by Rie Warren
I hated to break it to Cady, but her kids weren’t stupid, and they knew something was up. Hell, they’d caught us making out several weeks ago.
I didn’t say a single word to the woman, going about my business like it was none of her business. Apparently the same way she wanted me to treat her.
I’d been fucking unbearable last night. Dad had tried to talk sense into me then given up when I remained silent. I sure as hell didn’t want to badmouth Cady in front of him, in front of anyone for that matter. He settled for turning the TV up louder every time I slammed something in the kitchen or slapped something down on the porch.
Jesus, even Skunk skedaddled after I threw a football so hard the screen window almost buckled and broke.
I’d finally taken my bad mood outside, stomping down to the dock. Where, of course, I couldn’t help but think of that fine day I’d shared with Cady right in this very spot.
The woman infuriated me. Her and her stupid age thing. If she didn’t want a man in her life, why the hell was she going on a date?
If she just wanted a quick fuck, she knew I’d be happy to oblige, especially since screwing her seemed to be the only way I could reach her.
I’d laid back on the silvery wooden dock, looking up at the dark sky, barking an even darker laugh.
Yeah, last night had sucked. Today was no better, every hour endless. I returned home to take Dad to a doctor’s appointment, exchanging no more than a few curt words with him. Then I headed over to Wando High School with the thought that helping Coach Jay hump equipment around—letting him treat me like a pack mule—might take my mind off my Big Bad Mood.
It didn’t.
Nothing worked.
Because nothing would work without Cady, and I’d already known that for a long damn time.
I got the boys from school. Took Aiden to his jazz guitar lesson, dropped Dane at chess, watched Luke at football where he did what he could with the aid of only one arm and strict instructions to stay out of the play zone.
I ignored Cady when she got home, even though she hung around the kitchen while the boys scarfed dinner down. All of their eyes way bigger than normal. All of their mouths way quieter than normal.
After dinner, and cleaning up, they’d gone to the neighbors to play on their RipStiks.
I hadn’t spoken to Cady all day, and I fucking missed her. But I had some goddamn pride I needed to salvage, and she didn’t make it easy on me.
Maybe I should just forget this thing building between us. Just let her go. Find something else, someone else, to occupy my life. Get in touch with Peyton Fox and try to resurrect my career . . .
After grabbing a beer from the fridge, I sat out back by the pool, listening to the crickets and the frogs. It might’ve been November, but the weather remained what I liked to call southern sultry.
I heard the door open, then high heels clicking on the pavers.
“Jude.” Cady’s voice carried through the night. “I’m leaving now.”
I didn’t want to look.
I had to look.
I wished I’d never looked.
Just one look at her, my head tipping sideways, and I was up on my feet in an instant, the beer, the frogs, the boys forgotten.
Cady held still, like she’d been caught in a snare, while I walked around her. This latest dress was as tasteful as all the others, but stunningly sexy at the same time. Completely white with full sleeves cinched at the wrist, the dress had a long center plunge, revealing a slice of skin and the inner hills of her cleavage. The sheer white panel across her entire upper back made it clear she wasn’t wearing a bra.
She looked southern sultry.
I wanted to touch her, but I wouldn’t. Not again, not until she admitted she was mine.
Coming around to her front, my face sharpened into hard planes. “We both know you’re wearing that dress for me.”
Cady blinked up at me, and her hand drifted to her cleavage, right where I wanted to bury my mouth.
She didn’t deny the dress was for my benefit, and I took one step closer, a handbreadth from brushing against her.
She had to tip her neck to peer at me, lashes sweeping up to her slim eyebrows.
She had to feel the heat of my gaze, because I was fully aroused and still so goddamn angry.
“Why are you doing this?” A muscle leaped in my jaw.
“Because Troy is smart and handsome and successful—”
“Whoa. Are you calling me some kind of layabout or something?” I barred my arms across my chest, sneering.
“And he’s a few years older than me.” She lifted that stubborn chin even more.
“Goddammit, Cady!” I blasted out. “Fine. You go on your date with Troy, and I’ll just be here looking after your kids.”
She flinched, but I’d already recognized my lower-than-low blow. I sounded just like her jackass ex-husband.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.”
“Just let me go, Jude,” she whispered, beseeching. “Let me go now before one of us gets really hurt.”
“It’s already too late for that.” But I stepped aside.
Against every instinct screaming in my body, I let her go.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Cady
I KNEW THIS WAS a mistake the moment I’d told Jude I had a date.
Just let me go before one of us gets really hurt.
I’d just hurt him so much I didn’t think he’d ever forgive me.
Driving away from the house, I slapped my hands down on the wheel, my foot trembling on the gas.
It was Joelle’s fault I was here in the first place. She’d stuck her nosy nose into my love life, and when I’d ignored her fake phone and dating app plan, she’d ever so helpfully given me the number of one of her hubby’s business associates.
He’d looked great on paper.
Sounded nice on the phone once I’d found enough courage to call him.
He’d looked even better in the photo Joelle shoved beneath my nose.
Troy was married to his business. I knew that feeling. He was forty-two. Much more age appropriate. He had blond hair with a sprinkling of silver. The antithesis of Jude.
I reached the restaurant and saw he’d waited outside instead of leaving me to flounder after the valet drove off in my car.
“Cady.” Troy hit me with a winning smile, and he was definitely attractive in a completely clean-cut way.
But he came in for a hug while I held out my hand for a shake, and we sort of cancelled one another out.
He laughed it off, ushering me inside. “You’re even more beautiful in person.”
“Um, thank you,” I answered awkwardly.
It’d been so long since I’d been on a date. What I’d done with Jude couldn’t be classified that way, but then there’d been the pizza nights and the picnic at his house and the afternoons at the pool . . .
We were seated quickly in the upscale restaurant, and I hurriedly ordered a glass of wine, wondering if it’d be gauche to just start with a whole bottle.
Troy sipped from a tumbler of scotch. We attempted small talk after ordering, and I wondered how I’d make it through appetizers, let alone the main course.
I had no appetite.
I have no game.
Troy was handsome and smart and successful and funny . . . but I felt nothing but the hot white spear of guilt over the pain I’d inflicted on Jude. There were no tingles, no butterflies, no intense immediate attraction that made my body ache to be filled.
And I was willing to bet Troy had never called a lover his perfect sexy cum slut once in his life.
He was picture-perfect. Poised. Polite.
And not my type at all. Not anymore.
I stumbled through dinner, but when it came time to order dessert and I just wanted to flee, Troy angled his chair and gave me a knowing look. “Forgive me for saying, but you seem preoccupied.”
“I have three boys.” I gave the first excuse I could think of coupled
with a wan smile. “I’m just wondering if my house will still be standing when I get home.”
The truth was I couldn’t help but think Troy had probably never instigated a water fight in his kitchen just because. Or driven a woman down to her knees just so she could worship his cock. He probably hadn’t dressed up in the silliest of silly Red Riding Hood costume just to make his lover laugh.
But I wasn’t Jude’s lover.
Not anymore.
“I feel like there’s more to it than that,” Troy said, pulling me back to the present.
I fiddled with my glass, nodding.
“Look, Cady. We’re both old enough to have been around the block a few times, so we know when there’s no spark.” He finished the last of his drink and set the glass down. “You’re a lovely woman, but you’re not really here with me. So how about I pay the check, and we call it a night? No harm, no foul.”
“I’d really like that,” I blurted in a relieved rush.
“Okay now, a man’s ego can only take so much.”
“Oh, God. I’m sorry. I’m a wreck.”
Troy laughed, which made him even more attractive, yet I felt nothing.
He walked me to my car, shaking my hand with no awkward mishaps, and I took my first deep breath in hours once I started the engine.
There weren’t many lights shining from the house when I pulled into the driveway, but enough so I could see Jude’s shadow in the living room. He paced back and forth in front of the windows.
Oh, Jude. What am I going to do with you?
I entered the front door, and he immediately came at me.
“I’ve been waiting for you.” His eyes blazed blue, and his hair looked like he’d raked his fingers through it a few hundred times during the past several hours.
I set down my purse and keys. “I didn’t ask you to keep a lookout for me, Jude.”
“Did he kiss you?” His tone harsh and hard, he bunched his fists beneath his armpits.
“No. It was a total disaster, so you can go home now,” I snapped back, his belligerence making me waspish. “You win, okay!”
“What do you mean?” He loosened his arms, softened his stance.
“Troy was witty and considerate—”
Jude groaned a curse under his breath.
“And I was miserable the whole damn time.”
“Why?” he asked in a rough low voice, jaw still clenched. “Tell me why.”
I brought bleak eyes to his, my words barely above a whisper as I stood helplessly before him. “Because he wasn’t you, Jude.”
“Finally.” Rushing forward, he slammed our lips together with the force of so much denied greed.
I hung on, rising up to my tiptoes to get at every single part of him I could after such a dearth of contact with the only man who’d ever known me the way he did.
Jude barely broke the kiss to frame my face in his big hands.
He looked at me like he couldn’t get enough. Like he’d never get enough. Then his mouth was on mine again. Firm and warm as always, the taste just implicitly Jude.
Ahhh, his scent, his heat, his body.
And his tongue swishing all around mine with furious lush hotness.
He tore away again only to swoop me up into his arms.
Voice hoarse and deep, he dragged his tongue up my shivery neck. “I’m fucking you in your bedroom tonight, darlin’, not a damn hotel room.”
I’d been a puddle the moment he crashed our mouths together. But between his long plundering kisses, his hand crawling beneath my skirt and up my thigh, and his complete dominance carrying me upstairs to my room . . . by the time he set me on my feet and pointedly locked the door, I was already so, so wet for him.
He barged against me until we banged into the dresser, and even in the low light his blue eyes seared hot need inside me.
“Tell me how much you missed my cock, Cady.” Grabbing my hand, he planted my palm against the thick erection forming a hard ridge inside his pants.
“I want it, Jude. I want you. In me, now.”
He growled, sealing our lips together with such a clash I thought he’d draw blood.
And I wanted him to.
His hands delved right into the plunging front of my dress, tough warm palms scraping over my breasts.
His mouth moved lower, latching onto my neck I arched for him, and I could barely catch my breath.
His hands possessive, he ripped the front part of the dress all the way down to my waist. Then his mouth was there, roughly mauling and nipping and wetting me all over.
“Fuck. I’ve missed your tits.”
I had to brace my hands against the dresser, he used me so crudely, lavishing my breasts with bold swipes of his tongue, his hands gripping my ass and grinding me against him. And I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.
He moved just far enough away to locate the zipper on my dress, then watched it pool around my high heels.
He swiped at his mouth, his lips even redder from having been all over me.
“You better have worn those panties and stockings for me, goddammit.” Shucking off his shirt, he stood hard muscled and completely formidable in front of me.
Breaths rushed in and out of his broad chest.
“Troy didn’t even—”
Jude snatched my head back with a hard yank. “Don’t you ever say his name around me again.”
Then he kissed every single thought from my mind, pressing me between the dresser and his body.
I whimpered when he let me go. Only to twirl me around.
I didn’t have to be told to spread my legs.
I looked over my shoulder, and he stared straight into my eyes.
Leaving me in the thigh-high stockings and heels, he unzipped his jeans, the sound making me arch my back.
I moaned.
His big hard cock slapping right against my ass, Jude met my eyes in the dresser mirror with a dark smile. His hands delved into my hair, and he dragged out all the pins keeping my chignon in place.
The hairclips clattered to the floor one by one.
He grasped himself in one hand, pulled the soaked crotch of my panties to one side, and slid all around my hot swollen cunt with the flared head of his cock.
“There’s been no one since you, darlin’. I’ve been tested, you know.” His voice was hoarse with need.
His meaning clear, I whispered, “Please.”
“So you want my big fat bare cock buried deep inside you?”
“Yesyesyes,” I begged in a rush of words.
Swiveling my hips, I tried to follow the teasing path of his hot thick meat, but he gripped my hip with a hand wet from my pussy to hold me still.
He leaned in close, biting the side of my neck. Nipping the lobe of my ear.
“Don’t. Fucking. Move.”
I shut my eyes, a whine leaving my throat.
I needed him inside me so deeply, so desperately.
And he made me wait for it.
And wait . . .
The first long hefty plunge inside knocked me off kilter until my breasts were squashed against the top of the dresser and my hairbrush went flying to the floor. I didn’t care. I didn’t care about anything but this. And being filled.
And Jude.
Holding me by my hips, he withdrew to the tip, leaving just that blood-engorged head inside me.
“Fuck yourself back on me.” He slapped my rump. “Show me how much you want it.”
I rotated slowly at first, teasing him.
His hand ran up the center of my spine, and he cursed low in his throat.
I took half of his thick cock, and slipped forward again.
His fingers convulsed on my waist, and he tensed, moving his legs closer.
I pumped all the way back fast and rough, the resounding wet smack of my ass to his groin second best to his bitten out words, “Fuuuuck, Cady.”
Then he took over. No more teasing.
Jude fucked me so hard my feet came off the floor every
time he pounded up into me and my high heels clicked back with each egress.
I cried out with every wet thump, his balls swinging up to smack my swollen clit.
“You need to be quiet, sexy bitch.” His raw whisper at my ear made my pussy clutch.
Panting and gasping, I held on for dear life. Sweat grew between us, and the slippery sheen made everything that much fucking hotter. I leaned over, pressed back, offered my cunt to him anyway he wanted me.
Because he always took me to the deepest wettest hottest climax.
“That’s it, beautiful.” Jude pressed a hand against my belly, one finger dipping low to twirl around my clit.
“Jude!” My body froze and spasmed over and over again.
I contracted on his cock, and he just kept belting in and out of me.
Elbows locked, I leaned up, I pushed back, wanting all of him. Getting all of him.
He tossed my hair over one shoulder and bit down on the back of my neck so I knew I’d have to wear my hair down for days.
He marked me.
He mastered me.
He brought me to the brink of animalistic pleasure again. Two more rough thrusts and I was there, thrown over, shuddering and crying out with Jude’s hand cupped over my mouth.
His arms straining around me, coarse hair a caress on my orgasming body, I felt him unleash inside me.
He buried his face in my hair. “Cady! Unghfuuuuck fuck fuck.”
Rocking up into me through every wet pulse of his mighty cock, he held me seated right against him.
I couldn’t move.
I didn’t want to.
I kissed his strong jaw, the cords of his neck, the side of his cheek, and rubbed against him while he held me up.
“I fucking missed you.” He pulled out of me, and I bucked back for more.
He slapped my ass with a hard palm. “Greedy slut.” He yanked my head aside, still all over me. “Tell me you missed me too.”
My eyes heavy, my legs shaky, my pussy still needy, I smiled. “Missed you like this so much.”
His kiss softer, his thumb rubbed across the raw mark he’d made on the back of my neck. My breasts were no less bitten and bruised, and I felt beautifully female, beautifully used.
