I threw my hands in the air. "Yes, actually, I know exactly what it would cost! And with the plans you have for your life, it’s more than the combined operating costs of the gym all added together.”
Her eyes flew open wide before transforming to cold, hard orbs seconds later. “Of course you do. Tell me, Ethan, did my brothers hire you to tame me?”
Quick as a flash, Natalia picked up her napkin and dropped it on the table. She dug in her pocket and pulled out a couple twenties and dropped them on the table, too. "We're getting out of here," she said, and then stood up and started walking toward the exit while I just sat there, my mouth hanging open.
Did she... want me to follow her? She was pissed off, obviously, but she had said we were getting out of here. And she'd paid. I'd just decided that I should at least stand up when she reached the door. She whirled around on one sneakered heel and looked at me. "Well? Are you coming?"
When she said it like that, with expectation and urgency in her voice, how could I say no?
I called goodbye to Joey over my shoulder and hoped the forty bucks was enough to cover the food. I could always come back and -
“Oomph!" I managed as Natalia's hand locked like a vice around my wrist. She tugged me away from Joey and Hawk’s. Even at my height, half a foot taller than her at least, the force and speed of the tug made me trip over my own shoes. She snorted out a laugh as I caught up.
"Is everything okay?" I asked, completely confused.
"Everything's fine. I just want you to take me home," she said, reaching down for my hand. She twined her fingers with mine and yep, there was that energy zipping through my veins again. God, if she made me feel like this, I might agree to anything she asked of me.
Which was exactly what I was afraid of.
I was afraid to ask any more questions and ruin it - the good luck I had to be walking down a Philly street with Natalia, holding her hand. The good luck that she hadn't left me alone in the restaurant after I'd so obviously said something that upset her. She still wasn't talking. She didn’t say a word until we were back at the gym.
"Are we.... working out?" I asked, my voice going to a whisper when I realized how close Natalia stood to me now. We were both a little short of breath from walking so fast - her more so than me - and our breaths made clouds in the air between us.
Natalia gave a throaty laugh. "That might be a healthier solution. But no. We’re going all the way upstairs."
I nodded dumbly. Her jaw had a hard set, and I wasn’t sure if I should be thrilled or terrified by all the things I imagined her doing in bed when she was this angry.
"Natalia, I know you find it nearly impossible to resist me, but I'm working for you,” I attempted, a lame excuse. My risk alarms were going off left and right. Yes, I worked for her, but I also wasn’t sure that this particular cocktail of emotions was a good one to start sex with.
My cock, however, was very sure. It strained painfully against my zipper, a condition only made worse by the way Natalia pressed her body to mine.
"You're off the clock," she said, tilting her hips forward slightly. The head pressed against the top of her pubis, separated by a few thin layers of cloth. I wanted to shred them.
"Who punches that clock?" I asked, inwardly hating myself for continuing to talk when Natalia's lips began a path from my ear to my Adam’s apple.
"How about if I punch it by undoing the lock on this door," she said, raising her big doe-eyes to mine, "And you punch it by undoing my pants?"
I wheezed out a laugh of disbelief, and the next thing I knew, her arms were around my neck. She pressed her lips to mine in a pillow-soft, slow, utterly persuasive kiss. Her tongue flicked against the seam over my mouth only the slightest bit, but somehow, I could taste her. That was all I needed to know I couldn't refuse.
"Deal," I said, smiling against her mouth. Without overthinking it - a feat for me - I bent my knees, hooked my hands around the backs of her thighs, and hoisted her up in the air, swinging her so that her ankles locked around the small of my back.
She screeched, not seeming to care whether anyone heard or saw us. Wait. Could people see us? Were there cameras outside the gym? No, she'd said there was just one in the locker room when we'd talked about it a couple days ago.
It didn't matter. My body was acting independently of my brain, it seemed.
The hard-on in my pants, for one, but also the confident way my legs carried the both of us up those big concrete stairs, the way my arms braced Natalia against the brick and held her close to me as she fumbled with the old key in the lock, and the laugh that resonated from deep inside me when we got inside and she tried to kiss me, but failed because of the hair covering her face. My thighs burned by the time I got the both of us up the stairs to the third floor. Natalia was all muscle with a small amount of padding, and now I knew from practical experience that muscle was heavier than fat. I panted with relief when I spotted her bed, a simple platform construction with pure white bedding, facing the wall of floor to ceiling windows. I dropped her on the bed and stood there, drinking in her beauty. She was stunning in the moonlight that flooded the room. Golden skin, mussed hair, absolutely wild. And, for this night at least, she was all mine. Suddenly, I just wanted to be close to her, more than I wanted anything else - including being inside her. I flopped down next to her so that our faces were even and looked at her with a grin.
"You really want to?" I asked, giving her one last chance to back out of this. Whatever this was.
She answered me by sitting up, flinging one leg over my waist, and kissing me long and hard.
Okay then. We were doing this.
God, she was breathtaking. I wanted to burn the sight of her, hair tousled, chest heaving, smile beaming, into my memory. Her camisole edged up just enough for me to see the waistband of her jeans digging into the curve of her hip.
"Oh, baby," I crooned. I leaned down to kiss the skin there, groaning quietly as my tongue swept out, seemingly of its own volition, picking up her warm, sweet taste.
I knew, I remembered, that the area below her waistband only intensified that taste. She was hot and musky and salty with an edge of sweet. Last time I'd been desperate to make her come, to hear her scream. This time, I didn't know what to make of her - didn't know what we were or how we would end up. I did know I would be seeing her for the next few weeks, at least, though, which made me want to savor her.
So that's exactly what I did.
We spent a lot of time that night with my face buried between Natalia's legs - licking at her slick, dripping pussy, until she screamed my name, biting at the tendons on the inside of her thighs as she drew deep breaths in the aftermath of her orgasm. I sucked love bites on her perfectly smooth, round ass. I rasped my beard against the base of her spine and held her ankles down while I did it. I knew from memory that she was severely ticklish there. I took full advantage, relishing her laughing screeches.
I adored every inch of Natalia. In all the years I’d been romantically involved with women, she was unique. There was sex for maintenance, sex for fun, and then there was Natalia.
Sex with Natalia was a life-changing experience. As she flipped over beneath me and cupped my jaws with both hands, then devoured my mouth, licking into it slowly, like she had an eternity to do so. I shivered. She owned me. And she knew it.
Her thighs locked around my hips, and with a small grunt, she flipped me over. My cock badly needed attention, and brushing against the insides of her thighs wasn’t quite doing it. She smirked down at me, as though she could read my thoughts, before leaning forward. Her tits swayed in my face while she fumbled in a nightstand drawer. I wasn’t sure whether I believed in heaven, but if I did, this would certainly be part of it.
“I love how hard you get,” she murmured, righting herself. “It makes a woman feel good, you know, when a man gets hard as soon as he kisses her.”
“I was hard long before that, honey. It doesn’t take much when I’m with you.”
&nb
sp; She smirked. I smoothed my palm over her hip, then down between her legs. Her eyes rolled back a little, in time with the slight arching of her back. I shot her a smirk in return as my fingers glided through her slick lips. I used two of them to trace a lazy circle at her opening, and when she tried to raise up to take me inside, I pushed them in farther, crooking them against her front wall. There was a dime-sized patch of flesh inside that would make her tremble, and before I thrust inside her, I wanted her to feel it.
She let out a long, full-throated moan, and I mentally fist-pumped. There it was. Now that I’d given her one orgasm and the promise of another, I could take what I’d been dreaming about for days. I pulled my fingers from her channel, using her slippery juices to run my hand down my cock, and nodded at her to roll the condom on. She did, then grabbed at the base. “Open up for me, honey,” I murmured, knowing that she’d tensed around my fingers.
She did, allowing me to sink into her instead of pushing my way in. And, oh Lord, was she heaven. She lazily rocked her hips forward and back, slicking my cock through her channel even though she barely let it slip out of her. Warmth crept up my body at the lazy intensity of it all, and within minutes, that warmth turned to fire. When she dug her fingernails into my pecs, I locked her hips in a vice-tight grip, and thrust up into her as hard as I could manage. She moaned, arching her back, which gave my thrusts a new angle. Before I knew it, we were moaning our release together.
She collapsed on top of me, and we puffed out exhausted laughter for a few seconds before she swung her leg up and over my torso. Then I eased her down to the bed, wiped her slightly sweaty brow, and ran my fingers through her hair, slowly. She nuzzled into my neck as her fingers ran up and down my torso.
"You've been working out since the last time I saw you," she hummed.
"Remember my buddy Mark?"
She tilted her head back and I barely made out her scrunched brows in the dim blue city light as she considered. "Mister blondie with the beard? A little... round? Here?" Her fingers danced over my abs and I jerked as a rogue ticklish nerve jumped.
"Yeah," I chuckled. "Well, he was.” Then his girlfriend broke up with him - totally shocked him - and he was a fucking mess. I made him do couch to 5k just to keep his mind off it. Didn't hurt me, either."
"I remember him," Natalia said. “He was working on it. Looked good by the time I saw him at Knockout Brothers last year. All that because of a shocking breakup,” Natalia mused. "It's only ever a shock to one person, isn't it?"
"It was a shock to all of us," I replied, remembering. "Mark and Kylie were a sure thing. As sure as sure gets."
"Nothing is for sure," Natalia said. I thought of our moms, knew she was thinking of them too.
"Guess you're right," I replied. "Except... I'm pretty sure of one thing."
"Hmm?" Natalia asked, her hand stilling on its idle path.
"I'm absolutely certain that I will be extremely disappointed if I don't get inside you again before the sun comes up."
"Is that so? Well, I guess, if you think you can - oh!"
Natalia's hand had made its way down underneath the sheet covering my crotch and found me rock hard again. Already.
"I can," I growled, and flipped her onto her back. I dropped a kiss on her perfect mouth. Yeah, she looked gorgeous when she bothered with an occasional swipe of lipstick, but I loved her lips best just like I loved the rest of her. Naked. Soft and relaxed. Ready. She was even relaxed when she rolled the condom onto me.
There was no riding or frantic roughness this time around - there was just me and Natalia, pressed against each other, moving together like we breathed - heavy, slow, easy, peaceful. Natural. Without overthinking or rushing or chasing something we knew was coming. I bottomed out inside her and she craned her neck up to kiss me. Her fingers twined in my hair as I pulled out, quietly beckoning me back to her. We took our time. We savored each other. I half-forgot myself - who I was, why I existed, outside of this moment.
It was only when Natalia said my name in a choked gasp - "Ethannn!" - and her hips arched off the bed, her pussy pulsing around my cock, that I came back to myself, only to be swept away again by my own orgasm. I growled adoration and praise for her into her neck, and found the same sentiments in her eyes when I finally pulled away to give her one last kiss before taking care of the condom.
She cradled my head against the pillow of her breast afterward, and my hand found a perfect resting spot gently cupping the curve of her ass. Suddenly, I had a flash of a vision - these thighs that I'd just licked every inch of straddling a motorcycle seat, or hemmed in by a climbing harness. Her beautiful breasts encased in Kevlar. The sinews in her neck straining as she fired a gun or crouched to jump off a building. A small groan escaped me as I involuntarily grabbed her butt and pulled her closer to me.
She chuckled. "You cannot be ready to go again. You are human, right?"
I shook my head, then took in a long, slow breath, thinking I could suffocate in her breasts and I probably wouldn't even mind that much.
"That wasn't it."
"Well, what then?" Her voice was low, soft, her words slow to come. She was on the edge of sleep.
"I don't want - you're just - God, Natalia, are you sure?"
"About having sex with you?" She laughed, sounding a little more awake now. "Pretty sure. I think."
"Not that. It's just... you're perfect."
She snorted, but I stayed quiet.
"Ethan. You sound so upset. What's going on?"
“I…” I let out a long sigh, loathe to say the words but knowing I had to. “I don’t know if I can stand it.”
She propped herself up on one elbow, peered into my eyes. I tried to keep my own eyes from tracing the shape her breasts took – one resting on top of the other, their heavy curves taking on new shape. “Can’t stand what?” She was genuinely confused, which worried me. How was she possibly going to understand?
“Can’t stand you putting yourself in danger. Like you’ve described. Hell, it was hard enough to know you were running with the bulls last year, and we’d said goodbye at that point.” I touched her shoulder, let my fingers brush down over her upper arm. Her eyelids fluttered with pleasure. “You seriously want to go back to leading the crazy dangerous life?”
She looked down, staring at the sheets bunched up between us. “It’s who I am.”
“Have you ever tried being… you know. Normal?”
“I’m trying it now,” she replied. “Running the gym. Owning the gym. Being pinned down by the gym. And I can already see all the ways I’m going to be bored out of my mind.”
It felt like I’d been punched in the gut. Automatically, my hold on her ass tightened. “Thanks.”
“I wasn’t saying I was bored with you, Ethan.” Natalia snuggled back up against me, and fleetingly, I wished I could keep her this way always. Snuggly and content just to be near me. I knew I couldn’t. “You’re great, but you know what I mean. This life. The whole thing - going to work at the same place. Doing the same thing, over and over. Never leaving, because I can’t. Everything I do, everything I have, everything I am -It’s all here. Forever.” She groaned. “See? I’m dying inside just talking about it.”
“Well, that’s because you’re not looking at it the right way. Let me help.”
She raised an eyebrow at me. “What does that mean?”
“Well, obviously, I’m going to help you with The Knockout.” I leaned in and tilted my face up, planting a soft kiss right behind her ear. She groaned, and I laughed, blowing air against the skin there, which made her squirm. “Let me show you,” I said, “how good it can be to have a life that’s… calm. Normal.”
Natalia shoved me gently with one hand. “Calm and normal. Why in the world would I want –”
“Because people love you,” I said, unable to stop myself. I loved being with Natalia, and I could already feel myself slipping down the slope into loving her, but obviously there were other people in the equation. Her dad. Her
brothers and their families. “And,” I said, “as your business consultant, I have to remind you that it’s cheaper. Better for the gym. You all want that. You all need that.”
“So, you’re going to show me… how?” Something had changed in her voice. It was somehow… thinner. Like she was now only eighty percent there.
“Dinners and movies. Walks through the city. Quick trips to a bed and breakfast. Maybe we’ll even get crazy and run a 5k or go biking. Lots more of this,” I said, snaking my arm around her waist, letting my hand rest on the upper curve of her perfect ass. “If you hate it – if you really, truly miss jumping off of buildings and out of airplanes, and dodging angry bulls, then –”
“Then what? I can go back to doing them?”
I should have heard the edge in her voice. Should have realized she was leading me right into a trap with her incredible hair and delicious-looking tits and general air of teasing. I was half teasing her. She wasn’t joking at all.
“Yeah,” I said, leaning in to kiss her on the mouth. Her fingers laced through my hair and blood rushed back down to my cock.
That was when it all went to hell.
Her fingers tightened, wrapping my just-long-enough-for-serious-grabbing hair in a death lock. She wrenched my head back and glared into my eyes. “Listen to me, Ethan Anderson, and listen carefully, because I’m only going to say this once.”
I winced, sucking in a breath when she tugged my hair again. This would be kind of sexy if there wasn’t rage radiating from Natalia’s gaze. I squeezed my eyes shut and managed a tight, “Oh-okay.”
“Nobody – not my brothers, not my father, and especially not you, tells Natalia Ortiz what she can or cannot do. I do what I want, when I want, for the reasons I want. If I want your opinion about it, I will ask you. Do you understand me?”
I nodded, just a tiny bit. “Yep,” I choked out.
Just like that, she released my hair. My scalp throbbed, and I dropped back onto my pillow. “Jesus, Tali.”
Just Let Go Page 8
