She hated to admit it, but she didn’t really mind that part so much. It wasn’t as though he was quick to finish and then passed out immediately afterward. He went for food and water when they needed it, and twice she’d fallen out of bed laughing when one of the many long conversations they’d had turned ridiculous. And sex with Ben Richards—whether he bent her over and fucked her from behind, let her tie him up and have her slow, torturous way with him or took his sweet time driving her out of her mind with his fingers, his mouth, his tongue—was phenomenal.
Every. Single. Time.
She answered on the third ring. “Let me guess, Dr. Li called.”
There was a long pause on the other end of the phone.
“If I didn’t deserve that, I’d be offended.”
“Well, thank heavens you’re not.” She made sure the smile was loud and clear in her voice, even if she didn’t completely mean it.
“Since you asked oh so politely I’ll tell you. There’s no place to park on your street, so my hands are tied on the being a gentleman and ringing the doorbell thing. I need you to come out.” Almost as an afterthought he added, “Please.”
The bottom dropped out of her stomach. He was there, not calling to cancel again.
“I suppose I can excuse it this one time,” she told him. “Be out in a minute.”
Rachel grabbed her wrap off the foot of the bed and wound it around her shoulders.
Let’s get dressed to the teeth and go out tonight, he’d told her earlier that morning.
After nothing but those on-again, off-again marathon sessions in bed, his timing couldn’t have been better. She’d been starting to wonder if she was nothing more than a booty call—long talks and breakfast in bed aside.
Let’s go someplace so nice we leave drunk and starving because the food portions are really small and the wine really good, he’d said, his forehead touching hers, his timing uncanny. She’d just chickened out of showing him her vulnerable side by asking him exactly why he kept coming around when he’d asked.
He was right. The entire street was packed with cars parked bumper to bumper. It was eight o’clock on a Wednesday night. Of course all of her neighbors would be home.
He’d stopped his car on the street so the passenger door was positioned between the trunk of one car and the front bumper of another parked at the curb. He stood in the space between them, dressed to the teeth indeed.
Rachel made it down two of the five steps on the front stoop and had to stop or trip down the rest when she got her first good look at him. Her only thought for a long moment was, Holy Mother of God.
Dressed in all black—his jacket finely tailored to showcase his broad shoulders and narrow waist, shirt unbuttoned two buttons at the collar and dress pants pulled flat across his taut lower abdomen—he looked positively dangerous. Lethal even.
“Wow,” she heard him breathe as she descended the rest of the steps slowly, his eyes taking her in from top to bottom and back. “Rachel, Rachel, Rachel.”
Goose bumps rose on her arms at the almost reverent way he said her name.
“I almost forgot I was peeved with you for the way you answered your phone a minute ago.” His hands slipped around her waist when she joined him by his car.
“I thought for sure you were backing out on me again.” She held a finger to his lips when he leaned in for a kiss. “You should know red does not come off. If you kiss me now you’ll be wearing it all night.”
She shivered at the hungry look he gave her.
“It would be worth it,” he said, his voice low, seductive.
She grinned. “But you won’t.”
“Not your mouth anyway.”
She spread her hands over his chest and slid her fingers under the lapels of his jacket as he dipped his head and pressed his lips to her neck in lieu of a proper kiss. The fabric of his shirt felt almost as good under her hands as she knew his skin would later.
He lifted his head, leaving her wanting so much more than that one touch.
“You look amazing,” he told her.
“You look pretty damn good yourself,” she whispered back.
She would have melted into him when he showed the other side of her neck the same attention but his hands on her waist held her away from him.
“We should probably get in the car and go before we make a spectacle of ourselves right here on the street,” he murmured, his breath hot on her skin as he outlined the shell of her ear with his nose, making her chandelier earring sway and goose bumps break out over her arms. “The sooner we eat, the sooner we can go home.”
“Do you know,” she started, struggling to sound as if she was in control of herself, “that it’s been forever since I’ve been to a blues club?”
He lifted his head slowly. “You’re going to make me wait through dinner and music to get you out of this dress?”
She smiled sweetly. “I hear Angelina Pope is singing at Blue Chicago tonight.”
“Okay, you win.” He stepped aside and opened the passenger car door. “But only because it’s Angelina Pope.”
“I’m sure it doesn’t hurt she’s gorgeous,” she said, stepping into the wedge made by the open door.
Angelina Pope was Spanish, drop-dead beautiful with a killer curvy body and a smoky voice that made the fine hairs raise all over Rachel’s body when she sang.
“I wouldn’t have any idea,” he told her, his face carefully blank. “I’ve never noticed anything but her voice.”
Rachel touched her lips to his in the barest whisper of a kiss, careful to not leave her lipstick behind, and slid into the car.
He took her to The Signature Room on the ninety-fifth floor of the Hancock Building, where they sat at a window-side table overlooking the Chicago skyline. After ordering a bottle of wine, bowls of lobster bisque and seared Scottish salmon for both of them, she was sure they were not going to leave hungry at the end of the meal.
“Did you know my stepfather had never been in a long-term relationship before he met my mother?” he asked after their server poured their wine and walked away.
Rachel tore her gaze away from the breathtaking view.
“There’s a reason you’re telling me this, out of the blue?”
“You’ve told me about your parents.” He sipped his wine. “And I woke up a week ago to find Bree trying to figure out the coffeemaker in my kitchen. She repaid me the favor of making her a pot by giving me the third degree about why I was opposed to having a girlfriend. I figured, by association, you were curious as well.”
She felt herself blush despite being guilty of nothing.
“I’ve never talked to her about this.” She couldn’t help but laugh at how ludicrous it was that Bree had brought it up. “Apparently she got the idea that you’re a confirmed bachelor from some offhanded remark Petra made to her once.”
To her relief he laughed with her. “Well, that explains a couple of really confusing things she said.” He folded his hands on the table, his expression still warm, amused. “My mother and I lived with my grandparents from the time I was born until I was eight or so. My grandmother was a housewife, so she was there to get me off the bus after school and put me to bed while my mother worked a waitressing job and took a college class here and there. She could have afforded a place of our own, but she was determined to put money aside so I could go to college and never have to wait a table or work hard labor if I didn’t want to.
“My grandfather had a minor heart attack when I was in third grade. My dad, Tracy, was his doctor. He says he fell hard for my mother the instant he laid eyes on her. Ask him and he’ll tell you he knew that moment that he hadn’t made a mistake by putting his education and career before having a girlfriend. He married her within six months, became a father to me even though he’d never thought of having children of his own, and put her the rest of the way through medical school.”
She could see the pride he felt about his parents. “And your biological father?”
�
��Lied to my mother, told her he was single so she would sleep with him when he was actually married with a family.” His expression darkened slightly. “When she told him she was pregnant he turned his back on both of us. She’s never told me his name, only that she’d tell me who he was when I turned eighteen if I was still interested in knowing. I was never interested.”
She felt a sharp pang for him. No matter how grounded he appeared to be outwardly, being rejected by his own father, even a father he never knew, had to hurt on some level.
“Maybe we could skip the blues club tonight,” she suggested.
As much as she’d wanted to get out and get some perspective on how she felt about him, without the way he consumed her completely when they were behind closed doors, she wanted to put her arms around him and convince him to take her home and back to bed even more.
“Oh no.” He smiled at their server, waiting to continue while he set their salads in front of them. “You said you wanted music, you’re getting music.” He gave her a wolfish smile. “And Angelina Pope just might help put me in the mood for later.”
She gave him a droll look. “As though you need any help.”
* * * * *
There was no urgent groping when they got back to his apartment in the wee hours of the night, both of them a little tipsy but nowhere near drunk on good food, good music and what she’d just learned was really good scotch.
He’d knelt inside the door and helped her with the straps on her shoes, kicked his off next to them as he slipped out of his jacket and led her to his room by the hand.
When he closed the door with a soft click and reached for his shirt buttons she took his hands, stopping him. “Let me.”
He paused a single heartbeat, then gently twisted his hands free and trailed his fingertips down her forearms. At her elbows he turned his hands, running the backs of his fingers up her arms. Her own fingers began to tremble with anticipation as she worked the buttons free. She pulled his shirttails free and he dropped his arms to make it easy for her to remove his shirt. God help her, he was wearing a plain undershirt that hugged that incredible chest of his like a second skin.
“Your body makes me crazy.” Her voice was quiet, strange to her own ears.
His stomach tensed when she slipped her fingers under the hem of the t-shirt and pressed her hands flat against it.
“You.” She looked up at him, into his dark-gray eyes. “You make me crazy.”
She took her time pushing his shirt upward, relishing the feel of his soft body hair and his skin. He said nothing, just watched her, waiting, his arms still at his sides as he let her do what she was doing. Her nails grazed over his nipples as she pushed upward and she smiled at the muscle that ticked in his jaw.
He raised his arms and to help her get the undershirt over his head more easily. Not one to usually let her have her way—she suspected it was more for the sake of pushing her buttons than always needing to be in control—she half expected him to take charge. He surprised her by lowering his arms to his sides again.
In her bare feet she had to raise up on her toes just a little to kiss his neck, right over the spot where his pulse hammered hard near his throat. She kissed him in the same spot on the other side the way he had with her earlier in the street, her hands traveling over and down his chest as she did. She brushed her lips over his collarbone on that side, dipped her head and kissed his nipple. He sucked in a sharp breath, then groaned when she touched it with the tip of her tongue.
She toyed with it, spurred on by the way his breath quickened, unbuckled his belt and tugged the button of his pants open roughly. When she slid the zipper down and pushed the fabric just low enough to almost expose him, he broke his control, buried his hands in her hair and crushed her mouth in a kiss.
She let herself drown in it for a moment, clinging to his half-naked body, her hands alternately clutching and stroking his back, his hips, his ass where it was partially bared to her touch. He sank his teeth into her bottom lip and growled when she gripped his hips and ground herself against his incredibly hard erection.
And when she grabbed his wrists and tugged gently, he released.
She took a reluctant step backward, then another, leaving him breathing hard and looking like a wild animal standing in the middle of his bedroom. She slipped her belt open and dropped it, unwrapped her dress and let it drift to the floor, backing toward the bed slowly as she did.
He groaned her name and tucked his thumbs into the waist of both his pants and his underwear. She reached behind her back and unhooked the clasp of her bra, then tossed it aside. He shoved his way out of the rest of his clothes and started toward her slowly. She stopped moving when the edge of the bed touched her calves, pushed her underpants to her knees and then sat to remove them the rest of the way.
When he was close she crawled backward to the middle of the bed. He followed, crawling on hands and knees over her without touching her anywhere. She didn’t need him to. She wanted nothing more than his body pressing hers to the comforter, his cock filling her to bursting and his mouth—her lifeline.
He kissed her in long, delicious tastes, sucking one lip and then the other, dipping his tongue in her mouth and then lightly pulling on hers when she responded. He balanced his weight on his arms over her and settled his hips between her thighs.
She had to turn her head and catch her breath when he pushed all the way inside her in one long stroke, not stopping or slowing down until he was buried to the hilt.
“God yes,” she heard herself whisper as a white-hot electric thrill scorched her.
“You are all mine, Rachel Marsh.” He spoke against the side of her face as he thrust again. “Look at me.” He rolled his hips. Her back wanted to arch but she was pinned to the mattress from ass to shoulders by his body. “Rachel, look at me, baby.”
It took so long for her to force her eyes open.
“I see you, Ben,” she managed to say. “I see nothing but you.”
She barely stopped the words I love you from slipping off the end of her tongue, but they were there. And she meant them. Every letter of them.
“This is how crazy feels.” He pulled back slowly. “Can you feel it?”
She expected him to slam into her, even braced herself for it, shaking with eager anticipation, but he rocked back into her as though he had all the time in the world.
“I feel you, Ben.” She slid the sole of one foot down the back of his leg and wrapped her other leg around his waist. “I feel nothing but you.”
He kissed her in another long, unhurried taste as the movement of his hips took on more of a rhythm. A very slow, very erotic rhythm.
As hard as it had been to open her eyes after that initial rush of their bodies joining, now she couldn’t look away. He didn’t close his eyes when they kissed, but neither did she. For the moment nothing else existed but her and Ben and the way their bodies fit together. Ben and the way he stoked the fire within her slowly, drawing out the moment one delicious thrust at a time, the heat from his own body pouring into her.
Ben and the impossible, dangerous amount of love she felt for him.
Chapter Ten
“Good, you’re here.” Ben closed the door and stepped farther into his dad’s huge office. “Do you have some time for me?”
“Hey, kid.” His dad took his reading glasses off, folded them and set them aside. “I have to dictate a couple of charts, then I’m finished for the day. What’s up?”
Ben tucked his hands in his pants pockets. “I need to talk to you about working at the Chicago office instead of Homewood.”
His dad laced his fingers together on his desk top and looked at him expectantly.
“This is about Rachel Marsh.”
There was a pause. “What about her?”
“I’m dating her.” He’d thought confessing his relationship with Rachel to his boss, his strongest supporter and his dad, was going to be difficult, but he felt nothing but calm. “I wasn’t being completely ho
nest when I told you we were friends in college. You need to know that I started seeing her a few days before her first interview. I didn’t say anything before because I wasn’t sure where things were going with her, and, personal feelings completely aside, I think she’s ideal for the job.”
“So do the rest of us, as you know, but you also know company policy, Ben.”
He laughed a quiet, humorless sound. “I know it, but company policy is for the Chicago center. I understand the rules will apply as is for Homewood as well, but there is no policy regarding involvement between coworkers at separate facilities. And no one but you and the other three board members have the ability to do the same damage that Paul and his wife did all those years ago.”
His dad’s mouth twitched, amused. “You have a point, but if the board starts turning a blind eye just because there’s a gray area where this is concerned…”
“Your employees will think you’re stepping into the twenty-first century.”
“They already do without an amendment to the standing rule. We’re ahead of our field in preventative therapies as well as treatments for some of the most debilitating diseases. We have a generous employee benefits package, full coverage insurance. We offer more paid sick and vacation time than a lot of companies I know about.”
“So what will it hurt if you do away with the rule?”
Tracy studied him a moment. “No one but you has questioned it until now.”
“No. No one has questioned it out loud. It’s archaic and unnecessary.”
His dad stood up and came around the desk, shaking his head but smiling. “I can’t do away with a rule because you’re dating someone we want to hire. You and I both know everyone would scream favoritism if it suddenly vanished for you.”
“Anyone who would already is. You’ve made it clear from the day I graduated and started working here that your spot on the board is going to be mine someday.” He took a deep breath and raised his hands. “Dad, I didn’t come here to fight. I came here to tell you I’m in love with her, and to ask if there’s any way we can work around that without ruining her chance of getting a job she both wants and deserves.”
KeyParty Page 8
