The Opposite Effect

by Shandi Boyes

“Hey,” Clara greets me, her voice groggy from just waking up.

  Just like this morning, she glides through my apartment wearing nothing but my short-sleeve tee she fell asleep in. Even without a speck of makeup, her face is fresh and vibrant. That might have something to do with the fact she just napped for two hours straight. I've been wondering the past week if she was getting enough sleep in her new apartment. It wasn't just the dark circles plaguing her eyes that had me guessing; it was the fact she couldn't stop yawning. Anyone will tell you there's nothing more contagious than a vigorous yawn. I bet you're yawning right now, aren't you? Well, that’s what it's been like at Inked the past week. Every time Clara yawned, it spread through the whole crew like an out-of-control fire.

  Her brisk strides to the kitchen slow to a snail’s pace when her eyes stray to a suitcase sitting at the entranceway of my apartment.

  “Is that bag from my Tumi Alpha luggage set?” she queries, swinging her eyes back to me, her voice high and ear-piercing.

  “If you’re asking if that is your bag, yes, it is,” I reply, having no clue what Tumi Alpha is.

  I stand straighter, bracing for impact when I spot the fighting spark igniting in her eyes.

  “Why is my bag sitting in your foyer?”

  The confusion on her face escalates when her eyes bounce around my kitchen, absorbing her fruit bowl, smoothie blender, and a handful of cosmetics Charity rustled up from her apartment scattered across the countertops.

  “Two orgasms don’t equal a lifetime commitment,” Clara mumbles, her concern growing by the minute.

  Her eyes rocket to mine when I ask, “What about three?”

  A grin curls on my lips when the concerned mask on her face momentarily slips, exposing a flare of excitement from my tease.

  Quicker than I can snap my fingers, the excited gleam is replaced with anger when I mutter, “You got an itch you need scratched, Princess?”

  My cock turns to stone when she replies, “You're lucky the kitchen counter is between us, or my knee would have become reacquainted with your crotch."

  I smile a shit-eating grin. “Don’t break it before you get the chance to use it.”

  Her breathing becomes excited when I nudge my head to the box of condoms sitting to my right. She tries to keep the expression on her face neutral. She miserably fails. A smug grin curls on my lips. I've never seen her so muted. She usually spits her fiery words off her still sizzling tongue when we engage in a bit of friendly banter, whereas now, her lips twitch but not a word spills from her mouth. I like this new look, and I can't wait to study it in greater detail when she's beneath me.

  Clara’s throat struggles to swallow before she mutters, “How long?” Although her question is short, her interrogating gaze adds to its length.

  “As long as it takes for your shock to wear off—”

  “Already gone,” she interrupts, her eyes blazing with the spark our earlier union in the shower renewed.

  “And. . .” One word is all it takes to secure her utter devotion. “Until the men responsible for your attack are held accountable.”

  Her brows tact together. “How long will that be?”

  I lift my right shoulder into a shrug. “Could be days. . . or weeks.”

  Her eyes bug as her lips purse into a sexy pout. “Weeks?” she squeaks out. “You want me to stay here for weeks?” She gestures her hand around my apartment.

  When I nod, her pupils enlarge to the size of dinner plates. She balls her fists before her eyes drift between me and the entrance door of my apartment, no doubt calculating the most viable exit. I arch my brow and glare into her eyes, warning her that if she attempts to flee, I won’t hesitate to tie her to my bed. There's no chance of her leaving here before I've had my fill. And considering I’ve just spent the last two hours moving her belongings into my private abode and I didn't freak out once, the chances of me getting my fill anytime soon are low. Very fucking low.

  "Weeks of finding out how many ways you can scream my name." My voice is as wild as my desire to claim her. "Do you have a problem with that, Princess?" My words are crass, but I want to test her; to see if she's only here because she's afraid of being alone, or because she actually wants to be.

  Clara snaps her eyes back to me. She doesn’t say anything. She just stands across from me wide-eyed and open-mouthed. I slant my head to the side and stare into her glistening eyes. The more I stare, the livelier the glint I identified last night becomes. Clara isn’t here because she's afraid or lonely. She's here as she wants to be ravished. Consumed. Devoured. And I know just the man for the job.

  “If you keep leaving your mouth hanging open like that, I’ll find something to fill it with.”

  Clara sucks in a deep breath and lets it out slowly before her eyes drop to my jeans. My cock—now hard—pulses against my zipper when she licks her lips before slowly raking her eyes up my body. Even though I'm wearing a pair of ripped jeans and a short-sleeve shirt, her eyes drink me in as if I'm standing before her as naked as the day I was born.

  When her heavy-lidded gaze reaches my face, I jerk my head back and say, “Come here.”

  I push off the kitchen counter I'm leaning on, preparing to beat her race to the door if she attempts to bolt. She stuns me for the third time in under twenty-four hours by just shrugging her shoulders before spanning the distance between us. I can tell by the look on her face that she wants to engage in a war of words, but since I've caught her in a moment of weakness—her libido overriding her astuteness—she appears more willing to put our game of tit for tat on the backburner for a few hours so we can undertake more stimulating activities. If I were a better man, I wouldn't use her weakness against her. It's a pity I'm not a better man.

  My cock firms as Clara paces towards me with her eyes blazing and hips swinging. Some men would feel intimidated by the determination set in her eyes. Lucky for me, I don’t have a problem with a woman who calls it as she sees it. Don’t get me wrong, I can’t wait to have her flushed and speechless beneath me, but I sure as hell won’t cite an objection to her climbing onboard and taking herself for a ride. Fuck! Just the thought has my cock wrangling the zipper in my jeans, dying to break free.

  A jagged groan rumbles from deep in my gut when Clara slings her arms around my neck and seals her mouth over mine. Her tongue sweeps across my lips before plunging inside my mouth. I return her kiss by weaving my fingers through her silky hair and twirling my tongue around hers. The warm goodness of her mouth has my cock aching to be immersed inside her. Curling my arms around the back of her slim thighs, I hoist her feet off the ground. She smiles against my lips when I place her on the kitchen counter on my right. Her backside dangles far enough off the edge, our crotches align.

  The stubble on my chin scratches Clara’s neckline as I place a succession of featherlike kisses along her jaw, making her purr like a kitten. My chest swells. There's no greater compliment to a man than being able to switch a strong, determined woman to a purring little kitty. Clara is a take-no-shit type of lady, and I love that about her, but when she loosens the tight reins she governs her life with, I feel invincible. Like King-Fucking-Kong.

  After a few more nibbles on her jaw, I pull back and peer into her bright eyes, distracted by something rumbling louder than her erotic purrs: her stomach.

  “Sorry,” she mumbles, chewing on her lip. “I haven’t eaten anything since the carrot last night.”

  I inwardly swear. I was so caught up in ravishing her, I didn’t even consider she hasn’t consumed a single nutrient in the past sixteen hours.

  “Food first,” I reply to her whimpering protest when I pull away and walk to the fridge. My tone relays my internal battle not to kiss her sexy pout right off her sinful little mouth.

  I groan when I swing open the fridge. It is so empty, I can hear wind hollering through it. Hearing my grunted response, Clara hops off the kitchen counter and saunters towards me.

  “What have you got?” she queries, bobbing her neck a
nd peering into the fridge.

  The cutest little crinkle scrunches her nose when her eyes roam over the bare basics my fridge is stocked with. “It isn’t too bad,” she mumbles under her breath, snagging the half-filled carton of eggs and a nearly empty bottle of milk.

  Pushing the fridge closed with her hip, she paces to the cooktop. Leaning my back against the counter, I cross my arms in front of my chest, relishing the view of a princess preparing breakfast for a beast.

  Clara moves along the main counter of my kitchen, swinging open each cupboard she drifts past. I tilt my head to the side and arch my brow when her search extends to the overhead cabinets. Her stretched position forces a small portion of her scrumptious naked backside into my view. I've never been one for going it alone, but with a visual that enticing, I'm fighting the urge to whip out my cock and give it a few strokes.

  Clara grabs a glass mixing bowl I didn’t even know I owned from the top cabinet before turning around to face me. “Are you going to show me where anything is? Or am I just going to work it out on my own?”

  She tries to keep her words sharp, but the cheeky grin tugging her lips high foils her attempt. With a wink, she spins around and commences cracking the eggs into the glass bowl. I give my eyes a few more moments to drink in her long bare legs, sexy-as-sin body, and tousled hair before pushing off the counter and striding towards her. I wrap my arm around her waist, pull her in snug, and drop my head into the crook of her neck.

  “What do you need me to do?” The heat of my breath bounces off her skin and filters through my nose, engulfing my senses with her rich floral scent.

  “Not distract me,” she replies, slipping under my arm.

  I try to hold back my groan. I fail.

  “Do you have any paprika?” she asks, twisting her neck to peer at me.

  My brows stitch. “What?”

  Clara smiles before briefly shaking her head. “Do you have anything with a bit of heat I could add to the egg whites to give them flavor?”

  I quirk my lips. “Chili sauce?”

  She smiles a broad grin. I move to the pantry to gather the hot sauce while Clara pulls out a frying pan from the cupboard below the stove.

  "In time, buddy, I promise," I mumble to my cock when the alluring image of Clara bending over has him springing to life.

  Twenty minutes later, I'm sitting down to the most unmanly lunch I've ever eaten. Forever healthy, Clara divided the yolk from the eggs, removing all the hearty goodness a guy of my size loves. My ceramic plate is void of the regular crispy bacon and pancakes it is generally stacked with, replaced with slices of avocado and apple.

  I push back from my four-seater dining table, causing a massive creak to sound through my apartment, and amble to the fridge. Clara's egg-white loaded fork stops halfway between her plate and her mouth when I stride back into the dining room with a chunk of cheddar cheese and a grater. I drench every inch of my plate in the scrumptious goodness of cheese before lifting my eyes to Clara.

  “Cheese?” I angle my head to the side and arch my brow.

  Clara chews on her lip before shaking her head.

  “Are you sure?” I ask, noticing a flare of hesitation sparking in her eyes.

  I scoop up a large chunk of cheese-covered egg whites and shovel it into my mouth. Clara squirms in her seat when my deep, throaty moan rumbles up my chest.

  “It is so good.”

  Clara's nose screws up as she pushes her plain egg whites around her plate.

  I lean in close to her side and whisper, “What about if I guarantee you will burn off those calories within twenty minutes of eating them.”

  Her eyes missile to mine.

  “There's no better cardio than sex, Princess.”

  I transfer some of the cheese piled up on my plate to hers. “Now eat up. You’re going to need the energy.”

  A grin curls on my lips when she fails to sound a single protest to my demand. My grin turns into a full smile when she digs her fork into her now cheesy eggs and raises them to her mouth. Just as her fork disappears between her pouty lips, she locks her wintry eyes with mine. The huge smile etched on my mouth gets wiped right off when she releases the most provocative fucking moan I've ever heard when the eggs hit her taste buds. I was wrong earlier. Sex isn't Clara's weakness. It is her ally.

  I thought I had our whole dynamic worked out. She would be a strong and independent woman until we step into the bedroom—then, she'd happily hand the baton to me. But I was wrong. Very fucking wrong. Not only does Clara have me over a barrel outside of the bedroom, but she also has me by the throat inside as well. All it took was hearing that one little moan topple from her lips, and I'm ready to do anything to hear those noises torn from her throat in the middle of ecstasy. Anything at all.

  The last ten minutes have felt like I'm an inmate serving a life sentence in a county jail with no chance of parole. It's been torturous. I devoured every scrap of food on my plate within thirty seconds, shamefully displaying that my patience to have Clara beneath me has worn thin. Clara, on the other hand, has taken her sweet-ass time enjoying her first meal in over sixteen hours. If that isn't bad enough, she savored every last drop with soft little moans and slow and gentle chews. If I didn't want her to know her little ploy to unravel me was working, I would have dragged her across the table and force-fed her. And no, I'm not referring to food.

  Once the last smidgen of avocado is smeared off Clara's plate and popped into her mouth, I seize her wrist and yank her across the table. A limited-edition hearty giggle topples from her mouth and jingles through my ears. Her laughter transforms into a throaty moan when her new straddled position has her feeling the thickness of my cock.

  Any defiance her eyes have been wearing the past ten minutes fades into the horizon when I pull my shirt over her head and discard it on the floor. Her eyes grow darker, switching from an icy blue to the color of a dark ocean. I wait for her to speak, to put up a protest about me stripping her bare without first seeking permission. Not a word seeps from her lips.

  The voluptuous swell of her chest is thrust into my face—as if she’s offering them to me—when she slings her arms around my shoulders and draws in nearer. I connect my eyes with hers before taking one of her taut pink nipples into my mouth. A hiss parts her lips when I swirl my tongue around her tweaked bud.

  “Brax. . .”

  Fuck, I love the way she says my name.

  As one of my hands moves to secure a handful of her curvy ass, the other cups her spare breast. The tightness of her nipples firms as my mouth and fingers work her at a chaotic pace, eliciting more purring moans. My cock stirs, loving her hearty moans, but hating the constraint of my jeans. Like she can hear the silent protests of my cock, Clara slides her hand underneath my shirt and fiddles with the button on my jeans.

  Her throaty moans turn into a feral groan when her fumbling movements are unable to unclasp the fastener. A chair scraping across a wooden floor thunders through the room when I abruptly push my chair away from the table. I feel her smile against my lips when I undo the button of my jeans and slide down the zipper. A deep growl vibrates through my mouth as she slips her hand inside my jeans to stroke my cock.

  Clara pulls her lips away from mine and stares down at me, her eyes sparkling bright, her lips swollen from our kiss. For a woman who protects her heart with an iron fist, she's open, exposed, utterly unguarded. She's exposing sides to her I’ve hoped to see, but have never witnessed. She holds my gaze as she speeds up her strokes, her focus solely devoted to taking me to the brink of ecstasy.

  Her affectionate—almost loving—gaze has my chase to climax strengthening and my heart swelling. Every minute I spend in her presence makes me more beguiled by her. And from the doting blaze sparking Clara’s arctic blue eyes, I'd say I'm not the only one becoming entranced.

  When the shriek of my land line sounds into her ears, Clara’s strokes halt, her head snapping to the side. I ignore the interruption, not willing to harness my desire to
claim her any longer. I bite down on her nipple before jerking my hips upwards, trying to recapture her devotion.

  My plans go to shit when a deep voice sounds over my answering machine. “Brax, it is Daniel from Caramine Care. Don’t panic, but your grandma took a turn this afternoon. . .”

  Chapter Twenty-One

  The heavy stomps of my boots bounce off the walls and cluster in my ears as I stride down the narrow corridor of Caramine Care. My heart is thrashing in my chest, still panicked about my earlier phone call with Daniel. Although he downplayed the seriousness of the situation, I've still arrived at Caramine Care within twenty minutes of his call. My grandmother means the world to me. She's the woman who raised me, and the woman who owns a vast majority of my heart. All but the little snippet enlarging to accommodate Clara.

  The instant Daniel's message sounded through Clara's ears, she slid off my lap and secured my shirt off the ground. She stood at my side biting her nails as I returned Daniel’s call. I didn't need to speak for her to know the urgency of the situation. The concerned expression on my face told the whole story. I was gutted.

  Although Daniel assured me my grandmother was comfortable and resting, I knew the twisted feeling in my stomach wouldn't settle until I saw it with my own two eyes. That sick feeling spread from my stomach to my heart when I suggested for Clara to come with me. I tried to smother the panic in her eyes by pretending it wasn't about her meeting my grandma, that it was just killing two birds with one stone. She could visit her friend while I checked on my grandmother's condition. The soulless gaze that filled Clara's eyes the night she was mugged returned stronger than ever.

  She blinked back tears before mumbling, “Friend? What friend?”

  Her chin quivered, exposing she knew exactly who I was referring to. Deciding to play stupid, I said, “The person you were visiting the day I bumped into you at Caramine Care.”

  Any walls I crumbled between Clara and me the past twenty-four hours reformed before my very eyes. She took a stumbling step backward, her retreating strides only stopping when she crashed into the kitchen counter.