“You are a savage,” Emmett gasped, falling back against the mountains of pillows scattered around his bed sometime later. I had no idea exactly how much time had passed between rounds two—and three—but I was out of breath and wonderfully used when he turned to his side and draped a strong arm over my bare stomach.
“A savage, huh?” I ran my fingernail over the hourglass tattoo on his bicep as a satisfied smile tickled the corners of my mouth. “Don’t tell me you’re going to write a song about that next.” I could see it now—“Me and the Savage in the Red Dress.”
He released a low breath and shook his head. “Just might have to. Goddamn, girl, you’re wild.”
A rush of pleasure rippled through me and settled in my stomach at the exact same time it decided to growl. He laughed as I buried my face against his chest in embarrassment.
“Worn out?” he questioned, and I bobbed my dark head against his sweaty skin, my hair swishing over his eagle tattoo. “Too fucking bad. I’m just getting started with your ass, Brock.”
Mouth falling open, I popped my head up and swatted his toned chest as hard as I could. He looked utterly unimpressed. “And you call me savage. You fuck me, then refuse to feed me.”
He crept his fingers from my hip to my butt and scooted me closer to him. “Poor, Angel.” He outlined my lips with the tip of his tongue, and scalding heat wiggled down my spine. “Tell you what, you go clean up, and I’ll cook you something good.”
I arched a brow. “Really?” Since I arrived in Texas a few nights ago, the closest thing to “cooking” I’d seen him do was throwing the ingredients for his foul-looking protein shakes in a blender. Other than the barbecue at his father’s place, every other meal had come from some sort of delivery service.
“Really,” he said.
“I don’t do Exorcist shakes,” I said dryly, and he smacked my ass. “If you keep doing that, I won’t be able to sit right tomorrow.”
His green eyes widened in mock surprise. “You think you’ll be able to sit straight now?” I moved my thighs together, turning pink all over after I winced at the soreness between my legs. “That’s what I thought.”
“Proud of yourself?” I demanded, and his eyes gleamed as he bobbed that gorgeous head of his up and down.
“Hell yeah, I’m proud. You told me you’re mine, remember?” he said. When I parted my lips to retort that he had used his body to coax me into it, he gave my bottom another swat. “Don’t take it back now.”
“I wasn’t going to.” Well, not exactly.
“Good because this thing between us is one-hundred-fucking-percent confirmed now. You’re mine, like it should’ve been eight years ago. There ain’t nothing in this world that’ll keep me from loving you and Matt like I should. You understand that, don’t you, Angel?”
Dear, lord. I understood, alright, but what the hell was I supposed to say to that? I moved my head up and down, and swallowed down the pressure in the back of my mouth. “Yes,” I said, my heart thundering against my ribcage. “Yes.”
“That’s right, beautiful. Yes.” He bent his dark head and kissed my nipple before rolling off the bed and winking a green eye at me. “I’ll get food, you … rest. Shower. Get ready for more.”
“You’re insatiable!” I yelled after him, admiring his bare ass until he disappeared into the hallway. Then, grinning, I slid from the center of the enormous California King bed, grabbed my phone from my purse that had somehow found its way into his bedroom, and crept into the bathroom.
The master bath was nearly twice the size of the one in the guest bedroom I was staying in, and I sighed as I ran my fingertips over the stone shower wall to turn on the jets. This entire house was a contractor’s wet dream.
I started to put my phone on the counter, but I paused when I saw I had two new texts from Lyra. Anxiety gnawed at the pit of my stomach as I opened the first message because I was scared to death that something bad had happened. Reading over the message, my shoulders sagged in relief a moment later.
1:07AM: Because, I’m a bad, bad best friend—and dude, I totally miss you. ;) Hope your night rocks.
I immediately picked up on the “Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny” reference since that was the first movie we’d ever watched together years ago, and most of Lyra’s visits—excluding this one—involved a re-watch. Her second text, a link to a YouTube video, had been sent a minute after the first. I clicked on it, and nearly choked on my saliva when Tenacious D’s “Fuck Her Gently” blasted from my phone. I immediately hit the back button, but I was laughing as my fingers flew across the screen to message her back:
You’re a really sick bitch. Hope you’re not playing these where Matt can hear them or you’ll owe him your entire retirement fund. Love you. PS: Dude, I totally miss you too.
Leaving my phone on the counter, I stepped into the shower. And as I washed away the scent of sex and Emmett’s cologne with his body wash, I found myself humming the song Lyra had sent.
* * *
The aroma of something delicious greeted me as I wrapped a towel around my body and walked back into Emmett’s bedroom. He lay on the bed, dressed in only boxer briefs, with an acoustic guitar in his hand, and a notebook lying where my naked body had writhed only moments before. I cleared my throat and he looked up at me, a slow smile forming on his lips.
“I was joking when I said you should write about me,” I whispered, leaving a trail of damp footprints on the hardwood as I approached him tentatively.
He shrugged one shoulder. “I can’t get enough of you, so why wouldn’t I?”
I ran my teeth over the corner of my lip. “Then I hope you’re keeping it PG.”
“You were humming “Fuck Her Gently” in the shower,” he pointed out, and I covered my face and laughed. “Believe me, this’ll be tame.”
“You shouldn’t spy on people in the bathroom,” I said breathlessly, climbing on to the bed. I spotted a plate on the nightstand on my side. When I leaned over to inhale, he slipped a hand beneath my towel, massaging me from the small of my back to the curve of my butt. “Mmm, what is this?”
“It’s me wanting to be inside you again.” I shot a dark glare over my shoulder, and he threw his head back and chuckled. “Fuck, Angel, you’re evil when you’re hungry. That is Nutella and banana chimichangas.”
I cocked an eyebrow as I grabbed the plate and sat back against the blue linen headboard. “Nuhh-tell-uh?” I repeated, imitating his thick southern drawl. I bit into one of the chimichangas and moaned. “Oh … wow.” Chocolate hazelnut sauce dribbled down my chin, so he reached over to wipe it away.
“What the hell do you call it, beautiful?” He sucked the tip of his thumb into his mouth, and the pit of my stomach grew taut at the heated look he gave me.
“New-tell-uh,” I said, drawing my knees up to my chest. “Damn, Hudson, haven’t you seen the commercials?”
“Nuhh-tell-uh, New-tell-uh—whatever the hell you call it, you look like you’re about to start moaning again. I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“It’s good,” I admitted. “Ridiculously good. You sure you didn’t have this delivered?”
He touched his fist to his chest and shook his head in mock outrage. “Goddamn, you’re killing me, Angel.” He placed his guitar between the bed and his nightstand and flung the notebook to the floor. Then, he slid toward me with a hungry look in his eyes that made butterflies dance through my chest. “I am an awesome cook.”
I opened my mouth to protest when he took the plate from my hand and returned it to the nightstand, but he shushed me a second later when he picked up a chimichanga and held it to my lips. “Open wide.”
“That’s what he said,” I muttered.
“Open. Wide,” he repeated.
Peering up at him from beneath my lashes, I leaned forward and took a bite. He was feeding me. Dear lord, he was feeding me. I closed my eyes as the sweet flavor made my tastebuds tingle.
“Your toes are curling,” he mused, and I moved my head up and down.
“Already told you it was good.” I took another bite, and he wiped the corner of my mouth again. Opening my eyes, I saw his thumb was once again in his mouth. It was a turn-on—a big one—and I clenched my thighs as I dropped my gaze from his.
“You should have some,” I said softly, and he shook his head. Tucked his finger beneath my chin to focus my stare on him. “Please, I’ll feel all awful about eating it all myself when—”
“It’s better off of you.” As if to demonstrate, he ran his thumb over a streak of sauce on the side of the plate and smeared it over my lips.
“Don’t you think—” I started, but he bent his head down, kissing and licking until my heart was going a mile a minute. He drew away wearing a smirk, so I narrowed my eyes and took another bite, my own tongue flicking over his fingertip. “Don’t you think it would be easier if you’d take a bite?” I demanded.
He shook his head. Returning the plate to the nightstand, he tugged my towel open. Murmuring his appreciation for my body, he dipped three fingertips in the chocolate sauce then drew a path from the valley between my breasts to my belly button, which he circled with what looked like a giant bullseye.
“I’m not even going to comment on why you put that there,” I said, and a suggestive grin lit up his face.
Tilting his head back, he admired his handiwork, dragging his stare from my stomach, that was now sucked in, to the rise and fall of my chest. “Like I said, it’s much, much better on you.”
“We’ll make a mess,” I sighed but he straddled me anyway and lifted his broad shoulders.
“Does it look like I give a damn.” He kissed one breast then the other before he slipped his tongue between them, moving it in a gradual, fiery path along the sauce. “Hell, you taste good.”
“Like chocolate,” I whispered, arching into him when he buried his nose in my bellybutton.
“And hazelnut. Fuck, I want to be inside you again already.” Lifting his eyes to mine, he cocked an eyebrow at the way the edges of my mouth twitched. “What?”
“Your face, Hudson, that’s what.” I reached down and wiped the sauce from his nose. He caught my hand and pressed it to his lips, tugging my fingertips into his mouth one by one. “Ahhh,” I moaned. “Why do you do this to me?”
“What?” He crawled up my body, trapping my hips between his thighs as he wedged his hand between us and nudged my sex apart with his knuckles. “Make your pussy this wet?”
He slipped one finger inside me, crooking it. I groaned, grasped the sheets and bucked my hips. “You’re so dirty. You make me so—”
“Mine. I make you so mine.” Giving me a wicked look that made my body heavy with desire, he climbed off of me to dig in the nightstand drawer. “Bend over, Angel.”
I obeyed, my heart pounding wildly as I faced the headboard and curled my fingertips around the back of it. A rush of anticipation hit me hard when I heard the condom foil rip, and a moment later, I shuddered because I felt his hard length pressed against my opening.
“Move your knees a little closer to your chest,” he ordered. As soon as I did. he scooted into the space between my feet, framed the small of my back between his large hands, and slid the tip of his erection inside me.
I cried out, my voice husky and raw.
He gave me another inch, even though I wanted the full eight.
“You’re a tease,” I murmured, looking over my shoulder at him. He grinned, and I hated him. No, I loved him. So damn much it made my heart and head and body swell. I tightened my sex around his cock, and he released a curse. Slipped a little deeper within me.
“You’re such a fucking tease,” I repeated.
He moved his hips, jerking in and out of me using short, shallow strokes, and I gritted my teeth. “You love it,” he told me and dropped a kiss to the center of my back. “Tell me you love it, beautiful.”
“No.”
“Yes,” he growled, and I shivered. “Why else would your legs be shaking like this?”
“Because you’re a tease,” I retorted. He pumped faster, still not filling me, and still driving me absolutely wild. I buried my face into a pillow and cried out into it. “Ohhh, fuck!”
“Look at me and tell me the truth,” he said. This time when I looked back at him, his expression was beautifully sincere. I swallowed hard and moved my head up and down.
“I love it,” I whispered. He pushed a little deeper inside of me. “I love it so fucking much.” Another inch, a little more. “God, Emmett, I love you.”
“Oh, Angel, I love you too,” he whispered before he buried himself to the hilt and took me under.
* * *
Emmett’s loud doorbell ringing incessantly woke me the next morning, and I sat up straight in bed, my hair flying everywhere as I registered where I was. Still in his bedroom. With him lying facedown and buck naked beside me. Good god, he really was beautiful.
His doorbell rang again, and I poked my tongue in my cheek.
“Emmett.” I shook his shoulder hard. “Emmett, wake up.”
He popped one eye open and smirked. “Greedy Kinsey Brock ready for more,” he drawled.
I narrowed my eyes at him, even though my body came completely alive at the thought of feeling his weight on top of me again so soon. Last night had been epic, and I couldn’t imagine turning down an invitation for more.
“No, you cocky bastard. Your doorbell is ringing.”
It rang again. Then two more times.
Opening his other eye, he sat up and yawned into his elbow. “Lyra?” He glanced at the clock on the nightstand as he wiped the sleep from his eyes. “Thought she didn’t usually get up before nine.”
I lifted my phone from the nightstand and shook my head after I checked it to see there were no new messages from Lyra. “She would’ve texted before she came back.”
“Dammit,” he groaned and rolled off the bed. Rummaging through one of his dresser drawers, he found a pair of black gym shorts and jerked them on over his bare ass. Before he left the room, he gave me a stern look. “Don’t you dare leave this bed, beautiful, because you’re all mine after I get rid of whoever this motherfucker is.”
I saluted him, evoking a big, shit-eating grin from him as he ducked out the room.
I lay in bed for what felt like an eternity, but when he didn’t return right away, I sighed and slid to the edge of the mattress. Wrapping my towel from last night around my naked body, I started toward the bathroom. I made it halfway there, but the sound of yelling coming from the front of the house froze me in my tracks.
Sucking in a harsh breath, I tiptoed to the entrance of the bedroom and pressed my ear to the crack in the door.
“—even gotten a paternity test or do you just believe everything that comes out the little gold digger’s mouth?”
I flinched and raked my hand over my chest. What the hell was going on now?
Emmett’s response followed swiftly, and even though he was quick to defend me, I was trembling as I listened to him. “Are you fucking with me? Have you looked at him, Dad? There’s no denying he’s mine, and I don’t need a paternity test to prove that.”
“You’re not the only man with dark hair and green eyes, Emmett.”
“Are you really standing in my goddamn house, insulting my son and talking shit about a woman who—”
“Who I what? Barely know? I don’t need to know much—other than she’s a little convict who—”
Shaking my head from side to side, I stumbled away from the door, loathing myself for ever going near it. My face felt numb as I returned to the bed and sat on the edge, and hot tears fell to the back of my hand, scalding my skin. What was wrong with Emmett’s family?
Hell, what was wrong with me for crying over a man I knew was a shitty person?
I dragged my hand over my face and reached for a tissue from the box sitting on the nightstand, but my fingers spasmed when my gaze caught a name written on a piece of paper in the drawer that was still partially open from Emmett’s condom-search last night.
Kinsey.
Why was my name there?
Flicking my tongue over dry lips, I cast a glance toward the door. I could still hear Emmett arguing with his dad, their voices growing louder and louder with each passing second. Whatever was on that piece of paper had something to do with me, and even though I knew I shouldn’t, I couldn’t resist reaching into the drawer.
Pulling it out.
And holding my breath when I saw that it was a letter. It was old and creased where it had been read then re-read, and my fingers shook as I held it close to my face and examined it.
Dear Emmett,
I guess by now you’ve realized what a mistake you made with me, but I feel the same way. Stay away from me. Don’t write me. Don’t bother me. Please … forget you met me this summer. You’ve brought me nothing but trouble, and I don’t want OR need that in my life.
I’m sure you’ll understand.
Take care of yourself. Finish your album and do everything you said you’d do. But please, leave me alone. It was fun, but now it’s nothing.
-Kinsey
It was written on the same yellow legal paper I’d written all my letters on when I was in jail, but these words weren’t mine. These words were a cruel twist of everything I’d ever written to Emmett—a slap in the face that burned my soul—and the tears that had fallen after I heard Peter Hudson’s thoughts of me came back. They dripped from my cheeks and on the page. They smeared the old, pencil-written words.
They hurt brutally.
I was still clutching the letter when Emmett stalked back into his bedroom, red-faced and breathing heavily as he growled that his father and Natasha could take their dinner party and stuff it up their asses. When he saw me, though, he froze, his dark brow knitting together.
“What—” His green eyes dipped to the yellow paper in my hands, and realization softened his expression as he tentatively approached me. “Oh, that.”
“Yeah, this.” I swallowed back another sob, but my shoulders bowed forward. “What is this?”
He kneeled in front of me, resting his chin in my lap. “It doesn’t even matter now. I should’ve ignored it, but I was so—”
“Emmett,” I whispered, and yet he continued.
“—Damn pissed off at you for saying we were nothing when you were everything. Like I said, it doesn’t matter now. I know why you wrote it, and I know why it’s the only letter of yours that found its way to me, but it doesn’t matter anymore.”
“Emmett,” I repeated, my voice so sharp I felt a pang in my chest. I carved my hand through my hair and released a noise that sounded like a broken animal. “It does matter. It matters so much because I. Didn’t. Write. This.”