Fixation (Magnetic Desires Book 3) (19 page)

"You’re more than that, Lolly. You’re a fighter."

"Maybe."

He undid my bra and stroked his hands over my arms, pushing the straps down until it fell to the floor. "You are the strongest woman I know."

Ready to leave the topic behind, I snorted nervously. "You still talk too much."

"You need to learn to take a compliment." I could feel him moving behind me as he removed his T-shirt.

He dropped it to the floor in front of me, and it occurred to me this was a first since we’d been back in each other's lives. I wanted to spin around and place my hands on his bare chest. Needed to feel the heat of him beneath my palms as I explored his body in a way his anger had kept me from being able to.

"Uh-uh." Grasping my waist, he held me trapped. "We have all night. Don’t rush it, sweetheart. Let me satisfy you the way you should be."

He didn’t tack on
every night,
but he didn’t have to. It was in the connection between us. What he wanted, what he’d always wanted, even when he’d been too angry to admit it. I should have reveled in the victory. But what good was it when I couldn’t let us go down that road? With care that belied his strength and the passion inside him, he pulled me against him. The hard heat of his muscular torso soaked into my back and I relaxed into him, my head resting on his shoulder. Holding me there, his chin nestled in my hair, one arm across my chest beneath my breasts, the other skimmed my belly to nestle over my slit. His erection pressed against my ass through his jeans and I wiggled, wanting to feel more. "Leo, I want you."

Nudging my head to the side with his cheek, he kissed my shoulder. "I know, but I want to make this last. You always were an impatient one."

He flicked his finger over my clit, spiking the ache inside me, and my breath whistled between my teeth as I thrust into his hand. I could feel the curve of his lips against my shoulder while he cupped my breast, sliding my nipple between two fingers and pinching the bud until it peaked. Shutting my eyes, I wallowed in the sensations he lifted from me. I was a needy mess of desire and his fingertips slid through my wetness, pushing inside. My knees buckled, bringing my pussy firmly into his hand, and pulling him deeper into my channel. Rubbing against his palm, needing the friction, I wanted the release that would come with it. A whimper froze in my throat as I edged closer to orgasm but couldn’t quite reach it. It would take little more than his finger dancing over my clit to set me off but I wanted more. Deep inside my core, the ache for him grew. I wanted his cock, his hardness pushing against my inner walls, stretching and filling me so when I came, it would be world shaking and satisfying.

Leo had other plans. Hooking his fingers inside me, he increased the pressure where I needed it until I cried out, my orgasm ripping through me and stealing my breath.

He chuckled near my ear as I came down. "Are you satisfied?"

"Hardly." Spinning in his arms, I didn't give him a chance to catch me before I pressed myself to his chest. His grin fell, his gaze locked on where my tits rested against him. I’d moved too quickly to fully register the glimpse of worry that shadowed his eyes while I rose on tiptoe to drag his mouth down to mine. Thrusting my tongue into his mouth, I drew him down to me. Tangled together, each of us took what we needed. The faint scent of chocolate, black currants, and sandalwood, mingled with the sweet taste of him, and I pressed myself against the hard angles of his body when he dipped me back.

Breaking away, I ran my gaze over his torso while I fumbled with his belt. The tattoos I remembered were supplemented with more. Pressing my palm to his chest, he covered it with his own, while I pulled the belt from his pants with the other. I traced my hand over the enso on his left pectoral. "Still haven’t finished the journey?"

"I don’t think I ever will."

I moved my gaze along with my free hand down the left side of his body. Some of it faded, some new. A tree of life took up the space between his ribs and the V of his hips. Thick black lines that resembled birds spread from the top of it to the enso. Walking my fingers over the cut ridges of his six-pack to the other side, I worked my way up the trail of yellow roses and photography film to the girl who had wrecked him before me. I pressed my lips together. We’d never talked about what his friend had told me while we’d been on the cruise in the tropics. Wondering why I hadn't made the canvas, I tried not to be jealous. For a man who’d wanted to be reminded it seemed out of character. "Where’s mine?"

He exhaled, his chest rising and falling beneath our hands, and he inched my palm to the side. My name, a flourish across his heart.
Shit
. My fingers prickled as I ran them over the ink. It was almost as if I owned his heart. Lips parted, I darted my tongue out to wet them. Surely this was only him reminding himself, but what if it wasn't? "Why did you get this, Leo?"

"Does it matter?"

Drawing my brow together, I gnawed at the inside of my lip.
It might.
"I guess not, but I need to know."

"I’ll tell you, but not tonight." Cupping my ass, he fitted me snugly against him. "Unless of course you want to forget about…"

The length of him against my belly was enough to remind me what we were doing, but I wanted the answer to my question. Still, I decided it could wait when he sunk to his knees in front of me again, blazing a trail with his mouth, his tongue flicking from my belly to the inside of my thigh. His breath heated my cooling skin, reigniting my dampened desire.

He did this to me. This hit to my senses that never left me sated for long. The need for more like it was oxygen, like I was starving for him. I gasped and gripped his shoulders as his tongue darted inside my slit. An instant rush of wetness added to the slide of his tongue over my sensitive flesh and I shivered as he delved into my core over and over, intermittently pulling back to lap at my clit. Whimpering under his skilled attack, each move he made filled me with the need for more. My hips bucked, and he pulled me into his mouth, his hands on my ass pushing me firmly against him.

"God, Leo." I was so close to exploding.

My body caught fire when he mumbled something against my pussy and sucked the ball of nerves, clamping down on it with his teeth. My knees collapsed under me. Only his hands and his mouth kept me upright while I came on his face. He held me there, until I loosened the grip on his shoulders and regained my balance. I worked on breathing, remembering how to pull oxygen into my lungs, to inhale and exhale while he got to his feet, the grin I remembered so affectionately splitting his face.

"Your taste is addictive, sweetheart." Coiling a tendril of my hair around his finger, his gaze locked with mine and he tugged me in for a kiss. His beard moist with my arousal, his tongue stroking mine covered in my taste.

I was done with this dance we were doing. Three orgasms and not once had his cock been inside me. The craving for him to fuck me was all consuming. I tugged at his jeans, heard the pop of the snap give way, and reefed them down. His erection outlined by tight boxer briefs made my mouth water, until it was wet as my thighs. The thin cotton between us was no match for my fixation. Dragging them down, I reached for him and stroked the thick length. Hips rolling, he jerked in my hand and groaned low in his throat.

"This is what I need, Leo. I need you to fuck me. I need your wildness, your lack of control, your dominance."

"My dominance?" He growled. "You want me to fuck you like I did on my desk?"

"Yes," I whimpered. The thought of how he’d taken what he wanted without care had my insides clenching. "Yes."

Grabbing my hair, he wrapped it around his fist and yanked my head back to crush his mouth on mine. His kiss was all teeth and tongue, savage and passionate, and I trembled as that latent desire inside me uncoiled once again. The wall met my back before I was even aware we were moving, his other arm wrapping around me to pull me up and guide a leg around his waist. His cock nudged at my slit, a groan escaping our mouths, his or mine, I couldn’t be sure. Tangling my fingers in his hair, I kept his mouth pressed to mine while he pushed straight into my aching pussy. An eruption of tingles speared through me as he lifted and plunged into me, skin against skin, his arousal and mine combined.

"Shit. I don’t have a condom." One hand shuffled through his pockets while the other held me to the wall. "We should stop."

"Fuck, no. We haven't the last two times." Pulling at his hair, I lifted myself up and down on his cock. "On the pill."

"Thank fuck, sweetheart. Don't think I could have beared it if you’d told me to stop."

It hadn’t bothered him when we'd come together again initially, but that he’d taken the moment to ask me if I wanted to stop marked the return of a consideration we hadn’t had for each other before.

Sweat coated our skin as we thrashed together against the wall, needing to take our release from each other. Heavy panting filled the air between us. "Don’t stop, Leo, don’t stop. Don’t ever fucking stop." My high-pitched scream filled the space between us as he slammed into me over and over.

"You’re so fucking wet." The sound of our bodies moving together was loud in the quiet house, but I didn’t care, couldn’t stop while he filled my craving, bringing me closer to satisfaction, bringing me closer to the release that would help me keep my distance from him in the days to come. The ache in my core expanded, filling me, curling my toes, and sending spasms through my legs as it became too much, my orgasm detonated inside me, an explosive chain reaction that had me calling out his name, and God's, while he fucked me until I could no longer see straight. Until I became too sensitive to the feel of him inside me. He nipped at my lower lip as he slammed into me a final time and followed me with his own release.

We stayed against the wall, his weight pressed into me, and his hands either side of my head while our breathing steadied and slowed. Only then did he pull out, his cum coating my thighs. "Are you satisfied?"

I nodded, not sure what to say, or what time it was, or what to do next. Cupping my face between his hands, he brushed his lips over mine. "You want me to go?"

I wanted him to stay. It would be so easy to settle in his arms and never leave them. "I think you should."

Pain laced his features for the briefest of seconds before he let go of me and pulled up his pants. He picked up his shirt and with his back turned said, "Next time you’ll ask me to stay."

And the thing was, I knew he was right. I knew it deep down in the darkest spots in my soul, because only he resided there. "There won’t be a next time, Leo."

"You don’t believe that." Coming back to me, he stroked my cheek with his knuckles.

The sound of sobbing infiltrated the intense silence, while I scrambled for an answer, followed by a scream, and I yanked my sweatshirt on before reefing open the door. Leo followed closely behind as I crossed to Tia’s room.

"It’s okay, princess. It’s only a nightmare." Taking a seat on the edge of the bed, I held her until she woke enough to let go of the dream that had scared her.

Leo leaned in the doorway watching us. I didn’t need to give him the answer as to why I wouldn’t pursue anything with him. He’d known before we went into that room. "I think you better go."

He frowned, his shoulders sagging, but he nodded and turned, his feet dragging and the stairs creaking as he made his way out. I hugged Tia a little closer. I was doing the right thing, so why did it feel like such a damn battle?

"Can I have a drink, Mommy?" Tia squeaked and rubbed at her eyes.

"Sure, princess, I’ll get you one." I settled her down and made my way downstairs. The rumble of his bike momentarily pierced the quiet, before it disappeared into the distance and the silence seemed even thicker than it had before he left. Maybe it would have been easier if he’d kept on hating me, even a little bit. Filling a glass from the faucet, I headed back upstairs to give Tia her drink before going back to my empty bed. I tossed and turned, trying to get comfortable. I'd convinced myself that sleeping alone was the right thing to do, but in the depths of night I couldn't help but wish Leo's warm body was wrapped around mine.

Leo

A week ago, I’d thought I’d gotten under Lola’s skin. I’d pushed her and she’d responded the way I’d hoped she would. It had been an intense night as we laid out the past and found satisfaction in each other's arms, but she hadn’t let me stay. And since that night, she’d been careful to not give me another opportunity. Fumbling through the folder at the back of the letter file with agitated fingers, I darted glances to the stairs in case she came down from her shower. The envelope was still there, the top torn open, the papers resting in front of it. Quickly, I flipped through the pages. There wasn’t much. A fairly simple divorce outline compared to the one I’d shredded weeks ago. While I'd wanted to protect my assets from the money hungry con artist I'd convinced myself she was, she wanted nothing from me, other than to let her go.

But the signature lines remained blank. Perhaps her sister was behind this. Mellie certainly couldn't stand me and took every opportunity to remind me that I was an asshole.  

I shoved them back where I’d found them when I heard her footsteps thudding on the stairs. It niggled at me that even if she hadn't been the one to initiate the papers, she still had them. Was she considering signing them? How long did I have before she signed me out of her life?  

"Thanks for staying while I got cleaned up." Lola braided her hair loosely over her shoulder.

I wanted to tangle my fingers through it, pull her against me, and use my mouth on her skin to convince her to rip up those papers. Instead, I shoved my hands in my pockets and shrugged. "No problem."

"Say goodbye to your father, Tia." Lola nudged our daughter.

Tia looked up from her drawing. "Bye, Daddy. I’ll see you tomorrow."

"Yeah, tomorrow." I gave her a quick hug, careful not to let her note the tension in my arms. For a five year old, she was perceptive, but she didn’t need to know how tentative the relationship between her parents was. "Love you, princess."

I stalked out of the house and across to my bike. All Lola had to do was ask me to stay and I’d never let her go again. More than that, I wanted to pack my girls up and take them home. If she said the word, I’d have her moved in the blink of the eye.

I couldn’t hate Mike. I owed him more than most, but she didn’t belong with him. She belonged with me, always had, even when all I’d wanted to do was throw her ass up in the air and take my belt to her, I’d known that. It was what had kept me from forcing her to leave and it was what had kept me from physically hurting her when my anger got too much, except for the night I’d tried to say goodbye.

The bike’s motor screamed out my frustration as I hit open road. No matter how I’d tried to convince my mind that we were better off apart, it didn’t hold, not when my soul recognized her as mine. If only that night hadn’t ended so brutally. If only I hadn’t been so focused on wanting her out of my life, I would have seen that it wasn’t what I wanted at all. That my gut instinct was to believe what she told me. I’d fought her because I hadn’t wanted to hurt at her hands again.

Oh the irony. Not only had I hurt her hands, but now, she was the one who wasn’t willing to take a chance. We’d had six years of a marriage where we’d spent far more time apart than together, yet neither of us had actively sought to end it. So why, after all that, was she still holding onto the papers that would leave her free of me?

I pulled into the car park of the local hangout, Blazer’s and stormed inside. As soon as Tia’s bedtime had passed, I would go back over there and get the answers I needed. We’d wasted enough time, and I wasn’t going to waste any more.

The bar was unpopulated at this time of night and I thumped down on a stool, calling for a whiskey from the bartender restocking the shelves. Sitting there, I nursed that bloody whisky until it warmed as I rehearsed what I was going to say to her.  

When I couldn’t stand it any longer, when the creep of energy under my skin had my teeth on edge, I tossed down the last of the whisky and went outside for a cigarette. The nicotine cravings had lessened, but old habits were hard to break when I was frustrated.  Lola needed to make up her mind one way or another. I had to know if I was chasing ghosts. I tossed the cigarette, crushed it into the ground with my heel and strode toward the bike. She’d fought hard for me when I wouldn’t give her an inch of ground. I’d fight harder to get my woman back. Climbing on the bike, I revved it, letting the back wheel spin out as I turned sharply on the loose gravel and headed toward her house.

I banged on the front door, and then put my fist to it again. She knew the sound of my bike, so if she didn’t answer soon I’d forget about waiting to be let in.

The door opened. "Leo, what are you doing back?"

I advanced on her and she took several steps back, while the door closed behind us. Grasping her waist, I held her locked in my gaze. "Lola, what do you want?"

Her eyes were huge, shifting between blue and gray. "What are you doing here, Leo?"

Pacing a tight circle, I scrubbed a hand over my beard. "Less than a week ago, you were wrapped around me. Now, you’re pretending like it never happened. I need to know what you want."

"I don’t know."

Each step I took was one she took back, our gazes locked, our breathing in sync until we hit the landing, her back against the wall, my arms trapping her against me. "Sure you do." I nipped at her throat. "You want me to drag you into that room and crawl inside you. You want to feel my hands all over you."

Her breathing got sharper. "Yes."

My body itched to do just that. To haul her onto my shoulder and throw her onto the bed, but until she gave me a sign that it would be more than fucking, I wouldn’t move from where we were. "I told you I wouldn’t settle for less than every night."

"I can’t give you that." She dipped her glance to her hands on my chest.

"Not yet, maybe. But soon?" I hooked a finger under her chin and lifted her gaze back to mine.

"Why Leo, why are you pushing this? Why can’t we be happy as we are?" she pleaded, her eyes clouded.

"Are you happy?" A growl rose in my throat, my chest aching at the question I needed to ask. I counted to five in my head and took a deep breath to steady myself. "Because I’m not, and knowing you’re still thinking about signing those damn papers…"

"Yes, I have the papers, Leo." The blood drained from her face as she shook her head. "I don’t know what I’m going to do with them. I don’t know whether we can be more than what we are right now."

Again, her gaze dropped, despite my hold on her jaw. I tilted my head until I got in her line of sight. "We can. We could be so much more if you’d let go."

"How am I supposed to do that?" Her hands fluttered above my chest while she raised and dropped her shoulders. She plucked at my thin cotton T-shirt. "It’s not like we’re only making choices for ourselves."

She still used our daughter as an excuse. Yes, I wanted what was best for our girl, but couldn’t Lola see that was her and I, together? "Then tell me, if it was only you and me—"

"But it isn’t, and I don’t have the answers you want."

She could fight me on this until she was blue in the face, but the way she settled in my arms, and the longing in her gaze told me I could convince her. Trapping her wrist between my fingers, I dragged her into the room where we’d spent hours together the other night. "I do. I have the answers, sweetheart."

Stripping off my T-Shirt, I pulled her close, moving her palm over my chest. "You asked me why I got this. And I asked you if it mattered."

"It doesn’t." She worried that perfect pout of hers.

"I think it does."

"Then why, Leo? Did you hate me so much you had to ink your chest to remind you every damn day?"

"No, sweetheart. I inked you over my heart, because you took it with you. You shocked the hell out of me, turning up out of the blue and reminded me of all the pain I went through when I lost you, but that didn’t change the fact you still held me captive."

"All the pretty words." Under the veil of her hair, her mouth tugged up at the corners.

"True words, Lola. Maybe I got lost in the haze of the pain and anger your disappearance caused, but I’m here now and I’m not going anywhere."  

"For now."

"No, for the rest of our lives. You’ll work it out soon." I cupped her cheek, brushed my thumb over her jaw. "Let me remind you of how good we are together."

Her fingers curled in the smatter of hair in the center of my chest as I took her mouth, devouring her slowly, and savoring her sweet, coffee infused taste. Darting her tongue over mine, she gave in to me, and a groan rumbled through my chest at the sensual intimacy of her surrender. The fight that had filled our fucking was replaced with desperation. Tearing at each other, clothes flew as our feverish fingers popped buttons and snaps. Black lace shredded between my fingers, her arousal coating them.

Gripping her ass, I hauled her into my arms. "I’ll fight to have you in my arms, in my bed, Lola."

Her lips covered mine, her arms strangling me as she flicked her tongue into my mouth and seated herself above the head of my cock. It jerked, pulsed with the craving to sink into her already. The heat of her made a groan rumble through my chest, and she pushed her tongue further into my mouth. We tangled a fast and frenzied dance of lips, tongues, and teeth.

The wall was right behind me and it would have been easy to spin around and lean her against it while I slipped inside her, but I wanted to give her more than that. I wanted to pull her apart over and over again. Crossing the room, I pushed her down on the bed and spread her legs apart while she gripped the corded muscle of my shoulders. Her thighs were soaked with her arousal, the scent of her a heady thing that drew me in. I plunged fingers between her slick pussy lips and felt her squirm beneath me, her hips bucking to pull them deeper. Firm flesh swollen and ripe reacted to my touch, and a shudder surged through her when I brushed my thumb over her clit. "I love your fucking pussy, sweetheart, and the way you’re always so eager for me to be inside you."

Slow circles over the kernel of her nerves while I kept up the rhythm of my fingers inside her had her keening and her hips undulating. She rose and dipped beneath my fingers. I wanted to be able to touch her like this every day and every night, hell, whenever I wanted, not only when the craving got too much that we could no longer hold back. Back arching off the bed, she fell apart in my hands. Dragging it out, I watched her face tighten, and her eyes squeeze shut as her lips parted, before her entire body relaxed. Her sex face was something I would never get over.

She opened her eyes and rose up on her elbows, a slight smile playing around her lips, her chest rising and falling with short shallow breaths. The bed tempted me, made me want to settle beside her, pull her on top of me and watch her face all over again. Taking my hand, she threaded our fingers together and pulled me down on top of her. "Lay here with me for just a minute."

"Are you spent?" I brushed the hair from her face and gazed into her eyes.

"Hardly." Her grin was instantaneous, lighting me up inside. "But, we have all night and more."

I cupped her face in my palms. "Every damn day."

"We have time." She pulled her knees up to cradle my hips, holding me in an intimate embrace.

Breathing synchronized, bodies melded together, she ran her hands down my back, leaving a trail of ecstasy beneath my skin. A purr filled my chest, rolled around in my throat, while she flattened her palms against my hips and rose up to take me inside her. Sliding into her was a slow dance of exquisite torture. The heat of her inner walls as they worked to take me deeper flooded my senses.

I dipped down to kiss her, soft tongue thrusts and the salty sweetness of the connection between us kept me grounded when all I wanted to do was surge forward, hammer into her willing pussy, and find release. A quick roll had her on top of me, her knees digging into the mattress while she moved her hips with fluid grace. Palms pressed to my chest, she straddled me, pulling me deeper into her tight core, rising and falling on my length. The sweet slap of her ass against my tight balls had me breathing faster. Our gazes connected and locked while she rode me. Her whimpers filled the silence between us, and in my chest, a roar took over. This was my girl, my wife, my always. Gripping her hips, I arched up to taste the salt on her supple flesh, and felt her shudder as I dragged a dusky nipple between my teeth. Breath hitched, her face tensed, and then she was lost in her orgasm, lost in the motion that kept her sliding up and down my cock. Her body crumpled forward as she cried out, and I thrust into her harder, sustaining the orgasm and finding my own. My cock pulsed as I released inside her, holding her to me even after we were done.

Afterward, I rolled us onto our side, and pulled her tight against me. Watching her fall asleep in my arms made my chest tighten, a lump form in my throat. Brushing the hair from her face, I rested my nose against hers. This was home. I didn’t know how I could have ever doubted that.