What Happens After Dark Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Teaser chapter

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Berkley Books by Jasmine Haynes

  Praise for the novels of Jasmine Haynes

  “Super sexy . . . I love, love, loved it!”

  —Bella Andre, author of Love Me

  “Deliciously erotic.”

  —Susan Johnson, New York Times bestselling author

  “An erotic, emotional adventure of discovery you don’t want to miss.”

  —Lora Leigh, #1 New York Times bestselling author

  “So incredibly hot that I’m trying to find the right words to describe it without having to be edited for content . . . extremely stimulating from the first page to the last! Of course, that means that I loved it! . . . One of the hottest, sexiest erotic books I have read so far.”

  —Romance Reader at Heart

  “Sexy.”

  —Sensual Romance Reviews

  “Delightfully torrid.”

  —Midwest Book Review

  “Bursting with sensuality and eroticism.”

  —In the Library Reviews

  “The passion is intense, hot, and purely erotic . . . recommended for any reader who likes their stories realistic, hot, captivating, and very, very well written.”

  —Road to Romance

  “Not your typical romance. This one’s going to remain one of my favorites.”

  —The Romance Studio

  “Jasmine Haynes keeps the plot moving and the love scenes very hot.”

  —Just Erotic Romance Reviews

  “A wonderful novel . . . Try this one—you won’t be sorry.”

  —The Best Reviews

  “More than a fast-paced erotic romance, this is a story of family, filled with memorable characters who will keep you engaged in the plot and the great sex. A good read to warm a winter’s night.”

  —Romantic Times

  Berkley Books by Jasmine Haynes

  WHAT HAPPENS AFTER DARK

  PAST MIDNIGHT

  MINE UNTIL MORNING

  HERS FOR THE EVENING

  YOURS FOR THE NIGHT

  FAIR GAME

  LACED WITH DESIRE

  (with Jaci Burton, Joey W. Hill, and Denise Rossetti)

  UNLACED

  (with Jaci Burton, Joey W. Hill, and Denise Rossetti)

  SHOW AND TELL

  THE FORTUNE HUNTER

  OPEN INVITATION

  TWIN PEAKS

  (with Susan Johnson)

  SOMEBODY’S LOVER

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada

  (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

  Penguin Books Ltd., 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  Penguin Group Ireland, 25 St. Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd.)

  Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia

  (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty. Ltd.)

  Penguin Books India Pvt. Ltd., 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi—110 017, India

  Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, Auckland 0632, New Zealand

  (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd.)

  Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty.) Ltd., 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196,

  South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This book is an original publication of The Berkley Publishing Group.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  Copyright © 2011 by Jennifer Skullestad.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized editions. HEAT and the HEAT design are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  PRINTING HISTORY

  Heat trade paperback edition /November 2011

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Haynes, Jasmine.

  What happens after dark / Jasmine Haynes.—Heat trade paperback ed.

  p. cm.

  ISBN : 978-1-101-54583-6

  I. Title.

  PS3608.A936W47 2011

  813’.6—dc22

  2011011591

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  To my mom,

  because she’s a wonderful lady.

  Love you, Mom!

  ACKNOWLED GMENTS

  Thanks to my special network of friends who support me, brainstorm with me, and encourage me: Bella Andre, Shelley Bates, Jenny Andersen, Jackie Yau, Ellen Higuchi, Kathy Coatney, Pamela Fryer, Rosemary Gunn, and Laurel Jacobson. And of course, thank you to my agent, Lucienne Diver, and my editor, Wendy McCurdy.

  PROLOGUE

  HE TIPPED HIS HEAD BACK, SAVORING THE FEEL OF HER MOUTH ON him. Christ. She knew every nerve that excited him. Dropping his chin, he opened his eyes to drink in the sight of her down on her knees on the plush navy carpet, her silky black hair cascading down the slope of her back. With red fingernails, red lips, and alabaster skin, she was more beautiful than any model gracing the cover of a fashion magazine.

  He groaned as she hit a sweet spot with her tongue. His legs trembled, his tension rising, need pulling at him.

  For six months, she’d been his to command. Since the night he’d won her away from Derek, her bruiser boyfriend, in a downtown club. She wasn’t made for the club scene, and he’d taken her from Derek as if she were the war prize in hand-to-hand combat, which technically she was, since he’d decked the guy to rescue her.

  And what a prize she was. Squeezing his cock, she tantalized him, drove him mad. He thought his head would explode. Shoving his fingers through her hair, he pushed her back. “Not yet,” he murmured.

  She gazed up at him with eyes the shade of sapphires. “Did I do something wrong, Master?” Her voice was soft, sweet, like the gentle babble of a distant brook.

  She insisted on c
alling him Master as if he were her dom and she his submissive. He’d never gone in for the dominance and submission lifestyle, but after he found her in that San Francisco sex club, he’d read a bit on the Internet. There were aspects of it he enjoyed immensely—tying her down, blindfolding her, a good spanking, toys, forcing her to push her sexual limits—but other elements, humiliation, degradation, making her cry, giving her to another man as if she were chattel—which was what he’d caught Derek doing—that stuff, not so much. She liked to be dominated, but she needed to feel special. She needed approval. She withered when she was ignored.

  He couldn’t have ignored her if he’d tried. Even when she wasn’t within sight, he fantasized about her. Hot fantasies where she was handcuffed, spread out on his bed, and begging him to crawl between her legs. Yeah, he liked the dominant role. “I told you not to make me come yet,” he said sternly.

  “You should punish me for that,” she whispered. “Because I’m such a slut, and I’m bad.”

  That was another thing she liked, the name-calling. Bitch, slut, even worse. At first he’d used the names because they made her wild. But they made him burn hotter, too. Being with her had taught him how sexy a little dirty talk could be. And then there was the punishment thing . . .

  “Get on the bed, whore,” he ordered, and his erection surged, his blood pumping faster.

  She bit her bottom lip, drew in a breath, her nostrils flaring with her excitement. Then she rose gracefully, her movements steady. He’d closed the blinds against the cold January night, and the soft lighting of his bedroom illuminated her slender body, the elegant curves of her back and bottom. Her limbs were long and lithe, her breasts small, the areoles dusky pink buttons. She was a tall woman at five nine, and barefoot, she was only a couple of inches shorter than him. He’d never been worried about his height; Derek had been taller and bigger than he was, but he’d still won the girl.

  She climbed onto the big bed on all fours, her ass heart-shaped.

  “On your back,” he instructed. “Spread your legs and arms.”

  She laid down, her pussy glistening. The rich burgundy of the bedspread made her skin glow. “I know I’ve been bad, Master. You need to punish me and call me the names I deserve.”

  For her to feel that way, he’d assumed she’d had bad relationships in the past that had marked her with some deep-seated insecurities. Derek the horse’s ass certainly wasn’t the first. He also couldn’t deny his desire for a little tender lovemaking and more intimacy. He wanted to know more about her, exchange more than sex, reach a deeper level. But there was power in dominating her, too. They both excelled at dirty, nasty games. He’d bought the fur-lined handcuffs; then he’d bought the four-poster bed to attach them to. The scarves in the top drawer of his dresser—which could be used as either blindfolds or bindings—hid a variety of toys he’d used on her.

  He hoped to God one of his daughters didn’t start rooting around in there during their frequent trips home from college.

  “Scarves or handcuffs?” He could gauge her mood by the kind of restraints she asked for. “Which do you deserve, you dirty little bitch?”

  Her lips parted; her eyes darkened. “Handcuffs,” she whispered.

  She wanted things a little rougher. Something must have happened at work today. Not that she ever told him much about her life outside the bounds of their relationship. She was secretive even when he questioned her. Her evasiveness was one of the things he’d had yet to break her of, but he would, eventually. Tonight, she’d been tense when she arrived. In fact, she’d been unusually stressed for weeks, and he’d learned that the worse her day had been, the higher degree of domination she required.

  “Wider, slut,” he demanded as he took one delicate ankle in his hand. She stretched for him, her scent rising, swirling around him. He was hard for her, ravenous, but the night would end quickly after he came. He wanted to stretch it out.

  She’d never spent the night. They didn’t cuddle afterward. He didn’t know precisely where she lived or the name of the company she worked for, only that she was thirty-five, unmarried, no children, made her living as an accountant, and she was promiscuous. He’d gathered that the fact he’d been her only lover over the past six months was unusual.

  He took it as a testament to how good he was at giving her what she needed.

  She needed the trappings of submission, but what she loved best was making him climax with her mouth and swallowing his come. She relished every groan, every cry of pleasure he gave. If he didn’t make her come before he did, she wouldn’t come at all. As if she didn’t require the orgasm to be satisfied.

  But in this moment, he craved her climax, her pleasure, to feel her body tremble for him.

  Rounding the bed, he restrained her other ankle. Then he went to work on her wrists, anchoring them to the bedposts. He didn’t ask her if it was too tight; she would merely tell him that she would take whatever he chose to dish out.

  “What are you going to do to me, Master?” Her voice quavered, but it wasn’t fear; it was need. When she was restrained, he could force her to let go.

  “Would you like me to fuck you?” he murmured, climbing onto the bed, leaning close to draw in the scent of her. She made his head spin.

  “I’m your whore. You can do whatever you need, Master.”

  Need? Christ. He needed so much, all the things she withheld, herself. Her thoughts, her feelings, her fears, her joys, her past. Yes, all those things; but for now, he would take this, savor it, until she gave him more.

  He grabbed her chin, held her, forced eye contact. “I want to hear you scream my name when you come.”

  She blinked rapidly a moment, and he knew that wasn’t what she wanted to hear. She wanted his orgasm. But she was his slave, and she answered the way she had to. “I will.”

  He lowered his lips to hers, though he didn’t kiss her. “I’m going to lick you, my sweet little slut. That’s how I want you to come,” he whispered against her mouth.

  She tensed. He’d never gone down on her when she wasn’t restrained. He’d never made her come with his mouth, tongue, or fingers when she wasn’t immobilized and unable to fight him. He loved it that way, too, because in those moments, she was his, she let herself go. As if somehow the restraints actually set her free.

  “But don’t you need to come?” Her tone rose slightly at the end as if it were a question, yet she cajoled, her voice like a siren in the night.

  God yes, he needed to come inside her, or her mouth. Or by her hand. She could work him up in any way she tried. But he wanted her climax, which was tantamount to her capitulation.

  “I’m going to lick you, and you’re going to scream.” He covered her, flesh to flesh, held her gaze, her eyes wide, pupils dilated, her nipples pebbled against his chest. “Right?”

  She gave in. “Yes, Master,” she whispered on nothing more than a puff of air.

  Then he crawled down her body, tasting her skin as he dragged his tongue over her breasts, her belly, down to the finely trimmed mound of her sex.

  “You have the sweetest scent.” He breathed her in, then put his tongue to her a moment. “And the sweetest taste.” He loved her pussy; she was gorgeous, full, pink, her clit burgeoning.

  He swiped his tongue across her, back and forth, swirling her taste in his mouth. God. How he loved this. She writhed against her bonds, and her soft sounds of delicious distress filled the room. He fit first one, then two fingers inside her, and played her G-spot and her clit in tandem.

  She panted. Moaned. Music to his ears. Then her legs started to shake, her cries rose, she called out his name, and her body jerked. He kept at her, rode the tide of her orgasm, until she fell limp against the comforter, her dark hair splayed across his pillows.

  Her taste lingered on his lips as he shimmied up her body to lay beside her. “Was it good?”

  “Master, it was heaven.” She swallowed, closed her eyes.

  He wasn’t looking for affirmation. There was just
something too . . . fast. As if she’d wanted to appease him.

  “But you didn’t come,” she added.

  He gave her a long, measured look, something inside him shifting. “You didn’t come either, did you?”

  She swallowed again. Like a nervous habit she’d suddenly acquired. “I did.”

  “Don’t lie to your master.” He clenched his teeth against the epithet that rose to his lips. He could call her whore, slut, bitch, almost anything as he was seducing her, but the words lost their sexiness in the aftermath.

  She filled herself with a great gulp of air, her chest rising, her skin tinged with pink, though not as if she’d just surrendered to a luscious orgasm. More like . . . nerves.

  “I’m very displeased that you didn’t come.” He used language she understood and responded to.

  Yet this time she evaded him. “I’ll suck you,” she whispered. Straining against the handcuffs, she tugged her wrists as if she needed to touch him. “I’ll make you come.”

  A coldness spread through him. “How often do you fake it?”

  “I don’t,” she whispered, looking at his nose, his cheek, his mouth, anything to avoid meeting his eyes.

  But he felt her lie in the stiffening of her limbs. He wondered how many times she’d faked an orgasm, how many times he’d been so wrapped up in her, in what she made him feel, that he hadn’t realized how good an actress she was.

  Fuck. He was forty-five years old, too old to get rankled, yet the fake cut him. He wanted into her life. He wanted her to know about him, his daughters, his work, even his failed marriage. And he wanted to know everything about her. There were times his gut roiled against her secrets, the way she held him emotionally at bay. But this was what they had. She phoned, came to his house, had him call her names, tie her down or cuff her, blindfold her, spank her. When she was at his mercy, he could do anything he wanted. The sex between them was fantastic, but he wanted something more authentic from her, more real, more than just bits and pieces of her life. He wanted a whole night without her rushing away. He’d wanted all that for months, but he hadn’t pushed. He’d bided his time. Only to find out she’d actually faked some of her orgasms. Damn her.