by Alison Kent
It was Saturday, and the weather was gorgeous, which meant both motor-vehicle and foot traffic were hell. It shouldn’t have taken him but fifteen minutes to reach Jodi’s small complex. It took him thirty. Fortunately, he didn’t have to deal with gates or security and was able to park with no fuss.
The apartment building where she lived was older and only two stories tall, very vintage, very retro, very chic. He found the pool easily, situated as it was in the horseshoe of the complex, which, judging by the gathered crowd, was home to a smorgasbord of young, hard bodies.
Jodi wasn’t at all hard to find, her long blond hair hanging down her back rather than pulled into a ponytail or piled on top of her head. It was also dry, meaning she wasn’t swimming and having him wear the trunks was just about him fitting in.
She was talking to a couple who were older than Roman had first thought and who, he guessed, were in charge of the party. The trio stood on the tiled patio just outside the pool’s concrete apron, where the man was flipping burgers on a grill.
Jodi caught sight of him and waved him over. He wasn’t in the mood to socialize or even exchange names with her neighbors, but goddamn if he was going to be able to resist that look in her eyes. The one that told him he was the sweetest thing ever to walk into her life.
And skin him alive if he didn’t feel exactly the same. Christ. This was a disaster in the making. Of monumental proportions. If the agency didn’t strip away his badge, he was going to fire his own sorry ass for acting like a dick with no brain.
“Hey there,” she said once he’d reached her side. “We’re celebrating the Dimons’ anniversary. This is James, and this is Kay. Guys, this is a friend of mine, Roland Green. He’s a manager at Splash & Flambé.”
James shook his hand enthusiastically. Kay said, “My daughters, Wendy and Helen, they shop almost exclusively at Splash. I didn’t think Wendy would ever get over her love of white blouses, but the boutique has brought so much color into her life.”
“Not to mention,” James added, “making it possible for me to balance my bankbook in my head. Even I can add zero plus zero.”
“I’m glad they’ve found our collection to their liking,” Roman had Roland say to Kay before he turned to James and added, “And my condolences, sir, as I suffer extensively from a zero balance myself, even with my employee discount. Not that my current attire is at all representative.”
Jodi chose that moment to link their arms. “His current attire is my fault. I told him to grab swim trunks and hurry. I didn’t want him to miss out on your burgers, James, or on your daiquiris, Kay.”
Kay leaned over and kissed Jodi’s cheek. “You are a sweet girl to flatter us so. Isn’t she sweet, Roland? But why am I asking you a question with such an obvious answer? I can tell by the look in your eye that you’re quite acquainted with her sweetness.”
“Now, Kay,” James put in, clearing his throat. “Don’t scare the man so soon. He’s come here to spend time with Jodi, anyhow, not to listen to stories of those girls of ours shopping us blind.”
“You’re a sweetheart, James. And we’ll be back the minute you ring the dinner bell,” Jodi told the other man, making Roman seem a lot less like the interloper he was. “It was very kind of you to humor them with talk of the boutique.”
“I’m not always a queenly ass. I can be polite. And kind,” said Roman.
“And at times you can also be the furthest thing from a queen.”
He huffed. “Would that make me a king?”
“I’m still hoping it makes you hetero, and that I wasn’t a pity fuck or an experiment.”
“Dipping my toe into uncharted waters?”
“Your toe was about the only thing you didn’t dip.”
He stopped, spun her to face him. Her hair swung around her shoulders like a silk cape. He wanted all of it brushing his chest while she rode him. Wanted to see it pooled on his sheets while he took her from behind. “I didn’t come here to talk about the other night. Not about what we did, anyway.”
Her blue eyes grew icy. “You’re wondering if I’ve talked to anyone.”
“You said you wouldn’t. I know that. It’s just important in ways I can’t explain.”
“Like you can’t explain being gay and burying your tongue and your cock in my pussy?”
Sweat broke on the small of his back, the hollow of his throat, his forehead. “Yeah. Like that.”
She continued badgering him—and it wasn’t undeserved, since he’d bound her to a confidentiality agreement without disclosing the fine print—as she walked him around the pool’s apron to a small umbrella table and two chairs.
She sat and crossed one long, bare leg over the other, swinging her foot, her jeweled bronze thong slapping against her sole. “Maybe you should give it a try.”
“What do you mean?” he asked cautiously, perching on the edge of the second chair and wondering if he’d walked into a trap.
“If you can’t satisfy my curiosity about the first, then I think you owe me the second.” She looked over, looked down, and peered at him above the dark glasses she wore. “You involved me in that one, remember? It was my pussy you used in your experiment or to satisfy your curiosity or whatever.”
“I remember.” Christ, how he remembered. But their encounter had nothing to do with experiments or curiosity and everything to do with that thing that made a man ache for what a woman had between her legs.
“Well then?” Her question jarred him back to the moment. “Homosexual or heterosexual?”
What was he supposed to say? At this point, even he wouldn’t believe his cover story. “If anyone else is asking? I’m as queer as a plaid rabbit.”
A sly grin lifted the corners of her mouth. “And if I’m asking?”
“I think you know,” he said, with a snort.
“So what does that mean? For us?”
Us? What us was she talking about? Us? She’d wanted to fuck him. So she’d fucked him. That didn’t make them an “us.” “It means that there’s a lot I can’t tell you, and it’s best if we just forget what happened.”
She pushed her glasses into place, stared at the small gathering of her neighbors across the pool. “Can you really do that? Forget what it felt like to be inside me?”
Maybe in another lifetime. When he was rebooted with a new memory and couldn’t remember a thing about Roman Greyle. “I don’t have a lot of choice.”
She pursed her lips, her disappointment obvious. “What about me? Do I get a say? Or is the only choice I have to never see you again?”
That was part of the reason he’d come here. To make that happen. “That would be the best. For both of us.”
“So that’s it? We just stay out of each other’s way?”
“It shouldn’t be that hard.” He laced his hands, bounced his thumbs together. “It’s not like Dustin needs you to come shopping with him. And I don’t plan to visit the gallery again.”
“Not even when he shows the photos of Livia?”
Uh…Roman frowned. “What photos of Livia?”
Jodi dropped her head back, raised her face to the afternoon sun. “Did you know she’s an exhibitionist?”
Christ. “What? What’re you talking about?”
“From what I understand, it’s not so much sexual as a power trip thing. At least that’s what Dustin said.”
“And how would he know?”
“You don’t know much about your boss, do you? Dustin is probably her best friend. He knows all her secrets.”
Knowing Livia Hammond was not in Roman’s Splash & Flambé job description—a job from which he hoped to resign very soon. “To answer your question, no. I don’t plan to visit the gallery again, even to see photos of Livia.”
“That’s harsh. Disrespecting your boss just to avoid seeing me.”
There was no way for him to win here. No way at all. “What do you want from me, Jodi? Why so intent on busting my balls?”
She chuckled under her breath, then pus
hed out of her chair, wiggling her fingers in a “gimme” motion. Warily, he got to his feet, frowning when she held out her hand and ordered, “Empty your pockets.”
Since he could use a good dunking, he shrugged out of his shirt; set his wallet, keys, and cell phone on the table; and then reached for both of her hands. She walked closer, keeping their clasped hands between their bodies, releasing one, then cupping him where he lived.
“Busting is not what I want to do to your balls,” she said as she lightly squeezed. And then she took a huge step in reverse and dragged both of them over the edge and into the pool.
He’d sucked in a full breath before hitting the water and had time to pull her close and wrap his legs around hers as they surfaced. She sputtered and laughed, pushing her hair from her face, then hooked one arm around his neck and slipped the other into his trunks.
It was all he could do not to howl. He kept one arm around her waist, used the other to pull them to the side of the pool, and once there, pressed her against the wall, himself into her body. “I didn’t come here for this.”
“You can tell yourself that all you want,” she said, her hand wrapped around his shaft, squeezing, releasing. “Maybe you’ll even talk yourself into believing it.”
“Jodi, I—”
“Shh. Just do what I say.”
He cut his gaze left, right. “We have an audience.”
“No, we don’t. This is why I love living here. Everyone minds their own business.” She thumbed the head of his cock, finding the slit, playing there, then running her nail along the seam underneath. “Do you know what I would really love to do?”
“Right now? I’m not sure I’ll survive you telling me.” It was all he could do not to unload in her hand.
She tossed back her head, laughing with an infectious joy that had him surging into her palm, that much closer. “I want to suck you. I want you to sit on the edge of the pool and lean back on your elbows. I want you to spread your legs and hook your knees over my shoulders. I want you to let me take you to the back of my throat, to suck your cock until you come. I want to give you the blow job of your life.”
He was pretty damn sure that was what she’d done the other night in her office, though having her do it again now…He groaned, tightened his ass at the picture of her pink lips on his cock. “I want a million dollars to fall from the sky. None of it’s going to happen.”
“I know that,” she said, moving her lips close to his ear, her hand under the water, letting go of him to work one of her legs free from her bikini bottoms. “You can fuck me instead.”
She was insane, but she was also half naked and lifting him out of his trunks. He shifted her in his arms, and she wrapped her legs around his waist and guided him into place. One quick surge and he was buried to the hilt, shuddering as she slipped both of her arms beneath his and dug her fingers into his ass.
“Now tell me. How can you even think of giving this up? The sun, the sea breeze, sex in a swimming pool in front of a crowd?”
He didn’t even want to think about it. “Does everyone here know what we’re doing?”
“Of course, they do.” She pushed against him, took him deep, pulled away, and moaned. “And you can bet they’re jealous as hell and wanting in on the action.”
He didn’t want to think about that, either. All he wanted to think about was how tight she was, and how hot, and how his cock felt like the skin would split if he moved wrong. He was so fucking hard, he hurt.
She caught the edge of her lip. “I know at least one of my neighbors who’d love to join us.”
“Are you kidding?” he ground out.
She shook her head.
“You want another woman?”
“No. Another man,” she replied.
“That’s not going to happen.”
“But wait,” she said, her voice breathless and teasing. “As far as everyone else is concerned, aren’t you gay?”
“I’m pretty sure you outed me when you stuck your hand down my pants.” He pumped his hips, one, two, three short, quick strokes. She squeezed him with her cunt, squeezed him with her fingers, which were crawling closer and closer to the rim of his ass. “You want to tell me what you’re doing back there?”
“Giving you a good time. You didn’t seem to mind me playing with all the goods in my office.”
Did she have any idea what it had been like for him? Nearly a year of celibacy, and she opened her mouth and begged? “Jodi?”
“Roland?”
He shook his head. “It’s Roman.”
She looked confused. “What?”
“My name is Roman.” And why he’d spilled that on top of everything else…“Do you know how fucked I am?”
“Right now? I’d say yeah. You’re buried to your balls inside of me, and I’m doing my best to get a finger in your ass.”
“You’re not going to ask me about my name?”
She squeezed, pumping him, milking him. He felt the ooze of his pre-cum and groaned. “I figure you’ve told me enough. I can imagine the rest. I’d rather imagine the rest. At least for now. If I’ve put both of us in danger with my selfishness, well, just tell me the rest when you can.”
As close as they were, her breasts flattened against his chest, her nipples pebble hard, her clit throbbing, he couldn’t look anywhere but into her eyes. He gripped the edge of the pool with both hands, used her legs and arms as leverage for his strokes.
He wanted her beneath him. He wanted to pound into her. He wanted to drive away all the secrets that were going to keep him from having her any hour of the night or day. Because that was how much he wanted her. And that admission was the trigger that released his cum.
It pulsed from his cock and spilled into her, heating her, coating her. Her eyes widened as she felt the flow of thick liquid, tears following as her orgasm swept through her.
He shot semen for what seemed like forever, and her convulsions lasted even longer. Never in his life had he shared such a completion. And he’d driven away his only chance of experiencing such magic again by putting her in danger.
Two hours later, on his way to his truck, he realized how much as he watched a van roll slowly by the complex and found himself looking into the eyes of Tomás Bebé.
Seventeen
Livia had come to the decision this morning. She’d been avoiding the issue because, honestly, she couldn’t come up with a workable solution, and failure was not an option. But once things had settled in her mind, she’d known she had to tell Finn.
Splash & Flambé would never have been such a success if she hadn’t found a way to implement even her most extreme ideas. And this one—she took a deep breath—this one had the potential of being one of her finest.
“I want you to take the photos as we discussed. The only difference is that I don’t want you following me and hovering and hoping to catch me engaged in some prurient act of exposure.” She knew that was how he saw what she did. It was how most people looked at what was to her second nature. She’d been doing it almost all her life.
“You’re thinking of staging the shots? Using props? Maybe rosebushes and piano benches and cats?”
She turned her head, which she’d been resting against the seat back, and cocked an eyebrow, which she doubted he could see with her sunglasses in the way.
Then she realized he was facing the Atlantic, his eyes closed. He wasn’t looking at her at all. “Very funny. And no. No props. Just me and whatever you want to use of the setting in your final crop.”
“Have you decided on the setting?”
“I haven’t given it any thought at all.”
She was still facing him, so she saw his frown when he rolled his head to look at her. “I thought you came here because you have this all figured out.”
“I do. The main concept, anyway. There will be details to finalize, of course.”
“Details like the setting.”
She nodded. “If we can take a couple of days and get this out of
the way, we can all get back to our schedules and our lives.”
He stared at her as if she’d lost her mind. “A couple of days. What, you’ve got that much showing off on your calendar that you decide to cram it all into a couple of days?”
“It’s not showing off.”
“Right. It’s letting people look.”
She went back to staring at the clouds, which were like popcorn in the sky. “We can do this without you making digs, or we can call it off.”
He stayed silent, leaving her with nothing to listen to but the soft roll of the surf onto the beach, the squawk of the gulls circling overhead, the slap of the patio umbrella, which sounded like a sail fighting to unfurl.
“What you do,” Finn finally said, “no matter how you describe it, isn’t easy for me to deal with. And it’s not like I only take on jobs that meet some strict moral code. Most of them come with a butt load of immorality. But none of those are cases in which I’m personally involved. I make sure I’m not. Not with any I take on.”
“And you’re involved with me.”
“Involved may not be the right word, but yeah. You’re not just a random client.”
“The way you’re not just a random photographer working on his beach house?”
“Something like that.”
“I’m glad. Because my plan wouldn’t work quite so well otherwise.”
“You’ve got my attention.”
Success, she thought, smiling to herself. “I think the only way this will work is if we can compromise somewhere between spontaneous and staged.”
“I’m listening,” he said when she paused to let that sink in.
As long as he was doing so with an open mind…“You, as the photographer, work out the venue, and then I perform for you.”
“For me.”
It was more statement than question. She responded in kind. “If you figure out in advance where you’d like to shoot, a couple of locations maybe, say the beach, and a nightclub, whatever, then we can take a day or two to do this, Dustin will pay you, and you can be on your way.”
Finn’s only answer was, “Hmm,” so she went on, pitching her idea like a carnival barker. “If he gets what he’s been wanting and thinks the shots worth a show, he might even sell a few of them. Make the time spent even more worth your while.”
