Chapter 17. Haley #2
Ace opened his buckle and ripped his belt off with a crack that made my eyes glaze over and my mouth water.
“She likes that,” he said, his voice dangerously soft.
“She does.”
“Do you like this?” His hand moved between my legs, cupping me before he pushed my wet panties aside and slid two fingers inside me.
My back arched at the delicious intrusion. “Very much.”
“And this?” He thumbed my clit and my mind went quiet. All the noise disappearing as lust infused my brain.
“S’good.” I could barely get the words out as he pumped his fingers and circled my clit in teasing strokes.
“You’re so wet,” he groaned. “I want to fuck you so deep.”
“Please do. We don’t have much time. You made a very bad decision and ordered something to eat when there is plenty to eat right here.”
“Christ.” He groaned, and the desperation in his voice, the slow, steady thrust of his fingers, took me to the edge in a heartbeat. “If you keep talking like that I—”
“What?” I asked, my heart pounding in anticipation. “Tell me.”
“I’ll lose control.”
“I would pay money to see that, but since I’m almost naked and have no cash hidden on me, I can offer you this.” I took his free hand and placed it on my breast.
“I always wondered what you were hiding under your clothes.” He withdrew his other hand and squeezed both my breasts, thumbs running roughly over my nipples. “You have beautiful breasts.”
“Thank—” My words were lost in a groan as he yanked my hips forward and leaned down to take my nipple in his mouth, sucking so hard white-hot heat shot through my veins.
A delicious shudder ran through my body. I’d never been manhandled before, never been treated with such delectable roughness. The men I’d been with had been gentle and caring. I never realized until that moment that what I really wanted was to be taken, my body devoured out of blazing need.
“Maybe we should wait.” His carnal gaze as he looked me up and down made me hot all over. “I should take my time with you, give your sweet pussy the attention it deserves.”
“No waiting. Not the first time.” Some part of me was struck by the irony of a person who rarely stopped talking being rendered incapable of giving more than two- or three-word answers. “Your turn to strip.”
“Someone has to be dressed to answer the door.” He ripped off my panties and then unzipped, pulling out his cock, thick and hard and bigger than I’d ever imagined.
Unable to resist, I wrapped my hand around his length, stroking and squeezing until he groaned.
“Is this for me?” I asked as his eyes glazed over and his body shuddered.
“You’re going to get that and more if you don’t stop.” He put a gentle hand over mine and moved me away. “I want to be inside you the first time. I want to feel your hot, wet pussy around me when you come all over my cock.”
My breath hitched. “I want that, too.”
Ace rolled on a condom from his pocket. “Are you ready for me?”
“So ready.” I wrapped my legs around his hips, licking my lips in anticipation. It had been a long time. Too long.
I felt him pushing at my entrance, so big, so wide.
For a moment I thought he’d be too much, but when he pushed inside all I felt was pleasure.
I let out a shuddering breath at the sensation of being stretched and filled, bracing myself on the desk.
Me and Ace. Together at last. He pulled out and thrust again, burying himself to the hilt in one hard stroke.
“You feel so good when you take it deep.” He slammed into me, and I let out a moan as the desk banged against the wall.
“Desk,” I panted. “People.”
“I don’t give a fuck. I have wanted you for so long I don’t give a damn who hears us.
” He pounded into me, setting up a rhythm that was matched by the slam of the desk and the thud of my heart.
Everything tightened inside me as he quickened his pace, the drag of his cock against my sensitive inner walls winding me tighter and tighter.
“I want to hear you come,” he gritted out. “I want to hear what I do to you.”
“I need it rough.” I groaned. “I need you to fuck me so hard we break the desk.”
He hissed in pleasure. “I’ll give you that and more.
” Reaching between us, he circled his thumb around my clit as he ground into me, his gentle touch a contrast to the hard thrusts that slammed the desk into the wall over and over.
When we were both breathless, our skin slick with exertion, he caught my lips in a scorching kiss and pressed his thumb down firmly, sending me into a whirlpool of ecstasy that swirled through my body until I was nothing but a blaze of sensation.
With one last thrust, his cock pulsed with his own release, and a groan ripped from his throat.
“Oh my God.” I was sticky with sweat, pulse thudding, chest heaving, physically spent, and all I could think was how I wanted him again.
Save for that singular image, my mind was uncharacteristically quiet and still.
I could actually hear myself think. I could follow one thought, and it led to the man who had dropped his hands to the desk and rested his forehead against mine.
I followed the thread, and realized with hideous certainty that if I let him get too close, he might open that black box of pain inside me and set everything free.
I didn’t want to go down that road, didn’t need that emotional connection. We were compatible on a physical level. I didn’t need any more.
“That was—” A knock on the door cut him off and he quickly zipped up his pants.
“Room service.”
I jumped off the desk and made a run for the bathroom while Ace pulled his shirt over his head.
“This reminds me of the night you and Matt came home from a party, and I had sneaked Adrian Yang into the house,” I called out. “I ran naked into the washroom then, too.”
“You told Matt you were studying.”
“I didn’t lie.” I leaned out the bathroom door. “We were studying anatomy.”
We ate. We had more sexy times. Finally, we collapsed on Ace’s enormous bed. I’d only had a few hours’ sleep the night before, and that was on the floor, so my eyes closed as soon as my head hit the pillow. “No funny stuff,” I mumbled.
“There’s nothing funny about a naked Haley in my bed.” He lay on his back and pulled me across his chest, tucking my head against his shoulder. Not as soft as a pillow, but so much warmer.
“Are you going to sleep, too?”
“I’m too wound up,” he said. “Sing me one of your songs. I don’t remember hearing any of your originals in your streams.”
“I haven’t uploaded them,” I said. “They’re more of a catharsis for me. I don’t know if I could open myself up to sharing that kind of pain.”
Ace folded his hands behind his head. “So that’s what you do instead of cry?”
It took a few moments before I could answer. He saw me. He’d always seen me. He’d always known when “fine” didn’t really mean “fine” at all.
“I suppose so.” I ran my finger along the rough bristles of his jaw, and then over the mouth that had given me so much pleasure. Ace took my finger and sucked it gently between his lips. I felt the gentle pressure as a throb between my legs and suddenly I wasn’t tired anymore.
“Do you enjoy working with A-list celebrities?” I asked, moving away from the uncomfortable subject of my feelings. “What are they like?”
“Mostly they’re just lonely people,” he said.
“They can’t go out to a restaurant or a movie without everyone gawking at them or asking for an autograph, so they often just stay in or visit with other celebrities.
They can’t go out on a date in public without it being front-page news, and even if they book a private room somewhere, they’ve usually got a bodyguard or two watching over them. ”
“I can relate,” I said, smiling. “Between you and Matt, it was an effort to have a proper date.”
Puzzled, he frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Sixth grade. Jay Harris tried to kiss me behind the school, and you showed up and told me my dad needed me at home.”
“You were too young to be kissing anyone,” he grumbled.
“Seventh grade. Dev Kumar invited me to go for a walk in the woods and you and Matt just happened to show up on your bikes and decided to walk us home.”
“He wasn’t there to appreciate nature,” Ace said. “I overheard him talking to his friends.”
“High school,” I said, ignoring him. “My first real boyfriend, and yet every time I tried to be alone with him…”
“You and Dan Garcia were a disaster waiting to happen,” he bit out. “He was you but without any modicum of restraint. If Matt and I hadn’t intervened, you two would likely have wound up in some serious trouble.”
Dan Garcia was the most thrilling person I’d ever met.
He would do anything, try anything, break any rule.
His brain moved faster than mine, jumping from one crazy idea to the next—climb on the school roof at night, sled down a steep hill into a frozen river, light things on fire—he was particularly enamored of fires.
Ace was right. We weren’t good for each other, but damn he’d been a good time.
“Are you talking about the fact he was my first kiss? Do you know how much maneuvering I had to do to be alone with him? Matt’s truck didn’t break down by itself the night of the Halloween dance…”
Ace looked over, his eyes glittering in the dark. “That was you?”
“You weren’t the only one who was good with engines.” I shot him a sly look. “Dan was pretty good with his hands.”
“Don’t tell me things like that. I might have to hunt him down the next time I’m home.”
“Well, then I’d better not tell you about the first time we had sex.”
“He still lives in Riverstone,” Ace muttered, half to himself. “Janice mentioned that he’d worked on her car. He took over his dad’s auto body shop. Maybe he has an accident. Car jack fails. Electric shock. Fire…”
“I snuck him in my bedroom window,” I said smugly. “Matt thought I was all tucked safe in my bed. It made it all the sweeter.”
“God, Haley.”
“That’s what Dan said.” A smile tugged at my lips.
“I didn’t even like him that much, but he was willing to climb up the drainpipe and risk being caught by Matt, which made him worth having.
” I had been determined not to leave high school a virgin, and since the boy I’d been crushing on since I was old enough to have crushes had dumped me for Esme Duncan, I’d taken what was available and regretted it the next day.
I didn’t feel anything for Dan, and he didn’t feel anything for me.
He loved to experience things, and I’d been a new experience that he didn’t need to have again.
“I miss Matt.” The words dropped from my lips before I could stop them. I never talked about Matt, especially not the stuff that made my heart hurt, but Ace had given me a safe space to say the words that were always there. “He was a good big brother.”
Ace pressed a kiss to my forehead. “He loved you very much, bug. He was always worrying about you.”
“I tried to look after myself, so he didn’t have to,” I said.
“After Dad died and Mom got lost in her work, I just—” I drew in a shuddering breath.
“I didn’t want to lean on him too much. He put so much pressure on himself trying to be the man of the family.
I didn’t want to add to his burden. I didn’t tell him when I was sad or scared or lonely. I let him think everything was fine.”
“He would have been there for you if you’d let him,” Ace said. “He was there for me. Just like you were there for me that day at the creek after your dad died.”
“You cried,” I said softly. “I didn’t realize how much you cared for my dad until that afternoon. And I didn’t know that people like you cried.”
“People like me?”
“Strong and steady. So calm and in control. You seemed a lot older than fifteen. Nothing ever seemed to bother you.”
Ace laughed. “That’s what Matt said about you, when I told him you weren’t acting like yourself after the funeral.
I realized that afternoon that I’d never seen you cry.
No matter what happened you were always cheerful and upbeat.
You never stayed angry with anyone. You’d sulk a bit when your parents scolded you, but then minutes later, you’d be laughing and joking again.
Matt said you didn’t feel things the way other people felt them, and they just bounced off you like water off a duck’s back. ”
“I feel things,” I said. “But he was partly right. I keep those strong emotions buried deep inside.”
“You could have let them out that day at the creek with me,” he said. “I wouldn’t have judged you.”
“I know.” I leaned up to kiss his cheek before closing my eyes as sleep pulled me under. “But the tears wouldn’t come.”