Submission Moves: An MMA Romance (18 page)

This is a fucking terrible idea.
 

He didn’t know if it was a sense of self-preservation or maybe just plain common sense that was speaking. Either way, he shrugged it off. This was different. He and Rose were different. What they had didn’t come along very often, and four years apart couldn’t kill it. That alone made it worth pursuing. She just needed to get used to him, get used to having him around and being a part of her life. He just needed time to convince her. He’d take it any way he could, any time he could.

“We have time right now to not be friends, I think.” He tugged her arm and had her across his lap. He reclined her body and brought his mouth down on hers for a kiss.

Rose was still too stunned to do anything but lay pliant in his arms as his tongue stroked inside her mouth.
 

What the heck just happened here?
 

She thought she’d just told him she was afraid of getting too attached. She meant to ask him to be careful not to lead
her
on. But he took it the other way around. Rose was flabbergasted. First of all, she would never be that presumptuous and arrogant. Second, the thought of Niccolo Rossi not being able to help but fall in love with her was laughable. Utterly ridiculous. He seemed to think so too, judging from how funny he found it. She tried not to take offense, she really did. But the look of incredible relief on his face when he thought she told him that all she wanted was sex was a little insulting.
He was a guy alright,
she thought with equal parts disappointment, regret, and relief.
 
 

Nevertheless, she ought to set him straight. This was her fault. She shouldn’t have been vague with her pronouns. She braced her palms on his shoulders and pushed him away. She started to speak, but Nick beat her to it.

“I got one condition.”

Oh, now
he
has a condition?
Rose kept her mouth shut out of spite.

“I don’t want you hooking up with other guys. I don’t share, Rosie. I’m no one’s side piece.” He kissed the tip of her nose. “The same goes for me. I won’t see anyone else.”

“Oh, well…” It never even
occurred
to her to see anyone else. There
was
no one else. He, on the other hand, probably had tons of options, and she didn’t think she had any right to demand exclusivity. Yet he was the one who was insisting on it. She felt her heart swell with gratitude, which was dumb. She was feeling grateful because Nick didn’t want to fuck anyone else for the time being. This was an all-time low even for her.

And this was why she didn’t believe in casual sex, despite having friends that swore by its many benefits. She knew firsthand how sex turned people stupid and left them at the mercy of the other. It was all a game of one-upmanship, and up until recently, she’d refused to play.

It was too late,
she realized. She was already at his mercy. But Nick didn’t know that. It gave her some comfort to know that she’d get out of this with her pride intact.
       

“Now, where were we?” Nick whispered with a smile as he slipped his hand under her skirt. Rose watched as his eyes grew wide and his mouth fell open.
 

“Rosie, Rosie, Rosie,” he said, amused and unmistakably turned on. “Why aren’t you wearing any panties?”        

Rose felt her face grow beet red. She stifled an embarrassed laugh and hid her face on his chest. “I was. I just took it off while I was waiting for you.” She sighed softly as Nick stroked the inside of her thigh.
Her predicament was certainly not without perks,
she thought, her body quivering at his touch

“So you planned all this?” he said, smiling. “To seduce me in a gym full of people in the middle of the day? That’s so naughty.”

“No!” Rose exclaimed, laughing. “I was just taking precautions. I figured it was safer in my purse in case you…” She shrugged helplessly. “You go into beast mode and rip it off me when we…” She trailed off again, letting a pointed look fill in the rest. “I have half a dozen meetings today. I can’t go commando.”

Nick eased her off his lap and got up to lock the door. He sat back down and motioned for her to get on top of him. She straddled him carefully, as best as her slim skirt would allow. Getting impatient, he bunched her skirt up around her waist and pulled her down on his lap.
 

He pushed the hem of her top up. “Damn, I missed these,” he said, popping her bra open and letting her breasts tumble into his large palms. Rose did that magic ninja thing that girls did and took her bra off without removing her top. He licked his lips, fully intent on making the most out of his all-access pass. He leaned forward and bit her.
 

She let out a shrill scream of surprise.
 

He clamped his hand over her mouth, laughing and shaking his head. The room was not designed to keep noise out or in. He could hear muffled conversations and laughter from the outside. He was sure that if Rose started screaming or making all those sexy sounds she made during sex, the whole gym would know what they were up to. “Rosie, you gotta keep it down.” When she nodded in promise, he let her go.

He reached into a drawer for a box of Monster Condoms. An unopened box, she looked happy to note. They fumbled with his clothes and with the rubber with hands made clumsy with urgency. When their bodies were finally connected, they both groaned and stayed still like that for several seconds. She had her arms around him while his face was buried in the crook of her neck, inhaling her clean scent and revelling at how
fucking
right they felt together.

Rose’s arms instinctively tightened when his hands moved to cup her ass. He adjusted her angle and seated her higher. Urged on by his hands, she started to ride him. Slow, at first, then faster once she found her position and rhythm. Her mind went blank. The whole world was reduced to the man she held in her arms and the hard length slipping in and out of her. Nothing else mattered. Not the loud voices or the music coming from the outside or any of the worries she came there with. She was so wound up it didn’t take long for her to feel her release mounting.
 

Without warning, Nick flipped her onto her back, brought her legs together, and hooked them over his shoulder. “This way, I can go as hard as I want,” he whispered.
 

Her brows shot up. She didn’t know he’d been holding back on her. But the moment he began moving, Rose understood what he meant. With her legs together and her thighs bearing the brunt of his force, he was free to be as aggressive as he wanted to be. Each powerful thrust of his hips reminded Rose of just how much stronger and bigger he was. Nick could really hurt her, do anything he wanted with her, and there wasn’t a damn thing she could or would do about it because she was a girl—a small, stupid girl at that.
 

Maybe it was the change in her breathing or the way her eyes glazed over, but Nick seemed to sense that something was not quite right.
 

“Rosie, look at me,” he told her. “Look at me, baby.”

She obeyed, forcing her focus back on him and giving him a shaky smile to let him know she was okay. He continued pumping into her, hitting a spot inside that shot tingles down her legs and made her muscles clench involuntarily.

Her body tensed and she came with a silent scream and with eyes wide open. It shocked her. It was fierce, violent, unexpected and, with Nick watching her come apart and her looking into his eyes, way more intimate than she was prepared for.
 

His climax quickly followed and he came the same way, looking right at her. He collapsed on top of her before turning them on their side and wrapping her in his arms. Slowly, she surfaced, feeling Nick’s stubbly jaw nuzzling the side of her face.

      A flood of embarrassment came with Rose’s sense of awareness. Reeling from what she’d just experienced, she had been clutching him like her life depended on it. What the heck was wrong with her? How the heck did they end up naked and entwined on his couch? She just wasn’t herself when she was around him, that was for certain. Immediately, she loosened her grip on him and tried to turn away, but he held on fast. After a half-hearted show of resistance, she gave up with a loud sigh and buried her face in the crook of his arm. A little cuddling never hurt anybody, right?

CHAPTER 18

“What time’s your meeting?” Nick asked as they emerged from the tiny en-suite bathroom.

“Fifteen minutes ago,” Rose said with a resigned sigh, glancing at the clock on the wall. “And it’s all the way across town. I didn’t mean to stay this long.” She fished out her panties from her purse and slipped it back on. “I guess they just have to get on without me. Anyway, Anna’s there so…” she trailed off.

“Sorry I made you miss it,” he said with a mischievous smirk that belied just how sorry he was. He picked up her discarded bra off the floor and tossed it to her after lacing up the drawstring of his track pants. “And the meeting after that? What time is it?”

“In a couple of hours.”

“We got time then. Why don’t you stay for a bit?” He wiggled his dark brows at her suggestively. “We can hang out.”

“Hang out?” She shot him a look of pure misgiving.

As if she hadn’t been riding his dick only moments ago
, he thought. This woman sure was weird. She showed more reluctance at such a harmless suggestion. “Rose, I’ve never kicked a woman out right after sex,” he said. “That’s not very…nice.”

She lifted her chin defiantly. “Please don’t do
me
any favors. I’m perfectly fine with—”

“It’s not a favor.
I
want it, okay?” He sighed and shoved a hand through his hair. They were basking in a post-sex haze, and if there ever was an excusable time to act all corny and shit, this was it. He sat on the couch and beckoned her closer.

She joined him after much hesitation and shrieked when he pulled her across his lap and tucked her under his chin. He brushed his knuckles along her spine until she let out a soft sigh and cuddled closer to him.
 

“You call this hanging out?” she asked with a smile in her voice.
 

Nick kissed the crown of her head in response and inwardly congratulated himself at how good he was getting at breaching her defenses.
 

Just as he felt her relax completely, her phone rang and she jumped up in surprise and scrambled off his lap. She took her phone out of her purse and swore softly when she got a look at the screen.
 

He laughed. Rose hardly ever swore. It was actually cute, as long as he wasn’t on the receiving end of it.
 

She signalled for him to keep quiet as she took the call. “Hi, Mom,” she said into the phone, glaring at Nick, who scooted close to eavesdrop and didn’t bother disguising it.

A shrill, female voice on the other end of the line replied.
 

“Rose, the country club ball is tomorrow. I hope you haven’t forgotten. I’ve already picked out your dress and I’ll have it sent over tonight, so don’t you dare try giving me the excuse of not having anything to wear.”

Rose groaned and slapped her palm to her forehead. “I haven’t forgotten.”

“Oh, and I saw Rob yesterday. He said he called you several times but you never got back to him.”
 

“Knock it off with Rob, Mom. I mean it,” Rose said, shuddering.

Interesting,
Nick thought. There had to be a story there. He quirked a questioning brow at her, which she dismissed with a shake of her head.

“So who are you taking as a date? You’re still registered with a plus one. Honestly, Rose, it’s very rude to ruin the seating arrangement for everyone else because you’re too lazy to get yourself an escort.”

Their exchange went on for a while with Rose growing more visibly stressed and irritable by the second. Nick rubbed her back to soothe her, and she gave him a small, grateful smile.
 

“Are your parents divorced?” he asked when Rose finally got her mom off the line.

“They never married. I have no contact with my biological father,” she replied, voice carefully devoid of emotion.

“Pat never legally adopted you?”

She gave a sad shake of her head. “I really wish he had. But my mom wouldn’t let him.”
 

“How come?”

Rose leaned back into his arms and tucked her legs under her. “My mother’s dream was to marry up. She set her sights on this shithead son of some old Chicago family. Daniel Shannon was his name. She says they were madly in love, but that his family threatened to cut him off if he married her. I don’t know why she thought getting herself knocked up could fix everything.” Rose laughed bitterly. “Needless to say, it didn’t work. All I got from him was his name. My mom was adamant that I keep it even though Pat begged her to let him adopt me.”