It amazed her how he could find uncharted territories and plumb new springs of gratification every single time they had sex.
Andrew satisfied her on every level—mental, emotional and sexual. What had been hot chemistry in their youth must have had much deeper roots. There was a reason she was so attracted to him—he made her see parts of her she could never have accessed on her own.
Even the strength, the independence and the will to be successful that she had found in herself had been because of him leaving her. It wasn’t ideal the way he had left, but no relationship was ideal. Didn’t she hate perfection, anyway?
Pain, mistakes, regret and growth were part of their relationship as much as love, understanding, support and joy were. And that was how she wanted it to be.
“Open for me.” His deep voice shook her nerves.
She went under him again, and he pushed her thighs apart. He lifted her up slightly and his tongue caressed her pubic mound, meandering up and down till she crooned when tension built up inside her.
Every inhale propelled her closer and closer to the light. His tongue danced on her clitoris and the needles of heat shooting through her had her banging her fist against the wall, begging for release.
“I guess this is what wall-banging sex means.” He chuckled, growing more and more persistent in his mission to lavish her with all the care she deserved.
She was simultaneously embarrassed at her abandon and thrilled at experiencing this kind of no-holds-barred sex. Not being the kind of person who could generally overcome her inhibition, she was shocked—in a pleasant way—at her own reaction.
“Don’t worry, I don’t have any neighbors.”
With all her hesitation dissolved, she was engulfed by the ultimate culmination to all her pent-up desire. This one was even more powerful than her first. Chaotic tornadoes lashed inside her. In the chaos was satisfaction. It was a sensual indulgence to have him all to herself for hours at a stretch.
“I feel like I’m the one having all the fun.” she complained.
“What’s wrong with that?” His lips separated from her and he allowed her to close her legs.
He cuddled next to her, clearly signaling that he was done for. Now it was time for intimacy of a different kind. Ashley entwined her legs between his, wanting to feel the wet, hot bulge of him stroke her thighs.
She pulled her limbs up and down under the sheets, scraping over the bottom of his shaft, and he groaned.
“You’re insatiable. And you’re making me insatiable too.” he said.
“I’ve held out for seven years. Can you blame me for wanting to take it all now?”
But she understood that he was tired, so she stopped arousing him. Tapping his stomach with her fingers, she moved her gaze down to the table and saw the picture of him as a kid. Looking at it reminded her of the one sore topic between them that remained.
The topic of having children.
Not wanting to kick the hornets’ nest, Ashley pinched her lips together, though the disquiet in her didn’t settle.
“Something bothering you?” Andrew asked, drawing her into the sanctuary of his body. His ability to decipher her innermost thoughts was astonishing.
“Why don’t you want to have kids, Andrew?” She said it before she knew what she was saying.
Andrew pulled away from her, rolling onto the other side of the bed. They hadn’t even started talking about the issue and he was already closing up.
“I’d be a bad dad, like Carl was. I don’t want to put any kid through that kind of childhood.” he said.
So she was right about his unwillingness originating from his own screwed-up relationship with his dad.
“No, you won’t be that way. I won’t let you be that way.” She stretched her arm and took his ear in her palms.
His jaw clenched. “Ashley, let’s not argue over this right now. We’re not having kids.”
For someone who was so successful and had the image of being a confident CEO, Andrew had so many insecurities regarding being a spouse, father, boyfriend.
“I know I’m not going to be the best parent, either, but I have faith in my abilities to learn and grow. You should too.”
Hoping her advice would make him reconsider, Ashley kissed him on his forehead.
Then let it go.
Chapter 19
Sending flowers to your girlfriend’s workplace was the most clichéd trick in the book of romance. A more creative man would have picked lilies, white petunias or an equally inconspicuous flower, but Andrew had gone for the classic—roses. Red roses.
The bucket-sized bouquet sat at the entrance to her office. Talk about subtlety.
“These roses are gorgeous,” Edward, the cover designer, commented. He was in her room to ask her to take a look at some concepts and designs he had come up with for the cover of Andrew’s book. “And they’re expensive. Your boyfriend really cares for you.”
The office staff, including the interns and copyeditors, had gathered around the flowers like bees, sniffing at the showy posy. There was no place for such an exorbitant luxury in her tiny office. Ashley wondered what the occasion was.
Assuming that it would be written on the note snuck amidst the roses, she plucked out the yellow envelope from the bed of roses.
To the woman who smells more ravishing than a hundred roses. Can I have the pleasure of celebrating my thirty-second birthday with you?
Breath clogged up her windpipe, refusing to be pushed down. Behind the note was the date, time and venue of the place he had chosen to meet her at.
Glad that he had reminded her, she pushed the note into her top drawer. Andrew’s birthday was still three days away.
Edward left after she assured him that she would come by his room at three to finalize the cover design for Perfect Chemistry and Andrew’s autobiography.
The final edits on the book were all done and it was already in production and up on online retailers’ websites. It was September already. Only two months until release date.
Ashley was eagerly looking forward to seeing how people would react to it. Personally, she’d loved every minute of reading the book. It was a deep and insightful account of a successful and determined man. There was no doubt in her mind that the book would be a mega success.
People responded to authenticity like they responded to nothing else and his moving account of his life was extremely genuine. At certain points in the book she had cried, reading about the rough patches Dracosys had gone through since its inception, and had wished she could have hugged Andrew every single night they had been together.
Making sense of all of it had given her a better view on why Andrew had been such an infrequent visitor in his own home those early years. The company could have lost millions of dollars if it made the slightest wrong move at that time.
The fact that he had retained his sanity through that trying year made her fill up with admiration for his mental fortitude. Not that her struggles had been any less. But she had never had to put up a brave front in front of shareholders, her spouse and the world.
Reading the book made her feel lucky for having fallen in love with a wonderful, strong, and thoughtful man. And she was going to hold onto him, because, as somebody wise had said, some chances only came once.
With a smile tugging at her lips, she started searching on Amazon.com for birthday gifts.
***
“So, this is where you’ve always imagined taking me on a date? To a church?” Ashley asked, unsure, when they passed by a cathedral.
“We’re not going into the church. We’re going to the jazz club down the road.” His hand was in hers. Though the September wind had not turned chilly yet, having something warm pressed against her skin was always welcome in any season.
“Unless you want to go in and renew our vows.” Ashley said, sarcastic.
Having meant it as a funny retort, she was surprised when he squeezed her fingers and said: “I’d like to do exactly that, actually.�
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“I wasn’t serious.”
“I am.”
She bit her lip. Although she was quite sure that she loved Andrew, marrying him a second time… that wasn’t something she was jumping at doing. She’d barely given it any thought. She’d thought they would be dating forever.
What really surprised her was that the man who had, until last week, refused to date her was now throwing up the topic of matrimony all of a sudden. As the topic whirled through her brain, she finally found her stand on this. This time, sense was going to prevail over speed.
“We hurried our wedding last time. This time, I refuse to entertain any talk of marriage until we’ve been together for at least a year.” She narrowed her eyes so he understood that she was serious about this. No compromise.
“That’s a sensible thing to say. I’m proud of you.” His impish grin defused any rift the issue could have caused between them. “But I didn’t mean it literally. I just want us to reaffirm our trust in each other. In a spiritual sort of way.”
“We already did, Andrew. The night we had sex. I’d call that a reaffirmation of the highest sort.”
He grinned. “You have a point there.”
Caging her hips with his arms, he brought her body closer to his. It was an invitation. Like a slow fuse, her thread of control burned and burned, the flame getting to the point where she was ready to blow in his arms.
“I couldn’t get you to agree on car sex, but kissing in public should be tame enough, even for a risk-averse girl like you.” Andrew taunted.
“We’re not teenagers to be kissing on the street,” she scolded, though the draw of his smoldering gaze was too much to resist with her dwindling willpower.
“We grew up too fast, Ashley. All our youth, we tried to be adults. Now that we’ve become adults, let’s be reckless adolescents for once.”
She couldn’t refute it. In their twenties, they had both been so preoccupied with trying to be mature, successful, responsible adults. Rent, bills, mortgage, marriage, housework—her early twenties had passed in a blur.
Drifting to the corner of the street, coming to stop under a lamp post, she clasped her hands behind his neck. There were not many people, but there were some, crawling out of the cathedral, whose attention they already had.
“You’re a public figure now. You sure you want to do this?” She brought her lips so close to his that his pupils dilated, flushed with desire.
“If a picture of me kissing someone in public has to be splashed all over the internet, then I’d not want it to be with anyone else but you.”
The silent calling of the air he blew over her lips was the last push she needed. Arching her back against the lamp post, she grabbed his collar and sank into his lips, drawing him into the most explosive kiss of their lives. They delved deep immediately, none of them in the mood for surface pleasantries. She gave herself completely in this kiss, submerging all of her into the man who would take all of her—faults and all.
He slid his tongue over her lips, then followed it with a nibble. She was glad he hadn’t forgotten what she liked. She liked it edgy. Like the bursting of firecrackers, the rush of blood to her ears drowned out everything, including the heated whispers of people who had gathered around them.
For a long time, there was only his tongue in her mouth, teasing her slowly and drawing out all her secrets. All her insecurities. All her passion. And she gave it all away, holding nothing back. Letting him see every inch of her, devour every inch of her and love every inch of her.
He grabbed her wrist and the pad of his thumb checked her nails. Good thing she’d manicured them last week. Then he lifted a single finger up to her lips and scratched the corners of her lips with her nails. She shuddered like a shaking leaf. The nails were like teeth, but different. Sharper. Sweeter.
He pampered the regions he had poked with her nail with swipes of his tongue to lessen the ache. Just when she thought he was done, Andew opened his mouth and put her finger in.
She inhaled unsteadily. Her whole body shook from the currents that were charging them. Her finger in his mouth and her mouth… there was something inherently erotic about that.
And that wasn’t all. They passed her finger between them, taking their turns to lavish pleasure upon it. Her tongue rolled over the finger inside his mouth. In the cocooned world of their mouths, their tongues and her finger were having a threesome.
An awesome threesome that ended right at the moment when her groin started throbbing with the burning necessity to get closer to him than a kiss.
His breath, mixed with the musky scent of his cologne, spread all over her nostrils. Delicious. Sexy. Masculine.
“So how did you enjoy your first experience of finger kissing?” he wanted to know.
“I want an encore.” she demanded.
His easy laugh vibrated inside her bones. The effect he could have on her was astounding. He made her push her boundaries and try new things… and love doing them.
“Yes, me too. But not here.” Holding onto her hand, he walked her to the entrance of the cathedral. “Here.”
The receding sunlight cast a final glow on his face as it merged into the horizon. The people around them had moved on. Standing here, at this spot, she felt like she part of something ethereal. It was ending of something and the beginning of something new.
Andrew’s eyelashes tickled her bare shoulder when he rested his head on her.
He sucked on the bare skin of the crook between her neck and shoulder, and all the worry left her while she filled more pleasure into her body. When his teeth got involved too, she jerked involuntarily.
“Stop, or you’re going to leave me with a hickey.”
“Something else I didn’t get to do as a teenager.”
“It’ll be so embarrassing if I walk into work with one of those at this age,” she complained. But she couldn’t discount the sheer thrill of having him leave a mark on her. To have proof of how much he wanted her tattooed on her body.
“Don’t worry. I’m not going to go that hard on you.” Andrew eased up, then shifted to her lips. “Unless you want me to.”
Through her hazy eyelids, she barely spotted the reflection of her nodding a vigorous yes. She had to venture out of her comfort zone sometimes.
His smirk creased the skin surrounding her neck. With brushes of his teeth, he circled around the same spot on her neck. Rather than spending her brain power thinking about what to wear to office the next day to cover her love bite, Ashley spent every bit of it basking in the pure, sensual indulgence of being loved.
Awareness thrummed in the veins of her neck that were stretching one by one to allow Andrew more space to make love to her skin. Her nails tore into his flesh when he sucked her throat so hard, it became impossible to stop the tremors that slicked her already moist sex with a fresh flood of heat. He was probably going to end up with some bruises of his own tomorrow. They could be a hickey pair. The thought made her insides smile.
“So what’s playing at the jazz club tonight?” she enquired casually, when he had left his mark—literally.
“I don’t care. Screw the jazz club idea. I’m too wet to sit and listen to music.” he said.
She gripped him tightly, unsure that the strength remaining in her ankles was sufficient to keep her grounded. He supported her, keeping her afloat.
“And I have a neat collection of jazz records at my place. Wanna dance naked while listening to them? We can have melting hot sex for dessert—with a scoop of ice cream.”
That was the kind of offer no one could refuse.
“What flavor?” she asked, naughtily.
“Whatever you like.”
“Cookies and cream.”
A long, steamy kiss was delivered right on the spot between her breasts. Due to her low-cut T-shirt, she felt him on her bare skin. As the smooch turned into a suck, her nipples shot up straight, hardening and sticking out through the material of her blouse, pushing right into his cheek. Alerted to
their rasping call, Andrew reached with his finger and brushed over them in lazy circles. With the rough cloth brushing over her oversensitive nipples, they pulsated with rapture. She had to bite her lip to keep herself from crying out at the volcano of pleasure that was erupting in her.
The chaotic madness in the center of her core escalated, reaching breaking point as he turned his mouth to the ripe buds. Every time. He did this to her every time.
“Cookies and cream is my favorite too,” was the last thing from his mouth before he cradled the heat of her desire with his taut palm and, without even pushing down her jeans, skyrocketed her to the zenith of pleasure.
***
There were many ways to eat ice cream. But all of them lost to the carnal delight of licking it off Ashley’s wet, aroused nipples. The sugar of the ice cream mingling with the spice of her alabaster skin was purely divine.
“Do you remember you licked me off like this the very first time we had sex?” she said, transporting him back to when they had been twenty-two.
“Oh, yes.”
He hadn’t forgotten how her skin had tasted back then. But it tasted much better now. Richer. Creamier. Seven years of deprivation had made him crave the unique flavor that was innately Ashley. He laid his arm on her stomach, which was wet and sticky.
She flushed when her stomach groaned. They’d missed dinner to skip out to his apartment for a session of naked ballroom dancing and hot sex followed by a very creative way to eat dessert. But in between all this, they had let the main course slip their minds. And he could bet she was as hungry as him.
“Wash up,” he ruffled her hair. “I’ll make something.”
“We can order takeout. You don’t have to cook.” She tried to pull him back under her.
“I have dreamt of feeding you my special pasta for ages. You’ll like it.”
Ashley pouted, but then made her way to the bathroom.
When she hopped into the bath, Andrew picked out his clothes from the cupboard of his room and headed for a shower himself.
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