Never Let Go: A Collection of Sensual Short Stories Read online

  She forced her gaze back up and met his steely look with as tough an expression as she could manage with her cheeks still hot.

  “I don’t do drugs. I have no drugs. If I look guilty…well, it’s nothing to do with anything illegal.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “Oh? Then why do you look guilty?”

  “Can I just go? Please?” Her voice lilted at the end, almost begging. And irritation sparked, pushing down some of her embarrassment. It was always easier to speak her mind when she was angry. Sometimes too easy. “I was wondering what you looked like under that uniform, if you must know.”

  His expression didn’t shift. If anything, his face stiffened even further into the professional façade that all cops wore. “Is that a fact?”

  “Yep. Can I go now?” She wasn’t saying please again.

  He held her gaze for a moment before his slid, quite unprofessionally, down her body. She was suddenly happy that she’d dressed up for her night out. When his gaze moved back to hers, something in his eyes had shifted, though his expression was the same. Her stomach clenched, and she resisted shifting to try to ease the sudden pressure building in her pussy. Something told her that this man would know exactly what she was doing, and why.

  “Try to keep within the speed limits, Miss Thomas. I won’t be so forgiving if I have to pull you over again.”

  Tom’s Tavern was packed by the time David Drake arrived. He would have had to shove his way to get a seat at the bar if most people hadn’t moved without him having to say anything. Something about his large stature, maybe. Or the ugly glare he knew he wore.

  Damn. The woman he’d pulled over—Michelle Thomas—had tried his self-control like none other. And it wasn’t just that pretty coed thing that she had going on, it was her attitude. Her seeming disregard for his authority.

  He liked it.

  Hell, if he’d met her anywhere else—out of uniform, off the job—he’d have done a damn sight more than barely brush up against her in the fastest frisking he’d ever conducted. There were enough things riding his mind without visions of riding a mouthy young woman he’d pulled over added to the list. But he’d be damned it that wasn’t a nice thing to think about.

  He waved at the bartender, Jimmy, and the man nodded.

  “No freaking way,” a voice said behind him, loudly enough that it penetrated the din around him. The vague familiarity of it tugged at him, and he turned.

  As if he’d suddenly fallen into some insane dream world, the woman who’d taken over his thoughts all afternoon stood in front of him, arms crossed and frown creasing her face.

  She was as striking as he remembered. Not soft and cute like most of the college women who pursued him. No, her features were too strong to ever be confused with most of women he shared time with. Her forehead was a tad too big, her nose more Roman than pert. But she was beautiful, even if she’d never be on the cover of a magazine. And those lips…the woman had a mouth made for kissing. Among other things.

  “Did you follow me here or something? Seriously, that’s creepy.”

  “Don’t flatter yourself.” He grinned at her to soften the words. “You’re in my bar. And I’m one hundred percent sure you aren’t a regular here. But I am.”

  The outrage in her eyes faltered, and she glanced behind him. He turned to see Jimmy waving his beer at him.

  “You want one?” David asked her over his shoulder.

  She shook her mostly empty bottle. “Sure. What the heck.”

  “At the risk of sounding like a man who hasn’t updated his pick-up lines since 1995, what’s a girl like you doing in a place like this?” He waved for another beer.

  Amusement danced in her eyes. “Drinking a beer. Same as you.”

  “This isn’t exactly the hangout of choice for most college students.”

  “Well, I’m allowed. I graduated a couple of months ago.”

  “Is that so? I’d still say you’re not a regular.” He definitely would have noticed her before.

  “True. It’s my first time here.” She looked around the bar, as if evaluating it. “I like it. Kind of gritty and just a little dirty.” Her eyes met his again, and the obvious double entendre sent a jolt straight to his dick.

  But, the epitome of self-control, he didn’t ask her if she liked it dirty. Instead he took a long drink from his beer, watching her on the other side of the bottle.

  When he finished, most of his beer was gone, but at least no lame lines threatened to spill from his mouth.

  “So what are you doing here? Should I be worried you’re stalking me?” he asked.

  “You wish,” she said, and he had to admit—at least to himself—that he kind of did. “I’m here with a friend. Her latest boyfriend wanted to come here for the nachos or something.”

  “Don’t know about the nachos, but the jalapeño poppers are worth coming for.”

  “So healthy.”

  “I try.” He grinned at the cute grimace touching her mouth. “You want to dance?”

  “Sure.”

  He took the remainder of her beer and set it on the bar next to his. They’d have been safer with friends or the bartender, but he didn’t intend to come back to them. They’d only had two beers, but her smile was already a touch loose, and he didn’t want her to get drunk. There was no doubt he was a bastard in a lot of ways, but that didn’t include taking advantage of drunk women.

  And he fully intended to take advantage of her tonight.

  He pulled her body close to his on the dance floor, even though the song wasn’t exactly slow. Her body fit snugly against his, her curves melding just right against him. Swirling around him, her scent filled his lungs. Sweet and clean, she smelled like oranges and soap.

  His dick hardened at her closeness and he slid his hands down her back, gritting his teeth against the urge to rub his aching hardness against her.

  Together they swayed to the music, and by the time the song ended, he was ready to pull her close and fuck her in front of the whole club. Bend her over a nearby table and push up the little dress he’d been thinking about all day. People’s opinions and his hopeful promotion to detective be damned.

  Would she be horrified by the idea? Or would it excite her as much as it did him?

  Air filled his lungs, but the deep breath hardly calmed him; instead it seemed to pull her scent deeper into him. The woman was intoxicating. Full of fire and nerve. And he was sorely in need of her. Not just because he hadn’t had sex in a few months since he’d had to focus all of his energy on his work and the detective’s exam, but because there was something in her that pulled at something in him.

  She stepped back and tugged him away from the dance floor. He followed, trying to get himself under control, but watching her ass sway in that dress as she walked didn’t help matters.

  When they got back to the bar where they could hear each other better, she went on her tiptoes and her lips brushed his ear.

  “I’ve been thinking about that frisking all afternoon.”

  His lip twitched. If only she knew the thoughts that had been circling his mind, she’d probably run as far and as fast as she could. “Me too.”

  “Want to get out of here? Go somewhere quiet?”

  His cock swelled at her words, at her soft breath against his ear, at the new huskiness in her voice.

  Without a word he took her hand in his and headed for the door.

  Chapter 2

  Her body tingled, a mixture of nerves and excitement that pushed her to do daring things. Things that she wouldn’t have thought herself capable of before tonight.

  Two weeks of freedom.

  That was what this time was. A break from her real life. And why the heck couldn’t she spend them exactly as she wanted to? She could. She would. And right now what she wanted was the sexy cop.

  Her hand held tightly in his, she allowed herself to be led to the front doors of the bar. His hands where large and rough, just like she’d fantasized.

  And boy, how
she’d fantasized.

  Only a few hours had passed since he’d pulled her over, but her mind had worked overtime in those hours. Drake. That had been the name on his uniform. A last name, no doubt. Holy crap. She was headed “somewhere quiet” with a man and she didn’t even know his first name.

  A small voice in the back of her head screamed that this was insane. That she was more responsible than this. That good girls didn’t go off with strange men they’d just met—police officer or no.

  Shove it, she told the voice, this might be my only chance to do something crazy. She was a planner, something she’d gotten from her parents. The rest of her life was planned down to the year—or that was what it felt like sometimes. Not entirely her plan, partially her parents’ plan, with bits she added herself. They’d provided the outline, and she’d just been given the chance to fill in some of the colors.

  She deserved two weeks of freedom.

  They stepped outside and she halted in her tracks. Surprisingly, they were alone. The bar must have had a place for people to smoke in the back of the building. Music from the bar filled the air around them, but the noise was subtle.

  He stopped in his tracks when she didn’t move to follow. Then he turned to look at her, eyebrow quirked with an unspoken question.

  “I think we need to come to an agreement before we go any further with this,” she said.

  “Not much for spontaneity, huh?”

  She would have bristled, but his teasing grin made her want to smile back.

  “Okay, beautiful, what kind of agreement are we talking here?” He took a step closer, closing the gap between them to mere inches, and his scent tickled her nose. Beer and something spicy beneath it, a smell that was his and his alone. She ached to close the distance between them. To inhale his smell, memorize it. To kiss him, press herself against that hard body. Feel those hands of his all over her. Barely, she resisted.

  “First, this is just sex,” she said. His eyes widened but she kept talking. No letting him get a word in edgewise and distracting her. No letting her brain catch up so it could talk her out of this. “Second, this is short term. Two weeks, tops. Maybe just tonight.” It had to be short term. How was she supposed to concentrate on her grad program with this kind of man hanging around? He was distracting with a capital D. And she was pretty sure that sleeping with him would make him only more so.

  “Is there a number three in there, beautiful?” Amusement touched his tone, and his eyes crinkled in the corners. His gorgeous blue eyes. A woman could get lost in them.

  “Uhm…” she forced her attention back to her list. “Yes. Number three—this is just sex.”

  “You already said that.”

  “Well, it’s important.”

  He stepped closer and one of his hands went around her and gripped her ass, pulling her closer, while the other held the small of her back. She gasped at the hardness of his erection against her stomach. His very impressive erection. Damn. She could feel her pussy wet and tighten with need.

  Oh please, let him agree. I don’t think I could stop now if he didn’t.

  “I’ll agree to your terms, if you agree to a bet,” he said, voice a low rumble.

  “A bet?” She struggled to get her brain to work, to listen to his words instead of staring at his mouth. He had a very nice mouth.

  “I’ll bet you that by the end of the two weeks, you’ll be ready to throw your rules out the window.”

  As if. She had no doubt that this man was good in bed. But she had plans. A future. A blueprint for her life that she’d worked her butt off for, and she wasn’t about to let a man—no matter how sexy—ruin those plans. Sure, they weren’t totally her plans, but she was committed to seeing them through.

  “What do you get if you win?”

  “I get you, babe,” he said, voice so low she almost thought she’d misheard.

  Her mouth was suddenly dry, but she forced out the question anyway. “And what do I get when I win?”

  He chuckled and nuzzled her hair. “I want to fuck you in that alley. Where people could see us. Where they might hear you cry out when I make you come.”

  Holy shit. Her sex pulsed and her breath caught at the thought. She could barely concentrate well enough to speak with her pulse thundering so loudly in her head. “Sounds like you win either way.”

  “That’s the kind of bet I like to make.” He smiled at her. God, the man was sexy when he smiled. Then he bent down to nuzzle her neck.

  Her damn legs almost gave out on her, and she spoke without thinking. “What if I want you to do that now?”

  His head rose from where he’d started softly kissing her neck, and his eyes were narrowed, pupils dilated to make his irises look darker than the night surrounding them. “Then I guess I’d just have to come up with another prize.”

  She licked her lips. This was insane, but she didn’t care. Freedom was hers, until her real life started again. “Better get to thinking.”

  Without another word, he crushed her body against his, kissing her hard. Not testing. Demanding. His tongue pushed into her mouth, as if her words had unlocked something inside of him. With everything she had, she kissed him back.

  He’d unlocked something inside of her, too.

  The second she didn’t dismiss his suggestion, his dick about jumped out of his pants. She wasn’t just beautiful and different. Not just a woman with a will to match his own. She also seemed to seek adventure like he did, or at the very least was open to it. And adventure—in all things—was what life was all about.

  She’d said two weeks. But he’d be damned if he would let her go in mere weeks. Not a gem like this. Not if they meshed together, like he was certain they would. He’d just have to convince her. Hell, he’d done more difficult things in two weeks, hadn’t he?

  He dipped his tongue into her mouth, and she returned his kiss with a fervor that send his blood pounding, while she clung to his shoulders and plastered her body against his.

  The whole situation didn’t seem real. He’d never had such an immediate reaction to a woman. Never wanted to push things much longer than a night. Maybe all of this was because she had set the ground rules, because she’d said he couldn’t have her for long. No, it wasn’t that. It wasn’t just that. He hadn’t been able to get her out of his head all day.

  He broke the kiss and guided her back to the alley, watching for a regret in her expression. Waiting to see if she’d back down. But while she bit her bottom lip in the most adorable way, and seemed a bit hesitant, she acted as though she was as eager for this as he was.

  A man could get drunk on that kind of a thought.

  They hit the darkened area, just beyond the reach of the streetlights, and he kissed her. She returned his kiss without restraint. Tongue sliding against his, arms around his neck, her fingers digging in to what little hair he had on the back of his head to grip.

  “We can go farther back if you want.” Part of him wanted to push, wanted to assume. This was his goddamn number-one fantasy, after all, and he wanted to enjoy it with her more than he wanted his next breath. But he needed her to be comfortable with this too. In his fantasies it had always been his needs that mattered. His desires. But in reality, she had to enjoy it or he wouldn’t either.

  She glanced around, a bit of hesitation in her eyes, but in the end she shook her head.

  Taking that for assent, he kissed her again. God, the woman had been drinking beer—why did she taste like fruit and peppermint? With her hot tongue sliding against his, he could have spent the night tasting her. But she squirmed against him, seeking something more.

  Slowly, he pushed her back against the brick wall of the alley. Her dark brown hair reflected the moonlight, back where the streetlights couldn’t reach them. Lips swollen from his kisses and her eyes full of passion, she was a vision.

  “You’re beautiful,” he murmured, tucking a bit of hair behind her ear.

  Instead of smiling at that, or shyly thanking him like most women wo
uld, she frowned. “No getting mushy on me, Officer Drake.”

  He grinned and almost told her to call him Detective Drake—it would be official soon, after all—but he kissed away her frown instead.

  Sliding his hands down her sides, his memory flashed to earlier in the day, when all he’d wanted to do was feel her up while he was frisking her—not the norm for him; he was a professional, dammit. Just like in his fantasies, she reacted with a low moan at his touch. Her body was firm, yet softly curved. He moved his hand across her abdomen and up to cup her breast. A perfect fit for his hand.

  With the wall behind her, he grew more forceful, hands moving across her body. She responded in kind, moaning for him, touching him, moving her tight little body against his. He was so hard it was almost painful.

  It was more perfect—she was more perfect—than he ever could have imagined in his wildest fantasies. Her exotic scent rolled around him, spicy and sweet, driving him closer to the edge. And when she reached between them to grasp his cock over his pants, he groaned into her neck.

  “Like that?” she asked, her voice a breathy whisper.

  Instead of answering, he ran his hand up her thigh, under her skirt. She gasped when the back of his fingers brushed against her panties.

  “Fuck, you’re wet.” He rubbed her slowly through the material, and her grip on his cock faltered. “I think you like how hard I am for you. I think you can’t wait for me to fuck you against this wall. Out here where people might hear you scream.”

  As if confirming his words, she muffled a moan into his chest. He slid his fingers into her thong, touching her soft, heated skin beneath the material.

  She clung to his shoulders while he explored her, making small sounds. So wet and soft and hot.

  Hell, he couldn’t wait.

  With a hard pull, her delicate panties ripped away. He slid them into a pocket. The urge to just plunge himself into her immediately was almost overwhelming, but he had to make sure that this was good for her. The trust she’d already shown him by indulging in this fantasy was huge; he couldn’t betray it by coming inside her without concern for her needs.