Wild at Heart (13 page)

“
Dare
…” His name melted on my tongue like dark, sinful chocolate. “Please—
oh, god!
“

He released one of my hands and his fingers clamped down on my nipple as he circled my bellybutton with his tongue. “Say it, Ree. You need to speak up, baby.”

No, I needed to
come
.

“Please lick me or I will die.” I fisted his dark locks in my shaking fingers and pushed his head lower, waves of excitement surging through my body, settling in my core.

“Well, I did promise to take care of you. And since this is a matter of life and death…” The end of that sentence—and his incredibly hot mouth—ended up buried deep between my legs.

Dare indulged in a long, leisurely lick, the effects of which I felt all the way up my spine. He growled, and I knew the low, carnal sound was a pleased response to how soaked he found me. “I missed you so fucking much. Your sexy body, your sweet taste, your sultry moans.” Raising his head slightly, his eyes met mine. “I’ve been losing my mind without you.”

And here I was, losing my mind THANKS to him.

He spread me open with his fingers and ran his tongue along my center, lapping me up then plunging into me. My nails raked over his back, digging into his skin, hanging on for dear life as he worked me into a wild frenzy.

“This is the part where I make you scream my name.” He held me down with one hand on my stomach as I writhed beneath the pressure of his unyielding, possessive licks. “Let go, Ree. Let me hear you come.” Then he sank two fingers inside me, while claiming my clit with his lips. He sucked me into his mouth, circling his tongue over the nerves, and I completely lost myself in the sensation of being owned by him.

This was the very definition of being wholly
consumed
. Trembling from the pressure. Gasping for air. Tears in my eyes from the immense pleasure. Coming so hard I forgot my own name. After all, there was only room for one word on my lips—
Dare
.

Spasms rippled through me—a visible earthquake in my body—but he kept me pinned to the table, reveling in the tremors and coveting every single drop of my pleasure. When I had nothing left to give, he made his way back up to my lips, kissing me senseless, kicking up my already frantic heartbeat.

“I’m not done with you yet.” His delicious promise sent excited shivers over my body. “We’re just getting started, baby.”

“Good. Now it’s your turn to wear my name on your lips.” I slid off the table, teetering on the columns of Jell-O that were my legs, using Dare’s rock-hard stomach to steady myself. “I want you inside me,” I said as I grabbed the waistband of his jeans. I tugged the zipper down, setting him free. It never failed to amaze me that every perfect inch of him was masterfully sculpted. “First in my mouth…” Lowering his jeans to the floor, I slid my palms down the front of his legs and knelt directly in front of him. “…then I want—”

“
Ree
…” His eyes flashed in warning, and my mind was immediately flooded with naughty thoughts of the many things I wanted to do to him. And that I wanted Dare to do to me. “There isn’t going to be a
then
if you keep talking like that.”

I stroked him with my hand, sliding over his throbbing length as I flicked my tongue over his smooth, hot skin. Licking him once from base to tip, I took him in my mouth slowly, torturously, then deeper and faster, making it my mission to give him just as much pleasure as he’d just given me.

He leaned against the table, gripping its ledge with one hand as his other twined through my hair. “You’re playing with fire.”

Grinning up at him, I met his eyes and skimmed my fingers over my breasts to my phoenix, down my hip, ending at the spot between my legs. “I’m fucking with dynamite,” I said, parting my thighs, touching myself as I licked him. “And I’m looking forward to the explosion that is sure to follow.”

Dare cursed and pressed his lips together, his eyes rolling back in his head. His breath was so shallow and labored I couldn’t tell if he was panting or groaning. Maybe both. I knew he was close—so close to the edge, so completely lost in me, so fully entwined in us. And I loved that I was the one doing this to him..

Just when I thought he was about to let go, he pulled away and grabbed my shoulders, hoisting me up. He kissed me on the mouth, then grasped my left wrist and spun me around so that my ass was flush against him and my stomach pressed against the edge of the workbench.

“I want to fuse you to me so I can never lose you again.” The palm of his other hand glided over my curves, etching his touch into my skin.

“There’s nowhere I’d rather be,” I said. “Right now. And always.”

Dare nudged my legs apart with his foot and bent me over the table, dipping my breasts in the now purplish-brown paint that coated the whole surface. Our bodies were both covered in colors as if we were one of his paintings come to life.

He thrust into me so hard and fast I cried out his name in surprise and ecstasy. With a quick roll of his hips, he drove even deeper, sinking his teeth into my shoulder as he groaned his pleasure. He stayed like that for a moment, completely unmoving, throbbing inside me as I pulsed around him, feeling fuller then I’d ever been before.

Then he was moving inside me, pulling almost all the way out and thrusting back in with deep, long strokes that launched every one of my senses into orbit. The fact that his hands were everywhere only spurred on my uncontainable moans.

He held my waist, hips, and ass, his grip so rough it walked a fine line between pleasure and pain, desire and despair. His other hand slid up my front, over my throat, to my parted lips, his thumb pressing against my mouth. I wrapped my lips around him, sucking to the same rhythm of his thrusts.

Both of us ravenous, insatiable.

He licked his was down my jaw and neck, then back up toward my lips. Plucking his thumb from my mouth, he brought it down under the table and between my legs, rubbing my own saliva over my clit as his tongue met mine in a breathless kiss.

His mouth, fingers, cock—it was too much, too overpowering, too wild. I came so hard my nails left claw marks through the wet paint on the wooden workbench as I screamed his name. Liquid heat spread through me as Dare intensified his pace, panting hard, his own climax chasing mine.

“Goddamn, Ree.” His mouth was hot against my ear. “You drive me so wild, baby. Wild at heart, crazy in love, fucked to the bone.” With those words, he ground his hips into me one last time, completely letting go, unabashedly filling me with warmth as he collapsed against my back.

“Let’s do that again,” he said as he kissed my cheek. “I want to watch you as you come. I need to see that pretty mouth scream my name.”

“Again?” Turning in his arms, I arched an eyebrow, still riding my post-orgasmic high.

“Again and again.” Dare gripped my ass and lifted me up so that my legs wrapped around his waist. “But, first—a shower. Good thing you’re already soaked,” he teased as I bit down on his bottom lip.

Oh, god.

We were back.

And here to stay.

Finally.

Hopefully.

sixteen

“D
are Wilde is an art god!” Arianna said as she opened the front door of the gallery and ushered in two delivery men carrying large canvases. “And he’s going to be a filthy rich art god very soon. These babies are going to sell faster than Twinkies at fat camp.”

I nodded in agreement, and pointed the uniformed duo toward the back room where we were storing the art until it went up for sale next week. “Dare deserves of every bit of success that’s soon to come his way,” I said. “He’s an incredible artist.” And it was way overdue, considering everything he’d been through.

“Dare, huh?” She cocked her head and regarded me. “The way you say his name sounds so…”
Possessive? Protective? Personal?
“…familiar,” Arianna said, and I realized it was time to come clean to my new friend.

I twisted my braid between my fingers. “I haven’t been completely honest with you, Ari. Not that I lied…I just left some things out. About Dare.” Mostly because I’d been so angry and confused over him pushing me away. “He and I are…” God, we were so much more than just a single word, a simple explanation. “We have a history,” I said. “And a present.”

As for our future? Now that we were fighting side-by-side…it would be bright.

It had to be.

Though, I had to admit, I’d been on edge lately. Even after what happened between us when I went to deliver his contracts—or, rather, ESPECIALLLY considering that day—all I could think about was Dare’s plan and all my dead-end attempts to find some other way to get to his dad. I couldn’t bear to see him get hurt.

Again.

Arianna’s high-pitched squeal startled me. “You and Dare Wilde?! I can’t believe you’ve been keeping this from me!” She was gaping at me as if I’d grown a second head. “Crap. And here I was, going on and on about him. Practically stalking the guy! I’d been going to his place three times a week under the pretense of business, desperately hoping he’d show me more of his paintings. The special ones Rex says he keeps in his bedroom.”

“I have a feeling you weren’t there
just
for the paintings.” I laughed. Sure, every one of her designer blouses and pencil skirts were the latest fashion, but I’d never seen her wear six-inch stilettos to meet with any other client. There’d also been a few extra undone buttons on her top every time she headed over to Queens.

“Well, I was kind of hoping he’d show me something else while the bed was nearby.” She blushed, laughing. “But I guess he was saving
that
for you all along.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before,” I said with an apologetic smile. “I’m not used to having girlfriends.” Since leaving my old world behind, real friends without ulterior motives were an unexpected wonder I was still getting used to. Not to mention, Dare had been going through so much lately that I had no idea how to approach the subject of our relationship with Arianna…or anyone else.

Sneaking around might’ve been hot in theory, but combined with an actual, viable threat, the gravity of our situation took all the fun out of just about everything. Every time I slipped over to his apartment under the pretense of getting more signatures or checking on new art, I had to look over my shoulder. Every time I kissed him, I had no clue when the next one would come.

Or if there would be a next one.

“You’re living with Rex Vogel and you’re sleeping with Dare Wilde,” Arianna said as she shook her head. “Could I be any more jealous right now?” She smacked my arm good-naturedly, and pointed to one of the canvases. “Let me guess, they’ve also painted you, right?”

“Only Dare.” I bit down on my lip to keep from grinning as my mind went back to the incident on his workbench. Yeah, he’d painted me. In many, many ways. Inside and out. Body and soul. I’d been scrubbing color from my hair for a week.

“Oh, my god!” She clasped her mouth with both hands. “His father!”

“
What?
“ A chill shivered over me.

She ran a hand through her dark red locks and shook her head. “This is so embarrassing,” she said, groaning. “I kind of told him Dare and I were dating.”

“You told Dare’s father…WAIT. You SAW Dare’s father?!”

She nodded. “God, I’m so sorry, Ree. If I’d known that you two—”

“No, that doesn’t matter. It’s fine.” I waved my hand. “When did you see him? I need to know EXACTLY what happened.”

“Umm…” Arianna looked startled by my urgency, but there just wasn’t time to explain to my freak-out. She pursed her lips and frowned. “Let me think…”

“Did he come here?” I prodded. “To the gallery?”

“Yes. Looking really out of place, actually. Too rough to be one of our regular high-end clients, and way too intense for a hipster on a wine-and-cheese gallery crawl. But let me just say that I now completely understand where Dare gets the tall, dark, and handsome from.”

“
Ari
.” I couldn’t care less how hot or not the deadbeat asshole was. “What did he want?”

“Nothing much.” She shrugged. “Just said that he and Dare hadn’t spoken for a while, but that he was trying to make contact again and wanted to meet the people who mattered most to his son. It’s kind of sweet if—”

Shit. “Did you tell him where Dare lived?”

Arianna shook her head. “He already knew. Apparently he heard Dare had a girl at La Période Bleue and saw me over at his studio, so he deduced we were an item. And I didn’t correct him. I’m sorry.” She touched her fingers to her throat nervously. “I guess I was just trying to employ the power of positive thinking. If I told enough people we were a thing, then maybe…”

Double shit. “You told him you were Dare’s girlfriend?”

“I’m sorry, Reagan.” She bit her lip, suddenly looking panicked. “I had no idea—”

This time, I cursed out loud. “Ari, it’s okay. I’m not mad at
you
. Dare’s father is a psychopath.” Who now probably had a big, fat bulls-eye trained on Arianna.

Fuck. Fuck. FUCK!

Her brows knit together in confusion. “I don’t understand. What’s—”