Authors: Claire Kent
He looked up at the sound of her voice.
“Caleb,” she murmured huskily. “I’ve waited long enough. I want you inside me.”
His face twisted—with tension and weakening control, she thought. “I was going to—”
She was practically writhing now, both to emphasize her point and to keep his mouth from going somewhere it didn’t belong. “Later,” she urged him. “I want you to fuck me now.”
He didn’t argue. He pulled himself up until his face was on the level of hers. She reached down to the fastening of his pants, working on them until she was able to free his hard cock.
He hissed when she ran her fingers up and down the hard length of him. And then released a hoarse moan when she rubbed little circles over the tip. He gave an involuntary thrust into her hand, tightening his fingers on the top of the sofa, with which he was supporting himself.
“Condom,” he said.
She released him, reaching onto the floor for where she’d dropped her purse. “Here,” she offered. “I have one. It’ll be quicker.”
She pulled one out of the inner pocket and quickly tore open the wrapper, rolling it on for him and not meeting his eyes although she knew he was watching her intently as she worked.
He wanted her. That much was obvious. But anything else going on in his mind was beyond her fathoming.
With the condom in place, Caleb reached in between her thighs. He stroked her open with his fingers until he could feel her warm, intimate flesh.
She was wet, and one of his fingers slid into her easily. Kelly gasped and bucked up a little, reaching behind her head to grab on to the arm of the sofa with one of her hands.
“Caleb,” she whispered, her leg hooking around his body. “Now.”
He pulled his hand out and lowered himself over her, until his face was very close. He used one hand to support some of his weight on the sofa and the other to position his cock at her entrance.
She raised her hips to meet him, and her body adjusted easily as he slid his hard flesh inside her.
He froze momentarily, his face beside hers, his expression hidden, his breaths long and deep, as if he were breathing in her hair, which was spread out on the leather cushion beneath her head.
Kelly lay under him, wishing she could distance herself the way she used to all the time. With Caleb. With all the other nameless men she had fucked.
She couldn’t. Not really. She knew this was Caleb. Knew she hated him. And understood him. And wanted him anyway.
And all of it could exist inside her heart at the same time.
She bent her knees on either side of his hips and wrapped one of her arms around his back—still clinging to the arm of the sofa behind her for stability with the other hand.
They were a little cramped on the sofa, but not too much. Caleb’s forearms were planted beside her shoulders. He thrust into her slowly, sliding out, and then plunging back in with long, pleasurable strokes.
His face was so close to hers that his nose and lips glanced across her skin occasionally. Sometimes like a kiss. Sometimes like a nuzzle. Sometimes just an accidental contact from their motion.
His face was damp and tense, and growing tenser with each one of his thrusts. Soon, the strokes of his cock became shorter and faster. And, instead of the heavy panting, he began to grunt softly in rhythm with their motion.
It felt good, and there was something erotic about the coiled intensity and hot throbbing of his body as he pumped into her. She felt heavy and tense and breathless, but she didn’t feel an orgasm developing yet.
She raised her feet off of the sofa, pulling her knees toward her chest and allowing him to sink in even deeper, the solid substance of his cock stretching her, filling her.
He huffed out a sound of surprise and froze briefly, gasping hotly against the skin of her cheek.
Strangely proud of this evidence of his diminishing control, Kelly wrapped her legs around his waist, hooking her ankles to hold them stable.
“Fuck,” Caleb breathed, his body clenched, his arms shaking a little, his pelvis jerking in tiny, involuntary thrusts inside her.
Something tight was knotting up in her chest at his reactions, and she felt flooded with heat and confusion.
This felt different than the times they’d fucked before, and not just because Caleb seemed to be losing it.
“Caleb,” she breathed, pumping her hips against the weight of his body. “Caleb, please.”
With a muffled groan, he started thrusting again. Beginning slowly but quickly building up to a rapid, jerky rhythm again.
She could feel an orgasm swelling up below her belly, but it was still just the beginnings. The friction of his hard length as it slid slickly within her wet channel sent tingles out from their joining. And the shaking of the sofa, the sound of the leather, and the feel of its rubbing against her bare skin all seemed strangely concrete and visceral—primitive on the most basic level.
Caleb’s motion sped up until he was driving into her fiercely, and the slapping of their skin mingled with their panting and the squeaking of the sofa. But then he stopped, his eyes shut and his head jerked away from her.
“Caleb?” she gasped, her body shaking beneath him, from more things than she could process. She realized that she was digging the fingers of one hand into the sinews of his neck and so she forced herself to relax her grip. Instead, she clung desperately to the arm of the sofa behind her head.
He didn’t answer. Didn’t move. But he was breathing in heavy rasps, and his body was wet with perspiration under his clothes.
“Caleb,” she said again, this time her voice was an obvious plea. “Caleb, please.”
“Kelly,” he gritted out, his jaw clenched and his eyes almost desperate when he opened them. “Can you”—he paused to breathe—“I don’t know if I—”
Kelly tightened her legs and inner muscles around him in a way that made him groan. He tried to draw his pelvis away, sliding his cock out of her body, but her legs around him restricted his movement.
“Kelly,” he said thickly, his breath, his voice, wafting over the damp skin of her cheek.
She didn’t know why she wasn’t faking orgasm the way she had before. But for some reason she couldn’t seem to manage it now. Couldn’t tense up her body. Couldn’t release it in shudders and whimpers. She didn’t want to.
It felt like a lie.
“Maybe,” she answered hoarsely. “But it would take too long. I’m good.”
Caleb released a guttural sound and squeezed his eyes shut. He started to thrust again, moving slowly, almost stiltedly.
He was trying to hold out until she came too.
Kelly had no idea why.
But he was barely holding on, and something more powerful was happening right now than an orgasm. She tightened her inner muscles around the thick substance of him inside her, jerked her hips to create rapid friction.
She stroked down his back, feeling the fabric of his dress shirt until she reached his ass. She felt the muscles of his firm flesh there, and kept stroking until she was reaching between his legs.
She squeezed his balls.
“Fuck,” he gritted out, staring down at her face with something almost unbearable in his expression.
He came—and all of the coiled tension in his hard, heated body freed itself with a throbbing, shaking release.
She could feel his climax throughout her own body, and it made the ache in her throat, in her chest, and between her legs even deeper, even more insistent.
She was as leveled as she’d been from her most powerful orgasms, and she didn’t even know why.
Caleb had collapsed over her, his warm, sated weight pressing her into the leather of the sofa. His face was buried in her hair at the crook between her neck and shoulder. He was breathing rapidly, and she could feel his body relax and grow almost pliant in the silence.
If she could just make herself think strategically, she would know this was good. He hadn’t just come. He’d come against his will. She should be able to use it.
But she couldn’t seem to make herself think that way.
She accepted his weight for a minute, until emotion burned in her throat, in her chest. She poked him in the shoulder.
“You all right?” she asked softly.
“Yes,” he breathed, with a huff of ironic, self-deprecating amusement.
“The condom,” she reminded him, feeling his cock softening inside her.
With an agonized moan, he pulled off of her, leaving her body feeling cold and shaky.
While he took care of the condom, she grabbed a soft throw and pulled it over her nakedness. She was rarely embarrassed or self-conscious by her unclothed body, but she felt strange and vulnerable at the moment, and was hoping the blanket would help.
When Caleb returned, he had fastened his pants again, leaving his shirt untucked. He lowered himself onto the sofa, slouching against the back of it. Kelly was perfectly comfortable curled up in a ball under the throw, but she didn’t resist when Caleb reached out and pulled her against him, draping his arm around her.
Truth be told, she really liked the way he was holding her.
He was silent for so long that Kelly felt anxious and unsettled. Finally, she asked, “You’re not going to beat yourself up, are you?”
He cocked an eyebrow. “It wasn’t my most impressive performance.”
She shrugged. “Felt pretty good to me. I have no complaints.”
He gave her an impatient look.
She didn’t try to convince him any further. If he wanted to believe his performance had been a flop, she wasn’t going to go out of her way to persuade him otherwise.
It gave her a different kind of advantage—at least temporarily—and she needed every advantage she could get.
They sat together for a long time, and neither said anything. But Caleb didn’t pull away, and that really surprised her.
She just couldn’t figure out what was going on with him. The sex had obviously been real. His desire for her must be real. And he was definitely softening to her. But everything else—she had no idea.
“Why won’t you let me go down on you?” he asked, with no warning or segue.
She was so surprised she gave a little jump, until he settled her beside him again. “What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean. You don’t want me to go down on you. I was wondering why.”
She wasn’t ready for this conversation. She felt too vulnerable from her conflicted feelings, and she needed some time to recover emotionally before she could tell good lies again. All she could manage was a little shrug.
“Tell me.”
“Is it something everyone is supposed to like?”
“I don’t know. Maybe not. But you won’t even let me try.”
He wasn’t whining or complaining. His tone was slow, thoughtful, putting clues together to solve a mystery.
It was terrifying, since she wasn’t sure what he might discover about her in the pursuit. He could expose her damaged soul.
“It’s just not my thing.”
“How do you know? Has anyone gone down on you before?”
She had no idea how he’d known to ask that question, but she was trembling slightly, so she pulled out from under his arm. “Of course,” she lied. “I’m twenty-eight, and I’ve had a lot of sex. You think I’ve made it this long without oral sex?”
“You’re lying to me,” he murmured, his gaze seeing far more than it should. “You’ve never done it before.”
He didn’t look pleased or gloating or even particularly surprised. It was more like he understood something, understood her.
“What’s the big deal?” she demanded, trying not to sound too bristly, although that was the way she felt.
“It’s not a big deal, but you’re making it into one. What are you afraid of, blossom?” He reached out to cup her cheek with his warm hand.
She hated and loved when he called her that—since it felt intimate, special, a little secret between just the two of them. She heard herself admitting, “It’s just always felt like—like surrendering control, and you know how I feel about that.”
He nodded and reached over to pull her against him again. “I know.”
She expected him to ask her to let him try, to prove that she might enjoy it, but he didn’t. He didn’t say anything, just held her, and it felt like he was protecting her, taking care of her, in a way she couldn’t begin to articulate.
He was too smart to trust her completely so early. And he was too guarded and paranoid to reveal himself fully to her—even if he was starting to have some real feelings.
She wasn’t stupid enough to think he could ever fall in love with her. But there were things nearly as strong as love in the world—things like obsession, like need.
Still, he wasn’t acting the way she had predicted. In fact, in some ways he seemed totally out of character. None of this felt quite right.
It wasn’t right. She shouldn’t be here. She shouldn’t be doing this. It was as wrong as a wrong thing could be.
If she could think of anything else to do, she would just do it, but all other options would mean losing even more.
There must be more to uncover about Caleb—secrets he wanted to hide from the world. If his computer didn’t offer those secrets, then something else would, if she could stay close enough, if she could get him to really lower his guard. If she left now, all hope for either justice or retribution—or even closure—would be gone.
She had to see this through.
A few days later, she went to get Caleb from his home office, since Breah had fixed them a really nice dinner.
The office door was opened, and she paused in front of it. She could see part of the room from where she stood, mostly just an expanse of the bookcases lining the far wall.
Before she could announce her presence or knock, she saw Caleb walk into her line of sight and pause in front of the bookcase. He closed his hand over a curlicue that was carved into the wood, evidently turning it to release a latch. Because then part of the bookcase opened out to reveal what Kelly recognized as a safe.
Kelly wasn’t surprised. She’d assumed there would be one somewhere in the house. A man like Caleb would always have a safe.
She just hadn’t known where this one was.
He punched some numbers into a keypad—his body was blocking it so Kelly couldn’t see what they were—and then the safe door opened.