by Tessa Bailey
Sarge added a second finger inside Jasmine, and her answering whimper sounded like a different woman. Not her. It couldn’t be her. But it was. In that moment, she was a woman who let a man pleasure her inside a car, out in public, and didn’t give a thought to the consequences. The only responsibility resting on her shoulders was to herself. The cataclysmic need funneling around her, inside her, an undeniable force of nature. And God, Jasmine wanted to come for Sarge. Wanted to fulfill his fantasy. Create a new one. Right now, inside this car, it didn’t feel wrong.
Later, it would, but—
Sarge planted the back of his wrist on the inside of her jeans, wedging his hand and holding his fingers at a slant. “Fuck yourself on my fingers. When you’re sliding, riding and bouncing up and down on my dick later, I want to know how those hips look from the side.”
With those heated words driving her higher, Jasmine chanced cracking an eyelid to see Sarge’s head tilt to the right, to get a better view from the side, licking his upper lip as he looked. His gaze was glassy, fevered, that square jaw tighter than she’d ever seen anyone’s. Forcing her eyes back closed before she never wanted to close them again, Jasmine gripped the steering wheel, tweaked her hips back and slid down onto Sarge’s large fingers once again. “Shit,” she breathed. “Feels so good.”
“More,” he demanded, his tone dark and rocky. “More. Take more, but know that I can fill you so much more with what I’ve got in my pants.”
“Y-yes,” she said on a stuttered exhale. “I know…I saw.”
Jesus, had she really said that out loud? It ceased to matter amid their mutual heavy breathing, the sound of her backside sliding on the seat as she worked up and down his fingers.
Something told her the noises falling from Sarge’s mouth would ring in her head for days. Broken, desperate growls, interrupted by rushed pulls of air. Like he was drowning, just like her. “You did see it, didn’t you, baby? Saw me all fat and dying to come? I spent the night listening to your tight body roll around on that creaky bed. You’ve never heard it creak the way it will if I convince you to fuck me.” His thumb went into overdrive on her clit, fast and relentless. “But don’t worry, baby. I promise no one will hear it over you screaming to get me deeper.”
Her bucking hips twisted on his final word, sending a multitude of sensations firing through her blood, seizing her muscles in a locked position to let the pleasure dance on the mountaintop. She wanted to get away, she wanted to get closer, her body didn’t know what to do, how to handle the shaking relief. There was even a hint of frustration that she’d only ever been halfway to completion until now, never having been propelled to such a level of fulfilled lust, but it drifted away when she started to come down. It didn’t happen all at once, but in softening degrees.
When an iota of mental consciousness became possible, Jasmine heard her own voice repeating “yes, yes, yes,” on a throaty loop. Felt Sarge’s tongue raking up and down the side of her neck, his teeth taking small bites from her shoulder.
Jasmine no longer kept her eyes closed as a defense mechanism, but because she didn’t have the strength to lift her lids. Something jabbed in her throat when she felt Sarge—now kissing across her shoulder—tug her panties back into place and zip her jeans.
“I’m not going to sit here waiting for some big talk to fuck everything up,” he gritted out, arousal thick in his tone. “I’m going to go back inside. I’m going to use the same hand that just made you come to jerk myself off. So damn hard. And later? Later, I’m going to hope you come home wanting the real thing from me.” He took her hand and squeezed it around what could only be his denim-covered erection. “Baby, we both know the real thing is what I’ve got.”
“You’re so arrogant now,” she whispered on a huffed breath, unable to put the required exasperation in her voice.
“No, I’m not. I’m overcompensating for the fear that you’re going to take one orgasm and run.” He sounded almost angry. “You should know I’m going to make doing that really hard for you.”
God, why wouldn’t her heart stop slamming against her ribs? “Somehow I already knew that.”
“Good. Maybe you’re finally paying attention where I’m concerned.” When his mouth settled at the corner of Jasmine’s mouth, she startled, and Sarge sighed. “Be safe at work, will you?”
“Okay,” she murmured as he left the car, the door closing with a firm click behind his retreating form.
Holy shit. Something told her safety wasn’t a concern at work this week. The hazards started and ended with the big compelling man crashing out in her home.
Chapter Five
For once, Sarge was actually grateful that Lita needed to be bailed out. The Old News drummer had wasted no time since returning from tour to raise some hell, being tossed into Manhattan Central Booking her first night back on a drunk and disorderly charge. While her one phone call should have been to James, Lita had called Sarge’s cell phone instead. But if Sarge knew Lita—and you didn’t spend years with someone on a tour bus without seeing their worst—she’d called Sarge with the express purpose of getting a rise out of their manager.
Sarge, however, didn’t have the desire to go a round with James by not alerting him to Lita’s latest antics, so there he stood, after an hour on the train. Outside Central Booking, waiting for James to show up and bail out Lita.
Again.
From his vantage point, he could see three separate Santa Clauses ringing bells for donations to the Salvation Army and wondered why they couldn’t at least attempt to appear like the real deal, finding their own damn blocks to work.
Taking potshots at charities now, are we? God, he was in a shitty mood. The back of Sarge’s neck itched; his winter clothes felt too tight. Sweat pooled at the base of his spine, even though the temperature sat squarely at thirty-five degrees. And while he wanted Lita’s latest stunt to be the reason for his irritable state, it had more to do with her calling from jail before he could…relieve himself this morning.
Honestly, he should be dead by now. Killed off from an unusual case of purple testicles. He’d slammed back into Jasmine’s apartment, all but salivating with the need to take out his villainous erection and stroke it to the memory of Jasmine’s sexy waist shuddering as she climaxed for his fingers…and his phone had rung. If he hadn’t had one fist propped on the entry table while he unzipped his jeans with the opposite hand, he wouldn’t even have seen Central Booking pop up on the screen of his phone, where he’d left it by the door. But he had. And he’d known if he missed the call, his pain-in-the-ass bandmate would be shit out of luck.
So with an agonized shout at the ceiling, he’d abandoned his quest for self-love and answered.
Now? He couldn’t blink without his dick getting hard.
Jasmine. God. The way she’d popped those hips back and slid forward, choking his fingers with her tight—he’d known it would be—pussy. The way her lower lip pouted every time he talked dirty in her ear, as if she didn’t understand why she liked it so much. At least, he prayed like hell she liked it, because he didn’t appear to be capable of keeping the words locked inside, the way he always did until it came time to write songs. Although didn’t it make perfect sense that Jasmine would call forward the words, since his songs were about her?
Sarge leaned back against the gray limestone building, mentally berating James for not being his usual early self. He wanted to get back to Hook. Tomorrow night, he would meet his niece for the first time. Spend some clearly much-needed time with his sister. Tonight he would go back to Jasmine’s and hope she hadn’t already put his possessions on the curb. Oh, and also hope she’d let him fuck the stuffing out of her. He couldn’t forget about that.
As if he could. He had a near-decadelong obsession with a woman—no end in sight…yet—and a punishing, uncompromising need to get deep, deep inside her where he hoped to lay the obsession to rest. If there was a stern voice in his head telling him on repeat that his heart would be set on fire like Jimi
Hendrix’s guitar once all was said and done? He was beyond listening. Distance hadn’t worked. So he would eliminate every speck of daylight between them and attempt to grind his infatuation into dust.
Sarge pushed off the wall when he saw James approaching, looking as though he wanted to tear down the city with his bare hands. “Hey, man.”
“Is she still in holding? Have you gone in yet?”
“Not yet.” When James tried to bypass him into the building, Sarge stepped into his path, ceasing his progress with a hand to the chest. “I waited out here for a reason. You need to cool off before you see her.”
James shook him off and stepped back, tugging on the sleeves of his trench coat with meticulous movements. “Trust me, I’m feeling positively chilly.”
Sarge noticed a photographer across the street taking pictures of them and turned his back, indicating that James should do the same. Not that it would be anything new when gossip blogs broke the news that once again, Lita Regina had ended up behind bars for the night. “It doesn’t matter if I trust you. It matters that Lita expects you to go in there and throw your weight around like an asshole. You do it every time.” Sarge shook his head. “She loves it.”
For once, James actually looked interested in something, one dark eyebrow dipping behind his aviator sunglasses. “Why would she love it?”
“So she can be angry at you instead of herself,” Sarge near-shouted, jabbing the freezing air with a finger. “Shit. You know what else? I’m done playing referee for you two. You’re both reasonably intelligent people—you can figure each other out without my help. I’ve hit my limit.”
James took off his sunglasses with a casual sweep of his hand, removing a square of material from his coat pocket to clean the lenses. When he was finished with the task, he replaced them over his eyes and nodded once at Sarge. “Your sister wasn’t quite as enamored by the prodigal son’s return as you’d hoped, I take it?”
“Oh, just fuck right off.” Sarge bypassed James on his way toward the entrance. Yeah, he was well aware that he was taking out his piss-poor mood on James, but someone could ask his rock-hard balls if he cared. Until he got back to Hook and got his own family situation—and the Jasmine situation—under control, he didn’t have the capacity to focus on much else.
The two men showed identification and signed in at the glass enclosure just beyond the entrance vestibule. James spoke in a curt tone with the officer as he completed the bail transaction. After funds and paperwork had exchanged hands, they were escorted by a female officer to a beige waiting area where Sarge dropped into an orange plastic seat and James began to pace.
It was a familiar position for them.
Sarge reached over and picked up the nearest magazine from a stack on the wobbly side table, but closed the rag immediately when his face popped up on the fourth page under speculation that the band was breaking up, piggybacked by an article about his recent hookup with a reality show star he’d never met in his life.
Neat.
Sarge realized James had stopped his nervous laps around the room, and was now standing with his buffed loafers pointing in his direction. “What?”
“I’m waiting to hear what happened with your sister.”
“Then it’s a good thing you’re in a waiting room.”
A muscle ticked in the band manager’s cheek. “You’re not acting like your usual self. Something must have happened, and I’m your manager. So.”
Sarge lifted his hands and let them drop to his bent knees. “You just want me to distract you until they release Lita.”
“Partly.”
Sarge had no choice but to laugh, but it faded fast. He and James got along fine in their silent agreement not to discuss feelings, but in an artistic profession, shit tended to come out in the wash, whether in song lyrics or after a particularly sloppy night out on the road. It didn’t matter how succinct he made his explanation, James would see everything. Same way Sarge saw what was taking place between James and Lita. But hell, Sarge needed a distraction from thinking about Jasmine—about everything—so he’d talk. Anything to get him through another ten minutes without wondering what the night would bring.
“My sister didn’t want me to stay,” Sarge began. “She had a rough breakup with the father of my niece. Doesn’t want her daughter to get attached to me since I’ll only leave again.”
“Right.” James sat back in his chair, thumb tapping on his thigh. “Where are you staying?”
Sarge stared hard at the cinder-block wall when he answered. “With Jasmine.”
His manager was silent for a tick. “The Jasmine? Jasmine Taveras?”
Hearing her name felt like rolling around in burning cinders. “I liked you better as guy who doesn’t give a shit.”
James started to say something else, but the metal door on the opposite side of the room swung open to reveal Lita. Barely reaching the escorting officer’s shoulder, she had both hands shoved into her ripped jeans, a red-and-black-checkered beanie pulled just above huge, apprehensive green eyes, which were firmly trained on James. “Um.” She shifted in her boots. “I’m with the band?”
In an effort to keep from pissing off James, since the poor fucker had stopped breathing beside him, Sarge didn’t voice the other half of the band’s inside joke. Lita’s innocent, kid-sister appearance had gotten her stopped at security more than once at Old News shows. She looked incapable of lifting a pair of drumsticks, let alone whaling on a kit like a legend. Once, before a show in Amsterdam, she’d told the venue’s head of security she was “with the band,” to which he’d replied in a deadpan tone, “The Spice Girls broke up fifteen years ago.”
Now, even though Lita wasn’t looking at Sarge, he knew she expected the rejoinder, but how the situation was handled needed to be James’s call this time. Too often, Sarge had played good cop, and clearly, it hadn’t done a damn thing to keep Lita from diving back into self-destructive waters.
Thinking of his fingers thrusting into Jasmine’s addictive heat that morning, Sarge wondered if he’d jumped headfirst into self-destruction himself.
Finally, Lita turned her attention to him, arms crossing over her middle. “You were supposed to come alone, Sergeant.”
Sarge shrugged, but sighed when he couldn’t pull off being callous when it came to Lita, even though she’d used the nickname she knew he couldn’t stand. “You were supposed to stay out of trouble.”
“Maybe this is just a surprise band reunion and you’re both on hidden camera.” She elbowed the stone-faced guard to her right. “Smile.”
“Lita,” James started in a warning tone, but when the drummer’s gaze turned hopeful, Sarge could all but feel the shift in his manager’s demeanor. “I…uh. Brought you some aspirin.”
Lita’s expression turned dumbfounded as James approached, producing a bottle of water and aspirin out of his deep coat pockets. When Lita only watched him with suspicion, he lifted her hand, placed the tiny white pills inside, and closed her fist around the medicine. “What are you doing?”
The sound of James clearing his throat bounced off the walls, making it sound louder. “I assume since you drank your weight in whiskey and attempted to scale the Chrysler Building last night, you likely have a headache.”
Trying not to be obvious, Sarge patted the air in the universal sign of take it down a notch, man. James showed no sign of acknowledgment, but he handed Lita the water bottle. The drummer stared down at it like a foreign object. “Wait. What’s going on here? You’re supposed to be listing every way I fail at life by now.”
James’s wince was almost imperceptible. “Yes, well. I’m not going to do that.” He took a deep breath and laid a hand on Lita’s shoulder, touching her for the first time that Sarge had ever witnessed. “I’m just…I’m glad you weren’t hurt.”
And this is why you never give unsolicited advice, Sarge thought, as Lita tensed, moisture gathering in her widened eyes. James frowned down at the drummer, as baffled by her reaction as Sarge
. Maybe four years wasn’t enough time to get to know someone, because he certainly didn’t expect Lita to haul back and throw the water bottle across the room, where it exploded against the cinder block. No sooner were her hands free than she shoved an unmovable James, backing toward the exit like a terrified cat.
“Look, thanks for bailing me out, but this is where we part ways.” Lita split a look between them. “It wasn’t a good day to try something new.”
James stepped forward, hands fisted at his sides. “Lita—”
“No.” She shook her head, warding him off with a hand. “I’m out of here. Stop following me. Stop checking up on me. I don’t need you.”
When the manager only fell into silence, Sarge made a last-ditch effort to calm the drummer by giving her a reassuring smile. “Hey. I hear the Spice Girls broke up fifteen years ago.”
“Too little, too late,” Lita called as the metal door slammed behind her.
The look James gave Sarge was pure murder as the manager stormed past and went after Lita, leaving Sarge alone in the waiting room with the escorting officer.
“Hey, man. Can I get a picture with you?”
On the upside, his hard-on was only a sweet memory. But something told him it would be back in full effect as soon as he breached the Lincoln Tunnel exit into New Jersey.
Jasmine sat on the factory roof, her sandwich forgotten on the cinder-block ledge beside her. From her vantage point, she could see Manhattan. And if she closed her eyes really tight and blocked out the mechanical hum from the factory beneath, she could feel the whir of yellow cabs soaring down Broadway. See the white steam curling out of crisscrossed grates midavenue. Hear the new wave of young city dwellers laughing, breathing hot air into their hands as they convened over paper coffee cups.
From the time her parents had moved their family from the Dominican Republic to Hook during high school, she’d pictured herself flitting across the electric backdrop of Manhattan. Reading the newspaper on her balcony, going on outrageous dates just to tell the tale the following morning. Getting a callback about her demo tape and being whisked away into a life of limousines, parties, and photo shoots.
