Harlequin Desire June 2021--Box Set 1 of 2

by Katherine Garbera

  “Let’s go home, Cherry,” she said before unlocking the door and giving it a hard jerk.

  Once the restaurant failed, the flashy BMW she’d purchased during better days as a private chef was repossessed when the payments were more than she could handle. She had returned to driving the cute and sporty little Miata her parents purchased for her at eighteen. It was fifteen years old and a bit finicky at times. When the engine didn’t start on the first try, she caressed the steering wheel and tried again. “Mama loves you,” she whispered, easing onto the street.

  The drive to her modest loft apartment in Brooklyn went well, and she was glad to pull into her parking spot in the garage. She quickly made her way to the elevator and up to the ninth floor. She loved the building’s architecture: exposed brick, piping and ducts, beamed ceilings, wood columns and oversize windows. The blend of industrialized style with modern appliances and design gave it an aesthetic she had fallen in love with and had been pleased to be able to afford. She didn’t have a lot of space, less than seven hundred square feet, but the ceilings were ten feet high, and the city’s views were vibrant at night.

  As soon as she unlocked her sliding metal barn door, Jillian began undressing, leaving a deliberate trail of sequined clutch, heels, flashy red-satin dress and then her panties. Nude, she walked across the hardwood floor to the kitchen to pour herself a glass of wine. She’d gotten all dolled up. Attended the event. Eaten delicious food. And now she was ready to relax.

  Her front door slid open and Cole stepped inside, still handsome in his black suit and tie. Jillian took a deep sip of her wine. “What took you so long?” she asked with a glance over her shoulder.

  He closed and locked the door, then came toward her with heated eyes as he undressed and dropped his clothing atop hers. “How were you so sure I was coming?” he asked, removing his boxers and kicking them away to slide across the polished hardwood.

  Jillian gave him a look that said “puh-leeze” as she enjoyed the sight of his sculpted nude body. His inches, darker toned than the rest of him, grew in length before her eyes, with a slight lean to the right. And led him right over to her. She was already shivering in anticipation as he wrapped one strong arm around her waist and pulled her close to bury his face against her neck.

  “Humph. You just wanted to make sure Lorenzo wasn’t sniffing around,” she teased.

  He stiffened and raised his head to look down at her. “Really?” he asked in his deep voice.

  She gave him a soft laugh before leaning back in his embrace and drizzling some of her wine across her breasts. “Thirsty?”

  He bent his knees to tongue the moisture. “And hungry,” he moaned against her soft flesh.

  Jillian flushed with heat. “Cole,” she gasped as she blindly set the glass atop the counter before pressing her hands to the hard contours of his back.

  When he raised her body with ease to bury his face against her cleavage, she wrapped her legs around his waist. The first feel of his crafty tongue against her nipples rushed them to hardness. He suckled one of the tight buds into his mouth and she released a sigh of pleasure from deep within as she rolled her hips.

  Her entire body felt alive with their sexual chemistry. The pulse they created was not to be ignored or denied. And it had been that way over the last year without hesitation or deceleration.

  Jillian clung to Cole as he carried her over to the center of the loft and the brown-leather sofa that also served as her bed when there was time to open it. There wasn’t. Passions unleashed, they needed quenching.

  Cole sat on the sofa with her straddling his lap. She brushed the curls from her face as he leaned his head back and eyed her. Her face. Her breasts. Her belly. The close-shaved mound of her intimacy. He massaged her hips and upper thighs as she took his hard inches in her hand to stroke. He grunted at her touch and rocked his hips forward.

  “It’s so hard,” she whispered, enjoying his wince of pleasure.

  “It aches,” he admitted.

  Jillian took one of his hands and pressed it down between her thighs. He cupped her. The curve of his palm pressed against her warm, pulsing bud as the tips of his fingers stroked her lips. Heat and electricity infused her. She cried out in sweet release as she rolled against his touch. Her grip on his inches tightened, evoking a wild cry of pleasure from him that gave her such immense joy.

  He straightened and pressed kisses from her jawline up to her ear. “Watching you in that little red dress all night, and not being able to touch you, was pure hell, Jillian,” he rasped.

  She trembled.

  “All I could think of was getting it off you and me inside you,” he continued before sucking her earlobe.

  She panted sharply.

  “Did you have on a bra?” he asked.

  She shook her head.

  “I could tell.”

  He leaned her upper body back and lowered his head to lick her nipple and then caress it with a cool, steady stream of air.

  “Damn,” she swore with a gasp.

  He switched his wicked onslaught to her other breast.

  “That. Is. Amazing,” Jillian admitted as he tended to her with slow and deliberate care.

  She pressed her hand to his head and leaned to the right to open the wood box atop the square glass end table to retrieve one of the dozen condoms inside. She was ready for him. Wet, throbbing and in heat.

  Tearing the foil, she removed the ribbed ultrasensitive latex.

  “You ready?” he asked, watching her work the protection along the length of his hard inches.

  She nodded.

  “I wanted to taste you the way you like,” he said, his voice thick.

  “We like,” Jillian reminded him, rising on her knees.

  “It’s the best meal I’ve ever eaten,” Cole said, his smile wicked.

  “Really?” Jillian asked, easing onto him.

  Slowly.

  They stared into each other’s eyes, mouths open at the feel of her tightness surrounding his hardness.

  Cole swore as the thick base of his erection entered her.

  She dropped her head back and looked up at the ceiling, feeling her eyes glaze over with passion. She took a moment to adjust to the feel of him pressing against her walls. He throbbed inside her. She liked it—a lot.

  Cole pressed his hands to her back and pulled her forward to kiss her. First, a slow press of their lips, and then he deepened it with his tongue and a guttural moan as she rocked her hips back and forth. She ended each smooth glide with a Kegel that gripped and released him. He liked that—a lot.

  With her hands pressed to the sides of his face and his arms wrapped around her so tightly that her breasts flattened against his hard chest, they slowly ground against each other as they took turns sucking each other’s tongues. Sweat coated their bodies. She felt his heart pounding hard, just like her own. He lowered one arm to grip a handful of one of her round buttocks. She whimpered into his mouth.

  “So good,” he moaned, his eyes searching hers.

  She nodded with urgency before she licked at his mouth and suckled his bottom lip. “Damn good,” she agreed, stopping to clutch and release his inches with her walls.

  “Jillian,” he moaned, leaning back against the sofa and drawing her forward with him.

  She rose slightly on her knees and took the lead in riding home. Nice and slow. Wicked and deliberate. She always wanted to give as good as she got, and the truth was that Cole Cress was the best lover she had ever had. Attentive. Passionate. Lengthy. It was nothing after a long night of numerous climaxes for her to beg him to claim his own happy ending to bring the passionate torture to an end. It was commonplace for them to sex each other to sleep and then have him wake her not long after for more.

  His stamina was beyond impressive.

  And addictive.

  She broke the kiss
to look at him with soft eyes and a hint of a smile. “I really like having sex with you,” she whispered.

  “Same,” he agreed.

  “And the best part,” Jillian said, quickening the back-and-forth motion of her hips.

  “What?”

  “Climaxing while you’re inside me.”

  She felt his tool stiffen.

  “Same,” he said, lifting his head to capture her mouth with his own.

  Together they moved in unison, fast and hard, as they drove each other headfirst into the electrifying white-hot spasms of their climaxes. Moans. Hoarse cries. Hurried and frantic movements. Mindless falls into the hot abyss together. Shaken. Stirred.

  With one last high-pitched cry, Jillian collapsed against him and rested her forehead against the top of the sofa as he rubbed her back and pressed kisses to her shoulder.

  The aftermath of their fiery connection had them both sweaty and spent.

  Ding-dong.

  Jillian frowned at the sound as she raised her head.

  “Not Leon I hope,” Cole quipped, a teasing light in his electric eyes.

  She sat upright and lightly pinched one of his nipples. “You’re sexier than you are funny, Cress,” she said, rising to walk over to the door where she kept a tablet on a small metal table in the corner. On the screen was the video feed from her doorbell. And she was looking at the face of Nicolette Cress.

  “It’s your mother,” Jillian whispered, her heart pounding at the shock as she galvanized into action, picking up their trail of clothing.

  Cole stood and deeply frowned. “What?” he asked.

  Jillian gave him a dramatic shove as she took quick steps to the sofa and slapped the clothing against his chest. “Bathroom,” she ordered.

  “What!” he exclaimed, now holding the pile in his arms. “I’m not hiding from my mother.”

  She turned to open the engraved armoire against the wall to remove a cotton robe. “Yes, you are. Because I need my job, and your mother is not firing me because she discovered The Rebel naked—”

  “The Rebel?” Cole scoffed.

  “Yes,” Jillian stressed as she pulled on the robe and moved to push him across the apartment.

  Ding-dong.

  Cole’s frown deepened as he back-stepped into the bathroom. One of her sexy heels dropped from the heap in his arms.

  Jillian motioned with her hand for him to back up some more so that she could grab the doorknob. “Two rings? Your mother’s a little pushy,” she said before pulling the door closed.

  * * *

  Cole set their clothing in the sink before easing the door open a little. Through the crack, he watched Jillian sniff the air and survey the scene. She suddenly jumped, as if frightened, and rushed over to the sofa. Picking up the empty condom wrapper, she slid it into the pocket of her bright yellow robe. He looked down at the latex still clinging to him, filled with his release.

  “Mrs. Cress?” Jillian said, feigning surprise. “It’s a little late, and I was running a bath.”

  “You and I need to speak,” his mother said.

  About what?

  “I’m curious what we have to discuss that couldn’t wait until I got to work in the morning,” Jillian returned coolly.

  Feisty.

  Cole covered his mouth to trap a yawn. A night of decadent food and champagne capped off with mind-blowing sex, he wanted nothing more than to sleep it off. He leaned against the sink and crossed his arms over his chest as he listened to their conversation.

  “Your dealings with my son,” Nicolette said.

  Cole stiffened.

  “Excuse me,” Jillian said. “You’re mistaken.”

  He stepped closer to peek through the slit of the open bathroom door. His mother and his lover were facing each other. Jillian’s back was to him. He grimaced as he fought the urge to dress and leave his hiding place to admonish his mother for dipping into his business.

  Her hiring of Jillian as part of her household staff was Nicolette’s business.

  “Tonight, at Gabriel’s, was very revealing when Lorenzo and Cole seemed to bump heads about you,” Nicolette said, looking around at Jillian’s apartment before casting her blue gaze squarely on the chef. “That, plus Cole unable to take his eyes off you in that red dress, was telling.”

  Just deny it, Jillian, and send her on her way so we can go to bed.

  Jillian shook her head. “Mrs. Cress—”

  His mother held up her hand to stop her. “I don’t have time for games or pretenses,” she said in her heavy French accent. “I know my sons. Probably better than they like. He wants you or has had you. Either way, I want it to end.”

  Cole frowned as he straightened to his full height. Anger burned the pit of his stomach. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

  “And if you end whatever it is you two have going on, I will appoint you an executive chef at one of the Cress restaurants...in another state,” Nicolette finished. “So, choose. Either way, you are done at the townhouse. I won’t pay you to screw my son.”

  What the hell?

  This was a side of his mother Cole had never seen before. Cold. Manipulating. Controlling.

  “But you will offer me an executive chef position instead?” Jillian countered with a tinge of sarcasm.

  “The only talents of yours I am interested in my family enjoying are in the kitchen,” Nicolette said.

  “Mrs. Cress, I refuse to be insulted in my home. It can fit inside your pantry, but it’s mine,” Jillian asserted.

  No nonsense until the end.

  Nicolette chuckled. It was mocking. “And my son might fit inside you, but he’s mine, and I do not want this thing between you to get out of hand.”

  He turned and dug through the pile of clothing for his underwear and suit pants. He was ready to confront his mother. “This is bull—”

  He paused in jerking on his boxers at the sound of the front door sliding closed. He felt like a fool, frozen like a deer in headlights in Jillian’s cramped bathroom, waiting to hear what was going on. He pulled his boxer briefs up, dropped the black pants, and opened the door to step out.

  Jillian, locking the front door, glanced back over her shoulder. “She’s gone, Cole.”

  “I figured that out since I was in the only hiding place in here,” he said, standing with his hands on his hips.

  She smiled at him as she crossed her arms over her chest and made her way to one of the three expansive arched windows of her apartment.

  “I’m sorry about that, Jillian,” he said. “I had no idea my mother would ever pull such a stunt.”

  “It’s not your fault, Cole,” she said, leaning against the window, the city’s nightscape as her background.

  He walked to her and wrapped an arm around her waist to pull her back against his body. “She left before I could set her straight about this stunt,” he said, eyeing Jillian’s reflection. “But I will as soon as I see her. I can’t believe she insulted you like that.”

  He frowned at her continued silence.

  “Cole—” Jillian raised her eyes to lock with his in the window “—I’m going to take the job.”

  His frown deepened as he stepped back, releasing her from his grasp. His jaw worked in rising irritation as he realized that Jillian was putting her ambition before him.

  What was it she’d said at the restaurant? Suddenly this thing of ours has developed strings.

  Right. They were never meant to last.

  Although he and Traci had been in a relationship, Jillian’s choice felt like a similar betrayal. Not as callously calculated as Traci’s machinations...

  Or was it?

  She turned and leaned back against the window as she stared at him, asserting, “It’s an opportunity that I can’t pass up, Cole.”

  Still...

&n
bsp; It stung.

  He released a bitter chuckle and shook his head before turning to cross the room to enter the bathroom.

  He dressed and made a conscious effort to not let his anger toss her clothing. That would be childish. He was sardonic at times and could find humor where most could not, but he wasn’t silly. As he smoothed the lapels of his suit jacket, he eyed himself in the mirror above the sink. In the reflection, he saw the truth of his anger at Jillian.

  And his hurt.

  Cole cleared his throat and forced away the emotion lining his face.

  It was not his first time looking betrayal in the face.

  But it will be the last.

  He left the bathroom. “Have a good life, Jillian,” he said, taking long strides to the door.

  She rushed across the space to stand in front of him. “Cole, talk to me,” she urged, clenching his upper arms.

  He brushed off her touch. “The way you did before you decided we were done without even talking to me?” His tone was so very cold.

  “This was no strings, remember,” she said. “We were just having fun. Remember?”

  He looked down at her. “I’m clear about that,” he assured her. “I just didn’t know you would use me for your come-up. Excuse me if that’s hard to swallow.”

  She looked pained by his words. “It’s so easy to speak from your seat of privilege, Cole,” she said.

  He scowled. “Privilege?” he barked.

  “Your family. Cress, INC. Your wealth.” She ticked off each on her fingers.

  “None of those things earned me my first James Beard at just twenty, and you damn well know that—or you should, Chef,” he said, letting his ire drip off the word.

  “Don’t mock me, Cole,” Jillian said, her voice soft.

  “Don’t shortchange yourself,” he shot back.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Why not gain the position based on your skill and not a payoff where you collude with my mother to control my damn life?” His voice was hard, unrelenting.

  “You made a scene tonight, Cole. Your mother discovered our personal business because of you. I lost my job tonight, Cole,” Jillian said, her hands slashing the air as she pointed at him.