“So that was Harrison you were… Whatever you were doing with?”
Darius nodded, and Leigh had to bite back a grin when she saw how the young man looked positively star-struck.
“Yes, that’s what I said. Wow, I can’t believe I managed to keep him out! I didn’t keep him all the way out, but I don’t think he got anything he can use to find out who I am. Anyway, I don’t have anything personally identifiable on this laptop. I’ve created an entirely new person on this, so even if they find… Shit, I’m not supposed to tell you that.”
Leigh grinned and shook her head.
“Don’t worry, I went temporarily deaf right then. I haven’t a clue what you said. Anyway, if that was Harrison, you could’ve just told me. I could’ve called him and told him it was you.”
“You told him about me?”
Leigh hesitated and told him the truth.
“Not yet. He took that attack very personally. He was in no mood to accept any help.”
Darius deflated a little, but he nodded as if he understood.
“Yes, a man wants to fight his own battles. I can see that.”
Leigh shook her head.
“A man, if he’s wise, uses all resources at his disposal. There are no points for doing it alone. When you battle somebody with no honor, you lose when you follow the rules. You don’t take boxing rules to a street fight.”
Darius frowned.
“But there’s pride.”
Leigh sighed.
“You and Harrison would get along very well. All right, could you maybe put down whatever it is that you’ve learnt from today and I could give it to Harrison? I wouldn’t want to mix it up by trying to tell him any of it. Let me talk to him, convince him to let you help. All right?”
Darius looked like his wildest dreams were coming true.
“Wow, that would be… Wow. Yeah, sure, I’ll put it together and give it to you now. I’ll take about twenty minutes, is that fine?”
Leigh nodded.
“Of course. Darius, I owe you. I really do.”
The impish grin that flashed across his face made him look so young that Leigh wondered, again, if he could possibly be an adult.
“Tell Harrison Bloom that, will you?”
Leigh smiled.
“Of course, I will. I hope he’ll come to his senses and let me help. That is, let you help. Anyway…”
“We’re square now, right? I don’t owe you money?”
Leigh chuckled and shook her head.
“No, you don’t owe me any money. And Harrison will probably be interested in that program of yours – the one that you used.”
Darius seemed to light up.
“Really, you think so? I call it the mopper.”
“Of course you do. Of course you call it the mopper. Now, I should get going. Can I help you with clean up? Drop you somewhere?”
Darius shook his head.
“No, I’m good. Give me twenty and I’ll give you what you need.”
Leigh nodded and waited. She tried to get some more of her work done while she waited, but she was too buzzed. Apparently, hacking was a high-adrenaline sport. She had just been on the periphery, and it still felt like she had run a marathon and beat a rival on the final stretch.
“There, done. Don’t forget to tell Harrison about me, will you?”
“Darius, you’re the star of the story,” assured Leigh.
She wanted to rush home and tell Harrison all of it, but she had to go to work, where Roger was not too happy with how she had taken off. She considered calling Harrison, but after spending the afternoon with Darius and his paranoid security, she was beginning to have second thoughts about her phone and laptop.
Maybe she should get Harrison to take a look at everything. Maybe he already had.
She wouldn’t be surprised if he already had.
They really did need to talk, thought Leigh, as she finally made her way home. She hadn’t expected Harrison to be home, but was glad to see him in his study.
“Hey,” she said, knocking on the open door. Harrison looked up, distracted, but he seemed to slowly focus when he saw her.
“Leigh, you’re home.”
Leigh smiled and walked to him.
“You look tired. You need to get some sleep, you know. When did you last eat anything?”
“Are you fussing over me like wives are supposed to?”
Leigh found herself being pulled onto his lap and let herself relax. She hadn’t realized just how tense she had been, either. It was taking a toll on both of them.
“Maybe I am. I worry about you. If I have to fuss over you, I will. I could turn into a champion nagger, too.”
Harrison’s smile was affectionate and teasing.
“Oh, I know that.”
Leigh frowned.
“Are you trying to tell me something?”
“Maybe. Or maybe I’m just trying to tell you that I missed you, and I’m glad to see you’re home.”
Leigh relaxed against him completely, and held on to him as their lips met for a soft kiss. She sighed against his lips and let herself sink into it, relishing how he could draw a response from her with the simplest of touches.
She loved what he could do to her.
She loved knowing she could do that to him, too.
“Harrison,” she whispered, as the kiss turned deeper, and his hands moved over her possessively. She loved how he could thrill her with just a touch. She loved how he could make her need him so much, so easily.
She knew that would never change.
“I can think of a way for us to relax. I can promise complete relaxation.”
She smiled, but his fingers were already working magic, undressing her almost before she knew it. She laughed, all the cares and worries lifting away as she felt his hands on her bare skin, but the laugh ended on a sigh as he undid the hook of her bra and drew it off her.
“Harrison,” she whispered again, his name almost a chant on her lips as they found his. He was intent on her, as if everything in him was focused on her, and on her pleasure. She was cherished when she was with him.
She belonged to him.
She belonged with him, in his arms.
“Kiss me again,” he told her, and her lips parted over hers, finding such pleasure in how his tongue found hers, stroked and teased it, until she was clinging to him. His hands moved over the soft skin of her back, over and over again, while her breasts ached for his touch.
She needed him.
“I need you,” he whispered in her ear, his tongue tracing the folds of her ear and making her shiver, giving her the words she felt.
“Make love to me,” she told him, but his lips curved against her neck as he licked her delicate skin.
“What do you think I’m doing, my love?”
Leigh laughed, delighted and aroused, taking his hands and placing them on her breasts.
“I want you to touch me. I need you to touch me.”
“Leigh,” he said, her name a hoarse moan on his lips as he looked into her eyes and touched her breasts, full and soft. His thumbs moved over the stiff peaks, stroking her nipples and pressing them until she was whimpering, her eyes still on him.
“Please, Harrison, please, I need you. I need you so much.”
“I need you, too. I need you trembling for me, so needy for me that you can’t think of anything but me.”
“I…”
But she couldn’t form more words, because he dipped his head to close his lips around her nipple, licking it, grazing it so lightly with his teeth, before sucking on it and making her press herself against him, pulling his head closer and closer to her.
She needed him so much, so much.
“Harrison!”
His name was a cry, a plea for more. He gave her more, his fingers rolling her nipple in them as his mouth continued that gentle assault that she couldn’t get enough of.
“You’re so lovely, so sexy,” he told her, before moving up and kissing
her, finding her lips in a mad frenzy that she more than equaled with her own.
“Touch me,” he said, and she dragged his T-shirt up and off him, eager to touch him. She wanted to feel his skin against hers. She wanted…
“Leigh, you leave me undone,” he told her when her fingertips found his small, hard nipples and stroked them, pressing them.
She wanted him undone, as she was.
She moved against him, and felt his hardness against her soft, wet center. The panties she wore, the sweats he had on, were almost no barriers to the heat between them. She needed him inside her. She needed to hold on to him as she rode him, until they stopped thinking at all.
“You’ll drive me…”
She didn’t let him finish that. She took his mouth with hers, the kiss frantic, hard and ferocious now as she wrapped her arms around him and moved against him, rubbing her body on his, loving the friction of his chest against her soft breasts. She could feel him getting harder, throbbing against her. She needed him so much.
“Now. I need you now,” she said, breathless with her need to have him inside her.
She gasped at his strength as he wrapped his arms around her and got to his feet, taking her with him, holding on to her, and carried her to the bed. He laid her down, but before he rose, he drew her panties down and off her, leaving her naked and open to him.
“Harrison…”
“I’m coming, love,” he told her, tenderly, quickly taking off his sweats and briefs.
Leigh opened her arms to him as he moved over her, kissing her softly, his lips fitting over hers so perfectly. She wrapped herself around him, drawing him as close to her as she could, and it still didn’t seem close enough.
“I love you,” she told him, trying to make the words mean everything they should. She held so much inside her, she needed to give him all of it.
“I know,” he said, as if the words were torn from him. He kissed her cheek, his lips sliding down her face to her neck. He pressed kisses along her shoulders, licking softly before sucking on her soft skin. His hands seemed to be everywhere, touching and seeking. She was struck anew by how he could make her respond. She felt like every part of her aflame with desire.
“Harrison,” she managed to say. She needed him. She couldn’t wait.
“Me too, baby,” he said, and when he kissed her again, she saw her desire and her need echoed in his eyes.
“Now. Please, now, please,” she begged, her legs wrapped around him.
His manhood pressed against her soft, moist entrance, where she was more than ready for him, to take him deep inside her and give him all of herself.
“Harrison, please…”
He didn’t make her ask again, though she would’ve begged again. She felt him pressing against her, slowly entering her with gentle thrusts, his hips circling subtly as he entered her. She held on to him, her hips rising to meet his thrusts as she drew him deeper and deeper inside her.
She could do nothing but hold on to him and follow the rhythm he set, timeless and steady. She moved along a wave, desperate to crest, but he kept her with him, moving slowly, in such a sweet invasion that she never wanted it to end.
She whispered his name, over and over again, as he withdrew from her, almost all the way, so slowly, so gently, before moving in again, sliding so deep inside of her with every thrust that she could hardly breathe.
His teeth tugged at her lip and she moaned against his mouth, offering him everything – everything that she was.
She belonged to him.
“You’re mine,” he said, burying himself in her hard and fast, in a shock to her system. But she welcomed him, deeper inside her, as he drove into her harder and faster. She urged him on, meeting his need and that speed with her own.
She was more than a match for him. She took as much as she gave, and she wouldn’t stop until she had what she needed. What he promised.
“Leigh,” he gasped, his fingers tightening against her skin, and she knew that he was close.
“Wait for me,” said Leigh, and it was an order as much as a plea as she rose higher, and higher.
She was so close, too. She could feel everything clenching and coiling deep in her belly, waiting to explode. When his hand slipped between them and touched her, touched that hardened nub of flesh that could push her over that edge, her nails dug into his back as she buried her face against his neck and cried out, screaming his name as she took the pleasure he had promised.
“Leigh,” he said, and there was such tenderness as he held back long enough for her tremors to slow down, and then he moved again, so hard, so fast this time, his hard length filling her over and over again. She held on to him, and she let herself rise again, to that peak. This time, when she flew, she took him with her, and she held on to him as if she would never let him go.
She knew she would never let him go.
He belonged to her. As much as she belonged to him, he belonged to her, too.
Her heart thundered against his, still, and the weight of him was pleasant. She knew he wasn’t resting all of it on her. He wouldn’t.
“Leigh. Leigh, I love you. You’re my life.”
She smiled and pressed a kiss against his neck, and she didn’t care that a tear slipped down her cheek.
It had been a stressful couple of days. It had been more than stressful. It was only now that she realized how frightened she had been, for him, and for them.
With that, reality came crashing back, like a bucket of cold water drenching her.
Harrison felt the change. Of course he did, thought Leigh.
He rolled onto his side, but he didn’t let her go. Pulling her close, he pressed himself against her, and she stayed there in his arms, feeling safe again.
For how long? She couldn’t help but wonder.
“Leigh, I know you’re worried. Won’t you trust me?”
Leigh shook her head, wondering how she could find the words to make him understand. She had to, didn’t she?
“I do trust you, Harrison. But I feel… I feel like you’re beginning to shut me out. I know what you’re like. I know you need to handle all your problems on your own. But they’re not just your problems anymore, are they? You asked me, once, to trust you with my problems. To trust you to help me. Why won’t you let me do the same?”
Harrison went still. She knew he was thinking.
Finally, he pressed a kiss against her hair.
“Trust you to come up with a way to get your way in the end, after all.”
Leigh smiled, turning around to face him. Cupping his face, she kissed him.
“It’s only the truth, you know. I’m not trying to trick you or anything.”
“I know. You’re right, we are a team. I didn’t mean to shut you out.”
Leigh nodded.
“We’re both learning. So will you tell me what you’ve been doing? I can see the worry lines, Harrison. Even if there were no lines, I’d feel the worry from you. Don’t you know that I feel it?”
Harrison nodded and kissed her again.
“I know. I know you do. You’re right, we’re a team. I don’t know just how you’re going to help me, though, you couldn’t code your way out of a paper bag. I appreciate the support, of course.”
Leigh grinned.
“About that… I have something to tell you.”
Chapter 8
He clenched his hands into fists so tight that his knuckles turned painfully white.
Angry didn’t begin to describe it. Even ‘furious’ seemed tame compared to the fire that raged in him.
How dare they! How dare they insult him like that!
He had been prepared for Harrison Bloom’s move. He had anticipated it. As expected, Bloom had reinforced the firewalls, made them sturdier, set up a few tripwires – and it had all been good work, excellent work. Bloom had even come up with a couple of ingenious tricks that might have tripped him up if he hadn’t been so carefully meticulous in his research and planning.
&nb
sp; Preparation was everything, after all.
But there was a wild card in the mix now. The hacker did not do well with wild cards. They were unpredictable. He did not like unpredictability.
Code, when done right, did what you wanted it to do. That was why he liked it.
This was unacceptable.
Even worse, he hadn’t been able to follow this new person, this… this interloper, back to whatever hole they had crawled out of.
The hacker was shaking so hard that the chair rattled against the table. On the wall was a printed out hard copy of his plan to destroy Harrison Bloom. But that plan had not taken into account an outsider who would come in and shove themselves in where they were unwelcome.
This was between him and Harrison Bloom. This was nobody else’s business.
How dare they, how dare they!
The hacker closed his eyes tightly and waited for the rage to pass, as he always hoped it would. Sometimes, when he opened his eyes, he found that he had broken something. It didn’t matter, of course. All things could be replaced. All people, too, could be replaced – except the ones that mattered.
He mattered. He had to remember that.
No matter what they did, he would win. It was his destiny to win this war. He had made sure of that.
Harrison Bloom had sealed his fate by marrying Leigh Wells – his sister. The man had married his sister, and he presumed moral high ground on anything! It was a joke. The entire family was a joke.
Not that he was surprised, of course. The moral bankruptcy Harrison Bloom had inherited was inevitable. It was only right that he’d pay for it. After all, so many others had paid so far, and Bloom hadn’t cared.
The shakes slowly stopped, and he took a deep breath, focusing on how it filled his lungs and made his fingertips tingle.
He felt alive again.
He had lost focus for a minute. It wouldn’t happen again.
Opening his eyes, he was surprised to find that he had broken his mouse. A shard of plastic from it had pierced the skin of his ring finger. Fascinated, he watched as the blood snaked down onto the table, dripping. He could almost hear the sound it made.
Our Happily Ever After: BWWM Interracial Romance Black Women White Men (That Forbidden Love Book 3) Page 8