Own Me Read online

  “You’ve been in a shitty mood since everyone showed up to help. Look, I’m sorry about the red paint—”

  “Stop,” I say, sitting on the edge of the walnut coffee table that probably cost half my tuition for the year. “The red looks fine. I don’t want to fight about paint. Or some look you think I have on my face. Because I’m nothing but grateful for your family’s help tonight.” I reach out and put one hand on her knee.

  It’s a little weird to see Genevieve in cut-off shorts and a tank top. She’s usually very dressed up, but I love this low-key look on her. It’s beyond sexy, and I’ve had to resist the urge to drag her into our room and show her just how much I like it…maybe a couple dozen times tonight.

  “You didn’t seem like it,” she says, still looking up at the ceiling.

  I stand up and head to the bathroom, getting the Eros lotion Marigold gave me out of the cabinet. She’s still staring at the ceiling when I come back to the living room.

  I pull her foot onto my lap, and she jerks her head up, but I ignore the look of shock on her face and act like I’m doing the most natural thing in the world.

  “I’m sorry. Maybe I’m just tired. It’s been a long few days.” Her foot is ridiculously small. I pour some lotion on my palms, and the heady, spicy aroma fills the apartment. I run my thumbs along her arches, and she bites her bottom lip and lets out a strangled moan. “Good?”

  “So…damn…Adam,” she gasps as I rub harder, watching her face contort as she pushes her foot harder into my hands.

  I rub until she’s gone slack on the couch. Then I grab the other foot, and she squirms back on the cushions and slowly slides back down until she’s hanging half off the edge. I rub until she sits up, looking at me like she wants to say something.

  “Are you—”

  I start to ask a question. But I don’t remember what, because she’s suddenly straddling my lap, her arms around my neck, her body pressed soft against me, her mouth fierce on mine.

  “I don’t know what the rules are,” she gasps. “But if we’re going to be…bonded, why not make the best of it, right? We can handle being friends with benefits.”

  “Genevieve,” I groan, ripping my mouth away from hers. “I want you. I want you now. Come to bed.”

  She nods, and I stand, lifting under her ass. She circles her legs around my waist, and I walk, blinded by her kisses and deaf from her moans, my free hand in front of me to take the impact of every wall I bang into on the way to our room. I’ve never been happier to have no idea what the hell is going on beyond the moment I’m drowning in.

  I stumble through the doorway and drop her on our huge bed, which takes up most of the tiny room. Our bedroom. Her hair spills deep midnight against the pure white bedspread. I kiss her neck, pressing her hair back so I don’t miss a single inch of skin. She kneads her fingers into my shoulders, then pulls back with a start.

  “I’ve never— I’ve never seen you naked,” she says, her brow furrowed.

  I can’t help laughing. “It’s not usually part of the tutoring experience, but for you I’ll make an exception.” I strip off my T-shirt, undo my pants and let them drop, and stand in front of her in just my boxers.

  “Oh.” Her gray eyes are wide, darting up and down my body so quickly they’re like silver fish in a bowl. “You’re…wow.”

  I hold my arms out and chuckle. “I know. Pretty damn amazing, right?”

  “Yeah. Yes. I think so.” She sits up on her elbows and cocks an eyebrow my way. “So, how does a scientist get such an awesome body?”

  “Microscopes,” I say, walking close to the bed. I like the way her mouth closes tight and her eyes pop wide. “They’re heavy. Good for lifting.”

  “Really?” she whispers, her eyes on my abs.

  “No.” I kneel on either side of her hips and drop my hands next her shoulders, bridging my body over hers. I lean down to nuzzle her neck, kissing and sucking softly. “I lift weights. Boring, I know. Guys aren’t the big mystery girls always assume we are.”

  “Weights? That’s hard for me to picture. I guess I always think of you with…well, with microscopes, or your binders. Or petri dishes…” Her voice trails off as she touches my face gently, then lets her fingers explore down my body.

  I make sure I hold every muscle tight, glad I started lifting more regularly again when the stress of my impending deportation got real. It’s an old trick leftover from my time in the military: lifting is the most mind-numbing thing I can do. It’s what I did to help myself adjust to life in the barracks—and to give myself a shot at catching up with the guys who’d been building muscles all the years I was buried in books.

  Now I’m glad I needed to zone out recently, since my hot-as-hell wife is obviously appreciating the efforts.

  “That’s very stereotypical,” I say, letting my mouth roam as low as the scooped neckline of her shirt. I kiss where the little bit of lace meets her skin. “I was in the army, you know. I’m not just a science nerd.”

  “You were?” Her eyes widen, and I think about the day in the barracks when my best friend, Uziel, told me that agreeing to conscription was my only chance of ever getting laid.

  He wound up being right.

  I drag my thumbs over the straps of her tank and pull them down her shoulders, letting my mouth follow the trail my fingers take. “Three years. Very hard, very lonely labor.”

  “Was it awful?” she asks, her breath hitching as I kiss down past the curve of her shoulder, my stubble scratching at the delicate skin.

  “Not so bad.”

  It wasn’t.

  I liked the discipline. I liked getting away from my father for a few years. I liked the respect in his eyes when I came home after my service was done.

  I didn’t like the surprise that came with it. He’d figured I was going to dodge my conscription because I’d been so immersed in studies. Or give military life a try, but then prove to myself and everyone else I wasn’t tough enough and ask for an exemption.

  I actually contemplated doing exactly that, but proving my father wrong meant more to me than even my science studies or my reluctance to give three years of my life to the military. Shallow, but true.

  “Girls serve, too, right?” Genevieve asks, her fingers running up the back of my arms and drawing down over my back.

  “Not as long as men, but, yes. A lot of them do.” My first girlfriend was a girl I met in the army. She was as heartless as she was gorgeous, and her constant emotional torture and wild temper cooled me on the idea of dating for a long time after we broke up. “I don’t really want to think about them, though.”

  “Why not?” She arches under me, her body bucked up off the mattress and pressed hard against mine. I suck air hard through my teeth and blow it back out.

  “Because the most gorgeous girl I’ve ever seen is in my bed, and she just happens to be my wife. Being with you is the only thing I want to think about, Genevieve. Holy hell, you’re beautiful.” I press up on my arms and look down her body. Her shorts are pushed low on her slim hips, and her tank is riding up under the swell of her tits. “If you’re making me this crazy with your clothes on, I’m not sure I’m going to be able to control myself when I strip you naked.”

  She blushes at my words. “Adam…” She bites her bottom lip and looks away.

  “What is it?” I struggle to keep my voice even.

  “If we do this…it changes things, right?” Her eyes have gone a dark gray, plagued with a thousand worries. About me, about us.

  The words come out of my mouth, and they’re not just a vehicle to get her out of her clothes. I mean what I say.

  “It does. But things already changed, Gen. We’re not just friends. We’re bonded to each other. We take care of each other. And I know… I know it’s not permanent. But while we’re together—”

  I stop and take her hand and rub a thumb over her rings, the ones I put on her finger when I asked her to agree to this marriage of convenience, and when I vowed to take care
of her. Forever.

  I know that can’t be. I don’t get forever with her. That privilege belongs to some other guy. Maybe that guy will be who she thinks about when she’s buying her wedding dress and maybe that guy will think to carry her over the threshold—her first love married someone else, but she’ll be looking to feel what she feels with Deo again someday.

  Someday she’ll meet the guy who makes her feel that—and that’s the day I’ll have to let her go.

  “What if you hadn’t needed to get married so quickly? Do you think there’s any chance this all would have happened anyway? Later on?” Her hands glide up to my neck and hold tight at the base, pulling my mouth close.

  We’re inches apart, and I close my eyes and press my body down over hers, collecting her in my arms and crushing her against me. “I hate even thinking about that.”

  “Why?” Her voice is ribboned with panic. “Why do you hate it?”

  “Because I’m…”

  Afraid I would have never gotten the courage up.

  Terrified to think about a life without you.

  I kiss her mouth, release my hold on her, and run my hands over her arms, tug up, and pin her wrists over her head.

  “Because I’m a scientist,” I say, like the coward I am. “I like to work with facts, not anecdotal what ifs.”

  I’m petrified that my one shot with you was wasted on a lie. I should have wooed you the day we met. I should have made you forget the guy you thought you were in love with. I should have taken a risk, because now I’m in a marriage with an expiration date that I’m afraid will come too soon.

  The truth squeezes the air out of my lungs, and I kiss her, hard and fast, to keep the possibilities of that alternate reality from taunting me.

  “Would you ever have asked me out?” Her legs twine with mine; her teeth nip at my bottom lip. “Were you attracted to me?” Her question is nothing but a ragged pant.

  I run my hands over her body, coasting over the flat, warm plane of her stomach, spreading my fingers along her underwire bra and up over the cups, desperate to rip her clothes off.

  “I was just glad someone as amazing as you even wanted to be friends with a geek like me. And you know you’re beautiful. So damn beautiful,” I tell her.

  I press her shirt up, and she nods to let me know—yes— she wants it off. She moans as I tug it up and over her head, letting her hair fall in a wide circle on the mattress as I drop the scrap of cloth onto the floor. I rub my hands over the lacy fabric of her bra, then reach a hand around her back and undo the snap. I pull it away, and her tits fall out, soft and tempting.

  Too tempting.

  I drop my head and suck in a nipple, loving the way her entire body jerks. She curls up toward me, her fingers raking through my hair and pulling my head closer. I suck and kiss, burying my face in the impossibly sweet smell of her, holding her tight to me with one hand at her back. I use the other hand to undo the button and tug down the fly of her tiny shorts. I push them off her hips and reach back up for the waistband of her panties.

  There’s nothing there.

  I pull my mouth back from her nipple and look up at her, the need for her so extreme it’s a physical ache. “You didn’t—?”

  She bites her bottom lip and shakes her head, her cheekbones a deep pink. “I’d packed them all. I kept out a set I got from Maren and Whit, but I didn’t want to work in them. It’s, um, really…it’s sexy. Do you want to see?”

  I sit up on my knees and drag my hands down her body, just hard enough my fingers leave imprints on her skin for a few seconds.

  “I want to. You have no idea how badly I want to. But I need you now. Right now. I can’t even think about being any more turned on than I already am.”

  She leans up and tugs at the waistband of my boxers. The fabric is stretched out like a ridiculous tent, and I shake my head when she giggles.

  “What’s so funny, wife?” I ask.

  She stops giggling at the possessive way the last words comes out, and her eyes meet mine, the pupils pitch black. She tugs hard, and my boxers are on the floor.

  “Nothing’s funny.” She shakes her head. “I’m just happy.”

  I press her shoulders back so she falls onto the mattress.

  “You’re happy?”

  I smile down at her, my fingers trailing down her stomach, stopping just inside of her thigh.

  She nods. “Mmm. So happy. My husband is an incredibly kind, handsome genius. Like that’s not enough, he has the biggest cock I’ve ever seen.”

  The sexy words slip out of her mouth so sweetly, it’s jarring.

  My hand presses her legs apart, and I’m ready to find her clit and rub her until she’s slick and ready for me. But there’s no need.

  “Your pussy is soaked,” I say, my mouth close to her ear. I slide my fingers deep into her, screwing my eyes shut and swallowing hard when a long, hungry groan breaks out of her mouth.

  “I want you, Adam. So bad. So damn bad.” Her whimpers shake her body, and I press my fingers deeper, my eyes on her face. I’ve wanted her for so long, and now I can have her.

  She’s spread in front of me, wet and ready, begging for me.

  She’s my wife. There’s nothing wrong with what I’m about to do.

  So why do I feel like I shouldn’t be doing it?

  Maybe because I know I’m just a stand-in.

  Maybe because I’ve never wanted anything the way I want to be the one she chose.

  But that’s not possible, so I decide to be satisfied with the fact that I get to be with her at all. I’m luckier than I deserve. And I can’t say no to her. It’s just not in me.

  “What’s wrong?” Her hands grasp tightly on my jaw. She pulls me up so I’m looking right at her, right at the lush mouth that I want on every part of my body. Everywhere. “Is something wrong?”

  “No, nothing’s wrong. I want you.” Even as I’m debating in my head, my fingers are moving faster in her, sucked into the tight, wet core of her. She winds a hand down between our bodies and closes her fingers around my dick, rubbing and pressing until my breath goes ragged.

  “If you want me, take me,” she murmurs, her tongue darting out to lick my ear. She blows softly and that one tiny action spirals everything out of control.

  “Damnit, Genevieve. Are you sure?”

  “Yes.” She opens her legs wide and pulls me to her, fitting the head of my dick just where she’s slickest. “Now, Adam. I don’t want to wait anymore.”

  I kiss her and press long and slow. She’s so tight I’m afraid to go any faster, but so wet I know she’s ready for more. “Genevieve? Is this—?”

  “No.” She shakes her head and grabs at my hips.

  For a second I think the “no” means she doesn’t want this after all, but then her hands tighten on my ass, and she slams me deep into her. My vision goes dark and only comes back in silver pinpricks of bursting light.

  “Like this?” I draw out of her and press back in, then do it again and again, faster.

  “Like this.” She locks her legs around my hips and rolls on top of me, then pulls me up by the shoulders so our bodies are locked close. She grabs my hands and puts them on her tits. I squeeze them, rolling her nipples under the pads of my thumbs. She says something rapid and sexy in Spanish, and I don’t know what it is, but I want to do whatever keeps that language spilling out of her mouth like music.

  “You like it like that?” I jerk my hips up hard and fill her completely. She spreads her legs wider and drives deeper onto me.

  “More,” she begs, her silky black hair over her shoulders and my arms, her mouth twisted like she’s almost where she needs to be.

  I pull out and tip her back on the bed, grab one of the throw pillows she just bought, and prop it under her. Her hips are tilted up, and I kneel in front of her. “More?”

  She covers her face with her hands and arches her back. “Mmm. Yes!”

  I slide deep into her, my thumb rubbing around her clit. “Look at me.�
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  She separates her fingers and smiles from behind the bars they make. “I am.”

  I pull back, almost out, and say, “Let me see your face.”

  One eyebrow arches high. “Why?”

  I lean forward, grabbing her wrists and pulling her arms to the side as she laughs. “Because I want to see your face when I make you come.”

  The laugh stops in her throat. I thrust deep, bracing my arms and holding her wrists. Her eyes lock on mine, never breaking contact. Not when she draws her knees up and lifts her hips higher. Not when the first wave of slick tightness surrounds my dick, making my vision blur. Not when her lush little mouth opens wide and the first panting moans break into something louder, something wilder.

  I drive deeper into her, adjusting until the moans turn to pleas and, finally, a long, fantastically sexy string of Spanish that ends with my name.

  She’s so wet, I can’t hold back for another second. She shakes and bucks under me, and I finally empty into her, rocked to my core, and completely spent. I lie on top of her for a second, then move to roll off.

  “Stop.” She twines her legs around my waist, pressing her heels into my ass. She wraps her arms around my shoulders and kisses me softly. “Stay in me. I want to feel you in me.”

  “Am I heavy?” I ask.

  She doesn’t answer. Her breathing is shallow and slow, and I roll to the side, still buried inside her, but not lying on top of her. She hitches her hips closer and nuzzles her head against my shoulder before going slack. I’ve never seen anyone fall asleep this quickly.

  The room is dark, and I wait until her body shudders with a chill before I pull away from her.

  For a second, I feel the weight of being an imposter. I’m not the man she wanted, and that stings. But, for a little while, I get to have her to myself, and I’ll take it as long as it lasts.

  I’m not sure about much, but I know I’ll kick myself every day ’til I die if I waste a single second of the time I have with Genevieve Rodriguez.

  No. Genevieve Abramowitz.

  I wonder how long this amazing woman will share my name, then I decide to stop thinking about the unknown future and enjoy the bliss of my present situation.