A Wicked Truth

  And then his mouth was coming down on mine and I forgot about everything else. I leaned against him, parting my lips as his tongue teased the corner of my mouth. He took his time, slowly exploring every inch. One hand pressed against the small of my back, the other cupped the back of my head, holding me in place. As if I wanted to be anywhere else.

  We were both panting by the time he pulled back. His fingers tightened, massaging my neck as his thumb made circles under my ear. My entire body felt like it was vibrating, cells humming, desperate for his touch. For more.

  “You know,” he said quietly. “For a while, I wondered if what I felt was just an infatuation, wanting what I couldn't have. That if I finally had you, the desire would fade.”

  “And?” I raised an eyebrow.

  He smiled, his hand sliding around to the side of my neck, thumb pressing against the pulse point there. “And I just want you more every day, every hour.” His eyes darkened. “I want you so much it hurts.”

  “I want you too.” I ran my hands down his chest to his stomach. I smiled as I tugged his shirt up. He hissed as my fingers skimmed over those hard, flat muscles. “Sometimes I feel like I'm going to explode, like my body can't contain everything I feel for you.”

  He cupped my chin and kissed me again, fierce and hard. “I need you.” He practically growled the words.

  I yanked him against me, a thrill running through me at the feel of him hard against my hip. Arousal flared sharp and bright inside me. I moved my hand lower, cupping him through his jeans.

  He swore. Suddenly I found myself on the floor, his body stretched out on mine. I wrapped my legs around him, grinding against him as his mouth came down on mine. His hands were hot as they moved over me, pulling and tugging at my clothes until he managed to get them all off. Judging by some of the tearing sounds I heard, I wasn't sure they'd be wearable again, but I didn't care. I only cared that he was touching me and didn't stop.

  “Too many clothes,” I breathed into his ear. “I want you naked.”

  He chuckled, and I moaned as the vibration went through me. He pushed himself up onto his knees and yanked his shirt over his head. He went to his feet, his pants coming off next. I stared up at him, greedily devouring every inch of him. He was so gorgeous. And he was all mine.

  His eyebrow quirked up. “What?”

  I ran my hand over my stomach and down between my legs, loving how his eyes followed the path. His cock twitched when I slid my finger between my slick folds.

  “I was just thinking of how hot you are,” I said honestly. “And how you're mine.”

  He wrapped his hand around his cock, slowly stroking the hard shaft. “I am yours.”

  He came down between my legs again. He put his hands on my knees and slid them up my thighs. “And you're mine.”

  I reached down and squeezed his wrist. “Always.”

  He slid his hands under my hips and raised me up so that my weight was on my shoulders and upper back, his hands supporting me. His eyes met mine and I felt the tip of him brush against me. In one smooth motion, he slid inside and my back arched. I cried out as he filled me, stretched me.

  He stayed there for a moment, our bodies locked together, and then he began to move with slow, steady thrusts. Each one went deep, reaching that place inside me that only he could touch. I reached up and put my hands on his, arching my body up to meet him.

  His hands slid from my hips to my waist and he pulled me up to him. My butt rested on his thighs as he moved us together. I wrapped my arms around his neck, using his body as leverage to move myself against him, across him. As the pleasure built inside me, my head fell forward. I pressed my face against his neck, moaning as his lips danced across the side of my throat.

  “I love you so much,” he murmured. “My Shae.”

  “My Jas.” I nipped at his flesh, tasting the salt from his skin. “All mine.”

  “I've been yours from the first moment I saw you,” he said.

  He pulled me even tighter to him, my nipples hard points against his chest. We were barely moving, just the smallest back and forth motion that put the perfect amount of friction on my throbbing clit. I flexed my muscles around his cock, and he swore.

  “I love you, my Jas.” I ran my teeth along his jaw, then nipped at his earlobe. “Now and always.” I pressed my mouth against his ear. “Make me come.”

  He bit down on my neck, hard enough to make me gasp, and then I was on my back and he was over me, pounding into me. I wailed as my climax hit me, every muscle tensing. He kept going, forcing me from one into the next. Or maybe it was the same one, magnified until I couldn't even scream.

  My senses were exploding, each one overloading on a multitude of sensation. The sight of him above me, the feel of his skin on mine. The sound of his voice calling my name. His scent surrounding me. I could taste him.

  And then he was coming too, groaning as he pulsed inside me, emptied. I felt him spilling into me, and I reached up, pulling him down onto me. I accepted his weight gratefully, holding him to me even as the pleasure faded and my body gave over to the pleasant fatigue that followed great sex.

  Jasper rolled us over so that I was laying on him and reached over his head to grab a blanket from the couch. He pulled it over us, tucking it around our bodies before settling back down with me on his chest.

  “I don't know about you,” I said as I pressed my lips against his chest. “But I think this should be one of our Christmas traditions.”

  His fingers massaged my scalp. “What should?” he asked absently.

  “This.” I flattened my hand on his stomach. “Get a live tree, have sex and then decorate the tree.”

  He chuckled. “That sounds like a great tradition to me.”

  I looked up at him. “Does that mean we should start decorating?”

  He grinned. “I may need a few more minutes to recover.”

  I laughed. “Me too.” I snuggled more closely to him. “But we have plenty of time.”

  Chapter 25

  Six Months Later

  I pulled my feet up onto the couch and tucked them underneath me. I sighed as I looked at the mess around me. School had ended on Thursday, and yesterday had been the teachers' time to clean their classrooms. I'd gotten it all done, not wanting to have to come back in next week. I did, after all, have a lot to do.

  Three weeks from today, I was going to be changing my name from Lockwood to Whitehall. It would be one week after the year anniversary of Allen's death, and I was going to be marrying his best friend.

  And I knew Allen wouldn't have wanted it any other way.

  There were probably some people who thought the two of us were moving too fast, but we didn't care. It was going to be a small ceremony, just the people who really cared about us. Gina and Junie. Mitchell and his girlfriend Brenda. Jasper had invited his parents, but they hadn't said for sure they were coming.

  They hadn't been too excited when he'd told them about our engagement, but they hadn't been opposed to it either, so I was willing to consider that to be a step in the right direction. They would have to be a lot worse than distant to be worse in-laws than the Lockwoods.

  I hadn't seen the Lockwoods since that day at the police station. I'd kept to my decision not to continue pursuing the arson case, and I'd let Henley deal with everything to do with the trust. The Lockwoods had tried to drag it out, refusing to adhere to Allen's wishes, even if they received the rest of the trust. That had been my only stipulation to continuing to pursue the case.

  Finally, in mid-April, a judge had finally ruled that all of the Lockwoods' claims had no merit and ordered that the trust be released. So Jasper had gotten the money for his clinic, and we'd been able to pay off the loan I'd taken out to cover what we'd originally planned to use the insurance money for.

  The clinic was doing well, and Jasper had been able to get enough donations to keep it going without any other financial input. Not that I would've minded using our money, but Jasper insisted that we keep
the extra from the trust for the future, just in case.

  I still hadn't decided if I was going to go back to school in the fall. Even though Principal Sanders had been agreeable about me coming back at the beginning of the third quarter, I'd ultimately decided against it. Full-time at least.

  After talking things over with Jasper and Gina, I'd decided that it would be more disruptive to the students for me to come back than it would be to keep the substitute for the rest of the year. She was a good teacher. Once Jasper had hired his new secretary, I went back as a sub. I hadn't, however, cleaned out my classroom, letting Mrs. Kim use the things I'd bought, hence the reason I'd gone in to help clean up yesterday.

  I'd ended up spending the rest of my free time doing something I'd never thought I would've wanted to do. I wrote a book. I'd started it off as an exercise to help me work through everything that happened, but it had ended up turning into something more. A month ago, my agent had called and said she had a publisher interested in my book. They fast-tracked it, and it was due to come out shortly after Jasper and I would be getting back from our honeymoon.

  And that was what I was currently working on. Not the book, but rather our honeymoon. The wedding details were more or less taken care of, but Jasper and I had been going back and forth about where we wanted to go. Now I needed to finish making the reservations or we were going to be sleeping in the airport.

  Jasper had wanted us to do something big, go to Europe for a couple of weeks. I'd told him that I was fine with us just going to a bed and breakfast up the coast. Finally, we'd talked about it and realized that we were trying to sell the other one on the honeymoon we thought they wanted. Once we'd gotten that out, it had been easy for us to agree that the perfect honeymoon for us would be a week in Vancouver.

  I'd made up a list of places to call and was just reaching for the phone to start making the calls when it rang.

  “Hey, Maggie.” I leaned back and stretched out my legs, taking care not to kick off any of the papers I had spread out.

  “Shae, great news!”

  My agent was in her early fifties, but sounded like a bubbly teenager. I sometimes thought that was her secret weapon. People didn't always take her seriously at first, and that often ended up giving her a stronger bargaining position than people realized.

  “Really?” I reached behind me and twisted my hair up behind my head.

  “I just got a call from Elton in legal, and the publisher received an offer for the movie rights.”

  I sat up straight. “What?”

  Maggie laughed. “That's right. And with the offer made, you're going to clear a million, easy.”

  I didn't really remember the rest of the conversation, but I must've said the right things in the right places because we ended the call and I found myself staring at the phone. A million dollars. The exact amount of the insurance policy that we'd had to give up.

  The amount that Jasper and I could use to do what we'd been dreaming about – start a clinic near the place where it had all started for us, near UCLA. Jasper had hired a couple doctors to help him at the clinic up here, so we'd also discussed getting an apartment down there to stay while we were getting things started. Now it looked like we'd be able to do it this year.

  I supposed that answered my question about whether or not I was going to teach next year. It also brought up something else that had been on my mind for a few weeks...

  “Hey, babe.” Jasper smiled as he came into the room. “Things were slow so I thought I'd come home for lunch.” His smile faltered. “Is something wrong?”

  I shook my head. “No. Maggie just called.” I stood up and gave him a quick kiss. “I just got an offer for the movie rights on my book.”

  “That's great!” He smiled again as he wrapped his arms around my waist, pulling me against him.

  “What's even better is, my cut will be enough to start the clinic in LA.” I put my arms around his neck. “So when we get back from Vancouver, we can start apartment hunting.”

  “What about school?” he asked.

  “Well...” I gave him a small smile. “I was thinking it might be a good time to kill two birds with one stone. Take time off to go to LA with you...and take time off to start a family.”

  His entire face lit up, chasing away any of the lingering doubts I'd had about bringing up the subject. “Really? You don't think it's too soon?”

  “No.” I shook my head. “I'm tired of waiting. Allen and I waited, wanting to have things happen in the perfect time, but look what happened. We lost what we could've had.” I threaded my fingers together behind his neck. “I don't want to waste time anymore.”

  He stared at me with that intense look in his eyes, the kind that made me think he could see all the way into me.

  I shifted uneasily. Had I misread him? “Unless you wanted to wait...”

  His mouth came down on mine, hard and fast. “I want to have a family with you.” He pulled my bottom lip into his mouth, sucking on it for a moment before releasing it. “In fact.” He gave me that smile that made my stomach flip. “I think we should practice.”

  I let out a squeak as he swept me up into his arms. I laughed and kissed the side of his neck. “Well, they do say that practice makes perfect.”

  THE END

  Please turn the page and enjoy a FREE bonus to A Wicked Truth: The complete Box Set of Exotic Desires.

  Exotic Desires Box Set

  By M.S. Parker

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2015 Belmonte Publishing LLC

  Published by Belmonte Publishing LLC.

  Exotic Desires Vol. I

  Chapter 1

  Reed

  Paris, France.

  I'd arrived three days ago, coming by way of London, Glasgow, Vienna, and Rome, as well as Moscow and Berlin. None of these places were like home and I was grateful for that.

  Home.

  I ran my hand through my hair, ignoring the appreciative looks from the women in the café. I knew I was good-looking. I wasn't conceited, just honest. That was one of the vows I'd made to myself when I left Philadelphia a couple months ago. No more lies. Lies were the reason I'd been traveling around Europe, wearing out my welcome with various college friends. If I'd just been honest back then, with her, things might've turned out different.

  I shook my head and drained the last of my drink. I didn't want to think about Piper Black. After all, the entire point of coming to Europe was to get away from her. I managed a wry smile. Another lie. It wasn't just Piper I was running from, the same way it wasn't her who'd made me turn my entire life upside-down. She'd just been the catalyst who had started the whole damn thing.

  I looked across the street to where the Eiffel Tower stood and took a moment to enjoy the regal landmark. I tossed a few bills onto the table and stood up. I hadn't been over to see it yet. I'd been a little more interested in the Paris nightlife than the city’s history. After all, I was twenty-seven, far from an old man, and I'd spent the last five years of my life concerned more about work, about doing what my family expected of me. My little tour of Europe was my time to have fun.

  I looked up at the tower and then around. After dismissing a few possibilities, I found exactly who I was looking for. Putting on my most charming smile, I approached her.

  “Bonjour. Voulez-vous me prendre en photo?” I held up my phone.

  “American?”

  Her accent was thick, but I was more interested in how her long brown hair would look spread across my hotel bedspread or the way her curves would feel under my hands.

  “Yes.” I pulled my thoughts to the present. “I'm Reed.”

  “Monique.” She flashed teeth too straight to have been completely natural. The nose was a little too
perfect too. My eyes flicked down to her ample breasts. Probably fake as well.

  “Would you take my picture, Monique?”

  “Of course.” She took my phone, letting her fingers brush, then linger against mine.

  I smiled at her as she snapped a shot of me with the tower in the background. When she handed me back the phone, I winked at her and, on a whim, sent the picture to Piper. I'd been keeping her updated on my trip. Well, more or less. Things hadn't exactly ended badly in the angry sense, just me being hurt. I wanted to let her know that I was okay. And I was okay...sort of.

  “You are here alone?” Monique asked, her voice as erotic and soft as the finger she ran up my arm.

  I was about to be very okay.

  ***

  Monique’s big brown eyes widened when she saw the hotel where I was staying, but she didn't seem overwhelmed. I'd definitely chosen well. I had no problem with Europeans who were enamored with Americans. What I didn't need was someone looking for money and a green card. Monique might not be Stirling rich, but she dressed well enough to let me know she wouldn't be coming after me for some big payday. There were too many women who thought they'd fuck me and I'd take care of them for life. Or the ones who tried to do things like get pregnant or some shit like that. Finding a random hook-up was getting to be as complicated as having a relationship.

  Not that I'd really know. Pretty much all of my relationships had been shit.

  “Reed?”

  “Come on, ma chérie.” I slid my arm around her waist and pulled her towards the elevator. “You're going to love the view.”

  As soon as the elevator doors closed, she was on me. Her mouth was firm, no hint of hesitation. Definitely something I liked about European women, especially the French. If they wanted someone, they went for it. I wrapped my arms around her waist and pulled her even more tightly against me. She moaned and nipped at my bottom lip. I dropped my hand lower and squeezed her ass. If she was half as good in bed as she was at kissing, this was going to be fun. And probably just what I needed.