Stone: At Your Service (Carolina Bad Boys #1) (21 page)

“
Tryin’ to prove a point?” Her husky voice worked its way inside of me, and I released one last jet.

M
y voice was nothing more than a hoarse whisper. “Not trying. Think I made it.”

I
rolled onto the bed and took her in my arms. Warm come slipped between our bodies, but neither of us cared. In fact, it felt real damn good. Pulling a blanket over us, I tangled my toes with hers and curled her hair around my fingers, bathing her neck with small kisses.

“
What about you?” she asked.

I couldn
’t believe she was still breathing, let alone conscious and talking after the fuck of the century.

“
Hmm
?” Her long locks filtered through my fingertips. Her distracting display of full curves and creamy flesh took my libido on another loop-de-loop.

“
What do I get to do if anyone touches you again?” Her elbows bit into my chest when she pressed above me.

“
You can call me out and kick my ass.”

“
Even if it’s Nicky?” Her timid question was an arrow to the heart.

I touched her with tenderness and waited until her lips sought mine.
Our skin was fiery hot and we were too close, too electric to do anything but touch and taste. With her soft and open and me hard and ready, words took a backseat to base need. Another condom was rolled on before I pulled her leg over my hips to join our bodies.

Her ass filled my hands
as she sank onto my cock from above. Her gasp—”Oh, God, Josh!”—was music to my ears, but it wasn’t enough.

Her arms
curled around me, pulling me closer. “How are you doing this to me?”

“
It’s all you.” Lying below Leelee, I spread my thighs wider and opened her up more. I braced my feet on the bed and held her hips still with my hands. Pumping my hips, I hit every sensitive place inside of her. My lips ran down to her nipples, drawing them into my mouth.

The slow luxurious drag of my cock in and out had us gasping against each other
’s mouths. Her breath sweet, her cunt a tight heat pulling me in, Leelee cried out every time I withdrew. I pushed, and she arched for me. This slow motion lovemaking melded us together. Blazing need poured between us.

I didn
’t want to come. I wanted to stay inside her forever.

Fifteen minutes later, maybe more, we were slippery to the touch, still going at it with the never-ending pace.

“Jesus.” Leelee’s nails sheared against my straining shoulders.

I
gathered her in my arms until we stretched against each other from toes to joining to lips. I sucked the pulse on her neck so hard a love bite immediately rose. Her cunt rippled around me. She bucked against me but I held her back so she’d come slowly, over and over again.

“
Just like this.” I curled my hips and thrust into her.

Leelee flew apart in my arms. Her pussy feathered over me and I shouted,
“Yes!”

The long and
smooth became heavy, heated, gasping, needy. Rolling her to her back, I pulled her up onto my shaft and planted her feet on the bed. She was gonna take my cock and milk it good. Her hands slithered down my belly, between my thighs, to my balls.

“
That’s right, Josh. Fuck me hard.” Her mouth turned to my ear and she bit down. Hard.

My toes curled. The wet smack of our flesh almost made me come. I withdrew from Leelee, so slowly she moaned. My cock was covered in us. Veins rippled beneath my hand as I
fisted my shaft. Leelee looked so good, so open.

Raising my ass
up to pound into her, I poised at her entrance. I fell on her with a growl, driving the hard spike of my shaft inside. She climaxed the instant I cupped her ass and pulled her up tight. Grabbing her hair, hauling her head back, I used the handhold of her waist to piston inside of her. Every thrust shuddered through us.

My chin scraped up her neck to her ear and I groaned,
“This belongs to me.”

“
Yes!” She fastened me in wet, velvet heat, hurrying my orgasm.

I shattered
apart. The condom filled with come I wanted to overflow her depths and run back down our thighs.

One more night.
Fuck that. An entire life was what I wanted with Leelee. Covering us up, I ran my hands all over her. Our kisses were the sweet, satisfied kind. Afterward, she nuzzled my chest, slowly slipping into sleep.

I turned off the bedside light and held her. I kissed her temple and she snored lightly. A laugh rumbled in my belly. Her cute nose burrowed closer to my chest. Her legs twined between mine. I
couldn’t stop feeling her skin, touching her, finally settling my palms on her ass.

An hour or so later, I was still awake, taking
Leelee in with all my senses. I glimpsed my phone sitting beside the bed. The screen was blank. No missed messages, no missed calls. God, I missed the kid. He was the joy of my life. I wondered what he’d make of Leelee; he’d probably consider her his own personal Disney princess come to life. I snagged the cell and clicked to a photo I’d taken the week before heading here. Big goofy smile, dimple in his chin, huge hazel eyes, JJ was the spitting image of me before I’d given up on love. The phone glowed while I caressed the screen across his face.

“
I miss you, baby boy,” I whispered before I set the phone down. I squeezed Leelee tighter, trying to decipher what she thought of me, if she’d love my son as much as I did, getting way the hell ahead of myself. “But I’m gay,” I muttered.

Quiet, sad, defeated,
she answered, “I know.”

I
’d probably squished her awake. I clenched her even closer, hating the tears that tripped from her eyelashes. 

“
I can’t be with you like this.” Her silent sobs almost broke me down. “We have to stop doing this.”

I whispered,
“Why do I already miss you?”

“
Don’t. Don’t miss me, Josh.”

“
Then don’t leave me, Leelee.” Leelee for lust, Leelee for love, Leelee for so long-gone. Soft and warm and pretty. Wholesome and innocent minx.

She snuggled deeper and I didn
’t want to lose this thing I’d never had. I wrapped her tighter in my arms.
Fuck me. I’ve become a cuddler.
“You feel good.”

“
Mmm.
” She murmured, her thigh sliding between mine. “You feel hard, Stone.”

“
It’s Josh.”

“
I know. I just like you hard.”

Killing me.

“Gonna stay ’til morning?” I asked.

“
No choice.”

With my f
ingertips beneath her chin, I made her look at me. “That’s not the answer I’m lookin’ for.”

Wariness
and want clashed within her eyes. “For now. For you.”

Smoothing her hair away from her face until it coiled along my chest, I lingered over her lips, kissing her softly.
After she slipped back into sleep, I released a ragged breath. I imprinted the feel of her on my body before finally drifting off.

In the morning, I woke up, alone. I scanned the room
, but she was gone along with a pair of my shorts, the T-shirt I’d offered her last night, her heels and bag. The dress I’d destroyed lay in a heap on the floor, just like my heart.

Ravage the fair maiden much, asshole?

I crossed both arms over my face. Emptiness surrounded me. The last time I’d felt this heavy weight was when my dad died. I didn’t even consider looking for a note from Leelee. She wouldn’t leave one. It wasn’t her style, and besides, she’d pretty much said it all last night when she told me we had to stop doing this.

I
pulled her pillow on top of my face, smothering myself in her scent. I lay like that until I threw the pillow aside and stood up.

“
Screw this.” I wasn’t some fancy-pants pushover.

T
his time I knew just where to find Leelee—someplace she couldn’t hide, someplace she couldn’t run from me.

The
book fair.

Saturday
: Book Fair Fiasco

I DIDN’T KNOW WHAT I was going to do when I got to Leelee, but I had the fastest shower on record. I was even speedier than the kid when he thought I wasn’t paying attention at bath time and tried to get away with a splash and dash. I tried telling him Daddy has eyes in the back of his head, but that just wigged him out.

Dressed, deodorized, and aftershaved for the non-shave, I hustled into jeans and whatever shirt came to hand.
The green Henley. It highlighted my hazel eyes and rugged good looks, at least that’s what Ma had said when she’d given it to me. Fuck it, it passed the sniff test, it’d do. Striding to the grand hall, I thought about making a big Lifetime
Movie of the Week
scene. Chicks liked that weepy, get-your-Kleenex-out shit. Or maybe a John Cusack
Say Anything
grand gesture . . . minus the boom box and serenading, although Leelee did have a thing for my singing.

Maybe
I’d haul her into my arms, drag her back to my room, and tie her to the bed until she listened to common sense, then fuck her silly again.

That sounded like a plan.

The line was backed up beyond the room leading into the book fair, and it had already been going for an hour and a half. These romance readers were hardcore junkies. Growing increasingly impatient, I finally made it into the room
before
the room I needed to reach. Inside, dozens of random companies hawked their wares from body art to glass bongs, to cover model agencies. When I came up beside Big Blond from the Guys with Balls competition displaying
his
wares, we bumped fists. He introduced me to the Bad Boys for Books rep, talking me up like I was the next big thing since Fabio. I shook hands and gritted my teeth in a smile.

I
accepted a business card with a, “Sure, yeah. I’ll call you if I’m ever interested”—
not likely
. I made my way forward slower than the kid getting ready for Sunday School when I took him to church once a month.

Nametag checked, I
finally entered the promised land of pervy books . . . and a squealing mass of arms, legs, and—what the fuck—feathers bounded up to me.

Jules Gem. She didn
’t have a megaphone, but she was still attached to her mic. She gestured for her camera guy to get a close up. “Stone! We’ve been waiting for you to show. You’re
such
a dark horse celeb at LitLuv.”

“
Uh . . .” I frowned down at her, trying to come to grips with her outfit du jour. It consisted of some white feathery sweater thing that made my nose itch. “Hi, Miss Gem?”

“
Oh, look at you!” She slapped my arm, not so playfully. “You remembered not to call me ma’am, aren’t
you
a darling. Can you say that to the camera for me?”

“
Huh?”

“
Darling. Go on now, put some of that sexy southern feeling into it.” She simpered into the lens with a huge conspiratorial wink.

Remembering the trouble I
’d gotten into during the flash mob, I asked, “This thing live?”

“
Of course, Stone. Nothing scripted here. As we always say at the beginning of our broadcasts: You
LitLuv
it, we
live
it!”

I
grinned at the sheer audacity of the woman.
Nothing scripted my ass.
“Sure, darlin’, whatever you say.”

Flapping her hand
s around in some sort of funky swoon-dance, she cut back to me. “Are there any authors you want to meet today, Stone? Who’s your
favorite
?” She shivered in a display of delight.

“
Nicky Love’s my man. But I’ve also been taken with Leelee Songchild.” In more ways than one, and hopefully in more ways to come.

“
Isn’t she just
gorgeous
.” Jules’s eyes widened dramatically.

Hell yes
, she was.

“
And can our Leelee ever write!” She turned to the camera, aiming a massive smile at it. “New Adult author has Stone under her spell. New Adult, everyone! It’s the
new
black.”

Giving a practiced view of her profile, Jules slanted her eyes at me.
“And we’ll have a
huge
feature on Stone coming in the August issue of
LitLuv
magazine. Because he’s big, he’s brawny, he
is
all that. I’ll be in touch with Stone after the convention, folks, because I live right down the road from him on Isle of Palms.” She pointed at me for the viewers. “All of him, for all of you. Isn’t it purrrfect?”

What the hell? She was about ten minutes down the road from my garage. Life was never
gonna be the same. “You’re just a stone’s throw away from me, huh?”

She smiled at the camera then motioned for the dude to
stop rolling. “That’s right. Great tagline, Stone, I think we’ll use it. And the feature I’m doing on you? Full photo spread, mm ’kay?”

“
I’m not sure how comfortable I am with that, Miss Gem.”

She swung toward me, pure feminine menace.
“You don’t have to be comfortable, just hot. And you can do that with both hands tied behind your back.” Her eyes clouded. “Oh! Now there’s an idea . . .”

Oh hell no
, there is not!

Before I could stage a protest,
Jules sauntered off, back in full Queen of the Con mode. I could just imagine her at the shop, digging up all my old dirt and getting cozy with Ray over a goddamn latte or some such Starbucks shit.

I
’d worry about that later, after I made my peace with Leelee.

I scanned the cavernous overcrowded, overheated room, looking for any kind of landmark. Spotting big banners swinging above tables arranged in long lines, I read the genres boldly splashed across them in flames of red until I located New Adult. There was only about half an acre of concrete floor, sweating book hungry mobs, and possibly another Jules ambush
between me and the most populated area taking up the far right corner.

I smiled when I saw Leelee had her own special promotional banner above a table heaving with fans.
That’s my girl.

I started in her direction. Unfortunately, I saw Nicky off to the side in the
Paranormal lane, flagging me down. His suspenders dripped from his waist, the collar of his shirt was undone three buttons, and some broad had her hands all over his chest. 

Obviously c
aught in the middle of a heated moment he wasn’t all too happy about, he gave the man-to-man distress signal of wide-eyed horror.

“
Goddammit.” After last night I owed him a save.

Making my way over with lots of shouldering, elbowing and
“’Scuse me, ma’am, pardon me, miss,’” I planted my hip on the table. I enjoyed several moments of Nicky’s unease while his fangirl fawned all over him.

I cleared my throat. Arching
an eyebrow, I went for the highhanded, he’s-mine look.

Chicky
looked up, blinked big brown eyes, and pressed her lips together.

I leaned over her to Nicky,
“Is there a problem here, lover?”

Chicky
backed up. She scowled between the two of us with
impressive
fury. I moved between her and Nicky, and she craned around me, sputtering, “But—but, you said it wasn’t true!”

Ha.
“Yeah.” I caressed up my man’s arm and into his hair, jerking him to me over the table. He murmured death threats under his breath. It was funny. My thumb rode up and down the pulse of his neck, making sure Chicky saw he was mine and I owned him. “There seems to be a lot of that goin’ around.”

Guess I knew where he
’d spent the night . . . because we were both so good about the hush-hush, down-low shit.
Shee-it.

Chicky
’s glare turned lethal, but hers was no comparison to Jules Gem’s weapon of mass intimidation. I did feel bad when she marched around me to lay a resounding smack on Nicky’s cheek. Fucker deserved it though, as much as I had when Leelee slapped me at The Golden Banana.

She
stomped away and I turned Nicky loose.

“
So, you’re hitting that?” She wasn’t his type—too easy—but I’d be willing to bet he’d docked, cocked, and loaded the Good Ship Hot-to-Trot.

“
It was either that or bunk with Missy.” He carefully rearranged his books, his swag, his PDA running a mini-slideshow of his book covers.

“
Thanks for your sacrifice last night.”

“
Thanks for the bro-move just now.”

We exchanged
back slaps. “Think nothin’ of it. At least you got laid, man.”

He was already
smiling and inviting a group of women to approach him. “You too, huh?”

“
I don’t fuck and tell.” Rubbing my mouth, I looked out over the crush of people, regaining my compass point on Leelee. My heart knocked around like a loose piston in my chest.

“
Since when?”

“
Since Leelee. That’s when.” I patted my palm to my tat, and he knew exactly what that meant. It was right over my heart and held the other two things I loved—cars and the kid.

“
Shee-it.”

“
Yeah.” I met his eyes, nodding, just as surprised as him.

Nicky pulled me to him with a long, hard
hug. “Jesus, Josh.”

“
Yeah.” I grinned as I backed away.

I threaded
my way through a cluster of teen girls and their mamas converged around a YA author, all glittery nails, sparkly faces, and too much floral perfume. I ended up face-to-face with a well-endowed woman who grabbed both my arms.

“
Stone! I saw you in Guys with Balls. I’ve gotta get your autograph.”

“
Mom! You are not getting your boobs signed again this year.” Her teenaged daughter sounded mortified.

I
’d have been a little shocked myself if the same thing hadn’t already happened with another busty broad, right after said show.

“
Oh yes, I am. It’s tradition. Besides, this is The Stone.” She shoved a Sharpie in my hand. Yanking a side of her shirt lower, she bared a good acre of tit. “Use as much space as you need. Make it out to Marianne with an
i
, okay?”

W
e were drawing a crowd so I kept it short and simple:
To a beautiful lady, Marianne. All the best, Stone.

I accepted her hug then hurried off before any other body parts became available for autographs. I
’d made it all of ten feet when I heard the tail end of Jules’s high-pitched screech. I thought about her promise, aka threat, to track me down in Mt. Pleasant. At the rate my day was going, maybe I oughtta head her off at the pass. Pulling out my phone, I called the garage.

“
Stone’s, just a stone’s throw away,” Ray answered.

I
tore the phone away from my ear and glared at it. Then I snarled into it, “Excuse me?” Oh hell no. And how the fuck had they heard that bullshit already?

“
Just saw you on the convention broadcast online. We thought it sounded catchy.”

“
Yeah? I
catch
you using it one more time and I’ll make sure all of y’all never collect another phone number from the female clientele again.” I gripped the phone harder. “It’s Stone’s, at your service.”

“
Isn’t it just.” A feminine voice simpered beside me.

Christ.
Missy Peachtree, not at your service.

I muffled the phone.
“Shouldn’t you be signing—I don’t know—whips or something?”
Hell, I was signin’ tits, why not?

S
he smacked my ass with a wide-open palm. “Great idea. But paddles have much more room to personalize.” As usual she gave as good as she got before melting into the crowd from which she’d materialized.

The phone pressed back to my
ear, I listened to Ray ramble on. “We hooked up the laptop to the big TV in the reception area so everyone can watch the goings-on over in ’Lanta.”

I didn
’t know you could do that. I wished they didn’t know either. Now all my escapades would be the talk of Mt. Pleasant.

“
And just before you called I got off the phone with that Jules Gem. She wanted to check your schedule for next month. I figured we could use the publicity, so I offered her a free oil change.”

Too bad she thought I was a foreign car dealer. Thank
God most of this shit wouldn’t hit the fan until after the Con. “Good idea about the oil change. Maybe we can keep her sweet.”