Chapter 4 #2
Carved by moonlight, eyes black as night, Ax has never looked more dangerous… or more devastating. Like he’s one breath away from taking me apart. And God help me, I’d let him.
Because my body isn’t just thrumming with possibility over a baby; it’s thrumming with him, with a fire I shouldn’t even be standing this close to.
‘Yes.’
The entire world tilts on that one word.
Yes.
It’s not soft. Not tender. Not protective – and I know protective. It’s how he looked at me from the very first day we met.
But this… this is possessive.
Axel. Possessive. Over me?
‘What about the caterer? You said…’
My tease trails off, my throat closing around it. Christmas. Theo’s proposal. Our stupid camaraderie. Camaraderie, for fuck’s sake. Because we’re friends. We’re not— not—
‘Turns out she wasn’t my type.’
‘And suddenly, I am?’ I try to laugh it out, but it cuts short when his eyes sweep over me, ever darker, jaw flexing as he refuses to answer. ‘This is a joke, right? Some twisted push to make me rethink the whole thing: the baby, being a mum—’
My rambling quits when he plucks a strand of hair from my lip, the shake of his head so subtle, I might have imagined it. But there’s no imagining the continued heat in his eyes.
‘We’re friends, best friends,’ I say too fast, too breathy. ‘You really wanna risk all that—?’
‘No.’
‘No?’ I choke.
‘There is no risk. You and Theo are family. My family. Nothing changes that.’
‘Sex changes everything.’
‘Does it? How many lovers are you still friends with?’
‘Plenty. But it’s not me I’m worried about.’
Not entirely true.
I’m worried about us.
Because he doesn’t keep lovers long enough to make friends, so what happens if we… and he…?
I shake the spiral out of my head.
‘And you don’t need to worry about me,’ he says, his voice too low. ‘You want my baby, and I want you in my bed. Our friendship stays intact.’
I want you in my bed…
I can’t believe what I’m hearing. As for our friendship…
‘You say that now.’
‘And I’ll keep saying it.’
‘You can’t be sure.’
‘I’ve never been more sure.’
A slow, heavy thud beats behind my ribs, between my legs…
I should be running – protecting what we are, what we’ve built. It’s safe. It’s known. But this… My God, can we really do this?
‘Clock’s ticking, Tay.’
More than he knows. Literally. Biologically.
But Axel and Theo are the only men I’ve ever depended on.
Is a baby worth risking half of that?
No risk, he says.
But do I believe him?
I want to. He’s never led me wrong. But…
I wet my lips, lift my chin, and ask the question still burning a hole right through me: ‘You want me?’
‘I don’t just want you,’ he growls, leaning close enough to catch my breath in his. ‘I want you every which way I can have you.’
His heat presses in, my nipples tightening against the silk.
‘You hear me, Tay?’ He slips past my cheek, his breath feathering my ear and a shiver bolts to my toes. ‘You agree, and you’re mine. For as long as it takes.’
Holy fuck.
He’s staking his claim.
And no one owns me.
Not ever.
But my feet stay rooted, everything about him and this moment sinking its claws in.
‘You think you can be a good girl, Stone? Obey my every command?’
I shudder at the promise of it.
Not love. Not romance. Not forever.
Just this.
This heat.
This hunger.
This reckless promise that if I give him my body, he’ll wreck it beautifully.
‘You want that?’ I say, more helpless than ever.
‘You want a baby?’ His voice is like velvet, still teasing against my ear.
‘Yes…’
He eases back, his mouth inching closer, and my own parts, ready, willing, waiting…
What will he taste like?
How will he kiss?
How will it feel to have him buried deep inside me?
And his eyes catch all of it…
The breath I’m holding.
The thighs I’m pressing together.
The way I’m already halfway gone.
‘I want this,’ I whisper, realising he needs to hear it as much as I need to admit it.
He stills, eyes burning into mine, one beat, two…
So close, but not close enough.
My glass slips from my hand… He’s taken it from me, set it on the small table. His own discarded beside it. His eyes never once stray. His breaths saw through his nose in fierce, predatory pulls. He swallows up the space between us, heat and muscle towering over me.
‘You know I don’t do gentle, Tay.’
He grips my hip, thrusting me flush against his body, and fire licks across my skin.
‘I’m incapable of soft.’
His other hand slides into my hair, fighting against the pins as he takes hold, tugging hard enough to make me gasp. My eyes water while my body pleads for more.
‘I’ll take what I want. How I want.’
His eyes pierce me, and I lick my lips, finding my voice above the flames.
‘You think I want soft?’ I say, proud of how steady I sound. ‘You think I need gentle? This is me, Ax. When have I ever been either of those things?’
His mouth curves – not a smile. Something hotter. More lethal.
‘You’ll learn.’
Some semblance of self-preservation kicks in as my brows pinch together. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘If you agree to this, you agree to my rules, and you bend for me.’ His thumb strokes me through the silk, tiny little currents shooting off in every direction as I struggle to focus on his words. ‘And I’ll take all of you, Tay. And I mean… all of you.’
All? No.
My heart’s as locked down as his. No one’s getting that. But the rest?
God, yes.
‘Then do it already.’
His eyes flash, his grip tightens, his whole body thrums—
But he doesn’t move.
So I do.
I rise onto my toes, lashes fluttering closed, my lips parting for his heat, his breath, his—
He jerks me back by the hair.
My scalp screams, my core clenches, a gasp tears free. ‘What?’
‘Not that,’ he bites out. ‘Hard limit, Stone.’
I blink, and I see it.
The line.
The intimacy he won’t cross.
The one I should’ve known he’d draw.
In my escort days, kissing was as off-limits as sex itself. A peck to the cheek: that was the line.
And now…
Kissing means real intimacy.
Kissing makes it real. Full stop.
He knows it. And I should’ve known it too. Rookie mistake.
But…
‘You were the one who said you wanted all of me…’ I swallow over the heated recollection. ‘Every which way.’
His laugh is low, dark, almost sinister.
‘I wasn’t talking about your mouth.’
And Jesus Christ, my knees nearly give out, liquid heat flooding into my lace.
‘Changing your mind, Stone?’
I shake my head, and his jaw tics.
‘Then get inside.’
He releases me, and I flounder, the spell shattering the second he steps away.
‘Move, Stone. Unless you want me to take you right here, where any late-night wanderer can see. Because I’m game if you are…’
His fingers lift to the buttons of his shirt, working each one open with maddening calm. Like we’re not about to change everything between us. Like it’s not monumental in every way. But I asked for it. I started it.
Not this, though. Not sex.
I asked for a baby. Not to break rank.
He pauses on the last button, the exposed strip of his chest – all that ink and cut muscle, bronzed against white cotton – drawing my gaze down like gravity.
‘I’m clean,’ he says, and my eyes snap back to his, ‘if that’s what you need clarifying.’
Fuck. ‘No. No, it’s not that. I am too. It’s— I—’
‘Then?’
I nip my lip, hating that I’m on edge. That I can’t just claim this moment like I would any other man or woman I’ve slept with. But he’s not another notch on the bedpost. He’s Axel. Fucking Axel. And I need more time. Space to think without him in it. I need…
‘I don’t even know if I’m fertile right now.’
His mouth quirks, a rare dimple denting his cheek now the beard’s gone.
‘You think I give a shit about fertility? That’s your side of the deal, not mine. You want a baby. I get you any time I want you. And I want you, right here, right now.’
My heart short-circuits. My brain, too.
I don’t recognise him like this – not with me. Hard. Demanding. Brutal, even.
But my body loves it, the throbbing ache low in my belly intensifying with his every play.
‘What is it they say, Tay?’ He drags his teeth over his bottom lip, and damn if I don’t quiver. ‘Practice makes perfect. And I plan on getting plenty. Now get inside. Or leave. No harm, no foul. Your choice.’
I move before he can doubt me again. Move before I doubt myself.
I make it as far as his bed and freeze.
Fuck. We’re really going to do this. Me and Axel. Axel and me.
The cool, conditioned air kisses my sensitised skin as I spin towards the balcony. He steps through the breeze-filled drapes, drinks in hand, eyes flicking from me to the door; was he really expecting me to bolt?
Hell, no.
I curl my trembling fingers into my palms, lift my chin, make him think I know exactly what I’m doing when every nerve screams otherwise.
He sets our drinks on the small, round table in the corner, nudges the wingback chair beside it with a swift kick so it’s facing me – like I’m the entertainment instead of the Tuscan coast. Then he strips his shirt with his back to me.
Tanned muscles bunch. Wild strokes of ink flex. And my mouth parts, my pulse hammers.
Who’s the real entertainment here?
I’ve seen him shirtless before – post-workout, sweat-slick, half-dressed – but now, like this… knowing what’s coming, knowing what he wants…
It’s like seeing him for the first time.
And it doesn’t feel real.
It’s like a wicked, salacious, utterly debauched dream that I could wake from at any second – and one I want to drown in forever.
‘Axel?’
I don’t even know what I’m asking.
Just that I need his gaze. Need to know he’s sure.
Need to know that after this – baby or no baby – we’ll still be us.
He tosses his shirt aside and lifts his drink, taking a slow swig as he turns. And he’s no longer my best friend with a body carved by discipline.
He’s a man carved by sin – for sin.
All muscle and strength and power…
Built to dominate.
I drink him in: eyes too dark to read, mouth set firm, broad shoulders, tight pecs, abs I want under my nails, ink I want to trace like a map, until I reach the hard V disappearing into his low-slung jeans, and the—
I suck in a breath.
The bulge straining against denim kills any remaining doubt: he wants this.
And God, do I want him back. My body pulses – aching, needing – my thighs already slick. And he hasn’t even kissed me. Refuses to.
‘Show me how you like to be touched, Baby Girl.’
My heart flips out, eyes shooting to his; you what now?
I don’t know what hits harder: the pet name or the command. Jesus Christ – both!
‘Remember the deal.’ He has the nerve to smirk. ‘What I want. When I want. How I want.’
He can’t be serious. I’m not shy in the bedroom – far from it – but this is different. This is Axel. My best fucking friend. He’s known me forever.
And he wants me to do it with him half a mile away.
‘Show me.’
It’s not a request. It’s a command.
He lowers himself into the chair. Legs spread. Inked forearms braced on his thighs. A glass of rum cradled between them like he’s got all the time in the world for this. For me.
‘Not shy, are you, Baby Girl?’
Baby Girl.
It pinches right behind my ribs.
‘Don’t call me that.’
‘Why?’
Because it makes me feel vulnerable, open… his, in ways I don’t want to look at too closely. I’ve never been anyone’s baby anything. Not even my father’s.
‘Stone?’
But if that’s what it takes to play this out on his terms…
‘Doesn’t matter.’
His eyes narrow like he’s about to push, but instead, he settles back, fingers grazing over stubble, eyes raking over me.
Like a slow drag of heat, he takes in my parted mouth, my breasts that shift with every stilted breath, the hem of my dress as my thighs press together, my toes as they curl into the wood…
‘Show me,’ he says again, quieter, heavier. ‘Burn for me.’
And as though I’m under his hypnotic spell, I move. My hands glide over silk, one dipping low between my legs, the other drifting up towards my breasts. I lightly tease every pulsating point, until I catch one pleading bud and squeeze.
‘F-fuck…’ It shivers out of me and shoots straight through him. I’d smile if I wasn’t so lost in sensation, pinching harder, sinking deeper – Christ, I’m soaked. My arousal seeps through the layers, coating my fingers and the silk. I know it’ll stain, but I’m too far gone to care.
He makes a sound – curse, groan, strangled breath, I can’t tell. He’s still as stone, but his eyes… his eyes are fire.
Me, burn?
You’re the one who’s going to burn, Ax.
I slow it down…
He wants a show.
I’ll give him a show.
One he’ll never forget.
I curl my fingers into the tiny straps of my dress, revelling in the flash of white across his knuckles, the tension pulsing through his god-like body. He wants to look relaxed and in control, but every hard ridge tells me the truth.
Who really has the power here?
I ease the straps over my shoulders, silk sliding south, and the man quivers, a full-body shudder he tries and fails to swallow, his sharp inhalation the sweetest tell.
I’m doing this to him.
Axel, who worships control above all else.
His control, his dominance, his way or the highway…
And he’s going to break.
He’s going to break for me.