Read First and Only: Callaghan Brothers, Book 2 Online
Authors: Abbie Zanders
“Was it that obvious? Was I that awful?”
Ian slipped a finger under her chin and lifted her face to look at him, not sure whether he wanted to crush her in his arms or throttle her for even thinking such a thing. He swore that if he wasn’t already head over heels in love with her he would have been in that moment. Her eyes were big, so filled with worry and uncertainty that it blew him away. How could she ever believe that, even for a moment?
“No,” he said gently. “You were that
good.
I’ve never felt anything like it, never.” And that was the God’s honest truth. He’d never had anyone respond to him with such pure, honest emotion. Innocent, yet wanting. “But I wish you would have told me. I would have been gentler. I know I must have hurt you.”
The thought that he had hurt her cut ribbons through his gut. He pictured the marks he’d left on her body and felt a fresh wave of guilty pain.
“You didn’t hurt me.”
“Liar,” he chastised, kissing her forehead.
“Okay, maybe it hurt a little,” she admitted, drawing small circles on his chest with her fingers. “But I was afraid if I told you, you’d stop.”
He almost snorted. She believed he could have stopped? Obviously she had more faith in his self-control than he did. Well, he probably could have stopped, but it would have killed him. Or caused permanent damage in the very least. He told her as much.
“I’m sorry, Ian,” she said, and he wished she would stop apologizing. “Are you upset with me?”
She had to stop looking at him with those big doe eyes or he was going to kiss her until she lost consciousness. Then again, he might just do that anyway, but he needed to taste her. Soon.
Could he ever be upset with her when she looked at him like that? No, not seriously, but Ian was not a fool. The slightly wicked part of him pointed out the glaring possibilities that the right response might elicit.
“A little,” he fibbed, wishing his voice wasn’t quite so husky. Then he felt her melt into him, and almost felt bad for misleading her. Yes, he was upset, but only because he couldn’t bear the thought of hurting her. But he knew that’s not how she understood it.
“Can I make it up to you?” she asked, her voice far too seductive to belong to a woman who had been innocent only a few days ago. Either she was a really fast learner or he brought it out in her. He preferred to think it was the latter.
Ian appeared to consider her question, but he already had a plan in mind. She would regret leaving him alone in her room while she took that extended shower yesterday. He had made good use of the time.
“R
ead to me,” he said, surprising her. Lexi’s head lifted from his shoulder. He fought to hold in a grin as he handed her the Salienne Dulcette novel from the nightstand. Her eyes narrowed suspiciously.
“Start on page 129, if you don’t mind,” he said.
For a moment he wasn’t sure she’d comply, but he saw the instant her eyes changed from surprised to excited and aroused. Ian pulled her onto him, letting the proof of his own desire press into her lower belly. Her weight felt good, comforting. As long as she was touching him, he could control himself. If she pulled away, all bets were off.
She opened the book against his chest, and looked at him questioningly.
“Go on,” he encouraged, his hands strategically placed along her well-rounded hips. She took a deep breath – he loved the way her breasts pressed into him as she did – and began to read.
He was easily the biggest man she had ever seen, sinfully adorned with smooth bronze flesh and rippling layers of muscle, one atop the other until it formed a relief that would take hours, days, years to learn intimately. She trembled at the sight of him, at the hungry look in his eyes, as she sat on the bed in her prim little white nightgown.
“On your knees,” he growled, removing his belt with one fluid, erotic movement. The leather snapped in the air, making her flinch, but he didn’t mistake the look in her eyes for fear. It was arousal, pure and potent.
When she made no move to obey, he grabbed her, flipping her onto her stomach. With one hand spanning her back he held her down easily, even as she wriggled against him. His other hand slipped beneath the hem of her gown, his hands rough and calloused, rasping along the back of her thighs, sending bolts of pleasure right into her core. Despite herself, she cried out.
The panties she wore were torn viciously from her with no regard for their worth, only the barest brush of his fingers against her swollen sex when she craved so much more. He smirked as he raised his hand and landed heavy, the resounding crack loud in the quiet room. But his smirk vanished and his eyes darkened when he beheld the rush of wetness his little caress had running down her thighs. It was supposed to be a night of seductive torture as he readied her for him, but he soon realized that he was the one in danger of being tortured.
“Lift your ass to me,” he growled, harsher and huskier than before as his cock strained against the limits of his jeans.
“No.”
The simple denial, spoken with obvious effort, had the first droplets of come pearling along his swollen head. She was going to be the death of him, surely.
“I said, lift your ass to me.”
A shiver ran the length of her spine before she once again answered, “No.”
Holding her upper back firmly against the mattress, his other arm snaked beneath her hips and pulled roughly upward. Before she could react, he dove between her legs, pulling her over him to straddle his face. Every effort against him was futile; he held her locked in place, his arms as strong as his resolve.
She tried to withhold her cries, but it was impossible with his wicked mouth, tongue and teeth on her. He devoured her as if he was a starving man and she was a king’s banquet. Long slow licks, teasing nips; he sucked her between his lips and then dipped his tongue into her hot entrance. He moaned, loudly, as if in great pain as she spilled even more for him.
“Son of a bitch,” he muttered as the pressure built within her. He could feel it, sense it, and it angered him. It was too fast, too easy. She could not climax yet; he would not allow it. He had clearly underestimated her need for him; she’d hidden it well.
But there was no hiding from him now, not when the truth was there in his mouth, on his tongue. He continued to hold her with one iron hand, as he released himself and worked his jeans below his hips. Damn her. She was making him burn hotter than the sun.
When she began to clench around him he withdrew. A string of foul oaths spewed from her lips, so bold and explicit he could not believe they had come from her sweet little mouth. He would have laughed had it not been for the pain nearly ripping him apart. To think that he could bring her down to such a primitive, visceral level had him nearly drunk with the power of it. Within seconds he held his overly engorged shaft at her entrance, hating himself for being so weak.
With one tremendous thrust he impaled her, making her scream so loudly the windows rattled. It was sheer ecstasy, pure and simple. He’d never felt anything like it. For a moment he just held himself inside her, certain that he had just died and had gone to heaven. But after the initial shock, she began to clench around him, a wave of ripples up and down his cock, demanding his undivided attention.
He pulled out and thrust into her again, so hard and deep that his balls slapped against her, his grip on her hips unbreakable. She wasn’t fighting him anymore. She was crying, pleading, begging him to take her harder, faster, to ease her pain. Sweat poured down his back as he lost himself in her, gave her everything, withheld nothing. The bed’s headboard banged against the wall with the force of his thrusts, yet she begged for more until she tightened around him, strangling his cock tighter than any fist.
She began to come, squeezing him so hard he saw stars. He pulled out and shoved himself into her again, finally releasing the last thread of control he held as he began to empty inside her. He penetrated her over and over again, each stroke milking more seed from him until black rimmed the edges of his sight, and still he came. Come filled her, dripped from her, coated her already slick folds, coating him as well. He rolled his hips with the final jet of seed, losing himself to the blackness as he gathered her seizing body in his arms...
* * *
L
exi stopped reading, her heart pounding like a jackhammer into his chest. Ian’s blue eyes were glowing. “Is that what you fantasize about, Lexi?”
She moved the book aside and rubbed herself against him so he could feel her desire. Reading the passage aloud while laying naked atop his arousal was incredibly erotic. She dipped her head and licked his throat, eliciting a low growl that rumbled through his chest and into hers.
She was beyond coy games, beyond lies. “Yes.”
“With me? Tell me you dreamed of me doing this to you, Lexi, while you played with your little toy.”
He knew about her toy? Yes, of course he did. She let her teeth scrape across his skin. “
Only
you. Ever.”
His eyes were as intense as she had ever seen them. Darkened to a midnight blue, they were still so clear, so flawless, like the finest sapphires. He rolled Lexi onto her back. “I’m going to take you like that,” he told her, his voice thick with lust.
“You can try.” Her skin was flushed, her nipples pebbled, the ache of anticipation riding her hard. She smirked at him, basking in the intoxicating sense of power at having a man like Ian look at her like that.
“God
damn,
baby,” he growled, flipping her onto her stomach with one smooth move. She caught the end of the bed and with surprising strength, pulled away from him. He growled – no words this time - grabbed her by the hips, and pulled her back.
“Raise your ass to me.” His voice was rough, commanding, demanding obedience.
“No.” She pushed her hips into the mattress. How many women had ever dared to deny him? If the sounds he was making - deep-throated growls of warning - were any indication, not many.
He brought his hand up and smacked her on the ass, hard enough to leave his hand print. She pushed her face into the pillow and screamed, but she raised her hips just a little as he kissed and licked the sting away. If this is what defiance got her, she vowed to do a lot more of it.
“More,” he commanded. She shook her head back and forth, still lodged in the pillow. Another smack, this time on the other cheek. She cried out again and lifted enough for him to gain purchase beneath her. His mouth found her sex and he buried himself deep, immediately causing her vision to blur with the sheer intensity of it. Lips, teeth, and tongue set to work on what had to be the most glorious form of punishment there was.
“Ian, please,” she pleaded as he took her to the edge over and over again, pulling back just before she came each time, building her need to a fever pitch. “Please, please, please, Ian. Have mercy.”
* * *
W
hen her cries became so desperate he could no longer bear them, he positioned himself behind her and began to enter her. Unlike the man in the story, he would go slow. He would never intentionally hurt her again, no matter how out of his head with lust he was.
But Lexi had other ideas. The moment he began to move she thrust back against him, taking him all at once. He cursed as she cried out into the pillow, feeling the shockwaves as her sheath fought the brutal and sudden penetration.
He held her still as he came over her, pressing her back to his chest. One arm reached beneath her, crossing over her breasts and grabbing on to her opposite shoulder, locking her into place. “Easy, baby,” he whispered in her ear as she cried. “Easy.”
His other hand found her sensitive nub and began to caress it until the pain turned into pleasure again and he felt her inner muscles begin to work him from the inside. Only then did he begin to move, slowly at first, then increasingly faster and harder as her body grew accustomed to him.
When she came, she came so hard that he was forced to hold her up, gripping her hips while he pistoned into her harder and faster, the slap of flesh a fast, furious tempo. Ian was lost, no longer a civilized, disciplined man, but a brutal, primal beast. He gripped her tightly, needing to feel every possible inch of her against him. When his own release was imminent, he instinctively held her hips and curled his pelvis, driving deeper and harder, scraping against her most sensitive spots, forcing a second, fierce climax as he angled himself, rocketing his release right into her cervix.
Like the man in the book, darkness tinged his vision as sweat burned his eyes. He collapsed to the side, holding Lexi tightly against him, remaining joined with her. Gasping desperately for breath, he tried to make sense out of what just happened.
“Are you alright?” he choked out, suddenly fearing that he might have hurt her in his temporary loss of control.
She turned her head back to him, and the look in her eyes annihilated him. They were glowing,
glowing
, with pure, unconditional love. He squeezed her tighter, fighting back the urge to sob. Dear God. She loved him. He knew it, felt it as certainly as he’d ever felt anything in his life. And if there had ever been any doubt, he knew in that moment that he loved her too.
Their coupling had been so intense, so profound, that had she not been on birth control, they would certainly have created a child. The thought saddened him a little. The idea of her carrying his child sat very well with him. It was something they would have to discuss. Right after he asked her to marry him. He considered proposing right then and there, but thought better of it. He wanted to do this right. Really right. Candlelight. Roses. The most stunning ring he could find.
“She’s good, isn’t she?” Lexi said sleepily a while later, Ian’s body spooned protectively around hers, still buried deep inside her as he lazily contemplated different methods of proposal.