by Christa Wick
Luke traces the edge of my bottom lip with his finger. "What I can't figure out is how such a stupid, mean bastard produced a daughter like you."
I turn my head to the side. He’s being almost sweet, attempting to make me feel better after his toys upset me. Instead, I feel more self-conscious and three times as confused about him as before.
We’re in his bedroom, naked as the day our mothers birthed us, and consent is...questionable. I mean, it doesn't exactly matter if I want to when Luke has left me no choice.
"Marie, I know your father told you with every hit, every cut, and every burn that you weren't worth loving." Clearing his throat, Luke exerts enough pressure on my chin to coax me into looking at him again. He lowers his head, his warm brown gaze leveling my resistance as he claims a small, soft kiss before speaking again.
"Baby, he lied."
Looking at the flogger and metal switch, I shake my head. "If he lied, then what are those for?"
With a single pass of his hand, Luke sweeps everything into the drawer.
"When you're ready," he answers. "However long it takes to reach that point, I'll show you."
13
Marie
Fingers stroking through my hair. Lips whispering across my mouth.
Slowly, I surface from a troubled dream to find Luke Masters cradling me.
"Baby, do you always kick in your sleep?"
My gaze bashfully falling somewhere between our bodies, I blush. "Sorry."
"That's an apology—which I accept—but I want an answer."
"Not always, just a lot." Shrugging, I try to process the fact that I managed to fall asleep in his strong arms and he’s still holding me.
Not that I mind his arms around me right now. It feels pretty fabulous—and beyond weird. I know next to nothing about him, yet he seems to know everything about me. Granted, half of my life is probably in some police databank somewhere, but what he doesn't know outright, he senses on some deeper level.
"It takes a long time being safe to grow out of it." Sighing, he gives me another sweet kiss.
I look at him, see too much understanding for me to be comfortable with and look away. Hoping to change the subject, I try to sit up.
Luke won't let me. Drawing me closer, he buries his face against my neck.
That, too, feels fabulous, but I wiggle against his embrace.
"I need to check my phone."
"Your phone is fine. The line is monitored, no call will slip by." Beneath the bedding covering us, he trails his fingers over my flesh. "And Tommy is fine. You'll see him at dinner."
I frown, as annoyed with my own predictability as I am with Masters' ability to intuit the thoughts running through my head. Hopefully he can't read my mind entirely because the faint strokes against the back of my thighs are affecting other parts of my body and I would rather not have him realize this fact.
Luke's chuckle yanks my attention to his face. Pushing me onto my back, he kisses me.
"Your color changed, baby. That lovely cream skin went pink right here." Bringing his hand up from under the covers, he lightly taps my cheek three times in quick succession. He pushes up on one elbow while his free hand lowers the sheet to expose my chest. He palms a breast. "And here."
He slides down my body, nuzzling my breasts and pushing the bedding onto the floor. Lifting his head to capture a nipple, he inspects the flesh of my lower body. He smooths his hand over the hair covering my mound. Still sucking at my breast, he draws my nipple taut then releases it with a wet pop before gently pinching one plump thigh.
"And now here."
His head swivels until he’s gazing directly into my eyes. Grinning, he works his fingers between my thighs. Running the tip of one over the wet seam of my pussy, his grin turns into a toothy smile full of confidence.
"Miss Lafayette, I do believe you’re ever-so-slightly attracted to me."
I close my eyes, trying not to blush or smile or—
Moaning, I arch my back and fling one leg to the side as he continues to tease me. I latch onto his shoulder and press my nails into his skin. His fingers teasingly explore the hot, sopping interior of my pussy until I confess.
"Maybe...a little."
"I can work with a little." His mouth returns to my breasts, and the only sounds for a few seconds are his sucking kisses against my flesh and the slurping play of his fingers inside me.
My moans quickly join the chorus.
Followed by my gasps.
And, finally, a soft, whining plea to let me come.
"Yes." My fingers curl in Luke's hair as he weaves a line of kisses across the swell of my stomach. His large, muscular frame moves to fill the space between my parted thighs. Releasing his hair, I push up on my elbows and watch him spread my lower lips.
He’s the first to see me like this—to even want to see me like this. His gaze shining with sensual approval, his hands manipulate the thick, slippery folds of my sex.
"Such a lovely pink pussy, baby." His face pushes forward. His mouth disappears as it descends into the silky brown hair and he starts to suckle my clit.
My nipples, already hard, pucker to smaller points. I toss my head back, the soft grind of my hips stirring a fresh moan. Luke groans in return, the vibrations rippling across and through my sex. He eases two fingers into me, the first few strokes narrow. He widens them, stretching my virginal opening in preparation for his cock. The strokes continue—a little faster, wider, rougher.
I buck, cry out. My shoulders hit the mattress and my head digs into the pillow as I lift my hips. Three fingers plunge into me, his tongue and lips incessant against my clit—sucking, pushing, pinching. His fingers flex, thrust, retreat, fuck in again, wide and deep until I scream through another hard wave of release.
Only then does Luke slow. His tongue replaces his hand, the licks turning gentle and relaxing. Wet with my juices, a finger plays against the tense, nervous rim of my ass. His nose rubs at my clit with each probe of his tongue inside my pussy. Throaty, ravenous noises leave him. My thighs press against his ears as the sound of him feasting pushes me closer to another climax.
With my attention focused on my pussy, my ass relaxes just enough to accept the tip of one squirming finger. Pleasure radiates from the bundle of nerves and muscles he’s invaded. When I suck a breath in and release an approving moan, he pushes until he’s in up to the middle joint.
Damn! The teasing play of his finger in my ass draws the muscles of my pussy tighter. Pressure stacks along my clit, my sex narrows and coils around his tongue. My hips work with him, moving to take more of his finger and tongue inside me. I wrap my hands around the back of his head, letting him know I want him exactly where he is.
"Yes…" I squirm, wiggle, pussy and ass pulsing rhythmically against the intrusions.
His shoulders flex to push my thighs further apart. I lift, settle, needing some intangible alteration to push me that last inch forward and over the edge. A second finger drives into me. I gasp and force my thighs as wide as they will go. He thrusts again, smooth and deep as my ass tenses and my mound presses more firmly against his forehead.
Lifting his head just a fraction, his mouth finds my clit again and he throttles the shaft and hood as his fingers plunge one last time and I come harder than I could have ever imagined.
When I open my eyes a minute later, Luke covers me with his body. He kisses me, the taste of my juices on his lips. I surge against him, my ass pushing against the mattress so that my mound rubs against his erection.
"Please," I whisper, my voice barely audible.
His lips brush over my ear. "How many lovers, Marie?"
"None." I choke out the admission, still worried he will stop once he knows.
He pulls away. I try to hold him to me, too needy and wrecked to be ashamed that I could cling to him or any man.
"I'm not stopping, love." Reaching back, he cups my cheek then runs his hand down to squeeze my breast. "I just don't want you to have any new worries."
/>
I’m so focused on the word "love" that I don't realize he has opened the nightstand drawer until he shuts it. Abandoning my breast, he wraps one hand around his shaft, his fingers free to tear open the foil wrapper in his other hand. A fat pearl of liquid glistens in the slit of his cock, disappearing from view when he caps it with the condom and smooths the latex down his thick erection.
I close my eyes, dizzy with the thought that I managed to cause that bead of arousal, that I somehow made Luke rock hard and ready to fuck me, that twice now I’ve felt him growl while his mouth and hands were between my legs.
He settles on top of me, softly nuzzling my right cheek. "Don't be afraid, baby."
"I'm not." The truth shocks me—thrills me. I can't remember the last time I felt so safe, so worry free. I should be scared witless—blackmailed into the bed of a powerful man and about to lose my virginity to him, my sister's life on the line, my freedom and Tommy's at stake. Instead, I feel aroused, warm, relaxed yet tense because I’m so ready to be claimed by this man.
"I'm not afraid," I repeat. I wrap my arms around his neck, my head dipping back to expose my throat to his kisses.
The rough brush of his beard against the sensitive skin of my neck sends a wave of shivers washing across my body. My muscles tighten in response to the sensation just as Luke starts to slowly fuck his cock into me. Groaning, he kisses my collarbone and makes a fervent request.
"Relax, baby."
Another kiss in the hollow above the bone melts my muscles with its sweet heat. Forcing myself to uncoil when everything he does only makes me wind tighter in pleasure, I open to Luke. The head of his thick cock pushes and stretches and pushes a little more until it’s past the first gate. I close around him and exhale in a hot rush of hissing air.
My nails scrape down his back and I push against the invading shaft. "More."
"I'll give you everything, love." Luke pushes deeper, the pleasure erasing for a moment the fact that he has again called me "love."
When I realize it, I bite my lip and wonder what "love" means to a man like Masters.
"Shhh...baby." He takes a little back stroke, the immense head catching at the rim of my tight pussy. "Don't think—feel."
Feel—yes. That I can accomplish with pleasure. Feeling feels good—it feels hard, soft, thick, liquid, hot, heavy and yet so light I might float to the ceiling if his weight didn't anchor me.
Bringing my knees up, I press them to his hips. My ankles lock behind his muscular ass to keep his cock deep inside my aching channel. My bottom starts a tilting dance, hitting back and forth as the large pommel at the end of his shaft rubs over a sweet, sensitive zone that demands more strokes, each harder and faster than the last.
Clinging to his shoulders, I lift. His strong arms hold us both off the mattress, letting me ride his shaft as he bites gently at my neck and goads me toward a wilder pace.
"That's it, love. Feel how we fit together, how you were made to hold and fuck my cock."
"Yes..." The word leaves me half a dozen more times as my body grows frantic, my pussy whipping along his thick, long shaft until I come again and my arms and legs can no longer secure me to him.
I fall to the mattress. Luke rears back. His hands grab my knees, force my thighs apart. Still inside me, fucking slow and deep, he watches as my upper body writhes along the mattress, pleasure continuing to lash at my flesh so that I buck and twitch uncontrollably.
Forcing my eyes open, I watch as Luke's gaze slowly travels my body. I finally see what he sees. A light film of perspiration glimmers over large, heaving breasts. Arousal pinches and peaks fat, hard nipples. Exertion and the inferno burning low in my gut flush my skin. And there, at the juncture of our bodies, his cock fucks in and out between my spread legs, my flesh covered in a thick, translucent cream that proves just how much I want him.
I look up just as his eyes close. Sucking in a deep, deep breath, he holds it until, biting his lip, he shudders and comes.
14
Luke
I stay with Marie until sleep covers her like a heavy blanket. Slipping on a robe, I go to my penthouse office and check the operations files that I left my team working on. As a potential lead on Machado, it was easy getting local law enforcement to share call logs and text messages for the cellphone Rose had before Ortiz destroyed it.
SHE'S A CUNT!
Why r u making me stay with her?
Let me test them. She's a used up stupid cow.
Listen to me, baby. We don't need her!
Blow for blow? ;) <3 (.)(.) ({})
There are cell tower ping locations and photos, too. Even after her phone started going straight to voicemail with Marie's contact attempts, Rose appeared to be living in a Walnut Park neighborhood and shopping at the corner store. She always had a male companion identified as part of Ortiz's crew with her, but none of the images look like she was being held hostage. One of the photos shows her in a bikini, tits out as she straddles Ortiz poolside.
My fingers skim across the keyboard without pressing any keys. For the first time in a long time I’m uncertain. There are three competing scenarios that can be woven from the facts presented. First, Rose and Ortiz are working together to force Marie to test the marked cards and the contacts. Ortiz gets the added benefit of roping Marie back into his seedy criminal enterprise. Second, Rose was working with Ortiz but now she’s only a hostage. Either way, Ortiz figures Marie won't flip on him as long as she believes Rose is in peril.
Third scenario, Marie and Ortiz are working me.
I don't want to consider this last option. I just fucked Marie—or made love to her or something in between on a sliding scale of I don't really know what the hell is happening between us but I don't want it to stop. Marie seems innocent even though I know she’s participated in confidence schemes with her father. She’s also spent the last six years working the lowest, toughest jobs a woman can work while still earning an honest living.
Maybe she got tired of being pissed on for being honest. Maybe she wanted one score big enough to rid her of Rose while keeping a clean conscience by setting her baby sister up to go solo.
Maybe I'm just a dumb, overconfident mark.
Sighing, I print off the picture of Rose topless and the text messages and cell tower records. I shove them in an envelope then head to my home gym. I don't go there to work out but to catch a quick shower and change into something other than the silky robe wrapped around my body.
It wouldn't do to have Marie's scent on me when I question her baby brother.
Tommy is sleeping when I arrive at the small suite of rooms I have restricted him to. The guard goes to wake him as the resort's kitchen sends up a late night snack.
The kid emerges a few minutes later fully dressed, his clothes the same as he had on when he was taken from the hotel room where Marie stashed him.
"Give the guard your clothing size and fit preferences," I say as I push the tray of food toward him.
Tommy doesn't respond to the offer of fresh clothing, but he pops open a can of soda and chugs half of it down. Closing his eyes, he tilts his head up and burps loudly.
Smart ass and passive aggressive, not the combination I want to deal with in the middle of the night.
I toss the envelope at him.
"Any idea when that picture was taken?" I ask even though I know the answer.
His cheeks heat. I don't know if it's because he's looking at a picture of his twin's tits and is embarrassed or because I’m questioning him.
"She had her hair colored that way a couple of days before we last saw her." He taps a dark smudge visible on her right shoulder. "She never had a tattoo when she was with us, but she had been trying to get two hundred dollars off Marie to get a Trojan horse done."
On the inside, my brows are shooting all the way up my forehead. On the outside, I stare at Tommy with a blank face. Did Rose think she was being clever by subtly outing her game plan to Marie?
"Our dad had one. You know, Troy
and Trojan."
"Yeah, I got it," I say then nod at the other pages he’s holding in his hand. "What about the text messages?"
He shrugs, tosses the stack on the the table and finally grabs a slice of pizza.
"Did you show Marie?" he asks around a chunk of pepperoni.
"Not yet. Do you think it will change her mind?"
His face screws up with pain. He covers it with a cough.
I don't think he’s this good an actor. The anguish is real.
Tommy washes down the pizza with some more soda then nods at the papers.
"Marie thinks more of Rose than she does of herself," he tells me. "There's the shit dad put into Marie's head."
His face tilts upward and he pretends to study the ceiling.
"He tore her down every day, made her feel guilty for even breathing. Tried to do the same to me, but she wouldn't let him. Still, she couldn't stop all the beatings, so she feels unworthy because of that."
"Did your dad beat Rose?"
Again, I know the answer, or think I do. But I need to get the kid to keep opening up.
Tommy shakes his head.
"He gave her almost as much from the cons and cards as he took for himself. Now Rose doesn't have as much as she had when she was Daddy's Girl. So Marie feels guilty about that, too."
"You love, Marie," I say.
He nods, throat tightening.
I ask my last question.
"Anything you can tell me about Ortiz? Marie said he and your father did jobs together."
"Yeah, they were just starting up when Marie took off with us. Getting involved with the gangs was the last straw."
I wait, giving him time to remember what it was like the first time they lived in L.A.
"Solandro wasn't into confidence games just to get money out of the marks. That was pocket change to him. What he wanted was to blackmail important people. Bank managers, pharmacists, cops…. So Troy showed him how to manipulate anyone, find their weaknesses. Troy always said the perfect mark was someone who cared about their family more than themselves."