The Jewel of His Collection

by Fae Mallory

  “Oh, yes, sweetheart,” Ian murmured. When Violet looked up at him, she nearly bit through her lower lip at the sight of him kneeling beside her, his eyes dark and glittering as he cupped his cock through his jeans. She was arousing him, and that knowledge gave her the confidence to go further.

  Spreading her legs wantonly, Violet reached down to trace her fingers through her folds, shocked by how slick she was. She was wetter than she’d ever been, and Ian hadn’t even touched her yet. Her hips rocked, begging for more, and she slid her fingers deeper, relishing Ian’s growl.

  “I knew it. I knew you’d be like this,” he muttered as he tore at his belt and the fly of his jeans, shoving them halfway down his legs. Violet’s eyes went wide at the sight of his flushed cock curving almost angrily against his stomach. Neither of her previous lovers could compare to his size, and for an instant she felt a flicker of fear.

  Ian smirked as he caught her looking. “Are you ready for me?” he asked, giving his cock a few strokes.

  Violet could only stare wordlessly, so he took hold of her wrist and lifted her hand to his mouth, sucking on her slick fingers. “Oh, yes, you are,” he muttered. “God, you’re sweet. I’m going to eat you up. Later.”

  With his jeans around his knees, Ian should have looked ridiculous, but his hungry expression wiped any thought of laughter from Violet’s mind. She moaned as he moved to cover her with his body, bracing himself on one elbow as he took himself in hand. “Yes,” she moaned, wrapping her legs around his, the denim rough against her skin.

  Warm lips brushed against hers, and then he was pushing against her. Violet cried out at the first penetration, her channel clenching greedily around him as he eased the head inside. “Relax, sweetheart. Just relax and let me in,” he crooned.

  She moaned as he pushed deeper, her body struggling to accommodate his girth. “Come on, Violet,” he coaxed, his dark hair coming free from its low ponytail to tangle around his face. “Just let me in, sweetheart.”

  “I’m trying,” she whimpered, taking a deep breath as she tried to relax her muscles, ashamed of the way her body was fighting him.

  Ian froze and gave her a sharp look. “Are you a virgin?”

  “No!” she denied, her face heating. She was so bad at this that he assumed she was completely untutored. This was a nightmare. “No, I’m just out of practice, and you’re…”

  She trailed off, biting her lip, and Ian promptly ran his tongue over the abused flesh. “I’m—?” he prompted.

  “Really big,” she whispered, wishing the floor would open up and swallow her.

  Ian laughed aloud. “Oh, Violet, you’re a dream come true.” His mouth came down on hers, teasing her into twining her tongue with his. While she was distracted by the kiss, he reached down to take hold of her knee, looping it over his elbow as he gently pushed it back. “How about this?”

  With inexorable pressure, he pushed deeper, and this time her body yielded to his, opening for him as he sheathed himself inside of her. “That’s good!” She gasped as he ground his hips against her, feeling like he was touching the core of her being. It hurt a little, just enough to convince her that it was real, and the dull ache of her muscles only made the pleasure of having him buried to the hilt inside of her sharper and sweeter. This was real. Ian was making love to her.

  “Yes, it is. God, you’re tight,” he muttered, sounding almost angry as he pulled back and thrust forward again, gliding more easily now.

  Bracing her other foot against the floor, Violet arched into his thrusts, sweeping her hands over his back and feeling his muscles bunch and relax as he started to move more aggressively, pulling almost all the way out on each withdrawal only to plunge back inside. She was wide open now, all of her defenses battered away, his to take and do with as he pleased.

  Above her, Ian was grunting with every thrust, a muscle in his jaw twitching. Fascinated, Violet cradled his face in her hand, gasping when he turned his head to kiss her palm. She moaned as he pushed her knee back farther, changing the angle just enough to graze her clitoris on every stroke.

  “That’s it,” he growled, grinding his hips down. Violet keened in delight, feeling lightning flooding through her veins.

  It was too soon to orgasm. They’d barely been doing this for five minutes. If she came now, Ian was going to think she was an utter neophyte. Trying to keep control, she dragged her nails down his back, distracting herself by grabbing his ass, his lean muscles flexing under her hands as he pounded into her.

  “Minx,” Ian accused as his hips started to move even faster. “You shameless hussy.”

  There was admiration in his voice, and Violet grinned, giving his ass a squeeze. Ian growled at her initiative and forced her knee back farther until she could put her leg over his shoulder. Violet, startled by her own flexibility, released her grip on him to grab his sweat-slick shoulders and hang on for dear life.

  “Kiss me,” she pleaded.

  Her thigh muscles screamed in protest as Ian lowered himself enough to cover her mouth with his own. Violet thrust her fingers into his hair, holding him in place as he plundered her, her nipples chafing as they rubbed against his hair-roughened chest. They were both sweating and grunting as they strained against each other, and Violet felt like her world had been black and white until this encounter turned everything technicolor. Nothing in her life had been more real than this.

  With Ian’s tongue plundering her mouth and his cock pounding into her, she was utterly overwhelmed. Helpless to hold back, she screamed against his mouth as her core went molten, her channel clasping him hungrily, trying to pull him deeper so that he’d always be part of her. Above her, Ian cursed and groaned, his body trembling as heat suddenly flooded her, filling up every empty space in her soul. She wasn’t alone anymore. Now she had Ian.

  Her muscles cramping, Violet lifted her leg off his shoulder and wrapped it around his hip, holding him in place when he would have rolled off of her and humming in contentment. “That was amazing,” she purred, playing with the damp strands of his hair.

  Ian chuckled and kissed the top of her head. “You’re full of surprises. I thought you’d make me work much harder than that.”

  His words felt like a splash of cold water. “What?”

  “I thought—” He cut off as his phone began to ring. “Hang on a second.”

  With a grunt, he pushed himself off of her and out of her, leaving Violet to huddle alone on the floor as he fumbled in his tangled jeans for his phone. “Xavier?”

  Drawing her knees up, Violet wrapped her arms around them to keep herself warm as she watched Ian listen to whatever Xavier was saying, his face smoothing into a cold mask. Gone was her adoring lover, leaving Ian Carlisle, CEO of Carlisle Enterprises, in his wake. “Yes, I agree. Get the plane ready.”

  He jabbed one long finger at the phone to cut the connection and got to his feet, tugging up his jeans. “Hand me my shirt, would you?” he requested.

  Loath to unwrap her arms, Violet scuttled across the floor and tossed the shirt to him. “Duty calls,” he informed her as he did up his buttons. “I’m sorry, Violet. I have to go to New York.”

  “Of course you do,” she murmured, bypassing her underwear in favor of simply yanking her dress back over her head, needing the coverage.

  “Don’t pout,” he chided, leaning down to brush his lips against hers in a quick, impersonal kiss. “I’ll be back soon, and we can pick up where we left off.”

  He headed for the door, leaving her to dog his heels. “What did you mean when you said that?” she asked, hating the quavering note in her voice.

  A puzzled glance answered her, Ian’s eyes distant. His body was still here with her, but clearly his mind was a million miles away. “Said what? Can we talk about this later? I’ll call you, okay?”

  The impatience in his voice was well-disguised, but Violet heard it anyway. “Okay,” she whispered, tilting her head back slightly in hope of another kiss or at least the reassurance of hearing hi
m call her sweetheart again.

  Ian nodded in approval at her acquiescence and left without looking back, his shoulders tense and his head held high. Of course it was. Why would he have cause to feel ashamed?

  Violet locked the door and stumbled back into the Madden gallery, his words echoing in her head—I thought you’d make me work much harder than that. The comment mingled with the memory of his laughter when she pulled him down for their first kiss and the triumphant look in his eyes when she disrobed for him. At the time she’d dismissed it all as happiness and satisfaction, but now those things took on a darker connotation.

  It was all a game to him.

  He sounded like he’d made a bet about whether he could get her to sleep with him and was delighted that she’d been so easily won over. Hell, she hadn’t even made him try to seduce her. Instead, she’d thrown herself at him five minutes after he showed up. She done everything he wanted like an obedient pet pleading for her master’s attention, and he’d fucked her and left her without a second look.

  What were the odds that he even needed to go to New York? Wasn’t it possible that the whole thing was just an excuse to get away from her before she became clingy? Violet’s knees gave out, leaving her sitting limply in the middle of the floor, her throat burning as she tried to hold back tears. She’d given herself to a man who saw her as nothing more than a challenge, and she had only her own stupidity to blame.

  Had she really thought that he could be interested in her? Violet laughed at her own idiocy, the noise harsh and jarring in the silent room. Men would fuck anything if the woman threw herself at them, even her, dumpy as she was. She’d gone after Ian like a cat in heat, and he’d taken pity on her, laughing behind his hand the whole time.

  Choking on unshed tears, Violet peeled herself off the floor. She couldn’t stay here in this room with his paintings all around her for another second. Grabbing her discarded underwear, she stuffed everything into her purse and yanked her hair into a tight bun, hoping that if she walked fast enough, no one would try to stop her before she reached her car. Pausing only long enough to set the security system, she hurried out of the building, feeling like her shame was being broadcast to the entire world.

  She didn’t draw a full breath until she was barricaded inside her apartment, and only then did Violet allow herself to cry. Standing under the shower’s scalding spray, she scrubbed her body furiously, trying to wash away the memory of Ian’s touch. In less than an hour, the most glorious moment of her life had become her worst memory, and she cried herself out on the shower floor.

  She knew better than this. When she acted on impulse, she always suffered for it. What happened this afternoon was a mistake that wouldn’t be repeated. If Ian came back to the museum, she’d make it clear that what happened between them had been only temporary insanity that meant nothing to her.

  It wasn’t until she was in bed with the melting remains of a carton of ice cream sitting on her nightstand that Violet had a hideous thought—Ian hadn’t worn a condom.

  She might have made an even bigger mistake than she’d thought.

  Chapter 7

  Violet gave her calendar a suspicious look as she counted dates for the fifth time. According to the numbers, this wasn’t her fertile time, but her cycle had never been entirely regular. The pill had taken care of that in college, but she’d gone off it in hopes of losing some weight once men became a nonevent in her life. She assumed that if she ever found a boyfriend, they’d take things slowly enough to give her time to get things taken care of before having sex. That was how Violet did things. Careful planning and preparation had served her well throughout her life. When she took risks, she inevitably wound up in tears.

  “Dammit,” she muttered, cursing herself for her stupidity. Owensport was a town out of time, something that she normally found charming, but it also meant that things such as over-the-counter Plan B were years away, and with her duties at the museum, there was no way she had time to make a last-second appointment with her gynecologist. For the first time, Violet found herself regretting leaving New York. At least in the city, she’d have access to a safety net.

  Unfortunately, she lived in Owensport, not New York, and it was too late to fix this now, meaning that she’d just have to deal with the fact that she’d lost her mind and thrown herself at Ian. She made a mistake, and now she was paying the price. She was going to be biting her nails to the quick until her period showed up—if it showed up. The alternative didn’t bear thinking about, so Violet tried not to think about it, shelving all thoughts of hiring more help for the museum at the same time. Working fourteen hours a day meant that she didn’t have time to think.

  Although she tried to shove all thoughts of Ian out of her mind, her heart leaped every time her phone rang, only to come crashing back down in disappointment when it was invariably her sister calling to check on her. On Tuesday, a male voice greeted her when she answered, and Violet swallowed a sob when it asked, “Are we still on for Friday?”

  “Hey, Paul,” she murmured, trying not to let him hear her disappointment. He was a nice guy. It wasn’t his fault that he wasn’t Ian.

  Violet slapped her hand over her mouth to muffle her nervous giggle when she realized that she, who hadn’t rated a second look from a man in years, had gone from having brunch with Paul on Sunday morning to fucking Ian in the museum only five hours later. There was no need to dress it up in pretty euphemisms. They hadn’t made love—they had fucked.

  “Um…yeah. Yeah, we are. How about the Moon & Raven?” The Irish pub was a recent addition to Owensport, and Violet hoped it would be trendy enough to suit Paul’s tastes since he’d expressed displeasure with the town’s lack of nightlife.

  Concentrating on where to meet for drinks meant that she didn’t have to think about any of the other issues, such as if she was lying by not telling him about what happened with Ian. They’d had a total of one date and exclusivity hadn’t even been mentioned, but if she found out that Paul had gone directly from her to another woman’s bed, Violet admitted that she wouldn’t be pleased.

  Admitting that she’d slept with Ian meant admitting what an idiot she was to think that the other man truly cared about her, and Violet’s spirit rebelled at the thought. If this relationship continued, Paul would have plenty of time to learn all of her flaws and weak points. There was no point in calling his attention to them before they’d even had a second date. Besides, it wasn’t as though Ian was going to advertise the fact that he’d fucked the museum’s dumpy curator. Her secret would be safe.

  That was assuming she wasn’t pregnant, but Violet shoved that thought back down the moment it surfaced. There was no way she was pregnant. She couldn’t possibly be that unlucky. Paul would never find out, and what he didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him.

  Decision made, Violet kept her mouth firmly shut as the conversation continued, listening to Paul describe the story he was currently working on involving the town’s decision to upgrade its water treatment facility and hiding her yawns behind her hand. By the time she hung up, she knew more about sewage than she’d ever wanted to know. Hopefully he’d gotten it out of his system, so he wouldn’t want to talk about it at the pub. There was no way she’d be able to even look at a beer if he did.

  The week passed slowly, and every day Violet’s heart broke a little more when Ian failed to call her as he’d promised. By Friday, she decided that the best revenge was moving on with Paul, so she barricaded herself in her office at the museum to slick on her most confidence-boosting red lipstick and use her curling iron to add a few extra waves to her hair before going to meet him at the pub. It was only as she was walking in the front door that she realized she was wearing the same dress she’d worn to the premiere and blushed. He was going to think she didn’t own any other clothes.

  Paul hopped off his stool to greet her, pressing a firm kiss to her cheek. “Hey. You look great.”

  “So do you.” Violet smiled, trying not to compare his neatly p
ressed khakis and white button-down to Ian’s more casual style. Paul was both shorter and stockier than Ian. He couldn’t be expected to carry his clothes with the same flair.

  “So, tell me all about the show,” she invited as she took a seat beside him at the bar. “I’m afraid I didn’t have time to read your review.”

  “You work too much,” he accused, tapping her nose with his index finger. “All work and no play makes Violet a dull girl.”

  Flushing at his teasing rebuke, Violet’s mind wandered back to Sunday afternoon. She’d played then and quickly wished she hadn’t. “I’ve been thinking about hiring more help,” she admitted to deflect the criticism.

  “And replace Leroy?” Paul suggested.

  Violet laughed in surprise. “Leroy’s been there longer than I have. Why would I get rid of him?”

  “Well, he’s not exactly a people person, is he?” Paul asked. “He wouldn’t let me back in after Carlisle pulled his trick with the egress. He was a real hard-ass about it, too. I even slipped him a twenty, but no dice. It did get me your phone number though, so it wasn’t a total loss.”

  “His usual bribes are higher than that.” Violet chuckled, remembering the pleasure in Leroy’s voice when he told her about the hundred dollars he’d accepted to let one of their guests skip the line. Apparently she should have pressed him about the other bribes he’d taken if he was selling her phone number.

  Paul gave her a sharp look. “Is there something going on with you and Carlisle?” he asked.

  Violet choked on her swallow of beer. “What? No! Why?” Hearing the frantic note in her voice, she realized that she was protesting too much. She should have laughed it off.

  Paul shrugged, still watching her as if he were trying to read her thoughts. “Just a hunch. And when I mentioned the egress thing, you didn’t even blink, so I assumed you already knew about it.”