Chapter 14
Zephyr
He’dmadehersquirt.
Zephyr had never squirted in her life, and it wasn’t like she didn’t have any sexual experience. She’d had a few partners; two of them had made her orgasm. She had always enjoyed sex and had never felt shame in wanting her pleasure, but she’d genuinely believed she was just one of those women who weren’t built to ejaculate.
She’d been wrong. With a few thrusts of his strong fingers, he’d unraveled that belief.
The next morning, as Zephyr changed the sheets and got ready to go to work, she thought back to the previous night.
With her head cleared from arousal and post-orgasmic bliss, she realized he’d sought her out, despite saying he didn’t want to complicate anything with sexual attraction. It didn’t get more sexual than what they’d done, a first for them.
A decade ago, their relationship hadn’t been as sexual, though not for the lack of trying on her part. She’d been eighteen and he almost twenty-two, and he’d been adamant about not sleeping with her until he could do better for himself, like she’d even cared about that. But she’d seen him before that, seen him fuck a girl once against a wall, and god, her teenage self had been eaten up with jealousy. She remembered she’d cried to Zen that night, and it had been her younger sister who had very sensibly told her to just talk to him because he didn’t even know of her existence. She had taken the advice, and gathered her courage, and approached him one evening.
And he’d fallen for her. Only to not remember a thing about it.
Zephyr took a deep breath. He was hers now, and that was all that mattered. He had initiated something between them, and that was her win of the day.
One step forward.
Zephyr loved the way her ring glinted in the salon lights. Throughout the day, as she’d worked on two of her regular clients, her eyes kept drifting to the way the gems sparkled in the bright lights in her workspace, and god, she loved it. She loved the weight of it on her finger, the reminder that he had given her the perfect ring for her, the
way anyone who saw it ‘oohed’ and ‘aahed’ over it. She loved the feeling of soreness between her legs, the memory of his fingers inside her every time she moved, the glow on her face as she caught her reflection. Her eyes were shining and she loved it. Marriage suited her. Marriage to him suited her.
As she snipped one of her newest client’s hair, her eagerness to return to their new home built up. She didn’t know how the night would go, but she knew she wanted to just be in his presence again. Odd as it sounded, she missed him.
Shaking off her thoughts, she focused on what her newest client was saying.
“That’s a nice ring on your finger.”
Zephyr had been receiving compliments about it all day and she’d been smiling like an idiot about it, but something in the woman’s tone had her gaze sharpening. It wasn’t something obvious that she could put her finger on, just something… off.
“Thank you,” she smiled politely and simply cut the lock of mahogany hair between her fingers.
“Mrs. Villanova, right?” the client pressed.
Zephyr kept the polite smile as she checked the lady out. Mid-forties, crow’s feet on the corner of her hardened brown eyes.
She stayed silent.
“Your husband manages girls, did you know that?” She didn’t wait for a response. “Girls on the streets, he takes them under his security, gives them better choices. It’s bad for business. But at least you won’t have to wonder where he’s spending his nights when he’s not at home. A man like that wouldn’t be content to settle, you know.”
Zephyr didn’t react outwardly as ants crawled up her skin. Something about this woman was unsettling, and not just what she knew about her husband. It felt icky, like she’d dragged the scent of something rotten inside with her.
Turning on the blow-dryer so she wouldn’t have to listen to any more of her words, Zephyr quickly finished with her hair as soon as she could, barely spending any time to actually make it look as good as she was known for. She nodded to one of the assistants and indicated for him to take over the final setting, leaving the repugnant woman behind as she went to the main counter for a breather.
The receptionist raised her eyebrows. “Bad lunch?” Which was code for an awful client.
She gave a weak smile, her mind swirling with questions, not about Alpha, because she knew what he did already, but about the woman and who the hell she was. How did she know all that about her husband, and more importantly what was she doing at Zephyr's workplace telling her all of it? What was the point of that?
The demoness in question came to the counter and paid, all the while watching Zephyr with sharp eyes. Just as she stepped out from her side, she bent from her height.
“The Syndicate is watching you now.”
And she left.
Zephyr didn't know what The Syndicate was but it sure as hell didn't sound like a club she wanted the membership to. Frowning at the bizarre encounter, Zephyr shook her head and wrapped up her day, totally weirded out by the random woman. She clocked out and exited the salon to find Victor, her bonafide bodyguard and driver, reading a newspaper as he leaned against the large Rover, a few women checking him out as they walked past him.