by Mlissa | Mar 31, 2012 | Uncategorized
Choices. So many choices.
I seem to be in a bit of a mood so, let’s go with something a little different…
This snippet is from something new I’ve just turned in and that I’m now waiting on an answer from my editor. It’s called Malachi’s Heart (I’m not sold on the title yet either) and it’s a M/M Contemporary Western…
Snippet:
Last call at the Bar Next Door. In about an hour, Malachi could go home. Eli would handle the end of clean-up, per their deal. Malachi would open the bar and Eli would lock the door at the end of the night.
Last call. Much as he loved the bar, he sometimes loved leaving it just as much. Especially tonight. Danny was here again and almost too drunk to sit steady on the barstool and way the hell too drunk to stand, walk, or drive himself home. When he was sober, he was Daniel. All grown up and hotter than fire, tempting every man and woman with his crooked smile, his whipcord frame, and his bright green eyes. When he was drunk though, as he seemed to be more often than not lately, he was Danny. All grown up and acting like a teenage kid, full of angst and sadness.
“C’mon Danny. Time for you to go.” Malachi ‘Mal’ Rhalston picked up Danny’s half empty glass of whiskey.
“Hey asshole. I wasn’t done with that,” Danny said, louder than necessary with Mal standing right in front of him. Mal held up the glass and and swirled the amber colored liquid against the sides.
“This? You weren’t done with this?” Mal looked at it. “It is a bad idea to waste such good whiskey.” He downed it himself in one swallow, feeling the burn all the way to his soul. Danny wasn’t the only one suffering over anything, but he always liked to think he was. Selfish prick.
“I was right. You are an asshole.” It was said without heat or rancor, only a weariness that hurt Mal to hear.
Mal smiled his typical bartender smile. It wasn’t one he usually gave Danny being they were best friends and all, but right now, it was all he could muster. “Never said I wasn’t.” He wiped down the bar in the immediate area of Danny. The man never wore cologne, but had a spicy, earthy scent all his own that Mal would know anywhere. He didn’t know if anyone else could smell it and it didn’t matter. The only thing that mattered was that he could, that he knew Danny so well… He mentally shook himself and focused his attention once again on Danny, on his face. “So, what had you in here tonight tyin’ one on?”
“Same shit, different day.”
One thing Mal always admired about Danny was the fact that the man could be stinkin’ drunk and still speak without slurs or ripples in his words. Most men in the bar that got that blasted couldn’t string the syllables of their own names together, much less carry on an actual conversation. To talk to Danny, one wouldn’t know he was fifteen sheets to the wind aside from the lack of balance and the smell of his breath. “Which shit would that be? Job shit or man shit?”
Danny was working his own place a few miles outside town. It was something neither of them ever wanted years ago when they had a chance to own a ranch, but Danny had found a small one that needed a lot of work and he’d thrown himself into it.
“Man.” Danny spat the word with disgust and Mal wiped the bar again just to be on the safe side. “It’s always about a man.”
“Things not work out with that pretty thing you carted out of here the other night?” The glare Danny leveled at Mal would have frightened a lesser man. Mal wasn’t now nor had he ever been scared of Danny. Their friendship went back too far. They knew everything about one another. Danny, drunk or sober, wouldn’t hurt anyone unless it was to protect someone else and he sure as hell would never strike Mal.
“You should know the answer to that one.” Mal did know and secretly, whether it was the right thing or not, he was always glad. Danny always did do things the hard way.
“Then why do you bother?”
“Can’t have who I really want.” The words were miserably spoken, full of sadness and resignation. Mal understood exactly what it meant and felt like to want someone so much and not be able to have them. He’d been dealing with it most his life, but hearing those words from Danny… Well, it was the first time the other man had admitted he felt something for someone.
“You mean there is someone? A serious someone?” He desperately wanted to ask who the man was that had Danny all fucked in the head and drinking the desire away every night. He wanted to know who had been lucky enough to garner Danny’s romantic interest so he could help the guy get his head out of his ass. Danny was special and deserved someone just as… Mal should know. He’d always wanted to be the man Danny fell in love with.
“Where the hell have you been? Of course there’s a serious someone. You think I like fucking a different ass every other week? Damn, Mal. I thought you of all people would… Shit. I’m outta here.”
“I’ve been trying to get your ass outta here for ten minutes.” At Danny’s confused looked, Mal laughed and hoped he’d pulled it off as nothing more than friendly. “Last call, remember?”
end Snippet
(a little man candy for y’all since there’s no hot cover)

Now, please have a wonderful Saturday and make sure to drop in on the other authors participating in Snippet Saturday:
Megan Hart:Read in bed!
Rhian Cahill
Eliza Gayle
Mandy M Roth
Mari Carr
McKenna Jeffries
Myla Jackson
Taige Crenshaw
HelenKay Dimon
Lauren Dane
Leah Braemel
Shiloh Walker
Shelli Stevens
~lissa
by Mlissa | Mar 17, 2012 | Uncategorized
There aren’t too many of my books to choose from with regards to club scenes. I don’t really write club books, as I call them. I’m not now, nor have I ever really been big on the club scene, be they dance clubs or BDSM clubs.
When I was younger and in high school and college, yeah sure, I spent a good number of weekends at clubs, but I was always the one holding up the wall or keeping track of everyone’s purses at the table while my friends all went to mingle and dance. I didn’t mind. Sometimes guys would come up to talk, sometimes they wouldn’t. I was good with it, either way. People watching was a definite entertainment.
I try to stay away from reading club books a lot because…well, if I don’t like the atmosphere in real life all that much, I’m probably not going to like it much in fiction. But, club books, especially BDSM club books are hugely popular among readers and I have read my fair share. Some are well written. Some are nothing more than sex in a club. However, I have to say, the one trope I stay away from, is the going undercover into a club. Dear heavens. They’re like bad horror movies when the girl does something dumb and you’re yelling at the screen for her to NOT open the door to the cellar or run off in her little t-shirt and panties into the woods. You know the girl is gonna get caught up in something in the club. You know she’s gonna lie about it so the hero doesn’t know what she’s up to. You know he’s gonna be pissed when he does find out and ask her why she just didn’t come to him for help. And that’s always my question. Tell the TRUTH for once…lol.
So, when I write club scenes into my books, I try to keep the games and the fibs and the secrets as minimal as possible.
Snippet:
Bobby adjusted the mask as he stood just inside the club’s second floor door. It was the first time he’d ever come to the warehouse home of Abyss alone. He was actually glad to have the mask on. People knew him here. People expected him to be a certain type of person here. A womanizer. A letch, even. Most definitely not a man interested in another man. It was a reputation he’d worked hard at cultivating. It was a reputation that was about to go up in smoke in just a short amount of time. Was he ready for this? He’d been asking himself that question at least once an hour for the last week. Was he ready to step out of the closet? Was he ready to embark publically, on this journey? Was he ready for his family, his friends, his best friend to find out he was deeply in lust with another man?
That word, lust, didn’t scare him like the other L word did. He knew Thor wasn’t in the same place he was because Thor had no idea who Bobby was. How would Thor feel once he found out? He knew Bobby’s reputation under his real name. Would Thor still want him?
Bobby sighed and dropped his hands to his sides. He was still dressed from work, having come straight from a business dinner he’d been unable to get out of. He hadn’t had time to change into more appropriate club attire, which for him was usually black jeans and a skin tight t-shirt, along with black leather boots. He at least shed his jacked and tie in the car, ran a hand through his hair to dishelve it a bit, but overall, he still looked like the lawyer he was in his real, daytime life.
Real life. If everything went his way, this alternative lifestyle with Thor would become his real life, his real personal life. He’d have to come clean to those he was closest with. He’d have to let them in on his little secret. He’d have to open up about the man he wanted in his life. Aidn, Bobby’s best friend and Thor’s mentor, didn’t have a clue. That’s how good Bobby had been at keeping it hidden, keeping his secret. But before anyone else could find out anything, he’d have to let Thor in on his real identity.
Thor. Just thinking the man’s name sent chills of pleasure up and down Bobby’s spine.
Nothing was going to happen at all though if he didn’t move out of the doorway and farther into the club. He took a deep breath and started toward the corner where Thor and Mick set up their flogging stations.
Bobby scanned the crowd as he walked through and around the small groups of people milling about. He didn’t know anyone and no one seemed to look twice at him. He had to admit, he felt a little out of place and more than a little unsure of himself, which was a completely different feeling for him. He was never unsure or insecure or uncertain about anything. However, this change in his life was nothing if not painfully nerve-racking. It was all he’d been able to think about since Thor had walked out of that top floor room last weekend. He hadn’t allowed himself to think Thor would want to see him again and so while Bobby had fantasized about the other man, he’d never dared let himself believe that more than one night could be possible.
Now, though…
There were a lot of differences between he and Thor. Professionally more so than personally. Bobby was an attorney, and a pretty damn good one. He dressed in high priced, high powered suits. His shoes alone could probably pay the rent of the club’s warehouse home for a few months.
Thor on the other hand was all blue collar and manual labor, his body honed from his work in construction. He worked outside all day, worked with his hands… His hands. Bobby moaned to himself as he thought about Thor’s workman’s hands, rough and hardened.
For the last week, every time Bobby thought about Thor and the spanking he’d given, Bobby’d shifted in his desk chair, swearing he could still feel the sting, the imprint of Thor’s palm on his ass. It was strictly his imagination, but it kept him hard and wanting nonetheless. He’d wanted those hands on him for so long and when he’d finally experienced them, the reality had been better than any fantasy.
Tonight, he wanted to feel something more. Tonight, he wanted to feel Thor’s flogger against his back. He wanted to feel Thor pressed against him with an erection that would match the one already growing inside Bobby’s pants.
But, Thor didn’t usually flog men in the club. Mick, his station partner, who was an openly gay dominant, usually took all the men. Bobby had never wondered at it, had actually always assumed Thor was straight, but taking a chance at the Halloween house, asking for a spanking in private, had changed everything. The mask had started out as a Halloween prop, but then as the last night drew closer, it became a shield against possible rejection. He’d been prepared for Thor to say no.
Thor saying yes had both shocked Bobby and given him hope. Thor sliding his cock between Bobby’s lips and saying he wanted to see Bobby again, had given him more than he could have ever imagined. It gave him a chance… He just had to trust his identity didn’t take that chance away.
He settled in the back of the crowd surrounding the flogging stations. In the spotlight, Thor and Mick stood back to back, long, heavy tailed floggers in opposite hands, wielding them with precision at the two people strapped to each of the two St. Andrew’s Cross’ on either side of the designated area. Both men moved fluidly, independently, but at the same time, they moved together as one. It was a sight to see and Bobby knew Thor and Mick practiced a few times a week, knew they trained themselves mentally and physically for the weekend shows they put on.
The slap of leather against skin echoed through the corner. Sighs, and hisses of breath, backs bowing, bodies arching, muscles contracting held those around Bobby, and Bobby himself, rapt. It was like a spell being woven the way the tails of the floggers arced through the air.
Bobby’s own body responded with lust, arousal, and a need so sharp it bordered on pain. He wanted to be up on that cross. He wanted to be on the receiving end of Thor’s flogger. He wanted Thor, and watching him work, watching him in his element, only drove that want deeper into his blood.
Bobby did his best to shake off the hunger long enough to turn his focus forward again. Thor’s hair, normally in a pony-tail or braid down his back, had been left loose to hang around his shoulders tonight. Sweat plastered some of the strands to his neck and cheeks and forehead. It also had his flowing white shirt clinging to his broad and furred chest. A smile twitched at Bobby’s lips as he continued his perusal of the man he couldn’t stop thinking about.
Moving a few inches to the right, Bobby outright grinned as he got a full length view of Thor. The man was in a kilt. It had been more than a month since he’d worn it, opting instead for leathers at the haunted house. The kilt, along with the rest of his current attire was something of Thor’s trademark. Kick ass combat boots. Green, blue, and yellow plaid kilt. White flowing shirt that left little to the imagination as to the definition of his chest and abs. The nearly waist length long hair, and a flogger in his hand.
It was little wonder to Bobby why people flocked to see Thor work, why his Flogging 101 classes and workshops were always standing room only, why women practically orgasmed whenever he pet their hair and whispered in their ears before stripping them topless. It’s why Bobby practically orgasmed every time he got near the man. Thor exuded power in everything he did, in every flick of his wrist. He commanded attention with little more than a look and Bobby would be the first to admit, albeit quietly, Thor had him wrapped around his little finger.
The two men lowered their floggers and stood side by side to bow at the applause from the crowd gathered in front of the rope. Thor and Mick moved to their respective cross and slowly, methodically, carefully uncuffed and massaged feeling back into the arms and shoulders of those that had been bound. One man. One woman. And the way the woman looked up at Thor, the way her eyes couldn’t seem to let go of him, well, Bobby understood what she was trying to convey. It was far more than a thank you. It was what had kept Bobby rooted to the bed last weekend after Thor had spanked him, fucked his mouth, caressed him and confirmed he’d wanted to see Bobby again.
There was always an intensity in Thor’s gaze, whether in rest or in scene, and Bobby more often than not found himself staring whenever they were in mixed company with mutual friends. He tried to keep it from being obvious, but had been caught before, having had to play it off as being lost in space.
His attention zeroed in on the male Mick had just finished with. Another man had stepped forward with a black leather jacket and the look on the male submissives face when he lifted his eyes upward took Bobby’s breath away. There was such devotion, such hunger evident on his face. The man Bobby assumed was the dominant in the relationship wrapped the jacket around the other man’s shoulders. A shiver of need slid through Bobby’s body at the way the dominant cradled the other man in his arms, held him close and whispered something which caused the submissive to nod against his chest. Bobby watched them cross over the rope together, still huddled close, barely an inch separating them and felt an ache that stretched from his cock to his gut and up to his chest.
It was a feeling he’d never felt toward a woman or from watching a woman with a man. He could honestly say, looking back through all his years of dating women that he’d never felt attached or felt the desire to become attached, but watching the two men had him tied in knots. He wanted that closeness. He may not be sure he wanted the dominance and submission all the time, but he wanted a relationship with a man. He wanted that commitment.
When the couple disappeared from view, he turned his attention back to Thor’s flogging station only to find the man gone. Bobby’s heartbeat thundered in his chest, panicked that he may have missed him tonight.
“You want what they have, don’t you? The two men.”
Bobby’s breath caught at the whispered words from behind. Thor. And whispered wasn’t exactly right, but given the volume of the industrial music, it was as close to a whisper as could be. He nodded his answer, heat creeping up his neck that he’d been caught staring yet again, that he hadn’t been able to hide the longing.
Thor pressed himself against Bobby’s back but otherwise didn’t touch him. Bobby wondered if Thor would step away if he leaned back. He wondered but was too scared to find out.
“Which one of us has feared being found out more? You or me?”
The tone was conversational, the warmth radiating off Thor was anything but… “Me.”
“Because you wear the mask?”
Bobby felt the words more than heard them. He touched the edges of the mask, ran his fingers along the string that wrapped around the back of his head and again, nodded.
Thor slid a hand inside Bobby’s front pants pocket and squeezed his thigh. Bobby jolted and let loose a groan no one could hear. His cock, already a painfully aroused reminder of the path he wanted to embark on, twitched. “You can keep it on for now. Come with me.”
Bobby swayed a little when Thor removed his hand and his heat, but then he wrapped his fingers around Bobby’s arm and tugged him toward the rope and St. Andrew’s Cross.
People were talking, a new crowd was gathering and nerves settled themselves uneasily in Bobby’s stomach. He’d never done this before, the public thing. In the crowd a few minutes ago, they were in shadow, enough darkness around that that no one would have thought anything about seeing them standing close and talking. They weren’t in shadow now. They were under spotlights, visible.
His eyes must have shown his hesitation, his uncertainty because the softening in Thor’s own eyes made Bobby feel better in a way he couldn’t explain. Nervous still, but it was more manageable.
“This time is more for me than you,” Thor said, his mouth right up against Bobby’s ear. “This is my coming out, so to speak. No one knows your identity, not even me, but I’ve never flogged a man in public, never been brave enough because I knew once I did, I’d never be able to pull that desire back in. For more reasons than I can name, I need you to be my first. Please say you understand.”
Warmth spread through Bobby at Thor’s words and he found his forehead touching, leaning on Thor’s shoulder. He wanted to drop to his knees, but figured Thor wasn’t ready for something that public. And in all honesty, Bobby didn’t think he was either. After all, he was still wearing a mask.
Thor’s declaration though, was enough to cement Bobby’s earlier decision that he needed to reveal his identity to Thor. Tonight. He wanted to make it real, make it really real and about him, who he was. It wasn’t how he’d planned things to go. Hell, he hadn’t actually planned anything at all other than hoping to see and play with Thor again. It looked like he was going to get his wish and part of him would have liked to do it without the mask, but, not in this place, not in public. He wanted to do it on his terms, in private.
Thor placed a kiss to Bobby’s ear and again, moved away from him, his eyes harder, serious, hungry. “Shirt off.”
Bobby did as he was told. As he was told. Something about that warmed him further. So many different feelings and different thoughts had been flowing through him over the last week since he’d finally accepted and voiced that this with Thor was what he wanted. It was still overwhelming, still freaking him out in bits and pieces, but not enough to where he was willing to back off and go back to how he’d been.
He had no tattoos, no piercings, or any other markings that would give anyone a hint of who he was. Still, the idea someone he knew might recognize him made his stomach quiver with unease.
Once he got the last button undone on his shirt, he shrugged it off and handed it over to Thor who laid it over the small table where floggers, whips, acrylic canes, and riding crops were arranged. Bobby’s cock hardened even more as he took in the array of spanking implements.
“Do you want to pick one out or do you trust me to do it for you?”
It was a heavy question, that one of trust. Did he trust Thor?
End Snippet
Be sure to check out the following blogs for what I’m sure are to be some insanely fun snippets:
Megan Hart:Read in bed!
Rhian Cahill
Jody Wallace
Eliza Gayle
Mandy M Roth
Mari Carr
McKenna Jeffries
Myla Jackson
Taige Crenshaw
Delilah Devlin
Shelli Stevens
Shiloh Walker
TJ Michaels
Have a great Saturday (the condition of my basketball bracket at the end of the day will determine how good or bad my day was/is/could have been…lol)
~lissa