Minute by Minute (Games & Diversions #3) Read online

  I grab Elena’s jaw, lifting up her face to stare into mine. Her eyes are heavily hooded with desire, and whatever little resistance I had left is completely demolished.

  “Come on,” I say gruffly to her.

  I separate myself from her body, grabbing onto her limp, hanging fingers. I swallow her hand with my mine, and soon I am leading her out of the hallway and upstairs towards my master bedroom.

  She follows obediently, her steps mirroring my own.

  We advance up the marble stairway to my room at a silent, steady pace, and still when I open the bedroom door, she remains quiet, simply stepping in line with my lead.

  I grab the arms of her wrinkled blazer, tossing it to the side. I slide her tight blue jeans off her ass and down her legs, and I lay her on my bed before she can conjure up any protest.

  She doesn’t.

  She just looks widely up at me, her blue eyes big and wondrous, full of confusion and awe.

  Instead of ripping at the buttons on her blouse like I normally would, I unclasp them one-by-one. Elena is shaking uncontrollably by the time I unbutton the last one, tears still trickling from her eyes.

  I open the blouse to reveal her panties, and I blow gently at the silk over her sex, a calculated move that makes the lips of Elena’s pussy noticeably quiver.

  She is gasping before I even touch her.

  “I thought you said you wouldn’t fuck me,” she mutters breathlessly.

  “I’m not.” I lean over her, finally pressing my lips to her soaking panties. “This—my beautiful, blue-eyed blonde—is something I believe they call making love.”

  She inhales sharply, and I settle between her legs, making myself at home—to the greatest home that a formerly self-imposed homeless boy like me could ever know.

  Between Elena’s thighs is my comfort zone—a place I know, a place I cherish, a place I adore.

  I can lavish my attention on it, taking my time “interior decorating” her magnificent walls. And in return, her zone is always warm and welcoming—inviting. It treats me like the owner I am.

  My pussy.

  Mine. And always mine.

  I chuckle softly into the comforts of her always-receiving confines, taking my time to marvel at the beauty that is her magnificent pussy.

  Bare, trimmed or in-between, it is a sight to be seen—a unique treasure that could be stamped the “eighth wonder of the world.”

  I press my tongue to her plump lips, lapping at her sensitive slit over the black fabric that stretches there.

  She moans, and I can tell that she is already near her peak, the slow anticipation of what I’m about to do driving her as crazy as it’s driving me.

  I nuzzle my nose between her folds, inhaling.

  “Do you want this, baby?” I ask.

  I stare upwards at her.

  “Yes,” she hisses softly.

  “I said, do you want this, baby?”

  Louder, she calls. “Yessss.”

  “Do you… want… this?” I fix my lips on her pussy, sucking her through the thin silk.

  “Yes, Lukas!” she finally screams, pressing her hand into the sheets.

  I grin with my chin resting at her clitoris.

  “That’s what I thought, Elena.”

  And then I punish her.

  I trail a torturous route with my mouth from one end of her pretty slit to the next.

  I run my tongue from the inside to the out, taking my time to soothe and suck at her pulsating clit.

  I let the pressure of my mouth do the talking, whispering sweet nothings without saying a word, serenading her with a song that has no lyrics.

  My tongue is my instrument, and I can conduct “the Ninth Symphony” with it.

  Elena’s breathing shifts from shallow to nearly panicked until she is panting in such quick spurts that I fear her heart will explode.

  I want it to.

  I want this time to be the best she’s ever had. I want to give her every soft touch that I’d ever been denied—every warm kiss that never met my face.

  I need my touch to give her everything she’s ever dreamed of—everything I’d ever dreamed of.

  I let myself be the answer to her nightmares…

  I let her be the answer to mine.

  And when she comes, I hold her there, cupping her pussy with my mouth as I let her ride the wave of ecstasy on the edge of my tongue.

  Her cries are incessant, and her pleas to God are uncontrollable as she weaves her hands through my hair, holding on for dear life.

  Mmm. Sweet bliss.

  I relish every second of her climax.

  And before her breathing can even out again, before she can come down from her delicious high, I am out of my clothes—shucking my pants in a second, tossing my shirt in a flash.

  My boxer briefs are one of the few layers that separates us, and when I rejoin Elena back on the bed, they are shortly the only one that does.

  I slide Elena’s panties down her sculpted legs; I inch my fingers beneath her black bra to release the perky, soft pink nipples atop her tender, supple breasts.

  I slide my face in-between them, licking and sucking, taking my turns with each one as I pull her sensitive tits between my teeth.

  Her sighs are loud, her groans released tightly from her bitten lips.

  I can’t resist it.

  I go straight for her bottom lip, sucking it inside of my mouth so I can swallow her moans.

  At the same time, I peel off my black boxer briefs and send them flying across the room, repositioning myself so that my hardness prods near the center of Elena’s warmth.

  I hesitate, grabbing Elena’s face for her full attention.

  “Listen to me, love,” I say sharply.

  “I know what I said before… Fuck what I said before.

  “I don’t want to play these games with you anymore, Elena. I don’t want to have rules.

  “And I had lied to you before. I did have rules… and I was playing with the same playbook I’d been using all my life.

  “No more. No fucking more.”

  I slink off of the bed and towards my pants, retrieving a golden condom from my back pocket’s wallet. I prepare to open it when a hand grabs my own.

  It’s Elena’s.

  “No rules, right?” she whispers, staring hungrily at my mouth.

  I put the condom down onto the bed.

  “No rules,” I agree. And then I slam into her.

  She cries out on a surprised gasp, her wetness fitting me like a tailored glove, surrounding my naked shaft with a mixture of heaven and complete nirvana.

  Jesus Christ. I can hardly take it.

  I’m harder than the Rock of Gibraltar, and I pause and hold my breath for several seconds before I can even begin to move inside her.

  She feels so damn good.

  The thought can barely form in my head before I start to move, my body leading the way as my brain scrambles to catch up.

  I move slowly, steadily.

  I slide my cock into the recesses of Elena’s tight pussy until I can build up a beat—a hypnotizing rhythm that puts both of us on a journey to ecstasy.

  Slowly, I tell myself. Don’t rush.

  But surprisingly, it’s not hard to make it last… because the longer I draw our lovemaking out, the more erotic Elena gets.

  To see her face with every inch I draw deeper, to hear each hitch in her sighs…

  It makes me wonder why I’ve never done this before.

  Why I’ve never touched a woman like this, kissed a woman like this, penetrated another woman like this…

  But when she opens those frost-colored eyes and looks into mine, the answer is as plain as day.

  It’s because none of those other women were Elena.

  With this step, I set fire to all the rules I ever had… and I’m enjoying watching them all burn.

  I close my eyes, savoring each stroke into Elena, letting my body voice all of the things I cannot say.

  I comfort
her in the best way I know how—and in doing so, I find the peace I’d been searching for… and I pray to God that it will be enough.

  Because, in this moment, Elena is enough for me. But am I enough for her?

  I can’t think about it for long because soon our bodies start to ebb and flow in unison, a stark difference from the way we used to crash into each other, colliding into one another with waves of eroticism and elation, riding the other’s body into a euphoric climax.

  And though I loved when we came together fiercely, this time is better than every time before it because there’s something here that wasn’t quite there before…

  And whatever it is, it makes me want Elena more than ever.

  I pick up the pace, swinging on a crescendo of Elena’s moans. Her whimpers turn to cries, and I stroke harder, feeding the frenzy of her quickened heartbeat, the tempo of her strangled breaths.

  Suddenly, I feel myself coming… and can’t do a damn thing to stop it.

  Elena climaxes intensely on my cock, her gorgeous cunt squeezing the length of me in a wet embrace, and I pull out with no more than a second to spare.

  I imprint her body with my orgasm, contentment flooding my body as I release the contents of my climax in steady spasms over the expanse of Elena’s shimmering body.

  And even when the spasms stop, I cannot stop touching her, my desire for her overshadowing everything else, my body barely descending from its peak before it, unprecedentedly, decides that it is ready for another round with the woman with whom my need knows no bounds.

  Stacking the Deck

  Cards are war, in disguise of a sport.

  –Charles Lamb

  DAY 7—2:32PM

  Casa de Griffin

  LUKAS

  Sixteen hours later, the dead of night turns into dawn, which in turn rolls into mid-afternoon… and Elena and I still can’t get enough of each other.

  With a warm Saturday rainstorm as our background music, Elena and I make love into the wee hours of the morning—waking only to grab each other again, begin another round of incredible sex, and repeat the same cycle over and over—our satiation never complete, our hunger never satisfied.

  We shut ourselves in, cutting the world off from each other.

  It isn’t until my phone buzzes from the far side of the room that I have even have the presence of mind to take my nose off of Elena’s soft neck.

  I barely stir.

  “Your phone’s buzzing,” she tells me with a murmur.

  “I know.”

  “Well, don’t you want to get it?”

  “Elena,” I mutter, my lips buried in her collarbone. “I haven’t been answering calls or texts for the past two days. Do you honestly think I’ll start now?”

  Elena rolls over in bed, and the perfect embrace we are wrapped within breaks abruptly. She extracts the curvy line of her body from the hollows of mine, and she looks at me—her arctic blue eyes wide and unassuming.

  She grabs my hand, squeezing it.

  “Look… I know staying closed off seems like the perfect idea right now… but we have to rejoin the real world again at some point.

  “You… me… We’ve both cordoned ourselves off from everyone for the past three days. And if we don’t deal with our issues now… “

  Elena sighs heavily, rubbing my palm.

  “Then we’ll never deal with them… We’ll cut ourselves off…

  “And I’ll let us… because I know how much easier it is to avoid the problems instead of addressing them.

  “Let’s take the difficult but right route—for once.”

  I don’t say anything, but as Elena’s tiny fingers start to interlink with mine, I feel a tug in my chest—a pull at heartstrings that were chewed and torn before, but now have been slowly repaired by her—along with the insistent and irresistibly irritating, but adorable Ana.

  I give in… releasing myself from Elena’s hold so that I can swing my legs over the bed.

  I walk—stark ass naked—to my jeans, and I pull my cell out of my back pants pocket, pressing the center button at the base before hitting the “Text” app sitting in the far left corner.

  I snort on a laugh.

  Speak of the goddamned devil…

  It’s Ana… and she sounds urgent—almost panicked.

  Anastasia:

  Ok, hear me out before you decide to ignore this or even throw the phone out the window.

  I’m just a messenger. And you know what they say about shooting the messenger… So, don’t pop a cap in my ass…

  Chris’s phone is on the fritz.

  He asked me to hit you up so that the two of you could meet for a business dinner.

  It’s something to do with Voyager—and it doesn’t sound very good.

  He says he knows it’s short notice but he needs you.

  Be at the Grand Hyatt. Tonight. 7 o’clock. Armani’s.

  That’s all I got.

  Remember: NO CAP-POPPING.

  I close the message.

  Incredulous, I hold the phone in my hand for several seconds without saying a word. If I wasn’t so fucking furious… I’d actually laugh at some of Ana’s jokes.

  But I can’t.

  Because anything involving Chris is no longer a laughing matter, and the truth of the actual matter is… that I don’t trust the lying bastard.

  The dirty con artist got Ana to do his goddamned dirty work.

  And I’m not so sure I’m up for whatever Chris is trying to pull.

  Elena sits up when she notices me not moving.

  “Who was it?” she asks.

  “Ana,” I reply gruffly.

  I turn towards her.

  “She sent me a message from Chris.”

  Elena nearly gapes.

  “From your friend, Chris?”

  My friend, Chris.

  I scoff. The expression sounds so foreign to me now.

  “Yeah…” I try to quip lightheartedly on a hard laugh, “… that’s the fucking one.”

  Nerves warp Elena’s face—as I’m sure they are warping mine—and she sits silently on the bed, confusion contorting the expression across her furrowed brow, my white bed covers clutched fiercely at her chest.

  “What does he want?” she questions quietly.

  “Business dinner.”

  “And does he know…?”

  “That I know?”

  She nods silently.

  I shake my head at her.

  “No…” I look down at my phone again.

  “But he will after tonight.”

  I toss the phone towards her.

  “You’ll need an outfit.”

  “For… dinner?” Elena gawks. “But I thought this was strictly business, and I…”

  “You… are my business. And I’m not leaving you by yourself. Not again. Also, last time I checked, I own a third of the company involved in this so-called ‘business dinner’…”

  I trail off, my thoughts wandering over to what the hell Chris’s angle could be, but I draw a blank.

  “Let’s both get showered and dressed as quickly as we can,” I say, staring out of the window at the falling rain.

  “Looks like we’re going to be in for one hell of a night.”

  ***

  DAY 7—6:41PM

  Grand Hyatt Tampa Bay – Armani’s

  ELENA

  My dress is too short.

  My dress is too fucking short.

  With my high heels clicking against the taupe-colored tiles of the Grand Hyatt lobby, I pull for the fourth time at the lower hem of my unfamiliar and new navy dress, trying pointlessly to extend the length of it.

  A tug here. Another yank there.

  My palms are sweaty, but Lukas doesn’t seem to notice, and as we cross the length of the golden lobby, I let my hand that is engulfed in his hang peacefully in its place.

  The other hand?

  That hand is going nuts, pulling needlessly at the line of the dark blue stunner that Lukas purchased for me j
ust this evening.

  It’s a flawless, A-line dress—sleeveless, and it fits perfectly at the bust and waist, hugging my slanted curves only to flare delicately out at the hip, creating the aesthetic of a beautiful but chic woman alongside her black suit-fitted Adonis.

  It’s probably the first time I feel praiseworthy at Lukas’s God-like side.

  And I must admit…

  He and I paint a damned beautiful picture together.

  But I am casually fucking it up…

  Because I am too damned preoccupied with my dress to let the visage of us stay perfect.

  It’s all because I need a distraction, really.

  Anything.

  Any little detail to focus on rather than what I am about to witness.

  This impending implosion of a decade-long friendship.

  Almost two decades, actually.

  Chris and Griff.

  Best friends.

  Business partners… turned enemies.

  It feels like I am marching into the throes of a ticking time-bomb convention… and I’m the one who has lit everyone’s fuse.

  The elevator in front of us dings, and we step inside silently, squeezing each other’s hands tighter in place of talking.

  Several tension-filled seconds pass as we ascend in the elevator before Griff looks at me.

  “You’re fucking gorgeous,” he whispers… and I smile.

  It is the only statement he manages to make… because as soon as we are ushered into the restaurant, we catch the sight of Chris sitting at a nearby cloth-covered, white table.

  And the sight isn’t pretty at all…

  Queen of Hearts

  Sometimes you have to withdraw.

  Sometimes you have to sacrifice one of your pieces to win - preferably a knight rather than a king or queen.

  —John Rhys-Davies

  DAY 7—6:55PM

  Grand Hyatt Tampa Bay – Armani’s

  ELENA

  “Waiter… Waiter!”

  I call out to our server as he passes for a second time.

  “Another glass of white wine, please.”