by Riley Storm
“Why did you hate yourself?” she asked. “What happened Trent?”
“For a long time,” he said. “I was carrying a festering guilt. Someone that I was supposed to protect died. More precisely, they were killed. I felt that it was my fault. That I should have done something to stop it, you see. That if I’d acted differently, if I’d somehow magically been somewhere I didn’t know about, I could have maybe saved his life.”
“Whose life?” she asked, trying to figure out how that guilt translated into his destroying her shop.
“The leader of our clan,” he said. “That was over a year ago. The killer has long been dealt with, but our clan is still leaderless, and I’ve been blaming myself.”
“I’m sorry,” she said. “It sounds like you didn’t do anything wrong.”
“I didn’t,” he said, sighing as he said the words. “I didn’t do anything wrong. I’m still trying to convince myself that I believe it. Here.”
He touched his heart.
“But up here,” he said, touching his head. “Up here I know it. I’m still working on reconciling the two. They don’t always work well together.”
Lilly laughed softly. “I do know a thing or two about that. But Trent, I don’t understand. How does that translate to what happened to the shop?”
“It’s because I was afraid,” he told her. “A…friend, helped me realize that, after a bit of a throwdown and a few more drinks. He talked to me a lot, and we realized that it was because I saw myself so negatively, that when we dragons went public, I became afraid that humans would too. That you would all judge me as I have judged myself.”
“Ah,” she said in understanding. “And as a place selling dragon items, the store was basically the opposite of how you saw yourself.”
“It was like looking at what I wanted to be versus what I knew I was deep down. So for that, Lilly, I am sorry. You did not deserve that, and I regret it. I didn’t at first, as you know. You’re right, I was ordered to come help you out for a week as punishment for what I did. I won’t deny that. Not to you, not anymore.”
Lilly bit her lip.
“But truthfully?” he said, changing his tone, leaning forward slightly. “Truthfully, Lilly, I’m glad I was. Because otherwise, I would never have met you. Got to know you. If they’d simply ordered me to pay for the damages, I would have dropped off a wad of cash, and that would be that. So I’m happy that this was my punishment.”
“That’s a hell of an apology,” she said, biting her lip, for once unsure of what more to say.
“I am so sorry for what I did. I’m also sorry for not stating in the beginning, or after we became friends, or even more than friends. You had the right to know, and I let you go on thinking it was because I wanted to be there. Though I did, by that point, but I should have told you that too.”
“Why didn’t you?” she asked, curious as to what his response would be.
Trent swallowed visibly, his shoulders stiffening. “Because, Lilly. By the time I even thought about it again, I was already falling.”
“Falling?” she asked, her voice gone, not even a whisper.
“For you,” he said.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Lilly
“Oh.”
It was quite possibly the stupidest response she could have ever uttered. Immediately after her brain registered what she’d said, Lilly wanted to hide in a hole and pull it in after her. The burning fury of embarrassment flooded her entire face, from forehead down to her jaw.
“Trent, I…”
She didn’t have to search for any more words, because he was already coming across the table toward her. Lilly didn’t hesitate. She flung her arms around him and melted into his heated kiss, hating the desk between them, a barrier to pressing herself against his firm body.
The conversation hadn’t been long, but it had been everything she needed to hear from Trent. He’d gone on a journey of soul searching, aided by a blow or two to the face, and had returned, realizing that he had something that was worth the effort of talking.
Her.
When he casually reached over and lifted her up and onto the desk, she cried out in surprise but didn’t fight him. His strong hands hauled her short but definitely not petite frame onto the wooden desk, sitting her down at the edge and then stepping close.
Her legs parted automatically, wrapping themselves around his hips, the height of the desk actually making her taller. Not that it mattered when Trent pressed her back down onto the wood, spreading his weight out over her, his bare chest against her clothed one.
“Wait, wait,” she said as he started to kiss down her jaw, his hands fumbling with her shirt.
“What? What is it? Something wrong?”
“Close the door, okay? People can see in here from outside. I don’t want any of those church crazies getting a peek of me doing it with a dragon. They don’t deserve that view,” she said with a giggle.
Trent leaned back, closing the door to her office.
“Now, where were we?” he growled, lifting her shirt from her body and burying his face between her breasts.
“Right about there I think,” she said, gasping pleasantly he nipped at the sensitive skin of her neck. A pleased moan filled her office.
As he pushed up against her, Lilly felt him growing harder, could see the bulge in his pants grow larger. All his attention was fixated on her, however, and she wasn’t about to object. Not when he was so good at it.
Her pants, simple black leggings, quickly followed the way of her shirt, leaving her clad only in her underwear.
“Just take it off, okay?” she said, embarrassed that it wasn’t anything fun. “I wasn’t expecting to see you today.”
“You think I’m going to argue about having you naked all that much faster?” Trent said with a snort. “Works for me. You give the orders. I will obey.”
And he did, stripping her down to nothing and then lowering her back onto the desk.
“Get rid of the shirt, will you?” she said, shaking her head, smiling at him. “That thing makes you look like a bum.”
“What are you talking about?” he asked, leaving a line of kisses down the middle of her chest and over her round stomach. “This is the latest high fashion. It cost me twenty-thousand dollars for this shirt. But I’ll sell it to you for a hundred bucks.”
Lilly giggled, clamping a hand over her mouth as he stood up and struck a pose.
“And that good-looking thing?” she asked, eyes falling on his crotch. “What about that? How much will that cost me?”
“Oh, that thing? You don’t want that thing,” Trent said, shaking his hips.
“Oh, I think I do,” she said throatily. “Now take it off, mister, and get back over here. Enough silliness. I want you.”
Trent’s mood changed immediately. He came back at her without stripping as ordered, covering her mouth with his, kissing her aggressively. Lilly moaned as he ran his hands over her body, the sound muffled by his mouth.
“I want you too,” he gasped as he wrapped both arms around her legs and dropped to his knees.
She shuddered as he kissed the insides of her thighs with a gentleness at odds with the muscles that were straining at his skin—huge biceps, thick chest, and broad shoulders outlined in stark relief.
“Oh, Trent,” she moaned as he got to business, his tongue sliding over her with a wet warmth that caused her entire body to tense up at the sensation. Then she relaxed into it, melting as Trent pleasured her.
It didn’t take long for her cries to bounce off the walls. Trent knew exactly what she wanted, what she needed, and he was giving it to her. The pressure between her legs built and built, swiftly crashing against her in ever-growing waves that she couldn’t resist.
The flood reached her brain, catching her up in its flow and washing her away in a sea of endorphins as the first orgasm flooded her system. She shook and trembled, little cries and yelps emerging as she covered her mouth, trying to keep from stra
ight crying out.
Trent rose, his pants somehow down at his ankles, rubbing himself against her entrance, teasing her and giving her time to prepare for what would come next. By this point she was more than ready. She was in need.
When he entered her, Lilly gasped, her chest rising from the desk. Trent bent over her, kissing her, smothering her with his mouth as he pushed deeply into her. A mixture of pain and pleasure accompanied the thrust as her body forced itself to adjust to his considerable girth.
“Fuck that feels so good,” she hissed, not bothering to watch her language in the throes of the moment.
Trent was simply too good for her brain to consider such things. All she could do was lie back and try to keep herself from screaming out. The last thing she wanted was for the police to be called. That would be an awkward explanation she didn’t need. Especially if it was Deputy Frazer who arrived.
I can’t believe we’re doing this in my office!
Trent picked her up from the desk then, holding her in the air, legs apart. Lilly gasped, flinging her hands around his neck and holding on as he increased his speed.
“Holy shit!” she yelped as their hips smashed together rapidly.
Trent groaned into her ear, biting down on her neck once more. Lilly stiffened, her body closing down until the only thing she could feel was Trent inside of her.
Then, golden warmth exploded out from between her legs as he forced another orgasm from her body. Lilly cried out, burying her face in his, unable to do anything else as Trent never slowed. She shivered, her brain fried by the constant thrusting.
“Don’t stop,” she gasped when he slowed at some point later on. “Keep going.”
“I’ll explode,” he rumbled, voice taut.
“I can’t…I can’t take much more. Holy shit,” she gasped.
Trent was squeezing her ass, holding her aloft, and now he lay her back onto the desk, his body pressing down on hers as he thrust at a new angle.
She could feel him shudder and shiver.
“Do it,” she whispered into his ear as sexily as she could. “Please, Trent. For me.”
He groaned loudly, one hand slamming into the desk so hard she thought the wood was going to crack.
Then he jerked, and she felt him swell once more a split second before he erupted inside her.
Lilly slumped back against the desk, her body limp, unresponsive to her commands, too flooded from the brief, brutal pleasure that had been inflicted upon it by Trent. For his part, he was barely keeping his weight off her while he breathed hard, the short but intense effort he’d put forth having winded him.
Good to know that I can have that effect even on a dragon.
Silence reigned between them for a few minutes as they both basked in the afterglow of sex, that warm, fuzzy feeling that rendered brains useless and never lasted quite as long as would be nice.
“I’m glad you came back,” she whispered, locking her arms around him in a hug this time, kissing his cheek.
“You are?” he asked.
She pulled back, giving him a look, then glanced down to where he was still inside her.
“Ah, right,” he said, shaking his head, laughing amusedly at himself.
“What do we do now?” she asked, meaning after the unenviable cleanup.
For some reason, my office wasn’t planned out with mid-morning sex in mind. I suppose I’ll have to change that.
As if on cue, both of their stomachs rumbled.
Trent glanced down and laughed. “Food it is, I guess.”
“I knew there was a reason I liked you,” she said with a giggle, sitting up.
Trent’s face lit up. “You like me?”
“Even more now that you’re showing this newfound emotional maturity,” she said, hauling him in so she could kiss him again.
It was true.
As long as it’s not an act. As long as he really has learned his lesson.
Lilly couldn’t handle any more lies.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Lilly
“That is some impressive stamina, sir,” she said, reaching up to clean a corner of her mouth as she rose from her knees.
Trent, for his part, leaned back onto her desk, his face slowly relaxing into a lazy smile, courtesy of her recent efforts.
“What can I say, you have that effect on me,” he rumbled contentedly. “Thank you.”
Lilly smiled, licking her lips suggestively and swallowing any last evidence of what she’d been up to. “I mean, you have the same on me, but there was no way I was going to be ready to go again that soon. You were...rather vigorous the first time.”
“Sorry,” Trent said, shrugging his wide shoulders.
She enjoyed watching his muscles flex and move even with such mundane actions.
“Oh, don’t apologize. It was good. Really good. I just needed more time than you apparently,” she said, glancing down below his waist, feeling satisfied, a job well done.
“Next time I’ll take longer,” he said.
“So there’s going to be a next time, is there?” she teased flirtatiously.
“I sure hope so,” he admitted easily. “And a time after that.”
Lilly laughed. “Hand me my bra, will you? The food should be here anytime now, and I don’t really want to answer the door topless.”
Trent reached over behind the desk and grabbed the plain beige article from where it had landed and handed it to her.
“Next time I know you’re going to stop by the shop for a little fun, I’ll be sure to wear something more exciting,” she joked.
“I like what’s underneath better,” Trent said. “But I certainly won’t stop you, that’s for sure.”
“I didn’t think so,” she teased, putting her clothes back on and reaching for the water bottle she kept on her desk to take a swig. “Are you going to get dressed?”
“Do I have to?” he rumbled. “Nobody is coming inside…”
He flexed his core, stomach and chest muscles popping in a visually pleasing display that momentarily distracted her attention from anything else.
Shaking her head, she wagged a finger at him playfully. “Stop that. Yes, you have to get dressed. I’m not going to eat brunch with you while you’re naked, mister. Not happening. I like to pretend I have some class, even if I did just…you know, to you, in my office.”
Trent grinned. “And you had fun too.”
“Maybe,” she admitted coyly.
It had felt rather naughty. The sex had been so spur of the moment, so intense and quick, she hadn’t thought it over until after. What she’d just finished doing, however… That had been premeditated while she ordered them food, having had a hard time focusing on the phone’s screen with him standing next to her, ready to go again.
“But that doesn’t mean I’m eating food with you like that. So put your pants on. You get away without having a shirt. That should be enough for you,” she said, sticking out her tongue at him.
“You mean you didn’t like my ultra-post-modern-chic-haute-couture shirt?”
Lilly looked at him.
“What?” he asked.
“Nothing, I just didn’t realize you knew so many fancy words.”
Trent frowned. “Me cave man. Me want lady. Me take lady. Rawr. Grumble. Use stone. Bash lady on head. Carry lady home. Boink. Boink.”
Lilly couldn’t contain her laughter. “I don’t think cavemen said ‘boink boink’!”
“Me no understand,” Trent said, reaching forward and grabbing her, trying to lift her over his shoulder.
“Stop!” she yelped. “Put me down, you oaf!”
“Cave man no like oats.”
“Oaf. I said oaf! Put me down,” she shrieked, struggling free of his grip before punching him in the arm. “Ow!”
“You did that to yourself,” he said with a laugh, turning away as she playfully punched him again.
“Not fair.”
There was a knock at the front door.
“Fo
od’s here!” she cried, dodging his hands and grabbing her shirt, throwing it on. It was inside out, but she didn’t care.
“Get back here!” Trent growled, pinching her rear playfully as she darted out of the office.
“Coming!” she called at the figure waiting outside the door, his back turned to the shop as he waited.
“You certainly were,” Trent said from in her office. “Though I’m not sure why you feel the need to announce that to the driver.”
Beet red, Lilly turned to glare at him, but Trent wasn’t even looking, his head bent over and shoulders shaking with laughter as he pushed the door mostly closed so the driver couldn’t see into the office.
“Ooo, I’m going to get you,” she muttered under her breath, unlocking the door.
The driver turned as she pulled the door open.
“Hi, sorry about that. I—”
Lilly went quiet as the man slid a gun out from under his windbreaker.
“Make a sound and I fire,” he said in a familiar voice, speaking so quietly she could barely hear. “Get in the van.”
His head jerked in the direction of a white panel van, its rear windows obscured with a deep tint, making it impossible to see inside. There was no logo on it, nothing to identify it as food delivery.
Had he waylaid her driver?
Nervously, she went outside, pushing the door open wide as she did. Maybe the sound of the street outside would get Trent’s attention.
“It’s you,” she said, recognizing the gunman from several nights before. The one whose wrist Trent must have crushed in the fight.
“Just get in the van,” he snarled. “Before anyone gets hurt.”
“It’s broad daylight, mister,” she said. “You can’t expect to get away with this.”
“I can, and I am,” he growled. “If I don’t, you die. So you might want to get in the van.”
Lilly recognized the sounds of someone on edge. This man was likely already operating on a hair trigger, hellbent on getting his revenge. She didn’t want to push him. It would be her own life she was risking.