

CAUGHT

(Prequel to HAWK)

By Jo Raven

The moment I met HAWK, I was CAUGHT.

That was the night my boyfriend called me frigid in front of everyone at my favorite restaurant, and Jamie Hawk Fleming came to the rescue. Casually as you please, he proposed an arrangement: no attachments, no feelings. Only hot, awesome sex.

That's fine with me. I want to get over the humiliation my ex-boyfriend caused me, prove to myself I'm not frigid, and—let's be serious, who can say no to a mouthwateringly handsome young millionaire? It's surely an experience, right? Even if he doesn't want to be my boyfriend, just my fuckbuddy.

I'm perfectly fine with that.

If only my head—and my heart—didn't have other ideas...

Read on and find out what happens next in HAWK (Sex and Bullets #2).

**CAUGHT** (Prequel to HAWK)

Jo Raven

Copyright Jo Raven 2016

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author. The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, events, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

Cover art: Jo Raven

Chapter One

Chance Connor is the greatest asshole alive.

Also, as of now, he's my very EX-boyfriend.

And good riddance. He cheated on me, has been cheating on me for a while, in fact, and I have only just found out—tonight, at our two year first date anniversary, in my favorite Italian restaurant.

Did he sit down and quietly tell me what was bothering him? Did he explain to me that our relationship wasn't working for him anymore?

No. But his _other_ girlfriend showed up and so he decided that it was a good time to break up with me. A good time to explain how he can't be with me because I am such a lousy lay.

In front of everyone.

"Sorry, Layla," he says, without a single hint of contrition on his suddenly loathsome face, "but I can't waste my time teaching you how to act in bed. You're frigid. Good sex is important to me. I'm done."

I'm in too much shock to cry, or scream, let alone string words together and reply with anything resembling coherence. Hands curled into aching fists in my lap, I'm still sitting right where I was when the skank he has been dating arrived and grabbed Chance's arm, then told me how he's been with her for a year now, and that it's for real.

That I should give him up because his heart belongs to her.

A year. The thought he left my arms to slip into hers day after day for all this time makes me want to puke.

Finally, Chance stops talking, and there's a ringing silence in the restaurant. I feel the eyes of the customers on me, burning small question marks and pity holes through my flesh.

God, I don't think I've ever hated a guy so much in my life.

My knees are knocking together, but I brace my hands on the table and stand up. "Go," I say, not sure what I should be saying, what smartass reply I could have given. "Go away. Now. Leave."

He gives me a pitying look, like he just realized how much worse I am than he originally thought. "Come on, Layla, don't take it so hard."

"Hard?" I laugh, and it sounds crazed, so I stop. "You freaking two-timing bastard. Get out!"

I start toward him around the table, not sure if I want to scratch my nails down his face or beat him up with my fists, or maybe start on the skank beside him—when a shadow falls over us.

Quite literally. Because the guy who has just approached our table has to be six foot five, give or take an inch. I have no idea what he thinks he's doing, so I glance toward him and open my mouth to tell him to get lost, too.

And I go completely still.

I can't help it. He's easily the most handsome man I've ever seen, in real life or in magazines, with his short, blond hair, those sharp cheekbones and steely eyes, and the body of a line-backer, tall and broad-chested.

He's dressed in a sleek, expensive gray suit that shimmers where the light catches it, like silver. His pale stubble glints like gold dust. He narrows his eyes at me, then his full mouth lifts in a smirk and he turns to Chance.

"Man, I wanna thank you," he drawls, shoving his big hands in the pockets of his dress pants. "This was awesome."

Chance stares at him.

I gape. His words are like a dash of cold water.

_Oh my God._ He approves of what Chance did? Of how he broke up with me, and of the things he said... holy crap, did he hear what Chance said about me being frigid?

I want the earth to open up and swallow me.

I want to put Chance and this guy together and kick them in the nuts.

I want to run away.

"Who the hell are you?" Chance mutters, glancing at the skank and back at the guy.

"Oh, did I forget to introduce myself? My name is Hawk. Jamie Hawk Fleming." The guy lifts a pale brow, and God, that name is familiar, but I can't place it right now, with my heart racing and the scorching burn of humiliation traveling up my neck. "And like I said, I wanna thank you for breaking up with this girl tonight, in this restaurant, because I've been watching her since she arrived and wishing she'd be free to have dinner with me."

"What the fuck?" Chance's face has gone red. A thick vein is pulsing at his neck, like it does whenever he gets mad.

The noise of the restaurant fades away. The room recedes, leaving only the beautiful, tall stranger and his unexpected words.

He turns to me and leans over the table, offering me his hand. "Shall we, then?"

"Are you serious?"

He hums and nods, those blue-gray eyes twinkling. I put my hand in his, mesmerized by the way his fingers engulf mine, and let him pull me to his side.

"Hey man, you can't do this," Chance is saying, taking two steps toward us, dragging the still unnamed girl behind him. "Layla? You can't just let a fucking stranger take you—"

"It's just dinner," the man says, his hand still wrapped around mine, his palm rough and hot. "And you broke up with her." He pauses, gives Chance a condescending look. "Not that she ever belonged to you, or _with_ you. Not a girl like her."

My jaw has officially hit the floor. Who is this guy?

His arrogant confidence stops Chance like a physical barrier, like a punch to the chest. I can see how Chance struggles with indecision, with anger, and I wonder what his issue is. Like this man just said—this Hawk Fleming or whatever—Chance broke up with me. Why isn't he just walking away?

It's as if he's suddenly jealous at any man showing any token interest in me. Or maybe at this man, who's so obviously rich and better-looking.

It's disgusting, and I make a sound of distress before I can help it. I feel sick. Sick that Chance would throw me away, slander me publicly, and then think he has any claim on me.

"You look beautiful," Hawk tells me, lifting my hand to his lips, and even if it's just for show, I shiver at the brush of his soft lips over my fingers.

And I'm also glad, because Chance's face darkens so much he may well stroke out, and then he turns on his heel and leaves, the woman whose name I've yet to catch giving me a baleful glare before stalking after him.

Leaving me alone with this guy, and with the eyes of everyone in the restaurant still on us—curious, judging, pondering.

I hope it was fun for them, because honestly, I'm pretty shaken right now as the pieces of the evening fall around me like raindrops, revealing holes—in my life, in my plans for the future.

Because I'd somehow thought Chance and I would move in together soon. That I'd finally meet his parents. Build a life together.

I don't know for him, but for me two years is a big deal.

Was. _Was_ a big deal.

Oh my God, we're done, and he was freaking awful, and that woman...

The air is stuck in my throat, and my vision is all blurry, so when Hawk grips my chin and turns my face toward him, I barely see him. He's a hazy, beautiful outline of a man, until I blink and his bright gaze becomes clear once more.

"Okay?" he says. Only that, and waits for my reply.

I nod. I mean, what else can I do? He salvaged as much of my pride as possible, salvaged my night, and no matter how scattered and hollow I'm feeling, the thought of sitting close to this guy is making my face warm.

"Then this way, please," he murmurs and leads me away to a table by one of the bay windows overlooking the harbor. His steps are heavy, his gait powerful, his grip on my hand just shy of painful. "I was about to order."

And I was about to die of shame and anger and the shards of my life falling around me, and he saved me.

My heart trips over as he takes a seat across from me.

A waiter comes to bring me a leather-bound menu, and bows to Hawk with a murmured, "Mr. Fleming."

That's when it hits me and I know who he is, turning the evening from weird to surreal.

My head spinning, I open the menu blindly. "No way," I whisper.

Jamie Hawk Fleming. Heir to the Fleming Empire.

Is this for real? Is he playing a prank? Am I dreaming? Oh my God, nobody pinch me, okay? If it's a dream, I want it to last.

***

"So... you like artichokes?"

"What?" I've been staring at his hands. They're resting on the table. Big, strong, with blunt fingernails.

"Artichokes." He tilts his head to the side and one side of his mouth tips up. "That what you ordered, right? _Spaghetti_ _alla chitarra con carciofi e bottarga_." At my clearly confused look, his smile goes up a notch. " _Pasta with artichokes and fish roe."_

_Oh God._ _Of course he'd know Italian. I wonder how many languages he speaks. How many sports he excels at._

_So I just nod frantically. "Yeah, that's right."_

_" That what you wanted?"_

_Crap, no._ _But I paste a smile on my face. "Oh yes."_

_I can't even remember ordering, let alone what I picked out._

_He chuckles, and rolls his eyes a little, and it's... sexy. How on earth is that possible? He scratches at his stubbled chin and I want to beg for the job._

_Please, let me help you scratch that golden stubble... Let me stroke down that long, corded neck to the powerful shoulders that look out of place encased in that tailored suit, the narrow waist and those long legs..._

_" I was just making sure." God, that chuckle, that grin is setting my panties on fire. Isn't that wrong, five minutes after my boyfriend broke up with me?_

_Then Hawk shrugs off his jacket, draping it over the back of his chair, and holy crap, Hawk in a tailored shirt is so much better._

_Not as good as he has to be without any clothes on, but it's an improvement. And God, I'm staring._

_At the Fleming Empire heir, who did me a kindness and brought me to his table so that I didn't walk out of here with my face on fire and my pride in shambles._

"I, um. I wanted to thank you." I fiddle with the coaster of my water glass. "For this. You didn't have to step in and rescue me, but I do appreciate it."

His gaze slides over me, hot, stopping at my mouth. "I'll admit, I'm selfish. I really wanted to have dinner with you. I was fucking glad when I realized he was out of the picture."

And now I am half outraged and half pleased.

Because he didn't do it to save me, or so he claims.

But he wanted to have dinner with me, and I can't help the rush of heat at the thought he was really observing me from afar, wishing I sat down with him.

"Well, I'm here now."

"You sure are." He holds my gaze as the waiter approaches us with an ice bucket. He places it beside us, takes out a chilled bottle of wine and presents it to Hawk who nods. "Right here."

His voice is warm, and strangely it makes me shiver.

He is offered a drop of wine to taste it and he just waves at the waiter who hurries to pour us two full glasses, replaces the bottle in the ice bucket, and walks away.

I barely notice him go.

"To tonight?" Hawk suggests, lifting his glass, and I raise mine, on autopilot. "To meeting you."

"To tonight," I whisper and swallow down my wine like water.

And whoa, it tastes good.

"Thirsty?" He raises a brow and reaches for the bottle. "I'm kinda thirsty myself."

My face flames. He pours more wine for both of us, and I order myself not to take another sip, even if I'm so frigging nervous my fingers are tap-dancing on the table.

What am I doing? What are we doing? Is he flirting with me? Seriously flirting, or just passing his time? Maybe he does that with any girl who crosses paths with him.

Maybe his date stood him up?

"You eat here alone?" I blurt out, before I decide I shouldn't ask. "I mean, you came here alone? I—"

"It was supposed to be a business dinner," he says, glancing down at his shirt and pants with what looks like distaste. "My partner canceled."

"Partner?"

"Business partner." He winks at me over the rim of his glass. "Business meeting."

Why does the way he says all this make me hot?

Okay, scratch that. Anything he says makes me hot. The guy's a god. What the hell am I doing, sitting here with him?

"You work?" He puts his glass down, reaches up and undoes the top button of his shirt. Yeah... is it too warm in here? "Or study?"

"Study." I drag my tongue over my lips, desperate for moisture, and tear my gaze away. "Publishing."

"Sounds interesting," he says, but when I turn back toward him, I find that his gaze is fixed on me. "Publishing novels or nonfiction?"

"Both."

In fact, his gaze is fixed on my cleavage, I discovered when I follow it. I've dressed in a dress I bought a few months ago in New York, when I was visiting my mom. It's a vintage cut, knee-length, with a deep cleavage showing off my boobs. I don't have a great ass, like my friend Dorothy, but my boobs are good-sized. I used to like them, before Chance said one day that they were too big.

I wonder what Hawk is thinking, and crap, my nipples are tightening under his scrutiny. I like that he's looking at me like that, especially when he glances up, meeting my eyes for a fleeting second, and gives me a wolfish grin.

"God, you're sexy," Hawk rasps, and hey, can I have him for dessert, please? No need to wrap him, I'll take him to go.

"So are you," I admit, though it costs. I swear the skin on my cheeks is blistering.

His gaze dips to my boobs again, then does a slow slide up my neck to my flaming face and he licks his lips.

Holy crap.

Never felt this way with a guy before. This insta-lust, this heat between my legs just from staring at this bulging biceps in that fine shirt, the small dimple in his chin, the long, pale lashes and thick brows over those ice-blue eyes.

"How badly do you want those artichokes?" he asks, and I blink at him, lost. "Is it like, a craving you need to fulfill no matter the cost, or...?"

What?

"I don't like artichokes," I blurt, and clap a hand over my mouth, because holy crap, Lay, exerting some control over your mouth might be a good thing. "I mean, I can go without."

"Good. I'm not that hungry after all." He's looking at me, at my face, as if trying to read me. "I'd much rather taste you."

Silence stretches between us. I try to swallow, but my throat is closed up.

_Taste me?_ "You want to kiss me?"

His eyes glitter. "Yeah. And not only on the mouth."

Oh boy, I think I'm finally catching on, and I squirm on the seat, the heat returning between my legs, coupled with an urgent pressure and a pulse that feels like my heartbeat.

"I, um." I glance at the other tables, wondering if they can hear any of this. "You want...?"

"I want lots of things with you," he says, his voice low and deep. "I was watching you, watching as you crossed your legs and uncrossed them, as you put your hand over your tits." He nods at my boobs and my nipples wave back at him, hard and aching. "Goddammit, girl. You're so hot I'm in danger of shooting my load right here and now, just from looking at you."

_Wow._ Nobody has ever said anything like that to me. And maybe I should be running away from this guy who has no trouble telling me all this, but I find myself leaning toward him.

"Chance said I'm frigid," I whisper, and God, what's wrong with me tonight? It's as if every random thought I have has to come out of my big mouth.

"He's a goddam idiot," Hawk mutters. "You're anything but frigid. You're hot like all hell, Doll. And I can prove it to you. Would a frigid woman come four times within an hour as I pleasure her?"

_Ohgod, ohgod._ I've never... never even come once with Chance.

Hawk must read my thoughts on my face, because his brows draw together in a frown. "Tell me he at least made sure you came when you had sex," he growls, and the fine hairs on my arms lift.

"He tried," I say, remembering how Chance often complained it took me too long to show any signs of pleasure.

"That motherfucker," Hawk mutters, and it's all so weird, hearing a guy like him, in a suit like that, swear like a sailor. He reaches for my hand and strokes his thumb over my knuckles, sending a great shudder through my body. "Let me show you, Gorgeous. Show you what it can be like. What you can be like, with the right guy."

And he's the right guy?

"What do you want from me?" I whisper, kind of frightened at his intensity even as I'm curious as hell and turned on like nobody's business.

"I want..." He glances to the side, sighs. He keeps his gaze averted as he says. "I want to show you how hot you are. I want to have a good time with you. I want you. My dick hasn't deflated since I saw you. But you need to know who I am. I—"

"I know who you are," I say.

He looks startled. "Good. Awesome. Well, a man in my position can't offer you anything more." At my confused look, he says. "I can't have a relationship. Can't date you. So if you want a boyfriend, then you can walk away from this table right now. No hard feelings. Too much is at stake."

His money, I guess. He doesn't want to get involved with any girl and then face a scandal.

"I understand," I begin, but he stops me, squeezing my hand.

"No, you don't, because it's not that simple. Believe me. But it's the way things are. There are bigger issues than my personal pleasure at stake here. So if you come with me to the hotel where I've booked a room, and we have great sex together, that's it. That's all I can offer you."

I ponder this. He's honest, I'll give him that. Doesn't try to lure me with promises and sweet words. He's straight with me, and I won't deny what he promises for tonight is already good.

If nothing else, it will take my mind off Chance and the ugliness he caused.

"I understand," I say again and squeeze his hand back. "I'll take your offer, Jamie Fleming."

His grin turns boyish, and his gray eyes soften. "Call me Hawk."

Chapter Two

The hotel he's booked into is a block away, and we walk, hand in hand. It's not dating, but then why does it feel so much like it?

"So... you don't live here in Baltimore?" I ask, when the silence becomes too much as we cross the street.

"I do."

"So why the hotel room?"

He glances at me, his mouth curling up in that easy smile that sends bolts of heat through me. "I called and booked a room when I saw you sitting at the restaurant. Just in case."

I huff. "Confident, much?"

And he hasn't answered my question, not really.

He shrugs. "It was a wishful thought. Besides, in my line of work, you have to be bold."

I bet you do. And through the sting of annoyance, the heat flares stronger than ever.

He hoped to get into bed with me. He wished for it.

Holy crap, Batman.

His hand is tight around mine, and a good thing too, as my heels are too high to be walking down the street. Hey, I was only supposed to walk from the car into the restaurant and back, but they are the perfect heels—matching my lilac dress in tone and sheen, its hem peeking under my black coat. I wanted to be pretty for Chance, and then I was glad I did when he dumped me.

Better look pretty when your boyfriend of two years dumps you for a tramp and another man invites you over to his table, right? Look at all the things I learned tonight.

Right this moment, though, I am thrilled that the hotel is right in front of us, with the promise of taking the shoes off at last.

The shoes, among other things...

Glancing up at the tall man beside me, I lick my lips and warmth floods my face when I realize I'm doing it. But how can I help it? This feels unreal. He's just too gorgeous with his powerful built and those gray eyes... That arrogant air when he stops in front of the reception desk and asks for the key to the room, then sends a smirk my way, his eyes half-closing, a speculative gleam in them.

A gleam that says he's already undressing me in his mind, and that is so damn sexy my whole body tightens with excitement.

Can't recall any man looking at me that way. Certainly no Chance. Chance who announced publicly that I'm frigid in bed.

Hawk makes me feel all kinds of hot, inside and out. His gaze makes me lift my head, push my shoulders back and my boobs out. Makes me feel pretty and desirable.

Naughty.

"Come on." He takes the room key and starts toward the elevator, forcing me to run in my heels, and I want to hiss at him to slow down, but at the same time I like that.

I like how much bigger than me he is, how much longer his strides are. That he pulls at my hand, sure I'll follow. That he gives me another once-over while waiting for the elevator, and my skin tingles and heat spreads down my belly.

The elevator doors close behind us, and he yanks me to him suddenly, without warning, his hand splayed on the small of my back, our bodies melding together. His face dips, and his mouth brushes mine, a searing kiss. Something long and hard presses into my hip.

"Feel me," he murmurs against my lips. "Feel how much I want you. How you turn me on. Even from the distance, as you sat at your table, I could feel your heat."

The elevators door open, and I barely notice, caught up in him, his spicy taste, his spicy scent, his cool gaze with its sparks of fire, his tall body dwarfing mine.

I lift my hand to his face, needing to touch his hard jaw, to touch his hair and see if it's as soft as it looks.

He marches me backward before I manage, out of the elevator cage, over velvet carpet that muffles our steps.

He pushes me against a door and crowds me in again, his hot mouth skimming over my cheek, pressing to my neck, sucking. He's panting, I realize, as zings of pleasure travel down my spine and my hands clutch at his muscular arms through the suit jacket he's put back on when we left the restaurant. He's aroused and kind of out of control.

Because of me.

That's a heady thought, and when his hands close around my waist and his thigh nudges between my legs, I don't stop to think we're still in plain view of anyone passing by, my eyes closing, my body shuddering with pleasure.

Dry-humping Jamie Fleming's muscular, strong leg.

Oh God.

Thankfully, he presses his mouth to mine as the pleasure spirals and my body jerks with the first orgasm I've had in a long while, my cry muffled.

_Holy crapballs._ There's a ringing in my ears. The dim lights of the corridor blink in my vision as my senses slowly return and I find myself slumped against the door, Hawk's leg still between mine, and his handsome face creased in a pleased grin.

"That was so hot," he whispers, his voice a sexy rasp, and strokes his thumb over my lips. "Can't wait to hear the sounds you make in the bedroom."

Suddenly I'm overheated, self-conscious and kind of sick to my stomach. "I, um. Look—"

"You're so sexy," he says, and leans in again. The proximity of his eyes, his mouth, his straight jaw, the golden stubble, it's all too much for my poor brain. It short-circuits again when he smiles that devastating smile and can't process anything else while he inserts the key into the lock and pushes the door open. "Come on."

Coming is the one thing I'll certainly be doing with him, that's for sure.

***

The room is big. It's a suite, I realize after taking in the space with the sofa and armchairs, and the separate space for the huge bed.

It's covered in a white bedspread and has... rose petals strewn over it? I blink, sure I'm hallucinating. This doesn't happen in real life, does it? Not in any of the hotels I have visited in my lifetime, and this hotel had a very unassuming air, from the outside, at least.

I walk toward the bed, running one fingertip along the wall. There's a framed drawing of a naked woman hanging by the bed, and a tall crystal vase with red roses on the bed stand.

Definitely not common. I touch the satiny petals of the roses and inhale their scent.

Smiling, I turn around—and find myself face to face with Hawk whose gaze has turned sharp. Fierce.

Predatory.

"I'm going to strip you bare," he says, his voice that same low rasp that sends heat through my body, a fiery path down my core. "Eat you out. Stroke you so deep you'll feel it for days. And fuck you until you can't walk straight. Are you ready, Hot Stuff?"

"It's Layla," I breathe, barely audible, all the air sucked from my lungs at his words and the heat in his voice.

"Trust me," he goes on, prodding me until I fall on the bed, bouncing a little, "soon you will forget your own name."

"Cocky, much?" I manage even as he puts a knee between my legs and shoves my coat off my shoulders, then pushes my dress up my thighs.

"I'm only stating facts." He winks at me and in record time he has my panties off and his face between my legs.

Holy shit.

His breath is warm on my shaved pussy—shaved because Dorothy insisted I should, this being a two-year anniversary and all—and his stubble scratches against my inner thighs, jolting me. His hands land on my legs, rough and big, and spread my thighs a bit more.

Opening me up. Spreading my pussy wide.

_Crap._ "Hawk, I..."

He looks up at me and stills, waiting for me to say more. "This okay?" he finally asks, when no words come to my mind, and his question sends a different kind of warmth through me.

Aggressive and yet careful, pushy and yet ready to stop.

I barely nod when he licks his lips and puts his mouth on me. Unable to hold back a moan, I fists my hands on the white bed cover, my legs trembling. His tongue circles my clit, flicks back and forth lashing at it, then licks lower, into the core of me.

"Oh God!" A shockwave of need blasts through me, zinging up all the way to my head. My nipples are so tight they ache and I need... need to come. Need to relieve the pressure between my legs that's only growing with every twist of his tongue.

Then he adds his fingers, and they're thick and long and oh Lord... A keening noise leaves my throat and my head falls back, my body arching into him as he strokes me, like he promised—deep and hard, stretching me, ramping up the pressure until I'm ready to beg for release.

"Please, Hawk... Please..."

_Yep._ Begging.

As I'm fucking his face. And so turned on I can't even find it in me to care. I've never felt so good in my life, never felt such need. It's burning in my veins, deep inside my core, and his movements only make me burn hotter.

He licks my clit, swirls his tongue around it, thrusting two fingers inside me. Then he sucks on my clit, and I'm gone.

I shatter into a million pieces as the pressure breaks. Pleasure races up my spine, and I arch almost off the bed as I come in his mouth, a cry leaving my mouth.

_Oh shit. God._ What was that?

This time when I come to my senses, I'm staring at the white stucco of the ceiling, my thoughts empty and swimming above me like glass fish in a sky of white.

Boom.

That's my heart, banging against my ribcage.

Hawk slides up my body, braces himself on his hands on either side of me and looks down at me.

God, that's hot. Everything he does is smooth and sexy. He looks pleased with himself.

He has every right to be.

Then something hard and hot bumps against my thigh and I jump.

He chuckles, a dark, come-fuck-me sound that steals the breath from my lungs. "Just wanted to feel you against my cock."

He's naked. The realization dawns slowly and in stages. He undressed while I was zoned out, staring at the ceiling, and is now holding himself over me in all his muscular, naked glory.

I scoot back to see him better, and he grins at me.

Tanned in the way only pale people who spend a lot of time outdoors can be—playing tennis and golf, I suppose, sunning himself on the deck of his dad's yacht, swimming in private coves—he's made of gold and silver, a living statue of a man, all rolling muscles and fantastical proportions.

Broad shoulders, sculpted chest, tight abs, narrow hips—then thick thighs and long legs, but my gaze glances off them, snagged by his cock, stiff and flushed, thick and long, pointing up.

Metal is sticking out of the head—metal barbells. He's pierced.

"Okay?" he asks, and something passes through his eyes, an expression I haven't seen before. A flash of vulnerability and nervousness.

Is he seriously asking me if I think him good enough? Or maybe big enough? Is he nervous because of the piercing?

"You're beautiful," I say in all honesty, and his cocky grin returns.

"You're the beautiful one," he says. "I'm just cocky."

Very cocky, I decide, glancing at his big cock again. Never has the word described a man better. I lick my lips, a surge of confidence shocking me. "Are you going to use that, or what?"

"That?" He looks down, his grin widening. "Are you referring to my dick?"

I shrug, and can't help smiling. "Guess so."

"I'm sure gonna fucking use it. I follow through on all my promises." He pauses, fumbles on the night stand and lifts a condom. He pulls it on.

"Turn over, Doll," he murmurs, "and let me show you what _that_ can do." I squeal when he grabs my hips and rolls me over, on my belly. "And one last thing: you like roses, right?"

***

He half-lies over me, brushing my hair off my back and pressing his mouth there, on my bared neck, awakening nerve endings I didn't know existed. Somehow, it seems my neck is directly linked to my boobs and my pussy, because I clench everywhere with each kiss, moaning into my folded arms.

He presses down more, letting more of his weight on top of me, and his hot, hard cock slides on my ass, leaving a wet trail, the barbells hard points that make me squirm.

I'm doing this to him. Make him hard. Make his dick drip with desire. Make a groan rumble in his chest when I push my ass up and rub against this cock.

"You're killing me," he whispers, his teeth catch on my earlobe, tugging on my pearl earring. "I thought I had more self-control."

It thrills me, that he's admitting it. Admitting he can't help himself with me.

_Then do it_ , I want to say. _Put your cock in me_.

But he starts kissing a path down my spine and I gasp as the pressure, and the pleasure, intensifies. I never knew my back was an erogenous zone. My back, my neck, my earlobe—and now his hand trails down the crease of my ass, stroking, pressing lightly. Brushing lower, against my pussy, then moving back up.

I writhe on the bed, suddenly so close to coming again I panic, hovering on the sharp edge of another mind-shattering orgasm.

His hand moves away before that happens, and I draw gasping breaths in the quiet, my ass lifting, trying to follow his touch.

He groans again, and shifts. I turn my head, trying to see what he's doing, but he pushes me back down with a firm hand between my shoulder blades.

"The thorns were stripped," he says, and what the heck? "Maybe next time we can leave some on. If you like it."

I have absolutely no clue what he's talking about.

Then my breath catches as something cool and soft brushes over my back, trailing low, over my ass. A sweet scent spills in the air.

Roses.

What is he...? _Why?_

He lifts the bunch of roses off my back.

He brings it back down, a light slap that releases more scent—and a ripple of sensation down my back, to my ass. He does it again—lifts the roses, brings them down, and the impact sends heat pooling in my belly, and between my legs.

_God._ What is he doing to me? Why do I like it so much?

The blows come faster now—some harder than others, and each hit jolts me and unfurls more heat inside me, until I'm moaning loudly.

Moaning his name.

"Like this?" he pants, stopping and trailing the roses up to my shoulders, then along my spine down, between my ass cheeks, making them clench, then down my thighs. "You're so wet, babe. Fuck, I need to be inside you."

"Please," I sob the word. "Yes."

"I knew it," he gasps, letting the roses fall on the bed and pushing his cock into me, drawing a cry from my throat as he stretches me wide, "from the moment I saw you. I knew you'd like me to touch you that way."

I can't dwell on what he's saying—mostly because he's filling me up, his cock so hot and hard, and the barbells brush over all the right places inside me, and I'm so close to coming I can't even breathe.

His weight settles on top of me, and it feels so good. I realize he's holding himself mostly off, his arms flexing at my sides, and his breath washes over my super-sensitized neck.

"You smell good," he says, and I push back, taking him deeper, making him gasp for a change. "Oh fuck, yes. Do that again."

Pushy. Hot. He feels amazing inside me, behind me, around me.

I shove my ass back once more, and he goes nuts. His hips flex, and he starts thrusting inside me, long, powerful shoves that have me coming with a shout, shaking where I'm pressed into the bed. My pussy tightens around his cock in sharp waves, and he curses, stilling, letting me milk his hard-on until the pleasure ebbs.

"Fuck." He suddenly sits back, hauling me up with him, his cock pushing even deeper inside me, the pressure of this piercing making me moan helplessly. His hands move over my boobs, tugging on my nipples, stoking the last ember of desire left inside me as my mind whirls. "So pretty. Need you, need to feel you... Damn."

He thrusts up inside me, his cock impossibly hard, and my pussy clenches again. I moan with another mini-orgasm, burning in his hold, trembling—and he grunts as he comes, hard, filling the condom. I can feel the heat of his cum through the thin rubber.

When he's done, he pulls me down on the bed with him and wraps his arms around me. "Did I keep my promise?"

I'm too wiped out to speak, so I nod.

He chuckles. "You can now tell that asshole of an ex of yours that the F word doesn't apply to you."

"F-word?"

"Frigid?" I hear a grin in his voice. "Yeah, I don't think so. Hot like hell, that's how you are, babe."

I laugh quietly, pleased. Happy. Exhausted and sated. "That's all you," I whisper, because that's the truth, and yet, deep inside me, I can't help the new wave of warmth his words bring.

Jamie Hawk Fleming thinks I'm hot. That's any girl's wet dream.

But the dream will soon be over and I need to wake up.

Chapter Three

We don't stay the night in the hotel. That's the first wake up call. Hawk rolls over, gets up, showers and pulls on his clothes, telling me he's had a great time.

He's smiling, and he's nice and polite, but it's obvious for him the night is over, and I feel like a cheap hook-up.

Which I am. Though the price of this suite sure isn't cheap, but still. Dinner, a few compliments, and I jumped into bed with a stranger. A wealthy, handsome, sexy stranger, but you see where I'm going with this.

Sure, the sex was amazing. Like, for real. I'm even walking funny when I get off the bed to use the bathroom, and I thought it was just a myth. Whose guy's junk can do that to you, right?

Hawk's, that's whose. His cock and the four orgasms he gave me tonight.

I clean myself, pee, come out and get dressed, too, my clothes wrinkled in a heap on the floor. I smooth them out as best I can, and then it gets more awkward when he shoves his hands into his pant pockets and tilts his head toward the door.

"I should be on my way. Long day at work tomorrow."

_Oh God. Seriously?_ "No need to make excuses," I tell him coolly, gathering my purse and coat and storming past him.

"Excuses?" He sounds amused, and as he closes the room door and ambles beside me to the elevator door, he gives me a smirk. "It's the truth. Dad wants me at an important meeting with the other shareholders, at seven in the fucking morning in Washington. We're flying at five."

Oh. And now, according to my cell phone time is one in the morning. Where did time go?

I ride with him down, trying not to look at his sexy mouth, or stubbled jaw, or pale hair. The broad shoulders I clawed at as I came.

He hails a cab for me, and I climb inside. I turn to take one last look at him as we speed away. He's still standing outside the hotel, hands still in his pockets, a new expression on his face, one that has me puzzled as we drive out of view.

It looks a lot like regret.

***

Days pass. Nights, too. I feel an emptiness that's only partly explained by the lack of Chance in my life.

Turns out he was easy to cut out of my routine. I miss watching thrillers with him and eating together at the college cafeteria, but apart from that, I'm curiously fine without him.

And I miss Hawk.

Okay, that's obviously not possible. I only met him once, spent less than a night with him, and no matter how many orgasms he gave me, I can't miss a guy I only spent a couple of hours with, most of them spent on his bed in a hotel room, right?

Yet I do. I miss the way he looked at me like I'm the most desirable woman in the world. The way he told me I'm hot, and pretty, the way his body hardened against mine, the way he kissed me and held me.

Like I'm unique. Like he's never met anyone like me.

Which is bullcrap. It's all in my mind, it's all I wanted to believe. Maybe what he wanted me to believe, too—that he felt something. That it wasn't all a charade to help me get over the break-up.

And why should he care how I felt? He didn't have to do any of it. Also, he had sex with me, and he was hard. He wanted me.

Or he wanted it. Wanted sex. A man like him probably has rough, marathon sex on a regular basis. He found me in a vulnerable position and took advantage. It's what rich, arrogant men like him do.

That's what they do, Layla.

Questions spin in my mind, questions I hadn't posed myself in the insanity of the evening's rote—like, does he do this often, pick unknown women from restaurants and bars and take them to anonymous hotel rooms to fuck?

I mean... he's obviously a playboy. Even if his life isn't splashed all over the tabloids as much as one would have expected, I kind of recall a couple of scandalous photos of him with pretty girls hanging on his arms, at some gala or other. He can't be over twenty-five—in fact I'm quite sure I read he's even younger than that somewhere, or else my friend Dorothy told me—and guys of his age, his looks and his money are expected to sleep around.

I doubt I'll ever hear from him again—and I guess now I know how he managed to avoid scandals: he keeps his conquests quiet, out of the spotlight. If I told anyone I spent a steamy night with Jamie Fleming, who would believe me? No photos, no proof.

Nobody knows, except Dorothy, and the memory will remain in my mind, a bright light and snapshots of touches, glimpses of pleasure unlike anything I've ever felt.

A desire unlike any I've ever experienced. God, the roses... and his touch. His cock inside me.

Somehow even though I know he won't call me again, won't come around to see me, won't have dinner with me again... It was worth it. I can't regret it.

Did he regret me?

A noise from the room next to mine draws me from my thoughts. Speaking of Dorothy... My roommate walks through my door, her dark hair a ratty nest around her head. Let's just say she has restless sleep—which I blame on the tons of caffeine she consumes every day.

She's holding a steaming mug right now. "Did you know," she says, "that the suite he bedded you in is the honeymoon suite of the exclusive Pearl Buck Hotel?"

"Bedded? Seriously, Dodo?" But this little piece of news floors me, when it shouldn't. "It was probably the best room he could get on short notice, or something. That's all."

It means nothing.

Dorothy shrugs and sits uninvited on my bed. She slurps noisily at her coffee. "So, any signs of life from Tall, Blond and Mysterious?"

"He's not mysterious," I mutter irritably. "We know who he is."

"But his motives are mysterious."

"Nothing mysterious about a guy wanting to dip his wick in a random girl."

"You're not random."

"But your comments are."

She tsks. "You still haven't given me the details of your night."

"And I won't."

"It was that good, huh?" She grins at me, flashing me a crooked front tooth, and I think about that.

She's right. But it's more. It's how... violent is was, and sensual, intense and perfect at the same time. The kiss against the door, his mouth on me, the roses on my back, his arm around my chest as he rocked inside me...

Intimate. Far more intimate and personal than anything I ever tried with Chance.

"What's up?" Dorothy's gaze has sharpened. "Why the frown? I thought you had a good time."

"I did."

And that's the problem. It was an amazing time. It was more than that, it was an unforgettable night, and Hawk swept through my life like a hurricane, so how am I supposed to forget all about him now and pretend that night never happened?

"He doesn't want a repeat," I hear myself say and wish I could swallow the words back. I sigh as I fuss with my bed covers, pulling them from under Dorothy's ass to make my bed. "I should head to class."

"Not so fast." Dorothy manages a hard grip on the hem of my sweater, and hauls me down beside her. "What doesn't he want?"

I rub a hand over my eyes. "To see me again."

She gives me a long, serious stare. "Did he say that?"

"Yeah."

"Okay. That's asshole-y of him. But you just broke up with Chance. And you barely know Tall, Blond and Non Mysterious. Right?"

"Right." I manage a smile. "Let me go to class, Dodo."

"Yeah. Me too." She taps my nose. "I hate seeing you sad, Laylay. Don't set your heart on a guy who told you from the start he won't be with you. He gave you a good night. And he's a millionaire, right? You can't trust a millionaire. That's common knowledge."

"Nobody told me," I mutter, more irritated at myself by the second. "You're right, it was a good night, and everything's fine." I make my smile brighter, even if it's strained. "A new experience. Maybe someday in my memoirs I'll mention it and become a bestseller."

"I thought you wanted to be a publisher, not a writer."

I thought many things, too. I thought I knew myself, my body, my desires. I thought I was safe and happy with Chance—and look. Just like mom and dad, we broke up.

Broke apart.

And then a blond Nordic god gave me in one brief evening what I've been missing. A glimpse of a lifetime.

***

The week passes way too slowly as I try to focus on my classes and assignments for college. The weekend is a drag. I don't want to go out, so I stay in and do my best to study.

The next week rolls in, and then out, and it's as unbearable as the previous one. Mom has been calling me, too, as if sensing the funk I'm in, insisting I visit her in New York, trying to lure me with promises of awesome shopping, theater plays and author signing events.

Sounds good. I should go.

But something's keeping me back. And it can't be Hawk. That would be absurd. He's not going to be part of my life in any form, so why am I still thinking about him?

It's the sex, I tell myself as I save my notes from today's marketing lecture and close my laptop, shoving it into my bag. The awesome sex.

And my general and regrettable lack thereof.

Maybe it's time to get my head out of my ass and start looking. Looking at guys of my age and status—students—instead of millionaire playboys who travel halfway around the world to watch an opera in Sydney or eat at their favorite sushi restaurant in Tokyo.

Normal guys. Even if they aren't so godlike in bed, or out of it.

Norman from my English class has asked me, like, a hundred times already this semester if I want to catch a movie with him, and Jaxon from my economics class mentioned three times in the past ten days that we should study together for the upcoming history test.

Jaxon is cute. And come on, Hawk's not all that much older than me and Jaxon. I'm nineteen. Hawk is—as my googling him successfully revealed—twenty-two.

But going out with Jaxon... _No._ Just, no.

I snap my bag shut and close my eyes. Hawk. It's normal to be thinking about him, I remind myself. He saved me the night of the break-up—swept in and made me forget the pain, made me feel good about myself, gave me lots of mind-blowing orgasms and turned the night into a sexy fairytale.

It's over. It's over now, Layla. Move on.

Still, I don't call Jaxon, or Norman, and I don't look at the boys as I walk out of the auditorium toward my car.

I don't need boys, I decide. Not now. It's good to take a break after being with Chance for two years. Concentrate on my studies, spend time with Dorothy, maybe visit Mom.

Let the memory of Hawk fade. Then maybe I'll see his pic in the newspaper, in the entertainment section, or in Mom's gossipy magazines, and smile fondly.

One day.

I head home, mulling over this, trying to decide if traveling to New York in the middle of the semester is a good idea, when my cell phone rings.

Parking my car, I pull out the cell. "Dorothy? I'm almost home." Because who else might be calling me tonight? "Is everything okay?"

The silence at the other end of the line stretches.

Then comes a dark chuckle that trickles over my skin like melted caramel. "Everything's okay, yeah. Depending on how _you_ are, Hot Body."

Heat spills in my chest, spreading up my neck. "I'm, um, fine." I clear my throat. "What's up?"

"Something's definitely up and hardening." I can hear the wolfish grin in his voice. "I'd send you a pic but pulling my pants down is a challenge where I'm at right now."

The heat seeps into my cheeks. _Oh God._ "Where are you?" I didn't mean for my voice to go all breathy, but I can picture him in my mind and...

"On my bike."

I bite my lip. "So no pics possible, huh?"

I know he rides a motorcycle. A big, mean-looking one. I've read much more than I should have about him these past few days, despite my resolve not to think about him.

"I could show you. Up and personal."

I'm holding my breath, I realize, and let it out in a whoosh. "Is that so?"

Because I thought he'd never call me. That I'd never hear his voice again, or see his face across from mine.

"I'm not far from the restaurant where we met," he says, his voice soft." Come."

I almost do. Holy crap, I'll see him again. "And then?"

"I wanna take you for a ride."

I swallow hard, my throat tight. "On your bike?"

"That, too."

"I'm on my way."

Chapter Four

He's sitting astride his bike. I see him as I park my car at the curb and kill the engine.

_God._ He's gorgeous. Even better looking in his leather pants and jacket, if possible, than he was in his expensive designer suit.

His grin flashes bright from across the street.

_Right. Okay._ My palms are sweaty as I grab my purse and step out of my car, hitting the lock button and crossing over to him.

He said he follows through on all his promises, and he did promise not to date me. Not to stay with me. Not to be with me as a boyfriend would.

So why is he back?

As I approach and he towers over me even when sitting on his badass bike, self-consciousness belatedly hits and I tug on the hem of my sweater and smooth down my skirt. I wasn't planning on anything sexier than watching Arrow on TV for tonight, so my skirt is knee-length, and I have my leather boots on. My hair is pinned to the back of my head with a pencil, and I have no make-up on.

_Classy, Layla._ Perfect for seducing a millionaire hunk, and... wait, what am I doing? This is the guy who stated upfront he'll never want a relationship with me.

But aren't relationships overrated? I think again of mom and dad and their painful divorce as I come to stand right in front of Hawk and shiver.

Maybe I don't want a relationship, either. As long as I can see this man, inhale his spicy scent. Touch him.

Or maybe I'm going crazy. Lust sure is a powerful drug, and when he lifts a bunch of flowers—roses, I realize dimly—and runs the blossoms over my arm, releasing their scent, it hits me hard.

_Roses._ Memory of tiny lashes hitting my back, my ass. His fingers touching me. His cock filling me.

A gasp escapes me.

Then he puts a rough hand on my cheek, then slides it to the back of my neck and draws me closer to him, and I'm falling.

Nestled against his thigh, pressed between his warmth and his bike, with his hand cradling my head, I feel high. His warm breath washes over my mouth, smelling of mint and a hint of Scotch.

"I thought," I try to keep the words in but they come anyway, "that I wouldn't see you again."

"I thought that, too," he whispers, pulling me even closer, his eyes narrowed, "but fuck that. I wanted to see you."

Me, too, oh God, me too, I think as his mouth covers mine and the kiss turns hot within seconds—his tongue twisting with mine, his teeth biting at my lower lip. He's eating up my mouth like a starving man, his hand traveling down to my back, hauling me until I'm riding his muscular thigh.

Pleasure zings down my nerve endings, pools low in my belly. I'm in real danger of coming right here, right now, on the street, dry-humping his leg.

This kind of thing keeps happening when I'm around him. Normally I'm not much for public displays, even less for public orgasms.

I pull back, breaking the kiss, and his hand clenches against my back. He blinks, the gray of his eyes gone dark. "Wanna come with me tonight?"

I lick my lips. "And tomorrow?"

"My promise remains the same," he says, his voice not faltering. The roses are resting in front of him, on the bike, their scent mingling with his and with the fumes of the passing cars. "Nothing has changed."

Nothing?

But I want this too much. With him. I want him to show me how it can be. I want him filling me, I want to feel his heartbeat slamming against my back, against my chest. I need him in my arms.

So I lift my skirt and climb on the bike behind him, linking my arms around his hard middle. "Let's go."

***

He's given me a helmet to wear, and it sits heavy on my head. I also can't rest my cheek on his back, as I'd have liked to do. It's my first time on a bike, and I'm stressed that I'm going to fall off, especially on the turns.

However, I still notice that he manages to keep the bunch of roses—red roses, almost crimson, like blood—in front of him as he weaves through the city streets, and that he seems to know what he's doing, like he's been riding a bike for ages.

Urban cowboy, I think and snicker as I imagine him with a black Stetson and one of those tasseled leather vests, the sound lost in the wind as we speed down an avenue.

An incognito millionaire slash bad boy driving through, crossing the lives of ordinary people, and they don't even know. When we stop at a traffic light, I catch a girl my age watching us. She smiles, and I guess she's seen the roses.

She thinks she knows what's going on here. A romantic escapade.

She doesn't know what the roses signify—hard sex with no feelings attached, offered by a guy who otherwise spends his days in the offices of his family company, directing the rise and fall of commercial empires.

I cling to his strong back as he speeds down unknown streets, until he parks at the gate of an illuminated building. The street is flanked with trees, and the buildings are shiny, brand new and clearly high scale.

A guard appears from a side building, takes one look at Hawk and opens the gate with a press of a button on a small control device.

We ride into the compound, and park in a covered spot.

"Your place?" I ask after I've dismounted, pulled off the killer helmet and straightened my skirt as best I could.

"A friend's."

A flash of disappointment goes through me. I really wanted to see his place. Or one of his places, anyway. Get a glimpse into his life, into who he really is.

But then he's climbing off, unfolding his tall frame and taking off his own helmet, and I forget what I was thinking about.

Dressed in that black leather jacket, a white T-shirt peeking underneath, with that panty-dropping grin directed at me, I'm left with no choice. Right now, I'd follow him just about anywhere for a chance to run my hands over his face and body, to kiss those high cheekbones and the hollow at the base of his neck, the line of his shoulders to his strong arms and down to his hands.

Hands that are currently grabbing my hands and dragging me close to him, so that he can brush his mouth over mine. Then with a wink, he turns and pulls me inside the dim interior of the building.

Caught up in his presence, I barely notice our surroundings, but a few things jump out—like the marble floors and wall linings, the low leather furniture forming a sitting area to the left, the mirrors and perfect polish of the elevator doors. There are three elevators, and Hawk hauls me to the one at the far left. It dings as the doors open and we step inside.

Then Hawk produces a small key which he uses to activate our ride to the top.

The penthouse.

Of course it's the penthouse, I think, a little dazed, as we stand in the gilded cage of the elevator, classic music playing, Hawk's hand around mine. He smells of old leather and a hint of aftershave weaves in with his natural, mouth-watering scent, turning my knees weak.

The doors slide open and I follow him into a gleaming white apartment with large black and white photos hanging on the walls and huge windows looking over the twinkling city and the lit-up boats in the harbor in the distance.

Wow.

He leads me across the enormous living room slash kitchen, through a hall wide enough to host a formal dinner in and then into another room.

A bedroom.

"Is this..." I swallow, glancing around as he walks me straight to the ginormous bed. "Is it your friend's bed? Maybe we shouldn't—"

"It's the guest bedroom."

Oh, right. Just a little thing for guests, that's all.

Hawk pushes me to sit down on the bed and shrugs off his jacket. It thuds to the floor and next he tears off his T-shirt. Muscles bunch and release, and beautiful ink ripples over his abs and pecs.

Roses done in black ink.

Before I take a closer look at the intricate tattoo, he's pushing me down and climbing on top of me, making the mattress dip. He carefully lowers himself over me until his thick erection is nestled between our bodies, puts down his elbows beside my head, and starts kissing me.

Oh Lord. I've been kissed before. Heck, he's kissed me before—but this is something completely different. He's fucking my mouth with his tongue, sucking on my lips, and every stroke and thrust of his tongue sends a wave of wet heat between my legs.

He pushes my coat off and I wriggle out of it. He sits up, grabs the hem of my sweater and lifts it off.

"Oh yeah," he murmurs, his gaze fastening on my bra-covered boobs, a slow smile lifting his lips. "I remembered right."

"Remembered what?" I'm reaching for his zipper, wanting him out of his clothes, too.

"How pretty you are."

My throat tightens. I shouldn't let his words affect me. This is just sex. He's only being nice.

So I unzip his pants and shove my hand inside, rewarded by a deep gasp and a roll of his slim hips.

"Fuck, babe." He catches my wrist, giving a breathless laugh. "Not so fast. I have plans for the evening."

"Plans." I curl my fingers around his thick hard-on, because he's going commando tonight, and God, it's bigger than I remembered. "Like, take me to a classic music concert, or an opera? That's what you normally do, right?"

He laughs again, and I like the sound. Deep, and playful. "Nah, not my style. Also, I don't play the piano. Just FYI."

"Damn." I grin at him, and he braces himself over me, letting me pull down his leather pants. They slip down more easily than I expected, freeing his cock, and it swings a little, the barbells flashing as it slaps my belly.

He groans. "Fuck, I think the plans are on hold. Need to fuck you first."

Crude. And hot.

Yeah, he doesn't seem like the opera-going, piano-playing kind, and know what? That's fine by me. I don't think I could deal with any pussyfooting and discussing art before sex.

Not when I want him this badly.

"Condom." He groans again, his hard-on sliding over my stomach as he flexes up, stretching his arms and looking down at me. "In my jacket. Fuck."

He pulls away to get it and I start undoing the clasp of my skirt. Need to feel him on every inch of my skin. Although he called and we're here now, I'm back where I began—scared it won't happen again.

But he's back on the bed, tearing the foil open and covering his cock, allowing me a good look at the silver metal piercing the head. So sexy. Never thought a man's cock would make my mouth water and my body arch.

"The skirt. And the boots." He reaches for my legs. "Leave them on."

Speechless I watch as he pulls my panties off, all the way down and off me. As he spreads my legs and rubs his thumb down my seam, opening me. As my skirt pools around my hips, baring me to him completely.

Then he lifts his thumb to his mouth and sucks it off, his eyes growing hooded and dark, and I moan, my insides clenching at the sexiness of it.

"Sweet," he whispers and lowers himself over me, one hand guiding his cock into me. The head bumps my entrance, and then he's sliding in, a slow, pleasurable drag that has me arching against him.

"God..." So good. On the edge of painful, but frigging perfect. I clutch at his hips, then slide my hands inward, where we're joined.

His powerful body is racked by fine tremors as he slowly pushes into me, his abs clenched so hard they feel like smooth, carved rock where my hands are touching them.

He pushes deeper, and my eyes all but roll up in my head. His hips rock and he grabs and lifts my legs over his hips, one after the other, boots and all.

Allowing him to bury himself in all the way. A gasp escapes him, and when I can finally pry my lids open to see, I find his eyes wide with something akin to shock.

"Holy fuck," he whispers, and I'd say the same if I had any breath left. "You okay?"

I love that he asks me, and it's cute, too, like he's aware his dick is pretty big and that he can cause physical damage.

At my nod, he starts to move, and things escalate fast from there. The pressure increases, the pleasure ratchets up, until I'm holding on to his arms for dear life, shocked at the needy sounds leaving my mouth.

Gradually I become aware I'm using real words. "Faster. Yes. Oh God. Like that. Yeah. Please."

And he fucks me into an orgasm that catches me off guard—a sudden clench deep inside me, a roll of heat, a sparkle that burns and aches in the best way—and I'm crying out his name, the heels of my boots digging into his muscular ass as I come apart.

I feel an answering shudder in his body as I float in a haze of pleasure, feel his thrusts lose rhythm, and he moans, burying his face in the crook of my neck. His cock pulses inside me, the heat of his release seeping through the condom, and another wave of pleasure rolls through me.

"Hell, babe." He's panting, and I just love that it's because of me. He pulls out of me, making us both groan, and rolls over, to my side, working the latex off. "That was fucking awesome."

He holds the condom, staring at it, a crease between his pale brows.

"What is it?" I feel liquid, a pool of satisfied woman, as I roll on my side to get a better look at him, and maybe finally also run my hands over him.

"It's just that..." His mouth twists, and he glances at me quickly, then away. "This isn't my usual game."

"What do you mean?" A thread of unease weaves itself through my mind.

"Simple sex."

I blink. Okay, what? "You mean normally you do more things like..." I frown back at him. "Like the roses?"

His brow smooths out and he grins, catching me off guard with the openness of his expression. "Yeah. Just like the roses."

"You can use the roses if you like." I nod at where he dropped them, on a side table. A bit of heat rolls up my face when I admit, "I liked that."

"Well, well..." He lifts a hand to my face, strokes my cheek, and his eyes go soft. "Really?"

"Really." I shift, feeling kind of ridiculous only dressed in my bunched up skirt and boots, but the way his gaze travels down my body washes the feeling away in a tide of want. "I thought it was hot."

"It sure was."

And he's right here, and I want. I want so much more.

Dammit.

I give in and sit up, then put my hands on his chest. Firm, warm, smooth, muscles rolling under my palms as he leans back, propping himself up on his elbows, observing me.

"What is it, girl?" He looks down, when my hands trail over his washboard abs to his navel. His cock is semi-hard, stirring more as my touch approaches it.

"Just wanted to touch you like this."

"Then by all means." His gaze drifts up from my hands to my boobs, and his lashes lower over dilated eyes. His cock is hardening, lifting between us. "If you keep it up, though, I might not be able to try something else with you."

"Like what?"

"Like that." He nods at something.

Something else he's left on the side table, I realize, turning reluctantly to see, something silver coiled beside the roses.

"What is it?"

"Take a look."

I love how his body feels under my touch. I hesitate, slipping my hands up his hard pecs to his shoulders. Love how wide they are, how my fingers splay over his forearms, looking tiny resting on his biceps. He has more ink there. Words in a cursive script, encircling his upper arms.

He puts those arms around me as he throws his bare legs off the bed. He stands, lifting me with him, and I wrap my legs around him with a yelp as he moves.

He walks over to the side table and lets me slide back down. My cheek rests on his bare chest for a moment, and his heartbeat thuds steadily in my ear.

So warm and solid. He feels so good.

But curiosity finally wins out and I turn, bending over the table to take a closer look at the silver thing. I tug at it. The handle is silvery indeed, but from it sprout black leather strips.

"What is this thing?"

"My new flogger," Hawk says, pressing his chest to my back and sliding his arms around my waist. "I bought it just for you. Isn't it gorgeous?"

***

It is sleek and dangerous looking, I think, turning it over in my hands. I'm kneeling on the bed, and Hawk is lying on his back beside me, one arm folded under his head, his gray eyes luminous as he studies my face, waiting for my verdict.

"Is this... like a whip?" I wet my dry lips with the tip of my tongue, and Hawk lifts a hand to my face and wipes my mouth with the tip of his finger.

"Yeah. A hand whip. But it doesn't really hurt. Like the roses." He gives me a crooked grin. "Try it on your hand. You'll see."

_Try it?_ I wrap my hand around the silver handle and drag the soft leather strips over my other hand. It tickles. It feels... good.

Then I lift it up and bring it down on my open palm a bit harder.

"Oh fuck..." Hawk's eyes turn to slits. He lowers his hand to his crotch and that's when I realize he's hard again. "I want to do that to you."

"You do?" I mean, obviously, if he bought this flogger just for me, but it's kind of weird. And exciting. "Where would you hit me with it?"

"On your back. Your ass." He tugs on his cock, toys with the barbells, and a flush rises to his cheekbones, making his eyes glitter. "On your tits. Between your legs."

_Shit._ I'm breathing hard, and the tips of my breasts ache, tight with desire. I never thought I'd want a guy to hit me with anything, roses or whips.

But I can't deny that the thought, the mental image of Hawk doing that to me is setting me on fire.

"Yes," I whisper before I even know I'm saying it. "I want it."

He curses softly, sitting up and putting both hands on my face, his rough palms catching on my skin. He leans in. "Are you sure, Doll?"

"Yes," I say before I change my mind.

His smile is soft, softer than the strips of his flogger. "I promise it will be so fucking good. And if you wanna stop, just say the word, okay?"

I nod, not trusting my voice. Then he unclasps my skirt and pulls it off me, and I'm naked, except for my boots.

"Love your boots," he whispers darkly, letting my skirt fall to the floor. "Turn around."

I turn on all fours, and he puts a warm, heavy hand in the small of my back. "Like this?"

"Damn perfect." Something cool and velvety caresses my leg, and I realize it's the flogger. He lets the strips trail over my back, over my ass, lets them flow over my crack, over my exposed pussy, and I shudder, tiny jolts of pleasure running up my spine. "You look fucking beautiful."

I turn my head, to say not sure what, when he lifts the flogger and lets it fall on my back. There's almost no force behind it, only gravity, it seems—and the impact is soft and yet startling. Pleasurable.

Instead of speaking, I moan, my head falling forward.

"That's it," he murmurs, letting the flogger fall on my back again and again, each time a little lower, stroking my shoulder blades, my ribs, reaching my ass. He works the strips over my ass cheeks, and the pleasure mounts and floods into my core, making me clench.

That's when he spreads my legs more, draws back a little and lets the strips fall right over my pussy, hard.

"Oh God!" I flinch and shake, and it's not really pain, but it's not pleasure, either. It's just shock.

"Relax," he says, but then does it again, and again, and then it's all pleasure, dark, thick pleasure that drips down my belly like syrup, tightening my insides until I can't breathe.

My legs are trembling, and when he hits me again, I small cry pushes past my lips.

I'm close to coming, I realize with a start. From this. From Hawk flogging my ass.

"Like this?" He now drags the strips over my pussy, and I whine deep in my throat from the tantalizing stroke.

"More," I beg. "Harder."

"Seeing you writhe like that, seeing how you like it... Hot damn." He snaps the flogger against my inner thigh and I struggle to bite back another plea.

So close.

He strikes my other thigh, the impact leaving a light sting that only makes my belly tighten more.

"Please, Hawk..." I need.

Need more.

"Turn around." When I don't move, my body too taut with need, he pushes down on my back until I'm lying on my belly, and then rolls me over.

I look up into his handsome face, and he smiles, slow and sexy.

He trails the strips of the flogger over my breasts, then flicks them over my belly, and I gasp. He sits back enough to snap the flogger over my boobs, over my hard nipples, and I'm lost in sensation. I grab at the sheets, needing a tether.

I find none as he alternates between my boobs, then slips his other hand between my legs and breaches me with two fingers.

"Holy shit!" I rock against his hand, the pleasure bursting in me like a firework, flames and sparks, and I come so hard my vision goes black. The pleasure liquefies my bones. "God..."

His fingers are still inside me. He's holding himself still, sitting back on his knees, and between his legs...

Good God, he's so hard it's impressive.

And I want his cock inside me. "Please," I whisper, and reach down, glide my hand over my belly until I brush over my clit and touch his hand that's still half-buried inside me. "In me."

He kind of grunts, the flogger dropping from his hand on the mattress, and he pulls his fingers out of me, slowly, dragging on my inner walls, sending ripples of pleasure into my core.

Bracing himself on one hand, he guides his cock into me in one thrust that seems to go on forever, until he's seated inside me.

We both cry out at the sensation.

He's hot, and so hard, and when he does a sort of push-up over me, and I lift my legs to his waist, he crushes his mouth to mine and groans against my lips.

Feels even better than last time. So much better. He surges like a wave inside me, muscles flexing in his chest, his arms, his legs. There's nothing slow, nothing gentle about this lovemaking. His pelvis is rocking, his dick pushing in and out of me, his weight pressing me into the mattress as he picks up speed.

He's thrusting deep inside me, hard and fast strokes, his breaths coming in uneven pants.

"Fuck," he grunts, "fuck, fuck, babe, I'm..." His strokes turn shallow and frantic, and I moan his name as another tsunami of pleasure hits me, taking me under.

His forehead drops to mine. His breath catches, his hips jerk, then again. And again. He comes for a long time, waves of liquid heat bursting deep inside me.

"Fuck me..." He shudders when I clench around him again. "That was..."

Awesome.

Amazing.

Better than ever.

It's not until later, when he finally pulls out of me, that I realize something else. There's liquid dripping out of me.

And he has no condom on.

Shit.

He seems to realize, too, and he glances up at my face, brows drawing together. "Oh fuck. Tell me you're on the pill."

"I am." It's the truth. "And I'm clean."

The question hangs in the air between us. _What about you?_

"I'm clean, too." He sighs and flops on his back. "Got tested this week. I wanted to ditch the condoms, but hadn't thought to do it so soon."

My heart trips. "Ditch them?"

All possible reasons flash through my mind and my heart is hammering.

He turns his head toward me. "I'm only fucking you, babe. No other girl."

"But you said..."

"No feelings. No relationship." He puts a hand down, searching for mine. Clasps it. "But sex... yeah, I want that with you. For as long as this lasts."

"Me too," I hear myself saying as if from a distance, and oh God... What am I doing?

Chapter Five

"So, your man, he's hot." Dorothy is chewing on a chocolate cookie and pretending to be studying. She's got her laptop open and her notebook, but she's watching music videos instead. "Not like the guys asking me out."

"Hawk?"

"That's the one. Was there another? When are you seeing him again?"

I press my lips together and pretend, in my turn, to be engrossed in the statistics book I'm supposed to be reading.

"Laylay."

"Hm?"

"Hasn't he called you since last week?"

Actually, it's been ten days. I did text him once, a few days ago, but he didn't reply. I'm totally out of my element here. No clue what I'm supposed to do. After all, we're not together. Although we've been meeting for three months now, in hotels and places owned by friends of his, I can't demand to see him. Don't even dare ask what he's doing when he's not with me.

He said he's not sleeping with other girls, and I have to trust him. Checking the internet every day isn't healthy.

I do it, of course. Haven't found any incriminating evidence, though. No pics of him with girls, no gossip.

That means nothing, of course, since there's no evidence about him being with me, either.

Which leads me to question my sanity for letting him inside me without a condom every time. I just... want him. Like crazy.

Stupid, Layla.

Then again... he's taking a risk with me, too. And I doubt he stalks me on the internet, like I am doing. Like I've been refusing to do this past week.

No more stalking for me.

"Layla. Is everything okay?" Dorothy is staring at me.

_Whoops._ "Yeah, sorry. No, he hasn't called me."

"Maybe it's because of what's been going on with his friend?"

"Friend?"

"This Jordan guy. Like, he totally vanished from the face of the earth two years ago and Hawk has traveled to Mexico based on rumors that he went there."

_You kidding me?_ I stop checking the internet for six days and I miss this? In Mexico. Probably drinking tequila with some chick in a pool.

Damn.

***

"See you in an hour, babe," Hawk says, and I disconnect the call, lying back on my bed.

I put down my phone and stare at the far wall of my bedroom. I should be happy he's back from Mexico and calling me to meet up. We have fun together, if nothing else, and my body is already tingling when I think of him. Of how he makes me feel.

How he makes me come.

But God, I wish I had a real boyfriend sometimes. Someone I can share real stuff with. Someone I can call in the middle of the night to talk about my fears, and hopes, someone who will cuddle me and make me hot chocolate when I feel blue.

"What you need," Dorothy says, wandering into my room, "is new lingerie. Tall, Blond and Sexy will appreciate it." She sinks down on the bed beside me. "I overheard your call. That a problem? "

"Nope. No problem."

"Then why the long face?"

"You know why."

Dorothy's expression softens. "Is that about what the doc told you?"

I nod and put my socked feet on the wall.

"It's going to be fine, sweetie," she says.

And I don't see how. "You're right."

"Besides, you said Hawk isn't the guy you want to spend your life with."

I said that.

She copies my pose—lying on her back, putting her socked feet on the wall. Her socks have tiny dinosaurs on them. "He's a playboy millionaire and not interested in relationships. You want a guy who will understand you, and think long-term with you."

But all this doesn't change what the doc said and how my life will never be the same. "I hate this."

"There are options in life, Laylay. Don't overthink this. And look at it on the bright side. No need to take the pill anymore!"

"Yay me," I mumble, and my eyes burn.

"Oh baby girl." Dorothy turns and throws an arm over me. Her dark eyes are inches from mine. "Don't let this get you down. We will go and see more specialists, okay? And I was kidding about the pill. I mean, use protection, right? Always."

I nod again, because she's right. I'm just still in shock. "Hawk and I, we're exclusive. At least, he says we are."

"Okay then. Chin up. I love you, girl."

"Love you, too." I sniffle. "Marry me, Dodo? You're the best."

She snorts. "Go and have hot sex with your man. Hot sex is like going to the spa. It will make you feel better."

_God, yeah._ Sadly, though, I doubt it will be enough... Maybe it's me, maybe I'm changing. I'm over Chance, have been for a while, I know I'm not frigid in bed, I know I love sex... and I want more. More from a guy than that.

And that's exactly what sexy, handsome, rich and distant Jamie Hawk Fleming can't give me.

***

His tall shape astride the motorcycle is by now familiar. I haven't seen him in a couple of weeks, though, and it feels both like yesterday and months since I last met him.

Since I last took in his beautiful face, his strong body that I am so intimate with. In my mind's eye, I see every ridge of muscle, every drop of ink on his skin.

My own body clenches with desire just from the sight of him waiting, just from the memory. I'm primed for him. It's an automatic response.

No idea why my heart leaps, too, as if excited. This is a carnal thing, I remind myself. Purely sexual. We're having fun. I'm learning what turns me on, what makes me come.

He turns me on.

Shaking my head at myself, I walk over to him and his gaze on me sends heat into my cheeks—like every single time.

"God, I missed that blush," he says, his voice so low it's practically a growl, and I reach up to touch his face.

His golden stubble is more pronounced. His hair is longer, falling in his eyes.

"So... Mexico, huh?" His stubble is softer now, as it's turning into a short beard. "Did you find your friend?"

A shadow passes behind his bright eyes. "Nope. But I'll find him. He's hiding."

"Why?"

One of his broad shoulders rolls in a shrug. "Sometimes having money makes life fucking hard. More dangerous." He's silent for a moment, regarding me. "I know how this sounds. Being poor is much harder, I know. And dangerous in other, more subtle ways. But money means bullets."

I frown. "But why?"

I don't want anything happening to Hawk. A shiver shakes me at the thought.

"The why doesn't matter." He leans his cheek into my hand and gives me a puppy look. "I missed you, babe."

"It's Layla," I say, pulling my hand away. Sometimes he acts all sweet and snuggly, and I need to put some distance between us, because I want this.

I want to be like that with him. Like a couple.

But that's not us, and I love his darker side, I remind myself. I love the hard, hot sex and his floggers and paddles and all the ways he loses control with me.

Hawk isn't cuddly. He's not boyfriend material, no matter how much I want to think he is. He's kept true to his initial promise.

So when he pulls a small box from one of his leather jacket pockets, I don't know what to think. Surely... Nah.

No.

No way.

And I'm right. Taking the box in my trembling hands, unable to read anything on his handsome, smirking face, I open it to find a fine bracelet inside.

It looks silver, but of course the inscription inside the box lets me know it's platinum. It's made up of several flat, fine chains that shimmer under the street lights.

"Like it?" he asks.

"It looks like..." I wet my lips, glance up at him.

"The strips of my flogger," he supplies the answer, looking smug.

"Why?" Strange question to ask when given a platinum bracelet that has to cost a fortune, I know, but why would he buy me anything? I'm just his fuckbuddy.

"To always remind you that you like it." His gaze dips to my cleavage, darkening. "That you beg for it. For me."

"I don't beg for you." I scoff, getting scared, all too aware he might have seen through me, realized I feel more for him that I'd ever admit, even to myself. "It's just sex."

"Yeah." He turns his face away. "Yeah, it is. Damn good sex, though." From the side, I watch his mouth tilt up in a smirk. "And now you'll wear my flogger on your wrist."

"Maybe."

He faces me again. "You will, Doll. Because in the bedroom you're mine."

***

I mull over his words as he drives me to yet another boutique hotel. I swear, we must have tried them all over the past few months.

In the bedroom you're mine.

You'll wear my flogger on your wrist.

He's marking me. Like a lion, marking his females.

But why? He doesn't need to do that. Not him. Not with me. He can literally have any girl he likes.

Unless he really does like me that much, which is... insanity. If he did like me, he'd have asked me out. He'd try to be a boyfriend for me, not someone I see when he's in town, not someone I only see at night and have sex with in random hotel rooms.

I finger the bracelet as we enter the hotel. It hangs heavy on my wrist. Definitely expensive stuff. Should I give it back?

It almost feels like he's paying me for sex.

Although when he turns to me and smiles, when he takes my hand and lifts it to his warm lips, that thought flees. He's never treated me badly. Never implied I'm cheap.

"You look more gorgeous than ever," he whispers.

_See?_ Makes it so difficult to be angry with him. Difficult to hate him when he's only giving me pleasure. Difficult to send away.

As Dorothy put it a few days ago, why send away a man who can make you come so hard you see stars? She claims that the mere mention of his name makes me moan.

She's lying, of course. She can't know that. I only do that when she's not around.

Soon enough we're inside a luxurious room, and he grins at me as he tugs me toward the bathroom. He's playful, and I'd much rather have his more intense, forceful side tonight.

He lets go of my hand to plug the huge bathtub and turns on the water. He winks at me over his shoulder. "I've traveled a lot. Wanna wash me clean?"

Despite my anxious turn of thoughts, the image is enough to make me throb between my legs. "No water for washing in Mexico?"

"I tried drowning in tequila," he mutters, and I'm not sure he's joking. "Didn't work out so well."

"Miss your friend, huh?"

"Damn right. I'm worried about him." He drags me close, then starts undressing me. "Missed you, too."

"You can't," I whisper.

"Can't what?"

"Say things like that to me."

"Why not?" His hands still on the zipper of my dress.

"Because of your promise. Because there can never be anything real between us."

He gives a dry laugh. "What's more real than sex?"

"You know what I mean."

He says nothing after that, his grin frozen in place, kind of manic. His hands are moving, though, taking off my dress, cupping my boobs, stroking down my flanks. His mouth finds my mouth, and he pushes me back against the tiled wall of the bathroom, kissing me hard.

He lifts my hand with the bracelet on, drags the metal against his cheek. His lashes are lowered, hiding his eyes. "You make me feel good. Like everything's fine in the world."

"Then why can't you be with me?" I ask, before I can stop the words. "Is it because of what you said? Danger?"

Stop, stupid mouth! I barely know him—except for his awesome body, that is. I don't really want to be his girlfriend.

Do I?

"Forget about that," he mutters.

"But I—"

"I needed to see you." A crease forms between his brows as he releases my hand and takes a step back. He pushes his hair out of his eyes. Such a boyish gesture. He looks so young like this.

I keep forgetting he's barely older than myself. And tonight he looks oddly lost in thought. Lost inside his own head.

Drawing a deep breath, inhaling his scent, I put my hands on his jacket and push it off his shoulders. He blinks, as if caught off guard, and lets me peel the jacket off him, then his T-shirt. His chest rises and falls sharply when I skim his pecs and broad ribcage, then undo his jeans and push them down, too.

Then groans when I go to my knees to take off his biker boots, socks and pants, leaving him naked.

When I stand back up, he puts his hands possessively on my ass and mashes my body to his, grinding his stirring hard-on between us. He's kissing me again, and doesn't stop as he tugs me toward the tub.

I toe off my shoes and he breaks the kiss to help me inside the warm water. The tub is half-full by now and when he climbs inside and pulls me down, on top of him, that's more than enough.

"I want you," he whispers and squeezes my boobs in his big hands, then bends forward to lick my nipples. "Couldn't think of much less during my trip. Fuck..."

He leans back when I put my hand between us and tug on the piercing, then curl my fingers around his thick cock, eyes closing. He's so hard, it feels like he's close to coming.

I know his body. I can feel his approaching orgasm in the way his legs shake underneath me, the way his balls are drawn up tight.

Lifting up, I guide him inside me—because I missed him, too, and I want him desperately.

He arches up when I sink on top of him, grabbing the rims of the tub in a white-knuckled grip, his jaw tight. He slips deep inside me, the feeling overwhelming, his cock stroking every pleasurable spot until I can't keep quiet anymore and moan out loud.

The pleasure is making me light-headed. I grip his shoulders to steady myself, bending over him, and he thrusts up.

I cry out at the fullness. It's perfect. I'm panting with it, unable to think past the fact he's sheathed inside me again, fitting me, stretching me, making me...

Making me his.

I falter, and he stops moving, watching me from heavy-lidded eyes. His body is still arched backward, his hands still gripping the rims of the tub, the tendons in his neck corded. His cock pulses inside me, a steady tickle that tells me he's on the cusp of shooting his load.

But he's struggling to wait and see if I'm okay.

I lift up, sink back down on him—and that's obviously the signal he's been waiting for, because he rocks his hips up and starts pounding into me in fast, rhythmic thrusts that begin to unravel me.

No roses. No flogger. Just him and his cock, his beautiful body and that vulnerable, oddly naked expression on his face.

"Hawk!" I try for more, but my belly is clenched so tight I can't speak, and then my core spasms around him, hurtling me into pleasure.

His thrusts stutter, and faintly I hear him cry out as heat floods my pussy, making me clench again.

"Hell, babe." He lets his head thunk back, on the edge of the tub, eyes closed, pale lashes fanning on his cheekbones. "It's like... it gets better every goddamn time."

I shake my head, because it feels that way to me, too, but I can't. Can't let myself think, or ask any more stupid, embarrassing questions.

We've covered that topic already.

Then he reaches for my hands, eyes fluttering open.

"Hold me," he says, and I suck in a sharp breath.

This isn't part of sex. Of sex-buddying. Neither was the bracelet. What's going on?

"Hawk... I can't," I whisper, vaguely aware I'm repeating to him what he said to me earlier tonight.

"Damn." He gives me a rueful smile. "Of course not." He rubs both hands over his face. "It's just... it's the fucking anniversary of my grandpa's death. I shouldn't have called you tonight." He starts to get up, sloshing water as his words sink in. "I'd better go find something to drink."

Sounds like his grandfather was important to him. I have so many questions—when did he die? Who was he? It's the first time Hawk lets a glimpse of his real self peek through, and I don't know what to do about it.

Except...

"Wait." I slide my arms around his neck and rest my cheek on his shoulder. "I'm sorry."

He doesn't move a muscle, perfectly still in my hold, his heart hammering wildly against my boobs. "Me too, Gorgeous. For everything."

He doesn't elaborate, and I don't ask. I just hug him, and gradually he lifts his arms and hugs me back.
Chapter Six

"So when are you going to tell me about your boyfriend?" Mom asks, sitting at my kitchen table and sipping black coffee.

"Boyfriend?" I frown, cradling my own mug of milk-with-coffee and leaning against the counter. "I don't have a boyfriend."

"Well then, no idea how you call it these days." She waves a manicured hand and smiles at me. It's kind of creepy how much she looks like me. And kind of nice, too. "That young man who's holding your hand in the picture."

"The" picture is the only photo of me and Hawk the tabloids have managed to score so far. It made quite the splash last month. We're walking into a restaurant, and he's holding my hand, glancing over his shoulders as the paparazzi flashes went off.

Needless to say we fled the restaurant and had dessert in bed instead.

"Don't you know who that guy is, Mom?"

"Some rich guy or other. The Fleming heir." She sighs. "Don't tell me you're just friends."

Trust Mom not to know who Hawk really is. It's a miracle she saw the picture. I bet one of her friends showed it to her.

"Yeah, he's rich. And we're not really together. We only went out for a while."

That's not a lie.

I mean, he's vanished again. No phone calls, no texts.

I can't take this anymore. This constant vanishing act that has me wondering if something happened to him, or if he just decided he got bored with me.

It's easier to put things into perspective when I haven't seen his face in a while. When I haven't heard his sexy voice.

This has to stop.

"Honey..." Mom beckons for me to approach and I do, because curiosity killed the cat and I'm ten times worse. "Come here."

"What is it, Mom?"

I sit beside her, and she takes my hands. It reminds me eerily of Hawk in the bathtub, taking my hands to ask me to hold him.

"You're beautiful, honey. You're intelligent, and educated, and amazing. I hope what happened between me and your dad, this divorce, didn't affect you negatively. Because it didn't work out between us, it doesn't mean you can't have a fabulous relationship, get married, have a happy life with your partner." She wrinkles her nose. "That what you call it nowadays, is it? Partner."

"Mom." I try in vain to disentangle my hands from hers. She's strong. "It's not that. Hawk and I were never meant to be together."

"How do you know that if you don't give him a chance?"

"I gave him lots of chances, Mom," I mumble, finally wrenching my hands free. "He doesn't want a relationship. And I don't really know him well enough to know if I want one, either. With him, I mean."

Her eyes, so eerily similar to mine, fill up. "You have feelings for him. I can tell from the way you talk about him, from the way you say his name."

_Damn._ And here I thought I felt nothing anymore.

"Everything will be okay, love," she says and claps her hands, putting on a bright smile. "I know. Let's go get a mani-pedi together. And shop. It will make us both feel so much better."

So I let her take me along and pretend to have fun, because otherwise I'd have to admit to myself that my heart is aching.

***

It's late the next week, long after Mom has left back to New York and I've returned to the grind of classes and assignments, when I receive a call from an unknown number.

I'm in the process of getting a coffee from the cafeteria at school, so I let the call go to voicemail and pay for my drink, then grab the Styrofoam cup and head toward my parked car.

My phone rings again.

Crap.

Rooting around in my purse where you can find anything from expired candy to usb sticks and a broken flashlight, I finally locate my phone and connect the damn call.

"Yeah?"

"Layla Green?" The voice is deep, deeper than Hawk's, and definitely masculine.

"Who is this?"

"Layla, Hawk needs you. Why aren't you with him?"

_What the hell?_ "What are you talking about?" I mutter. "Hawk doesn't need me. And again, who are you?"

"Rook. A friend."

"Funny. He never talked about you."

"Maybe you weren't paying attention."

_Jesus._ "Look, Hawk and I aren't together. We just fuck."

"You mean you're fucking around with him."

I shrug. I'm in a funk. Might as well let this guy think that. "How the hell did you get my number?"

"I borrowed Hawk's cell. Look..." He sighs. "If he means anything to you at all, come see him. He's at the James Hollister. By Patterson Park."

"What's that?"

"A high-end private clinic. He and his damn bike got into some sort of accident a few days ago. He's okay, but he hit his head pretty hard and they're keeping him in for observation."

_Oh God._ I'm standing there frozen, the cell clutched in my hand.

_Accident?_ "I didn't know—"

"I'll leave your name at the reception desk," he says briskly and disconnects.

Just when I thought I had Hawk and my feelings for him figured out, he twists my heart all over again.

***

The grounds of the clinic are spotless. Bright green lawns and perfectly trimmed hedges, and a white building with huge glass windows and a massive entrance, the five broad steps leading to it sparkling in the watery sunlight.

A man is sitting behind the immaculate white desk, and in his pale blue suit, with his brown hair swept over his forehead and dark-rimmed glasses, he wouldn't be out of place in a period drama movie.

"May I help you?" he asks, glancing at me over those damn glasses. His brow creases. "Ms...?"

"Green. Layla Green. I'm here to see Hawk." I blink when he gives me a blank look. "Mr. Jamie Fleming."

"Oh right, Mr. Fleming. Mr. Carter said you'd drop by." He waves at an orderly who's coming down the hall. "Sarah, please escort Ms. Green to Mr. Fleming's room."

Nodding at him, I follow the orderly down a long corridor, then we ride up two floors in the elevator and come out in another spotless passage.

"This way, please," the orderly says, and I follow her quiet steps past numbered doors, my mind numb.

We stop at number 2, and she knocks on the door. "Mr. Fleming." She pokes her head inside, although I haven't heard an answer. "Ms. Green here to see you."

She steps back and I enter the room. It's big, as expected, with glass doors opening to a balcony. There's a table and leather-padded chairs, and a double bed.

Hawk is sitting on it, his back propped on a mountain of pillows, hands resting on his legs. He's dressed in pale gray pajamas and a white sweater. His scruff has grown into a beard, and his hair is so long he's peering through it at me.

His gray eyes look a bit too wide at finding me there.

"Hot Body?" he asks, and that breaks me out of my trance.

I close the door behind me and walk toward him. "Hi."

He looks strangely small and fragile slumped on the bed, his face pale, dark smudges under his eyes. Of course, the moment I sit beside him, making the mattress dip, I find that's not true. He's not small at all.

His mouth pulls into a tight smile. "What are you doing here?"

"I came to see you."

"And how did you know where I was?"

"Rook called me." I lift his hand from where it's resting on his leg, turn it over. It's bruised and scratched, the gashes taped. "Said he's your friend?"

Hawk nods. Swallows hard. "He is."

"Said he borrowed your phone."

The ghost of another smile touches his lips. "Rook's just cross I didn't call immediately to tell him about the accident."

_Okay. Right._ "But your parents have been here, I bet, as you recovered?"

He stares down at his hand in my hand. "They dropped by once."

"Once?" I'm horrified, and I try to regain control. "Why?"

"They're busy people."

Are all millionaires' lives like that? I want to ask him, but his face is blank, and it looks like a façade of sadness.

"Well, you could have told me. I'd have come."

The corners of his full mouth lift. "Thanks."

"What happened?"

"Took a tight corner. Lost control of the bike."

_God._ "And you hit your head?"

"Rook said that?" He chuckles, although I fail to see what's so funny about that. "It wasn't so bad." He turns so that I can now see a small shaved patch on the side of his head and a neat line of dark stitches. "I've taken quite a few hits to the head in my life. I'm fine."

"Crap. I'm sorry." I lift my other hand to touch, and he leans just out of reach. "Sorry you're hurt. What do the docs say?"

"That I'm good to go. Tomorrow."

I let my hand drop. "Were you going to tell me?"

He shakes his head.

And why am I asking? Haven't we established already that he's not my boyfriend and feels no obligation whatsoever to keep me in the loop of his activities?

"I shouldn't have come," I whisper, and stand up. I turn away and tug on my coat. "I'll leave you to rest."

"No, wait." He comes after me, throwing his legs off the bed and staggering across the floor to reach me by the time I turn back around. "Just fucking wait."

He pulls me into his arms, and I'm shocked by how thin he feels under the loose sweater. How long has he been here? When was the accident?

But he doesn't give me time to ask. The moment I look up, his mouth comes down on mine, and he kisses me like he's breathing me in.

Hungrily. Then softly. Then he backs me up against the bed and I don't stop him.

I don't want him to stop.

Sifting my fingers through his longish, silken hair, I draw him down with me, on the bed. He could have died in the accident. I might not have known until it was over.

But he's alive, and he's here, and he's beautiful.

He pulls down my leggings, and I push up his sweater. He lifts my blouse, and I tug down his pajama pants. He's already barefoot. I slip off my ankle-high boots and we roll on the bed together.

He comes on top.

He likes that.

Pressing my hands to the covers, he licks and strokes and makes love to me with his tongue, then he enters me, and we rock together, our panting breaths echoing in the room.

"Missed you," he rasps as he thrusts deep inside me, each stroke stoking the fire in my belly. "So much."

"Need you," I whisper back, lost in the haze of desire. "Don't leave."

Then there's pleasure, and a plunge into space, and more, crazy pleasure that has me writhing and moaning and shouting his name.

And less than a week later... he's again gone.

Chapter Seven

"I'm not doing this again," I tell Dorothy after a week of phone silence. "I can't."

So it's not been weeks and weeks of him gone without a word this time.

But I feel closer to him. More worried about him, after the accident and his comment about his parents only visiting once. The thought of him sitting alone in that hospital room for days and days without visitors just about broke my heart.

He could have called me.

He didn't, and I need to remember that.

Same now. Whatever is happening in his life, he chose not to make me a part of it. He cut me out before I even edged in a little. Promised me from the start that he couldn't be with me.

And that I wouldn't be with him.

A man of his word.

Mom is really pushing for me to visit her, and I'm looking into flights, because, why not? Nothing keeping me here.

"Give him a few more days before you bury him," Dorothy mutters.

"Why are you on his side?"

"Because he's way too handsome to give up on?"

Good point.

But not good enough.

"It's soul-sucking, okay? I can't do it."

"You care about him," Dorothy states, matter-of-factly, as if she knows. Have I told her anything? Have I talked in my sleep?

"I don't," I protest at last.

A bit too late, it seems, because Dorothy's eye gleam. "Call him."

"No frigging way."

"Come on, Laylay. Last time you got pissed at him, it turned out he was in an accident. Maybe something else happened now, keeping him from you."

"What, his fingers are broken and he can't text? Oh wait, he got amnesia and can't remember me anymore?"

"Yikes, you're really mad at him, aren't you?"

I blow out a breath. "I shouldn't be. He hasn't done anything he wasn't supposed to do. I shouldn't expect more."

"But you're human, Layla." Dorothy comes around the kitchen table and gives me a quick hug. "Of course you expect more. Maybe it's time to move on? I promise I'll let up with the teasing."

Maybe.

I thought I had this under control. That it was all fun and no strings attached, and that it was a good thing—but I don't know what I'm doing, or feeling anymore.

Only that it hurts.

***

I turn and look over my shoulder at my reflection in the mirror, checking out my legs in my boots and short skirt.

The boots Hawk asked me to leave on whenever I wore them as he fucked me into bliss.

Stop. Thinking. About. Hawk.

I have a date tonight. With Norman. To watch a movie. I don't even know which one. He mentioned an action flick and that sounds good. Definitely not in the mood to watch romantic drama right now. Some explosions might be good for my bruised soul.

I've also booked my flight to visit Mom next month. A change of environment might lift me out of my funk, remind me that everything's fine.

That I don't need Hawk.

"You look great," Dorothy gushes, coming to stand in front of me and tweaking my ponytail. "And happy. Good for you, girl."

I'm not happy. I'm tired. I'm sad. But I keep my smile on.

"What about you? Going out with Kenny?"

"Nah." She and Kenny have been going out for a month now, and it doesn't look like it's going to last much longer. "I have an assignment to work on, anyway."

"Come with us to the movies."

"That's not exactly conducive to kissing and sexing, is it?" She wags a finger at me. "Go get him, tiger."

Only I don't know if I want to get Norman, if I want to kiss and have sex with him.

The thought makes me gag a little. That's not a good sign, is it?

Okay, all ready to go. Got my cell, my watermelon-flavored chewing gum, my lipstick, my coat. Norman is picking me up, which is sort of old-fashioned and might even be cute, only I don't feel the vibe. Should I find a pair of fifties horn-rim glasses and a polka dress?

And why am I pissed at Norman before I've even gone to the movies with him?

Jesus.

Waiting for Norman to arrive, I flip through the photos on my phone. There's one of me and Dorothy, making scary faces outside the place where she works part-time. Another of me and Mom at the old harbor, drinking Martinis.

And one of Hawk. He's asleep on his stomach, blond hair hiding his face, his magnificent back and ass on full display.

I run my fingertip over the screen and bite my lip, and hell, how can anyone top this? This body, this intensity. The way he makes my heart ache sometimes, when he lets his guard down.

Stop it, Layla.

But of course my phone starts jumping in my hands, and Hawk's name blinks on the screen, as if summoned.

Jeez.

My heart thumping unsteadily, I connect the call. "Yeah?"

"Hey, Doll. How have you been?"

The thrill of hearing his deep voice again stirs heat in my belly and sends my pulse booming in my ears.

It's impossible to stop my body from reacting to him.

"Okay. Studying a lot. And you? Where did you vanish to this time?"

A small pause, and I hold my breath, because it came out more accusatory than I meant it to be. Less aggressive than I feel, though, too, so there's that.

"Remember my friend who was missing?"

"Jordan. The one you went to Mexico for."

"That's the one. He surfaced, and there has been some trouble."

"Trouble? You okay?" My heart speeds up again at the thought of anything happening to him.

"Yeah. Everything's fine." I hear voices talking in the background, and I wish he'd tell me more.

How long can you wait for someone to let you in?

"That's awesome," I say, meaning it. "So glad you got your friend back."

"We're cousins, in fact," he says—one of those crumbs of info he bestows on me occasionally and that I cherish long after, because they are so rare. "But we're more like brothers."

And I'm glad he has some family to call his own—someone closer to him than his distant parents.

God, I shouldn't fall into this trap again. Shouldn't worry about him.

"Wanna meet tonight?" he asks, and my mouth is already forming the Yes I want to give him.

I force myself to stop. "Can't. I'm going out."

"With your nerdy roommate?"

"Nah. A classmate."

"A girl?"

"A guy."

"What the hell?" I flinch at the anger in his voice. It's hot and sharp and intense, like him. "You sleeping with him?"

"No. I'm not." I draw a breath, and blurt, "not yet."

The silence that follows is rolled in broken glass. Suddenly I'm sorry. So sorry for what I said—and it's not even true, because I don't want to sleep with Norman, or anyone else but Hawk.

Isn't it insane?

"Why?" he asks, his voice like gravel.

I wince. "You keep vanishing. You don't tell me anything. We're not really together, Hawk."

Another silence.

"I thought we had an agreement," he finally says. "From the beginning, it was all on the table. I haven't changed the rules."

No, he hasn't. "Hawk..."

"Fuck, no. Not letting this happen. I'm coming to pick you up," he says. "I'll be there in two minutes. Be ready."

***

He's already parked outside my building when I come out, in my coat, clutching my purse. I honestly don't know why I'm not fighting this.

Honestly don't know if I ever could. From the very first moment, he caught me. Neither of us admit it, but I'm his.

Maybe I should move to Alaska. Or Europe. Or Mongolia. Far enough the sound of his voice can't reach me and lure me back to him. Fighting against the pull is like trying to swim upstream, to run upslope.

Not sure I'm strong enough.

Not sure what I'm feeling, what to call the emotions he brings out in me, this worry, this need, his warmth, this sadness.

Don't know what to do with them. With someone who doesn't feel anything about me, and yet won't let go.

He gives me a wide grin as I approach his bike, and I can't read his face.

"Get on," he says, and I climb up behind him. "Hold on tight."

Always. He's a wild ride. Every single time.

I pull on the extra helmet and slip my arms around his waist, let him rev the engine and dive back into traffic. Weave through the city, not really caring where he's taking me, lost in the feel of his muscled back pressed to my front, his hard abs under my hands.

Just one week apart and I missed this.

Him.

This is bad.

We ride for a long time. He doesn't seem to have a destination in mind as he drives down avenues and through quiet neighborhoods, and I'm content to cling to him and let the thoughts flow out of my mind, leaving a pleasant numbness behind.

Strangely, he sometimes glances sideways, or over his shoulder, as if expecting someone to be following us.

And then I know I've been watching too much TV with Dorothy lately. I mean, why would he think we have a tail? What could he possibly have done for such a possibility? The paparazzi rarely, if ever, manage to catch a glimpse of him.

We end up far from the town center, as far as I can tell, and ride through an open gate into an obviously private property.

Trees line the paved driveway. A mansion looms in the distance.

He turns onto a path between trees and bushes, the headlights of the bike the only illumination, and comes to a stop beside a pond with floating water lilies.

He kicks the stand into place and stays there for a long moment. The quiet seeps in. A bird trills in a bush.

It's not as cold as I expected. There's a promise of rain in the air, which is heavy with the scent of some aromatic herb and the freshness of the pond.

He takes off his helmet, but he still doesn't make any other move.

"I wasn't supposed to meet you," he whispers, and I wonder for a moment if I imagined the words.

"Hawk?" What does he mean? Meet me today? Or ever?

He shakes his head. "It's peaceful here."

Carefully, I slide off the bike and take off my helmet. There's a wooden bench beside us and I place it there. "Is this place yours?"

"Belongs to an uncle of mine."

The lights of the bike reflect on the still water of the pond, washing back on us, turning his hair and beard to polished gold.

"Were you really going to let him fuck you?" he asks, finally turning toward me. He climbs off, muscles bunching in his powerful thighs through the soft leather of his black pants. "That guy you were going out with tonight."

I look away, unable to meet his gaze. "I don't know."

"Fuck." He walks a few steps to the edge of the pond, pushes his chin-length hair out of his face.

"You set the rules," I remind him quietly. "You're not my boyfriend."

"Hell, don't I know it." He lets his helmet drop to the sodden ground and kicks at the mud. "Son of a bitch. I shouldn't have called you. Shouldn't have come. I wish..." He mumbles something that sounds like, "It's killing me."

But I probably didn't hear well. It would make no sense.

He turns and comes toward me, hands fisted at his sides, and I take a step back. He's never been violent with me before—well, at least not in a non-pleasurable way—but anger sparkles in his gaze.

It fades as he reaches me, replaced by a darkness I know well.

Desire.

"You're not fucking him," he snarls and grabs the back of my neck, pulling me to him. There's no hesitation as he slants his mouth against mine, and I don't try to stop him.

He's right. I don't care about Norman, or anyone else, as long as I can have this.

Fear grips me, like every time when I realize how he's gotten under my skin, but I'll deal with that when he vanishes.

Again.

Right now, the ache of wanting him is too much. I need relief. I need him to touch me. To fuck me. To get me off.

Mark me in every way possible.

His tongue explores my mouth, strokes the roof, sends tingles of pleasure down my belly. His lips are warm, rough as he moves them over mine. His hands fight with my clothes, tugging and pulling until he's got my coat off. I don't even know where it lands, and I don't care.

He walks me backward until I bump into something solid.

His bike.

I perch on it. He's still kissing me as his hands move, tearing off my sweater dress, undoing my bra, cupping my boobs.

Then his hand slides into my panties and I break the kiss, panting, lifting my gaze from his mouth to his eyes.

There's an ache there I can't place, a thorn buried in the gray.

He slips a finger inside me and my vision blurs. I lean back, balancing on the leather seat of the bike, and he bends over me, fucking me with his finger while unzipping his pants with the other.

It's going to be fast and hot. Happens more often than not between us, and I can't deny I like it this way. When he can't pace himself, can't wait to bury himself inside me.

I lick my lips, shivering when his finger touches that spot inside me that feels so good, and watch lazily as he frees his heavy cock and gives it a stroke or two. The silver barbells quiver.

His lashes lower, his mouth goes a little slack and his hips rock forward.

I love watching him when he's lost in pleasure.

He drags his finger out of me, replaces it with his cock, pushing into me, and we both groan. It's uncomfortable on the bike because he's a tall guy, but the moment he's halfway in, he grabs my legs and draws them up around his hips, forcing me to lie back as much as I possibly can without falling off.

And then he slides home, and I moan his name and claw at his hands which are gliding up to grip my waist.

He fucks me hard, as I thought he would, short, powerful thrusts that soon push me into a screaming orgasm, and hell, I hope the house is empty. Never been so loud before in my life. The pleasure clawing through me is otherworldly. Turns my body into a supernova, set my blood on fire.

He follows me right after, coming so hard his hips jerk and his breath comes out in a shout as his hot cum floods me.

I'm hanging off him, my legs trembling where they're wrapped around him, the ridge of the saddle digging into my back, the air turning cold against my sweaty skin.

I can't move, not yet. I feel boneless, saturated with pleasure.

But he starts moving, pulling out of me, breaking the connection, the moment. I should know I can't hold on to this feeling for long.

To this man. He's like smoke, slipping through my fingers. I look at him as he tucks himself in, golden hair falling in his face, getting my fill.

I can't be one of those women who hang onto a man who doesn't love them. Who spend their lives hoping something will change. That sex will magically transform their guy into a love-sick man ready to put a ring on their finger and love them in sickness and in health.

And for the first time in my life I know I want that. Someone to love me that much. To want to share with me more than physical pleasure.

Soon I'm leaving to New York to visit my mom, and I know it, deep in my heart, that when I return he won't be waiting for me at the airport, or answer my calls. He'll have vanished again.

It's time I cut him loose. For him it was skin-deep from the start, and it's starting to cut me too deep for a happy ending.

How could I ever know, looking at the swirling clouds above and the rustling foliage of the trees as I pull on my dress again, that I'm in for a big surprise? That nothing is as it seems, and that this isn't the last time I'm seeing Hawk after all?

Read on and find out what happens next in HAWK (Sex and Bullets #2):

Bad-boy heir to the Fleming Group empire, Jamie "Hawk" Fleming, at your service.

Here's the breakdown: my father has been thrown behind bars on murder charges, and my mother as accessory. That was three months ago, and since then, everything has been a downhill ride.

The only thing keeping me sane right now is Hot Body. Her name is Layla, and all that matters is that she's gorgeous, sexy, and great in bed.

Until I wake up tied up and gagged, Layla standing over me. Sounds promising, huh? A pretty girl, maybe handcuffs and a whip?

But that's not our scene, and the pissed-off men who kidnapped me are lurking in the shadows, ensuring that this won't be a fun time at all...

OUT NOW!

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

A huge shout-out to all my readers for your support. It has been two years since my first romance book (Asher) was released, and it has been a wonderful journey together with you.

Like always, many thanks to my PA Tracy Comeford, and to my friends Leah Michelle, Kerry Fletcher, Nathalie Aynie, Jade West, Kia Zi Shiru, Cora Brent, Stephanie Witter, Amber Burning, Zelah Meyer, Ashley Paternostro, and Michelle McGinty. If I am forgetting someone, I am sorry. I love all my readers.

Special thanks to Angie Mitchell for the idea of the title, and of course to the amazing ladies who beta read this story for me in record time and caught so many errors (any errors remaining are on me): Lisa J. Anderson, Lilian Flesher, and Gina Paulus.

Many thanks to Katie Salidas of Rising Sign Books for the great formatting.

AUTHOR BIO

Jo Raven is a New York Times and USA Today bestselling author, best known for her series Inked Brotherhood and Damage Control. She writes edgy, contemporary New Adult romance with sexy bad boys and strong-willed heroines. She writes about MMA fighters and tattoo artists, dark pasts that bleed into the present, loyalty and raw emotion.

Find all my books here ▶ http://joraven.com/books

Be the first to get your hands on my new releases & offers, giveaways, previews, and more by signing up here ▶ http://bit.ly/1CTNTHM

Meet me online—on Facebook ▶ https://www.facebook.com/AuthorJoRaven, chat with me on Twitter ▶ @AuthorJoRaven, and join my readers group for sneak previews of my covers and stories ▶ http://on.fb.me/1K2LvzO.

REVIEWS MATTER...

If you like my books, please think to leave a review on amazon or any other site. It would mean the world to me, and it helps me get paid advertisements and get the word about my books out there. Thank you!

**Have you read the Inked Brotherhood series? And the Damage Control series? You can find all my books here:** <http://joraven.com/books>

