Stipulation Read online

Page 2

  Matt Connover.

  Matt reaches down and grabs Brian by the lapels of his jacket, hauling him off the floor. No one makes a move to intervene because Matt looks to be in control, although he seems to be vibrating with the need to do violence.

  Putting his face in Brian’s, he grits, “It will do me no good to beat your ass or tell you how reprehensible your conduct is, because you won’t remember it in the morning. Rest assured… I’ll be by your hotel room first thing in the morning, and then I’ll decide which part of me you’ll get. ”

  Brian stares at Matt without any comprehension of what he did… yes, he’s that drunk. Matt is disgusted and he gives Brian a solid push while releasing his grip, causing Brian to stumble backward a few steps. He doesn’t fall down only by the grace of a few of the other lawyers that catch him.

  Spinning away, Matt walks past me out the bar, growling, “Let’s go. ”

  Grabbing my purse, I hurry to catch up to him.

  Once the doors on the elevator shut, I have the nerve to look up to Matt. He’s pissed, and I’m not sure if it’s at Brian, me, or both of us.

  “I’m sorry,” I say, because the silence is awkward, and because I think that’s what he’s waiting for.

  “For what?” he asks in surprise.

  “I don’t know,” I offer lamely. “I thought you were pissed at me. ”

  “Mac… you have nothing to be sorry for. That pig was drunk and inappropriate with you. He’s lucky I didn’t kill him. ”

  “Well, that’s a little overboard,” I say with a laugh. “I’m sure he got the message how very wrong it was. ”

  “No,” Matt says, his voice icy. “He didn’t get the message. But he will tomorrow morning when I pay him a visit. ”

  “What will you do?” I ask, wondering if Matt would truly beat his ass. I don’t want him to do that, but it sure would be awesome to know that someone wanted to do that on my behalf.

  “He’s off the case. I’m sending him packing. ”

  “What?” I say, now feeling extreme guilt that Brian would lose his job. “You can’t do that. He was just drunk. ”

  Matt pushes away from the wall of the elevator where he’d been leaning, and stalks up to me. He gets all in my personal space, but I don’t step back from it. Unfortunately, I’m a bad, bad girl, because damn it… I like him in my space.

  Leaning down, Matt practically growls at me, “He had his f**king hands on your breast, Mac. ”

  I wish I could tell you it was the violence in his voice, or even the absolute menace he was portraying, that got me excited, but it wasn’t… it was the pure, flat-out jealousy that was practically dripping off his lips that got my motor running.

  Matt-Fucking-Connover is jealous another man was touching me.

  I’m so going to milk this for all it’s worth.

  “So what if he was touching me?” I whisper.

  The golden tones in Matt’s eyes turn a deep shade of amber, and he steps in even closer, now only a mere inch or so separating our bodies. “Because it should be my hands that are on your body… only mine. ”

  I think the bells of Heaven have rung, but sadly, it’s just the chime from our elevator that we’ve reached our floor. Matt steps back from me but grabs my hand as he exits. I have no choice but to follow along. He pulls me swiftly down the hallway, right to my hotel room door.

  He doesn’t even wait for me to get my key. Taking my purse from my hands, he roots around in there like a pig looking for a truffle. He pulls the key out, slips it in the reader, and opens my door. Then he’s pushing me inside, his hand on my lower back. Following me right in, he propels me all the way into the center of the room, throwing my purse on the floor.

  When I turn around to look at him, it’s all over. The instant our eyes connect, an almost palpable spark leaps between us. In that instant, we launch ourselves at each other.

  “Fuck, I can’t believe I’m doing this again,” Matt grumbles, just before his mouth starts to ravish mine. I groan instantly from the contact. We are so ferocious in our need to mate our tongues, our teeth clack together in an almost painful way. It doesn’t stop us though… we keep kissing and kissing and kissing.

  My hands immediately go to Matt’s shirt, trying to swiftly undo the buttons, but making no headway whatsoever. Never one to be worried about finesse or decorum, I grip the material tightly in my hands and jerk as hard as I can, expecting buttons to spray all around us and his glorious chest to be exposed. In my mind, I even see it happening in slow motion, because yeah… that’s how it would happen in those steamy, romance novels I like to read.

  Instead, the buttons hold firm and my hands fly outward, holding nothing but air. Matt pulls away from my mouth to look down at me, taking note of the failed attempt to strip him bare… and I’m sure the way my mouth is hanging open in disbelief.

  His eyes crinkle in amusement, and then he starts laughing.

  Hard.

  I mean gut-busting, belly-clenching, pee-your-pants hard. Pushing away from me, he actually has to put his hand down on the dresser to hold himself up while he laughs. “That was probably the funniest thing I’ve ever seen,” he says between gasps, tears pooling in his eyes.

  Glaring at him, I say, “Is your shirt made of like steel or something?”

  And that causes him to succumb to fresh peals of laughter.

  I merely cross my arms over my chest and rain down my most displeasing frown upon him. He finally gets control of himself, letting out a few stray snickers, and then he’s standing straight in front of me. Holding his hands out in front of himself, he says, “I’m sorry… but that was funny. ”

  “Yeah, not so much for me,” I tell him. Walking to the door, I open it. “I’m sort of not in the mood now. ”

  Matt’s lips quirk at me, and he grins at me in sheer amusement. “I’m not going anywhere. ”

  “I told you I’m not in the mood. ”

  The irritating fool walks over and sits down on the edge of my bed. “Yes, you are. Now get over here,” he says as he unbuckles his belt. “I’d kill for you to take me in your mouth right now. ”

  I’m weak. That’s all there is to it. I close the door and walk back into the room, but I’m not convinced that this should evolve into sex.

  “What are we doing, Matt?” I ask in a tired voice.

  He gives me a devilish grin as he pulls his belt off, tossing it on the floor. “I’d say you’re getting ready to give me a bl*w j*b, and then I’m going to make you come more times than you’ll be able to remember tomorrow. ”

  Well, oh shit… that practically just made me have an orgasm right there. Shaking my head to clear the sexual fuzziness away, I say more firmly, “I thought we both agreed this was wrong. Besides, you got your jollies off again at One Night Only this weekend and…”

  I stop, because I almost admitted that his sleeping with someone else is a deal breaker for me. But is it? And do I really want him to know that knowledge affects me? He’s been pretty clear about the fact that I’ll only ever be a f**k for him, and I sure as hell don’t want him having power over me… thinking that it hurts my feelings.

  So I quickly say, “And besides… I slept with someone else, too, this weekend. Remember… most amazing weekend ever. ”

  Matt pushes off from the bed and comes to stand in front of me. He takes his finger and thumb, gripping my chin so I have to meet his eyes. “I lied. I wasn’t with anyone this weekend. And you lied for that matter, too. You didn’t sleep with anyone else. ”

  I start sputtering, jerking my chin away. “What makes you think I lied?”

  He’s having none of it. Drawing me into his arms, he wraps himself around me. He kisses me then, so very softly, and whispers. “I know you lied for the same reason I did. We don’t want to admit this attraction, yet both of us are obsessed by it. You can’t get me out of your mind, just as I can’t get you out of my mine. I’m tired
of fighting it, and I’m tired of jerking off when I’d rather be sunk deep inside of you. So I’m not fighting it anymore. ”

  He kisses me again, just a light grazing of his lips against mine, and I sigh. While this relationship is still so very wrong, his words to me are so very, very right. I can handle that there will not be a relationship out of this, and that this will only ever be sex, because damn if it isn’t the most powerful, fulfilling, and mind-blowing sex I’ve ever had. Yeah, I’m jumping in if he’s on board.

  I know this will come to bite me in the ass one day, but I’m still not able to walk away. I can foresee all types of problems cropping up just because I’m powerless to stop myself from banging my boss.

  Pushing out of his arms, I drop to my knees in front of him and unzip his pants. I peek up at him, and he’s staring down at me with dark eyes, his lower lip stuck between his teeth. He’s holding his breath, watching to see what I do, and it makes me feel invincible.

  He must see the power radiating off me, the quiet confidence I have in my stare, because he’s compelled to say, even as he gently strokes my cheek, “This is just sex, McKayla… nothing more. ”

  Taking him in my hand, I squeeze him gently, loving the way the air hisses out of his lungs. I lean forward and lick him from base to tip, looking up at him once more. “As long as it’s nothing less. ”

  “Fair enough,” he grits out, before grasping my head and urging my face toward his dick.

  I then proceed to give him, what I’m betting is, the best b**w j*b he’s ever had. Yeah, I know that sounds cocky, but the sounds he’s emitting, the curse words he’s dropping, and the way his body cannot seem to stay still under my ministrations… it’s all adding up to be one hell of an inexplicably magical moment for the great Matt Connover.

  “God… Mac… that feels good,” he groans. I purr in approval, not wanting to remove my lips from him to thank him for his praise.

  Intent on making him scream my name out, I pull him in deeper than ever, straight to the back of my throat, and give an extremely strong suck. His hands grip my hair, and he tries to pull me off. “Fuck… I’m going to come if you don’t stop. ”

  I think I snarled at him. I might have even released him long enough to gnash my teeth like a feral dog fighting over a bone, but it was enough that he released my head. I latch back on, intent on bringing Matt the same pleasure that he has doled out to me on more than occasion.

  I pour my all into it, loving every time he trembles against me, loving when his words are harsh and dirty, but then sometimes reverent. I love the taste of him, and the reclamation of the power that I was holding earlier.

  I’m loving all of it, but none of it compares to the feeling of when Matt finally orgasms so hard that his legs buckle and he falls to the bed, whispering over and over, “Mac… Mac… Mac…”

  Matt chanting my name in reverence is much sexier than him screaming at the top of his lungs. This was indeed a job well done.

  With a supremely satisfied smile on my face, I crawl up on the bed beside Matt and wait for him to recover.

  Then it’s my turn.

  I can hardly wait.

  It’s quitting time. The workweek is over, and a bunch of my colleagues invited me out for drinks with them. I declined, giving some lame-ass excuse that I already had plans, but truth be told, I don’t feel like doing anything other than going home, eating a carton of Ben & Jerry, and falling into a coma-like sleep.

  I’m exhausted, both mentally and physically.

  Why you ask?

  Well, I’ll tell you.

  I spent two days in Chicago with Matt, watching him depose witness after witness, while paying keen attention to his cat and mouse game so that I could take the best notes possible. At night, he kept me awake until the early morning hours, making love to me over and over and over again. He was insatiable. I was insatiable. We couldn’t get enough of each other, but I drew the line when Matt wanted to pull me into the bathroom on the airplane so we could both join the Mile High Club.