Fast & Hard: A Formula 1 Romance (The Fast Series) Page 14

  “What do you mean?” Mallory asks.

  “We’d like to do an exclusive. Infinity Magazine would be perfect, global digital coverage and print in the US, plus sixteen countries in Europe, and eleven in the Asian markets.” Cooper’s eyes are big, darting between Mallory and I. He’s practically salivating.

  “An exclusive?” I ask.

  “Yes, your life, your career, the wins, the losses, who you really are. Your story, as you want it told, no bullshit. Mallory, you’d have total control.”

  “Oh, wow. That means so much that you would offer that, Mr. Cooper. Really, I am honored. But Mr. Gibbes doesn’t do personal stories.” Mallory smiles but I see the twinkle in her eyes dim a little.

  “Damn, that’s too bad. I think you have a story to tell, Lennox.”

  “Everyone has a story, Mr. Cooper,” I reply.

  “Yeah, you’re right about that. Here’s my card, if you ever change your mind, please.” He hands a card to Mallory and one to me.

  Mallory thanks him and I follow her as she picks up another champagne from the open bar and I order another scotch. “What was that about?” I ask her as she downs half her glass in one go.

  “That,” she comes up for air, “is daddy’s worst nightmare, his nemesis, arch-rival. He’s Robert Mitchell’s Digby DuPont,” she giggles. “My dad threatened to stop paying my college tuition if I went to work at Cooper.”

  “That’s messed up,” I shake my head and watch Mallory reach for another glass of champagne. “You know, we’ve done our work here tonight, I think it’s probably safe to leave anytime you want now.” I’ve lost count of how many glasses she’s had but she’s power drinking now and can’t be having a good time.

  “Ooo, auction time!” She hiccups as the lights flicker alerting the room to focus their attention as another identical man in a tuxedo takes the stage. “Let’s go watch horrible people complete to leave as little money as possible to cancer research while still getting credit and one-upping each other!”

  Mallory drags me near the stage right next to Lydia and Robert who immediately purse their lips and tsk when Mallory wraps an arm around me and cuddles into my side.

  “Mallory, you’re drunk!” Her father sticks his fat head into our space and seethes at her. “You look like a tramp!”

  “Hey,” I shake my head at him and warn him as clear as possible, without causing a scene, that I’m not above causing a scene. Mallory flips him the bird and Lydia gasps.

  What kind of father calls his daughter a tramp? This is insanity. I have no idea how Mallory escaped her childhood and became a reasonably functioning adult.

  Bidding starts, donation for some specialized medical equipment in a new treatment wing of the local children’s hospital. A few people call out their cheap-ass bids, $1,000 here, $2,000 there.

  “$10,000!” Robert yells and smirks at me, the crowd claps.

  “I hate him,” Mallory mumbles into my side, slurring her words.

  Something primitive boils over inside of me watching Robert’s dumb fucking face glare at his daughter like she’s a piece of trash and I’m the scum leading her into ruin.

  “One hundred thousand,” I yell. The crowd roars. Mallory’s eyes go wide and Robert and Lydia gasp and huff, as if it’s offensive that a charity make more money.

  “One ten!” Robert bellows, putting his hand on hips wide hips, completely convinced that he’s just shown me who’s boss.

  “Two fifty,” I shout.

  “How dare you!” Robert seethes before Lydia can smack him in the gut because the whole room just heard him chastise someone for donating money to kids with cancer.

  “I can do this all night, old man. How deep are those print media pockets these days?” I bait the two most awful people in this room. I probably shouldn’t have sunk to his level, using money to make a point, but it’s for two good causes: kids and the girl clinging to me who he’s humiliated for the last goddamn time.

  Mallory snorts as Robert and Lydia’s mouths drop open and the room snickers and whispers behind us. Lydia looks around, horrified, then scurries out of the crowd like the shameful excuse for a human she is.

  “Sold!” The auctioneer announces over the microphone. “Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars of state of the art medical equipment to treat children afflicted with cancer here in New York City! Your name, good sir?”

  “Mallory Mitchell and Lennox Gibbes,” I reply.

  The other attendees clap, a few random strangers pat me on the back, which I actually do not appreciate, but then the auction moves onto the next item. “Take me home, Mr. Gibbes,” Mallory wraps her hands around my neck and presses her tits into my chest.

  “I thought you’d never ask, hot nanny.”

  I lead us out of the crowd of people at the stage and toward the exit when Robert rears his ugly head again. This guy’s like a bad case of herpes, there’s no getting rid of him. “You’ve gone too far this time, Mallory! Too far! You are dead to me! Dead!”

  “Dad?” Mallory turns to him and slurs slowly. “Gooooo. Fuck yourself.”

  I can’t help but crack up laughing, Mallory swaying like a drunk person and telling her old man off in the middle of this black tie affair filled with New York’s elite. A hundred people must have heard her.

  Robert storms off and Mallory calls to me, way too loudly for present company, “Lennox, take me home and do those filthy things to me you said in German!”

  “Now who needs a nanny?” I laugh and wrap my arm around her to support her as I walk, and she stumbles, out the door as our limo is pulled around.

  “Four Seasons, Central Park,” I tell the driver and then push the button to close the divider window.

  Before the window is even fully closed, Mallory’s straddled my lap in the back of the limo and my hands are finally inside the slit in her dress running up her warm thighs and over her smooth ass. “Where are your panties, Mallory?” I growl as she attacks my neck.

  “Must have forgotten them,” she says in between breaths before she grabs my face and smashes her lips against mine. She tastes like sweet champagne and I need to know what the rest of her tastes like.

  With a hand underneath her, I flip her over and lay her down on the back seat. She whimpers and pushes her hips up to mine as I start my descent down from her neck, over the soft swells of her breasts, over her hard nipples. I’m almost to her belly button, kissing and licking through her dress when her hand in my hair goes limp.

  I look up and her eyes are closed, her head turned to the side. Out cold.

  This can’t be happening, this is a new low in my life. I don’t think I’ve ever been rejected. Certainly, no woman has ever fallen the hell asleep on me before. This nanny is going to be the bloody death of me.

  Fifteen

  “Oh, it’s quite clear you’re no romantic. Take my hand and we can run, into every setting sun. I’m getting closer, closer, closer to me.” - Sea Girls - Closer

  Mallory

  I’m floating on light, fluffy clouds. Warmth radiates around me. I stretch my toes and crisp, luxurious cotton slides against my calves. A thick down pillow cradles my head as I keep my eyes closed and wiggle blissfully back into the… hard morning wood pressed into my ass?

  My eyes shoot open and that’s when the throbbing at the front of my brain starts. Curtains are cracked on the panoramic floor to ceiling windows in front of me, hints of the New York skyline beyond coming into view as my eyes struggle to focus. Wrapped around my chest, a strong forearm I’ve come to recognize. The heat emanating into my back and soothing my muscles, the scent drifting to my senses, my sort-of boss. The man I was paid to supervise last night.

  Except, oh god. I was the one needing supervision. The memories of my father slut-shaming me, my mother’s face fighting the Botox to grimace in my direction all evening, her club friends sneering, it all comes back as the pounding in my head picks up.

  On the nightstand is a bottle of Powerade and a travel packet of Advil
. I would smile at the thoughtfulness of the gesture if moving my facial muscles didn’t incite the marching band in my temples. I reach for the bottle and rip open the packet of pain meds, scooting out from under Lennox’s heavy arm just a bit so I can drink. The sheet pulls down and my naked breasts are exposed, a warm beam of sunlight hitting them and dusting the room.

  I sneak a hand behind me and run my fingers over a sleeping Lennox, up his muscular thigh, and I shutter my eyes in relief when I feel the cotton of his boxer briefs. “Keep going, a little higher,” his deep, gravelly morning voice murmurs into the back of my head and he moans as he pulls me by my waist back into his impressive length. Everything about this man is rock hard, every sculpted inch.

  Except, what he did last night. There was a softness inside of him.

  “Did we…” I start, afraid of the answer. If I don’t remember the first time I had sex with this glorious specimen of a man, I am going to regret it more than any of the scenes I caused last night.

  “You’d remember if I fucked you, love.” So smooth and confident, a touch arrogant, but given the girth of what I feel in my backside right now, maybe it’s well earned.

  He releases his hold around my body and rolls onto his back, stretching and taking up half of the king-sized bed. I pull the sheet up around my chest and sit up against the multitude of down pillows lining the headboard. The suite is exquisite. Rich fawn walls, cream and leather sofas, and purple orchids on mahogany end tables bring pops of color to the luxurious space.

  I suck down the Powerade, the artificial cherry flavor replenishing much needed electrolytes and quenching my cottonmouth. I need to do damage control, figure out how bad the fallout is from my behavior last night. I remember leaving with Lennox, but I have no recollection of how I got into this hotel, naked, and in bed. Over the back of a chair in the attached seating area, I see my mother’s gown, $5,000 worth of Givenchy, and I peer my head at it because it looks ripped down the entire length.

  “What happened to my dress?”

  “You were stuck and demanded I get it off you ‘right fucking now.’ I obliged.” Lennox says, smirking and running a hand over his bare chest. I have a million and one things I should be doing right now, but I can’t take my eyes off his abs and the trail of dark hair below his belly button.

  “And then I just, fell asleep?” I’m so embarrassed.

  “No, then you tried attacking me like a rabid bear. Then I put you to sleep.”

  “Thank you,” I sigh.

  “Again, asshole, not monster, Mallory.”

  “You weren’t an asshole last night,” I poke his leg under the covers with my toe. “You didn’t have to do that, you know, the auction.”

  “Aye, I know.”

  I want to cuddle up against him and lay my head on his broad chest, wrap my hand around his narrow waist, but I don’t know if snuggling is on the table. We have yet to discuss this arrangement and cuddling might be squarely in the girlfriend zone. We’re in the murky inappropriate workplace shagging zone, I think.

  “The Maxwell Cooper thing,” he says, scratching his head and twisting his face up oddly.

  Oh god, I’d forgotten. Max put us both on the spot and personal stories are already a touchy subject for Lennox. “Sorry about that. You’ve made your stance on the matter clear. No worries.”

  I change the subject and wonder what else I’ve forgotten or blacked out. “I need to check my phone. Was it as bad as I remember?” I look all around but don’t see my phone anywhere. I have no clothes nearby to throw on so I try pulling the sheet off the bed to wrap around and take with me.

  “I turned your phone off and don’t bother with the sheet,” he yanks it back from me, “already seen it all. Quite lovely, if I may add.”

  “Lennox,” I yank the sheet back, “I have no clothes here! Give me your shirt or something, you brute!”

  He groans and gets out of bed, giving me a perfect view of his tight ass in his boxer briefs and, on his return trip with his dress shirt from last night, an eyeful of bulge. He runs his tongue over his bottom lip when he sees me staring at him, and watches me slip his dress shirt on in bed. “Stop looking at me like that, I need to shower,” I tell him, rolling up the sleeves.

  “I’m just going to dirty you up again,” he argues, and my chest tightens. I’m kind of glad he said it so I know where we stand after last night.

  “Awfully arrogant, Mr. Gibbes,” I inch toward the bathroom and then take off in a mad dash as he tries to grab me across the bed.

  “Payback, Mallory. Payback!”

  My reflection in the bathroom mirror is enough to frighten the dead. I have raccoon eyes, my hair looks like a woodland creature made a nest in it. “Where is my phone?” I call through the bathroom door as I start scraping last night’s makeup off my face with a washcloth. I’m picturing all the nasty messages from my family that await me, but I’m more worried about any harm I may have created for Lennox.

  “You won’t be needing it today,” he calls back.

  I mumble to myself thoughts of strangling him while I loot the Four Seasons vanity kit and brush my teeth. If photos of me drunk and hanging all over Lennox come out, Sandra is going to can my ass. I most certainly do need my phone today.

  I pop out of the bathroom to demand he grow up and return my phone but he’s no longer in bed. He’s standing a few feet away, arms crossed over his chest, sporting a raging hard-on, and he’s looking at me like a lion about to take down a gazelle.

  “Lennox,” I cock my head at him, “give me my phone.”

  He raises one finger and motions for me to come hither.

  “Lennox,” I warn and take a step backward, calculating how far I need to make it back into the bathroom, if I can beat him. I take half a step and then make a break for it. I don’t even get two steps before his arms loop around me, I’m flipped around, and tossed over his shoulder.

  “Oh my god, you absolute caveman,” I scream and wiggle.

  “Scream all ya’ want, love, just gets me harder.” He slaps my ass so hard I let out another shriek.

  I’m carried through the suite’s living room and he throws me on the bed, sending me flying with a bounce on the firm mattress. I’ve never seen his eyes so vivid green, so intense. I am the prey and he is the predator, except I want to be eaten, I want him to tear at my flesh and open my soul open. He stands, gaze never leaving mine as I prop myself up on my elbows and he makes his way to a small overnight bag nearby, fishes out a new box of condoms and tosses them on the bed.

  “A whole box, oh my,” I watch him and start seductively unbuttoning his shirt that I’m wearing. Lennox is at the foot of the bed watching, chest heaving, nostrils flaring. He approaches and takes my foot, pulling me to the end of the bed in a swift tug. His lips press to the arch of my foot, my ankle, up my calf, and he licks a sweet trail behind my knee before dropping my leg back to the bed. He does the same to my second leg and my breathing is already picking up, my pulse racing.

  My second leg falls to the sheets and he kneels onto the bed between me, fists my half-open shirt, and rips it the rest of the way, buttons ruined and popping off. He’s so toned and muscular I can see every tiny movement he makes reflected in each sinew and tendon flexing. His sculpted abs are tight and the outline of his hardness is pushing up to the low waistband of his briefs.

  He inches forward and shoves the tattered shirt off my shoulders leaving me completely bare before him. I’ve always been the one in control, the aggressor between the sheets, but right now I find myself completely at his mercy. I want to give myself over to him, for him to take what he wants from me. And it’s making me so wet for him.

  Holy fuck this is hot. How is he so sexy?

  Lennox growls at the sight of me so exposed and vulnerable and spreads my legs in his strong arms, holding my knees open and silently taking in the sight before him. He bends and begins licking his way up from my knee, along my inner thigh and traces his lips along the outside of my freshly waxe
d folds. He barely makes contact with a feather-soft kiss on my mound and I gasp and push myself toward him. But he retreats and works his way down again, trailing his tongue up my other thigh before landing back at my center when he licks me with a touch so light it’s barely a breath.

  “Lennox” I hiss and push at him again, so desperate for pressure or friction.

  My fingers running through his thick hair, I clutch a handful and try to pull him to me. I need his mouth on me, I need his tongue dancing with mine. I need the taste that is so uniquely Lennox. I fall back onto the pillows when he allows himself to be pulled up and he covers me with his body weight, hands and mouth on my breasts. He’s sucking to leave marks and god, I want him to. I want his claim branded on me. He circles my nipple with his tongue, then caresses the peak and bites before he takes it between his lips again and smothers it in the heat of his mouth.

  Kneading my other breast, he brings his legs up to kneel over me, grips my jaw and finally his tongue meets mine. A faint whisper of last night’s scotch melds into my palate. I gasp for air between the assault of our mouths and feel so powerless beneath him, merciless to this dominance and it’s the most liberating feeling I’ve ever known. I want to let go, forget, give in to him completely. His thick cock is pushing into me and I reach for his waist to push his briefs down but he captures my hands and pins them beside my neck.

  “Hands above your head,” he commands and for the first time, I don’t argue. I obey, watching him in a trance and gripping the pillow beneath my head.

  Take me, I won’t fight.

  Sliding down my body, his tongue leaves a trail of heat across my collarbone, the valley of my breasts, the sensitive skin of my midsection. My lungs are on fire and I’m trembling with need, the games we’ve been playing for weeks are long gone. I’m ready to beg if need be. He can win, he can have me.

  “Fucking beautiful” Lennox groans, taking in the full naked length of me before him. “Spread your legs.” His voice is so low and gruff, his accent even thicker than normal.