His brow lifted. “Sexual outlet?”
“Yes.”
“You’re definitely not that, Alexandra.”
I decided to go with my other angle. “Well, you can’t tell me it’s not wrong,” I added. “If you were in Rick’s position, you wouldn’t want your girlfriend to be doing what I’m doing. This isn’t even like me. I don’t cheat. I don’t stray from the pack. For some people that might sound ludicrous, but that’s the way it’s always worked for me. My life was planned even before I was born: go to a good school, earn good grades, take on leadership positions in high school and then go on to Princeton. In the walking herd of sheep, I’m not the one that turns around and goes backwards.”
Even I couldn’t believe how extremely pathetic of an existence that appeared to be. Yet, it was true. I was safe. I was comfortable. I was predictable and reliable. The world could be a dangerous and unpredictable place, so living by a routine schedule and making sure that I hit the major mile markers of my life helped to detract from that uncertainty. It made the world seem a bit less daunting. But Lord did it leave a bad taste in my mouth now.
He studied my face in what I would almost call an incredulous fashion. It was as though I’d just given my entire spiel in an ancient language that not even the Rosetta Stone could have deciphered.
“Do you really believe that, Alexandra?” he asked, slipping another piece of cake into my mouth. “That you’re supposed to go through life in a calculated fashion dictated by other people?”
I didn’t, but I was still lying. “Yes.”
“And never once have you ever considered what you want?”
I was ripe with fibs tonight. “That’s what I want.”
“Well, what do you think I want?”
I paused before answering, taking the time to watch his tongue lick a piece of chocolate from his top lip. My mind betrayed me as it remembered the things that tongue could do and the areas of my body that it had traversed.
“You want me to have sex with you again?” The answer actually wasn’t supposed to come out in the form of a question, but the intonation at the end of the sentence snuck in at the last minute.
He grunted, but didn’t give me much more of a response than that. Instead, we continued to feast on the cake until only a few crumbs and swirls of melted chocolate remained on the plate. Admittedly, I missed it when it was gone. It was the most satisfying dessert that I’d ever had in my life but I couldn’t tell if it was the actual dessert, or the company I’d had the pleasure of keeping.
He pushed the empty plate away and turned my chair so that we were facing each other. Then, he inched me a bit closer. “Alexandra, how did you feel when you were with me?” he asked. “How did I make you feel? And, I want you to be honest. Don’t hold anything back.”
I turned away from his face, but he gently touched my cheek to reconnect our gazes.
“Honestly?” I licked my lips and his eyes fell to my mouth before returning to my eyes. “Well, honestly, you made me feel different, but not necessarily like a different person. Just a different version of myself. You tapped into, and brought out, something inside of me that I thought had died years ago on a farm in Lafayette.”
“And what was that?” he asked.
“The version of me that felt free. Fun. Centered.”
He drew closer. “So, which version of Alexandra Miller feels the best?”
Ethan’s voice vibrated off my ear drums in a deeper tone than normal, and I became painfully aware of the throbbing between my thighs. My arousal only increased my desire for him, but I loved the feeling of struggling to remain in control when I so desperately wanted to fall out of it. I had no idea what he was doing to me, but I felt that if you were to look close enough, you could see where he controlled me with strings. The difference was that I actually wanted those strings. I wanted to desire him. Fear was the only reason I fought it.
“I like the version of me with you inside,” I found myself replying, shocking me to my core although I hoped I didn’t show it. My legs parted and he slipped his hand underneath my dress until he’d made it to my thigh.
“Where inside of you?” He trailed his fingers over the dampness on the outside of my panties. “Here?”
I shook my head and touched a finger to my mouth. “No. Here.”
“Alexandra!”
The call came from outside the kitchen’s front door. It was definitely Roderick’s voice, which really should have startled me into some form of shame or desire to pull myself together, but my legs only parted wider. Ethan’s fingers weaved their way into my panties and stroked the throbbing nub that I’d guiltily wanted to explore myself a few times over the years.
“Alexandra, where are you?” Roderick called again.
Ethan’s fingers meandered until they found their way inside me, his thumb still stroking my clit on the outside.
“Think I can make you come before he gets in here?” he asked, the deep timbre of his voice laced with arousal.
Roderick’s head came poking around the corner and my breath caught, but still my legs went wider. All it would take was him entering the room fully and taking a few steps to the right to get a clear view of what was going on behind the table, but even that didn’t give me enough reason to stop.
“Hey honey,” I greeted, ensuring not to sound like I was on the verge of orgasm. “I was just talking to Dr. Stewart about what we spoke about earlier.”
He stopped in the doorway. “Is that right?”
“Yes, my love.”
“Back here by yourself?”
“It was too loud out front.”
“And what about this romantic set-up?”
I laughed. “This…this wasn’t for us.”
“Well, we have people to meet and pictures to take,” he slowly added as though trying to determine how much of what I was saying was truth. “I don’t want our time here tonight to be a complete waste. Did you accomplish what you set out to do?”
Ethan’s fingers flickered faster and I struggled not to wiggle in the chair. It was amazing that fingers could feel that good moving inside of me, and how much I meant what I’d said before. I wanted to feel his weight in my mouth. I wanted to put my mouth somewhere that, if my mother ever found out, would cause her to keel over from a massive heart-attack. I had no idea what my father would do if he found out, nor was I curious.
“Yes,” I answered. “Let me just finish up here and I’ll be right out.”
“No. You come now.”
Ethan’s fingers stopped. He and Roderick locked glares. I discreetly shook my head; I didn’t want him getting in the middle of anything going on between Roderick and I. At the end of the day, Roderick wasn’t what I’d consider a bad person. He was critical because he’d been raised so high-strung. He was disconnected from the general population for the same reason — the spoon in his mouth that he’d been born with had been made of platinum. He demanded respect, which included doing the things he asked at the very moment he asked for them. Like my father, he could be stressful, but he wasn’t malicious.
“Sweetheart, please?” I pleaded. “I’ve told you since day one how important your campaign is to me. We just need to finish hashing out the details.”
“Then I’ll stay back here with you.” He started forward, but I put up a hand to stop him.
“Honey, you work the room out there and Dr. Stewart and I will figure out the details of the Five-K fundraiser we’re organizing in conjunction with the medical center and the community board. The Five-K that will be headlined as your event.”
In that single instance, all of his suspicion was seared away by the illumination of his eyes. “My event? What for?”
“Juvenile diabetes in Louisiana’s youth.”
He snapped his fingers. “Children?”
I nodded. “Yes, children. It will be a perfect opportunity for the people to get to know you outside of your military role. So, I’ll see you in like two minutes?”
“Yes.” He nodded
. “Not a minute later.”
He then turned and swished out of the room. Ethan watched his path for a few seconds before turning to me. “Does he do that a lot?” he asked. “Demand you to do things?”
“Don’t worry about it, Ethan,” I assured.
“Alexandra—”
“Sometimes.”
He made a gruff noise in the back of his throat and then looked down at my dress. “My fingers aren’t going to make you come in two minutes.”
Before I had a chance to comment, he lifted my dress and slipped my panties down over my legs. I bit into my tongue to stop myself from moaning when I felt the warmth of his mouth against my center. He used his tongue to part my folds and flick my swollen nubbin, and I angled my hips to grant him deeper access, pulling a few strands of silky hair into my fingers. He circled his tongue around the organ and then sucked…and licked…and sucked. His finger inside of me probed, swirled and stroked. The danger of being caught only made the sensation building inside me more intense, but nothing inside of me wanted him to stop.
Within seconds, I was coming. I exploded and soared, and he somehow knew just where to place his tongue to extend the feeling until I shuddered and trembled. I didn’t want to end the night here, my core aching to be filled by him, but we didn’t have much of a choice.
I pulled him up for a kiss so that I could taste myself on his lips. He pulled the kiss deeper and I felt him smile against my lips, so I smiled back.
“I have to go,” I whined against his mouth.
He kissed me again, latching onto my mouth and refusing to release until he’d had his fill. Even as he broke the kiss, I moved towards him, not quite ready to be deprived of his taste.
“Think about what you want,” he said, leaning back so that our faces were only a few inches apart.
“I’m not sure what I —”
“Think about what you want,” he repeated. Then, he released me, scooped my panties from the floor, tucked them into his jacket pocket, and kissed my forehead. With him, forehead kisses were not the chaste gestures that I’d once thought them to be. Somehow, Ethan made them erotic, yet sweet.
“One more thing,” he said, standing. “If you’re with someone who doesn’t allow you to be yourself, then who are you when you’re with them?”
He left before I could attempt to answer a question that I had no idea how to answer. Even as I freshened up and sauntered back to the front to take Roderick’s elbow while he worked the room, the question bugged me to no end. Who the hell was I when I was with Roderick if not the free and desirous woman that Ethan brought out of me? Who was I but a robotic complement to the “perfect” woman that my parents had raised?
I flashed a smile at the mayor and glanced over at Gia. She and Eli were on the dance floor, tethered and completely oblivious to the world around them. I looked at my mother, not a hair out of place, standing next to my father with their elbows linked. As he engaged in conversation with a state representative, she glanced off into the distance. When I followed the path of what had captivated her, I found nothing.
-----
Ethan
The cold, dry Louisiana air succeeded in soothing my erection, but the minute I stepped into my warm house, I knew that Alexandra would be back on my mind again. Why I took her panties, I have no idea, but that’s part of the crazy shit that I’ve been referring to. Everything that I was doing with her, even the way I reacted to her, was completely uncharacteristic of me. I even felt warmer around her, although I know that doesn’t make a lick of sense. Alexandra, to me, was a slow moving vapor. With each conversation, visit to her office, lunch outing, and now, sexual escapade, she seeped further and further into my bloodstream. I couldn’t tell if she was poisonous or innocuous, but the fact that she’d gotten me to break a very long-standing decree to never touch a woman who was in a relationship with someone else forced me to push her more to the toxic end of the spectrum.
Yet, I was enjoying the poison. I was enjoying the feeling of being slowly drained of my sanity just for the sake of trying to claim even small parts of this woman. I wanted to carve out a section of the grey matter in her brain that thought of only me, desired only me, and eventually gathered enough strength to convince other parts of her body to follow suit.
Though, I wasn’t the type of man to settle for the number two slot, or the one hiding out in a kitchen with his fingers inside of a woman that hadn’t stated outright that she wanted to be with me; with Alexandra, I couldn’t help myself and it was driving me even further up the wall. The argument could be made that I was looking for excuses because she was “just another woman,” but that would be bullshit. There was something about Alexandra. Something that spoke directly to me.
To add to that, I didn’t even feel an ounce of guilt towards Roderick simply because I knew Alexandra could be much more than the woman she currently was. Nothing was sexier than a woman with the confidence to be whoever the hell she wanted to be, shucking all of the restrictions people tried to put on her. Alternately, there was nothing sexy about a woman forced to walk with her chin at half-mast. I did feel guilty for putting Alexandra in an uneasy position in her relationship, however. On the list of positions that I wanted to put her in, uneasy didn’t even make it in the top one hundred.
Controlled, even footsteps drummed against the sidewalk behind me as the valet station came into view. When I slowed, the gait turned into a tempered shuffle. I turned around, pleasantly satisfied when I saw Roderick’s blond hair gleaming in the moonlight as he neared me.
“Dr. Stewart, right?” he asked.
I nodded. “Ethan.”
“Roderick Hamilton,” he greeted. “I’m gunning for a Louisiana State Senate seat. I’m sorry that we were not formally introduced. Sometimes Alexandra likes to take things into her own hands so much that she forgets to be the woman I taught her to be.”
It didn’t surprise me that he didn’t realize that we’d met a few times before when he’d stopped by to check on Alexandra at the office. The practice, although very successful, wasn’t flamboyant or extravagant. A place with too many lights or bright colors could actually be harmful for the children that I served. If it had been the type of place to accurately reflect my net worth, I was certain that I would have made his list of people worthy of knowing.
He extended for a handshake. Some of Alexandra’s stickiness still lingered on my fingers and I smiled internally as I shook his hand. I took Roderick for the type of man who would find the natural aspects of a woman’s body disgusting in favor of some false sense of decency. The kind of man that would turn up his nose at the thought of tasting a woman’s essence on his tongue. It was no wonder why I was currently fucking his woman, and even that admission didn’t bring forth any secretly hidden guilt.
“Pleasure,” I answered.
“I’m sure that Alexandra has told you all about me by now,” he said, grinning. “She has a tendency to talk about me quite a bit once you get her going.”
I nodded again. “Yes. Once you get her going…”
A breeze flitted through the few feet between us, wafting a brief pause into the conversation. I got the sense that he was not a man of few words unless trying to skirt around a particular issue or topic, so I decided to relieve him of his discomfort.
“Something you want to ask me?” I asked. “You seem like you have a question. Is this about your campaign?”
He looked to the patrons standing behind me waiting in line for their cars to be presented to the front by the valet. “No. It’s about Alexandra.”
I didn’t make a comment, but folded my arms across my chest to give him my attention.
“Even if it is to talk business, I would appreciate it if you did not put yourself in a position where you find yourself alone with her,” he warned. “Because of my campaign, I am being heavily scrutinized by the public and the optics of the woman that will be my future wife with a single, playboy doctor would not bode very well for my image.”
&n
bsp; As much evolution as we as humans can claim, there was still a part of us just as primal as the more nescient beings that walked among us. That feral urge was oozing from my pores as I listened to this man be more concerned about his image when his woman was alone with another man, than what she could possibly be doing with said man. I also didn’t get the sense that he was so trusting of Alexandra that he didn’t care what my intentions were; his ego simply eclipsed his judgment. He probably couldn’t fathom her ever wanting anyone other than him, but just because a woman didn’t want an overly jealous man didn’t mean that she didn’t want someone who acted as though, in her, he had something precious to lose.
I turned my body slightly. “Playboy doctor? Have a good evening, Mr. Hamilton.”
He took a step forward. “Excuse me?”
“Problem?”
“Yes, I have a problem. I just told you to avoid finding yourself alone with my woman and you didn’t acknowledge my request.”
“Maybe I don’t agree to your request.”
He stopped, taken aback. “Just who the hell do you think you are?”
“Google me.” I was being an arrogant little shit, but this man rubbed me the wrong way. If there was one thing that I was proud of, it was the fact that even as the name Ethan Stewart had gained prestige over the years, it never changed my outlook. Without the experiences that had shaped my childhood, I would have never accomplished as much as I did. Denying that seemed like killing a part of my existence.
Roderick was a man who assumed that because he’d come from generations of wealth, anyone he encountered who couldn’t say the same was equivalent to the rubber soles on his shoes.
“Stay away from my woman,” he threatened.
I smiled. “Have a good evening, Mr. Hamilton.”
Without having to give him my ticket, the valet pulled my car up to the curb. I thanked him with a hefty tip and sped off down the road, the situation with Roderick already forgotten.
By the time I pulled into my garage, my thoughts were again hijacked by Alexandra.
Fated: An Alpha Male Romance Page 5
