Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 94205 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 471(@200wpm)___ 377(@250wpm)___ 314(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 94205 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 471(@200wpm)___ 377(@250wpm)___ 314(@300wpm)
Weird thing to be proud of, but she’d take it.
She’d take anyone telling her that they were proud of her. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d heard that.
He moved right over that spot inside her once more, and she could feel her clit throbbing as she clenched down on him. “Come if you can, baby. You don’t have to wait for permission.”
She shook her head back and forth. It wasn’t possible. It couldn’t be, right?
More. Harder.
He drove deep and she came, clenching around him as she dropped her head down, her cries filling the room. He kept driving himself deep until his own shout joined hers.
Butch slid free and she slumped onto her stomach. She heard him walk across the room. He must have been getting rid of the condom.
Then he reappeared, sitting beside her, and started rubbing the small of her back. “You okay, baby?”
“Yep. Just leave me here for about, um, five years. By then, I ought to have enough energy to move.”
His low chuckle sent another shiver through her. What was wrong with her? She’d come three times. She was done. There was no way she could come again.
Right?
“Come on, you can sleep in a minute.”
“Or I could sleep now,” she mumbled.
“Nope, you have to pee first.”
“Nuh-uh. Don’t. I’d know if I needed to pee, and I do not gotta go.” Then she thought about that for a moment. Did she? Maybe. But she still wasn’t getting up.
A slap to her ass made her squeal. Turning, she glared at him while she reached back to rub her abused cheek.
“What was that for?” she asked with a pout.
“What have I told you about that lip?” He reached forward and tapped her lower lip.
“I can’t help it. It has a mind of its own.”
“Seems that it does. You’re still getting up to pee. I know girls need to do that or they risk getting a UTI.”
Good Lord.
That’s why he wanted her to get up? That was sweet and bizarre all at the same time. How did he even know that? Did men care about that?
Another smack landed on her ass.
Well, Butch cared, apparently.
“Ouch. Ow. I’m going. I’m going. Sheesh, I thought your bossiness was just for sex.”
“Apparently not,” he called out to her. “And you like me taking command. You need it.”
She huffed out a breath as she stepped into the bathroom.
She didn’t think she needed it.
Then she caught sight of herself in the mirror. She looked flushed and satisfied. And there was a look in her eyes that she hadn’t seen in a long time.
She was happy.
Butch was good for her. Coming back here might have been a move born of desperation. She might have had plenty of crappy things thrown her. But it was all worth it just for this moment here. To know a man who treated her right, even if it wasn’t going anywhere.
Heck, just knowing him a week had changed her. He was attracted to her. He wanted her for her. Not for any other reason. Not to use her talent or because she was Chandler Devout’s stepdaughter.
“I don’t hear any peeing!” he called out.
“Do not listen to me pee!”
“I can’t listen to you because you’re not peeing.”
“This better not be some weird kink because that’s a hard limit,” she told him as she moved to the toilet.
But she was smiling as she sat down to pee. For the first time in ages, it felt like someone really did care about her health and welfare. Her mom sometimes did, but it was fleeting and abstract.
This felt warm and encompassing. Protective.
That was what he was to her. Warmth and safety. Caring and attentiveness.
And she wanted to keep him.
23
Butch Malone was a cuddler.
That was her first thought as she woke up.
Her second was about murdering her annoying phone as it rang again. Who was calling her?
With a groan, she rolled over and tried searching around the nightstand for it. Where the heck was it?
It stopped, and she sighed with relief, settling back into the soft bed. Damn, she wanted to steal this bed. She could marry this bed and be happy every night for the rest of her life.
Okay, now she was just being weird.
Then her phone started up again. With a growl of frustration, she sat up and glared around. Where was it? Who the heck was calling her?
She was going to freaking kill them.
Standing, she stumbled around, looking for her phone. Finally, she spotted it on the coffee table.
“Hello,” she croaked without looking to see who was calling. Her eyes wouldn’t focus properly.
“I’ve been calling you for the last half an hour, Lara,” Chandler said coolly down the phone.
Memories slammed into her with the force of a steam engine.
The wedding. Geoffrey begging for her to come back to him. Chandler threatening Butch to get him to break things off with her.