by Taryn Quinn
She reared up and buried her teeth in my shoulder as she swallowed her screams. The bite of pain, the way she shuddered around me, and the sob that broke from her decimated the last of my control.
I threw my head back and came so hard my mind shorted out. Silence and calm infused my too busy brain. All because of her.
I slumped against the car and she slid down my body to drop onto the hood. Her forehead fell to the center of my chest as we learned how to drag oxygen into our lungs again.
Her fingers twisted into my belt loops, holding me between her knees. I rested my hands on her thighs and my chin atop her head.
I didn’t know what to say, but it seemed that it was a problem we shared. Her fingers slid over my sides and away as she sat up. I wanted to kiss her. It seemed like this moment was too much to just step back and pretend it didn’t happen.
I shrugged out of my dress shirt and draped it over her shoulders. She pushed her arms through the sleeves. I unbuttoned the cuffs and rolled them back until I found her small hands.
She lightly trailed her fingers over my wrist as I buttoned each cuff before buttoning up the front. It was too big on her until I got to her breasts.
Dear God, she was simply one of the most beautiful women I’d ever seen. Even with the night behind her and fucked within an inch of our lives, she was stunning. I pushed her hair behind her ear and lifted her chin so our gazes met.
“I don’t know what to say,” she whispered.
“That makes two of us.”
A small smile tugged at the corners of her lips. “I’ve never done anything like that before.”
I couldn’t exactly say that I hadn’t had mindless hookups in my lifetime, but nothing like this. Being reckless wasn’t something that I did often. Not with a name like Chapel.
My father was a bastard, but he was a powerful one. And the family name was synonymous with Seattle leadership both in the political arenas and all areas of business. I didn’t let this side of me out. It wasn’t allowed to be.
But then again, no one had ever had the key before.
Not until a hostess from a little family bistro.
Not until Georgia.
“It’s never been like that for me before.” The confession was out before I could stop it. Maybe I didn’t want to stop it.
There was no way that I could actually put this part of me back in the box. Not now. Not after knowing just how we were together.
“I...”
“Georgia, you can’t deny this was good for you.”
“No, of course I can’t.”
“But...”
“But this was a reaction. Like you said, a chemical thing.”
I raised an eyebrow. “We’ve had a chemical thing since the first day I walked into Bellamy’s.”
She looked down. “You’re a customer.”
“So what?”
“You’re one the most influential customers we have. Half of your company comes over for drinks and food and you keep our catering staff busy. What if we—it just wouldn’t work.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m Georgia Barrows and you’re Maximus F. Chapel.”
I laughed. “Did you Google me?”
“Of course I did!”
Her outburst made me smile wider. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“You and I do not fit. At all. And besides, I do not have time in my life for anything even remotely resembling...whatever this is.”
“Fucking?”
Her eyes widened.
“It’s what it was.”
She pushed me back and slid off the hood. “Exactly. I don’t fuck strangers.”
“I’m not a stranger.” I quickly took care of the condom and tied it off. I rescued my suit jacket before it fell onto the concrete. I used my pocket square to hide the evidence and tucked it away before zipping up and fastening my belt.
Her cheeks flushed as I snapped out my jacket. It smelled of her. Tangerines and heat and sex. I had a feeling it would never get dry cleaned.
My shirt fell over her hips as she looked down at what I’d done to her. Her pantyhose were absolutely destroyed. Shredded edges fell down her calf to pool at her ankles. She reached out to lean on me and her fingers met with my naked belly.
She tried to pull back, but I’d angled myself in front of her car so she had no choice but to accept my assistance. I crooked my arm so she could hold onto my forearm as she took off her shoe and pulled off what was left of her stockings. She stepped back into her shoe and did the same with the other. “I can’t even wrap my head around what we just did.”
I curled my arm around her waist and pulled her flush with me. “We had an incredible experience.”
“And what?” She looked up at me.
Here, up close when the adrenaline wasn’t hazing every detail, I saw just how tiny she was against me. Her head didn’t even reach my shoulder with the ankle-breakers she wore. Those damn shoes drove me mad, to be perfectly honest. She wasn’t fragile, but she was incredibly small.
I could have taken her again. Right here. Right now.
I didn’t need the out of control danger aspect of what had happened earlier to want her again, but it had heightened everything. It had also broken through a lot of the barriers we’d allowed between us.
But it felt like a door was appearing. And she was going to hide behind it at any moment.
“I want more of it, Georgia.”
“This is crazy. I have to make a report, I have to go cancel my cards and reboot my entire life. For God’s sake, he even has my phone. I can’t deal with this now.”
I unearthed my phone. “Start here.”
She shook her head. “I need to go home. To find all the numbers and... I just have to go.”
She was shutting down.
I knew it.
The door was closing and I had no idea how to stop it.
She backed up and bent to retrieve her keys. At least the thief hadn’t gotten away with those too. “I have to go, Ma—Mr. Chapel.”
“No.” Her gaze swung to me, a little startled at my sharp voice. Good, because she needed to know that we weren’t going back to the status quo. “You don’t get to call me that after what we just did.”
Her chin lifted and she disengaged the locks to her car. “I have to go.”
I tightened my hold on my suit jacket until it was crushed in my hand. “Georgia.”
Her huge mahogany eyes were just a little wild. Similar to what I’d seen when I’d tasted her so thoroughly. But this time they were a bit different.
This was the running kind of wild.
She got into her car and left me standing there staring after her. She didn’t look back, didn’t brake until she reached the end of the garage. When she paused there for a moment, I took two steps forward.
“Come back,” I said into the empty space.
She took a right and out the front of the garage into the street. Then she was gone.
Dammit.
5
Georgia
My fingers shook on the steering wheel.
Oh God.
What had I just done?
My thighs were still wet from him, for goodness sake. He wanted more. Wanted me to what? Go home with him?
It didn’t make sense.
None of this made sense.
I tried to push Max to the back of my mind. I couldn’t handle any more of him in my head right now. Even if he was literally clinging to my skin in every sense of the word. From his scent to his shirt and to the ridiculous level of connection I’d never felt with another soul.
I slammed my hands on the wheel at a red light. “Get it together,” I said to the dark car.
I had far more important things to worry about. Like the fact that I’d been mugged.
Mugged.
I couldn’t even wrap my mind around it at the time. And now... Now I was just mad.
Everything was in my purse. With the hours I worked, I
had to be prepared for anything and now I had nothing.
Except three amazing orgasms.
I swiped my hand over my face. Yeah, that did not get my credit cards cancelled and a new phone. My budget was pretty fluid thanks to a lifetime of being frugal, but spending money on another phone was going to suck. Especially since my credit cards would take a few days to fix.
A car honked behind me and I stepped on the gas. I had to pay attention. It was late—after midnight.
Really? Had it only been a little over an hour?
My whole world had gone from exhausted and dragging, to the kick of adrenaline with a mugging, to...Max.
My...well, everything still throbbed in sensory memory. And from the invasion. Because he’d taken complete control of me. Even when I’d tried to assert myself, it has been just for a moment.
And I’d loved it.
God, what was wrong with me?
I pulled into my driveway and didn’t even remember the drive. Dangerous on a whole different level. Autopilot in the middle of the night was often how I got myself home, that wasn’t the issue.
I’d thought of nothing but him the entire time. That was the part that I didn’t want to face.
I parked and locked my doors when I normally wouldn’t have. This was a safe neighborhood. I’d grown complacent as a woman, as a member of society. My life was the restaurant and home. I didn’t go out much simply because I was too tired to make the effort.
The dangers of a big city were everywhere and I hadn’t paid attention to my surroundings. I’d become a victim.
What had happened after was beyond definition.
I rushed up the walk and into my house, locking the doors. Part of me wanted to turn every light on in my house. To banish every shadow, but I wasn’t going to be ruled by fear.
I was naked without my bag, my phone—my things.
For fuck’s sake, I was practically naked in my vestibule. I wore Max’s shirt and he’d cut my panties off me.
Literally.
Cut them off me.
He’d ripped my pantyhose to get to me.
He’d wanted me that bad.
I sagged against my door. Nothing made sense. I didn’t inspire that kind of reaction from anyone, let alone one of the richest men in the state.
I was officially living in Oppositelandia.
With shaking fingers, I opened his shirt and stripped it off, leaving it by the door. I didn’t want him on me. I didn’t want his scent sticking to me right now. I took the stairs at a run and stripped out of my skirt and the threads of what was left of my nylons.
I turned the water to scalding and stepped under it in the dark. I pressed my hands to the cool tile. The abrasions stung from my trip to the ground from the mugger then Max’s orders to face the cement support beam. I tipped my face up to the spray and the first wave of tears hit me.
Too much.
Today had been too much. I crouched down in the shower and let the hot water run to warm before I stood and quickly washed before my hot water tank emptied. I was sore between my legs in ways I didn’t want to examine.
I wrapped myself in a huge towel and curled up on the center of my bed. The moonlight left slats of silver across my unmade sheets. Part of me wanted to just close my eyes and let the rest of the day fall away. Now that the adrenaline was gone, my limbs felt like lead and all I wanted to do was sleep.
But I didn’t.
I sat up and dragged my laptop off the hassock next to my bed. I turned on the light and opened up my computer to find all the numbers to call.
By the time I’d finished, it was heading for three in the morning. I was lucky because I didn’t have to work the early shift the next day, but now with a list in my head, sleep was elusive.
I forced myself to turn off the lights and close my computer. To lay in the dark and relax.
I’d changed out of my damp towel into my favorite nightshirt between credit card company phone call seven and eight. I should have been able to sleep, dammit. Exhaustion wasn’t even the word for what I was.
But my nipples were sore under the soft cotton and my center felt abused and sated in a way that didn’t make sense. I literally felt like a tornado had lifted me, shook me like a ragdoll, and dropped me back down to the ground.
With orgasms included.
I slipped my hand into the wide collar of my shirt and hissed at my still sensitive breast. My nipple hardened immediately as if it was looking for more of Max’s mouth and rough touch. I cupped myself gently and tugged at the tight tip.
The moan that slipped out of my mouth surprised me. As a woman who was alone more often than in a relationship, I knew how to satisfy myself. The ultimate insomnia cure was something I was very familiar with.
But I shouldn’t need it tonight.
Not after what I’d done. What we’d done.
Tell that to my body. Because there was an ache sitting low inside of me that left me restless and hurting. With my other hand, I slid down over my nightshirt to the hem and lifted it. I coasted over my thighs, then the curve of my mound to my stomach. With both hands under my shirt, I plucked at my nipples.
Each pass was pain and pleasure. Something I’d never associated with the other. Yes, I liked a more abrupt touch sometimes—what woman didn’t when she was in the moment? Truly in the moment.
But this... This was different.
Max had drawn on my skin until my nipples were an angry raspberry color, and he’d tasted my pussy as if it was something akin to champagne. If I looked in a mirror, I was fairly sure I’d find faint bruises from his touch.
That was a tattoo I’d live with for as long as it lasted.
God, yes. Especially if it resulted in this feeling.
My right hand strayed lower, over my ribs, and down the curve of my belly to the swollen lips that still hadn’t quite recovered from him.
I dipped two fingers through my folds to the silky wetness that was already readying me for Max. He wasn’t there. He probably wouldn’t ever be inside me again, but the memory was etched in my mind.
Hell, I’d have to get a bigger toy to remind myself of the perfect fullness he’d provided. My eyes fluttered closed and I remembered his flicking tongue over my clit. I couldn’t mimic that, but the memory was bright enough that my body took any contact and gave only pleasure in return.
I tugged at my nipple as my hand moved faster, my fingers raced to give me the friction I needed. My hips lifted off the bed and the cry in the night was hoarse with pleasure and a plaintive groan that still left me wanting.
I curled around my hand and closed my legs, lifting my knees up to my chest...anything to get that final tightness and friction. As the orgasm crashed into me, consciousness lost and sleep took me under.
When I came around again, daylight infused my room. I groaned because I definitely hadn’t moved in the night. My entire body was stiff and I felt hungover. I fumbled around my bedside and groaned. No phone.
I pushed my hair out of my eyes. No clock in my bedroom because everything—and I do mean everything—was in my purse. Even the watch I rarely wore.
I pulled a pillow over my face. Maybe I’d just call in pathetic. It was a thing. I certainly felt like I’d gone twelve rounds with Holyfield. Pathetic had to be enough to warrant a day off.
The TV remote had to be somewhere in my bed. I fell asleep with it almost every night. Eventually, I was going to have the buttons permanently indented in my hip.
I made a wide arc with my arm and found it halfway down. I hit the power button and winced when I heard the talk show host that was on.
Not good.
I sat up and pressed info and sure enough, it was almost two in the afternoon.
Dammit. No time to find someone to cover for me.
I dragged my sorry ass out of bed and into the bathroom. Twinges from my sprawl on cement and...other things made my usual quick morning rituals a little lengthier.
And because the idea of one of my form-fi
tting dresses made me whine—out loud, because I was pitiful—I went for a soft sundress and cardigan sweater.
Screw primping.
I had to make time for makeup because I looked like an extra on the Walking Dead even with ten hours of sleep under my belt. A little bronzer hid a multitude of sins.
I didn’t have anything to put in a purse, but I grabbed a small Vera Bradley that could hold my checkbook for a visit to the bank. I’d need cash to get a new cell.
Just kill me. I so didn’t want to deal with that circle of hell today.
I definitely should’ve called in.
After an uneventful drive into the city and a frustrating trip into the bank, I came out with a few hundred dollars and a shiny new debit card. Lucky for me that the mugger had gone for my tips and hadn’t gotten to use my plastic.
With my brain buzzing from the business manager’s list of things to watch for, I didn’t have time to stop for a phone. I made it to the parking garage with ten minutes to spare.
My hands shook a little as I parked. I looked for a spot under lights and close to the exits. Old self-defense class checklists bubbled in my head. If we had a mugger in the area, we’d have to go back to the buddy system for closings. We never should have stopped, but I would talk to Angel about having a staff meeting. I didn’t want the attention and people asking me a zillion times if I was okay, but I had to keep my coworkers safe.
I threaded my keys through my fingers and held my thumb on the panic button as I rushed through the garage. My heart slammed and I couldn’t hear a damn thing. Just blood rushing in my head as residual fear crawled up my spine. I didn’t actually breathe until I was halfway across the street.
Bellamy’s was doing a brisk business as usual. I’d never been so happy to see people waiting to get inside. I wouldn’t have time to think about my attacker or Max Chapel.
Thank God.
I walked through the brass and glass door and Chelsea rushed to me, dragging me through the small group of people to the kitchen.
“I’ve been trying to text you all morning.”
“Yeah, about that.” And it begins.
“What the hell is going on? Mr. Chapel was here as soon as the doors opened.”