Page 6

SOUNDTRACK: Scream My Name by Thomas LaRosa

~ brIDGET ~

I’d just finished blow drying my hair and walked out into the room to get dressed when Sam passed me on his way to the shower.

We were both still naked and had spent most of the afternoon sleeping and laying around. Sam watched videos on YouTube of guys who go stealth camping with weird tents their viewers send them, while I played on my phone—location off, as usual, thank God—and organized a date for tonight since everything that wasn’t cash had to be paid for on my cards since I was the only one who was allowed to be outside of Oregon right now.

The show was called Le Désir. Some kind of adult version of Cirque du Soleil. I was looking forward to it.

“I’ll be ten minutes,” he murmured, stroking a hand up my body and leaning down to give me a quick kiss as he passed, but he didn’t slow.

I turned to watch him walk away, that tight ass beckoning me. But it was the way his back muscles did delicious things when he cranked an arm up to run a hand through his hair that made my stomach trill .

I smiled and considered wrapping my hair in a towel to join him in the shower. But I didn’t want to take the edge off. Sam knew we were going to see a circus , but he didn’t know that it was rated mature . No minors allowed—and not just because they served alcohol.

The theater was new and relatively small by Vegas standards. But to be safe, I’d gotten us one of the private boxes high up so we wouldn’t have to worry about people seeing our faces. Then we would head to a restaurant that offered private dining rooms for couples. I was pretty sure by the careful wording on the website that was because there was more than food on the menu if you wanted it. But I’d wanted the chance to be out with Sam without him getting that haunted look in his eyes.

We wouldn’t need to order sex workers. I was sure we could find a way to enjoy each other for dessert. That was my plan, anyway.

And that got me thinking about when Sam grabbed me in the bathroom and talked about the hunt.

I was still irritated that he’d been too quick to get after me this morning. He was smug about it, too. Teasing me a couple times and accusing me of pouting.

Thoughtful, I looked at the now-closed bathroom door and smiled.

He knew our tickets were for a circus, but didn’t know which Casino housed the theater. He did know the name of the restaurant—we’d shared a look when I told him about my suspicions for their secret menu—which meant, worst case scenario, if he couldn’t find me for the show, he’d know how to catch me for dinner. And he’d be frustrated if he hadn’t found me earlier.

My smile got broader.

The shower turned on in the bathroom and I launched into action. I was dressed and made up in under five minutes, giggling as I wrote him a note.

“There’s nothing on under my dress. I need someone to confess to. Come find me. Good luck.”

I stopped at the door to make sure he still had the shower running and wouldn’t hear the clunk of the hotel door, then I was out in the hall, and gone.

Forty minutes later the lights in the theater dropped to pitch-black, only a small glow in the orchestra pit below the stage. My heart hammered, beating far too quickly, but I couldn’t stop smiling.

We were both using our burner phones. Sam had texted me twice.

SAM NOTPRIEST: I should have known.

SAM NOTPRIEST: You’re going to need more than confession when I’m done with you.

Even reading that sent a bolt of want diving from my heart, straight between my legs. As the music began, I prayed he’d figure it out before this was done. I wasn’t sure I could wait for dessert.

Unfortunately, the show only made it worse.

Fifteen minutes in I was regretting running from Sam. I needed him here.

There were no lines in this show. Only a story told through dancing, acrobatics, and music. A very sexually charged, animalistic story.

Beauty and the Beast. But this was no Disney.

Half an hour later, I sat on the edge of my seat, thighs pressed together, leaning on the balustrade, enthralled. If I didn’t ache with desire, I would have forgotten Sam completely. The show was incredible—powerful dancers and acrobats, flexible in ways that gave me all kinds of ideas and made me wonder what they all got up to with each other off-stage.

The main couple were riveting—the guy was tall and muscular. Shoulders the size of a barn and hands big enough that when he lifted his partner by her waist, his fingers touched at the front.

She was small and lithe—a ballerina, I thought. Not that it mattered. It wasn’t their talent that compelled me to keep watching, but their chemistry .

Whoever put this show together needed to be given a Grammy. Or an Oscar. Or whatever.

The pair danced and flipped and writhed together, telling the story of a woman in poverty who’d been employed by a rich, but ugly recluse who hid his face behind long, messy hair and rejected all human kindness with rudeness and aggression. Violence at times.

She had empathy for the monster and slowly broke through his defenses.

Shocking, I know. But it worked. I was rooting for her to break through before we were five minutes in—and furious with him when he so clearly wanted her, but rejected her over and over, until her heart was in tatters.

But, halfway through, as his walls crumbled and she stared, pleading with him to love her, nerves and anticipation fizzed in my belly. Moments later when he broke through his own fear and stroked her jaw, I felt the touch on my face. And when he lifted her up and they began to dance…

Holy shit.

The music built, rising and falling in waves as he cradled her, turned her, then stroked her—but all of it tantalizingly depicted in dance, the touches and movement so suggestive, but never quite obscene.

My mouth went dry when he spread her limbs and his hand appeared from behind, between her legs, lifting her like he called the audience to worship. Then letting her drop and catching her gracefully, bending her around his hip and whirling her as her head fell back in bliss, her hair trailing over his legs, the floor, his chest as he turned and twisted, raised and lowered her, curled and stroked—every movement an impossible, graceful, dangerous sweep and glide as he used his body and strength to showcase her beauty and elegance.

Then, in the magic of modern theater, as the lighting dropped and changed, their painted leotards appeared to suddenly match so that as they entwined and moved together it was impossible to see where his body ended and hers began.

They became one.

One movement.

One body.

One breath .

A beast of many limbs, but all of them fluid and lithe. I barely noticed when the music began to pound because it couldn’t overwhelm the thudding of my pulse in my ears.

I was breathless. Panting with need. My mind half-present, drinking in the sights and sounds, and half-absent, coiled with Sam, pressing into his touch, stirred by his deep rumbles, aroused at the sight of his strength, swallowing his cries—

I felt Sam’s ragged breath in my hair and the heat of him at my back, and for a split second, I thought my fantasy had become immersive—until I blinked out of the trance and he was there. But when I sucked in, heat and thrill exploding in my belly, and started to turn, his hand came up, fingers and thumb gripping my jaw, forcing me to look at the stage.

“No,” he growled. “Keep watching.”

I swallowed and felt my throat slide against his calloused palm. Inwardly, I cheered when he lifted me out of the seat and walked me backwards to the second row of chairs that were positioned behind the first—and between the curtains, hiding whoever sat in them in deep shadows.

My breath was already heavy. My breasts felt full, one nipple teased against his forearm when he moved me and I was so grateful for the music because it covered my low groan.

“You like a guy in tights?” Sam rasped in my ear as he stopped in front of one of the chairs and let me slide down his body, setting me on my feet between his, facing the stage. He loomed over me, still gripping my jaw and wouldn’t let me turn to look at him, but I shook my head as best I could.

“I like what he’s doing—I was thinking of you,” I said honestly.

“I’m not sure I believe you,” he growled, his tone walking the line between teasing and furious.

“It’s true. I don’t lie to you,” I breathed.

A deep, approving rumble vibrated against my back and my breath caught. “Keep watching,” he instructed sharply before letting go of my jaw and leaning down, his body pressed against mine as he reached for the hem of my dress and began to furl it up at the sides. His fingers trailed up my legs so my skin pebbled and a tingling rush of pleasure rose up both legs to merge at my spine and make me ache .

When he slid his hands under the hem and could let it gather on his wrists, his touch grew firmer, his hands cupping my inner thighs and sliding up until he found me and groaned as he played fingers over my softest, most sensitive flesh.

Sighing with relief to finally have him touching me, I let my head sink back against his chest, but Sam shuddered and growled, “No.”

For a moment I was afraid he was angry, but then he planted one hand between my shoulder blades and bent me forward at the same time he took my hand and clamped it onto the back of the empty chair in front of us. “Hold on,” he muttered, then dropped his lips to my spine and kissed his way down the open back, his hands leaving me as he caught the back of my skirt and lifted it up and over my hips, baring my ass.

I bit my lip and bumped back against his steel length like I had in the bathroom this morning. But he snapped at me to stop, his teeth grazing my spine hard enough to make me flinch until I stopped moving.

He straightened with an approving rumble, but stopped touching me too, bunching my skirt along the hollow of my back until he was satisfied that it wouldn’t fall down.

And then he reached for me again.

His fingers stroked, curling, even though he didn’t enter me. I made a whimper of complaint as my core began to ache again. Then as he found a slow-but-insistent rhythm with his fingers against my flesh, he flattened his thumb between my ass cheeks and rubbed there, too.

I sucked in hard, unable to resist widening my stance to give him better access, my stomach trilling when he rumbled again, his breath growing harsher. But then he leaned against my ass, still stroking me, and rasped, “Eyes up, Bridget.”

I’d let my head drop without even thinking about it. When he gave the instruction, I snapped my head up to look at the stage. Sam rewarded me by sliding two fingers into me and my jaw went slack, but as delicious as his touch was, I wanted more. I wanted him.

“Sam, please,” I gasped.

“Watch the show, Bridget,” he said through his teeth. “You paid for it. And I can tell you like it—you were already ready for me, wife. I don’t know whether to be offended, or grateful. ”

“Grateful,” I whispered. “Definitely grateful.” Like me.

He hummed and I heard the smile in it. And it made me so fucking happy that he was pleased.

For long minutes, as the couple on the stage danced and whirled and writhed, simulating intimacies that made my flesh heat, Sam pushed me closer and closer to orgasm, his touch growing harder, more aggressive, until my knees wobbled. I prayed the music wouldn’t stop, because I knew my breath would be audible to others if the room went quiet.

The music grew faster and louder. I watched as the couple on stage moved to a position front and center and all other lights cut out except for a stark spotlight directly over them.

And he had her bent over in front of him.

I sucked in as Sam’s hands left me. I was shaking, trembling on the edge of orgasm, so the loss of him was devastating. He cursed and pushed out of the chair and I snapped my head around to look at him over my shoulder, ready to beg that he not leave, but all I saw was him fumbling with his belt, then his eyes locked on mine and he growled at me.

“I said, keep watching.”

Biting my lip, I turned back to watch the couple on the stage whose movements now rose and fell in a direct mirror of the intimacies I was aching for. To my relief, Sam took hold of my hips and pulled himself over me, reaching to twine his fingers with mine on the chair back in front of me, locking me between his hips and arm as he used his free hand to position himself. I arched my back to help him, aching for him to fill me.

Then he was right there, and he dropped his chin next to my ear.

“I said, watch, Bridget.”

Forcing myself to raise my head, my jaw dropped open when he took me in a single, sudden thrust, so hard, and filling me so full, my toes tingled and I almost came.

I was shaking, panting, afraid my knees might give if he didn’t finish this soon.

Then the music hit a crescendo, and as my husband’s trembling hand slid up my body to cup my throat, and his breath fluttered against my hair, his chest warmed my back, and his cock filled me to gasping, my body responded with a rapidly increasing pressure, the fullness of my core filling my heart and mind and pushing me right to the edge.

“You see, Bridget?” he whispered hoarsely as we moved together. “You see what you do to me?”

As I nodded, he groaned and let go of my throat, his hand slapping to my hip, his fingers digging in as he began to pound, and I dissolved into a quivering mass of pleasure, each of my senses overwhelmed simultaneously—the sight of the dancers in a parody of orgasm and ecstasy, my body shivering with my own impending bliss, the sound of my husband’s need driving my own—and the flutter of his breath on the back of my neck.

I crested the wave, my head snapping back as I sucked in a breath to call for him. Sam gasped, one hand clapped over my mouth, the other a clawed grip on my breast. As my orgasm hit, he pulled me backwards into his lap, tilted his hips and drove into me, holding me so I was relentlessly pounded over that edge, every ounce of pleasure wrung out, my screams smothered by his palm and my body jerking, quivering. And in the midst of that mindless bliss, as the music reached its peak, Sam buried his face in the curve of my neck and bellowed his own climax.

While he still shook under me, both the music and theater lights cut out.

I sucked in, fighting to be silent, but there was a roar as the audience cheered and applauded to raise the roof, offering cover for the last of our cries and groans.