Calling It

by Jen Doyle

  Chapter Thirteen

  He wasn’t coming. Five episodes of House Hunters and one pint of ice cream later, and that was the conclusion Dorie had reached. She should be happy about that. She was happy about that.

  She hugged the pillow to her chest as she tried to keep herself from crying.

  This was ridiculous. It wasn’t like she’d expected it to go anywhere in the first place. But her heart hurt—there was an actual ache in her chest. Her insides felt like they’d been turned inside out, and it wasn’t because the ice cream hadn’t sat right with her stomach. There had been plenty of guys in her life and at least that much ice cream, although rarely because of a man. And now, after only one kiss, it felt like her world had been turned upside down. What if they’d actually...?

  She went still at the sound of a knock on the door, halfway hoping she’d imagined it, while desperate to hear it all the same. Unsure which would be worse, she went the denial route and turned up the TV.

  There was another knock, much louder this time. No mistaking that one. But she turned the volume up louder once again.

  Okay, yes, she wanted him here—but she was so freaking scared at just the thought of having this conversation. And she was excellent at avoidance.

  “Dorie! Let me in!”

  Dorie closed her eyes. Definitely scared.

  “I will fucking break down this door!” he shouted. And then, as if he realized how crazy that made him sound, he amended, “Okay. So I won’t break the door down. But unless you tell me to go to hell, I’m using my key to open it and I’m coming in.” His voice faded in and out a little as if he was pacing back and forth in front of the door.

  Though she shook her head, she did turn the TV down a little bit. “I’m sleeping,” she said.

  There was a moment of silence, and then, “That wasn’t a ‘go to hell.’”

  With a sigh, she let herself fall back into the comfort of the couch. No. No, it hadn’t been.

  She heard him say, “Fuck,” before the sound of a key turning in the lock and then the door opening. Although she very deliberately kept her gaze on the TV, she could feel him standing there and looking at her. When she wrapped her arms around herself tightly enough to focus on that rather than crying—or, well, him—he closed the door gently, paused for a moment, and then came across the room, with a muttered, “Well, at least you don’t have the bat.”

  “Only because I didn’t think about it,” she muttered back.

  He made a sound that might have been a muffled laugh. Or maybe not.

  Doing everything possible to ignore the way her heart was skipping beats, she unwrapped her arms from her body, as if she hadn’t just been holding herself in a death grip, and attempted to look casual as she rearranged herself on the couch. Hoping desperately he wouldn’t notice the ice cream or the wad of tissues on the floor, she tucked her feet underneath her and nodded her head toward the TV. “If you’re going to stay, you’ll have to deal with House Hunters International.” If this was a fight with her brothers, that in itself would have been enough to send them running out of the house screaming.

  But Nate sat down at the other end of the couch, far too close for comfort. “I prefer the US version, but international will do.”

  She resisted the sudden urge to swing her head in his direction. With great effort, she pouted, “Too bad. I changed my mind. How about a Full House rerun?”

  “Fantastic.” And in case his enthusiasm wasn’t enough, he added, “Joey’s my favorite. How about you?”

  Dorie had no response. The only time she’d ever watched Full House in her life was when she’d been forced to stay overnight at the neighbor’s because the babysitter fell through. “You really are a girl,” she muttered.

  Rather than respond to her insult, he snapped, “Want to do our hair and nails, too?” He grabbed her heel and put her foot in his lap. “I’ll do your toes first and then you can do mine?”

  She’d have given anything to have a comeback that would have laid him out cold. But the second his hand moved up to her ankle she lost all ability to speak.

  That thought was shattered when he let go, practically pushing her away.

  “Tell me why,” he demanded quietly.

  “What?” She dragged her gaze away from his mouth.

  “Tell. Me. Why,” he repeated, his voice raw. His hand clenched against his thigh as he very deliberately didn’t look at her. “Why did you lie to me?”

  Right. Now it was her turn to look away. “Because you’re Nate Hawkins.”

  The words escaped before she even realized she’d spoken. Words that revealed far too much than she intended, thanks to the sob rising up in her throat.

  “I know who I am.” He jumped to his feet and turned his back on her. “I just want to know why you pretended you didn’t.”

  “Oh, excuse me, Mr. Pot,” she said, jumping to her feet as well, her hands going to her hips. “Hi, Kettle. My name is D.B. Nice to meet you.”

  He went still and then made another one of those laughing-type sounds, although she couldn’t imagine that’s what it actually was. Not that it mattered. She was on a roll and she was going with it. “Oh. Why, hello, Mr. D.B. It’s nice to meet you, too. I mean, I’m not at all thrown by a random stranger coming into my apartment while I’m taking an amazing bath—” leaving out the Nate Hawkins component, of course “—and eating my—”

  “Dinner,” he finished for her, turning around as she glared and continued, “Yes, dinner. That I was saving for—”

  He cut her off midsentence by saying, “Could we do this without you wearing the glasses?”

  “I... What?” Puzzlement turned to irritation. She glared up at him. “Um, no. If you’re going to yell at me then I’m sure as hell going to see it.”

  “I’m two freaking inches from your face.” He actually took her glasses away—that she’d been wearing. “Trust me, you’re going to see me.”

  It was more like ten inches given the height difference, and his features were already a blur. She punched him in the stomach and grabbed her glasses back, then jammed them back on. “What the hell is it to you?”

  When he was the one to step away she found that, for the first time in her life, she wished she hadn’t won her argument. At least when he’d been yelling at her, he’d still been engaged. Now he was just standing there, staring at her blankly as if she was just another random groupie, desperate for his attention. Which she wasn’t. Which she refused to ever be.

  “Just go,” she started to say as she bent down to pick up the remote again, willing the tears to stay contained until he was out of her way.

  But when she waved him away with her arm, he grabbed it. “You really didn’t know,” he said, more to himself than to her it seemed. “The other night. When you were in that ro—When I thought it was Fitz’s apartment I was coming into.”

  Technically it was still Fitz’s apartment. Dorie gave him as evil an eye as she could muster. “Do you honestly think I would have set myself up for this?” They may have only known each other for a few days, but she hoped he knew her well enough to know that at least.

  He went still for a second. Then, gruffly, “Take off your glasses.”

  There was something in his eyes that cut off her protest. Something about the way he stepped back and ducked his head down.

  She had no idea what compelled her to comply this time. Maybe it was because he seemed a little lost, maybe it was because it was just easier not to see the disappointment on his face so clearly. But this time she did as he said.

  After a much longer pause, he repeated, “Tell me why.” Except this time it sounded more as if he was pleading.

  She closed her eyes and shook her head. She hated this. “I heard your voice and thought one of my brothers had some misguided idea that they’d come o
ut here to check on me. And then I could tell it wasn’t any one of them so I grabbed the bat, and then you said your name was D.B.”

  Already off and running, the babble took on a life of its own. “Then I got my glasses and by the time I realized who you were, you were already talking to Fitz—oh, and by the way, your little sister’s name is Angelica according to the rest of the world. How was I supposed to know that she goes by Fitz? I mean, whoever came up with that as a nickname?” Dorie looked away. “And you just seemed so sad and—”

  “I seemed sad?” he said. “When I was talking to Fitz.” That second part was a statement more than a question.

  Good, Dorie. Tell the nice beautiful billionaire baseball man that he sounded sad when talking to his baby sister.

  “Well, maybe more...defeated.” Lonely, she only barely managed to keep herself from adding. “I told myself it didn’t matter who you were because you obviously still needed a place to stay so I went to change the sheets and I was totally going to say something when I came out, but then I turned around and the way you looked at me...” Like he’d wanted to eat her right up. And she’d almost let him.

  “How did I look at you?” he asked, just as quietly as he took a step toward her. He reached for her glasses and put them back on.

  He was so close she could feel the heat radiating off him.

  “Was it like this?” he asked gruffly, cupping her chin in his hand and forcing her to look into his eyes and see the stark hunger within. Because, yes. That was exactly the look. Seeing it all over again overwhelmed her. She grabbed behind her for the couch’s armrest just as he bent down and kissed her.

  Her lips ignored every red flag her brain was throwing and opened for him as he devoured her mouth. He grabbed her hips and lifted her until she wrapped her legs around him. He seemed frantic, as desperate as she was, and it made her even hotter. Her moan had him gripping her even tighter, and his need for her had her clutching him to her. When he ground against her, hitting her in just the right spot, she broke from the kiss and gasped for a breath. God, she was about to come right here, in his arms and fully clothed.

  “Wait! No,” she finally managed to say. It was too much. Except her hands betrayed her, threading up through the hair at the nape of his neck.

  He groaned when she shifted, her hips tilting up a little, her body wanting more from him as her brain kept telling her to run away. Far, far away. She could not get involved with this man. With Nate Hawkins. There were so many reasons why that she... That... She tried to pull away a little so she could think straight, but instead she just managed to push up against him harder. Oh, God.

  “Please don’t mean that,” he said, nuzzling the crook of her neck, his lips and tongue doing amazing things. “But if you do? You need to tell me now. And the glasses would have to come off. For good this time.” His hands, too, one now in possession of her ass while the other worked its way up her back. “If you really mean the no, then you can’t ever wear those glasses again.”

  Dorie pulled away abruptly. “You like my glasses?”

  He pulled back, too, a grin on his face. “Christ, woman. I love your glasses.”

  That was it. She was gone. “Couch. Down. Now.”

  This was a bad idea. Terrible. And yet...

  She threw her arms around him and shifted her weight in a way that would throw him off balance. It caught him by surprise and he fell down to the couch, his low laugh rumbling as he reached out to stop their fall, cradling her in his other hand and gently lowering them down the rest of the way. And then he was on the couch and she was straddling him and it felt better than she’d ever imagined it could.

  It had never occurred to her, however, that he might feel the same way. That his hands might shake a little as he raised the hem of her sweater and lifted it up over her head. Or that, just like her, he wanted to see and taste and worship. Stopping her from unclasping her bra, he took hold of her wrists and pinned them to her back while he slowly traced the curve of her breasts with the tips of his fingers. When he did it all over again, this time with his tongue and with agonizing deliberation, she was so desperate for him to ease the ache that when he finally sucked her nipple into his mouth, she gasped in relief.

  Surging forward and pulling out of his hold, she took his face in her hands and kissed him. He responded by putting his hand to the back of her neck and pulling her the rest of the way down. She dragged his shirt up past his waist.

  Sitting back, she let her hand trail slowly down what was, possibly, the most beautiful body she had ever seen in her life. “You’re perfect,” she whispered. “This can’t be real.” It felt like a fantasy. It was a fantasy. And yet there was so much more to him—to this—than she’d dreamed it could be.

  “I’m not,” he practically growled, obviously not happy with what she’d said. His hand closed over hers. “And this is.”

  She raised her eyes to meet his. He made her feel beautiful. Powerful. And when she reached down to unbutton his jeans, when she ran her fingers down the length of him—when she felt him tighten and twitch against her hand—she almost came out of her skin. “This is because of me.”

  His hands settled loosely on her hips and he smiled, clearly amused. “It is most definitely because of you.” She felt his gaze on her face as sure as a caress when she took him fully in her hand.

  She loved the feel of him. Loved how intense his gaze was as he dropped back against the couch as she played. But when she pushed herself up to her knees to lean forward and kiss him, he put his hand out to stop her, commanding, “Stay.” Then his hand went to her thigh and he nudged her legs wider apart. Her heart nearly exploded out of her chest, sending a surge of heat straight down to where she could do absolutely nothing about it other than beg him to move his thumb—now teasingly exploring the inside of her thigh—just a liiitttle bit higher.

  His laugh when her hips bucked forward was a good indication that begging wouldn’t help. Nor was his actual response. “Gotta be patient, baby. Don’t they teach you that in Boston?”

  He wasn’t unaffected by any means. She could tell that much from the way he was pulsing in her hand. But then he took that away, too, taking her by the wrist and placing her hand flat against her stomach. Shifting it down so that her fingers dipped under the waistband of her jeans.

  When she whimpered, he bent closer, his lips brushing the curve of her breast, then traveling up her skin.

  He ran his fingers down the slope of her shoulder. Her nipples hardened painfully—visibly—which made him smile. He let his hand drift farther down, playing with one, then the other. She was about to dissolve into a throbbing, panting mess, and he appeared to be completely calm. Overwhelmingly cool.

  Except for the rasp in his voice when he said, “Undo your jeans.”

  Thank You, God.

  Her heart pounding in time with the pulse between her legs, she did as he said. Her eyes fluttered closed when he reached out and pushed her jeans farther down her hips, when his hand trailed up the inside of her thigh, right to—

  This time she could only breathe her, “OhmyGod.” Her hips jerked forward as he pushed her underwear to the side, then slowly slid his finger in. “So wet,” he murmured as a second finger joined the first.

  She fell forward, over him. Clutched the back of her couch as he worked magic with his fingers. She was incoherent, delirious with need. And when his tongue rasped her nipple at the same time his thumb brushed her clit, she shattered and screamed.

  His fingers eased out of her still-pulsing heat, as she panted her way back to earth. She felt his mouth on hers—felt, rather than heard, him murmur, “Beautiful,” against her lips—as he twisted and gently laid her down. She only vaguely realized he was stripping off the rest of her clothes. Luckily she was still off in another dimension somewhere, one where her poor decision not to wear the one pair of lacy panti
es she owned didn’t matter.

  Sighing, she let her hand drift to his hair—such thick, beautiful hair—and smiled as his hand lightly brushed her ankle, then her knee on his way back up. But she went still when she felt the stubble of his chin against the inside of her thigh. She wasn’t ready for that. It felt too intimate. Not what she usually allowed during a one-night stand—not something most of her one-night stands even had an interest in doing.

  Nate laid his arm across her waist and held her down. “Just one taste,” he said, so close she could feel his breath against her, and yet his eyes met hers, seeking permission.

  If anything, that frightened her even more. Not that there was any question of his desire—he was practically vibrating with tension, holding back only because he’d sensed her hesitation.

  This was not who she’d imagined him to be. Sexy, yes. Going after what he wanted, absolutely. But connected enough to be aware of her limits before she even said them? Caring and thoughtful and almost reverent?

  How was she supposed to keep her distance from someone like that?

  “Just because you like my cooking,” she whispered, “doesn’t mean you get to have everything in the kitchen.”

  He pulled his head back and she suddenly understood the power of Nate Hawkins’s gaze. Goose bumps popped up all over her body as he stared at her, seemingly seeing every iota of doubt and vulnerability she kept bottled up inside. Then he smiled. “Guess I’ll have to keep coming back until I’ve licked the cupboards bare.”

  He pushed her legs open a little wider, and without breaking the look between them bent to run his tongue ever-so-slowly along the crease where her thigh met her hip. Exhaling enough for her to feel the warm, hot air between her legs, he moved to the other leg and did the same, before laying kisses on her navel, her ankle, her knee.

  He pulled away and she sat up on her elbows just in time to see him rip open a foil packet and put on a condom. He moved over her, his hand traveling up her leg on his way. And time stopped when he looked down and caressed her cheek, murmuring her name.