Falling Fast Read online

  Falling Fast

  By Cerise DeLand

  Resplendence Publishing, LLC

  http://www.resplendencepublishing.com

  Resplendence Publishing, LLC

  P.O. Box 992

  Edgewater, Florida, 32132

  Falling Fast

  Copyright © 2010, Cerise DeLand

  Edited by Michele Paulin

  Cover art by Les Byerly

  Electronic format ISBN: 978-1-60735-122-1

  Warning: All rights reserved. The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.

  Electronic release: February 2010

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and occurrences are a product of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, places or occurrences, is purely coincidental.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  About the Author

  For my son, Stephen,

  who understood the challenges of living with a head injury

  and valiantly sought to overcome them

  day by day,

  minute by minute...

  and succeeded.

  Chapter One

  If Shana Carpenter had forgotten Kade Stapleton was eye candy, it was definitely because she’d feared for weeks now that he’d realize who she really was when they met this morning. That he’d call her callus and unethical, throw her out of his office, and slam the door to any apology she might make for how she’d ruined him.

  But here he stood. Cool and business-like, he blinked at the sight of her, seeming more stunned at her appearance than angry. Good. Great, in fact.

  She’d dressed for success, and if he were eating her alive with his heavy-lidded lime-green gaze, then she rivaled him for ravenous.

  What a man. Every inch a hard-muscular dream machine, Kade stood maybe ten inches taller than she. He’d bulked up since last she’d seen him four years ago in the ring. Sculpted and golden, the former rodeo star stared down at her, and damn, did he make her mouth water. He even smelled good. Spicy and musky.

  She’d never gotten as close to him as this—except in her dreams. Recently, they’d begun to come with stunning frequency.

  But here he was, striding toward her. Meeting her for the first time. Her heart picked up a beat at the sight of his rolling gait, his lean hips, the broad-as-a-barn shoulders he’d honed from working in the saddle ten hours every day—every day, until four years ago, when he’d quit. All because of her.

  She winced, fearing he might know that Shana Carpenter was really S.J. Carpenter, the reporter who’d killed his career, but he smiled at her pleasantly. In one mad rush, all Shana’s nighttime fantasies of being adored by the champion bronc buster fired up like a giant heat wave.

  Better yet, her pussy gushed with warm cream at his welcome, and she beamed at him, knowing she’d been right not to wear any panties today. To feel free. Free of the past.

  “How do you do, Mr. Stapleton?” She gave him her neon smile, plunked her briefcase on the floor and put out her hand.

  “Hello, Miz Carpenter,” he crooned in a Texas drawl that rumbled all the way down her body to tease her swollen little clit. “Nice of you to travel all this way to meet with me,” he murmured as he took a long gander into her eyes, and she hoped he saw that she admired his looks. He grasped her hand, and a sizzle sparked between them that jarred them both.

  “Wow! Sorry!” he exclaimed and grabbed hold of her forearm with his other big hand.

  “It’s okay,” she told him, but she lied. The static was similar to the one that traveled between them every time he touched her. In her dreams.

  “This old building,” he said and shook his head ruefully. “It began life as a trailer. Never was very well grounded.”

  “Ah, I see,” she declared, unsteady on her feet due to the jolt and wanting to tell him that maybe this current between them was more than her wish-fulfillment.

  Reaching out with two hands, he steadied her with a mighty grip that made her wish she could strip off her linen suit. Better yet, he could strip it off. Like he strips me down in my bed each night as I toss and turn, making love to him and making up to him for how I ruined him.

  He threw her a polite grin now that made her yearn to taste his lips. Come kiss me with that rugged mouth. Growl how you missed me and need to be inside me.

  But instead, he seemed to fight not to glance down her body. Most men, she knew from years of experience, liked her figure. Lithe and long-legged, she had a toned ass and pert breasts men drooled to have, but only a few had. How I’d love to give them to you, Kade.

  He nodded toward the chair opposite his desk. “Have a seat, Miz Carpenter.”

  Shana stepped backward, said thank you and sat down like the top-notch PR consultant she truly was. This was an interview for her firm to do a promotion for his rodeo, not an opportunity to seduce him. But I’m dying to reach out and lick your skin there at the hollow of your throat.

  “Ah, well, let’s begin,” he offered in a hoarse voice as if he had forgotten why she was here. “Hot in here, I know.” He cleared his throat. “Sorry the air conditioner is broken. Again.” He grinned, fast and tight, his generous mouth making her hungry for a nibble of his lips. “Can I offer you a drink?”

  That and anything else you want to give me. Like you do at night, when you climb into bed and hover over me with your thick shaft already hard and ready to take me.

  She vibrated with desire, pushing away her urge to leap up and peel away his pale denim shirt and low-slung jeans. Then she’d see if his chest was as broad as she thought, and if his cock was as long as she’d dreamed.

  “Miz Carpenter?” He called her from her reverie. “Drink?”

  “Ah. Yes, thank you, I will.” She settled herself back into the rickety folding chair, crossed one leg over the other and smoothed her suit’s skirt to her knee. Her pussy needed petting, that was for sure, but she couldn’t say, “hey, pardon me while I show you how pink and demanding my little cat is,” could she?

  She forced herself to look around and noted the nicks in the wooden furniture and the drab paint on the walls. The main office of The Hayward Rodeo was a wreck. If the town of Hayward, Texas was going to succeed at building this rodeo into an A-number-one national attraction, they would need to spruce up their offerings then their image. This office décor came in a close third. To do that, she now knew for certain, they needed one more thing badly. Her.

  But when she looked back on him, he was focused on her lips. And his tongue was taking a slow journey around his open mouth.

  Can I just kiss that for you? She pressed her thighs together then shifted in her chair.

  He did, too.

  Rearranging your cock because of me? Shana sat straighter, and her nipples beaded beneath her lacy bra. He couldn’t see them beneath her jacket, but he definitely zeroed in on her cleavage in the v of her low-cut tank top. What the heck? She’d worn it to see if she could interest the man who in her dreams took his sweet time sucking her breasts into his talented mouth, nibbling at her big nipples and running his tongue all the way around her diamond-studded belly button before he feasted on her pussy.

  “Miz Carpenter? Ma’am?” Kade Stapleton raised his voice, but he definitely sounded strained, as if he were strangling.

  “Hmm?” She lifted her chin and shook back her shoulder-length, platinum curls.

  He swallowed, loudly
. “What’ll it be? Water? Soda?” He raised a hand to buzz his assistant on the intercom. “We have coffee, too, if that’s your poison.”

  “No.” You are. My obsession. My desire. Ever since I wrote that article about you in the sports section of the Dallas paper four years ago. Ever since I printed a retraction, resigned for my foolishness and began to plan how I’d make more amends. Ever since, I began to think of how I could take you into my bed and kiss the hurt away.

  She squeezed her labia together and felt a trickle of perspiration wend its way between her breasts.

  “Water. Cool water. Please.”

  “Two waters, Reata,” he told his assistant as he squinted at Shana and looked for all the world like a guy who was trying to concentrate.

  Shana would have laughed, but the lure of him had her wiggling forward in her chair to try to massage her pulsing cunt. Four years ago, she had been frightened by her response to his languid cowboy sexuality. She’d been young, twenty-two, in her first job at a newspaper and so naïve, both professionally and sexually. Since she’d ruined Kade, she’d corrected both lacks. Now, she thoroughly examined whatever she did before she opened her mouth or typed one word. To complement that, she also knew what she liked in men. Honest, forthright, funny. But no one held her fascination like hunky, jovial Kade Stapleton.

  The man was heavenly. No man could match his bronze, god-like tan, that sun-kissed shock of yellow-gold hair hanging over grass-green eyes. Or the rock-hewn features with generous lips and a mellow bass voice that melted her into a puddle of foolish desire. No real-life lover ever compared in looks or bedroom manner. This lack in her life was her penance, she knew, for doing him wrong and declaring he was a hothead with the judges.

  Once more, regret flooded her, and she yearned to use her body to heal the wounds she’d made. But how could she without looking like a horny lunatic?

  Stifling a moan, she bent and dug through her briefcase for her copy of the PR proposal. All thumbs, she couldn’t find the thing.

  “Problems?”

  His tone was husky. Dark and suggestive. She looked up to see Kade devouring her with those wide, green eyes, his look hypnotic, his mouth parting. A vision of him using that mouth to tantalize her sensitive nipples made her yelp.

  “Chair not comfortable?” he asked, suddenly solicitous.

  “Oh. No. No, no. I’m fine. Chair’s fine.” Brain’s dead, but my pussy’s on fire.

  “Here’s your water,” he said, sounding relieved when his assistant walked in, handed both to him, then shut the door behind her.

  He sprang up to give Shana one of the bottles. “Would you like a glass? Ice?”

  “No. Thanks.” Shana stuck out her hand. “Water’s good. Plain. Warm.”

  But when he reached out to give it to her, her fingers touched his, and this time, the shock was electric. Riveting.

  She reeled.

  He clamped her hand to his rock-hard chest and rubbed her fingers. “Christ, sorry. You okay?”

  “Sure.” She stared up at him, automatically reaching out to caress her own burning hand and, in the process, his ribs, too. “Are you all right?” she asked him, more than thunderstruck. That shock is exactly the voltage I feel every night when you put your mouth on mine. That shock is what I crave when you put your fingers on my pussy and spread my lips for you to lick all my juices. “Feels divine.”

  He put his other hand on top of hers and stroked her from fingertips to forearm as if she were a cat in heat. “Like nothing I’ve ever felt before.”

  “This has never happened to me before, either.” I’ve never wanted a man to touch me all over like you do. Never wanted a man to eat me up. Feast on me.

  His voice was a rasp when he said, “Let me make it up to you.”

  “Oh, yes,” she crooned and stood. “I’d like that.”

  He stepped closer now so that their hips touched, her pussy flooded and his erection jutted up against her. His body heat washed over her like a hot river. “I’ll buy you a drink when we’re done,” he promised. “Lunch, too, if you want.”

  “I want.” I want badly.

  “A steak?” he asked, his eyes verdant with hunger. “Or maybe that’s too much for lunch.”

  “No, I like steak. Hearty things.” Like you.

  “Oh, I do, too.” He was nigh unto whispering as his eyes drifted down to her jacket where her breasts chafed to be out and swaying toward his lips. “But, uh, fact is, I’d take you to JoeDan’s Ice House across the street, but he’s getting a whole new kitchen installed and the place is closed.” Kade grinned, his handsome mouth widening as he added, “I do cook. Want to come home with me? For lunch, that is?”

  “I do.” She flowed forward to press her breasts briefly against his chest and wondered where her business manners had fled when she added, “But I’m hungry now.” She struggled to look demure, for god sakes, when all she really wanted to do was move closer into those muscular arms.

  “No breakfast?” he asked.

  “No.” She licked her lips and looked at his. “I ran out early and wanted to be on time for you. It’s a three hour drive from San Antonio.”

  “Not good to starve,” he murmured, sounding far from paternal as he braced her shoulders and pulled her so near they were flush against each other from her rock-hard nipples to his long, steely shaft. “Are you faint? In this heat, you’ve got to be good to yourself.”

  She nodded, barely breathing. “I am. I mean…I do.”

  “Let me help you take your jacket off.” His eyes sashayed from her lips to her cleavage as his big hands gathered the fabric and slid it down her arms.

  She turned to let him have her coat. But when she faced him again, he didn’t move away. Couldn’t, it seemed, as he bit his lower lip and took in the size of her breasts then stepped backward.

  “Drink your water.” He spun away from her, went back to take his chair and examined the folder on his desktop. “Let’s talk about this, shall we, Miz Carpenter?”

  “Shana.”

  “Shana,” he repeated slowly, squinting at her as if he were determined to look only into her eyes. “Your proposal is a really fine one. Strong. The budget’s good, too. You’ve been direct and honest about what you can accomplish with us way out here in no man’s land of west Texas. I like direct and honest.”

  Direct. Honest. That’s exactly how he praised her seduction of him each night before he gathered her close, caught her to him like a second skin and began to love her, pet her and please her. She pressed her cunt to the hard chair, her labia pulsing in pleasure. “Thank you.”

  “I want your mouth, Shana, darlin’,” he would always whisper to her just before he took her lips and branded them as his own.

  “I can’t get enough of you, Kade,” she’d tell him truthfully. “I never needed anyone like I need you.”

  “I need you, too, baby,” he’d say while his strong hands splayed against her back and crushed her breasts against his firm chest. “We’re not talking about the past.” He’d loom above her and bend to kiss his way down her throat to tongue her nipples. He’d pull them into the warm cavern of his lush mouth and make them hard as stones. “We’re talking about now.” And he’d take her other nipple and give it the same hot blessing. “We’re talking about this.” He’d flick his tongue over her jeweled belly button ring. “This rage of mine to be here.” He’d groan as he sank to his elbows and, with careful fingertips, traced her seam, curled her heavy labia open and feasted on her juicy folds with tender devotion. “You are so sweet, baby.” He’d lave one lip with a slow and careful tongue. “Your cream is thick as syrup.” He’d lick the length of her other lip then slide one blunt finger up inside her cunt. “Your pussy tastes like August peaches. And you are all mine. Let me show you.” And he’d curl two more fingers up inside her greedy, little channel. “I’m gonna fuck you now. Long and slow and easy.” To prove it to her, he’d lift her hips and press up inside her in one, long glide to ecstasy. He’d set a rhyt
hm, steady and rigid and maddening. He’d tweak her nipples. Circle his thumb over her clit. “You’re such a beautiful woman, Shana darlin’. Inside and out.”

  She would cry out in delight, his words freeing her of how she’d hurt him. “You forgive me,” she’d whisper in wonder and curl into his powerful, hot body after their climax.

  His green eyes became glass now, and he frowned. “Forgive you? Why should I?”

  Jolted, Shana glanced around at the dilapidated room. She wasn’t in her bed with him, but here in his office. From the looks of him, he appeared shaken and wary of her while he wore an indifferent mask of a cool businessman.

  “Forgive me…” She tried to repair her blunder, pushing back regret that she couldn’t really live her nighttime fantasy here with him. Searching inside her briefcase, she hoisted papers. “Forgive me for bringing only one copy of the proposal.”

  “That’s okay,” he said, pursing his lips and scowling down at the open folder on his desk. “Where shall we begin, Miz Carpenter?”

  Here on your desk. Me under you. You inside me.

  “The name’s Shana,” she got out on a smile, scolding herself for her irrepressible dreaming. She powered up her professional forty-watt grin, trying to destroy the chill she got from his no-nonsense efficiency. If she was going to close this deal, she needed to warm him up. If I don’t go up in flames first.

  His eyes locked on hers. He was playing tough again. Was he testing her?

  “Ah, yeah, right, Shana,” he agreed at last. He hitched his mouth up to one side as his sultry greens darted to her breasts where her traitorous nipples blossomed at his regard. In a millisecond, he shook his head and his gaze shot back up toward hers. “Good way to begin, with first names.” But he didn’t say, you can call me Kade. Instead, he said, “I’ve read your proposal through a couple of times.”

  “Good.” You should. “To get the Hayward Rodeo into the public consciousness, a full-scale PR campaign is what you need.”