In another, a woman is on her knees between another woman’s thighs, her head moving in slow, deliberate rhythm while the second woman grips the bars and tips her face back in pleasure.
I have to watch her for a few moments because even though I’m a dick girl, it’s maybe the hottest thing I’ve seen this year.
In a third, a collared woman clutches the bars while a man swipes some sort of humming electrical device over her body in deliberate strokes that make her body jolt in helpless, shivering increments. Her mouth is open. Her eyes are dazed. She looks humiliated and adored in equal measure.
My entire body tingles at the idea that I could ever be treated like that. That maybe Iwantto be treated like that.
Liquid heat pools hard and sudden between my legs, and I take a step back before I can stop myself.
Then one forward.
I didn’t come here to be shocked and turned into a puddle of euphoric arousal.
I came here for Deacon.
I drag my gaze from the cages to the mirrored bar and start toward it, because bars are where information lives, and if I can get close enough, maybe?—
I stop so abruptly my heel nearly turns under me.
They’re all there. Nash. Shiloh. Ever.
Waiting.
There’s no surprise on their faces. No scramble to hide the fact that they’ve caught me exactly where I was never meant to be.
For one sharp, disorienting second, the entire room seems to narrow until it’s just them and me. The pulse of the music turns distant. The low red lights smear across glass and polished metal, catching on the hard lines of their faces. My stomach drops so fast it feels like missing a step in the dark.
Nash stands at the center of them, one hand braced on the back of a barstool, immaculate in a tweed vest over dark pants, expression unreadable in that way of his that’s worse than anger. Shiloh leans against the bar with his sleeves rolled and his mouth half-curved like he’s been entertaining himself for the last ten minutes with thoughts of this moment. Ever stands a little apart from them, broader, stiller, all his attention locked on me in a way that feels almost physical.
Nash crooks one finger.
Come here.
A fine trembling begins at my feet and starts climbing. No. Absolutely not. I amnotgoing to obey his silent command.
I turn to leave. I get two steps before Shiloh is there in my space.
He doesn’t grab me hard. He doesn’t need to. He just appears in front of me, one hand settling lightly at my elbow, redirecting me with that infuriating, easy grace of his.
“Ah-ah-ah,” he murmurs. “You came all this way.”
“I’m leaving.”
“Obviously you were trying to because you got caught,” he says. “Your timing is impeccable as ever.”
I yank my arm back. “Move.”
His eyes glitter. “Or what, Yank? You’re here. On our turf in a way you know you’re not supposed to be. What are you going to do?”
I open my mouth, then shut it again, because the truthful answer isI don’t know. Scream? Scratch? Make a scene in a room where I’m beginning to suspect scenes are purchased for sport?
Shiloh’s smile softens into something more dangerous. “Behave, brat.”
“Don’t call me that.” Every nerve fiber in my body bristles at his use of that name. But he’s not wrong. Iknowhow I’m behaving.
“Then don’t act like a brat.”
He guides me—not roughly, but with no room for misunderstanding—back toward the bar where Nash and Ever wait. My skin is buzzing by the time I stop in front of them. Fury. Adrenaline. Humiliation. Something wetter and more traitorous underneath.
