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Biting back his impatience, Luc trailed Tyler, then registered the fact the other man was walking down the hall of a designer-decorated apartment . . . to the bedroom.
At the end of the hall, Luc came to a stomach-lurching stop. There, Alyssa lay sprawled out across the man’s bed, curled up with his pillow, wearing one of his T-shirts that rode up around her waist, a thong, and nothing else. She was out cold.
Was this really what it looked like?
What else could it be, idiot? If she’d simply been scared, why hadn’t she called to tell him where she was and that she was safe? Why did she need to get undressed and into Tyler’s bed?
Betrayal slammed him, so deep he almost couldn’t breathe. The sight of her so relaxed and tangled in another man’s sheets gouged his heart out of his chest. For a fleeting moment, he acknowledged that her infidelity was better than her death. But they’d been married less than two weeks. What the fuck did he do now?
“You look like I took a battering ram to your stomach. ”
Luc whipped a glare around to the other man. “Didn’t you? How did this work? She came home to find the house vandalized, and called you to protect her, giving you the perfect opportunity to help her out of her clothes? Or did you hit the house to scare her and hope she’d call you, then let you fuck her again?”
“Man, you just don’t get it. ”
What is there to “get” except the fact my wife is fucking another man?
Tyler shook his head. “Take her home; make sure she rests. And get the hell out of my face. ”
His words were dismissive, as if . . . well, as if Tyler knew he’d see Alyssa—and have her—again. Whenever he pleased. Luc gritted his teeth. He ought to leave her here with her lover. He’d been stupid enough to fall for her—hard—and now he was going to pay the price. He’d married her because she carried this man’s child. Now he was getting an inside look at what it had taken for these two to conceive. And didn’t it hurt like a bitch?
But if he’d married Alyssa for this baby, then by damned, he was going to take her home for this baby. She might share her body with Tyler, but Luc planned to dig out a place in her heart and make it his, find some way to make her care so that her every betrayal became a rending ache on her conscience.
Gritting his teeth, Luc approached the bed and lifted his sleeping wife into his arms. She barely stirred. “What the hell did you do to her?”
“Nothing out of the ordinary. She’s just exhausted. ”
Meaning Tyler often fucked her into a near coma? The bastard was trying to piss him off.
Luc jerked Alyssa closer to his chest. And he couldn’t lie—even knowing what she’d done, he was glad that she was safe and whole and close. “Stay the fuck away from my wife. ”
“You leave her, then you’re leaving someone else to take care of her. And whatever needs she has. ”
Bullshit. Luc had loved her furiously, desperately, the morning he’d left for Los Angeles. Could she really have had needs so overwhelming in three days that she’d turned to another? Or did she have such feelings for Tyler that Luc’s absence made hopping in the other man’s bed both more convenient and a necessity?
He couldn’t stay here and listen to Tyler say another word or he’d turn homicidal. Luc could feel the rage boiling up in his gut, starting to bubble over. As much as Luc hated him, Tyler wasn’t worth prison time.
Then again, if Alyssa was voluntarily fucking her bouncer so soon after their wedding, neither was she.
“Fuck off. ”
Jack and Hunter backed down the hall quickly, leaving a path for him; then they exited Tyler’s apartment, emerging into the late-afternoon sun. Luc clutched Alyssa to his chest, purposely avoiding the pitying looks the other men shot him as he climbed into the back of the SUV.
As he settled Alyssa into his lap, he wondered, now that he’d found her, what was he going to do with her?
ALYSSA woke with a headache and a moan. Her limbs seemed to weigh a thousand pounds each. Her mouth felt stuffed with cotton. Putting two thoughts together in her sluggish brain wasn’t happening.
Gingerly, she lifted her lids, stunned to find it nearly dark in the shadowed room. Her room.
Everything inside her snapped to attention. How had she gotten here? And when? God, it had to be . . . what? Five thirty? Almost six? If Tyler had brought her back, he should know that she should have been at Bonheur hours ago. With a gasp, she rolled over to peek at the clock.
Instead, she found Luc sitting on the edge of the bed, stone still and silent. If his sudden appearance here didn’t tell her something was dreadfully wrong, his face said it for him.
“Luc?” She scrambled to sit up . . . and realized she was wearing Tyler’s T-shirt.
In fact, now that she looked around, everything had changed. The last time she’d seen this room, it had been all but destroyed. Now the bed was made with fresh sheets and blankets. It smelled faintly like paint. The mess was gone. “What—what’s going on?”
He looked grim, and she had the distinct impression he was holding in his fury. “I think it’s time I asked you that question. Someone broke in the house, and you didn’t call me. You called nine-one-one and Tyler, then disappeared for nearly twelve hours. You never called to tell me you were alive. You never answered your phone. ”
“I was afraid and . . . I must have left my phone in Tyler’s car. I—”
“I assume you’ve been with him all this time. ” He fired the question at her, like a well-aimed laser.
Her stomach pitched and rolled when she realized how this must look to Luc.
“Yes. But—”
“In all that time, you never thought to call me to let me know the psycho who’d broken into the house hadn’t abducted you? Oh, that’s right . . . ” He snapped, the sarcasm thick and biting. “You were too busy letting Tyler fuck your brains out to tell your husband where the hell you were and that you were alive. I woke Jack up at an ungodly hour, walked away from the taping of my show to hop a plane, and flew across the country. I told the press you were missing. And where do I find you but Tyler’s bed. ” He stood, fists and teeth clenched. “Goddamn you!”
Alyssa closed her eyes. Yes, Luc would jump to this conclusion. He must have retrieved her from Tyler’s apartment. From his bed. She winced.
But why couldn’t he get it through his thick head that, despite her “profession,” she’d never step out on him?
“It’s not what you think. Let me explain,” she implored. “I—”
“You’re addicted to his cock?”
“No. ” She sighed. “Luc—”
“You’re in love with him?”
She blanched. “No!”
“Then you just get a sick kick out of cheating and making an ass of me?”
How could he believe that for a second? It was probably his anger and residual fear talking, but . . .
Alyssa took a deep breath. Then another. Hadn’t they had this conversation—or one remarkably like it—before Luc had left Louisiana and she’d discovered she was pregnant? Yes. He’d accused her of being Tyler’s main squeeze and fuck buddy for nearly two months. Couldn’t Luc see that she loved him? Granted, she’d never said the words, but God, she’d given herself to him in every way, let him into her life, her house. Let him plant his seed in her body. Been thrilled to know she’d always have a part of Luc. And he just kept insisting that she was a whore.
She couldn’t keep living like this.
Rolling away from him, Alyssa found the edge of the bed and stood, making her way to the door.
Luc glared at her. “Where the hell are you going?”
Damn it, she wanted to strangle the man for breaking her heart. “Fuck you. ”
As she stormed out the door, his hand clamped around her biceps and he hauled her back to the bed. “Oh, you fucked me. Totally. You’ve got me coming and going so much I don’t know my name half the time. I’m twisted and tied up
in you, so goddamn addicted. And you know the sad part? If you took the other man’s T-shirt off your gorgeous body right now, I’d stupidly fall to my knees and be ridiculously grateful for the chance to fuck you again. ”
His words hit her like a sledgehammer. Luc had feelings for her, but he was terrified to trust her. Because of who she was. What she’d become. If she told him now that she loved him, would he embrace her and tell her that he loved her, too? Or just laugh in her face?
She was too afraid to find out.
Tears flared at the back of Alyssa’s eyes, stinging. She blinked them away, refusing to cry over this man again. “No, the sad part is you married me believing the worst about me. You never let me tell you what happened today. And now it doesn’t matter. I agreed to this marriage because you seemed to have feelings for me and claimed to want this baby. God, I’m so stupid. You probably even think the baby is Tyler’s. ”
His dark eyes drilled her with anguish and fury. “Is it?”
Two words, and she felt as if he’d punched her in the stomach. This wasn’t going to work. Ever. She’d always believed rose-colored glasses were pointless, but when she’d agreed to marry Luc she’d worn them. At the cost of her heart.
She wrenched her arm away from his grip. “Like I said, fuck you. ” Alyssa stormed out the bedroom door and down the hall. Before she reached the stairs, Luc grabbed her from behind and slung her against his chest. He swatted her ass with a broad, hot palm. Fire ran across her skin, down her legs. Why? Even when the man infuriated her, insulted her, her body still responded . . .
“Since you ask so sweetly,” he growled through clenched teeth.
Before she could absolve him of the notion that she was going to get naked with him, he dropped her to the mattress and ripped Tyler’s shirt from her body. Now the only thing standing between him and his angry lust was her lace thong.
As Luc had always done with her barriers, he ripped this one away, as well. The thong fell to the ground.
“You want me to fuck you?” His voice croaked. “I’m all over that. ”
His control was unraveling. And she knew what would happen then. If she was going to stay, they needed talk now, not sex. She must convince him that the baby wasn’t Tyler’s. But Luc’s demanding stare, the one that told her he was going to fuck her in every way possible, be more thorough than ever, dissolved her arguments. Instead, heat sparked low in her belly. A breathless need to touch him consumed her.
“I don’t want this now. ” She said the words, but they trembled—just like her body.
Luc ignored her, trailing a pair of fingers down her abdomen and dragging them over her hard clit. She tensed and tried to push his hand away. But she was no match for his determination.
His fingers sank deep into her pussy.
“As wet as you are for me,” he murmured against her tight nipple, “I think you’re lying. ”
Damn it, he knew her body too well. He took her nipple in his mouth and pumped her full of his fingers. Sensation sparked immediately, and against her better judgment, Alyssa arched to him. She shouldn’t, but . . . This was Luc.
“We should talk. ” Every word came out strained, between pants.
No way was Luc going to take her seriously.
He laved the heavy curve under her breast; then his teeth nipped at the hard tip. “After you come for me, and I remind you how hot everything is between us. ”
As if she’d ever forget. Before she could protest, he plunged his fingers deeper and sought out her G-spot. In seconds, Luc began to ply it mercilessly. Oh, my . . . Yes! Grabbing desperate handfuls of his shirt, she moaned.
“That’s it. Feel me. You want more, don’t you?”
She shouldn’t. They should be talking about his assumption that she was fucking Tyler, had become pregnant by him. But damn it, Luc was overwhelming her, her body was on fire, and she loved Luc too much to say no. “Yes . . . ”
Luc again rubbed her G-spot, now thumbing her clit. “Who do you want?”
“You, Luc. Always you. ” She broke out in a damp sweat, panting, mewling for more as pleasure ramped up in her belly. Need burned between her legs, multiplying, building.
How could he alone do this to her, shove her so quickly to the ragged edge of restraint and sanity?
He shimmied down her body and bent to her. Alyssa’s anticipation soared as she felt Luc’s hot breaths all over her wet, swollen flesh. Yes, please. Now. Sooner than now.
“Only me?” he demanded.
“Only you. ”
His dark eyes blazed across her face, anger warring with lust and possession in a tangle that made her catch her breath. “Make me believe it. ”
He suckled her clit into his mouth with a hungry snarl, putting his shoulders—his whole body—into it. From his first lick, pleasure seized her unlike anything she’d ever felt. His clever tongue ruthlessly drove her up, along with those long, probing fingers. He pushed her to the brink of orgasm with long, liquid swipes of his tongue on her clit. Then he drew it into his mouth and sucked.