Page 26 of That Girl is Trouble

I almost don’t answer, but Axe is watching me intently, and the bastard has a way of pulling words from my lips without my brain’s consent. “I wished… that I didn’t need him anymore. Jesse.”

The weight of that confession makes my gut twist in the same way it did when Triss came back for me. I got my wish—I wasn’t alone anymore—but it came with a price. The kind of price that calls for a fourteen-year-old Kat doing chest compressions on a corpse.

And Jesse? Sure, I figured out how to be without him. Because he was gone. Because another man spilled his blood all over the floor.

Axe lifts my chin with his fingers and levels me with a stare. “You’ve never needed anyone, Kat, long as I’ve known you.”

I shake my head. “I did though. I needed him so I could function, so I could… feel something.”

That’s who I am, isn’t it? That’s what I do. Replace one thrill with the next so I can relish in the high, immerse myself in things and people to distract myself from the loneliness.

And shit, that’s a scary thought, because not only does it shrink Jesse into nothing more than a temporary fix, but it exposes who I really am—a junkie. My drug of choice is people. The kind who will sate my need for danger and excitement and all the shit I never got when I was a kid sitting alone in that big, empty house.

“That what this is, then?” he asks, taking a step closer, his fingers still locked under my chin. “You working here? ’Cause this won’t replace Jesse, Kat. This won’t—”

I slap his hand away, pushing Jesse out of my mind as I home in on the bill still sitting between Axe’s fingers. “I’m not trying to replace anything. And I’m not getting paid to talk. Either have a seat or get the hell out.”

He opens his mouth, ready to say more, but after a beat, he gives his head a little shake and says, “You can start on my lap tonight, Kitty.”

He makes his way to the leather couch, pulling off his jacket along the way. Then he flops down and holds out that bill.

“Did you stay?”

I tilt my head, confused. “For what?”

“All ten songs.”

I purse my lips. “No.”

“Yes, you did.” He chuckles. The smirk on his face has no business looking that good. “Can never resist, can you? Doing exactly what I tell you to do. How is it that you got such a hard time fucking listening, but as soon as there’s a threat of punishment, you practically fall to your damn knees?”

Gritting my teeth, I start the music and then drop down on top of him, straddling his legs as I pull the money from his fingers. “You’re paying me. Don’t forget that. The second the meter stops, so do I. And I won’t do a damn thing you tell me to do until you start it again.”

Axe traces along the curve of my jaw and over my lips, his fingertip sticking to my lip gloss. He pulls it to his mouth and sucks it off. “Cherry,” he murmurs. “You wear that for me?”

“No.”

All I get in response is a smirk, like he sees right through the lie.

Like last time, I move my body to the music, rolling my hips against him, pressing my tits close to his face. And like last time, Axe is mostly unmoved. His expressionless eyes remain focused on my face instead of sliding over my body. His hands listless on the couch instead of sneaking touches on my thighs.

He’s prepared himself to have me this close to him. He’s upped his game. Which means I have to up mine.

In one fluid motion, I reach behind my back and undo my bra. It falls down my arms before he can stop me.

He sucks in a quick breath, his body jumping to attention, his spine straightening and his thighs beneath me tensing. “Kat,” he says in that low voice. A warning I ignore.

“Axe,” I say, shucking it off completely. There’s a moment where he’s locked in place, where the grip he’s suddenly got on my ass tightens.

Axe Donovan came in here to play a game. But this is my fucking house, and I’m the one who makes the rules. So I steady my hand on his chest and push him back against the cushions, continuing my motions as I move to the beat of the song, as I let my breasts dangle too close to his face.

“No touching,” I whisper, but his hands remain on my skin. He pulls me closer, his face a breath away from one peaked, hard nipple. A pulse shoots to my pussy, and I’m quickly lost in the sight of him—how he watches me, the way his chest expands as he breathes in the scent of my skin. And the feel of his hands, shaking as his grip turns bruising.

“Fuck,” he whispers, voice cracking.

It’s that tone, that second of vulnerability that makes me break. That moment that uncontrolled, hungry version of him slips free. That’s when I let him put his mouth on me, when I let him take my tits into his hands and drag his tongue over my skin. His teeth close over my nipple, and there’s another clench between my legs as he lets out an unhinged, needy groan.

I drop flush to his lap, grinding myself against him, seeking to sate that sudden desperate need for friction. I expect him to push me away, to tell me it’s not right, to get back to that familiar mantra, say those two words I loathe so much. No touching.

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