by Claire Kent
Apparently they did anyway. Ander turned his head away with a jerk. “I know. I am sorry. If it helps, I’ve felt like an ass about it. But it was a delicate situation. And I dug myself into a hole by letting the ruse go on for so long. And, also, I thought perhaps—if you knew I was no longer seeing clients—you might not let yourself get so close to me.”
He seemed almost embarrassed at the last admission, but he cut his eyes over to check her expression.
The words were presumptuous, perhaps, but they were also entirely true. She would have been far too scared to get this close to Ander if she’d known he’d retired from his life as a gigolo.
“Oh.”
“I hope this hasn’t destroyed our friendship,” Ander said, for the first time sounding upset. “I hope you can forgive me.”
Maybe she was still in shock. Maybe she hadn’t yet fully processed everything he’d told her and everything it implied.
But Lori was actually starting to feel kind of giddy.
“Oh, Ander,” she murmured, reaching over to pull him into a hug, “After all the secrets we’ve kept from each other, did you really think one was going to destroy us?”
Ander returned her hug immediately, wrapping his arms around her with an urgency she hadn’t felt from him in two months. She squeezed his firm body in her arms, pressing her face into his clean-smelling shirt and reveling in the delicious warmth of his presence.
“You don’t have any other secrets I don’t know, do you?” Lori asked, muffled by his shoulder.
Ander lifted his head from where he’d had it buried in her hair. And he said a little tentatively, “I...I don’t think so.”
Which implied that everything he still left unsaid were things she should already know.
When they pulled away, both of them were smiling.
Then they both leaned back against the couch, as if this revelation had worn them out.
“Thank God that’s out,” Ander groaned, stretching out his legs and looking over at her beside him. “I can’t tell you how stressful it was trying to hide the evidence.”
Lori chuckled. “I didn’t suspect a thing. I never would have guessed you’d want to go into archeology. I still think you should be a sex therapist or write that book. You know so much.”
“Yeah. But I want...I want to do something entirely different. I have enough baggage. I don’t want to always bring it with me to work.”
Lori thought about that. Then she nodded, “I guess that makes sense. But why archeology?”
He gave a half-shrug. “I’ve always loved history, art, languages, and culture. You know that. I actually took a couple of classes last year, just out of interest. So when I was trying to think of what I might like to do, it was what I came up with.”
“I think it’s a good idea. Combines all your areas of interest.” She grinned at him. “Are you going to wear wrinkled khakis now? Or maybe a fedora like Indiana Jones?”
Ander snorted. “I’ll do my best to avoid it.”
“You didn’t think about going into business?” Lori asked. “I bet you could be a CEO at some company in less than a decade.”
Ander’s mouth turned up in a smile that was just a little bitter. “Maybe. But that’s my father’s thing. And it’s another kind of baggage I didn’t want to bring with me to work.”
Feeling a surge of tenderness, of protectiveness, of affection, Lori leaned over and pressed a soft kiss on his cheek.
Drawing his brows together, Ander asked, “What was that for?”
“That was for being so smart,” she said with another smile. “You definitely made the right choice about your career. And I’m so glad you’ll be able to do your own thing.”
* * *
“So the wedding went all right?”
Lori had pulled out wine glasses from her cupboard and was digging through a drawer for a corkscrew. “Yeah. It was actually pretty fun. Everyone was all into my books. And no one thought anything about my not having a date.”
She recognized the quality of the silence from the other room, so she added quickly, “But don’t you dare say you told me so.”
She found the corkscrew and carried it with the glasses into the other room, where Ander was putting in on the DVD. “I wouldn’t dream of it,” he murmured.
Lori was grinning like a maniac but she couldn’t seem to help it.
The month Ander had been on his archeological field project on Santorini had seemed endless. She’d missed him horribly, so much it as almost embarrassing.
But now he was finally back.
“Do we really have to watch this movie?” Ander asked with a long-suffering expression. He wore a white t-shirt and gray trousers with no shoes or socks, and he looked so scrumptious she wanted to swallow him whole.
“Yes,” she said, sticking out her chin to show her stubbornness. “It will be fun. You can mock it to your heart’s content.”
“But Pretty Woman?” Ander’s voice was edged with skepticism and reluctance.
“Just watch it,” she said, scowling at him.
He chuckled as he picked up his wine and the remote. “Your good mood didn’t last very long, did it?”
She flopped down next to me. “You have no one to blame but yourself.” But she gave him a sideways glance, drinking in the sight of his relaxed face and his tanned skin from hours in the Mediterranean sun. He’d apparently had a really good trip, the field project sealing his determination to go into archeology. She was so glad he’d found something that might help him feel fulfilled, despite the gaping hole he’d left in her life during his absence.
She sighed, trapped between poignancy and joy. “I’m so glad you’re home.”
Ander laughed again, but he put his arm around her to give her a squeeze. “Me too.”
They watched the movie. Lori managed to basically enjoy the fluffy, implausible sap, despite a snide running commentary from Ander. She didn’t complain, since she’d told him he was allowed to mock. But she took vengeance by snuggling up against him.
He wasn’t normally a touchy-feely person. Since they’d canceled their business arrangement, Ander rarely initiated anything more than brief, casual touches. But he was the one who put his arm around her, so she figured she could consider that the first move.
She leaned against him happily as she watched and let herself enjoy the simple pleasure of being close to him.
They’d reached the final scene of the movie—the blissful reconciliation in a swell of romantic feeling without the slightest hint at realism or basic human truths. Lori tried to get into the fantasy-spirit, but Ander’s ironic snorting kept getting in the way.
Pressed against his side, her legs curled up on the sofa, Lori peered up at him. “Didn’t you have fun?”
Ander tried to give her a look of cool disapproval, but his adorably twitching mouth revealed his true mood.
“You know what I was thinking?” Lori asked, straightening up although she couldn’t bring herself to draw away from his cozy side.
Ander didn’t pull his arm away. “That you’d like to run off with Richard Gere?”
She stifled a snicker. “No. I was thinking about how the first thing we did together was watch a movie.”
“Actually, the first thing we did together was get coffee and walk over to the park.”
Lori huffed. “I’m making a point here.”
“I see. And little details like accuracy keep getting in the way. Very annoying.”
She knew him well enough to know he was in high-spirits tonight. He didn’t reveal a rush of giddiness like Lori always did, but his irrepressible banter and warm eyes gave him away. She felt another urge to hug him but managed to repress it this time. “Do you want to hear my point or not?”
“Yes,” he said. “Actually I do. What is it?”
Lori paused. Then huffed again. “Now I’ve forgotten it.”
“It had something to do with watching a movie together. Fond memories of that erotic film?”
> “It was good,” she said honestly. “I wouldn’t mind seeing it again.” Then she remembered her point and she added almost bashfully, “What did you think of me back then? I mean, at first.”
When Ander didn’t answer, she darted her eyes up to his face. He wasn’t looking at her, and his face had sobered into thoughtfulness.
“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want,” she said after a minute, with what she thought was remarkable generosity given her desperate desire to know.
“You terrified me.”
“What?”
Ander met her gaze. “You terrified me,” he repeated mildly. “I’d never been with a virgin before. I could tell from the beginning that you were smart, generous and compassionate, and obviously I knew you were beautiful. I was stressed that whole week about ruining your first experience with sex.”
“You were not!” Lori stared at him breathlessly. “You were as cool as a cucumber.”
“You know by now I’m a good actor. I’m not sure why it mattered so much to me, since I’d never put much significance in sex before. But something about it being your first time—your entrusting me with that kind of responsibility—really hit me. It got to me.”
“Oh.”
They looked at each other for a minute. Then Lori said in close to a whisper, “I’m glad my first time was with you.”
Her only times were with Ander. He was the only man she’d ever had sex with. At present, she had no desire to have sex with anyone but him.
She tried not to think much about it, since she wasn’t sure what to do with that knowledge. Things would change eventually, in one way or another, and she was trying to just let them play out without obsessing. It was the only way she could handle the turmoil of her emotions.
Then Ander surprised her, since he wasn’t often given to confessions of this kind. He said, “Me too.”
A wave of emotion rose up in her chest, so powerfully she couldn’t contain it. It flooded her, consumed her, overwhelmed her.
And she did the only thing she could think of to do.
Stretching up and leaning forward, she pressed her lips against Ander’s mouth. After a moment, his softened, then opened beneath hers. Her tongue slipped out to trace along the line of his lips softly, sending tiny pulses of pleasure all the way to her fingertips.
She pulled back, flushing warmly and panting a little.
“What’s going on?” Ander asked thickly, suddenly frozen on the sofa beside her.
“I don’t know,” she admitted, squirming a little in both embarrassment and lingering pleasure. “I just wanted to kiss you. Sorry.”
Ander didn’t answer with words. He just stared at her for a moment until she saw something hot ignite in his eyes. Then he took her face in his hands and kissed her.
Lori whimpered in surprise and rising feeling. As Ander’s lips and tongue waged a passionate assault, her arms twined around his neck and her entire body pulsed with sensation.
One of Ander’s hands curved around the back of her head and the other slid down to stroke along her spine. Shivers followed in the wake of his touch. She whimpered again and brushed her fingers along the smooth curve of his scalp, adjusting on the sofa so she could press her body against him more fully.
She was hot and breathless when she finally pulled out of the embrace. Ander looked flushed too, and his chest rose and fell rapidly with his breathing.
“Wow,” she gasped. “That was...that was good.”
Ander let out of huff of dazed laughter. “Yeah.” Then he turned always observant eyes to scan her face. “Do you think you might want to do it again?”
She knew what he was asking. What he’d wanted to ask for the last three months. He’d just been waiting for the right time.
Lori couldn’t tell him anything but the truth. “Yeah. Definitely.” A thrill of joy ran through her when she saw the brief blaze of relief in his eyes. “I mean, it would be a shame not to. We’re really good at that.”
Ander reached out again to cup her face. “There are other things we’re good at,” he said, just a little diffidently.
Lori gulped. There were other things they were good at. Things they were good at together. So many other things they could look forward to in the days and weeks to come, fading off like a fuzzy trail into the future.
But things didn’t always have to be complicated, and not everything had to happen at once.
So she smiled up him, reaching out to pull him down into another kiss. “Yeah. That’s true. But let’s just stick with kissing...for now.”
Twelve
Lori’s head was already spinning, and she hadn’t done anything more than kiss Ander.
They’d gone to dinner and the symphony earlier that evening, and she’d offered Ander a drink when he’d walked her up to her apartment.
They ended up making out on her couch, and already Lori was so turned on she wanted to explode.
To begin with, Ander’s hands had only been in safe positions—on her back, in her hair, cupping her face—but now his caresses were becoming more presumptuous. As his tongue plunged between her lips to play along the roof of her mouth, one of his hands slid down to palm her bottom.
Lori moaned against his mouth and clutched at the back of his shirt. She adjusted until she was practically in his lap, pressing her breasts against his chest and trying to get some friction on her groin.
Still deep in the kiss, Ander slipped his hand beneath the hem of her dress and stroked up her bare thigh. She shivered at the intimate contact and tore her lips away from his so she could gasp.
Ander used the opportunity to mouth his way down her jaw to her throat. He lingered over her pulse point until Lori whimpered in pleasure.
Her arousal hot, wet, and throbbing now, she shifted again, moving one of her legs over both of his thighs so she could straddle his lap. She needed pressure against her clit and she needed it now.
He held her hips with both of his hands to brace her as his lips moved even lower. He took one breast in his mouth through the silk of her slinky cocktail dress and suckled at her nipple so skillfully Lori’s hips started to work shamelessly against his.
Ander was hard now. She could feel the bulge of his erection in his trousers. She rubbed her arousal urgently against his and felt pulses of pleasure spiral out from the contact.
Her skirt was bunched up around her waist, and Ander’s hands slid down to hold and squeeze the soft flesh of her ass. She wore a thong because the silk of her dress was so thin, and the strip of fabric across her wet pussy was exquisite torment.
“Ander!” she gasped, as one of his hands slipped between her thighs to press against the place she was most hot and wet. Her back arched as she tried to ride his hand with embarrassing abandon.
Ander raised his face to stare at her for a moment, his eyes hot, hungry and almost primitive. Then he groaned and leaned forward to mouth her throat.
Without warning, he bit down hard.
Lori came against his hand with a choked cry.
She was conscious of Ander straightening up so he could watch as she rode out the spasms of pleasure. When they faded, she slumped against his chest, gasping and pressing sloppy kisses against his cheek and the side of his head.
Ander held her tightly for a few minutes, until she started to move against him again. She rubbed against his groin, felt a thrill at how hard and tense he was.
She knew he wanted her. And she wasn’t even close to sated.
“Ander,” she murmured, stroking his smooth head and kissing all over his face. “Do y—”
“Fuck, baby,” he rasped, his hands suddenly strong her shoulders as he maneuvered her body off of his. “I better go.”
“Oh,” she said, staring as he stood up stiffly, still kind of dazed from her orgasm. “Do you have to?”
He gave a huff of ironic laughter. He was sweating a little, and he held himself so tightly he could barely move. “I’m sorry, Lori. I definitely have to go.”
“I have that early class in the morning. I’ll call you tomorrow.” He leaned down to give her a quick kiss on the mouth, and then he left before she could get another word out.
Lori collapsed back on the couch with a little whimper. Her body felt chilled and she was brutally disappointed. Not really surprised, though. He’d done this to her before.
She and Ander had been dating now for a month. They went out, talked every day, did a lot of kissing, and sometimes went even further like tonight, but Ander always called an end to it before they got to sex. Lori truly appreciated the way he’d been willing to take it slow. Moving from friendship to something deeper was obviously what both of them wanted, but she’d been worried about moving too fast because of the way their relationship had begun.
She thought she’d made it clear that she was more than ready for sex now, however, but Ander still wouldn’t take the final step.
If he wasn’t yet ready, she would be patient. He’d been more than patient with her.
But she knew he wanted it. Knew he wanted her. It didn’t take much for Ander to get aroused around her, and men didn’t have the advantage of being able to hide their arousal very well.
It wasn’t a physical issue. She knew that. But she didn’t know what else he might be waiting for.
She thought they were both in the same place emotionally. They’d both been in too deep when Lori was still his client. They’d taken a step back to being friends for three months so they could come to terms with what they wanted and set the groundwork for a more healthy attachment. And for the last month they’d been pursuing a romantic relationship. They hadn’t spoken words of love, but she knew how much Ander cared about her. She knew how important she was to him. And she knew how much he desired her.
So why didn’t he want to have sex with her?
* * *
“Whee!” Lori exclaimed in pure glee, sliding over to Ander on the ice. “Did you see me? I didn’t fall once! I’m so much better this time.”
Ander laughed and drew her smoothly beside him. “Much better. I told you you’d be good at ice skating if you’d just relaxed a little.”