9. Never
Unwind.That was what Lily told me I needed to do. Take a night, chill out, relax. But sitting in my apartment watching movies on my laptop was the last thing I wanted to do.
It wouldn’t relax me. All it would do was drive me up the goddamned wall and end with a heavy dose of guilt, because spending a Friday night watching movies and eating junk food was something Matty and I’d done a thousand times.
At the same time, she had a point. I needed to do something.
Every muscle in my body was wound as tight as a violin string, and after my disastrous encounter with Matty that afternoon, not to mention coming face-to-face with Lily’s gorgeous but terrifying tiger, a little downtime was in order.
Lily, bless her pushy little heart, stayed home. She was healing quickly from the wounds she’d sustained in the fight earlier in the day, but she was also spending a good amount of time sleeping.
So, I’d dragged Leo out with me. The mission was two-fold. The club was in a part of town known for its occult crowd, which meant we might run into Matty. Did I have any idea how the hell to handle another run-in with him? Nope. My brother wasn’t a badass on his own, but with the shadow driving the bus, he was a force. And not in a good way.
Four mojitos later, I had a pleasantly warm glow going. More than enough shine to take the edge off my mood and lower my inhibitions. I knew Leo was watching me dance, and I felt the moment he slid in behind me. He’d done this three times already, running off any guy who tried to snake into my space as I moved with the beat of the music, letting the thump of the bass wash everything away.
I danced, ignoring the way his hand crept under the hem of my top, barely brushing my hip above my jeans. It was a chaste move compared to the couples grinding around us, but that didn’t make it any less intimate. Luckily, I had just enough liquor in me to want that kind of intimacy.
His heat left, leaving my back open, and I breathed an unexpected sigh of relief. Craving closeness because I was tipsy and missing the guy I really wanted was not a great way to handle Leo’s attention.
I knew that.
Just like I knew I would have to talk to him in the morning, when my mind had better control over my body.
Then that dominating body heat returned, only it felt different. My blood warmed in response, and when his hand returned to my hip, to the same place it’d been before, his touch sent a current of lust rippling across my middle.
Holy hell.
Maybe it was the extra rum in my mojitos, or maybe it was the music, but I caught myself leaning back into that touch without even realizing it. Those strong fingers dug into my hips, not stopping me or guiding me. More like he was anchoring himself to my body.
An image of Hook filled my mind, and his scent washed over me in a cruel trick of my tipsy mind. It wasn’t the first time I’d smelled his trademark leather and saltwater bouquet. I smelled that man every night in my dreams, and his scent lingered in my senses for a precious few seconds after I woke each morning before reality snatched it away.
It was a pathetic kind of torture because I really did miss him. Fiercely. I wasn’t about to apologize for that. In just a few days, he’d gotten under my skin in a way no one else ever had.
When that scent wrapped around me on the dance floor—whether it was real or imagined—I caved. I let myself pretend, for a moment, that it was Hook standing behind me as I moved. That it was his hand gripping my hip so possessively.
And now I had a new thing I would have to talk to Leo about later.
I wasn’t oblivious to the way he looked at me, or to the way he’d danced with me earlier. Longing lingered in his eyes, but for as tempting as the man was, my body just wasn’t responding to him.
Well, until now.
He leaned in closer, the heat of his chest spreading against my back as one of his hands came up and brushed the hair away from my neck. It felt way too good to stop that sensual touch, but when his lips brushed my ear, I recoiled.
How could something that felt so right make my heart lurch so violently?
Guilt and betrayal slammed through me. I twisted out of his grip, ready to read him the riot act for crossing that invisible line, but when I turned, I wasn’t looking at Leo.
All rational thought fled. I blinked repeatedly, but he was still there. Hook. Looking as hot as sin. Not to mention furious as fuck.
He was different, though. There were dark shadows under his eyes, painfully clear even in the limited light of the club, and he had a beard that looked like it was months in the making.
What the hell did the bartender put in my mojitos?
I closed my eyes for a beat and opened them again. “This is a trick, right?” It had to be. A combination of alcohol and stress and music and pulsing lights.
Had to be a hallucination.
But what kind of hallucination just stood there, silent, chest rising and falling as he looked at me like he wanted to destroy me? Or devour me. I couldn’t tell which.
Only one way to know for sure.
I held out a hand, fully expecting that toe-curling vision of Hook to shimmer into the ether. Instead, he looked down at my outstretched hand, hesitated for a breath, then wrapped his fingers around mine, sending a savage shiver through me.
He was real. Really, truly real, and standing right in front of me.
Before fear or doubt could get the better of me, I led him away from the dance floor and through the first door I could find.
Is this a supply closet? Whatever. I didn’t care.
The moment we were alone, he was in my space, crowding me against the door with his big body. His mouth opened and closed, like he wanted to say something but couldn’t find the words. Then his hand tangled in my hair, and our lips crashed together in a desperate, clawing, hungry kiss.
He pressed his body so tightly against me I could feel every hard plane of the man, including what he was packing below the belt.
I pulled my head back and looked at him to make absolutely sure I wasn’t losing my mind. “Please don’t let this be a dream,” I whispered. And if it was, was it too much to ask of the universe to just let me live in it forever?
Need twisted inside me like a caged animal. When I hooked my leg over his hip, he grabbed me by the ass, lifted, and pinned me to the door with the ridge of his cock grinding through my jeans.
It still wasn’t enough. I moved against him the best I could, my frustration growing into a monster of its own. I was already swollen, slick, and aching, but I needed so much more. It felt like I’d gone a lifetime without him. Now that he was here, I would never get enough.
He pulled back, lifted me roughly off him, and spun me around. A thrill shot up my spine and anticipation swirled low in my belly. Strong hands grabbed my wrists, lifting them over my head and pinning them to the wall.
Even with the steady thump of the music bleeding in through the walls, I could hear Hook’s heavy breaths. But for all the desperation seeping from both of us, he just stood there, panting, holding my hands captive.
I pressed my ass back, just a little encouragement.
His response was a low, rumbling growl. “You still like playing with fire, don’t you, love?”
Despite the taunting tone, his voice was like coming home. It melted something inside me that had begun to freeze over the moment Matty and I had landed in our world.
“And you still like to tease,” I said, feeling somehow breathless, excited, and terrified all at once.
His free hand slid up from my hip, slipped under my top, and drifted up, exploring. Fingertips traced the line of my bra before trailing back down, driving me mad with their feather-light touch.
“You’re killing me here, pirate.”
I expected a chuckle, but what I got was a grunt before his hand popped the button of my jeans free and slid inside. Strong fingers delved roughly into my panties, finding my sensitive clit with unerring accuracy. I bucked at the first shock of sensation, until his hips pressed against my backside, his erection painfully clear.
The next stroke ignited my nerve endings. The third damn near brought me to my knees. If he hadn’t been holding me there by my wrists, I might’ve sunk to the ground in a puddle.
Hook worked me with his fingers as he pressed his hard length to my backside, thrusting against me despite the layers of clothing between us. With every thrust, and every dip and swirl of his talented fingers, the dim light in the storage closet seemed to grow brighter.
“That’s it,” he said, his voice rough.
I balled my hands into the fists above my head and buried my face against my arm, biting down on the sensitive flesh to keep from screaming.
“That’s my girl.” His words were barely a whisper, hot against my neck. “I want you to tell me when you’re about to come for me, Never. But...” Another dry thrust, another rough pass of his fingertip over my clit. “Don’t you dare come until I tell you.”
A delicious shock of pleasure rocketed through me at the warning. I was already so close. So fucking close, and he’d just lobbed a challenge that my defiant side was all too happy to take him up on.
He growled low in my ear. “Tell me.”
I felt the command in every cell of my body and everything inside me tightened. “I’m...” I couldn’t breathe. “Fuck...”
“Now, Never. Give it to me.”
A half second later, my orgasm hit me hard and fast. It wasn’t one of those euphoric, toe-curling events like he’d given me back on his ship. It’d been building too long for that. Weeks of neglect had pushed me to this point, and rather than blissful relief, it was more like a sharp slap to the ass that leaves you knowing the sting will last for hours.
It left me aching, wanting, and I let my head fall between my upstretched arms.
“How are you feeling, love?” The question rolled over me, hot and hungry, with a dangerous edge deepening his voice.
All I could do was whimper.
“Don’t move,” he ordered, letting go of my wrists.
I did as he commanded, but only because I wasn’t sure my body would do anything else. It was trapped in some indescribable torture. Behind me, I heard the rustle of fabric. Then my jeans and panties were yanked down, and he was there, his thick cock pressing between my thighs. Hook grabbed my hips and pulled me back one shuffling step.
“Hands stay on the door.”
I flattened my palms against the cheap wood, digging my nails into the grain. It didn’t matter that I was exposed, overheated, and utterly breathless, because I was also in the kind of pain only a good hard fuck could cure.
With every second that ticked past, my insides twisted harder.
His hot, rough palms slid up my back, his knuckles dragging beneath my silky top. “I’ve thought about what I was going to say to you if I ever saw you again.” His fingers traced feather-light lines down my ribs, fanning out across my hips. “So many times.” One of his hands disappeared, and I felt the head of his heavy cock nudge my needy entrance.
“Hook.” His name was a whispered plea. I wasn’t a woman who begged for anything, but the kind of woman I’d always been didn’t matter one fucking iota when it came to him.
He stilled, and I could have screamed at the universe. Why the hell would he stop?
Oh shit.
I’d called him Hook. The name he hated. But I couldn’t seem to shake it from my memory even though I knew the real one.
“Atlas?” I turned my head to look back at him, but the hand on my hip flew up and anchored in my hair, forcing my gaze to the floor.
“You know, I think I like it better the other way.” A rough slap landed against my right ass cheek, the thumping force of it driving me forward a few inches.
I pinched my eyes closed and sucked in a sharp breath. Another thumping smack reverberated through me, making every sensitive spot inside me ache more even as it ratcheted my frustration higher.
“Listen carefully,” he whispered, so quiet I had to strain to hear him over the music and the blood pounding through my veins. “If I ever see you with another man the way I saw you dancing with Leo, I will slaughter him.”
A wicked chill sent a wave of goosebumps racing across my skin. The man was insane. Which made me equally insane for getting even more turned on by that threat.
“Then I’ll punish you,” he growled, landing another heavy slap.
Mother fucker. The pleasure-pain was almost enough to get me off again. Coupled with the knowledge that he was crazy jealous and being ridiculously possessive, well, I was obviously a lost cause.
“How?” I breathed, daring him to smack my tender ass again. I squeezed my thighs, relishing the feel of his cock pressed tight between them.
He pulled back, stealing away his heat. His free hand snaked between my legs, finding my clit and stroking it entirely too lightly. Next, he pressed one of those long, strong fingers inside me, letting out a low groan that made my nerve endings tingle. He alternated like that, with one hand still gripping my hair tight enough to sting, until I was right there at the edge again. Teetering.
Then he pulled back and let go, resting his hands on my hips.
“Goddammit,” I hissed under my breath. That was what he meant by punishment.
Dragging my head up but keeping my gaze and my hands firmly planted on the door, I did the only thing my desperate, lust-addled brain knew how to do. “Come on, pirate. Is that all you’ve got? Because I’m pretty sure Leo is still out there. If you’re not up to the task, I could go—”
The sound that erupted from behind me turned my knees to jelly. One of Hook’s hands braced my hip as the other lined us up. Then he slammed into me hard enough to send a jolt of pain zinging through me. His fingers dug into my left hip. His right hand clamped hard around the back of my neck. And he did it again. And again. Giving me exactly what I needed to soothe the ache that’d been building inside me since the moment I’d stepped foot back in my world.
His thrusts were rough, almost violent, and the way he held me was so deliciously possessive. I probably should have been frightened or worried or furious at the way he was handling me. Instead, I was melting inside. The pendant dangling from my chest swung in front of me with each punishing surge.
And the damned thing was back to glowing.
Hook shifted slightly, driving in deeper and hitting a spot inside of me that lit me up like a Christmas tree. Pleasure-filled electric shocks flickered from my center to the very tips of my fingers and toes, weakening everything in their wake. My inner walls spasmed, then locked down tight around his gorgeous cock.And just like that, I was lost.
My knees buckled under the force of my orgasm, but instead of stopping, he pulled me up by the back of my neck and slammed me flush against the door.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
Every time he drove into me, the door shook on its hinges, but I barely noticed.
I was gone. Spinning in the moment and the feeling of Hook—my broody, bossy pirate—fucking me hard enough to make to me cry. Moisture slipped from between my lids. Traitorous tears that no one should ever see, and I couldn’t do a damned thing to stop them from flowing.
He groaned something in a language I didn’t understand a second before his hips stuttered, and I felt him come hard inside me. Panting, he pressed into me again, the weight of him pinning me to the door. I was pretty sure his hands and his body were the only things holding me up.
His ragged breath was warm against my ear. “You’re mine.”
I couldn’t respond. My throat locked up tight, the uncomfortable lump in it courtesy of the tears spilling down my cheeks. He must have realized something was off because he tried to let me go. When I started to sink to the floor, my legs refusing to hold me upright, he gathered me in his arms.
“Never?” Alarm colored his voice. “Talk to me. Did I hurt you?” he whispered into my hair.
For some fucked up reason, that only made it worse. I wrapped my arms around him and buried my face in the crook of his neck.
Why was I so emotional?
Because of everything. Because I never expected to see him again. Because with every day that passed, I was losing any chance of getting my brother back. And did I mention that I hadn’t expected to see my pirate again? In the midst of everything, I’d been trying like hell to let him go.
My feelings for him were ridiculous. What kind of woman fell that fast and that hard for a guy?
A stupid one, and I’d been trying so goddamned hard not to be stupid. I’d been telling myself that it was a fling. I mean, what else could it have been to a guy like him? So, I’d hung my feelings and insecurities on the memory of him and let him take all the blame.
Then the jerk just had to show up and make me feel... everything.