“Courtney, do not step outside your own bounds,” Khalid warned her then, his voice worried.

She laughed at the concern, flashing him a suggestive look.

“Do you think I haven’t done such things, Khalid?” she asked him. “When one is experimenting with her body, she tries many things.” Besides, her first goal had been to be a virgin, a very experienced virgin, in Ian’s bed. One did not get the experience one needed without a small amount of experimentation.

Khalid’s eyes widened marginally, as they seemed to glaze again. Good Lord, the man was a lost cause at that point.

She tapped her fingernail against the table, aware of both Alyssa and Khalid watching her warily.

“Very well.” She made up her mind quickly. As far as she was concerned, there was no sense in debating the matter. She would know immediately if such a thing would tempt his control. She would be able to feel it, his arousal, reaching out to her, fueling her own.

She had no intention of remaining a nun all her life, and the fact that she was unaroused with any other—male or female—unless Ian was present, was beginning to irk her to no small amount.

“Courtney…” Despite his obvious arousal, Khalid leaned forward, his expression warning.

She frowned, ire heating her expression. “Khalid, as much as your concern is appreciated, it is unwarranted. I never do anything I believe will harm me more than I am willing to be harmed. I am not Melissa Gaines.” And she was growing tired of the other woman haunting the relationship she knew she could have with Ian. “I am not willing to lose every dream I’ve had in my life because of her destructiveness. I, Khalid, will do whatever it takes to make Ian see that. But never, ever, will I do more than my own conscience, or decided lack of boundaries, is comfortable with.”

She was not an immature, psychotic, manipulating nutcase. She was simply a woman in love with a man who would walk away rather than risk the possibility that his hungers were destructive. A man, haunted by a death he had no hand in, a hunger he could not deny he felt, and one whose loneliness filled every part of his soul. That loneliness, that haunted ache she had glimpsed in his eyes for so long, was breaking her heart.

She needed to see laughter there. She wanted to see warmth and love. She needed to see his acceptance of her and of himself.

It was an ambitious plan, she had known that all along. There was a high chance of failure, though she refused to accept that it could happen.

“You could be a very scary woman, Courtney.” His lips quirked in a gentle smile as she tossed back the rest of her whisky.

“And so I should be,” she sighed as she glanced at Alyssa, meeting her reflective stare with a glare.

“I never thought otherwise.” Alyssa held her hands up in surrender. “But we aren’t the ones you need to convince. And we won’t be the ones to hurt if the convincing doesn’t work, Courtney. Ian is a dear friend of mine, and I count you as the same. Khalid and I will worry regardless of our faith in your sanity…” A smile tipped her lips. “Or your lack of it.”

“Some days, where Ian is concerned, I’m all for the insanity bit,” Courtney sighed, the nervous excitement running through her veins creating a hyper-energy that was difficult to tamp down.

She glanced back at Khalid, noting the tension in his large body, the obvious arousal. He was anticipating Ian’s reaction to what was to come as much as she was, though for different reasons.

As he lifted the bottle of whisky he had brought to the table to refill her glass, Thom approached from his side. Leaning close, he murmured something to Khalid before turning and moving away once again.

“Okay, ladies.” A gleam of anticipation filled his gaze. “Ian just pulled into the driveway. I would say the fireworks are about to begin.”

Chapter Twelve

Ian stared at the back entrance to The Club, the double wood doors with their lantern lights at the side. The stately brick surrounding it gave the entrance an imposing, by-permission-only, air. And once again Courtney had broken that long-held tradition.

What was it with women lately? First Tally and Terrie had slipped through to allow Tally to seduce Lucian and Devril in a most erotic manner. Now Courtney was taking a page out of her book and revising it enough to tempt Ian’s very sanity.

What it did to him to see her there, as though she were some empress of the erotic arts, tempting him to destroy them both. And she was tempting him, in ways no other woman ever had.

He quickly controlled the slight smile that would have curved his lips at the thought. She was a wildcat. She took every caress, every touch and turned it back on him, accepting every adventure he introduced her to with a hunger that never failed to surprise him. She accepted him so easily, that the firm control he had held over his deeper hungers, was slowly slipping.

She made him smile. She made the haunting loneliness he had lived with so many years dissipate. She made him want to believe…and believing was the most destructive thing he could do. For both of them.

Taking a deep breath, he stepped from the back of the limo, staring at the doors to The Club with a sense of fatalism. She was there, in the very heart of all he was. The rumormongers had nicknamed them Trojans for their dominance and their habits of sharing their women. But it went so much deeper than that. It was a part of them, who they were, what they were, and the often overriding concerns that lifestyle brought. It wasn’t just any woman who could deal with the fact that her husband or lover needed to tie her up, use exotic toys on her, or allow other men to watch or touch what should be primarily his.

It went beyond possessiveness though. Not that Ian wouldn’t kill the man who dared to touch Courtney without his implicit permission. Club member or not, the results wouldn’t be pretty.

He shook his head. Realizing instantly that he was already accepting the fact that he couldn’t hold out against her much longer. There was nothing left but the prayer that some part of the past affection would survive this new relationship when she realized it wasn’t really what she wanted and that he had destroyed the innocence that was so much a part of her.

She wouldn’t be the first.

Kia Stanton’s sense of betrayal and fury wasn’t necessarily unfounded when her husband had surprised her with his desires. Carl should have revealed his sexual tastes to her before their marriage. It had destroyed a relationship that might have worked had he been honest in the beginning.

Courtney lacked the boundaries other women did. She amazed him on a daily basis, with her view of the world, her acceptance of things she had no experience with, not just sexually, but life in general. She never made judgments, and always tried to understand each side of the coin.

She could handle his hungers.

He grimaced at the part of his sexuality that insisted that she was strong enough, hungry enough, to accept his needs. That her sexuality, her sense of self would never be threatened by the desires that ate at him.

And another part of him saw nothing but Melissa, her eyes gazing sightlessly beyond him, that damning letter lying by her side. All he could feel then was the horror, the fury, the guilt… He should have known. He should have been more careful…

“Mr. Sinclair, the door was locked.” The doors swung open to reveal Matthew’s dour countenance. “I locked it myself and checked it before I left. I have no idea who aided her in gaining entrance.”

Khalid had. Ian wasn’t stupid. He knew the other man was chomping at the bit to test Courtney’s control.

“Don’t worry about it, Matthew, she would have found a way in no matter the measures taken against her.” He slipped his coat off as Matthew closed the doors behind them, his gaze going instantly to the closed portals of the social room beyond.

Something surged in his bloodstream. A sense of expectation, an electrified arousal. The static charge had the hairs lifting along his nape as the ache in his cock intensified. His erection tightened, his body heated, and it took a long, indrawn breath to clear the haze of lust suddenly filling his head.

Spank me, Uncle Ian… Her voice teasing, her eyes holding a gleam of untamed laughter.

God yes! Make it hurt, just a little more, Ian. Just a little more… Her screams of unabashed pleasure and sexual pain echoed in his head as he watched the small, tight entrance of her ass bloom open for his thick cock.

I won… Her unsteady laughter as they collapsed on the bed night before, drowsy, replete, the sexual battle for control still considered a draw. Ian wasn’t satisfied with a draw.

Shaking his head, his jaw tightened as he forced himself to move to the doors. All he had to do was stalk to her and drag her out. No matter who stood around her… The doors opened. No matter what she was doing…

God have mercy on his soul…

Ian came to a resounding stop, shock gathering in the pit of his belly, his dick nearly pushing through his slacks as he felt his eyes widen, his lips parting in surprise.

It wasn’t possible. He wasn’t seeing it.

The outfit itself was control-destructive, but he could have withstood it. Ian was known for his control. And the wicked red short skirt and top, though incredibly tempting, could have been resistible.

But the rest…

He felt his mouth dry, then water, a haze of lust enveloping him, searing him as he watched Alyssa Hampstead behind her, her lips lowering to Courtney’s bare shoulder, her teeth raking the flesh as her hands slowly parted the buttons on the vest Courtney wore.

Dark brown eyes flared with a heat of their own as his gaze locked with his lover’s. Lust, impossibly hot, hungry, demanding, flashed in her eyes a second before the vest parted, revealing the swollen, hard-tipped mounds beneath.

He couldn’t breathe. Breathing wasn’t an option. He was too concerned with his eroding control to worry about breathing. Besides, if he breathed, he might have to blink, then he would miss…

“Fuck…” The long, drawn-out hiss was accompanied by the muttered groans and growls of the other men scattered about, watching as Alyssa moved around Courtney, bending, her pale pink lips opening as Courtney’s hand lifted to cup her own breast and guide her nipple to the other woman’s mouth.

Soft female lips puckered around the turgid nipple as Courtney almost stumbled, reaching for the edge of the table as Alyssa obviously nipped at the tender bud.

Ian was barely aware he was moving. He had to be breathing, because he had the strength to walk—no, stalk. Distantly he was aware of the intent building inside him as he moved behind Courtney, his fingers wrapping around her braid as he pulled her head back to his shoulder, his arm going around her waist to steady her as a strangled, greedy moan left her lips.

“She likes the pain, Alyssa,” he growled, knowing he was cursed forever. “Do it right.”

Alyssa’s cool blue eyes were warm with arousal as a smile tugged at her suckling lips, but she did as he urged. And she let him watch.

Her lips pulled back from her teeth, giving him the perfect view of Courtney’s hard little nipple, the areola darkening, as Alyssa tugged at it, her tongue washing over it.

“Ian… Oh God…” Courtney stared up at him, her body drawn tight, lust nearly turning her eyes black as he stared down at her.

His hand moved from her waist to her opposite breast as her hands gripped his lower arms. He gripped her nipple with thumb and forefinger, milking it forcefully as her eyes glazed with the sensations.

Wild. Untamed. She was the most beautiful creature he had ever seen in his life. But this wasn’t what he wanted for her. Another woman, no matter how erotic the sight, couldn’t bring her the pleasure that Ian knew another man could.

“Khalid.” His voice sounded torn from his throat as he continued to stare at Courtney.

“Yes, Ian.” Khalid’s darkly accented voice was harsh with arousal.

“I require a third.”

“With pleasure, Ian.”