The first thing Gretchen noticed when Finn returned to the club hours later was that he had changed clothes. As he drew closer, she could see the few bruises at the corner of his perfect mouth. When he reached for her, she could see that his knuckles were battered, and he tensed just a bit when she touched them.
She couldn’t explain the sudden dampening between her thighs. She wasn’t sure if it was some primal enjoyment that he had protected her, or the simple fact he looked so damn sexy and dangerous. She just knew she wanted him and tonight she would have him.
“Are you ready?” He didn’t meet her eyes.
“Sure,” she answered quietly and let him lead her out of the club and to his car.
She waited as he opened the door for her then slid inside. Her dress rode up slightly, and she could feel the cool leather on the bare skin between her thigh-highs and the short dress.
Finn didn’t speak as he drove to his apartment, and she was reminded of the first night he had driven her there and how she had actually thought she could hate him then.
He still said nothing as they entered his apartment, and she followed him inside, putting down her bag and going to the fridge as he made his way to his bedroom. She filled a glass with water, trying to calm her nerves as well as the desire building inside her. She wasn’t sure what he was thinking, but she knew she had to be honest with him tonight about her own feelings. She finished the water and walked slowly to his bedroom. He was standing at the window, staring out at nothing when she entered.
“Don’t ask me about it,” he cautioned without turning around. “I don’t feel like talking.”
“Good,” she replied, making her way across the room to him. “I didn’t come in here to talk.”
He turned, and in his eyes she could see a war of battling emotions. He was still so angry, but there was pain and a hint of desperation as well.
“It’s probably best if I stay in the other room.”
He began to move away from her, but she took hold of his belt, stopping him.
“You still mad?” She let her lips turn up slightly and the look he sent her in response was answer enough.
“I’m not in the mood to be gentle,” he warned.
She reached up, running a hand through his hair.
“You wouldn’t hurt me.” Her voice was confident, though she was anything but. She knew he would never physically hurt her, but emotionally he was capable of destroying her.
He took her wrist in his hand and pulled it away from his hair.
“You’re not going to turn me away tonight,” she vowed. “If you want to in the morning, go ahead, but tonight, I’m not asking for your permission, Finn.”
She continued to stroke his hair and watched as the anger he had been fighting began to ease from his eyes. She leaned up, pressing her lips to his until his gave against hers. She slid her hands into his jacket and pushed it from his shoulders. She eased the buttons of his shirt open as she walked him slowly toward the bed.
Finn’s breath hitched as Gretchen’s soft hands brushed against his chest, and her lips ignited small flames over his skin. She peeled his shirt away, and her hands were suddenly strong on the muscles of his back. He closed his eyes, breathing her in as she bent to kiss along his shoulder and down his chest.
He murmured her name like a wish and her lips curved against his skin. She took her time trailing kisses down his body as she slid the zipper of his tailored slacks down, before going to her knees. When she took him into her warm, wet mouth, his knees gave, and his hands fisted in her hair, pulling pins out so that curls tumbled down her back. He moved his hips, forcing her to take more of him, though he tried desperately to control the movement. Just when he thought he could take no more, and he made a move to push her away, she rose and pushed him to the bed. He watched as she slid the zipper of her dress down and let the fabric simply fall away to pool at her feet.
He had always thought Gretchen was beautiful, but he had never ached for her quite the way he did now. She ran her hands down her body, over breasts she had left free, and down to the garter belt that held up her smooth stockings. She stood with her legs on either side of his, and she lifted one foot onto the bed, unsnapping the garter and slowly sliding the fabric down her smooth leg. He lifted a hand and followed the trail of her fingers. When she replaced the first foot with the second, he unsnapped the hose himself and slid them down her legs, then reached up to pull her thin silk panties away. She took his hand then and led him to her center, closing her eyes when his fingers found her wet and warm. Her hands fisted in his hair as her body tightened around his fingers.
“Tell me you want me,” she demanded, looking into his eyes.
“I want you, Gretchen,” he gasped, wondering if those words had ever been truer than at that moment.
“And you need me.”
His fingers slid from her. “I need you,” he told her.
She straddled his hips and took him into her, surrounding him in warmth and wetness.
“My God, I need you,” he breathed into her ear with her body pressed against his.
She moved her hips over him more fervently, the strength of his words pushing through her. His passion was fierce now, but still he was careful not to push her, not to hurt her. He lost his hands in the hair that tumbled down her back and let his lips explore her neck and finally her chest.
All he could think was there wasn’t enough, there would never be enough time to get his fill of her, but then as she looked into his eyes and drove him closer and closer to the edge of delirium, he was certain he wanted to spend his entire life taking as much of her as he could.
“I love you,” he confessed, pulling her mouth to his and holding her tight against him.
As she drove him over the edge, he heard her whisper those same three words in his ear before she fell with him.
* * * * *
Gretchen drifted toward consciousness, growing ever more aware that Finn was no longer lying in bed with her. She opened her eyes slowly and saw him standing by the floor-to-ceiling windows, looking down on the city. He hadn’t bothered to get dressed, and she let her eyes roam over the hard muscles of his naked back. She could see the bruises on his body now, and she knew that whatever he had done the night before had not been quick or painless for anyone. Her heart ached for him, suddenly feeling too full for her chest.
“What are you thinking?” He didn’t turn. She should have known he would be aware of her.
She climbed from the bed and went to him, wrapping her arms around his narrow waist and pressing her naked breasts to his back. “I was thinking of how much I love you,” she confided, bracing herself for his reaction.
She was surprised when he chuckled and shook his head, leaning against her and holding on to her forearms with his rough hands.
“What were you thinking about?” she countered, trailing kisses along his back and up to the Celtic sign of protection on his shoulder blade.
“I forget,” he lied, “it’s hard to think with a naked woman pressed against you.”
“I could move away.” She smiled against his skin. His hands tightened on her arms, and he held her closer.
“No,” he told her, “I don’t want you anywhere but right here.”
He pulled her around so that she was standing in front of him. She was suddenly very aware of standing in front of an open window completely nude, but he only smiled at her, biting his lip enticingly.
“Are you going to tell me about last night?” she asked, rubbing a hand over the cut at his brow. He tried to look away, but she slid her hand to his cheek and forced him to meet her eyes.
“No,” he told her. “I’m not.”
Gretchen hadn’t expected it to hurt so much for him to deny her, but she felt his response like a slap in the face. She dropped her hand and began to move away.
“Don’t,” he pleaded, wrapping her in his arms. “I don’t want you to know that side of me, Gretchen. I want to…”
“I want all of you,” she cried. “I know what you’re capable of, Finn, and I love you despite that, or because of that, I don’t know. I just know that I love you, all of you.”
Finn stared back at her, still unsure of what he had ever done to win her heart or earn her love.
“I took care of them,” he told her, and there was no apology in his voice, because there wasn’t anything he was sorry for. He had to admit that he was scared of what she would think of that, but there was no way she wouldn’t find out what had happened, either through the club, or the agency she worked for.
“What happened to you?” she asked quietly, touching his face gently before taking his bruised hands in hers.
“I gave them a chance to stop me,” he replied.
“Why would you do that?” She began kissing each of his battered knuckles.
He couldn’t help the smirk that turned up the corner of his mouth.
“Because I knew they couldn’t, and I wanted them to suffer.”
He watched her as she continued to kiss his bruises, noticing as her tongue ran over his skin. His dick began to stir, filling, so that it brushed her thigh. She looked up and met his eyes, and he was surprised by the familiar look of hunger there. He wondered if he would ever be able to guess the moods of Gretchen Christensen or if she would always be an enigma to him. She ran her hands up his chest, lifting to her toes and bringing her lips to his.
“Thank you,” she whispered against him before she took his mouth.
He pulled her against him roughly, cupping her ass and lifting her so that she wrapped her legs around his waist. He pressed her against the exposed window and drove into her.
“Finn, the window,” she started to protest, but then he bent and took her nipple into his mouth, and she leaned away from him, using the window for leverage as she moved her hips against him, forcing him deeper into her warm center.
He felt her reaching out for something to hold on to; he heard her fingers as they slid down the glass without gaining purchase. Then her breathing was quickening with the rapid pounding he was giving her. Despite how he loved her, and how he wanted to protect her, he couldn’t stop himself from wanting to take her body, pushing her to the limits of her pleasure before she exploded.
“Finn.” Her voice started low, like the orgasm he was sure she was starting to feel. Then her voice rose, and his name burst through her lips on a scream, as her body bucked, and her pussy gripped him tightly, squeezing and releasing as if milking him.
It was too much for him, he couldn’t hold back, and he began to thrust deeper inside her until he too was coming undone.
He pressed her firmly against the window, as he leaned into her, trying to catch his breath before he carried her to the bed, still buried inside her. He laid her back, pressing his chest to hers as he lay atop her, trailing kisses down her neck.
“I love you,” he whispered reverently, amazed at how much pleasure he found in saying those three words.
She pulled his face to hers and kissed him deeply.
“I love you too,” she told him, before lying back and brushing the hair from his eyes.