“It did.” A rush of static, then a silence. “But her kid is still dead. She just knows it now for sure. So that sucks really fucking hard.”

  12

  I’d been there, more than a couple times. Sometimes you’d go out on missions with good guys and sometimes you’d come back and they wouldn’t. I’d been at more than my fair share of spouses’ doors, telling them they’d been widowed. It was a shit job, but someone had to do it, out of respect for the dead and those they left behind.

  “Yeah,” I said after another pause, then thought what the hell and went for it. “Do you want cheering up?”

  I meant taking her out somewhere for a drink or something, but when she answered with her address and hung up, I wasn’t about to bitch.

  ***

  She opened her door wearing a smirk and a Fugue State Five T-shirt that barely covered her ass.

  My fingers dug into the leather jacket I had slung over one shoulder. “I’m not his fucking substitute.”

  In one fluid move, she peeled off the shirt, pitching it to the ground. Venus in a green push up and matching bikini briefs. “Just making sure I wasn’t either.”

  I laughed and kicked the door closed behind me. “No danger of that.”

  Leonie sucked on her bottom lip. Watching. Waiting for me to make the first move.

  I ran my thumb up her wrist, her chocolate eyes molten as she tracked the motion. When I reached the velvet-smooth inside of her elbow, she squeezed my hand and I tensed, thinking she would drop my hand and move away but, she gave a husky laugh that half-caught in the back of her throat.

  The way that sound hooked into me, I should have taken it for a warning, not a signal to finally cave and let her hair fall through my fingers. The strands rippled like a river, cascading

  13

  over my skin, mesmerizing me. Then I fisted her hair, tilted her head, and sucked on the hollow of her neck.

  Rising onto tiptoe, she arched against me with a wanton moan, curling her fingers into my belt loops.

  The fraction of an inch I put between our bodies might as well have been a mile for the effort it took. “Ladies first.”

  She laughed. “You like to torture yourself?”

  I smiled, but she had no idea.

  I led her to the sofa. Sitting lengthwise, one leg stretched out along the cushions, the other foot on the floor, I tucked her against me, back to chest, suckling and nibbling on the creamy line of her shoulder.

  Leonie swept her hair out of the way to give me better access. Her hand splayed on my thigh when I nipped the hollow of her neck and she melted into me.

  I loved the puzzle that each woman’s body presented. Loved unearthing their secret desires and controlling their pleasure. Taking them from zero to sixty. These first strokes of my hand across Leonie’s softly rounded belly was the lightest touch; the brush across her nipple, the gentlest tweak. Still, she was so petite, I was worried that I’d hurt her.

  “Drio.” She half-twisted around. Dark lashes swept her cheek, her eyes huge under half-closed lids. “Don’t hold back.”

  I laughed, just the kind of throaty growl they all liked to hear. “I’m not.”

  But Leonie didn’t flutter her eyelashes and toss her hair, which was the usual response that got. She just huffed a soft laugh and straddled me. “Yeah. You are.”

  14

  She leaned in and I shook my head. “Sorry, bella. I don’t kiss.” The words left an ashy taste in my mouth for the first time ever.

  Something flashed in the depths of her eyes. Not hurt. Pity? I wasn’t a charity case. I swung my other leg onto the floor, but Leonie pushed me back with a hand to my chest, brushing her nose against mine.

  “Plenty of other things we can do.” She rocked against my erection. I might still have bailed, except she placed my hands on her tits, forcing my palms to grind against her. Heat poured off of her, infusing my soul, and blunting the edges after a day being so angry and so alone. With Leonie, skin on skin became a comfort I hungered for.

  She was like a siren, sliding over me, all supple curves and soft warmth, her faint floral perfume weaving through my senses like a net drawing me in.

  I wanted to mark her. Bruise her skin with my lips, thread pleasure with pain. I wouldn’t.

  I was the perfect gentleman in bed. Containing the darkness, letting it cut only me, was my private ongoing damnation. I waited for the day it finally sliced me open, bleeding me out.

  “Calmati.” My control was hanging on by a thread.

  Leonie unclasped her bra, letting it dangle for a second, before dropping it to the floor.

  With a growl, I pushed her onto her back, sucking her tit into my mouth. I didn’t unleash the full weight of my desire on her; I wouldn’t, because neither of us would survive it, but I loosened my iron control a fraction.

  I wrapped my arms around her waist, gently sucking the sweet curve of her hip. She arched against me, her fingers threading through my hair. I sucked harder, scraping my teeth against her skin, checking that her low cries and writhing stemmed from arousal and passion and not anything distressing.

  15

  I couldn’t say whose groan it was that stuttered along my spine and took root in my dick, now pulled hard and tight against my stomach.

  Gripping her wrists with one hand and holding them above her head, I teased her nipples into stiffened peaks, licked into the hollows of her collarbone.

  “More.” Her command was a growled drawl.

  I skipped one finger against the lace waistband of her underwear. “Like what?” My hair fell forward into my eyes, all my focus on the rippling of her abs as I ghosted that finger back and forth across her waist before finally sliding it between the lace and her skin, flexing my fingers against her stomach.

  “Bastard. Stop teasing.”

  Slowly, deliberately, I removed my hand.

  “Don’t you even–” She dragged in a shaky breath, her head falling back as I trailed kisses and tiny nips down the length of her body.

  Making short work of the bikini briefs, I had to stop a moment and take her in. I wanted to map out the freckles along her left hip, learn how hard her thighs could squeeze when wrapped around my waist, spend hours savoring the minute differences in taste and scent over every inch of her. “Bellissima.”

  She blushed, pink tingeing across her body in a soft wash. “Aren’t you going to get undressed?”

  “No.” I nudged her knees apart, trailing my lips up the curve of her thigh. “That okay?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  I chuckled at her high-pitched agreement. “Natural redhead, huh?” A raw heat pooled low in my gut. I ran my finger over her clit, Leonie growing breathless and frantic.

  16

  Not as frantic as how badly I wanted to taste her. My dick strained against my zipper.

  I slid my hands down her hips, pinning her thighs open, and licked her engorged clit.

  Leonie bucked her hips. “Yes.”

  A ragged groan escaped me. An asteroid hit couldn’t have stopped me from feasting on her. I slid one finger inside of her. Over and over, I licked into her, gripping her thighs, one finger thrusting.

  Her cries of my name were the only thing anchoring me to reality.

  That and my determination not to come in my jeans. If she hadn’t orgasmed then with a sharp buck of her hips, her thighs tensing and her cunt muscles spasming, I might have lost that resolution.

  I pulled my finger out of her, and, my eyes locked on hers, sucked on it.

  Leonie hissed, her eyes fully dilating once more.

  I don’t know who was breathing harder, but the satisfied lopsided grin she bestowed on me made all exertion worth it. I forced air into my lungs. Repeats were not how I rolled, and the fact that I wanted to spend the night and see how many more times I could make her lose her mind and earn that look was the only kick in the ass I needed.

  I pulled a knit blanket that was draped over the back of the sofa onto her. “Relax. I’ll let myself out.” I was already on my feet, making my escape, my back to her.

  The cushions rustled and she padded up behind me. “I’ll walk you out. It’s the least I can do.”

  Seeing her with her hair tumbled about her shoulders, a feline smile on her face, and the blanket barely hiding her naked body, I almost didn’t make it out the door.

  17

  There was a moment of hesitation where I worried things might get weird. I opened my mouth to say one of the bullshit lines I gave women at this point to leave them in a good mood, but Leonie spoke first.

  “Don’t tell Nava, okay?”

  I blinked. The fuck? “No problem. I leave for Rome in a couple of days anyway.” That ace up my sleeve in case she’d wanted to see me again was supposed to elicit a frown or a pout, not make her nod, clearly relieved, making me wish I’d said something else.

  “Have a great trip.” She held the door open for me.

  I stepped into the hallway, then turned back to say something, but she’d already shut the door.

  I narrowed my eyes at it. Oh bella, I may have been going to Rome but I was definitely coming back.

  Copyright: 2017 Deborah Wilde

  Cover Design: Mercurial Forte

 

 

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