Five Minutes Late: A Billionaire Romance

by Sonora Seldon

  And who knows? If I’d had two cents worth of courage, maybe I could have made him tell me right then why he’d let the Killanes victimize him for years. Maybe I could have gotten him to spill just what the deal was with this future he thought we were locked into, maybe I could have talked him into sharing his burden, and maybe then our path together would have turned in a different direction.

  Maybe.

  40. No Matter Where You Go

  I wasn’t the only one who needed comfort that night, not by a long shot. I found that out moments after we went back inside the cabin, clawed at each other right inside the door, and ended up leaving a trail of shirts and blankets and shoes and coats and assorted naughty underthings leading from the door to the bed.

  We stood naked in the darkness, our arms twined around each other. The only light was a warm orange glow that leaked out from the banked fire in the woodstove, a flickering light that painted our bodies and danced in the greater darkness of Devon’s eyes.

  I looked into those eyes and I saw the hunger there.

  Devon could be many kinds of lover – gentle or rough, slow and tender, or fast and frantic. He was usually quiet, but sometimes a thundering growl rumbled through his body as he drove into me, as if I was being taken by a man who was half tiger under the skin. Some nights he whispered filthy, perverted things into my ear, while other nights he used his mouth in ways that went far beyond words.

  He could be inventive, a little bit kinky – tempting him into being a whole lot kinky was one of my ongoing projects – or often as not, he showed me just how crazy arousing vanilla sex could be when it was done Devon style.

  He’d pleasured me in beds, on floors, in showers and bathtubs and on the seats in his private movie theater – you know, the usual spots. He’d also made mad love to me in more than a few exotic locations – and no, I’m not going to give you any examples, although I will say that we should have brought a blanket that one time, because it turns out bridge girders can do terrible things to a girl’s back.

  That night, though, he was nothing but hungry – hungry and desperate.

  We stood next to the bed, and he pulled me tight up against him, every inch of my soft curves pressing into the muscled plane of his body, and I felt the tension humming through him. His right arm reached around my back, pinning me in place for his pleasure, while his left hand slid down my body to take possession of my ass, his fingers digging deep into the tender flesh.

  He held me so tight, it was as if he thought I might disappear.

  The voice I knew so well, the voice that comforted and teased and delighted me in so many ways, whispered into my ear.

  “Ashley, are you real? Truly real? I need you to be real, I need you to be my anchor. Can you be real for me?”

  “Baby, I’m real – you can touch me and taste me and feel in a thousand different ways how real I am.” I slipped my right hand between us, reaching for him. “I’m as real as this.”

  My hand eased down over the hard length of his cock. I curled my fingers around it, stroking and caressing, and felt the warm shaft leap in my hand, straining for release.

  “Devon?”

  He rumbled something in his throat, shifting his hips against me.

  “Devon, I need you to be real too. I need you to be real and I need you to be with me, no matter what.”

  I sank away from him then, and I sat down on the edge of the bed. I pushed aside the comforters, peeled back the sheet, and looked up at him standing over me.

  “Devon, I need you to be real, and I need you to touch me. I need your hands on me, I need your mouth on me, and I need you inside me. Please, be real for me.”

  He dropped to his knees without a word. He knelt on the bare floorboards at the side of the bed, leaned forward between my open legs, and wrapped his arms around me. Even kneeling before me like this, he was so unreasonably tall; when he held me, I could barely breathe within his powerful arms, and when he kissed me, his strength and need took what little breath I had left.

  As his mouth pulled away from mine and I gasped, his arms loosened. He slid his hands down my sides until he held my hips firm in his grip, his fingers clamping down and holding me still, captive, ready to be tasted and taken in any way he chose.

  His head dropped down, eased to one side, and then his mouth was on my neck. He kissed and nipped, his tongue danced over a single delicate spot where my pulse hammered ever faster beneath the skin, and then he bit down hard. He bit me, marking me, his mouth working hungrily, and I leaned into the sweet pain.

  As I trembled beneath his mouth, my eyes closed, I felt his right hand leave my hip, slide up over my curves, and cup my left breast. He held its warm weight in his palm,

  eased his fingers around the swelling curves on either side, and I leaned forward, pressing against his hand, needing more. Then he rubbed his thumb over my nipple, teasing it into instant, aching hardness as I whimpered beneath his firm touch.

  I lost myself to him, to what his hand was doing to me, and I didn’t notice his head moving lower until his mouth tasted my right breast. I jumped, gasping, as his tongue lapped underneath and around my breast’s heavy, generous curves. He kissed and licked and teased over and around, everywhere except where I needed him the most – and then, at the same moment his thumb rubbed hard over my left nipple, he sucked my right nipple deep into his warm, wet mouth.

  I moaned, helpless and needy, as his hungry mouth worked against my breast, suckling hard. With each eager pull of his lips and tongue, I felt wetness surge between my legs, and I couldn’t help but grab onto his shoulders and pull him in even closer, slicing my nails into his skin as I ached to have him inside me.

  I sat there, mesmerized, and slowly realized that my hands had dropped back down to the bed. His mouth had left my breast. I looked up, dazed, to see Devon standing over me.

  Hunger still burned in his eyes, now along with desperation, animal need, and … was that fear I saw? Why? Here, now, with me, what could he possibly be afraid of?

  “Ashley, I need more, I need so much more. I need everything, I need … I need you to be real, to be real enough for both of us.”

  He pushed me back onto the bed before I realized it had happened. One instant, I was sitting there, looking up at his tortured face for clues, trying to figure out just what he needed from me – in the next instant, I was lying on the bed, and Devon was on top of me.

  His long, lean body pinned me beneath him, a prisoner to his strength. I breathed in his scent, I felt his weight pressing me down into the bed, and I ran my hands over his flanks and up onto his back, feeling those powerful muscles moving beneath the skin.

  It was a little hard to breathe with so much man bearing down on me, but it got a bit easier when he rose up onto his elbows – until he took my face between his hands, leaning in so close I could feel his breath and see the despair in his eyes.

  “Ashley, I need you. Without you, I’ll drift away on the wind and be lost.”

  Then he just stared down at me, begging me with his eyes to understand.

  Nothing on earth was going to stop me from giving him what he needed, whatever it was – and while I might not know exactly what he was trying to tell me or just what he needed from me so desperately, I did know a good place to start.

  I reached up, grabbed two handfuls of hair, and pulled his mouth to mine.

  I drew him in, tasting with my tongue between his lips, our mouths melding into one just as I needed to be one with him, to be there and save him whenever the fate he feared came around the corner. He moved his tongue against mine then, sucked gently, probed and tasted and kissed until my need to have all of him, every bit, overwhelmed me.

  I opened my legs beneath him, took his hips between my thighs, and hissed into his ear. “Devon, what I need is you inside me, and right now.” I nipped at his ear a bit, too – I just couldn’t help it – and then I fell back onto the bed, my hair already damp with sweat against the pillow.

  I knew
his body needed mine too – I knew it from the feel of his warm, steel-hard cock straining against me, and from the speeding rhythm of his heart that I felt as my breasts flattened beneath his broad chest. His deep, heavy breathing told me, and the fine tremors running through his muscles as he groaned and ground his hips against mine – whatever was going on in his head, I knew the rest of him wanted to take me, fast and hard and now.

  But his head was still in charge, and he spoke to me instead.

  “Soon, so soon … but first, I want to trace and explore every line of you, every inch, every trembling curve of your sweet body. I want to remember all of you.”

  Remember? Was one of us going somewhere?

  He explored me then, memorizing my curves as wetness and need ached deep inside me.

  He started at the top of my forehead, brushing back a few strands of hair and then settling his lips against my skin in a gentle kiss. He pressed feather light kisses to my tip of my nose. He nuzzled my chin, bit at the angle of my jaw, and then he pressed his face deep into the hollow of my neck, where my pulse sped just beneath the skin, and he rested there, still and silent, just breathing.

  He moved lower, and it was sweet torture. I shivered at every touch, whimpering beneath his lips and tongue, and I so needed him to hurry, but he wouldn’t.

  He kissed my shoulders, he licked salty sweat from the skin at the base of my neck, and he took each collarbone in turn between his teeth – not biting down, not marking me, but just holding onto me for a few endless seconds. He nibbled and kissed along the top of my chest, teasing just above the swell of my breasts, and then pressed a needy, working kiss to the center of my chest.

  He pulled away after that, and rose up off his arms to kneel over me. He looked down at me, just looked at my curves and planes and warm skin, and then he reached out for my breasts.

  His sure, knowing hands cupped my breasts, and I hissed in a sharp breath as he gave each one a gentle squeeze. When he took his hands away, I sighed in frustration – when he touched me again, I wanted to scream, because he trailed just his fingertips over my swelling curves, barely touching the skin. He ran his fingers under each breast, up and over, then reached underneath again to hold their weight, pushing his palms up into the ripe, heavy flesh, as those maddening fingers kneaded and worked and fondled until I almost did scream.

  Again he pulled away, and again just his fingertips returned, now stroking around and over the rough skin of each areola, circling my stiff, aching nipples without ever quite touching them.

  I couldn’t stand this sweet teasing much longer – if he didn’t take care of business soon, I’d be sorely tempted to kill him.

  Then he leaned down to my right breast and brushed his lips against the nipple, dusting it with just the faintest kiss, and I arched my back, pushing myself up to him, needing – and he pulled away again.

  “Devon, please …” I heard the needy whine in my voice, but I didn’t care, I just cared about feeling him touch me, really touch me. I wanted to be tasted and pleasured, I wanted to be used and ridden hard, I wanted so much from this impossible, adorable, overpowering man – and I wanted every bit of it right then.

  I went from wanting to yowling like a cat when he shifted his attention to my left breast and bent down to suck my tender nipple.

  He drew the hard nub deep into his mouth, working his rough tongue over and around the sensitive tip, as I twisted beneath him, moaning. He heard me, felt my need, and bore down, suckling hard as arousal lanced through my body, throbbing in my clit and flaring deep inside me.

  Then he bit my nipple, just one quick, teasing nip, and I squealed. I squealed, I jumped, and my hands fisted in the sheets, clawing at them while I drowned in sensation. But when he lapped his tongue over the nipple, licking away the tiny, delicious sliver of pain, my hands left the sheets and slipped up his arms. I reached higher as his mouth closed onto my nipple again, working hungrily, and I raked my nails into his shoulders and down his back.

  I wanted him inside me, ached to have him take me right then – but he wasn’t done exploring.

  My hands fell from him and I sank back onto the bed, gasping. I was exhausted and full of racing energy, blissful and tense, happy and frustrated and aroused all at the same time, and I sincerely wanted to murder him so bad when he left my breasts and moved on down my body.

  Once more he cataloged every curve and dimple and shivering stretch of skin, taking his time while the body he was memorizing burned with the need to be plundered and taken and satisfied.

  Devon kissed down the center of me, down over the rising curve of my stomach, around the ripe hills and valleys of my body, the body that I’d once been so nervous about displaying to him – but now I showed him all that I had without shame or fear, because I knew he saw the woman within the curves.

  While he kissed my stomach and swirled his tongue into my navel for a silly second or two, his hands followed on either side of me. Warm and sure and knowing, his palms eased down my flanks and over my hips, cupping and holding every curve in turn, keeping me close, as if he was afraid I might escape before he could remember all of me.

  Then in a single sweet moment, he pinned one hip down with his left hand and kissed me there, while his right hand slipped between my legs and reached deep into my wetness.

  I moaned and bucked, pushing myself into his hand as he eased one finger and then two inside me, gently, with care, probing and pleasuring as my clit ached for his touch – and then he pulled his hand from me.

  Before I could scream or hit him or kill him, though, he bent down, planted a kiss on either side of my mound, and then went lower – he went lower and he tasted my center.

  His tongue eased through my wetness, licking over the tender folds, almost entering me but not quite. I quivered at each delicate, dancing touch, waiting to feel more, aching with the need for release – I was so close to coming, so close to losing it before he ever even took me, and then his mouth was on my clit.

  He pressed his lips to the swollen bud, and then he sucked gently.

  I jumped, I made a noise I’d never thought of before, I felt the orgasm building inside me, surging along my nerves, an earthquake powering to the surface – and the crazy man stopped what he was doing again, pulling his mouth away and kissing the inside of my right thigh instead.

  He was so lucky I didn’t have a knife or a gun or something handy right then.

  But I didn’t, he knew I didn’t, and he continued on down my body – he’d said he wanted to file all of it away in his mind, and he was a man of his word.

  But hey, I was not too proud to beg.

  “Devon, I need to come, please – stop teasing, okay? Please?”

  Yep, pitiful and horny and needy, that’s Ashley Daniels.

  Then arousal took a left turn as Devon stroked down my thighs, all the way down to my knees – and yes, he knew I was SO ticklish there, the bastard.

  He dug his fingers into that one certain place at the edge of each kneecap, and I giggled like a helpless fool, laughing and twisting in his arms as he kept up the assault. He got my kneecaps, he also found that super-tickle-monster spot in the tender fold behind each knee, and I dissolved into a goofy, shaking lump, as he laughed with me and my arousal bled away – a little.

  Just a little.

  He kissed each knee goodbye and then descended further, kneading my calves with his strong fingers. He rubbed and pressed deep, probing into the muscles, and you know how massages are supposed to be so relaxing? Not this one – the longer and harder his fingers caressed me, the faster my heart ran. Warmth flared deep inside me again, rising higher as he moved lower still.

  Now his strong hands and fingers kneaded my feet – he’d never massaged me there before, never pressed his thumbs into the soles, never handled my toes and rubbed hard against the arches and my heels … and I had no idea until that moment just how arousing, how maddening, a foot massage can be.

  Just like that, I was aching for him again, n
eeding him to touch and pleasure me everywhere, and needing more than anything to feel him deep inside me – and that was when he moved back up my body.

  Devon eased over me like a panther stalking prey. He moved above me in the darkness, a great weight of muscle and bone and desire, and I reached up the pillars of his arms to pull him down to me.

  His hips bore me down into the mattress, his hard, hungry cock surged against me, and he lowered himself onto his elbows. I slipped a hand around the back of his neck, trying to pull him close for a kiss – but he leaned to one side and whispered into my ear instead.

  “Stay with me, please, I need you. I do not deserve you, my impossibly beautiful and loving Ashley, but I need you at my side and in my heart, for all the fleeting time that we have left.”

  Then his hands clamped tight to my shoulders as his mouth tasted mine in a long, searching kiss – but now arousal fought for my attention with the alarm bells ringing inside my head.

  We had a lifetime left – didn’t we?

  I was young, he was young enough, and we were both healthy. I loved him more than I loved breathing and I knew how he felt about me, even if he never had said the words …

  So why did I hear that countdown clock ticking louder and louder with every pounding beat of our hearts?

  A thousand questions shouted to be heard as Devon moved to rest his face in the hollow of my shoulder, and I didn’t have any of the answers. But then he shifted his hips against mine, his breath came faster, his fingers dug into my shoulders, my own aching need rose to meet his – and it came to me that no matter how many answers I didn’t have, I was certain of one simple thing.

  So I said it.

  “Devon, I promise I will stay by your side, no matter where you go and no matter what happens. I promise I will never leave you.”

  Then the time for words was over, and he took me.

  He kneed my legs wide apart and dove into me with one powerful thrust. His teeth sank into my shoulder, I tore my nails down his back, and we rocked together as one. Over and over he drew back and then plunged deeper into my body, forcing himself further into me with every stroke, his massive cock stretching me to the limit, to the point of pain and beyond, as I clamped my legs around his hips and clung to him.