EIGHT
Adalind
What the heck was I doing?
I needed to turn my car around, drive home, climb back in bed, and try to forget about the enigma known as Ross Ward.
Just moments before my phone dinged, I had decided that I needed him out of my life. Because it wasn't healthy. It wasn't right. I needed to just move forward with my life, putting the whole Kenny and Hex and Ross thing behind me.
Girls like me didn't get involved with men like that.
And I damn sure didn't get all wrapped up with a man who ordered me around and dismissed me like a dog.
No sir.
Not me.
I was raised better than that.
I didn't like alpha assholes.
That wasn't my cuppa tea.
Why then had I plugged his address into my GPS and started driving?
Maybe it had something to do with the fact that he had, in essence, rescued me. It was hero worship. I had been the damsel in distress; he had been the white night come to save me.
Hell, maybe I had some damn brain damage.
That sure explained why I was turning into... a hotel?
Why was he leading me to a hotel?
So much for all that 'that's all I want' bull, huh?
I was just about to turn around when the man at the gleaming front entrance to the six-floor gorgeous gray stucco building waved at me. Curious, I pulled up beside him, watching him bend down in his black uniform, and get eye-level with my window.
"Mr. Ward wanted me to tell you to pull over toward the right," he said, indicating the area he meant, "where the resident entrance is."
Oh.
So he lived in a hotel.
That was, well, unusual.
As far as I understood the concept, the only people who had a residence at a hotel were like the uber-rich who jet-set all over the place, and didn't want to have to worry about maintaining a property.
Why then did Ross choose this instead of a home or even a condo?
I pulled my car into one of the empty spaces, feeling a bit odd as I grabbed my purse, and opened my door.
When he had texted, I had been in full-on bad-day attire - old, roomy pajama pants, an oversized sweatshirt, with my hair in a top messy bun.
After the text, I had jumped up, going into the shower to do a quick rinse without washing my hair, threw on a pair of jeans and a long-sleeve purple tee, pulled my hair down, and called it a day.
I didn't want to look like I was trying to impress him, even if maybe I was. Also, it was the earliest part of morning. I didn't want to look like I was asking for it. Not even if I had been thinking about his tongue and lips on me pretty much since the moment I left, and was in a constant state of sexual frustration even as I went about my boring nightly tasks.
I had barely closed my door when I saw him.
He was leaning back against the wall right by the entrance, eyes trained on me. Even from a distance, I could feel their intensity, could feel how penetrating they were.
Like he knows what you look like naked.
And, well, he absolutely did.
I hadn't even been able to muster up a tiny shred of resistance to his seeking hands, lips, tongue.
Hell, I didn't want to.
Here he was, looking at me like he was starving still and I was the feast. Even though he had already gotten his fill just mere hours before.
There was a thrill in my belly as I forced my legs forward, knowing that in doing so, whether I had agreed to it aloud or not, I was offering myself over as a feast.
He seemed calmer too, I realized as I got within a few yards of him. Actually, it may have been the most relaxed I had seen him so far. He always seemed to have almost impossibly perfect posture. But now he was leaning back against the building, completely unconcerned with messing up a suit that I was pretty sure I would Scotch Guard to keep perfect with how much it must have cost. The air around him seemed calm. Even his jaw was completely relaxed, allowing the edge of his lips to quirk upward slightly.
"Hey Addy," he said, voice low, as I stopped a few feet in front of him.
"Hi," I greeted him, then blurted out, "You live in a hotel."
"I do," he agreed, making no move to push off the wall, seeming content to stand and watch me until the sun came up.
"Why do you live in a hotel?"
His lips tipped up even higher at that, his head ducking to the side. "When we order room service, you will have all the answers you need."
"Isn't it a little late for room service?"
"Baby, for what I pay to live here, they will cook me whatever I want whenever the fuck I want it," he said, pushing off the wall, and putting his hand on my lower back.
"Oh, Mr. Ward!" the woman at the desk - tall, long-dark-haired, brown-eyed, and large chested - cheered at him, clearly happy to see him. And, well, who wouldn't be. But as her gaze slid to me, I swear her smile went cold.
"Briana," he greeted her, but his voice was as icy as her smile was, and I had a feeling it was because he noticed what I did. And that, well, it was nice. You had to appreciate a man who didn't care that other women were practically throwing themselves at him. When he was with a woman, he was with her, case closed.
You had to respect that.
"Oh, wow," I said when we walked up to a private elevator that Ross accessed with a key.
Were 'upscale elevators' a thing? Because I was pretty sure this one qualified with its brown walls and lack of push buttons.
The doors slid open to a private hallway with only two doors on either side, and a floor-to-ceiling window at the end with a view of the Navesink River.
"What? No butler waiting with champagne?" I teased, sending him an awed smile as we stepped out.
"You want a butler with champagne, doll, next time, I'll make sure there is one."
The crazy thing was, I didn't think he was joking as he moved to slip his keycard into the door lock.
It opened with a quiet whoosh.
Oddly, as I moved to step inside with him, there was a little voice in the back of my head warning me There's no going back now.
Somehow, I was even okay with that.
The lights went on as Ross moved inward.
And me, yeah, I was frozen on the spot.
Because I had never in my life seen anything even half as impressive as his home.
Across the expansive space, the furthest wall was floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked the other side of the Navesink River, light floating across the water thanks to the houses that lined it and the bridges that went over it, connecting Navesink Bank with the nearest town.
It's cool; it's almost like an island, I had told my mother when I first arrived, even though my actual apartment was so far removed from the river that you had to take a five-minute drive just to see it.
In the middle of the room was the living space with a massive fireplace I wondered fleetingly if he ever used. There was a low dark brown leather sectional sofa across from it, one section of which jutted out like a chaise. I could see him dropping down there after a long night of work, yanking at his tie, head resting back against what looked like leather of even better quality than the ones at Hex - which was really saying something.
The floors were an immaculate, gleaming dark wood. The walls were painted a neutral brown that was just a shade or two darker than beige.
To the other end of the room was the massive kitchen space which was cut off from the living room with a swirling brown, gold, white, and black marble-topped island that I would swear was big enough to be a bed. The cabinets matched the shade of the floors, and the stainless steel appliances were devoid of a single fingerprint.
In fact, the whole space was spotless.
I imagined that was a very nice side effect of living in a hotel - maid service.
But even so, it was more than just vacuumed and mopped and wiped.
It was, well, empty.
There weren't any personal touches, unless the very expensive coffee machine that looked like it came straight out of a Starbucks counted. Which it didn't.
Right inside the door against the wall was a long low wooden bar cart the color of all the other stain in the room, lined with a few different liquor bottles and several glasses. The only bottle with any liquor missing was the bourbon which I had learned was his personal drink.
Down beside the kitchen was a hall that seemed to lead to four doors.
Three beds and a bath?
For one solitary man.
It was almost sad how empty it felt.
I could picture him up here, all alone, day in and out, nothing but his own deep intensity to keep him company.
And for reasons I didn't understand, my heart ached.
"Addy," he called, voice a little loud, making me realize he must have called me more than once. "Do you want a drink?" he asked and, sure enough, he was standing beside the bar cart.
It was nearly morning.
I shouldn't be drinking.
That being said, it was still technically night if you were seeing it from this side of the pillow, right?
"Sure," I agreed, watching him reach for the bottle of wine that was sitting there, going through the motions of peeling the foil, popping the cork, then pouring the deep maroon liquid into a rounded wine glass before handing it to me to go and make himself his drink.
I brought the glass up, taking a deep breath because - as I had learned at Famiglia - there absolutely was a difference between cheap and expensive wine. To me, a twenty-dollar bottle of wine was 'nice,' but the wine at Famiglia - and this wine I was sure as well - had to be at least double that. It was in the smoother, richer taste. And smell. Which was why I was breathing it in before tasting it.
"Oh, my God," I moaned as I closed my eyes.
I opened them to find Ross watching me with warmth in his eyes I didn't often find there. "Good?" he asked. "I don't drink wine, but the sommelier from the restaurant downstairs told me this is the cab I needed to keep up here for guests."
"Wise, wise man," I agreed, taking another small sip, wanting to savor it.
"You want to order then get the tour?" he asked, moving toward the kitchen, producing a menu from a drawer. And not a paper menu. Oh, no. This was a fancy hotel. They had leather-clad menus with fancy parchment paper and specific fonts.
I noticed as I walked over, putting my glass on the island, and taking the menu from him, that not a single price was listed.
I was pretty sure that was how you knew that even an orange juice was going to cost twenty dollars.
I ended up ordering cocoa crepes stuffed with whipped cream and strawberries, figuring trying them was going to be a once in a lifetime experience.
Ross ordered some kind of fancy egg scramble thing with a name I didn't know how to pronounce, then put the menu away.
"Alright, want the tour?" he asked as the silence went tense.
"Ah, duh," I agreed with a smile.
He led me down the hall, showing me the hall bath which, while fancy, was just a typical washroom. There were two guest bedrooms. One was being used as another office with the same amount of computer screens as he had at Hex, even though they were currently all dark. The other room was simply a guest room with a full-sized bed and cream comforter.
"And this is the master," he said, and I tried to pretend that that declaration didn't make my belly go all fluttery.
It was an unnecessarily large space dominated by a huge California king bed covered in a dark brown comforter. The walls were a shade darker than the main area of the space, giving the whole room a more cozy feel. There was a dresser and massive TV on the wall across from the bed and two doorways off to either side of that.
"What?" I whisper-yelled as he flicked the light on to the one to the right declaring It's just a closet. "This is not just a closet," I corrected, moving inside, taking a breath because the whole space smelled overwhelmingly of him, something I found incredibly comforting for some reason. There were shelving units built into three of the walls, all his suits and shirts hanging perfectly. Down the center were lower units meant to house shoes, ties, and cufflinks. "This is practically the size of my apartment," I informed him. "I mean, I could live in here," I added, shaking my head.
He chuckled a little at that, and I turned to find him watching me, realizing I had been absentmindedly stroking my fingers over the sleeves of his suit jackets as I passed them.
"I'm almost afraid of how grand this bathroom is going to be if you think this is just a closet."
"The bathroom is pretty fucking badass," he admitted as we walked back into the bedroom. "Even I can see that."
I walked in the doorway and, yep, 'badass' pretty much covered it.
There was warm sand-colored tile on the floors and up the walls of the shower that sported four shower heads. The door leading in was entirely glass, no brass or silver anywhere except the tiny handle. The floor was laid with small neutral-colored river stones, giving the space character as well as acting as a way to prevent slipping.
There was a double vanity flanked by two floor-to-ceiling cabinets. The countertop matched the marble in the kitchen, and the entire wall behind the sinks was mirrored.
Reflected in that glass, yeah, it was the tub.
And it was just begging me to climb in, I swear.
It was beautifully white, deep, and slightly scalloped on the top, higher in the back to rest your back against. There weren't any jets, but it looked like the absolute perfect place to unwind.
Finally, there was one small door to the side of the tub where, I imagined, the toilet was located.
I literally wanted to curl up in the bathtub and cry the whole thing was so beautiful.
"Okay, I changed my mind. I will live here. Rent out the closet to someone else." He made a chuckle and I turned shaking my head at him. "Such a waste. I bet you've never even been in that tub."
"Got me there," he agreed, rocking back on his heels. "If ever you have the need for a bath, you're welcome to demand I let you in," he offered, moving out of the way, then toward the door to the living room. Almost, it seemed, as if in a rush to get away from me.
If I didn't completely understand that urge to run after saying something you didn't exactly mean to, I might have been offended. As it was, I just followed him out, grabbing my wine, and moving over to look at the view.
"This view might make whatever you pay for this place worth it."
The darkness was easing up off in the distance, casting streaks of light across the otherwise black sky.
Soon the sun would be up.
And I would have, sort of technically, spent a night at Ross Ward's place.
"There's the food," he declared, still all the way across the room when I had expected him to come and stand beside me.
I hadn't even heard anything, but I figured if you lived somewhere long enough, you became very aware of the ding of the elevator.
I reached under the island to pull out the half-hidden stools as Ross let a man in all black in, wheeling a cart over toward where I was sitting.
Feeling weird, I gave him a smile. "Hi," I said as he looked up at me.
"Hi, Miss," he said, then turned back to Ross who did that smooth tip pass thing, and the man let himself back out.
"I didn't even think I was that hungry, but now I want to eat every bit of it," I declared as he handed me the plate after he took off the silver top.
And, well, as one could expect from an uber fancy hotel with a built-in restaurant, the crepes made me want to cry.
"I think the plate is clean, doll," Ross said, a chuckle in his voice, making me realize I had been scraping the very last streak of whipped cream up to eat. "Good, right?" he added when I looked up a bit guiltily.
"So when I move into the bathroom, room service is included with my rent, right?"
He chuckled at that, taking the plates, putting them back on the tray, and sticking the cart in the hall to be dealt with later.
"You look tired," he observed in almost a sad way, taking away the sting that would normally come from someone saying you look tired, which everyone knew was just synonymous with looking like crap.
"I am usually in bed by eleven," I admitted, shrugging at my kinda lame bedtime, yes, even on Saturday nights. "I need to be at work by eight-thirty. You look tired too." Especially considering his schedule likely meant he was up until the early morning a lot of the time.
"I can lend you a shirt," he started oddly, making my brows draw together. "To sleep in," he clarified. Oh, well then. My desire, recently tamped down by some serious foodgasming, rekindled. "The guest bed is free."
Oh.
Alrighty.
Yeah, I totally misread the invitation to come over, didn't I?
What a waste of really pretty panties.
"I can just drive--"
"Stay," he commanded. "That way, when you get up, you can see what is on the menu for lunch."
"Well," I said, smiling big, "when you put it that way!"
He gave me another of his smiles that didn't reach his eyes, leaving me to wonder what, exactly, it might take to get that kind of reaction out of him, if it was even possible to.
"You have two choices. Dress shirt or tee."
"What?" I asked, mock-outraged. "You? The man who is perpetually in suits that cost more than my car actually owns something as lowly as a t-shirt? How workaday is that?"
"Gotta have something to workout in."
"Really? You think a shirt is necessary? I think all the women at the gym would be fine with you going without."
His eyes heated slightly, and the silence went awkward for a moment before he broke it. "How do you know I'm not rocking a dad-bod underneath all these suits?" he asked, the first bit of teasing I had maybe ever seen in the man.
"Hey, there's nothing wrong with a dad-bod, but I have a feeling you have abs under there. The kind that you can trace a finger between."
Crap.
That was too much, right?
Way too suggestive considering I was just an overnight, spare room guest. That was a comment that potential lovers said.
"You'd be right," he said, giving me a smile that wasn't even meant to be confused with a real one. "What's your poison, Addy?"
"A dress shirt," I decided. Preferably the one you're wearing. Because I was a freak like that apparently. Normally, the long sleeves and the buttons would drive me up a wall. But, like my aforementioned freakishness implied, I wanted the dress shirt because it made me think of him, because there was something inherently sexy about feeling a shirt he had worn against my bare skin, skimming my thighs, brushing over my nipples...
Okay.
Yeah.
I needed to shut that down.
"Addy," he said, in that voice that implied I had drifted off again. And I had. Into sexy thoughts of him sucking my nipples into his mouth through one of his shirts.
"Yeah?"
"You wanna try out the bath first? I know you were eye-fucking it."
Oh, boy.
He wasn't allowed to use the phrase eye-fucking. Not even talking about an inanimate object. It was not helping at all. It sounded way too good coming from him.
"If you're offering, I'm in."
"I'm offering," he said, moving off down the hall to, I realized as I followed, run it for me and put out a couple fluffy towels. "And here," he said after digging through a cabinet. "They left all this bath shit out when I first moved in."
This bath shit was a large, fully stocked basket with salts, scrubs, bombs, bubbles, and loufahs.
I took it, looking up at him with what had to be wide eyes. "You're excused now," I said with a smirk, making him chuckle.
"Knock yourself out, Addy," he said before closing the door.
I would claim to have shyly undressed, worried he might peek in. But, well, that would be a lie. I ripped my clothes off like I was a drunk girl begging for Mardi Gras beads. If he wanted to peek, well, I was all for that.
But, unfortunately, that door stayed respectfully closed as I got in the water, as I used a little bit of each of the products in his basket, maybe silently pleased that they were all in the package still. Because it sort of implied that there had been no long-term woman around recently, right?
Then again, many women hated baths.
And it was none of my damn business what went on before me anyway.
Not that there was a me anyway either.
I was a house guest.
A very lucky, very spoiled house guest.
He might have gone down on me just hours before, but since I pulled into the lot, he had been nothing but, well, friendly. As in, that was what he wanted.
Friendship.
And I was going to go ahead and be that pathetic girl with a crush on a guy who didn't see her that way, but went on being friends with him because she liked being near him. Also, because she was a masochist.
Water cool, I stood up, drying carefully with the fluffy towels, and only then realizing... he forgot to bring in a shirt to wear.
I considered slipping my old clothes on, but chose instead to just wrap up in the massive towel, and peek my head out.
The door opened silently, clearly not alerting Ross who was sitting off the end of the bed, legs somewhat spread, his elbows on his knees, his head ducked. His tie was gone, as was his suit jacket, and the first three buttons of his dark shirt were undone.
My shirt was sitting folded on the bed right beside him.
"Ross?" I asked, my voice oddly airy.
His head rose slowly, his eyes deep, intense, heavy, full of something I couldn't quite put my finger on.
He said nothing though, and the silence made me shift from foot to foot.
"I just... you forgot to give me," I said, advancing toward him, ready to grab the shirt and hightail it back to the bathroom.
But just as my hand moved down to snatch the fabric, his arm moved, his hand encircling my wrist, making my head snap up to look at his face.
I recognized it then.
The look.
I hadn't seen it often, but it was there.
A man barely holding onto his control.
His fingers at my pulse point, I was sure he felt my heartbeat speed up even as I had the same sensation in my throat, temples, and between my thighs.
"I said just breakfast," he said, voice low.
"I know," I agreed, not wanting to admit this part because it was ridiculous, but I had totally screenshot that entire conversation.
"I lied," he admitted. "That wasn't all I wanted."
"Oh, no?" I asked, trying to talk through a sudden heaviness in my chest, my air seeming trapped in a corset of anticipation.
"That was never going to be enough," he went on, his finger stroking up the side of my wrist. "I'm a little worried that no matter how much I get, it might never be enough."
I couldn't say for sure because I didn't know him that well, but that seemed like it was a pretty monumental declaration for a man such as him, someone so guarded, someone so tight-lipped.
Maybe, just a tiny bit, he was letting me in.
I shifted, moving to stand in front of him, watching as his head angled up to keep my gaze. With my free hand, I reached up, working out the tuck in my towel.
"We can test that theory out," I suggested, dropping my hand, letting the towel slide down.
His head moved up to face the ceiling, eyes closed.
"Fuck," he growled, taking a breath before lowering his head again, his eyes drifting open, on my face for a long second before drifting downward, over my breasts, my torso, waist, thighs, all the way down to my feet before going just as slowly back up.
I swear his eyes had impact, I could feel them brushing over me, my skin goose bumping in response. My nipples tweaked as a heavy pressure came down on my lower stomach, and I got wetter by the second.
Just when I was sure I couldn't take another second of inspection, his hands moved out, sinking into my hips, pulling me forward and down, straddling him like I had been in his office earlier.
The brush of his pants against my thighs, his shirt against my breasts, was enough to set my skin on fire, and I had to fight the urge not to rub my nipples against the smooth warmth again as his hands slipped around to my lower back, then down to sink into my ass.
"Don't deserve you," he murmured as he moved forward, scraping his scruff up the column of my neck. "But that's not gonna stop me," he added before one hand left my ass to grab the back of my neck, dragging my face down so his lips could claim mine.
It seemed like seconds, just a brief meeting of lips, but by the time his mouth pulled from mine, my lips felt swollen and overly sensitive.
I looked down into his deep eyes, the promise there making my belly flutter as I scooted back slightly to put space between us, allowing me to reach for his buttons, slowly undoing the ones he hadn't already.
As my fingertips brushed the skin at the lowest one, the muscles beneath contracted, something that somehow managed to make my belly do the same.
There was something intoxicating in knowing you managed to affect a man like him, a man whose experience you knew had to trump yours, who must have had arm candy that rivaled Victoria Secret models.
I could still make him shiver a little.
My hands slid under the material at his shoulders, pushing it down, watching as his skin got exposed.
My eyes drifted down.
And this time, the stomach-dropping sensation had nothing to do with desire.
Oh no.
It was a mix of surprise.
And concern.
Because Ross Ward, I realized, maybe had metaphorical guards because at some point in his life, he had needed literal ones. And there had been none to be found.
All across the tight skin stretching over his strong chest muscles, then even visible in the dips between the impressive abdominal muscles I knew he was hiding.
Scars.
They were almost flesh-toned, aged, definitely from when he was younger. But there were so many that there was more space that was scarred than there was that was unmarked.
My gaze moved back up, my breath catching at one on the left side of his chest I had missed before.
It was right under his clavicle, round, raised, almost puckered looking.
I didn't have to have experience in the past with one to recognize it.
A bullet hole scar.
I watched as if it wasn't attached to me as my hand slid up his bicep and over his shoulder to allow my thumb to slip down and trace the weirdly smooth, raised circle.
My eyes lifted, seeking his, but already finding them watching me, searching for a reaction.
And, sure, there were a million different things going through my head, questions I wanted answers to, even if it wasn't my business to ask.
But there was a tightness around his eyes, a tension in his shoulders.
Like he was bracing himself.
Like he was expecting the questions. Ones he didn't want to answer.
Besides, no matter how much my curiosity might have been piqued, this was not the time for that.
I leaned down, pressing a kiss to the scar, then placed my hands on both his shoulders, pushing until he moved to flatten against the mattress so I could move to press my lips between his pecs, down the center of his abs.
Scooting down, I worked his belt, button, and zip free, dragging them down enough for me to reach inside, and slide my hand around his straining cock.
His breath hissed out of him as my thumb brushed over the head, spreading out a bead of pre-cum before I slowly lowered down, eyes on him, and took him into my mouth.
His hand went to track up my neck, but paused, remembering, then moving to the side of my jaw instead as I slowly took him down, the velvety skin against my lips seeming to make my pussy clench in anticipation. I couldn't quite make it to the base. Wrapping my hand around him there, I started working him. Slow. Intense. Because his gaze was boring into me, more penetrating than it had any right to be, making the moment seem important rather than just a sexy lead up to the grand finale.
My tongue stroked over the impossibly smooth skin of the head, lapping up more pre-cum, finding the ritual of tasting him perhaps the most erotic feeling I had ever experienced.
"Addy," he called, voice a low, rumbling sound that moved through my insides as a shiver, but also a command.
I sucked him deep once more before releasing him, kissing back up his stomach, chest, neck.
My legs planted on the outsides of his thighs, opening me up, allowing me to drop my hips down and feel his hard cock run between my slick folds, making a whimper escape me as I pressed up to look down at him and the head hit my clit.
His arm lifted, his hand brushing my hair over to one shoulder so it didn't curtain my face. "You gonna ride me, Addy?" he asked, voice rough, making a shudder move through me, something that didn't just happen inside. He felt it too. "That's not an answer," he told me, smirk devilish as he ground his hips up against me.
My forehead slammed down on his shoulder as a loud moan worked its way out of me, making him do another grind since - I guess - that still wasn't exactly an answer.
"I'm gonna need an answer out of you. But in the meantime--" His hands slipped to the backs of my thighs, yanking so hard that I flew upward over his body, my belly level with his face, making me suddenly realize what he was planning to do in the meantime.
Go down on me again.
But this time, with me riding his face.
I felt my cheeks go bright red even as he brought in his arms between my thighs so he could slide downward.
I had no hangups about oral sex. I liked to give. I liked to receive. I had received not even half a day before from this very man.
There was just something about this position.
There was something about the phrase 'sit on his face' that made my stomach go all swirly and weird.
But even as I was in the middle of convincing myself I could never get over the weird feelings I had toward this position, I felt his tongue trace up one of my lips, moving upward and around my clit without brushing it, then back down the other lip before tracing up the seam and - finally - pressing into my clit, making my hips buck a little violently.
His hand moved up, sinking into my ass, holding me in place as he licked and sucked and drove me higher.
His other hand moved between my thighs, pressing a finger inside me, thrusting lazily as he kept devouring me, occasionally making an appreciative rumbling noise that kept making me wetter by the second.
It was right there.
Just one more thrust, or one more stroke of his tongue, and that would be it.
But suddenly his finger was out of me; his hands grabbed the space where my thighs met my hips, dragging me backward slightly.
"You gonna ride me, Addy?" he asked, voice rough with his own need for release.
There was no other answer.
"Yes," I whimpered, sliding backward even as he scooted back up on the bed, going in the nightstand for a condom, protecting us as I put my thighs on either side of his waist.
His hand went to the base of his cock, the other settled on the top of my thigh, his eyes boring into mine.
And, again, I got that feeling.
The one I felt when I went down on him.
Like this was somehow important.
I raised up, positioning over him, looking at his face as I felt him stroke the head up toward my clit once more before moving down, and pressing against my opening, just a firm pressure waiting for me to take him in.
So I did.
Slowly.
Even as my walls stretched around the head, my hand slapped down on the top of his on my thigh, holding on, as my air exhaled out of me like a gasp.
In response, his eyes closed for a second as he took a deep breath before opening, his hand turning under mine so he could twine his fingers through as I kept lowering my hips, taking him in, taking him deeper than anyone before, feeling a slight pinch when he finally buried to the hilt.
"Oh my God," I whimpered, taking a moment to adjust, pulling in a slow, deep breath.
His hand pulled from my grip as he pushed to sit up, one arm going around my lower back, the other stroking down my jaw, his brows drawn together slightly. "You okay?"
And, what could I say?
I have a feeling - with absolutely no facts to back this up - that this moment is somehow significant.
That would make me sound like a crazy chick.
To be perfectly honest, your cock is quite a bit bigger than any I've had before, and it is taking some adjusting.
Yeah, no. Referencing other cocks was never good.
"Pinches a little," I admitted, pulling up slightly when his hand yanked at my hips, wanting to ease it.
"Your pace," he offered, even though his body was tight, the muscles coiled, every inch of him needing motion, needing release as much as the pressure on my lower stomach, and the aching in the walls wrapped tightly around him, said I needed as well.
I lifted my hips, almost losing him, before sliding back down, taking him almost fully.
His hand tightened on my hip, telling me he was every bit as affected as I was, that this was as intense to him as it felt to me.
I lifted again, taking him a bit deeper, feeling the pinch ease.
Soon, there was no keeping it slow, dragging it out, enjoying the moment. The pulsating need inside was acutely painful, demanding release.
I rode him harder, faster. His hard exhales of breath, the way his fingers were gripping in hard enough to bruise my skin spurred me on, wanting to take him with me, wanting us both to lose control together.
"Ross," I whimpered, fingers pressing crescent-marks on his shoulders as I held on.
"Come, baby," he demanded, voice rough.
As if I needed the permission, I came even as he told me to, the pleasure seeming to form at the base of my spine before exploding outward, overtaking me completely.
I was vaguely aware of crying out his name as my forehead slammed down on his shoulder, letting the waves crash through me.
Even as I came down what felt like forever later, I could feel him inside me, hard as ever.
I pushed myself up, my brows drew together slightly, finding his eyes just as hot as moments before when he could feel my walls milking his cock.
"Not done with you yet," he informed me, arm tightening around my lower back to anchor me against him as he moved to take his feet.
Even just fully satisfied, my pussy tightened in anticipation, greedy for more.
I had no idea what his intentions were until I felt my ass drop down on the sleek, cold surface of his dresser, the shock making my body jolt even as his arm left my back so both of his hands went behind my knees, jacking them up as his cock withdrew, then slammed back in - hard, deep. He paused, watching my face, gauging my reaction.
But there was no way I was going to turn this down - getting to see what a man like Ross Ward was capable of; watching him lose control.
It might have been the hottest thing I had ever seen.
My hands went to plant behind me on the dresser, making my back arch, and my breasts press out.
A deep, low growl came from somewhere buried in his chest as he leaned forward, snagging one of my hardened nipples between his teeth, biting just past the point of genuine pain, the odd pain/pleasure mix making me let out a throaty moan.
Hearing it, he released my nipple, pulling back, and starting to fuck me.
There was no other way to put it; he fucked me.
Hard.
Each thrust deep, going as far as my body could take him as he pistoned into me, each jerk making my body jolt with the impact.
All I could think even as the orgasm built again, this time feeling even more acute, was that it had never been anything like this before. I had been fucked before. Or, at least I thought so. But this was different. This was raw, primal, completely without any kind of control at all.
His skin dampened with sweat over his impossibly tight muscles; I could feel the glistening on my skin as well, as I managed to rip my eyes from him for a moment, looking down, watching his cock slam inside me over and over, something that made my pussy become a vice grip around him.
"Fuck," he hissed, making my eyes go up again.
His hand grabbed my knee, forcing my leg straight up, putting my ankle to his shoulder, freeing his hand to move between us and work my clit.
Seconds.
It only took seconds before the orgasm exploded through me violently, making my entire body shake hard as the waves crashed, as the world went quiet, my ears not even registering the cry I must have let out because my throat hurt as I slowly started to come back down.
"Fucking amazing," he praised before slamming deep, jerking upward, and coming with my name on his lips, half-collapsing forward, his forehead to my shoulder as he struggled to find his breath.
He might have stayed that way for a long while, trying to find that control he always had, if maybe aftershocks hadn't started racking through me.
His head raised, eyes going soft, then he wrapped me up, pulled me close, and carried me back toward the bed, carefully placing me on my side so I didn't rub against my stitches, pulling the blankets up to my shoulder.
"One second," he said, walking back to the bathroom to deal with the condom, coming back barely a minute later, climbing in the other side of the bed, sliding in behind me on his side, "Turn, Addy," he demanded softly, making my belly wobble as I flipped to my other side, only to be pulled close, nestled under his chin as his hand stroked up and down my spine.
It was then that I finally realized I was right.
It hadn't just been a mix of happy hormones and wishful thinking.
This was important.
It was significant.
Not just for me.
But for him as well.
Because suddenly, those guards he wore so well that I thought maybe they were soldered on, seemed down.
And, well, one had to imagine that it wasn't just the sex. If that was the case, a man as good-looking as him would have had a reason to let his guard down at least a few times a week.
This was more than that.
The guards were down, I was sure, because he felt something akin to what I did.
I pulled my arm up between us, resting it on his shoulder, not realizing where I had placed it until he pulled back slightly, looking down at me.
"You can ask," he said, tone a bit hesitant, something I didn't expect from such a normally confident man.
Part of me didn't want to.
I didn't want to ruin what was, as a whole, a perfect moment. I didn't want to muddy the memory if things didn't go well if I did ask.
On the other hand, I recognized that I might not get the opportunity again, that this could be my only chance to get to truly know him, know what was underneath.
"What happened to you?" I asked, looking up from the bullet hole scar to his eyes, finding them watching me a bit warily.
"You know what a dog fight is, right?" he asked oddly.
"Yeah," I said, brows drawn together.
"I was the fucking dog."