STORY EXCERPT

Chance

The voice slides down my spine like ice water, cold and sensual all at once. I freeze, my empty champagne flute suspended mid-air. Then I turn, offering my most professionally vapid smile.

“I’m sorry, do I know you?”

Ronan’s hand clamps around my bicep with precisely calibrated force. Not enough to make a scene, just enough to convey absolute ownership. I haven’t seen the man in three days, and the effect is electric. He’s wearing charcoal Tom Ford, radiating the kind of authority that makes lesser mortals reflexively check their posture and my cock twitch like a Pavlovian dick. It doesn’t help that he is so unfairly beautiful, tall and powerful with a body as strong as his personality.

“Fascinating alias,” he says sarcastically, steering me inexorably toward the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the city. “Creative. Bold. Incredibly stupid to keep using the same one.”

Unfair. The familiarity actually works in my favor, in case I run into other people who knew me when I was using it, but it’s probably not strategic to argue that yet. I pout a bit instead, with a tiny hidden tremor when I see him respond with a twitch of the mouth that could be read as either irritation, which would be bad, or a desire to teach me a lesson, which could be really, really good.

“I can explain,” I say through the pout.

“Can you?” Ronan continues moving us away from the party’s center, his smile never wavering. “Perhaps you can explain why my analyst, who seems to think he is my chief intelligence officer, is infiltrating a competitor’s event without clearance. Or why you’re wearing that around your neck?”

The last words come as his thumb brushes against my collar, hidden beneath my shirt. I swallow hard. When he reaches a secluded alcove, he pivots, backing me against the cool glass with one fluid movement. The city sprawls forty floors below us, a dizzying expanse of lights and shadow.

“I thought you wanted me to wear it.”

“It’s proprietary technology, Chance, my pet.” The endearment doesn’t sound at all affectionate. “I don’t want the chance of anyone here scanning it. I’m possessive with what’s mine.”

“Ronan, I was just—”

His hand finds my throat, fingers slipping beneath my carefully knotted tie to trace the contours of the steel band. The Heartline. His gift. His claim. The most advanced piece of biometric technology on the planet, disguised as a BDSM accessory. And absolutely, expressly forbidden during espionage.

“I hope you remembered just what it means,” he says, voice dropping an octave as his fingers tighten fractionally around the metal, “and how tight I can make it, sweetheart. Would be a shame if you came so close to passing out as you did during foreplay.”

Shit. I had loved that, in the privacy of his room. But he wouldn’t do it to me in public, would he? He leans closer, his breath the loudest thing in my suddenly small world. The collar seems to pulse against my skin, unnervingly alive. I should be terrified. I’m compromised, caught red-handed, and Ronan doesn’t tolerate insubordination. He could punish me, fire me, or, far worse, break it off with me and break my heart in the process. Instead, a delicious thrill races through me, pooling hot and insistent at the base of my spine.

“I just wasn’t expecting to see you here,” I manage, voice embarrassingly breathless.

“Clearly.” His thumb traces my lower lip. “That's the problem with espionage, Chance. You never know who might be watching.”

I’m acutely aware of my body’s betrayal, of how easily he reads my response. The collar was a choice I made. It doesn’t matter that it’s a commitment I still don’t fully understand. I know it’s part of Ronan’s forbidden research, something to do with that damn Lazarus project that has haunted me from the start, technology so advanced it blurs the line between dominance and something more profound. I was crazy to accept it without demanding details. Crazy in love, perhaps. It seemed important to not ask questions, to demonstrate what I’d do for him, even if I turned around and snapped at his heels afterwards. Either way, the weight of it against my throat reminds me constantly of who I belong to.

“You agreed to my conditions when you put this on,” he continues, his finger slipping beneath the collar to tug gently. “Absolute transparency. Absolute trust.”

“I know,” I whisper, and hate the neediness I hear in my voice. This is important, and I keep getting distracted by how much I want him to hold me down and fuck me. “I just—this acquisition could threaten us. I needed to—”

“You needed to come to me with your concerns and ideas,” Ronan interrupts, his breath hot against my ear. “Not play unauthorised spy games at corporate cocktail parties.”

His hand slides down my chest, ostensibly to straighten my tie but actually claiming territory. My body responds with embarrassing enthusiasm. Right here, with hundreds of industry power players mingling just yards away, I’m reduced to this—trembling and hard, my back pressed against glass that suddenly seems too thin to support us. He could do what he liked with me and I wouldn’t resist, whatever the consequences. It’s always been this way between us, and he knows it, the bastard.

I love him so much.

“But spy games are fun.” I don’t know how I manage to sound resentful when all I want is to be on my knees in front of him.

“Perhaps we should continue this conversation somewhere more private,” he suggests, his voice promising delicious retribution. “You need to be taught a lesson.”

I’m about to agree—to beg, if necessary—when a smooth voice interrupts.

“Ronan Beresford. I thought that was you.”

We both turn to see a tall, impeccably dressed man regarding us with knowing amusement. I take a moment to place him: Romeo Felix, formerly Ronan’s top legal counsel, now Infonaut’s chief attorney. From the way his gaze flicks between us, lingering on Ronan’s hand at my throat, he’s seeing far too much.

“Romeo,” Ronan acknowledges, not stepping back an inch. “I wasn’t aware Infonaut had acquired your services.”

“Six months ago,” Romeo replies, his smile never reaching his eyes. “And who’s your... friend?”

Ronan’s fingers tighten imperceptibly around my collar. “Chance Donahue. New acquisition specialist.” Bastard, as always. If Romeo knows the name I’m under, I’m screwed.

Romeo’s eyebrow arches. “Is that so? Curious. I don’t recall seeing that name on the guest list when I approved your company’s attendants.”

“An oversight,” Ronan replies smoothly. “One I’m sure you can overlook, given our history.”

“Of course,” Romeo says, his gaze lingering on the slight bulge of the collar beneath my shirt, and polite enough not to look at any other bulge. “Old friends deserve certain... accommodations.”

The knowing tone makes heat rise to my face. As Romeo departs with a final loaded glance, Ronan’s fingers trace the edge of the collar once more.

“This evening was a waste of my precious time. We’re leaving,” he murmurs. “Now.”

I hesitate for a moment. I have my pride. I don’t want to slink after Ronan with tail down and cock up, compliant and horny. But if I don’t, he might not take me home and give me what’s coming to me. Choices, choices.

ADULT EXCERPT

Ronan

I brush my lips down the sharp slope of his spine, soft as possible. I kiss each vertebra. I taste salt and fading shame. He stirs, makes a small noise. I let my tongue trace the knobs of his back, from shoulder blades to the dimples at his lower back. I could mark him again. I don’t.

His voice is hoarse with sleep and heavy with trust. “Good morning, Ronan. That’s nice.”

I don’t answer. I can’t. Not without ruining it.

I slide my hand slowly over the curve of his hip, guiding him onto his back with a pressure he obeys before he’s even conscious of moving. That obedience unwinds something inside me. I use one arm to brace myself while the other traces circles on his ribs, then the line of his chest. There is no urgency now. We have all the time in the world. And I have him.

He opens his eyes. Looks at me. Really looks. He sees the man I don’t show anyone, the one who wakes in the aftermath and wants only to hold what he almost broke.

I lower my head and kiss his collarbone first. Then the collar itself.

My tongue follows the arc of it, slow and devotional, like it’s not steel between us but thread. Chance’s breath stutters as if he knows what I could do to him with it, if I chose.

But this is about loving him. So is that, but it’s a different kind of love. I need to give him both. I need to give him everything. All I ask is all he is in return. Isn’t that fair?

“Ronan,” he whispers, already beneath me in every way that matters.

My hand finds him between the legs and I feel the impossibly tiny rosette of his anus. How wonderful, that this tiny thing can yield and let me in. His body’s pliant, even before I touch the small bottle on the nightstand. My fingers move automatically to prepare him to be fucked. Muscle memory. Cruelty. Love.

It doesn’t matter.

He’s wet and stretched and mine.