by Linda Kage
“And she flipped out, too,” I guessed.
Oren nodded. “Oh, yeah. Big time. Called me a freak and threatened to cut off my pecker if I’d given her an STD. All kinds of lovely shit. I actually had to blackmail that one to keep her trap shut about it.” He let out a small, depressed sigh. “She still really hates me.”
In a split second, I went from crazy jealous to heartbroken with sympathy. But seriously, what was wrong with all the whores who’d seen him? How could they treat such a sensitive area so callously?
“I want to see it,” I blurted out.
“What?” He sent me an incredulous glance. “No. Besides, you’re not supposed to see me like this ever again.” As if suddenly remembering that part of his vow he’d made himself only minutes ago, he grabbed the sheets and lifted them to cover himself to his chin.
I rolled my eyes, but then grinned and crawled toward him. “Oh, come on. Please. I promise I won’t upset you with my reaction.”
He crab crawled away from me, shaking his head vigorously. “No fucking way on earth. Even Blondie freaked out when she saw it. And she’s like the last person ever who’d hurt someone with her reaction to their...differences.”
“Well, I already know to expect something different, so it’s not going to take me by surprise.”
He glanced away, and the panic on his face almost killed me. “It’s really bright purplish red and looks like a blood vein popped or something. And it looks worse when I’m soft.”
I lifted my eyebrows, intrigued. “Really? Then I guess we should make it hard before I see it at its best, huh?” Reaching down, I found him through the sheet and wrapped my hand around his cock. When he jerked in my palm, I tsked at him to behave. “And bright purplish red is actually one of my favorite colors.”
He looked at me, his expression full of so much uncertainty, but I swear I also saw an ache as if he wanted to believe me, as if he wanted to trust me with the most vulnerable part of himself. “Caroline.” The way he rasped my name and hardened even more under my touch made me hum with delight.
I leaned in to kiss him, my hand working up and down his steadily growing length through the sheet. He kissed me back, spiking his tongue deep in my mouth. When he groaned and cupped my face in his fingers and the sheet dropped from between us, I knew my distraction had worked.
I ripped the covers off him at the same moment I tore my mouth from his and looked down.
“Damn it.” He sucked in a breath and fisted his hand over his mouth before turning his face aside.
“Oh!” Genuine surprise littered my voice. “It’s bigger than I thought it’d be.” Then I smoothed my thumb over the mark that had caused him so much grief and added, “So’s the birthmark.”
He turned and looked at me. I grinned at him as innocently as I could. Reluctant amusement finally entered his eyes. Then he let out a short laugh and glanced away. His cheeks were a little flushed though, so I knew he was still embarrassed. Wanting to put him at absolute ease, I leaned down until I was lying on my belly and eye level with his lap.
“It kind of reminds me of one of those Rorschach test things. Which image do you see in the inkblot. Hmm...” I pulled my bottom lip in between my teeth as I examined him fully. “I see...West Virginia. Or a really strange, misshapen sperm. No. I like West Virginia better.”
When I glanced up at him, he just blinked at me as if he couldn’t figure me out at all. “What?” I asked.
He slowly buried his fingers in my hair. “You don’t have to pretend it’s okay if you don’t want to. If it wigs you out, just say so.”
I crinkled my face with confusion. “Why would a birthmark wig me out? Seriously, Oren.” I went back to examining my Rorschach test. But, nope, all I could see was the state of West Virginia…on a really big, yummy-looking cock. “You know, this is probably the only time I’d be able to fit an entire state into my mouth.”
When all of Oren’s stomach muscles tensed, I smiled smugly. Then I leaned in and licked him from base to tip, lingering at the tip until I lapped up the droplet beading from the slit at the end. “Mmm.” I closed my eyes, relishing the salty flavor of him on my tongue. “West Virginia tastes good.”
I opened my lashes and glanced up to meet his gaze. We kept the intense eye contact as my mouth opened and I leaned forward to take him between my eager lips. His eyes flared wide and his fingers clamped down harder in my hair.
“Christ,” he hissed as he watched me take in as much as I could. His neck arched back and he panted a few times. Then he smacked the heel of his foot against the mattress beside me as if he needed to relieve some of the pleasure before he looked back down, his gaze darting between my eyes and the place where my lips slid up and down on him. “God, Caroline.”
I cupped his balls, and he blurted out a sound I’m sure he didn’t mean to.
“Fuck, this is...” He arched up his hips and simultaneously pushed down on my head with the grip he had on my hair. When I started to gag, he instantly let up pressure. “Shit. Sorry. I didn’t mean to...Jesus. It’s just so fucking good. Who knew actually seeing someone go down on me makes it so much hotter. Or maybe it’s just you. Watching you.”
I sucked on him a little harder and took him deep into my throat. He shouted out another unintentional sound. Gripping the sheets beside us with his hand that wasn’t buried in my hair, he seemed to be bracing for the grand finale. “I’m coming.” His voice was strained and his fingers were like iron, clamped in my hair. “Caroline, I’m—shit.”
He tried to tug me off him, giving me plenty of fair warning, but I didn’t want to go anywhere. I wanted all of him. I moaned at the pressure on my locks and applied more suction as I stroked him faster.
The stream of curses that left him when he flooded my mouth was so filthy and delicious, I reached down and touched myself as he came.
For a moment, he was too shocked and sated to realize what I was doing. But when he noticed I was trying to get myself off too, his eyes flared.
“Oh, I don’t fucking think so.” Grasping my wrist, he ripped my fingers away from the throbbing wet spot between my legs. Then he flipped me onto my back and climbed on top of me. “Last night, it was hot when I knew you were touching yourself, but two nights in a row just makes me think I’m not doing my job. This is my pussy, woman. No fingers touch this clit but mine.”
His thumb instantly found me and began to massage without mercy, sending me to an immediate peak. I cried out and arched under him. “No tongue laps up this cream but mine.”
He leaned in, and I couldn’t help it, I gripped his hair in my hands, so eager to feel his mouth on me, I almost couldn’t take it. “Oren.”
He paused right before contact and glanced up. “And no one calls me that but you.”
I loved the way he claimed ownership of me, but more than that, I loved the way he gave ownership right back to me. As soon as his warm, wet tongue touched me, I came.
I don’t know how much time passed. I think I drifted in and out of sleep for a while as I lay limp and satiated against him. The sweat from our bodies was still drying as we clung together, but I knew he was awake because his fingers kept stroking up and down my spine. Occasionally, they dipped down farther than usual on his descent until he reached my ass and he’d cup a globe in one of his warm palms, but then a second later, he was on the move again, caressing his way back up the center of my vertebrae.
“I should probably go before I fall asleep,” I murmured, too liquid limp to move. He didn’t answer, didn’t try to get me to stay, so I blew out a disappointed breath and sat up.
But when I tried to crawl off the mattress, he grasped my wrist. I glanced down at him, my heart thumping hard in my chest.
Instead of asking me to stay, though, he said, “You don’t have a car.”
I blinked. “Huh?” I knew I didn’t have a car.
He shot upright, his face flaring with anger. “Are you fucking insane? How the hell have you been getting here and home each
night? Don’t tell me you’ve been walking, because what is that, twenty blocks, between your place and mine?”
I cleared my throat discreetly. “Okay,” I said. “I won’t tell you that, then.”
He closed his eyes and growled. “Caroline. What the fuck?”
“The first night, I had Aspen’s car. And besides, it’s only eighteen blocks, not twenty.”
“Oh. Well, thank God,” he muttered, not sounding relieved at all. “Because those two less blocks make it sound so much safer. I cannot freaking believe you. Don’t you ever—ever—put yourself in that kind of danger again just to see me.”
“Excuse me?” My back straightened self-righteously at his demanding tone. “Don’t tell me what to do. I can take care of myself.” I set my hands on my hips and glared at him as he jumped from the bed and began viciously ripping clothes off the floor and jerking them on. “I took a credit hour of self-defense training last semester, plus I’m always armed with mace, a whistle, and Noel set me up with one of those nifty Taser things.”
Fully dressed, he slapped a ball cap onto his head and grabbed his wallet and cell phone off his dresser. “Well, that makes me feel half a percent better.” He frowned at me where I was still sitting in nothing but his sheet. Then he clapped his hands. “Let’s get going already.”
I shook my head. “Where exactly are we going?”
He tipped his chin down toward his chest but kept eye contact as he sent me a dry glance. “I’m driving you home.”
Immediately, I started to shake my head. “But you can’t do that. What if Noel sees your truck pulling into our driveway and me climbing out of it, and he kills you?”
He stepped closer. “And what if some psycho douchebag spots you on your eighteen-block jaunt and rapes you and kills you?” With a snort, he added, “I’d rather face your brother.”
Aww, he really was so concerned about me that he was willing to take on Noel to keep me safe. That was just incredibly sweet. I was about to tell him how considerate he was when he said, “Besides, we’ll just borrow Blondie’s car. She leaves the key to it hanging right by the front door. If he happens to be looking out his window when you get home, he’ll think she’s dropping you off. Problem solved.”
My lips parted as a bit of disappointment filled me. “Oh,” I said. “Good idea. Are you sure she won’t mind?”
He snorted. “Blondie? Of course not. She loves me.”
Ten minutes later, we approached my place, only two blocks away when I shifted uncomfortably in my seat. Zoey’s car was probably the most comfortable thing I’d ever ridden in, but it felt different in here tonight, with Oren behind the wheel. Plus there was the fact that nothing between us was even remotely resolved.
“You can pull over here,” I said quietly.
Oren sent me a hard glance. “I don’t think so. We stole Blondie’s ride so I can see you right to your front door.”
“Yeah.” I shrugged. “But if you stop here, I can give you a proper goodbye, and Noel wouldn’t have to wonder why Zoey’s windows steamed up before I got out.”
Stomping on the brake, Oren veered the car toward the curb and jerked us to a halt. But he didn’t reach for me. He didn’t even look at me. He wrapped his hands around the steering wheel and stared out the front window. His jaw looked hard in the glowing reflection from the dashboard lights, and his expression was tense.
I pushed my hair behind my ear and licked my dry lips as I realized what this meant. “You’re never going to touch me again, are you?”
He let out a breath and quietly said, “I don’t know.” Then he groaned and let go of the steering wheel to clutch his head. “I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know.”
I hugged myself, feeling like shit for putting him through this. “I’m sorry,” I whispered.
He looked at me but said nothing.
I shook my head, defeated. “I know what kind of position I put you in. With Noel. With yourself. And I’m…I’m so sorry for making you go through this. I’m sorry I tricked you. I’m sorry…I’m just sorry for everything. But most of all I’m sorry that I don’t…I don’t regret it.” I winced. “I know that’s really awful and selfish of me, but I don’t regret it. I loved it. I loved every moment, and I just…it was the best time of my life. So, thank you—”
“Come here,” he murmured quietly, stretching his hand my way.
I went to him, and he pulled me into his lap. One hand went to the back of my neck, tangling in my hair, while the other rested on the side of my face. He gazed into my eyes a moment, the temptation on his face so acute that it filled me with a need to soothe him. Then he pulled me in close until my cheek was against his heartbeat and his arms were around me.
“You know I’m not mad, right?” he said softly. “When I blew up earlier, I wasn’t even really mad then. I was...I don’t know, having a freak-out moment because the reality of it all just overwhelmed me, I guess. I shouldn’t have directed it at you, though.”
I sniffed and wiped at my dry face, feeling shitty anyway for putting him into such a situation. Pulling away from his warm chest, I looked up into his eyes and whispered, “I’ll go.”
But he said, “No,” and kissed me. His hands held my face captive as he tortured my mouth, softly stroking his tongue between my lips and claiming a piece of my soul.
I gripped the front of his shirt and pulled him closer, sliding across his lap until I was straddling him and rubbing my heat against his hardness. He arched up and groaned into my mouth. I thought he was going to take me, right there in the driver’s seat of Zoey’s car, two blocks away from my brother, but he broke away, heaving and gasping.
He pressed his forehead to mine. “One week.”
I blinked, confused. “One week what?”
“This. You, me, us. We give it one week to explore…whatever we want, and then—out of respect for…your brother—that’s it. The end. We never speak of it again. Okay?”
He didn’t even want to give me a week. I could see it in the swirling torment in his gaze, the tautness of his jaw, could hear it in his harsh, whispered words. Betraying Noel honestly killed him. But he was as tempted as I was.
I nodded immediately, realizing I was getting more from him than I should be. “I’ll take it,” I said. I was as elated as I was sad to know I had seven more days with him.
I totally didn’t mean to let the temptation win. I was supposed to be stronger than a silly little craving. But then I underestimated the power of Caroline Gamble.
She’d wanted me, so she’d gotten me.
I knew I should be pissed. Because of her underhanded sneakery, I’d betrayed my best friend and done the one thing he absolutely did not want me to do to him. But knowing she’d wanted me that much, that she’d gone to such extremes, became my own personal stalker, it really turned me on. And so the anger just kind of disappeared somewhere in between all the awe and flattery and desire.
That didn’t mean I was ready to play full-out liar and deceiver the very day after stabbing Gamble in the back, though. Except, yeah, that’s how it went down, anyway.
“I call bartender tonight,” he said as we strolled across campus together.
He’d texted me after my last class of the day, demanding we meet at the student union for a drink. Hamilton had met up with us too, and after we’d had a coffee break, we decided to head our separate ways before we met again later that night for our shift.
Since it was Thursday—ladies’ night—that meant all of us guys had to work. Two manned the bar while the other three waited tables out on the floor. And like every other week before, it turned out that Gamble and Lowe worked the bar every Thursday.
I usually had no problem waiting tables, since it brought me more tips and I met more chicks that way, but today, I kind of wanted to stick behind the safety of a counter. I was no longer a free agent; I couldn’t just let random women slip me their phone numbers or—
“Holy shit.” I slowed to a stop and blinked dazedly
at the world around me. But had I really just thought of myself as taken? No longer available to the ladies? Committed?
Whoa. Where had that shit come from?
Since I’d stopped dead in my tracks to absorb the shock, both Gamble and Ham stopped walking too, and glanced back.
“Ten?” Gam asked, his brow wrinkled with concern. “What’s up?”
I shook my head. I was about to tell him it was nothing, but there was no way he’d buy that. So I settled for scowling at him. “You hog the fucking bar every week. Why don’t you give it up once in a while so the rest of us can get a break from all the handsy chicks grabbing at our junk?”
Gamble stared at me as if I was insane. Then he shook his head and snorted. “As if you mind that part? Besides, I’m married, you’re single. I have no business being on the floor, working my way around a bunch of single, drunk women.”
I made a face. The urge to tell him I was no longer all that single myself itched at my throat until I had to say something or I was afraid I’d blurt out everything. So I pointed toward Hamilton. “Well, Ham’s no longer single, and you have no problem making him wait tables every fucking week.”
“You’re right.” Gam glanced at Ham. “Sorry about that, Quinn. You can take the bar tonight if you want it.”
Hamilton perked up and immediate pleasure clouded his face. But then he frowned slightly as he glanced toward me and then back at Gam. “Are you sure? I don’t want to cause any strife.”
“Oh, go ahead and fucking take it,” I groused, waving my hand and storming away from both of them.
It’d felt weird being around Gam all day. But strangely, guilt wasn’t the only thing afflicting me. I was suddenly so very irritated with him. Everything he said seemed to get under my skin. I needed to escape.
But instead of letting me go off on my own, he called after me. “Hey.” A second later, he jogged up and appeared at my side, keeping pace with me. “What’s up with you today? You okay?”
