Chapter 17 Beg
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
BEG
Jett
“Yeah, I left it for your valet to deal with. I’ll apologize tomorrow, but I’m not going to allow her to be a target again. I’m getting her upstairs and locking her up for the night. The only reason we’re not headed north to the border is because you’ve got cameras everywhere.”
“Bloody hell, you both could’ve died,” Devon growls.
“Died?!” That’s Harlow in the background. “What happened?”
“I’ll explain in a minute, love.” Devon turns back to me. “You sure you’re okay? Do you need to go to the hospital?”
“I’m fine. If I wasn’t, I’d go.”
Devon keeps talking. “Get her upstairs. We’ll take care of the truck. The team will be in tomorrow by lunchtime. A plan is already in the works—”
I interrupt that thought. “Since a semi just set out to kill us, we’re going to need a new plan.”
Lennon groans. “And here I was worried about the first plan.”
Devon doesn’t argue. “I agree. We’ll meet in my suite at noon. The last thing we need is for this to leak to the employees or the locals. Try to get some rest.”
Rest. I doubt that. “We’ll talk tomorrow.”
I don’t see a scratch on Lennon, but my thermal coffee cup that lives in my truck, because I can never remember to bring the damn thing in, went soaring. I have a crater in my temple as a reminder that this isn’t some nightmare, but a hellish reality.
I give Lennon a nudge onto the elevator before me. When a large group tries to join us, I put my hand up. “Sorry. Private elevator.”
“Oh great, you think you’re going to have sex on the—”
The doors close, and I turn to Lennon. “Tell me the truth. Are you hurt?”
She doesn’t waste any time. She cuts the distance between us, and for the first time, I’m not the one kissing her.
She pushes up on her toes and presses her body to mine. She wraps her arms around my neck and can’t get close enough.
Her energy matches mine after what just happened. An adrenaline rush does crazy things to the human body. The heart speeds. The brain is more alert. There’s an increased blood flow to every cell of the body.
Every sense is heightened.
I may have a gash on the side of my head, but I wasn’t kidding when I said my gut is fine. If it weren’t, I’d be back at the hospital now.
So when I wrap her up in my arms and lift, it’s the most I’ve done since surgery. It also makes me feel more alive than I have in years.
Her legs wrap around my waist, and I press her back to the elevator wall.
I press my dick to her pussy and curse the invention of clothes. If her moan has anything to do with it, she feels the same.
Thoughts of her virginity nag at me, reminding me this could lead to something, but not the end game.
Not tonight anyway.
My hand slides to her ass and between her legs. She breaks our kiss. Her exhale against my skin mixes with a little mew.
If I wasn’t hard already, that would do it.
I put my other hand flat to the wall beside her head and look down at her. “I didn’t know you were an adrenaline junkie.”
Her eyes are heated, and her usually pale skin is flushed. She’s about to say something, but the elevator dings and the doors part.
I set her on her feet and take her hand. I’ve got her down the hall, in my room, and up against another wall in no time. She melts into me and her fingers claw at the buttons on my shirt. I look down at her. “What are we doing?”
She shakes her head. “Please don’t talk unless it’s to tell me you need to go to the hospital. I want this.”
I grip both her wrists in one hand and press them to her chest. “I want this too. More than you can imagine. I’m not embarrassed to say that I’ve been thinking about this since you landed on top of me when I was fresh out of surgery. But I’m not sure this is the best idea.”
Her face drops in disappointment. “Are you not cleared from the surgeon to have sex yet?”
I frown. “I’m not talking about me. I’m talking about you.”
She tries to twist her wrists out of my grip, but I hold firm.
I shake my head. “We’re not making this decision tonight. We could’ve died. I’m not the kind of asshole who will take advantage of you right now.”
“Please.”
“I’ve had a lot of experiences, but I’ve never had to hold a woman at arm’s length who was begging me for sex.”
She looks up at me through those thick lashes. I swear, she bats them a few times. “But this is going to happen eventually. I feel it, and I know you can too. Why wait?”
I take her wrists wrapped up in my hand and lift to press them to the wall over her head. “Because second thoughts and regrets are shit. If I were to ever be one of those to you, I’d hate myself.”
Her eyes fall shut, and her body slumps.
I call for her. “Baby.”
She opens her eyes. “How many ways do you plan to turn me down?”
I lean in to kiss her before pulling her arms from the wall, but I don’t let go.
I turn her so her back is against my chest again and press my groin into her ass.
“Do you feel that? That is not the cock of a man who is pleased to turn you down. I’m so fucking hard for you, I’ll have blue balls into next week at this point.
But when I take you for the first time, it’s not going to be because Petrov hired someone to kill you, and your head isn’t clear. I want you to be sure.”
She turns her head to peek up at me. It kills me to see disappointment laced in her features. Even so, she sinks into my chest, and I swipe the underside of her breast with my thumb.
“I’m sorry that happened. I don’t ever want you to be scared when you’re with me.”
She pulls in a trembled breath and nods.
I put my lips to her temple and kiss my way down the side of her face until I land below her ear. “Do you want me to do something about that?”
Her eyes fly open. “But you just said—”
“Shhh.” My hands start to roam but stay in the semi-safe zone. “No sex tonight. But I can do other things. I can relax you and make you forget. I’ll make you come so hard, you’ll feel like you were transported to another universe.”
Her dark eyes angle up to me in question.
I claim her mouth with mine again. “Let me do that for you. I’ll make you forget, even if it is just for a little while. Then we’ll sleep. Tomorrow will be a new day. A day of reckoning for you.”
Her head falls back on my chest.
“Lennon,” I call for her. “Tell me what you want.”
She turns to me. “There’s nothing more that I want than to forget.”
Lennon
Desperation isn’t a good look, but I don’t care.
When that semi hit Jett’s truck tonight, I thought everything I’ve gone through to get to this point was for nothing.
Six years of hell.
Six years lost.
Living with myself as a murderer...
All for nothing.
Of course the first man I meet after all that is too honorable to be like, you wanna finally have sex for the first time at the ripe old age of twenty-five? Sure, I’ll be happy to check that off your list for you.
“Yes,” I repeat the thought I screamed in my head. “If you’re going to make me say it, I’m not ashamed. Right now, I’m desperate for anything with you.”
A slow sexy smile pulls at his lips. It’s a mix of satisfied and challenged.
As if he’s going to have to work that hard.
I’m a ball of nerves. And to think just a short time ago, I was yawning on Felicity’s floral sofa.
He moves until the backs of my legs hit the bed and almost makes a presentation of it when he tags the bottom of my shirt at the waist and pulls. I lose sight of him for a nanosecond, but when he comes back into view, his eyes drag over my breasts in my boring bra and bare skin to the waist.
I shiver as goosebumps spread over my bare skin.
“You won’t be cold for long, baby. I plan to warm you up from the inside out. I might not be able to officially fix your problems until tomorrow, but I sure as hell can make you forget them tonight.”
His hands go to my hips and drag up my ribcage. He brushes his thumbs over my nipples. They pebble through the thin material, and I feel it everywhere, but especially between my legs where no one has ever been but me. “Please. There’s nothing I want more than to lose myself in you.”
He never breaks our connection as his hand moves to my back.
When my bra goes slack, he goes straight to the button on my jeans that sit low on my hips.
They’re too big, but I liked them, so I decided to make them work.
Jett works the button and zipper with ease, but gravity does the rest of the work.
Standing here in my panties and the bra that’s falling down my arms, an electric energy rushes through me. Anticipation and apprehension mix in a way that’s exciting and liberating.
Jett’s gaze drops from my eyes to my body. He brushes one strap off my shoulder and the other follows suit and falls down my arms.
Besides my labored breaths, I don’t move. I’m too focused on the way he’s looking at me.
It’s different than how any man has ever looked at me before. He’s not ogling me. Everything with Jett is different.
There’s a reverence in his eyes that I’ve never seen. If he could worship me through his gaze alone, he’d be on his knees at an altar.
I’ve never felt so comfortable in my skin and...
Free.
His finger dips into the band of my panties. He drags his index finger along my skin before dipping it deeper.
My hands flex on his biceps to hang on. “Oh my.”
“Yeah. Oh-fucking-my.” His whole hand takes advantage and dips inside. His touch slides through my wet sex and my body jerks. Every nerve ending goes haywire. He nudges my panties down with his other hand, leaving me completely bare for him. “Back to the bed.”
I’m awkward and in too much of a hurry, but I’m not embarrassed. I need him.
Jett follows me down on the bed. He’s still completely dressed and not offering me any space. Once my head hits the pillow I slept on last night, he crawls over me and leans down to take my mouth.
When he kisses his way over to my ear and down my neck, I don’t know what to do or say, so the first words that go through my mind pop out of my mouth. “I feel like it’s unfair that I’m the only one naked.”