Chapter One

Chapter OneReading the text message I’d just received, I felt my back straighten. “Shit.”On the barstool beside me, Izzy paused in bopping her head along to the song playing loud over the dome’s speakers. “What? What’s wrong?”“Inaya had to cancel,” I told her, referring to a tight mutual friend we’d first met here at the Vault four years ago, a club that in my opinion was like no other. “Her grams had a fall.”Izzy’s brow pinched in concern. “Crap. Is Judy okay?”“She’s fine, she just got a bit of a scare,” I explained as I replied to Inaya’s text, telling her to give her grandmother a hug for me and to call if she needed anything. “So did Inaya, I think. She doesn’t want to leave her grams alone tonight.”“Poor Judy. I’ll go check on her tomorrow.”I dropped my cell back in my purse. “I’ll come with you.” We all loved Judy; she was an absolute riot. I grabbed my glass and knocked back the last of my drink. “I’ll stay with you until Cole gets here,” I told my British friend and neighbor, referring to her new boyfriend. “Then I’ll go on home.”Izzy’s frown deepened. “Why?”I cast her an incredulous look, fiddling with the V collar of my black sequined dress. “Because my plan for the night is now null and void. Why else?” Inaya and I had intended to have a blast together here in the dome—named for its shape, the bar-slash-club resembled a large ballroom and was more or less the heart of the Vault’s basement.The dome had a somewhat sensual vibe. Long antique mirrors adorned the black marble walls. The floor was checkered like a gameboard. Red velvet drapes framed the French windows. Chandeliers hung from the high ceiling. Private little alcoves could be found between the fluted columns.There were people everywhere—the long bar, the crowded dancefloor, the few tables, the arched hollows, the mirrored cubed boxes at the rear of the dome. You couldn’t actually see what was going on inside the boxes as the mirrors were made of one-sided glass.“That doesn’t mean you have to leave,” said Izzy.“Well I’m not heading into a private room with you and Cole.”She sent me an impatient look. “I wasn’t suggesting that, and you know it. I just mean you could sit here for a little while.”I put my empty glass on the bar. “All on my lonesome? Not an attractive idea.”“You wouldn’t be alone for long. The bloke in the corner has been staring at you for the past half hour. At least stay long enough to give him a chance to approach you.”Intrigued, I lifted a brow. “Who is it?”“I don’t know what his name is, but I’ve seen him here before,” Izzy told me, idly plucking at one of her rich brown curls. “Broad. All corded muscle. Military haircut. He has a scar slicing through his eyebrow that adds to the whole marine look.”Recognizing that description, I said, “His name is Galen. I heard from another guy here that he used to be in the Navy and now owns a security business. He’s also a Dom, so he’s off my menu. He’d likely be able to give me what I want, but I wouldn’t be able to return the favor. I make a terrible submissive.”I’d never find it in me to call someone Sir, keep my eyes down if told, or do anything but snort if someone tried to put me on speech restrictions. I liked to feel helpless, but full-on submit? That I was no good at. I only followed orders on my own terms. Or not at all.“You can’t be that bad,” said Izzy. “Dom after Dom comes your way.”“Oh, I am that bad. I cooperate only as and when I feel like it. Which is not submitting.”“Then why do so many Tops approach you?”“Personally, I don’t think their interest is in me specifically. It’s common knowledge in the basement that I never fully yield to anyone and am not interested in doing so. These particular Tops see me as a challenge.”“Ah,” she drawled, realization dawning. “That’s why you’ve never had an arrangement with any of them.”I nodded. Many arrangements existed within the basement of the exclusive twenty/four-hour club. Arrangements where members claimed each other, rendering them off the basement’s market. But these not-quite-relationships only applied at the club, meaning said members could keep their private life separate. It suited a lot of people, especially the many high-profile characters who frequented the place.“And you’re sure that Galen is like them?” Izzy asked me.I grimaced. “Not positive. But it’s the vibe I’m getting from him. He has that glint in his eye that I’ve seen before.”“You won’t know for certain unless you at least talk to the bloke,” she pointed out, smoothing a hand over the lacy sleeve of her satin jumpsuit, which was almost the same champagne-pink color as my mid-length hair. “You never know, you two might click.”“I don’t see that happening.”“You could be wrong. But I’m not asking you to hang here specifically for him. I doubt he’ll be the only person who heads your way. If it isn’t that ridiculously pretty face of yours that has people coming over, it’s those outrageously sinful curves you’ve got going on. You might meet someone who pushes all the right buttons for you.” She gave my arm an encouraging squeeze. “Stay.”I sighed. “I don’t know …”“You’re all dressed up, and you came all this way. There’s no sense in going straight back home. What harm could it do to sit here for half an hour or so? If you don’t meet anyone you like, well, you don’t meet anyone you like—it isn’t a huge deal. It’s possible that you will, though. But there’s an absolute surety that you won’t if you leave. Come on, give it a go.”It would be frustrating to have gotten dolled-up only to return home pretty much immediately. Plus, I’d been looking forward to going out. Until recently, I’d been part of an arrangement with another club member. Now that I was no longer claimed, I was free to find someone new to play with. I’d hoped to do so tonight and break my dry spell.I blew out a breath. “I’ll stay for half an hour.” If nothing interesting happened within that timeframe, I would hightail it out of here.Izzy gave a satisfied nod. “On another note, have you decided who you’re taking as your plus-one to the upcoming charity ball yet?”My mood soured at the reminder. My mother—a well-known actress who rocked the industry—had recently decided to throw a charity ball for a cause that she gave no real shit about. A self-absorbed attention junkie, Alondra Vickers didn’t truly care much about anyone or anything other than herself.We didn’t have anything close to a good relationship. Or even much of a relationship at all. She cared for me in her way, but emotionally we were more like distant relatives.Since she had a talent for pissing me off, I wasn’t exactly thrilled at the idea of flying all the way to LA for a ball that I had no wish to attend. Especially when the guest list would feature many of the actors, actresses, directors, producers, etc. whom I’d met over the years that, like Alondra, were narcissistic to the extreme.Like called to like, I supposed.“I’ll probably take my apprentice.” I would have gladly taken either Izzy, Inaya, or one of my other closest friends, Cat. But I didn’t want my mother anywhere near the people closest to me. She’d only think to use them in some way—all three of my girls were people she’d consider useful, due to their professions or connections.Izzy in particular would be someone my mother would think to use. She was not only a talented photographer, she was the daughter of two very famous and highly desirable celebrities. The Brit and I had the latter in common. Her younger brothers were just as high-profile.“You mean Zhen?” asked Izzy.“Yep.” I braced my elbow on the wooden bar. “He heard about the ball and begged me to take him. If I could, I’d skip the event and give my ticket to his boyfriend so that they could go together.”“But your mum would flip her lid, because she worries how it would reflect on her if her daughter didn’t care to support her.”“Her image is important to her.”Izzy gave a helpless shrug. “At least the ball is for charity.”A snort popped out of me. “It’s for her to network and bask in being the center of attention. I’d rather someone who cared about the cause threw the ball.”“Has she apologized for all the porky pies she told in one of her recent interviews?”As if. “Alondra takes no responsibility for any hurt she causes.” It hadn’t been the first time that she’d falsely portrayed herself as an attentive, loving mother to the media. Or even the first time she’d laughably claimed that I looked up to her. But she’d never before stated that my dads played a small part in my upbringing.That couldn’t have been further from the truth.Ansel and Troy had raised me. They hadn’t had full custody of me, but they hadn’t needed to be granted it. She’d shipped me off to them when I was a kid who’d she branded “too difficult.” By that, she’d meant that I had my own mind—something that massively inconvenienced her.“Do you think that she partly did it to rile your dads?” asked Izzy.“I think she considered that a side-benefit. She enjoys trying to get a reaction out of them.”Izzy’s mouth tightened. “She’s going to forever punish Ansel for leaving her, isn’t she?”“Of course. No one’s ever left her before or since. She doesn’t know how to handle it. And she wants Troy to suffer too because, in her view, he stole what was hers.”It was kind of ironic that if she hadn’t pushed my father into a threesome with Troy all those years ago—something which had then become a regular thing for them—the two men probably wouldn’t have grown close. But Alondra was very good at getting people to do what she wanted, even my strong-willed father. It had backfired on her in this instance, though.Izzy slanted her head. “What do you think cut her more? That Ansel divorced her, or that people pitied her for losing him to a man she’d essentially—albeit inadvertently—pushed him toward?”“The latter. It keeps her bitterness alive.” Glimpsing a guy coming up behind Izzy, I said, “On a much more pleasant note, Cole has arrived.”Sidling up to her, he dropped a kiss on her mouth and then took in every inch of her. “Looking far too gorgeous, as per usual.”“As are you,” she said, her mouth curved. “You’re also late.”“Got stuck in traffic.” The unbelievably hot world boxing champion nodded at me. “Hey, Briar.” His brow pinched. “You alone?”“Hopefully not for long. I guess we’ll see.” Aw, he didn’t look comfortable leaving me on my own, bless him. “I’ll be fine by myself. Really. You two go have a good time. And lots of orgasms.”He laughed.“We’ll do our best.” Smiling, Izzy slipped off her stool. She pointed at me. “Half an hour at least.”“Yeah, yeah. I need to answer a call of nature first, though.”Cutting through the crowd on the dancefloor, I made my way to the restroom. There wasn’t a long line, so I was in and out of there fairly quickly. As I began making my way back to the bar, I had to pause as a cluster of women inadvertently blocked my path. It was at that very moment that I sensed someone come up behind me.“Hmm, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you here alone before,” said a deep, gravely, testosterone-laden voice that rumbled at the most tantalizing timbre. It would make any girl’s skin break out in goosebumps, and mine did exactly that right then.I was very much aware of whom that voice belonged to. I’d heard it narrate quite a few romance books, among other things. And it didn’t belong to Galen.Slowly pivoting, I found none other than Kaleb Westley. Damn, the man was a spectacular sight to behold. So decidedly masculine. His face was all sharp angles with a light layer of dark stubble. His eyes were a vivid hazel brown, and his short hair was the color of rich earth. He was built like an athlete, long and lean and strong.There was an edge about him. The kind that made your belly flutter and your hormones run havoc. With that bad boy vibe, I could easily imagine him wearing a leather jacket and straddling a Harley. Or me.“What makes you think I’m alone?” I asked.“I saw your friends leave the dome. You stayed.” His gaze did a head-to-toe tour of me—slow, bold, laser-focused. “No red tonight?”“No.”A predatory indecency lit his eyes, and he cocked his head in an almost wolfish movement. “Briar, isn’t it?”“Yes. And you’re Kaleb.” No sense in playing dumb. “I rarely see you alone. Where’s your … partner in crime, for lack of a better term?”Kaleb’s mouth tipped up. “Oh, he’s around here somewhere.”How he and the very famous actor Trace Lacroix had become close friends, I wasn’t sure. But neither ever came here without the other. They liked to share women, but they never claimed any. No one knew why they appeared to be anti-arrangement.What was well-known here in the basement was that sex with them could be, to quote many, ‘intense and hot as hell.’ They liked to give a woman a rough ride. I was all about rough rides.“So,” he began, “do you think it’s arrogant of me to believe that I could have graduated from that magic boarding school in the movies?”My lips quirked. “That depends. Are you a wizard?”“I’ve heard it said that my hands are magic.”As it happened, so had I. “What about your”—I flicked a glance at his crotch—“wand?”He hit me with a full-on, panty-dropping smile. The same one I’d seen him wearing on the countless fan-created memes that circulated social media platforms. He had quite a following, and there was no mystery as to why.“Oh, it works just fine.” His gaze dropped to my lips. “I like your smile.”That was a two-way street. “Do you?”“Yes.” He leaned in, as if to confess a secret. “It kind of makes me want to lick your mouth.”I thought I might like that. “Is that so?”“It is so.” He coasted his fingertip over my bottom lip, adding, “All along here.”My mouth went dry that easily.Leaning in a little more, he hummed. “You smell good.”“Smooth as a motherfucker, aren’t you?”He chuckled and, Jesus, that sound vibrated against my skin, pebbling my nipples.“There you are,” said a low, rich, velvety voice—one that came from behind me. I recognized it easily; had heard it in an endless amount of movies over the years. “I was wondering where you’d gotten to,” Trace added.Kaleb looked at him over my shoulder. “I bumped into Briar and got a little distracted.”I turned to meet Trace’s gaze, finding myself immediately ensnared by those indigo blue eyes. Where Kaleb was ruggedly male, Trace was a whole other kind of masculine. Well-groomed and cleanshaven, he possessed a predatory elegance and lethally raw charisma, like those distinguished, psychopathic spies and assassins you saw in movies. He’d actually played a fair few.I’d seen enough clips of him half-dressed to know that his tall frame was deliciously sculpted. Seriously, his abs were perfection. His short, stylishly cut hair was black as the dead of night and boasted sporadic streaks of silver that were like slivers of moonlight.At least a decade older than me, he couldn’t be much older than Kaleb. Trace might carry a worldlier vibe, like someone who’d seen and done it all before, but he didn’t look over forty. Surely no man past that age had that body.It was really no wonder that Alondra, uncaring that he was younger than her, made a move on him years ago. Several moves, actually, if the stories were true. He’d smoothly rebuffed each of her attempts at luring him in, exhibiting no interest in her. That alone made me curious about him.I hadn’t known many men to reject my mother—not even the boyfriends of mine who she’d flirted with to ‘test’ if they were loyal to me. Yeah, she was a treasure.He held out his hand. “Trace.”I shook it, a buzzing sensation skipping up my inner arm as his warm palm closed over mine. “Briar.”“She’s here alone,” Kaleb told him, a bad-boy note in that decadent voice.Trace lifted an intrigued brow, slowly releasing my hand. “Really? Waiting for someone?” he asked me.I shook my head. “No.”“Hmm.” Drinking in every inch of me, Trace took a fluid, purposeful step forward. “You’re not wearing red. I take it that you and Grover are a thing of the past.”I flicked my head to the side. “How did you know that I had an arrangement with Grover?”“Kaleb and I make a point of looking into women who pique our interest. You piqued ours.”Oh. Well, then.Trace slid another step closer, and Kaleb did the same behind me. My pulse kicked up. They were boxing me in. And I kind of liked it.They were also making it clear that they were interested in taking this further than flirting. Did the thought of a threesome make me uncomfortable? Hell, no. There would be nothing horrifying about being the focus of both Trace and Kaleb.Plus, I’d been raised to be open-minded. As long as whatever was happening in a bedroom was between consenting adults, I didn’t see that it mattered if it involved multiple partners. To each their own.Trace studied my face. “We don’t make you nervous, do we?” It wasn’t a question, it was a realization.“Should I be nervous?”“Most women are when they have two men closing in on them. They say it makes them feel hunted.”It actually did, but … “Maybe being hunted doesn’t bother me much.”Trace’s eyes gleamed. “Tell me something, Briar.” He lowered his head. “How would you react if I kissed you right here and now?”Probably inwardly swoon. “I don’t know. Are you any good at it?”One side of his mouth kicked up. “I’ve had no complaints.”“Then there likely won’t be any issues.”Warm lips grazed my ear as Kaleb pressed even closer. “Only one way for you both to know for sure,” he said, his sinful voice making the little hairs on my nape stand up.“My thoughts exactly.” Resting a hand on my hip, Trace smoothly slanted his mouth over mine. Then he just took it. The kiss was deep and sensuous and hungry. I sank into it, fisting his shirt, breathing in his cologne—it was dark, spicy, and as intoxicating as the kiss itself.Having grown up around actors, I wasn’t fazed by them. But a girly part of me was squealing in delight that the Trace Lacroix was actually kissing me.“My turn,” said Kaleb, a growl edging the words.Trace pulled back, his eyes glittering as they bore into mine. He palmed one side of my face and gently turned my head.Kaleb swiped his tongue across my tingling bottom lip. “Told you I wanted to lick it.” He took my mouth in a wet, explicit, downright dirty kiss that fired up my already prickly nerve-endings. He bunched the bottom of my dress in his hand but didn’t flip it up, no, just let the threat of it taunt me, intensifying the moment.Trace raked his teeth over my earlobe. “I want you. We both do. Let us have you, Briar.”My core clenched at that. Tearing my mouth free of Kaleb’s, I let out a shaky breath. I was about to speak, but then I caught sight of a passing male shooting both Trace and Kaleb a seriously dark look. “What was that about?”“Jealousy,” said Trace. “He’s another man whose interest you piqued.”Kaleb nipped my jaw. “Lowe wouldn’t be able to give you what you need. From what I heard, he needs a little direction in the bedroom. He won’t be very good at making a woman feel helpless.”I froze. I hadn’t told them that I liked to feel helpless. I hadn’t told many people, actually. I’d recently spoken of my sexual preferences to my friends at the bar in the Vault’s lounge, though. Recalling that these two men had been close by at the time, I narrowed my eyes as it hit me. “You eavesdropped on my conversation.”“We overheard some of it, we weren’t purposely listening in,” Trace corrected.Kaleb put his mouth to my ear. “Imagine having one man pin you down while another man fucks you. Imagine having two men control you, take what they want from you, give you no choice but to accept and enjoy whatever they do to you.”I wouldn’t have thought that my body could both melt and roar to life at the same time, but that was what happened. Warmth bloomed low and spread outward. Some very interesting places began pulsing, throbbing, and buzzing.“Come with us,” said Kaleb. That coaxing tone wasn’t necessary. His voice was a lure all on its own.I swallowed, looking from him to Trace. “Where?”“We booked a basic room just in case we found someone we wanted to play with.” Trace breezed his lips over mine. “Come with us.” The whisper was pure liquid seduction.And I caved.“You’d better make it good,” I said.Trace’s mouth curved. “I like you, Briar.” He tucked my hair behind my ear. “One thing. Call it a warning or a promise or both: we don’t do gentle. We fuck hard. You still with us?”“Only if there’s no anal. To be perfectly frank, my ass hasn’t had enough experience to take a rough pounding.”Trace’s smile widened. “That’s all right. We both want your pussy anyway.”He stayed in front of me while Kaleb took up the rear as we walked across the dome, out of the ornate doors, and through to one of the hallways that featured door after door—some led to themed rooms, some led to ones which were more basic. The whole time, my heart pounded and my stomach fluttered.As Trace unlocked a particular door with a swipe of his membership card, Kaleb turned to me and said, “Listen, Trace and I can be greedy fuckers. But if you don’t like something, you say stop and we stop. That’s all it’ll take. Got it?”I licked my lips, appreciating his reassurance. “Got it.”He gave a satisfied nod and urged me to follow Trace into the room. I did so, finding that, like all basic private rooms, it resembled a luxury hotel suite. There was a huge double bed, standard furnishings, an attached bathroom, and even a patio door that would have led to a balcony if this was a real hotel.Wound tight with excitement and anticipation, I almost jumped on hearing the door close behind me.Hands landed on my hips as Kaleb pressed up against my back once more. In front of me, Trace stared at me, his eyes glittering, his face cold, his mouth set into a cruel slash.Trace’s fingers went to his shirt buttons. “Strip her, Kaleb. And be quick about it. I want a taste of that pussy before I fuck her, and I don’t want to wait.”Well, damn.