With a groan, Wes pulled his mouth from hers, let go of her wrists.
“Not here.”
Since she disagreed with that assessment, Vivienne slid her hand between his legs, and did her best to change his mind. “Not exciting enough without the taco crowd? We could move this in front of the window and hope a bunch of people walk by.”
His answering chuckle loosened something in her chest. “Tempting, but this time I want you all to myself.”
Before she’d realized his intentions, Wes ducked down and hoisted her over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. Her stomach hurt from laughing by the time he’d marched her across the floor and dumped her on his mattress.
He dragged his T-shirt over his head. “I mean to have you in my bed, wife.”
Vivienne froze at the pronouncement. Wife. She was his wife.
He was her husband.
She watched as he shucked his jeans and underwear, revealing the perfection of his body. Strong. Sexy. For two years of her life, he was all she’d ever wanted. And tonight, he was really hers. Boyish and eager, with mussed-up hair and sex on his mind.
Despite everything that had brought them to this point, all the guilt and wasted time, she didn’t want to miss the moment. She could worry about the rest tomorrow.
“You’re falling behind there, Mrs. Brennan.” He grabbed the hem of her shirt and pulled it up over her head. “Let’s get you naked,” he said, giving her a playful shove to make her lie down so he could do the same with her jeans and underwear.
When he was done, Vivienne sat up and scooted to the middle of the bed so there was room for Wes to join her. He positioned himself on his back, with his head on the pillow, watching as she reached behind her back to unhook her bra.
There was something about the look in Wes’s eyes when he watched her undress that did it for her every time. With a coy smile, she crawled toward him, leaning down to catch his mouth in the kind of kiss that let him know exactly what she was thinking.
When she lifted up, his eyes were that dark, swirling blue that let her know he was on the same page. Or at least she thought he was, but when she made a move to slide down his body to take him in her mouth, he stopped her.
“Grab the headboard.”
“Wes...”
“Do it.” There was a little bit of darkness in his voice as he issued the order, and she was helpless to disobey. He grabbed her by the hips, once she’d complied, and she had to admit, it was kind of sexy the way he manhandled her, positioning her with a knee on either side of his head.
“I’m calling the shots this time.”
She should hate it. At least that’s what she told herself.
She was independent. She’d built herself a life and career without him. Without anyone. And that’s how she liked it. Because if there was one thing she knew, people never failed to let you down. To leave. Wes had done both already.
Then his breath trailed along her inner thigh. And it made her want what she shouldn’t.
Him.
But it felt good to let go of the control, just for a second. To rely on someone else with no worry that it might end in heartbreak or disappointment. Because the truth was, though she might struggle to trust him with her heart, he’d always been the master of her orgasms.
When his tongue touched her, the shock of pleasure sizzled through her. He was the one who growled, though. “It’s been way too long since I’ve tasted you.”
She tipped her head back in ecstasy as he licked straight up the center of her. Her fingers tightened on the headboard as Wes alternated between slow, open-mouthed kisses and then switched it up with surprising moments of suction that had her on the precipice in no time. Vivienne tightened her thighs, and the novelty of the rasp of his beard against her sensitive skin drove her even higher. The heat built fast, almost too fast considering she’d come so recently. This time was different though. In the bar, the steady drive of his fingers against her G-spot had unleashed something deep and pulsing in her belly. But this, the swirl of his tongue against her clit, was a shallower kind of pleasure. Not worse, just different, like static electricity crackling across her skin. And then Wes did that thing she liked where he pressed his tongue hard against her and moved his head just so—oh God, it felt even better than she’d remembered—and the myriad sensations coursing through her culminated in a flash of heat and light as her pelvis jerked and she came apart with Wes between her thighs.
She was boneless as he helped her slide down his body, until she was lying on top of him. With a satisfied sigh, she pressed a kiss to his talented mouth as he traced the length of her spine with his knuckles.
His cock was hot and hard between them, and she teasingly wiggled her hips. “You didn’t want to come, did you? Because I’m all tired out.”
“No problem,” he assured her. But before she could tell him she was only joking, he’d rolled her onto her back with a swift, hard kiss.
“You just lie back and let me do all the work.” The offer was made with a cocky grin that convinced her libido that she could probably muster the energy for round three. The slide of his body as he eased himself inside her dispelled any doubt, and Vivienne wrapped her arms around him, sure she would never get enough of the way he made her feel.
He was gorgeous when he fucked. Predatory. She’d forgotten the intensity of him. The focus. How he turned straight-up missionary into the most consuming, intimate kind of pleasure.
She drank in the familiar sight of him as he thrust into her, the feel of his muscles bunching and releasing beneath her questing fingers. She’d missed the feel of him, exciting and familiar, all at once. Vivienne bent her knees, sliding her heels closer to her thighs, because she knew what he liked, too, and she wanted to thank him for the thing he’d done with his tongue.
Digging her heels into the mattress, she countered his thrusts, circling her hips and wringing a curse from him. Yeah. He loved that. And she loved giving it to him. Wes’s muscles drew tight and his hips started to speed up as he hit the point of no return. Then he was groaning her name as his body convulsed with the force of his release. Vivienne wrapped her arms around him, pressing her lips against his neck and holding him close as he shuddered with the aftershocks of their desire, hoping that he’d felt even an echo of what he’d made her feel.
When his breathing returned to normal, he pushed off her, rolling onto his back, and they lay side by side in his giant bed, staring up at the ceiling.
After a moment, Wes grabbed her left hand with his right and began idly stroking his thumb across her knuckles. It was hypnotic, and surprisingly electric considering how tame it was compared to all the ways, all the places, he’d just touched her. The memories distracted her, and it took her a second to realize that he was twisting the ring off her finger.
Something like panic fisted her heart, squeezing to the point of pain.
“Done with me already?” It was supposed to be a joke, but it held no levity. The symbolism of it was a fissure in her heart, growing wider by the second.
He turned his head toward her on the pillow. “I know you don’t like it. I saw your face when you opened it.”
Shame washed through her. She’d been a total bitch to him after the intensity of what had happened between them that last day at her place. Being spanked had pushed her to the physical brink, made her more vulnerable than she’d ever been, and she hadn’t been able to process the emotional fallout. Or the inescapable connection that had sprung up between them. From the second Wes had pulled her into his arms and held her while she cried, she’d known something monumental had shifted between them. Something she couldn’t undo. And so after she’d used him, slaked her need for punishment, she’d discarded him without explanation. Pushed him away with brutal efficiency, intentionally hurt him in an attempt to avoid dealing with the shift in their relationship.
And still h
e’d shown up at her door to help her.
“I was just...surprised.” Terrified. Desperately happy.
“Uh-huh.” To her amazement, he sounded amused, not offended. “I’ve got something for you.”
Her shriek of shock turned to a laugh as he rolled his big body on top of her, before bringing her along for another half turn. When they were done, he’d usurped her side of the bed, and she was on top of him.
Planting her knees in the mattress on either side of his torso, she pushed herself up so she was straddling his stomach. The expensive ring clattered against the end table as he dropped it there before lowering his hand to the drawer pull and tugging it open. “Can you grab that red box for me?”
Vivienne leaned slightly to the side, her gaze snagging on a red velvet ring box tucked against the back corner of the drawer. Her fingers shook as she reached for it, turning it over in her hands, avoiding the next step.
“Open it.”
Swallowing back her fear, Vivienne complied. The hinges were tight, and the box snapped open. For a moment, she thought her heart had stopped.
“Wes...”
A small diamond was set in matte white gold that reminded her of vines. It was like nothing she’d ever seen before. Too modest for a man of Wes Brennan’s current means, too thoughtful for a stand-in ring for this sham of a wedding, too perfect for any of that to be a mistake.
“It’s yours.”
The wording struck her as odd, ringing an alarm bell deep in her bones.
And she knew. Without question. That this ring was hers. It had been intended for her all along.
Her chest felt tight, crowded with emotion, as her gaze found his.
“You were going to propose?”
His embarrassed grin sent her heart careening into a free fall. “I mean, one day. Once I’d made something of myself.”
“I told you I didn’t care about that.”
“Because you grew up with a father who was a named partner of a corporate law firm. My mom was trying to support two kids and a raging drug habit as a grocery store cashier. When she bothered to show up for work, that is. And I didn’t know how to make you understand that I needed to be able to provide for you, not because you couldn’t, but because not being able to would make me too much like him.”
His dad. Wes had described him as a low-budget con man who only showed up when he needed money, who only called when he needed bail.
Wes’s self-recriminating laugh broke her heart as he took the little box from her numb fingers. “When I bought this, I didn’t think this moment would be so far in the future.”
Then, before Vivienne could even fathom what he was doing, he lifted her hand and slid the ring onto her finger.
I, Wesley James Brennan, take you, Vivienne Amelie Grant...
She replayed the vow he’d made her at City Hall in her head, his voice solemn and deep, as she stared down at her hand and the unique, perfect ring that completely eclipsed the generic princess-cut diamond she’d worn earlier.
Vivienne leaned forward, bracing her forearms on his chest so she could catch his mouth in the kind of kiss they hadn’t shared in a very long time. One that lacked the crackling heat and promise of deep, drugging pleasure. One that, instead, promised something far more profound and lasting than physical pleasure.
As if he’d sensed the difference, there was a question in Wes’s blue eyes when he opened them, and the difference in the way he was looking at her gave her chills.
Wes lifted his hand, his fingers tracing the curve of her cheek. “Viv?”
“Yeah?”
“The last time we were together, when you wanted to be spanked?” His fingers stilled against her face. “Was I...was I not giving you what you needed before? Would you have stayed if the sex had been dirtier? More adventurous?”
The sheer vulnerability of the question was enough to rip her heart out of her chest, to break through the wall of bravado and ice she’d constructed to keep it safe after she’d driven him away six years ago. The layer of shame that kept her from admitting how desperately she wanted this fake marriage to be real. The bone-deep knowledge that she still loved him. Dirty, sweet and every which way in between.
“You’re enough for me, Wes. Just this. Just us.”
He always had been. Always would be.
And to prove it to him, she leaned forward, pressing a kiss to his chest, right above his heart as she slid her other hand down his body, taking him inside her so they could rock together until the heat between them raged out of control again.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
“WHERE DO YOU think you’re going? I’m not done with you yet.”
Vivienne laughed as she slipped out of his grip and made a break for it, crawling toward the edge of the bed. “I need to hydrate or I won’t last the night.”
“I’ll allow it,” Wes decreed. “But be quick,” he advised, with a smack on the ass that made her giggle, but also made her want to hurry back and explore the pulse of heat that flared in her belly. Grabbing his T-shirt from the floor, she pulled the black cotton over her head.
His lips twisted with wry humor. “Yes. Modesty is key after how we’ve spent the last four hours.”
In response, she pulled the pillow from beneath his head and smushed it on his face.
“There’s some bottled water in the fridge,” he advised, his voice muffled by her feather-filled retribution.
Vivienne padded her way across his loft, eyes roving over the decor, his possessions. It was a classy place, for sure, but it didn’t scream tech billionaire. It was more understated than that. Cozier. It took her a second to realize the reason for that was all the little personal touches that he used to tease her about. The ones, she suddenly realized, that she’d phased out of her own life in the intervening years.
Picture frames on the table, a shelf full of books, things he used to be far more utilitarian about.
“Oh my God. Are these throw pillows on your couch?” she teased with faux horror. When they’d lived together, he’d been adamantly anti–throw pillow since beading and tassels and fringe made them uncomfortable, which, he’d argued, robbed them of their pillow destiny. Granted, his were plain, but it was still a big step for Wes.
“What can I say? I guess you rubbed off on me.”
The idea of that pleased her more than it should, but her grin faded as she approached the kitchen and her eyes lit on his stainless steel fridge.
Or more accurately, on the crayon drawing that was proudly displayed on it.
To Uncle Wes, it said. From Jeremy.
The sudden buzzing in her brain was disorienting, and she braced a hand against his butcher-block island as she tried to catch her breath.
Reality was not to be denied though. It seeped through all the cracks in her heart, reminding her that there was no happy ending for her and Wes. They’d tried this once, and it had all gone to shit.
They were only here now because she’d lied to him.
The vilest of lies.
She looked down at her finger. At the perfect ring. Perfect because he’d chosen it for the old her. The one who hadn’t known yet what a coward she would become.
“Viv?”
His voice was too loud, and the realization that he was behind her snapped her head up.
She swiped a hand across her cheek to erase the tear that had escaped against her will, wondering just how long she’d been standing there.
“You okay?” There was concern on his handsome face as he stepped up to the fridge, pulling open the door and grabbing each of them a plastic bottle from the door rack.
He’d pulled on his jeans, but he hadn’t done them up. Her throat ached at the sight of him as he set the water on the counter beside her.
“I was just looking at your picture.” Her voice sounded small, but it echoed in the emp
ty feeling in her chest.
He glanced over his shoulder as he cracked open the lid on his own bottle. “Nice, right?” He was grinning with pride when he turned back to her, but there was something else there. Something that sliced at her heart. Love. “You might not recognize me, but that is actually a very accurate depiction of my backyard soccer skills.”
“Erin had a baby.” A little boy that Wes obviously adored. He was an uncle.
“Yeah. She found herself a good guy. Peter’s a high school chemistry teacher.” Wes took a long swallow before putting the cap back on the bottle and setting it next to the one she hadn’t touched. “But Jeremy, that kid’s the best. You’re gonna love him.”
It was the worst possible thing he could have said. Including her like that, like part of the family, brought everything roiling to the surface, past and present clashing in such a painful, disorienting way.
“We didn’t use a condom.”
He frowned at her abrupt announcement, and she braced for his fury before she realized it was just confusion. And concern.
“I know. We haven’t used one since we established we were both clean after the elevator, remember? Do you want to sit down? You look a little pale.”
Wes lifted her onto the counter before she had a chance to protest. Not that she could have even if she’d wanted to, because other words started spilling out of her mouth instead. Words she should have said to him a long time ago.
“Not now. Then. That night in your car.” About a month and a half before everything had gone oh so wrong. “Our second anniversary.”
They’d been driving to dinner to celebrate when Wes’s hand had wandered far enough up her thigh to ruin his anniversary present—a black lace garter belt and thigh-highs that Viv hadn’t been able to resist. Wes had felt the same way. They’d pulled into an alley so he could unwrap his gift right away, which had resulted in them missing the window of their fancy reservation. They’d ended up improvising their anniversary dinner with fast-food burgers and milkshakes in bed, followed by a couple more rounds of dessert.
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