Chapter 38
Mariyah
T he door handle slipped from Shehryar’s fingers, snapping back into place with a loud clang. He swore and I chuckled, but our lips stayed interlocked as he dragged us through the threshold of his bedroom, desperation and desire keeping us close and frantic.
I slammed the door shut; his fingers found the lock. He urged me back against the wood, and we worked in a frenzied sync, ripping and pulling at his clothes as we kissed and kissed and kissed.
The tie and jacket thrown over his arm fell to the floor first, followed by my heels and the two gift bags. He kicked his shoes off. I yanked at his open waistcoat, growling in frustration as it got caught on his massive shoulders. He grinned against my lips and helped me tug it off.
Buttons were flicked open. I greedily caressed my hands all over the naked warmth of his muscled torso, relishing the little hairs that tickled my skin. The sound of fabric sailing through the air harmonised with our panting and grunting. And then it was all hands on the buckle of his belt.
The moment he tore the leather from the loops of his trousers, I arched off the door and reached behind me to undo the straps at my back.
“No,” Shehryar growled against my lips before swaying away entirely. “Let me.”
Gosh, he was gorgeous. Stupidly, stunningly, wildly so. Hair mussed by my hands, shoulders slumped with lazy confidence. Cheeks pink, pupils blown, his stare so glazed and predatory.
I did that to him. And the feminine power of it went straight to my head.
I cocked my chin, playing the lazy, smug seductress. “Say please.”
He tipped his mouth into a riled smirk and crowded closer. “If you want me to say please , menace, then you behave and take your punishment like a good little girl first.”
“Punishment?”
His grin widened, but the smoky, black heat that filtered through his stare made my pulse spike. Before I had time to think, Shehryar tore away and propelled me around with a firm grasp. He clamped his hand around my nape and shoved my cheek against the hard wood of the door.
I gasped, bracing my palms on either side of my head. “Shehryar.”
He was behind me in an instant. Mouth against my cheek, pelvis to my hips.
He ground the massive bulge of his erection into my arse. He was so fucking hard already.
I wasn’t sure if I moaned because he was breathing shallow rasps by my ear or because the anticipation of feeling him inside me was wrecking my mind. Both.
“I haven’t forgotten nor forgiven the way you let Candy touch you,” he rumbled, rolling his hips in slow circles. He dragged his mouth down my cheek and past my jaw. My lashes collapsed as I tipped my head, giving him all the access he wanted to my neck. He swirled his tongue against my pulse, the hairs of his beard taunting my sensitive skin, and the flashes that unleashed in my core had me whimpering. “I’m still pissed off about it, and you’re still too smug about it.”
It was so hard to concentrate on what he was saying when he was strumming the vibrating nerves down my neck with his mouth, so my reply came delayed. “Can’t let it go, can you?”
“Of course not.” His hand on my nape forced my head further to the side as he slid the back of his other fingers up my bare spine. “Nobody touches what’s mine.”
Unable to express my discontent against his skin, I curled my fingers into the door. “I’m not a fucking object, Sheri.”
“No,” he whispered, and I swore he sniffed my neck. My breath hitched and my knees shook. In one slow tug, the straps at my back loosened. “But you’re Daddy’s little sex toy, aren’t you?”
“No,” I breathed out. But it was bullshit.
I was. His . His little menace. His wanton, bratty toy. Eager and aching and wet and willing and needy like it was mating season and I’d walked miles to find him.
But he was mine too. My dickhead. My Sheri. Mine to arouse and taunt and tease and pleasure. Mine to fight with, but only so he’d handle me in a way that made the chemicals in my brain react explosively. And I knew with certainty it did the same thing for him.
“Yes, you are.” He skimmed his hands over my shoulders, nudging the straps of my dress off. “You’re a precious little toy, so irritating, but so fucking beautiful too.”
I hadn’t been wearing a bra underneath, so when the neckline of my dress dipped forward, I was left naked from the top. I shivered as both his warped compliment and cool air swept over my tight nipples. And heck, they weren’t sensitive, but I almost begged him to touch them.
I dropped one of my hands, silently urging him to hurry up and take my dress off, but he didn’t change his pace. “Don’t rush me,” he murmured. I glared over my shoulder only to find him smirking in menacing delight. “Would you rather I tear the dress off?”
“No,” I ground out.
“Exactly.” A ferocious possessiveness dampened his amusement as he dragged the straps off my wrists. “Though I really want to. So much.” He eased back and skimmed his blunt nails down my sides, tracing my rib cage, my waist, and gently grazing my skin. “But I won’t.”
He kneeled. My gaze followed eagerly. He held the gathered fabric at my rounded hips as he said, “Because one day I’m going to fuck your throat while you wear it. Roughly .” I choked on a quick breath as a fervent yes, please echoed up my core. “So that every time you put it on, you’ll never remember who designed it, only how I made a stunning, dribbling mess of you in it.”
He teased it off my hips and it pooled with my underwear at my feet.
I stood naked, leaning my upper body against the door in fear of my knees giving out. Pulse thrumming. Cunt soaked, throbbing, and hollow. Wanting what he’d said beyond reason.
“Look at you,” he purred and kissed my derriere. He grasped my ankles in turn, drawing the dress away from my feet. “Shaking already.” Kiss . “How cute.” Kiss .
“I’m not fu—” He sunk his teeth into my flesh, and my words turned into a groan. “Fuck, Sheri.” I arched back, pressing my arse into his face. He moaned low and long as he licked over the mark, and I numbly heard the tug of a zip before he pulled back and—
Slap! I yelped as the harsh sting of his palm prickled across my other arse cheek. “You’re not shaking?” Slap . Again, right across his bite mark. “Are you sure?” Slap . Slap . “Really?” Slap !
“Shehryar,” I cried. Slap. Slap. Slap. “Daddy , please. ”
He moaned and squeezed my smarting skin hard. My eyes crossed under the bittersweet pain. He laid a trail of soft kisses up my spine, slowly rising to his feet the higher he got. His trousers grazed my sensitive backside as he pressed into me and kept pressing forward until the weight of him against my back forced me to hinge at the waist. I braced more of my weight on my palms against the door as he clasped my throat in one hand.
Through his open fly, with only the barrier of his boxers, his erection felt so hot, hard, and delicious. Everything seemed to drag our combined centre of gravity and pleasure point to where my arse cushioned his hard-on. It might’ve been embarrassing how my pussy reacted to the twist of pleasure on his face if I didn’t find him so irritatingly, impossibly beautiful.
I whimpered, pushing back. He sighed in reply, and little pecks landed all over my jaw and cheeks, so sweet and tender. But his words? They were anything but.
“You’re mine, Mariyah,” he rasped, his hips rocking, his mouth lingering over my ear. His other hand caressed down my naked body. “So, when you’re touched by another man…” His voice grew deeper, darker, his fingers pawing at my rounded hip. He grazed his teeth almost angrily across the spot under my ear. “Ask me what I wanted to do to you when he touched you.”
My mouth hung open as I panted, rocking faster, needing him to touch me where I was liquid and hot, but he spread his hand over my thigh and didn’t stray any closer.
“What—what did you want—to do?”
He dug his blunt nails into my skin, and I whimpered through my teeth. “I wanted to bend you over the nearest table and fuck you in the ass,” he growled viciously.
Oh fuck. Why the fuck was I tingling like I was going to come just listening to him talk, and yet it felt so impossibly far to reach too?
It was the way he was talking, the way he was rubbing his pelvis into mine. I could feel it. Imagine it. His fat dick stretching my arsehole. I’d feel so full, but he’d make it so good. I wanted it.
My imagination paired with the simulation of reality and his tormenting fingers grazing my thigh were setting off crackers that were quickly edging closer to a bigger explosion but never quite sparking intense enough to let it blow.
He weighed his mouth down heavily on my ear, the little circles his fingers were making on my thigh growing a touch faster like he was mimicking touching my clit. And fucking Neves, I could feel the sweet tug in the swollen bud, but without any actual stimulation it ached so much I nearly screamed.
“Shehryar,” I half sobbed, half groaned, writhing my hips faster.
His fingers skimmed higher, so close to the crevice of my pubic bone. “I would have tied you up with his fucking dress and bent you over the table. Stretched your ass on my fingers and sucked on your clit until you creamed on my tongue. And he would have watched it all.”
My eyes rolled as I pictured it, liquid fire pouring down my middle. “Fuck…”
“I would have made you face him as I fucked you,” he growled, grinding his dick into me harder but still kept his hands exactly where they were. “Shown him what a whore you are for me. Had you look right at him as you chanted my name. I would’ve held you by the hair. Thrust deep until you felt me in your stomach. You would’ve cried, begged, whined; ground your needy fucking clit on the table.”
“Sheh—Shehryar…”
His hand squeezed my throat. “And you would have come so fucking hard for me too.”
I cried out in frustration, wanting to come, desperate to push the unbearably vivid sensation in my sex over the edge but unable to do it or convince him to either.
He abruptly released me, spinning me as he stepped back. I slumped against the door, disorientated and shaking from pent-up desire and dissatisfaction. But fuck me, the flushed, feral look on his face and wet spot in his grey boxers was so worth the agony of denial.
“On your knees. Now.”
I wobbled away from the door and collapsed to the carpet as an eager puddle.
I want his dick. I want it in my mouth.
But before I could reach for him, he crouched down to my level and scooped up his belt by my knees. My gaze flew rapidly between the black leather and his stern stare. “We’re going to try something new for your punishment.”
Wait, that wasn’t it? Oh shit…
My belly jumped, and my breaths came quick and short as he carefully threaded the leather under my hair, looping it around my neck. Then he paused. “I’m going to tie this around your neck, and you’re going to crawl on your hands and knees to the bed.”
I blinked, ears ringing, mind numb. Surely, he hadn’t said…
“What?” I breathed out.
He brushed the back of his fingers across my cheek. “You’re going to crawl to the bed with my belt around your neck.”
Humiliation ripped the skin from my cheeks and sparked a fire in my chest. What he wanted was ridiculous. I wasn’t a fucking dog that I was going to wear his belt like a collar and crawl.
I should’ve raged at him for suggesting it. I wanted to but…
My clit pulsed so hard, pleading and whimpering in excitement.
No…no, no, no, no! No fucking way. Mariyah, you’ve gone mad.
I shook my head rapidly, but no words came out to express any disagreement.
His gaze softened. “You can use the safe word if you don’t want to, Mariyah, and I can take you straight to the bed, or we can stop entirely. It’s your choice.”
He waited. And waited. My churning embarrassment heightened, but I still couldn’t say the word.
Instead, I eyed the distance to the mattress. It wasn’t that far…technically.
Fucking Neves, you can’t seriously want to—
“Just to the bed?” I murmured in question.
“Just to the bed,” he confirmed. “But say red and we can stop.”
I gulped as I met his patient gaze.
He’d clearly figured out that I had a minor, very secret humiliation kink. Being stubborn and prideful kind of made it hard to accept wanting to be humiliated. But sometimes, in certain states of horniness, with certain people, it was…it pushed my arousal to the point of frenzy.
A week ago, that person would never have been Shehryar…but right now?
I took a deep breath and nodded softly. “Just to the bed.”
He gave me a gentle smile, but the moment it faded…my stomach plummeted. Realisation at what I’d just agreed to ran around screaming in circles as he buckled the belt around my neck, leaving it loose enough that I had a small range of movement.
But that was of no comfort when he stood, forcing my neck forward and up.
I was left staring into the eyes of a ruthless villain set on breaking the girl who’d crossed him.
He had every intention of making the humiliation sting.
I was panicking. Burning angry and embarrassed and spiteful. And just as achingly turned on.
With the other end of the belt still in his hand, he angled his head and smirked, eyeing me with cruel lust. And I’d been naked the whole time, but I suddenly felt so acutely exposed. I was hyperaware of everywhere he looked. From my pert breasts, swaying with my nervous jitter, to the red heat blotched across my skin, and the visible stretch marks lining the curves of my upper thighs.
“You look so pretty on a leash, little menace,” he purred.
I gritted my teeth as a pointed claw dragged down my middle and hooked somewhere above my sex. “Fuck you, dickhead.”
One arrogant brow flew up. He gave a sudden, harsh tug, and I jerked forward on my hand with a quick inhale. “I suggest you watch your tone.” Each stern word was an aching flick at my swollen clit. “Unless you’d rather do laps of the room until you’ve learnt to.”
There were a tonne of insults vaulting around my mouth, but I bit the side of my tongue and held still. It wouldn’t end quickly if I kept fighting him. And I was desperate to come.
“Better.” He released the end of the leather, and it swung down to the carpet in front of me. Then cupping his erection, he walked backwards to the bed. “Keep still.”
He didn’t have to tell me twice. I was left immobile, mouth watering, thighs clenching, at the way he rubbed himself. The way I wanted to touch him. No, I wanted more.
The seconds he took to shuck his trousers, boxers, and socks were twisting agony, but he made me wait on hands and knees until he was sitting naked at the edge of the bed.
Running one slow fist along the length of his big, thick cock, he said, “Now crawl.”
I hesitated. Of course I fucking hesitated. It was the most embarrassing thing I’d ever done. Crawling to a man while he jerked himself off, with his belt around my neck like I was some pet he’d bought.
A toy. A mindless fucking sex toy for his entertainment and usage.
It was humiliating. And yet…
It was the way he watched me, the way it set my body on fire, the promise of what came after that urged me to push past the churning frustration and make the first move forward.
Right hand. Right knee. Left hand. Left knee.
And he actually. Fucking. Moaned . So low, so breathy. So needy.
“Look at you,” he purred. “Such a pretty, perfect menace. Keep going. You’re doing so well.”
A whimper clogged my throat as sharp pulses rang through my leaking cunt. And I was leaking. With every hand and knee I moved. Right down my own fucking thighs. I was too scared to look in fear of seeing a trail of wetness dripping onto the carpet. That would’ve been too much humiliation to stomach in one day.
Shehryar took his hand off his dick with a twisting tug and leaned forward when I was about a metre away. “Almost there.” He eased his thighs further apart, allowing me to crawl between them, then swiped up the end of the belt in one hand. “That’s it. Sit on your knees.”
Leveraging myself with one hand against the mattress, I kneeled before him, panting and shaking like I’d run a long-distance race without any prep. All because I was throbbing painfully between my legs and the overstimulation was too much.
He made quick work of looping the belt around his fist, forcing me up higher and closer. His hand went to the nape of my neck, and he crashed his mouth over mine. He lapped at my tongue with a forceful yearning that contracted my lungs on a moan. I clutched on to his knees for balance as I kissed him back with equal vigour and passion.
“How was that?” he rasped through heavy pants against my bruised mouth.
“Embarrassing.”
I felt his lips hitch. “Good.” I glared. His smile crooked higher. “But you did so well.”
A happy shiver tickled down my spine, and I smacked my lips to his in a long second kiss. “Does this mean I get to make you beg and plead now?”
He chuckled, and the way his eyes crinkled at the corners was a stab of cuteness to my chest. It was an entirely new feeling for me—related to him at least. It was a new experience too, bantering and laughing with someone during sex, after he’d punished me on top of that. I had to admit, I really liked it. It didn’t take away from the sexual tension. If anything, it added more intimacy to it.
“That depends,” he said. “Have you learnt your lesson?”
I shrugged. “Probably not.” I teasingly grazed my nails up his thick, hairy thighs. His breath audibly stuttered, and my skin puckered in delight. “I’ll piss you off again at some point. And you’ll make me crawl again or spank me and make me come over and over until it hurts.”
I drew little circles at the apex of his thighs, the way he had done to me, so close to his dick slanted against his lower belly. I swore his erection gave a little jerk. He clenched his jaw, his neck visibly straining. The urge to lean in and kiss it, taste the saltiness of his golden skin was overwhelming.
“But,” I whispered against the prickle just under his jaw. He dropped his head back and let out a low groan. I throbbed all over as his hand climbed into the back of my hair. “I’ll never intentionally make you jealous, Sheri.” I swirled my tongue over his pulse, giving him a sucking kiss, and he swore under his breath. “I don’t have to anymore.” I dragged my teeth towards his Adam’s apple, keeping my fingers moving lazily. “Because you’re already mine.”
He snapped with a harsh growl, fisting my hair and yanking me back to look at him. He was panting, cheeks glowing pink, and the black flames bursting in his pupils charred me down to the bone. My arousal rose out of them like a phoenix, renewed in spirit and strength by ten-fold.
“Fucking touch me, Mariyah.”
“Say please,” I purred, edging one hand closer until I just skimmed the side of his cock.
He gritted his teeth, his hand tightening in my hair, but then his jaw fell slack. “Please,” he rasped. “Please, Mariyah. Touch me. Stroke me. I need your hands around my dick. I’m begging you.”
Oh, fuck, fuck, fuckfuckfuck. Oh, fuck…
The pleading crease between his brows. The possessed desperation in his blown pupils. The way he swayed forward, closer, his mouth hovering over mine. None of it was forced. None of it was fake. Everything about him was true, aching, and stunning.
I stopped breathing for a second. Before air punched back into my lungs and sent a storm of pleasure and power raining down on my belly, suffocating me, drowning me in the best way. But—
“How many women have you shown that face to?” I heard myself say at the abrupt, irritating thought of someone else seeing what I was seeing.
He slid his hands to cup my face as a little smirk lifted his mouth. “Jealous?”
I squared him with a glare and wrapped a squeezing hand around the base of his dick. He jerked and hissed, his face twisting, hands shaking against my cheeks.
I returned the smirk he’d only just worn. “Jealous? When you’ve been pining for me for five years? Not particularly, no.” I dragged my fist up and rubbed my thumbs over his swollen crown, awing at the amount of pre-cum I found beading out. “You’ve always been mine, Sheri.”
He throbbed hot in my palm and moaned gorgeously as I spread the pre-cum down his length. But it wasn’t enough for the kind of eye-rolling, mind-numbing pleasure I wanted to give him.
“Mariyah,” he said through a gasp as I eased back, lowering my upper body. “Fuck, Mariyah.”
I could’ve come just listening to him moan my name; it was the sexiest thing I’d ever heard.
“Say you’re mine, Sheri,” I whispered by the tip of his dick.
“I’m yours—I’m yours.” I opened my mouth, but he jerked my face back up, lightly squishing my cheeks. “Don’t do that. Don’t put your mouth on me. I want to fuck you nice and slow tonight, but I won’t be able to if you suck me off.”
I pushed my lips into a disappointed pout. “But I’ve been waiting all night to have you in my mouth.” He uttered something indecipherable under his breath, and a smug smile twitched across my lips. I cocked my chin, playing the sweet, obedient toy. “Can’t I have a taste? Just a lick. Please, Daddy.”
He groaned up the ceiling, his dick pulsing in my hand, before glaring ferociously back down at me. “One lick, Mariyah. I’m serious. One fucking lick.”
Drooling like my favourite meal was laid out in front of me, I wrapped my mouth around his tip. I moaned, eyes rolling, and Shehryar groaned so fucking loudly. I sucked and swirled my tongue, taking him deeper, massaging his balls in one hand, watching his reaction as I pulled my mouth up. Angling my head, I shaped my lips around the underside of him and traced the vein down and up, then sucked on his tip again until my cheeks hollowed.
“Enough,” he roared, yanking me back. He slipped out of my mouth with a faint pop. “Enough. Get on the bed. On the fucking bed. Now.”
His fingers worked with blinding speed, unbuckling the belt from around my neck. He slipped it out from under my hair and threw it aside. And then we were both tugging and pushing me up onto the mattress. I collapsed onto my back, and Shehryar effortlessly dragged me further up until I had a pillow under my head.
He braced himself over me, the heat and earthy scent of him cradling me. I spread my thighs wider, curled one foot over his firm arse. He dipped a hand between us. I fisted the back of his hair.
At the first nudge of his dick into my pussy, we both sucked in a breath and held it.
His hands came around my cheeks again, thumbs nudging at my lips. He lowered his face closer to mine and stared right into my soul. It should’ve been uncomfortable how intense his gaze was, but it felt so good to be held down by it. I held on to him just as tightly.
“Shehryar,” I whispered.
And he pushed in all the way in one slick slide.
My head lolled back as I moaned and Shehryar groaned into my chin, his lips kissing, breath heaving.
“You’re so perfect, little menace,” he rasped, dragging his hips back. “So fucking beautiful.”
The slow friction, building up some unspeakable kind of pleasure, had me panting as I grazed one set of nails through the bristle on his jaw. “So are you. So bloody, stupidly gorgeous.” A moan tore out of me as he slowly sunk back in, and I could feel through him how tightly my inner muscles clenched. “Oh, fuck. Sheri .”
He kissed my mouth, again and again in long, tugging pecks as he rocked lazily in and out. “You have no reason to ever be jealous.” Kiss . “You were right.” Kiss . “You’ve had me wrapped around your finger for five bloody years.” Kiss . “And I denied it to myself.” Kiss . “To you.” Kiss . “To everyone.” Kiss . “But the feeling of wanting you was always there.” Kiss . “And I fought it, thinking that would be better for everyone.” Kiss . “But you’re impossible to forget. Impossible to really hate.” Kiss . “You’re incomparable to anyone else, little menace.”
Kiss . A long, deep, fierce kiss.
I couldn’t fucking breathe as pleasure swamped my lungs, head, and belly, all because he wouldn’t shut up, wouldn’t stop spouting sweet admissions I had never dreamed of becoming real between us nor ever realised how fucking insane it would feel to be revered the way he was doing it.
The sensation was so intense, my clit felt like it was about to burst again. I just needed…
“Faster,” I breathed out. “Faster, Sheri. I wanna come. I need to come.”
I dipped my one hand between us, desperate to rub the pulsing bud, but Shehryar caught my wrist and dragged it back up.
“No.” He shook his head, pinning my wrist to the pillow. “We’re taking this slow. Meaning no clit rubbing yet. No rushing. No coming before me. Not tonight.”
“Shehryar,” I sobbed in frustration.
He was going to keep edging me. Keep my climax right there in the back, ready to shoot forward but never quite getting enough momentum to fire off. I didn’t even know it was possible to be edged like this while getting fucked slowly and deeply. I wanted to kill him, but I wanted it to last too.
“I know it aches,” he whispered and kissed my nose, my cheek, my chin. “It aches for me too. But doesn’t it feel good?”
“It does, you fucking idiot,” I whined and kissed him hard and long.
“Thank you,” he said through a pant against my lips.
I was seeing cross-eyed and was convinced I was hearing just so. “What?”
“Thank you for letting me fuck you like this.”
I whimpered loudly as the exposed livewire inside me sparked violently under his words.
Fuck, fuck, fuck. He just thanked me. He fucking thanked me.
I didn’t know that was a kink I had until now.
“Shehryar, shut up,” I said, half pleading, half growling.
“No.” He pressed his mouth to my cheek, his beard prickling my damp skin. “You like it when I whisper to you. You clench around me so hard. And I love that you do. I love the way you respond to me. You were meant to be under me, Mariyah. And I was meant to dominate you and submit to you. To taste you and fuck you and pleasure you until you lose your mind.” His voice grew raspier, his thrusts faster. “May I do that? Do I have your permission to do that for as long as possible? Please , little menace. Let me make this so good for you.”
I regretted it. Wanting him to beg and plead. It was far more dangerous than having him humiliate and dominate me. In a way I wasn’t sure I was going to survive. Because I loved it as much as it ruined me, but I’d never be able to deny him when he asked like that. Ever.
I was fucked. Literally and metaphorically.
“Yes,” I cried, shaking and nodding my head all the same. “Yes, fuck yes.”
And gosh, did he do just that. He drove into me like the night was never-ending. Kept kissing me between feverish words of gratitude and promises and compliments that aimed arrow after arrow to my clit and hit bullseye every damn time. Until the pain of amassed pleasure was so excruciating, tears rolled down the sides of my face.
“Sheri, please, please, I can’t take it anymore,” I whimpered between his kisses. “I need to come.”
His forward thrust induced a loud squelch, that’s how wet I was and how much he was leaking.
“Cling on to me, little menace,” he rasped, stroking one hand down my sweaty front towards my aching clit. “I want us to come together. Can you do that for me? Can you hold it until I tell you to?”
I nodded rapidly. I would have sold my soul to him if he’d asked just to get him to touch me where I needed him to.
“Kiss me.”
I wrapped my lips around his and shrieked in absolute ecstasy as his thumb found my clit and rubbed in little circles. He groaned in reply and picked up his pace, each plunge pushing me to the edge until I had no ground left to stand on. But I fucking held back for dear life, and—
“Let go,” he growled against my lips. “Come, fucking come for me.”
Two more swipes of his thumb was all it took.
I broke apart on a scream so harsh that no sound came out, shaking down to my toes, as biting bliss ripped out my old nerves and burned me in new ones. I swore I verged on losing consciousness because I barely felt Shehryar’s hard, jerky thrusts as he came inside me.
He groaned into my mouth, gasping as I did too, until the tightness from both of us eased. I sunk back into the bed into a sweaty, vibrating pile, and Shehryar landed as a boneless heap on top. He weighed ten-fucking-tonnes, and I wasn’t sure my lungs would survive being crushed under him, but his heavy body was a pleasant anchor when I could hardly feel my own limbs.
Eventually, he slid off me and laid on his stomach next to me.
I blinked at his beautiful face. He stared back just as heavy-lidded and sated.
“I actually fucking hate you,” I whispered.
His exhausted chuckle was music to my ears that I wanted to listen to for a very, very long time.
Shehryar poked a finger into my cheek. “Don’t fall asleep,” he rasped against my forehead.
I grumbled and blindly swatted his hand away. “Shush. I’m tired,” I moaned, snuggling closer to his wide, half-naked body under the freshly changed duvet.
My head was on his chest, my leg tucked over and between his. His arm was around me, fingers teasing over the edges of my hair and around my ear. Other than the hairs on his chest tickling my nose once or twice, he was like a heated pillow, and it was blissful. I was all sexed out, and the comfort of his firm grip was lulling me into what I already knew was going to be the best sleep.
“Don’t you want to shower?” he asked, tracing a slow finger over the shell of my ear.
“No. We wiped down in the bathroom. That’s enough. Shower in the morning.”
“Okay.” He pressed a long kiss to my forehead. “But don’t fall asleep yet.”
“Sheri,” I whined with a tired little sob. Annoyed, I forced my heavy lids open and tilted my face up. “Why won’t you let me sleep?”
The playful smile on his lips faded away until not a glimmer of it was visible on his stiff expression. “Will you come with me tomorrow?”
“Where?”
“To my half…” His brows knotted as he chewed over his words like they tasted wrong in his mouth. “To her birthday party. My father’s daughter.”
My lashes lifted in surprise. “You decided to go?” Then his previous question sank over me, and I raised my head from his chest. “Wait—you want me to go with you?”
His Adam’s apple bobbed. “I’d rather not go alone,” he muttered. “I want you to come with me. Please . If you don’t mind attending an eighteen-year-old’s birthday party.”
I’d never heard him sound so unsure before, and it kind of fucking hurt. In a good way and bad way.
Bad because that uncertainty wasn’t him, and I hated that his own fucking father had reduced him to it even if they were technically trying to work things out.
But good because he’d trusted me with that vulnerability, and that meant something big.
“Of course I’ll come,” I said, moulding my palm to his bristly jaw. He leaned into my hand, the tension in his eyes melting away. I stretched up and pressed a weighted kiss to his cheek. “You never have to plead with me for something like that, idiot. I’m there if you need me to be.”
I flashed a big, impish smirk. “We’re gonna show up in style and make this party count.”