“About damn time,” I hiss through my teeth.
A low rumble of his laughter fills the air, tingling a path from my ears and stirring sensations low in my belly. But I am not pleased when he shoves away from me, no longer touching me, almost as if he is defying me, teasing me on purpose. I am ready to turn, to take over, to make my own demands, but I believe his promise to stop whatever he is doing if I drop my hands.
Relief washes over me when I hear the rustle of clothing and the tear of paper — a condom I am certain. Soon. Soon he will be inside me. His hands come down on my hips and his shaft presses between my thighs. Deft fingers stroke through the wet heat of my body, preparing me when I was ready long ago.
“Please, Chris,” I moan, aching for fulfillment.
“Easy, baby,” he replies, and oh yes, I feel him press between my legs, thick and hard, and exactly what I need.
Still though, he holds back, teases me, sliding his erection up and down in the wet heat of my swollen flesh. He can’t want the way I do or he could not do this and I silently vow to amend that, and soon.
“Payback”-
He thrusts into me, hard and deep, burying himself to the hilt and moaning with the impact. I moan with him and gasp when he lifts my hips, finding a deeper spot. There is no time to revel in the fullness of him inside me, the completeness my body needs. He thrusts again and the wild, wicked hard pump of our bodies together erupts into a frenzied dance. His hands are all over me, his cock is inside me, filling me, stretching me. Pleasing me. In a remote part of my mind, I think of the glass, of the two of us shoving against it. Of the possibility of it breaking, but I don’t care. If I am going to die I want it to be with this man inside me.
The bloom of orgasm begins to build and I try to fight it, unwilling to give up the sweet bliss of almost there. But he is grinding into me, touching me, pushing me, and I am weak. I stiffen, unable to move the seconds before I shatter, my body clamping down on the hard length of him and shooting darts of pure white-hot bliss to every nerve ending I own.
A guttural sound escapes his lips, and he buries himself deep in the depths of my spasming sex, shaking with his own release. I want to push against him, participate in his pleasure as he has mine, but I am still trembling and weak with the final bittersweet ending to my orgasm.
For a few moments the world spins and we are more animals than people, lost in a primal act, where nothing but satisfaction exists. When finally I blink the world back into view, twinkling city lights dot the inky canvas of the night. Chris is still inside me, draped over me, his hands on the window beside mine.
He nuzzles my neck. “How about that pizza?”
I smile. “You better make that two.”
“If it means you have the energy to keep fucking me like you just did, I’ll buy you a damn dozen.” He slides out of me and a glow of satisfaction fills me with his words.
Now over my fear of falling out of the window, I turn around and lean on the glass and watch him pull off the condom, tossing it into a trashcan by the couch. His jeans are unzipped, low on his hips but he is dressed all the way down to his boots. My glow fades. Suddenly, I am more than a little aware of my nakedness. “You never even got undressed.”
He’s back in front of me, wrapping his arm around me, and stroking the hair from my eyes. “Because you stole my control, Sara, and that never happens.”
My chest tightens at the tormented quality to his voice and I think…I think, for this tiny window of time, he needs me. Maybe, I need him. I stroke his cheek with my fingers. “I was the one with my hands over my head, pressed against a glass that could crash in. Actually, I still am.”
“We are,” he points out. “And it’s hurricane reinforced. We’re good.”
My hand is resting on his chest, the steady thrum of his heartbeat beneath my palm and it somehow makes me feel more alive. He makes me feel more alive. I want to do the same for him, to wash away his suddenly darker mood, as he has mine.
“You know, Chris,” I say. “I do have a few boundaries.”
He arches a brow, narrowing his gaze on mine. “What boundaries would you be referring to?”
“I’m not going home in a bra with my blouse gaping open. You ripped my shirt.”
My reward is his sexy half-smile, the same one he’d given me outside the gallery, by the Porsche. “I didn’t hear you complain at the time.”
“I’d lost my blouse. I darn sure deserved it to be for a pleasurable reason.”
His eyes light with naughty mischief and he nips my bottom lip. “I’ll gladly buy you a new one so we can do it over again.”
“I’ll settle for borrowing one of yours right now. I’m not eating in high heels and pantyhose.”
He wiggles and eyebrow at me. “I would really like it if you would.”
“Oh no,” I say and I smile and kick off my shoes for emphasis. “Not happening.”
“Next time,” he says with a wink, and the inference there will be a ‘next time’ shouldn’t please me for reasons I’ve already determined, aside from the fact that he’s going back to Paris. Without knowing why Chris is damaged, he is, and I am, and we are bad for each other. Next time isn’t good for either of us unless…we need more than tonight.
Chris pushes off the window, away from me and surprises me by tugging his shirt over his head. And oh, oh yes, his abs are rippling perfection. I knew he was good looking, I knew he was athletic, but every inch of him is rock-hard and sculpted in what only genetic and regular hours in the gym can do. The intricate tattoo covering his entire right shoulder down his arm, the one I’d hungered to see more clearly, has me spellbound. The dragon is majestic, etched with such detail and skill, he could have drawn it himself.
“Do I pass inspection?” he asks softly.
I reach out to touch the design on his arm, only to have him capture my hand.
“If you touch me while you’re looking at me like that, you won’t get that pizza.”
He steps closer and pulls his shirt over my head. I inhale his sexy scent clinging to it and me and I hug it close, wishing it were him. “I’m not sure I care about the pizza.”
“I’m not letting you pass out on me.” His finger slides under my chin, lifting my gaze to his. “Now we’re both half-dressed.” He lowers his voice, and adds, “On an equal playing field.”
Equal. It is the last thing I expect from a man who’d completely dominated me minutes before. It doesn’t compute. Power is taking, not giving. How can he do both? Who have I ever known who could?
“Equal would mean that I get to push you against the window and forbid you to move, while I’m mercilessly teasing you.”
His eyes darken, shadows swimming with gold flecks in the sea of his green eyes. “If I thought you were ready for where that will lead, I’d let you.”
Let me? He’d let me? “What does that even mean, Chris?”
He reaches up and strokes my bottom lip, and the touch is gentle, but there is a barely contained edge beneath his surface I’m coming to know. “There is so much I could show you, Sara, but I’m not ready for you to run away.” There is a sense of inevitable regret to his words.
I react to a sense of him pulling away from me without him actually moving—it claws at me inexplicably. I grab his arm and step closer. “Who says I’ll run away?”
“You will,” he says.
Does he think I can’t handle more than tonight? Does he not see I need more than tonight? I need the escape. “You’re wrong.”
He shakes his head. “No. I’m not.”
I open my mouth to argue but his cell phone rings from inside his jean pocket, I think. His ring tone is a concert pianist and I’d be willing to bet my car that his father is the musician. I hate my father, I’d told him. What had gotten into me? And clearly, even with his father gone, he holds his in high regard.
Chris slides the phone from his low-hung jeans and I’m fairly certain he chooses to answer the call to end our conversation.
“Right,” he says. “My usual and hold tight just a sec.” He glances at me. “What kind of pizza?”
The pizza place called him? I’m confused. “Cheese.”
“Make my usual an extra large,” he says into the phone. “Right. Thanks.” He ends the call. “Pizza is on the way.”
“That’s what I call service.”
“It’s almost closing time, and Jacob went in to get a pizza for himself and asked if I’d called.”
“Like I said, that’s what I call service.”
“I’ve known the owner a good ten years and since he also owns the Chopper shop I frequent, he likes me. I send him lots of business.” He reaches for my hand and leads me to the couch. “Make yourself comfortable. I’ll get us drinks and plates and we can eat right here.” He smiles. “Unless you’re tired of looking out of the window?”
I shake my head and sit down. The brown leather is soft and a bit chilly, and I shiver. “That was a very bad joke.”
He picks up a remote and the gas fireplace to my right in the corner flickers to life. “I’m good at bad jokes.”
“Yes,” I agree, pulling a brown throw over me. ”I know. The man with the one red shoe?”
“You don’t like Tom Hanks?”
“That’s an old movie.”
“I’m a fan of classics.” He sits down next to me and grabs another remote, punching a button. A massive flat screen television lowers from the ceiling above the fireplace. He offers me the controller. “The key to my castle, at your disposal.”
I am charmed and comfortable with this man in a way I don’t remember being with anyone before him. I accept the remote. “And The Man with One Red Shoe is a classic?”
“Right along with Austin Powers.”
“Austin Powers?” I ask. “Tell me you aren’t an Austin Powers fan.”
“Have you watched Austin Powers?”
“Well no,” I concede, “but they look so silly.”
“That’s the point, sweetheart. It’s an escape from reality.” He pushes to his feet. “I’ll grab us drinks and plates.” His lips twitch. “Wine?”
“No,” I say with emphasis. “I do not want wine.”
“Corona?”
“No. Nothing with alcohol.”
“That leaves you with bottled water or Gatorade.”
“Water,” I say. “I never drink calories I can eat. Leaves room for more pizza.”
“I see,” he replies, looking amused. “More pizza is always good. I’ll be right back.”
I sink down into the seat, and watch him walk toward the massive open kitchen overlooking the living area, and he is all long-legged, male grace and flexing muscle. He’s also one big contraction. Funny, charming, seemingly without the ego he has every right to possess. But there is more there. The man who’d faced off and won with the King of Egos himself, Mark Compton. The man who’d pressed me against a window and took me with a dark passion I’d sensed came from a deep, troubled place. The man who’d told me he’d show me things but he wasn’t ready for me to run. I burn to know what that means, what’s beneath his surface. And for the second time tonight, I think we are two messed up people destined to destroy each other but I can’t walk away. No. Can’t isn’t the issue. I simply don’t want to.
Chapter Sixteen
Chris has just set plates and two bottles of water on the table when a strange buzzing sound fills the room. I frown. “What was that?”
“My version of a doorbell,” he says with a boyish grin that is a complete contrast to the dark, edgy man who has just done wonderfully wicked things to me. “If a visitor manages to get past the elevator code, I still have to let them in from this side.”
“That can’t be the pizza, can it? They called about ten minutes ago.” He glances at his watch and the thick silver and black leather design has become somehow erotic to me.
“Right at ten minutes,” he confirms. “But I’m guessing they gambled and made my usual before they called me.” He pushes to his feet, running strong hands down his legs.
“Where’s the bathroom?” I ask, and stand up.
He motions to a door beside the fireplace and heads to the elevator. I watch him, trying to imagine how I’d react as a female delivery person if Chris answered the door, or elevator, with no shirt on. His tattoo. I never thought I was a tats kind of girl but his are hot, maybe the hottest thing I’ve ever seen. Or maybe Chris is simply the man who hits all my hot buttons.
He punches in a code in the panel by the elevator and I can’t see if there is a blushing female inside, but I do hear Jacob’s voice and Chris’s sexy rumble of laughter. The sound does funny things to my chest, the kind of funny feeling attached to unwelcome emotions. Oh boy. Don’t go there, Sara. Don’t start falling for Chris. This is an escape from reality.
He turns and heads back toward me, two pizza boxes in his hands, and all I can think of is being pressed against the window with him doing naughty things to me. I amend my prior thought. He absolutely hits all my hot buttons times ten. I refuse to clutter up a good thing with emotions and thoughts of tomorrow. When I was in this man’s arms, he pushed my limits and left no room for anything but what he was making me feel. I am instantly hungry and pizza isn’t what I crave. It’s him, and a desire to feel what he made me feel not so long ago.
He lifts the boxes in his hands. “They brought us two. If you’re going to the bathroom, go now. Trust me. It’s the best pizza on the planet when it’s scorching hot.”
I grin. “On the planet?”
“You bet, sweetheart, and I’ve done a lot of eating in Italy.”
Laughing, I quickly scurry away, and dart into a spare bathroom where I flip on the light to reveal a room so luxurious it makes my master bath look like a porta potty. The darn thing even has a sunken tub. Out of the blue, my chest tightens and I lean against the door, forgetting my hunger and my urgency. This life, Chris’s life, the expensive everything around me, was my life when I was growing up, and I’m apparently having a rare flashback to the past. A part of me misses the girly things like a fancy bathtub, soaps, and perfumes, but I quickly remind myself, there’d been a price for those things. Chris is a different story. He earned this life, he owns it and deserves it, and I know my desire to do the same has the Riptide ‘carrot’, as Chris had called it, enticing me. It’s my chance to ‘earn it’, or a tiny piece of this life Chris lives, myself.
I shake off my thoughts and quickly use the bathroom and wash up, checking myself in the mirror in the process. My lips are bare and swollen and my brown hair a wild mess. Not surprisingly, I look thoroughly fucked, but remarkably better than I remember looking in a long time. Fucked. Not made love to. I smile into the mirror. I like the freedom this new me is experiencing. It’s sexy. He’s sexy. I feel sexier than I have felt in my entire life.
“Hurry, woman!” Chris shouts out and I laugh and exit the bathroom.
“Why do women do hurry so poorly?” he asks, as I join him on the couch.
“Why do men do impatient so well?” I counter, and my nostrils flare with the wonderful scent of baked bread, spices, and tomato sauce.
“Because you teach us impatience.”
I snort. “Like you men are teachable? I don’t think so.”
He opens the lid of one of the boxes and the cheese is bubbly and yummy looking. “That looks and smells so good. I’m not even going to be embarrassed to let you see how much pizza I can put back.”
He offers me a plate and I happily fill it will a large slice. “You don’t look like you can put down more than a slice or two.”
“Obviously, you know the right things to say to a girl, especially after she’s, ah, been naked.” I smile, less embarrassed with this man than seems possible considering his hot, famous, status. “But I assure you I can.” I take a bite and moan. “Oh…hmm.”
“Good, right?” he asks, and takes a bite of his own slice.
“So good,” I agree, snatching a napkin from the roll he’s set on the c
offee table. “I’ll be jogging a few extra miles this week but it will be worth it.”
“You’re a runner?”
“It’s my cardio of choice and I can do it at home. I’m not much into group activities and I hate the gym crowd.”
“There’s a private gym on the fourth floor. It’s one of the reasons I picked the building.”
“You have the whole floor. I’m shocked you don’t have a gym here.”
“I use the space for my studio which I’ll show you when we finish eating.”
I’m going to see Chris Merit’s studio and I am reminded of what a superstar is. “You don’t act like a famous person.”
“I don’t think of myself as a famous person.”
I finish my pizza and set the plate down, my hunger curbed enough to find him far more interesting. I pull one leg onto the couch. “But you are. You have to know you are.”
He shrugs and grabs another slice of pizza for both of us. “I’m just me.” He hands me my plate.
Absently, I accept the pizza. “You are one of the youngest, most successful living painters in the world. You’re brilliant, Chris.”
“And because I know you truly admire my work, that matters to me. Believe me, there are plenty of people who want to be close to you for the wrong reasons when you’re in the spotlight.”
I take a bite of my pizza and consider him. He’s already reaching for another slice. I’m still considering him when he takes a bite.
He arches a brow at my attentiveness. “What are you looking at me like that for?”
“You don’t like people to know you’re famous.”
“I don’t go around announcing it.”
My brows knit together as I start to piece together something. Or I think I do. “Wait. Do you intentionally use your father’s photo for public forums?”
A slow smile slides onto his lips and he disposes of his plate and motions to the box. “More?”
If I Were You-nook Page 14
