by Dakota Gray
I read between the lines of the statement. “You see us on equal footing when I'm sober?”
She settles next to me on the bed. Her hip is a soft cushion against mine. “Yup.”
Which means I get to her. I try to remember a distinct moment when her facade faltered—at the club when I called her Sugar and my ten minutes. Other than that, she's only shown me what she wanted me to see of her. I've lost count of how many times I've shown her my hand.
She offers the water to help me wash down the sandwich. “Your eyes are a little clearer.”
I drink half, then set the glass on the nightstand. As I scoot down to get comfortable in my bed, I tell her, “Duke remembers you.”
She sucks in a breath. “No, he didn't.”
“You lied. About everything.” I'm the one lying, but more cracks show up in her facade.
Irritation flashes in her eyes. “He's an attorney of record for a competing firm. Believe me when I say that's not knowing someone in passing, much less fucking them.”
I like the woman I see when her barriers crumble. She's still prickly as shit though.
I lift my hand and rest my fingers on her cheek. “Who is the Broken Virgin?”
Her mouth parts and she moves her hand from the bed to my stomach. “I want you to make me a computer. Two grand range. I save a lot of documents, PDFs, digital photos and run large databases. It'll be a personal computer, but I'll need decent security. If you do a good job, I can use some of my contacts to help your business along.”
The offer stills my hand, and my heart pounds. “You'd do that for me?”
“You can't suffer if you starve to death first. I saw the inside of your fridge. You shouldn't have paid for that hotel room.”
The warmth spilling into me goes cold. I grab her wrist and yank her against me. Her face is inches away from mine. Fear flickers in her irises. Good. I keep her wrist imprisoned above my head. Her breasts are crushed against my chest, and I can feel her breathing race.
“Don't toy with me. That's a warning.”
“What's after that?”
I use her weight, her vulnerability, to flip her onto her back and then I'm between her legs, looming over her.
I lean close so she can see my eyes and know I mean what I say. “The threat.”
She's trembling beneath me, her breath short and choppy but she doesn't break the stare. I've scared her and she's not backing down. “Why does manhandling me make your dick hard?”
I scoff. “I was hard before that. But let's see...” I lean to the side to flip her dress up to her torso. No panties, as I suspected. I slip my finger between her folds and she's wet. “Were you wet before or after, Sugar?”
I'm not sure if it's the question or endearment that makes her jawline clench. “Even halfway to tipsy, you're a masher.”
She doesn't answer the question, but I can guess she was wet for me at the club. The promised threat doesn't change the fact she's attracted to me. Genuinely attracted to me.
And that trips me up. I hurt someone she loves. She has come into my life to hurt me back any way she can because of that. At some point, did her goal stop being revenge? And now she's just entangled in my bed?
Huh. Sucks to be her.
Do I care? Not really. I want her to knock it off. Forget revenge. It's pointless. We should fuck for a few weeks, until things get old, and she can go back to her life. She's smart, driven, and based on her walk, she knows how good her pussy is. What more could she possibly ask for from life?
And that's how I find myself frowning down at her with my finger still buried in her slit.
“Do you revenge fuck every man who hurts your friends?”
“No.”
“What makes me special?”
She bends her leg at the knee and that shifts my finger deeper. I know she's doing that to distract me, and it'll likely work.
Believe it or not, I have incredible impulse control. Do you know how easy it is to blow through ten grand in a month when you're twenty-two? Especially if you know you're going to get at least six the next month and the month after that? The only responsibility I had at the time was to send my mother at least two grand for three months until my father's life insurance kicked in.
I only have one vice and I'm knuckle-deep in it. I'm also very picky about who I put my mouth on. “I haven't forgotten the question, Robyn.”
She clenches around my digit. She likes the sound of her name in my mouth—my first time saying it to her.
“You want me to stroke your ego?”
Instead of taking the bait, I swirl my finger around her clit. Her knee falls to the bed. The last time I'd touched her like this I hadn't paid too much attention to her face. I had to focus.
This time I get to see how she bites her lower lip when she's aroused. Not in the middle but on the side. It's subtle and sensual. And her eyes, God, they go hazy from pleasure.
I should have watched her face more the first time. We are even. My touch shatters her facade. Something inside me loosens at the knowledge.
I ask, “Were you supposed to fuck me?”
She grabs my hand and lifts it to my nose. I laugh. That is a clear no—she's trying to distract me.
I flop onto my back and press my palms to my eyes. “I'm pretty sure you're not crazy or a murderer, so I feel comfortable enough to offer you my bed if you don't want to go home. I'll fuck you in the morning, but I need to get some sleep to do it justice.”
She shifted with me, and one of her breasts rests on my outstretched arm. “You'll give me cab fare if I want to go home?”
Robyn likely knows the answer. I haven't let her pay for a damn thing since we've met. “My mother went to finishing school as a little girl and imparted every bit of unwanted knowledge on how to properly treat a lady.”
“Where did she go wrong?”
“She let me join the army. They turn boys into men.”
She sits up and I assume she's making plans to leave. I dig into my jeans for my wallet. Her hands go up beneath her hair and I can't move. The dress falls to her waist. She hadn't been wearing a bra either.
I'm probably wrong about the murderer part. Robyn is some kind of assassin. Her redheaded friend is her handler. The weekly meet at Starbucks is a check in. How do I know this? First, my brain stops working. Second, my heart barely lurches forward again a second later.
I reach up and pinch the brown tip. Her nipple hardens and she moans so damn softly.
“You're staying,” I tell her. There isn't an option now. We're fucking after I get a few hours of sleep.
“Aren't you going to get undressed?”
If I take off my shirt, the odds are good my pants will be next, and then I'm putting my dick inside her. I'll last about one stroke, which wouldn't do. “No.”
She wiggles the rest of her way out of the dress. I can't do anything else but stare. From head to toe, she's perfect. I don't throw that word around. I honestly don't care about a woman's looks or size. Her taste is the only thing that matters.
But Robyn is perfect. She doesn't cover herself when she notices I'm looking at her like I'm about to take a bite. Nope. She turns around, throws her ass against my right leg and settles in for bed.
I go to sleep with my shoes on because if I take them off, I'm ripping off my pants and putting my dick inside her.
~CHAPTER SIX~
4:59 a.m. I'm up. I slap the alarm before it can go off. I glance to my right, and Robyn has burrowed under my comforter. A plain blue one that is soft and warm. She's dead to the world. I don't want to wake her. She'll only distract me, and I need to think.
I maneuver away from her, quiet as death. I've lived in my condo enough years to get around in the dark. There's not much in it, to be honest. I have a few sports memorabilia in the living room. Awards I was given from the army. Couch, TV and apparently so little food in the kitchen that Robyn thinks I'm spending what little money I have on her. I make it to the bathroom without stubbing any toes.
I
go through my routine: brush my teeth, wash my hair, and then my dick and nuts. I stand under the hot spray and close my eyes to think. It's time to be Sherlock.
I popped Virgin One's cherry when I was twenty-two. I was on leave. My mama needed money. V-One was the bridesmaid. I was the stripper. Before she ever told me her name, I ground her face in my crotch. After she put at least three twenties into my G-string, I ate whipped cream off her tits.
After the bachelorette party, she slipped me her number. By the next day she wasn't a virgin. We fucked for two months. She'd started to look at me like I could give her something more than orgasms. She wanted me to stop stripping. I told her my mother used to beat me with branches from a weeping willow, and I just couldn't commit.
It was a lie. I didn't want to commit. My mother only swatted me occasionally when my mouth got smart. No branches were hurt during my adolescence.
Could she have cried for a month? I shake the water off my face and I honestly can't say. She was kind. She liked it when I spanked her. She didn't taste like milk but I always had a craving for chocolate chip cookies after eating her. I actually took her out on a few dates because she was funny and sweet. Spending time with her outside of the bed wasn't a hardship.
But did I ever act like I wasn't exactly the man I was? Not a single moment. She shouldn't have been shocked I was a dickbag.
Virgin Two I once again met at my stripping job. She coordinated the party and spent most of her time watching me. She let me change in her bedroom, and I thought her naive. Now, I'm not the one to denigrate my former fellow professionals, but not all strippers are honest. Some are thieves, just like in any profession
Because I'm nothing if not predictable, I made a point to flirt with her after I was in my street clothes. She had dimples, a husky laugh and, no, she wasn't pretty or cute. Her black hair was dull and she was a bit too pale, but she smelled like rain.
For a month all she let me do was kiss and finger her. And steal her panties. What? I needed something to hold me over while she kept me just shy of suffering from blue balls. Smart, funny—yes, I have a type. She was a NICU nurse with a bleeding heart. She worked nights, and occasionally I'd pick her up after a job and we'd have breakfast.
My stomach clenches and I shut off the water. Month two, I did everything my mouth could do to a pussy. Three, I took her virginity, and then she dropped me. She never uttered the word love, but I can say I saw all the warning signs.
I rest my head against the cold tile. It was Virgin Two. I have no doubt of that as memory after memory hits me. She was white, but that doesn't mean shit. She could easily be Robyn's family. She dumped me, but that doesn't mean she wouldn't have cried over me for a month.
Why? Fuck if I know. I'm not something special. I love my mama and cheese grits like any real Southern boy. My charm amounts to me smiling hard enough my scar looks like a dimple and saying, “You'll look real pretty on my face, Sugar.”
There's no confusing what I am, and I don't hide the truth. It's not my fault if someone falls for me.
That leads me back to why would Robyn blame me? She knows what I am. She's smart. She's been around the block, and likely has a horde of men panting after her for a second chance.
So...what the fuck?
Normally, I wouldn't care, but she's made this shit my problem. I just want to fuck her without looking over my shoulder, waiting for her to drop an ax on my head.
The only silver lining is, if she does kill me, Duke will make sure she gets the death penalty.
Yeah. I know. I'm twisted, but there is a naked woman in my bed, and I'm going to fuck her.
*****
Robyn doesn't stir until around nine. I've taken my run, ordered breakfast and answered the frantic texts Tarek and Duke have sent me. They receive a picture of my smiling face while holding a newspaper. Proof of life makes everyone calm down.
I can hear her in the bathroom as I work in the guest bedroom that I've turned into the office. The sink goes on forever and that likely means she found the toothbrush I dug up and the wash cloth I laid out.
I install the CPU into what will be her computer. The RAM goes in next. I stall at mounting the brackets because she's padding around the apartment. I close my eyes to hear her better.
She lets out a soft laugh. She's in my living room, likely looking at my family photos spread around. Probably the one where I'm standing next to my mother, who's dressed like Scarlett O'Hara.
Three minutes later, she's pulling apart a croissant and leaning against the doorjamb of my office. Her hair is damp and her face is free of any makeup. Pillow creases crisscross on the right side of her face, but they don't mar her perfection. To my great disappointment, she's put her dress on.
“Is that mine?” She curls her toes into the carpet and smiles at me.
“After you pay for it,” I joke.
“Because your mama taught you to pinch your pennies?”
“Yup.” I take her in again, because it's Robyn. Her tattoo is on full display. I now know it's her only tat. The design is too intricate to be a drunken decision, and the ink looks too fresh to be more than three years old.
“Why Hermes?”
“What?”
“Your tat.”
The light in her eyes fades. “He's seen as a guardian in some myths.”
There's more to the story. Some parts clearly make her unhappy. I want to know more. Everything. Anything she's willing to tell me, but not if it kills the mischievous glint in her eyes. That's not my problem as long as she's of sound mind and body. My problem is that she's not naked in my bed.
I snap off the anti-static wrist band and climb out of the chair. “Don't come in here with food. And hurry up and finish eating.”
She eats some more. “How long have you been waiting for me to wake up?”
“Four hours.” I push her backward toward my room.
“But you didn't wake me up.”
“I wanted you rested.”
She turns around and lazily walks toward my room. Her dress is wrinkled, but it swishes with the sway of her hips. I put a hand to the small of her back in case she tries to slow down.
“Are you going to at least try foreplay first?” She finishes the croissant.
I grab the hem of her dress and pull it over her head. She's laughing again and faces me. “No small talk?”
“On the bed?” is my attempt. I don't wait for her answer but push her back since she's a foot from it.
Everything bounces. Everything. My dick stands up to celebrate. She crawls up the mattress, her laugh filling my room. I pause long enough to notice she's made my bed. She's so not normal. I don't know what happened to make her this way, but she's naked and on my bed, so I can ponder that later. I waste no time taking off my shirt and pants.
She says, “I was hoping for a strip tease.”
I jump her. I made her mouth mine the night before. I remind us both of that. She's all hands—caressing my face and my back. Next time I'll four-point tie her to my bed but...next time.
I close my hand on her throat and tug her bottom lip with my teeth. Her moan comes next, but her brows are slashed down. She's pissed at me for making her like what I do to her. I can live with her anger. Not sure if I can survive another second without burying myself inside her.
We'll both get over our hangups, I'm sure. Eventually she'll love it, beg for it, and I'll be balls deep. Relationship goals.
I give her my mouth to concentrate on. She can't be mad if she's trying to suck my tongue down her throat. I help because I'm a giver. I drag my tongue over the roof of her mouth, and her legs clamp around my waist.
See. Giver.
Soon she's rocking her pussy against me. My boxers are the only thing keeping me from losing hold. I break the kiss to nip at her chin, then trace her pulse beneath my mouth. I suck hard just to the left of that and her hips arch up. I stay there for a long while, tongue-kissing her sensitive spot.
She squirms and moans, and I love
the feel of her nipples against my chest as she moves. They're soft but hard. Brushing against me. Thoughtless friction that makes my balls tight. My boxers have a damp spot from where she keeps grinding against me.
It's torment.
I fucking love it.
The torture gets better when I move to her breasts. Our first real meeting. I settle back on my haunches and brace myself on my hands. Double Ds. Her areolas sit between the bottom curve and top swell of her breasts. The left one is bigger. Perfection.
I'm halfway to where I want to be. Letting the thought skate across my mind makes my throat thick with hunger. Her pussy is on the lunch menu, and I'm being a good boy by eating my veggies first.
I palm her breasts to test the boundaries of what she likes. I start with a soft rasp of my fingertips, watching her face, her mouth. The moan comes when I scrape my nails over the swell and squeeze hard.
She likes a bit of pain.
I sink my teeth along the side of her boob to see if she likes that too. She grabs a fistful of my hair and pushes my head closer. I growl my approval and decorate her breasts with mouth marks. The bruises turn dark red, almost purple against her brown skin.
I slide to her torso with gentle, open mouth kisses. Her skin is buttery smooth. I lick, kiss, touch to my heart's content. She trembles beneath me, rocking her hips into me whenever I take a break from her breasts or stomach to kiss her. The way her fingernails dig into me as I settle between her legs—my cock so goddamn hard—I know she's on the edge.
But she wanted foreplay. She's going to get her wish.
“Nate,” she pleads.
“Not done yet,” I murmur along her chin. “There's still some skin I haven't licked.”
“Don't stop, Nate.”
I edge back, tucking her knees up to my chest, my hands on her around her waist—an old stripper trick—then I flip her onto her stomach. Her surprised gasp transforms into a moan as I ball a hand in her hair, moving the soft strands out of the way, to lay a kiss on her nape. She wiggles her ass into me after I switch to teeth and tongue. I straddle her ass, bearing down with enough weight to take away her leverage. I make my way up and down her spine like that.