The Businessman's Tie (The Power to Please, Book One) Read online

  Who knows where one night of passion might lead?

  Nonnie Crawford’s disastrous marriage is over. The divorce papers are signed and she’s ready to begin a new life. Out celebrating with friends, she attracts the notice of a dark-eyed stranger. His smile is an invitation, a dare.

  She yields to her desire and when he seduces her in a back hallway of the bar, she experiences the most sensual moment of her life. She craves more of him, but he leaves without telling her his name.

  “Our kind will always find one another,” is all he says before claiming one last kiss.

  Shaken by her unexpected submission to his demands, Nonnie tries to forget the man she dubs The Businessman. Her memories prove difficult to shake and she wonders what he meant when he said “our kind.” She decides to seek him out.

  Her search eventually takes her to a BDSM club. Nervous in the unfamiliar scene, she meets Michael Weston, a sexy charmer who is keen to sooth her apprehensions ... and to seize the reigns left dangling by the absent Businessman.

  Nonnie wanted her life to change, and now it is changing in ways she could never have imagined.

  The Businessman’s Tie

  The Power to Please, Book 1

  ______________________

  by Deena Ward

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Excerpt from The Playboy’s Proposition

  Dedication

  About the Author

  Web Site and Social Media

  Copyright

  Chapter 1

  The first time I saw him, when he looked back at me, a thrill of energy blazed through every nerve in my body. It was a tingling flash, gone in an instant, leaving me hyper-aware of his presence and every detail about him.

  He stood by the bar, one arm resting on the bar’s surface, his shirt collar open under his jacket in a casual way that made me think of a businessman relaxing on his way home from work. Was his tie in his car? I felt sure he was wearing a tie before he decided to come in here and have a drink.

  His dark hair was brushed back from a wide and manly forehead. Because of the distance and low lighting in the bar, I couldn’t tell the color of his eyes. Dark. I was sure his eyes were dark.

  He had a fine Roman nose and a clean-shaven square jaw. Classically handsome is what he would be called. He was tall, and powerful-looking, though not muscular in a bulky way. Something about him seemed familiar. Had I met him before? No. I would remember meeting this man.

  There was no telling what he might do for a living, but I guessed he was a professional of some sort. I also couldn’t be sure of his age, and guessed he was around forty.

  But guessing about certain details wasn’t important at that time and I’m not sure why I’m bothering repeating them now. There was only one thing I really wanted to know about him.

  When he looked back at me, at that first moment when our eyes met, did he feel what I felt?

  Nothing in his demeanor suggested that he felt anything. He simply stood there and looked back at me, not in a blank way, but in a thinking, contained sort of way. If his nerves were jangled like mine, he never showed it.

  And then, much too soon, this moment of tingles and questions was gone, obliterated by my friend, Sherry, who half-yelled in my ear, “See something you like?”

  I blinked. Something I like? I looked down at my drink. Just like that, the moment when I first saw The Businessman was over.

  I played it light with Sherry. “And what if I have?”

  “Good for you!” she raised her glass to me. “Attention, ladies!” She called to our two other friends at the table, her voice raised to carry over the loud music in the bar. “It’s official. Our freshly-minted divorcee here is ready to move on. She’s spied a potential candidate for some single-time-to-mingle sex. Raise your glasses.”

  They laughed. We clinked glasses all around, and I played along with their ribbing since it was why we were all here tonight -- to celebrate my divorce. Clink your glasses to a fresh start. Why the hell not.

  They teased me about all the hot men I could have with a free conscience, but I found it difficult to focus much on what they were saying. They talked about my ex and what a loser he was, how lucky I was to be done with him and how my future was wide open, etc., etc. Basically, it was everything we had been saying since my husband and I first split nine months earlier. The only difference now was that the split was official. I had signed the papers that morning.

  The talk about my circumstances and about my ex, we had all hashed and rehashed so often I could have recited what everyone was saying before they actually said anything. Normally, I thoroughly enjoy shredding my ex-husband’s character. It was just that tonight, I had experienced something new. Instant attraction. With a stranger in a bar. How odd ... and thrilling.

  I couldn’t pay much attention to my friends. It took most of my mental effort to keep from searching out The Businessman, as I thought of him now, to make sure he was still standing by the bar. Finally, I gave in and looked for him, glancing furtively so I could quickly look away should he be looking back at me.

  There he was, still standing at the bar, but he wasn’t looking my way. Damn. He was talking to someone, an older man. Could have been worse. He could have been talking to a woman.

  My friend Jackie poked me in the arm. “Hey! We’ve called your ex enough names for one night. Why don’t you get on over there to Mr. Sexy and stake your claim.”

  I only smiled.

  “I’m just saying, if you don’t do it, one of these young blondies trolling around here will beat you to it.”

  I shrugged and said, “If he wants young blondes, he’s welcome to them.”

  My friends laughed at me. They know when I’m full of shit.

  “Go on,” said Sherry. “Go say hi. He won’t bite.”

  “Or maybe he will,” said Gail.

  “I can tell he’s got a taste for fresh hot divorcees on the prowl,” added Jackie.

  And they went on in this manner for a while, thoroughly enjoying themselves, until I couldn’t take it anymore and escaped with the classic line of “I’ve got to use the restroom.” They didn’t buy it, but the restroom excuse is sacred, and there was nothing they could do but laugh at me as I walked away.

  I had to pass The Businessman to get to the restroom and I couldn’t resist, on my way, trying to catch his eye. He did look my way as I passed, but not at my face. He gave my body a quick and intimate look-over. Feet to chest, and there he stopped. I should have been insulted, but I wasn’t. Maybe it was because I’d had three stiff drinks. Most likely, it was because I hoped he liked what he saw.

  By the time I was in the hallway that led to the bathroom my face was a bit hot from embarrassment. I spent a few minutes at the lavatory getting myself together and reminding myself what I was doing here. I was having fun, that’s all. I remembered how to have fun, didn’t I? Oh, hell, who knew. Did I ever have fun, even before my marriage? Regardless, now was the time to start.

  I told myself I would walk up to The Businessman and introduce myself. I would do it. I would. And I checked myself one last time in the mirror before I headed out of the restroom on my mission. Look out, sexy stranger, I thought. Here comes a woman with a plan.

  But I never got the chance to put that plan into action.

  The Businessman stood in the hallway in front of me.

  He leaned against the paneled
wall, his arms crossed casually. Up close like this, he was taller than I had thought, and powerfully built. He looked solid under his suit jacket and open-collared shirt. He had a sexy, lidded look as he gave me another once over, then met my eyes.

  That strange energy thrummed through me, the same one as before. My brain seemed to stop working, as if I could only experience the world through this sensation, this heavy sensuality that hung between me and The Businessman.

  No, that’s not right. To be fair, my brain was still working. I just wasn’t listening to it. My brain told me to get the hell out of the hall. It said I wasn’t ready for whatever this man was offering, or for what he might take. It said run away. Dangerous character there. Forget about fun. Think about what you’re doing.

  My tingling body, however, told me to let the moment play out. It said to forget about caution and explore the possibilities. I was free and pushing 30, and I didn’t need anyone else’s permission to do whatever I wanted to do. This man was probably the most appealing, sexy man I had ever seen. And if I wasn’t mistaken, he was interested in me.

  My body made a much better argument than my brain.

  Then The Businessman smiled a small, knowing smile. His grin was an invitation. It said, come on, do you dare?

  It was as if a haze had risen in the hallway, and the only thing I could see clearly was the powerful man with the wicked smile. My awareness of him was acutely intense. Something about him. Something.

  I knew I wanted him. Just like that. I wanted to kiss the corner of that grin and taste exactly what it was he might be offering, or what he might take.

  When he held out a hand to me, I stepped forward and took it, and he led me past the ladies restroom, farther down the hall, and into a darkened corridor that branched to the right from the main hall. I could make out a closed door at the end of the corridor, but couldn’t see any details since the only lighting came indirectly from the main hall. We stopped about halfway to the closed door.

  Had I gone insane? What was I doing? We hadn’t even spoken a word to one another and here I was following this man into the shadows of a noisy old bar. But I wasn’t thinking any of the things that I should have been thinking. My body had triumphed over my brain, and I wasn’t thinking at all. My senses were focused on the man holding my hand. Even the loud music from the bar faded far into the distance.

  Anyone walking to the end of the main hallway could have seen us back there, a pair of dark silhouettes moving in the shadows. The Businessman pulled me to him, held my face and leaned down to kiss me. His lips barely touched mine. It seemed he was breathing me in and I did the same.

  We brushed lips and he tasted of clean freshness and of the bourbon he had been drinking. I could smell the spicy scent of his cologne and I laid my hands against his hard chest. His masculine smell mingled with the smells in the corridor, grainy spilled beer and the tang of pine paneling, the bite of the dust we had stirred up from the old carpeting.

  Our kiss slowly became more intense. I opened my mouth and he claimed it with a hard tongue. One of his arms slipped around my waist and behind my back to pull me closer while I raised my arms to his shoulders then wrapped them around his neck.

  This kissing was a feral thing, hard and intense and out of control. At least on my part. For The Businessman, I think not.

  I didn’t question anything. I didn’t worry about people walking down the main hallway and seeing me. I didn’t worry about being alone necking with a stranger. I was of the moment and my body felt alive in a way it never had. My heart raced as he kissed me in what felt increasingly like a claim. We weren’t kissing each other. He was claiming me.

  His mouth moved over mine with smooth and firm expertise. He held my face and took what he wanted from me, leaving me breathless and ready for more.

  I don’t know how long we did this. I was lost in it all. And so when everything changed, it took my mind a while to catch up.

  We had been kissing, so close and tight together, my chest mashed against his hard chest, my fingers groping at the sinewy toughness of his back. And then it all changed.

  In a swift and smooth movement, he pushed away from me, seized my hands and raised them over my head. In another movement, he turned me around and shoved me into the wall, front-first, my hot cheek pressed against the cool paneling. It seemed only a microsecond until he had somehow smashed his body against the back of mine to hold me still, while at the same time he secured my hands to a fixture on the wall, above my head.

  Just like that, I was bound ... and nearly helpless. I could feel his breath on my ear. I wasn’t sure what had just happened. I tried to twist and bend my head back far enough to see what held me in place. There it was, wrapped around my wrists. The Businessman’s tie.

  I stupidly thought, “So that’s what he did with his tie.”

  My reaction after that, though, was instinctual. I pulled, of course. I pulled, and my breath which had been shortened from The Businessman’s kisses now became rough and ragged from a growing panic. I didn’t want to be helpless. I had to get away. I may have said no. I don’t remember. I don’t know why I didn’t yell, but I’m certain I didn’t yell.

  I did not want to be tied up by a stranger. I pulled harder but was unable to get much purchase because of his hard weight pressed against my back. My panic grew.

  But before it went full-blown, The Businessman spoke his first words to me.

  He said in a deep and soothing voice, “I’ll let you go if that’s what you want.”

  I slowed my frantic pulling. He ... would let me go ... if I want? I made a few more weak pulls as I considered what he had said. What? What was this? A trick?

  He trailed his fingers down the sides of my raised arms, so very, very slowly, raising goosebumps as he went. Then he continued down both sides of my body, past the sides of my breasts, down my waist, and hips and onward to my upper legs, where he stopped and slowly toyed with the bare flesh of my thighs just below the hem of my short skirt.

  He said, “I will let you go, if you want.”

  His breath warmed my ear. I shuddered lightly.

  He said, “But I don’t think that’s what you want.”

  I shuddered again as his fingertips played up and under the bottom of my skirt, climbing higher, my nerves dancing under his touch.

  I stopped trying to free myself. My breathing slowed as if I were holding it in anticipation of where his fingers might travel next. My panic morphed into desire, wanting him to touch more of me.

  He took a half-step back to give himself room to explore, I presumed. When his fingertips of fire reached the bottom curve of my buttocks, and my breath audibly caught in my throat, he stopped his movements, leaned over so I could see into his dark eyes, and said, “Are you afraid of me?”

  I swallowed the lump his words had raised in my throat, and answered with a weakness I had not expected, “Yes ... no.”

  He smiled a bit and said, “Good. Do you want me to let you go?”

  I shook my head.

  “Say the words,” he said.

  I knew I would say the words. I knew I would say just about anything he wanted me to say, with his fingers lightly touching the bottom of my ass, right at the edge of my panties and on the verge of heading I hoped I knew where.

  I said, “I don’t want you to let me go.”

  “Good,” was all he said.

  He leaned back again, and I was jerked roughly when he grabbed my panties with both hands and tore the flimsy fabric from my body. I gasped then gritted my teeth at the moment of pain that resulted from the elastic biting into my skin.

  He rolled up the back of my skirt and tucked it into the waistband, baring my ass. I felt my face grow warm when he did nothing for a few moments. I assumed he was standing there looking at me. I tried not to think about it. I tried not to think about someone else seeing me from the hall. But mostly, I tried not to think about how those thoughts excited me more than they frightened me.

  “Arch
your back and stick out your ass,” he said.

  I didn’t act quickly enough for him, apparently, since he pushed a hand into the small of my back, and with the other hand roughly reached between my legs and pulled backwards.

  While I tried to adjust to the feel of his hand on my most private parts, he continued to give me orders, “Hold it like that. Spread your legs. Wider. Now don’t move.”

  And then his hands were gone again. He said, “Pretty,” then nothing more.

  My face was scarlet from heat. I was on display to this stranger, and really, to anyone who might happen to pass down that main hall and glance down here. What if someone had been standing right over there at this moment, watching this big, powerful man arrange me for his pleasure?

  I saw the scene in my head, as if I were standing in that hallway. Me, tied and helpless, my back arched as much as it could, my ass thrust out, bare naked, as a fully-clothed stranger inspected me. It was humiliating and thrilling. I was on fire.

  God, I wanted his hands on me. Please bring them back.

  As if he heard, The Businessman reached between my legs and trailed his fingers all the way from my clitoris to my asshole. His fingers were slick as they slid, slick from me.

  My entire body shuddered and it wasn’t hard to hold the pose in which he had placed me. I pushed my butt out as much as I could. To find him.

  He toyed with me a few seconds more, stroking up and down, up and down. Then with both hands, he took hold of my labia and pulled them apart. He held me open for a while, as if this, too, he must inspect, though surely it was too dark for him to see clearly. He squeezed and pulled on my flesh with strong fingers, mixing pleasure at this unexpected action with minor discomfort from the pinching.

  Hold and pull. Pinch and pull. Watching. Watching. He was watching this most intimate part of me as he played with me.

  And then he let go and shoved two fingers inside me. I groaned. Oh, God! I groaned loudly. I had been ready for the invasion, and his fingers had easily rammed into me, though they felt large at the same time. It felt like heaven. I was tingling practically everywhere.