8. With Me, You Follow
With Me, You Follow
JULIETTE
The flap hadn't fully closed behind us before his hands were on me again.
Certain. Unapologetic. Nick backed me against the timber framing beside the canvas opening, the entry flap falling closed behind us with a quiet finality. His palms pinned my hips there, fingers pressing hard enough that I’d feel the ghost of them tomorrow.
Good. Let it show.
"You talk like a woman who’s used to being the smartest person in the room. I want to see if you're as smart when you can't breathe."
"Is that a threat, Nick?"
"It’s a forecast." His teeth grazed my pulse point. Not quite a bite. A promise of one. "You've been in control of every boardroom, every negotiation, every man who's ever underestimated you."
"Yes."
"Not with me." His hand slid up my ribs, palm flat against the thin cotton. "With me, you follow."
My breath stalled. The tension I’d been holding along my spine finally released. And he was telling me I could set the armor down.
“Say it,” he ordered.
“I follow.”
His eyes closed for half a second, and the sound he made was rough, almost pained. “Good.”
Then his mouth was on mine, and any pretense of restraint dissolved.
This wasn't the kiss from outside. That had been a question, an exploration, a crack in the door.
This was a demand. His tongue didn't ask—it invaded, steady and methodical, like he was mapping out a route he intended to take again and again.
I let him have it, my fingers twisting into the fabric of his shirt because I needed one solid point to hold onto while the rest of me went liquid.
Nick broke the kiss just long enough to unholster his sidearm. He set it on the table by the entrance without looking, the movement automatic.
Then his hands found the hem of my tank top, pulling it over my head in one smooth motion.
It hit the floor somewhere in the dark. The overhead fans caught the movement, pushing a slow, humid weight of air across my skin.
And then his mouth was on my shoulder, trailing down to the hollow of my throat, lower still.
“No bra,” he said, as if he’d logged the fact earlier and shown heroic restraint until the leopard cleared the area. His thumb brushed over my nipple, already tightened to a peak. “Bold choice for a leopard hunt.”
"I wasn't expecting company."
"Liar." But approval roughened the word before his head dipped to take me into his mouth.
The heat of it—wet, insistent, his tongue circling with ruthless patience—sent a jolt straight through me. My head thunked back against the timber frame. He hummed against my skin, a low vibration that traveled nerve to nerve, and his free hand gripped my hip hard enough to bruise.
"Nick—"
"I've got you." His teeth scraped lightly over my nipple, and I gasped. "You're going to let me take care of this. Take care of you. Understand?"
I nodded, not trusting my voice.
His eyes lifted to mine, dark and serious in the dim lantern light.
"Words."
"Yes. I understand."
A dark satisfaction flickered in his expression. Approval, maybe. Or hunger. They looked the same on him.
“That’s it,” he said, low enough to make my pulse misbehave.
He straightened and stripped off his shirt in one clean motion.
For the first time, the glimpses of ink I’d collected became the full picture.
He was a ledger of everywhere he’d been and everything he’d survived, and I wanted to read the ink with my teeth.
My eyes tracked the lines wrapping his biceps and disappearing beneath the hard slope of his collarbone.
A compass rose over his heart. Coordinates along his ribs. A knife blade down his oblique.
He let me look. Watched me looking with an intensity that made my skin flush.
"You're staring," he said.
"You're a lot."
"I haven't even started."
My laugh was unsteady. "Confident."
"Observant." He stepped into my space again, one arm hooking around my waist to pull me flush against him. Skin to skin now, his heat immediate. “You lean left when you’re tired. Your breathing changes when you see me. And your chin comes up when you’re nervous. Not afraid. Nervous. ”
His grip didn’t loosen.
“I can read tracks. Patterns. That’s the job.”
His gaze held mine. “But you?”
A slight shake of his head.
“You’d still surprise me.”
My throat went dry. "You were supposed to be focused on the animals."
"I was." His mouth found the curve of my ear. "You're the only thing out here I can't predict."
The elephant would like a word.
I wanted a clever answer, one sharp enough to keep the balance between us even. But his hand had slid lower, palming my ass through my shorts, and my brain had stopped forwarding calls.
He must have felt the shift because he smiled against my skin. A real smile, one I'd never seen from him. It changed his whole face.
"There it is," he murmured. "There's the woman who's been hiding behind the CEO."
"I'm not hiding."
"You're not talking, either." His fingers curled into my waistband. "I want to hear you. Every sound. Can you do that for me?"
I could have said no. Could have flipped the dynamic, reclaimed control, reminded him who I was in every other context. But that was the point, wasn't it?
This wasn't every other context.
This was his world.
And the strange, quiet relief of it softened the ache beneath my sternum.
For once, I wanted to stop being the one in charge.
"Yes," I whispered.
His gaze darkened, and his breath left him in a slow, controlled rush.
“There you are.”
He rewarded me by dropping to his knees. The sight of him there—broad shoulders, ink-dark skin—was a physical weight in the room. He didn’t look like a man surrendering. He looked like a hunter settling into his vantage, eyes steady and perfectly positioned to take exactly what he wanted.
Steady, Jules.
His hands hooked into my waistband and pulled. The shorts slid down my thighs, my calves, pooling at my ankles. I stepped out of them, and he tossed them aside without looking.
For a moment, he just looked at me, attention climbing my body inch by inch. "No underwear either," he observed. "You really weren't expecting company."
"I don't like lines."
His eyes glittered. "Good. Neither do I."
He leaned forward, and his mouth found the inside of my thigh. A kiss. Then another, higher. His stubble scraped against sensitive skin, and I shuddered, my hands grabbing for the frame, his shoulder—anything to anchor myself.
He took his time. Worked his way up one thigh, then the other, leaving a trail of heat and damp. When he reached the apex, he paused. Breathed against me. Waited.
"Nick." My voice broke on the syllable. "Please."
"Please what?"
I couldn't form the words. Couldn't articulate what I needed when I barely understood it myself. I just knew that if he didn't touch me, didn't end this exquisite torture, I might actually fracture.
He seemed to understand anyway.
His mouth found me, and I stopped thinking entirely.
The first stroke of his tongue was devastating. Slow, deliberate, like he was memorizing the taste of me. No one had ever taken their time with me like this. His hands gripped my thighs, holding me open, holding me steady, while he worked me with the same focus he'd used to track that leopard.
I was going to come apart. Right here, against this frame, with my fingers twisted in his hair and his name falling from my lips as everything inside me gave in.
He sensed it. Of course he did. He pulled back just before the edge, and I whimpered—actually whimpered—at the loss.
“Not yet.” He rose to his feet, and I could see the strain in his jaw, the way his hands flexed once before going still. He was holding himself back. For me. “Bed.”
It wasn't a question.
He swept me up like I weighed nothing—one arm under my knees, the other around my back—and carried me through the suite.
The space was dark, but enough moonlight filtered through the canvas seems to paint everything in silver and shadow.
He laid me on the bed with more care than I expected, then straightened to look at me.
I'd never felt so exposed. Or so powerful.
"Your turn," I said, pushing up on my elbows. "You're wearing too many clothes."
He didn't move. "I'm wearing exactly what I need to be wearing."
"Which is?"
His hands went to his belt. The slow slide of leather through khaki was obscene. He pulled it free in one long movement, the sound sharp in the quiet room. Then his fly.
When he pushed his pants down, I forgot to breathe.
He was beautiful. Not in the way of the men I'd known before—polished, groomed, soft in all the places that mattered.
Nick was carved. Every muscle defined, every line purposeful.
The tattoos continued below his waist, wrapping around his hips, trailing down his thighs.
And between them, his cock was hard, thick, demanding attention.
He didn't rush. Let me look my fill, the same way he'd let me look at his chest. When my eyes finally met his again, he was watching me with that same intense focus.
"Last chance," he said. "To tell me this is a mistake."
Oh, baby. That ship has sailed.
"Probably still is."
"I've spent two days trying not to break you, Juliette." His voice was rough. "If I get in that bed, I'm stopping the act. I’m going to be heavy, and I’m going to be rough, and I need you to tell me right now if that’s going to be a problem."
I sat up slowly. Reached for him. Wrapped my hand around his length and watched his eyes go dark.
"I want that," I said. "I want you. However you need to take me."
He swore—a single, bitten-off word—and then he was on the bed, over me, around me, his weight a grounding force that pressed me into the mattress. His mouth found mine, and the kiss was bruising, claiming, everything I'd asked for.
His hand slid between us, fingers finding me wet and ready. He groaned against my mouth.
"So responsive," he murmured. "So fucking perfect like this. You have no idea what you do to me."
I arched into his touch, needing more. He gave it—two fingers sliding inside me while his thumb circled my clit with merciless control. The pressure built again, faster this time, and I clutched at his shoulders, his back, anywhere I could reach.
"Nick—I'm close—"
Control is officially gone.
"I know." His fingers curled, finding the pulse point that sent a violent, silver heat straight to my throat. "Come for me. Now."
The command broke me. I shattered beneath him, crying out, my body tightening and releasing in waves that seemed to go on forever. He rode it out with me, his fingers working me through every aftershock, until I was boneless and gasping beneath him.
“That’s it,” he said, voice rough against my throat. “Good girl.”
Only then did he withdraw. Only then did he position himself above me, the head of his cock pressing against my entrance.
And stop.
I blinked up at him, still caught in the haze of my release. "What—"
"I don't have anything." His voice was strained, the control visibly costing him. "I didn't plan this. I never—" He closed his eyes, a muscle jumping in his jaw. "Tell me you're covered. Please tell me you're covered."
It took a second to understand. When I did, relief flooded through me.
"I’m covered. Birth control. And I’m clear. Haven't been with anyone in—" I shook my head. "It doesn't matter."
His eyes opened. Relief moved through them first, followed by a darker kind of heat.
“Clear on my end.”
"Then what are you waiting for?"
"This." He reached down, aligned himself again. “You needed the choice. No secrets, Juliette. Not tonight.”
I understood. In his world, in his job, information was survival. And he was giving me all of his.
"No secrets," I agreed.
He pushed inside me in one slow, inexorable movement.
The stretch was everything—fullness and heat and the sharp pleasure of being filled so completely. I gasped, my fingers locking around his biceps, and he stilled, giving me time to adjust. His forehead pressed to mine, his breathing ragged.
"Okay?" he managed.
"More than okay." I shifted my hips experimentally, and we both groaned. "Move. Please."
He did.
The first few strokes were controlled, measured, like he was still trying to protect me from the full force of him. But I didn't want protection. I wanted him—all of him, the parts he kept locked down behind that professional exterior, the parts that only came out in the dark.
"Harder," I demanded.
His eyes flashed. "Yeah?"
"God, yes."
He gave me what I asked for.
The rhythm changed, deepened, became something primal.
He drove into me with a force that rocked the bed, that made me cry out with every thrust. His hand found my throat—not squeezing, just resting there, a reminder of who was in control.
I let my head fall back, offered him the vulnerable line of my neck, and he took it.
His mouth closed over my pulse point, sucking hard enough to leave a mark.
"More," I heard myself say. The word didn't sound like it belonged to me—this raw, desperate version of my voice. But it was mine. All mine.
God help me.
Nick responded by hooking an arm under my knee, bending me nearly in half.
The new angle made me gasp, made him sink deeper than I thought possible.
His rhythm didn't falter. If anything, it intensified, each stroke driving me higher, closer to an edge I couldn't see but could feel approaching like a wave in the dark.
"Look at me," he ordered.
I forced my eyes open. Found his in the moonlight.
"I want you to see who makes you come." His voice was gravel and heat. "I want you to remember this. Remember me."
As if I could forget. As if any part of me would ever be the same after this.
My release broke through me without warning, a hard, blinding pulse that left me gasping. I cried out his name, or tried to. It came out broken, fragmented, lost in the sound of my own shattered breathing. My body gripped him hard, and he groaned, a sound torn from somewhere deep.
"That's it," he gritted out. "That's—fuck, Juliette—"
He surrendered to the fall. I felt the sudden, violent tension in his spine, his hips locking against mine as he found his own release. He didn't break; he simply anchored himself to me, his weight a steady, grounding force.
For a long moment, neither of us moved. The only sound was the slow, even sweep of the bamboo fans overhead as the air slowly began to cool against our skin.
Eventually, he shifted to the mattress beside me, one arm heavy across my stomach, his face turned into the pillow. His breathing remained ragged, a slow, uneven match to my own.
We lay like that until the world stopped spinning.