell out of him.

Perhaps it was simply the notion that she was the kind of woman who required permanence, which in and of itself, should send him screaming for the hills.

Of course, that kind of women was not what he needed. Or wanted.

All the more reason to back off.

And all the more reason why hands-off was appealing.

But she was crowding his space, assaulting his mind. So, while cutting and wrestling calves, his body getting the physical workout he needed and his muscles screaming with pain, he resorted to ticking off in his head everything he wanted to do to Miss Emma Lavender.

First, he’d fuck her, plain and simple, and he’d take his good time doing it. He’d show her the power of his body, the pleasure he could provide and the physical joy of being with a man who
knew
what he could provide—he’d fuck her until both of them were sated and until neither could lift a finger off the bed.

Step one. And just the beginning.

As he roped calves and tied their feet, he imagined slipping silk cords around Emma’s delicate ankles and threading those cords between her legs and around her body. He would secure her wrists and ankles so that she couldn’t move, leaving her exposed and vulnerable in ways she’d likely never experienced before. He’d show her she was there simply for the fucking.

His fucking.

He pictured her in his bed, spread-eagle, the silken ropes lassoed on each hand and foot, firmly secured to each of the four posters.

He imagined her arms above her head, wrists bound together, and hanging from the eyehook embedded in the tack room beam, her toes barely touching the ground. His mind flashed to her sprawled over his spanking bench, her ass high in the air, her red cheeks quivering and waiting for his hand. He pondered whether she would prefer leather to his palm….

He wanted her hard and fast, down and dirty. He wanted her long, slow, and deliberate—each move calculated for maximum pleasure. He wanted to fuck out the come-fuck-me contradiction in her sweet, pretty pink lips, and longed to hear her scream and curse his name with intense orgasmic pleasure.

And then beg for more.

Hell, he wanted her now.

Gage shook off the thought as one of the ranch hands yelled. A calf shot up off the ground, and he twisted to tackle it as the young bull leapt his way. Cole jumped to his side, and they struggled and then held the calf down until he was cut and branded.

As the iron seared into the hair and hide of the animal, marking it with the BF ranch brand and clearly showing that this particular calf belonged to him, he held a foreign and captivating notion in his head that he wanted to do the same to Emma.

Not physically brand her, of course. He would never do that. He wouldn’t intentionally cause injury to any woman. Women were to be respected. But the crazy notion of possessing her, and somehow marking her as his, hit him unexpectedly in the pit of his gut.

He’d never wanted a permanent sub. He didn’t intend to start now.

The calf jumped up, jerking Gage’s thoughts back to the real world. Gage watched him stumble away.

“Mine,” he said, under his breath.

“That’s why we do it,” Cole responded.

Gage looked at him. “What?”

Cole stared back. “You weren’t talking about the bull, were you.”

Gage didn’t know what the hell he was talking about.

****

Now, twenty-four hours later, Gage strolled into his office, leaving the doors open behind him. He stepped to his desk and laid his briefcase to the side, turning to stare out the window at the mountains. The window glass was due for a cleaning. He’d get Chad on that first thing in the morning. If there was one thing he couldn’t stand, it was a window he couldn’t see clearly out of.

Or that someone could not see clearly
into
.

The office was twenty-two floors up, and the likelihood that anyone could see in was nil—unless one owned binoculars or a telescope and lived on the mountain or in a nearby condo. And because of that distinct possibility, he liked the glass to be sparkling clean.

If anyone were to observe his behind-closed-doors escapades, he wanted them to see vividly how he could thoroughly please a woman—not to mention, himself.

Yes, one could add public sex displays to his list of depraved sexual deviancy. He liked to be watched—and for his sub to be watched. He was a showman, after all. And showmen loved the limelight.

Gage avoided looking at the door. He itched to learn if Emma had followed him, but he would not give in to searching for her. He would wait to see if she presented herself. This was her decision, without any further coercion from him. So, he sat behind the desk and opened his briefcase, taking out a folder.

Another stack of papers lay on his desk, slightly to his right, and he glanced to the title page. There were three words printed on the page, approximately one-third of the way down:
Emma Lavender.
And then underneath:
Confidential
. Chad had already been in and prepared his report. He’d trained that young man well.

Chad was a sub but not to him. At least not in a sexual way. Chad was gay, and Gage was not about same-sex relationships. But Chad’s tendency toward submissiveness was a plus for their working relationship. In fact, Gage supported and coached Chad on more than one occasion on the art of being submissive in a sexual relationship. Grateful, Chad paid back the favor with his loyalty.

Some men had office wives. Gage had an office sub.

It worked for them.

He lifted the paper-clipped stack of papers and slid them into the back of the folder, now open on his desk. He glanced down to the agreement sitting on top.

“Ahem.”

Gage looked up. Emma stood before him. His cock jumped.

Inwardly, he smiled. Pleased.

His outward appearance, he knew, was stoic. Unmoving.

Time to get down to business.

****

“I got off the elevator,” she said.

He nodded. “I see that, Emma. Do you know why you are here?”

Her head tilted upward, slightly. “I do.”

Gage leaned into his desk and closed his eyes, briefly. Upon opening them, he noticed she had not moved. “I’m not sure that you do. Please sit, Emma”

She settled into the desk chair opposite him. “Try me.”

Don’t taunt me, Emma.
“Is that a challenge? Because I’m not about challenges. I’m about sure things.” He paused and watched her swallow, the muscles in her neck squeezing and moving in and out. “Are you a sure thing, Emma?”

Her eyes darted back and forth. “Yes,” she said softly.

“I can’t hear you. Emma, when you speak to me, speak without hesitation. I will ask again. Are you a sure thing?”

She inhaled and huffed out a breath. “I… I said ‘yes.’”

Gage stood and shook his head, watching her face. “No.”

Her gaze, still wrapped up in his, held a moment of panic. “No?” she questioned, and stood.

Dammit, he was not going to let her flee again.

In a few short strides, he rounded the desk, placed his hands on either of her shoulders, and turned her to face him. “No, Emma. You hesitated. I’ll not move forward until I know for certain that you are ready to give up control to me.”

He watched those words play over her face. Fucking was one thing. Giving up control was something else.

But she didn’t address the control issue. She said, “How can I tell you I am ready if you don’t tell me the expectations?”

“That’s for further discussion.”

Emma shrugged out of his grasp and planted herself in the straight-back leather chair in front of his desk. His hands fell to his sides. “I
am
ready,” she said, and then cocked her chin up, almost as if in defiance. “Spill it.”

He should spank her ass.

Gage narrowed his gaze and stared. She didn’t flinch. Held his glare, tit-for-tat.

“All right then.” He doubted she was ready. In fact, he knew she was
not
. Perhaps he’d been crazy to think otherwise. But he backed up and moved round the desk toward his chair, talking all the while. “There are things you need to know, Emma. There is a process to be carried out.” He reached for her folder and rifled through a few papers. “A contract to be understood and signed, a nondisclosure agreement. We’ll need to get that notarized. You’ve already been vetted by my staff and…”

Emma stood again. Gage glanced up. “Are you going to keep bouncing up and down? Sit, Emma!”

She didn’t. “I thought you just wanted to fuck me. This sounds like a business deal.”

“Fucking is business, Emma. At least with me.”

“But an NDA?”

“Of course. It protects us both.”

She stared, her chest lifting and falling. “It sounds so cold.”

You have no idea.
“And your point is?”

“I…I’m not sure.”

“There you go again. See? You are not ready.”

She shook herself. “Yes. I am. I am fine.”

“Prove it.”

She blew out a breath. “Let me see the damn contract.”

“Get on your knees, Emma, and ask for my forgiveness.”

Her face turned into a puzzle. “What?”

“Get on your knees,” Gage repeated, “and ask for my forgiveness.”

“Why?”

“For arguing with me. If we are to move forward, you are to understand that what I say goes. I am telling you, you are not ready. You are arguing with me. That is not permitted.”

Emma stared, and Gage could see the gears grinding in her head.

“On your knees, Emma.”