Our tongues continue to assault each other as I unzip him, stroking his cock as I draw it nearer. Vic tightly wraps his arms around me and I continue to support myself with my levered feet and a hand curled around the edge.
He plows into me and the force has us whimpering into each other’s mouths.
The harder he pummels into me the wilder and more out of control I feel. I bite his bottom lip, dragging it through my teeth, the metallic taste of blood hitting my tongue.
Vic growls, dislodging it and moving them down my jaw to my neck with enough suction it shoots sparks through my body. His face hides in the crevice, his nose and mouth plastered to the skin as he picks up his pace, his cock hitting me all the way to the depths, as far as it will go. My head falls back and smashes into the stainless steel mirror behind it. The pain works in tandem with the pleasure, heat spreading through my body as I near my release.
One of Vic’s arms loosens its bind, the other growing stronger to make up for its absence. The released hand wraps around my throat in a hold that is neither delicate nor harsh, it agrees with the manic pounding of his body into mine.
“Your neck, Freya,” he hums into the skin, his breath caressing it as his hand does the same, “is one of the sexiest things about you, and the first thing I couldn’t wait to taste.”
Vic comes to a complete stop, and I’m out of breath from almost reaching my peak or I’d yell at him not to. The hand around my neck slithers to the back, grasping the hair at the nape, forcing my attention back on him. His eyes, like rich decadent chocolate, bore into mine, “Who do you belong to?”
I don’t respond, not wanting to give him the satisfaction. His pelvis grinds into mine as he makes luscious circles, his grip in my hair tightens, “Say it?”
“You first,” I pant, my hips circling with his, needing any kind of movement they can get.
“You, Freya. I belong to you.” He thickens his accent, probably knowing how it arouses me. It works because I lose my senses to his voice and the way his words make me feel inside, so filled and ready to explode with the depths I love him. Any minute now it’s all going to shoot from my pores in a bright light that blinds everyone in its path. It gives me no choice but to answer with what I know he wants to hear. “Vicsuyan,” I breathe out, knowing how much he loves me to say his full name. “I could never again be with anyone else.” I mean it too; whatever comes next for us, nobody will compare to how he makes me feel inside. What we have is so tangible and raw I won’t even bother trying to find it somewhere else; it would be a waste of time. These past few weeks were filled with more passion and awakening of my soul than I ever hoped for in a lifetime.
Satisfied with my answer he rocks his hips, gaining back speed, and within seconds I’m coming. Vic’s mouth is wrapped around my own, muffling the cries. He stops once again while my breathing recovers, pulling out when he’s convinced that I’m done coming down from my orgasmic high.
His still hard cock is coated with me, but it lacks the extra thickness from our combined release.
“You didn’t come?” I ask as he helps me wiggle back into my pants. We knock heads a few times in the effort.
“No,” he responds as he fastens his erection back inside.
“Why?”
He pins me back into the small counter, “The next time I come inside you will be when I fully have you.”
“What was this then?” I remember our conversation at the beginning of the flight as I zip my own pants. I try to control the rage as I force the zipper up so hard I get some of the skin on my finger caught. I wince from the pain. Vic takes the hand, placing a gentle kiss on the red mark it left behind, causing my heart to thump against my chest, winged keys jabbing their way through my body, once again reminding me just how strongly he affects me.
“I needed to prove a point,” he says with his lips still glued to my skin.
I snatch it back. “What? That I’m so shallow it only takes your cock to buy me?” I stumble over the words as we hit turbulence and an attendant asks for everyone to gather in their seats and secure their seatbelts.
I peek through the door and quickly realize there will be no way to hide that Freya Brennan is now a member of the Mile High Club.
I hold my head high, like I have nothing to be ashamed of, refusing to look at the attendants or passengers, not wanting to be met with looks of disapproval or leering eyes.
“No,” Vic says from behind me, returning to our conversation. “That you need me just as much.”
“Sex doesn’t equivocate need,” I sneer over my shoulder. “Letting you into my body doesn’t mean I’ve forgiven you or that I even want to forgive you.” My next words are lies, but I can’t stop them from coming out, “People will say anything for an orgasm; it doesn’t mean anything. You don’t mean anything.”
I’m ashamed of myself. I have never purposely lied in order to hurt someone before and I never want to do it again. My guilt folds in on me as I take my seat and finally have the chance to properly see Vic as he takes his. He’s not hiding his emotions or showing that he doesn’t have any; he looks like a man that has met defeat, who has been broken. He doesn’t look over at me even though I’m clearly staring at him. He rubs his hand over the stubble that is forming along his jaw, absorbed in the aisle way’s carpet.
“Hey,” I place a hand on his thigh, ready to apologize for my despicable behavior.
“Do you think I wanted this Freya?” Vic looks over at me, “I was quite content with my life. Then I find you, and none of it’s good enough anymore. It would be so much easier to walk away, but I can’t, and I never will. The life I was so satisfied with was no life at all. A life with you is.”
I swallow back my emotions, wishing I had taken the attendant up on her offer of the hard stuff. It’s time for things to get real. “Are you capable of love? The kind of love required to start a family and future with?”
“Freya,” he breathes, deepening his voice, sending tingles through my body. I’m beginning to think he enjoys saying my name just as much as I crave hearing it. “It saddens me that you don’t already know how in love with you I am.”
My heart stops. My blood halts. My breathing ceases.
It all comes back alive at the same time, working in unison to create an uproar of activity.
A crackle in the speakers announces that our flight is coming to an end and for us to prepare for descent. I take a moment to compose myself, and when the plane begins to lower I finally speak, “If you love me, you have to care for my family too. Their safety is just as important as my own.”
“I’m aware of that now.” Vic’s hand comes out, stroking the side of my face. “I don’t usually do apologies, as I’m not a man who does something without first calculating its risks and rewards. However, this time I was wrong and I’m truly sorry. You have my word that nothing like this will happen again, and although your life will always matter more to me than theirs, they will be protected.”
“Thank you,” I whisper, pressing my cheek into his palm. “I forgive you, for whatever it’s worth.”
He answers just as quietly, “It is worth everything.”
Chapter 22
“Are you sure you’re ready for this?”
I roll my eyes, “Yes.”
Vic kisses my nose, “As cute as I find it when you get cheeky with me, I need you to stay professional and to listen to me even if I’m ordering you. Both our lives depend on it.”
“You’re right, I’m sorry. Let’s start over.” I put on my most sober face, but add a little bit of defiance in the tiny smirk I wear just to mess with him and how serious he always is.
Vic smiles at my mockery. It’s an actual smile that reaches his eyes and he laughs, kissing my nose again.
“You have the most beautiful smile I have ever seen.” I scrunch his shirt in my fists, tugging him closer, and I kiss the hell out of him, overcome with my first genuine smile. This is a huge step forward; I’ve finally put a crack in his exter
ior.
Vic pulls pack from our kiss with a warning, “Freya, you can’t do that. We’re partners right now, not lovers.”
“So we’re married,” I deadpan.
Vic tries to conceal another smile, “Exactly.”
He has me repeat the plan back to him one more time. Since we landed and found a hotel, we’ve been spending our time with sex, sleep, planning, breakfast, more sex, and finalizing our plan, in that exact order.
After Vic is somewhat convinced I remember everything he told me, we go up the street a few blocks to a salon for my scheduled appointment. As soon as I’m in the chair, Vic is explaining to the hairstylist exactly how he wants the updo to be. Not overly done, but not basic either. It can’t be sexy, and it can’t be young and prom-like. Sophisticated yet unmemorable. When the stylist shares her ideas and Vic is satisfied, he steps back to the wall to observe.
“Is he always that bossy?” The stylist tries to joke low into my ear, but concern is clear in her eyes as she gets to work.
“He likes things a certain way,” I explain, aware how bad that sounds. I know she’s worried that I’m some poor, innocent girl who found herself a man that controls and manipulates her.
I receive a pity frown from my brush off. I don’t blame her, I would be the same. I can’t exactly tell her the real reason he’s being so specific with my looks. I can’t be like “Hey, no worries, my boyfriend and I are just going to a charity event where we plan on killing a man, so he has to make sure I’ll blend in, ‘kay? No biggie.” Yeah…it’s definitely better if she thinks I’m in a controlling relationship.
Next we find me a dress at some boutique that has the most exquisite clothes. I could spend hours touching the silky fabrics and admiring their sleek silhouettes. After trying on a few we decide on mauve purple with a low back and flowing bottom half so it would be easy to move in if need be and not constricting. He has me keep on my grandma’s diamond earrings that I always wear, as they are in his words, “classy yet understated.”
The last step is getting my makeup done at the Chanel cosmetics store right next to the boutique. Vic is just as specific here with how he wants me to look, but the woman here finds it sweet.
“Now we go get Bones, who will escort you,” Vic informs me after he pays.
“Who’s that?” I ask as our driver opens the door to the limo Vic ordered and has arrived at precisely the right time (which Vic specified quite clearly). I already knew that Vic wouldn’t be the one to stay with me at the event. He knows some of the people who will be attending and they would be curious as to why he’s there.
“A nickname I gave him based on the state I found him in when he refused to give me his real name. Now that’s all anybody calls him.”
“Why would he do this for you?”
“He owes me a favor and he needs the money,” Vic states like it’s that simple. “You ready?”
No. “Yup.”
Having sensed my lie, he places a hand on my shoulder, “Bones can go this alone, he’s up for the challenge.”
I carry out the conversation we’ve had numerous times since arriving as Vic tries to find ways to not involve me, “But didn’t you say that everyone has dates at these kinds of events?”
“Yes, but there’s always the few who don’t.”
“Won’t that draw attention to him?”
“Yes.”
I feel like a broken record as we repeat words spoken already today in the hotel room, “Isn’t attention the opposite of what we want to pull this off?”
“Yes,” Vic answers, like I’m the one in charge and I need him ready.
I give my most encouraging smile, “Well, then I really don’t see much choice.”
Vic looks past me with a frown, “No, I suppose there isn’t.”
Chapter 23
“Wow!” I exclaim, rolling down the limo’s window and sticking my head out for a better view of the apartments before me. According to Vic it’s the Tribeca neighborhood, which means nothing to me as I’m not familiar with anything in New York City other than Central Perk (and that’s not even real), but if I had to guess, it’s one of the more expensive areas. I can tell this building in particular is exorbitantly priced by the doorman out front, the well-cared-for greenery, and the huge open windows all around it, giving it a holier-than-thou presence.
“Are you sure he needs the money?” I turn my head to Vic, pointing my thumb to the building. I’m referring to Bones, who we are picking up at this building. If Vic says Bones has plans to buy a yacht I’m going to punch him.
Vic leans across me to roll my window back up, “This isn’t his place.”
“Oh.” At first I don’t ask whose it is, but after a few seconds I change my mind, curiosity getting the best of me, “Whose is it?”
“My sister’s,” he nonchalantly replies as he pulls out his phone, bringing it to his ear.
“If she ever stays with us then we’re returning the favor and coming here!” I can’t help but declare. I’m not normally one who does a favor for a favor, but how could I turn down an opportunity to stay here? I haven’t even seen the inside but it doesn’t matter, I can hardly wait to come back.
“Anytime,” Vic says in all seriousness, shifting his attention to whomever answered the other line. “We’re here.”
We watch through the tinted windows in silence. I try to calm my nerves, not sure who will be walking out the lobby door. After the people I met yesterday at Cole Private Bank and Trust, he could be scarred and scary, or devastatingly handsome. Both make me just as nervous.
A man in a fitted black tuxedo exits the building. “Is that him?”
Vic doesn’t answer, so I can presume it is.
Bones is nothing like what I was expecting from my wild imagination. He’s young, maybe my age or a little younger. It’s hard to tell because he has one of those youthful faces with old soul eyes, so he could really be forty. Bones walks like a person unsure of himself and on edge as he fidgets with whatever is in his pockets and darts his head all around like he’s expecting someone to jump out at him.
The limo driver has the door open when Bones approaches and he ducks his head in, looking back and forth between Vic and I before stepping in and sitting in the seat across from me.
I almost gasp, because up close this man has the most exquisite pair of green eyes I have ever seen. I truly didn’t believe green eyes like this existed on a person. I took a trip to Ireland last year, and they remind me of their plush green hills, so rich and vivid with color. To accentuate Bones’s boyish features, he has freckles sprinkled along his nose and cheekbones that have a pinkish glow to them.
“It’s been a fucking long time, man,” Bones says, scooting in next to Vic, placing the satchel he had over his shoulders down between his feet. “How the fuck you’ve been?”
Vic has worry in his tone as he examines him, “I’m more concerned about you.”
“Fuck man,” the man-boy chuckles, scrubbing his face with hands that are all man. “I’m still trying to work through my shit, but I can’t fucking complain.”
If this were a drinking game based on how many times this man says the f-word, we’d all be plastered one minute into it.
“You see Vikki recently?” Vic asks, still examining him from top to bottom like he expects to find something.
“Shit yeah,” the man-boy vigorously nods his head, almost like a tick that he can’t stop once he starts. “That girl’s real fucking tight. Checks in with me every fuckin’ week, by phone or sometimes in fuckin’ person.”
“Mm,” Vic nods his head in approval. “You eating?”
“All the fucking time,” Bones motions down his body. “Can’t you fucking tell? Shit man, I didn’t even know my fucking stomach had muscles. I thought that shit was only good for cushioning my fucking ribs.”
“Good,” Vic nods once more. He changes gears, his features becoming just as straight as his body. “You get everything I asked for?”
Ma
n-boy bends down, unzipping the top of his duffel, “Almost didn’t. Fucking list like that with only twenty-four hours’ notice? You’re lucky half this shit was already in your sister’s place.”
Bones starts pulling things out, handing them off to Vic. The first is a slim black laptop about the size of a notebook. Next is some other equipment I don’t recognize in the slightest, a gun, something small I can’t see, another gun, and as he pulls out more things I can’t place, he talks into the bag, his left leg continually bouncing as he does, “That your girl?”
“Yes,” Vic answers as he inspects everything he’s handed. Some he places between them and others on his lap or the floor.
Man-boy hands off what looks like a sniper rifle, “She’s pretty.”
Vic takes it with a gleam in his eyes like he’s being reacquainted with a long lost lover. “I agree.”
Once the bag is empty, man-boy glances my way, rubbing his palm a few times on the front of his suit jacket before extending it out to me, “Bones.”
I accept his hand with a friendly smile, “Freya.”
He cracks a smile and it brings out the childish quality of his features, “You as fucking nervous as I am?”
“I’m about the most nervous I’ve ever been.”
He does his vigorous head nod again, “Good.”
“Good?”
“Yeah, gets the blood pumping. It’ll help you run faster if shit hits the fucking fan,” he says it so seriously, like there’s a high probability it will happen.
I look to Vic with worry over Bones’s certainty. He shakes his head at Bones like a father would to his misbehaving son, “Don’t listen to him Freya, he’s messing with you. If we stick to the plan it will all go smoothly.”
Bones gives me lopsided smile, “It’s true man, I’m just fucking with you.”
“Thanks. That’s reassuring,” I grumble, questioning Vic’s choice in a partner for tonight.
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