Pros & Cons of Vengeance

by Wasp, A. E.

  He thrust his hips again, and we both groaned out, “Fuck!” simultaneously.

  His dark eyes bore into mine, and he was breathing hard, but he grinned broadly anyway.

  “Only one thing to do,” he said, his voice coated with the thick, syrupy southern drawl I’d only heard him use once or twice.

  “Let me have my way?”

  “Nope. We’ll settle this the old-fashioned way. We’ll wrestle.”

  I blinked. He’d said wrestle like wrassle, and holy shit it was adorable. I would do a lot of truly sordid things for that grin, but…

  “We can’t wrassle, King Kong! You’re like seventy-seven times my weight. You could pin me in a second.”

  He pursed his lips thoughtfully, and I wanted to kiss him senseless. His hard cock was still rubbing against mine, but languidly, like he was hardly even aware of it. Hardly even aware he was driving me batshit.

  He shrugged, like he’d exhausted every possible solution to the dilemma. “I guess that means I win, then,” he said brightly. He did another of those crazy ab contractions and brought his knees up to straddle me in one swift movement, keeping my elbows pinned to my sides. “So lemme tell you what I’m gonna do to you first.”

  Oh, fuck that.

  I narrowed my eyes and dug my fingers into his rib cage.

  He screamed like he’d been electrocuted and arched away from me.

  “Whatsamatter, Castille? The big, strong protector-man can’t handle a little tickling?”

  He flopped down on the bed next to me and curled in on himself, folding his hands over his chest, but I surged to my knees and followed him.

  “Stop!” he laughed. “Fucking stop! There’s a whole section in the Geneva Convention about this!”

  “Whose script are we following? Whose?” I couldn’t even remember what the fuck I was talking about, but I’d be damned if I let him win. This was the most fun I’d had in ages. Maybe the most fun I’d had ever.

  “Mine!” he insisted through his laughter. “Mine, mine, mine.”

  A flash of triumphant glee in his eyes was my only warning. He grabbed both of my hands and rolled over on top of me again, pinning me down in the same spot where I’d been a minute ago.

  Then, like the most gloating winner who ever gloated, he dipped his head and licked a broad stripe up my cheek.

  He leaned back, smiling, like he was waiting to see my reaction. Christ, his smile did things to me.

  “Ew!” I complained, even though disgusted was not remotely close to what I was feeling. “Doesn’t the Geneva Convention have rules against that?”

  He shook his head seriously. “You should really know better, Pfeiffer. Never start a land war in Asia, and never, never start a tickle fight with the Charlton High School All-Scholastic Wrestling Champion.” He pressed my wrists more firmly to the mattress, and his eyes gleamed. “Unless you wanna be at his mercy.”

  The accent. Oh, God. At his merrrseee.

  Then he waggled his eyebrows at me and bit his lip, cramming decades worth of sexy thoughts into one lava-hot glance, and I was done for.

  Kill me now.

  Dead.

  I’d packed a lifetime of sexual experiences into six months… or so I’d thought. I knew of every kink and had tried most of them. But if you’d told me it was possible to balance on a razor’s edge between outraged laughter and premature ejaculation, I would have called you a liar. For all that I’d seen and done in the last six months, humor had never entered the equation, not once. But all of a sudden here I was, with my cock throbbing and joy bubbling in my chest, and it was everything I hadn’t known I needed.

  “Well, maybe I wanna be at your mercy,” I told him, only it came out different than I’d intended – not arch and teasing, but low and serious. Honest.

  And just when I started to worry that I’d fucked something up, he let go of one of my wrists to cup my cheek and leaned down to press the sweetest, softest kiss to my lips.

  It took about two-point-four seconds for us to shuck our clothes after that. I remember exactly nothing about the process except that one minute his suit pants and my trunks were there, and the next they were gone, and I was so fucking relieved that finally there was nothing between us.

  I wanted to lean back and look at him. I wanted to paint my name on his chest with my tongue. I wanted to finally, finally get my mouth on his cock. But every technique I knew had somehow flown out the window into the Florida night. Every practiced move, every nuanced glance I’d honed had decamped to some other part of my brain. Now that we were finally naked and pressed against each other, all I could do was feel.

  His thumbs stroking my hipbones were the most erotic sensation ever. The heat of his chest against mine spread through every part of me, and for once in my air-conditioning-loving-life, I welcomed the heat. I wanted the nip of his teeth at my jaw, my ribs, my belly button, and the chafe of his leg hair against mine as he moved down my body.

  He took my cock to the back of his throat in one smooth motion, and my hips bucked off the bed.

  “Jesus, fuck,” I yelled. I hadn’t been kidding about the edging earlier, and between that and everything that had happened tonight, I was poised at a precipice. “Fuck, fuck, fuck. Warn a guy!”

  The vibration of his chuckle around me, and the hard weight of his hands holding my hips against the mattress were his only response.

  It was gorgeous, and the noises I made were mortifyingly loud, but I couldn’t stop them any more than I could stop the tears that kept building up behind my eyes. Everything about this night was so intense, even more than I’d imagined when I’d fantasized about it earlier, and not just in a physical sense. He was drawing all these emotions out of me – joy and anxiety and protectiveness and caring, and I had no clue how to handle them.

  When he finally pulled off a moment later and crawled back up my body, I was pretty sure he could read all this shit, clear as day on my face. I wished I were half the liar Ridge was.

  “You okay?” he asked, brushing one thumb over my cheek.

  I nodded and threw my forearm over my eyes. “It’s just… been a minute since I picked someone to be intimate with, that’s all. Been a minute since I wanted to.” Such a fucking sap. “Just, like, ignore me. Or give me a second.”

  But Steele didn’t pull away or take this marvelous opportunity to question whether I was really really really sure wanted this, or whatever. He just… cupped my cheek the way he had earlier.

  “I’ve got all the minutes you need.”

  “Ugh,” I groaned, moving my arm away. “Disgusting. Stop being so nice. I can’t handle it.”

  He grinned. “Awww, whatsamatter, Brekkie? Hot little ass can’t handle a little tender?”

  “Asshole.”

  He reached down and wrapped his huge hand around my cock, then tugged gently.

  Shiiit.

  “Pardon?” he said.

  “Nothing. Nothing,” I squeaked.

  “That’s what I thought,” he said, satisfied. “How do you want it, then? Hmm?” He braced on his elbow and reached up to gently yank one of my curls. “Want it rough? Want it gentle?”

  “I thought this was your script?”

  “It is.” He grinned. “This was the script. Me, giving you exactly what you want.”

  Damn.

  “Then yeah,” I agreed. “I want it hard.” Hard and fast and rough enough to burn out all this other stuff – all this shit that made me way too fucking sappy about something that, despite the serious attraction between us and the way he made me laugh my ass off, was really still just sex.

  Steele tossed me a wink and climbed off the bed, then opened the nightstand drawer. He threw a tube of lube on the coverlet beside me and kept rummaging.

  “Uh, Breck?” he asked curiously. “There are like three toys and four kinds of lube, but I’m not seeing your condoms, babe.”

  Oh. Oh, shit.

  I sat up in bed and stared at him. “Fuck, I didn’t even think. I don’t
have any,” I told him.

  “You don’t?” I got why he was stunned, given my line of work, but…

  “No!” I wailed. I ran a hand through my hair. “I don’t. I mean, I use them religiously when I have sex. It’s just that I don’t have sex when I’m not… you know, with a client.” I met his eyes. “I didn’t expect this. I didn’t expect… you.”

  The look he gave me was… I didn’t want to jinx it by naming it. Surprise, but hotter. Amazement, but sweeter.

  “Should I go…” I began, ready to run to the fucking store… literally, if necessary… to get some more.

  But he shook his head. “I’ve got you,” he told me. He found his suit pants under my swim shorts on the floor and dug out his wallet and the condom inside. He held it up between his fingers and grinned. “You were saying?”

  Oh, God. “Hard and fast,” I demanded, pulling my legs up to my chest. “And I don’t need prep. I’m already set.”

  My toys had already gotten an extensive workout earlier in the day.

  But of course, he had to fucking verify that himself, running the pads of his fingers over my rim to tease me before dipping a well-lubed finger inside.

  “You see?” I panted when he’d braced himself above me. “I told you.”

  “Oh, I see,” he agreed. He withdrew his finger and quickly shoved two more inside, hitting my prostate and setting off a white-lightning chain reaction up and down my spine. Then the fucker smiled at me, all slow and knowing, and did it again.

  This was what I’d been afraid of. This, exactly. This stupid connection that was irrational and likely a fucking figment of my imagination. I didn’t know how to trust it… or him… or myself.

  Steele sucked in a breath, and it was ragged. His eyes were way too bright, and he looked sick, or stoned, or both.

  “Fuck, Breck,” he said. “Just… I wanted to… but I can’t…”

  “What?” I demanded. “You can’t what?”

  “I can’t wait.”

  “No shit! This is what I’ve been saying,” I told him, and he laughed – a quick puff of sound that seemed to be pulled from him.

  I grabbed the condom he’d thrown on the bed earlier and ripped it open, then turned on my side and grabbed his fucking beautiful cock. “I want this. Now.”

  He nodded.

  I rolled the condom down his length and added a thick coating of lube. I was prepped, I was, but his dick was in proportion to the rest of his body, and there was no way this was going to happen without a little burn.

  I found myself flat on my back the next instant, with Steele leaning above me, poised at my entrance. “I wanted this to start slow,” he laughed. “Special.” He shook his head. “I am constantly underestimating my powers of self-control with you.”

  Jesus, the man had no idea. If this was any more special, I was going to spontaneously combust and leave behind nothing but a cloud of dust.

  Steele was practically trembling with want as he pushed inside me, and it was… humbling.

  God, seriously, I was disgusted with myself. I knew better than to make sex – even really hot sex between people who liked each other a lot – into a hearts and rainbows affair. But there was something about wanting a man who wanted me back in equal measure – a kind of parity I’d never experienced before.

  I was used to guys lusting after me – my face, my body, what I could do for them. I’d never had anyone look at me like I was this… precious thing. Not like I was fragile, but like I might fly out of his grasp at any moment. I was used to the illusory feeling of being detached and in control that I’d had with my clients. I’d let myself believe that control meant safety, and I’d found out just how wrong I was. But this, right here, was the real deal.

  The way he moved inside me, the joy and total absorption on his face, were potent. I barely had to reach down and touch myself before I was coming all over my chest. A second later, he pulled out and whipped the condom off himself so he could splatter his release on me, too. My dick gave a tired twitch at the sight.

  “That was… it was…” Magical. Transcendent. Mind-altering. “Good,” I panted as he collapsed half on top of me. “Really good.”

  He rolled to one side and gasped out a chuckle.

  “See, now I want to take that as a compliment, baby. But considering you were fucking a lot of old, white grandfather-types, I just don’t know…”

  I pulled away and stared at him in disbelief. “Is that… is that a prostitute joke? Really, Castille?”

  “Too soon?” he asked with fake solicitousness.

  I smacked him in the gut, hard. “Your cum is still on my chest,” I reminded him.

  “Yeah,” he sighed sleepily, clearly pleased as fuck.

  I rolled my eyes. “No. Etiquette. Whatsoever.”

  He chuckled and rolled on me more firmly, knocking the breath out of my lungs… but I kinda liked it anyway. “Oh, son. If you wanted some refined asshole, you’re screwed.” He forced my legs apart with his own and rested his head on my chest. My stomach was being glued to his chest, but he didn’t seem to care, and fuck if I cared either. “You’ve got yourself a swamp rat, instead.”

  He exhaled a satisfied gust of air, tucked his elbows against me, and relaxed.

  Oh, damn. Steele Alvarez… the smart-mouthed giant, the military-honed badass… was a full-body cuddler.

  This was a hundred times more dangerous than some whack-job senator.

  But instead of moving, instead of kicking Steele out of my bed with a wink that promised more casual fun tomorrow, I lay as still as I possibly could so I wouldn’t disturb him and wondered how long my swamp rat might want to stick around.

  11 Steele

  I should have been thinking about ways to crush Senator John Harlan so completely, his slimy buddies could snort him. What I was doing was wondering how long Breck would keep me around before telling me to get lost. Eventually, inevitably, he’d go back to his college life and I’d go back to doing what I did. But my plan was simple: I’d follow him to George Washington and anywhere else until he kicked me to the curb.

  Early morning sun beat down on my naked chest as I stretched out on one of the teak loungers on the patio near the pool. A few more days in Florida, and I’d be as tanned as a Mr. Universe contestant. I was going to give a medal to whoever had decided to have this meeting by the pool.

  Leo occupied another lounge chair, hiding from the sun under the shadow of the upper balcony. In sunglasses and a white T-shirt, the Fed stared intently at the printouts of several of Harlan’s offshore accounts. Following the money, as the old saying went. Forensic accounting had taken down more bad guys than guns ever could.

  Carson sat next to Leo, frowning and tapping angrily into his phone.

  Wesley sat on the edge of the pool in Star Wars-themed swim shorts, dangling his feet in the water and watching the show. His head swiveled from right to left as Danny floated past on inflatable raft shaped like a giant pink flamingo, wearing nothing but miles of tan skin and a bright blue banana hammock smaller than most of my underwear. Tragically, as much as I appreciated Danny’s God-given beauty, I couldn’t stop searching the patio for the man who occupied ninety percent of my attention lately.

  I jumped as a shadow fell over me and cold water drops rained onto my face and chest.

  “Enjoying the view?” Breck asked, leaning over the back of my lounge chair. He shook his head and more droplets flew from his curls onto my body. He was shirtless, and the turquoise bathing suit he wore, while marginally larger than Danny’s in that it covered his entire ass, barely reached the top of his pubes.

  “Fuck yeah,” I said, reaching for him. He laughed and dodged easily out of the way.

  A gust of wind sent Danny’s bird raft bumping into the side of the pool. “He looks so peaceful,” Breck said, watching his friend. “I have the strongest urge to jump on him.”

  “Me, too.” I wiggled my eyebrows teasingly. Breck punched my arm, and I laughed. “Hey! You’re invited
, of course.”

  “As a third?”

  I nodded. “Or you could just watch, if you’d rather.”

  Breck snorted. “You wish, old man. No way you could handle me and Danny together.”

  Laughing, I pulled him onto my lap. He was probably right. God, he felt so good in my arms that I couldn’t even care about the glare Ridge was giving his brother and me. In my opinion, his glare was growing weak, becoming more for appearance’s sake than any actual animosity he felt for me. He seemed to be growing resigned to the thought of Breck and I hooking up.

  The sound of metal wheels rolling over cement drew all eyes. Josie rolled a cart loaded with glass pitchers filled with frosty drinks in unnatural colors. Today’s outfit was a high-waisted nautical-themed bathing suit right off a Betty Grable poster and candy-apple red platform sandals. She rang a small bell, like the world’s most alcoholic ice cream man, and obediently we converged on the glass-topped table.

  “Drink up, boys. I’m trying a new rum from Barbados that Charlie never let me touch before. But I figure, there’s not much he can do about it now.”

  Leo took a pink drink garnished with spears of pineapple and maraschino cherries. “Remind me never to get on your bad side, Josie.”

  She scoffed. “You just do what Charlie needed you to do, and we’ll get along just fine.”

  Danny joined the group, leaving wet footprints in his wake. Wesley trailed behind, eyes locked on Danny’s ass so hard, he bumped into the kid when he stopped walking. He caught Danny by the shoulders. “Sorry!”

  Danny frowned at him, reached for the blue drink with orange slices, and took a step away. Ooh, Wesley was going to have to up his game.

  “We’ll get the job done. Don’t worry, Miss Josie,” I said. “Piece of cake.”

  It really should be. So far, Harlan had stuck to the basic bad-guy plan. An email had arrived this morning asking for another ‘campaign contribution.’ When Ben-slash-Carson had refused, a second email had come from an ‘anonymous source’ with a lovely little montage of Carson and his fuck buddy from the party along with a boilerplate blackmail letter straight out of bad-guy school asking for a few thousands dollars ‘campaign contribution.’