Curve Effect (A BBW Box Set of Contemporary, Science Fiction and Paranormal Romances) (5 page)

"How much research have you done for this article?" Richardson slid into the chair behind his massive, ornate wooden desk. He smoothed his fingers through the mix of black and gray hair before dropping his hand into his lap.

Looking at him, I felt like a mouse trying to stare down a King Cobra. He had the home team advantage and a deep, sexual sophistication I couldn't begin to fathom. Craig was only lover number three. If the rumors about the club were true, that was one night's worth of companions for some of its members.

He may have been a dominant within the club, but he needed to know I was interviewing him. "I don't go by second hand information, Mr. Richardson. So why don't we start with the club's activities."

"That would be second hand information, wouldn't it, Miss Lane?" Relaxing into his leather chair, he smiled like a cat that had just discovered a canary out of its cage. "Of course, while we most likely have members of the media among our patrons, I can't take you on a guided tour of the facilities."

His gaze moved over the portion of my body visible from where he sat behind his desk. "So why don't you sketch out your understanding and I can confirm or deny. That will save us both time."

Resisting the impulse to roll my lips as if I had just been busted passing a note in my sixth grade civics class, I smiled at him. "This is a sex club, Mr. Richardson, where consenting adults engage in sexual intercourse without any monetary exchange."

"Sex isn't a given, Miss Lane." He tilted his head, his study of my upper body narrowing down to my breasts.

And I wasn't even wearing my blue blouse!

"The exchange," I continued, "sometimes with sex, sometimes not, can include restraint, sensory stimulation, role-playing, and power play."

Richardson lifted an eyebrow, one that was a little too perfect for its arched lines to be natural. "Sounds like something you read on Wikipedia."

I inhaled, letting the slow intake of air cool my cheeks before the blush had time to fully form. "You wanted a sketch of my knowledge, sir."

I clamped my mouth together, wishing I had used some other word to address him. My mistake didn't go unnoticed. His gaze lifted from my tits to my face, the gleam in his eyes as predatory as his smile.

"You know, if you would like more than words from an online encyclopedia, I could arrange something -- an experience for you." He leaned forward, his elbows on his desk and his fingers steepled, the contemplative position a perfect mirror of Craig in his office after yesterday's editorial meeting. "Think about it. Your lush body on display, a light flogging from our dungeon monitor with an audience of a few members, everyone masked of course. Your skin colors easily, doesn't it."

"Would any of your members be willing to have me interview them?" Out of view, I clenched my thighs to keep from squirming in my seat. There was nothing I could do about the flush heating my cheeks, but I could at least keep my ass from dancing.

Richardson pushed a little closer to his desk. "Before or after your flogging, my dear Miss Lane?"

My lips parted, my brain too fuzzy from the suggestion to whip out a quick retort. I had not come to the club prepared to have someone like Richardson work me over psychologically. A rookie mistake that made me think Craig still had good reason to call me
cub
.

"Ever so slightly repressed, I see. Not unusual in a budding submissive." Richardson opened a drawer on his desk and removed a glossy book the size of a trade paperback. He pushed it across the wooden surface then settled deeper into his chair. "Our interview is over for now. I suggest you read the literature and decide if you are interested in pursuing a second, more intimate, conversation."

********************

"Baby, whatever you're smuggling in that bag of yours, it's not going into the restaurant." Opening my door for me, Craig plucked my computer bag from my hands, gently drew me from the cab of the vehicle then locked my bag in the trunk.

I tried to glare at him, but I didn't want to further rouse his curiosity as to what had me so worked up. I had stuffed Richardson's book inside before rushing downstairs to meet Craig in the paper's garage. I had spent the remainder of my workday before that sneaking glances at its content. Richardson was dead wrong, of course. Beyond the exposed flesh, the pictures did nothing to arouse me.

I mean, sure, a fabulously sculpted male like the one sliding his arm around my waist dressed in tight leather pants and shirtless made me a little wet during my research. I could picture Craig in the outfit, his bulge a little bigger, his skin slightly paler. Yeah -- wet, wet, wet. But the nipple clamps, the bar holding the woman's legs open, her pussy exposed and drooling with need, and the flogger -- so not my thing.

Okay, her pussy drooling with need, seeing that much arousal, was hot, too -- but the cause of all that moisture, not at all.

Feeling Craig's hand discreetly slide over the top curve of my ass, I twitched.
Chapter Three -- The Fine Art of Spanking
steamrolled through my head. The pink and swollen outline of a palm print on one butt cheek every bit as large and pale as my own, the man's disappearing hand as her thigh shielded his penetration of her pussy.

Craig slid his hand a little lower and I twitched again.

"Jumpy, cub. Going to tell me why?"

I blinked, felt my cheeks heat. He laughed, dipped his head and whispered in my ear. "I'll lick it out of you tonight, baby. I won't let you come until you tell me."

Swallowing a moan, I leaned slightly into him for support as we followed the maître d' to the table. If Craig kept talking to me like that, he would have to carry me to the car. I couldn't walk with that kind of ache filling my pussy.

Holding out my chair, he gently folded me into it before taking his seat. Once we were alone, he leaned closer, his voice low as he teased me. "Do you know your perfume changes on you when you're aroused? I wanted to pull the car over and fuck you half a dozen times on the way here."

I closed my eyes. I couldn't look at him when his gaze could melt steel. I was trying to work up the nerve to open them when a familiar voice shattered my building calm.

"If I might interrupt for a moment."

My head snapped up and my gaze jerked right to where John Richardson stood a few inches from my elbow. Before I could open my mouth, Craig spoke.

"That depends, John."

My head whipped left to look at Craig. He was on a first name basis with John Richardson, the owner of Cathedral?

What…

The…

Fuck…

"Just a moment, at the bar if you prefer." Richardson skillfully scooped my hand up, leaned low and brushed his lips across my fingers. "You'll forgive me, Miss Lane, for the intrusion."

I peeled my attention from Richardson to look at Craig again. His gaze on Richardson, Craig's face had hardened, the expression most likely imperceptible to someone who hadn't spent the last year in a deep, yearning study of all things Craig Spence.

Rising, Craig gave me a small, meaningful look that I couldn't interpret. I watched them reach the bar and begin talking, their bodies close, heads bent as if conspiring. Craig looked my way twice, his gaze hooking and holding mine each time. With the distance and lighting, I felt more than saw the color rise on his cheeks and the flare of his nostrils.

Holding his body stiffly, he returned to the table. Richardson followed, securing my hand one last time before leaving us to our dinner.

"I do regret we won't be having a second conversation anytime soon." He squeezed my fingers lightly, his lips less abstract than before as they pressed against my skin.

The second my hand returned to the table, Craig covered it with his. He held it while we ordered, his thumb rubbing against my flesh as if he could erase Richardson's kiss.

Slowly I put two and two together, my body heating as I pictured Craig in the photos I had studied that afternoon. Richardson had hinted that members of the media were patrons of the club. Craig definitely had a dominant streak in him -- anyone at the paper who had spent more than a few minutes around him would agree.

But was he really a Dom? Did he get turned on by spanking and flogging and all of the other acts I had view on those glossy pages? Did he want me over his knee, ass bare to his hand as he alternated between spanks and rough thrusts inside my pussy.

I started to shake, so much that he gently squeezed my fingers.

The food arrived and he released me, but not without a warning.

"Baby, if you don't want me taking you right here on the table, you need to eat fast."

********************

We skipped dessert.

Somewhere between the restaurant and his home, Craig regained his self-control. He didn't touch me in the car, kept his gaze laser-focused on the road and speedometer. Ushering me into his house, he pointed at the chair near his fireplace.

"Stand over there."

Dizzy with need, I walked the dozen plus feet to the chair and stopped. Somewhere in the back of my brain, a feminist manifesto played. The rest of my body told me to ignore the bitch.

Yeah, ignore her. I mean, why was she or a man or another woman allowed to define feminism for me or what it means to be a woman? I could think women deserve respect and an equal voice and still want Craig to turn me over his knee, fingering and spanking me until I came screaming his name. I certainly shouldn't lose my F card just because the very idea of it made me wet.

Did it make me wet?

Craig stepped behind me as I pondered the question, his nose pushing against my hair. He inhaled, no other part of his body touching mine. "Damn, baby, your scent is all vanilla and cinnamon right now. So edible."

He placed something on the floor then stepped around me and took a seat in his chair. One hand held a tumbler of dark amber liquid, the other Richardson's book.

"Did you get that out of my bag?"

"Yes. John said you received a copy." He took a sip of alcohol then set the glass on the table. His foot pushed at something on the floor and I looked down to discover my black pumps. The ones with the silver studs that I had worn that last day at Belinda Lee's sex parlor.

I had brought them into the office that morning intending to wear them to dinner. I had chickened out after examining Richardson's book, stowing the pumps in my desk at the last minute. Maybe it wasn't time to tell the bitch to shut up. "Did you search my desk?"

"No. I saw you shove them in your bottom drawer so I liberated them." Sucking on his bottom lip, he opened the book to chapter three and traced the full curve of the woman's round ass. "Put them on, cub."

I hesitated. He looked up, his will palpably pushing at mine through his eyes and the firm set of his mouth. I kicked my flats off and nudged them under the chair.

"Lose the skirt, too." He didn't watch to see if I complied. "You were dancing in your chair after you came back from South Bay. And this is why you were jumpy going into the restaurant. You were thinking about my hand here…"

He touched lightly against the palm print on the woman's fair skin before trailing his finger down to where her thigh shielded the man's fingers inside her pussy. "And here."

Out of my skirt, I stepped into the pumps. His gaze drifted back to me, the reddish-brown brows lifting as he realized I had on a garter belt and stockings. The book slid from his lap onto the leather cushion. He stood, moved in front of me, his hips pushing against my padded ones. His hands found the opposing edges of my panties and he jerked, ripping them from me.

"Spread your legs."

I did, immediately, the contractions rolling through my pussy causing my clit to jump rhythmically.

He stroked his fingers between my labia as he stared intently at my face. "Remove your blouse before it's in pieces."

He kept rubbing between my legs as I struggled to comply. His touch robbed me of any dexterity. My elbows tangled in my sleeves above my head. He captured the fabric, trapping me. I couldn't see him, could only feel him and hear his slow exhalation.

"You have no fucking idea how sexy you are," he whispered through the cloth. "How hard you have my dick."

If any man could make me come with just his words and body heat, it was Craig. I trembled, my knees pushing together to keep me upright.

"Trust me, baby."

I wasn't sure if it was a question or a directive, so I answered. "I do."

He stripped the blouse the rest of the way off and dropped it to the floor. My bra closed in the front and he pinched the closure and dragged the straps down my arms, leaving me standing in front of him in a garter, stockings and the black studded pumps.

"Perfect." Tugging at one nipple as he continued stroking my pussy, Craig kissed a hot, wet line up my throat. Starting a slow grind of the nipple, he bit lightly at my chin and pushed two fingers into my cunt.

"Ten months," he groaned. "No Cathedral, no other women. Just my hand and fantasies of you, little girl."

My head rolled back against my shoulders. Soft, needy moans whispered up my throat. Hips and thighs strained, moving with Craig's fingers until my entire body started to tremble.