by Pam Godwin
In a blur of movement, I strip us both out of the wet clothes and carry her to the couch. Reclining on my back, I spread her nude body over the length of mine and rub my hands over her back and thighs, warming her satiny skin.
She feels like heaven in my arms. Every caress fuels my desire for her. Pulsing heat surges through my cock, making me harder, hungrier. Her breathing increases, quickening my own breaths. I can’t stop myself from gripping the base of my cock and guiding it toward her soft hot center. I desperately need to be inside her. But in the back of my mind, there’s a conversation on pause. A necessary conversation.
“Tell me why I feel like I’m still chasing you.” I roll my hips beneath her, gliding the tip along her folds while plunging my fingers into her wet heat and teasing us both.
She swallows a moan and braces her hands on the cushion above my head. “We’re together…”
“But?”
Christ, she’s soaked. Throbbing around my fingers. So fucking ready to take my cock.
“This isn’t togetherness.” She lowers her forehead to mine. “Sex isn’t love, Decker. Not for men like you.”
I groan. “Men like me?”
Fuck, I try to make sense of her words, but my brain is operating on a single circuit. Hot naked woman. Wet pussy. Must thrust.
“Yes, men like you.” She pulls my hand out from between us and takes over, curling her fingers around me and adjusting the angle. “Men who can do this and walk away without giving the woman another thought.”
She lowers herself on my cock, and the tight clasp of her body sucks me in and zaps my ability to think.
“Ahhhh, fuck.” My muscles spasm against an onslaught of pleasure. “Fucking love your cunt, Laynee. Give me your mouth.” I reach for her neck to yank her closer.
She knocks my hand away. “We’re still talking.”
Why I thought I could hold a conversation while buried inside her is beyond me. All I want to do is flip her over and pound her into multiple orgasms.
After a few calming breaths, I remind myself I initiated this heart-to-heart. Because it’s important. Much more important than the unholy ache gathering in my balls.
“You’re crazy if you think I can walk away from this and never think of you again.” I brush a thumb across her pouty lips. “I’m not sure I can walk away from you at all.”
“Why not?” She squints at me suspiciously and lowers her chest to mine, inadvertently rubbing her nipples against my skin. It’s fucking distracting.
“I’m really struggling to put two words together here.” My chuckle comes out as a pained groan.
“Try.” She grips my jaw, her expression intense. “Why don’t you think you can walk away?”
“Because this is different.” I hold her stare. “I know that sounds like a banal platitude, but it’s the truth. You are different.”
Her pussy clamps down on me, wrenching a guttural sound from my throat and begging me to thrust.
“Don’t do that.” I grab her ass and give her a hard warning squeeze. “No clenching.”
She laces her fingers together on my chest and props her chin on her hands, putting her sweet little mouth a kiss away. “Why is this different?”
“You’re killing me.” I lick my lips. “I’ve never had a conversation during sex. Nor have I ever fucked the same woman more than a couple times.”
Her expression darkens, and I realize that was the absolute wrong thing to say.
I cup the side of her face. “I’ve never cared about someone enough to commit to a relationship.”
“You committed to an agreement, Decker. One that gives you a monthly salary. And sex every day. And investors for your business venture.”
My jaw stiffens. “I hate that goddamn agreement because it makes you doubt what’s going on here. But I don’t regret signing it because it brought us together.” I push my fingers through her hair and try to ignore the torment of her pussy pulsing around my cock. “As for the investors, I’m not a leech. I need financial independence.”
“See? That’s exactly what—”
I cover her mouth with my hand. “I don’t want income so I can leave you.” I stroke her lips and move my hand to her hair. “I’m a proud man, Laynee. I can’t sit here on my ass and live off your money. That’s not the way I’m built. I need to feel like I’m contributing. I need to know I can support you and protect you in every way.”
Her eyes soften, and she melts against me with a heavy sigh. “You still haven’t said why. Why me?”
“If you want me to wax poetic, you got the wrong guy. My feelings are simple. My stomach hurts when I think about sleeping without you. I get moody and sulky when you lock yourself in your office. I hate when I don’t have access to you. Because I fucking love to look at you. I even enjoy listening to you ramble on about shit. You don’t bore me. In fact, I can’t think of a single second I’ve been bored in the past five months. That’s pretty fucking novel for a man like me. And right now, your tight cunt is squeezing the fuck out of my dick, and there isn’t another goddamn place I’d rather be.”
“That’s…” Her lashes drift downward, shielding her eyes. “That’s a better answer than I expected.”
She rewards me by shifting her hips and slowly riding my cock. I let her rock and grind until my need to devour her shreds my self-control. Flipping her onto her back, I give her my dick the way we both need it—hard, uncivilized, and full of fire.
Her throaty moans tighten my balls. I capture her mouth and kiss her with the same urgency and vigor as the hammer of my hips. I feed on her sexy sounds and roll with the undulation of her killer body. When the coiling impulse to come grips the base of my spine, I fight it back. I’m not ready for this to end. I’ll never be done with this woman.
Sex isn’t love. Not for men like you.
She’s wrong. I’ve fucked so many women, too many, and it’s never felt like this. It was always about chasing the release and getting the hell out of Dodge. But with Laynee, I want to stay right here, inside her, with her. Forget the orgasm. Every thrust into her body is an expression of deep, strong, possessive, mind-over-body insanity. If that isn’t love, then the damn concept doesn’t exist.
“I don’t want to come.” I drive into her, pressing against the back of her pussy, aching for her to feel me the way I feel her.
“You have to, Decker.” She bites at my lips then kisses me deeply, passionately, the only way she knows how. “I’ll take it personally if you don’t.”
I wrap her legs around my waist and savor her whimpers and husky little breaths as she digs her heels into my ass.
“We’ll do it together.” I lift her chin, forcing her gaze to mine.
She nods, swallows. “I’m close.”
“You’re going to look at me when you come.”
“Okay.” Her forehead pinches in concentration, and her tits bounce against my chest, teasing and tormenting.
“You have such a great rack.”
“You talk too much.” Her pinched lips slip beneath a grin before flattening again.
“I want to know—”
“Shut it.” She closes her eyes.
“What goes on in that sexy head when you’re trying to come?”
She sighs. Then her eyes focus on mine, and her pupils are so big they swallow the blue. “I think about how huge and hard your cock is and how lucky I am to have it ramming inside me.” She gasps on the next thrust and fists her hands in my hair. “I think about how the thundering sound of your heart means you’re into this. Into me. I imagine you being so desperate for me that you’d punch anyone who tries to come between us and this amazing feeling. You’d battle an army of Gladiators, fight off a pack of wolves—”
“Gladiators and wolves?”
“Shh. This is my fantasy.” She tightens the muscles in her pussy, making my eyes roll back in my head. “You’d snarl and growl and bare your fangs, marking your territory, protecting me from danger, all while finding pleasure in my
body. And you keep coming back for more. Because this means something to you. And maybe, just maybe you’ll…” Her lashes lower. “Stay.”
Christ, this woman. I grab the back of her head and kiss her until there’s no oxygen left in the room. Until the crescendo of her moans rise in volume and intensity, and her body trembles on the peak of release.
“This means everything to me.” I kiss her again then pull her head back to stare into her eyes and watch her explode. I fall with her, instantly, violently, shooting my load and roaring to the ceiling. The force of it stops my heart and stuns me into a breathless stupor. It takes me several minutes to gather my bearings. I have just enough energy left to roll us on the couch so that she’s on top and not crushed by my weight.
“I think I just died.” I close my eyes with a stupid smile on my face.
“Hmm.” The evil hussy slides up and down on my cock, laughing. “You’re dead and still hard? Why am I not surprised?”
I pull her against me and bury my face in her neck. “You smell like the sweetest incentive.”
“Incentive?”
“Incentive to die with you in my arms.”
She releases a soft sated breath and goes limp against me, twining our legs and tangling her fingers in my hair. I’m overcome with the need to hold her closer, to watch over her and guard her from anything or anyone who might cause her harm. It makes me feel vulnerable and…scared. Through utter ignorance, I failed in protecting the students in my school. What if I fail her, too?
The rapid rhythm of our breaths eases into contented silence. She lies so still and lethargic on top of me, I wonder if she’s awake. Long moments pass before her fingers twitch and lift to trace the line of my jaw.
“I’ve been doing a lot of thinking.” She skims her hand down my throat and flattens her palm over my heart. “About my past relationships. And my current one.”
“I’m listening.” I pull the blanket off the back of the couch, wrap it around us, and press my lips against her head.
She snuggles closer against my neck. “My experience with the people I’m closest to has made me question what it means to be intimate. And to be in love. I blame myself for the neglect, the betrayal, and abuse—”
“That’s unacceptable. You’re not—”
“I’m not defending their actions. Let me finish.” She flexes and loosens her hand on my chest. “My parents loved me, but they never gave up anything for that love. I thought I loved Trey and Blake and even Reese…”
I tense beneath her. “Reese?”
“I do love him, Decker. As a friend. I never definitively understood why he and I couldn’t be more than friends until you enlightened me about his submissive nature. We could’ve worked through that, but we didn’t. We didn’t even try. He would’ve never given up his need to…”
“Be fucked in the ass?”
“We really need to work on your refinement.” She laughs. “But yes, his need to be a bottom, and I was unwilling to understand his needs. None of my relationships have followed the law of sacrifice, and that’s where I screwed up. I’ve been so consumed by the idea of someone loving me that I was willing to settle on any one who flashed me a doting smile. I overlooked flaws, shady behavior, adultery…terrible things. What I should’ve done all along was look internally. I should’ve asked myself, What will you give up for this man? Had I done that with Trey or Blake, the answer would’ve been Nothing. I wouldn’t have sacrificed a thing for them because deep down, I knew they were wrong for me.”
One could argue she sacrificed the flawless skin on her back for the son of a bitch who stabbed her, but that’s not what she means. She didn’t willingly let him hurt her.
The self-centered part of me is more focused on how this conversation applies to her and me. I know she’s asking herself what she’d give up for me. And it goes both ways. Does she want me to walk away from my pursuit to start up a new school? Something else?
“You’re quiet,” she whispers against my neck.
“What do you mean by the law of sacrifice?”
“The best way to gauge how much you love someone is by how much you’re willing to sacrifice for them. I’m not talking about dramatic gestures, like giving up your career or taking a bullet. It’s the little things, forfeiting tiny parts of yourself that have lesser value than the thing you’re trying to attain.”
“What are you trying to attain?”
“Love.” She lifts her head, peering up at me. “Am I freaking you out?”
“A little. Only because I’m a guy, and you’re speaking a language I’ve never understood.”
She moves to lie on the center of my body, chest to chest with her elbows propped on my shoulders. “I want you to stay. Not because we renewed the agreement. Not because you need income and investors and a celebrity girlfriend. I want you to stay for the right reasons, and I don’t want to fuck this up. I’ve never been willing to fully surrender myself to anyone, but when I’m with you, I want to relinquish my fears, my defenses, my rules and hard limits out of devotion. And trust. I want you to stay because your heart is enriched by sacrifice.”
Her words fill me with a feeling of breathlessness that radiates through my chest. “What have I sacrificed?”
“You could’ve kept the money you made in your business, could’ve reinvested it in another venture.” She searches my face, her eyes bright and clear. “You gave up your livelihood for those kids. You gave up everything. And that makes me want to be a better person. I want to make sacrifices. For you.”
Through all this talk about sacrifice, she hasn’t once asked me to give up a damn thing for her. It dawns on me with frightening clarity that I would forfeit, forgo, and surrender anything and everything for her.
I shift us into a sitting position, arranging her legs around my waist and hugging her chest to mine. “Before you start making offerings to me like I’m some kind of sex god, because…well, we both know I’ve earned that status…”
“Oh, brother.” She rolls her eyes, grinning.
I smile with her, kiss her lips, and let the humor drain from my face. “You’re going to make a sacrifice for someone else.”
Her gorgeous face creases in confusion. “Who?”
“You, Laynee.”
“I don’t understand.”
I lift her off my lap, clasp her hand, and lead her upstairs to the bedroom. A few weeks ago, I did something rash and irreversible, something that will make my petite beauty seethe with murderous wrath when she finds out. Knowing the outcome won’t be pleasant, I took the fearless-man route and put off telling her.
Every year, she hosts a charity event for battered women. It’s one of those exclusive dinner-for-a-cause affairs, where glamorous people pay fifty grand a plate to rub elbows, flash their fancy clothes, and bid on sports memorabilia, famous gowns and jewelry, and elite services. Held in Savannah, the event brings in hundreds of celebrities, paparazzi, and massive media coverage, all of which results in millions of dollars for victims of abuse.
The event is tomorrow night.
I release her hand in the bedroom and pull on a pair of workout shorts. She doesn’t know it yet, but we’re on the cusp of a raging argument. I won’t go into it with my junk hanging out like a target.
She follows my lead and puts on one of my t-shirts, watching me with tapered eyes. “What are you up to, Decker Gabrielli?”
I step into the closet and return with a garment bag. A couple months ago, the famous designer, Victoria Beckham, created a floor-length gown for Laynee, specifically for tomorrow night’s charity dinner. Laynee didn’t notice it missing from the closet the past couple weeks.
“What are you doing with that?” Her eyebrows pull together.
“Open it.” I lay it on the bed and step back, my pulse pounding in my throat.
She unzips the bag, and her hands slide over the black satin. I’m not a fashion guru, but the high neck and plain sheath style seemed rather drab and boring. But that’s not why
I had it altered.
It cost me thousands of dollars at the best dress shop in Savannah. I’ve since learned that the price I paid for alterations was a small fraction of what the gown is worth.
She casts me a perplexed look and lifts the dress from the bag. I hold my breath.
As she turns it over to inspect the back, the blood drains from her face.
“What the—?” Her hands tremble, searching the seams. “No.” She gasps, whispers. “NoNoNoNoNo.” Chest heaving, she tosses the material on the bed and glares at it with horrified shock. “Where the fuck is the back of the dress?”
“It’s been sacrificed.” I step into her space, cradle her face in my hands, and hold her gaze with mine. “Sacrificed for something greater. Something extraordinary.”
Nothing is more extraordinary than her strength and survival. It’s time for her to wear her scars with pride, and there isn’t a better way for her to expose them than at a charity for abused women.
Her show of bravery will inspire her celebrity friends to donate more money to the cause. The media will celebrate her acceptance of her imperfections, and amid the overwhelming support, Laynee will finally heal.
I don’t realize until later how very wrong I am—about all of it.
CHAPTER 20
LAYNEE
Oh God, this can’t be happening. I jerk away from Decker’s touch and pace the bedroom. A feverish chill engulfs my body, and a lump the size of Georgia lodges in my throat.
“You destroyed my fucking gown.” I can’t believe it. I’m staring at the backless sheath of satin, and it still doesn’t seem real. “Ninety thousand dollars, Decker. I paid ninety thousand dollars for that dress.”
“Try it on.” He cocks his head, his voice infuriatingly calm. He doesn’t get it.
“Fuck you.” I storm toward him, pointing a shaky finger at the bed. “You fucking ruined it!”
“Your reaction has nothing to do with the damn dress and everything to do with fear.”
Fear? I know fear. I’ve been carrying it around for six years. Fear that a director will demand I do a scene with my back exposed. Fear that I’ll have a wardrobe malfunction in public, and one of my scars will show through. Fear that my imperfections will be leaked to the media, and the hateful world will body-shame me into an early grave.
