by Taryn Quinn
My fingers did just that. Dragged them aside and her swollen lips were there just waiting for me to plow into.
I pulled her hand away from my cock and placed it on the wall, high above her head like her other hand. Then I gripped her hips and dragged her up onto her toes so we lined up.
“This is what you need? Here in this alley. Will that door open?”
“I-I don’t know.”
I crowded into her, my dick pressing into her thigh. “I don’t even care. I don’t think I could stop if someone did walk out here and watch. I want you that much. It would take ten minutes to get you into a hotel and do this properly.”
“Fuck the hotel. I want this. I like this.”
“Yes,” I hissed. This place on the edge fed the need I already had. Would it be as powerful on a bed with silk sheets and soft music? I just didn’t know.
“What do you want, Miss Barrows?”
She shuddered against me and I got off on the power of it. God, I was feeding on her like a high. The endorphin rush I got when I scaled Mt. Rainier and rappelled down with my brothers was the only thing close.
And it paled in comparison.
“Your cock inside me.” Her voice was a broken whisper.
I’d needed to hear her say it so badly that there were no words left in me. I slammed inside of her and drove her up onto her toes once more. Our height difference made my thighs burn but I didn’t care. I was inside her again.
She clamped down on my cock and I blew out a long, low groan. I wrapped one arm around her ribs until her breasts rested on my forearm and I gripped her other hand.
Brick dug and scraped over my knuckles as I laced our fingers and held her back against me and hammered into her. The angle was exquisite and excruciating. I slid my arm up between her breasts for leverage, to drag her down onto me. I held onto her shoulder and lost myself to the precious torture.
I needed more.
I cupped her jaw, twisting her to meet my mouth.
The kiss was clicking teeth and rough lips. I sucked on her tongue and she grazed my bottom lip with her teeth as we lost ourselves in the visceral pounding of flesh. My end was coming too fast.
I’d wanted her too badly, had reacted too strongly to seeing her touch Bellamy. I’d needed to brand her, cover her, and now I was speeding toward an orgasm I couldn’t stave off.
She turned her mouth away from mine and buried her face against our stacked arms. She sunk her teeth into my forearm a moment before I felt her flutter around my cock, then squeeze harder. I buried my mouth in her hair at the back of her neck and answered her bite with one of my own.
This wasn’t me.
I didn’t mark and I sure as fuck didn’t bite. But with her, nothing was within normal parameters.
My breathing was fast and my heart was going to bust through my sternum, but I held on and rode her orgasm, fighting against my own.
When she sobbed, I lost the fight and came so hard my spine shuddered and cramped before righting itself. I curled around her to protect her from the rough cut of the brick and to hold myself inside of her as my cum filled the condom. Part of me wanted to strip it off and splash inside of her, coat every inch of her from the inside out with my semen, my sweat, my smell.
It didn’t make sense.
Branding her was bordering on obsession.
Part of me screamed to run in the other direction, but the more dominant side of me held her close and pulsed inside her to feel that sweet release still riding her. Her tears dripped down my arm and her shudders dragged me back into the moment.
This place wasn’t safe for me on a few fundamental levels. None of which mattered right then.
I pulled out of her and tied off the condom. The fact that I could dispose of it so quickly made it seem even worse.
Now there was only the scent of sunshine and Georgia mixed with a hint of decay. We were far enough from the dumpsters that they didn’t draw away from what we’d done, but if I dwelled on our environment for too long, it would cheapen the moment.
I pulled her panties back where they belonged. To trap the scent of us mingling together against her pussy. I wanted to be close to her as long as possible, even if it meant I wasn’t truly next to her. I cupped my hand over the cotton and felt how swollen and wet she still was.
She jerked and swiped a hand over her cheek. I turned her in my arms and pulled her hand away from her face. Her long lashes were starred with tears and her pupils were blown out.
I slipped an arm around her neck and pulled her flush against me. Words didn’t seem to make sense, so I didn’t bother to try to figure out what to say. After a few moments, I drew her out of the shadows and into the sunshine.
I slipped my hand into hers and our fingers twisted into a simple link. As if our fingers understood what my head didn’t. The sidewalk was still quiet, but there were people coming out. Foot traffic was doubling up and we’d walked out like nothing happened.
Her shell-shocked eyes held a similar look from the night before, but this time, I didn’t want her to run. I wanted her to know it was me who gave her that pleasure and understand that it was something rare.
I ushered her through the crosswalk and into the parking garage. She stiffened and looked around. I tightened my hold.
I spotted her car and drew her toward it. Again, she tensed, but today the spot we approached was well-lit. I crowded her against her door. Not touching her because I didn’t trust myself. I braced an arm on either side of her and peered down at her.
There was another condom in my wallet and my cock was already half-hard for her.
No.
That wasn’t happening again.
Not now.
“Stop looking at me like that.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Because this shouldn’t be happening. Yesterday I understood, but not this. Not now.”
I could feel her slipping away. She was being smart. I knew I wasn’t, but the logical side of my brain was on hiatus. I was completely ruled by my—what was it called? Lizard brain? When wants and needs took over for logic.
That was me right now.
Where this woman was concerned anyway.
I pulled a phone out of my pocket. A brand new iPhone with all the bells and whistles. I knew that was her preference simply since she was as iPad obsessed as I was at work. Once I got used to an operating system, I was pretty monogamous. Considering eighty percent of my app creations and products were Apple based or Apple compatible, it seemed safe.
“This has a special solar battery included in the case, and it’s also shatterproof.”
She took the phone. “Wow. Evidently, I’ll be giving Chapel some more of my money.”
“No. This is yours.”
“Oh.” Her brows knit together. “No, I can’t.” She pressed the phone back against my chest. “No.”
“Please. I know what a hassle it is to get a new phone. Let me do this for you.”
She tilted her head to the side. “Why?”
“Why not?”
I took the phone from her and pressed my thumb against the scanner. Her eyes went huge. “You’re my passcode?”
“Just so I could give it to you. You can delete my fingerprints once you add yours.” Not that it would take much to break into her phone if I really wanted to. But if the public knew just how easy it was to hack their phones, they’d lose their minds.
She looked down at it and pressed the green contacts button. “Added yourself, did you?”
“Absolutely. You just need to log in with your password, and everything will come over.”
“Is that right?”
I knew she was withdrawing. I truly didn’t know how to stop it. I slipped my arm around her back, under her cardigan, and traced my thumb over the low-cut back of her dress. Her silky skin was warm and lured me closer. “Georgia, I don’t want you to shelve me into a customer slot anymore.”
“But you are.”
“When I’m with you, I’m not.”
<
br /> She curled her fingers around the phone and rested her hand against my chest. “How are we supposed to make that distinction?”
Something stilled inside of me. The idea was ghostly and nebulous, but it was there. When I was in her bloodstream, she forgot to think, forgot to say no.
I needed that part of her to be mine.
The part that couldn’t turn me down.
I looked down at her phone. My lips moved before my brain could catch up. “When I email you.”
She frowned. “What does that mean?”
I licked my lips. Yes. This I could work with. My cell burned against my thigh. I plucked her phone out of her hands and opened the email program. I had a dummy website that wasn’t attached to any of my work or home programs.
Something that I could use only for us.
I logged in with my voice and created an email for her and for me. A mirrored account that would be our secret. That no one could access except for me. I set it up to push to her phone with a vibration that pulsed three times.
“Just wait for an email.” I handed her back the phone. “No one has to know about us if you don’t want them to.”
I cupped her face and drew her up onto her toes. Instead of the kiss she was expecting, I brushed my nose along hers and breathed her in. I didn’t touch her lips, didn’t touch the rest of her.
I watched her mouth, saw the unconscious want in how she dragged her teeth over her lower lip. I stepped back. One huge step so that I didn’t move back in and offer up anything to keep her.
She had to want this as much as I did.
“Miss Barrows.”
She cleared her throat and inclined her head. “Mr. Chapel.”
I waited for her get into her car, for it to turn on before I spun on my heel and stalked across the parking garage, back out to the sidewalk and to my building. I didn’t look back.
Even if I wanted to with every breath.
I took out my phone instead. This field I understood. I’d give her exactly what she wanted.
Thu 27, July 2017
Maximus Chapel
To: [email protected]
Subject: Do you want to play a game?
No warnings.
No rules.
-M
Two minutes later, I got an email notification. I got into my office and opened it.
Thu 27, July 2017
Georgia Barrows
To: [email protected]
Re: Do you want to play a game?
Yes, I’m game
-G
7
Georgia
I skirted around the table, swept up an empty wine glass on the edge, and set it down at the bar as I made a pass through. It had been a bitch of a night at Bellamy’s. Three of my waitresses had come down with mysterious ailments. Personally, I was pretty sure they were attending the free Kings of Leon show down at the Chapel Amphitheater.
And with that thought, Max was back in my brain.
No word, no visits, no sightings.
He’d completely vanished for the last three weeks.
He’d left me there in that parking lot with the impression that he wanted to continue seeing me in some sort of fashion and then he’d just disappeared.
“Georgia?”
I turned around at Angel’s voice. “If you tell me one more person took off on me tonight, I’m going to commit murder.”
Angel grinned. “No. Just letting you know I told Dean and the staff that we’re doing an early last call. No one is here anyway. Hell, I’d be at the concert too if I could.”
“I could kiss you.”
“Yeah, yeah. Just wrap up the drawers for me, all right?”
“Got it.” I rushed over to the podium and gathered up the credit card receipts from the mini cash register we used and transferred the money to the night drop bag for Angel.
End of the night chores ate up any time to overthink my situation with Max. This was my life and I liked it this way, dammit. For the last few weeks, I’d managed to control the crazy thoughts that plagued me—and my dreams.
Most of the time.
Okay, so maybe a few nights a week, I went to bed with an ache that had never been there before Max, but I’d survive.
It was what I did.
As the last customer got their to-go box and left, an insistent pulse buzzed at my hip. I’d tucked my phone inside the belt of my skirt. I locked the front door and leaned against the cool glass.
I was still learning the ins and outs of my phone, but I didn’t remember setting anything on vibrate. I pressed my thumb over the fingerprint scanner and a single envelope filled my screen.
His name along the bottom. That thrill seeker email account.
Closing my eyes, I tucked the phone back along my hip and shook my head. No. I wasn’t going to open it. I was getting over the entire mess labeled Max.
He told you no warnings.
I shook my head. Three weeks was far too long to wait. If he actually thought I was going to be at his beck and call at any time, he was sorely mistaken.
The phone pulsed three more times. I tried to ignore it, but it was too late. I knew it was there.
I pulled out my cell. I was not going to open it.
Nope.
I was just going to turn off that stupid vibrate feature.
“Georgia?”
“Huh?” I looked up.
Dean stood in front of me with a white towel draped over his shoulder. “Something important on that screen?”
“Nothing that can’t wait for us to close up.”
“You sure? From a secret boyfriend?” He waggled his eyebrows. “There has to be some reason that you’ll never go out with me.”
I laughed. “I could never measure up to your legion of women.”
“You’d be surprised, beautiful.”
I rolled my eyes. Dean breathed and a flirty remark came out of his mouth. “Is the bar cashed out?”
He shook the night drop bag in front of me. “Of course.”
I tucked my phone away and took the bag from him. “You can get out of here if you’re all cleaned up.”
“My hero.” He turned away then stopped and spun back on his heel. “Do you need me to walk you to your car?”
I smiled. “Me and Chelsea carpooled.”
“I can walk you both out.”
“I’ll walk them out,” Angel called.
“There we go.”
Dean grinned. “Boss man just doesn’t want me to get near you or Chelsea.”
I laughed. “We’re too smart for your tricks.”
Dean walked backward. “I can guarantee I could make one or both of you fall for me.”
“Nope!” Chelsea called from the dining room.
I laughed. “Definitely not me.”
He groaned and clutched his chest as he stomped backwards. “Right to the heart. Cruel, capricious women!”
I grabbed the other cash bag and brought it back to Angel. I tapped on the doorjamb. “We’ll be ready in five.”
He held out his hand for the bags and opened the drop safe in the floor. “Thanks.” Angel looked up and then sat back in his chair. “All good?”
“Yeah, of course. I’m beat. I can’t wait to get out of here tonight and take a long, cool shower.”
“Amen, sister.” He stood and shut off his desk lamp. “Anything that doesn’t get done, we’ll do tomorrow.”
I plugged my iPad into the charging station and waited at the doorway. “Hoping to catch the last set?”
He laughed. “You know me too well.”
I tugged my phone out again and forced myself not to look at the readout. Instead I went to the lockers for my purse and dropped it inside. Out of sight, out of mind.
Chelsea met me at the front of the restaurant. “Hey, can you use your ultra-mega phone and look up the hours for Gino’s? Jake wants to meet me there, but I’m sure they h
ave to be closed.”
Seriously? I just couldn’t win.
I dug into my bag for my cell and tapped the bottom button for the phone to come alive. I tried to close the email before it popped up, but it flashed white on the screen with a bold, dark typeface.
Thu, 17 August 2017
Maximus Chapel
To: [email protected]
Subject: Instructions
Be home tonight.
Ask no questions.
Lock your doors.
-M
My stomach jittered and my heart slammed. What did that mean?
“Georgia?”
I fumbled with the home button until I could change out the application. I swiped his email away and brought up a web browser. “What was I looking up again?”
“Gino’s hours. Are you all right?”
“Yes. Just tired.” My voice sounded far away even to my own ears. “Right, Gino’s.” I typed out the website. It felt like it took forever for the page to load, then even longer for my eyes to focus. “Yes. Yes, it’s open. Summer hours.”
“Well, shit. Guess I owe Jake a pizza. Want to come?”
I double tapped the bottom button on my phone to bring up the email again. For the first time in weeks, my blood buzzed and my heart raced.
Was I really going to do this?
God, yes.
I cleared my throat. “No, I need to get home.”
Suddenly, I wasn’t tired at all.
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Thrill Chaser
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