Praise (Salacious Players Club #1)(52)

“Charlotte?” he asks when he sees me. “Where’s Beau?”

“I drove him home.”

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want him anymore.”

“Don’t say that,” he snaps.

“Did you read the form? I filled it out. Did you read it?”

A small wrinkle forms between his brows, clearly confused by my rambling. Before he can shut me out, I storm through his front door, directly to his office. I hear his footsteps on my heels, and when I spin to face him, I catch the way he’s still wearing his work clothes from a couple hours ago, but the white shirt is unbuttoned, revealing his chest and the patch of hair peeking through. God, I want to touch it, run my fingers through it. Am I into chest hair now?

He reaches up to rub his forehead, looking exhausted as he says, “Charlotte, we really can’t be doing this. The form, the submission, any of it. We can’t.”

“Why not?” I snap back. If there was any semblance of me guarding my feelings, it’s gone now.

“You are my son’s girlfriend!” There’s so much desperation in his tone and turmoil in his expression.

“Ex!” I yell back.

“Does it really matter? Does it make me any less of a piece of shit if he’s your current or ex-boyfriend?”

“What about what I want? Why am I being denied?” I cry out.

“I never should have hired you. This was all a mistake.” He pulls at his hair, staring at the floor, and I’m left speechless. Too sad to be angry and too angry to be sad.

“Why would you say that?”

Suddenly, his body is pressed against me, one hand around my lower back and the other cupping my jaw. His face is only inches from mine as he whispers, “Because I didn’t expect you to be so perfect. I had no idea keeping my hands off you would be this hard. And then I walked in that day and found you on your knees…” He squeezes his eyes shut, pressing his forehead against mine. “Jesus Christ, Charlotte. You have no idea what you do to me.”

“Yes, I do. Because I love the way I feel when I’m with you. I see the way you want me, how much you adore me. How many people really get to feel that with someone? Why would I ever deny myself something like that?”

“We could never let anyone find out,” he replies, his gaze falling to my lips. “It could never be real. You deserve better than being someone’s dirty secret.”

I know he’s right and somewhere down the line, I’ll hate myself for this impulsive decision. But at this moment, I don’t care.

“I want whatever I can get,” I reply. “I want you.” I barely get the words out before his mouth comes crashing against mine. It happens so fast we are lost in the nuclear current of lips and tongues and teeth, starving for each other. His mouth tastes like bourbon and he kisses me with long, powerful strokes of his tongue that send butterflies straight to my stomach.

I’m practically levitating, trying to keep up with the ravenous movement of his mouth against mine. And when he growls with my bottom lip between his teeth, I hum softly in return. I need him like oxygen, gasping for air with every swipe of our tongues as our hands grasp and touch each other as much as we possibly can.

As suspected, the firm muscles of his body feel like heaven against my fingers. I cascade my hands up and down his back, reveling in how delicious he feels beneath this tight cotton shirt. There’s nothing in this moment that portrays Emerson as a man twenty years older than me. And I don’t feel like I don’t deserve him because he’s out of my league. It just feels like us, a moment months in the making and worth every torturous second of yearning.

My back is pressed against the wall as his mouth travels down to my neck. Emerson barely comes up for air. He’s like a man left to die of starvation and finally offered a meal. His hands grip my ass as he hoists me up, wrapping my legs around him as he grinds me into the wall. The rock-hard bulge in his pants rubs against my clit and I explode with sound, crying out for him.

“My girl wants this, doesn’t she?” he growls as he does it again.

“Yes!” I cry, pulling him in for another kiss.

“Then get on your knees and take it out.”

No one has ever scrambled to their knees faster than I do in this moment. Heat pummels my insides at just the sound of his sex commands. I want more—I need more. I want Emerson Grant to dominate me like he never has before, tell me every single dirty thing he wants to do to me and every dirty thing he wants me to do to him. I will obey every single command without hesitation. His voice is like lava dripping down my spine, and I am a gooey mess of a sub, willing to do literally anything he says.

I’m so eager to have his cock in my hand, my fingers fumble with his zipper while his hand gently brushes back my hair. I’m hit with a sudden sensation of I can’t believe this is happening mixed with Thank God this is finally happening creating one epic feeling of carnal elation and excitement.

When I finally get his button undone and his zipper down, I see the tip of his waiting cock, red and throbbing, poking out the top of his tight black boxers. Gently easing down the elastic, I slowly let this sight sink in. I’m looking at Emerson Grant’s cock, just inches away from my face.

Gazing up at him with my sex-crazed doe eyes, I whisper, “Now what?”

He smiles before biting his lip. “What do you want to do with it?”