Sense and Sensuality

by Cara Hart

  Standing in the corner, a Tom Collins in hand, he watched Elle socialize with Jason’s guests. She fidgeted with her hair every two seconds, and frequently glanced over her shoulder, paying little attention to the discussion around her. For an intelligent woman, she was uncomfortable with anyone outside of her academic world. He’d seen her debate the merits of Chaucer over Shakespeare, whom she’d termed “a literary thief,” with perfect ease, but she couldn’t hold a simple conversation with someone’s grandmother at a wedding.

  Tenderness swept through his chest as the DJ announced the bar was open, and the dance floor was calling. He drained his drink, then set the glass on a nearby table before cutting through the crowd toward her. Bless the Broken Road played as she glanced up, her eyes sweeping the crowd until they landed on him. A sweet smile lit her face, and his breath caught. God, he loved her.

  Confusion crossed her brow and he realized he had stopped in his tracks. Blood rushing in his head, blocking out the croons of Rascal Flatts, he swallowed and took the hardest step of his life—toward the woman he loved.

  “Hi,” he said in an inane attempt at conversation. “This dance is mine, I believe.”

  “I believe it is,” she answered softly, taking the hand he held out for her.

  “Ah, so this is who’s held your attention, Eleanor,” said the nattily dressed woman with whom she’d been speaking.

  “Yes, Mrs. Cunningham. This is Dr Edward Harrington.” Elle smiled shyly up at him. “We work together.”

  “The infamous Eddie, I presume.” Mrs. Cunningham raised an eyebrow. “Careful with this one, Eleanor. Meghan has told me about him.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Elle answered, shooting a narrow-eyed gaze at Eddie. “I’m always careful.”

  “I know you are, darling.” Mrs. Cunningham patted Elle on the cheek, then shot daggers at Eddie with her eyes. “Hurt this one, sonny, and you’ll regret it.”

  Eddie’s eyes widened. “No, ma’am.”

  “Very well. Go dance, you two.” A wry smile crossed her lips. “I have a good feeling.”

  Eddie stared at the strange woman over his shoulder as Elle pulled him onto the dance floor. “Did she just threaten me?”

  Elle giggled. “Yes.”

  Swinging her into his arms, Eddie growled into the curve of her neck before whispering in her ear, “Should I be frightened?”

  A shiver ran down Elle’s back under his fingers and her breath faltered as they swayed. “No.”

  A new song came on and Eddie pulled Elle closer, holding her still when she stumbled slightly. He knew she could feel his cock straining at his pants, but didn’t expect her to cuddle closer, cupping him with her hips.

  “Jesus, Elle.” He stared into her eyes, shocked she would have been so aggressive in public. “Are you drunk?”

  She blinked, halting. “Why does every man think I’m drunk if I act like I want him?”

  “Because you’re not all that attractive, hon.”

  Elle’s eyes widened with horror as Luce’s voice came from behind Eddie. He swore as he stepped back to see his poisonous boss standing with a hand on her hip, studying the nails on the other, a smug grin on her face. “Could I have my date back, please? We both know you’re not woman enough for a man like Harry, anyway. Been there, done that.”

  “You—he—Harry—Eddie—” Elle sputtered, cheeks red and eyes flashing with rage. “Oh, you bastard!”

  Eddie held his hands in front of him in surrender. “Elle, I can explain.”

  “I’m sure you can, you silver-tongued asshole!” The other dancers began to stop and stare. “You almost had me, you know. I was falling for that bullshit of yours!”

  “Elle, you’re cursing again,” he said, stunned.

  “And a classy lady like me wouldn’t do that, would she?” Elle bellowed.

  “She sure wouldn’t fuck a stripper,” Luce chimed in.

  Elle drew back and belted her in the face.

  Chapter Eight

  “Elle, wait a minute!”

  “Fuck off, you asshole!” Elle stormed down a hall blindly, ignoring the screams of the woman from The Seven Circles threatening to “sue her ass.” The beautiful bitch could do whatever she wanted—legally and with fucking Harry.

  “Elle, please! Give me a chance to explain!”

  She whirled. “Explain what? How you fucked me for shits and giggles in a strip club? How you’re a stripper? Or is it a whore?”

  He skidded to a halt, a stricken look on his face. “No!”

  “No to which part, Eddie? Or should I call you Harry?”

  “No!” He swiped a hand over his forehead. “Absolutely not!”

  “Well, I must say, your repertoire has vastly decreased.”

  “Shit, Elle, I hate that name. I’m not a stripper. I am definitely not a whore, thank you very much—”

  “Oh, no? Thank you, then, for playing one when I needed a warm body last week.” She struggled to hold back the tears burning at the back of her throat. Once again, Eddie Harrington was the witness to her humiliation. At least this time, she knew who he was.

  “Stop it, Elle.” He grabbed her shoulders and shook her. “You asked me to have sex with you. It was not my idea.”

  She laughed, unable to contain a hysterical note. “Of course. So sorry for forcing you to do something so heinous. My apologies. Now please leave me alone.”

  “No.”

  “What?” Elle stared at his desperate face, incredulous. “You’ve humiliated me. You’ve left me. God knows what you’ve told your friends about me. Did you have a good laugh at my expense? I hope so, because it’s the last one. Can’t you just let me be now?”

  “No, I can’t.”

  “Why, for God’s sake?”

  “Because I love you.”

  Elle stopped struggling in his grasp. His palms began to gently stroke her arms, as though attempting to heat her skin. Warmth blossomed in her stomach and spread through her limbs.

  “What?”

  “I’m in love with you.” He tipped her chin up with one hand and brushed her lower lip with his thumb. “I’ve been in love with you forever now. Don’t you remember, I told you last week that I’ve wanted to touch you for so long?”

  “If you love me, why are you working in a strip club?”

  He thumbed away a tear. “I borrowed some money from Lucinda. I knew her in high school, and she knew how much I wanted to escape my dad. When I needed money for grad school, since I wouldn’t take his, she offered to loan me everything. But when I tried to pay her back, she demanded I work at the bar. She refused any other payment, and when I threatened her, she said she’d sue me for breach of contract.

  “At first, it wasn’t so bad, and since no one sees our faces, there was no danger of being discovered and losing my post at the University. But I got tired of working there, and she tightened the reins. Threatened to go to the administration if I quit. And then you showed up for a bachelorette party, and your sister ordered some entertainment for you.”

  “So you thought it would be entertaining to seduce me?” Elle said, shoving at him.

  He let her go and she stepped back, running into the wall. Her breath caught as she realized he’d made her come while standing against a wall, and her pussy, already wet from dancing with him, throbbed with arousal.

  “You knew I didn’t know who you were.”

  “I meant to escort you out, sweetheart, remember?” He leaned on the wall, bracketing her body with his arms. Heart thudding in her chest, she closed her eyes. “But I couldn’t refuse your demand, not when I needed you so badly. You wanted me then. Do you want me now?”

  “Yes... NO!” She wiped a hand over her lips, her chest heaving. “How could I? I don’t trust you.”

  “Yes, you do, baby,” Eddie whispered against her ear. Shivers of pleasure shook her as she fought to remain standing. She stumbled against him as the wall behind her moved. His arms closed around her waist as he backed her into an empty ballroom. �
��You know me. I love you. I’m going to make you love me, too.”

  “No...” she whimpered as he pressed her to the wall, the faint strains of Meg’s first dance song coming through the cracks in the removable divider. “You’re only using me...”

  “Never,” he breathed into her ear, gently taking the lobe into his mouth, and lowered the zipper at the back of her dress. “You’ve caught me good, Miss Elle. That name suits you so much better than Eleanor, by the way.”

  “Mmm... Oh God!” He thrust his groin gently into the vee of her thighs, and her pussy clenched with need. “Eddie—God, I—”

  “Sshhh, don’t say anything.” The tip of his tongue rasped along the side of her neck, and down into her cleavage. With a quiet swish, the straps of her gown fell to her elbows, exposing her bra.

  “God, Elle, another lace strapless? You’re going to kill me with your lingerie,” he groaned just before he slipped a hand between the lace and her skin, brushing his thumb over her hardened peak. Swirls of giddy sensation left her gasping for breath when he pulled her breast free and twirled his tongue over her areola. “Who knew you had such sexy undies?”

  “Who knew—you—went—commando?” she panted, clutching his head to keep him feasting at her nipple.

  His hands wandered lower, gathering silk as they went, until he had slipped her gown over her hips and it fluttered to the floor.

  “Holy shit,” he muttered, staring at the white lace merry widow she wore, a dumbfounded expression on his face.

  “I have sexy undies, remember?”

  Eddie’s cock throbbed in his pants, his gaze glued to the lace covering her curves. She even had the clip-on stockings, so that there was a tantalizingly bare strip of thigh available for his gaze. God, she was a sexy woman, and if he was smart, he’d keep her for the rest of his life.

  “Are you going to stare at me, or are you going to fuck me?”

  His eyes shot back up to meet her amused expression. “I never thought I’d see the day smooth-player Eddie Harrington couldn’t speak.”

  “Oh, I can speak, baby, but I think you want me to do a hell of a lot more than that,” he growled, stripping off his jacket, tie, and cummerbund, then reaching into his back pocket for his wallet. After withdrawing the condom he’d slipped in there earlier today, on the off chance that he’d be able to coax Elle into a rendezvous, he dropped the wallet onto the pile of their clothes.

  Holding her gaze, he slipped a hand between her thighs, unsurprised to find her dripping with moisture through the thin lace covering her mound. “Excited, are we, Dr. McLaren?”

  She plucked the condom out of his numb fingers as she lowered her gaze to his groin. “I do believe we are, Dr. Harrington.” With a smug smile, she reached for his fly. “But I am willing to do a little interpretation of the literature if you wish.”

  He raised a brow. “I do indeed—Jesus,” he gasped as she closed a fist around his aching cock. “I love it when you do that.”

  “And I love it when you’re inside me,” she murmured against his lips as they glued themselves to hers.

  Fingers shaking, she tore open the package and rolled the condom over his throbbing length. He yanked the thin silk of her thong, tearing it, then wrapped one of her legs around his waist as he crowded her against the wall. “Are you ready for me, baby? I’m going to take you so deep.”

  “Hard and fast and deep, Eddie.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes.”

  They gasped in tandem as he thrust home, bracing her with his arm at her waist and the other holding her leg around his hips. He withdrew, then lunged forward, burying his length inside her, again and again, until he couldn’t tell when he left off and she began. Her pussy clamped around him like her fist had, milking pleasure from him with every thrust, his knees trembling with the effort. Her heel dug into his ass, urging him faster and faster, refusing to let him slow. Tension built in the base of his spine, gathering heat in his balls, driving his frantic lunges to a higher level, her gasps and moans ringing in his ears.

  “Oh God, Eddie—oh God, I can’t—”

  Ripples waves of pleasure swamped him as her sheath contracted around him. She screamed into his mouth, which he’d pressed to hers to smother the sounds of her ecstasy. His own groan of satisfaction ripped through his chest and he came.

  They leaned on the wall in exhaustion, their shuddering pants echoing in his ears, as Eddie waited for his heartbeat to return to normal.

  “Sweet Jesus,” Elle muttered, her mouth against the curve of his shoulder.

  “You said it.” He heard her chuckle and lowered them to the floor, careful to keep her resting on him so she wouldn’t be on the carpet.

  Minutes passed as they lay there, thoughts of her reaction consuming him. Would she hate him now? Was it too much to hope she’d allow him to court her? Recite some poetry—Byron, maybe, every woman loved Byron—send her flowers, take her out to dinner, make wild love in a bed for once?

  “All right,” she murmured, halting the list of gallantries he would perform to win her.

  “What?” he asked cautiously.

  “I love you, too, and if you quit working at that bar, I’ll hit you.”

  “What!”

  She leaned up over him and grinned. “Your boss might hate me, but that mask is sexy.”

  Epilogue

  Eleanor McLaren Harrington was in Hell.

  And she looked gorgeous. With her hair floating down her back and a halter top cupping her magnificent breasts, she danced up a storm in the middle of the gyrating crowd on the dance floor. Eddie shook his head and hid a smile as he watched his wife. When she put aside her professorial dignity, she could party like a rock star.

  “Hey, sexy, could we get a couple of Kamikazes?”

  He glanced over to see two co-eds leaning over the bar, their breasts spilling out of the low-cut shirts they wore. “Sure.”

  Reaching without thought for the ingredients and mixer for the shots, his gaze drifted back to where Elle had been. Three large guys now stood around the same spot. Eddie frowned.

  “While you’re at it, you think you could dance for us?”

  The question pulled his attention back to the girls who’d ordered the drinks he was making. “Sorry, ladies, I don’t dance for payment.”

  They pouted prettily, the same pout the freshman girls in his English 101 gave him when they wanted a higher grade. “For free, then?”

  “I don’t think so, sweetie,” Elle cut in, emerging from between a couple of tall, muscle heads to saunter up to the bar. “Anyone who tries to take him from me gets punched.”

  “Yeah, right,” the shorter one sneered.

  “I wouldn’t doubt her, ladies. She packs one hell of a jab.” Eddie laughed at their crestfallen faces. “Just ask Luce.”

  He pointed to where his boss stood by the DJ booth, a plaster cast still in place over the nose she’d had three surgeries to fix after Elle broke it at Jason’s wedding last year. She’d threatened to sue, but when Eddie pointed out that he did a better job of managing the bar than she ever had, she relented. As long as Elle didn’t come near her, Luce didn’t care where his wife partied.

  “Oh shit,” the tall one mumbled. “Know anyone else who’ll dance for us?”

  “I will,” Elle volunteered, waiting to laugh until after they fled with their shots.

  “Bullshit, baby.” Eddie leaned across the bar to grab her face with his hands. “You only dance for me, got it?”

  Elle smiled her sexy grin, the one that said she couldn’t wait to get him alone in Room Three, before pressing her mouth to his. “I got it.”

  About the Author

  Cara Hart loves books, so much so that she decided to give writing one a shot. Now she’s a fully fledged member of RAA – Romance Addicts Anonymous. When she’s not writing, she’s taking classes so she can pursue an advanced degree in English or working at her day job at her local university. Her favorite activity is sipping Earl Gre
y while reading a great book. Cara is a member of Romance Writers of America, Capital Region RWA, and Hearts Through History RWA Chapters. She lives in New York City.

  Cara loves to hear from her readers. You can reach her at carahart@live.com.

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