Fire & Ice (The Locklaine Boys #1)

by Jessica Prince

  There was no confusing that one for a mini stroke. I definitely orgasmed a little bit. I remained speechless as he pulled the door opened and smiled at me one last time. “Sleep good, sweetness. I’ll call you tomorrow.” He turned to leave before pausing to look over his shoulder. “If you don’t answer I’ll just hunt you down and spank that pretty ass of yours before I fuck you. Either way, no matter how much you fight me, I’m gonna be inside you again.”

  With that, he was out the door, and I was left standing there feeling simultaneously aroused and terrified, all at once.

  “YOU SURE YOU’RE GOOD, brother?”

  I looked across the roof of Dex’s car where he stood, elbows resting on the top, his frame standing in the opened driver’s side door of his car. We’d been on scene for hours, trying to calm down the frantic wife who’d finally had enough of her husband’s abuse and put a bullet in him. Fortunately, her aim was shit and she’d hit him in the ass instead of killing the son of a bitch.

  Unfortunately, the fucker had lived and was raising hell about pressing charges for attempted murder. By the time the wife was cuffed and put in the back of a cruiser, I wanted to do the planet a favor and finish the job she started. The only consolation was the fact we were also able to haul his ass in for beating on his wife. She probably wouldn’t be in for longer than the night. Him, on the other hand? Well, after her attorney hands his ass to him with a self-defense argument, odds were, he’d be in some serious shit.

  It wasn’t immediate, but justice would prevail in that case. But that didn’t lessen the sting from the serious case of blue balls I’d been sporting most of the night.

  “Yeah, I’m good,” I lied. But what was I supposed to say? Call me crazy, but I didn’t think, ‘Hell no. I got your sister off, now all I can think about is being buried balls deep inside her’ was something Dex would handle all that well.

  I was so screwed. I’d seriously underestimated my attraction to the fiery redhead when I started this whole thing. I thought it would be as simple as a few rolls in the sheets to work her out of my system. I’d gotten her off once—and I didn’t even get a happy ending—and already, I was feigning for more of her. I could only imagine how much worse it would be once I finally had her in all the ways I wanted her.

  No way was once going to be enough. Hell, a dozen times wasn’t going to cut it. Problem was, the woman hated my guts. Getting so close to her once was a friggin’ miracle, and she was already trying to convince herself it was a bad idea. I didn’t know how I was going to pull it off, but I needed more—so much more—and I had to talk her into it, as well.

  Luckily, I knew her weak spot. The woman never could back down from a challenge.

  “HONEY-BOO-BOO, YOUR grumpy face is putting a serious damper on my exceptional mood,” Tomas stated, earning a giggle from Navie who was sitting behind the counter at Fire & Ice, playing Candy Crush on her phone while I went through the receipts in the register. “I’m going to have to ask you to cheer up, you’re bringing down the boutique’s ambiance.”

  I wanted to reach across the counter and knock his fedora off his stupid head. “First off, never call me honey-boo-boo again. Unless you want me to start referring to you as Sugar Bear.” His lip curled up in disgust and I knew I’d won that round. “And secondly, this is my shop, and you are my employee. I can bring the ambiance down as much as I want and you can’t do anything about it. Now get to tagging,” I ordered. I was so used to Tomas that taking his specific brand of crap wasn’t an issue for me… as long as he was at least doing the job I’d hired him to do, which at the moment was tagging the jewelry that Navie had just brought in.

  He let out a disgruntled huff, but got back to work so I ignored the choice words he grumbled under his breath.

  “You know, he’s got a point, sweetie. You seem a little off today. What’s up?”

  “I’m good honey.” I smiled to try and convince her of my lie, but I could feel it didn’t meet my eyes.

  She studied me for a few seconds, skepticism etched across her pretty features. “You sure? Because I’m here if you ever need to talk.”

  I put the receipts, along with the cash, into the moneybag and zipped it up. “I promise, it’s all good.” Wanting to end the conversation before it had a chance to really begin, I walked out from behind the counter. “Go ahead and call it a night when you’re done with that, Tomas. I’ll handle closing up for the evening.”

  He and Navie both looked at me in surprise. It wasn’t that I never closed, I did all the time, but I never sent my staff home and began closing down an hour early. But I desperately needed some quiet time to think. I needed my sewing room and my designs to get lost in. I needed an oatmeal crème pie, STAT, but, stupidly didn’t leave the boutique stocked. It was obvious to my friends that something was up with me, but at that point I just didn’t care. Griffin had been calling and texting for most of the day. And I needed time to figure out what the hell I was going to do.

  I didn’t wait around for them to ask any more questions. Leaving them in the front, I headed to my sanctuary, closed myself in, stuck my earbuds in and turned on my mellow out playlist. I tried to lose myself in my work, and had been doing pretty well for about fifteen minutes, when my music cut out for a second when another text came through.

  With a sigh, I pulled my phone from my pocket and thumbed across the screen.

  Him: Stop fucking avoiding me, Pepper.

  I actually felt a twinge of guilt at the anger coming through in that message. His earlier texts had started sweet and funny, and then slowly turned seductive, then downright dirty. When I hadn’t responded to any of those, the phone calls started, not an obsessive amount; just enough to know he really wanted to hear back from me. His later texts grew in agitation when the calls all went unanswered.

  My phone chimed again.

  Him: I told you I’d hunt you down if you tried to run. I meant it.

  My thumbs hovered over the screen as my mind tried to formulate a response that would appease him while giving me some more to think.

  I had nothing.

  Instead, I jacked my music up louder, blaring Silversun Pickups’ “Nightlight,” and stuffed the phone back in my pocket. The song’s second verse had just started when, all of a sudden, the buds were yanked from my ears and a hand clamped around my upper arm, spinning me around.

  Using the momentum of the spin, I balled my fist up and shoved it into my attacker’s gut while screaming at the top of my lungs.

  My assailant let out a deep oomph as he bent at the waist, releasing my arm to hold his stomach. I’d just stepped to the side in order to run when I heard a pained voice say, “Fuck me, Pepper! Are you determined to kill me?”

  My mouth dropped open in shock. “Griffin? Are you crazy?!”

  “Me?” he shouted incredulously, standing to his full height. “I’m the one that’s been physically assaulted by you twice in the past few days!

  “Well if you wouldn’t keep scaring the shit out of me, I wouldn’t have to kick your ass!” The last three words were punctuated by slaps to whichever part of his body I could reach. “You’re lucky I didn’t have my stun gun on me this time! How did you even get in here? We’re closed for the day.”

  “The door was unlocked. I called your name when I walked in. It wasn’t like I was in stealth mode, Pepper.” He stared down at me, his eyes narrowed in angry slits. “And if you hadn’t avoided me all fucking day, maybe I wouldn’t have had to track you down in the first place.”

  “So it’s my fault you’ve turned into a stalker, is that it?” My words dripped with sarcasm as I channeled all my frustrations in an attempt to drown out the longing I felt for his touch.

  His glare morphed into a wicked grin. “I prefer to think of it as determined. It has a better ring to it.”

  “Call it whatever you want,” I shrugged like I didn’t care one way or another. If there was one thing I had mastered when it came to Griffin, it was feigning indifference. I’d had y
ears of practice. “But I’m really busy, so you need to go.”

  Instead of turning for the door he did something that seemed to be becoming a habit over the past few days. He came at me, crowding me against the closest surface, which just so happened to be a wall this time. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m pretty sure I told you exactly what would happen if you ran from me.”

  Good Lord! I knew Griffin was hot. You didn’t secretly love someone for close to a decade without noticing how good looking they were. But Dominating Griffin was something else completely. Something unexpected. Something I had absolutely zero defenses against. All he had to do was growl in that raspy voice and my body turned into a quivering mass of want.

  “We can’t do this,” I objected weakly, forcing the words out at the same time my body screamed in objection. “This is a mistake.”

  “I disagree,” Griffin said softly as he ran his nose along my jawline. “I think it’s a brilliant idea. And I know you think that, too.”

  “Do not,” I argued breathlessly, tilting my head to the side to give his lips better access to the length of my neck.

  He pulled his face back far enough to look me in the eye and asked, “So if I were to slide my fingers into your panties, you’re telling me you wouldn’t be wet?” I could see the shimmer in his icy blue gaze. He was all but daring me to lie.

  “I didn’t think so,” he smirked knowingly when I couldn’t say the words. “Now,” he spoke as he slid his hands down my ribs on either side, only stopping when he got to my hips. “Do you want your spanking before or after?”

  I let out a yelp as he lifted me from the ground like I weighed nothing, intuitively wrapping my arms and legs around him and holding on. “You aren’t spanking me,” I insisted as he walked us across the room.

  “You sure about that?” he chided. Coming to a stop, he lowered me to the table that ran the length of the back wall. “’Cause I think I am.”

  He most definitely wasn’t. On that, I’d fight him tooth and nail, but when it came to sleeping together? Well, I was giving up the ghost on that one. “We can have sex, Griffin.” I crossed my ankles behind his back and ran my fingertips over his shoulders and down to his firm, defined pecs. “But if your palm comes anywhere near my ass, I’ll kill you. Understand?”

  His lips twitched with humor as his hands slid up the outside of my thighs, continuing their journey upwards until the flouncy skirt of my dress bunched up at my hips. I could feel the rigid length of his erection as he pulled me even closer to him. Clamping my teeth into my bottom lip, I fought to bite back the moan that wanted to work its way from my chest. The pressure of him pressing against my core sent bolts of electricity through my bloodstream.

  “Any more rules?” He asked as he rocked against me, his fingers curling around the thin material of my panties at my sides.

  It was so hard to concentrate when he was working my body into a frenzy, but somehow I persevered, getting out the most important part of our deal. “This is a one-time thing,” I muttered against his cheek, relishing the feel of the rough stubble against my lips. “After tonight, we go back to exactly how we were before. We never talk about it, and there are absolutely no repeats.”

  His eyes darkened and his fingers tightened, straining the flimsy fabric covering me to the point a loud riiiiip sounded through the room. Griffin lost all sense of restraint, jerking my skirt the rest of the way up with one hand as the other fumbled with his fly. I gasped as the cool air hit my damp, bare flesh, and I was lost. I needed him inside of me, immediately.

  “Griffin,” I whispered, pleading with him to hurry.

  “Condom in my wallet,” he grunted as he yanked at his belt. “Back left pocket, sweetness.”

  He didn’t have to tell me twice, by the time I unearthed his wallet and pulled the condom out, he’d managed to pull himself free. Snatching the condom from my fingers, he ripped it open with his teeth and sheathed himself quicker than I’d ever seen any man move before. Between one breath and the next, he was inside me, causing me to cry out as his thick length stretched me, forcing my body to let him in. The spike of pleasurable pain was absolute ecstasy. I thought I might come just from having him fill me, but when he pulled out and shoved back in on a hard thrust, that intoxication combination only got better.

  “Shit,” he cursed, his teeth clenched, jaw tight. “Never get enough of this.

  “Oh, God,” I groaned as he pounded into me, over and over. I felt myself tightening around him as each snap of his hips pushed me closer to the edge. “Griffin. Oh fuck!” My nails raked down his chest as I tried to find purchase, something to hold on to in order to keep from plummeting over. It was so good. Too good. It was the most intense feeling I’d ever experienced. And it terrified me. “Too much,” I panted. “It’s too much, Griffin.”

  “You can take it,” he grunted, never letting up as he pushed me down on the table. The new position had the head of his shaft hitting something inside of me that caused my eyes to widen in shock as every muscle in my body grew tighter. “Take all of me, Pepper. I want to feel you drench my cock while you scream for me.”

  I clawed at him in earnest, trying to pull him closer at the same time I felt the need to push him away. I was so close to coming harder than I ever had in my life. I was talking a blackout-inducing, vision-blurring, earth-shattering orgasm that would leave my body completely boneless once it finished ravishing me.

  “You really think once will be enough?” Griffin asked, ripping me from my lust-induced fog as he pulled out and punched back in.

  The determination staring back at me as my vision cleared made my throat go dry. “Griffin—”

  “You think you can act like this never happened?” Thrust. “Just walk away and feel nothing?” Thrust.

  “Stop,” I begged as the edge of that cliff grew closer and closer.

  “You can’t have something this good just once.” He hissed through gritted teeth. The exertion he was putting forth to hold back his own release written all over his face.

  “Pleeeeease,” I cried, writhing underneath him. I wanted him to shut up just as much as I wanted to come.

  “You know you want more,” he coerced. “You’re just as addicted to me as I am to you.”

  “I hate you,” I bit out. And at that moment I really did. The way he manipulated my body, taking all control away from me as he pushed and pulled unrelentingly. He dangled my release right in front of my nose, only to yank it away at the very last second.

  “Doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy this. I’ve heard there’s nothing better than a hate fuck.”

  He wasn’t wrong there. This was, by far, the best sex I’d ever had. Ever. “It’s just sex,” I gasped, locking my legs around him as the waves of pleasure started to build even stronger.

  “Just sex,” he agreed.

  I tangled my fingers in his dark, silky hair, simply to have something to hold on to as I crashed into oblivion. Something to ground me. “It doesn’t mean anything.”

  “Not a damn thing.”

  “I still hate you.”

  “Fine with me, baby. But fucking come already,” he growled, picking up the pace and slamming into me once, twice, then I went off like a rocket. My head thrown back, eyes screwed shut, I shouted my release until my throat grew sore.

  The rough, gravelly, “Ah! Fucking shit!” Griffin bellowed just before he buried himself balls deep and came with my name on his lips sent renewed tremors through my body.

  “HOLY SHIT,” HE SAID once we were both able to breathe again.

  I dropped my arms from around him, one falling limp against the table while I brushed my damp, sweaty hair off my forehead with the other. “That was…” I had no words to properly describe what just took place. Not only because it was epic, but also because anything positive I had to say would only lead to Griffin’s ego growing even bigger. Not a risk I was willing to take.

  “Jesus, sweetness. If that’s how you fuck when you hate someone, I’d hate
to see how pussy-whipped the poor schmuck you fall in love with is gonna be.”

  A sharp pang radiated through my chest at his words. Because little did he know, he was that guy… once. And look how well that had played out.

  “Get off. You’re squishing me.” I gave his shoulders a shove, but it was like trying to push a boulder.

  He kept me pinned to the table from his chest down, but lifted up on his forearms just enough to get a good look at my face. “You know, usually when I make a woman come so hard she goes hoarse, I at least get a thank you for the effort.”

  I glared up at him. “And I just love it when a man talks about the other women he’s slept with when he’s still inside me.”

  The humor fled from Griffin’s expression “I’m sorry,” he whispered just before lowering his head and kissing me gently on the lips. It wasn’t until that moment that I realized we hadn’t kissed once during sex.

  “It’s okay,” I whispered back, feeling myself melt just a bit under the affectionate action. “But you’re still squishing me.”

  “Still think that was a mistake?” He asked with a genuine smile.

  “I’m thinking you probably shouldn’t piss me off when your pants are down,” I shot back, “seeing as I’ve taken you down twice already.”

  His smile got even bigger and my belly fluttered. “God, you’re cute.” It certainly wasn’t what I’d expected him to say after threatening his man bits, but apparently good sex made Griffin positively jovial.

  No, scratch that. It wasn’t just good sex. It was friggin’ brilliant!

  He stood straight, holding on to me to help me sit up, and slowly pulled out. An immediate sense of loss washed over me once I was empty. Pushing it to the back of my mind, I stood on slightly shaky legs and smoothed my dress back into place as Griffin discarded the used condom in the trash can. When he turned back around, his pants were zipped back up, but the belt and button were still undone.

  “On the off chance you were even more difficult to persuade than you usually are, I took precautions. I was totally prepared to butter you up in any way necessary.”