ROMA KING: Book 1 in the Roma Royals Duet

by Hart, Callie

  More than beautiful.

  More than sexual.

  She’s something out of a fairytale, and I can’t believe she’s fucking mine.

  “I’m going to put my hands on you,” I tell her. On my hands and knees, I prowl up the bed, humming sweet discord at the back of my throat as I find myself hovering over her pussy. Not yet, though. I can’t lick her yet.

  I’ve used my tongue to speak and to taste for twenty-seven years, but it’s not until now that I realize its most important purpose: to bring this woman to climax, to give her insurmountable pleasure. To bring her to the edge of an unknowable precipice and to push her, clawing and panting and moaning my motherfucking name as she hurtles over that edge and tumbles down, down, down…

  I’d happily go mute, foregoing speech, giving up all of the wonderful flavors of the world, doomed to only taste ash, if it meant I could suck, and lave, and lick her between her thighs, teasing the swollen bundle of her clit every damn day for the rest of time.

  I force myself to keep moving up her body, though. When I do settle in between her legs, I’m going to be settled in there for a long damn time, and I don’t plan on surfacing for air if I can help it. There are other things I need to do first. Other things that need to be said.

  I’m transfixed as I hold myself over her, my biceps warming as I use them to keep my weight from her chest. She looks up at me, eyes wide and innocent, and I’m hypnotized by the peppering of freckles that span the bridge of her nose and her cheekbones. There’s something about them that make her seem so innocent, but when I finally manage to turn my gaze to her eyes, so mercurial and changeable, the heat and the defiance there scatters that innocence to the wind. “You want me,” I growl into her ear. I push her legs apart with my hips, sinking myself between them. I have to clasp my bottom lip between my teeth in order to hold back the groan that builds inside me. My cock is throbbing, aching with desperate need as I angle my hips upward, lightly grinding myself against her pussy. I’m smug beyond all fucking reason when her breath stutters past her lips, and a judder of arousal travels through her naked form. “You want me real fucking bad,” I repeat, doing nothing to hide the smirk that forces the right side of my mouth to lift. “What are you thinking about, Firefly?”

  “I’m thinking about being on my hands and knees. I’m thinking about my king behind me. I’m thinking about his hands on my hips, pulling me back to him as he rubs his slick cock all over me, rubbing himself over my pussy, sliding his erection up and down, between the folds of my pussy. Between my ass cheeks. I’m thinking about how I would tremble and shake as he pushed his fingers inside me…” Her pupils dilate, and I watch her very physical reaction to what she’s imagining in her head.

  Nuzzling my nose into the hollow of her neck, I draw in the smell of her, a featherlight shiver tracing down my spine. “Such a dirty girl,” I rumble. “No need to think about any of that much longer. I’m gonna do very bad things to you… and I’m going to make every single one of them feel good.” It’s a warning. A promise. “You’re not going to know what’s hit you when I finally sink my dick inside you. You think you know what it’s going to feel like, but you have no idea. You’re going to obey me. You’re going to do everything I ask of you. You’re going to let me worship you. For every demand I make, there’ll be a reward. For every sting of pain, there will be a sea of pleasure to soothe it.”

  Arching my spine, I bow myself over her, stooping down, and I suck one of her nipples into my mouth. It tightens in my mouth, the bud of flesh pebbling between my teeth as I gently bite down, and my stunning Firefly gasps at the bolt of pain I’ve sent ricocheting around her body like a stray bullet.

  “Pasha! Oh, fuck…don’t…” Her breathless pleas are like music to my deviant ears. I wait, though, pausing to make sure I’m not overwhelming her. She winds her fingers into my hair, fisting it and pulling…not away from her body, but toward it. Nearer. Closer. “Fuck! Don’t stop. Please don’t stop.”

  She wants more of me. She will always want more of me, like a heroin addict always needs to chase down their next high, and I’m eaten alive by satisfaction. I will be her addiction. I’ll make damn sure of it. I’ll make sure that she never has to go too long between hits. I’m going to fuck her like this every motherfucking day, until I’m all she wants, all she will ever crave.

  Sweet Firefly. My red-headed phoenix, burning as she rises from the ashes. My hands roam, exploring the planes and curves of her body as I flick her delightfully pink nipple with the edge of my tongue, the exact same way I’ll soon be flicking her clit, and her body thrashes, her back arching up away from the raw silk sheets.

  “Pasha! Pasha, please!”

  Inside, I’m roaring with victory. She has no idea how fiercely I will protect her. She has no idea how impossible it will be for her to walk away from me after this. Her nipple is a blushed, darker shade of pink when I release it from between my teeth. My dick pulses with need as I suck it one last time, and it pops out of my mouth, glistening and wet, and perfect in every way. The swell of her breasts is so fucking distracting. I’m mesmerized by her creamy, porcelain skin—not a single blemish in sight. I’m rock solid as I drink her in, and I feel it: second after second, I’m getting drunk on her. She’s the most intoxicating thing I’ve ever experienced.

  Is she just as wasted from me? Do I make her head spin, the way mine has been spinning? Does she feel unsteady on her feet every time I walk into a room? I already know the answer to all of these questions: yes, damn fucking straight she does. I can see it in her eyes as they feast on my shoulders, and my arms, and my chest. I know it from the way her hands tremble as she dares to reach out and touches her fingertips to my skin.

  We are both as fucked as each other.

  “I want…” She hesitates.

  I urge her on by nudging her between her legs with my cock. “Tell me. Right now. I need to know.” The words tear at my throat as I push them out in a low snarl.

  My breath is ragged.

  My pulse raging.

  My blood singing.

  I am so fucking alive right now.

  My stunning little firefly glances away, her cheeks turning a vibrant shade of red, and with one sharp thrust of my hips, I slide the tip of my cock inside her—not all the way, and only for a second. I withdraw, pulling out immediately, but I’ve gotten her attention. She sucks in a gasp of air. Her eyes are back on me, and they’re burning. “Oh, Jesus. That’s so cruel,” she says.

  I ignore the desperate edge to her voice. “Finish. Tell me what you were going to say. Tell me what you want. Tell me all of it.”

  Slowly, with cautious words, she speaks. “I want you to fuck me,” she says. “I want…I want you to play with my ass while your cock is deep inside my pussy. I want your hands on my tits, groping and squeezing me while I ride you. I want your come in my mouth. I want it all over my tits. I want to rub it into my skin, so I can feel you everywhere, all over me, coating every inch of me. I want…”

  I growl, thrusting myself a little deeper this time and then wrenching myself away. It’s so, so difficult not to take her. I want to fuck her so hard and so fast right now, but I can’t allow myself to do it. I need her to commit to what she wants from me. I need to hear it, just as much as she needs to say it. Because we both know how hot this will be. We both know how dirty, dark, fucked up and depraved it could and will be, if we’re both honest with each other.

  I need her to share her darkest fantasies with me. And once she has, I will reward her by delivering every single one of them to her on a silver platter.

  My little firefly makes a small, anxious sound, but I can see it all there in her eyes, boiling just beneath the surface. “Be brave,” I command. “You never have to hide who you are from me. I already see it. I already see you.”

  She takes a deep breath, visibly drawing her strength together. “I want your fingers in my mouth while you fuck me. I want you to make me fucking scream, Pasha. I want you to hold me d
own, and I want you to take what you want. I want you to fuck me in my ass. I want your hands inside my panties under the table of every restaurant we ever sit at. I want you to fuck my mouth while I’m on my hands and knees under those same tables. I want people to see. I want…I want people to watch. I want them to watch us. I want them to stand over us, watching your cock slide inside me. I want them to watch you make me come, until I’m screaming your name, Pasha. I want it all. I want everything. I want you.”

  If I so much as twitch right now, I will come. Her words are incendiary, lighting me on fire, starting a blaze that quickly catches hold and turns into a roaring inferno. I’m going to give her what she wants. I will give her what she needs, and I will delight in every motherfucking second of it.

  But first, I’m going to give her my mouth.

  I move downward, and when I lave at her pussy with the flat of my tongue, at last tasting how sweet and how heady she is, I instantly lose all control. I don’t just lick her. I don’t just suck.

  I fucking feast on her.

  I lose count of how many times I bring her to the boundary line of her pleasure and then reel her back. Four? Five? Seven times? By the end, she’s thrashing around on the mattress like she’s possessed, begging me to let her come; I barely have to breathe on her clit before she’s shuddering, her legs locking up, her head rocking back, and she’s crying out my name as her orgasm rips through her.

  She is a sight to behold as she climaxes. The muscles in her stomach flex, taut and beautiful, and her thighs clamp around my head as she drives my mouth down onto her, driving my face down into her pussy as she floods my mouth with the taste of her orgasm. I snarl as I take it. I growl as I suck at her, massaging the swollen bundle of nerves that make up her clitoris, and I revel in every second of it.

  There has never been, nor will there ever be anything as satisfying as this.

  This woman, grinding her pussy against my mouth, her fingers digging into my hair as she shakes and trembles against me, chanting my name on every outward sigh.

  I’ll take her soon. I’ll relish my own pleasure, and I’ll roar as I empty myself inside of her, every single last damn drop. But for now, I look up the length of her body, my tongue slowing, gently teasing small circles over her, and I enjoy every spasm and every sensitive cry that comes out of her as she comes down from her high.

  I enjoy the beauty of every single second as she floats back down to earth.

  She may be small, but holy fuck is she fierce.

  5

  ZARA

  END OF THE LINE

  I’m not breathing.

  I’m awake, but I can’t move, and I can’t breathe. Shadows dance in the corners of the bedroom, and for a second it looks like someone’s standing by my door, watching me. A tall, dark, familiar shape that instils both panic and relief in me at the same time. Adrenalin crashes down on me like a wave breaching on a shore, and the weight of it nearly crushes me.

  Move, move, move…

  Come on!

  My fingers respond first, the slightest of twitches, and it’s as if the miniscule movement unlocks the rest of my body, freeing me from the thrall of sleep. I rocket upright in bed, kicking myself away from the tall, dark shadow by the doorway at the same time I pull a burning breath down into my lungs.

  “Fuuuck!” My cry echoes out into the hallway and bounces around the silent apartment. The dark outline of the man standing by the door isn’t a man after all. It’s actually the shadow of my old ski bag. I see this and know that I was dreaming, but…I still feel like I’m falling. I still feel like I’m pinned to the mattress, shattering apart as I came.

  I suck in another long stream of air and slump forward, holding my head in my hands. What the fuck is wrong with me? Why the hell am I so freaked? I’ve spent a thousand nights tangled up in my mystery man’s arms, but I’ve never woken and felt so panicked before. The dream was intense. Highly sexual, and incredibly vivid. I try to catch hold of it, snatching at the edges of the dream, trying to figure out why my heart is beating out of my chest so hard, but it’s impossible. As always, the moment I try to hone in on the specifics of the dream, it dematerializes, disintegrating into smoke.

  I almost sob with frustration.

  It was the same guy. I have no idea what he looks like, but I know it was him. I always do. Though all visual cues vanish along with the details of the dream, I’m always left with the sense of him, and it’s so fierce. Intense. Whoever he is, this man I’ve created inside my head, he is a force to be reckoned with.

  I pick up the glass on my bedside table and I drain it, my hands shaky and unsteady. My mouth is still dry, my tongue like sandpaper, so I swing my legs out of bed and pad to the kitchen, filling the glass from the cooler next to the fridge—an exorbitant luxury I’ve allowed myself, since the rusty pipes in the Bakers’ makes the water taste like shit. Armed with my fresh glass of water, I get back into bed, nestle down into the blankets, get comfortable, and out of my bedroom window, down on street level…

  …a phone begins to ring.

  The phone.

  I sit up.

  I blink.

  Do not freak out, Zara. Do not freak out.

  It’s too late for that. It took me hours to fall asleep. Hours. And now that damned payphone is going stop me from snatching another hour or two before the sun rises? I don’t fucking think so. I’m going to take out the stupid fucking payphone, and then the entire apartment building. Even Hitchin’s is going to go up in flames.

  No…

  Fucking…

  More.

  Hurling back the covers, I get up and jam my feet into the pair of sneakers I kicked off beside the bed. Do I care that I’m in my pajamas? Nope. Does it matter that my hair is a royal mess? Negative. I could be naked and covered in green body paint like a goddamn leprechaun and it wouldn’t mattered at this point. Paul from Cyscom had been useless in resolving the matter of the ringing payphone, but he did make one fairly reasonable suggestion: why not just pick it up? He proposed that I politely tell the caller they had the wrong number, but now, pushed to the point of insanity, close to tearing out every hair on my head by the root, and so sleep deprived that I’ve forgotten my own name, I have something else in mind.

  My feet slip out of the back of my sneakers as I storm out of the apartment. My heart’s firing like a piston as I charge down the stairs, down the hall, and out of the building.

  When I step out onto the street, I think the ringing’s stopped for a second, but then the shrill sound erupts out of the payphone, cutting through the otherwise silent night air. It’s like nails down a chalk board. Like biting down on a cotton wool ball between my front teeth.

  I narrow my eyes, glaring at the payphone.

  Five short strides land me right in front of the thing. I grab hold of the handset, ripping it from its cradle, and I hold it up to my ear. “No! No more. I think we’ve all had enough now, thank you very much!” My voice rises higher and higher, until it’s no more than a rush of angry air. “Y’know, there are people in this neighborhood who like to sleep. People who have jobs. People who like a little peace and quiet when they climb into their beds at the end of a twelve-hour shift. And here you are, calling, and calling, and calling, without a single thought to anyone else, because you’re bored and you think it’s fu—”

  “911. What is your emergency?”

  The oxygen flees my lungs.

  What the…?

  There’s a crackling, a rustle of static distorting the line, but I know what I heard. I say those words a hundred times a night. Sometimes more. But I’ve never heard anyone else say those words to me.

  This is weird. Beyond weird. There’s a fault in the telephone system somewhere, clearly; emergency calls are being rerouted to this payphone or something. It must be a seriously messed up glitch to make the phone actually ring on this end, then disconnect the call, but…it kind of makes sense. “Hey, I’m sorry, I think there’s been some kind of error. I didn’t
place an emergency call. The payph—”

  “Hello?” The small, scared voice on the other end of the line cuts me off. A thousand pins and needles bite into my skin all at once, the hairs standing to attention on the back of my neck. It’s familiar—the voice is so damn familiar that I sway, reaching out to grab hold of the payphone.

  Another voice speaks, the first voice again, and electricity jolts upward from my feet, making my head spin. This voice is familiar, too, now. More than familiar. It’s my own voice.

  “Hi, there. Is everything okay?”

  “Um…I don’t…I don’t know. My big brother is…he isn’t moving.”

  “Where are you, sweetie?”

  Oh my god.

  I cover my open mouth with the back of my hand, turning to look up and down the street. The place is deserted, not a person in sight. No one out walking their dogs. No one stumbling home drunk. Inside Hitchin’s, everything is dark, and even the neon Budweiser sign that hangs over the bar is turned off.

  This has to be a joke. Some really fucked up, sick kind of joke. I’m listening to a recording of the Petrov call—the very same call Detective Holmes told me was corrupted and irretrievable. Someone is playing it down the phone to me right now.

  “We’re at home.” The little boy’s voice is reedy and soft, the panic in his voice harrowing.

  “Where are your mommy and daddy?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Oh, okay. And what’s your name, sweetheart?”

  “Corey. C-O-R-E-Y. That’s how you spell it.”

  I choke on a ragged breath. Corey. Corey Petrov. Oh god, this isn’t happening. It can’t be. A shiver of alarm makes me turn around to look behind me. Am I being watched right now? I doesn’t feel like I am, but I must be. There’s no other reason someone would steal this recording and then play it down the phone to me, only days after Corey Petrov went missing. Someone is doing this for kicks. They want to watch my reaction to the recording. I don’t believe in co-incidences, and even if I did, this particular coincidence is just too unbelievable to wrap my head around. I took Corey’s call. I helped him. And now his recording is being played down a phone outside my apartment?