“Thanks,” I mumble. “I?—”
GoodLord.
I don’t know why I assumed the party for the inner circle of the Obsidian Syndicate, being held at a sex club, would be any different from the wildness I just witnessed out on the main floor. But I did.
And I was wrong.
Extremely wrong.
My breath chokes in my throat, my eyes blinking rapidly as I stutter to a halt with one foot through the doorway, faced with pure, hedonisticmadness.
Threesomes. Foursomes. There’s one girl on her knees at the far side of the room, totally naked except for her mask, surrounded by thesixmen she’s…uhh…
Servicing.
With her mouth and both hands.
Holy.Heck.
A loud cry of pleasure rips my gaze to another vignette, and my jaw drops another inch or two when I find myself looking at two gorgeous women—one Asian with silver-streaked hair, the other a ginger with freckles across her skin, on top of each other in a sixty-nine position while two men fuck them mercilessly.
“Miss.”
I flinch, gasping a little as I wrench my attention back to the guard who opened the door. Was it just a second ago? Or have I been standing here staring like a psycho at this craziness forhours? I can’t see his eyes through the dark black holes in his mask, but I can feel them burning into me.
“Are you entering or not?”
“Entering,” I blurt, forcing my legs to work as I make my way into the carnal chaos of the low-lit room.
The door shuts behind me with a click, the finality of it making my pulse jump and my belly tighten.
What the heck are you doing?
Not everyone in the room is engaged in the X-rated display. Some guests, clothed, are standing by a dark bar, where a petite woman in a black evening gown is mixing and shaking drinks. Others talk quietly in armchairs, half observing the sex and half simply talking, as if this is a regular, normal thing.
Everyone’s wearing a mask, staff and guests alike. Even so, the second I see him, I know I’m looking at the devil himself.
Vaughn sits by himself on the far side of the room, lounging back in a deep, dark brown leather armchair by a crackling fireplace. One of his hands hangs lazily over the side of one of the armrests, holding a glass. The other hand slowly strokes his chiseled, razor-sharp, clean-shaven jaw beneath the matte black and blood-red mask covering the top half of his face.
He’s in a black dress shirt, open at the collar, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. It gives a huge view of the expansive collection of dark, twisting, malevolent-looking tattoos that swirl up his arms from his wrists, across his chest, and all the way up his neck to his tight jaw.
For oneinsanemoment, I feel my brain starting to suggest I walk over to him.
Yeah, how abouthell to the no.
Instead, swallowing heavily, I roll my shoulders back, pushing my meager cleavage out as I walk with as much Vivian Leigh swagger as I can possibly muster toward the bar.
The bartender dips her chin at me.
“Just soda water, please,” I say quietly.
She doesn’t move, and just keeps staring at me through the empty, soulless dark eyeholes of her mask.
“Um, vodka, then,” I mumble.
This time she nods, setting a crystal tumbler on the bar and then pouring a very expensive-looking vodka into it before pushing it my way, all wordlessly.
I thank her in a shaky tone, bringing the glass to my lips. I take the smallest sip possible, instantly feeling my throat tighten as the burn trickles over my tongue.
