“Isn’t it obvious?” he asked with a single brow raised. “I’m being nice to Auntie Joyce’s baby.”
Seraph’s eyes were wide, her mouth hanging open for a moment before she snapped it shut and shook her head, lifting her arms between them to frame his face with her hands. “Are you on drugs? Is that it? You can tell me, and I’ll help you find some resources. I won’t even tell Uncle Louis, I swear. Just tell me what’s going on with you.” Her voice had taken on a desperate note that she didn’t even try to hide. His actions had her so confused; she didn’t know how to categorize them. What was going on here?
“If it was drugs, would they make you feel good, Ser, because that’s all I want to do. I want to make you feel good so that you scream my name like you did at that party. Can I do that?”
Slowly, Seraph shook her head. His eyes had darkened from a warm brown to something akin to mud after it rained, and everything inside of Seraph was telling her to run as quickly and as far away as she could. But she didn’t get the chance because faster than she could process his already brazen behavior, Damon’s hand slid off of her waist and slipped underneath her skirt to rest on her panty-covered mound. His mouth dropped to her neck, and he kissed her softly before speaking directly into her ear.
“Are you sure?
Sliding his palm against her, he used his middle finger to rub along her slit, soaking the crotch of her panties in her juices.
Sucking in a breath, she grabbed his wrist. “Don’t do this.”
“Why?” he murmured, licking the shell of her ear.
She whimpered, her fingers tightening around his wrist. “Because… it’s wrong.”
Biting her earlobe, he growled. “When has an orgasm ever been wrong?” Then he pulled her panties to the side and slid a finger into her opening.
“Oh my God,” she cried out softly as her hips bucked of their own volition.
He slid a second finger into her and began pumping quickly. Heat engulfed her belly, and the way she widened her stance was an unconscious reaction, her head falling back against her shoulders as she panted heavily. When Damon leaned forward and nipped at her throat with his teeth, he added a third finger, and she shuddered at the intrusion—at how full she felt.
“What’s my name?” he asked.
Eyes closed, she shook her head, refusing to answer him.
His thumb dug into her folds until it found her clit, and her eyes popped open to find him staring at her intensely. “Answer me,” he demanded.
Her mouth parted as her bottom lip curled in and tucked under her teeth. His eyes narrowed at her defiance, prompting him to pump into her faster until her knees weakened and her toes curled in her flats. She gripped his forearms as her climax sped toward her like a bullet train.
“Shit! Damon!” she hissed. “Fuuuuck!”
She slumped against him, moaning when he pulled his fingers from inside her, the wet sound echoing in the quiet kitchen. He sucked the three digits into his mouth, and as she watched him clean her juices from his hand, the reality of what just happened hit her harder than her orgasm had.
Not again! she thought, her face pinching into a frown. Before Damon could say another word, she ducked under the arm he still had anchored on the counter behind her and sprinted toward the front door. With trembling fingers, she pulled her keys from her pocket and jogged toward her car. Her mother was standing in the street, grinning up into the face of some man that Seraph didn’t recognize, but she was too flustered to do anything about it. She eased her car out of the driveway and rolled down the window to call out a goodbye to Joyce before speeding off down the street and navigating out of the neighborhood.
She couldn’t blame this one on sleep, and it didn’t seem like she could blame it on drugs either. He hadn’t been bleary-eyed nor had slurred speech, and when she thought about it, neither of those symptoms had been present the night of Jaime’s party. Maybe the truth was that Damon had a side of him that no one ever saw—a side that she would have never believed existed. Where he had always seemed shy and reserved, he was now full of bravado and perversion, and for some reason had fixated on her. Her thoughts went from wondering what was wrong with him to figuring out how to avoid him at all costs.
There was no way she was letting him put his hands, mouth, or any other body part near her again.
CHAPTER SIX
Explain Yourself
“Heifer, I know you didn’t leave without saying anything?!”
Seraph sighed as her mother screeched into her ear and lifted her shoulder to hold her phone to her face as she unlocked the door of her apartment. She’d been anticipating this call and was surprised it had taken an hour to come. Those sixty minutes had given her enough time to browse the aisles at Poured in search of the perfect bottle of sweet wine to drown her woes in tonight.
Walking inside, she locked the door behind her and disengaged the alarm before dropping her keys onto an end table and kicking out of her shoes as she made her way to the kitchen.
“I said bye, Mama.”
Joyce sucked her teeth, and Seraph dug her trusty rabbit wine bottle opener out of a drawer and fixed it to the top of the wine.
“No. What you did was yell out some mess from the front seat of your car as you were driving off! That’s not the same thing at all. You weren’t even here ten minutes. You didn’t even get to eat!”
“I know, I know! I’m sorry. I’m just having a crisis right now and prefer to be alone.”
As soon as Seraph heard Joyce’s sharp intake of breath, she silently cursed herself for her poor choice of words.
“A…crisis? What’s going on?”
The good-natured fussing in her tone had been replaced by stern concern, and Seraph rushed to reassure her.
“It’s not a crisis, Mama. That’s not the right word. I’m…dealing with a situation that I need to work through. It’s not a crisis,” she reiterated, “but there is a moral aspect that I need to figure out.”
“Moral?” Joyce asked, confusion radiating through the phone lines. “Did you commit a crime?”
Seraph dropped the rabbit opener onto the counter and carried the now-open bottle of wine with her into her bedroom.
“No, Mama. I did not commit a crime.”
“You sleeping with your boss?”
Chuckling, she put the phone on speaker and placed it on her nightstand as she began removing her jewelry and putting it in the velvet-lined box on her dresser.
“As much as I adore Gina, no, ma’am. I’m not sleeping with her.”
“You rob somebody?”
“Well,” Seraph began wryly, “since robbing someone is definitely a crime, I’m going to have to say no, ma’am.”
“Did you—”
“Mama, come on!”
Joyce’s laughter brought a smile to Seraph’s face, even as she rolled her eyes.
“Well, shit. If you won’t tell me, I have to guess.”
Seraph grabbed her phone and carried it with her into her closet as she disrobed.
“I’m not ready to tell you just yet. I thought I was but…I just need you to exercise a little patience. Remember how you used to tell me it was a virtue when I was growing up? Well, I need you to remember that right now.”
“Seraph Soleil.”
At the use of her first and middle names, Seraph groaned. “Yes, ma’am?”
“You know you can talk to me about anything, right?”
“Yes, ma’am. I know.” It was something Joyce had said to her dozens of times during her childhood and well into her teenage years. Having come from a home where freedom of expression was a punishable offense, Joyce made sure that her daughter never felt as if she had to censor herself.
“And even though I can’t promise I’ll understand, I can promise not to judge you too harshly or put undue pressure on you.”
The earnestness in her mother’s voice made a lump form in Seraph’s throat. “I know, Mama. I love you.”
“I love you more, baby. Never forget t
hat. Now, I’ll let you go. I can hear an echo, so I’m assuming you’re in your bathroom.”
Seraph nodded, even though the other woman couldn’t see her. “Yes, ma’am. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“You’d better.”
Then the call disconnected and Seraph sat her phone on the counter while she started the water for her shower. She needed to clean away all evidence of what Damon had done to her then she planned to climb into her bed and binge on some feel-good shows and put all thoughts of him out of her head.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Bang My Line
Her phone rang four times in a row before she silenced the ringer and put the damned thing in the drawer of her nightstand. Damon had been calling her nonstop for the past hour, and she was one more call away from blocking his number. He didn’t leave messages. He didn’t text. He just hung up and redialed.
He was wasting his time because Seraph did not intend to answer for him. There was nothing for them to discuss. Sure, she had a handful of questions to ask him about the things he’d done to her and the reasons that fueled him, but after their encounter earlier that day, she didn’t think she could be in a room alone with him long enough to get the answers she needed.
A peculiar, rhythmic knocking on her door pulled her attention from the show she was watching on her tablet. Exhaling an annoyed breath, she stared at the wall in front of her that separated her bedroom from the rest of her 800-square foot apartment and contemplated whether or not to go answer the door. It was after nine, and not only was she already in bed, but she’d set the security alarm in anticipation of not leaving her bedroom until daybreak. None of her friends would show up this late without calling first, and her mother had both a key and the code to her alarm.
Her brows furrowed and she frowned when the knocking sounded once more, trying to think of who it could be without her taking the easy route and simply checking. Then, a light bulb clicked on in her head, and she shot up from her prone position as it occurred to her who was likely at her door.
Damon.
It had to be him. She lacked the words to explain how she knew, but her surety was undeniable. Also undeniable was the unwanted but intense heat curling in her belly at the memory of being filled by Damon’s fingers. That was enough to make her lie back down and pull the covers up over her head.
The last thing she needed was Damon in her apartment. Letting him in would be playing a dangerous game, one she wasn’t sure wouldn’t end with her face down, ass up, and her brain muddled with confusion and shame.
When the knocking continued, her eyes darted to her nightstand and she quickly played a round of heads or tails in her head to help her decide whom she should call—her complex’s security or the police. Just as the mental coin landed with heads up, her work phone began to chime. The initially low ringtone ascended with each run until she was certain whoever stood on her porch could hear it without straining. Throwing back the covers, she leaped out of bed and rushed into the living room where her work phone was charging on one of the two end tables that bookended her small couch. After silencing the device, she sighed loudly and stared at the front door, willing her solicitor to change their mind and go away.
As soon as that thought crossed her mind, the knock sounded again. Groaning, Seraph flicked on a lamp and stomped over to the door to punch in the four-digit code and disengage her security alarm. Pushing up onto her tiptoes, she looked through the peephole, cursing softly when all she saw was blackness. Whoever was at her door had covered the tiny window with their finger. For some reason, that small action only seemed to cement Seraph’s thought that it was indeed Damon. Taking a deep breath, she threw back the deadbolt and eased the door inward a few inches. Instead of standing in the opening, she used the door as a shield, keeping most of her body hidden from the person who stood on the other side. With wide eyes, she took him in. It was the same man who had finger-fucked her into an orgasm in her mother’s kitchen just ten hours earlier.
He was also the man who’d, as a kindergartner, come into her life when she was fifteen and her uncle married his mother. The man that she’d babysat off and on until she was eighteen. The man who had taken the boundaries of their relationship and burned them to the ground, turning the box she’d kept him in on its head. This was the man who, out of nowhere, seemed determined to tie her mind—and body—in knots.
His dark brown skin seemed to glisten under her porch light as he stared down at her with an impassive look on his face. Stretched across his chest was a plain white t-shirt that clung to his pectorals and was partially visible under a half-zipped university hoodie. A pair of sweatpants clung to his waist and thighs, displaying an obvious erection that her eyes stuttered over and gave her pause. Involuntarily, her mind transported her to Jaime’s party and the memory of him rubbing against her bare sex. Her brain screamed at her to look away from his dick, but she just couldn’t peel her eyes away from it.
She was literally dickmatized.
By her cousin.
The thought made guilt dance in the back of her brain, but the thumping between her thighs, the steady pulse that felt as if her pussy had a heartbeat of its own, worked that guilt into the shadows.
Hell was her destination and her transportation was soaked in gasoline. Unleaded. Ninety-three octanes.
“Damon,” she began, shaking her head slowly and willing—begging—her body to calm down enough to send him away, “what are you doing here?”
A moment of silence passed between them before he leaned against the partially opened doorframe. “Why didn’t you answer the phone when I called you?”
Finally, she jerked her gaze up to his face to see his lips twisted into a knowing smirk that instantly irritated her. Obviously, he knew what she was looking at, and his amusement made shame bite at her cheeks.
Her knuckles whitened as she clenched the door and gritted out, “Which time?”
He lifted one dark eyebrow at the infusion of attitude in her voice. “The last time.”
She huffed, blowing air out of her nose. “I was tired of you calling me.”
He nodded as if it made perfect sense to him. “And the first time?”
Rolling her eyes, she shot back, “I didn’t want to talk to you.”
He stared at her so long that she began to fidget, and she was too damn old to be fidgeting under anyone’s stare. Her neck heated with anger and embarrassment, and just as she opened her mouth to tell him to go away, he spoke.
“That’s fine. We don’t have to talk.”
The implication in his words was as clear as glass, and her breathing grew shallow as anticipation settled into her belly. She blinked rapidly at her internal reaction to his words, and a tendril of panic snaked its way up her throat.
“Look, Damon—”
“Let me see you,” he said, and although he spoke softly, the demand was clearly understood.
Despite wanting to slam the door in his face and run back to bed, Seraph felt a buzzing in her ears that compelled her to do the opposite. Like a marionette attached to an invisible string, Seraph pulled the door open wider and shuffled into the doorway. She stood frozen in place as Damon’s eyes traveled from her sock-covered feet, up her bare thighs where the hem of her sleeping gown began, then paused where the juncture of her thighs rested under her gown before skirting up her torso to her face.
The hunger in his eyes caused a gush of moisture to ruin her panties and gooseflesh to bubble all over her body. Was it possible to be aroused and terrified at the same damn time?
When Damon reached down and squeezed his dick over his sweats, Seraph clenched her thighs together and took a step backward, hand gripping the doorknob tightly. Her mind screamed for her to close and lock the door—to put some distance in between the two of them until he came to his senses, no matter how long that took—but that same compulsion that pulled her from behind the door rooted her where she stood, making her wait for his next move.
Silently, Damon stepped ove
r the threshold of her apartment, removing her hand from the knob and pushing the door closed behind him. She walked backward, stumbling over her own feet as she tried not to get run over by his commanding presence. He reached out, wrapping his fingers around her wrist and pulling her flush against his body.
“Careful,” he said, his tone laced with a warning that she wasn’t sure how to process. Did he mean that she should be careful with her steps or careful with how she handled him? She couldn’t figure it out and refused to ask because the last thing she needed was any sort of clarification about anything from him. All she needed was for him to exit her apartment and—maybe—move back to Dallas.
Pulling out of his grasp, she backed up until she could step around one of the armchairs in her living room, putting some much-needed space in between them.
“It’s late and I need to go to bed.”
He shoved his hands into his pockets, his eyes trained on her. “You’re right.”
She sighed, her shoulders drooping with relief. “Thank you.”
With quick strides, she crossed the living room, her hand outstretched as she reached for the doorknob. And just as her hand made contact with the cool metal, she felt the heat of Damon’s body against her back as his hands fell to her hips, freezing her in place. His lips grazed her neck, and the soft touch made each of the tiny hairs all over her body stand on end as a full-body shiver consumed her. She bit her lip to stifle the soft moan that tried to escape from her mouth. He didn’t need to be encouraged by her.
Determined fingers trailed down her thighs until they reached the hem of her gown. He bunched the fabric into his fists and slowly lifted it up her body.
Swallowing against the lump in her throat, Seraph curved her hips forward, trying to move them away from the hard body standing behind her.
“Da—think about this, don’t—”
He released the fabric and slid his hands underneath, sliding his palms up her torso until he reached her unrestrained breasts. Cupping each globe in his hands, he rubbed his nose along the shell of her ear.
An Illicit Seduction: a Dark Erotic Experience Page 4