On the Ropes (20 page)

“Thank you for the trust.”

A door slammed closed on the other end of the house. Stephen canted his head toward the sound and listened until the sound of a car engine started downstairs. It seemed the Rozhkovs were going out, and he could probably thank his brother-in-law for it later.

Things might get a little loud.

Stephen moved away and stepped out of his shorts. He took his time undressing. Folded everything neatly and stacked it all on top of the dresser in front of Jan.

Her face may have been forward, but her gaze tracked his movement. He didn’t care enough to correct her on it at the moment.

He stalked over, and her stare fell more and more as he got closer. It started at his eyes and when he was right in front of her, it landed on his aching cock.

Some men could hold back their erections—compartmentalize the stimulation so their dicks stayed soft while they teased—so their partners wouldn’t know how they affected them.

Stephen wasn’t one of those men and didn’t care to be. Being hard didn’t make him any less in control.

Her lips parted when he brushed the tip of his cock against them.

She tried to suck him in, but he pulled out of her mouth. A tacit reminder of who was in charge.

“How are your knees?” he asked.

She lifted each as if to test them. “A little tender.”

“Sit back on your heels.”

She did.

He moved closer to her, planting a foot on either side of her clamped knees.

Her forehead furrowed, but she said nothing. She had to have known at that angle, there wasn’t much she could do besides kissing his thighs.

“Tilt your head back and open wide,” he said.

Her face was still fixed with consternation, but she did as he asked. She dragged her wet, pink tongue over her bottom lip before pulling it back into her open mouth.

“Stick it back out.”

Her nose crinkled as she did it.

Too fucking cute for what he was about to do.

He picked up his sac, spread his legs farther, and settled it on her extended tongue. “Make it wet. All over.”

After a halting start, she took up a confident rhythm of licking and sucking. She drew his balls into her mouth and massaged them one at a time with gentle whorls of her tongue. She turned her gaze up to him as if she were looking for feedback, and she got it with every tightening of his nuts.

The cock he held against his belly started weeping. He pulled back, and she let him fall from her mouth with a sigh.

“Up on your knees. Open wide.”

Her lips parted and he slipped his cock between them once more. She formed a strong suction around his shaft the moment his head touched her tongue. She wasn’t going to let him tease this time. She took more of him into her mouth and his legs damn near gave out beneath him.

He pressed his hands to the sides of her head and slowed her sucks. His plan hadn’t been to spill his seed down her throat, and he was already dangerously close to it. The anticipation would probably kill him long before her jaw grew tired.

He pulled out of her and helped her stand. Easing around her, he pressed his body against her backside. Her teasing fingers tickled his belly as he pressed his hands over her breasts and pulled her earlobe into his mouth. While drawing out the delicate flesh, he clamped her nipples hard between his fingers, and smiled when she bucked.

He let her ear snap back and licked where his teeth had been. “I want to decorate your body. Mark you as mine.”

“I don’t mind a little biting.”

“Oh, I’m going to do that, too, but that’s not what I had in mind.” He pulled his hips back when her searching fingers alighted on his cock.
Not yet
.

Twisting her nipples, he said against her ear, “I’d mark you in places no one else could see—that only you and I would know about. Maybe here.” He plucked both nipples hard enough to make her yip and immediately pulled her back against him by the hips. He let his hands trail down past her pubic mound and pressed his index and middle fingers against her clit. “Or maybe here.”

She squirmed against him, grinding her cunt against his hand. He wrapped his left arm more securely around her waist to hold her still, and traced slow circles around her nub.

“Just a little metal, so every time your clothes bushed against your skin, you’d feel its pull and be aroused by it. You’d wish I were there to give you some release. Bend you over and fuck you soundly.”

He nestled his cock into the warm cleft of her ass and slid two fingers into her sheath. She let out a startled gasp when he added another finger and fluttered them inside her.

“Look at how wet you are.” He slipped his hand out of her and held it in front of her face. His fingers were coated down to the knuckles with her natural lubricant. He put them back where they were and attacked her clit with his thumb while his fingers thrust in and out of her.

Her pussy clamped around him, her hips squirmed what small amount they could—anything to hold him in, to show that this was pleasurable for her, even when her words did not.

He didn’t care if she didn’t scream. All the evidence he needed that he was getting the job done was right there on his hand.

“You like the idea of belonging to me, don’t you? Of letting me give you what you need?”

She said “yes” on a quiet gasp and pushed up onto her tiptoes as he finger-fucked her harder.

“Good.”

He pulled away, only to lead her to the bed. He picked her up easily, set her on her knees at the end, and pushed her shoulders down flat. With her ass and pussy bared up to him so enticingly, he couldn’t resist bending down for another taste of her. Her moans spurred him on as his thumbs parted her lips and his tongue delved into her.

He wanted her to come like that—with him up close and personal—but he’d meant to keep her on the edge, not give her release. She wouldn’t come again until his cock was inside her, but the prospect of her gushing into his mouth again was like the brass ring of sexual endeavors.

God.

He swirled his tongue over her puckered hole and pushed a finger into it before what he was doing registered.

“Stephen!”

“I plan to own every part of your body.” He flattened his tongue over her mound and stretched her tighter hole with his finger. Her toes curled against his thighs as he slipped another finger into her and withdrew his tongue. “I’m going to know your body even better than you do.”

He parted her thighs farther with his own. His cock’s head probed her wet entrance, and she tried to sit back on it.

His fingers in her ass kept her at bay.

“Stephen…”

“I’m going to fuck you. Don’t worry, but we’re on my time now, remember? Not yours. You kept me waiting, and I’m simply doing the same.”

“It’s not the same thing, and you know it!” She wriggled her ass at him, and somehow he stopped himself from ramming into her full-bore and making her submit.

He reached beneath her and stroked her clit while pushing the fingers of his other hand into her up to the knuckles.

Face pressed against the comforter, she swore, and spread her legs farther for him.

Inviting him in.

He accepted the invitation.

Jan bit her lip hard as Stephen plunged into her and harder still when he pulled his fingers out of her ass.

He grabbed her hips and pulled her back onto his cock so forcefully that his thighs slapped against hers.

Oh, God.

With her hands bound as they were, the only control she had was with her mouth and hips. She could pull away. She could tell him to stop. But, she didn’t want to.

With each aggressive thrust, her body relented more to him, and her brain went right along with the scheme.

“Yes, fuck me,” she whispered.

Her pussy clamped around him, rewarding each tap of her cervix—each massage of her G-spot.

She felt uninhibitedly wanton and freer than she’d ever been, and knew it was a matter of trust. She didn’t know when she’d given it to him so completely, but it’d toggled some switch in her head.

Maybe it was when he’d said he wanted to claim her—to own her body. That meant he wanted to
keep
her. In the past, she might have bristled at the thought of being kept, but that was B.S.

Before Stephen.

“I’m fucking you,” he returned after performing some sort of swirling figure-eight with his cock that had her clawing at the air and muttering nonsense words.

“And later, I’m going to make love to you. Do you hear me? I’m going to untie you…”

His tug of her clit made her blaspheme.

“And I’m going to kiss you breathless. I’m going to make you hold me and look me in the eyes while I make love to you. Do you hear me?”

She didn’t see where it made a difference, but she nodded the best she could.

He increased his already dizzying pace, and soon her body felt tight as a drumhead. His very next thrust made her explode.

He wrapped his arms around her chest and pulled her up against him, thrusting up into her while he whispered into her ear.

“You deserved to be loved, Jan, and I’m going to love you.”

She came again, squealing through clenched teeth and seeing nothing but stars.

“I’m not just going to tell you I love you, but I’m going to show it every day that I can. I’m not the kind of man who’ll phone it in.”

“I know,” she said in a rasp. He’d proven it for a year. He’d shown that it wasn’t the prospect of chase propelling him, as it was with so many other men. She’d played hard to get, but he’d won.

She’d
let
him win, and that was the important part.

His hard body against her back began to strain and shudder, and his breath came out in a hiss.

His rhythm fell apart as he set his teeth to her shoulder and bit.

She screamed as he came. His spasming cock set off an orgasm that made the first two feel like warning shots.

“Oh, God.” He was so worth the wait. Worth her implicit trust and attention…but could she give it?

He let her down gently and pulled out, rubbing the small of her back as she relaxed against the covers.

The bed shifted, and he padded away. Her eyelids were heavy and her body utterly relaxed in the aftermath of three powerful orgasms, and she wanted to do nothing more but wallow in bliss. He’d done that to her in a way no one else could.

When he returned, he untied her, settled them both under the covers, and pulled her close. She sprawled half on him, half off, with her thigh slung over his and her cheek pressed against his chest. His heartbeat was a slow staccato against her ear, further lulling her to a contented place—a place where she felt welcomed.

He skimmed his fingertips tenderly up and down her spine. “You should stay here,” he said. His hand paused at her nape, right beneath her hairline in a ticklish place that made small spasms erupt down her spine.

She reached back and pressed his hand more firmly against her neck. “That seems out of the blue.”

“It’s not. I just want you to know that the option’s on the table.”

She pushed up onto her hands and stared down at him. “I’m certain your sister would find the option rather inconvenient.”

“Why would she? And why do you think I haven’t thought this through?”

“Oh, right. Lawyer.” She rolled her eyes, then rolled off
him
. Pulling the covers up over her breasts, she stared at the ceiling. Of course he had his entire life planned out, and could probably change his goals midstream if it suited him. She couldn’t be so flexible.

“Meg and I share the house. It’s empty most of the year, and obviously isn’t being cared for. It makes sense to have someone here.” He smoothed some hair back from her forehead.

“A house-sitter.”

“Stop trying to sanitize our relationship. If you don’t want to call me your boyfriend, that’s fine. We’re adults. You can call me whatever you want, but don’t behave as if this is some superficial thing I’m handling with uncalled-for flippancy. It’s true I’ve never invited a woman to stay here before, and I’ve damn sure never wanted to ask one to
live
with me.”

“
Live
with you?”

His shrug was slow. Lazy. “Part of the time at first. I’m transitioning. I’ll be between here and Boston tying off loose ends.”

“What do you mean, loose ends?”

“When I go back to work next week, I’m putting in my notice.”

“You really mean it?”

“I do. I’m not happy, and I have a luxury that most other people don’t have. I can
choose
something different. I can choose to do nothing at all.” He wrapped an arm around her waist and rolled her smoothly onto her back. A gasp fell from her lips as he slipped inside her.

Her body was sore, but welcomed him anyway.

“I’m not going to beat around the bush, Jan,” he whispered into her ear. “I want you here when I am, and I intend to make up for lost time.”

“Hmm?”

“You’re so used to being alone, but I’m not going to allow you that. I want you in my presence all the time, not just so that I can use your body as I see fit…” He slipped an arm under her ass and pulled her more firmly against him. Her clit sent out its first tingling signs of surrender, and all she could do was whimper.

She couldn’t think.

She closed her eyes to shut out the distraction of his searching green stare. “Wh-what do you want from me?”

“I want everything from you. Your trust. Your body. Your love.” His expert thrust made her keen. The pleasure made her feel so full that it was almost at the point of discomfort. She may very well explode.

“Do you understand, Jan? I want us to have something stable and lasting. No more running. No more long-distance wavering. You
here
.”

Her next shout of pleasure upon the swerving of his hips was so unintelligible, she couldn’t make sense of the words her own damned self. Something about
take me, take me, take me
, but in nonsense words.

“We’re going to get married and have a bunch of kids. You can work or stay home. I don’t care.”

His thrust set her teeth to chattering and toes to curling. She grabbed at anything she could as he ground into her, feeling very nearly ready to fall apart. Body and heart were of one accord—they both wanted what Stephen offered. He offered a future and a promise of warmth like what the Emersons had. She wanted that.