Beautiful Bombshell Part 10

"Did you wear a condom?"

"I always wore a condom," I said, laughing. "Well, before you."

She smiled and rolled her eyes. "Right." But then her legs slid up around my waist. "Before me." All I needed to do was s.h.i.+ft my hips slightly and I would be able to press inside her. Yet somehow, talking about this naked and over her felt perfect. We had no secrets. "Did she come?" she asked.

Sighing, I admitted, "She faked it."

Chloe laughed, head pressed back into the pillow so she could see me better. "You're sure?"

"Positive. It was an impressive effort if not a bit over-the-top."

"Poor girl didn't know what she was missing then."

"It was only a few days before the conference room," I whispered, kissing the corner of her mouth. "I think I was probably already in love with you. So when I think back to that night with Amber, it feels as though I cheated. Given how you found me tonight-blindfolded, pa.s.sively accepting an erotic dance-I want to air all of my potential sins. I guess that's why I'm talking about Amber now."

Her face straightened, eyes wide and earnest. "Babe. You didn't cheat. Either with Amber or if had been another woman tonight dancing for you."

"I wouldn't, you know," I said, my voice tight. Reaching above her, I untied her hands, rubbing her wrists carefully. "You saw that I wasn't aroused until I knew it was you. I couldn't be unfaithful to you."

She nodded, and I kissed up her neck to her swollen lips. Swollen from the rough treatment I gave her not long ago. Holy s.h.i.+t she must be sore everywhere. Even still, she lowered her arms, reached between us, and rubbed me over the crease of her s.e.x.

When she kissed me, she moaned quietly against my tongue. "You taste like me."

"However could that have happened?" I asked, nibbling her bottom lip.

Angling her hips, she pushed up into me, suddenly demanding and urgent.

"Easy," I whispered, pulling back and sinking into her slowly, groaning into her neck. "Don't go too fast." f.u.c.k. She even felt like honey, smooth and sweet. "So good. Always so f.u.c.king good, Chlo."

"How did you know?"

I paused for a moment as I pulled my hips back, interpreting her question. "How did I know you're sore?"

She nodded.

It was her favorite game, the one where I told her every tiny thing I noticed. I paid attention; she loved it.

"You rode my fingers pretty hard earlier."

She hummed, eyes closed and hands running down my back.

"And I wasn't particularly gentle in the restroom."

"You really weren't," she whispered, turning her head to suck on my shoulder.

I started an easy, steady rhythm moving in her. "So just now, when I put my mouth on you? I wasn't surprised you were a little swollen."

"Close. Faster, please, baby," she gasped, but I didn't pick up speed.

"Not faster," I objected, lips near her ear. "It's the slow s.e.x that drives me most wild. It's when I can feel you best, hear every sound you're making. I can imagine how we might look beneath the blankets, where I'm moving in you. I think about how many times I'll make you come. I don't have all of those thoughts when I'm f.u.c.king you hard in a bed, or in a bathroom of a casino."

Her breath faltered, and she held it, silently begging me to get her there. She ran her hands up my back, around my neck to my face. I felt the cool press of her engagement ring, thinking holy s.h.i.+t, this woman is going to be my wife, have my children, share my home and my life. She'll see me grow old and most likely insane. She'll promise to love me through all of it.

I lifted myself above her, arms straight so I could watch what I was feeling, moving inside her. But her hands cupped my face, brought my attention back to her eyes.

"Hey."

I tried to catch my breath, felt sweat drop from my forehead onto her chest. "Yeah?"

She licked her lips, swallowed. "I am so in love with you." Her thumb slipped into my mouth and I bit down sharply, causing her to let out a tight moan. "And whatever happens outside of this, of us like this . . ."

"I know."

We shared a desperate look, a mutual, silent agreement that we would never get enough, that maybe the ideal life was us here like this, alone and touching, but it would never be our reality to exist here exclusively. It was why she crashed my bachelor party but would leave tomorrow. It was why I couldn't stay away, knowing she was in the same city.

And here she was, limbs heavy and fevered beneath me, hips rising urgently up to mine to get what she needed. She would always belong to me-at home, at work, in bed-and that thought sent me barreling down the road to my release.

She was close, but unfortunately I was closer. "Get there, sweet thing. I . . . I can't . . ."

Her hands gripped my hips, head pus.h.i.+ng back into the pillow. "Please."

My body tensed, hips thrusting wildly, my o.r.g.a.s.m held back by barely a thread. "f.u.c.king get there, Mills."

It was the voice I used sparingly because I never wanted it to lose its effect on her. With a flush down her chest, she arched off the bed, pulling her thighs high up against her body to send me deep into her. With her lips parting in a sharp cry, she dissolved into her o.r.g.a.s.m beneath me.

I'd never tire of the view of Chloe coming. The blush on her skin, the nearly drugged darkness of her eyes as she watched me, and the way her lips shaped my name . . . Every f.u.c.king time it reminded me that I was the only man to ever give her pleasure like this. Her arms fell away, heavy with exhaustion, and her tongue peeked out to wet her lips.

"f.u.c.k," she whispered, shaking.

Relief washed through me, opening the floodgates and permitting my own body to tumble forward, blind to everything but the sensation of her around me. The sweetness of her, the wetness of her . . . My back bowed back as I came, shouting out into the quiet, sterile room.

The sound of my yell echoed from the ceiling when I collapsed onto her, sweaty and heavy. I wanted to nestle my face into the smooth curve of her neck and sleep for at least three days.

She laughed, groaning under my weight. "Get off me, Hulk."

I rolled away, practically cras.h.i.+ng into the mattress beside her. "d.a.m.n, Chlo. That was . . ."

She curled into me, purring, "Very, very good." Stretching to nibble at my jaw, she whispered, "I'm going to need at least ten minutes before we do that again."

I laughed, and then it turned into a hoa.r.s.e cough as the idea hit me fully. "Jesus, woman. I may need a bit longer than that. Just f.u.c.king cuddle me for a few."

With a small kiss to my neck, she whispered, "I can't wait for you to become Mr. Bennett Mills."

My eyes flew open. "What?"

Her laugh was low and husky against my skin. "You heard me."

Acknowledgments.

Thanks to our agent, Holly Root, to our partners in crime (husbands and kiddos), to our fantastic readers, and to our friends and family who put up with our gla.s.sy-eyed stares when we're mentally plotting another chapter during a lunch date.

Thanks to every single wonderful person at Gallery. Thank you, Jen and Lauren.

And thank you most of all to our editor, Adam Wilson, who appreciates that knickers are best in a bunch.

Hot on the heels of Beautiful Bombsh.e.l.l comes Will's story.

Will this chronic Casanova finally meet his match in a bookish bombsh.e.l.l?

Take a sneak peek here at the opening chapter of Beautiful Player . . .

Prologue.

Hanna

We were in the ugliest apartment in all of Manhattan, and it wasn't just that my brain was especially programmed away from art appreciation: objectively these paintings were all hideous. A hairy leg growing from a flower stem. A mouth with spaghetti pouring out. Beside me, my oldest brother and my father hummed thoughtfully, nodding as if they understood what they were seeing. I was the one who kept us moving forward; it seemed to be the unspoken protocol that party guests should make the circuit, admire the art, and only then feel free to enjoy the appetizers being carried on trays around the room.

But at the very end, above the ma.s.sive fireplace and between two garish candelabras, was a painting of a double helix-the structure of the DNA molecule-and printed across the entire canvas was a quote by Tim Burton: We all know interspecies romance is weird.

Thrilled, I laughed, turning to Jensen and Dad. "Okay. That one is good."

Jensen sighed. "You would like that."

I glanced to the painting and back to my brother. "Why? Because it's the only thing in this entire place that makes any sense?"

He looked at Dad and something pa.s.sed between them, some permission granted from father to son. "We need to talk to you about your relations.h.i.+p to your job."

It took a minute before his words, his tone, and his determined expression triggered my understanding. "Jensen," I said. "Are we really going to have this conversation here?"

"Yes, here." His green eyes narrowed. "It's the first time I've seen you out of the lab in the past two days when you weren't sleeping or scarfing down a meal."

I'd often noted how it seemed the most prominent personality traits of my parents-vigilance, drive, impulse, charm, and caution-had been divided cleanly and without contamination among their five offspring.

Vigilance and Drive were headed into battle in the middle of a Manhattan soiree.

"We're at a party, Jens. We're supposed to be talking about how wonderful the art is," I countered, waving vaguely to the walls of the opulently furnished living room. "And how scandalous the . . . something . . . is." I had no idea what the latest gossip was, and this little white flag of ignorance just proved my brother's point.

I watched as Jensen tamped down the urge to roll his eyes.

Dad handed me an appetizer that looked something like a snail on a cracker and I discreetly slid it onto a c.o.c.ktail napkin as a caterer pa.s.sed. My new dress itched and I wished I'd taken the time to ask around the lab about these Spanx things I had on. From this first experience with them, I decided they were created by Satan, or a man who was too thin for skinny jeans.

"You're not just smart," Jensen was telling me. "You're fun. You're social. You're a pretty girl."

"Woman," I corrected in a mumble.

He leaned closer, keeping our conversation hidden from pa.s.sing partygoers. Heaven forbid one of New York's high society should hear him giving me a lecture on how to be more socially s.l.u.tty. "So I don't understand why we've been visiting you here for three days and the only people we've hung out with are my friends."

I smiled at my oldest brother, and let my grat.i.tude for his over-protective-hyper vigilance wash over me before the slower, heated flush of irritation rose along my skin; it was like touching a hot iron, the sharp reflex followed by the prolonged, throbbing burn. "I'm almost done with school, Jens. There's plenty of time for life after this."

"This is life," he said, eyes wide and urgent. "Right now. When I was your age I was barely hanging on to my GPA, just hoping I would wake up on Monday and not be hung-over."

Dad stood silently beside him, ignoring that last remark but nodding at the general gist that I was a loser with no friends. I gave him a look that was meant to communicate, "I get this coming from the workaholic scientist who spent more time in the lab than he did in his own house?" But he remained impa.s.sive, wearing the same expression he had when a compound he expected to be soluble ended up a goopy suspension in a vial: confused, maybe a little offended on principle.

Dad had given me drive, but he always a.s.sumed Mom had given me even a little charm, too. Maybe because I was female, or maybe because he thought each generation should improve upon the actions of the one before, I was meant to do the whole career-life balance better than he had. The day Dad turned fifty, he'd pulled me into his office and said, simply, "The people are as important as the science. Learn from my mistakes." And then he'd straightened some papers on his desk and stared at his hands until I got bored enough to get up and go back into the lab.

Clearly, I hadn't succeeded.

"I know I'm overbearing," Jensen whispered.

"A bit," I agreed.

"And I know I meddle."

I gave him a knowing look, whispering, "You're my own personal Athena Polias."

"Except I'm not Greek and I have a p.e.n.i.s."

"I try to forget about that."

Jensen sighed and, finally, Dad seemed to get that this was meant to be a two-man job. They'd both come down to visit me, and although it had seemed a strange combination for a random visit in February, I hadn't given it much thought until now. Dad put his arm around me, squeezing. His arms were long and thin, but he'd always had the vise-like grip of a man much stronger than he looked. "Ziggs, you're a good kid."

I smiled at Dad's version of an elaborate pep talk. "Thanks."

Jensen added, "You know we love you."

"I love you, too. Mostly."

"But . . . consider this an intervention. You're addicted to work. You're addicted to whatever fast track you think you need your career to follow. Maybe I always take over and micromanage your life-"