Page 57 of Rolling 75 (The Noire Brothers #1)

RYKER

“T hat was inspiring .” My lips brush the shell of Mercy’s ear, and a shiver rips down her spine. “I should bend you over right here to show them how well I can make you scream.”

She tangles her arms around my neck. The sassy confidence that was my undoing long before I was strong enough to vocalize it encircles her like a halo of seduction.

“You could take me down to Magie Noire. I’m sure you’ve got some ways to make a girl lose her voice down there.

If you do your job well, they might even hear me up here. ”

That is unexpected, but not unwelcome. A thrill shoots through my veins.

Our sex club isn’t an area of the resort I’ve ever spent much time in. It was my father’s pride and joy, and I despised that man. Plus, I hate people being in my fucking business. And entering Magie Noire puts a sex life on display. But it’s a feature our clientele loves for good reason.

And one I knew Mercy would eventually be curious about, so I prepared.

I palm the back of her head, gauging where her mind is with my words first. “You want to be my queen, but have me fuck you like my slut?”

Her breath hitches, and her pupils blow wide. “Now you’re getting it, Noire.”

That sexy rasp coils around me, sinking into my flesh and bone and soul like barbed wire, shredding the ache that I lived with in her absence. The worry that we’d never find our way through the haze of pain. The fear that I’d never be the man she chose.

And the thin veneer of restraint I’ve been clinging to.

Like I have numerous times now, I whisk her into my arms and dart for the door with her giggling into my neck, my brothers and the rowdy sports wives roaring a celebratory hoopla at our heels.

“People are going to start talking about how we leave a room,” she muses.

“Let them. It means they know you’re mine.” I seize her mouth, not bothering to worry about people in the halls or the route to get there. They’ll move, and I could travel this path in my sleep. I’ve trudged every step there is to claiming her a thousand times in my dreams.

Her hunger seeps into me, much like her bite did all those years ago. She marked me as hers with that vicious chomp at preschool. And, years later, she tethered me to her over beignets on a merry-go-round. I’ve belonged to her ever since.

There’s a back route into Magie Noire for us to enter privately, so we duck into one of the covert tunnels and scurry toward it. There’s also a room that requires my iris scan.

When we finally make it there, I set her down before the door to my hideaway, but we can’t seem to break the kiss for me to gain us admission into the room.

Her tongue commands mine with a fervor, and I clutch the small of her back, melding her soft curves to my hard form, my cock spearing into her with unyielding intent.

She tugs on my lapels and purrs into my mouth, which is so reminiscent of our first kiss at the Blind Tiger, but so vastly different.

That was teeming with nerves and tentativeness, anguish and mixed emotions.

This is Mercy in control. Mercy on fire. Mercy living .

Tenacity and perseverance.

With a nip to her lower lip, I manage to retreat enough to move my eye in front of the scanner so the door unlocks.

She glances around the secluded corridor, soft jazz music crooning in the distance, along with the indistinct murmurings of Magie Noire guests. “This isn’t what I expected.”

“It’s our private wing. I’m not good at sharing …

not even a glimpse of you or a thought in someone’s head about what you’d be doing in the club.

They’d wonder about your proclivities, and I’d have to kill them.

” I stall with one hand on the knob, the other twining her fingers, pleased that she seems to accept that.

“This is my room. No one has ever used it, including me.”

When I swing open the door, she wanders through, intrigue propelling her forward. And for a brief stroll, our unhinged heat is placed on hold.

A quiet rumble of yearning usurps it, like a muggy summer storm lying in wait.

Wall sconces wash the room in an amber glow, highlighting the antique tobacco pine flooring, alabaster walls, gilded mirrors, feathery pillows, and bamboo-silk throw rugs.

In the center, a king bed is framed in reclaimed wood with a pillory footboard for bondage play.

Beside it, a wall-mounted rack dangles ropes, cuffs, and crops.

And diagonal from that is a cabinet and dresser, both stocked with unopened toys.

Mercy peruses the drawers, her chest heaving, lips parted, interest clearly piqued. “Why haven’t you used this room?”

“I was waiting for my queen, remember?”

Her brown eyes coast to me. With the orange-tinted lighting reflected in them, they’re the shade of cognac.

“How long were you waiting? How long …” Her strength wanes before rising like a cresting wave.

“You let me go out with other men, be with other men …” A shadow of guilt or maybe agony falls upon her. “Didn’t it hurt you?”

I knew this was coming, but Mercy rarely asks questions before she’s prepared to accept the answer. And my choices have tormented me for years, so I wasn’t overly eager to share.

“It killed me.” I stride toward her, hands in my pockets so I don’t pounce on her … yet. “That’s why I sent most of your dates packing.”

She peers around the room, almost as if the dungeon of erotic fantasies will provide her perspective. “But you didn’t offer me an alternative.”

“No.” I select a few of the massage candles from the cabinet, strike a match to light them, and set them on the dresser as I elaborate.

“I wish I could give one succinct explanation, but the truth is, I was conflicted for several reasons. I wasn’t sure I could be what you needed long term.

My lifestyle was in opposition to a lot of your desires. ”

“And perfectly aligned with others.” Her gaze flicks from the lit candle to my face, embellishing that simple sentence with years of unmet cravings.

“Yes.” Resisting the urge to rip her clothes off, I prowl around her, keeping my movements slow until I’m standing behind her.

“I also didn’t want to act on my feelings too soon.

You wanted to be free until you were at least thirty-three.

I respected that. I was afraid that if I tried to change our dynamic too early, you’d shut it down, and I’d lose you completely.

So, I waited because I needed to know that what I was offering was right for you. ”

If I could go back, I’d do it all differently. I’d shake some sense into my younger self and claim her the night of her twenty-fourth birthday. We’d have a decade of memories as a couple to warm us. But then again, we wouldn’t have Remy, and that thought is too devastating, so …

“Complicated.” Her simplistic response is precisely what we’ve always been.

I sweep her hair to the side, my lips cruising over the slope of her shoulder and neck while my other hand splays over her stomach. “Very.”

She arches her back and tilts her chin in a silent request for more. “And what inspired this room?”

“I had it designed for you a couple of years ago.” My teeth graze her earlobe, my words flowing over her skin.

“You were gone, but I never lost hope. Hope that I’d find you or that you’d choose to come back to me.

Hope that you’d be mine someday. Hope that I’d redeem those years when I so foolishly waited and deliver everything you needed. ”

A chill rockets through her. “So this … non-vanilla playground is—”

“Whatever you want it to be.” The gravel in my voice renders it nearly unrecognizable, but I can’t believe we’re here.

When I researched how to approach this part of our relationship after everything she’d gone through, the answers were both intimidating and encouraging.

Because there was no sure way. Every survivor is different, every journey lined with diverse setbacks and various healing avenues.

Basically, the experts I consulted advised me to be clear with my intentions, to let her set the pace, to not make arbitrary decisions about what she could or could not handle, and to provide her with options.

Mercy didn’t undergo sexual trauma, and yet she experienced a loss of power and agency so great that I can’t even fathom how that transformed her. Her confession that us being together was essentially a trigger nearly wrecked me, but still, I hoped.

So … I’ll be whatever she needs me to be.

“I want to be claimed, to be yours, to be fucked. To be owned.” She spins in my arms, her eyes vulnerable yet undaunted. “And I want to be put in that guillotine thing. No, not guillotine. That’s morbid. The pillory.”

A boisterous laugh bellows out of me before I thread my fingers into her hair and crash my mouth into hers.

She opens for me immediately, her tongue swiping against mine with urgency, the hungry storm reignited.

I pull back slightly, licking her lower lip and coaxing her to chase me.

She doesn’t disappoint. My girl is ravenous.

This reinvigorated fierceness in her is intoxicating, but I’m wary to rush it.

“Are you sure? That’s a big step, a huge power exchange. There are other things we could do.”

“I’ve never wanted anything more. This is a way for me to reset.” She plays with the hair at the nape of my neck, her lips trailing my jaw with pecks and licks, her assurance conveyed in a sultry warble. “I trust you, and I need this. I think we need this.”

That final sentiment emboldens me, so I take a step back and feed her some instructions. “Get undressed. Everything off. And wait for me on your knees.” I point to a floor cushion, and when she nods, I tack on a warning. “I expect your responses to be verbal. Do you remember your safe word?”