by C. L. Donley
Grayson hit send and the phone warbled, sending an immediate confirmation. He set the phone down.
“And now you have a bigger problem,” he finished as he took a drink from his beer bottle, his gaze on her.
Oh boy.
Amara’s pulse quickened. There was no hope of calming her trembling body. She never felt so elated to be terrified.
Still, she couldn’t resist.
“How big?” she teased returning his gaze with a raised eyebrow, trying to even the score.
No chance of that.
Grayson just about murdered her with a single wink. He lowered the bottle, mouth still full of booze.
“Yeah right,” she bluffed in a bout of nervousness, her tongue retreating to a corner of her mouth as she smiled.
“Now who’s stereotyping who?” he said sitting back, pulling a wallet out of his breast pocket.
Her heart wouldn’t stop doing flips, as though she had just reached the peak of a roller coaster.
Was this her life?? No, it wasn’t, it was infinitely better than what she could have envisioned.
Had she really captured his imagination the way he’d captured hers? It just didn’t seem possible. She felt a bit panicky. She had a feeling she would be trying to catch her breath for the rest of the night. She suddenly felt grossly out of shape.
As if he’d read her mind, he continued.
“If it makes you feel any better, you terrified me first. Because for a moment I thought you were going to tell me that you were backing out of the deal.”
Her voice was barely audible.
“You were terrified?”
“Yes.”
Grayson looked Amara over. Her nipples were pronouncing themselves through her bra, enough that he could see them through her dress.
He continued.
“I was terrified because what started out as an innocent attraction to you has become…” he took a moment to search for the right words, “an unignorable fixation.”
His words infused her with equal parts fear, curiosity and confidence. She was glad he’d waited until now to make such a bewildering confession.
“How many of those have you had?” Amara deflected, nodding towards his beer.
Grayson didn’t argue about defense mechanisms just then, he merely smiled, lifted his phone from the table and held it in front of his face. “Say cheese.”
Then, the electronic simulation of a camera shutter.
“What was that for?” she asked.
“I’m calling it, ‘the before picture.’” he said.
“Take one of yourself too,” she said, sending him a flirting glance before looking down and fiddling with her napkin.
Grayson stared at her.
Part of him thought maybe he should take her advice, but he didn’t.
He stared at her for a long time. Even though he knew she could feel it, she didn’t look up.
He looked at her lips, barely believing that the wait was suddenly about to be over.
She shifted her posture as their waiter came to clear the table, as if she was bored.
“Anything else I can get for you guys?” the waiter dutifully asked.
Grayson kept his gaze on Amara. “Just the check.”
Eight
Chapter 8
Kissing Amara once they got back into the car, Grayson realized a bit too late, had been his first mistake.
He hadn’t meant anything by it other than to put her at ease.
He could tell she was nervous by the far-off look she’d adopted once he’d seen the contract and sent it back to her lawyer friend with his signature.
She’d obviously retreated to her head and, once there, likely put undue pressure on herself, obsessing over her body or some such detail.
So he figured if he could catch her off guard with a kiss, he could save her the awkwardness, and the hardest part would be over.
Instead, Amara’s kiss had been like a match on a dry forest.
It was a gesture he’d used a million and one times: lean in, one hand to graze the cheek, hand moves to the mouth, one kiss on the lips. He wouldn’t call it a signature move, but it was his custom when selecting a woman for his next affair. He liked when a car ride was fraught with all kinds of anticipation; he found a fast ride in a luxury car could sometimes do the job better than foreplay or was sometimes foreplay in itself.
Not so with Amara.
For when he leaned in, her eyes locked onto his and willed them to remain open and return her gaze.
And when he touched her, ever so slightly, she sucked in a breath so sharp and yet her eyes barely fluttered— a reaction so foreign and unexpected it positively electrocuted him.
When his hand moved to her mouth, she had yielded so utterly and completely, it was as though he had known her before, but he hadn’t and it had only made him more anxious to make that happen.
Finally the kiss came, and it was hungrier that he would’ve liked, her eyes still wide open and watching his, moving back and forth between him and their connecting lips, which didn’t take long to be their connecting tongues, and then back to their mouths, the sound of their panting and their smacking lips, so good, so tantalizingly slow, and he completely forgot where they were and what they were supposed to be doing, and the top was still down and anyone who was anyone could see them.
When they finally came up for air, all Grayson could say was, “wow.”
Amara finally closed her eyes once he pulled away, full lips parted and a pained expression on her face as if searching for his kiss. Her eyes darted underneath her eyelids a bit before they fluttered open to the sound of the car engine revving up.
Oh, right, she thought. Car. Planet Earth. My name is Amara. The car took off like a rocket down the street.
“I gotta get you home. Now,” Grayson said.
“Where’s home?” Amara asked dreamily.
“Not close enough,” he said.
He stole kisses between every traffic light, bringing her tortuously higher and higher to boiling point until she didn’t seem to be able to come down anymore.
The car stalled at one particularly lengthy stop, and he swore as he struggled to regain his mental coordination, his fellow drivers honking horns and yelling out appreciative sentiments. Normally Amara would be laughing, telling some joke to put him at ease, but she was in no state to be of use, and it was good to see that they both seemed to be suffering under the same spell.
At one point he freed his right hand in order to trail it up her dress at the knee, and when he discovered she had been so wet that it was starting to pool between her lower thighs he almost ran off the road and killed them both. How had he not remembered to put the top up before now? He was starting to try and convince himself that losing your virginity on the side of the road in a car could be special too.
“You have protection, right?” Amara broke through his thoughts.
“No way, I love paternity suits,” he answered sharply, sarcastically.
Amara was silent but not because of his response. She was staring at his erection that had become bold and triumphant beneath his khakis. When she reached out to touch it he forcefully put her hand back in her lap, which then caused his hand to roguely yet gently continue its pilgrimage back to the wetness between her thighs. This time, Amara parted her legs for him and he let out a groan and cursed.
While she watched his eyes, conflicted between the road and the discovery of his own hand, the hand was starting to fondle her.
“How much farther?” Amara demanded.
“Almost there,” he said.
“Me too,” she laughed in a thin voice.
Grayson retracted his wayward hand, now wet with Amara’s juices. Two of his fingers went into his mouth as if he’d asked to lick the bowl from the batter of a cake. The car slowed and they took a right turn down a street that was practically straight up the side of a mountain.
“I’m feeling really weird right now,” Amara suddenly announce
d.
“What do you mean?” he managed to ask.
“I mean I don’t have any feeling left in my hands and I need water. I think I’m having an allergic reaction to something.”
“I think you’re describing arousal,” he smiled.
“No, I know what arousal feels like, this feels like I’m about to die.”
“Have you been this aroused before? Because I haven’t. Not from foreplay,” he confessed.
“When does it go away,” she said between coughs.
“You don’t want it to.” he giggled. “At least I don’t.”
“We’re gonna die on this hill first,” she said.
Amara felt as if she were completely vertical as they wound up the endless hillside. As a breathtaking view emerged on the driver side, the road finally evened out and they were in front of a large private estate. They abruptly stopped. As she took in the house that spanned her entire field of vision, Grayson was out of the car and on the passenger side in a flash, wrenching Amara from the car and standing her up against the passenger side door. His mouth plundered hers without ceremony and her arms went up around his neck, into his closely shorn hair, and then down along his shoulders. They could’ve had sex right there but she figured that if he’d risked their lives to get here that he’d probably wait until they got inside—
Suddenly the rogue hand had returned under her dress.
His fingers had found the oasis between her thighs and began to separate the fabric of underwear. With expert precision, they found her clitoris and began to rub steadily. Her mouth flew open as she tensed, her eyes shut tight as she held onto his broad shoulders, paralyzed as pleasure was coursing through her, building at a furious rate. His breathless kisses up and down her neck and along her jawline were sweet enough to make her cry, the contrast between the tenderness of his lips and the wicked machinations of his fingers making her whisper velvety curses into his neck.
With his own throaty encouragements tickling her ear between licks and kisses it wasn’t long before she felt release rising up to meet her. Fuckin’ a, it felt so good already, and the feeling was only getting stronger. Her orgasm was going to be a supernova.
“Wanna watch me come?” she heard someone say, someone that sounded exactly like her. Gruffly he assured her he did, again and again. As she bucked and gasped uncontrollably against him and his Mercedes, her orgasm radiating through her ferociously, he continued to rub and lick and suck her all the way back down to the present.
“Holy shit, Amara. You. Are. Incredibly. Sexy,” he whispered as he straightened her underwear, then her dress. “I almost lost it just watching that.”
He kissed her lightly as he pulled away from her and took her hand. She looked around and realized they were still outside. She hated that she even had legs as he started to pull her, hated that they weren’t lying down. The friction of her thighs and underwear against her still swollen sex caused aftershocks in her as she walked.
Amara tried to remember a time where she’d seen a more luxurious house in person and not just in pages of a magazine. High ceilings, modern and mostly gleaming white, mixed with complements of dark wood that felt both masculine and old world. It was a statement of elegance by way of arrogance, from a man who did not grow up having money and was determined to show he had better plans for it than anyone. She was certain she’d never seen greener grass. The panoramic views were to die for, but she had the feeling those would have to wait.
He’d retrieved his phone with a free hand, hauling Amara behind with the other. He appeared to be taking a phone call but, instead, whatever he was doing had brought the entire house to life. Suddenly the doors unlocked and they were inside.
Soft light emitted from mysterious sources embedded in the decor, the level of detail reserved for the very wealthy and selective. Even the silence that welcomed them seemed to be of a quality that was beyond her means. Her size ten strappy platforms sank into the luxurious carpet, that turned to luxurious tile, and finally to luxurious hardwood.
“I hate the size of this house right now,” he said, trapping her in the hallway outside of a random guest bedroom. Amara laughed as he kissed her this way and that, her wits having returned to her now that he’d brought her to orgasm once, in the driveway against the side of his convertible.
“I need to… calm down,” he suddenly said.
“Why?” she replied, sounding disappointed.
His head was laying on one of her shoulders, his hands moving up and down her naked arms. She could feel his hot panting breath on her neck as he found his words again.
“It’s your first time, Amara I can’t…” he gave her shoulders a squeeze as his voice trailed off.
The weight of him against her felt sweet. She put a hand in his hair and took in her surroundings as she reluctantly reminded him, “It’s your million.”
Fuck. He was paying her for this, he remembered.
The sickness of the thought gave him the motivation he needed to get his bearings.
He kissed her sweetly- not on those lips- before retreating down the hallway and into the guest bedroom where he discarded his sports coat and walked out of sight around a corner.
When she followed him she was greeted by a sun-soaked balcony and deckchairs.
Grayson had walked behind a wet bar that was catty-corner to an outdoor sitting area that overlooked the mountains above and the city below. Amara kicked off her shoes and sauntered towards him.
“Drink?” he offered.
“No thanks,” Amara replied.
He smiled. “Non-alcoholic if you prefer.”
“Bad manners to turn down a drink, is it?” she bantered, knowing he must think her a prude.
“Not bad manners, just bad etiquette. A subtle difference.”
“Fine. An Alaskan polar bear heater.” she countered.
He laughed. It was a reference from the original Nutty Professor movie, 1963.
“‘You gonna drink this or rub it on your chest?’” he recited.
“Orange peel, lemon peel, carrot!!” she giggled.
He could still smell her on his fingers as he raised the glass to his lips.
“If I’m a little young for the reference, then you definitely are.”
“My dad grew up going to the movies and sitting in front of the tv,” she explained. “He’s seen just about any and everything that’s ever been filmed.”
“Sounds like an interesting guy,” he replied.
Amara’s mind went to her father, her mother’s abuser.
For some reason, she had never had trouble separating the man from his abuse.
It was hell when he was there, but once he’d agreed to leave, their relationship had instantly improved. She was thirteen then. And now, they were cool and shared a Netflix account.
She was just paranoid that one day she would wind up marrying him.
But she didn’t say any of that.
“He’s a basket case,” was all she said, as she grabbed the drink from his hand and took a sip. It was strong, whatever it was. She grimaced as it went down.
“Ready?” she sputtered.
Grayson smirked. He kept his eyes on her as he moved from behind the bar with purpose and walked her backward by both hands. They passed the sitting area, located directly in front of large folding glass panels that served as the guest bedroom walls.
“How do you take this infernal dress off?” he asked, giving her a once over.
“I have to pull it up over my head,” she smiled.
“Do it,” he said.
“Out here?” she shyly asked.
She never wanted to seem too eager, he realized, as though not quite knowing what she was allowed and never wanting to overstep her bounds.
It was the reason why she’d made a monetary deal for herself rather than simply say, “do you want to be my boyfriend?”
He knew that was what she wanted, knew that he couldn’t give it to her, so he had let her make the arrangement.
She was pure marriage material, a former employee, and now he was using her for sex. He was low indeed for this.
But he pushed his thought process aside as she stood in front of him, tossing her sunglasses on the table behind her and lifting her skirt up above her hips with long dark limbs. She pulled her dress over her head and her matching bra and panties were lacy, and also yellow. His libido put his conscience into a sleeper hold.
“You borrow those too?” he asked.
“No,” she smiled. “These I’ve been saving for a special occasion.”
Shit.
No choice but to make it special then, Davis, he thought to himself.
He left the wide balcony doors open behind them, making sure there was a bed within arm’s reach before he kissed her again.
He cupped her face in his hands, her breath coming out in light gusts and this time, her eyes were closed. The afterglow of her previous orgasm by now had faded. She was ready again, and the same intensity he’d felt between them in the convertible was back.
After a long moment, he still hadn’t kissed her, and those dark eyes of hers flew open and found his impossibly blue ones like a tractor beam. The two seemed to instinctively know that their kiss was going to transport them again, and they each would be lost. He touched his forehead to hers and she let out a sigh as she smiled, he did the same.
Holy shit, this is crazy, she wanted to say. But she didn’t move, because now his head was tilted and he was leaning in, their lips brushing at first and then clasping, one tender kiss after another. She tried to stay calm, tried to let him take his time, but she was holding her breath and it was backing up into her lungs.
She was indeed coming apart in his arms, just as he’d predicted she would.
“Breathe, Amara,” he simply said.
Like he’d said to her when he was still her boss and he’d ambushed her in the Webster cafeteria, and she wanted to cry again like she did then.
“Fuck, it’s happening again,” she sobbed. She broke away from him and looked down at her hands, palms up, flexing open and closed at her command. “I can’t feel them,” she was panicking.
