Crown of Lies (Truth and Lies Duet #1)

by Pepper Winters

  “Take off your clothes,” he growled thickly, his voice no longer entirely human as he shoved his jeans down his legs and stepped out of them.

  Sitting up on the bed, I obeyed, shrugging out of my damaged top and reaching behind to unhook and unzip my skirt. The moment it unfastened, I lay back down, shimmying from the material until he grabbed the ends and yanked it the rest of the way.

  My garter belt glittered in the low lamps by the window and door. My pantyhose reminded me everyone else knew me as the queen of Belle Elle, yet Penn was the only one to tear me down until I was naked and begging for a single touch.

  His gaze latched between my legs where my black G-string matched my bra. He bit his lip, then grabbed my ankles, yanked me down the bed, and pressed himself on top of me. His fist slammed into the mattress with all the frustration and rage he wouldn’t admit, making my heart hammer and blood race.

  “Fuck, I want to be inside you.”

  I surrendered to his feral kiss, letting him direct and guide me. His fingers plucked at my garters, undoing my pantyhose until they hung undone around my thighs. He rocked his cock against me—the only things separating us were two pieces of cotton.

  Terror tried to interrupt my pleasure—things like birth control and protection and the fact I should tell him it was my first time.

  But embarrassment kept my lips shut.

  Penn was experienced. He couldn’t hide that fact with the way he attacked my mouth and body with confidence born of expertise.

  If he’d noticed I was a follower in this and no longer the leader I’d been groomed to be, he didn’t care or mention it. I just hoped he’d take charge of the protection issue, and if he entered me too fast, then I would say something but not before.

  I clutched at his black top, needing it off. Needing skin on skin.

  He listened, tearing his mouth away to reach over his head and pull the second to last piece of clothing off.

  My hands flew up of their own accord. I traced his abs and up to his chest. He didn’t try to stop me and the luxury, the privilege of touching him filled my blood with heated desire.

  Staying braced on one arm over me, his fingers looped around my panties and pulled them down. My hand latched onto the other side, keeping it high, protecting my modesty. I didn’t know why, but sudden shyness attacked me.

  He gritted his teeth. “Let go.”

  I bit my lip, refusing silently.

  “Elle.” His growl sliced through my unwillingness.

  Closing my eyes briefly, I let go and allowed him to drag the lace down my legs. He slipped them off my ankles and tossed them over his shoulder. Clamping a powerful hand on my inner thigh, he spread my legs. “So fucking beautiful.”

  I trembled as his stroked upward, running his fingertips along my wetness. “Christ, Elle.”

  My mouth opened as he pressed a finger slowly inside me.

  My breasts ached, and I reached behind me to undo the confines of my bra. He grimaced with agonizing need as I revealed the final part of me. He swallowed hard as my body welcomed his finger, my hips rocking upward to meet him.

  “Touch me,” he commanded. His finger hooked inside me, dragging a gasp through my lungs. I reached forward blindly, unsure what to do and how hard to grasp.

  He tipped forward, giving me access to his boxer-briefs.

  With an out of control heartbeat, I pulled aside the tight cotton and inserted my hand into the warm depths.

  He shuddered as my fingers latched around him.

  “Jesus.” He bowed as I squeezed hard, unsure if soft or violent was his undoing.

  I copied the pressure he used on me—not being gentle, not giving him time to adjust to being touched.

  His finger speared upward, pressing against the sensitive spot inside that turned everything into liquid gold. Grunting a little as I fisted him deeper, he inserted another finger.

  The stretch. The burn. His fingernail scraped a little as he didn’t give me time to adjust.

  I matched his punishment with my own, digging my nails into his shaft, pumping him in the same way he thrust into me.

  “Goddammit.” His head bowed, his lips wide. “Fuck, that feels good.”

  His greedy cock leaped in my hands, demanding more. Something hot and sticky coated my fingers as I swooped over the crown and back down again.

  He hooked his finger deeper, causing me to writhe on the bed. My voice erupted on a gasp. “Oh, God.”

  “Finally, you speak.”

  I shivered, sinking back into myself as he stroked and teased. Words seemed a million miles away in the realm of conversation and humanness. I was somewhere deep inside where only feeling and sensation were permitted. “I wasn’t aware you wanted me to.”

  “I want to know how this is for you.” His eyes blazed.

  “How?”

  His thumb landed on my clit. “Do you like this? Do you need more? Less? Tell me.”

  I answered back with a squeeze of his cock. “Do you like this?”

  He groaned. “Do you really need to ask?” His hips thrust into my palm. “I’m practically coming all over your goddamn fingers.”

  The confession sent lust and desire and giddy, giddy happiness fizzing like fireworks.

  My body slowly melted, becoming more inviting, wetter, hotter.

  He noticed.

  A dark gleam entered his gaze. “I have no intention of fingering you all night, Elle. Just like I don’t expect you to jerk me off.” His fingers stroked me ruthlessly. “I want to fuck you. I need to be inside this.” He hooked his grip, pressing something intimately hardwired to an exquisite button inside my belly.

  Another press and I could’ve climbed up whatever pleasure hill I currently trampled, striding closer toward the summit. But each time he pushed me, he pulled me back a little—making me out of breath and desperate for the top where I could finally rest and be rewarded.

  He pulled away, removing his touch, making me empty. “Tell me now if that’s going to be a problem.” He fisted himself, looking between my legs. “Tell me if you’re having second thoughts because once I’m inside you, I won’t be able to stop.”

  Now was my final chance to admit I wasn’t ready. That this was too soon. Too fast. Not done by rational women.

  But the words weren’t there.

  The only ones I knew were: “I want this. I want you to fuck me.”

  His eyes snapped closed as his stomach tightened. “Your wish is my command.” Shoving my thighs wider, he pushed his boxer-briefs down his legs and threw them to the floor. Reaching for his discarded jeans on the bed, he pulled out a condom packet and passed it to me.

  “I take you’re not on the pill.”

  I took the slippery foil. “No.”

  “Fine.” His jaw gritted as his gaze locked on my shaking hands. “Put it on me then.”

  I had no intention of telling him I’d never done this before. Ripping the packet, I carefully pulled out the odd smelling latex and pinched the top like I’d been shown in sex education at school.

  He didn’t say a word as I positioned it over his crown and rolled it down his very impressive length.

  He shuddered as my fingers went further than necessary and cupped his balls. His eyes flared wide before I pulled away, unsure if I was allowed to do that or not.

  Wedging his hips between mine, he snarled, “Answer me one question.”

  I was obsessed with the sight of his sheathed erection only inches away from my core.

  He grabbed my chin, forcing me to meet his eyes. “Are you a virgin?”

  I stiffened. “How—how would you know that?”

  “I don’t know that. That’s why I’m asking.”

  I licked my lips. “I’m—”

  He waited with angry eyes, the tip of his cock nudging against my entrance. “Tell me, Elle. Otherwise, this will be very painful for you.” Pushing forward, he entered me just a little.

  The discomfort burned, but in a good way; but he had so much
more to go. So many ways to rip me apart if I wasn’t honest with him.

  I dropped my eyes. “This is the first time I’ve been with a man.”

  His forehead furrowed. His face replayed a memory I couldn’t see. His hips pushed forward again, inch by lazy inch. “I’ll go slow.”

  I tensed. “Okay.”

  We breathed in the same ragged rhythm as he slipped ever so slowly into my body. When he hit an unbreakable barrier, I clenched with trepidation and pain.

  He stopped.

  A few dazzling drumbeats of my heart, and I forced myself to relax a little.

  He pressed deeper.

  His dominion was collected but incomplete. There was nowhere I could look without him being there. No scent I could breathe without it being him.

  I couldn’t do a thing but allow him to penetrate me in every sense of the word.

  Another inch and a sting began—an awful burn that brought tears to my eyes. I turned my head, doing my best to bury my face or bite down on freshly laundered sheets.

  “Hurts?”

  I nodded, unable to look at him. I was a failure at this.

  “I told you I’d protect you even when I was hurting you, remember?” He grunted, dragging my eyes to him. He loomed over me like a demon with muscles etched in shadow, a face chiseled from granite.

  I nodded.

  “Well, then, this is going to hurt.” The flash of lust on his face distracted me then all I knew was pain and pleasure and pain and pleasure and pain, pain, pain.

  He impaled me swiftly, sharply. No more creeping softly. No more adjusting or seduction.

  He fucked me.

  He took me.

  He consumed me.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “OPEN YOUR EYES, Elle.”

  I couldn’t, not with the tears trickling down my cheeks. Tears I didn’t even understand. I wasn’t crying because it hurt—the pain had already faded a little. I wasn’t even crying because I’d given this man who I didn’t know the final piece of me that no one else had earned.

  I cried because in his strange arms, with his delicious body inside mine, I found a smidgen of that freedom I’d tried so long to find.

  “Open your eyes,” he ordered again, rocking into me.

  I obeyed, drinking him in, noticing the small beads of sweat on his brow and the wildness on his face.

  I shifted beneath him, my hips adjusting to fit his. My tears dried like salt tracks. “You’re huge.”

  “You’re tight.”

  “It feels...nice, though.”

  “Nice?” He half-smiled, fighting back the quick flashes of darkness he kept hidden. “Just nice?” He pressed into me. “No other description? No better word for me fucking you?”

  “Sore?”

  He scowled. “I was thinking of another.”

  “Hard? Full? Desperate?”

  His face eclipsed with shadows. “Desperate?” His voice switched to ragged breath. “Desperate for what? This?” He arched into me, his back bowing, his hips driving into mine with power and precision.

  My neck tensed, my skull digging into the bed as my shoulder blades came off the mattress. A wave of pain and a crash of pleasure. It seemed I couldn’t enjoy one without enduring the other.

  But I’d never experienced anything like it.

  I wanted more.

  So much more.

  But I’d have to wait because bliss like this meant he must’ve come, and I’d read men couldn’t have multiple orgasms like women.

  You haven’t come yet.

  It didn’t bother me. Tonight had been a simple task to lose my innocence. It rid me of that minor complication, and the next time (if there were a next time), there would be no pain, only pleasure.

  My hips moved, kissing the top of my mound to his lower belly. A thank you. A request. A bit of both.

  He licked his lips, self-control etching his face. “You want to continue?”

  “There’s more?” My lips parted as eagerness washed through me. “You didn’t...finish?”

  He chuckled; it shook his body inside mine. “I won’t take offense to that. But if you honestly think I’d just enter you and be satisfied, you need some serious lessons on how I fuck.”

  He looked down at where we joined, encouraging me to watch, too. He pulled back a little before pushing forward. The pain morphed to pleasure, warming and melting with a fine veil of sharpness.

  Embracing the fire feeding on the lust inside me, I placed my hands on the top of his ass where his back clenched beneath my fingers. “More.”

  He planted his fists into the sheets by my head. “Fine.” He slipped from slow to serious, driving into me.

  My core clenched around him. A twinge of discomfort tried to steal me away.

  Screw the pain.

  I wanted this.

  All of it.

  He groaned long and low, his hips thrust upward, hitting some part of me that shattered into stardust. His hips jack-knifed into mine, as deep and as close as he could go. He let go. He drove again.

  Thrust. Thrust. Thrust.

  Whatever place orgasms lived suddenly swarmed alive like a hive with its ferocious queen. The buzzing flew from my toes to my knees to my spine, from my fingers to my arms to my tongue.

  Everything ignited, and I jumped.

  I jumped from the tower of Belle Elle. I forgot about my career, my rules, my boundaries.

  I deleted myself.

  I met Penn in the black debasement and spoke crude consonants and tasted dirty vowels. “I want you to fuck me. I want you to make me scream.” I dug my fingernails into his ass, jerking him to me. “Give me what I want.” I bowed off the bed, capturing his mouth with mine, taking control all while submitting the remaining power I had. “Fuck me...please.”

  I should’ve prepared for the unleashing.

  I should’ve expected what would happen with such an invitation.

  But it still took me by surprise. Still thrilled and terrified and teased.

  “You fucking asked for it.” His smile was pure criminal as his stomach tightened, and he drove into me so hard, so fast, his hips bruised my inner thighs. His mouth latched onto mine, our teeth clacking, our tongues knotting, every last masquerade at being civilized...gone.

  He didn’t just take me up on my offer.

  He doubled my stakes and went for everything he could claim.

  He fucked me.

  No, that was woefully unjust.

  He broke me, fixed me, split me.

  His body slammed again and again and again into me. His cock sliding in heat and wetness, dragging more from me. The orgasm buzz increased, consuming everything.

  His stamina made my legs jelly. Every feminine atom burst with bliss. My hips tried to meet his, but his pace kept me pinned to the bed. With a ragged breath, he slapped a hand over my heart, pressing my lungs, preventing me from gasping, counting my charging heartbeats.

  My skin burned with sweat, turning his grip slippery. His fingers slid off me, slamming into the mattress. His arm buckled, wedging his entire weight on me. His hips thrust as if he had no power over his body anymore. As if all he was, all he was meant to do, was possess me until I possessed him in some karmic twist of fate.

  I gasped and panted and gulped as sex turned to the most basic of coupling.

  He buried his face into the sheets, his back suddenly going ramrod straight, his cock pulsing inside me.

  I froze, not knowing what to do.

  I knew exactly what I wanted to do.

  My fingers turned gentle, caressing his spine. The moment I touched his sweat-misted back, he reared up, baring his teeth. “Don’t. I’m just—” His jaw worked. “I’m so fucking close.”

  “Don’t stop.”

  His face scrunched up with sexual agony. “I don’t want to finish yet. I haven’t had enough of you.”

  My cheeks pinked even as triumph blew trumpets in my belly. “Oh.”

  He bent and kissed me, unapologetic with lust
and his desire to come. His eyes remained closed, barring me from reading him or trying to guess if this physical act meant more to him than mutual release.

  I couldn’t figure him out, and I desperately needed to if I was going to survive whatever he’d done to me.

  Because he had done something to me.

  He’d awakened me, and I could never go back to sleep.

  “Fuck, you feel too good.” With a feral grunt, he pulled away, withdrawing, and leaving me empty. Sliding down my body, his legs fell off the bed, his knees thudding against the floor.

  Before I could ask what was wrong, his hands landed on my inner thighs and pushed my legs apart. His mouth—the same one that’d been kissing me—landed on my core, his tongue pulsing inside me with a different kind of wetness, a more intimate kind of heat.

  I bowed off the bed, clutching the sheets in shock. “Oh, my God.”

  He bit my clit with careful teeth. “You’re sore, and I need to fuck you hard. I doubt you’ll find a release with me. So...you’re going to have one now.”

  The sheets didn’t provide enough traction to grip onto. I grabbed his hair instead.

  He cursed something deep and dark. His voice twisted my stomach into bowties. His tongue entered me again. It wasn’t enough after the deep penetration of his cock; the shallow claiming left me straining for more.

  But then his hands joined in too, pinching my clit as his fingers ran beneath his tongue to press inside me, granting girth and dexterity, pushing me up the cliff of an orgasm I’d bathed in since he turned me from pure to deviant.

  Just like in my office, he didn’t mess around.

  He wanted me to come.

  I would come.

  My legs tried to close around his head, but he slammed a hand onto my thigh, spreading his saliva and my arousal. Grabbing my wrists, he kept then pinned on my belly while his tongue worked me harder.

  The orgasm had colors like a dark rainbow—all blacks and grays and reds and oranges. I felt it gather. I saw it swirl. And when it descended from my bones and ligaments to gather in my womb, it glittered like some magical malicious force.

  His tongue was the wand that spent that magic, dragging it from me, forcing it to explode in body-crippling waves.

  “Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God.” I climbed the bed, him, the world. I went blind, deaf, mute.