by Lili Valente
But I’m a real woman, too.
I am.
Even if the curse is real, I’m still every bit as alive as other people, at least for now.
I feel that truth in a way I haven’t in so long. I was sleep-walking through life, and then Jeffrey stomped in, giving orders and bossing me around, making so much noise I couldn’t close my eyes again.
Or my heart…
If I do this—if we do this—it’s going to be more than sex. I like Jeffrey, possibly even more than like Jeffrey. I can’t stop thinking about the way he knelt to take off my boots. At first, I’d thought it was the undressing aspect that made me feel flushed all over, but the more I think about it, the more certain I am that the actual act had little to do with the rush.
It was the tenderness in the moment that has me hitting replay on the memory again and again, like a morphine addict desperate for another fix.
Jeffrey saw that I was afraid and gently stepped in to offer practical support.
It’s such a little thing, but to a person who has felt unseen for so long, it seems huge. It feels like recognition. Acceptance. A little like…love.
If he’s falling in love with me, I should leave.
I should pack my things, walk up the hill to my family’s estate, and lock myself away in my tower for the next six months. And then, if I wake up on December nineteenth and I’m not dead after all, maybe Jeffrey and I can pick up where we left off.
Yes, he has free will, but I have an obligation to do what’s right by the people I care about, and it isn’t right to get in any deeper with him.
Not when I’m still ninety percent sure I don’t have a future to promise.
“Maybe he doesn’t want your future,” I whisper to my reflection, but it knows better, and so do I.
I’ve led such a sheltered life that vast swaths of the human experience are unknown to me. I’ve never flown on a commercial airplane, never walked unfamiliar streets in a foreign country, never filed my own taxes, or rented an apartment, or worked a job that involved getting up and going to an office every morning. I don’t know what it feels like to live alone or kiss a stranger or make plans for the future beyond my twenty-sixth birthday. But I know what it feels like to fall in love.
Rafe taught me that. And I’m grateful to him for it.
If you’re really grateful, you’ll leave before you hurt Jeffrey the way you hurt the first man you thoughtlessly fell in love with.
I shake my head. This isn’t the same. Jeffrey is a grown man capable of making informed decisions and not a boy swept up in the rush of first love. If he thinks I’m worth the risk, then who am I to tell him otherwise?
The lock clicks on the door, and my heart leaps into my throat. For a split second, I consider diving into the bathroom. Instead, I lean my shoulder against the wall and slide my hip in the other direction. I’ve never seduced anyone, either, but I’ve spent enough time around professional models to know the positions that set off my designs—and the female body—to the best advantage.
And I know this teddy is beautiful, breathtaking.
I’m fairly certain Jeffrey is going to like what he sees.
I’m also fairly certain he won’t say no to me tonight.
What I’m not expecting is for him to step through the door, take one look at me, and drop the carryout bag. I’m not expecting him to slam the door behind him, step over the food, eyes blazing, and grab me around the waist, pushing me up against the wall as he bends his lips to mine.
I don’t expect a white-hot kiss so intense my body catches fire, going up like straw drenched in kerosene as I wrap my arms tight around his neck and return the kiss, my tongue dancing with his. I don’t expect his hands on my breasts through the thin fabric of the teddy, tracing the outline of my hard nipples, sending zings of awareness sizzling across my skin, and I don’t expect that my pretty new panties will instantly be this wet.
“Are you sure?” he rasps against my mouth as his fingers dip under the silk, hot and delicious on the bare skin of my breast. “That you want me to be your first?”
My head falls back with a groan. “Yes.”
He kisses my neck, nipping and licking as he rolls my nipple between his fingers, and stars explode behind my closed eyes. “Say it, Lizzy. I want to hear you say it.”
I tip my chin down, lids fluttering open and my heart flipping in my chest as his hooded gaze locks with mine. “Those exact words?” I ask, my pulse spiking as Jeffrey guides his thigh between mine, rubbing the thick muscle against where I ache.
I circle my hips, breath catching as waves of sticky pleasure flood between my hipbones and more heat gathers between my legs. “Why?” I add. “Does that turn you on? To know you’re my first?”
“What do you think?” He takes my hand, guiding it to the front of his jeans, summoning another eager sound from deep in my throat.
I trace the outline of his erection, breath coming faster as I feel how long and thick he is and how wildly hard. I suppose I should be nervous about that not-at-all-small part of him fitting inside of me, but all I feel is proud. Powerful. Beautiful. I’ve made this gorgeous, strong, secretly sweet, and always in control man desperate to be with me. To take me, to know me in a way no other man has before.
What do I think about that?
“I think you’re beautiful and sexy and probably very good at this,” I say, continuing to stroke him through his pants. “But that’s not why I want you so much.”
“Then why?” His jaw clenches as he threads his fingers through my hair. Even the sensation of his fingertips skimming across my scalp is erotic.
But also comforting. Safe.
He knows all my crazy secrets, but he’s still here. He still wants me, respects me, cares about me, even though my reality often bears little resemblance to his.
“Because you’re a good man,” I whisper, my palms smoothing up his abs, over his hard chest, up to cup his face. I brush my thumb over his full bottom lip. “Very good. So please, Jeffrey Von Bergen, will you be my first?” My nipples pull tighter against the silk of my teddy at the hunger that flares in his eyes. “I want to feel you inside me. I want—”
My words end in a gasp that becomes a groan as he hitches both of my legs up around his waist, lifting me as his lips crash into mine. We kiss like we’re starving for each other, like we’re never going to get close enough, as he carries me deeper into the dimly lit room to the bed.
He rips the quilt from the mattress with one hand and lays me down on cool sheets, pausing just long enough to rip his sweater over his head before he’s on top of me, his mouth hot on my neck and his hand between my legs, rubbing me through the lace of my panties.
“God, Lizzy,” he murmurs against my skin as I moan and arch closer to his fingers, craving more friction, dying to feel some part of him inside me. “I’ve never wanted anyone like this. I want my mouth all over you. I want to devour every inch.”
“Yes.” I cling to his shoulders, shivering with anticipation as he drags the crotch of my panties to one side and traces one big finger down my center, making me jerk and moan as he passes over my clit. “I want to know what you taste like…everywhere.” I run my palm over his hard length through his jeans, squirming as he teases his thumb gently around my clit. “You have way too many clothes on.”
“And they’re going to stay on,” he says. One finger presses against my entrance, making my head spin.
“Yes. Oh yes,” I arch into him, luxuriating in every centimeter as he glides inside.
He curses beneath his breath, and when I drag my eyes open, he’s gazing down at me with a pained expression. “You’re so tight, love.”
“And wet.” I shift my hips, taking his finger even deeper. My eyes never leave his, the connection between us making every sensation hotter, more brilliant and sparkling and right.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” he whispers, groaning as I pop the top button on his jeans and drag the zipper down.
“Yo
u won’t,” I promise as I reach inside, taking his burning length in my hand. “I’m not afraid. Not even a little bit.” I stroke him up and down, loving the way his lids flutter and his lips part, loving the pleasure on his face. “Don’t worry. I’m ready. You can get a condom.”
He frowns, and a sound somewhere between a growl and a laugh rumbles his chest. “Oh no, sweet Lizzy. We’re not even close to that part yet. I told you. I’m going to devour you.”
He adds a second finger, stretching me deliciously, sending tingles dancing across my skin. He kisses me again, slow and sexy, turning my blood to honey as he murmurs against my lips, “Every single inch.”
21
Jeffrey
I’m never the kind to rush when I’m in bed with a woman, but tonight I intend to break every last one of my personal records. I’m not going to stop until Lizzy has come so many times she’s dripping for me, begging for me. I’m going to make my beautiful girl so wet there won’t be any pain.
Only pleasure and sweetness and a night she won’t ever forget, no matter how many men come after me.
None insists a primal voice deep in my caveman brain. Not a single fucking one.
The thought of another man kissing her lips with his fingers in her pussy, summoning these hot, turned-on sounds from low in her throat, makes me want to lock her in a tower and hide the key.
But she’s spent enough time locked away.
Tonight is about freedom, about giving her everything she wants, everything she needs.
Starting with orgasm number one.
“Yes,” I whisper against her throat as her hips move faster. I shift my hand, rubbing her clit with the heel of my palm as my fingers push deeper into her slick heat, summoning a sexy whimper from her lips. “Come for me. I can’t wait to watch you, to feel you. You’re so fucking sexy. So beautiful.”
“God, you feel so good, Jeffrey,” she pants, her head falling back and her thighs beginning to tremble. “So—” She breaks off with a cry, her fingers digging into my biceps as she comes.
Fresh heat rushes onto my hand as her inner walls tighten, and I’m certain I’m going to die if I don’t get my mouth between her legs in the next ten seconds. But I remind my caveman brain that no one ever died from pussy deprivation and pull back to sit on my heels, reaching for the tie at the front of her teddy with shaking hands.
I tug at the velvet, my gaze locked on her breasts as they rise and fall, straining the shimmering silk. “This is fucking stunning. You should wear this. Only this. All the time.”
“All the time?” she echoes, still breathless, the way I intend to keep her.
“Unless you’re naked.” I untangle the ribbons and part the two halves of the teddy, pain and pleasure working through me as I reveal her high, tight breasts and swollen nipples. She’s so beautiful it hurts a little. “So lovely,” I murmur, bending to kiss the underside of each breast, loving the way she cradles my head tenderly in her hands and whispers, “Oh, yes. Thank you…”
“You never have to thank me.” I skim my lips over her nipple, making her shiver again. “It’s my absolute pleasure.”
“But I want to thank you,” she says, moaning softly as my tongue gets involved, tracing light circles around her tight tip. “I’ve never felt this good. Never. Not in bed or out of bed or with a basket full of chocolate.”
“And we’re only getting started,” I promise. I suck her nipple into my mouth, and she wraps her legs around me, arching into my lips and tongue, shivering harder with every nip and suck, her breath coming in harsh, shallow gasps until I start to wonder….
“Have you ever come like this?” I ask, my voice rough, raw with wanting. “From just your nipples?”
“No. But I… Oh, please.” She moans, squirming beneath me in a way that makes my balls ache. The need to be buried inside her is a dragon breathing down my neck, threatening to burn me alive if I don’t get my cock in her pussy now.
Right now.
But I’m a prince. I was born to fight dragons, and I’m not even close to done with this woman, not when Lizzy is writhing under me, gripping fistfuls of my hair. I take control of her left nipple with my mouth and her right with my fingers and take her higher, tugging and sucking in rhythmic waves until she shatters, trembling hard against me as she comes.
“Fuck, Lizzy, you’re incredible.” I hug her close, squeezing her tight as she comes down, my head spinning as her hips rock forward, rubbing against where I ache, where I want with a need that cuts all the way to the bone.
“You,” she says, pushing at the top of my jeans. “You’re incredible. God, Jeffrey, I want you so much. I need you inside me, please.”
A part of me wants to wait, to insist she come on my tongue first, but the desperation in her calls to the desperation rising inside me, burning hotter, higher, until I’m afraid I won’t have the sense to grab a condom if I don’t do it now. “One second,” I promise against her lips.
I vault from the bed.
I’m in the bathroom, grabbing a condom from my toiletry bag, and then back on the bed rolling it on in what feels like a second. The film just…skips, and suddenly I’m kneeling naked beside her, guiding the rubber down over my painfully swollen cock with no memory of disposing of my jeans.
But I’m damned well going to remember taking off those panties.
I reach for the thin fabric stretched over her hips, curling my fingers around the top. She lifts her bottom, making it easy for me to draw them down her thighs, calves, and off each foot. I bring them to my face, inhaling the scent of her, balls dragging heavier between my thighs as the salty, tart, perfect smell of her desire spins through my head.
She reaches for me. “Now. Please, now.”
Dropping her panties reverently on the bedside table—they’re too pretty to throw on the floor—I lengthen myself over her. Her legs wrap around my waist, and suddenly we’re there, in the perfect position, without even needing to reach down and adjust. It takes me off guard for a moment, and the tip of my cock slips inside her before I’m mentally prepared for the feel of her tight and wet around me.
I try to regain control, to rein in the hunger and slow the hell down, but before I can pull back, Lizzy flexes her legs, forcing me deeper. My breath catches and my heart skips a beat as I push into where she is so tight—so wet and hot, yes, but so, so tight.
She feels…incredible.
Better than incredible. Rapturous. Savagely sweet.
But even as my cock celebrates the best few seconds of its life so far, my heart races.
I have to be hurting her. I don’t see any way that I’m not.
I brace myself on my forearms, holding still inside her as I gaze down into her face, sweat breaking out in the valley of my spine as I realize I can feel her pulse beating around my erection, each throb sending a tremor through me. But she doesn’t appear to be in pain. Her lips are softly parted, and her breath comes faster, but when her eyes meet mine, they’re bright with satisfaction.
“It’s so good,” she murmurs, her hands trailing down my chest as she shifts her hips, taking me a little deeper into paradise, making my head spin. “So much better than I even imagined.” She pulls in a breath and exhales, rocking her hips forward with a moan that nearly undoes me.
“I’m not hurting you?” I ask, my voice tight and what’s left of my willpower evaporating at an alarming rate.
“Oh, yes.” She bites her lip as she moves, circling her hips this time, her inner walls gripping my cock in mind-melting new ways. “But it hurts so good. I finally understand that stupid song. This is what he meant.” She wraps her arms around my ribs and hugs me closer. “It hurts a little, but all I want is more. Please, Jeffrey, more.”
I try to go slow, to be gentle, I really do, but by the time I pull back and glide into her the third time, Lizzy is wiggling against me at the end of each thrust, making it clear she’s as desperate for more as I am.
“Is this all right?” I ask as I rock faster, deepe
r.
“All is right,” she says, breath catching as I grind my pubic bone into her clit at the end of my next thrust. “God, yes, perfect, don’t ever stop. Take me. Hard. I want you hard.”
Gripping her hip in one hand, I let go of the wheel, losing myself in her heat, her fire. The feel of her breath hot on my neck as we strain together is so sexy I know I’m going to embarrass myself.
I’m going to come—soon, so soon. I have to take a breath, take a beat away from her intoxicating body before I embarrass myself.
But before I can pull away or shift our position or do something to break the pleasure feedback and hold back my orgasm a minute or two, Lizzy gasps, “Oh, there. There. I’m almost there!” and I couldn’t stop if I wanted to.
I have to get her there. I have to feel her—
Oh, fuck, I can feel her—
I cry out as she goes tight around me, her pussy squeezing me as she comes, calling out my name.
I come a beat later, pleasure slamming me to the mat and pinning me there as I gasp and moan and doubt I’m going to survive it. It feels like I’m being turned inside out, each wave of sensation even more intense than the last until, finally, the tide begins to drag away.
Slowly, dazedly, I come back into my skin to find Elizabeth beaming beneath me, not looking the slightest bit displeased by my abbreviated performance.
I smile as I dispose of the condom in one of the tissues beside the bed and roll onto my side next to her. “Everything okay?”
“So much better than okay.” She sighs and turns her head, kissing my bicep. “Let’s do that all night long.”
“Done,” I agree. “Just let me recover for a few minutes first.”