RIDING ROUGH (Hard Leather, #1)

by Franca Storm

  Until our night together last week.

  He’d let it crumble a little. He’d allowed me in.

  In the parking lot when he’d comforted me after my date had basically considered me as trash. The way Mason had spoken to me then had shocked me to my core. With emotion. Dropping his normal apathetic, robotic, unflappable demeanor. He’d softened. But just as quickly, he’d reverted right back to his regular state once we’d arrived at my place.

  Clearly, it was becoming a pattern with him. Opening up and pulling me close, just to then pull the hell away.

  I jerked my hand out of his grip, causing him to frown, looking unsure. Turnabout’s fair play.

  “Luce?”

  “You want me, then you don’t.”

  “I always want you, little darlin’. That’s never up for debate.”

  “You fucked off for a week, Mason!”

  “Told you, I had some thinking to do. Just cuz a man wants something, doesn’t mean it’s right to take it, does it? And, fuck, you and me, we’re…”

  “We’re what? Just spit it out! You owe me that much!”

  “You twist me up, make me crazed.”

  I blew out a breath. We were going around in circles. “Argh. You said that already. It didn’t make enough sense then and it doesn’t now.” I made a move to slide out from where he had me crowded in against the wall. “Just forget it. This is pointless,” I huffed.

  His hands clamped down on my arms, holding me in place and making me gasp out from the shock of his sudden movements. He pierced me with a smoldering gaze that threatened to set my entire body alight, as he growled, “You make me lose control. All right? Happy now? I can’t keep myself in check when I’m around you, thinking about you… in any way when it comes to you. Why the fuck do you think I stayed away for so long? And now I’ve had a taste of you, it’s a thousand times worse. I’m not a man who loses his shit. Always been in control. Until you, woman!”

  Oh. My. God.

  I had that much power over the formidable force to be reckoned with that was Mason Cross?

  “Control is overrated,” I said, my lip curling up into a sly smirk, as I threw the gauntlet down at his feet. It was time to settle this thing between us, once and for all.

  Your choice, Cross. Make it. Now. In, or out?

  8

  ~Mason~

  I couldn’t believe it. Here she was, challenging me again. Just like that night. Tempting me with that sexy little smirk of hers. Hell, the truth was, I didn’t need any extra tempting. Luce was a fiery ball of temptation to begin with. The problem with fire was, you touched it and you would get burned.

  But if there ever was a woman worth all of that, it was her. There wasn’t anything on earth that could tell me otherwise. Cuz I knew now. I’d tasted her and I couldn’t get her sweetness off my tongue. I was pretty damn sure, I never would.

  I looked at her watching me, knowing she was trying to figure out where my head was at. The spark in her eyes flickered, starting to dim, as the seconds ticked by. She wanted me to open my mouth, to tell her I was going to snatch up the challenge she’d tossed down at my boots.

  But I was done talking. Sometimes words were nowhere near enough.

  My hands fell from her arms. Stepping into her, I slowly reached out and grasped the nape of her neck. The internal battle I’d been waging lost all meaning the moment I felt her soft skin beneath my wandering fingertips. Just like the other night.

  I pulled her into me, forcing her mouth to mine. I hadn’t realized how worked up she'd been all this time until our lips collided and she instantly went wild, her sharp nails clawing at my neck, her pouty lips working frantically to devour mine, and her breath coming in stilted pants like an animal in the throes of an intense heat. Shit, it was usually the way I rolled, what I always went in for.

  Intense. Straight down to business. Hard. Rough.

  Until now. Cuz right now I just wanted, no—needed—to slow down for once and savor it. To savor her. Take my time and worship the one woman I’d always wanted and never imagined I’d ever fucking get to claim as mine. The other night when that window of opportunity had presented itself, I hadn’t been prepared for it and I guess it'd overwhelmed me. I hadn’t known what to do with it. So, I’d just run with it as I did everything else in my life—in that automated, fast and furious way. I’d treated Luce like any other girl. Fucked her rough and dirty… and kept my shit locked up real tight.

  She deserved better. So much better.

  And I was gonna give it to her.

  “Shh, little darlin'.” I cupped her face, easing her back. “We already rushed last time.”

  “I’m all for rushing,” she argued.

  Yeah, I could tell. She was trembling with need. It wasn’t like I was above it either. My swollen cock was pressing real uncomfortably up against the zipper of my jeans. Seeing her so desperate for me was the most beautifully raw sight I’d ever witnessed. Somehow, even though it was sexual desire that was in question, there was just something so pure about it with her. So fucking innocent. It was all new to her. And I was the one she was trusting to teach her, to explore it all with.

  “Just relax,” I urged her, stroking my thumb over her cheek.

  She frowned in thought. “I thought makeup sex was supposed to be a crazy, hot, whirlwind.”

  I chuckled. “Hmm.” I slid my hands over her shoulders, sweeping them down the length of her exposed arms, and she shivered in my hold. “Is that where you think this is heading?”

  “Well, yeah,” she answered, all matter of fact. “We had a bitch of a fight and—”

  I grabbed her hands abruptly, causing her to gasp and fail to finish her sentence. Raising them above her head and pressing them against the wall, I told her with a smirk, “I was just planning on kissing the fuck out of you until you didn’t have breath left in your lungs to utter another word. Then that would’ve been the official end of our fight with you down for the count.”

  “Mason!”

  I grinned to let her know I was kidding. Her expression softened. I leaned in and whispered, “Pixie.”

  Big blue eyes sparkled back at me. “That’s the first time you’ve called me that in an actual affectionate way in so long. Just like the old days.”

  Shit, was that true?

  “I’m sorry.”

  She shrugged. “I just missed you, that’s all. Really missed you, Mason.”

  “Fuck, I missed you, little darlin'.” I dipped my head and kissed her long and deep, showing her just how much. She needed to feel it through every soft touch of my lips against hers, the nip of my teeth pulling at her sexy bottom lip and the sweep of my tongue inside her sweet mouth relishing her unique taste. I was used to a kiss being little more than a precursor to sex. Often, I just skipped that shit entirely with some of my hookups, cuz it could send the wrong message, inviting intimacy into a strictly no-strings, empty-sex situation.

  With Luce, it was a hell of a lot more than that. It tapped into a part of me that I thought was long gone, awakening an unburdened innocence in me that I hadn’t possessed since early childhood. Before my psycho old man had fucked everything to hell and back and set me on a path that'd stripped away everything good in me. Here with Luce, though, it was as though that goodness had been resurrected. The way she kissed me like I was someone, more than a trophy to brag to her friends about scoring a biker or some shit. The sweet way she nuzzled the side of my neck whenever I pulled back slightly to allow us both to breathe for a second.

  “This last week was torture.” Holding her gaze, I let go of her hands, my fingers skimming down the sensitive skin of her inner forearms in a real slow glide as I leaned in and whispered, “Real fucking torture. Still having to keep a close eye on you as your protection detail day after day, but forcing myself to hang back, stand in the shadows and keep my hands off you.” I blew out a breath. “Trying to do the right thing never felt so fucking wrong.”

  “What are you saying?” she panted.r />
  I guided her hands down to her sides and relinquished my grip. A little groan of protest left her that made me smile. She couldn’t stand me not touching her, even for a moment. Well, she needn’t have worried.

  I lifted my hand and sank my fingers into her silky purple waves, as I told her, “After finally having you, tasting you and claiming that delicious body of yours, the idea that I’d never feel you in my arms again wasn’t something I could wrap my head around. No matter how hard I tried. Every time I saw you, I ached to touch you, to hold you, to fuck you again and again and again.”

  “Mason,” she breathed.

  Fuck, I loved it when she uttered my name all desperately like that.

  “I’ve never felt this way about anyone before, Luce. Usually, I sleep with a woman and I’m done. They’re out of my head. But with you, you didn’t just stay there, you consumed me.” I brushed my lips over hers. “You always have. Now we’ve crossed that line, though, I can’t lock down how I feel about you anymore, how much I fucking want you. We belong together. We’ve always belonged together and I’m done letting any outside bullshit get in the way of it.”

  Her arms flew around my neck and she jerked me down to her, crushing our lips together. She didn’t ease into it. There was no hesitation at all from her. And, as her hands slipped from around my neck and clutched my biceps fiercely, I knew the sex kitten from the other night had come back out to play. For all my intent to keep things PG-13 with her, to take it nice and slow this time around, the second she dug her sharp nails into my inked skin, it sparked my darker desires to life.

  I couldn’t trust myself. She was pushing me right to the goddamn edge. So, against my natural instincts to dominate, I let her take control, own the kiss. And I relished every second of it; her full, luscious lips moving all over mine, her eager tongue frantically exploring every inch of my mouth, like she couldn’t lap up my taste fast enough.

  She startled me then, rubbing her large, perky tits against my shirt. Hers was so thin that I could feel their sweet softness with barely any barrier at all, as though she were almost naked. It was deliciously erotic, the tease of it. The need that it sparked in me was so close to pushing me over the edge that I had to rip my mouth from hers and suck in a breath in a bid to calm the hell down.

  It didn’t work, because Luce had other ideas.

  Ideas to drive me batshit crazy. To push me until the thin thread of control I was holding onto finally snapped and I gave in and unleashed all over her, as it was becoming very clear was what she wanted from me.

  A sudden thrust from her, grinding her hot little pussy against my already raging erection was the last straw. I was about to pull back and tell her what was what, how it was going to be, when her expression stopped me short. Her eyes were wide as though she was shocked that she’d been so brazen. So sexually forthright. For someone so inexperienced, it was amazing. Something to be applauded, not quashed.

  “Luce, I’m trying my damnedest to do right by you this time around.”

  She frowned. “What are you talking about?”

  “I went too hard. Treated you too rough, too dirty.”

  “Did you hear me complaining?” she asked, cocking a shrewd eyebrow.

  I couldn’t help a smirk from forming. “I heard you screaming.”

  She licked her lips. Jesus Christ.

  My control was slipping. I was about to lose control. “You were screaming out my name. Not just screaming either. Moaning, groaning, panting and fucking begging. You couldn’t get enough.”

  Startling me yet again, she fisted her hands in my t-shirt and demanded, “Then make me scream like that again, baby.”

  She was literally begging me for it, but I was still hesitating. What the hell was wrong with me? Fuck, it was obvious. She wasn’t like the other girls I’d fucked. I actually cared about her wellbeing, how she felt. How what we did would affect her. I’d known her most of my life. I’d wanted her for the entire adult portion of it. But, more than even that, she was my best friend. She’d been my confidant for years, before I’d forced our estrangement to protect her. At the end of the day, she was everything.

  “You deserve better than—”

  Her finger covered my lips. “Stop it. I decide what I deserve, not you. I also decide what I want. I don’t want some toned-down version of you, Mason. I’ve wanted you for years just like you’ve wanted me. And, I don’t know about you, but what I wanted was the real you. Even the rough and dirty bedroom you. You turned my world upside down that night and I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.”

  I shook my head. “Luce, you don’t—”

  “No. You were attracted to the same thing in me that I was in you.”

  “And what’s that?” I asked, more than a little intrigued to see what her answer would be.

  “My wild heart. The part of me that’s begging to unleash on someone who can finally handle it.”

  She was right on the money.

  It had me full-on grinning back at her. “You got me, little darlin’.”

  She didn’t return my smile. Her face was frozen with intensity as she gazed at me expectantly. No, it was more than even expectation. It was a challenge.

  She was calling me out.

  Screw it all to hell… she wanted the beast, I’d give it to her.

  Time to unleash.

  “It was you who called out the beast, little darlin’. Don’t be forgetting that later when you can’t walk straight.”

  She gulped, but her voice was steady as she looked me right in the eye and told me with a sultry look, “I can’t wait.”

  Fuck, she was getting so spicy. I loved it. I couldn’t wait to bring out more of it.

  I reached around to the back of her top, found the clasp, then had it tossed down at her feet in the next second, exposing her delicious tits. Perky rounded globes, large and glorious with rosy-red puckered nipples.

  I licked my lips, then grasped her hips, jerking her against me.

  “Show me how much you want my cock.”

  She got my meaning and began grinding her sweet little pussy against me, as I held her hips, guiding her, forcing her rhythm. Jesus, my cock hated me for putting it through so much teasing. But the feel of her sliding along my jean-clad length was worth the torture, the intense tease sending shockwaves of pure pleasure shooting through my cock, tightening my balls, and spiking through the rest of my body.

  She faltered as I leaned in and closed my mouth over her left tit, suckling at the soft flesh like a starving man. I dug my fingers into her hips, making her squeal, and then she refocused on her task like a good girl while I went to town on her succulent tits. Licking, suckling and biting them, I worked her up into a frenzy until her moans and mewls became pants and bordered on screams of bliss. Her hips had become almost violent in the ferocity of their desperate motion. Jesus, she was going to make me come if she kept that up.

  “Enough.”

  She stopped immediately, pleasing me.

  Pressing my hand to her naked tits, I eased her up against the wall beside the door.

  Her eyes lit up with barely-contained excitement. She was panting already and I’d barely got started.

  I reached up under her tiny skirt and slid my hand slowly up her thigh, watching her reaction carefully. She could hardly contain herself, her breaths coming faster and harsher, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth, fidgeting restlessly against the wall. Her thighs were silky smooth and so, so soft. Perfect. Just like the rest of her curvy body. I skated my fingers higher. Higher. I stilled completely, just shy of where she really wanted my attentions. She whimpered and whined, “Mason, please.”

  There it was. The magic word.

  I jerked her lacy thong to the side and thrust a finger inside her soaking wet pussy, driving as deep as I could go. She jolted against the wall and screamed from the sudden shock of it. After having my cock inside her the other night, she was able to take my finger without too much resistance, so I didn’t n
eed to give her time to adjust. I pounded into her, finger-fucking her without mercy.

  “Aren’t you a dirty girl? Getting fingered up against a wall and loving every fucking second of it. So much that your tight little pussy’s dripping all over my hand.”

  I paused long enough to work another finger into her. Her eyes rolled back in her head and she grabbed at my arms for support as I continued to pump in and out of her at a rapid-fire pace.

  “Oh God,” she cried. “Please, Mason. Please.”

  “What’s the matter? You need more?”

  She nodded frantically, bucking her hips and trying to ride my hand.

  “Not full enough, little darlin’? Do you want another finger, is that it?” I teased, knowing what she really needed.

  “No. I… not that.”

  “Say it then. Tell me what you want.”

  She squeezed my biceps. “Your dick. Fuck me. Fuck me now.”

  I smirked. “There’s a good girl.”

  A sudden knock at the door had the both of us stilling. I was all for ignoring it, until Billy’s voice called into the room, “Mason! Got what you asked for.”

  Son of a bitch!

  “What’s he doing here?” Luce asked. She looked adorably shell-shocked that we’d been interrupted doing something that probably passed for dirty in her mind.