Gabe’s house was close enough to walk to, but she decided to drive. Even if it only shaved a few minutes off, it was worth it. As she pulled to a four-way stop she started having second thoughts.
What if she was making a big mistake?
What if Gabe was Jonah’s father and things between them were awkward after this?
What if he wasn’t Jonah’s father and she never saw him again after tonight?
What if you get a brain tumor and die?
The voice in her head wasn’t Em’s; it was hers. If this past year had taught her anything, it was that tomorrow is not promised. After looking both ways she pressed on the gas and continued forward.
When she pulled up to Gabe’s house the front window was open and she could see the light was on in the kitchen. She put it in park and shut off the engine but remained in her car. Before she went up to the door she wanted to make a decision and once she did, she wasn’t going to look back.
If she wanted to just have dinner and get to know Gabe better, then fine, that’s what tonight was going to be. But, if she was going to do this, she wasn’t going to let any doubt be in her head about it. There wasn’t going to be any ambiguity on whether she was doing the right thing or not. She would sit here until she made a decision and then not look back.
She bit the inside of her cheek and tapped her foot on the floorboard. Then she closed her eyes and pulled a trick out of her mom hat that she’d used with her girls when they were upset and needed to calm down.
Smell the soup, she inhaled through her nose.
Cool the soup, she exhaled through her mouth.
Smell the soup, she inhaled through her nose.
Cool the soup, she exhaled through her mouth.
She repeated that about ten times. Once she was in a calmer state everything became clear to her. It was as if the fog lifted and the lighthouse was shining bright to bring her ship safely home.
Tonight wasn’t about the girls, or Emily, or even Jonah. Gabe was right. Adriana had shown up for all of them. Tonight she was going to show up for her.
With that in mind, she asked herself one simple question.
What do I want?
The answer was clear.
With a clarity that she hadn’t felt in maybe her entire life, she got out of the car and walked up the front path with determined strides. Before she even made it to the door, Gabe answered it.
“For a second I thought you were going to pull another Roadrunner.” He motioned to her car.
She smiled with confidence as she walked past him into his house. “So did I.”
“I’m glad you didn’t,” He said as he shut the door.
“So am I.”
She turned around and found him staring at her with a curious look.
“I thought you were already in your PJs.”
“I was. I put on shorts but left my lucky shirt.”
He crossed his arms, putting the sculpted muscles in his biceps and forearms on full display. Her mouth watered as her eyes took in the lines, dips, and curves that showcased his sculpted strength.
Lord, have mercy.
“Lucky shirt, huh?” he grinned.
“Yep.”
“Did you go to Michigan State?”
“Nope.” She was really enjoying this easy back-and-forth banter. It was the most relaxed she’d been around Gabe and she loved it.
“So why is it your lucky shirt?”
“I won it. It’s the only thing I’ve ever won. It was raffled off at a charity auction.” She looked down at it and pointed to the bottom left area. “It used to have a signature of Magic Johnson on it, I guess he went there, but I’ve had it so long it faded from all the washings.” When she looked up, she saw Gabe staring at her in complete disbelief. He looked more stunned even than when she told him he might be a dad. “What?”
“You had a T-shirt signed by Magic Johnson and you washed it?” He made it sound like she’d murdered nuns or something.
“It got dirty,” she shrugged.
“Wow.” He shook his head in exaggerated disappointment. “And I thought we were going to be friends.”
She laughed and when she did she saw that look in his eye. It was hard to describe but it was a look that made her feel special. Not in the generic sense. It made her feel special in the rare Hope Diamond sense. In the Aurora Borealis phenomenon way. In the Marilyn-Monroe-icon way. That’s what his eyes made her feel when he gave her that look.
Her laughter died down and she took in a shaky breath. As much as she was enjoying this easy rapport, that’s not what she’d come here for tonight. “That’s sad that we can’t be friends, because I was sort of hoping, for tonight at least, that we could add ‘with benefits’ onto that title.”
His eyebrows rose. He didn’t speak for a few moments and Adriana gave him the time to absorb what she’d said. It’d been a big day with lots of new information to process and she knew that her statement had probably come out of left field, for him at least.
“Friends…with benefits?” He spoke slowly.
“Yep. It’s a one-night-only offer, though. So if my laundry habits have damaged our relationship beyond repair, it’s probably best if I go.”
She moved toward the front door, which he happened to be standing in front of. He didn’t budge.
After only one step, he stopped her. “Wait. Are you serious?”
“About leaving or being friends with benefits?”
“Both.”
“About leaving, no. About one night of being friends with benefits, yes.” A private grin tugged at her lips. “I’m very serious about that.”
Gabe stayed perfectly still, the only tell that her words had affected him at all was in the narrowing of his eyes. “What made you change your mind?”
“I’m attracted to you. I’ve been fighting it since I first saw you at Sue Ann’s,” she breathed a huff of laughter. “No, wait. It’s more like I’ve been fighting it since I saw you on my big screen. It’s been much harder to ignore and resist now that you’re in 3D.
“And you were right. I do show up for everyone. I take care of their needs. So tonight, I decided to show up for me and take care of my needs.”
“I think I might be able to help you with that.” He walked toward her with a predatory look in his eye that made her core squeeze in anticipation.
Before they got to that, some things needed to be said.
This time she was the one to stop him. “First, I think you should know that I haven’t done this since before I had the twins, so it’s been a long time for me. And I need this. My body needs this. After tonight though, whatever happens, we have to go back to being friends. Period. No more benefits. Just friends. This is a one-night-only offer and then it’s as if it never happened. It will be like fight club; we won’t talk about it.”
He was silent for a few seconds before he said. “It’s been that long since you had sex?”
“Is that all you heard?” She smiled as she shook her head.
“No. I also heard that we’re going to be friends no matter what happens.”
“Wow, you really only hear what you want to.”
“I call it selective memory.” His lopsided grin sent her heart tumbling down the hill faster than Jack and Jill.
“So do we have a deal?” She held out her hand.
Chapter 12
‡
Gabe was staring at Adriana’s hand and still couldn’t quite believe what she was offering him. It was as if he was looking in the eyes of the unicorn and seeing that it was real, but still not believing what his eyes were telling him.
This wasn’t his intention when he texted her. He’d just wanted to talk about Jonah. However just like everything this weekend, things had taken a very unexpected, very interesting turn.
Most guys would be jumping at the chance to take what Adriana was offering. Yet he was hesitating. He wanted more than that. No matter what the outcome with Jonah was, he wanted to be in Adriana’s life
. He’d already thought just being friends with her would be difficult after just a kiss. If he knew the way her face looked when he was buried deep inside of her, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to ever think of her as just a friend.
It might be selfish, but it was true.
Still, she’d said she needed this, and he definitely needed this. It had been a long time for him too, and he’d never wanted anyone the way his body craved Adriana.
Gabe had learned the hard way that he couldn’t control the future and it was a waste to worry about the past. The only thing he could do was make the best decision about the moment he was living in. Right now, that decision was a no-brainer.
Lifting his arm, his hand enveloped hers and she sucked in a sharp breath. “Deal. But, remember, deals can always be renegotiated.”
A small grin tilted up on her lips and he waited for her to argue. When she didn’t he took one step forward and closed the distance between them. Everything inside of him was screaming to ravish her. To tear both of their clothes off and take her up against the wall. But he didn’t. If this was a one-night-only event, he was going to spend as much time on the undercard as he could before getting to the main event. Foreplay was the name of his game.
Lowering his head, Gabe stopped just short of kissing her. His lips hovered above hers, building the tension between them. He slid the tips of his fingers up and down her arms. She was vibrating with kinetic energy, so alive with it that touching her felt like touching a live wire. Every muscle in her body trembled with pent-up desire.
Finally, as her breaths began coming in short pants, his hands slipped to her waist, gripping her there as he pressed his lips against hers softly and slowly, taking his time with every movement of lip against lip. Fuck, he loved the way she felt. Every moment they weren’t together he was dreaming of this. Touching her like this. Kissing her like this. Being with her like this.
Everything about her drove every impulse he had to the brink.
Her eyes. The curve of her smile. The way her hair glistened. The fresh citrusy smell of her. Every detail brought his nerve endings springing to life. They tortured him with aching want for her.
He sucked her bottom lip into his mouth and ran his tongue along it, causing a needy groan to escape from her. That visceral noise nearly ended all of his lofty plans when it caused an uncontrollable lust to shoot through his veins, but he summoned up his will and stayed the course.
His life experience, both in the ring and out, had taught him discipline every bit as powerful as his raging lust for her was. So he wouldn’t give into those baser instincts. He would find the strength to harness his self-control.
With measured restraint, he kept kissing her gently as his hands moved up from where they’d been resting lightly on her hips and trailed up the side of her torso, forming an outline of her body as if he were sculpting her out of clay. His fingers grazed along her hour-glass figure, memorizing her shape and texture.
She was perfect. She was a masterpiece. There was nothing on this earth more flawless and effortlessly beautiful than she was.
A breathy moan sounded from the back of her throat and he slipped his tongue in between her lips and explored the wet, hot recesses of her mouth. Her tongue pressed back against his, and they twirled around each other in perfect sync. Meeting each other lick for lick.
What started as an exploratory kiss quickly ignited into a fiery inferno of need. Knowing that if he didn’t extinguish it things would quickly get out of control, he forced himself to pull back a little and let his eyes move across her face, taking in every detail like he was memorizing it.
He wanted to commit every last little piece of tonight to his long-term memory. He wanted to store it there, forever unchanged, so he could take it out and look at it whenever he wanted to. Anytime he wished to indulge in a replay of what was sure to be the greatest experience of his life, there it would be. Waiting for him.
“I’ve never wanted anything the way I want you,” he growled.
She let out a harsh breath as her eyes closed at his words and her head tilted back, exposing her elegant neck. A flush colored her skin, and he saw the pulse at her throat pick up speed.
His cock hardened at the realization that it was his words that’d had such a profound and immediate effect on her. It was the knowledge that he wanted her so much that had turned her on that deeply.
“Then take me,” she sighed in a ragged whisper.
Wasting no time, Gabe started to undress her with trembling fingers. They weren’t shaking from nerves. Far from it. He’d rarely felt more confident in his life. Maybe in the ring during those magic moments when he was “in the zone.”
Maybe.
No. His fingers were shaking because of the pure need pulsing through his veins. Still, even as adrenaline shot through him like a powerful drug, he wouldn’t allow himself to give in to it.
Neither of them had been with anyone for so long. For different reasons, of course, but somehow it felt as if they’d been waiting for each other. That kind of fate shouldn’t be rushed.
With each piece of clothing that Gabe removed from Adriana’s body, he felt just a little closer to her. There was an invisible ribbon threading around them as they held each other. Gabe could sense it. It was unseen but undeniably felt, and every time his bare skin touched against hers, and the heat of their bodies fused together, it wound just a little bit tighter, binding them together.
He liked that. He wished he could know for certain that it would never unravel. But that wasn’t how life worked. His past had taught him to live with uncertainty, and to, if not love it, at least accept it. To embrace the mystery of the future in order to fully appreciate the pleasure of the present.
He was never more grateful for that lesson than he was at that moment.
Gabe trailed hot kisses down her neck, his lips pressing against her soft supple flesh and leaving imprints with every fleeting kiss.
He could taste the silky saltiness of the sheen of sweat that now coated her. He could feel the throbbing hum of her racing pulse, and he could sense the tremulous energy that thrummed through every cell of her body.
They were in complete harmony. Each one of those things were mirror images of his own body’s responses. It was proof that she wanted him every bit as much as he wanted her. That was a hell of a high bar to clear.
Gabe continued his trail of kisses down her chest. She felt real under his hands and his mouth in a way she hadn’t before. He realized then that he’d subconsciously been thinking of her as an ethereal being up until now, but his perception had shifted with touch. She wasn’t an otherworldly creature anymore. She was Adriana. Flesh and blood.
Very, very sexy flesh. But still flesh. He was desperate to see all of it.
He slipped his hands around her back and slid his fingers under the clasp of her bra. He wanted more than anything else to have her standing there before him, totally naked. Nothing in between the two of them. He wanted to be able to look her up and down and take in the spectacular sight of her nude body. Every dip and curve, every elegant and sinewy muscle.
He needed more than just seeing her. He needed to touch her. Touch every inch of her. Press his body against hers with no barriers, and take his time exploring every inch of her landscape.
After tonight, he would know her like he knew the back of his hand or the streets around his house. He wouldn’t need a map to her body because he would have the topography memorized. Every flat plane and sumptuous curve would’ve become a part of him, absorbed into his muscle memory like the fighting moves he trained on day after day and year after year. They would pop into his brain with no more effort than recalling two plus two. Second nature.
Gently, using only the most delicate pressure, he ran his thumbs along her collarbone and pushed the straps of her bra down her arm. It dropped with a soft thud on the floor. He stood back, marveling at the creamy skin that was revealed underneath the garment—not to mention the stiff, deep red nipples
that topped them.
“Damn, you are so perfect,” he murmured. There was no word other than awestruck to describe how he felt.
“Touch me. Please,” she pleaded, trailing her fingertips down the side of his arms.
The sound of her sexy voice snapped him out of the trance he’d been in and he realized that he had been staring at her, mesmerized, for several long beats. Her beautiful breasts had hypnotized him, but now he was free of that spell.
He immediately dove down, dipping his head straight to her nipples and taking them into his mouth. He sucked them hard. They were the sweetest candy he’d ever tasted and he had no intention of letting them out of his greedy mouth anytime soon.
Then, switching things up, he flicked them gently, gauging how each movement affected her by the reaction it elicited in her.
Swirling his tongue around her hard nub sent tremors all over her body, while nipping it with his teeth drew a tortured moan. His rapid up and down flicking caused her to throw her head back and arch her back forward.
Check, check, and check.
He filed all of that information away for future use. Hopefully a lot of fucking future use.
Finally, she fisted her hands in his hair and pulled his head back so that she was looking intently into his face. Then, an edge of desperate longing in her voice, she gasped, “I need to…I can’t stand up. My legs…”
He reached down and palmed her ass, cupping it as he lifted her up off the ground in one swift movement. When she felt what he was doing, she joined in by hopping up and wrapping her legs firmly around his waist, her arms around his neck.
Their kiss was frantic and desperate as he carried her back toward his bed. His tongue swept the wet recesses of her mouth, and hers did the same to his in their claiming kiss. The energy between them built in intensity with every step he took closer to his bedroom.
Fire and Foreplay Page 13
