Manny stuck his head into the hall and said something to Shade. I stared into space. I’d assumed my repeated jail time had been the source of my name, and I’d been wrong. Like everything else in my life, it was rooted in shit.
I swallowed. “I’m going to the club with Mila for an hour. I’ll be back down in time for the fun.”
Shade didn’t stop me. “Play nice.”
Fat chance. My chest burned. I needed Mila, for her to look at me like I was more than this broken piece of shit.
And God help her if she didn’t.
Chapter 42
Mila
The rhythmic thud of music marked my slow stroll down the sex club’s corridor. I’d been escorted to the wardrobe by Tyler, who’d played bodyguard for the short walk through the warehouse. He’d handed me over to Clem, a woman who ran the bar staff and who’d promised to stick with me until I was safely in Convict’s clutches.
Clem guided me with a light touch until the music swelled and the room opened up, a vast space, dense with bodies and heat. With a blindfold on, I couldn’t see anything, but my other senses worked overtime. The scent of perfume and sex mixed with expensive alcohol and leather.
The pulse between my thighs was impossible to ignore.
Convict’s presence closed in behind me. Heat at my back. A familiar, grounding scent that had become an addiction.
A cool, small object pressed under the blindfold and into my ear. A headphone.
His voice poured in, low and rough. “You’ll hear me now. Even when I’m not touching you.”
I swayed towards him, the only solid thing in this overwhelming sea of sound and sensation.
He directed me through the room then stopped me. Metal creaked.
“Kneel on the platform.”
Bars pressed against my outstretched hands, and I ducked my head and crawled onto a lightly padded, raised stage.
No.My brain filled in the picture. A cage.
My pulse thudded faster. It had to be one of the gilded ones I’d seen women suspended in, people touching and even fucking them through the gold bars. Desperately, I tried to work out where I was in the room. In the centre or off to the side? How many people watched me right now?
“Hands up.”
I flinched at the soft clang of chains but obeyed, raising my arms. Leather cuffs snapped around my wrists, binding them to opposite sides of the gilded frame. I was spread open, exposed and vulnerable in a way that sent another wave of heat pooling low in my belly.
The room buzzed around us. Footsteps nearby. Laughter. Moans.
Then hands slid up my thighs, taking my borrowed dress with them. I’d chosen skimpy black lace to match the underwear beneath it. Underwear that was in danger of being revealed when the dress inched higher.
“What are you doing?” I whispered.
His voice came low through the earpiece. “The game starts off as an obedience test. The better you do, the more I reward you.”
I shivered, automatically on board with whatever this game was. My emotions needed burning up, and doing something dirty and public would push me to an extreme. One rewarded by orgasms.
“Widen your knees.”
I obeyed.
“Good girl. Now stay very still.”
Something touched me between the legs, and I jumped. Convict shifted my underwear aside and eased a cool and slick toy into my wet centre. He seated the curved end perfectly against my already swollen clit so it cupped me on the outside as it filled me inside.