But he was dying to know what this was about.
Just knowing a connection to Britt stood right under his roof made him crazy with hope. But it annoyed him too, and it pissed him off that he couldn’t separate the two feelings.
“I don’t have the faintest damned idea what you’re doing here, but it looks like I don’t have a choice in the matter. Please, make yourself at home,” he drawled. “But you’ll be on your own—I’m in no mood to play host. Besides, I’m about to hit the sack.”
“Oh no you’re not. Only old men go to bed at nine o’clock.”
He grumbled under his breath, slouched and scrolled the channels, the programs not even registering in his fuzzy brain. Her fault, because this woman had an association with the one he’d been pining over like a pussy sap for a whole week.
Which made him long to choke Lexi’s scrawny neck for ruining his perfectly good night of brooding.
“Oh yes I am.” He had a sleeping pill with his name on it sitting right in his medicine cabinet waiting for him to pop it and fall into oblivion.
She plopped onto the couch mere inches from him and started rifling through her enormous handbag. He caught a whiff of her spicy fragrance and wondered if she bought her perfume at the same place Britt did.
“Shit, what do you keep in that damn thing, your kitchen sink?” He held up his hand. “Never mind. I don’t really care. What the fuck do you want, Lexi?”
She pulled a box out of her bag with one hand, and tossed her ropes of hair over her shoulder with the other. “I need to give you this. It’s from Britt.”
His pulse spiked. He bolted into an upright position. “From Britt?”
Lexi giggled in a low and throaty tone. “Well, that sure perked the dude up, eh?”
He reached for the box, cradling it in his hand with wonder. His heart raced in anticipation. Diego couldn’t think of what Britt could be delivering to him, and at this time of the night, at that. He studied the box. With its plain cedar-hinged lid, it didn’t reveal even an inkling of Britt’s purpose. Suspicion reared its ugly head.
“What, is this a cruel joke or something?” he asked, his voice sounding surly to his own ears. “Is it going to explode in my face when I open it?”
Lexi’s smile faded. She reached up and held his cheek in a genuine, tender manner. Her sherry eyes searched his for understanding and forgiveness. “No, honey, it’s not a joke. I promise you, you’ll love what’s inside. In fact, it just might cause an…explosion later. So as soon as I leave, take a good long look. But before I go, I want to say something to you. I’m sorry. Real sorry. I mistrusted you from the get-go without even giving you a chance, and I tried my damnedest to manipulate her away from you. It was wrong. I was wrong, and I hope you can forgive me some day.”
Diego shook the surprise from his brain. “Whoa. Wasn’t expecting that.”
“I know.” A mischievous smile curved her full lips. “And it was damn fun seeing the shock jolt in your gorgeous eyes.”
“I…goddamn, anyone ever tell you you’re a fucking cyclone?”
“All the dang time.” She patted his cheek, stood and strolled to the door. With her hand on the knob, she glanced at him over her shoulder and winked. “Have at her, you hoodlum biker dude, you.” She pulled the door open.
He halted her steps with, “Lexi?”
“Yes?”
“I admire your loyalty to her, and I’m glad she has a friend like you. So I guess you’re forgiven.”
He thought he saw the faintest glitter of a tear in one eye. “Thank you. I was very wrong about you. You’re a good man.”
“I appreciate that. And maybe I was wrong about you too.”
“Maybe.” She winked again and shrugged. “Maybe not.”
He chuckled, continuing to hold the box. “I still don’t know what this is all about.”
“You will, Diego. You will. Just open it and you’ll start to understand.” She slipped out into the night as quickly as she’d blown in.
If it hadn’t been for the hard wood of the box in his hand, he’d have thought what just happened had been a dream. His pulse thrummed while his stomach knotted with a jumble of excitement and dread. He leaned back into the couch cushions and stared at the box. But curiosity got the better of him.
He lifted the lid, the strong scents of cedar and roses filling his nostrils. He gazed down at the contents in puzzlement. With its switches and small antenna, the white, oblong contraption appeared to be a remote control of some sort. It sat on a bed of pink rose petals, and the subtle message of that brought an image of her to mind. Not a photo, but a real image of her bound while lying on pink rose petals right where his feet rested at this moment, so pretty and breathtaking, so soft and pliable in his hands.
He shook the fantasy from his head and studied the box. A folded piece of paper peeked from behind a slot in the lid. He drew it out, his heart skipping a beat when he saw his name scrawled on the outside in the very same feminine script he’d seen on the envelope of photos.
Britt’s sexy handwriting.
Lifting it, he waved the paper beneath his nose and inhaled. He smiled. It pleased him that she’d thought to add that perfumed touch of herself to the correspondence. He drew in the aroma, starved for her unique scent. Ah, it filled his lungs and conjured more torturing thoughts of her, the throaty sounds she’d made when she’d reached climax, the pursing of her pink, plump lips, the musky fragrance and flavor of her sex.
On an exhale, he groaned, “Okay, get a hold of yourself, Mansini.”
He fidgeted, trying to readjust his pants against the thickening of his cock.
With his hands shaking, he didn’t delay any further. He unfolded the paper and read the note.
Diego,
I’m so sorry. It seems I’ve been a very bad girl and am deserving of a spanking. Can you ever forgive me? If so, please go to Club Swank on the north side of Tampa at nine thirty tonight. Bring the remote with you. I’ll be waiting. Waiting to whisper “Pink” in your ear.
Love,
Britt
Diego shot to his feet. “Holy son of a bitch.” A thrill of anticipation ripped through his loins. Just looking at her handwriting and smelling her perfume had started his cock to throbbing, but her words…motherfucker, she may as well have been sucking him off.
He glanced at the clock. It read nine ten. A curse of alarm tumbled from his mouth. He raced to the shower, adjusted it to ice-cold, stepped in and soaped himself up.
Almost time to finish what he’d started. And yet he knew he’d never be done with Britt Malone.
Chapter Seventeen
Britt sat at the bar and glanced at her watch for the fiftieth time. Nine forty-five. Her heart sank. He wasn’t coming. She’d pushed him to the limit with her mistrust. She deserved to be stood up.
Resigned to her fate and prepared to drown herself in her tears and a Long Island Tea, she slid her glass across to the bartender. “Another one, please.”
He nodded and went to work on preparing her drink.
“I prefer to make love to a woman who’s slightly buzzing rather than hanging her head over the toilet all night.” The deep, raspy voice slithered into her ear and went straight for the punch, right down to her core. Her clitoris throbbed against the thin strip of her G-string. She couldn’t see him yet since he stood behind her, but she could sense him, the warmth of his big body, his crackling aura.
“Diego.” Her voice came out breathy, almost climactic, as if by that one sentence he’d made her come.
“Hi, babe.” The scent of spicy aftershave and soap filled her nostrils a second before he slid onto the barstool at her right. To the bartender he said, “Whatever you got on tap, please.”
She flicked a sidelong look at him. He wore crisp jeans and a brown shirt the very shade of his eyes. Short-sleeved and ribbed, it hugged his sculpted body and made her hands flex with the urge to touch him. It was the first time she’d seen him in anything but a t-shirt, leather jack
et or bare skin. She loved the rougher Diego, but this version of him gave her a thrill she hadn’t expected. Her gaze moved upward. She studied his strong profile, the somewhat crooked nose, the full lips and long hair.
So hot and handsome. She yearned to crawl right over on top of him and kiss him silly.
“I was afraid you wouldn’t come.”
“Oh, I’m going to come all right.” He shifted his gaze to her, the look smacking of a certain arrogance that gave her a decided charge. “I’ve been without you for a whole damned week,” he snarled, glancing away again, “and if my balls get any bluer, I’m going to be a big ink spot on the fucking map. In fact, I think my safe word should be ‘blue’.”
She laughed. He didn’t have to tell her he teetered on the edge of restraint. It had been apparent from the moment she’d sensed his presence. She wouldn’t begrudge him that either. She deserved his wrath and would take it until he’d unloaded all the resentment on her.
She grinned. In her.
“I’m sorry, Diego. I screwed up. Really huge.” She twisted the barstool around and faced him. Britt wore a miniskirt and she made sure her bare legs touched his clothed ones. Soft rock music played on the overhead speakers. The volume on the TV behind the bar had been turned down, but old punk-rock videos played on the screen.
The bartender set their drinks down. She picked hers up, sipped as she spoke. “I know you didn’t enter the photos in the contest—well I know it now, anyway. Lexi found out for me. She got a friend to hack into the magazine’s list of entries. Your name was nowhere to be seen.”
“Hm.” He nodded, as if to ask, “And when are you going to tell me something I don’t already know?”
Determined, she went on despite the jumping nerves in her gut. “I hope you can forgive me for not trusting you, for suspecting you of such a despicable thing. It’s just at first I didn’t know you that well. All I got from you were these dark, mysterious vibes and then I had both Doris and Lexi’s influence. And then that picture I found didn’t help.”
“Yes.” He stroked his goatee and nodded, his lips compressed in a tight frown. “Vibes from a hooligan, a goon, a criminal. I can understand that.”
She sighed.
He stared straight ahead, his gaze fixed on the television, and drank his beer with indifference.
“Please, Diego, will you at least look at me?”
He swiveled his head back toward her. His eyes blazed with a mixture of rage and pain. It tore at her heart, and she recalled the vulnerable side of him, the side she’d seen at his son’s graveside. This was a tortured man, but a good man. A man she’d almost let walk right out of her life. She’d do anything to repair the damage she’d done.
Anything.
“I almost didn’t come. Got my shower, got dressed and then I thought, what the fuck am I doing?” His jaw clenched. His eyes searched hers and she fell in love all over again. “But you’re in my blood, Britt. I could no more not come to see you than I could stop breathing. And that pisses me the hell off.”
“I’m sorry. The last thing I want is for you to be mad at yourself because of me.”
“I’m embarrassed to admit it, but do you want to know what I’m really guilty of? Of behaving like some stupid-assed, wet-dream-ridden kid. I became obsessed by a gorgeous woman in all that kink—in pictures given to me by mistake.”
“No, Diego, no.” She reached for his hand and placed his palm on her cheek. Even though she did it for him, it felt so damn good to have him touching her again. “You did nothing wrong. Nothing. I should have been flattered by your infatuation. I should have trusted you more. I’m the wrong one, and I can’t say I’m sorry enough. But I still don’t understand how the picture ended up in your desk. I know there’s a perfectly good explanation, but I’m just curious…”
He took a long swallow of his beer, set it down and held her gaze. “Pure accident, same as how I ended up with them in the first place. One of your negatives must’ve fallen out on my desk and somehow ended up shuffled back in with the copies of my pictures that I gave to Carolyn. She got doubles made from the negatives. Yours—luckily just that one pose—came back in the packet.”
She choked on her drink, speaking through coughs. “C-Carolyn saw it?”
“Yes. I’m sorry, babe, I didn’t know it got mixed in there, but I take responsibility for my negligence in it ending up in her packet. She brought it to me that night she showed up. I didn’t even know until then. But it’s still my fault. You have every right to be pissed and never speak to me again.”
Britt rubbed at the condensation on her cocktail glass and continued to hold his cheek with the other hand. “No, I… Wow. It’s hard to swallow and kind of humiliating, but it does corroborate Lexi’s claim that you had nothing to do with it. Which I believe with my whole heart and soul.”
His hand curled around the back of her neck. He drew her close so their noses were just two inches apart. By that one little move, hope flourished in her chest. “So where do we go from here? Why did you ask me to come here? Why are you torturing me like this?”
“Because if you’ll forgive me and give me another chance, I want to show you just how sorry I am. I want to tell you.”
A dark eyebrow winged up. “Really? Show and tell, huh?”
She took a long drink of her cocktail, held the liquid in her mouth until it warmed, swallowed. She had to get her nerve up for what she was about to blurt out. The liquid settled balmy in her belly. Or could it be the heat from his gaze making her feel all fuzzy inside?
“Yes, but let me tell first before we get into the showing part. I…” Her tongue tangled inside her mouth. She glanced away, but he drew her eyes back to his by hooking a finger under her chin and turning her face toward him.
“You what?”
“I…” She swallowed the knot of tension clogging her windpipe. “I know I didn’t behave much like it, especially toward the end, but I…I’ve fallen in love with you.” Once the words were out, her bravery strengthened. “I love you, Diego. I think I’ve loved you since you first knocked me off my feet in the drugstore. Right after you returned the pictures to Lexi.”
His hand fell away from her. She struggled to ward off the chill. His face went pale, almost pasty. “Y-you love me?”
The look of horror on his face told her she’d made a terrible mistake. Vulnerable and saddened by it, she murmured, “Yes. Yes I do.”
He shot to his feet. “Do you realize what you’ve just done?”
Britt’s mind scanned and searched, but for the life of her she couldn’t come up with any reason why her words of love would make him react with such panic. Except that he didn’t love her back and he felt she’d just done the equivalent of tightening a noose around his neck.
“Uh, no. What have I just done?”
He stood with his hands dangling at his sides, as if he didn’t know what to do with them. “There’s no turning back.”
“Turning back?” She started to reach out to him, but changed her mind. Her stomach kept getting tighter, sicker. “Diego, please tell me what’s wrong.”
He reached for her hand and yanked. She tumbled from the barstool and into his arms. Closing her eyes tight, she inhaled his earthy scent and slid her arms around his waist. Still unsure of his mood, Britt didn’t know how long this would last, so she took while she could.
She recognized a slow classic-rock song from his collection when it started to blare from the overhead speakers. Patrons trickled onto the dance floor, merging together by pairs, hands racing over bare skin, bodies becoming one. Diego pulled her closer, his arms tightening around her so that her body molded to his. Her breasts pressed into his hard chest, while the tube of his soft manhood snuggled against her abdomen.
“Britt, ah Britt,” he rasped in her ear. She shivered, savoring his warmness, waiting for his next words. “If you really mean that—really mean it—then there’s no turning back. You’ve just bound yourself to me forever.”
Ah-ha, she understood his panic now. He warned her that if she dared to cross the line he’d drawn, he’d never let her return without him. He’d never let her go. The realization of it sent her soaring on a wave of giddiness. She buried her face in the curve of his neck and pressed her lips to his warm skin. His pulse leaped against her mouth. She tasted the delicious, salty flavor she’d grown to love, and knew she could never be without it, without him, again.
She pulled back, capturing his gaze with hers. “I do mean it. I mean it with every beat of my heart. I was miserable without you, and even before I knew for sure you weren’t the one responsible for the magazine pictures, I still loved you, and I no longer cared what you’d done. Oh, I thought I knew why you’d done it, so I understood it. In fact, I even started to be glad I’d helped, you know, as if something positive had come out of posing for those kinky pictures.”
“Helped?”
“Yes, I know it turned out you didn’t enter them in the contest, so it’s a moot point, but when I thought you had, I started to assume you’d done it to make money for Tyler’s expenses or Carolyn’s medical bills. And I couldn’t blame you, because I think I would have done the same thing if I had a…a…”
“A son?”
“Yes,” she whispered, taking his face in her hands, boring her gaze into his. She shook his head gently, her words strong and resolute. “And I’m so sorry about that, about him. It tore me up to see you there at his graveside, to see the pain and courage and all that selfless love. I just didn’t know how to go about reaching out to you, when to do it, if I should impose myself on you after not trusting you like that. I didn’t want to interfere, and I was so afraid of you rejecting me.”
“I could never reject you, baby. Never.”
She smiled, pleased by his words. “Do you know how much I admire you for what you did for Carolyn, and for being such a good daddy to your son? Oh Diego,” she murmured, ignoring the occasional brush of a waitress passing by or patrons sidling up to the bar, “I want to be there for you when the pain becomes unbearable. I want to grow to love and know your son too. I want the chance to love you and to make you happy.”
Pretty in Kink Page 24