“And why does that make me feel kind of like a prostitute?” Ellie muttered. Only Lexie seemed to hear her thankfully, and she snorted into her hand so as not to draw attention to Ellie’s comment.

“Because if Mike hooks up with Ellie, then Adam will stop being so overly possessive about Mike and me hanging out, because it’s obvious Mike’s really into Ellie,” Angel said gleefully.

Ellie opened her mouth and closed it again without saying a word, because she couldn’t really think of what to say. She wanted to protest that Michael didn’t like her that much, but he obviously did like her enough to pursue her, and Angel would probably know better than Ellie exactly how much he liked her since they were good friends.

“It would also probably help if you stopped calling him ‘Pretty Boy’ and playing with his hair,” Leigh teased.

“Well, he is pretty and so is his hair. If Adam grew his hair out I would want to play with it more.”

“Then he’d really look like a Viking,” Sharon mused, her eyes going a little unfocused.

Angel elbowed Sharon in the side. “Hey, no fantasizing about my man while I’m present. You keep that shit to yourself.”

“Okay ladies, focus,” Maria said, cutting into the banter. She smiled at Ellie. “Let’s take this to the bedroom.”

“Hopefully that won’t be the last time Ellie hears that today,” Lexie joked as she grabbed Ellie’s hand and led the way down the hall.

This was not at all what Ellie had expected when she’d texted Lexie earlier... it was so much better. If this was what happened when she let people in a little, maybe dropping her guard wasn’t so bad.

Fuck me sideways.

Ellie looked like submissive sex on a stick. The violet and black corset she was wearing set off her creamy skin, black hair, and dark eyes, and pushed her breasts up like an offering platter. Black lace trimmed the top of the corset, matching the lacy, black mini-skirt she wore with it. Her legs were bare, pale against the dark skirt, and she was wearing strappy high heels which gave her several extra inches of height and added a seductive sway to her walk as she moved into the main room of Stronghold. Her hair was pulled back from her face but was otherwise down, curling around her shoulders, and her dark eyes looked huge in her pale face.

Trailing behind her, like a brood of ducklings, were Angel, Leigh, Sharon, Maria, and Lexie, all of them with excited expressions of expectation on their faces. Nosy little subs. They’d all dressed up for the club, but none of them were nearly as all-out dolled-up as Ellie. They waved at him and trotted over to the bar, with wide conspiratorial grins on their faces.