by Mandy Baxter
Dave’s flirty smile didn’t go unnoticed. Maybe he could coax some information about Tabitha out of the über-friendly front-desk clerk.
Good God. He might as well be some middle school kid passing notes in class. Did Tabitha talk about me at lunch today? What did she say? Also if she likes me, check this box. Can you say loser? “No, thanks. I’m good.”
“Okay, well, don’t hesitate to call if you need anything!”
He held up a hand in acknowledgment as he walked away from the front desk. What he needed was a fucking lobotomy to get Tabitha out of his head. Maybe Dave could grab a butter knife from the breakfast room and give him a hand with that.
The night dragged by on broken legs, painfully slow and debilitating. Damien played the part of amateur drug peddler, doling out the packages to customers based on weight, cost, and the individual dealer’s ability to move product. He made small talk when he could, manipulated each and every person through the door into offering up some piece of information, no matter how small. It didn’t get him any closer to Lightfoot, unfortunately, but Boise PD and the Idaho State Police would have a heyday when he wrapped up his investigation.
At the back of his mind, though, he fixated on a singular thought: Tabitha and what he could do to get her to the hotel ASAP. A week apart had been torture. True, their current circumstances were less than conventional, and didn’t he just feel like a king-size dick for it, too. Their lunch date hardly made up for the fact that he’d thrown himself at her not once, but twice. And truth be told, he could think of nothing more than doing it again. He’d order her to get naked before he laid her out on the bed and enjoyed her in the way he’d been dying to, coaxing those sweet sounds from her once again.
Christ. If he’d thought his head was fucked up before this gig, it was nothing compared to the tangled state it was in now.
Damien’s last customer had left fifteen minutes ago and he wasn’t expecting anyone else until tomorrow night. A muffled curse escaped his lips as he snatched up his cell and dialed the number he’d retrieved from Tabitha’s phone the previous week.
“’Lo?” Tabitha’s sleepy voice answered, and the husky timbre raced across Damien’s skin in a shiver.
“I want to see you.” No use exchanging pleasantries—or giving his name, apparently—at this point. He wanted her here. Now. Ten minutes ago. “Get in your car and get over here.”
Silence answered him and Damien’s heart pounded in his chest. Why couldn’t he just quit being a demanding dickhead for long enough to ask her nicely? Way to fuck up the only thing in your life you don’t want to ruin. Idiot.
Tabitha’s voice was like a caress when she answered, “Give me ten minutes.”
“Hurry.”
He disconnected the call and tossed his phone onto the bed.
The next ten minutes might as well have been ten years as he waited for Tabitha to show up. He’d considered running down to the lobby and buying a package of condoms from the hotel store. He needed to fuck like he needed food to live. But the front-desk guy already seemed to know that something was going on between him and Tabitha. It wouldn’t be a good idea to flaunt his need of a booty call in front of her coworker. He wasn’t interested in disrespecting her in any way. And really, it was a little presumptuous on his part to assume that’s where the night would lead. Sure, they’d fooled around, but that didn’t guarantee a repeat, no matter how badly Damien wanted that to happen. He needed to calm the fuck down and let things unfold. Naturally. It was just a sign of how badly he wanted her that he felt like he needed to rush out and buy a case of Trojans. Overeager much?
The minutes continued to tick by at a slog. What if she’d fallen back to sleep after his call? For all he knew, she’d been talking in her sleep, agreeing to his ridiculous command. Wound tight as a fucking spring, it wouldn’t take much to send Damien rocketing into the stratosphere. His skin clung to his frame, too goddamned tight, and his breath sawed in and out of his chest as though he’d been running circles around the hotel parking lot.
A derisive snort sliced through the quiet. He was keeping his cool like a boss.
When a soft knock came at the door moments later, his heart seized up in his rib cage before beating out a furious rhythm that sent the blood zinging through his veins. He stalked across the room with all of the collected calm of a disaster movie victim fleeing from a comet hurtling toward Earth, and threw open the door.
Jesus Christ, every time he laid eyes on her, she seemed more beautiful.
Her blue eyes glistened, still a little sleepy, and her short, blond hair was tousled in a way that made her look as though she’d just been fucked. Which, strangely enough, turned him on while simultaneously causing a pang of jealousy to flare in his chest. On the right side of her nose, a tiny jewel twinkled. He’d never noticed the piercing before; she obviously didn’t wear it to work. Tight, black leggings hugged her legs, leaving nothing to the imagination, and a worn, too-small Soundgarden-concert tee barely skimmed her waist along with a short, black leather jacket. A pair of fawn-colored sheepskin boots rounded out her outfit, and she’d never looked hotter. Just the sight of her made him hard.
“Hi.”
His eyes dipped to where the cropped top of her shirt revealed her belly button, and Damien couldn’t form a coherent response to save his life. He’d never wanted a woman the way he wanted Tabitha, and that mindless need was slowly ripping his composure to shreds.
With a mechanical step to the right he opened a path for her to come in. She placed a hand on her hip, cocking it to one side and said, “Should I be expecting anyone else to stop by tonight?”
“No.” The word worked its way up his throat, grating on his vocal cords like gravel. “Worried I might misbehave?”
A sweet smile curved her lips. “Maybe a little.”
He couldn’t help his own answering grin. “Get in this room. Now.”
When Damien gave her a command, Tabitha found herself helpless to deny him. A man she’d once sworn she’d keep her distance from, now her body responded to the gruff timbre of his voice, drawn to his side like lapping ocean waves are drawn to the shore. She’d been a wreck all week. Thinking about Damien. Worrying. Wondering where he was. What he was doing. Who he was with . . . A week of sleepless nights had her collapsing into her bed, exhausted, only to be woken by his call. The gruffness of his voice sparked her to life with the first word he’d spoken, and the decision to throw on a pair of boots and get in her car was one of the easiest of her entire life.
His gaze devoured her as she stepped into the room, the heat in those golden-brown eyes enough to make her sweat. Any words she might have wanted to say lodged themselves in her throat, but really, was it necessary to say anything? She knew why he’d called her and why she agreed to come.
As she walked to within touching distance of him, Damien reached out and wrapped his large hand around her waist. A low thrum of desire settled in her abdomen and Tabitha knew that if he were to slide his fingers between her thighs, he’d find her wet and more than ready for him. She was completely shameless in wanting him like she did. The tension of his arm stopped Tabitha dead in her tracks, and a low groan rumbled in Damien’s chest. His palm curved a path over her hip and settled on her ass. “What are you wearing under these pants?” he asked low in her ear.
She looked up at him from beneath lowered lashes and murmured, “Nothing.”
His free hand settled on her opposite hip and he took a step to his right so that he stood fully in front of her. Lord have mercy, he towered over her, his heavily muscled frame overwhelming and magnificent. Tabitha shivered as he traced a path up her torso, his fingers skimming the curve of her breast. “And under this shirt?”
Shameless. “Nothing.”
“Were you naked under the covers when I called?”
Tabitha shuddered at his words, loving the game he played. No man had ever talked to her this way before, and it gave her permission to be as brazen as she dared. “Yes.”
Up and down, up and down, his fingers brushed her torso beneath her jacket, teasing the swell of her breast until her nipples hardened and she ached for him to touch her there.
Damien’s body went rigid with each question asked, a slight tremor transferring through his touch into her skin. His barely veiled restraint caused Tabitha’s breath to race in her chest, and with every intake of breath, her breasts rubbed torturously against the rippled muscle of his torso. If he didn’t do something—anything—soon, she’d go out of her mind!
As if he sensed the maddening desire building up inside of her like carbonation under pressure, Damien took a step back and regarded her, his gaze raking over her with a hunger that sent her heart beating madly. With an arm’s length between them now, Tabitha’s body chilled in the absence of his touch. She moved to close the distance and he said, firm, “Stay where you are.”
Under his spell, she had no choice but to do as he told her.
For a moment he just looked at her. Her skin tingled with his appraisal, flushed with heat as though his hands were still on her. With a slow breath, Damien reached out, took the strands of her hair between his fingers. “Your hair is like silk.”
The wonder in his tone caused Tabitha’s chest to swell with emotion. Such a contrast to his hard, commanding presence. He let the strands fall through his fingers and cupped her face in his palm before tracing the shell of her ear. A featherlight caress brought chills to the surface of Tabitha’s skin as he trailed his fingers past her earlobe and down the column of her throat, skirting the neckline of her T-shirt.
Anticipation coiled in her stomach as every nerve ending in her body grew hypersensitive. The quiet in the room was deafening, the only sound that of their quickened breaths. “Look at me.”
She brought her eyes to his and fought the urge to drop her gaze. Was this how prey felt in the clutches of a powerful predator? Or perhaps a lowly wolf in the presence of its alpha? He reached beneath her jacket and with the pad of his thumb circled one nipple. Tabitha’s lips parted on a sharp intake of breath, the sensation so intense despite the thin layer of cotton fabric that separated her skin from his.
With his left hand, he cupped the back of her neck, as if concerned she might suddenly look away. Or bolt. He held her fast, slowly circling her nipple as he studied her reaction with an intensity that caused Tabitha’s breath to come in desperate little pants that ended on a quiet whimper. She could come like this. With nothing more than his eyes on her and his thumb teasing her nipple to a diamond-hard peak.
“Does that feel good?”
He had to have known that he was driving her crazy. But it was part of his game, wasn’t it? The control he needed to exercise and the commands that Tabitha needed desperately to obey. “Yes.” The word burst from her lips in a low moan and Damien’s nostrils flared as his grip on her neck tightened and his thumb brushed along her jawline.
“Tell me.”
“It feels so good,” she said between pants of breath.
An unexpected sting of pleasure coursed through her body as he pinched the pearled peak through her shirt. “And that?”
“Yes,” she moaned. “Do it again.”
Damien crushed her to him in a searing kiss. Tabitha’s body melted against his as he cupped her ass in his hands and lifted her up to meet his height. She kicked the boots from her feet as she shucked her jacket and wrapped her legs around his waist. He thrust up as he pushed down on her hips, forcing the thick length of his erection against her barely clothed and aching sex.
Holy shit, the man was sex personified.
He backed up until the bed stopped him and sat down on the mattress with Tabitha settled firmly in his lap. His kisses left her breathless, his tongue thrusting into her mouth in a slow, desperate rhythm that cranked her desire into overdrive. No one had ever kissed her this way before. Each deliberate movement carried with it a sense of possession: the way his mouth slanted across hers, each flick or swirl of his tongue, the slight scrape of his teeth on her bottom lip. In no uncertain terms, Damien laid claim to her and Tabitha was more than happy to give herself over to him.
At once demanding and careful, Damien cupped her face in his hands gently, as though she were something fragile. The kisses that had been frenzied and desperate only a moment ago were now soft and slow. A savoring of her mouth that made Tabitha’s head spin. She was lost to him. Lost to his commanding, quiet presence, his body, the ink that decorated his skin. A slave to his scent, his callused fingers and smooth flesh, hulking form, the tousled locks of his light brown hair and the intensity of his golden gaze. This was an infatuation Tabitha would never find her way back from. And the realization of how far gone she was sent a trickle of icy fear through her bloodstream.
Chapter Thirteen
The sweetness of Tabitha’s mouth, the soft texture of her skin and silken hair, her floral perfume and unabashed desire, latched on to every particle of Damien’s body. The beginnings of an addiction he knew he would never have the strength to kick.
He couldn’t hold her tight enough, kiss her deeply enough. His cock throbbed in his jeans, hot and hard and so damned ready to take her. It had been such a long damned time since he’d been with a woman that he wouldn’t last a minute once he sunk himself into her slick heat. Entanglements of any kind while he was undercover were a huge no-go. But in the course of a week he realized that the longer he stayed away from Tabitha, the more he wanted her. And like the drugs he’d doled out so easily to eager addicts, he couldn’t stay away from her, no matter how hard he tried.
He grasped Tabitha around the waist and lifted her. Her petite frame weighed almost nothing and he set her on her feet, between his legs. Sitting up straight, he was damned near as tall as she was standing. Her expression was curious yet heated as he wound his fists in the hem of her T-shirt and dragged it up and off of her, slowly, revealing her body to his hungry gaze inch by tantalizing inch.
The fabric met the resistance of her full breasts, and when he freed them from the restricting fabric, they gave a slight bounce that forced a groan from Damien’s throat. Perfect and full, the dusky nipples stood proud and erect. He freed Tabitha’s head from the neck of the shirt but left the garment at her wrists. Winding the fabric, he bound her hands together and stood, repositioning them so that she lay on the bed and he stood over her.
“Don’t try to free yourself. Do you understand me?”
She answered with a nod and a low moan that caused his balls to tighten against his cock. As though in prayer, Damien went to his knees before her. The thin cotton fabric of the leggings hugging her legs like a second skin cooled his heated cheeks as he ran his nose up the inside of her thigh, inhaling her scent as he went. When he met the juncture at her thighs he said, “Spread your legs.” And Tabitha trembled beneath him as she did as he asked. It was fucking torture not to simply strip the damned things from her body, but as he’d done earlier, touching her through her T-shirt, he grazed his teeth along her inner thigh.
Tabitha bucked at the contact, her back arching off the bed as she let out a quiet whimper. He repeated the action on the opposite side and she cried out, squirming as though fighting the urge to free her hands—which truly weren’t bound in any sense of the word. But that was the point. It wasn’t the binding that kept her arms high above her head, tangled in the T-shirt. Rather, his words and her trust in him garnered her compliance. That blind trust was as seductive as her body. No one had ever completely trusted him, and warm emotion swelled in his chest.
“Put your mouth on me.”
The words were soft and pleading and Damien sealed his mouth over her sex, marveling at how damp the fabric was with her desire and how he could taste her arousal. Through the thin barrier, he knew her pussy was swollen, wet, and ready to receive him. Goddamn. This moment was heaven. The sweet torture of withholding himself from her almost more than he could bear.
“I want to touch you, Damien.”
He grazed his teeth along the sensitive ridg
es of her sex, and she shuddered. “Not yet.”
Like he’d taken off her shirt, Damien peeled the second skin of her leggings from her body slowly. He watched her reaction carefully, noting the quiver of her breasts with each pant of breath, the way her stomach muscles tightened when his fingers curled around the waistband of her pants. He eased them over her hips, kissing the juncture where her hip met her thigh, his attention divided between the newly exposed flesh and her arms, held high above her head and still tangled in her T-shirt. Holy Christ, she was a sight to behold.
He raked the pants down over her thighs and paused as he drank in the beauty of her glistening pussy. As he teased the short, damp curls, Tabitha let out a slow sigh. A release of breath that Damien felt over every inch of his body. With a quick tug, he freed the leggings from her ankles and dropped them somewhere behind him. He placed his palms on her thighs and urged them to part, sucking in a breath as he committed to memory how she looked, spread out naked on the bed, just as he’d imagined. Damn it, he should have gone down to the lobby and bought the condoms, gossip and reputations be damned.
“You are so fucking beautiful.”
Tabitha’s head came off the bed and their gazes locked. The emotion he saw in those crystal-blue depths shook Damien to his foundation. His fingers dug into her thighs and her lids became hooded as her head lolled back on the bed. Having her here, now, no matter the circumstances, was worth any risk both personal and professional. The world could fall down around him tomorrow, but tonight she belonged to him.
Most of the time, it was Damien who rattled others’ nerves. Sort of came part and parcel with being a big, tattooed, scary-looking son of a bitch. But this petite woman spread out on the bed scared him more than any drug lord, arms dealer, or dangerous fugitive he’d ever kept company with. Because for the first time in his life, Damien finally needed someone. He needed her.
He backed away, standing for only as long as it took to strip his shirt from his chest. He wanted nothing between his skin and hers. Her lips quirked into a grin as she watched him, her hands still bound and immovable above her head. A reluctant smile tugged at his lips as he fumbled with the button of his jeans, unable to tear his eyes from her, focus on anything but her. He was starved to bury his face between those sweet thighs again. One taste wasn’t even close to enough.
