“No. Better.”
“Better?”
Hudson glanced at his brother and his mouth twitched into a slight grin. “Absolutely.” The cityscape streaked by as he maneuvered the car through traffic with laserlike precision. Beneath them the tires crunched over salt-crusted roads, and outside tree branches twisted and curled like arthritic hands, begging for the renewal of spring. They reminded Hudson of the skeleton of a man he was without his heart; without Allie, he was a shell.
But what better way to burn off steam from sins of the past and frustrations of the present than . . .
“Holy shit,” Nick said as the DB9 came to a stop in front of Chicago Fight Club. The sign on the North Elston gym read BRING YOUR OWN WEAPON with double fists as bullet points. “I know you’ve wanted to kick the shit out of me for a while now, but are you serious?”
“Does Pinocchio have a wooden dick?” Hudson cut the engine and yanked on the door handle. “Get your ass out of the car.”
“Fuuuuuck,” Nick cursed under his breath. “Never mind kicking the shit out of me; you’re going to whoop me across the whole damn state.” He got out of the car and slammed the door shut. Again.
Hudson glared over his shoulder as he strode toward the gym. “That’s not working in your favor.”
Nick dragged his feet, then jogged a couple steps to catch up. “Wouldn’t you rather swaddle me in cashmere, then feast on Al’s Beef—greasy, hand-dipped, succulent meat n’ cheese? We’ll be like ladies who lunch.”
“No.” Hudson held the door open. “Come on, go inside like a big boy.”
“Ass.”
“Inside, princess.”
“You’re being a real jerk,” Nick said, shuffling into the fight club.
“Take it out on me in the ring.”
The second they walked in, Hudson heard the rhythmic sound of jump ropes slapping against concrete; the goading, shit-talking trainers shouting out drills; and the even-tempered thump-a-thump of gloved fists working well-worn, bloodred punching bags that dropped from the sky. Chicago Fight Club was hard core, and belts hung on the wall to prove it. This was the joint he sought out to silence the torment between his ears. Because when you were stuck indoors after mother nature decided to send the city into a deep freeze, beating the hell out of something seemed like a better energy burn than hamster wheeling it on a treadmill.
They moved deeper into the place, toward a roped-off ring in the back. Hudson gave tight nods to various trainers, and regulars like himself kicked a chin at him or grinned with mouth guards puffing out their cheeks and brightening their pearly whites.
When he’d started there six months ago, Hudson wasn’t into the formal training. He was a street fighter with defensive skills developed to survive one shitty neighborhood after another. But he quickly found sparring with an opponent channeled the simmering angst that always hummed in the background of his mind, endlessly shifting up and down like an equalizer. And working with a trainer honed his technique. His brother, however, was just as good, if not better, with the natural instinct. Despite the bitching and moaning, taking Nick into the ring had the potential to be one of his most challenging rounds yet.
“My brother the billionaire takes me to the nicest places. Couldn’t we have gone to Equinox or some fancy gym where they offer massages and women wear spandex?”
“What’s wrong with this place? You want to work up a sweat, you come here.” Hudson unzipped his jacket, then with a shrug of his shoulders tossed it off and to the side.
“What’s wrong? This is like some first-rule-of-Fight-Club place. And no, I don’t want to ‘work up a sweat.’ I want to chow down with my big bro picking up the tab while I leave the tip.” Nick looked up at the exposed support beams and the pipes that snaked around them, rattling and clanking from someone turning on the showers. The concrete was worn, the paint clean but peeling, and the walls bare. “At least they have hot water so I don’t have to ride home with your stench.”
“I shower at home.” Hudson fisted a hand behind his neck, pulling his T-shirt over his head and throwing it on top of his jacket.
“Oh, fuck me. No way.” Nick balled up his hoodie and dropped it onto a chair. “I’ll cab it, take the bus, walk through the sn—”
“Shut up and get your gloves on.” Hudson chucked his brother a set of gloves, derailing the next smart-ass comment that was without question about to fire out of Nick’s mouth. With his own pair in hand, Hudson parted the ropes and ducked into the ring. He shoved his left hand into a glove, then his right. Going head-to-head with his fists, he knocked the padded gloves together. “I’m waiting.”
Nick ducked into the ring with a glove on his left hand. “Violence isn’t the answer, bro.”
“Stop whining like a little girl.” Hudson rolled his head from side to side, giving his neck a crack to loosen it up.
Nick stabbed his right hand into the glove, then shook the hair out of his face. “Fine. If taking a couple swings at me makes you feel better, let’s do it,” he said, squaring off. Hudson immediately recognized the reckless gleam in his eyes. It was a trait they both shared, one that pushed them to their own respective extremes.
“If I only wanted to swing my fists at you for a couple hours, I wouldn’t need a boxing ring to do it.”
“True that.” Nick fanned his arms out to shoulder level. “So come on then, you thread-humping, designer-whoring pussy.” He flashed a smug grin. “Give it your best shot.”
Hudson chuckled as he watched his brother bounce on the balls of his feet. “Let’s see if your jab is as quick as your smart-ass mouth.” He stepped forward and raised his fists, keeping them tight to his chin. He knew his brother had game, but that didn’t stop him from . . . “Trigger shy?” . . . taunting, antagonizing, firing him up to strike.
Nick snapped out a couple of punches that were met with a forearm block. Hudson was quick to retaliate and nailed a clear shot to his brother’s ribs.
“Fuck, that hurt.” A swift kick to the other side of Nick’s torso had him ducking out of the way. “I thought we were going to just play around some, then go get you a fancy latte or some shit.”
“Says the fancy-ass coffee slinger.” Hudson was already balancing out his weight. He was like a bomb attached to an ignition switch and that bitch-ass bastard Julian was cranking the key. This was what he needed to level him out, to dull his mood into a tolerable state. Raw fucking would have worked, too, but one had to work with what one had. Besides, Allie had elevated the physical act into another dimension. There was no going back from that. She owned him—heart, body, and soul. Man, did he sound like a whipped son-of-a-bitch. As if he gave a flying fuck.
“All right, game on, bro. We’re goin’ to get scruffy now.” Nick threw out a left jab and something hot ripped through Hudson’s gut. He refocused, and with tremendous strength his muscles coalesced into the perfect uppercut that made his brother stagger as though he were drunk.
Hudson gave him a second to recover. “You good?”
“Yeah man, but who the hell pissed you off?”
“Clears my head.” Hudson spun and kicked his leg in the air, and his brother dropped low, dodging what would have been a direct hit. “Come on, Nicky, you’ve been in barroom brawls that rival the Octagon.”
“Hey, I’m a lover, not a fighter.”
Hudson thought about what it would feel like to live a life short on responsibility, and for a brief moment he envied his brother’s freedom. “You must have some shit to work out.”
“Evidently you do.” Nick moved in fast with a hard punch forward, then threw out a combination that made Hudson step up his efforts with a left-right.
“I was dumped, Nick.” As the words left his mouth a pain rolled through his chest and twisted down to his gut. And to top it off it was a lie, a total fucking lie that cinched up his stomach hard core. The devil knew his closet was full of skeletons, but secrets between brothers was something he’d never subscribed to. Nick knew his past; he
ll, they’d lived it together, and the cause and effect of it had bonded them tighter than most. But some lies were spun out of necessity.
“I know. It’s a first for you. Shit, wait, third. Same girl, but still.”
“Not funny.” Hudson went at him in a meet-and-greet in the middle of the ring, force against force, with each of them trying to toss the other off like a set of magnets. Their biceps strained and the muscles in their forearms flexed.
Twisting himself free, Nick bounced back on his heels. His chest heaved and sweat ran down his temples. “Actually, I need your help with something.”
“Christ,” Hudson muttered under his breath as he threw out a roundhouse kick.
Nick caught him by the ankle. “What’s that supposed to mean?” He laughed at Hudson jumping on one foot like a pogo stick before finally dropping his leg.
“Because conversations beginning with ‘I need your help’ usually mean you’re in deep shit.”
“Nah, nothing like that. I need a tux.”
Hudson’s guard dropped and his brow shot up to his hairline. “A what?” he asked just as Nick popped him a solid one in the jaw.
“Ha! Bull’s-eye, motherfucker.”
Hudson shook off the blow that had left him momentarily dazed. “Goddamn, good right hook.”
“Thanks.” Nick’s mouth lifted into a broad grin. “And I need a tux.”
“For what?”
“That frilly charity event of yours. I’m going too.”
“For the love of God, Nicky. Allie and I broke up but I haven’t sworn off women. I can get a date.”
“Not with your sorry ass, dick. With Harper.”
“Come again?” Sweet hell, Nick was going for the heavyweight title of shockers.
Nick cleared his throat. “I’m escorting the fair maiden, Harper Hayes,” he said, trying to sound all regal.
“Quit talking like that. And ‘maiden’ and ‘fair’ aren’t adjectives that describe the redhead.” The woman was more of a wrecking crew with a bullhorn, but Hudson liked her. She didn’t take shit even from hotheaded assholes like himself. “More importantly, when the hell did this happen?”
“Since Mother Nature played matchmaker on Christmas Eve. We’ve been hanging out.”
“Hanging out?” Allie had given him a heads-up about his brother and Harper, but the news still . . . he ripped a glove off and ran a hand through his hair.
“Yeah, she’s cool to talk to.”
“How often are the two of you just ‘hanging out’?” Hudson wanted his brother to be happy, but there were rules of the twelve-step variety that suggested getting into a relationship in the first months of sobriety wasn’t a good idea.
Nick shrugged. “A few times a week, I guess.” He glanced down at the gray mat sprinkled with droplets of their sweat. “I like her.”
“When were you planning on telling me this?”
“I’m telling you now, aren’t I?”
“Only because you’ve had the fear of the tux put into you. Christ, Nicky.”
Nick flashed a cheesy grin. “So you’ll help me get all spiffy like my big bro?”
“Ass kisser.”
“Please.”
“Of course.”
“Thanks. Next week?”
“I’m out of town at the start of next week. But I’ll make a few calls.”
“Sweet.” Nick laughed. “Now get your glove back on so I can knock your ass across this mat for being a prick.”
Chapter Fourteen
A commotion in the hallway drew Allie’s attention from the e-mail on the monitor in front of her. Hudson was in the building. She felt his presence before she even heard his voice. The hair on her neck raised and her skin tightened in anticipation.
Through the open door she saw him round the corner, his jaw tight and his brow furrowed. “No, absolutely not,” he barked into the phone he held pressed to his ear. “I’m about to discuss it with her.” He turned his attention to Colin, his tone tight and clipped. “Hold her calls,” he instructed as he strode by his desk and into Allie’s office, closing the door behind him.
“God, you’re hot when you’re pissy.”
He lifted an amused brow. “That was for the benefit of the young Mr. James.” With a push of his thumb he powered his phone off before dropping it inside his suit jacket. “Not to mention the other dozen or so I passed in the hall. Nothing more than a show so I might steal a moment alone with you.”
“It was?”
“Hmm, but now I’m intrigued.” A smile tugged at the corner of his lips. “Hot when I’m pissy, eh? Let’s discuss.”
“It turns me on when you go all alpha male,” she said, shifting slightly in her chair.
Hudson’s eyes flared as his shrewd stare picked up on her subtle movement. “Is that so?”
“You know it does.” There was no denying it. Hudson had experienced her response to his more dominant side on numerous occasions. But the gleam in his eyes told her he was enjoying the turn in conversation far too much to let the subject drop just yet.
“I know you’ve had a taste of what it’s like when I’m in control.” He drew closer. “Let’s hypothetical here. Suppose I told you to touch yourself?”
“Hypothetically . . . are you watching me do this?”
“Of course I’m watching.”
“Then hypothetically . . . I would keep my eyes locked on yours and do what you asked.” There was a time when Allie would have found the idea of touching herself in front of a man far too embarrassing to even consider. But Hudson once told her it was a fantasy of his to watch her pleasure herself, and his unyielding desire gave her confidence. It made her feel wanton and sexy and awakened a side of her she never knew existed.
“And what if I waited until you were about to come, then stopped you?” He rounded the desk. “And told you that if you didn’t stop, you couldn’t have my cock.” In a swift move he spun her chair to face him. “How would that feel, being unable to release until I say?”
“I think I’d like that.” Her voice had turned breathy and needy, betraying the growing ache between her legs.
“Then suppose I told you to finger yourself until you were about to come again.” A rush of pleasure surged through her core and she pressed her thighs together in an effort to find some relief. But Hudson placed a hand on each of her knees and yanked them apart. “And then once again made you stop right before you slipped over the edge.” His thumbs moved in small circles on her skin. “Teasing you little by little.” His hands fell away and he straightened, his cock straining against the fabric of his suit. The conversation was affecting him as much as it was her, but he kept going, adding one more caveat to their little game. “And to be clear,” he added, “you’re not allowed to beg.”
Allie bit her lip to stifle a moan. “Hypothetically this is making me wet.”
He smirked. “Oh, I’m not even close to being done.”
Evil bastard. “You’re not?”
“No, because then I’d have you take your nipples, one at a time, and pull, hard, until I said stop.” His words caused her nipples to harden against the rough lace of her bra. “All the while you’re trying to forget how desperately you want to come.”
“Even though I’d want to keep my hands much lower?”
He nodded slowly. “But you can’t because I won’t let you come if you don’t obey. And make no mistake, Alessandra, you won’t come until I decide you’re ready to be fucked.”
She swallowed hard.
“Still think you’d like being controlled?” He smirked. “Hypothetically.”
All she could manage was a small nod.
His eyes narrowed briefly as he appraised the situation, then his expression turned into something darker. It was a look she’d come to know well, one that never failed to leave her breathless. “Take your panties off,” he ordered softly.
Her mouth gaped open. “The door isn’t even locked.”
“It wasn’t a request.” His stan
ce altered as he gazed down at her. “Do it.”
He watched with hungry eyes as she reached under her skirt and slowly peeled the scrap of black lace down her thighs. “Spread your legs. Show me how much you want me.”
A thrill shot through her at his rough command and she shivered. Being exposed to him, so open and vulnerable while he stood before her fully clothed was more of a turn-on than she would have ever thought possible. Parting her thighs, she revealed herself to him, and in return was rewarded with his sharp intake of breath.
“Beautiful,” he murmured, dropping to his knees before her. “So swollen and wet.” A single finger skirted her trembling opening. “You’re aching to feel me inside you, aren’t you?”
“God, yes . . .” She lifted her hips in a shameless plea for more, but he kept up the maddening pace, circling her in a lazy, leisurely rhythm. Every so often his fingertip would dip inside, only to withdraw and begin again. She was near mindless with the need to be filled when he finally pushed two fingers inside of her.
Allie’s head fell back against the leather chair. She was wound so tight, she knew all it would take was one skilled flick of his wrist to send her spiraling over the edge. But instead his hand remained perfectly still.
“Don’t come,” he said. His voice was harsh with a barely leashed restraint. “Not until I say you can.” With that his fingers began a slow and teasing pump in and out of her quivering flesh.
Somehow she managed to stop herself from grinding against his palm, resisting the urge to ride his fingers to the shattering orgasm she craved. But she couldn’t hold back her plea. “Please, Hudson,” she begged.
“When you come it will be with my cock inside you.” His fingers moved in a circular motion. “And I don’t think you’re quite ready yet.”
He added a third finger and a moan was ripped from somewhere deep inside her. She dug her heels into the carpet in an attempt to stem the wave of pleasure that threatened to consume her. He kept her on the edge, driving her mad but never giving her exactly what she needed to get her off. When the first tremors of orgasm grasped his fingers, he removed them, leaving her a quivering, panting mess. He held her gaze as he brought his fingers to his lips, tasting the evidence of her arousal. “Hmm, yes, I do believe you’re ready now.”
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