I wanted to laugh. This story was ludicrous. I had left a set of house keys and my alarm code with Kix because he’d been worried about a fan who’d gotten a little too close, and he could confirm there’d been no party. But how was it possible that no one had ever breathed a word of these accusations to me? Not Iris, not my publicist, not Kix himself?
Declan wouldn’t invent something like this, though, and I could tell that my ignorance made me sound guilty.
Heat flooded my face, and I began to panic. “It wasn’t me, Declan. You need to believe me. I have my travel receipts if you need to see them, and you can contact the head of the program—”
He reached out and took my hands in his. “Shh. Okay. Okay. Slow your breathing down, sweetheart.”
I couldn’t calm down. This didn’t make any sense. “Why didn’t anyone say anything to me? Why didn’t someone contact me when I got home? I don’t… I don’t understand.”
“The department probably didn’t reach out because they were too busy dealing with the internal shit to realize they’d never spoken to the actual homeowner in your case. If someone had posed as your representative, that would have been enough. But if you weren’t there… was the house burgled?”
“No. I… gave the keys to a friend.” I swallowed and looked at him. “I need to find out what happened.”
I could tell he wanted to ask the name of my friend, but he kept the question back. Instead, he went on to tell me about some of the bigger busts that night that happened at much higher-profile residences.
“They had plenty of evidence of the corruption from those busts and the history of bribes that came out of woodwork afterward to worry about the smaller busts like yours. Believe me, a few people doing coke and ecstasy at a house party paled in comparison to the house full of heroin and prostitutes. And one of them had surveillance footage of actual police officers participating. So, no. Yours wasn’t the one anyone gave a shit about in the end.”
“Except you,” I pointed out.
Declan sighed. “Yeah. But only after I met you.”
“No wonder you thought I was an entitled dick.”
His eyebrows lifted, and his eyes danced. “No, that was because of the valet thing. And you telling me you’d ‘look out for’ me.”
Realization dawned. “You already thought Finn Heller was someone who bribed cops, and here I was offering you money to do my bidding.”
He nodded. “That’s about the long and short of it, yeah.”
I couldn’t help it; I started laughing. I laughed so hard I almost pissed myself. At one point, Declan started laughing, too, and we fell against each other in a pile of ridiculousness. One thing led to another, and our lips and hands found each other again. The laughing turned quickly to a kind of desperate sexual grappling. We fought for domination and flipped each other over and over until we damned near fell off the bed.
“Let me have you,” he said against my mouth. We were sweating and panting, leaving trails of beard burn all over each other’s skin. “Please. Please let me inside you.”
I groaned and nodded, hoping like hell I had a condom somewhere in my toiletry kit. I hadn’t come to Aster Valley expecting to have sex, but I usually… My wallet! I usually kept one in my wallet in case someone offered me a blow job and I found myself in a position to accept.
I pulled myself away from him long enough to scramble out to the living room and find my wallet in my backpack. Once I returned with the condom, I grabbed the lube from the bedside drawer where I’d used it to jack off countless times already to thoughts of the sheriff’s stern looks and strong body.
After handing the condom to Declan, I snapped open the lube and began to prep myself. Declan’s eyes glazed over as he watched. “Fuck, that’s hot,” he said, reaching for the lube so he could help. As soon as his fingers were involved, I lay back and lost myself to the feel of him. The thick press of his fingers stretching me was enough to make me hard and dripping again despite my massive orgasm earlier.
I couldn’t believe Declan Stone was going to fuck me. I’d fantasized about it but never thought it would actually happen.
When he finally leaned over me and pressed his covered cock to my hole, I sucked in a breath.
“You’re shaking,” he said.
“Please don’t change your mind,” I blurted. “I don’t think I’d survive it.” I tried to give him a cheeky smile to soften the echoing sound of desperation in my voice, but he stopped it with a hard kiss.
“Not a chance.”
When he stretched me open with his thick cock, I arched back and squeezed my eyes closed. His arms were propped under my knees, holding them back and keeping my legs wide open for him. I normally would have felt exposed, but with Declan I didn’t. I trusted him. He seemed like the kind of man who would take care of the people he had sex with.