Exposed

  “A party.”

  “You didn’t say a party. You said a wedding reception.”

  “It’s pretty much the same thing, isn’t it?”

  “Umm. No. Not really. Not so much. Not even a little bit, actually. Besides, I thought the whole brilliance of getting married in Vegas was that we didn’t have to have a reception. I mean, I was kind of fond of that aspect of the whole thing.”

  “And here I thought you were fond of getting me as a husband.”

  She raises a brow. “Let’s not let that ego of yours get too crazy now, huh?”

  I laugh, because how can I not? I’ve hit the jackpot with this wife of mine—she’s sexy and sarcastic and so, so smart that sometimes it just blows me away. This morning is obviously going to be one of those times.

  “Well, then I don’t want to have a reception,” I tell her. “I want to have a party celebrating the fact that I am married to the most wonderful woman in the entire world.”

  She narrows her eyes at me. “Laying it on a bit thick now, aren’t you?”

  “Not if it helps me get my way. Then I’m laying it on just perfectly.” I give her my most charming smile, even as I reach across the table for her hand. I open up the fist she instinctively made and press a slow, lingering kiss right to the center of her palm.

  If possible, she looks even more suspicious. “No fair clouding my brain with sex to get out of this conversation.”

  “Not even really good sex?” I ask, licking my way along her lifeline until the end, where it curves just above her wrist. She gasps a little, then moans as I deliberately sink my teeth into her mound of Venus, the fleshy part of her hand right at the base of her thumb.

  “That goes without saying, doesn’t it?” she says after a second, her voice huskier and her eyes blurrier than they were just a few moments ago. “All sex with you is either really, really good or completely phenomenal.”

  “Why does ‘really, really good’ suddenly feel like an insult?” I ask, a little disgruntled. Probably because I would have described all our sex as phenomenal.

  “Maybe because you’re a compulsive overachiever with a serious competitive streak—even against yourself?”

  “Huh.” I turn the words over in my brain as I kiss my way over her wrist and up her inside forearm until I get to the bend in her elbow. “Yeah, that sounds about right,” I tell her, lapping at the sensitive skin on the inside of said elbow.

  “You don’t play fair,” she complains, dropping any pretense of eating her croissant as she crawls from her chair onto my lap.

  “I don’t believe I ever said I did,” I answer as my throat goes desert dry. She’s dressed in just a loosely knotted robe and it’s suddenly much more difficult to think as she straddles me, her lush wetness pressing against my cock. “But then, I’m pretty sure you don’t play fair, either.”

  “I have to do something to stay ahead of the game.” She leans forward, drops a kiss on the corner of my mouth before licking her way across my bottom lip. “I am married to one of the most brilliant men in the world—at least according to Forbes, the New Yorker, and the Wall Street Journal.”

  My laugh—and my voice—are strained when I reply, “You’ve been reading up on me again.”

  “Like I said, I’ve got to stay a step ahead somehow.” She must decide we’ve talked enough, because she silences me by pulling my lower lip between her teeth and biting down softly. The little jolt of pain shoots straight to my already hard dick.

  “How long before your car gets here?” she whispers before licking inside my mouth.

  Like I can tell time when she’s kissing me like that, her hips lifting and lowering against my own? “Fifteen minutes, I think.”

  Her hands go to work on my tie, pulling the knot apart even as she strokes her tongue over my teeth, along the roof of my mouth, against the desperate, greedy length of my own tongue. “We better hurry, then. Don’t want you to miss your flight.”

  “Perk of being the boss,” I gasp out as she yanks my dress shirt out of my pants and slides her fingers under the silk. Her hands are cold against my overheated skin and they feel amazing as they stroke over my abs and up my ribs to my chest. “The plane won’t leave without me.”

  “Still, it’s rude to keep your vice presidents waiting.” She finds my nipples, toys with them for long, drawn-out seconds that are half-torture, half-pleasure and all ecstasy.

  “Fuck my vice presidents.”

  “And here I thought I was the one you wanted to fuck.” She laughs against my mouth and the warm vibrations of it send shock waves of need down my spine. I’ve barely touched her and already I’m so close to coming that I have to run numbers in my head to try to keep myself from going over the edge. Determined to make her as hot as I am, I slide one hand under her robe to grab the lush warmth of her ass and use the other to slip inside the gaping front of her robe to thumb over first one of her nipples and then the other.

  She gasps. Shifts against me. Then shrugs off my hands. “Not this time,” she whispers against my skin as she slips off my lap onto the floor between my knees. “This time, I’m the one in control.”

  Her words shoot through me like a flare, lighting up every nerve ending in my fucking body even as they make me wary. Because this isn’t how it is between us. It isn’t how things work. From the very beginning, Chloe has given control over to me. Even when she was scared, even when she needed to be on top so that she could feel free, she’s yielded to me, let me be the one to make her feel good. I’m more than willing to give control over to her for a little, but I need to make sure she’s okay. Make sure she’s taken care of all the time. And with the way her touch is clouding my brain right now, I’m afraid I won’t be able to do that.

  I’m about to tell her to stop, to ask her if she’s sure, when she presses a long, warm, lingering kiss right below my navel. “Don’t look so worried,” she tells me with a wicked little grin, her fingers busy working on my belt. “I won’t bite unless you ask me to.”

  I cup her cheek in my palm, and—using every ounce of willpower I have—wait for her to stop what she’s doing and look up at me. “That’s not what I’m worried about.”

  “I know. But I’m okay, baby. I promise. You make me okay.”

  Fuck. I close my eyes so she won’t see how gutted I am by her words…and by the trust she places in me. I love this woman, adore her, need her like I need the blood that runs through my veins.

  I keep my eyes closed as she unbuckles my belt, undoes my pants. And then she’s tugging my pants and underwear down to the top of my thighs and I know if I look at her now it will be too much. I’ll lose it before she even touches me.

  But then I hear a small snap and my eyes fly open in time to see Chloe pouring cinnamon scented oil into her hand. She must have had the bottle in her pocket because there’s no way I would have missed it if it had been sitting on the kitchen table next to my coffee cup.

  “You planned this,” I manage to grind out as she drops the bottle on the table and begins rubbing the lube between her palms.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she answers, right before she licks the tip of her index finger. “Mmm. Good choice, Ethan. It’s delicious.” She sucks the finger deeper into her mouth and I nearly lose it completely as my dick jerks against my stomach.

  I want to grab on to her, to pull her back onto my lap so I can bury myself in her and teach her just what this kind of teasing will get her. But I can’t do that to her, not when her sense of her own sexuality is still so fragile. And not when she’s having such a good time teasing me.

  So I grab on to the edges of my seat instead of grabbing on to her and pray my self-control is as good as I think it is.

  Chloe watches me through half-closed eyes, a sexy little smirk on her face as she gives a quick shrug that has her robe falling to the floor at her feet.

  “Fuck.” The word falls, unplanned, from my lips and it’s as much a prayer as it is a curse. For long secon
ds, she doesn’t move. Instead, she just stands there, watching me watch her and it’s one of the sexiest moments I’ve ever experienced.

  Under my admiring gaze, her skin flushes a delightful pink and her nipples grow hard. Her breathing gets a little ragged and a fine tremor wracks her, making her whole body shake just a little. She’s beautiful like this, soft and sexy and so fucking gorgeous that my own breathing pattern is thrown a little off. Hell, a lot off.

  Fuck self-control.

  I pry a hand from where my fingers are wrapped around the seat of the chair and she leans forward and begins rubbing her oiled up hands along my cock in slow, thorough strokes that have my eyes crossing and my hips arching off the chair.

  “Chloe. Please.” No amount of willpower or self-control is going to be able to save me if she keeps this up. “I—” My voice breaks and I suck in huge gulps of air, trying to get enough oxygen to steady my breathing. But she’s only getting started, and as her fingers glide down my cock to my testicles, I nearly beg. For her to stop, for her to continue. I don’t know at this point and to be honest, I don’t really care. How can I when she’s cupping my balls in her hands, rubbing her oiled-up thumb against them as she leans forward and presses wet, openmouthed kisses over my abdomen and down my V-cut.

  I’m not sure what feels better at this point—her hands or her mouth. All I know is that heat is sizzling down my spine, along my most sensitive nerve endings and I feel like I’m being burned alive.

  Chloe turns her head, swipes her tongue along the length of my dick and my whole body goes from really amped up to balancing on the edge. My balls tighten. My cock throbs. The urge to come is nearly overwhelming.

  I fight it back. No matter how hot Chloe is, no matter how perfectly she’s touching me, I have more self-control than a kid with his first girl. Or at least that’s the lie I’m telling myself right now.

  I grind my teeth, clench my fists, search for control where there isn’t any. Chloe laughs, low and sultry and hot. So fucking hot. She’s well aware of my predicament, knows exactly what she’s doing. And she’s enjoying the hell out of tormenting me.

  I’m such a control freak that the knowledge should piss me off, but instead it only makes me hotter. Only makes me want her more.

  And then she pulls back just enough to fasten her warm, soft, wet mouth around my cock and I know it’s a losing battle.

  “Chloe, please—” I tangle my fingers in her hair, tug gently. I’m not sure if I’m trying to get her to pull off or to take me deeper. I know only that if she stays like this I’m going to lose my mind one slow pulse of pleasure at a time. “Baby, I—”

  By now, she knows what I need better than I do, though, because suddenly she takes more of me, sucking me deeper, deeper, deeper, until the head of my dick hits the back of her throat. She hums softly, her tongue stroking back and forth against the underside of my cock before she slowly, slowly, slowly pulls back. She pauses for a few moments, circles the head of my dick with her tongue a few times before flicking the bottom of her tongue, fast and hard, over the very tip. I call her name, my voice low and strained and guttural, but she just sucks me deep again.

  Again and again and again, she takes me, until sweat is running down my chest and my fingers are tangling, tugging, pulling at her hair.

  Until I’m arching off the chair and muttering all kinds of dark, sexy, dirty things to her.

  Until her lips are red and swollen, her cheeks flushed and hollowed out. And still it’s not enough. Still I want more.

  I’m controlling the pace now, hips slamming back and forth like a metronome as I fuck her mouth, her throat. Harder, faster, deeper. There’s a roaring in my ears, a pounding in my blood, a throbbing in my dick that warns me I’m on the brink of losing the last little bit of my control.

  Chloe must sense the same thing, because she pulls off for a second, nuzzles against my abdomen. Her mouth is hot against my burning skin, but the rest of her body is cool where it settles against me. It’s a small jolt, a pleasant shock that pulls me out of my head—out of the pleasure—just enough for me to regain a fingerhold on my control.

  “Chloe, baby, I need you,” I tell her, hands stroking up and down her bare, silky back.

  She’s shuddering now, shaking with the same need, raking fiery claws through my every nerve ending. “I need you, too.”

  Giving up control to her isn’t easy for me, but I swear it’s all worth it when she’s climbing back on top of me, straddling me with her long, beautiful legs.

  And then she’s wiggling against me, getting herself situated just right so that my dick is sliding against her pussy—not inside of her yet, but between her drenched folds. It feels amazing. She’s amazing. And when she starts moving her hips, swinging them back and forth to get the most friction between us, it takes everything I have not to just give in right then and there.

  “I love you,” she murmurs, eyes closed and breath hot against my lips.

  It’s the tipping point. My hands reach out, grab her hips before I make a conscious decision to move them, and then I’m pressing her down, increasing the pressure and the friction and the pleasure for both of us.

  Chloe moans, a low, broken sound that ratchets up my own need even before she braces her hands on my shoulders and teases my mouth with her nipple. Thank God.

  I pull it into my mouth, sucking gently before running my tongue in circles around her areola. She feels so good, tastes so good, that for long seconds I can’t think. Can’t breathe. All I can do is feel.

  Then she calls my name, a high-pitched, painful sound that echoes through me as she arches her back and shudders brokenly. Her hips continue to rock back and forth against me, but it’s not enough anymore. Not enough for me and definitely not enough for her.

  That’s how I know it’s time. I might have given her control, she might have taken it, but it’s not what either one of us really wants. Sure, being like this with her feels good—everything I do with Chloe feels good—but she’s growing more and more anxious, her body moving more and more restlessly against my own.

  “I’ve got you, baby,” I murmur, lifting her up and then lowering her down so that my cock slides gently into her. She cries out as I enter her, head falling back, fingers digging into my shoulders. Already, I can feel a different kind of tension entering her, one that anticipates sexual satisfaction instead of one that fears not being able to find it.

  I’m close myself, too close, but I’m determined that she comes before me. Sliding a hand between us, I find her clit with my thumb. I circle it once, twice, then again and again as I lean forward and bite gently at the curve where her neck meets her shoulder. Chloe cries out, jerks against me, then she’s coming, coming, coming. And so am I, emptying myself into her as ecstasy sweeps through me—overwhelming, omnipresent, all-encompassing.

  It goes on and on and on, and if it wasn’t for Chloe, holding me, grounding me, I’m not sure I’d ever find my way back. Or want to.

  When it’s over, when both of us have finally come down, Chloe sags against me. She presses kisses to my jaw, my throat and her favorite spot just under my chin. I tilt my head up to give her better access, and as she licks her way across my collarbone, I can’t help thinking about a second round.

  Except the phone chooses that moment to ring. I’m not about to make a mad dash for it, not with Chloe still curled up, warm and soft and sexy, in my lap. It goes to voicemail, and seconds later, my cell phone buzzes with a text. My regular San Diego driver, Ben, has arrived.

  And I’m a total mess.

  Chloe giggles as she sees his text, then slowly peels herself off me. When I think about what I have to do today, what’s in store for both of us beyond the walls of this house, I want to hang on to her, to keep her sheltered against my body forever. But she’d kick my ass if I tried.

  And so, reluctantly, I let her go, then watch as she gathers up her robe and slips it back on her shoulders. “I need to take a shower. I’m going to be late for work if
I don’t get a move on. And you…” She shakes her head and giggles when she looks at me. “I don’t know how you’re going to fix yourself and get out of here in time.”

  “Obviously, I’m taking a shower with you.” I stand up and slide my pants the rest of the way down my legs. Then I follow my wife to the master bedroom, dressed in nothing but a half-buttoned dress shirt. If I wasn’t feeling so fucking fantastic from the phenomenal sex we’d just had, I’d probably feel like a freaking fool.

  “Oh, no, I don’t think so.” Chloe shoots me a look over her shoulder as she grabs a set of lingerie out of the dresser I’d had moved in to hold her things. “I know what will happen if you get in that shower with me, and unlike you, I’m not the boss. I have to be at work on time, especially considering this is my first week back after quitting in the middle of my internship. I’m not taking any chances with pissing someone off.”

  “You could piss them all off and they still wouldn’t fire you.”

  It’s the wrong thing to say and I know it even as the words leave my mouth. But it was too late, there was no way to stop them, and now they’re just out there, hanging between us like a minefield.

  I can tell by the look on her face that Chloe doesn’t know how to respond. I can see what she wants to say in the pissed off tilt of her chin and the defensive set of her shoulders. But I can also see her trying to reason the anger away, considering she knows as well as I do that no one is going to fire the boss’s wife.

  “I’m sorry,” I try. “Your relationship with me has never had any bearing on your employment and it never will. You got the internship because of your brains, your grades and your innovative ideas. You’re going to keep it—even through the rocky start you had—for those same reasons. And while it’s true that they won’t fire my wife, it’s also true that you won’t take advantage of that nepotism. You’ll work your heart out for your bosses, for yourself and for me. I’m sorry if I made it sound like I thought any differently.”

  “I get it. I do,” she insists as she turns on the hot water and lets it run. “I know you’re the power behind Frost Industries and as your wife—even if I didn’t build any of this company—I’ll still get a bunch of rights just because of who I’m married to. It sucks, but that’s the way things are in the world.”