Beth Kery - Because We Belong

“Your hand,” she said without hesitation, pressing her hips against the divine pressure. “Always your hand. Your touch,” she added shakily.

“The video will be the same for me. I allow you to use a vibrator in my absence, don’t I?”

“Yes,” she mouthed, too overwhelmed with growing arousal to speak audibly.

“But you would rather have me?” he asked, and despite his typical palpable confidence, she heard the thread of uncertainty in his voice . . . of naked need.

“A million times over,” she repeated his words brokenly, looking into his scoring blue eyes. Emotion overcame her. She clamped her eyes shut, a tear shooting down her cheek, and came against his hand.

She returned from the realms of bliss at the sensation of the plug sliding out of her ass. He was almost immediately there—a fuller, throbbing replacement. He held her stare as he slowly entered her, his eyes a brilliant contrast to his rigid features. The raw intensity of the moment overwhelmed her. There wasn’t a spot in her body or soul she wouldn’t willingly give him.

“Don’t look away,” he said harshly when he pressed his testicles against her buttocks and she gasped for air that didn’t seem to adequately expand her lungs. He must have sensed how powerful the moment was for her. He spread his hands on her hips and began to fuck her, his pelvis slapping rhythmically against her ass. “Don’t ever look away, Francesca.”

He sounded almost angry, but she knew he wasn’t. It was the intensity of the moment that strained his voice. She merely shook her head, too inundated by the sensation of his cock plunging in and out of such an intimate place, too saturated with love and desire to do anything but surrender. The clitoral cream in combination with Ian’s primal possession made her burn yet again. Even the soles of her feet heated and prickled. He spread his hand over her lower belly, continuing to thrust his cock in and out of her. She cried out sharply, her back arching slightly off the bed, when he slid his thumb between her labia and rubbed her clit.

“Oh no,” she gasped, hardly aware of what she was saying.

“Yes,” he corrected between clenched teeth. “Open your eyes.”

She did as he demanded, not realizing she’d closed them as ecstasy mounted. The sounds of their bodies smacking together faster and faster seemed to match the pounding of her heart in her ears. His thumb moved, creating a delicious friction. She was about to ignite like the tip of a struck match. She focused on him with effort, biting off a moan. Sweat sheened his face, chest, and ridged abdomen.

“Tell me you love me,” he rasped.

“I love you so much.”

“Always.”

“Yes. Always,” she said, her lips trembling as she crested. She felt him swell inside her, the slight pain of discomfort only fueling her desire, providing the edge she needed to come. Her sharp cry was silenced by Ian’s roar of release.

A moment later, he fell between her bound legs, holding himself off her with his arms braced on the mattress, both of them still quaking and panting in the aftermath of the sheering storm of climax. A drop of sweat fell in her eyes. It burned, but she didn’t blink; the image of him was too beautiful.

“I’ll call Lucien and Elise and cancel for tonight,” Ian said, his gaze running over her face.

“It’ll be too late. They’ll already be on their way. Besides, you could use an evening with friends. You always seem to relax and enjoy yourself around Lucien. He has a good effect on you.”

His mouth twitched. “I enjoy myself much more around you. And you wouldn’t believe how relaxed I am at the moment.”

“You know what I mean. You’ve been under so much stress lately, with your mother being ill.” Her grin faded. After a moment of studying him, she reconsidered. “Do you really want to cancel?”

He straightened and slowly withdrew from her, grimacing as he did so. “Yes,” he answered honestly as he began to unbind her arms and legs. “I’d rather spend the night with you right here,” he said after a moment. He shot her a darkly amused glance as he whipped the rope from around her limbs, releasing her restraints with as much methodical precision as he’d made them. “But I suppose I shouldn’t be so selfish. A couple hours spent with friends isn’t going to make a big difference in the scheme of things. I’ll be back in bed with you soon enough, right?”

“Absolutely.”

An inexplicable chill passed over her heated flesh like an invisible shadow, and was gone in an instant. She sighed with relief as she straightened her freed legs and stretched like a content cat.

She hardly thought about her automatic, certain reply until later. Naturally she and Ian would be here together later.

They would be in each other’s arms, where they belonged.

SIX MONTHS LATER

“Nothing is certain, is it? Nothing,” Francesca said bleakly as she set down the investment and finance section of the morning paper, the headlines exclaiming over the faltering Japanese economy. Her gaze lingered on one headline: Japanese Conglomerate Hires Investment Banking Firm to Sell. She bit her lip nervously, jumping slightly when her housemate, Davie Feinstein, touched her shoulder.

“Some things are certain,” Davie said with a significant look she endeavored to ignore. She accepted the steaming cup of tea he offered her and gave him a smile as he sat. He started doling steaming pancakes onto their plates.

“Like taxes and your weekend breakfasts. Like your friendship?” Francesca asked, forcing her voice into an airy tone because they were skimming a sensitive topic, and she refused to go there on this bright December morning. The sensitive topic: Ian’s abandonment of her a half a year ago following his mother’s death. But not just his mother’s unexpected death, also the discovery of the poison truth about his biological father . . . a truth that had been revealed by Lucien Lenault after Francesca and Ian had made love so intimately that summer evening. One moment, their future had been secure and bright. All of that changed in a matter of seconds by the slashing knives of truth.

And doubt.

She knew Ian had been fearful his entire life that his unknown father had at the very least taken advantage of his mentally ill mother, at worst, raped her. The identity of his biological father had remained a mystery to him, however, until that evening six months ago. That fateful night when Lucien and Elise had come to dinner, Lucien had known he’d been providing a shock by telling Ian they were half brothers, but that wasn’t the worst of it. He’d also revealed that their common parent, Trevor Gaines, had been a rapist and serial reproductionist—a man who got a sick fascination from impregnating as many women as he could. The impact of that revelation, along with his mother’s sudden worsening condition and death, had had a decimating effect on Ian.

Francesca didn’t like to think of that other issue that she’d suspected had been yet another crack in Ian’s well-being, the bizarre coincidence that Ian had asked to videotape her during sex the very night he found out his criminal father got his kicks out of taping his conquests and victims. She suspected Ian had made some self-condemning judgments after that, but he’d never given her the opportunity to assure him he was a far, far cry from being remotely similar to Trevor Gaines.

She’d wanted nothing more than to comfort and ease his suffering, but he’d left . . . disappeared without a word to her or a personal message. Gone. The man she had meant to marry, whom she loved more than life itself.

As had become the custom, she and Davie were avoiding the fact that the man she’d been the most certain about in the world had disappeared off the face of the earth, and was determinedly refusing to be found.

“Taxes and my friendship are definitely certain. As for my weekend breakfasts, I’ll make them as long as somebody comes to eat them,” Davie was telling her, passing the syrup.

“I miss Caden and Justin the most during weekend breakfasts,” Francesca said.

“Actually, Justin said he’d try to stop by after going to the gym this morning.”

“Really?” Francesca asked hopefully. Davie nodded.

Why did everything have to change? Davie, Justin, Caden, and she had been tight friends and roommates for years. But then she’d met Ian, and her life had taken a course she’d never imagined. She’d spent more and more time in Ian’s luxurious downtown penthouse and planned to move there permanently when they married. As one of the wealthiest, most influential men in the world, Ian had taken her to places she’d only dreamed about before and exposed her to movers and shakers not only in the art world—her world—but from all walks of life, from business leaders to politicians and celebrities. He’d introduced her to challenging lovemaking, taught her the power of submission . . . turned her body into a honed instrument for experiencing distilled pleasure. He’d transformed her into a more confident woman who was sublimely comfortable in her own body, a woman who fully owned and took pride in her accomplishments and sexuality.

But then tragedy had struck. Ian had willfully vanished. Justin and Caden had both prospered at their jobs and moved into their own homes. When she’d returned to live with Davie full-time in his Wicker Park townhome, so much had changed. She herself had altered; the free-spirited, gauche young woman she’d once been had disappeared, and a more sober, contained, sad and bitter woman had taken her place. Davie had always been there, though, a solid, reassuring pillar in her life. He’d been there to help her stanch her wounds, encouraged her to focus all her energy on finishing her master’s program and her painting. Thanks to Ian’s prestige and patronage, her reputation had grown in the art community. She was at no shortage of commissions for her work, and had even turned down a few lucrative ones.

Still, sometimes it felt like her life had come to a shrieking halt. She was still disoriented, her brain quivering from the jarring impact of abrupt loss.

She poured the syrup on her pancakes, her attention once again drawn to the newspaper and the news about Tyake Inc. selling because of the Japanese financial crisis. Davie noticed her preoccupation when she began to drown her pancakes. He touched her hand. She blinked and lifted the syrup bottle.

“Is there something in the paper about Noble Enterprises?” Davie asked cautiously, referring to Ian’s multibillion-dollar company.

“No, not that I see,” Francesca said evenly before she set down the bottle and picked up her fork. She was once again highly aware they’d come very close to the topic of Ian. Ian was synonymous with his hugely successful company, after all. Or at least he had been, before he’d forsaken his position at its head.

She heard a knock at the front door and set down her fork, glad for the distraction.

“Why is Justin knocking?” she asked as she stood, perplexed. Justin, Caden, Davie, and she were practically family, after all.

“I don’t think I unlocked it yet this morning,” she heard Davie say as she left the kitchen and walked down the hallway. Francesca twisted the lock and whipped open the front door.

“You’re just in time—” She halted midsentence when she realized it wasn’t her friend Justin standing on the front steps.

“Lucien,” she said, shock ringing in her voice at the unexpected sight of Ian’s half brother. Just looking at his classically handsome face and dark, tousled hair made her flash back to that horrible night. She vividly saw Lucien’s rigid, concerned expression and heard Ian’s hollow tone as he’d stared at the photo of his biological father.

My mother. That’s why she sometimes acted afraid of me—all my life, she’d wince and cower at times at the very sight of me . . . because I looked so much like him. Because I had the face of the man who took advantage of her. I had the face of her rapist.

She forced the excruciatingly painful memory of Ian’s words from her brain and tried to focus on Lucien. She’d been avoiding him, just like she’d been avoiding everything associated with reminders of Ian. It was nothing against Lucien, or his new wife, Elise. In fact, she cared deeply about the couple. It was just a survival instinct. Reminders of Ian cut too deep.

Lucien’s nostrils flared slightly as he studied her somberly, his sharp, assessing gray-eyed stare reminding her uncomfortably of a blue-eyed one.