Chapter 6
Chapter Six
H E WORSHIPPED HER FOR as long as he could. He held out, touching her, tasting her, kissing her, his hand parting her legs, finding the spot that drove her wild and brushing it until she cried his name right against his ear, her fingers clutching the back of his neck, hard, digging into him there, and then, right as he was about to thrust into her, thanking Christ almighty for Willow’s creation, she paused, and moved to stare down at him, her cheeks flushed and her eyes—there was no other word for it—frenzied.
“Francesco—,”
He froze, ice flooding his body as he realized she might be about to put a stop to this. Which was the smart thing to do, obviously. He should be the one doing it, but wild horses wouldn’t stop him, unless she asked.
“Protection,” she said. “I don’t have anything on me. Obviously.”
He stared at her as if she’d sprouted a second and third head. As though she’d started to recite the bible in pig Latin. Her voice seemed to be coming from a long way away.
Shock did that to a person, he supposed.
Because he was shocked he could possibly have forgotten such a fundamental basic of sex.
“Tell me you have something,” she groaned, dropping her head forward and pressing it against his, which had the dangerous side effect of bringing her sex very, very close to his rock hard cock.
“Yes,” he bit out, thanking everything he could for always being prepared. “I have something.”
If he had any doubt about how much she wanted this, her moan of relief would have overcome them. Keeping her pressed low to his body, partly because he didn’t want her to hit her head on the roof of the car and partly because he craved that connection, he reached into the glove compartment and removed his wallet, flicking it open with one hand to retrieve a condom. He opened it with his teeth and then reached between them, his hands brushing her sex as he unfurled it over his length. The restriction was an almost unbearable form of pleasure and pain, a promise of what was to come that made him spill a little of himself.
“ Cristo , cara ,” he ground out. “I want you.”
“I know,” she whispered, and then she brought herself down, so his tip was notched at her entrance, and just stayed there, staring at him, both of them recognizing the fact they were on a precipice, and about to barrel right over the edge of it. “It’s mutual,” she promised.
He swore again, but this time, his fingers dug into her hips, holding her tight, steady and dragging her lower, lower, down over his hard length, his eyes latched to hers the whole time, watching her, daring her, studying her, needing to see her as well as feel her.
She closed her eyes though, so he dug his fingers in a little harder, in warning. “No closing your eyes. Watch what you do to me.”
She blinked quickly, staring at him, dragging her lower lip between her teeth, and then he thrust, all the way into her, balls-deep, so her muscles spasmed and tightened around him, and he had to grind his teeth to stop from exploding then and there, because she felt so goddamned great and he had been wanting this for a long time.
He just hadn’t realized how bad.
“Watch what you do to me,” he said again, thrusting into her as he held her hips, pulling her down, filling every inch of her, so intimately, so close. Her face grew pinker and sweat beaded on her brow, and her eyes fluttered shut every now and again, when she got carried away, and then she’d remember and look at him, just as he’d said.
Her hair fell over one shoulder, and he moved a hand from her hip to the long, loose coil of raven dark hair, curling his hand in it and forming a fist at her nape, dragging her mouth to his then and kissing her long and hard, deep and demanding, his tongue lashing hers, his mouth owning her mouth, as his body commanded hers, pleasured hers.
He felt her orgasm building, felt the panicked way her body shuddered, the way she trembled against him, and she went to pull away from his kiss, to process the feeling, but he wouldn’t let her. He wanted to taste her pleasure, to feel her screams, so he kissed her through it, as she fell apart at the seams, a trembling mess of want and need, of desire and pleasure. Her muscles squeezed him like a vice, so he had to stop moving just to hold back from his own explosive release.
But then, her breath was slowing, and she was kissing him back hungrily, desperately, dragging her mouth to his neck and nipping him with her teeth. “Too many clothes,” she muttered, when she encountered his shirt collar.
“Next time, we’ll choose a better venue for this.”
She stilled, and he realized the whole idea of ‘next time’ might have seemed presumptuous, but no. He wouldn’t even entertain that. When sex was this good, it didn’t happen just once. It was practically an imperative to continue exploring this. To feel each other again and again, to give into this pleasure over and over, to take this gift, to relish in it. To master one another’s bodies in each and every way they could think of. Suddenly, the idea of that took hold, and he imagined all of the ways in which he might pleasure Willow. That she might pleasure him.
He imagined her tied up against his bed, her hands above her head, her body his to command and devour. He imagined going down on her until she begged him to stop because the pleasure was too much to handle, and then he imagined bringing his body over hers and driving into her, slowly at first, teasing her, and then hard and fast, all at once. He imagined her on her knees, taking him in her mouth, big, beautiful eyes latched to his. He imagined her bent at the waist, with him behind, hands on her breasts, cock disappearing inside her beautiful body, driving into her until she shook all over.
“Fuck,” he pushed up so he could kiss her neck, moving to the sensitive flesh just beneath her earlobe and sucking there until she was a whimpering mess, bringing a hand around to her bottom and splaying his fingers against her ass, digging into her flesh, then moving towards the separation, holding her there, while his cock thrust into her and stayed deep, buried, devoured by her.
“Francesco,” she said his name in a way he’d never heard before. Like it was a curse and a blessing, like it was her last word. “Yes, please, Francesco. God, yes.” The words kept tumbling out of her, like an incantation, words that expanded inside his chest, making him want nothing more than to do this for every minute of the rest of his life. There was no greater feat, no accomplishment he valued more than driving her to this fever pitch, and he didn’t stop to wonder why, he just knew that it was how he felt, and he gave zero fucks about it.
This time, though, as he watched her face flush and contort and pleasure rippled through her, he couldn’t control his own reactions. He cursed under his breath, pulled her hips down against him, and rode that wave with her, every agonizing cry she made, he felt in his soul, because his body was coming apart with the force of his desire, his need, and then, his satiation.
He made a low, guttural sound, from deep in his throat, and then kissed her, to muffle their cries, kissed her as his body took over completely, pumping into her, as he spilled everything he had into the moment then collapsed back against the seat and let out, of all things, a laugh.
She felt like she was waking from a dream. Or a daydream. Or a fantasy. She felt jet lagged and confused. But as she pushed up onto her elbows and glanced around them, she was met with the familiar and the foreign. The hedgerows she knew as well as the back of her hands, because she’d run along them so many times as a girl and then a teen. The grey afternoon sky and gently lashing rain. Francesco’s car, with its leather interior and luxury fittings.
Francesco.
Her friend .
Her…what the hell had just happened?
Like a mirror that had been fragmented into a thousand pieces, memories of what they’d just done seemed to fall apart then come back together, creating a strange distortion. Or rather, a recollection, that made very little sense. Because he was her friend. And this was…a complication neither of them would want.
But he was grinning that sexy AF grin of his, looking up at her, as if he had zero problem with this whatsoever, and she didn’t know if that was reassuring or annoying.
He lifted a hand then, cupping her cheek, before moving a finger to her lips. “Don’t look like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you’ve just robbed a school bus.”
She pulled a face.
“Don’t look like you’ve just made a mistake,” he said, more seriously, eyes scanning hers. “There’s nothing wrong with what just happened.”
“You’re my friend, Francesco. My friend. ”
“Yes, I am.”
“But this is,” she gestured from her chest to his, shaking her head. “I mean…it’s…”
“It’s sex,” he said, simply, eyes boring into hers.
“Right, sex.” She tried to put that spin on it. “Just sex.”
“Yes.”
“Because you know how I feel about Tom,” she said, moving her hand to his shoulder and pressing it there.
Francesco’s expression didn’t change but his eyes narrowed slightly. “Yes, but I’d prefer not to discuss that while I’m still inside you.”
Heat flushed her body. “I just meant…”
“Willow, how well do you know me?”
She rolled her eyes. “Do you even need to ask?”
“Do you think I’m going to be making wedding plans around the fact we just had sex—albeit mind-blowingly good sex—in my car?”
She almost laughed at the idea of Francesco doing any such thing.
“No,” she admitted, a small smile tugging at the corner of her lips.
“Good. So don’t overthink this. It’s not a big deal.” Then, he caught her face in both his hands and pulled her towards him. “But don’t even think about saying it won’t happen again.”
“But we’re—,” Was all she managed to say, before he was kissing her, in that insanely possessive, demanding way he had, his tongue thrusting into her mouth, taking over her breathing, her senses, making her see unicorns and rainbows and everything that was holy. Making her body tremble and weaken, crushing against his. His hand came between her legs, finding the spot he’d conquered before and rubbing her there, not gently, but hard, in time with his kiss, so her already over-sensitive nerves went into a spasm, and she was falling apart all over again.
“Francesco,” she groaned into his mouth, but he was kissing her still, swallowing the words, and she was on some kind of cloud nine thousand, floating above them, floating above anything but this.
It was Francesco who broke the kiss, so he could look at her as he said, “I plan on making you come a lot this weekend, so get used to it.”
Her eyes widened. Her heart raced. Her stomach squeezed and swooshed, and butterflies seemed to explode in her belly.
“But—,”
“No buts. This is just sex. It means nothing, cara. It changes nothing. At the end of the weekend, we’ll walk away and go back to our normal lives, our normal friendship.”
“Because I have Tom, and you have whatever woman you click your fingers at,” she said, wondering why she couldn’t even conjure a mental image of Tom in that moment.
“Precisely.”
“Okay,” she said, as he began to move his fingers again, faster, and she was arching her back, riding the wave of pleasure, not caring that she might as well have just made a deal with the devil.
* * *
Not with a single flicker of his expression, with a minute shift of his features, did he allow even a hint of doubts to show outwardly. It was imperative that she—that they both— believe and accept what he’d said in the car.
They were friends. Friends who’d now slept together. Who knew the way each one felt in the most intimate of ways. Friends who had to go back to being friends when this was over, despite what they’d just done.
He felt the tsunami of Willow’s concerns and refused to amplify them with his own. He refused to feel anything other than bliss.
Sex was sex.
They were both mature enough to understand that. Experienced enough to be able to separate what came down to their bodies’ biological urges from their longstanding knowledge of one another on a personal level.
When the weekend was over, and they went back to London, and their lives, this would all fade into nothingness. Irrelevancy. Forgotten. Or, if not forgotten, accepted as a part of the past, that had no bearing on their future.
He couldn’t regret it.
Not when he remembered the ecstasy that had shown on her face. The way she’d surrendered to the sheer pleasure of what they were doing. Not when he allowed himself to consider the way her family treated her, and the doubts and insecurities he’d seen her wade through. He’d been able to give her something that had overridden all of that. Something that had pushed those negative thoughts from her mind.
And he’d do it as many times as he could this weekend, if it meant she didn’t frown quite so much.
It was a conviction that stayed with him as they returned to the mansion, and Willow stepped out of the car, once more elegance personified, her clothes and hair all perfectly in place, with no hint of how she’d just been ravaged, crammed up against the steering wheel of his car.
A conviction that strengthened when they walked, side by side, and silently, into the corridor, only to be greeted almost immediately by Meredith, who took one look at Willow and paled perceptibly. “I thought you were getting your hair done.”
“No,” Willow countered, calmly. “I was showing Francesco the town.” Only to Francesco was the faintest hint of pink, flushing over her cheeks detectable. “I’m going to do my hair now.”
“Guests will start arriving within the hour,” Meredith croaked, glancing at an ancient clock in the hallway. “You’re nowhere near ready.”
“I’ll be ready,” Willow assured her stepmother, but Francesco was already imagining dropping to his knees and kissing her sex until she was delirious with pleasure, too distracted by her body’s euphoria to do anything other than whimper his name. He imagined her with her hair all messed up and her clothes in disarray, and had to bite back a laugh when he let himself contemplate how Meredith might react to that.
Meredith’s demeanor shifted noticeably as she turned to Francesco. “Did you enjoy the town?”
“Yes. I’m looking forward to exploring it some more,” he said, reaching down and squeezing Willow’s hand, so she could be in no doubt as to what he was referring to. Her flush darkened. Power surged through his body, an ancient, masculine pleasure driven by his ability to pleasure and torment this woman.
“Well, you’re always welcome to come and stay with us, any time,” Meredith said, distracted now, by something behind them. “Oh, by the by, I have wonderful news. Your aunt and uncle were able to change plans, after all. They’ll be here later this evening.”
Francesco processed the words without a hint of outward emotion. “My uncle and aunt?”
Meredith’s smile was tight. “Isn’t it wonderful? They’re flying across, just for tonight. They were delighted when I told them you and Willow were here already.”
“You told them that?” Willow asked, her voice high-pitched, revealing a streak of panic at Meredith’s throw away revelation.
But it was the wrong thing to say to this woman. “Of course I did,” she snapped, drawing her gaze back to Willow and looking at her with something approaching contempt. “They are like parents to Francesco. Why shouldn’t I have mentioned him to them?”
Willow gaped visibly. “We—hadn’t?—,”
“No reason, whatsoever,” Francesco said, squeezing her hand again. “We will go and get ready.” He recognized a need to remove Willow before she imploded. “See you soon.”
“Please make sure her hair?—,”
He whisked Willow away before Meredith could finish the sentence.