He wanted more. Wanted to bury his face between her thighs, reclaim her secrets as his own. He wanted to slide his tongue between the petals of her sex, lick every inch of her until she screamed. Until she pressed her wet pussy against his mouth as she came.
He reached up and tore the panties off in one smooth motion.
“That’s better,” he murmured, kissing his way along her inner thigh.
Her legs were trembling as he worked his way toward the cleft between her legs. When he got there he caught the scent of her desire, earthy and primal, and he had to resist the urge to push her back on the bed and drive into her then and there.
Instead he slid his tongue between her legs, running it through the folds of her pussy until he reached her clit.
She cried out, her fingers clutching his hair as he closed his lips around the center of her need, sucking and lapping.
“Oh, god… Max…”
He lifted his head and pressed his hands against her thighs, pushing her onto the bed. Then he grabbed her knees and pulled her down until she was on the edge of the mattress, her pussy inches from his face.
He pushed against her thighs until she opened further for him, her sex wet and glistening, begging for his mouth.
He ran two fingers over the engorged tissue, stopping at her clit, applying gentle, circular pressure until her hips started moving.
“That’s right, Abby.” He slid his thumb inside her as he continued stroking her clit with his fingers. “You’e going to come for me. Then I’m going to fuck you until you never want to leave me again.”
There had been a time when Abby wouldn’t let him see her this way, when it took courage for her to open herself to him. Now he savored the image of her open and wet, feeling the last remaining barriers between them fall in the face of their separation and reunion.
She pushed down against his hand and his thumb sank another half inch inside the hot cave of her pussy. He leaned forward, closed his mouth around her clit, and sucked hard as he slid three fingers inside her.
She ground her hips against his mouth, moving in time to his rhythm as he tongued her clit, alternating between sucking and lapping. His movements were as frenzied as hers. No thought, no plan, just the need to taste her sweet pussy, to feel her come against his mouth, to taste the juices of her release.
“I’m going to come, Max,” she gasped.
He slid the tip of his soaking pinky into the tight rosebud of her ass, his tongue still working her clit, his fingers still sliding through the channel of her pussy.
Her response was instantaneous.
She screamed into the room, her body shuddering in his hands as she came, her pussy soaking his mouth as the contractions wracked her body.
He covered her sex with his mouth, leaving no area untouched as he buried his face inside her, lapping up her desire like he was drinking from a hidden reservoir in a desert cave.
She shook for a long time, wave after wave rocking her body until she finally lay limp and panting, still spread for him on the bed.
He stood, pulling off his T-shirt and sliding off his jeans. Leaving them in a pile by the bed, he stretched out next to her, pulling her into his arms and kissing her long and deep, the feel of her naked body against his the purest form of pleasure he’d ever felt.
“Abby, Abby, Abby…” He kissed her face and stroked her hair.
“I love you, I’m sorry… I love you, I’m sorry…” She repeated the words over and over, touching her mouth to the skin of his chest and neck. It was like a match to the wick of his skin, like she was lighting candles along every surface touched by her lips.
He stroked the length of her body, let his hands travel across her breasts and down her ribcage, into the hollow of her waist, over the swell of her hips and the fleshy softness of her thighs.
He hooked her knee around one of his hips and rolled under her until she was straddling his body like Lady Godiva, naked and powerful.
He sat up, not wanting even an inch of space between their bodies. He didn’t know if he would ever want space between their bodies again. If he would want to be away from her for even five minutes.
His cock nestled against the moistness of her sex. “I need to be inside you, Abby.”
He grabbed her hips and positioned her over his rigid cock, his head brushing against her entrance.
She bent her head, her hair forming a curtain around them as she touched her lips to his, their tongues meeting as she sank onto him.
She moaned against his mouth, and he wrapped his arms around the small of her back, pressing her against him, wanting to embed this moment — this moment when they were one again — in his memory.
She held his head in her hands and moved her hips, grinding against him, exploring his mouth with her tongue.
He held onto her ass as she matched his upward thrust, his cock penetrating her so deeply he came up against the barrier of her cervix. Her withdrawal was the sweetest kind of torture — the slow drag of him out of her, the relief as he sank back into her heat.
He took one of her nipples in his mouth as their hips moved together, sucking on the erect bud as she gasped, her head flung back while she slid faster up and down on his cock.
He was ready to come — past ready to come.
Hell, he’d been ready the second her dress had dropped to the floor.
But not without her.
He separated the cheeks of her glorious ass, opening her even further for him until she cried out in surprise, his cock sinking even further into her, her clit rubbing more fully against his stomach as she moved.
“Come for me, beautiful,” he said.
She was grinding hard on him now, working the friction on her clit with the penetration of his cock, her eyes closed as she lost herself in her impending release.
“Give it to me, Abby. Fucking come for me.”
The words seemed to let loose something inside her. She froze for a split second, suspended between the pleasure of their rhythm and the release that came a moment later, her body shaking against his as she screamed in ecstasy.
It was all he needed. He wrapped his arms around her back, pressing her tight against him as he spilled into her. His cock was locked in the delicious vise of her pussy, her channel clamping down on him while she came, milking him of semen even as he was barely able to tunnel though her tight channel.
It was a never-ending earthquake, a tectonic shift in the plates of their reality, a physical manifestation of an unspoken truth: they belonged together, and they would never let anyone separate them again.
It was a silent promise. One he made to her as she collapsed against him, as he clung to her, pressing his lips against her damp skin.
“I love you, Abby. I love you.”
Eight
Abby woke up alone in bed, sunlight streaming across the rumpled sheets, the terrace door still open. It wasn’t hot yet, but the air was still and warm, and she rolled over onto her side and threw an arm across the side of the bed that had been occupied by Max.
She hadn’t dared hope he would forgive her for doubting him. Hadn’t dared hope he might even be willing to think about forgiving her. That he’d opened the door so readily to her, that he’d let her back into his heart and his bed, was an unexpected gift.
He’d been tender with her at first, clinging to her while they made love, molding his body to hers like he wanted to erase any separation between them. But he’d grown more voracious as the night wore on, taking her with a frenzied hunger that said everything he hadn’t been able to say about their time apart.
He’d been lonely. She could see it in his eyes, knew it from the careful way he’d moved around her at first, like he was shielding himself from her, like he didn’t dare believe she was back for good.
She hated that she’d done that to him. She would spend her life making it up to him, proving to him that she would always be by his side, that she believed in him no matter what.
She thought she hea
rd running water somewhere in the house, and she tuned her ears to it, picking up the soft clatter of metal and the clink of silver against porcelain.
Max was making breakfast.
She smiled and sat up. Mexico was beautiful and serene, but there was no place like home, and her home was with Max.
She used the bathroom in the master suite and threw on Max’s discarded T-shirt. Her body was stiff, her center sore in the best of ways, when she descended the stairs.
The sounds from the kitchen got louder as she made her way down the hall, the smell of coffee and frying bacon making her stomach grumble. She hadn’t eaten since yesterday afternoon, before Angel had shown up at her bungalow. She’d been offered food on Angel’s plane, but she’d been too nervous to think about eating. Now she found that she was ravenously hungry.
She stepped into the living room and headed for the adjoining kitchen.
Max’s back was turned to her, his muscled shoulders moving as he did something with his hands that she couldn’t see. She paused when she reached the rough-hewn post that acted as an unofficial divider between the rooms.
She wasn’t surprised that he was shirtless, but he still took her breath away. His back was broad and sculpted, his jeans barely hanging onto his hips. Her hands itched to slide around his waist, to touch the hard ridges of his stomach as she lay her head against his back, to feel the rise and fall of it as he breathed.
She didn’t get the chance. He stopped moving all at once, like he sensed her there, and turned to face her. She saw the fear on his face in the moment before he covered it with a familiar bravado.
She smiled, determined not to make a big deal out of it. He wouldn’t want her to worry about him. Wouldn’t want her to think he was afraid she was going to leave again.
“You going to offer me some of that coffee?” she asked.
He moved aside, giving her a look at a breakfast tray already set with a cup and a vase filled with a few sprigs of lavender. “Already on it, although I was going to bring it to you in bed.”
She closed the distance between them and wrapped her arms around his neck, pressing her body to his. “Let’s eat on the terrace instead. It’ll be too hot soon.”
He wrapped his arms around the small of her back and touched his lips to hers. “Your wish is my command.”
He said it lightly, but she knew from the look in his eyes that he was speaking literally. That there was nothing she could ask for that he wouldn’t deliver.
Luckily for him, he was all she wanted.
His kiss was long and lingering, the movement of his tongue languorous against her own. She was wet by the time he pulled away, her body already primed to welcome him all over again.
And she wasn’t alone.
She flattened her hand against the erection in his jeans. “”Hmmm… maybe we should hold off on breakfast.”
“No way,” he said. “Your food will get cold.”
He stepped away from her and loaded the tray with a cheese omelette and crispy bacon, a stack of pancakes and a pitcher of syrup, fresh butter, a bowl of strawberries, and a carafe of coffee. He added a second cup to the one he’d placed there for her.
“Let’s eat,” he said.
She laughed as she looked at the groaning tray. “You sure you don’t want some help with all that?”
“You’re not lifting a finger,” he said.
“If you say so.”
She followed him out onto the terrace and watched as he removed everything from the tray. A couple minutes later, she was settled in the chair across from him, a cup of fresh dark coffee in her hands.
“Hmmmm… heavenly,” she said after taking a sip.
They held hands as they ate, Max seeming as hesitant as she was to break contact. They’d both been damaged by everything that had happened before she left for Mexico, but being apart had been its own kind of trauma. She’d spent a month on the beach, trying to convince herself she could live without him. Now, she knew it for the lie it was.
She would never be able to live without him. Not really.
She’d cleaned up her half of the omelette, six pieces of bacon, and four pancakes, plus three cups of coffee, by the time she sat back in the chair with a groan.
He eyed her empty plate. “Get enough to eat? Would you like another omelette? Some french toast? A side of beef?”
She laughed and tossed her napkin at him. “You shouldn’t ask questions you don’t want answers to.”
She looked out over the verdant lawn, let her eyes travel over the end of the property, out into the scrubby edges of the golf course. The city shimmered like an oil slick in the distance, the heat already rippling the air around it.
She skimmed past the Luxor’s pyramid, the glittering towers of the Aria and the Cosmopolitan, the majestic architecture of the Bellagio, until she found the dome of the Tangier in the skyline.
She hadn’t even thought about her job. Jason had sent her an email saying it would be there when she was ready to come back, but that had been before — before the visit from Angel Vitale, before she knew Jason was a sociopath.
From the terrace of Max’s house, the curve of the casino’s signature dome looked vaguely sinister. Jason was there, holding court in his corner office, putting on the facade of successful financier and real estate developer when underneath it all, he was a partner in the worst kind of crime.
She turned away from it to look at Max. “Now what?”
He lifted an eyebrow. “Can you be more specific?”
“What happens with Jason? With Fredo DeLuca?”
Surprise lit his eyes. “What do you know about Jason’s dealing with DeLuca?”
“Only what Angel Vitale told me.”
He cursed softly. “She shouldn’t have done that.”
Abby had the feeling Angel Vitale wasn’t a woman who worried too much about what other people thought she should and shouldn’t do, but there was no point mentioning that to Max.
“Someone had to tell me.” It came out harsher than she’d intended.
Max’s eyes flashed. “I was trying to protect you.”
“Well, don’t,” she said. “Not anymore.”
He shook his head. “That’s nonnegotiable.”
“Except this isn’t a negotiation, Max.” She kept her voice even, not wanting to throw fuel on the fire of what she now realized was going to be an argument. “I’m part of this, whether you like it or not.”
“I don’t,” he said tightly. “Which is why my number one priority is to get you out of it as soon and as completely as possible.”
“What if that’s not what I want?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said.
“It doesn’t matter?”
“Listen, I get it,” he said. “You and Jason have a lot of history. Not just our friendship when we were kids, but all the stuff that came after. You feel betrayed. But this is going to be messy — it’s already gotten messy — and you’ll just make it messier.”
“My job is still there, waiting,” she said. “I can help.”
She didn’t know the Syndicate’s plans, but surely her proximity to Jason and the casino could help them — and Max — somehow.
He stood and walked to the railing of the terrace. He looked out over the landscape for so long she thought he might be done talking. Then he turned to face her, and she saw the anguish in his face.
“I can’t be worried about you while this is going down. Jason is going to use you — maybe not today and maybe not tomorrow, but eventually, he’s going to use you to get to me. That can’t happen again.”
She walked over to him and slid her hands around his waist, leaned her head against his chest where she could hear the soft thump of his heart.
“He was only able to use me because I didn’t know what was going on,” she said. “If I’d known, it wouldn’t have worked.”
He held her head in his hands and forced her to look at him. “If you’d known, it would have been worse. He mig
ht have hurt you, Abby. Might have had the DeLuca’s hurt you.”
“I won’t let that happen,” she said. “I’d be in the office. I could feed you information that might help. Jason would never know.”
“You have no idea what you’re saying.’
“I do!” she said. “I know exactly what — ”
“You don’t.” It came out as a shout, and he took a calming breath before continuing. “Jason has hired a private security detail, not a bunch of overweight mall cops with batons — mercenaries, ex-soldiers who kill for money. Who kill for fun.”
“What… what do you mean a security detail?” Jason had always been low-key, arriving and exiting the casino without fanfare, walking the streets of Vegas like everyone else. His only nod to security was the system set up at his house.
“I mean that Jason doesn’t go anywhere without a posse of ridiculously huge guys carrying ridiculously huge weapons under their jackets.”
She took a deep breath. It was a wrinkle she hadn’t counted on, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t still help.
“That doesn’t have anything to do with me,” she said. “As long as no one gets suspicious, I’ll be as safe as everyone else in the executive offices.”
Max shook his head. “I can’t talk about this right now, Abby. I just got you back. Don’t ask me to start worrying about losing you again.”
She bit her tongue against the arguments that rose in her mind. He was right. It wasn’t fair. She’d just gotten back, and she had things to do, too. She needed to go home, check on the house, touch base with Meredith, see her dad.
There would be time later to make her case.
“All right,” she said. “But Max… I’m not that little girl who was scared and broken. I’ve fought to not be that girl. I can’t… I can’t have you treat me like that anymore. It makes me feel small and powerless, and I can’t ever feel that way again. You have to understand that, even if we don’t talk about Jason right now.”
Wages of Sin: Las Vegas Syndicate Book Two Page 5
