Chapter 31 - Chase Me, Cowboy

He caught me at my lowest, curled up against my headboard with my phone face down on the bed. Normally, I don’t let those little comments back and forth bother me, but tonight, one really got under my skin. I still haven’t told Mom about the whole posting music online—she’s blocked online—so I had nobody to pull me out of my spiral. She’s not at home, anyway.

I was dipping pretty low this time. Then, my phone screen lit up.

Now, I’m in front of the mirror, curling my freshly washed hair. My makeup is piled on the sink. I’m having trouble finishing this last curl because my hands keep shaking, and I’ve almost burned myself twice. I don’t know why I’m getting ready. I’m sure he’s going to take me up to a hotel room and all my carefully done mascara and lipstick will end up smeared across the pillow. But I want him to see me and think I’m beautiful. Maybe that’s pathetic, but it’s real.

My phone buzzes. I drop the unplugged curler into the sink and grab it.

Car’s on its way, I text.

I might faint. My heart races, heat surges up my neck. I go to my closet, yanking open the sliding doors.

I can’t go too casual. I also can’t do a dress and heels.

My fingers skim over the clothing, thinking of the last time we were together. At the back of the closet hang a half dozen unworn lingerie sets. The ones I bought at the mall and wondered whether he would ever see me in them. Pale pink, white lace, satin straps.

Fuck it, I’m going in. Taking one down, I slip on the panties and adjust the little bows at my hips. The bra is more complicated, with a lot of straps that have to be arranged around my ribs to get everything to lay correctly. Over it, I pull on a pink sweatsuit and grab my slip-on shoes, going for my wallet on the bedside table. Mom and Hugh are gone on an overnight trip again, this time to the coast.

I tiptoe downstairs. Derry is out cold on his bed, snoring so loud he can’t hear my footsteps. I glance at the clock on the stove as I pass by. Almost midnight. I pull out a notepad from the junk drawer and find a broken pencil.

What do I write?

Heading out of town overnight. Call you in the morning!

Don’t worry about me.

Serena.

Mom’s gonna immediately guess where I am, but that can’t be helped. I set the notepad on the counter where she can’t miss it. Oh, and I have to tell Sabrina because she’s expecting me the day after tomorrow. I promised to come out to Wyoming, just for a few days, before heading back to Mom’s again, and I hate being a disappointment.

Thinking hard, I frown with my fingers over my phone before shooting off a text to Sabrina.

Hey, I’m postponing my flight a couple days. Had a couple things come up.

I hit send, and she sees it instantly.

That’s fine. Everything okay? she replies.

My shoulders sink. She’d tell me if she was upset.

Nope, all good. Just wanted to get some stuff done first. Promise I’ll be back ASAP.

Headlights flash through the front window. After shoving my phone in my purse, I unlock the door and slip out, setting the alarm from my phone. The last thing I want is the system alerting Mom and her texting me while I’m busy.

Tonight, it’s cooler than it has been, and the sprinklers put up a fine mist as I cross the drive to the gate. It’s a hired car of some kind, not an Uber, with dark windows. I slip out of the gate, and a driver appears, coming around to open my door.

“You’re Miss Maxwell?” he says.

I nod, intimidated. “Yes, sir.”

“Alright, hop on in, and we’ll get you where you need to go.”

Nonplussed, I do as he says. There’s a barrier between the back and the front of the car, so I don’t have to make conversation. But that plunges me into my own thoughts.

I am doing exactly what I said I wouldn’t. I’m letting him use his money to bring me to him so he can sleep with me. No warning, just summoning me like an asshole. My forehead scrunches. I lean it against the cool glass as we leave the neighborhood and head toward the city. He said we were going to the Whitehall Hotel, at the periphery of the city. It’s a private hotel that a lot of celebrities stay at because it’s easy to keep the paparazzi on the other side of the huge iron gates surrounding the gardens.

My stomach clenches.

The last time he saw me, I was walking away from him at the airport. He has a lot of nerve, texting me like this. I have a lot of idiocy in falling right back into his arms and his bed.

Won’t stop me, though.

I squeeze my eyes shut and open them, but they won’t focus. It’s the way my heart pounds, it has my ears roaring, too. Through the haze, city lights glimmer in the distance. It feels like it’s taking forever, until all at once, we’re pulling through the front gates and around a sleek parking lot to an arched doorway leading to a marble lobby.

The driver is parked and out, opening my door before I can move.

I freeze, swallowing.

“You alright, miss?” he asks.

Am I?

“Yeah,” I say hoarsely.

He steps back, and I scoot out, standing on shaky legs. All I have is my overnight bag, with a change of clothes and some toiletries, so he doesn’t need to get my luggage. I smile, and he dips his head. Then, I’m alone on the curb.

I take a step in and the automatic door swings open. My body tingles, and I stumble, half inside the doorway.

He’s walking down the hall. Striding, more like, on his long legs. He doesn’t see me because he’s on the phone, distracted, but I get a good, hard look at him.

God, he is gorgeous.

It’s only been a few months, but it looks like he’s been working out. I swear those goddamn enormous shoulders are somehow broader. And the way his clothes are disheveled, but still a nice dress shirt and pants that sit perfectly over his body…it’s enough to make my mouth water. His hair is all tousled, as if he’s been running his fingers through it.

I enjoy the thought I’m frustrating him enough to make him do that.

He glances up and comes to a screeching halt. I forgot how pretty his heavy eyes are, so hard to read. His lips part, he takes a step, then hesitates.

God, I want to turn and run. Or run to him.

Neither of us moves. Then, the door beeps, and I stumble into the lobby. Shaken into action, he comes close until he’s towering over me. I don’t know if it’s how many nights I lay awake thinking about him, but it feels like years since we saw each other.

“Hi,” I whisper. My voice cracks.

His hand comes up. I catch it in my periphery, and he takes me by the base of the neck. When he kisses me, everything goes so quiet. We’re completely alone, no longer in a lobby surrounded by strangers. There’s nothing but his taste, his warmth, the press of his body against mine.

Everything is calm.

This needs to stop while we’re out in the open. Breaking contact, I push him away, head swiveling to scan the room.

“You can’t do that,” I hiss.

He rolls his eyes, taking my bag and slinging it over his shoulder. “Come on then.”

I let him take my hand. We move through the lobby and turn the corner to the elevators. The tension vibrates through me like I’m holding a live wire. I’m going to explode. Ding—the elevator slides open. He ushers me inside. The doors slam shut.

“What about here?” he says.

I glance sideways at him.

“You can wait.”

He leans his head against the wall, releasing a pent-up sigh. “You’re gonna make me work for it, huh?”

“Should I?”

He flicks his gaze down at me, then away. The elevator slides to a stop.

“I always put in the work,” he says.

We step off the elevator, and his hard palm settles on my lower back. It’s a little pushy. Maybe it’s eagerness. Whichever it is, he steers me firmly along the hall and loops his arm around my waist in front of room 513. I don’t know why I’m burning up, dying inside. It’s not like this is the first time we’ve fucked.

I’m starting to doubt it’ll be the last time.

It has to be. I can’t keep doing this.

We step inside. His bag is by the bed, still upright and zipped. He drops my luggage and turns, taking me by the waist. My ears roar. He dips in, and his mouth meets mine in an open-mouthed, hungry kiss. Rough, insistent hands steer me backward to the bed. I’m dimly aware of him pushing me up the mattress and climbing atop me. One knee shoves my legs apart so he can sink between my thighs.

“Fuck,” he groans, running his lips from mine to the side of my neck.

My body burns. Without meaning to, my hips work against his, trying to rock against his erection.

“Goddamn,” he says. “I missed this.”

I don’t know what to say. I also missed this feeling of being high on him so much. I’m soaked already; it’s making my panties stick to my skin. His hand slides beneath my sweatshirt, and he pauses and lifts his head.

“What’s this?”

Oh, I forgot about the lingerie.

“Something you don’t deserve,” I say.

He pulls my shirt up to expose my bra. His chest expands sharply. Rough fingertips trace over the silk straps beneath my breasts, running up to the transparent lace over them. A sharp sting of pleasure aches between my thighs when he touches my right nipple.

“I forgot you have the prettiest goddamn tits I’ve ever seen,” he murmurs, transfixed.

I ache, hips pressing up. He looks at me, and for the first time, looks deeply into my eyes. And I catch a flickering light in his. A readable emotion—softness, desire. My stomach drops like a rock in deep water. This is escalating out of control. If we don’t stop, we’ll both be too tangled up to leave each other without devastation. Maybe we’re past that point already.

He palms my breast gently, leaning in to brush his lips against mine. Gently, he kisses them, then between my collarbones.

“You smell good,” he murmurs. “I missed it.”

“What do I smell like to you?” I let my head sink back.

“Soft, sweet, vanilla kind of,” he says. “And you, I can’t describe that.”

“Does it make you hard?”

I know it does, but I need to hear it, feel it. He sinks his hips down, and his cock grinds into my thigh. “I need to be in that pussy, sweetheart.”

“Get a condom,” I say.

He does, getting up to take his shirt and pants off. I can’t help but notice again that he’s a little less broad. I hope that doesn’t mean he hasn’t been eating or sleeping. Then, I hope it means that and it’s because of me. I love being wanted by him, even if it means he suffers.

He sinks to his knees, setting the condom on the bed.

“I want to see the rest of this,” he says, tugging down my sweatpants. His eyes drop, and he touches my hip, tracing the satin bands. His fingers end up on the fabric over my pussy, touching the seam gently. The panties don’t have a gusset, just transparent gauze, now soaked. He can feel it, I know by how his eyelids droop and his breath hitches.

“I want it, too,” I whisper.

“Oh, I can fucking tell.”

He pushes me further up on the bed. The low light glints off his hair as he dips his head between my thighs. His tongue glides over the gauze, tight over my pussy, and my eyes roll all the way back.

Something shifts. Tonight doesn’t feel like the other times.

Am I alright with this going to another level?

My head fills with images of the last few months. Bored out of my skull, dying to text him, dying to tell him every little thought in my head. Writing down all the things I would tell him in my notes app so I don’t lose my resolve. Now, here I am, in his bed in a hotel room in pink lingerie because I know he wants me so fucking badly he can’t stay away.

I’ll think about everything else later.

“Make me come,” I let out, barely audible.

His tongue slides over my pussy again, pressing in to reach my clit through the fabric. The added friction makes everything so sensitive. I thought it would take longer, but I’m building already. My stomach tingles, pleasure a tight ache deep inside where only he reaches. I open my mouth to tell him I’m going to come, but it hits me so hard my spine cracks as my hips rise off the bed.

I yelp, ecstasy ripping through in harsh waves. They ebb enough; I can finally focus on the pleasure, and it’s so slow and clear that I soak in every second of it. Through my hips, deep inside, down my thighs. To the soles of my feet and my curled toes.

That was pent up, waiting for him.

I’m limp and panting when it ends. He mutters something and bites the inside of my thigh, licking the little mark he leaves.

“You want me to fuck this pussy?” he rasps.

I nod, wordless. He pushes himself up, then pauses. His eyes dart over me and to the floor.

“What?” I manage.

“Mind if I tie you up?” he says, casually.

Speechless, I blink. That only lasts a half second before arousal floods through me, and I’m nodding. The corner of his mouth turns up, and he picks up his belt where he dropped it earlier.

“Hands together, above your head,” he orders.

What am I doing?

Pulse racing, I do as he says. The headboard is flat with a metal rod across the top. He loops it underneath and wraps it snugly around both wrists, fastening the buckle, so I’m bound a few inches from the pole. My stomach flutters as a sudden wave, then drop of arousal goes through my stomach, centering deep inside.

Oh no, I like this more than I thought I would.

He pulls back, a glitter in his usually shuttered eyes. “Not too tight?”

I shake my head. My face is on fire.

“Nothing to say?” He sits back, kneeling between my open thighs. “That’s a first.”

When I’m tied up, him pushing my buttons only turns me on.

“You gonna tease me or fuck me?” I pant.

He pushes down his boxer briefs, and his cock releases, so hard it’s flushed. “You wet enough?”

I roll my eyes. He doesn’t need to ask that.

“Don’t you fucking sass me,” he murmurs, sinking down. There’s a faint ripping sound. He tore my panties open. Oh my God, he is the absolute worst—oh fuck.

He slides in easily, as big and hard and heavy as I remember. My fingers clench, nails digging into my palm. Something about being constricted makes my blood pound harder and my pussy throb like a drum. I’m restrained, constricted, but filled to the brim. It’s a battlefield, trying to figure out what I feel, why I like it. Then, he pulls out halfway and slams back in.

“Oh God,” I yelp.

He angles his hips, hitting the sweet spot just inside. My toes curl, and my body lifts.

“You like that?” he grits out.

“No, I fucking hate it, clearly,” I pant.

He slams in. Tears slip from my eyes into my hair, forced out by the swirling sensations inside and across my skin. He pulls out, almost to the tip. It’s loud as he thrusts. I’m not sure I’ve ever been this wet in my entire life. Is that the weeks we spent apart? Or the things I’m discovering about myself I never dreamed I’d be into?

I was aware of things like…this. But it didn’t occur to me to try it out.

Obviously, it occurred to him.

“Maybe I should tie your legs open and eat your pussy,” he grunts, thrusting in shallow strokes.

“Fuck,” I gasp.

“What’s that mean?”

“It means, maybe you should.”

He laughs, breathless. “I got you all night, sweetheart. We can do anything and everything you want.”

He pulls out, his cock dragging across my thigh, and dips his head. His tongue flicks over my nipple. Then, he bites the side hard enough to leave a little mark. I gasp again, and my hips move against the bed, humping the air. I think my pride is out the window at this point. Should I care? Maybe, because as soon as we’re not naked anymore, we’ll be back at each other’s throat. But right now, I can’t find it in me to give a fuck how pathetic I look.

I just want him.

I need the empty place he left not to hurt so badly. Even if just for the night.

Everything would be so much easier if we weren’t the way we are. If whatever led up to his point had been different. If we’d met in a bar, nothing to our names. Of course, that couldn’t have happened with the man I can’t get out of my head. He just had to be a big fucking complication from day one.

“You want to come again?” he murmurs, lifting his head from my breast.

“Please,” I beg.

“You bring your vibrator?”

My face heats, worse than it already burns. “It’s in my bag, in the inside pocket.”

He gets up, and I can’t help but admire him moving across the room to where my bag sits. I’m terrified of my vibrator going off in the airport, so I brought my little purple bullet. It’s small, but powerful. He unzips the pocket and takes it out, unwrapping the towel I put around it to muffle any mishaps.

“I need to get you something better than this,” he says, flipping it in his hand.

“It’s my extra.”

He sinks back down on the bed, flicking it on the lowest setting. My fingers clench, wrists straining against his belt, as he touches the bullet to the entrance of my pussy.

Oh…oh…oh.

Through my hazy lashes, his face is stern, mouth a line. His eyes rest between my thighs, taking in the weak bucking of my hips. My body prickles with sweat and desperation. A swell of arousal hits me hard, but doesn’t send me over the edge. My legs spasm and clamp.

“Keep those open,” he orders, eyes flashing.

I can’t. I’m shaking. He takes my thigh and spreads me open. The vibrator slips inside, and he pushes it against my G-spot with two fingers, holding firmly. Then, he dips his head, and his tongue slides, hot and intense, over my clit. A yelp slips out, turning to a moan. I’m so close. He sucks my clit into his mouth and flicks it gently.

Back and forth.

In a slow circle.

His other hand splays across my stomach. I wonder if he can feel how I’m tensing as the pleasure builds. There’s no way he can’t; I’m shuddering like a leaf in the wind. Twisting, shaking, hiccupping. Pleasure rises and tightens until I can’t tell whether I’m in pain or not. He speeds up, and I snap. It washes over me in a hot wave. The vibrator is sweet torture, pushing me until my spine arches off the bed.

Wetness spatters across my thighs. He swears under his breath, tongue dragging over my sensitive pussy.

Then it’s over, and I’m a little puddle on the bed.

“Good girl,” he says, sitting up. “We’re off to a flying start.”