by Holley Trent
She reached for the remote control on the coffee table and pressed the appropriate combination of buttons to activate the television and Blu-ray player.
When the show started, he wrapped his left arm around her waist and pulled her back a bit so her ass was against his crotch. He snaked his hand beneath her shirt and pressed it just above her waistline.
She drew in a breath.
“Why don’t you grab that blanket and lie down? Maybe if we’re lucky, we’ll both fall asleep.”
“Uh. Good idea.” Given the movie narrator’s deep monotone, she’d probably doze off within five minutes. She stood, grabbed the afghan from the recliner, and returned to her previous spot on the sofa. She curled up next to him and draped the blanket over their spooning bodies.
Being snuggled next to him like that felt natural, and with each exhalation, she relaxed a little more into his embrace, and even more when his hand found her belly again. He dragged his chin across the top of her hair, moaning a little.
“You smell good,” he said.
“I use much better shampoo and conditioner when I’m not traveling. I don’t bother weighing down my bag with the good stuff when I’ve got to haul firearms with me.”
“Logical.”
“Is my logic off-putting? I had an ex once tell me I would be so pretty if I did less thinking and less talking.”
He tensed behind her.
And just like that, her mood spiraled south. It wasn’t so much the memory of what David had said, but more so the fact that she’d actually tried to heed his request, though subconsciously. She’d found herself not wanting to speak up—not wanting to volunteer information, even when she knew damn well she had the answers other people lacked. Even when she knew speaking up would save them all some time and effort.
“No. Not at all.” Fabian trailed his fingers up her side beneath her loose shirt, tickling her belly, her ribs, and stopping just short of her bra band before skimming downward. “Whoever said that must have been some kind of fool. I like that your mind is always churning. More than that, I love that you had the education to feed it.”
“Oh, that’s right. You and Felipe didn’t have any formal schooling.”
“No, we didn’t. Some of the old ladies in the troupe taught us to read and write. We picked up scraps of this and that as we could from handed-down correspondence coursework. Homeschooling textbooks. That sort of thing. It was nothing like having a real teacher. I worry now that even if I tried to enroll somewhere, I wouldn’t be able to keep up. You know what they say about old dogs.”
She pressed her elbow back against his ribs and nudged him. “You’re not that old.”
“How old are you, dragón?”
“Twenty-eight. Some people dread getting their AARP cards in the mail when they reach a certain age. Well, I dread getting my Old Maid card. It should be coming any day now.” She wanted to clap her hand over her mouth for even saying it. She’d never given that a lick of thought, at least not consciously. But now that it was at the forefront of her thoughts, maybe the idea of being alone did terrify her a bit. Not finding someone willing to put up with her shit long-term. Not finding someone devoted enough to try and try again for the babies she wasn’t sure she could have, but wanted so badly.
“I’m thirty-five.”
“I know,” she said, chuckling. “Felipe is thirty-five.”
“I suppose if you know Felipe, you know me, huh? I guess we’re pretty much interchangeable.”
She scoffed. “You so aren’t.”
“How so?”
She closed her eyes to shut off the visual stimulation from the television screen and blew out a breath. “You just aren’t.”
She didn’t know exactly what had made them that little bit different. Maybe it was their separation all those months, or maybe they’d always been that way. Felipe was just a bit bolder, more assertive, whereas Fabian tended to hold back a bit more. He didn’t take anything for granted. Maybe it was the simple difference between older brother and younger brother. Who knew?
“Do you mind me coming over? Without asking, I mean.” He drew his fingers back up again, this time toying with the elastic of her bra band.
She wished he’d stop being so tentative. She wouldn’t be upset if he wanted to touch her. In fact, she wanted to be touched. Normally, she might have said something snide like, “I’ll get over it,” but she didn’t want to leave room for anything to be misunderstood. She wanted him to know that he was welcome wherever she was, at least for now. She didn’t understand what was happening. She wasn’t going to make it out to be true love or anything like it just because the Shrews tended to fall for the men they rescued. She didn’t want to trick herself into feeling a certain way just because of a trend. She didn’t know if she was falling in love with the man, but she did know for sure she’d liked him a hell of a lot, and not just as a friend.
“I’m glad you came,” she said.
He didn’t push for more. She’d judged him to be the kind of man who didn’t need his ego stoked.
He just nuzzled his face against her ponytail and pressed a caressing hand over her left breast.
When she didn’t brush it away or otherwise impede him, he dragged his thumb across her perked nipple, drawing a moan from her when the sensation sent a tingle down her core to other neglected places. Already, her sex quivered and tensed, anticipating being stretched, being filled.
He laid feather-light kisses on her cheek, and down to the sensitive hollow of her neck.
She tipped her chin back for him, giving him more access and letting his mouth roam where it would while the hand inside her shirt eased down to her waistband. He deftly unfastened her jeans and pushed his hand past the barrier into her panties.
She gasped as his fingers slipped between her lower lips and swirled at her opening.
His breath was hot against her ear when he whispered, “You’re so wet.”
“Am I?” Lame. Try as she might, breaking her habit of having an answer for everything was a hard one.
“Mm-hmm.” He shifted forward a bit, and the fact that he was equally aroused became evident as his erection poked her backside through her jeans.
She wriggled her ass against him, and oddly felt brazen for it. She was the kind of woman who wasn’t apologetic about asking for things. If she needed something, she made a request to the appropriate party and didn’t say sorry or beat around the bush. But, this situation was different. She was asking Fabian to fill a need she hadn’t had quenched in three years.
And maybe Maria was right. She could have had sex before now, but she hadn’t been ready.
Now she was ready. For him she was ready.
“Yes?” he whispered.
She nodded and locked her gaze on the television screen.
Kissing her neck, he eased down her jeans beneath the blanket along with her underwear and used his foot to nudge them to the end of the sofa to free her legs. He moved behind her, rocking back and forth a bit, probably easing down his sweatpants.
He found her clit with his left hand and eased her back against him, rubbing her, teasing her, as the satiny skin of his cock eased between her thighs.
She drew in an involuntary breath as the end of it tapped the hand she rested in front of her thighs.
That might hurt.
Gathering her wits about her, she stroked her fingers over the slick head as he shifted her top knee up and back so her leg draped over his and she was opened wide for him.
His fingers skimmed hers briefly as he adjusted his cock’s angle and pressed it at her entrance.
He shuddered behind her when he worked the head in, and paused there, breathing heavily. “I hope you…” He hissed when she clenched around him. It was involuntarily, but fuck, she hated slow build-ups. If she were going to be fucked, she wanted one of them to burn some calories in the process.
“…won’t think poorly of me if…”
She wrapped her fingers around his wrist and s
queezed, silencing him. “It’s been a while for me, too.”
His nose skimmed up and down at the back of her head—a nod—and he gripped her hip and delved deeper into her.
“If I can’t last, there are other ways I can—”
She rammed her hips back, and sheathed his cock as far down as she could.
“Okay,” he said, moving now with intention. “I see what you want.”
“So give it to me.”
A chuckle rumbled in his chest as he increased his pace, gripping her knee and pounding into her hard enough that she could barely catch her breath.
The man could keep a rhythm, she had to give him that, and fuck if this one wasn’t torturous. She could hardly believe he had concerns about longevity when she was the one nearly ready to break apart.
He nudged the afghan down, and through her periphery could see him watching the movements—the repetitive in and out—over her shoulder.
She closed her eyes and sighed. “Bet you’d have a lot of fun with a big mirror.”
He didn’t respond to that quip beyond shifting his hand down to her clit and squeezing it between his thumb and index finger. He gave it a little sharp tug as his thrusts went deeper, harder, and she grabbed his wrist as her body began to quake.
“You’re close?”
Her teeth chattered as her core began to spasm and toes curl against his legs.
“I thought you said…you had…superior endurance,” he said between panted breaths.
“I…I lied.” And the last guy she’d had sex with didn’t hit every nerve ending in her goddamned cunt simultaneously. It’d taken her a lot to get off back then, but again, she’d been trying to put two puzzle pieces that really didn’t fit well together and expected they’d grip when in fact, their very natures were that they couldn’t bond in the first place.
He strummed at her clit, and she wheezed. “Dear Lord. I might die.”
“Don’t die yet. I haven’t had my fill of you.”
Well, that wouldn’t take long. Her average relationship length was about seven months. She had been with David for a year, but she later learned he’d started cheating six months in. He’d cheated with a woman less intelligent than him and more submissive. That was what he liked, apparently.
She blew thoughts of him away on an exhalation and concentrated on the situation at hand. She had a gorgeous man behind her who’d been so desperate to be in her company that he’d asked his brother to drive him over. This was a man who’d seen her as she was from their very first meeting, and he hadn’t been turned off by it. In fact, for some unfathomable reason, he seemed to like it.
With another little tug of her clit, he tipped her over the edge and she cried out, digging her nails into the fabric of the sofa.
His rhythm faltered, and breaths near her ear went choppy. Then his big hand grabbed at her hip and held her still as his dick pulsed inside her. “God.”
“Yeah. I think I just saw Him, too.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Fabian jolted awake when his morning erection skimmed the crease of Astrid’s warm ass. She scooted against his body, wriggling as if to settle in closer, and he slipped his hand over her hip, targeting her thigh’s apex.
She exhaled a little sigh in her sleep, and he grinned, pressing his nose against her messy pile of hair.
What a way to wake up.
He suddenly understood why Felipe had been in such a hurry to put down roots.
As Fabian’s fingers glided over her thighs, his vision cleared. He stopped his hand.
Astrid’s messy hair hadn’t been the only thing worth noting in his periphery.
A petite woman with long, curly brown hair and bags the size of half-dollars under her eyes perched on the edge of the coffee table, looking on serenely.
Maria. That was her name. He’d met her briefly at dinner.
Her hands were folded demurely onto her lap and legs crossed at the ankles. She could have been doing anything from waiting for the start of a church service to listening to a fortuneteller spin her future.
“Good afternoon, Fabian,” she said in a calm voice. Too calm.
Afternoon, she’d said…
“Es tarde.”
He pushed up onto his right elbow, careful not to dislodge the afghan draped over him and Astrid, and squinted at the clock on the cable box. 1:21 p.m.
“Mierda.” He gave Astrid’s arm a little shake.
She muttered, “What?” without opening her eyes.
He skimmed his fingers over her cheek and said in the Spanish he hoped Maria didn’t understand, “Maria is here. I think you overslept.”
“Hmm?” Her left eyelid crept up slowly like a mechanized garage door ticking up. She sighed. “What’s up, Maria?”
“I just got here,” the other Shrew said. She grunted and eased her shoulder holster off her arms. “Came straight from the assignment. Dana called and asked if either of us were going to make it to the range. I had just left the stakeout and went straight from there to take care of paperwork. I told her I didn’t know where you were.” She cocked her head to the side and narrowed her eyes. “Though I guess I should have suspected.”
Fabian squeezed Astrid’s arm. “What is she saying?”
Astrid yawned and covered her head with her arm. “Missed a training session this morning. Dana was trying to figure out where I was.”
“Are you going to get in trouble?”
“Doubt it.”
“We’ve got a meeting at three,” Maria said, and she pointed her index finger at Fabian. “Tell him. Dana said we should be there at the office. All hands on deck, including all the dudes.”
“Why?” came Astrid’s muffled voice.
“Don’t know. I’m going to go shower off the cigar stink from the bar I was in and throw together some lunch. Maybe we can be out of here by 2:30.”
“Mm-hmm.”
Maria stood and loped down the hall, singing softly to herself.
Fabian eased his hand beneath the afghan and pressed it against Astrid’s belly. “What did she say?”
“Dana has called everyone under the sun in for a three o’clock meeting. You included.”
“Why me?”
“Don’t know. Best you do what she asks, though. She’s not a lady you want to be on the bad side of.”
“You don’t seem so eager to get up.” He kissed her neck and pulled a giggle from her.
She snuggled back against him a bit more, brushing his semi-erect cock through his sweatpants.
He hissed and put a hand between them. Couldn’t afford to get too excited now that they’d acquired a chaperone.
“Nope. Warm under here.”
“I see.” He leaned down and skimmed his lips over her earlobe, earning him a smile from her. “I thought you said getting on Dana’s bad side isn’t wise.”
“Yeah, I did say that, huh?”
“You did.”
“I’ll get up then.”
He waited a few moments, but funnily enough, she didn’t move.
Water drummed in the bathroom, so Fabian felt safe enough to ease the afghan off.
“Fuck.” She was still naked from the waist down, and the cock he’d been chastising on and off for the past five minutes went for the gusto. He wanted so badly to put his mouth there—to taste her, pleasure her. Somehow, he suspected that after pumping her full of his spunk, she wouldn’t be amenable to the idea. She might even kick his ass when she realized he’d done it. He could have pulled out, but hadn’t seen the point of it. What’s the worst that could happen? was all he’d been able to think when he was inside her.
She sat up, sighing, and grabbed her jeans from the end of the sofa.
His eyes focused on the odd motif of her socks as she wriggled her panties up her legs. He pressed a hand to her waist.
“Dragón, are those pigs on your socks?”
“Yes. Flying pigs, in fact.”
“Cute.”
“That sarcasm? You going
to ask me what little girl’s dresser I raided and wonder when I’m going to give them back?”
“No. Why?” Odd woman, and not because of her socks. He stifled a chuckle.
She stood and let her panties snap at the waist before bending to step into her jeans.
Before he could help himself, his palms met the globes of her ass and squeezed.
She yipped and took a big step away from him. “Quit it. I don’t want to have to body slam you.”
He shook his head. “No entiendo.”
“Yeah, you entiendo just fine.” She wrapped fingers around his wrist and squinted at him. “And don’t think I didn’t notice you didn’t pull out last night.”
Busted.
“If I end up pregnant, your rolling stone days are over, dude. I will ball-and-chain your ass so quick, you won’t see it coming. You’ll be down the aisle and in front of a priest before the ink dries on the marriage license, do you understand me?”
“So be it.” Like he’d thought the previous night—what was the worst that could happen? In his book, forging a permanent genetic connection was the best-case scenario. When she figured out how useless he was for anything else, she’d have no reason to want him around.
“Right.” She unhanded him, gnawing pensively on her lip.
“Qué, dragón?” Had she figured it out already?
She hooked her finger at him, and strode backward down the hall. “Shower?”
Together?
He didn’t make her ask twice.
* * *
“We’re running out of chairs,” Dana said as she pushed a rolling desk chair from the outer office into Shrew & Company’s conference room.
Fabian recognized a few of the people at the table. His brother, naturally, near the end closest to the door and on Sarah’s left side. Sarah rubbing her belly idly with one hand while flipping through a pile of paperwork with the other. Dana, of course. Patrick, whom he met at dinner the other night. Maria sat across the table from Fabian with his old circus crony Mr. Tolvaj at her right.