Employing my yoga skills, I squeezed my muscles and lightly thrust my hips to add to the delightful friction between our bodies.

“Come for me,” he urged, and I blinked, making my hazy vision clear, and focused on his face to see that he was holding on by a thread.

I brought an arm from his shoulder down between our bodies, rubbing my clit as he continued to move inside me. Within a few minutes, I pushed myself over the edge, coming with a low moan.

When I came back down to earth and opened my eyes, I was disappointed to see I had missed most of Xavier’s release. His teeth sank into his bottom lip and he trembled in my arms with the residual aftershocks of his orgasm.

We stayed connected that way, breathing heavily, wrapped up in each other’s arms for several minutes afterward. Then Xavier rolled us to the side, rearranging us so I was on my back, my legs and arms still wrapped around him and his body resting on top of mine.

“I take it you liked my new tattoo?” I teased about our marathon love-making session.

“It’s a gift I don’t deserve and definitely didn’t earn.” His voice dipped, and he continued to rock my world. “But I sure as fuck appreciate it. Thank you, féileacán.”

Tears filled my eyes and my heart felt like it was going to burst with love for this man. Sucking up my courage, I admitted in a quiet voice, “I have very strong feelings for you, honey.”

His face went soft and his eyes went lazy as he took in my words. Then his head slanted and his mouth crashed down on mine. The kiss was deep and wet and left me completely breathless. And in the end, I didn’t mind at all that he hadn’t verbally reciprocated my feelings.

His kiss said it all.

It was nearing nine o’clock and my feet were killing me as I sat at the bar in The Den, sipping on a coke. Trixie was taking a few days away from her daughter now that her son-in-law was home, saying it was pertinent she give them some alone time together.

While I agreed wholeheartedly, I didn’t like the fact that it meant I was mostly working the room again since she was there to do the rest.

It was there at the bar that I realized that even though I had initially enjoyed my time working at The Den and had adapted—I thought—rather well at being thrust into the life of a high-end hooker, I didn’t miss it. At all.

The challenge of keeping everything running smoothly had become my new obsession. I loved coming to work every day and left fulfilled in a way I hadn’t in a long while, even if some of the girls still hadn’t come to terms with my new position.

I couldn’t really blame them for their standoffish behavior considering I was the newest of them all and seemingly got preferential treatment by being “promoted” out from under their noses. And that was exactly why I was still getting animosity from them after word finally spread about the real reason why Trixie wasn’t coming around very often.

I probably would have thought the same thing if I had been in their shoes. Obviously there was a reason Xavier had singled me out and given me the chance to do something more. And the easiest explanation in their minds was that I was sleeping with him, which was unconfirmed but very much true. Although, I had also heard I was blackmailing him into letting me stay out of the stable.

Cherry led a balding man with a rotund belly over to where I sat. Her face had a catty grin on it and I braced myself for whatever she had up her sleeve.

She was the worst out of the two-dozen girls working for Xavier. She undermined me every chance she got. She spread rumors around about me having chlamydia and being pregnant with some random client’s baby. She constantly planted seeds of hatred into other girls’ brains.

I had even found the lock picked on my own room and some of my stuff tossed just the week before. I just knew she was behind it, but I couldn’t prove it since the security cameras mysteriously had a glitch the same night it happened.

“Aurora,” she said snottily. “Jerry here is looking for someone to cut her hair into a pixie cut and shave all her body hair off. I told him you would do it for six thousand plus one thousand in tips. He’s pretty excited.”

My mouth dropped open as I looked over at the man who was now blushing, his hand stuck inside the waist of his pants. It was the hopeful and expectant look on his face that made me pissed at her, though. She knew I wouldn’t do it. Hell, most of the girls wouldn’t do it even for seven grand. She also didn’t care that she was getting his hopes up either. Even if he did have strange requests, he was still a person who didn’t deserve being a pawn in her twisted games.

What Cherry thought she was going to get out of this was beyond me. It wasn’t like I was going to go off on him for being a freak and storm away.

Then again, she probably figured after I refused the virgin with obvious distaste that I would have done the same in this case. She knew that kind of behavior would get me fired.

“I’m sorry, Jerry, but I’m going to have to decline. I rather like my hair the length I have it. If you’d like, I could see if one of the other girls would be interested, however,” I gently let him down.

“You could do that?” His eyes brightened and he gave me a shy smile.

“I can.” I gestured to Cheech to hand me a napkin and a pen. I pushed it towards Jerry and said, “Write your information on there and I’ll see what I can do. In the meantime, if there are any services you still want to try tonight, Ghost over there can hook you up.” I pointed to the black man standing by the secret door, avidly watching our exchange. Xavier insisted on no one touching me or messing with me whenever I was out on the floor. Ghost seemed to take that directive very seriously.

After Jerry thanked me and scurried towards the exit, Cherry stomped her foot and left on a frustrated noise. I shook my head at her pathetic attempt to rattle me and stood from the stool, going back to the platform to relieve Kitty, who I knew was eyeing a group of men in the corner who appeared to be big spenders.

Gyrating your hips for hours on hours was actually quite tiring. It was also rather dull. Sparky was a good deejay, but there were only so many times I could listen to dance music before I went out of my mind. An hour later, when Ghost nodded at me, letting me know my replacement was there, I smiled.

I climbed down the stairs and made a beeline towards the secret door. Halfway across the floor, I felt his eyes on me. My steps faltered and changed direction of their own accord. Taking a leisurely stroll of the room instead of immediately leaving, I came upon Xavier leaning against the wall with a predatory look on his face.

“I can’t wait to get you alone,” he whispered in my ear. “There’s a present for you on my bed. I expect you to be wearing it and ready to go when I get there.”

“Okay,” I breathed with anticipation. It had been several days since we were able to be alone. Between his schedule and mine, it just hadn’t happened. We were long overdue for some sexy time. Extremely sexy time.

“Get out of here before I bend you over a table and give everyone a show.” His eyes blazed as they swept my body in its red lace lingerie, making my stomach dip.

Even though I wanted him right then and there regardless of who might see, I turned on my heel and left on a mission. The sooner I got to his house, the sooner we could be together again.

I let myself into Xavier’s house, flipping on lights as I went. Not paying attention to anything other than my mission, I went straight to his bedroom to see what my surprise was. On the bed, I spotted a garment bag and shoe box.