by Serena Grey
I turn a cautious glance at the driver, who’s looking straight ahead, a pair of earphones stuck in his ears. Sliding a hand up Landon’s thigh, I stop when I touch the erection already straining through his pants. Slowly, I run my hand along the hard ridge. “I’m not very hungry,” I say hopefully.
He catches hold of my hand, taking a deep breath. “I wish we could go back, but there’s someone expecting us.”
With that, he opens the door, almost immediately appearing at my side to help me out of the car. I’m still wondering who could be expecting us, while simultaneously trying to compose myself and get in control of the arousal raging through me.
The restaurant is on the ground floor of a building that’s on a hill close to the waterfront. Even from the street, views of the Golden-Gate Bridge and the sparkling lights reflecting off the water are simply breathtaking. We enter the restaurant, first going into a quiet reception, from where a fussy maître d’ ushers us upstairs to a dining area overlooking the main restaurant, with less obstructed views.
No sooner has the maître d shown us to a secluded table than a door at the rear opens and a stocky man with bright red hair and a broad smile bursts into the room. He approaches our table, and Landon gets up, an easy smile on his face as he clasps hands with the man before they exchange a bro-hug. The man faces me and grins. “You must be an angel,” he says, taking my hand with an earnest look in his deep green eyes.
Landon does a small head shake. “Rachel, this is Cameron McDaniel. Cameron, Rachel Foster.”
“Pleased to meet you,” I say.
“Delighted.” Cameron raises my hand to his lips, ignoring Landon’s narrowed eyes.
“Cameron is an old friend,” Landon tells me, “and he only recently opened this restaurant, so he’s dying to hear you say that it’s awesome.
“Definitely awesome,” I say, with a smile at Cameron, whose grin widens.
“Definitely, I like you already.” He pulls out a seat and joins us. “What are you doing with this handsome devil anyway,” he says jovially. “We reds should stick together. I know all the dirt on him. Known him for years. I could tell you things that’ll make him squirm.”
I steal a glance at Landon, who’s chuckling silently. He looks almost jovial, so different from the controlled man he usually is in public, and the intensely sexual person he is when he’s with me. He sees me looking at him and holds my gaze, and in his eyes I can see the sensual promise that always goes right through to the deepest parts of me.
I turn back to Cameron. “I look forward to hearing the worst.”
Cameron responds by clapping his hands excitedly, before summoning a hovering waiter who takes our wine order. “For my friend, who I haven’t seen in ages, and his lovely girlfriend, I have prepared something special,” he informs me. “You don’t mind seafood, do you?”
Shaking my head, I wonder if I should correct him about the girlfriend part. Landon, who’s watching me, makes no move to say anything, so I leave it.
“Perfect,” Cameron grins again, “Now while we wait, lets gossip.”
I haven’t enjoyed a meal so much in a long time, laughing so hard at Cameron’s quips that more than once I almost choke on my wine. He’s irrepressible, around the same age as Landon, but with a wicked wit and sharply funny commentary that flows very naturally. He tells me how he met Landon when he spent a few years working at the New York Swanson Court in his early twenties, before leaving to open his own restaurant. He took courses in management and learned how to expand along the way. Now he owns a chain of restaurants in Northern California.
By the time we leave, I’m not only stuffed, but actually sorry to be leaving Cameron. He follows us outside to the sidewalk and gives me a warm hug. “Take good care of her,” he warns Landon, making a big show of relinquishing me to him.
“I believe I’m already doing that,” is Landon’s only reply, his carnal gaze on my body telling me all the ways in which he’s going to take care of me.
A flash from across the street makes me raise my head in alarm, and a few more flashes follow. Landon mutters something under his breath and pulls me closer to him.
“They always come here hoping the catch the movie stars leaving,” Cameron says, turning dismissively from the paparazzo. He eyes Landon. “You can blame yourself for looking too much like a movie star.
“I agree,” I say, giggling, even as Landon’s hand around my waist sends warm heat coursing through my body. I shouldn’t have drunk so much wine, I decide silently, saying goodnight to Cameron.
Landon helps me into the waiting car, joining me in the back just as the car starts to move. Alone again, the impossible sexual energy that always radiates from him finds me, drawing everything inside me to him. I’m tense again, eager for him to touch me, wanting to touch him so desperately that it hurts.
I sneak a look at him, the same moment as he turns to me. In the next second, he pulls me to his body, crushing my breasts against his chest as he claims my lips.
He tastes perfect, like the wine we shared, and like warm sexual heat. A low moan comes out from deep within me as my hands roam over his body, trying to touch him through his clothes and wishing I could tear them off.
When he releases me, I’m panting softly, my nipples straining against the fabric of my bra. His chest is rising and falling sharply, his increased body heat enveloping me even through the barrier of our clothing.
“I’ve been thinking of this all evening,” he whispers, his palm tracing a path along my thigh. “No, since we spoke on the phone earlier. I need to fuck you.”
“Me too,” I admit, my thighs parting of their own accord, needing his touch, even though I know we’re in a car, that we have to wait, at least until we get to the hotel.
His fingers tighten on my thigh. “You’re going to give yourself to me, every part of you.” He traces his lips along the side of my throat. “I want you so much, Rachel, and I’m going to make you mine.”
The possessiveness in his words strokes the flames of my desire, making it almost impossible to wait. By the time we get to our hotel, I’m practically burning with need, senseless to everything but the driving desire to have him deep inside me.
Inside the elevator, he looks as if he’s barely restraining himself. He stares at the numbers on the panel, his hand tight around my waist. Standing close to him, I can feel how tense he is. I feel as if we so much as look at each other, then we’re going to end up having sex inside the elevator.
As soon as the doors slide open in the suite, he pulls me inside, pinning me to the walls of the entrance foyer, and claiming my lips. His tongue dips inside my mouth as he rocks his hips against me, allowing me the feel the steel hard length of his arousal.
I’m panting, fumbling with the tie of my dress in my eagerness to take it off. Landon, thinking along the same lines, tears off his jacket and shirt, without bothering to release my lips.
My hands find his chest, running feverishly over the rock hard muscles before moving down the flat board of his stomach to his waistband, where my fingers get busy undoing his belt.
He pulls my dress apart, exposing my body only in a pair of bra and panties. Then he pulls me from the wall, so he can slide the dress off my shoulders. Before my fumbling fingers succeed in undoing his pants, he already has my bra off, and is pulling my panties down over my hips, letting them slide till they fall around my ankles.
I finally manage to get into his pants, stroking his hard length through his briefs. He groans and slides a finger between my legs, feeling the slickness of my need for him. His groan turns into a low growl, and in a swift motion, he lifts me, spreading my legs around his waist as he pins me to the wall, his hips pressed against my needy, aching center.
I sigh impatiently, and unable to wait anymore, I rub myself against him. My body is pulsing with unbearable, uncontrollable need. “Landon...” I moan.
“Shh, baby.” With my legs wedged around his waist, he pulls down his trousers and briefs,
just enough to free his cock. At the sight of the thick, turgid member, my body turns to liquid desire. “Fuck me, Landon.” I pant, long past the point of shame, “Fuck me, now.”
He obliges, spearing me with one sweet plunge that goes so deep inside me, I lose all my senses. Everything disappears but exquisite sensation of his cock inside me, and his tongue working feverishly at my nipple as he thrusts so fast and so deep, it feels less like just sex, than some kind of intense primal mating. His deep grunts mix with my whimpers, the sounds of uncontrolled and unbridled pleasure filling the room.
He moves his mouth from one breast to another without slowing his pace. I groan, my body tightening around him as warm pleasure courses through me.
“Ah fuck!” his voice is tortured as he leans back, still thrusting, giving me a view of the tightened muscles from his chest to his stomach, and the column of his cock as it moves in and out of me. The sight pushes me over the edge, and I cry out, helpless and boneless, my body spasming in a long, pulsing orgasm.
He plunges deep, filling me completely as my body contracts with pleasure far beyond anything I’ve ever experienced. I hear his low groan as his hips jerk, his cock twitching inside me as he comes.
Afterward, he pulls me off the wall and drops to his knees, still inside me. His chest is rising and falling heavily. I wrap my hands around his neck and bury my face in his hair, pressing my sweat-sheened body against his with a strange desire to be as close to him as physically possible.
After a few moments, he rises to his feet, carrying me, with his semi-hard cock still buried inside me. He carries me to his room and lays me gently on the bed before starting to pull away.
“Don’t,” I whisper, not wanting to release him. “Don’t go.”
He settles between my legs, leaning his weight on an elbow. He leans down and covers my mouth with his, kissing me with an intensity that feels as if he’s getting to the very depths of my soul. With his free hand, he caresses my so-sensitive skin. I feel him harden again, still inside me, and the full feeling makes me moan into his mouth.
He pulls his lips away from mine, his blue eyes dark with desire. Holding my gaze like some kind of erotic hypnotist, he starts to move, this time doing it slowly, sliding in and out of me, and stroking my already sensitive walls to the edge of pleasure.
I can’t look away from his eyes. As pleasure intensifies and his control begins to slip, it feels as if I’m looking into his soul and he’s looking into mine. As if, in that moment, there are no barriers. As if we’re not lovers just in our bodies, but somehow to the very depths of our souls.
I come with a long drawn-out whimper, my body tightening as pleasure rocks me. His soft groan follows, and his hands tighten reflexively around my waist as he spills himself inside me.
He pulls out, sending aftershocks rolling through me, and pulls me close to his body, holding me against his warmth. I feel tears teasing at my eyelids and I blink them away, concentrating instead on how good it feels to be so close to him.
Enjoy it while it lasts, an inner voice warns, it’ll soon be over.
I wake up sometime during the night, still in Landon’s bed. The room is dark, with only a dim light from outside the open curtains. Landon is not with me on the bed, nor anywhere in the room.
I find a white hotel robe in the dressing room. Putting it on, I find my way through the suite, finally going through the open doors that lead to the terrace. There I find him standing by the stone railings, looking out at the city in the night.
I stand by the doors, just looking at him. He’s wearing pajama bottoms riding low on his lean hips. The air is cold, but he doesn’t seem to feel it. As I watch, he runs a hand through his dark gold mane, then leans forward on the railings, releasing a sigh as the muscles of his back flex with the movement.
I find myself wondering what he’s thinking. There’s something melancholy about his solitude, and I’m hesitant to disturb him, but almost as if he can feel me standing there, he turns around and straightens.
“You should be asleep,” he says.
“So should you.” There’s a hint of tiredness in his eyes, “What are you doing out here?”
“Just thinking.”
I join him at the railing. “What about?”
“Work.”
I turn to look at him. He’s looking straight ahead, his eyes focused on the darkness beyond the lights. Had I really expected that he would tell me what was on his mind? His monosyllabic answers remind me that even though last night it felt as though something had shifted in our relationship, it was just my imagination.
We’re still practically strangers, with good sexual chemistry, but still strangers.
The wind moves, causing me to shiver slightly. Landon notices. “You’re cold,” he says. “Come on. Let’s go back inside.”
He puts his arms around me, and his skin is warm, even though he’s been standing outside shirtless. In his room, he takes off the robe I’m wearing and pulls the covers back on the bed, lying down with his arm around me until the steady rise and fall of his chest lulls me to sleep.
I feel it when he gets up not long after, the loss of his warmth almost jerking me out of sleep. He doesn’t return till it’s getting light outside. I wake up when he joins me on the bed, and after another tender round of intense sex, we lie in each others arms, not speaking, and not asleep either, until he gets up to go to the bathroom, and I leave for my room to prepare for the day ahead.
Despite hardly getting any sleep, Landon looks wide awake and alert in the morning when we go back to the Gold Dust. He leaves me almost as soon as we get there, joining the project managers for a meeting.
Tony introduces me to the interior designer Lydia Khan, a vibrant middle-aged woman, who according to my research, has done refurbishment work in many big-name hotels all over the world. We spend the morning talking about her work creating distinctive properties, and enriching the experience of visitors through compelling design.
Landon calls me around midmorning. I’ve just left Mrs. Khan, and Claude is showing me around the hotel bar, where refurbishment has been completed. It’s luxurious and glistening, with black leather seats surrounding low, deep-oak tables. The bar itself covers one large expanse of wall, and a raised stage allows for small performances.
I excuse myself from Claude’s enthusiastic descriptions and answer the call.
“I have to go to New York,” Landon starts. “I’ll leave in about an hour, and I’ll be back tomorrow.”
“Oh.” I have no other words to articulate the devastating sense of loss.
I think he senses the disappointment in my voice. “It’s very important,” he says, “or else I wouldn’t leave... I wouldn’t go.”
I wouldn’t leave you. That’s what he had been about to say. I swallow. I have to tread carefully, or else I’ll be ascribing feelings to him that he hasn’t communicated, and then I’ll end up wanting more from him than he’s prepared to give.
“I’ll be here when you get back,” I say lightly.
“You’d better be.” His voice is low, and my breath catches in my throat.
I spend the rest of the day at the Gold Dust, alternatively talking with Claude, the managers of the spa and the world-class gym, who I hadn’t met before, and working on my Mac in the quiet of the office Claude has assigned to me. There, during every little break from my work, my head fills with the memories of Landon thrusting into me from behind while I stood over the desk.
In the evening, I order dinner from room service, and I eat alone while downing half a bottle of wine. Afterward, I explore the suite, ending up at the library, where I find among many exciting looking books, an old classic novel I’ve read at least a hundred times. I start reading it again, getting to a very dramatic proposal scene before I decide to call Laurie.
“At last!” she exclaims, “I was wondering when you would take a break from Landon long enough to remember me.”
“I’m mad at you,” I reply, “What did you tel
l my mom?”
‘Nothing,” she denies. “I said, very innocently, that your work in San Francisco involved a guy named Landon Court.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“So how’s it going?” she changes the subject.
I shrug. “Landon’s gone back to New York. He’ll be back tomorrow though.”
“He probably has to give his equipment a rest after you used him with a vengeance to end that incredibly long dry spell.”
“It wasn’t that long,” I protest, “and believe me, Landon’s equipment does not require rest to perform at optimum capacity.” He doesn’t even need to sleep, I add silently, still puzzled by his seeming inability to rest like a normal person.
Laurie giggles in delight. “Before I forget,” I hear the beeping sounds as she does something with her phone. “I sent you a link. No idea why I forgot to send it earlier. It’s pretty exciting.”
The message appears on my phone and I put the call on speaker while I follow the link. It’s one of the entertainment websites, and it has a picture of me, Landon, and Cameron McDaniel. Landon has his hand around my waist, his face impassive as he looks at the camera. Cameron is standing a little to the side, also glaring in the direction of the camera. My face is turned towards Landon so that only my side profile is visible in the shot.
The article is just a short blurb.
‘New York hotel and real estate billionaire Landon Court spotted in San Fran with longtime friend restaurateur Cameron McDaniel, and a mystery woman. Is the most eligible bachelor in New York going off the market?’
“Jeez!” I exclaim. “All we did was go out to dinner.”
“I know, right?” Laurie sounds impressed. “You’re hanging with the big boys now. Enjoy it. I gotta go, Brett will be here any minute.”
With that she’s gone. I end up following the link highlighting Landon’s name and land on a search result of all the articles the website has published about him. Most of them are about his public appearances with women. I’ve read the rumors about the women he’s been linked with before, so I skip those articles. There are pictures of him at an acclaimed play off-Broadway, directed by his brother Aidan. There’re other pictures of him with his brother, who is slightly darker, but with the same blue eyes and arrow straight nose. He’s the brother who was supposed to have sent ‘hooker’ me to Landon’s apartment. How awkward, I think. At least I know that we’re never going to meet and be put in a position where he would remember that Landon once thought I was a whore. By the time we get back to New York, Landon and I will go our separate ways.
