Enraptured Read online

  It was already hot, actually. Perspiration formed on the back of Jessica’s neck as she stood under the awning of Marc and Lauren’s building, cell phone in hand. The doorman was staring at her, as if waiting for her to do something untoward.

  “I’m just waiting for some friends,” she murmured. This was ridiculous. She didn’t belong here. But if she didn’t ride with Lauren and Marc to Roman’s party, she wouldn’t be able to get there.

  And she really, really wanted to see Roman Chase’s house.

  And dungeon.

  Lauren and Marc spilled out the front door, laughing as always. The couple was so cute together.

  “There you are, beautiful!” Lauren called, and embraced her like they were BFFs. Jessica blushed but hugged her back.

  “Thanks again for inviting me and giving me a ride and everything.” She turned toward Marc. “Hello, sir.”

  “Call me Marc. Or stud-muffin. I answer to both.”

  “Okay,” Jessica said, smiling back. It was impossible not to like them.

  A black stretch limo pulled up in front of the building.

  Lauren led Jessica by the hand toward the limo, where the chauffeur was already holding the back door open for them.

  “We figured we’d need a little more space,” Lauren said. “Thus the limo. Sorry if it’s pretentious.”

  “Am I underdressed?” Jessica asked. She felt like a moron. A sundress? And leggings to change into? She mentally groaned.

  “What? No. You look great,” Lauren assured her. Since Lauren was wearing tight, dark jeans and a tank top that showcased her infamous curves, Jessica decided to believe her.

  “Besides, we’ll all be getting undressed when we get there anyway,” Marc said.

  Jessica froze halfway into the limo. “Pardon?”

  “To go swimming,” Lauren clarified. “You have to take everything Marc says with a grain of salt.”

  “Gotcha,” Jessica said, grinning. She slid all the way in, the smooth leather of the seat cool on the underside of her thighs.

  The ride up to Westchester didn’t take nearly as long as Jessica expected. Marc and Lauren kept up a steady stream of conversation, to the point that Jessica didn’t even have to talk much. She’d worried needlessly about getting more super-personal questions about her sex life, or lack of it— but Lauren talked more about the fund-raiser they’d gone to the week before and the dark-chocolate fountain they had there than she did about kink.

  Jessica looked out the window, hoping she didn’t seem rude. She didn’t want to get carsick from all the twists and turns through the hills of New York that the limo driver was maneuvering them through.

  “It’s so pretty up here,” she commented during a lull in the conversation.

  “Yeah, lots of space. Lots of trees,” Marc said. “Trevor and Elisabeth live up here too.”

  “Why don’t you guys?” Jessica asked. “I mean, since you and Trevor and Roman work together and all.”

  “We like the city,” Lauren said, and Jessica glanced over to see her clasping Marc’s hand. The two lovebirds were grinning at each other. It was cute.

  “I go up for meetings as needed, or we teleconference. Or they come down to the city. It’s not too far, either way.”

  “Roman likes his privacy. He’d go nuts living with people on top of him all the time, like in Manhattan. He barely even keeps any staff around,” Lauren confided.

  Jessica nodded. He likes his privacy, huh? “Roman must like being single and having a mansion to himself, then, I guess.”

  Marc frowned. “Why?”

  Shit. Shit shit shit. She’d said the wrong thing. “Oh, I’m just being stupid. Because you said he likes privacy. Sorry.”

  “Yeah, Roman’s kinda wary about who he lets into his circle. He hates how all those chicks at the club are so, you know . . .” Marc trailed off. “. . . interested in his money.”

  Lauren dug her elbow into Marc’s side, but he just shrugged.

  The trees flashed by in a blur. Jessica’s face burned with embarrassment. Clearly, she must have come across the wrong way. Such a stupid faux pas and it wasn’t fair. She’d never dated a guy just for his money. Of course, she never knew a billionaire before, so she didn’t even have any experience with that sort of thing.

  Jessica had no clue how to respond to Marc’s awkward gold-digger comment.

  Shit shit shit.

  Lauren changed the subject, thank God.

  “I’m so glad it’s hot enough to swim today,” she said. “Can’t wait to see the new mosaic in Roman’s pool.”

  “He has a . . . mosaic?” Jessica couldn’t imagine why someone would want a piece of art underwater. Maybe he swam a lot.

  “This is it,” Marc announced as they pulled up a long, steep driveway to a looming mansion on the hill.

  Jessica gasped, but quickly stopped herself, hoping Marc hadn’t heard her excitement at the opulent display of wealth. She’d expected a big house. A really big house. She hadn’t expected this. Roman’s mansion was huge, bigger than her apartment building, easily. The acreage spreading around it was immaculately manicured.

  As for the house itself, it was dark and modern-looking, with jutting steel and glass that should have exposed the inside of the house, but instead was covered up with dark drapes. It gave the impression that while the structure was made of hard glass, the soft, protective fabric inside might shield its owner from the outside world.

  What are you hiding from, Roman?

  Her door swung open, held by the chauffeur. Jessica clutched her bag to her chest, feeling small in such an enormous setting.

  “Welcome,” a deep voice said behind her.

  Jessica swirled around. “Hi Roman. You scared me.”

  “I do that to you a lot, it seems. My apologies.” He patted Marc on the back. “May I kiss your fiancée?”

  Marc laughed. “Man, I told you already to stop asking for permission to touch her. She’s only my submissive in the bedroom. Everywhere else she’s still perfectly capable of telling you off if she doesn’t want you to touch her.”

  Roman smiled and gave Lauren a respectful kiss on the cheek.

  “Well, she didn’t knock you on your ass, so that’s good,” Jessica said, then covered her mouth, surprised she’d spoken out loud. “Sorry. Filterless brain always gets me in trouble.”

  Roman chuckled, and her pulse raced. He either liked her or truly thought she was funny, because he was really not the laughing type. She’d been watching him at WhipperSnapper long enough to know. He only ever laughed when he was with his friends. His circle, as Marc put it.

  Could she be his friend now too?

  Today felt like an audition. An audition for the role of Roman’s groupie. Well, she didn’t mind that, even if she’d prefer an audition to be his personal slave. Especially if it meant seeing his insanely handsome face outside of a dark club.

  “I’ve never seen you in daylight before,” Jessica said, following Roman as the group walked down a paved path to the back of the house.

  “So you’ve figured out for yourself that the vampire rumor is false, I take it,” he said.

  Jessica laughed. There wasn’t really a vampire rumor. Or maybe there was and she hadn’t heard it yet.

  Around the back of his estate was a huge sundeck surrounding an even bigger swimming pool. The pool had a hot tub attached to it that sprayed a waterfall down into the sparkling water.

  “It’s gorgeous,” she whispered.

  “Do you like whips?” Lauren asked, coming up behind her.

  “Pardon?” Jessica flushed and turned to her.

  Roman pointed deep beneath water. The mosaic at the bottom was of a dark, coiled black whip.

  “Wow,” Jessica said. “That’s incredible. I didn’t even see that at first. I just thought the pool was beauti
ful.”

  “And now that you see it,” Roman said, his voice soft, as if to calm her nerves, “what do you think?”

  “Everyone knows about . . . you?” she asked.

  “Everyone. It’s no secret I’m a Dom.”

  “Hi guys!” Elisabeth and Trevor came up to them with drinks in their hands.

  Jessica smiled, hoping it would mask her nervousness, but Elisabeth shocked her by pulling her into a friendly hug, as if they were old friends.

  “So glad you could make it!” Elisabeth said. “We’ve been dying to get to know you better ever since you started working at the club.”

  “Really?” Jessica asked. “That’s so sweet.”

  Why, though? It seemed strange that this group, the BAD Boys and their women, would care about her at all. She just served them drinks and overpriced cookies. Why would they assume she was the least bit interesting?

  “Greg and Andrew are here, too,” Elisabeth said, looping her arm through Jessica’s. “They’re inside somewhere, doing God knows what.”

  “Oh, I know what,” Marc joked.

  Lauren grinned at him. “Maybe we can join them after a dip in the pool.”

  Jessica couldn’t stop looking around her, at the luscious grounds, the huge outdoor kitchen with a grill, and the many reclining pool chairs with umbrellas beside them.

  “It’s so, so pretty here,” she whispered.

  “Thank you,” Roman said, and she laughed, not realizing she’d spoken out loud.

  “Let’s go get changed,” Lauren suggested, and grabbed Jessica’s other arm. Now she was sandwiched between the two women as they marched toward what looked like a . . . cabana?

  “He has a cabana?” she asked, wanting to get her word choice right.

  “Of course,” Elisabeth laughed. “Guests wouldn’t want to change in front of everyone. It’s really nice inside, too. There’s a bathroom and sauna, as well as several private areas to change clothes.”

  “I brought a bathing suit, “ Jessica said.

  Inside the cabana, Elisabeth opened one of the doors for her, as if letting her into a fitting room in a department store. That’s what the small stall reminded her of, although much fancier. There was a teak stool to sit on, and several hangers and hooks on the white-painted walls. Still, she could hear the voices just outside—the men talking, laughing.

  It felt like she was so very close to them as she pulled her sundress up over her head and hung it on the hook, then slipped out of her bra and panties.

  Naked. With Roman merely a few yards away.

  She quickly pulled on her bikini. It was very patriotic-looking, with a stars-and-stripes print. It had been on sale at a Walmart back in Denver. It was an old one, but it fit, so . . .

  Hopefully, since none of the rich people she had met in New York shopped there, they wouldn’t know she was decked out in Walmart’s finest. Maybe Roman and his friends would just assume it was some designer brand. Or not.

  It’s not like you need to fit in with their money. They knew she worked at WhipperSnapper. She wouldn’t be working there if she had money, so there was no reason to pretend otherwise.

  Jessica was about to open the door when she realized—she’d forgotten a beach towel. How could she forget something so simple like that?

  Stepping out of the private enclosure, she felt very undressed in her bikini. She should have brought a sarong at least. Or a stupid towel.

  Lauren and Elisabeth were chatting with each other through the thin walls as they changed. Jessica stood quietly with her arms crossed over her chest and listened. Not because she wanted to eavesdrop, but because there was nothing else to do.

  She cleared her throat so they’d know she could hear them.

  “I’ll be out in a minute, Jess,” Lauren called.

  Jess. She had only been there for ten minutes and she already had a nickname!

  “No rush, I’m just hanging out,” Jessica said. “I forgot a towel. I don’t know what I was thinking, packing a bathing suit and no towel.”

  Elisabeth stepped out of her stall wearing a beautiful bikini—black with rhinestones and little cutouts that would give her interesting tan lines.

  “I love your suit,” they both said in unison.

  Jessica laughed. “No, really, I love it. So pretty.”

  “Julian picked it out for me, so I can’t take credit,” she said, waving her hand, as if to say, no big deal.

  “Julian’s her on-call stylist,” Lauren announced, as she emerged from the room. Her voluptuous figure filled out her one-piece emerald green bathing suit perfectly, her breasts pushed up and forward by a built-in underwire.

  “You have a stylist?” Jessica asked. “Wow.”

  “He’s awesome. But he doesn’t get the BDSM thing at all. He’s always frowning when I have a new mark on me,” Elisabeth laughed. “Doesn’t matter how many times I try to explain to him that I’m a total pain-slut.”

  Pain-slut. The words sent a shiver down Jessica’s spine, and goose bumps rose on her bare skin.

  “I’m new to the whole scene myself,” Jessica said carefully. She didn’t want to come across as judgmental, or ignorant. But she was ignorant. And she wanted to rectify that.

  “You can ask us anything,” Lauren said. “And we’ll answer. Anything at all.”

  “Is there an extra towel I can borrow?”

  The two girls laughed so hard that Elisabeth almost started crying.

  “We’re not laughing at you,” Elisabeth choked out, and started laughing again. “You’re just so cute. Of course you can borrow a towel.” She strode through the spacious cabana to the steam room, where a pile of perfectly-folded fluffy gray towels sat in a cabinet. She took one for each of them.

  Jessica immediately wrapped it around her body, like a dress. The towel was warm. Had it been sitting in a warming cabinet? It must have been.

  “This is the nicest towel I’ve ever used,” Jessica said. “I didn’t even know they made towels like this.”

  “Yeah,” Elisabeth said. “I thought the exact same thing the first time I came here. I was used to the towels that get kinda rough and scratchy after a few washes.”

  “So I can ask you a real question, right?” Jessica asked, wanting to check before getting too personal.

  Lauren and Elisabeth turned to her, stopping before they headed out into the sun.

  “Um, Elisabeth . . . I heard you were trained by Roman. As a sub. Is that just a stupid rumor? You don’t have to answer,” she said quickly.

  “Yes,” Elisabeth said. “I was. I’ll tell you all about it another time.”

  With that, she held open the door for her, and the three girls stepped out of the cabana to the pool.

  There were people. Lots of people. She looked at Lauren in confusion, but Lauren just shrugged. “Roman likes his closest friends to come first, but he was in the mood for a party, so we invited our favorite people from the club.”

  “No work people?” Jessica asked, since their hedge fund connected the BAD Boys to seemingly every business person in the tri-state area.

  Lauren winked at her. “Nope. Kinksters only—it’s that kind of party. I figured you knew.”

  Chapter Three

  Roman held a beer in his hand, but it was mainly for show, so that everyone else would feel comfortable grabbing a drink from the large metal tub filled with ice that Sara, his assistant, had set up for them.

  Caterers dressed in black slacks with white button-down shirts worked efficiently to set out the long trays of sandwiches, deli meats, and salads. Roman didn’t particularly want them to stay, but they seemed to be professional enough, so perhaps it wouldn’t matter. And it was always nice to have someone nearby to hand you a fresh drink or take away a dirty plate.

  Within moments of arriving, the guests were in the mood for fun.
They all knew each other from the club. Roman looked over at Lauren as she emerged from the cabana with Elisabeth and Jessica.

  Lauren gave him the thumbs-up, which Roman took as a thank-you for throwing the party. Jessica seemed to have no idea it was all for her. Would she figure it out when Lauren made a move on her?

  Roman leaned up against the outdoor bar and tried to focus on the conversation among the other men nearby, but it bored him. He didn’t want to discuss the finer points of the latest Star Trek movie. He wanted to watch Jessica remove that towel.

  “Excuse me,” he said, and meandered over to her. She sat on one of the lounge chairs and was studiously applying sunscreen to her long, tan legs.

  He wondered what it would feel like to have those legs wrapped around him, to hold her thighs open as he licked her.

  Roman shook his head to clear the thought. He was still fully dressed, in jeans and a T-shirt, but he couldn’t afford to get too aroused now. Maybe later, when everyone had a few drinks in them. Something about the bright sunlight made him feel more reserved, unlike his guests. The sun brought out the playfulness in them, making them laugh and splash in the water.

  “Would you like a drink, Jessica?” he asked as he approached her.

  She jumped at the sound of his voice and looked up, laughing. “You must think I’m a complete moron.”

  “Why?”

  “Because every time you talk to me I look at you in shock. You walk so quietly, like a cat. I keep getting startled.” She laughed again.

  “I don’t think you’re a moron.”

  “You went to Harvard, right?” she asked.

  “Yale. That’s where Trevor and I met. Are you in school?”

  She paused, as if not sure what to say. “I was at NYU but I dropped out. My parents still don’t know.”

  “You should tell them,” he said.

  A woman holding a tray of sodas walked by, and Roman stopped her. “What would you like?”