“Watching is good. Experiencing is better.”
Poised above me on one arm with eyes as dark as midnight, he takes himself in his hand, the muscle in his bicep flexing, his thickly sculpted thigh muscle contracting against my own. Slowly. Deliberately. Deliciously. He strokes the head of his erection through my wetness.
No, not his erection, his cock, my mind supplies. Because nothing as rude and as ruddy could be referred to as anything else.
My hips tilt to meet him when he presses himself against me. His mouth, suddenly pressed to mine, swallows my gasp as he pushes inside.
Swallows my gasp. Feasts on it. Greets it with a masculine groan of his own as he presses deeper. So deep. My back arches with a silent plea as he undulates against me, shuddering as I coast my foot along his strong calf.
“Holland.” My name is a blessing, a benediction, as he presses his palms into the mattress, his body above me almost blocking out the light. He growls, his head thrown back, the powerful column of his neck exposed as he savours the moment, the connection, the feel of my muscles contracting around him. His next words are delivered on a long exhale and an equally slow stroke. “Feel how good we fit.”
“I had my concerns,” I whisper, wrapping my legs tighter around him at his shallow thrust, bringing his body closer still.
“Why, Holland,” he purrs, his teeth grazing the skin just below my ear. “Whatever can you mean?” His dark taunt curls around me like smoke, exploding deep inside as he blesses me with a solid second thrust. I cry out, stretching under him, drowning in the feel of him over me.
“You’re so big.” Maybe later, I’ll regret the truism as a cliché, but all I can do now is hang on as he takes my hand in his, dragging it down to where our bodies meet. To where, beneath our tangled fingers, he moves in and out of me, hot and wet.
“Feel. It’s like you were made for me.” His ragged breath blows across me, and I glance up and see him watching the place where we connect. Watching the slide of his cock and my body accepting it. “That is . . .” His words shake, his next breath a deeply masculine groan.
I swallow thickly as a familiar sensation begins to move through me, flooding through my veins, unfurling tissue and melting bone.
He drops his head, resting it against my shoulder. His body undulates as he rocks his hips, the motion sending a pulsing thrill through me. He withdraws, and I feel the loss of him immediately, a yearning ache to be consumed by him. Used by him. His next thrust makes me cry out as he plunges inside so deeply, his movements more commanding. Or maybe meeting my body’s demands as my hips move with his, the bedding beneath us knotted in my hands. His hand slides under my knee, lifting it higher, opening me. Something inside me snaps, my cries ringing through the room, my fingers lancing the hard muscles of his ass. Alexander groans, a shudder running through his beautiful body. A second later, the tempo changes, and I trade fevered whimpers for solid thrusts, the exquisite tension within me heightening, twisting, building with the collision of skin. The sensation spirals and curls and commands until my thoughts scatter and my body submits, sensation crashing through me.
Above me, Alexander’s strong arms gather me closer, his fingers curling around my shoulders as he thrusts again and again. With a primitive roar, he collapses against me, and I absorb the feel of him as he breaks above me. Around me. Inside me.
8
Alexander
“I was looking forward to being here tonight like I would a prostate exam, but it looks like my feelings are about to change. Not to mention my luck.”
I don’t immediately turn my gaze from the contemplation of the glass in my hand, but when I do, I try to do so without a scowl. But given it’s my brother who has spoken, my half-brother if we’re being technical, I’m not entirely successful.
Griffin Middlemass. Half-brother. All annoying.
Why the hell did I think to invite him tonight? Probably because I haven’t seen him in three months. It’s not a case of distance making the heart grow fonder but distance weakening the memory of how hard I find it to be around him.
“I take it from your avaricious expression that you’ve either seen a potential client or someone you’ve fucked.” Though judging by the direction of his attention, he seems to be under the impression that he’s about to unleash his charm on a member of the catering crew. Unless he’s developed a taste for elderly businessmen in the past three months, which isn’t inconceivable. Griffin’s tastes are wide and varied, though they don’t, as far as I know, include men.
“Do you routinely invite members of the criminal fraternity home?” Griffin tilts his chin as though to examine the ornate plasterwork in the high ceiling or perhaps the crystal chandelier hanging overhead. “I suppose you’ll know the one or two oligarchs with dubious business dealings. Maybe one or two junior members of the royal family open to a bribe or two?”
“I don’t associate myself with the corrupt.” Except that one oligarch’s son I happen to be old friends with.
“Just the morally corrupt, eh?” he invites, tapping the rim of his glass to his temple.
I don’t bite though the temptation is great. Lately, I’ve been like a bear with a sore head, so I’ve been told. The fuse on my temper minuscule. My attention to social niceties non-existent. The general feeling is that my behaviour is linked to my recent milestone birthday, and in some respects, it is. It is not, however, the result of a midlife crisis.
“Come to think of it,” he continues, “the ruling class? All thieves.”
“You forget whose blood runs in your veins.”
“It doesn’t matter. I’ll always be the black sheep, born on the wrong side of the blanket. Brought up on the wrong side of the tracks.”
To listen to Griffin would make a person assume he was raised in a tower block somewhere with crack addicts for parents, not in a small manor home in leafy Sussex. But he likes to play the role of hard done by.
“And a silk,” I drawl in response. “Appointed by the Queen as a member of Her Majesty’s Counsel learned in the law. Or so they tell me.” I’m not sure how. Or how anyone would be stupid enough to retain his services, but Griffin is a barrister. Griffin Middlemass, QC, no less. Had I not seen proof of this myself—Griffin dressed in the customary wig and gown orating a perfect character assassination of a witness in the hallowed courts of the Old Bailey—I might not have believed it myself.
“If you’re suggesting I got where I am as the bastard son of a duke, you’re way off.” Griff straightens his tie with an agitated twist.
I stifle a sigh, unwilling to join in his act of the aggrieved son. It’s not like I was ecstatic to find my father had left some half a dozen bastards around the country after his heart attack. But I resent how Griff likes to play both sides. The estate might’ve paid for his education and later his chambers and staff but, like the popular song, he prefers people to think he’s just a poor boy from a poor family. Which just isn’t true. Perhaps he should try being the head of the family for a while, then he might see how being in his position has its perks.
“Save me the act. It’s not my underwear or my wallet you’re trying to divest me of. You’re not at work now, so there is no need to be such an argumentative ass.” Even if that’s what makes him an excellent QC. It’s probably in the genes. His mother was an actress, after all.