Inhibition-X (4 page)

And what? Do tell
, Erix urged.

Risqué
, she thumbed, finishing her earlier text.

Sounds like I should have canceled my trip and come with
. The words flashed across the tiny screen.

She wasn’t sure she was ready to meet the mysterious Erix. Horror stories from those who’d met their online partners had her terrified of the idea. Staying online text-only suited her best. At least for now. No one got hurt. She delayed her response. What did one say to something like that?

I didn’t scare you off, did I?

No. Friends are coming. Got to go. Text me in about an hour. Can you?
She quickly swiped.

For you, kitten…anything. Talk to you in an hour
, he replied once more.

Beads landed at her feet, startling her back to her rowdy friends.

“Whaaat?” She squawked at them.

Her friends all stared at her. P.J. with a goofy, almost sympathetic grin, Morgan with a smirk that promised she was about to be embarrassed at any moment, and J.D. approaching with a serial killer-type grin.

Grabbing the beads from the floor, she tried to figure out what they were as she ignored them. Too heavy to be a necklace and too long to be a bracelet.

“Pop quiz, Shirley,” J.D. started.

“I’m not answering to that. Period.” Her glare gave him pause.

“Fine. Pop quiz, Heather. What are they?” He pointed to the beads in her hands.

Damned if she didn’t back up a step when he took another toward her. Sheesh, you would think she was back in college, all gawky and unsure. Of course, the high ponytail, faded jeans, and high-top sneakers weren’t helping her not resemble her former bashful self.

“You still get embarrassed, after all these years. Blushing over anything remotely naughty. Even now your cheeks are changing from pink to bright red,” J.D. teased.

“They’re beads,” she retorted, standing her ground.

“Yeah, but what kind,” he pushed.

She stared at the shiny, black marble-sized beads.

“I, uh…okay, fine. I have no idea.” Fine. Whatever, they won.

“Ever heard of anal beads?”

The balls hit the floor as if on fire.

“Oh nasty. What if someone has used them?” she wailed.

“Well, that answers whether she’s ever tried them,” J.D. stated, patting her on the shoulder and grabbing the beads. “I’m sure they’re re-stocked new or something for each new guest,” he said as he took them back to the cabinet.

“How do you know so much about them? Anything we need to be aware of, J.D.?” she teased.

“Wouldn’t you like to know.” His brow rose, but his grin gave him away. He’d no more used them than she had.

“Leave her alone, guys. Like either of you would care about our dirty little secrets.” P.J. attempted to take the heat off her.

She failed.

“Sure, spill the deets.” Morgan might have vied for nonchalant, but she got his undertone. He would love nothing more than for P.J. to spill some of her desires.

“Nope. There are some things friends are better left not knowing. It would be like spilling my wicked side to my brother or something.”

She caught the slight hurt expression in Morgan’s eyes before he recovered enough to hide his emotions. P.J. might like him in return, but the girl was still in hide-her-feelings mode.

A strange awkwardness filled the room as things turned silent.

Luckily, something jingled back out in the living area, saving them all.

Chapter Six

Khara stood just outside the foyer, waiting for them to invite her to enter.

“In our haste, we neglected to inform you of the banquet in your honor. Do you remember the bungalow you saw when we met you farther down the path?”

“Sure,” Morgan answered.

“That is the dining area. The banquet will begin at seven sharp, and the dress is, well, the less the better.”

Before any of them could question the latter part of her announcement, Khara turned and sauntered off. The guys’ heads bobbed back and forth in tune with Khara’s hips. Heather rolled her eyes and caught P.J. doing the same.

Morgan, as if sensing P.J.’s eye roll, whipped around, startled like a kid caught stealing a cookie. He gave a lopsided grin, trying to downplay the moment, but P.J. laughed, shrugged her shoulders, and went back into the room they’d discovered and claimed as the “girls’” room.

“Kinda freaky, if you ask me,” P.J. blurted, coming back out to grab her suitcase.

“What is?” Morgan asked.

“How she was like right there. So silent and stealthy and crap.”

So P.J. did have a jealous bone. Interesting. Morgan seemed oblivious to her rather sharp tone. Without doubt, this trip would bust things open between the two. Heather hoped in a good way, and not with a break in their friendship, as she wouldn’t even consider the level of awkward that would come from that scenario.

“Hey…shit!” J.D. announced, a scowl riding his normally laid back face as he stood just inside one of the unseen rooms.

“What?” Everyone inquired at once.

“Anyone else realize this abode only features two bedrooms, not counting the playroom?”

“Uh, duh.” P.J. announced as she dragged her overstuffed suitcase toward one of the bedrooms rather than break her back trying to carry the plaid beast. “I snuck a peek while you two dodo heads were gawking at Khara’s ass.”

“We weren’t staring. We were memorizing, my dear friend.” J.D. chuckled.

“Heather and I claim this one,” P.J. stated with enough glee that the room had to be the bigger of the two. “If you don’t like it, then you could always share the playroom with the swinging bed.” P.J. taunted.

“No way I’m getting stuck sleeping with this nerd, especially not on any round-ass bed. He snores. Like Mr. Ed on speed or something.” J.D. thumbed over to Morgan, who for his part was sputtering curses and flipping birds back at him. “Plus, I think we should agree now to keep the playroom for playing. In case any of us get lucky and want to use it for more than sleeping, if you get my drift. I don’t wanna bring a chick back and find slobber from Morgan on the pillows.”

“I do not snore, and I damn sure don’t slobber,” Morgan swore, grabbing his bag and heading for the other room.

“Yes you…” P.J. started and stopped like something lodged in her throat. At the same moment she began her trailed off comment, she noted Morgan stumbled in his steps.

Hum. Something had already gone down between Heather’s two friends. Damn. She’d always assumed, with the way each had spoken in the past, neither knew of the other’s true feelings. Just what the hell were they up to?

“Damn, man, this room is tiny,” Morgan bellowed back. “But I agree about keeping the other room for, er, special events.”

“Yeah, but one fart out of you and you sleep on the sofa. Or…better yet, let’s swap bunkmates,” J.D. offered.

“Uh, yeah, hell no. Let’s recap, shall we? You”—P.J. pointed to Morgan—”snore, and you”—she pointed to J.D.—“fart. I’ll take my chances with Heather, thank you very much. Plus, we need the bigger closets our room has.”

Both men pouted.

“If bunking together bothers you both so bad, ask the Marquis about his oversight at dinner, which, can I remind everyone, is only thirty minutes away. Let’s get unpacked and changed for dinner,” Heather suggested, trying to get the trio back on track. She hoped dinner would shed more light on some of the things the Marquis had alluded to.

“Or undress, if I remember right.” J.D. winked at her as he slipped into the guys’ room.

As she followed P.J. into theirs, she worried both guys might take Khara’s words seriously and attend dinner in the buff. She loved her friends dearly, but there were some things better left unseen between friends.

Tallywackers happened to be one of them.

Twenty minutes later, and much to her relief, they met back in the common room with the dressed guys. Well, sorta. They both wore Bermuda shorts and not a damn thing else. No T-shirts, no shoes—but she wouldn’t complain. No swinging junk in sight.

“Let’s get this show on the road. I want to meet the hot babes the island is rumored to have.” J.D. bounded toward the door, opening it wide enough that he bounced right through like a kid with no doubt of getting laid.

“Hot babes? Really? You sound like a schoolboy sporting morning wood,” P.J. chastised, following him out the door.

Though she was far more dressed than her friends, Heather still fought a self-conscious sensation in her little white bikini and green sarong tied at her hip.

P.J. wore a hot-pink, barely there bikini that only emphasized her ample bust and perfect tan.

As they ambled down the path to the dining hut, the exotic sounds and scents flooded Heathers senses again.

Either way, their adventure awaited them, and for once she’d come out of her shell to join in the merriments no matter how wild things got. She shook her arms at her sides, trying to rid herself of the nerves that had begun to sink in.

Damn you, over-thinking brain. Let go. Have fun, and if the opportunity arises, be a slut. A safe slut, and only for the trip, but get wild. Be more like your friends. Free.

And bam…both Morgan and J.D. mooned them as they hurried ahead to the hut.

Okay. Maybe not quite as wild as the guys.

Chapter Seven

A few steps down the path, an odd noise caught her attention. She elbowed P.J. to slow down and veered off the path slightly in search of the sound.

“What are doing?” P.J. whispered.

“Didn’t you hear something over here?”

“No, and don’t islands have poisonous snakes and shit? Like kill-you-immediately types?” P.J. appeared stricken as she pushed palm after palm out of her way.

“No. Quit being a weenie and come on.” P.J. didn’t have a problem with much of anything, except snakes. Those would knock the girl out on sight.

“Hell no. One of us needs to be ready to run for help.”

A glance back at P.J., and she recognized the tilted jaw and set eyes. P.J. meant what she said; she wasn’t moving an inch from the spot where she stood.

“Fine. I’ll be right back.”

Again, the
thump, thump, thump
.

When she moved another of the large palm fronds, she discovered the source or in this case, sources of the familiar noise.

Two people going at it like a pair of bunnies. A blonde bent over a fallen tree trunk, and a large twenty-something dude pounding into her from behind. The wet sounds of flesh slapping flesh rooted Heather to the spot, the arch to the woman’s back, the breathy sigh, and the tossing of her head vivid reminders of how long a dry spell she’d been on. Her own need spiking and her vagina reacting in the most primal way, pulsing to the point, she snapped her knees together.

She should have turned back. Given the duo their privacy and joined P.J., who probably thought she’d been bitten by a snake and lay dying upon the island’s floor. But she didn’t.

Desire kept her hidden in the foliage, watching them in the dancing light of the tiki torches.

The man’s arm snaked around his companion’s waist to just out of sight, but the sudden shudder from the woman gave a clue to where his hand might have gone. So did the rhythmic motions of his arm. Even propped upon the log like she was, with the man damn near lying across her back, the woman didn’t still her gyrating hips as she appeared to be matching her companion, thrust for thrust. Her bared breasts swayed in time with their movements, and going by the sounds of their moans, each was close to the edge.

Were they familiar with each other, or was this one of the hookups the Marquis had hinted at?

So enraptured was she by the erotic scene before her and the wild sounds of birds and other creatures that had begun to sing, that when P.J. touched her shoulder, Heather damn near pissed herself and fainted all at once.

“Holy jeebus you scared the shit out of me,” she whispered, snatching P.J.’s arm and pulling her away before they got caught.

“Scared you? I thought for sure you were dead or something.” P.J. replied, glancing over her shoulder to the area they were fast-tracking from. “What were you doing? Did you find something?”

“Yeah. Couple of animals getting their freak on.” Truth.

“Dangerous animals?” P.J. squeaked.

“Um, not dangerous. Come on, we better hurry before we miss anything.” She sprinted far enough ahead of P.J. to avoid further questions.

Once she reached the dining hut, she paused until P.J. caught up. When they entered they discovered long, wooden benches lining tables covered with large green elephant ear plants. They found both guys, of course, situated next to the two most scantily clad women in the place.

Figures.

A quick glance to P.J. confirmed that though she’d made eye contact with Morgan, she avoided his direction after catching sight of the chick seated next to him, who was leaning all over him. Girl needed to speak up. This cat-and-mouse game would end badly if neither came clean. Laughter from a happy couple on her right drew Heather’s attention back to the decorations of the place.

Glimmering candles in candelabras cast a romantic and tropical atmosphere. Khara arrived dressed in the sheerest of saris and completely bare beneath. Her skin seemed to glisten in the warmth of the candlelight, and her movements in walking to greet people seemed almost ghostlike. She appeared the very embodiment of a goddess.

Situated at the end of one of the tables was a man who oozed mystery and sex. Bare-chested, well muscled, and oiled to perfection. A green, barely there sarong tied at his hips and ended—well, any breeze would finish her answer. He wore a mask, so detailing any distinguishing facial features deemed impossible, yet she wanted more of his face bared. Deep brown eyes bore back into hers and caught her off guard.

Damn, busted gawking.

“Ladies and gentleman, please be seated, and we will begin serving.”

Heads turned as the Marquis entered the hut and joined them. He too was bare-chested, and adorning each of his flat brown nipples was a small golden hoop. Everything about him seemed so wild and raw.

Khara, who’d gone to his side the moment he entered, silently linked arms with him.