[B.S. #3] Claiming Laura Page 3

  “Happy birthday, Laura. Did you make a wish earlier on your candles?”

  Laura looked up. She was still a little red in the face but smiled at his sentiments. “Thanks for the birthday cake, but I’m too old to make wishes on a candle now. After all at this time in my life, I have realized that wishes don’t come true anyway.”

  Clay didn’t know if it was her birthday or something else that was making her sad. Wanting to cheer her back up, he put his cup down on the coffee table, pulled his lighter out of his pocket, and lit it. Getting on his knees before her chair, he held it up to her and asked her to make a wish and blow out the flame.

  Laura’s smile brightened. “Thanks but that’s silly. We’re too old for this kind of thing.”

  “Please humor me. I don’t think I’m too old to still have wishes and I know you’re younger than me. So just this once, do it for me. Make a wish.”

  Looking into Clay’s serious eyes as he held his lit lighter, she closed her eyes and made a wish. God, can I keep this man? It had been so long since a man had treated her with any respect to her wishes.

  Opening her eyes, she blew out the flame. As soon as she leaned forward and the flame was out, Clay leaned down and took her rosy lips. The kiss started out soft and gentle, as if he was scared now to startle her. But with his first taste of her, Clay lost his cool and deepened the kiss, rubbing his tongue over her bottom lip until she opened and took him in. God, she tasted so good. Clay was sure he had never had a kiss that came close to this moment before. Pulling back from her lips, Clay gave her a small kiss on each cheek. His arms that had crept around her as he had deepened the kiss released her and he sat back on his heels.

  When she opened her eyes Clay could see the glow in her bright green eyes, as she touched her lips and smiled “thank you for the birthday wish.”

  “No, thank you for making my wish come true. I’ve wanted to kiss you since I spotted you in the bar.” Clay got up off his knees and resumed his seat on the sofa.

  He didn’t know if Laura believed him or not, she distracted him from looking too close by handing him his piece of cake.

  Clay found out that evening that Laura, when she was calm and he wasn’t scaring her to death, was a great conversationalist. She told him about her job—she worked at an accountant’s office downtown. She loved reading, walks, and pets, even though she didn’t have any at the moment.

  As Clay listened to her talking about her life, he realized that he had probably heard this type of get-to-know-you stuff a hundred times before. But with Laura telling it, it seemed so refreshing and different to Clay. Everything she told him, he was interested in knowing more about. This lady just fascinated him and touched something inside of him, and he couldn’t wait to explore more of her.

  Turning the conversation around to Clay, Laura asked him about his tattoos, especially the large one on his left shoulder.

  Clay looked down at the tattoo. “I try to live by this motto. The design stands for ‘Strength, Faith, and Honor.’ After our unit was discharged from the army, I needed something to remind me that I wasn’t the man they were talking about. We were sent home with our tails between our legs, if not for our own self-worth, we probably would have floundered. Braden Security was born out of our need to prove everyone wrong. We used our skills and rebuilt our reputation and lives around it.”

  When she questioned him further, Clay wiped a hand over his face as if he was trying to wash the memories away. Just when she was about to tell him it was OK, she didn’t have to hear the whole story now, Clay sighed and continued.

  He wanted her to know about what kind of a man he was. He knew she was keeping part of herself hidden. He could tell by her reactions back at the club and now at her house. He knew if he wouldn’t divulge some of his background, he couldn’t expect her to either. Secrets had no part in the relationship he was finding he wanted to pursue with Laura.

  “When our unit was discharged from the army, it was because of a government screw up. That wasn’t the official story of course, but we all knew what had really happened. Angel with his strange insight into things, filled in some of the blanks, but the full thing could never be proven. Unofficially, and to make a long story short, the orders came down from a General. We think we know who, but we couldn’t pin him down as having sent them. We finally had to give up and get on with our lives. The past still haunts us, but we couldn’t live in it. So we put our heads together and made lives for ourselves soon after we got back stateside and decided to carry on doing what we knew best. James, the leader of our unit, had a little money. We pitched in what we could, and Braden Security was born. It gave us something to believe in again.” Clay took a cleansing sip of his tea to rid himself of the distasteful feeling the words still plagued him with.

  Laura was quite taken with Clay’s heartfelt words as he spoke about his company and the men that it was made up of. Laura could tell that the words meant something to him. He truly believed in his unit and in himself. He was a very self-sufficient man. A man’s man, some would say. Laura was still flabbergasted that such an intriguing man was sitting in her house and taking an interest in her.

  Laura tried to think of something to say that would be interesting to the man in front of her. The more she had heard, the more she wanted this men seated across from her.

  She knew, just looking at Clay that this man didn’t do anything he didn’t want to, but God she wanted him. She was just about to suggest another cup, when Clay stood up from the couch and walked over to her chair. He held a hand out toward her.

  She took hold of his large hand and he helped her stand. Looking deeply into his eyes, she hoped he was finally making a move. Then he smiled down at her and gave her hand a little squeeze and started leading her to the front door.

  Trying to keep the disappointment out of her features, she looked down at their held hands when they reached the door and stopped. Clay reached out and gently lifted her chin. He looked intently down into her eyes.

  “I had a delightful evening. I’ll call you.”

  “OK.” Laura tried to keep her voice strong.

  Letting her hand go, Clay brought her closer to him, giving her a small hug and kissing her forehead. Letting her go, he opened the door, told her to lock up and walked to his truck.

  Laura locked the door and stood on the other side of it, taking a moment to think over the evening. Would she see him again?

  Well, she would soon find out if her birthday wish came true. She had wished for a beautiful gentle man like Clay in her life.

  Turning off the lights, she went upstairs to bed to dream about the man she had met.

  Clay walked into his small apartment and threw his leather coat on the rack at the front door. Walking over to the small kitchenette, he took a beer from the fridge.

  He opened the bottle as he flopped on the couch and took a long drink. How lucky it was that Lance had asked him to help with the investigation at his club. Otherwise, he would have never been in The Vanilla Spice Bar and he would have never met Laura.

  The club was called the Vanilla Spice Playground or VSP for short. It had two sides and two types of clientele. It was a clean, safe club, but a few women had reported being approached outside in the parking lot by a man. The man seemed to be staking out the parking lot and checking out the women as they came out of the bar, especially if they were alone. It was making the women uncomfortable and they had complained to Lance. After one woman had almost been snatched, Lance called in Clay as a favour.

  Clay had never been there before, so he hadn’t realized how big the club was. It was hard to cover both sides of the bar himself. Clay’s personal interests had always leaned toward the spicy side of life, so he didn’t mind spending time at the club. He had been scouting out the bar the last few nights, mostly keeping to the spice side, checking out the patrons. Lance was concerned that this man might have a membership to the club. Lance had all the male members checked out but wanted Clay, with his backgroun
d in security, to have a look around. Lance thought maybe something had been missed in the background checks. Nowadays it wasn’t hard to fake documents. Clay, from the women’s descriptions of a big man, had mostly kept to the spice side of the club, thinking it could be one of the Doms. He could thank his lucky stars the he had stuck around tonight to see if any men matched the description in the vanilla side.

  Tonight he had checked the spice side first before he stopped in the vanilla side to take a quick look before he went home. He really didn’t think the guy they were looking for would hide in the vanilla bar, but he had to make sure he looked over the entire club.

  Remembering his first look at Laura as she trailed behind her friends. She had taken his breath away with that first glance. It was something that he would remember for the rest of his life. No woman had gained his attention and made his body react as fast as she did. The only thing he had a problem with was wrapping his mind around Laura being at the club. The picture just didn’t gel for him. As he got to know her, his first impression of her didn’t change. She was a lady through and through.

  He had only seen her in the vanilla bar, maybe she didn’t realize that on the other side of the front entrance was a door that led into the spicy BDSM club side of the VSP Playground. She was a very skittish woman and Clay had had enough sense to not ask a woman he had just met if she had a kinky side.

  Thinking of Laura again, he remembered the sight she made with the light from the house highlighting her long black hair and big green eyes as she watched him walk to his truck. She had a body just curvy enough to get his cock to stand up and take notice. He’d had a hard time keeping it down after his first glance at her. After he had her in his lap, the damn thing just got harder. He had always been drawn to long, dark-haired women in the past, but Laura clicked something in his subconscious level.

  As he got to know her more over the course of the evening, his fascination with her just grew. He wanted her. Right now just thinking about her again had him needing to adjust his pants and undo the top button for his cock to have enough room. With any other woman, Clay would have been making the moves on her shortly after meeting her. But with Laura, it was different. Yes, he wanted to sink into her, but he also wanted to cuddle her and protect her. She brought out unusual feelings for him.

  Finishing his beer, he made his way to bed. He knew he would have a hot restless night if he couldn’t get Laura out of his thoughts. And if he let his imagination loose, it would also be a sleepless one.

  Chapter Three

  The next morning Clay walked into the offices of Braden Security for their monthly meeting.

  Angel, Brad, and Grant were sitting at the long conference table. Clay hated having the meetings in the conference room. He preferred having the meeting in James’s office as they used to do before they became known to the public.

  James was the one that always insisted that they had to grow as the firm grew, and Clay guessed sitting at the conference table to have a meeting meant that they had started doing things more professionally.

  He took his usual chair at the right of the head of the table. The head spot was empty right now as James was away on his honeymoon with Avery. Clay poured himself a cup of coffee from the carafe sitting on the table and made himself comfortable. Sipping his coffee, he glanced at the other men already seated around the table. “Any updates?”

  Angel, who was reclining in his seat, spoke up. “I just finished the Turner affair. The guy has millions and just wanted to know where his wife was spending his fortune. After following her for a month, I was able to report that the money was mostly spent on dinners, shows, clothes, and the usual.”

  “Why couldn’t he just look at the bills and find out? Everything is online now. Why pay us to follow her as she shops?” Grant asked as he looked up from his blackberry. “Doesn’t make sense to me.”

  “Well, I think he was more interested in who she was spending the money on. She was going through it ‘like it was water,’ to quote Turner. Anyway, after I told him of the young boy toy that his wife had taken under her wing and was taking out on the town, I expected Turner to blow, but every now and then people surprise you. I couldn’t believe when he just said that we had done a good job. Now he was relieved as he didn’t have to worry that his wife was in any danger.”

  “He didn’t get mad or want proof of this boy toy?” Clay asked in disbelief. “I know if my wife stepped out on me, I would want proof and divorce papers would follow.”

  “No, he was just happy that she wasn’t being blackmailed as he had feared. The mention of the boy toy didn’t seem to faze him. In fact he didn’t even ask for his name or for any pictures I might have taken. It’s a strange world out there if you ask me,” Angel replied.

  “That’s it?” Grant asked.

  “Yeah, the guy wrote a large cheque for our services and that was it.” Angel just picked up his coffee and took a drink. “I hope my next assignment is not as boring as following around a woman shopping and carrying on with a guy young enough to be her son.”

  “Grant, you’re next.” Clay turned to him to see him pocket his blackberry and push his glasses up on his nose.

  “I’m still working on the Maguire case. I put some feelers out on the people the firm want to hire, through the internet. Nothing urgent.” Grant explained.

  Brad was next and just said he had a bead on a new job, but nothing yet. Then it was Clay’s turn.

  Clay gave them an update on the club. It really wasn’t a job for Braden Security, just a favor for his friend, but no matter what they did, they always updated everyone on their whereabouts, in case help was needed. “I spent three nights in the spice side of the club. None of the Doms in there strike me as being this guy. They seem to be protectors of all the women in the club. Even the strays are treated with respect. So I think my next step will be stalking the vanilla bar. Which I started last night.” As Clay thought back through the evening, a smile broke on his face as he remembered Laura.

  The guys around the table noticed.

  Brad quite the ladies’ man, smiled. “And what did you find in the bar? With that smile on your mug, it has to be a lady.”

  Clay came out of his musing and looked around the table. All the guys were staring back at him. “What the hell are you all looking at? God, you guys are worse than a bunch of old ladies looking for gossip.”

  That didn’t stop Angel from piping up. “We all gave James a hard time with Avery and something tells me that you’re leaning in the same direction. You do know that we have ways to find out anyway. So spill.”

  Clay knew he might as well tell them. With their skills it wouldn’t take long for them to find out anyway.

  “I met a beautiful lady at the bar last night.”

  Before he could go on, Brad asked, “Did you get lucky?”

  “Get your mind out of the gutter. She’s not that kind of a woman. She’s a lady through and through,” Clay answered back quickly, defending Laura.

  “Come on, in a place like that? I know it’s your friend’s bar, but any BDSM place earns a reputation. Anyone going there, to my way of thinking, is asking for it,” Angel defended Brad. He didn’t go along with the whole Dom thing and the leatherwear.

  “This is different. This lady was invited by her friends to the club to celebrate her birthday. I don’t think any of the women with her had a clue as to what went on in the other side of the club. But, getting back to finding the guy stalking the women.” Clay turned to Angel. “I could use your help now that your job is done. I don’t think any of the Doms are guilty of stalking the women outside the club, but I would feel better if we could cover both sides of the club. If you take one side we could do that. I will remain in the vanilla bar, which I didn’t get a good look at last night, and you can give the spice side a whirl. What do you say?”

  Angel looked at Clay in mild disgust. “You want me to dress up and play in that BDSM side of the club? No way. If you want my help, I will tak
e the vanilla bar. You, who feels at home with that lifestyle, can cruse the spice side.”

  “Well, normally I would, but can you do it as a favor to me? If you take the spice side, I can ask my lady to keep me company on the vanilla bar side. I know it’s asking a lot, but you have to admit that you have never been in a BDSM club to be able to judge. You never know, you might like it.” Clay was praying that Angel would step up. That was the only way he could think of seeing Laura. He could bring her with him to the vanilla bar and still help his friend out.

  Angel looked at Clay’s serious expression. He never asked for favors, so he had to be serious about this lady. He’d just met the woman and he didn’t want to let her out of his sight even to do his job. Interesting.

  Clay was always the one that acted as a father figure for the unit, even though he wasn’t much older than the rest of them. He was always the silent, calm one in any situation, so Angel knew he wouldn’t ask unless he was smitten with this lady. Angel, being Native American, believed in soul mates. Maybe Clay had found his, just like James had with Avery? With that thought in his head, Angel, couldn’t turn Clay down. What was a couple of nights spent in a costume watching people get their rocks off from hitting each other? With a long, drawn-out breath, Angel told Clay that he would help him.

  “Great!” Clay jumped up from his chair. “I’ll call Lance and he will set you up with the proper leathers for the club and a membership.” Clay was already pulling his phone out and calling his friend.

  “I don’t want a membership,” Angel muttered to Clay as he spoke on the phone.

  Clay just pulled the phone from his ear and told Angel, “Only members are allowed in the club.”

  “Suck it up, big guy. At least you can watch women getting off and not shopping this time,” Brad piped in with a laugh.

  Angel just gave Brad his black stare that usually got people to back off, but the guys knew him too well to abide by his wishes.

  “Just think, Angel. You might find your soul mate amongst the stray subs at the club,” Brad added.