Wicked Liar by Faith Summers

Chapter Eighteen

Candace

I just went for a late run around the block to calm my nerves, and now I'm heading back to my apartment. It's nearly ten, definitely too late for me to be out exercising, but I made sure I stuck to the paths where there were a lot of people and light.

I haven't been able to shake off what happened with Jacques earlier. I can't believe what the man said to me. It played on my mind all day. I came straight home after, thankful I'd done all my work for Massimo from this morning.

I usually end my night with one of my classic films, but I'm just going to shower when I get in and head to bed. I'm not even tired, I just want the escape of sleep, hoping it may rejuvenate my mind.

Mindlessly, I walk into my apartment. A few steps in and I stop short when I feel the strong presence of someone inside. It sends a quiver of awareness through my body.

"It's me," says a voice to my left I'd recognize anywhere.

My heart races when I turn to see a shirtless Dominic walking out of the kitchen holding an ice pack to his head.

I bring a hand to my chest and my lips part in an attempt to say something, but the words don't come.

I want to ask him how he got in my apartment, but quickly school my mind. When it comes to Dominic D'Agostino, there's little point in asking such things.

Besides, the heat that races over my skin at the sight of his perfectly sculpted tattooed body turns my brain to soup.

When he lowers the ice pack, my attention is drawn to the angry bruise on the left side of his face. The entire area is black and blue, with a little cut on the edge of his cheekbone.

Something happened tonight. He looks like he was in a fight. The thought sends me over to him.

"What happened?"

He shakes his head, a sign I'm not to ask questions. "Better you don't know, baby."

"Are you okay?"

"Worried about me, Angel?" He leans forward and the scent of his musky cologne tickles my nose.

"You're in my apartment holding an ice pack to your head. Something must have happened to you."

"It was a cat. A fucking big, furry cat. It jumped out at me and tried to bite my ass." His lips slide up into a wild smirk.

When I try to restrain my smile, he chuckles.

"The bruise is on your face, not your ass," I point out.

A faint light twinkles in his eyes that calms me. "Haven't shown you that one yet, baby. Want to take a look?"

"No." A blush flushes over my body when I remember how perfect his naked ass looks.

The image of it is right there at the forefront of my mind thanks to the many mental files I have stored away on him. I knew how it looked long before that night we spent together.

Dominic winks at me and I can't resist the smile that tugs at my lips. When I shake my head at myself, he reaches out to touch my face and nods.

"There she is. My girl. The Angel. Haven't seen that smile of hers in two years. I feel better now, although... it's my fault she doesn't smile for me anymore." His hand drops to his side and just like that the twinkle in his eyes disappears.

Something did happen. I haven't been around him for so long that I've forgotten he always tries to take my mind off things with jokes.

But why is he here?

"What are you doing here, Dominic?" I ask.

Instead of answering, he sighs and gives me a look I would call sheepish if I'd seen it on someone else. It's too regular for a guy like him who always oozes so much confidence. When he looks away and walks back into the kitchen, I follow.

Nerves grow in my stomach as Dominic sets the ice pack in the sink and rests his hands on the edge of the countertop. His shoulders sag and he stays there just like that for a full minute before he turns back to face me.

"Come here, Angel," he says, putting out his hand to me.

"Why?"

"I want to hold you."

Everything inside me stills because I know, I just know if I touch him the same reckless energy that possessed me yesterday when we kissed is going to come back and weaken me. I'm already in this weakened state of conflict.

"Dominic, we shouldn't do this."

"Come here to me." He beckons, and the possessive look in his eyes moves me to him. I stop a few paces away, but he reaches for my waist and pulls me closer so that our faces are just a kiss away.

"Are your brothers okay?" I ask, trying to steady my thoughts against the desire and arousal mingling hot in my mind.

"They went home to keep their women safe, and I came here to mine."

Our gazes lock and I process his words. This is the part where I'm supposed to say I'm not his. I just don't have the heart to and not when this is the first time he's ever referred to me as such.

"Dominic--"

"I want you back," he cuts in, and shock slams through me, refuting everything I thought, past and present. "I want you. We never had a chance and I want it." His eyes fill with desire and a compelling magnetism that makes my mouth water.

"I..."

"I want you, Candace Ricci," he rasps and lowers to my cheek, planting a soft kiss along the edge of my jaw.

More kisses follow tracing a line of fire down my neck, and my body tingles as the nerves awaken from his lips caressing my skin.

He slides his hands around my back and traces the contours along my waist, then my hips. When his hands roam down to my ass, then glide up to cup my left breast, a rush of wetness flows from my pussy and I know he has me under his spell. The wicked look in his eyes is a tell he knows it too.

What am I doing?

Again.

He dips his head, returning his lips to my neck, now nibbling at the skin.

"Tell me to stop, Angel," he whispers into my ear, his deep sexy voice thick and husky.

My lips part at the command, but for the second time tonight, the words don't come.

"Say it, Candace. Tell me to stop and I will. Tell me you don't want me back and I'll walk out that door and leave you alone forever."

Forever...

He'll leave me alone forever. Is that what I want? That's how I've been acting. Like I don't want him back.

Is that what I truly want, though?

I turn my face and brush my cheek against his. His eyes bore into me with anticipation, waiting for an answer I'm not sure I can give either way.

"Tell me." His voice takes on a harsher edge willing me to say the words, yet his eyes tell another story.

His eyes remind me of the boy I loved. The boy I still love. The boy I could never say no to.

My breath hitches and my throat closes when he walks me back until I'm pressed against the wall.

He squeezes my breast again and brushes his nose over mine.

"Tell me Candace or I'm going to fuck you and you won't be able to stop me."

His crass words send a rush of need sweeping through me, paralyzing me to his will as I conjure images from the night we spent together. One night with him had me hooked with eternal hunger and thirst only he can satisfy. I feel completely at his mercy when he catches my face, sliding his hand to my throat in an almost threatening way.

As the blue of his eyes darkens, I know the chance he gave me to back out just faded into the ether. My traitorous body takes over and I find myself running my fingers along the fine dark hairs of his thick forearms.

A devilish smile lights up his face and he tightens his grip on my throat.

"You want me to fuck you?" he husks and I nod.

The sin in his smile infuses with greed from my confirmation and holds an air of triumph that reminds me of that predator again. He's the perfect image of the devil taking pleasure in something he's managed to dirty up.

"Say it. Say the words."

"I... want you to fuck me," I say, vacuously obeying.

As soon as the words leave my lips, his mouth comes crashing down hard on mine for a cruel, devouring kiss. It's earth-shattering and filled with passion but tainted with a wild streak of hunger that's coming from the both of us.

We kiss for a few seconds and he pulls away to tug at my top. It's a sports tank top with a built-in bra so when he pulls it over my head my bare breasts fall out and my need for him is clear from the hard points of my nipples.

He runs his finger down the deep valley of my cleavage and stops right at the mark where the scar is. The scar the bullet left me with. It's just at the edge of my left breast. Although it has faded quite a bit, the skin is slightly raised, a reminder it happened.

My heart opens when his gaze flicks back up to meet mine and tears well within his eyes. One rolls down his cheek and I catch it.

"I'm sorry, my angel."

"I forgave you," I breathe.

"I can't forgive myself. I almost lost you forever."

I cup his jaw, feeling over the scruff of his beard, and guide his lips back to me. This time when we kiss it's hot and ravenous and just like that first night we were together.

I don’t have the strength to resist the raw, primal need forcing its way through me that wants him to take, possess me, and fuck me against this wall.

I don’t have the strength to fight with logic or fear because I want him to do whatever it is he wants to do to me. I need him to.

He pushes me into the wall and yanks down my panties and yoga pants at the same time.

"Fuck," he breathes when he looks down at my pussy and pushes two of his fingers into my wet passage. I don’t even bother to hide my embarrassment at being so wet for him. "Perfectly wet for me."

A desperate moan falls from my lips when he slides his fingers in and out of my pussy and returns to my breast to close his mouth over my left nipple.

I press against the wall, relishing the scorching hot pleasure cascading through my body as he finger fucks me.

When he pulls out, Dominic shocks the hell out of me as he licks off the slick juice of my arousal coating his fingers.

“Fuck, you taste too fucking good,” he groans. Before I can catch my breath, he crouches down and buries his face between my thighs, forcing his tongue up into my passage.

I moan against the wild thrust of his tongue, feeling nigh on insanity from the orgasm that’s building in my core. It’s been such a long time since I felt like this and the same man takes me over the edge the same way he did back then.

He lifts my leg and hooks it over his shoulder so he can drive deeper into me with his clever tongue. I have to grasp on to his shirt so I don’t fall over.

“Dominic,” I cry out, barely able to get the words out of my mouth as he licks over the hard nub of my clit and I come.

I was already so close it’s no surprise that I’m coming on his face, mewling like a cat in heat while I grasp onto the width of his shoulders like I’m trying not to fall off the face of the earth.

When I manage to catch my breath, I look down at him as he lifts his head and wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. The wide, wild smile on his face arouses me all over again.

He rises to his feet and my gaze drops to the bulge of his thick cock pushing against the front of his pants. It looks like it might burst, but he seems so in control.

With one possessive hand back at my chin and the other gripped around my waist, he lifts my chin so I can stare directly into his eyes and see how serious he is.

“I’m clean… I want to feel you with no barriers. Let me fuck you without a condom,” he husks.

I manage a nod, quickly doing a mental check that I took my birth control pill this morning.

He starts undoing his belt and when the buckle clinks my eyes flick from his hands working the zipper down his fly to the stern, sexy bad boy expression on his face.

His pants slink down his waist, revealing the waistband of his Calvin Klein boxers. He shoves his pants and boxers down his legs, freeing the thick length of his massive cock.

He’s big. I never forgot.

As he flips me around to face the wall, I press my hands against the smooth surface. My knees quiver when he grips my waist and moves his cock over my pussy lips. I'm so wet that when he slides in my body welcomes him, but I'm tight and he can tell.

“Angel,” he whispers and starts to move inside me. As he does every thought I have fades, melting into the layers of my mind.

His monstrous cock fills me up completely and when my walls adjust to take him, Dominic pumps into me wild and ferocious like he’s unleashing the beast within. Pleasure then comes in waves rushing over my body in ripples of undiluted ecstasy and the world dims around the edges.

A savage, animalistic groan rumbles in his chest when he starts fucking me raw and hard. I’m so lost in the primal rhythm that I forget everything that's not him and surrender to the call of desire. I take his relentless thrusts, loving the feel of him inside me and the echo of our bodies slapping together.

Another greedy orgasm claims me moments later and my knees buckle. He catches me and fucks me harder while I come, awakening my arousal once more. When he starts jackhammering with a ferocious speed, rutting into my body, I scream out his name on a strangled breath.

"Remember this is what I do to you Angel," he growls. "Only I can make you feel this way. Me. Nobody else."

There is nothing on earth that can refute those words. Nothing is truer and I accept them as fact regardless of what that means for me.

"Oh God," I moan out loud when a frantic burst of ecstatic energy rummages through me.

We both cry out when he speeds up and climb the ladder of pleasure together. That’s when his cock pulses inside me and he comes, blowing into my body. The spray of hot virile cum floods my passage, hitting my g-spot. The heat flows from my core, then blasts into the rest of my body.

I take a moment to catch my breath. He does too, but he continues to hold on to me. It’s probably a good thing because I don’t know if I have the strength to keep myself from fading away.

We just had sex.

Again.

It's been two years, and we just had sex.

When he pulls out of me and turns me to face him, he cups my face.

"I want more of you. I want tonight with you, Candace Ricci."

Tonight...

I want tonight with him too.

I can worry about reality when the sun comes up.

When his lips recapture mine, I kiss him back with the same greed.