Don’t Lie to Me

by Amber Bardan

  Oh, shit.

  “Fuck me, baby?” He used his grip on my thighs to yank my ass over the edge. Then his cock drove into me. I arched, air flooding my lungs. He filled me to bursting—swamped me with a sense of completeness I’d never experienced.

  “Fuck me like this?” He thrust, meanly, driving my hips up.

  I couldn’t answer. My eyes rolled back. Heat plunged through me, burning up my system and flooding me with need.

  He grabbed my pussy, his thumb clamped over my clit, almost touching where his cock battered into me. “Whose is this?”

  The first flood of orgasm wound through me.

  “Yours,” I screamed.

  He made a rumbling sound, then let go and held me under the knees, taking my pussy—his pussy, as he’d made me call it—with pounding strokes. I came—toes, fingers and entire body curling.

  Bliss broke though me, and he kept it going with his thrusts.

  My teeth snapped and clamped. My breaths shuddered. Then everything drained out of me in a wash. My every cell softened, and I drifted back, loose and pliant, and yet felt him more—felt every fraction of his hardness as it slid free of me.

  Had he come too?

  My head spun. He leaned over and scooped me up against his chest like a baby. Fucking hell, I felt like one. I held on to him. His skin was as slick as mine. He carried me to a door and down a hall to a bedroom, then set me on the bed.

  I flopped on the sheets, stretched out and pressed an arm over my eyes. My chest wouldn’t stop shaking. He crawled over me.

  His erection dug hard and hot on my thigh. Fuck. Nope, he wasn’t done. There was no way I could take more. He came over me and as mean as he’d been a moment ago, now his touch went soft. His fingers skimmed my sides. He kissed my ribs, stroked his tongue against my nipples.

  I shivered deliciously.

  He moved his hands over me as though I was breakable. As though my dips and hollows were awe-inspiring.

  I let my thighs fall wide and grabbed his ass, pulling his hips to mine.

  But then he stopped.

  He hovered above me. Everything became acute. He touched my mouth and gazed at me with such tenderness that my heart seemed to stop. His eyes were soft, heavy lidded, but no less penetrating as his gaze stole inside me. He held himself so close. My jellied limbs couldn’t be more aware of any fraction of body where the two of us touched.

  He breathed, and his stomach pressed against my belly. He scanned my face, then leaned in. His lips brushed mine. Hesitant. So contrary to how he’d been before, when he’d used me and owned me and taken me, that reality settled heavy and crushing—I’d been hungry, so he’d fed me.

  I’d been desperate, so he’d satisfied.

  He drove me out of my mind so I’d crash back here.

  Every moment before this one was a ruse.

  We kissed, and tremors of emotion overcame me. I had nothing left that he hadn’t broken. No shell he hadn’t pried free. The touch of his tongue and the feel of my own, sliding between our fused mouths, fueled a sweet, beautiful need I’d never before indulged. He kissed me with gentle sweeps. The warmth was slow and spreading, and so unlike the furnace I’d met with before.

  He settled on me. Another kind of desire swept me. I needed the tender touch of his hand on my waist, and the pressure of his chest hitching against mine. His cock grazed my vagina. I tilted my hips toward it. He entered me and my gasp made a shattering sound. He filled me, stretched open my flesh, but he took me in places he hadn’t reached before.

  He gazed at me, and his expression relinquished everything. I don’t know why he chose me for this, why he gave me so much, but I received him.

  I let him all the way in.

  There was no way to keep him out. I felt him—each exquisite pull in my pussy, but more the drag of his body against mine. Such slow gyrations, they shook me with the force of new things I wanted.

  He slid his arm under my neck until my head was in the crook of his arm. I couldn’t hold my body separate from my mind. My nails tore at his shoulders. His knee slipped beside mine as he seemed to try to fold himself into me.

  He pushed up and up and up into me. I turned my face against his cheek, mouth open and gasping against his hot skin. The salt of his sweat stung my lips.

  His hand moved between us and he touched my clit.

  I clung to him. “I can’t.”

  “You can.”

  My system felt shredded, yet still, something came together where he touched. The pleasure built sweet and stinging. That didn’t mean I could come again, even if I would enjoy it. I’d had too much.

  “I can’t.” I arched into him.

  He held me closer, pushing his cock deep, his hand sandwiched between us so tightly I don’t know how he moved his fingers—but he did. “You can.”

  Then his elbow squeezed at the back of my neck, and he drew me into a kiss. His tongue stroked lazy and wet in my mouth. His cock rolled deep. Something still unbroken shattered in my chest. I seemed to buzz, and sweet ripples burst through me.

  My knees clenched at his hips.

  “Good girl,” he breathed against my lips, and squeezed me hard. “My good girl.”

  My pussy pulsed around his cock. He controlled his movements—so damn slow—extending each movement.

  “Emma,” he groaned, and I tasted his plea.

  He rocked like he’d make it last forever, as though he couldn’t bear to stop. Like he’d been waiting his whole life for this. He came, and the pressure and heat he filled me with, the shudder of his body and the vulnerable gush of his breath let me know it was something I’d never have missed, and would never forget.

  * * *

  He slept with a hand clutched around the modest handful of my left breast. His chest rose and fell in a steady lulling rhythm against my back. My breath couldn’t slow to match his. My throat felt clogged. Hurt expanded its dreadful presence in my chest.

  “I don’t use friends.”

  Yet something fundamental in me had been rendered weary. Not used the way he’d threatened, but wounded.

  Raw and frazzled.

  Because if he woke right then and asked me again to move in with him, I’d flush my apartment keys down the toilet and give myself over to him without an ounce of goddamned self-preservation.

  His body blazed heat against me.

  Preservation I needed. Preservation I’d cultivated and paid for with my own broken heart and battered body. Preservation I promised myself I’d never let another person take from me.

  And he took it.

  Just like that, without permission. Deliberately. And that hurt more than if he’d struck me. There was little about cruelty that I didn’t expect.

  Yet, everything about what he’d done was unexpected and I had no idea what to do with any of it. I unhooked his fingers from my breast one at a time, then slid his hand from me. His breathing paused. I stilled and waited.

  His chin rubbed the top of my head like a big nuzzling cat. My heart pounded. He sighed—actually sighed. The sweetness of the sound pierced me. I scooted away, then propped a pillow against his chest where I’d been, and pulled the blanket over him.

  In the night, everything about him was bigger and darker and more beautiful. His lips seemed fuller, his jaw less angled. I brushed the hair on his temple, free from its usual neatness, mussed up and curled. I wondered how it’d look wet.

  I blinked and backed off the bed, then tiptoed to the door. I made it to the kitchen where we’d abandoned it lights still on, then scooped up my clothes and made for my shoes and handbag left next to the garage entrance. I shimmied into my dress, then shoved the bra into my bag and crept in the direction I’d seen the front door.

  I fished for my keys. Crap. My car was still at Angelina’s. I l
icked my lips, and pulled my cell phone out instead. I’d just have to call a cab. Too bad it’d cost a small fortune to get home from here. Like Haithem, Avner chose to live on the city outskirts. He’d built his house in an exclusive pocket of environmentally protected countryside, close enough to a major highway, which made city commute somewhat feasible—if you were driving yourself that is. His acreage backed directly onto national park lands, giving him both enhanced scenery and privacy.

  I reached the front door. Moonlight filtered in through the side panels, but the front of the door seemed like a slab of darkness, no handle distinguishable.

  My pulse sped up. I ran my fingers over the side. How the hell are you supposed to get out?

  A hand came to press on the door over my shoulder.

  I jumped and spun around.

  Avner towered over me, holding the door shut as though it was at risk of magically opening.

  “That is not how this will be.” His words were a steely rush. “You came to my bed. I warned you there’d be no turning back.”

  My breath lodged in my throat. His words came back to me.

  “If you stay another moment, there’s no going back.”

  But, I hadn’t gone back—I’d more than followed through on the sex. Yet, my heart thunked harder, because I couldn’t make myself mistake his meaning any longer.

  “You said you weren’t after a girlfriend.” My voice was weak and croaky, unconvincing even to me.

  “Girlfriend and boyfriend are schoolyard expressions.” He caged me against the door with his other hand. “There’s nothing childish about what I want from you.”

  He was so close. His scent slightly muskier than before, filled me with the memory of my mouth open on his skin and other dirtier things—yes, there was nothing juvenile about what we’d done.

  Nothing we did was remotely like what I’d experienced the few times I’d called someone boyfriend.

  His meaning, real and too-serious-too-soon to contemplate, was terrifying.

  “I told you I’m not an easy man.” His face lowered, his eyes only catching enough light to give them a proprietary glimmer. “I have demands.”

  I swallowed. Demands? Like when he’d demanded I come again when I’d been convinced I couldn’t?

  My skin caught fire.

  “There’s no sneaking from my bed.” His body went slinky as he rubbed up against me, slamming me bodily into the realization he was still naked. “No forgetting to kiss me goodbye.”

  His breath washed against my mouth. My lips parted, my chin pushed forward, closer to his.

  “I’m going to drive you crazy. Make you never want to leave.”

  He delivered that warning and before my heart could finishing plunging, his mouth was on mine, but it was my tongue aggressively seeking his.

  He picked me up. My legs clamped around his waist. He turned us around and began walking without breaking our kiss.

  I tore my lips free. “But I don’t do sleepovers.”

  “Then I’ll have to ensure there’s no risk of you falling asleep.” His hand moved from my waist to my ass as he held me up. The grin that cracked across my face took me by surprise.

  Exactly as he’d taken me—by surprise.

  Chapter Twelve

  Emma

  Our chances of a quick sneak-in sneak-out had always been a long shot. With the entry gates alerting them to our arrival, not to mention the world-class security system probably screeching our increasing proximity to the house, Angelina waited on the front veranda by the time Avner pulled up out front.

  I yanked at the bottom of yesterday’s red dress, and had the feeling my face was brighter than the fabric.

  Oh, boy.

  Her head tilted slightly as she waited. The smile she wore was 190 percent I-told-you-so. What was she even doing up?

  Didn’t normal people sleep in on Saturday mornings post party? I glanced at Avner. My tongue went sticky. His hair was once again sleek and glossy, but not an hour ago I’d had my wish of seeing it wet when he’d had me up against the wall of his wet room shower.

  I was up early because I hadn’t slept at all.

  The reasons why seemed to revisit me all at once, in every burn and scrape and ache in my body.

  He switched off the engine, then shot me a wink. Warmth flared in my middle. I couldn’t resist the smile that swept me.

  I couldn’t resist him.

  He’d made good on his promise to keep me from falling asleep, and the funny thing was how many times I’d been tempted to anyway. How many times he’d teased me to wakefulness because I’d melted into him, and almost succumbed. I tore my gaze away, and opened my door. It shouldn’t come as a surprise I’d wanted to fall asleep in his bed. That kind of sexual gymnastics would exhaust a trained athlete.

  Avner exited the car.

  I rushed up the stairs while fishing car keys out of my bag.

  “Sorry, babe, can’t stay.” I reached the top step and kissed her cheek. “Stuff to do.”

  “Haithem’s already put the coffee machine on.” She reached out as if to grab hold of me.

  I backed down a step. “Next time.”

  “Avner already make you one?” She crossed her arms, and her smile tugged higher up.

  “No.” The response rumbled right at my back. Dammit, he blocked my retreat. “She wouldn’t let me.”

  Avner and Angelina greeted each other with pecks on the cheek.

  Angelina bent and collected a basket from the ground. “Well then, I can’t let you drive all the way home without a morning coffee.” She turned toward the front door, as though that settled the matter.

  I glanced over my shoulder to my car, then back to the door. What were we supposed to do now? Have coffee with them, together...like couples? Did I have to sit next to him? Was I supposed to hold his hand?

  I had the urge to fan my collar but it was down too low on my chest.

  “Have you guys eaten? I just collected eggs.”

  Avner paused at the door, and held his hand out to me. “We’d love to have breakfast, wouldn’t we?” He squinted, just a little. The bastard’s smugness exceeded Angelina’s levels. I stared at his fingers, curled slightly and beckoning, and remembered how they’d touched and tickled me, stroked and tormented me. I cleared my still-raw-from-screaming throat and set my hand in his. “Sure, why not?”

  His fingers closed around mine, and I walked with him to the kitchen.

  The kitchen was light, bright and appropriately large. Yet, walking in to Haithem standing in the middle of it put me in the mind of kids playing with toy kitchens and mini tea sets. His fingers were too bulky for the dainty cappuccino cups he placed by the coffee machine.

  He glanced up when he saw us.

  Avner’s grip tightened on mine. He released my hand, but hauled me up against him. “Good morning.”

  Haithem’s gaze fixed on Avner. There were only two men present, yet the testosterone palpable in the room could’ve belonged to an army.

  “Avner,” Haithem said.

  I kept my eyes from rolling. Haithem was going to have to get over this. Avner reached across the island without letting me go. My middle pressed into the bench. He and Haithem shook hands for a long white-knuckled moment.

  Then Haithem turned to me. “Good morning, Emma.”

  His gaze was assessing, but his voice was warm.

  “Morning, Haithem.” I glanced back to Avner. Maybe there was something else up between the two of them?

  Angelina set the basket of eggs on the bench. “Omelets?”

  Haithem nodded, tore open a bag of coffee beans and filled the machine. The scent hit me in the lungs, so wonderful I almost moaned.

  “Sounds good.” I picked an egg out of the basket. The shell w
armed my palm. They had their own chickens, a veggie patch, herb garden and an apple orchid, as well as the whole vineyard thing. It was all so domestic and strange to see the same Haithem and Angelina who’d spent their first year together in the most modern city apartment I’d ever seen, now nesting here.

  The coffee machine buzzed, and then Haithem shook the milk into the cups with the flare of a trained barista.

  The cleaners had obviously already tackled last night’s mess. The kitchen was spotless. Sometimes having so much money was neat.

  Haithem slid the first two coffees to Angelina and me, then instructed us to relax. We took our cups to the kitchen table.

  Avner joined Haithem behind the counter. I sipped the coffee with my gaze glued to the kitchen. They worked silently together. Avner’s knife flew across a chopping board. The man had some serious knife skills...

  “Just sex, huh?”

  My attention snapped to Angelina, sitting opposite me, watching me over the rim of her cup. I gulped the coffee. My tongue scalded. No point denying it. “Maybe we’re seeing each other...”

  I lowered the cup and examined the contents.

  “Maybe?”

  “Girlfriend and boyfriend are schoolyard expressions.”

  But what do you call being had?

  “Who needs to put labels on it.” I scratched the back of my neck. “We’re just seeing where things go.”

  The words scratched. I cleared my throat again. I had an idea of where things would go—to Heartbreakville.

  His or mine. One or the other or most likely both.

  He was possessive.

  I wasn’t suited to possession.

  Maybe he didn’t know as much about me as he thought...maybe he’d get to know me and realize I really wasn’t someone you want to invest in.

  Someone it’s not safe to invest in.

  “Can you hear your voice?” She lowered her own. “Was it that good?”

  Yeah, I heard myself. I was so husky if I rerecorded my answering message, I could start a whole new kind of business.

  “If you’re not screaming, I’m not fucking you.”

  I knocked back the entire remaining coffee. The way I’d screamed, I was lucky to have any voice left at all.