by K. L. Kreig
“That’s it. Fuck my mouth, beautiful. Take what you need.”
That’s the detonator. That, and the suction on my clit and the fingers diving inside my pussy, which is already convulsing with my release. I’m coming long and loud, uncaring who may hear or see.
He allows me only a slight reprieve before he reaches between us and yanks down his bottoms. He fists his erection, thick and veiny, pumping a few times while I salivate. Scooting me down his body, he circles my clit with the head repeatedly until I’m a trembling mess, nearly upon another orgasm. Then he replaces his hand with mine and directs, “Use me to make yourself come again. Just like this.”
“God,” I murmur, feeling hedonistic. His palms cover my breasts, kneading, fingers plucking at my tight nipples as I work him against me, watching him watch me, until I soar once more, humming his name. With near desperation, I place him at my opening, mid-climax. I need him inside me. Now. I start to sink, tremors of pleasure still racking my muscles, as he takes over and seats himself completely. I gasp, that fullness pressing against my walls never feeling so right before.
We haven’t used a condom since that day in his parents’ bathroom. I would say I’m not sure what to make of that, but it would be an out-and-out lie.
“I love the way you feel hugging my cock,” he grits, sucking in a harsh breath.
Gripping both hips hard, he directs, as usual, moving me up and down his shaft, my only job to feel. My boobs bounce, my skin becomes slick, and that unholy pleasure he expertly plaits gathers energy at lightning speed in my very center. It’s fast. So fast. Too fast. A third orgasm is already upon me.
Shaw palms my neck and pulls me forward. Leaning his forehead to mine, his thrusts are steady and powerful as he gruffs, “I love the way you move on me. I love the way you scream my name and weep for me to fuck you harder. I love how your pussy strangles me right before you come.” He pulls my ear to his lips, whispering more filthy words that make me explode. “I love the feel of you milking every last drop of my seed like you’re going to starve without it, Willow. I fucking love that.”
That euphoria I crave barrels through me. My inner muscles clench hard and I crest a third time.
“Oh fuck, yes. So beautiful.” His voice is so gravelly and sexy, my release doesn’t die; it grows stronger. I’m gone. Flying high in that utopia of warmth and unmatched ecstasy, wanting it to last forever when his next sentence rips me back to Earth so violently I feel the thud of it in my bones.
“But I also love your broken heart and that tattered soul you guard with enviable strength, Willow.”
That euphoria I was riding screeches to a halt.
“I love that obstinate backbone. God, that’s a fucking turn-on.”
His movements are harsher now, more erratic, and he’s growing inside me indicating his own orgasm is starting to barrel down on him. But all I can concentrate on is how my heart pounds at his repetitive use of that word.
Love.
“I love your siren voice and your secretive eyes. I love your character, your satire, the power you don’t think you hold over me but do.”
True blistering panic unfurls until all the air seems to squeeze from my lungs. I thought I was ready to go there. I thought I wanted him to take that risk. I did, days ago, but now…now I’m scared shitless. I’m not ready.
His face pinches. He’s going to come. It doesn’t stop him from talking, though. “I love—”
That’s it. I slam my mouth to his, silencing him. Eating those words until they’re gone and the taste of regret that I did lines my mouth like lard, but still I don’t stop. He tries to separate from me but I don’t let him. I set my hands around his jaw and hold tight, twining my tongue with his. I grind my pelvis into him, squeezing my pussy with everything in me until I pull a guttural moan from him that’s base and raw. Until his fingers dig painfully into my sides.
“Come inside me,” I whisper against his lips. “I want to smell like you. Feel you drip down my thighs when I get out of bed in the morning.”
“Jesus fucking Christ, Willow.”
And that’s all it takes. A few well-placed suggestive words to turn a controlling male into a primal being with a singular focus: the need to stake a claim, mark, brand what’s his.
He pulls out and flips me over onto all fours. My blanket is long gone, but I don’t feel the bite of the air as he spreads my cheeks and enters me roughly from behind. I don’t feel the bruise of his fingers while he holds me in place and fucks me with undisguised vehemence so I’ll feel his words instead of having to listen to them. I don’t feel the numbness that sets into my knees as he reminds me that he owns every single inch of me, inside and out, even the organ now beating madly for him.
But I do feel his intense pleasure when he throws himself over the edge of bliss, scalding my insides with his virility, just as I’d begged for. I do feel the love he was in the middle of professing as he gently lifts me into his arms and carries me through the house and back to his bed. And I sure as hell feel his disappointment when he spoons me from behind, gruffly telling me to sleep.
Yeah. I feel that sting acutely.
Chapter 11
I reread the proposal on the expansion of our knowledge center in India for the third time. I try to absorb the insights an analyst spent hours researching and documenting. I attempt to put into context the cost of investment, including the additional experts we’ll need to hire in our risk-management unit, and weigh that beside the value we’ll bring Wildemer and its investors. I try to do my job as the co-CEO of a company my family founded ninety years ago.
I try and I fail.
All because I’m distracted by a leggy blonde with captivating eyes the color of fresh summer rain and a fucking two-inch steel levee completely encasing her heart, which I’m trying to find a single chink in.
Not only do I have to fight Reid fucking Mergen for her, I have to fight her for her as well. It’s exhausting.
And I thought I was the one scared shitless. I’ve got nothing on her.
Frustrated, I toss the fifty-two-page report on my desk and turn toward the wall of windows behind me. I drift back to last night when the mere sight of Willow standing in that open doorway eased this awful tension festering inside me. I felt it all release the second she slipped onto my lap and set her head on my shoulder. When I was buried inside her tight, wet heat, I found myself in her just as I’d confessed.
The words I said came easily. I’m more and more convinced the excuses I was using to hold back are unfounded. I just need to prove that. So I wanted her to know exactly how far I’ve fallen into her and how there’s no hope for escape. Her essence is tangled so deep inside me I’ll never be the same.
She’s scared, though. I get it more than she understands, but if she thinks I’m walking away from her, she has another thing coming. Willow Blackwell has blown up my entire world as I know it. Now that the dust has cleared and the pieces have settled around me, all I see is her. The angle I view it at doesn’t matter, either. Top, bottom or upside-fucking-down. Everything before her is blank, empty. Everything after her is life.
“Mr. Mercer,” Dane’s voice squawks through the speaker.
For a half second, I think about not answering. I need to solve the puzzle that is Willow. I need to get all the pieces perfectly aligned and superglue them together to secure a future that now looks colorless without her. But I remember how I’ve been skirting my duties of late because of the distraction that is a five-foot-five package of sexy-as-sin spunk and I swivel, punching the button that’s lit on my phone a little too hard.
“What is it, Dane?”
“I have Jack Hancock from Aurora Pharmaceuticals on line two.”
“’Bout damn time,” I mumble. I’ve left Jack Hancock three voice mail messages over the last two days, each one getting progressively pissier. I have been hitting wall after wall in my quest to put Mergen’s threats underground and the weight of continued failure is getting unwieldy. I
need at least one damn win in my corner. Picking up the handset, I push line two.
“Jack, how nice of you to return my call.”
The bastard chuckles. “Sarcasm doesn’t suit you, Mercer.”
“Really? It was tailor-made and everything.”
Still chuckling, he says, “What can I do for the Shaw Mercer today?”
“Charles Blackwell.”
There’s a brief hesitation before, “What about him?”
“I want a copy of his entire personnel file and all policies concerning his compensation. Retirement plans. Incentive plans. Life insurance contracts. All of it.”
Silence.
Jack is a client of Wildemer’s. An important one I personally worked my ass off to land. He took a chance on us when we were building up our specialty consulting business. He’s the one who gets to make demands of me, not the other way around.
So this move of mine is risky. Jack Hancock has a short fuse. He doesn’t like to be told to do anything, not that there are many people in our positions who do. But I’m also successful because I’m savvy at guiding people where they need to be. Where I want them to go.
And while I should have put all that experience and finesse to work with my request to vet out whether Aurora Pharmaceuticals fucked over the Blackwell family, the thing I’ve come to learn about Willow is she makes me completely lose my head.
“Jack?” I prod impatiently.
I fully expect him to tell me to pound sand. He probably should. I’m asking for documents I have no business having access to. But if he tells me no, things will get ugly. Fast. And all the work I’ve put into growing our pharma consulting division over the last several years will be on the line. Aurora Pharmaceuticals is the linchpin client of that division. We lose him, we’ll take a hit not only to the bottom line but to our reputation as well.
Our shareholders will have my ass in a sling. Hell, Noah will have my head.
Yet I’m not even blinking an eye. Willow is worth that risk. She has quietly slid into the number-one slot in my life, above everything else, and I wouldn’t change a thing about it.
Jack clears his throat, his voice now pitched low and concerning. “What’s this about, Shaw?”
“Justice.”
“Justice?”
“That’s what I said.”
“Justice for who?”
“His family, that’s who.”
Another pause. “I’m sorry, Shaw. I’m not following at all. This is old news. The death of my top scientist damn near killed this company. You know this.”
“Yes, I do.”
“Then why are we talking about it?”
I think about deflecting, but the fact I’m dating Willow is public knowledge. We’ve already been in the papers. Twice. In fact, at the moment, I’m staring at a picture taken of us last week leaving a cozy Italian restaurant; it’s in the social section of the World Herald. The light in her eyes as she looks up at me is blinding, even in black and white.
“I’m dating his daughter.”
“You’re…the woman in the paper? That’s his daughter?”
“Yes.”
“Jesus,” he breathes.
I stay quiet, let him absorb what I’m telling him. Willow is mine. Jack and I may only be business partners, but we’ve known each other for many years now. He knows I’m rabid about protecting what’s mine.
“Those files are confidential, Shaw.”
“Don’t bullshit me, Jack. I’m not going to ask again.”
Jack’s voice is harder when he tells me, “I think you have our roles confused here, Mercer.”
I’m sure my sneer comes through the phone line perfectly. “My role in life has never been clearer.”
This time the pause is endless. We’re in a Mexican standoff, neither of us wanting to blink. I would think he hung up on me but the solid yellow light on line two indicates otherwise.
“What are you looking for?” he finally asks with a heavy sigh.
Muscles I didn’t realize were knotted start to unwind. Leaning back in my chair I once again spin to gaze out the wall of glass. My eyes drop to the window across the street, one story down. A man rises from his desk when a redheaded stunner enters his office and closes the door. I see the play of her lips clearly from here. Daring. Taunting. Her hands move to the buttons on her blouse while he quickly moves to close the blinds that face the rest of his office, leaving the ones facing me open, as usual.
“I’m…” I take a breath, making sure what I’m about to say isn’t taken out of context.
Do I think Aurora screwed Charles Blackwell’s wife and daughter? Maybe. Do I think it was intentional? I hope to hell not or, linchpin or no, I will see Jack Hancock slapped with a lawsuit that will sink his ship before it ever leaves port.
“In all the time we’ve known each other, Jack, have you ever known my hunches to be off?”
“I have not,” Jack answers evenly.
“Then trust me. I’m not out to cause harm to you or Aurora. You’re an important client.”
“Why do I feel like if I don’t agree to this I’m going to get fucked up the ass?”
“Because you trust your instincts, just like I do.”
There’s a long bout of silence. “This is highly unusual.”
“I understand that, Jack. I will use the utmost discretion and confidentiality.”
“I want an NDA signed.”
“It’s totally unnecessary, but if it makes you feel better, not a problem.”
The sigh that reaches my ears is long and resigned. “My HR VP is going to have my head.”
“I appreciate this trust you’re placing in me,” I say, trying to give him some comfort I’m not looking to fuck him over. And I’m not. I only want Willow to get what’s owed her.
“Trust runs both ways. I trust if you find whatever it is you’re looking for I will be the first to know.”
“And I trust if I find something that’s off you’ll honor your obligations.”
I hear a knock on my door a second before the click of the latch. Only one person generally walks in without permission. When I slide my gaze away from the woman across the street, who is now melting into a puddle of pleasure, my eyes land on Noah striding over the threshold.
“Charles Blackwell was not only a pioneer in this field, Shaw, I considered him a friend. Based on what you asked for I can only assume you’re looking for compensation not yet paid and I assure you I trust my HR team implicitly. They don’t make those kinds of mistakes.”
I feel Noah stop beside me, his gaze following mine. A low curse ensues.
“Sometimes mistakes are just mistakes. Nothing nefarious intended, I’m sure. A second set of eyes can’t hurt.”
“I can have Sandra review everything again.” Sandra is his Human Resources VP, I assume.
“You can. But if it’s all the same, I’d still like the documents couriered over as soon as possible.”
“You’ll have the NDA within the day. Sign it and they’re yours.”
Noah moves around me, getting a better look at the show across the street. He leans his hip against the glass, his eyes glued to the exhibitionist couple.
“Thank you.”
“How about eighteen next week?”
Well, that’s a good sign I haven’t fucked up too bad, I guess. “Sounds great. Have Dane and Peggy set up a tee time. We’ll talk soon.” I push myself up and reach over to cradle the handset.
“That Jack?” Noah asks absently.
“Yes,” I answer, stopping to his right. I stuff my hands in my pants pockets and spread my stance slightly, rocking back on my heels.
“He give you a hard time?”
“Nothing I couldn’t handle.”
“I’m jealous as hell you have a front-row seat to this every week.”
I stare at the woman, whose glossed eyes beg us to join in on their little fun and games, the same as she always does. Her skin is pale. Her breasts are perky. She’s beautiful
and alluring. But she’s not tempting in the least. She’s not Willow. I hit the button that closes my blinds as ecstasy washes over Red’s face.
“Show’s over. I have work to do,” I bark. I plunk down into my leather chair and pick up the report I’ve been trying in vain to get through, forcing myself not to snag the cell mocking me from the corner of my desk. Three quick moves of my finger and a couple of well-timed commands is all it would take to have Willow here. Waist bent. That pretty ass in the air. Pussy swollen and dripping.
Hand to God it takes every bit of restraint not to make that call.
“Two things,” Noah says, his face now serious. Taking a seat, he throws one leg over the other.
I drop the papers in my hand, every bit of attention drifting away from my insatiable desire for Willow, now honed in on my best friend instead. “You hear something?”
His lips turn down before straightening back out. “Not exactly, but I have a lead.”
“On?”
“The missing friend of Bluebelle’s.”
I narrow my eyes. “The one who moved?” The only one we haven’t been able to find.
“Yeah. She lives in a small town a couple of hours outside of Charlotte. I was thinking we could take a road trip. Pay her a little visit.”
“Road trip?”
“Well, you know,” he says with a smirk. “Take the corporate jet. We’ll be in and out in twenty-four hours.”
I let that roll around a few seconds. We need to do this. See if she knows anything about that night. But twenty-four hours without Willow? Not gonna happen. If Mergen gets wind I’m out of town, he’ll be all over her like white on rice, spewing his lies. Poisoning her mind.
Maybe I can take her with me? We’ll stay at the Ritz. I’ll book a spa package for her. She can be pampered while I hopefully get what I need from the girl to refute all this crap and then I’ll spend all night celebrating as I bury myself in her repeatedly.
Yeah. That may work.
“Let’s do it. The sooner, the better.”
Noah nods. “I’ll make the arrangements. Saturday work?”
“Fine.”
