In the Unlikely Event

Shame. Anger. Fear. Elation. Excitement.

“I kept the napkin, didn’t I?” I twist a lock of her hair between my fingertips.

Marry me, Rory.

Then she does something so unexpected, I nearly swallow my tongue.

She drops to her knees and unbuckles my belt with frantic movements. I say nothing, because I’m not above getting an emotional blow job, and because a weird, fucked-up, highly convenient part of me thinks she needs to suck my dick to prove something to herself.

When she pulls my briefs down, I’m hard as a baseball bat. My cock pops out with comic enthusiasm. She fists it and groans, closing her eyes and shoving it into her mouth. My eyes roll back in their sockets, and I thrust a hand into her hair, tugging for moral support. I feel her tongue swirling against my tip and forget what planet I’m on.

“Aurora Belle Jenkins,” I growl, “one day, you’ll be the death of me. But what a fecking way to go.”

Twenty minutes later (okay, six), I come hard inside her mouth—after asking for permission—and yank her up by her hair. I know that’s what she wanted all along when she gives me that glossed-over, may-I-be-fucked-now? look—to be manhandled like that Richards’ assistant lass.

Sometimes the dissonance between the way I act to win her over and my real self makes me wonder if I’m a sociopath.

“This was the part where we were supposed to make sweet love.” She laughs, her lips red and swollen.

She dives into my bed. I’m still standing, propping a shoulder against the wall and watching her.

“You were the one who got on your knees, Princess.”

“I missed it, and I’m single now.” She shrugs, tying her arms over her chest like a rebellious teenager.

“No, you’re not.”

She blushes. “Did you enjoy kissing Brandy?”

“Yes,” I answer her honestly.

Her gaze shoots to me, thunderstorms brewing.

I laugh. “I enjoyed feeling your eyes burning holes in her skull. Meant I was still in the race.”

“You won the race.”

“There shouldn’t have been a competition.”

She stares at me with heavy eyelids, begging to be fecked. I deny her. This is the only leverage I have.

She has my heart. I have my dick.

I turn around, grab her purse from the nightstand, and leave. I come back ten minutes later with her suitcase, which I retrieved from Callum’s room using the card she had, and start unloading it.

She asks me questions, but I’m too deep in my head to answer.

When I’m done, I go into the bathroom, splash my face with water, and stare at my reflection in the mirror.

I point at myself, narrowing my eyes. “You’re going to go out there and feck the shit out of her. So hard she won’t remember what day it is. What year it is. What Shiny ex-Boyfriend’s name is. But this time, you’re going to be cool about it. You need to screw her like you don’t want to screw her. You’re going to—”

“Mal?” she calls out from outside.

I stop dead, my eyes widening.

“The walls are kind of thin, and anyway, I’ve slept with you before. I know you can deliver the goods.”

A rush of laughter courses through my throat as I throw the door open. She stands on the other side with her arms open.

She jumps at me, and her legs wrap around my waist, my hands firm on her arse, and we kiss so long and intense, I’m certain our oxygen supply runs short. I move up the length of the bed with her in my arms—before remembering I want to make it epic, yet casual, and look-I’m-not-trying-too-hard-at-all—and shove her front against the full-length window. We’re on the fifteenth floor or so, and there’s another room, in another hotel, facing ours.

I jerk her jeans down so fast the sound of ripping fills the air, and I tug her panties to the side.

“Mal,” she moans.

“Shut up,” I growl, remembering the writing on the photo.

Tries too hard.

Talks too much.

I sheath my cock with a condom, spitting the wrap into her hair and plunging in.

“Ahhh,” she hisses, holding on to the windowsill. But I just stay there, cock inside of her, not moving.

“Mal?” she asks, still facing the Mediterranean view and the opposite hotel room.

The balcony’s sliding doors are wide open. There are shadows of people moving around inside the room. They could watch the entire thing if they just bothered looking, and it gives me a possessive thrill.

“Yes?” I ask conversationally.

“Are you having a case of stage fright?” she asks, her tone matching mine.

I bite my lip to stop myself from laughing. Feck, I missed her sweetness and sass. “Nah. Just enjoying the view.”

“Can you enjoy it while thrusting into me?”

“Pass. You wanna get fecked? You do all the work. Go on, then. Feck me. Whenever you’re ready.” I give her arse a little slap. “Just move back and forth. Not exactly astrophysics.”