Sweet Victory: A Novella (His Wicked Games #2.5) (2 page)

“Please… ah, fuck!”

The phone vibrates again, and I almost climax… but Calder shifts away at the last minute, denying me my pleasure.

“Fuck you,” I say. “Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you…” One tear manages to spill down over my cheek, but I can’t do anything but shake my head and mutter.

“What do you want?” Calder prompts. “Do you want me to give you release right now? Or would you like me to fuck it out of you?”

I try to respond, but I’m not sure I’m forming real words. He must take pity on me, though, because the next time the phone buzzes he grinds against me. And I completely lose it. Like screaming-and-crying-and-tearing-into-him lose it. I throw my head back against the carpet and let the orgasm overtake me, and I clutch him so hard that I’m sure I draw blood.

I’m not sure how long I lie there afterward, just struggling to see straight again.

“How’s that for a welcome?” Calder says, more than a little amused.

I try to look pissed, but I imagine that the best I’m managing is somewhere between “deliciously satisfied” and “still incredibly aroused.”

“If you think I’m going to let you get away with that,” I say when I can speak once more, “then you don’t know me very well.”

He laughs, but he doesn’t resist when I push him off me and onto his back. He knocks over a garbage bag full of sheets, but that only makes him laugh harder.

“So you think this is funny?” I tease, straddling him. “Just wait until I’m done with you.”

I lean down to attack his mouth, but the minute our tongues meet, his phone goes off again.

“Who the hell…” he says, tearing his mouth away from mine. He slides his hand between us and pulls the buzzing electronic from his pocket. His brow creases slightly when he reads the name, and I sit back.

“What is it?” I ask.

He’s frowning. “Unknown number. But they’ve called me three times.”

That’s weird
. “Could it be a client?”

“Perhaps. But I usually keep those numbers on my contacts list.” His frown deepens. “Unless I forgot one. Or maybe Hafford passed my number along to someone.”

Calder has been working for a consulting firm right here in town, and he’s been doing so well that they promoted him last month. His workload is pretty intense, but he’s happy—as happy and fulfilled as I’ve ever seen him. He told me once that he had a knack for numbers, but it turns out that he has no shortage of love for them, too.

Still, he’s not the sort of guy to spend his free time glued to his phone, especially when we’re,
erm
, in the middle of things. But he looks concerned.

“Do you want to call your office?” I say. It took a little wrangling for him to get today off, and I don’t want him to get in any trouble. “Maybe something important came up.”

I can see the war waging in his eyes, the responsibility fighting the desire. But I kiss him gently on the cheek.

“Go on.” I climb off of him. “We can continue this in a few minutes.”

He nods, resigned, though I can tell he’s as disappointed as I am.

“When I get back,” he says, leaning toward me and brushing his thumb across my bottom lip, “I expect that revenge you promised.”

I grin. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Calder stands and helps me to my feet, then retreats into the second bedroom to make the call. Curious as I am, I resist the urge to follow and eavesdrop. I trust him to tell me if anything serious is going on. It’s probably just an anxious client.

Besides, this little interruption has given me the perfect opportunity to whip out that new lingerie. We’ve spent nearly every night together for the past few months, but we’re no longer bouncing between
his
place and
my
place. I want the first night in
our
place to be extra special.

It takes me several minutes to find the right suitcase among the piles of stuff all over the floor—especially considering how weak my legs still feel beneath me—but I finally spot the purple battered bag behind the door to the kitchen. It’s right next to the carefully packaged Ludlam painting that Calder and I have passed between us over the course of our relationship. Back at the beginning, after seeing how much I loved the piece, Calder tried to give it to me, but I claimed that I could never accept such a valuable gift from him. I don’t have any excuses anymore. It doesn’t matter who “keeps” the painting. It belongs to both of us now.

But I don’t have time to stand here and reminisce. I flash the crate a final smile and slip behind the kitchen door. I’m halfway undressed already, so it only takes me a minute to tug the rest of my clothes off and pull the lacy, slinky babydoll over my head.

I’m adjusting the straps when I hear Calder return.

“Just a minute!” I say. “I want it to be a surprise.”

Calder laughs. “I leave you alone for two minutes and you’re already up to trouble.”

“You’ll enjoy it. I promise.” I untwist the second strap and then run my hands down the length of the garment, ensuring that the sheer fabric lies flush against my body. It clings to me from my barely concealed breasts to the soft curve of my upper thighs. This lingerie certainly doesn’t leave much to the imagination.

“You ready?” I say finally. I peek out at him, then slowly ease my body from behind the door.

Calder’s eyes widen the moment I step into view, but as they sweep down my body—quickly the first time, then with a lingering appreciation the second—they darken and the lids droop into barely concealed lust.

“What do you think?” I ask, shifting my weight so that the lingerie presses against the round shape of my hip.

He responds with a sound very much like a growl.

“Definitely worth the wait,” he says. Then in three strides he’s across the room, grabbing me, crushing his mouth against mine.

I wrap myself around him, inviting him in. His lips blaze across my cheeks, my jaw, my neck.

“You… look… breathtaking…” he murmurs against my throat.

I tilt my head and flick my tongue across his ear. “They’re not making you go in to work, are they?”

“No. No one at the office has any idea who might have called me.” He pauses to suck at the hollow right above my collarbone. “It was probably just a sales call.”

I inhale sharply as Calder’s hand creeps from my lower back across my ass. Before I’m even aware we’ve moved, he’s backed me against the wall, his body hovering over mine.

“Even if they had called me in,” he says, his voice low and rough, “there’s no way I could have torn myself away from you. Not after seeing you in this.” He grabs the bottom edge of the lingerie between two fingers and slides it up over my hip. “There’s only one thing I plan on doing tonight, and that’s fucking you senseless.”

He presses his knee between my legs, forcing me to part them, and I willingly submit. My hands fly to the front of his pants, and in three seconds they’re undone and I have his hard length in my hand.

Calder groans as I rub him, but neither of us has the patience for any more foreplay. I guide him between my legs, then throw my arms around his neck as he lifts then lowers me slowly onto his cock. I curl my fingers in his hair as he fills me. His breath is ragged against my ear, his hands blazing hot against my thighs.

When he begins to move, it’s not with careful, measured strokes. We’re past the point of restraint. Instead, he drives into me again and again until the world is spinning around me. My head slams into the wall with every thrust and the lingerie bunches and chafes around my waist, but I don’t care. There’s only Calder wrapped around me and the pleasure building between my legs. The rest doesn’t matter.

The muscles are tightening inside of me, and I twist my grip on Calder’s hair. He moans, but if I’m causing him any pain he doesn’t complain. If anything, my desperate clutching only seems to spur him on, and he moves against me with greater force. I gasp and cling to him, until finally my body can’t take any more and the pleasure explodes through me. I throw my head back against the wall as I hurtle over the edge, and my orgasm seems to bring Calder very quickly to his own. He grunts and thrusts into me once, twice, three more times—and then I feel a rush of warmth as he fills me.

Afterward, we lean against the wall for some time before either of us manages to speak.

“I think,” Calder murmurs, “we might have to apologize to all of our new neighbors.”

“What?” It takes my sex-addled brain a minute to grasp his meaning. “Oh.
Oh
.”

My cheeks go hot, and I should be embarrassed, but all I can do is giggle. Calder joins in, wheezing and laughing right along with me, and I can only imagine that our neighbors on the other side of the wall must now think us insane as well as sex crazed.

When we calm down, Calder pushes my hair back from my face and looks down into my eyes.

“I love you,” he says softly.

“I love you, too.” I lean up and kiss him on the lips. My body feels languid and heavy and satisfied, and after a long day of moving and our recent exertions, I just want to sink into him and go to sleep.

“I take it you liked your present, then,” I say, sliding the lingerie back down over my hips. Not that it covers anything.

“I think you already have your answer to that,” he says, amusement playing about his eyes. “But yes, I liked it very, very much.”

“Didn’t you say you had something for me, too?”

The corner of his mouth curls up. “I did, didn’t I?”

“Well?” I poke him playfully on the chest. “Are you going to give it to me?”

“Hm.” He takes my hand and lifts it to his face as if inspecting the fingers one by one. “That’s a good question.”

“Don’t tease me.”

His smile broadens. “Tease you? Where’s the fun in that?” He flips my hand and presses a kiss against my palm, but he offers nothing else.

“I see what you’re doing,” I say. We’ve played this little game often enough. “You want me to beg for it.”

“Not precisely.” He plants another kiss at the base of my wrist. “I was rather thinking you might play for it.”

“Play?” I find that I’m smiling in spite of myself. Why am I not surprised by this turn of events?

“Nothing complicated,” he says. “And I’ll play fair, I promise.”

“Since when was trusting your promises a good idea?”

He grins and kisses my hand again. This time, though, he slips his tongue between two of my fingers, sending a shiver all the way up my arm.

“What if I lose?” I say.

He gives another flick of his tongue before looking up at me again. “You’ll just have to make sure you don’t.”

“What if I don’t want to play?”

That gets a raised eyebrow from him. He straightens and drops my fingers, then cups my face between both of his hands.

“Oh, you want to play. You can deny it all you want, sweet one, but I know you. And you never turn down a challenge.” His eyes gleam devilishly. “Our little games excite and arouse you as much as they do me.”

I’m about to argue that the response of my body has less to do with his proposal than it does with the fact that we’re still mostly naked and pressed up against each other—but even I know that that’s a lie. I don’t have to say anything. He reads the truth on my face.

“Trust me,” he says in a honey-sweet tone that turns my insides to mush. “This will be a game that you’ll never forget.”

He starts by ordering us dinner. He decides to get Chinese food from a little place down the street, and by the time it arrives, my entire body is trembling in anticipation.

I still remember the first time he and I ate Chinese food together. We were both naked, and I was blindfolded. Calder tried to help me eat—but as I remember it, we ended up getting distracted and never even finished the meal. It has to be intentional, him ordering Chinese food again, and I can’t wait to see what he has planned for me this time around. He’s asked that I continue to wear my new lingerie, and I’ve happily consented. My imagination runs wild as he lays out the various cartons on the kitchen counter.

“There you go,” he says, tossing me a pair of wooden chopsticks. “Eat up.”

I blink at him. “Just… eat?” Surely there’s more to it than that.

But he nods. “We’ve had a long day. We need some energy.”

I eye him suspiciously across the feast of fried rice and General Tso’s chicken. He’s ruffling through a box marked “Kitchen” on the counter, and after a moment he produces a bottle of wine wrapped in several layers of dishcloths.

“Merlot?” he asks. He pulls a pair of plastic cups from the box.

I nod, still not completely trusting his motives. The chopsticks are in my hand, but I don’t touch any of the food in front of me.

A moment later he’s filled the cups and set one in front of me.

“Aren’t you hungry?” he asks. He grabs his own chopsticks and starts examining his dinner choices.

“You just want me to eat? No catch?”

His lip curls. “Do you suspect I’m trying to trick you?”