Rules of Engagement (5 page)

“Take your hair down.”

She reached behind her head, removed the claw clip holding her hair up and tossed it on the table. Her multihued hair spilled down her back, some falling over her shoulders.

“Take off your clothes.”

She took her time toeing off her shoes. She crossed her arms in an X over her front, both hands gathering up the material of the borrowed shirt from the bottom. A deep breath, as if she was having a silent pep talk with herself, and she whisked the shirt over her head, revealing her strong form from shoulders to navel. Quickly now, she shoved the borrowed shorts down over her hips and they pooled on the floor, covering her feet.

Jake’s breathing quickened and he had to beat back the urge to free his cock and have her mount him. She was beautiful, all lithe lines with just enough curves to fill his hands. Her breasts were round and high and tipped with pouting pink crests that begged for his mouth. Her middle was smooth and taut with muscle, telling him she regularly hit the gym. The curls concealing her sex glistened with her arousal and were darker than the hair on her head. Her runner’s legs were long and strong and he very badly wanted them wrapped around his waist.

His hands fisted beneath the table and it was a moment before he trusted himself to speak.

“Cup your breasts,” he instructed thickly. When she did, he added, “Caress them, knead them. Rub your thumbs over your nipples.”

Her nipples budded and her abdomen muscles quivered.

His voice became huskier. “Imagine that it’s me touching you.”

She inhaled sharply and closed her eyes, her head falling slightly back.

“Open your eyes. I want you to look at me while you touch yourself.”

Her lashes lifted and she met his eyes, and bit down on the corner of her bottom lip until he thought she would draw blood. She pressed her thighs tightly together, obviously needing more stimulation there. But not yet. He wanted her needier.

At his order, she stuck the tip of her left forefinger into her mouth and sucked on it, getting it wet. Then she rubbed it over her pretty nipples and moaned softly when he told her to remember what it felt like when he’d suckled her earlier.

Jake’s erection became painful, constrained as it was by his jeans, but he didn’t command her to give him the relief for which his body clamored.

“Touch your pussy.”

She was so far gone that she didn’t even hesitate to run her right palm down her torso to where her pubic hair started. She slid two fingers between her labial lips and worked them up and down, occasionally pinching her clitoris.

“Spread your lips so I can see.”

She needed both hands to do as he ordered, so she abandoned her breasts and spread her sex with her left hand so he could watch her fondling herself.

“Fuck your pussy with your fingers.” His voice had become so much thicker and hoarser with each subsequent command that, by now, he wasn’t certain that she understood him. He had his answer when two fingers disappeared inside her slit and she cried out with relief and squeezed her eyes shut despite his earlier command. She fucked herself as instructed, but after several thrusts of her fingers, Jake could tell from the tears seeping from the corners of her closed eyes that she couldn’t make herself come and was getting more frustrated by the second.

She was needy enough, he decided, and he ordered her to come to him. He’d pushed his chair back from the table but remained seated. Katarzyna went to him and stood between his open thighs, tears glistening in her eyes and rolling down her cheeks, her hands hovering over his shoulders, waiting for his order to touch him.

He took her hand and guided it back to her pussy. When her fingers found an unsteady rhythm inside her sheath he grasped her waist, leaned forward, took a swollen breast into his mouth and sucked hard. Forgetting herself, she plowed her fingers into his hair at the back of his head, pulling him closer to her, and cried out. When he rolled her hard peak with his tongue, she cried out again and her hand quickened between her thighs.

He bit down on her nipple and she made a choked sound, but she didn’t come. He latched onto her other breast as one hand slithered between her lush ass cheeks. She widened her stance marginally for him. He came across her tiny hole, teased it, and her sphincter tightened against him. He would have to teach her to relax, to open for him. But not now.

Jake found her pussy, drenched, and added one of his fingers to hers. And, crushing his head to her breasts, she came, her inner muscles spasming wildly around their combined fingers.

Before her contractions ceased, he withdrew his hands and mouth and pushed her away from him just long enough to open his jeans. He breathed a sigh of relief when his cock sprang up, red and angry-looking, the head purple. He reached for her.

“Suck it.”

Still savoring the muscle spasms deep within her belly and gasping loudly for air, Katarzyna fell to her knees between Jake’s open thighs and lowered her mouth over his penis. The head was soft, softer than anything she’d ever touched, and a tingle of pleasure whipped through her and, even though she hadn’t thought it possible, need stirred once more.

With his hands tangled in her hair, Jake urged her to take more of him. Closing her eyes, she allowed her lips to slide down his length until going farther might have made her choke. He whispered instructions, telling her to suck, feel him with her tongue, wrap her hand around his base, play with his testicles. She did, inexpertly but very eagerly.

Underneath the skin that felt like hot velvet on her tongue, he felt as hard and rigid as a lead pipe. He cried out under her ministrations and she loved it, loved knowing that she was pleasuring him as he’d pleasured her.

Her fingers digging into the rigid muscles of his thighs, she let him direct the pace of her mouth moving up and down the rampant cock wet with her saliva. She lost track of time, aware of only the man using her for his sexual gratification and the subsequent arousal that made her thick fluids trickle down between her legs. He pulled her mouth off his shaft, shifted closer to the edge of the seat and, in a strained, husky voice, told her to suck his testicles.

She enclosed the taut sac within her mouth, her lips tickled by his dark, wiry pubic hair. She suckled him, rubbing her tongue across the underside of his sac, tracing patterns all over him with the pointed tip. He cursed, drew her head back and, gripping his cock in a tight fist, rubbed the tip of it across her lips. She obediently parted them, gave him a single lick and took him inside once more.

He shouted her name when he climaxed and salty liquid hit her tongue and the back of her throat. Katarzyna swallowed. When his body stopped jerking, she released him from her mouth and, per his order, licked him clean.

* * * * *

After separate showers, they cleaned up the kitchen and, cheeks stubbornly flushed, Katarzyna stuffed the stained sheets into the washer nestled snugly in a converted linen closet in the bathroom. Jake found a stack of clean sheets in the hallway closet and they haphazardly made the king-sized bed. Exhausted from their exertions, they crawled underneath the covers and slept.

Katarzyna woke with sunlight flooding the bedroom and Jake leaning over her, his fingers moving wickedly between her legs, his mouth on her breast. He quickly masturbated her to a climax before making her suck her juices from his fingers. She wanted to return the favor, but he straddled her torso, made her push her breasts together and fucked them.

The sensation of his hard, hot cock thrusting between her breasts created the most delicious friction while his balls rolled over her abdomen, making her wild. When he came, hot semen splashing the underside of her jaw and throat, so did she.

He cleaned her off with a damp washcloth and fell asleep with her limp body draped over his.

The second time Katarzyna awoke she was alone in the bed. She stretched languidly, enjoying the well-used feeling pervading her body and the lingering soreness that made her lips stretch in a satisfied smile. She sighed blissfully and looked around. The sun was still out, so she hadn’t slept the entire day away.

As she lay there amidst the tangled sheets, a buttery, garlicky scent wafted to her, making her aware of her empty stomach. She got up and dug out panties, a cotton tank top and matching shorts from her suitcase. Dressed, she made a beeline for the bathroom. Jake must’ve put the sheets in the dryer on top of the washer because it was humming along. A woman with mussed hair, bee-stung lips and drowsy eyes stared back at her when she looked in the mirror. Quickly, she splashed water on her face and rinsed out her mouth.

Following the domestic sounds of something sizzling on a hot surface, Katarzyna slowly wandered into the kitchen, a flurry of butterflies in her stomach. After everything they’d done, she wasn’t quite sure how to face Jake.

Luckily, he had his back to her as he cooked something on the stove. Her breath stopped as her eyes greedily took in the long length of him that was broken only by a pair of navy boxer briefs. Broad shoulders narrowed down to slim hips, which flowed down to thighs and calves hard with muscle. The smooth play of muscles beneath the tanned skin was almost hypnotic, distracting her with reminders of how it had felt beneath her hands.

Bit by bit, she began noticing the imperfections on his skin, the strips and patches of skin that were paler, textured differently, than the rest of him. How had she missed them? As her eyes moved from one scar to the next, Katarzyna realized with a sickening jolt that perhaps when Ella had said Jake’s lifestyle didn’t allow for lasting relationships, she’d meant something other than Jake needing lots of variety in his women. She felt oddly hollow inside. He had more injuries than the professional fighters she knew, let alone the cops, and some of those faded scars looked like the result of being on the wrong end of a sharp-edged weapon.

He turned around and Katarzyna swayed on her feet. He had more battle wounds, mostly faded, but there were three over his chest that were relatively new. She went to him, not knowing how her feet managed to move with her brain occupied by the imperfectly round scars that were so close to his heart. She touched each one lightly with a fingertip, as if needing to physically confirm what she was seeing.

She had to swallow the lump in her throat before she could speak. “Those are bullet wounds.”

“Yes,” he said, his tone not inviting further discussion.

Ignoring the closed expression on his face, she asked softly, “What happened? How did you survive?”

“A team of damned good doctors re-inflated my lung and patched me up,” he said matter-of-factly, like some part of her wasn’t tearing up inside at seeing how close he’d come to death, how close she’d come to never knowing him.

“Why would someone try to kill you?”

He moved away from her. “New rule—we don’t talk about my past.”

She wanted to grab him, spin him around and make him talk to her, but the implacable expression that had settled on his face told her it would be a useless exercise.

Nine days later found Katarzyna looking down at the breathtaking beauty spread out below her as Mother Nature flaunted her enviable charms. Trees and shrubs and other plant life, all in varying degrees of readiness for the upcoming snow and cold, thickly carpeted the mountains and grudgingly gave way to the snaking river that looked deceptively harmless from a great distance. And at the bottom, quaintly nestled in all that greenery, was the town, its buildings looking like Monopoly game pieces.

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, the taste of the air cool and clean on her tongue. A breeze, chilly but comfortable, dried the sheen of sweat on her skin and lowered her body temperature a couple degrees. Her blood was warm and her muscles were loose and limber, like she’d just finished a damned good workout.

“You’re going to make me jealous,” said Jake, his rough voice coming from beside her.

She chuckled even as she tilted her head back, eyes still closed, allowing the breeze to flow over her face. “This feels amazing. I haven’t been this relaxed since…”

“Since this morning,” he supplied huskily when her voice trailed off. “After I made you come twice before breakfast.”

Heat flashed through her and she went still as her senses responded to the memories his words invoked. She turned toward him and nearly groaned aloud when she met eyes darkened with need. Her body, which was well trained after ten days of mind-blowing sensual bliss, pressed up against his, and she slid a hand around his neck and pulled his head down to hers for a deep, hungry kiss.

When their mouths finally broke apart, Katarzyna’s right leg was half-wrapped around his hip and his hands were cupping her buttocks, lifting her until the hard bulge of his erection found the center seam of her cargo pants.

Jake, breathing heavily, set her down on a large boulder. Katarzyna braced both hands behind her to stay upright and blinked up at him in confusion. What she saw cleared away the sexual haze clouding her mind. His face was chillingly devoid of emotion. She’d seen cops use a similar mask when questioning suspects, but there’d been something in their eyes. Jake Duquesne’s eyes were flat and cold, reminding her that she knew next to nothing about the man whose body she’d taken into hers. He was casting his narrowed gaze around, searching, his tall body loose and ready, as if he was waiting for someone to come at him.