Ravenous, A Tame Quantum Novel (Quantum Series Book 5) Read online

  Holding my breath, I nod.

  “I own your pleasure, sweet Ellie. You come when I say you can, understood?”

  Dear God. Do I understand?

  “Ellie? I need the words. Tell me you understand.” He takes my nipple between his teeth and bites down just hard enough to draw a keening cry from me.

  “Yes,” I say on a gasp, “I understand.”

  “If you come before I say you can, I’ll spank you. Do you understand that, too?”

  “You’ll…”

  “Spank you, and I’ll make it hurt. Tell me you understand.”

  I swallow hard, mortified that the thought of his hand crashing down on my ass nearly makes me come. “Y-yes, I understand.”

  “If you want me to stop, you only have to say so, okay?”

  “Okay.” At this point, I want to beg him to get on with it, to please relieve the awful ache that’s taken me over.

  His expression changes then from tension to relief. He’s relieved that I’ve agreed to his terms. “Relax. I don’t bite. Not hard anyway.”

  Chapter 7

  I’m a quivering, trembling wreck as his lips move over my abdomen, working their way down the front of me.

  Reaching under me, he tugs on my panties, and I raise my hips to help him remove them.

  “Oh God,” he mutters. “You’re so smooth and bare.”

  His reaction makes me thankful I took the time to see Bryn earlier.

  My legs are forced farther apart by the broad expanse of his shoulders as he dives face-first into the core of my desire. He knows exactly where I need him, and he focuses on my clit, licking and sucking and driving me insane. I’m already on the verge of explosive release when he drives two fingers into me and curls them until he finds the spot that makes me detonate.

  I’m completely lost to the earth-shattering orgasm when I remember that I wasn’t supposed to let that happen without his permission.

  “Mmm,” he says, his lips and tongue soft against my sensitive flesh, “someone is in big trouble.”

  That’s all it takes to restart the climb.

  “Did you forget the rules you agreed to five minutes ago?”

  “I… I… You… That was your fault!”

  “That’s not how it works. You have to learn to control yourself.”

  I can hear the amusement in his voice as he continues to stroke me, building the fire all over again. “Don’t. I can’t. I can’t stop it.”

  “Yes, you can. Focus.”

  “I need something to focus on besides what you’re doing to me.”

  “I can help you there.” He withdraws from me and climbs onto the bed, shedding his briefs as he goes. Then he is leaning over me, his hard, thick cock over my face, and his intention becomes very clear.

  Jesus. I haven’t done this since I was twenty-something and trying everything once. Grasping his hard length, I begin to stroke him as he leans forward to pick up where he left off, albeit from a different angle. I quickly discover he’s no less effective from this side, and decide I need to distract him before he can milk another orgasm from me.

  Fitting my lips around the broad head of his cock, I take him into my mouth, sucking and licking as I go.

  His low growl vibrates against my clit, making me startle.

  Six days after I agreed to allow Jasper to father my child, we’re in full-on sixty-nine position, and I’m trying to hold off another orgasm so I won’t have to be punished twice. Holding off is easier said than done, especially when the man in charge of your pleasure is a sneaky devil and makes me come again.

  We haven’t even had actual sex yet, and already this is the best sex of my life. I should’ve known that would be the case with the man who could nearly make me come just by reading about the night before Christmas.

  “Big, big trouble,” he whispers against my still-quivering flesh. Wiping his mouth with the back of his other hand, he raises himself up. “Let me go.”

  I release my hold on his cock, and he pulls free of my mouth.

  “Turn over on all fours and spread your legs.” After issuing the directive, he gets up and goes into the adjoining bathroom. I hear water running before he returns to get something out of his bedside table. Turning to me, I watch as he rolls on a condom.

  Then he’s back on the bed behind me, his hands on my cheeks, squeezing and shaping them. “I love your sweet arse, love. I’ve had so many fantasies about this ripe, supple bottom.” His hand comes down on my right cheek, the sound echoing through the room and the pleasurable pain reverberating through my backside to my overstimulated clit. He follows the spank with a soothing caress that fans the flame. “Tell me to stop.”

  “No.”

  “No? Does that mean you like being spanked?”

  Before I can reply, his hand comes down on the left side, under the curve, in the space above my leg. I’ve never been spanked in my life. I had no idea I’d like it so much.

  “Had enough?”

  “No.”

  His low growl is filled with approval and what sounds like desire. The blows rain down upon my bottom until I’m reduced to nothing more than the pleasure and pain and unbearable heat. “Your arse looks so hot with my handprints all over it.” He aligns his cock with my entrance, pressing into me slowly but surely, grasping my hip with his free hand and holding me still for his possession.

  I experience a slight burn as my flesh stretches to accommodate his girth, but then he slides home, filling me completely, and taking me to the edge once again. “Jasper…”

  “What is it?”

  “I need to… I’m going to come again.”

  “Not yet.” He pulls out abruptly, leaving me desperate as well as needy. “Turn over, darling. I want to see your lovely face.”

  Moving gingerly, I do as he asks, gasping when my bottom makes contact with the sheets. The sensation travels directly to my clit, like it’s attached to a live wire.

  “There you are,” he whispers, brushing the hair back from my face and leaning in to kiss me. “So sweet and so sexy at the same time, and so permanently out of reach.”

  “Have you thought that? That I was out of reach.”

  “Entirely out of reach for so many reasons.”

  “Flynn wouldn’t care. He’s not like that.”

  “Trust me, darling, with the things I want to do to you, your brother would care.”

  “He’d never have to know. I’m not going to tell him. Are you?”

  “Ah, no, but at some point, your family might want to know who fathered your child. What’ll you say to them?”

  As he speaks, he presses his cock against my clit without entering me. My hands move down his back to cup his tight ass, hoping to direct him where I want him.

  “I’ll tell them I went through a clinic.”

  “So we can do this and other stuff as much as we want, and I never have to worry about losing the respect of the Godfrey family?” He pushes into me hard and fast, stealing the breath from my lungs and nearly triggering the orgasm that’s been hovering just beneath the surface.

  I can’t think about the Godfrey family when he’s moving in me and filling me so perfectly. God, all this time, I could’ve been doing this with Jasper rather than the many frogs who’ve crossed my path. I’ve wasted so much time with men who couldn’t find a woman’s clitoris with a map and magnifying glass. I’m swept away on a sea of pleasure when he stops, withdrawing and leaving me bereft.

  He grasps my legs and props them on his shoulders before entering me again at a whole new angle. He’s touching me in places no one else has ever been, and rocking my world one deep stroke at a time. How will I ever do this again and not think of the way he did it?

  “Talk to me,” he rasps in that sexy-as-all-fuck accent. “Tell me how it feels.”

  “Amazing.” I reach for his arms, holding on to him as he hammers into me. “I need…”

  “What? Tell me what you need.”

  “I want to come.”

&n
bsp; “Not yet.” He slows the pace, coming to a complete stop while embedded deep inside me. “Take some deep breaths. Slow it down.”

  “I don’t want to slow it down!”

  A smile stretches slowly across his face. “Remember when you agreed to allow me to be in charge in bed?”

  “Vaguely.”

  “Shall I refresh your memory?”

  “I’d rather you made me come.”

  His grunt of laughter sends him deeper, if that’s possible. “Put your arms over your head and hang on to the rails.”

  “Do I have to?”

  “If you want to come.”

  Groaning, I do as I’m told while realizing I’ve never had this kind of conversation with any man, let alone while in the middle of having mind-altering sex. Of course he has to go and ruin me for everyone else, right when I’m on the cusp of venturing into the dating wilderness once again.

  “Don’t let go.”

  He’s even sexier than usual when he’s barking out orders.

  As I grasp the iron slats in his headboard, I realize my hands are damp with perspiration. I’m one big nerve-ending, waiting to see what he has in store for me next.

  Bending over me, he takes my nipple into his mouth, tugging and sucking on the tight tip and making me writhe on the bed. He surrounds me so completely, there isn’t much room for me to move, but my body is now fully in his command, and he plays me like a maestro.

  His cock gets harder, stretching me to my absolute limit.

  I cry out, overwhelmed by the onslaught of sensation. “Please…”

  Pressing his thumb to my tingling clit, he says, “Is this what you want, lovely Ellie?”

  “Yes! Please… I have to…”

  “Come.”

  I explode. There’s simply no other word for it. Every cell in my body is fully engaged. I come back to life slowly, my scalp tingling, the soles of my feet burning, my legs trembling violently. And Jasper, he’s gazing down on me, taking it all in as he continues to move in me, still hard, still filling me to the absolute brink.

  “That was astonishing,” he says with reverence that moves me profoundly.

  I emerge from the stupor to imagine how I must look to him with my arms stretched over my head, breasts moving with every deep thrust, legs on his shoulders, body bent nearly in half. It’s almost obscene, and yet nothing about this feels obscene. No, that’s not the word I would use to describe it, and as soon as I can think of a word that adequately sums up this experience, I’ll let you know.

  He picks up the pace, driving into me relentlessly until he comes with a shout, his fingers digging into my ass.

  My legs fall like two overcooked noodles as he comes down on top of me, his sweat melding with mine, his chest hair caressing my sensitive nipples. I suppose I’m allowed to release the iron rails of his headboard now. I was holding on so tightly that my fingers are stiff and my arms ache from the strain. I wrap them around him as he relaxes into my embrace.

  So much for my worries that it might be awkward to have sex with Jasper. Awkward is the last word I’d use to describe what just happened, but now I wonder how I’ll ever look at him again and not think of the best sex of my life.

  She’s ruined me. I’ve had every sort of wild, crazy sex. You name it, I’ve done it. But I’ve never experienced anything even remotely close to what just happened with Ellie. And now I’m well and truly fucked in more ways than one. In the scope of an hour, the thought of her doing what we just did with any other guy has become completely and absolutely unacceptable to me.

  I’m enraged by the very thought of her getting naked with someone else. I don’t want her even talking to other guys, which is an unprecedented reaction for a man who has made a career out of not getting involved. I don’t have the luxury of getting involved. I come with far too much baggage. It wouldn’t be fair to any woman to expect her to take on me or my luggage.

  But one taste of the exquisite Ellie Godfrey has thrown my carefully constructed plans straight out the window.

  She doesn’t know—none of my friends here in LA know—that I’m living on borrowed time. At any time, I can be called home to England to deal with my birthright. That’s the deal I have with my father. I’m free to have my “little adventure” as a filmmaker in Hollywood, but only until I’m needed at home.

  Until that day comes, I pretend like it’s not happening. I pretend like I was born an ordinary person and not the future tenth Duke of Wethersby, heir to one of the largest fortunes in all of Great Britain and all the responsibilities that come with it—responsibilities I want nothing to do with.

  Funny thing about the British peerage, no one cares if it’s what you want or not. You’re stuck with your birthright no matter what other hopes and dreams you might have for yourself, and that’s exactly why I’ll never publicly acknowledge the child I make with Ellie.

  He or she will be my best and only chance to be a parent without the weight of expectation landing on my child’s tiny shoulders. I won’t have that for him or her. And yes, I’m expected to produce an heir, but that’s one thing my father can’t actually force me to do.

  None of my friends in Hollywood have the first clue about my lineage. I use my mother’s maiden name professionally, and all they know is that I come from a wealthy British family. That’s all they need to know, for now anyway. The day may come when I have to sell out my shares in Quantum and go home to do my duty. I hope that day is a long, long time in the future. If my father lives as long as Queen Elizabeth has, it won’t matter that I’m not interested in being his heir. I’ll be too old to care. I pray for his health and longevity every day of my life.

  “Are you okay?” Ellie’s soft inquiry reminds me to stay focused on the present rather than dreading an uncertain future.

  “I’m wrecked. You wrecked me.”

  “I think it was quite the other way around.”

  “Are you wrecked, darling?” I raise my head to take a closer look at her lovely face. Her eyes are closed, her lips swollen and her cheeks flushed.

  “That’s the least of what I am.”

  “I’m sorry… I was rough—”

  She opens her eyes and places a finger over my lips. “You were amazing. That was… Amazing.”

  “Oh.” Women so rarely surprise me anymore, but I’m finding that this woman is one delightful surprise after another. She liked being lightly dominated. Perhaps that means she might like—

  No. Don’t go there. You can’t go there with Flynn’s sister. You just can’t.

  I hate when my conscience pops in to set me straight. He can be such a disloyal pain in the rear. I’m losing all perspective where Ellie is concerned, and that can’t happen. Grasping the base of the condom, I withdraw from her, though that’s the last bloody thing I want to do. “Be right back, darling.”

  In the en suite bathroom, I take care of business, clean up and take a minute to get my head together after the most fantastic sex I can recall having in, well, ever. Usually I need a lot more than what we just did to make it fantastic, but with her, it was just… I don’t have the words, and I always have the words. Bloody hell.

  I splash cold water on my face, as if that might snap me out of this odd free fall I find myself in where she’s concerned. The water doesn’t work to fix what’s been happening to me since that morning on Flynn’s pool deck in Mexico when I agreed to father her child. And what we just did certainly isn’t going to fix anything. No, it’s only going to deepen my growing obsession with her.

  Funny, isn’t it, that you can know someone for years and go along your merry way as friends until one momentous conversation changes the perspective so dramatically that you begin to worry that nothing will ever be the same afterward. I draw in a couple of deep, calming breaths, trying to recover my upended equilibrium.

  I need to get back to her before she suspects something is wrong. Nothing is wrong. In fact, the opposite is true—everything is far too right with her. Double bloody hell.


  When I emerge from the bathroom, I find Ellie fully dressed and sitting on the edge of my bed, a faraway expression on her lovely face. “I thought you might stay the night.” I’m deeply disappointed that she’s planning to go.

  “Oh, that’s nice, but I can’t. I’ve got work in the morning and stuff I need to do at home.”

  At midnight? The question remains unspoken as I pull on a pair of basketball shorts and a T-shirt to drive her and Randy home in an uneasy silence. I want desperately to know what she’s thinking, but I can’t bring myself to ask. Maybe it’s better if I don’t know.

  I bring the car to a stop outside her cozy cottage—another in a long line of surprises where she’s concerned—and prepare to get out to walk her in.

  “No need.” She takes hold of Randy’s leash. “I’ll see you tomorrow. Thanks for a great night.”

  She’s out of the car and on her way up the walk before I can say anything in response. What the actual fuck just happened? How did we go from going at it like fiends to polite silence? We certainly got the awkward preliminaries out of the way, but the aftermath had been the definition of awkward. Two steps forward, one giant leap back.

  I drive home in an unusual state of turmoil. I’m not used to turmoil where women are concerned, probably because I steadfastly refuse to get overly involved. Agreeing to father a close friend’s child definitely qualifies as getting overly involved, but it wasn’t supposed to ruin a cherished friendship or make things weird between us.

  Although, how could it not? We’ve gone from professional colleagues and personal friends to fuck buddies in a matter of days. Of course it’s going to be a little weird before it evens out and things get back to normal. I take an inordinate amount of comfort from that thought, and from remembering there’d been nothing weird between us while we were in bed.

  I need to keep her naked in a bed if I want to keep the weirdness out of the equation. With that in mind, I send her a text as soon as I get home.

  Wear a skirt to work tomorrow. Leave the panties at home.