Welcome to Sugartown (10 page)

The assured
way he holds me gives me the confidence to be as free with him as I
want to be. Gone is the girl who hesitated as he pushed into me up
against my house, and as I break away from him, lifting my dress
over my head and letting it fall to the ground with a loud wet
slap, I feel a freedom I never thought possible. Elijah’s Adam’s
apple bobs as his gaze drifts over me from head to toe. The dress
didn’t allow for a bra underneath so I’m standing before him in
only a pair of lace knickers. I’m freezing and beginning to feel
self-consciousness sneak back in. I wrap one arm around myself, but
before I can cover up completely, Elijah takes my wrist and pulls
me toward him.

“
You’re so
fucking beautiful.” He wraps all six feet of hard muscle around me.
I feel smothered and small in his arms but I find I like that, too.
Very much. He runs his mouth along my neck, across my jaw until my
mouth meets his. With his hands he hoists me up and suddenly I’m
weightless. I can feel the hardness and heat of him through his
jeans and I’m more than a little afraid. I know this is going to
hurt, but it’s not the physical pain I’m worried about, it’s
knowing I’m going to want more afterward than he’s willing to
give.

My breath
catches in my throat and I press myself tighter against him so he
won’t notice how much I’m shaking. Elijah doesn’t notice, though,
he just walks us backward until his legs run into the bed and then
there’s nowhere else for us to fall.

My breath
leaves me in a rush as his weight settles on top of me. I’m running
a mantra over and over in my head:
Don’t
chicken out, you want this, you want him
.
Though my hormones and my lady parts are certainly on board with
handing Elijah my virginity on a silver platter, I don’t think my
head agrees. It’s coming up with excuses as to why I have to flee
from his motel room.

Maybe Elijah
senses my hesitation, because he pulls back and glances at me with
a bemused smile. I must look like a deer, caught in headlights. He
opens his mouth and I think he's about to comment on how much I’m
shaking, but instead he kisses the tip of my nose so gently I
barley feel it. He eases his weight off of me, and I’m about to
protest when his mouth glides over my collarbone and lower still,
until he’s kissing my breast and taking my nipple in his
mouth.

I arch
against him. His calloused hand palms my other breast and then he’s
trailing his lips over my tummy, licking and kissing his way down
until his warm mouth covers me, underwear and all. Elijah shifts on
the bed until he’s lying between my legs. His fingers curl beneath
the waistband of my kickers and he peels them off, painfully slow,
and tosses them somewhere over his shoulder. I’m laid bare before
him.

He slips a
finger into my wetness and slides it up to my clitoris, circling
gently. I want to tell him to stop, or to go faster, or to just
wait a minute and let me breathe, but none of that is necessary
because all at once his hands are replaced with his mouth and his
tongue is gently laving at me. His arms border my thighs. His hands
lie flat against my stomach with just a hint of
pressure.

My hands fly
to his hair and tug on the length of his faux-hawk. I’ve never been
more glad that his hair isn’t cut in a conventional style; for one,
if there was any more I might pull it all out in the throes of
ecstasy. Too little of it, and he’d be sporting claw marks on
either side of his head.

Elijah
circles his tongue around my clit before sliding the length of it
downwards, until he’s buried as far inside me as it will go. The
stubble on his chin and jaw prickles as he pushes his face into my
soft flesh, but it’s a sweet pain, and one I wouldn’t give up
freely. He lets out a moan and then lifts his head. There’s a light
sheen of moisture covering his mouth and, though I feel like I
should be more ashamed, or even a little disgusted, I have to admit
I don’t think I’ve ever been so turned on.

He smiles
like he knows exactly what I’m thinking and then his mouth is on me
again, sucking this time. I feel him take that tiny bundle of nerve
endings in his mouth and the sensation lays waste to all other
thought, all other feeling than my whole world collapsing in on
itself.

I throw my
head back and cry out, buck beneath him and clutch at his hair for
dear life as he brings me to climax.

Twice.

Or maybe it
was one long, uninterrupted surge of bone-melting pleasure. Either
way, by the time he comes up for air, he’s panting as hard as I
am.

Elijah swipes
the back of his hand over his chin and smiles at me with both
dimples popping out. He crawls up the bed toward me and as I watch
his predator-like movements, the waning fire inside my belly
ignites with new passion. His weight settles over me, his jeans
still on. He feels harder now than he was before, if that’s at all
possible. I look up into those chocolatey eyes and feel myself
falling. I know this is more than likely just the endorphins
talking because, when it comes to Elijah, I really know nothing
about him. How can you love someone you barley know? No. I know I’m
not in love with him, but for a moment I let myself believe I am
because I can’t think of anything more I could want.

I don’t know
what’s going through his head but his dark eyes bore into me as he
gently strokes the side of my face. For a split second I think I
see him grimace, like he’s in pain, but it passes quickly and then
his mouth is on mine and he’s kissing me deep and slow, and the
fire in my belly is so distracting I can think of nothing else.
After a minute Elijah pulls back and whispers, “It’s never just a
kiss, Ana.”

Chapter Eight

Elijah

When I wake,
I’m flat on my back with wood the size of Mt Kosciuszko throbbing
at my jeans and Ana hovering over my hips. She’s still completely
naked and completely fucking unbelievable, even though her make-up
is smudged and she has one serious case of bed-head.

“
Good
morning.” She gives me a shy smile through a curtain of hair which
I brush out of the way in order to see her better. I grip her hips
and push them down so I can feel her, so I know she’s
real.

She has that
look about her this morning, wide-eyed and a little skittish, like
she’s going to bolt. Even though I know that would probably be the
best thing for both of us in the long run, I can’t let her walk.
Just the fact that she’s stayed this long in this scummy motel room
with someone so undeserving of her time makes me feel things I
shouldn’t.

She frowns
and chews on her lip a little before saying, “Hey, where’d you
go?”

“
Nowhere,” I
say, and slide my hand from her waist up her back until I’m
gripping the nape of her neck. She’s such a tiny little thing. It’d
be nothing for someone like me to overpower her, and that scares
the shit outta me. It scares me so much I find myself pulling her
down until she’s wrapped in my arms and our chests are flush with
one another’s. “I’m right here.”

I kiss the
top of her head and she raises it up and offers me her lips
instead. It doesn’t take long for things to escalate to the point
where we’re both panting hard. Her hips are riding my own and it
would be nothing to free myself from my jeans and slide into her,
but even though it seems like this morning was made for burying
myself inside her and taking her slow and deep, I know that’s not
something she’s ready for.

When I first
met Ana, the fact that she might have been a virgin never even
crossed my mind. No way had that cherry not been popped. I mean,
fuck, if I’d gone to high school with her, I’d have made it my sole
mission in life to get this girl beneath me—and obviously, I
haven’t grown up any.

The minute
those words came out of my mouth last night as I held her up
against the side of her house, I knew how wrong I’d been about her.
It’s why I walked away before it was too late, before I couldn’t.
Despite her dating that fucking wanker Scott, it seems like she was
smart and never gave it up. Which I’m both glad and ungrateful for.
I mean, there’s a fuck-load of pressure on me right now. It’s not
that I’ve never had a virgin before, but more that I’ve never been
the guy who earned the right to such a gift. I still don’t think
I’m deserving of it, but she makes me want to be. So I guess that
counts for something.

“
Ana, baby.”
I sink my fingers into her hips and hold her there until she can no
longer move. Fuck, for someone so inexperienced she certainly knows
how to drive me crazy. “Stop. Please.”

I shut my
eyes. I can’t believe I’m saying this. When did I become such a
pussy? Oh right, the second Ana Belle walked into my
life.

“
Did I do
something wrong?” she asks, and her eyes dance around the room as
if she’s looking for an escape. She’s terrified that she’s said too
much.

“
No,
darlin’.” I prop myself up with one hand and take her face in my
other so she’ll look me in the eye and not down at the bed. “You’re
perfect, but if you want me to be, you need to stop
now.”

“
I don’t know
what you mean,” she says indignantly, and folds her arms over her
chest. I’m not gonna lie, it’s really fucking hard to take her
seriously when she’s naked and straddling my hips and her perfect
rack is in my face. I let out a small, good-natured laugh, and it’s
like a switch is flipped. Suddenly, I’m all too familiar with that
temper her dad warned me about last night.

“
Ana, how
many men have you been with?”

“
What kind of
question is that?” She scowls down at me before scrambling off the
bed and tearing the place apart, searching for her underwear. “I
haven’t asked you how many women you’ve been with.”

“
Too many to
count,” I respond quickly and try not to grimace at the way her
mouth drops open. I can’t lie to her when I’m trying to get her to
confide in me, so instead I relish in it. Yeah it’s a shitty
answer, but it’s the truth. “Your turn.”

“
No. It’s
time for me to leave.”

“
You’re
overreacting.”

“
Overreacting?” she asks. “Screw you, Cade.”

“
Now, isn’t
that what we were just discussing before you
overreacted
and started tearing up
my room for your underwear? Which, by the way, you’re not getting
back.” I pull the little lacy knickers from my back pocket and
dangle them before her with a shit-eating grin on my face. She
makes a grab for them, but not for the first time in my life I’m
thankful for my Godzilla status. She’d have to climb me like a tree
to reach these babies. That thought rattles around in my head for a
bit and suddenly I’m hard again. My voice is low and thick with
lust when I say, “Finders, keepers.”

“
Real mature,
Cade. I’ll be thinking of you as I freeze my bum off on the ride
home.”

I tuck them
back in my pocket and, surprisingly, she doesn’t make a grab for
them. Instead, she zips up her dress, the one that she tossed in a
heap on the floor last night and, if her nipples are anything to go
by, is still soaking wet.

“
You’re not
riding home in that.”

“
Don’t tell
me what I can and can’t do. You’re not my father.”

“
Thank fuck
for that! This’d be one twisted daddy–daughter relationship if I
was.”

“
This isn’t a
relationship, it was a mistake.”

“
Baby, this
is the furthest thing from a mistake.”

“
No?
Obviously trying to hand you my virginity all tied up with a big
red bow was a stupid move on my behalf. You don’t want it. Why
would you be interested in some small-town, doe eyed virgin when
you’ve clearly had so much better?”

“
Shut up,” I
say, just to throw her off the mental path she’s heading down. If
she thinks about it for more than a minute she might realise she
could do way better than some fucked up man whore with a shady past
and nothing to his name but a motorbike and a string of bad
decisions.

It looks as
though she may have already figured this out because she opens her
mouth to say something but I thrust my hand into her hair and pull
her toward me, smothering her mouth with my own. For half a second
she doesn’t kiss me back, but when I scoop her up into my arms she
wraps her legs around my hips and melts into me, her kisses as
fierce as my own.

I all but
throw her on the bed before me and her breath catches in her throat
as she leans up on her elbows. I nudge her knees apart with my own
and lean my weight into her so she can feel just how truthful the
next words out of my mouth are. “I want it. More than you know, but
you can’t just hand it to me on a silver platter. You should make
me work for it, make me earn it.”

She looks
confused. Confused and aroused. I don’t blame her. I’m both of
those things, and yet I’ve just guaranteed that my balls will be
blue for all eternity, because there’s no way that I could ever
deserve a girl like this. Not in this lifetime. Maybe not even in
the next.

“
We can’t go
five minutes without wanting to tear one another apart,” she
whispers, and her eyes dare me to deny it. I don’t. It’s the truth,
after all.