His mouth closed over my breast again, and I writhed against the rough wall, each scrape of the rough brick against my skin like an underscore to our passion.
I wanted him inside me, and I silently begged for him to just take me, to fuck me, and not to ask or tell, but to just do. I wanted to be his—I wanted to simply belong.
There was a couch about three feet to my right, and he took my hand and drew me roughly toward it. His mouth covered mine, and as his tongue teased me, his fingers yanked my skirt up the rest of the way up to around my waist. Then he whipped me around, his palms on my ass as he bent me over to spread me, to take me, and I moaned aloud in sweet anticipation, because wasn’t this what I’d been wanting this entire night? Hell, this entire year?
I felt his fingers graze over the raw and sensitive skin on my shoulder. And I sucked in air, realizing for the first time how thoroughly the brick had abraded my skin.
“I hurt you.”
“No,” I said, as something cracked inside me. It hurt, yes. But I liked it.
I didn’t know what that meant, but I knew that it was true. I liked the pain—not pain by itself, but pain that came from him. From our shared passion.
I wanted him to have that—the power to hurt me. I wanted him to keep it close like a gift. Because somehow that made me his.
I wanted to explain that, to make him understand, but I couldn’t find the words.
“I hurt you,” he repeated, and this time I heard the low, agonized tone of self-loathing in his voice.
“You haven’t,” I whispered, rushing to reassure him and cursing myself for not finding the words sooner. “Please, Cole, no.”
But he wasn’t listening, and I felt suddenly cold and exposed. I started to turn, to shift, to put my dress right. I couldn’t, though. He had one hand on my waist and the other on my shoulder.
The one on my waist kept steady pressure, keeping me bent forward and helpless.
The hand on my shoulder grazed lightly over my newly raw skin. Skin that only moments before had burned with a pain that punctuated pleasure, but that now just stung, almost shamefully.
“Christ,” he said, and this time his voice was so low that I almost couldn’t make out the word.
“Cole,” I said gently. “It’s okay.”
“Okay?” His voice was taut, a precursor to an explosion. He released me, and I stood up, carefully smoothing my skirt down even as I felt my cheeks burn. What had been one of the most erotic and exciting moments of my life had shifted totally off-kilter.
He held out his hand, and I saw that his fingertips were streaked with my blood. “I did that to you.”
“You didn’t,” I said. I turned around, then tried to adjust my dress. “Cole,” I said softly. “Please. I want this.”
“What?” The word was harsh. “What do you want, Kat? What could you possibly want from me?” He held out his hand again. “Pain? Blood?”
“Maybe.” I lifted my chin and met his eyes. “You said I owed you. Well, I’m willing to give whatever payment you want.”
“You have no idea want what I want or what you’re saying.”
“The hell I don’t,” I countered. “Don’t you get it, Cole? I want you. Whatever or however that means, I want you.”
Something flickered in his eyes, something that looked a bit like hope. But it was gone before I could be certain.
He took a step backward, and I had never seen him look more sad. “I may not have a lot of self-restraint. But I have enough. And I’m not taking you down with me.”
“Cole, please.”
He turned to leave, then paused at the door to look back at me. “I tore your dress.”
I fingered the rip in the neckline that exposed the lace of my bra and the swell of my breast. Despite my confusion and embarrassment and total frustration, my impulse was to rip it further. To rip the whole goddamn dress off. To stand naked in front of him. Tempting him. Testing him.
Instead, all I said was “Yes.”
“I’ll have Red drive you home,” he said, referring to the driver he shared with Evan and Tyler.
“Fuck that. I can find my own way home.”
Our eyes met, and for a moment I thought I saw regret. Then it cleared, and he simply nodded. “Take a jacket if you want,” he said, indicating a coat tree on the far side of the room.
Then he left, leaving me standing alone in his office, my dress ripped and my emotions equally in tatters.
five
“Avocado, salmon, and cream cheese,” Flynn said as he slid a plate loaded with the world’s biggest omelette in front of me. “Orange juice,” he added, following the plate with a champagne glass. “Of the mimosa variety. And—because what is breakfast without bacon?—a nice, crunchy side of pig fat.”
I lifted a brow as he put a plate of bacon on the small wooden table that took up most of the apartment’s minuscule breakfast area. “And I’m supposed to eat all of this how?”
“One forkful at a time.” He filled his own plate, then plunked himself down in the chair opposite me. “Consider it guilt food. I was out getting laid last night while you were home doing the morose girl routine.”
“When you put it that way,” I said, then dug in.
There are many benefits to rooming with Flynn. He’s the best cook I’ve ever met. He’s diligent about paying the rent on time. He works as a flight attendant, so he’s often gone for long stretches, thus fulfilling my need for alone time. And when he’s in town, he often picks up a shift at John Barleycorn, a local pub, which also fulfills that solitude thing, but has the added bonus of providing a place to go for drinks with good service guaranteed.
He’s been friends with Angie for years and gets along great with Sloane, so there’s none of the awkwardness that sometimes comes when circles of friends overlap. More than that, he’s easy on the eyes. And he’s straight.
It was that last characteristic that had intrigued me the most when I woke up that morning. Not because I wanted to sleep with him, but because he could provide insight into Cole. At least, I’d hoped he could.
I’d shared the basic overview of what had transpired at the gala while he cracked eggs and fried bacon. Once I had the lightly edited sordid tale out there, I asked him to play shrink and get into Cole’s head for me.