by Lexi Whitlow
I pause for a second. “What will you do?”
She lifts up onto her paint-covered elbows. “I’ll think of something. I always do. I’ve got a few accounts here and there.”
There must be a concerned look on my face, because she takes her shirt off and throws it away. And then, she pulls me down towards her waiting body. “Shut up,” she says. “We’re not here to chat.”
I peel off her paint-covered leggings, and her milky white thighs spread willingly for me. I can feel the heat of her body rising to meet mine, and my brain tweaks into that place—the one where I become hunter instead of man. My cock rises to the occasion.
Her body is perfection—skin pliant and soft, reactive to each touch. I kiss her again, slowly this time, trailing my lips over the line of her chin and down to the tender flesh of her neck. My tongue traces the goosebumps rising on her flesh, and I take one nipple in my mouth and then the other.
She moans softly, then whimpers in need.
My fingers descend, tugging her panties to the side and slipping inside her delicate folds. I feel her clit, swollen and ready for my touch. Her back arches as I slip one finger inside of her, and then another.
“Let’s get this done,” she says, putting one hand to the bulge pressing against my jeans.
“I think I can manage that,” I say, unbuckling myself and letting my cock free.
She slips my jeans off and kneels before me, looking up at me with those curious, glinting eyes. Her hand wraps around my cock, and she presses her fingers gently against my flesh, stroking me, tracing the ridges and contours with careful attention.
“Lie down,” she instructs.
She stands and presses me back into the bed this time. “You have a way with words,” I say.
“I’d rather not exchange any more of them,” she says, almost haughtily.
She’s not timid. She straddles me, her naked skin against mine, her hands working my cock. Gently, slowly, she lowers her lips to the head of my shaft and goes to work, swirling her tongue around the tip, and bringing my rigid length into her mouth. And she looks at me as she does it, bringing me to heights I didn’t think possible.
This isn’t something that happens. The girls I see use this kind of thing to get in my head, if they do it at all.
But Norah is just having fun.
She brings me to the very limit and backs off, slowing the movements of her mouth and tongue and bringing her cherry-red lips back to the head. There are still flecks of paint on her face and hair. They make her look more beautiful, more like the wild thing she is.
She builds me up again, licking and sucking, taking me to the back of her throat and swallowing gently, time and time again, like she wants to milk me dry. I’m unable to hold on any longer. My balls seize, and an orgasm made of light and liquid gold fills every nerve ending in my body. I come hard, lifting my eyes to watch her as she swallows every last drop.
Normally, I might leave in this situation. I’d be done.
But I’m not satisfied. I want that body—I need to know it.
I pull her next to me.
“That was…” I murmur. Earth-shattering. Unexpected. Insane.
Before I can think of a word, she brings a finger to my lips. “Shhh. You’ll ruin it.”
I grin. “You might be right. I’m told I don’t have a way with words.”
“Still talking,” she murmurs, curling her fingers in my hair and yawning. Lazily, she moves her naked, paint-flecked body to straddle me again, positioning herself above my chest.
“I need something to shut me up, don’t I?” I pull her closer towards me until she’s sitting just above my face.
She laughs. “I like how you think.”
She lowers the pink lace of her panties closer to my lips. I smell her, kissing her thighs as she sits above me. My tongue begins to explore her skin. She’s salty with sweat, her scent rich and dark and wholly inviting. I take it in, breathing deep, and I feel my cock stirring again.
Nearly driven mad, I grab her thighs and begin licking and sucking at the thin lace barrier that separates me from her sex. I use my tongue to find the tight, hard bud of her clit, and I suck it between my lips. Each moan and each involuntary movement of her hips makes my cock—impossibly—harder. I use one hand to yank her panties to the side, and I feast on her, covering her clit with my mouth and moving my tongue around that sensitive button in rhythmic circles as she bucks hard against me, her voice building as her own orgasm grows, deep inside of her core.
I’m vaguely aware that she’s raised her hands to her nipples and that she’s riding me faster and faster now. She’s crying out, arching her hips again and again. Her legs shake, and I know she’s coming with my tongue inside of her. I’m buried in her taste—and I haven’t been this satiated or this hard in years.
Just as she’s coming down from the high of her orgasm, I throw her back on the bed and move her to her hands and knees.
She’s laughing, her wild hair hanging over her face. She combs it behind one ear and looks back at me. She takes one look at my cock. “Again? You’re hard again?”
“All your fault,” I whisper, stroking myself. Her pussy is dripping, and utterly inviting.
“I don’t have a condom,” she murmurs. “But I’m … taken care of.”
“Good.”
I nod with a wicked grin on my face. I take her light body in mine and position her on the bed, her perfect ass in the air. I let my fingers explore her, dipping inside of her soaking wet pussy, and up over her tender, swollen clit.
“Ohhh….” She moans. “Don’t stop…”
I press my cock to her entrance and slide inside her, bit by bit. She’s impossibly tight, impossibly hot.
“God, you’re big,” she groans. “More… please, more.”
I almost lose it then. Her sharp taste is on my lips, and the feeling of her mouth on my cock is still with me. I’ve wanted to come deep inside of her since I first laid eyes on her in that bar, and I’d stroke my own cock a thousand times thinking of her rolling around in that paint, nipples hard as diamonds. But I hold myself back.
I fuck her with long, measured thrusts, each movement designed to draw out her pleasure.
Usually I’m thinking of my own, but this time, it’s different. I ride her as she comes again, her body shaking from exhaustion. Once she’s come just one more time, I let my balls seize up again, and I fill her up with my liquid hot essence. She moans, bucking hard against me.
We collapse together, and I fall asleep draped in her arms and legs, tangled in her body heat, my skin slick and perfumed with her scent.
I went out tonight to get art and a beautiful woman.
I definitely got both—and far more than I expected.
My phone is ringing. I hear it from a long way off, the tones familiar, melodic. “Purple Rain.” A song from another time, another prince.
“Jesus, what the hell is that?”
It’s Norah’s voice that wakes me, not the sound of my phone. I sit up, confused and blinking back sleep. The room is bright with sunshine and barely furnished, scattered with dirty clothes and books.
My phone keeps ringing; it’s the ringtone I’ve set for palace security. It’s the only tone I know I can’t let go to voicemail. They don’t call without a good reason.
I scramble in the back pocket of the jeans I dropped in a rumpled heap last night. I swipe to answer, hoping I’ve caught the call before it disconnects. If that happens, a whole different set of events get put into motion, none of them good, especially considering I’m naked and in a strange girl’s bed. I don’t need a mass of armed men bursting in under the assumption I’ve been kidnapped, ready to shoot first and ask questions later.
“Yes?!” I say, relieved to hear live air on the other end of the connection.
“Your Highness, this is Rowling. I’m sorry to disturb you, sir, but we have a situation developing at the palace. Your mother has requested your immediate return.”
&nbs
p; “What’s wrong?” I ask. “Is she alright? Is she ill?”
“No, sir. Her Royal Majesty is in fine health. I’m sorry sir—I can’t discuss this on an insecure line. When you get to the plane, we’ll have a secure connection and I’ll brief you. The jet is standing by at the airport. Is Duncan with you now?”
I struggle out of bed and to the window, peering down at the street. Duncan leans on the closed driver’s side door, looking up at me from behind mirrored aviator sunglasses.
“Yeah, he’s here,” I say. “Not in the room, but here.”
“He has instructions to take you directly to the airport. There’s no time to be lost.”
“Very well.” I end the call, then look at the phone in my hand. The last time I got a call like that was when my father died six months ago. That ringtone makes my guts clench and my heart race. I don’t ever want to get a call like that again—it means everything is falling apart.
Something big is going down at home. Something—I know—to do with my brother and his bizarre behavior. That’s the only reason they’d call me. He’s the heir. I’m the spare. They’re never supposed to need me, and I’d like to keep it that way.
“Everything okay?”
I turn. Norah is sitting up, her knees pulled to her chest and the sheets drawn tight, covering her from shoulder to toes. Last night she was wide open, shameless. Now, in the mid-morning light, she’s the picture of demure—if slightly rumpled and paint-speckled—reserve.
In the new light of the day, I realize she’s the most beautiful creature I’ve ever laid eyes on.
Game over.
“I’ve gotta go,” I say, reaching for my jeans and pulling them on, then searching for my shirt.
“Why?” she asks, confused. “I thought we’d go out for coffee… or…”
But I cut her off. “I’ve got to go.”
What I want is what she wants: I want to stay, have breakfast, hang out with her, get to know her. That’s never happened before—and it can’t happen now. It’s better to nip any expectations she might have in the bud.
Forty seconds later, I’m on the stairs headed down to the street and back into the over-bearing care of my patient, ever-loyal bodyguard, Duncan.
1
Norah
What an utter ass,” Chantal snips in her sexy French accent, then downs half a glass of red wine to punctuate her statement.
She doesn’t need to say it—I’m in perfect agreement. “I didn’t even get his last name,” I admit, lowering my voice. “And I went down on him—voluntarily! I’ve never been so comprehensively dissed in my life.”
“No, mon Dieu!” she cries, wagging her finger at me. “Never do that the first time. You must build them up to it. Otherwise it takes the mystery away.”
“But I liked it. A lot.” I give her a grin.
We laugh about it, which eases some of the sting. But I’m still chafed, mostly because Collin was blisteringly hot and a rocking great lay. He made my toes curl. There was something else about him, too, something I can’t put my finger on. He’s the first guy I’ve met in a very long time who I wanted to take the trouble to get to know better.
Oh well. Collin-With-No-Last-Name is an ass, and I’m done wasting tears and heartbeats on asses. If I ever see him again, he can kiss mine.
I even tried to find his profile again, but it was gone.
“So Norah, now that Stephen’s art-fest is over, what are you going to do? Are you staying in Paris, or going home?”
“I can’t stay. I’m moving out in—” I check a fake watch. “Like today.”
“So what is the plan?” She says “the” like a French villain in a movie. Zee.
I shrug. “I’m not going home yet. I’m thinking of doing a tour of the UK and the rest of the islands. I’ve always wanted to see Ireland, Anglesey, Scotland. I could Airbnb my way across the North Atlantic. I don’t have to stop until I get to St. Petersburg.”
Her eyebrows raise. “If you’re going to St. Petersburg, get there before summer ends, otherwise you’ll be iced in until next June.”
I grin, sipping my wine while a crew of men a few tables away ogle Chantal’s long, shapely legs. One of the men winks at me, flicking his tongue suggestively. I lift my middle finger, smiling. “Fuck off,” I mouth clearly, so he doesn’t mistake my intentions.
I swear to God, unabashed shit like that doesn’t happen with such frequency back home. We’ve got our problems in the states, but at least I can sit in a café with a friend without being subjected to obscene gestures from strange men.
Chantal turns to see who I’m insulting. She turns back, rolling her eyes. “Les cochons,” she smacks. “Pigs. They snuff for truffles in the dirt. They’ll never taste my truffle!”
We almost burst our sides giggling at the cochons sitting paunchy, balding, and humbled just tables away.
“French men are pigs,” Chantal observes, and she should know. “I prefer the English. They have manners.”
That settles it. I’m going to tour the British Isles, with a lengthy visit to the northern island of Anglesey. I have a good friend who lives there, and I’ve always wanted to visit anyway. It’s where my ancestors on my mother’s side come from. The place is a fairytale, loaded with history and castles, ancient baronial manor houses, and the last surviving absolute monarchy in the developed world.
I lift my hand to the garçon, offering my credit card in the air.
“Will your ex follow you?” Chantal asks, leaning forward. “He’s made quite the point of being by your side these last few weeks.”
I shake my head. “Thankfully I think Eric has to be back at work next week,” I say. “Unlike you Frenchies, in America we get two weeks’ vacation—max. He’s on day eleven, so I think I’m clear of him for a while.”
“He’s the reason you met that guy on Sparc, isn’t he? You were trying to get him off of your mind?”
As much as I hate to admit it, Chantal is probably right.
“You know, that sort of thing only makes a man dig in. Making him jealous will only lead him to desire even more what he can’t have.”
She’s probably right about that, too. Eric called me the afternoon after Collin, offering to take me to supper. He said he saw me leave with someone—the fucker had been watching me.
I was still licking my wounds from Collin leaving and needed to get out of the flat, and I stupidly went with him. He spent the entire evening reminding me in endless, tedious detail how successful he is. How long our families have known one another. How one day soon, when I get bored with being a “flighty artist, searching the world for poetry that doesn’t really exist,” I’m going to see the logic in settling down with someone familiar, someone who understands me.
Eric will never understand me.
I don’t give a shit about his money or his seat on the New York Stock Exchange. I don’t care that his father and my father are golf buddies, or that we’ve attended the same private school since kindergarten. I’m never going to be the girl who’s satisfied with an acre lot, a white picket fence, and a brunch table at the country club. I grew up in that world, and I’ve had enough of it. It’s soul-crushing. It’s for people who lack the capacity to imagine more for themselves.
I’d rather be dead broke—seeing the world, meeting fascinating people—than spend my life in a cocoon surrounded by well-dressed Stepford wives and their spawn.
“Mademoiselle, je suis désolée… em… I am sorry. Your card was declined. Perhaps you have cash?”
Fuck. I thought I had at least a hundred euros still there.
“It is not a mistake,” the waiter assures me sternly. “Cash or another card, s'il vous plaît?”
“I can get it,” Chantal offers.
I wave her off. “I’ve got cash,” I say, producing a handful of euros. “The card must have expired or something.”
I keep it cool, but inside, I’m shaking.
Back in the apartment I’m about to lose, I call my parents. That
account was linked directly to them. And I need to get shit straight.
But my father’s voice is shaky when I call him. It appears that my account isn’t the only one that’s utterly fucked.
“Barney’s disappeared, honey,” my father tells me, trying to keep his voice even.
“What do you mean, he’s disappeared? You invested everything with him!” I say to my father.
“He’s gone,” Dad says. “He’s gone, along with every asset in the company’s holdings. Every investment. Every checking and savings account. Everything. The FDIC and the SEC, along with the FBI, are tearing his offices apart. They say he’s left the country. Gone to the Emirates. He took billions with him. Honey, we’re broke.”
I try to process what my father has said. Barney Mackoff, long-time family friend, investment counsellor, owner of Mackoff Bank and Investment Trust, the man who has managed my family’s finances since before I was born, has stolen everything, disappearing into the murky underworld of international money launderers, oligarchs, and mobsters.
“We’re broke?” I repeat. “Not just me? I’m the one who deserves to be broke—not you guys. Shit. Oh shit.” I think of the profundity of it. My parents, who worked hard for their money—they’re just like me now. They were able to give me every opportunity and let me follow my dreams, and now their own dreams are dead.
And they’re the last people who deserve it.
“I’m going to try to sell the house on Pawley’s and the apartment in New York to raise some capital,” Daddy says. “Thank God this house is paid for.”
“This house” is my mother’s, inherited from her grandmother. It was paid for before the first shots were fired at Fort Sumter. It damn well better not be mixed up in this bullshit. I never did trust “Uncle” Barney. He tried to put the moves on me when I was just thirteen. He’s a creep.
“You need to come home, Norah,” he says emphatically. “Your allowance has to be stopped. Your credit cards are all cancelled. I can probably scrounge up just enough cash for your plane fare.”
