Secrets of a One Night Stand by Naima Simone

Nine

Anger was a wonderful motivator. Shame a close second.

Enough of a motivator to walk out on the rest of her parents’ dinner party, bear the brunt of their outrage, brave the freezing January night and the judgy eyes of this security guard.

Wasn’t the security for multimillion-dollar buildings supposed to be of the see-nothing, hear-nothing variety? After hesitating too long, he picked up the phone and punched in numbers on the keypad.

“I’m sorry to disturb you so late at night, Mr. Farrell, but this is John Ward at the security desk. There is a young lady here asking to see you. A Mycah Hill.” He paused, suspiciously eyeing Mycah as he nodded, listening to whatever Achilles said on the other end. “Right. I’ll send her up, then. Thank you, sir.” The guard hung up. “If you’ll just enter your information here and sign in.”

Mr. Ward slid a black registration book toward her and flipped it open to a clean sheet, setting a pen on top. Moments later, she followed him to a bank of elevators. He slid in a key card to a private car off to the side and a pair of doors opened. Stepping forward, he pressed a button, and shifted aside, motioning for her to go inside.

“This will take you to the penthouse. Good night, Ms. Hill.”

With that, the doors closed, and she rode thirty-two floors. In seconds, the doors opened once more, and she came face-to-face with Achilles.

It’d been less than an hour, but it might as well have been days. The impact of him slammed into her like a cudgel to the chest. He’d removed his suit jacket and tie, but the ice-blue shirt remained, and the black vest hung open over his massive chest, and the slim-fitting pants clung to his hips and powerful thighs. The hem broke over his bare feet.

God.

Why did the sight of his bare feet reverberate through her like two cymbals crashing together? Maybe because it reminded her of the man and the intensity, the raw strength barely leashed beneath the civility of the suit?

Maybe. Did it matter when her nipples tightened under the cups of her corset top and her sex swelled and dampened beneath her skirt? When her belly tightened, as if in hunger, but not for the dinner her parents had served nearly an hour earlier. Only the man in front of her could sate her.

She inhaled, swerving her gaze away from him, over his shoulder. To the relative safety of the apartment behind him. It served to distract her, because good Lord. She was used to wealth, but this... Just the glimpse of the expanse of glass, marble and stone had her softly gasping in amazement.

Achilles shifted to the side, silently inviting her in. He didn’t speak, just slid his hands into the pockets of his suit pants and trailed her as she wandered into the penthouse, gaping—yes, gaping—at the home that made her parents’ home look like a hovel. Okay, maybe not a hovel. But definitely a single-family home.

Three glass walls invited the dark sky and Boston skyline into the apartment, granting the illusion of living among the clouds. Floating, freestanding structures separated rooms into different living areas—couches, a white piano, fireplaces, a chrome dining table, random sitting areas with low-slung furniture designating the purpose of the rooms. A steel and veined marble state-of-the-art kitchen encompassed the back end of the penthouse, while a suspended, curving, glass-encased staircase led to the second level.

She jerked her awed glance from her surroundings to Achilles. His mouth twisted into a caricature of a smile.

“Go ahead and say it. I’m a hypocrite.”

She blinked. “What?”

“Lecturing your parents on excess and benefiting from the work of someone else and living here.” He wore that same dark smile. “I believe that makes me the definition of a fraud.”

“Since a fraud or a hypocrite would be the last persons to admit they were as much, I doubt it.” She tilted her head. “Let me guess. Cain?”

His eyes narrowed on her, and she chuckled, shaking her head.

“It’s not difficult to guess. Kenan is from Boston. You relocated to Boston and wouldn’t have had a place to stay. And unknown half brother or not, Cain wouldn’t have had you living in a place he wouldn’t live in himself. And this place—” she pivoted in a small circle, again taking in the glass palace in the sky “—has Cain Farrell written all over it.”

“And what has me written all over it?”

She knew a challenge when she heard it. Knew when she was being set up for failure, too.

“Keep some of the glass and the sky. More walls. Less steel and chrome and all the amenities. I don’t think you mind the fireplaces, but not gas. I think...” She paused, cleared her throat and considered the wisdom of her next words, but what the hell? “I think you’re like how you described your mother tonight. You like to see the product of your own hands. So you would want to chop your own wood for your fireplace. Which means trees, nature and not a glass castle on the thirty-second floor. How am I doing?”

He didn’t answer, just stared at her with that bright gaze that both unnerved her and set her ablaze.

“Why are you here?” he rasped.

“To make sure you’re okay.”

Once more he studied her with that unblinking, measured scrutiny. Then, after a moment, he gave his head a hard, abrupt shake and stalked toward the living room. “Do you want a drink?”

“Since I skipped after-dinner drinks, definitely.”

He glanced at her over his shoulder, eyebrow arched. “I’m sure that went over well.”

She flashed him a dry smile. “Swimmingly. If you can call dire warnings of ruining my family’s reputation by running after you like a common trollop—who even says trollop anymore, I ask you?—‘well.’ If so, then yes, it went over very well.”

“That’s...dramatic.” He reached the built-in bar and removed a Sam Adams for himself from the fully stocked mini-refrigerator. “What can I get you?”

“I’ll have what you’re having.”

He didn’t comment on her choice, just twisted off the cap of his beer, handed it to her and retrieved another for himself. Only after she lifted the bottle to her lips for a sip and downed the ale, did he ask, “Why are you really here, Mycah?”

Slowly, she lowered the beer, met his piercing gaze.

To apologize for my parents’ behavior.

To look you in the eye and see for myself that you don’t despise me.

All true. All answers she could give him, and he would most likely accept them. All she had to do was say them. Just say them, dammit...

“Because I didn’t feel safe in that house.”

Oh, God.Why had she said that?

Lightning flashed in his eyes, and she wanted to hide from it.

She wanted to hurl herself at it. Be struck by it.

“And you feel safe here? With me?” he asked, a low rumble in his voice.

“Yes.”

As inane as it was, as tumultuous as their past and current...relationship might be, she did. She harbored zero doubts that he’d ever intentionally hurt her, exploit her. If she’d come seeking shelter, he’d not only give it, he’d use his own body to provide it. That was his nature.

No.

It’s who he was.

After witnessing the pettiness, the cruelty her parents were capable of tonight, she needed that haven. She craved that security. She’d come here on the pretense of making sure Achilles was okay, but really, she was the one who desperately wanted to be assured.

Did that make her a user? Did that make her selfish?

“Stop, and no.”

She blinked, snatching herself from the downward spiral of her thoughts. “I’m sorry?”

“Wherever you were going right now in your head. You had a deer-in-headlights look in your eyes.”

“I’m selfish. A user,” she whispered.

“You’re going to have to explain that one.” He cupped her elbow and led her to one of the sitting areas, guiding her to a black armchair. “Sit. Because you look like you’re about to fall over.”

“I convinced myself I was coming here for you. When it was about me, for me, all along. Selfish,” she repeated, tilting her head back to meet his gaze. “I came here to use you.”

She expected his disgust at her admission. At the very least annoyance. Not that flicker of...oh, God, desire.

“Use me in what way, Mycah?” Another man might have hunkered down next to the chair, minimizing his size so she didn’t feel towered over or intimidated. Not Achilles.

And she didn’t feel intimidated or overpowered.

No. She felt covered. Protected.

And so aroused she could barely breathe without taking in his scent—pine, fresh rain and sex.

“Mycah.”

“I want... I would...” She couldn’t say it. Couldn’t push it out.

In her family, asking for what you needed—other than the latest season’s fashion line or the newest car—was akin to exposing your neck to an apex predator. It was revealing a weakness. When he’d been a stranger, someone she hadn’t expected to see after a night together, it’d been easier. But he wasn’t a stranger anymore.

If he’d ever really been.

And as much as she’d run to him tonight...as much as she trusted him not to intentionally hurt her... What this man could inadvertently do to her heart would make a natural disaster look like an April shower.

“We’ll table it for now.” He sank into the chair across from her, his sprawled long legs bracketing hers.

He didn’t speak as he tipped the bottle to his mouth and drank. And she did the same, watching him, mesmerized by the oddly sensual sight of his ale-dampened lips and the dance of his Adam’s apple as he swallowed. Maybe it was the alcohol she’d barely sipped, but she longed for nothing more than to lean forward and slowly close her teeth around that strong throat and flick her tongue over his skin. Taste the earthy, salty flavor of it.

User, a small, smug voice rustled in her head. The apple didn’t fall far from the tree.

“I’m sorry, Achilles,” she whispered, tracing a fingertip through the condensation dotting the bottle. “You didn’t deserve that kind of treatment tonight. I know you didn’t want my apology earlier, but I need to offer you one. Or try to.”

“Look at me.”

She lifted her head, meeting his gaze, a flicker of annoyance at her immediate obedience to his order mingling with a flash of lust.

“I didn’t want to hear it earlier because it wasn’t yours to give. The same now.” He leaned forward, setting his beer on the floor before propping his forearms on his thighs. Pinning his bright eyes on her, he said, “And yes, I was mad as fuck and trying to hide it with everything in me so I didn’t end up giving your parents and everyone else at that table the satisfaction of proving I was who they believed. The beast. The thug. The Feral Farrell.”

“You know about that?”

He snorted. “I’m not deaf or blind, Mycah.”

“No, I know that.” She waved her hand, frustrated. “I guess I hoped you hadn’t...”

“My mother always told me, it’s not what they call you, but what you answer to. Your parents or any of the people here in Boston don’t define me.” He paused, studied her, and she fought not to recoil from that incisive stare. Fought not to hide lest it perceive too much. Slice too deep. “So why are you allowing them to dictate who you are?”

“I’m not...” Damn him. She closed her eyes. Hiding. And not caring if he knew it. No, screw that. She reopened them, glared at him. “I told you before that you don’t know me. So stop presuming that you do.”

“Then tell me.”

If he’d scoffed at her, she might’ve left. Might’ve ordered him to fuck off as she stalked out of there in righteous indignation. But his quiet offer full of curiosity, of genuine interest, deflated her anger.

Soothed her hurt.

“In the interview, Cain asked me why I wanted to work for Farrell. The answers I gave—promotion, opportunity, experience—all were true. But he asked the wrong question. It should’ve been why I needed to work there. Because I do. I need this job.” She huffed out a laugh, holding the cold bottle between both of her palms and rubbing it back and forth, back and forth. “That party my parents threw tonight? Do you know who paid for it? Me. Or I will at the end of the month. Because the monthly allowance that they receive from Hill-Harper will be gone, spent on clothes, jewelry, lunches, spa appointments, gifts for their friends. And it will be up to me to cover the mortgage, household bills, staff salaries and any other outstanding debts they owe. See, my parents deride my career, but they depend on it.”

“You’re enabling them, and they’re taking advantage because they know you’ll pay their way.” He growled, anger radiating off him. “That isn’t love. That isn’t sacrifice.”

She shook her head. “It’s family,” she insisted. “If your mother—”

He slashed a hand through the air, cutting off her argument. “My mother would never have asked that of me. Which is why I would gladly have given her the world if she’d lived. And you know what she would’ve done, Mycah?” He leaned forward, his blue-gray eyes burning into hers. “Told me no. She would’ve fought me on it until I wore her down. C’mere.” He crooked two fingers, beckoning her closer, and she slid forward on the chair cushion. “You don’t even believe the bullshit you’re telling me,” he said, his voice impossibly gentle, brutally blunt.

Tears sprang to her eyes, stinging them.

But then, the truth tended to do that.

Sting.

“What is it, baby?” he whispered. “You’re safe. Tell me.”

The truth grappled with self-preservation in her throat for approximately five seconds before it burst from her.

“Three and a half more years. That’s all I have left. Three and a half more years before my sister graduates from high school and goes to college. Then I’m free. I’m paying for her tuition, and I can’t abandon her. She’s brilliant, Achilles, and deserves the best education possible. I won’t take that away from her, and I can’t lose her. She’s the only real relationship I have. I don’t put it past my parents to prohibit me from seeing her if I stop paying their bills. But in three and a half years, she’ll be through with high school and she’ll be eighteen, an adult. And I’ll have what I’ve dreamed about for years.”

“What have you dreamed of, Mycah?” he pressed when she hesitated.

She threaded her fingers through her curls—or attempted to. Remembering too late the strands were secured in an updo, she clenched her hands tight before dropping them to her thighs.

“Mycah.”

“Freedom.” As the word echoed in the room, she winced, emitting a hushed, embarrassed chuckle. Turning, she set her neglected beer bottle on the side table. Anything to avoid looking at him. “Freedom,” she repeated less vehemently, with a much heavier dose of self-deprecation. “You must think I’m dramatic.”

“You think I don’t understand the need for freedom?”

She jerked her head back to him, shock ricocheting through her.

He slowly nodded. “You know the terms of Barron’s will. By now, everyone does. For most people, it would seem like a dream come true. Co-run a multibillion-dollar company. Instant billionaire. But I never asked for it. Never wanted any of it. And I’m counting down the months, the days until I’m out of here. Out of Boston. Until I’m free from it all.”

He surged from the chair and strode to the window, yanking the tie from his hair on the way. Burrowing both hands through the thick strands, he fisted them, yanking so hard, she winced in sympathy. He splayed his fingers wide on the sheet of glass. As if attempting to reach through it to the sky beyond.

“Do you know the reason I hate the name Feral Farrell so much?” he rasped. “Because a part of me fears that there’s some truth in it. Sometimes I feel like I’m going crazy within the confines of this...world. After—” he broke off, his hand balling into a fist against the window, his head bowing between his shoulders “—I left Seattle, I deliberately chose a specific way of life for myself. A quieter life, a simpler one. This one... It’s too loud. Too harsh. Too mean. I know Cain and Kenan think I’m pulling away from them, that I’m distancing myself from them, but I can’t let myself become too attached because I can’t stay here. They were both born here. This is home for them. I don’t belong here.”

She rose and went to him, unable to remain in her chair any longer. Without questioning the wisdom of what she was doing, she crossed the room and didn’t stop until she stood behind him. So close, her forehead pressed into the indentation of his spine. So close, the toes of her stilettos nudged the bare heels of his feet. So close, her hands slipped under the edge of his vest and cupped his slim waist.

Achilles’s body went rigid, but he didn’t move away from her. Taking that as a positive sign, she closed her eyes, breathed him in. Dragged that decadent scent of the outdoors into her lungs and held on to it like a drug. Then as she exhaled, she already craved the next hit.

“You asked me how I wanted to use you,” she murmured, her words puffs that fluttered against his vest. “I came here because I needed you to hold me. To touch me. To shield me from the world just for a little while before I have to go back out and face it again.” She slid her hands over his stomach, up the ridged ladder of his abs until her palms covered his pounding heart. Turning her head, she pressed her cheek to his back. “I think we can give each other that. I don’t see anything wrong with both of us using each other.”

For the longest moments, he didn’t stir. The thump, thump against her hand the only movement. But in a sudden explosion of action, he wrenched out of her embrace, turned and damn near leaped on her.

Excitement and lust combusted within her, and she met him in a clash of lips, tongue and teeth, his beard abrading her chin and mouth in a sensual caress. God, it’d been so long. So damn long since she’d been touched. No, that was wrong. Not just simply touched. So long since she’d been touched by him. By Achilles.

The whimper that escaped her throat should’ve embarrassed her, but she was beyond that. Tunneling her fingers through his thick, cool strands, she fisted them, dragging his head down so she could feast on the mouth that had been taunting her for weeks. Impatient and so damn hungry, she licked him, demanding he give just as much—no, more—in return.

His big hands gripped her head, angling this way. Then that way. Then this way again. As if he couldn’t get enough. As if he’d never be satisfied. Join the club. He could suck at her tongue, nip at her lips, lick the roof of her mouth, and she would still yank on his hair, claw at his scalp, silently beg for everything.

This wasn’t a kiss.

It was war.

And goddammit, yes, she wanted to be a casualty.

“This dress. It’s been fucking killing me all night. How do I get you out of it?” he muttered against her mouth, his hands roaming her breasts, belly, hips.

Chest rising and falling on labored breaths, she turned, giving him her back. “Hooks at the back. Zipper at the hip.” She glanced over her shoulder at him. “Hurry.”

The next few moments were an exercise in patience as he worked his way through the delicate hooks of the corset-style top, but the brushes of his fingertips over her spine and the caresses of his coarse curses in her ears only heightened the rush of burning arousal in her veins. By the time the top loosened around her breasts and the skirt dipped around her waist, she trembled with lust, and gooseflesh pebbled her skin. And when he lowered the dress, the black material pooling around her shoes, leaving her clad only in a silk thong and thigh-highs, she sank her teeth into her bottom lip to imprison the sob of need that clambered at the back of her throat.

“Turn around.” He paused. “Please.”

That please in his gruff voice, with a note of the same need that burrowed through her, nearly sent her to her knees. Before she could do as he asked, though, he grasped her elbow.

“Wait.”

He knelt in front of her, and the air evaporated from her lungs. Her body and mind were of one accord as they both recalled the last time his face and that beautiful beard of his had been between her legs. But this time Achilles’s attention wasn’t focused on her sex but on her feet. Carefully, he removed her stilettos and swept the dress to the side. He sat back on his heels, staring up at her. Her body had never been the “perfect” size four, much to her mother’s dismay. Even so, over the years, Mycah had come to not just accept but to love her body, regardless of others’ opinions.

And as Achilles’s gaze caressed her thighs, which had never been slim, her hips, which had always been rounded, her belly that had never been completely flat and her breasts, which had always been fuller than an A cup, she felt desired. Worshipped.

Perfect.

“You’re beautiful.”

Truth ran through his voice, in every syllable. And no matter what might pass between them elsewhere, here, in this, she believed him.

“You’re overdressed.” She hiked her chin toward him, arching an eyebrow at his shirt, vest and pants.

His hands went to his vest, and he shrugged free of it. When his fingers gripped the top button of his shirt, she sank to her knees. Lust pumped through her, hot and heady, as she brushed his hands aside and took over the task. With every slice of inked brown skin revealed, her arousal ratcheted higher. She squeezed her legs against the sweet pain in her sex, knowing her flimsy lacy thong hid none of the evidence of the desire dampening her upper thighs. And as she pushed his shirt from his shoulders, Achilles confirmed as much when he dipped a hand between her legs, stroking a fingertip across the skin just below her folds and lifted glistening fingers to his mouth.

Deliberately, he slid them between his parted lips, licking them clean. His dense, black lashes fluttered close, and he moaned, the sound ravenous. She whimpered, an aching tug pulling hard in response.

“Touch me,” she pleaded, past pride. “Touch me, please.”

His arm snaked up, hand cupping the back of her neck and hauling her forward. Their bare chests collided, his mouth covering hers. She tasted herself on him, and the faint musk enflamed her. She opened wider for his possession. He cupped her behind with both hands, squeezing, and she arched into his hold, loving how he told her without words how much he enjoyed her body. Adored her body.

Tearing her mouth from his, she trailed her lips over his jaw, down his strong throat. She paid special detail to the swirls, geometric patterns, lettering and biomechanical art covering his shoulder, arm and chest. He was beautiful, and she closed her eyes against the sting of tears. Silly. God, she was being silly.

“Mycah?”

He cradled her face. Or tried to. She dodged those big palms, ducking her head and flicking her tongue over his flat, brown nipple. His groan rumbled under her mouth, and she raked her teeth over the nub, then sucked it, drawing hard.

“Damn, baby.” He carefully removed the band and pins from her hair, then drove his hands through the curls, tangling his fingers in them, tugging, sending darts of pain scattering across her scalp. “Again. Do it again.”

She complied. Gladly. Placing her palms against his wide shoulders, she lightly shoved. One of his muscular arms wrapped around her, and he fell back to the carpeted floor. She took swift advantage, crawling on top of his giant frame, straddling his abdomen and moaning deep as those ridges pressed against her wet, swollen folds. Another moan rolled out of her, and she couldn’t have stopped herself from grinding against him if inhaling her next breath depended on it.

Why did she need to breathe when pleasure so intense was turning her into living ecstasy?

“No?” Achilles growled, circling her neck, applying just enough pressure to have a dark, erotic wave swirl through her lower belly and pool between her legs.

“Yes,” she damn near whined, leaning into his hold. Another buck of her hips, another, and another, and she shuddered, so close to coming just from grinding over him and that illicit grip on her throat.

How was that possible?

Because it was Achilles.

“I don’t want to want you.” He accompanied the admission with a sweeping caress of her nipple.

Electricity sizzled in her veins, the sparks echoing in her head, but she still clearly heard him. And underneath the pleasure, hurt vibrated within her. She lifted her hand, preparing to shove him away from her breast, but when he pinched the tip, tweaked it, her hand fell away. She surrendered to the pleasure even as she couldn’t escape his words.

“You’re everything I told myself I shouldn’t have. Everything that’s destructive to me. And yet—” he cupped her, levered up and sucked her into his mouth, his tongue licking and circling her flesh before crushing a kiss to her lips “—you’ve become my fantasy.”

“And you hate us both for it,” she whispered against his lips.

He stared at her, his wolf eyes so bright, so intense it almost hurt.

“Yes. Almost.”

A pain carved into her, sharpened by the tender care he gave her. She wanted to hate him back, to strike out at him for making her care. This was sex. Ill-advised sex, at that. Nothing more. But her pounding heart whispered liar.

Good thing her heart held no power over her head, just as only her body could rule her for tonight.

Breaking the kiss, she slid down his body, scattering kisses down his torso, her fingers grasping the tab of his pants, undoing them, then tugging down his zipper. Scooting farther down, she settled in the vee of his thighs and fisted his cock. His guttural growl broke on the air, and satisfaction flooded her. He might hate desiring her, but his dick didn’t. This part of him—she freed him from the confines of his black boxers—loved her.

She didn’t waste time teasing him. Not when his dense, earthy musk teased her, and her mouth watered for the taste of him. Arrowing his length downward, she swallowed him. Another of his harsh moans rippled through the room and two large hands cradled her head, oddly gentle, and a contradiction to the barely leashed control of his straining body.

Closing her eyes, she lost herself in him. The feel of him sliding over her tongue. The threat of him nudging the back of her throat. The power of him pulsing in her hand. The taste of him she coaxed on each glide back up the length of his cock.

In this moment, as he bunched her curls in his hands, lifting them away from her face so he could glimpse every hard suckle, she was...powerful. He was hers.

And she was his.

In this moment.

“Enough.” His gravel-roughened order came seconds before he grabbed her by the shoulders and hoisted her up and off his body. But only long enough to shuck his pants, remove a condom from the wallet and sheathe himself. Then he reached for her, pulling her back on top of him. Grasping one of her hips with one hand, he squeezed his cock with the other, holding himself at her entrance. “Take me, Mycah.”

It could’ve been a demand. It could’ve been a plea.

She gave in to both.

Slowly, she sank down over him.

Her breath snagged in her throat at the impossibly tight fit, and she paused, shaking. Yes, she’d done this with him before. But this position made him seem bigger, thicker. Her fingernails dug into the dense muscles of his chest, and she shook with the increasing pressure as she pushed down, taking more.

The stretch. The burn.

And underneath? The pleasure.

Pleasure, simply because it was Achilles inside her, filling her, branding her flesh, marking her.

“Shh. Easy, baby. Take what you need.” He cupped her breasts, whisking his thumbs over the beaded nipples, his long hair tangled around his head. His hooded gaze seemed to miss nothing—not her struggle, not even her pleasure. His face hardened into a mask of such fierce lust, it stole what little air she had left in her lungs. “You’re so fucking tight. So wet. Months I’ve been dreaming about this, and nothing came close to how perfect you are.”

Months? So she hadn’t been alone in not forgetting that night?

A silent cry echoed in her head, and she sank lower. Oh, God. She had to move. Had to...do something. Using his chest as leverage, she rose off him until just the tip of him kissed her folds, then she took him back inside, the wide, thick length of him claiming her just as she claimed him.

Twin ragged groans penetrated the room, and with his hands still caressing her breasts, she rode him. Cautiously, at first, but gradually, with more abandon until he filled all of her and her behind slapped his thighs. It was so damn good.

Achilles replaced his hands with his mouth, drawing on her, sucking on her, torturing her as his big hands encouraged her to fuck him...to break him.

He tunneled a hand into her hair, pulled her head down as he reached between them and circled a blunt fingertip over the nub of flesh at the top of her sex.

“Let me feel you come all over me, baby.”

This was all demand. And she obeyed. He gave that engorged, pulsing flesh two more hard, relentless circles and she exploded, came apart for him. For herself.

And as he followed close behind her, his giant body surging and pitching beneath her, she clung to him, wringing out every last bit of the orgasm snapping through her like the hottest of lightning bolts.

Just like this release, she would claim all of tonight for herself because tomorrow she had to start the process of letting go all over again.

“Will you tell me about her?”

Beneath her, Achilles’s body jerked, then stilled, as if he hadn’t meant to betray his reaction to her question but hadn’t quite managed to hide it. His heart beat solidly, but at an elevated rate under her ear.

They continued to lie in his bed, the sheets twisted around their bodies from their last bout of sex. At some point during the night, he’d carried her from the living room up the stairs to the bedroom, and she’d discovered once more that slow, tender sex with Achilles was just as hot and mind-blowing as when it was fast and intense. But now, as the sweat dried on their skin and her thoughts had started whirling again, she couldn’t stop them.

And couldn’t keep them from tumbling out of her mouth.

Mycah didn’t repeat the request or say anything else to expound on the her. She didn’t need to; they both knew to whom she referred.

He remained silent so long, she assumed he decided not to answer her. Disappointment flashed inside her chest, but not surprise. Sex didn’t mean he would suddenly confide in her. Especially about someone who’d obviously had such an impact on his—

“What do you want to know?” The words erupted from him as if he’d propelled them out. Get them out or never say them at all.

She blinked, part of her unsure she’d actually heard him, but she quickly recovered, not willing to squander this opportunity.

“Are you still in love with her?” Oh, for God’s sake.

She mentally cringed. That’s what she led with? Dammit, she sounded...needy.

“No.” Gently grasping her shoulders, he lifted her. Sitting up, he slid across the mattress until his back hit the headboard. His hair tumbled about his face and shoulders, that piercing gaze narrowing on her. “Why would you ask me that?”

She shrugged. How could she answer that, when she didn’t know herself? “When someone remains so angry with another person it’s usually because they still have strong feelings for them.”

“I’m not angry with her.” His dark brows slashed down in a frown. “She taught me a valuable lesson I’ll never forget, but I’d have to care about her to be angry. And I don’t give a damn either way.”

“What was the lesson?” Mycah whispered, certain she already knew.

He watched her for several long, quiet moments, then said, voice flat but soft, “Most rich women will toy with someone out of their tax bracket, but when it comes down to it, they’re not settling for the dirty little secret.”

Each word landed like a solid punch, and through sheer will she didn’t flinch from the blows. Did he believe she saw him as a dirty secret? Second class? Out of her league? She scrolled through their interactions, beginning at the bar and ending with the evening at her parents’ house. Here, in the living room with his confession about hating himself for wanting her.

Yes, he did believe that.

Pain and anger sizzled inside her, but as quickly as it flared, she extinguished it. This wasn’t about her. And as much as she longed to defend herself, she couldn’t make it about her.

“Will you tell me what happened?” she asked.

He cocked his head, surprise flickering in his eyes. “Why is it important to you?”

“Because I want to know who I’m being punished for. And why.” And maybe, just maybe, though he claimed he wasn’t angry, speaking about it could lance this obvious wound.

Again, he didn’t immediately reply, but after a long pause, he finally nodded. Turning his head, he shifted his gaze from her to the glass wall that, during the day, would provide a phenomenal view of Boston Harbor.

“I met her not long after my mom died,” he began. “My mom and I were living in Tacoma by then, and it’d been just us. You might not have noticed, but I don’t play well with others—” a slight quirk of his lips, there and gone in an instant “—so I didn’t have anyone among my coworkers that I’d call friends, just acquaintances. So with Mom gone, I was alone, and when this beautiful, sophisticated, cultured woman approached me at one of my company’s investors’ parties, I fell. And I fell hard.”

Okay, maybe she didn’t want to hear this story. Jealousy sparked and writhed inside her, and though she reminded herself she’d literally asked for this, she couldn’t snuff it out. Couldn’t abolish the thought of this beautiful, sophisticated, cultured woman with this virile, gorgeous man.

“She claimed to love me, said she was interested in my career, concerned about my well-being. Even encouraged me to see a grief counselor about my mother. But the moment the counselor cautioned me about jumping into a relationship so soon after Mom’s death, she found a way to shut that down. Told me the counselor was against us. And stupid-ass me believed her. Fuck.” He loosed a harsh bark of laughter. “I was so goddamn dumb and needy.”

“Stop it.” For the first time since he started relaying his story, she spoke, scooting closer and grabbing his hand in both of hers. He turned from the window, dipping his head to stare down at their clasped hands. “The fact that you recognized you needed a counselor is brave. You actually going? Even braver. That she manipulated you into stopping, using your trust and love to further her own agenda, is her shame, not yours. So don’t you dare take that on you.”

He lifted his gaze to hers. He didn’t nod, but he didn’t refute her, either. Mycah took that as a win.

“We were together a year and a half, although that was a year too long. In that time, I never met her family, although she promised I would, I just needed to be patient. She did take me around her friends, though. Bought me new clothes, dressed me up, trotted me out to the clubs, bars, parties. Though she said she cared about my career, if my work interfered with her social events, she resented it. Even tried to sabotage it by calling my supervisor and insisting I be placed on less demanding projects, and expecting to be obeyed since she was an investor. See, she believed her money and pedigree would solve any problem or situation. Including me. Because I was her toy to play with, dress up, bend and, when the time came, to put on the shelf.”

“Achilles.” Part of her didn’t want him to finish. But again, not about her. Not about the hole he ripped in her chest with each word. So she didn’t say anything else. Just continued to hold his hand.

“I finally ended it, but not because I woke up or got fed up. Only because a coworker who knew we were dating took pity on me and emailed me the engagement announcement in the Tacoma society pages. Her engagement announcement to the heir of a financial empire.” His mouth twisted into a sardonic caricature of a smile. “When I confronted her about it, she waved it off. As if her upcoming marriage meant nothing. Because to her, it didn’t. She expected me to remain her fucking side piece. As I’d been all along, I just hadn’t known it. And she actually appeared shocked when I told her hell no. Seems no one had told her that before.”

He sighed, pinched the bridge of his nose, then tunneled his fingers through his hair, dragging the strands back from his face.

“I grew up in the roughest parts of Seattle, considered myself street-smart. I’d been through—” something hard...haunted flickered in his eyes “—some shit. But the first time a beautiful woman other than my mother showed me compassion, attention, I lost myself. I became someone I didn’t recognize. And I’ve never forgiven myself for it. I don’t know if I can. Because if I do, I’ll forget and I’ll do it again. I can never go back to that place. Ever.”

The vow came out impassioned, almost furious. But that fury was reserved for himself, the man who’d fallen for a woman who had betrayed him.

Mycah understood that kind of betrayal. The path of it might be different, but that pain? Oh, she was very familiar.

And it could break a person’s spirit. Their belief and trust in other people. In themselves.

“What was her name?” she asked.

He studied her for a moment, head cocked to the side. “Yvette. Why?”

“They say if you give the devil a name and say it aloud, he—or she—no longer has power over you.”

He snorted softly. “That’s what they say, huh?” He shook his head, a faint smile lifting the corner of his mouth before disappearing. “Yvette.” He said her name again, lower this time, and if she hadn’t been so tuned in to him, she might not have caught it. He hiked his chin at her. “What’s the name of your devil, Mycah?”

A spark of panic flared in her chest. Oh, God, where did she start? Easy. She didn’t. Because she was afraid if she did, she wouldn’t be able to stop.

“I don’t have any.”

“Liar,” he murmured, calling her out.

His arm shot out, curling around her waist, hauling her across his thighs. He arranged her so she straddled him, and she moaned, her sex notching against his rapidly hardening cock. But before she had time to roll her hips and get ready for round—what, three or four?—he cradled her face between his hands and tipped her head down so she had no choice but to meet his unwavering scrutiny.

“You, Mycah Hill,” he said, sweeping his thumb over her cheekbone, “are a liar. But that’s okay. We’ve had enough revelations for one day. But when you’re ready, I’ll be here. And you’re going to tell me. Because we both know you have demons. You let me know when you want to name them.”

Then he took her mouth.

And took her under.

And she let him.