Page 25 of The Friends and Rivals Collection

MY SO-CALLED SEX LIFE

Hazel

Theoretically, I’ve had a lot of sex. Every position, every kind, everyplace.

On paper.

And on paper, it’s been great.

In real life though, sex has been good enough, mostly fun, and usually enjoyable. But I often have to write my own ending in my head to get over the cliff.

Right now already feels different than anything I’ve experienced.

Or written.

Axel’s hands on my face are better than the feelings I get when writing one of my books.

There’s nothing accidental, nothing experimental. This is a full-throttle kiss. He’s not playing any games, and I’m so damn grateful. I want to be kiss-fucked, and he must know it.

He crushes my lips like he wants me naked, and soon. Really soon.

But there’s a restraint in him too, coiled, like he’s ready to pounce when I give him the word. Like he’s waiting for me to unlock the next level of this kiss. I arch my hips against him, grinding against his erection.

He grunts. It’s primal, and heat flares in my cells. Then, he cages me against the door, pressing his hard-on against me and answering my move with a dominant one of his own. Like he knows that’s how I want it.

And I do. I want to be dominated. I want to be pushed around. I want to be a little manhandled.

He lets go of my face to grab my wrists, lift them over my head, pin them.

Book kiss, here I come. I am no longer jealous of my heroines. I am my heroines, but even those lucky leading ladies have nothing on me now.

I’m having what I gave them in all those stories. A kiss that makes me hot, wet, hungry.

As he sweeps his mouth over mine, he moans again, rough and carnal. The sounds of his desire thrum under my skin, between my thighs.

Have me, my body begs.

It’s strange to feel this way with him. It’s so unexpected that I’m still shocked it’s happening, even though it’s also the very thing I’ve craved wantonly since the first night in Rome.

When I roll my hips against him, he drops my wrists so he can slide a hand down my chest. He’s not tentative. He’s deliberate as he palms my right breast, then squeezes my nipple.

I gasp. The sound turns into a long “ohhh.”

He breaks the kiss, stares down at me. His lips are red, swollen. His eyes are blue flames. “Better,” he rasps, as if he can barely form sentences.

“What is?” I ask, breathy from being kissed senseless.

“Kissing you is better than I imagined,” he says.

My skin glows. My whole body tingles. He’s talking my language. I want to be wanted. I want to be craved. I want to be talked to in bed.

“Have you thought about me a lot?” I ask, still a little shocked, a little awed from his earlier confession.

He rubs the back of his knuckles over my cheek. “More than I want to admit.” But he does just that— admits .

I feel…electric everywhere.

Shivery and tingly.

“You’re a really good kisser.” I’m not trying to be smooth or seductive. Axel simply is, and I want him to know.

“I just really like kissing you ,” he tells me, like he’s stripping himself bare, laying all his confessions at my feet. “So I think I’ll do it again,” he says, finishing in that cocky tone that’s irked me so many times before.

Right now? That tone makes me wetter.

This time when his lips come down on mine, he’s not as rough. He’s almost gentle, a little reverent.

But he’s also very, very busy.

Unbuttoning my blouse.

Kissing as he goes.

Another kiss on the corner of my mouth. Another button undone. His lips coast along my jawline. His fingers trail down my chest, over the curves of my breasts.

I’m breathless with longing as he kisses and undresses me. My shirt falls open, and he pushes it off one shoulder then sweeps his mouth along my collarbone. “Can’t get enough,” he says.

Same here. I grip his arms, running my hands along his skin, so damn eager to explore him.

As I go, I’m amazed that we’re doing this. That we’re hurtling into bed. It feels so unreal.

“Is this really happening?” I whisper. If I talk any louder, I’ll break the spell of the train, the rattle of the wheels, the soundtrack to this rampant lust that’s driving us on.

“Yeah, baby. You want it to?” Axel asks, and there’s zero cockiness now. He sounds…vulnerable. I hardly ever hear that emotion from him. It hooks onto my heart.

“I do,” I gasp. “I really do. I think I need to say it because it’s just so…unexpected.”

“Say you want me,” he commands.

Easiest words ever. “I want you.”

“Good.” He rains more kisses onto my shoulder, then pulls back to look at me again.

“Want to kiss you across every inch of your body. Your neck.” He swipes his thumb down my throat to demonstrate.

“Your tits.” His fingers travel down my chest. “Here, right here.” He journeys over my belly, then visits the top of my skirt.

“Your thighs. The back of your knee. The top of your ass.”

I try to breathe. I try to stay upright. But I’m boneless. I’m on fire. “Do it. All of it,” I say.

One possessive hand curls over my ass. He squeezes, then moves his hand to my thigh. “Want to taste you everywhere. Want to kiss you everywhere. Want to fuck you just the way you want to be fucked.”

I was already sold, but that —ending his soliloquy with an ode to my pleasure—has me gushing. “Now. Please. Now.”

He growls, the sound an appreciative rumble. “You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to hear that.”

He’s right. I have no idea. But as I gaze at his wet, parted lips, then his darkened irises, I’m getting the message loud and clear. “Actually, I think I do,” I whisper.

“Let’s make sure though. I’ll show you.” With a wicked grin, he drops down to his knees, pushes up my skirt, tugs at my panties, then slides them down my thighs.

I step out of them, trembling.

Axel looks up at me, licking his lips. “You are too sexy for my own good.”

I don’t even know what to say. I’ve never felt too sexy for anyone’s good. I’ve always felt like I’m having better sex in my head. Like I’m writing sex, rather than experiencing it.

Until now.

“Oh, god,” I gasp at the first flick of his tongue.

I rope my hands through his soft hair as he kisses me nice and slow and so luxuriously, like I’m the appetizer, the dinner, the whole meal.

I could get lost in this kind of attention. It’s decadent. It’s pulsing. It’s a mix of midnight and starlight and fire. “So good,” I murmur.

That spurs him on, and he kisses me even more passionately. I’m dying to come, but I really want him to fuck me. To throw me down, to push me against the wall, to take me. The images send me spiraling to the edge.

“Fuck me now. Just fuck me,” I demand, tugging on his hair to pull him up, but I pull him closer instead.

It’s too late to stop this climax. I’m coming hard, and holy fuck.

This is book sex, and I’m having it, and it’s not stopping. Pleasure seizes my body as I tremble all over. Euphoria radiates everywhere, and I want to bask in it. But I want more too.

Seconds later, I tug him up and grab at his jeans, in a frenzy to take off his clothes.

“Now. I want your dick. Just give me your dick.” I sound like a madwoman.

Because I am a madwoman.

“You can have it all,” he says, like he’s won every prize.

In seconds, I’ve got his shirt off, and he’s found a condom in his wallet, and we’re both shoving down his jeans and his boxer briefs.

His cock springs free, thick and hard.

But the sight of it jars me.

It’s like I’m having an out-of-body experience. Is this really me, on a train, the French countryside rattling by outside that window? Am I truly about to sleep with my once-upon-a-time friend, my former partner, my enemy who’s no longer my enemy? My almost lover?

I never thought we’d do this.

Now it’s all I want, but am I being impetuous? “This is weird,” I blurt out.

Stopping his work opening the condom wrapper, he frowns. His dick is rock hard, aiming at me, as he says, “What’s weird?”

But I hear, Do you not want this? Should I stop? What’s going on ?

I reach out to reassure him. His dick, that is.

I stroke his cock, thrilling at the velvety smoothness, the pulsing hardness.

Touching him sends shivers down my spine.

“You and me,” I say, breathy and mesmerized at the sight of him in my hand.

“It’s weird to be naked with you. It’s weird to watch you put on a condom.

But it’s a good weird. Don’t you think?”

“Uh…” Speechlessness is rare for Axel.

“Sorry,” I say, feeling foolish. “I didn’t mean to ruin the vibe by talking.”

He shudders. “You didn’t. It’s good.”

“What’s good?”

“Your hands on me, Hazel. It’s so fucking good,” he grits out as I run my hand over the head of his cock. “But if it’s weirding you out, we should stop.”

No fucking way. I squeeze him harder. “Don’t you dare stop.”

With a smile, he resumes rolling on the protection. Then he roams a hand up my thigh, hitching up my leg, hooking it around his waist. Slotting his body to mine, he rubs his length against me.

“Oh fuck.” He groans like I’m his dirty fantasy.

It’s heady, his desire. Especially since it matches all my wild, newly unleashed desire for him.

He notches the head against my entrance and then slides home. Filling me. Stretching me.

He eases out, his lips quirking up. Slowly, luxuriously he slides in, inch by inch. Then he’s buried inside me. He takes a moment to breathe, maybe to savor the way we feel, before he says, with a hint of a smile, “Even better.”

I meet his eyes. “Yeah, it’s even better,” I repeat. The words— even better —feel like our little secret.

Our dirty, sexy secret as he fucks me against the door, on a luxury train, coasting across Europe, no one suspecting what’s happening here in this compartment.

Long, deep thrusts fill me. Jolt me. They make me feel used in the best of ways.

His fingers curl around my hip, gripping me tightly. His other hand loops through my hair. I yelp a little at the pull.

“Too much?”

“Not enough,” I whisper.

He pulls harder. I lean my head back, savoring the roughness.

It’s demanding.

It’s real.

It’s raw.

“Tell me what you need,” he commands.

The intensity of the order thrills me.

“Fingers,” I gasp.

He slides a hand between my thighs. He’s rubbing my clit, filling my body, fucking me hard, slamming my back against the door.

I’m going to have bruises from banging against it, and I can’t wait.

I want to be fucked in a way that’s not enjoyable. That’s not good .

In a way that is great . That’s toe-curlingly, sheet-grabbingly great.

Just like this.

As he strokes me, fast and insistent, pleasure coils in my center. I tense, then my orgasm crashes into me, hard and punishing, beautifully brutal.

It’s everything I’ve ever written and nothing I’ve ever experienced.

I feel savage, and sexy, and very well fucked. I can’t stop moaning.

Axel’s not done though. He cups my jaw, squeezing it as he pumps, thrusts, then stills and shakes. For a mouthy man, he’s quieter than I’d have expected. He says nothing as he comes. Just shudders.

Then he kisses my neck.

I can feel all his held-back words in that kiss.

I don’t know what they are, but I swear he’s imprinting them on my skin. Things he’s afraid to say but he’ll speak with touch instead.

Or maybe I’m just feeling the endorphins raging through me.

And for the first time in my so-called sex life, I can definitely say I’ve had book sex. “I don’t feel weird now,” I say.

He smiles against me then laughs, soft and husky. “Good. Me neither.”

His smile fades though. His gaze turns serious. “Can I sleep in your bed? With you? As in… with you ?”

“You’d better,” I say, and I can’t wait to share the only bed in the compartment with him.