Lies & Lullabies (6 page)

“I thought you didn’t want sex?”

“Failure number one.”

Failure. I loathed the word and it instantly made me want to comply. I pushed off the bed, intending to head into the bathroom. I hesitated.

“I said I wasn’t going to fuck you tonight,” he assured me, “and I meant it.”
 

It had been about a day since I’d been able to take a hot shower inside a clean bathroom. The sample sizes of shampoo and body wash were perfect. I took my time, washing the city’s dirt and grime off my body and out of my hair. I slathered myself in a lavender-scented moisturizer and left a touch of the hair conditioner in my hair, combing it through with my fingers.
 

Taking a few breaths previous to exiting the bathroom, I opened the door.

In the suite, Catch sat in a chair across from the bed, reclining back with his thumb rubbing the speckling of stubble on the bottom of his chin. “On the bed, spread your legs, and put your hands behind your head.” He gave me directions, barking orders while hardly acknowledging me.

I turned toward the bed to do as ordered.

“Don’t move.” The command was a soft dart, pinning me in place. His steps plodded toward me.

He gathered my hair and shifted it over one shoulder. The unexpected touch of his fingertips on my shoulder blades knotted the muscles in my shoulders. An electric chill shocked my senses as he traced the two ravens sharing one leafless branch on either of my shoulder blades. “When did you get this?”

“Two months ago,” I told him. Shortly before my first fight, I wandered into a tattoo parlor. I had no idea what I wanted at the time. I was torn between two birds: a raven and a crow. The look of the raven helped me remember a piece of beauty when my life was drenched in ugliness.

“Why did you get it?”

“It’s personal,” I answered in a soft undertone to my audible breaths.

The heat and pressure of his presence receded, leaving me shivering in the wintry chill. “Get on the bed.”

I crawled up in bed and settled myself into position, folding my knees, pushing my heels toward my ass, and readjusted the towel to cover all the private pieces of myself.

Hovering over the side of the bed, he brushed his hand across my collarbone, tickling me with the light touch of his textured fingertips. “Legs down, flat against the bed.”
 

I slid my feet down until my legs rested on the mattress.

Unfastening the towel from my chest at a leisure pace, he unwrapped it from around my body like I was a present whose contents he’d expected to receive. The back of his fingers traced a straight line down my sternum and stopped at my belly button, circling the not quite flat surface. He placed his palm flat against my stomach, allowing it to rest on my damp skin. His hand might as well have been doused in a searing flame; it heightened my self-consciousness to a level beyond normal.

I had my ass and my tits to thank for my thicker size. I inherited my mother’s classic Coke bottle shape and was cursed with a waist to ass proportion that meant jeans were my arch nemesis. I didn’t love my body, but I didn’t hate it, either.
 

With Catch, my body became a battleground. I fought to detach, and he demanded the opposite with his touch. I wasn’t used to feeling anything with anyone. While I’d only had sex with one man in my life, none of the men I’d been with outside of the single experience touched me the way Catch had. It was rough, if they bothered to touch me, and it involved the only places they thought I’d reap pleasure: tits, ass, or pussy.
 

I jerked at the sensation rifling over my skin when he raked his fingers down my pubic bone. I sucked in a breath, releasing it slowly and unsteadily.
 

“I don’t think a single word you’ve said to me since we met has been the truth.” The tonality was seductive and mild in volume, worsening the affect he had over me. A hand crept lower, stopping a few inches above my clit. He circled the area with a feather-light touch.
 

The sizzle burned my skin raw, increasing the sensitivity. Looking into his eyes worsened the sensation. My fists clenched into tight balls. My nails dug into my palms. Every muscle in my body clenched.
 

Seeking a little reprieve, I kept my eyes on the ceiling instead of Catch’s face. “I thought you didn’t want to fuck me.”

His fingers brushed against my chin. “You can’t seem to follow directions, and you definitely lack in reading between the lines.” His occupied hand continued its descent. When his fingers slid down the lips of my pussy, my mouth fell open, releasing a sharp hissing sound.
 

His attention slipped downward, and he drew his hand up. Rubbing his fingers together, he separated them in front of my view, presenting his dripping wet fingers as a source of my shame. “You’re soaking wet with the truth, sweetheart,” he drawled. “It’s not about what I want, but what you want. Do you want more? Are you aching for me to fuck you, Sugar? Is it the reason you continuously broach the topic of sex between us?”

I didn’t answer.

He crept on top of the bed, sliding up my body, pressing me down onto the mattress with his weight. Pushing his legs between mine, he directed them to spread around him. The gap in my thighs widened. The lips of my pussy stretched, opening to reveal more of what Catch’s presence did to me. The seam in his jeans rubbed against my clit, provoking and teasing me. My body worked in direct opposition with my closed-off and sheltered mind, screaming at Catch without the words spilling from my mouth; I wanted more.
 

His closed fists bowed either side of the bed as they held his upper body up and apart from me. The piercing stare wouldn’t release me. “Change my mind. Use everything you have.”

I slid my hand down my body, damp from the shower, or maybe from the salacious feelings he pulled from me. Between us, I opened myself a little more with two fingers. He pushed up, his biceps swelling and tensing to accommodate his weight while he watched the movement of my hand.

Sliding my middle finger between my slick slit, I moved up and down. Moaning and writhing around with my eyes closed, I pretended to come on the spot. “You like the way I play with my pussy? Does it make you hard?”
 

A strong grip on my wrists stopped the movement of my hand. My eyelids flew open in surprise. Shaking his head, he made a clicking sound with his tongue against his teeth.
 

“I’m doing what you said.” My voice cracked and became heavily laden with hoarseness.
 

“And it’s part of the problem. The other? I want you to feel this, not pretend you feel things you don’t.”

“I can’t,” I shot back.

He pointed a glance to my pussy. “I can see my reflection between your thighs, and I have a feeling that doesn’t happen very often.” He sank his teeth into his bottom lip and squinted at me. “Wearing panties is going to be a problem for you when you’re around me.”

Never had I heard the inflection of the word panties sound so obscene.

“What do you need, Sugar?”

“I need…spank bank material.” I blurted out the first thing that came to mind. The last thing I needed was a catalyst to make me pant for him. Unfortunately, my time machine wasn’t readily available; the statement couldn’t be retracted.

He searched my eyes for a moment and straightened his spine. A glint of a hidden motive was behind his eyes. Methodic in his actions, he grabbed the hem of his shirt and pulled it over his head, throwing it onto the nearest chair. Gazing down at me, he brushed a hand over his hair to move it away from his forehead.

His body…fuck, his body. It kept my focus prisoner. The curve of his pecs. The bumpy ridges and dents in his torso. The veins running down his arms and the bulge of certain muscles. He was covered in a tattoo of a barren forest. The roots were winding and gnarled as it extended down his abs. The tops of the trees were bleak and spread out across his chest onto his shoulders and arms.
 

My hand extended, wanting to touch a part of him.

He gave my hand a cutting glare. I thought he was going to break my fingers. I quickly removed it from the air, laying it to rest at my side.

When he unbuckled and unzipped showing a tuft of closely cropped dark hair and only a few inches of the base of his thick, flaccid cock, I lost control of my fight to remain numb.

My hand manipulated my pussy, immediately moving faster. “Why aren’t you hard?”
 

“Mental fortitude.” He grabbed the hand resting at my side and touched it to the bottom of his supple lips, caressing my fingertips with his mouth.

My body wanted to burst open and reveal my secrets. My mind fought against breaking the seal. Considering me with a fierceness that plundered the oxygen from my breaths, he slid my hand down the peaks and valleys of his ethereal body. His skin was tepid and tense underneath my palm. He halted my hand shy of tracing the trail of dark hair extending down from his belly button.
 

Shuttering my eyes, I moved my hand in small circles against my wet nub.
 

“Sugar.” He took my hand and brushed it against the base of his cock, coercing my fingers to touch the shaft. “I don’t care where you decide to set those eyes, but I need to see all of you.”

Everything in my life was about disconnection. Having it forced on me threatened to break me apart. My eyes flew open and wandered everywhere on his body. There wasn’t a safe place to rest and his face was the biggest disaster zone.
 

A flicker of pleasure shocked me. I mashed my lips together to suppress a moan.

“Open.” He pressed his thumb down on my bottom lip and pulled it from the top.

My legs began to tremble around him. The hand he held moved on its own accord and routed for his touch. He obliged and fitted his fingers through the spaces in my hand, clenching down tightly. A tingle worked up my arm, pining for a link with my brain.
 

“Call for me.”

Tears trickled down the sides of my face as I fought against myself and lost.

 
“Catch,” I moaned, my neck curving, my back arching.
 

“Again.” His forehead met mine. The closeness of our faces never deterred our need to lock eyes with one another.

“Catch.” My nerves were shocked. My pussy began to pulse. The nub hardened and throbbed against my fingers, a precursor to a painful climax. I removed my hand before the peak threatened to take me under, and wiped my damp fingers on the towel beneath me.

My gaze alighted on Catch's face, expecting satisfaction. A perplexing look cinched his features. He glanced around the room for the indiscernible. Sliding off the bed, he placed one hand out to stop me from moving and zipped up his pants, fastening them.
 

He disappeared into the bathroom, leaving me to listen to the water run for a while. When he reentered the bedroom, the belt from his pants was held tightly in his hands.
 

I slid up in bed, ready to bolt out of the room.

“Relax.” At the foot of the bed, he grabbed my ankles and pulled me down until I rested flat against the mattress.
 

Pausing to glance at me, he assured me, “You’re going to want to buck off the bed, and I don’t want to cut off the circulation to your legs by sitting on them, it will ruin what I want you to feel.” He fastened one of my legs to the rails of the footboard and fastened the other in a way that left my legs slightly spread.

My hazel eyes shot darts in his direction, carrying questions for him to answer.

Crawling back on the bed, he situated himself between my thighs. He licked two fingers and simultaneously pinned my arms above my head with one hand. He slid two fingers inside me, urging gently inside.
 

The unexpected act pulled a gasp from deep within my lungs.
 

“Sugar? Do you want this to stop?” His smile told me he already knew the answer. “Because if you do, you’re going to miss out on something incredible.”

“No,” I whispered.

“Then, relax.” He began to arc and curl his fingers, pushing against what felt like my bladder. With violet-blue eyes frozen on my face, his fingers moved quickly and shallowly pressing against the nerve point inside me.

I couldn’t make sense of what happened to me. A feverish rush tingled over my skin, consuming me in a cluster of pleasure. The sloshing sounds of my pussy rang loudly in my ears. My thighs vibrated against the jarring motion of his hand.
 

“Fuck,” was all I could whimper.
 

Awash with shocking tingles, the ball of tension exploded. Liquid trickled down, dripping onto my ass. A mix between a squeak and a moan escaped, flooding the room with my expletive filled cries. It wouldn’t let me go, the pleasure turned into excruciating ecstasy.

His hand slowed its movement. His thumb pressed against my clit, swaying back and forth, sending me over a tiny summit one last time.

I came again with a whimper instead of a shout. My legs shuddered. My pussy throbbed. I felt like I was diving into a pool laced with drugs.

He halted, bringing his dripping fingers to my mouth. “Taste.”