Sinful Desire Page 24

  She swallowed and took a deep breath, his sweet dirtiness rushing over her. She ran a hand through her hair, trying to calm her overactive heart. How could she be so turned on, so aroused, so ready to do something thoroughly forbidden and also feel on the cusp of falling deeply?

  She had no rational answer. So she listened to her body, and she positioned herself over him. He shook his head, and whispered, “Not yet.”

  She furrowed her brow.

  “I told you I’d get you there,” he said as he brought the hand that hadn’t touched her rear back between her legs, rubbing her swollen bundle of nerves once again.

  “Oh God,” she said, closing her eyes and running her hands through her hair.

  “Remember the night I met you?” he asked as he stroked her clit, setting off fire after fire inside her, like sparklers on the fourth of July.

  She nodded on a pant.

  “Even then, before you even knew my name, I made you come like this.” He circled her clit, sending waves of intense bliss through her body. She shuddered. “I didn’t even touch your flesh, Sophie. I made you come through your panties, and it was fucking beautiful,” he said in a husky, smoky voice that brought back all her memories of the way he’d owned her body before she knew who he was.

  “It felt so good,” she said breathily as she opened her eyes. “Just like it does now.”

  He pinned his gaze on her, holding her captive as he fingered her clit, rubbing up and down in a blur as she rocked into him, wetness spreading to her already slick folds. “Your pussy is like paradise to me. I want you to feel like you’re in heaven every time.”

  “I do, Ryan. I do.”

  “And this time, beautiful—this time you’re going to ride me,” he said softly, slowing the pace on her clit to a lingering, lazy speed, taking her step by step to the next event. Moving a hand to her hip, he lowered her center to his hard cock. She gasped in pleasure as he ran the head through her slickness. “Just giving him a little natural assistance,” he said with a wink, then reached once again for the bottle of lube. “Do you want to put it on me?” he asked, handing her the bottle.

  “Yes. I love touching you. Any chance I get to touch you I’ll take.”

  “Touch me,” he said, and she shivered from the sexy sound of his voice, the sheer honesty of his lust.

  She poured some into her palm, then rubbed it over his shaft, from the head to the base and back. She set the bottle down, wiped her hands, and gazed at him. He rubbed himself across her pussy before traveling further. To her ass. He pressed the head against her, and she closed her eyes.

  She felt precarious. Wobbly. She breathed shakily.

  “Put your hands on my chest, Sophie. You need to hold onto something,” he told her, and she lowered herself slightly to anchor her hands on his pecs. “Like you’re riding me. Like you’re fucking me,” he said, as he pushed in, his finger lightly brushing her clit once again. Somehow, that contact, that delicious touch on the part of her body that was designed only for pleasure was enough to take the edge off. She drew a sharp breath as he breached her then stilled his moves. “Because you are.”

  His eyes stayed on her the whole time. His gaze guided her. His reassuring look told her this would not only be okay, but that it would be amazing. “I’ve got you,” he murmured, holding her hips and playing with her clit as she started to slide deeper onto him, the pressure sending sharp jabs through her stomach. This was all so…tense…and bizarre. But even through all the foreign sensations, she felt the potential for ecstasy.

  He guided her down, down, down. His voice was smoky as he whispered one last command: “Fuck me, Sophie.”

  He closed his eyes and groaned.

  That sound, that primal, thrilling noise raced through her, turning all that strange stretching into something else. Into the start of a whole new world of sensations.

  “You feel so fucking good,” he said. “I wanted you like this for so long. I’ve wanted all of you since I first saw you.” His eyes were squeezed shut as he uttered his dirty praise of her body, and his own primitive need for it. “You. Feel. Amazing.”

  And she did.

  She felt fucking amazing.

  She rocked into him, letting him fill her, letting him stretch her to the limits. Her skin was hot, and her heart felt feverish as she rode him, her ass gripping his cock as a tidal wave of intensity tore through her veins.

  He opened his eyes and blinked. “Wow. Just wow.”

  “It’s incredible,” she said, riding him as if she was fucking him…and she was. She was fucking her man in a whole new way. She wasn’t bound, she wasn’t tied, and she wasn’t restrained. She was free, and even though she’d happily and greedily be restrained the next time, for this moment, she loved that she could take his dick deep into a new place inside her. That she could explore the far reaches of her fantasies with him.

  “You are exquisite,” he murmured, his words tripping back to the compliment he gave her after their first time together. “Every single part of you.”

  That.

  That second.

  That moment.

  That ode to all of her.

  It was enough.

  She combusted. She was a rocket, and she soared. Every nerve ending fired. Every inch of her skin sizzled. Every cell in her brain buzzed.

  “That’s why I wanted you on top. I want to touch your pussy and fuck your sweet ass at the same time,” he said, taking the reins, thrusting upward as he rubbed. “So I can look at you. All of you.”

  She gasped as he seized control. She moaned loudly as he set the pace. She cried out in ecstasy as his fingers worked their delicious magic on her wet, hot, slippery center, coaxing the edge of an orgasm out of her.

  Then, sheer and unadulterated pleasure pierced her body. It washed over her like a tsunami. As Ryan thrust harder, and faster, and deeper, he sent her deliriously into a new type of climax, the kind that could be felt in places only he had touched.

  He felt like the only lover she’d ever had.

  He was the only lover she wanted to have anymore.

  She shuddered, trembling in exquisite pleasure.

  “Can I come in you?” he asked in a ragged voice.

  “Yes,” she shouted. “Please, yes.”

  He followed her there. Filling her with his heat. Flooding her with his release. Coming inside her. She collapsed onto his chest, a hot, sweaty, satisfied, elated woman.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  He cleaned her up.

  With a warm, wet washcloth, he erased the remnants of what they’d done, tenderly taking care of her, as she deserved. After gathering the towels and placing them in her hamper, he carried her into the bathroom, then set her feet down in the shower. She was so soft and warm, and he savored the chance to wash her hair—and wash himself out of her hair. He soaped her up, her breasts, her belly, and her bottom. Kneeling down on the floor, he cleaned her legs, then handed her the soap and she finished.

  After a quick wash himself, he ran a tub for them. Not too hot, since it was July, and even in her cool home, no one wanted to soak in the heat. When it was full, he scooped her up, and brought her into the marble bath, letting the water soothe her. He wrapped his arms around her, and snuggled her close.

  “Does it hurt?”

  She shook her head. “No, but it might tomorrow.”

  He kissed her forehead.

  “But I’ll probably still want to do it again, even if I’m sore,” she said, wiggling her eyebrows.

  “That’s my woman,” he said playfully. He tugged her close. “You are my woman. You belong with me.”

  “I know,” she said, resting her face in the crook of his neck. “Do you think everyone at the event will know?”

  “That I took your ass tonight?”

  She nodded, and splashed water on him.

  “As long as you walk like normal, only you and I will know I own your body. But everyone will know you’re with me. And that it’s much more than it was wh
en you first asked me to go with you.”

  “It’s so much more for me, too,” she said. Then she seemed to remember something. “Am I going to spend the night at your house tomorrow or will you come here again?”

  He pulled her closer, loving that she assumed they’d be together. He wanted to be with her. “Stay with me. But I have to leave early on Sunday morning. It’s a visiting day.”

  “Ah,” she said. “I’ll leave early, too, and head home, so you can get on the road.” She seemed to drift off in thought for a moment, then she asked, “Do you ever bring her gifts? Can you give her gifts?”

  “Only a few things are allowed. She usually just likes company. She likes seeing me, so I go. Why do you ask?”

  She screwed up the corner of her lips as if she were deep in thought. “You said she had a dream to make doggie coats. Right?”

  “Yeah. She actually gave me a pattern to hold onto,” he said with a light laugh. It was absurd. But it was also very much like his mom. “It has a dog bone design on the back.”

  “Do you have it?”

  “I do,” he said, turning to look her in the eyes. “Why?”

  “I have an idea. Would you like me to make it for her? As a gift. You could bring it to her. I mean, obviously she doesn’t have a dog in prison. But she might enjoy seeing the jacket. It might make her happy, right? Just to see it. If that was her dream to make them.”

  His heart stuttered. It stopped beating for a moment, then it thumped harder against his chest, as if it were trying to fight its way out to get closer to her.

  “You’d do that?” he asked, dumbfounded.

  “Sure. I can sew. I’m sure I’m not great at it like she was. I couldn’t make a living from it. But I know what I’m doing. I still have a Singer machine. I could do it an hour. It’s not hard to make a doggie coat if there’s a pattern.”

  “And you’d do that for my mom? Who’s in prison? For murder?” he asked, and he was sure shock was etched on his features.

  She shifted in the water that was now cooling. Some sloshed over the side of the tub. “I don’t judge her. It’s not my place,” she said softly, her blue eyes so honest, so guileless. “She’s your mother, and the only thing that really matters to me is that without her I wouldn’t have you in my life. And I want you in my life.”

  And then his heart managed to break free. It jumped from the steel cage he’d once kept it in and raced to the woman in his wet arms. He belonged to Sophie. He cupped her beautiful face in his hands and memorized this moment. The cooling water. The dark of the night. The still in her home. The racing of his heart.

  She’d bewitched him, and he didn’t ever want to be without the only person, besides his family, who he’d ever loved. “I’m in love with you, Sophie. I’m so in love with you.”

  She beamed. A smile broke across her face. “Oh, Ryan. I am so madly in love with you. I never stood a chance of not falling in love with you.”

  He smothered her in kisses in the tub. Then he lifted her out, dried them both off, and led her to the bed. Holding her close, he planted kisses all along her sweet skin, from belly to breast, elbow to ear. “I’m so in love with you,” he said, over and over. It was like a dam breaking inside him, and he couldn’t hold back anymore. He’d spent so long keeping all his secrets clutched tight and locked up, and this one truth, this incomparable, all-encompassing fact of his existence, insisted on being heard tonight.

  He couldn’t stop telling her as he held her tight. “I’m so in love with you I don’t even know what to do.”

  “Just love me,” she whispered back, and a tear rolled down her cheek.

  “I do. I will,” he said, and he kissed the tear away. “Please love me, too.”

  “I do, Ryan. I do love you so much.”

  Then, he made love to her as midnight fell across the city of sin. As he moved over her, they were the only two people in the whole wide world.

  She’d become his world.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Something wasn’t right.

  She’d noticed it when she traced the pattern on paper, and now she was seeing it for sure on the muslin fabric.

  Sophie studied the cloth in front of her, trying to figure out where she’d gone wrong. The little doggie neck-to-tail measurement simply didn’t line up. Was it a shorter jacket, perhaps? Mid-back? But as she peered at the printout of the pattern again, she reconfirmed that the coat was supposed to cover up the belly and back, as a coat should do.

  Bright morning sun streamed through her living room window. It was an early morning for a notorious late sleeper, but her day was packed, especially since she needed to squeeze in this sewing project before she began her final preps for the benefit tonight. Ryan had departed at the crack of dawn to take care of his dog, and she’d dusted off her sewing machine, setting up on the table by the window, ready to tackle this gift.

  He’d emailed her a photo he’d taken of the printed pattern, and she’d grabbed some fabric she had on hand from a few years ago when she’d made a mod retro skirt.

  Grabbing a new section of fabric, she followed the measurement once again.

  Whoa. That definitely was wrong. Wrong size. Wrong shape. Wrong everything.

  Had it been that long since she had sewn? No, it was only two years ago when she’d made that skirt. This pattern didn’t seem so complex as to throw her off like this, even with a dog bone design on the back.

  Staring at the pattern again as if it would reveal its secrets, she spotted something odd in the first row of instructions, then her brain turned it around. A light switch flicked on.

  “Ah!” she said, tasting victory.

  She’d just reverse a few of these steps to make the pattern work. Easy enough. Grabbing her pencil, she jotted down the correct order of the steps.

  She blinked.

  She peered more closely at the numbers in the first row. They lined up precisely with the reverse letters of the alphabet.

  She counted off in her head, quickly transposing the numbers into letters, her analytical mind easily sliding into coding mode.

  James Street.

  A hotbed of crime once upon a time.

  Studying the numbers more closely, they clicked into place, sliding like puzzle pieces.

  This pattern wasn’t a dog jacket.

  The measurement was wrong because the first row spelled out a street name, then what appeared to be two addresses on James Street. Her mind raced back to a few weeks ago when John had let slip a small detail from the case.

  ‘Today was like a goddamn puzzle. You know the math problems you can’t solve? And this was over addresses. Fucking addresses from years ago.”

  Oh God.

  She dropped the paper as if it were on fire. She scrabbled back in her chair, standing up, then backed away from it as if it would curse her.

  Could it be? Did that pattern hold the clues to what her brother was looking for in the case? Was this dog jacket pattern from Ryan’s mother something else? Something more? Something that revealed…

  Breathe in.

  Breathe out.

  She inhaled sharply, remembering what her brother had told her the very first day, before either of them realized her Ryan was his Ryan.

  “Something that would help me find the other guys I think were involved.”

  John was looking for accomplices. He’d thought Ryan was hiding something. But if this pattern unfolded into code, as she reasoned it would, then Ryan wasn’t hiding anything at all. He couldn’t possibly know there were addresses buried inside his mother’s “prize” dog jacket pattern.

  Only a seamstress would know this pattern wasn’t a pattern. Only a man or woman who attempted to make this jacket would be able to tell it wasn’t for a dog.

  Pacing in circles in her living room, she tried to settle her galloping heart. She worked to calm her overactive brain. She didn’t want to jump to conclusions. She needed to check, and double check. That was what she’d done in school. That was
always her strategy. Make certain. Make sure.

  She headed to her desk, flipped open her laptop, and started plugging in the two addresses on Google Maps. They showed up near each other in the same neighborhood—a dangerous section of town years ago that had since been gentrified. Sophie wanted to know who lived there. Property records weren’t hard to find—everything was online these days in realtor databases. She plugged the addresses into a realtor search. But the records revealed only when the homes were last sold—a few years ago. Nothing showed the owners’ names now, or from when this pattern was made, nearly two decades ago.

  But she’d spent a lifetime solving problems. Cracking codes. Creating her own damn codes.

  Grabbing the pattern again, she started writing out notes, trying to figure out the rest of the rows of instructions and what they meant. But only that first line translated neatly. The code seemed to shift in each row. Something was missing from the next line. Sophie peered more closely, and it seemed a letter had been turned into a symbol. On the next one, a number was simply missing, like a dropped stitch. She’d have to deal with those at another time.

  For now, she zeroed in on the first row of instructions, puzzling over how to find out who these addresses belonged to. She could easily call John and hand him this information in its current form. Or she could tell Ryan what she’d discovered. But she’d never been one to turn in her homework half-done. This code was only partially cracked, and her job was to smash it wide open. Whatever she had in her hands—whether it was a cold, hard clue, or a dead end—she was determined to figure it out.