Caught (Prequel to Hawk) (Sex and Bullets)

by Jo Raven

  But he starts kissing a path down my spine and I gasp as the pressure, and the pleasure, intensifies. I never knew my back was an erogenous zone. My back, my neck, my earlobe—and now his hand trails down the crease of my ass, stroking, pressing lightly. Brushing lower, against my pussy, then moving back up.

  I writhe on the bed, suddenly so close to coming again I panic, hovering on the sharp edge of another mind-shattering orgasm.

  His hand moves away before that happens, and I draw gasping breaths in the quiet, my ass lifting, trying to follow his touch.

  He groans again, and shifts. I turn my head, trying to see what he’s doing, but he pushes me back down with a firm hand between my shoulder blades.

  “The thorns were stripped,” he says, and what the heck? “Maybe next time we can leave some on. If you like it.”

  I have absolutely no clue what he’s talking about.

  Then my breath catches as something cool and soft brushes over my back, trailing low, over my ass. A sweet scent spills in the air.

  Roses.

  What is he…? Why?

  He lifts the bunch of roses off my back.

  He brings it back down, a light slap that releases more scent—and a ripple of sensation down my back, to my ass. He does it again—lifts the roses, brings them down, and the impact sends heat pooling in my belly, and between my legs.

  God. What is he doing to me? Why do I like it so much?

  The blows come faster now—some harder than others, and each hit jolts me and unfurls more heat inside me, until I’m moaning loudly.

  Moaning his name.

  “Like this?” he pants, stopping and trailing the roses up to my shoulders, then along my spine down, between my ass cheeks, making them clench, then down my thighs. “You’re so wet, babe. Fuck, I need to be inside you.”

  “Please,” I sob the word. “Yes.”

  “I knew it,” he gasps, letting the roses fall on the bed and pushing his cock into me, drawing a cry from my throat as he stretches me wide, “from the moment I saw you. I knew you’d like me to touch you that way.”

  I can’t dwell on what he’s saying—mostly because he’s filling me up, his cock so hot and hard, and the barbells brush over all the right places inside me, and I’m so close to coming I can’t even breathe.

  His weight settles on top of me, and it feels so good. I realize he’s holding himself mostly off, his arms flexing at my sides, and his breath washes over my super-sensitized neck.

  “You smell good,” he says, and I push back, taking him deeper, making him gasp for a change. “Oh fuck, yes. Do that again.”

  Pushy. Hot. He feels amazing inside me, behind me, around me.

  I shove my ass back once more, and he goes nuts. His hips flex, and he starts thrusting inside me, long, powerful shoves that have me coming with a shout, shaking where I’m pressed into the bed. My pussy tightens around his cock in sharp waves, and he curses, stilling, letting me milk his hard-on until the pleasure ebbs.

  “Fuck.” He suddenly sits back, hauling me up with him, his cock pushing even deeper inside me, the pressure of this piercing making me moan helplessly. His hands move over my boobs, tugging on my nipples, stoking the last ember of desire left inside me as my mind whirls. “So pretty. Need you, need to feel you… Damn.”

  He thrusts up inside me, his cock impossibly hard, and my pussy clenches again. I moan with another mini-orgasm, burning in his hold, trembling—and he grunts as he comes, hard, filling the condom. I can feel the heat of his cum through the thin rubber.

  When he’s done, he pulls me down on the bed with him and wraps his arms around me. “Did I keep my promise?”

  I’m too wiped out to speak, so I nod.

  He chuckles. “You can now tell that asshole of an ex of yours that the F word doesn’t apply to you.”

  “F-word?”

  “Frigid?” I hear a grin in his voice. “Yeah, I don’t think so. Hot like hell, that’s how you are, babe.”

  I laugh quietly, pleased. Happy. Exhausted and sated. “That’s all you,” I whisper, because that’s the truth, and yet, deep inside me, I can’t help the new wave of warmth his words bring.

  Jamie Hawk Fleming thinks I’m hot. That’s any girl’s wet dream.

  But the dream will soon be over and I need to wake up.

  Chapter Three

  We don’t stay the night in the hotel. That’s the first wake up call. Hawk rolls over, gets up, showers and pulls on his clothes, telling me he’s had a great time.

  He’s smiling, and he’s nice and polite, but it’s obvious for him the night is over, and I feel like a cheap hook-up.

  Which I am. Though the price of this suite sure isn’t cheap, but still. Dinner, a few compliments, and I jumped into bed with a stranger. A wealthy, handsome, sexy stranger, but you see where I’m going with this.

  Sure, the sex was amazing. Like, for real. I’m even walking funny when I get off the bed to use the bathroom, and I thought it was just a myth. Whose guy’s junk can do that to you, right?

  Hawk’s, that’s whose. His cock and the four orgasms he gave me tonight.

  I clean myself, pee, come out and get dressed, too, my clothes wrinkled in a heap on the floor. I smooth them out as best I can, and then it gets more awkward when he shoves his hands into his pant pockets and tilts his head toward the door.

  “I should be on my way. Long day at work tomorrow.”

  Oh God. Seriously? “No need to make excuses,” I tell him coolly, gathering my purse and coat and storming past him.

  “Excuses?” He sounds amused, and as he closes the room door and ambles beside me to the elevator door, he gives me a smirk. “It’s the truth. Dad wants me at an important meeting with the other shareholders, at seven in the fucking morning in Washington. We’re flying at five.”

  Oh. And now, according to my cell phone time is one in the morning. Where did time go?

  I ride with him down, trying not to look at his sexy mouth, or stubbled jaw, or pale hair. The broad shoulders I clawed at as I came.

  He hails a cab for me, and I climb inside. I turn to take one last look at him as we speed away. He’s still standing outside the hotel, hands still in his pockets, a new expression on his face, one that has me puzzled as we drive out of view.

  It looks a lot like regret.

  ***

  Days pass. Nights, too. I feel an emptiness that’s only partly explained by the lack of Chance in my life.

  Turns out he was easy to cut out of my routine. I miss watching thrillers with him and eating together at the college cafeteria, but apart from that, I’m curiously fine without him.

  And I miss Hawk.

  Okay, that’s obviously not possible. I only met him once, spent less than a night with him, and no matter how many orgasms he gave me, I can’t miss a guy I only spent a couple of hours with, most of them spent on his bed in a hotel room, right?

  Yet I do. I miss the way he looked at me like I’m the most desirable woman in the world. The way he told me I’m hot, and pretty, the way his body hardened against mine, the way he kissed me and held me.

  Like I’m unique. Like he’s never met anyone like me.

  Which is bullcrap. It’s all in my mind, it’s all I wanted to believe. Maybe what he wanted me to believe, too—that he felt something. That it wasn’t all a charade to help me get over the break-up.

  And why should he care how I felt? He didn’t have to do any of it. Also, he had sex with me, and he was hard. He wanted me.

  Or he wanted it. Wanted sex. A man like him probably has rough, marathon sex on a regular basis. He found me in a vulnerable position and took advantage. It’s what rich, arrogant men like him do.

  That’s what they do, Layla.

  Questions spin in my mind, questions I hadn’t posed myself in the insanity of the evening’s rote—like, does he do this often, pick unknown women from restaurants and bars and take them to anonymous hotel rooms to fuck?

  I mean… he’s obviously a play
boy. Even if his life isn’t splashed all over the tabloids as much as one would have expected, I kind of recall a couple of scandalous photos of him with pretty girls hanging on his arms, at some gala or other. He can’t be over twenty-five—in fact I’m quite sure I read he’s even younger than that somewhere, or else my friend Dorothy told me—and guys of his age, his looks and his money are expected to sleep around.

  I doubt I’ll ever hear from him again—and I guess now I know how he managed to avoid scandals: he keeps his conquests quiet, out of the spotlight. If I told anyone I spent a steamy night with Jamie Fleming, who would believe me? No photos, no proof.

  Nobody knows, except Dorothy, and the memory will remain in my mind, a bright light and snapshots of touches, glimpses of pleasure unlike anything I’ve ever felt.

  A desire unlike any I’ve ever experienced. God, the roses… and his touch. His cock inside me.

  Somehow even though I know he won’t call me again, won’t come around to see me, won’t have dinner with me again… It was worth it. I can’t regret it.

  Did he regret me?

  A noise from the room next to mine draws me from my thoughts. Speaking of Dorothy… My roommate walks through my door, her dark hair a ratty nest around her head. Let’s just say she has restless sleep—which I blame on the tons of caffeine she consumes every day.

  She’s holding a steaming mug right now. “Did you know,” she says, “that the suite he bedded you in is the honeymoon suite of the exclusive Pearl Buck Hotel?”

  “Bedded? Seriously, Dodo?” But this little piece of news floors me, when it shouldn’t. “It was probably the best room he could get on short notice, or something. That’s all.”

  It means nothing.

  Dorothy shrugs and sits uninvited on my bed. She slurps noisily at her coffee. “So, any signs of life from Tall, Blond and Mysterious?”

  “He’s not mysterious,” I mutter irritably. “We know who he is.”

  “But his motives are mysterious.”

  “Nothing mysterious about a guy wanting to dip his wick in a random girl.”

  “You’re not random.”

  “But your comments are.”

  She tsks. “You still haven’t given me the details of your night.”

  “And I won’t.”

  “It was that good, huh?” She grins at me, flashing me a crooked front tooth, and I think about that.

  She’s right. But it’s more. It’s how… violent is was, and sensual, intense and perfect at the same time. The kiss against the door, his mouth on me, the roses on my back, his arm around my chest as he rocked inside me…

  Intimate. Far more intimate and personal than anything I ever tried with Chance.

  “What’s up?” Dorothy’s gaze has sharpened. “Why the frown? I thought you had a good time.”

  “I did.”

  And that’s the problem. It was an amazing time. It was more than that, it was an unforgettable night, and Hawk swept through my life like a hurricane, so how am I supposed to forget all about him now and pretend that night never happened?

  “He doesn’t want a repeat,” I hear myself say and wish I could swallow the words back. I sigh as I fuss with my bed covers, pulling them from under Dorothy’s ass to make my bed. “I should head to class.”

  “Not so fast.” Dorothy manages a hard grip on the hem of my sweater, and hauls me down beside her. “What doesn’t he want?”

  I rub a hand over my eyes. “To see me again.”

  She gives me a long, serious stare. “Did he say that?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay. That’s asshole-y of him. But you just broke up with Chance. And you barely know Tall, Blond and Non Mysterious. Right?”

  “Right.” I manage a smile. “Let me go to class, Dodo.”

  “Yeah. Me too.” She taps my nose. “I hate seeing you sad, Laylay. Don’t set your heart on a guy who told you from the start he won’t be with you. He gave you a good night. And he’s a millionaire, right? You can’t trust a millionaire. That’s common knowledge.”

  “Nobody told me,” I mutter, more irritated at myself by the second. “You’re right, it was a good night, and everything’s fine.” I make my smile brighter, even if it’s strained. “A new experience. Maybe someday in my memoirs I’ll mention it and become a bestseller.”

  “I thought you wanted to be a publisher, not a writer.”

  I thought many things, too. I thought I knew myself, my body, my desires. I thought I was safe and happy with Chance—and look. Just like mom and dad, we broke up.

  Broke apart.

  And then a blond Nordic god gave me in one brief evening what I’ve been missing. A glimpse of a lifetime.

  ***

  The week passes way too slowly as I try to focus on my classes and assignments for college. The weekend is a drag. I don’t want to go out, so I stay in and do my best to study.

  The next week rolls in, and then out, and it’s as unbearable as the previous one. Mom has been calling me, too, as if sensing the funk I’m in, insisting I visit her in New York, trying to lure me with promises of awesome shopping, theater plays and author signing events.

  Sounds good. I should go.

  But something’s keeping me back. And it can’t be Hawk. That would be absurd. He’s not going to be part of my life in any form, so why am I still thinking about him?

  It’s the sex, I tell myself as I save my notes from today’s marketing lecture and close my laptop, shoving it into my bag. The awesome sex.

  And my general and regrettable lack thereof.

  Maybe it’s time to get my head out of my ass and start looking. Looking at guys of my age and status—students—instead of millionaire playboys who travel halfway around the world to watch an opera in Sydney or eat at their favorite sushi restaurant in Tokyo.

  Normal guys. Even if they aren’t so godlike in bed, or out of it.

  Norman from my English class has asked me, like, a hundred times already this semester if I want to catch a movie with him, and Jaxon from my economics class mentioned three times in the past ten days that we should study together for the upcoming history test.

  Jaxon is cute. And come on, Hawk’s not all that much older than me and Jaxon. I’m nineteen. Hawk is—as my googling him successfully revealed—twenty-two.

  But going out with Jaxon… No. Just, no.

  I snap my bag shut and close my eyes. Hawk. It’s normal to be thinking about him, I remind myself. He saved me the night of the break-up—swept in and made me forget the pain, made me feel good about myself, gave me lots of mind-blowing orgasms and turned the night into a sexy fairytale.

  It’s over. It’s over now, Layla. Move on.

  Still, I don’t call Jaxon, or Norman, and I don’t look at the boys as I walk out of the auditorium toward my car.

  I don’t need boys, I decide. Not now. It’s good to take a break after being with Chance for two years. Concentrate on my studies, spend time with Dorothy, maybe visit Mom.

  Let the memory of Hawk fade. Then maybe I’ll see his pic in the newspaper, in the entertainment section, or in Mom’s gossipy magazines, and smile fondly.

  One day.

  I head home, mulling over this, trying to decide if traveling to New York in the middle of the semester is a good idea, when my cell phone rings.

  Parking my car, I pull out the cell. “Dorothy? I’m almost home.” Because who else might be calling me tonight? “Is everything okay?”

  The silence at the other end of the line stretches.

  Then comes a dark chuckle that trickles over my skin like melted caramel. “Everything’s okay, yeah. Depending on how you are, Hot Body.”

  Heat spills in my chest, spreading up my neck. “I’m, um, fine.” I clear my throat. “What’s up?”

  “Something’s definitely up and hardening.” I can hear the wolfish grin in his voice. “I’d send you a pic but pulling my pants down is a challenge where I’m at right now.”

  The heat seeps into my cheeks.
Oh God. “Where are you?” I didn’t mean for my voice to go all breathy, but I can picture him in my mind and…

  “On my bike.”

  I bite my lip. “So no pics possible, huh?”

  I know he rides a motorcycle. A big, mean-looking one. I’ve read much more than I should have about him these past few days, despite my resolve not to think about him.