I didn’t know what he wanted and I opened my eyes to see he had the edge of a condom packet between his teeth. He was still up on one hand in the bed but no longer pressed into my hip.

His eyes were consuming me.

With dumb luck, since I was so far from thinking it wasn’t funny, it hit me that to use that condom, he needed to be freed of his jeans.

And I needed him free of his jeans.

Immediately.

It was so hot, so unbelievably amazing to stare into his eyes as I unbuttoned his jeans, yanked them down to his hips and felt him spring free, hard and ready for me, I’d never forget it, that moment after he’d given so much to me, knowing I was about to get all of him.

“Thanks, baby,” he muttered.

“Hurry,” I pleaded.

Joker hurried. His eyes keeping mine captive, it took him no time at all to deal with things. Then I felt him guide himself to me and nudge through my wetness.

“Yes,” I whispered.

“Ready?” he whispered back.

This was Joker.

And me.

Joker.

Carson Steele.

Oh yes. I was ready.

I nodded. “Absolutely.”

He slid inside.

My head again went back as I moaned, “Oh yes, yes, sweetheart.”

He started moving, suspended over me, slow and steady but with his leverage, deep.

Oh yes.

“More,” I begged.

“Wrap your legs around my thighs,” he ordered.

I did as told.

“Now just take me.”

I opened my eyes as he pulsed between my legs, far away but still close, connected. I lifted my hands and grasped onto his waist.

“Lift, tilt, move with me, Carrie,” he instructed, his voice now rasping.

I lifted, catching his rhythm and moving with him.

Oh gosh. Much better.

“Yes,” I panted.

“Yeah,” he grunted. “Hold on, baby.”

I grasped him tighter with my fingers at his waist and my legs around his thighs.

When I did he went deeper. Faster.

“Yes,” I moaned, my fingers digging in hard.

His free hand roamed my belly, down and in, as in in.

And that was it.

“Yes!” I cried, my fingers clawing at his waist, my legs tightening so much that I lifted my hips off the bed and he pounded inside me as it scored through me, blazing heat like I’d never experienced, long and hot and wild and beautiful in a way I thought it would last forever and I wanted it to as Joker kept taking me.

“God. Fuck. Fuck,” he grunted, his finger no longer manipulating my clit but moving so he could clamp his hand around my hip, keep me stationary and drive deep. “Fuck,” he whispered. “Fuck,” he groaned and reared inside me.

I opened my eyes, holding on, and saw his neck bent, his head down, as he thrust one last time and stayed planted inside, and I knew, even if it was silent, that he had what he’d given me.

I lay under him, breathing heavily, clasped to him like I never wanted to let him go (and thinking I actually didn’t), glorying in the feel of him filling me, watching with what could be nothing but utter glee as the shudders of his orgasm shifted through his powerful body as the fragments of the glory of mine whispered through mine.

And I kept watching, committing him to memory, as his fragments left him.

Not a second later, he lifted his head and said, “Be back,” pulled out of my hold, rolled away, got to his feet and that was when I watched him walk to the bathroom, adjusting his jeans.

I stared at the open bathroom door where he’d disappeared and I did this for only a single second before it struck me.

I’d conked him on the jaw. I’d scratched him too hard.

And he’d had to instruct me.

I’d been married and my husband had a healthy sex drive. The mood came over Aaron a lot. Sometimes, the mood even came over me, and until the end, Aaron was happy to accommodate me (as I was him).

I’d just had great sex, the kind I’d never had before, so in reality I’d just discovered what great sex was.

But I’d thought what Aaron and I had was great.

Now I knew it wasn’t bad, sometimes. Most of the time it was what it was.

But it had never been great.

And I knew right then that was because of me.

I wasn’t great

I wasn’t even good!

I wasn’t anything.

With Aaron I didn’t care. I had a feeling I understood better now why he replaced me, but I still didn’t care.

With Joker…

I shut my eyes.

Oh no.

A new burn of humiliation blazed through me as I moved in a frenzy on the bed, searching for my panties.

I saw them dangling off the side. I snatched them up, bent and shoved my feet through. Collapsing with my back to the bed, I lifted my hips and pulled them up, my mind whirling around and around.

Joker had started out kissing and caressing, but in the end he’d barely touched me.

He’d just done the deed, taking me with him, giving me glory, giving it to himself (without my help at all and maybe it wasn’t glory—he hadn’t even grunted—maybe it was just a perfunctory bodily release).

He’d been going through the motions to get it done.

Yes, oh yes.

Humiliating.

I thought being the Chaos Charity Case was bad.

This was worse.

I rolled off the bed, frantically grabbing my jeans. On my feet beside the bed, I bent over. One foot in, then the other one, I tugged them up.

And collided with a hard body behind me.

Fingers curled around my hips.

“What you doin’, baby?” Joker growled in my ear.

“I have to leave,” I whispered, pulling out of his hold only to find myself yanked back and again crashing into his body.

But this time his fingers didn’t curl around my hips. Two strong arms locked around my belly.

“You have to leave?”

It was another growl but this wasn’t a semi-curious, post-sex growl.

This one sounded borderline angry.

“Yes.” I struggled against his hold.

“Why?” he asked, quelling my struggle with frightening ease.

Then again, I now had very intimate knowledge through vision and feel of the kind of power in his body.

“Let me go,” I whispered, stopping my movements because I knew they were to no avail and praying he’d listen to me.

He didn’t listen to me.

“Why?” he repeated, his voice now openly annoyed and leaning toward harsh.

“I… that was… I didn’t…” I swallowed. “Today, I’m moving.”

“Carissa, just fucked you for the first time after a scene where we both spouted a lotta shit we gotta go over. I think the move can wait right now.”