by Cari Quinn
So what was his excuse? His tolerance was too high?
“Maybe you should tell me what you do remember, and I’ll tell you. We’ll see if we can fill in some of the holes.”
Instead of looking relieved at his suggestion, her brows furrowed. “Look, Michael, I have to go to back to work soon. Someone called off, so I picked up a later shift.”
He frowned. She had to go back out in that insanity? “But you already worked today.”
“Right. I often work a couple of shifts. I work at the bar, and I temp through the agency whenever they need me. Right now, I’m counting on the bar because my most recent positions with the agency just finished.”
He glanced toward the hall. No crying yet. “What about the baby?”
“Oh, he’s old enough to stay by himself.” When Michael’s eyes widened, she nudged his arm. “Sucker. I told you my dad’s coming over. He’s going to watch him.”
Right, her father was en route. If being in a kid-saturated environment didn’t freak Michael out enough, she had to add in some parental unit action. He should be positively itchy to leave by this point.
So why wasn’t he?
Michael swallowed and reached for her hair again. Somehow curling it around his fingers settled him. “Want me to start with what I remember?”
“No, I really don’t.”
He traced his fingers down her shoulder. “It started onstage. I didn’t notice you at first.”
“Why would you? You had Juliet.”
“Nothing has ever happened between me and Juliet. Nor will it ever. We do what we do for the crowd. In fact,” he brushed his nose against Chloe’s hair, “she slid her hand in my pocket after you and I started eyefucking the hell out of each other, and she found me hard. And she took off.” He chuckled and pulled back enough to see Chloe’s eyes. “Did you see her book across the stage? She never came back to my side for the rest of the set.”
A wrinkle appeared between Chloe’s eyes. “She thought you were really into her.”
“Yes, and it freaked her the hell out. But I wasn’t. I’ve never been hard for Juliet Reece.”
“It doesn’t matter. God, we never even had a conversation before this crazy weekend, so we might as well have just met a few days ago.”
He picked up her hand and grazed his fingers along her soft skin. “Where’s your ring?”
“That again?”
“I just want to see it. That’s fair, right?”
“Okay.” She slipped her hand into her pocket and withdrew the small piece.
Because of course it had to be sapphires. Didn’t that just beat all?
Two infinity symbols made up of diamonds bracketed a sapphire in the middle. The deep blue color was gorgeous, and he could only imagine how lovely it would look on her pale finger. He only had one question.
Well, two, but she didn’t have an answer for when she would start wearing it, so no point in asking that one.
“It’s pretty,” he said at length. No reason to dump his own issues with sapphires at her doorstep. If she liked it, that was all that mattered. “But why isn’t it bigger?”
“What?” She gaped at him.
“A wedding ring should be special.” He rubbed her knuckles with his thumb. “I know you were already engaged before, and that probably he gave you a nice ring.” Out of the corner of his eye, he glimpsed her tucking her other hand under her hip. “Nothing about this situation is normal, but if you decide you want to upgrade it, just let me know. Not that I don’t like the one you picked out,” he added as she gawked at him.
“Are you even real?” she asked after a moment.
“I wasn’t insulting your ring. Yeah, I have my own issues with sapphires, which is my problem, but—”
“Michael. You don’t even know me. We barely ever spoke. Were you even aware of my existence before this weekend?”
He slid her a glance. He was in no hurry to go there, but they needed to get their past on the table before she found out in another way and hated him even more.
If that was even possible.
“Yeah. Did you ever know about the pictures?”
“What pictures?”
“So I guess that’s a no.” He exhaled and rubbed her knuckles again before closing his hand around hers. She must’ve been distracted by his latest impending revelation, because she didn’t even try to pull away. “You know Lila is my stepmother.”
“Even though she’s barely older than you, yeah.”
“My family is weird. Sorry you married into it. Anyway.” He cleared his throat. “Back when she started up with Nick, she and my father were separated. I was concerned she was going to create a big issue with her divorce. My dad isn’t an understanding man. The fact that he’d had affairs for years wouldn’t stop him from treating L like shit. So I thought if I hired a PI friend to take some pictures of her and Nick while they were cavorting all over town, she’d see how indiscreet she was being.”
“So, wait, you hired someone to take intimate pictures of your stepmother?” Chloe’s eyebrows rose. “Sure you weren’t off on some Freud trip? She’s a beautiful woman, and I know how teenage boys are with hot MILFs.”
“She wasn’t technically a mother then,” he mumbled. “Just a stepmother.”
“Yeah, and you didn’t deny guys get turned on by having a sexy stepmom. So that’s how that was.” Chloe shifted to sit sideways on the couch, pushing her back against the arm. He didn’t blame her for needing space, but it still stung.
“The pictures weren’t intimate. I specifically told Jerzee to not photograph anything of that nature. He wasn’t sneaking around outside her bedroom. The photos were all taken outside, no super long lens, no big drawn out time period.” Michael rubbed a hand over his face. “And one of the pictures he got was of you and Nick.”
“Of me and Nick what? We didn’t do anything.”
“You were hugging. Smiling at each other. In one of them, it kinda looked like you were blowing him a kiss.”
“I don’t blow Nick kisses. What the hell? Where are these pictures?”
“Hang on. I still have them in my email. I kept them because—”
“You wanted spank material of your stepmother?”
“No,” he said sharply. “I wanted to have them available so she could see all of them. I’m glad I did so now you can too. There is no spank material or anything close to it. The most Jerzee got of Nick and Lila was them kissing outside a laundromat and him grabbing her ass—which if you know them, he does about every six seconds.”
“Wow. Bitter much?”
He didn’t say anything. She wouldn’t hear him out now anyway.
After opening his email on his cell, he scrolled through his folders until he found the one that contained the photos. Then he slid Chloe his phone.
She scanned through the snapshots without showing any reaction at first. Then her eyes misted and she glanced up at Michael. “I was pregnant with Axl.”
“Yeah. You were stunning. Are stunning,” he amended. “Do you want me to send those to you?”
Stiffly, she nodded and handed back his phone.
He tapped a few buttons and isolated just the shots of her and Nick. There were only a couple, and they were as innocent as could be.
Only a dick would be jealous of several-year-old pictures of friends hugging. Problem was, he was a dick, and he knew they’d once been way more than friends back in the day. How much more, he didn’t want to think about.
“Need your email address,” he said.
She gave it to him and he sent the pictures, then took a chance and lifted her legs onto his lap. She made a noise in her throat and tried to scoot back, but she was in the corner of the couch and there was nowhere to go.
“Full disclosure. I had a thing for Lila for a while. Teenage boys think solely with their dicks. When the gods grant you an attractive stepmother, yes, your thoughts drift bad places. But that was years ago. After she hooked up with Nick, the last of those fee
lings died.”
Chloe’s brow arched. “You certainly have a busy social life, Michael Shawcross.”
“Nah, back then most of it was up here.” He tapped his head. “The Lila thing wasn’t anything at all. She never saw me as anything but a son. I saw her as a mom too, and the last few years, that’s all I’ve seen her as. Often a pain-in-the-ass one too.”
Chloe’s legs shifted in his lap. Her little toe had a flower-shaped ring on it, which might have been the sexiest thing he’d ever seen. “I saw your hair first, from the stage. All wild and free. Swaying behind you as you danced. Definitely never saw it like that before.” He gave her ponytail a pointed look. “It’s always up when I see you.”
“I work and I take care of my son. No time for fancy hairstyles.”
“Maybe not, but I’m glad there was time for this.” He tweaked her little toe. “The ring’s hot as hell, by the way. Almost as hot as watching you dance with your girls and get totally loose to my music. I got off on the fantasy of you being all wet and ready just from watching me. As ready as I was for you.”
“Alcohol makes people do crazy stuff,” she said quietly, turning her foot into his ministrations on her arch. “Oh fuck, that feels good.”
Hearing her swear was always a slice of the forbidden. “Want me to give you a massage?”
“That sounds like a pick-up line.”
“No, it’s an ‘I want to give you an orgasm before you go to work’ line, so let’s pretend this is innocent until it’s so not.” He rubbed her ankle bone under the hem of her jeans. “Oh, and just so you know—I hadn’t had a drop when I was on stage. I might be a partier—might’ve been,” he corrected, “but I always kept the music sacrosanct. I never rehearsed drunk. Never performed that way either.”
Her feet wiggled. She was nervous, and trying to act like she wasn’t. Even that turned him on. “I can’t say the same. We pre-gamed pretty hard.”
“Your eyes were unfocused when we were dancing. I couldn’t decide if I wanted to take care of you or fuck you senseless.”
She inhaled audibly. “You were pretty much on the fucking track all night.”
“It kills me that I don’t know,” he murmured, digging his thumb into her arch just to hear that sexy little give in her breathing again. “I should’ve been able to memorize every moment of undressing you, and touching you, and licking you. I wanted to see your breasts in the light, outside the club. See the rest of you. The little slash of your belly button, the slit between your legs. Your ass. Goddamn, I want to see your ass bare. And I might have gotten to, but I was robbed of the memory and maybe I’ll never get it back.”
She swallowed hard. “Outie.”
Her soft, shaky voice made him whip his gaze to hers. “What?”
“I have an outie.” She peeled up her shirt to give him a glimpse of her belly, and Jesus, he couldn’t stop the groan.
Her stomach wasn’t flat. Wasn’t perfect. But he’d never wanted to worship every inch of a woman’s midriff more.
“Keep going,” he rasped, fully expecting her to say no.
But she rolled her shirt up higher, offering him a look at the pale peach lacy cups that guarded her tits. Between them there was a tiny bow, sweet and pure.
He bent her legs and leaned closer, reaching down to stroke her adorable navel. She flicked her gaze up to his and her lower lip trembled open. Just like before, she reached up to bring his head down to hers, sending him the message loud and clear that she was into it too.
Into him.
Their noses bumped and their lips mashed together before he took a quick breath and aligned them correctly. He molded his mouth against hers while he caressed her belly, learning her curves as he slipped his tongue along her seam. She opened for him, inviting him inside, and he hesitated long enough to speak against her flesh.
“What I regret most is not remembering this part. That moment before I entered you. Tongue, fingers, cock.” He opened his eyes and stared into hers, so deep and dark. “Kissing you nearly killed me. Imagining I missed out on recalling this…” Easing his hand between her legs, he squeezed, eliciting her gasp. “Next time, I’m going to fucking take notes.”
“You need a notepad? Maybe a pen?” Her teasing questions between their quick, hot kisses made him even more mental.
“Oh, Red, I have a canvas right here.” He scraped his callused thumb under the waistband of her jeans and she whimpered. “And I can paint you too.”
“You’re a talented man.”
“You have no idea. Maybe you need a reminder too.” He moved back and crooked his finger, inviting her on his lap. “Get on me.”
“Work,” she said halfheartedly.
“So make it fast.”
She rose and straddled him, sinking down on his lap while her fingers dug into his shoulders. He reached up to free her hair and she shook it out, smiling down at him in a way that stole his breath.
“I’m not sure I’ve ever seen that smile before.” He touched the side of her mouth. “Dimples?”
“Dimples and freckles,” she said with a sigh, and he winged up a brow.
“You forgot the outie belly button and the adorable feet.”
She pulled her shirt over her head, so quickly he couldn’t prepare. “But all the freckles,” she said, her voice fading out.
She wasn’t lying. They were sprinkled all over her pale skin, layered on top of each other in some spots. He wanted to investigate them all.
Instead, he grabbed the straps of her bra and yanked them down her arms, trapping them at her sides while he lowered his head to suck on her nipple.
“Michael,” she breathed. “Don’t—” He paused, looking up as her head fell forward so that her glorious curtains of flame-red hair surrounded them. “Don’t stop.”
“Never.” He nibbled the tip of her breast, absorbing her sounds of excitement like air. He coasted his hand down her torso to open her jeans. Underneath she wore mom underwear. White cotton, nothing arousing at all. Yet he couldn’t nudge the fabric aside fast enough. “On my fingers,” he said and she nodded, as if she wanted the same thing.
There was no teasing, no hesitation. He stroked her scant curls, swallowing over the dryness in his throat at how soaked they were. All for him.
No alcohol for either of them, no energy from a show, no dancing or club atmosphere. Just a saggy couch and granny panties and a baby sleeping upstairs.
Nothing had ever been hotter.
He separated her swollen lips with his index finger and rubbed her clit until she dropped her head back, baring her long, freckled throat. Nibbling his way down her skin, he slid farther inside her, entering her in a slow glide that made them moan in unison. One finger soon wasn’t enough, so he used two. He pushed them deeper, gauging what she could take. What would make those rosy lips fall open on a groan.
“Gotta come quick, so help me get you there.” He grazed her throat with his teeth. “Shit, I want to lay down and pull you over my mouth.”
Her arms were still caught close to her sides because of her bra straps so she flexed her fingers, balling them into fists. As much as he liked her being bound at his mercy, he liked even more having her hands on him. He reached back to undo her bra, allowing her to loosen the straps and drive her hands into his hair. Holding his head against her breasts, she rode his fingers, undulating with every one of his thrusts. A flick of his thumb over her clit and she pulsed around him once, twice, before shattering and soaking his hand.
Rocking his hand deeper, he kept going, ignoring her whimpers. “Sensitive?” He bypassed her clit and just pumped in and out, nice and slow, while he sucked on her nipple. She started tensing up and her nails pressed into the back of his neck. “Don’t fight it.”
“I can’t…no multiples for me.”
He smiled against her breast. “Before.”
“Michael—”
“If you keep saying my name, I’m going to keep you on your back on this couch until you scream it.”
>
She pressed her lips together and he chuckled against her breast, slowing his strokes. Giving her a chance to gather again, to find the rhythm he was coaxing her into one more time. Then going faster and faster while she sought more of what he was offering. Bearing down, she tightened up on him. So damn tight. Her walls convulsed around his fingers as she finally found her release with his name lingering on her lips like a chant. A prayer.
A song.
When she shuddered and slid down to him, he clasped the back of her head and brought it to his shoulder. Feeling her curl against him, relaxed and boneless, made the rigid shaft in his pants jerk. This wasn’t about him. He knew it, even embraced it because he’d spent too little time really focusing on someone else. But his body was a hell of a lot greedier.
“God.” Her mouth brushed the side of his neck. “Is there a handbook?”
“The Guide to Chloe’s O? No, but give me time and I’ll write it.”
Her laughter washed over him, dialing down the throb in his cock to a pulse. He wanted her—so much—but he wanted this even more. This connection he’d never had a taste of with anyone else.
“Usually, they’re rarely seen in the wild, especially the last couple of years. I haven’t even managed to—” There was a commotion on the stoop, and she raised her head just as the front door burst open and a man with graying red hair flung himself into the small living room.
“What the hell is all that out there, Chloe?”
At that point, a few things happened at once. None of them good.
Chloe screeched and fumbled for her bra and her shirt. Michael scrambled to cover her with his arms. And Chloe’s father’s eyes grew wide before they rolled back in his head.
Actually, that might have been Michael’s. He couldn’t really be sure because he was looking away and begging the universe to finally do him a karma solid.
For God’s sake, his wife didn’t even remember marrying him. He’d just solely focused on her pleasure without considering his own. Couldn’t he catch a break, ever?
