He pulled her tighter. “You think I’m pretty?”
“I also said not strong enough,” she pointed out, her smile lifting.
The humor wasn’t reciprocated. In fact, Asprey looked almost angry as he said, “Strength isn’t just about being able to take people down, Poppy.”
She would never know exactly what Asprey meant by those words, because he chose that moment to lift her up, tilting her mouth to meet his. All of the fight from the kiss in the Pit seemed to have left him, because this one was as gentle as it was strong, and, despite the fact that her body was clammy from the rain, searing in its heat.
As she lifted her hands to pull him closer, the quilt fell to the floor in a heavy slump. Her bare chest hit his, the tips of her nipples flecked with overwhelming sensation as they brushed against the rough smattering of hair on his lovely, perfect chest.
“You’re still freezing,” he murmured against her mouth, his hands moving over her body, palms flat as if to achieve maximum skin-to-skin ratio. “We should probably pick up that quilt.”
“I’ve always heard the best way to avoid hypothermia is to get a naked body as close to yours as possible,” she breathed back, her words interrupted by a series of moans she couldn’t seem to control. One of Asprey’s palms moved up her belly to cup her breast, his thumb rubbing against the nipple in slow, agonizing circles.
“Feel free.” He stepped back and lifted his hands. Bereft of sensation, Poppy used the moment to drink in the sight of him, her eyes greedy as they roamed over the long torso marked with just a hint of musculature and the flat plane of his stomach with its line of dark hair, which dipped to the towel just resting on his hips.
“Do you know,” she said slowly. “If we do this, you’ll be the first man I’ve slept with since I got out of jail.”
Asprey licked his lips. “Isn’t there a name for that?”
“What do you mean?” She trailed her fingers on his skin just above the towel, her whole body responding with a jerk when Asprey sucked in a sharp breath. “Like a freedom fuck?”
He laughed, a sound that got cut short when her hand dipped just below the towel’s edge. “I meant something more along the lines of a release party.”
“I don’t care what we call it, as long as it happens soon.” No use pretending this wasn’t exactly what she wanted. There would be time tomorrow to regret crossing the line, to pay for her mistakes. Wasn’t that what she did? Barreled headfirst into danger, paying the price later?
Impulsivity had its benefits. Her legs quaked and her back arched, her entire body thrumming with pleasure. There was a reason her weaknesses always won.
She tugged at Asprey’s towel, whipping it away with something approaching triumph.
Triumph was a good word for it. Asprey’s cock leaped at its sudden freedom, the wide, hard lines of it almost too good to be true. It really had been a long time. Too long. Much too long. She let out a sigh.
“If you don’t stop looking at it and do something with the damn thing, I refuse to be responsible for what comes next.”
She wasn’t sure which one of them moved first. One second, they were little more than two bodies, and the next, they were a whirl of limbs and heat and sensation. They kissed and growled, Asprey’s hands roaming in all the right places. But no matter how much time he might spend with his arms wrapped around her or with his hands moving deftly between her legs, Poppy never once lost track of his cock. Pressed against her belly, shifting smoothly through her fingers, a hard promise of things to come—the dull ache in her core yearned for that part of him.
“Please, Asprey, just fuck me,” she begged when it became too much. She wasn’t a woman given to begging, but there was almost nothing she wouldn’t do to feel him inside her.
He shifted only slightly away, bending to retrieve his leather jacket, which had fallen to the floor. “Just a second,” he called, fishing in the pocket for a familiar foil square. Even then, she couldn’t take her eyes away from him. “Got it.”
“I’m not going to question why you’re carrying protection in there,” she said. “Let me.”
She took her time rolling the condom over the length of him. This was always one of her favorite parts, the slow, sensual act of her hands working his length. Her dedication was rewarded with a low groan and Asprey’s head tossed back, a man given over wholly to the pleasure of the moment.
The temporary distraction gave her time to back against the wall, where several of the bizarre coat hooks protruded. Using one to secure her leg and two as handholds, she lifted herself off the floor, her body angled to receive him.
“So that’s what the hooks are for,” Asprey said with a low laugh. He might have had more jokes to crack, more observations to make, but they got tossed aside for more urgent matters.
As he slid into her, her body stretching in that familiar and glorious way, she stopped supporting her own body and anchored herself completely to him. She couldn’t think of a better place to be. He plunged deep and hard, taking her without apology but with extreme consideration for her satisfaction.
It didn’t take long to reach it. In another lifetime, she might have been ashamed for succumbing so easily to a man’s ministrations, for taking pleasure with the kind of selfish speed that signaled inexperience. But Asprey felt so good and so right, and his own growl of release came not long after hers.
They took a moment to regain their breath, forehead to forehead, neither one talking but communicating through the pounding of twin pulses. She was the first to break away, sliding through his arms, coming to rest on the floor on unsteady legs.
“I don’t feel cold anymore,” she said, testing her voice. It still worked.
“No, you really don’t,” he returned, pressing a soft kiss on her lips.
They fell to the bed in a jumble of limbs and blankets, both of them careful to avoid the creepy spot, choosing instead to wedge their bodies as close as possible on the left side.
“I don’t feel hungry anymore either,” she murmured, as they nestled into a comfortable spoon, his cock still semi-hard against her backside.
“Eating is overrated,” Asprey agreed, biting softly into her neck.
She arched into the graze of his teeth, sure he would leave prints, oddly thrilled at being thus marked.
“If I fall asleep, will you still be here when I wake up?” Asprey’s mouth was still buried in her neck as he spoke, his breath a hot whirl against her skin.
“Afraid I’m going to run off in the night with your wallet?” she asked, laughing softly.
“No.” Tongue replaced teeth against her neck, and this time when she arched, it was with her whole body. “I’m just afraid you’ll run off, period.”
She slowly lengthened her right thigh, pressing it between his legs as though she intended to rub and grind and put a man at his ease. As soon as he let out a low, guttural noise that indicated such ease was on its way, she used the lock of her leg to immobilize Asprey’s lower half. Caught off guard, he was easy to flip from there.
She ended up on top of him, kneeling on either side of his ass as she forced his face and stomach to the bed. Laughing, she leaned down and laid a series of kisses along his shoulder blades, tracing the lines of his muscles with her teeth and tongue. He tasted of salt and skin and bergamot. “Believe me, Asprey, when I say that if I wanted to run off, there would be nothing you could do to stop me. I told you once—when I play, I play hard. And I decide when the game is over.”
He angled his head just a little, enough so she could see the damnable smile of self-satisfaction that never seemed to fully disappear from his face. “Could you work my rotator cuff while you’re back there? I haven’t had time to visit my regular masseuse since you’ve been around.”
Her body shook as she bit back a laugh. How was she supposed to prove her point if he kept making her laugh? “Do you visit her between trips to the manicurist?”
“One should never neglect one’s cuticles,” he replied
primly.
“I bet you exfoliate too.” She loosened her legs enough so that he could flip over. When he settled once again between her legs, this time on his back, his dick had become fully erect and pressed insistently against her belly. Grabbing hold of his length, working him gently with her palm, she leaned in and added, “Just so we’re clear—I don’t date business partners.”
A groan escaped his lips. “Is that what this is? A date?”
“No. This is a freedom fuck, remember?”
“Yes, Poppy.” He grabbed her free hand and pressed a soft kiss on the palm. “I remember.”
When he once again entered her, she was careful to remain on top, working up and down so that she and she alone determined their pace, decided when she would come. She was in charge. She was in control. She called all the shots.
But when she threw her head back and cried, no longer able to resist the insistent pull down, down toward the meeting of their bodies, control was the last thing on her mind.
And that was something she feared even more than being trapped.
Chapter Sixteen
Poppy woke and dressed well before dawn, wakened by the soft sound of Asprey snoring. Such an inconsiderate sound, snoring, yet it fit his personality to a tee. He slept like a child who had spent a long, hard day at play, sprawled out over the entire bed and flush with the heat of his own exhaustion. He lay on his stomach, his naked ass framed by a twist of sheets, his hair adorably rumpled and falling into his fluttering eyelids.
It was a sight that filled her with longing and lust and the feeling that the night before had been a big mistake. She was attached now—not just involved on the job, but attached. It didn’t get much worse than that.
“Good morning.” Asprey rolled over and greeted her with a smile. Morning person. She’d forgotten about that. “Did Norma leave us a stack of hot pancakes, as promised?”
Poppy chuckled and tossed a miniature box of Raisin Bran at him. “This is as good as we’re getting. She also left us a few packets of instant coffee but nothing to make them with. If we want caffeine, we’re going to have to snort it.”
He sat up further, undismayed by this news. Fortunately for them both, the sheets fell naturally across his lap, though they didn’t do anything to hide the breadth of his chest, naked and gleaming and hairy in all the right places. It was amazing how well-crafted the male form was, she realized as her eyes naturally following the path of his chest hair from its widest point down along the crested planes of his abs to where… She looked away. She was supposed to be unattaching herself here, not getting lost forever in promises of the flesh.
Although the glint of humor in Asprey’s eyes indicated he hadn’t missed her appreciation, he busied himself ripping open the box of cereal and popping a few raisins into his mouth. “Sit,” he said, patting the bed next to him. “Have breakfast with me.”
She was starving. And they did have to ride all the way back to Seattle together. “I kept the Lucky Charms for myself,” she admitted, taking a seat near the foot of the bed. In the clear light of day, the creepy side looked even more like the site of a recent murder. “I told you I’m trouble.”
“You’re right—cereal hogging is kind of a deal-breaker for me. Why are you sitting so far away? I promise not to bite.”
“It’s not the biting I’m worried about.” She held out a blue marshmallow diamond. “It’s all that other stuff.”
He took the marshmallow from her and offered a sad smile in return. “We’re back to where we started, I see. I guess that means it’s your turn.”
“My turn?”
“At twenty questions. So far, we’ve each asked two. That means you’re up.”
“I’m not playing this game with you, Asprey. What’s the point?” Other than making things even more complicated than they already were.
“So you can ask me anything you want about our scheme—don’t pretend you aren’t dying to know why we steal forgeries. I promise to hold nothing back, and I won’t tell Graff if you don’t.”
Curiosity had never been one of her besetting sins before. Sure, she had her vices, most of them bad enough to outweigh any pretense at virtue, but she was generally content to let people be—if they wanted to ruin their lives with drink or sell homemade soap at street fairs or listen to country music, it wasn’t her place to critique the choices they made.
Unfortunately, there was no use pretending that the Charles family rulebook wasn’t a proverbial carrot dangling constantly overhead.
“Okay.” She shifted so that she faced Asprey head-on, even managing to keep her eyes above his waist as she did. “So, I know that Todd’s necklace was a fake, and I know you guys stole it for that specific reason. But I don’t know why.”
Asprey made a buzzer sound. “That was not in the form of a question.”
Oh, geez. He was turning it into a game show now. “Fine. Why do you steal forgeries?”
“Because the owners don’t know they’re fake, and we don’t want them to find out. My turn.”
Her head spun. “Wait a minute—that’s barely even an answer. What do you mean they don’t know they’re fake? Are you telling me Todd thought he was giving me a real necklace that whole time?” The news hardly made him a prince, but it meant something.
Asprey kicked back a handful of cereal before aiming the empty box at the nearby wastebasket, hitting the plastic bag with a neat swish. “The owners don’t know, as in they think they’re in possession of the genuine article—a belief they continue to hold long after we relieve them of their goods. And yes. Todd had no idea it was fake. That’s three questions for me.”
“You’re cheating!” She jumped off the bed. “Those were follow-up questions.”
“It’s not my fault you aren’t any good at this game. Hand me those coffee packets, will you?”
Poppy tossed them over and made a face, but he didn’t eat them in crystal form. Instead, he unfolded himself from the bed and stretched, showing her the finely chiseled cheeks of his ass as he padded into the bathroom to—hopefully—collect his clothes. There was only so much morning nudity a woman could take with only a box of Lucky Charms to keep her mouth busy.
Asprey leaned his head out the doorway. “What’s your favorite color?”
“Seriously?” He was doing his questions all wrong again.
“Yes, seriously,” he shouted over the sound of running water. “I’d guess teal, but that seems a touch too obvious.”
There wasn’t anything to do but play along. “It’s pink.”
His head popped out again. “You’re lying.”
“I like pink,” she insisted. He was going to ask stupid questions and then not believe her when she answered them? “It’s pretty, and it makes me think of cotton candy.”
When he emerged, it was with his jeans slung low on his hips and his hair slightly dampened, his smile so bright it was unseemly for this hour of the morning. Two ceramic mugs containing what looked like muddied water inside were unseemly too, but lukewarm tap-water coffee was better than nothing. He handed her the mug with a picture of Garfield and an I Hate Mondays logo.
“Pink, huh?” Without spilling a drop of his coffee, he tossed himself onto the bed, his legs extended in front of him and crossed at the ankle, a god on rumpled sheets. She wished he’d put a shirt on. It was distracting. “You’re full of delightful surprises. How about this one—if you could travel anywhere in the world, money is no object, where would you go?”
“Well, I can’t go anywhere in the world because I’m on parole and probably will be for the next few years. You know—for that crime you refuse to ask me about.”
He waved his hand. “Let’s pretend you’re going with someone who has political connections and can get some of those pesky red tapes waived.”
Her heart thudded heavily, and she forced herself to focus on her mug. That wasn’t a promise. It was hypothetical. Things like that didn’t happen in real life.
“I never really thoug
ht about it,” she said, buying time while her pulse slowed. Worldwide travel had never been in her playbook before—she dreamed of getting out of Seattle, sure, maybe moving south, a grifter on the run. But if money wasn’t an object? “Somewhere I don’t speak the language. Lots of open sky. Electrical storms would be a bonus.”
“Why wouldn’t you want to speak the language?” he asked. “And yes, I’m aware that counts as question three.”
She studied the cracks in the ceiling tiles. “I don’t know. It seems like a really good way to be alone without being lonely, if that makes any sense. And I get so tired of talking about things all the time. It doesn’t accomplish anything.”
“Is that a hint?”
She smiled. “No. Just an observation. Now it’s my turn. How does stealing forgeries tie in to your family business?”
He released a long sigh. “That’s a huge question.”
“It’s your stupid game.”
Asprey must have realized he was trapped, because he set aside his cup and swung his legs off the bed, his body hunched, arms on his knees. He tilted his head to look at her. “The quick and easy answer is that every single thing we’ve taken—and it’s a lot—is insured by Charles Appraisals and Insurance.”
Poppy swallowed her mouthful of coffee. A lump in her throat made it oddly difficult. “As in, you guys have to pay out the insurance claim? For things you stole? Things that aren’t even real?”
Asprey nodded.
“That doesn’t make even the smallest bit of sense.”
“No, it doesn’t,” he agreed. “Neither does turning yourself in to the police for a robbery in which they didn’t have a scrap of evidence that pointed to you as the culprit. Did you turn yourself in because you were guilty of the crime, or because you were protecting someone?”
Both those things. All those things. Once again, it was so hard to see her way through the fog of right and wrong. “Yes.”
Confidence Tricks Page 18
