Saved by a Dangerous Man (3 page)

I retrieved the bag and pressed it into his arms. “Thanks! I’ll be out in a minute or two. Or maybe five. Wanna make sure I clean it all up. Maybe I should just meet you at the airport—”

“Audrey,” Henry said, his voice soft. “It’s fine. No hurry.”
 

He pivoted and walked away, and I decided that his retreating backside was fast becoming the safest view of Henry.

I shut the door and hurried back to my bedroom, hoping that Corbin would still be waiting so that we could say our goodbyes.

He was leaned up against the wall between my tiny closet and one of the windows, smirking at a framed photo of me and Rob, lumpily costumed as lobsters for an elementary school play.
 

Even at rest, Corbin’s tall body suggested grace and easy confidence. He should be confident; he was capable as hell. Chillingly so. He uncrossed his arms and came to me.

I missed him already. “Do you think you’ll be around when I return?”

“No idea, but I’m trying my best,” he said. “Trying to get…” He shook his head.

His hand sought the bottom of my sweater, and then his palms were skimming over my bare stomach. He went higher, fingers sliding up the satin cups of my bra. I closed my eyes, allowing myself this moment.

There were so many reasons why I shouldn’t allow him to do this. Corbin was dangerous, and I knew next to nothing about him. I was a bounty hunter, as were my brother and my father—not to mention the impatient Henry Heigh, who had a legitimate lead on Corbin and who was waiting outside for me along with a man who looked like a mad doctor had merged two nightclub bouncers into one body.

But despite everything, I needed Corbin Lagos. He saw me, faults and all, and rather than recoil in disgust, he grabbed me with both hands. He gave me something I’d never had: happiness. No one else had even tried. He made me feel safe and important. He surprised me, and not just by turning up at unexpected times. He was so much more than a bad boy hired by the good people to do bad things.
 

Most of all, this man with no future made me want a lifetime together. We could never have that, but we had the present, and at the moment he was in front of me, palming my breasts, awakening all my senses.

He lowered a hand to my ass, grabbed a handful and squeezed, pulling me into him. The bulge in his jeans pressed against my stomach and ribs—he was, after all, eleven inches taller.

Corbin glided his questing hand under my bra. He brushed his fingertips over my nipple, and it tightened. Aching need followed wherever he touched.

“Have to go. What are you doing?” I murmured, swaying slightly under his spell.

“Fucking you.”

His forthright words gave me a physical and very wet reaction. My eyes flew open. “But Henry is—”
 

“He’s nothing.” He pressed his face against mine. Even though he did it gently, my cheek burned lightly where his stubble touched me. “I wish I knew how to change your mind,” he breathed into my ear. His voice was tightly controlled.

“I didn’t make this decision casually,” I countered, my stubbornness kicking in. “I can take care of myself, and if you don’t know that by now—”

“I know you can. You are tough. Anyone can see that.”

And then it was like a switch flipped.
 

He snatched off my coat and pushed me backward, onto my bed. In seconds, he had my jeans and panties down around my knees… my hands floated over my bare flesh, too late to help him.
 

“This has to be fast,” I gasped. “Really fast. Not like behind the restaurant.” My hands jerked toward his jeans, but Corbin unzipped and pulled them down. He wore no underwear. Seeing his huge, swollen erection so soon was a shocking thrill.

“Laundry day?” I asked. I raised my gaze to his and saw my lust reflected and magnified. He wasn’t in the mood for joking, apparently. I had to look away—it was like staring at the sun—so I returned my attention to his cock.

It was majestic, if that can be said of a dick that isn’t actively engaged in what it does best. Engorged, straining, the skin over the purplish-veiny shaft taut. And he was thick. I wanted to grasp him in my fist and squeeze, feel his pulsing strength. I wanted him inside me.
 

Corbin pulled a condom out of his pocket. Within seconds, he was rolling it down his length with quick, graceful movements.

He leaned forward, his mouth crushing onto mine. His lips were hungry, seeking, demanding. I moaned as the swollen head of his cock bumped over my slick sex, and I arched up as much as I could given my hampered legs. My hands scrabbled for his waist, grabbed and twisted in his T-shirt. Underneath the cotton, his body was burning hot, hard as granite.
 

His shoulders and arms rippled as he positioned himself, his legs on the outsides of mine. When he lowered his weight onto his knees, his thighs bulged, and I licked my lips nervously, suddenly feeling like a virgin about to be taught the wicked ways of the world.
 

He balanced on one hand and tilted his cock toward the wet juncture of my thighs. He grunted, then one small downward thrust and the distended tip breached me. My face went burning hot and all the muscles in my body tightened, on notice. He drove his powerful hips forward, and I was impaled on his erect length. Hurt so good. A flush spread upward, setting my chest and throat and face on fire.

Love, love, love
, ran in a loop through my mind. The thought was so unlike me… but he was everything. I hadn’t known he existed, and now I couldn’t live without him.
Love.
My inner muscles grabbed onto him with desperate relief.
 

“Fucking… fucking… so… hot,” I gasped between his thrusts, giving my mouth something to say that wouldn’t embarrass us both.

Corbin’s response was that familiar palm over my mouth. I arched up and finally let myself go, not worried about making too much noise.

Very far away, the doorbell rang. Corbin’s hand clamped tighter, but he needn’t have worried; I didn’t have the self-discipline to stop him, not when my body again hurtled toward the precipice of the bliss that Corbin never failed to deliver.

His finger honed in on my clit, and he rubbed me as he pummeled my tight hole. My pathetic bed squeaked for mercy. I was arched so far back that I could see more of the headboard than the ceiling, and every inch of me vibrated with tension.
 

My spine ached, and I knew my constricted knees and ankles might not be happy with me later. But what was later except an abstraction? Something that might not ever arrive. Only the moment mattered: Corbin’s broad shoulders and muscled chest flexing as he braced over me, his focused gaze fixed on my eyes as he fucked me. His face, angular, virile, and intense, twisted with pleasure and determination. His fingers swirled, I came again. With each churning thrust of his hips, a growl escaped his gritted teeth, his grunts almost eclipsing my shrieking cheap mattress.

Just when I’d adjusted to the assault, he slowed, pulling all the way out and then filling me again. My pussy, dripping by then, accepted him easily. He came down on one elbow and swiped his tongue over my mouth. His free hand roamed under my shirt until his fingers tugged at my nipple while my breast filled his palm.

I heard the front door open slowly, and I went stiff.
 

“There’s time.” Corbin’s hand moved from my breast back to my slippery skin, stretched to accommodate his substantial girth. He rubbed two fingers over my clit, his movements precise and effective. He’d gone still, too, his cock buried inside me, the bed silent.

Henry tentatively called out my name, then the front door closed again. I didn’t hear the footsteps, but the squealing wooden floor near the entry told me that Henry was inside, though not moving deeper into the apartment.

“Come for me,” Corbin whispered. The glimmer in his eyes was dangerous, I knew. If I resisted, he would push me until I either accepted or used my safe word.

My body softened, tightened, yielded again.

“Like this.” His voice was a low growl. “Now.”
 

Maybe he couldn’t order me to stay in town or quit my job and be a sanctioned outlaw with him, but in the bedroom, he’d won the loyalty of my pleasure-seeking body. Here, he was king, by right and by might.

I became a thrashing, sweating animal. Bit my lip so hard that I should have tasted blood. This was how Corbin imprinted himself on me, by wetly licking my mouth, displacing the rest of the world with his taste and scent while I crested on a tsunami of bliss.

But when I crashed… Even before the final shudders had passed, panic invaded. So much for the afterglow. Sad. With Corbin, I actually liked that part. He pulled his cock from my still-clenching sex. He was huge and swollen, so unsatisfied. He got up and slammed my bedroom door closed, rested his weight against it, his expression neutral.

Relieved, I smiled my thanks. “Henry, I’m almost done,” I called out. The moment I said Henry’s name, darkness shuttered Corbin’s face. And Corbin didn’t even know about the kiss.

“Your door wasn’t locked… just need to use your bathroom,” Henry yelled. “Butch and I split a pot of coffee an hour ago. Should have abstained.”
 

“It’s the door just before the kitchen. I’m… had to change my clothes.” Talking to Henry with my pants down around my knees just felt wrong. I stood up and made myself decent.

“Think I found it. Take your time,” Henry said. The bathroom door opened and closed.

“How generous of him,” Corbin growled, murder in his eyes. Except… that wasn’t an idle observation when it came to Corbin. A shudder crawled down my spine. “I don’t appreciate the way he just walked in here,” he said.
 

I agreed with that, but no good would come of saying so. “It’s not a big deal,” I whispered hoarsely.

He peeled off the condom and imprisoned his swollen member in his jeans. When he looked at me again, his eyes had gone cold. “If he lays a hand on you—”

I stood on my toes and kissed the sandpapery underside of Corbin’s jaw. “You won’t have to do anything because I’ll castrate him myself.”

I heard my toilet flush. It was a strange sensation because I never had company. It definitely felt… icky. My apartment was my private space. When Corbin slipped in, it was welcome. But Henry’s intrusion felt like trespassing.

A strange feeling came over me. I glanced down at the bulge of Corbin’s jutting, unsatisfied cock. It would only take another minute. He followed my glance, shook his head.

“Fuck me,” I said, my voice quiet. Then I hit the play button on my decrepit CD changer. I shoved my dresser over a few feet so that it blocked the door, just in case Henry started getting ideas.
 

“My good girl’s gone bad,” Corbin said. He studied my face with that intense expression of his, the one that made me feel stripped naked.
 

“You knew I wasn’t a good girl when I fucked you in the alley,” I pointed out.

“Oh, I knew long before then.” Corbin worked my jeans down again. I’d intended to suck him off, but if this was what he wanted…

I leaned over and hit the play button again—all of my appliances were recalcitrant—and a rock song exploded through the speakers. Only then did I realize that it could have too easily been
The Second Waltz
—the song we’d danced to our first night together. I’d never heard of Dmitri Shostakovich before then, but I’d listened to that song hundreds of times since. That would have been embarrassing.

Corbin shoved me on the bed, pulling my legs up. I stared at my jeans around my knees, my worn boots in the air, and I felt foolish.

“The moment you woke up in my bed, I knew,” he said.
 

“Bullshit.”

“Your eyes gave you away.” He treated me to his cocky smile. “I thought to myself, ‘Goddamn, this sexy little bounty hunter wants to fuck me more than she wants to turn me in.’”

I snorted and rolled my eyes. “Wrong.”

“History says otherwise.” Corbin leaned in, eyes gleaming. “Sex with me is worth two million bucks.” His amusement gave way to that ragged lust that I knew so well.
 

He anchored an arm around my knees, guided his cock to my slick folds. “What do you want, Audrey?” he asked, his voice all low and seductive.

“To get fucked by someone who isn’t an egomaniac,” I said.
 

“Mm.” He sank his teeth into my denim-covered calf, then shoved himself so forcefully into me that I felt my face get fireplace-poker hot.

And he fucked me. It was fast, but it was rough, even for Corbin, who liked to liberally spice his sex with pain and domination. I knew I’d have bruises where his hand gripped my hip. He held my lower body in the air, my mid-back, shoulders and head on the mattress. Barely.

His fingers dug into me, and I knew he was marking me. And when he leaned forward, folding my body under his weight, and pressed his palm over my mouth, I let myself go, writhing and moaning. Our grunts mixed with the music.

Corbin collapsed over me in a rare lapse of complete control. The man was heavy as a truck. I was so surprised that I didn’t try to shift him to a more comfortable position. He was still breathing hard, still coming down from his own orgasm. “I wish you wouldn’t go,” he panted.

“Sorry.”

He kissed my neck, right under my earlobe. “Ok.” He easily raised himself off me. “In that case, you’d better take this.” He sat up, then reached under the bed—
my
bed, which really shouldn’t have sheltered things I didn’t know about—and handed me an opaque black plastic bag, the kind the liquor stores use. He handed it to me, but I sensed he didn’t want to.

I glanced inside and saw a box of pretzel sticks, enough candy and chocolate bars to put a horse in a coma, chewing gum, a paperback novel about cannibal zombies, bottles of painkillers and vitamins, and a black box.

“Some things for your trip. Snacks and so on.”

“What’s in the box?” I pulled it out. It rattled.

Corbin took it away, dropped it back in. “Pencils. Look at it in your room. And no sharing with Henry.” His voice had gotten clipped again.