Brutally Beautiful

by Lynne Connolly

  If the first time was good, this topped it, sending shards of instant response right to her fingertips. This time she cried out, her body arching so her heels and shoulders were all that remained on the bed. She dropped back, but that didn’t stop him hammering into her, his rhythm steady. Every stroke heightened her response, driving her inexorably toward orgasm. He gained power and speed as she called his name, helpless under his attack, welcoming it with every part of her.

  So fucking good. He seemed to know what she needed, hard and fast, then slowing as he watched her, eventually crooning to her, “Come on, baby. I’m not stopping until I get one more out of you, but this one’s going to be the best you ever had. The very fucking best.”

  With one last devastating jerk of his hips, he thrust into her and held himself deep inside while she convulsed. Her pussy clenched around him, sharp and hard, so all she could do was hold on. Gen lost her mind, and only his arms around her held her safe. She gave herself to him completely for the untold time it took for her climax to hit and fade.

  * * * *

  “Sorry I don’t have a bigger bed,” she murmured into the warmth of his neck. She lay snuggled against him while he held her tight, despite their combined heat. He’d left her briefly to dispose of the condom, during which time he must have discovered the cupboard her landlord laughably called a bathroom. No sexy shared showers here, although she’d have loved to have topped the experience with some standing-up sex. Not remotely possible. But he’d come back to her and swept her into a close embrace before delivering a kiss that told her better than words that he’d enjoyed himself as much as she had.

  “Sometimes closeness is better,” he said, “but next time I’ll take you to my place. I have a bigger bed. Not that this isn’t perfect, of course.”

  “Nice try.” She laughed up at him, then stopped abruptly. Did that mean he wanted to see her again?

  He kissed her. “What? You thought I specialized in one-night stands? I prefer to get to know my women completely, inside and out.” He moved lasciviously against her, making her groan in renewed desire. “But tonight I have to go.”

  “You do?” She might have known this was too good to be true. Running out on her. “You have to be somewhere?”

  “Early start.” He flung back the covers and got out of bed again. At least she got to feast her eyes on that glorious, powerful body as he walked to the chair where he’d left his clothes. “I’m sorry, but I can’t go into work wearing these.”

  She tucked her arm behind her head and pulled the covers back. “What do you do for a living?” Would he tell her the truth? Where was the harm?

  “This and that. Not a very sexy job. Tell you what, I’ll tell you at dinner tomorrow night. How about that? Then I’ll be sure of you turning up, so you find out.”

  Gen swallowed her involuntary laugh. Was he kidding? He couldn’t really imagine she wouldn’t want to see him again. Not with that body, that sexy accent, and the way they worked so well together. “I’d love to have dinner, thank you. Where?”

  He named a restaurant in Manhattan that she only knew about because of a brief mention in the newspaper. The place was expensive and so avant-garde even hipsters hadn’t abandoned it yet. She raised a brow. “Trying to impress me?”

  “Sure. I need all the help I can get.” He laughed. “Wait until you hear what I do.”

  He’d dressed while they talked, and now she felt weirdly embarrassed to be naked while he was fully clothed. He ran his hands through his hair, pushing it back from his forehead and instead of looking like hell, as she would if she did the same thing, he looked sexy, ready for the night, and awake. “I can’t see anything you do turning me off,” she said truthfully. “Not now.”

  “Thank you for that.” He crossed the room and delivered a lingering kiss. By the time they’d finished, he had her leaning against his shoulder and he was fondling her breasts, rousing her all over again. “Goodnight, sweetheart. I can pick you up or, if you prefer, meet you there. Which is best for you?”

  “I’ll meet you.” If he came here, she doubted they’d ever leave, much less make the restaurant.

  “Okay. Seven thirty, or later?”

  “Seven thirty’s fine.”

  After one last kiss, he warned her to lock the door after him and left the apartment. It felt strangely lonely, as if he’d taken something with him.

  As she crossed the wooden floor, Gen exclaimed in pain when she trod on something hard. She picked it up and stared, dumbfounded at the gold circle in her hand. Her first, instinctive thought was, I’ll kill the bastard. Some judge of character she’d turned out to be. It wouldn’t be the first time a married man had lured her on, and staring at the ring brought it all back. She’d run from her comfortable hometown and its secrets and deceptions, found a job in the big city where she felt safer. Where everybody didn’t know her name and regard her as a scarlet woman. She’d been the other woman and hadn’t even known it. Well, this time she wouldn’t go along with it. Were all men the same, or just the ones she got along with? Or did she have Loser tattooed on her forehead?

  Reason kicked in. No, that couldn’t be right. She’d read his file—no mention of marriage, current or over. It had to be something else. But it still brought back what she’d fought so hard to escape from.

  Fuck.

  Chapter Five

  Gen had one advantage over Nick: she knew where to find him. Debow University, New York—or DUNY, as it proclaimed proudly on its sweatshirts—consisted of one old building and several new ones clustered together on a campus close to the old dock area in Manhattan. It had been founded for the children of the dockworkers, a privately funded beneficiary, but had grown into one of the most prestigious educational establishments in New York. She’d always wanted to come here and study, and her job gave her the opportunity to pursue the degree she’d been forced to abandon at home. The main building was old for New York, a huge warehouse from the middle of the last century, updated by an award-winning architect.

  Usually she got a sense of satisfaction, of achieving one of her goals, when she walked through the gates, but not today. Fury took over every part of her mind, and she wanted to scream with frustration. How could he make her feel so vulnerable? That ring had hit one of her vulnerabilities, and while she knew she couldn’t hold him to blame for it, the situation had jolted her, so similar to the same scenario five years before when she’d found her lover’s wedding ring on the floor of her bedroom.

  Poetry and literature meant Nick was based in one of the so-called modern buildings, but not one of the prestigious, architect-designed ones. The science faculties reigned supreme there. This one was hastily erected in the late seventies as the university grew beyond its premises, set unobtrusively in the south corner, near to the parking garage. Salt air had dulled the once gleaming pale blue paint, but for all its slightly shabby appearance, it had the reputation of being one of the liveliest places on campus.

  Not that she saw any sign of it today. Everyone seemed hard at work somewhere, the day’s schedule of lectures and supervisions well under way. Gen found her way to the library by following the signs, one of which pointed the wrong way and led her up a completely pointless hallway, so her temper hadn’t improved by the time she reached the spacious literature library, an endowment from a previous arts student who’d done well and left precise instructions as to what the library should contain. Without that, the arts department might have died a quick death. With it, it flourished.

  The shelves were set at right angles to the walls, creating study areas in between, so it took her some time to find him, plus he wasn’t dressed as she’d seen him on the two previous occasions they’d met. Today he wore a plaid shirt over a blue T-shirt, and worn jeans. Moreover, his hair wasn’t brushed straight back from his forehead but parted on one side, preppy-style. Still sexy, but different. The watch on his wrist wasn’t the sleek, thin Swiss model of last night, but a bulkier one.

  In the same glance
, she noticed the way he was leaning over a very pretty, very young-looking student, who was gazing up at him with stars in her eyes. Gen imagined she might have looked the same way last night, and hated herself for it. Even more, she hated him, totally irrationally, but it didn’t help. Now she could add unreasonable jealousy to the utterly stupid but undeniable emotions coursing through her. Nobody looked up. Why should they? He was quoting some romantic guff at the girl, about a knight riding between sheaves of barley. Gen hoped the barley fell on his horse and killed it stone dead.

  She already had the offending article in her hand, so she walked quietly around the table, as if searching for a book on the shelves, keeping her back to them until she was right behind them. Then she held her hand out and dropped the ring on the book that lay before them.

  It fell with a dull thud, but she hardly had time to say her rehearsed line, “Here’s your ring back,” before he acted. With no extraneous or flashy displays, he grabbed her wrist, his hand closing around it like a cop clamping on the cuffs. Using his grip, he dragged her around and glared up into her face, blue eyes cold and deadly. One brow arched in surprise, but his expression didn’t thaw. “Where did you get that?”

  “I found it on my bedroom floor this morning.” Her voice shook. “It must have fallen out of your pocket.” She firmed her chin, hating her weakness. “Yours?” Still unprepared for the violence of emotion, revealing both the way she’d felt then and the way he made her feel totally open and unguarded, she could do nothing but wait for whatever happened next.

  He picked it up with his free hand. “Notice something about it?”

  “It’s cheap gold. It’s thin,” she began, determined to insult him. She already knew she couldn’t break away from his hold.

  He nudged the ring toward the girl. “Pretend we’re at the altar. Put it on me.”

  Gen hated the way his voice was so steady, even low and as sexy as ever, damn him. Wide-eyed, the girl picked up the ring and placed it at the tip of the third finger of his hand. She pushed, but it barely reached the first joint.

  Nick glanced up at Gen. “It won’t go on my ring finger. It won’t even go on my pinkie.” He shook the ring off so it fell on the book. “I’ve never been married.” He paused. “It belonged to my mother. It’s all I have left of her. Did you find the chain? I have it attached to my key ring. It must have broken.”

  Gen shook her head and then closed her eyes, a wave of nausea rising in her throat. She swallowed it down but didn’t trust herself to say anything yet. She hadn’t found a chain, but then she hadn’t looked for one.

  “Sit down. Talk to me.” He spoke gently as if she were some kind of idiot he needed to placate. Gen opened her eyes and let him guide her to a chair on his other side. He released her wrist but slid his hand down to twine his fingers between hers and hold her hand. He could drag her back just as fast as he’d grabbed her wrist, but his message was clear. He was giving her the choice.

  He turned back to the girl, giving Gen a moment to gain some kind of control over her emotions. “You get it now? ‘The Lady of Shallot’ might sound cheesy to our ears, but it’s when we apply our mindset to it. It’s part of a complete group of poems, and you have to take them in context.”

  The girl cleared her throat. “It sounds different when you say it.” A case of hero worship.

  Was that Gen’s problem? Her euphoria had scared her this morning with its intensity. She could have seized on the wedding ring as an excuse to bring herself down. Or it just hit that sore spot that still niggled at her and kept her awake nights. Her fury dissipated in helpless mists, and she was left with confusion.

  The girl gathered her book and her laptop and left with one backward glance at Gen and a more lingering one for Nick. Even with him dressed in this guise, Gen couldn’t blame her. The swathe of nearly black hair that hung across his face in a silky mass only drew attention to the lowering mystery, the decidedly unpreppy face it surrounded. A strong jaw and high cheekbones delineated someone much tougher than the clothes and hairstyle indicated, if a person looked hard enough. But he’d disguised it well.

  He flipped back the hair with an impatient toss of his head, more suited to a schoolboy than this powerhouse, but he didn’t show any sign of self-consciousness. “So,” he said silkily, “questions? Were you looking for an excuse to not see me again?”

  She shook her head. “You make me nervous.”

  “I make many people nervous, not always for the same reason.” He didn’t show surprise, more resigned acceptance. “But I won’t tell you anything but the truth. I might not answer all your questions, but I won’t lie to you. Is that good enough?”

  “Not nearly, but it’ll have to do.” A clever person could cover all kinds of bad behavior that way. But it was a start. “No significant other?”

  He shook his head, his hair flopping forward once more. He pushed it back this time and shoved it behind one ear. “Not before you.” Flatterer.

  “Nobody, then.” Stupid to think of anything deeper than what they had. Admittedly it was more than she’d had with anyone else for a long time, but it didn’t work, getting carried away, as she knew to her cost.

  He watched her as if he could read everything she was thinking. “If you want to stop seeing me, you only have to say so.”

  “I-I don’t.” She took a breath and stared at the table, tracing a pattern on the plastic surface with the forefinger of her free hand. He still held the other, though more gently now. “That is, I’m not sure. I don’t know.” Oh, for fuck’s sake. “Yes, of course I do. That’s why finding the ring felt like a betrayal.” She swallowed. “It wasn’t the first time.”

  “Ah.” He made the sound long and drawn-out, relief coloring his tones. “Do you want to tell me about it?”

  Why not? She had nothing to hide, even though she felt her face heat as she told him. “I come from a small town in Idaho. Red River. Typical. I had a job at the bank. I thought that was it, my future. I felt trapped, but I knew I was lucky, so I didn’t think about it much. And besides, I met someone.” She had nothing to be ashamed of. Nothing. “He was an accountant, someone who visited the bank a lot for his business. We connected, you know?”

  “So tell me about this guy,” he said. “This scumbag.” He sat completely still, his attention absolute. A good-looking academic with almost tangible charisma, although she didn’t feel it as much here. So much she didn’t know about him, and the more she delved, the more mysteries emerged. Maybe her boss was right to check on him. Maybe her instincts were wrong, but they were all she had to go on.

  She sighed. “I fell for him. He romanced me: roses, chocolates, dinners, the whole nine yards. The dinners were always out of town in dimly lit places, and we got together at my place or a hotel. He said he was between apartments and was living in a motel.”

  “You looked at his bank records?” He didn’t appear condemnatory, more curious.

  She shook her head vehemently. “No, I wouldn’t. When he came to the bank, I was usually busy elsewhere.” She frowned. “Even that might have been planned. I found his ring once, and he said it was his father’s. Eventually his wife came to see me. She wanted me to leave him alone.” She drew a shuddering breath. “The next time I met him, I asked him about it, and he confessed. Said he’d have nothing if he left her. He worked for her father’s company. He said she was a monster. Said she was his jailer, that kind of thing. But I’d met her, and I’d investigated her. They lived in Boise, and she was a public figure there, her father a business owner who did a lot of charity work in the Rotary Club.”

  She hadn’t thought of John for a while. When she tried to think of him, she was surprised to find she couldn’t exactly recall what he looked like or how he sounded. Now she remembered how much he’d hurt her, nothing else. “I didn’t believe him. Sent him away. A few weeks later, she filed for divorce. Said I was the reason, and the local papers were full of pictures of me with John in the little hotels and the restaurants, w
alking along the street, kissing him outside my house. Social media too. She’d had us watched. She hated me, hated him, or so it seemed at the time. Wanted to brand us both.”

  He squeezed her hand. “You don’t have to say any more. You wore the scarlet letter?”

  She laughed, remembering the Hawthorne book. “Not that bad. But bad enough.” The stares, the condemnations, the way conversations would erupt into heated whispers when she went by. “I could have lived it down in time, I guess, but I’d broken up a fairytale marriage according to the press. In the end, he went back to her, begged his way back into her life. I felt almost sorry for her. I wouldn’t have taken him back. But nobody was listening to me, and eventually I decided this was my chance. I should get out. I’d always wanted to get my degree, but after school I just drifted, then worked at the bank. I did what I should have done years before, and I applied at DUNY. Seems they like mature students.”

  They exchanged a brief smile of recognition.

  “I could always waitress, I thought, and I had some money saved to help. But I got a better job once I moved.” She gazed down at the tabletop, traced one of the scratches with her finger, fighting the tears that wouldn’t help, because they never did. “Then I walked in here with your wedding ring and saw you with a gorgeous young girl. I know it’s stupid, I really do, but—I found his wedding ring on the bedroom floor, and…” She swallowed.

  He lifted their linked hands to the table and rested them there, and she raised her head to look at him. “I’m a one-woman man. One at a time, anyway. I used to play the field, and if I met two women who were into playing together, then yeah, but I grew out of grabbing everything I could a long time ago.” He took a deep breath and let it out. “Too long. Look at me, Gen.”

  “I’m looking.” She couldn’t look away. Those eyes held her; the way he sat totally still made her attend to him.