She straightened up then, standing before him, fully naked and totally unselfconscious. It was clear by her bearing, by the way she held her shoulders, by the slyly confident look on her face that she was damn proud of the way she looked standing there naked in the soft glow of midnight. He'd never seen anything sexier.
His breathing became ragged as his eyes traveled up and down her strong yet curvy body, her skin silvery with moonlight.
“I think I've tortured you enough,” she whispered as she climbed back onto the bed and knelt next to him. She tore open the condom wrapper with her teeth and had the condom unrolled onto him in a flash.
When she had readied him, she rose to her knees, put her hands on his chest, and straddled him. He watched her, transfixed, as she took him in her hand and then guided him to her entrance, slowly lowering herself onto him one luscious inch at a time.
His eyes moved to her face, enjoying the rapture he saw there. As she sank further and further onto him, she closed her eyes and threw her head back, fully engaging with what her body was feeling.
I'm doing that to her, he thought proudly. The pleasure she's experiencing right now is because of me. I'm giving her that ecstasy that's written across her face.
The thought gave him more than a physical thrill, he felt an emotional rush, as well.
Lauren began to move her hips up and down, much as she had done with her mouth earlier, and with equally intensely pleasurable results.
As she rode him, his eyes would flick down to watch her beautiful breasts as they bounced with the motion, or sometimes to the place where their bodies met. But mostly, his gaze was drawn to her face – her beautiful face, which was normally as placid as the deep waters of Lake Tahoe late at night.
Now, though, in the throes of ecstasy, every single thing that she felt was written across it. It was fascinating and dazzling to watch this internal story play out across the canvas of her exquisite countenance.
When he felt that he could hold on no longer, he let her know. She grasped his shoulder and begged him to give her just a moment more so that she could join him in the ultimate climax of their lovemaking.
He gritted his teeth and set his mind to make that happen. He refused to disappoint her.
When, several seconds later, she began to moan and scream, “Now! Now, Ben, now!” he came back with only one answering request.
“Lauren,” he said intently, “Open your eyes. Look at me.”
She did, and was amazed at how lucky he was, experiencing by far the most intense orgasm of his life with a woman who intrigued him more than anyone he'd ever met, all the while being granted the rare gift of looking into her eyes as he helped her to feel the same thing.
Chapter Nine
Lauren was jerked from the depths of a sound sleep by the simultaneous and discordant clanging blares of both her and Ben's cell phone alarm clocks going off at full volume.
Her head snapped up, and she was, for a moment, disoriented. Her first thought to herself was...oh my Lord, I had the oddest dream last...but that train of thought was interrupted by her quick glance around the room, which brought the realization that it hadn't been a dream after all. Her gaze almost immediately alighted on Ben sharing the bed with her.
Oooohhhhh, yeah, she remembered, coming fully awake. So, yeah, that happened.
She did a quick mental inventory of her body under the covers. Yep. Naked. So....absolutely, 100% certain. Not a dream.
Lauren, still fuzzy-headed enough with sleep that she couldn't think of exactly what the right words to greet Ben with this morning might be, raised a hand and waved to him uncertainly. Then, feeling like an idiot, snatched it back down again almost immediately.
She was happy, at least, to see that Ben seemed equally uncertain - although his unsure state of mind expressed itself by being overly cheerful, overly bright. Acting as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.
He sprang out of bed, sheet wrapped around his waist, and exclaimed, "Wow, so yeah. We should probably be getting ready, because we're going to need to be at the airport to catch that connector flight in about an hour."
This is good, Lauren thought, he's giving us a path to take. Overly-bright. I can do that. I can do overly-bright in my sleep.
She smiled cheerfully. "Good plan!" she enthused supportively, "Would you like to use the bathroom first?"
"No, no," he said graciously, "Why don't you take the bathroom first? I mean, you have the whole make-up thing to do. Guys lucked out, missing out on that. That takes time."
"That's really thoughtful of you," Lauren replied, "I believe I will take you up on that."
Then, with the other sheet wrapped firmly around her body, she made a quick exit to the bathroom, grabbing her overnight bag on the way in. She turned the shower on and got in, gratefully escaping to the oblivion provided by hot water and steam.
They both went through their morning routines, packed up their suitcases, left the room, and took a taxi back to the airport, each still maintaining their overly-solicitous manner toward each other.
By the time he brought her a coffee as they were waiting at the gate, and she had thanked him profusely, to which he insisted it was nothing, to which she in turn insisted that no, it was such a thoughtful gesture...she had a miserably sinking feeling that this could actually go on and on for all eternity, both of them being exceedingly polite and amiable with each other, and never really acting naturally ever again.
She felt like, in many ways, she would prefer their old bickering dynamic. At least there was some passion there, some blood, some heat. At least it was real.
The short flight passed quickly and in silence, both of them completely focused on their laptops in front of them. The instant they got off the plane, they were whisked to the location and immediately put into wardrobe and makeup.
Before Lauren knew it, they were standing in place for the first setup. Paul, the director, came in and began to walk them through it. Lauren was extremely nervous and fidgety, fearing a replay of the disaster which had been the early moments of her screen test, and Ben pulled her aside.
"You doing OK?" he asked her with gentle concern.
She nodded fleetingly, but he was clearly not convinced.
"Are you nervous about this, or..." he eyed her meaningfully.
The last thing Lauren wanted was to get into a conversation with Ben about their late night escapades in a place where they could possibly be overheard by the director and entire crew, so she quickly assured him, "This, this! I'm nervous about this! You know, it's just first day jitters, the camera, all that."
Ben smiled, looking relieved.
"Well, try not to be," he said, "I know that's easier said than done, but really just try to remember what I told you about picturing a friend inside the lens of the camera. Every single person out there watching the show, Lauren - they're rooting for you. They want to connect with you, they want to be your friend. It's just up to you to let them. Use that. Picture Sam in there, or Karina, or Amanda.
"Talk the way you talked to Karina when you were showing her the house she ended up buying. You're really good at this, Lauren. You're gonna be fantastic."
He smiled at her, and she thought that it was probably the first truly genuine smile he had given her all morning. That alone made her feel better than the entire pep talk...and it had been a pretty damn good pep talk, too!
She took a deep breath and felt herself relax a bit. Although her jitters were not entirely gone, at least she wasn't wound as tight as a coiled jack in the box anymore, ready to spring out of her skin at the slightest provocation.
Just a few moments after their exchange, the director yelled, 'Action!' for the first time, and Ben and Lauren began to go through their introductory remarks about the property. Lauren was extremely prepared. The cue cards were hardly a necessity because she had done all of her research and knew the facts of the home well.
After three takes, though, she didn't need Paul to tell her that she
was being stiff - even she could hear the wooden quality in her own voice - the simple, bare recitation of facts with no passion, warmth, or engagement behind it.
She shook her hands to try to release some tension and rolled her head back and forth to stretch out her neck. She knew that this was just nerves. God, she HOPED it was just nerves! She really needed to break past this tension that was holding her so stiff.
Not knowing what to do to accomplish that, she turned to Ben, eyes a bit wide. She recognized that she was sinking and didn't know how to pull herself back up.
"This is not going well," she whispered tensely, "Any other suggestions?"
Ben glanced over at Paul, and then back at Lauren, a sly smile slowly growing on his face. He leaned down to whisper in her ear.
"Well if none of my previous suggestions work, then maybe I can find a little hidden corner of this house and use my other special techniques to loosen you up."
Lauren couldn't help it, the shock of hearing him whisper that to her in front of all those people, with cameras trained on them, had a powerful two-pronged effect on her.
First of all, she thought it was hilarious and began to laugh. Secondly, she felt a rush of primal heat power through her, which had the unexpected side effect of completely loosening up her tense neck and shoulder muscles, relaxing her immediately.
Ben stood up straight, smiling at her, clearly delighted at hearing her laugh. "See? That wasn't so hard. Come on, Lauren. I know you can do it! You're gonna rock it out," he said supportively.
She smiled, actually believing him, feeling her confidence surge.
Paul, fresh from a conversation with one of the PAs, walked over just at that moment and said, "Alright! This is great. I already like it better. Just the energy, and the dynamic of how you two are standing. Very good. Much more relaxed, much more comfortable with one another. Let's go again, and let's try to keep that energy."
Lauren and Ben nodded, and Lauren smiled up at Ben, realizing that not only had he saved her ass, but that he had done it by merely bringing out a side to her that already existed. She took a deep breath and felt, not nervous this time, but excited. Pumped up. Ready to take on this challenge.
She was shocked at the way that the moment with Ben seemed to be a magic switch, turning the trajectory of the day immediately on a dime. She and Ben were in the zone, joking around, doing perfect takes on the first try, interacting with the crew, laughing - basically kicking their job's ass.
Lauren couldn't remember the last time that she had felt so confident, so powerful, so all-fired on top of her game as she did during the shoot.
Even the crew members were continually coming up and telling them that it was the best shoot they'd been on. When Lauren asked Ben about it, to try to figure out if they were just kissing butt and it was the kind of thing they said all the time or if it was actually true, Ben shook his head.
"No, they're not like that," he said, and then let out a short bark of laughter, "Trust me, they don't care enough about what we think to make stuff up, or be that interested in stroking our egos. We're not that famous."
She smiled, again recognizing the ring of verisimilitude in what he said and feeling gratified that she could take the crew's flattering words at face value.
When the day was done and she and Ben were in the town car with their suitcases for the ride back to the airport to catch their flight back to Hope Falls, Ben looked at her, eager anticipation in his face.
"So, what did you think?" he asked.
She smiled broadly and then reached up and stroked the side of his face.
"I think," she said happily, "That I've found a second career."
--- ~ ---
Lauren's high, as it happened, lasted about as long as the flight did. As the plane descended from the clouds, so did Lauren's heady emotions. As their hired town car drove them back up the mountain to Hope Falls, Lauren found herself drawing more and more back inside, putting up her old walls, wondering why she had felt so free with Ben over the course of the past couple of days.
It wasn't that she didn't like him. She realized now that she did, quite a lot, and that was exactly what scared her. Things with Ben were moving too fast. She couldn't let herself develop feelings for him. There was no guarantee that the show was going to go forward, after all. As far as she knew, they were going to see each other for the very last time in less than two weeks. What kind of condition would her heart be in the day after he left if she let herself fall head over heels for this guy?
She studied him surreptitiously out of the corner of her eye. I mean, look at him, she told herself miserably. He's so handsome, so chiseled in a Greek God sort of way. He's on a television show, he lives in LA where he's probably surrounded by starlets - the guy's gotta be a player. I'm probably just his latest weekend conquest, except that this particular 'weekend' happened to last several weeks.
Do NOT, Lauren, she cautioned herself. Do NOT get caught up in his web of charm.
She sighed and settled back in the seat, pulling out her laptop so she could work for the rest of the drive back to Hope Falls.
Yes, she realized, their little out of town jaunt had been the equivalent of a vacation - a vacation from herself - and now it was time to come back home and settle back into her normal routine.
She had a ton of things to take care of, and she figured it would be best for the both of them if, rather than having some big blow-out or confrontation where they had to have some 'talk' about the state of their non-relationship, she just used non-verbal cues to put some subtle distance between them.
Yes, she decided, less hurtful all the way around.
Ben smiled at her sweetly and she had to remind herself not to cave. Be strong, she told herself. No matter what sexy words come after that sexy smile, be strong. Remember what you have to do here.
Ben reached over and brushed her blonde hair away from her face - or rather, since Lauren always had every single strand of her hair perfectly in place at all times, it was more like his fingertips traced the line of where her hair swept back from her forehead into a perfect chignon.
Nevertheless, the tingles that it sent skittering across her scalp and down her spine made it very difficult to hold her resolve.
"Penny for your thoughts, beautiful," he said softly.
Without even looking up from her laptop, she said in a clipped tone, "Just working."
Ben's hand froze at the nape of her neck, and she realized he was taking note of her chilly demeanor. Apparently deciding that the best thing to do would be to simply move on as if nothing had changed, he said in a flirty tone, "So, you happy to be home, gorgeous?"
Again, not looking up or making eye contact with him, she said distractedly, "Mmmm....yeah. Lots of work."
Ben sighed.
She felt horrible doing this to him, but again reminded herself that in the long run it would be less painful all around.
Evidently deciding that he wasn't going to give up without a fight, though, he gave it one last try.
"So, lovely, it seems I'm slated to host a charity event in Hope Falls this weekend. The Policeman’s Ball, I think?"
At this, Lauren couldn't stop herself from looking up, her eyes widening.
"That's this weekend?" she said in surprise.
He looked puzzled, "Um, let me check my schedule," he said, pulling out his phone.
He paged through a few screens of his calendar and said, "Yep. This weekend, Policeman’s Ball, Hope Falls. Next weekend, children's wing dedication at Grace Memorial in Sacramento. Following weekend, bachelor auction, San Francisco."
Lauren crinkled her forehead in puzzlement. "You have a charity event every weekend?"
Ben laughed and said, "Oh, the first season of the show? Absolutely. I had more than one every weekend. But now I have it written into my contract that I have one weekend per month off completely. And any weekend I am working, I get either Saturday or Sunday to myself. No working all week and then working all weekend as wel
l."
Lauren leaned back in the seat, flabbergasted.
"How on earth do you manage to show houses?" she asked, "Weekends are my busiest time, they are for any real estate agent!"
Ben laughed again, shaking his head. He said, "Oh, Lauren. You're about to enter a world of everybody wanting to be close to you. You're never going to have to prospect for clients again. People are going to come to you, wanting to use you simply because they've seen you on the show, and either they trust you based on what they've seen there, or they feel like, by using you as their agent, they're actually purchasing up a little bit of your time. Paying, if you will, to become a small part of a famous person's life.
"Believe me, you are never going to have to worry about showing another house yourself ever again."
Lauren was rendered nearly speechless.
"You mean, you don't actually conduct showings and close deals yourself?"
He said, "Oh, I absolutely handle the final negotiations. I wouldn't trust anyone else to do that. However, most of the legwork is done by two people I have working in my office. Two amazing people that I would trust with my life. I mean, I kind of do, in a way, by trusting them with my business."
"I don't know if I could have an assistant," Lauren said dubiously.
"You're probably going to have to," Ben replied, "As difficult as I know that is to imagine, you liking to be in control as much as you do."
As he said the last part, his voice lowered, and vivid memories of their night together flashed through her head, as she could tell by his voice was happening to him, as well.
Her breathing became shallow and she had to exercise every bit of iron will she possessed not to snap her laptop shut, shove it back into her bag, and straddle him right there in the limo.
Ben smiled seductively, obviously reading in her face the effect he was having on her. Never one to miss an opportunity to close a deal, he followed up this small success by saying jauntily, "So, what do you say, Lauren? Accompany me to the Policeman’s Ball?"
Home Sweet Home Page 12
