Praise (Salacious Players’ Club)
Praise: Chapter 31

Charlotte

When I hear his approaching footsteps on Monday morning, a sense of calm washes over me. There is something in that sound. The repeating click-click-click cues a response in my body, a serotonin boost that puts me in an instant state of serenity. The anxiety I’ve wallowed in since waking up in his arms yesterday morning dissolves as I hear him walking into the room.

He strides up to where I’m kneeling and gently strokes my head.

“Good morning, Charlotte,” he says with the same inflection that he would say, Good morning, beautiful. Or I love you, Charlotte. And maybe I’m imagining that last one, but it sounds right in my mind.

“Good morning, Sir.”

We fit into these roles so effortlessly, like puzzle pieces clicking into place. Not a word was said since Saturday night about Beau, our secret, our future, or our feelings. It’s like the conversation scared us both into silence. We came so close to ending everything, so rather than face the music and admit what we both know is coming, we slid right back into the roles we were playing before.

Keep it secret.

Deny our feelings.

Don’t think about the future.

It doesn’t feel right, per se, but since I’m still here, kneeling on the floor for him, it feels like enough. Two weeks ago, I told him I would take what I could get, and that’s still the truth.

As he sits in his chair, I wait for instructions. Normally, he tells me to work at my desk or to come sit in his lap as he works. But minutes go by in silence as I wait. The urge to see what he’s doing is strong.

Finally, he mutters, “Crawl to me.” I bite my lip to keep from smiling as I move onto my hands and knees, looking up at him as I move. His chin rests on his hand, leaning against the arm of his chair as he watches me. There’s a subtle look of approval on his face, and I breathe it in, like it’s keeping me alive.

As I reach his chair, I settle back into a kneeling position. His fingers reach out to stroke my cheek, and I lean into the touch.

“I don’t want to work today,” he mumbles softly. And when my lips tighten, fighting back a smile, he continues, “I want to play.”

“Yes, Sir,” I reply sweetly.

“On the desk,” he commands, tapping the solid surface in front of him. Climbing to my feet, I sit down in front of him, and he instantly spreads my knees, moving between them. I’m wearing a knee-length dress today, black with buttons down the front and small white polka dots. It accentuates my curves well, tight around my breasts and hips. Underneath the dress, I have on a pair of light blue lace panties.

Emerson’s hands run up my thighs, and a throbbing arousal hits me as he reaches the hem and carefully pulls them down. Bringing the blue silky fabric to his nose, he inhales, keeping his eyes on me. I bite my lip as I watch him.

Then he opens his desk drawer and drops the panties in. I watch as he pulls something else out. It’s a familiar pink silicone, and my breath hitches as I recognize it.

“I found this in your desk,” he says. “Remember this?”

“Yes, Sir.”

I watch as he wipes the toy clean and dries it. It’s hard to hold so still while waiting for something as rewarding as that toy because I know what’s about to happen. After it’s clean and dry, he holds the blunt end up to my lips. “Open.”

Dropping my jaw, I welcome the toy, and once it’s seated against my tongue he says, “Suck.” And I do, coating the silicone in my saliva. He then gently pulls it out and lifts my dress.

I can hardly breathe as I watch him. Pulling my hips to the edge of his desk, he slowly works in the round, spit-covered end, and I have to swallow down my gasp. The intrusion is different when it’s someone else inserting it, and the way he’s doing it feels almost clinical. It’s an erotic, almost dirty sensation—and I sort of love it.

Once it’s all the way in, he admires his work, touching me and running fingers over my folds. I can’t tell if he’s hard yet, and I keep trying to sneak a peek. I already know today is going to be torturously long, but at the end, when I finally have him, it will be worth the wait.

When he pulls out the small black remote I remember from last time, I smile. With one little click, the toy begins humming against my clit and G-spot, and I try to slam my legs together, but he won’t let me.

“Let’s see how long you can take it before you come.”

I want to protest, but I can’t. He’s Sir today, a little different than last time. The vibration is low, but it’s almost worse that way, building me slowly toward a climax. And the fact that I can’t react much makes it worse.

Tugging my bottom lip between my teeth, I clench my eyes closed and force myself to breathe. Then he begins stroking my thighs, running his hands up to my breasts, pinching each nipple between his fingers.

“You’re getting close, I can tell,” he says, and he’s right. My body writhes on his desk, and my breathing turns into stunted gasps. “Right…there.”

Suddenly, the vibration is gone. Just as I was about to crest the peak of my orgasm, he made it stop. I feel a bead of sweat across my forehead as I take in a long, heavy breath. When I look back at him, he’s grinning, pleased with himself.

“Was I right?”

“Yes, Sir,” I reply.

“You’re not being punished, but I’m going to do that to you all day. If you’re a good girl, you’ll be rewarded at the end of the day. Understood?”

“Yes, Sir.”

He leans forward and presses his lips to a soft spot on the inside of my thighs. “I’m going to keep your panties in my desk. Try not to make a mess on your chair.”

Then he gently pats my ass and sends me to work. He spends the next couple of hours teasing me with steady vibrations, taking me to the edge and bringing me back down. I wish I could say I hated it, but so far, it’s not so bad. I like the buildup, anyway. And I love his attention most of all, which is what I’m getting today.

“It’s beautiful out,” he says, while I’m in the middle of an email to Maggie. “Let’s walk to the deli together.” Oh, Emerson, I think to myself. Of course you want to get me out in public with this thing inside me.

But do I argue? Nope. I simply smile, nod my head, and answer him accordingly, “Yes, Sir.”

“I’ll give you a foot rub tonight,” he says on the one-mile walk back, glancing down at my heels. These are a little more comfortable than the last ones, but I’m not going to turn down a foot rub. In the deli, he had me almost crying as he tortured me. It was packed in there, people milling around in all the open spaces as he flipped the toy on, making me cling to his arm for support, afraid I would crumble to the floor at any second.

He found so much humor in it, but I could also tell he was aroused too. So much so that he had to hold me in front of him the whole time to block people from seeing his hard length as we ordered our sandwiches. There I was ordering a turkey sub with Emerson Grant’s hard cock pressed into my back while a vibrator nearly made me orgasm in the middle of the word mayonnaise.

If people didn’t notice how strange we were behaving, it was a miracle, or they were blind. But we didn’t care. We ate our lunch in a small booth in the back with smiles plastered on our faces. This could work, I thought to myself the whole time. I could be his secretary as a front, and his girlfriend in secret, and no one would need to know. It would be enough.

But as we reach his house, and I see a familiar figure standing on Emerson’s front porch, all of that idiotic hope comes crashing down around me.

“Beau?” Emerson calls out, spotting his son. When he spins around to answer his father’s call, I freeze. I don’t know if Emerson feels the same wave of guilt as I do, but seeing Beau now feels like a punch to the gut. And he looks…good. Better than last time. He’s cut his hair, has a smile on his face, and doesn’t look like he wants to murder his own father.

“Is everything okay?” Emerson asks, rushing over.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

“What are you doing here?” I ask.

There is a look of skeptical surprise on Emerson’s face, his attention laser-focused on his son, and I can’t believe the rising jealousy that courses through me when I notice. It’s his son, Charlie. Of course he’s going to give him his attention. Over you.

“I was working in the area. I saw Charlie’s car here, so I thought I’d come hang out for a bit.”

Come hang out? Glancing toward the road, I notice his white truck parked on the curb. How did I not notice that before? He must have used the money his dad gave him last time to get it fixed.

None of this feels right, but I don’t say anything as Emerson opens the door to let him in. He looks so elated to see his son again, I can’t be the one who takes that away. So I act casual as we walk inside together. Emerson empties his pockets at the front entryway table, dropping his keys into the bowl.

“Are you hungry?” he asks Beau.

Beau shakes his head before turning toward me.

“So where were you guys at?” he asks. My eyes dance between the two men for a moment, trying to get a second of Emerson’s attention, but he’s too guarded, too scared.

“We went to the deli down the street. Are you sure you’re not hungry?” Emerson replies.

“Nope, I’m good. I got a new job,” he adds in, and the smile on his face feels almost contagious. If I wasn’t so uptight in this scenario, I might actually feel an ounce of joy for him, but I’m too unsettled. I keep waiting for him to notice that Emerson and I are fucking, as if he could read it on our faces.

I mean, I wish I could read Emerson’s face right now, but he’s being so guarded that it’s impossible.

“I’m going to grab some drinks. You guys go sit in the front room and I’ll be right out. I want to hear all about your new job,” Emerson says, turning toward the kitchen.

“Yes, Sir,” I answer out of habit, immediately wincing as the words tumble out of my mouth.

Emerson freezes in the doorway, and I try to play it off as nothing out of the ordinary, waltzing straight over to the sitting room at the front of the house.

“Sir?” Beau replies with a laugh.

I laugh too, trying to shrug it off, but I feel so fake. Almost mechanical, like I don’t even know how to behave normally. We make small talk while we wait for Emerson to return, and Beau doesn’t seem to suspect a thing, which should make me happy, but only makes me feel a little nauseous. Then Emerson returns with three beers clutched between his fingers, and Beau looks at them skeptically.

“I figured we could have one drink to celebrate your new job.”

Beau gives him an easy half-smile, taking one of the beers and dropping into the oversized leather chair. Emerson looks momentarily pleased with himself as he hands me my bottle, and it almost shatters my heart into pieces. Look at how happy he is. Beau is here and he’s actually smiling and they are about to repair their relationship. I can feel it.

How can I possibly take this away from him? And how can I be so selfish to expect Beau to just get over it? What is wrong with me?

With my eyes on Emerson sitting in the chair opposite his son, I drop slowly onto the last chair, and the minute my butt hits the seat, my eyes go wide.

The vibrator.

I completely forgot it was in there. And now I have to sit here with a remote-controlled dildo and no panties on while we pretend that everything is fine and we aren’t fucking behind Beau’s back. I can hardly hear a word they say over the chanting sound of shame echoing through my head—this is all my fault. Luckily, neither of them seem to notice.

In fact, for the next thirty minutes, neither of them notice I’m here at all.

I’m hanging on to the way Beau is looking at his dad. Between sips of his beer, he tells him about the new job as an apprentice for some big landscaper in the area. Then I catch the look of contentment and pride on Emerson’s face, and I sit here and question how the hell this happened.

A minute ago, things were so easy. Emerson and I could carry on our secret relationship under the guise of me being his secretary. And no one would get hurt. And just like that, Beau shows up, a cruel reminder that nothing is ever easy, and nothing good can ever last.

“So you like working here?”

It takes me a minute before I realize it’s Beau talking to me. With a swig of his beer, he stares at me and waits for my answer.

“Oh, um, yeah. It’s a good job.”

I can’t look at Emerson. I literally can’t bear it, but I feel his gaze on me momentarily. Probably the most he’s looked at me since Beau showed up.

“Good,” he replies with a nod of his head. “Well, next time I’m working in this part of town, I’d like to stop in again. Maybe we can all do lunch or something.” The way he’s looking at me, as if he’s hanging on to hope for something, is so hard to look at, I have to gaze down at my beer bottle, which I’ve completely peeled the label off of because of my nervousness.

“That would be great. I’d love that,” Emerson says, standing up.

Beau is still looking at me, but I’m frozen, my gaze locked on the cool drops of condensation on the brown glass of the bottle.

When Beau stands up, I breathe a sigh of relief. I just need to be alone with Emerson. We don’t have to go back to the way we were before lunch, but maybe we can just talk through this. There is something to salvage here…unless he wants to break it off now. I’m sure that with how good things seem to be with Beau that I don’t mean anything to him anymore.

No, I can’t think like that.

Beau hovers near the front door, and they make more small talk. When I see his hand reach for his keys he dropped next his dad’s on the front entryway table, I see something familiar sitting next to them. Heat floods my cheeks, and I start to panic when I spot the black remote, just inches from Beau’s hand.

He’ll just grab his own keys and leave. He won’t notice the remote.

When I glance over at Emerson, he seems unfazed, so deep in conversation with his son that he doesn’t even see what he dropped on that table in plain sight. I quickly stand up, hoping to get to the gadget first.

“All right, I should get going,” Beau says casually. I freeze in my steps across the room when his hand closes around his keys and the black remote, which looks so much like his truck remote it’s uncanny. In his fumble to pick them up, the remote goes clattering to the floor.

When Beau reaches down to pick it up, he must hit one of the buttons because the sudden, intense vibration between my legs is unwelcome and all wrong. I let out a scream and clamp my hand over my mouth, squeezing my face in a pained expression as I turn and try to run away. I have to take it out now.

The energy in the room changes immediately, like someone just flipped off the lights on a seemingly bright, sunny day. Beau stares at me curiously, waiting to understand why I would react like that, but what could I possibly say?

His vision pauses on me with the remote in his hand. “What’s wrong?”

Suddenly, there’s a scuffle, and I turn to replace Emerson yanking the remote out of his son’s hand. With one quick click of the button, the vibration is gone.

“What is going on?” Beau yells.

I should leave. I need to get out of this room, this house, this entire situation, but I’m stuck—caught in Emerson’s gaze as he stares at me with a loaded, apologetic expression.

This is it, I think. This is the moment when he can finally admit to his son that he fucked up, when he can finally admit that I mean something to him, and that everything he said to me in private was real. I wait on bated breath for the moment that I can already tell isn’t coming. Not the way I want it to at least.

“Someone say something, please,” Beau barks out after a moment of tense silence.

How on earth could we possible explain our way out of this? There is no innocent way to talk our way out of me wearing a remote-control vibrator. And it’s at that exact moment when Beau’s eyes shift from the remote in his dad’s hand to the spot between my legs, where I’m squeezing my thighs together and clutching my dress in my fist.

“I knew it,” he mutters in anger, suddenly realizing his suspicions were right all along.

“It’s nothing,” Emerson stutters with those enchanting green eyes on me. I swear I’m watching this play out in slow motion, the moment when he tries to actually deny what’s obvious. When he tries to deny me, or rather, us. My jaw drops as I glare back at him.

“Nothing?” Beau snaps, his gaze bouncing between the two of us.

“Yeah, nothing,” I mumble to myself before spinning on my heels and marching out of the room. The walls might as well be collapsing around me. Right now, it feels as if they are. And maybe I shouldn’t be so mad. I mean, it’s his son. I shouldn’t expect him to admit this so easily, but as I march through the office, I see everything that’s happened in the last two months play out—except this time in a different filter.

I see me, naive and hopeful, being everything Emerson Grant wanted me to be. I see myself changing for him. Kneeling for him. Lying and sacrificing myself…for him. I hear the slightest praise from his lips and how easily I caved and salivated for it, giving up everything I believed in just to hear it again and again. As if my entire worth hung on those two beguiling words: good girl.

The conversation between them grows heated, but it’s behind me in a muffled chatter I can’t translate. I’m too lost in my own haze of rage and desolation. I grab my phone from my desk, trying to focus on my surroundings through my blurred, teary vision. When I spin around and march toward the door for my purse, a warm, calloused hand clamps around my arm.

I look up to see Beau’s face stretched in anger. “Tell me the truth. Did he touch you?” he yells, and I can’t answer. I don’t even register the question. Shaking him off, I continue my march toward the door.

“Where are you going?” Emerson asks, blocking my path. As I bend down to retrieve my bag, a tear shatters on the shiny black surface of my high-heeled shoes. And I stare at them for a second. Who even am I? I lost my identity the minute I walked through that door. I gave it to a man who doesn’t even care about me.

It’s nothing, he said. About me. About us. Every single hopeful, lovesick, enamored thought in my head suddenly seems foolish.

God, I’m so fucking stupid.

When I tear open the door, he blocks me again. “Don’t go,” he says, and I hear the tone in which he says it, expecting me to follow it with an obedient, Yes, Sir. I keep my gaze away from his face as I obstinately mutter, “No.”

No, to your commands. No, to your promises. No, to your praise.

There’s another scuffle between them, and I’m able to work my way around Emerson. All my mind registers is the need to leave. So the minute the door is open, I disappear through it, and I don’t dare look back. The next second, I’m in my car and a moment later, I’m cruising down the highway toward my house. I manage to make it all the way to my bed before I sob hysterically into my pillow.