I don't need this side of her. The one that reminds me of who I once thought she was — warm and unguarded and completely without pretense. The goofy girl from the library who put stars and hearts in the margins of her notes.
I need her to stay the villain. She is making that very difficult.
We both notice the camera flash at the same time — a lens pointed in our direction from across the room. The paparazzi presence has doubled in the last twenty minutes since three members of the K-pop group AURIX arrived and the whole energy of the club shifted.
"Time to work," Blaire says, throwing my exact words back at me with a smile that knows exactly what it's doing.
Then she climbs onto my lap and straddles my hips, lowering herself down, and every coherent thought I have exits my body simultaneously.
"Mmm." She tilts her head, looking down at me with those eyes. "Am I lookingfuckableyet, Mr. Sullivan?"
Then she crashes her mouth to mine before I can say a single word.
This is my karma. I used those words to diminish her, and now she's weaponized them back at me, and I am completely, thoroughly, by the balls.
She's writhing against me now, grinding against the hard length in my pants with a focused determination that is making me simultaneously furious and out of my mind. My hands find her waist and grip before my brain has approved the decision, pulling her down harder against me.
The deep groan she lets out nearly stops my heart.
"Fuck, Blaire." I breathe it against her mouth.
"Think about the headlines in the morning." Her lips brush mine as she speaks, teasing. "If I come right here in this club on your lap, Bennet." She rolls her hips again. "Would that make me a good girl? I bet I'd be very good at that."
She takes my bottom lip between her teeth and bites down hard, then sucks it into her mouth, and I feel it from my spine to my toes.
I am going to combust.
I look over her shoulder. Multiple lenses angled in our direction, red lights blinking.
"You're so hard, Bennet." She breathes against my jaw. "I guess I am fuckable after all."
She starts grinding harder. Faster. The friction sends electricity shooting from the back of my neck all the way to my curled toes, and my hands move to her thighs, gripping hard.
"Yes — oh god. Oh god—" She bites down on her lower lip, her eyes squeeze shut, and she moans, her body trembling right on the edge.
My skin tingles with awareness, and my legs start to go numb as my climax tugs on my spine. I’m going to come in my pants and have photographic evidence of it.
Fluorescent lights.
Laughter.
Rain.
"Stop." I grab her hips and hold them still. She looks down at me, flushed and breathing hard, smirking in a way that should make me angry, and does, and also does something else entirely.
I lift Blaire to her feet and hold her by the shoulders, keeping her steady until I'm sure her legs are going to cooperate.
"You good?"
She sways for a moment, then nods slowly. "I think so."
I lead her through the club without another word, one hand at her back, navigating through the crowd and out the doors into the night air. I open the car door and wait while she gets in, making sure she's settled before I lean down to the driver.
"Get her home and safely into her apartment." I keep my voice level. "Not to the lobby. Her apartment." I hold his gaze. "If anything happens to her between here and that door, you'll never walk again."
"Yes, of course, Mr. Sullivan."
I close the door.
