by JA Huss
“I’m here. Just…” I blush a little. “Having a little fantasy about you and me in that bathtub, that’s all.”
He laughs. “We’ll get there.”
“I’m sure we will,” I say, stepping towards him as I reach around behind my back to unclasp my bra. He watches me intently as it comes free and slips down my arms to rest on the hard marble floor at my feet. I keep going. Because I want to be naked with this man. Right now. And wiggle my panties over my hips. Not so seductively that I look like a stripper up on a stage, but pretty close.
His mouth is open, his eyes fixed on my pussy as I reveal it, then step away from my discarded underclothes and turn to the shower. Giving him a nice, long look at my backside as I reach in and turn the water on.
He’s behind me then. Hands on my stomach, arms circling me as his fingers dip down between my legs and slip between the soft folds of skin to find me wet.
His lips caress my neck with kisses and I swear to God, I just melt back into him. My legs shake, my back arches, and when I turn my head towards him, his lips are there.
How? How did this happen?
“Stop thinking, Oaklee.” It’s like he’s reading my mind.
“I’m not objecting,” I say, trying to explain.
“Doesn’t matter. There’s time to think later. Now will never happen again so let’s just enjoy it.”
I don’t know if that’s sad or romantic. A little of both, I think, because—
“Oaklee,” he whispers, playing with my clit.
“Oh, God,” I moan.
“Stop. Thinking.”
He urges me to step into the shower, the spray of the water hitting me like a hot jungle mist. A moment later he’s pressing a bar of sweet-smelling lavender-colored soap along my arm, while fingering me with his other hand at the same time.
We both step under the water, letting it fall down our bodies—making it slick where we have contact. My back against his chest. His arm down the length of my stomach. The soap lather fills the bathroom with the scent of lilacs.
I close my eyes. Be present. Pay attention to all the little details that I don’t want to forget. The way his finger feels inside me. The steam flowing up towards the ceiling. The hardness of his cock pressing against my ass and the way his breath catches in the same moment as mine.
I turn to face him because I can’t stop myself. “I want to see you,” I say, taking his face in my hands. His eyes are brown. So brown. I don’t think I’ve ever noticed them before. They have flecks of black in them. And rings of green that I never noticed before. His cheeks and jaw are shadowed with today’s stubble. Just enough to be scratchy. Just enough to be sexy.
His neck is thick with muscle, but not out of proportion with his tall frame. His hair is dark, the water changing the brown to a near-black. It looks longer now too. Messier. Less suit and more leather jacket. One thick strand has fallen onto his forehead, curling a bit at the end. And that chin dimple appears, pierces my heart with an arrow, and then disappears just as quick.
“I like you too,” he says. Because he knows what’s going through my head.
He knows me. Somehow, he does.
He sees into me—through me.
His finger withdraws from inside me and his hand rests on my shoulder, urging me to turn. So I’m standing under the water and he’s a step away from it.
I feel exposed for some reason.
He is just as naked as I am, but the way he looks at me. With that hunger inside him. Silent, introspective, unmovable.
It makes me shudder even though the water spraying down my back is slightly too hot.
Smiling, he backs up to the marble-field wall, leans into it, one leg bent, the other straight so his body is slanted just a little. Just enough so that when he says, “Come here,” and I do, and I reach him—he can lift one of my legs up, slide his full-erect cock inside me, and then grip the firm muscles of my ass and lift me up.
He holds me like that for so long—his gaze trained on mine—I start counting out loud for some reason. “One,” I say. “Two. Three—”
And when I get to three he drops me, just a little. Just enough so that his cock sinks so deep inside me, I can feel it—not just in my pussy, but in my gut. In my heart. In my soul.
“How?” I say.
He shrugs, like this question makes perfect sense, he just doesn’t have the answer.
“Does it matter?” he finally asks back.
And I decide… “No.”
It doesn’t.
CHAPTER TWENTY - LAWTON
I know what she wants to know. I just don’t feel like thinking too hard about it.
It’s insane. It’s stupid teenage love. It defies logic and therefore, it isn’t real. It’s the situation we’ve been thrown into. It’s the game. It’s Jordan Wells and Hanna Harlow. It’s Bronco Brews, and Rocky Mountain Millionaires, and Home TV, and Shrike Bikes, and that stupid Opera House tavern up in Golden.
It’s the leather jacket, and the Assassin Saison, and the water tower on the roof decorated in white lights.
It’s the lack of elevator security, it’s the view of her penthouse from my terrace, it’s the alley down below, and the tattoo on my arm covered in antibacterial plastic, and a lingering feeling inside me that…
We did something wrong.
We fucked this up.
Somehow, some way, we missed the most obvious clue.
And yet… it’s still the closest thing to perfection I’ve ever felt with a woman.
So does it matter? Does it matter that when I leave here and tomorrow comes—when I go back to work and take phone calls, and meetings, and show houses, and do paperwork—the fantasy will end?
Will the sting of tomorrow take away the sweetness of today?
That’s the question she’s asking.
And that’s the question I answer when I reaffirm and say, “No. It won’t.”
“Fuck me hard this time,” she says.
I smile.
“Just do it.”
I smile bigger.
“Fuck me like the world ends tonight. Fuck me like we’ll never fuck again. Fuck me like—”
I whirl around, pressing her back into the hard tiled wall of the shower, back my hips up so only the tip of my cock is inside her. And thrust forward.
Her fingernails dig into my bare shoulders, gripping them like she never wants to let go, and I pound her again. She leans her head down, mouth open, and bites me on the fleshy part of my arm. Just a quick nip. Like she needs to get my full attention even though she already has it. It needs to be complete. It needs to be all-consuming. It needs to belong to her and only her.
I thrust again. Then again, and again, and again. Giving her what she wants. Her bite becomes a kiss. Her fingernails find their way to my back. Dragging up and down, up and down, and I fuck her back and forth. Back and forth.
And then I change my tactics. Stopping completely.
“No,” she whines, biting my shoulder again. “No.”
I hug her close. My hands gripping her ass so hard, she’ll have bruises tomorrow. My chest pressed into her breasts, relishing the feeling of her softness again the hardness of me.
As slow and soft as it’s been so far with Oaklee, that’s how fast and hard it is now.
I fuck her like the world ends tonight.
I fuck her like we’ll never fuck again.
I fuck her just the way she wants me to.
Her orgasm comes with a scream this time. A primal yell that makes me think of neighbors disturbed. Waking up and turning to each other with questions of, “What was that?”
But then I remember she owns this whole building and no one lives here but her.
So I keep going.
I fuck her till she’s screaming, and moaning, and whining, and begging me to keep going and stop all in the same breath.
She comes all over my dick for the third time tonight.
I come inside her for the third time tonight.
And even when that’s over and I’m sitting down on the stone bench on the other side of the shower, her in my lap, her head on my shoulder, our hearts still beating fast—like that’s the only speed they know how to beat—she says, “Again,” as she slip out of my lap and drops to her knees to take my cock in her hand. Her eyes gazing up at me like I am her god and she is my servant.
And I swear, I am hard for her. It shouldn’t be possible. I am spent in every way possible. But I am hard for her. Before she even gets the tip of my cock to her lips I am ready.
I grip her hair. Tight, because I can’t help myself. Hard, because that’s how she wants it right now. Rough, because I know the sting will only serve her in the end.
She gags, but I don’t stop. I push her face down until she loses eye contact with me. I push her face down until her chin is rubbing against my balls and her nose is pressed up to the skin of my lower abdomen.
Saliva drips out of her mouth. A strand hanging on her lips, then slowly, like a movie in slow motion, it drips onto my balls.
I release her head because if I don’t, I’ll come down her throat. She pulls away, gasping for breath, hand automatically coming up to wipe away the saliva.
I expect her to be angry. I expect, at the very least, a scowl.
But she smiles and then tips her head back down and we do it again. Then again. And again. Taking breaks each time she reaches critical mass. The moment when she can’t hold her breath, or keep her gag reflex in check, or stand another second of it.
And each time she goes longer. Each time she tries harder. Each time… she surprises me in a way no woman I’ve ever met has surprised me before.
“I’ll keep going,” I say. “I won’t stop. I won’t come. Not until you tell me you’ve had enough.” It comes out like a warning because that’s exactly what it is. Sexual self-control is something I’ve perfected. Something I cherish. Something I take seriously. “I can go all night,” I say, when she doesn’t answer me.
She’s breathing so hard now. Gasping for air. Her cheeks are bright red. Her lips slightly swollen from her efforts. Her eyes… still bright. Still excited.
She kisses the tip of my cock again, then opens her mouth—gaze locked on mine—and wraps her lips around my cock. Both of her hands grab my shaft, pumping up and down with a slight twisting motion. They are slick with water and saliva. That, along with the steaming heat from the shower, is the perfect combination to make me come.
But I don’t. Not until she gives in. And her actions make it clear she’s not giving in, she’s just changing tactics.
She goes slow now, and I don’t press her. I lean back against the tile wall and let myself relax. Let my body soften just a little. Let my eyes enjoy the beautiful picture she’s painting with her actions.
She takes my cock out of her mouth and swipes her tongue up and down my shaft. And Jesus fucking Christ, I might be a liar. Because there’s a moment when I think I might lose control after all.
She feels it too. Senses it the way only a woman connected—tuned in to me and only me—could be.
Because she stops. Gives me a minute. Plays the game we’re not playing.
She doesn’t want to win. Not at my expense. Because this isn’t a competition.
She wants me to get what I want, the way I want it.
“You’re not real,” I say.
She giggles. Flashing a smile at me I don’t think I’ve seen before. Something in between happy and satisfied. Something I want to see more of.
“You’re the one who’s not real.”
“Maybe neither of us is real?”
“Maybe none of this is real?”
I smile now too.
“God,” she says. “That dimple you unleash when you smile sometimes. I want to die every time I see it.”
“Dimple?” I say, momentarily distracted. “What dimple?”
“What do you mean? That cute-as-fuck dimple in your chin when you smile.”
I furrow my eyebrows as she plays with my cock. Her hands never stop. Her eyes once more locked on mine.
“You mean you don’t even know you have it?”
“Didn’t have it.” And then I smile. “Until you, apparently.”
“You’re dumb.”
“But it’s funny. I was just thinking the same thing about your smile.”
“What about it?”
“It’s different tonight.”
“No, it’s the same smile I’ve always had.”
But I shake my head. “If I can have a secret dimple I only reveal to you, then you can have a smile you only reveal to me.”
She stands up, dropping my cock. Which is almost a relief. Because even though we’re talking, I’m still very close to coming again. And then she climbs back into my lap, lowering herself down onto me. Pressing hard until I’m deep, deep inside her.
“Let’s both come again. And smile our secret smiles as we do it.”
I don’t even try to understand at this point. I just nod my head and smile until she giggles and pokes a finger at my chin.
And that’s her secret smile too. I know it’s for me and only me.
Because we come, for the fourth time tonight, together.
Later, after we’ve gotten dressed—me in my jeans, her in a t-shirt and shorts—and we’ve eaten our pizza and talked about everything except Hanna Harlow, and TV shows, and beer, and real estate, we climb into bed together naked.
Her body pressed against mine. Her heat is my heat and my heat is her heat.
There’s no pressure at all. We fucked, and fucked, and fucked again. So there’s nothing left to do but be still in the dark. My arm under her shoulder. Her head on my chest. Her heart beating slow, keeping time with mine because that’s what they do.
She says, “Good night, Law.”
And I say, “Good night, Oaks.”
Like this is just what we do before bed.
Like we’ve been this couple for decades instead of days.
And it’s only then that I remember that feeling I had earlier.
The feeling that I’ve missed something. Some clue that’s so obvious.
But her soft breathing tells me she’s asleep and it doesn’t seem fair to stay awake without her.
So I sleep too.
Because that’s all there’s left to do.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE - OAKLEE
I dream of smiling. Of laughing. Of happiness. And even though I’m asleep and I know it’s a dream, I know why I’m happy.
“Hey, sunshine,” a gruff voice whispers near my ear.
I know this is Law. I know it’s morning. And I know the next thing he says is going to be about leaving. About work. Or being late.
I open my eyes and smile for real. His face is right up next to mine, his eyes just inches away. The brown eyes with flecks of black and rings of green are pretty much the best thing to wake up to. Ever. “You’re leaving, right?”
“Not yet. It’s fuckin’ early.”
Which makes me laugh.
“I was gonna make breakfast first. What do ya like?”
I don’t even eat breakfast but I don’t want to say that. “Ummm… I dunno. Cereal?”
He makes a face. Which is adorable because out pops the dimple. “No, I mean like, real breakfast. Something hot.”
He’s hot. His stubble is clearly into the getting-me-wet territory. I didn’t see him wake up yesterday morning—God, was that only yesterday?—so I missed the morning stubble.
I never want to miss it again. I reach for his face, my hand finding a home flat on his cheek to feel the roughness. “Bacon?”
I’m pretty sure guys love bacon.
“How about French toast?” he offers up instead.
“Is French toast something on your regular menu?”
“No.” He smiles again. Fuckin’ dimple. “But it’s sweet and I want you to have something sweet to start the day.”
I sigh. It’s one of those God-I-might-love-you sighs. Contentment,
or whatever. “Sure. I’d love some French toast.”
“OK,” he says, leaning over to kiss me on the cheek. “I’ll work on that while you wake up. Meet you in the kitchen in ten.”
I watch him get out of bed. Naked. He has a very nice ass. Like… those glutes get worked regularly. And his thighs. Jesus. He looks over his shoulder as he pulls on yesterday’s jeans.
Dimple. Only it’s a new dimple. This one has a twin and they are both in his lower back, right above his ass.
“You OK?” he asks. “Not having regrets about last night or anything, are ya?”
I shake my head no as I study his new tattoo. It’s gorgeous. Still wrapped up in that clear barrier Vivi put on it last night. The colors are fantastic. Bright and new. Just like this relationship. “Do you get a lunch, Lawton Ayers?”
He laughs. “I do. Eventually. But I got clients today, so there’s no telling when it’ll be. I’ll be back for dinner though. Still wanna go to dinner tonight?”
I nod my head. Let out a long breath of air. And wonder how I’m gonna get through an entire day without him.
Then wonder… how did that happen over a weekend?
“Ten minutes,” he says, walking back over to kiss me again. “Don’t keep me waiting.”
I watch him leave the bedroom. I wonder if he knows how hot he is. He doesn’t act like it. He doesn’t have a stuck-up air to him. Even though he’s rich, handsome, and smart. Which is like the stuck-up trifecta.
But Lawton is a guy who comes from nothing. I can’t forget that. He’s got it all now, but if that new tattoo on his arm is any indication, it was a long journey to get here.
I can hear him downstairs as he goes through my kitchen cabinets looking for things. A frying pan. A spatula. I hear the fridge open and close several times. Getting out eggs and butter probably.
“Five minutes, Oaklee!” he calls from downstairs.
But I stay in bed a little longer. Thinking about how nice it is to have someone else in this penthouse for once.
That comes with a bunch of feelings. Mostly about loss, and sadness, and pain. And not all of them can be attributed to the fact that my father used to live here with me and now he’s dead.
