My gaze shifted toward the front, finding Minos leaning against the window, passed out. Behind me, Lenore seemed asleep as well. Ly's focus was on the road. And Minos's whiny music was still playing loudly enough through the speakers.
I was a real fuck for crossing the line again, but I couldn't make myself give a shit as I jerked my hips upward against her again, waking her up with the sensation.
She didn't respond at first, likely still out of sorts from the drugs leaving her system and from sleep.
My hips ground upward again, getting a quiet gasp at her as she pushed up slightly, looking down at me with those sleepy brown eyes that were a mix of confused and heated.
My hands slid down her back, sank into her ass, grinding her down onto me, watching as her lips opened on a silent moan as a shiver racked her system.
She didn't pull away.
She didn't say no.
No, instead, she did another little wiggle with her hips.
That was all I needed.
I used her ass to grind her against me as I thrust upward, finding the rhythm that made her breathing go fast and shallow, made her muscles tense, made it impossible for her to keep her sounds in.
My hand went to the back of her neck, pressing her face hard against my shoulder to muffle her sounds as I drove her up, then over the edge, feeling her body shudder as a throaty moan vibrated against my shirt.
She didn't move after, just clung to me as aftershocks racked her system. Satisfied. While my cock was still throbbing for release.
Don't get me wrong, if you weren't getting the woman you were with off too, I didn't see the point. But I don't remember the last time I walked away from a sexual encounter with a woman and didn't finish myself.
Now I'd fucked around with this woman twice. Twice. And I got nothing out of it.
What the fuck was going on with me?
"We're here," Lycus called, making Minos jolt as he startled awake. Behind us, I could see Lenore sitting up as well.
Taking a steadying breath, I folded upward, pushing Josephine off my lap, trying to bring some calm back into my system.
"I'll come back for Red," I snapped, grabbing Josephine around the wrist, and dragging her out of the car with me, up the drive, through the front door, and upstairs.
To Red's room.
I wanted her in mine.
And that was exactly why she couldn't be.
I needed to get some distance from this woman.
Because I got the distinct feeling that something was going to happen if I didn't. Something similar to what had happened with Minos and Lycus.
And that couldn't fucking happen.
Chapter Eight
Jo
They lived in a mansion.
I don't know why that was so shocking to me, but as Ace practically dragged me out of the car, I couldn't help but feel a little bit in awe of the massive gray stone house with its abundance of windows, its utter privacy on a giant piece of land with a whole forest around it.
Perfectly secluded.
Which didn't bode well for me, did it?
But I didn't let my mind drift there as Ace unlocked the front door and pulled me inside, his hand biting into my wrist that was barely starting to lose the bruises from the cuffs from that first night.
I tried to tell myself that I was fascinated by the home because I was trying to learn the layout so that I could possibly find a way to escape one day or night when everyone was occupied.
The fact of the matter was, though, that I'd grown up really poor. I was accustomed to cheap apartments in bad neighborhoods where nothing was ever quiet, not even in the middle of the night when I was trying to sleep. I was used to thrift store furniture with holes and burn marks and weird odors that never quite came out, no matter how much dollar store perfume my mother doused it with.
And while I'd done decently well for myself as an adult, choosing a steady career that paid relatively well, especially for a single woman, I had never seen actual grandeur up close and personal.
It was like touring a celebrity's house. Without any of the actual pointing out of things as Ace dragged me right up the front staircase, giving me only a brief look inside what seemed to be a library—which made sense since Ace clearly liked books—and what seemed to be a kitchen toward the back of the house.
There had been lush Oriental rugs lining the hallway, looking expensive and soft, but I didn't get to test that theory out for myself as Ace kept up the breakneck pace up the stairs, seeming to forget—or simply not caring—that my legs were a lot shorter than his, so every step he took was two for me.