The Possession Page 6
Hell, he’d only just begun.
Chapter Seven
Feeling a bit depressed, Kris applied the rich coconut oil into her nipples as she prepared for Exploration Day. The name was kind of a misnomer, she idly considered, since Exploration Day didn’t commence until nine o’clock at night.
Well, whatever it should have been called, she conceded, didn’t really matter. She just wanted it over and done with.
She’d spent most of the day sleeping and the rest of it worrying over tonight. Before last night, before Jack, she would have looked forward to having a bunch of wild sexual forays with complete strangers. It was why she had come here after all.
Maybe. She wasn’t so sure of anything anymore.
Least of all, Jack.
After he’d touched her the way he had last night, and after she had touched him the way she had, it dawned on her that perhaps she hadn’t wanted to come to Hotel Atlantis just for the sake of being wild and crazy. Perhaps she had wanted to come to Hotel Atlantis to prove to herself that she could be as sexy as all the brainless bimbos Jack had dated in the two years she’d known him. The very realization of such a thought had panicked her enough to run away from him.
Jack! Jack! Jack! Why did it always come back to the Grinch? she thought with a harrumph.
He was the bane of her existence, she decided on a martyr’s sigh.
But bane of her existence or not, he was also the sole star of every fevered fantasy she’d entertained in the past two years. And the only man on earth who could get her wet just by growling, she thought grimly.
Kris straightened her shoulders as she gazed at herself in the mirror. She had been hired for this five-day island excursion to do a job, she reminded herself. A job that she had very badly wanted to undertake. John was depending on her to fulfill her obligations and live up to her word.
And besides, she truly did want to experience submission with a man, to live out her deepest sexual fantasies with a handsome, domineering male.
Unfortunately, she frowned, the only man she could imagine ordering her around a bedroom was and had always been Jack McKenna.
But after the frightened tantrum she’d thrown last night, it was quite possible that Jack wouldn’t bid on her.
Stop it, Kris! Would you quit it with the Jack thoughts already! The man has loathed you for two years and now, because he masturbated you, you’re stupidly romantic enough to hope his feelings have changed? Yeah right! Besides, she tried to convince herself, he’s all wrong for you.
Kris took a deep breath and blew it out.
She had been hired by John Calder as a high paid prostitute for five hedonistic days. She had a job to do.
And she had less than an hour to talk herself into enjoying it.
* * * * *
Sheri Calder Conner Carucci turned around slowly in her swivel seat office chair to face her older brother. Her eyes wide, she simply gawked at him.
“What?” John grunted. He blushed, looking away.
She blinked several times in rapid succession. “Getting a little sentimental in your advanced years, Johnny?”
He threw her a “yeah right” look then strolled to the other side of the office and poured a glass of bourbon.
“Gut rot,” she said in an absent monotone as she tried to work him out in her mind. “Shouldn’t drink the stuff.”
When he said nothing, when he just stood there absently staring out the seventh floor window, Sheri stood up and slowly walked toward him. “Always trying to be the hero,” she murmured. “But then that’s what I love about you.”
He snorted at that. “I’ve never been a hero to anyone. Least of all to you—”
“Yes, you were,” she interrupted, wrapping her arms around his waist from behind and pressing her cheek against his back. “We didn’t choose to have the childhood we did, John, but there it is. And you protected me from it better than any other twelve-year-old boy ever could have.”
“But it wasn’t enough,” he said unblinkingly. “It simply wasn’t enough.”
“Hey I resent that!” She chuckled as she turned him around to face her. “Listen, I’ve got my faults but overall I’m a pretty decent woman.” She waited for him to look at her before continuing. “Okay so I picked the wrong guys twice, married them twice, and divorced them twice. But other than that,” she shrugged, “I’ve got it all. I’m happy, Johnny. I’m very, very happy. And,” she said, thumping him on the chest, “I owe it all to you, you big idiot.”
When his forehead wrinkled and he opened his mouth to speak, she could tell he was going to counter her admission with a rebuttal. She groaned, thumping him again. “Stop it! My shitty marriages didn’t have anything to do with you. There was nothing you could have done to stop me from marrying the wrong guys.” That wasn’t entirely true, but now wasn’t the time to bring up old ghosts. “It just happens. To lots of women,” she said pointedly. “Not just women whose parents beat the living shit out of them as kids.”
He sighed as he swiped a hand over his jaw.
“Let it go,” she said softly. “Because there’s not a damn thing wrong with me.” That wasn’t completely true either. She did carry one secret that weighed down on her pretty heavily. But, sadly, she’d come to realize it was a secret she would have to take to her grave.
His nostrils flared as he looked away, staring out into the night.
She sighed as she ran her hand up and down his back in a soothing gesture. “Have you ever considered the possibility that maybe, just maybe, you sequester yourself away on a remote island with a bunch of naked women because it’s easier than going out on an emotional limb with just one?”
He grunted. “Tell me something I don’t know.”
She clucked her tongue. “Try being your own hero for a change. I can take care of myself. And so can Jack.”
He sighed, then turned to her and grinned in an effort to change the subject. “I don’t know that I’m ready for such a monumental step for myself. However, we are in a position to help Jack out with Kris.”
“I like her,” Sheri said simply. “There’s just something solid about her, know what I mean?”
John nodded. “I don’t want you to give her any of the assignments tonight that could possibly end in fucking. That way if Jack loses any of the contests—”
“Jack?” she interrupted with a chuckle. “Not Jack. Let’s remember he’s not one of those soft rich boys down there, my dear. This is Jack we’re talking about. Just like you, he’s had to fight for everything he’s ever had tooth and nail.”
“Which makes him appreciate it more than they do,” he said softly, his gaze turning back to the window.
“Exactly.” Sheri thought the problem over for a moment, then nodded when the solution came to her. “I can pay Cherice off, get her to come down with a sudden case of the flu, and tell Kris I need her to wait tables at one of the tiki huts tonight instead of—”
“No.”
“No?” Her brow furrowed. “I thought you wanted to make sure Kris doesn’t end up in bed with any of the men tonight.”
“That is what I want.”
“Then…?”
“I only want you to give her assignments that can go no further than groping, fondling, and oral. That way if Jack loses any of the contests, he won’t be forced to watch her fuck another man.”
Sheri groaned. “Why go through all the subterfuge? Why not just pull her out of the line-up altogether?”
John raised the bourbon to his lips and sipped it as he stared out into the night. He sighed, relishing the burn as it glided down his throat. “Because I want him to have to work for her,” he murmured. “I want him to sweat all night long, wondering if she’s going to be the prize at a contest where the winner gets all.” He set the glass down. “I want him to go through hell and back mentally before the auction tomorrow. Because…”
“Because it will make him appreciate her more,” she softly finished.
“Yes.”
John chuckled as he turned his head to look down at her. “Okay. But you get to be Tattoo.”
She laughed and threw him a “yeah right” look before turning on her heel to leave. “Sheri Calder Conner Carucci is officially on the case,” she threw over her shoulder as she reached the door. She stopped before she opened it. “Oh and one more thing, Johnny,” she said, her face turning to the left so she could make eye contact with him.
He raised an eyebrow but said nothing.
“You’re my hero,” she murmured.
She left before he could reply.
Chapter Eight
Jack was delirious with panic as he looked for Krissy. All sorts of gut-wrenching scenarios went through his mind about the kinds of contests she was liable to be the prize in. But the worst one, he knew, was Pin the Dick in the Pussy, so it was to that booth he went first. When he quickly surmised that his professor wasn’t to be the prize at that contest, that some other woman would get screwed by the winner, he left immediately and searched the grounds for the right booth.
The surrounding courtyard of Hotel Atlantis was massive and dimly lit, the only light that was given off by blazing tiki torches. Much like a state fair, contest booths were set up all over it, only many of the games were x-rated and the prizes were gorgeous, naked women.
To the right of him was a pussy-eating contest, and to the left of him was the rubber ducky booth. The rubber ducky booth was set up the same way it was at state fairs where contestants got to choose one rubber ducky out of a dozen or so that were swimming by and pick it up to see what he’d won. Only instead of the prizes being stuffed animals, the bottoms of the duckies said things like “a blowjob” or “five minutes of cunt licking”.
Jack jogged by the rubber ducky booth, paying an angry customer no attention when he started yelling he’d been cheated out of his money because the bottom of his ducky said “a kiss”.
“Where are you?” he muttered to himself, his panic and possessiveness growing steeper with every passing moment. He continued jogging by various assorted booths, his heart rate increasing. “Where the hell—”
“Sitting spread out on the stage for your viewing pleasure,” a loud, disembodied male voice boomed out through a microphone, “we have the slut Krissy…”
Jack’s eyes narrowed first at the word slut and then at the name Krissy. “Don’t call her that, asshole. And don’t call her by my pet name for her either,” he gritted out as he picked up the speed of his jogging.
“As you can see our horny little Krissy is a natural redhead.”
Jack’s nostrils flared as he finally caught up to the booth and came to a standstill before it, watching angrily as the Prickly Professor spread her legs wide open on a stage and the male announcer ran his fingers through her pussy hair, petting her like a kitty-cat. He knew it was all a rehearsed act, but goddamn he wanted to kill the son-of-a-bitch for touching her.
The men gathered around the stage started whistling and shouting while the male announcer petted her intimately, catcalls and loud boasts filling the air.
“As much as our slutty little Krissy likes to get fucked,” the announcer continued while his index finger rimmed the hole of her vagina, “tonight she’s in the mood to have her delicious cunt sucked on.”
More whistling, louder catcalls and cheering. Krissy did as she’d been told to do, smiling down at the men in the audience while the announcer fondled her.
Jack gulped. It was the first time he’d ever seen her smile. Sweet Jesus he’d had no idea her cute little cheeks were dimpled. But goddamn it if that bastard didn’t quit touching her…
“Shall I suck on it first to find out how sweet her juice tastes?”
Jack’s jaw clenched hotly. If that motherfucker put his face anywhere near her pussy he was a dead man.
“On second thought, it’s the right of the lucky winner to get the first and only taste of this succulent cunt tonight, so gentlemen, let’s start the contest. The winner,” he finished as he tweaked one of her nipples, “gets to play with this gorgeous slut’s body while he drains her dry.”
Jack pushed his way to the front of the line, willing to do whatever it took to be declared the winner. He didn’t know yet what kind of a contest it was and he didn’t care.
If Krissy was getting her pussy sucked on tonight, it would be by him.
* * * * *
Kris’ heartbeat went into overdrive as she watched Jack’s teeth grit and the veins on his massively muscled arm bulge. Oh lord, she thought as she bit on her lower lip, don’t lose now, Jack. You’ve made it to the final two for goodness sake.
She knew he had to be tired. He was arm-wrestling his sixth and final opponent while she lay back on her elbows on the stage above the competitors, her legs spread wide at the knees, and watched. Occasionally she fondled herself as she’d been instructed to do, or glanced down into the arena of men to wink at them while she rubbed her nipples, but for the most part her gaze remained trained on Jack.
At first she hadn’t known what to think when he’d beaten his first opponent. She’d spent the greater part of the day talking herself out of thinking about Jack, only to have him show up at the first contest she’d been placed as a prize in and try to win the right to perform oral sex on her.
Quite frankly she hadn’t expected for this many men to be interested in winning the right to eat her out, so as it turned out Jack had his work cut out for him.
Not a bad showing for a woman with five cats, she sniffed.
Kris’ heart rate sped up impossibly further as more and more men began circling Jack and Lauren, waiting to see who would emerge the victor. Lauren was big and muscular like Jack so it was hard to tell which one of the two would win.
She had to admit, she was getting pretty turned on watching Jack arm-wrestle for her. He looked sexy in the jeans that molded perfectly to his body and the sexy black shirt that showed off his muscular arms. And then there was the way his teeth were gritted and his muscles were corded and slick with perspiration…
Very hot.
Knowing he was doing it for the right to perform oral sex on her—extremely hot.
And yet, perversely, she was as afraid of Jack winning as she was afraid of Jack losing. Because if he won he would get to touch her for a full thirty minutes and she didn’t know if she could handle it.
When all was said and done, after all, Kris would go back to being the boring professor of anthropology and Jack would go back to dating his dumb airheads. She wasn’t certain she could stomach seeing him with a beautiful, built blonde on his arm after spending so much intimate time with him. Every moment that she spent with him would make their inevitable parting of company that much more difficult.
Or, at least, it would for her.
“He’s almost got him pinned,” one man jovially called out before sipping on his glass of champagne.
Kris’ eyes widened as she tried to make out who had almost pinned whom. But so many men were gathered around now that she couldn’t make out much of anything.
“Come on buddy, I’ve got three hundred bucks riding on you!” another man called out.
A couple of minutes later, when loud cheers went up like wildfire, Kris’ heart damn near beat out of her chest. She could tell by the loud ruckus that a winner had been declared, but had no idea if that winner was Jack or Lauren.
She lay there in wait, her breasts dramatically heaving up and down, as she tried to calm her breathing.
And as she waited for the victor to emerge from the circle of men to orally perform on her.
Two sets of hands grabbed her from behind, lifting her up. She gasped.
“It’s okay,” one of the young men who worked at Hotel Atlantis said in low tones. “We’re just carrying you to the pillows to make the next half hour more comfortable for you is al
l.”
“But who won?” she breathed out as the young, muscular men carried her to the middle of the stage and laid her down within an enclave of lush pillows that resembled a harem bed. “Who won?” she asked again, wide-eyed.
“I’m not sure,” the man who had announced her on stage admitted. “I couldn’t see over the crowd. Still can’t.” He smiled at her. “It’ll be okay, Kris. Just remember if you don’t like the guy it only lasts for thirty minutes.”
But thirty minutes with Jack McKenna could go a long way toward breaking her heart, she silently admitted. Not that she could tell the guys that. They’d all think she was nuts, not realizing her history with him.
Try to remember you’re just a prostitute to him, Kris. No matter who walks out of the circle a winner, to both men you are nothing more than a prostitute.
And then she saw them. Both of them. Jack and Lauren shook hands as any good sportsmen would do after a winner had been declared, then broke away from each other. Her heart began thumping in overtime again as she stared wide-eyed at both of them, waiting to see which one would walk away and which one would climb the twig-like steps of the log stage…
She gasped as he took the stairs two at a time, his breathing ragged and his upper body soaked in perspiration.
“Jack,” she whispered.
* * * * *
Jack ignored the congratulatory remarks and the whooping victory sounds being sent up on his behalf as he narrowed his dark gaze at the object of his lust and obsession. Like a charging bull in full rut, he headed straight toward the bed of pillows she was lying in.
“Jack,” she whispered, her green eyes wide. “You won.”
“Disappointed?” he asked a bit gruffly. He was pumped full of a dangerous mix of adrenaline, possessiveness, and testosterone—the three elements he’d used to his advantage tonight to insure his victory. “I told you not to let another man touch your pussy,” he gritted out. “That announcer…”
“He’s gay,” she said quickly. “It was just an act.”
Jack grunted, realizing that part of her statement wasn’t true. He’d known the announcer for a few years and the man was definitely not gay. Still, he also realized that Krissy probably believed that statement to be true because it was a common lie the announcers often told to the new women to make them feel more comfortable with being fondled by them during the pre-contest shows.