Only You (A Sweet Torment Novel)

by Joya Ryan

“I am not jealous.” So she was a supermodel with legs longer than my entire body. Naturally someone of Leo’s wealth, power, and ridiculous good looks would date her.

  “That’s all you have to say?” Though Leo’s tone was rough, and anger tinted it, his body took on a whole different demeanor. His shoulders straightened and his hips subtly thrust out with every inch he took toward me and farther into my house. Hips that were lined with a black leather belt and black pants that accented his long legs. I knew what kind of muscles he was hiding. Sure, I may not have gotten a good look in the past, but I’d felt it.

  And in that moment, that was all I was thinking about.

  “Was there something else you wanted me to say?” I said on a strangled breath.

  “Well, you didn’t defend against liking me.” When I opened my mouth to do just that, he cut me off. “And don’t make a liar out of yourself, Red. You’re better than that.”

  The challenge was issued and heat bloomed in my chest. Anger, rage, want, lust. All of it flooded. I hated the way he made me feel. Hated that I lost my judgment around him. Hated that I wanted him so much. Hated the world spinning around me and the lack of control I seemed to have daily.

  I wanted my control back. Wanted to feel . . . wanted. Like there was someone left in the world who valued me. That I wasn’t this plague of a person with a bad past, bad present, and bleak future.

  “There are moments I like you,” I said slowly. “But I think like is the wrong word.”

  He raised a brow. “Oh?”

  I nodded and kicked the door shut behind him, bringing our bodies an inch apart. “I think want is more accurate.”

  He searched my face and I knew he was toiling with the possibilities and ramifications of what this encounter could mean. How far we could go. Because I was doing the same thing.

  But I was done thinking about that.

  Mostly because I was done feeling the way I did. I wanted that brief moment back where time stopped and all I felt was Leo. Where I wasn’t this awful woman no one believed in. That I wasn’t alone in my life.

  “It’s been a bad day,” I said.

  He scoffed and tugged his damp shirt once. “Tell me about it.” His hand trailed down and I thought he’d touch me, but he didn’t. “You said you wanted professional,” he reminded me, throwing my words from the night at the gala in my face.

  “I do. But I’m off the clock right now. And I want . . .”

  He crouched enough to coax me to look at him. “What do you want?”

  The edge in his voice made me think that maybe, just maybe, if I asked him, he’d give me it. It was a risk, but the coldness was overwhelming and his heat was too tempting to turn away from.

  “You,” I said softly.

  His dark brows sliced down with a look of concern. “What happened tonight, Paige?”

  “N-nothing.”

  “Bullshit. You look . . .” he examined my face. “Sad.”

  I cleared my throat. I’d just admitted I wanted him and was now standing vulnerable. I needed some power back.

  “I’m fine.”

  He shook his head. “I don’t believe you.”

  The words hurt, but not in the way they did from everyone else. Leo, once again, was calling me out, forcing me to admit something I didn’t want to. Something he seemed to see.

  “I want honesty from you, Paige. And I’m tired of you coming at me fifty percent, then walking away.”

  He stepped out the front door to leave me, and I realized how shitty that notion felt. I grabbed his arm. I was already waging a losing battle against this pain in my stomach and the tears dancing behind my eyes. If he left tonight, I just might break.

  “Don’t.”

  He turned around and looked at where I was gripping him on the arm, then at my face.

  “Stay,” I whispered. “And I promise, you can be the one to leave after.”

  “You still don’t get it. I didn’t want to leave the first time.”

  I swallowed hard and something so honest, so passionate flashed in his eyes. How long had I left him waiting at the bar before he realized I’d snuck out? A few minutes? An hour? I pushed the guilt down because it was the last feeling I wanted to have. The last feeling I wanted him to have.

  “I didn’t want to leave either,” I mumbled and he frowned.

  “Then why did you? Twice?”

  “Because I don’t like you.” The words came out so quickly that I couldn’t stop them.

  “Awesome,” Leo scoffed. “You know, I’m a pretty relaxed guy, but you?” Those blue eyes swept over me. “You make no sense. And I’ll be damned if I let another woman fuck with my mind. The shit you pulled tonight with the flowers, only to deny what you feel for me is . . .” His eyes leveled me with an angry blue ice stare. “Heartless.”

  And with that, my heart actually stopped. Not only did I realize he’d said “another woman,” meaning someone had obviously hurt him in the past, but from the sound of his voice and look on his face, it was bad. But he wasn’t totally wrong. I was acting like an idiot. Problem was, I didn’t know what or who to cling to. How to stop. How to . . . be honest with him. Because in the end, the unspun truth was rarely my friend anyway.

  “I know I screwed up,” I said. “I sent the flowers because I didn’t like you with that woman.” I shook my head at the ceiling, feeling weak for admitting that. “And I didn’t mean that I don’t like you . . . I just don’t like the way you . . .” I motioned my hand in his direction.

  “You don’t like the way I what?”

  “The way you see me, okay? I don’t like how you just—”

  “Call your bullshit?” he said with a grin.

  Yeah, that’s what I meant, but no way would I say that out loud. Not when I had admitted too much already.

  “Forget it,” I sighed.

  “No,” Leo said with a sharp rasp. “What the hell is going on with you, Paige? Do you enjoy fucking with people?”

  “No,” I said with a croak in my throat.

  Every emotion I had been battling the last week, hell the last several years, settled in my chest like rocks and it hurt to breathe. I was sick of feeling alone all the time, and no matter how hard I tried to claw out from under the badness weighing me down, I just couldn’t gain any ground.

  I was constantly digging. Trying to prove something, anything, to anyone. And nothing mattered. I was alone in a crowd, alone even with my friends—the ones who still saw me, that is.

  I was plagued. Seen as a risk.

  I offered nothing of value, because my word didn’t even mean anything. If it did, my own mother would have taken it. Roman would have taken it.

  But they didn’t.

  I was losing the fight, one I’d been waging since I was fifteen and begging to make the pain stop. The disbelief. Because the problem wasn’t that I didn’t have anyone to stand by me in anything—it was that I was slowly starting to wonder if I even had myself anymore.

  I glanced up and saw Leo’s face. It was pulled together in concern.

  “Paige . . . are you okay?”

  Taking a deep breath, I placed my hands on his chest and gently pushed him back so his shoulders met the wall.

  “I don’t enjoy fucking with people,” I clarified, “but I do enjoy fucking you.”

  Grabbing his shirt in my fists, I didn’t say anything else and leaned up and kissed him. Hard.

  I needed control. Something. Anything that made me feel like I had an ounce of strength left.

  When Leo didn’t pull away, I thrust my tongue between his teeth and he groaned. His hands landed heavy on my ass and hoisted me up. I wrapped my legs around his hips and continued eating at his mouth like I was starved. Because I was.

  Every time I tasted him, I grew more addicted.

  I bit his lip.

  Sucked his tongue.

  Then went back for more.

  He walked us into the bedroom while returning every heated kiss I gave. Balancing my weight on o
ne arm, he reached up with the other and freed my hair, instantly tunneling his fingers through it, pulling the tendrils hard enough to sting my scalp in the most erotic way that made me moan for more.

  I was so on fire for him that I clawed like an animal to get to his skin. Anything I could touch. Anything I could feel, I wanted.

  So long as I wasn’t feeling the ice. The empty, cold ache anymore.

  Without warning, he tossed me down on the bed and pulled his shirt over his head and off. I had only a millisecond to appreciate his cut abs and strong chest. The way his tattoo wrapped around him, like black ink loving his skin in an intimate swirled design, was breathtaking. But he was on top of me before I could even right myself.

  “You want me to fuck you, Red?” He wedged himself between my thighs and I raised my hips to grind against him. I shoved hard at his chest, making him fall on his back on the bed, and I straddled him. I yanked my shirt off, leaving me in nothing but knee highs and panties.

  Slapping my hands on his hard chest, I gently clawed his mocha skin and said, “No. I want to fuck you.”

  He wrapped his arms around my waist and sat up. All the hard muscles of his stomach rippling in a way that made my mouth water to taste him. Apparently he had a similar notion because his mouth latched on to one of my nipples and he sucked hard.

  My head fell back and I drove my fingers into his hair, letting him devour me.

  “Yes,” I groaned, loving his mouth on me.

  He sucked and licked, burrowing his face between my breasts and gently biting. He devoured every inch of plump skin and I arched my back, silently begging for more.

  There are several kinds of sex: angry, desperate, makeup, loving, consuming.

  Then there was this.

  Whatever Leo and I were on the brink of was somehow a combination of all of them. Rough, slow, hard, powerful, tender. I couldn’t figure out how I was feeling everything at once. My emotions were spiraling and I just wanted him. So much I didn’t care to understand why. And the passion was overwhelming.

  I reached between us, trying to unfasten his belt, but I couldn’t get a good enough grip. I loved his mouth on me, but had to push him to his back again so I could have more.

  He lay back, sucking my nipple hard until forced to let go.

  I went straight to work on his belt and fly. “Condom?”

  “In my pants pocket,” he said and I searched for it, finally finding it, then tugged his pants all the way off, leaving him naked. I shucked my socks and panties then straddled him again.

  His cock bobbed between us and I stared transfixed. He was longer than average, but what was more alarming was his girth. No wonder I had felt a little sore the morning after we’d had sex at the bar.

  A low rumble came from his chest. His whole torso strained with tension.

  He was holding back.

  Whatever he wanted to do, he didn’t, he just lay there, letting me straddle him, to look and touch.

  “This is your show, Red,” he said, confirming my thoughts.

  He could easily overpower me. Take me like he did the night we met, hard and consuming. But he didn’t. He let me lead. Let me have the power. And judging by the way his body flexed and tensed, it was going against his instincts.

  In this moment, I actually believed he truly saw me. Saw what I needed. And that was him. I needed to feel in control again, and somehow, he understood that.

  I ran my hands down his chest, pausing a minute to trail my fingertip along some of the lines of his tattoo. He grabbed my wrist and brought my hand to his mouth. He gently nipped at the fleshy part of my thumb, then kissed my palm, up my forearm, sucking on the pulse point.

  The action made me shudder. Like he was reaching out for any contact. Like he couldn’t stand not having his mouth on me. Or maybe he just wanted me. Truly wanted me.

  I bent and kissed his chest, running my lips from his sternum to his nipple and sucked. He hissed and those impressive abs flexed further, so hard they looked welded out of steel. I couldn’t help but go lower. Biting those steely ridges and licking them. His skin was so soft and hot.

  “You drive me insane, angel,” he muttered, and I wasn’t sure he realized he’d said it out loud.

  I traveled lower, and he looked down at me just as my mouth hovered over his hard cock.

  “You go down this path, you better be ready for retaliation,” Leo said with a husky voice.

  I had no idea what he meant, but it didn’t matter. I wanted him. Loved the power I felt hovering over him like this. I could handle whatever retaliation he was thinking. I just didn’t want to stop. Didn’t want to leave this moment. Because right then, I was happy, on fire, and ready to split apart from drowning in want for the one man who seemed to understand me.

  “Threatening me, are you?” I said with a grin.

  Keeping my eyes on his, I licked the entire length of his erection slowly. He gritted his teeth. So I did it again. He sat up, reached down to grab my thigh, and before I could move, he tugged me around. In one fluid motion, he pulled my hips toward his head and positioned me so that I was now straddling his face, looking down at his body.

  “I warned you,” he said, his breath hitting the sweet spot between my legs. He delved his tongue into my core and I cried out his name.

  He thrust in and out, causing my hips to rock slightly to meet his mouth. I leaned forward, took him between my lips, and sucked him deeply.

  He groaned against my heated flesh, so I worked faster. Lapping at him. He flicked his tongue over my clit so fast, I didn’t feel my release until it hit me in a strong, sudden bolt of pleasure rushing through my veins. With him buried deep in my mouth, I screamed as my body shuddered over and over again.

  He coaxed me up and spun me back around. I was so off-kilter that it took me a moment to realize he had sheathed himself in a condom and I was now straddling his hips once more.

  “Why—” I took a moment to catch my breath because little tremors were still sparking under my skin. “Why did you make me stop?”

  He flexed his hips and I felt his erection prodding my opening. “Because I want to come when I’m buried deep inside of you.”

  The words sent another dose of pleasure through me. I couldn’t hold back anymore. I sank down on him, my sensitive flesh aching in the most delicious way around him.

  “Still your show, angel,” he said. “Whatever you want, take it.”

  My eyes fastened on his. He gently cupped my hips, but didn’t move me. Just let me have, take, whatever I wanted. Again the realization that he somehow tapped into a hidden part of me was incredible. And scary. Because if he could read me this well, he could tell that I was—

  Oh God . . .

  The words stuck in my brain and the silent sound of them made my skin heat further, both in pleasure and terror.

  I was falling for him.

  I rocked forward just a little and his blue eyes stayed on my face but his brows sliced down in pleasure. The way he felt around me, inside of me, was too much to bear. He looked at me like he really saw me. Wanted me.

  No. Slow was bad. Connection was bad. A sting formed behind my eyes, so I lifted up until he almost slid from my body, then slammed back down. He growled and his grip tightened, but still he let me move how I wanted.

  And I did.

  I ground against him, hard and deep so that he hit that spot inside. I couldn’t help it. My eyes fluttered shut and my thoughts betrayed me and came out as words.

  “I feel you everywhere,” I said. With my hands on his chest, I bore down and swirled my hips, then bobbed up and down.

  And Leo just held on to me. With one large hand gripping my side, the other cupped my breast, and his thumb brushed over my nipple. It was enough to send me over the edge.

  “Leo!” I moaned as another hot flash of pleasure raced through me.

  He said something that sounded like “perfect angel” and I felt him follow me over the edge. His body pulsed and all those muscles flexed
and released.

  He sat up once more, only this time, he tugged the backs of my knees so that my legs wrapped around him, my heels locking together. I gasped because he was still hard, still inside me, now even deeper.

  Even closer.

  He wrapped his big arms around me and hugged me close. Tightly. His face buried in my neck, he gently kissed my throat.

  I felt so safe.

  Like nothing in the world could touch me. Not the past. Not the pain. Not even the truth . . . the truth that no one believed me. Believed in me.

  The sting behind my eyes made tears rise and I batted them back with my lashes. Leo wasn’t letting go. He just sat there and held me.

  I did the only thing I could. The only thing that felt right.

  I wrapped my arms around his neck and hugged him back.

  Chapter Twelve

  When I woke up to a warm, strong pillow that smelled like yummy spice and masculinity, I creaked my eyes open to find my “pillow” was Leo’s stomach.

  He was propped up slightly against the headboard.

  I must have fallen asleep hard, something I’d never done with anyone. I always slept alone. I sat up, hoping he didn’t notice. But when I looked at his face, he was wide awake, though it was still dark outside.

  “What time is it?” I asked, sleep still in my voice.

  “About four in the morning.”

  I rubbed my eyes. “You’re still here.”

  “Ouch,” he said with a grin. “I think we need to work on your bedside manner, Red. Tip number one, don’t insult the man who gave you two orgasms, then was used as your own personal body pillow, first thing when you wake up.”

  “I didn’t mean to fall asleep on you,” I said, realizing we were both still naked.

  “I’m glad you did.”

  I looked at him for a long moment. He seemed so comfortable. I, however, never spent the night with a man. Sure, I had sex, but never overnighters, slumber parties, or any length of time under the same roof after that. They were uncomfortable for me. Partly because I didn’t trust being near a man when I slept.

  Which was odd that I’d fallen asleep with Leo. It had never happened before.

  “You didn’t sleep?” I asked.