by Lily Cahill
He switches to give attention to my other breast while his fingers trail down my stomach. I shiver, even though his touch sets me on fire. His fingers are at the button of my jeans, then he slowly tugs my jeans open.
“Can I?” His voice is ragged.
“Yes,” I manage through my tight throat. “Please, yes.”
He peels my jeans down my legs, pausing to pull my shoes off before tugging them the rest of the way off. I feel so empowered, knowing what my near-naked body can do to this man. A long, shuddering breath escapes Ben.
“Jesus,” he growls.
Slowly, savoring what I hold over him, I run my hands down my body to my thighs, then spread my legs wide. My panties, like my bra, are sheer black. Then his hands are there, on the inside of my thighs. His hands are large and a little rough, but his touch is reverent.
He trails his hands up, up, up, until I’m nearly bucking into his hand to feel that final touch, the completion of his fingers against my pussy. He pauses, obviously savoring the moment, then his finger flits up my slit to flick at my clit. I moan loudly and thrust my hips.
I reach up to kiss him deeply at the same moment his fingers slide into my panties and plunge into my pussy. I keen against his lips and wrap both arms around his shoulders.
His shirt is gone. In its place, my hands roam over hard, rippling muscle and smooth skin. His shoulders are large, and the muscles in his arms are corded and lean. I trail my fingers across his chest, down his back, savoring the sensation in my fingers as I touch his skin. And all the while, his own fingers work in me, thrusting inside me with two fingers while he curls a third at my clit. My desire is mounting, driving higher with every pump of his fingers inside me.
“Ben,” I groan. “Do you have a condom?”
Ben’s chest heaves against mine, and he looks deep into my eyes. He kisses me softly, his fingers still but remaining buried deep inside me. “I do. Are you sure?”
I thrust against his fingers. “God, yes.”
Ben leans back and frees his fingers, then fishes a condom out of his pocket. I hold out a hand for it as he unbuttons his trousers and pushes them down his gloriously powerful legs. His black boxer-briefs strain over his bulging cock, and the thought of that inside of me nearly makes me come right there.
I open the condom wrapper and beckon Ben closer. With him still standing on his knees, I peel his underwear down his thighs and wrap my hand around his massive cock. I slide my grip up and down, and Ben flutters his eyes closed in ecstasy. With a wicked grin of my own, I angle upward and flick my tongue against the head of his cock. Ben’s eyes fly open, and his lips part with a shuddering breath.
Slowly, I drag my tongue down the length of him then back up. Then with achingly slow, sure movements, I roll the condom down his dick. Moving quickly, I tug my own panties down my legs and kick them off, then I grab Ben’s hips and drag him toward me.
He meets my gaze, his eyes searching my face. I nod, then he plunges into me.
I cry out with the feel of him, filling me, thrusting deep. He holds himself up on his elbows and pumps his cock in and out of my pussy, each moment of bliss making my desire build until I’m nearly blinded with it. Our hips rock in unison, our breath mingles between kisses. My body pulses and shivers as he plunges into me. Deep, so deep. I hold on tight, raking my fingers down his back as my orgasm coils tight within me.
Faster, harder. His cock inside me and his mouth on me and his eyes open to watch me. I suck in a hard breath, and sensations break against my body. My orgasm makes me go tight, tight, tight and then unspool just as suddenly, a million prickles making me ache with the utter completion of it.
Ben breathes quick, pumps fast, then he groans loudly and finds his own completion. We’re gasping for breath, sweat on our brows. Ben collapses to my side on the nest of blankets and drapes a heavy arm across my stomach. He kisses the side of my face gently, then we fall into the silence of two people who have found perfection together.
Ben’s fingers walk themselves across my stomach, tickling. I squirm and wriggled in his embrace.
I glance at him to find him smiling wide. So often, his expression is closed off to outsiders, his jaw firm and his eyes hooded. I’ve seen a crack in that expression, in his armor, but this …. I’ve never seen anything so beautiful as this.
I walk my own fingers up his lean arm. “How’d you join the football team anyway? I heard some of the girls on the squad say you were some big rugby star back in England.”
Ben props himself up on his elbow and smiles. “My reputation precedes me, I see.”
“So arrogant,” I tease.
“I played rugby at uni. I was captain of my squad, actually. My father was always appalled at me being so sporty. Rugby wasn’t nearly posh enough for the Earl of Derby.”
I pull a face. “I shudder to think what he says about football then.”
Ben grimaces. “You don’t want to know. Actually …,” he looks down at me, the grimace turning into a frown that worries me.
“Tell me about rugby,” I say quickly. I don’t want anything to mar this perfect little place we’ve found together.
The frown disappears, and Ben grins again. It makes me want to kiss him, so I do. Lord, it feels wonderful to do that. When I fall back to the blankets a few minutes later, his eyes are bright.
“Rugby,” I remind him with a wicked smile.
“I was a right side winger, number fourteen,” he says, even though the words mean little to me. I frown, so he explains. “I’m strong and a very quick runner, so I’m the one on the pitch who scores the most tries.”
“You try to score?”
A smile quirks at Ben’s lips. “A score is called a try,” he explains. “So when we pack on the pitch for the scrum, I’m one of the backs, which means I’m behind the forwards. Basically, I try to ground the ball in the in-goal.”
A frown wriggles between my brows. I understand football. I like football. But rugby sounds incomprehensible. But the passion that colors Ben’s voice when he’s explaining it to me is worth all this talk of scrums and props and hookers. Which isn’t the type of hooker I thought, it turns out.
Ben’s talent is obvious when he’s on the field for the Mustangs, but I wish he’d be able to find the same fervor for football that he has for rugby. Hell, I’d be happy if he could just play nice with his own teammates. He’s hinted about his family, but there must be some reason he left England for America. An aristocrat doesn’t just end up on an American college football team on accident.
Ben’s voice is tumbling over me like a fast-moving stream, his eyes bright. I laugh, and he stops. His eyes narrow.
“You haven’t listened to a word I said, have you?” he accuses, his tone full of laughter.
“I’m sorry,” I admit. “I drifted off somewhere around the ball being trapped in a ruck.”
We’re snuggled under one of the blankets, still fully naked, and Ben slip his hand up my bare skin to tweak at my nipple. “I guess I’ll just have to start at the beginning.”
I flutter my eyes closed and shift under his touch. “Or you could keep doing that.”
“Oh, I could do this all night,” he growls at my ear, his lips warm and soft.
He sighs suddenly and curls against my side, his hand still and heavy against my stomach. I open one eye to peer at him. He’s staring somewhere over my chest, his mouth worried into a frown.
“Nara,” he says slowly.
I don’t like the heaviness in his voice.
“I promised you in that note that I’d give you an explanation, for the other night,” Ben says, his eyes finally shifting to mine. “There are things about me …,” he trails off, and I feel his fingers twitch against my skin, nervous energy making him antsy.
I want to know this about him. But not now. Not tonight. I have my own secrets to share with him, my own crap from my family and past. But tonight, I want this to only be about me and him. About us, not all the attendant baggage.
Ben’s eyes flick to mine. “Our next date, eh?”
I shift onto my side and hook my thigh over the top of his hip. I can feel his cock harden against my skin, and my own desire awakens once again.
“The things we just did together, there’ll definitely be a second date. Maybe even a third.”
“Aren’t I a lucky bloke,” he jokes, but his hands are already wandering down my stomach, my hip, slipping between my thighs.
Gently, I push him onto his back and straddle his hips. The blanket slips off my shoulders to gather around my ass, and Ben licks his lips as he takes me in.
“Jesus, Nara,” he groans. His hands whisper across my thighs and curve around my ass, kneading at me.
Lifting tall on my knees, I position myself above his erect cock and look him directly in the eyes. Then slowly, I slide down along the length of him, until we’re joined together completely, utterly.
I pause there, my eyes closed and my body full. I let my eyes close and revel in the feeling of this, of the way he fills me all the way to my very core, of the press of him inside of me.
Then he groans and his hands grip hard at my ass, and I lean down over him, giving in to every single thing I want.
Chapter Nine
Ben
NARA HAD PROMISED ME A second date, maybe even a third. But this was our fourth date, by my count. Or, rather, our fourth date had been the night before.
It’s still early, the morning sunlight streaming into my window and glowing softly over Nara, curled beside me on my narrow bed. Her face is so peaceful in sleep, her body heavy where she drapes an arm and a leg over me. Just a hint of my old rugby jersey peeks up from the top of my light blanket. My cock stirs to see her in the navy-striped jersey, the open neck just showing a hint of her chest rising and falling softly.
I know I should let her sleep, but I can’t stop my hands from slipping up her leg. My fingers slide over her panties, then up the curve of her waist. Her skin is so wonderfully soft and warm, and I can’t help but press my growing erection against her stomach.
Nara moans slightly, then her eyes flutter open. It takes her a moment to focus on me, but she’s smiling.
“That’s quite the way to wake up,” she whispers, her voice still cracked with sleep.
“I tried to stop myself, but you just look right fit in that jersey.”
Under the light blanket, Nara covers my roving hand with her own and slides it down her back to cup her ass. I gently tug her closer, pressing her against my cock.
Jesus, she’s amazing. We both have packed schedules between classes and sports, but we’ve managed to steal off together four times in the last week. Even that doesn’t feel like enough. I go to sleep every night thinking about her and wake up every morning smiling because of her. It’s like she’s taken hold of my senses, pushing everything out until all I can see, hear, feel, and breath is her. She is consuming me in a way that hasn’t happened … in a very long time.
Nara tugs my underwear down and curls her small hand around my dick. I groan and tuck my head into her neck, breathing hard.
“I have to get to class,” Nara whispers, never taking her hand away from my cock.
“Rubbish,” I moan into her neck. “You’re never leaving my bed.”
Nara’s laugh is low and throaty, and she strokes me harder until I’m arching against her. Blindly, I reach behind me for the bedside nightstand and the condoms stashed in the top drawer. Nara tears the package open and slides the rubber onto my dick, then she lifts her thigh higher over my hip and draws me closer. I can feel her, the heat of her beckoning me. God, she’s like a siren. And I would gladly dash myself against any rock to be closer to her, inside of her.
I wrap both arms around her lithe, muscular frame and slide my hard dick into her. She’s so tight, so hot and wet and perfect. I groan loudly as I bury myself in her, and she answers with fingers raking down my back.
We lay on our sides, looking into each other’s eyes, as I slowly thrust in and out of her. It’s lazy, leisurely … until it’s not. Nara’s breath hitches high, and she clamps a hand against my ass.
I shift on top of her and thrust deep, hard. I slide a hand between our bodies to flick at her swollen clit, and she arches into my hand. She lifts up to bury her face in my shoulder and cries out, the sound muffled against my skin. Her body shudders, then I can feel her tighten around my cock in orgasm. Her pleasure drives me over the edge, and I thrust hard and fast into her, finding my own release.
I collapse back to the bed, my chest rising and falling and my cheeks hot. Nara looks at me, then breaks into the most glorious giggle I’ve ever heard.
“That’s one way to wake up.”
I drag her chin closer and kiss her deeply. “That is the only way to wake up, in my opinion.”
Nara giggles again. “We’ll have to apologize to Reggie.”
A grimace pulls at my mouth. “I’ve heard him and Megan enough.” But the annoyance I used to feel at the sound of my roommate and his girlfriend going at it is suddenly replaced with amusement. It’s funny what finding your own happiness will do for your outlook on things.
I slip out of the covers and pad over to the trash bin to clean up, then pull my boxer-briefs back on and jump back into bed with Nara. We lay shoulder to shoulder, one of my legs sticking out of the bed to brace myself up. These beds are extra long, but they’re not nearly wide enough to accommodate two.
I sigh to the ceiling and reach under the covers to twine my fingers with Nara’s. “We really should get up.”
“Yeah,” Nara says, not making any move to do so.
“Maybe after—” I never get to finish.
There’s a sharp rapping against my door, then my father bursts into the room.
We freeze, even my heart grinds to a stop.
“What are you—?” I manage.
“What is she—?” my father hisses.
Reggie comes running in after Father, his eyes careening from me to Nara to my father and back again. “I’m sorry, Mayhew. I tried—”
My father’s thin mouth twists into a furious scowl. He glares at me. “If you can spare a moment, I’d like to speak to you.”
Then he turns on a heel and stalks away. Everything speeds back up. I hurtle out of the bed and yank my jeans on. Nara is still laying there, her beautiful bronzed skin burning red.
“I’m sorry,” I say in a rush of words. “I’ll be right back.” Then I race out the door toward my father.
“So this is how you’re spending your time at university? Sleeping around with American girls?”
Father is pacing in the hallway just outside the shared kitchen.
“If I would have known you were coming,” I start, but Father talks over me.
“Oh, you would have hid your little dalliance? How mature of you, Benjamin.”
“Father!” I shout. I take a breath. Father lives for me losing my temper, proving to him I’m not worthy of inheriting his title and lands. He used to blame it on playing rugby, but then he blamed it on Shelby, and now I’m sure he’ll blame it on Nara or playing football or living in the U.S. I’ve learned over the years there is nothing I can do to please this man.
“Why are you here, Father?” I say, fisting my hands to keep my voice in check.
“Did you forget that I’d be stopping by on my way out to San Francisco for the gala? Or have you lost all manners since moving to this Old West town?”
I scrub hands through my hair. I’m so damned sick of him judging me for moving here. “It’s not the Old West, Father. It’s Colorado. We came here when I was in primary school for a skiing holiday, and if I remember correctly, you didn’t seem to mind it too much then.”
Father’s jaw goes tight. “Back then, I didn’t think my only son was going to run away from home, from his responsibilities for
this place. For playing football.” He says it like the word is poison on his tongue.
He stalks closer and jabs a finger toward the closed door. “I didn’t think my only son, who’s supposed to become the Earl of Derby, would be caught sleeping with a commoner.”
I throw my hands up, unable to keep quiet any longer. “It’s not the Seventeenth Century, Father. Who cares what I am and what she is!”
“I care,” Father spits. “Our world cares. The papers, if they found out, would have a field day with this. The illustrious Benjamin Mayhew, caught with the household staff.”
My voice goes deadly. “What are you implying, Father?”
“Oh, nothing is implied, my son. She’s beneath you. This is beneath you. It all started because you lowered yourself to be with a commoner. A store clerk’s daughter, of all things.”
“Don’t you dare talk about Shelby like that.”
“Why not? This all started because of her.” Father pulls himself up to his full height and glares at me. “Benjamin, I’m afraid you thought it was an idle threat before. But I promise you, if you can’t see reason and return to your home, your responsibilities; if you don’t stop it with this sniveling tantrum that made you run away to America, I promise you I will strip you of your title, the estate, everything.”
I have nothing to say, absolutely nothing to say. I draw the mask over my face, the cold, dead features that have been my armor since Shelby died. A horrid little smile curls at the edge of Father’s mouth. He backs away a step, then pauses.
“And Benjamin. I expect you at the gala tomorrow. Don’t disappoint me any more than you already have.”
I watch Father walk away, and am still staring at the spot for a long moment after he’s disappeared. Rage boils in my blood. Rage and a horrible feeling of impotence. Father holds my inheritance over my head like a guillotine, ready to sever me from my family, my title, my fortune at any second.
