Don't Game Me (Game Lords Book 2)

by Zoe Forward

  On a moan, he slid all the way in.

  She cried out and arched as pleasure and pain melded.

  He leaned in and kissed her deep until she thought she couldn’t breathe. He pulled away. “You have to stop pushing me like that.”

  Stop? Her lips tingled after the kiss, and her breasts ached. She could barely think. Yet, there was only one answer. “No.”

  “Hmm…” He’d shattered everything she thought she knew about this. He began to move inside her, quickly gaining in pace and strength.

  She couldn’t concentrate. Sensations rose in her.

  He lifted her thighs. “Wrap your legs around me.”

  She obeyed but had to nibble her lower lip to keep from screaming when he slid deeper, shooting off a ripple of sensation. As if he couldn’t resist, he leaned down to taste her lips. He kissed her with slow, thorough possession. His breath shuddered, and his muscles trembled. She stroked her hands down his back, enjoying the feel of his skin and the sheen of sweat on his body.

  Nothing had ever been as good as this.

  She arched against him, taking everything he had—the strength and power.

  Becca slid one hand around front to feel him entering her. He slowed and let her play with him as she touched him.

  “Christ, that’s amazing, baby, but I’m not going to last much longer.”

  She smiled, impatient to watch him lose control.

  “Let go,” he told her, pulling back slightly.

  She nodded, unable to speak.

  He drew her hand between her legs. “Touch yourself, baby. Let me watch you get there.”

  Could her face burn any hotter? Oh. My. God. She locked gazes with him, almost releasing a bashful denial. But the intensity burning in his eyes drove her.

  She touched herself and bucked, too sensitized.

  “Go easy,” he whispered, making tiny motions with his hips.

  She circled her clit while he watched intently. The faster she went, the more of him she received. The incentive worked, but he wouldn’t give her all of him no matter how much she begged, and she did hear herself begging.

  Sensation built, rapid and forceful.

  “I feel it, Becca. Feel you shivering around me. Come on. I’ll give you everything.”

  “Jake…”

  “Not yet, not yet…”

  The coil of pleasure snapped inside her, flinging her over the cliff. At her first shattering cry, he gave her everything. Every powerful thrust, every animalistic growl she needed to hear. This was enough to fuel her fantasies for years.

  He slept restlessly. Jake woke around midnight to Becca crawling over him, taking him into her mouth and kissing him to full arousal. She sucked him to a devastating climax. He brought her to another shattering release. This time she let him use his mouth to take her all the way there.

  He woke a little after two a.m. to her dozing across his stomach. Her small hand rested limply over his arm. He stroked her silky hair, enjoying its texture.

  Everything with this woman awed him. He wanted it all over again but halted initiating when he realized with cold dread that he wanted them in bed again tomorrow. He wanted next weekend, and contemplated flying to California for a long weekend on the excuse of a business trip. There was an incredible collectible store in L.A. she’d appreciate. He wanted so much more than sex. He looked forward to finishing the Hobbit series with her. He wanted to talk about some of his ideas for integrating their VR goggles with new technology, which had his mind churning with possibilities.

  Cold fear overshadowed pleasure.

  He’d never wanted a woman to stick around beyond one or two nights. Of course, his chosen bedmates usually didn’t engage him beyond quick physical release. What little they packed upstairs they made up for in looks. He usually gave nothing of himself in conversation and very little emotionally to those encounters. The ladies always seemed okay with that.

  To Becca, though, he’d given everything. He’d delighted in every throaty moan and each release. He’d liked when she wrapped herself around him in a tight hug afterward as if she didn’t want to be separated from him even for an instant. Usually, that made him claustrophobic, but he’d enjoyed it.

  She’d drawn him in with the temptation of intimacy.

  He didn’t do intimacy. He would not let his father win and turn into the genetically predisposed abusive asshole.

  Carefully, he disentangled himself from her and padded to his kitchen. He popped open a protein drink and guzzled.

  This had been a mistake. A huge mistake. Noah and Michael would kill him. Becca was going to hate him forever. He’d lose the Harrisons.

  What the hell was he going to do about this?

  14

  Becca woke with a satisfied yawn. She should be in a great mood. A gorgeous man made her feel beautiful last night. More than that. He’d sailed her on a wave of orgasmic bliss yet enabled her to retain a feeling of power. That was talent.

  The bedside clock registered four thirty a.m. But Jake wasn’t next to her. His side of the bed wasn’t even warm. Bad sign.

  The room was cast into low light that emanated from beneath the adjoining bathroom. The only hints of personality in the room were a few photos in frames on his dresser and the items of clothes strewn about. Like the rest of the apartment, everything else was picture-perfect as if selected by a designer—beautiful and high quality but impersonal.

  Becca pulled on his abandoned shirt and buttoned a few buttons. No Jake in the bathroom or TV room. She checked her phone out of habit.

  Pascal: Time’s ticking. We need results.

  She gripped the fake phone tight. His office might still be unlocked, but his computer might be off. All she had to do was turn it on and see if it integrated to the mainframe at work. Didn’t even need to have it password opened.

  Movement in the kitchen. Now wasn’t her moment.

  “That you, Becca?” he called out.

  “Yeah.” If she had this kitchen with its marble countertops and dark wood cabinets, she’d die happy, especially with its gas range. How she’d dreamed of cooking with gas instead of the electric POS in her California apartment. Electric never held temperature quite right. Her eye caught on an old-fashioned apple timer on the stove, so out of place in this kitchen. Perhaps it was a carryover from his childhood?

  Jake remained absorbed in his laptop computer screen, scrolling as he leaned into a counter, shirtless, wearing only PJ bottoms.

  Her fingers wrapped the phone from Pascal. The laptop probably wasn’t connected, although he might be connected right now.

  Bile churned in her stomach. She didn’t want to hurt Jake or her brother or sabotage the company they’d slaved to make an international success.

  To do or not do—either way led to someone getting hurt because of her.

  Jake wasn’t paying attention.

  She clicked to turn on the phone and pretended absorption.

  A swipe over the appropriate app. The right sequence of clicks keyed in, and she was into his system. The cool part about this tech, even though it was scary invasive, was that the user actually on the computer had no clue she was probing around. Jake was already online, in his mainframe and looking at some document. Took a bit, but she found financial information. Not much, but something. A swipe and it’d been copied onto the phone. Later, she’d send it to Pascal.

  Oh God. She shouldn’t have.

  But she had. Phase one, breaking into NJ Legacy mainframe and stealing files, was done.

  “You okay?” He glanced up.

  She dropped the phone. With a swipe, she picked it up off the floor and closed its home screen. She swallowed hard against bile working itself up her throat and swiped sweat off her forehead. “You working?”

  “Mmhm.”

  She peeked over his shoulder at the screen. A document. In German. “How’d you learn German?”

  “My grandmother was German. I spent a fair bit of time with her while my parents…worked through i
ssues when I was a kid.”

  He twisted and kissed her. She didn’t deserve this kiss, not after what she’d just done. As if picking up on her stress, he smoothed a hand down her spine, the act both soothing and sexy.

  Daggone, this man could kiss. His hands roamed her sides and slid into the shirt and around her naked waist. The kiss deepened, and he lifted her onto the counter.

  He broke the kiss, frowned, and lifted her down. “We need to talk.”

  “Talk?” Did he know what she’d just done? No, he couldn’t. She prayed he wouldn’t quiz her on why she was freaked out.

  “Yes, now.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead. Chaste. Odd.

  He moved to a barstool height chair at the counter and pulled out the other one. “Now, I can concentrate. Have a seat.”

  She moved on autopilot to the designated stool.

  Tension lined his face.

  She rushed to say, “Let’s not talk.”

  His face went into emotional lockdown. “I want you again. Don’t think there’s anything wrong with you. There’s not. That wasn’t easy to stop. I want you naked for the next twenty-four hours, but we have other activities scheduled for today.”

  “Okay.” Where was this going?

  “You want me too.” His lips curved up at the corners.

  “Not denying it.” She wanted this talking done so they could get back to being naked, so he could make her forget the rest of the world for another few hours.

  “I care about you.” He leaned forward and wrapped her hands in his large grip. “There’s only one option in all this.”

  “All right.” No clue to what he referred.

  “Great. You agree, then.” He relaxed. “Because we both needed this to work off what had been building between us. Once the sun comes up, things can go back to normal with us arguing and evading each other. This thing between us will be over, and no one else will ever suspect we, you know, had this night.”

  She almost nodded agreement because she was so entrenched in her fantasy of them naked in the kitchen. Then his words sank in. Dread cooled her skin. “What?”

  “We can have a bit more of a great time. Then, go back to normal.”

  “Normal?”

  “Yeah.” He smiled as if relieved.

  A numb feeling seeped into her skull. Normal should be good. Once he found out what had been done to his system, put two and two together, he’d hate her. But the woman in her who, apparently, had read far more into their evening than she should’ve was offended. The part of her struggling to stay alive and not have a mental breakdown urged her to avoid the fight and leave.

  He leaned toward her to place a soft kiss on her lips with a smile, a gesture so seemingly gentle and caring. His mouth moved down her neck, placing small kisses.

  He was trying to put her into the same box he did every other woman in his life. Short-term, no emotional investment, and fleeting. Now he probably planned some smoking hot good-bye sex, and then he’d magically move on to the next girl.

  Her brain seesawed. Hot sex might distract her from reality. Dignity demanded she fight, even though they didn’t have a future.

  Whatever they’d shared last night had been unique. Special. She’d never connected with a man like she did with Jake, and not just sexually. Perhaps he hadn’t connected. Maybe he was just talented in bed, like everyone said. She was the next dippy one-nighter overwhelmed by his skills. Her chest stung like someone ripped it open and a poured alcohol in there.

  Damn it, she had far more feelings for this man than she realized. Or wanted. That was a lie. She’d known. She hadn’t wanted to recognize it might lead to this moment with her all in emotionally, and him not so much.

  She deserved this pain for hacking his system.

  “Back to normal? Fine.” She stood straight and took a step away from him, balling her fist to avoid slapping him. “If you want to live up to your reputation as a one-night man, then so be it. Last night was okay. But we’re not doing it again.”

  He stood and stepped close to her. “It was way more than okay. I’m not saying you have to go right now. Only that we can’t have more than this night, because Noah would kill me if he knew.”

  “How do you know what Noah would or would not approve of?” His blank look communicated a chasm of fear he wasn’t willing to cross for her. Okay, that hurt more than anything else. “I don’t care what Noah thinks. I don’t need his stamp of approval on who I sleep with. But have it your way. The easy way. It happened. Now it’s over.”

  She stalked into the television area and grabbed her discarded dress and purse. Then she headed to the bedroom and ripped off the borrowed shirt, slightly mollified by the sound of buttons hitting the hardwood floor. She yanked on her clothes but couldn’t find her thong. After a brief search, she gave up.

  A glimpse in his bathroom mirror proved there was no fixing her morning-after shame. Stubble burn highlighted both cheeks. Her face was just a little too red. She’d have a devil of a time with makeup to mask this.

  Jake stepped into her path before she made it to the front door. “Becca, I thought you understood.”

  Her head dropped onto her chest. Shoving her personal freak fest to the periphery, she tried to focus on what was going on. “You’re right. This is best.” She placed her palm against his cheek gently. “I’m sorry. For everything. More sorry than you’ll ever know.”

  He reached out for her arm as she stepped away, catching her as before she touched the doorknob. “What’re you talking about? You didn’t do anything wrong.”

  She forced a smile. “I’m not one of your random one-night girls you need to soothe before you shove out the door. I’m walking out. We can never have the normal you want. We never had normal before. We’ll just move on. You do what you do best, which is run.” Softly, she added, “It’s better for you, anyways.”

  That hadn’t gone as planned. It might’ve if he’d stuck to his plan, which had been not to jump into bed with her. Jake wanted to run after her and make this right. Or at least figure out what the hell she’d been talking about. It’s better for you, anyways. It almost sounded like she was warning him off.

  For the first time in his life, he didn’t have a premeditated next step. He didn’t know what to do to make it right. He didn’t know what he wanted from her other than her back here, smiling and in his bed. Did that mean he really wanted a tomorrow? And a next day? What was he supposed to do?

  Come on, you always know.

  The next step with a woman in the past always came to him as an obvious move, almost second nature for him. He knew exactly how everything would play out. Except with Becca.

  It could be why was she the only woman who messed up his game. Actually, he had no game when it came to Becca. Years of experience and all of that knowledge amounted to exactly jack shit when it really mattered.

  She mattered. To him. He didn’t want to be enemies with her, at least that was one small fact he recognized. Beyond that, he remained confused as hell.

  How could he have messed up so badly?

  An hour later, Jake sat in his car in the parking garage. He checked his phone for the fifth time in the past few minutes. No message from her.

  He’d texted Becca twenty minutes ago to make sure she made it back to the hotel.

  The last thing Jake wanted was to hurt her. Yet, he’d done it anyway. He was the worst asshole ever.

  He shouldn’t have promised Noah they’d go for a run this morning. The absolute last person he wanted to face right now was Becca’s big brother. He texted Noah: In traffic. On my way.

  If only he were in actual traffic. He shoved the key in the ignition and grabbed a can of Red Bull out of the cup holder. He chugged the nasty stuff, needing a turbo charge to do this run. Jogging on little sleep and ramped up on caffeine seemed like a pretty bad way to start this big day.

  Now he had to get his mind straight to hide from Noah what happened. During the drive, he played out scenarios to smooth things o
ver with Becca. All held low odds of working.

  Two miles into their jog, Noah reached out and grabbed Jake’s arm, stopping him. Noah rested his hands on his legs, panting. “What’s up your ass today?” He rolled his watch and whistled. “We just did a nine-minute mile. I haven’t done a nine-minute mile since high school. Are you trying to kill me before the ceremony? Or prove I really am Superman?”

  “Sorry. You okay?” Jake hadn’t realized he’d been moving so fast. He’d been trying to erase the picture of Becca’s disappointment from his brain.

  “Hurts my ego you asked, but I’m not a sprinter.” He pulled upright with a deep breath and stared at Jake critically. “It’s a girl problem, isn’t it?”

  “I don’t have girl problems. I drank Red Bull before I came.”

  “You’re a mess today. Your socks don’t match. You showed up late. You weren’t aware of how fast you were running. You only drink Red Bull on emergency days when you didn’t have any sleep. Red Bull makes you nuts. No sleep and morning stress…yeah, girl problems.” His face darkened. “Did you and my sister…?”

  “I kept Becca out of reach of jerks last night like you asked.” Just not me. He hated lying to Noah. He’d never been this deep is mistruth. But you didn’t exactly lie, at least not yet.

  “You better sure as hell not’ve last night…”

  “I worked late on the Germany marketing issue. Woke up around two or so and worked. Got jacked on Red Bull.” That part was true.

  “You work too hard. I benefit, but take a break once in a while.” Noah clapped him on the shoulder. “Promise me you didn’t lose the rings.”

  “Got ’em.” In his tux bag in the trunk of his car.

  “Did you finish your best man speech?”

  Shit. No. Supposed to finish it last night. He faked a smile. “Yes.”

  “Liar. You may be able to bullshit your way through any public talk, but this is my wedding.”

  “I’ll come up with some embarrassing tidbit about you.”

  “Don’t use the thing from undergrad that involved the cheerleader and a dare. That was awful. I’ve had some serious crash-and-burns, but that one wins. Best we leave that in the long-ago past. How’d it go getting Becca back to her hotel last night? Any battle scars?”