Chapter 1
I am in love with another man’s wife. Widow, Dax Hayes amended as he looked from Krista Matthews’ grief-stricken face to the coffin waiting to be lowered into the ground. His mouth went dry, his heart beating a rapid tattoo that threatened to burst from his chest at that guilt-ridden revelation. Jesus, why did that slap-in-the-face acknowledgement have to choose this moment, in this place, to rear its ugly head?
With considerable effort, Dax shifted his gaze away from her red-rimmed, sorrowful blue eyes, resisting the urge to cross over to her even as he admitted his strong feelings for his colleague’s wife didn’t come as a surprise. He’d wanted Krista the moment he’d glanced across the surgery room and looked into her eyes for the first time two years ago, and nothing had changed since. There had been something in those eyes, a sated expression he rarely caught on a woman’s face—not even a sub he’d just satisfied through strict, sometimes painful, stimulating control. That look had drawn on his dominant instincts and stirred his lust in a new, exciting way; so much so, he recalled giving serious consideration to asking her out and breaking his steadfast rule of not dating hospital employees.
Another first for him had been when his friend and surgical partner had introduced the new surgical tech as his wife, and the swift kick to the gut from that announcement did nothing to level off Dax’s interest. Even though a good number of medical professionals of his acquaintance thought no
thing of infidelity, he never crossed that line. At least, not without the spouse’s invitation and approval. He had no moral objections to participating in a consensual threesome. Before and after the onetime ménage with Kurt and his wife, Dax had known how much he wanted Krista, and how utterly he’d failed to drive out his forbidden lust with other women. If he spoke with her now, he’d hear the ache of loss in her soft voice and be tempted to pull her into a consoling embrace, something he’d managed to avoid doing the past several months as he and other hospital employees took turns visiting their home and offering their assistance as the couple struggled with Kurt’s disease. After what Dax had done, the role he had played that led up to them standing in this cemetery over Kurt Matthews’s grave, he didn’t have the right to offer Krista comfort of any kind. Worse, he knew from past experience, touching her would result in unleashing his dominant cravings in a way he’d never experienced with another submissive woman.
“Yea, though I walk through the shadow of the valley of death; I will fear no evil; for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”
Despite the pleasant seventy-five degree Miami temperature, sweat trickled down his back. As the minister wrapped up the service, Dax found no comfort in the standard prayer. The questions that plagued him about his friend’s death may never be answered, and that would be his cross to bear. A hand landed on his shoulder and squeezed, drawing his attention away from the ornate, walnut casket to his best friend Sean’s concerned grey eyes.
“You’re not going to offer any psychology platitudes, are you?” Dax, Sean and his five other close friends came from troublesome childhoods that had landed the seven of them in a summer camp for juvenile delinquents during their teens. Even though the psychologist meant well with his mothering, the shrink’s habit of constantly watching for signs one of them was struggling with past mistakes and tragedies could be annoying.
“Just reminding you we’re all here for you before we take off. Are you going to go to the house, pay your respects to the widow?” Sean asked.
Dax had been pleasantly surprised to see his friends at the funeral, the silent way they joined him for the service then came out here for the burial site eulogy a balm to his tortured conscience. But he was glad they weren’t following him to Kurt’s home. As close as the seven of them were, as well as they knew each other, one or more would be bound to notice his internal struggle when he could no longer avoid offering condolences to Kurt’s widow. He had to keep thinking of Krista in those terms to keep her at the arm’s length he needed her to be, where his conscience demanded she stayed.
“Yes. I won’t remain long as there’s a lot of family here. I plan on giving her your card. She may need someone who understands, since she lost her Master along with her husband.”
“You could help her there, eventually.”
“No, I can’t, and don’t ask me why. Thanks for coming.” Turning to face the others, Dax included Zach, Miles, Jackson, and the Carlson brothers in his appreciation. “It means a lot, you guys coming today. Kurt was a friend as well as an associate. He’ll be missed.”
“We’ll get together soon, poker or a play party, your choice,” Jackson suggested as the crowd started to disperse, and Dax saw Krista’s black-clad, slender form walking toward the limousine.
“Sounds good. Thanks, guys.”
Pulling up in front of the Matthews home fifteen minutes later, Dax opted to park in front of the white-brick ranch to keep from getting pinned in by other guests. Cutting the engine of his vintage Corvette convertible, he sat a moment, trying to get his act together before he entered the house where he’d had the most intense and satisfying sexual experience of his life. He cursed as he thought of the length of time since that one night, and the attempts he’d made to put distance between him and the one woman he couldn’t seem to forget.
But that night hadn’t been the first time he’d visited Kurt’s home, or walked out driven by an ache for his friend’s wife he couldn’t suppress. Like today, it had been a pleasant February afternoon when he’d stopped by with a CT scan of a patient they’d been conferring on, after calling ahead first to get his opinion on the best treatment plan. Stepping inside the sprawling house in the well-to-do neighborhood, he’d known Krista was Kurt’s wife, as well as the penchant for BDSM Dax and his colleague shared in common. What he hadn’t known was that the woman he continued to fantasize about every time she was assigned to assist him in the OR, relished living as her husband’s full-time submissive.
“Dax, come on in.” Dr. Kurt Matthews held his door open and Dax stepped inside, clutching the scan in his hand. A part of him knew this was a mistake. He found being in the same operating room with Krista Matthews difficult enough, seeing her in the home she shared with her husband would be tantamount to rubbing salt on an open wound, but he refused to let his libido get in the way of his job. Giving his patients the best care possible had always come first, which was why he had set aside his misgivings and phoned ahead to let Kurt know he needed a second opinion on William Henderson’s case.
“Thanks for making time to go over this with me, Kurt.” Handing him the medical report, Dax kept his eyes on his friend, resisting the urge to look around for Krista. “I’ve got him scheduled for a double bypass in two days, but now I’m debating over whether I should do a triple. I hate cases like this that could go either way, especially when it’s an eighty-two-year-old man with his history.”
“You can’t discount the risk of a major coronary on the table,” Kurt said, holding up the heart scan to the light as he walked into a great room. “Give me a minute here. Can I get you something? A beer?”
“I wouldn’t say no.” But I should, Dax thought when Kurt called out for his wife.
“Krista, bring us a couple of beers, please.”
There was a second of silence before her soft voice echoed with her reply. “Be right there, Sir.”
Shit. The title of respect she tacked on told Dax just how far the Matthews took their Dom/sub relationship, something he hadn’t considered when he’d decided to interrupt the weekend with work. Or had he suspected, and allowed curiosity and the non-stop growing desire for forbidden fruit to lead him here today? Dax didn’t care for that possibility. He didn’t cross certain lines when indulging in his dominant proclivities and wouldn’t start now, no matter how tempted. But the sight of Kurt’s wife entering the room wearing nothing but a thigh skimming, light blue shift and decorative, blue-suede collar almost coerced a rebuttal of that last thought from him.
He was no novice when it came to admiring a submissive woman, but his instant, adolescent physical response as he watched her pad across the hardwood floor and saw her in something other than baggy, hospital scrubs for the first time, made him feel like one. What sane man could look away from those slender legs or the pierced nipples easily seen through the sheer garment?
“Pretty, isn’t she?” Kurt asked, bending to kiss her as she handed one of the beers to Dax.
“Very. Thank you, Krista.” He took the bottle from her slender hand, their fingers skimming before he pulled back as if burned. Her blue eyes widened, as if the friction had shocked her also, before she lowered them in deference to her role in the household.
“Sit down a minute, Dax.” Kurt settled in a wide recliner and, as if it was the most natural thing for her to do, Krista knelt at his feet, sitting back on her heels and lacing her fingers together behind her.
The position pushed her chest out, stretching the thin material against the metal loops adorning her nipples. A pretty blush stole up her neck and spread over her face as she widened her knees, and the short slip rode up far enough to reveal an enticing glimpse of denuded, plump folds.
Perfect. That was the only thought in Dax’s head as he tilted the cold bottle up to his mouth and relished the relief rushing down his dry throat. For months, he’d been wondering what it was about this one unattainable woman that he found more appealing than any other who had crossed his p
ath in the fifteen plus years he’d been indulging in a BDSM lifestyle. Then she looked up at her husband. A search for approval accompanied the eagerness to please suffused on her face and went with the love shining in her bright blue eyes. She’d glowed with that same look when Kurt had first introduced her as his wife, just minutes after Dax had decided to break his rule about not dating co-workers and planned to ask her out—an expression every dominant man strove to produce on their submissive.
Dax had only himself to blame for succumbing to temptation six months later, and if he had it to do all over again, he would refuse Kurt’s invitation to gift his wife with a ménage for her twenty-eighth birthday. That night may not have been the first time he’d had the pleasure of seeing the dark-haired, full-time submissive all but naked and on her knees, but it had been the one and only time he’d touched that soft, alabaster skin, felt the pillowy cushion of her lips wrapped around his cock, and heard her mewls of pleasure as she climaxed. He had to admit, though, that first time he’d seen her had packed almost as big of a wallop to his dominant libido as the few times he’d spotted the couple at the new BDSM club, Chains, since then, and the one time he’d caved to his desire and fucked her.
“Do you have plans tomorrow night?” Kurt asked Dax as they changed out of their scrubs in the doctors’ locker room.