Prince Albert

  and his mouth turns up at the corners, that shit-eating-grin on his face. Damn it, I just know that he's going to be impossible to live with now. He's going to think I want him all the time. I feel obligated to let him know that is definitely not going to be the case.

  "I hope you don't think this means anything is different between us," I say. Crap, that came out wrong. It sounds totally bitchy.

  But Gaige laughs. "Whatever you say, darlin'," he says. "You want to pretend like you're not lusting after me all the time, go right ahead."

  "See, I knew that's what you'd think if we ever hooked up." I slide off of him, feeling incredibly awkward standing there naked, and scramble around for my clothes, scurrying back into them as quickly as I can.

  Gaige stands there looking around, buck naked, holding the used condom in his hand. "I don't suppose there's any discrete way of throwing this out, is there?"

  "Oh my God, no," I say. "Not up here. You want the staff knowing we screwed?"

  "I'm sure your father has hidden cameras or something in the house," Gaige says, his voice calm.

  "No way," I say, my heart beating wildly in my chest. "Oh my God. You don't think he does, do you?"

  Gaige laughs. "Relax, darlin'," he says. "It's our dirty little secret." Then I watch as he puts the condom in my teacup.

  "Did you just put that in my cup?" I ask, my voice like two octaves higher than its normal pitch. "That's the grossest thing I've ever seen."

  Gaige shrugs. "You'd rather I carry it through the house to the bathroom?" he asks. "The cup's empty. Get rid of it in the bathroom. Don't be such a priss."

  "I'm not being a priss," I say, bristling at his attitude. Did he really just say this was our dirty little secret? I mean, I don't want him to shout it from the rooftops, but shit, he's acting like he's all embarrassed to have screwed me. This is more awkward than I thought it would be. "And you don't have to worry. I'll keep my mouth shut."

  "I sure as fuck hope not," he says, pulling his t-shirt on over his head. He winks at me, obviously meaning it in the lewdest way possible. "I kind of liked it when it was open."

  I can feel my face flushing warm, and try to hide it by leaning over to grab my novel, but Gaige sees it.

  "You're blushing," he points out helpfully. "It's cute."

  Of course that makes me blush even deeper. "Cute," I say. "I can't believe I heard the word cute come out of Gaige O'Neal's mouth."

  He raises his eyebrows as he walks past me, teacup in his hand. "Stick around, darlin'," he says. "I just might surprise you."

  Gaige does surprise me, a few minutes later, after I've retreated to my room. I'm undressed and about to step in the shower when his voice makes me nearly jump out of my skin. "Hey."

  "Shit, you scared the crap out of me. What, are you no longer knocking now?"

  "Touchy, touchy," he says. He's grinning. He's fucking pleased with himself, so I slap his arm playfully. "Careful, darlin', I remember how you liked the spanking I gave you earlier."

  "What are you doing here?" I ask. "You know our parents aren't going to be out all night."

  "What, you think they're going to check our rooms for us?" he asks. "We're not sixteen."

  "They could hear," I say, swatting his hand away as it slides up my leg.

  "Only if you're as loud as you were in the sunroom," Gaige says. I feel myself flush, and Gaige laughs. "Don't feel bad. I'd be that loud if I were having the best sex of my life, too."

  "You're full of yourself," I say. "I'm getting in the shower."

  "I never pretended to be humble," Gaige says, stepping around me and into the shower without even asking. "Are you going to join me, or what?"

  "Are you always this annoying after sex?" But I step inside, closing my eyes as the water runs over my head and down my body. I brush away the water on my face, opening my eyes to see Gaige watching me.

  "I don't know," he says.

  "You don't know what?"

  "I don't know how I am after sex." He applies body wash to his hands, then rubs his hands over my shoulders and along my arms, working up a lather on my skin.

  I shouldn't be showering with Gaige. I mean, I definitely shouldn't have done what we did earlier in the sunroom either, but I really shouldn't be prolonging things. What happened in the sunroom was crazy, my mind snapping and me losing all sense of reason and propriety. But my sanity is back now.

  At least, my sanity is back until his hands are roaming over my breasts, my skin slick. And until I look at his well-defined chest muscles right in front of me. Then I think I lose my mind again. I reach out and touch him, running my fingers down his abdomen. "What do you mean, you don't know how you are after sex?"

  Gaige shrugs. "I don't usually stick around long enough to find out what chicks think after sex."

  "Chicks?" I ask. But I'm still smiling. "You really are a pig, aren't you?" If he doesn't stick around after sex, why the hell is he here?

  Gaige grins broadly. "Oink, oink," he says.

  "That's hot. At least you're honest."

  "Want to hear some more honesty?" he asks, his finger tracing around my nipples, one and then the other. Heat rushes through my body at his touch and I find myself wanting him back between my legs. Damn it. It's like we didn't just have sex minutes ago.

  One time is a mistake, I think. Twice…well, that's something else entirely.

  "Why are you here?" I ask him.

  Gaige takes my hand and wraps it around his cock. "Because you make me so fucking hard I can't think straight," he says. "Because I spent a whole summer four years ago hanging out with you all the time, and thinking every day how it would feel to have your lips wrapped around my cock. Today was the first time I got to feel them."

  "You spent a whole summer thinking about me blowing you?" I stroke him lightly, my hand running down his length, even as part of me thinks there's no way in hell I should be doing this. I'm worried that Gaige is going to be addictive, and that's terrifying.

  "I spent a whole summer thinking about you on your knees with your lips wrapped around my cock," he says, his voice low and gravely. "I spent four years thinking about you sitting on my face. Four years thinking about you riding me."

  "I – " I start. I realize I don't know what the hell to say. The fact that Gaige has spent any time at all fantasizing about me – about us – seems absurd. "I'm sure you say that to all the girls."

  Gaige laughs. "Not quite, sweetheart."

  "You know, some people use that word as a term of endearment," I say, my hand stroking him lazily. "You make it sound like an insult."

  "You take it whichever way you want, darlin'," he says.

  "I don't know whether to be annoyed or turned on."

  "Now, I've definitely heard that before," he says, smiling as he reaches between my legs. "I'd say turned on is more accurate."

  Arousal courses through my body when he touches me, but I stop his hand with mine. "I've never been turned on by someone who irritates me as much as you do, Gaige."

  He grins. "I'll definitely take that as a compliment, sweetheart." He spins me around to face the shower wall and pins my hands above my head. "I only washed your front. Can't miss the opportunity to wash the other side."

  "You're so thoughtful," I start, but I'm immediately distracted by his hands traveling down my hips and ass, and then between my legs.

  "People tell me that a lot," he says.

  "Yes," I murmur, as his fingers find their way inside me. I can't follow the conversation anymore; all I can think about is his fingers and what they're doing. I move to turn around, but he reaches up with his other hand and pushes my palms firmly against the shower wall again.

  "Assume the position," he says, and I can't help but giggle.

  "What position is that?"

  "It's whatever position I put you in," he says, and the throbbing between my legs intensifies. Damn Gaige. He says the kind of things that my brain tells me I should think are totally misogynistic and repulsive things to say
, yet my body seems to feel exactly the opposite.

  "You think I'm just going to do whatever you tell me to do?" I ask. But I don't move my hands. I stand there, letting the hot water pour over me. When Gaige steps out of the shower, the blast of air-conditioned air hits me. For a second, I think he's just decided to leave, but he pops back inside, foil wrapper in hand.

  He covers my palms with his, my hands still above my head, and leans in close to my ear. "I think you're going to do what I tell you to do," he says, sliding one hand down my arm, then along my back, and over my ass. "Because you like that someone has the balls to do it."

  I laugh. "And you think you're the one with the balls?"

  I hear the wrinkle of the foil wrapper, and I swear, I practically melt at the sound. What the hell is Gaige doing to me? Then his hand is on my hip, and he's pressing against my entrance, and with one swift movement, he's inside me.

  "I know I am, sweetheart," he says, thrusting deeper inside me, until I feel his heavy balls pressed up against the bottom of my pussy. His palms cover my breasts, and he moves slowly inside me as the warm water from the shower pours over us. "Now, I want you to touch your clit for me. Rub it while I fuck you."

  A moan escapes my lips as I comply. As if I'm not going to listen to an order like that. Pleasure courses through my body, bringing me higher and higher until I'm calling out Gaige's name again and again, hoping the shower drowns out my cries.

  "I'm going to come in you, darlin'. Do you hear me?" Gaige's voice is strained.

  I grunt my response, too caught up in my own pleasure to form words, but Gaige grabs a handful of hair and pulls my head back. "Tell me you want me to come inside you," he demands.

  As if on cue, I'm on the edge as soon as he orders me to say it. "Please," I beg. "Please." It's all I can say. I had no idea someone talking to me so crudely could be so damn hot.

  "Fuck," he groans, his hand still tight on my hair. The pain heightens the intensity of everything, and I'm putting more pressure on my clit, completely swept away in the moment. "Tell me, darlin'."

  "Oh God," I gasp. "Fill me with your cum."

  Gaige lets go of my hair, both hands on my waist as he thrusts inside me one last time, crying out, the sound almost feral. His orgasm triggers mine, and I feel myself crashing over the edge. His grip on me is tight, his fingers embedded so deeply in my flesh that it's the only way I don't fall over when I come, his arms wrapping around my chest, drawing me close to him.

  It's a few minutes before either of us speak, my head too foggy from my orgasm. We just stand there, Gaige still inside me, his body pressed against mine.

  "God, I really like how you are in bed," Gaige says.

  "Thanks, I guess? You haven't actually been to bed with me yet."

  "That's right," he says, slapping my ass. He slides out of me and steps out of the shower. "We'll have to remedy that."

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  GAIGE

  I'm lying on her bed, still wrapped in a towel and reading her novel, when Delaney comes out of the bathroom. Before I can even make a comment about the book, she's snatched it out of my hand.

  "Why are you reading this?"

  "Because it was sitting on your pillow."

  "So you thought that was an invite?" She's shoving it in her desk drawer, hiding it away, I suppose with good reason because that book was pretty fucking dirty. I knew Delaney had a wild side to her.

  "An invite is me telling you to sit on my face," I say. "You leaving your dirty books lying around just means anyone can pick them up and read them."

  "It's not a dirty book," she says.

  "Really?" I ask, getting up and rushing toward her desk. She lunges back toward the desk, going for the desk drawer, but she misses, and I pull the book out, flipping open to one of the pages. Delaney jumps up, one hand holding the towel around her breasts. Honestly, the only reason I even hold the book out of her reach is because I want her to lose the towel. I read from the book: "Brayden thrust his throbbing manhood into her slick channel of love. Holy shit, what the fuck is a channel of love?"

  "Stop. Seriously!" Delaney reaches one more time for the book, and I slip my finger under the edge of her towel, watching it fall to the ground. Then, satisfied, I return the book back to her. She groans her frustration, and when she bends over to pick up her towel, I make sure to get an ass-smack in.

  "Goddamn, I'm not going to get tired of slapping you on the ass like that," I say.

  When she stands up, her eyes are flashing. "What the hell was that for?" she asks. "You really are twelve years old, aren't you?"

  "You liked it before."

  "That was different," she says, bringing the towel back up around her, but I wrench it away from her.

  "Stay naked," I tell her. "I like you uncovered better." It's true. Shit, this girl makes me wound up, just looking at that curvy ass and tits. I'm not sure what the hell I'm still doing in her room, except that I don't want to stop touching her. Not yet.

  Delaney squirms away, grabbing the towel from me and wrapping herself up again. As if I didn't just have my hands all over that naked body of hers. As if I weren't just inside her.

  She sits down against the pillows on the bed, setting her book on the bedside table. "Do you think our parents are home?"

  I shrug. "Who cares?"

  "You don't think they heard anything, do you?"

  "In this house?" I ask. "No. Are you worried?"

  "Aren't you?"

  "Nope," I say, lying down beside her on the bed. "Not in the least."

  "Your boot is off," she says.

  "You're just noticing that shit now?" I ask. "Seriously?"

  "I noticed before," she says. "But that was upstairs when we were…"

  "Fucking?"

  "You have a way of making everything sound so….crude."

  "Sorry," I say, but I'm not. "I'll say making love instead."

  Delaney giggles. "Oh my God, I think I'm going to vomit."

  "Make loooooovvvve," I say, dragging out the words, my voice sickly sweet. "That's what that novel of yours would say, wouldn't it? I'd make love to you with my throbbing manhood?"

  "Stop," she says, rolling her eyes as she swats me on the arm.

  "Hey, I'm not the one reading it," I say.

  "At least I can read," she says. I make a meowing sound and a pawing gesture at her, and she sticks out her tongue at me. "What are you doing here, anyway? Don't you want to go back to your room?"

  "And miss out on the chance to bug you?" I ask.

  "Seriously," she says. "Isn't that your thing? Casual sex?"

  "Yeah, so what?"

  "Doesn't that involve not hanging around afterward?"

  "Delaney Marlowe, are you treating me like a one night stand?" I ask, putting my hand on my chest. "I'm hurt." Okay, I'm being sarcastic, but I am kind of surprised. I mean, come on, usually I'm the one who's out the door as soon as I can get away with it afterward, but Delaney's acting like she's the one who wants me gone. I'm more annoyed than hurt.

  "That's what this is, isn't it?" she says. "I mean, upstairs….and, um, in the shower, that can't happen again, Gaige."

  "So when you handle me in Japan, you're not going to handle me," I say. "Is that what you're saying?"

  Delaney blushes. Score one for me. "Absolutely not," she says, her voice firm. "This cannot happen again, Gaige. We're going to be under scrutiny in Japan and I'm representing the company there. So are you. There would be so much blowback if that –"

  "Yeah, yeah, got it," I say, cutting her off. Leave it to Delaney to be wound so tight when it comes to stupid company policies.