by Linda Verji
The minty taste of him was intoxicating, so was the heat of his kiss. Chryssa let him imbue her, putting her apology for everything that had happened yesterday into kisses instead of words. His lips were tender on hers, one hand moving from her waist to cradle her head in his palms almost as if he wanted to keep her to him and never let her go.
The two lovers teased each other, one pulling the other’s bottom lip, the other nipping at the others top lip before they let their tongues tangle again. Chryssa didn’t even know when Eli lifted her. She found herself seated on the kitchen island, the towel racked over her thighs as he stood between them. Cradling his face in her palms she wound down their kisses into soft pecks before whispering against his lips, “I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry?” There was disbelief in his voice as he pulled back a little to look into her eyes. “Are you sick?” He moved a hand to her forehead as if checking her temperature.
“I know right? I can’t believe I’m saying it either.” Chryssa laughed as she swatted his hand away. She was surprised too. She never ever apologized to people. It showed weakness. But after the stunt she’d pulled, he deserved one. “Enjoy it. It may be the last time you ever hear it from me.”
“Why are you not pissed off at me?” he asked suspicion tingeing his words. “This is a trap right? You’re lulling me into my comfort zone then you’re going to go ghetto on me, right?”
“It’s not a trap. Why would I be pissed off?” She shrugged as she dragged him closer with the arms still around his neck. She pressed her forehead against his as said, “You had no choice.”
“Maybe we should talk about -”
“Nope.” She cut him off quickly with a kiss. She didn’t want to talk about anything. It would only lead to an analysis of why she’d run away. He’d want explanations. She wouldn’t want to explain; which would lead to a fight. She didn’t want to fight – she just wanted some love.
“Can we just t-”
“No talking.” Tightening her thighs around him and pressing her groin against his crotch. He took a deep breath when she rolled her hips just the way he liked it. Against his lips she whispered, “What time do you have to be at the hospital?”
“I have surgery at two then I’m on call tonight,” he managed to answer. While he was speaking she lowered one hand and unzipped him. His eyes crossed when she stroked his length, already forgetting whatever he’d been about to yap about.
“Good.” She unknotted her towel letting its sides fall to the counter and leaving her naked to his already hungry gaze. “Then we’ve got time…”
CHAPTER 16
“Let’s close him up people,” Eli announced signaling an end of the craniotomy he’d just been performing. Everyone around the prone patient breathed a sigh of relief. They’d been working on the teenage hit and run victim for the last four hours and for a moment it’d been touch and go. He’d crashed twice during the surgery, but somehow still managed to hang on for his dear life. The man up there was definitely looking out for the kid.
As soon as Eli exited the operating room, he was ambushed by a middle-aged woman. Her midnight black hair had escaped the untidy ponytail she had tucked it into and tendrils stuck to her stained face. Her voice was tinged with a Spanish accent she asked, “How is my Manuel?”
“The surgery went well and we’ve got him stabilized.” He smiled at Manuel’s mother as he answered. “However, there was some serious brain injury from the accident and we won’t know what effects it had until…”
The woman lunged at him even before he even completed the sentence wrapping him in a bear hug and thanking him profusely, “Gracias! Gracias! Gracias!”
He could only pat her back awkwardly. If it wasn’t for Zain walking by just then and heading the woman off to ICU to see her son, the awkward hug would’ve lasted much longer. By the time she came back, he was leaving the on-call room having changed out of his scrubs and back into his suit.
“Shouldn’t you be resting your feet or something?” Eli motioned to Zain’s swollen stomach as she walked him to the entrance.
“What are you talking about?” Zain patted said belly. “I just got in.”
Eli could only shake his head in admiration.
Looking at her now, it wasn’t so hard to believe that he’s once considered courting her. Granted Zain Ford was a beautiful woman. However the moment Chryssa had come into his life, every other woman faded and she took center stage. Now all he felt for Zain was genuine affection.
Practically skipping to his long strides, Zain drawled, “Soooo…”
“So?” Eli asked looking at her sideways.
“Don’t pretend you don’t know.” Zain swatted him on the arm. “How are you and Chryssa doing?”
“Isn’t this like girl talk or something?” Eli asked. The brilliant mid-morning light hit him smack in the eyes as they stepped out of the hospital. For someone who’d been awake most of the night , then pulled in for an emergency surgery the light gave him an instant headache. To Zain he added, “Ask her.”
“You know Chryssa,” she grumbled. “She’s probably gon pop me in the mouth first before she talks relationships.”
Walking towards his spot, he clicked on his car keys. His car beeped almost drowning out his, “We’re doing fine.”
At least he thought so.
Eli still couldn’t believe she hadn’t stomped his ass to the ground after Sunday night’s shenanigans. To say he’d been floored when she’d taken responsibility for their sleep sex instead of shifting the blame to him would be an understatement. Obviously Chryssa was more rational than he gave her credit for. Maybe, she really was ready for the next step in their relationship.
As if she could read his mind Zain waggled her eyebrows. “Do you think she could be the one?”
He tried to open the driver’s door, but she slipped between him and the vehicle. He took a step back giving her a frustrated look. “Don’t you have a heart to cut into or something?”
“No.”She shook her head before leaning on the car with her arms crossed over her chest. “Come on Eli. Share.”
“No!”
“Heeey!” she squealed in protest when he suddenly lifted her up and set her on the sidewalk.
“See you tomorrow Zain,” he said then he drove off.
Right now he needed to get home and catch some sleep. Chryssa was coming to his place after work for a lesson. If he was going to talk to her about seriously dating, then he would need all his wits about him. He would need arguments and counter arguments convincing her that they were the perfect match.
***
Chryssa’s car purred as she parked it in front of Eli’s house. She’d made quick time from work because she was eager to see him. Two days without him and she was having serious withdrawal symptoms. She needed her fix bad. Grabbing her bag from the passenger seat, she exited her car.
She didn’t even have to ring the door bell. The moment she stepped on the front step, one side of the large mahogany doors opened and with a smile he tagged her into the house. She barely had time to take in how good he looked in just sweat pants and naked everything else, like he’d just woken up. He slammed the door behind her, before pressing her back to it and dipping his head in for a kiss.
Her bag cluttered alarmingly when it fell from the grasp of her suddenly weakened fingers, but Chryssa didn’t mind. They only contained the toys she was planning to use for today’s lesson. Instead she concentrated on Eli’s heated kiss.
Hiking her skirt to her waist, he lifted her up. She wrapped her legs around his waist. He separated their lips so he could see his way as he walked them to the living room, but she kept teasing. He groaned when she nipped on the skin at the side of his neck, pausing in his steps for a second before he continued to walk.
Once in the living room, he settled on the couch with her on his lap straddling him. She turned his head towards her ready to continue with the tongue teasing, but instead he pressed a fingertip to her mouth, “Wait.
”
“What?” Removing his finger from her lip, she dipped her head for a kiss. He tagged at her lower lip before retreating again. She whined, “Eli.”
“Baby, we need to talk.” It was the ‘baby’ that had her tensing. He never called her baby. There was a no ‘baby’, ‘sweetheart’ or ‘honey’ clause in their agreement.
She sat up on his lap, tension already starting to coil in the pit of her belly as she narrowed her eyes at him. “Talk about what?”
Seeing the suspicion already suffusing her face, Eli schooled his face into a teasing smile as he leaned back on the couch, “You know when you scrunch up your face like that you look like you’ve got a lemon in your nose.”
“Talk about what?” she repeated again seeing his words for what they were – a diversion. Calculating from the ‘baby’ and the way he paused before answering her question, she just knew what was coming. But she stayed put on his lap.
I could be wrong. Maybe he just wants to speak about the lessons.
Her hand was cold as ice when Eli took it in his. Licking his lips as if nervous, he said, “I’d like to take you out for dinner tomorrow.”
Dinner? Maybe she hadn’t understood. Maybe she was reading into his words. Please don’t do this Eli. She mentally begged him as she asked, “What do you mean dinner?”
“You know. I take you to a nice restaurant. We order dinner. You get to test the limits of my black card like you’ve always wanted. I get to talk to you and know you better.” Though he was lounging indolently on the couch and he still had that small smile on his face, the muscle ticking at the side of his jaw and the fingers digging into the skin of her thighs weren’t exactly relaxed.
The air between them was charged with so much tension even a lumberman’s axe wouldn’t cut through it. Voice cold as ice, Chryssa asked, “Like a date?”
“Like a date,” he confirmed. Any hope that Chryssa had been holding onto fizzled to nothing with his words. He wanted a date. Her first emotion was sadness because she didn’t want it – them -to end like this. Then came the anger.
Why would he do this? She’d told him she didn’t want more. She’d emphasized that they were just partners helping each other. Quid pro quo – nothing more, nothing less. Why did he have to mess that up?
“I have to go.” There was a thin thread of anger as she started to climb off his lap, but he held her onhis lap with a firm hand on her waist and the other on her thigh.
“You haven’t answered me.”
What the hell did he want her to say? He knew what her answer was going to be. It was officially over for them. But just to confirm it she said through gritted teeth, “No.”
“Why?”
Because you put feelings on the table you idiot.
Because I can’t be in a relationship with any man.
Because I want you so badly in my life it hurts to think that you just ended us like this.
Fuck you Eli Stone.
Instead of saying all the words tumbling over each other in her mind she kept struggling to get off his lap, “Let me go.”
“Why can’t you?” Eli insisted instead of letting her go. She didn’t mean to do it. One minute she was struggling to get off his lap, the next minute her hand was sailing towards his face.
SLAP!
The sound echoed through the whole house as her palm connected with his face. For a moment they both stared in shock at each other. Then she was scrambling off of him, his shock loosening the hold of his arms around her.
“I’m sorry… I didn’t…I wanted…” Lost for words, she stood on unsteady feet and straightened out her skirt. I need to leave before I do something stupid. She turned on her heels hurrying to the door.
She heard him call her name but kept moving. If she hadn’t tripped on her bag on her way out she probably would’ve left it there and hiked home. Picking it up, she rushed to her car. By the time he got to the driveway still in bare feet, she was already inside and revving the engine.
He tried to stop her but before he could, she peeled off. Once she was as far from Eli as she could make it on her swirling emotions, Chryssa parked her car on the side of the road and took deep breaths trying to calm herself down.
It was over. They were done. There really wasn’t anything to be angry about. She’d known this would have to end sooner or later. It was better for it to end right now anyway - when she didn’t have any feelings for him!
So why did it feel so wrong? Why could she still feel the sting of her palm from when she’d hit him? Why could she feel the prick of tears at the back of her eyes?
CHAPTER 17
Eli gave her one week to cool down.
He’d hoped that she would call him on her own, but he wasn’t really surprised when she didn’t – disappointed, but not surprised. A smarter man would’ve walked out of the three hundred pounds of high school drama that came wrapped up in the one hundred and forty pound grown woman that was Chryssa. But he wasn’t that man. He wanted her too badly.
With a soft purr, he parked his car in the underground parking to Chryssa’s building. The spot he’d chosen was as far from hers as he could get. He didn’t want her spotting his car then pulling another runner. Except for the porter, there was no one else in the elevator. Eli nodded at him with a smile as he got in behind him.
“Going up?” The porter’s voice resonated in the steel enclosure.
“Yeah. Sixth floor,” Eli said. Before the porter could ask the question he had his mouth open for, Eli added, “Chryssa Williams.”
“Miss Chryssa?” The porter nodded knowingly as he clicked on the button marked six. “Good one that one. Always asks about my script.”
“She is, isn’t she?”Eli was curious to see where this conversation was going.
“You the one who spent the night in her house the other day?” the porter asked.
“Yes I am.”
The porter was quiet after that answer. The elevator came to a groaning stop on the sixth floor. Eli had just stepped out of it when the porter grabbed his arm. There was a fierce spark in his eyes as he said, “You treat her right. She’s got a hard a life.”
With those words he let Eli’s arm go. What the hell was that about? Eli stared at the now closed elevator doors. What kind of hardship could Chryssa have? She had a good job, good friends and a good life all round. What was hard about her life? It was a question that kept him occupied as he waited by her door.
Chryssa took her time getting home. It was a few minutes past seven when the elevator pinged her arrival. The doors opened and she stepped out of the elevators. She wasn’t looking up as she walked towards her door. Instead she was busy rummaging through her purse. Her distraction gave Eli time to observe her.
One week hadn’t changed her. On the outside she was still his beautiful, confident and sexy Chryssa. The white knee-length dress skimmed her curves lovingly, topped by a grey cropped jacket and grey heels only emphasized her beauty. However that same week had changed Eli’s perception of her.
Now he knew that there was a chink in that armor.
She wasn’t that perfect and she wasn’t that confident. It only made him want her more because now he had a real woman on his hands and not some kind of fantasy doll.
“Shit,” she exclaimed when the keys she’d just extracted from her grey handbag slipped from her grasp and fell to the ground with a loud jangling noise. She bent to pick them. Eli, ever the consummate gentleman strode towards her. She lifted her head just as he bent to help her.
“Ow!” they both groaned when her forehead connected with his chin. Eli straightened up clutching onto his jaw.
“Eli, are you okay?” Chryssa forgot the keys and her own forehead for a minute as her instincts took over. She stood up in a hurry. Her gaze was concerned as she cupped his face in her palms rubbing his chin with her palm. “Did I hurt you?”
“I think I bit my tongue,” Eli said milking her concern for all it was worth.
“Open up. Let me
see,” she said, unaware that in her urge to care of him she’d stepped closer to him. But Eli was aware; aware of her vanilla scent tickling his nostrils, aware of the warm flesh of her breasts brushing against his chest, aware that if he dipped his head right now he would be kissing her.
Not to scare her away, he only placed a palm on her waist to keep her close as he opened his mouth for her inspection. Peering in, she said, “I think I see some blood.”
“Is it bad?” he asked.
“Not so much, but let’s get you into the house so I can check.” She bent to pick up the fallen keys. Eli almost smiled as he followed her into the apartment. He hadn’t even had to beg her.
After she’d deposited her bag on the trolley by the door and slipped out of her shoes, she turned back to him, “Okay, let’s-”
Eli cut off her words with a kiss. He couldn’t help himself. He’d missed her too much. The moment their lips met the spark lighted afresh as usual and slowly, but surely tutored itself into a raging inferno.
Her lips opened up for him like this was what was meant to be. Her tongue dueled with his as if she’d been learning his rhythm from birth and her arms looped around his neck as she lifted on tip toes to reach him. His hands locked around her waist then shifted to her ass, cupping the firm flesh before pulling her closer to his aching body.
His hands moved furtively up and down her body as they kissed, tattooing his possession on every inch he’d been denied this last week. He wanted to consume her as she was doing to him, fill her as she was doing to him. He didn’t care that she’d probably taste the blood on his tongue; he just wanted her to taste the forgiveness there too. He’d missed her.
She was the first to pull back from the kiss, her eyes meeting his. The desire that’d been there was quickly replaced by awareness that he was here - in her house, then by wariness because he wasn’t supposed to be here. She stepped away from him, “Let me go get you some water.”
