Pretty Daring

by Jessa Kane

  “Mine!” he shouts down at Wagner.

  “Yes, I’m all yours.” I climb onto Ezra’s lap and I’m flooded with relief when he lets me dislodge his hands from around Wagner’s neck, who immediately slumps back, gasping for air. I straddle Ezra’s lap and scoot as close as possible, dropping kisses on every inch of his face. “I missed you. Where have you been?”

  “Trying to figure out how to keep you,” he heaves, leftover anger vibrating his muscles. “I went to ask your father for permission to marry you—I thought you’d like that—and he told me about your trust fund, princess. Told me he would take it away if you stayed with me. I needed to figure out a plan. I’m not worthy of you, but as long as I had a plan to one day be worthy—”

  “Shhh,” I say against his mouth, kissing him lightly, my heart careening into my ribs. “You are worthy. Right this second. And I don’t care about the trust fund. I only want you.”

  He bares his teeth at the man slumped behind us on the floor. “You pushed me away because of this pig?”

  “I was worried you’d kill him, yes. But…” Suddenly embarrassed, I duck my head. “I was going to tell you everything this morning.” I search for the right words. “All my life, everything has been handed to me. Just once, I wanted to solve my own problem. My father had to bribe a recruiter to get me into Princeton. And…I just couldn’t bear to ask him to bail me out of blackmail, too.”

  “That’s what this fucker was doing?” Ezra bristles, reminding me of a lion who has just spotted a gazelle. “Blackmailing you over something your father did?”

  Whoops. Probably should have saved that nugget of truth for later. “It doesn’t matter,” I murmur, rubbing our lips together. “It’s over. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t let him touch me when I belong to you so completely.” I feel his cock stiffen between us and rock against it instinctively, ignoring the man sprawled out a mere three feet away. “You made me your little girl. That’s how I want to stay.”

  A groan releases, deep in his chest, and as we converge on each other’s mouths, his hands creep up under my skirt to grip my buns. I tug down the neckline of my tank top to show him my bare breasts and he gives a low curse, taking one hand off my backside to unzip his pants. “You’ll never keep anything from me ever again, Ophelia,” he says, grunting as he takes out his cock and slaps it against the back strap of my thong. “I almost died when he pulled you in here. No one touches what’s mine. No one touches the girl I love.”

  “No one,” I whisper at his lips, lifting up so he can position his stiffness at my wet hole. I slide my tongue into Ezra’s mouth, playing with his bigger one, then I slowly lower myself on his thick rod of flesh, letting it fill me until I’m whimpering and clawing at his shoulders. “I love you, too, Ezra,” I gasp, flicking my hips back and grinding them forward. “Oh lord.”

  “Fuuuuuck.” He slaps my right butt cheek, then grips the flesh and uses it to propel me into a rough rhythm, his teeth bared against my mouth. Growling possessively. I hold on tight to Ezra’s broad shoulders and ride his pulsing cock, my thighs flexing around his hips. Wagner has an up close and personal view of our joined bodies and I don’t care one way or the other. I need Ezra right now and when that happens, we become the only two people on the planet.

  Furthermore, I can sense that Ezra is still shaken up over seeing me being dragged by another man by my hair. The sounds and movements he makes are desperate, cut with residual rage. I want to reassure him. I want to make him secure in the knowledge that he’s the only one who’ll ever be allowed to touch me. I want to make Ezra my master in the eyes of every single man alive…starting with Wagner.

  “You’re so big,” I breathe, leaning back and riding up with slow undulations of my hips. “I’ll never be able to fit it all.”

  Ezra’s strong throat is exposed when his head falls back on a masculine moan. “This clown didn’t know you’ve been getting twelve fat inches, did he, princess?” He catches my chin and tilts my face up. “Maybe he needs to be told.”

  Arching, I drop my head all the way back so I’m looking Wagner right in his red, scandalized face. “My man took my virginity with his twelve big inches.” I punch my hips forward on those three final words, squeezing my inner walls around Ezra’s shaft and he grits out a curse in response. “He feels so good inside me.”

  Ezra twists a hand in my tank top and yanks me back up, bruising my mouth with a wet, groaning kiss. He lands a sharp spanking on my buttocks, then jiggles the flesh of my right cheek. “You’re not man enough for this,” he rasps at Wagner, but he’s staring at my mouth. “No one’s ever going to get his come inside this pussy but Ezra. Isn’t that right, princess?”

  “Yes,” I manage, gasping when Ezra reclines back and starts to pump his cock up into me—fastfastfast—wet, slapping sounds filling the room. “Ezra, oh my God. Ezra!”

  His thumb finds that sensitive button between my thighs, playing with it, and his upthrusts grow even more ferocious, lifting me off the ground so I’m bouncing up and down on his lap, flying up several inches and slapping down, impaled on his meaty erection. I feel unexpectedly naughty knowing we have an audience watching me get possessed with such force. I can feel Wagner’s eyes on us, observing me from behind, seeing every veiny inch of Ezra’s cock slide into my pink opening—and it makes me come.

  I come with such intensity, my scream hurts my own ears and I feel the flood of moisture traveling down Ezra’s flesh, dripping on his lap and corded stomach, into his pubic hair. My throat muscles strain and I shake with a violence I didn’t know my body was capable of. Before I know what’s happening, Ezra pins me down on my back and slams his cock into me, again, again, again, the top of my head coming within an inch of Wagner’s thigh with every thrust. “My tight, little fuck toy,” he bellows at Wagner. “Not yours. Not anyone’s. Mine.”

  Ezra’s jaw slackens and a hot flood releases inside me. Above me, his muscles shudder with the onslaught of pleasure and his hips pump and pump, sending fluids splashing in every direction on Wagner’s floor.

  “Ophelia,” he pushes through clenched teeth, finally dropping down on top of me and laying kisses on my face, neck and hair. “Ah, princess. I love you.”

  “I love you, too,” I whisper, my heart in my throat. “Let’s go home.”

  Ezra

  When I carry Ophelia into her father’s office twenty minutes later, he shoots to his feet behind his desk, slamming the phone into its cradle. “Ophelia,” he fumes. “I should have known when you didn’t come home or answer your phone that you were with this thug.”

  “This thug just saved me from making a huge mistake.”

  She pats me on the chest until I set her down, though I’m having a really hard time taking my hands off of her, even for a second.

  Her father frowns. “What are you talking about?”

  “She’s talking about your business partner,” I grind out. “He’s been blackmailing her in exchange for…”

  I grow livid all over again and have to garner all my willpower to keep myself from plowing a fist through the closest wall. Fuck. If I hadn’t seen her across the street, I don’t even want to think about what might have happened. That piece of shit was prepared to take Ophelia against her will and I’ll be having nightmares about it for the rest of my life.

  “In exchange for what?” Ophelia’s father demands. “What are you talking about?”

  Unable to help myself, I approach the desk and slam a fist down onto the antique wood. “In exchange for her. In his bed.” Needing to touch my girl and make sure she’s okay, I turn and pull her into my arms, becoming whole again when she snuggles into my hold. “He knows about the bribe you laid down to get her into Princeton. He threatened to ruin you unless she gave in.”

  “I changed my mind,” Ophelia says, facing her father with her cheek flattened over my heart. “But he wasn’t going to take no for an answer. Ezra showed up and kicked the door down.” She kisses my chest through my shirt. Once, twice. �
��He protected me.”

  I drag my attention off Ophelia to find her father pale and lowering himself into his chair. “I can’t believe this. I told Wagner about the bribe in confidence and he…he uses the information to try and get his sleazy hands on my daughter?” His troubled eyes land on Ophelia. “You should have come to me.”

  She shakes her head sadly. “Look at everything I’ve been given. Every advantage. Tutors. The best schools.” Her eyes shine with unshed tears. “Everything is given to me without question. I wanted to stand on my own two feet. I didn’t want to be a burden.”

  The man appears dumbstruck. “All these things I give you, daughter…they’re because I love you. You’ll never be a burden.”

  “Thank you.” She slides her hand into mine, squaring her shoulders and I’ve never been prouder of anyone in my life. “But I still want to stand on my own. For a long time, I’ve wanted that. I don’t need the fancy trappings and money and Princeton. I want to make my own decisions and tackle the world as I am. Not what I’ve been built up to be. Father, I need to make my own decisions. And my first decision is choosing love. Choosing Ezra.”

  There’s no way to keep the happiness off my face. Not when she looks up at me with love shining in her eyes. “Ophelia,” I breathe, brushing her hair back. “My princess.”

  “I love Ezra,” she murmurs. “And I’ll leave this all behind in a heartbeat to be with him.”

  “You don’t have to do that,” her father says, sighing. “Not entirely.”

  I glance over at him in puzzlement.

  He stands once more. “I owe you a great debt, Ezra. It’s bad enough that my business partner stooped so low. If he’d actually been able to carry through on his threats…” He closes his eyes and shivers. “We’ll put Princeton on hold for now. You’re young, daughter. If you’re still happy in four years’ time and Ezra has followed through on his promise to provide for you, then we’ll celebrate. If not…” He eyeballs me carefully. “Your trust fund will be waiting.”

  In other words, I have four years to prove myself.

  Little does he know, I have enough motivation—and startup capital—to do it in half that time. And I will. There’s no mountain I wouldn’t climb for the girl standing beside me. She might have fallen in love with an ex-con, but I’m going to do her proud.

  Starting now.

  I heft my princess up into my arms and carry her from the office, whispering in her ear how much I love her, how I would die for her, that I’m going to marry her as soon as possible.

  And I do.

  EPILOGUE

  Ophelia

  Five Years Later

  I climb into my Bentley and let out a long breath, leaning my head back against the leather headrest. A smile curves my mouth. The reasons for my happy exhaustion—my twin daughters—wave at me from the upstairs window of the house, Leeza standing behind them with her hands on her granddaughters’ shoulders. I signal my mother-in-law, who lives in the guest house half a mile away on our property, to let her know I’ll be back soon. Then I start the car, pulling around the twinkling stone fountain that sits in our driveway and starting the journey down the tree-lined path to the main road.

  Memories reach out to me from all sides. The first time Ezra brought me here two years ago, carrying me over the threshold like a bride, even though we’d already been married three years by then. I can see him chasing our daughters through the orchard, pretending to be a monster, sunlight flickering around their shadows. In a few months, Christmas lights will hang from these trees, making our home look like a winter wonderland.

  Life is beautiful.

  I’m married to the most hard-working, loving, passionate man on earth and I’m headed to see him right now. My thighs tingle with anticipation as I make a turn onto the road that will take me to the manufacturing plant. The one Ezra built from the ground up and turned into a multi-million-dollar operation in just five years.

  Really, he accomplished what he set out to do much sooner than that. In those early days when we moved to Michigan, Ezra found us a small one-bedroom apartment. It was filled with sunshine and it had a small fireplace. Most importantly, it had a bed. Ezra made love to me so many times in that tiny, happy apartment, I lost count. And nothing has changed since we moved to the fourteen-bedroom mansion on Lake Erie.

  No, my husband is as starved for my body as ever. More so. His lunch break begins in eight minutes and he made it clear over the phone that I’m on the menu.

  My nipples tighten to points inside my dress and I press down a little more on the accelerator, my breath quickening. He took me against the shower wall this morning. So hard that I screamed and drew blood on his back. But we’re insatiable. Most nights he’s barely in the door from work before he’s barking at his mother to take the twins outside to play.

  I let out a long exhale and command myself to focus on the road. Crashing wouldn’t be ideal, would it?

  The four-year deadline set by my father came and went without us even noticing. My trust fund? I don’t need it.

  Ezra had been working on new ideas while in prison and he used them to shake up the automotive industry. His company uses different, sustainable materials to create sleeker parts at lower cost and his empire grew into a behemoth almost overnight. In other words, when we occasionally meet my father for dinner in Manhattan, Ezra picks up the check.

  Still he doesn’t fit in with the elite world in which I was raised.

  No, he’s self-made. He’s fierce. He’s better than all of them.

  And he’s all mine.

  I flex my fingers on the wheel and the diamond on my finger catches the light. Do I like having all the luxuries he’s given me? Sure, who wouldn’t? I rest easy at night knowing our children will never want for anything.

  Would I give it all up and follow Ezra anywhere? Would I go back to living in a one-bedroom apartment in the city? In a heartbeat. I’ll live any life as long as he lives it with me.

  I had the idea for my very own business inside the four walls of that first, little apartment. Ezra was so driven to succeed that I was bitten by the entrepreneurial bug myself. We had a nice nest egg to start off, thanks to Ezra’s colleagues’ debt of gratitude, but most of it went toward getting the car parts business off the ground. Still, when I told Ezra I wanted to start my own dark chocolate brand, he made sure to set aside the capital.

  Years later, Ophelia’s Chocolate is beginning to expand. I have several orders to fulfill for major food retailers and interest grows daily. Ezra’s need to keep me safe and close to home led to him building an industrial kitchen and packaging room on our property, so I can leave my employees to their work and spend time with our children with ease.

  I’m so grateful for every single moment of this life. It’s almost too perfect to be real.

  Minutes later, I walk into my husband’s office and close the door without a sound, leaning back against it and just looking at him. His huge shoulders fill out the button-down dress shirt completely, testing the seams. His dark blond hair is pulled back in a small bun at the base of his neck and that beard—the one that leaves chafe marks on the insides of my thighs—is close cut and sprinkled with gray.

  When Ezra spots me, he stops mid-sentence and hangs up the phone call he’s on, standing slowly behind his desk. Behind him, the wall of windows overlooks the acres of land on which his business sits. Workers rush between buildings and trucks, loading parts for delivery. But I only notice them out of my periphery, because I can’t take my eyes off Ezra. He rakes a hand over his open mouth and looks me over, the same way he looked at me when he’d just gotten out of prison. “That a new dress, little girl?” He reaches down and adjusts his manhood. “Come over here and let me take a closer look.”

  I set down my purse and cross the room, sidling between my husband’s big body and the desk’s edge. He crowds me until I’m forced to slide my butt up onto the ledge—and honestly, I would be more than happy for him to rip my panties off, plow his
thick shaft into me and take me hard. But my husband seems intent on savoring me. His fingers undo the buttons of my new, cream-colored dress slowly, until he can push it aside and palm my bare breasts.

  “How do you get more beautiful every time I see you?” Ezra breathes, dipping his head to suck my nipples, one by one. “It’s a mystery how I’ve managed to build this business when I sit here thinking of you every goddamn second of the day.”

  “I think of you, too. Every second—” I murmur, but I’m cut off by his ravenous mouth.

  He shoves the hem of my dress up to my waist, pulling me closer to the edge of the desk and I spread my legs open, how he likes. His rough hands mold my breasts and I whimper into his mouth, begging him without words to make love to me. When he merely sucks in oxygen and dives back into another kiss, I whine in my throat and unzip his pants, sliding my hand inside to stroke his cock.

  “Ah, fuck, that’s so good,” he bites off, pumping his hips toward my touch. “I don’t feel like I’m alive without your hands on me. If I had my way, you’d be chained to this desk, you know that? Where I could sit you in my lap and keep you there all day. Where you belong.”

  “Mmmm.” I tip my head back and let him suck a red mark onto my neck. “I think we can arrange that for your birthday this year.”

  He lifts his head and I watch his pupils expand. “Yeah?”

  I slide my hand out of his pants and play with my nipples, twisting my body side to side in a tease. “What else would I get the man who has everything?”

  Ezra moans, his eyes fastened to my breasts. “God knows that’s true. I’ve got everything.” He presses his forehead to mine. “I got everything I need the second you chose me.” His lips jump at one end. “But I’m not turning down having you chained to my desk.”

  “No. I don’t suggest you do.”