Todos los capítulos de The Pleasure Protocol: Capítulo 31 - Capítulo 40

Simone knocked like the police."Open up! I have wine, I have noodles, and I have a lot of questions!"Ariana unlocked the door. One, two, three. By the time she'd finished, Simone was already through it, a paper bag in one arm and a bottle clutched in the other, kicking off her sneakers in the hallway like she lived there."You look weird," Simone said."Hello to you too.""No, seriously, you look...." Simone stopped and squinted. "You look rested. That's weird. You never look rested. Did you sleep?""I took a shower.""Okay. And?""And I ate lunch.""Who are you." Simone shoved the bag into her arms and went hunting through the kitchen cabinets for glasses. "Where are your glasses? Why do you own four mugs and no glasses? Ari, you're a grown woman.""Top shelf, behind the cereal.""That's where you keep glasses? Behind the cereal?""It's where I put them so they don't fall."Simone looked at her for a second, and her face did something tender and awful, and then she turned back to t

The photographer had been told to make the Ashfords look like a family.It was proving, Dominic thought, a considerable test of his professional skills."Lovely," the man said, for the fourth time, from behind a camera that looked as if it cost more than a house. His name was Maitland, and he had a voice like warm milk and the nervous tic of a man who had photographed enough billionaires to know exactly what happened when you said the wrong word. "Just a little closer. Mr. Ashford, if you might, ah, soften the shoulders."Dominic did not soften his shoulders."Perfect," said Maitland faintly.The drawing room at the estate had been rearranged for the occasion. Someone had hauled the good armchairs to the window, where the light fell soft and gold over the lawn. A portrait stand had been erected in the corner. A tray of tea sat untouched on the sideboard. The Ashford family sat in the places they had been told to, with the air of people attending a funeral at which nobody had died.It

At midnight, he was in the atelier.He hadn't intended to go there. He had told the driver home, and the car had turned toward the penthouse, and somewhere on the way he'd said, quietly, Velour. The driver had not asked why.The lamps hummed. The steel benches gleamed. Somebody had cleared the sketches from the wall and left only one pinned in the center, a rough drawing of a cuff in cross-section, with the double lining marked in his own cramped hand. Performed within specification.He took off his jacket. He rolled his sleeves. He pulled the tablet from his bag, opened Form 7, and scrolled to page four.Restraint (rope): Ask first.He read it for a long time.It would be rope, then. Not tonight, but soon. He could already see how it should go. Not hemp, which was coarse, and not synthetic, which slid. Cotton, perhaps, soft-spun, with enough give to forgive her and enough weight to remind her. A single length, he thought. Her wrists. A slow, even tie that spread the pressure and left

"Oh...."It was nothing like the vibrator. It was slow. His tongue was hot, and it moved against her in a long, wet, patient stroke, from the bottom of her to the top, and she cried out so loudly that she heard it echo off the grey walls. Her hands jerked in the rope. Her thighs strained against the ties.He did it again. And again.He was merciless. He was gentle. He'd learned her, she realized dimly, he'd learned exactly what she liked, in two sessions, with a notebook in his head. He found the place that made her gasp and stayed there. He closed his lips around her clit and sucked, softly, rhythmically, a slow, firm pulse, and her vision blurred and her knees shook and she heard herself sobbing his name."Dominic.....Dominic....."He glanced up.She would remember that look for the rest of her life.His dark head lay between her pale thighs. His eyes were on her face. They weren't clinical. They weren't cold. They were black, the pupils swallowed whole, hot and hungry and utterly f

"They know you.""Lots of people know me.""Grandfather.""Your queen is hanging, by the way."It was. Dominic hadn't seen it. He moved it, and it was the wrong move, and he knew it was the wrong move while his hand was still on the piece."I asked you a question," Dominic said."You asked a clinic. I'm not a clinic." The old man took the queen. He did it neatly, with the left hand, and set the piece on the table beside the board with a small click. "Are you eating?""What?""You look thin. Your mother says you're thin. For once, I think she's right.""I'm not thin.""Have you eaten today?"Dominic opened his mouth.He had had black coffee at five. He'd had nothing since."I thought so," his grandfather said, almost gently. "I can tell you that when I was your age, I forgot lunch for a whole year. Your grandmother used to put a sandwich on my desk and stand there until I picked it up. It's a family failing. We forget to feed ourselves when we are busy being important."Eat something.