Naked: The Blackstone Affair, Book 1

Vauxmoor’s Bar & Grill was trendy but not boisterous to the point where we had to shout to talk. I mostly just enjoyed my view anyway. Seated over his plate of steak, Ethan was the picture of polite English gentleman. One supremely hot English gentleman. Gone was the heat and promise of sweaty sex we’d shared at the elevators. He’d turned that off just as quickly as he’d turned me on.

“How did an American find herself at university so far from home?”

I picked at my steak salad and went for a sip of cider instead. “I—I struggled for a bit after high school. I—” I closed my eyes for a moment. “I was a mess actually, for a lot of reasons.” Taking a breath to calm the nervousness that appeared whenever I had to answer this question, I said, “But with some help to focus my attentions, I discovered an interest in art. I applied to come here and by some miracle got accepted at U of L. And my parents were so thrilled to see me motivated they sent me off with hearty blessings. I have a great-aunt—at Waltham Forest. My aunt Marie, but other than her, I am on my own here.”

“But you are taking a graduate degree now?” Ethan seemed genuinely interested in what I was doing here, so I kept talking.

“Well, when I finished my undergrad in art history, I decided to apply for advanced study in conservancy. They accepted me a second time.” I stabbed a piece of steak with my fork.

“Any regrets? You seemed a little melancholy there when you were talking.” Ethan’s voice was soft when he wanted it to be.

I looked at his mouth and thought about what it’d felt like crushed against mine, forcing me to accept his kiss.

“About coming to London?” I shook my head at him. “Never. I love living here. In fact, I’ll be devastated if I don’t get a work visa when I finish my master’s degree. I consider London my home now.”

He smiled at me.

You’re too damn beautiful for your own good, Ethan Blackstone.

“You do fit in here . . . very well. So well, in fact, I wouldn’t have known you weren’t native until you spoke, but even then, American twang and all, you blend right in.”

“A twang, huh?”

“It’s a very nice twang, Miss Bennett.” He grinned across the table, his blues twinkling.

“So, what about you? How did Ethan Blackstone end up as CEO of Blackstone Security International, Ltd.?”

Still dressed for work in a fine dark gray suit that definitely cost more than my rent, he took a drink of his beer and licked the corner of his mouth.

“What’s your story, Ethan? And you have a drawl, by the way, as opposed to a twang.” I smirked at him.

One sexy eyebrow perked up. “I am the younger of two children. It was just my dad growing up for my sister and me. He drove a London cab and took me with him when I didn’t have school.”

“That’s why you didn’t need directions to find my flat,” I said. “And I’ve heard about the test the London cabbies have to take on all the streets. It’s gargantuan.”

He smiled at me again. “That would be The Knowledge. Very good, Miss Bennett. For an American you are quite up on your cultural facts of Britain.”

I shrugged. “I saw a show about it. Was pretty funny actually.” Realizing I’d distracted him from the conversation, I said, “Sorry for interrupting. So what did you do after you finished school?”

“I went into military training. Did that for six years. Left. Started my company with the help of contacts I’d made while enlisted.” He looked at me longingly again, seeming to have no inclination to keep talking.

“What branch of the military?”

“Special Forces, mostly reconnaissance.” He didn’t offer any more details, but he grinned at me.

“You are not very forthcoming, Mr. Blackstone.”

“If I tell you any more, I’d have to kill you, and that would just blow my promise all to shit.”

“What promise?” I asked innocently.

“That I’m not a serial killer,” he said as he popped a piece of steak into his beautiful mouth and started chewing.

“Thank the gods! The idea of eating a plate of beef with a serial killer would have totally killed this date for me.”

He swallowed his meat and grinned at me. “Very funny, Miss Bennett. You are a wit.”

“Why, thank you, Mr. Blackstone, I try very hard to be.” He disarmed me with his charm so effortlessly that I really had to work to keep him on task. Ethan could turn a conversation to his advantage in an instant. “What do you do at your company?”

“Security mostly, for the British government and some private international patrons. Right now we are swamped with the Olympics. With so many people coming from all over into London—especially in our post-nine-eleven world—it’s a challenge.”

“I bet.”

He pointed at my salad with his knife. “I bring you to the best place in town for a Mayfair steak, and what do you do?” He shook his head at me. “You order a salad.”

I laughed. “It has some steak in it. Anyway, I can’t help it. I don’t like to be predictable.”

“Well you’re very good at being unpredictable, Miss Bennett.” He winked at me and took another bite of his steak.

“Can I ask you a personal question, Ethan?”

“I get the feeling you’re about to,” he said dryly.

I sincerely wanted to know. The idea had been forming in my head for a couple days now. “So, do you—do you collect nudes . . . or something?” I looked down at my plate.

“No,” he answered immediately, “I was working security for the Andersen gallery that night. There were a few high-profile guests, and I merely went to make an appearance. I have employees who do the actual on-site work.” He paused. “But I’m very glad I attended, because I saw your portrait.” His voice sounded amused. “I wanted it, so I bought it.”

I could feel his eyes calling to me to look at him. I lifted my eyes up.

“And then you walked in, Brynne.”

“Oh . . .”

“I heard what you and Clarkson said, by the way—about me and my hand.” He tapped his ear. “High-tech security gadgets in my line of work.”

My fork dropped with a clang, and I must have jumped a foot. He smirked and looked smug, and far too sexy to be here with me. I was so mortified I wanted to run out the door. “I am so sorry you heard—”

“Don’t be, Brynne. I try to avoid my hand to get off, especially if there are other, more lovely, options.”

His fingers tugged on my chin. I felt my body heat up as I let him lift my face. Whoa . . . breathe, Brynne, breathe.

“Like you.” He whispered the rest. “I want the real thing. I want you underneath me. I want to get off with you.” His blue eyes never left mine. He did not let go of my chin either. He held me firm and made me acknowledge his words.

“Why, Ethan?”

His thumb flicked out and brushed my jaw. “Why does anyone want anything? It’s just how I react to you.” His eyes rolled over me and got that smoky look in them. “Come home with me. Be with me tonight, Brynne. Let me show you.”

“Okay.” My heart pounded so hard I was sure he could hear it. And just like that I agreed to something I knew would be life changing. For me, it would be.

The instant the word left my lips I witnessed Ethan close his eyes for just the briefest flicker. And then it was all a flurry of activity and purpose setting the pace from there; everything in sharp contrast to the sensual conversation we’d just been having. Within minutes he closed the bill from our dinner and led me out to his car. Ethan’s firm touch pressed against my back, pushing me forward, taking me away to a place where he could have me. Alone.

• • •

Ethan drove us to a gorgeous glass building sitting high above the London skyline of previous centuries, modern but reminiscent of prewar Britain in an elegant way.

“Good evening, Mr. Blackstone.” The uniformed doorman greeted Ethan and nodded politely toward me.

“Evening, Claude,” he returned smoothly. The pressure of his hand, ever present on my back, propelled me forward into the open elevator. As soon as the doors closed us in he spun me and crushed his lips down on mine. It was just like the Shires Building all over again, and I felt the punch of arousal hit me hard between my thighs. And I was starting to get a clearer picture of my companion as well. Reserved in public, Ethan was all proper gentleman and restraint, but behind closed doors? Look. Out.

His hands were all over me this time. I didn’t resist as he backed me into a corner. His touch warmed and made me soar both at once. He dragged his prickly whiskers down my neck and pushed his hand up my blouse to cup a breast. I gasped at the feel of his hot hands roaming as they made purposeful strides toward knowing my body. I arched into him, my chest thrusting out, pushing my breast further into his hand. He found my nipple through the lace and tugged.

“You’re so fucking sexy, Brynne. I’m dying for you,” he spoke against my neck, his breath tickling my flesh.

The elevator stopped and the doors opened to an elderly couple waiting to get on. They took one look at us and took a pass. I tried to push back from him, to put some space between our bodies. For the second time today, I found myself panting for Ethan like a harlot, out in the open for all and sundry to see me.

“Not here, please, Ethan.”

His hand left my breast and reappeared from where it had been under my shirt. He brought it to rest on my neck. I felt his thumb start moving in a slow circle right under my chin. And then he smiled at me.

Ethan looked happy as he took my hand with his free one and brought it to his lips for a kiss. Damn, I loved when he did that.

“You’re right, and I apologize. Do you forgive me, Miss Bennett? I am afraid you make me forget where I am.”

My belly flipped down low with an ache. I nodded at him because I couldn’t do anything else, and whispered, “It’s okay.” The elevator, bless its mechanical heart, kept moving us closer to his floor. I wondered what he would do as soon as he got me inside his flat. Ethan had me totally under his spell, and I was pretty sure he knew it too.

Finally the elevator stopped at the top floor, and the soft settling made my belly roll again as Ethan put his hand on me. The man was tactile—always touching if he could get away with it.

He used his key to unlock the carved oak doors and pushed one open, ushering me into his private space. It was a beautiful room, lighter than I would expect for a man. The main room sported a gray and cream palette, lots of wood and moldings and decorative elements for such a modern space.

“This is beautiful, Ethan. Your home is lovely.”

Ethan shrugged out of his suit jacket and tossed it over a couch. Taking my hand in his, he led me over to a wall of windows and a balcony that looked out onto the breathtaking city lights of London.

But then he turned me away from the view out the glass doors to face him, and took a few steps backward. He just stared at me for a moment.

“But nothing is as beautiful as you standing here, right now, in my house, in front of me.” He shook his head, looking almost desperate. “Nothing compares.”

I felt the overwhelming urge to cry for some reason. Ethan was so intense, and my poor brain was struggling to take everything in as he started moving toward me, slowly, like a predator. I’d seen the move before. He could go fast, slow, hard, gentle—any way, and make it look effortless.

My heart rate sped up as he came closer. When just inches from me, he stopped and waited. I had to lift my head to meet his eyes. So much taller than me, I could see his chest lifting with his own rapid breathing. It felt good to know he was as affected by this attraction as I was.

“I’m not beautiful like that . . . it’s just the camera lens,” I said.

He reached for my green sweater, undid the button, and slid it down my back until it landed with a soft swish on his shiny oak floor.

“You’re wrong, Brynne. You’re beautiful all the time.” He went for the hem of my silky black shirt and drew it up over my head. I lifted my arms to help him.

In my black lace push-up bra I stood before him as he devoured me with passionate blue eyes. He brushed over my shoulders and traced over the swell of my breast with the back of his fingertips. The reverent touching made me ache for more, and I couldn’t keep still any longer.

“Ethan . . .” I leaned forward into the stroking of his fingers.

“What, baby? What do you want?” He tilted my head to the side and exposed my neck. He kissed me there. The combination of his facial hair and those soft lips was electrifying. The pleasurable feelings grew to the point where I was totally lost to need. The point of no return had passed for me. I wanted him. Badly.

“I want—I want to touch you.”

I brought my hands up to his white dress shirt and loosened his deep purple tie. He held me loosely and stared as I unknotted the silk, tight as a bowstring ready to snap. My fingers worked at the knot and in a minute I had his tie slipping loose to join my green sweater on the floor. I started unbuttoning his shirt.

He hissed when my fingers touched his exposed skin.

“Fuck yes! Touch me.”

I pushed his fine white shirt off him to the growing pile on the floor. I looked at his bare chest for the first time and nearly wept. Ethan was tight with muscles and washboard abs that melted into the most erotic V-cut I’d ever seen on a man.

I leaned forward and touched my lips to the middle of his chest. He put his hands on either side of my head and held me to him, like he would never let go. His strength and dominance were pretty clear. When it came to sex, Ethan was the one in charge. And strangely, it soothed me to understand this. I was safe with him.

He moved down to kneeling, his hands sliding down my hips and then my legs. When he got to my shoes, he tugged at first one and then the other and removed them sweetly from my feet. His hands skimmed back up to the waist of my linen pants. He pulled the string and loosened the tie and then dragged them to the floor. He steadied my legs while I stepped out of the crumpled heap of linen, and then he kissed me right above the waist of my panties. My belly fluttered some more and the ache between my legs got stronger. Ethan brought his fingers to the black lace and slipped them under the elastic. He drew downward and then they were off me.

He stared at my pussy, bare to his eyes, and he made a noise, very primal and very urgent, and then he looked up at my face again. “Brynne . . . you’re so beautiful I can’t—fuck, I can’t wait—”

He feathered his fingers over my stomach and hips and pulled me forward to his lips and pressed them right on my bare mound. I shivered from the intimate touch that held me captive, waiting for what came next.

He stood back up and placed my hands deliberately on his waist. I got his message loud and clear. I started to work on his belt and then his slacks. He looked impressive. The ridge inside his boxers was impossible to ignore as his pants came down. He growled when my hand brushed over the thin black silk covering his straining cock. As I bent down to focus my efforts on removing him from his clothes, he unhooked the clasp on the back of my bra and pulled it away. I was totally naked.

“I won’t stay the night here, Ethan. Promise you’ll take me home after.”

He scooped me up and started carrying me out of the room. “I want you to stay with me. Once won’t be enough—not with you.” He kicked open a door and brought me into a bedroom. His face looked wild and desperate. “I need to fuck you first, and then I’ll go slow. Give me tonight. Let me make love to you tonight, beautiful Brynne.” He hovered over my face. “Please.”

“But I can’t stay the ni—”

His mouth swallowed my protests as he stretched me out on his soft, plush bed and started touching my body. Kissing my body. Heating my body until any conscious thought I had before this point fled my brain and kept on going. I was breaking my rules, and I was very aware of that fact as Ethan’s tongue swirled over my hardened nipples, alternating between little scrapes of teeth followed by soft stroking to soothe what he’d done.

The contrast from the brush of whiskers on his goatee to the caress of his soft lips made me soar. I felt like I would orgasm just from what he was doing. The pleasure made me cry out and arch. My legs scissored as he worked on my breasts. Unable to keep still, I was wild and abandoned beneath him. He felt so good I couldn’t regret this decision. All my reservations deferred to the exquisite workout he was giving my body and fled without another thought.

Being naked is not terrifying for me. I’ve done it a lot for the modeling and I know that men find my shape pleasing. It’s the intimacy that is harder for me to process. So when Ethan says a thing like “Let me make love to you, beautiful Brynne,” I knew I didn’t have a chance.

“Ethan?” I cried out his name in abandon, not really for any other reason than to reassure myself I was in this with him and not off in some fantasy erotic dream world.

“I know, baby. Let me take care of you.” He pulled back from my breasts, put his hands on the inside of my knees and opened me up. I was totally spread before him, and he stared down at my sex for the second time tonight. “Christ, you’re beautiful . . . I want a taste of that.”

And then he put his mouth on me. That soft tongue rolled over my clit and my folds and caressed. I could feel his goatee pricking the sensitive flesh as I writhed against his lips and tongue. I would come in a second and there was no stopping it. There was no stopping Ethan. He took what he wanted.

“I’m coming . . .”

“The first of many times, baby,” he said from down between my legs.

And then two of his long fingers pushed their way inside me and started stroking. “You’re tight,” he rasped, “but when it’s my cock in you, you’ll be tighter, won’t you, Brynne?” He kept finger-fucking me and flicking his tongue over my clit. “Won’t you?” he asked again, this time more forceful.

I felt the rush, the tightening begin deep inside my belly as it started. “Yes!” I cried out in a push of air, knowing he expected an answer.

“Come for me then. Come for me, Brynne!”

And I did, the experience unlike any other orgasm I’d ever had. I couldn’t do anything else but come. Ethan pushed me to the edge and then caught me when I went over. I crested the wave of ecstasy pinned down with his fingers deep in my pussy, holding me there. It was shattering in its brilliance, and I could do nothing but accept what he gave me.

His fingers slipped out of me and I heard the sound of a packet being ripped open. I watched him roll the condom down his thick, beautiful, rigid cock. The part of him that would be deep inside me in a minute, and I shivered in expectation.

He lifted his blue eyes to mine and whispered, “Now, Brynne. Now I’m having you.”

I sobbed at the image of him mounting me, the anticipation so great I was barely coherent.

Ethan loomed over me, the head of his penis tipped inside me already, burning hot and hard as bone. His hips forced me wider as he sank his cock down deep and true. He took my mouth, thrusting his tongue simultaneous in movement with his intrusion down low. I tasted myself on his tongue. I was taken by Ethan Blackstone in his bed. Totally and irrevocably.

I rode the wave as Ethan rode me. He did it hard at first. Pounding pulls in and out of my soaked core that went a little deeper on every stroke. I felt myself striving toward another orgasm.

The veins on his neck bulged as he propped himself up to get at me from another angle.

I squeezed my pussy around his pummeling cock while he worked me hard. He made all kinds of sounds and whispered dirty talk about how good it felt to fuck me. It just made me wilder.

“Ethan!” I shouted his name, coming a second time, my body in total surrender to his much larger and harder one as I shook and writhed in abandon.

He didn’t stop. He kept on drilling me until it was his turn to orgasm. Neck straining, eyes burning, he took me harder still. I stretched to accommodate his length and girth as he grew a little tighter. I knew he was close.

I squeezed the walls of my vagina as forcefully as I had ever done and felt him go rigid. Groaning out a guttural noise that sounded like a cross between my name and a war cry, Ethan shuddered over me with his blue eyes glowing in the dim of the room. He never took his eyes from mine when he came inside me.