Chapter Seventeen
Madison
When Cole showed up at the apartment again, I couldn’t quell the excitement dancing in my belly. Had that lock of hair always tumbled over his brow like that? How had I forgotten the smolder in the depths of his eyes? They were the purest blue, like being lost in the heart of an iceberg.
Thank goodness Jess was out for the day so she wasn’t around to witness my tongue roll out as I panted after her big brother. Yes. There was no point denying I would spend time in Cole’s bed if he asked.
And beg if he didn’t.
“How’s Jess?” Cole barely looked my way as he threw his keys on the counter and leaned his delectable ass on a stool.
I sank onto the couch, disappointment nipping at my chest as I shoved back any hopes of picking up where we’d left off.
Naked. Needing. Naughty.
“Ah. Good. Better than good.” I smiled brightly, forcing cheer into my voice. “Jess is great, isn’t she?” It had been a refreshing change for me to spend time with someone so unaware of their beauty, both inside and out. In fact, I felt bad Cole paid me to have her here.
“Yeah, I can imagine you don’t come across people like her often,” Cole said dryly. He cocked his head. “She seems happy enough.”
I shrugged, tamping back my irritation. “Prada shoes and silk dresses will do that to a girl.”
Cole scowled. “Jess isn’t like that.”
She’s not like you.
He didn’t need to add the unspoken words. They were right there in his voice.
But his eyes told a different story. Desire. Confusion. Guilt. He didn’t want to feel like this. To want me. The knowledge stung, then faded as he crossed the room and sank down in front of me. He cupped my face, saying nothing, just pressing his forehead to mine.
“I’m sorry,” he breathed.
His apology prompted me to make the first move. Truth was, I didn’t want to want him either. But I did. And it seemed stupid to deny it.
I tilted my head to press my lips to his and unleashed the power behind the dam. With a growl, Cole lunged forward to return my kiss, his tongue flicking out to lick along the seam of my lips, catching me off-guard. I gasped and he took advantage, sucking on my bottom lip, biting down. My gaze flew to his and he pulled back, leaving me even more confused.
A smile teased his mouth, his eyes filled with desire. Only desire. “Perhaps I should make you happy?” he suggested with a devilish grin. “Would you like me to make you happy, Madison?” He smudged a thumb across my cheek, following the line of my jaw, caressing the shell of my ear.
I swallowed, trying to coat my tongue with enough moisture to speak.
“Y-yes.” I nodded in answer to his challenge. Excitement caught at my breath, my skin tightening in expectation.
I wanted something real…
And from the lust filled expression on Cole’s face, things were about to get very real.
Exhilaration lit a fuse through my veins. He jumped up, pulling me with him as he rose. The momentum carried me until I was wrapped in his arms. He didn’t stop there. A quick twist and he’d yanked me up, carrying me into the bedroom just as he had the last time we’d ended up in bed. Except this time there wasn’t any protest, I was with Cole every step of the way.
I pressed my lips to his throat, his cheek, his jawline, any sliver of skin I could reach as we fell onto the bed. He rolled so I ended up sprawled on top of him.
“Take it off. All of it. I want to see every inch of you.” He pushed at the hem of my shirt while grappling with his own T-shirt.
Within moments nothing lay between us but skin. He hadn’t even touched me and I was panting, hot and wet and ready. The last of my fractured thoughts melted away as his lips found mine and he thrust his dancing tongue inside, demanding. I braced myself against his shoulder, my hand curling about his face as our tongues skipped back and forth. Tasting, stroking, giving, until I had to break free, gasping for air.
My hair swung to settle against his chest as I rose to my knees, straddling his thighs. Blood thundered through my veins, pulsing with the throb of desire.
“What are you going to do now?” Cole’s breath quickened and I felt his muscles bunch beneath me, anticipating my touch.
I wasn’t good at playing games. Not with Cole. But I would try. An exaggerated shrug lifted my breasts closer to his mouth, dusky pink nipples hardening into two inviting nubs which lay just out of his reach. Cole let out a groan, his hands tightening on my waist.
I was in control. The surge of power set a fire in my belly, melting my insides, my confidence pulsing in tempo to my throbbing clit. His expression told me how much he was enjoying it—that like me, the moment was only filled with two things. Me and Cole.
I smiled invitingly, edging my hips back until my breasts brushed his chest. My nipples were tight and achy, the sensation a delicious sting of pleasure that raced through me. The urge to crush myself to him and rub myself against him was overpowering, but I stopped just shy of touching. I dropped down further, leaving a trail of pebbled skin across his stomach.
All the time I kept my stare locked on the smoldering blue of his eyes. Nothing short of hypnotizing. I sank lower still, my nipples brushing against the smattering of hair trailing down to his navel. I dug my teeth into my bottom lip, my body so touch-sensitive I imagined I could feel each individual hair flicking against me. Just before I reached his cock, I wound my way back up his torso, intending to start again. Only my mouth would follow the path this time. I wet my lips, drunk on the rush of power sweeping through me.
Cole saw me as confident. Capable. All the things I wanted to be. A strong, self-possessed, sexy, woman—everything I wasn’t.
Even if it was a lie, I loved the fact Cole allowed me to pretend.
“Let me.” I drew back on my knees and cupped my breasts. He grumbled when I pulled away, but breath hissed between his teeth as I squeezed my breasts together, rolling and tweaking on my nipples.
My head fell back as each tug sent an arrow of heat straight to my pussy. Cole made another half-hearted attempt to grab at me, but his focus was more on what I was doing and he relinquished me easily when I wriggled out of his hold.
“Careful, you don’t want me to bite,” I warned.
His eyes fell to half-mast. “Maybe I do,” he teased, his voice a tangle of anticipation and desperation.
His words had shivers of dark desire flaring along my spine. I bared my teeth and lowered my head to nibble at his chest, grazing at his nipples. He tensed, cock jumping to attention against my belly. Gravelly sounds rose from his throat, a low hum against my mouth.
I ignored the throb of my sex, urging me to grind against his thigh, impale myself on the thick, male hardness just out of reach. Instead, I painstakingly inched down his body, following the scatter of hair with open-mouth kisses, just like I’d planned. I dipped to taste his navel, his skin like a sweet, spicy explosion in my mouth. My nipples grazed his cock, his velvet hardness brushing my peaks, tingles of warmth blooming between my thighs. Cole groaned and I did it again, licking and kissing at his belly.
“I need to…oh yes.” He cupped my breasts, pushing them together as he eased his shaft between them.
Cole flexed his hips and I throbbed with pleasure as the head of his cock emerged from the tight valley he’d created. Once. Twice. He lightly pinched at my nipples and I bucked against him, causing his cock to slide back a few inches. His teeth clenched, his eyes blazing hotly as he pushed forward again.
This time as he thrust through my breasts, I lowered my head to flick my tongue across the tip of his cock. Cole froze and I quickly slithered down to take him into my mouth.
“Oh. Fuck. Yes.” He shifted restlessly, hands feathering through my hair before retreating to fist at his sides.
His restraint faltered and it drove me on. I gripped the base of his cock, laving around the engorged head, licking across the crest of his foreskin. A shudder racked him as I guided him in and out, creating a smooth slide, allowing my teeth to ever so gently scrape against the skin. Another long lavishing lick of his head. Cole bunched my hair in a painful grip. I relished the show of his control slipping. Again and again I swallowed him down, dragging him against my tongue until the sweet, salty taste of precome told me he was close.
He pulled me away and I allowed him to slide free of my mouth. Cole twisted and pushed me onto me back, following until I lay beneath him. He stared down, a dangerous light in his eyes.
“No holding back.” I met his hot, glittering gaze.
“Oh yes. No holding back,” Cole promised.
He wrenched open the drawer and made a grab for the condoms. They spilled to the floor, but he still managed to get hold of one. He tore at the packaging with his teeth and excitement bit as a rush of dampness soaked my thighs. Kneeling between my legs, he secured my hips to the bed.
“I want to see your face when you come.” His growled words were almost my undoing.
A hot flush beaded my body, nipples tightening, need a deep ache.
“I want to hear you scream. Will you scream for me?”
“Oh. Yes.”
“Good. Then I won’t bother asking if you’re ready.”
Before I could answer, Cole cupped my ass in one hand, tilting my pelvis to meet the nudge of his cock. He looked down at the view and snarled with pleasure.
“Fuck. I’m gonna make you come so hard.”
I didn’t have time to process his words before Cole drove into me and my breath was ripped away with a cry of pleasure. Nothing could have prepared me for the fullness of him inside me, the sound and feel of his balls slapping against my ass as the sheer force of his thrusts shoved me back into the pillow. I raised my arms above my head, bracing the headboard as I found the rhythm.
Pleasure built up fast, slamming me with the same force as Cole slammed deep. There was no time to catch my breath. Sensations engulfed me in waves, the scent of our mingled juices a heady spice enveloping me.
“Give. Me. More.” I gritted my teeth, gripping the white rungs of my headboard. Demanding.
Without breaking rhythm, Cole tipped my ass higher, shifting to get deeper. Each time he buried his cock, he let out small grunts of pleasure and I dug my toes into the sheets, locking my knees to help him, hips rocking faster as I kept pace.
“Touch yourself. Touch that beautiful pink clit.” Cole’s breathless words encouraged me to release one hand from above me, slither past my belly through dampened curls.
He stopped long enough to see me comply, his breath a rough hiss of sound. A sharp pang of pleasure ripped through me as I pressed my fingers against the throbbing bundle of nerves, pressure escalating into mind-numbing ecstasy.
“Faster. Rub your pussy harder. I want to see you come all over my cock.”
I shuddered under him as he spurred me on, filling the air with heated demands, winding me higher.
I felt wanton. Bad. But instead of guilt making me retreat into the safety of my nice shell, I embraced the feeling. I threw back my head, closing my eyes to shut everything out except the sensations spilling over me; the exquisite slide of Cole’s cock, the flick of my fingertips as I rubbed my clit.
My breath caught, body tightening, contracting in on itself until it was a single pinpoint of intense physical pleasure. I twisted restlessly, the feeling too much to bear as a primal sound built up from deep inside. The cry when I came ripped out in a garbled chaos of sound, scraping past my throat to spill into the air.
Cole’s grip tightened, his hips jerking forward. “Yes. That’s it, babe. Yeeeessss.”
His forehead touched mine, his breath dusting my cheek, his whole body quaking with deep-seated satisfaction. He disposed of the condom before blanketing me with a comforting weight, brushing his lips across mine. Stretching up, I deepened the kiss, owning the moment and taking exactly what I wanted. I wasn’t afraid to do anything with Cole in the bedroom. Not anymore. Here, we were equals.
He gave my fingers a gentle squeeze and a pang tore through my chest. It was a pity the story was different outside of the bedroom, where Cole was filled with mistrust and derision.
But he wanted me, and no one had ever been so raw or honest. That was what allowed me to let the first curl of self-belief take hold in my heart, that what I wanted might lie within reach.
Logan had treated me like a plaything, going through the motions, living up to some ideal instead of letting go to really feel. My mother had wrapped me in artifice, compelling me to live on the surface and shroud my true emotions until I’d become a parody of a living, breathing Barbie doll.
Until now, I’d been willing to accept this as my life. But Cole had awakened the truth inside of me and I didn’t know if I could go back.
I squashed down the thought, not wanting to think too hard about that now, not when Cole was here. For him, I was willing to delude myself a little longer. Pushing myself onto my knees, I straddled his legs, keeping my lips on his, swallowing his breath down with my kiss as though it were the only thing keeping me alive. My kiss, my touch became driven by a frantic edge. His breath sucked in through his teeth as I gripped his already stiffening cock.
“Fuck me. Hard.” I demanded, grinding my hips against his thighs, enjoying the feel of him. Rough and unyielding.
His gaze locked on mine, the depths lit with ice and fire. “Show me,” he growled.
I snagged up a condom, loving the jerk and twitch of his cock as I rolled it over his hardening shaft. Raising myself onto my knees, I positioned his length beneath me, soaking his head in creamy desire. I drew his cock up and down my slit, teasing as I pushed him inside me the tiniest bit, then pulled back to rub him against my clitoris.
Cole’s hands tangled in the sheets, his jaw clenched tight. “Do it,” he gasped.
I couldn’t wait. I eased down onto his cock, then rose again finding a fast, rocking tempo. I rode Cole relentlessly, driven by a frantic need to claim him as he had surely claimed me. The orgasm built up hard and fast and at the touch of Cole’s thumb to my clit, I clenched tight around him, heat exploding in a ball of pleasure that engulfed us both.
Still it wasn’t enough. I barely gave us time to recover before I leapt on him again. Lips, teeth, breasts…I saturated myself in Cole’s pleasure, desperate to drink my fill, lest it be snatched from my grasp.
Afterward, I lay wrapped up in his arms, too tired to move. I wish my brain had gotten the memo and would stop.
This brief interlude was a solar flare, blindingly sweet but not enduring. I needed to keep reminding myself of that, in case I fell into the trap of wishing it could last forever.
And it forced me to keep thinking about my own future. I couldn’t stay wrapped in the cocoon of another false world, no more real than the one my mother had created.
I closed my eyes and resumed the flick and slide of my fingers across the smoothness of Cole’s skin, letting the reality of my situation sink in and envelop me.
Sooner or later, my past would catch up with me. Sooner or later, I’d need to decide where I belonged.
Jess came home not long after Cole and I dragged ourselves from bed. She didn’t appear as please as I was to see him and they were quick to fall into sibling bickering, focused around what Jess was doing….or not doing.
“I haven’t seen you do your stretches for a while.” Cole never seemed to be able to leave well enough alone. And he failed miserably at reading the situation where his sister was concerned, blinded by his need to protect her.
“I do them in my room, when you’re not around to badger me,” Jess was quick to snap back.
“Well maybe if I saw some kind of improvement.” Cole muttered under his breath.
Jess opened her mouth to argue, but I cut in. “I’m heading out for coffee. Want to come, Jess?” I grabbed my bag and jacket from the rack by the door. “It’s single origin day at Kiva’s. Jamaican beans. You haven’t tried those.”
“Ja’ makin’ me crazy.” The start of a smile appeared on Jess’s lips.
“So, you’ll come?” I opened the door, as if I didn’t care whether or not she followed. I’d figured out early Jess was not a girl to be pushed.
“Yeah. Wait up, I’ll grab a sweater.”
“Why don’t I come along? My treat.” Cole shared a small smile of thanks with me.
“Oh. Well, if you’re going, I won’t bother.” Jess stopped half-way to the door, obviously not ready to forgive his latest dig.
If I hadn’t been looking at Cole when Jess rebuffed his offer, I would have missed the flicker in his eyes—the flash of hurt he hid behind a shrug and a smile.
“No, that’s okay. You go ahead. I have to drop in and see Marcus anyway.” He carried on flipping the lid of his laptop down, grabbing his keys as if his sister hadn’t just stabbed him in the heart.
I busied myself with my bag, not wanting Cole to know I’d witnessed Jess’s deliberate snub. I felt for him. Cole loved his sister. Anyone could see he would do anything for her. And I was beginning to understand his game, the way he drew Jess’s anger, set himself up as a target so she took her pain out on him. Not on herself.
“You’ll be okay?” I couldn’t help asking.
“Sure. Why wouldn’t I be?” Cole dropped a quick kiss on my lips as he went out the door.
I didn’t let him escape so easy. I slid my arms around his neck and drew him closer. His mouth softened against mine and I stroked my tongue inside his mouth, deepening the kiss. I pulled back slowly, tugging on his bottom lip with a gentle nip of my teeth.
“Until later then,” I said, my words full of dark promise.
Desire sparked in his eyes as he let me go.
“Later then.”