Chapter 12
ISEULT
Why couldn’t I kill him?
I’ve never once hesitated ending someone’s life. So why did I stop myself from ending his miserable life, and why the hell am I still on the floor, kissing him as though it’s the only thing I ever want to do?
My hips rock against him, his erection pressing up deliciously into me, causing my body to ache with desperate madness.
His dick was definitely an eyesore. Who needs a dick that big? And why do I very much want to find out if he actually knows how to use it?
He flips me over, thrusting his hips in slow, tantalizing circles.
“Tell me to stop,” he rasps, lips coasting up my throat, and I have magically lost my voice.
The only sounds I seem to manage are the little moans I’ve never given another man before. Because none of them have done to my body what he already has.
The men before were just a quick fuck. No foreplay. No nothing. I was bored every single time.
But this? It’s like an escape. A feeling most akin to flying and never wanting to fall.
He groans when he doesn’t hear my refusal, shoving the dress up my body until it hits my hips. He doesn’t attempt to take it off. By now he knows I’d kill him if he tried.
His mouth lowers to mine, kissing me with such raw passion and savagery, I almost forget I’m supposed to hate him.
I’ve never been this reckless. Usually, I’ll meet a man, then plan to meet him another day after running a background check. Then once we fuck, I never call him again.
But with this man, I don’t even have a name. Yet I’m on the floor, letting him touch me like he paid for me.
I freeze, holding a breath in my chest when his mouth falls to my breast, kissing it through the thick material.
It’s fine. He’s not going to take off the dress.
My pulse quickens, and I close my eyes to steady my nerves.
I want to feel his bare skin on mine, his mouth everywhere, but I can’t.
I concentrate on his fingers as they journey up my inner thigh, slipping into my warmth as he works my clit between two fingers. My body contorts on a gasp, the unquenched desire blazing through my body with such intensity that tingles spread across my limbs.
He rubs me faster, propping on an elbow as he watches me intensely, and my stomach roils, hating the way he’s staring at me, but craving it all at once.
“I’ve been dreaming of touching you like this,” he groans. “Gonna have this pussy wrapped around my cock, begging me to come.”
“Fuck,” I gasp when he curls his fingers and deepens his strokes.
My hand grasps a chunk of his hair while he continues his maddening tempo.
Men don’t usually take such command of my body. I’m normally dictating their moves and rolling my eyes when they can’t seem to listen. But this man doesn’t need instructions. He’s got my manual all figured out.
“Don’t stop,” I pant, tugging his hair harder, the release edging closer…until with a flick of his finger, I let out a scream. Loud and unashamed.
My teeth sink into his shoulder, and I swear I’m going to leave a mark. But he doesn’t so much as flinch. Instead, he growls madly, as though enjoying it.
“That’s it, bambina. Let me hear you. Let me hear what I do to you.” He continues touching me, the waves of my release ebbing and flowing through me in rhythmic waves of unbending pleasure.
And before I realize what’s happening, I’m lifted in the air and thrown on the bed, his body behind mine and my vibrator in his grip. He forces my legs apart, his hot breath against my ear.
“What are you…”
But the words instantly die in my throat, replaced by a cry when he cups my pussy with my toy and flips on the tongue. It flicks around my already sensitive clit, making my body shudder, my voice lost to the desperate cries.
“I—I can’t,” I gasp, unable to imagine having another orgasm.
He fists my hair, tilting my head to the side so I can look at him. “You’re gonna come over and over until I tell you to stop. And right now, you don’t have my permission.”
He spins the toy over to the opposite side, and the vibrations from the wand make me scream and curse, my limbs shaking with unbearable intensity.
Then I’m flying again, soaring and begging for him not to stop.
And he doesn’t. He increases the intensity, and before I know it, the need for release latches on to me until I cry for it desperately.
“You’re gonna make me come so hard…”
He grunts, thrusting the vibrator inside me so deep, my fingers tremble and the sounds coming out of my mouth don’t resemble me at all.
Before I know it, I’m falling once more, warmth sluicing up my body, tightening through my muscles, and never wanting this feeling to end.
He doesn’t halt the sweet torture, lowering the setting to a dull hum over my aching clit, giving my body only a momentary stay until the tempo jumps between high and low, taking me to the edge once again, only to pull me back from it.
Everything inside me coils. My body trembles, the sounds I make too embarrassing to even think about, but it hits me again—the slam of my release—so hard I feel tears swell in the corner of my eyes.
In a flash, his hands are on my hips and he’s flipping me on top of him until I’m straddling his muscular thighs.
He gazes up with those unspeakable emotions, and his palms hold my face within them, his thumbs tracing my jaw.
“Who hurt you, Red?” he asks with a whispered demand, staring at me with determination.
My heart tightens.
And I almost do. I almost tell him. Almost want to.
But I don’t.
“No one,” I lie, but my voice betrays me.
He gives me a sympathetic smile. “I’m gonna get you to trust me one day, and when that day comes, you will tell me. And if he’s still alive, I’ll make sure he dies slowly.”
I inhale a rapid gasp, emotions clogging my throat.
My heart stills in my chest, unable to beat, to do much of anything.
And as I stare down at him, it’s like he’s begging me to climb up with him to the edge of the tallest mountain and not be afraid to fall.
But falling with the wrong person is the most terrifying of all.
My brows squeeze, and I harden my expression. “I don’t need anyone fighting my battles, least of all a stranger I don’t even know.”
He concentrates his eyes on me, his palm on the back of my head, lowering my forehead until it’s touching his. “You’re so stubborn.”
“That’s what they tell me,” I breathe.
“That’s okay, baby. I like a challenge.”
Then he’s kissing me, ever so slowly, and I’m drunk on the high of these emotions he brings out.
And while every thought inside my head tells me to end this, my heart?
It can’t seem to. So instead of leaving, I cling to his shoulders and let him kiss me until he retrieves a condom from my nightstand.
Until his body falls on top of mine. Until he rolls the latex over his thickness, pressing his cock against my bare core. Until I feel myself climbing again.
And with his mouth returning to mine, he slowly slips inside me, inch by tantalizing inch, refusing to look anywhere but into my eyes.
And I swear my heart… I never knew how good it could feel, to sleep with someone you have a connection with. It’s madness and chaos and pure utter bliss.
I kiss him roughly, his tongue snaking with mine, his hands in my hair as he drives deeper with every stroke, as though he’s trying to reach all the way inside and make me remember him forever.
And though I may remember him forever, I can’t let him stay.
“Widen those thighs for me, Red,” he groans.
When I do, he lifts up one of my legs and drapes it over his shoulder, rising on his knees, fucking me so hard my head hits the headboard.
My eyes close of their own volition, the intensity too much for me to bear.
“Look at me,” his voice rumbles.
And I do. I can’t seem to fight his forceful tone, not with what I’m feeling in every nerve ending.
His eyes fall to the place where our bodies meet and he mutters a curse, his gaze rising back to my eyes, and the faster he pounds into me, the more I beg.
And with his eyes latched on to mine, I fall, knowing it’ll be the last time I do.
This will never happen again.
It can’t.
He will never have me.
GIO
She’s snuggled up against me, and I’m afraid to move even an inch, because if I do, she may realize I’m actually holding her. When a woman like this lets you hold her, you don’t do a thing to ruin it. Because my Red, she could bolt at any moment.
I get that more than anyone. Relationships have never been something I wanted.
I never did commitment. I had casual flings, and that was always the extent of it.
I never had a reason to stay, to grab on to something.
But with her, like this…I want to hold on.
I want to latch on to something meaningful. Someone meaningful.
“How long have you lived here?” I ask.
“For a few years.” Her fingers stroke my abdomen, and I close my eyes, reveling in the sensation of her hands on me.
“Where were you before?”
She chuckles. “I see what you’re trying to do, and it won’t work.” She glances up, her eyes bright like two rare jewels. “You may have fucked me better than anyone has, but—”
“Whoa.” I jerk back with a grin, and an uncomfortable expression settles on her features, as though she’s just realized what she said. “Did you just admit I’m the best you ever had?”
“Uh, no.” She grimaces, tightening her mouth to stop from grinning, a finger scratching her temple. “You must be hard of hearing.”
“Mm-hmm.” You couldn’t erase that grin off my face if you tried. “The ice queen admitted I was the best fuck she ever had. I’m gonna get that tattooed on my chest.”
“You’re so annoying.” She rolls her eyes.
With a laugh, I grab her jaw and drag her in for a long kiss, and the woman melts right into me, languidly rolling her tongue with mine, lazily groaning. When I draw away, she’s utterly breathless and beautiful.
“Fine, Red. We can do this your way, but eventually you’ll like me.”
“I don’t like anyone.” She cocks a brow.
“You don’t say?”
She plops her head back down onto my chest and sighs, almost under her breath. Without thinking, I lift up and kiss her on her forehead.
“What was that for?” she asks, peering up with softness bathing the tranquil ocean of her eyes.
“I have no idea.” I brush the hair off her face with the pads of my fingers, and she lays a palm against my frantically beating heart.
“We should do dinner,” I tell her.
“Was that you asking me out?” There’s a smile etched in her voice, shining through her eyes.
“What if I am?”
“I’m not really a ‘take me to dinner’ kind of woman.”
“Maybe you just haven’t met someone worth asking you.”
Her gaze widens before giving me a faraway look, staring to her right. “Doubt you’re the one.”
With two fingers, I tilt her chin and center her focus on me. “How would you know if you’re always too busy pushing me away before I even get the privilege to know you?” I sweep her lower lip with my thumb, watching as her breaths grow ragged with every second. “So, dinner? Tomorrow?”
“I work tomorrow.” I swear she wants to say yes, she just needs a reason.
“So take off.”
She snickers. “It’s not that kind of work.”
“Who do you work for?”
She shakes her head, giving me a tiny smile. “You never give up, do you?”
“Finally, you’re starting to realize that.”
She props her chin on her palm and gives me a defeated look. “You’re insane.”
“All true.” I wink. “I’ll be picking you up at seven tomorrow, and I expect you to be fully dressed by then.”
“Is that so?” She lays her cheek back down against my chest and sighs like she’s content to be right here with me.
My chest swells with possessiveness for a woman whose name I don’t yet know. As we lie there for silent minutes, my fingers massage her scalp while her breathing falls to a steady pattern.
“You have to go,” she tells me as she yawns. “You can’t sleep here.”
“Why not?”
She peers up. “I don’t let anyone sleep over. It’s a rule.”
“A rule, huh?” I continue to massage her. “What other rules do you have, Red?”
Why the hell does she seem so adamant about our sleepover? And how can I get her to change her mind?
“None of your business.”
“Can I stay for a few more minutes?”
“Just a few more minutes. But then you really have to go.” She groans, pressing her cheek back against my chest like she’s made it her home.
My heart warms.
By the sound of it, she’s about to pass out at any moment.
But I’m not about to tell her that.