Cruising the Strip Page 5

  Snake Eyes

  by Karin Kallmaker

  “I think I’m in the wrong place.” Tendra’s gaze swept the large suite again as she muttered under her breath. Yes, there were coffee and snacks on the side bar of the suite’s main room. The sofas offered comfortable respite from a day of workshops and high-level networking. But the women in low-rider jeans and leather vests, fishnet stockings and mini-skirts were not adding up to the business of trauma surgical supplies.

  A door to what she presumed was a bedroom opened and through it she glimpsed racks of lingerie. A compact blonde was adjusting the cups of a violet teddy until her breathtaking cleavage was properly arranged. She shook her full, golden hair into place over her shoulders and eyed herself critically in a full-length mirror. Frowning at what she saw, her gaze flicked out the open door to where Tendra stood staring.

  That cool, critical gaze traveled up and down Tendra’s body, then a lift of an eyebrow agreed that Tendra, in her baggy slacks and badly ironed white shirt, was definitely in the wrong room. With an elegant tap from the toe of a killer high heel, the blonde pushed the door closed, breaking the spell.

  Tendra dug in her pocket for the business card-sized invite to the vendor’s hospitality suite. Maybe it had been a mistake to treat herself to a day without her contact lenses. Holding the card as far away as she could, Tendra thought it said suite fifteen hundred, but that’s where she was, and, well, the displays of certain items she could see through the other bedroom door weren’t the kind of accessories used in patient treatment.

  Her heart pounding in an erratic rhythm, she forced herself to stop looking at the coils of soft white rope, the gloves with everything from faux claws to sandpaper on the fingertips, and leather buckled items made to restrain any part of the human body. Peering at the card, she decided it must say suite sixteen hundred, and she turned toward the door.

  “Can I help you?” The soft voice stopped Tendra in her tracks.

  She knew it had to be the blonde before she even turned around. “No, but thanks. I know where I’m supposed to be.”

  Crystal green eyes appraised her coolly, though Tendra detected a hint of humor. “You’re not the first person to get the wrong floor. You don’t look like a doctor.”

  “You don’t look like an…escort.” At least not in the street appropriate black slacks and simple silk tee, Tendra could have added.

  The eyes darkened. “Are you trying to insult me?”

  “No more than you were me.” Tendra shrugged. “I’m five years older than I look, and no, I don’t stand on a box in the operating room.” She was used to being shorter than her colleagues, and it was no surprise that as petite as the blonde was, she was still an inch or so taller than Tendra was.

  “I run a cyber-escort service, and no, I don’t fuck men for money.”

  Tendra gave a little nod. Her brain was too fogged and tired to exchange barbs and flirtations.

  “I fuck women for fun, though,” the woman added. There was a blatant invitation in her eyes. “You look like you could use some extreme relaxation. If you twist any tighter you’re going to break.”

  Stunned by the woman’s perception, Tendra fumbled for words. “I don’t—I’m just in the wrong—I’m not—”

  “Don’t tell me you’re not into women. Not after the way you looked at me. And at the toy room.”

  “I’m late for drinks—I was meeting someone—”

  The cool, firm voice silenced her. “Have a drink with me in my room.”

  Tendra couldn’t believe how much she was tempted. She hadn’t had a sexual impulse for at least a week, and yet her entire body was screaming yes in seconds. She’d had the psych courses; she knew why she was looking for an escape from life, through any means possible, including far too much Scotch every one of the last seven nights.

  “I’m Vette.” The woman held out her hand, her expression cool except for that lingering gleam of humor in her eyes. “Short for the kind of car I’m sure you’ll someday own.”

  An electric shock ran through Tendra the moment their hands clasped. “Corvettes aren’t really my style.”

  Vette didn’t let go of her hand. “But wouldn’t you like to drive one, just once?”

  She knew the color was draining out of her face. Blood was rushing to her sex, which was swelling and pulsing like a second heart. She had resented having to come to this convention instead of taking a badly needed few days off. Her mentor Reilly had said she would be better for the distraction, but Reilly had Liz, and that made her outlook on life a lot rosier than it used to be. Distractions? Tendra hadn’t arrived here wanting more than a steady supply of Scotch and a lot of sleep.

  Vette moved just a little closer, still holding Tendra’s hand. “Actually, they say a Corvette isn’t a car you drive. It’s a car that drives you.”

  She trembled, unable to breathe. The woman’s eyes were mesmerizing and Tendra felt as if a spell were stealing over her, and she was falling. Falling, and willingly.

  “I want to fuck you,” Vette whispered. “Jesus. I took one look at you, and that’s all I can think about. Fucking you until you forget your name.”

  I just walked in the wrong door, Tendra wanted to say. She wasn’t into this kind of scene.

  “Breathe.” Vette’s voice sharpened with command. “Breathe before you faint.”

  Tendra sucked in air, and her vision narrowed to Vette’s face. She felt pierced by those eyes, pinned in place, and far too much of herself was exposed.

  Maybe if they’d had to wait for an elevator she might have found the wherewithal to extricate herself. Vette’s grip on her hand wasn’t tight. A simple twist would have separated them. Vette had stopped gazing at her with that penetrating intensity as they walked down the corridor, so she could have just walked away.

  Vette opened the door to her room and even stood back to let Tendra enter first. She could have backed off. But she didn’t do any of those things.

  She went in. It was a hotel room, like any other. Sunlight still streamed in through the open drapes. It wasn’t a dungeon, or a staged set like in a porn movie, just two beds, a dresser, and a tastefully hidden TV. A bottle of Glenfiddich sat on the dresser, still nearly full.

  The door snicked closed as Vette said, “Take off your clothes and get on the bed.”

  Why did every word Vette say seem to hit her with a physical force? Her skin jumped at the command, but her brain objected. “I’m not into—I mean, this isn’t me. I think you have the wrong idea of what I like.”

  Vette looked up from pulling the covers off the bed. “No, I think I have you figured out. You’re not normally submissive. Most of the time you’re in absolute control of everything. Your last relationship, if you can call it that, you were definitely the top in and out of the bedroom, and she left because you didn’t give her any space.”

  Tendra wasn’t going to talk about what’s her name. In the tone she reserved for first-year residents, she said, “Stop it. You don’t know anything about me.”

  “You’re right.” Vette undid the fly of her slacks and they made a soft, sensual sound sliding to the floor. “Except that right now you need in the worst way not to be in control. You need to let someone else do the planning, the worrying, the protecting. And right now, I really want to be that for someone. We both get what we’re aching to have.”

  Tendra tried not to look at the almost sheer panties that were clinging to Vette like a second skin. She closed her eyes and saw the massive amount of blood against the white of the surgical table. The tone of the flat line warning on the heart rate monitor had played in her ears for the last week, though at the moment the pounding of her own heart was almost loud enough to drown it out.

  She’d been lucky, lucky beyond belief to have practiced as long as she had without losing a supposedly otherwise healthy patient. Sure, there had been the patients nobody could save, but a teenager with an unsuspected blood clotting disorder—it had all happened so fast. The first wa
s the hardest, everyone said so. Even if she had done everything she should have, everything necessary, it was still hard. His whole life had been ahead of him.

  “Come back,” Vette whispered. She was standing in front of Tendra now, magnificently naked. In the teddy she had been sensual and inviting, in street clothes elegant and sexy. Naked, it felt as if some other kind of energy was shimmering around her. Tendra had visions of one hard, erect nipple playing against her clit, and shivered at the thought of those full, soft breasts massaging her ass.

  She was breathing hard. She had to close her eyes. She wasn’t sure she licked her lips, but if she did it was because the thought of losing herself in the act of worshipping between Vette’s legs made her thirsty, and a bottle of Scotch was no substitute.

  “Take off your clothes and get on the bed,” Vette repeated.

  Tendra obeyed. She felt tension fall out of her shoulders during the simple act of unbuttoning her shirt. She opened her eyes to find Vette watching her appreciatively. A few minutes where she didn’t think, didn’t remember…this wasn’t how she would normally achieve a state of tabula rasa, but the opportunity was here.

  Her jeans slid to the ground. With a tug, they ended up in a heap, along with her shoes and socks. In another half-minute, she had shrugged out of her shirt, unhooked her bra, and stepped out of her panties. All done automatically, as if she were getting ready for bed at home, on her own.

  “Very nice,” Vette said. “Now get on the bed.”

  She hesitated. “How?”

  “Surprise me.”

  Something in Vette’s voice told Tendra she wasn’t moving fast enough. She got on the bed, on her hands and knees.

  “Spread your knees.” Vette’s hands were already on her body, caressing her back and shoulders, then underneath to play with her nipples. Tweaking, pulling, not cruel, but sharply stimulating. “You’re naked and on my bed, waiting for me to fuck you.”

  Tendra said nothing, not sure what she was supposed to do except wait. Vette’s hands were firm and controlling.

  “Do you want me to fuck you?”

  “Yes.” It was the truth, but it wasn’t all she needed.

  “Then get on your back.”

  Tendra rolled over and was just settling when Vette moved on top of her. She was pushed down the rest of the way, her legs nudged open, then fingers were inside her. Vette pinned her with the weight of her body and she pushed even deeper.

  Vette had been right; if there was bedroom play, Tendra was a top. She’d never yielded to anyone before, not like this. Vette had some of her weight on one elbow, and her forearm was draped lightly over Tendra’s throat. When she swallowed, she could feel that light pressure reminding her she was not in charge. She was on this bed to take what Vette wanted to give, to enjoy it, to please with her own pleasure. To forget her name, to forget…

  “No,” Vette said. She looked into Tendra’s eyes, all that sharp, bright intelligence leaving no room in Tendra’s thoughts except for the sensation in her cunt as Vette thrust and rolled, massaged and teased. “Stay open, stay with me.”

  Tendra could hardly breathe. Those eyes possessed her; they gave her no place to hide except behind her own closed lids.

  Vette put pressure on Tendra’s throat. Tendra immediately opened her eyes. “That’s better,” Vette cooed. “No hiding. You’re getting fucked by a complete stranger who doesn’t even know your name. Let it feel good. Oh, that’s better. You just got so wet.”

  Tendra knew sex could fill up empty places inside her. She’d loved, been washed over with tenderness. What Vette was doing to her was the opposite—it drained. The room was going dark, sounds were getting muffled. Even her own heartbeat, throbbing in her ears, was getting faint.

  She wanted to beg to come. She wanted to beg for Vette to lick her, to fuck her harder, but she wasn’t in charge. Whatever Vette felt like doing that was what would happen. She hadn’t been told she could beg.

  “There, there, right there,” Vette murmured. “Put your hands under your ass.”

  It was hard to move with Vette’s weight on her, hard to make her body do anything when Vette’s fingers were touching everything, stroking from nerve to nerve, deep, shallow, twisting, thrusting. She wriggled, trying to obey, aware that Vette wasn’t making it easy. She had to get it right or Vette would stop.

  She was about to say that she had done as she’d been told when Vette said, “That’s right, I’m fucking you.”

  Her eyes glowed like green fire, burning into Tendra.

  “We met ten minutes ago, and now you’re getting fucked. There’s nothing but my hand, my body, and your hungry cunt liking what I’m doing to you. I wanted your body, to own it, to use it. That makes you mine.”

  The words were running together. She wasn’t sure what Vette was saying, but she didn’t have to know. She hung suspended from the jewels of Vette’s eyes, the world shrinking inward until those eyes were the only light, and letting Vette’s hand enjoy her depths was the only reason she existed.

  Vette shifted her position slightly and the feel of hot, wet pussy on her thigh distracted her from Vette’s eyes. But Vette’s words brought her focus back to the sharp gaze. “I thought you might want to know what you’ll get to lick, if you please me.”

  The tension in her shoulders, across her breasts, was unbearable. She felt tethered to Vette’s eyes, swinging with each thrust, afraid she would break free, fall, get lost forever. There was something that wouldn’t let her go, but she needed to escape it, so she pushed up, thrust up to meet Vette, to give herself to those eyes.

  Her orgasm shattered her. She was empty, turned inside out.

  The past dissolved, everything went away. Only her body remained, a ragged collection of trembling muscle, shaking nerves and so much wet…so wet.

  The green eyes softened, filled with matching tears. “It’s okay,” Vette said. “It’ll be okay.”

  She curled into the welcoming arms, said thank you for the tissue. She’d never come like that before in her life. She wasn’t sure she wanted to again, but even as the thought formed, her body told her otherwise.

  Vette asked softly, “What’s your name?”

  She looked at Vette blankly for a long moment.

  Vette smiled. “Good.”

  Let It Ride

  by Radclyffe

  “I’ve always wondered what limo drivers did while they were waiting for their clients to finish doing whatever they were doing,” a woman said as she slid up beside me.

  I dropped my last quarter into the slot machine and watched two cherries and an orange jiggle into position on the horizontal bar, then turned to the redhead I’d first seen that morning at the airport. The company I worked for had sent a fleet of six limos to pick up arriving members of Escort Services International, and I was driving one of the black stretches assigned to the group for the next five days. I hadn’t been quite as lucky as a couple of my fellow chauffeurs. My client was one of the corporate executives—a friendly enough guy—but I would have much preferred to drive the escorts to the Palace. My current companion had been one of a group of sleek, sophisticated women who deplaned looking as if they’d just stepped out of the pages of Cosmo. Even though they were all great looking, she stood out for me. I think it was her obvious confidence and self-assurance. She clearly didn’t think being a high-class call girl was anything to apologize for.

  I motioned to the beeper on my belt. “These mean we don’t have to lurk at the curb any longer.”

  “What do you do instead?”

  “Most of the guys congregate in the lounge and talk about sports or girls,” I replied. I’d shed my black suit jacket and loosened my tie when I’d started feeding the one-armed bandit an hour ago. I saw her give me a slow once over, and I hoped my white shirt wasn’t wrinkled. She looked just as good as she had earlier. Her shoulder length red hair was wavy and thick, and she’d left it loose. She’d changed into a casual pair of black Capris and a sheer pale blue blouse, a
nd the lacy cups of her diminutive bra were visible as they cradled her full breasts. I think I must have stared a little too long because when I glanced up, she gave me a knowing smile. I’m sure she was used to people assessing her body, and I suddenly didn’t want to be relegated to the category of those who mindlessly lusted after her. Even if I did have a flash of mindless lust imagining what it would be like to get my fingers inside those frothy bits of white lace and lift her breasts out into my hands.

  “You don’t care for the topics?” she asked.

  I struggled to remember what we had been talking about before my brain dropped into my crotch. Oh, right—sports and girls. “I like them both, in the right circumstances. But I prefer action to conversation.”

  She signaled to a cashier and bought a paper container filled with 400 quarters and set it on the narrow shelf in front of my slot machine. Without taking her eyes off me, she started dropping coins into the slot. “And what’s your favorite sport?”

  “Poker.”

  “You live in the right town then.”

  “That’s what I thought when I moved out here,” I replied. “I still do.”

  “And what about the girls?”

  “What about them?”

  “If you don’t like to talk about them, what do you like to do with them?”

  I caught her wrist as she was about to slide another coin into the machine. Her face registered surprise, then interest as I pulled the coin from between her fingers and dropped it back into her bucket. “It depends on how much time I have.”

  “Some things don’t take a lot of time.”

  “And some things are better if they do.”

  She nodded, as if liking my answer. “Why did you stop me?”

  “I was afraid you’d get lucky and we’d be tied up collecting your winnings.”