by Sam Mariano
I scoff, peeling my sweater off and tossing it somewhere. “Are you fucking kidding me? How many random women am I going to have to serve their fruity little cocktails as they snuggle you in that booth and hang all over your every word? I will fuck anyone I want to, up to and including Felix. I will fuck my way through every man who works for you, if I damn well feel like it. Don’t tell me who I’m allowed to sleep with, Rafe.”
Grabbing my hips and jerking me back against his body, he says, “I know that’s the alcohol talking because this isn’t like you, but you need to stop.”
“I don’t need to do anything,” I tell him. “You’re not my boss.”
“Actually, I am,” he answers dryly.
“I could quit. I should quit. I do quit.”
“Your resignation is rejected,” he informs me, easing me away from his body just enough so that he can reach between us and unsnap my bra. “Tomorrow you’re going to go to work, like always, I’m going to come in for dinner, like always, and you’re going to be my waitress, like always. Our relationship is too important to me to fuck it up with sex. That was my fault. I’m sorry. But you and I are going to get through this, we’re going to get back to normal, and that does not start with you quitting.”
I push the bra straps down until the fabric drops to the ground, leaving me topless, then I begin unbuttoning my pants. “No, I don’t think so,” I tell him. “I think it’s time I stop living my life for you. I think it’s time I think about what’s best for me.”
“What’s best for you is obeying my commands,” he informs me.
I scoff, pushing my jeans down. “No. I won’t tell you what’s best for me, but I know.”
I do know. I should stop worrying about Rafe Morelli and return to my original plan, the whole reason I came to Vegas in the first place. I should focus on being a good person, on ridding the world of bad people.
I should accept that Rafe Morelli is a bad person, and I tricked myself into believing otherwise.
I’m down to a pair of pink, lacey panties and nothing else. Rafe’s gaze travels up and down my naked body, lingering between my legs where I’m still covered.
“Take them off,” he says.
“Nope,” I tell him, a little smug. “This pussy is off the menu for you now. Sorry.”
He doesn’t like my words. No, more than that—he hates them. Taking a step closer so he can look down at me in that intimidating way of his, he repeats, “Take. Them. Off.”
Just as deliberately, I brace a hand against the massive wall of his chest and tell him, “Go. To. Hell.”
My smugness is shortlived. Rafe gives me a shove and I fall backward on the bed. My legs fly up as I fall, but he steadies them, then reaches for my panties and drags them off.
“Rafe,” I complain.
“You told me I could lick this pussy anytime, anywhere,” he reminds me.
“That was before you dumped me, asshole. Common sense indicates that offer is—” I break off on a cry as Rafe wrenches my thighs apart and buries his face between them. Spikes of pleasure hit me hard as he licks my pussy just the way I hoped he would earlier, pausing to kiss me everywhere, like my pussy is the altar he worships at. God, he is the best at sex. I still want to punch him, but I can’t take his tongue away from my clit. That would just be self punishment.
I give in, spreading my legs wider. My eyes roll back in my head with every delightful stroke of his expert tongue, but just when I’m about to come, just when I’m arching up off the bed, chasing ecstasy, he abruptly pulls way.
Disappointment envelopes my whole being as I fall back against the bed. “No. No, no, no.”
He grabs my hip and turns me over so I’m tummy down on the bed, then his hand comes down hard on my ass and I jump. “That’s what you get for telling me you were going to fuck other men,” he states.
“You bastard,” I accuse, frustrated to the point that I’m tempted to touch myself, even with him right here. I want to get off, I was so damn close, and now I’m aching and needy with no relief in sight.
“That’s right, I’m a bastard,” he tells me, coming down on the bed behind me. I hear his pants unzip and my pussy clenches with need. I don’t want to fuck him, but I need to come, and he gives the best orgasms.
He doesn’t ask permission, anyway, so I don’t have to wrestle with whether or not to let him.
Smacking my ass again, he tells me, “Ass up.”
I push it up just in time for Rafe’s cock to slide inside me. I groan, burying my face in my pillow. He must like it there, because he grabs my head and holds my face down. I jerk, struggling on instinct more than because I legitimately don’t like it, but he ignores me and fucks me so hard, I can’t keep pace with him. My whole bed moves with the force of his thrusts, with the power and brutality of him pounding inside my pussy like his dick is a blade and he’s going to slice me to ribbons. Some thrusts are so hard they hurt, but the friction of his cock against my walls feels so good, his possession of my body feels so good. I know I shouldn’t let him do this, but I can’t bring myself to ask him to stop, either.
Need burns inside me as he invades me with his cock. “Rafe,” I cry out, but it’s muffled against the pillow.
His hand in my hair tightens. “You’ve done enough talking for tonight.”
“I want—” He presses my face harder into the pillow. I gasp, rearing back, but I take his point and stop talking.
As violent a coupling as this is, I expect it to end sooner than it does, but it feels like he’s inside me forever. A spitefully long time, considering somehow, as turned on as I was to begin with, he isn’t letting me come. He knows just how to make me come—I know that, because he does it regularly, multiple times per session, but this time he doesn’t want to pleasure me; he wants to punish me. Punishment sex is not something I’ve had with Rafe before, so this is a whole new ballgame.
My muscles are tired, my body is covered in perspiration, and my face is hot with a mix of exertion and the limited airflow from being trapped in the pillow. My pussy aches and burns with every thrust now, because he went in bare with his giant cock and he’s used up all the natural lubrication without creating more. When he drives inside me, I feel myself stretching, trying to fit him.
“Rafe, please,” I say, when I’m able to pull my face from the pillow.
He pushes my face back into the pillow and rides me harder. I groan, my pussy taking his punishment, but stinging as he shoves the way every inch. With a few more thrusts, he buries himself deep and releases himself inside me.
I’m so exhausted, so physically zapped, that I feel relieved. Normally I never want sex with Rafe to stop, but I’m tired and sore and still so drunk, the world turns the wrong way sometimes.
Rafe pulls his cock out of me and I hear him zip back up. I’m too tired to move, but he doesn’t expect me to.
“Now, you lie there with my cum inside you all night like a good girl.” Rafe yanks the covers out from under me and drapes them over my exhausted body. Then, after fucking me to sheer exhaustion, he has the gall to lean down and place a chaste kiss on my forehead. “Good night, Virginia.”
20
Virginia
My morning is spent nursing an unpleasant hangover and reliving the most embarrassing memories I’ve had to deal with since last time I got that drunk. It was a long time ago. The night I told Rafe about a while back, when I ended up singing I Believe I Can Fly and making a whole slew of bad decisions.
Last night my bad decisions had different names, but damn, did I make a mess. If I didn’t already have a massive headache, I probably would after reliving the horrible highlight reel from last night.
I pick up my phone several times to text Rafe an apology. I was an out of control, emotional drunk girl, and I wasn’t even his problem anymore. Actually, I was never his problem. While to me it certainly feels like he dumped me, we were never even officially together.
Ugh. I feel like garbage today for so, so many reasons.<
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Since I have to work tonight even if I feel like shit, I drag myself out of bed, grab a bottled water, and take a shower. My shower is sad and lonely compared to showering at Rafe’s house, but I can close my eyes and touch myself while memories of his strong arms around me play out in my mind, while I replay even last night, him tearing off my lace panties and dropping to his knees beside my bed so he could eat my pussy and punish me with a lack of orgasm. Taunting me afterward by taking his own and leaving me wanting.
Oh, God, that man.
Once I’m clean and the ache in my body is finally sated, I head to the kitchen. I’m rooting around the refrigerator, looking for something to make for lunch when I hear the knock at my front door.
My mind is caught somewhere between “it has to be him” and “it can’t be him” until I get to the door, pull it open, and see the heart-crushingly adorable bent head of Rafe Morelli on the other side of my front door. His forehead wrinkles adorably as his eyes rise to meet mine first, and then the rest of his body slowly follows his lead. I love the way he moves—so leisurely, like the whole world will wait for him. They usually do, so he’s not wrong in thinking that. He brings himself to his full height and looks down at me, surveying me to see how I look today.
I didn’t want this visit, but it’s not like I’ll turn him away. Even as I stand here looking at him, I have a vivid recall of his fingers digging into my hips, of the sudden intrusion of his cock. I can feel him owning my pussy, making me take his length. God, that was so hot. I mean, I’m sore as fuck, and sitting down isn’t much fun today, but damn.
Bringing myself back to the present, I cross my arms and cock my head. “What’s up?”
“You know what’s up,” he states, nodding toward the interior of my apartment. “We need to talk. Can I come in?”
“We already talked,” I remind him.
He gives me a dry look and ignores the lack of invitation, pushing the door open and letting himself inside my apartment. I should move back, but the moment that Rafe brushes past me is one of my favorites, always. When he’s at the restaurant, I always put myself in his way as much as possible so I can collect as many of those memories as I can. No two are exactly the same, and they never get old. I always feel him, and now is no different.
Well, a little different, because where every other time I could imagine what it would be like if he closed that distance, now I don’t have to imagine. Now I can remember. Now it’s even tenser because I know how it feels to have those lips brush mine, I just don’t know if they ever will again. I know what it feels like to have him inside me, to have his scent, his body, his taste all around me, inside me, completely overtaking me.
Every other time he’s brushed past me, I felt his dominance in the limited way you can feel something you haven’t experienced yet, but now I have memories. Not a complete collection, I’ll never have a complete collection, but no number of women I’ll have to watch him bring around in the years to come, no lack of a repeat performance, none of that can ever take those memories away from me. They’re mine forever, locked away in my mind, for better or worse.
He walks into my apartment and looks around. Last time he was in my apartment, it was to move Nate out, but that was a different building. He’s never been in this one before last night, but I can feel him scrutinizing how small it is. Rafe likes his space—giant house on a big track of land he’ll never need, huge booth even if it’s only for two people. Rafe Morelli is a man who likes room to stretch out, even if he’ll never need it.
My apartment lacks room to stretch out.
“Jesus Christ, this place is claustrophobic,” he states.
I smile faintly. “It was just as small last night.”
Rafe glances back at me. “I was distracted last night. How do you live in a place this small?”
“I work a lot,” I point out. “I don’t spend much time here.”
Shaking his head in faint disapproval, he reaches into his left breast pocket, extracts two thick envelopes, and holds them out to me. “You need to move. A shoe box is bigger than this place.”
I do not touch either envelope, but I have a good idea of what’s inside. “Put those away.”
His attention momentarily diverted from my tiny apartment, he looks back at me. “What? Why?”
“Because I fear there’s money in those envelopes. The only reason there could be money in those envelopes would be because you feel guilty about fucking me and you want to pay me off. That’s going to lead to me having to tell you ‘I’m not a prostitute,’ and I would prefer to avoid having to tell you that again. Put those back in your pocket and we can pretend you didn’t just try to pay me off.”
He does not do that. He reaches his hand even closer. “Take the envelopes, Virginia. I know you’re not a prostitute, that’s not what this is.”
“Well, in accordance with not being a hooker, I don’t take payment for sexual services, so what else would you call it?”
“A settlement.”
I blink at him. “A settlement?”
Nodding once, he says, “If I were a normal man, you could sue me for sexual harassment. Obviously I’m not and you can’t, but that’s not fair, and you’re one person I never want to be unfair to.”
“You know I would never sue you, even if I could. I do not need or want your money, so please put that away.”
“Don’t be stubborn,” he advises, leaning into the doorway of my kitchen and dropping the envelopes on my countertop. “I played with your heart and wasted your time; you deserve compensation. I’m leaving these here. You can count it later if you feel weird doing it in front of me, but it’s 35 grand. I know you said you couldn’t afford to take that class just for fun… well, now you can. Since you have a little extra money now, you should also call your landlord and tell him you’re moving into a matchbox, because you need more living space.”
“Why are you so obsessed with my living situation?” He’s still looking around, but I think he’s latching onto that because he doesn’t want to discuss what happened last night. I decide to save him, so he knows he isn’t morally compelled to. “We don’t have to talk about it, you know. It happened, it’s over, it’s done. I was upset last night, and the alcohol made it worse. We’ll be fine. I’m not going to quit… Everything will be fine.”
Instead of taking my escape hatch, Rafe shakes his head. “No, last night needs to be addressed. Last night was not one of my better performances. I shouldn’t have fucked you like that without giving you a safe word first—Hell, I shouldn’t have fucked you like that at all, given the conversation that happened earlier that night. I didn’t even give you a chance to—” He pauses and runs a hand over his slicked back hair. “I practically forced myself on you.”
Memories of the way he used my body flood my mind, making it hard to concentrate on the moment. Making me hot, and this is not the time for that.
“I was rough with you, rougher than I should have been,” he goes on, since I’m not responding.
I finally interrupt to let him off the hook. “You don’t have to apologize for that. I liked your roughness, and I don’t need a pay-off for enduring it.”
“Well, I want you to have it anyway,” he states. “I don’t like the way things ended between us.”
“I don’t either,” I agree. “I still care about you. I enjoyed every minute of our time together, right up until that last few in Sin’s yard. Honest, we don’t have to talk about this. I would prefer if we didn’t. I would prefer we just move on.”
“I do care about you,” he swears.
My heart sinks under the weight of those words, but I try to keep my head above water. “I know you do.”
“I just… I can’t… I don’t like way I felt…”
My protective instincts take over and I take a step forward, gripping the lapels of his charcoal suit jacket. He looks down at my hands, mildly surprised that I’m touching him. I slide my hands inside the jacket and run my hands down his
chest, down his sides, and with as much forthright honesty as I can manage, I tell him, “I know emotions ran high yesterday. I won’t deny I was disappointed. I wanted you to take a chance on me, I wanted to see what could develop between us. I wanted you, period. But I’m not another problem for you to handle, Rafe. All I wanted was the chance to be what you needed. To ease your ache. Not to confine you. Not to pressure you. Not to get anything from you. I wanted to be what you needed, and for a few days, I was. Maybe that’s all it was supposed to be. It was just a really long moment, and now it’s over. Nothing has to be weird; nothing between us has to change. I have always wanted to satisfy your needs. Normally it’s just a refill, but over Christmas, you needed a safe body to come inside. You thanked me plenty in the form of orgasms.” Withdrawing my hands from his jacket, I offer a little smile. “We’re good.”
He stares at me for a moment, then his eyes narrow like he’s trying to puzzle me out. He’s making it too complicated. He’s so used to a certain kind of woman, and he has absolutely no idea what to do with me. Drama-free and uncomplicatedly honest? No way, that’s not a thing that exists. I can’t help cracking a smile.
He pounces on it. “What?”
I shake my head, smiling at him fondly. “You’re cute when you’re confused.”
His eyebrows jump, but a glint of humor enters his eyes. “You like confusing me, huh?”
“I’m not doing anything to confuse you. I’m just being a normal person. A nice person. The kind of person who could never have her own reality show. So, you know, not your type.”
“I love nice women,” he states. “That’s completely wrong.”
“Great, then accept that I only wanted to be a good experience for you and let’s get on with our lives.” Moving past him and into the small kitchen, I grab the envelopes and try to hand them back. “Here. I don’t want this.”