by Naima Simone
Desperate and coming undone, she settled her heels on the edge of the bed, widening her thighs and grinding into his relentless mouth. Electrical currents danced up and down her spine, and for a moment, she feared the power of this looming orgasm. Even as the pleasure swelled, she mentally scrambled back from it. Both wanting it to break and fearing the breaking.
But Ezekiel didn’t grant her any quarter. He slid a finger and then another through her folds, then slowly pushed them inside her. Her sex immediately clamped down on them, and she cried out, arching hard, her hips twisting, bearing down. Pleading for more of that invasion. That fulfillment. Again, her mind whispered too much, but this time she didn’t run from it but embraced it. She worked her hips, sexing his fingers even as she pushed into his mouth.
More. More. More.
“Take it then, sweetheart,” Ezekiel encouraged her, and she realized she’d chanted the demand aloud. “Give it to me.”
His urging and the stroking of his fingertips over a place high and deep inside her catapulted her into orgasm. She exploded, her cries bouncing off the walls, and he didn’t stop, not until she weakly pushed at his head, her flesh too sensitive.
Lethargy rolled over her in a wave, and she sprawled on the mattress, unable to move. She could only stare as Ezekiel surged to his feet and quickly stripped himself of his remaining clothes.
Her breath stuttered as he bared that big, hard, gorgeous body. She’d already caressed and kissed his wide chest. But his lean hips, that V above them designed to drive women wild with lust, his powerful, muscular thighs, and God, his dick. Long, thick and wide, the swollen tip reached to just under his navel. Maybe she should feel some kind of trepidation at taking him inside her. But no, with the renewed rush of desire flooding her veins, she craved having him fill her. She ached for it. Maybe then this emptiness would dissipate.
Ezekiel paused to grab his wallet from his pants before tossing them aside. From the depths of the black leather billfold, he withdrew a couple of small square foils and tossed one on the bed before ripping open the other.
She waited for him, equal parts eagerness and nerves. There was no turning back—not that she wanted to. She didn’t fool herself into believing there wouldn’t be consequences for this decision. For both of them.
Yet, as he sheathed himself and climbed on the bed, crawling over her body, she didn’t care about the costs. Not when his gaze burned into hers. Not when he settled between her thighs. Not when he cradled her face between his large palms.
Not when his cock nudged her entrance and slowly penetrated her.
She gasped at the welcome, coveted intrusion. Whimpered at the low-level fire of the stretching. Clutched his shoulders at the unmistakable sense of being claimed.
“Zeke,” she whispered, burrowing her face into the nook between his throat and shoulder. “Please.”
She shifted restlessly beneath him, unsure how to alleviate the pressure that contained both pleasure and the barest bite of pain. It’d been so long for her, that as he pushed, steadily burying himself inside her, she couldn’t remain still. Had to find the position, the place that would relieve the ache...or agitate it more.
“Shh,” he soothed, tilting her head up and brushing his mouth across hers. “Relax for me, Ray.” Another stroke of his lips even as he continued to gain more access to her body, drive farther inside her. “Relax and take me. That’s it,” he praised, momentarily closing his eyes as she lifted her legs around his waist, locking her ankles at the small of his back. Allowing him to surge deeper. “Fuck, that’s good, sweetheart. So good,” he ground out.
He held himself still above her, only his mouth moving over hers, his tongue mimicking his possession of her body. She returned every kiss, losing herself in him. Gradually, the hint of pain subsided, and only pleasure remained. Pure, mind-bending pleasure.
On a gasp, she arched her neck, pressing her head back into the mattress. Savoring him buried so deep inside her. Impatience rippled through her, and she rocked her hips, demanding he move. Demanding he take her.
Levering off her chest, he stared down at her, green eyes bright, expression dark.
“Ready?” he growled.
“Yes,” she murmured, curling her hands around his strong upper arms. “Please.”
With his attention pinned on her face, he withdrew his length, the weightiness of it dragging over newly awakened nerves. She groaned, twisting beneath him. Needing more. Hating how empty she felt when she’d just been so full. But a jerk of his hips granted her wish. He plunged back inside her with a force that stole the air from her lungs, the thoughts from her head.
Over and over, he took her, thrusting, driving, riding. On the end of each stroke, he ground his hips against her so he massaged that swollen bundle of nerves cresting the top of her sex. She’d become a sexual creature void of rational thought, only craving the ecstasy each plunge inside her promised. She raced after it, writhing and bucking beneath him, demanding he give her everything, hold nothing back from her.
And he didn’t.
Crushing his mouth to hers, he reached between their straining, sweat-slicked bodies and circled her clitoris, once, twice, and before he could finish the third stroke, she shattered.
She came with a scream, throwing her head back, body quaking with wave after wave of release. For a second, she fought the power of it. But as he continued to thrust into her, riding out the orgasm so she received every measure of it, she submitted to the pleasure, to the loss of control.
And as she dived into the black abyss, she didn’t hesitate or worry.
Because she knew, at least for the moment, she wasn’t alone.
Twelve
As Ezekiel steered his Jaguar up the quiet Pine Valley street, he glanced at his wife. His wife. He rubbed a hand over his beard before returning it to the steering wheel. Part of him still couldn’t believe he could call Reagan Sinclair—no, Reagan Holloway—by that title. Not just bride. That ship had sailed when she led him to their master bedroom and stripped for him in a private show that had him nearly begging to put his hands on that pretty body. Stroke all that smooth, beautiful skin. Taste her mouth and the sweet flesh between her thighs.
He probably shouldn’t be thinking about sex with his wife while driving down the road to his in-laws’ house to drop some unwelcome news.
Especially when just the thought of Reagan naked beneath him, eyes glazed over with pleasure, her sensual demands for more pouring from her kiss-swollen lips, had him shifting uncomfortably in his seat.
Two days. He should’ve been back to Royal and Wingate Enterprises two days ago. They were supposed to fly to Vegas, tie the knot, then fly back. But after that first night with Reagan, drowning in an unprecedented lust that had seared him from the inside out, he’d extended their “honeymoon.” They’d spent it in the suite. Talking. Laughing. Eating. Fucking.
And sleeping.
For the first time since Melissa, he’d slept beside a woman instead of leaving her bed or guiding her from his. And the guilt he’d expected to flay him alive had been absent. Which had only stirred the flood of conscience and shame that had been missing.
But not enough to drag him from his wife’s bed or make him uncurl himself from around her warm, naked body to sleep on the couch. Because then she wouldn’t be within easy reach when he woke up throbbing and hard for her.
It appeared he couldn’t get enough of his new wife. In and out of bed. Although to be fair, they hadn’t gone very far from the bed.
He smothered a sigh. Okay, so they’d crossed the platonic bridge and burned it in a blaze of glory behind them. But he hadn’t lost complete control over this situation. They could carry on with their plan of living separate lives without emotional entanglements. Sex did blur the line a little, but it didn’t obliterate it.
He and Reagan had set those boundaries for very good reasons.
A kernel of unease wiggled into his chest. She’d already made him forget his priorities—saving Wingate Enterprises. He couldn’t allow this kind of slip to become a habit.
Beside him, Reagan fidgeted. And not for the first or fifth time. Glancing down, he noticed her clenched fists on her lap. Before he could question the wisdom of it, he covered her hands with one of his and squeezed.
“It’s going to be okay,” he murmured.
She shook her head, a faint, wry smile tipping the corner of her mouth. “I ran off to Vegas with a man my parents disapprove of. I don’t know which will send my mother into a coronary faster—the elopement or Vegas. And my father...” She shook her head, releasing a humorless chuckle. “I don’t even want to imagine his reaction right now. I started all of this to take my inheritance and keep my family. But it might turn out that I lose both.”
“You’re borrowing trouble, Ray,” Ezekiel said softly. “Your father might be stern and overbearing, but he loves you. He’ll stand by you.”
She huffed out a breath. “You don’t know Douglas Sinclair. Not like I do. If there’s one thing experience has taught me it’s that he doesn’t handle disappointment well. And he never, ever forgets.”
He jerked his gaze from the road to throw her a sharp look. Something in her voice—bitterness, sorrow, pain... It wasn’t the first time he’d detected that particular note, just as he’d noted her habitual stroking of that scar just below her neck.
Secrets. And if he was staring into her eyes, he would see the shadows of them there.
Moments later, her parents’ home loomed into view and he steered the car up the driveway, pulling to a stop in front of the mansion.
“Reagan.” He waited until she switched her gaze from the side window to him. “Whatever you face in there, I will be right beside you. I won’t leave you.”
Her lips twisted into a smile that in no way reached her eyes. They remained dark. Sad. The urge to demand she pour out her pain onto him, to insist she let him in swelled within him, shoving against his chest and throat. But before he could speak, she nodded and reached for the door handle.
“We should go in,” she murmured, pushing the door open and stepping out.
Silent, he met her in front of the car and took hold of her hand. The warning to not muddy the boundaries rebounded against his skull as he raised her hand to his lips and brushed a kiss across the back of it. She glanced at him, and a glint of desire flickered in her eyes. Good. Anything to chase away the shadows.
Just as they cleared the top step, the front door opened, and Douglas Sinclair stood in the entrance. He stared at them, his scrutiny briefly dropping to their clasped hands before shifting back to his daughter.
He didn’t greet them but moved backward and held the door open wider. Yet, nothing about his grim expression was welcoming. More likely he didn’t want the neighbors to have a free show.
Settling a hand on Reagan’s lower back, Ezekiel walked inside, lending her his strength. He valued family loyalty and acceptance. Understood the drive to give one and crave the other. Yet he hated how even while Reagan strode ahead, shoulders soldier-straight, head tilted at a proud angle, she did so with a fine tremor that echoed through her and into his palm.
“Reagan.” Henrietta rose from the couch as soon as they entered the small salon. She crossed the room and cupped her daughter’s shoulders, pressing a kiss to her cheek. “Where have you been? We’ve been calling you for days now. Honey, we were all so worried.”
“I’m sorry, Mom,” Reagan said, covering one of her mother’s hands and patting it. “I had my phone turned off. I didn’t mean to scare you.”
Henrietta studied her daughter for a long moment before shifting her scrutiny to Ezekiel. “Ezekiel,” she greeted with a nod. “It’s good to see you again.”
“You, too, Henrietta,” he replied, slipping his hand up Reagan’s spine to cup the nape of her neck.
“Mom, Dad, I have news,” Reagan announced. “Zeke and I—” She broke off, and he squeezed the back of her neck, silently reassuring her. “Zeke and I are married. We eloped to Las Vegas. I’m sorry that you’re finding out after the fact, but we—”
“I asked her to come away with me, and she did,” he interjected, but she shook her head, giving him a small but sad smile.
“No, he didn’t. I asked him, and I know you’re probably disappointed in my decision to elope, but it was my decision.” She squared her shoulders. “He is my decision.”
Surprise and no small amount of hurt flashed across her mother’s face, but the older woman quickly composed her features. She shifted backward until she stood next to Douglas, who hadn’t spoken. But his stern, forbidding frown might as well as have been a lecture.
Every protective instinct buried inside Ezekiel clawed its way to the surface, and he faced the other man, moving closer to Reagan. Letting it be known that she was his. And dammit, whether that claim had an expiration date or not, he would protect what was his.
“You deliberately went against my wishes, and now you show up here for, what?” Douglas demanded, his voice quiet thunder. “For our blessing? Our forgiveness? Acceptance? Well, you have none of them.”
“No, not your blessing,” Ezekiel said evenly, but he didn’t bother hiding the steel or the warning in it. “And she nor I require forgiveness for a choice we made together as two consenting adults. Would your acceptance of our marriage be important to your daughter? Yes. But it’s not necessary.”
“It is if she—or you—want access to her inheritance,” Douglas snapped. “Which isn’t going to happen. Her grandmother gave me final say over who I deem suitable, and you are not it. Reagan knew that and yet she still defied my wishes, regardless that it would bring hurt and shame onto her family.”
“Douglas,” Henrietta whispered, laying a hand on her husband’s arm.
“No, Henrietta, this needs to be said,” he said. “I—”
“No, it doesn’t,” Reagan quietly interrupted. “It doesn’t need to be said, Dad, because I already know. You’ve made it very clear over the years—ten to be exact—that I have only brought disappointment, embarrassment and pain to this family. God knows I’ve tried to make up for it by being the respectable, obedient daughter, by following every rule you’ve laid down, by placing your needs and opinions above my own. But nothing I’ve done or will do will ever make up for me being less than worthy of the Sinclair name. For being less than perfect.”
“Honey,” Henrietta breathed, reaching a hand toward her daughter. “That’s just not true.”
That sense of foreboding spread inside Ezekiel, triggering the need to gather Reagan into his arms and shield her from the very people who were supposed to love her unconditionally. Because this was about more than an elopement or an inheritance. This—whatever it was that vibrated with pain and ugliness between these three—was older, burrowed deeper. And it still bled like a fresh wound.
“It’s true, Mom,” Reagan continued in that almost eerily calm voice. “We’ve just been so careful not to voice it aloud.”
Ezekiel looked at Douglas, silently roaring at the man to say something, to comfort his obviously hurting daughter. To climb down off that high horse and tell her she was loved and accepted. Valued.
“If you think this ‘woe is me’ speech is going to change my mind about the inheritance, you’re wrong.” The same deep freeze in Douglas’s voice hardened his face. “I hope your new husband...” he sneered the word “...with his own financial and legal troubles can provide for you. Although, that future is looking doubtful.”
Fury blazed through Ezekiel, momentarily transforming his world into a crimson veil.
“Watch it, Douglas,” he warned. “No one smears my family name. And since your daughter now wears it, she’s included. I care for mine... I prot
ect them above all else. And before you throw that recklessly aimed stone, you might want to ask yourself if you can claim the same.”
“Don’t you dare question me about how I protect my family,” Douglas snapped. “All I have ever done, every decision, is for them. You, who has had everything handed to you merely because of your last name, know nothing about sacrifice. About the hard work it takes to ensure your family not only survives but thrives. About rising above what people see in order to be more than they ever believed you are possible of. You don’t know any of that, Ezekiel Holloway. So don’t you ever question my love for them. Because it’s that love that convinces me that my daughter marrying you is the worst decision she could’ve ever made.”
Anger seethed beneath Ezekiel’s skin, a fiercely burning flame that licked and singed, leaving behind scorch marks across his heart and soul.
“I may be a Holloway, but I’m still a black man in Royal, Texas. You don’t corner the market on that. When the world looks at me, they don’t see my white father. They see a black man who should be grateful about being born into a powerful, white family. When they find out where I work and my position, they assume I’m only there because I’m Ava Holloway Wingate’s nephew, not because I earned it by busting my ass working my way up in the company while attending college and receiving my bachelor’s and master’s.” He huffed out a breath. “So don’t talk to me about hard work or sacrifice, because I’ve had to surrender my voice and my choice at times so others can feel comfortable about sitting down at a table with me. I’ve had to work ten times harder just to be in the same place and receive the respect that others are given just because of the color of their skin.”
He forced his fingers to straighten from the fist they’d curled into down by his thigh. “And I never questioned your love for your family. I just have reservations about the way you show it.”
“Zeke,” Reagan whispered, leaning into him. Offering support or comfort, he didn’t know. Maybe both.
