Found (Not Quite a Billionaire Book 3) (30 page)

“No. But I should’ve known.”

“Did you tie the ropes?”

I didn’t want to go back to this. I wanted to lock that box again and throw away the key. “No. But I let it happen.”

“Do you want to know what I think?”

I laughed, though it wasn’t funny. “No. Yes. And you’re going to tell me anyway.”

“I am.” She sat straight as a soldier and did it. “I think you found out that you enjoyed domination, but you don’t enjoy pain. Not real, hard-core pain. I think she does. I think she craves it, and she thought she’d get it from you, and when she didn’t, she told you it was because you weren’t man enough. I think she went way further than you wanted to go, and since she knew she could use that to hurt you, she brought it up tonight. I’ll bet somebody’s doing those things to her now, and I’ll bet you know it.”

“Yeh. I do. She said as much, that night I went to see her.”

“And she tried to get you to go down that path again, because it had hurt you to go before.”

I didn’t answer, and Hope said, “And did you?”

“No.” The word was an explosion. “No.”

“That’s right. You came home to me, and you needed it sweet. You needed it gentle. You needed to remind yourself that you weren’t that man anymore. You wanted to tell yourself that you were hard, but you weren’t brutal. You wanted to believe that you could love somebody. That you could protect her from anything, even from yourself.”

I was wrung out. I was shattered. “How do you know?”

“Hemi.” She’d turned in her seat to face me, her face as urgent as the hand she put on my cheek. “I know because I know you. I know because I see you. I know because I love you.”

Hope

The evening didn’t end up the way I’d thought it would. It was so much more.

When we went into the hotel, Hemi had his arm around me, and I had both of mine around him, not caring who saw or what they thought of us. And when we got into our room, he grabbed me.

The kiss was hot and wild, out of control from the second his mouth closed over mine. There was no calculation in the way he devoured me, or any control at all in the way he shoved a hand up under my skirt and got hold of my hip.

His fingers dug in, and I didn’t complain. I had my hands around his head, pulling him into me, but despite his urgency, his own hand was behind my head when he backed me straight up against the wall.

And there was absolutely nothing civilized about the way he ripped off the black underwear I’d chosen so carefully, or the way he spun me around.

His fingers were in my hair, unfastening the clip, and a metallic
ting
told me it had landed on the stone floor. My hair was falling out of its knot, and then his hands were at the back of my neck, unfastening the hooks holding my dress closed. And controlled, deliberate Hemi Te Mana’s hands were fumbling.

“Shit.”
It was nothing more than an explosion of breath. I felt the release of the fabric collar at my nape, then the coolness on my skin as he yanked the zipper down, and I shivered. His hands were shoving the delicate fabric roughly down and over my hips, and I didn’t care. Not about the dress, and not about anything else. He needed this, and so did I.

Hemi talked during sex. Always. Now, he was silent, his ragged breath and my own the only sounds in the quiet room. My bra fell to the floor, and his hands were all over me.

I had my forearms against the wall, and I was surrendering, falling down, falling deep. One of his hands was between my legs, the other one on my breast, not rough even now. He was remembering how sensitive I was, taking care of me even in the midst of his nearly unbearable excitement. But the second his fingers gently pinched my nipple, a dark shock ran straight to my core, my back was arching, and I was moaning.

“Shit,” he said again. “You’re so wet. I have to . . . I have to . . .”

“Do it. Please.
Now.”
It was almost a sob.

He spun me again, and my back hit the wall. His hands were at his belt, fumbling again, and I was there, helping him. I was naked, dressed only in black fuck-me-now heels and a barbaric display of jewelry, and Hemi was fully dressed, and I didn’t care. There was only one thing that mattered.

One hand went under my bottom and lifted me straight off my feet, and the other was in my hair, tugging my head back. I wrapped my legs around his waist, put a hand down, and helped guide him inside me.

He entered me in one hard thrust, and I let out a choked cry. I’d been expecting it, and still, it was nearly too much.

He stopped dead. I could sense his pulsing energy, his unbearable tension, as clearly as if I’d been in his skin. “Hurting you,” he said hoarsely.

“No.” The need clawed at me. “Never. Do it. Hard.”

He groaned, and then he did it. Hard, and strong, and savage. There was nothing but ferocity in the hips that pumped against mine, and no control at all in the hand that pulled at my hair.

He didn’t kiss me. He didn’t say a word. But he told me everything. How desperately he desired me, how frantically he’d needed to be inside me. How only I could fix this, could soothe the hurt burning in him. He took me hard and deep, and I took him the same way, and when my orgasm came on me with the force of a locomotive, I honestly thought I wasn’t going to be able to stand it.

When it hit me, it felt exactly like that train. Like a shock wave, slamming into me, knocking me senseless. And Hemi doing the same thing.

Too much. Too hard. Too deep. Everything.

Hemi

I thought I was going to pass out. I was sure Hope was. I shouldn’t have done it, and I couldn’t have helped it.

Afterwards, I stayed where I was for a long time, and she stayed with me, her hands on my shoulders, holding me close, not asking for a thing. At last, though, my arm relaxed, and I supported her as she slid down the wall.

And still I held her. Even after her feet hit the floor, I didn’t let her go. I couldn’t. I stood, still pressing her between my body and the wall, while my head came to rest against my forearm and I trembled and shook, while I tried to stop it and couldn’t. I needed to move, to let her move as well, but I couldn’t.

It ended, of course. Every moment did. Life moved on, whether you wished it wouldn’t or you couldn’t wait for it to happen. In the end, it was Hope who took off my jacket and tie, Hope who unbuttoned my shirt and pulled it off, then dealt with the rest of my clothes. She unfastened her own shoes and left them where they lay, then stripped off her bracelet and earrings and dropped them onto the hall table. And when we were both naked, she took my hand and led me into the bedroom, pulled back the duvet, drew me down with her, and wrapped her arms around me.

“This is how I love you,” she told me, and if I’d ever thought a gentle woman couldn’t be fierce, I’d been wrong. “This is how I hold you, and this is the way I’ll be holding you forever. In my arms when I can, and in my heart always.
Always.
You’ll never lose me, because I’ll never let go.”

I did my best to control myself. When my chest began to tighten, I called on the self-discipline of a lifetime. When the tears pricked behind my eyelids, I did my utmost to shut them down. That was what I did. That was who I was.

I failed. My chest heaved, and a ragged, ugly sound came out. I sobbed once, and again. Twice more, and then I was rolling away, onto my back, away from her. I was breathing hard, squeezing my eyes shut against the tears, and feeling them trickling, hot, shameful, and unstoppable, down my temples.

“It’s all right. You’re all right.” Hope’s voice was soft and sure, her hand was stroking over my hair, and she was kissing my cheeks, my eyelids. Kissing the tears away, taking them into herself. Sharing my pain, accepting my burden, letting me know that she would help me carry it. Now and forever.

I’d always been alone. I’d known that was the way it had to be. But I wasn’t alone anymore.

I’d have died for Hope. I knew it as deeply and as surely as I’d ever known anything. I’d have killed for her, too. I’d have done anything it took to keep her safe.

But the thing I’d never expected, that I’d never dreamed could be possible . . .

She’d have done the same for me.

Hemi

Anybody would have thought that I’d have flown back to New York with Hope at my side. I know I’d thought it. The only problem was, she wouldn’t go.

“Too bloody right I don’t understand,” I said. We were driving to Katikati the next morning, and nobody could have called me cool today. “You said I didn’t share. I’ve shared now, and you can’t say I haven’t. You said you weren’t strong enough to stand up to me, that I wanted to keep you weak. Here you are, though, driving to Auckland and driving us home, and here I am in the bloody passenger seat letting you do it. There you were last night as well. All of that.”

I didn’t go into detail, because some of those details were more than embarrassing to recall. A general summation would have to do. “You can’t tell me now that you don’t know you’re strong enough. You have to know I realize you are. You know you’ve got me wrapped around your finger, too. Ask Koro if you doubt it. I know he’d be happy to tell you. So why the hell not? What in the world are you waiting for? What are you making
me
wait for?”

“You’re yelling,” she said, her hands tightening on the wheel.

That brought me up short. I didn’t yell. Well, maybe.

“Right,” I said after a moment and a couple deep breaths. “I’ve stopped. Why not?”

Her eyes didn’t leave the road. “I love you more than ever, and
you
know
that.
But I told Sonya I’d stay at least three more weeks.”

“Bugger Sonya.”

“Best boss I’ve ever had. The most confidence I’ve ever had, too. And, yes, I know I’m a waitress, but you have to start somewhere. I know Karen needs me, too, but . . .”

“No,” I was forced to admit, “I don’t think so, not in the way you think. Could be good for her to be without you for a few weeks. Takes you for granted, doesn’t she. Besides, she needs to know she can count on me, and listen to me, too. I’m tougher than you are, and she needs that. You may be good at holding my feet to the fire. You aren’t good at holding hers.”