CHAPTER 3 Penny Calloway
Just One Night
We walk in silence the rest of the way, my heart pounding with what he was going to say. We stop in front of a high-rise literally around the corner from the bar, and he walks through the double doors. A staff member greets him, and we bypass the desk toward a set of private elevators.
He pushes the button, and I wonder what it would be like to walk through the fancy lobby here with Sammy and Benji screaming at each other over who stole whose bouncy ball and who lost whose slime.
We couldn’t possibly take Liam up on his generous offer.
He flashes a card in front of some reader before he pushes the button for the sixteenth floor out of seventeen total, and as the doors close, it feels like this elevator is too small for the two of us.
I break the silence with a question. “So you live by yourself and have a four-bedroom place?”
He chuckles. “And I’m only here about half the year.”
“Why such a big place?” I wonder aloud.
“Honestly, the views.” He shrugs. “My place is two floors, and the balcony is too. My front door is accessible from the sixteenth floor, there’s a doorman, it’s a good part of town, and this building is quiet and secure.
I guess it just had everything I was looking for when I was ready to get out of the Bradley Mansion. ”
“Consider me jealous.” I smirk.
“I already offered to have you move in while you get on your feet, so it could be all yours, too.” He smirks back, and something in his smirk makes him look…older. Hotter. Not like my best friend’s brother.
I blow out a breath as I try to gather my wits about me. This is perfectly innocent. He just said to me on the sidewalk that he’s having fun with me. He’s just being friendly.
We get to his floor, and even his front door is fancy. He unlocks it and holds it open, indicating I should walk in first, and I’m immediately blown away.
I mean, I live in a fairly nice house in Lincoln Park. We bought the place for two million several years ago, and it’s only appreciated in value in the time we’ve lived there.
But this?
This is something else, from the hardwood floors to the wrought-iron staircase to the wall of windows looking out over the darkness of Lake Michigan.
“Wow, Liam,” I murmur. “This is incredible.”
God, just the thought of my kids and those stairs has a shudder of fear darting down my spine.
I could see Benji taking colorful Sharpies to the white walls, and Sammy would take one look at the railings and consider it a personal challenge to ride down them only for his brother to follow in his footsteps but inevitably end up either bleeding or breaking a bone.
“The primary bedroom, the office, and my weight room are upstairs,” he says, nodding up the stairs. “The guest room is down here along with my kitchen, dining room, and family room.”
“It’s a nice setup.”
“Come on in,” he says. He leads me through the front hall toward the kitchen, and I stand by the table in the breakfast nook looking out the windows, imagining how gorgeous it must be in the daylight. He grabs another beer from the fridge. “Can I get you anything?”
“Maybe some water,” I ask.
He grabs me a bottle, twists the cap, and brings it over to me.
“Thanks,” I say. I chug a few sips and set the bottle on the kitchen table, and it looks out of place since there’s nothing else on the table.
He takes a long pull from the bottle of beer, and he sets it on the counter.
“Come check out the view from my balcony,” he says.
He leads me out a door on the other side of the kitchen. The air is colder up here, and the wind whips more, but even in the dark, the view is something spectacular.
I turn toward him to say that, but he catches me off guard when I find him staring at me.
My brows dip together, and I’m about to ask him what he’s looking at when he takes a step toward me.
“Fuck it,” he mutters. He wraps an arm around my waist, hauls me into him, angles his head down, and brushes his nose along mine.
“Liam,” I say softly, trying to be the voice of reason.
The pull causing my thighs to clench together is working hard to negate that voice.
“We can’t do this,” I say softly.
“Why not?” he murmurs. He’s close. So close. Too close. I’m no longer drunk on the wine. I’m drunk on his scent. I’m falling into an abyss I don’t want to climb out of.
Just one night.
I just want to get lost in Liam Bradley for one night.
The voice of reason prevails, the stupid bitch. “Three reasons. We’re both drunk, you're my best friend's younger brother, and you're way too young for me.” I press my hands to his chest in an effort to push him away, and my God, those muscles are hard.
What would it be like to feel him naked, to run my palms along the hard planes of his back as he hovers over me?
I want to know.
Suddenly, without reservation or fear, I need to know.
I know I’m making the absolute wrong decision here. But I can’t seem to stop myself.
“I’m not drunk,” he says, his nose still brushing mine, his lips centimeters away, his breath warm against my mouth. “And sometimes the best ideas are the bad ones.”
I close my eyes and lean into him, breathing in his scent as another kind of warmth fills my core, and I tilt my head so my lips catch his.
Oh, God. His lips are so soft, so warm, so inviting. He parts them, and it’s been a long, long time since I’ve kissed someone at all, let alone someone new, but it’s like riding a bicycle—if you were riding a bicycle with a partner in the middle of a tsunami, maybe.
Feelings rush through my chest, complicated ones and simple ones, new and old alike, as we both give into this kiss with abandon.
His arms tighten around me, and it’s not my best friend’s brother kissing me, but it’s this hot NFL star whose future is unsure but who I had fun with tonight as I face my own unsure future.
This man who wants to help me however he can and is nice to me and has offered me a place to stay…
Oh, right.
He offered me a place to stay.
Kissing him would complicate that.
But like he said…fuck it.
I don’t want to stop, especially not as he shifts his hips and I feel that his hardness is growing, and especially not as I rest my palms on that hard chest. I want to see the hard chest. I want to feel his muscles as they move over me.
I want his mouth on my body, not just on my mouth, but everywhere.
His mouth opens to mine, his tongue moving in, exploring, sure, and confident as it brushes mine.
I want him to quell the ache that’s forming between my legs, an ache that feels so familiar yet one that’s been absent for so, so long.
I want him to blow the dust out of there and give me a new experience, one I can dream about, even though we both know this isn’t realistic, that it would never work, but it would allow us both to just feel good for one godforsaken night.
His hands move along my torso, and I move mine from his chest to wrap around him, running my nails along his back and down to his sweet, tight ass, which I squeeze before I move my hands up again.
The kiss starts softly enough, innocently, but soon shifts into urgency. Needy. He shifts his hips again, this time thrusting toward me, making sure I can feel how hard he is. Making sure I can feel how big he is.
I can’t help but moan as I think about his cock inside of me, claiming me, giving me back something I didn’t think I’d ever get to have again.
“Fuck, Pen,” he mutters, dragging his lips along my neck just like I thought of earlier, and it feels even better than I imagined. He’s all scruffy jawline and hard muscle. “God, I want you.”
My answer is a moan. I know I should stop this, and maybe if I hadn’t had all the wine, I would.
But my body seems to have all the answers tonight, and maybe I’ll regret it in the morning, but right now, I’m not thinking about the morning.
I’m thinking about Liam Bradley’s lips on my neck.
I’m thinking about kissing him some more.
I’m thinking about how I have one night to myself to do whatever I want, and what I want is to do Liam Bradley. All night. Maybe twice.
I’m thinking about how he wants me.
God, I want you, he just said to me.
And God…I want him, too.
We’re crossing a line we shouldn’t cross, but at the same time, it feels inevitable.
“I want you, too,” I murmur.
He kisses me again, and he breaks apart from me suddenly, grabbing my hand and leading me back inside, through his house, up his stairs, and to his bedroom. He sets me down, and he says, “I’ll be right back.”
I don’t know what I expected out of Liam Bradley’s bedroom, but this wasn’t it.
I guess I was expecting a messy bachelor pad with an unmade bed and empty cereal bowls littering the nightstand and video game wires hanging all over the place, but instead, this is gorgeous.
Elegant, even, with the glossy white furniture, black curtains, and black, white, and khaki bedding.
A black leather couch sits across one wall, and a black leather recliner is in the corner.
It’s not just a bedroom. It’s a space for relaxation, play, and sex. It’s a room for a mature adult, and I guess I’ve never looked at the twenty-six-year-old younger brother of my best friend in that light.
I’m sure looking at him like that now, though.
It’s sexy and luxurious, like the man himself, apparently, and a twist of wistfulness pings through my chest that this is the only time I’m going to get to be in here.
It doesn’t have to be, a tiny voice tells me.
Yes, it does. Now shut up and let’s get to the good stuff.
I shake my head to quiet the voices, and Liam appears in the doorway. He’s a man on a mission, and he stops short of me.
He hands me the bottle of water from earlier. “You said you were drunk, and that’s why this is a bad idea. Drink.”
I follow his instructions, and it’s actually very sweet how he’s treating me. Do men like this actually exist? Or is he just being nice because I’m his sister’s friend?
I chug the bottle as he kicks off his shoes, and I do feel a bit more clear-headed after it’s empty. And the clarity is telling me that I deserve this night.
I sit on the edge of his bed, which has the softest blanket my fingers have ever touched. I reach down and pull my shoes off one at a time, and Liam walks over so he’s standing in front of me.
He reaches down to take my hands in his. “It’s okay if you don’t want this, Pen. But to be clear, I do. Very much.”
I pull to a stand, and he doesn’t budge or move back.
Our bodies are aligned in the front, though I’m several inches shorter than him than I was before now that my shoes are off.
I look up into his eyes, and I see a man looking at me with such desire, such unabashed need, that my thighs clench again, and a deep, dark ache pulses between my legs.
“I do, too,” I whisper.
He wastes no time, dropping my hands and looping one arm around my waist, setting the other on the back of my head as his mouth crashes to mine.
And then I’m lost. His tongue thrashes in my mouth, and I want it on my body.
I love kissing him, but I’m aching everywhere to take this to the next level.
I push my hips toward his to give him the hint, and he moves his hand from the back of my head and lifts me onto the bed, his mouth never moving from mine.
My skirt is in the way, but he pushes it up as he moves over me.
He can see my panties, and I have no clue what sort of random bra and panty set I chose this morning when I got dressed, but whatever it was, it’s likely old and dingy and not at all sexy since I had absolutely zero inclination that I’d end up in a pro football player’s bed by the end of the night.
If I had, maybe I would’ve done things differently…
but he doesn’t seem to mind whatever it is that I do have on, so I push the thought away.
I need to get out of my own head and just enjoy the moment. He’s enjoying it. I want that, too.
He’s hovering, teasing as he slams his hips to mine. He hitches my leg up and settles between my thighs, and I wrap both legs around his waist as his hips buck to mine.
I grow desperate, needy, as he does it again and again.
I’m moaning, panting, frantic as he pulls his mouth from mine and trails his lips down my neck, running a hand down my torso to my hip and back up again, this time landing on my breast. He massages it, and he lifts off me to pull my red sweater over my head.
It lands somewhere on the floor, and he works my bra next.
Great. I went with a faded white one this morning, basically the mom bra that’s the least sexy of them all—one of the few where the underwire hasn’t come out in the wash and still fits.
He doesn’t care, though. He just wants what’s under it.
The second the bra is off, his mouth is on my tits, and I arch back at the feel of his mouth on me.
Oh my God.
Holy shit.
It’s like a freaking wave of pleasure as he licks and sucks, pinches and bites. Was it like this before, or has sex changed? In all these years I’ve been with one man while he was out with who knows how many women…is this what I’ve been missing out on?
Because…damn.
Liam Bradley knows what the hell he’s doing, and he’s only just getting started.