All In: The Blackstone Affair (Book 2)

“I want you too.” She nodded and leaned up to kiss me. “Take me to bed, Ethan.” The most beautiful words I’d heard in days and days met my ears. I took those sweet lips she offered and scooped her right up off the floor, her body tight against my chest.

She wrapped her legs around my hips and buried her face at my neck. I groaned out loud and started walking. When I got us to the bedroom, the sight of the bed made up with clean sheets had never been more welcome. Monday! Annabelle had come, thank the blessed gods! If those sheets from this morning had still been there with the evidence of my pitiful wanking session all over them, I don’t know what I would have done. I made a mental note to give Annabelle a nice—thank you for being discreet—tip.

I laid Brynne out on her back and just looked down at her for a moment. The need to go slow was important this time. I wanted to cherish her and accept this gift she was giving to me. I needed to savor her.

Her hair swept over her shoulders and her eyes looked sort of green against the turquoise top she still wore. Not going to be wearing it for long.

I started on her trainers. Then the ankle socks. I cupped her feet and massaged them before sliding up her leg and hips to the waistband of her shorts. My fingers slipped underneath and gripped. Down they came. My eyes took in the reveal of her skin as the fabric slipped away—navel, hip bones, stomach, pussy, and long legs. Legs that would wrap around me when I was deep inside that beautiful, bare pussy of hers. Sweet Christ.

There was a reason my girl was a model. A nude model. She possessed a body that had the power to render me speechless. I wasn’t done revealing my masterpiece yet, though. I reached for her top. It was a one-stop shop too. Nothing underneath. I wanted to shout out a triumphant YES. Her breasts spilled out to the side as soon as I got that shirt off over her head.

“Brynne . . . beautiful.” I heard the sound of her name come off my lips but couldn’t remember intending to say it. I had to see her naked again, to remember how she looked, to know I had the right to touch her and that she’d accept me. I had to have some small part of her inside me before I could do anything else too, I was that desperate.

Slowly I dragged my mouth from her navel up to one perfect breast, covered the whole nipple and sucked deep. I pulled her up inside my mouth and caressed the underside with my fingers. So soft. She budded up tight and hard underneath my tongue, and I had to give consideration to the other one to be fair. Those beauties deserved an absolute equal share of my attentions toward fairness for sure.

She looked so yielding and sensual lying there for me to fill my eyes with her image. Like a portrait. But one that only I would ever see. That’s not true. The nagging irritation was fleeting as I pushed down deep into the dungeon of my mind the idea of others seeing her naked. Right now I had a feast before me. It was time to partake.

I needed to feel that flesh against my tongue and lips. I needed so much from her that I was shaking as I kicked off my shoes and reached for my belt. I stripped out of my clothes fast, very aware that Brynne watched every move I made, her eyes traveling all over me. The sight of her admiring made me so hard my balls hurt and my cock burned. Only for her.

I lowered onto the bed with my knees leading, totally distracted about where to go first. She was a banquet for me all splayed out, her legs bent slightly but not revealing what I wanted to see. My urges rose up from somewhere and the words came out of my mouth. “Open up and show me. I want to see what’s mine, baby.”

Slowly, her feet slid upward until they were flat on the sheets as she bent her legs at the knees. I held my breath and felt the thud of my heart in my chest. She shifted one leg over and then the other. Just like that. She did what I’d asked of her. Perfect submission in a graceful maneuver that ran a jolt of lust up my cock just from the show she was giving me. I was nowhere near satisfied. I wanted a good long look before I started in on what I’d been denied for too many days.

“Put your hands up over your head and hold on to the bed.”

Her eyes flickered a bit and focused on my mouth.

“Trust me. I’m gonna make it so good for you, baby. Let me do this my way . . .”

“Ethan,” she whispered, but she did what I asked, slowly bringing her arms up to cross wrists over her head and grip the edge of the mattress. God, I loved when she said my name during sex. I loved when she said it, period.

“Baby.” Her breasts puddled to the sides and up a little with the rise of her arms. Those perfect raspberry-tipped nipples begged for more of my tongue. I went back to them, sucking and tweaking the sensitive flesh, loving how she moved beneath my mouth. She flowed in a rhythm with me.

I dragged my lips off her. My fingers reached out for a nipple and rolled it around before pulling the tip up in a little pinch. She moaned and arched for me but kept her arms up. I pinched the other one and watched her flex her hips a little, her legs widening and displaying even more of that part of her I needed to know again.

“You’re so beautiful like this,” I said against her stomach as I kissed my way down to the place I needed to have my mouth against. I kissed first and loved her response. She trembled beneath my touch. I flicked my tongue over her folds, pressing her open like a blossom. Mine. She flexed her muscles and whimpered. Small, soft sounds of pleasure and need. Need for what I could give to her. Need for me.

“You are . . . so fucking beautiful, Brynne,” I murmured against her flesh.

“You make me feel beautiful,” she stuttered in a whisper and opened up a little more underneath me.

“That’s it . . . give yourself over to me, baby.” I kissed her pussy lips just like I would her mouth. “I’m going to make you come so hard, and you’re going to think of nothing but me when I do,” I told her.

“Please make me . . .”

I growled against her flesh. “Making you come under my tongue is the sexiest thing in the world. How you move. How you taste. How you sound when you get there…”

“Ahhh . . .,” she moaned and moved beneath me. Such a gorgeous sound. I went to work on her in earnest as she cried out, arching her hips to meet my mouth. I held her open and devoured the quivering softness. I couldn’t stop and I couldn’t slow down. Her quim up against my lips, where my tongue could find its way inside her over and over again, was all I cared about. I kept it up, sweeping over her clit until I felt her go off.

“Oh, God, Ethan!” she cried softly, convulsing as her climax took over.

“Uh-huh,” I groaned, barely able to speak. “Now you’re going to do that again!” I told her as I moved up and aligned my cock. I flinched when our parts touched, like a jolt of electricity charged me. Our eyes met and hers widened in that instant before I took her.

I buried my cock on a hard, slick thrust, unable to deny myself for another second. She moaned the sexiest sound I’ve ever heard when I sank down into her. Fuck, she felt good—tight and hot and swallowing me in, her inner muscles clenching around me through the force of her ongoing climax. It was something so fine it frightened me to understand the power she held over me. Brynne held me captive as she had done from the first. Sex was no different. She held me captive all of the time.

She moved with me, accepting every stroke like she needed it from me to live.

“I’m going to fuck you until you come again!”

And I did.

Brynne took it all; every pounding drive of my cock into her sweet cove, the sound of our bodies slapping together filling the air, bringing us closer to the end. I loomed over her face with mine, gripping her eyes with mine, owning her body with mine. I saw only her. I felt only her. I heard only her.

She tensed deep inside and rolled her eyes back, her mouth falling open. I took that too. I covered her lips with mine and thrust inside with my tongue. I swallowed her cries when she started to orgasm and gave her mine when the rush hit me in the balls. This was going to be immense: a blast of something indescribable, pleasure that belied words to express what it felt like, shot up my cock. I could only get lost in her and ride it out as I fell into oblivion with the explosion.

My body slowed to a stop and just stayed buried inside her, still convulsing through the pulses. I didn’t want to ever leave where I was. How could I?

Time stilled and we breathed. The simplest task of taking in oxygen was all consuming. I could feel her heart pounding beneath my chest and the little spasms of pleasure being drawn out to the last around my cock from the tight walls of her quim. So fucking good.

When I could bear to pull my mouth away from her skin, I hovered over her face, searching her eyes for something good. I was afraid for what I might see. The last time we’d been like this together, very bad things happened in the next moments. She told you to get off her and walked out the door.

“I do love you.” I whispered the words, barely audible just inches away from her face, and watched her eyes grow luminous and then wet. She started to cry.

Not really the reaction I’d hoped for. I pulled out of her body and felt the gush of wet between us. But Brynne surprised me yet again. Instead of distancing herself, she burrowed right up against my chest, held on to me and sobbed quietly. She wept but wasn’t trying to get away from me. She was seeking comfort. I realized I would never understand a woman’s mind.

“Tell me everything will be okay . . . even if it won’t,” she said between sobs.

“It will be, baby. I’ll make sure.” I wanted a Djarum so bad I could taste it. Instead I held her against me and stroked over her hair, twining my fingers through its silkiness over and over again until she stopped crying.

“Why?” she asked after a while.

“Why what?” I kissed her forehead.

“Why do you love me?” Her voice was low but the question very clearly heard.

“I can’t change how I feel or know why, Brynne. I just know you’re my girl and I’ve had to follow my heart.” She still couldn’t tell me the same. I knew she cared for me, but I think she was more convinced that she was undeserving of love more than anything. Either giving or receiving.

“I haven’t told you the rest of the story yet, Ethan.”

Bingo. “What are you afraid of?” I asked. She stiffened in my arms. “Tell me what frightens you, baby.”

“That you’ll stop.”

“Stop loving you? No. I won’t.”

“But when you know everything? I’m a mess, Ethan.” She looked up at me with her eyes sparking different colors again.

“Hmmm.” I kissed the end of her nose. “I know enough already, and it changes nothing about how I feel. You can’t be any worse than me. I command you to stop worrying. And you’re right. You are a mess down here, and I made you that way.” I snaked my hand down between her legs and slid my fingers all along the center of her and felt what I’d put there. The caveman in me loved the idea of all that spunk I’d put inside her, but she probably didn’t. “Take a bath with me and we can talk some more.”

Her eyes widened from my touch but she nodded her head and said, “That sounds nice.”

I rolled off the bed and went in to start the bathwater. Her eyes tracked me, looking over my back. I knew she was staring at the scars. I knew she’d ask me about them soon too. And I would have to share my fucked-up train wreck of a past. I didn’t want to. The thought of bringing her into that cluster fuck went against every instinct I possessed, but still, I wouldn’t ever keep the truth from her again. That wasn’t an option with Brynne, and I’d learned my lesson.

I poured in some bath bubbles and adjusted the temperature. I looked up at the sight of her walking into the bathroom. Naked and beautiful and coming toward me, she took my breath away even if she’d gotten too slim. I found myself thinking about another round of prehistoric shagging but forced it down so the rational part of my brain could function. We really needed to talk through some things, and sex had a way of pushing to the front of the queue and overshadowing everything else. The greedy bastard.

So I took her hand instead and helped her step into the tub with me and got us settled. I sat in the back and put her in front of me, her slippery bum resting temptingly against my suddenly reawakening cock. I told my tackle to shut the hell up, and to imagine Muriel the street vendor and her accompanying mustache if he wanted more of Brynne’s divine fanny. That did the trick. Muriel was hideous, and probably not even a real woman. Maybe not even human. In fact, I’m sure Muriel is really an alien scout sent here to sell newspapers and learn the language. I still craved my Djarums. Piles of them.

Brynne sniffed the air. “Do you smoke in here?”

“Sometimes.” I really need to stop doing that. “But I’ll have to stop it inside the house now that you’re here with me.”

“I don’t mind it, Ethan. The smell of the spice and the cloves is nice and it doesn’t bother me, but I know it’s bad for you and I don’t like that part.”

“I’m trying to quit.” I slid my hands up her arm and then down over a breast resting just at water level. “With you here I’ll do better. You can be my motivation, okay?”

She took a deep breath and nodded. Then she started talking.

“I never went back to my high school again. Only six months from graduation and I quit. My parents were in shock at the change in me. It didn’t take long for them to find out about the video either. They argued about what to do, and had very differing opinions. I didn’t care. I was someplace else in my head and very, very sick. It’s hard to admit about myself, but it’s the truth. I was destroyed emotionally with no way to escape the demons.”

I kissed the back of her head and held on to her a little tighter. I knew all about demons, the evil cocksuckers that they were. “Can I ask why your parents didn’t try to press assault charges on the three of them? I can’t imagine it would have been difficult to get an arrest. You were underage and they were adults . . . and there was videotaped evidence.”

“My dad wanted them in prison. My mom didn’t want the publicity. She asserted that my slutty reputation would only drag our name through the mud and upset the social order of things. She was probably right. But again, I didn’t care what anyone did about it. I was lost in my head.”

“Oh, baby . . .”

“And then I discovered they’d gotten me pregnant.”

I stilled at that unwelcome news. Fucking hell . . .

“It put me over the edge. I—I couldn’t deal with any of it. My dad didn’t know what to do about a pregnancy. He started talking to the senator. My mom scheduled an abortion for me, and I simply could not handle any more. I didn’t want a baby. I didn’t want to kill what was inside of me either. I just didn’t want to be reminded of the incident and everything and everybody reminded me. I guess if I’d felt better about myself I could have figured things out, but then if I’d felt better about myself I would have never gone to that party in the first place and ended up on that pool table.”

“I am so sorry.” I spoke softly but firmly, wanting her to really understand how I truly felt. “Listen, baby, you cannot blame yourself for what happened to you.” I pressed in close to her ear. “You were the victim of a crime and treated abominably. It was not your fault, Brynne. I hope you know that now.” I rubbed up and down her arms, drawing the warm water up over her skin.

She settled more into my body and took a deep breath. “I think I do now, for the most part at least. Dr. Roswell helped me, and finding my place in the world helped too. But back then I was done. Done with living. I couldn’t see another path for me.”

All the warmth of earlier left me and I braced for what was coming. Like a train wreck you can’t stop staring at, I had to know what had happened to her but also didn’t want to know. I didn’t want to go to her dark place with her.

She shifted in the bath and twirled her fingers in the water as she started speaking again. “I’d never felt so calm as I did on that day. I got up and knew what I would do. I waited until Daddy went to work. I felt bad for doing it at his house but knew that my mom would never forgive me for doing it at hers. I wrote them good-bye letters and set them out on my bed. Then I took a handful of sleeping pills I’d stolen from my mom’s stash, got in the bathtub, and cut my wrist open.”

“No.” My heart compressed in a painful grip, and all I could do was hold on to her, feel her warm body, and be grateful she was with me now. Imagining her at the point of taking her life, at such a young age, and feeling she had no other options was very sobering. I knew how I felt about Brynne, but this scared the shit out of me.

“But I sucked at that too. I got sleepy and didn’t really cut deep enough to bleed out, or so I was told later. The pills I took were the far worse danger. Daddy found me in time. He came home for lunch to check on me. He said a weird vibe was shadowing him the whole morning and he just came home. He saved me.” Brynne shuddered slightly and turned her head a little more to rest her cheek on my chest.

Thank you, Tom Bennett. “I’m so glad you sucked at it,” I whispered. “My girl can’t be brill at everything.” I tried to lighten the mood a little, but this was not a conversation for steering. My role was to listen, so I kissed her hair again and put my hand over her heart. “When I speak to your father I’m going to thank him,” I whispered.

“I woke up in a psychiatric hospital. My mother’s first words were that I’d had a miscarriage and had done something very stupid and selfish, and that the doctors had to put me on a suicide watch. She didn’t handle things well. I know I embarrassed her. And now that I’m older I can only imagine what I put my parents through, but she didn’t seem to want to face what I had done either. Mom went on and on about what a blessing it was to have the pregnancy out of the way, like this was her biggest concern. Our relationship is not easy. She disapproves of most everything I do.”

Brynne sighed again into my chest. I just kept touching to reassure myself she was indeed here. My girl was telling me her deepest secrets, in a hot bath, naked in my arms after some really mind-blowing shagging. I didn’t have any complaints. Well, maybe a few, but I wouldn’t voice them to Brynne. I continued pulling warm water over her arms and breasts, and thought about how much I didn’t approve of her mum. What mother would say such a thing to her daughter after a suicide attempt?

“When it was all over my parents sent me to a nice place in the New Mexico desert. It took time, but I got better and eventually learned how to deal with my past. Not faultlessly, but I managed to make some decent progress, I suppose. I discovered my interest in art and grew up.”

Brynne paused again in her story, almost like she was gauging how I was accepting her news and if I was shocked or horrified by her now. She worried far too much. I picked up her wrist with the scars and kissed right over the jagged marks. Little slices of white marring the otherwise perfect skin with its translucent sheen, the blue of her veins showing from underneath. The idea of her cutting into that skin made me very sad for what she had borne.

I had a sudden epiphany—Brynne had done her attempt at around the same time I was in that Afghan prison about to be—

She entwined her fingers with mine and drew me out of my thoughts, bringing our hands right up to her mouth and holding them there with her lips. Brynne was kissing my hand this time. I felt warmth flush all throughout my body and tried to hold onto the wonderfulness of the sensation while it lasted, because her gesture made me far too emotional to speak.

“I never knew that my dad went to Senator Oakley and basically blackmailed him. He was livid that he’d nearly lost me and blamed Lance Oakley for everything. My dad wanted to press charges but realized I was in no shape to withstand a trial and probably never would be. And the added bonus of my mother telling him to leave it alone, and allow me to heal in peace, convinced him to let the idea of a formal prosecution go. But Daddy still wanted retribution of some form. Senator Oakley just wanted all the ugly to go far, far away from his political career, so he forced his son to enlist in the army and solved his biggest problem when Lance was shipped off to Iraq. Then he arranged for my acceptance at the University of London when the time came that I was well enough to leave New Mexico and go off to college. We decided on London mostly because it was so far away from home and the art was here. I could speak the language and Aunt Marie lived here already, so I wouldn’t be completely on my own in a foreign country without at least some family.”

“So the senator has known exactly where you were all these years?” The situation sucked, was much bigger than I ever imagined, and the risks to Brynne could be enormous.

“I never knew that part until last week,” she whispered. “I thought I got in on my own merits.”

“I can understand how that might bother you, but your graduate study was earned on your merits as exemplary in your field. I’ve seen you at work, and I know you’re brilliant at what you do.” I teased with my tone and kissed the side of her jaw. “My adorable anorak, Professor Bennett.”

“Anorak?” she laughed. “What kind of crazy Brit slang word is that?”

“Yeah, I think you Yanks call them nerds or geeks. That’s you. An artsy anorak that I adore.” I turned her head to mine and met her lips for another kiss. I knew we were both remembering our ridiculous chat in the car that morning about the professor detaining the misbehaving student. Which would be her, the professor, and me, the misbehaving student.

“You’re crazy,” she said against my lips.

“Crazy for you,” I said, squeezing her a little. “But really, Senator Oakley owed you a hell of a lot more than what he gave, although it doesn’t make me happy to know that he is very aware of exactly where you are in the world and what you’re doing every day.”

“I know. And it scares me a little. Daddy said that Eric Montrose died in a weird bar fight when Lance was home on leave from the army. He—he was one of them . . . on the video, but I never saw any of them again after that night. Not even Lance Oakley.”

The sound of her voice bothered me, and so did the thought of her remembering what she’d gone through at the hands of those degenerates. I was really happy one of them was dead. That part didn’t bother me at all. I just prayed his death had nothing to do with that video and Senator Oakley’s vetting.

I set the water to drain and helped her out of the tub. “I won’t let anything happen to you, and you don’t have to be scared. I got it covered.” I smiled and started drying her legs with a towel. “I’m going to speak to your dad tomorrow and find out everything I can on Senator Oakley.” I dried her arms and back and breasts, thinking I could get really used to doing this. “You just let me worry about the senator. I’ll send some feelers out and see what I get back in the way of information. Nobody’s going to get near my girl unless they come through me first.”

She smiled and gave me a very nice nibbling kiss on my bottom lip. I had trouble restraining myself from spreading her up on the sink counter and having her again.

Brynne’s skin had a natural golden glow, but right now it was pinked from the hot water, and so beautiful it was hard to look and stay neutral. Don’t think about it. I ignored the urge and worked at drying her luscious curves, which had definitely lost some of their curviness but were still lovely and all mine. She stood gracefully for me as if not at all affected by our nakedness in such proximity. I wondered how in the hell she managed to do it. Well, I had an idea of how. She was a model who posed in the nude and she was used to it. Don’t think about that either.

I couldn’t remember ever being driven by my cock in the way I was driven with her. Maybe when I was just starting out, but nothing with this level of intensity had ever consumed me like it did now. Fucking Brynne was right up there with food and shelter these days.

Everyone needs the basics, Brynne. Food, water . . . a bed.

She provoked emotions in me I didn’t know existed until the night she strolled into the Andersen Gallery talking bollocks about me and my trusty hand.

She tugged the towel away from me with a sexy smirk and used it to wrap up all that glorious nakedness in fluffy cream cotton. A damn shame. She walked into the bedroom and I could hear drawers opening and closing. I loved the sounds of her in there, moving around and preparing for bed. I pulled a towel down for myself and started drying off, immensely grateful I would sleep with her in my arms tonight.