Just This Once (King Family, #1)

by Lena Hendrix

Intensity darkened Whip’s eyes as he leaned in close, wrapping me in his heat. “Emily, do you think I could call you sometime?”

My insides were screaming. The last thing I wanted to do was go home to a lonely, still-unpacked apartment. Whip inched impossibly closer. I lowered my lashes, then gathered every ounce of courage before looking into his steel blue eyes. I’d wasted so many years doing the good thing. The right thing with the wrong men. Whip may not have been the right man, either, but there was something about him that was pulling me in. I didn’t give a damn if it was wrong. I wanted it. Craved it.

“You know, I really appreciate you not calling the cops on me. I’m thinking I can thank you for that . . .” I swallowed hard and willed my voic...

“I never do this,” she panted. “I don’t give a fuck.” My tongue burned a path up her neck. “Even if you did, I wouldn’t stop this.”

I pressed my thumb to the wet spot. “Already wet for me, Emily?”

“If you want to know how wet I am . . .” Watching her confidence build was the sexiest thing I’d ever seen. I ached when her right eyebrow pitched higher. “You could feel for yourself.” My jaw flexed as I dragged the blade of my hand through her covered pussy. She was soaked. I groaned a rough exhale. “Fuck, Em.”

Whip King had a pierced. Fucking. Cock.

Yes. A world in which I was pinned beneath Whip King as he drove into me over and over with that glorious bedazzled cock.

“So what’s the deal, then? Saunter up next to him and go in for round two.” Her arms swept wide in invitation as if it would ever be that easy. I pulled her arm back to her lap. “I can’t.” “Why not?” I exhaled a frustrated sigh. “He’s a firefighter.” Rachel’s eyes went wide. “Oh shit, that’s right.” I sank lower in my seat. “Yep. And I didn’t know that until after we . . .” My hand rolled in circles between us. “You know.” “He works for your dad? That is so freaking hot.” Rachel stared at Whip across the bar.

“Nothing—just remembering how funny it was to see you like a turtle on its shell when you slipped in that puddle.” During a house fire a few months ago, Lee was stripping siding off the building when he lost his balance and fell backward into a shallow koi pond. The weight of his air tank had made it so he couldn’t roll himself over. He’d been stuck, like a turtle on its shell, moving his arms and legs and rolling around trying to right himself. “Fuck off. You know those air tanks are heavy as shit, and it’s not my fault the mud was too slick for me to flip over. You could have helped sooner, you know.”

In another town—another life—Lee and I might have been friends,

Then it dawned on me—the way her gaze swept over my open closet only moments before she was pulling her floral dress back over her head and running out of my house like she couldn’t get away fast enough. She knew. She fucking knew. She could have said something then—explained why hooking up was a bad idea, and I would have agreed with her.

Apparently Whip King is an asshole. A well-built, pierced dick, get-on-my-knees-and-beg-for-another-taste grade-A asshole. But goddamn did he look good in his dress uniform.

He stepped forward, crowding my space and gripping my hips through my navy satin dress. “It can’t happen again.” His warm breath floated over my tingling skin. “I know.” The pull between us inched me closer, but I waved my hand between us. “You need to keep you and that thing away from me.”

I went to push past him when his hand caught my upper arm. In the darkness his blue eyes formed intense, black pools. I raised my chin and willed my knees not to wobble. “This conversation is over.” A soft rumble filled the space between us as his breath caressed the shell of my ear. “I bet if I lifted the hem of your skirt right now, I’d find your panties soaked, just for me.” I tugged my arm free, annoyed that he was 1,000 percent correct. “You’d be wrong.” I swallowed past the lump that clogged my throat and leaned in close. An evil smirk crept across my face as my lips brushed the shell of his ear. “Because I’m not wearing any.”

Sir. What a kiss-ass. An image of me bent over Whip’s bed, bare ass in the air as he burned a path of hot, wet kisses up the back of my thigh flashed through my mind. NOPE. Thinking of literally anything other than that . . .

Whip laughed in agreement. “Yes, sir. I know what to do if she chokes.” He turned to me with devious, knowing eyes. Take it. Choke on it.

Maybe in some sick way I’m trying to get back at Craig for cheating on me with my supposed best friend and blaming me for being boring in bed when I didn’t want a threesome with her.

“I told you I was going to make you beg for it.” Emily sucked in a sharp breath. “Whip . . .” “Beg, Prim.” My blood was white-hot. My fist gripped the back of her shirt. “I—” Her eyes fluttered closed. “Please . . .” Sick satisfaction washed over me with a wolf’s grin as my stomach clenched. “That’s my girl.”

Sloane, a server who worked at Abel’s Brewery, laughed as she straightened. “Maybe try pulling the giant one out of Abel’s ass.”

I stretched my neck from side to side. “Just a bit of whiplash, I think.” I shot a pointed look across the table, and Whip ducked his gaze as he took a sip of his beer.

You can thank me by meeting me at Trawler’s Cove at 7 p.m. tonight.

“I don’t trust that look in your eye.” Whip’s voice was a rasping husk that sent tingles cascading down my spine. I shot him a wicked grin as I lowered his pants and underwear, freeing him. “I’m going to ruin you for all other women.” I slowly licked a prominent vein on the underside of his cock. With a deep groan, Whip’s head fell back. Then he glowered at me before his hand caressed my cheek. “You already have, Prim.”

“You’re fucking soaked, Prim. Tell me you’re so wet from taking my cock down that tight little throat.”

“I want more.” I clambered onto the bed. His eyebrow popped up when I lay on my back with my feet stretching away from him. Then I shimmied to the edge and hung my head off the bed. “Like this.” His eyes were dark and wild as he stroked his cock with a hard tug and stepped forward. “You want me to fuck your throat?” I licked my lips and nodded. “Open your mouth.” I did as I was told, pressing my tongue flat to accommodate him. “Good girl.” My fingers found my clit, and I started working it in slow, torturous circles as he slid his cock into my mouth. “Fuck.”

Later, when he nestled his hips in the cradle of mine, he teased my opening before slipping inside. Eyes locked, he pinned me to the bed with his delicious weight. My legs wrapped around him as my arms wound around his neck. My hands fisted his hair. Whip buried his face into my hair, murmuring my name and easing himself inside.

In the darkness of his bedroom something shifted, altered something inside me. In his embrace I realized that it was no longer two sort-of friends fucking and having a good time. It was two souls baring themselves to each other and finding that our broken parts somehow clicked together perfectly. His name was a whisper of my breath as he finally filled me completely.

Royal If you’re trying to come out of the closet, it’s no big deal. We already know.

“You know, I liked you better when you hated me.” “Liar.” He laughed. “Besides, I never hated you. But maybe I hated the way you made me feel.” Tingles spread through my chest. Light danced across his features as I stopped to face him. “How did I make you feel?” His jaw ticced and my heart rate spiked. “Like I’d burn down my entire world just to have you.”

And the only person who could ruin it was me.

“You,” she breathed. “I want to feel you.” “I’m right here, baby.” My fingers pumped in and out of her, going slower and deeper each time. She pressed on my shoulders, demanding I meet her eyes. “Please.” I leaned toward the nightstand, where I kept the condoms, but her grip on my shoulder tightened. “Just you.”

Slowly, I pushed the head of my cock inside her. Our moans filled the bedroom as I sank into her, each barbell of my piercing stretching her open. When I was buried to the hilt, I paused and looked down at her. “You feel like home to me.”