Ariane took a step back and rubbed her arm where he had grabbed her.
“What discussion? I talk to you, and you just stand there. What’s the matter with you?” she asked as she walked backwards toward her bedroom.
“I’ll tell you what’s the matter with me.” He growled. “I don’t share. I have never shared and I never will.”
Ariane tried to protest. “But…”
“Listen to me! Two weeks ago I told you I wanted you so much that I was willing to turn my life upside down for you. Do you remember what you said when I asked you if I should?”
“Yes, I do,” Ariane said softly. “I said that I would like that very much.”
“When you did that, did you not make a commitment to me?”
“Yes, I did.” She reached out to caress his face.
“And then you can’t even keep your skirt on for two weeks waiting for me to return? You have to go partying with other men. You have no idea how that makes me feel.”
“That’s what you’re mad about?”
“Yes, and don’t give me any crap about Jean-Michel and Charles being gay, because there’s a third man in that picture. And he’s holding you very tight, and the way you look makes it clear that you enjoy it.”
“Oh my God, you’re jealous of Patrick!”
An insidious guilty feeling overtook her. Not because she had enjoyed dancing with Patrick that night, but because she had actually very much enjoyed more than that. Judging by his reaction to her touching Patrick in public while fully clothed, Ariane figured Peter would really lose it if he knew that they had finished the night together in her bedroom.
“Who’s Patrick?” Peter asked, his tone almost back to normal.
Thinking about that night again, Ariane lowered her eyes for an instant. When she locked her gaze on his again, he said, “Oh, I knew it.”
His voice was so low that Ariane really only guessed at his words. Her breath was becoming shorter. She could not understand why, but she was getting very turned on by the rage seeping out of Peter. How sick was that? “He’s my ex. We’re trying to be friends. It’s over now.” She reached forward to touch him again.
“You’re damn right it’s over now,” he said, unzipping his pants and letting them drop to the floor. “Now you’re mine.” He removed his shirt.
Standing naked and very aroused in front of her, he continued his diatribe as he unzipped the back of her dress, pulled it over her head and sent her underwear flying across the room. “From now on, no one else will be touching you! I own you. You hear me? When I’m not with you, no one, not even your gay buddies, can lay as much as a finger on you.” He pushed her onto the bed, pinned both her arms over her head and pushed into her violently in one thrust. “Is that clear?”
Ariane bucked against him, adding to the strength of the collision of their bodies. She gasped, surprised by how good that felt. “Yes. It’s clear.”
At that instant, her mind separated from her body. Even though she knew there was something terribly wrong going on with her, she was unable to help herself. She so craved his violence that she was purposely going to fuel his fire.
“He stayed the night,” she whispered and mentally braced herself for the impact of that confession.
Peter’s body froze. Then he raised his torso, and still leaning on her arms, he gazed into her eyes. She could see that he was barely in control of his fury.
He pulled out of her and then pushed back in more brutally than the first time. She bucked to meet him again, and her entire body started to shake.
Panting and pulling out again, he asked, “He what?”
“He spent the night in my bed, but…”
“But what?” He thrust himself back in, hard.
Ariane whimpered. There was barely enough air in her to answer. “He just slept there. He didn’t make love to me.”
Peter froze again. “I’m not sure you realize how lucky you are that that man’s a fool.” He lay down on her, crushing her with all his weight.
Slowly, he freed her arms. First she remained still, unsure what to do next.
Feeling brave, she took his head in her hands and gently stroked his lips with a thumb before she asked, breathlessly, “Do you crave my tenderness as much as I crave your violence?”
The question seemed to leave him speechless.
She smiled and tilted her hips towards him. “Do you want me to beg you to crush into me again? Because if you do, I will.”
“God, no. Today you won’t have to beg.” He sucked on her thumb and thrust into her again so hard that Ariane thought he must have used all the strength that he could muster.
Knowing he liked it better that way, she kept her eyes open as he pushed her over the edge and her entire body shuddered with his.
They lay panting in each other’s arms, and then he rolled on his side, bringing her along. He nibbled on her lower lip and then covered her mouth with his. He caressed her lips with his tongue, and she moaned in his mouth. She adored his kisses.
While she had introduced him to cooking, he was teaching her about kissing.
After French Cooking 101, there was Advanced French Kissing.
She was happy to be the only student. She didn’t like to share either.
She wondered what she would have to do to make it last.
Maybe she would need to cross some lines to get detention.
***
Want to read more?
Check out LEARNING CURVES 3
DETENTION
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About Olivia Rigal
Born in Manhattan, Olivia Rigal spent her youth going back and forth between the United States and France. She lived and studied law in both countries. While studying she kept herself busy with a variety of jobs. She worked in the Clignancourt Flea Market as well as in a Parisian recording studio. In Manhattan, she was a dog groomer and then an administrative assistant in a famous English auction house.
Olivia settled in France to raise her family. She travelled throughout South East Asia and has a special fondness for Laos and Thailand. When her law practice does not keep her busy in Paris, she runs away to write novels in her Florida home next to MacArthur Beach State Park.
In December 2012 she started publishing short novels in English as an independent. Early 2014, she began translating them into French. The stories she tells stand alone. However her characters often meet so you can run into them again in several stories.
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CAN'T SHAKE YOU
by Molly McLain
CAN'T SHAKE YOU © Molly McLain 2014
Lovers to friends to lovers…could it get any more complicated?
One thing Carissa Brandt knows: spontaneity always get her in trouble. Still, she’s gone and jumped head first into an impulsive summer renovation project with her fingers crossed. When her contractor turns out to be a cheat, it seems her only lifeline is the proffered hand of Josh Hudson—the sexy Marine who left her aching for more than their single night together three years ago.
Josh has two hard and fast rules: never mix business with pleasure and don’t look twice at women his friends have dated, much less loved. It makes life in a small town simple—or it would, if he wasn’t harboring a secret with the potential to destroy his good name and the reputation of a woman he can’t get out of his head.
When Carissa finds herself in a bind, Josh’s integrity—both personal and professional—won’t let her fail. Will working together finally extinguish the attraction lingering between them? Or will the smoldering embers of their passionate rendezvous ignite all over again and set aflame the friendships they cherish the most?
Warning: This book contains a hella-sexy, inked up hero, a spunky heroine who isn’t afraid to speak her mind, smokin’ hot sex, and enough swearing to make your momma blush. For readers 18+.
Chapter One
Drywall fasteners were not the kind
of screws Carissa Brandt should’ve been thinking about on the first official Saturday night of the summer.
In fact, she needed to get her head back in the game and fast. She’d come out tonight with a goal and it didn’t involve compiling her hardware store pick-up list. Heck, she’d even splurged on sexy new undergarments to fuel her nerve and wake her inner sex kitten.
To find a lion for her lioness, however…
“Got something special planned tonight?” Her best friend Maddie, tonight’s hostess, detached herself from a cluster of backyard party-goers and joined Carissa near the makeshift bar.
“What makes you think that?” She shot the other woman an innocent grin and claimed a seat at a tall, wrought iron patio table near the edge of the veranda.
Maddie chuckled and climbed into the opposite chair. “Oh, I don’t know. It could be the I-need-to-get-laid look in your eyes. Or the thong you’ve got on.”
Busted. “You know I never make those kinds of plans,” Carissa replied in an intentionally stuffy tone, like that of the proper guidance counselor she spent three quarters of the year portraying. But leaning in close and speaking for Maddie’s ears only, she added, “Though if an opportunity should present itself, far be it from me to let it pass.”
Her friend let out a whoop of approval that had several nearby guests glancing curiously in their direction. “My girl’s finally back! Too bad it’s only taken a year.”
Carissa swatted at Maddie’s arm and shushed her, envying the free-spirited sparkle that danced in her eyes. “No reminder necessary, believe me. My body lets me know what a disappointment my sex life is every time I break out my vibrator. And don’t get too excited, because I’m just testing the waters. Dangling my line, so to speak.”
Of course, snagging a bite would be something akin to catching a minnow with a whale in the almost too-small town of River Bend, Nebraska. Or anywhere in the greater Cameron County area for that matter. But if Carissa intended to make this place her permanent home, she had to at least try.
Her friend broke into a ridiculous, seated happy dance, then went Royal Guard serious as a couple of her teenage neighbors strolled by the table in itty-bitty, barely-there bikinis, rivulets of water streaming from their pool-dampened hair.
“Great party, Maddie,” one of the girls called out, her grin all bubble gum and sunshine. “And I love that dress, Ms. Brandt. Totally hot. Victoria’s Secret, right?”
Carissa’s cheeks flamed to about a gazillion degrees, and she bit her lips together to contain her second bout of embarrassment in as many minutes.
I’ve just been made to blush by an incoming freshman.
She managed to give the girls a polite smile and a finger wave, but as soon as they ambled out of earshot, she let out a mortified groan. “I might as well just tattoo ‘desperate’ across my forehead.”
Maddie’s expression softened only marginally. “Relax, chica. For one, you’re gorgeous. It’s about damn time you put away those pencil skirts and cardigan sweaters, and showed off that smokin’ body. Two, you’re on summer vacation. Pretty sure that gives you a free pass to be as hot and sexy as you wanna be for the next two and a half months.”
If only. Life hadn’t been that simple in years. Since college probably. And even then she’d never been the kind of girl to throw caution to the wind and flaunt what God gave her when she was looking to catch the attention of a man. Always the practical one. The patient one. The one who rarely indulged or reached out and simply took what she pleased.
This whole going after what she wanted thing—namely toe-curling sex—was going to be a serious effort in dancing outside her personal boundaries.
She’d done it once before, so it was there, buried somewhere inside of her. It was just a matter of baiting the right kind of man.
“Oh no, no.” Maddie waved a hand in front of her face. “No overthinking. Just go with the flow. Roll with the punches. Or in the hay preferably. Just…let loose already. You deserve it more than anyone I know.”
Carissa gave a solitary nod, her confidence flaring briefly. “I do, and hopefully I’ll have enough time to pull it off.” And there was still work to be done on the nerve part, too. “This house is sucking the life out of me and we’re only a week into the renovations.”
“Hold up—wasn’t the purpose of hiring a contractor so you could avoid giving up your summer?”
“Flipping doesn’t work that way, Mads. Especially with Alex on the job. At the rate he’s burning through my capital, I’ll be lucky to come out ahead at all, let alone bank any profit.” She lifted a shoulder and pressed her lips into a tolerant smile, because what else could she do?
“Mmm-hmm.” Maddie’s narrow-eyed expression was one Carissa had been treated to several times since she’d purchased the fixer-upper. And her friend’s next words were just as familiar. Predictable even. “Josh would’ve guaranteed you came out ahead. You know he would have, even if Hudson Contracting doesn’t do small potatoes jobs anymore.”
Carissa shot her friend a ‘no way’ glare and gave her head a sharp shake. Strands of hair slipped from her messy updo and she pushed them back behind her ear, her fingers toying with her earring in an attempt to appear as unaffected as possible. “We’ve been over this before. I would never ask him to stoop to the level of my little flip.”
For more reasons than Maddie or anyone else in town would ever know.
“Speak of the devil.” Maddie’s gaze swept across the lawn and halted at a point on the opposite side of the pool.
Carissa followed the cue, glancing to where a group of men had gathered around the built-in barbecue, exchanging handshakes, back slaps and fist bumps with the summer kickoff party’s newest arrival—the owner and CEO of west-central Nebraska’s most up-and-coming commercial and high-end residential development company.
Josh Hudson was also Maddie’s soon-to-be brother-in-law. And the man most likely to creep into Carissa’s imagination, late at night, when more than twelve months without actual sex got the best of her.
In the distance, Josh grinned that sexy, crooked smile of his and laughed out loud at something his brother—Maddie’s fiancé, Dan—said. The deep, husky sound echoed across the yard, sending a rush of thrill bumps zipping down Carissa’s spine. She tried not to notice how the black cotton of his Led Zeppelin t-shirt stretched across his broad shoulders as he reciprocated the older, slightly shorter man’s greeting. She also tried not to stare at his spiky, dark hair or the collage of colorful tattoos decorating his thick forearms, but God, she was a sucker for hot ink and ripped arms. The two together were a wicked aphrodisiac and, more frequently than she’d ever admit, the mere sight of Josh’s stellar body left her squirming in her panties.
She brought her drink to her lips, shocked to find the bottle nearly empty.
Thank goodness she was drinking from the non-alcoholic cooler tonight. Though maybe she ought to rethink that decision, considering her current state of mind and Josh’s perpetual state of yumminess.
“Ah, crap, it’s after seven already—I’ve gotta get the DJ started.” Maddie hurried off her stool, oblivious to Carissa’s melting resolve. Making a show of fluffing her jet-black bob, her friend gave a dramatic sigh. “Such a glamorous life I lead, as the almost-wife of the Cameron County D.A.”
“The Real Housewives ain’t got nothin’ on you, babe.”
Maddie laughed and, with a pageant-worthy twist of her hand, turned away. Over her shoulder, she called back, “Forget about the flip and the kiddos tonight. Let your hair down. Have some fun.”
Carissa stuck her thumb in the air, but as soon as Maddie disappeared into the crowd, she sagged back against the chair and blew out a breath.
Chances of making much progress on her rekindled goal were slim to none now that he was there, because not only was he hot with a capital H, he was also one of the reasons she’d taken so long to get to the point of wanting to date again.
Damn, the man cramped her style. He was her ex-boyfri
end’s best friend, for Pete’s sake. Given their respective relationships to Maddie and Dan, they saw a lot of each other and, on every occasion, she ended up feeling guilty as hell for fantasizing about things she had no business even considering.
One taste wasn’t enough.
It had to stop. That’s all there was to it. Especially if she hoped to have any luck transitioning back to the land of the sexually gratified. Three years was far too long to let a guy monopolize her libido. And, as a grown woman, surely she could tame her attraction to a mere mortal of a man.
Even if he was built like a Greek god.
Pulling in a deep breath, she straightened her back and shook off the musing. A beer would be phenomenal right now, but the night was still young and her apartment was on the other side of town. Also? Her family could do without another drunken jailbird to add to its dysfunction. It was probably best on all accounts if she steered clear of the real liquor.
Another distraction was in order. Preferably sooner than later.
“Looks like you could use another drink.”
Like she’d rubbed a magic lantern, said distraction materialized at her side.
Carissa glanced up from her empty lemonade to see a familiar and rather handsome face grinning down at her. Not quite as sexy as Josh’s, but tempting nonetheless.
I can work with that.
“Tony.” She greeted the athletic, shaggy haired man, with a bright smile that mirrored his own. He leaned in and gave her a peck on the cheek, and then stepped away to retrieve them each a fresh drink.
“You look gorgeous as always,” he said as he returned, grabbed the chair Maddie had vacated and pulled it around the table, so that when he sat, his commendable bicep bumped against her shoulder.
Promising.
“Which makes me question why you’re hiding way the hell over here in the corner.” He shifted forward on his elbows and twisted toward her, his words slightly slurred. It was in that moment, paired with his cloudy-eyed focus on her chest, she realized he was drunk. Not quite wasted, but easily headed in that direction if he didn’t slow up on the alcohol.
Red Hot Obsessions: Ten Contemporary Hot Alpha Male Romance Novels Boxed Set Page 124