Damaged Goods (19 page)

Her slender body was still quivering with aftershocks when he slid to his knees behind her. “Spread your legs wider for me, sub.” She did with a moan. “Good girl,” he praised, then said, “Now don’t move.”

The dildo slid into her easily, considering how wet and ready she was. She gave a grateful moan and her hips wiggled slightly. A sharp bite on her ass stopped that and he turned on the vibrator in his hand. With one hand, he spread her luscious ass and with the other he ran the vibrator along the soft outer folds of her pussy. Her hums of pleasure rocketed up to guttural shouts when he leaned forward and licked and lapped at the sweet pucker of her ass. Brice waited until she was pushing back with her hips, trying to get more of his mouth before finally bringing the vibrator to her clit.

Her scream was a flame in his blood and in that moment the game fell away and all he wanted was more. More of her ass. More of her cunt. He wanted everything she had to give and it was a hunger that wouldn’t be denied. It could have been hours or minutes. Brice couldn’t tell, time had stopped for him. He didn’t register Riley’s screams following close behind her own orgasm. Or the men switching up. He just kept going, devouring her from back to front and back again until his face was coated in Terryn’s juices and her thighs were quivering against his cheeks.

As he pulled the dildo from her and stood up, he recognized the signs that not only was she in sub-space, but he had achieved top-space. That high that came when every sense was sharpened and attuned to the sub before him. Looking to the others, he realized that they too had gotten there. Riley was mindless and begging. Her hips flexed in time with her wordless pleas and her men looked like predators about to strike.

Terryn was teetering on the edge even now. Her body so primed and ready that Brice knew it would take very little to push her over again. He surmised that the others must have been keeping up with the game while he’d been lost in his sub, because the pails were both almost full. So full, in fact, that the first one to reach orgasm next would win.

He couldn’t stop the taunt, didn’t even want to try. “Gentlemen,” he said to draw their attention. “I won.”

Then he picked up a hose pointed it at those lovely, responsive breasts and blasted them. Terryn lost her mind. She shook and screamed and thrashed as he lashed those perfect tender nipples with the water. She looked breathtakingly glorious. Her pale skin was wet and glistening, her pert breasts pulled taut from her body, the nipples flushed a deep red within the clamps. As she shuddered and came in a never-ending dance of ecstasy, Brice couldn’t tear his eyes away.

He didn’t hear the others’ applause as he dropped the hose and stalked back to her. All he heard, all he saw, was her. Wet, panting, restrained and waiting for him to take her. He dislodged the cord but left the clamps, then kissed her while he fumbled for the condom in his soaked jean pocket. He kissed her like he’d never kissed her before. Dirty and raunchy. Fucking her mouth with his the way he was going to fuck her body as soon as he got the condom on.

“Please. Please, please.” It was a mantra that she breathed when he released her mouth. He got his jeans opened and was sliding the rubber in place when he heard a scream from Riley. He looked over to see her impaled by both her men—bastards didn’t have to worry about condoms—with Cade in the front and Trevor taking up the rear, so to speak. The sight was electrifying and erotic. The three of them were grace and beauty together and it never left him unmoved to see them like this.

He looked back at Terryn to see her watching them and she seemed equally moved. Then he slid one of those perfect, mile-long legs of hers over his hip and drove into her with every ounce of power he had. She was screaming again. Deep guttural screams in time with the hard, driving thrusts he was pounding into her body and nothing had ever sounded or felt so good.

He gathered the chains of her breast clamps into one hand and added a rhythmic tugging to match his thrusts. She was helpless and mindless. His sub fantasies come to breathing, vivid life and in the midst of his frenzy, his heart fell.

As sure and as deep as he knew his name was Brice Marshall, he knew he was in love with the woman in his arms.

He touched his forehead to hers, gathered her closer with a hand on her ass, and said, “Come with me, baby” against her lips. “Come with me now like this. One more, c’mon…there. Like that, almost…there.”

He groaned as she clenched and came in a lovely surge and he pumped once. Twice. Once more and he joined her with their heads and faces meshed together. It felt like his very soul poured into hers with every burst of release.

Chapter Seventeen

Three days later, Angie’s condition was improved from critical to stable. She was still in a medically induced coma, but the doctors had hope of a full recovery. They weren’t making any guarantees, but they were optimistic so it gave everyone else a reason to be hopeful too. Terryn was sitting at Angie’s bedside painting her nails as she chatted about all that she’d been missing.

“Well, I for one can’t wait for you to come back to work so I can quit,” she told her as she brushed on a second coat of Shameless Red. “It’s not that I don’t love Jenny. She’s awesome. I like the work too. The tips are great.”

She lifted Angie’s hand closer to wipe away a smudge. “I hate to say it, but it’s Mandy. Wow. How you have managed to work with her for all this time, I don’t know.” Feeling a little guilty about talking bad about someone, even though the person she was talking to was unconscious, Terryn looked around the room before she continued.

In a much softer voice, she said, “I just started there and she’s asking me what we’re supposed to do. She has been there for, what? Six months? Yet she asked me how to make a vanilla latté. What’s that about? How can you work at a coffee shop for six months and not know how to make a vanilla latte?”

She sighed with a shake of her head as she started on the clear coat. “It’s not just that either. Have you noticed how she never really looks you in the eye?” Terryn took a few calming breaths before she said, “And the way she treats the customers. She takes forever to make a coffee and if someone makes a comment about it, she bites their head off.” Terryn scooted down and started on the toes when she finished with, “I know she is sweet for the most part, but I just gotta say, I am looking forward to becoming a customer again instead of a coworker.”

“When did you get here?”

Terryn startled at Jenny’s voice and smeared red all over Angie’s little toe.

Jenny laughed. “Oops, sorry.”

“I’ve been here about ten minutes, why?” she asked. Jenny was looking nervously from Angie to Terryn and back again.

“Oh, I was just curious. I’ve been here for a while and just ran down to the gift shop for batteries. My camera is about dead.” She looked at the clock and asked, “Did the nurse come in already?”

“Not since I’ve been here,” Terryn answered.

Before she could question her about her strange behavior, Jenny spoke. “You know, I tried to fire Mandy, but she came to work anyway.” Her quiet laugh was infectious and Terryn chuckled with her. “It wasn’t long after she started. I told her it wasn’t working out and maybe she would do better as a maid or a waitress.” Jenny rolled her eyes at that and said, “Well, I took her keys and the very next day she was waiting at the back door when I pulled up to open. She said, ‘I tried to get in, but you have my keys’.”

With a childlike grunt of frustration, Jenny tossed her purse to the floor. The gesture was cute and disarming and Terryn laughed out loud as Jenny picked up her purse with a grimace and complained, “Who in their right mind shows up for work after they’ve been fired? I tried to tell her that she needed to find another job and that she didn’t work here anymore and you know what she said?” Terryn shook her head and watched as Jenny’s face crumpled comically into another frown and said, “’Oh, I don’t need two jobs, this one is enough for me.’”

“You can’t be serious?” Terryn laughed. “What did you do then?”

“What could I do? I opened up and she waltzed in and started working. She was better for a while after that, but I think I’m going to have to fire her again to keep her focused.” Jenny looked as exasperated as a person could get and then reached out to brush a hand along Angie’s forehead. “How are you, baby girl?”

“You didn’t leave Mandy alone in the shop, did you, Jenny?” Terryn asked, just now realizing it was business hours.

“God, no.” Jenny shuddered at the thought, then made a noise that could only be described as an evil chuckle and said, “Bill is there with her.” And the two of them laughed like loons.

That was the sight that greeted Kent and Brice when they walked into the room. Kent asked, “You two primping my sweet girl?”

If Terryn didn’t know better, she would have said that Jenny looked panicked at the sight of the two detectives.

“Are you two planning to visit long?” Her voice shook and Terryn couldn’t decide if Jenny looked ready to laugh or cry when Brice answered.

“Oh, we’ve only got about fifteen minutes before we need to head out.”

Jenny shrugged and loaded up the batteries into her digital camera and said, “Well, in for a penny, in for a pound, I guess.”

Just then, the nurse walked in and Jenny snapped up her camcorder and started filming. Terryn gave her a quizzical look but held her tongue. “Angie, Doc says you are going to be okay,” she narrated as she slowly panned the room before coming to rest with it pointed at the nurse.

The nurse, whose nametag read Natty, was young with dark hair and a pretty smile that she flashed to the camera as she turned back the covers. “That’s right, sweetie,” Nurse Natty said. “The doc will be easing back your meds in just two days and then you’ll be able to turn onto your side yourself. But for now…”

She eased Angie over to her side and just as she was about to prop a pillow behind the small of her back, she stopped with a puzzled look on her face. Cautiously, she reached out and lifted the gown away from Angie’s backside. Pure shock crossed her face accompanied by a gasp of outrage. The detectives and Terryn rushed to see what was wrong just as the nurse burst into hysterical laughter.

The men saw it next and Brice bent double with his hands braced on his knees as laughter boomed out of him. Kent braced himself on the mattress and laughed so hard he went silent with it. Terryn was blocked by the three so she had no idea what was going on until the nurse plopped back into a visitor chair still lost in her giggles.

Finally, Terryn got to see. She felt the punch of it hit her like a surprise even though she’d been braced to see. But there was no way to brace for this. With her expression frozen in a drop-jawed look of shock, she turned to look at Jenny and now understood why the woman had been acting so nervous.

Jenny had written on Angie’s ass in big black letters when no one was looking. The words were simple and to the point.

KISS THIS.

Terryn’s laughter erupted and started them all off again.

“What?” Jenny said between laughs. “She is gonna love this when she wakes up.”

When Terryn got back to the shop, easygoing, smooth-tempered Bill looked fit to kill. Terryn couldn’t imagine what would have put the normally smiling guy in such a foul temper. She hurried around the counter, plucked an apron off the hook that read
Muffins are like sex. Even when they aren’t any good, they’re still pretty good.

She asked, “Is everything all right, Bill?”

His answer was more grunt than words, so Terryn let it go and moved to help the customer who’d just walked in. After fixing the coffee, she headed back into the kitchen for a muffin to finish the order and stumbled on what she realized must be the source of his mood. Mandy was standing way too close to Bill staring up into his face. Bill looked beyond uncomfortable and even though he was in a corner, he tried to back up even more. Terryn couldn’t hear what Mandy was saying, but she didn’t think Bill would mind her interruption.

“Mandy?” she said, and then repeated it louder since it didn’t appear as if the woman heard her. “Did you make the peanut butter chocolate muffins this morning?”

When Mandy turned with a vacant smile and a shrug, Terryn asked, “I think those are them on the cooling rack there. Can you take them out to the counter, please? I’ve got to wash my hands.”

Mandy smiled sweetly and shuffled over to the plates, then checked the oven. “Mandy?” Terryn said, “They’re on the cooling rack.”

“I know that,” Mandy snapped. Her vacant pleasant face scrunched into a frown. “Who put them there?”

“I did,” Bill said from his corner, giving Mandy a look.

Mandy’s expression mellowed once more and she took the muffins out to the front without another word. Bill let out a gust of air that would have parted Terryn’s hair had she been standing closer.

“I tell you, that woman is crazy. I don’t know why Jenny keeps her on.” Bill looked baffled for a moment. “The woman just has no sense of a person’s personal bubble.” He held a hand up in front of his face until it was almost touching his nose. “Who talks to someone this close? Who is comfortable that close unless you’re getting busy?” He dropped his hand and shook his head in frustration.

“What was she talking to you about?” Terryn asked.

“She was going on and on about how much she liked Jenny, how much she liked our girls and how we were raising them right, not like some of the girls out there.” He scrubbed his hands over his face as though to wash away the memory of having Mandy that close and Terryn laughed.

“Maybe you should tell Jenny she was trying to hit on you. Then Jenny would fire her for real.”

Bill shrugged good-naturedly and waved that suggestion away. “Nah. You good to go here? I gotta get out of this place.”

“Sure,” she answered. “Mandy and I will be fine and Brice is picking me up at closing time.”

Back at in the precinct, Kent was focusing on Brian and Jenny, doing some discrete digging into recent purchases and financials while Brice was trying to track down someone who had counseled Mandy in that treatment center she’d attended as a teen.