The Proposal (37 page)

Guys & Dolls

Behind the sheer, red curtain, Black Betty adjusted
her leather corset, rolled her shoulders and took a deep breath. The chatter of
male voices in the club came at her in waves, low, deep, and laughing. Ice
cubes clinked in rocks glasses filled with double malt scotch.

She’d been at Dolls & Doms for so long she was
certain she knew every man in the room. Being a private,
membership-by-invitation-only men’s club a few scant miles from the Vegas
strip, the roster filled with rich, famous and politically-elected males wasn’t
difficult to keep up with.

Tonight’s event was just another bachelor party.
Another bare ass to smack.

Her
signature song,
Ram Jam’s Black
Betty
,
began and blared loudly over the club’s obscenely expensive sound system. She
took a deep breath and flung her long, blonde hair back over her shoulders.

Pushing
through the curtain with one spiked, black boot, she sauntered across the stage
and down three stairs to the main floor where she shoved away two men on either
side of her. Cheers rang out as she strutted through the crowd and flicked her
long, black whip. It cracked on the marble floor in front of a cocky looking
twenty-something dressed in an expensive gray suit, sitting in a leather club
chair smoking a cigar—Alistair Ingram, hottest leading man on the big screen
and the groom to be.

Betty
had seen the front page engagement shot over the summer on one of the lurid
entertainment magazines while she was in line at the supermarket. She’d picked
it up and flipped through, noting the way Alistair preened in front of the
camera, never once posing with his fiancé who stood five yards behind him
carrying a big, heavy-looking box. Betty gave the marriage a year on the
generous side—if his bride-to-be got smart and dumped his pretentious butt.

Circling
her hips, she went into auto-pilot. Her routine was like driving a car by now.
She’d say it was like riding a bike, but she’d never learned to ride one. Every
best-man who booked a party wanted a Dom. She supposed they figured being
spanked was permissible by the bride-to-be, whereas performing erotic torture
on a Doll—the club’s cutesy name for subs that Betty despised—would fall into
the cheating category.

She
straddled his lap, leaned forward and pushed her breasts together, inches from
Alistair’s face. When he reached out to touch, she stepped back and cracked the
handle of her whip against his knuckles.

A
wicked grin spread across his lips. He shook his hand and sucked the knuckle of
his index finger, his melted chocolate eyes blazing. Jesus, he
was
hot.
But he knew it all too well. Betty couldn’t wait to get him alone and wipe that
shit-eating-grin off his face.

This
was one man who needed to be taught a lesson.

Betty
knew her punishment mentality was against every rule in the book. Everything
she did to him was to be consensual and done for pleasure—pleasure through
pain. But she couldn’t help her desire to punish the ones who were deserving.
The ones like her first husband. The ones who thought they were above
respecting women.

She
slipped a blindfold out of one of her thigh-high, black boots and secured it
over his eyes. “Stand, Doll,” she commanded, snapping her whip at his feet.
“For the next hour, you’re mine to play with.”

His
friends shouted and jeered as he stood. Betty glanced around and caught the
familiar faces of other movie and T.V. actors, a few musicians, a director, and
a producer who she’d brought to his knees on multiple occasions.

She
unclipped a spiked collar from her garter and buckled it around Alistair’s
neck. “Quite the charmed life you live, Doll. Time to get a little dirty.”

That
fucking grin still sat stiff on his lips, and he ran a hand through his
dark-blond hair, leaving it sexy and tousled. There was no help for her, she
wasn’t going to play Miss Nice Dom tonight.

Betty
winked at the tall man standing next to the groom’s chair. “You’re the best
man, I presume?”

He
shot her a star-studded smile. “I am.” He played a lawyer on T.V. She’d seen a
couple episodes of his show on her nights off.

“Go
get me the leash on the bar,” she commanded, twirling her whip so it wrapped
around the best-man’s legs.

He
placed his hands on his hips in mock irritation. “Don’t I get a please?”

“Baby
doll, you only paid me to make one person beg tonight, and it sure as hell
isn’t going to be me.”

Best-man
tossed his head back laughing, and strolled to the bar to fetch her leash.

“What
are you going to do to me, Black Betty?” Alistair asked, rocking his hips and
shoulders back and forth, the smoke from his cigar spiraling in the air.

She
grabbed his hair and jerked his head down, placing her lips beside his ear.
“I’m going to make you wish you were tucked in bed nice and snug next to your
pretty little fiancé, Doll.”

He
chuckled and rubbed his hands together.

Best-man
was back with the leash. She yanked it out of his hands and clipped it on
Alistair’s collar. “Walk,” she commanded, tugging on the leash and leading him
through his friends.

The
music transitioned into
Submission by
Delphic
,
and Betty cringed internally as the club’s Dolls stepped timidly through
doorways, dropped to all fours and crawled across the marble floor.
“Entertainment’s here!” Best-man shouted.

Betty
knew for the most part it was all an act. The Dolls worked there because it
meant a damn good paycheck—same reason she was still there. This was a job, not
a lifestyle like it was for the members of real BDSM clubs. This was vanilla,
and after the last ten rocky-road-years of her life, she fucking adored
vanilla.

No,
this place wasn’t hardcore. She’d gone head first into that lifestyle and
gotten tossed right down on her back. She still had the scars to prove it
thanks to husband number two, who’d never been one for safe words. Hence the
reason she’d never be a Doll. She’d never find herself on her back again.

But
a few of the Dolls, like Red Mary, let themselves believe this was some kind of
glamorous lifestyle. That letting these rich assholes do whatever they pleased
to her was going to make one of them fall hopelessly in love with her. She was
here to be saved, to find the fairytale. She probably even let them fuck her.

She’d
figure out soon enough that there was no fairytale. Nobody knew that better
than Black Betty.

“Through
here.” Betty flung open a door and led Alistair down a hallway paneled in rich
mahogany. “Give me this.” She grabbed the half-smoked stogie out of his
fingers, dropped it on the marble floor and swiveled the ball of her foot on
top of it.

“That
cigar was two hundred bucks. Probably more than you make in an entire week.”
The side of Alistair’s lip hitched in a snide smirk.

Betty
grabbed his cheeks and squeezed. Hard. “No speaking unless you’re asked a
direct question. You answer me by saying
yes mistress
. Do you understand
me Alistair Ingram?”

He
let out a contemptuous snort of laughter. “Oh, I got it.”

She
shoved him against the wall, kicked her leg up and pinned him with her spiked
heel against his chest. “Do. You. Understand. Me?”

Alistair’s
face went blank. She wished she could see his eyes under the blindfold. He held
his hands up at shoulder level, surrendering. “I understand.”

Betty
pressed her heel into his chest harder. She knew it was her imagination, but
she swore she could feel his heart pounding under her foot. The thought ignited
a smoldering heat between her legs. She leaned in, her lips mere centimeters
from his. “I understand,
what?”
she said, her voice a harsh whisper.

“I
understand, Mistress Betty.”

“Just
mistress.” She lowered her foot to the floor and yanked his leash. “Your fiancé
will make me her maid-of-honor when I’m through breaking you, Superstar.”

She
couldn’t miss how his breath came quicker. All the dumbasses who were members
got off on the idea of being cock teased. She’d wind him up so tight, he’d blow
with the slightest touch of her feather tickler.

Reaching
a black door, Betty put a hand on Alistair’s cheek and turned the cut crystal
doorknob. “Welcome to my lair, Doll.”