She must have still looked dazed, because he brushed a stray curl from her face, his expression growing tender. Almost affectionate.
“Let’s go, Ms. Donovan. I’m starving.”
She ducked her head. “Me too.” She admitted hoarsely. Only, she wasn’t thinking about food as she spoke and pleased, Justin laughed.
********
The restaurant was split into two levels. The hostess led them to a small booth on the bottom level with a lovely view of the freshly risen nightlife. She would have ordered something for herself, but since Justin was familiar with the restaurant she let him have free reign. She wasn’t really hungry for food, but figured that eating something would act as a good distraction.
So while Justin ordered for them both, she watched a horse drawn carriage clop past their window, the occupants too involved with one another to pay their surroundings any mind. She wanted that. To love someone so much that everything else seemed inconsequential. Granted, the lovebirds were probably still in the honeymoon phase of their relationship. Where everything was cast in a rosy light until they saw their partner’s true colors. The eventual disappointment seemed inevitable, but that didn’t make the romance that came before it any less enticing.
“So, I’ve been thinking.” She turned at the sound of Justin’s voice.
“About?”
“The fact that I have no idea what I’m doing when it comes to planning a wedding.”
Her chest suddenly felt achy and strange, but she ignored the sensation.
“It’s really not that hard.” She assured him.
“If this was a traditional wedding, I would agree with you.” He sighed. “The problem is that the media will play as big a role in all of this as Bethany and I. I’m more concerned with which news channel I’m going to call to broadcast the big reveal than I am what color flowers to use as a centerpiece.”
“Shouldn’t you be talking about this with...” her name tasted like ashes in Rei’s mouth. “Bethany?”
“I would,” Justin began, looking chagrined. “But I don’t really like talking to her.”
“In a few months you’re going to have to do a hell of a lot more than just talk to her.” Rei reminded him, unable to keep the censor out of her voice.
“I know.” He said, head bowing, “but I’d like to put off the inevitable for as long as I can.”
“Is this why I’m here? To help you plan your wedding.” she asked, growing increasingly angry, but not sure why. She had no right to be angry with him. As his personal assistant it was her job to help him with things like this. And the more intimate aspect of their relationship shouldn’t even be a consideration. They had an understanding after all.
But still...
“Not exactly.” He finally answered, concern creasing his forehead. “I actually need your help setting up dates and appointments. Tuxedo fittings, press conferences, pre-wedding dinner. Things like that. Any events that we can invite the press to while still controlling the amount of information they’re exposed to.”
“I see. So basically you want to feed the papers what to write so that they won’t start doing any digging.”
“Exactly. I’m afraid I was pretty...verbal about my refusal to take Bethany back when I called off our engagement the last time.”
“The last time? You were engaged to this woman before?”
“Unfortunately.” He grimaced. “It was a media circus, and I didn’t exactly hold my tongue when the shit first hit the fan. Once we admit that we’re giving things a second chance, there’s bound to be some speculation about my change of heart. I don’t want the press digging into why we’re getting married. We give them enough to keep them satisfied, but not enough to guess the real story.”
“What is the real story Justin?” she’d promised herself she wouldn’t pry, but it was like those damn files. Nothing was adding up, and she needed to make sense of something.
Anything.
Even if she wasn’t sure why knowing had suddenly become so important.
“If you hate this woman so much, why are you going to marry her?”
He seemed torn, but in the end he simply sighed and folded his hands on the table before him.
“I thought I was in love with her. When you don’t know what sort of person she is, it’s an easy mistake to make. She’s charming, vivacious, and clever. She can walk into a room and make the lights seem brighter, the music sweeter.”
Rei shifted in her seat. She didn’t like where the conversation was heading and regretted bringing it up.
“The thing about Bethany,” Justin continued carefully, “Is that she knows how to become someone else. She can read a person, and know just what to say and do to get that person to do what she wants. I noticed it after we’d been dating only a few weeks, but brushed it off. Manipulating people wasn’t a crime. It was a skill. Especially in business. But then I noticed that she wasn’t just doing it with strangers. She was like that with everyone. Family, friends, it didn’t matter. She seemed to enjoy causing rifts between people. Lying and saying someone had said or done something that they hadn’t, and sitting back to watch the resulting fallout from a safe distance. That was Bethany’s version of fun. Sowing discord and unhappiness were extracurricular activities for her and it got to the point that I couldn’t stand to be around her.”
Just then their waiter arrived with their food. Justin waited until the man had stepped away again before continuing his story.
“When I broke it off, she started crying. Told me that she didn’t mean to be the way she was but that she couldn’t help it. She was unhappy and it didn’t seem fair that everyone else could go about living their lives when she’d never be able to do the same. That’s when she admitted to having breast cancer and that according to the doctors her diagnosis didn’t look good. She was trying so hard to live her life to the fullest, to appreciate the time she’d been given, but finding out she had the disease had made her so bitter...”
He smiled but it was without humor.
“At least, that was the story she gave me. And I believed her. But it was just one more lie. My worry, my pain, my love for her, was something she could laugh about behind my back while she continued to string me along.”
“But why would she have done such a thing?” Rei felt sick imagining what he must have went through with this woman. There had to be some sort of explanation. A reason why someone would so something so horrible.
“Money.” He answered simply. “From what I gather, once she married me she would have come up with some story about how the diagnosis had been wrong. She may have even claimed that the cancer had been beaten. Even if I had found out differently, as long as I had learned the truth after our wedding there would have been nothing I could have done about it.”
“Why not?” Rei asked, growing outraged on his behalf.
“Because of my company. In many ways, stocks rise and fall based on the public’s perception. Divorcing my wife because I’d found out she’d been lying about having a terminal illness? That’s not the kind of publicity you want in my world. Especially when sweeping it under the rug and pretending that our marriage was a healthy and happy one would have been both cheaper and easier.”
“That’s-” Unhealthy. Sad. Disgusting. “-awful.”
He sighed. “My sentiments exactly.”
“What’s changed?” She asked after a moment. “What convinced you to go back to her?”
For the first time, he seemed uncomfortable. Almost, unwilling to admit the truth. Then he straightened his shoulders, firming his resolve right before her eyes.
“The company is bankrupt. Without the backing and influence Bethany’s father can give me, I could lose everything.”
She found herself going very still. Staring at him across the dinner table she couldn’t help but shake her head in bitter disappointment.
“So are you going to make your vows to her or to her bank account?”
“Rei.” He started, but
she wouldn’t allow him to finish.
“I’m just trying to understand.” She said with a laugh. “I mean, you can see how it wouldn’t make a lot of sense to me. You’re saying that you dumped Bethany in the first place because she was willing to do anything and everything to marry you, not for yourself, but for your money. But it’s perfectly fine when you do the same thing?”
His face hardened and anger flushed his face with color.
“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“I think you’re wrong about that.” She hissed. Leaning across the tables she fired her next words at him from less than a foot away. “You’re marrying this woman because it’s easy. Because at the end of the day you can play the martyr and still feel good about yourself. Tell yourself you have no choice, that it’s the only way, when really it’s simpler to get in bed with the devil than it is to make a few hard choices. I’ve noticed something about you Justin Reese. You’re brilliant, but you’re too willing to accept whatever it is that people throw at you all for the sake of expediency. Bethany may have been the first person to take you for a fool, but she certainly wasn’t the last.”
Even while the words were coming out of her mouth, she was imagining dragging them right back in. By the time she’d managed to pull herself together, her temper had already gotten the best of her and it was too late. Justin was staring across the table at her, rage contorting his face. Before she could convince herself to apologize, before she could spout some lie about how she hadn’t meant it, she tossed her linen napkin on the table and inclined her head.
“If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go freshen up.”
She was proud of herself, how calm she was as she came to her feet. How poised. Weaving through the tables in the restaurant she made her slow, careful way, to the ladies room. Once there, it was a simple matter to check all the stalls, to be sure she was alone before she walked over to the full length mirror taking up one wall and let her head collapse against it hard enough to hurt.
She groaned, loudly, and bumped her head again.
She was such an idiot. Rei had never imagined herself as a glutton for punishment, but that was obviously the case. It was the only explanation for why she’d let petty jealousy get the best of her. And that line about people taking Justin for a fool? Good God? She was trying to ease the man into the possibility that Stan may be stabbing him in the back. She wasn’t supposed to rub it in his face and call him a moron for letting it happen. Clutching her hair, she made a sound like a dying animal and tried to erase the last five minutes from her memory.
“Please God.” She murmured against the glass, hoping her deity would hear her prayer. “Please make me smarter. Or at least give me a better version of common sense because the batch I have now is obviously defective.” She waited a beat. Then: “Amen.”
The squeal of door hinges was an intrusion, and Rei straightened. She was fixing the mess she’d made of her hair when she happened to look up and see the reflection of the person who’d just entered the bathroom.
She whipped around immediately, heart going to her throat.
“You can’t be in here.” She said, whispering as if the presence of a man in the girl’s bathroom would go unnoticed as long as she kept her voice down. She waved her hands in a desperate attempt to get him to shoo. “Get out. I’ll be done in a minute.”
Justin didn’t say a word as he began to stalk towards her. It was only when she examined his face that she realized that he was still angry. It was in the tight set of his shoulders and in the firm unsmiling line of his mouth. Anger made his eyes appear brown and Rei found herself trying to take a step away as he came towards her.
With the mirror at her back, there was nowhere else to go.
“Justin.” She began, holding up her hands in a weak attempt to placate him. “You don’t want to do this.”
“You don’t know what I want.” He responded.
“You’re right.” She agreed quickly. Eyes darting around the bathroom in a panic. She’d never make it past him. He was already less than a few feet away. “I have no idea. But that doesn’t mean we can’t talk about this like two reasonable adults.”
She wasn’t sure what she’d expected him to do to her, but when he grabbed her by the upper arms and pushed her towards the row of sinks she couldn’t help but squeak in surprise. Before she could say anything else, he was spinning her around, trapping both of her arms behind her back, and pressing her forward until the upper half of her body lay flush against the cool countertop.
“Justin?” His name sounded as uncertain as she felt, but he didn’t bother answering. There was a single minded focus to him, an intensity as he stared into her eyes by way of the mirror above the sinks. He never glanced down to see what he was doing, he didn’t have to. Instead he just continued to watch her, even as he pulled her skirt up to her waist and began to undo the front of his pants.
She bucked and squirmed on the countertop but no matter how she moved the hand trapping her wrists at the small of her back never slackened their grip. It was like the limo all over again. Only this time, literally anyone could walk in on them. She tried to tell him that. Tried to explain that they would be caught, but he didn’t seem to hear her.
Instead he pushed her legs apart with his knee. Considering how angry he was she’d expected him to shove himself inside of her. To hurt her. But she supposed she should have known better. Even with his temper riding high, he took his time with her. Holding his cock still so that he could rub the bulbous head back and forth across her pussy. He didn’t try to enter her. Not at first. Instead he positioned himself so that with each slow push of his hips the head of him could caress her clit.
The ache it generated, having him standing against her and sliding his length against the gathering evidence of her excitement, was so strong it made her shudder. Even the threat of being seen was its own mix of torture and pleasure. All too soon she found herself pushing against him, meeting each thrust so that his dick could strike her clit just a little bit harder. She spread her legs and rolled her hips, and with a chuckle he pulled back and began to push against the entrance of her body. She was wet, wet enough that she could feel it sliding down her thighs. He hovered there, at her entrance for what felt like an eternity.
When he finally shoved past the tight flesh of her pussy, he did so so suddenly that she nearly rose up off of the counter at the feel of him. He sunk inside of her to the hilt and she could feel his muscles jerking, throbbing in time with her own. He never released her arms, instead using them like a leash so that he could drive her backwards to meet each of his thrusts.
Once inside of her he stopped being slow, stopped being careful. His thrusts were wild, almost violent, each one deeper than the last thanks to his grip on her arms. The angle was just sharp enough that he was striking her G-spot with each stroke and Rei’s vision went white, her breathing choppy, as the first orgasm snuck up on her.
The sound of flesh against flesh, wet and thick, echoed through the room and Rei had to bite her lip to keep from crying out as the pulsing echoes from her last orgasm began to feed off one another in preparation for the next. He did something with his hips, something that made him reach an even deeper angle when she hadn’t thought such a thing was possible.
Pulling her upright, he wrapped his arms around her. The fingers of one hand went to her clit while the fingers of the other slipped beneath her shirt to capture one of her nipples. From this position he couldn’t go as deep, but the friction was more pronounced. Even better, she could look in the mirror over the sinks and watch his cock pumping into her.
The sight of them like that, working together, bodies straining towards completion, took her breath away and Rei found herself clutching Justin’s arms just to steady herself. Without him there to hold her up she would have fallen. The second climax left her thighs shaking so hard it was laughable to think that she could support her own weight. She wanted to tell him to stop. Wanted to make hi
m pull out of her, but he was so completely in charge of her, so utterly in charge of every ounce of pleasure that he milked from her body, that she couldn’t say a word in protest.
And when she felt a third orgasm building, thoughts of stopping went right out the window.
‘I never used to be like this.’ She thought, dazed, her hips grinding against sensations working over her sensitized flesh. ‘I never used to be so...ready. So hungry for the touch of another person.’
One stroke, two, nice and drawn out as if he couldn’t bear to be separated from her, and she came once again. Body jerking in his arms and inner muscles going into spasms. He pushed past the clenching walls of her pussy to bury himself inside of her as his own climax struck. He had to brace himself against the counter as his hot spunk flooded her insides. Filling all those empty places and ripping a sob of completion from her throat even as her toes curled. Her legs came up off the ground, making the connection tighter, and she curled up in the web of Justin’s arms as shudder after shudder ripped through her.
It felt so good she found herself moving still, body milking every last drop from his wildly jerking cock. It set off another avalanche of sensation, another uncontrollable wave of pleasure. At first she thought she’d peed on herself, but when she managed to glance into the mirror, she saw that the liquid gushing from between her legs was clear in color.
Jesus.
She was a squirter.
When the hell had that happened?
When they were done they had to peel themselves apart. Retrain muscles that had clenched and frozen in the midst of orgasm to move again. To let go. When Justin sat her on the counter, she found that her hands had clenched into fists and it was almost painful to straighten each of her fingers out and regain mobility.
He went to his knees before her. At first she expected him to grab one of the paper towels on the wall to clean her thighs, but instead he leaned forward and licked her. Lapping up her cum as if it were the sweetest wine. When he reached her sex, he cleaned her there too and the sensation was a soft pleasure. A warm comfort that relaxed every part of her body as if she’d been dipped in a hot bath. When he was done, he didn’t try anything else. He just slipped her skirt back down without a word, set her on her feet on a dry part of the bathroom floor, and left.
Bad Behavior (BWWM Romance) Page 5