Rounding a corner, she spotted him on a wide matted area. There was, in fact, a ring for boxing and he stood just outside of it, attacking a punching bag as she predicted.
At the sight of him, she stopped cold.
He bounced on the balls of his feet, legs apart, knees bent. He was beating the hell out of a punching bag, taking his time between blows as though assessing the bag, measuring where he wanted to hit next and how hard.
He landed a shuddering hard hit. Each blow landed deep, swinging the bag from where it hung from the ceiling. She wondered if this was his pent-up aggression and if it had anything to do with her. She wouldn’t mind taking a few whacks at the bag. She itched to take a swing at it. She guessed they all had their demons, but tonight he was hers.
Maybe she should get something like that for herself. Hang it in her spare bedroom and attack it any time she was in a mood. It might be the kind of workout she had been looking for.
She watched him, enjoying the sight more than she should considering he had just dismissed her. Rejected her. He was shirtless, of course, his bare chest on full unabashed display. He really was something off the cover of Men’s Health, and that only fueled her anger.
He’d always had a great body—even in high school, but this was just . . . just ridiculous. Was this what prison did? Gave you a body that could be weaponized? He should offer the prison workout experience. The hard-core gym rats would show up in droves.
A pair of athletic pants sat low on his hip bones and she couldn’t do anything but look at those bones and the indentations and feel her mouth salivate. Suddenly she had an image of herself straddling him . . . of her hands right there, gripping each side of his hips, her mouth pressing directly over his navel, following that subtle happy trail down, down, down . . .
Heat swarmed her face.
If her nephew hadn’t interrupted them the other night, she could have already done that. As it turned out, now Cruz wanted her gone.
She must have made a sound that alerted him to her presence. He swung around, his eyes snapping to her.
Again, she felt caught. Like she had done something wrong. Like he could take one look at her face and know all the wicked things she had been thinking as she admired his body. If possible, her face flamed hotter.
“What are you still doing here?”
She hated the question . . . hated him right then. “You made me like you,” she accused. He blinked. She continued, gaining steam. “I’d managed to put you behind me.” She was stabbing the air with her finger now. “I’d forgotten you—” Not exactly a lie. She had mostly forgotten him. “And then you kissed me in the closet and came to my house and the coffee shop and you made me start wanting you all over again.” Her chest lifted high with angry breaths.
He said nothing but came closer, ripping the Velcro free on his gloves.
She kept on talking in the face of his steady advance. “I came here to apologize to you about my sister, but that’s not the only reason—”
“Why are you sorry for your sister? You didn’t do anything.”
“I know that, but she is my sister—”
“Is that what you do?” He tossed one glove angrily to the mat and then the next. “Go around apologizing for your sister?”
“No,” she snapped.
“As far as your family is concerned, I will never be right with them.”
She swallowed. He spoke the truth, but she didn’t care what her family thought. She couldn’t always claim she felt that way, but she felt that way now. He shouldn’t care either.
“I’ll never be good enough for you,” he added fiercely. “And your family is not wrong. Fuck, Gabriella. You were fired because of me!” He waved a hand in the direction of the door. “So why don’t you go? Leave and stay away from me. You’ve apologized for your sister. Duty done. You can go now.”
She sucked in a sharp breath. She’d been dismissed.
“Why are you being such a jerk?”
Where was the Cruz from before? The one who couldn’t stop kissing her?
He leapt toward her and gripped her arms. “Because I’m trying to do the fucking right thing.”
And casting her from his life was the right thing? “So damn noble. Isn’t that what you always do? You went to prison for a crime you didn’t commit.” Her gaze flicked around her. “Then you opened a rec center for all the kids in your old neighborhood instead of leaving this town where people treat you like a pariah. When do you ever just do something for you? Something that might not be the right thing but it’s what you want? Something that makes you feel good?”
His hands dropped from her arms. His jaw tensed, a muscle feathering along his cheek. “You don’t know anything about me.”
“I’m right about this.” She nodded with certainty. “You went to prison for years. You’re accustomed to self-denial.” She lifted her chin and took a risk, saying, “You wanted me before. Now you don’t.”
He stepped back, eyeing her warily, and she was convinced. He hadn’t stopped wanting her. He just decided against it. She had to remind him that he still wanted her.
She continued, “You’re scared.”
He shifted on his feet and snorted as if that was the most ridiculous thing he had ever heard. “I’m not.”
She glanced around, taking stock of their surroundings and what was available to her. With a fortifying breath, she stepped forward. A wary look came over his face. She walked past him and approached a pair of dangling gymnastic rings anchored by chains to the ceiling. Kicking off her flats, she let her feet sink into the soft mat.
“What are you doing?” he called.
Holding his gaze, her hands reached for the hem of her T-shirt dress.
His expression went from wary to alarmed. “Are you trying to goad me into . . .”
The rest of his words died a swift death as she pulled her dress up and over her head and tossed it several feet aside. Teenage Gabriella Rossi—hell, even Gabriella from a month ago—would never have been able to do such a daring thing. She wouldn’t have had the confidence.
But now she stood before him on full display in her bra and panties. True, they were a good bra and panties set. One of her best. She felt pride and no small relief over that.
The lacy black demi-cup cut really close to her nipples and did great things for her girls, thrusting them up and out. The matching black panties were little more than a lacy scrap of fabric and showed a considerable amount of ass cheek.
Reaching for the rings, she turned so that he could appreciate the cheeks peeking out of the lace.
She pushed out her ass and snuck a look over her shoulder at him, not sure what she would find. Hopefully, he wasn’t still glowering . . .
He came up fast behind her with a growl, one of his hands going to her breast, sliding right inside the skimpy cup so that his hand covered the entire globe. His other hand grabbed hold of her ass.
He groaned and the sound was pure animal. “You’re going to kill me.” His hands squeezed her breast and ass and she moaned, her hands slipping from the rings, ready to let go, unable to hold on.
“Don’t move your hands. Keep them on the rings.” He nipped her earlobe as though to emphasize the point and she whimpered as lust shot straight to her sex.
She tightened her grip, fastening her suddenly sweating palms around the rings. He circled around her and buried his face between her breasts as both his hands simultaneously slid inside her underwear to mold and squeeze her ass. “Your fucking body destroys me.” He punctuated each word with a deep rolling massage that blasted sensation straight to her clit. “It’s insane how much I want you.”
“You told me to leave,” she panted, reminding him that he had said that . . . still hurt over that fact. It had stung and she wasn’t above flinging that at him.
He lifted his head and stared down at her with liquid dark eyes. “I didn’t want you to leave,” he confessed. “I’ve always wanted you, Gabriella Rossi. In the boathouse . . .
I didn’t know it was you, but I wanted it to be. In prison, in the dark of night, when I dreamed of the girl I kissed in the boathouse she didn’t have a face . . . so I gave her yours.”
Twenty-One
Following that mind-reeling confession, he dropped, pulling her panties down in one sweeping move. They fell to her ankles. She didn’t even have an opportunity to kick them aside before he lifted both her legs and draped them over his shoulders. Her feet were off the ground and his face was buried between her thighs, his mouth fast on her pussy. She wanted to process his shocking words, but there was that distracting, wondrous mouth of his.
She tried to think about the significance of what he said—he had always wanted her? She wanted to ask him, but he was devouring her. Licking and sucking. She wanted to grab hold of his hair for support, but she couldn’t let go of the rings.
Every once in a while the sensation of his tongue rubbing her clit was too much, too intense, and she would use her grip on the rings to pull her body up and away. Growling, he would clamp down on her thighs, tug her back, and mouth-fuck her harder. Until she was coming. Screaming as a climax rolled through her.
Her vision was unfocused but she gradually realized he was standing in front of her again. She was shaking as he peeled her hands from the rings and unhooked her bra. The straps fell down her shoulders, leaving her naked in front of him. His eyes traveled over her. Over all of her. “The reality is so much better,” he said thickly. “Better than anything in my head.”
He acted as though he had wanted her for always and always—and after his unbelievable words she wondered if maybe he had. I’ve always wanted you, Gabriella Rossi.
Could he have noticed her in high school? Could he have crushed on her, too? Like she had crushed on him?
But she couldn’t contemplate that right now. She couldn’t even think at all in this moment.
His gaze fixed on her breasts. She tried not to squirm under his scrutiny. “Such pretty tits.” She moaned and arched as one of his big hands palmed her breast. “I could spend hours just loving these.”
His touch grew almost rough as he handled her.
She relished it, arching her spine, thrusting her chest out. He fondled a heavy globe, pinching her nipple between thumb and forefinger. His other hand followed suit so that he was squeezing both mounds, lifting them and pushing them together while tweaking the tips.
Suddenly she couldn’t stand anymore. Her knees gave out and her legs buckled. He caught her, lowering her to the ground gently so that she didn’t just drop. His mouth found her breasts. He sucked a nipple deep into the cavern of his mouth. He used his tongue and teeth, and she arched on the mat, pushing her flesh into his greedy mouth. Her breasts had never been lavished with such attention. She felt owned. Marked and possessed.
He settled his hips between her legs, forcing her legs wide. He only wore his pants, but she felt him, rock-hard, prodding into her bare sex. He pressed down to grind against her and it was amazing. She was ready to come again, and he hadn’t even penetrated her.
She buried her fingers in his hair and held him close, content to keep him there forever as he ground his cock into her, the barrier of his pants something she hated and wanted gone. Her hands flew to his waistband, tugging them down.
“I need a condom,” he growled around one distended nipple, scoring it with his teeth. “But I can’t bear to stop . . .”
“I can’t bear for you to stop either.” But they needed a condom. She knew that.
He lifted away and she watched hungrily as he quickly stood and discarded his pants. And then he was naked. Gloriously naked. Oh. My. The man was a god. Especially that part of him. There was nothing earthly about it. His member looked like a heavenly instrument as far as she was concerned.
She pointed a finger rather desperately, her sex clenching in near pain to be filled. “My purse.”
He followed the direction of her hand and was there in a flash, bringing the bag back to her just as quickly. She dug through the contents until she found the condom she had packed. She handed it to him with a smile. “I came armed.”
Smiling, he took it. “Fuck, my hands are shaking.”
He wasn’t lying. His hands were shaking. For her. Because of her. How could that be? This was Cruz Walsh. Sure, he’d been in prison for seven years but she knew the man was no monk. He’d been with scores of beautiful women.
Her gaze roamed over him. He was so beautiful. His erection bobbed between them and she reached for it with both hands, and she realized she would need both hands.
He groaned as she wrapped her fingers around him. He was big. Bigger than anything she ever had inside her. She stroked him in awe, touching the fat crown reverently. She traced the slit, rubbing in the pre-cum that leaked out, gratified as another groan shook him. The head of him swelled and grew tighter under her fingers. “Damn it, Gabriella. How am I supposed to open this when you’re touching me like that?”
Touching, she realized, wasn’t enough. She bent her head between them and licked him once, twice, and then she fully pulled him into her mouth.
He fell back on the mat with a strangled cry, arms spread out in surrender at his sides. She leaned over him, lavishing her mouth up and down his engorged cock.
“What are you doing to me?” he gasped, his hand burying into her hair, not guiding her, just holding on to her as she worked over him.
“Stop.” He sat up and rolled her onto her back on the mat. He hovered over her, his elbows propped on either side of her head, his dark eyes locked with hers. “I’ve waited half my life to be inside you.”
The words jarred her. Half his life. Since they were fifteen. She gulped, holding his gaze, lost inside his eyes.
“The feeling is mutual.” She needed him inside her now. More than she’d ever needed anything on this earth she needed to feel this man buried deep in her.
The condom crinkled near her head. Her gaze drifted to the side. It was still in his hand. She reached for it. Took it from him. She tore it free from the package and lowered it between their bodies. He watched her as she rolled it down the hard length of him. She couldn’t resist. She wrapped her fingers around the girth of him and gave him a good squeeze.
A shudder racked him and he choked out a profanity.
Surprisingly, her fingers were steady and sure. Finished, she gripped him again and brought the head of him to her opening, dipping the tip of him and gliding it over her wetness.
Shoulders shaking from strain, he looked down, watching as she slowly guided the crown of him inside her, just a fraction.
Then she was shaking, desire and anticipation overwhelming her. With his elbows still propped on either side of her head, he framed his hands along either side of her face, fingertips brushing her hairline. “Look at me, Gabriella. I want your eyes on me as I enter you.”
She looked at his face, inches from hers, and she didn’t blink.
It should have embarrassed her, but everything about this moment was so right and long-awaited. She burned for him.
Tension rippled over his jaw and then he let go. Shoved inside her with one slick thrust, filling her completely, stretching her deliciously.
She threw back her head and a sob broke from her lips.
“Gabriella,” he commanded. “Look at me.”
Her gaze whipped back to him.
Eyes on her face, he thrust again. Harder.
She squirmed against the invasion, her hands pushing at his corded shoulders as if needing leverage. “Oh,” she gasped. “You’re big . . .”
“You can take it.” He brought his mouth to her ear, biting down on the lobe sharply, sending a rush of moisture to her sex. “Oh, you just got really wet. You feel amazing.” Another thrust. “Like you were made for me.”
She cried out at the fullness of him sliding in and out of her, the friction shooting sparks through her. She lifted her hips greedily, taking in more of him.
His mouth claimed hers, swallowing her cries. He ki
ssed her senseless, his tongue rubbing against hers, arousing her on a whole new level and sending another rush of moisture to her sex.
“How do you feel this good?” Breathing raggedly, he pulled back to thrust even deeper, harder, shoving her higher up the mat. He followed, driving into her. A small scream escaped her.
“That’s right. Scream for me, Rossi.”
Her nails dug into his shoulders, hanging on for dear life. It was incredible. She didn’t know sex could be like this. Rough and hard and fast. She didn’t know she could want it like this.
She was shaking and wild, her body not her own. She came in a violent burst. She went limp, his name on her lips as she quivered in the aftershocks. Tears sprang to her eyes from the miracle of it. It might be sacrilegious, but it did feel like a miracle. A miracle fifteen years in the making. For fifteen years she had wanted this and dreamed of it like one did the lottery—a lovely fantasy that was never expected to come true.
He didn’t stop though.
He continued riding her, pumping ceaselessly. His hands dug into her generous hips, lifting her up for his thrusting cock. “Again, Rossi.”
“Can’t,” she gasped, shaking her head. It was too much. There was no way. He could not possibly wring out another orgasm from her.
He was unrelenting. His thrusts fell faster, harder, pushing her again to the edge of another climax.
She clutched his shoulders, his back. Her hands skimmed down and gripped his tight ass, reveling in how it flexed as he pumped in and out of her.
Then he launched her over that edge again.
A keening cry escaped her—a sound that should have embarrassed her if she could form coherent thought. Tears streamed down her face.
He lost all restraint. He became an animal of instinct, fierce and intense as he worked into her body, taking it and claiming it for his desire.
She’d never felt so desired. So inherently female. So strong and powerful.
A few more plunges and he stilled, throwing back his head with a groan as he came.
Her breasts rose and fell in heavy gasps. She couldn’t slow her breathing.
Beautiful Sinner Page 20