Trading Down (Winner Takes All, #1) Read online

“MIT, then I did my MBA at Harvard Business School. Looks good on the résumé.”

  “And you stayed on in the Boston area after that?” Boston must be a good three hours’ drive from here; longer on a night like this.

  He nodded.

  “So what brings you here, walking the highway in a tux and Italian patent leather shoes in the ass-end of nowhere?”

  “What was it you said earlier? ‘Bad luck and worse choices’? Something like that.”

  He fixed her with those steely blue-gray eyes.

  Sometimes you just want a man to reach across the bar, take your face in his hands, and kiss you like you’ve never been kissed before. Even if he’s a complete stranger. Even if he’s a complete stranger who looks and smells like trouble, and who every instinct tells you to fend off with anything that might come to hand.

  Cassie pulled herself up. Denny looked like the kind of man who could do that to a girl, but not tonight.

  Tonight, every so often when his guard briefly dropped, he was the guy who had flinched at the opening of a door, whose first reaction was to reach for a gun that wasn’t there and whose second reaction was to cast around for possible escape routes.

  “What are you running from, Denny?”

  He dropped his look, eyes fixed on his glass, the hands wrapped tight around it.

  They were alone in the bar now, the doors locked up when Finn had finally played ‘Big Shot’ for the last time and then, muttering to himself, had headed out into the night. Lou had long since closed down the kitchen and headed down to the trailer he called home.

  “What does anybody run from?” he said. “The past. Memories. Mistakes. A couple of guys with guns and a particularly limited range of small talk. You know how it is.”

  Trouble.

  It was as if she was a magnet, drawing it to her wherever she went.

  “You serious about that last one?”

  He shrugged.

  “So there was a girl? That’s what you said before.”

  “Sure there was a girl. A manipulative, scheming bitch.” Then: “It was nothing. Just some fun that one of us took too seriously. She never made any secret of being a manipulative bitch, after all.”

  His glass was empty, but not for long.

  Cassie topped her own up, too, and took a long slug. “Was there nothing good about her?”

  There were always at least two sides to a story. Somewhere back in another life there was probably a guy in a bar saying the same kinds of things about her.

  “She was beautiful, she was fun, she had an IQ of 160 and she was screwing my best friend. I’ll give you a hint: one of those was a lie.”

  “So that’s what made you run?” She regretted her words instantly: such a clumsy choice of phrase.

  His look hardened. “No,” he said steadily, “if you really must know, it was that that made me drink, and it was the drink that turned me to gambling, and in the meantime my best buddy turned against me and as he just happened to be my business partner too he managed to cheat me out of everything I had... And so here I am: alls I own is what’s on my back and in my back pocket, and I’ll tell you something, that roll in my back pocket isn’t rightly mine either.”

  “So when you say there’s two hoods on your tail it’s true?”

  A shrug, again. “Might be one, maybe three, I don’t know. But I’ll tell you one more thing before I head out onto that highway again and see where I end up: you don’t want anything to do with me. I’m trouble. Deep trouble with a capital D. So right now, despite you looking at me with beautiful eyes I could just lose myself in, despite the way you lean towards me when I talk, the way you moisten those god-damned kissable lips, despite how kind you’ve been to me... Despite all that, I’m going to get up from my seat and say ‘Thank you very much, ma’am, for your hospitality’ and I’m going to walk out that door and out of your life.”

  Sometimes you just want a man to reach across the bar, take your face in his hands, and kiss you like you’ve never been kissed before. Even if he’s a complete stranger. Even if he looks and smells like trouble.

  But sometimes you have to do it yourself.

  She put a hand to his jaw, felt the rough rasp of his stubble, and then she leaned in, pausing only when their lips were almost touching.

  Trouble.

  His lips met hers, tenderly, delicately at first, and then they were pressing, parting, tongues probing, touching.

  Now he took her. Standing so that his bar stool tumbled away behind him, he leaned over the bar and coiled an arm around her shoulders, holding her, turning her so that she looked up into those steel eyes. His other hand found her side, coming to rest on her ribs, and then running down, following the narrowing of her waist, the swell of her hip.

  She pulled away, holding him with only her eyes.

  She came around the bar, came to stand before him, and put a hand to his chest, the hardness of his ribs.

  That was when he put a hand at the back of her head, fingers buried in her long blonde hair, holding her, guiding her as he turned her head and kissed up the line of her jaw. Light kisses, butterfly touches. His tongue flicked at the lobe of her ear, teasing at where an ear-ring was attached. Then he took the ring in his lips and tugged gently. That pulling sensation, the touch of his lips and tongue on her ear... it was so intense!

  He turned her head again and kissed her deep, a kiss of possession, and he drew her body against his, a hand on the small of her back pulling her tight against him.

  That moment, when two bodies that have never touched press together for the first time, the fitting of new geometries, the press of a hip, breasts squashing up against ribs, thighs against thighs... the slight movements, the pressing and shifting... the growing hardness against her midriff.

  That moment.

  That.

  3

  He lifted her. So easy, as if she were no more than a feather.

  Placing her on a table, he pushed so that she was leaning back, and then his hands went to her little black skirt, finding the hook, the zipper, tugging it free.

  When her skirt was discarded somewhere on the floor, Denny’s hand came back up, the backs of his knuckles pressing against the lace of her thong. With a steady roll of the wrist, he pressed against her softness, knuckles dancing across her, and there was an abrupt wet heat. She threw her head back and groaned, then glanced around, panicked, uncertain.

  “Not here,” she said, but he didn’t hear or chose to ignore as he lowered his face to her, and started to kiss her through that black lace, his lips firm, pressing and squeezing. She leaned back, arching her spine, her head full of This is wrong... another mistake... you don’t know this guy but one of the few things you do know is that he’s trouble and the rest of her filled with I don’t care.

  She eased her legs farther apart, then hooked them over his shoulders as he sat before her, his face buried.

  Pressing hard against her, he started to roll his head from side to side, grinding against her with his face, working her clit with his upper lip and teeth through the lace, making those intense sensations pull together and start to transform into something else, a tightness, an almost electric stabbing pleasure.

  Finally pulling her thong aside, he drove his tongue inside her, thrusting repeatedly, his lips resting on the hood of skin that covered her clit, rolling and pressing as his tongue worked its way deep inside her.

  “Oh God!”

  She had never been a screamer; she wasn’t a one to emit any more than a long groan at her peak before now.

  “Oh God, yes!”

  His tongue shifted so that it was gliding around and across her clit while his fingers drove deep into her, picking up the rhythm he had established with his tongue.

  “Oh...”

  Steady, deep thrusts, while that tongue swirled and glided and then started a rapid, fluttering, flicking that took her right to the edge and over, a sudden clenching of every muscle in her belly, in her pussy, in her thighs, an expl
osion of sensation, as she clamped her legs around his head, keeping him there, holding him there, as each wave of orgasm became less than the one before and, finally, she was spent.

  §

  “My place isn’t far,” said Cassie. “And my limo’s waiting outside.”

  She had a little Nissan, ancient and falling apart, held together with chewing gum and hope. Maybe it wasn’t quite a limo, but it had lasted her two years, with a little help from Lou and Old Bub.

  But on a night like this...

  In the half a minute it took them to lock up, run across the parking lot to where she’d parked, and tumble into the car, they were both soaked through.

  They sat there for a moment, gathering themselves, then Cassie swept her sodden hair away from her face and blinked away the water in her eyes. She turned to Denny and they started to laugh, and then they were in each other’s arms again as the wind heaved and buffeted the little car, as if at any moment they might take off.

  His kiss tasted of whiskey and her, now. Such a horny, intimate flavor. And her free hand slid down his torso to that hard mountain in his lap, finding its shape, its size, its hardness.

  “Your place?” he said, resting a hand on hers, and she realized he had changed again. This was the Denny who flinched at the opening of a door, and who cast his look around for escape routes. Out here in the open, he had become a hunted animal once more.

  She fired the ignition and it caught third time, which was miracle enough on a night like this. Even with the wipers going full speed, it was hard to see far ahead, as she used the stick-shift to ease through the gears and head out onto the highway.

  She drove at little more than walking pace, or that’s how it felt, leaning forward to peer through the rain-slicked windshield. Great gusts of wind repeatedly rocked the little automobile from side to side, and at any moment might easily flip them right over.

  The woods gave them a bit of shelter, and the rough track up to Cassie’s cabin was the fastest part of the journey. When they pulled up, Cassie sat back, heaved a big sigh, and said, “Well that was sure the longest mile and a half I’ve ever driven. Hell, I bet you’re not used to traveling in this kind of luxury, are you?”

  §

  They ran from the car, hand in hand, through the torrent of egg-sized raindrops. Cassie found the lock, got her key in first time, and then they were tumbling into the cabin, the door slamming shut behind them of its own accord.

  Neither of them noticed the way the window shutters heaved and slammed in the wind. Or the water running down the inside of the front door. They weren’t aware of the creaking and groaning noises as the whole cabin appeared to shift on its foundations under the onslaught of the gale. Or the steady drip drip drip of water falling from the inside of the corrugated metal roof, where Cassie had already placed buckets – old leaks, as reliable as Bub and Finn.

  Forcing Cassie back against the cold wall, Denny buried that hand in her hair again, held her head so he could kiss her, hard and greedily.

  His thigh ground between her legs, lifting her feet off the ground as he pushed against her.

  His free hand supported her hip, then shifted down to her ass, a tight, hard grip, squeezing and kneading.

  Her t-shirt was soaked through and when he moved a hand to pull at it the fabric stretched, and then something gave and it ripped all the way up the front, exposing her flat white belly, the sapphire stud in her navel, the black lace of her bra.

  His head dipped, working down her neck as that hand still buried in her hair tugged her head sharply back. Down and along her collarbone, across the swell of her breasts, and then his tongue traced the center-line of her cleavage until it encountered lace. Tugging at the cup of her bra, he exposed more of one breast, and swept across it with his tongue until he found the hard little button of the nipple.

  As his tongue circled and flicked, biting and gently pulling that nipple between his teeth as he flicked it with his tongue, she felt a pleasure like the one she had felt earlier, a heat in her belly, a new tension of the muscles. As he worked that nipple in his mouth his hands moved down, found the fastenings of that little black skirt once again and tugged it clear.

  She wanted to rip his shirt open, expose him, but she doubted she had the strength and, in any case, if all he owned was what he had with him then this was his only shirt. That thought reminded her that this man was trouble, and then she found the top button, undid it and felt chest hair against her knuckles as she slid her hands down further to find the next one.

  Half the buttons undone, she paused to slip a hand in, find the bulge of his pecs, the hardness of a nipple. She flicked at it with a long thumbnail, then she slid her hand down the front of his shirt again and found the next button, the next, the next.

  Pulling his shirt back, she pushed his head away from her breast so she could drop her head to his chest and kiss that tiny, hard nipple, running her tongue in delicate circles around it, across it. And all the time, her hands worked lower until they found his belt and released it, found the top button of his pants, the zipper.

  She had to drop to her knees so she could peel those rain-soaked pants down across his hips, his thighs, his calves and then free, and now, when she came to his shorts, and pulled at them, his manhood sprang free towards her face.

  She caught it in her mouth, a reflex move like a snake strike. So hard and long! She wrapped one hand around the base and took him deep, keeping her mouth clamped tight so she had to force him in through hard lips.

  She hesitated for a moment to look up, and make eye contact... so intense! And then – still eyes-locked with this man, this dangerous stranger – she pulled back, her mouth still tight around him, pressing her tongue hard against the underside of his shaft so that her tongue-stud dragged along it as she withdrew. Pausing, she swirled her tongue around the swollen head of his shaft, alternating between that swirling and flicking it with the tongue-stud. Then she started to bob her head fast, her clasped hand matching that rhythm, that speed.

  Soon, her jaw was aching from holding her mouth so wide to accommodate him. But then, just as the ache was threatening to become too much, his response changed and he started to thrust against her, matching the rhythm of her bobbing head.

  He must be close... There was a tension in his body now, a tightness to the way he moved, the way he thrust deep into her mouth until he hit the back of her throat and she had to swallow against him.

  So close...

  She felt it in her hand first, a swelling of that hard shaft, a throbbing and...

  Strong hands closed around her wrists, holding her still and then disentangling her and pulling her hands away from him... the hand that had been pumping around his shaft, the hand that had been cupping his balls, the middle finger pressing up firmly behind them to tease that sensitive area between balls and ass.

  He pulled away, then lowered himself until they were both kneeling. Still holding her wrists in that strong grip, he pinned her arms above her head, back against the wall. He kissed her, then, and their bodies came together. The base of his shaft ground against her mound through the wet fabric of her thong, and the swollen head was against her bare belly, skin on skin, sliding up and around the stud in her navel as they started to move together.

  He turned her, guiding her down so she came to lie on the cold, wood floor. Such strength in the way he manhandled her body like that!

  Still gripping her wrists, he was above her now, on top of her, his legs forcing hers apart. He came to lie with his balls against her soft heat and the length of his shaft along the flimsy fabric of her thong and up beyond that belly stud. He was hard and wet as he started to slide against her, and she arched her back so that she could push up to meet him.

  There was an urgency in her body, in her head, as she pushed up to meet him, grinding herself against that hardness. That almost painful grip on her wrists, the hardness of his body, the way his chest squashed her breasts as he ground down, and that hard grinding agains
t her sex, only the lace of her thong between them.

  He shifted his grip, so that he held both her wrists in one hand... then he reached down and tugged her panties aside that he could guide himself to press against her wetness. Now, each thrust took that swollen head sliding over her clit, the length of his shaft grinding against her wet folds, his balls coming to rest with each thrust up against her soft opening.

  When he shifted position again he was pressing at her, teasing and parting her with the head of his dick, dipping in and out in shallow movements that grew tantalizingly deeper with each thrust, until suddenly she was taking the full length of him, hard and fast.

  That was when it all became one, when, with a rush of her senses, she became aware of the heaving and groaning of her little cabin as the storm battered at it, the sounds all melding together as this man, this dangerous stranger, drew himself away and then drove his full length deep inside her, again and again.

  When you’re with someone for the first time, sometimes the climax comes as a surprise. When the time is close everyone has their signals, their shows, but that first time you haven’t yet learned the language of your new lover.

  Denny didn’t speak in code or insinuation.

  He groaned, loud, and suddenly a new tension took over his body.

  His grip on her wrists tightened, a new pain that somehow mixed with the other sensations in her body, heightening everything.

  That tension intensified as he thrust deep and held himself there, pausing to soak up the responses from her ... the tightenings, the pushing.

  And as he held himself there, she felt those tightenings grow more intense and she knew it was going to happen again, if only...

  She struggled against his stillness, and he squeezed her wrists even tighter, hurting her, controlling her, then she felt that tension in her belly transforming, shifting, moving downwards... a tightening around his shaft, deep inside her... a clenching of her muscles as his body jerked and, deep inside her, he throbbed and pulsed in response.

  And then, as a sudden hot, liquid explosion filled her, her entire body bucked against him, tightening on him, gripping him deep, and she was taken over by the most intense orgasm she had ever known.