Claimed by Him (2 page)

This was not a new thing, finding excuses to see Graves.

Sometimes it just felt like she woke up with the hopeful thought of getting a glimpse of the guy. She ached to make those immobile lips of his smile, to feel the butterflies in her stomach when he spoke her name in that deep, rumbling baritone, to look into those amazing amber eyes and feel the heat they generated pool in liquid lava between her legs.

She knew he was off-limits according to Daniel, but she didn’t care what her brother said. Daniel said all his rich friends were a bit eccentric and that Chloe would do well to steer away from them.

She’d tried. She’d really tried.

But when she lay in bed at night, touching herself, she could never reach that perfect spot until Graves’s face flickered in her mind. And his deep, low voice, and his sad, golden eyes.

Womb clenching tight at the thought, she pulled the car out of the parking lot only to halt at the first stop light. This wouldn’t do though. This waiting for Graves to suddenly want her was like waiting to win the lottery. You may hope and wish all you like, but in truth, there was a fat chance of it happening. And now that her twenty-fifth birthday was coming up, frustration rode her hard over the fact that she hadn’t been able to hand her V-card to the only man she’d ever wanted to give it to.

At a younger age, she’d even expected to be married with babies by now. But her family’s untold wealth and power had intimidated every man she’d known. Once a guy found out she was a Lexington, they either fell absolutely in love—which was creepy and disappointing—or they no longer wanted anything to do with her. For who could really keep up with an heiress? Graves, on the other hand, couldn’t care less about her family’s billions, since Danny said he had even
more
than they did. Which was amazing, since he’d been the one who’d had further to climb than anyone.

The light turned green, and while Chloe absently viewed the rearview mirror as she accelerated, she caught sight of her Mercedes pulling out of the building parking lot. Her heart stopped. Graves was leaving already?

Her mind flickered with images of another fun-filled night with her friends, and then twirled with the possibility of an exhilarating, titillating night at Graves’s place, and her pussy clenched with fierce want of him.

She now had the perfect excuse to go to Graves’s place. Her first excuse
ever
.

Her insides grew warm and mushy at the thought of seeing him again, and her panties got soaked every second she thought about it. She could pretend her date had canceled and would return his car, and maybe he’d invite her in for a drink, and what if one thing led to another and he kissed her and then…?

She swallowed, then came to a decision and made a screeching U-turn, promptly following the rear lights of her car. He stopped at the gas station, and her stomach moved when she realized he was filling up her tank.

Oh, God, she wanted him so much it hurt.

Braking at the side of the road across the street, she watched his muscles bulge as he shoved the pump into the gas opening. It was a stupid thing, really, but as he leaned his beautiful butt against the side of her car and waited, looking down at his cell phone and answering some e-mail or text, she felt her nipples draw tight as pebbles at the intimacy of him filling her car up for her.

Twenty minutes later, her Mercedes slid into the parking lot of an extremely posh building. She waited for a couple of minutes, then eased his Range Rover underground, parked, crossed the lobby, and asked the receptionist for his apartment number. Of course, she was told he had a separate elevator, being the sole owner of the entire top two floors. But Graves was just like Danny and they loved intelligent homes, so it was no surprise for her to have to click a button downstairs for his own private elevator to be “activated.”

What surprised her was how quickly he, personally, answered the ring.

“Code’s unlocked. Come up and down the hall.”

Anticipation flicked through her as she boarded the elevator. She rehearsed her excuse for returning his car so soon.
My date canceled…

No, for that would make her sound unwanted, and what she needed for him to see was that she was desirable and available. Right?

Briskly reviewing her options, she stepped into his apartment, her heels clinking on the granite floor. Some sort of security became activated, for she heard a “scanning” sound surround her and then it fell silent.

It was all dark across the living room except for the city lights that flickered outside the window, but once deeper into the hall, all lights vanished.

She held her breath as she entered the dark room at the very end of the hall. Graves’s deep baritone voice cut through the air. “Close the door please.”

She started. Then, hands trembling, she closed the door behind her. Her vagina clenched.

“Now take your clothes off. I need this to be fast and hard and I need you to role-play for me.”

For a stunned moment she blinked at his cool, businesslike tone. “Excuse me?” she gasped.

“You heard me. Take your clothes off. I need to get someone out of my system.”

“Graves?” Chloe asked.

There was a silence, then she heard him mutter, “Lights on.” The lamps flicked on: two matching ones beside his bed and a sleek, tall one by the window drapes. In the background Chloe could hear the virtual butler of his intelligent home speak in a British accent:
Yes, sir.

And as her eyes adjusted to the light, her heart became a kettledrum in her chest.

Graves stood by the end of his massive king-size bed, wearing nothing but dark slacks draped low over his narrow hips, and his nude, muscled torso glowing golden under the lamplight. For a split second, his face went blank.

“
Chloe?
”

“Graves?”

Her stomach tumbled at the riveting sight he made, over six feet two inches of gorgeous, partly nude male. His eyes shone dark amber, and the effect of them was immediate as they locked on hers from across the room. His ebony hair tumbled recklessly atop his head. His neck was thick and corded, and she could see the flex and ripple of muscles as he started forward.

Oh, God. Predator. Large, lean, feline. Coming toward her.

Her braless nipples pushed against her strapless dress as she took in his amazing physical form, slowly advancing toward her, making her heart accelerate with each step.

He was so athletic and so mesmerizing, she could hardly think, couldn’t even move to save herself.

Graves was ripped, hard, and also…pissed. A pair of handcuffs dangled from three curled fingers of his left hand, and Chloe stared, horrified at the sight. A hand flew to her mouth. “What are you doing with that? Are you expecting someone?” she gasped, genuinely dumbstruck.

He stared at her from beneath drawn eyebrows and advanced the last steps in that slow, panther-like way that made her want to run for cover, shoving the handcuffs into his pants pocket. “What the fuck are you doing here, Chlo?”

“Returning your car. My date got canceled and I didn’t think you’d mind if I dropped it off sooner…”

When he reached her, he leaned over her in a way she could tell was meant to intimidate, his eyes stormy and wild as he assessed her with nerve-racking intensity. “I didn’t ask you to come here. How’d you get up here?”

“I followed you. You told me to come up when I rang,” she said, loathing that her voice shook.

His spicy, elegant scent did powerful things to her libido. Unnerved out of her mind, she stepped aside with a calming breath and distracted herself by taking in his bedroom. A year ago it had been featured in
Architectural Digest
. The expert touches of the best decorators in Chicago, one of whom Chloe knew very well, graced every corner of the whole apartment, from small Picasso drawings on the walls of his bedroom, to gold-leaf sculptures among the bookshelves. The look was contemporary and simple, maybe even austere, with gray walls, gold velvet drapes, and black woods, but it was elegant and expensive looking. What really knocked his home out of the park, she’d been told, was the intelligence wired down to the heated flooring. Every room was rumored to contain computer systems so advanced they rivaled Tony Stark’s in
Iron Man.

It was all so fine, so calculated, so…Graves.

And as for the man himself? Oh, God, she was actually in his bedroom. His private lair. And she was dying to be with him. Her every forbidden fantasy since she was fifteen had been with
him.
She imagined him laying her on his bed and kissing her lips, her throat, the tip of her breasts…

He stepped in front of her again and pulled her chin up, his pupils dilated. “Leave. Don’t ever, ever, come back here. Ever.”

His lips as he spoke were so plush and mobile she could only stare at them, hypnotized, her legs trembling weakly. Dropping his hand, he took a step back and flexed his fingers at his sides, his face taut with displeasure.

Chloe’s chest hurt as she worked to breathe, and a horrible thought that Graves wasn’t single clamped its fist around her throat. Was he expecting someone? Who was he going to have sex with tonight? “I…I didn’t know you were expecting someone—I thought you didn’t have a girlfriend. Danny said you never have. Do you, Graves?”

He seemed transfixed by the sight of her lips moving. “I don’t do girlfriends.”

“Then what…?” she asked, confused. Burning jealousy had wrapped its tentacles around her, and now it wouldn’t let her go.

Graves’s stormy gaze traveled down the rest of her body until he yanked his eyes back up with a clenching of his jaw. His voice kept dropping and now it was a low, seductive rasp. “Just leave, Chlo.”

She rubbed her hands over the goose bumps he’d caused. “I just don’t understand. Are these the kinds of things you guys are into? Do you hit your women, Graves?”

He plunged his hands into his hair and circled around one time in desperation. “Jesus, I don’t hit women!”

“Then you just tie them up and what? Play with them?”

“I can’t do this with you, Chlo. Please. Get out of here. Now,” he hissed through his teeth, then he paced away only to come back and glare at her. “Please, damn you. I beg you.”

But his eyes…there was hunger there. Something primal, calling to something deep and intrinsic inside of her. She shook her head stubbornly, because she couldn’t leave…not so Graves could have another woman. Not when her body was crying out painfully for a measly touch from him. Not when she could see the unleashed power within him coiled in each and every straining muscle in his body. And not when she could see the storm of desire in those thick-lashed, flaming eyes.

Breathing with difficulty, she ran her tongue over lips, her nipples erect and pressing hard against her strapless dress as she kept glancing at the shiny silver handcuffs dangling from his pants pocket.

“Just tell me what you do that’s so wrong that you can’t do it with me,” she croaked out.

A long, thick silence stretched between them, then she watched as his fingers curled into trembling fists at his sides.

“I’m going to ignore you ever said that,” he said in a low, threatening voice that made her pussy even wetter. He grabbed her elbow and escorted her down the hall to the elevator, softly commanding, “All lights on.”

Yes, sir.

Suddenly bathed in an explosion of light, Chloe blinked, yanked her arm free, and whirled around to face him, setting her hands on the muscled wall of his chest.

“I want you, Graves. Please don’t send me away.”

He hissed like she’d burned him with her touch as he grabbed her wrists and lowered her hands, his face twisting with pain. “You don’t know what you’re asking, Chlo.”

“I want you so much I ache when I look at you. I know you want me, too, I see the way you look at me.”

“You think I look at you?” he scoffed angrily, then he curved his hands around her nape and wound his fingers into her hair, pulling her head back so their eyes met. “Maybe I do look—because what you’re wearing just begs me to. But you’re not my type. I don’t do innocent heiresses who dream about weddings. I don’t do my friends’ baby sisters.”

“You seriously plan to stand there and tell me you don’t want me? You can’t even look me in the eye anymore!” Disbelieving anger surged to the surface. “You’re a fucking pussy, Graves.”

“A pussy?” He massaged her scalp almost painfully and leaned in, his teeth clamped. “You’re right. I am. I’m a big wet pussy and I want to lick yours so bad, the need to scares the living daylights out of me. That’s right, Chlo. I
want
you so much you make me shake in my fucking pants. I’m obsessed with you…with where you are…and what you do…and who the fuck you’re with…I want to bury myself inside you so deep I won’t ever want to pull out.”

Her breath came in gasps, his sensuous words creating havoc in her. She was torn between latching onto those lips so close to hers and climbing him like a tree. She reached shaking hands to his shoulders, her vagina clenching tight. Her voice throbbed. “Please, Graves, I want you. I ache so much.”

“No, Chlo, this can’t happen.” He bit the inside of his cheek so hard, she could see he’d done some damage to himself before he stepped aside.

Chloe shook on unsteady feet as she watched him press a wood panel on the wall and grab her car keys from the compartment that opened. He came back and slapped them into her palm. “Drive safely and call me when you get home.”

A drop of blood from inside his mouth had gathered at the corner of his lips, and Chloe touched his lips on impulse.

“What happened? Why did you do that?” she asked, picking up the drop of blood with her fingertip. Then she did the unthinkable and licked the drop with her tongue. Graves seemed transfixed, and she could see his muscles contract on an indrawn breath, and she would never, ever, forget the lust-filled ecstasy in his eyes.

Heart galloping in her chest, she reached out to pick up another crimson drop.

But at the first touch of her fingertip, Graves slammed his eyes shut and turned to bury his teeth in the fleshy part of her palm. Then he licked her with a low, animal growl.