Muscle for Hire (22 page)

The kiss was more tender than any he’d given. Barely a contact of skin to skin. As much as he wanted to plunder her mouth, he knew the split on her bottom lip wouldn’t allow him.

So instead, he feathered her parted lips with the softest of kisses before moving to her throat. She curved her neck, allowing his mouth to travel her throat. He tasted every inch of her flesh, desperate for her. He nipped at her skin with his teeth and sucked at the spot until she whimpered. Her hands found his hair, tangling in strands.

“Oh…”

Her shaky sigh ignited fresh need in Aslin. He groaned in response and dragged his lips up to her ear. She rolled her head and he sought out the tiny dip near her pulse and flicked his tongue over it before nipping again.

“Aslin…”

Rowan’s moan vibrated through him. He lowered his mouth, exploring her collarbone, kissing the faint bruise there. A shard of anger surged through him, the cold memory of what caused the bruise assaulting his rapture.

Someone was trying to—

The torturous thought was lost to him when Rowan’s hands directed his lips to her breast.

He suckled on one puckered nipple, rolling it between his teeth and laving it with his tongue.

She moaned and panted words fell from her. Words like yes, more and harder.

He refused to allow himself. One of them needed to remain in control. It would be too easy to succumb to the desire engulfing them both. To live in the moment and forget her injuries. He had no doubt Rowan could deny the pain in her body, but he would not allow himself to cause any.

Not physical pain.

Sexual pain…pain from the pleasure he gave her? That was a different matter.

And so he continued his tender worship of her nipple, her frustrated cries for more feeding the fire in his groin.

He slid his mouth to her other breast, cupping its weight with a gentle hand as he licked at her nipple. One swipe of his tongue. Two. Three.

“Please, Aslin.” Rowan’s voice was a husky whisper. “Harder, please?”

He closed his lips around her taut nipple and sucked once.

“Yes.” She arched into him, bunching her fists tighter in his hair.

He sucked again, a little harder this time, and then dragged his mouth up to her jaw.

“I don’t want you gentle,” she protested, shifting on her knees until she was closer to him. “I can take it. I—”

He brushed his lips over hers, silencing her protests. “Shush.” He chuckled. “I’m in charge.”

Her own laugh bubbled up her throat. “Fine. But I’m not going to be injured forever, ya know.”

Aslin lifted his head and grinned down at her. “Oh, I know. But for the moment, you are, which means I’m in charge. Got it?”

She arched an eyebrow. “Yes, sir.”

He squeezed her butt. A little. “You’ll pay for that later. But for now, I’m going to carefully lay you on your back. You’re not allowed to touch me. You’re not allowed to move. Do you understand?”

“What if—”

He gave her a stern look. “You are not allowed to move. I may be dangerously close to losing control, but I still
am
in control. And that means I can walk away if you don’t do as I say. Wrap your arms around my neck.”

Rowan did as he ordered. The second her breasts and belly pressed to his torso, his cock throbbed with exquisite agony. Hot blood flooded its length, turning it to a rod of excruciating need. He denied its demands, finding Rowan’s gaze with his stare as he smoothed his arm around her uninjured side and back. Leaning slightly forward, he planted his free hand on the bed, supporting as much of their combined weight as possible. “Ready?”

She nodded.

He lowered her slowly, slowly, onto the bed, watching her face for any sign of pain. There wasn’t any. None at all.

Just an undeniable desire and hunger.

The moment he felt the mattress take her weight, he straightened, sliding his hand from behind her back.

She adjusted her legs, keeping her knees bent on either side of his thighs, her stare never leaving his face.

“Put your arms where they won’t hurt.”

Without a word, she slid the backs of her hands over the duvet until her arms were resting slightly from her body. Aslin’s stomach clenched at the bruise staining her flesh over her ribcage. He bent, placed his hands on the bed and brushed his lips against the injury.

“Oh God.” Rowan’s breathless whisper stroked his senses.

He kissed her flesh again, just as softly, barely making contact.

A delicate shiver rippled through her. “I’ve…I’ve never had anyone kiss me better before.”

He lifted his head and gazed down at her. “I’ve never been in love before.” The confession left Aslin before he could stop it.

Rowan’s lips parted. “Jesus Christ, Rhodes, I want you inside me. Please?”

In response, he repositioned himself between her legs, skimmed his palms down the length of her thighs to her knees and oh so gently lowered his mouth to her pussy.

She gasped at the first swipe of his tongue over her folds.

He stopped. Lifted his head. Studied her. “If you feel any p—”

“Again, Rhodes.”

“Now who’s being the bossy one?”

Chuckling, he lowered his head back to her sex and ran his tongue over her clit.

“Oh, yes.” Rowan’s sigh fueled his pleasure. He lapped at her pussy, keeping each stroke measured and tender. With every pass of his tongue on her clit, her moans grew louder. He feasted on her juices, reveling in her flavour as he lapped at her sex. Beside his head, her legs trembled. He paused, knowing she was close to release. Her ragged pants and whimpers told him so. But he didn’t want her coming yet. There was so much more he wanted to give her. He wanted to take her so much higher.

Raining a slew of soft kisses along the inside of her thighs, he replaced his mouth on her sex with his fingers. He parted her folds, rolling her clit under the pad of his thumb.

Rowan’s breath hitched and a soft gasp escaped her. Followed by a low moan as he slipped his index finger into her moist slit.

“Oh God, Aslin.”

Her legs trembled again. He continued to explore her inner thighs with his lips as he gently wriggled his finger deeper inside her, seeking out the inner sweet spot of her sex.

She whimpered, her pussy sucking at his finger with constricting pressure.

Aslin’s head swam again. His cock ached, engorged with need. He refused to acknowledge its torment. Rowan’s pleasure was his only purpose.

Withdrawing his finger from her sheath, he stroked her clit again. Little circles of increasing pressure and speed. She called his name, a husky plea he wanted to surrender to.

Instead, he dipped into her pussy, two fingers this time, scissoring them within her feminine walls as he moved his lips to her belly. He painted the flesh around her navel in a string of soft kisses, journeyed the subtle line up her abdomen with his tongue. She moaned, her eyes closed, her breath rapid and shallow.

When he reached her breasts, when he claimed one distended nipple with his mouth, her pussy squeezed his fingers.

“I’m…I’m going to come soon.”

Her panted words flayed Aslin’s control. Fed his desire.

He suckled on her nipple with growing need. If he didn’t stop soon, he would be unable to.

Forcing himself to release her nipple, he worked his way back down her body with feathery kisses on her skin, tender swipes of his tongue, his fingers stroking her inside the whole time.

Making love to her in the most gentle way he could. Giving her the pleasure she so desperately sought.

Returning his mouth to her spread folds, he stroked his tongue over her clit, bathed her clean of her cream before sucking on the tiny knot of sensitive nerve-endings again.

Rowan cried out, thrusting her hips upward.

Aslin suckled again, nipped her clit with his teeth, and then, as her hips bucked once more, penetrated her sex with his tongue.

As deep as he possibly could.

Rowan’s orgasm gushed over his tongue, his lips. He drank in her flow, even as his other senses feasted on her release—her raw moans, her musky perfume, her quivering thighs framing his head…

She came and he continued to make love to her with his tongue, addicted to her pleasure. Greedy for it.

And when the pulsing pressure of her inner walls began to fade, he laved his tongue over her clit again and dipped his finger inside until another orgasm claimed her.

And one more.

It wasn’t until his cock screamed at him for its own release that he pulled away from her body.

He straightened to his feet, on fire. In pain. Fuck, so much pain.

“Aslin?”

He sucked in breath after breath, refusing to open his eyes. If he looked at her now…

The rustling sound of material told him Rowan was moving. Reaching for him.

He jerked open his eyes. Took a step back.

“Aslin,” she whispered. “Let me—”

He shook his head. “If I let you touch me, love, my control is fucked. I promised I wouldn’t hurt you, but if you touch me…”

The rest of his statement hung on the air between them, as taunting as the flush in her cheeks, as tormenting as the scent of her release in his breath.

His cock throbbed, pushing against the zipper of his jeans, engorged.

“Then I won’t touch you.” Rowan shifted on the bed, facing him on her knees. “But let me watch. Please? Let me see how much you want to fuck me. Look at me as you fuck your own hand and imagine it’s my—”

Aslin tore open his fly before she could finish.

His cock sprang free, jutting upright, no longer imprisoned by his jeans. He wrapped his hand around its swollen length, grounding out a harsh breath as even that contact sent shards of concentrated pleasure into his core.

“Look at me,” Rowan murmured

He snapped his stare to her face, his hand choking his leaking dick.

“Imagine that’s my cunt engulfing your cock, not your hand.”

Her words pushed him over the edge. He punished his erection, pumping its length with savage force. Up and down, slamming the side of his clenched fist to the root of his shaft every time, staring at Rowan as he did so.

Unable to look away from her.

He ground his teeth, refusing the groan in his chest. Trapping it there as he fucked his hand and stared into Rowan’s eyes.

It was the most raw, truthful connection he’d ever made with a living soul.

I love her. I love her. I love her.

The feverish, heady thought roared through his head. His release erupted from him, detonating in the deepest part of his groin before radiating out to his balls, the base of his spine, his anus. It shot up his spine like a current of white-hot fire. It sank into the pit of his gut. He sucked in breath after breath through clenched teeth, watching Rowan witness his climax, wanting her to see exactly what she did to him.

His seed spurt from him. Arcs of white, ropey fluid that shot up into the air.

“Oh God,” Rowan moaned, “I can’t…”

Before Aslin could move, before he could register what she was doing, she moved off the bed and sank to her knees before him. Her hand covered his come-slicked one on his dick and she slid her lips over the bulbous head of his cock.

His seed flowed into her sucking mouth, over her tongue. She pressed her teeth at his flesh.

Searing pleasure consumed him. He threw back his head and finally allowed his suppressed roar to tear from his throat as his hand still pumped his spurting erection with Rowan’s hand covering his.

And then it was over.

Strength deserted him.

He crumpled to the floor, the sounds of his panted gasps joined by Rowan’s laughing joy as she stretched out between his legs on the floor, resting her cheek on his inner thigh, combing her fingers through the pubic hair on his scrotum.

“You weren’t meant to move, Hemsworth,” he rasped, his gaze jumping blankly around the ceiling as he fought for breath in his lungs.

At his groin, Rowan chuckled. “I may regret it later.” She stroked her fingers over the flat plane of flesh next to his hip. “But I don’t give a fuck right now.”

“Remind me to tan your backside when you’re better.”

She lifted her head and grinned at him down the length of his body. “You can do other things to my backside when I’m better if you like.”

Aslin’s gut tightened at the thought. He groaned, returning his gaze to the ceiling. “Rowan, I’ve already exerted all the control I possess. If you keep talking like that…” He let the promise remain unspoken.

She laughed.

Five minutes later, Aslin realized he was slipping into sleep. And still on the floor.

Lifting his head, he peered down at Rowan, a smile on his lips.

She was sound asleep, her cheek resting just above the root of his cock, the fingers of her hand loosely cupping his balls.

The overwhelming desire to not disturb her, to stay exactly where they were welled through him. For a heartbeat. Commonsense told him the floor was
not
the place for a person who’d survived an explosion to be.