“That's strangely reassuring, to be honest,” he grinned lopsidedly at her as he returned to the position he had been resting in. “But I suppose I shouldn't distract you again. You want answers from me, after all.” She nodded, and he continued. “Naturally, there was no evidence, and the charges were dropped. I was never even brought in for questioning. But I was so fed up with the whole situation that I was about ready to fire her, damn the consequences.”
“What stopped you this time?” Angela asked with a tilt of her head.
“It was actually my assistant. She brought up the point that if I fired her, it would look like I did so because she had opened her mouth about the alleged abuse, and to the public eye, it would make me look like the guilty party,” a wistful look crossed his face. “Darla assumed that I was in a relationship with my last assistant because we were so close all the time, but that couldn't be farther from the truth. She and I had been friends since high school, and even when she messed up on her job as my assistant, I kept her around because she was my friend, and she always had great advice for things.” He sighed and closed his eyes. “If I'm honest, I miss her council. She and her wife were always the best people to go to for opinions.”
“How is she doing, by the way?” She traced patterns along his chest and shoulder in an effort to soothe him as he quietly mourned his fallen friend.
“She's surviving, but when I talk to her, I can tell how much pain she's in. It makes me not want to talk to her about how I'm feeling because, sure, I miss my friend like no other, but that was her wife that was killed. I feel like I'm hardly in a position to talk to her about my grief over her wife dying.” He shrugged. “But that's neither here nor there, I guess.” He opened his eyes again and regarded her for a few moments, as if trying to read her face before murmuring, “You have doubts about my theory, I see.” Angela averted her eyes as she tried to find the words that she was looking for.
“So you think that Darla is responsible for all three attacks because she's jealous of our relationships with you?” Angela frowned and did her best to try and find it in her to not believe that even someone like Darla would go that far for the sake of someone that had been, more or less, a boss with benefits. He nodded.
“If her harassing others and our past wasn't enough, she'd been harassing my assistant and secretary before you came,” he sighed and raked a hand through his hair. “I couldn't confirm that it was her, but there was literally no one else, in or out of my company, that had been connected to both of them and had the motive to want to harass them. Neither of them were particularly close to one another, so for them to have almost identical messages being sent to them at around the same time was more than suspicious.” His lips pulled away to reveal his teeth as he snarled. “I even called the police to report the fact that they were being harassed, but I was told that there was nothing they could do.” His hands clenched into fists again. “That was two weeks before they found her in the river.”
Angela swallowed.
“Part of me wants to hope that you're wrong,” Angela admitted quietly. “But I can't ignore how many coincidences there are. I don't think the police can, either.”
He nodded again and returned his gaze to the ceiling.
“I told the police all of this when we were talking before I came to your house. If they don't follow through with this lead, I think I might rip out my hair in frustration.” He brought an arm to lie heavily over his eyes. “I can't bear to think of them as that incompetent.”
“I would much rather you didn't tear your hair out,” she said with a smile, bringing her hand up to rake through his short locks. “I quite like it just the way it is, thanks.” She knew that there was at least a small chance that she was coming across as callous, but she just wanted to try and make him smile, at least a little, just enough to break up such a serious atmosphere that had permeated the room as they talked. He lifted the arm over his eyes just enough to peer at her with one eye, a grin tugging at his lips.
“I aim to please, after all,” he said quietly, and before she had the thought to open her mouth to retort, he rolled on top of her, edging her legs apart so that he could nestle himself between them. “In fact, I aim to please more often than not,” he grinned lasciviously at her, and she swallowed thickly.
“Ah,” she breathed as he nudged his nose into the crook of her neck. “Up for round two already?” she rasped, not realizing until that moment just how dry her throat was. He lifted his head to peer down at her.
“In a few moments,” he said after observing her for the span of a few heartbeats before he hopped off of her and crawled backwards off of the bed.
“W-wha-?” she sputtered, sitting up to try and chase the moment that he was swiftly taking with him.
“I doesn't take much to see that you need something to drink,” he said easily, tossing a wink at her as he helped her out of bed. “And if I know you right, you want tea.” She felt her face grow hot at how easily he knew her wants and needs but didn't bother to deny that she could really go for some tea right now, just enough to wet her whistle, as it were. “Hot or cold? I'm guessing cold can help your throat.”
“Why would my throat need any help?” She frowned, confused by the comment, only to let out a gasp of surprise when he pulled her so close that their hips were pressed flush. Through the thin material of his boxers and her yoga pants, his clear arousal was undeniable and impossible to conceal.
“To get it ready to be put to work,” his grin widened, and a thousand scenarios ran through her mind. She could certainly think of a few ways that her throat could be put to use. “But first, hydration!” He promptly let her go, spinning around and practically sauntering out of the room.
* * * *
“I-I'll have it iced, please!” she said, skipping to keep up with his gait as he made his way down the hall and deeper into the house. It was something that she hadn't really had the opportunity to take in before, and she had to admit, she was both impressed and a little intimidated by the expanse of the place. The living room that they walked through to make their way to the kitchen had a tall vaulted ceiling from which a tasteful chandelier hung and softly lit the space. The rounded corner couch that took up a good portion of the floor looked plusher than her bed back home, and had a chaise lounge at the end that she could easily imagine herself curling up on to take a nap. The walls were a deep, comforting blue, with a stone lined fireplace centered on the wall beside the large flat screen television mounted on the wall.
The kitchen right next to it was partially sectioned off from the living room by the angled counter top, and the appliances looked as though they were all top of the line. The marble counter tops and rich cherry wood cabinets gave the kitchen a warm feeling, and she felt right at home.
“Any sugar in your tea? Honey? Lemon?” he asked from over his shoulder as he prepared the pitcher of tea. “I think I've got some other fruit in the fridge if you'd like to put that in, too.” She came up beside him and wrapped an arm around his waist.
“I just like my tea black, thanks,” she said, pressing a kiss into his shoulder.
“Ahh, I knew I could always count on you to have sensible taste in beverages,” they laughed as he finished stirring the tea. She pulled some glasses out of the cabinet after a few moments of searching, and went to the fridge so that the door dispenser could fill them with ice.
“Well, you know me,” she said as he filled their glasses. “I'm a no frills kind of woman.”
“So you are,” he said, his eyes taking her in as though she were a work of art, and not a stressed woman with mussed hair wearing a baggy shirt and worn out yoga pants. She pulled deeply from her tea to try and hide the blush on her cheeks that formed under his stare. In an effort to cool her face, she drained her cup in one go, enjoying the feeling of the chilled tea sliding down her throat. When she set her glass down, David held up the pitcher with one hand as he took a drink from his own glass, a silent offer to refill her glass. With a nod
of her head, he filled her glass with more tea, and she made a point to take her time with her sips this time, enjoying the flavor of the tea rather than letting the temperature cool her throat.
For a few moments, they drank their tea in a comfortable silence, the quiet gently draping itself over them like a blanket of snow on the earth. In the soft lighting and tender company, Angela felt the safe, despite the events of the last few days. The mouthful of tea that she had just pulled from her glass went down with a harder gulp than necessary when she watched the way that David's throat bobbed in time with his drinking. She gave up on sipping on her tea altogether when she watched a drop of the condensation from his glass fell onto his chest and trekked lazily down the chiseled planes of his abs.
She hadn't realized that she was watching its descent until he cleared his throat.
“Well, then,” he broke the silence, setting his glass down on the counter and removing the two steps worth of space that had been between them, hands sliding home to grip her hips and tug her ever so firmly to him. “It seems that you're awfully distracted by something all of a sudden,” he grinned knowingly at her, and in spite of the fact that this was merely the starting steps to a dance that they had done a thousand times at this point, it never failed to make her core throb in anticipation and delight. “Dare I ask what on Earth has your attention so tightly in its grasp?” He brought a hand to her jaw, his fingers gracefully fanning over her jawline and lifting her face to meet his eyes.
But Angela was far from the easily flustered, stammering mess of an innocent woman that she had been when they first began to weave this web, and she returned his grin with a smirk of her own. With a shimmy of her hips, still pressed flush against his, she let a hand reach out to touch him, her fingertips following the still somewhat wet trail that the drop of water had left on his skin until she reached the waistline of his boxers.
“I found this drop of water on your abs to be absolutely fascinating,” she said, playing his game. Truth be told, she wasn't sure why they changed the way that they spoke to each other when they were flirting, but she certainly didn't mind it; it made the shift from their normal every day interactions to their more erotic play space more defined, so that she felt like she always knew when they had transitioned from one to the other. Even when the shift was sudden, she was never left to wonder on which side of the line they were standing at any given moment, and she found it strangely grounding.
Speaking of grinding...
* * * *
With a roll of her hips and a hand slipping into his boxers, Angela managed to steal away his smug grin as he gasped and let his eyes roll back. While her victory was relatively short lived, she relished in it all the same, and felt herself swell with pride because she was, for a few brief moments, able to make the ever calm and collected David lose his cool.
But that victory came with a price.
The world spun on its axis when David retaliated, scooping her up off of the ground and hauling her over his shoulder. She squirmed wildly, her legs flailing and she squeaked in alarm. Her protests were met with a rather swift, sharp smack of his palm on the swell of her butt cheek, causing her to jump in surprise. The tender flesh of her rear tingled where his hand had struck it, and she bit her lip to try and quell the pulsing between her legs that was only growing more and more demanding.
“If that's how you want to play this,” he said, and she could hear how smugly he was grinning as he turned and walked the both of them back to the bedroom.
“Put me down, you oaf! This is so cruel!” she squealed when his hand clapped against her ass again, harder this time, and this time she couldn't deny that she felt her core grow slick at the slap.
“If you insist,” he said with a shrug, tossing her on the bed once he had stopped in front of it. She flopped limply onto the bed, sprawling on her back with a cry of surprise. Before her body had even settled on the mattress, he was upon her, crawling over her body with a predatory look in his eyes that left her squirming for an entirely different reason than wanting to be let down. “Is this more to your speed, you filthy little thing, you?” he asked with an arch of his brow.
“Something like this ,” she said
“Good,” he hummed pleased. His hands were already working on undressing her, sliding her yoga pants down. She lifted her backside and shimmied her hips to help him in the endeavor, and within seconds, she was kicking them off of her legs and letting them fall where they may. She didn't even have the time to wonder whether they fell off of the bed or not before he was pulling her shirt over her head, encouraging her to sit up to shuck it off and toss it behind them.
She shivered when he trailed his open palm along the curves of her body, his fingers splayed wide to cover as much ground as possible. When she squirmed too much for his liking, he gripped her hips with a firm squeeze and pinned her with a firm look, silently ordering her to not move around too much. She knew this game well, this taking of control over the situation and letting her know that everything was well in hand. Though she always felt a thrill of excitement every time it happened, she simultaneously relaxed herself more under his care, trusting him not to take things too far or harm her in any way. Her body tingled in anticipation for what was to come, and she couldn't help the smile that tugged at her lips at the thoughts that raced through her mind about what he could do to her.“Feeling awfully cheeky tonight, aren't we?” The corner of his mouth quirked up as he loomed over her, the broad expanse of his shoulders and chest encompassing most of her vision. She sucked in a breath and held it when his hand drifted down to her nether lips, neither teasing nor entering, merely resting his fingers at the entrance to her channel.
“Why are you trembling?” His voice was a low murmur, his lips tickling against the skin of her neck when he dipped his head low enough to nestle in the crook of it.
A shaky breath rushed past her lips as a woefully inarticulate response to his question, and she cursed herself when she felt her cheeks growing steadily hotter as his lips began to travel down her smooth stomach. She felt her entire center clench in anticipation for where he was heading, but his lips trailed down past her womanhood, something that surprised and slightly disappointed her. He pressed open mouth kisses down her thigh, stopping just above the knee before beginning to trek the path back up at an even slower, even more deliberate pace. The sensation sent tingles up her leg, and she felt drunk on the heady feelings that he was stirring within her.
Just as her eyelids fluttered shut, her eyes popped open when she felt his nose nudge her outer labia, replacing his fingers, which had taken up residence at her hips. As he caught her eye, the intensity of the situation seemed to amplify, and though she wanted to speak, to beg that he give her what she needed, the words seemed to have lodged themselves in her throat. He seemed to study her face for a few heartbeats, and he must have divined her wants through the look on her face, as he slid a hand back from her hip to return to her center, slipping inside of her in one fluid movement.
“David …” she whispered hoarsely, the quiver in her voice matching the thrum of her body under his attentions. Her heart was hammering in her chest so hard that it was almost painful. He pressed a gentle, almost reverent kiss to her inner thigh, his eyes never leaving hers. Her core ached for him.
Angela sat up, leaning back on one arm and reaching out for him with the other. Her fingers slid into his hair and clutched at it, knowing that she had to tighten her grip on her sanity lest she lose it when he used that clever tongue of his. As if to delay the inevitable response, David pulled away just before he would have pressed his mouth to her core. A slow, devilish smirk spread across his face, and she knew that at that point, no matter how much she wanted to beg and plead with him to get her way, doing so would be absolutely fruitless.
“Look at me,” the firmness of his tone was a rather quick reminder of the power that he commanded when it was the two of them. She knew that he would never hurt her, and she took comfort in that, but it wa
s hard not to be intimidated, at least a little. “Look me in the eye as I'm working your cunt.” His words were harsh, crude, and did nothing but stoke the fire in her belly. She couldn't put into words why him talking in such a filthy way made her feel like this, but it never failed to make her tremble with want.
His demanding nature was apparent in the way that he kissed her – his tongue was so commanding and domineering that he barely allowed her to tease him with her own tongue. She was completely at his mercy, and they both knew that he would have it no other way. His tongue ran along her lips, wetting them before he lightly bit on her bottom lip, pulling on her hair steadily to hold her head at just the right angle to allow him to deepen the kiss. After a few moments of enjoyment, of their tongues dancing in a slower, more deliberate way, he pulled back, his lips attaching to her neck and nipping at the skin there again.
“David,” she whined when his hands began to slowly caress the skin from her hips to her inner thighs, the movements slow and light. “You're so cruel,” she tossed her head to the side, a hand coming up so that she could bite her knuckle in favor of letting out an embarrassingly loud wail of pleasure when she felt his fingers sliding past her entrance. “You're so hard on me sometimes…”
“Cruel and hard?”
She heard him chuckle from where his face was buried in her neck as she let her eyelids slide shut for a moment, the soothing blackness that greeted her helping her to focus her pleasure hazed mind. Just when she felt like she had a grip on her thoughts and could face what was to come next, his fingers inside of her moved ever so slightly in just the right way that she was left breathless for a moment as her mind reeled.
Instantly, her eyes sprang open and her gaze was met with David's, who had lifted his head from her neck to peer down at her smugly as he began to work her ever so slowly. She bit her lip, but a moan slipped out of her all the same.
“Dear, oh dear,” David leaned forward and languidly kissed her, taking his time with both his mouth and his hands, drawing out the experience as long as possible for the both of them. “Whatever am I going to do with you?” he mused as they parted, his finger swirling around her clit as he hummed thoughtfully, pretending to think over his options when he had so clearly already decided exactly what he was going to do with her. “And just what thoughts are running through your head?” He stilled his fingers, knowing that it would be the most effective way to get her to answer him clearly and honestly.
Hang Em' Up: A Bad Boy Sports Pregnancy Romance Page 126