Things We Left Behind

Put It on My Tombstone

Lucian

I hate to admit it, but your place doesn’t suck,” Sloane mused over her pad thai.

We’d paused our sex marathon to refuel by eating Thai food naked in bed while watching Brooklyn Nine-­Nine reruns. It was the most rom-­com thing I’d ever done in my life.

I leaned over and stole some of her noodles. “I’m glad you approve.”

She was naked except for her glasses. She’d piled her hair on top of her head with a few efficient twists of her wrists and a flimsy elastic tie. With my thousand-­thread-­count Italian sheets draped over her, she looked both adorable and sexy.

The women I dated—­or more accurately took to bed—­didn’t do adorable. They were well-­dressed, well-­coiffed, and never seen in public in gym clothes. Sloane, on the other hand, had unironically packed pajamas with hearts. I couldn’t wait to see her in them…and strip them off her.

She twirled her chopsticks in a circle to encompass my bedroom. “It doesn’t feel like the lair of an evil villain. It’s more like the bachelor pad of a hot wealthy guy with no personality.”

The sly look she shot me did her in. We’d both gotten less insulting in the heat of the moment, which meant we had serious ground to make up when my cock wasn’t inside her, making her scream my name.

I dumped the food cartons on the nightstand and snagged her by the ankle when she tried to escape.

“You’ll pay for that.”

I anchored her knee between mine, tightened my grip on her ankle, and tickled the bottom of her foot.

Sloane shrieked and tried to wriggle free.

“Apologize,” I said mildly. It was a game we’d played when we were different people, and I probably should have left it in the past where it belonged.

“Okay! Okay! It’s the bachelor pad of a hot, wealthy guy whose designer has no personality,” she screeched.

My bedroom was done in rich browns. Large, dark furniture dominated the space and was softened by expensive ivory bedding and heavy curtains that currently blocked out the world.

“Try again.”

“Agh! Okay! I’m sorry! You have a very nice place. I definitely don’t hate it.”

I gave her rounded ass a resounding slap and released her foot. “There. That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

“That’s what she said.” Her voice was muffled by the pillow.

“That’s not what she said twenty minutes ago,” I reminded her, coasting my hand over her bare shoulders, down the silky skin of her back, drawing the sheet with me so I could memorize each notch in her spine.

Her body was a fascination. Generous curves packed in a tiny, feisty package. I never knew what was going to come out of her mouth next. An insult or a demand for me to defile her in a new way.

It had been a gamble, bringing her here. The less Anthony Hugo and his minions knew about my life, the better. But I’d laid enough false leads for them with the tracker on the company car this week before removing it. Besides, if his men spotted me with Sloane here, she would just look like some woman his enemy was fucking. In Knockemout, it would be clear she was much, much more.

I lowered myself over her and sank my teeth into one luscious curve of her ass.

“Did you just bite me?” Sloane demanded as I leaned back to admire my handiwork.

“I’m giving you a souvenir to remember our final weekend of debauchery,” I said.

She clambered to her knees on the mattress and faced me, looking like a golden-­haired goddess. I wanted her. Again and again and again. And each time I had her, I realized it still wasn’t enough.

“In that case, I get to give you one too,” she announced.

She pounced and I let her push me over backward, enjoying the feel of her warm, soft body in my arms. Her sleek thighs straddled my own, and when her hand gripped my already hard shaft, I had to grit my teeth to keep from groaning.

“Not there,” I growled.

She pouted.

My phone rang from the bedside table.

“Does your admin usually call you at 10:00 p.m. on Valentine’s Day?” Sloane asked, peeking at the screen.

“Neither one of us has a life,” I explained before answering the phone. “Petula, you’re on speakerphone and I’m not alone.”

“Has the world ended and I’m unaware?” Petula demanded.

“Very funny. What do you want?”

“Representative Houser wants to move your lunch forward an hour tomorrow.”

I glanced up at Sloane, who was releasing her hair from its knot. “Reschedule it. I’m busy this weekend.”

“Does this have anything to do with your company tonight? You really should let me run a background check on her.”

“You already did and it’s just business,” I lied.

A pillow hit me in the face. Sloane pointed at her bare breasts and mouthed, “Business”?

“I have to go, Petula. Something’s come up.”

Sloane smugly studied my hardening cock.

“Wait. While I have you, I need you to go to this address and take the man who lives there shopping for a new suit this week,” I said, then rattled off Emry’s address. “Something that says eligible widower, not befuddled grandfather.”

“Consider it done,” Petula said. “One final thing. I confirmed your reservation for you and your lady friend next Thursday evening.”

Sloane’s eyes narrowed.

Shit.

“Thanks, Petula. Take the weekend off,” I said quickly. I disconnected just as my blond bed partner vaulted off the bed.

“Sloane,” I said sternly.

“Don’t even try it,” she said, grabbing something off the floor. It was the lacy corset I’d ripped off her. She threw it over her shoulder and bent again.

“Are you actually jealous?” I demanded, amused.

“Of course not,” she huffed. “I just don’t want to be cavorting with a penis that’s cavorting with other vaginas. It’s not hygienic.”

Sloane Walton was unlike any other woman I’d ever taken to bed. “I’m not cavorting with other vaginas,” I said dryly. “Where are you going?”

“If you think I’m just going to take your word for it, you’re an idiot,” she said, gathering her discarded clothing off the floor.

“I’d like to point out that of the two of us, you’re the one actively pursuing men on a dating app.”

“I’m not sleeping with any of them. Yet.” Frowning, she whipped back the duvet cover and felt around under the sheets. “Have you seen my underwear? Never mind. I don’t need them.”

I reached for her, but she dodged me.

“I’m not sleeping with my Thursday date either.”

“Yeah, okay.” She gave an unladylike snort and bent for her bag.

It gave me the opening I needed. I grabbed her around the waist, lifted her in the air, and tipped us both onto the mattress.

“If you don’t get off me right now, Lucifer, I’ll knee you in the balls. And while it would be a destructive blow to women everywhere, I will do what I have to do,” she said fiercely.

“You’re jealous,” I said again, thoroughly enjoying myself.

To be on the safe side, I rolled her and settled myself between her thighs before leaning down to kiss her mouth.

She softened instantaneously beneath me, but my victory was short lived when she bit my lower lip.

“Ow.”

“Serves you right. Now, give me my pants, and we’ll pretend this never happened.”

That wasn’t an option. “I don’t have a date Thursday,” I told her.

She flailed under me, which didn’t help me forget about the raging hard-­on I had nestled against her belly.

“I’m taking your mother out to dinner.”

Sloane settled immediately. Her eyes were suspicious behind her now-­crooked glasses. “You do realize that I can easily confirm that story.”

I nuzzled my nose along her jawline and felt pride when goose bumps cropped up on her ivory skin. “We meet every week for coffee or a meal. I make sure she’s not falling apart and hiding it from you and your sister. She makes sure I’m not working myself to death. We usually split a dessert. But I’m not sleeping with her.”

She studied me for a long beat. “Okay. I believe you.”

“You do?”

“You get irritated when you’re hiding something. You just look annoyingly entertained right now.”

“I find your jealousy annoyingly entertaining,” I agreed. S~ᴇaʀᴄh the FɪndNovᴇl.nᴇt website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

“I’m not jealous,” she insisted.

“I am,” I said.

Her eyebrows shot up. “You? Why?”

“You’re still dating. Any day now, you’re going to meet Mr. Right, and then he’ll be the one who gets to do this.” I dipped my head and closed my lips over one pert nipple.

She arched under me, the added friction against my cock driving me wild.

I released her breast with an audible pop. “I don’t want to be your Mr. Right, but I might actually miss this warm, willing body of yours when it’s no longer at my disposal.”

Sloane shivered. “Then I guess you’d better take advantage of me now.”

I wasted no time rolling on a new condom and positioning myself between her legs.

Seeing her splayed out beneath me like a banquet to be enjoyed had me counting my lucky fucking stars. A few more fucks and a few more mind-­blowing orgasms, and we’d finally be sated. But not yet.

I gritted my teeth and sheathed myself in her with one vicious thrust. Those green eyes slammed shut as every muscle in her body tensed around me, under me. Her body teased me by both welcoming me and trying to fight me.

I wanted to touch her everywhere. To memorize every inch of her. The full curves of her breasts and hips, the taut flesh of her belly. All that velvet-­smooth skin that begged for my teeth.

“Tell me what you want,” I rasped, withdrawing just far enough to slam back in, forcing the final inch inside her.

Her feet moved restlessly against the sheets. “So good,” she rasped. “I hate that you’re so damn good at this.”

“Tell me what you want, Sloane,” I insisted, punctuating each word with a hard thrust.

Her eyes were open now, hands reaching for me, drawing me down against her. “Just you. Give me you.”

I lost myself inside her, in the grip and pull of those smooth muscles. In the emerald green of her eyes. In the way she breathed my name as I drove us both up. I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t pull back. Not with the way she was gripping me.

“You better get ready to come because I’m about to go off,” I warned through clenched teeth.

“Shut up and fuck me harder.”

I obliged, knowing that my orgasm would force hers. She hitched her thighs higher around my hips and took me even deeper. As her breasts bounced against my chest, she reached behind me and sank her fingers into my ass cheeks.

“Lucian,” she whispered.

I came.

The churning in my balls fired up the shaft and erupted in a heart-­stopping burst. And then she was gripping me, rippling and writhing. We were coming. Each wave all-­consuming, each crest higher than the last as our bodies fought for every last drop of ecstasy.

Jesus, she was beautiful when she came.

It was perfect. She was perfect. The way she fit me, the way she begged for what I had to offer. The way she reacted to my basest needs. Every time we let this happen, I convinced myself it would be the last time. And every time we finished, I knew it wouldn’t be.

Her arms came around my waist and held there.

“Good God, man. Do you have to register that thing as a weapon? Ugh. Where’s my root beer? I’m dying. Valentine’s Day sex killed me. You can put it on my tombstone.” Sloane’s muffled voice came from beneath me.

I smiled into her hair and decided I’d worry about what this seemingly never-­ending need meant later.