by Joss Wood
“You are indescribably beautiful, Emily Arnott.”
Emily flushed, a little embarrassed, a lot turned on. Matt lifted one breast in his hand, testing her weight, his thumb sliding across her distended nipple. “Lean back,” Matt told her and Emily didn’t hesitate. She’d trusted him with her Morris situation and he, even though he’d thought they were over, had come to Vegas to help her. She trusted him implicitly, with her heart and her body.
Em leaned back and Matt dipped his head to pull her nipple into his mouth, to swipe his tongue over her, sending prickles of pleasure rocketing through her. He moved to her other breast and lathered it with love, and Emily couldn’t keep her moans of encouragement to herself.
Matt lifted his head to look at her, his deep, dark eyes intense. “Don’t be afraid to tell me what you like or don’t like, imp.”
“I really like that,” Em told him.
Matt grinned and he suddenly looked ten years younger than he did in the chapel. “Good to know.” Matt held her close and allowed her to slide down his body, groaning when the vee of her legs slid over his pipe-hard erection. Emily, because she could, placed the palm of her hand over the bulge in his pants, testing his length and his strength. The first time she saw him she’d noticed, as naive as she was, how masculine he was and if anything, the passing years had made him even more so. A small part of her was glad she hadn’t known him at nearly twenty-one; she hadn’t been enough of a woman for him then, but now she was.
Emily gently pushed Matt’s hands off her and reached for the buttons of his shirt, before slowly sliding them open to reveal his chest. She pushed his shirt off his shoulders, eyeing the bulging muscles in his arms, his hard pecs and gorgeous, ridged stomach. “Love your body, Velez,” Emily murmured.
“Love yours more,” Matt replied, his voice hoarse. “Can I please touch you now?”
Emily shook her head, smiling. “Not just yet.”
Reaching for the band of his pants, she popped open the button, worked his zipper down and pushed his pants down his hips, resting her head on his chest as she looked down at his very impressive package.
He wanted her; she could see it in his eyes, in his pants. Suddenly Emily couldn’t wait any longer; she needed him, in her and now. Jerking her head up, she met Matt’s eyes, hers gaze open and frank. “Can I ask you one favor?”
“Anything, imp, you know that.”
“Can we just strip and can we climb onto that bed and can you drive away the bad memories and replace them with something wonderful and, well, good?”
Matt swiped his mouth across hers, once and then again. “Darling, don’t you know that there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you?”
Emily shimmied out of her panties and, after taking Matt’s hands, placed them between her legs. He instinctively and immediately found her small bundle of pleasure, sending hot flashes through her. Hovering on the brink of orgasm, Emily felt Matt pull back and then he was lifting her onto the bed and a few seconds later, he was naked and looming over her, his shaft probing her entrance. Emily wound her legs around his hips and pushed up, sighing when he filled and then completed her.
Matt rocked once, then again and Emily shuddered, the cliff she was standing on falling away and crashing into the sea. She screamed as she plummeted, only to be lifted up again and hurtled toward the sun. Matt plunged within her, his hoarse voice urging her to come again and because he asked her to, she spasmed again as he emptied himself inside her.
As she floated back to reality, Matt heavy and damp as he lay on her, Em turned her head and smiled as a beam of sunlight hit the edge of their bed.
Everything, including sex, was better in the bright light of honesty and freedom.
Eleven
Emily rolled over, slowly opened her eyes and blinked at the clock sitting on the bedside table. Night had fallen and she realized she’d been asleep for three, no, four hours. Rubbing her eyes, she slowly sat up and, feeling a cool breeze hit her skin, realized she was naked.
Emily pulled the bedcovers up to her chest and tucked them under her armpits. She slowly rubbed the bare skin on her ring finger, happy to be rid of the ostentatious, probably fake diamond.
She was also free of Nico; she wasn’t in danger of losing Arnott’s, and her life, as of this moment, was back to normal.
But what did normal mean? If it meant going back to a life without Matt in it, she’d pass, thank you very much.
She loved him...and not only because he’d broken Nico’s nose. No, she loved him because, despite telling her that he wouldn’t, he’d come running when she told him she needed him, when she’d asked him for his help. She loved him because he’d been there for her, because he stood in the ring with her, because he’d waded—figuratively and literally—into her fight.
But she also loved him because, well, he was Matt, and he deserved love. He was funny and caring and tough and determined and loyal and, yeah, sexy.
Matt walked into the room, sat on the bed beside her and tucked a long strand of hair behind her ear. “You’re smiling,” he commented, his thumb skating over her cheekbone.
Emily’s lips twitched. “I was just thinking how sexy you are and how good you make me feel. You wore me out and I passed out.”
“While I’m happy you think I’m a stud, I think the fact that you haven’t been sleeping well for weeks might’ve contributed to you falling asleep on my chest.” Matt pulled his thigh up on the bed and rested his hand on her knee. “How are you feeling, imp?”
Emily, losing herself in his deep, dark eyes, considered his question. “Good.” The tips of her fingers drifted across the top of his hand. “Thank you for coming to help me—I’m so grateful you did.”
“Sweetheart, when are you going to realize that there isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for you? You call and I come—that’s the way it works, the way it will always work.” He looked at his swollen knuckles and half smiled. “There isn’t anyone I wouldn’t fight, there’s no limit on the amount of money I’ll spend, the distance I’ll travel...you can ask anything of me, Em.”
Could she, really? He looked sincere, sounded genuine and if she didn’t ask, she’d never know. “Can I ask you one more favor, Matteo?”
“Sure.”
Emily sucked in a deep breath and with it, a blast of courage. “Do you think there’s any chance of you standing in the ring with me for the rest of my life? Will you be my person, my rock, the one person I can rely on and trust?”
Matt stroked his hand down her messy hair. A smile danced across his lips. “Yes to all of the above.”
Emily let out a shaky laugh. “You didn’t even stop to think about that!”
Matt lifted one shoulder in a casual shrug. “I don’t need to. I wanted you in my life six years ago but neither of us were ready for each other and when I saw you again, I knew I wanted you in my bed. It wasn’t long before I knew I wanted you in my life, although I tried to fight that.”
Matt looked down and for the first time she saw him stripped of his confidence. “There are things I’ve got to say to you, Em, and it’s not easy...”
Emily immediately shook her head. “You don’t need to. This is a new day and a new start.”
Determination flooded Matt’s face. “No, honey, we need to do this because if we don’t, it’ll always be there. We can’t move forward until we address the past.”
Emily took his hand and held it between her own two.
“I told you, briefly, that my parents were all about Juan. What I failed to mention was that they had absolutely no interest in me, at all.”
Emily wanted to say something, anything, but knew he wouldn’t appreciate pity and sympathy might cause him to shut down. So she gave him the best gift she could: silence and her complete attention.
“I tried to do everything he could, with no measure of success. No matter what I did, I couldn
’t be perfect and that was what Juan was, to them. My default mechanism was to compete and when I realized I couldn’t, that he was way out of my league, I rebelled. My competitive streak came back when I went to college and realized I could actually win at some things. Then winning became an addiction.”
“Okay...”
Matt looked down at their linked fingers. “At the same time I was trying to compete with Juan all I ever wanted was something, anything, from my parents. I gave up wishing for toys or new clothes or a bike for Christmas and started praying for the big things—a kind word, a hug, conversation, affection. But the more I wanted it, the more elusive their attention became. Eventually, I stopped hoping and decided that dreams were for fools and if I didn’t want, I couldn’t be disappointed.”
Wow, their parents had really messed them up, in different but equally destructive ways. It was a minor miracle that both she and Matt were as normal as they were.
“With you it was the perfect storm.”
Emily frowned. “Me?”
The corners of Matt’s mouth lifted. “Six years ago, I saw you and I think, at the risk of sounding, cheesy, I recognized you.”
“We’d never met before,” Emily informed him, puzzled.
“I don’t mean it like that—I recognized you as being...mine. For the first time since I was a kid, I wanted something, someone, so much that it scared me so I ran. Hard and fast.”
Emily leaned forward and dropped a kiss on his bare shoulder and rested her forehead against his collarbone.
“Six years later and I see you again and you’re engaged. Worse than that, you’re engaged to a man I competed against. I told myself that I was interested in you because I wanted to take you away from him, because I was a competitive douche and I was. But, underneath the lies I was telling myself, because wanting and dreaming and being disappointed wasn’t something I was prepared to feel again, I knew what I felt six years ago was still the truth.”
Turning her face into Matt’s neck, Emily kissed him, once, then again.
“You are what I want and what I need. You are my biggest dream, Emily. Winning has always been important to me, but, with you, I don’t care if I don’t get all that I want from you. I’ll settle for what I can get. So yes, I’ll stand in the ring with you.”
Matt looked down, bit his lip and Emily was touched to see her alpha man looking vulnerable. And when he lifted his eyes back to hers, she saw the love within those depths, love he’d been needing to give someone and was prepared to offer her. “Do you think you could ever love me?” he asked.
She wouldn’t make him beg; that wasn’t fair. Nor would she tease him or make him wait. This was too important; he was all that was important. “But I do love you, Matt, intensely, crazily. You’re...” Emily hesitated, looking for the words to make him understand.
“I’m what?”
“You’re what I’ve been looking for since I was fourteen, the missing piece of my heart. Strong, steady, reliable and God knows, sexy.”
The corners of Matt’s mouth twitched but his eyes remained serious, as if needing more. She could give him more; there wasn’t anything she’d hold back from him. “It feels like I’ve been on a long, lonely road and when I met you again, it felt like I’d arrived home. You’re my home, Matt. You are what the rest of my life looks like.”
Happiness replaced the apprehension in his eyes. Emily smoothed the wrinkles out of the sheet covering her knee. “I’ve been used to operating on my own—”
“And that changes today,” Matt interrupted her.
Emily smiled at his very alpha-male, top-dog comment. “And it might take me a while to get used to that but I’ll do everything I can to make us work.”
Matt shook his head. “I’ll make you happy. And I promise to protect you always. I’ll make us work—I promise.”
Emily slid her hand under his and pushed her fingers between his. “I don’t know much about relationships but I’d like to think that, if we decide to jump in—”
“Oh, we’re jumping in,” Matt insisted.
Emily smiled. “—we go in knowing we’re on an equal footing with both of us committed to making each other happy. We won’t always both be strong at the same time, Matt—we’ll take turns being strong for each other, protecting each other when the other feels weak.”
Emily saw a hint of doubt on Matt’s face and shook her head. “I’ve always been the strong one, for my dad and for Davy, but that doesn’t mean that I now think that I have to be weak or want to be protected all the time. You’ve also been alone for a long time and the only way this can work is if we go forward as a team. Can we do that?”
Matt pushed his hand through his hair. “Yes, okay...” Matt hooked a finger in the edge of the blanket and tugged. “Can we stop talking now and can I show you how much I love you?”
“In a minute...” Emily looked out the window, wishing they didn’t have to talk about Nico but knowing that they must. They needed to move, permanently, past him.
“Do you think he’ll come back to Falling Brook?” Emily asked Matt.
“He’d be stupid if he does,” Matt replied. “I sent a dossier to the SEC detailing some of his dodgy trades and I’ve no doubt that Morris will be investigated. I’m not sure if he’ll face a criminal charge. You can also lay charges against him for blackmailing you. Morris is going to have a lot to deal with in the near future.” He paused, then added, “And I threatened to tear him from limb to limb if he comes back.”
“And the photograph of my dad and Sokolov?”
“I have the hard copies from his briefcase. I very much doubt Morris will resurrect his blackmail attempt. I think that ship has sailed.”
Emily mulled over his words, agreeing he was right. “Talking about another aspect of the future, are you going to take the job offer from Black Crescent?”
Matt shook his head. “No, I’m not. I used them to twist my board’s arm but also because I have this thing about winning, about wanting to be chosen. Knowing that you love me and that you have chosen me, that’s all I need. Besides, Vee isn’t keen to move from MJR to Black Crescent.”
“And we can’t upset Vee,” Emily teased.
“Damn straight.”
Matt leaned forward and nuzzled her cheek with his lips. “Can I propose a way forward, a plan of action?”
Emily’s mouth twitched with amusement. “Certainly.”
“I suggest that you drop the blankets and let me love you again. And after that, why don’t we head out? I know a small, lovely restaurant and maybe, if I give you enough wine, I can talk you into marrying me, right now, here in Vegas. I can’t wait to make you mine, imp,” Matt added.
Emily’s heart bounced off her ribcage before doing happy somersaults. She pretended to think, drawing out the anticipation. “I have another idea...why don’t we make love, then eat, and then you can bring me back here and we can pretend we’re on our honeymoon? Then, in a couple of months, we can make it official back home, with Davy and my dad and all our friends as witnesses.” Emily wrinkled her nose. “But...”
Matt arched his eyebrows. “But?”
“But I still expect a kick-ass proposal and,” she glared at the rumpled lace dress in the corner, “I absolutely refuse to wear white.”
Matt grinned, his face open and full of joy. He tugged the bedcovers away and pulled her into his arms. “Now there’s a deal I can’t refuse. And, I didn’t need to blackmail you into doing it.”
Emily wound her arms around his neck and brushed his lips with hers. “And what would you have blackmailed me with, Velez?”
“I would’ve refused to sleep with you.”
“Effective, I have to admit,” Emily told him, laughing.
Matt captured her mouth in a long, sexy kiss before pulling back and looking in her eyes. “I know. Now, my delicious imp, be quiet and love me.�
�
It was an order she was happy to obey. “I do—I will...forever.”
* * *
Matt poured coffee into two mugs and looked out Emily’s windows to the forest beyond her father’s yard. They’d been bed hopping for three weeks—from her bed here to his bed in his house across town, and occasionally she stayed over in his apartment in Manhattan—and they were both sick of shuffling around.
Matt felt Fatty brush against his legs and leaned down to pick up Em’s very rotund cat. “You weigh a ton, dude. I think we need to think about putting you on a diet.”
Fatty responded to that suggestion by digging his claws into his arm. Matt rubbed his ears and head, eyeing the boxes scattered around Emily’s apartment. Later on today, the movers would be coming to move all her stuff into the old farmhouse they’d purchased on the outskirts of town.
Their new property would be a fresh start, a place that was theirs as opposed to his or hers and he couldn’t wait. And, best of all, Emily had finally decided on a wedding date, three months from now.
Matt, desperate to start a family, had asked her to go off the pill and she’d agreed so, with any luck, their firstborn would arrive before their first wedding anniversary. That might raise some eyebrows of the more conservative folk in town but Matt didn’t care. He was, after all, the town rebel who’d corrupted their favorite good girl...
Besides, he’d just make them some more money and all sins would be forgiven. Matt grinned. If those same conservatives knew how his fiancée and the future mother of his children blew his mind last night, and this morning, they’d know exactly how bad his imp could be...
And he loved it. He loved her.
“Where’s my coffee?”
Matt lowered Fatty to the floor and smiled at the grumpy words drifting down the short hallway to him. Em was not a morning person and only a cup of coffee, or a deep, drugging morning kiss, turned her grumpiness to gratitude.