Illicit: A Forbidden Romance (6 page)

J
ocelyn moved like lightning
, jumping off the bed and grabbing her clothes off the floor in one swift movement. She pulled a shirt over her head and hissed, “I didn’t know she was coming home so early!”

I didn’t move. I knew, even if I hadn’t gone about it the right way, that I had made the right decision. Just the warmth in my chest at the sight of Jocelyn was proof enough.

“What are you doing?” she asked, smacking my foot under the blanket. “Get up!”

I steeled myself for what was to come. “Your mother needs to find out about us.”

“No!” Jocelyn gaped at me, her face a picture of panic. “Not yet. I’m not ready. Please?” She spun around when Amanda’s voice floated down the hall. Joss had only enough time to fold her body in the space between the wall and the dresser before the bedroom door opened.

Amanda walked in, one eyebrow raised as she appraised me on the bed. “You’re only now getting up?”

I glanced at the clock on the nightstand. It was one in the afternoon. “Had a late night,” I said, sitting up and searching for my pants. She approached, bending over me for a quick kiss. “Where’s Joss?” she asked, turning back for the door.

I glanced across the room to where her daughter was peeking around the dresser, shaking her head. She looked so young in that moment, so unlike her usual self. “She’s around somewhere,” I said with a noncommittal shrug. I hated having to deceive Amanda but I had to trust that Joss had a plan.

Amanda sighed and turned back to me with soft eyes. “So did you think about it? What we discussed before I left?”

I ran a hand through my hair, sighing. We’d had the serious conversation only three days ago but already it felt like a million years had passed. I wasn’t even sure I was the same man she left behind. “A little.” I walked over and rubbed her arm, hoping to lead her out of the room for this conversation.

She stopped, looked around, and sniffed the air.

I rubbed the back of my head, trying to play off the distinct musk of sex in the room. “I was, you know,” I said, holding a fist in front of my crotch and making a crude gesture.

Amanda cracked a smile and pressed her body to mine. “You missed me?” she asked, gazing up at me with eyes that looked too much like her daughter’s for comfort. I tried not to cringe from self-loathing when she stood on her toes and kissed the side of my neck.

I was conscious of Joss’s gaze on my back, keenly aware of how it must feel to watch your lover kiss someone else. No doubt Joss was seething right now, either hurting or jealous or both. My mind spun with ideas on how to refuse Amanda’s advances without suspicion, but thankfully, she pulled away first.

“I should go greet Joss happy birthday though,” she said, her face filled with regret. “We can do this later.”

“
E
njoy it
!” My younger brother, Tristan, clinked his beer bottle to mine as we sat at a bar the next day. “You, Big Bro, are living the life!”

I glared at him, taking a long pull from my beer. “It’s not like that.”

He shook his head, chuckling. “You know what the next logical step is, don’t you?”

I let out an impatient huff. “Don’t even go there.” I gave him a warning look. “I swear if you say threesome, I’m gonna break this bottle on your face.”

Tristan threw his head back and laughed. “Isn’t that every man’s ultimate fantasy? To bag the mom
and
her daughter?”

I smacked the back of his head. “You need to stop watching so much porn.” I held the bottle up to my lips, drained my drink, and got off the stool. “Why am I even talking to you about this? It’s not like you have a conscience.”

Not that I could talk.

Tristan clutched at his chest. “Ouch. That almost hurt,” he said then held up his palms. “Okay, okay. I’ll be serious. Just sit your ass back down, you drama queen.”

“You can’t tell anyone about this,” I said, acquiescing.

“You know I won’t.”

And he wouldn’t. Since we were kids, Tristan and I had been close. He was my cocky little prick of a brother who liked to pick fights with the bigger boys at the playground, and I was the protective tough guy who made sure he didn’t get his ass handed to him. Now that we were bigger and older, Tristan no longer needed me to fight his battles, which wasn’t to say he was no longer a cocky little prick. But prick or not, I trusted him with my life.

“So is the daughter your girlfriend now?”

“No. Amanda is still, technically, my girlfriend.” I shook my head. I should have broken up with Amanda the moment she walked in the door. How had this all gotten so out of hand?

“So let me get this straight: You’re cheating on Amanda with her own daughter?”

I dropped my head to the bar. I was a cheater. I had become the very thing I reviled. “But this isn’t the same as what Eleanor did to me,” I insisted.

Eleanor Moreau, the woman to whom I’d given my grandmother’s wedding ring only to discover she had been cheating on me the entire length of our two-year relationship. It had taken well over three years and a few failed attempts at relationships to get over the betrayal, to let go of the emotional baggage. And now that I had, I realized I’d become her.

Tristan eyed me steadily. “It’s not?”

I screwed my lips shut. Cheating was cheating. Any way I put it, I was the bastard in this scenario.

Fuck.

I jumped up and threw a few bills on the bar. “Talk to you later. I have some business to take care of.”

I headed straight for the bookstore in Pembroke Gardens, knowing that Joss would be working tonight. I stalked into the store, on a mission, but the moment I spotted her talking to a customer from behind the help desk, my brain emptied of all rational thought. All I could think in that moment was the slide of her hair through my fingers and the warmth of her lips around my cock.

I ducked into a deserted aisle and rearranged my pants. My reaction to Jocelyn was unsettling, so immediate and reckless. In my thirty years, a woman had never thrown me quite like this.

Her green eyes widened when she saw me approach. “What are you doing here?”

“We need to talk.”

She glanced around, then down at her watch. “I’ll meet you at the café. I have a break coming up in ten minutes.”

I waited at a table in the café for nearly seven minutes before I stood up and headed over to the back of the store, toward the hallway that led to the bathrooms and the Employee Only entrance. I leaned against the wall beside the water fountain and waited.

Finally the employee door opened and Joss emerged, looking surprised to see me. “I thought—”

I pushed away from the wall, my body buzzing at the sight of her. “I couldn’t wait.” And before I could stop myself, I rushed forward and dove for her lips. My momentum drove us to the other side of the hallway, and I pressed her back into the wall as I tilted her head up and deepened the kiss. I groaned when her hands wrapped around my waist and pulled me flush to her body.

We pulled away only when a man cleared his throat on his way to the bathroom. We turned our heads away from the stranger, our faces still only inches apart.

“Hi,” I whispered, swiping at the moisture around her lips with my thumb.

She smiled at me, her cheeks red. “Hi.”

I dipped my head and pressed a kiss on her jaw. “It’s taking all of my self-control not to screw you right here, right now,” I whispered, my lips grazing the shell of her ear. It wasn’t exactly what I’d planned on saying, but it was the truth nonetheless.

She let out a shaky breath as her hands went up to my chest. “You said you needed to talk to me about something.” She pushed, creating about a foot of distance between us.

I wiped a palm down my face, sobering. “I guess I did.”

She bit back a smile. “Well?”

I stared at her, the words stuck in my throat. In truth I was unnerved by the thought of losing her so soon, but if I had to be a loathsome, deceitful man just to be with her, then maybe we were better off apart.

Jocelyn’s face clouded over. “Please don’t break up with her yet.”

“Joss…”

“I’m not ready.”

I held her shoulders, bending down to look into her face. “Not ready to be with me?” I asked gently.

She shook her head, eyes glistening with unshed tears. “I know it’s probably too late, but… I’m not ready to destroy my relationship with my mother.”

I wrapped my arms around her, fitting her inside the crook of my body. More than anything, I wanted to make it all better, make it so that nobody got hurt. That wasn’t possible—not at this point, anyway—but maybe I could prolong the inevitable.

D
espite my recent actions
, I liked to consider myself a man of honor. But when Amanda crawled into bed with me that night, her lips soft and hands seeking, I found myself faced with a decision.

“Jake,” she breathed by my ear, curling her warm body around my back. Her hands slid around to my front, trailing over my abs and down to my crotch.

I took hold of her wrist before she went too far. “What about work?”

“I’m done for the night.” She nibbled on my earlobe and my cock twitched. Hell, I’m only human. “I thought you and I could spend some time together,” she added in a voice filled with sultry promise.

“What about Joss?”

“What about her?” she murmured, nuzzling into my neck. “She’s probably asleep by now.” She pushed me on my back and sat astride me, rubbing her warmth into my rapidly swelling cock.

Not gonna lie, it felt damn good. But I held her hips and forced her to stop. “Not tonight.”

Her face fell. “Jake, what’s wrong?”

I sighed, running my hand through her hair. “Nothing. I’m just tired.”

She leaned down, setting her chin on her hands. “Really? There’s nothing more?”

The confession rose like bile in my throat, but I swallowed it down. “We’re fine, Amanda,” I said, touching her cheek.

“What about the thing we talked about?” she asked, blinking like she was trying to fight back tears. When I didn’t answer, she pushed up off my chest and climbed off. “Okay. I get it.”

“Hey,” I said, capturing her hand before she was beyond reach. “That wasn’t a no.” It occurred to me that I could just give her the honest answer now and put her out of her misery, but the truth was that I wasn’t the honorable man I thought myself to be. When it came down to it, I was chickenshit.

She gave me a sad smile and bent down to give me a quick kiss on the lips. “I’m not trying to pressure you.”

“I know you’re not.” I gave her a reassuring smile. “I promise, I’ll have an answer soon.”

I
couldn’t sleep
that night, my brain trying its best to wrap around the situation. I couldn’t figure out how to resolve the problem without hurting anyone. Was it even possible to be with Jocelyn without destroying her relationship with her mother? Did I even want to put that bond to the test? Did Joss?

The answers wouldn’t come. I finally slipped out of bed around two-thirty in the morning and went to the garage to check on some wood pieces I’d stained.

“Couldn’t sleep either?”

I spun around and found Joss standing just inside the garage, closing the door quietly behind her. She looked so sexy with her hair down in messy waves around her face, wearing an oversized shirt that was falling off one shoulder. I let out a sharp breath at the sight of her.

“Couldn’t turn my brain off.” I swiped a palm down my face, trying to rub the lust from my eyes.

“What were you thinking about?” she asked with a raised eyebrow.

“About everything.”

She cocked her head and bit her lip. “Like?”

I tried to fight it, but denying my need for Jocelyn was like swimming against a tidal wave. With a wretched grunt, I stalked over, circled my hands around her waist, and lifted her up onto the edge of the workbench. “Take a guess,” I said, pulling apart her thighs and fitting myself in the space between. She hooked her heels around my ass and drew me closer until my erection was nestled in the junction of her legs.

I lifted the hem of her shirt and ogled her black cotton underwear. “Just panties?” I trailed a finger up the center of her warm crotch, then traced it up her belly and into her shirt. The breath hitched in her throat when I closed my palm around the soft weight of her breast, rolling her nipple between my fingers until it pebbled.

“So tell me,” she breathed. “Tell me what other thoughts are keeping you up tonight.”

I curled a hand over the loose collar of her shirt and tugged it down, exposing her breast. “I was thinking of this,” I said, flicking her nipple. I tugged the shirt lower and freed the other breast. “And this.” Dipping my head, I alternated suckling from both mounds, nipping at her nipples before laving each one with my tongue.

She leaned back on her hands and arched her back, allowing me more access. “What else?”

I grinned. So the girl wanted dirty talk. “I was thinking,” I began, kissing my way up her neck to her ear. “About how much I wanted to taste you. To open you up and run my tongue through your folds, up and down then in circles, tasting your wetness. I want to devour you until you’re squirming, until you can’t stand it anymore and you break apart. I want to taste your come, feel your insides trembling around my tongue.”

She let out a ragged breath.

I kept my word and proceeded to do just what I’d described. Joss grabbed handfuls of my hair, unable to decide whether to pull me away or to hold me closer. Eventually, she resorted to grinding her crotch into my face, gasping softly as the legs around my shoulders wound tighter and tighter.

“Jake!” she gasped as she climaxed. I slid two fingers inside her and continued to work her clit with my tongue, hell bent on making her come again.

And come she did. She was deathly silent but her entire body convulsed for a good thirty seconds, her inner walls quivering around my finger.

I couldn’t stand it anymore; I stood up and shoved my tongue inside her mouth, wishing like hell I could screw her like I desperately wanted. She clutched at my hips but I held back. I’d taken a risk once not using a condom; I couldn’t take it again. One mistake was all it would take to ruin her future, a future I wasn’t even sure I’d be a part of.

Her eyebrows knitted as she waited for me. “Why—?”

I sighed. “I didn’t bring any condoms.”

“I’m on the pill. I thought you knew?”

“Since when? Since Eli?” The name slipped out without thought. I hadn’t meant to sound like a jealous twat.

She bit back a smile. “I’ve been on it since I was sixteen. My mom wanted to make sure I didn’t accidentally get pregnant, even though it took another two years before I even lost my virginity.”

My mood darkened at the idea of someone taking her virginity. Someone not me. “Who was it?”

“Does it matter? You won’t even know him.”

“Yes. Everything about you matters.”

She let out an impatient sigh. “His name was Harry Nicholls. We dated on and off in high school. My first time was with him on prom night.” She set her hands on my shoulders. “There, you happy? My love life is a cliché.”

“Who else?” I suddenly felt the need to know every single person she’d been with, unheeding of the fact that this conversation had never benefitted a relationship in the history of ever.

“Really? Right now?” She looked pointedly down between us. “You want me to talk about my ex-boyfriends while I’m exposed and throbbing?”

I brought her hand down to my erection. “You’re not the only one throbbing. But I need to know.”

Her nostrils flared and her eyebrows drew together, but she answered anyway. “After Francis, there was this guy, Dylan. We dated for three months. Then there was Joey. He was an art major and, I guess, my most serious relationship at six months.”

“Did you love any of them?”

She fixed her green eyes on me and I was sure she could see right through me. Instead of answering, she tugged my pants down and pulled me out, positioning me at her entrance. “I’m not answering that question until you give me something in return. Tit for tat.”

So I squeezed her tit.

She chuckled and scooted closer to the edge of the bench. “Now for the tat.” She pulled on my hip, slowly drawing me into her warmth.

I sucked in a ragged breath and pushed in the rest of the way. “Damn, you feel amazing.”

“So move.”

“Answer the question first.”

She sighed. “No, I didn’t love any of them. I thought I maybe loved Joey, but whatever it was, it didn’t last long.”

I cupped her jaw in my hand and held her gaze as I drew out and slid back in. “Thank you,” I said, kissing her lips. “For being so open with me.” I swayed up and knew I’d hit the right spot when she gasped. But if I thought I could get away with not talking about my past relationships, I was wrong.

“Tell me about yours,” Joss said, her body undulating with mine, meeting me thrust for thrust.

“You want me to talk about other women right now?” I gritted through my teeth.

She paused for a moment, studying me. Then she said, “I guess not.”

But before she closed her eyes and dipped her head into my neck, I saw the momentary flash of sadness in her eyes.

Still moving, I held her face in my hands and made her look at me. “I have loved in my lifetime,” I said, thrusting in slow and deep. “But you… you’ve consumed me heart and body, Jocelyn. I’ve never—
never
—felt this way about anybody before.”

Her lips quivered as she lunged forward and kissed me. A moment later, she sucked in a breath. Her entire body tensed then broke apart, fingers clutching at my shoulders as she rode through the tremors.

I came right after, driving deep as I pumped my seed into her. With her face cradled in the palm of my hands, I leaned my forehead on hers and tried to catch my breath, trying to make sense of the inconceivable notion that I’d fallen for her at this time in my life.

“I wish I’d met you before you met my mom,” she whispered, her hands covering mine.

“Me too.” For a long time I’d tried telling myself that it was Amanda I wanted, but I’d only been fooling myself.

“You said before that you give a piece of yourself each time you have sex,” Joss began, her eyes a brilliant green. “What piece did you give me?”

An unfamiliar feeling clanked around in my chest, sending my heart racing. I wasn’t usually a sappy, emotional kind of guy but when it came to her, I wanted to spill every flowery thought that came to mind. “Everything,” I said, my voice rough with emotion. “When I’m with you, I lay it all bare and give you everything.”

She kissed me, deep and passionate, letting me know that she was giving me a part of herself too. But however much she gifted me, it was more than I deserved.

“Joss, we have to tell Amanda.”

She recoiled, the haze of desire dissolving from her face. “I thought we agreed—”

“Joss!” I said, forcing her to look at me. “Your mom… she wants to get married.”