Her Secret Lover (What Happens in Vegas) (9 page)

Micah added a finger to his attention, pushing it inside her hot cleft and finding her hot and soft and ready for him. But he wanted her to come first because the first time would not be gentle; there was no way in hell he could guarantee that. He continued to kiss her folds, with slow, dragging licks of his tongue that spread around her delicious lube. He applied himself to his task, reveling in the way she moved underneath him, the grinding twist of her hips against his mouth as she sought to take what she wanted, no longer patient to wait.

“Yeah, Kelsey. Take what you need. Use me to feel good,” he murmured against her skin and then transferred his focus to her clit.

She thrashed a little underneath him, her hands in his hair, tugging and pulling him even closer to the
V
between her thighs and then she went bowstring taut. Her entire body was arching up toward the moonlight, and he angled his head to see it all: the elegant bend of her body, the sharp, tight peaks of her breasts thrusting upward.

“Oh. My. Fucking. God.” Her cry was deep, guttural as she came, loud in the hush of the secluded courtyard.

He kissed his way up her body, lingering in the dips and hollows, licking the soft curves until he could cover her mouth with his. She opened to him, her hands touching everywhere she could reach as if the orgasm had only sparked her appetite and not satisfied her hunger. Good. He wanted her as desperate for him as he was for her.

She trailed her fingers down his chest, lingering over his nipples with feather-light swirls that made him gasp, and then lower until her fingers closed around him again. Micah pulled back enough to look at her, their mouths still glancing against each other as he almost lost himself in the wicked, hot depths of her eyes.

“That was…” she whispered, her voice shaky and uneven. She licked her lips as her hand began a slow stroke that he pumped into. “I want more.”

“Greedy girl.” He chuckled, breaking off when her thumb swiped the sensitive head of his cock. “I’ll give you more. Anything you want as long as it is done with me inside you, deep and hard.”

“Yes.” She nodded, releasing her hold on him as he leaned over to snag his jeans and pull them over.

He fished the couple of condoms out of his pocket and then lifted her slightly to place the denim under her back and hips.

“Here?” she asked, her eyes on him as he opened the packet and rolled the condom down his shaft.

“Yeah. Fucking here. You okay with that?” Micah looked up at her, his hand idly gripping his length and stepped in closer until he could rub the tip of his penis up and down the wet length of her sex. She moaned and pushed back in a rhythm that was only calculated to get him to stop teasing her and get inside her.

He could definitely oblige.

Micah pushed inside her, the heat of her tight body searing him through the latex and pulling him like a man starved after too many days in the desert. Her body was lush, giving, slick and tight, and he could not resist. She spread her legs further, lifting her hips up to meet his thrust and he slid home in one long push.

“Goddamn, Kelsey. You feel like a dream.”

“You’re awake,” she said, her hands skimming over the skin of his chest, down his arms, and up to tangle in his wet hair. He leaned into her touch, soaking up every sensation as he immersed all of his senses into this moment with her.

Micah slid out of her body until only the tip of him remained inside her. They stared at each other, his body shaking with the effort to make this connection last before he lost what little control he had left.

She grabbed his hips, her fingers digging into his skin, emphasizing her urgent plea. “Please, Micah. Move. Fill me up. Please.”

It was the permission he needed to give in to his own raging lust, and he surged forward, pulling out and gritting his teeth at the clinging caress of her channel. He leaned over her, hands braced on the concrete on each side of her head, the position keeping them eye-to-eye as he covered her with his body and thrust deep. She jerked out a shuddery sob each time he snapped his hips and sank into her heat.

The combination of her desperate sounds and the way her body opened to him was enough to get him to the edge and keep him there, hovering so close to coming that his vision went dark on the edges. It was her second orgasm that tipped him over. He watched, mesmerized by her soundless abandonment to her pleasure, the jerk of her hips against his own as she squeezed her breasts and nipples and came all over his cock.

“Fuck, you’re gorgeous. Fuck.” He leaned down and took her mouth, half panting and half moaning as he drove in deep and spent himself in a long, toe-curling orgasm. He fucked into her body, continuing the hard thrust as he rode it out, extending it for as long as he could because the thought of having to leave her slick, hot, wet, yielding body made him ache. “Take me. Take it.”

“Yes. Yes.” Kelsey chanted in a loop of half words and raged breaths as she collapsed against the pool deck in a boneless heap.

Micah lowered himself, maintaining as much full-body contact as he could while he greedily explored her mouth. He did not want this to end, the aftershocks of pleasure causing his cock to pulse inside her in a valiant effort to make a repeat performance. Kelsey kissed him back, her hands looping around his neck, fingers lightly tracing the slope of his shoulders as they came down from the contact high of skin-on-skin.

“Are you okay?” he asked, lifting his head to look into her eyes. She was slow to meet his gaze, her eyes unfocused when she finally did meet his own. “You good?”

“Don’t sell yourself short. That was perfect,” she said. She stretched out, her arms extending out as he slipped from her body. Micah admired the long, toned line of her body, and he suddenly didn’t want the night to end. “We need to do that in a bed next time. I want to ride you, but not on this concrete.”

Micah chuckled, reaching out his hand to help her up. “Is that an invitation to stay?”

He had no idea if their arrangement allowed for sleepovers, but he hoped it did.

“This might be temporary, but I’m a better hostess than to come and then kick you out.” She walked over to her pile of clothes and bent over to pick them up. The position gave him an excellent view of her tight ass, and he knew that the next round would involve him driving into her from behind with that view on display. His cock started to harden, wholeheartedly agreeing to his plan.

Micah covered the distance, intending to tell her exactly what he planned when three loud, drunken voices popped up at the security gate to the courtyard. The low rumble of Aiden’s voice told him her friends had departed the club earlier than expected. Kelsey’s head whipped up, her eyes wide with shock and alarm.

“Oh crap.” She scooped her clothes up and gestured toward a doorway to the left of the pool. She dropped her bra and had to scrabble for it again as a laugh burst from her mouth. “Move it, or my friends are going to get an up-close-and-personal view of your junk.”

“What? Are you afraid that if they get a look at my personal assets you might have a fight on your hands?” He grabbed his own pile of clothes, having to snag his Converse twice before he got a solid grip on them and followed her in a mad dash for the shadows near her door and the safety inside her place.

Kelsey fumbled with her keys, looking over her shoulder as the shouts and laughter of her best friends got closer and closer. She flashed a glance at him, her grin wide, cheeky, and oh so naughty. He loved it.

“And for the record, there would be no fights. I don’t share. No matter how temporary the arrangement is.”

He blinked, his dick getting harder at the sound of possession in her voice. He could handle the lust but it was the surge of ownership in his own gut when he thought of her with another guy. Micah pushed it down and cleared his voice before answering her.

“No sharing. I’m on board with that.”

“Good.” She pushed the door open and crooked a finger for him to follow. “Drop your clothes on the floor. You won’t be needing them anymore tonight.”

Chapter Eleven

It was way too early to be up.

The smell of brewing coffee teased Kelsey as she rolled over in her bed, burying her head under her pillow with a groan. But she was up now, the lure of liquid caffeine drawing her out of her sleepy haze. She reached out and snagged her phone from the nightstand and looked at the screen, wincing at the crazy time of the morning. They’d gone to sleep a couple of hours earlier, exhausted after three rounds of the best sex of her life.

She stretched, tossing her phone back toward the general direction of the side table, not caring when it missed and made a loud
thunk
on the floor. In spite of the early hour, she felt too good to care. Her body ached in that way that gives you a secret smile all day when you remember every kiss and thrust and clench from a night of being well used. She let the memories of the night before roll through her mind as the tingles and shivers passed over her skin, and she smiled the smug smile of the thoroughly fucked.

It was times like this that she wondered why she waited so long between bed partners.

The sound of ceramic mugs being placed on the tiled surface in her kitchen was the motivation she needed to go seek out her current bedmate, that and the potent brew that would be the only thing to get her through the day on so little sleep. Kelsey reached out and snagged her short, kimono-styled silk robe off the bench at the foot of the bed and slipped it on. She made her way down the short hallway to the kitchen, surprised when she didn’t find Micah in that end of the room.

Her place wasn’t huge, so it took only a quick scan to locate him, bent over at the waist, tight ass showcased in his jeans and his cut back muscles left exposed as he peered down at the photos lined up on her bookcases. She watched him for a few moments, noticing his intense interest, the way he reached out and touched certain photographs with soft, lingering swipes of his finger. Her gut twisted a little with the knowledge that he was seeing her life
…
her real life
…
and she knew questions would follow. Questions she wasn’t used to answering from the guys she slept with.

That’s what she got for bringing him home with her. It wasn’t that she hadn’t calculated it in her tally of just how bad an idea this really was. Her final calculation had placed it somewhere between the zombie apocalypse and her unfortunate attempt at pixie haircut in the ninth grade, but it hadn’t stopped her. Getting involved with a tourist. Getting involved with a guest at the hotel. She’d known that unless she booted him out the door in the wee hours of the morning, he would get a peek behind the curtain. Taking him to some random hotel hadn’t appealed at all, and that feeling had overridden her desire to keep him at an arm’s length.

She ducked behind the breakfast bar not even trying to be quiet as she picked up the mug Micah had placed on the counter and poured a cup of the hot stuff. When she turned, he was standing in the same place, a soft smile on his lips as he stared at her. He was hot with his dark hair rumpled and his eyes warm but also heavy with his own lack of sleep.

“Good morning,” he said, tracking her with his eyes as she made her way across the room to stand next to him.

“It is morning but it’s too early to be good,” she said, hoping the smile she could feel tugging at her mouth would take away any of the sting from her words.

It didn’t appear to deter Micah as he leaned in and pressed his lips against hers in a kiss as sweet as the sugar she never took in her coffee. His flesh was warm and soft against her own, and she didn’t even notice that she was leaning into him, following the lead of his hand which was suddenly cupping the back of her neck. Fuck, but he killed her with his kisses. He was world-class, stellar, toe-curlingly good.

Every kiss flared the passion between them again as it had after round two early this morning. In the only attempt for him to leave, Micah had kissed her, intending it to be good-bye, and it had left them sweaty and wrapped up in each other on the rug in her bedroom.

“Does that improve your assessment of the morning being ‘good’?” Micah asked, his breath warm on her cheek as he skimmed along her skin, stopping only to deliver a tender bite against the skin of her neck.

Kelsey shivered, laughing softly as he leaned his forehead on her shoulder and the seconds passed by them in a comfortable way she didn’t have with many people. Micah was a surprise, one that pleased and puzzled her, as she tried to keep their relationship in the right box. The sex part was easy but the compatibility, the easy way between them was harder to pigeonhole.

Micah lifted his head, turning back to the bookcase while taking a sip of his coffee. He gestured toward a photo of her parents taken about five years ago on the back patio of the house. Her mom was in her father’s lap as usual, since they couldn’t be in the same space without touching each other.

“Are these your folks?” He glanced back at her. “You look like your mom.”

Kelsey hesitated to answer, her first inclination to suggest that she call him a cab to go back to the hotel, and it must have been written all over her face because he quickly backtracked.

“Did I ask the wrong thing?” He stepped away, running his free hand through his hair with more embarrassment than irritation. “I’m not sure where the boundaries are here, Kelsey.”

Defensiveness rose up in her chest, and her words flew out of her mouth much harsher than she intended. “The boundaries are easy. This is temporary. We have sex. You leave. I stay.”

“So, is asking questions about family off-limits? I can go down on you for hours, but I can’t ask about a photo in your living room?” He stared her down and she shuffled a little on her bare feet with the intensity of his stare. “I know this is what it is, but we’ve been friendly enough so far without causing any type of international incident. If I wanted a girl to let me fuck her, I could have rented one of those by the hour.”

When he put it that way, it sounded ridiculous. It wasn’t like they hadn’t talked before about things in their lives, she’d taken him to meet her friends. She liked Micah. It didn’t have to change the rules to tell him about a damn photo.

“You’re right.” She offered up a smile and reached for the photo, handing it over to him. “I’m just
…
twitchy.”

“Twitchy,” he said, his expression and his tone flat with a hint of confused.

“Yeah, twitchy. You make me twitchy.”

“I’m presuming that isn’t as bad as it sounds since you let me make you feel other things at least five times last night.” His smirk was back, and Kelsey wondered again how he could be so laid-back and easy to talk to.

“You make all of this too easy,” she said, waiting to see if he understood what she was really saying. Micah stared at her for a couple of beats, his eyes assessing her and then warming with his understanding and agreement. “
That
makes me twitchy.”

He broke eye contact first, and she felt the loss of the warmth in his deep brown eyes, but she also felt relief. Shit was getting way too serious in here.

“Yeah, I know what you mean. The rules don’t cover everything going on here between us,” he murmured while still gazing down at the photograph. She struggled with how to answer that, but he wasn’t expecting one and didn’t leave her any space to fill. “They are a beautiful couple together.”

She looked at the photo, one of her favorites, and she knew what he saw. Her father was a large man with gorgeous dark skin and his hair cut very short, smile wide and open. Her mother was tall as well, her skin a stunning mocha shade that was beautifully matched by her coppery, butterscotch eyes, her dark hair long and curly. Kelsey was a perfect mix of her parents with her skin a deep caramel, her father’s copper brown eyes, and her mom’s dimpled grin.

“They were so much in love, best friends, but they could fight over politics like the world was on fire. They took great pride in canceling out each other’s votes, but they both adored Japanese food and agreed on how to put the toilet paper on the bar thingy.”

“You put it on there so that the TP rolls down from the top.”

She grinned at him, patting him on the head like an obedient pet. “Exactly.”

Micah shook off her touch with a grin and a roll of his eyes. “Your parents sound like mine. They make you believe that all that stuff I write about is possible.”

“My folks had it. I’d bet all the money in Vegas on that fact.”

She knew that her tone gave away her own wistfulness over ever having that kind of love in her own life. She didn’t really care right now. She wanted it. Who wouldn’t?

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know your mother had passed,” he said, watching her intently. “I hope I didn’t bring up a tough subject for you to talk about.”

Kelsey squirmed, realizing too late that she’d caused his misunderstanding and walked right into a part of her life that was difficult to share with her best friends, much less an almost stranger. But none of her warning bells had gone off when they’d moved to the topic of family with Micah.

“She’s still alive,” she said and for a split second she thought about covering it up and telling him she’d misspoken, but she didn’t want to do that. She wanted to tell him about this part of her life. As usual, talking with him was like talking with someone she’d known forever. This guy was different, and she was glad he was leaving on Sunday or she could be in big trouble. “She’s suffering from early onset dementia and has been in a nursing care facility for eighteen months. It’s a toss-up on any given day if she even knows who I am. She remembers my dad more often.”

“Oh,” Micah said, his gaze fixed on her own as he obviously struggled to figure out what to say. She opened her mouth to spare him the effort but he beat her to it, and what he said had her stepping closer and letting him put his arms around her and drag her to him in a loose but warm embrace. “That’s got to be even harder on you, to see her still here but know that inside she’s lost.”

How did he know? How did he have any idea what kept her up nights and had her weeping in the hallway outside her mom’s room so her dad didn’t see?

“My dad has it worse. He misses his best friend,” she murmured, her face buried in the dip of his shoulder, his warm skin and scent washing over her in silent comfort. “But he says that we at least have the memories she’s lost. We have that comfort, and she
…
doesn’t. We loved each other, laughed a lot, and supported each other.”

“It sounds like you had a happy childhood,” Micah said, his voice low and soothing as it vibrated against her cheek. She looked at him, wondering how he made that accurate leap from all the heavy stuff she said. He must have read her thoughts because he chuckled and took the photo from her, running his thumb across the glass. “I’m not one of those guys on the Strip who reads mind. It wasn’t much of a leap to know that a kid who grows up knowing her parents love each other that much is likely to have a happy childhood.”

“You speak like you know from experience.”

“I do. My folks sound like your parents. I always had the security of knowing they adored each other. That makes a kid secure and happy. It set the bar pretty high for my own marriage.”

She remembered that he was divorced, but he’d never spoken about it in the press, so she wasn’t sure how big a failure his marriage really was. All she could do was ask, and if he told her that it was none of her business, fair enough. This thing between them was in a weird space, and they were negotiating its terms minute-by-minute it seemed.

“And your marriage? How far off the mark was it?”

...

Micah released his hold on Kelsey and placed her photograph back on the shelf, turning his body so she couldn’t see his face clearly. It was a move calculated to give him some privacy from her prying question, even though he knew he was going to answer. It hadn’t been easy for Kelsey to share that fact about her mom, and the least he could do was return the show of trust.

“Well, since I count being faithful as one of those basic things to make a marriage successful, I’d say we missed the mark pretty spectacularly,” he said on a sigh that rumbled down deep in his gut. When would the knowledge of what happened stop making him feel like shit?

“She had to be crazy. Who would cheat on you?” Kelsey clapped her mouth shut pretty quickly, her expression telling him that she blurted it out before she could stop herself. It gave away more of her feelings about him than she really wanted to reveal, but that was okay by him. He liked Kelsey, and he was glad to know she liked him, too, even if they couldn’t keep each other.

He laughed a little before he launched into his answer, the taste of it both bitter and sweet on his tongue.

“We were sweethearts from elementary school, married right after high school, and then I went to boot camp. I don’t think either of us was prepared for life in the military much less being married. We had never lived anywhere but Bridger Gap, and suddenly she was left alone on a military base with nobody while I was halfway across the world.”

He was trying to a gentleman, to be fair. Yes, Becky was the one who broke the vow, but he hadn’t been that great a husband, putting the Corps before her in everything and not really sympathizing when she’d told him how lonely she was and asked to go back home while he was deployed. Looking back on that time, it felt like two kids playing at being grown-ups.

Kelsey wasn’t so understanding, and she didn’t hide her irritation on his behalf. “It’s not like it was a huge surprise either. Everyone knows what being a member of the military means these days. It’s no picnic for anybody.”

“I’m not making excuses for her. Becky cheated on me with a guy I’d been friends with since we were in diapers, and that shit hurt,” he said, his tone carrying more of an edge than it should after all this time. “I woke up in the hospital in Germany with a head injury from the IED and my parents were there with the news that my wife wasn’t going to be waiting for me when I got home.”

“She didn’t even tell you herself?” Now Kelsey was pissed and he couldn’t help but admire the way her cheeks flushed pink when she was angry. It was cute and sexy and made him want to pick her up and carry her back to bed. “There is being young and there is being a cowardly bitch, and I know where I put the former Mrs. Holmes right now.”