Because of His Fortune (For His Pleasure, Book 25) (7 page)

Her first bite of chicken was a
revelation.
 
It was mouthwateringly
good, and tender and the complexity of tastes Liam had brought out was simply
amazing.
 
She moaned, chewing it,
savoring each bite.

“Is it okay?” he asked, worried.

“Okay?” she said, astounded.
 
“Do you not know how good this food is?”

“I hoped you’d like it,” he replied.

“I love it,” she told him earnestly.
 
“You have a real talent.
 
This is one of the best meals I’ve ever
eaten.”

“Me too,” he said.
 
“But for me it’s the company.”

Grace smiled again and shook her
head.
 
“You’re too good,” she laughed,
eating more of his food, drinking wine, and wondering if all of this was too
good to be true.

Liam seemed to be in great spirits
despite his recent loss and what Grace knew must be in the back of his mind—that
his last conversation with his mother had been a horrible argument.

He poured both of them more wine.
 
“So,” he said, “how was work today?”

Grace made a face and rolled her
eyes.
 
“It could’ve been worse,” she
said, and then thought about it.
 
“Actually, I’m not sure if that’s true.”

“What was so bad?
 
Was Easton giving you a hard time
again?”

“He was okay,” she said, waving at the
thought of him.
 
“I mean, he hates
me, that much is obvious.
 
But he
did compliment my work from yesterday, so that’s something.”

“That’s great,” Liam told her.
 
“So what was so bad, then?”

She explained how her brother had come
into the office and given her a hard time about the newspaper article and the
picture of Liam with her in it.

Liam started laughing.
 
“Your brother is the best,” he said,
laughing harder.
 
“I need to hang
out with him.”

“Oh, he’d love that.
 
Scott worships at the feet of wealth and
celebrity.”

“I’m much more than that,” Liam
said.
 
“I’m also a pretty face.”

“True,” she said, smiling.
 
“But he doesn’t approve of my
involvement with you.
 
He says you
and your kind will never accept me.
 
He says we’re from different planets, different universes—all
that.”

Liam’s smile faded.
 
“Do you believe that?”

“No, not exactly,” she said, frowning a
little.

“So you believe it to some degree, then.”

“I don’t know what I believe.
 
But it does seem like I’d be more
welcome if I was rich and from a powerful family and I’d attended private
schools and ivy league universities.”

Liam sighed.
 
“Just because some people are snobs,
doesn’t mean we’re all snobs.
 
And
it also doesn’t mean we have to listen to the opinions of fools.
 
We’re not living in the fifteenth
century.
 
Things have changed, and
in the modern world, there’s a thing called social mobility.”

“It sounds so simple when you talk about
it,” Grace said.
 
“But I’m not sure
it’s really like that.”

“What matters is you and me and what we
think,” Liam said.
 
“So tell
me.
 
Do you agree with him that our
differences in education and wealth should keep us apart?”

She shook her head.
 
“Of course not.”

“Then let’s not allow that kind of
ridiculous to attitude infect our minds,” Liam told her.
 

Grace wanted to believe him.
 
“I’ll try not to.”

“Promise me, Grace,” Liam said, his
expression growing serious.
 
“Promise me that no matter what, you’ll always believe that we deserve
to be together.”

She hesitated.
 
“I want to believe,” she said.
 
“But I guess what worries me most is
you, Liam.”

“Me?” he asked, looking shocked.

“I don’t know if you really believe it as
much as you say.
 
Maybe you just
want to believe.”

Liam’s expression grew defiant.
 
“I’ll never believe that people should
be judged based on the amount of money some distant relative earned or the fact
that they were able to attend a prestigious school because someone bought a new
wing for a library in their name.”

“I know that you think that,” she told
him, considering her words carefully.
 
“But there’s a difference between what you think, intellectually, and
all of the things you’ve been taught and internalized from your life
experiences.”

The candle flames wavered as she and Liam
stared across the table at one another.

Grace was once again struck by Liam’s
pure handsomeness; his pale but nearly flawless complexion, the beauty of his
eyes, the devil-may-care grin he wore so easily.

But that grin was nowhere to be seen for
the moment.
 
Liam was thinking about
what she’d just said, and it was obvious that her words didn’t sit well with
him.
 
“It’s my life experiences that
tell me I’m no different, no better than you or anybody else.”
 
He stood up.
 
“I mean, do you honestly feel that I’m
secretly sure that I’m better than you, Grace?”

She stood up too.
 
“I didn’t mean it that way.”

She could tell that her comments had
gotten deeply under his skin and now she regretted pushing the issue.
 
Liam had come over, made himself
vulnerable, cooked this amazing meal—and all she’d done was find ways to
cut him down for it.

Liam turned away from her and stared at
the floor.
 
“You did mean it,
Grace.
 
You were telling me the
truth.
 
And you feel like I’m a
fraud, and that deep down I’m some kind of closeted elitist.”

“I don’t even know what that is,” Grace
said, approaching him from behind.
 

He turned around and looked at her with
his gaze burning.
 
“It means that I’m
just like Mother,” he said, his words bitter, like acid.

“Your mother wasn’t a bad person,” Grace
whispered.

“Are you sure about that?” he said.
 
“You didn’t know her.”

“You’re right.
 
But anyone who’s related to you can’t be
all bad.”

Liam smirked.
 
“Stop trying to placate me.
 
I’m not fragile.
 
I’m not going to break apart.”

“Are you trying to convince me or
yourself?”

His eyes twitched.
 
“I don’t know, to be honest.”
 
He reached out and touched her
face.
 
“I just know that I can’t
stop thinking about you.
 
Even when
I’m staring at the body of my deceased parent, even when I’m planning a funeral
and listening to the sobs of my siblings.
 
All I want to do is find you, be with you, feel you against my skin.
 
To slide inside you and fill you up,
crawl inside you until we blend together,” he murmured, moving closer and
closer until his lips were mere inches away from hers.

Grace tried to catch her breath, but she
was falling again—falling deeply into him, into his eyes, as his lips
touched hers and ignited the flame once more.

His lips were like nothing Grace had ever
felt before, and it seemed as though each time they kissed, her feelings for
Liam Houston only grew in intensity.

Their passion wasn’t diminished at all by
the events of the past few days.

If anything, it was more fervent, the
flame turning into an inferno that threatened to engulf everything in its path.

Even Grace was frightened by what was
happening between them.
 
She was
powerless before him, powerless to resist what she felt, and knowing that was
terrifying.

Her whole life up until now, she’d always
managed to stay in control.

But as Liam touched her, she had to admit
that everything had changed.
 
She
was now his completely.

“Oh God,” she whispered, as his lips
trailed down her jaw and neck and his hands worked the buttons of her blouse.
 
“Liam,” she moaned.
 
“That feels good.”

His lips were on the swell of her breasts
now.

He kissed them as he unbuttoned her
blouse all the way, and then his hands slid up to her bra and around,
unclasping it with dexterous efficiency.
 
Her lacy black bra fell to the floor, and now her chest was bare, as
Liam’s hands grabbed her breasts and his lips and tongue sucked her nipples.

Grace’s hands grasped Liam’s head,
feeling the sensuous strands of his hair as it intertwined through her fingers
and she pressed her chest into him, encouraging his sucking mouth.

Her nipples were crying out for him, the
sensitivity so enhanced, it was almost enough to make her scream and sob all at
once.

She wanted him more than ever.

“I want you in my mouth,
please—please!” she said, pulling away.

Liam stared at her with a ferocious
hunger in his eyes.
 
“Down on your
knees, then.”
 
He stood with his
legs apart and she dropped obediently to the kitchen floor.

She was at crotch level now, and her
hands reached out to unbuckle and unbutton his pants, frantically pulling them
down to his ankles.

His erection was poking through the hole
in his boxers, and Grace pulled those down also, sliding them easily past his
hips and down to his feet.

Liam’s perfect cock was pointing directly
at her face, as she grabbed the shaft with one hand and then licking the head
with her tongue, delicately.

He took a slow breath in and let it out,
and she saw that his powerfully thick legs were shaking from excitement.

“Your mouth is amazing,” he whispered.

She sucked on his head now, taking the
velvety softness of it into her warm mouth, her tongue wet, sliding around and
around, encircling the bulbous head of Liam Houston’s perfect cock.

She could feel the pulse of his heat, his
liquid, wanting to spurt into her mouth and cover her throat with his
seed.
 
She was encouraging him to
come, wanting to make him come fast—and then hoping he’d fuck her and
come again right away.

The thought of Liam fucking her made
Grace that much more excited, and she began bobbing her head enthusiastically,
sucking him in deeper, her lips extending and grasping his shaft all the way
down near his balls.

“Oh, damn that’s deep,” Liam said.
 
“I’m fucking your throat, baby.”
 
He thrust his hips against her,
penetrating her mouth, and she could in fact feel his cock pushing against the
back of her throat, nearly triggering her gag reflex.

She pulled back and let him loose, taking
a deep gasping breath.
 
A trail of
saliva poured from her mouth and onto his cock.
 
She looked up at him, her tongue
flicking out and grazing the tip of him, as he groaned and closed his eyes.

Grace went back to sucking on just his
head, while her slick hand stroked his shaft fervently.

“Play with your tits while you suck my
cock,” Liam instructed her, as he slowly thrust his hips, pushing his hard,
dripping cock into her mouth and then sliding it out until the tip was
lingering between her slightly parted lips.

Grace let go of him and instead began
touching her breasts, tugging on her own nipples, feeling the quickening of her
pulse and her excitement, as Liam’s dick seemed to get even harder in her
mouth.

He was groaning, breathing heavily
through his nostrils and starting to fuck her mouth, pumping his hips in time
with her desperate sucking.

She slid her tongue all over his shaft as
he pushed in, and then pulled out, she bobbed her head toward him.

Grace wanted him to come so badly she
could hardly stand it.

“Now put your hand down your pants and
play with your pussy while I come in your fucking mouth,” Liam told her.

He pushed into her mouth again and she
moaned from deep in her throat, feeling his urgency, tasting his pre-cum.

She slid her hand down into her pants and
under her panties.
 
They were soaked
through, completely wet, and her fingers plunged effortlessly into her hole.

“Shit, yeah,” Liam said, looking down and
watching her play with her breast using one hand and finger her pussy with the
other hand.
 
“Fuck that pussy,
baby—fuck it good and come for me.”