“Trip down okay?” he asks.
It’s the most banal pleasantry, but it reaches down inside me and squeezes like a command. It’s that deep voice, the gruff undercurrent to every word. My stomach knots.
“Fine, no problems, sir.”
“There’s been a little change of plans for tonight. Don’t worry, we’ll still have plenty of time to get to know each other. I just need to escort a client to and from a nightclub. It’s the same place we’re eating dinner.”
“We’re eating in a nightclub?” I ask.
He gives me a grin and my heart does a funny two-step. “We’re eating at my club. Nightclub’s in the basement.”
He guides me through the waiting area. He moves easily, despite the crowd. If I tried to walk through this many people, I’d get bumped a dozen times. Instead, whenever anyone gets near, he draws me closer to his side and shoulders through, turning a little so he shelters me from any contact. At the curb, he holds up two fingers for a cab. He holds open the cab door for me, and my stomach does a flip-flop.
“You belong to a club?” I ask, as I climb into the cab. “Like a gentlemen’s club? That’s—“
He puts my bag in the trunk and climbs in on the other side. “Very eighteenth century?”
“I was going to say cool. I’ve never met anyone who belongs to an actual gentlemen’s club.”
As we roll away from Penn Station, he reaches across me, buckles my seatbelt, and slides his arm across the back of the seat. I look up into his eyes to make sure I’m not overstepping the bounds as I shift over until the seatbelt clip bites into my hip, as close as I can get to him. He smiles down at me.
“Well, you can judge for yourself how cool it is in a couple of hours. I’m looking forward to showing you around.”
“Have you been a member long?” I ask.
He nods. “About eight years. I started off as a junior member, then I bought a full membership after my parents died.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, sir.” I look up at him, but he just gives me a gentle smile.
“It was a while ago.” He shifts in his seat and winds a strand of my hair around his fingers. “You come into the City often?”
I nod. “A lot of my friends ended up here after college.”
“Where’d you go?”
“S.U.N.Y. Albany.”
“English major?”
“Journalism. I was going to be a reporter.” I shrug sheepishly. “Like Lois Lane.”
He chuckles, laugh lines bracketing his mouth. I still haven’t decided if Logan’s handsome or not. His features are maybe too rugged, his nose broken too many times, his jaw too sharp. Not classic good looks, although his face has a ton of character. If I were writing him, I’d make his nose an aristocratic blade, and give him a lantern jaw. But I couldn’t improve on his voice, and I could never invent his eyes. They’re deep brown and fathomless, and when he was belting me, they went absolutely savage. His mouth’s wide, with a full lower lip, and he smiles easily. His face is smooth today: he’s shaved off the dark brown stubble that scraped my chin when he kissed me goodbye. His shave has revealed the strong angle of his jaw. Would he let me kiss it, that warm hollow under the joint?
He thumbs my lower lip, making me aware I was biting it.
I scoot up against the seat belt until I can whisper right in his ear. “Could I kiss your neck, sir?”
He turns his head and rubs the tip of his nose against mine. His breath smells of spearmint. So much nicer than coffee. “Yes, baby doll. Good girl for asking.”
His words—the pet-name and the praise—make my head spin. I tuck my face into his neck. His skin’s warm and firm. The scent of skin and sandalwood fills my nose. I press my lips into that hollow and feel the rumble of pleasure he makes.
He reaches up and cups my cheek. He presses my face into his throat for a long moment, then murmurs, “Sit back and behave yourself.”
I do as I’m told, feeling a glow well inside me, totally out of proportion with our little interaction. But it feels so good to be with a Dom again, even if Logan’s barely more than a stranger.
“So why aren’t you working for The Daily Planet, Kitty?”
Oh, no. I’m going to have to tell him my real name soon. Definitely before I give him my passport. And I don’t think he’ll be happy with me when he finds out I lied to him, particularly when he’s given me such a cute nickname.
“There aren’t many jobs in journalism anymore. I started my first novel while I was job hunting, and I got lucky and was able to make a career of it. I still use my journalism skills, though, doing research for my books.” I scoot up against him again. “Sir, there’s something I need to tell you when we’re alone.”
“Whisper it to me now,” he says. His arm slides around me and draws me tight against him.
“I didn’t tell you the truth yesterday. My name’s Emily. Emily Martin. Kathryn’s another of my pen names. I’m sorry, sir. I’m so sorry.”
He remains still for a moment, his head tucked down so his cheek touches mine. Then he stretches his legs out in the cab’s foot well and rubs his fingertips up and down my bare arm.
“Why’d you lie to me?”
I don’t have anything like a good reason. HIM was screaming in my ears not to trust him. He was auditioning me for the role of his sexual submissive by making me strip naked in a public bathroom. If it didn’t work out, did I want him to know my real name? “I was afraid.”
“But you’re not now?”
“I’m afraid.” I’m always afraid. “But you said trust had to start somewhere. This is where it starts for me.”
He grunts. “That’s good, but you know you’re going to have to
