Strong Enough (Tall, Dark, and Dangerous #1)(38)

“Yes! Yes to all of it!”

“Then come for me, kitten. Give me everything you’ve got.” He groans the last just as he pushes his body into mine.

“Unh,” I half grunt, half gasp as he stretches me painfully. He’s so big. Almost too big.

Just before the pleasure-pain becomes too much, he withdraws, but not completely. With his broad tip still resting within me, Jasper reaches between us to rub me as he sucks on one nipple and makes shallow thrusts into me, giving me time to accommodate him. When I relax again, my body clutching for more of his thick length, he eases in farther, biting down on my nipple at the same time, creating a sensual overload. I dig my fingernails into the smooth skin of his back.

“Oh God! Jasper!”

“Mmmm, that’s right. Give me your claws.”

With that, he pulls out and then slams back into me, hard and deep. My body stretches around him and then squeezes in that divine way that I feel in my every bone and muscle. When he withdraws again, he pounds back in deeper still, but not completely. I know the moment he’s fully seated within me. He flexes his hips in one last thrust, one more delicious push that sends me falling over the edge. I’m thrown onto a wave of ecstasy and then carried out to sea by a million more.

I’m so enraptured that I hardly hear his feral grunt when he stiffens against me, but I feel it when he lets go. I couldn’t not feel it. He pulses within me, each throb so strong it tosses me right back into the fray of my orgasm. And this one, we ride out together.





TWENTY-TWO


Jasper

I carried Muse’s limp, naked body from the living room floor to her bed. She asked me to lay with her. For some reason I agreed. Now she’s resting quietly against me. Her head is on my outstretched upper arm and she’s facing me, her fingers drawing lazy circles on the cool sheets between us.

I don’t open my eyes. I don’t look at her. I’m sure she knows I’m not asleep. Even if I could sleep in the room with another person, I couldn’t do it right now anyway. I can almost feel her mind spinning, like vibrations of unrest in the air around me. Stirring. Churning.

I smile into the dark when I hear her voice. I knew she wouldn’t be able to stand the silence for very long.

“Jasper, where are we? Whose cabin is this?”

I sigh. Always with the questions.

“It’s mine.”

“Is this your house? I mean, where you live all the time?”

“I don’t live anywhere all the time.”

“But do you live here some of the time?”

“What if I do?”

I feel her shrug. Even with my eyes closed, I can picture it in my head. The way the corners of her mouth dip in. The way her eyebrows rise just a little. The way her hair moves against her shoulders. I can recall with absolute clarity nearly every small detail about her. Just like I’ve never really felt much guilt, I’ve never really been haunted by someone I’ve met on one of my missions before either. But Muse . . . she is one who will haunt me, I think. Forever.

“It’s fine if you do. I just . . . It seems . . .”

“It seems what?” I prod gently, enjoying the residue of pleasure that’s still softening my muscles.

“It doesn’t seem to reflect you. Like, I don’t see things that make me think of you, ya know? Is that weird?”

It’s my turn to shrug. “I don’t know. I guess I don’t really pay much attention to décor.”

She turns the nervous attention of her fingers to my ribs, tracing each one, starting from just beneath my arm. “What about this place or what piece of furniture or what knickknack says something about you? About the real Jasper?”

She’s clever, trying to get to know me this way. As someone who most often employs deceptive, devious or covert means to get information that people wouldn’t normally divulge, I can appreciate it. Her method doesn’t surprise me. She’s an intelligent woman with a curious mind. I like that about her. What does surprise me is the ease with which I decide to tell her what she wants to know. It comes with a pang of guilt and melancholy, though. I know why I’m going to take advantage of the first person I’ve felt close to in a long time and tell her some personal things about myself. It’s because she won’t be a threat to me. She can’t be.

“There’s a white china dish in the master bathroom. Right beside the sink. I see it every time I wash my hands, brush my teeth, whatever. It was my mother’s. Since I was a little kid, she kept her hair ties in it. When I take the lid off, it makes the whole room smell like her.”

Muse’s voice is hushed, tentative when she asks, “Is she . . . is she gone?”

“She might as well be.”

I don’t know why I even give her that answer. I know she won’t be satisfied with it. Muse is the type of person who wants to know everything about the people in her life. What they love and hate, why they do the things they do. What makes them tick. She’s that much like her father.

“So she’s not dead?”

For about a tenth of a second, I ask myself if I really want to do this. Let someone in. Take the risk. But then I remind myself that there’s no risk at all. And for whatever reason, that bothers me more than if there was.

“No, she’s very much alive.”