Take Me Slow

by Shani Greene-Dowdell

  I spend the next few seconds trying to regroup from that sight alone. It’s seared in my mind. How can one man be so… blessed? My mind wanders wildly. I really want to know what he’s capable of doing to me in bed. That curiosity is even more pronounced since I won’t get to find out.

  Thoughts of Blaze moaning my name in bed leave me flush all over and burning with the desire to drag him upstairs to my ‘paid for by the FBI’ room and do all kinds of freaky things to him immediately. I want to kiss him more than I can remember wanting to kiss anyone. I want it all as the song goes, ‘if only for one night.’

  You’re here to do a job! Do it, girl, and get out of this rinky-dink place. Then, go catch some more bad guys.

  “Good,” I say, dragging my eyes back to his cropped brown hairline and dusty brown eyes. “So, Big Blaze…” I shiver because it’s even sexier hearing his name come out of my mouth that time than before. “You wanna hear what you need to do to get me upstairs to my room?” I ask, ready to trap him.

  “Hell yes. Tell me what I need to do, and it’s done,” Blaze says in that honey-whiskey tone that has driven me mad since the first word he said to me.

  “All I need is for you to pa—”

  I’m cut off by the fire alarm blaring overhead; an annoying, screeching sound that makes me feel like my eardrums are going to explode.

  “I’m going to fuckin’ shoot something,” he yells as all hope of us going upstairs is doused.

  “I’ll help,” I yell back, grimly. Someone does need to get shot for causing this alarm to go off. I’m not even sure if I was just about to give in to Blaze or tease him some more, but I hate we are interrupted by this sounding alarm.

  As people start to evacuate out of their rooms and out of the building, I realize this thing with Blaze and me just isn’t going down. With so many things happening each time we meet, I contemplate our meeting is just not meant to be.

  Blaze looks like he’s more interested in helping to evacuate people out of the building than he is finding somewhere else to go, so I join him in knocking on doors and telling people they need to get out as the smell of smoke grows stronger.

  Hours later, the building is evacuated, and the fire department has located and extinguished a small kitchen fire.

  “You know what, I think we should just call it a night,” I say, exhausted, smelling of smoke and ready to go home and lie down. At the moment, I’m tired of looking at the motel.

  “No, Ari. I’d love it if we could finally get the chance to hang out. We’ve been at this for the third night in a row, so let’s just do it. I’ll go and rent a car and drive us out of the city to somewhere more secluded.”

  I would offer to drive my car, but I haven’t had a chance to remove anything from it that might link me to the FBI, so I agree to Blaze’s plan.

  I yawn, the gravity of the day weighing down on me. “Sure, let’s do it.”

  Not an hour later, Blaze pulls up to the still smoky motel building and picks me up in a blue SUV. We small talk as he jumps on the highway. At this point, I’m unsure if we’re on an official date, or if I’m still just doing my job, so I go with the flow.

  “So, you’ve only been in New York for two months?” he asks as he turns onto the expressway.

  “Yeah, two months. I came up from North Carolina chasing dreams,” I tell him. It’s partially true. I’m living my dream of taking down bad guys, but I have been here for years.

  “Oh yeah? What’s your dream?” he asks.

  “To be a Broadway actress,” I say. It’s cliché, but it also has some truth to it. When I was a little girl, I used to want to be an actress. My parents even contemplated sending me to theater school.

  “I can see you doing that. You’re very dramatic at times,” he says. “Especially with your facial movements. You don’t have a poker face.”

  If only he knew.

  “Dramatic, oh, I can show you dramatics. If you keep shooting shots at me, I’m going to tell you about yourself,” I say huffing and crossing my arms.

  “That’s exactly what I’m talking about. Look at how you’re pouting. Broadway, look out; here she comes!” he says like an announcer for a Broadway show.

  “Whatever Big Blaze,” I say, and we both erupt into laughter.

  Ten minutes after we get on the highway, we witness a five-car pile-up ahead of us, which backs up traffic for hours. We spend that time talking about life and what brought us both to the point we are now. I can’t believe how much I tell him about myself, mostly true, as he wades through the traffic.

  Opening up to him about Tracyee is especially hard, knowing he’s the kind of man that keeps pimps and traffickers in business.

  Five hours later, I’m convinced Blaze is just a man in need of a companion. He’s not some rude and dirty trick who tries to exploit a girl’s need for cash to fulfill all of his nasty desires. He’s, dare I say it, a gentleman.

  He pulls into a nice hotel, and we check in. We crash onto the bed as soon as we enter the room. Within minutes, we are laying in each other’s arms talking about life. It’s not long before the weight of the long day overtakes us and we fall asleep.

  The next morning, I awake to the sound of Blaze’s phone going off.

  “Hey, Blaze…Blaze!” I shake him slightly as I call out his name.

  “Huh?” he murmurs and sits up. “Where were we? My family is big New York Jets fans. We don’t support any other team,” he says groggily.

  It’s funny to hear him pick up where we left off talking before we fell asleep last night. We were talking about sports, and he was telling me how much his family loved the Jets before his eyes fluttered and he was asleep.

  “No, your phone is ringing,” I tell him, chuckling.

  “Oh,” he giggles then rolls over and answers it, immediately swinging his feet to the floor and hopping out of bed. “Blaze speaking… okay… no, I checked on that yesterday, and she wasn’t there… Okay… Yes… No…Oh really? I’m on my way in now,” he says, hangs up, and sighs.

  “Is everything okay?” I ask.

  “Come on, we have to go now,” he says. He’s still half asleep as he begins to put on his shoes.

  “Do I at least have time to shower?” I ask in a pout.

  He looks at me as if he’s considering it. A glimmer of lust runs across his eyes, and I can see them undressing me and carrying me into the shower.

  “A shower… that would be nice, and it’s so tempting, but I have an emergency. I have to go now,” he says sternly.

  “Okay.” I get up and start putting on my shoes, as well.

  When we reach the door of the hotel, Blaze turns to me and pulls me into his arms. With a ragged sigh, he pushes strands of my hair out of my face.

  “I had an amazing night with you, Ari. It was better than anything we could have done sexually. I enjoyed just talking to you. It was really nice.”

  I nearly dissolve in his arms. My heart is raging out of my chest. I feel like melting in this man’s arms over the way he’s looking at me. He doesn’t just say good things; he looks at me like he means every single word. Why does he have to be someone who picks up prostitutes?

  “I had a great time, too,” I say, and his lips meet mine before the last word is spoken.

  I freeze for a second, trying to halt the feelings I know are coming next. The comfort. The desire. The heat. He is so different than any other man that has tried to pick me up, and it’s easy to feel something for him.

  “Let’s do this again tonight,” he says, pulling back to look into my eyes. “Minus the rain or fire, of course.”

  “Don’t forget the screaming old lady,” I say with a chuckle.

  “How could I forget her?” he laughs along with me. “I’ll see you tonight then?”

  “Yes.”

  “Great. I’ll come by after I get off work,” he says. He takes my hand and leads me out of the hotel hand in hand. The entire time my hand is in his, I feel as though I’m on fire…a blazing fire. I
can’t wait until nightfall.

  Chapter Five

  Blaze

  I drop Ari back off at the motel and very pointedly analyze the fact that moments ago I felt so comfortable lying in bed with a suspected criminal. Sure, I spent most of last night stuck in traffic with her, talking about everything from when I was a young boy playing tee ball to my football days in college. Granted, she and I are so compatible, from our zest for life to our tarnished dreams, it’s easy to talk to her because she understands me. And that kiss. It took every bone in my body to pull me away from her lips. If the chief hadn’t called me, I’d still be drinking from her lips.

  I miss her already, but she told me her room number, and I’ll be getting back to see her as soon as I can. At the moment, I have to go to the station to lend my hand to a cold case. Someone just called in a tip to the tip line. Had that call not come, I would have taken Ari up on that shower, and we would be rocking each other to ecstasy at this very moment. I have no doubts about that. Yeah, this so-called undercover sting has gone far beyond an officer looking for his next perp. I’m a goner.

  I pull up to the station and immediately retrain my thoughts. It’s Monday morning, so hopefully, with the new week to come, I’ll get my head back in the game. I have a lot of cases to solve, a community to serve, and egos to stroke at city hall. Nowhere on my schedule is there time to fall in love.

  My day is grueling, and the chief sends me all over town chasing tips. After a long day, I head home. I’ve already put in a full twelve hours looking for a missing young lady who we believe fell prey to the underground sex trafficking networks of NYC, so I’m taking the evening off to recharge.

  The thought crosses my mind to go to Ari’s as I promised, but I fight it off, opting to eat, shower and lie down. I told her I would see her again tonight, but after I spend the day in cop mode, I have rearranged my thoughts and put my priorities in order. Her lifestyle is part of a bigger problem I work every day to fix. I can’t get my head clouded with feelings of love and lust. It will only hamper my ability to help others.

  As soon as sleep assails me, dreams of Ari live on Broadway dancing and singing her heart out in a majestic type of stage play fill my head. The one recurring thing in this dream is her beautiful smile.

  The next two nights are filled with the same—dreams about Ari. The dreams are enough to keep me satisfied. I’m not going to call her or try to see her ever again. I’m going to go about bringing these traffickers to justice another way that doesn’t involve her arrest. At least, those are the lines I feed myself.

  By Thursday night, I can’t take it anymore. I have to see her. I’m standing in front of her motel room door, knocking, but no one answers. I go back to the park and then the alley where I first spotted her.

  There she is in the alley, standing with her back pressed to the old stone wall and one foot propped up on an old stump for support. This woman has a stance like no other. Once again, I know it’s her by the nasty way she’s standing there watching me approach her.

  As soon as I reach her, the lust, the feeling of love, the dreams, everything I’ve been feeling for her this past week erupts into an embrace, and my lips come crashing down on hers. It feels like heaven as we connect, my hands steadily moving up her thigh while I suck her tongue for its nectar.

  The kiss gets increasingly heated. Ari climbs the wall as if she’s trying to get away from me yet come to me at once. I make a guttural sound at the sensation of my cock brushing against her womanhood. I tighten my grip on Ari’s hips so that I won’t try to rip off her clothes right there in the alley. At least, I have that tiny bit of control left.

  Hey!” a familiar voice shouts, from an open window behind us, sounding furious. “How many times do I have to tell you two that this is private property! Be gone in five seconds, or I’m calling the cops. One— two—” the woman begins counting.

  “Hold your horses, lady. We’re leaving!” I say and grab Ari’s hand. This time, I’m prepared. I didn’t come in my squad car. I drove a rental, ready to usher her to the nearest hotel and have my way with her.

  “Can we stop for coffee?” she asks. It’s an unusual request, especially after the sexual tension we just shared, but her wish is my command.

  “Sure. Anything you want,” I tell her, knowing she’s stalling and prolonging the inevitable. We are made for the love we are about to share, and she’s worth the wait.

  I glance at Ari every chance I can as I ride as fast as I can toward the closest Starbucks. I have so many questions about her that need answers.

  Why does she need to have sex for money? Does she have a terminally ill grandmother? Are her student loans that expensive? Does she have a brother she needs to pay bail to get out of prison? Is she planning to pay someone off at Broadway so she can get a role? The wilder the reasons I come up with, the less I can bring myself to pull out my badge. If she’s suffering through something tragic, she doesn’t deserve to have an arrest heaped on top of her.

  Plus, she’s far too pretty to go to jail. People will do terrible things to her on the inside. The only person who should be allowed to do terrible things to Ari is me. Which brings me to the question I desire to know the answer to the most: How wet and warm can she get for me?

  We make it to Starbucks, place our orders and wait for our drinks. I gaze across the room of plush sofas and arresting Ari is the furthest thing from my mind. Because of her, I have a whole new morning jerk-off routine, considering how often I’m woken up from dreams about finally getting to see her pretty pussy and needing to take care of myself. I’m on the verge of going insane, only a few moments away from taking my gun to the shooting range and firing away all of the fucking sexual tension that’s keeping me up at night.

  Thankfully, Ari’s wearing something that’s not causing all of my blood to rush south, for once. She’s wearing an oversized, pink shirt, loose black jeans, and flats. She looks as good in modest clothing as she does in her late night ‘uniforms.’ Her hair is tamer, slicked to the back with something. There’s a black and pink scarf around her neck with a broach that makes her look regal.

  “Blaze!” the barista calls our order, and I hop up to get it.

  I put Ari’s coffee thermos on the table so that she can tear a pack of sugar with her teeth and drop it into her drink. I am ridiculously charmed by that little detail; the fact that she cares enough about the environment to carry her own thermos in her purse. Ari looks and acts like someone I can have; someone I can take home and introduce to my mom. The whole scene makes my breath catch.

  “I need to get some more creamer,” I say to excuse myself from her mesmerizing innocent beauty. I walk over to the condiment station and give my hardness a moment to go down before returning.

  I stare at Ari as I walk back to the table. Her eyes go wide with recognition of my attention to her, a breathtaking shade of hazel. Coffee mug forgotten beside her elbow, Ari tugs her bottom lip between her teeth in a self-conscious motion that goes straight to my dick.

  My feet carry me across the room on autopilot. I’m a piece of scrap metal, drawn irresistibly to a magnet. Ari helps to close the distance, coming around the table. In only a few seconds, she is in arm’s reach.

  “My apartment is a one-minute walk away,” I tell her, breathing a little harder in anticipation. It’s what we both want, and apparently, from the twinkle in her hazel eyes, it’s what we both need. “There was no construction; no rain; no fires; no traffic jams; nothing at all wrong ten minutes ago when we drove over here. So, I can’t think of anything that would get in our way tonight. Please come home with me.”

  Ari is breathing hard, chest rising and falling in time with mine, and lips bitten red. “Yes,” she says, fervently.

  I take her by the hand, and we walk out the door into the parking lot. I turn and grab her by the waist, pulling her body against mine. My fingers slip into her curly hair as I plant my mouth on hers again. The taste of her lips is so good to me. I can’t wait to have her
pinned between my body and the wall.

  She returns the kiss, giving herself to me freely. For a split second, I wonder if this is something she does for all men, or if it’s something special she has for me. We kiss until she convinces me it’s something special, made just for this moment we’re sharing. A moan escapes from deep within my throat when she licks my lips as part of the most sensual kiss I’ve ever received.

  I take her hand and guide her around to the passenger’s side to let her into the car before running around to the driver’s seat, cranking up and getting to my apartment in record speed.

  Chapter Six

  Ari

  The very moment we get inside Blaze’s apartment, he pushes me back against the wall and kisses me hard, much harder than before. This time, there’s immeasurable passion flowing from him. Hands clenched in my scarf, as he handles me roughly, he shows me he’s not the gentle giant I think he is.

  We taste like the coffee we abandoned back in the store, thermos and all.

  He looks incredible, curls windswept and cheeks pink from the cold weather. He kisses back with equal fervor like he’s been wanting this as much as I have. That’s gratifying. It’s terrific to feel wanted, and every conscious part of me tells me these are his true feelings.

  When his neck bends as far as possible—he’s much taller than me—he lifts me in one push, using the leverage of the wall. I go with it, wrapping my legs around Blaze’s waist and hooking my arms around the back of his head. In that position, it’s all too easy for him to press into my body and keep me there, his manhood brushing against my womanhood every time one of us dives back into the kiss.

  “Fuck, Blaze,” I murmur. “Holy fuck, you’re so fucking hot. Your fucking arms…” F-bombs come out of my mouth with ease until my words drop off as my hands roam his muscular arms. Are so fucking big and strong… I complete the thought in my head for fear his python-like arms will squeeze the life out of me if I say it aloud. He’s taking over every part of me, especially my mind, and I’m allowing it. “I love being in your arms,” I admit.