by Kira Blakely
Not now.
But I couldn’t step free of him. How was it possible to want someone this much and be this afraid at the same time?
Cain leaned over and pressed a button on the wall beside us.
The elevator slid upward, the glass one continuous line, the buildings shrinking inch by inch, the lights bright, smaller, smaller. I sucked in a breath and held it. “What are we doing?”
“We’re going to the top, Margot.”
“Why?”
“Because that’s where you belong.” Cain kissed the back of my head. “Now, hold still and watch. Feel what’s happening out there and in here. Just feel.”
I did as I was told, leaning into his warmth. His fingers worked across my shoulders, under the straps of my dress. He slipped one off.
“Cain,” I said, but I couldn’t breathe.
“I know you care. You care too much about everything,” he whispered. “I see it in the way you move, the way you talk, the way you interact with people. The way you worry. Breathe, baby. Be here.” His lips grazed the spot where my strap had been and I shivered.
It was too good. I needed him more than I could take.
“I’ve never been good at this,” I whispered. The lights flicked lower, the buildings soared, and so did I. God, so did I. I wasn’t just high off the ground. I was high in my soul, in the very part of me that didn’t want to be.
A lump in my throat that refused to be swallowed.
“What aren’t you good at?” Cain asked, and slipped the other strap free, kissed that place too, tenderly, his lips hot and wet against my skin.
“One-night stands.” I hiccupped it out.
He spun me away from the view and cupped my cheek. “One-night stand,” he growled. Hazel fires burning me, taking me. “Who said it was that, Margot?”
“But if it’s not, then what—?”
The elevator halted, and the doors opened. Cain lifted my straps back onto my shoulders and took my hand, led me out into a wide carpeted hallway, the cubicles here dark and empty, not even desks or chairs.
“What is this?” I managed.
“My father’s new project. He’s going to turn this entire area into a restaurant because why the fuck not, right? A private restaurant for him and all his business cronies.” The bitterness in Cain’s voice shocked me.
He was cocky, arrogant, and way too commanding, but never bitter.
“You don’t like him,” I said. “Your dad. You never have. What happened, Cain?”
He tucked his arm around my waist and carried on walking. “We’re not here to talk about him, Margot. We’re here for us.”
“Us.”
“That’s right. Us. You know, I’ll give you everything you need tonight.”
But not forever. And that was fine. Totally fine. One night was all I needed with him to get rid of all those squiggly bullshit feelings that distracted me every day at work. Man, maybe this would even be productive—it would help clear my mind.
Are you seriously considering doing this?
“Here,” Cain said, as we reached the far end of the space. He tugged open a steel door, pulled it wide so it wouldn’t swing shut on us, then guided me out onto a balcony.
There wasn’t a magical picnic waiting. No candles or tables or chairs. No fairy lights.
It was only the view, and concrete, and us.
“This way.” He took me again, from the door and over to the edge, to look down on the mapwork of streets, the toy cars, the specks which were people.
“It’s beautiful,” I said.
“Scary,” he replied. “All those souls. People who are working late or losing what they wanted. People who are completely alone or surrounded by their families. Every single life laid out before you, Margot. Doesn’t it make you feel insignificant?” He wasn’t morose as he said it. “Doesn’t it make you feel like your problems don’t matter? Your life isn’t that bad?”
“No,” I said, and leaned against his side, the wind whipping the loose pieces of my hair against my throat and back again. “It makes me feel real.”
“You are real.”
“Sometimes, I feel like a shadow of who I used to be. Or I’m supposed to be. Is that stupid?” I searched his face for any hint of judgment.
“No,” he said, smiling, his eyes shining from the inside out.
So gruff and manly, yet beautiful in the sense that everything around here was beautiful. Everything in existence. Everything below us and above us. The dirt on the streets, the scarred concrete, the stars above.
“I’ll make you feel real, Margot.” He patted the lip of concrete. “Sit with me.”
“Are you—are you crazy? We could fall.”
“What if we fly?” He asked, grinning wide.
“That’s humanly impossible, you know.”
Cain threw back his head and laughed, pure joy radiating from every pore. “God, I love that about you. You’re so fucking practical.” He let go of me, stepped up to the ledge, swung one leg over, then the other, and sat down, facing the fall.
He braced himself with one hand and reached back with the other. “Come. Trust me.”
“Trust you? I don’t trust myself.” I gripped my arms, now covered in goose bumps from the nip in the wind minus his warmth at my side.
He didn’t shift his hand.
Don’t. Don’t be crazy. You’re not supposed to risk things. You play by the rules. That’s who you are.
But that wasn’t who I had to be.
I took Cain’s hand, scooched my ass onto the ledge, and swung one leg over, my heart beating so fast it would surely thud right outta my chest. I moved the other leg over and shut my eyes tight.
Cain tugged me to his side and held me. “Open your eyes.”
The wind picked up and tugged at my dress, at my arms, my legs. Oh god, what if I we were sucked down? Mom and Jemma needed me. I shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t be doing this.
“Open your eyes, Margot.” It wasn’t a question.
I opened them, stared out at the night and its many lights.
“Look down.”
“You’re crazy,” I said, my jaw clenched so tight I’d need the Jaws of Life to pry it the hell open. “I’m getting off.”
“Do it.” He jiggled me against his side.
“Oh-ho, don’t do that. Don’t you dare do that.”
“I’ll carry on shaking you until you look down.” He made good on his promise. “Are you ready?”
Finally, I lowered my gaze to my lap, then my knees, then past my dangling feet. I exhaled a massive breath that turned into a shrieking giggle.
Just below us, there was another balcony, one that jutted out from the building, with a sturdy base and high railings, open to the air. If I fell, I would be caught, not killed.
“You asshole,” I said, and turned on my tenuous seat, punched him on the arm. “That scared the crap out of me.”
“Well, you’re too full of crap,” he replied, and shrugged, grinning from ear to ear. “This seemed the best way to rid you of it.”
I waved a finger under his nose. “You’ll be the death of me, Cain Foster.”
“No,” he said, and took hold of my finger. “The salvation.” He tugged me closer and brushed the tip of his nose against mine. He kissed it once.
Butterflies in my stomach? No, everywhere, in my heart and mind and fluttering down my legs and arms.
I opened my eyes wider, taking him in, memorizing each pore, the crook in his nose, those hazel eyes, almost golden in their intensity as they flicked up and down, studying me.
“I’ve never believed there’s anything perfect in this world,” he whispered. “I’m starting to change my mind.”
“Cain, I—”
“Don’t ruin it.” He snaked his fingers into my hair, tangled it all up, and pulled me into him.
His lips brushed against mine, and I moaned, far too loud. Seriously, it was only a kiss, but the noise that’d come from me suited the throes of deepe
st passion. Because that’s what this is.
I was instantly wet. Fuck, pity I’d decided to forgo underwear tonight—I’d ruin this dress.
“If you make those kinds of noises, Margot—” He spoke against my lips. “I’m trying to do the right thing, here.”
“You?”
“Fuck, I’ll kiss the cynicism right out of you.” He licked my bottom lip, and I moaned again. I couldn’t keep it in.
Cain tightened his grip on the back of my head, tugged lightly on the strand of hair he’d captured. He licked my top lip.
I opened my mouth to him, moved against him, with him.
The kiss was longer, deeper. His tongue claimed the space, massaged mine. He tasted a little like beer, but mostly like him. In all the nights I’d spent imagining this moment, it had never been this.
On top of a building, the city laid out beneath us, his flavor invading me.
It was perfect.
But nothing was perfect, surely.
He tilted my head back and increased the pace of the kiss, holding me against him, so solid, a rock. We didn’t sway or fumble on the edge. He controlled each movement precisely, the fingers of his free hand racing down the front of my throat, across my shoulder, down my arm, to my hand. He squeezed it and broke the kiss.
“Let’s go,” he said.
“Where?”
“My place.”
“Your hotel room?” I asked, my lips still humming from him. God, I was flushed from head to toe. I’d never had sex with a man I didn’t love, and certainly not in a fucking hotel room.
“No,” he said. “My place.”
“Where’s that?”
He nipped my bottom lip. “No more questions, Margot.” He released me, adjusted his pants around his dick, then got off the ledge, back onto safe ground. “Turn around.”
I scooched on the rough edge, slung my legs back over onto the safe side.
He held out his arms, head tilted to one side, smiling again—but in a different way this time. It was enigmatic. The glint wasn’t fully mischievous. It wasn’t just trouble. It was deeper than that.
“I told you, Margot, I’m going to take you places,” he said. “You’re safe with me.”
I squashed the kernel of doubt in my gut and slid off the ledge and into his arms.
Chapter 9
Cain
“What is this place?” Margot asked, as we walked into the entrance area of my luxury apartment in the Loop. She looked around, admired the view out of the ceiling-to-floor windows. The place was outfitted with furnishings I hadn’t chosen, apart from the kitchen, which was a total wreck. “Cain?”
“My apartment,” I said. “I made a fuck-up in the kitchen, so I’m getting it redone. Staying in a hotel until they’re finished.”
Margot halted behind the teal sofa that faced a flat-screen TV. I’d never used it. I was hardly ever here now. Before, it’d been the same, in truth. I was a traveler.
“What did you do in the kitchen?”
“You don’t want to know.” It wasn’t anything particularly weird. I’d tried making a stew in a pressure cooker and blown up half the kitchen. Was I about to admit that? Fuck no. She didn’t need to know I enjoyed the occasional cook-off.
“It doesn’t look like you,” Margot said, softly.
“Nothing looks like me.” I shut the door and locked it, then walked over to her.
She leaned her arm against mine, and the gesture was enough to send all the blood from my head directly to my cock all over again. Margot wasn’t a habit or an addiction. She was a gut reaction.
“I mean, it doesn’t look like a place you’d stay. It’s—where are your pictures? Where are your books or things? I—there’s nothing. It looks like a Pottery Barn catalog.”
“I would be offended, but I don’t give a fuck about interior decoration. You’re right, though. I don’t stay here often. And when I do, I tend to have little accidents like the one in the kitchen.”
“Why don’t you stay here often?”
I looped my arm around her shoulders, kissed her on the temple. “Do you really want to talk about that now?”
“Yes.”
“Because I don’t stay anywhere for long.” I turned her in my arms, then got down on my knees in front of her and worked her dress up her thighs.
“Wha—?”
“Quiet.”
Her thighs were pale, thick, and they dipped inward at that precious triangle—the perfect inner thigh gap. I slipped two fingers into that gap, then turned them and ran them against her soft flesh.
No underwear. Christ, I could’ve fucked her on that rooftop, with the view of forever in front of us.
But that wasn’t right. She deserved this. She deserved to see the inside of an apartment no woman had seen before.
“Cain,” she whispered.
“Tell me you want it, Margot. Tell me how bad you want me to taste you.”
“I do—” There was hesitation, though.
I removed my fingers before they slid into her, before they parted her wet, swollen lips and found fucking paradise between her thighs. “But?” I looked up at her, waiting.
“I’ve—I’m sorry. I’ve—this is stupid. I’m fucking thirty years old.” She squared her shoulders and forced her mouth open—adorable, as usual. “I’ve never had an orgasm with a man, so I don’t want to, uh, disappoint you when it doesn’t happen.”
My cock thickened, pressed against my jeans so that it was fucking excruciating.
Never had an orgasm with a man.
Fuck.
She was mine.
I couldn’t have her virginity, but I could have this piece of her and keep it as my own. And I could give her something she’d never experienced.
“If you don’t want to because of that, I’ll understand,” she said, and nodded once.
I responded by turning her body, pushing her ass against the sofa and parting her legs wide, displaying the pink lips between them. She was so swollen, not even pink, no, but red, desperate for me. Dripping.
“Are you done?” I asked, then I buried my face in her pussy. I sucked one lip and then the other, tasting her—another new addiction. Clean, a little salty, perfection. She was the unique flavor I’d been made to taste.
“Oh g-god.” Margot’s palm hit the sofa, and the other tugged on a handful of my hair. “Oh my god, Cain.”
I kissed her clit next, pumped my tongue against that nub, then circled it, pumped and circled. Her breaths became moans. I inserted a finger inside her tight hole, and she sucked it right in.
“So fucking warm,” I whispered. “Your pussy is a furnace, Margot. You’re going to make me crazy. I’ll fuck you right here on this sofa.”
“Please,” she whimpered. “I want it.”
“Not until you come,” I said, against her clit. I pumped and circled again, increasing the pace. I slipped another finger inside her and rammed them home, hooked my fingers and found her G-spot, worked that too.
All of it, in unison. Her clit. Her G-spot.
I made her body hum.
She jerked her hips in time with my rhythm, and I kept her on the back of that sofa with my hand on her thigh, pinning her.
“Oh fuck,” she said. “Oh fuck. Oh my holy—I’m going to—this is—” Her mouth dropped open and the words cut out completely. She choked on them. She choked on her orgasm. Her eyes rolled back in her head. Her back arched. She vibrated on the spot.
“That’s right, Margot. Come for me. Only for me.”
A wordless keen escaped her, and her pussy walls closed around my fingers. I kept pace with her orgasm, slowing on the clit, but still working my fingers, filling her with them, giving her something to clench around, to work, for her trouble.
She rammed through her climax. Shattered in my palm and against my lips.
Finally, Margot slumped against the sofa. She slid from it, down, into my lap on the floor, hooked her arms around my neck and stared at me hazy-eyed, layers of hone
y hair free of the updo now. Her wetness pressed against the front of my pants, against my cock. “How did you do that?”
“I know your body like I know mine,” I said.
“Why?”
“Because you are mine.” I shifted my grip and weight, then pushed off from the ground.
She gave a little shriek of surprise, then laughed at herself, tucked her legs around my waist and clung to me like my girl. My girl.
I carried her through the living room and to the bedroom. I dumped her onto the bed, admired her, lying there beneath me, totally exposed.
This was everything I’d wanted for fucking years.
“What?” Margot asked, and scooched up onto her elbows. “Cain?”
“You’re everything.” I unbuttoned my shirt.
Her eyelids fluttered. She watched every movement I made, biting the corner of her lip.
I stripped the shirt off and gave her a view of my abs, of the tattoos that took up most of my chest. I undid the button on my pants next, unzipped them. “Are you ready?” I asked.
“Yes. I want you,” she said, without hesitation.
I ripped my pants down, kicked off my shoes, and bared myself completely, observing her reactions to me.
Her gaze drifted to my cock, and her jaw dropped.
I pictured fucking her mouth until she gagged, but shook the idea away. No, not tonight. Not the first time. This would be what she’d fantasized about. I ran a finger down my cock, tapped the base. “It’s all for you. Think it’ll fit?”
She gulped.
“Let’s find out. Dress off, Margot.”
She struggled up and kneeled. Tugged the dress up and over her head, exposing smooth flesh, perky, small tits, the curve from her tiny waist down to those wide hips. She cupped her breasts and massaged, fixated on me, first my face, then my cock.
“Lie back,” I said. “Open your legs for me, baby.”
She flopped back, straightened out, and kicked her legs open, placed her hands behind her head.
I laughed at the pose. Christ, she was delightful.
What a woman.