Chapter 2

2

Ripley

Holding my breath, I wait behind the living room wall until I hear Uncle Mase’s gritted expletive—fuck—his drink bashing down on the table.

I squeal internally and do a little fist pump, then spin toward the staircase, ascending as fast as I can on the balls of my feet, so he doesn’t suspect I played him.

Even though I totally did.

Desperate times call for desperate measures, right?

I’m leaving for my first semester of college next week and that means I’m running out of time to give myself to Mase. Because I know him. He thinks if he can resist me one more week, this magical attraction between us will eventually subside. It won’t.

But if I can just push him into confessing his feelings for me, we would have so much freedom to explore this…this insanity between us. Out from underneath the prying eyes of my parents or the upper-crust friends that would consider our relationship a scandal. I’ll be a two-hour ride away on his bike in my off-campus house. All alone, except for my amazing, non-judgmental best friend, Alana.

If I can just show him what he’ll be missing by staying away…he won’t.

I wouldn’t be able to stand it if he did.

Ever since my mother married Mase’s brother when I was fourteen, I’ve been infatuated with the rough and tumble biker. He thinks I don’t see beneath his scary exterior, but I do. He might be six foot four inches of pure steel, his skin swathed in prison tattoos and knife scars, but I see the affectionate way I catch him watching me sometimes beneath his black brows. Kind of a cross between obsession and irritation.

It excites me.

Everything about him does.

My heart beats triple time whenever we’re in the same room. My palms get sweaty. I breathe funny. Sometimes I forget I’m supposed to be seducing him and just stare at his dangerous profile like a lovesick teenager—

Oh, that’s right. I am one of those.

I love my Uncle Mase. Desperately.

So I really need him to cooperate, follow me up the stairs to my room, so I can unleash my feminine wiles on him, dammit.

When I hear the heavy tread of his motorcycle boots on the stairs, a sound shudders out of me and I press a hand to my bare belly, trying to appease the fluttering. Mase has been in my bedroom a few times. Once to bring me a stuffed fox when I was sick last year, even though he looked like he was silently calling himself an idiot the whole time. He also came in to fix a broken drawer in my dresser. My underwear drawer, specifically. And…I might have broken it on purpose so he’d have to look at my panties. But I’d only succeeded in pissing him off.

Today’s plan has to work.

He clears his throat outside my door, the sound like gravel beneath his motorcycle tire. “Ripley.” A pause. “Hurry up and show me this thing. I don’t have all fucking day.”

Lord, what I would give to have him talk like that in my ear.

His colorful vocabulary has always been a source of disdain from my parents, but it excites me. The way he doesn’t tone himself down for them or anyone.

“Oh! Uncle Mase. You scared me.” Hand to my chest, I do my best to look surprised that he’s standing there. “Come in. I’ll get the project so I can show it to you.”

He grunts, propping an elbow on the doorframe. “I’ll stand here.”

“Out in the hallway?”

Mase doesn’t answer, merely continuing to watch me through narrowed eyes. I’m still in my string bikini—purchased with him in mind—but crossing the hardwood floor of my bedroom while he peruses my body in the itty bitty bathing suit feels even more explicit than it did downstairs near the pool. Do I hear him groan when I bend over to open the bottom drawer of my desk? Or is that just wishful thinking?

I can hear the high-pitched laugher from my mother outside, along with the whir of the margarita machine. All the sounds are muffled, but they’re a reminder that we’re one curious set of eyes away from being discovered. An uncle watching his nearly naked niece strut around her bedroom, a beer bottle in his hand.

Taking a bracing breath, I remind myself of my favorite motto.

No guts no glory.

And I close my hand around the ceramic object I made in secret yesterday while my parents were out browsing yachts. If they’d been home while I created a six-inch sex toy shaped like a phallus, they probably would have had a lot of questions.

Keeping the toy hidden behind my back, I turn and slowly cross the room toward Mase, noticing his fist tighten around the beer, the closer I come.

“Okay…” I breathe. “Here it is.”

Paying close attention to his face, I hold up the sex toy.

Something primal flares in Mase’s eyes, his jaw tightening ominously. “What the hell is that, Ripley?”

“It’s for me.” I twist side to side, trailing the tip of the toy down my belly button, letting it linger on the low waistband of my bikini. “For fun.”

I get the impression he’s trying to control his breathing. He grinds his forehead against the doorframe, then glances toward the stairs. As if ordering himself to abandon the situation immediately. Instead, after a few heavy moments, he asks me, hoarsely, “You’ve…used it?”

Triumph makes me giddy. He’s never, ever let our conversations get too personal. Never let them cross the invisible line drawn in the sand between uncle and niece. But he just did. And I couldn’t be more thrilled that there’s no turning back now. “Not yet,” I whisper, tucking the thick tip just inside my bottoms. “I was thinking I’d try it now.”

His hips press to the doorframe. “Goddammit, Ripley.”

“What?” I slowly back toward the bed and sit down on the edge, carefully edging my thighs apart. “You don’t have to stay…”

Mase watches me expose my sex like he’s witnessing a beautiful disaster unfold. The string bikini covers only the valley of my sex, but nothing on either side. It will take very little effort to nudge the material over and slide the toy between my lips. But deep down, I know Mase is not going to let it get that far. Not if my plan works.

I want you so bad. I’ve wanted you forever.

Every part of me is throbbing with heat, excitement. I’m wet between the folds of my womanhood and though I’m innocent of men and pleasure, I’ve educated myself enough to know that the dampness is a good thing. That it’s natural when a female is aroused—and good lord, I am definitely that. Uncle Mase is finally at his breaking point, his big chest heaving up and down as he watches me tuck the ceramic phallus between slick lips that have never been breached, not even by my own fingers.

“Stop that. Now.” He stomps into the room, kicking the door shut behind him, huge and dangerous and pissed off in his motorcycle cut. “You’re a virgin.”

“So what?”

His hands are white-knuckled fists at his sides. “You put that in too deep, Ripley,” he growls through clenched teeth, “it’s going to pop your little cherry.”

“I know.” I gasp when the toy drags over a sensitive spot and exhilaration fans out into every corner of my body. A shiver passes through me, beading my nipples, and he groans in response. “I don’t want to go to college a virgin. I’m getting it over with.”

“The fuck you are.” He leans down and gets in my face, gorgeous in his fury. Here is the rampaging ex-convict I’ve heard my father whispering about. The man my father claims used to rain hell on his enemies and put the fear of God into everyone else. Only this time, I’m the object of his frustration. His barely leashed vitality. “Put one inch of that thing inside of you and I’ll spank you raw.”

I press my lips together to suppress a moan. Spank me? With his huge, scarred hands? I’ve never imagined that scenario and it sends a thrill racing down toward my core, tightening my loins like a wrench. Having the man I’ve pined for so long watch me touch myself is overwhelming my senses. It’s awakening a sexuality inside of me I always suspected was just waiting to be tapped. And I’m definitely tapping it now, while the source of my frustration seethes in front of me, a thick ridge tenting the front of his jeans. Uncle Mase is hard for me. I’m not just dabbling in teasing him or trying to make him notice me.

This is real. It’s happening. I need it to happen.

“Fine, spank me afterward,” I breathe, unevenly. “But you can’t stop me now.”

His hand lifts, hesitating over the bulging crotch of his jeans, before he gives in and massages himself through the stiff material. “Your first time should be with a real man,” he rasps. “Not some little toy.”

Little? Aren’t penises supposed to be around this size?

Setting aside that concern for another time, I shake my head defiantly and press the toy to my entrance, a mewling noise spilling out of my mouth. “I don’t want to wait anymore to be filled up. I need it now.”

“Then you’ll fucking get it from me, brat,” he pants, ripping down the zipper of his jeans and—holy shit. Holy shit. His shaft springs out of the opening, thick and unruly and as wide as my forearm. It’s twice the size as my ceramic phallus, which I have dropped in my utter shock at the sheer girth and length of him. I have no time to prepare as my uncle pins me down onto my back and settles himself on top of me, his substantial weight stealing the breath from my lungs. His long, black hair hangs down, tickling my shoulders, the gold cross around his neck dangling between us. Sweat dots his upper lip and forehead. “Open your thighs and get what’s coming to you.”

Poised on the edge of oblivion, my heart rejoicing in my chest, I obey him, spreading my legs as wide as I can, whimpering when Mase reaches down between us, gripping the turgid flesh and—

“Mase!” calls my stepfather, right outside the door. Followed by a knock. “Ripley, have you seen my brother?”

Mase has gone completely still on top of me, his hot breath pelting my face.

“Yeah, um…” I call, my voice unnatural. “He went out to check on his bike.”

My stepfather chuckles. “Him and that bike. Okay, thanks Rip.”

Several seconds pass where there is nothing but our harsh breathing, my heart beating wildly in my chest. I think that as soon as my father’s footsteps fade on his way down the stairs, Mase is going to finish what we started. I’m dying to watch that tight tether snap. So I’m shocked when he climbs off of me, shoving a hand through his unruly black hair. “Jesus fucking Christ,” he spits, turning away to zip his enormous erection into his jeans. “I can’t believe I let it get this far. Almost fucked my niece.” He casts me a tortured look over his shoulder. “Cover yourself up, Ripley.”

My head spins at this turn of events. “But…”

“Do it now.”

Horrified that my lip is beginning to tremble, I reach for a pillow and hold it over my still-aroused body. “I don’t want to stop.”

“Too. Bad.” Fully dressed now, he turns and jabs a finger at me. But his ire slowly dies, replaced by nothing but remorse—and I think that’s worse than seeing him pissed. “Listen to me. I’ve got no business putting my cock in a sweet thing like you. You’re going to college. You’ve got a bright future ahead of you. Don’t you dare fuck it up for someone like me.”

“I wouldn’t be!”

“Oh no?” He glances down at the bed, the bulge in his pants seeming to grow impossibly larger. “I’d have knocked you right the hell up, Ripley.”

“We can be more careful,” I whisper, a happy tingle going through my system at the idea of being pregnant with Mase’s child.

He shuts down, lips clamping together. “Go to school. Forget this ever happened.”

Before I can say another word or tell him I’ll never, ever forget, he turns and slams out of the bedroom, leaving me in open-mouthed shock on the bed. How did I manage to win him and lose him in the space of five minutes? I thought this was it. We’d finally be together, but I was stupidly naïve, wasn’t I?

I’m sitting there for a good five minutes with tears streaming down my face before I realize Mase’s cell phone is face down in front of me. It must have fallen out of his pocket.

With a frown, I pick it up and swipe a thumb across the screen.

No lock.

A single eyebrow goes up, my curiosity buzzing, and I navigate to the contacts section. Maybe I’ll just delete every single female name I come across. How about that? I’m feeling pretty scorned and depressed at the moment. It might go a long way toward improving my mood. But all I can find are Mikes and Johns and a Gavin.

“All male names,” I murmur after a thorough search. “Not a single female?”

Despite its fracture, my heart starts to pound happily—until I find a contact with no name attached. Who could it belong to? Before I can talk myself out of it, I hit dial.

“Hello, this is Estelle,” says an elderly female voice. “I don’t recognize this number. Are you calling to schedule services with one of our escorts?”

Ice fills my veins.

An escort service?

Mase has the number to an escort service in his phone? Does he go to them?

Fresh tears well in my eyes at the thought of his hands on anyone else. I mean, he’s a virile thirty-eight-year-old man. I never assumed he was celibate, but the proof that he’s been with other woman sets off a landslide in my chest.

But I’m not a quitter. My mother always says I’d make an excellent chess player because I think three moves ahead of everyone else. I prove that when I say, “Actually, I’m calling about scheduling a job interview.”

When Mase reenters the room a few minutes later, I hold the phone out to him with an innocent smile. He looks at me suspiciously for a moment, his eyes sweeping me with a wealth of hunger and regret, before he curses gutturally, turns and stalks back out.

With a new plan giving me purpose, I spring off the bed and call my best friend, Alana.

“Hey, are you home? I have an idea.”

Alana groans, well used to me and my schemes. “Uh oh.”