Every Part of You: Resists Me (3 page)

He slapped her clit. Hard. The pain, sharp and intense and furious, bit at her like the sting of angry wasps.

And that, finally, was what sent her over the edge, as though he’d known it all along. Simone came so hard the world turned gray and red at the corners of her vision. The second slap hurt worse than the first on her love-swollen flesh, and it sent her tumbling into a second climax so hard on the heels of the first it was as though she didn’t stop coming the entire time.

“So fucking beautiful,” Elliott said.

The heat of him hit her belly and breasts as he came all over her. Simone’s breath caught in her throat, watching his head fall back with pleasure, his hand still stroking the last bursts of his climax over his fist. It wasn’t what she’d expected from him, not at all, but oh, God, it was so hot that her body tried and failed to send her over the edge into one more climax. Her cunt tightened, clit tingling, but she couldn’t quite manage.

Still, it had been close and she’d never come from just watching a man get off before. She sipped at the air, trying to find her voice, and could only manage to whisper his name. Elliott, blinking, focusing at last on her face, slowed to his final stroke.

“Wow,” she said. “That was … amazing.”

That’s when he leaned in to kiss her softly, the embrace as unexpected as his orgasm had been. She thought he might say something, but he only pressed his forehead to hers for a moment, his eyes closed. Then he kissed her again, once more, before he gathered up his clothes and took them with him as he left.

*   *   *

She hadn’t come out of the bedroom after him—that he had expected. She hadn’t called him, either, and Elliott wasn’t surprised by that any more than by her refusal to follow him. Simone had impressed him as a woman who knew what was what. What shocked him into a gape-mouthed silence, though, was the fact that she’d shown up at his office the next afternoon with a paper bag from a local bakery in one hand and a cardboard tray containing two large coffee cups in the other.

“I take it you’re not much one for cuddling,” was her greeting. She didn’t wait for him to invite her in, but set down the bag and the coffee in front of him. She shut his office door, then turned back to him.

“Simone,” he said, and that was all he managed to say.

“Look. I’m sure that you’re used to a certain … kind … of woman, let’s say.”

“I am.” He looked inside the paper bag. Lemon scones. His favorite. The coffee, sweet and creamy, also the way he liked it.

“Dig in. I bet you’re starving. There’s some hummus and chips in the bottom of the bag, but you have to share. I’m starving, too.”

He was starving, as a matter of fact. He’d skipped lunch, intending to duck out early to have dinner with Molly, but the charge nurse had called him to say it was one of her bad days and he shouldn’t bother.

“I know it’s a hike for you with traffic and all,” the nurse had said. “And I’d hate for you to get all the way out here only to have her not even know you.”

What he hadn’t been able to tell the woman, who’d worked there since before Molly’d become a resident, was that his visits had stopped being solely for Molly a long time ago. Even on the days when she didn’t know him at all, or the worse ones, when she thought he was his father, when she wept and pleaded with him not to leave her, to never, ever leave her—even on those days, Elliott visited for himself. Because there were so few days left before she’d be gone for good.

“Why not let me take you out for a real meal?” Elliott asked.

Simone paused in taking out the carton of hummus and bags of chips. “First of all, that sounds more like a date. Second of all, me and you? We have some discussing to do. And I sort of got the idea that you’re the kind of man who doesn’t like to make a scene. If this isn’t enough food for you, we can order pizza.”

Shit.

“Are you going to make a scene, Simone?”

“No. I don’t intend to,” she told him. “But I do intend to say what I mean to, and I do mean for you to listen.”

“That sounds ominous.” He tore open a bag of chips and dunked one in the hummus, his stomach rumbling.

“Only if you’re uncomfortable with discussions of an adult nature.”

He paused to give her a look, trying to judge her. She’d said it lightly enough, but her expression was neutral. He sat back in his chair. “You’re pissed off.”

“Let me ask you a question, Elliott. Don’t you think I have the right to be a little disgruntled?” She sat in the chair on the opposite side of his desk and sipped from her paper cup of coffee. Her voice, still light. Expression, still neutral.

He knew enough about women to know he was in for a shitstorm if he didn’t play this right. The problem was, he was never able to play things right. Elliott sighed.

“What do you want me to say? Sorry?”

“Are you sorry?”

He looked at her. “No.”

“Then don’t say you are.” She sipped coffee again. “But I think you need to understand some things about me.”

He expected her to tell him how she didn’t put up with bullshit. How he didn’t know what he was messing with. Maybe even that he was a selfish prick. All things he’d heard from other women over the years.

“I’m not a robot,” Simone said, instead. “I’m a real girl. With real feelings. Which might surprise you, or make you feel uncomfortable, but that’s the way it is, and for someone who made such a big deal out of me being rude for dancing with someone else when you told me you didn’t want to dance, I think it was particularly rude of you to fuck me and leave without so much as a ‘call you later.’ You didn’t have to stay for breakfast, but you could’ve at least acted like you weren’t chewing off your arm to get out of a trap.”

“I don’t like to sleep in someone else’s bed.”

“Who does?” Simone said with a frown. “You could’ve just said so.”

“I’ve tried that in the past. Women don’t like it. They think I’m making an excuse. Or that I should somehow get over my desire to sleep in the comfort of my own bed, with my own pillow, for their sake.”

“Oh, women,” Simone said with an airy wave of her hand. “We can be some kind of crazy bitches.”

Elliott snorted reluctant laughter. “Yeah, you mentioned that the night we met.”

“But men,” she added, “can be assholes.”

“Yes. We can. I wasn’t trying to be an asshole. I just … didn’t want an argument.”

“I wouldn’t have argued with you.”

“I didn’t know that.”

She smiled, then. A small one. “No. You didn’t.”

“I’m sorry,” Elliott said, surprising himself.

“Accepted.” She gestured at the food. “Eat up.”

He dug into the hummus and crunched a chip, watching her as she sipped more coffee. He could remember the taste of her. The feel of her skin under his fingertips. The way she moaned, the color of her skin fading from red to creamy pale …

“You’re staring,” she told him.

Elliott shifted, uncomfortable. “I’m sorry.”

“Are you imagining me naked?”

He had been, but shook his head.

She grinned. “Liar.”

A smile tugged his mouth. “Are you imagining
me
naked?”

“Oh. Absolutely.” Simone lifted her cup toward him. “I’m hoping I get another chance to see it for real.”

“You’re not … mad.”

She sighed for a moment. “Listen. You’re kind of hard to like, do you know that?”

“Yes.”

“Bonus points for acknowledging,” she told him.

Elliott tore the lemon scone into four equal pieces and laid them out on the napkin, since he had no plate. Before he could reach inside the paper bag for another napkin, Simone handed him one. “Thanks.”

“And yet I like you anyway,” she said.

“You have suspicious taste in men.”

She gave him a cheery smirk. “Oh, there’s no doubt about that. But here’s the thing, Elliott … you like me, too.”

He did like her, that was the crazy thing. He’d liked her from the moment in the elevator when she’d transformed herself from office mouse to after-hours vixen. And when she’d held her own at Barry’s party. He liked the way she tasted and smelled, the way she moved under him, but most of all, he liked the way she responded to him.

“I don’t even know you,” Elliott said.

“You know parts of me,” Simone replied in a low voice.

He was no longer so hungry. Elliott wiped his fingers carefully on the spare napkin. “Seeing you naked doesn’t mean I know every part of you.”

Simone got up from her chair and came around the desk to sit on the edge of it. Her knee brushed his on purpose. She crossed her arms at first as he leaned back in his chair. Then, before he could stop her, she swung her leg over his lap. Straddling him, she put her hands on his shoulders, her thumbs brushing his neck.

She put her mouth to his ear. “I like it when you hurt me.”

*   *   *

Simone had never seen a man move so fast. One minute she was on Elliott’s lap. The next he’d lifted her and pushed her to the side so hard she stumbled, whacking her elbow on the edge of his desk as he got out of his chair, which went spinning into the wall behind him. She straightened, rubbing it with a wince.

“That’s not the kind of hurt I mean,” she told him.

“What the hell is the matter with you?”

She didn’t feel much like laughing, but forced a chuckle to keep her voice light. “You want the whole list, or the Reader’s Digest version?”

Elliott blinked. Ran a hand through his hair. Then across his mouth. “I’m sorry I pushed you. Are you okay?”

Simone rubbed her elbow, which was still tingling. “It’s fine. I’m sorry you were so upset by what I said.”

They stared at each other for long, silent moments that she wasn’t going to break. He could tell her to get the hell out. He could pull her into his arms and crush his mouth to hers. Either way, she was going to leave it up to him.

Elliott frowned. “Do you always just say what you think?”

“Mostly.”

He looked at the spread of food she’d brought—she knew his preference for lemon scones, hummus and chips, because that’s what she’d seen him bring in for breakfast or lunch. She’d known he’d be hungry, because she’d watched him all day, and he hadn’t eaten. She’d known, too, that he’d need that extra napkin.

She knew so much about him, Simone thought, and he had no idea who she was.

“Look,” she said suddenly. “I came here because I wanted you to know something. About me. I wanted you to know me a little, Elliott. I mean, we were pretty intimate already, and I know you don’t really see women more than once or twice—”

“Who said that?” He looked surprised, but not affronted.

It had been a guess, based on the parade of women he’d been bringing to his office for the past year and a half, since the first time she’d stayed late and noticed she could see him from her window. He wasn’t denying it. Simone shrugged.

Elliott frowned. He did that a lot, but she’d seen his smile, and it was worth waiting for. He rubbed at his mouth again. Not smiling.

“I don’t want to be your girlfriend, just so you know,” Simone told him. “I don’t think fucking equals love. I want you to know that, too. And I’ll never, ever be that girl who shows up on your doorstep with mascara streaming down her cheeks, asking you why you don’t love me.”

It was working. The corner of his mouth twitched. Just a little. Not quite a smile, but the promise of one.

“I like sex. A certain kind of sex, to be honest,” she said bluntly. “The rough kind. The kind that leaves marks. It’s not that I can’t get off on the soft, romantic, vanilla-flavored fucking, because I can. But I like the pain.”

Elliott coughed.

Simone didn’t back off. “I like teeth on my throat and having my nipples pinched, having my hair pulled and my clit slapped.”

Elliott coughed again, harder this time.

“I don’t like being tied up. Or spanked as discipline.” The tone of her voice had gone from light to slightly harsh, but she didn’t work too hard to change it. “I will never, ever wear a collar. I won’t call any man Master.”

He smiled then, finally, and though it was far from that brilliant one she’d had the luck to catch the night they’d been together, it was better than the frown. “No. I don’t imagine you ever would.”

She smiled, too. “I like you, Elliott Anderson. You’re smart. You have a good job. You’re sexy as hell—”

He snorted soft laughter at that and shook his head.

“And you like to hurt women when you fuck them.”

That stopped his laughter as fast as it had begun. The frown was back, this time accompanied by furrowed brows. He didn’t deny it, but obviously he didn’t want to admit it, either.

“You like it,” she repeated softly. “And I like it. So where’s the harm in liking it together?”

He shook his head again. Harder, this time. “You have no idea.”

“About what? What I like?” It was Simone’s turn to frown. “Because I can guarantee you, I’ve had enough time to figure it out. I mean, this wouldn’t be the first time a dude’s tried to tell me what I like or not—”

“No. Not about what you like. About what I like. I don’t. Like … that,” Elliott said.

He was lying to himself. She knew it, but wasn’t going to call him on it. Taking a chance, Simone sidled a little closer. “All I’m saying is, maybe we could give it a try.”

“What? Fucking? You said it yourself. I don’t see women more than once or twice. I’ve already seen you more than that.” His lip still curled in a sneer, but his gaze wouldn’t meet hers.

Simone’s chin went up. “Fine. Listen, I don’t beg. I don’t chase. I don’t need to.”

“I’m sure you don’t.” It was a compliment that sounded vaguely like an insult, and it stung her unexpectedly.

She pushed away from the desk. “Enjoy the scones.”

He reached to snag her sleeve as she passed. “Wait a minute.”

She waited without looking at him. Elliott let her wait, but he didn’t say anything. Finally, she turned. “What?”

“You don’t know me,” he said.

She gave a pointed look at the scones. The coffee. The napkins. Then at him. She raised a brow.

“No?”

His mouth thinned. “No, Simone. You don’t.”

“Fine,” she said again.