Unfortunately Yours (A Vine Mess, #2)

Oh yeah. This was the new her, apparently. Obedient as all get-out.

How else was she supposed to behave when this man had unlocked secrets to her pleasure that she didn’t even know were being held prisoner? He was magic. And his erect penis, God help her, was pure perfection. Normally Natalie would have called it too large. She had called it that at first glance. But the foreplay—the mothereffing foreplay turned that . . . eight? Nine-inch? . . . monster into a jungle gym. And it had a curve in it. She actually had to throw her hips back to accommodate that slight bow and in doing so, her clit rubbed against the solid, so solid base of his sex, turning her into a moaning, sweating mess.

“There’s a lot happening on your beautiful face, but nothing coming out of your mouth.” He sat up suddenly and she whimpered, because every time this man moved, she found a newer, better angle with which to happily torture herself. “Tell me what you’re thinking,” he demanded against her mouth. “While you’re fucking me so fucking good, Natalie, say what’s on your mind.”

“I love your dick,” she blurted in a rush, holding on to his shoulders so she could maneuver herself even faster. “I love it.”

His eyes were almost black by now, upper lip curled. “What do you love about it?”

Why was she shaking so violently when she wasn’t even having an orgasm? Did this man give her pre-orgasms? Was that possible or should she donate herself to science? “It’s . . . y-you made me ready for it,” she gasped. “With your mouth.”

“When I sucked your tits?” He spanked her hard and she screamed into his shoulder. “Or when I stuck my tongue in your pussy?”

Actual moisture was beginning to overflow from her eyes, her teeth chattering. So good, so good, so good. “Both!”

“Tell me the truth. You thought I would throw you into missionary, come in sixty seconds, and fall asleep. Didn’t you?”

“Yes. No,” she babbled, rocking furiously in his lap. “I-I don’t know.”

“Not with my wife.” Without warning, he flipped Natalie onto her back and drove her up the bed with one savage pump of his hips. “I’ll be earning the right every single day to come inside pussy this good.”

The orgasm slapped harder this time and she soared, loving it, loving being objectified and fucked and revered all at the same time. It was in the way he leaned down to kiss her, letting her know with that cherishing stroke of his tongue that he would be there to take care of her when it was all over. That he adored her.

She could feel that.

He made her feel it.

Now she wanted to return the favor. “You’ve more than earned it,” she whispered, scraping her fingernails along his scalp. Raked them down his back and his eyes glazed over. Then she contracted the intimate muscles between her legs and watched his control stumble, his jaw flexing, a stuttered version of her name tumbling out of his mouth. “Although . . .”

“Yeah?” he asked hoarsely, hips moving faster. “Yeah, princess?”

She positioned her mouth against his ear, flexed again, and buried her nails into his back. “Do you really need to earn anything when I want your come so bad?”

“FUCK,” he bellowed, gripping onto the headboard with his left hand, yanking up her right knee in his other one. The bed creaked ominously beneath them, faster and faster, while he worked through his finishing thrusts, finally flattening her with a snarl and filling her with liquid heat. She took hold of his ass cheeks and yanked him in tighter, purring in his ear. He cursed, panted, and groaned through a renewed series of pumps, their flesh connecting and smacking, hands straining to touch, to gain purchase. From above, his huge body dominated her smaller one in a way she instinctively knew she would crave for the rest of her life.

Moments later, they were nothing but a tangle of sweaty limbs, their labored breathing slowing in the small room. August’s mouth traveled along the slope of her shoulder, kissing her beneath the ear as his fingers twined themselves with hers. “Holy shit,” he muttered into her hair, sounding completely dumbstruck. “Holy shit.”

“Hmmm.”

“Seriously, I should get a medal for staying hard that long. You . . .” He rolled her closer, nuzzling his mouth into her neck. “I’ve needed you.”

“I’ve needed you, too,” she whispered, a sting creeping in behind her eyes.

He lifted his head to frown down at her. “You sure that falling bucket didn’t hurt you?”

Natalie felt herself plummet deeper into the feelings that had been building for this man and wouldn’t seem to stop, despite their very opposite objectives. Despite the outward reasons they’d married and the different directions they were heading. “I’m sure.”

Her heart gave a heavy thud, so intense that she reached out suddenly for the glass of water on the bedside table, just for something to do with her hands. In the process, she bumped her laptop and the screen brightened. She barely noticed at first. Not until August tapped her bare hip. “Who is that?”

“Who is who?”

August pointed over her shoulder at the New York Times engagement announcement still very much visible on her screen. The glass of water paused halfway to Natalie’s mouth.





Chapter Twenty




Every time things between him and Natalie started to feel right, a snake had to slither through the grass, jump up, and bite him square in the testicles. Swear to God. As soon as her shoulders stiffened, he knew something was up. And he knew he wouldn’t like it.

A significant part of August didn’t want her to confirm the identity of the suited, smiling golden boy in the photograph, because he’d already put it together. Central Park spread in the background gave it away. That fucker with the whitest teeth he’d ever seen was Natalie’s ex-fiancé. They’d just had sex so incredible that he’d heard “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” by the Beatles playing when he came and this was going to ruin it, huh?

“Who is who?” Her question lingered in the air, her eyes zipping to the screen, widening, the glass of water stopping before she could take a sip from it. “Oh.”

“Oh?”

She took a long drink from the glass and set it back down on the bedside table. “That would be my ex, Morrison, and his new fiancée.” Her smile was tight and brief. “I wasn’t internet stalking. Someone sent me the announcement.”

“When?”

Jerky shoulder shrug. “I don’t know, a little while ago.”

It was all coming together now. His stomach pitched first, followed by the scraping out of his chest, leaving it hollow.

No, not totally hollow.

There was a big billow of green smoke wafting in, carrying jealousy on its back. Sticky, grimy, and impossible to escape. “A little while ago, as in, right before you asked me for sex.”

“Asked you for . . .” She opened her mouth and closed it, nose wrinkling up. “I don’t understand where you’re going with this.”

August lunged off the bed to his feet, zipping himself back into his jeans with numb fingers. “You need me to spell it out for you?”

“Apparently I do.” Her voice had grown louder to match his. “Yes.”

Unable to stand the sight of Morrison’s smiling face another second, he crossed to the other side of the bed and closed the lid of the laptop. “You were feeling shitty about your ex getting engaged and I was a convenient ego boost.”

That marked the first time he’d ever rendered Natalie speechless.

And it didn’t feel a tenth as good as he expected it to.

In fact, it felt the opposite of good. It was awful.

She stared up at him for several beats, then seemed to blink back tears while turning her face away. “Get out of my room.”

It took him a moment to find his voice. “Deny it.”

“No, you have it completely right. Everything I said about having feelings for you was a big, elaborate lie so I could get some ego-boosting sex.” She stood up and shoved him toward the door, but he didn’t budge an inch. Couldn’t seem to move at all. “Doesn’t that sound exactly like me?”

Nope.

Nope, it certainly did not.

Now she was covering herself with a pillow. Hiding from him.

Apologize. Right the hell now.

“Tell me this isn’t one of the reasons you’re going back to New York,” he growled instead, because he had obviously lost full control of his faculties. The green smoke growing thicker and thicker inside his chest was manning all battle stations. This finance guy was utterly perfect for August’s wife—who he was fucking in love with, by the way—and the whole time they’d been making love, she’d been sad about the asshat marrying someone else.

She’d just turned him inside out in that bed and the possibility she’d been on a different page was eating him alive.