‘If that was me, would you stop them?’ she asks, her hand slipping lower to palm my cock. I won’t deny that the woman has talented fingers and before I can stop her, I’m hard. And yet, despite her standing right beside me and being the one with her hands on my cock, it’s not her I’m thinking about.
It’s Niamh’s long, pale legs wrapped around my waist that I envisage. Niamh’s wide blue eyes that I want to stare into as I make her mine. Niamh’s long, ebony hair that I can almost feel wrapped around my fist as I force her to take me deep between those rose-red lips. There’s something about her innocence I crave control over.
Vittoria’s smirk when my thoughts cause me to harden even further has me covering her hand with mine and removing it from my aching balls. I’m sure she thinks she’s wholly responsible for my rock-hard cock, and I don’t want her to suspect anything different.
‘Would you want me to?’ I ask, twisting her arm behind her back and pulling her roughly against me before taking her mouth in a brutal kiss. I pull back when she bites me and laughs.
‘Of course, darling. There’s nothing sexier than a possessive man.’
What neither of us says is that until we’re married, we’re both free to see other people, sleep with other people. Something I have happily done all my adult life– until that bloody graduation party. Since then, Niamh has occupied every sordid thought, although anyone paying attention to my choice in women over the past four years would quickly recognise that each and every one has had a striking resemblance to that one woman.
Besides, I simply don’t care enough about Vittoria to do any such thing, and she knows it. Not to mention the fact that she’d be pissed as all fuck if I interfered with her sex life. Although I imagine she’d enjoy the feeling of multiple men fighting over her, and I can picture her bathing in the blood of the men I’d defeated.
She’ll make a formidable wife. For as long as we survive each other. And no matter how much I might crave someone else, only marrying Vittoria will make me king.
We head down the spiral staircase to the wine bar. The seating is designed primarily for the more adventurous couples. The upholstery, luxurious black velvet, and pillars topped with gilded ornaments are designed for indulgence. Unlike upstairs, this area isn’t overlooked and gives the impression of privacy, although there are carefully placed cameras everywhere and the recordings from those have provided much of the material we’ve needed over the years to ensure that various influential customers remain under our control.
Vittoria is correct. We’ll never trust humans in the same way we trust other Kinfolk– even our enemies– and we ensure that we have iron-clad ways of getting what we want from them. From there I lead her towards the back of the building, pausing in front of a studded wooden door. I place a hand flat on the surface, feeling the wood heat beneath my palm and a set of carved symbols appear. I read the ancient letters of the Ogham inscription aloud and the door pulses, shifting in its reality before it opens, not into the narrow basement staircase of the human world, but into the foyer of my club in the Underworld where fantasies are indulged.
The worlds exist on top of one another, but time functions differently in each, meaning that there are only certain times and places where you can move between the two without some kind of magic. Some areas have changed in one world but not the other. Glasgow’s Underworld includes an extensive series of tunnels and underground features long since covered by the modern human city.
Kinfolk are able to move easily between worlds using the thin places. Some are permanent, while others appear and disappear on a whim. A rare few can be conjured using a particular type of magic.
Humans can also pass between worlds, but it’s not as straightforward. Human eyes can’t see the Underworld except in exceptional circumstances, or when it is shown to them by one of the Kinfolk. Certain things, rituals you might call them, are required, but are far easier when they are with Kin. And often they are lured through with extravagant promises like I would offer Niamh if I thought she was corruptible.
Humans should never make a deal with the Kinfolk– they simply don’t understand the danger. But if they do… then we are restricted only by the limits of their desires.
Those desires take many forms, but the lowest level of The Three Graces, focuses on sexual fantasies. It’s not a sex club, but it does cater to those who seek desire in whatever form they can dream up if they are foolish enough to make one of those deals.
Vittoria pauses outside a door when we hear the crack of a whip, followed by a groan of pain-tinged lust but I stride on and, as soon as she realises where I’m headed, she follows.
The door at the end of the corridor houses my favourite playroom. As soon as we’ve entered, any sense that she’ll go along submissively with what I want disappears. I walk forward, stopping at the foot of the four-poster bed and turn to face her. In turn, she saunters towards me, and I’m surprised to see a smile play along the corners of her mouth.
‘This is… exceptional,’ she breathes, her gaze moving from the blood-red satin sheets covering the bed, to the black velvet drapes that can be used to enclose the bed simply by tugging a single satin cord. ‘And so romantic.’
I almost believe her as we stare at the flickering flames of the black and red candles on display. Most of this was my idea, but I did tell the Kin responsible for setting up the room to add her own flourishes where appropriate. She knows both me and Vittoria well, having spent time pleasuring us both, together and separately, so I trusted her to know what our darkest pleasures are.
‘Wax play?’ Vittoria asks, waving her hand through the flames of the bottom row of candles.
‘Whatever you wish,’ I say, watching as she tilts her head to one side and takes the central candle from that row then stretches out her other arm in front of her. She angles the black candle and we both stare as she moves the candle down the length of her arm from her elbow to her wrist, theheated wax dripping smoothly onto her tanned skin. I smile at the sight of her skin reddening, and the way the wax hardens, as does my cock.
She sucks in a breath. ‘I’m sure the red will look good on you.’
‘On me?’
‘You don’t think you’re going to have all the fun, do you? There’s nothing quite like the fear in a man’s eyes when those hot drips of wax get closer and closer to the soft, sensitive skin of his?—’
I blow the candle out.
‘Spoilsport.’
I unfasten my jacket and slip it off. Wandering back to the door, I hang it on a hook on the mahogany coat stand. Everything in this room is dark, from the wooden furniture to the soft furnishings to the various toys sitting in plain sight or hidden away in drawers.
One of those drawers scrapes open and Vittoria chuckles, the leather whip and cat-o’-nine-tails that she holds in either hand dark against her skin. She swishes the cat through the air a few times, then cracks it once at her side before repeating the same with the whip in her other hand.
‘What I’m wondering, Cillian, is why you’ve never brought me here before.’
‘This is my workplace, Vittoria.’ I loosen the bottom of my shirt and shrug. ‘But now, I’ve decided it’s time to explore your limits.’
