The Hookup Equation: A Loveless Brothers Novel

by Noir, Roxie

  I grab Thalia, laughing. I push her inside, slam the door, bolt it again, take her by the hips and walk her backward.

  “Tomorrow everyone’s going to be talking about how the youngest Loveless brother tried to fuck a door, and it’s all going to be your fault,” I tease her.

  “Oops,” she says, her arms already around my neck, her fingers in my hair, clearly not sorry. “But it worked, didn’t it?”

  She backs up against a table and without thinking I grab her, lift her onto it. It protests slightly under her weight, and it’s probably hand-made from expensive wood, and I couldn’t care less as I grab her hand and press it against my cock, still straining at my zipper.

  “Did it?” I ask, capturing her mouth with mine, her bottom lip between my teeth. “Did it work like you wanted, Thalia?”

  I shrug my coat off as she wraps her legs around me, kiss her again, harder, groaning into her mouth as she slides her hand from tip to root.

  “Because this is what happens when you suggest that I do anything slower and deeper and harder,” I go on. “But you knew that.”

  “Well, I was hoping,” she admits, a smile in her voice.

  “Liar,” I say, grinning. “You know exactly the effect you have on me and you enjoy every second of it. Get this off,” I tell her, pushing her coat over her shoulders.

  She sits back, pulls it over her arms, and it slides off the table.

  “And this,” I say, tugging at her sweater. She pulls it off and I get my own shirt over my head just as she reveals a long-sleeved shirt.

  “That too,” I say, planting my hands on the wooden table, her thighs between my hips and forearms. “Anything else you’ve got on, get it off. You’re done teasing me for today.”

  “It was cold,” she says, revealing a tank top, pulling that over her head.

  “But it’s warm now, and I like it when you’re wearing nothing,” I tell her.

  She unhooks her bra and I practically rip it off her body, pull her to me, kiss her feverishly. Her skin against mine is molten, electric, and I think I growl as I run my hands up her stomach, let her breasts fill my hands, pinch her dark nipples between my fingers.

  Thalia groans into my mouth, her legs tightening around my hips and I press myself against her, cock throbbing like I might explode.

  She opens her mouth under mine, and I find her tongue with mine, tangle them together as I roll her nipples again between my fingers, feel the tremor move through her body and into mine.

  I do it again, feel the tremble, the aftershock and I record every motion, every noise, a seismograph to her earth. She makes me believe in magic, it’s true, but I still want to map her bit by bit, know precisely what causes which reaction.

  It’s by far the most fascinating data I’ve ever compiled, and I pinch her nipples again, harder and this time she gasps, bites my lower lip.

  “I did miss you,” she murmurs, her mouth on mine, and I take her nipples between my fingers, brush my thumbs over the pads.

  “Tell me again,” I say, and I feel her smile against me.

  “I missed you,” she says, and she sits forward. “When I couldn’t find you I went to your house and laid in your bed.”

  I move my hand, run them down her back, along her spine, feel the way she arches. I grab her ass, pull her into me, imagining her naked and spread on my bed, one hand between her legs as her eyes drift closed.

  “And what did you do?” I ask, my voice rough.

  “What do you think?” she murmurs.

  I pull open the button on her jeans, practically rip the zipper open, splay them open around her hips. She leans back, on her elbows, and she lifts her hips and I pull her jeans off, throw them on the floor behind myself, drop to my knees.

  “I think I should probably be concerned that you went to my house when I wasn’t there and got yourself off on my bed,” I tell her, pushing her legs apart.

  I press my mouth against the inside of one thigh, then suck her soft skin into my mouth, just hard enough to leave a welt for the next day or so. She makes a soft noise that’s half gasp, half moan, and I breathe in her scent: heady and musky and so, so sweet.

  “I have a key,” she says, her breath coming faster, teasing. “I didn’t break in.”

  I laugh softly and mark her again, harder this time, leaving a bruise that’ll last a few days on the inside of her golden thigh. I like thinking of her finding these later, in the shower, when she’s getting dressed, and blushes as she remembers what left them.

  I look up at her. She’s propped herself up on one elbow, her eyelids low, and as she watches me she slides a hand through my hair, one knee thrown over my shoulder, her other foot on a chair.

  “Are you marking me?” she asks, and I run a thumb over two small splotches on the inside of her golden thigh, my heart beating so hard I can feel it in my fingertips.

  “Yes,” I admit. “It’s so I can come back here tomorrow and remember right now.”

  “Good,” she says. “I like the reminder.”

  “Good,” I say, and finally slide my hand up the inside of one now-marked thigh until my fingers reach her wetness, skimming across her lips, and her hips jerk. “I like giving you something to think about.”

  Thalia makes a noise in her throat that’s partly a strangled groan, partly a sharp gasp, and her fingers tighten in my hair, then instantly release, like she’s afraid of hurting me.

  She can’t. Not when she’s so wet for me that my fingers are soaked from a single touch. Not when her lips are swollen with desire, not when her hips move ever so slightly toward me.

  I’m lost, giddy. I want to fall into her and never come out. I want to possess her. I want her to never say another name that isn’t mine. I want to be the last person to ever spread her legs and find out just how wet she is, the last person to feel her shudder at the first lick, the last person to feel her come.

  Thalia says my name, barely a whisper. I slide my fingers along her slit and revel in her one last time, and I push them inside her and find her clit with my tongue and God, she moans. I lick her harder, sink myself in her to my knuckles, and I swear she tastes like honey on my tongue.

  I take her right to the edge. I wait for the tremor that says she’s holding her breath, that she’s almost there. I wait for her toes to curl and I wait for that sound, that high-pitched gasp, and then I stop. I lick her one last time and I pull my fingers out of her, turn my head, mark her one last time as she releases me.

  I stand and she’s already sitting up, mouth on mine, tasting herself as she practically tears my jeans open.

  “Tease,” she gasps, pulling down the zipper.

  “Just greedy,” I say, pressing my body to hers, my mouth to hers, and she wraps her hand around my length, strokes me. “I like when you come in my mouth, but Thalia, I really like when you come on my cock.”

  “What else do you really like?” she murmurs, stroking me again.

  “Raindrops on roses,” I say, and she bites my lower lip, stopping me.

  I grab a condom from my pocket and I get my pants off, my cock still in her in hands. I reach between her legs again just because I can, strum her clit again, feel the wave move through her body.

  “I like that out there, you’re a polite good girl, and in here you’re my own personal sex goddess,” I tell her. “I like the list you made of ways you want to fuck me. I like that you took notes when we tried them.”

  I didn’t care that she was a virgin when she told me. I still don’t, but there’s something about knowing she’s never said this to anyone else that makes my heart beat like a drum.

  There’s something about first that, despite everything, makes me flutter.

  There’s something about only that makes me feel like I own the universe.

  I step back, find the chair, sit and pull her after me.

  “And I like that being with you feels like the solution to a problem I didn’t know I had,” I say. “You’re strangely like coming home, Thalia. T
ruth is, I just like you.”

  She straddles my lap and the chair creaks below our combined weight as she moves forward, pressing my length along herself.

  “I like you too,” she says, simply. I put my thumb on her lower lip, slide it over her chin, down her neck.

  “But what do you really like?” I murmur. “Come on, Thalia.”

  She smiles and leans forward, her face against mine, and without looking she takes the condom out of my hand.

  “I like looking across a room filled with people and knowing that I’m the one who gets to go home with you,” she says, pulls back slightly. She rips the condom open with her teeth, and my cock jumps against her.

  “What else do you like?” I ask, holding onto her hips as she grabs my cock, rolls the condom down it, pumping me slowly, a slow, wicked smile spreading across her face.

  “I like the way you look on the very first stroke,” she murmurs, breathless. “I like the way you feel inside me. I like the sound you make when you realize you’re not going to hurt me and you start fucking me as hard as you can.”

  For a moment, I’m speechless, because I’ve never heard Thalia say anything like that before.

  Speechless and utterly, completely desperate for her.

  I grab her, pull her up until she’s half-standing and half kneeling, her forehead still against mine, and I slide the tip of my cock against her clit, between her lips, against her tight, hot entrance.

  “Are you teasing me?” I whisper.

  “No,” she murmurs. “I’m savoring the moment right before you make me lose my mind.”

  With that, she sinks onto me. Her eyes slide closed and she groans, her fingernails digging into my shoulders as she takes me all in one stroke and my vision goes black, then gray.

  I have her by the hips, holding her so tight I think I might leave bruises but I can’t stop myself, pulling her down, pushing as deep as I can as she moans, her hips rolling, her whole body a single movement that begs me for more.

  “That look,” she whispers.

  “The one I make because you feel so fucking good I’m afraid I’m going to come instantly?” I ask, voice rough and low.

  She leans forward and kisses me. It’s a soft kiss, a delicate kiss, careful and gentle, even as she rolls her hips against me and moves my cock inside her and I can’t help but growl, can’t help but grab her and move her and push myself harder and deeper and feel the quiver that moves through her body.

  I want her. I need her like I didn’t know I could need someone else. I want her to belong to me in a way that transcends possession, that transcends everything. I want to burn her into my skin just so everyone who sees me knows whose I am.

  We kiss again and then she leans away, just slightly. She reaches behind herself and anchors her hands on my thighs. She rocks back and forth and I drag her into me, over and over again, as hard and deep as I can.

  I watch her face, feel the way she shakes and I hit that spot over and over again. She whimpers, moans, bites her lip. Her breasts bounce, her nipples tracing circles in the air and she’s gloriously beautiful, flushed and rapturous and, unbelievably, mine.

  “Caleb,” she whispers, and she reaches one hand for my face, darts a thumb across my lips.

  “Thalia,” I answer, the only word I have right now.

  “You’re not gonna hurt me,” she says.

  I pull her onto my cock as hard as I can. Every muscle in my body tenses and Thalia cries out, gasps, digs her nails into my thighs so I do it again and she whimpers, moans, pulls me forward.

  “Please,” she says, the words hardly audible. “Caleb, please.”

  “I love you,” I say, and she trembles and I sink as hard and deep as I can, like maybe I can meld our bodies into one.

  “I love you back,” she says.

  “Come,” I tell her, the word a growl, a command, a foretelling as she flutters, clenches, her foreshocks rocking through me. “Let me feel you come, please let me feel you —"

  “Caleb,” she whimpers, and she does.

  I feel like the earth shakes, like the timber of my bones might crack apart. Thalia is a cataclysm, a force of nature, unstoppable and perfect as she says my name again and again and clenches like a fist around me, still somehow begging for more.

  I follow her instantly, helplessly. Everything I have is hers, and I offer it over and over until she finally stops moving, warm and supple against me. I kiss her on the neck and on the cheek and then, finally, on the mouth, my arms around her as she curls herself around me.

  We stay like that for a long time, my face pressed into the crook of her neck, her chin atop my head as I run my fingers up and down her spine and she traces idle circles on one shoulder.

  Finally she shifts, just enough that I slide out of her, and she moves and sits on me sidesaddle, one arm slung around my shoulders as I lean back against the chair that we’ve probably just sullied.

  “I have a confession,” she says, playing with my hair again.

  “Go on,” I say, and can’t help but smile.

  “I lied about what I was doing on your bed when I went to your house.”

  I pause for a moment, looking at her.

  “Were you really on my bed?” I ask, tapping my fingers against her back.

  “I was,” she says. “I really did miss you. I just didn’t lie there and think of you and masturbate.”

  Damn.

  “You just laid there and missed me, then?” I ask.

  “Not exactly.”

  “Thalia,” I say, and I’m trying to scold her just a little, but my voice comes out slow and lazy. “The hell did you do on my bed?”

  “I called your brother,” she says, her eyes dancing with laughter. “To see if he knew where you were.”

  I can’t help but smile, start laughing myself.

  “Thank you for lying earlier,” I say. “That’s the least erotic thing you could have said.”

  “I’m sure it’s not the least erotic,” she says, then gives me a quick kiss and hops off my lap, heading for the bathroom.

  “It is,” I call. “Seth’s a total bonerkiller.”

  “Be nice, he’s letting us stay with him,” she calls back, then shuts the door.

  * * *

  The room has a four-poster bed, a plush couch, and a fireplace, not to mention a very fancy shower and fluffy, luxe bathrobes.

  We sit on the couch in bathrobes and debate which founding father was the coolest, though we quickly settle on Benjamin Franklin. We talk about my future and our future and then my future again, though it’s not much of a distinction because it’s obvious they’re the same thing. We talk about a month from now and six months from now and a year from now and we both assume that we’ll still be together so easily that it’s completely unremarkable.

  Then she takes a shower and obviously, I interrupt it and it turns out I like the way she moans my name when her voice is bouncing off tile.

  We fall asleep together in the huge bed, and I don’t dream about a single thing.

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  Caleb

  I hear the door shut downstairs and the sound jerks me from half-awake to fully awake, the springs of Seth’s sofa bed sighing underneath me. I lie there, Thalia sleeping next to me, her arm draped over my chest, and I listen.

  Footsteps: a creak on that floorboard in Seth’s living room, then quickly, quietly, up the stairs.

  I glance at the clock: six-thirty in the morning, and a dark shadow flickers across my heart because I know, I know, that he’s just now coming home. I haven’t seen him since Friday afternoon, and now it’s Sunday morning, and I have a sinking feeling about where he’s been.

  I move Thalia’s arm as gently as I can, roll off the sofa bed. I find my pants in the dark and pull them on, glance back at her one more time, open the door of Seth’s office and close it quietly behind myself.

  Two doors down, the outline of my brother pauses.

  “Did you just get home?” I ask. />
  “I went out for a run,” he says, his voice quiet, hushed.

  “In jeans?”

  Seth sighs, rocks back on his heels. He turns and faces me, arms folded over his chest, and looks me dead in the eye.

  “What?” he says.

  “Don’t do this,” I say, softly.

  “Do what?” he says, his voice low, quiet, deadly.

  “Don’t go back to her again,” I say, nearly whispering. “Do you remember the last time? You swore —”

  “I was lying,” he says, and I close my eyes, take a deep breath.

  “Please?” I ask.

  My eyes are adjusting, and now I can see his face, light eyes and dark hair, cheeks and jaw and chin all variations on my own.

  “I’m fine,” he says, answering the question that I didn’t even have to ask.

  “Are you?” I say, and the words drop like a stone into the floor, lie there between us.

  “Of course I am,” he says, and turns away, opens his bedroom door. “I’m totally fucking fine, just like always. I’m gonna take a shower, see you in a few.”

  Seth closes the door behind himself and I stand there, glaring at it, wishing that I knew black magic so I could curse her name.

  Then I take a deep breath, shake it off, and go back into a sleeping Thalia.

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Thalia

  “All right,” says Caleb, looking at his phone and swiping a few times. “So far, so good. Next.”

  He holds his phone screen out to me and I lean forward, studying the face that he’s zoomed in on: bearded, brown-eyed, very obviously one of his brothers.

  “Levi,” I say instantly. “I met him yesterday. Oldest brother, engaged to June, lives in the cabin he built, Chief Arborist for the National Forest, has a dog named Hedwig and a rug named Jedediah.”

  “Excellent,” says Caleb, taking the phone back and swiping more, then holding it out again.

  “Violet,” I say. “Married to Eli, the middle brother —”