by Pippa Grant
“They say the crowd loved the Twin Tanks Right-Stuffing it,” Eloise grumbles. “Damn yahoos can’t right stuff anything.”
Parker snorts, then all three of them go eerily quiet while they stare at the phone.
“How bad is it?” I whisper.
“Not bad,” Parker says quickly. “Really. Just gossip pages being gossip pages.”
So, basically, I can never show my face at work again. Or anywhere else in the city. Chase is new money, but he’s money. It doesn’t matter. He screwed me in an elevator, dry-humped me on a Kiss Cam, and now the whole world knows I trashed a supply closet after screwing his brains out in there too.
“It’s just conjecture that you hooked up,” Willow flits back to the coffee pot and digs my only two clean mugs out of my cabinets. “They don’t even mention the police being called.”
“It could be a lot worse,” Parker adds.
“Far worse for him than you,” Eloise assures me. “No one thinks you’re in love with him.”
I grab Parker’s phone, enlarge the font, and scroll through.
They’re right.
No mention of the cops. No mention of my temper tantrum. Not even a hint that we did the dirty deed in the back of the bar.
Just a side picture of Chase and his broody, hungry, determined eyes trained on something.
My belly drops.
Because I don’t know what I’m seeing, and I don’t want to care, but I can’t help myself.
Either they’re right, and he wants me, or they’re dead wrong, and he wants to obliterate me.
Not that there’s much difference between the two.
I can’t like Chase Jett.
I don’t know how.
And I’m afraid wanting to just might destroy me.
19
Chase
Saturday morning started at four AM with a flaming bag of dog crap exploding on my front steps. I don’t know if it was Bro or her brothers, but I get the message.
I’m persona non grata with the Bergers.
I spent the morning hitting the shit out of a punching bag and the afternoon working. As I’m sitting in the car on the way home, I’m hoping they spray-painted dicks all over my house or hid stink bombs in my bushes or that the overgrown man-children are waiting for me, looking to avenge their womenfolk again.
No such luck.
It’s like they don’t care enough to acknowledge my existence.
As though I’m a nobody.
My fists clench.
I’m not a fucking nobody. Not anymore.
I head inside and pound on my punching bag until it splits, but my mind won’t shut up and my dick’s asking why we’re sitting here alone when we could be out pushing Bro’s buttons.
I jack off in a cold shower with images of Bro’s pussy dancing in my head and the taste of her nipples an elusive memory on my tongue, down three shots of whiskey, and try to sleep.
Somewhere in the middle of the night, I wonder where Bro is. If she’s awake. If her upstairs neighbors are having an animal orgy jamboree. If she’s thinking about me.
If she’s wanting to touch me.
I roll over and pound my pillow, and feathers explode all over my room.
Two weeks ago, I was in California brokering a quarter-billion-dollar deal with the largest internet gaming company in the world. I was in control of my life. In control of my business. In control of my dick.
This week, I fired everyone who knew anything about management at the company I’ve been positioning myself to buy for three years, because they insulted a woman.
A woman I’ve despised most of my life.
A woman I can’t get out of my head.
By Sunday morning, I can’t take it any longer. I call my car around and give the driver Bro’s address.
I tell myself I’m not going to touch her. We’re just going to talk. My dick smirks. He doesn’t believe me.
Her apartment door is painted turquoise. It’s a rectangular ocean in a sea of dingy, cracked, dirty sand-colored walls. I knock, and after a moment, it flings open.
“Hey, I’ve got your phone—” she starts, then her dark eyes land on me and narrow to suspicious little slits. “You.”
My joy sausage misses the tone and stands up and salutes her. Oh, yeah, baby, it’s me. Come to papa.
I blow out a slow breath and tell it to picture my grandma naked.
“We need to talk,” I say to Ambrosia.
She tries to slam the door, but it’s easy to anticipate. I’m halfway inside before the wood bangs into my knee. “Please,” I add.
She lifts her fingers in an X like she’s warding off evil. “Back, glittery sex demon. I’m exorcising you.”
I shove my hands in my pants and wish I was mature enough to pull off a grow up look, but she might be onto something. Being possessed would explain this week.
Plus, I can’t get the fucking glitter out, and somehow it’s spread to every last pair of pants I own. I really do have a glittery crotch.
“I’m not here to take your clothes off,” I say, but as the words leave my mouth, all my dick hears is take your clothes off, and it leaps in agreement.
Of course, she notices.
I could be in steel-plated armor and she’d notice. She has some kind of internal erection detection system. I can tell by the way her eyes go dark and the way that delicious pink tongue darts out to lick her lush lips while she moves her arms to aim her crossed fingers at my crotch.
He can tell she sees him too. He’s trying to wave at her.
Does she have to be so fucking hot when she’s pissed?
“Back away, and neither one of us will get hurt,” she growls.
“Can we pretend to be adults for two minutes and have a simple conversation?” I say.
“You’re not a grown-up. You’re some kind of male sex kitten in a glitter suit, and I’m done with you.”
“I was thinking dinner. In Central Park.”
“I am not sucking your dick in Central Park.”
“I don’t want you to suck my dick. I want you to have dinner with me.”
“And eat you,” she accuses.
I wish I could say she doesn’t look like she’d enjoy going down on me, but I know the signs of rampant lust, and she’s waving them like a flag.
Dilated pupils, check. Shallow breathing, check. A barrage of denials and commentary on my junk, check.
It’s Bro. She’d tackle me in the produce aisle, rip my pants off, ride me like a donkey, and ask if me that was a microscopic needle in my pants or if the nice scientists in the asylum had noticed I was missing yet.
It’s not easy resisting the challenge—my joystick has noticed it hasn’t yet become intimately acquainted with her mouth, and there’s only so much I can do to convince it that it’s not in charge here—but I keep my voice level and don’t break eye contact. “You can eat vegetarian lasagna for all I care.”
“Eggplant lasagna?” Dammit, this woman can make vegetarian lasagna filthy. She’s so fucking perfect. She cocks a hip. “Carrot lasagna? Banana lasagna?”
She’s doing it again. She’s making my balls ache and my dick do battle with my zipper. “Anything you can get on the printed menu delivered from the kitchen and prepared by the chef,” I grind out. “With our clothes on and our hands above the table. I just want to talk. Like normal human beings. Maybe I’ll bring flowers. Maybe you’ll say thank you.”
“I don’t know what kind of backwards psychological trick this is, but it won’t work. You can’t have my pussy. It’s closed. Permanently. Zipped up and tossed out in the trash.”
My dick sees her throw down and raises her a triple orgasm. “Ambrosia—”
“Do. Not. Call. Me. That.”
Staying calm is a battle. Staying unaroused is impossible. “What do you want me to call you?”
“Nothing.”
Okay, Nothing, can we talk before we fuck again?
I know I didn’t say it out loud, but her eyes s
hift into pissed-off kitten slits, her fingers twist into gnarled claws, her back hunches, and she hisses a demonic oath at me.
Fine, she stayed human. But I still swear she read my mind.
But you want to know the dumbest part of all of this?
I’m hard as a lead pipe. I know if I just tell her she’s a douche-fucker she’ll ride me like a stallion until I’m permanently cross-eyed, and all I can think about is that I’ve never kissed her.
Yeah, I’ve had my tongue down her throat. We’ve played tonsil hockey. I know how firm her lip is between my teeth and how far it’ll stretch when I pull. I know she tastes like honey and that she can do things with her tongue that are illegal in four states, but I’ve never kissed her hello.
Or goodbye.
Or I missed you. How was your day? Steak, chicken, or lamb?
And I have this ridiculous fucking need to kiss her.
The door across the hallway opens. “Is that the boy you banged at the Yankees game?” the old lady asks.
“He tried, but he has a limp dick,” Bro replies.
“Too bad. He’s a looker. Honey, I don’t mind ‘em a little limp. You can come try it with me when you get bored with her.” She goes back in her apartment, but I get the feeling she’s watching us through her peep hole.
Also? Bro just called me a limp dick. I might still have a chance of getting through to her. My dick’s cheering—it knows what’s up.
Besides it.
“I like you,” I grind out.
She goes pale and blinks. She’s got the wide-legged stance, hands balled into fists, but she’s missing the flash in her eyes. And instead, there’s something I can relate to all too well.
Raw, unbidden vulnerability.
Easy to recognize. Same thing’s making up ninety percent of my blood right now.
“Are you that desperate to get back in my pants?” Her voice wobbles. Not the breathy, let’s fight and fuck wobble. The don’t hurt me wobble.
I angle further into her apartment, leaving my foot in the door so we’re not trapped.
It’s as much for my sanity as her comfort. I swallow hard. “You’re very pretty when you smile.”
She starts to sneer, but seems to realize I’m serious. “We have absolutely nothing in common.”
“We both know where to hit Ares to make him cry like a baby.”
“We have nothing healthy in common.”
“We both like it when you come.”
She shoves me in the shoulder. That simple touch lights me up like Times Square at Christmas and sends half my brain power shooting to my dick. I grit my teeth and press on. “You’re smart. You’re funny. And I can’t stop thinking about you.”
“Why are you doing this?” she whispers.
She’s so close, I could twine my fingers with hers. I could brush her cheek with my thumb. I could tangle my hands in her wavy hair.
I could capture her parted lips and kiss her. Not like the guy who wants to fuck her brains out—we’ll get there, because I still want that too—but as the guy who wants to not hate her.
Her eyes are dark as night, dwelling in shadows and demons and fears. Someone hurt her. Someone hurt her badly.
I suspect that someone was me.
“You’re fucking hot.” I angle one hip closer to her, still keeping one foot in the door. “I can’t stop thinking about your ass. Your tits. Your pussy. And I also can’t stop thinking about this smart mouth. Your quick wit. Your balls.”
“I don’t have balls, you fucking nimwit.”
I tuck a strand of hair behind her ear. Christ, I want to suck on the soft flesh of her neck and brand her. “You’re strong and stubborn and brave, and it makes me so hot I want to rip your clothes off and make you come in my mouth.”
“You don’t get to say nice things to me.” Her eyes squeeze shut. She’s shaking. I’m not touching her, but I can feel her shaking.
Or maybe that’s me. “What if we could?” I murmur. “What if we could forget yesterday? We’re fucking good in bed. What if we’re good everywhere?”
“We’ve never done it in a bed.”
“Let me take you to dinner and back to my place. I have six beds. We’ll try them all.”
Her fingers are inching down my chest, and my cock is straining to meet her path. I’m losing the battle of wills with my body, and having her breasts pressed against me while she angles her face to mine isn’t helping. I let myself caress her cheeks, soft as peaches, and trace her lush lips.
Squeak…squeak…squeak…
“Afraid of hogzilla?” She whispers. “You’re such a pussy.”
“Say something nice, and I’ll eat your pussy before we go to dinner.”
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
“I would.” Being honest with her is the single fucking hardest thing I’ve done in my life. “I’d very much like eating your pussy.”
“You’re lying,” she grits out while she grinds her palm over the denim trapping my shaft.
I want to rock into her touch, but instead I push her hand away. My cock howls in protest. “One nice thing, and we both get what we want.”
She battles me and goes for the button on my jeans. “Quit fucking around and just do me.”
Oh, how I want to. “I like it when you give orders.”
Her fingers still, but she still won’t look at me.
“You remember that time you smeared I let my dog do me up the ass on my old Ford? That was so fucking hot. I couldn’t stop thinking about you thinking about my ass.”
“I like your ass,” she whispers.
Oh, thank Christ. I cup her breasts and flick my thumbs over her nipples poking through her shirt. “I like your breasts.”
“I like your ugly chin dimple.”
Close enough. I nip lightly on her neck. “I like the way you grip my hair when you’re coming.”
She’s fumbling with my zipper. “I like that thing you do with your tongue.”
“Which thing?”
“All the things.” My rod finally springs free, and she gives it a long, sure stroke from balls to tip and back again.
“Can we shut the door?” I hiss out.
She yanks on my dick to guide me all the way into her apartment. The door slams shut. Bedsprings squeak overhead.
She sinks her upper teeth into her lower lip and hits me with wide, vulnerable eyes. “I like your arms,” she whispers while she strokes me again.
She’s not trying to strangle me, but her touch is making me impossibly hard. My cock strains in her hand, and I can’t stop my hips from jerking into her touch. “You have amazing fingers,” I tell her.
“I like your penis.”
“It likes you too.”
She bends to get a closer look, and fuck, then she’s licking my tip, swirling her lithe, pink tongue around me while she cradles my balls.
I’m holding on by a thread, because if I thought hate-fucking her brains out was mind-bending, having her lush lips wrapped around my cock, her mouth sliding over me while her tongue suckles me like a lover is taking euphoria to another plane of existence.
“Holy fuck, Bro.” I grip her hair while she settles on her knees and takes me deeper. My legs are shaking. My heart’s about to give out. And my shaft is begging for more.
She moans as she takes me all the way in, her eyes sliding back into her head, her fingers kneading my tight balls, her tongue swirling and gliding against me like I’m the most delicious fucking thing she’s ever had in her mouth, and everything goes white. My hips jerk out of control. She’s sucking and licking and rubbing and I’m throbbing harder and longer and thicker than I’ve ever been before, and if I start coming, I won’t stop. I try to pull out. “Ambrosia—” I gasp.
She sinks those perfect nails into my ass and takes me impossibly deeper down her hot, wet throat, her tongue still worshipping me, her teeth scraping my flesh, and I can’t hold back any longer. I come down her throat, a roar erupting from my soul while I pou
nd into her mouth and she drinks me up, every last tremor cradled on her tongue, every surge met with a suck, until she’s satisfied and I can barely stand.
Rainbow stars are blurring my vision. When she releases me with a pop, she presses kisses along the length of my still-hard dick. “Good boy,” she croons.
I drop to my knees, and not just because they can’t hold me anymore. She’s wearing a smug, satisfied smile, but her dark eyes tell me she’s not nearly done.
Good, because I’m not done with her.
“Good girl,” I say. “Now tell me you’ll go to dinner with me.”
She’s toying with the buttons on my shirt. “If I don’t?” she pants.
I cup her pussy and find her leggings hot and soaked. She arches into my touch, and I grind my palm against her. She thrusts into my hand.
“Say you’ll go to dinner with me, or I’ll quit touching you.” I kiss her before she can say something we’ll both regret, but this isn’t our usual kiss.
This kiss is slow and leisurely. I’m not plundering, I’m exploring. I’m not gripping her hair, I’m letting my fingers tangle in the silky strands the way I want her tangled in my sheets. I can taste me in her mouth, and it makes my dick throb again. I rock against her, not to get off, but to show her what she does to me.
“I want to touch you,” I whisper against her mouth.
“I—I need you to touch me,” she whispers back.
And just like that, I’m lost.
Game over. I’m done.
My soul will forever belong to Ambrosia May Berger. Everything else be damned.
20
Ambrosia
Chase shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t have given him head, and I shouldn’t agree to go to dinner with him.
But I want to. I need to.
I crave him like an addict craves drugs, and I don’t want to quit.
He slides his hand into my pants, his strong, sure fingers easily finding their way in my playground. I tug my leggings down to give him easier access, and I spread my legs like the wanton sex goddess I want to be.
All the while, he’s kissing me. Gliding his tongue into my mouth as though we have all the time in the world, stroking my tongue with his, coaxing my lips to open wider instead of just taking what he wants.