“Yeah, she’s pretty stubborn. Cola! Come!” She yelled louder.

With the door open, I could hear the yells and shouts even clearer, and wasn’t really sure how Lennox could stand to hear that. Add in the dog’s barking, and it was really quite loud!

“Jesus, they’re really getting after it, aren’t they?” I asked her.

“You have no idea. This is pretty mild for Paxton,” she said just before she walked outside and captured the collar around the dog’s neck.

Cola continued to bark even after she got the dog inside.

“Does she ever stop?” I asked, wincing a little as the large mutt’s bark reverberated off Lennox’s walls.

She shook her head. “Only if I put her into her cage in my room. That’s her quiet place.”

I grabbed a hold of the dog’s collar and started pulling her in the direction of what I assumed were the bedrooms.

It turned out to be the third on the left.

It was painted in shades of pink. The bedding was a soft pink, and the walls a bright neon pink. More like the color of a highlighter, if I was being honest.

Her floor was the only thing not pink, and that was a dark grey that looked to be softer than my bed.

I sank at least half an inch into the carpet, thinking that it’d be perfect to fuck Lennox on.

Her bed, however, was even nicer.

It was a king size in a huge rustic wood frame with four posters.

At the footboard there was a stand for her TV, so close that she could see it perfectly if she were to be in bed.

The dog’s cage was even pink, if you could believe it.

“Do you have a thing for pink?” I tossed over my shoulder as I moved the still barking dog to her cage, and shut her in.

“Yeah, pink’s my favorite color,” she said with a laugh in her voice. “That’s also my favorite song!”

I wanted to laugh, but I didn’t dare because I feared she was being serious.

“Well, now that we have that taken care of, why don’t you slip into a pair of pants and some shoes so we can go?” I offered.

She shook her head in amusement. “First of all, I’m wearing shorts. Second of all, I don’t have any jeans that are clean for me to wear. Where are we going, anyway?”

I liked that she didn’t tell me no, instead just asked where we were supposed to be going.

I smiled a cryptic smile and said, “You’ll see.”

Chapter 5

Sex jokes aren’t funny. I mean cum on, people.

-Coffee cup

Lennox

“You do realize that this is a strip club…right?” I asked the man at my side.

“Yep,” he agreed quickly.

“A female strip club…” I continued. “One where males go without their females.”

He nodded again. “Yes, and no. This isn’t a strip club anymore. The KPD bought it so we could hold SWAT training, and other department trainings that are required by law. It says it’s a strip club on the outside, but it isn’t. At least not anymore.”

I breathed a sigh of relief, thankful that I didn’t completely underestimate the guy.

“So is it renovated inside?” I asked as he got to the door.

He shook his head. “Yes, well sort of. The front part is still pretty much the same as it had been, but the back part is completely renovated. That’s where we’ll be having dinner. The stripper poles are still up, though. The guys found those pretty fun, so we left them.”

I snorted.

Guys would.

He led me into the back of the building, using a huge set of keys that he’d revealed from his pocket to get us in.

“Oh, wow,” I said, looking around the large arena. “Do y’all use all of this stuff?”

The ‘back’, as he’d called it, was more like a warehouse.

Everything in it was painted black, and there were huge obstacles, ropes hanging from the roof, and even padded walls.

“Train. Run through the course. See if we can beat our times. A little bit of everything,” he said as he passed the ropes.

My hand curled around one of the ropes, and I dropped my bag off my shoulder, settling it on the floor by my feet.

“Can you climb this?” I asked, taking a running jump and pulling myself up.

I curled my feet around the long rope and started to climb hand over hand.

I got about ten feet off the ground before I decided that I really couldn’t go any further.

My hands were already killing me.

And I was fairly sure if I got all the way to the top, which I wouldn’t, that I’d fall to my death.

Looking down, I saw Bennett smiling up at me.

“That all you got?” He asked, curling his massive hand around the other rope and raising his eyebrow at me.

I nodded. “I don’t have much upper body strength.”

He held the rope underneath my butt steady as I started to come down, but didn’t move his hand when my ass started to get close to it.

“Uhh,” I said, nodding my head towards his hand. “You think you can move that?”

He grinned. “Sure I could.”

I slipped until his hand rested against my ass, and I visibly jolted at the contact.

If Bennett hadn’t had his hand there, I would’ve been swinging.

I glared. “Move it.”

He grinned, baring his teeth, and laughed before moving it.

I slid the rest of the way down, and rubbed my hands on the back of my shorts to try to work out the sting.

“Can you climb that?” I asked in challenge.

He raised his brow at me, then nodded.

“Yeah. It’s a requirement to be on the SWAT team,” he said simply.

“Prove it,” I declared.

“And if I do? What do I get?” He rumbled softly, moving in close.

I licked my lips, suddenly very aware at what his words were doing to me.

My heart was beating fast and my palms were sweaty. And we wouldn’t even mention the other places.

“What do you want?” I breathed.

He moved his head forwards until he was less than a hairsbreadth away from my lips, and said, “You.”

I gasped, getting a huge lung full of the air he’d just breathed out, and said the only thing I could.

“We’ll see. You’ll have to do more than climb a rope to get me. But I’ll at least consider it…that is, if you can even do it.”

He chuckled before backing away.

Placing both of his hands onto the rope as high above his head that he could, he started to climb.

And he didn’t even use his legs.

It was all in his upper body.

Every single bit of it.

Holy. Shit.

“Holy shit!” I breathed.

“Such a fuckin’ show off,” a male said.

I turned to see a man directly behind me.

He was gorgeous.

Tall with brown hair, and the most beautiful brown eyes I’d ever seen, he could easily be a cover model for a magazine.

He was wearing faded light blue jeans, black boots, and a black long sleeved shirt that covered him from hands to neck.

I smiled at him. “I bet him he couldn’t do it.”

He raised a brow at me, surprised, I’m sure, that I’d done so.

“It takes a lot to get Bennett to do much of anything. It must’ve been some payout,” he laughed, starting forward.

“It’s totally worth it,” Bennett yelled from above us. “Introduce yourself, shit head.”

I covered my mouth with my hand to keep the laughter from bubbling forth.

Jesus, these men acted like they were twelve year olds!

“I’m Michael,” the man at my side said, extending his hand.

Before I could extend my own hand, though, Bennett was there.

He dropped down in between us, officially cutting off our contact before it even got started.

“I said introduce yourself, not touch her,” Bennett said.

There was no venom in his tone, yet I could tell something was taking place in front of me.

A silent admission between the two.

“Jesus,” I said. “He didn’t offer to fuck me as an introduction. It was only his hand.”

He turned his honey eyes to me and smiled. “I know.”

Simple as that.

I know.