Page 2 of Born into Blood

“Thank you,” I quickly say, hoping he doesn’t just turn and walk off.

He doesn’t give me a smile, but I reason that he’s probably just not a smiley kind of guy. His eyes run over me, and I quickly push aside the warning bells that want to start ringing. I tell them to shut right the fuck up because this man just helped me. He didn’t have to step in, but he did, and a man who would do that isn’t the kind of man who would hurt me, so when he motions for me to lead the way to the back room, I don’t question it. I just march my ass down the hall and into the small room that’s outfitted with nothing but a wall of mirrors, a single chair, and a dancer’s pole.

Once inside, he shuts the door and goes to sit down. I’m still not entirely sure what he wants me to do, but when I grab the pole and start dancing, he doesn’t stop me, so I keep going. I put everything I have into the dance, wanting to please him without really understanding why. There’s something about him that I’m drawn to. Maybe it’s the gorgeous face and perfect body, maybe it’s the power that he wears like an aura, or maybe it’s just that he showed me kindness in a way that no one else ever has, whatever it is, it’s like he’s pulling me towards him, and when I can’t resist it any longer, I let go of the bar and saunter over.

His blue eyes watch me, but his face is an unreadable mask. He might as well be watching a nature documentary with all the emotion he’s showing. I falter for a second, losing my rhythm because I’m worrying too much. I want him to like what he’s seeing. I want him to like me. I know it’s stupid to care so much about what a stranger thinks, but I do, and I can’t help it.

Lowering myself onto his lap, I feel a twinge of victory when my ass settles against the hard length of him. I smile, but he doesn’t return it. I know he must care about me a little bit because of what he did in the hallway, but I’d never know it from looking at him right now. He’s emotionless, and if it wasn’t for the hard cock pressing against my ass, I’d never know he was enjoying the show.

Wanting to get more of a reaction from him, I circle my hips, grinding against him even harder, demanding a response that goes beyond his dick. With my bare breasts bouncing right in front of his face and my lower body working so hard I can feel the burn in my muscles, I’m finally rewarded with a deep, masculine groan before his eyes meet mine. They haven’t softened. If anything, they’ve just grown harder, colder, and more distant, but I don’t let it faze me. He can fight it all he wants. That groan he just gave says it all.

“Knees.”

That one word from his beautiful mouth is a command that I don’t even think about disobeying. Part of me fears that he’s just like Ralph, that he’s going to use me to get what he wants and then toss me aside, but I ignore it, choosing to believe that this man is different, that it’s going to lead to something more.

I scramble to my knees, settling between his legs, and watch as he unzips his pants, and when he frees himself, I’m a little surprised at how big he is.

“Suck.”

Another one-word command that’s spoken in his accented voice, but he doesn’t force me. He waits for me to obey him. Leaning closer, I wrap my lips around him and slowly slide down. My plan is to go slow, to let myself get used to his size, but that’s not how he wants it. When he roughly fists my hair and slams me down at the same time as he rocks his hips and thrusts into me, I gag around him, tears falling from my eyes. I’m locked in place, unable to do anything but take what he’s giving me.

Fear runs through me, but then he growls something in a language I don’t understand, and I can’t help but wonder what he’s saying. The idea that he might be saying something kind sends a spark of warmth to my chest, and I begin to work with him, sucking and tonguing his shaft as best I can. My throat feels raw, my makeup is a wreck, and he’s showing no signs of slowing down. If anything, he’s getting rougher, each thrust a little harder than the last, and when I let out a muffled, pain-filled moan, he fists my hair tighter and growls out another sentence that I’m choosing to believe means something good, that his words are tender where his actions are anything but.

With one last thrust, he buries himself inside me and lets go. For a few horrible seconds, I can’t breathe, and I start to choke, but he doesn’t pull back. Breathing heavily, he holds me in place until he’s completely empty. Only then does he pull me off him by my hair. With my throat burning and my scalp stinging, he pushes me away, already zipping his pants up by the time I fall back onto my ass.

I watch him, too stunned to move, too horrified and scared that I might have misread everything, but then he meets my eyes, and they might look just as cold as before, but I know I can see affection in them. He’s just trying to hide it.

He leans closer, and I’m surprised when he reaches out and cups my face, trailing his thumb along my skin. “You look like her.” His voice is barely more than a whisper as he stares right through me. He’s not seeing me. He’s seeing her, whoever the fuck that might be.

A wave of jealousy hits me hard, and before I can stop myself, I whisper, “Who do I look like?”

His mouth lifts up in a smirk, but there’s nothing lighthearted about it. The darkness in his eyes has me wishing I’d kept my mouth shut.

“The one woman I’m not allowed to touch.” His tone is hard, the words spit out like he can’t stand the taste of them, and then he’s shoving me aside so hard I fall on my ass again.

Desperation fills me, forcing me to reach for his leg as he stands up. I grab his calf, feeling the hard muscles beneath my hand as he looks down at me.

“You can fuck me,” I tell him, not caring that it makes me sound pathetic. I can live with that. Over time I can make him forget her, and then he’ll be mine, and I’ll keep him so happy that he won’t have time to even think about her. He won’t even remember her goddamn name.

Leaning down, he fists my hair tight enough to sting, stretching my head back so I can’t look away. “And what makes you think I’d want to fuck a whore like you?”

He sees the confusion and hurt on my face and gives a harsh laugh. “Just because I let you suck my dick doesn’t mean I want you touching me.” Before I let go, he pulls his wallet out and takes out several hundreds before dropping them and giving my head a pat. “It wasn’t a bad blow job, pet.”

He steps away, and I’m too shocked to stop him. He’s already walking out the door before I find my voice and ask, “What’s your name?”

At first I think he might ignore me, but then he says, “Osip,” before walking out and leaving me alone.

Osip.

I whisper the name into the empty room while I replay everything that happened. I can still taste him on my tongue as I scoop up the three-hundred dollars he left me. The smile spreads easily across my face. A man who doesn’t care isn’t going to part with this kind of money. Ralph didn’t even leave me anything close to this, and he was a man who was constantly telling me he loved me.

Stuffing the money into one of my shoes so no one else can see it, I stand up and step closer to the mirror in front of me so I can try and wipe away some of the smeared makeup around my eyes. Instead of looking away from my reflection, this time I face myself head-on.

“He’ll be back,” I whisper. “Osip will come back for me.”

He makes me wait eight days before he steps foot inside Lou’s again. I’ve picked up extra shifts, too afraid I would miss him when he came back, so even though I’m exhausted, everything inside me lights up when I see his gorgeous face. He meets my eyes and nods towards the back. I don’t get a smile, but that’s okay. He shows his affection in other ways, like the fact that he even bothered to come see me again. A man like him could go into any club and have all the women swarm him, but he chose this club—he chose me.

With a smile for the man I’m currently dancing for, I let him put another dollar in my thong before I rush over to where Osip is waiting for me. Without a word, he grabs onto my arm and leads me to the same back room as last time. Before the door is even fully shut, he’s bending me over the chair and tugging my thong down.

---