As soon as he was outside of Claire’s sight, the rage and fear rose in his throat, threatening to choke off his air. Aaron Schwartz had been part of his mother’s sphere for so long that Alex had stopped really worrying about the man’s intentions or designs. His pale, watery eyes were just part of the scenery in his mother’s house, which Alex had left as soon as he could. That spending too much time around Olivia was incredibly frustrating was one of the few things that Alex and Philip had always been able to agree on. His mother tended towards manipulation, and given the way she’d lived the last 30 years of her life, Alex could understand why, but it was incredibly tiring to always try and guess which of the many possible motivations was driving her now.
He’d never once considered Claire’s safety in that house. It should have been his first and only concern, and instead he’d just fled as soon as he could, and left her on her own. One more sin on the list for which he would have to atone. But later.
His body surged with energy and adrenaline that he couldn’t control, couldn’t tamp back down. He needed an outlet for it.
He pushed open the door to Zoey’s room—he was already thinking of it like that, something which made part of him smile deep down—and kept tight control over his energy. She had kicked off her shoes, and was stretched out on the chaise, reading. She’d pulled reading glasses from somewhere, and twisted her hair up into a messy bun, secured with a pencil. He wanted to cross the room to her, rip her sweater off and nip at her breasts until she screamed, but he held himself still, forced himself to stay calm—until she smiled. There was so much acceptance in that small expression, so much invitation. She looked like a librarian fantasy come to life, and she wanted him, rampant energy and all.
He closed the door quietly behind him, but it was the last thing he expected to do quietly.
***
The tension in Alex’s eyes made Zoey’s breath catch in her throat. The rippling of his chest as he pulled his shirt over his head did more than that.
She loved the smooth planes of his body, the sense of strength without the intensity of a guy who spent more time at the gym than anything else. She’d never preferred men who looked like bodybuilders; Alex had a healthy musculature, and it made her body light on fire.
He crossed the floor quickly, settling down onto the chaise with her, his body pressing her down into its soft cushions. There was nothing soft about his embrace. His hands were hard, sharp, twisting and pinching at her body as she clung to him, etching her back with her nails and his shoulder with her teeth.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” he muttered, his teeth closed around her nipple through the layer of her sweater. She’d shed her bra when she’d leaned back to read.
“I’ll tell you if you do,” she said. It was naive to say he couldn’t; she knew he could. She also knew he wouldn’t do it on purpose.
Her sweater came off then, tossed across the room. He yanked at her jeans, and she heard the denim tear. He cursed, slowed down, and she dug her nails viciously into his shoulders to spur him on. He growled, and one more yank pulled her jeans free. Her panties followed, joining them on the floor. His own clothes came off, just as unceremoniously, and he was naked and splendid before her, his cock pulsing hard and gleaming with his fluid. His eyes were powerful and strong, and she reached out for him, wrapping her arms around him as he kissed her.
“Promised to lick you,” he said, softly, as if he were reminding himself. He pulled back from her a little, his forehead resting on hers as he seemed to struggle to catch his breath. “I promised.”
“Another time,” she replied. “Now, I think we both want something else.”
Gratitude shone in his eyes, and he didn’t waste time. He reached past her for a condom—she spared a single moment to be amused at how he seemed to have them stashed everywhere he ever was, but she pushed the train of thought away before she could wonder how many other women he’d had here. He sheathed himself in it, and then slid into her, his eyes fluttering closed in satisfaction as he plunged deep inside of her. She arched her back, accepting him utterly.
He thrust into her for a moment, almost idly, and then he pulled back, tugging at her hip. “Turn over. I want to see these bruises for myself.”
Her body sighed a little at the emptiness, but she obliged him, turning over, pressing her ass back to him. He knelt behind her, running his hands over her flesh. He paused every so often, planting his hands very carefully, and she imagined that he was matching finger tip to finger tip on some of the more livid bruises. The tip of him pressed into her, and as he slid into her, he let out such a groan of satisfaction that her body shuddered around him. He thrust into her again, a little more attentively this time, one hand holding her hip where he’d bruised her, the other holding the back of her neck.
The sensation was very different than the spanking the other night. She had the same sense that she could ask him to stop at any point, and he would, without question, but instead of pain making her walk that fine line tonight, it was the feeling that he was controlling her, that he was taking her, in the more archaic sense of the word, without regard to what she was feeling. No, that wasn’t it. Trusting that she was enjoying what he was doing, and trusting that if that enjoyment stopped, she would say something.
She wanted a different angle, more of their bodies pressing together. Her forehead was pressed into the couch, her ass up in the air, and she shifted, bracing her hands against the arm of the chaise, raising her torso until she was up at an angle from where he was buried in her. She had to spread her thighs wider to keep him from slipping out, but in return, he pressed into the front of her, rubbing deliciously over the delicate spot inside of her. One of his hands went from her hip to her breast, teasing and slapping at her nipple as he thrust into her, and sweat broke out along the line of her back. She brought one of her own hands to her clit and teased at the engorged nub. It was always a strange sensation, touching herself when she was so full of cock, and sometimes it didn’t do much to increase the arousal she was feeling, but this time—this time she swelled with the sensation, with his hot breath on her skin. His thrusts were pushing into frantic, his body shaking as he pounded into her, and while it felt amazing, her orgasm was still miles away when he shuddered into her, spasming and groaning into her ears. She let him carry her down to the chaise as he got rid of the condom, then tugged her back against him.
She let herself be wrapped up in the warm heat of his body as he snuggled her close, nipping at her neck and shoulder in an almost friendly gesture, his cock still giving little twitches as his body wound down from the heated peak.
It was almost a surprise as his fingers slid through her damp curls to brush her clit. She gasped, her hips bucking against him; with her pussy relaxed and soft again, the sensation ran through her like a freight train. “You don’t have to,” she gasped out.
He gave a breathy chuckle in her ear, and his other hand slid underneath her, pulling her to rest slightly on his chest, and give his hand better access to her nipples. Electricity surged through her as if he’d completed a circuit. Her body arched as she cried out, nothing holding her down or pressing her into the earth. “Oh my,” he breathed, and she whimpered at the sound moving through her. “What do you want, princess? This? My tongue? Something else?”
His tongue would be lovely, amazing, but telling him to stop was unthinkable. “Everything,” she said. “Everything at once.”
He laughed again. “Let’s start here, then,” he said, and his fingers picked up speed and intensity as she ground her hips into him, seeking more contact, more pressure, more everything, He licked and nipped at her neck, taunted the peak of her breast into a sharp point, and whispered to her about all the filthy things he intended to do to her. Binding her, tying her to a wall and masturbating just out of the reach of her mouth. Spanking her until she cried, then fucking her ass with his fingers and cock, his body slapping against her while her flesh was still tender and aching. Flogging her, clamping her nipples while he blindfolded her and beat her, a thousand little indignities and pains that made her gasp and buck and cry out until she spasmed against him, the orgasm spinning her out with a long, unwinding sound of luxurious pleasure.
“Oh my lord, sha,” she whispered, when she’d caught her breath, and he laughed again, pulling her tight against him. “What did she say to you to put you in such a mood?”
It wasn’t that it was the wrong question, but she felt him tense all at once. “Later,” he said, after a moment. “Let’s talk about it later.”
“Sure,” she said. Sleep was coming up fast, anyway; she hadn’t slept well the night before, and it had been a long day today. She felt her body lift, cool sheets closing over her, and she snuggled into them. And then she felt something warm behind her, wrapping around her. She was surprised, and woke up enough to smile. She meant to turn over and snuggle into his shoulder, but before she could, sleep claimed her, and she fell deep down into the abyss of it all.