Branded

by Scarlett Finn

  “That doesn’t mean we have to get up,” she murmured, pointing her tongue to lick the muscle her cheek rested on. “Just stay here.”

  “You like to lie around in the morning? For how long?”

  She shrugged and still hadn’t opened her eyes as she relished this chance to get closer to him, and squeeze the unyielding muscles that had endured through their several bouts of sex last night. “You like to get up?” she asked. “You’re a morning person?”

  “I’m a breakfast person.” The heat of his palm moved up her body and curled around her shoulder. The strength of his arm crushed her chest against his ribs and she hoped that signaled his surrender to her need to remain in this moment, in this bed with him. “I prefer the night. It’s easier for me to get my work done.”

  “Me too,” she agreed. Most of her jobs through her life had taken place at night, whether it was serving in a restaurant, working at a bar, or throwing herself around a pole. For a long time, she’d been nocturnal, and it suited her.

  “I don’t even know what time it is,” he said and his face left her hair, so she presumed he was looking around for a clock, but there wasn’t one.

  “I use my phone if I need an alarm,” she said, unaware of where she’d left her purse last night, probably scattered somewhere on the floor with their clothes. “Other than that, I don’t need to be anywhere until it gets dark. So let’s stay here until we need to move.”

  “We do need to move,” he said, his voice laced with a subtle innuendo.

  Exhilarated by what he might say next, she was enticed by the unspoken promise of action in his voice. “We do?”

  Taking her knee from between his legs, she lifted it over to the other side of his legs in an indirect invitation, and it was one he didn’t take long to accept. Rocking her onto her back, he managed to get hold of both her arms to stretch them high above her head and link their fingers. She’d learned that he liked to stretch her body as far as it could go and she liked being at his mercy, under the mass of him.

  Angling her hips, she coiled her lower limbs around his and still hadn’t opened her eyes. He licked her lips, kissed her chin, and rubbed his nose over hers. “Are you awake?” he asked.

  Unable to stop herself from wriggling and writhing, she moved against the thick column of his erection that was tantalizingly close to slipping inside of her. All he needed to do was lift, she could tilt, and then their bodies would dock. But he kept her here, pinned down with him, giving her just enough room to squirm beneath him in a constant motion fueled by the need of his body bleeding into hers.

  “I’m talking to you. I’m awake.”

  “Yeah, but you haven’t opened your eyes,” he said. “How do I know you’re not talking in your sleep? That this isn’t a dream, and you won’t freak at me when you wake up and realize my dick is rammed up in your pussy?”

  It was nice that he was considerate, although she sensed the teasing in his voice, so she didn’t know how many of his words were genuine and which were just his way of stretching out the seduction by using speech to torment her. It was working. Because she could feel her natural lubrication building, preparing her body to accept him, and she wanted him, just as she’d wanted him every time they’d come together last night.

  Being with him was new and exciting and yet, he felt stable, like a relentless force that she could get used to having in her life. Although she didn’t want to wake, she pried her eyelids apart until she could blink him into focus, which took her a minute because she tried to keep her gaze as narrow as she could. This kind of bliss needed to be memorized and she needed her eyes closed to heighten her other senses, to smell him, to hear him breathe, to feel his chest move against hers and every point of skin contact.

  His muscles imprinted themselves on her soft, pliable form that was ready to be owned and dominated. “I’m awake,” she said again and tilted her chin to try and tempt his mouth.

  But they only made feather-light contact before he stole himself from her reach. “I thought you had places to be today and things to do.”

  He hadn’t been supposed to spend the night. She’d tried to walk away from him in the street, but that turned out to be a joke. Their afternoon sex had been too amazing, their date had brought them closer, and she’d thought she could walk away from this man? Impossible.

  “You’ll need to do something to wake me up then,” she said, because if she wasn’t given a boost of energy, she’d be happy to languish here all day. “To remind me of my responsibilities.”

  “You’re not getting out of this bed until I’m through with you and that might take a very long time.”

  There was that promise again. Something he didn’t say was somehow conveyed in the way he gazed at her. “I might be able to live with that,” she said.

  “Good, because what I tasted last night has only made me hungry for more.”

  “More?” she said, too caught up in the intoxication of hormones to remember the aches in her muscles caused by what they’d done last night. “Fella, you about squeezed me dry. You fuck me like no other man ever has.”

  “And I’ll keep fucking you like that,” he said. “I’ll fuck you any damn way I like. I’ll fuck you here, at my place, in my car, in your club, any fucking place I choose.” And he meant it, he couldn’t speak like that, with such conviction, such certainty, without meaning every single word. “I’ll guarantee no other man will ever touch you because you’ll be touched by me every minute of every day. They won’t have a chance to hurt you, to seduce you away, because I’ll be there to watch. I plan to learn everything about you, Squirm, everything there is to know and I’ll make damn sure that you never feel unsafe again. You’ll never be vulnerable again. I’ve got you. Anyone who tries to hurt you, answers to me, and I’ll always get to them before they get to you.”

  “Archer,” she purred, aroused by his words, his body, his gaze. “I’ll never betray you either.”

  She wanted him to know that she was sticking around, just like Derren had. Archer might not understand why the man had taken an interest in him, but she did and it was beyond sexual. There was a power within him, a light dimmed by darkness.

  Circumstance had made him hard and unforgiving, but she’d looked into the man who rescued her from Sizzle, who couldn’t put her to work, who’d freed her from his captivity and she saw a fierce man who had his own morality dowsed in integrity. He might cut corners, he might do wicked things for money for other people, but he deserved more than the hand he’d been dealt.

  He deserved her patience, deserved her loyalty, and in a way, they’d been blessed by the need to stay together while they completed their task because it would give them time, and the excuse, to be together for as long as it took. In other circumstances, they might have pushed each other away; she had been guilty of doing that with men in her past, usually after Tag voiced disapproval over their character.

  But not this time. Archer was here and he was telling her he wasn’t going to let her get away.

  She was given more room when her pelvis was freed by his and she prepared to accept his kiss, but it didn’t come. Archer rose to his knees and got to his feet. Despite the proud erection jutting toward her, he only looked down at her and yawned as he scratched the top of his head.

  Then he turned around and separated the drapes of gauze, tossing one over the back of the couch to leave a space for her to view him lumbering to the kitchen where he began opening cupboards and drawers indicating that he was on the hunt.

  “What are you looking for?” she asked when he closed one cupboard to open another.

  “Food,” he said.

  She could understand his need for nourishment, he was a big guy who had to work out to have muscles like he did. He probably needed a lot of energy and he’d expended a lot last night meaning he’d need to replenish his stores.

  “What kind of food?”

  “Something decent,” he muttered.

  Sitting up in the middle of the bed
, she held the blanket to her chest and drew up her knees. “I have something you can eat over here,” she said and only when he twisted away from his search to look at her did she let her raised knees part in sync with the elevation of her brow.

  “Horny in the morning, aren’t you?” he said and went back to his rifling. When he didn’t find anything more exciting, he returned to one of the original cupboards he’d opened to pull out a box of cereal. “Cheerios. That’s all you’ve got for me?”

  She shook her head when he dug his hand in the box to pull out a fistful of the cereal pieces. “I told you, there’s a feast over here.”

  Stuffing the cereal into his mouth, he went for another handful as he moseyed back to the bedroom. He guzzled a third lot, discarded the box to the bedside, and picked up the water bottle she’d filled last night to gulp down what remained in it.

  After he was done and the bottle was returned to its spot, he dropped to his knees at the side of the bed. “Bring it,” he said, patting the mattress in front of him.

  She couldn’t believe that he was actually yielding to her suggestion. But he certainly didn’t seem hesitant. He scrubbed the back of his hand over his mouth, cleared his throat and then threw the covers away from where he knelt, and from her, sending them right off the end of the bed.

  The position was just fine for her, so she scooted over. He caught the leg she threw over his head before it landed, and wrapped it around the back of his head. With his palms on the front of her thighs, he gave her a harsh yank until she was right at the very edge and then his head went lower and she felt his breath against her opening.

  But it was his fingers that met flesh first. They spread between each of her creases. He parted her and rubbed the pad of one thumb and the pad of the other back and forth, plumping her clit. The heat of his breath still warmed her folds.

  “Better than Cheerios,” he hummed and then his tongue slid inside her.

  She hadn’t been prepared for how close she was or how inspiring the girth of his tongue pushing into her would be. Desire made her writhe. Climax tickled the edges of her consciousness; she could already feel it building. His tongue went deep, deeper than she’d have thought it would and his thumbs continued to work until eventually his tongue slid out slowly before working its way back in, sending her closer to the crescendo she craved.

  When his hands slid away, disappointment whimpered from her lips and she arched her pelvis, but they only slid down her thighs, over her knees to direct both legs tighter around his head. Massaging her own breasts, she pinched her nipples, and ran her hands up her shoulders, over her neck to her face and into her hair.

  His tongue was still there doing its work. It slid out and upwards, right through the seam of her body. Her enlivened slit was quaking, ready to accept him, ready to take what he wanted to give. The very tip of his tongue slithered over her clit. It went up and down to stimulate her then he pressed it close, covering the entire sensitized nub with the heat of his rough, wet muscle.

  His hands came back to slide under her ass and angle her upward to allow him to taste her deeper, to suck her harder, to stimulate her clit between his lips. As they eased back and forth, his tongue just met the most alive point on her body. Massaging it with his lips, he kissed her then slid his tongue back down through her and let gentle suction form between his mouth and her body’s threshold.

  “Archer,” she breathed, stuttering his name.

  Her hands were on her breasts again, but they didn’t stay still for long. They glided over her abdomen, and she was amazed by how every tiny touch of his, and of hers, fired neurons in her mind to tell her that orgasm was her only option, that she wouldn’t live without it, wouldn’t live without him.

  His kiss left her and for the briefest moment, she feared that was it. That he planned to abandon her right when she was so close, nearly there, teetering on that precipice… Then like a pro he began to rub her clit with his tongue again, faster this time, and his thumbs were back, beneath her now, coming from below, they rubbed up and down from his mouth to her pussy, up and down making her gasp. When his lips closed around her to give one hard suck, he pushed her over that cliff and she descended into the oblivion of ecstasy he’d promised.

  Without a chance to put her thoughts back in order, or to form words let alone sentences, she was shoved back by his large hands on her ass until her head almost hit the opposite wall that her bed was flush against.

  The consuming nature of his next mouth kiss jolted her equilibrium and the taste of her own body merged on their tongues, which unleashed a second wave of climax. While she was right in the middle of this rapture, he pushed his cock into her.

  They’d done it so many times that she was becoming accustomed to his size. But she felt every inch of his engorged shaft and every microsecond of his invasion. Yes, she would probably be sore later in the light of day when she was no longer lost in this thrill, but she didn’t care about that. All she cared about was him here, fucking her, kissing her. Except the kiss didn’t last.

  “You are horny,” he said. “You’re starved. I don’t deprive you, I give you every inch of cock you need.” She couldn’t deny her yearning. “You’re gobbling me deep. You want it bad.”

  Nya hadn’t realized how fast her hips were moving, but they were racing his. In fact, even though she was beneath him, she was almost setting the pace. Her pelvis rose and fell, rose and fell, and his was forced to work in opposition, to maximize the sensations driven by this joining.

  Their unions had become instinctive, though they kind of always had been. They’d slipped into easy sync. She knew how he wanted her to move, when she should squeeze him inside, when she should let him go. She knew how to run her hands over his chest, how he liked the way she scratched her nails on the side of his neck. He always growled when her fingers combed up into his hair behind his ears and dragged back down to crunch and tug.

  Nya knew how to tempt his mouth to hers, though she knew he would resist her kiss as it was part of the game. Except she triumphed in that moment. She got what she wanted as he was distracted by what was happening with their hips.

  Managing to coil her tongue around his, the intimacy of the act was heightened by the sweetness of the cereal still lingering in his mouth and the taste of her own self. Those tastes fused as their tongues and bodies warred for completion. He took her back to the place he’d taught her was her new home.

  When he stole dominance of the kiss, she didn’t fight to get it back. Tipping her head, she screamed loud, something she would never normally do, something she would ordinarily be self-conscious of. Nya liked to be private, to keep to herself, to never let others know what she was doing. But with Archer, she was loud, loud enough that she made her own ears ring.

  She screamed, she shrieked, she gasped and moaned. Sometimes she said his name, sometimes she said her own. Sometimes she was just screaming, “Yes!” Sometimes she was screaming, “More!”

  Every time she opened her eyes, she read satisfaction in his features, a determination to please her, and a determination to bring himself to that same mindless oblivious insanity that she dwelled in when he was inside her.

  The sheer force of this scream unleashed what she needed to rid herself of. The passion, the frustration, the anger, the upset, everything she’d been through came out in that scream and something about that vulnerability, about showing such bare, raw emotion made him retort with a similar growling call. He swore and fired hard into her, his hips shunting hers with such force that her head hit the wall.

  Panting, she knew he was done and she was spent, but couldn’t stop shivering through the aftershocks of the last orgasm he’d delivered to her. “Oh, baby,” he half whispered in a tone she couldn’t decipher, probably because she still couldn’t hear right or see straight.

  In a subconscious move, she lifted her head and he gave her a kiss before he tried to roll away. But just as she had when they woke up, she clamped herself tight, locking her legs aroun
d his pelvis and her arms around his neck. “Stay,” she said. She didn’t want him to ever leave her body despite the fact that their union was over, at least for now.

  “Right here?” he said like he didn’t understand what she was getting at, or what this was supposed to achieve.

  “Yes, just for a minute.”

  And he did. He didn’t move. He stayed there, braced on his forearms with their sticky bodies glued together. Regardless of their uneven breaths and their lack of cohesive thought, she wondered if she’d ever been this content in a single moment with a man in her life.

  “What’s going on?” he asked and his forehead bumped hers. “In there.”

  Her eyes were closed again like she was trying to recapture the sleep he’d forced her from earlier, not that she was complaining, given how that had ended for her.

  “Come on,” he said, resting his forehead on hers and moving his head side to side as if he could encourage the thoughts to be released by agitating her brain inside her skull.

  “Nothing bad,” she whispered, trying to tilt for his kiss, but he didn’t give her it.

  “You tell me what I want to know before you get a treat.”

  Like punishment and reward, if she told him what he wanted to know he’d kiss her. He’d give her everything she wanted. But until she did, she was in the naughty corner and she wouldn’t be gratified by him.

  “It’s just…” She didn’t want to remind him of how they’d started, how they’d met, but it was relevant to answering his question. “With everything that’s happened in these past days, this week, with you at yours and Tag, Bryant, and Jonno, and everyone else, I just… feel like I haven’t stopped, feel like I haven’t been able to just breathe and relax and exist. But with you here, it just… I don’t have to worry about any of that. We can just be us. Be happy and chill. And it’s been a long time since I’ve been able to say that. I just wish…”

  “What do you wish?” he asked when she didn’t continue.

  It seemed so ridiculous, childish almost, that she didn’t want to say it. “I just wish we could shut the world outside for a while,” she said. “Just stay here and spend this time screwing and getting to know each other and just being human beings going about their lives without the drama and the upset that is waiting for us out there.”