The sincerity in his voice told Brea he really would be there for her…but he was too close for her to breathe, much less rub two thoughts together. A terrible awareness consumed her—of his big arms around her, his warm breath in her ear, his hard, naked chest flattening her sensitive nipples, and his heart chugging in time with hers.
As if he felt their connection, too, his penis hardened even more, surging between them, nudging where her ache swirled and thickened.
“Pierce…” Brea meant to pull away.
Instead, she found herself writhing against him.
“I’m trying to be a good guy, pretty girl, but if you keep that up, I’m going to fuck you again,” he groaned. “In thirty seconds—or less.”
Fresh need tightened between her legs. Brea’s head told her that would be terrible. But her body loved the notion, heating and softening all at once, arching to get even closer.
Pierce cursed, then lifted her breasts in his massive palms and sucked one nipple into his mouth. She gasped…and her protest faded into a wail of pleasure.
Why was she resisting him? The damage was already done. She was no longer a virgin. They had already had unprotected sex. Would another few minutes of sin really matter?
Of course she was rationalizing, but when Pierce tongued her sensitive peaks, then sucked one deep into his mouth, she dug her nails into his shoulders and gave in. “Oh…”
As he moved to thumb her stiff crests again, he slid his tongue up her neck. “It’s so right between us. Say something if you don’t want more, but otherwise… All it takes to feel good is a little shift and”—he yanked the crotch of her panties out of his way slowly, giving her time to refuse him as he fisted his erection and adjusted her directly over his swollen head—“fuck…”
He gripped her hips and gave her a gentle push down. Gravity did the rest of his dirty work. Together, they destroyed her resistance. When she finally enveloped every inch of his hardness, she sank against him with a long, agonized gasp.
Having Pierce inside her, filling her so completely, shocked her even more than the first time.
“That’s it,” he growled in her ear. “You’re not too sore?”
Brea felt a slight sting everywhere her flesh stretched to accommodate him, but this time it only hurt in a good way. “Not enough to stop.”
He urged her up the length of his shaft, then urged her back down. “You like the bite?”
Beneath her, he lifted his hips, his erection scraping her swollen sex as he shoved inside her, prodding some nerve-rich spot deep.
“Yes,” Brea hissed, her head falling back with a moan of surrender as her blood raced and her heart careened.
“Grab on to my shoulders. I’m going to fuck you until you can’t think about anything but us.”
She was already there.
A voice of caution in the back of her head tried to scream at her to stop, to consider whose daughter she was and what she was doing. But Pierce’s raspy breaths and rough hands distracted her from anything resembling reason. His male musk swam in her head. He overwhelmed her. He intoxicated her.
He owned her.
As he shafted her up and down his length, her ache tightened, her pleasure multiplied, and her objections fell silent. All that remained were his long fingers encircling her, his big body driving under her, and his thick cock filling her. Brea found herself rocking with him, swaying and grinding, gasping and keening toward the pinnacle of pleasure he was already so close to giving her.
“You look fucking beautiful.” He pinched her nipples, his grip tightening even after she sucked in a shocked breath of pained bliss. “Open your eyes. I want to watch you come.”
Brea lifted her lashes slowly. Immediately, his black stare fused itself to her. The intensity of his arousal seared her. His cheeks flamed with it. His jaw clenched with it. His entire body tightened with it. The sight of him—along with the feelings surging between them—mesmerized her. Everything about him more than accelerated her desire. A connection she’d never felt with another human being overwhelmed her. It wasn’t purely sexual, but it was as if, with some click, her soul attached itself to his.
It was shocking. It felt irrevocable.
Her hunger climbed. She ached to be even closer, craved her mouth on him. She needed him in every way a woman could touch a man.
With a cry, she fastened her lips over his. Pierce might have been physically underneath her, but he took charge, tangling his fingers in her hair, locking their mouths together, binding them in ways she’d never imagined. Brea couldn’t help but melt as she ground down on him, stroke after frantic stroke.
Finally, he tore his lips from hers with a gasp, then grabbed her hips tighter, thrusting himself hard and deep and sure, as if she was his and he had every right to claim her in any way he liked. “Give it to me. Orgasm number three. I want it now.”
She keened as she plunged down, taking him deeper than ever. The tension gathering in her belly and between her thighs coalesced, knotting up so tightly she panted, dug her nails into his bare shoulders, and unraveled with a scream.
“Yes. Oh, fuck…” His fingers bit into her as he rammed up one last time, teeth clenched, tendons in his neck flexing as ecstasy overtook him. “Brea!”
Together, they fell into the abyss, clinging, clutching, holding on for dear life. Pleasure threatened to drag her into an addicting, sublime darkness as she panted, her head lost in a dizzy sway she no longer had the will to fight.
This climax was shockingly stronger than the first two. And when she finally opened her eyes again, she found Pierce’s inky stare locked on her. The feeling of falling into him unnerved her. The longer she studied him as they tried to catch their breath, the deeper she fell. Something about being with this man in this moment… She felt as if she’d somehow tied herself to him for all time.
Like he was her destiny.
Ridiculous. God had a plan for her. And as much as she was loath to leave Pierce’s arms because this would probably be their last few moments alone, He wouldn’t curse her to lose her heart to a man her family and community would shun, right?
Pierce pulled her in, kissing his way up her cleavage, her collarbone, her shoulder. “Stay tonight.”
She shouldn’t. She couldn’t.
But she was so very tempted.
The truth was, her father would go to bed early because, even if he wasn’t giving the service tomorrow, he would want to be well rested for his first Sunday back in the church since his surgery. Cutter wasn’t leaving the hospital tonight. It was already past visiting hours, and he wouldn’t expect to see her until he was officially discharged in the morning. So the two people most likely to care where she spent the night would have no idea she wasn’t at home, tucked chastely in her bed.
This might be her only chance to stay with Pierce, indulge her need for him…and purge him from her system for good.
Still, she had one question. “Why?”
“Want me to keep being honest with you?”
“Please.”
Pierce looked at her as if he never wanted to let her go. “I’ve never felt about a woman the way I do about you.”
Brea’s breath caught. A wave of pleasure washed over her. Another rush of it flushed her cheeks. “I’d have to be up really early.”
“Any time I get with you is better than none.”
His words softened her heart. She felt the same. It probably wasn’t smart but… “I’ll stay.”
A smile stretched across his face, transforming him, before he nuzzled his face in her neck. “I’ll make sure you don’t regret it, pretty girl.”
Normally, she’d suspect he meant something sexual. And she didn’t think for one second that he’d keep his hands off her the rest of the night. In fact, she hoped he didn’t since the thought of him inside of her again made her whole body flash hot, as if she wasn’t already spent. As if he hadn’t utterly satisfied her minutes ago. But something about the way he watched her or touched her
—Brea couldn’t exactly put her finger on it—convinced her he wasn’t simply wanting to hook up again.
If she were honest, she wasn’t staying strictly for the sex, either. She more than liked him, despite all the reasons she shouldn’t. But everyone in her life behaved as if she was a girl; Pierce alone treated her like a woman. Didn’t she deserve one night with a man who made her feel good?
Maybe Pierce wasn’t her sin but her reward—albeit temporary—for always being everyone’s dutiful friend and helpmate. And maybe she was fooling herself. Even so, Brea resolved to pack as much pleasure as she possibly could into this one night and leave tomorrow with no regrets.
She smiled. “Are you going to feed me before you take advantage of me again?”
“I could.” He nuzzled her. “Or I could just chain you to my bed and fuck you all night.”
That should not turn her on so much, but it sounded both forbidden and wonderful. “How about both? I can fry eggs in less than five minutes.”
Pierce cradled her face, and the way he looked at her again—as if she meant the world to him—had her stomach flipping over and upside down with a giddiness that spread through her body. If she wasn’t careful, she would fall for him.
He pressed a passionate kiss to her bruised lips, something slow, urgent, and thorough. Something that told her what the rest of her night was likely to be like. Something that excited her almost more than she could contain.
When he finally lifted his head, he brushed his thumb across her tingling lip. “As long as I get to watch you cook naked, hell yes.”
* * *
Sunday, August 17
Predawn darkness surrounded Brea as she slowed her car and killed her headlights. She wished she could turn off her guilt half so easily after creeping from Pierce’s bed and tiptoeing out of his house. What would he think when he woke to find her gone?
Nothing polite. He wouldn’t care that people had expectations of her—that her father required her in the front row at church or that Cutter needed a nursemaid after his release from the hospital. He wanted her all to himself. And if she could have been selfish for a bit longer, she would have stayed.
But that wasn’t her reality. She had responsibilities and, unlike Pierce, she enjoyed people relying on her.
It was just frustratingly inconvenient today.
Shoving aside that reality, Brea brought her car to a complete stop in front of her house and let out an exhausted sigh. Since she didn’t see any lights on inside, thank goodness, she figured Daddy must still be asleep. Hopefully, she could sneak in a shower and a power nap before they left for church.
Flushed and boneless, her whole body sensitive and beyond sated, she turned off the engine and eased from the seat. She winced against the soreness between her thighs, but the tingly, uncomfortable ache reminded her of Pierce. Of the best night of her life.
He’d kept her up half the night before he’d curled her against his big furnace of a body for a couple of hours of rest…only to awaken her again with his teeth in her shoulder and his heavy erection working its way back into her snug, swollen sex with a low male groan.
The memory nearly had Brea staggering against another bomb of desire detonating inside her. The urge to throw caution to the wind—to climb back into her car and return to Pierce—assailed her. She’d give almost anything to jump into his arms again and stay for good.
That was a lovely fantasy. Maybe if she wasn’t a dutiful small-town preacher’s daughter and he wasn’t an outsider who killed for a living, they could find some way to be together. But all the what-ifs and wishes in the world weren’t going to change reality.
They were doomed.
She had given Pierce her virginity more to satisfy her own desires than to save Cutter, and she would have to both atone to God for her sin and live with her actions. But right now…she didn’t regret a thing.
Brea eased her car door shut, slung her purse over her shoulder, then, shoes in hand, crept toward her house.
“I never thought I’d see you doing the walk of shame.”
That all-too-familiar voice made her heart drop.
She whirled. “Cutter…”
Brow raised, he sauntered in her direction, eyeing her up and down as if he had no idea who she was anymore. Shame rolled through her, but she beat it back. Who was he to judge? He wasn’t her father or God. She might not have needed to give herself to Pierce Walker to save him, but she’d offered. Her heart had been in the right place…even if the rest of her had been far less altruistic.
“Listen. I can—”
“Explain?” he cut in sharply.
At the rebuke in his voice, she pressed her lips together mutely. He’d already grasped the situation. Nothing she could say, short of lying, would convince him of anything less than the truth. And she saw no point in compounding her sin with a falsehood.
“Help you home. I didn’t think you’d already be released from the hospital, and I’m sure you shouldn’t be out of bed. Why are you?”
He drew closer and clutched her arm. Even though the shadows hid the disapproval in his expression, Brea could feel it. “Been too ‘busy’ to look at your phone?”
She’d turned it off last night, and Pierce had kept her far too busy to even think about turning it back on. “Sorry.”
“I called. Repeatedly. Until three this morning. Then I sent Cage out to find you. But you weren’t home. You weren’t at the church. You weren’t at the hospital, either. Then I remembered that bastard Walker telling me—after he served as the shooter’s judge, jury, and executioner—that you were at his house. That you were waiting for him there. And sure enough, that’s where my brother found your car about an hour ago. And since there’s no way you and Walker were having a deep, existential conversation in the middle of the night, I checked myself out against doctor’s orders and had Cage drop me off at my truck so I could come after you.” Cutter clutched both of her shoulders and dragged her under the nearby streetlamp in time to see a guilty flush crawl up her face. “Dear God. What the fuck did Walker do to you?”
She winced, both at his shout and his choice of slurs. “Please lower your voice and calm down.”
“Calm down? I worried he took advantage of your naiveté. That he seduced you but…” Cutter’s grip tightened, along with his mouth, which flattened into a grim line that promised retribution. “He left his mark all over you. You reek of him. Your cheeks are whisker burned. Your lips are bruised and swollen. He fucking ravaged you.” The tightness in his voice told Brea that notion pained him. “Son of a bitch. He said you begged him to intervene on my behalf.”
Had he really thought she wouldn’t? “I-I was terrified for you.”
“Not as afraid as I’ve been for you. I knew damn well what he wanted the moment he laid eyes on you.” A scathing, cynical stare twisted his face. “He demanded you give it to him, didn’t he?”
She shook her head and tried to think of some way to explain that wouldn’t make him even angrier. “That’s not what happened.”
He clenched his jaw, turning deadly still. “Shit. Then it’s worse than I thought. Because now that I see what he’s done to you, the only other way I’ll believe you spent a night in his bed was if he forced you. By all that’s holy, I swear I’m going to kill him.”
“Don’t. You can’t. He—”
“Don’t try to sugarcoat what that motherfucker did to you.”
Cutter only used that language around her when he was beyond furious. He underscored that fact by curling up his fist, rolling a growl up from his chest, and punching her driver’s-side window.
Brea jumped and started—then blinked in horror when he reared back to do it again, as if he wasn’t satisfied that the glass hadn’t shattered the first time.
“Stop.” She grabbed his elbow and hauled back with all her might.
He whipped a furious stare on her, then snarled out another curse as he shook out his hand. “You shouldn’t have gone to Walker on my behalf.
You promised me you’d stay away.”
“You needed me, and I—”
“He’s dangerous. I hope you fucking get that now.”
“Cutter, please. Listen…”
“No. I know you. I know you sacrificed yourself for me. And I know what you’re doing right now. Don’t you dare try to make me feel less guilty.”
“I’m not. I’m telling you that—”
“It wasn’t too bad?” he scoffed. “A conversation with the asshole is torture. I can’t imagine how you endured a whole night with him fucking on top of you.” He clenched his hands into fists again with a guttural grunt. “I would have gotten myself out of the situation. And if I couldn’t have, it wasn’t worth whatever he put you through. I don’t even want to think about how much he bent you to his will—and hurt you—without wanting to kill him.”
The longer she let Cutter linger on this subject, the angrier he would become. And he wasn’t calm enough yet to hear that Pierce hadn’t forced her to do anything. He might not be for a while.
“It’s over. Right now, I’m worried about you. You should never have left against doctor’s orders. You have a nasty concussion. Don’t break your hand, too. You need rest. I’m so thankful you’re alive. Please don’t worry me more.”
“I’m fine. I’m taking you to the hospital to get a rape kit.”
She blanched. “No.”
“You’re going to let him get away with defiling you?” His incredulous stare curdled her stomach.
“He’s not getting away with anything. I’m focused on you right now. I’m worried about you. Nothing else matters.”
Cutter raked a hand through his hair, angry knuckles reddening. “You can’t expect me to let this go, Bre-bee. I understand why you might not want to tell everyone in Sunset or even your father. I don’t agree because this isn’t your shame. But I understand.”
“You don’t understand at all. Let it go.”
“Are you fucking crazy?”
“Keep it down, bro,” Cage hissed as he made his way down the driveway to join them on the sidewalk. “You’re going to wake up the whole neighborhood if you don’t.”
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