‘Like you do,’ she said, and found his gaze.
‘Mol, I—‘
‘Shh,’ she said. ‘I know. I have no expectations. I was a job to you and coming to terms with that is difficult. I’m hurt and humiliated and… I know that you’re sexually attracted to me, and that if we did act on that attraction that you’d only end up hurting me because you’re not interested in forever. I get all that. But if I can feel this way with you, then I can feel it with someone else, right? I don’t want to settle for half measures. If nothing else, then all of this business with the murders has taught me that life is too short.’
‘Life is too short,’ he muttered, staring into the middle distance.
Words were forgotten when his determined mouth met hers, and he devoured her in a rage of passion. Sliding down the bed, she took him with her, pulling his reassuring weight onto her body. Questions and talking were irrelevant. Being hurt wasn’t what she wanted, but reason and rationality were neglected concepts now that their tongues twined in acknowledgement of the burning lure that they could no longer ignore. Blake shifted to dispense with the blanket, and when his hands skimmed up her body she was struck by just how right this felt in comparison to what she had experienced downstairs.
‘Mol,’ he whispered onto her, then tasted her again. ‘Let me try.’
‘Try?’ she panted, so frustrated by this delay that she snatched hold of his neck and forced their mouths together again. Her need for him was overwhelming. Already, she was aware of the bulge of his pulsing member. His fervour drove itself into her hip, and that awareness poured hot, wet desire through all of her senses and into her blood.
‘Trust me,’ he said. ‘Let me try.’
‘What?’ she asked, trying to decipher what he was implying while seeking out his kiss.
Surrendering to the hunger, she whimpered when Blake thrust his tongue against hers to battle for residence. ‘To be your full measure,’ he said, taking his pampering lips to explore her tingling neck.
Yanking his mouth off of her body, she stared up into him. ‘You want to do this? You want us to do this? Properly?’ Pounding in her belly tugged on her slow smile.
‘I can’t be without you, babe,’ he said. ‘You were never a job, Mol. I’ve wanted you all to myself since the moment I set foot downstairs.’
‘Really?’ she asked, caressing his face.
‘You were never a mark. I tried to convince myself that you were because I was so scared of losing you.’
‘Scared?’
‘You asked me what I was scared of,’ he said. ‘You asked what my fear was… this, Mol… this is my fear. I’m scared of laying myself bare to someone that I care about, of giving them my all only to have it thrown back at me. You were right… I’m scared to get close to anyone… but you… with you it is so easy. You’ve never made me feel exposed.’
‘I don’t know how you did this to me,’ she said, finally allowing her own smile to flourish. ‘I don’t date, I hate cops… yet here I am.’
‘Will you?’ he asked, stroking her hair with his fingertips. ‘Will you let me do my damndest to be the one for you?’
Molly sucked her lip into her mouth. Could she believe him? Could she not? She shouldn’t want this, she shouldn’t want him. But he had no reason to lie to her anymore. She wasn’t a suspect; he had shown her the file. As far as she knew, since she’d discovered the truth of his occupation, he had been open and honest with her.
‘Promise me that you’ll never lie to me again. About anything. Lies of omission count.’
His lips widened. ‘I promise.’
‘Then I’m all yours,’ she whispered.
Her glow transferred to him, and once again their lips met. The fury of the blending wasn’t as fierce as before, instead it was his pure devotion that seared her loins more than any kiss they had shared before.
Whipping off his shirt, his hands closed around her breasts to test the flesh and learn the shape of her. The sweep of his fondling hands was so warm it connected every sensitive zone of her body, inside and out. The pound of her heart became connected to that point of her core, tingling through her neglected passage. The sensations intensified when his palms skimmed over the quivering flesh of her abdomen and landed on the tender surface of her aching thighs. He took the time to spoil every inch of her with his caress sending more bolts of fervour to each and every crevice and mound of her form. Molly parted her legs wider around him, hoping to consume his body with her own.
As distracted as she was by his exploration of her figure, he managed to maintain his indulgence of their mouths. This was a kiss without end, one that was finally allowed without betrayal or misdirection. This was the truth of who they were, and what they wanted. In that mating of tongues and mingling of sweet saliva, she conveyed to him that she was ready for this, for him, for them.
The drugging kiss loosened her body and all worries ebbed away. He took all of her panic and uncertainty and without words expressed to her that he would look after her, that he cared, and that she was his priority. His massage continued, and while he pampered her frame he managed to find her the depths of her being while barely making contact, forcing the pulse of desire to build, to grow and spread until her longing for him was all consuming.
He might be a cop, and they might have difficulties to surmount in the not-too-distant future, but the mass of his solid body on top of hers soothed her. The kiss slid to her jaw, to her clavicle, and then he was sliding away the straps of her dress and teasing the exposed mounds of flesh with a talented mouth.
‘Blake,’ she exhaled, knowing that his mouth would take as much time to treat her as his hands had and she wasn’t sure she was capable of processing that extent of sensation.
He drew back, but she couldn’t bring herself to open her eyes. Wriggling in her bed, she prepared for what was to come and a flood of moisture in her centre betrayed how long she’d craved it, despite her words having said otherwise.
Distraction abound, she made herself check where his mouth had gone, hoping that he hadn’t been deterred. His eyes were all over her now-bared body, scrutinising the path his hands had just travelled. Of their own volition her nipples peaked, flattered by the hunger in his gaze, and his finger came up to trace the fullness of her breast. Her eyes floated shut and her already straining nipples tightened further. A long, satisfied whimper seeped from her mouth when his lips touched hers again.
Blake grinned down at her, gripping her waist with feral possession. ‘You taste sweet, Sugar, and now you’re all mine.’
A smile bled onto Molly’s face. Now that she’d surrendered to the truth of her emotions she felt like a teenager, all blushes and giggles at the attention from the man who gave her such adoration and thrills.
He wrapped the full length of his long, warm fingers around her narrow wrists and clamped her down to kiss her. She had no intention of going anywhere, but this was his way of possessing her, and of giving her security in the knowledge that as long as he held her she was safe, stable, and finally, no longer alone.
Sliding his mouth to her throat, he investigated all of her with lips, and teeth, and tongue, leaving no millimetre neglected. His attention reduced her to a mute. Mute, except for the satisfied moan that persisted in her. Starting an expedition of her own, she slid her palms across his naked chest, down the flesh of his back and into the back of his jeans. Squeezing him closer to her, she ground against his rigid passion.
‘You don’t play fair,’ she whispered against his neck, before nipping his ear lobe with her teeth. ‘You’re so in control, and I’m a mess of hormones.’
‘Control is the last thing I have,’ he said, pushing an arm under her to hold her hips up so he could slide off her dress and her panties. Removing his own jeans gave him an interlude to explore her body again.
‘Get down here,’ she said, grabbing hold of him to pull his body onto hers. ‘You have a job to do.’ Locking her legs around him, she revelled in the press of his
engorged organ on her centre.
‘One I hope I’ll have for a long time,’ he said.
‘You’re so meticulous… I think I could get used to this kind of comprehensive attention.’
‘That’s my plan,’ he said, probing her entrance with a fingertip. ‘I’m not a man who leaves any avenue unexplored.’
‘There’s one you’ve missed,’ she said, arching up again, sucking his digit into her core.
‘Not for long,’ he said, stroking the channel within her. Her breathing quickened and he smiled, but she couldn’t see straight anymore, then he pressed into her clit, flicking it to send a barb of endorphins flooding her brain and prickling through all of her pores. ‘This might be the most promising lead yet.’
She was so engorged and desperate for completion that she didn’t even mind the cop hot talk, though she might later. ‘Do you want me to finish the job for you?’ she asked, on the cusp of frustration.
‘Not so funny when you’re on the other side of the teasing,’ he said, licking her lower lip.
Opening her mouth to argue with him, she was cut off by the plunge of his thick member invading her core. Gasping out his name, her eyes met his and he was right there above her, showering her with adoration.
‘I solved the mystery,’ he said, moving slowly in and out of her.
‘The mystery?’
‘This is it, this is what life’s all about.’
She’d told him not to sleep with anyone he met downstairs, and here she was, breaking her own rule. But this was different and she knew it, every atom in her burned with the certainty. His pace increased then the words and all concepts of reality were lost to oblivion. Emotion and sensation took over as they bonded, building towards their climax. This might be their first joining, but she couldn’t imagine how it could ever get better from here, except somehow she knew that it would.
‘Are you ok?’ he asked. Molly nodded. ‘You’re quiet. Really quiet. In fact, I’ve never seen you this quiet.’
Molly held up her hand and rolled onto her side away from him causing fear to shoot through him. Blake had to consider that maybe she wasn’t satisfied with his performance. Or that she was regretting what they had said before they’d made love. Perhaps actually having sex with a cop had pushed her over the edge. Maybe it was guilt or shame or—
She flopped back onto her back and pinned him in her gaze. The smile that slunk onto her lips made his eyes narrow. She was feeling mischievous, he could read that look in her eye. His arm was spread across the top of her pillow, so he lowered his hand to ruffle her hair.
‘What is that look for? Do you have ideas, Miss Ashton?’
One side of her mouth tipped up and she knelt up on the bed, kissing his cheek as she leaned off her side of the bed. To steady herself she had to take his hand, and after entrusting her weight to him she leaned further.
‘What are you doing?’ he asked, but relished the sight of her naked body stretched taut along the bed.
When she did shoot back up she was wearing a grin that he had no time to ask about, because she elevated her other hand to show that a silk scarf was dangling between her fingers.
‘Tell me you’re joking,’ he said, gawping from the scarf to her. She shook her head. ‘You’re joking, or I have made a serious error in judgement here.’
She pouted and her chin fell to her shoulder, showering her in her flurry of mussed hair. He shrugged and lifted his hand toward the bedpost. ‘In for a penny, in for a pound,’ he said.
To reach his wrist she had to stretch over him, and he couldn’t resist sucking her puckered nipple into his mouth as it danced above his lips. She shrieked and leapt back to kneel on her feet. ‘What?’ he said, all innocence.
‘You were going to let me do that,’ she said, and tossed the scarf to the floor. ‘You were really going to let me do that?’
‘You have an alibi. I’m pretty confident it’s accurate, because it’s me.’
‘But… you were so sure of it that you were really going to let me tie you up?’
‘What was that? A trust exercise? Why is it shocking to you that I trust you?’ he asked, and pulled himself up to lean on the headboard after stuffing a pillow behind himself.
‘There is a crazy female serial killer out there,’ she said. ‘How do you know I didn’t finish Mason off downstairs and then come up to snuff you out?’
‘Now that is a very good point,’ he said. ‘It didn’t occur to me.’
‘You? Mr Brilliant mind? It didn’t occur to you? Isn’t that logical?’
‘It’s logical, but it’s not likely. Also, Choker doesn’t let her victims finish. I finished. I definitely finished.’
Molly let out a sigh and nudged his chest before she fell against him. The feel of her hair spilling across him sent webs of desire into his skin. Like needles it pricked and stung his flesh with arousal. Her hand moved onto his sculpted stomach and she pushed her palm into him, forcing her hand up. When she reached his clavicle, it curled and she dragged the tips of her fingernails down against him.
He didn’t hesitate to grab her wrist when her nails reached his hip. He flipped her onto her back and pinned her hands to the mattress by her head.
‘If it shocks you that I would trust you to tie me up,’ he said, and kissed her jaw, then her shoulder. ‘It should shock me that you let me hold you like this. I don’t need scarves, Mol, but it’s the same thing. It’s the same trust.’
He found her neck and caressed it with his moist tongue. He loved the way she wriggled and whimpered against him as he savoured the taste of her.
‘You’ve taken control of me before and never hurt me,’ she said. ‘I know you would never hurt me.’
Finding her gazing up at him, past drowsy eyelids, her lips just hinted at her pleasure she had experienced with him. ‘How? How do you know that?’
‘It’s like you said. You have to trust your intuition.’
‘What does your intuition tell you about me?’ he asked.
‘That you have the power to shatter me whenever you choose,’ she said. ‘But that you would always rather see me happy than hurt.’
‘You have good intuition. I won’t shatter you, Mol… You won’t get rid of me until you take out a restraining order.’
She laughed. ‘Wouldn’t I have to go to a police station for that?’
‘Good point,’ he said, and mimicked an evil laugh. ‘I will forever be by your side then.’
‘Are you friends with lots of police?’ she asked, as his lips returned to their exploration of her body.
‘I’m not friends with a lot of anybody… You don’t have to hang out with them, if that’s what you’re worried about. Keane is the only one you’re ever likely to see.’
‘Jason,’ she said. ‘That’s right.’
‘Should I be jealous of the smile I hear in your voice when you say his name?’
‘I forgot about my agreement with him. I should have brought it up with him when I was at your place.’
‘Ok, are you going to tell me this time?’
‘You’ll see,’ Molly said. ‘We’re going to do it in front of you.’
‘Do what?’ Blake asked. ‘Because I swear to God if it even looks like he is thinking about touching you… or there is the slightest hint that you might get naked…’
‘You are jealous,’ she said. Though he still had her hands pinned, she managed to lift her head and kiss the underside of his chin.
‘Yeah, I am,’ he said. ‘And I will be if any man ever thinks of you that way.’
‘Well, you’re safe,’ she said. ‘I don’t date.’
‘You’re going to date me,’ he said.
‘Am I now?’
‘Yeah, you said you would let me try, and that is what I intend to do.’
‘What if someone sees me with a cop?’ she teased.
‘You won’t be likely to get a parking ticket ever again,’ he said. ‘Or a speeding fine.’
‘I don’t drive,�
�� she said through a squeal of laughter.
‘No, you don’t,’ he said and his eyes wandered up. ‘Your liquor license will be safe forever.’
‘I think it already is,’ she said.
‘Ok,’ he said. ‘Here’s one you’ll like.’
‘What?’ she asked.
‘We can do whatever we want in public, and we’re more likely to get a high five than a citation.’
‘Whatever we want?’ she laughed. ‘Meaning have sex.’
‘Or just making out, whatever you’re comfortable with.’
‘I won’t be having sex with you in the middle of a shopping mall, if that’s what you were thinking.’
‘No,’ he said. ‘I was thinking that we could take a trip to the beach. Find a nice hotel. See nothing of the scenery until dinner. We could eat, walk along the sand, and… see what happens.’
‘I’m blessed, you know that?’
‘I can see that,’ he said, and his eyes wandered down to her chest.
‘Not that, you,’ she said. ‘I get to see the side of you that you’ve hidden from the world for so long. You appear all scary all the time, but you’re a big softy inside.’
‘You’re softer inside than I am,’ he said and wiggled his eyebrows at her. ‘I know it because I’ve been there… recently.’
She laughed. ‘You just ruined a beautiful moment with your crudeness, Mr. Carson.’
‘Detective,’ he said.
‘I hope it doesn’t turn you on to be addressed that way,’ she said. ‘Because it would take me longer than your attention span to get used to the idea of being with a cop.’
‘Don’t worry, I’ll try not to bring my work home too often.’
‘Yeah right,’ she said. ‘Don’t bring your work back to my place. Take it back to your own. I only have one bedroom and the only couch I have is in the bar. I am not spending the night in the bar while you seduce your suspect.’
He shook his head and touched his lips to hers. ‘No more seductions.’
‘Sorry?’ she said.
‘I wouldn’t be able to seduce anyone else… not now.’
‘Why not?’
‘I want you to be faithful to me,’ he said.
Reluctant Suspicion Page 26