STORY EXCERPT

The winter sun beat down on her and she turned her face toward it. A dozen different shades of turquoise were reflected in the waters of the Mexican Gulf as they lapped lazily against the sand. The beach was almost deserted. Janine at the hotel had explained that was because visitors couldn’t handle the thin air. Well, Nicole didn’t appear to have that problem. She was bone weary but too wired to sleep. Besides, she loved beaches and it was years since she’d been on one.

She loved swimming even more.

Grinning, she parked her car in front of the hotel and made her way to her room. She thought about Pascal and Kai as she did so, her instincts for once letting her down. They had to be involved in coercion of some sort, and yet she felt as though she could trust them. Just because they looked like male models and made all sorts of suppressed feelings bubble to the surface, there was no reason to lose her objectivity. Gramps had wanted her to come here and she owed it to him to resolve this issue. It would help if she knew what that issue was, of course, but she figured that if she did enough stirring, something would pop up to make sense of it all.

Nicole stripped off her clothes and pulled on a severe one-piece bathing suit. She donned an all-concealing wrap, slipped her feet into flip-flops, picked up a towel and her book, and made her way back down to the deserted beach. It was as though she had the place to herself. She saw no one either in the hotel lobby or on the beach itself, which was fine by Nicole. The last thing she needed was company, or intrusive questions. She threw off her wrap and would have run into the warm ocean, except her lung capacity wasn’t quite that accommodating.

When she reached the water and waded in it cooled her heated skin. She dove into an incoming breaker, surfacing some distance away from shore. Controlling her breathing in the manner that was second nature to her, she swam strongly, setting up a rhythm and eating up the distance like a greedy predator. This was when she felt the most alive. Swimming was what she’d been born to do. It was what she really excelled at, and yet she hadn’t taken to the water for years.

Don’t go there and spoil the feeling. Don’t think about anything. Live for the moment.

Nicole had no idea how long she swam for. She lost all sense of time and simply allowed the water to soothe her troubles away, at least temporarily. She turned onto her back when she got tired and floated, eyes closed, allowing the sun to soak into her body. She’d always wanted to live in a warm climate. Perhaps, when she’d solved the conundrum of Gramps’s investments, she’d move somewhere hot. It dawned on her properly for the first time that she now had enough money to do whatever she liked with the rest of her life.

Shouting and splashing brought her back to reality. Obviously, she no longer had the beach to herself.

“I think we’ve gotten to her in time,” an urgent voice shouted.

She recognized that voice. It belonged to Pascal. Irritation surged through her. She didn’t need anyone’s company, and certainly not his. Before the thought registered, a pair of strong arms lifted her from below.

“I think she’s still breathing!”

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“I’d say she’s definitely breathing,” said another amused voice—Kai’s, presumably. The pair of them appeared inseparable.

Pascal emitted an angry hiss. “Saving you from your own fucking stupidity.”

“I don’t need saving, thanks.”

“We can see that now, but that isn’t how it looked from on shore. You appeared to be drifting out farther and farther. We thought you’d lost consciousness.”

“Well I hadn’t.”

Nicole wriggled out of his arms and swam toward shore. Pascal swam right alongside her, keeping up easily. Not many people were able to do that. It seemed these two annoyingly protective alpha males could since Kai appeared on her opposite side.

“Are you two stalking me?”

“We saw you just kinda floating there,” Kai said. “We figured the thin air had gotten to you. It’s happened to people before.”

“Just so long as you don’t expect me to thank you.”

“The thought never crossed our minds.”

She could hear amusement in Pascal’s voice, which infuriated her. Damn it, what had she done? There was no way she could avoid walking up the beach with them and they’d see the real her, or as much of it as was on show in an ugly one-piece. She felt out of control without her disguise, but it was obvious she wouldn’t be able to get rid of them easily. Best just brazen it out like it was no big deal. As they got closer to shore, the thin air kicked in again. It made her short of breath, slowing her strokes and providing a legitimate reason to send them on their way.

“Go ahead,” she said. “I’m sure you’ve got better things to do with your time.”

“Can’t think of a single one,” Pascal replied, grinning.

Shit, there was no shaking them off. Well, they might be determined to cling, but that didn’t mean she had to talk to them. Besides, she couldn’t spare the breath and they covered the rest of the distance in silence.

They reached the shore, their feet hit the shallow ground, and when they all stood up she realized both men were naked. That was all she needed. Her eyes drifted toward their genitalia in spite of herself and widened with surprise. She was no expert on the subject of the masculine form, but even she had to concede that these two were impressively well endowed.

“Do you always swim in the nude?” she asked, turning her eyes away.

“Hey, we thought you were drowning. We didn’t have time to worry about threads.”

A spontaneous smile sprang to her lips, but she was still turned away and they couldn’t have seen it. “Of course you were,” she said.

Pascal grabbed her hand, amusement turning to annoyance. “Look, you don’t seem to get it—”

She snatched her hand away. “Please don’t touch me.”

She grabbed her belongings from the sand and made a beeline for the hotel.

ADULT EXCERPT

Pascal moved to his lover’s feet next, sucking his toes, tickling his soles, and then attaching pins to his toes. He worked his way up the insides of Kai’s legs, heading closer to his genitals. Nicole could now count eighteen pins attached to Kai’s body. Pascal was running out of places to put any more.

Surely he didn’t mean to put any there.

She gasped, excited and aroused beyond her wildest imagination, when Pascal grasped Kai’s erection firmly and sucked it into his mouth. For the first time Kai showed a reaction. It was as though he wanted to lift his hips and shove himself deeper into Pascal’s mouth but didn’t dare. Pascal moved to Kai’s scrotum and sucked one of his heavy balls. When he released it again she could see that he was tugging at the hairs on it with his teeth. It took her a moment to realize that he wasn’t doing it to tantalize. His actions stretched the delicate skin until there was sufficient available for him to attach a pin to it. Kai sucked in a deep breath, but his eyes remained closed, his breathing even.

Pascal repeated the process with his other ball and then turned his head, finally giving some attention to Nicole.

“The ridged band around Kai’s foreskin is one of the most sensitive areas in a man’s anatomy,” he told her.

“Surely you can’t—”

“Oh, I think Kai would feel shortchanged if I didn’t.”

Pascal worked the area with his hand, pushing the head of Kai’s cock between his thumb and forefinger until the skin puckered and he was able to attach a pin. Kai groaned and Nicole, leaning forward to make sure she didn’t miss a thing, noticed a drop of pre-cum slip from his cock.

“You’re losing control, buddy,” Pascal said, tapping his thigh. “Concentrate!”

“Sorry, master.”

“Do you know where a man’s frenulum is?” Pascal asked Nicole.

“Not precisely, no.”

“It’s the nerve bundle on the underside of his cock, right here,” he explained, lifting Kai’s rigid erection with two fingers and pointing to the spot. “Sensitive doesn’t begin to describe it.”

“And I guess you’re going to affix the last of your pins there.”

“That’s right. It will test Kai’s powers of restraint to the limit. Not many men could take it without either quitting or ejaculating, but I’m counting on my buddy to remain disciplined.”

A choking sound slipped past Kai’s lips, but otherwise he sat perfectly still, shackled to the chair, as Pascal prepared to attach the pins.

“Here we go,” Pascal said, using the stern toned he’d employed when he’d required Kai to scrub the baseboard. “If you lose control, slave, then there will be consequences.”

“I won’t,” Kai replied, his voice a strangled moan as the last pin was put in place.

“There.” Pascal stood up and looked down at his slave. “Ain’t that one of the prettiest pictures you ever did see? How does it make you feel, darlin’?”

“Hot,” Nicole said without hesitation. “I’ve never even imagined anything remotely like it.”

“You have your fantasies, though.”

“Of course. Doesn’t everyone?”

“I’d like to hear them, but right now we should to deal with Kai’s needs. He’ll be wanting me to fuck him, and I’m guessing you’ll want to watch.” She nodded, unable to be anything other than honest, given the circumstances. “Okay, but before that he’ll need to take a thrashing.”

“Why?”

“Because that’s the way it is.”

“Oh, I see.” But she didn’t—not really. “What about the pegs?”

“They need to be taken off, which is your assignment.”

“You want me to remove them? To touch him, to—”

He sent her a taunting smile. “You have a problem with that?”

“No, I guess not.”

Tentatively she approached Kai, wondering which pegs to remove first. She assumed the ones on his cock and balls would hurt the most but couldn’t bring herself to go straight for that area. So she started at his head, removing the ones from his lobes, then his neck and arms. His nipples came next.

“Lick and suck them better for him,” Pascal said in a commanding tone.

Nicole did so, her own breasts brushing against his chest as she leaned down and applied her lips to his torso. He tasted of sweat, sex, and masculinity. For the first time Kai showed signs of agitation. Was she doing something wrong? She turned to look at Pascal for guidance.

“You’ve stirred him up,” he said in a censorious tone.

“Me! What about all the stuff you did to him?”

“Stop sucking his tits, Nicole. If Kai can’t take it without reacting then he doesn’t deserve your attention.”

Kai half groaned and then clamped his mouth shut. Nicole continued removing the pins, leaving his cock until last. When she removed the pins from that area, too, Pascal ordered her to suck his cock. She fell to her knees beneath his splayed legs and did just that. It was something she’d never done before, but she’d read enough on the subject to know she should run her tongue down its length, tease him by sucking his balls and tickling the head of his cock. Kai tried to lift his hips the moment she sucked the whole of him into her mouth and Pascal ordered her to stop. He grabbed a rope, tied it around Kai’s waist and fastened it at the back of the chair. It was now impossible for Kai to move any part of his lower body.

“Now carry on,” he ordered Nicole.

She sucked Kai’s pulsating cock deep into her mouth, tickling his glans with her tongue. Kai groaned and, before she knew what was happening, a fountain of sperm hit the back of her throat, almost making her choke as she struggled to swallow it down.

“Oh dear,” Pascal said, sounding amused. “Someone’s in for one hell of a punishment now.”