I leave the dressing room, waiting in the hallway for Autumn to emerge. When she does, she takes my breath away and my unrestricted cock surges in my pants as I take in her luscious curves. She’s chosen shiny patent leather leggings that are open on her inner and outer thighs, similar to garter hosiery, but her pussy is obscured by a red leather skirt that hugs her hips, making me wonder if she’s pantyless underneath.

  Her top is also black and red, a matching leather bustier that cinches around her waist and pushes her breasts up to look even more voluptuous than normal. The top curves, a huge circular cutout that goes around her cleavage to create a shoulder strap, the whole ensemble held together at her throat with a buckled leather collar.

  She’s almost spilling out of her cups, which makes it hard to pull my attention from them. But the light in her eyes sparks, daring me to look elsewhere. With the leather eye mask, she looks like a kinky, sexy superheroine.

  I’m almost tempted to go no further. I want to push her up against the wall, fall to my knees, and lift her skirt, sampling and devouring every fucking inch of her right here.

  But when she lifts her gloved right hand and I see the riding crop she holds, I smile. So that’s how she wants to play?

  Oh, Princesse.

  I take her left hand, and we descend the stairs together, the red and ultraviolet lights illuminating our steps until we reach the club level, where lowly throbbing bass heavy music washes over everything. I feel Autumn squeeze my hand and freeze with her.

  I can understand. Everywhere you look, there’s an erotic desire on display, filling the two levels of the playground. In the center of the room, suspended off the floor for all to see, are cages, two of which are currently occupied, one by a man in a dog collar and nothing else, the other by a woman riding a machine that’s obviously giving her plenty of good vibrations.

  There’s something for everyone. Solos, twosomes, threesomes, and more, there seems to be every combination of human body possible within the depths of the dungeon, all of them moving in time to the pulsing music.

  “This . . . has to be illegal,” Autumn murmurs as she sees a dominatrix on a small stage flogging a partner with a cat o’ nine tails. “Some of these have to be paid workers, right?”

  “Most are here to indulge in fantasy, or as a part of their lifestyle. But some? I wouldn’t be surprised.”

  “How does the city let them operate?”

  I chuckle, taking her hand and leading her through the space to a quiet corner to look her fill. “How do brothels and places like this operate in New York? The city and police are handsomely compensated to turn a blind eye. To them, officially, this place doesn’t exist.”

  Autumn frowns. “But . . . the workers.”

  “Ironically, being underground seems to have cleaned up Paris more,” I tell her. “The clients, the workers, they don’t want public notice. So they police themselves more effectively than anyone else would.”

  “Trust me, I would not bring you to a place that was . . . exploitative,” I tell her. I give her a moment to decide now that she has seen the place. If she wants, we can go back upstairs and leave. But if she’d like to stay, I think we will both enjoy ourselves very much. “So, shall we?”

  I’m not even sure she’s aware of how eagerly she’s nodding her head, her eyes wide and unblinking so she doesn’t miss a thing as they flit around the room.

  We grab drinks as we watch some of the action. Autumn tilts her head, intrigued by some of the wilder groups, such as the threesome where one woman is pegging the man while he fucks the other woman on bottom, or the girl who’s allowed herself to be bound, kneeling and blindfolded, her mouth the only thing she can move as her partner allows anyone interested to take advantage of the woman’s lips and tongue.

  But what really interests Autumn are the couples, the pairings of men and women who are into each other. Her breath catches as she watches two women, obviously intent on each other, move into an intimate sixty-nine that almost seems out of place in the erotic club. They’re not fucking, they’re making love on the satin sheeted mattress in the corner of the room. It feels voyeuristic to intrude on their sensuality, but I suppose that is the point.

  “Have you ever been with another woman?” I ask Autumn, wrapping my arms around her and feeling the heat of her ass press against my crotch.

  “No . . . but those two are still hot,” Autumn admits, and I have to say she’s right. It’s not about the oral sex or their bodies. It’s in the way they touch each other, the way the whole world could dissolve around them and they wouldn’t care. The appeal is the intimacy they’re sharing.

  We step away before the couple climaxes, sitting on a loveseat across from another couple, this time a man and a woman. He’s pouring himself into her, his lips and hands stroking every inch of her chocolate brown skin that looks nearly pitch black in the club’s lighting. With his pale skin almost fluorescing in the same light, it’s erotic art in its purest form. Like yin and yang as they combine and flow in and through one another.

  Autumn’s breath catches, and I feel her hand rest on my thigh, sliding up to find my hardness. She cups me, turning her head to find me looking just at her. “Simon . . . I want that.”

  “Them?” I ask, and she shakes her head. “Me?”

  “Yes,” she says in a husky voice. “I want that . . . intimacy. That closeness. Like them.” She lifts her chin toward the couple across from us. “And them.” She looks over to where the two women were making love.

  “Here . . . or in private?”

  “Private,” she answers.

  I find it intriguing that when she is anonymous in a mask, in a place where there are no expectations or limits and she can have or do anything, she wants . . . me. No, when offered the world, she simply wants us.

  Taking her hand, I signal to one of the club’s workers, and a few seconds later, we are led to a private room, luxuriously furnished with a round bed that could easily hold a couple . . . or more. Along the walls are various cabinets, and I’m sure that if I opened them, I would find all of the playthings anyone could want for sexual pleasure, and probably a few I’ve never even imagined.

  But the only ‘toy’ I want right now is Autumn and what she brings with her to the room.

  “Dance for me,” I tell her as I sit down on the edge of the bed. “Like you did that first time I saw you . . . shake your ass.”

  “You want me to twerk?” Autumn asks, and I nod as I trace her hips with my hands. “I’m not that good—”

  “Now,” I growl, taking command. “Show me how you move that sexy ass of yours.”

  Autumn gasps, and for a moment, I wonder if I’ve gone too far or misread her. But then I see her breath escape in a shudder and she smiles coyly. Turning, she uses the pulsing sound of the music coming through the walls to guide her. In the leggings and skirt, some of her movements are obscured, but when she drops, nearly touches my lap, and then slowly brings her ass back up, I see flashes of her pale flesh.

  She’s not wearing panties under the skirt.

  Autumn must hear my quickening breath and realize that I’ve discovered her surprise because she throws her hair over her shoulder, peeking back to give me a triumphant look that has me growing even harder in my pants. I lean to shrug off my jacket as she brings her hips up, her ass thrusting in my direction before she drops back down again, red leather and pale skin flashing back and forth.

  “You are a very sexy woman, Princesse,” I tell her honestly.

  She turns around and bends over, cupping her breasts through her top but giving me an eye-popping view of her deep cleavage that I can’t help but lick. She takes them away too soon, dropping to her knees before me. “You want me, Simon?”

  “You know I do.”

  “You want to fuck me?” Her hands trace up my thighs, and I fight to stay steady and let her have her fun. Because while she’s torturing me now, I will torment her later, bringing her pleasure until she’s boneless and spent.

  “Yes.”

  She moves her hands higher, her thumbs sliding up my length. “Hard?”

  “I want to fuck you so thoroughly that you never doubt me. I want to paint my name inside you—on the walls of your pussy and on the pillars of your soul. I want to set your body aflame with pleasure so that when we are finished, you ache for more and know that only I can give it to you.”

  Autumn cups me fully, rubbing over the bulge in my pants with her whole palm. I hold still as she unzips me, her eyes taking me in up close. I’ve swollen to the point that my head has emerged from my foreskin, and I watch as she slowly reaches for me, wrapping her fingers around my shaft and drawing me down as she watches how my skin reacts.

  “Suck it,” I tell her. “Swallow all of me.”

  Autumn smiles and leans in, kissing me from my balls and up the bottom of my shaft until she reaches my tip before running her tongue around my head, sighing happily as she tastes my leaking precum.

  Her touch is electric, and as she licks me up and down like a lollipop, I’m struggling to not take over, to force my cock down her throat until I explode. But she’s doing exactly what I ask, licking me until I’m shiny from root to tip and then sucking me deep into her mouth before doing it all again.

  “Tres bien, Princesse,” I rasp. “For that, touch your pussy for me . . . but don’t come.”

  “Okay.”

  I shake my head, and she pauses. “Yes . . . Simon,” I suggest, and she pops her mouth off my cock but continues stroking me with her hand. Her eyes are full of curiosity and fire. “Say it. Say my name,” I repeat harder.

  “Yes, Simon,” she answers dutifully, reaching down and adding her own little flair to things by flipping her skirt up and over her hips, showing me the globes of her ass and the way her leggings actually curve under her cheeks, making them look even rounder and sexier.

  Autumn returns to licking up my shaft one more time before swallowing me . . . and sucking my soul out through my cock. She’s voracious, her cheeks hollowing and pressing against my hardness as she takes me in deeply, her tongue swirling around my head before she buries me in her throat.

  Autumn stays there, reaching between her legs to stroke herself, and the sensation of her moaning around my cock as she pleasures herself nearly pushes me past the point of no return, but Autumn teases me, pulling back just enough to edge me time and time again as she looks up at me with gleeful eyes.

  “Oh, is that how you want it?” I ask, and Autumn hums, flirting with me around her mouthful of my manhood. “The more you tease me, the harder you’re going to be . . . punished.”

  Autumn sticks her tongue out and circles it around my head, lewdly showing me how devilish she can be. “Promise?”

  She goes down on me again, her tongue and lips a magical miracle on my head and shaft. My eyes close as she buries me in her throat again, and the only way I’m able to hold off is by reaching out . . . where my hand finds something.

  Her riding crop.

  Oh, Princesse . . . what toys you give me.

  I sit up, spreading my legs to give her full access, and with the crop in my right hand, I playfully trace it over her ass and then between her cheeks. Autumn wiggles her hips, and I lightly tap her with the crop, making her gasp around me.

  “Harder,” she pants when she pulls off me for a moment.

  We quickly fall into a playful, joyful game together, my hand flicking the crop to smack against her ass, and the harder I do it, the more eagerly she swallows my cock. For heavenly minutes, we go back and forth until I can take no more. Tossing the crop to the side, I grab a double fistful of her hair and take over, fucking her mouth quickly and almost brutally. She swallows, taking me stroke for stroke and making sexy, wet noises until she moans her orgasm, and as she rides her fingers, I thrust a final time, exploding in her sweet, sweet mouth.

  For my final spurt, I pull out, and a thick blob of my seed lands in the valley between her breasts, marking her. I wipe my slick, wet cockhead over her lips, not ready for it to be over. “See what you do to me, Princesse? I’m still hard because you’re so fucking sexy covered in my cum. You’re so naughty, making me lose control before I get inside your pussy.”

  “More, Simon?” she asks, biting her lip and looking up at me hopefully.

  “Come here,” I growl, pulling her up and turning her over my lap. My cock does deflate a little—I just climaxed—but seeing the sight of Autumn’s upturned ass in my lap and feeling the heat from her pussy against my thigh has me three-quarters hard as I run my hand over her twin perfect cheeks, massaging them. “God, this ass will be the death of me,” I moan, not complaining in the slightest.

  “Death by derriere?” Autumn says with a giggle, but it turns into a moan when I slap her left cheek. “Oh!”

  “Together . . . we can explore,” I tell her, rubbing the reddened cheek before smacking the right side. “I do not know everything, so you must tell me honestly what you like and don’t like. We can explore together. Oui?”

  “Oui,” she says, gasping when I spank her left side again, this time a little harder to test our limit. I gather her hair in my hand, pulling her head back and making her back arch, lifting her ass higher. The air in the private room is rich with the heady smell of our arousal, and when I reach between her legs to cup her smooth sex, she moans thickly. “Please, Simon . . . fuck me.”

  I grunt in answer, lifting her out of my lap to get behind her. Her ass is pink, her pussy gleaming and puffy, the lips open and ready to caress me. I can take no more and push myself into her, feeling her body shake as I fill her tight cleft.

  She cries out in pleasure, and I grab a handful of her leather-covered hips and thrust harder. I see her collar and slip my fingers inside. “Oui?”

  “Yes,” she moans.

  I pull, choking her slightly while giving me purchase to take out all my sexual energy on her, my hips driving hard and fast as they slam against her luscious ass. I press her into the forgiving cushion of the bed and pull tighter.

  Autumn’s arms give out, and she collapses, her chest and the side of her face pressed to the mattress. She reaches back for purchase, trying to touch any part of me she can get at. Her nails scrape along my hips as I thrust, adding a hint of delightful pain.

  It’s too much for her. Her hands fall to the sheets, grabbing handfuls as she becomes a prisoner to my desires. I feel her clench around me, and then another orgasm makes her wail before I erupt, letting go of her collar to grab her ass. My fingers dig deep into her soft flesh, marking her skin with a memory of our desire as I ride her through our shared pleasure.

  Somehow, we’ve never taken our clothes off past my tuxedo jacket, only rumpled and shoved them out of the way to gain access to one another. But as I embrace her, holding her quivering body on the bed, I feel more exposed to her than ever.

  “Are you . . . okay?” I ask, carefully assessing her.

  “No, I’m infinitely better than okay.” She sounds dreamy, her eyes still closed and the hint of a smile on her lips.

  I run a soft touch over her ass, noting the red fingerprints already blooming amid the pinkened skin. She must sense my concern because she opens one eye, peeking back at me. “Nothing I didn’t want . . . and enjoy,” she says approvingly. “Besides, I marked you last time, remember?”

  I hum, remembering the mark fondly. The bruise of her bite took days to totally fade from my skin. “I remember . . . and next time, you can do it again.”

  “Next time?” Autumn echoes, and I lean in, kissing her neck gently above the collar. I make a note to check for marks there too after we get dressed. Her neck is much more delicate than the flesh of her ass, and I wouldn’t want to take things too far. But the skin there is unmarred and as porcelain as always.

  “Any time,” I correct myself.

  CHAPTER 19

  AUTUMN

  This week has been utter madness.

  The naughty outing with Simon left me deliciously sore physically and distracted mentally. Selfishly, I still want the best of both worlds—the competition and Simon—and I don’t want to choose one. I want the world, I want the whole world, and I want it now, so I guess you can call me Veruca.

  Simon’s affections and attention make me feel like I’ve won the lottery. He’s everything I could ever want—gorgeous, intelligent, kind, giving, romantic. A literal dream come true. But I can’t forgo the competition when I’ve worked so hard, fighting to chase my design dreams. Giving that up for a man doesn’t sit right in my soul.

  Not that Simon’s asking me to.

  Hell, he texted me the day after our visit to the club, and when I told him that I truly needed to buckle down on my designs, he was encouraging and supportive. In fact, he sent a gorgeous arrangement of peonies, roses, and lavender to my apartment with a note that he hoped seeing them each night would send me to sleep thinking of him. And they have.

  I’ve been head-down in the workroom for hours each day, sewing like a madwoman before bringing garments back to my apartment to do even more hours of tedious and time-consuming hand stitching of the delicate lace to each piece at night before finally collapsing into bed. The flowers have been a silent cheer from Simon to keep going.

  “What do you think?” I ask Jeanette. She does a half-turn in my Seduction theme finale piece, checking herself out in the mirror.

  Inspired by my 1930s lingerie set, I’ve created a bias-cut dress of the finest peach silk I could find. Well, in today’s time, it can be considered a dress. In 1930, it would’ve been considered a nightgown, perhaps part of a bridal trousseau. Especially with the shimmery, semi-translucent fabric.

  I scan the garment, assessing every detail. The tiny gathers below the bust make the most of Jeanette’s breasts, the lace neckline has a thin length of ribbon woven through the spaces within the lace to give it a bit of naughtiness, and the sleeves flutter just past Jeanette’s shoulders. The silk glances over her figure to the floor, except in the back, where it rests snugly and flatteringly on her ass. The walking slit in the back is cut high, to just below her butt, and it's filled in with a wide V of the same lace that accents the neckline.