Fall Into You (14 page)

“Mmm, good girl.” His body pressed against the backs of her thighs and she could tell
he was still wearing his jeans. “Stretch out your arms.”

She did as she was told and laid her cheek against the counter.
He grabbed her arms and guided them behind her back. The soft leather that he’d hit
her with now looped around her wrists. He cinched the belt with a
clink
, binding her arms. Then, he kicked her heels apart with his booted foot.

She only had a second to realize how at his mercy she was before he was sliding inside
her. Hot and thick and every bit as toe curling as she’d imagined. Every muscle in
her body seemed to contract at the sweet invasion. A low moan drifted off her lips
as he eased in, stretching her and taking his time burying himself inside her.

“Fuck,” he murmured under his breath. His hand gripped her shoulder, as if he was
trying to hold on to something within himself. “Am I hurting you? You’re, God…you
feel so…”

The fit was snug, her tissues tender, no doubt from her long bout of celibacy, but
pain was definitely not how she would describe it. Fantastically intense was more
like it. “No, sir. Feels…amazing.”

At her words, she felt the tension in his grip ease a bit, and he canted his hips
back, dragging himself almost all the way out then pushing deep again. Sensation went
through her like ripples over the water. He groaned. “You’re right about that.”

She wiggled beneath him, an involuntary movement, her body craving more than the slow-and-sensual
approach.

“Why so squirmy, beautiful?” he teased. “Not a fan of nice and easy?”

“Not right now…sir.”

“Dirty girl. Hard and fast it is, then.” His easy rhythm dialed up, and soon she was
sliding back and forth across the counter, her skin slippery with sweat and highly
sensitized, and the belt pressing into her tender wrists. The sound of his thighs
hitting the back of hers and their shared moans supplied an erotic soundtrack she
knew would haunt her fantasies.

His free hand wrapped around the front of her hip and found her swollen clit. She
bucked against him, but he held her in place with ease. His fingers slid along the
slick tissues and pinched gently,
winding the tension inside her into a tight, glowing ball. Her breath caught in her
throat.

“That’s right. Give me your pleasure. Come for me, darlin’.”

His pace turned NASCAR worthy, and his talented fingers did a move that made her nerves
sing. Her body rocked against the counter, her back arching, and the glowing ball
inside her burst into a hundred flecks of illuminated sensation. She lost conscious
control of her body. Her head lifted and a sound unlike any that had ever come out
of her filled the quiet cabin.

A deeper groan came from Grant, and his grip on her arms turned demanding as he reached
his own release. Her name tumbled from his lips, and she couldn’t ever remember her
own name sounding so sexy. She closed her eyes and let herself fall into the afterglow
with him.

Seconds—or maybe minutes—passed with both of them locked in that dreamy place of dwindling
bliss, his body draped over her back. She wasn’t sure she ever wanted to get up. But
once the only noise in the cabin had returned to the droning fridge and the ticking
clock, Grant freed her arms and slipped out of her. His voice was low. “Stay there.
I’ll be right back.”

No problem. She wasn’t sure she could move. Her muscles may have dissolved.

Before she knew it, he was back with a warm, wet cloth, attending to her. Then his
palm was sliding over the spots where he’d hit her, rubbing in some sort of balm that
cooled her skin. She knew when she looked back at this moment, she’d probably feel
embarrassed, but right now she was buzzing too much from the orgasm to care.

“Can you stand up, Charli?” he asked, his voice all soft, rounded edges now.

She pushed herself onto her elbows then rose. He wrapped a robe around her from behind
and rubbed her arms, making them tingle and bringing some feeling back into them.

“You okay?” he asked.

She turned around to find him looking like she’d left him. Fully dressed and wearing
a frown. For the first time, she registered that he hadn’t let her touch him or see
him naked. He probably had only pushed down his pants and taken her. And he still
hadn’t kissed her. She’d let him hit her, restrain her, and fuck her, yet they hadn’t
had a first kiss.

The realization dampened her buzz. “I’m…fine.”

He put his finger beneath her chin and studied her face, her eyes. “You’re upset.”

“I’m not.” But the declaration sounded hollow even to her own ears. She didn’t know
what she was. Confused, mostly.

He deepened his frown, staring at her for another moment and apparently confirming
whatever it was he was sensing. He lowered his hand and sighed. “I’m sorry, Charli.
This was a bad idea.”

The words sent a sharp snap of disappointment through her. She looked down and knotted
the belt on the robe. “Always what a girl wants to hear after she’s gotten naked with
someone.”

“I thought you would call the safe word from the get-go. Then I—” He paused, and she
glanced up as he raked a hand through his hair.

“Then you what?”

“Then I couldn’t resist taking you over.” He shook his head and looked away, as if
he was giving himself a firm lecture only he could hear. “Why didn’t you stop me?”

Because she’d kind of loved it. Because it was thrilling in a way that no sex had
ever been for her. Because for some odd reason, she’d trusted him not to go too far.
But no way she was going to say any of
that
out loud. She crossed her arms and tilted her chin up. “Because I need this training
and wanted to show you I can handle it. I’m not scared of you, Grant.”

He glanced over at her, his expression darkening. “You should be.”

She conjured up a practiced nothing-bothers-me smile, ignoring the fluttering anxiety
in her belly, and claimed her victory—though now it felt like an empty one. “Guess
I’m your new trainee, cowboy.”

His lips parted, but she didn’t give him time to respond. She picked up her clothes
and ugly undergarments and traipsed out of his cabin, taking his robe and her shredded
nerves with her.

He hated losing control.

This loss had at least come with a naked, spanked Charli splayed across his kitchen
counter and sex that had damn near blown his head off.

But still, his jaw had yet to unclench.

She’d baited him, thrown a gauntlet down to test his own self-control. And he’d failed.
Sure, he’d been the one giving the orders and the swats, but it had been driven by
pure emotion—something he worked hard at keeping out of his sexual encounters. And
dammit, he’d hit her with a fucking belt with no contract, without even knowing her
hard and soft limits. He’d barely managed to stop himself before he’d completely gone
off the reservation and taken her to his bedroom—a place he’d never taken any woman.
Charli Beaumonde had unraveled him.

And hell if he could stop thinking about her. Since she’d walked out the door, he’d
done little else than replay the scene and invent new ones, imagining how much further
he wanted to take her. His
claim-and-conquer gene was on a rampage, and he wasn’t quite sure how to turn it off.

Plus, now Charli was apparently refusing to stick to his stay-safe rules until he
agreed to his end of the bargain and took her on for training. Two days had passed
since their encounter and she’d stopped checking in with him. He’d waited for her
text this morning, knowing it wouldn’t come, and turned on the GPS tracker. Luckily,
Charli hadn’t figured out where he’d installed it. Otherwise, he had no doubt that
she would’ve disabled it.

Yesterday, she’d gone to the office and he’d been able to relax and get some work
done. But today, she’d turned in the opposite direction, and he’d had to get in his
truck and channel his old CIA persona to do a little surveillance. So now Grant found
himself parked between two buildings across from a broken-down diner in some town
he didn’t know the name of watching Charli eat pancakes with a guy who talked with
his hands. Grant adjusted the volume on his phone’s earpiece, trying to stay focused
on Charli while still listening in on the conference call with the Water’s Edge department
heads.

“If we switch to a screw top and a cheaper bottle, we can lower the price a bit,”
Lars, the head of sales, suggested. “We could get into some of the bigger stores.”

The others began to debate.

“No screw top,” Grant said, using his gavel-hit-the-desk tone. “I have no interest
in going mass production. Our wines are an experience. As long as we keep producing
the highest quality product, there will be a market for it.”

“But in this economy…” Lars protested.

“Our numbers have only gone up,” Grant said. “Next topic.”

He knew his team meant well. They saw the sales at Water’s Edge and knew the potential
their wines had at becoming a mass-market brand, but Grant refused to sacrifice quality.
His father had run a successful cattle ranch for decades using that philosophy, and
Grant didn’t plan to veer from it in his own business. Plus, The Ranch now brought
in enough money to fund him for as long as he needed. The wine business had turned
into a mere bonus.

Lars moved on to another item in the agenda, but his voice faded into the background
as Grant caught movement in his peripheral vision. Charli had parked her rental car
in the alley between the diner and a pawnshop. The shiny rental was the only new model
in sight and apparently, Grant hadn’t been the only one to notice that. The pawnshop
blocked most of the sunlight, but Grant hadn’t missed the shift in the shadows behind
Charli’s car. Someone was in the mood for a little grand theft auto.

“Son of a bitch.”

“Huh?” Lars asked.

Grant didn’t have time to respond. He pulled out his earpiece and grabbed for his
glove compartment, which was, of course, locked. “Dammit.”

He yanked the keys out the ignition and unlocked the compartment, grabbing for his
gun. He glanced back at the diner. Charli was stepping out, absently digging through
her purse for something as she walked—her keys, probably.
Shit.
He definitely didn’t need Charli surprising a thief.

Grant hopped out of truck, checked the safety, and tucked the gun into his waistband.
“Charli! Hold up!”

Charli looked up from her bag and paused as if verifying she’d heard what she’d thought
she heard, and then turned her head in his direction. He jogged toward her. Thank
God he hadn’t parked far away or he may have not been able to intercept her. When
she realized it was him, she put her hands on her hips, her exasperation evident even
from a distance.

“Go back inside,” he called, pointing at the diner.

She glanced back at the restaurant. “What?”

He hustled past her toward the parking lot. “Inside. Now.”

Whether she figured out there was danger or saw his gun, she
listened. He turned the corner into the alley on full alert. Charli’s car was third
from the street, and besides an empty can rolling in the breeze, everything appeared
to be still. He crept forward, his eyes and ears in full scanning mode. But after
one step, the backside passenger door on the rental car jolted open and someone barreled
out, dressed in all black and running full speed in the other direction.

Grant drew his gun and climbed over the hood of the first car, trying to catch up
or at least get a description. But the thief had too much of a head start on him.
The guy reached the end of the alley and disappeared into the greenbelt that stretched
along the back of the buildings.

“Fuck.” Grant ran to the edge of the trees but knew it would be pointless to go traipsing
after him. No doubt the guy was a local and would know the landscape better than him.
After one last fruitless search of the periphery for any kind of evidence, he headed
back to Charli’s car to see if there was any damage.

The rear passenger door was still wide open, and as Grant frowned down at it, a creeping
feeling raised the hairs on his neck. What in the hell would a car thief be doing
hiding in the backseat? If he had wanted to hot-wire it, he would’ve been fooling
around the driver’s side. Grant ventured closer and peered into the backseat. A shiny
roll of masking tape sat on the floorboard. His grip on the frame of the door tightened,
lividity burning a path through him. He looked back to the trees, ready to hunt the
bastard down and show him all the torture techniques he’d perfected.