by Evie Claire
“You know what I’ve always wanted to do in my spare time?” she asked, slowly running a finger along an intricately carved design.
“What’s that?” Brody asked, taking a leisurely step her way with a mischievous smile.
“I’ve always wanted to fuck on a pool table just like this.”
If the brashness of her comment caught him off guard, he didn’t let on. He studied her face, his eyes moving quickly and intently as if some internal struggle was working itself out. Needing zero visual guidance, Phebe blindly hooked a finger through one of his belt loops and pulled him to her. His hands landed on her shoulders to steady them both.
“Phebe…” His voice was full of hesitation. “You’re really drunk.”
“Yes, I am.” She nodded her head in agreement and ran her hands up his shirtfront to the soft, warm skin just under the collar. She pulled it to the side and planted a delicate kiss in the dip below his neck, inhaling deeply the smells of cinnamon and coffee and man. Brody’s head fell back. His gaze shot up to the ceiling, exposing his neck and taking in her touch. “But I wasn’t last night,” she offered between gentle kisses. “And if you’d been in my bed, I think we both know where that would’ve gone.” Phebe turned her face to his.
Brody loomed over her, a hungry look in his eyes. What was he waiting for? Phebe laced her fingers behind his neck and pulled him down to her. Or tried to. He didn’t budge, and she was left half dangling from his neck.
“I never take advantage of drunk women.” Brody’s hands left her shoulders and slid along her arms, trying to pry himself from her grip. Phebe wasn’t giving up so easily.
“Seriously? You don’t want to sleep with me?”
“Of course I do. Have since I first laid eyes on you.”
“So, what’s the problem?”
“I don’t want you to wake up in the morning and regret me.” Brody leaned down, placing a hand on either side of Phebe, closing the distance between them. Their lips were inches apart, but Phebe didn’t dive in for the kiss she was desperate for. Something in his words stopped her. The familiarity she found in him was there again. The feeling she’d felt the day they met and she’d bared her inner thoughts to a total stranger because it seemed like the right thing to do. Was it the gin, or was it him?
From out of nowhere, a single resounding heartbeat threw itself against her breastbone and punched the air from her lungs. It was her body’s innate reaction to him. One that heightened every sense she possessed and refocused each one more acutely on the man pressed against her. She didn’t have to be stone cold sober to know that the connection she was feeling with Brody was something different. She’d known plenty of men in her life. None compared to him.
“I don’t think I could ever regret you, Brody Cantrell.” And it was the truth. No matter how much alcohol flowed through her veins, or how much distance separated their positions in life, there was some part of herself she recognized in Brody. Something that just felt right. Something he obviously felt, too. Their lips lingered, waiting for the kiss that would take them past the point of no return. Hesitation melted from his face, replaced by need.
He tasted of cinnamon, a sweet-hot sensation that warmed her tongue with each thrust of his. The hands she’d spent hours fantasizing about found their way to the nape of her neck while hers found the ass they longed to explore. The only problem was all the clothing that still separated them from doing the damn thing.
Brody pulled away, leaving Phebe wanting more. Her thoughts were so love drunk, she couldn’t process what he was doing when he walked a few paces away. There was a single click. The room dimmed, leaving only dark, golden sunset hues streaming through it. Slowly her vision adjusted. Brody stood by the chair that held the work lamp. A shadow cast over his face.
“Take off your shoes,” he instructed in a voice that left zero room for negotiation. Phebe did as she was told, kicking free of her heels. “Let your hair down.”
Phebe grabbed at the hair tie wound around her topknot. Blond hair spilled over her shoulders, drawing an audible inhalation from Brody.
Phebe wasn’t a supermodel. Her well-formed curves were quite arresting—a Grecian goddess’s body where most of her friends were total waifs. And no matter how much she appreciated that body in the privacy of a shower-fogged bathroom mirror, she still felt compelled to hide its shapeliness during the day. Femininity wasn’t a sin, but it made Phebe feel weak. Especially when negotiating multimillion-dollar contracts in a room full of men.
She loathed feeling fragile in the boardroom.
She loved it in the bedroom.
And for whatever reason, that was the ruling emotion that overtook her body the moment her thighs opened wide over the wooden side rail of Uncle Nuck’s old pool table and Brody’s solid warmth slipped into the space between.
He made quick work of her skirt, pushing it up to her waist and moving on to the row of buttons directly above it. Phebe’s lips found his neck. Her fingers blindly fumbled around his waist before circling back to the belt buckle that bit into her thigh. When he pushed the silk blouse over her shoulders a whoosh of air chilled her curves. She froze. Instinctively moving her hands to cover her black lace D-cup bra and the cool white flesh spilling over it, she focused on a freckle in the dip below his Adam’s apple and swallowed hard.
Brody felt her pause and pulled back to take her measure in the last dusky rays that spilled through the window. Gently, he hooked a finger under her chin, lifting it until their eyes met. He shook his head ever so slightly and clucked his tongue against his teeth.
“Such beauty should never hide.” Taking her wrists, he pulled them away and placed a soft kiss on each palm. There wasn’t an inch of her his gaze didn’t devour. She’d never felt so exposed before a man. When an appreciative—and ever-so-naughty—smile broke over his face, she’d never felt more adored.
In a flurry of motion, he ripped his shirt over his head and threw it to the floor. A glorious array of color spilled into the room. Under swirls of vibrant ink, muscles rippled along his flank and spilled into the top of his jeans as if funneled there by a striking V muscle. It was enough to completely wipe away any hesitation Phebe felt. Because all she wanted to feel was her tongue tracing every inch of his flesh.
Their lips found each other’s and settled into a familiar rhythm. Brody crashed into Phebe, consuming her with a hot wave of naked man and muscle. He pushed her back to the pool table’s velvet top. His lips left hers. Tracing their way down her neck, over her chest, and to the soft mounds of flesh still covered by her bra. She arched off the padded slate top when his hands slid around her ribs. Her bra melted away. Cool air pricked her nipples, and then his mouth was on her, warm and wet. Gently sucking one nipple while his fingers softly rolled the other between finger and thumb. It was Phebe’s spot. One that sent lightning streaking straight to her crotch. She caught a moan in her throat and dug her nails into the biceps that supported his weight. Fingers and tongues were great, but she needed to feel all of Brody. From the inside.
She tore at the fasteners on his pants. Desperation made her hands clumsy but didn’t slow them. She needed him. And if she didn’t get him right then, she might blow all by herself. What fun was that? She ripped the belt from its loops in one slapping motion and reached for a zipper that struggled to contain his erection. It sprang free—hot and wet at the tip—into her waiting palm.
The only thing left standing between them and everything they wanted was her thong. That was easily fixed. Brody skillfully grabbed the front panel and pulled the slip of underwear to its breaking point. The waistband strained, but allowed enough room for his cock to slide past and into her waiting warmth.
Just the tip of him barely into the wet folds of her. It was a tight squeeze. The sensation so overpowering it stilled them both. They clung together, afraid of moving, afraid of coming from the initial touch alone
. Brody shifted his weight and the subtle move pulled the kind of sounds from their depths only sex can. Raspy groans ripped through the muffled bar noises from below. Good god, what the fuck was happening to her?
Phebe arched her back and wrapped her legs around his waist, determined to take as much of him as she could. She wanted it all, forced so deeply inside there would be nothing of her left, only them. Slowly he slid deeper, farther, past the point any man ever had been before. He squeezed into parts of her she didn’t know she had. His single stroke created a swell in her that inched along the edge of pain. It slid into her belly, reached across her chest, and pushed at her throat until it challenged her ability to breathe. And she loved him for it.
Her head fell back and she exhaled one long, shivering breath. His lips found the soft indention where her clavicles met and he licked his way up from there. On the inhale, Phebe’s walls accepted the limits to which they’d been stretched and settled around his girth. He paused at the top of her, flexing his ass cheeks again and again, creating tiny waves of pleasure for her to ride.
She moaned with each one, tensing, clenching, and hanging on for dear life to the dick that—with one thrust—had brought her so close to orgasm. If he asked later, she’d blame it on the Fireball, because never in her life had sex made her consider the plausibility of spontaneous combustion. She was on the brink.
Slowly, he withdrew, pleasurably torturing her with the same sensations all over again. Her body bucked and rolled, and came to a screeching halt on the edge of everything she wanted. She bit her lip. Hard. Knowing what came next and how quickly he could coax it from her, she braced against an imminent orgasm with mounting angst. When it didn’t come, she opened her eyes. He fumbled with something between her legs. She sat up enough to see him roll a condom down his length and mentally slapped herself for getting so caught up in the moment she’d forgotten. But Brody knew what he was doing, and before she realized it, he’d plunged balls deep into her again. The second stroke more satisfying than the first.
They worked against each other. Their lips locked, tongues and hands so intricately laced together she hoped they’d never come undone. And their bodies didn’t. Until they did. Brody held nothing back. He fucked her like a man should. It was hard. It was rough. It was unapologetic. It was everything. Her femininity had unknowingly ached for hands like his.
Not wanting the pleasure to end, she opened her eyes in search of distraction. Looking past his shoulders as they rose and fell over her, she focused on rustic, bare-beam rafters and the crumbling mortar that held them in place. She’d never been fucked like this—all wild and reckless. It was always proper in her world. And a proper date meant a five-course dinner and—if there was any hint of chemistry—fucking on his five-hundred-thread-count sheets. Usually with a lame-duck dick because they weren’t real men, just boys playing dress up with the trappings of a man’s life. They’d never have the nerve to lay her over a pool table and dare her not to come. But Brody did. And wasn’t it everything?
The smells of chalk dust and sex clung to the muggy evening air. Her lips tasted of warm cinnamon and gin from her lover’s kiss. In her arms, she held a man that had turned a shit day into one she never wanted to forget. More than anything, in that moment, she wanted to come for him. She wanted him to fuck her so hard she would never forget their messy perfection. And so with one final thrust against him, she pulled him in so deeply, they both lost total control.
In a quaking convulsion of sweat and nerves and cum, they fell over the edge together and found everything they needed.
Chapter 10
Brody
Was it any wonder Brody had forgotten an early morning meeting when a woman like Phebe Stark still lay wrapped in his sheets?
Hands shoved into his pockets, boot soles slapping against concrete, he made quick work of the few blocks between his place and a local café. One where his mother, Lona Cantrell, and her attorney waited. He wouldn’t mind keeping them waiting forever. But that was rude, and he’d put the meeting off long enough.
Feeling as if a pair of vice grip pliers were tightening around his life even further, he pushed through the doors into the Flying Biscuit Café and found his mother’s outstretched arms waiting for a hug. Not that Lona was doing any of the tightening in his life. No, it was dealing with his late father’s will that added to the mounting pressure.
“Brody!” she exclaimed like she hadn’t seen him in years. It had been a week, tops, since they’d last seen each other.
“Hey, Mom.” Brody leaned into the hug, allowing Lona to squeeze as long as she liked, then sat down beside her in front of a waiting cup of coffee.
“You take it black, right?” she asked, straightening the silverware that also waited for him.
“Yes. Thank you. Sorry I’m late.” Brody tucked into the coffee he so desperately needed, and a biscuit Lona pushed his way. He hadn’t exactly gotten much sleep last night and he was starving. Though he certainly wasn’t complaining.
“No problem, Mr. Cantrell, this in an informal meeting. We just need a couple signatures and you’re all done.” The attorney reached into his briefcase and produced a stack of papers, pushing a half-eaten plate of pancakes to the side.
“I thought I already did that.” Brody scanned the papers in front of the attorney as best he could upside down.
“What you signed earlier reverted the cash you inherited from your father back to your mother. These papers are for the actual property…” Lona’s attorney put on a pair of readers and scanned the paragraphs. “Most notably a roughly two-acre tract off of…Rhodes Street?” His face quirked up. “Is that right?” The attorney asked under his breath and then busied himself going through another stack of papers. “Just one second.”
Lona turned to Brody while the attorney double-checked his paperwork. “Brody, I really wish you would reconsider,” she whispered. “Your father wanted you to have something.”
Brody kept his eyes on the black liquid in his cup. This was the hundredth time they’d been over it. He didn’t want a dime from his father. And even though he had more bills than money at present, accepting anything from his father’s estate wasn’t an option. He would find a way to make up the balance by himself.
“Then he should’ve spent a little more time being an actual father. I’m fine, Mom. I don’t need or want anything from him. You should have it.” He swallowed the lie, determined not to let her know the truth of his finances.
“Your father loved you.”
“He had a strange way of showing it.”
“He was proud of you.”
“No, he wasn’t, Mom. He made that abundantly clear. You were the only one who was ever proud of me.”
“He didn’t understand your decision to walk away from a full college scholarship. But, in time, he was proud of how you took on the responsibility of Nuck’s bar.”
“Mom,” Brody finally looked at Lona, “that’s bullshit. Dad was never proud of me. And I don’t want a dime.”
Lona’s eyes went wide. They always did when Brody cursed in her presence. And then the very next minute, they were lit with resolve. “Well, what about when I die? You’ll get everything then,” Lona shot back, trying to reason with Brody as best she could.
“Please, look at you, you’re the picture of health. You’re going to outlive me!” Desperate to change the direction of their conversation, he leaned over and kissed his mother’s cheek, squeezing her hand and giving her a smile that always melted her. He loved his mom as fiercely as a son could. Brody wasn’t the only family member Thomas Cantrell had spent the majority of his later life ignoring. Lona would never admit it, but now that Thomas was gone, the weight of his neglect had lifted off her shoulders and she seemed ten years younger.
“Brody!” Lona beamed at her son and waved his compliments off.
“Okay, guys, sorry. I don’t have t
he paperwork I thought I did. This says the property is two point two acres on Rhodes Street, but that doesn’t seem right to me and I don’t have a copy of the county’s property record on me. Do you have any idea when your husband might have acquired this property, Lona?”
Lona shrugged. “Thomas was always buying depressed properties—tax sells, bankruptcies, stuff like that. It’s how he spent any extra money we had.”
“I would really like to double-check these documents before we start the quit claim process for your son to hand it over to you, Lona.” Again, the attorney scanned the papers, with his head tucked sideways this time. “Mr. Cantrell, you are certain you want to give everything to your mother?”
“Absolutely.”
At his side, Lona sighed heavily, then suddenly sat up straighter. “What happens if I don’t accept it?”
“Um…” The attorney tapped his thumb against the table. “I’ve honestly never had that happen. Most family members fight to get as much as they can.”
Lona landed an elbow in Brody’s side; it was teasing but also testing. “See, I can refuse it. Then you have to accept it.”
Now Brody sighed, sensing that it was best to leave the comment be. Yes, his mother could refuse to accept the property, refuse to sign the papers, thus leaving him with part of the inheritance his father wanted him to have. Judging by the determination lighting her eyes, she just might do it. But if she wouldn’t take the property, it didn’t matter. Someone would. His mind was made up on the matter.
“I guess you’re right, Mom.” Brody’s shoulders hunched over his coffee, giving the impression he was accepting defeat, just to get her off the subject. It was better than starting another argument they’d already had too many times for his liking.
“Mr. Cantrell, I would really like to check this paperwork with my secretary before we sign. Just so we’re absolutely certain what it is you’re giving away.”