Bet Me to Stay

by Candace Havens

  He kissed her. “Nope. You work. Is it okay if I pick up my kitchen stuff later?”

  “Of course, or I can bring it over tomorrow.”

  “Great.” He kissed her again. “Sorry.”

  “Don’t be. Thank you for dinner.”

  Then he was gone.

  She had to tell him the truth. It probably meant the end of this amazing time they had, but it was the right thing to do. When he found out who her family was, yep, that’d be it.

  Her churning stomach wasn’t so crazy about that idea.

  Her phone vibrated.

  You’re amazing. Also, let’s explore that whole tying-you-up thing soon. I have some ideas.

  Yes, ending this would suck like all the hells.

  Chapter Ten

  Liam had taken to leaving a reserved card on the booth Cassie liked to sit in and work. Having her near, well, hell, he liked it. The woman was always in his head these days, and he found himself coming up with the lamest excuses to see her. But she never gave him a hard time about it.

  Tonight, she’d come of her own accord. After she told him that she physically hurt from their late-night fun, he decided to give her a bit of break. It had taken everything he had not to run back to her apartment and offer to cuddle her that night.

  Liam the Cuddler.

  What the fuck is wrong with me?

  More than once, he caught her watching the traffic across the street from her booth. Something must have been going on at The Rustic Pig. He’d taken a peek but didn’t notice anything more than their regular crowd.

  When they’d been busy, she’d pitched in and bussed tables like a pro. No one asked her to do it, she just picked up a tub and a rag from the back and started working. He’d told her they had it handled, but she laughed at him and then waved him away with the rag. That was the kind of woman she was, and he had never met anyone like her.

  She’d popped behind the bar to make some black and tans, and his brother had asked how she’d learn to float beer like that. “I came out of the womb knowing how,” she said but didn’t offer a real answer. She never talked about her past. Every time he tried to ask, she clammed up.

  And why the hell do I care?

  Because he did. Ever since the book club, she’d been a bit on edge. She’d wanted to tell him something, he sensed that. But for the life of him he didn’t know what it was.

  Then, the late crowd came in and he had no time to think about it.

  Once The Boar’s Head thinned out, around eleven, he took a couple of glasses of Jameson to the table, along with an order of potato skins. Those were her favorite appetizers. He loved that she had a passion for food that rivaled his own. She wasn’t afraid of carbs like so many people were.

  And she had a body that was like something out of a pinup magazine, though he didn’t think she’d appreciate it if he told her that.

  He wondered what she’d think if he explained that even when she wasn’t with him at night, he was dreaming about her.

  Finn had given him a hard time because his mind was definitely not on the job. It was on her. Strange since he’d only met her a short while ago.

  And scary. Definitely scary.

  “It’s like you know me,” she said as he put the plate on one side of her laptop and the glass whiskey on the other.

  “You’ve been looking out the window a lot tonight. What’s happening across the street that has you so interested?”

  She blanched.

  What was that about?

  “Is everything okay?”

  “Uh. Well, there’s something I need to tell you.” From the look on her face, he didn’t like where this was going. Was she ready to call it quits? Maybe that’s why she showed up without him asking.

  Why does it matter?

  Because he cared about her. They hadn’t known each other long enough for that sort of thing. Though, after reading her books and seeing how her mind worked, he did believe he might understand her more than most people in her life. Even if he’d never met those people.

  Crap.

  He held up a hand to stop her from speaking. “Whatever it is, I’m betting it’s not as much fun as what I have planned. I feel like we need to do some serious research for your book. You know, explore some things you haven’t tried yet. That is, unless you have hard limits.”

  She blinked. “Uh. Hard limits?”

  He leaned in and brushed his thumb over the pulse on her wrist. “I have some ties upstairs. And, if your body is up for it, I thought we could try some other things as well.”

  She squirmed in her seat.

  He grinned. That was the reaction he’d hoped for. “So can your news wait?”

  She stared at her keyboard for a minute but then lifted her head. “Definitely. I want to hear more about these things—what did you have in mind?”

  The ideas were actually hers, and he’d been thinking about them ever since they’d had phone sex.

  “I’d rather show you. I need another hour, though. Finn hasn’t had a night off in a while, so I sent him home. He’s probably out finding his next wife. It’s a habit with him.”

  “Hmmm. That sounds like a good story I want to write someday. But don’t worry about me tonight. I have so much writing to do. I can wait. I don’t want to, but I can.” She put a hand on his thigh and then it slid up.

  His cock screamed for attention. Just with a touch. He jumped up from the bench like she’d set him on fire. Well, she had. “Sorry, folks, bar’s closing. Last call,” he said.

  There was a great deal of grumbling, since it was only eleven on a Friday night, but it was his fucking bar. He could close any damn time he wanted to.

  “Liam.” She giggled. “You can’t close. The place is full.”

  He crossed his arms. “Oh, I can.”

  It still took an hour to get the last of the patrons out the door and get the placed cleaned up.

  While he was busy locking up, she wiped down tables and was carrying a bus tray to the kitchen.

  “Hey, you don’t have to do this,” he said, taking the tray from her.

  “I don’t mind. Like I said, I have a lot of experience waitressing. Most artists do, right? Actors in New York and California have to do the same. You probably didn’t have that problem with your voice. I imagine you started making money right away.”

  He shrugged. That part of his life was over a long time ago. “I did all right. I was making it into bigger venues when the call about my dad came in.”

  “But couldn’t your brother run the bar himself?”

  He snorted. “Finn? Uh, that would be no. He’s great as long as he has a keeper. But he’s not one for managing. I call him the talent. You’ve seen him in action; he’s a flirt and gets people to buy booze and food. But he’s got his head up his arse most of the time. Don’t get me started on how many times he’s been engaged.”

  She laughed as she helped him wash dishes. She definitely knew her way around a commercial kitchen. “You have had a lot of practice with this.”

  As if she hadn’t realized what she was doing, she glanced down at her hands. “Yep. So, back to music. The passion when you were playing the other night, how do you walk away from something like that? And that you aren’t sharing it with the world—it just seems a shame.”

  “Like I said, someone had to take over the pub. It’s our legacy and has been in our family since the twenties. That bar you were admiring was built by my granddad from a single piece of wood he found in the Adirondacks. We’ve had presidents, queens, and kings in this place. I’ll never be able to let it go.”

  She bit her lip, and every time she did, he wanted to kiss her and fuck the hell out of her.

  “I get what you’re saying, but that song was an original, right?”

  He nodded, wishing they could change the subject. That part of his life still left a bit of an ache. He loved music and had lived for it. Until he didn’t.

  “Why not write, then? I bet you could do really well as a
songwriter, though I think it’s sad you don’t share the beautiful baritone voice with the world. It hurts my heart a bit.”

  “Best to leave the past where it is,” he said. “I do have some immediate plans for our future. It involves some old silk ties I found in my closet. You interested?”

  Her narrowed eyes told him she wasn’t done with the music questions, but he hoped the distraction worked.

  Then she smiled. “Fine. But is it okay that I’m also kind of scared? You know me and comfort zones. I sort of like to live in them.”

  After turning off the lights, he backed her against the door. “We can skip the ties and I can fuck you right here?”

  She laughed and then glanced behind her at the pub across the street. “I can’t believe I’m saying no, but we’ve done sex against a wall. I’m curious about those ties.”

  Then she jogged past him and out the door. By the time he reached his apartment door upstairs, she was there, shivering.

  “I had no idea it was so cold outside.” She rubbed her arms up and down. “I left my coat and my laptop in the bar.”

  He chuckled. “Excited?”

  She winked and then laughed. “A little. And I was honest about being scared.”

  “Don’t be. I have no desire for you to be uncomfortable, just wet and ready for my cock to pound the living fuck out of you.”

  “Mmmm. Yep. That did it. I’m much warmer,” she said as she followed him inside. He’d run up earlier and turned the heat on. And was glad he did.

  “Get out of those clothes and get in my bed,” he ordered.

  Her eyebrow went up.

  “Do you want your surprise or not?”

  She ran for the bedroom and was naked in seconds.

  “God, you’re beautiful,” he said, tracing a hand down the side of her breast. “A goddess should be worshipped, right?”

  “I think I very much like where this is going.” She smiled.

  “Get on the bed and spread your legs and arms for me.”

  She crossed her arms and that sweet smile of hers was gone.

  “We don’t need safe words. If you’re uncomfortable, you just say stop, okay?”

  She nodded and then lay on the bed. When she spread her legs and those pretty pink pussy lips of hers were exposed, his cock pressed uncomfortably against his jeans, which was why he left them on but took off his shirt.

  He didn’t have a headboard or anything to tie her hands to, but he’d decided to improvise. When he opened the side table drawer and pulled out the ties, she started to bring her legs back together.

  “It’s good, lass. We’re going slow and I won’t be tying you to anything. Put your hands out.”

  She did as he asked. He used the red tie around her wrists.

  “Put them over your head and keep them there, no matter what, okay? You’re going to want to reach down, but don’t. That’s part of the pleasure.”

  “Um.”

  He kissed her then, sliding his hand down to her heat and entering two fingers. She bucked against his hand. “There’s a good lass. Do what I say and I promise you more pleasure than you can stand. Do you trust me?”

  “More than I did the first time you asked that question a few weeks ago.”

  Had it only been a few weeks? Her lying there, splayed out before him, he couldn’t remember what his life was like before her.

  Boring.

  That wasn’t the case any longer, and tonight was a perfect example. He wasn’t really into tying women up. But she was interested, so he was, too.

  “When do we start?” She was glancing up at him expectantly.

  He gave her wink. “Patience, luv.”

  Then he left her there to run to the kitchen.

  “This isn’t some prank where you leave me here and then go out with your friends or something, is it?”

  He shook his head. “No, lass,” he said from the kitchen. “And you’ve been hanging out with the wrong sort of people if you think there’s any possibility I could really walk away from you naked like that. You have no idea what you do to me.”

  As he was coming around, he heard her whisper, “Thank God.”

  And glorious she was there with her body waiting for him to devour. “What is that?”

  “Whipped cream. Bit of a cliché, but a fun one. I’m going to make a Cassie pie and eat every bit of you. You game?”

  A blush crept over her cheeks. “Yes.” The husky whisper jolted his cock back to attention.

  Damn this woman had him wrapped around her finger. He wasn’t sure who was in charge.

  “Keep your arms above your head and don’t move. If you move, I stop.”

  She eyed him warily. “Deal. As long as I can do the same thing to you.”

  Damn if he didn’t love the way her mind worked.

  He was in the kitchen now, making them a snack. The bloody sex with her was so much—more. She gave as good as she got. Though he was mindful of treating her a tad more gently so that he didn’t cause her discomfort. That still nagged him that he hadn’t thought about what might be happening to her body.

  Though she didn’t seem to mind the worship, and he did. There wasn’t an inch of her he hadn’t explored, with one exception.

  He was about to head back in when he found her at the doorway to the living room.

  She dropped the sheet.

  After they’d just sucked whipped cream off of each other’s bodies for two hours, she was more confident. He loved that.

  “Now, there’s a good lass. You up for a bit of impromptu fun?”

  “Uh, isn’t that what we just did?”

  He chuckled. “No, I’d been thinking about eating you out and fucking you hard all day. This is something I just thought about when you dropped that sheet.”

  She pursed her lips. “Fine. I’m game. What’s your idea?”

  “Why don’t you bend over that desk next to you? I need you to take some notes.”

  She gave him a funny look, but then her eyes flashed wide. Bending over the desk, she presented him with her gorgeous arse. Fuck. There wasn’t a part of her he didn’t adore.

  “Stay just like that. I’ll be right back.”

  He returned a few short moments later with a bottle of lube and a condom. He put them on the desk.

  “What are we doing?”

  “I’m going to fuck that arse of yours, lass. You ever had a cock in your arse?”

  “No,” she whispered. A virgin, then. Something came over him, more of that possessive bullshit, and he wanted to own that ass more than anything. But he had to make it right with her.

  “Like before, we won’t do anything that makes you uncomfortable. I promise you, done the right way it can be every bit as pleasurable as me fucking that sweet pussy of yours. You ready?”

  She bit her lip. “I’m afraid it’s going to hurt. Your cock is ginormous.”

  He laughed. “I’m not just going to ram it up there, lass. Though, right now, I’m thinking about doing exactly that. Trust me. Okay. Any time you want to stop, we will.”

  “Okay.”

  “Spread your legs for me, lass.” He stood behind her, working her tight little cunt with his fingers. As she started to tighten around him and moan, he took his two fingers out and slid them up to her arsehole, sliding her sweet juices all around. Then he lubed one of his fingers.

  “Diddle your clit for me, lass. Show me how you do it when you’re alone.”

  She glanced back over shoulder at him. “Oh, lass. I know you masturbate. We all do. You had those fingers up your sweet cunt when I called you the other day. Show me what you were doing.”

  Blushing, she slid one of her hands down to her clit. “That’s a good lass. You’re going to feel some pressure. If it feels uncomfortable at all, you just say stop.”

  “MMMMmmm.” She moaned. He could have stood there all day watching her, but he also wanted her ass.

  He slid the tip of one finger in, and when she squeezed around, he paused. “Relax, las
s, as much as you can. Keep those fingers busy on that sweet pussy of yours. Show me how it’s done.”

  She relaxed then, and he worked her with one finger for a bit. Then he lubed up the second. “Oh,” she said when he slid slowly in and out of her.

  “Shove those fingers up and fuck your pussy.” She moaned again, and he stuck a third finger up her ass, stretching her, getting her ready for him. She thrust her ass out at him as if she wanted more.

  “You ready to take my cock? Ready for me to fuck that tight little hole of yours, lass?”

  “Oooohhh. Liam.”

  “That sweet pussy is dripping with cream right now baby. I’m going to make you come even harder. Keep going with those fingers.”

  Fuck, he was ready to shoot his load just watching her fuck herself. Something about this woman made him a randy teen ready to lose his shit every five minutes.

  He put the condom on and slathered his cock with lube. It felt good to fist it for a second and he gave himself a few pumps. She glanced back at him and smiled.

  Holy. Fuck.

  Slipping the tip of him in her hole, he paused, giving her a chance to get used to him. She stopped her fingers.

  He slapped her ass and then smoothed it with his hand. Keeping his cock where it was. “Keep fucking that cunt,” he ordered.

  She closed her eyes, and he shoved a bit more of himself into her. Fuck, she was so tight.

  “You okay?”

  Her fingers slid in and out, and she was close to coming.

  “More,” she said. “I want it. Give it to me.”

  He pushed into her, and she contracted around him.

  “Ohhhhh,” she said. “I—oooohhh.”

  She was coming, he pulled out a bit and shoved back in again and again.

  “I can feel you, that big cock. I didn’t know,” she said, her breath coming out in tiny gasp. “So much. So much.”

  “Fucking this tight little ass of yours, lass, is only second best to that pussy. Fuck it for me while I take care of you here.”

  Her fingers slid faster and faster, the juices dripping down her leg as he fucked her. Matching her pace, he fucked her hard, probably more than he should have, but she begged him for more and more.

  Grabbing her tits, he twisted her nipples as he went balls deep into her ass. She shoved herself against him.