CHAPTER ONE
Erin Wyatt stood at the foot of the bed, her long blonde hair combed out, the sex freshly washed from her body. She was dressed once more in her stylish skirt suit, the one she was supposed to be wearing to lunch with her friend Rhea. In reality she'd been fucking the biggest client at her husband's law firm, trying to curry favor. This time made her fourth with the billionaire entrepreneur and sportsman. She'd be lying if she said the sex was no good, but it was high time she pulled the plug.
"I'm sorry," said the twenty-two-year-old former homecoming queen whose worst fear on earth was displeasing a male. "But I can't do this anymore."
Roger Caine, age forty-three, laced his fingers behind his head on the pillow. He was nude beneath the sheet and fiercely handsome with silver black hair and rugged, purely masculine features.
"You don't say?" He smiled.
It was a slanted half smirk that shattered the remainder of Erin's fragile nerves. She had no business standing up against a man like this and she knew it. She was half his age with barely a tenth of his savvy and worldly experience.
His eyes were equally intimidating. Deep blue, flecked gray like steel and perilously deep. Eyes like that had one simple message: show loyalty, keep your end of the bargain, and there'll be no trouble, but turn against me and I'll bury you.
"Is it because I spanked your ass?" he wanted to know.
Erin felt the blood rush to her pale face. Her ass was red and stinging. She'd seen the marks in the bathroom mirror a few minutes ago while getting dressed. It hadn't been a particularly severe spanking, but something about him saying the words made it twice as difficult, twice as humiliating.
"No," she said a little too quickly. "I'm just worried about Kevin. I don't want to hurt him."
Caine laughed, clearly enjoying himself, like a big cat playing with its prey. "It's a little late in the game to worry about that, don't you think, Erin?"
Erin lowered her eyes. It wasn't supposed to be going this way, not at all. She'd rehearsed it in the bathroom as she cleaned herself up and put her clothes back on. This was supposed to be her goodbye. Her swan song, marking the end of their clandestine, two-month-old affair.
"I love my husband," she whispered.
"And that's why you're here," he mocked. "Yes, I know. Everything for hubby's career. Nothing in it for poor suffering little Erin. Always the good girl, aren't you?"
Erin's brain flashed with anger. "I didn't start this. You told me?"
"Told you what? That your husband's advancement in his firm depended on you spreading your legs? That I could be his best friend or his worst enemy? Men say a lot of things to get a woman in bed, my dear, but that doesn't account for how much you enjoyed it--unless you've been faking all that moaning and sweating and?"
Now it was her turn to interrupt him. "Enough, Roger. I can't take this anymore." Her hands were over her ears. She wanted to hear nothing but her own heart, thundering in her own chest, telling her to run, telling her to pick her high heeled feet up off this deodorized hotel carpeting and head straight out the door to the street and back to her car, to her home and to her real life, as the happy bride of Kevin Wyatt, the man she adored and wanted to have babies with.
How had it gotten to this point, anyway?
All of this, what she was doing here, had seemed right, honestly it had, back at the Christmas party, the one for Kevin's law firm. That's where her beloved spouse of two years, her sweet, eager beaver pup of an associate lawyer had introduced her to Roger Caine, his new benefactor.
She'd been prepped for hours ahead of time by her sandy haired husband.
"This guy is big, baby, and he likes me," Kevin repeated one last time on the way over in the car. "He wants me to represent him in all his affairs, across the board. You know what that could mean? I could make partner in another two years, maybe less. And now he wants to meet you. There's no limit to this, baby."
What Kevin didn't know was that Caine's help had a price tag, one that his pretty green eyed wife would be paying with her flesh. The first kiss of Caine's lips on her hand told her there would be trouble. Too much electricity down her spine. Too much heat. And that look in his eyes. Why hadn't Kevin seen the man stripping her with his eyes and trying her out for good measure?
"This is my beautiful bride," Kevin pushed her on him. "I've told her all about you."
"I hope not everything," he drawled. "Everyone should have a few little secrets."
"Jack Kennedy," she identified the quote.
He bowed his head. "Very impressive." Then to Kevin he said "As for you, now I understand why you kept her from me all this time. You were afraid I'd steal her away."
They all three laughed, though the rapacious light in Caine's eyes and the angled half grin he saved just for her made it clear this was no joke. He really did intend to have her.
Erin had never cheated before and would never have dreamed of it. But this was different. There was something in the situation that was ... out of her control, that was it. It was as if Roger Caine wasn't really giving her a choice, just telling her to do this for Kevin's sake. And for hers. Except now she had to take control back. Having her ass spanked like a child was just the incentive she needed.
Not that Erin didn't like it. In fact...
"The choice is yours," Caine broke into her reverie. "Go, stay. Nobody's forcing you. Just so long as you understand the implications."
A chill passed through her. This was her darkest fear. That Kevin would suffer, maybe even losing his job. A mere word from a man like Caine to the senior partners hinting at a change of law firms for his billion dollar corporation would amount to a death sentence for a young wet behind the ears barrister like Kevin Wyatt. "You'll hurt my husband, won't you?" She asked.
Caine's cock was tenting the sheet. He'd fucked her twice and already he wanted more. "I don't need to blackmail you into sex, Erin, and we both know it."
She tried to keep her eyes off the covered erection. If only Roger Caine wasn't such a good lover. If only he didn't know how to take command of her young body in ways stressed out Kevin couldn't manage. "You're not a gentleman," she told him.
Caine grinned, whipping aside the sheet. "And that's exactly what keeps you coming back again and again, my little straight arrow daddy's girl. Now let's get those lips over here where they belong."
He commenced to stroking himself now, long, lazy passes straight up and down the length. His pole was long and thick, surprisingly substantial for a man who went just five foot nine inches tall. Kevin was six foot, though he was thinner and his endowment was on the puny size. Erin felt especially guilty for enjoying this bigger penis and for thinking of it whenever Kevin made love to her.
Luckily, this was not too often anymore. Ever since he'd finished law school and taken on this demanding new job with Malbie, Masters and Lamb their sex life had gone straight downhill. His future was bright, according to Calvin Malbie, so long as he kept his nose clean and made himself useful. This meant long hours, lots of stress. And a nonexistent libido.
"Roger, I need to go," she protested. "It's almost five. Kevin might be coming home soon."
Caine reached for his silver cell phone on the bureau. Without taking his eyes off Erin, he called his secretary. "Lillian. Get a hold of Kevin Wyatt for me. Tell him I need to discuss some merger plans with him. Have him wait in my office. I'll be there in an hour."
Erin swallowed hard. The bastard thought of everything.
"There you have it," he announced triumphantly. "No more excuses."
"Roger, I don't want to do this," she protested. "Really I don't."
Caine's tone darkened, half teasing. "Do you need another spanking, little girl?"
Instinctively, she clamped her hands over her ass cheeks. "No," she defied.
"Then you know what you need to do," he pressured. "Tell me, Erin, tell me what you need to do."
Erin considered her options. The door was right there. Caine was naked and wouldn't be able to follow her into the hall. All she had to do was walk out of here, put him out of her life forever. If only her feet would move.
She told herself it was loyalty to Kevin keeping her here, on account of her being scared for his job still, but there was more to it. Roger Caine was stirring something in her long buried. It had been years since she'd let members of the opposite sex take control of her completely, but she could still remember the thrill as a child, of being tied, the captured squaw, secured to a tree or forced to clean a pretend house, a belt of rope at her waist, the end of it attached to some post, or wrapped in a boy's greedy fist.
Those were pre-sexual times of course, but there were grown up echoes of it later on, in her dating patterns, the way she chose the tough nosed jocks, the ROTC boys and finally an ambitious young law student determined to sit astride the world one day and fuck it silly. It was no wonder Kevin was drawn to Caine and vice versa, they were peas in a pod.
Except in sex. There they were nothing alike. Kevin was unimaginative, perfunctory, basically phoning in his performances. Like he checked his mind at the door. Not that he was heartless; she never doubted his love. He just wasn't generating the passion or the heat she so desperately needed. She faked the orgasms, till finally he stopped noticing one way or the other.
She was used to this, having spent her time in the arms and the beds of egotistical sports heroes and mirror gazers. They wanted their cocks sucked and their women easy on the eyes. Erin focused on looking good on their arms, and, when the occasion called for it, on her knees.
Roger Caine was an entirely different breed of man. He opened her wide, taking his fill each and every time. "You're a virgin," he rasped the first time, his words searing her ears as he nibbled at the soft, delicate lobes. "You've no clue what you are about to experience."
She soon found out as he played upon her poor flesh, making her writhe and thrash. With his fingers, twice, he made her come before ever entering her. The third time he worked her to fever pitch, held her and made her beg.
Oh, god, she had to get away from this man. She could not fall under his spell, not even one more time. What if this were the straw to break the camel's back? What if she never had this kind of strength again.
"I'm waiting, Erin. Tell me what you need."
The words were small, feminine whispers. "I--I need to please you."
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