Tam’s dismissal aside, the night had been pure pleasure. He felt like he’d just come from a particularly good workout. His muscles pumped thickly with blood and were already aching. After a quick hair and body shampoo, Ian got out of the shower and toweled himself dry. In the mirror, he was the same as before. Handsome face, cool eyes, body as strong as always, but inside was another matter. Inside he was weak and begging. But only for her.
He walked out of the bathroom and into her gaze. “Thanks for the shower.”
She sat on the window seat, the same one she’d watched him from that first time, looking beautiful and sexy and in control in her flowered robe. But he didn’t miss the way her eyes devoured his naked body, lingering only a little on his heavy cock that they both vividly remembered had been inside her only a few minutes before. He started to get dressed.
“So are we in one of those on-the-sly relationships, or will you come out for a drink with me sometime?” he asked.
“I don’t go out for drinks.”
He knew she was bullshitting, but didn’t want to press the issue.
“Not even water?” Well, maybe just a little.
“Sometimes.” A smile came and went on her face. “I do eat, though. Why don’t you invite me to your place for dinner?”
So she was planning on keeping him secret. “When can you come?” he asked.
“Anytime.”
That sounded promising. Ian felt his lips twitch. He picked up the pencil on her bedside table and, on the cover of her sketch pad, wrote down his address, phone number, and his name, too, in case she forgot it.
“My schedule is very flexible after six in the evening every day. I’m off on the weekends and Thursdays. And—” he smiled as she glanced down at what he’d just written, “—you don’t have to call first.”
“Are you sure about that?” She raised an eyebrow. “Doesn’t a boy like you have at least a dozen little sex bunnies lined up to fill his evenings?”
“Maybe a boy like me, but this man doesn’t.”
Her lips pursed, and then she smiled. “Point taken.” She stood up from the window seat. “I’ll call you.”’
And, Ian thought with a wry grin, that was his cue to go.
Chapter 6
Ian was surprised when Tam showed up on his doorstep the following Thursday bearing gifts.
“May I come in?” she asked as he stood there staring at her for longer than what was called for. She held a large picnic basket in front of her with both hands. It looked heavy.
“Please do,” he said, regaining his equilibrium. This was definitely a surprise.
This was the first time he’d seen her in black. The slim-fitting, sleeveless dress skimmed down her shoulders over her pretty breasts and belly to swirl just above the floor and the silver sandals on her feet. As she walked past him into the house, the scent of green tea and rosemary floated up from her skin. He almost closed the door on his foot when he noticed the back of the dress. It was nearly nonexistent, revealing the subtle musculature of her shoulders and back as it dropped from the narrow shoulder straps to hug her high ass, hips, and thighs.
“Where’s your kitchen?”
Ian pointed and watched as she walked toward it, her small but shapely behind twitching like a metronome. He looked on, amazed, as she unloaded her picnic basket on the counter. Damn. Tam took out a bottle of pre-chilled white wine, grilled salmon, asparagus, mashed potatoes, gravy, sliced strawberries, and two small cakes, all in their own separate containers.
“I thought since I didn’t call to give you time to make dinner, I’d bring a little something.” Tam turned and opened cupboard after cupboard until she found wine glasses. She took out two and began to set up the small dining table for dinner. “I hope you’re hungry.”
As a matter of fact, Ian was. He had also been about to go out for chicken wings and beer with his friends. But that was obviously not going to happen now.
“Just give me one second.” He went into the bedroom to cancel on his friends. “Sorry, Derrick. Something very unexpected came up. Tell the guys I’ll see them on the court tomorrow night.”
His friend made some noises of protest, but eventually said, “Cool,” and hung up the phone. When Ian got back to the dining area, two places were already set, food on the plates, candles lit, and the wine poured.
“I’m normally much more domestic than this, but you’ll have to take what you get tonight.”
“I’m sure I’ll be more than satisfied with your efforts,” Ian said.
Tam snickered and invited him to sit down. “Come, before the food gets cold. I had to race over here as it is to make sure the steam was still on the fish.” She glanced at Ian. “Oh, I forgot to ask, you do like salmon, don’t you?”
He laughed. “Yes, I do.”
They sat down at the table, facing each other like teenagers on a first date. She glanced at him over the flickering lights of the candles, smiling. The salmon was good, tender without being overcooked, and the butter-simmered asparagus melted on his tongue.
“Good choice,” he said, indicating the wine. It was a vintage he had in his cupboard, a light pear-infused wine with just a hint of the fruit’s sweetness.
“Thank you,” she murmured.
They ate a few more bites, occasionally watching each other with nothing but the silence between them. Then Ian decided to break it.
“So, what brings you to my neck of the woods?”
Tam smiled. “Not too much. I was bored sitting at home by myself. Jasmine’s off on a study date, and I can’t focus on painting right now.”
“I see.” He wondered if this was a booty call disguised as dinner. Not that he had a problem with that.
Tam neatly sliced an asparagus stalk in two and then forked a piece to her lips. She licked off the butter, swirling her tongue around the abbreviated vegetable before sucking it into her mouth.
“So, tell me about yourself,” she said. “I feel like I know a lot about you as a professor, but not too much about Ian Tate, the man.”
“You know a lot about the man.”
“I want to know more about you than the size of your dick and how many times you can make me come.”
“Why do you want more than that? I thought all you wanted to do was fuck.”
“You do get straight to the point, don’t you?”
“I try to. It saves on all the excess bullshit.”
Tam smiled again. “Well, I’m interested in you. Obviously.” She paused. “We don’t always have to get together for sex.”
“Ah, I see. You think that just because I’m Jasmine’s professor, things would get complicated. Well, your daughter doesn’t have to know anything about us. Nobody does.”
She tilted her head to look at him. “I’m not trying to keep you a secret.”
“Really? Then why can’t I take you out to dinner somewhere public?”
Tam blushed. It was the second unexpected thing from her tonight. Her skin darkened to an even lovelier shade, and she looked down.
“OK. Scratch that.” She sipped her wine, waving the fingers of her free hand dismissively. “We’re two reasonably mature people who enjoy each other’s company. Can you just leave it at that?”
“I just want to be clear on what’s going on here.” Ian felt the need to keep this light. Their talk was getting much too serious much too quickly. “We can get together and fuck, maybe even have the occasional dinner. But if, say, I had a faculty party to go to and needed a last minute date, I shouldn’t bother calling you, right?”
“Something like that wouldn’t be completely out of the question,” she said just as facetiously. “Under some circumstances, I would be able to go with you.”
“That’s a relief,” Ian murmured, his tone dry as desert sand. Tam rolled her eyes and laughed. They finished their dinner talking comfortably about nothing too important. Then she helped him wash the dishes before they went into his cozy bachelor’s living room and sat on the couch in fr
ont of the darkened television.
“If this were a normal date, I’d ask you to watch a movie with me,” Ian said.
“Who says this isn’t a normal date?” She leaned over to look at his meager DVD collection stacked neatly under his IKEA coffee table. “You want to watch this one?” She sat back with a copy of Coming to America in her hand. It had been Zoë’s favorite movie. And with such a simple thing, his wife’s memory bubbled up in him.
“Sure,” he said, clearing his throat. “You want some popcorn?”
She refused the popcorn, but he got up and went into the kitchen anyway to get them both glasses of water and a bowl of M&M’s. Ian swallowed hard as he emptied the packet of candy into the clear glass bowl. When he walked back into the living room, she had the movie ready to play in the DVD player. Her sandals were off and her legs curled up on the sofa. She seemed innocent and young. For a moment it was easy to forget that this was the woman who had effortlessly given him the best sex of his life and seemed to have no problem with a no-strings-attached repeat performance.
Tam looked up as he neared the sofa, then she leaned toward the table to pick up the remote. Her bare back, slender and sleek, glowed briefly in the blue light of the television before she sat back in her seat. The earlier impression of innocence vanished when she turned toward him.
“Ready?” she asked.
When Ian sat down, she leaned into him, inviting him to slip an arm around her. Another surprising move, but he wasn’t going to complain. Her skin, brushed with that same illusive green tea and rosemary scent he’d noticed when she first walked into his apartment, was soft and yielding beneath his hand. Tam pressed PLAY on the remote control.
The opening credits started, and, for a moment, it was easy to believe it was Zoë beside him on the sofa, saying for the millionth time how much she loved Eddie Murphy, although the Beverly Hills Cop series wasn’t exactly her favorite piece of cinema. But his wife had never called it “cinema,” and she never smelled like fresh growing things, and she never had bits of red paint stuck in the corners of her fingernails.
“Are you all right?” the not-Zoë asked.
“Yeah, just a little gas. No big deal.” He lightly thumped his chest for effect.
“Too much asparagus, maybe,” she said and rubbed the place over his heart. “Just don’t burp in my hair.”
“I’ll try my best not to,” he said. Then she draped an arm over his sprawled thigh, her hand hovering just above his dick. All thoughts of Zoë went flying out the window.
But Tam didn’t go any farther. It was just her and her soft skin and the possibility of sexual contact that made him want to arch his hips to her hand or move his own hand to her breast just to take the night to its inevitable conclusion. They watched the movie in relative silence until it ended with the final happily ever after, and then Tam was yawning and stretching out her long legs.
“That was nice,” she said. Her breath smelled like chocolates and near sleep as she leaned in toward him. “I’m going. Jasmine should be home by now.”
His eyes searched her face for some hint that she might be joking. Did she really just come over here to tease him and then run back home? Her mouth settled on his, creating a light suction.
“Good night.”
Before she could pull away he anchored her to him, opening his thighs wider and pulling her lips closer again. The chocolates were stale on her tongue and the sleep flavor bitter, but Tam was sweet. She twined her slim arms around his neck and pressed her breasts against him. His dick perked up, blooming full and hard against her stomach.
Ian scraped his blunt fingernails gently across her back and felt pleased indeed when she arched deeper into him and opened her mouth wider for his kisses. Soon she was kneeling in the sofa, her thighs spread over him as she held his face and kissed him deeply, saying with her tongue and her hands and the trembling beginning of a moan that she wasn’t quite ready to go.
Ian moved his hands to her hips, kneading her soft flesh. Her dress hiked up, and he was under it, exploring the pieces of string that made up her panties and then the skin beneath. She actually moaned when his hand brushed over her shaved pussy, and her mouth slipped away from him as she gasped. His fingers found her soaked lips and her clit and then lightly stroked the opening of her pussy. Tam’s head fell back, and she pulled down the straps of her dress to reveal her breasts. Her nipples were as hard as the chocolate M&M’s. They didn’t at all melt in his mouth as his tongue moved over them, tasting and sucking them while his hand played with her soaking pussy.
He caressed her clit to the rhythm of his tongue on her nipples, and she rewarded him with a long, singing moan. Her wetness dripped over his fingers, washing over them like seawater. She was so slippery, so open he could slide his dick inside her now with almost no resistance. She would swallow him, hold him in the sultry vice of her pussy and ride him hard until they both collapsed with pleasure. The image of it made his dick throb even more.
She gasped again as he slipped a finger inside her, still stroking her clit with his thumb. Tam raked her fingers through his hair and down his neck, feeding him her breasts, her nipples, the gift of her noises. He sped up the motion of his fingers, and she grasped his head to her chest, nearly suffocating him in the steamy heat of her breasts. Her hips started to jerk uncontrollably, her pussy snaked against his hand, and she was coming, gasping and shuddering in his grasp, her arms still holding his head tightly to her breasts.
“Shit…” she murmured breathlessly against his hair.
“I’m glad you enjoyed it,” he said with a soft laugh.
She pulled away from him, releasing his head to fall back and let the couch catch her full weight. From the deep olive green of the sofa, her body looked sated and soft. She smiled at him, taking a slow visual tour of his body, with a particularly long stop at the swollen ache in his jeans.
“So,” she said. “What can I do for you?”
He shook his head. “Not a thing. I’m good.”
“Really?” She looked at his dick again.
It throbbed as she licked her lips and then slowly eased a finger between them. She sucked on the finger until it was wet and moving with liquid ease in and out of her mouth.
“No, it’s OK.” He cleared his throat and surreptitiously adjusted himself. “I’ve got some papers to get to before tomorrow. If I don’t do it now, it’ll be the weekend. And I don’t like working through my weekends.”
Her eyes widened in surprise, and the motion of her finger stopped. “You’re serious?”
“Unfortunately, yes,” Ian said.
Tam pushed down her skirts and got up off the sofa. She settled the straps of the dress back on her shoulders and went into the kitchen to gather up her picnic supplies. From the dim light of the candles still flickering on the table, Ian watched the almost meditative way she moved around his kitchen until she had all her things in the picnic basket and was ready to leave.
“Thank you for a lovely dinner,” she said. “And an even more…tasty dessert than I had planned.” She stood in the threshold of his kitchen, basket held in front of her, boldly appraising him again. “I’m disappointed you didn’t take me up on my offer, but I guess there’s always the next time.”
“I hope so.” He really, really hoped so.
Ian wasn’t sure what he had been gambling on when he had pulled his dick away from Tam’s mouth, but he hoped it would pay off. Soon.
He walked her to her car, where they exchanged a laughably chaste goodnight kiss. It was early, not quite ten thirty. Yolanda, his neighbor on the other side of the duplex, hadn’t even left for work yet. She worked at a classy strip joint, what they called a “gentlemen’s club,” in town. Yolanda’s Saab convertible still sat in the driveway under its logoed tarp.
“Call me sometime,” Tam said. “Maybe we can do that public dining thing you talked about.”
“Definitely.”
He stepped back as she pulled out of his driveway an
d, after giving him an awkward little wave, drove off down the well-lit street.
Chapter 7
The basketball banged against the backboard and rattled the chains of the outdoor basket before Ian grabbed it out of the air and quickly dribbled it down the court.
“So what, or who, did you stand us up for last night?” one of his friends, Rashawn, asked, his breath coming loud and fast as he tried to get the ball from Ian.
Troy, skinny and fast, came out of nowhere and took the ball with a yell of triumph. “Did that dime next door finally let you hit that?”
Ian and his friends battled each other in a good-natured game. The four men laughingly overtook each other, tossing the ball back and forth and occasionally making a basket while they talked shit. None of them took the game very seriously. They played to work out and unwind. And the effects of their weekly game and nearly daily workouts—strong physiques, easygoing temperaments, and effortless athleticism—were obvious in each man.
Troy, the investment banker and the only married man among them, loved to hear about his friends’ single, and sometimes scandalous, lifestyles. He’d willingly given up his own bachelorhood nearly three years ago to a little sous chef at a local four-star restaurant. He was too happy to even contemplate cheating, still, he liked to hear about his boys and their seemingly endless parade of pussy.
“What did I tell you fellas about neighbors?” Ian asked. He laughed, sweeping the ball from Derrick’s hands and darting behind him to run for the basket. He took the shot and missed. “Shit!”
“Exactly. Don’t shit where you eat. Common sense.” Derrick threw himself after the ball heading dangerously out of bounds, easily fending off the two men on the opposite team. “But that woman is a fine, fine thing.”
Derrick was a lawyer and one of the first people Ian met when he moved to Miami two years ago. Compulsively successful and ruthless in the courtroom, he was a nice guy everywhere else. Mostly. Only Ian knew he was stupidly in love with his best friend, a woman he’d known since college. That didn’t stop Derrick from sleeping with some of the most beautiful women in Miami though.
Propositioning the Professor (Professional Lovers Series Book 2) Page 5
