Surrender bh-1

by Lora Leigh

“Cole,” she screamed out his name as she felt her orgasm building. “Oh God, Cole, I can’t stand it.”

  “You can, Tess,” he groaned, levering over her body as his hips powered inside her.

  “You can, baby. Take it. Take it, Tess. Cum for me, baby. Cum for me now.” He surged inside her as she tightened around him.

  Beneath her, Jesse had clasped her waist hard, his hips slamming into hers, and despite their speed, both men kept in perfect synchronization with the hard thrusts of their cocks inside her body.

  Tess couldn’t stop her screams, couldn’t stop the sensations that tightened her body, the boiling pressure, the hard, piercing pleasure/pain was too much for her untutored body to take for long. When she climaxed, she wailed out at the explosion, tightening on them further, her ass, her cunt milking the cocks possessing her until she heard their shattered male groans and felt the hard, spurting jets of their sperm filling each hole.

  Her orgasm shuddered through her body, over and over. Her muscles clenched on their cocks as they exploded inside her, making them cry out around her, jerk against her as her cunt and her ass drew on their flesh, shuddered around it, burned them with her release until she fell against Jesse gasping, boneless.

  “Son of a bitch, Cole,” Jesse’s voice was harsh, weary now. “She’s drained me.” Cole pulled free of her and collapsed on the mattress, helping Jesse to lower Tess between them. Once there, he pulled her against his body, his hands running over her back, his lips caressing her temple as she fought to regain her breath.

  “You’re mine, Tess,” he whispered, stopping her heart with the emotion she heard in his voice. “Taken by me. Held by me. I won’t let you escape me again.” She would have answered him, but shock held her immobile when she heard the enraged scream of her mother from the doorway.

  “You dirty whore! Just like your father. You’re just like your father—!” Lora Leigh

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  “Oh my God!” Humiliation sped through Tess’s system seconds later as Cole and Jesse jumped to hide her from sight.

  They jerked their pants from the floor, shielding Tess as they dressed quickly.

  Cole’s body was tight with fury as Tess fumbled with her gown, her fingers shaking so badly she could barely get it over her head.

  Turning to her, still shielding her, Cole helped her untangle the material and ease it over her head.

  “I’m sorry, baby,” he whispered, his lips feathering over her hair as he straightened the gown.

  Tess shook her head, feeling the heat that traveled over her face. With a final touch of his fingertips to her cheek, he turned to her mother.

  “How the hell did you get in?” His voice was furious as he faced Ella Delacourte, dark and warning.

  “I didn’t come here to talk to you, perverted bastard that you are. Look how you corrupted my daughter. You’re just like that trashy, home wrecking sister of yours.” Ella was screeching now.

  Tess felt her face flame in shame as she stood to her feet, her legs shaking from her exertions and her fear. Dear God, how had her mother got into the house?

  “Mother, why are you here?” Tess’s voice was thick with tears and confusion.

  She wasn’t ashamed that she had experienced the sexuality of the act. But being caught in it was mortifying. And by her mother!

  “I came to see why you were here after I found out your father and his tramp were away for the week,” she sneered. “You haven’t even called me. I was worried.” The classic guilt trip from her mother any time Tess spent time with her father.

  “Ella, control your tongue,” Jesse’s voice was hard and laced with warning.

  Tess looked at him in surprise. She had no idea Jesse knew her mother.

  Ella cast the other man a look that should have withered him with shame. Jesse stood before her, his shoulders squared, his dark face furious.

  “Tess, go shower or something.” Cole drew her into his arms, kissing her head softly, his hands soothing on her back. “Let me take care of this.” Tess shook her head.

  “I haven’t needed you to fight my battles before this, Cole. I don’t need you to do it now,” she said. “I haven’t done anything wrong—”

  “Wrong?” Ella’s voice was piercing. “You think fucking your perverted lover and his friend isn’t wrong, Tess? I raised you better than to whore for some depraved bastard.”

  Tess trembled at the fury in her mother’s voice.

  “Ella!” Jesse’s voice was a lash of cold, hard fury now. “Get the hell out of here before I escort you out. And I don’t think you want me to have to do that.” The heated edge of fury in Jesse’s voice surprised Tess.

  “Get her the hell out of here,” Cole muttered to his friend.

  “Would you guys just stop this?” Tess ran her fingers through her hair, hating the tremble in her hands as she faced her mother.

  Years of being made to feel ashamed of her sexuality, of her needs as a woman washed over her. She remembered the lectures from the time she was a child, on the depravities of sex and the sins of the flesh.

  “Mother, I told you I’d be back after the party,” she sighed, leaning against Cole for support, thankful in a way that she didn’t have to hide from her mother now.

  “How could you do this, Tess?” Ella’s expression was livid, her gray eyes glittering with fury. “How could you have become so depraved?”

  “Depraved?” Tess shook her head, sighing. “I’m just different from you. I’m sorry.” A tear escaped her eyes. She hated having her mother angry with her, just as she had hated leaving her father so long ago.

  As she finished speaking, a movement behind her mother caught Tess’s attention.

  Her father, tall and strong, his face coldly furious, moved into the room.

  “Well, I guess you’re satisfied,” Ella sneered when she saw him. “She’s just like you and that whore you married.”

  Missy was with her father, and for once, Tess saw anger lining the beautiful blonde’s face.

  “You’re in my home, Ella,” Missy reminded her, her slender body tense and lined with anger. “I suggest you leave it and consider what you’re losing in this display you seem intent on. Tess isn’t a child. She’s a woman. Her lifestyle is none of your concern.” Fury pulsed through the room, nearly choking Tess.

  “I can’t believe you did this. That a child of mine would lower herself to the same games her father plays.” Tess flinched under the cold, unrelenting judgment her mother was meting out.

  “Ella!” Missy’s voice was a lash of hot fury. “I will have you escorted from my home if you cannot speak to your daughter decently. What she does is no business of yours. She’s a grown woman.”

  “And I don’t need anyone fighting my battles for me,” Tess bit out, more than surprised at the confident edge of power in her stepmother’s voice. Missy with a backbone? She wouldn’t have believed it.

  “Do you know what she was doing here, Jason?” Ella screamed out at her ex-husband. “This had gone even further than the games you practice—”

  “For God’s sake, Ella!” Jason cursed furiously. “Listen to you. Do you think our daughter wants to hear this? Our problems don’t involve her.” Her father’s face was ruddy with his own embarrassment. “I don’t care what she was doing. I trust Cole to protect her, that’s all I needed to know.”

  “Well had you shown up a moment sooner—”

  “Then I would have warned them of my arrival before entering the house,” he growled in disgust as he cast Tess an apologetic look. “For pity’s sake, stop humiliating Tess because of your own bitterness. This has gone too far.” Ella turned to Tess, her eyes hard, resentful. “Leave your belongings, Tess. You’re going home with me. Now!”

  When had she ever given her mother permission to order her around in such a manner? Tess watched her in growing confusion and pain. She had never known how angry, how bitter her mother had become. And for what reason? She had often stated how her life was more secure
without a man interfering in it.

  “I won’t leave, Mother.” She felt Cole’s hands tighten at her shoulders, the way his body tensed expectantly behind her.

  Shock filled her mother’s expression.

  “What did you say?” She seemed to gasp.

  “I won’t leave—”

  “He’s using you, Tess,” Ella said furiously. “You’ll be nothing but his whore. He proved that today.”

  Tess shook her head. “I love him, Mother. I have for years and I was too scared to admit to it. But I’m even more frightened of being alone and bitter, without at least having this time with him.”

  Silence held the room. She thought she heard Cole whisper a reverent “Thank God.” But she wasn’t certain.

  “You will,” Ella screamed furiously, her fists clenching at her side, her eyes glittering wildly. “You won’t stay with these monsters.”

  “Perhaps it’s where I belong.” Tess wanted to cry out at the hurt that flashed in her mother’s eyes. “I love Cole, Mother, and I’m not ashamed of that, or what I’ve done. I enjoyed it.”

  Ella opened her mouth to say more.

  “Don’t speak, Ella,” Jason snapped. “Keep your mouth shut and leave her the hell alone.”

  “You don’t control me, Jason,” Ella bit out, her body trembling. “You didn’t while we were married and you don’t now.”

  “Probably what her problem is,” Cole whispered at Tess’s ear.

  Her eyes widened for a moment before she put her elbow in his hard stomach. He only chuckled.

  “I will if you don’t keep that viperous tongue quiet,” he growled. “And trust me, Ella, you better be careful. You may find out the monsters you hate so much are more a part of you than you know.”

  “I’m not part of this,” Jesse finally sighed as he finished dressing. “I’m heading out of here, boys and girls. See you at the office, Cole.” He slapped Cole on the shoulder before leaving the room.

  Ella’s eyes followed him, narrowed, furious.

  “Mother, perhaps you should leave as well.” Tess took a hard, deep breath. “We’ll discuss this later, when we’re both calmer.”

  Ella turned back to her. The perfectly groomed cap of auburn hair framed a surprisingly young face. At forty-two, Ella Delacourte looked nearly a decade younger.

  But she was more bitter and vengeful than any woman twice her age, with a much harder life. “Come with me now, Tess, or I won’t allow you back in my home.” Ella’s lips thinned as she stared at her daughter, ice coating her voice. “You’ll no longer be a daughter of mine.”

  Tess trembled. She had never seen her mother so angry.

  “I’m sorry, Mother.” She shook her head. “I can’t.” Ella drew herself erect. She cast her ex-husband a dark look then turned and stalked from the house. Tess flinched as the front door slammed closed behind her.

  “She’ll settle down, Tess,” Jason said gently. “You know how your mother gets.” Tess ran her fingers through her hair as she took a hard, deep breath.

  “She won’t forgive me, Father,” she said, her voice low, thick with tears. “Not ever.

  No more than she ever forgave you.”

  “Tess,” Cole’s voice was soft, gentle as his arms wrapped around her, holding her.

  What a perfect feeling, she thought, to be held so tight, so warm against him. But how long would it last? How long could it last? She loved him, but how could he love her? Had her own desires, her unnatural needs lost her the love of the only man she had ever truly wanted?

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The question followed Tess through the rest of that night. Cole didn’t come to her bed. For the first time in six nights, he wasn’t beside her, tempting her, teasing her with his body, his lust. She lay in the middle of the big bed, staring silently up at the vaulted ceiling, the loneliness of the room smothering her. God help her, if she couldn’t get through one night without him, how would she handle the rest of her life?

  What had she done? Had her desire to experience with him everything his other women had been her downfall? Had her envy, her depravity, ruined the only chance she had to make him love her? She swallowed the tight knot of fear in her throat.

  Realistically, she had known that her chances of capturing his heart were slim. She just hadn’t expected it to be over so soon.

  Realizing she wouldn’t be sleeping any time soon, Tess got up, pulling on the bronzed silk robe that lay at the bottom of the bed and belting it firmly. She slipped her feet into soft, matching slippers and left the room. She would prefer to sit in the kitchen, drowning her sorrows in the chocolate mint ice cream her father kept on hand, rather than wallowing in them.

  As she stepped into the hallway, she followed the bright light spilling from the kitchen further up the hall. She halted in surprise at the doorway. Dressed in a thick robe, her blonde hair attractively mussed, her surprisingly pretty face free of makeup, sat Missy, digging into a bowl of the mint flavored chocolate, the box sitting temptingly in front of her.

  “Great minds think alike?” Missy flashed her a smile as she looked up, waving the spoon in her hand at the cabinet. “Grab a bowl.” Tess walked to the cabinet and did just that, then sat down at the other side of the rounded table and began to spoon in a large portion.

  “Nothing settles the nerves like Chocolate Mint,” Missy sighed. “And I guess today rates as definitely that.”

  “I’m sorry,” Tess apologized, genuinely regretful that she had caused her stepmother any pain. “I didn’t expect Mother to show up.” Missy paused, her spoon suspended above her bowl as she flashed Tess a frown.

  “Tess, I’m not upset for me,” she said sincerely. “I’m upset for you and Cole. Your private choices should not be aired in such a manner. Cole was furious, of course, that she hurt you. But I was angry for your sake.”

  “Why?” Tess frowned. “We’ve never been close. We barely get along.” A knowing smile tipped Missy’s pale lips.

  “Tess, you fight with someone when you feel threatened, and when you care without a safety net, an assurance that you are cared for as well. I know that. I used to be the same way, until I met Jace.”

  Tess hunched her shoulders. Missy’s assessment was much too close to the truth.

  “That’s how I knew you loved Cole.” Missy dropped her next bombshell. “At first, it was just general sniping, but as he teased and flirted and pushed you, it became outright fighting on your side. I knew then your heart was involved.” Tess nearly choked on the spoonful of ice cream she was attempting to swallow.

  How could anyone, especially airhead Missy, who wasn’t such an airhead after all, know her better than she knew herself?

  “Have I lost him?” Tess couldn’t keep the longing, the fear from her voice as she stared back at the other woman.

  “Lost Cole?” Missy laughed in surprising amusement. “Tess, Cole has been fighting for your attention for over two years now. What the future will bring, I don’t know. But I sincerely doubt you have anything to worry about for the present.” This did little ease to her worry.

  “He hasn’t returned.” She shrugged, dropping her eyes to her bowl. “Maybe I disgusted him. Maybe I was supposed to refuse when Jesse came in?” When Missy didn’t answer, Tess risked a quick look.

  The other woman watched her sympathetically, warmly.

  “Cole is different from other men,” she said as Tess watched her worriedly. “How different, is up to you to discover. But I’ve known him all his life, and I know Cole doesn’t play games. If he invited Jesse, then he wanted it too. He wouldn’t try to trap you, Tess, or hurt you. You have to trust him that far.”

  “I’m scared,” Tess admitted, her eyes going back to the melting ice cream. “I don’t know how to handle what I feel and what I want.”

  “Do any of us?” Missy’s chuckle was self-mocking. “It takes meeting the man who can give us what we need, who knows, because it’s what they need. I know, Tess, because that’s what your father and I
have. A relationship that fulfills what both of us need.”

  “Mother never loved him.” Tess knew that, had known it for a long time.

  “Your mother has to love herself first.” Missy shrugged. “Now finish your ice cream. I’m sure Cole will be back before the party tomorrow, and he’ll show you then how much he’s missed you. I know he didn’t want to leave and he hated going before talking to you first, but in this case, he assured me it was necessary.” What, Tess wondered, could have been so important that he couldn’t even see her before leaving?

  * * *

  Tess waited, and she waited. All through the next day, while she was dressing for the party, and halfway through the boisterous, noisy affair she waited, and held onto the hope that he would be back that night. She gave up at nine. She set aside her glass of champagne, put away her hope and walked regally from the noisy ballroom and up the narrow steps that led to the Turret Room. She would pack and leave in the morning.

  She wasn’t certain where she would go, but she was certain she couldn’t risk staying here, or begging him to forgive her for something she didn’t know if she would change.

  The sexual dominance of the act had thrilled her. The utter thick, hot pleasure in Cole’s voice had only spurred her on. She didn’t know if it was something she would ever want again, but she knew experiencing it would be a memory she would always hold onto.

  She kept her head down as she entered the room, going straight for the suitcase stored in the large walk-in closet just inside the room. She placed it on the luggage rack, opened it and re-entered the closet to collect the few things she had brought with her.

  As she folded the articles of clothing, the tears began to fall. They were hot, blistering with pain, and shook her body as she tried to console herself that at least she had tried. For one time in her life, a very brief time, she was free.

  She wiped at the tears, her breath hitching as she moved to the stone dresser and collect the clothing there, then she went to her bed and picked up her robe. The last article Cole had given her. It was then she saw the small, black velvet jewelers box. She stopped, clutching the silk robe to her chest It was a ring. The diamond glittered with shards of blue and orange, intensifying the gold of the thick, simple band. Her hands shook, her body trembled. Her head raised, her eyes going to the shadows of the opened bathroom door.