Dukes of Ruin: Chapter 23

This might be the only time the tower’s party room has been silent.

The light is low everywhere but here, a large lamp trained right on Sy. There are candles elsewhere, the light flickering around the four corners of the room. From my vantage under the heat of the light, the rest of the tower could be a vast abyss, and that’s what it feels like. There are probably three dozen people in this room, but it feels like it’s only the four of us. Sy, sitting backwards in a chair, hunched over, arms resting on the back. Nick, watching from my side, his gloved hand reaching out to wipe the excess ink away when my needle lifts. The Duchess and all her starlight as she carefully places a stitch into a cut on Sy’s eyebrow.

Someone over by the bar coughs and I watch from my periphery as Nick shoots him a glare. The frat isn’t used to this ritual because it isn’t theirs. But they’re trying. It’s a more spiritual feeling than I’m used to, like their energy is pulsing into the stone and mortar, wrapping around us.

These are the most important tattoos I’ve ever done.

Sy’s back piece is a round tribal between his shoulder blades, each ring a part of his native heritage, and the silence is a show of respect. Not for Sy, although he deserves it. It’s about respecting the significance—the honor. This is a warrior receiving his badge.

I lift my gun and Nick is there instantly, wiping away the ink. He’s the only other person we’d ever allow to be a part of this. The tribal has gotten intricate, bigger over the past three years, each ring a victory, but Nick hasn’t been there for most of them. I can see him tracing the rings with his eyes, maybe wondering which fight belongs to each.

With each victory, the rings get bigger, take longer. One day, it’s going to be a full piece. I can envision it so clearly in my mind, the rings expanding outward like ripples.

Their dad, Manny, taught me the symbols. The one I’m currently pricking into his skin is his tribe’s symbol for change. His dad appreciates the care I take in doing them—so much that, every year, he invites me to their summer ceremony so the tribal elder can bless my ink. We’ve been doing it since high school, and it’s obvious from the first few rings that I was still learning, the ink a little fuzzy. Usually, looking at my own bad work would make my chest thrum with the instinct to fix it, cover it up with something better, but this?

This is sacred history.

Tate was around for some of them.

I look up and see the soft, flickering glow of candlelight illuminating Vinny’s cheek. She’s perched on a chair right in front of Sy, sitting on her knees. Her forehead is pinched in concentration as she pushes the needle through Sy’s skin, delicately tying off the thread of a stitch. He’d come off the mat with a river of blood streaming down his eye—the only good shot the Baron really got on him—and Vinny had been the one to toss him a towel. Now she’s patching my boy up, her needle on one end of his soul, mine on the other. Something about it is painfully intimate, as if Vinny and I are meeting through the care we’re taking for him, weaving together through his flesh and spirit. If either of them asked me why, I don’t think I could explain it, but it might be closer than sex.

When I finish the last link on the ring, I let the buzz of my gun cease, and it drops the room into a heavy, expectant hush. Nick reaches over me to give it one last wipe down just as Vinny snips off the last stitch. Sy glances over his shoulder, meeting my eyes, and I nod.

The three of us watch him, waiting. He begins the ritual at sundown, and his silence isn’t broken until he either loses, or he’s gotten his mark. His back expands with an inhale, and then his gravelly bark emerges. “Fuck the Barons!”

The whole room erupts in a loud, rowdy cheer, and someone’s close enough to the lights to flick them on, revealing a room full of excited, half-drunk miscreants.

Fuck, I love this place.

Between one cheer and the next, the music crashes through the speakers like an impatient guest, sending the space into a pulse of deep bass.

I give Sy a pat on the shoulder as he stands, stretching his arms and legs. Verity is there with a beer and a smile, saying, “Congrats!” and he ruffles her hair.

There’s a pause before he looks at Vinny, who’s gazing up at him with a wary expression. I’m expecting some more fireworks, because these two… I’m not sure they know it yet, but the tension between them is just like his back piece; a ripple of rings, spreading out, glancing off all of us.

I wish they’d fuck already.

Luckily for the vibe of the night, he just reaches out to give her a quick tap on the cheek with the flats of his fingers. It’s more of a pat than a slap, and I’m relieved to see her take it as the gesture it’s clearly meant to be, giving Sy a small grin as she gathers her medic supplies.

Sy is always a little easier to take after a fight.

From here, it’s a proper party. Nick helps me get Sy’s back prepped for healing, and I carefully put the blessed ink away, going through the motions of sanitizing the area. My tattoo work isn’t over yet. It feels good to have the gun in my hand again, like my art never quite knows if it’s real until it’s being pricked into flesh as a token of permanence. The pace of it slows me down, the methodical precision, the humming vibration as the needle buries itself in the flesh. Even when it’s easy stuff, like lining the pledges up for their very first paw, it doesn’t feel like the end of a ritual. It feels like the middle of one.

I reset the gun and glance over at Vinny, who’s currently chatting with Verity at the bar. Her cheeks expand with a smile—a real smile—and the sight of it makes me freeze, realizing I’ve never seen it before. It’s as radiant as the sun, and when she laughs at something Verity says, I feel so eager to have it shine on me that I call her over.

“Duchess! Bring me a beer.”

Her smile deflates like a sad balloon, and for a second, I regret calling out to her. Stars are always better observed than felt. Something happened to her in the ring. I watched as it stole her away under the glare of the spotlight and returned her to us with wide eyes, mouth set into a new resolve.

Whatever happened, it makes her willing to turn to the senior DKS manning the bar and request a beer. He hands her a bottle from our stash and she carries it over, passing Sy as he pulls on his shirt. I see the way her eyes take him in, the flick of her tongue while he can’t see her. She’s not the only girl here eyefucking him. Hell yeah, my man could pull a lot of tail if he’d take the stick out of his ass for ten minutes. Cutsluts love nothing more than to be a victor’s spoils.

Too bad Sy never takes his cut.

She approaches my makeshift workstation with a beer in one hand and her cup in another. She hands me the bottle, still looking like a fucking firecracker in that get-up Verity put her into. She’s lost the jacket, which doesn’t surprise me. It always gets too hot in here. Something about the way she’s looking tonight just… fits. All those little strappy things Nick keeps putting her in are sexy, but stick to her frame artlessly, as if her very essence finds them disagreeable. Too soft. Vinny needs to be covered in harsh things.

Lucky us.

It makes it harder to shake the feeling that this girl erupted from my brain, fully formed. Sometimes, like this morning’s spat with Sy, she seems like this fucking… issue. She throbs around this place like a sore muscle, climbing the staircase to her loft, zipping from room to room, as restless on the outside as I feel on the inside. It’s hard to really sink down into my thoughts when I hear her. See her. Feel her.

But other times, a lot like right now, she almost seems too good to be true.

“Thanks, Vinny,” I say, swallowing half in one gulp. It dulls the rattling sounds in my head. The questions and second-guessing. I reach for her and drag her forward, pushing down the waist of her pants. The points of the star reveal themselves and I trace them with my finger, silently counting the points.

“So is that post-game tattoo ritual something all of you do, or…?” she asks, glancing over her shoulder at Sy.

“Nah,” I say, lingering on the skin covering her hip. “That’s just for Sy. It’s a native warrior thing—probably not spiritually legit on account of me being white as fuck, but it’s what his dad did in his fighting days.”

She reaches out, prodding the Virgin Mary on my bicep. “I didn’t peg any of you for the religious types.”

I let out a grim laugh. “Ah, I was raised Catholic. You know the drill.” I shoot up on the bench, raising my voice over the party to sing, “If you’re happy and you know it, that’s a sin.”

Around the room, a handful of DKS respond:

Clap. Clap.

“There’s my boys!” I raise my beer to them, smiling wryly at their cheers. To Vinny, I explain, “Some of these fuckers had to sit through mass in school with me. Snorting Ritalin in the sacristy—now that’s the ritual of my people.” I drop back onto the bench, arranging my supplies. “Our Lady of Sorrows,” I say of the tattoo. “I’m lapsed, but some things just stick to you. Seven swords, seven points.” There’s definitely a little mountain of evidence here that Lavinia isn’t real, and I take a moment to count the points on the star again.

It doesn’t work in my dreams.

I tried it the last time we slept together, because I saw her. She was blonde—she always is when I’m dreaming. But I finally saw the stars. I saw the red light. I saw the air and heard the screams, but I also saw the tattoo.

And it was just some janky, jumbled blur of lines.

“Wanna help?”

His eyebrow rises. “Help with what?” There’s a wariness in her voice. She’s right to have it. I could bend her over my bench and fuck the daylights out of her if I wanted. No one in this room would stop me. That’s the kind of power that comes from being a Duke. It rushes through my blood like a stimulant.

I point to the freshman eagerly waiting his turn. “These cubs have earned their marks. You want to assist?”

Her expression clears into surprise. “Me?”

I shrug, grab a fresh vial of ink, and pat the small section of bench between my legs. “Sure.”

She hesitates slightly, but swallows the last part of her drink and straddles the bench. I grab her by the hips and yank her back until the swell of her ass pushes against my crotch. Excited warmth spreads through me at the feel of her against my bare skin—my shirt having been lost on the climb up the tower. I fold her body in the curve of my torso like a heartbeat. Maybe Nick’s got the right idea with this lap-sitting business. “Okay, tell me which one of these douchebags should go first.”

She looks down the row—they’ve been standing there for an hour—told to do so by Nick. Poor fuckers thought they were coming up all those flights of stairs to get lit. Instead, they’re standing in a line for most of the night. That’s the life of a pledge. When the party’s over, they’ll get to clean up our fun.

Vinny searches the line, assessing each kid like she’s picking the winner of a beauty pageant. “How about him?” she says, pointing to a punk toward the end of the line.

My eyes narrow. “Why him?” I press my palm against her side, sliding it up beneath the hem of her crop top. “You think he’s cute or something?”

Her shoulder lifts in what could either be a squirm or a shrug. “He held the door for me on the way out of the gym. Shouldn’t I, like… bestow my Duchessy favor on him or whatever?”

I breathe in the scent of her, rich and sweet, a hint of honey. “If you start doing that, you’ll have all these guys scraping at your feet like dogs.”

A slow, wicked smirk spreads her lips. “I can think of worse things.”

I give her waist a hard squeeze. “Don’t forget who you belong to. A guy could get jealous.”

“Big words coming from the guy who fucks his ring girl on a regular basis.” The scowl she sends Haley’s way shocks me enough that my hands freeze on her ribs. “But you could always do your own dog-like scraping, you know.”

“You’re jealous,” I smugly declare. “Fuck me, Lucia. You really keep shit close to the vest, but you actually want our dicks.”

She whips around to gape at me. “I’m not jealous!”

“You are,” I insist, cock twitching against her ass. “You’re like five seconds from clawing her eyes out.”

She turns away, spine a touch more rigid than before. “You’re delusional.”

“You’re in denial.” Despite this, I press her closer, running my palms under the hem of her shirt. My fingers graze the underside of her bra, her tits heavy and plump, and it doesn’t matter that she goes rigid. I raise my thumbs and flick them over her nipples. “Haley’s old news, anyway. I haven’t fucked her since spring. She’s already been told what’s off limits. You don’t need to have a cat fight on my account. Although…”

This time, she really does squirm. But not before I feel the shiver that rolls down her spine. “Don’t flatter yourself.”

Laughing quietly, I decide to hold this information for later. “Hey, Ballsack,” I call out to the kid she chose. He stumbles forward abruptly, like he forgot where he was for a moment. Probably fell asleep waiting.

“Yes, sir?”

“You’re up. Take off your shirt and sit in the chair.”

The other guys holler out to him as he leaves the line, slapping his shoulder and giving him high-fives. Vinny looks back at me, her ass twisting and rubbing against my cock in the process. “Is this their initiation?”

“One of them,” I say, rocking my hips a little to build friction. “They had to do some shit work for a few weeks to get here, but once they get their cub mark, they’ll move through the ranks, gain a few more responsibilities—earn a few more privileges.”

“Like a cutslut?”

Ah, the jealousy.

Nick’s going to fucking lose it.

“Sometimes.” I gesture for Ballsack to take off his shirt and sit sideways on the bench. The mark goes on the upper arm, a bear’s paw print to denote their cub status. It’s a process every one of us has gone through. I slide my arms between hers and her body and pull her tight against me. “Now, you and I are going to do this together.”

Her body tenses. “You want me to tattoo him? I thought you never let anyone else touch your gun.”

Ballsack looks over at me, then to her, eyes wide. “She’s doing it?”

“Turn around and shut up,” I tell him. “And never look at my Duchess again.” Ballsack isn’t a bad kid. None of them are. They’ve survived a lot to get this far, but it’s our job to keep them in line. No one knows better than I do that the fists of Forsyth are chaos goblins, ready to jump at any promise of destruction. They need a firm hand. “Got it?”

His eyes dart forward. “Yes, sir.”

“Entitled fuck,” I mumble. I push Vinny’s hair off her shoulder, letting my fingers graze over the skin on her neck, and settle my chin in the crook where I have a good view of both our subject and the supple swell of her tits below that loose crop top. “And yes, you’re going to do it. With my help, of course.”

I already have the cub mark prepared on a template, and I instruct her how to apply it, using cold water to leave the purplish temporary dye behind. When it dries, I position the tattoo gun in her hand and wrap my hand around hers. “When you pull the trigger, it’s going to buzz,” I remind her, “and it’ll shake your hand but hold firm. I’m here to keep it steady.”

“Okay,” she says, tightening her grip. “Like this?”

“Exactly.” I wrap my arm around her stomach. “Ready?”

She takes a breath and then turns on the gun. It jolts to life, and she jumps. “You got it, baby,” I tell her, rubbing my hand on her flat belly. “All you have to do is trace the template.”

I hold her arm still, keeping the vibrations minimal, but wait for her to connect with Ballsack’s skin. It takes her a second to get there, but I don’t mind. She’s so close, and she smells like sex. “He’s going to flinch when you make contact,” I say quietly in her ear. “Don’t move with him. Prepare for it. Keep the needle just under the epidermis. It’s more of an etch than a stab.” She moves closer and finally the needle touches his skin. Like I said, he flinches, but not much, and I keep my grip solid over her hand to hold her steady. “That’s right. Good girl.”

She exhales, and I feel her shoulders loosen. Slowly, we trace the outline of the paw print’s middle pad together. I pull the gun back when I think she’s going too deep, and press it in a bit when she’s being too light. It takes half the outline for her to really get a feel for the depth of it, but once she does, my fingers are only covering her knuckles for the novelty of the touch. I don’t think I could ever get enough of her skin, all soft and smooth.

These marks are small and won’t take long, so I savor it while I can. Last year, when my own pledge group got farther into the process, some of them asked me to cover it up with the actual brass Bruin. Bigger and meaner.

She relaxes into me, and I run my hands up and down her legs. She only needs a little help getting the gun steady, but I let her take control. The pledges seem into it, excited to be marked by the Duchess. She’s sexy like this, trapped between my thighs, sharing this moment with me. My cock is rock hard, turned on by the whole scene. She’s bright and there’s no confusion in my mind—this girl is the Duchess. She belongs to us.

She moves to the outlines of the top five pads without me even having to direct her, and I take a moment to really breathe her in. I’ve been horny since the day I ate her pussy in front of Nick, but there’s just one problem.

Nicky hasn’t tapped it yet.

Sy and I talked about it last night, our not knowing what he’s waiting for. Nick’s never been one to draw out the promise of gratification, and he obviously wants her. Worse than that, he obviously needs her. Even now, I can see him across the room, bottle tipped back to his lips, staring at her like someone who’s been magnetized. She’s got her venom in all of us now, but Nick? He’s got it bad. I even got a dressing down for kissing her in the ring, as if she isn’t mine to do with as I please.

I’d be lying if I said it didn’t make me want to do it again.

“Now what?” she asks, pulling the gun back. She tilts her head, considering, and I realize she’s done the little claw marks, too.

Shifting forward, I grunt at the pressure against my dick. “I have to change the needle to shade in the middle areas.”

I decide to do the rest myself, but when she tries to stand up, I slam her back onto the bench against me, making a low, disapproving sound. “Tell me, Vinny,” I say, beginning to press the bundle of needles into the empty spaces. “Did you like it when I licked your pussy?”

Ballsack’s neck twitches, eyes widening, but he obeys orders, not daring to look at the Duchess.

I can’t take my eyes off the tattoo long enough to catch her expression, but I swear I can feel her surprised stare against my hand. “It, uh, got the job done.”

Scoffing, I move from the center pad to the ones at the top. “Please, your body was shaking like you were having a goddamn seizure.” My free hand wanders up her shirt. She should have known I couldn’t resist touching her tits when she was wearing that short little top. “I’m good at what I do. No shame in admitting it.”

She’s still as my palm cups her breast, squeezing. “I’m not ashamed. I got exactly what I wanted.”

Ballsack’s eyes keep cutting to the side, just shy of actually making contact with her.

“I’m glad to hear you say that.” I pull the gun away, revealing Ballsack’s finished tattoo. “Just a sec, wardog. Hang tight.” I put the gun down and get comfortable with Vinny’s chest, sliding my other hand up her shirt.

Her hands clamp around my wrists. “What are you doing?”

“Relax.” I tip her back against me, feeling the weight of her tits in my hands. “Ballsack’s a good cub. He wouldn’t look. But he’s made a good impression on you, and that means I need to make a point.”

Her chest dips with a long exhale. “What point is that?”

I pinch her nipples, delighting in her hitched breath. “That you belong to us. Your tits. Your pussy. Your ass.” Dropping my voice to a whisper against the shell of her ear, I add, “Your mouth…”

Her nipples are peaked now, head resting back on my shoulder. “I think everyone knows that.”

“Of course they do.” I open my mouth against her neck, giving her tits a hard squeeze as I start sucking. It’s been a few days now, and all her bruises are fading. It’s a shame. The blue and purple was perfect on her, a little trail of breadcrumbs to every point of her body.

Guess I’ll need to make more.

Her skin tastes like copper and sky, the flavor of the moon. Pulling back, I admire the bruise I’ve made. “But it never hurts to remind them.” I reach up to her chin, turning her to meet my gaze. Resting my thumb on her lip, I add, “And it never hurts to remind you.”

Her eyelids give me a heavy blink, and I know she’s perfect when she immediately figures it out. “You want my mouth.”

I answer by dipping down to kiss her, intending to push my tongue between her lips. I’ve been thinking of them ever since that kiss in the ring earlier. Seeing their imprint on Sy’s neck during the entire fight didn’t exactly help matters, either. Nick getting his briefs in a tangle over it doesn’t make me less inclined.

Vinny obviously doesn’t agree, because she whips her head to the side before I can make contact. I follow her gaze right to Nick, who’s fisting the neck of his bottle like it’s someone’s throat. “Don’t,” she warns, so low that I can barely hear her. “You don’t know what he’ll do to me.”

Of course I know.

People like to think I’m too lost in my own problems to recognize theirs, but it’s not true. I see things. I see Sy on the edge of losing it every time she’s in the room. I see him sometimes around the tower with his head in his hands, breathing like his lungs are holding all his air hostage. I see Nick, every now and then, sitting on the end of his bed, hunched and silent, eyes so shrouded with darkness that it makes me wonder what he’s thinking about. I see him get up every day and try to shake off the layer of South Side that’s calcified over his skin, but never quite succeeding. Whenever everyone else sees that tattoo on his temple—two-three-seven—they see an ode to South Side. Mayhem and destruction. A true soldier.

But I see 7:32.

I see them for what they are; fractured, volatile, too internal for their own goods. And I’ve seen Vinny the morning after Nick chucked her into that elevator—black and blue and red, red, red…

“I want your mouth,” I tell her, forcing her to face me. “One way or another.”

I can see when it hits her, and Jesus fuck, but that elevator must be really bad, because she doesn’t even look conflicted about the choice; her mouth around my cock or being subjected to whatever Nick will have in store for her.

I know the second I pull away that I can’t wait. “Now.” There’s a flash of apprehension in her eyes that doesn’t lessen when I stand, putting the obscene bulge in my pants right into her face. Breathing hard, I reach for my fly and say, “Ready?”

Her eyes widen, pinging around the room. “But—”

“Nick won’t care. Kissing and fucking are off-limits, but not this.” We’ve already drawn the attention of a few people, and it just makes my dick twitch even harder at the thought. “No one will look. Not unless I tell them to.”

She tries, “We can go upstairs,” and I shake my head.

“I’m making a point here. Remember?” I nod to the floor. “Here.”

A hardness that I haven’t seen since this morning returns to her features and she looks around, eyes flitting over Ballsack and the row of cubs pretending they’re not hanging on to every word.

“Is this an order?” she asks.

“If that’s what it takes to get you on your knees, yeah.” I tilt my head. “That or I just make you.”

Sighing, she rises from the bench, giving me a steely look as she steps over it and stands in front of me, hands fidgeting. I grab her by the hair and expose her neck, resuming the hickey I’d started on before, dipping down to rub my tongue over the mark. I drag her close, my cock grinding into her lower belly, and then grunt into her neck, reaching down to get two thick handfuls of her ass. It’s how I realize she’s not wearing any panties. There’s a rip just below her ass cheek, and my finger meets skin. If I push it in a little further, it’s warm skin. And if I curl into her, sliding my finger between her thighs, it’s slick skin.

“Fuck,” I growl, pulling away from the hickey long enough to get a good look at that plump mouth of hers. And then, in a show of having zero self-control, I duck in to finally steal that kiss. Nick isn’t looking. What would it matter?

But she bobs away, straining away from my mouth. “Don’t,” she repeats, and the flash of panic in her eyes makes me pause.

I wonder if Nick has any idea how effective their agreement is. It’s not real loyalty by any stretch, but even here, cloaked by the party, she wouldn’t break it. My knuckles strain against the denim of her jeans as I rub her slickness into the furled tightness of her asshole. There’s a loud rip, the slash in her jeans giving way.

One of her palms lands on my bare chest, but the other reaches for my zipper, lowering it quickly.

Without warning, she drops to her knees, almost breaking my trapped wrist in the process.

“Hasty,” I say, panting as I shove my pants down my thighs. “I like it.”

But before she can even get an eyeful of my cock, she’s darting an anxious gaze toward the room. There’s a slack-jawed sophomore standing at the bar, gaping at the two of us.

“Can’t we have… like a buffer or something?”

“A buffer?” I know all the blood in my body is rushing toward my dick, but I don’t know what the hell she’s talking about.

“Someone to stand between us and… well, everyone else.” Her eyes dart to Ballsack still in the chair. To be fair, I haven’t told him he can leave.

“That depends.” I give my cock a squeeze. “You gonna swallow?”

She bites back, “You gonna let me breathe?”

Ballsack looks like his boner might kill him.

Grinning, I agree, “I’ll let you breathe enough.” She nods. “Then I can arrange that.”

“What about her?” she asks, before I can grab the nearest person. She’s looking over her shoulder at a group of cutsluts across the room, and I fight back a laugh. Girls, man. Catty bitches to the moon and back.

I bark, “Haley! Get your ass over here!”

She doesn’t hesitate, skipping up, freezing in place at the sight of my dick in Vinny’s face. I tell Ballsack, “Sit here and make sure no one comes over. Keep your back turned.” Haley still makes my eyes hurt—diarylide yellow, too brash, too bright—but I still give her an order. “You can watch my Duchess take my dick.”

Haley rolls her eyes, folding her arms moodily, but I know she doesn’t really care. Vinny wouldn’t be the first girl she’s watched suck me off.

My Duchess, however…

Vinny throws Haley a dark, determined look, and then wraps her fingers around my shaft, making me inhale a hiss of air. Spiteful, stubborn, and competitive. “Tell me she isn’t the perfect Duchess,” I say, chuckling low as I touch her cheek. Vinny meets my gaze and then parts those plush, red lips. Her tongue is the first thing I feel, wet and hot against the head of my cock. I watch, enraptured as my cock surges a bead of pre-cum right onto the rosy tip of her tongue. It disappears in the next instant, her mouth sinking forward, enveloping me in tight heat.

“Fuck, Vinny.” I cradle her cheek, coaxing it deeper as Haley looks on with a tight expression. All of the other cutsluts are peering around her, realizing what’s going on. Vinny sinks lower, but her tongue isn’t doing much. Her eyes keep lifting to mine, like she’s trying to figure out whether or not this is doing it for me. That more than anything makes me ask, “You ever sucked cock before, beautiful?” Even as I say it, I know the answer. “Just Sy’s, huh?” He wouldn’t have given her the space to get comfortable with it—not like I would. I rest my shoulders against the wall, basking in her efforts—pulling back to bathe the tip with her tongue. “Yeah, because you’re ours. I bet he choked you, didn’t he?”

She gives me a long, significant look.

I tuck my fingers beneath her hair, against her nape. “Don’t hold it against him. You’re probably the first girl who’s ever tried.” When she pushes farther, throat jumping with a gag, I grunt, “Don’t be a hero. Use your hand, baby.” She’s aware of the eyes on us, gasps and chuckles drawing more attention than we had initially. I lift her hand from my hip, curling her fingers around the base. I don’t need it deep. I just need it like this—wet and slow, the sounds of sloppy suction mingling with the music.

She shifts her knees toward me a bit, twisting her mouth a bit as she pulls back, only to sink back down. I can feel her testing it out, breathing hard through her nose as she reaches beneath my dick to graze a knuckle against my balls.

I shudder, clamping my hand around her neck. “Yeah, yeah, that’s good. So good for me, Vinny. Look at your mouth—so fucking pretty. Can’t wait to finally fuck you. I bet you’d like it hard, wouldn’t you? I bet you’d be mouthy when there isn’t a cock stuffed in there.”

Haley heaves a sigh, and I shoot her a murderous look.

She shrinks back.

Holding onto Vinny’s neck, I urge her faster, thrusting against her tongue. “Come on, baby. Show all these bitches who we belong to now.”

That really gets her going, shoulders curling as she takes me in deeper, wetter, her fingers fondling my balls with a little more confidence, rolling them gently in her soft palm. I drop my head back, jaw clenching as I rock against her lips. There’s a searing pool of lava settling into my spine, and I know I’m already getting close. I wonder if this is what Sy felt as she clumsily took his beast of a cock, my thighs shaking as she slurps her way up my shaft.

“The fuck…?”

I whip my head around, meeting Nick’s eyes.

Or, I would, if he weren’t staring at my dick disappearing into Vinny’s mouth.

Sy is behind him, watching the same thing.

Most of the party is, too.

“Hey, guys.” She tenses at the interruption and I pull her back down, the head of my dick jumping against the flat of her tongue. “Kinda busy. Come back in ten, yeah?”

Haley looks between us, waiting for direction.

Nick is the one to give it to her. “You two can go.”

Oh, right. Ballsack is here, too. It’s not like either of them have stopped the party from noticing, which was the point. The Duchess is mine—ours. She represents DKS but she serves us—exclusively. The way Ballsack walks off with these short, wobbling little steps, confirms he knows it. He’s probably packing the most painful boner of his short life.

“Don’t stop, Vinny.” I rest back, realizing she’s also aware of the crowd watching. I massage my fingers into the base of her skull. “You’re doing so good, baby. Show them what you’ve learned.”

She takes her hand off my balls and presses it against my abs, fingernails digging divots into my skin as she bobs and licks. Sy’s broad shoulders cast us in shadow, but I can still perfectly see the way Vinny darts her eyes toward Nick, nervous at us being caught. She’s probably shitting herself, thinking he’ll get mad.

He’s really not.

“Fuck me.” Nick’s voice is a low, strained octave when he squats down, pulling her hair back to watch. “I always knew you’d make the prettiest cocksucker.” He brushes a knuckle over the flushed ridge of her cheekbone, and I can practically see the alarm drain from her face.

Sy’s voice rings out, slow and distracted. “We don’t have time for—”

“Yeah, we do,” Nick disagrees, resting his palm on the back of her head. His pinky rests over my thumb, and when he pushes her down, I can feel the pressure he uses, gentle but assertive. Her movements falter, fingernails digging painfully into my side as he guides her deep, eyes fixed on her stretched lips. She makes a wet, panicked sound and he eases up, running his fingers through her hair as she pops off, gasping for breath. He swoops in, fusing their lips together in a hard kiss. I don’t know what to look at—her wet eyelashes or the peek of their tongues meeting between their lips.

A glance at Sy reveals he’s rubbing his cock through his jeans with one hand, and taking a swig from a bottle of beer with the other.

“You come yet?” he asks.

Shaking my head, I bide my time, waiting for her to break away from Nick’s demanding mouth. The second she does, I’m hauling her back in, feeding her my cock before Nick can have her again. Luckily, he’s happy to watch, sweeping her hair away from her neck. He sees the mark I made there earlier, and I know what he’s going to do before the irritated knot appears at the back of his jaw.

He leans in and attaches his own mouth to it, sucking his own mark on top.

I can feel the grunt she makes through the shaft of my dick, and my teeth clench. “I’m close.” I think I might say it more for Nick and Sy than her, because when they edge closer to watch, I get this odd rush of satisfaction, like I just can’t wait for them to see what our girl has agreed to.

It hits me like a sledgehammer in my solar plexus, stealing my breath with a heaving grunt. All three of us look down to watch my dick jolt between her lips. It surges with the first wave of cum, and I’m almost too late to grab the base and yank her back, forcing her jaw open.

“Let us see,” I demand, and she quickly complies, opening her mouth just in time for a thick ribbon of cum to shoot onto her tongue. Nick is there to thread his fingers into her hair, holding her steady as I empty my balls into her hot mouth.

My cock twitches with a final, feeble gush, the cum landing more on her chin than her lips. I reach down to gather it up and push it inside with the rest, breathlessly adding, “Remember our deal.” Her wet eyes shine up at me, and with a slow, heavy blink, she closes her mouth and gulps with her whole body, forcing my seed down into her belly. “That’s our good girl,” I say, thumbing the wetness from beneath her eyes.

Nick looks about two seconds from undoing his own fly, but Sy cuts in, voice thin and deep. “Saul just called. It’s time to go do the thing. We don’t have time.” Nick growls, shooting to his feet. Both of their dicks are visibly straining against the confines of their pants. And they’re not the only ones. Half the DKS look one second from bending a cutslut over the nearest surface. You’re welcome boys. Sy adds, “Lock her upstairs and—”

Vinny rises, eyes full of fire, as she drags a wrist over her mouth. “You’re locking me up again?! But I just—!” She points to my cock, as if the prospect of being locked up has made the whole thing obsolete.

“No.” The decision comes from Nick, and brooks no argument. “She’s the Duchess,” he says matter-of-factly. “She goes where we go.”

Sy looks to me for help, but I shrug, pulling up my pants. I like having the Duchess around too. She smells good and, well, if I get confused, I look for the star. “Baby bro is right,” I tell him. “We take her.”