Chapter 20

20

Zara

"Oh, my god." The glass of wine topples, but I manage to catch it at the last moment. His face. He’s got his tongue between my arse cheeks. Heat flushes my cheeks. My other cheeks. I try to wriggle away, but his grip on my waist pins me in place. I’m not a prude; not by a long shot. I’m a strong, independent woman who has always believed that the right guy is an illusion, that the only person I can rely on is myself. That the person who’ll appreciate me 'as is' has yet to be born. It’s something I have believed in firmly, and no one I’ve ever met has made me revisit this assumption. But the way this man is worshiping my body by licking that very intimate, very forbidden part of me is making me question every one of my beliefs. And it’s not only because of how my body is responding to his attention, how my heart is thudding against my ribcage like my favorite vibrator on its highest setting, how my nipples harden and my thigh muscles quiver, how I can’t stop myself from clenching down and pushing back into his face, and holy hell, that’s not what I want to do. I don’t want him to realize how turned on I am because he’s eating my arse. "Hunter, stop," I gasp.

It only spurs him on to drag his hands down to my cheeks and squeeze them apart even further. He pushes aside my bikini bottoms, then swipes his tongue over my puckered hole and my eyes roll back in my head. He twists his tongue inside my back channel, and I shudder. Pleasure contracts my lower belly, and my thighs squeeze together. My eyes roll into the back of my head, and I’m going to come. Oh, god, I’m going to?—

He pulls out his tongue. "Don’t you dare come, Fire." I hear his voice as if from far away. And he’s stopped torturing me with that magic tongue of his. I push my butt back, trying to chase that sensation that brought me to the edge, and he laughs.

The twatwaffle snickers, and the lust recedes from my thoughts. I pull away—and this time, he lets me. I pivot around, straighten my bikini bottoms then raise my hand; but he catches it. Then he wipes the back of his free hand across his mouth. The gesture is so erotic, so salacious, that my pussy clenches. The shudder of lust that had retreated rushes forward in a wave again. My knees knock together, and I’d sink down into the water if it wasn’t for the fact he has a tight grip on my wrist.

He scans my features. "You okay?"

"No, I’m not. Why did you stop?"

"Told you I wasn’t going to let you come. Not that easily, anyway."

Jerkhole. I try to pull away from him again, but he tightens his hold on my wrist.

"Let me go."

"When you’re no longer angry."

"You can’t tell me how to feel," I snarl.

"Wanna bet?"

"Fuck you." I shouldn’t allow him to see how much he’s unnerved me, but damn it, I’m allowed, aren’t I? First, finding him here, under the same roof, in the same hot tub as me, when I’d been thinking rather randy thoughts about him. Then, having him come through on said randy thoughts in the randiest way possible…was not what I’d expected of him. To be honest, I’m not sure what I expected, but it wasn’t quite that. Definitely not Hunter Whittington squeezing my arse like it belongs to him. Not Mr. Stick-in-the-mud, stabbing his tongue inside my forbidden place and bringing me to the edge, only to not let me orgasm.

"I will, just not yet." He smirks.

"Go to hell."

"Only if you come with me, baby."

"Aargh." I squeeze my eyes shut. It’s not like me to lose my cool when I’m dealing with a man. Definitely not Mr. Douchekabob, who denied me my climax. "Do you always have to have a ready comeback?"

"Only with you, Fire."

Something in the tone of his voice, a gentleness at odds with the ruthless restraint with which he pulled me back from the throes of a mother of a summit I came so close to peaking, has me opening my eyes.

He’s looking up at me with a strange light in his eyes. A possessiveness? A hunger, perhaps. More like a proprietorial look that, combined with his dominating presence, has me going weak in the knees. Shit, shit, shit. I knew I shouldn’t have agreed to this one-night stand arrangement with him. He’s manipulated his way into making me agree. Doesn’t mean I have to go through with it. I take a step back, and he rises to his feet.

Just like that, he unfolds himself and straightens. The water cascades off of his shoulders like he’s the model from the Old Spice commercial I watched growing up. No, he’s more like Chris Hemsworth in Thor: Love & Thunder , or Chris Pine in that nude scene in Outlaw Knight . Ooh, la, la, and now, I’m resorting to French in my thoughts. That’s it, I am truly flustered…but, in my defense, he’s standing in front of me and he isn’t wearing a stitch of clothing.

Those carved-out-of-rock chest planes extend to a lean waist, flat stomach—no, concave stomach—which, in turn, dips down to meet a humongous, monstrous, enormous, gargantuan, colossal, massive—you get the idea—appendage that points straight up toward his belly button. And ladies, I wish I could say it was grotesque, or hideous, or repellant, but the truth is, it’s the most gorgeous, most beautiful, most immense cock I’ve ever seen.

My knees buckle all over again. I stumble forward, and he stops me with his other hand on my shoulder before I can fall against that wall of goodness—otherwise known as his chest. Before I can feel the hardness of all that male virility in that column he carries between his legs. And his balls, oh, his balls are a work of art.

They should have their own installation at the Tate Modern, along with the upthrust of his dick between them. A sculpture I’d call Hunter’s Pillar, or a phallic representation of what it is like to be hunted by the owner of said appendage. Right, I’ve officially gone into meltdown then, and all because I saw his penis? Again, in my defense, I’ve seen the male member before, but none as prodigious as his.

The heat that had retreated toward my core turbo charges forward, until it seems to have flooded every part of me. My nipples tighten until it feels like they’re ready to torpedo out of my bikini. As for my pussy...? It’s in pussy heaven, with threads of moisture lubricating my cunt, readying itself for an imminent penetration—which I’m not going to let happen. Not yet.

I twist my arm and tug. This time, he releases me. I stumble back, right myself, then tip up my chin. "I’m going to take a shower."