by Shayla Black
“Come.”
She nodded wildly, then her body went completely taut, and she let out a primal, throaty howl. Nothing had ever sounded so sweet to his ears. “Josiah!”
Maggie rode his face to the squirming, scorching, screaming climax’s end. He worked every sensitive nerve until the tension left her body with an exhausted sigh of satisfaction.
He pressed a kiss to the inside of her thigh with a smile, drinking in the sight of her rapidly rising and falling chest, her flushed face, and her eyes closed in repletion.
In the silence, he shucked his pants, fished a condom from his pocket, and rolled it on. He crawled over her body, hovering, watching her.
If he were the sort of guy eager and capable of hanging on to a woman forever, he’d choose one like Magnolia. She was sweet enough to lure him, yielding enough to submit to him, uninhibited enough to scream for him, and sassy enough to keep him guessing.
Just as well she wasn’t looking for happily ever after, either. They had tonight, and Josiah intended to fully enjoy it.
“How do you feel?” he asked smugly.
“Boneless. Content.” She lifted lazy lids to him, her turquoise eyes glittering. “Ready to return the favor.”
A minute ago, he might have been able to resist her mouth on him long enough to truly enjoy a blow job. But as soon as she looked at him, that was a big hell no. Every cell in his body geared up for one imperative and one imperative only.
Get inside Magnolia West.
“Another time, baby.” He covered her and gathered her thighs in the crook of his arms. As if he’d done it a thousand times, the head of his cock easily and naturally found exactly the spot he wanted to invade.
“I—”
“Hold on.” His rough thrust forward cut off whatever she’d been about to say and replaced it with a loud gasp that echoed in his ears and gave way to her long, low groan.
Josiah joined her as sensation rolled up his cock. Heat flared. She tightened on him. He swelled as fresh desire poured down his spine.
Shit. If he wasn’t careful, this would be hard and fast and over too soon.
“Yes!” she cried out. “I don’t know what you’re doing to me, but dear god, please do it again.”
Experimentally, he eased back, then slid in once more, this time deeper. She answered with another sharp inhalation. Her nails dug into his shoulders. She clung to him, thighs hugging him close.
“Good. I don’t think I could stop fucking you right now for any reason. You feel amazing . . .”
There had been more to his speech, but he lost the thought as soon as she rolled her body beneath his, moving with the rhythm of his stroke while he shifted from one to the next, deep, slow, and bed-jarring.
What was it about this woman? Sure, she was pretty. But he’d fucked pretty women before. Hell, he hadn’t even seen Maggie totally naked yet, and he was already so damn keyed up to stay inside her all night. The lacy bodice was covering the breasts he craved. But even without seeing her bare, he knew Maggie was . . . more. She was more interesting. She was kind. She was funny. She was an adorable, sexy-as-hell mess. She was dangerous to his equilibrium. She was a challenge he could get used to taming—or at least trying to.
Josiah slanted his lips over hers again and sank deep—tongue and cock. He’d been inside Maggie mere moments. Already, his blood ran scalding hot, turning to lava, pooling and bubbling, searing him with desire. He was unbearably hard, beyond sensitive, and on the edge of losing his control.
Holy shit, was it even possible to work Maggie out of his system in one night?
Thank god he had another day or two while he made a few things clear to Enlightenment Fields to sate himself with her.
Some guys thought he was bent because he got just as much pleasure out of getting a woman off as he did getting off himself. But no way would he leave Maggie less than utterly, sublimely satisfied. He wanted her smiling. He wanted her coming back for seconds. Hell, he wanted to wipe Sawyer, Davis, and any other man she’d given herself to entirely from her memory.
Refusing to wonder why, he distracted himself by clasping her tight and rolling to his back. Then he scooted to the middle of the mattress, positioning Maggie on top of him. “Ride me, baby. Show me how you like to be fucked.”
She writhed on top of him, enveloping more of his dick. “Slow. Deep. Hard.”
That answer was fucking perfect. “Hmm. What will it take for you to lose that dress?”
“There are two catches at my nape,” she managed to get out between sawing breaths. “The bottom is held up by a zipper at the small of my back.”
Josiah grunted. Mission accepted.
He pulled her down so she lay on top of him, breasts to his chest. In one maneuver, he worked at the fastenings at her neck and bent his knees so he could fuck her from below. They both groaned as he thrust up, Maggie when he scraped the sensitive nerves inside her pussy with each long stroke, and Josiah when the dress fell away from her shoulders to pool around her chest and revealed her velvety cleavage.
He continued to push his way inside her body as he attacked her zipper. The moment it came undone, he lifted her silken skirt. “Take the dress off. Pull it over your head and . . .”
He didn’t have to tell Maggie twice. She tore it away and pitched it across the room, never breaking stride and never quite catching her breath.
Josiah knew the feeling. He took one look at her symmetrical, swaying, lush tits in his face and lost his damn mind.
She didn’t need him to guide her in a rhythm. Maggie knew exactly what she wanted, and just like she’d said, she liked it long, slow, and deep. With every thrust, he submerged more of himself into her. Sweat beaded at his temples. He couldn’t look at anything but her—her cloud of golden hair now tumbling around her torso, her undulating body, and the way she parted her legs to accommodate him. He especially loved watching his cock penetrate her.
As he filled her again, Maggie’s head fell back. Her breaths quickened. He worked hard to keep his wits together. She didn’t make that easy. Her every move was sensual, every reaction to him instant and perfect. He thrust; she tightened. He caressed; she moaned. He lost himself in her eyes; she fell into him in return.
Shit, he had to get her to climax now. His own was creeping up fast.
Gritting his teeth, he lifted up into her again, this time swirling his thumb over her hard, swollen clit. She was close, and his not-so-subtle push toward the pinnacle hardly went unnoticed. She gripped him tighter and chanted his name again.
“Kiss me,” he breathed roughly.
Because that won’t be at all like splashing oil on a raging blaze . . .
No, it totally would be, and he gave zero fucks.
Maggie didn’t hesitate. She bent to him, softly layered her lips over his, and teased him with a kiss that was like a whisper. Like gossamer. It left him hungry.
Josiah demanded more, thrusting a hand in her hair and fastening his mouth to hers, nudging her lips wide and thrusting his tongue deep as he plowed into her body, shoving hard against sensitive spots that had her gasping and melting in his arms.
“You like that, baby?”
“Yes.” She dug her fingers into his shoulders.
“You want more?”
“Please . . .”
He loved the way she panted. “If I give it to you, are you going to come?”
She nodded frantically. “I don’t think I can stop it.”
“Good. I want to watch you come apart.”
She gyrated down on his dick with a whimper, as if protesting her inexorable need to feel more of him. “But I’m not ready for this to end.”
“Oh, I’m going to fuck you again. You can bet on that. Now let go. Don’t make me wait.”
As if she had the reassurance she needed, Maggie went primal on him, working her way up
and down his cock, which now screamed for relief. Roughly, he filled her again and again, gratified when he saw the color rising up her chest, flaring across her face. It doubled when she clamped down on his shaft so hard he could barely move.
“Baby. Oh, yeah. Oh, fuck . . .”
“Josiah!” Her answering cry nearly destroyed him.
Tugging his fist in her hair, he guided her lips over his own again and swallowed her next long, high-pitched wail.
Shit, he could feel her pulse around him, gripping, squeezing, milking him. No force on earth could stop him from giving in to the intrinsic animal need to merge with her, mark her, show her who she belonged to.
The thought spilled through his head, and he had only long enough to think a passing whoa before his climax erupted—volcanic and epic—stripping him of rational thought and hurtling him into dark, thick ecstasy. At the moment, Josiah didn’t care if he ever found his way out. He simply groaned, a long, strangled sound that ripped from deep inside him, and let go of every shred of his control.
The orgasm seemed to go on forever. He wanted to believe it was because he hadn’t gotten laid in a while. On some level, he knew he was bullshitting himself. His pleasure had nothing to do with deprivation and everything to do with Maggie.
As he recovered from climax, something more than the usual mellow filled him. Josiah rolled her to her back and delved into her stare for answers. Maybe he should pull out, put distance between them. But he didn’t want to.
“Oh, my gosh.” She was still trying to catch her breath when she pinned him with an intimate stare that reverberated down his spine. “Hi.”
“Hi.” He swallowed. Impossible not to notice that instead of slowing down, the longer he looked at her the more his heartbeat accelerated.
What was she doing to him?
“Wow. You probably hear that a lot, but . . . wow.”
That made him grin. “Wow yourself. You were pretty amazing.”
Her smile dimmed. “It’s not me.”
“Baby, it’s not all me. Sex is usually a good time but that was really fucking intense.”
“Because of you. My fiancé . . .” She shook her head. “Never mind. You don’t want to hear my insecure BS.”
“Was your fiancé the sort of a douche who tried to make you feel responsible for his shortcomings as a man?”
“No. I just didn’t do it for him. He suggested that if I were less inhibited, sex might be better. But that was crap. And I just . . . couldn’t.”
“Not with him, maybe. With me? You weren’t inhibited at all.”
“I know.” Her admission was so soft he barely heard it. “I’m surprised. It’s not like I know you well.”
“Maybe you feel more at ease with me.”
“I wasn’t self-conscious with you at all, but you make me nervous. I mean, you’ve been all over the world . . .”
Yeah, while working. Did she think the CIA had routinely sent him to places like the Côte d’Azur? Nice, France, would have been fantastic . . . and totally unrealistic. “Some places are really overrated.”
Syria, Congo, Ukraine, and Venezuela all came to mind.
“But you’ve seen things, met people, obviously had a lot of sex.”
No sense denying that, so Josiah didn’t even try. “I don’t think that has anything to do with it.”
“You’re wrong. I’ve barely set foot outside of Texas. Not that I really want to go anywhere else, but Comfort proper has about thirty-two hundred people. I feel like I’ve known the same thirty-two hundred people most of my life. There are fewer than seventy guys in this town who are roughly my age. I know them all. I’ve dated a number. I haven’t been impressed by any. I didn’t love my fiancé and . . . Oh, lord. We’re supposed to be having fun, and I’m babbling.” She pushed at his chest like she wanted to get free. “Sorry.”
Regretfully, he withdrew from Maggie’s body and disposed of the condom. She was still trying to find her way to her feet when he returned and urged her back down to the mattress.
Normally, he didn’t hang around to hear whatever his lay of the moment had to say after sex. He wasn’t looking for attachments, and subs, if he had sex with them, rarely had expectations beyond the moment. Maggie was different. He wanted to understand why she’d let this nonsense about her ex and her small-town life mess with her head.
“Don’t apologize, baby.” He caressed his way up and down her silky skin. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”
“It doesn’t matter. Since things ended with Davis, I’ve been wondering what I’m doing and where I’m going. My sister and a lot of my friends are starting to get married, and I . . .” She sighed. “I’m not sure that’s for me.”
Josiah didn’t press or pry. He understood. If she hadn’t loved the guy, her broken engagement must not have been terribly traumatic. Lucky for her that she hadn’t been the stupid sap ready to invest in forever, only to learn she’d been played. Josiah held that honor. But clearly, her breakup had left her unsettled.
“Because some tool told you that you needed to loosen up in bed?”
“No. I didn’t really care what Davis thought. That was another clue. We simply didn’t . . . connect. In fact, I don’t connect with most people. I stayed in the relationship because I didn’t want to disappoint everyone, especially Granna. I let the engagement drag on longer than I should . . . It’s ancient history. What about you and your fiancée?”
“Ancient history, too.”
“How ancient?”
“Three years ago.” And that was all he wanted to say about that.
“Do you ever see her anymore?”
“No. It’s definitely over.”
“Do you miss her?”
“Hell no.” Sometimes, he missed the illusion of a future and a family. In the rare moments when the world wasn’t quite so crazy and work was a little slow, he reflected on his existence. Then, he sometimes wished for more meaning in his life. But hell, he had friends and family. He did his bit to save the world. It wasn’t all bad.
Lately, though, he’d found himself wishing more often that he weren’t quite so alone.
“I don’t miss Davis, either. Why are we talking about this?”
Honestly, he couldn’t remember. But he sensed she had a point.
Josiah pressed a kiss to her forehead. “You don’t usually connect with people. I’m different, why?”
“I don’t know. Maybe because we really only have tonight and I don’t have to worry about what happens between us tomorrow.”
“Or maybe you just haven’t met anyone else who flipped your switch and you’re selling yourself short. You’re sassy and funny and easy to be with. You connect with your sister and grandparents, so clearly you’re capable.”
She bit her lip. “But I don’t trust well, and I . . . don’t have a good relationship with my mother.”
“I noticed some distance between you two at the reception. Something happen?”
“Other than the fact she elected not to actually be a mother for most of my life?” She scoffed. “I can hear all the armchair psychologists now telling me I have attachment issues and that I just need to forgive my mom and work through my childhood trauma in order to have a happy, healthy adult relationship. News flash: My mom and I more or less worked it out a few months ago.”
Josiah would guess less rather than more, but he didn’t correct her. “How did that go?”
“Honestly, it wasn’t the major catharsis I thought it would be. It seemed to do wonders for Shealyn but . . . nothing changed for me. I’m not mad at her anymore. And I know she’s trying to make amends. It’s just I don’t feel . . . invested.”
“Have you tried getting closer to other people since then?”
“No,” she admitted. “But I don’t think making peace with Mom makes anything any different for me.”
“It’ll most likely come,” he assured her, because he really didn’t know what else to say. And because having her naked and flushed underneath him wasn’t doing great things to his logic.
“Maybe you’re right.” She shrugged. “Want a shower?”
“No. I want to fuck you again.”
But he wanted more than that. He loved the idea of working her, coaxing her, finding the magic combination it would take to make her truly surrender herself.
A crooked smile slowly worked across her mouth. “I don’t know. Maybe I should make you beg this time.”
That wasn’t how sex worked for him, but he wasn’t going to argue, simply prove she had it all wrong.
For now, he chuckled and gathered her wrists in his grip, anchoring them to the mattress above her head. “Why don’t you be a good girl and lie there while I suck on your nipples until you scream?”
Maggie’s breath caught. Yeah, she liked it when he talked dirty. Josiah had noticed that the first time he’d worked his way between her legs, and he had no trouble exploiting her weakness.
“That sounds great, but don’t be disappointed. I don’t think my breasts work that way.”
The fact her voice was already shaking told him she was woefully mistaken.
“Humor me.” He tightened his fingers around her wrists. “Don’t move your arms. Whatever happens, whatever I do, keep them right here.”
“Why?” Her breath caught.
“Because I said so. Because I can make you feel so much better if you obey.”
“I don’t like that word.” She wrinkled her nose. “Obedience definitely isn’t my strong suit.”
He laughed. “I won’t make you eat your vegetables. Tonight, I’ll only ask you to do things we’ll both enjoy.”
Maggie bobbed her head in consideration. “I’ll try. But when is it my turn to make you feel good?”
“Baby, you already do.”
Josiah couldn’t wipe the smirk off his face as he lowered his head to her. God, he had the wonderland of her body spread out and all to himself, along with hours to learn it, pleasure it, master it. She would be tender tomorrow, maybe a little sore. But he’d make sure she considered every stinging, swollen ache worth her while.
