Under Parr

by Blair Babylon

  Jericho patted her on the back. “You okay?”

  “Fine,” she said in a strangled voice. “Fine. I didn’t need to know that. I’m a Methodist.”

  He laughed. “I saw the gold cross you were wearing on the first day we met. You’re not wearing it tonight.”

  “No, I don’t wear it when I bring a backpack on a date.”

  “You took your cross off for me. I’m honored.” He spread his hand on her back above her dress, her skin cool and smooth under his fingertips. “I noticed you grabbed your backpack out of your trunk.”

  “Oh, yeah, well. Just in case.” She drained the rest of her glass of champagne and held it out for a refill. “And it looks like I’m stuck here for the night.”

  Jericho grabbed the open bottle of champagne from the ice bucket and refilled her glass. “This is where I’m supposed to be gallant and tell you I’ll sleep on the couch if you’re not up for anything.”

  She looked up at him, her dark eyes luminous in the lamplight. “Don’t be gallant.”

  A shiver flowed through Jericho’s body, an effervescent cascade like the champagne he’d poured into her glass.

  Tiffany raised the glass to her soft lips and downed half the wine.

  He waited until she had finished her sip and settled the champagne flute on the coffee table before he leaned in and brushed his lips over hers.

  The sigh of her wine-scented breath was sweet on his tongue, and he pulled her closer with his arm under her back. Her spine arched under his hand, a supple movement that again reminded him more of a ballet dancer than an athlete.

  Her delicate hands slid up around his shoulders and clasped behind his neck as he kissed her. They were still sitting on the couch, their legs turned toward each other and their knees between them. Jericho rose, leaning Tiffany backward, and he straightened his legs to hover over her.

  She breathed another little sigh as he braced himself with one arm on the arm of the couch behind her head.

  Excitement raced through his flesh, pounding in his veins and his ears as he laid her backward. He liked this woman. It wasn’t just that she’d trash-talked and then beaten him in golf and was thus interesting. God, writing GOTCHA on the ball had been brilliant, and he was still marveling about it. It wasn’t only that she was obviously more concerned with the future of Newcastle Golf Club in her community than her own job since she hadn’t ever asked Jericho if he was going to trim the employee roster. She was probably rightfully confident that another club or course would snap her up. It wasn’t just the protectiveness that had roared in him after she’d been afraid of the cop or that she’d been injured and unfairly excluded from the club’s blue-chip health insurance policy.

  Maybe it was everything, or everything and more.

  Tiffany held herself up on her elbows as he kissed her, and he was careful not to press too much of his weight on her. But again, him having the bodyweight of a horse was only a slight exaggeration, and he didn’t want to sprain her shoulders or elbows. An injury might affect her golf swing.

  As he left her mouth and ran his lips along her jaw and up to her ear, she trailed her fingers over his shirt from his shoulders to his waist, almost a tickle over his ribs, and she whispered, “Do you have a thing this time?”

  “Bought a twenty-pack on the way home from the golf course that day,” he confessed, chuckling. “They’re stashed in every drawer of this hotel room, plus my wallet, golf bag, and the glove compartment of my car.”

  “Damn, you’re cocky,” she said, but she arched her neck under her lips.

  He whispered in her ear, “I’ve wanted you to be Miss May ever since I saw you in the bag room.”

  Her breath rushed faster as he nibbled, caressed, and sucked her neck down to her shoulder. “But that was the middle of April.”

  “I wanted a whole month with you,” he said, breathing on her skin as he spoke. “I wouldn’t have settled for just a few weeks.”

  She giggled, but it was a low, throaty sound like he was getting to her. “A whole month? Sounds like a lot.”

  Yeah, she was going to be getting a lot, all right. Jericho would make sure of that. One of the reasons his breakups were so amicable, he suspected, was that his dates always left his bed with a smile on their faces.

  And not just his bed. Other places, too.

  But for right now, for his first time with Tiffany, his bed was the right place.

  Jericho stood behind the couch and lifted her in his arms.

  Tiffany squeaked as he picked her up. “Oh, don’t hurt yourself!”

  Jericho laughed as he carried her to the bedroom of his suite, kicking the door out of the way as he strode. “Carrying you? Carrying you isn’t even going to aggravate my shoulder, let alone hurt me.”

  “If you’re sure—”

  He bent and laid her on the bed, pausing to enjoy a long look from her slightly glazed eyes and parted lips and the long, sunshine-yellow dress that hugged and skimmed her curves in all the right ways, down to her innocent-looking shoes that almost appeared to be ballet dancing shoes. “I’m sure.”

  She batted her eyelashes and bent one knee as he examined the soft swells and curves of her lush body under her dress.

  Jericho said, “Roll over on your stomach.”

  Tiffany dithered, “What are you going to—”

  He stopped surveying her womanly body and stared straight into her eyes. Jericho made sure his voice was not the slightest bit angry nor impatient, but it was pitched an octave lower. “Roll over.”

  She stared back at him for a few seconds, wariness rising in her dark eyes, but slowly, using her elbows and feet, she pushed herself over on her stomach near the center of the bed. The yellow dress fell over her smooth form like a molten gold waterfall, clinging to her hips and ass. Jericho had been watching the way it moved and clung to her skin all night long.

  He asked, “Is your knee all right like this?”

  Tiffany was watching him out of the up-tilted corners of her eyes, and she nodded.

  Jericho yanked on his tie, loosening and then unraveling it, and then he threw the gray silk rope on the pillow beside her hand and began unbuttoning his shirt. “You will tell me if your knee hurts or is in any way uncomfortable, understand?”

  She nodded again. A few of her braids slipped past her smooth shoulders as she turned her head and watched him take off his shirt.

  Jericho tossed his dress shirt onto a chair beside the bed and crossed his arms to strip off his undershirt, discarding it, too.

  Scarlet lipstick still stained the plump bubbles of her lips, and she smiled as she watched him strip for her.

  Well, strip to the waist for her. The rest would wait.

  And then she giggled.

  “What?” He’d been going to the gym in addition to his time on the golf course. Indeed, now that the golf season was a month old, walking seven miles while carrying thirty pounds of golf clubs on his back every day had melted his last bit of winter insulation off. The striations of the muscle fibers on his biceps and six-pack of abdominals stood out under his skin.

  Tiffany’s eyes were squinted in amusement, even as they were still a bit glazed from arousal. She said, “Golfer’s tan.”

  Jericho’s arms, neck, and right hand were several shades of tan darker than his chest and shoulders. He held up his left hand, which was also pale because golfers wear a thin leather glove on their non-dominant hand. “Guilty.”

  “So typical,” she laughed.

  Tiffany didn’t have a golfer’s tan. Her skin was unmarred by tan lines from her immaculate shoulders to her glittering fingernails. “You don’t have one.”

  “Sunscreen. You should try it. Looks like you’d burn.”

  “Maybe I will,” he said, chuckling, and set one knee on the bed. The mattress bent under his weight as he reached and slowly, much slower than he would have liked, drew the zipper down the back of her dress, over her ass, and down her legs.

  When he’d seen her walkin
g up the steps of the Westerly House from the back, the black line of that zipper set into her bright yellow dress had practically whispered to him that this was where her clothes would open when he took them off of her. He’d been thinking about unzipping that long zipper down her back all night, deciding whether to have her standing up or lying on her stomach like this.

  His knuckles dragged over the small of her back and down the backs of her thighs as he unzipped her dress to the clasp at her hemline.

  Her scarlet and glitter-gold nails curled on the lace duvet, and she flexed her back as the silk loosened around her and parted. When the spaghetti straps fell down her arms and her dress was lying under her, Jericho ran his hands up her sleek legs and over her ass.

  The lingerie she wore underneath her dress was a dark sable brown so closely matched to her skin tone that the silk and lace almost seemed to be a part of her. The stretchy lace of her panties clung to the smooth rounds of her ass, and her bra was a strapless band around her back that felt like silk as he ran his fingertips over it.

  Very nice. When she’d moved while they’d been eating supper, she’d looked like she was entirely naked under the dress, and Jericho’s mind had been preoccupied with that thought all night.

  As he stroked the backs of her thighs and the curvy globes of her ass, Tiffany made a tiny sound, a catch in her throat that was almost a whimper.

  Good, she was into it.

  He believed that all the other women-of-the-months had enjoyed themselves in his bed. They’d seemed to, anyway. They’d been rather vocal about how much they’d liked what he did.

  But he was going to make sure Tiffany didn’t think they’d broken up with him because he was a lousy lay.

  He touched the hinged Velcro and white plastic contraption on her left leg. “Do you want this on or off?”

  “Oh,” she said, pushing herself up on her arms. “I can take it off.”

  “Lie down. What feels better for you?”

  “Off,” she said. “If I’m not walking around, it can cut off my circulation and makes my foot go to sleep. But I can take it off.”

  He placed his hand in the center of her back and pressed. “I said, lie down.”

  She turned back and laid down, pillowing her head on her elbows. “Okay.”

  It took him only a second to rip away the Velcro and slide the brace out from under her leg. She flexed her foot and wiggled her toes, sighing.

  Jericho bent and kissed the back of her shoulder, running his lips from the soft round at the top of her arm to the back of her neck while he rested his hand on her other slim calf, holding down her leg.

  She moved her leg a little, and he pressed it more firmly onto the bed.

  “Oh,” she whispered. She was looking at his gray tie lying on the pillow in front of her face.

  Jericho didn’t want to dominate her because she’d beaten him at golf. Revenge didn’t exist in his heart. Her golf ability didn’t diminish his masculinity.

  But they were playing his game now, and he was better at this game than she was.

  Jericho leaned over her, his lips beside her ear. “Is there anything I should know?”

  “No,” she said, but it was almost a whisper.

  “Is there anything off limits?” he asked.

  “No.” Her voice seemed a little higher.

  He dipped his chin and kissed her shoulder. “Nothing?”

  “Nothing,” she said back.

  Evidently, Tiffany was all-in, so Jericho was going to make sure Miss May had the best month of her life.

  The thought slammed him in the head.

  He was limiting his expectations with Tiffany to a month.

  And he shouldn’t do that.

  So, maybe he should start gently.

  Just because he’d tossed his tie onto the pillow didn’t mean he had to tie her up with it.

  Yet.

  Jericho stood on his knees beside her on the bed and smoothed his hands over her shoulders, kneading her muscles underneath. The sinews in her shoulders relaxed under his hands, and the next cute little sound Tiffany made was more like a moan than a whimper.

  Her limbs melted under his hands, relaxing as he caressed her.

  He didn’t want her too relaxed, though, so he pressed his knee between her thighs, parting them around his leg.

  She glanced over her shoulder at him, but she laid her head back on the pillow and let him continue.

  Her body was amazing, athletic and strong. He ran his hands down her arms and the firm strength of her biceps and triceps to her hands, stroking his palms over hers. A sharp ridge of golfer’s calluses crossed her left hand, a thin line on her palm but just below the junction with her fingers that testified about how much time she spent on the driving range. When he ran his left hand over her palm, his matching calluses rubbed over hers.

  As he caressed the muscles of Tiffany’s shoulders and back, his hands drifting down to her narrow waist, she sighed.

  Jericho whispered, “You aren’t going to sleep, are you?”

  “I’m very relaxed, but you have my full attention.”

  He moved his knee forward between her legs, pressing just slightly where her panties covered her softness.

  “Now, you really do have my full attention,” she said.

  Jericho leaned forward, moving her hands from her sides up to the pillow and bracing himself above her, pinning her wrists to the bed with his hands. He whispered, “Stay relaxed. Keep your eyes closed. Just feel.”

  She nodded, and he ducked his head to run his lips down the back of her neck.

  The sweet scent of her perfume, zephyrs of baby powder and roses, filled his nose, and her skin under his hands was so soft that he almost couldn’t tell when he’d caught the edge of her silk dress with his fingers.

  He thought he could stay there forever, touching her skin, inhaling her feminine scent, and feeling the softness of her thighs around his leg, but his pulse accelerated.

  Need rose in him, blotting out his best intentions of pleasuring her and then asking her to go away for a weekend with him for their first time. He couldn’t wait.

  He couldn’t even catch his breath.

  A Guy She Really Likes

  Tiffany

  Tiffany’s brain was wavering a little from the champagne, but she hadn’t been with a guy she really liked since she’d broken up with Tyrone during her senior year of college. Sure, there had been a guy or other who she’d picked up or a friend-with-benefits-type of an encounter here and there, but boinking some guy for the fun of it was a whole lot different than going to bed with a guy she really liked.

  Wait.

  When had she started thinking of Jericho as a guy she really liked? Had it been after he’d listened to what she thought about Newcastle Golf Club and said he’d take it into account when he was making changes?

  Or maybe it had been in the storm shack when he’d had his tongue between her thighs.

  It would probably be a mystery forever.

  And now she was lying face down in his bed in his hotel room while his hands traced her body like he was memorizing her form.

  His hands were strong and gentle as he kneaded her shoulders and neck. She hadn’t even realized how much tension she’d been holding in there, though some of it was because she’d been strangling her steering wheel after that cop had been tailgating her.

  And some of it had been worry about NGC and NFA’s golf team.

  And some of it was just the past year and a half, ever since stepping on a damn rock had ripped out her knee and shredded her life.

  Just the touch of those memories made Tiffany’s body tense again, but Jericho’s hands smoothed it away.

  She was safe now, and she didn’t have to go anywhere until morning. She didn’t have to think or recriminate until the next day at all.

  Tiffany had just been enjoying the backrub, almost wishing they could keep it to that, until Jericho had inserted his knee between her thighs.

  His k
nee was resting between her legs.

  Every time she breathed, her body expanded, and the pressure of his knee against her folds increased just the tiniest bit, just enough to keep her full attention right there.

  Her heart pounded faster in her chest.

  His hands circled her waist, his fingers reaching around the narrow part, and then he pressed down on her hips just slightly, just a suggestion of grabbing her hips and pulling her backward.

  Tiffany bit her lip because she had not been lying when she said she was up for anything that night.

  Jericho dragged his fingers over the swells of her ass.

  Tiffany made a sound in her throat, a moan she could not bite back.

  Jericho’s hands traveled further down her butt to her legs, and he massaged the back of her thighs, pressing away her tension there, too.

  He reached her knees, and then each of his large hands wrapped around the back of her legs and began to travel upward with his thumbs stroking the insides of her thighs.

  Time slowed to a crawl as his thumbs neared the junction between her legs, and then he slowly began to massage her there, too.

  Her skin awoke, blooming with heat as he rubbed first the outside of her folds over her panties and then slipped his thumbs underneath the elastic.

  He stroked her soft skin on the surface, kneading firmly with his thumbs like when he’d been massaging the tension from her neck. Her skin grew more sensitive, her seam between becoming tender. When he pressed his thumb between her folds, he slipped on her delicate skin inside because she was already wet.

  The slick pressure on her clit spiraled through her, and Tiffany arched her back and rose up.

  Jericho’s hand pressed between her shoulder blades. “Down.”

  He didn’t scrub his thumb over her clit like some other guys did, trying to make up for lack of technique with mere friction. Instead, he held her down with one commanding hand on her back and slowly pulsed his thumb on her clit, each rhythmic press spreading farther through her pelvis and then through her body like ever-larger pebbles dropped in water.

  Her breath quickened, and she tried to move backward, but his firm hand between her shoulder blades kept her from rubbing herself against him.