The Choice Read online

  “No, it’s biology. I’ll bet you could sweet-talk your way into seeing her pussy. She likes you. I can tell. And you definitely like her.” Liam sent him a considering stare. “What if she’s the one for you, mate?”

  Seth had begun to wonder the same thing. To hear his old friend echo his question was eerie. “I don’t see how. I should already be back in New York since I promised my family I’d be home for the holidays. And once I leave this godforsaken state, I’m not coming back. And you know how I feel about relationships. So I really have no business with that girl.”

  Liam laughed. “Uh-huh. When did you say you’d scheduled your return flight?”

  Seth had already put off making his reservation for too long. “Fuck off.”

  Liam gave him a knowing smile. “You’re dragging your feet, and she’s the reason. I have a hunch about you two…”

  “Are you turning into your mother now?” Seth frowned. “It’s downright scary, the way shit she says comes true.”

  “I’m not following in her footsteps. Just…sometimes I get a sense of things. And I’ve got one about you two.”

  “Well, worry about your own life. Doesn’t Raine need a fresh water bottle? Or some slap and tickle?”

  That made Liam laugh again. “All right. I’ll fuck off for now. I reserve the right to give you shit in the future. I’m sure I owe you.”

  With that, his Irish buddy headed toward Raine and Hammer with sure, jaunty steps, leaving Seth alone with his thoughts—as well as a clear path to either the front door…or to Heavenly.

  He hesitated. It would be logical to return to Shadows and book a flight home tomorrow, then see what kind of good-bye action he could finagle at the club tonight. But all he wanted was to cross the patio to the pretty blonde and do his damndest to seduce her. Besides, the poor thing was sitting by herself since Raine was currently busy being happy and playing hostess. Heavenly probably didn’t know anyone else here. It would be rude to ignore her.

  When he spotted a tray of champagne flutes on a nearby bar, he plucked up two and sauntered in her direction.

  When he reached her side, she looked up and flashed him a cock-hardening smile. A sappy grin stretched across his face. Yeah, he was happy to see her. Seth knew it showed.

  For the hundredth time, he wondered why Heavenly got under his skin. Smooth moves and banter came easily, and he usually had no problem segueing from a drink to a few kisses…to a sweaty orgasm or two. Right now, he felt tongue-tied. And unsure.

  Damn, he was usually cooler than this.

  “Hi, Seth.” Her voice caressed him as she gave him a sweetly dimpled smile.

  For a moment, he just stared at her glossy lips, dying to know if she tasted as sweet as he’d been imagining for nearly two long weeks.

  “You look…fantastic, angel.” He offered her one of the flutes, then bent to kiss her cheek. The scent of something fruity—strawberry?—coupled with a musk that was strictly her filled his nostrils. “Since you’re sitting here alone, I thought you might want some company.”

  “That would be great. I was here with Dr. Beckman before he got called away for emergency surgery.”

  “What a shame.” Inside, Seth mentally fist-pumped at his good luck. The night was definitely looking up.

  “Yeah, I think he was looking forward to the party. He said he’d stay beside me tonight, but of course he went when duty called. He’s a dedicated surgeon and a brilliant man.”

  Seth raised a brow. “I thought you didn’t work with Beck that much.”

  “I don’t, but…” She blushed. “He intervened when one of the doctors kept hitting on me. Since then, he’s taken the time to spend lunch with me most every day. I really enjoy it.”

  He barely managed not to scowl. Beck was pursuing a virgin? It would be hysterical if it wasn’t so fucking wrong.

  “So are you two dating?” Or, god forbid, getting naked so he could bend her over his desk and plow into her?

  She blinked, and her lashes swept down. “N-no. Dr. Beckman is a mentor. A friend.”

  Friend? Oh, that was priceless. He had a hard dick for her, and she considered Saint Beck her role model and pal.

  Couldn’t happen to a nicer guy…

  Even better, the sadistic doctor obviously hadn’t found the balls to ask her out, much less touch her. His evening was looking up.

  Seth smiled. “But he left you here by yourself and…”

  “Since I don’t really know anyone else except Raine and her men, I decided to sit by the pool for a bit. It’s peaceful.”

  “Want me to keep you company, angel?”

  “I’d love that.” She gestured to the chair beside her.

  He took the seat opposite her instead. “I’d rather sit here so I can look at you. You really are gorgeous.”

  Heavenly blushed again. She did it often and well, and Seth didn’t want to imagine her too jaded to give him such an innocent response.

  She focused on the fluted glass of bubbly, holding the delicate stemware as though it were her anchor. “You’re flirting with me again.”

  “I am.”

  “Dr. Beckman said you do that with a lot of girls.”

  Did he now? Asshole… “Beck doesn’t know me well, angel. He’s wrong.”

  Technically, Seth wasn’t lying. Usually, he didn’t need to flirt to get laid. In dungeons, women came to him. He didn’t mingle with the fairer sex outside of BDSM. Too messy and complicated. Too…everything spending more time with Heavenly would probably be.

  She suppressed a big smile. “Oh, okay. So what’s in the glass you brought me?”

  Leaning forward in his chair with a grin, he dropped his voice to a low, conspiratorial whisper. “Champagne.”

  “I’ve never had any.” She looked wide-eyed and excited.

  “Take a drink. See if you like it,” he urged. “You’ll have something else to add to your ever-expanding repertoire of new firsts.”

  A list he really wanted to add to in a meaningful way.

  With a dimpled smile, she closed her eyes and took a tentative sip.

  “Well?”

  Her eyes flared with pleasure. “Oh, I like champagne. Smooth and sweet. The bubbles tickle my nose.”

  “I thought you would. Look at you, being all adventurous.”

  She laughed aloud, and the musical sound hit him square in the solar plexus. “Not quite, but I’d like to be. I’ve got to get through nursing school first.”

  “Well, you’ve got to start expanding your horizons somewhere. You know, it’s hard to figure out where you belong and what life might have in store for you if you never live a little. What’s that expression? All work and no play makes Jane a dull girl…”

  “I must be the dullest person on the planet,” she groaned. “Nursing school really is harder than I thought. Good, though. I like the challenge. But I haven’t had time for much else since I started. That’s why I’m really looking forward to this winter break. A whole month without research papers and exams!”

  “So you have time to spread your wings.” And if he stayed, he’d love to help her spread other appendages, too. “I have some ideas where you can start. Want suggestions?”

  “Why not? I have a feeling you’ll give them to me, anyway.”

  “You’re right, but I promise to make them good. We might not know each another well yet, but I’m a very good detective. I’ll figure you out…”

  She stilled. Her lips parted in a pantomime of a smile. “Have you, um…deduced anything yet?”

  Why are you suddenly so nervous, angel?

  Seth didn’t want to spook her, like he had at the end of their picnic. She was beginning to open up, so he chose his words carefully. “Well, since you like to try new things, you’ve got courage. I also suspect wine could become one of your favorite indulgences.”

  She exhaled the breath she’d been holding. “That’s probably true.”

  “And I know you’d love to travel and explore the world.”
r />   “I think about it all the time.”

  “Hmm… And on your travels, I can imagine you acquiring a slew of eager lovers, only too happy to satisfy your every desire.” He dropped his voice and seized her stare. “Myself included.”

  Her blush deepened to a rosy glow. “I don’t even have time for one man. What would I do with a slew of them?”

  Heavenly might have scoffed, but under that she sounded almost wistful.

  Seth leaned forward again, his hands dangling over his knees. He stared, his gaze deliberately direct as it traveled down her body. The longer he drank her in, the more her nipples poked the front of her dress. The more she fidgeted as if an ache settled between her legs.

  Oh, this was getting good.

  “I don’t know about any other guy, but I know what I’d do if you were mine…”

  Heavenly downed the last third of her champagne, then set the flute aside before tilting her face his way. Her heavy-lidded gaze nearly had him hurdling the table and closing the distance to kiss her.

  “What?”

  Her rapt, breathless curiosity made his cock jerk. “You wouldn’t ever want for attention, angel. My hands, my lips, my body would be all over yours at every opportunity. You’d know I was thinking about you all the time and just how indecent my thoughts were.”

  She dropped her gaze and hissed in an indrawn breath. The air between them hummed. He focused on the slender column of her neck, watching in satisfaction as the throb of her pulse leapt frantically at her throat.

  “Indecent?”

  “Filthy. I shouldn’t even repeat what I’d be thinking. It would shock you.”

  “T-tell me,” she murmured. “I want to know what you’d imagine if you thought about me…in that way.”

  “Once we go down this path, there’s no turning back. You’ll know exactly what’s burning through my brain every time I look at you. And you can’t ‘un-know’ that. Are you sure you want me to go on?”

  She bit her lip, crossed her slender legs, then toyed with one earring before stilling again. He waited and watched, every cell in his body tense and desperate for her consent.

  The flush of color spreading up her cheeks only made him want her more. The buzz between them charged him like a live wire. He clenched his fists to keep himself from touching her. He just needed that one word…

  But she made him wait, staring, her breath uneven as she licked her lips before finally whispering what he wanted to hear. “Yes. Please…”

  The rest of his blood rushed south to fill his already engorged cock. “I haven’t kissed you properly. Not yet. But you have no idea how badly I want to nip at those plump lips or how much I fantasize about tasting the rest of your sweetness.”

  She blinked, eyes wide, then swallowed and seemingly forgot to breathe. Her nipples hardened even more. “Seth…”

  The palpable pull between them thickened. It had him beyond hard and desperate. Christ, when was the last time he thought he’d lose his mind if he couldn’t have a woman? Especially one he’d never even touched?

  “Once I showered you with kisses and love bites, you’d be aching to tear away your clothes and press your skin to mine, but I wouldn’t let you. I’d want to undress you myself. And I’d take forever doing it. I’d reveal you one creamy, tantalizing inch at a time, kissing every newly exposed bit of skin until you panted and whimpered and begged.”

  She let out a ragged breath. The sound of it was an electric spark that lit up every erogenous zone in his body. She shifted restlessly in her seat again, her hands clasping and clenching in her lap. Her eyes were deliciously dilated.

  “But you’d know how unbearably hard and aroused you’d made me, angel, because I’d lift you in my arms and drag you against me, wrapping your legs around my waist so I’d press my thick, hard cock—”

  She gasped, the color in her cheeks deepening more. Even the shade of her lips had become a flushed red.

  Fuck, she was absolutely stunning.

  “I’m shocking you. Should I stop?”

  The emphatic shake of her head was an urgent plea. “No. Tell me more.”

  The triumph spilling through him was liquid pleasure. “Mmm, where was I?”

  “Um, my legs. Around your waist. You’re…hard.”

  “I am.” The smile he sent her sizzled with heat. “Once I had you pressed flush against me, I’d notch my cock against the swollen pad of your sweet pussy. Since there wouldn’t be any more clothing between us, I’d grind against you, skin to skin. And I wouldn’t stop until you told me in explicit detail what you wanted me to do next. Do you know what that is, angel? Do you know what you’d want?”

  She wriggled on the bench, uncrossed and recrossed her legs. She licked her lips as if they’d gone desert-dry. “I-I don’t…”

  “Yeah, you do,” he cajoled in a tone only she could hear. “Our bodies don’t lie, and I can read yours.”

  Slowly, her lips parted. Her eyes went soft with arousal. Her hunger simmered just under the surface. He could almost feel it, taste it. She ached. She was wishing he would touch her. She wanted to know what it felt like to have his mouth, his hands, his naked body on hers.

  The scent of her lust filled his nose and slid deliciously into his brain. So potent, so perfect, the fragrance seemed as though it had been engineered for him alone. Christ…

  “Tell me you’d want it, Heavenly.”

  At his husky demand, she took a shuddering breath. “I…would.”

  “I know. But I wouldn’t do anything more than press my dick against your pouting folds for a good, long while.”

  “You wouldn’t want to make love to me?”

  “Oh, hell yeah. I’d want to. I do right now,” he admitted, leaning even closer, brushing his thumb back and forth across her palm. “But I’d make sure you were wet and needy for me first.”

  “How?”

  Seth hadn’t thought it was possible, but every visible inch of her skin flushed darker. God, this verbal foreplay was better than the last round of sweaty sex he’d had with a sub whose name and face he’d already forgotten.

  “Well, I could use my fingers, but I’d much rather check your needy little cunt with my tongue…” The stunned breathlessness on her face and her fine trembling spurred him on. “I’d feast on you, angel, as if you were my last meal. I’d lap and lick at you, sucking in your clit and delving into your soaked passage until you came hard.”

  “Seth…” Her plea was sweet and shocked and aroused as hell.

  “Angel?” he tossed back, already considering where he might be able to find them privacy inside the house. No one would notice if they disappeared for an hour…or five, right?

  “I-I…”

  Before she could wrap her brain around her thoughts and speak, her mobile phone blared between them, rude and insistent. She jerked in response, hands fumbling as she picked up the device and obviously tried to gather her wits.

  Heavenly opened her phone and scanned the screen. Her lips parted and her eyes widened with a totally different emotion.

  Alarm.

  Suddenly, she shot up and darted away, calling to him over her shoulder. “I have to go. Sorry…”

  What? No. She couldn’t just go. Why the hell was she leaving?

  Seth was mere seconds behind her. “Tell me what’s wrong. What upset you, angel?”

  “I can’t stay. I’m sorry. We’ll talk later. Bye.”

  He charged after her with longer strides—until Pike suddenly stepped in front of him, blocking his path. “Hey, Seth. I got a question.”

  “Later. I need to talk to her.” He sidestepped the guy and gestured to Heavenly.

  Pike grabbed his arm. “No, you don’t. Beck wants you to stop sniffing around that girl like a dog in heat. So I told him I’d make you heel.”

  The pierced, tatted Dom’s sly smile sent Seth’s temper soaring. “You tell that asshole that lifting his hind leg and pissing all over her doesn’t make her his. Now fuck off.”

&nbs
p; He shoved past Pike and jogged past the other guests, scanning for those blond waves and that bright blue dress. Nothing. He darted for the front door and wrenched it open, hoping to spot her. But when he searched up and down the shadowy street, it was clear Heavenly had disappeared.

  “If it would please you, Sir, this girl would happily join you in your private room.”

  Chastity’s endorphin-drunk invitation made Beck tense. The submissive rode her natural high after the “punishment” she’d begged him for and now nestled her welted ass on his lap. Normally after a hard scene with his favorite whip, Beck would be loose and relaxed. He’d definitely be ready to take Chas or whomever he played with to bed, plow her deep and hard. He’d done it—and most of the subs here—many times.

  Tonight, his cock was snoring.

  He refused to close his eyes and pretend she was Heavenly. He might be a prick, but he wasn’t completely heartless. Besides, he couldn’t fool himself, even if he tried.

  Grimacing at the hopeful lust in Chastity’s eyes, Beck brushed sweaty red strands of hair from her face gently. “Not tonight.”

  What else could he say? He couldn’t give her a good reason for his refusal. Hell, he couldn’t even give himself one. Fixating on a blue-eyed virgin was a terrible fucking excuse.

  When he’d come to Shadows tonight, playing with a willing pain slut had sounded like a fantastic distraction. He’d eagerly peeled off his lab coat, fully intending to let the sadist inside him stretch. Gratification that didn’t come from his fist had sounded mighty nice, too.

  That wasn’t happening. All he could think about was having Heavenly in his arms.

  Not happening. Sure, Heavenly might have submissive tendencies, but he doubted BDSM was even a blip on her radar. Hell, as sheltered as she was, she’d probably never heard of it.

  Unfortunately, none of that stopped him from imagining her naked and panting and bound for him, her ass throbbing and red with his marks…

  Yeah, he was a fucking perv. Everyone knew it, especially him.

  “This girl understands, Sir,” Chastity said. “Please excuse this girl for asking.”

  Somehow her soft acceptance only made Beck feel worse. She’d approached him to sate her need for pain, and he’d done it, wishing he was a thousand miles away the whole time. He couldn’t bring himself to satisfy her in any other way.