12. Max

Wanting something badly and not being able to have it is a new and deeply unpleasant experience for me.

If I'm completely honest, wanting something badly full stop is pretty rare. I suppose it makes me entitled beyond belief to conclude that I never want for anything sufficiently to actually want it.

Even the top job at Wolff Holdings came to me seemingly effortlessly, in the end. I've had my beady little eye on that glittering prize for the two decades that I've worked for Anton, and, sure, I wanted it like an aggressive little Jack Russell who's always nipping at his master's heels.

But did I think Anton would step aside and free up this most coveted of roles? Not on your life.

Not until a certain glacial blonde stepped into his life in those elegant heels of hers and blew every other ambition, every desire he'd ever had, right out of the water.

The job is mine: CEO of Wolff Holdings, the largest privately owned corporation in Europe in terms of enterprise value and turnover. Some might say timing has poisoned the chalice—I know Anton views it as such. Crystallising the value we've created in the form of an initial public offering is the next obvious step, and Anton feels like he's dodged a bullet there.

He's always adored the work itself. The nuts and bolts. The empire building. He's great at the limelight, but he doesn't need it. And, having found his true love later in life, he'd rather be off fucking his beautiful bride poolside than enduring what is undeniably the total and utter circus an IPO entails: endless roadshows and hoop-jumping and investor-courting.

That's why he's found the perfect successor. I'm that circus dog. Stick a plastic bow-tie on me and I'll cavort through every hoop there is. I love being the centre of attention. I fucking thrive on this stuff.

What I don't thrive on is being kept waiting. Nobody holds off on me—not in business, and definitely not in my sex life. Which is why the conundrum of the woman moving so beautifully on stage is making my head ache as much as my balls.

She's in a bodystocking again. It's similar to the one she wore in Cannes, adorned with strategically placed diamanté, only tonight's version is sheer black.

It conceals nothing.

The way they've lit her is perfection. A chrome pole is centre stage, and boy is she working it, but the way Darcy moves isn't like any pole dance I've seen before. It's almost like… she's edging it. She sways onstage, her body a sensual silhouette, backlit so it appears to glow, her loose hair a red halo.

She caresses the pole.

Abandons it.

Sways some more.

Hooks a knee around it and lets herself glide slowly, weightlessly, in a full turn to the hypnotic opera-techno mix playing before sinking to the floor.

Perhaps it's my extreme state of arousal that has me over-identifying with the pole. Poor fucker. It's like a giant cock, and she will not get the fuck on it and ride it properly. It's driving me insane.

Her body is beautiful. So beautiful. Strong and curvy and sensuous. The way she moves almost brings tears to my eyes. She's a free spirit, in thrall to the music and no one else, and it occurs to me that this is her secret. This is where her magic lies. The way she's engaging with the stage, the music, the pole, feels private. She is absolutely, one hundred percent, playing for the audience, but the way she's doing it makes me feel like a grubby little voyeur, watching a show that's intended for no one else's eyes but hers.

I don't know how she does it, but it's spellbinding.

This is no seedy strip club where the woman dancing is beholden to engage by the promise of tips, by the allure of potential tens and twenties and fifties if she pouts and winks and bites her lip and holds eye contact.

Oh, no.

She's above that. She's above us. She has no apparent interest in the roomful of men and women whose rapt attention she's garnered, whose gazes are devouring her almost-naked form as their hands and mouths devour their neighbours' bodies instead. The attraction, the arousal, only runs in one direction tonight, and she has all the power.

As soon asshe takes her bow and exits the stage for the final time to rapturous applause, I push through the crowd, declining the advances of a very attractive blonde I'm pretty sure I've fucked in here before. I have the advantage, given the number of nights I've spent in here and Wolff's pop-up JV with Alchemy, of being something of an insider.

Which is to say I know where the dressing room is.

I head downstairs to the basement as quickly as my erection will allow. It houses not only another, more hardcore playing space—The Vault—but six additional private rooms and a small dressing room the performers use. Darcy's is the only performance scheduled for tonight, which means she should be alone.

I knock.

‘Who is it?' she calls.

‘It's Max.'

There's a pause, and I shove my hands in my pockets as I wait.

She opens the door and stands there, one hand on the doorframe and one on her hip. She's still in her bodystocking, obviously, since I gave her about a twenty-second head start before following her down here like a stalker.

And I look.

I take her in shamelessly.

Every curve, every tiny, glinting crystal on her body. The flush on her cheeks—from exertion and from the adulation she received, no doubt. The way the sheer black gauze turns her furled nipples darker while defining them perfectly and showcases the neat line of hair between her legs so light it's barely visible.

She told me in France she was a natural blonde. I suppose that's my evidence.

When I drag my eyes back up to her face, she's surveying me in amusement.

‘Have you quite finished?'

‘I could look all night,' I tell her. It's true.

‘Clearly.' She nods at my stiff dick.

‘You did that. Bending over like that at the end. You dirty, dirty girl.'

‘What do you want, Max?'

I lean in and kiss her on both cheeks, noting the heat radiating off her body. Not surprising, given the feats of athleticism it's just performed. Her workouts would put my punishing gym regimen to shame.

‘Can I come in?'

‘Not a good idea.' She gazes at me as I pull back, and the hunger in her eyes tells me it's not because she doesn't want me to. Rather, she's upholding her sister's bullshit rules.

I let my gaze flicker south again, to those perfectly taut little buds. I could stoop and take one in my mouth right now. ‘Do you get turned on doing that? Knowing every single guy in there wants to fuck you? Knowing that whichever poor woman they sink their dick inside now, they'll be imagining she's you?'

‘Obviously,' she says, and I don't miss her shuddery exhale.

‘Are you going to get yourself off now?' I crane my neck to see if she has any toys lined up in there to help her.

‘Yep.' She pops the p. ‘And I'm going to enjoy every second.'

Jesus Christ. ‘Let me do it for you.' I glance around. The corridor's empty. ‘No one has to know,' I plead. ‘I'll put you on that table and make you come so hard with my tongue. Think how good I can make you feel, even through the fabric.'

‘Max. No.' She tightens her grip on her waist.

‘Fine.' I didn't expect her to give in, anyway. Not here. ‘I want you to dance for me tomorrow. At my place.'

She widens her eyes. ‘What the actual fuck? No.'

‘Seriously. No one needs to know. You can do it off the books.' I pause. ‘I'll give you twenty grand.'

Her face is a picture. If I didn't want this so badly, I'd laugh.

‘What—that's ridiculous! You're insane. You can't pay twenty grand for a dance.'

‘I can and I will. Give the money to charity if you don't want it.'

She rolls her eyes. ‘Is this your fucked-up way of getting me to sleep with you?'

I sigh. Time to lay my cards on the table. It'll go better for me, anyway. ‘Look. There's something between us. You might be in denial, for some unknown reason, but that's fine. I don't pressure unwilling women to let me fuck them.' I never have to pressure any woman to let me fuck her, if she must know. ‘I want to fuck you, yes. I want to fuck every hole in your perfect body—I told you that already.

‘But I also want you to get naked and dance just for me. I want to enjoy you without sharing the pleasure with anyone else. And if you want to fuck me afterwards, then great. If not, no problem. But I'm categorically not paying you for sex. You'd have to do it because you want to. Do you understand?'