My Sinful Love (Sinful Men Book 4) Page 15

  I believed in fate too.

  In second chances.

  As he spooned me, brushing soft kisses against the back of my neck, right there, right then seemed precisely why I’d landed a job in Vegas, and why I’d said yes to the New York gig. As if the cruel mistress of circumstances who had toyed with us and yanked us apart when we were younger was working in our favor now.

  Bringing us back together in a whole new way.

  After that rough, punishing sex that bruised my hips and made me sore everywhere, I was sure I’d fall asleep sated. I did. For a bit.

  But sometime in the middle of the night, I woke. Not with a start, but with a slow, unhurried shift of my hips. His erection grazed my backside, and I wiggled my rear against him.

  Without speaking, Michael slid his hand along the back of my thigh and shifted my knee to make room.

  “Yes. Please. You’ve made me insatiable.”

  “Good, I like you that way. Hungry for me,” he said against my neck as he eased inside me. He made it a lazy and luxurious coming together, as the warm pleasure in me hummed, tension coiling, and I climbed to the edge once again. I cried out his name, and then out of nowhere, a sob escaped my lips, mingling with my noises, obscuring the sound.

  A tear slid down my cheek.

  I wiped it away quickly. Judging from the way he grunted and shoved deep in me, he didn’t notice. I was overcome as a storm of emotions swelled, gripping my chest, squeezing my heart like an invisible hand.

  My heart was fracturing at the same time as it was stitched back together. Sex with Michael was both wondrous and bittersweet.

  And I understood precisely why I felt so fucking good, and so fucking confused at the same time.

  “It’s so good with you, Annalise,” he said a minute later.

  “I know. It is. It’s so good.”

  It was unlike anything I’d ever felt. It was better. It was the best.

  That was the problem.

  37

  Annalise

  The beautiful blonde, who wore an emerald-green satin push-up bra and matching lace panties, stretched on her belly on the white duvet—heels in the air, lips red and pouty.

  Casey Sullivan had one of the best smiles I had ever photographed. The woman also knew how to give “come fuck me” eyes to the camera. She was thinking of her husband, Nate, so she said it was easy to gaze at the lens that way—like she loved him and wanted him at the same damn time. We were finishing up the last series of shots at the boudoir studio space.

  Afterward, I showed her some of the pictures on the back of the camera.

  Casey shrugged into a robe and peered at the images, and she squealed in delight as we flipped through the frames. “These are amazing,” she said, then ran her hand over the outline of her belly. “You can’t tell I had a baby six months ago.”

  I shook my head. “You look radiant and beautiful. The camera loves you because you’re so happy and in love.”

  Casey met my eyes. “You can see all that from how I look at the camera?”

  “Of course. It’s in your eyes. Everything is.”

  Casey narrowed hers and studied me. “Hmm. What’s in yours, then?” she asked playfully.

  A red flush crept across my cheeks.

  Sex, hot sex, and more sex. Dinners, days, sleepless nights. Idle chats, deep conversations, sweet nothings, and so much coming together. The last two days and nights in Manhattan had passed in a blissful blur. I’d canceled my hotel room and stayed with Michael. Yesterday, I’d finished my shoot for Veronica’s while Michael had worked with clients, and last night we’d gone to dinner and a club. And there had been hours when we hadn’t left the room at all. New York with Michael was a great escape from the past and the present.

  The only trouble was it almost seemed too good to be true. Too deep, too quick, too intense. I couldn’t believe we were here after all this time, and I couldn’t help the part of myself that was scared, after all I’d been through, all we’d been through, to feel so much so fast.

  “You’re happy too.” The declaration came from Casey, and my heart skittered.

  “Of course I’m happy,” I said in my best cheery tone, keeping things businesslike. “I love what I do.”

  “But I can see a sadness in your eyes too. Is something holding you back from truly being happy?” Casey pressed.

  I swallowed and fiddled with my camera. The woman was too observant—that was supposed to be my job. I didn’t answer.

  “If something holds you back from your happiness, you should try to move through it,” Casey said softly.

  I looked up, my client’s gentle words threading into me. “Spoken from experience?”

  “Sort of. I had to get over my fear that my husband and I would risk our friendship if we became more.”

  “And you didn’t, clearly.”

  “We didn’t, but we had to face it and take a leap of faith. I think whatever is making you sad, you should face it,” she said wisely.

  On the cab ride back to the hotel, I lingered on her advice. Rubbing my thumb against the outline of the lens in my camera bag, I realized Casey was right. I had to face this thing, this nagging voice, this knot in my stomach that stood in the way.

  My fear of what closeness might lead to. How hard that made it to live in the moment.

  That night I dressed in jeans, heels, and a soft black sweater, and perched on the edge of the bed before we headed out for dinner. I waited for Michael to emerge from the shower, and when he did, my heart thundered. His hair was damp and a white towel hung on his hips, revealing his flat, toned stomach and the trail of hair that led to my favorite place. God, I wanted him so badly, in ways that went beyond the physical.

  “I’m scared,” I blurted out, ripping off the Band-Aid.

  He sat next to me on the bed, gazing at me intently. “About what?”

  This was the hard part. The deep, dark truth. “Because it’s so good with you.”

  His lips twitched and he looked down, then back up at me, schooling his expression. “The sex, you mean?”

  I nodded. “That. Yes. It’s amazing. It’s better than anything I’ve ever had.” His grin lit up the room, as I continued, “But that’s only the start. It’s not just the sex, Michael. It’s how we are. You and me. Our connection. And I want to embrace every second, but sometimes . . .”

  “You worry,” he whispered, finishing the thought.

  “I do. Sometimes it’s hard to jump in because I think of all the things that could happen . . .” I slowed my words to run my fingers along the back of his neck and into the soft strands of his damp hair.

  “I’m right there with you. We just have to let ourselves feel, and take it one day at a time. That’s what I’ve learned, Annalise,” he said, leaning his head back against my hand and closing his eyes, almost as if he was demonstrating how to feel again.

  How had he gotten to be so wise? Where was the carefree, easy guy I fell for decades ago? But of course, I knew the answer. He’d had to let go of who he was. He’d had to walk through all his own grief too.

  As my fingers toyed with his hair, I asked, “You learned that because of your father?”

  “Yes. Once I stopped missing him so much and being so angry about everything that happened, I chose to live in the moment and try to appreciate every day. I learned to just have a good time hanging out with family. Enjoy work. A good hard run. That’s the only way through everything. Keep on living—keep on feeling.”

  “I want to feel. With you,” I told him honestly. I’d survived the grief, and now it was time to live.

  Go all in.

  So when I went to dinner with him that night, I chose to relish every ounce of the happiness, to lose myself in the joy of being with this man I cared for so deeply. When we returned to his room for our last night together, I knew there was one more thing to do. One more way to give my whole heart to moving on and having faith.

  “Take my picture,” I said. His brows raised in questi
on as I handed him my camera. “I’m turning the tables, like you said. I’m always the one behind the camera. I want to be the subject, and I want you to photograph me, getting naked for you. That’s what I want to feel tonight—what it’s like to give myself to you.”

  His eyes blazed darkly, shining with desire and something else—something I’d wanted desperately when we were younger. Something that scared the hell out of me now. But maybe if I was on the other side of the camera, I could handle everything I saw in him, and let him see the parts of me no one else was privy to.

  38

  Michael

  I wasn’t a photographer, but I didn’t need to be to know she was a breathtaking subject. Gorgeous, real, and heartbreaking. Written in her eyes was a mix of emotions—trepidation, courage, excitement, determination . . . I tried to capture them all as she tugged her black sweater over her head, then unbuttoned her jeans.

  She didn’t pose or mug for the camera. She simply did, and I simply shot.

  She reached for the zipper of her jeans and worked it open.

  “Mmm. It’s getting harder to concentrate,” I murmured as I snapped a shot of her undressing.

  She laughed, and I caught that on film too. “Harder. Haha,” she said with a flirty smile. That was captured for posterity also—her playful side shining through. I caught every moment of her getting ready for me.

  Her eyes met the lens, as if she were able to peer into it to see me. Even though I was the one with the camera, somehow I felt studied at the same damn time. She was so knowing, observant down to her marrow, even when she was the one being photographed. Those green irises held me captive as she gazed at me, taking her time undressing, pushing the denim of her jeans down one hip, then the other, giving me a strip show.

  She wiggled her eyebrows. Licked her lips.

  My chest rumbled as my dick hardened. “That’s what I was talking about earlier. You enjoying yourself.”

  “I am.”

  “I want you to enjoy yourself with me.”

  “I do.” She let her jeans fall to the floor. She stood in her black bra and panties, and I snapped an image of that too, as my skin grew hotter and desire flashed inside me.

  “You like it when I take your picture?”

  She nodded.

  “Then lie back on the bed. Hair on the pillow. That’s one of my favorite looks of yours. All those crazy red strands spilling across the white pillowcase.”

  “Tell me why you like that,” she said, scooting back on the bed, assuming the pose.

  “Because you’re vulnerable and raw. Because you look real and sexy, and you look like you want me.”

  She swallowed, and I snapped quickly, cataloging her reactions. “I do want you.”

  “Let yourself want me,” I said quietly, capturing more as she reached back to unhook her bra, her breasts spilling free.

  “Fuck,” I muttered, my erection straining against my jeans. “I’m so fucking turned on. Can’t concentrate on the picture.”

  “Don’t concentrate. Just shoot,” she said, as she tucked her thumbs into her underwear, and I continued snapping shots, my length thickening as a heavy need thrummed in me. The need to have her. To take her.

  She pushed down her panties, revealing the soft auburn landing strip. My mouth watered. I wanted to rub my face against it, to feel her slickness on my jaw. To taste her heat on my tongue. I groaned but somehow managed to click again and again, as she skimmed off her panties and lay naked on the hotel bed.

  “Open your legs,” I instructed.

  She raised her knees and let them fall open.

  Gripping the camera harder, I swallowed thickly. “Don’t let anyone else ever take your picture like this,” I said, as possessiveness rushed through me. I hated the thought of anyone ever seeing these photos, let alone seeing her naked. Thank God the pictures were on her camera, which meant they’d be safe where they belonged.

  “Never,” she said in a heated whisper. “No one ever has,” she added. “This is only for you.”

  I inhaled sharply, her meaning registering. She was giving me something her husband had never had. Something that was a first.

  I couldn’t take it anymore.

  In a flash, I set the camera on the bureau and unbuttoned my shirt.

  With her index finger, she beckoned me. I recorded that image in my mind—her calling me to her side. Me heeding her wish. I’d play those few seconds over and over again. “Come to me,” she said. “Join me. Fuck me like you wanted to when you were taking the pictures.”

  I shoved off my jeans. “On your stomach, then,” I said, and didn’t take my eyes off her as she flipped to her belly. With her cheek pressed against the pillow, she watched me. Watched me as I stripped off my boxers and as I reached to stroke my cock, hissing in a breath because it felt so fucking good to touch myself as she stared, her eyes flaming with lust. But something else too. Longing, desire, and also a new kind of freedom. Like she was finally letting herself feel everything.

  She lifted her rear, inviting me home.

  “You,” I gritted out as I climbed on the bed and brought my dick to her ass, rubbing it against the soft flesh of her rear. She moaned, rising up into me as my hard length slid between her cheeks, like a filthy tease of what I wanted to do to her someday. She pushed back, and I filed that reaction away in the dirty vault to bring out again when we were both ready. For now, I moved lower, gliding the head of my dick against her heat. She was slick and wet and so damn ready for me.

  “I want you so much. I love wanting you. It feels so good,” she said, her eyes looking back at me, and I fell even harder for her as she let herself open up to me and to pleasure and to this chance to feel again, to live again, and hell, I hoped maybe, just maybe, to love again. I covered her with my body, and she let out the sexiest purr, then the most intoxicating moan as I pushed the head of my dick into her slippery sweet entrance. I sank inside in one slow, deep, decadent thrust.

  “Did you like it when I took your picture?” I asked once I was fully seated in her.

  “God, yes,” she panted.

  I pushed deeper. “Why? Why did you like it so much?”

  She moaned. “Because I love being naked with you. I love being with you. You make me feel so good.”

  “Just let me make you feel this way. Let me.”

  “I will. I am. Oh God, please.”

  As I fucked her like that, slow and unhurried, she moved with me, shifting her hips, aligning her body, sliding against me. I cupped her tits, squeezing, then pinched her nipples.

  She gasped as I tugged at them, and that drove me. Burying myself as deep as I could go, I gripped her hair in my hand.

  “Yes,” she said, urging me on, and I knew she meant both the fucking and the tugging. I wrapped those gorgeous red strands around my fist.

  Yanking her hair, I pulled her head back, raising it off the pillow.

  I gave it to her the way she wanted. Driving in deep. Gripping her hard. Fucking her relentlessly.

  With each thrust, she cried out in pleasure. With each pinch, she groaned my name. With every nip of my teeth, she became wetter.

  And I was consumed. Utterly consumed.

  Sex with her was a revelation. It was as if I’d discovered life on another planet, to know that it was possible to have this kind of sex. Savage yet tender. Cruel but gentle. To know she wanted it the same way. Her sounds told me she wanted to feel it everywhere. In her body. On her skin. In her heart. Oh God, I hoped she wanted me in her heart. So deep that I could never be removed. Like I was the end of the line for her. Just like she was for me. Always.

  Love me, I wanted to say. Just fucking love me.

  But I couldn’t say that. Not now. Not yet. Instead, with her hair tight in my hand, and her throat exposed, I gripped her shoulder, digging my thumb into her collarbone.

  “Just like that, just like that,” she cried out, this time in French, in that heated way she spoke when she was close to the edge. Her pussy clenc
hed around my shaft, so tight, so fucking perfect.

  “And this?” I asked, biting down on her shoulder. Love me.

  “Oh God.”

  I thrust harder. Brought my lips to the shell of her ear and spoke harshly. “Do you want me to leave marks? Ones that say you’re mine? I want to fuck you till you’re mine.”

  “Yes. Yes. Yes,” she urged, and I let myself believe she was answering my greatest wish. I’m yours.

  I pressed my lips hard to her neck, my teeth biting down, digging in as she went crazy beneath me, rocking and thrusting and losing all control as she cried out and came undone in a fevered frenzy.

  My body tightened, and my vision blurred. The rarest pleasure, the kind that came from total carnal bliss, surged in my bones, igniting me until I came long and deep inside the woman I loved.

  I just fucking loved her.

  And it was so goddamn hard not to tell her, in her language or mine. I tried to swallow the words, to choke them down, but the moment got the better of me. “Je suis fou amoureux de toi. Tellement fou que je pense à toi, tout le temps, et je ne peux pas m'en empêcher,” I whispered, barely scratching the surface of how I felt.

  She tensed all over. Then she scooted out from under me, her hands on my chest, her eyes meeting mine. “You speak French. You speak perfect French.”

  Fuck.

  I hadn’t meant to say it in French. To tell her I’m mad about her. Crazy for her. That I can’t stop this feeling. And I hadn’t meant to let on that I’d understood everything I’d heard her say in her native tongue.

  39

  Michael

  Sixteen years ago

  As I rounded the corner of the long hallway in the languages building, I opened the note yet again. The one I’d found scattered in my driveway, wreckage from my father’s wallet. Like a treasure hunter, I had salvaged it, clutched it in my hand, gripped it tight that night, like a precious thing. And it was. I’d held onto it ever since. I probably always would.