by Lara Adrian
“Very good. For that, you deserve a reward.”
He moves between my legs, then spreads them wide. His heated palms skate down my thighs and behind my knees, bending them so that the soles of my feet are flat on the cushions. His gaze rakes over me, from my fully exposed sex, to my naked torso, which glows milky pale under the moon and stars above us.
Then his eyes lift to my face and I see so much desire in his expression, it staggers me.
“Jesus Christ, you are stunning, Avery. You have no idea, do you?” His deep voice is rough, a jagged scrape of words from his throat. “If I were a painter, this is the only muse I’d ever need.”
He kisses the shallow dip of my stomach, his mouth hot against my skin. His tongue is deliciously soft as he licks and sucks a dizzying path to one side of my pelvis, then the other. My spine arches in reflex to his kisses, and it takes all of my concentration to keep my hands obediently clasped above me as he proceeds to taste every bare inch of my abdomen.
I’m already soaked and quivering even before his palms slide under my ass, lifting me to his mouth. The first flick of his tongue along the seam of my body nearly unravels me. But I ride it out, wanting to obey him. Wanting to please Nick with my submission as much as he is pleasing me now with his dominance and control.
He plunders my sex with his mouth and tongue, stroking my clit, licking and sucking my pussy as if he means to devour me. Tremors ripple through me, spreading fire across my senses as my climax swells to life. I can’t contain it. I can’t hold back my sharp cry of release as he sucks my clit between his teeth and penetrates me with his fingers, my walls squeezing around him, greedy and demanding.
“Oh, God.” My hips buck in his hands, but he doesn’t relent. He keeps kissing me, keeps stroking me mercilessly with his tongue until I fear I’ll pass out from sheer ecstasy. “Oh, fuck . . . Nick.”
I’m still coming, still shuddering with the aftershocks of my release when he finally eases me back down onto the cushion. “Don’t move. Keep your hands where they are.”
“Yes, sir.” My agreement boils past my lips, not even a hint of hesitation. Right now, I’ll say anything—submit to anything—for another chance to feel his mouth on my needy flesh.
Straddling me, he rises up over my torso. His cock is fully engorged and immense, riveting my gaze to it as a droplet of hot, silken fluid drips from the broad crown onto my belly while Nick reaches over my head. I have no idea what he’s doing. My mind is blissfully drugged on adrenaline and endorphins, and my senses are still hazy as I slowly float back down from somewhere in the clouds.
I hear him withdraw something from a hatch near our heads. The soft slither doesn’t fully register until I feel the cool abrasion of rope being wound around my wrists.
Alarm shoots through me, jolting me back to full awareness. “Nick—”
“Shh.” He pauses what he’s doing and reaches down to gently stroke my cheek. His gaze holds my wary eyes, firm and calm. “Do you trust me?”
I swallow. “You’re tying me up . . .”
“Yes. But only because I think you’ll enjoy it.”
“I don’t know.” I try to pull my hands down and find he’s already bound them. Although there is slack in the line, I am tied securely to a metal cleat. “Nick, I’ve never . . .”
“I know, baby.” His voice is as gentle as I’ve ever heard it. “But you can trust me. And you know how you can stop this if we go too far for you. Just tell me to stop. Anytime, at any moment, and I will.” He caresses my cheek, then leans down and brushes a tender kiss over my lips. “Let me take you somewhere you’ve never been. Let me show you how good it can be to let go, to lose yourself to something you can’t control. Lose yourself to me, Avery.”
He’s not asking so much as commanding, yet I don’t bristle. I do trust him. I want to do things with him I’d never dare try and never in my life wanted to share with anyone else.
I agreed to let him take me away from safe ports today, and I can think of nothing more enticing than to do what he’s asking of me now—to lose myself to him and to this unquenchable passion that seems to obsess us both.
“Trust me,” he says, and I nod. “Not good enough, baby. I need you to say it.”
“Yes, sir.”
He shakes his head. Strokes my cheek with tender care. “No more sir. Not now.”
He kisses me again, a slow, soul-searing tangle of our lips and tongues. My arousal kindles to new life again, fueled by the erotic pressure of Nick’s erect cock resting against my stomach as he straddles me. His shaft twitches and swells as we kiss, his breath rasping into my open mouth.
He slides his palms down the length of my outstretched arms. “Do you have any idea how much you turn me on?” His caress moves to my breasts, then lower, as he eases himself back down between my parted thighs. “I could fuck you for days, baby. Weeks.”
I sigh at how good that sounds. “Promises, promises, Mr. Baine.”
He chuckles darkly. “I would say don’t tempt me, but there’s no point in pretending that where you’re concerned.”
“Then fuck me now,” I order him, but my attempt at control is lost when his fingers slide into my cleft and push deep inside me. “Oh, God, Nick.”
I feel him lean back and grab for his shorts with his free hand, his other still driving me wild and making me squirm in needy anticipation. I hear the tear of a condom wrapper, followed a moment later by the delicious pressure of Nick stroking his cock along the wet seam of my sex. I arch to greet him, and he thrusts home on a coarse grunt.
We slip into a deep, urgent rhythm, both of us hungry for the contact, our bodies fitting together as if they were made for each other. He pushes deep, filling me until I can hardly breathe. Bound at my wrists, I can only use the tension of the rope to steady myself as he pounds into me in a frenzied tempo, driving me toward the crest of a fierce orgasm.
Nick watches me as I start to break apart once more, his eyes scorching me with the ferocity I see in them. “That’s it, baby. Come for me again. I want to see it. I can feel your tight pussy milking me. I know you’re close.”
“Yes,” I gasp, my breath heaving as I rock on the cushion, totally at his mercy.
The rope is a sweet abrasion against my skin, reminding me that I have no control with this man. Nor do I want it, not when the pleasure is as intense as this. I bite my lower lip as a whimper starts to boil up the back of my throat.
“You’re so pretty when you come,” Nick praises me. “You make the sexiest sounds. It makes me so damn hard to hear your little cries.”
He fucks me deeper, powering into me relentlessly, mastering me completely. I bear down to take the full measure of his battering thrusts, loving the animal intensity of him. Loving how raw and primal he can make me feel, while still managing to make me feel safe, even cherished.
My orgasm explodes an instant later, breaking over me in wave after wave, drowning me in pleasure. Dimly, as I’m spinning out to orbit, I feel Nick’s pace slow to a pause. He pulls out of me, still fully erect.
“Flip over, baby.” His voice is gravel, rough and jagged. “I need you on your knees. Now.”
Because I’m boneless now, in addition to being bound, he helps me turn. His strong hands are shaking a bit as he takes hold of my hips and twists me so that I’m no longer on my back, but positioned before him on my knees on the cushion. The length of white rope is coiled tighter around my wrists now that I’ve flipped over, locking me in place with my ass in the air and my hands stretched out in front of me.
“Ah, fuck,” Nick growls. “What are you doing to me? I’ve never seen anything as hot as you.”
His palm lands sharply on my ass. I wince and bite my lip, my soft cry sounding more like a desperate, wanton mewl. Nick seizes my hips and hauls them higher, pulling my arms tauter and making my spine bow. His cock nudges thickly at the mouth of my sex, then slides home.
My breath rushes out of me as he fills me, stroking into me long and hard. His
cock feels immense at this angle, impossibly thick, and each deep, invading push seems even fuller than the last, bringing me to the brink of pleasure and pain.
And I want more. I want all of him. I tilt my pelvis, opening myself wider for him so I can take every hard inch, ever jarring thrust. He’s starving for me, too, and the staggering force of his lust is hotter than anything I’ve ever felt.
Coarsely uttered curses and growled praise for how I feel, how I look, boil out of him in sharp blasts as he fucks me. The sensory overload is too much to contain, and there’s no stopping my climax. It roars up on me in a searing flash, filling my vision with stars as the jolting burst of sensation explodes inside me.
Nick’s tempo doesn’t slow as I shatter apart beneath his powerful thrusts. His hands clamp down tight on my hips as he pounds into me. “Yeah, baby. Let me hear you.”
I couldn’t hold back my scream of release even if I tried. I moan his name, quivering as the orgasm ripples through me, wave after wave of pleasure. Nick’s palm slides up my spine, toward my shoulders. He presses me farther down against the cushion, the motion levering my ass even higher as he powers into me with greater urgency.
I feel the shift in his focus now that I’m spiraling down from my orgasm, my body slack and boneless. Nick’s hands return to my hips, clenching harder as he chases his own release. I feel the coiled tension in his cock, the steely length of him swelling larger with every deep pump of his hips. He is as stiff and solid as granite inside me, as hot as molten iron.
He makes a strangled sound as he pistons hard and fast within me. And then his body arcs sharply and he slams home, shuddering and swearing with the force of his release. He keeps moving inside me, releasing my hips to wrap his arms around me instead, folding over me and dragging me tight against his heated chest.
I don’t know how long we stay there like that, both spent and slick with sweat and the earthy musk of our lovemaking. All I know is that I don’t want to move. I want to feel him inside me all night if possible.
I groan in sullen protest when he eventually withdraws to dispose of the condom.
“Are you all right?” He asks the question quietly, almost hesitantly, as he reaches up to unfasten my bindings and set the rope aside. “I didn’t hurt you—”
“No.” I shake my head, still drunk on ebbing pleasure as my arms sag onto the cushion, as boneless and fatigued as the rest of my body. I roll to my back and look up at his solemn, breathtakingly handsome face. “No, you didn’t hurt me. That was . . . amazing.”
“You’re amazing,” he murmurs. “Being with you is . . .” His words trail off and his gaze cuts away from me. “I wasn’t expecting this. I wasn’t expecting you, Avery.”
He glances back at me and curses low under his breath. Then he bends toward me, taking my face in his hands as he kisses me. Not with fire and urgency this time, but with a tenderness that nearly breaks me.
Because I feel something unexpected with him too. Something I didn’t plan for or want. Something I cannot afford to risk.
I need this man. I want him with something deeper than desire. Something more powerful than the obsession we both share for each other. I’m falling fast, and as much as I want to pretend I’ll be able to walk away after Claire returns and my reality resumes, I have to admit another surrender to Nick tonight.
My body and my pleasure both belong to him, but the more staggering truth is, so does my heart.
Chapter 32
“Are you sure no one can see us?”
“No one can see us.” Nick’s grin skims the surface of the sunlit turquoise water as he moves toward me, both of us stark naked beside the boat. “There’s no one around for miles. Just you and me. And maybe a small shark or two.”
“What?” I shriek my reply and lunge for him in reflex.
He chuckles, catching me in his arms and pulling me against him. “Got you right where I want you now.”
“Bastard!” I smack my palm against his shoulder. “Are there really sharks out here?”
His smirk is cryptic, and I decide I don’t really want to know. I don’t want to escape his arms either. His muscled body feels too good against me, our legs sliding together, tangling below the surface.
It’s peaceful out here, just the two of us . . . and the various sea life I prefer not to imagine. A couple of miles away, off the port side of the Icarus, Islamorada is a long strip of lush green. Behind us in the distance are clumps of smaller green islands that bristle out of the water.
Although we woke to a handful of neighboring boats moored in the large bay with us, all but a couple had moved on soon after sunrise. Nick and I took our time having breakfast on deck, followed by a lazy few hours of lovemaking in the main cabin. When we crawled out for a breather and refreshments afterward, I quickly found myself being talked into some morning skinny-dipping off the side of the boat.
I loop my arms around his shoulders, reveling in the simple intimacy of the moment as we float almost weightlessly in the warm, crystal blue salt water of the bay.
“This is absolute paradise,” I murmur, tipping my head back to look up at the pristine blue sky and a pair of white gulls riding the breeze overhead. “How do you ever find the will to return to New York after spending time out here?”
“My life is in New York. Not here. Hasn’t been for a long time.”
I lower my head and meet his gaze. “How long?”
He shrugs, nonchalant. “I moved away for good when I was twenty.”
“And made your first two million in real estate investments by the time you were twenty-two?” I can’t help but gape as I put together the pieces of what he’s told me. “That’s amazing. I realize you’re brilliant, but you must’ve been a business tycoon prodigy too.”
He smiles dismissively. “I got lucky, that’s all. When I came to New York, the Iraq War was just beginning. I had some money saved up, and I figured the one thing every war needs is equipment, supplies. So I invested in a few defense contractor companies.”
“A smart move.”
“And lucrative as it turned out. After about a year, I’d more than doubled my money. Around that same time, real estate in Florida was starting to go crazy. So, I bought up a few properties, flipped them, then reinvested in bigger and bigger developments and put some money into the market as well. I knew it couldn’t last, and just before the housing market bubble started to burst, I got out. I dumped everything, sold it all at the peak. By the end of 2008, I was worth half a billion. Since then, I diversified. Stocks, corporate finance. Anything that catches my eye and looks to be a solid investment. Anything I can either turn into something bigger or disassemble and sell off at a profit.”
I reach out to trace a dampened wave of black hair that’s sticking to his brow. “And now, here you are,” I say, utterly impressed by all that he’s accomplished.
“Yes. Here I am.”
His gaze doesn’t leave mine, and in the heat of his penetrating blue eyes, I try to understand how it is that we’ve ended up together like this. How is it that of all the women he could choose to spend his time with, he is with me?
“Why me, Nick?”
“What do you mean?”
He studies me so intently, I’m sure I must be overstepping. I shake my head, uncertain how to begin now that I’ve broached the subject. “I’m not asking you to tell me how many other women have been here with you like this—”
“You can ask,” he says, though his voice is clipped. “The answer is none.”
“None.” I repeat the word dully. I hadn’t expected him to answer, let alone say this.
He shakes his head. “Not on board my boat. Not to my place in Miami. Not here, like this. No one.”
This revelation is more than unexpected. It’s bewildering, and much too gratifying, to think I am the first. The only. But still . . . “Then why now? Why me?”
“To be honest, I’m not sure. I hadn’t planned for this.” There is an edge to his gaze as he looks at m
e, a hardness that makes me worry that I’ve ruined our moment. With his silence, the only sound around us is the soft lapping of the water against the boat, and the high-pitched cry of a sea bird. Then Nick shakes his head and utters a curse under his breath. “I’ve done a lot with you that I haven’t with anyone else. You’ve obsessed me, Ms. Ross. Now that I’ve opened the door, I don’t think it’s going to be easy to close it.”
“Is that what you want?” I swallow hard. “To close the door on me?”
“No. That’s not what I want. I want to throw them all open. I want to be the one to lead you through them.”
“I don’t understand,” I murmur. “You can have anyone, Nick. That night at the gallery, you could’ve gone home with any woman there. Yet you chose me.”
“Yes, I did.” His arms drift down my back below the water as we continue to float together. “Unless I’m mistaken, you chose me too.”
“True, but I didn’t know who you were.”
His dark brows arch. “And if you had?”
I recall how bruised I’d been by the rejection of my art. How pissed I was when I learned from Margot that he was not only a reputed player, but Dominion’s owner. “I think I would’ve told you off rather than spend the night with you.”
“Is that right?” A devilish smile quirks at the corner of his lush mouth. “I think you would’ve gone home with me regardless of that.”
Eyes narrowed, I snort a laugh. “How positively arrogant of you to say so, Mr. Baine.”
“Tell me I’m wrong.”
I can’t and he knows it. And as I float in the circle of his strong arms, my argument that I might have been able to resist him—then or now—is quickly losing steam. I cling to the only piece of indignation I have left.
“You don’t like my art.” Even though my voice is soft, it’s an accusation.
“I never said that.”
“You told me yourself it wasn’t very good. Not good enough for your gallery.”
“That’s not the same as saying I don’t like it, or that I don’t think you have talent.”
“Do you?” I can’t help but ask the question. His professional opinion as the owner of a highly respected gallery cannot be disputed, but it’s his personal judgment that has me holding my breath. “Do you think I have talent, Nick?”