Chapter Twelve

A soft yelp escaped Tracy as Dylan tossed her over his shoulder then dropped her on a patio chair near the outside of the deck, away from the main light source. It gave them a sense of privacy, but also made her realize she was alone in the dark with a very intimidating alpha.

Dylan wrapped his fingers in the waist of her pants and tugged them off with no semblance of gentleness. “Don’t get scared now, Red. You just yelled at me for the second time. If I was gonna hurt you, don’t you think I’d have done it by now?”

His smart-ass comment scoured away her nerves. Tracy rewarded him with a soft kick to his shoulder, and he only cast her a half-hearted glare before yanking free her panties.

She doubted he could see much with the darkness, but the way he zeroed in on her pussy said he saw enough to tantalize.

He didn’t touch her though, not at first. Instead, he swiped his thumb across his bottom lip. “Top off, too.”

“I’m not getting naked outside.”

“Like everyone hasn’t seen it already.”

She remained silent.

He tilted his head. “Really? Not like I haven’t smelled Sam and Mason on you, figured they’d have stripped you down already. Useless alphas too eager? Fine, just pull that ugly sweater up, hmm? I want a good look at you.”

Hesitation tugged at her. Even in the darkness, she lacked confidence. It was one thing to think about something sexual, about twisting bodies and mindless lust. She didn’t want to see his disappointment when she showed him anything, though, when he got a look at how lacking she was. He’d been with enough other females to know how far short she’d fall.

He tsked, a soft sound, before his hands went to the bottom hem of her sweater. He caught her tank top, as well, tugging both up more gently than he’d done with the pants. A soft groan echoed inside him with each inch he revealed. “You worry too much, Red. Wouldn’t want to see if I didn’t already know I’d like it.”

“Richard always said I was too skinny.”

His growl took on a dangerous edge, and he didn’t bother to hide it. “He was a fucking idiot. I don’t even like you and I can say every glimpse I’ve gotten of you has made me hard.”

He spoke with such bluntness, as if it didn’t embarrass him at all that he’d been turned on by her, that despite his not-so-nice comments and attitude, he’d been attracted. She probably could have smelled it if she hadn’t been so busy trying to ignore it.

He moved the fabric above her breasts, and the cool breeze tightened her nipples into hard peaks. Who am I kidding? It’s him that’s doing it, not the breeze.

“Fuck, Red,” he almost purred, the sound so sinful she whined a moment before he lowered his mouth to her waiting breasts.

He didn’t offer gentle kisses. Instead, he left a love-bite on her left breast, near the lower curve. A trail of stings remained as he moved his lips and teeth until he reached her nipple, causing her to cry out. Forget careful or cautious—Dylan sent her body into chaos with his rough touches.

He didn’t move away from her, so close she could feel his lips curl into a smirk. “I like that sound better than you bitching at me. Hell, maybe we can actually get along if we do it like this. Never talk, never get in each other’s way. Nope, I’ll just fuck you whenever you annoy me too much, and you’ll love every second of it, won’t you?”

She didn’t have time to respond—couldn’t have thought of anything to say back anyway—before he switched to her other breast. Between the nipping of his teeth and the slide of his demanding tongue, he kept talking. “It’s a fucking shame those other idiots didn’t pay any attention to these. Look at those perky little nipples of yours, just begging for my touch. I bet you anything your clit is the same, isn’t it?”

It was. They both knew it, even though he hadn’t touched her there, yet. Her clit was hard and aching, peeking out from its hood and pulsing with each of his touches to her breast, as though they were connected.

He settled his hands on her thighs and pushed them obscenely wide. Even with her spread like that, he took up every inch of space as he lowered himself to his knees before her.

His expression was ravenous, as though he’d spotted a meal he intended to finish off. I want him to finish me off. The thought hit her so fast she didn’t have time to counter it, to doubt herself.

His large, strong hands moved up her thighs until his thumbs bracketed her cunt, then moved to the top of her pussy to brush the sides of her clit.

The touch was so sure. He had the confidence she didn’t. His lack of doubt grounded her, and when he used those thumbs to pull back the hood of her clit, to expose her fully to the cold night air and his hungry gaze, she surrendered.

She let go of her past, of every single fear Richard had created in her. They wouldn’t be gone forever, but for the moment was enough. It was more than she’d thought she’d get.

She stopped worrying about her body, about a future, about what she should or shouldn’t be, and narrowed her focus to the man kneeling between her legs as he lowered his mouth to her waiting pussy.

The first swipe of his agile tongue was slow and languid, and a guttural groan spilled from him. “You are delicious.” His growled words blew warm air over her drenched sex, but as soon as he’d rasped them out, his seeking tongue was back. The laziness of that first touch gave way to hard licks, harsh and wild. He laved her clit, her folds, pressed his stiffened tongue as deep into her tight cunt as he could manage. He took her over entirely, like an animal poised between her thighs at the most sensitive part of her.

Tracy trembled with the overwhelming sensations, with the way he drove her body hard and how she wanted—no, needed—more.

Without thinking about it, she set a hand on the back of his head, a demand she’d never made before. She was passive in bed, someone who gave what her partner wanted but never more. His hair was soft against her palm, and she threaded her fingers through the short brown strands.

A mocking chuckle came from Dylan’s lips even as he never stopped pleasuring her. Tracy used the grip to pull him impossibly closer, the edge of her release so close her thighs trembled. The way her skin tingled, the blurring of everything just on the sides of her perception told her how close she was to coming, and how badly she wanted to break apart beneath Dylan’s tongue.

Except, as soon as she started to topple, when she wanted nothing more than to dive off that precipice, everything stopped.

Dylan moved back, his tongue swiping over his lips to clean them. He must have thought it funny, because without her saying a word, he let out a soft laugh. “You look good like this, all needy and denied.”

A wanton whine was Tracy’s response, her brain in chaos as her body struggled with the stolen orgasm and searing need. “Why did you stop?” The words were broken and panted out.

Dylan dragged his thumb against the side of her clit, the touch so light it only teased her, only kept that fire sizzling inside her but didn’t let her come. “Because you’ve been pissing me off for days, Red. You really think I’m going to let you get off so easily? Plus, fuck, I just like to see you like this, all undone and at my mercy.” A stream of cool air blew over her hard and tormented clit.

Tracy pulled at the back of his head, but he didn’t budge. The orgasm drifted out of reach, but the moment it did, as soon as she pulled in a more controlled breath, Dylan dove back in.

This time, his finger toyed with the flooded entrance to her sex. He didn’t push in, but the constant pressure drove up her desire up another level, another pleasure denied to her. His lips latched around her needy clit, sucking hard on the bud.

Tracy arched her back and rolled her hips, but Dylan never changed a thing. He didn’t give her more or less, just stayed locked on her clit. The release he snatched away roared back to life, to the forefront of her mind and body. It rushed toward her, almost frighteningly powerful, enough to drag her under.

Just like the first time, as it started to crest over her, when goosebumps sprang up over her skin and the first tightening of her cunt hit her, Dylan pulled away, her grip sliding away from his head as a sob of need escaped her.

He offered a kiss to her inner thigh, then turned the one into a trail, going from knee to the juncture of her body. He spoke between them. “God damnit, Red, those sounds you make? I’d knot you right here if I thought I could get away with it. I can see your cunt pulsing, just begging for my cock. You want me to fill you?”

She nodded. Yes. Something. Anything. Any fear was gone, any questions. As long as he kept touching her, anything was good. He’d driven her mad with the pleasure and the denials, and the fire he’d grown to a blazing need inside her wouldn’t be denied.

He pressed a kiss directly to her cunt but avoided her clit, the bastard. “With a welcome like that, how can I resist?”

She expected him to stand up, to strip out of his pants and shove deep inside her.

Instead, a deep growl left his lips and two thick fingers plunged into her sopping wet heat as his mouth returned to her pulsing clit. He didn’t pull away this time, didn’t deny her anything. He fucked her with those demanding fingers, stroking against every sensitive spot of her, even curling to torment the area behind her pelvic bone where a knot would stretch her, would lock inside her. Between his relentless tongue and his harsh fingers, she almost cried out as her body finally snapped.

Her orgasm had grown, each denial increasing it. Every muscle inside her tightened—her womb, her cunt, her thighs, even her hands clutching the back of his head. The release stole her breath and turned her thoughts to sludge. She could do nothing but endure the rushing pleasure so intense it bordered on pain. It slid through her until she fell backward in the chair, sinking into it without an ability to even think about moving.

Dylan withdrew his fingers, even that sensation too much on her tired body. When she whimpered, he offered an unrepentant smirk and an unnecessary twist of his fingers to pull a gasp from her.

He righted her clothing before lifting her to his chest. Against her better judgment, she allowed it. The heat of his skin, the sensation of his strong arms wrapped around her were nicer than she’d have thought.

He settled her into her bed, stripping off the sweater with a disgusted grunt and another comment about hating it. His annoyance made her want to buy more of them, made her want to watch him tear them off her.

Tracy caught his wrist before he could pull back, questions in her mind that she didn’t dare ask. What did it mean? Where could this go? Was he going to stay?

Whatever openness or almost kindness Dylan had found during their moment of insanity must have drifted away, because back was that annoyance, that wall. He always did that, turning into someone else afterward. “Don’t get things twisted, Red. We aren’t whatever you’re thinking.”

“Why did that just happen, then?”

He gave a chilling look, the sort that made her flinch back. “Because you needed it? Because I wanted to? Sex doesn’t have to mean shit. We aren’t kids who believe in fairytales.”

Tracy released his wrist. What was there to say back to that? Besides, it wasn’t as if Dylan was the sort of man she’d want anything to do with, anyway.

Or the sort who would want anything to do with me.

He sighed, some of that armor he’d strapped back on slipping. “Red—”

“Goodnight.” She tried to fill the seemingly nice word with as much ‘get the hell out’ as she could. Even with her cunt still sticky and her body thrumming from her orgasm, she tried to tell herself to get over it.

He didn’t respond with another sigh, but instead a vicious growl. It didn’t land. He’d had the chance to hurt her enough times—she wasn’t afraid of a little growl he tried to use to get out of fights.

“Fine,” he snapped when the growl didn’t work, then all but stormed out like the kid he pretended she was being.

Fine. It’s not like I have to deal with him. I have other choices.

And yet, as she closed her eyes, as she couldn’t help but think about her life and future, she’d started being unable to picture that future without Dylan as well.

And she was pretty sure that fact would break her heart.