Page 15 of The Pleasure Contract
“I like there to be as little confusion as possible.”
“What exactly does that mean, though? One man’s feast is another man’s famine, or so I’m told.”
For a mouth she knew was hard and demanding, the way it curved looked inviting. Knowing. “This is the deal, Bristol. I like you. You seemed genuinely interested in a great variety of things instead of just playing a role to play it. I get the feeling you could talk about anything to anyone.”
“Well, yes, Lachlan. That’s called being a functional adult.”
“You might be surprised.”
He moved closer to her, but he didn’t tower over her. He thrust his hands in his pockets and studied her. And it was different, now, that they both knew how hot the fire between them burned. And how it felt when he was buried deep inside her. Much, much different.
Bristol had to press her legs together. Or maybe she wanted to.
“You don’t want anything from me, and strangely enough, that makes me want you more,” Lachlan said with a quiet intensity. “We have insane chemistry. I can’t think of anything that I’d like more than to get another taste of that, as often as possible, and with my schedule that requires a lot of effort. Or a contract.”
She considered that for a moment. “So, these girlfriends of yours.Girlfriendbeing a euphemism, clearly. These are women you hire but don’t call escorts. Or what they are—what I’d be. Prostitutes.”
Something was obviously wrong with her that she didn’t find the very idea appalling. That here, in this alley still wet for him, that word only made her shiver. Straight down into her clit.
“If there was a word for it, I think it would be mistress,” Lachlan said. “In the historic sense.”
“Mistress.”She laughed at that, because it struck her as such a glittering, archaic word for something that was far more prosaic. If not much discussed in polite circles, for all the strides the world had made in viewing sexuality more positively. “And these mistresses of yours all just...follow you around, making themselves available for sex on your schedule?”
He looked perfectly relaxed, standing there with that gleaming sports car behind him. Almost careless, but she could see the dark intensity in his gaze. It matched the current of fire and need that was only growing in her.
“Yes. That’s pretty much the entire job description.”
“Don’t they have lives? Their own jobs? Things to do?”
“Some do. Some don’t. It depends. And if they do, that often contributes to the length of our time together.”
“What job allows time off for being a billionaire’s plaything?”
“Again, you’d be surprised.” She started to say something else but he shook his head. “I don’t want to litigate my life, Bristol. There are far more entertaining things we could be doing, don’t you think? All you have to do is sign a few documents to protect us both. It’s the easiest thing in the world.”
“I bet every heroin dealer in the world tells their clients the same thing.”
“I promise you, I’m better than heroin.”
She believed him, and that should have served as a wake-up call. Bristol opened her mouth to tell him thatof courseshe couldn’t do what he was suggesting. That she was an intellectual. That she didn’t have ajob, she had a career and abody of workand was expected to make a substantive intellectual contribution to knowledge. To social policy.
Sheexpected these things from herself.
But she’d spent years and years doing nothing but flexing her intellectual muscles. And make no mistake, she’d loved it. She loved what she did, she loved studying, she loved teaching, and she loved writing.
But somehow in the midst of all that, Bristol had forgotten how to feel the way she did right now. A little bit battered, a little bit dazed, and wonderful.
She could still feel him inside her, thick and hard, filling her up so that she couldn’t breathe without that, too, feeling like a sensual act.
And she’d gone to one extreme. Why not go to the other?
What would it hurt?a voice inside her asked.
Lachlan looked as if he could stand there, waiting for her answer, forever.
And even that stillness, that quiet ease, made him hotter.
God, but he was hot.