by BETH KERY
She noticed his stare on her. Her gaze bounced off him and landed on her coffee table.
“Why did you move to Chicago?” he asked.
She paused before answering. She’d moved to Chicago because she’d been haunted by the idea of seeing all the old places she’d used to visit with her mother following her own bout with cancer. She’d been haunted by the idea of her only family member—her uncle, Seth—being forced to witness another round of chemo or radiation, or another excruciating wait for a doctor to give them results.
Joy’s physician had declared her completely healthy on her last several visits, but the fear of the cancer returning—of inflicting further misery on Seth—had been what had instigated her move across the country. She didn’t want to put Seth through what her father had been through when her mother had been diagnosed with cancer.
She didn’t want Seth to suffer like she had when she’d been a child, watching as the cruel disease stole away a loved one bit by bit until there was nothing left but insubstantial memories.
“I needed a change of pace,” she said quietly. “The Steadman School is one of the finest preparatory schools in the country for art.”
“Davis is considered the same,” he pointed out, referring to the prestigious high school where she’d taught gifted students in Hollywood. He noticed her expression of surprise. “Oh—Seth told me the name of the school where you taught. That was before I . . . we . . .” He cleared his throat. “Met. Like I told you earlier, Seth pretty much clammed up whenever I asked about you after that.”
A strained silence ensued. She couldn’t tell him that after their electrical, impulsive tryst, she’d informed her uncle about her cancer diagnosis. Seth had become as anxious and protective as a mother bear after that. She hadn’t told him specifically about her sexual encounter with Everett, because she hadn’t even known it was Everett at the time. Apparently, Seth had taken it upon himself to deflect Everett’s interest in his niece because he’d been aware that Joy had more crucial things to focus on for the next several months than an affair with America’s heartthrob.
“So . . . why the desire to transfer schools?” he persisted after a moment.
He knew she’d sidestepped the original question, she realized. She sighed. “Sometimes we just need to wipe the slate clean. Start somewhere new.”
He nodded. “Begin a new chapter. I get that. I’m jealous,” he added after a moment.
“Why would you want to wipe your slate clean?” she asked. He glanced at her calmly. Joy realized she’d just asked him the question she’d hoped he wouldn’t ask her. She reached for her mug of tea. “Never mind. You don’t have to answer that. It’s just that you seem to be at the height of a very successful career. I would have thought . . .”
“What?” he asked, when she faded off.
“I would have thought you would be one of the last people in the world to want to make a fresh start. You have a pretty impressive body of work on your slate to consider erasing it all,” she said with a smile.
His brow creased into a slight frown as he stared at her mouth. Joy dropped her chin and studied the surface of her tea. “Thanks,” she heard him say. “But sometimes, success can lock you into a certain pattern. You can’t help but wonder if things would be different if you just knocked over the whole house of cards and started from scratch.”
I can tell you what it’s like: it’s lonely, she thought before she had the opportunity to censor herself.
“Joy?”
It felt like all the tiny hairs in her ears and on her neck stood on end at the sound of his quiet voice.
“Yes?”
“You asked me earlier if I ever wasn’t confident. I’m not right now. You don’t want me here, do you?”
Her gaze zoomed to his face. “No. I mean, I do want you . . . here,” she added quickly.
“Then why are you so skittish?” In the distance, she heard the drone of the dryer spinning. The tightness she’d been experiencing in her chest rose to her throat.
“You don’t know?”
“You’re embarrassed?” he asked slowly, as if he’d seen the answer with those sharp eyes of his and plucked it right out of her consciousness. “About what happened at the studio?”
“I’ve never done anything like that before. I didn’t know who you were. I didn’t even know your name.”
His facial muscles convulsed slightly. He set down his cup on the coffee table and suddenly he was touching her cheek with one hand while the other cradled her neck. A silent spasm of emotion went through her when she felt his fingers slide into her hair and rub her scalp. Her lungs seemed to have locked up.
“It shocked me, too,” he admitted. “Maybe not in the same way it did you, but still. I couldn’t stop thinking about you, Joy.”
She just stared at him, mute, all those old feelings flooding into her awareness, a wave of fear for her own life, a lightening flash of lust . . . Everett’s eyes watching it all, a bright beacon she couldn’t quite interpret, but couldn’t help seeking.
She was healthy now, at least the doctors said so . . . alive to face another day, another moment. Who could possibly not relish this one?
His head dipped toward hers.
“I don’t want to make you feel strange or guilty about this.” She inhaled him, her floral-scented soap transformed by his male essence. “Is it okay?”
Her gaze came unglued from his moving lips and glided over his nose, meeting his stare. Maybe he read her bewilderment . . . her enthrallment.
“Is it okay that I’m so attracted to you?” he clarified somberly.
Her mouth dropped open in amazement. She nodded.
“So you’re not going to back out of going out with me tomorrow night?”
Uncertainty reared its head, breaking through the surface of her lust-addled awareness. This was her chance to back down. Everett may understand what was happening here—he probably had this effect on every woman he encountered. For her own part, she was quite sure this whole thing was a bizarre mistake. His fingers found a sensitive spot on her scalp. She stopped herself from purring in pleasure when he rubbed it.
“No. I’m not changing my mind,” she whispered.
His smile stunned her—a quick, unabashed flash of distilled happiness. He leaned down and brushed his mouth against hers before she’d recovered. She felt a shock go through her at the unexpected contact. His mouth caressed hers like his fingertips had her skin earlier, a tender exploration. She closed her eyes and trembled. His kiss wasn’t a ravishment to trigger lust and make her forget everything else.
It was better. Much better.
He lifted his head a moment later. She cracked open her eyelids and saw that he was watching her.
“If you had any idea about the things I’m fantasizing about doing to you right now, you might change your mind about tomorrow night.”
“I don’t think so,” she said slowly, surprising herself.
His nostrils flared slightly. Joy had the thrilling thought that she was about to be sexually consumed.
“I hated the fact that I wasn’t able to touch you that first time,” he said in a hushed tone. His hands spread along the sides of her rib cage, distracting her. “I hated the fact that you probably were left thinking I was single-minded and selfish—”
“I didn’t think that,” she interrupted him.
He brushed her lower lip with the tip of his thumb, his features tightening. “I was selfish. I was single-minded. That’s not the part I regret. I just regretted not being able to give you the same unselfish pleasure you gave me in return. Let me do that now, Joy. Let me show you I can give as well as get.”
Her brain stalled. It took her a moment to realize he was watching her expectantly, his face tense, his eyes reminding her of the starburst tattoo—fire in water.
“Okay,” she whispered.
His hands moved gently to her back. He found her zipper and lowered it, his gaze remaining on her the whole time. His hands
brushed over her shoulders, lowering her dress below her breasts. He removed her bra and tossed it aside so quickly, one second she possessed meager protection, and the next her breasts were bared to the cool air and Everett’s hot stare.
“So lovely. So perfect. I knew you would be,” he murmured, touching a peaking nipple with the tip of his forefinger. Her breath stuck in her lungs as she watched him detail both crests at once, looking fascinated by the changes he wrought in her flesh with his drawing, plucking fingertips. Prickles of pleasure spiked along the surface of her chilled, pebbled skin. She gasped softly when he pinched at her lightly and seemingly pulled an invisible cord of sensation that led all the way to her womb.
“You’re cold?” he asked, running his hand along the tiny goose bumps rising along her chest and breasts.
“No,” she managed to say. “Well, maybe a little.”
He smiled and covered her breasts with his large, warm palms. The next thing she knew, he’d seized her mouth with his own. For a few seconds, she was stunned at the onslaught of his kiss. His former nibbling at her mouth was a mere tiny sampling of his passion. He gave it to her now in full force, his lips molding hers hungrily, his tongue plunging between her lips, searching and probing. Liquid heat surged between her thighs. God, he knew how to kiss. Joy had never considered her mouth to be a sexual organ on par with her pussy, but when Everett kissed her, it suddenly felt like it was. She moaned shakily beneath his heat, her tongue sliding against his, joining in a sensual duel. His hands moved on her breasts, shaping her flesh to his palms.
It was like dipping her chilled flesh into a heated bath. She melted against him. Had he known his kiss would have that effect on her?
He came up for air an untold period of time later, but his mouth was immediately on her neck, one hand spreading at the back of her skull. Joy panted as he ravished her skin, her eyelids opened into slits, staring sightlessly at the light fixture on the ceiling. Shivers of sensation rippled through her as he rained kisses on her bare shoulders and paused to take a gentle bite out of the muscle.
She realized she was just sitting there, dazed beneath the tsunami of sensation caused by Everett. She reached into the opening of his robe as he continued to ravish her, a thrill of excitement going through her as she touched warm skin and dense muscle. He went still when her fingertips brushed against a small, erect nipple. He grunted softly and wrapped his hands around her wrists.
She looked into his face, surprised, when he pulled her hands away from his body.
“Let me touch you right now,” he said, his voice slightly gruff from arousal, his face tense and somber.
“Okay,” she said uncertainly.
A small smile flickered across his lips. He gently moved her wrists to the small of her back. “Arch your back,” he said. “Present your breasts to me.”
Confusion and alarm went through her at his words, but the sharp pang of arousal that tightened her sex trumped them. Her breath coming in shallow pants, she arched her back, causing her breasts to rise toward him. She saw his cock leap against the fabric of the robe. It was as if invisible fingers pinched at her clit.
She moaned raggedly when he squeezed one breast gently while he slipped a nipple between his lips. He drew on her with his mouth and she shifted restlessly on the couch. She pulled on her wrist, intuitively needing to hold his head against her, to rake her fingers through his hair, but he held her hands firmly at her middle back.
“Shh, it’s okay,” he soothed, lifting his head momentarily. “Keep still for a moment while I taste you.”
He lowered his head again and took a love bite out of the flesh he held cupped in his hand. Joy gasped. He continued to maraud the captive breast, using lips, teeth and tongue to stimulate her until Joy wiggled helplessly on the couch, desperate for friction on her sex.
“Everett,” she pleaded softly when he finally enclosed the nipple with his warm, sucking mouth. She made a choking noise, and he laved the crest with a warm, slightly raspy tongue as if to soothe her.
He lifted his head, spearing her with his stare. He smiled.
“You’re very beautiful,” he said, glancing at her flushed breasts. He placed his hand matter-of-factly between her thighs and pressed.
Joy gasped.
“It’s okay,” he assured, using his hand to gather the fabric of her dress, sliding it over her thighs. “Lean back,” he instructed. “Keep your hands behind your back, please.”
She followed his instructions, watching him mutely as he temporarily released her wrists and knelt on the floor. He raised her dress to her belly and let it drop. He deftly lowered her panties to her thighs, then spread her legs so that the fabric stretched tight. Joy moaned in anticipation when he firmed his hold on her wrists again with one hand, restraining her, and leaned into her lap. It embarrassed her a little, how aroused she became by the fact that he held her captive to what was to come.
He dipped his tongue downward between her labia. “Aw, Jesus, you’re so wet. You taste so good.”
She convulsed in a distilled spasm of pleasure as he laved her clit. She jerked in his hold, shocked by the sharp sensation. He held her in place with a spread hand at her waist and continued to press his tongue against her, his movements concentrated and eye-crossingly precise. She whimpered helplessly, Everett’s head in her lap, his tongue shooting her straight to heaven.
The pleasure he wrought was hot, forbidden and completely, utterly inescapable. He lapped at her, pressed her clit like it was a magic button, and before she knew it, she was riding the crest of the wave of climax.
Her muscles clenching tight, she thrust her hips against his warm, wet tongue and came in a delicious, pounding rush of release.
She gasped in the aftermath, her brain still spinning in the vortex of pleasure, her flesh still vibrating and singing in the aftermath of bliss.
She opened her eyes at the sensation of Everett’s open, warm mouth kissing her thigh.
Holy shit, she thought dazedly as she gasped for air. It’d felt like he’d plunged her straight into the center of passion . . . the heady, intoxicating experience of being alive. Had she been so dead—or so afraid of death?—for so long now that she’d forgotten the experience?
Had she ever known what it was to feel alive to this degree?
It took her a few seconds to fully comprehend that Everett had stood and was walking toward the hallway.
“Where are you going?” she asked, disoriented.
“I should leave,” he said shortly.
“Everett?”
He paused and turned toward her. Joy lowered her dress and raised the fabric over her breasts. Her confusion altered to bewilderment when she saw how rigid his face was with arousal, how regret flickered across his features when he saw her hurriedly cover herself from his gaze.
“I really did just come here to talk to you,” he said hollowly.
“Oh,” Joy said stupidly. She stood and watched as he stalked out of her living room. She heard the sound of the dryer door opening and closing, and then the bathroom door shutting behind him. Disappointment smacked into her like a physical blow.
Of course it would be better to cool off a little, to take things slower. Joy wasn’t even sure what was happening here. Whatever was going on between her and Everett was extremely powerful and potentially volatile. Better not to go so fast that she was utterly consumed.
Of course she was lying to herself. How could she not long to leap into the blazing flames with Everett?
She pulled herself together and was in the kitchen rinsing out their mugs when he returned a minute or two later, completely dressed. She set the cups in the drainer and turned to face him. His hair was starting to dry, turning the color of it to a mélange of dark gold, pale blond and burnished light brown. He often was photographed wearing hats. Joy had a flash of understanding as to why. His hair was truly his crowning glory. He would draw attention and stares from quite a distance if he didn’t routinely cover it.
; She wiped her hands on a dish towel and glanced toward the windows. “It’s still raining outside,” she said shakily.
He grinned and glanced significantly down at his clothes. “It’s okay, I’m already wet.”
So was she. She could feel the wetness between her thighs, the tingling sensation in her pussy from his masterful lovemaking.
“So, we’re definitely on for tomorrow night, right?” he asked.
She blinked in amazement at what she was seeing. Everett Hughes? Looking uncertain? Worried, even? Did he think she wasn’t going to agree to go out with him because he’d taken her on a mind-blowing afternoon ride to heaven?
“Absolutely,” she said with a tone of conviction.
He looked relieved. “I’ll come by and pick you up—say at around six o’clock? We’ll have a late dinner after the premiere,” he said.
“Sounds great.”
She followed him as he headed toward her front door and watched him step into his shoes. She was a little bewildered by the contrast between his raw sexual intensity just moments ago and his slightly uncomfortable, practical manner at present.
He slapped his wet cap on his head and turned to her. He opened his mouth as if to speak, then shoved one hand into his jeans pocket and reached for the doorknob with the other.
“See you tomorrow night,” he said.
Her front door shut with a click. Joy just stood there for a stretched minute, wondering what the hell had just happened to her.
Four
She spent a good portion of the time she was supposed to be sleeping enumerating all the things she needed to do the following day in preparation for the premiere. How did one go about getting ready for a date with the most eligible bachelor in the country? She’d have to get a manicure and pedicure and get her hair trimmed. She’d have to dip into her savings account and buy a dress.
In the moments she wasn’t having those anxious thoughts, she was busy replaying every second she’d spent with Everett in vivid detail. What had he meant when he’d said she’d be shocked by his sexual fantasies in regard to her? What specifically had he been thinking about? Joy had had several long-term boyfriends and one or two intense sexual affairs that hadn’t lasted long. Still, none of those experiences called to mind the experience she’d had with Everett out there in her living room . . . the way he’d restrained her gently, forcing her to face her pleasure head-on.
