Page 22 of Duplicity

Thisis deft fingers pinching and plucking at my nipples. There’s a double layer of ruched fabric at the top of this dress, but no padding, and the feel of it is an instant shot of electricity to my core. I’ve been blessed with extremely sensitive nipples, and they react to Brendan’s touch like two little whores as the pleasure of his pinches shoots through me.

I don’t even realise I’ve made a sound until he chuckles, low and pleased.

‘Bingo. You like that.’

‘Yeah.’ I feel shy even admitting it.

‘Yes, you do. That’s my girl. Fuck, they’re hard.’

He ramps up his attentions, squeezing and plucking. I let my eyes drift closed to more fully absorb the hits of sensation, my head dropping back against his shoulder. With his head bent, his breath is warm on my jaw. He releases one nipple and drags his palm down my front so he can snag the hem of my dress and burrow beneath it before cupping my pussy hard, his fingertips pressing right against my entrance.

If I thought having him touch my nipples was shocking, this is so much more: confronting and dirty andhot, especially because he’s still rolling my left nipple around as best he can through the fabric.

‘Legs wider,’ he grunts against my jaw, and I widen my stance, keeping my palms clamped to the glass for balance as his fingers flex against the scrap of lace that constitutes my underwear this evening.

‘So much to play with.’ His voice is more of a purr now. ‘I just bought a catamaran, but I can already tell you’re going to be a lot more fun, love. I want to see it all.’

The ominous threat has my heart rate ratcheting up, because fuck, this is really happening. He releases my pussy, and I think he’s going to go for the concealed zip at the side of my dress,but he takes a step back and slides the slinky fabric up over my bottom until it’s completely bared to him.

I squeeze my eyes shut and press my lips together, because it’s soblatant, so shameful and excruciating and unseemly, being exposed like this to a man who’s paying terrifying amounts of money for the privilege. But the deeply buried part of me that liked the way he grabbed me just now is also forging bravely to life, a tiny, tough seedling bursting into existence with little wisdom and even less heed for the dangers ahead, dangers that seem more imminent when he lets out an anguished, carnal groan.

‘Jesus fuck, love.’ He gives the slippery fabric an impatient push upwards, and then both his big hands are stroking and grabbing at my cheeks. I can’t even imagine how I must look to him like this, skin and lace and heels on display for him, my hands braced against the glass.

He hooks one finger under the string of my thong and runs a calloused knuckle lightly down the cleft of my bottom, abandoning it before he gets too far south and letting the lace snap back into place. His breath is audibly ragged.

‘I’ve wanted to do this since I saw you at the RA looking all cultured and classy and innocent in your floaty dress, and fucking look at you now. The lovely Marlowe is all mine to play with. You should know I’mthis closeto whipping out my dick and shooting my load all over your arse, but I won’t. Because this is you auditioning me, so tonight, love, you come first, okay?’

‘Okay,’ I agree breathlessly, grateful that he’s not hiring me for my dirty-talking skills. Because I’ve got nothing. What Idohave in my High-Class Hooker arsenal is a couple of recent rewatches ofWhen Harry Met Sally, just so I could nail the fake orgasm thing. Except, the way this guy is manhandling me is making me think it won’t be very hard at all to sound convincing. He’s most definitely pressing the right buttons, even if tonight’spressure and stakes and nerves mean there is literally zero chance of my coming for real.

He lets my hem fall some of the way back down. Then, in a couple of slick movements that tell me he’s had a lot of practice at this, he gathers up my hair and dumps it over one shoulder, slides both my straps down as far as he can with my hands like this, and finds the zip, yanking it all the way down so that my brace position is the only thing holding my little dress up.

Until, that is, he barks out his next order.

‘Turn around.’

CHAPTER 11

Marlowe

As I turn, instinct has me pressing a hand to my chest to hold the dress up.

Brendan takes a step towards me, shaking his head. ‘Back against the glass. Let it fall. I want to see what I’ve bought.’

Every minute in here with this guy brings a fresh fear, a fresh confrontation, a fresh precipice off which to leap, but this is the highest precipice so far.

His gaze is so intense. So all-consuming. It’s like nothing exists for him in this moment except for what lies beneath my dress. He told me during the interview that he had ADHD.

I suppose this is what hyper-focus looks like.

‘Go on.’ He nods. ‘Eyes on me as you do.’

There’s a lump in my throat the size of a golf ball. I give myself a mental kick and remove my hand. Surely I’m the first woman he’s been with who’s ever hesitated to undress for him. Most of them probably chuck their thongs at him the second they get him alone—or even before.

The slinky fabric drops instantly, the tiny, ineffectual straps slack around my forearms, the dress caught around my hips and my top half completely exposed to him.

Standing here topless in front of a man I don’t know while he openly appraises me feels wrong on every level… except for the level where his eyes drop from my face to my naked breasts, and I finally understand what all the romance books mean when they say a man’s eyesburn, because his are blazing. His mouth opens and shuts again, this moment of silence between us stretching into eternity.

Until he grins.

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