Exquisite

by Elizabeth Hayley

  Siobhan sheepishly turned her attention back to Saul, who was giving her a disapproving look. “I see some things never change,” he muttered. “Now that I have your attention, let me repeat myself. We’re going to try swapping out our menus for tablets, so keep track of how that’s working out and report back to me at the end of your shifts.”

  “Okay,” Siobhan nodded, instantly worrying about how many tablets she was going to drop before the night was over. What the hell was wrong with giving people regular menus?

  Hayden also murmured her assent and Saul disbanded the meeting.

  “You really know how to make an impression,” Blaine whispered to her as she walked by.

  “I’m not making one, I’m maintaining it,” Siobhan replied.

  “Very true.”

  Siobhan and Hayden went to prep the front of the house for opening. It wasn’t long before the doors to the Stone Room opened, and Siobhan was forced to carry around expensive electronics and occasionally even pour water in their proximity. It was a nightmare in the making.

  “The digital age has gone too far,” she grumbled when she returned to the hostess station after dropping a tablet in some guy’s lap. If his Lamaze-like breathing was any indication, she’d made contact with a very sensitive part of his anatomy.

  “What happened?” Hayden asked.

  “Oh, nothing. I just castrated a customer. No big deal.”

  A cackle burst out of Hayden, and Siobhan realized it was the first time she’d heard the other hostess laugh.

  Siobhan tried, and failed, to hide her smile. “I’m glad you find it so amusing.”

  Hayden wiped tears from her eyes. “I really do. God, I haven’t laughed like that in a long time.”

  “Well, pay attention because I’m sure that’s not the worst thing that will happen to me tonight.”

  Hayden chuckled lightly again. “I’m not sure it can get much worse than that.” She then turned her attention to a customer who’d walked in. “Though I guess I better seat this one. He’s too good-looking for you to harm.”

  Siobhan smiled and looked over her shoulder to see who Hayden was referring to.

  And as Hayden welcomed the guest, Siobhan felt her heart drop. The night was definitely about to get worse.

  Chapter 13

  Derick honestly didn’t know what the hell he was doing at the Stone Room. Well, he did, but he still wasn’t sure why he’d let it happen.

  When his buddy Jack had called and asked Derick to meet him there for drinks, Derick had initially balked. He’d heard Siobhan was back working there, and he knew that they both needed a clean break. But when his friend had started busting his balls about avoiding his favorite hangout because of a breakup, Derick had caved. The man’s logic had made sense on the phone.

  It made no sense now.

  Because even though Derick didn’t want to disrupt his life due to a breakup, what had happened with Siobhan was more than that. It was a shattering.

  Not helping matters was the fact that Siobhan was actively avoiding him. She kept her eyes focused directly in front of her whenever she walked past his table. Not to mention that she was as rigid as a flagpole.

  Even though he’d convinced himself on the way over that he and Siobhan were adults who were capable of inhabiting the same room without it being amazingly awkward, he really should have known better. Because as Siobhan tried to look anywhere but at Derick, Derick had a difficult time looking anywhere except at her. He tried to be stealthy about it, casting glances over his glass as he took long gulps of his drink, and constantly adjusting his position so that he’d have a reason to twist in her direction.

  It really sucked, he realized, to be so pathetic.

  Chapter 14

  Forty-five minutes. That’s how long Derick lasted before he had to get the hell out of there. He was clearly affecting Siobhan’s job performance, since he was pretty sure it was a bad idea for her to ignore an entire section of the club.

  And also, he felt…sad. It was too difficult to look at the one thing he wanted most in the world all the while knowing he couldn’t have it. So he pulled his coat tightly around him and stepped out onto the sidewalk, turning toward home. He needed to walk a little, try to shake off some of the melancholy that had settled into his bones.

  He made it about twenty feet before he heard someone calling his name behind him. Derick knew the voice, and his body instinctively turned toward it before his brain could catch up. He waited for her to reach him, and when she did, he saw the hard set of her features, and braced himself. The cold air whipped all around him.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” she asked.

  He narrowed his eyes. “What? I can’t meet a friend for drinks?”

  She rolled her eyes. “You had to do that here? There was nowhere else in the entire city that you guys could have gone?”

  Crossing his arms over his chest, he glared down at her. “Why should I rearrange my plans? I’ve been coming here for years. I shouldn’t have to change my whole life around to accommodate you.”

  Some of the fight seemed to drain out of her. “Why are you doing this to me, Derick?”

  He allowed his arms to fall to his sides. “What do you mean?”

  “I get that I was horrible to you. I get that I was wrong. But believe me, you telling me good-bye was punishment enough. You don’t need to keep reminding me of what I lost. It’s already something I’ll never be able to forget.”

  He let out a deep breath, causing white air to puff out in front of him. “I’m not trying to make things harder for you, Siobhan.” But as he said the words, he wasn’t so sure they were true. He knew she was right. He could have told Jack to meet him somewhere else. Some casual ribbing from one of his friends had never pressured him into doing anything before. But it had tonight—because he’d let it.

  Derick had wanted to see her. But more than that, he’d wanted to be seen by her. Had wanted her to have to watch him doing something normal and ordinary, as if his life had gone back to how it had been before her.

  As if he could even remember what that life had been like.

  The realization made his chest ache. He’d told her that he’d never want to hurt her intentionally.

  Maybe he was a liar after all.

  “It won’t happen again,” he said, peering into her eyes and hoping that she could see he meant it.

  She sniffled a little, her eyes darting around the busy street. “Good,” she said. “You wanted this to be over, Derick. I need you to follow through with it. It’ll be hard enough trying to get over you without having to see you all the time.”

  She turned to go but his hand reached out before she could move away from him. He didn’t want to look back on this moment and know that he hadn’t been honest during it. That he hadn’t been the man he’d always claimed to be. He’d already lost too much to also lose himself.

  “I don’t want you to get over me.”

  Siobhan looked up at him. “What?”

  He stepped closer to her. “I don’t want you to get over me. Because I’ll never get over you.”

  And without knowing who made the first move, Derick and Siobhan were kissing in the middle of a busy Manhattan street, displaying a love that would never die but seemed to manage to always destroy them both.

  Chapter 15

  Siobhan fell back against Derick’s bed, his weight pressing against her as his lips moved wildly over her skin. She allowed herself to let go, to submit to what they both knew would always be a constant between them. No matter how much one might push the other away, the pull back to each other was a stronger force than anything else in their lives.

  “God, I’ve missed you,” she breathed into his ear before sliding her teeth over it.

  Derick’s response was a low groan that reverberated down her spine as his erection ground against her through his jeans.

  “You’re so hard,” she said. “I want you.”

  “Yeah?”

 
She could feel him smile against her throat as he spoke.

  “Mm-hmm,” she answered.

  The coarse hair of his beard tickled as his mouth moved lower—down to her collarbone and over her stomach as he lifted her shirt over her head. She wanted his hands all over her.

  His knees straddled her as he sat up on her thighs, pinning her in a place she didn’t want to move from anyway. She could see his cock straining against his pants. Needing to feel it, she ran her hands over his length through the denim before unbuttoning his jeans and yanking the zipper down. “Mmm,” she moaned as she rubbed her hand over him through the bright-white cotton of his tight boxer briefs.

  Derick jerked his hips a bit at her touch and then moved to the side to guide her onto her stomach. He unhooked her bra and slid it over each arm so she could shimmy out of it.

  She already loved this—her face pressing against Derick’s bed so she could inhale his scent. God, she’d even missed that.

  His fingers ran along her spine and over the sensitive flesh of her shoulder blades and the back of her neck. She was already grinding against the bed, needing any sort of friction she could get to soothe the sweet ache between her thighs. She knew how wet she must be and could feel the slickness that had probably been there since she’d first seen him at the bar. She didn’t even need him to touch her. His proximity to her was an aphrodisiac on its own.

  And now here she was, lying in his bed again as he touched the most intimate parts of her. He’d been toying with her thong, pulling away the lace far enough to stroke his finger slowly around her entrance without pushing inside. It was a blissful torture that only he knew how to provide.

  Finally Derick pulled her thong down from under her skirt and pushed his fingers inside her. “That feel good?” he asked when she bucked against the mattress.

  “God, yeah,” she said, the comforter stifling her voice as she reached up to grab the edge of the bed so she could ride Derick’s fingers. She was already so close to coming, her body tensing with every smooth motion of his hand, every stroke of his fingertips inside her as they pressed against her walls. “I have no idea what you’re doing, but don’t stop doing it.”

  Derick released a small laugh. “I wasn’t planning on it,” he said, sliding his finger between her ass cheeks.

  And that’s when she came undone. Her hips jerked wildly over his hand as the waves of her release coursed through her, undulating down her core until they gradually subsided.

  “God, you’re sexy when you come,” Derick said.

  He pulled his hand away, leaving her feeling empty and wanting again. She raised her ass in the air enough for him to hike her tight black skirt up around her hips. “I want you, Derick.”

  “Yeah?” he asked, his hand massaging the cheek of her ass before smacking his palm hard against it. “How do you want it?”

  She nearly yelped at the contact. “Jesus, do that again,” she pleaded.

  Thankfully he complied, his hand striking her already sensitive skin with a sharp crack. Then she felt the head of Derick’s cock between her thighs, rubbing delicately over her clit. The slickness from her orgasm lubricated him as he slipped against her, holding himself in his hand as he moved his dick between her folds.

  Desperate to have him inside her, she wiggled against him. “Please, Derick. Make me come again.”

  “Like this? Is this what you want?”

  “Yes,” she huffed.

  And that’s when Derick thrust inside her, plunging so deep it felt like he might stay a part of her forever.

  Maybe he would.

  The fullness she felt as he retracted and then slammed into her had her nearly losing it again. But she wanted to wait for him to get there, too, to feel the pressure building inside her until she was ready to burst.

  His movements grew faster, more forceful. And she could tell he was getting close.

  God, she wanted him to come, to get lost in her as he let go.

  “Come. God, now,” he said as he reached around to stroke her clit in a way that had her coming almost instantly.

  She could feel Derick straining, and she knew he was trying to hold off as he stroked her through the lingering pulses of her orgasm.

  But as soon as she was done, he pulled out of her, flipping her over again so she could see his hand stroking his cock furiously as he raced toward his own release. She’d never watched him do this to himself before, and it might have been the sexiest thing she’d ever seen.

  She took all of him in—the flexed muscles of his chest and shoulders, the hard lines of his abs. Then his entire body tensed with pleasure and he came.

  She hadn’t expected to love it as much as she did. But the way he’d taken control of her, marked her, had her wondering why they hadn’t done this before now.

  Derick leaned down and pressed a lingering kiss to her lips before standing and heading to the bathroom. He returned with a warm washcloth and wiped himself from her body. Once she was clean, he tossed the washcloth into the hamper before returning to the bed and sliding in beside her. He wrapped his arm around her, pulling her close.

  Pressing his face into her hair, he inhaled deeply.

  Siobhan wasn’t sure what to make of his silence. He seemed content wrapping himself around her in his bed, but she was afraid to hope. Settling back into him, she decided that words could wait for morning.

  Chapter 16

  Soft sunlight streamed through the window, casting pale light over Siobhan as she slept beside him.

  He could feel the rise and fall of her chest against his as her head rested in the crook of his arm. Derick wanted to exist in this moment forever. Everything was uncomplicated as they lay there, snuggled together.

  But the reality was pretty damn complicated.

  It had been easy for Derick to ignore their issues in the rush of passion that overtook them as they had stood there in the darkness. Issues that couldn’t be ignored in the stark light of day.

  Derick shook Siobhan lightly. “Hey,” he whispered into her temple when she’d roused. “I think we need to talk.”

  Chapter 17

  Siobhan felt like she was moving on autopilot as she scooted up the bed to lean back against Derick’s oversized plush pillow, pulling the sheet over herself as she went. Derick’s tone let her know that what was coming was probably something she didn’t want to be naked for.

  He sat down on the edge of the bed and turned toward her. He watched his hands as they twisted in his lap before he took a deep breath and looked at her.

  She wasn’t sure what she saw in his eyes. Uncertainty? Sadness? Relief? She wanted to ask, but Derick had requested this conversation. She’d let him lead it.

  Finally he cleared his throat in a way that let her know he was slightly uncomfortable. “That was…Christ, what is wrong with us?”

  Her eyes widened. Hearing him imply that what they had just shared was wrong somehow was shocking. And painful. She hoped that he hadn’t meant it the way it sounded. “That’s a long list,” she said with an awkward laugh that she prayed covered how badly his words had stung her.

  Derick rubbed his face with his hands. “I’m sorry, Siobhan.”

  “Me, too. I know I’ve already said it, but Derick, I really am so sorry. I’ve punished you for my own issues and insecurities, but I’m done with that. Done hurting us both. You’re a great man, and I’ve been crazy to not accept you for who you are. We just need to—”

  “No, that’s not…” Derick stood abruptly and stalked away from her a few steps before turning around. “God, I messed this up so badly.” He returned to his spot on the bed and looked at her intently. “You say you’re sorry, and I can forgive you, Siobhan. I really can. Neither of us has been innocent in all of this. But when it comes to forgetting it…” Derick shook his head. “That’s something I can’t do.”

  Siobhan felt her entire body seize as though all the oxygen had been suddenly removed from the room. “What…what are you saying?”

&
nbsp; “We can’t do this. Come on, Siobhan. You know we can’t. How many times have we been in this exact place? How many times do we have to hurt each other before we leave well enough alone?” Derick’s face softened. “I know I said I didn’t want you to get over me. And that’s the truth. But that doesn’t mean that I don’t think you should. That we both should.”

  Despite racking her brain for words, Siobhan kept coming up empty. After a few tense and silent moments, she quickly got up from the bed and started dressing.

  Derick remained silent as she pulled her clothes on. The only sound was the opening of a drawer and the rustling of his putting clothes on, too.

  She didn’t turn and look at him once she finished dressing. Instead, she made her way out of his bedroom in search of the shoes she’d kicked off somewhere last night. Tears were prickling behind her eyes, but she’d be damned if she’d lose that bit of dignity, too. She would not let him see her cry. Once she’d put her heels on, she made her way toward the elevator.

  “Wait, Siobhan…don’t…don’t leave like this.”

  She turned around and gave a dry laugh. “Like what, exactly?” Her eyes grazed over Derick in sweatpants and a tight black T-shirt. It struck her that this was probably the last time she’d ever see him dressed this casually. Maybe the last time she’d ever see him period.

  He sighed heavily, his shoulders slumping with the exhale. “Hating me.”

  Siobhan’s eyes fell to the floor to try and keep the tears at bay. Once she felt more in control, she looked back up. “I don’t hate you, Derick.”

  He scoffed. “Really? Because I hate me right now. Bringing you back here…it was weak of me. I’m sorry I’m such an asshole.”

  Shrugging, she offered him the last bit of truth she had. “It’s not like you dragged me here. We both made decisions—today, yesterday, and all the days before.”