SOAR (The Indigo Lounge Series Book 4) (8 page)

Yes!

But
as if he knew one more would send her over the edge, Noah stopped.

“You
don’t call the shots. You never did. What makes you think I’ll allow you to
order me around now?”

Tears
flowed freely down her cheeks. She was a frantic second from rubbing herself to
orgasm. “Please…” she whispered, broken.

“That’s
right. If you want to come, you’re
gonna
have to beg
way more than that.”

She
squeezed her eyes shut and struggled just to breathe. How could she have
forgotten how insanely heightened sex with Noah could be?

“
Pleasepleaseplease
,” she chanted, the words strung
together into an incoherent jumble.

He
feasted on her - teeth, mouth, tongue, fingers, dragging every last ounce of
surrender from her. When he had her on the brink, he twisted around so his head
and shoulders rested on the hood. He dragged her up and spread her over his
face.

Splayed
on top of his car, she shamelessly ground herself on Noah King’s mouth until
pleasure exploded through her system.

“Oh
God!” She speared a hand through his hair and twisted helplessly against him.
Her supporting arm gave way, and she screamed again as she arched out of
control, certain she would crack her head on the windshield. But he caught her,
steadied her with one hand between her breasts, and the other on her lower back
and let her relax. Her forehead touched the cool glass, and her whole body
melted against his car.

Still
raining kisses on her ravaged core, he drew down her dress, and with one last
kiss, covered her up. Rising, he gripped her waist and lifted her from the car.
Her head drooped onto his shoulder. In the drowsy aftermath, Leia barely felt
it when he deposited her in the seat and fastened her seatbelt.

He
returned to the bistro, presumably to finish locking up, and emerged a minute
later.

Without
speaking, he slid into the car and gunned the engine.

***

The
journey back started in total silence. The air felt thick with acrimony and the
heavy scent of sex. Halfway home she glanced at his stony profile. Sensing her
gaze, his hand tightened on the steering wheel. The warning made her look away.
To his crotch, which bulged with a raging hard-on.

Treacherously,
her mouth flooded with saliva and her breath locked in her lungs.

“You
hungering for another lesson, baby? I’m happy to oblige. You can take a pick of
the lamppost over there, or under the neon sign advertising boob jobs? Or hell,
I can lick you to orgasm again on the hood at the next traffic light. But don’t
stare at my cock because it won’t be going anywhere near your pussy ever
again.”

Face
flaming, she averted her gaze. “Don’t be vile.” Her voice emerged as weak as
her whole body felt. And her pussy throbbed with the need to have him fill her,
hot and heavy and hard.

“You
love me vile. Or you wouldn’t be licking your lips right now.”

Her
hands shook before she clenched them in her lap. “Please don’t be like this.”

“You
made
it like this. I’m just playing by your rules, sweetheart. And you
know what? Right about now, I’m beginning to wonder why I ever abandoned my
Catch. Fuck. Release system. Maybe it’s time to reactivate it.”

“What
are you saying, that you intend to fuck faceless strangers again?” The question
emerged a jagged whisper.

“Why
not? Emotionless fucking has its perks. And it sounds like a great life choice
right about now.”

“Noah—”

“I
told you not to say my fucking name,” he snarled.

“But…what
about Ashley?”

“What
about her?”

“Aren’t
you going to take her current status into consideration?”

His
jaw clenched so hard she feared for his molars. “Her personal feelings matter
very little to me.”

“God,
you’re being so…”

“So…what?”

“So
cruel.”

“You
didn’t think that when you were begging me to make you come.”

She
opened her mouth, but no words came out. Her face burned at the smug mockery in
his eyes. “I’m going to stop talking to you now.”

“Fucking
great idea.”

He
slammed on the gas and the Maserati shot forward.

They
arrived at her house fifteen minutes later. The electronic gates swung open,
but he stopped the car just inside the gates, his features frozen as he stared
at the mansion. The guard who manned the gates started to come out of his
cubicle. She waved him away.

When
she realized Noah had no intention of driving her to the front door, she
reached for the handle.

“Wait,”
he growled. Pulling a sticky note from the glove compartment, he scribbled on
it. “This is my PA’s number. Call her early tomorrow and arrange to drop off my
T-shirt. She’ll also let you know if you left your phone at my place.”

She
took the note and stared at the information. She’d
googled
King’s Ransom in a moment of weakness and knew exactly where his offices were
located. She could probably deliver his T-shirt personally after her
meeting—

“Something
wrong?” he demanded.

“Umm…no.”

“Then
get the hell out of my car.”

EIGHT

Noah’s
concentration was shot to hell, and he wasn’t even pissed off about it anymore.
He’d passed pissed off at around ten this morning when one of his directors had
fucked up a business deal and Ashley had left the tenth message for him to call
her.

It
was now gone midday, and he hadn’t heard from Leia. Obviously his instruction
for her to call
early
hadn’t been explicit enough.

Or
maybe she relished goading him to the point where he lost control like he had
last night. He hadn’t been able to stop himself from giving her the punishment
they both craved. And fuck, had she come apart like a firecracker. The
denotation still reverberated through him.

God.

His
breath shuddered out as the scene replayed in his mind like damned stuck
record. The noises she’d made as he’d taken his belt to her, the power and
satisfaction that’d surged through him as he welted her ass good. As he dropped
to his knees and worshiped her pussy, the sheer, fucking sweetness of her.
That look
of helpless surrender and ballsy defiance in her
eyes when they were done. Images crowded his brain, leaching away any hope of
concentration he had left. He could’ve fucked her hard and fast, right there
and then on the hood of his car, and she would’ve let him.

So,
why the hell hadn’t he? His cock certainly didn’t understand that insufferable
decision one little bit - not when he’d been erasing the security tapes of them
in Red’s office, nor breathing in her incredible scent during the tense ride
home.

He’d
been rock hard for hours afterward. Rubbing one out hadn’t helped. Thinking of
Leia just made him harder. He’d eventually taken an ice pack to his groin for a
full hour before his erection had abated.

Hell,
he’d delayed shaving until the last possible moment this morning because he
hadn’t wanted to wash the scent of her pussy off his face. Even now, licking
his lips, the memory of her taste lingered. One hand stroked his chin and played
over his lips as the other passed over his re-energized hard-on. He groaned out
loud as another shudder rammed him. Foolishly, he pressed his flesh. Stars
exploded behind his eyelids. He was halfway to unzipping his trousers and
stroking himself back to sanity when his private phone rang.

For
several seconds, he stared blankly at the phone. Then he shook his head.

Jesus,
he was losing his mind.

“Yes!”

“Whoa.
Down boy.
Who the hell pissed in your porridge?”

“I’ll
give you one guess.” There were two but he wasn’t about to admit it to his best
friend.

Gabriel
cursed. “What the hell did Ashley want?”

About
to tell him, Noah hesitated. When he’d woken this morning, the first thing he’d
felt was raw anger fused with anguish when he thought of Leia. The second
emotion had been much more surprising.

Forced
to think about having a child of his own, he hadn’t been able to stem the
mixture of elation and despair. As much as he hated Ashley, she carried a part
of him inside of her. She was a bitch through and through, but she was a bitch
carrying his child. There were no adequate words to relay that information to
his friend.

“Christ,
if you can’t talk about it, then it must be worse than I thought. She hasn’t
framed you for murder, has she? Or did she give you a disease before you bailed
out of NYC two years ago? Either way, I’ll have your back if you want to send a
hit squad after her—”

“You
back in town?” Noah interrupted him.

“Yeah,”
Gabe said. “Got back late last night. Minus my
possibly-soon-to-be-ex-girlfriend, I might add. And hell no, I don’t want to
talk about it.
Drinks on Wednesday night at The Sphere?
I’ll round up the guys.”

A
refusal dangled on the tip of his tongue, then Noah mentally shrugged. He had
to tell them soon enough. If not, his friends would snoop and harass until they
found out what was going on. “Sure. Usual time.”

“So
you going to tell me what Ashley wanted?” his friend pressed.

“It
can wait till we meet.” Noah eyed the clock on his computer, a burning need to
find out where the hell Leia was suddenly clawing through him. “I have to go.”

He
hung up and dialed La
Carezza
Inc. When he was
informed that Miss Michaels was unavailable, his temperature spiked higher. He
couldn’t reach her by mobile because hers was sitting on his desk.

Slamming
down the phone, he called another number.

“Do
you have eyes on her?”

“She
left her office twenty minutes ago. Looks like she’s having one of those powwow
lunches with a bunch of suits at a posh restaurant.”

Noah
stopped himself from asking for the name of the restaurant. The way he was
feeling, he needed to
not
be in a public place when he confronted Leia
Michaels.

“Have
a message delivered to her from me…yeah, I know it’s not part of our deal, but
do it anyway. Sure, charge me. Yeah, I’ll wait for you to find a pen.” He
stifled a curse, waited, then rattled off the message and ended the call.

Moderately
satisfied and his world slightly saner, he pressed the intercom. “Maddie, I’d
like to review my schedule for the week. And bring the real estate file from
Hartford with you, please?”

He
closed two major deals, and was in the middle of shortlisting the condos
Hartford had sent, when Maddie buzzed him again at 2pm on the dot.

“If
that’s Miss Michaels, tell her to come straight in. And hold my calls for the
next half hour.”

“
Er
…Yes, Mr. King.”

The
door to his office swung open.

Leia
entered and kicked the door shut. Noah realized he’d been holding his breath and
released it.

Holy
hell, she was so fucking beautiful. The memory of her grinding her sweet cunt
into his face, plastered itself across his vision. His body revved up, forcing
him to remain seated.

Let
her come to him.

His
gaze swept greedily over her,
then
conducted a slower
journey. Her skirt suit would’ve been boring had it not been for its short
length and the two-inch panels of leather running down both sides. Underneath
her leather-trimmed jacket, she wore another one of those semi see-through tops.
His fingers itched to undress her, spread her on the floor and pound his
frustration into her.

Chunky
jewelry draped her neck. On closer examination, he noticed faint finger marks
on her throat. He’d done that. Left his imprint on her skin. The guilt he’d expected
to feel never materialized as satisfaction tipped his lips. He may be as pissed
as hell with her, but the idea of Snyder seeing those marks on her filled him
with childish glee.

She
slammed the piece of paper in her hand on his desk. “‘
Be in my office at 2pm
sharp or what I did to you with my mouth last night will feel like a Disney
sing-along compared to what I’ll do to you this time?’
Do you have any idea
how I felt having this delivered to me during my lunch meeting?”

“I
wanted to make sure you didn’t mistake my intentions. I take it you read it out
loud to your lunch companions?”

She
gasped. “Are you insane? Of course I didn’t!”

“Then
I fail to see what you have to be embarrassed about.”

“That’s
not the point. I was in a public place. Your note could’ve fallen into anyone’s
hands. Hell, the waiter smirked as he gave it to me so he most likely read it.
And who was that guy who delivered the note? He wore a disgusting smirk too, by
the way.”

“A
friend of mine.”

Her
fingers closed over the note and scrunched it into an angry ball before tossing
it back onto his desk. “Oh, and he just happened to be in the neighborhood
where I was having lunch?”

“Sure,
let’s go with that,” he answered.

Her
eyes narrowed. “You’re having me followed, aren’t you? That’s how you knew
where I was last night.”

“Let’s
go with that too.”

“I
want it to stop.”

“No
fucking chance in hell.”

“The
deadline for delivering the blackmail money isn’t till the end of the week. I
hardly think Stephen’s going to do anything stupid before then to jeopardize
things.”

Noah
laughed. “Are you seriously trying to rationalize how a psychotic rapist’s mind
works? What do you think he’s going to do when the deadline comes and goes and
he doesn’t get his money?”

A
trace of apprehension slid over her face. “I can protect myself.”
 

“Wake
up and face reality, Leia. He’s been in prison. And
people
like him
,
they don’t get rehabilitated
. He
proved that by coming after you the second he was free. Finding that bastard
ASAP and putting him back behind bars is the only option here. Until he is, I
won’t be telling my man to stand down. End of subject.”

She
looked ready to argue the point. He short-circuited it by picking up her phone
and holding it out to her. “You left that on my bedroom floor, apparently.”

“Apparently?”
Her hand brushed his, and a tiny gasp escaped her as electricity zapped at the
point of contact.

“Maddie
found it when she was packing up my stuff.”

Dark
grey eyes met his for a second before they skated over him to the view beyond
his window. “You never did tell me where you’re staying.”

He
relaxed in his seat. “Upstairs, for now. I had some of the offices converted
into a corporate suite when I leased the place.”

Her
gaze snapped upward and stayed there, as if she had x-ray vision that could see
his current sleeping quarters.

He
suppressed a smile. “You have something for me?”

Nodding
reluctantly, she reached into her large handbag and passed out the neatly
folded T-shirt. Her movements were slow when she handed it over. “What’s so
special about this T-shirt anyway?”

He
took it and tossed it onto his desk. “You forfeited the right to know about 11
a.m. on Saturday morning. Did your board meeting go okay this morning?”

“As
well as can be expected,” she said vaguely, her gaze sliding from him to flit
around the room.

Irritation
snapped through him. He got up, rounded his desk and perched on the edge.
“Focus, Leia. What’s going on?”

She
looked at him and frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I
mean you haven’t looked at me for longer than two seconds since you walked into
my office.”

She
cleared her throat and fidgeted some more. “What we did last night—”

He
chuckled. “You mean, me turning your ass red and eating your pussy, and you
loving every second of it?”

Her
face flamed bright red.

Noah
barely stopped a smile from splitting his face. Good to know some things hadn’t
changed. He tucked a stray hair behind her ear and had the satisfaction of
feeling her shiver.

“What
about it, baby?”

“I
don’t want it to happen again.”

His
almost-smile evaporated, and he grabbed her arm. “Come again?”

A
cute grimace crawled over her face. “That’s the problem. I don’t want to. Not
with you.”

He
straightened. “Then who the hell with?”

“No,
I didn’t mean that,” she said in a rush, then shook her head. “You…this…it’s
messing with my head. I don’t want to see you again, not if…”

“Not
if what?” he grated.

“Not
if we can’t be friends.”

Blind
anger surged high. “Are you fucking kidding me? You break up with me less than
three days ago and you want to be
friends
?”

She
flinched. “You don’t want to be friends, but you have people watching me and
you think you can summon me to your office whenever you please?”

“I
never claimed to be a rational human being.”

“God,
how can you not see how fucked up all this is?”

He
shrugged. “I know how we can make everything sane again.” And it didn’t involve
him being fucking friend-zoned.

She
stared at him with a mixture of sadness and determination. “I’m not changing my
mind about us, N…” she pressed her lips together to stop his name spilling out.

“I’m
going to beg you to come back if you that’s what you think. I was going to
suggest a straight-up fuck.”

She
choked. “Excuse me?”

“You.
Bent over the back of my couch.
Me. Pounding into you.
One time only offer. No muss. No fuss. We never really got a chance for a
proper goodbye.”