Knox (Sexy Bastard #3) (8 page)

“Please, what? You’re going to have to tell me what you want,” he says.

“I want . . . I want you to touch my pussy,” I whisper shyly, haltingly.

He rewards me by sliding first a single finger inside me, then a second. I gasp. My hips buck against his palm, my body trembling with the pleasure of having Knox where I want him.

“What else do you want?” he murmurs, still teasing me with those fingers, sliding them in and out.

“Lick me,” I gasp.

He adds his tongue, long wet licks to the inside of my lips eventually giving way to gentle pressure on the bundle of nerves at the core of my being. He rocks his fingers back and forth inside of me, his tongue moving over my clit with a persistence that makes my eyes water. It’s hot as hell watching him, seeing how much he loves this, knowing I could tell him to do anything right now.

“Knox.” I’m bracing myself against the wall, closer to coming than I want to be. Too soon, too soon. “Knox,” I gasp louder.

He responds by licking me harder, faster, and I groan through gritted teeth.

“I want . . .” I’m so turned on I can hardly speak, and he doesn’t let up. If he doesn’t stop, I’m going to come right here. I fist my hand in his hair and pull him back from me, as hard as it is to let go. I wait for him to look up at me, our eyes locking. “I want . . . to come with you inside me,” I gasp.

At that he pulls his fingers out of me, gives me one last long lick from bottom to top, and stands up to full height. His pants still half-on, he reaches into his pocket and pulls a condom out of his wallet.

I nod my head upstairs toward the bedroom and start to walk that way. But Knox pulls me back toward him, landing a stinging smack on my ass as he draws me in.

I moan, biting my lip, caught between surprise, pain, and pleasure. “Is that how it’s going to be?”

“Yes,” he says, looking straight into my eyes. “I’m going to fuck you right here, right now.”

And with that he bends me over the back my couch, gripping my hips as he moistens the tip of his cock in my wetness, and then pushes himself all the way in. Damn he was fast putting that condom on.

I gasp, so full I can hardly stand it. Waves of pleasure rocket through me as my body takes him in. Knox’s rock hard cock is finally inside me.

I brace my arms against the couch as he thrusts his way deep into me. I bend my knees, grinding my hips against his so that he’s pounding against my clit. I feel myself tightening around him, the edge of an orgasm approaching as our bodies move in sync.

But I don’t want to come yet. Fucking Knox feels too good.

Fortunately he’s got a similar idea.

“I could pound this delicious ass of yours all night, Shelby. But I’m going to need to see the rest of your sexy body.”

Knox flips me around and lifts me up. I wrap my arms and legs around him, my mouth desperately searching out his as he walks us over to the front of the couch. He sits, positions me so that I’m straddling him. I moan as I slide myself back onto his cock, finding home again as I settle and then tighten around his fullness.

It doesn’t take long before we get our rhythm back. Sex with Knox feels like an instinct I’ve had all my life and suppressed. My core tightens around him and I moan with pleasure as my pussy begins to contract.

I close my eyes and call out his name as I come long and hard, slamming myself down on his dick again and again to squeeze out every last contraction of the powerful explosion that’s coursing through my body. Somewhere in the middle of that I hear Knox coming too.

I rock back and forth in his arms, his dick still hard inside me, our mouths hungry and warm and wet for each other.

If sex between me and Knox wasn’t meant to be, how can it possibly feel so fucking good?

S
helby blinks
as a stream of light falls across her face. Her hair is fanned out over her pillow, her lips turned into a slight smile as I lean over and gently place one of her nipples in my mouth.

I’m not much of a morning person. But if more of my days started out like this, maybe I’d change my tune, I think as I slide a hand between Shelby’s legs. She’s warm to the touch, still sleepy. She looks so innocent when she’s not feeding me some sassy line.

But Shelby’s not so little anymore.

Try telling that to her brother, though.

Fuck.

What are we going to do?

I roll back over to my side of the bed and stare at the ceiling in despair.

Shelby stirs, opens her eyes, stretches her arms over her head. “Why’d you take your hand away?”

“Just thinking about the real world,” I say as I trace a finger along her collarbone. “And the fact that we’re going to have to return to it.”

“Ugh,” Shelby says. “Can’t we make believe it’s just us? Last people on earth.” She sighs.

I wish we could.

“If you’re willing to enter a witness protection program, say goodbye to your friends and your job, then sure, we could give it a shot. You’d never be able to come back to this apartment.”

“Sold.” She rolls over and yawns. Damn. Even her morning face is cute as fuck. “Where would we move?” She glances up at me from under her eyelashes.

“Some anonymous motel room off a single lane highway, in a town with nowhere to go and nothing to do.”

“I’m pretty sure we could find a way to keep ourselves occupied in a room with a bed and a mini-bar,” Shelby says with a laugh. “Or hell, even just the bed. You’re intoxicating enough.” She traces a finger up my abs, and it’s all I can do not to push her back down into the sheets.

“Seriously, Shelby.” I gaze into those huge, adoring eyes.

“I don’t want to be serious,” she says, scrunching up her face.

“It’s going to be pretty fucking serious when Jackson finds out and murders me.”

“He’s not going to find out,” she says, closing her eyes and rolling away from me. “At least . . . not in the next two weeks.”

“What do you mean?” A thought occurs to me. “Did you guys get into a fight or something? Because of his no-show last night?”

She sighs heavily, which worries me, but then she shakes her head. “I reamed him out, but I get why he had to skip. His project is really taking off, and it was a life-or-death-of-the-project meeting he had to go to. I get it, even though I was annoyed.” She cracks an eye to grin at me. “Besides, a brave knight—or should I say a brave Brave?—came to my rescue.”

“So, what, you told him in exchange for standing you up, he had to stick his head in the sand for two weeks? Just because he made a mistake, I don’t think he’s going to ease up on the protectiveness.”

Shelby snorts. “Not a chance. But he did tell me that said huge project is taking him out of town. He has to go to Charleston for two weeks.” Now her eyes search out mine again, and there’s a spark of hope in them that I haven’t seen before. It looks good on her, even though it makes my chest ache, because I know it’s only temporary. “So we don’t have to go back to the real world yet,” she says.

It’s tempting. So fucking tempting, to just agree with her, roll over and kiss her now, and figure out the rest later. But I can’t stand the thought of that. Having her, having everything I want, only for two weeks? “And then what?” I ask. “We take a two-week vacation from reality and after it, we just go back to our lives like nothing has changed?”

“Something like that.” She shrugs, feigning nonchalance, but I can see it hurts her too, thinking about this ending so quickly. “Can’t we just enjoy the two weeks, and figure the rest out later?” Her hand reaches out to brush over my chest, then wraps around my bicep. I can’t think straight with her skin on mine, hot, burning straight through me.

“Thought you didn’t date athletes,” I say, placing a hand on Shelby’s hip and squeezing tight.

“It would take some serious convincing.” She smirks. “You’re welcome to start making your case.”

That does it. Fuck consequences. Fuck wasting the two weeks we have.

I roll over her and lean down to suck her bottom lip into my mouth, even as her legs fold up around my waist and her hands drop to grab my ass hard. We don’t bother with foreplay this time. We don’t need it. When I slide my cock deep into her, she’s already warm and waiting.

A
n hour
later I’m headed back to my place to shower and change before my appointment with an outside physiotherapist.

That sharp twinge in my pitching shoulder reappeared during a second pitch practice—a burning feeling that isn’t on my regular list of aches and pains. Don’t want to raise any alarms, so I haven’t told anyone on the team staff. But when the possibility of an early-season injury starts keeping you up at night, it’s time to get that shit checked out.

I’m just stepping out of the shower when my phone buzzes. Jackson. Pretty much the last person I want to talk to right now. But I throw a towel around my waist and pick up.

“What’s going on, man?” I say as casually as I can.

“I’m calling about Shelby.”

Shit.
I freeze in the middle of my house like he’s going to pop through my door with a baseball bat in hand, ready to take his revenge.

How did he find out?

I panic, running through possible excuses.
It’s not what it looks like, I was just dropping her off at home. And staying over. And leaving looking like my head was stuck into a wind tunnel the next morning. Um . . .

“Thanks for taking one for the team last night, dude. I owe you one.”

I practically collapse against the sink in relief. Then a new sensation tears at me: Guilt.
Yeah, I took one for the team all right . . .
“Hey, no problem,” I manage, my voice sounding weak even to me. “Least I could do.”

“Do you think she’s still pissed at me? Be honest,” he adds. In the background, I can hear loud horns, and the rush of a highway—he must be on his way to the airport, heading to Charleston already.

“She seemed fine when she left last night.”
Definitely alone, and not with me,
I resist adding as I reach for my razor.

“Okay. Well . . . ” There’s a long pause, before Jackson’s voice comes back, sharper than ever. “Wait, you saw her leave?”

“Um . . . Yeah?”
That’s one way of putting it.
I mean, I definitely watched while she walked out in front of me . . . 

“Was she with anyone?”

Cue second heart attack. I stop shaving, because I’m liable to miss and cut a gaping hole in my chin at this rate. “What do you mean?” I ask, ignoring my fist clenched around the razor.

“It’s just . . . ” He groans. “Sometimes when she’s mad at me, she has a tendency to take it out by being a little . . . riskier, than usual.”

You could say that again.
“You know she’s an adult, Jackson, right?” I can’t help saying.
Shit
. Probably the wrong time to try and defend her honor.

“I know that,” he snaps on the other end. “I just want to make sure she’s okay. And I’m out of town for two weeks, so I just . . . Can you do me a huge favor? Can you check in with her a couple times, while I’m gone?”

Oh gladly. And far more than a couple.
I sigh, though, like it’s going to be a huge pain. “Yeah, sure, I guess I can try.”

“Just . . . make sure she doesn’t do something dumb. Like jump into that Marc Wright guy’s arms.”

“
Who
?” I ask, suddenly grinding my fist around the razor handle for an entirely different reason.

“Oh, some football player whose Twitter feed had pics of them all over it from last night. His captions were . . . Not safe for work. Which is fine, and all,” he adds in a forced voice that makes it clear it is very not fine that some guy is posting suggestive shit about his sister. “But she works for his team, y’know? And Marc Wright has a history of reckless and illegal behavior when he’s got a couple of drinks in him.”

I look in the mirror at my half-shaven face. Now I’m getting worried. Gonna do my own background check on this sack of shit.

“Anyway, thanks for looking out for her.”

“Not a problem, man.”

Relieved at not being found out, I agree a little over-enthusiastically.

I hang up wracked with guilt. As I finish up my shave, I watch my face in the mirror, wincing. What’s going to happen to our friendship if Jackson ever finds out that
I’m
the one he should have been worried about, not this Marc Wright guy?

I throw on a pair of jeans and head to my appointment, leaving that question hanging in the air.

N
o news is good news
. The doc doesn’t see anything alarming in my MRI, either in the tissue or the bone. Tells me to keep an eye on it and come back in three weeks or so.

I know the same isn’t true of a silent morning-after, so I send Shelby a check-in text. She replies with a gym selfie featuring heavy spandex and a solid dose of cleavage. Pays to be a gentleman after a one-night stand with your oldest friend’s little sister.

Make that a two-night stand, with an optional extension.

I’ve gotta say, Jackson’s absence couldn’t be better timed. Rolling up to the bar a few hours later, I’m feeling pretty glad I don’t have to face the two of them simultaneously.

“Get lucky last night?”

Hello, Savannah. Nice to see you too.

“I don’t kiss and tell,” I fire back. “Can’t say I’ve heard the same about you.”

We’ve got the bar to ourselves in the Sunday afternoon lull. Ryder and Cash are huddled at the end of the bar going over receipts, and Shelby is nursing a longneck in the corner of the room, no worse for the wear in a short skirt and a tight tank top as she chats with the rest of the girls. She’s got the vibe of a rocker chick recuperating after a long night out, still sexy despite the dark circles under her eyes. Only I know she wasn’t out partying with a bunch of roadies. She looks up from her phone and raises her bottle my way as Ruby and Avery join in on Savannah’s good-natured teasing.

“Knox, you should be cashing in on your Twitter celebrity to score with the ladies,” Ruby says. “No such thing as bad publicity, right Shelby?”

“Could go either way,” she says, looking me up and down from across the room as though she’s sizing me up. “I’ve seen athletes come back from way worse. But it would help if the man weren’t a social media black hole.”

Our eyes meet, and the corners of Shelby’s mouth turn up imperceptibly.

“I don’t do selfies,” I respond. “Athletes should let their work on the field speak for itself.”

“This guy sounds like a prime candidate for a social media makeover,” Cassie says, sidling up to the bar for a refill. She turns back to Shelby. “Shelby, you should help him!”

Shelby cocks her head at me, clearly enjoying this game. “If he’s in the market for a ghostwriter with a knack for viral tweets, I may know someone.”

She’d sure have a leg up on any potential scandals—especially the ones she might have caused. Speaking of legs, she crosses her long, lean ones and I lean back against the bar, basking in my view. Those legs were crossed around my neck just this morning.

“Oooooh, I like the sound of this,” Ruby says. “Maybe the five of us could tweet on Knox’s behalf.”

“Sounds like a disaster in the making,” Cash says as he slides me a beer. “Hand over the keys to your devices at your own peril, my brother. I smell a dose of character assassination combined with heavy surveillance of your personal life.”

Ryder looks up from his paperwork. “Wouldn’t want to distract everyone from the topic of Knox’s nonexistent sex life and pathetic internet presence, but aren’t we supposed to be making plans for this weekend?”

A weekend at Lake Lanier, a rented house. I almost forgot. I
did
forget, what with everything going on with Shelby. Damn. I wanted this weekend to ourselves, the first of our truly free, alone time.

Two weeks is seeming shorter and shorter. And now we’ll have to spend two days of those weeks away with the gang. An innocent gathering of a group of friends, two of whom happen to be surreptitiously banging.

What’s the worst that could happen?

Out of the corner of my eye I see Shelby toss back her drink.

I thank whoever’s watching over us that Jackson isn’t going to be around this weekend.

The girls huddle up to the bar to discuss, Shelby taking a seat as far away from me as possible. Probably a good idea. But I still feel her presence as if she were two inches away, her hand wrapped tightly around my cock in the shower this morning, her brown eyes gazing straight into mine as she slid her hand back and forth, harder, faster . . . I take a swig of my drink, and nearly choke on it.

Cassie deputizes shopping duties. The boys are handling booze and snacks, the ladies are on meal planning and activities.

Shelby is only halfway listening, mostly playing around with her phone. I feel mine buzzing in my pocket and reach for it.

Three texts from the sexy rocker girl at the end of the bar.

“Still sore from this morning’s workout,” the first text reads.

I smile and read the second.

“You worked muscles I should use more often.”

That sounds about right to me, I think, my grip tightening around my beer as the blood in my limbs starts working its way to my dick.

“Not wearing any underwear right now,” the final text reads. “Meet me in the bathroom.”

I look up and she’s gone.

I take a deep breath. Game time, Knox. Savannah and Cash are still teasing about my social media life—or lack thereof. “You’re right,” I tell them. “I gotta up my game. I’ll start by taking a quick bathroom selfie.”

They both snort as I stride out of the room, no one seeming to have noticed that Shelby is already gone. Good. That buys us a little more time.

I stride straight into the men’s room, and there’s Shelby, leaning casually against the sink, one leg raised a little, just enough that I can get a peek up her form-fitting, definitely panty-less skirt.