ARRANGED

by R. K. Lilley

  “What the fuck?” he panted in a rough, agitated voice.

  He held me up with a strong hand fanned out against my belly, and he kept me prone like that, buried deep while he emptied himself with drawn out spasms.

  It went on for quite a while. He savored his climax to the very last drop. “Worth every penny,” he muttered into my ear at the end, like he hated it, but not nearly as much as he loved it.

  My body was confused about what was happening to it. I was coming down from the high of my climax, a little mortified at my wanton response to him, a part of me had definitely gone a little numb, and in spite of all that I was still turned on.

  When he was finally finished, he dragged himself out of me.

  I sucked in a breath at the sensation of that slow, slick pull.

  He finally tugged himself free. There was a wet little pop as my cunt reluctantly let go of his broad tip.

  A second later his palm left my belly, and I felt his heavy form shift away and leave the bed.

  I held my own weight for maybe three seconds before I collapsed. I was boneless. Used up. Spent. I didn’t think I had an ounce of energy left in my body.

  I don’t know what he did after that. I fell asleep straight away.

  CHAPTER

  EIGHTEEN

  CALDER

  I woke up with a raging hangover and a relentless hard-on. What the hell?

  I didn’t even know where I was.

  Oh, wait. Yes, I did.

  In my wife’s bed. I’d caved in and gone to her the night before.

  So many excuses had led me here. I’d lasted exactly two hours from the time I dropped her off to when I broke. Refusal turned to denial which led quickly into empty justifications.

  The fact was that I’d wanted her more than I cared about my reasons for hating her. I’d needed to fuck her. Needed it.

  So I’d changed my mind. Twisted all of my rationalizations. This might be a travesty of a marriage, but there was no reason I couldn’t make the best of it. I’d use her body however I pleased and keep hating her, I told myself. Maybe I’d get lucky and she’d fall in love with me so I could break her money-loving heart.

  Even I knew it was an empty excuse. I used it anyway. Anything to bury myself inside her for a few hours. And if that wasn’t bad enough I’d actually allowed myself to stay the night. My father would be unbearably smug when he heard.

  It was untenable but I should’ve been used to the feeling. Lately my whole life was untenable.

  Two years ago I was on top of the world. I was independently wealthy. I was happy. I was a romantic. I thought love conquered all. I thought love existed.

  And then everything had changed. A few unfortunate happenings caused it, but all that mattered were the results—I lost everything of value in my life.

  My business went belly up. My father disinherited me. The love of my life married another man. In that order.

  The result? I’d become hardhearted. A cynic. And there was nothing I hated more than a fortune-hunting female.

  Except perhaps my father for leveraging me into marrying one.

  And now I was sleeping with her without any coercion whatsoever. And this wouldn’t be the last time. I knew it in my gut. I hadn’t had enough of her. Not even close.

  Still, I tried to rally. I swore to myself I’d leave right away.

  Right away after some aspirin, coffee, and one more quick orgasm.

  Reluctantly I turned my head, taking in my first sight of my wife in the morning light.

  It wasn’t a smart thing to do. I should have just walked away without looking back.

  It was very early, but she’d left the blinds open completely and the morning sun was just peeking in with streaks of sunrise.

  She was lying on her stomach, nude from when I’d undressed her the night before. Her hair was a silky tangle of tawny blonde waves that covered most of her shoulders and half of her face. That face was turned to me, innocent in slumber and flawless in the dawn light. I’d never seen her without makeup on before. Her skin was smooth and perfect and pore-less as a babe. She looked like the crossover child of a Victoria’s Secret model and a Disney princess. It was an intriguing, unsettling, stirring combination, to say the least.

  So clean and so dirty. So innocent and so tremendously, immeasurably fuckable.

  Moreover, I’d never seen her face relaxed, without artifice or guile. It was shocking. It was fascinating. I wanted to brush all the hair away and study her at my leisure. Every inch of her, inside and out. I wanted to ferret out all of her secrets. I wanted to know what made her tick.

  It made no sense. I knew all I needed to already. She was a gold digger. The most predictable creature on earth. She shouldn’t have interested me in the least.

  But I’d be damned if I wasn’t absolutely fascinated. Fascinated and disgusted. Disgusted enough that even when she looked this innocent I wanted to lash out at her.

  I wanted to hurt her. I wanted to fuck her silly. I knew I’d do both, but for the life of me I couldn’t manage to do it in that order.

  I slowly slid the sheet off her, running my hand along her back as I did so. She stirred but didn’t wake. Her silky skin curved into my palm as it skimmed her, like a cat seeking firmer contact. My little pet bride.

  When she was uncovered, I ran my hand over her back again. She sighed contentedly in her sleep.

  I throbbed. When my palm cupped her ass, it perked right up into the air. I fingered her cunt. Her legs shifted, letting me in. She was soft and ready. Warm and wet.

  I could count with my fingers the times I’d gotten her off, but it was already too much. Excessive. I’d gone too far.

  I had trained her too well. She caught fire when I touched her now. She was my creature. I made that.

  I loved it and resented the hell out of her for it.

  I used two fingers to get her off. I watched her face while I did it. Watched it go from slumber, to waking, to the wonder of orgasm.

  It was an addictive thing to witness. Distracting. The sort of thing that diverted you from your day’s plans.

  Your life’s plans.

  Our eyes were locked together. I was sucking my fingers clean, wondering if I could hold back long enough to get her off again before I shoved myself balls deep into her cunt. It was an unforgettable moment.

  And our door opened.

  No knock. No warning at all.

  A small, middle-aged woman with a tight, hard expression on her face walked right in as though it were the most natural thing in the world.

  I stared. She was vaguely familiar looking. I was so shocked at the intrusion that I didn’t react at first. I just stared.

  The baffling woman glared at my wife.

  Glared. At my wife.

  “There’s no time for you to be a sloth this morning, Noura,” she said with strident disdain. “You’re an hour late. Out of bed, lazy girl. It’s weigh-in day.”

  My stunned gaze swung to my wife. How would she react to this strange, awful woman?

  To my chagrin she didn’t. Or rather, she did. She rose without a word and obeyed the older woman.

  I was distracted watching her bare ass move from the bed to the bathroom. The terrible woman followed her.

  When they were out of my sight, I shook my head. Hard. Twice. What the fuck?

  I got up, wrapped the sheet around my waist, and followed them.

  My wife was standing naked on a scale. The woman was glaring down at it.

  “Up two pounds?” she was saying coldly. “Must have been quite a night. Hope it was worth it for you. Looks like you’ll be skipping breakfast. No milk in your coffee either.”

  My gaze flew to my wife. Her face was utterly stoic. And for some unfathomable reason, she didn’t speak one word of protest.

  Why wasn’t she putting this shrew in her place? Well, if she wouldn’t . . .

  “What the fuck are you doing?” I burst out at the stranger. “Who do you think you are, talking to her
like that?”

  “Excuse me, Mr. Castelo,” she spoke to me in a completely different tone. Her very demeanor changed. “I’m Asha. The handler. Just doing my job.”

  “Well, you better rethink how you’re doing it.”

  “How so, sir?”

  I didn’t even know where to begin.

  Wait. Yes, I did.

  “Get. Out. Of. Our. Room. And do not enter it again. Without. Knocking!”

  For her part she reacted quickly enough to suit even me in that moment.

  I threw on my clothes from the night before and went on a bit of a tear, going through the apartment, gathering my wife’s entire staff.

  Strangely, a teenaged girl was in the mix. She was studying me coldly, like I was the one who didn’t belong in my wife’s apartment.

  I ignored her, focusing on Noura’s team: Asha, the loud handler. Chester, the too-friendly, eyes too warm on my wife security. Vincent, the quiet driver.

  I went on a tangent, laying out some ground rules that I thought should have been pretty fucking obvious.

  “Don’t walk into our bedroom without knocking. Ever. In fact, stay out of our bedroom alto-fucking-gether.”

  That was for all of them.

  “Don’t raise your voice to my wife. In fact, don’t even think of speaking to her with an ounce of disrespect in your tone. Don’t so much as look at her fucking funny. Noura’s the one in charge here. No one else.” I glared at Asha all throughout this part of my rant. It was for her. “And if I hear that you’ve been telling her what to eat—that you’ve been telling her not to eat.” I had to collect my temper before continuing. “So help me God, there will be hell to pay!”

  Mouthy Asha didn’t have a thing to say to that.

  “Is all of that crystal fucking clear?” I asked, making solid eye contact with each of them.

  Why was the teenager grinning like a loon now? I ignored her again.

  Asha’s eyes snapped at me, but she didn’t hesitate. “Yes, sir,” she replied firmly.

  “Crystal,” Chester drawled. He was clearly holding in a smirk.

  “Certainly,” Vincent agreed cheerfully.

  I left them without another word, returning to my wife’s quarters.

  CHAPTER

  NINETEEN

  Noura was just stepping out of the shower, toweling herself off. So clean. Not for long. I watched her for a time, wondering why she had nothing to say.

  Finally I broke out with, “Why’d you let her treat you like that?”

  She shrugged. It drew my eyes down to her barely covered, edible tits. “That’s just how she is. I was too tired to fight her today. Besides, I’m supposed to listen to her. It’s part of the arrangement.”

  “Fuck the arrangement,” I said succinctly. “No one gets to tell you what to do. Certainly not her.”

  She raised her perfect brows at that. Insolent, succulent little piece.

  “I mean it,” I stressed. “You’re a Castelo. Don’t take any shit from her. Don’t take that kind of shit from anyone.”

  “Except you.”

  I glared. She may have had some sort of a point, but as far as I was concerned it was irrelevant to the conversation. “You don’t have to take orders from her. Consider whatever that was stricken from the arrangement, okay?”

  She didn’t smile at me. God forbid. But her face did soften into something so warm I could barely stand to look at her. “We don’t have to be enemies, you know,” she said with quiet solemnity. “There’s no reason we can’t be civil to each other. Pleasant, even. I’m game if you are. Truce?”

  A peace offering. It would have been sweet if I didn’t despise the very idea of her. And worse and even more despicable, the need I felt building in my blood for her.

  No. No. No. No. I wasn’t parting ways with this grudge. I’d hold onto it for the rest of our lives if I couldn’t find a way to be rid of her sooner.

  Instead of answering, I moved closer. I grabbed her chin and studied her face. “I’m not used to seeing you without makeup,” I told her. “I don’t like it.” (A lie.) How was she even more beautiful like this? She dazzled me. “You look too young,” I added. (The truth.)

  She raised her face to me, tempting me to take her mouth in a kiss. I resisted. “I’ll take that as a no.” She sounded almost sad.

  “No truce,” I agreed, taking off her towel. I lifted her onto the closest counter, parting her thighs.

  I’d infuriated her and I liked it that way. I wanted her hot and furious.

  I didn’t undress. I just took out my dick and started fucking her like my life depended on it. Because it did. If I couldn’t rut my need out inside of her Right—Oh. This. God. Second. Yes—I was convinced I’d die on the spot.

  She raised her lips to mine for a kiss but I managed to resist, turning my face away.

  Instead I bent down to suck on a pebbled, perky nipple.

  “You’re so cold,” she told me in a ragged breath.

  I ran my mouth up her collar, along her throat. “Are you kidding me?” I rasped into her ear. The words weren’t voluntary. They were torn from me. “I’m on fire.”

  I pulled back to watch her face as she started to come, but I couldn’t take it. I didn’t want that between us, that unspoken intimacy. I rallied myself to pull out and turn her around, but I didn’t even manage that. The best I accomplished was to bury my face in her neck so I didn’t have to see her gorgeous eyes while I shot my load deep inside her fortune-hunting cunt.

  I stayed there until I was sure she’d milked out every last drop. Betraying every stubborn principle I had never felt so good.

  When I finally pulled out, I didn’t look at her face.

  She didn’t join me in the shower, and I was relieved. She stepped in after I stepped out, and I was still maintaining my self-control well enough not to look at her.

  “Do I have a change of clothes somewhere in this place?” I asked her blandly.

  “There’s a rack of men’s clothes in the closet. I suppose we can assume they’re meant for you.” Her tone was even blander than mine, the brat. I almost joined her in the shower just to slap her lightly on the ass for that bit of sass, but resisted. If I so much as touched her again, we wouldn’t be leaving for some time.

  I caught her just toweling off again when I exited the closet. I managed not to look again, point for me. “Who’s the teenager?” I asked her.

  “Another model. She needed a room . . . temporarily. I have extra room, so I offered.”

  I looked her way at that. She was still toweling off. Why was it taking her so long to get dry? Maybe she needed my help? I shook off the thought.

  “This isn’t some child model halfway house,” I said sternly. I was determined to regain the control I lost every time I got my dick wet inside her.

  “I’m aware of that,” she said with unfathomable calmness. It heated my blood. I had an almost uncontrollable urge to shake up that calm. I stared at her lips, remembering how they felt wrapped around my shaft.

  “Send her back to her parents,” I ordered.

  “Not everyone has parents, Calder.”

  I blinked, trying to focus on the subject at hand. “She’s an orphan?”

  “She’s emancipated. It’s complicated. I have an extra room. She doesn’t cause any problems. She’s a kid, she needs me, and I like having her around.”

  I stared at her. “You’ve adopted a teenager?”

  Did she just roll her eyes at me? And. How far would they roll back with my cock rammed down her throat?

  “Please,” she uttered.

  I liked that word on her lips. “Say that again,” I rasped.

  She glared at me. I liked that too. “Please,” she gritted out.

  I grinned. “Aren’t you a bit young to be someone’s mommy?”

  That lit a challenging, almost smug look in her eyes. I knew it meant she was about to goad me in some kind of way. “We’re friends. She’s only a few years younger than me. Actually, she�
��s a lot closer to my age than you are.”

  Gorgeous little brat. It worked. Point to her.

  Abruptly, I dropped the subject and left the room.

  There was no food being prepared in the kitchen. I took up the job myself. No breakfast my ass.

  I’d make sure she ate something decent (only because I knew she wouldn’t eat if I didn’t) and then I swore to myself that I was outta here.

  The rest of my wife’s team had gone back into their holes.

  All that was left was a teenaged model drinking coffee and watching me like I was her favorite TV program.

  I studied the contents of the refrigerator. At least it was adequately stocked.

  “Does she like omelets?” I asked the girl.

  “I have no idea,” she answered. “We don’t really have breakfast around here.”

  “So I’ve heard. We’re having it today.”

  “I’m Jovie,” she told me cheerfully.

  “Banks,” I responded automatically. Everyone had always called me by my middle name. Everyone except my wife. Why did that realization make me flinch all of a sudden?

  “So are you like living here or something now?” she asked bluntly.

  I sent our bold little houseguest a flat stare. “Are you?” I returned.

  “Yep,” she answered without hesitation. “I’m your wife’s roommate,” she added with incorrigible sass. “And her bestie. We’ve been inseparable since we met.”

  I felt a pang of something unpleasant move through me. Jealousy, thick and bitter, shifted around inside of me, making itself right at home. It settled deep, lodging itself down into my gut. I knew the emotion, but I wasn’t certain of the why of it here. I couldn’t possibly be resentful that my wife had a friend. Even I wasn’t that much of a bastard, right?

  I was dishing up the first omelet when my wife walked up to the bar that looked into the kitchen. I placed it in front of her, trying not to take in the sight of her in more than the smallest bites.