Bombshell (Hollywood A-List #1)(76)

“I’m in my nightgown,” I said, as if he couldn’t see my hips and hard nipples through the thin cotton.

“Not for long.”

He opened the door and took me to a rickety set of wooden stairs along the outside of the house. Clap creak clap clap, he didn’t say a word and didn’t leave me an opening to ask a question.

When we got to the bottom he picked me up, taking my breath away, saving my bare feet from the cold stones.

“Are you all right?” I asked when we got to a padlocked door. “What’s going on?”

“That house is too damned small.”

He turned the black disk on the padlock and popped it open. Swung the hinge and opened the door with a jerk. He dropped me inside.

The overhead light was dim, but I could see cobwebs and old movie posters on blue paint. Cardboard boxes were stacked everywhere, but I could discern the shape of a bedroom under them. A desk with boxes under and over. Loft bed with no mattress. A dresser with boxes on top and in front.

“When they said it was storage they meant it,” I said.

He faced me, and I knew why he wanted to be away from the house. Bathed in intensity, glowing with desire, he was a man on a mission.

“I’m not spending another night in bed with you unless you’re naked.”

I felt naked already, the way he was looking at me. My nipples stuck out of the nightgown, and my clit had just started to throb.

He brushed his hands over my breasts, feeling the tips. “All day, I wanted you. You sat down by the bluff, and I saw that little bit of skin over your waistband.”

“You were a gentleman.”

“Not anymore.” He pinched a nipple through the nightgown, and I groaned. My spine turned to jelly. It was easy for him to turn me around so I faced a stack of boxes. My body had no will of its own when he bent me over. I even hissed out a “yes . . .”

He picked up my nightgown in one swift motion, exposing my ass to the air.

“This is mine.” He ran his fingers over my slickness, slipping two inside me. I groaned. He took them out and put a third finger in, stretching me. “You ready to get f*cked?” He pushed inside me as deep as he could.

I couldn’t see him take his dick out, but I knew he was, and I felt it on my cheek as he stroked my lower back.

“Take me,” I said. “Please.”

“You’re so hot. Such a sexy girl. You make me so hard.” He slapped my ass, and the sting made me shudder.

I pushed into him and he countered. Three strokes and he was deep. When he’d gone down to the root, he grabbed my hair and pulled.

“This what you want?”

“Harder.”

“Touch yourself. Make yourself come, and I’ll f*ck you so hard you crack.”

He planted his hands on my hips. I reached between my legs, for my clit, his dick, feeling the way he moved inside me.

“Cara,” he whispered, sucking air in. The tenderness of his call the opposite of the way he f*cked me.

He bit the back of my neck as I came, holding me up as I lost control of my body. I bit back his name, turning a scream into a deep breath and a grunt.

He pulled out of me, but held me still by the hair. Then he marked my lower back with his come, softly saying mine mine mine as if he was trying to convince himself it was true.





CHAPTER 57


CARA


“I decided something.” Brad pushed me against the wall outside the room where Nicole slept. He kissed me and felt my body through the nightgown. We whispered together after midnight, but I still worried about waking someone.

“You shouldn’t make decisions right after sex.”

“I made it during.”

“Even worse.”

“I need you. You’re staying.”

“You cannot pay me and bed me at the same time.”

“I’m only paying you for the hours I’m not f*cking you.”

“Are you serious?”

“Dead serious.”

“No. That’s—”

“Good. It’s decided. I’m going to sleep on the living room floor. See you in the morning.”

He stepped back, looked me over from head to toe, and walked down the hall.

“Brad,” I said quietly. He slowed. “Do you trust Paula to be at your house while you’re here? Since the fight, I mean?”

“Stop thinking about this. You’re freaking out for nothing.”

I didn’t agree with him at all. I thought there was plenty to freak out about. His daily routines. His lists and tasks. Everything she did, which was so very much.

Pushing him was going to get me nowhere though. His breathing had already gotten slow and shallow. If he was letting go, I could let go.

“Good night, Brad.”

“Good night, teacup.”





CHAPTER 58


CARA


Brad and I had spent two days and two nights together. I met his friend Buddy, cooked with his mother, took Nicole on long walks around town. We took her to the ice cream shop in the afternoon, after the playground, where Brad sat with me and talked about his childhood and his family.

“I can’t believe how smart she is,” he said of his daughter as she climbed the play structure. “She’s reading. And stop telling me it’s normal.”