Chapter 1: The Pool Table's Gaze
The door to The Anchor was heavy, scarred wood that stuck for a second before giving way with a groan. Mike’s hand was firm on the small of Julie’s back, a proprietary pressure that sent a familiar, liquid heat straight to her core. He guided her into the wall of sound and smell—stale beer, bleach, the greasy ghost of fried food—and the low, appreciative hum of conversation hit a sudden lull.
Every eye in the place slid to her.
She felt it like a physical touch. The neon glow from a beer sign painted her skin in ripples of blue and red. She’d worn the simple things he liked: a white cotton blouse, three buttons undone from the top, the tails tied in a loose knot just above her navel. It left a strip of her stomach bare. Her jeans were old and soft, hugging the curve of her heart-shaped ass and the long lines of her legs before flaring slightly at the ankle. No bra. The air conditioning, what little there was, brushed over her and her nipples puckered instantly into hard, aching points against the thin fabric. She knew they were visible, two dark shadows pressing insistently against the white.
“Jesus,” someone muttered from a booth to the left.
Mike heard it. His fingers spread wider on her back, dipping just below the waistband of her jeans. He leaned in, his breath hot against her ear. “Look at them, baby. Every one of them. They haven’t blinked.”
She did. She swept her gaze across the room—the college boys clustered around the scuffed pool tables, their drinks forgotten; the older guys at the bar, elbows sticky on the laminate, turning on their stools. Their stares were blunt, hungry, a little drunk. A boy with a baseball cap tilted back on his head openly tracked the sway of her hips as Mike steered her toward an empty high-top table in the center of the room. She felt the slick warmth between her thighs, a betraying pulse that made the denim feel unbearably tight.
“Mike,” she whispered, her voice a husky thread under the thrum of the jukebox. She didn’t need to say more.
He pulled a chair out for her, the metal legs screeching on the tile. “Tell me.”
She bit her lower lip, catching it between her teeth as she slowly, deliberately, sat down. The position made her lean forward slightly, and the open V of her blouse gaped. A collective intake of breath seemed to come from the pool table area. She looked up at Mike, who remained standing, his own eyes dark and fixed on her face.
“I’m soaked,” she breathed, the words just for him. “Just from walking in here. Just from them looking.”
A slow, possessive smile spread across his face. He didn’t sit. He reached out and, with a single finger, hooked the knotted tie of her blouse. He didn’t pull it loose. He just let his finger rest there, against her bare stomach, a claim staked. “Show me.”
Her breath hitched. She leaned back in the chair, arching her spine just a little. The movement tightened the blouse across her chest, making the outline of her nipples unmistakable, sharp as nails. A guy lining up a shot at the nearest pool table froze, his cue stick hovering over the green felt. He just stared.
“Good,” Mike murmured. His hand left her stomach and came to rest on her shoulder, his thumb stroking the side of her neck. “Now, untie it.”
Her fingers trembled as she obeyed, pulling the loose ends of the knot. The blouse fell open another inch, revealing the deep shadow of her cleavage, the smooth swell of her medium breasts. The air was cool, a direct kiss on her feverish skin, and her nipples tightened further, almost painfully. A low whistle came from the bar.
“More,” Mike said, his voice dropping. It wasn’t a request.
Julie’s heart hammered against her ribs. She let the blouse fall open another button, her eyes locked on Mike’s. The fabric barely held together now, a precarious curtain. The men were getting bolder. The one who’d whistled called out, “Hey, sweetheart, need a drink? Looks like you’re overheating.”
Laughter, raw and encouraging, rippled through his friends.
Mike’s thumb pressed into the pulse point on her neck. He didn’t even glance at the guy. “Ignore him. He gets to look. That’s all. Stand up.”
She rose, her legs unsteady. Mike’s hands went to her hips, turning her slightly to face the room. The mirrored wall behind the bar was cracked, but it reflected a fragmented, dizzying scene: the crowd of men, their faces blurry with lust and cheap beer, and her, a pale, open fantasy in the middle of it all.
“Put your hands on the table,” Mike instructed, his own arousal pressing against the back of her jeans.
She bent forward, bracing her palms on the sticky tabletop. The pose thrust her ass out, rounded the line of her back, and pulled the blouse completely away from her chest. From the front, from the sides, she was nearly exposed. A bottle clattered to the floor somewhere. The conversation had died, replaced by a thick, waiting silence punctuated by the thud of a bass line from the speakers.
Mike leaned over her, his chest to her back, his mouth at her ear. “They can see everything, Julie. Every curve. They’re imagining their hands on you. Their mouths.” His own hand slid around from her hip, down over the front of her jeans, pressing hard against the denim where she was hottest, wettest. She gasped, a sharp, audible sound in the quiet. “They can hear how ready you are for me. They wish they were me.”
“Yeah, we do!” a voice slurred from the darkness, followed by more laughter, louder this time, emboldened.
Mike didn’t rush. He applied a slow, circular pressure through the fabric, and Julie’s knees nearly buckled. A thin sheen of sweat gleamed on her chest. She could feel the weight of a dozen stares on her skin, on the places Mike was touching, and it amplified every sensation until her whole world was a pinpoint of desperate, public need.
“I’m gonna take you to the pool table,” Mike whispered, his voice thick with his own excitement. “I’m gonna bend you over it. And you’re going to let every one of these drunk fuckers watch what happens next.”