Bad Girl by Night (27 page)

And he touched her, kissed her, worshipped her with his eyes.

But then came that inevitable time when the tide rose within him and for a little while his
own
pleasure took over, expanding through his body in hot pulses and a wild, wired sort of tension and heat—that finally burst free inside her.

They lay together afterward for only a moment before he got up and retrieved the key to his handcuffs. It was the least he could do.

After releasing her, he slowly drew her arms down from where they’d been raised overhead for so long; then he rolled her to her side, where he lay facing her, to gently rub her wrists in his hands. The cuffs hadn’t been tight on her, but if her wrists were sore at all, he wanted to make them feel better. “Are you okay, honey?” he asked.

She nodded, looking a little astonished. “It was just . . . normal sex—only with handcuffs on.”

“I know,” he told her. He could have made it more than that, and maybe he would . . . someday. But not yet.

“It was . . . easier than I thought. To be cuffed. You should try it sometime,” she added with a teasing, pointed look.

He ignored that part to say, “See? I didn’t have anything
too
heinous in mind.”

“Letting you fuck me in the ass was actually a lot more challenging than this when it came down to it.”

“And you ended up
loving
that.”

Her face flushed at the reminder—they’d indulged in that particular act a few times now. Then she said, “Maybe you would be stronger, too—if
you
surrendered to
me
.”

He simply let out a sigh. It was a fair, sensible statement. “Maybe I would. But I’m just not quite there yet, honey.”

She tilted her head against the bedcovers, looking inquisitive. “So how is it that I’m so much tougher than you, Mr. Tough Cop Guy?”

Not to detract from her strength—because she
was
damn strong—but … “Maybe it’s because I’m
pushing
you to be. Because I love you.”

“Well,
I
love
you
, too—remember? And I’m not as good at being pushy—but I
will
push. Eventually. And you’ll let me. And it’ll be good.”

 

 

L
ater, they lay in Jake’s bed. Darkness had fallen, but moonlight streamed through the back window of his little house, still allowing Carly to see much of the room. It was simple in that “man way”—warm colors, old dark oak furniture that he’d told her had come from his grandparents. It was chipped up and could stand to be refinished, but Carly appreciated the quality and workmanship of the pieces and thought they suited Jake somehow. Solid, attractive, but just a little flawed.

Yet she could accept the flaws in him. Easily. Because—it turned out—they were so similar to her
own
flaws. She hated what had happened to him, but his past made it so much simpler for her to be with him, to open up with him. It was a rare thing in her life to feel as comfortable with someone as she did with Jake, even after knowing him only a short time.

When his cell phone buzzed next to the bed, he leaned over to grab it, and she listened to the one-sided conversation. “Dude, what’s up?” he said merrily—then, “Well, yeah, actually, it
is
late and I’m kind of in the middle of something, so . . . feel free to get to the point.”

After hanging up a few minutes later, he told Carly his friend Shane was borrowing his uncle’s cabin cruiser, docked in Traverse City, for Labor Day weekend, just a week away, and inviting the guys from the H.O.T. program who lived nearby to come spend a couple of days on Lake Michigan. “Would you be up for going if I can get my shifts covered?” he asked.

Wow. Meeting his friends. And not just for a few hours, but a whole weekend. “Will, um, Colt be there?” she ventured.

“Naw,” he said, swiping his hand through the air as if brushing the thought aside. “He’s too far away—this’ll only be a handful of fairly local guys, and a couple of their girlfriends.”

She bit her lip. “But did . . . you or Colt tell your buddies about what happened after that night at the hotel?”

“It came up,” he said quietly. “More from Colt than me—he has kind of a big mouth. But he told them about a girl named Desiree, not Carly. And I don’t think they’d care anyway, even if they knew—but they never need to know I met you before coming to Turnbridge if that’s how you want it.”

“Um, yes please,” she said, knowing it was the only way she could face his friends, and sort of hoping she’d never have to cross Colt’s path again. She’d liked him, for that night, but all things considered, it would be difficult to face him as her mild-mannered, small-town self.

Jake grinned. “So does that mean you’ll go?”

Carly’s life had kept her so isolated in many ways—and socializing with a bunch of Jake’s cop friends on a boat sounded a little stressful, just because she’d be so out of her element. But at the same time, it sounded kind of fun and exciting, too. She’d never actually
known
people who got invited on weekend trips on Lake Michigan. So she tried to sound perfectly cool and casual when she said, “Sure, that sounds nice. And it’ll be nice to meet your friends. Besides Colt, I mean,” she added, heat climbing her cheeks as she spoke.

“They’re good guys—you’ll like them. And they’ll like you.”

But she was no longer really thinking about the guys she’d soon meet—and because she felt so at ease with Jake, she didn’t hold back the question that had just entered her mind. “Now that you and I have gotten close, does it bother you, what I—we—did with Colt?”

“It was the most exciting sex of my life,” he said in reply. “Remember?”

“But . . . I mean, you didn’t know me then. You didn’t
expect
to know me. Now that you know the
real
me, does it make you think of me differently?”

She felt his look in the shadowy light. “Don’t do this to yourself, Carly.”

“How can I not?” she asked. “If I were really Desiree, I wouldn’t care, but since I’m
not
her . . . I’m a girl who
does
care. And I’m pretty sure
that’s
the girl you’re in love with, right?”

She couldn’t read his expression as he studied her, until finally he said, “The fact is, you might not like it, but you
are
Desiree. And you
are
Carly. And I’m in love with the whole package, honey, all of it. The only difference between you and most women is that you let yourself go that night, you let yourself do exactly what you felt like doing.”

“And that’s okay with you? Because even as Desiree, that was a big step, a first.”

“I don’t judge people too much on what they do sexually unless it hurts somebody—know what I mean?”

She did. But she also thought it might be different when it was someone you loved, that logic was one thing, but the built-in mores of our society usually ran deeper in most people. “I appreciate that—but to be honest, I’m still not sure how
I
feel about it. I mean, yeah, as Desiree, it was ultra exciting. As Carly, though . . . well, it’s something I would never do. The
real
me.”

“You keep talking about this real you, but what you don’t seem to get is that the girl I met in Traverse City was just a different part of you. A part you’re not comfortable with. But she’s in there,” he said, pointing his finger gently into her bare chest. “And that’s okay with me.”

She lowered her chin, still uncertain. “Yeah?”

He flashed a grin. “I
liked
Desiree. You act like she’s the devil incarnate or something, but she’s just the more confident, more daring side of you. And for your information, I was bummed out to wake up and see you were gone.”

She drew in her breath, truly stunned. He’d never told her that before. And she wouldn’t have appreciated it when in Desiree mode—because as Desiree, she’d forced herself to be so unemotional, so uncaring. But here, now, she appreciated it.

“I don’t want to freak you out or anything,” Jake went on, “but the truth is, that night excited me so much that . . . I wouldn’t mind it happening again sometime. At first, I was a little uncomfortable with the idea, with another guy being involved, but I never realized until then how much it would turn me on to share a woman, to see the woman I was with being fucked, up close like that, to be with a woman bold enough to want two guys, two cocks, at once.”

When she didn’t reply, he said, “Shit,
did
I freak you out?”

Still snuggled against him, she shook her head against his chest. After all, it was hard to be
too
freaked-out given that she was the one who’d reminded him about their night with Colt. Maybe she truly
was
starting to accept that Desiree was a real part of her, and maybe hearing Jake’s views on Desiree made that part seem . . . a lot less awful than she usually thought. She’d been consciously taking the pieces of Desiree she actually
liked
—that she was pretty and stylish and confident—and drawing them into her everyday life. But she’d never before thought about bringing the nastiest of Desiree’s naughty sex into her life, too. Now, even as her stomach churned at the very idea, her pussy flared a bit beneath the covers.

“Then . . . do you think you’d ever want to do that again?” Jake went on. “Because . . . it would excite the hell out of me to see you experience that much pleasure.”

Her heart beat faster at the very suggestion. “You wouldn’t feel . . . jealous now?”

“You love me, right?” he asked.

“Madly.”

“Then no, I wouldn’t be. I mean, sex is different when you care about somebody. As long as I’m the one you care about, it would excite me to . . . to give you that. To give you more pleasure than I can on my own, you know?”

She glanced up at him, tilted her head. There was a lot to think about here. “I’m not saying I’d even consider this, but for the record—um, don’t you have control issues? Worse than mine, it would appear? So . . . wouldn’t something like this be a problem for you? I mean, even when I didn’t
know
you had control issues—that night with Colt, you had control issues.”

In response, he gave her a smile that conceded the point. “Yeah, if there’s anything I could change about that night, I’d have been as pushy as you and Colt from the start, calling more of the shots. I was just . . . caught off guard by the whole situation. If it happened again, I’d know better.”

“So you’re saying if it happened again, you’d be the one in full control.”

“Not necessarily
full
control. But I’d hold my own from the beginning this time. And if it was with
you, now
—well, I’d probably let the other guy know you’re mine and that I’d have the final say on what does or doesn’t happen.”

She could have taken that in a lot of different ways. If she were in Desiree mode, she wouldn’t have condoned his possessiveness—but the person she saw as her
real, true
self didn’t mind, and even liked having a man who valued her that much.

Angling another grin her way in the dark room, he said, “You never answered my question, though, sweetie pie. Would you ever do it again? I mean . . . wouldn’t that be the ultimate way to feel like you’ve conquered your problems? Last time, you were
all
Desiree, and you were fucking amazing—but I’d love to experience that with you as the complete woman you are, as Carly, with no pretenses this time.”

Perhaps it was the first time since he’d asked her that she’d seriously tried to envision such a scenario. No slinky red dress or heavy makeup to hide behind. No fake name. It would also mean: no ability to turn off her emotions. She would feel it this time, inside her, as deeply as such a thing could be felt. She would be Carly Winters, Turnbridge town sweetheart gone wild. The thought brought another hot blush to her cheeks. “I . . . I don’t know if I could, Jake.”

“You want to,” he teased her with a naughty little grin. “You loved having two cocks.”

God, she
had
loved that. She might not be able to say it out loud, but the memory made her breasts ache with need as her pussy began to pulse. She’d never even
imagined
a feeling like that. Not only the physical part, but . . . what perhaps should have left her feeling at their mercy had instead instilled in her a sense of ultimate power and liberation.

Just then, Jake’s words from earlier replayed in her head.
Maybe I think that even if I can’t quite free myself that maybe I can free you—that if you give it all up to me, that’ll happen for you.
Hmm. He’d just shown her with the handcuffs that sometimes surrender did make you stronger. Even if he couldn’t surrender to certain things himself, maybe he knew what he was talking about.

Even so, she felt her blush intensify and bit her lower lip. The act had been outlandish
enough
when she’d been hiding behind a disguise, a whole different personality—when she’d thought there’d be no consequences because they were all strangers. What Jake was suggesting now would be much more complicated.

So finally she replied by saying, “I love
your
cock.”

“Nice avoidance tactic,” he answered on a laugh, clearly seeing right through her. “But if you want to tell me more about how great my cock is, I’ll let it go.”

“A
bout time, Lockhart,” a muscular, dark-haired guy called from the shiny white boat’s upper deck as Jake led Carly by the hand across the marina’s dock. They each carried weekend bags, and Jake also held a beach tote and the small shopping bag containing the bikini he’d just bought for her after finding out her only swimsuit was old and worn.

“Sorry we’re late,” he said without explaining the reason why—which suited her fine. She didn’t mind her boyfriend buying her a bikini, but she didn’t necessarily want all his friends knowing she’d never even owned one before, which she’d confided in him while shopping together in the boutique up the street.