I fumbled with the button. Got it free and then yanked at his zipper. Pulled it down and dove in. Let out a shudder when my fingers wrapped and pulled free his cock. So hard in my hand. So ready. I wrapped my hand around it. Fucked its length as he ravaged my mouth, the hiss against my lips telling me the tempo he liked. He thrust his hips, the hard beat against my aching cunt not nearly enough. Not compared with the organ in my hand. The one that was pulsing beneath my hand. The one whose tip was wet with arousal, heated with need. I dropped his cock, put both hands on his chest and pushed, his mouth fighting it, one of his hands catching my wrist and putting my hand back on his cock, my name a beg on his lips.

God, I lusted for this man. I needed him. I needed him to be completely mine. I didn’t want second best. I didn’t want rebound sex. The look in his eyes, domination and lust – I had become addicted to that look. My need for him trumped anything with Brant. I couldn’t help that. I couldn’t help the different things I wanted from each man. I only knew that right now, I needed more than my hand on his cock. I needed to feel, for at least a short period of time, a full connection with him.

“The bedroom,” I gasped. Moved my hand, tried to leave his grip, to move toward the stairs that would take us to my bed.

“No.” the resolution in his voice stopped me in my tracks. I looked over. Saw him standing, legs spread, jeans low on bare hips, his c**k heavy in his fist. “I need you right now. Lay down.”

“Here?” I looked at the floor, at the Persian rug that had set me back a good six figures.

“Christ, Layana. Now. Strip.”

I yanked at my clothes, my eyes on his hands. One pressing at the base of his cock, the other moving in slow strokes, the pinch of his face, his eyes closing for a moment before they blazed to life and stared at me, my body almost naked, my hands fumbling with the strap of my bra. He dropped to his knees, pulling me down before him, on my back, the rough kiss of the carpet my welcome party. He spread my legs, held onto my waist and pulled me forward and onto his waiting cock.

God. I knew. So many things wrong with this picture. But God, it felt so good. I stared into his eyes, listened to him whisper my name, and enjoyed every second of the ride. For those minutes, I forgot about Brant, about Tennis Barbie, about anything but him and me and that moment of time.

I was his rebound.

He was my sidepiece.

And both of us wanted more.

At least I did. Maybe anything else was a lie I was telling myself.

Chapter 36

Jillian

It’s safe to say I never liked Layana. There is something about a woman, when you look into her eyes and see calculation that I don’t like. I prefer the open books, the countless women who pass through this office full of smiles and sunshine and optimism. I don’t look in their eyes and wonder what they are thinking. I don’t listen to them speak and search for hidden meanings. I don’t wonder, when they leave, where they are going. But that, from day one, is how it has been with Layana. I had hoped she would pass on. Hoped that another woman would catch Brant’s fancy, that he wouldn’t go for her long legs and mess of curls. But, alas, he did. She stayed. And now, here we are. Two women battling over this man. I only want to protect him. She loves him. We have differing views on what loving him entails. I don’t want to think about what she does to keep him. Whatever it is, it’s working. The man won’t take his eyes off her.

I’m sure there are things I could do. To poison their relationship. Expose her lies, put a quiver of death into the perfect existence that he thinks they live. The problem is that she knows the secret. The one that I hug, with the tight grip of a mother bear, to my chest. The one that I have spent years protecting, blood, sweat and tears seeping through the iron bars I have built to keep it in. Destroying their relationship? His trust in her? The secret would burn to the ground along with their love. Be exposed in the open air for whoever wanted to grab its papery truth and run wild. In that secret lies nothing but destruction. And so I sit here. Continue paying the men who keep tabs on Brant at all times. Smile when she enters. Help to hide her lies. Pretend to love her with the same vigor that I love him. And hope that one day she fades out of his life.

I can take care of him. She can only—will only—break him in two.

Excerpt, The Journal of Jillian Sharp.

Chapter 37

“Stay.” I watched his hands slow, the rub of the towel through his hair coming to a stop. He lowered his hands, wiping his face before dropping the towel on the floor and stepping over it, a second towel wrapped around his lower half as he strolled over to his jeans.

“I can’t. Stay too long in this place, I’ll start thinking I belong here.”

“It’s one night.” One night I desperately needed. How different would a night with Lee be? Would he stay the whole night or leave me in the dead of night as Brant so often did? Would he wrap me in his arms or would he sprawl out on the other side of the bed?

He dropped the towel, my eyes plummeting. Watching the careless movement as he pulled on his pants, uncaring of my eyes, his mouth curving into a confident grin as he tugged them over his hips.

“I have clothes here. If you want fresh ones.”

He scowled. “Brant’s?”

I had so many answers for that but went with the simplest. “Yes.”

He moved over to the bed, pulled at the sheet until it was clean of the bed and my nakedness was fully exposed. “I f**k his woman, I don’t want his life.” He reached a rough hand out, rubbing a palm over my right breast, the nipple hardening under his touch, the dark look in his eyes turning into a gleam of satisfaction. I sighed, reaching my own hand out and laying it on his cock, the cut of his open jeans leaving it out, stuck out, at perfect eye level from my spot on the bed. It was hot, his skin heated by the spray of the shower and his hand moved from its place on my breast to my hair, gathering the long strands of my hair and pulling me upright, pushing me in the direction of his cock.