The Devil's Bargain Read online

  The sound of his name on her lips in that begging tone did wicked and weird things inside him. He’d do anything she wanted. She made him want to be a better man. The kind she deserved.

  But she also made him want to growl and shout from the highest rooftop that she was his. She made him sloppy. She made him give a damn, which was dangerous.

  How could she make him want to be both the best and the worst versions of himself at the same time?

  Not that it really mattered. It simply was. Genevieve was complicated, and his reaction to her was even more so.

  Caught up in her own cloud of need, she reached for him. Her fingernails dug into his skin. The pinch helped to center him, bring him back to the here and now.

  Curling his body over hers, Finn placed his palms on either side of her. Finding her mouth, he pulled the taste of her deep inside.

  His dick throbbed with need, but he had to ask a couple questions first.

  Staring into her glassy eyes, he asked, “Are you on something?”

  “Huh?”

  “Birth control. As much as I want you pregnant again so I can experience everything with you this time, I think probably not a smart move.”

  “Oh.” She blinked, the haze clearing a little. “Yeah, I’m on the Pill.”

  Thank God. “Obviously, I’m clean.”

  She blinked again. “Oookay.”

  Perfect. Bending his head, Finn tugged the bud of her nipple into his mouth. Grasping her hips, he pulled her to the edge of the table so that he could align his cock with the tight, wet entrance to her body.

  Genevieve’s hands curled over his shoulders. “Wait. Wait.”

  Finn stilled, the head of his dick kissing the moist heat of her pussy. It was torture to stand there, so close to heaven, but he did.

  Closing his eyes, Finn started to back away, but Genevieve’s legs wrapped around his hips tightened, keeping him in place.

  “You aren’t going to ask me if I’m clean?”

  That’s what she was worried about?

  Finn could count his own heartbeat as it pulsed through his cock. The opening to Genevieve’s sex fluttered around the tip. She pulled his hips closer, and it was just too much.

  Using his grip on her, Finn pulled her forward at the same time he thrust deep. He slipped inside her body like he was born to be there. A groan of relief rumbled up through his chest. Genevieve let out a matching sigh.

  The walls of her sex clamped down around him, squeezing tight and stealing his breath.

  “Holy shit.” The words just popped out.

  Wrapping his hands around her face, Finn said, “Look at me.”

  Genevieve’s heavy-lidded gaze snapped to his.

  “I didn’t ask because I already knew the answer. How many times do I have to tell you that I know exactly what you’ve been doing for the last three years? Genevieve, you and Noah matter. You have from the moment I laid eyes on you.”

  She shook her head. “Too much.”

  She was wrong. “Not enough,” he countered.

  This was a discussion they could have later. Right now, he needed to feel her fall apart in his arms.

  Using his leverage, Finn began to thrust in and out of her body. Slowly at first, relishing the pleasure he found from her. The excruciatingly satisfying scrape and pull of friction.

  Genevieve whimpered. She spread her thighs wide, rocking her hips in time with his movements. Gripping his shoulders, she held on.

  It had been a damn long time since he’d had sex. Since the last time he’d touched her. Before, a dry spell for him had been going three days without a woman in his bed, let alone over three years.

  “This isn’t going to last long,” he warned.

  Her response was to lean forward, sink her teeth into his shoulder and shatter around him. The wave of her orgasm broke over him, sucking him under.

  The world spiraled down into a darkness that left only Genevieve at the center. His own release started at the base of his spine and shot straight out in hot spurts that left him gasping and weak.

  His knees sagged against the table and his arms collapsed out from under him. If it wasn’t for Genevieve’s thighs wrapped tight around his body he might have hit the floor. Instead, he ended up draped half across her body and half across the table.

  His harsh breathing mixed with hers. Her head was buried against the column of his throat.

  He was aware enough to register the flutter of her mouth as she placed a kiss against his skin.

  Yes. This was right.

  Finding strength from somewhere, Finn rolled back up onto his feet. He scooped her into his arms, spun to find the office chair on the far side of the room and collapsed down, cradling her naked body against his.

  After a few seconds, Genevieve stirred. Shifting, she looked up at him, an impish grin tugging at her lips.

  “You finished with me now?”

  “Not even close.”

  Nine

  Genevieve woke up alone. She knew Finn was gone before she’d even opened her eyes. Dread curled through her belly, but she forced it down. Nope, she wasn’t going to let herself think the worst.

  But instinct had her hand moving over to where he’d been sleeping to test if the sheets held any residual warmth. They did, although what did that prove?

  Nothing really, except that she needed to get a grip on herself. She was either doing this or she wasn’t, and if she was she couldn’t live every day waiting for the other shoe to drop.

  That wasn’t fair to Finn, but it also wasn’t fair to Noah. Or herself.

  Rolling onto her back, Genevieve pressed the heels of her palms into her eyes and rubbed. It had been two days since the studio. And since then, Finn had been at her side. Which was amazing, but it was also overwhelming.

  She hadn’t had a chance to catch her breath. To reason her way through what was happening and just how she needed to handle it all.

  Maybe she needed to send Finn home for a while.

  Grabbing her phone from the nightstand, Genevieve looked at the screen through bleary eyes, but that all changed when she registered the big numbers glaring at her.

  9:18.

  Bolting out of bed, she was halfway down the hall, her heart thudding for a completely different reason. No toddler slept until 9:18. Something was wrong.

  It didn’t help to find her son’s room empty. Or for the rest of the house to feel eerily quiet. Darting through the house, she skidded to a halt at the kitchen. The empty kitchen.

  Spinning in a circle, the dread that had churned her belly minutes before was now making it a whirlpool. Until something out of place caught her eye. A white piece of paper in the middle of the counter.

  Snatching it up, her eyes raced over the words, just starting to digest them as the garage door began to rumble.

  Yanking open the door, she raced into the garage. Even though, thanks to Finn’s note, her brain knew what was going on, the rest of her needed to feel Noah’s little body cradled in her arms.

  Finn had barely stopped the car before Genevieve popped open the back door. Noah grinned up at her, chocolate smeared across his angelic face.

  “Doughnuts, Mama.”

  Her precious son took the smashed-up treat gripped in his tight fist and shoved it against her lips.

  Her hands shook as she unbuckled him from his seat. Her arms felt weak, but she wasn’t about to let him go once she’d scooped him up. Hugging him close, Genevieve pressed a kiss to his head and breathed in his toddler scent.

  Rounding the car, Finn gave her a huge grin and leaned in for a kiss. But after touching his lips to hers he suddenly pulled back. His eyebrows beetled with confusion.

  “Hey, what’s wrong?”

  With his arm wrapped around her body, there was no way she could hide the tremors still working
through her.

  “I woke up and you were both gone.” She should have stopped there, but words tumbled out. “He’s my whole world and I don’t know what I’d do if you took him away from me.”

  Finn jerked backward as if she’d hit him. Which only made the sludge of nasty emotions in her belly worse.

  Shaking his head slowly, he said, “I would never take him away from you. Not ever, but definitely not like that.”

  “I know.” The minute the words were out of her mouth, she realized they were the truth. Finn was a con artist and a thief. But he had his own twisted sense of honor. He’d done nothing but help her since he’d forced his way back into her life. And while she might not trust him implicitly, she did trust him to protect their son.

  Closing her eyes, Genevieve realized how terribly she’d just screwed up. Reaching for him, she placed her hand along the hard ridge of his jaw. “I’m sorry. You didn’t deserve that reaction.”

  “No, I didn’t.” His words were harsh, but the hand he pressed into the small of her back was gentle. “But I understand.”

  She seriously doubted that he did. But even if so, that didn’t make what she’d just done any less regrettable.

  It was clear, by the expression in his eyes, that she’d hurt him. Something she wouldn’t have thought possible.

  Finn DeLuca didn’t let anyone matter enough to inflict pain. Or he hadn’t before. Even when she’d thought he was letting her in, it became obvious to her in hindsight that while she’d opened up to him about her worst fears, deepest secrets and most private desires...he’d given her absolutely nothing. In fact, he’d used what she had shared with him in order to get exactly what he wanted.

  For the first time, Genevieve stopped being pissed because that reality had left her vulnerable, devastated and feeling like a stupid idiot. Instead, she started to wonder why.

  What had happened to make Finn DeLuca the man he was? A charming, egotistical, devilish loner?

  She had no idea what this was between them, and wasn’t willing to even ask the question at this point. But what she did know was that this time she wasn’t going to let him get away with keeping himself separate and walled away.

  Genevieve had every intention of demanding more.

  * * *

  It was the middle of the night. Finn, Genevieve and Noah had spent all day together. After the rocky start in the morning, it had turned into an amazing day.

  Made even better by the fact that Genevieve was naked, spread out diagonally across the bed, her hair a mess, her skin flushed from pleasure and a relaxed smile on her face. The orgasms he’d had didn’t suck, either.

  Propped up on an elbow, she watched him. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

  Such a typical Genevieve demand. “That’s a pretty wide area to cover. And a difficult order to comply with. I don’t know everything you know so I can’t fill in the gaps.”

  She kicked out, her foot connecting lightly with his shoulder. “You know what I mean.”

  “No, I really don’t.”

  “Tell me something about you I don’t know. Before, you didn’t share anything. You’ve said several times that I have no secrets—which is creepy, by the way. You have nothing but secrets. I know you’re wealthy, but I don’t know how or why. I know you like jewels and art, but I don’t know where that desire started from. I don’t know if you have any family. Brothers, sisters, parents?”

  A frown tugged at the corners of her mouth. She rolled, grabbing the sheets and tucking them around her body. As if cataloging all the things she didn’t know about him made her feel exposed.

  Nope, he wasn’t going to let her start hiding from him now.

  Reaching out, Finn grasped the edge of the covers and yanked. They dragged against her skin, slithering against her body as he tossed them onto the floor beside them.

  “Hey,” she exclaimed, leaning up and chasing after them.

  Finn snaked an arm around her waist, tugging as he tumbled them both back to the bed.

  She struggled for a few seconds and he let her, waiting until she’d calmed again before rolling them so she was tucked into the curve of his body.

  “I have family money. My great-great-grandfather owned a plantation. He grew cotton and tobacco. But my great-grandfather wanted to move away from agriculture and slavery, and he wanted to be more powerful and influential. He used the family connections to build an import/export business, eventually building a transportation conglomerate. Shipping, rail, trucking, each generation managed to grow the business...until it became a multibillion-dollar corporation.”

  Genevieve’s fingers began to play against his chest, lightly stroking his skin in a way that was soothing and arousing at the same time.

  “My father was no exception. He spent his entire life devoted to growing the company. However, his focus was on expansion, which meant he was always traveling. Gone for months at a time as he opened a new hub in Europe or Asia. Or acquired some tiny warehouse in Africa. My mom went with him.”

  Finn heard the bitterness in his own voice and hated himself a little for it. You’d think after so many years he would have gotten past the anger. Apparently, not so much. “They were rarely home, and when they were they spent most of their time at the office. The business was their life.”

  “Is that why it’s not yours?”

  “Partly.” No, that wasn’t true. “Absolutely. I didn’t learn much from my parents, but I did learn that life requires balance. Sawyer and I decided early on we weren’t going to let the company—or any job—consume us the way it did my parents.”

  “Sawyer?”

  Tension tightened his shoulders. Finn consciously tried to relax it away, but it didn’t help. “My little brother.”

  “Where is he? When do I get to meet him?”

  “He’s dead.”

  Genevieve shifted, trying to move so she could look up at him. Tightening his arms around her, Finn kept her right where she was.

  “How?”

  Of course she’d ask. Finn fought against the rage that always tried to swallow him whole whenever he thought about Sawyer. The problem was that whenever he won the battle, that just left the guilt. The guilt he’d never be able to get rid of.

  “I was an adrenaline junkie when I was younger.”

  Genevieve tipped her head sideways. The fingers that had been playing across his skin stalled for several seconds. No doubt she was confused how his statement answered her question.

  “The problem with having no goal in life, but enough money at your disposal to buy whole islands, is that you get bored.”

  “Not necessarily. You got bored.”

  “Fair enough. I got bored. It didn’t take me long to figure out adrenaline cured the boredom. Around seventeen I started racing cars. Not legally, mind you.”

  A huff of sarcastic laughter puffed against his chest. “What would be the fun in that?”

  “Exactly. The more dangerous, the better. Some of my degenerate friends turned to drugs for adventure and the high, but I never found that satisfying.”

  “You like to be challenged, not to be out of control.”

  “Pretty much. Street racing, skydiving, BASE jumping. You name it—if I could get a hit of adrenaline, I was in.”

  “What does this have to do with Sawyer?” There was the question he’d been expecting.

  “Sawyer was the angel to my devil. Studious and serious. While I had no intention of working at the company at all, he always planned to take over. My parents recognized that and began grooming him for the position at an early age.”

  “Did that bother you? Them choosing him over you?”

  “Not at all.” Bitter laughter squeezed from his chest. “I felt sorry for Sawyer, although I know he didn’t dread the idea of it as I did. The thing was, since our parents were always gone, the two of us
pretty much only had each other. We were very close, even though we were very different.”

  “Not surprising.”

  “But we also fought. All the time.”

  “Also not surprising. You were brothers. And young.”

  “Maybe so. The older I got, the worse it became. Because Sawyer didn’t approve of any of the things I enjoyed doing. He was constantly harping on me that I was going to die young.”

  What irony that Sawyer had been the one to fulfill that prophecy.

  Caught up in his own misery and memories, Finn hadn’t realized he’d stopped talking until Genevieve asked, “What happened?”

  “He followed me to a race one night, pissed that I was going. There was a rumor the police had been tipped off about the intended track, so the location changed at the last minute. Somehow, he got word the new location had been compromised, as well. He followed me to stop me, but I wouldn’t listen. We argued, but I got in the car, anyway.”

  God, he would never forget the utter anger on Sawyer’s face as Finn had driven to the starting line and roared away.

  “I didn’t see the accident. I just heard about it later. The cops did show up. There was a scramble as people left. And somehow, Sawyer was hit. They told me he died on impact.”

  Finn shrugged, words backing up into a lump in his throat.

  “That doesn’t change the fact that he’s gone.” Genevieve’s soft voice washed over him.

  “No, it doesn’t. He shouldn’t have been there. It’s my fault.”

  She stirred again, trying to move so she could see him. Finn tightened his arms around her, but this time she wouldn’t be put off. Wiggling free, she pushed up so she could look at him.

  “You’re smarter than that, Finn. You know it’s not true.”

  “Maybe.”

  Grasping his face, she brought them nose-to-nose. “No. You didn’t hit him.”

  “It should have been me.”

  “That’s not how life works. I lost my parents when I was so young that I don’t have a single memory of either of them.”

  “I wish I didn’t have a memory of mine. I identified Sawyer’s body. I was nineteen. Our parents let their staff make the arrangements for his funeral. They flew in that morning and flew out again that night. Some business deal in Hong Kong that couldn’t be postponed.”