Defying the Odds (20 page)

Clay didn’t have the answer to that, but he wasn’t complaining about it, either. He moved over to the other breast, giving it the same harsh treatment, sucking and tugging lightly with his teeth until it beaded up. Melody was panting, shaking in his arms. She was so fucking responsive it drove him crazy.

He dragged his tongue slowly from her chest to the base of her throat and then used his hold on her hair to expose the gentle curve of her neck. He nipped and bit at the soft skin, her hair soft against his face, her moans making his cock ache for the first hard push inside her.

“Please, please, please.” She writhed in his arms, her warm, wet pussy brushing against his dick, beckoning him. “Please, Clay!”

He brought her mouth to his. The kiss was hot, wild, uninhibited for the pulse of several long heartbeats before he pulled away and looked at Melody, needy and breathless over him.

“Go ahead.” Clay’s voice turned low and gravelly with sex. “Use it; fuck it. It belongs to you; own it.”

Melody’s gaze became molten, the pink sheen of morning painting itself over her flushed skin. She licked her lips, looking awed. “Is that true?”

“Yes,” he assured her without hesitation. “I thought I was broken too, that I’d never trust women, but I had it all wrong. I wasn’t broken at all. I was just waiting for you. It’s always been yours; even before we met, it belonged to you.”

Clay wasn’t real sure if they were talking about his heart or cock, but it didn’t seem to matter. Melody sucked in a sharp breath, her eyes glittering like emeralds as they filled with tears. She reached up, cupping his face in both her open palms. She kissed him, soft and sweet, as she shifted her hips, rising up higher on her knees until the head of his cock was pushing against the tight, warm opening of her pussy.

He tightened his fingers in her hair once more. He took dominance of the kiss, pushing his tongue into her mouth as an outlet. The pleasure of leisurely sliding into her wet heat, her pussy slowly stretching to accommodate his girth, was driving him insane. They were both shaking with the measured rise of bliss, feeding the flames on purpose, waiting until the pulse was too much to deny.

She clung to his shoulders, her small fingernails digging into the skin until he was buried as deep as he could go. Melody pulled back, looking between them, her chest still rising and falling with rapid pants of desire.

“I like looking at you in me,” she whispered as if confessing a dark secret. “I
dunno
why I like it, but I do.”

He leaned farther back on his open palm, giving her a better view of their bodies connecting. Melody sucked in a sharp breath in response, her gaze still glued to the place between them where his cock was buried deep inside her. Seeing her so enthralled with their joining was spellbinding. Clay couldn’t have moved even if he wanted to. All he could do was look at her face, seeing her eyes grow glassy with passion and awed beauty over what she was witnessing.

With a low moan, Melody’s head fell back, her hair tickling his thighs, making it obvious the sight became too much. Then Clay couldn’t do anything
but
move. He thrust his hips up instinctively and clasped the round curve of her hip to pull her tighter against him. Melody moaned a second time as she fell back farther, her open palms resting against his legs, exposing the curve of her lush figure to his hungry gaze.

He slid his hand up her body and stopped to palm one round breast, brushing his thumb against her nipple. Melody used her grip on his legs to grind against him. Clay moved with her, offering his cock up for her enjoyment. He wanted to watch her get off on him, and he used Melody’s pleasure as a distraction against his own rising hunger. He left her breasts neglected to trace his thumb around the swollen folds of her pussy. Melody shuddered, goose bumps spreading over her flushed skin.

He teased as she rode him, listening to her low moans, observing as her body tightened with the need to come. When he finally touched her clit, rubbing his thumb against it soft and fast, Melody cried out. Her body jerked from the powerful sensation. He expected that she’d give in to the rush of pleasure and fuck to a quick orgasm. Instead she adjusted to the intensity of the intimate touch and rode out the storm leisurely. Bowed back to the thrust of his cock, her movements remained languid as he teased her to climax.

Watching her with a heavy-lidded gaze, Clay continued to play with her body, spread out—beautiful and willing—in front of him. He rubbed her clit, stopping only to feel the slick stretch of his cock buried deeply inside her as she ground against him. Melody’s breathing became sharper, more desperate. Her skin grew dewy with a fine sheen of sweat.

The rise was so slow the pinnacle was a surprise.

When Clay went back to concentrating on rubbing the tight bud hiding between her folds, Melody suddenly cried out, her body shaking, her pussy pulsing around him. Wave after wave seemed to roll over her, drawing out low, sweet sounds of surrender that nearly pulled him down with her. Instead he rode out the storm, thumbing her clit until she fell over the edge, then caressing the smooth lines of her naked body when the rush simmered down to slow, quivering pulses of bliss.

When he felt the last of the tension fall out of Melody, he sat up, wrapped both arms around her back, and pulled her to him. She was languorous, obviously needing the extra support. She twined her arms around him, burying her face in the curve of his neck as she tried to get her breath back.

If he wasn’t so fucking desperate, he would have let her cling to him all morning, but seeing her let go like that, watching the ecstasy build and build, he was half out of his mind with lust. Still holding her to him tightly, he reversed their positions.

Clay pushed her against the mattress before reaching down and then grabbing her thigh. He spread her wide as he pulled out and thrust into her in a hard, carnal mating he couldn’t tame. Melody screamed in response, her back arching, her fingers tangling in his hair. He started driving into her, hungry for his own taste of oblivion after the forced separation between them.

His body strained; the pump of his heartbeat reverberated through him stronger than ever. He was blind to everything save the need to fuck Melody, a helpless slave to his own pleasure. He would have been angry about the weakness if Melody wasn’t right there with him, driven and yearning, her hips moving with every slap of skin against skin.

Melody’s moans became sharp, hard gasps of pleasure, and he knew she was close. He fucked her harder, his grip bruising as he pumped his body into hers. She tensed, her nails dragging across his back, her body shuddering with a second orgasm.

Clay was lost.

He fell into the chasm, the pleasure pounding, the throb of it making white spots form in his vision. He fisted the sheets as his cock pulsed, filling Melody with the warm, sticky evidence of his pleasure. He shuddered and moaned in her arms, surrendering completely to the cataclysm of ecstasy.

It destroyed him.

It left him bare, exposed, and humble in the face of it.

He loved this woman.

There was no other explanation. It wasn’t even surprising. It felt like something he should have known all along. All he could do after the revelation was collapse over her, utterly spent. His words were gone, stolen with his breath. He knew he was heavy and eventually gathered enough good sense to roll off her. He fell onto the bed next to Melody, a hand splayed over his chest, still rising and falling in sharp, hard breaths that lingered after the crash.

His head felt like someone had taken a sledgehammer to it.

Clay knew there was probably something to be said, some profound words of undying love and devotion that were protocol when you found the other half to your soul. Instead he rolled into her because not touching her was agony. His cheek rested between the
valley
of her breasts once more. Her heart was still beating faster than usual, and he listened to the thump of it, feeling his eyes grow heavy.

“That was nice,” Melody finally whispered into the glow of early morning filtering in past the open windows.

“Yeah,” he agreed, already half asleep to hide from the headache. “Thank you.”

Melody stroked his hair in response, lulling him to sleep as effortlessly as she’d pulled him to passion. She gave so willing of herself. Everything she had to offer was his for the taking, and it didn’t feel like a robbery. Everything he had to give was hers too. Clay could lie here, and he didn’t have to say anything.

She already knew.

After the early morning sex, the rest of Clay’s slumber felt more like a power nap than anything, but he wasn’t complaining. He had a hard time sleeping too deeply once the sun rose anyway. He was naturally a morning person.

When the phone rang, Clay reached over to answer it himself, seeing that Melody was still asleep.

“Yeah?” he whispered into the receiver.

“Hey, Clay, buddy.
How you feeling?”

Clay pulled a face. Even after sex and winning a championship belt, his agent’s voice grated on his nerves. “What’d
ya
want, Rick?”

“I just wanted to make sure you were up and moving.”

Clay groaned.
The promotion bullshit.
He’d forgotten about it in the wake of getting back together with Melody. He wanted to be with her all day, not playing nice for sponsors and fans.

“Clay?”

“I’m up,” Clay said rather than complaining, because he had a contract that said bitching about the obligations was pointless. “How much time have I got?”

“Couple hours.”

Clay hung up the phone and then glanced at Melody, who blinked tiredly at him. She brushed her hair out of her face and then gave him a lazy smile. “You didn’t say good-bye to your friend.”

“He’s not my friend; he’s my agent.”

“Does that mean you don’t
gotta
be polite and say good-bye before hanging up?”

“That’s exactly what it means,” Clay said with a smirk. “He makes an obnoxious amount of money off my blood and sweat and knows better than to complain ’bout my bad attitude.”

Melody gave a laugh of incredulousness. “That
ain’t
nice.”

“More often than not, I
ain’t
that nice.” Clay winced, hoping it wasn’t too much of a shock to hear it. “You
wanna
try out that big
ol
’ tub in the other bathroom?”

Melody grinned, looking perfectly fine with his confession of a long history of rudeness. “I’d
love
to try out that tub with you.”

Clay was struck by how nice it was to wake up with Melody. Playing domestic with her was something he could get very used to. He wanted every day to start by watching her crawl out of bed naked and padding barefoot across the room. He admired the way she looked from behind—with her long hair hanging thick and loose down her back and the gentle curve of her ass taunting him out of bed.

Melody stopped at the bedroom door, turning around to arch an eyebrow at him. “Are you coming?”

“Yeah.”
Clay rolled out of bed and stretched. He grinned when he spied Melody squinting at him. “You want your glasses to get a better look?”

She surprised him by smiling and nodding. “Hand ’
em
to me.”

He picked her glasses off the nightstand and walked them over to her. Melody put them on, looking adorable wearing the black frames and nothing else. Her gaze ran over him boldly, making Clay’s cock stir. Forget the championship belt; spending most of his life keeping himself in peak physical condition felt more than worth it just to get Melody to look at him like that, with stark appreciation showing in her lustful gaze.

“You are one fine-looking man, Clay Powers,” Melody finally announced, giving him a mischievous grin. “Even all bruised and battered, you’re mighty nice on the eyes.”

Clay looked down at himself, seeing a large bruise over his rib cage, but not much else. Most of the damage was to his face, which was still throbbing this morning. He winced. “I probably look rough.”

“It
ain’t
that terrible.” Melody shrugged. “I wish I’d have remembered to bring you some vanilla extract. It’s my mama’s remedy for bruises, and you wouldn’t believe how well it works.”

Clay gave her a look. “I heard a
lotta
remedies for bruises, but I
ain’t
never
heard of that.”