This. This moment right here, between these two people, was so real and raw I felt it grip me. Like a fist was closing around my body and yanking me forward. I was compelled, crying and squeezing Jem’s hand.
“I guess I’ve always wanted to feel a love like that, you know?” Jimmy said. “And it pisses me off that we devalue people all the time. Pisses me off that we do it to dogs too. I know they weren’t like the nicest looking dogs when you got them. But that doesn’t mean they don’t deserve a home.”
Beck swallowed thickly. “Yeah. I agree.”
Beck looked at his paper again. It felt like the room was holding its collective breath. Because I could see what was happening on Beck’s face. The turmoil there. But I didn’t know what he wanted to say.
Beck Mason looked right at me, as if needing the comfort. I smiled—as full a smile as I could—and placed a hand over my heart. You can do it, I mouthed. Whatever it was he was going to do.
“So, uh,” he started, clearing his throat, “it’s not a secret anymore about who I am. It was actually never a secret. I’m a Mason. My parents run the Miami Devils MC and when I was a teenager, I served five different sentences in a juvenile detention facility. A lot of people have seen my mugshots now.” He put his notes down. “It’s hard to have your past dragged up by strangers. Made fun of. To have assumptions made about you. To be picked apart. But I don’t want to feel shame about that. So I won’t.” Beck kept staring at me. “Because what does that say about people like you or me, who have done time but are back on the right path? Or have been involved in a criminal organization and gotten out? There’s no shame.”
“I think it’s more like courage, don’t you?” Jimmy said.
I was weightless again—heart wild and open and reaching toward Beck.
“A couple of weeks ago I wouldn’t have said that. But I think you’re right,” Beck replied. “Courage.”
Tears were streaming down Jem’s face. I took the camera from her, held it steady—and held her in a one-armed hug with my free arm.
“I say all that because a dog did that for me. I never used to say that because I always worried I sounded dumb. But I did this program my last time in juvie where I worked with this dog. Willow.” Beck’s voice wavered at the end. “She was a real good girl. She’s the reason I’m here. Without her…”
“Yeah,” Jimmy said. “I get it. You need things in this life that are bigger than you.”
My body was vibrating. That electric, hot-pink glow I’d gotten the day the idea for Wild Heart had struck into my brain like lightning was repeating itself. The universe was shaking wisdom loose for me and I knew what it was. Money. Good. Evil. The way it flows through our lives and touches everything, the impact it leaves.
What if Wild Heart started giving away money, like I’d always planned?
“That’s why I started this place,” Beck said. “It’s about dogs. But it’s also about people. The way they impact each other. And yeah. I don’t want to live in a society that tosses anyone away—animals or people. We’re not some huge fancy place and we never will be. But I guess I want to help as much as I can.”
“You’re doing a great job,” Jimmy said. He turned to the camera. “Everyone should donate here.”
They both laughed, the room lightening a little bit. Jem sniffed next to me.
“Everyone should donate here,” Beck said. “And one last thing. Well, two, I guess. The more money we raise, the more dogs we can rescue. The more people we can help find something real, like Jimmy did. Please don’t give up on us. We promise to keep expanding for as long as we can.”
I looked at the camera, preparing to turn it off.
“The other thing was about Luna.”
I shook my head. No, I mouthed. About you. I pointed at him.
“Luna da Rosa made a mistake and she’s making it better,” Beck said. “And I can personally say that she has more compassion and integrity in her little finger than most people do in their whole body. I trust her. And I believe in her.” He coughed a little. “And thank you.”
I clicked off. Glanced down at my phone to see the response to the live video. Checked it against the donation page.
“Well,” I said, “the video was about ten minutes long and you raised another $100,000 in that time.”
Elián hooted behind me and Jem screamed.
“Great job, boss,” I said to Beck. If I didn’t touch this man soon, I was going to lose my mind.
“Sure,” he said. “We all did a great job.”
Then I watched Beck hug Wes. Hug Jem. Whisper something in their ears that had them nodding.
When he walked over to me, he surprised me—placing a palm to my cheek.
“You didn’t have to say those things about me,” I said softly.
“Yes, I did,” he replied.
Fireworks.
41
Beck
Those ten minutes had been a rush.
And fucking terrifying.
A strange peace came over me at the end. Like a truth had been knocked free so I could show it to the world. According to Luna, millions of people were watching it.
In reality?
The only person in that room was Luna.
Even as Jimmy’s words made me remember my own past, even as I watched Jem and Wes respond to a feeling we all could identify with—being worthless to the world.
But really, Luna da Rosa held my attention. She was the only one I was speaking to.
Two of the longest hours of my life went by—we sent Betty and Veronica home with Jimmy and busied ourselves with the usual. Luna and Jem trained Penelope. Elián helped me put everything I’d said into that video into a speech I could use. Wes counted checks and answered volunteer requests. It was a good goddamn day, sliding into a good goddamn night. And when seven o’clock hit, I sent everyone home.
Everyone except Luna.
The knock came at 7:02. For the past two hours, I’d been filled with lust and emotion. It wouldn’t take much for me to become an animal. Luna stepped in, slid the door shut. There was a dirty paw-print in the middle of her white tank top. Her skirt was dusty at the ends. Her makeup was smudged. Luna was coming to me as authentic as she’d ever been.
“Lock the door,” I said. I had to force the words through my tight throat.
She did. I nodded at the open blinds and she closed them with trembling fingers.
“Come here.” I patted the spot on my desk directly in front of me.
She sat prettily in front of me, looking like a gift. I rolled my chair forward. Pulled the tie from her hair. Pressed my nose to the loose tendrils. Inhaled as she sighed. My arms came around her body and my hands knocked every fucking thing from my desk—highlighters, pens, cups, leashes, dog food, sticky notes. All of it clattered to the floor.
I sat back, placed my palms on her knees. Spread her legs slowly. All that hair fell in a curtain around her face.
“Thank you again. For what you said about me,” she whispered. My fingers wrapped around her bare ankles, slid up her calves, shifting the fabric of her skirt, revealing delicious inches of skin. “I haven’t been feeling very confident about myself recently.”
“Luna.” I meant to say more but her inner thighs were exposed now. I dragged my beard across them, nuzzling the skin. “Luna.”
“Yes?” Her voice shook.
I opened my mouth, breathing her in, tasting her. “I said those things because I like you. Because you’ve shown me the kind of person you really are.” My fingers kept shifting, shifting. She tilted her hips so I could shove the material past her waist, exposing pale-pink underwear. “And I know you understand how thankful I am for your help.”
“I do. Of course, I do.”
“Good.” I hooked my fingers into the lace and dragged them down her legs with an obsession—each tug, every part of her leg, the beautiful sight of her pussy right in front of my face. There for me to enjoy and explore.
I spread her legs further
.
“Because now I’m going to fuck you with my mouth,” I rasped, pulling her toward me by the hips. “Because I really like you, Luna. A lot. It’s hard for me to express myself. But you should know this. And if you don’t come on my face right now, I might fucking die.”
I leaned into her wet folds and finally inhaled the true scent of her—earth, salt, sugar, woman—and I couldn’t stop my tongue from swiping up her sex.
“Beck.” A plea. My palms spanned the round curves of her ass. I squeezed, dragged her closer, and swept my tongue up and down. “I need… I need…”
“Anything you need, say it,” I growled, eyes looking up at her from between her legs.
“I really like you too,” she gasped, wrapping her fingers in my hair. She rocked her hips, brushing her clit against my mouth. I smirked and held her still. “My friends, they…” She was already panting. “They said I was falling for you.”
“Is that true, sweetheart?” Endearments weren’t my thing, but I’d called her sweetheart three times now. If any woman was my sweet heart, it was Luna da Rosa. I kissed the inside of her thighs, taking my time, biting her flesh. I smelled her arousal, could feel her legs already trembling and I’d barely licked her. This beauty was going to come from anticipation alone.
I’d never felt so alive, so in control, so fucking vulnerable.
“I’ve never felt this way about anyone. Ever,” she whispered.
I stood so fast the chair fell over. Then I was bending Luna back, taking her mouth in a furious kiss. She moaned loudly, gripping my hair, spreading her legs even wider as my fingers caressed her pussy. I slid my index finger inside and was gripped by wet heat that had me fisting her hair. Pulling it. My palm grazed her clit and she cried out, head falling back, exposing her throat to my lips. She bent back farther and my mouth landed on her breasts, pulling her nipples through the fabric. I’d done this in my dreams and in my fantasies. The reality was even more beautiful.
I wasn’t sure what to do with all this extra emotion. So I put it into my actions, pushing her back onto the desk and dropping to my knees. I shoved the rest of her skirt over her hips, dragged her ass to the edge of the desk, and dropped my tongue directly onto her clit.
“Holy shit,” she cried out, almost laughing—but this wasn’t going to be funny.
“Tell me when you first thought about this,” I said. “About us.”
Us.
I gave her clit a few long strokes that had breath coming fast through her nose.
“The day on the beach. I kept thinking… god, that’s amazing… I kept thinking about your beard and what it would… what it would feel like.” She gave in to a long groan. I pulled an even sexier sound from her lips when I fluttered my tongue lightly, sliding another finger into her heat. I rubbed my beard back and forth across her thighs and her back arched off the desk.
“Yes,” she gasped. “That’s what I thought about.”
“What next?” I held her hips and swirled around her clit, fucking her slowly with my fingers.
“At the bar,” she moaned. “I thought… I thought you were sexy. Hoped you would kiss me.”
“I should have.”
Her thighs tightened around my ears. “The first time on your bike. I pictured you pulling over on the side of the road and fucking me against the first building we found.”
I thought of Luna’s hair wrapped around my wrist, her palms flat on a brick wall, back bowed as I took her from behind.
“I should have,” I grunted, then increased the pressure of my tongue. Firm, even strokes right against her clit as I stroked her from the inside.
“I wanted to suck your cock on that motorcycle, Beck, Beck, Beck.” Her fingers yanked at my hair. I shoved her farther across my desk, sending even more meaningless office supplies tumbling to the ground. One leg hoisted over my shoulder as I licked her clit fast, hot.
No goddamn mercy.
“After you come on my tongue, you’re going to drop to those knees and suck my cock, sweetheart.”
She squealed at that, mouth wide, these breathy, sexy sounds tumbling from those lips. I did the fanciest tongue work of my life as she writhed and panted and yanked the hair from my head. I knew that everything about this moment was different, that everything with Luna would be better. The ugly voice in my subconscious was quieter now. Softer. Replaced by a feeling of trust.
My hand worked beneath those skirts and I palmed her breasts with the other, let her nipples harden as I sucked her clit between my lips.
“Oh my god, like that. Like that like that—”
Luna climaxed with her entire body—screams, moans, limbs trembling, hands slapping down onto the desk as I held her to my face while she rode out the aftershocks. I would have happily kept going, licking her over and over until she tapped out. But that wasn’t what she had in mind.
Not at all.
Luna da Rosa sat up on that desk. Put her foot on my chest and shoved. I fell back into my desk chair, surprised.
“What are you doing?” I asked, because I could have guessed and I wasn’t sure I deserved it.
She leaned forward, palms on my thighs, and ghosted her lips along my ear. “I’m going to get on my knees and service you, sir. Like you told me. How does that sound?”
My fingers flexed on the chair. “You don’t have to do that. Those were just words. A fantasy.”
“You would deny me the pleasure of feeling your huge cock hit the back of my throat?”
My brain sparked, shorted. Went entirely black. My jaw felt seconds away from breaking. “Sweetheart.”
“Mr. Mason.” Her mouth teased mine, biting a little. “Why are you restraining yourself, Beck? You think I can’t handle the beast?”
I growled at her, lip curled.
She gave me a hard, bruising kiss. “I’m going to have this cock, Beck. And you’re going to come down my throat. And you’re not going to hold back, you hear me?”
She sank to the ground, layers of her skirt fanning out all around her. Her fingers slid over my knees, tugged down my zipper. She reached in, freed my cock—already leaking, aching for her.
“Where do you want those hands?” she asked. She knew. Luna had figured out my little obsession with her hair.
“Your hair,” I bit out.
“Then do it.”
So I speared my fingers into all that brown-and-gold silk as she lowered her plump lips all the way down.
42
Luna
Power.
There you are.
That had been what was missing — or rather, taken from me—as the media and my fans had descended with their bloodthirsty insults.
It was my power, being slowly drained away as I tried to correct a mistake that would never, truly, be corrected.
It was my power, being drained away because I gave it away to strangers. My twelve million fans didn’t really know the true me. Money drained it. Greed drained it.
But not now. That glow over my heart was back and in full force, demanding me to service this sexy, filthy hulk of a man sitting in front of me. A man who had spread my legs and eaten me out with a hungry abandon, growling and licking and groaning and shuddering. Seeing his shaggy, bearded face between my legs had ignited a thrill I’d never experienced before.
But now it was my turn. Beck the beast was mine to play with—to tease and taunt and to be overcome by.
The cock I released was miraculous. Thick, veined, perfect. Big. Really big. And I wanted it all.
He speared his fingers into my hair and I gave into it—gave into the pure sexual need that threatened to consume me. The second my lips caressed the tip of his cock we both groaned. His fingers gripped my hair, and I slid all the way down, enjoying the stretch, his taste, and my immediate arousal. Sex, for me, was always fun and hot. Being raised in Coconut Grove meant I had no shame when it came to bodies, pleasure, sexuality. I fucked around and hooked up and had fun with lots of men— in summary, I’d given a lot of blow job
s.
This was the blow job to end all blow jobs. Like our kiss on the bike had been for me, I wanted this experience for him to be everything. I wanted to reward his bravery, his heart, his giving nature. I wanted to reward his tongue’s masterful work.
I wanted Beck as mindlessly out of control as I’d been. My lips hit the base of his cock and then I slowly, slowly dragged my mouth all the way up. Let go with a pop.
“For the love of fuck,” he grunted. “Don’t you dare stop.”
I squirmed at that, bit my lip. Gave him my teasing eyes. “Maybe I will.”
His fingers tightened in my hair. Twisted. Trapped my face an inch from his dick. I was so hungry for it my tongue flew out, desperate for another taste. “Do you want it or not, sweetheart?”
“Yes, more, yes,” I begged, hands flying forward. I gripped him with two hands, lowered my mouth and sucked his cock with enthusiasm. The utterly gratified sound he made was the most erotic thing I’d ever heard. It rumbled from somewhere deep in his chest, and it was because of me. Beck gripped my hair as I sucked his cock, my legs shaking, body on fucking fire. His groans were perfect, the way he gasped my name, his begging, his pleading, the rough way he handled my head. I wanted it, wanted more, and when his palm slipped beneath my shirt to squeeze my breasts, I lost my mind. Was sucking him fast, bobbing my head, letting him work my nipples as I moaned around his hard flesh.
He yanked on my hair, stopping me.
I was panting, out of breath. “What… what’s wrong?”
“Tell me you’re close again.”
In response, I tried to squeeze my legs together. Needy. Nodded.
Beck was moving in a flash, dropping from the chair and laying his big body on the floor. I was picked up and deposited neatly over his mouth. His tongue slid through my pussy and my head fell back at the divine contact. I put my hands on his broad chest and rolled my hips, fucking Beck’s mouth, enjoying this luxurious exploration. In front of me, he was fisting his cock and I watched it like live porn—Beck’s head beneath my skirts, tongue in my cunt while he fucked his own fist.
WILD OPEN HEARTS: A Bluewater Billionaires Romantic Comedy Page 21