Unconditional by Lexi Blake

beat the holy living shit out of him if he hurts you. And I want to read that contract. Sometimes Taggart forgets I run that damn club. This is one of his plots. The man is always plotting. Sometimes I pray for the CIA to call and put him on assignment so I can get some fucking peace around here.” He put a hand on her shoulder, visibly calming. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”
    She had no idea. She only knew that she was happier than she’d been before. “He’s helping me and with way more than the orgasms.”
    Ryan turned a little green. “Please don’t say that word in front of me.”
    He was shaking his head as he left the room.
    “Wow. How is he going to handle tonight? Master Keith and I are supposed to scene together.” She hadn’t really thought about how she would feel being naked in front of her brother-in-law.
    “He’ll manage. He’s been in the lifestyle a long time now. So you said he was teaching you more than orgasms?”
    Emily settled onto her lap. Ashley patted the pretty cap of dark hair. “He’s giving me some homework. You know how I get a little distracted and disorganized?”
    “A little?” Her sister laughed, probably remembering how bad Ashley’s room had been when they were kids.
    It was a problem. “So Master Keith and I sat down and I’m supposed to turn off everything for two hours a night so I can get my work done. He’s a monster, too. He checks my laptop. Did you know that they can tell where you’ve been on the Internet and what time you went there?”
    That had been an unpleasant spanking when he’d caught her checking a social networking site during the two hours she’d promised to spend on her work. The upside was she’d managed to get everything done because she hadn’t been distracted.
    “Uhm, yes, hon. There are about a million ways for your Dom to keep track of you these days. So this is working for you? I have to admit, I always thought Keith was a little cold.”
    He wasn’t cold. A little aloof, maybe, and he seemed to prefer to talk about her instead of himself. With one exception.
    He changed the subject any time she mentioned her daughter.
    But then he was a guy who didn’t have kids. He probably didn’t know many either. When he met Emily, he would fall in love.
    She stopped herself because that was a long ways down the line. But she was starting to care about him, starting to plan her days around the time they spent together.
    He seemed to really like her.
    “There is one problem though,” Ashley admitted.
    “What?”
    “He’s been very generous with the sex stuff.”
    Her sister’s eyes rolled. “You have to stop calling it the ‘sex stuff.’”
    She ignored her sister. “But he hasn’t taken, if you know what I mean.”
    “Seriously?”
    “Seriously. And at first I was pretty sure I just wanted him to teach me discipline, but I think I want to have sex with him.” She wanted more. She wanted to give to him.
    “And we’re talking about Keith?”
    She grabbed all of her patience. “Yes, we’re talking about Keith, and I know exactly who he is to you. He’s the man Ryan turned you over to when he decided to become Dom Douchebag. He’s also the Keith who made sure you got home. He’s the Keith who would never have touched you because you were his friend’s. So I am talking about that Keith. I’m also talking about the Keith who has been very patient with me, who walks me to my car every night and then makes me call him to be sure I made it home all right. He’s the same Keith who nearly spanked me when he realized I had that light thingee on in my car and have had it for a good six months because I haven’t had the money to change the oil. So guess who met me before my psych class and took my car down and got it completely maintenanced? Yes, Keith again.”
    She didn’t like to be reminded that Jillian had once been given the choice of belonging to Ashley’s Dom.
    “Oh, shit. You’re already falling for