I could feel how hot my cheeks were and knew my face must be red. I wasn’t sure if it was because of the alcohol or because I was embarrassed. I looked at Hayden, wondering if I could trust him. Then I decided it didn’t matter anyway. That was the beauty of going to dinner with a stranger from out of town. After tonight, I’d never have to see him again.
Taking a deep breath, I explained, “There’s this guy, Mark, who works in the Sociology department with me. We’re both sectional lecturers and both have our sights set on a position that’s opening up at the end of the semester. One of the professors is retiring then, so we’ll have a shot at snagging one of the most coveted positions in the department.”
“Ah, a workplace rivalry,” Hayden nodded knowingly. “I don’t envy you. That sounds rough.”
“To be honest, there’s more than that.”
“Oh?”
“We’ve kind of been flirting these past few months,” I confessed. “I know, I know, I shouldn’t have gotten involved with somebody I work with. But even though I knew it was risky, it was also kind of exciting, so I went along with it. We started dating and then…”
Hayden waited patiently for me to continue, his eyes never straying from my face. “Whatever it is, you can tell me,” he finally reassured me when it became apparent I wasn’t going to continue. “I leave town in two days, three tops. What do you have to lose?”
He was right. And maybe it would feel good to confide in someone. I only had my work friends to talk to and I certainly wasn’t going to tell them what had happened. I swallowed hard and confessed, “Tonight Mark wanted to have sex.”
“And you didn’t?”
“That’s the thing. I did want to. We started fooling around and getting undressed and then right before, you know, it happened, I told him…” I blushed furiously before just blurting it out. “I told him it was my first time.”
Hayden blinked. “Oh,” he said. I could see he had a million questions for me – who wouldn’t? But instead of asking any of them, he simply rested his head on his hand and waited for me to continue. So I did.
“He thought it was weird,” I said. “And I get that. It is sort of weird that I’m twenty-eight years old and am still a virgin, especially considering I’m not particularly religious or anything like that. It’s incredibly weird, actually. But I am and so I told him…and he didn’t react at all the way I’d hoped or expected. He looked at me like there was something wrong with me. We ended up getting in a fight.”
“What happened?”
“We broke up,” I shrugged. “I told him I couldn’t be with someone who didn’t respect me, and I left his place. But I didn’t want to go home. I didn’t want to be alone, so I went to the bar. I…I had a bad night.”
“I’m sorry you had a bad night.”
“Thanks.”
“Can I ask an obvious question?”
I sighed knowingly. “I don’t know why I haven’t lost it. I should have done it years ago. I mean, I wanted to and the opportunity presented itself a few times, but it never felt right. I guess I always had this dumb, overly-idealistic idea that I’d give my virginity to the man I loved. But then it just didn’t happen. I never fell in love and the years kept passing and before I knew it I was a twenty-eight year old virgin.”
“Actually, I was going to ask if you’re in love with this Mark jackass.”
“Oh.” I hesitated. “No,” I finally admitted after a long pause, “I’m not in love with him.” I had to say that hearing Hayden scornfully call Mark a jackass was like music to my ears. In fact, it was exactly what I needed to hear.
“If you don’t love him, then maybe it’s for the best that tonight didn’t go as planned,” Hayden pointed out. “If being in love is important to you, I mean.”
“Isn’t love important to everyone?”
I’d meant it as a rhetorical question but Hayden nonetheless scoffed in response.
I took another long drink of red wine. It was way better than the red wine I was used to, but then the stuff I drank usually came in a box. Emboldened by the alcohol, I confessed, “Sometimes I think I should just get it over with and be done with it. Then it wouldn’t be this big stupid obstacle, you know? Or maybe I should just lie and pretend I’ve done it before.”
Hayden shook his head. “Don’t lie.”
“Why?”
“You’d only be hurting yourself.”
Tipsily, I eyed him from across the table. He hadn’t had as much wine to drink as I had. While I was feeling a big woozy, he was still in full control. And he still looked put together and professional. Not a single hair was out of place. As I looked at him, he reached up and unfastened his tie, leaving it hanging loosely around his neck.
“Are you married?” I asked, looking at his hand to see if there was a ring. There wasn’t.
“No, I’ve never been married,” he replied.
“Do you have a girlfriend?” Maybe it was a desperately obvious thing to ask, but I didn’t care. It wasn’t like he was being subtle with me either, so I figured I was entitled to be direct with him. Besides, the drinks had made me braver than usual.
“I don’t have girlfriends,” he said sharply. “I stopped dating a long time ago.”
“So you’re just on your own?” I asked naively. “That must be lonely.”
“I’m fine,” Hayden said a tad defensively. “I have…friends.”
“What, like fuckbuddies?” My language was crasser than usual, but whatever. I was drunk.
He looked at me like he wasn’t quite sure what to make of me, but I could tell he was trying to suppress a smile. “I suppose you could say that. What is this?” he quipped, “An interrogation?”
I looked him up and down, liking what I saw. And drinking to excess apparently got me all hot and bothered. Who knew? Giving Hayden what I hoped was a sultry look, I purred, “What if I was one of them?”
“Excuse me?”
It was completely out of character for me to make a proposal like that but then again, it was also completely out of character for me to drink as much as I had. “Let’s have no strings attached sex,” I blurted out. “I can get my first time over with and you can get off. We both win.”
“That’s very romantic of you,” Hayden said dryly.
“You’re one to talk; you have fuckbuddies,” I reminded him cheekily.
He grinned. “You’re a firecracker, you know that?”
“Thanks, I think.”
“It’s a compliment.”
“You haven’t answered me about the sex.” Then my face fell. “Oh.”
“Oh?”
“You’re not interested,” I concluded, suddenly feeling incredibly stupid for assuming otherwise. For all I knew, maybe he was into dudes. Maybe I’d been misreading his signals all night and he was just a lonely guy who wanted some company. That would teach me to be presumptive.
“I’m interested,” he assured me quickly as his eyes traveled over my body Both the declaration and the lingering gaze thrilled me. “Believe me, Daniella, I’m very interested. But you’re drunk and it wouldn’t be right to take advantage of that.”
“I’m not that drunk!”
He was unconvinced. “I’ll tell you what. Come back to my hotel with me. If you still want to have sex after you’ve sobered up, then we will. If you change your mind, then we’ll order room service, have a nightcap and that will be that. No pressure, no expectations.”
“Okay,” I agreed. “Deal.”
Chapter 02
As Hayden put his key card in the door and ushered me into his hotel room, I couldn’t quite believe what I was about to do. I’d never imagined I’d ever have a one night stand with anyone. What the hell was I thinking? It was so unlike me!
And yet, it was because it was out of character that it was exciting. I felt like I was finally living a little and it was about damn time. Standing next to him in the hotel elevator on the way up to his room, it had taken every ounce of willpower I had not
to throw myself into his arms right then and there. I’d never felt such a strong attraction to anyone before.
Besides, I reasoned, if he turned out to be a creep at least we were in a hotel. I could always scream and someone would hear me. I made a mental note to stop reading so many crime novels because they apparently made me assume that everyone I met was a serial killer. Yeah, that wasn’t crazy at all.
“Whoa,” Hayden murmured, catching my arm and steadying me as I momentarily lost my balance. I grabbed onto the door frame and, scowling at my high heeled shoes, kicked them off. I’d taken care with my appearance that night. I’d wanted to look nice for my date night with Mark and had expected to give him my virginity. But ironically, it wasn’t him who I was about to sleep with. It was Mark’s loss, I decided defiantly.
“Holy shit, your hotel room is fucking massive!” I exclaimed as we stepped inside. Technically it wasn’t a hotel room. It was an entire suite. The designer suit, the fancy hotel room…I was beginning to realize that Hayden must be filthy rich.
Hayden chuckled. “You swear like a sailor when you’re drunk,” he informed me. “It’s actually kind of adorable…and pretty damn hot.”
One strap of my little black dress had fallen off my shoulder, but I made no move to adjust it. Instead, I stood there before Hayden barefoot and intoxicated, looking up at him. More than anything I wanted to feel his lips on mine, but I wanted him to make the first move. So I waited, hoping I could seduce him into kissing me.
It didn’t take long.
His eyes locked on mine, Hayden reached up and unfastened my hair. It tumbled loose around my shoulders and in an instant his hand was entangled in it, pulling gently to keep me where he wanted me. And then his mouth was pressed against mine, his tongue slipping past my lips to explore my mouth and caress my tongue. It was electric.
I felt my back press up against the wall as Hayden kissed me deeply, with more passion than I’d been expecting. I couldn’t have pulled away had I wanted to, but I didn’t want to. No one had ever kissed me quite like that. It felt like he wanted to devour me. It was raw and animalistic and incredibly sexy.
Then, abruptly, he pulled away. “I can’t,” he said. “You’re still drunk.”
“Fine,” I relented, marching over to his king size bed and throwing myself down on it. “We’ll watch a movie,” I said, grabbing the remote control from the bedside table and switching the large flat screen on. I still couldn’t get over the fact that sleepy little Burlington had such luxurious hotels. I felt like I was royalty or something just by being there.
I switched the television to something that looked vaguely interesting and we watched it for a while. Then I looked over at Hayden, who was seated in an armchair beside the bed. He’d taken off his suit jacket and rolled the sleeves of his white button up shirt up to his elbows. “There’s plenty of room on the bed,” I told him, shifting over and patting the empty mattress to prove my point. “You can join me, you know.”
He shook his head. “I can’t.”
“Why?”
“I can’t trust myself with you. It’s hard enough to keep my hands off you from here.” There was such longing in his voice that it made me ache inside.
“You don’t have to be such a gentleman, you know.” Earlier, when he’d been buying me drinks and holding the door for me, his hand on the small of my back as we walked, it had been sexy. Now it was getting frustrating.
Hayden smirked. “I’m not usually a gentleman,” he assured me. “At least not in bed…”
That piqued my interest. “What does that mean?” I demanded.
He shrugged. The women I date and I have one thing in common – and usually only one thing,” he quipped. “We like control. I enjoy taking control and they get off on giving it up.”
“So what does that involve, like whips and chains and stuff?” I pressed. I was inexperienced but I didn’t live under a rock. I knew a bit about BDSM, but had never taken much of an interest in it. I’d always assumed it was abusive and degrading to the women who submitted, but now the thought of letting Hayden tie me up and have his way with me was actually dialing the tingles up a notch.
“That can be a part of it sometimes, yes,” he nodded. “But there’s so, so much more to BDSM than whips and chains. It’s about control. It’s about surrender and trust and a battle of wills. There’s nothing quite as satisfying as getting inside a feisty woman’s head and truly dominating her.”
“Are you going to do that with me?” I asked, intrigued and a little intimidated by the thought. I didn’t know what it would feel like to let a man control me but I wasn’t completely opposed to finding out…
“No,” he said quickly. “It’s your first time. We’ll just stick to the basics.”
“Oh,” I said with just a hint of disappointment. “Do you do BDSM often?”
He cracked a small smile at that, maybe due to the way I’d phrased the question. “I’m making an exception for you tonight, but usually I engage in BDSM almost exclusively. That said,” he added regretfully, “It can be tough to find the right woman to play with.”
“The right fuckbuddy, you mean?” I asked, grinning.
“You’re not going to let that go, are you,” he observed. Then he explained, “I’ve always felt like to truly appreciate a dominant relationship you have to have, well, a relationship. You need to know the person and understand them…once I know what makes a woman tick and just how far I can push her limits without breaking her…that’s what true BDSM is all about. The shallow one night stands I have don’t really lend themselves to forming the type of intimacy I’m after.”
“Intimacy…? You…?” I giggled drunkenly. If there was one thing I’d managed to figure out about Hayden Slate, it was that he was a commitment-phobe. He slept around, had given up dating ages ago and even deflected my questions when the mood struck him.
“You’re in dangerous territory,” he growled.
I snorted. Then I propped myself up on my elbow to look at him, my tone more somber. “If you’re looking for a deep connection like that, then why not just find a girlfriend?” I asked. It would, after all, make the most sense.
“That’s not an option for me,” he retorted, that wall I’d come to recognize going up again.
I rolled onto my stomach with my head near the side of the bed closest to Hayden. My long hair hung down, lightly grazing the floor. I reached out and grabbed the tie that dangled loosely around his neck, using it to reel him in. “Can you at least kiss me?” I asked when our faces were only inches apart. “Please?”
He obliged before I’d even finished speaking, grabbing hold of my face and giving me what I’d asked for and then some. The ferocity of his kiss was startling and when we pulled apart I was left momentarily breathless, stunned and delighted by his ravenous appetite for me. It was certainly reciprocated. I wanted him so bad it hurt.
He sat on the edge of the bed then, leaning down to untie his shoes and remove his socks. “Thank God for that,” I giggled as I crawled up behind him on the bed and wrapped my arms around his muscular torso. “I don’t think I could handle it if you wore your socks to bed!”
Hayden rolled his eyes and allowed me to unbutton his shirt from behind. Then I slipped it off of him, tossing it aside without a second thought. I was so eager that it was almost overwhelming. The gorgeous, mysterious man stood up then and I began to reach for his belt buckle, but he pounced on me before I had a chance to undo it.
I let out a startled cry but he silenced me by pressing his lips to mine.
As he kissed me, Hayden laid me back on the pillows and slid his hand up my thigh. I parted my legs to give him full access as he explored the lace top of my black thigh highs. The higher his hand travelled, the higher the hemline of my silky black dress was raised. When I felt it bunched up around my navel and knew I was lying there with my red lace panties on full display, a thrill went through me.
Hayden’s finger brushed against the front of my panties, t
ouching me though the thin fabric. My breath caught in my throat and I tilted my hips toward him, wanting more. I didn’t have to wait long to get it.
His hands travelled higher and his fingers hooked underneath the waistband of my panties. Then he peeled them down like he was unwrapping a present. I blushed hotly as I laid there before him completely exposed, but I made no move to cover myself. I wanted it. It was time.
“God, you’re so sexy,” Hayden breathed as he stared down at me. Then he leaned forward until his face was near my smooth shaven mound. “I have to taste you.” With that, he spread my soft folds apart and buried his face in my sex.
“Oh!” I cried out as I felt Hayden’s hot breath on my privates. His tongue slid over my sensitive flesh, lapping the juices from my slick slit before delving into my clenching orifice. I groaned as he fucked my pussy with his mouth, writhing wantonly beneath him. I’d never imagined receiving oral sex could feel so good – and he certainly seemed to know what he was doing!
“Mmm,” he groaned, making it known that he enjoyed being between my thighs just as much as I loved having him there. He licked my intimate flesh greedily as though he just couldn’t get enough of me. His enthusiasm only caused my arousal to heighten.
When Hayden turned his attention to my clit, I thought I’d cum right then and there. Shocks of pleasure assaulted my senses as he circled the tender nub with the tip of his wet, coarse tongue, teasing me mercilessly. I felt my trigger swelling from his ministrations and began to moan in longing. “Please!” I begged. “I need to cum!”
That’s when he captured my clit between his lips. His tongue rasped over its pulsating head and I had to bite down on my lower lip to stifle my scream of pleasure. I shattered beneath him, my orgasm tearing through me like a hurricane. I was left trembling and exhausted, my entire body shaken to its very core.
Hayden took me in his arms.
“That was incredible,” I sighed in satisfaction.
“You were incredible,” he replied, and I could tell by his voice that he was being completely sincere. “I wish you could have seen yourself, flushed and panting, gyrating for me on the bed. You’re exquisite.”
His for One Night Page 2
