Rage

Chapter 4

Chapter Four

Arkady

I studied her for a long time, searching for any sign she didn’t want this. I knew I was a bastard of the highest degree, both before and after jail. But I wasn’t a rapist. And I wasn’t my brother.

I wouldn’t take her choice away from her, not ever.

“Tara?” I asked again when she didn’t reply, worry creasing my brow. “Talk to me.”

Her blush receded, but her hands moved to cover her eyes, and she moaned in mortification. “I just realized—no, it’s too embarrassing. I can’t say it.”

“Do you want me to stop?” I asked slowly, placing a gentle, exploratory kiss on the backs of her hands. “Because?—”

“God, no. All this time, I thought I was sleeping with Arkady Accetta and found out it’s a lie. Now the real you wants to—and I?—”

“Don’t worry about it.” Her embarrassment was adorable when I stopped to think about it. To her, she’d already been living this life. But to me, it was a chance I didn’t ever think I’d get, and now that it was right here in my grip, I wasn’t about to let it slip away. “I’ll make you forget all about that fuckstick. Promise.”

She grinned, her hands finally falling to her sides. “Good.”

“Tell me how you like it,” I commanded, my hands trailing to my hips to unlatch her legs from around me. “I wanna make it good for you.”

“I don’t know,” she whispered, turning her head to the side in shame.

And we couldn’t have that. I wouldn’t let her feel shame for her own sexuality.

“Well then, I guess we’ll just learn together.”

My hands trailed up her legs as I set them down on either side of me, one at a time, her body shivering beneath my touch. I ached behind the rough zipper of my pants, rock solid and barely containing myself. Hell, when she’d stuck her sweet ass against me and writhed like a fucking hellcat, I nearly blew my load right then and there. I wanted to bury myself in her wet heat. I hadn’t had a woman in my arms, around my cock, in five years. And to have the first time in all that time be with Tara?—

Fuck me, I was gonna come in my pants like a teenager.

I bit my tongue and thought of anything to keep from blowing my load before I could even get inside her. I might not need more than a single pump, but I wouldn’t be like all those other men who’d never seen to her pleasure first. I wanted her to enjoy it, too. And that meant keeping my cool.

I could do this.

“It’s been awhile for me, fair warning,” I admitted as I let my hands fall to her top, undoing each button so slowly it was like torture. “I hope I don’t disappoint.”

“I’m not exactly batting home runs here, buddy; the bar’s on the floor,” she muttered, then covered her mouth with a little gasp that made her turn pink again.

I buried my face in her stomach so she wouldn’t see me laughing.

What a pair we made. A woman whose lover beat on her, and a man who’d spent the last five years in prison for someone else, both apologizing for their low expectations where sex was concerned.

How fucked up was that?

Screw that.

If I didn’t satisfy her this time, then I’d just have to keep coming back until I did. She might sleep next to my imposter at night, but I’d be the one whose cock she dreamt about, whose tongue she tasted on hers, whose fingers left an imprint on the inside of her tight little cunt.

“Something funny?” she asked breathlessly as my hand slipped the last button free and tugged the edges of her shirt apart, baring her breasts to my gaze. She had on some sort of thin, lacy number that looked thin enough to rip apart with my bare hands. I was tempted to try, just for show.

“You’re cute when you blush,” I said, shrugging away her concern. “Now, let me admire this gorgeous creation before me.”

“You’ve got a hell of a sweet-talking tongue, Arkady,” she sassed as I grabbed her wrists and dragged them above her head. “What do you plan to do to me?”

“Everything.”

And I meant it, too.

I wanted to taste her, breathe her in, listen to every sound and sigh and scream she made so I could catalogue it in my brain for the rest of eternity. I wanted to drown in her, like I’d always fantasized about when I went back to my dorm alone and jerked one out to the memory of her lips around the head of a beer bottle, or the way she chased a straw with her tongue when she was wasted.

“Do you still do that thing with your tongue?” I murmured absent-mindedly as I kissed my way down her chest, skimming the space between her breasts before continuing further south, promising myself I’d come back and pay attention to those later.

“What thing?” she asked, sucking in a breath as my tongue dipped into the divot of her navel. “Oh, fuck, why is that so hot?”

“Should I do it again?” I teased, letting my tongue trace around the outside rim once more before trailing back up the way it came, heading for the bountiful breasts I’d abandoned. “Or do you wanna find out how it feels to have my mouth on your tits?”

“Oh, please continue,” she gasped, her back arching as she squirmed beneath me, one of her hands coming down to thread her fingers in my hair. “Don’t let me stop you.”

My lips closed around one of her pert nipples through the practically see-through fabric, and she moaned, her voice unrestrained now as her back came off the bed and she ground her hips into mine.

I couldn’t fight the chuckle that bubbled from my lips, tickling her sensitive skin as my tongue swirled around that taut nub. “You like that, huh?”

“I—I, I think I’m going to come,” she said suddenly, her whole body taut as a bowstring. “Oh, fuck?—”

I felt her whole body shake as I bit down gently, flicking my tongue across the tip of her nipple as she came silently, her hands fisted in the sheets around her, eyes closed, teeth clamped down on her bottom lip like it was killing her to hold it in.

I didn’t want her to hold it in. I wanted to hear her. I wanted my name on her lips.

“Say my name, Tara,” I growled, my tongue already working on the other side, a hand trailing down to her waistband. “I need to hear my name on your lips?—”

“I—I can’t,” she whimpered, sadness tainting that beautiful voice.

She broke my heart with those two words.