Chapter 19
NINETEEN
She felt better than Leo could have imagined. For an instant, as he pushed inside her, pure, blind panic overtook him. He knew this was different. He knew this would change him. He knew he could no longer lie to himself.
“Amelia, I?—”
He stopped himself with a groan. He couldn’t tell her how he felt. Not like this. Not when she’d essentially hired him, and he hadn’t had the self-control to stop himself from touching her. Not when she deserved so much better than him.
She moaned, tilting her hips. Her sweet body was heaven beneath his. He cupped her breast, sliding his cock out and back in with a long, punishing stroke. His reward was another moan and a flush on Amelia’s cheeks. She watched him with her pale gray eyes, looking utterly dazed.
“It feels so good,” she whispered. “I didn’t know it could feel this good.”
Curving his body over hers, he kissed her long and hard as he fought to maintain control. He wanted to come already, just from feeling the warmth and wetness of her. She was perfect—perfect for him.
This woman would be his undoing, this beautiful fairy who’d trapped him with a scowl.
Her nails dug into his ass as she urged him deeper, drawing a ragged gasp from his throat. He braced himself on his arms to get extra purchase, driving his hips into the woman he loved. Her breasts jiggled, her eyes glazed over, and Leo was done for.
There was no coming back from this.
When she reached up and touched his cheek, he caught her hand—her left hand—and pressed a kiss to her palm. She wore his ring, hadn’t taken it off. Right now, as their bodies joined in the most intimate of ways, that ring felt anything but fake. He wanted her to wear it forever. Wanted her to be his in truth.
Emotions tore at the very fabric of him. Sex had never been like this. Never so intense, never so fucking good. Trying to wrestle control back over his raging heart, Leo grabbed Amelia’s legs and held them up over his shoulders. He drove his cock deep into her like he could thrust his way to making her understand what she meant to him.
“Leo,” Amelia gasped. “Leo, Leo.”
“I’m here,” he replied, voice a bare rasp. He gripped her ankles, held them wide, nearly lost his mind. Sweat beaded on his forehead, dripped down his spine. He was gone. He was done. He was never coming back from this.
Stacking her legs to the side, he changed the angle until she moaned loud and long. Maybe if he showed her all his tricks, she wouldn’t want to leave. Maybe if he made this good for her, she’d understand?—
“Oh my God,” she gasped, gripping the blankets. “Oh my God, Leo. You’re so deep. You—” A ragged inhale. A whimpering exhale.
He turned her onto her stomach and thrust into her, then lifted her torso until her back was plastered to his front. “Grab my neck,” he said, lifting her arms so they were curved behind her head, clinging to his nape. She tangled her fingers into his hair and pulled, like she didn’t even know what she was doing. He bit her shoulder, losing his mind. Her breasts were lifted, nipples taut. He played with them until she keened and chanted his name, then let his hand slide down to rub her sweet, swollen clit. He dropped his fingers lower to feel himself entering her, unable to process the sheer bliss of the sensation.
Amelia—his Amelia, his woman, his love—wrenched his hand back up and pressed it against her bud. A feral smile curled his lips; he liked when she demanded her pleasure from him like it was her due. When she came, he felt like a superhero. She gripped his cock with tight inner muscles, and he gasped, wanting to make it good for her but quickly losing his grip?—
He roared, the sound muffled by her skin. He bit her shoulder, holding so tight, so tight. She collapsed onto her hands, and he fell right there with her, his body draped over hers. After three or four ragged breaths, he pulled away from her and disposed of the condom. When he came back to the bedroom on shaking legs, she was on her side, limbs splayed, eyes half-closed.
“Leo,” she mumbled. “What…”
Curling his body around hers, he ran a hand down her side and over her hip. Her beautiful, soft body. He’d never tire of it. He pressed a kiss to her nape.
“What just happened?” she asked, voice dreamy.
He chuckled, curling his arm around her. “That good, huh?”
“Your ego will be totally unmanageable after this,” she said in a slightly slurred voice. “But, wow. I didn’t know it could be like that.”
Neither did I , he thought.
They slept wrapped around each other, waking up an hour later in a daze. Amelia stumbled to the bathroom and he heard her electric toothbrush whirring, then she came back and collapsed in bed. When he took his turn in the bathroom, a part of him wondered if he’d be relegated to the couch when he came out.
But Amelia smiled at him and spread her arms, and he climbed under the blankets beside her. For tonight, at least, he’d be next to her.
Amelia woke at dawn, her face mashed into the pillow. Leo’s leg was a heavy weight across the backs of her thighs, his arm slung across her shoulder blades. She turned her head. His face was softened by sleep, his eyelashes dark against his cheeks. She couldn’t believe she’d actually had sex with a man who looked like that.
It terrified her. Emotion filled her chest until it crowded out her lungs. She could barely breathe.
Somehow, in a week, she’d fallen for this man. As she shifted, the rising sun glinted on her ring—but it wasn’t her ring, was it? It was rented from a jeweler. She’d give it back to Leo in a little more than twenty-four hours. She curled her fingers and stared at the rock and its Art Deco band, dreaming of a world where she and Leo were in the same league.
She’d been stupid to agree to this, because now her heart was involved. She should have seen this coming.
“Morning.” Leo’s voice was rough with sleep, his eyes half-closed. With his arm still across her back, he pulled her closer and nuzzled his face into the crook of her neck. “I love the smell of your skin.”
Maybe she could enjoy this for a little bit longer, Amelia reasoned. Maybe she could block out the outside world, forget about her spreadsheet, and pretend Leo’s feelings were as tangled as her own.
“Morning,” she said, trailing her hand over his chest. She liked the scent of him too, and the way it felt to wake up next to him in a big king bed.
His hands roamed over her body, and she liked that even more. Spreading her thighs for him, she let out a little whimper while her own hand went on an expedition south. Leo groaned when she curled her fingers around his shaft.
“I love it when you touch me,” he told her, lips near her ear. “Your touch is so sweet, Amelia.”
He wrapped a big hand around hers, guiding her to jerk him off a bit harder. Her heart stumbled. It had been so long since she’d shared a bed with a man, and it had never felt like this. She’d never felt so safe, like whatever she did, Leo would be right there alongside her.
Her eyes followed the movement of their joined hands, her head resting on his chest. Leo’s other hand stroked her hair, the softness of his touch a complete contrast to the strong grip he kept on his shaft.
“You like watching?” he rasped. “You like seeing the two of us jerk me off?”
She nodded, her cheek rubbing against his chest hair. The hand he’d been using to stroke her hair smoothed down her spine and began plumping her ass. He let his fingers tease the cleft of her ass as they watched the movement of their hands on his cock.
“You make me so hard, Amelia,” he told her, then pressed a kiss to the crown of her head. “Just knowing you’re watching this is making me want to explode.”
A fine tremor passed through her body. She rubbed her thighs together, and Leo let out a low grunt. He let go of his cock and rolled her onto her back, pushing her legs apart. Then his hand was there where she needed it, teasing, circling, penetrating. She arched off the bed, panting. “Leo.”
“Come on my hand, Amelia,” he commanded. “I want to watch you.”
“I’m trying,” she panted, which drew a laugh from him.
He pressed a kiss to her temple, her neck. “Yesterday was the hottest fucking thing I’ve ever done,” he said, and Amelia knew he was just giving her lip service. A man with Leo’s experience probably had a mental catalog of fantasies he’d watched come true.
But it was still a nice thought, to imagine that Amelia could make him unravel. That she had the power to undo him, as he had that same power over her.
He kissed her earlobe, breath ghosting over her throat. “I want you to grind that pussy on my hand the way you ground down on my cock yesterday. You made my jeans wet,” he told her. “Did you know that? You soaked through your underwear and left a pretty little dark spot on my pants, and don’t you dare apologize for it.”
She gusted out her best approximation of a laugh, her hips bucking as he wound her tighter and tighter with nothing more than his hand and a few dirty words.
“I’m going to jerk off to that memory for the rest of my life.”
“You are?” Amelia’s eyes flew wide, and she realized that Leo had shifted so he could fist himself with one hand while he blew her mind with the other.
“No fucking question,” he grated. “My girl making herself come, fully clothed, just from dry-humping my cock. I’ll never forget it.”
His girl. He’d called her his girl again. While Amelia’s lagging brain tried to process it, Leo did something clever with his fingers, changed the angle, increased the pressure…and all thought fled from her brain. She came apart with a cry, her hands flying to his biceps. She held on for dear life as her body detonated. He coaxed her through her orgasm, wrenching every drop of pleasure until she pushed his hand away with a whimper.
Then the bed shifted, and she heard crinkling. Lust jumped in her—her body was buzzing from the orgasm. It seemed it would be like this every time with Leo; she’d always want more. Before he could position himself between her thighs, Amelia pushed him onto his back and straddled him.
She could count on two hands the number of times she’d ridden on top. After trying it a few times, her ex had told her she was terrible at it and refused to do the position with her. She hadn’t gotten far enough with other men to work up the nerve to try again.
But Leo was different. She could see from the heat in his eyes that he liked when she wrestled control from him. She felt safe with him. She wanted to try all the things she hadn’t had the courage to explore with others.
“If I’m not good at this, just tell me,” she panted, grabbing his cock to position it at her entrance.
“I’m not going to dignify that with a re—” Leo interrupted himself with a moan as she sank down on top of him.
A wicked smile curled Amelia’s lips. Leo’s fingers dug into her hips as she began to move, rocking up and down, then leaning forward to go forward and back. She gasped, and Leo tightened his hold on her.
“Grab the headboard,” he said between breaths. “Use it for leverage.”
Oh . Oh, wow. Amelia’s breaths came short and sharp, then stopped completely when Leo bucked his hips in time with her movements. It took her approximately half a second to erupt, her second orgasm of the morning tearing through her body with such force all she could do was cling on for the ride and hope she survived to the end.
She felt the moment Leo came. His neck went taut, and a flush stained his chest and cheeks. He gritted his teeth and let out a rough grunt, the sight of all that tension, all that masculinity sending another wave of pleasure rocking through Amelia’s veins.
She collapsed on top of him, wrapped up in his arms. While they were still joined, he rolled them over so he was on top, then kissed her long and deep, his hands cupping her face and jaw as fine tremors passed through both their bodies.
“Amelia,” he finally gusted out, leaning his forehead against hers.
“I need to go brush my teeth,” she said, dazed, and Leo began to laugh. “What?” Amelia complained, voice far away.
“A man needs a bit of coddling after that kind of performance. You should be petting me and telling me what a good job I did.”
Amelia gave him a few cursory pats on the top of his head. “Good boy.”
He laughed harder. “Don’t worry,” he said as he rolled off of her. “My ego is safe from overinflation around you.”
She grinned, smacking his chest with the back of her hand. It took her a few more long minutes to work up the strength to move, but she did, eventually, make it to the bathroom for her morning ablutions. As she stared at herself in the mirror, she saw bright eyes, mussed hair, and flushed cheeks. She couldn’t help but smile around her toothbrush.
Sex was great .