Page 91 of Spark

“Yes,” she gasps out. “Just don’t stop what you’re doing, Kendrick. Don’t stop.”

“Baby, this house could be burning down and I wouldn’t stop.” I don’t feel like I can call her baby unless I’m fucking her, so I’m using the word at every fucking opportunity now.

Ruby groans desperately. “I’m so close, it hurts.”

And there’s my cue.

Panting with excitement, I grip Ruby’s gyrating ass cheek, finding my target, and then, I give her soft ass cheek a gentle spank—one that elicits a mangled, tortured whimper of excitement.

“Harder,” she grits out.

I give her what she wants, and her reaction is even bigger this time, which, of course, gets me going like crazy, too.

Somehow, I manage to hang on for dear life through Ruby’s excitement and keep it going for her. But I must admit I’m now hanging on by the barest of threads.

Feeling dizzy and breathless, I spank Ruby again when the scooping movements of her pelvis serve her ass cheek to me on a silver platter, while my other hand continues working her clit, and my cock remains buried deep inside her, filling her up. Moans and groans lurch out of me, and the room feels like it’s spinning. And thank God, that third spank gets her across the line.

As Ruby throws her head back and comes with a keening wail, the floodgates open for me, too, and I’m catapulted into the stratosphere like I’ve got two rocket launchers strapped to my balls.

But even as I’m momentarily blinded by pleasure, my brain registers a startling truth. An unfortunate one, if I’m being honest. I won’t survive it if Ruby doesn’t catch feelings for me by the end of this supposed fling. This extended role-play. This charade.

It’s undeniable to me now.

I’m a slave to this woman’s body, every bit as much as I’m a slave to her heart. Her soul. Her smile. Her laugh.

Why? Because I’m deeply, madly, irrevocably, and infinitely in love with Ruby Margaret Connolly. Addicted to her. Desperate for her. God help me, I was born to love this woman. She’s The One. And there’s no option for me, other than making her mine, through any means necessary.

26

RUBY

A week later

“Thanks for coming to my place for the writing sesh, everyone,” Kendrick says. He and our bandmates are seated in his living room, while I stand at the nearby kitchen counter, arranging a pretty charcuterie board for the festivities.

These days, whenever we get together to write music, we do it either at Savage and Laila’s gorgeous place in Malibu or Kendrick’s comfortable house here in North Hollywood, since those are the only two homes with full-blown recording studios in case we come up with something in record speed and want to lay down a demo. This time, since I’m staying here, Kendrick’s place won out as the most convenient option.

The agenda for today’s writing session is a singular one: coming up with the future mega-hit we’re going to unveil during the finale ofSing Your Heart Outin six weeks. Luckily, that’s plenty of time for us to write and record a single song.But still, given the once-in-a-lifetime launching pad, it needs to be amazing,not merely good enough. Not to mention, we not only need to write the song, but we also need to record it, get it mixed and mastered, and rehearse it into the ground so we’re foolproof and dialed in when the time comes to perform it on live TV. All things considered, I’m actually a bit stressed about the timeline.

My charcuterie board assembled, I carry it into the living room, doing my best not to hobble like a woman who’s been fucked, expertly and often, over the past week. I’ve never had so much sex in my life, let alone sex that curled my toes so violently, they might actually be permanently deformed at this point. It’s been worth it, of course. This is the best soreness of my existence, but my band doesn’t need to know about that. Not when Kendrick and I have agreed that everything will go back to normal after our secret fling has run its course.

“Big ups to Savage for making it,” Titus says, as I place my tray onto the coffee table and sit next to my brother. “The rest of us have had time to decompress from tour by now. I can’t imagine how exhausted you must feel after shooting the show every day this week.”

That’s how it goes with the shooting schedule. For the judges, anyway. The first week or so involves long days that capture all the fan-favorite audition episodes, followed by the Draft Day and Guest Mentor episodes that will be shooting tomorrow.

“It was in my best interest to get out of the house today,” Savage says with a chuckle. “When I left, Laila was sitting at her baby grand, obsessively writing a song like a madwoman. If I’d stuck around, I’d be dead by now for breathing or eating too loudly.”

We all crack up. At one time or another, we’ve all been Laila—a songwriter in the zone who doesn’t tolerate distractions.

“That’s best part of being married to another songwriter,” Savage muses. “We both understand the madness.” He grins wistfully. “I can’t even imagine trying to do life with someone who doesn’t get what it feels like to create amazing art out of nothing.”

The rest of us share a smile and encouraging comments about our friend’s happy life. Savage has undergone an unbelievable transformation over the past few years, and we couldn’t be happier for him.

In the midst of the back and forth, Kendrick’s eyes meet mine. I flash him a secret little smile, and he returns the gesture, followed by a smolderthat makes me blush and start pulsing between my legs.

I look away, not wanting our bandmates to notice him eyeball-fucking me. They still think that kiss at Reed’s party was a performance for the hidden cameras we knew about, since that’s what I told them in the group chat. A conscious decision to get ourselves the bonuses up for grabs. I’m determined to let them keep thinking that way.

God help me, when this fling ends, the last thing I need is for any of these people to know what we did. Titus, especially, can never know. Not because he’d be mad at either of us. Titus loves Kendrick like a brother, and I’m an adult with ownership of my own body, thank you very much. But because, honestly, I’ve always had a feeling Titus wishes Kendrick and I would get together one day, and I don’t want to deal with his disappointment, on top of mine, when that doesn’t happen.

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