The Seduction of Destiny Rhode [The Seduction 3] (Siren Publishing Ménage and More) (8 page)

Her breath locked down in her lungs, and she couldn’t think.

“You are so fucking adorable when you do that.”

He kissed her hard and fast before she had any chance to ask him what the hell he was talking about, and two seconds later, she really didn’t care. She was lost to his kiss, his tongue, his taste. Being with him like this was utterly surreal as everything about him that attracted her should have made him so far out of her reach, and yet there she was, in his hotel room, with his hands massaging her ass and his tongue taking inventory of her mouth.

There was no point in fighting it. It was just sex, after all. At least this time she
wasn’t
married. She wasn’t breaking any rules. Maybe for once she could simply enjoy herself…
maybe
.

He started grasping for the zipper on the back of her sundress, and she stiffened. When he pulled away from her, she closed her eyes and held her breath.

“Destiny?” His tone was soft and questioning.

“Hmmm?” She tried to act as if nothing were wrong, but she was stiff as a board, and she knew her nose and forehead were scrunched into her hairline.

“Destiny.” This time his tone spoke command, and she regrettably opened her eyes and looked at him.

“Look, baby, you have two kids. I know you aren’t a virgin, so what’s going on here?”

That was a very good question, one with an answer she wasn’t sure of herself. She
wanted
to be there with him, yet at the same time, she felt she shouldn’t be.

She pushed him back and moved farther into the space where the bed was and sat on the edge, feeling rather defeated at this point. Ronan gathered up his sheet around his hips and came and sat beside her. He had the curtains on the sliding glass door pulled back, and moonlight spilled into the otherwise dark room, illuminating enough so one wouldn’t trip on anything, but not enough that she felt exposed to him in any way other than emotionally, and there wasn’t much she could do about that.

“Destiny, talk to me.” He placed two fingers beneath her chin and turned her head until she faced him.

“Sex and I…we aren’t on very good terms let’s just say.”

“No, let’s
not
just say. Tell me what’s up. I don’t want to hurt you or take advantage of you, and right this minute, I sort of feel like I am. So tell me what the problem is here.”

She sighed. He was right of course, and this time it was all her fault. She was the one who came to his door in the middle of the night wanting some more of what he’d given her the other day. Since that afternoon, she hadn’t been able to stop thinking of him, and of course since that day, he’d been everywhere but where she seemed to be. It drove her crazy until she finally broke down and showed up here in the middle of the night.

“I’ve only been with two men. My husband, and Aiden. Aiden was…a mistake. A
huge,
terrible mistake. I was just so lonely and…God that’s pathetic. That’s what every married woman who cheats on her husband says, I bet.”

She got up and began to pace across the blue carpet. When she got to the glass door, she turned and looked back at him. Even against the backdrop of a king-size bed, he was a large man.

“I was lonely. My husband ignored me. He was never home. I was horny.” She slapped her palm to the top of her head. “It’s no excuse! What I did was wrong, and I hurt Oscar, effectively ended my marriage, and if my kids ever found out, oh my God, I’d die. I’d just
die
!”

She looked at him, hoping he understood her turmoil, but he looked utterly confused. In fact, he was sort of looking at her as if she’d turned purple. She tucked her hair behind her ears and licked her lips, both a sign of how nervous she was.

“This is such a big mistake, Ronan. I’m sorry.” She rushed past him, heading for the door, only to have him grab her arm and pull her down into his lap.

“First of all, while you’re not making a whole lot of sense, this is clearly a big issue for you. And second, are you saying you haven’t been with
anyone
since your divorce?”

She stared up at him and nodded, embarrassed and knowing
he
would know exactly how long that had been since it had been a topic of discussion over the dinner table with Aiden one night.

“You haven’t had
any
sex in nine
years
?”

“Well, longer really…and you don’t have to say it like that!” She folded her arms hard across her chest.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart, you just…it just…
wow
.”

She growled and tried to excavate herself from his lap, but he only held her harder.

“Just a minute. Stop trying to get away from me.”

“Haven’t I embarrassed myself enough?” She gave up her struggle and accepted the fate of being trapped across his lap.

“I’m so sorry, love. It just came as such a shock to me. How does someone go that long without sex?”

She growled again, really wanting to scratch his eyes out. “It’s not that big of a deal. It’s not like water or food or some necessity!”

He shook his head as if in disbelief.

“Darlin’, for some people it very much
is
a necessity.”

She wasn’t sure how she felt about that statement. It wasn’t as if it had been a conscious decision exactly, and there wasn’t any changing it at this point, but she had the very real impression that by
some people
he meant himself. Cleary he was a very sexual man, which she’d recognized from day one. She could never satisfy a man like that, and she knew it! Why she was there setting herself up for disaster was something she couldn’t understand, and the war within her over that very subject was starting to suffocate her.

“Well, for women…we’re different. We have our kids and activities and friends and…I had a busy life!” she finished, sounding strained and distraught.

“Okay. Okay.” He stroked her hair as if she were a puppy. “I reacted badly. Let’s start this conversation over again, okay?” He ran his hand over a rough five o’clock shadow covering his chin and the sexist cleft she’d ever seen.

“I told you, sex and I aren’t on the best of terms. Can I ask you something?” She chewed the corner of her lip and pushed her hair behind her ears nervously while awaiting his agreement.

“Tell you what, for you, and you alone, you can ask me anything, and I promise to answer honestly. Deal?”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “For it to be a deal, don’t I have to give something, too?”

His smile grew. “Oh right, you are correct. Well now, let me think.”

He allowed his gaze to scan the ceiling, and she felt like punching him.

“I know.” He moved so fast she wasn’t sure what happened, but suddenly she was on the bed, flat on her back, and he was positioned in the rather vulnerable spot between her legs.

“Every question you ask, I get to see, touch, or kiss, somewhere on your body…my discretion.”

She tried to sit up, but he had his arms wrapped around her legs and when she rose even half way, he tugged, knocking her back down.

“Somehow I think I’m getting the raw end of this deal.”

“Oh honey, on the contrary, you’re getting the sweet end.” He winked at her. “I promise you that.” He pushed his hands up under her dress and ran his thumbs on the inside of her thighs making her wriggle. “Now, ask your question.”

“I don’t remember what it was anymore.” It wasn’t a total lie, but she wasn’t sure she liked this
deal
he’d bartered.

He inched the skirt of her dress up her thighs. She tried to bat his hands away, but all that did was make him take a bite of her left thigh, causing her to squeal, then moan in a fashion that spoke nothing at all of
stop
.

“Ask me.” He held her gaze in the moonlight while he ran his lips along the skin of her thigh. He wasn’t really kissing or doing anything other than moving along it, but good lord, combined with the heated look in his eyes, it felt lethal.

“You’ve been with a lot of women, right?” She swallowed hard.

“Sure.” He stayed vague.

“You infuriate me.” She sighed.

“Would you rather I be the type of man to kiss and tell? Because I work with a lot of guys, and the story of tonight would make great…”

“No!” She slapped her hands down on top of his. She didn’t even want to think about his sharing her insanity with all the men she saw every single day.

“Okay, then ask your question.” He started to blow across her skin, then run his fingers gently over the spot. It caused her to shiver in a most delicious way.

“I’m worried that I’m, well that I can’t…” She swallowed again then moved her gaze from him to the ceiling. “I’m rather boring in bed, and I take too long to orgasm, and I’ve never truly felt satisfied.”

He chuckled. “Oh, Aiden would love to hear that. Damn me and my ethics!”

She slapped at his hands again. “It’s not funny. Aiden was amazing, might I add.
He
wasn’t my point. I spent three short weekends with Aiden over the course of a year before my guilt choked me and I had to call it quits. I was never relaxed with him. I was always on edge like I thought Oscar was going to walk in at any second. I honestly don’t know what he saw in me or why he kept coming back.”

He grew still and stared at her for the longest time until she felt like bolting from the room, then carefully began to speak.

“Destiny, I think you are a beautiful, passionate woman. I’ve had the good fortune to spend a great deal of time with both your boys, working alongside them. They’re amazing young men and from what I’ve heard, your ex wasn’t around enough to have done that. That’s you in them. You’re so damn smart, you’re feisty…” He chuckled. “You definitely know how to give someone hell when they need it, but I’ve seen you be just as compassionate. When Manny was having that trouble with his landlord, you didn’t even think twice about it. You gave him and his family three rooms so they could regroup and stay together and be safe.”

He slid up the bed until he was laying atop her, looking down into her eyes.

“You are a
truly
good woman, and there aren’t enough of you out there. Why in the world wouldn’t Aiden, or any man with eyes and half a brain, be falling all over themselves to be with you?”

She shrugged. He was being sweet, but then, he wanted in her pants…or under her dress, as the case may be.

“Stop that,” he barked at her.

She blinked. “What?”

“You’re systematically dismissing everything I just said.”

“How could you possibly know that?”

He pushed the hair back from her face.

“I’ve learned to read you, I guess.”

He placed the softest kiss to her lips. It was like ice cream on a hot summer day.

“I’ve learned that you play with your hair when you get nervous, which you probably know as well. That’s probably the reason you pull it up so tight every day in the first place. I’ve learned that you blush whenever I catch you looking at me, which I’ve decided means you were picturing me in all my naked glory.”

He smiled.

She rolled her eyes, but couldn’t stop the smile from breaking across her face.

“I’ve learned that you break pencils when your sister is around.”

“That happened once! And how did you see that?”

“I was in the office with Aiden. You just couldn’t see me.”

“Bastard.” She smiled, belaying any insult that might otherwise have come with the harsh word.

“I’ve learned the way you look at your boys is the way every parent in the world should look at their kids. Every kid on the planet deserves to be looked at like that.”

She felt a lump form in her throat, and she drew a deep breath in the hopes of not becoming overly emotional.

“Okay, stop.” Her voice cracked.

He stroked the skin along her face and into her hairline.

“Nope. One more thing.”

She held her breath not wanting to cry.

“Aside from all of that, and so much more I could tell you, I’ve also learned you are the most passionate, sexy, fiery woman I’ve ever had, or wanted, in my bed. That day in the hall, honey, you were anything but boring, and if you’ve never felt satisfaction in the arms of a man, and leaving Aiden out of it, your husband was a horse’s ass. Destiny, the way you came apart in my arms, good God do you have any idea how long I stayed hard for you that day? How many times I’ve thought of you since? How badly I want to taste you right now and make you fall apart on my tongue?”

She couldn’t breathe. Everything he said was too wonderful. She reached up and caressed his head, running her fingers through his hair. She stared into his eyes, afraid to say what she was feeling just then. She feared that somehow, taking this moment anywhere but where it was would ruin it—make it pop like a balloon and never be the same again.

“Destiny, I can see the need in your eyes. Let me love you, sweetheart. Let me show you how good it can be when a man truly possesses a woman. Let me make you crazy with need, then let me satisfy that need. Trust me. I’ll make certain you never regret it.”