Cherry Bomb: Forbidden Bad Boys

by Clara Leigh

  Dare sighs and downs his drink. “I admit that Marie and I saw one another for a couple of weeks six months back. It was a mistake; we really weren’t compatible. So yes, I know who she is, and yes, I’ve slept with her, but I don’t see how that’s relevant to us.”

  Six months ago. The minute he says it, I know it’s the truth. I even vaguely remember the story. Flo and I, if we were really bored while filming the Caine Chronicles, would sometimes make a game of naming the long, long list of ladies he’d been associated with.

  “And Arrietty? Who’s she, and why are you bothered she’s broken her leg?”

  “Wrist,” he corrects me, frowning in a way that makes his brows meet in the middle. “And it’s not broken, only badly sprained.”

  “He hasn’t talked about the Borrower to you.” Lorne’s eyebrows shoot up his brow. “Seriously? I get a full run down of what she does at school every day and I’m forced to watch videos of her chasing butterflies.”

  Sure he’s mentioned the Borrower. She’s his kid sister. I’m not seeing the connection.

  “Arrietty… The Borrowers…” Lorne elaborates.

  The penny finally drops. “Oh, right, like the book.” Gran read that whole series to Flo and I when we were small. “Is she okay?” I ask Dare. Seems he’s more of a dutiful big brother than at first appearances you’d credit him as being.

  “Fine now, thanks. Bandaged up and none too worse for wear. Flicka, I’m sorry there was no opportunity to tell you I was leaving. My mum called Jace when she couldn’t get hold of me. Jace arranged a taxi, and I couldn’t exactly ask him to pass on a note.”

  “You couldn’t have had somebody else let me know.” I stare pointedly at Lorne occupying the stool between us.

  Dare shakes his head. “People know that Lorne and I are friends. If you keep getting calls from him, folks will figure it out. It didn’t seem like a sensible move. I don’t know how much attention you’ve paid to the media over the last week, but both the film and our roles in it are generating a lot of attention. There are more than a few entertainment journalists out there desperate for a story. If there’s so much as a hint that there’s something between us, they won’t waste time fact checking. Everything they published after the award ceremony will be regurgitated and worse. Flicka, unless you want things to unravel, we need to avoid being seen together.”

  “I’m sick of pretending.” There’s so much venom in my words, that not only do Dare and Lorne glare at me with widened eyes, but the barman joins them in sharing their incredulity. “What? Am I not allowed to get sick of the crap? Well get ready for another shocker, I’d dearly like to tell them to go fuck themselves.”

  Dare’s fingertips whiten, where his grip tightens on his glass. Meanwhile, Lorne gazes at me in bemusement. “Then why don’t you?”

  “I’ve not had enough to drink, but if I had, I’d tell them where to shove their contract for the new season of the Caine Chronicles. I don’t want to do it. I’m done pretending to be in high school. It’s a joke. I never even attended high school.”

  “And your sister?” Dare enquires. I wish he didn’t look so serious.

  “Flo doesn’t even like filming. Music is her true love. The tracks she’s produced in my absence… Wow!” I kiss my fingertips. “You’re not going to believe it when you’re hear them. They are so good. Really fucking amazing. Seriously, no one in their right mind would even think about dragging her from the studio to work on some sappy teen drama.”

  “You really have had too much to drink,” Dare observes, shooting me a disapproving look around Lorne, but the tilt of his lips gives away his amusement. “I’d no notion you could be so potty mouthed.”

  “What’s up, is it turning you on that I’m saying all the bad words?”

  His eyes sparkle. “You have no idea.”

  “Dare only has to hear the world fuck and he’s ready to dive in,” Lorne points out.

  Dare punches his buddy on the leg, but his gaze remains entirely focussed upon me.

  I fake a laugh. All of a sudden, things feel tense, and the back of my neck is burning. “Was that what I did wrong the other night?”

  His brows pull lower.

  “Should I have talked more, told you all the stuff that was in my head instead of staying mum?”

  “Flicka,” he mouths.

  “I could try it now. Fuck. Cock. Cunt,” I say to him. “When are you going to fill my pussy with your nice, hard dick?”

  He shakes his head.

  “Coward. What’s up, can’t you handle a virgin?”

  Lorne chokes on his whisky so that he snorts amber liquid into is hands. “Bugger,” he murmurs, then makes a dash to the gents to clean himself up.

  “You’re cruising for trouble lady,” Dare warns me.

  Damn right I am. I catch the barman’s eye and order a proper drink, which I knock back in one glorious gulp. “Take me somewhere and fuck me senseless, Dare Wilde.”

  “Do it,” the barman advises. “Although, if he’s fool enough to turn you down, I’m willing to take you anywhere you want, baby.”

  Dare shoots him a withering look, then holds out his hand to me. I clasp it, but he only escorts me as far as the private booth at the back of the club where I encountered him the first time I came here. “Is that really what you want? Maybe you’d like to think on it for a little while.”

  “Cold feet?” I tease him.

  He presses his hands to the sides of my head, holding me so that I can’t escape making eye contact, or his seriousness. “If we take this path, there’s no going back, Flicka. The press will get wind of it. It might not be immediately, but word always gets out, and then you’re going to find yourself in a hell of a lot of shit.”

  “So I’ll find myself a decent lawyer first thing in the morning. I’m sure you can recommend a few.” I smile and edge forward onto my toes.

  Dare traces a finger down the side of my face. “Convince me this isn’t just the drink talking.”

  “It isn’t, and you know it isn’t, which is why if you had any sense you’d take me home right now.”

  “I’m not known for my intelligence.”

  “Wicked eye candy,” I mutter, then push him deeper into the secluded booth. No one can see us here unless they step right into shadows beside us. As of this moment, I’m not sure I care if they do. Hell, they can even take pictures if they damned well want to.

  We make out, kissing and caressing one another with reckless abandon. Dare’s hands twist within my hair, mine slip inside his clothing. I rake my fingernails over his back and the plains of his abdomen, while he explores my collarbone and sucks on the flesh at the side of my neck.

  Have to love me a man who does that. It makes me shiver in a good way, and ramps up my desire for recklessness.

  “Here or take me home to bed?”

  Dare shakes his head, but doesn’t let go. I can’t figure him out. For someone with such a wild reputation he’s surprisingly reluctant to throw caution to the wind and get frisky. I don’t think it’s lack of desire holding him back. I can feel exactly how eager he is.

  I’m wearing a dress. What if I just abandoned my underwear and straddled him? That’d certainly give the Chinchilla dudes something to chew on. It’s hard to spin pantie-less antics. Also, I think it’s the sort of thing that gets Dare fired up. I haven’t forgotten his eagerness to get intimate when he woke that time and found me in his lap.

  We fall onto the padded seating. My skirt rides up, my knickers stay on for the moment, but I do straddle him. Lord, the shape of him against my pussy lips. Even with two layers of fabric separating us, it’s sheer bliss. If only we weren’t here in his club. The ability to snap my fingers and be someplace else with him would be a grand thing right now.

  “Yes,” I murmur. “Yes, Dare.” He holds the weight of my breasts, coaxes the nipples into pointedness before sucking them deep, one after the other. I think I just found my new favourite activity. Arousal zaps through me like it’s
my clit he’s working and not my areola.

  “Do me.”

  “No.”

  A gasp is out of my mouth before my brain has properly processed his refusal. “Why not?”

  He just looks at me with his molten chocolate eyes.

  “Why?” I tease one finger around the circle of his lips.

  “Because you’re drunk.”

  “Totally am not.” Or if I am, it’s not on alcohol, but the prospect of finally having him.

  “Okay, you’re not drunk, but you are tipsy and I can’t be sure you’re thinking straight.”

  “I’m not going to suddenly change my mind, Dare. I’m sick of pretending to be something I’m not. I’m ready to be me, the real me. The woman who very, very much wants you.”

  “And what if she’s not so keen on the real me?”

  I laugh, because he’s an open book. It’s not as if he routinely holds anything back. All right so he’s shown more of an ability for subterfuge than I’d have automatically credited him with, but that’s been born of necessity. It’s not who he is.

  “Home or here?” I ask him again. I imagine he’s made out in more than one private booth before.

  “Home,” he says so softly I have to strain to hear him. Desire swims in the depth of his expressive eyes, but his genuine emotions are unfathomable.

  -21-

  Dare Wilde

  If this were a film, we’d leave the club, walk around the corner, and check straight into the nearest hotel. Thankfully, it isn’t. As it turns out I have more integrity than my reputation suggests. Leastways, when it comes to virgins I do. Past experience has taught me that being cautious is the best option; otherwise trouble has a way of landing itself in your lap.

  Not that having a little bit of decency stops me from wanting to do all manner of things to her perky ass. I’ve wanted her from the moment she first settled herself on my lap. Nor does it stop me cheering and thumping the air triumphantly inside my thoughts over the prospect of her bidding those Chinchilla fuckwits goodbye for good. I’ve been waiting for this moment. It’s past time that she unclasped the ball and chain from around her ankle.

  “Things are going to get messy.” She already knows it, but somehow I feel the need to point it out.

  “I hope so. I want you to come all over me.”

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  She smiles. Of course she knows that. She knows exactly what I mean, and somehow doesn’t care anymore. I’m not sure I understand what the tipping point was, but maybe it’s unimportant. What matters is that she’s reached it and isn’t going to tolerate any more of that manipulative shit that’s been holding her back. Watch out world, Flicka Caine is waking up!

  “Does Flo know what’s coming?” I ask, sparing a momentary thought for her twin.

  “I’ll have a chance to warn her. Nothing’s going to erupt overnight. We’ll be back on set by the time the story breaks. If it breaks at all.”

  I pray her optimistic view of the future pays out. In my experience the press can be relied on to do the exact opposite of what you’d wish or expect.

  “Take me home, Dare—to your place.”

  If I do that, I can pretty much kiss my Jack Bold screen test goodbye. Hello being typecast as a villain from now until eternity. Bold or Flicka? Villain or saint? The crazy thing is that it’s not even a difficult decision. She’d win over any number of gloriously juicy acting roles, which isn’t to say it’s not going to sting when Jace tells me I’ve bollocksed my chances.

  “What are you stalling for, bad man? I thought we were headed on a wild adventure. A wild and exceedingly dirty adventure?”

  She tilts her chin up to claim a kiss and presses her pert breasts against my chest. “You know I’m wet for you? Are you hard for me?” As if she doesn’t know the answer to that based on where her hand is currently pressed.

  “I don’t think this is the right time and place.”

  “There’ll never be a right time or place. Leastways, none better than now. I’ve made my mind up, Dare. I don’t want to see clips of you around town with anyone else. I want those pictures to be of me… of us. If you want that too, then this is your chance. She squeezes my cock and I jolt. Dammit. I’m already anticipating the clasp of her sheath endeavouring to milk me dry. I need to get her out of here and fast, but I need to do it without drawing attention. And then somehow I need to get her to my place again without us being seen. That’s not going to be so easy when Jace lives right across the hall. Maybe he’s out tonight. I really pray that’s the case.

  “Are you sure about this, cherry bomb? You want to go home with me? What do you even really know about me?”

  “I know your lineage. I know you’re inventive, and you’re a dirty talker.”

  “Like that, do you?”

  “It makes me burn.”

  “And what else makes you burn, Flicka Caine?”

  “Take me home and you’ll have plenty of time to figure that out.”

  I nod. “And what if you figure out some things about me that you’re not so sold on?”

  “Is that a real risk? I already know that you’re mad, bad, and dangerous to know.”

  I guess I ought to be relieved that my reputation as a womanizing bad boy with an appetite for living it large doesn’t put her off, but it’s not the universal media truths about me I’m concerned over. It’s the stuff that nobody—well hardly anybody—knows about me that give me pause. Normally, I don’t worry about such things, but whatever this thing is that’s developing between Flicka and me, it’s not as simple as a no-strings hook-up. There are expectations involved and life-changing decisions attached to it. She’s gonna have to know what she’s really dealing with. I just need to find the right moment to tell her.

  The right moment is probably before we tumble into the sack, but she’s so fucking eager and tipsy, I’m not sure that’s how it’s going to pan out.

  -22-

  Felicity Caine

  I don’t recall how we reached Dare’s apartment. All I know is that one moment we were in the club and the next his place. The penthouse flat is both everything I imagine and totally contrary to my expectations. Surround sound and a smart TV the size of a cinema screen, yup…yup. Streamlined, ultra-modern décor, that’ll be another big yeah. Book nook, quirky hanging chairs, and a collection of cutsey, small plastic animal-like figures lined up across the top of the glass coffee table, not so much. He holds my hand as he shows me around.

  “Where’s the bedroom?” I ask. Seems odd that I’m the one that’s leading the show, drawing us both in that direction, but I’m buzzing with a sense of urgency. I’m done with holding back. I want everything now. Fuck delaying.

  Man does he feel good. In the bedroom, we’re barely through the door before I’m wrapped around him grabbing his totally grab-able arse, squeezing him, holding on tight. I’m not content to keep things at this level though. I want his mouth on mine, and I make that happen. I want him naked, and I start on making that happen too by working open his fly. The way he fills my palm gets me increasingly tingly. Seems impossible that such a big thing could fit inside of me, but I’m more than willing to figure out how that works.

  “We can take our time. It doesn’t have to be over in seconds.”

  I’m not deliberately rushing. I’m just over eager to get to the prize. And make no mistake, Dare Wilde is one hell of a prize. Naked, he’s an absolute god: all ink, sinew, and muscle. His weight presses me into the mattress, covers my own nakedness, which he explores with eager, if gentle reverence. He nuzzles the space between my breasts, and then lavishes my nipples with vast amounts of attention. I arch up towards him whenever he sucks hard, drawing the teat deep and then releasing it. I think I might drive me over the edge from that alone.

  “Talk to me. Tell me what you’re going to do to me,” I demand.

  Talk to me—probably not the words he wants to hear right now.

  He laughs. I love the way the rumble in his ches
t feels against my naked skin.

  “I’m going to kiss every damned inch of you: toes, elbows, nose, everything.” He demonstrates as he speaks. “Some bits are going to get more attention than others. Those bits I’m going to worship with my cock as well as my lips. You don’t mind if I get your tits all sticky, do you Flicka? What about down here, between your thighs?” He leads with his fingertips. “Seems your pretty slick here already. Is this all for me? Are you a little eager for something?”

  “A lot eager for something more than your fingers.”

  “You don’t like what I’m doing with them?”

  He knows perfectly well I do. I can’t stop mewls and sighs echoing out of my throat. He has two fingers inside me and it’s making me ever more slick and needy. His hand is wet when he eventually curls it around the top of my thigh, steadying me, I realise, while he lines himself up so I get the first real impression of his naked cock against my lips.

  It’s beautiful that moment, just having him there, hot and firm against me. So very vital.

  “Dare,” I mouth.

  He looks down at where we’re almost joined and I follow his gaze. It’s obscene the sight of us nuzzled together.

  “I want you.”

  “I want you too.”

  It feels perverted, being in this position, almost fucking, but not quite.

  “Why don’t we just try it?” I’m not sure if I’m speaking or thinking aloud. I know I want him to draw me up and onto him, exactly as if he’s trying me on for size. We need to know if we’re going to fit, right?

  “We’re totally gonna fit, chérie.”

  “Are you sure? You’re awful big.”

  “And you’re wet for me. You’re so goddamned wet, Flicka. I swear I could slide right in to the hilt and fill you up in one incredible stroke.”

  “I’d like that.”

  He presses me down into the mattress and grinds our hips together. His cock rides against my clit, teasing that rather than the entrance to my pussy. I wrap my legs around his back, opening myself up to this sensual dance, showing him exactly how willing and ready I am. He still doesn’t dip inside.