Bad Boys Over Easy Read online

  “It doesn’t,” he quickly assured her and cupped her breast, closing his eyes briefly at the sensation of her heavy in his hand.

  “Oh damn, that feels good.” She squirmed a little. “But we still shouldn’t do this.”

  “Why not?” He stroked over her nipple, wrenching a gasp from her.

  “We’re friends, we’ve always been friends, and I don’t want to ruin that.” Biting her lip, she sighed. “But wow, I am so attracted to you right now.”

  “The feeling is mutual.” He kissed her forehead. “If you want me to go back downstairs, I will. But I don’t want to.”

  Ashley felt like one of the problems with her personality was that she was too impulsive. She didn’t think things through.

  She was trying to make better choices, weigh the pros and cons before just jumping into something.

  But her mind was mush. Cold, runny, leftover mush. She couldn’t think about anything rational when Lucas was stroking her nipple and moving his lip back and forth on her forehead.

  All her brain could seem to focus on was that she wanted Lucas to make love to her. She really, really wanted him to, in a way she couldn’t remember ever wanting another man.

  She cared about him, she trusted him completely, and when she looked into his eyes, she saw something she didn’t understand, but that made her feel she was just about the most desirable woman in the world.

  So she opened her mouth and told him, “Don’t go. I want you to stay.”

  Damn, she couldn’t believe she’d just said that.

  But Lucas leaned back so she could see his face. Then he gave her the most beautiful smile she’d ever seen on him, one that lifted sweetly, a little crooked, and went all the way up to his eyes. It did strange things to her insides and left her breathless.

  “Ashley.”

  He gave her a light kiss, a feathering of his lips over hers, so that she barely had a taste of him, barely got to feel him against her before he was gone. It was a caring kiss, not a passionate kiss, and it sent her deeper into confusion, panic, concern that she was acting on a hormonal impulse and would live to regret it.

  Oh, well. She was sure she’d done stupider things, and he was doing the most delightful things to the underside of her breasts. Somehow when she hadn’t been looking or thinking or noticing anything but the desire in his eyes, he had worked her tank top up to her bra.

  Now his fingers were stroking back and forth, slowly, steadily, enticingly, on her bare skin below her bra. Jumping up from time to time to tease her nipple with a barely-there touch.

  She’d never thought of herself as a passive lover, but this was different. Lucas was different. She knew him, but she’d never seen him like this, with this lusty determination on his face. It had her aroused, yet unsure of her own role. So she just stood there and let him touch, let him take the lead.

  Which he was. He seemed to be approaching her the same way he would a chemical equation. He was assessing her, observing her reactions, deciding on the best plan to proceed with. He was slow and steady, lips on her neck, her shoulder, nuzzling, caressing, while his fingers touched higher and higher until they were brushing back and forth over her nipples.

  Ashley swallowed hard, her legs quivering, her pulse racing. She was still clutching the Ben-Wa balls in her hand, and suddenly aware of the fact, she reached back for the table, intent on dumping them. The image of those balls, what he could do with them, was so hot and scorching she nearly moaned. Too much. It was all too much to take in.

  His eyes followed her movement. “Maybe later,” he whispered, his mouth rubbing over the front of her shirt, right at the swell of her breast. “The second or the third time.”

  He yanked the cup of her bra down at the same second she realized his meaning. Ashley sucked in her breath. He meant more than once, tonight. He meant all night. He meant…oh, boy.

  “Sounds like you’ve got this all figured out.”

  With one expert flick, he popped open her bra. Why had she ever stupidly thought that Lucas was naïve when it came to women? He clearly knew his way around intimate apparel.

  “I’ve had a lot of time to think about it, and what I want.”

  He took a step back, and she whimpered when his hands fell off her.

  “And right now I want to see you naked. And then I’m going to touch and taste every inch of you.”

  If he insisted.

  Six

  Lucas was having a hard time not just ripping Ashley’s clothes off and taking her on the Pleasure Party table.

  But he had meant what he’d said. He had anticipated this moment for years, never really expecting it could actually happen, and he wanted to savor it. Savor her. Savor the feeling that he could give Ashley pleasure.

  “Well, that’s getting right to the point, isn’t it?” She smiled at him then, a naughty suggestive smile that made his gut clench and his groin tighten.

  Ashley had been tense a minute before, but now she seemed to have made a decision to enjoy this shift in their relationship.

  “Are you going to get me naked or should I?” Her tongue slipped out and wet her bottom lip.

  She looked gorgeous with her flushed cheeks and her wild curls, with her shirt shoved up and the top of one breast peeking out of her unhooked bra. She had golden skin, and a tiny silver ring in her belly button above her skirt that made him want to lick it.

  No woman was as attractive to him as Ashley was, because she was a beautiful woman and because he was in love with her. And one way or another, tonight she was going to be his.

  “Oh, I’m going to get you naked.” He tossed his hair out of his eyes. “If you don’t mind.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t mind.”

  Lucas’s heart filled. Damn, this was everything he wanted, everything he could ever hope for. Ashley in front of him, desire in her eyes, and a sweet smile playing about her lips. Did she even know what she meant to him? He wanted to tell her, knew he shouldn’t.

  So he reached for her and took the shirt over her head, her hair tumbling back over her shoulders as the tank top cleared her head. He dropped it onto the empty box Ashley had set on the table to pack up her products.

  Since her bra was sliding down her arms and was crooked on her breasts, he just pulled down the straps and flung it over in the direction of the shirt. Then stopped to look. To stare. To mentally groan and to try not to grovel.

  Damn. His blood rushed, his pulse pounded, and his jeans were unbearably tight.

  “Stop looking at me like that.” Ashley was blushing, her hands on her hips, shoulders raised protectively.

  “Like what? Like I think you’re incredible? Amazing? Sexy? Because I do.”

  Her skin had goose bumps, her nipples taut.

  Since it was hotter than hell outside, he knew she wasn’t cold.

  “Like I’m a cell on a microscope slide.”

  He had to laugh at that. “Never once has looking at a cell from any organism given me a hard-on. I’m staring at you because I think you’re gorgeous.”

  “Since when?” Her hand was reaching for her discarded shirt.

  Lucas stopped her by grabbing her arm. He’d cry if she covered up those breasts after only sixty seconds. “Remember that summer you went away to camp to be a counselor?”

  She nodded, hand still poised to grab her top. He knew she would if he let go of her wrist. “I was eighteen.”

  “When you came home, tanned and confident, laughing and excited, I watched you. And I realized that you were beautiful. You’ve only grown more so every year since then.”

  “Lucas…” she said, and it sounded like a warning, but her green eyes had gone soft.

  He knew what her warning was. He knew now there was no time to take it slow, to hesitate, to savor Ashley. Not this time. She wasn’t sure of him, her feelings, what they were doing, yet she wanted him. Lucas was sure that Ashley cared about him, maybe even loved him, given how she had treated him over the years. But she wasn’t in
love with him.

  That was okay, because he planned to make love to her until she did fall in love with him. Or at the very least until she saw that they had something really solid to build a relationship on.

  If she got cold feet, it would be over before they could even start.

  So he had to take her so far into pleasure, she’d forget to think.

  Instead of answering, he kissed her. Hard. With tongue.

  She gasped.

  He took the wrist he was holding and draped her arm around his back. He pulled them together. Then bent down and took her nipple into his mouth. She tasted warm and sensual, her nails digging into his back. Lucas sucked, and he licked, and he sucked, until she was whimpering and breathing hard. Until he grew rougher and rougher, nipping at her with his teeth, flicking along her breast with his tongue until he reached for the other one.

  The room was quiet except for their heavy breathing and an occasional random moan from Ashley that spiked his temperature and sent him sweating. She tasted so damn good, so sweet and eager and he was so completely sure that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. When he cupped her ass, a tight firm cheek in each of his hands, Ashley swore.

  “Shit, this feels good,” she murmured.

  “You’re telling me.” Lucas pulled his mouth back from her breasts as he slipped his hands under her skirt. Her panties were silky, tight across her backside, and low on her hips.

  He wandered around, his thumbs landing on her soft mound. “It’s very hot under here.”

  “I’m sure there’s a purely biological reason for that,” she said, her head tilted back. “Like that the proximity between my thighs raises the temperature.”

  “Or because, biologically speaking, your body wants to be fucked.”

  “Lucas!” She stared down at him, her mouth open as he dropped down onto one knee.

  “What?” He pulled her skirt down, watched it puddle around her ankles, exposing her pink panties. Of course they were pink. Ashley was a pink kind of girl. “All the signs of arousal are here. Heavy breathing, tense muscles, heated flesh.”

  Ignoring her fingers pressing down hard on his shoulders, he skimmed his thumbs under her panty line, sinking one into her slickness. “Wet. Definitely aroused.”

  “So this is all about biology?” Her voice had gotten sharp. “My body is reacting to a stimulus? How flattering. I suppose that’s what has happened to you too, then. Your body is reacting to the arousing image of all these sexual products and their functions.”

  He liked her outrage. It meant she cared. Lucas peeled down her panties. “No. Not at all. My body is reacting to seeing you naked. My body is reacting to the fact that my fantasy is finally coming to life. My body is reacting to the fact that I love you.”

  Ashley gasped. He so did not just say that. “What? You don’t mean that!”

  And oh, God, would he just stop stroking her like that, right across her clitoris with the pad of his finger. She couldn’t think, couldn’t concentrate on anything but how she ached deep inside. About how good this felt. If she wasn’t clinging to his shoulders, she swore she would have fallen over in a heap of quivering muscles.

  But he couldn’t love her. He couldn’t.

  “I do mean it.”

  Lucas was on his knees and Ashley realized that he was leaning forward, his mouth opening, heading right toward her like he was going to…

  “You’re not going to…”

  His lips pressed against her curls, right over her clitoris. Bull’s-eye. She jerked in surprise, in desire.

  “Lucas, don’t.” Ashley wasn’t a prude, not by any stretch of the imagination, given that she sold dildos to her friends, but she was standing up in her living room. She was naked, except for her panties still hooked around her thighs. Lucas was on his knees in front of her, and it was so damn sexy, yet so unnerving. Intimate.

  “You’re not, you can’t, you won’t,” she babbled.

  His tongue stroked her.

  Oh, yes he was, could, would.

  One of his hands was on her backside, holding her in place, the other spreading her apart for his mouth, and Ashley saw stars. Twisting his hair around her fingers, she held on for dear life as he moved over her again and again, his tongue incredibly talented. He dipped, he twirled, he slid deep inside her until her legs were shaking and her heart was racing.

  She murmured, “Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit,” as the tight burning need rose higher and higher. When she tried to ease away from him, afraid she’d shatter too soon, he just followed her, stalking her, never letting up for a second.

  Desperate to get away, she almost fell off her stilettos. It felt so damn good, so hot, so wet, so perfect and she couldn’t stop if he didn’t stop.

  The light from her teardrop crystal chandelier fell on Lucas’s head, drawing out the caramel highlights in his hair. The hair that she was just about ripping out at the roots.

  He pulled back far enough to murmur, “Come for me, Ashley. Please.”

  Like as if she were doing him some kind of favor. She would have laughed, except he buried his mouth in her and sucked her clitoris.

  Her head snapped back, a low groan ripping out of her, as she exploded, spasms of pleasure rocking through her body. It was short, volcanic in intensity, and left her stunned. She shuddered, she shivered, she whimpered.

  “Lucas, oh my God,” she managed as she tried to remember to breathe, her body still pulsing from the cataclysmic orgasm.

  Her legs wobbled when he let go of her. Somewhere in the back of her mind she realized he was ripping off his jeans, his briefs, tearing open a condom. But it didn’t really register what that meant until he wrapped her leg around his thigh and slid into her, hard and possessive, sinking in like he owned the place.

  Ashley came again. Immediately. And was so damn shocked that she did fall off her shoes, landing on the flat side of the sandals. Which only sent him deeper inside her as they both moaned.

  Her inner muscles convulsed, her whole body tingled, as he pulled back and thrust up into her again. Going on her tiptoes, she kicked her slip-on shoes out of the way and held onto his chest, her forehead resting against his shoulder. She could smell his skin, a musky sensual scent, intermixed with the sweetness of her own desire rising between them.

  He was moving in her, hard, steady strokes, and Ashley nipped his skin, wanting to taste him, wanting to feel and experience all of this moment. Everything felt hot, over-bright, sharply in focus. She was dizzy, out of control, holding onto Lucas, thinking that this was something more, something deeper, than what she’d ever had with any other man.

  Maybe it was because they knew each other so well. Because they cared.

  Whatever it was, when Lucas groaned with ecstasy in her ear, he touched a spot in her heart that she hadn’t even known existed. “Ash.”

  Then while she was overwhelmed, in awe, he came inside her with one last fast thrust. Squeezing her muscles around him to further his pleasure, Ashley watched his face, watched his eyes roll back, watched his jaw twitch, studied the dewy perspiration on his upper lip with a kind of feminine triumph.

  She had done that.

  He wanted her. Desired her. Lost his control in her.

  And that made her feel very, very sexy.

  “Whoa,” he said, after he had stopped pulsing in her.

  Ashley gave a soft laugh. “Is that your scientific conclusion?”

  “Yes. Based on the fact that this was incredible.”

  “Yeah, it was, wasn’t it?” Ashley kissed his shoulder, then eased herself off of him, and stepped back with a grin.

  She felt fabulous, her body still tingling and shivering with aftershocks. It was the rush of running a marathon and winning. Or more accurately, like scoring big at a Nieman-Marcus sidewalk sale. Sexy shoes for five bucks.

  The floor was sticky beneath her feet from humidity, and she stepped back into her stilettos, lifting herself up two inches. The room was hot, suffocating, and her hair w
as damp from sweat. Turning, she headed on wobbly legs toward the fan she had standing behind her dining room table.

  “Where are you going?”

  She glanced back at Lucas, who was watching her, one hand unrolling the condom, neither his erection nor his expression looking like he was finished for the night.

  Good.

  “Just turning on the fan. It’s hot in here.”

  With a flip of the switch, it started up, blowing cool air across her heated body, sending delightful little shivers through her. It caressed her hot inner thighs, her hardened nipples, her tight belly, and she lifted the heavy hair up off her neck to dry the dampened curls.

  “This feels good, Lucas. Come here.”

  The air dancing across her was turning her on, and she was hoping for round two.

  “Coming.”

  Perfect.

  Seven

  Lucas wondered if Ashley had any idea what she looked like bent over that fan completely naked, wearing high heels.

  Given the tone of her voice, he suspected she did. Which meant she wouldn’t be shocked when he came up behind her and slid his cock back into her.

  Because once wasn’t enough for him. He didn’t think a lifetime would be enough, but he was hoping to settle for that.

  It was stifling in her apartment, a side effect of being on the second floor of a ninety-year-old house with the original windows. Her air-conditioning was twenty years old and mediocre, and the sun had pounded heavily all day. It was probably still seventy-five degrees outside and eighty in the house, even though it was eleven at night.

  So there was definitely a need to stay naked. And Ashley looked so good doing it. She was bent just a little, enticingly, her back arching, the bumps of her spine curving gracefully. Her ass was high and firm, her waist dipping in so it created an hourglass shape. Those blond curls of hers blew behind her as she dug her fingers in the crown of her hair, her head tilted.

  Lucas walked toward her, sweating from want more than from the heat. There was just something so unbelievably sexy about the lines of her body. He dropped down on his haunches and caressed her ankle.