BRIAN (The Callahans Book 1) (84 page)

              As if reading her mind, Taylor slipped his finger inside, slowly and gently exploring her wet, tight sheath in a delicate massage that had her gaping with pleasure, breathing shallow, quick breaths. She couldn’t believe how heightened she felt, his tongue grazing over her clit, his finger stimulating her from within, her skin swelling and tingling as she reached her peak.

              “Oh,” she moaned. “You’re making me come.”

              “Come on my mouth, Rose,” he whispered, and the cool air from his words sent another rush of arousal through her.

              With his finger, he drew circles around her labia, as his tongue flicked her clit. It felt like the best kind of torture. She craved more deep stimulation, and anticipating he would penetrate her again had her in a tizzy of ecstasy.

              Taylor leaned back, shifting on his knees, grabbing her ass, and running his big hands up her outer thighs. Then he lowered himself down again, his tongue meeting her, as he licked one long, slow stroke from her ass, over the length of her vagina, and up to her clit where he sucked slightly before traveling back down.

              Words wouldn’t come, but she moaned as he worked his way back up again. Every time he suckled her clit she felt a surge of arousal pushing her towards an even higher peak. And every time he pulled away, traveling downward, a hot rush of tingles shimmied across her skin.

              Licking upwards, his mouth settled on her clit and he suckled. She was so close. Any new touch would send her over the edge, and Taylor must have sensed that as he slipped his finger in her hot, throbbing sheath, suckling and massaging in an erotic cocktail of sensual pleasure.

              “I’m so close,” she whispered. “Keep doing that.”

              And he did, groaning at the thought of her climaxing on his mouth.

              “Oh,” she moaned. The hum of his groaning sent the sweetest vibration through her, and it was her undoing.

              In a hot surge of swelling heat and tingles, she arched over the peak in a powerful orgasm, clenching and expanding in a series of riveting waves.

              Riding the sensation, she barely registered Taylor had asked her something. When she opened her eyes, feeling his fingers working inside her, she saw him gazing down at her, as he held his large erection in his hand, stroking it.

              “Fill me.”

              Whispering, he said, “I left my condoms in the car outside.”

              Without thinking beyond the simple math that he was clean and she was on the pill, she said, “It’s okay,” and Taylor immediately grinned in response, helping her shift up the bed and angling his thick, long erection flush against her hot, quivering vagina, which he teased and massaged with his dick.

              “Damn, you feel good,” he groaned.

              He helped her spread wide for him, hooking his arms under her knees, and as she watched him, she rested her head on the pillows. She wanted him so badly. She couldn’t wait to feel his girth, his large erection thrust in, but he was enjoying himself too much penetrating her in slight shallow dips and working her wetness over his wide head.

              The stimulation had her heading towards another climax, and biting her lip was all she could do to keep herself from begging him to thrust inside.

              Taylor let out a breathy laugh, saying, “You’re squirming.”

              “I want you.”

              “We need to let you cool off or else you won’t come again.”

              She laughed at that. “I’m far from cool. I feel on the brink as it is.”

              “Yeah?”

              She nodded and let out a carefully measured breath.

              As he played between her legs, teasing his hard erection in and out and edging deeper and deeper, he whispered in a low, smooth tone that set her heart on fire, “I want to fly you around the world and fuck you in the most glamorous hotels. I want to show you what my money can do. I want to make you happy, Rose. You can still do all the work to help people that you’re compelled to do.”

              “Just not shutting down the pipeline?” she teased, grabbing his ass and forcing him to thrust deep inside.

              He groaned out, and as her body expanded to accommodate his hard girth and the length of him, Rose felt a sudden surge towards climax.

              “Oh God,” she called out, completely forgetting to keep her voice down. “You’re making me come.”

              Taylor began thrusting hard and fast, as though he were consumed with pleasure. His lips pressed hers as they bounced against the mattress, hot waves filling her as she clenched around his hard erection.

              When he eased back to look at her as he thrust harder and faster, his voice came out in jolts and grunts. “You’re coming? You don’t need me to grind into your clit?”

              “No.” She smiled, feeling his every inch inside her. “But do it anyway?”

              He did, thrusting a few more times, then settling in deep and pressing his pubic bone against her clit and working slow, deliberate circles, which caused the most sensual stimulation. Feeling him deep inside commingling with the perfect amount of pressure to her clit quickly brought her to another orgasm.

              “Oh!” she moaned, swelling and exploding as he ground firmly into her.

              “I’m about to come,” he managed to say, and her response was grabbing his ass and holding him deep inside her. “Are you sure?”

              “I want to feel you,” she said breathlessly, her mind nearly gone in the throes of her climax.

              “God, you’re sexy,” he groaned, stroking her hair and kissing her cheek. Then he quickened his pace, thrusting and grinding firm against her clit whenever he was deep inside. Soon Taylor groaned and exhaled as he came, slowing the rhythm of his thrusts.

              Collapsing on her, he fought to catch his breath, as she stroked her fingertips down the length of his damp back and brushed the sweat from his brow before combing her fingers through his hair.

              When he lifted up, their eyes met and he brushed her dark hair off her forehead. After a moment, he kissed her, then he eased out of her, rolling onto his back.

              Rose curled into him, asking, “What really happened at that party?”

              She felt Taylor tense beside her, and he let out a stuttering breath.

              “I really don’t know. One minute I was sipping a glass of champagne and talking to the dean of medicine from Mount Sinai, and the next thing I knew I was waking up in the hospital. My dad says it was a psychotic break. I’d been under a lot of stress.”

              Rose didn’t feel it was her place to comment, but she didn’t see how a psychotic break could cause him to act bizarrely with no recollection of his behavior, not to mention Taylor didn’t strike her as the sort to have a mental breakdown in the first place.

              She was jarred from contemplation when her cell began buzzing on the nightstand. Reaching over Taylor for it, she saw Carter’s name flashing across the screen.

              “It’s one of my guys,” she said.

              “I won’t say a word.”

              Swiping to answer the call, she said, “Carter? What’s going on?”

              “Madison wants to do further testing, but she has a preliminary report that breaks down the chemical compounds in the samples we gave her.”

              “Okay?”

              “Rose, it’s bad.”

              “Let’s get it to the attorney and file a motion.”

              “Even if we do, it’ll take time for the legal proceedings to amount to much. We have to act fast.”

              “Carter, we can’t go off half-cocked,” she said, lifting up and tucking her legs to the side. Taylor was studying her, so she shifted her back to him. “When can you be back at the motel?”

              “In an hour, but Madison needs payment. She can’t test further without using another lab, and, at the very least, we have to front her the cash so she can get in there and do what she needs to.”

              “Shit, right,” she said. “How much?”

              “I’m e-mailing you the invoice now,” he said.

              “Sure, let me give you a call back once I look it over. Thanks, Carter.”

              After hanging up, she set her cell on the bed and slid her laptop over.

              As soon as she opened her e-mail, Taylor shifted up in bed.

              “Is everything okay?”

              She touched eyes with him then clicked on Carter’s e-mail and opened the invoice. As soon as she saw the amount, she knew everything was not okay.

              “Just some billing stuff,” she said distractedly, as she tried to recall her savings account balance. Frustrated, she realized it wouldn’t matter. She didn’t even have a fraction of what Madison needed. “We’re constantly in the red.”

              Taylor neared her and ran his hand down the length of her back.

              “Is there anything I can do?” he asked.

              She smirked with an edge of skepticism. “You’re going to fund my effort to destroy you?”

              He grinned and kissed her cheek. “A good fight is a fair one.”

              Pulling the laptop towards him, he scrolled through the bank transfer instructions, logged into his account, and within minutes sent the payment. All the while, Rose looked on, strangely touched by his eagerness to help, which was entirely at odds with his refusal to be on her side against the pipeline project.

              He closed her laptop and leaned on his elbow, naked from head to toe.

              “Ready for round two?” he asked with a crooked smile.

              “One World has a meeting tonight,” she said regretfully. “As soon as a few of my team members get back from the city.”

              “Come here,” he said, as he rolled to his back, inviting her to be held. When she settled in beside him, draping her arm over his chest and hooking her leg over his, he asked, “When will your meeting be over?”

              “It’s hard to say.”

              “Can I have a limo waiting for you?”

              She laughed. “That sounds highly conspicuous. The last thing I need is for my team to find out about this.”

              “Likewise, but I’d like to see you.”

              “I’ll think about it.”

              He stroked her hair and they lay in silence for a few minutes.

              It felt so good nuzzling into the crook of his neck and feeling his warm hand brush over her body. She was drifting off, but didn’t let herself slip away into sleep.

              “What’s Krylotech Industries?” he asked in a dozing voice.

              “That’s the vendor whose bill you paid,” she said, stiffening.

              He let out a breathy laugh. “Yeah, I got that. But what do they do for you?”

              She didn’t want to have to say but wasn’t sure how to dance around it. Taylor would know soon enough. How troubling was this secret relationship of theirs? She wanted nothing more than to get closer to him, and yet she knew she was his greatest enemy, and he was hers.

              “It's a lab. They test samples for us.”

              “Soil?”

              “Sometimes. Sometimes water. Sometimes dying vegetation or dead wildlife. Whatever we think can prove environmental harm.”

              “So what did you take from Starlight to test?”

              Rose eased up on her elbow so she could meet his gaze.

              “We found barrels full of chemicals,” she said.

              He furrowed his brow, listening.

              “Davey Construction uses combustion to weld the pipe segments together, and the chemical is their accelerant. It’s supposed to burn off and harden, splitting the chemical compounds as it fuses the pipes together. That’s why it’s unregulated. Davey has argued that once it’s heated up, it dissipates and vanishes. But it doesn’t. It leaches into the soil. Even if Starlight doesn’t suffer an oil spill, which is unlikely, according to statistics, those chemicals used by Davey are just as bad.”

              “Look, Rose, I see how important this is to you, and I commend you for your tenacity, but I spoke with my father. I’ve looked at our safety reports. There’s no connection between those chemicals and the health of communities living near other Starlight pipelines.”

              She bolted upright, gaping at him.

              “There’s no documented connection,” she pointed out. “What do you think I’m working my ass off to accomplish here? I’m exposing all of this. Why is it so hard for you to believe me?”

              He sounded genuine as he said, “I don’t know.”

              She sighed. “I need to get dressed. You should go.”