by Lindsey Hart
The longing she felt wasn’t just physical. It was so much more than that. Curtis was unfairly built, gorgeous to a fault, but it wasn’t just that. Maybe she’d had to think about him as such an asshole so she really wouldn’t ever notice his non-asshole qualities. Maybe she had to wall herself off to protect herself. It was easier to hate someone than feel anything else.
Especially because they could never be good together.
He might have made it clear he was interested in her but really, one massive obstacle stood in their way even if the twisted, broken road in front of them suddenly smoothed out. Even if no other details were issues, not the money, not the power he held as her boss, there was still the big fact that he didn’t want children. And she wasn’t giving up on her dream of being a mother.
She’d never had sex just for the sake of enjoying it. Maybe that was where she went wrong. She’d always wanted it to be meaningful, so she’d never done casual encounters. She always saved it for when she was dating someone. Somehow, though, it was always lacking. It was the ultimate irony that she tried to wait for it to have meaning and then, it never did.
“If you sit there thinking any harder, the blanket is probably going to catch on fire below you from those churning wheels and all that steam pouring out of your ears. You’re like a short-circuiting hand beater that our company mass produced without doing our due diligence.” Not even Curtis’ joking barb could spoil her suddenly squishy, soft mood.
She knew she was going down and she was going down hard. Crashing and burning in the most epic way. “Yeah. Sorry. I was just thinking.”
“You’re missing the sunset.”
She blinked. “I’m not. I’m watching it. Just thinking at the same time. I’m an executive assistant. Multi-tasking is my middle name.”
“Your parents certainly were reading strange baby name books when they had you then.”
She rolled her eyes at his corny comeback, but her lips tugged into a small smile. The blanket rustled below as Curtis edged closer. She didn’t even try to pull away. She’d end up in the grass if she did. She could have. The grass wouldn’t have been so bad, but she didn’t move.
Her entire being froze like a blast of frigid air swept through her insides, chilling them beyond functioning properly. Curtis shifted a little closer and she knew she couldn’t move if she tried. She was about to have an internal meltdown in five seconds. She was turning into a pile of mushy goo, or rainbow slime, as the seconds ticked on.
He was too close. She could feel his body heat. The night was chilling off as the sun went down. He was so warm. So. Warm. So. Close. He smelled so good. Intoxicating.
Her insides turned into a squirmy, liquid mess. If he was the fire, she was the marshmallow. She imagined herself getting all gooey and perfect and then suddenly combusting into flames. She’d never actually roasted a marshmallow before. She’d totally seen videos though. That was her. Gooey. Flames. Charred. She was burning up in her own skin.
And then, Curtis touched her. He edged his hand closer until his fingers brushed hers. She actually gasped like she’d just sat down on a hill of ants and realized that the ants in the pants saying was no joke. His baby finger grasped hers and twined through it like a weird version of a pinkie promise. What was she promising him? Was she agreeing, just like that? Silently, because they didn’t need words? Because words were what was wrong all along? They’d both talked a big game and they were both done with their paltry protests. They were both done sparring, slinging stones and arrows.
Her eyes flew to his face. The purples, pinks, and reds of the sunset were illuminated there, turning his already bronzed complexion into a burnished gold. She shivered.
“I wanted you from the first day I saw you.”
Lexi blinked. That was not what she expected to hear. “I didn’t. I didn’t want you from the first day I met you.” Her words were lacking their normal heat. Maybe they really were done sparring.
“I can live with that.” Curtis went on the offensive, reaching over with his free hand and running the pad of his thumb down her cheek. She tried not to revel in the callousness.
“Why are your fingers rough? All you do all day is type on your laptop and indulge in rich, entitled things.”
Curtis chuckled under his breath. “Lord. You have no idea, but I applaud the effort. I actually enjoy woodwork. I have a shop at the house. In the garage. You never went out there. I do a little every single day. It was something my grandfather loved too. This cabin was only half finished when he bought it. He did the rest. Finished all the inside. Built most of the furniture too.”
Lexi tried not to think about the detailed cabinets, the amazing kitchen table with the carved legs or the nightstands and dressers in the bedroom that she’d put her suitcase in. It made it too real, too personal. She could imagine Curtis’ grandfather with a five year old Curtis, teaching him how to hold some woodworking tool. It made her feel all soft and weird inside. She didn’t want to feel soft or weird.
“Right. Well, you’re still a jerk. A rich jerk. My boss jerk. This is never going to happen.”
His finger ran down her cheek and caressed her jaw, sending off a shower of sparks through her bloodstream. Her heart hammered so loud it sounded like a freaking frog was standing between them, bellowing out his mating call. No, she was not pounding out a mating anything. That was a stupid thought. Being so close to Curtis, his dark blue eyes, as dark and alive as the lake’s surface as it mirrored the sunset, was doing horrible things to her.
“It would ruin our lives,” she went on. “Or at least, my life. Which you obviously don’t care about. You can fire me. Hire another one of me. Find a model, find- find anyone else….”
“You’re wrong.” The pad of his thumb smoothed over her bottom lip. The spark shower in her blood reached apocalyptic proportions. “There isn’t anyone else like you. You don’t give a shit that I have money. You don’t care about anything I own. That’s not who I am to you.”
“You don’t need money to be an asshole.”
Curtis sighed, but it wasn’t a sigh of impatience. It was one of those sighs that told her that he knew very well she was going to surrender soon.
“We’re back to that, are we?”
“If we do this, it’s not going to be anything more than hate sex.”
“Who said anything about sex?”
Lexi froze. Curtis’ fingers swept over her bare arm. The hair stood up, mirroring the blazing path of fiery warmth his finger traversed.
“It’s a one off,” she went on. She should shut her mouth, but for some reason, the words just kept falling out of it. “I’m going to take that job in marketing if it happens, just so I never have to see you again. I- I want your promise that if we do this, uh- any of this, that I won’t be fired.”
“Of course you won’t be fired.”
“It’s not logical,” Lexi argued, probably just with herself. “I don’t even like you. You’re not a nice person. I- you- you have too much money. You don’t have an appreciation for how real people live. For the struggles the rest of us go through.”
“You’re right,” Curtis pursed under his breath. He was so close. His face mere inches away. “I know nothing about what it means to be real. I don’t know what it’s like to lose loved ones or hurt or be lonely or what it’s like to be used. I don’t know what it is to truly want a beautiful woman who likes to pretend that she doesn’t want me too. I don’t know anything about the pains and stings of unrequited love. I don’t know anything about wanting a particular woman, thinking about her day and night, and the pain of understanding that she hates me unjustly.”
“Love?” Lexi scoffed.
Curtis’ lips curled just a little and she breathed out a harsh breath of relief. He was using that word lightly, the way she would. The way anyone would if they didn’t know what it truly meant to feel it.
“Substitute any word you’d like. It doesn’t change that we’re here. That we’re here right now. Th
at you agreed to come.”
“I was forced into it.”
“Were you?” His brow quirked. He was toying with her. He was enjoying himself. He was also far too close. So close that it was hard for her lungs to expand and contract to draw in enough breath to sustain her. Maybe that’s why there were suddenly black spots dancing in front of her eyes.
“We both know that’s not the truth. So what if I’m your boss. Maybe it wouldn’t be such a mess. Maybe we could both be professional after. Maybe you’d enjoy it. Maybe you’d want a repeat. Maybe you’d let go of the notion that I don’t have a heart or feelings.”
“I’m very well aware that you have a heart,” Lexi sniffed. She couldn’t let Curtis get in, under her skin. He was dangerous. So. Freaking. Lethal. It was like he was a snake and he’d bitten her. The venom was spreading through her veins and she didn’t have the anti-venom to save herself. “You do have a heart. It’s black and metallic and cold.”
Before she knew what he was doing, Curtis’ hand gripped hers. He captured her fingers and brought her palm up. She was too stunned to pull it away when he set it on his chest. His. Chest. His warm, cotton clad, muscular, hard, slightly damp, very alive, incredibly sensual, chest. He set her fingertips right over his heart. She knew that her face must be scarlet, but she couldn’t look away any more than she could tear her hand away from that furious beating. It was rapid and it was there, very much alive.
“I think if you gave it a chance, you’d find that it’s not any of those things.”
“I think if I gave you a chance, I’d find that you’re even more of an asshole beneath the surface. We’re from different worlds. You’re my boss. You’re-”
“You’re making this so much more difficult than it has to be. Really, it’s quite simple. We’re two people who want each other and we’re here. Alone.”
“Because you made it, very conveniently, happen that way,” Lexi hissed. Curtis’s heart beat on below her fingertips.
Curtis looked like he was enraptured by the beauty of the sunset, but he wasn’t looking at the sunset. He was staring at her. She was staring back since she couldn’t tear her eyes away.
“This is going to happen,” he said softly. His usual mask of professionalism and indifference slid away and there was something there she’d rarely glimpsed before. Vulnerability. He’d let her peek into it, behind that steel façade before, but never like he did at this moment. He was so painfully… human, that it stole her breath all over again. “We both knew that. We both know it.”
Lexi’s heart went wild, thumping and beating furiously out of her chest as Curtis angled his head. He tilted his face, titled it down. Angled it towards hers. Lexi knew that he was going to kiss her. She couldn’t pull away, but she made one last feeble attempt at defending her heart, which Curtis had so effortlessly stripped bare. He’d disarmed her in one single day. No, not a single day. He’d been waging war against her defenses for years. It didn’t help that she’d been waiting in her high tower, just waiting to wave that white flag, even if she’d deny it to her dying breath.
“I’m not your type,” she panted.
“What the hell are you talking about?” Curtis muttered under his breath. “You most definitely are my type. You’re the most beautiful woman in the world.”
“You’re just saying that.”
“I am saying it, and it’s the truth. There isn’t anyone like you. I’ve known it for a year now. When I finally opened my eyes and saw you. I’ve been waiting, Lex. For a year. I haven’t been with anyone else.”
“Maybe that’s what makes you such a jerk. Your balls must feel like they’re in a vice by now.” She wanted to clap a hand over her mouth. She couldn’t believe she’d just said that.
Curtis lifted his hand away from hers at his chest, but hers stayed. He cupped her cheek gently and leaned closer. His lips were just a breath away. Literally, since she could feel the warm, minty puffs of his blazing over her jaw, chin, cheeks, lips. She could feel him everywhere. Her nipples puckered under her bra and further down south, her lady bits shivered and tingled. Her whole body thrilled and flushed.
Curtis caressed her cheek. She leaned into it.
His lake blue eyes darkened, his pupils dilating.
His heart thundered like a herd of wild horses under her fingertips. Hers joined in that stampede.
“Is it okay that I want you, Lexi?”
Jesus. The way he said her name was liquid fire and exotic silk all rolled into one. She wanted him. Wanted his god body on hers. Wanted him desperately. Wanted him with all the passion that years of pent up denial suddenly spun out and unraveled. She wanted him more than she’d ever wanted anything. Wanted his kiss. Wanted his calloused fingertips on her skin. Wanted him to bring her to life. She wanted all of him. Jerk. Boss. Trust Fund Baby. The James she knew and the Curtis she didn’t.
He didn’t move. Didn’t just claim her. Didn’t take what she wasn’t willing to give. Didn’t act one inch like the entitled jackass she thought he was. The air crackled and shimmered between them, the sky painted with all the glories of the golden sun as the only witness to the very real, very surprising passion that was driving her crazy.
“I don’t know.” It was the only honest answer she could give.
It didn’t stop her from leaning in those few inches, the longest nearly negligible distance she’d ever covered in her life. She crossed those inches and it was her who leaned in. It was her who brought their faces together. So. Close. It was her who set her lips on Curtis’.
Fire exploded between them like the sun fell out of the sky and landed straight in their laps. Her entire world was painted a thousand times brighter than that dimming sunset in the distance. She was drowning in the golden light, getting sucked deeper and deeper.
Kissing Curtis wasn’t anything like she thought it would be. She could never have dreamt of putting that sensation into words. There were no words. No words before. During. There’d be no words after either.
And then… when she was truly lost, waving her white flag high and crazily, his lips took over and he really, truly kissed her.
CHAPTER 17
Curtis
The kiss wasn’t everything he’d been waiting so long for. It was so much more. It wasn’t just a kiss. It felt like… it felt strangely like destiny. Like, when his grandfather picked out that half built cabin for the woman he loved so very much, he’d set in motion an entire chain of events that could never be altered. It didn’t entirely make sense and it was probably just mushy, fairy tale style garbage, but that was the way he felt. He didn’t feel it lightly either since he was far more given to pessimistic musings when it came to romance.
He was done holding back. His hand stayed locked on Lexi’s dainty chin, but the other tangled in her sandy tresses, tugging her closer. She whimpered low in her throat but didn’t pull away. Instead, her lips opened up in invitation.
He swept his tongue over her lush bottom lip before he sucked it into his mouth and bit down gently. She writhed against him, her chest slamming into his as her hands tangled around his neck. When her tongue pushed into his mouth, taking him off guard, he knew that the blue balls he’d been battling for a year were worth it.
Curtis stroked Lexi’s tongue. He nipped her lip, he thrust his tongue into her mouth. He chased. He was the aggressor. He let her take the lead right before stealing it back. He ate her low whimpers and her furious sounds of pleasure. She was perfection and he threw everything he had into giving her that perfect kiss. He knew he might not have another chance.
He nipped her lip again, the warmth of copper blooming in his mouth as he tugged at her hair hard enough to make her gasp. What do you know, Lexi bit back. She sucked his lip into her mouth and sunk her teeth in. The sting was absolutely fucking delicious. He felt like a bundle of nerves, a powder keg about to be blown to the sky.
Maybe Lexi felt the same way because her hand snaked under his shirt boldly. Her fingers were scalding on his already ov
erheated skin. He let her explore. Let her trail her velvet soft fingers up the ridges of his abs. Let her stroke his tongue as she stroked his pecs. Let her clash her teeth into his as she flicked her thumb over his nipple. He swallowed her moans and gave her his darker, feral groans.
Apparently, she was done with taking shit slow. She was done with not wanting him. She was done with protests and pretense because she slipped her hand out of his shirt and started going at the button on his jeans. How the hell could that simple touch alone just about make him explode?
“I want these off,” she demanded breathlessly as she pulled away.
He pulled her back, claiming her mouth so furiously that their teeth smashed again. “Ladies first,” he shot back right after he blistered her lips again.
Her eyes darkened into that feral blue. The sun had just about set, smearing everything that dusky grey blue that is hard as fuck to see through. Except he was seeing fine. Every detail of Lexi’s pleasure blown pupils, the flare of her nostrils and the curl of her kiss swollen lips was etched in his mind in vivid detail.
Apparently, she was on board with that in a major way, because her hands left his jeans and flew to hers. She made quick work of them, peeling that tight denim that had been teasing him all day, down her legs in record time. She tried to kick them aside, got her ankle stuck in one pant leg, and let out a shriek as she toppled onto her side. Shocked, she stayed that way for a second while he held his breath. Then she laughed. She let out a musical sound that was pretty much like angels singing up in the sky. It was real. Genuine. Beautiful. And he loved it. Every single lilting, lyrical note.
He reached down and freed Lexi’s ankles before he tossed her jeans aside. Her flip flops were already settled on the edge of the blanket. It was just her, the tight red tank she’d revealed earlier in the day after she’d stripped the plain sweater off under the hot summer sun, and her white cotton panties. They were darkened in the center with her desire, and it was enough to make his balls kick up into his stomach like they’d been smashed with a baseball bat. They kind of had. A Lexi sized bat.