by Maggie Marr
“Your assessment was correct.” She stopped pacing and looked straight into his eyes. “I was afraid. I was afraid of what your reaction would be if I told you I was pregnant. Scared that you’d assume I’d done so intentionally, to get at you, to get at your money, to trap you. I couldn’t live with that. Also, I didn’t want the pressure that I assumed would come from you.”
“Pressure?”
Aubrey looked away from him, her gaze turned toward the floor. “To terminate the pregnancy.”
Justin’s heart nearly burst from his chest. Heat seared through his soul. “Why would you assume such a thing? Why would you think that I wouldn’t want my own child?”
Aubrey pulled at her hands and started to pace once more. “Do you remember who you were then? Do you truly remember your lifestyle? Justin, please. You may now be willing to become a parent, but fifteen years ago? I think you bedded a different supermodel nearly every night.”
He tilted his head to the side. He did remember those days. Filled with frivolity and hedonistic pleasures. Wine, women, and loads of parties. He’d been young and sowing his oats. Her eyes filled with melancholy, her full lips turned down, her chest heaved as though she’d just finished a forty-yard sprint.
“Aubrey, you were different than those women.” His eyes traveled over her body, and again his gaze locked with those brilliant green eyes. “You knew you were different.”
“Oh”—Aubrey rolled her gaze to the ceiling and raised her hands high—“I knew I was different. Not only did I not stack up in the supermodel department, but I was also your subordinate at Travati Financial. Wow, how cliché, the younger protégée sleeping with her boss, and then let’s follow that up with her getting pregnant.” She spun and faced him, her eyes narrowing. “I did not want to be that girl, that woman. That’s not who I am.”
No, that wasn’t who Aubrey Hayes was then or now. She was much more than a cliché or a gold digger or a one-night stand. She was more than all those things. She was unique and original, and she’d stirred him to his very core. Brought him in that one night to a place he couldn’t imagine and had wanted to visit again and again and again.
Justin stood. “You remember when you came to me, after that night, when you walked into my office?”
A flush started at her collarbones and colored her neck, finally pinkening her cheeks. She didn’t move or nod, but her eyebrow twitched an acknowledgement that she shared that memory.
“I had an entire speech prepared for exactly what would go down when we spoke.”
Aubrey’s tongue chased over her full bottom lip. She crossed her arms. “I’m quite certain you did. I’m sure it was lovely. You were very good at letting women down easily. An art form for you. A magical touch as I remember. Most of your former flings actually remained your friends after you got rid of them.”
“Oh, Aubrey.” He stepped closer. Lavender and mint, the scent of Aubrey, filled his nose. Her luscious red hair, wild and curly and untamed. “Do you have such little faith in your appeal?” He tilted his head and looked into her eyes. “The words that I’d prepared were not meant to make you leave, the words were meant to make you stay.”
Her lips parted. Her eyes widened. A sharp gasp.
“Was I wrong? Did I misinterpret our night together? All those months when we worked side by side. You and me, our rapport? I’d never had a relationship like that with any other woman, nor have I since.” His eyebrows creased. “Was I completely wrong in my assessment of what could have been between us?”
She turned from him. Stepped away from his touch, his nearness. Her arms crossed over her body. “No,” she said, her head tilted toward the floor, her entire body faced away from him. “You weren’t wrong.” Her voice was nearly a whisper. “But how could I possibly believe, then, with the life you had”—she turned and faced him now. Her expression a study in confusion and melancholy—“how could I have thought that I would be enough for you?”
His heart careened in his chest. She was right. He’d given her no indication that he’d wanted her after their night together. Instead he’d listened to her words and let her go with a hope that he’d one day win her over. That he’d be ready for a permanent relationship and she’d still be there, working with him at Travati Financial. He had such excellent instincts in business. Great timing. Both had helped him to acquire his fortune, but they had been completely off where Aubrey was concerned.
Her eyes held an openness, a vulnerability. He stepped toward her and he reached out and pressed his fingertips to her cheek. “I wanted you. I wanted us … but I also realized that demanding that you make a different choice when it came to our night together would mean losing you.”
How could she forgive him, trust him, after the other night? He’d been so hard, so callous, so angry, and yet here she was, baring her soul to him, making herself vulnerable to him, telling him about the mistake she’d made due to her own fears. How could any person allow themselves to be so emotionally vulnerable again and again and again? And yet Aubrey did, was doing so now. His heart swelled; in many ways she’d been much too good for him then and was still too good for him now.
The heat pounding through his body wasn’t just desire, not just lust, but the memory of the feeling of wanting to protect her, to make her his, to take care of her and her soft, vulnerable side that spoke to him as no other woman had.
He nodded. “You came into my office and used words like professionalism and career and not wanting to be the woman sleeping with her boss.” His fingertips pressed up from her cheek and over her hair. Soft as silk. “I couldn’t be the man to keep you away from your own dreams.” He shook his head. “But instead, I lost you anyway. You left. I should have come after you, chased you, found you.”
“You weren’t ready and neither was I.” She tilted her cheek into his touch.
“You told me to forget the night we shared.” He pressed his fingertips to her chin and tilted her head up to his. Her lips quivered. “So I tried to forget. For fifteen years, I’ve tried to forget. Do you know, Aubrey, how hard it is to forget something that is absolutely unforgettable?”
Her eyes closed and a deep breath rattled through her chest. “I never forgot,” Aubrey whispered.
“Nor did I.” His lips were upon hers. This time there was no anger, only heat. Raw, unadulterated passion and need and pent-up want that had survived for over a decade, emotions they’d pretended did not exist. He pulled her into him with a gentle tug, and her body melded to his.
God. Yes. This was his Aubrey. He pressed his hand to the back of her head and tilted that lush mouth toward his so that he might plunder her even deeper. His tongue twined with hers and then his teeth grazed her bottom lip, sucking and pulling and wanting and needing.
His hand pressed over the front of her dress where her breasts strained, her nipples pert and tight beneath the fabric. He unfastened the three pearl buttons and slipped the dress over her shoulders. Her body relaxed into his. God, he wanted her. He’d wanted her for over a decade. She came to him in his dreams when he was alone and asleep, her body like a siren calling to him.
His fingertips beneath her bra, he pressed her nipple, then unsnapped the back. The lace fell forward from her shoulders. Unlike last night, she did not stiffen or pull away from him. Her arms wrapped around his neck, and her hands wove into his hair. He pulled her closer, his hand around her firm ass, nothing but the tiniest piece of fabric between them. He tugged at the string of her panties and snapped them from her body.
“God, yes,” she moaned.
Her voice propelled him forward, and he pressed her naked body closer to him. Her hands were on his bare chest. Her lips now pulled at his nipple. Her hand slipped down, beneath the waist of his pajamas, and she grasped his cock, a firm grasp at the base of him.
He nearly doubled over, so great was the pleasure, so long had it been. Her stroke was firm and even with a tight grip up his shaft, her fingertip swiping at the pre-come on the head of his cock.
“Aubrey.” His voice was low, a guttural groan. He’d not heard that sound come from his throat is so very long. Too long. That voice was one that he’d only heard when Aubrey clasped his sex, when Aubrey touched him and kissed him and made him drop to his knees with pleasure.
This woman. God, he would worship at the feet of this woman if only she would never leave him again. He crushed his mouth to hers while she stroked his throbbing cock. To pleasure her, to make her his, to be inside Aubrey consumed his mind. Her hips undulated against him. His fingers slipped over her belly and through her curls and into the hot wetness of her sex, pressing at the engorged nub of her clit, her head thrust back as he pressed his lips to her neck.
Again, his finger circled. Her breath caught and her chest heaved with pleasure. He would touch her, he would make her scream his name. Now. Again. Later. For the rest of his damned life if she let him. She was heaven and sweet, and he could barely contain his own pleasure. He lifted her and took her to the couch, then laid her back on the plush suede. His lips slid down her belly, his teeth grazing her flesh. His fingertip danced across her clit. He pressed two fingers deep into her sex, and her hips bucked from the pleasure of his touch. He pressed his mouth over the top of her thighs and spread her legs with his hands. His eyes gazed upon her, wet and soft and glistening with want.
“Aubrey, you’re beautiful.”
Her hips arched up in response to his words, her breath short pants driven by desire. His fingertip still stroked and circled her clit even as his eyes devoured her sex. Their gaze locked. He kept his eyes on hers and leaned forward. His tongue stroked along the side of her, laving up one side, so close to that tiny spot that desired relief.
“Please, oh my God, Justin, please.”
The pleasure of hearing his name on her lips consumed him. His cock hard and strong, he fought the urge to rise up and push deep inside her. Now, this moment, was about pleasure for her, a prayer to this goddess, to this feeling, to this need that she created within him without even trying. In spite of his anger, in spite of his hardness, in spite of his maleness, she made him vulnerable and kinder and better and was all he could ever desire or need.
Her hips pressed up to him, and he cupped the hard curve with one hand and pressed his tongue deep into her. The muscles of her entrance tightened around him, her hips fighting against his control as he pressed up and up again, his finger no longer stroking her clit.
“Please, Justin, please,” she burst out, nearly breathless.
He pulled his tongue from her and stroked up, the tip dancing across her clit. A soft stroke, featherlight, and her body tightened. She was close to the edge. His lips circled her clit and sucked, the hot rich taste of her on his tongue. He circled and teased and licked some more.
“Oh my God,” Aubrey whispered. Tiny shrieks of pleasure burst from her mouth. He pressed two fingers deep into her sex, and her body convulsed around him over and over again. Her orgasms rolled through her body with each tremble, and her hands clasped him and pulled him up over her body.
“Please, oh my God, Justin, please, I want you inside me.”
He pulled her up and sat on the couch, then drew her leg over his and positioned her above him. He kissed her breast, rolling her nipple in his mouth. She was on her knees above him, the wet of her sex, the heat of her sex, pressing against the tip of his cock. He was so ready to thrust up into her but wanted her to take the pleasure she needed as she needed it.
“No, but we need—Justin?”
“No, we don’t.”
“But last time?” Her words filled with heat and want and desire.
“It can’t happen again.”
With those words, he hitched his hips upward, and she slammed down onto his cock. Her head rolled back. She drew up over his shaft slowly, her sex squeezing him all the way up to the tip.
“Oh Aubrey, God, for years I’ve thought about you and this and us and—my God.”
Again she slid down his throbbing cock, spearing her body on top of him, her pussy squeezing tight around him. He didn’t have long. The tightness in his back built, and the control he’d held was slipping from him. He placed his arms on her back and leaned forward, taking them both to the floor and the plush rug before the fireplace.
Beneath him now, she gazed into his eyes. Her face was pure beauty. He pulled back and pressed into her body, hip deep. He watched her face. The soft vulnerability, the pleasure, her gaze locked with his. Her eyes and his said everything that words could not say. This together. There had been nothing like this for either of them ever.
Control slipped through his fingers like loose sand. A deep throbbing sensation clasped his back. He pressed deep into her body, again and again and again. The rhythm nearly lost, the control gone, skin slapping against skin. The heat, the desire, the want, the need to fall over the edge with her pushed him deeper and harder into Aubrey.
“Oh my God Justin, I’m going to come.” She wrapped her legs tightly around his back and her arms around his neck and held onto him as he pulsed deeper and deeper and deeper.
“Aubrey.” With one final roar of her name, come jetted from his balls, a white-hot force that throbbed from his cock and coated Aubrey’s insides. Together they fell over the edge.
Chapter 11
Morning came early at Rockwater Farms. Morning came before dawn. The cattle, the sheep, the chickens—even Scout was awake long before the sun rose over the horizon. Aubrey opened her eyes. There was little light in the room. The faint outline of the cotton sheers lazily drifted in front of an open window, the breeze bringing the smell of damp earth and wet air.
Late-night dinner service rarely prevented her from waking when she heard the first lowing of the cows on their way to be milked and the crowing of the rooster. A long, deep breath and the scent of sex and the musk of warm, sleepy man filled her nose. She turned her head to see the outline of Justin’s body. He lay flopped on his belly with one arm thrown protectively over her body as though he owned her. Quite possibly he did own her.
Hadn’t she dreamed of him often? Hadn’t she failed to find a relationship since her night with Justin? Hadn’t she not had sex in nearly fifteen years? She closed her eyes. How had she failed to have sex in fifteen years? Even Nina and Cassidy had both tried to “get her laid,” as they said. But she’d been busy, consumed, unimpressed by the potential suitors Hudson had offered up to her. Why settle? She never settled. Now, with Justin beside her, she remembered why she’d been unable to accept anyone else. Last night he’d caused her to shiver with uncontrollable pleasure and shriek his name and writhe and claw and fly to the greatest heights over and over.
Justin Travati, in two nights, one fifteen years before and now again, had ruined her. Absolutely and irrevocably ruined her for other men. Now what would she do? Wait another fifteen years?
For a face like that? Maybe. That jaw. Those lips. His arm that, even relaxed and in slumber, was cut and rounded with the muscles of a man who took good care of his body. Of course he did. All the Travati brothers were a bit vain. A bit too caught up in themselves for their own good.
“You’re awake?” His voice was a deep growl, as though disgusted by the very notion that she should be awake at such a horrendous hour. “I thought I exhausted you last night.”
He curled his arm around her body and pulled her close to his side. She closed her eyes. Now this felt good. So very good. To be held tight by this man, a powerful strong man who might have anything or anyone in this world he desired. What woman wouldn’t become intoxicated by the very idea that she might be the one, the only one, whom he could ever want? But with a Travati? Untrue. Forget the words from the evening before, she was not buying into a forever-after happy ending for her and Justin.
“When the farm wakes up, I wake up.” She pulled at his arm to extricate herself from his grasp, even though she definitely didn’t want to. No, she could lie here all day, perhaps every day, for the rest of her entire life.
“
You never needed much sleep.”
“What?” She turned to him and pulled her eyebrows together. “How do you know that?” How would he know that? They were together one night, only one night. Her habits, her sleeping habits, couldn’t be deduced in only one night.
“I watched you,” he said. He pulled his lips away from the pillow. “You ran in the mornings, I ran with you. What was it, like five a.m., and then you’d be at the office by seven and I always got there by—”
“Seven fifteen.”
He nodded. “Bingo. Sounds a bit stalkerish now, doesn’t it?”
“If I didn’t know who you are, I’d be a little bit scared right now.”
“If I didn’t know who I am and you told me some guy was doing that, I’d be a bit scared for you too.” Justin dropped his head back to the pillow.
“But why? When? I mean—”
“A need. A deep-seated need. Call it a premonition, call it … I don’t know what the hell to call it, but after our night together, even after you marched into my office and gave me your speech, I felt this overwhelming need to protect you. To keep you safe.”
“But what about after I left New York?”
Justin rolled onto his back away from her. He stared at the ceiling, the light of dawn beginning to creep into the room. “Something else to worry about, I guess.”
“More like out of sight, out of mind,” Aubrey said playfully, but a heaviness settled into her chest. That was Justin, wanting what he couldn’t have and then not caring once it was gone. His hand jetted out and grasped her, pulling her down onto his chest.
“That’s not what happened.” His voice was soft. A long sigh. His eyes searched the ceiling of the bedroom. “I got sick.”
She pressed upward on her forearms. “What do you mean—”
“We kept it private. A secret. We had to. We were in the middle of a huge deal, and if they’d found out something was wrong … that I was ill, the deal would have collapsed and Travati Financial … Well, let’s say Max’s inheritance wouldn’t be available to him.”