Echo (Pierce Securities Book 9)

by Anne Conley

  After taking the wheel back from Hodge, Simon half-watched the water and half-watched Lacie while he rolled the facts of the case around in his head, coming up with nothing. No links, no ties, just a jumble of puzzle pieces he longed to connect to Jonas but had no idea how.

  Was he just trying to pin something on Jonas because he hated the man so much for what happened to Bonnie? Everyone knew the man was shit, was fathered by shit, and deserved shit. Was Simon being narrow-minded by thinking Jonas had something to do with Lacie?

  Could be, but currently, nothing was pointing anywhere, so he was stuck with where his gut was taking him.

  His eyes fell on a pleasant distraction, and as much as she was irritating him by flaunting herself, he couldn’t stop watching her. Her pale skin was coloring slightly as she relaxed in the sunshine, her muscles growing slack with each passing hour. Lacie was more rested than he’d seen her since he met her, and a surge of pride at the fact this had all been his idea coursed through his veins. His chest swelled, and he allowed the brief thought that this could be permanent.

  Then everything crashed down. It couldn’t be permanent. He couldn’t give her what she needed. She was Lacie Hill and needed a man to come home to every night, a man who trusted her, who would never question her. Simon couldn’t be that man. He knew he was a control freak. He would want to know everything about her—where she was going, who she was going with, where she would be, why she was doing things.

  She would want a husband and kids. He couldn’t do that. He’d seen the way his dad was with his mom, and they’d been happy, but he didn’t have that in his make-up. His past kept him from trusting her completely.

  Simon ignored her contented sighs drifting up to him as he turned the boat back to the marina and opened up the throttle, suddenly in a hurry to not have the stimulating visual.

  He was ready to get home so he could safely lock her away in his house and himself away in his room. What he was not prepared for was the ride back to the sanctuary. He knew he was being short with her when they docked and he turned off the engine.

  “Okay, let’s go.” Lacie’s eyebrows rose and her mouth fell open as she scurried around, trying to gather her things. Simon felt the guilt at messing up her day like a nauseous roil in his gut, but he didn’t do anything about it. He simply ushered her off the boat and into the Jeep.

  They had barely gotten on the road when Lacie turned in her seat. “Okay, what did I do this time?”

  Simon thought he knew what she was talking about but wanted to make sure. She needed to say the words. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, we had a perfectly pleasant time yesterday at your house, and then you take me out on a distracting excursion, and I thought we would get more pleasantness. Instead, you acted like I have leprosy and didn’t say two words to me the entire day.”

  Simon looked over at her and slowed down on the curvy road. Anger flashed in her eyes, reddening her sun-kissed cheeks. She was gorgeous.

  She’d turned in her seat, so one knee was propped up, and a flash of purple showed under her shorts. She hadn’t put the tank top on, so her sleek skin was on display.

  He slowly pulled the Jeep over to the side of the road, trying to think of a way out of this when all he wanted to do was yank her over the center console and ravage her.

  He set the parking brake, still thinking.

  “I was trying to give you something fun. Something to keep your mind off of things. We’ve got a work week starting tomorrow, and I just wanted to give you something different to think about.”

  “Like how I’ve managed to make you angry at me again?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” He’d never been pissed at her. He knew he could be sullen and moody, but he’d never been mad at Lacie.

  “You kissed me the other night, then didn’t talk to me for two days. Then saved me from that man and took me back to your house, which is beautiful, and we had an awkwardly amazing time together. But the awkwardness is all you, Simon. If you would just let loose, we might have some fun while we’re together. But something’s crawling around in your butt, and I don’t know what it is.”

  That was the most extreme language he’d ever heard come out of her mouth, and he felt the corners of his lips quirk up in a smile. Barely.

  He looked her squarely in the eyes, those mahogany pools of depth, but his eyes strayed to her lips—ripe, lush, kissable, fuckable lips—and his groin respond. He desperately needed to focus on why she was in his life in the first place. Video feeds into her house. Attacks on her person. Threats.

  And all the ways he could love on this woman.

  “Let it be known, Lacie, I want to fuck you eleven ways to Sunday. You cannot possibly fathom the filthy things I want to do to you, and being around you is torture because that’s all I think about sometimes.” He took a deep breath, schooling himself. Her eyes had widened at his proclamation, and she snaked her pretty, pink tongue out to wet her lips. He halted her anticipation.

  “But I must keep things professional between us. I can’t be who you want me to be. I can promise you that.” He swiped a hand across his face, ending with his fingers pinching the bridge of his nose in an effort to not look at her anymore.

  “Simon, I’m not looking for declarations of love and marriage. I just need … I don’t know what I need, but this isn’t it. If you can’t do this job without making me feel like dog poop on the bottom of your shoe, then let someone else at your office do it.” She bit her lip as if unsure of what she was talking about but was clearly unwilling to take it back. Her eyes dared him to contradict her.

  “No one else at my office is going to take care of you,” he growled at her, the very idea making him want to punch someone in the face.

  “Then you do it.” Her words were simple, whispered in the darkness, but they spoke volumes. His eyes snapped to hers, and she was looking at him from under lowered lids.

  A sudden need fired through him. “How long has it been since you had one, Lacie?” His voice was husky as a ball of desire slammed into his gut. Her eyes widened, and he couldn’t stop his hand from reaching for her knee, the smooth skin of her legs taunting him. When she didn’t answer, he prodded her. “How long since a man touched you? Made you climax?” Her chest heaved, the anger in her eyes turning to a heat—a heat that spread straight to Simon’s cock.

  He wanted her with every breath he had but knew he couldn’t have her.

  “I don’t know,” she breathed at him, her voice sending trickles of lust splashing across his overheated skin. “Two years? Three?”

  He couldn’t take it anymore. Tangling his hands in her hair, he yanked her face toward him. “That’s too damn long for anyone.”

  Simon kissed her for all he was worth, slamming his tongue into her mouth, taking, biting, sucking. He needed her, and he wouldn’t have her, but he’d be damned if she was leaving the side of the road without the orgasm he so desperately needed to give her.

  “Take off the shorts,” he groaned between kisses. His erection pressed against his shorts, but it went unheeded. He’d take care of that later. Right now, all that mattered was this woman in his arms and her pleasure. And he’d get a fair amount of enjoyment out of giving it to her.

  Lacie squirmed around in the seat, trying to get undressed, while he kissed her, unwilling to stop. He pulled the strings on the top and back of her bathing suit and got handfuls of the gorgeous breasts he’d only dreamed of. Plump, smooth skin filled his hands, and she moaned as his fingers went to work, seeking, then finding the pert buds of her nipples. Tweaking them. Rolling them between his fingers.

  She gasped, and he couldn’t stop. Pulling his hands up to her face, Simon cradled it, leaning his forehead against hers. “I can’t give you much, but I can give you this.” Lowering one hand back to a nipple, he twisted it before leaning himself bac
k in his seat to look at her.

  Sprawled out in his Jeep, naked, Lacie looked stunning. Pulling one knee out so she was spread wide before him, Simon licked his lips as he looked his fill. He was dying to taste her but couldn’t go that far. That was a level of intimacy he wasn’t ready for. But as his hand drifted from her nipple to the glistening, pink folds of her pussy, he knew he had to sink his fingers inside her.

  But he would draw it out for as long as he could. They were rather secluded and had all the time in the world. This was his one chance he was allowing himself with her. He was going to fucking enjoy it.

  Reaching out to drag his finger along her dampness, he relished that she was this wet for him. From kissing him. He was hard enough to crush rocks, and she was just so damn slippery it made him lightheaded. Her clit peeked out from under its hood and he stroked it lightly, hearing her gasp his name. That sound sent another shock of lust straight through him.

  Slowly, his finger disappeared into her heated flesh, and the noise filling the car was his own tortured moan. As he pulled it out, just as slowly, the moisture on his finger sent tremors of need through him. Inserting two fingers, he slowly began pumping them.

  He looked at Lacie, her head leaned back on the window, eyes closed in rapture.

  “Look at me, while I do this. You don’t ever get to forget who’s taking care of you.” His voice was dark, guttural with his own restraint, but his needs were not in question right now. Simon brought his other hand down to lightly circle her clit as she opened her lust-hazy eyes and looked at him.

  Lacie was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen in his life, and she was his for right now. As her pussy tremored around his fingers, he could guaran-fucking-tee she wasn’t thinking about anyone else.

  He applied a little more pressure to her clit and curled his fingers slightly as he felt that rough spot on her inner wall. And then he bent his head to her nipple, finding the erect nub and sucking it into his mouth.

  Two hard pulls and Lacie gasped, grasping his hair in tight handfuls as her pussy clamped down hard on his fingers. He continued thrusting them in and out, determined to milk her orgasm.

  As she came down, Simon reluctantly leaned back and slipped his fingers into his mouth, tasting her sweet, honeyed musk. It was better than he’d imagined and almost made him come in his pants, but by dragging in a deep breath, he managed to regain control and adjust himself.

  That had gone faster than he’d wanted, but she was apparently on as tight a rope as he was. He had to solve this case fast and get back on solid ground again.

  “What about you?” she whispered, looking pointedly at the erection straining his shorts.

  “I’ll live,” he muttered as he started the car, then froze as her seeking hands fumbled at the fastenings to his trunks.

  “I want to. Let me, please?” Her eyes were wide and so fucking innocent. Did she really think he’d be able to stop with a hand job? If she touched him, he’d have her on all fours, pounding into her so hard his cock would be in her throat.

  But as he looked at her pleading, brown eyes, Simon knew he’d do whatever she asked right now. And a handjob wasn’t anything compared to what she could be asking, right?

  Simon pulled his shirt up over his head and, with shaky hands, pushed her aside and undid the drawstring to his shorts. Lifting his hips, he allowed himself to fall out into her hands, engorged, leaking and ready.

  He hissed as Lacie grasped him in her tiny hands, enclosing his paws around hers. “Tighter, like this.” He held her hands in his and guided her strokes—long, slow, and tight. His hips thrust up to meet her, completely of their own volition, and Simon tossed his head back and closed his eyes.

  He couldn’t see anyway. Everything tingled hot—his skin, his blood, his muscles. He was a raging bundle of static electricity, all because of Lacie’s elegant hands on his cock. She cooed at him—words of encouragement, he supposed—but all he could hear was the blood rushing in his ears.

  She was fantastic.

  Lacie gripped him tightly, stroking him faster and harder. His hisses became moans. The hot electricity became a raging inferno. Suddenly, everything exploded in a fiery-white blast as thick, hot ropes coated his belly.

  “Fuck, Lacie.”

  He looked over to see her reaction, and to his surprise, she was looking at his stomach, covered in shots of semen. Sheepishly, he tugged his t-shirt to clean himself, but before he could, Lacie leaned over and ran her tongue through it.

  “What—”

  “Shhh … This is good,” she murmured between licks.

  Simon had never seen anything like it. The ember sparked to life again as she ran her tongue all over his torso, licking him clean. The tiny, hot little tongue of hers—coating him as it cleaned—conspired to make him lightheaded. He was so screwed.

  When Lacie finished, she leaned back and licked her lips, but Simon was speechless. He didn’t have words to convey to her what that had done to him, so he yanked her to him for a punishing kiss of thanks. He then started the Jeep with all intentions of getting her home and in his bed as soon as possible. He had a list of filthy things to do to her, and she’d made it perfectly clear she’d be okay with it. But would he?

  At this point, he didn’t give a fuck.

  “Before we go back to you not speaking to me for a day or so, or until I need you again, I wanted to talk about next week with you.”

  Her total change of topic was making his head spin. He was still between the sheets with her inside his mind, and she was already off to school next week? Talk about compartmentalization.

  They’d crested a hill with a curve at the bottom, and it was almost dark, when he pressed the brake pedal to the floor. Nothing.

  “Hang on …” he said.

  “No, you hang on. Just because you’re scared of something doesn’t mean we can’t communicate about anything.”

  Damn women and their talking. He tried to downshift, but the hill wasn’t helping.

  “No. The brakes are out. Hang on.”

  Simon could make out something in the middle of the road, and with a sinking pit in his stomach, he knew they’d been ambushed.

  He pulled the emergency brake lever, and the Jeep slowed but not enough. They were close enough he could see it was an enormous tree. Not one of the mesquite trees that proliferated the landscape but one of the big, old oak trees that had been here for centuries.

  Simon’s only option was to roll the Jeep, but it was either roll or hit the tree head-on, and that would undoubtedly kill them both. Reflexively, his arm shot out as if it would actually hold Lacie in. Thankfully, she had her seatbelt on.

  With fifty yards to spare, he turned the wheel sharply to the right so his side would hit—hopefully. The Jeep rolled with a shatter of glass and a wrenching of metal, and they were upside down, tree branches poking into the cab of the Jeep.

  He heard a ticking from the tree.

  “Get out. Now,” Simon barked. To her credit, Lacie didn’t argue. She immediately started fumbling with her seatbelt.

  With the clicking loud in his ear, Simon reached over her to the glovebox and opened it but everything fell out.

  “Shit.”

  Groping on the floor blindly, Simon felt around for the knife he kept there. Lacie was breathing loudly.

  “I can’t get it. It’s stuck.” The panic in her voice sucked his gut inside out, and he redoubled his efforts.

  Simon unclasped his seatbelt and fell to the ceiling, continuing his search. Finally, his fingers wrapped around the familiar bone handle of his grandpa’s Case pocket knife.

  In one fluid movement, he opened it and slashed at her seatbelt. Dropping it and grabbing her, he pushed open her door, the clicking noise loud and getting faster in his ear.

  Simon grabbed Lacie’s hand and yan
ked her along behind him.

  “Run, Lacie! Run!”

  They ran as fast and as far as they could, but when the bomb went off, they were still launched a good ten feet. Simon held onto Lacie’s hand, and when they were both on the ground, he shoved her under his body to protect her from flying debris.

  He didn’t let her up until he’d gotten his breathing under control. Hands down, that been the scariest moment of his life. Trying her compartmentalization tactic, he murmured, “My mom made me take ballroom dancing lessons when I was a kid, so I’m fair at rug-shaking. Does that sound like something the kids would like?”

  Chapter Fifteen

  The sounds of skin slapping together and grunts filled the tepid air of Jonas’s playroom. Aptly named, his playroom was easily disinfected, all the surfaces either covered in chrome or vinyl. V had brought him a disgusting whore for his purposes tonight, but she wouldn’t be here long. And neither would any evidence of her.

  Jonas looked down, pleased to see his cock ramming in and out of her pussy as she moaned pathetically. He should have gagged her because he didn’t like the porn-star encouragement from her, but he’d been too excited tonight about what had happened with Simon.

  He’d known the tree in the road wouldn’t kill Simon Pierce, yet the entire episode had worked out better than he’d ever dreamed. Simon was petrified. And Jonas had gotten more than he’d bargained for in seeing the two of them together in Simon’s Jeep before he’d crested the hill to the “fallen” tree.

  Yeah, Jonas had been there.

  Even now, looking back on the connection between the two, Jonas got hard just thinking about how he would break it. Which was good. He would sever the bond with Simon like he’d severed Jonas’s bond with Bonnie. He needed to think about that because if he kept looking at the whore, he was going to lose his erection.

  Flipping her, he slammed into her tight asshole.

  “Ow! Fucking use some lube,” the whore moaned.

  “Shut up.”

  Jonas had tracked Lacie and Simon out to the lake and found the perfect opportunity to scare them on the near-deserted road leading to the marina. That was one thing living a life of privilege afforded him and Simon—having access to hideaways.