FLIRTING WITH 40

by K. Bromberg

  “Unbutton your pants,” she demands.

  I quirk an eyebrow and fight my own smile. “Bossy, bossy.”

  She takes a step toward me. “You told me earlier that, if I want something, I need to go after it.”

  “In so many words, yes.” There’s a slight tremble to her hands, her nerves flickering for a moment. I know this must be hard for her, but damn it if I’m not proud of her for stepping out of her comfort zone. I’m definitely not going to complain that she’s stepping out of it with me. “What is it you want?”

  She gives me a devil of a grin before she takes another step forward. “You.”

  Confidence looks so good on her.

  “You trying to howl at the moon, Blake?”

  She pushes me back against a tree and then drops to her knees. “You going to stop me?” I tense in anticipation when her hands find my zipper and our gazes meet. My smile is half-cocked and a guttural groan rumbles through me when those lips of hers wrap around my dick. She flutters those lashes at me and breaks her suction. “I dare you to tell me you don’t want this.”

  I chuckle as my hand fists in her hair so she’s forced to look at me when I say it. “Not on your goddamn life.”

  My moan settles through the trees as she takes me deep into her mouth with the first touch of her lips.

  All thoughts vanish.

  All cares are gone.

  It’s just me and her mouth and the warm, wet suction she uses that has my head falling back and my hand wrapping around strands of her ponytail, begging her to slow down so I don’t come so fast and urging her to go harder so I can.

  It’s heaven and hell and fire and ice and every lustful tug between.

  I see stars as her tongue slides over me and around my tip. She moans as her hand grabs my balls to play with them while her mouth suctions around me and takes me deep.

  “Blake.” My groan is guttural and raw and is exactly how she makes me feel.

  She adds pressure with her hands, her fingers, her lips. Faster. Slower. Softer. Harder. I begin fucking her mouth as the pressure builds and the need swells.

  My hands grip tighter. My muscles tense. My cock throbs. My growl cuts through the silence as she swallows every last drop I give her.

  My head swims, and my body sings with endorphins.

  It takes a few seconds to wade through the post-coming haze, but when I do, Blakely is standing before me. Her lips are swollen, her eyes are heavy with desire, and her hair a mess. She’s never looked more beautiful.

  “What?” I ask as she just stares.

  “There. We’re even.”

  “Even?” I laugh as I tuck my dick back into my pants.

  “You surprised me last night. I surprised you today.”

  I take a step forward. “That’s a dangerous game to start playing with a man who loves dares.” I put my hand on the back of her neck and pull her into me so I can kiss her. It’s brief but packs a punch, and when it ends, I keep her close so she can see my eyes when I speak. “There is no even in sex, Blakely. There’s pleasure. There’s wanting to make the person you’re with fly. There’s enjoying watching them soar and knowing you gave that to them. If sex is a contest you have to win, then you’re doing it all wrong.” Another kiss that, this time, begs me to fuck her. “I’ll always get mine in the end . . . it’s the journey to get you there that makes mine all that much more enjoyable.”

  “Oh.”

  My favorite sound of hers again.

  But I love the way her throat moves as she swallows hard, how her eyes widen, how her breath hitches.

  “Hey, Blake?” I pick up the tackle box and chuckle. “You can be bossy with me anytime.”

  Blakely

  “Aren’t you supposed to be helping me fish?” I ask as I glance to Slade, who is texting someone yet again.

  He’s been the most attentive man in the world this entire trip, but now that I need his help, he’s on his phone.

  “I thought that was against the rules?” He quirks a brow.

  “Doesn’t seem to me like you care too much about rules in the first place.”

  “Guilty as charged.” He flashes me a grin that screams mischief. “And yes, I am in fact helping you as we speak.”

  “On your phone?”

  “Yep.”

  “Do you care to explain because texting is not helping me.”

  “Yes it is.” He tosses his cell onto the cooler and leans back on his hands. “You should be catching a fish in about ten minutes.”

  “What am I missing here?”

  “I’ll tell you if you tell me what you have planned for Heather?” he offers.

  I’m not sure I like that trade.

  “You’ll know when it happens.”

  “Okay.” He lifts the bottle of beer to his lips and takes a long sip of it. “Then I guess I can’t tell you how you’re going to win the fishing contest today.”

  I bark out a laugh. “Win? We’ve been sitting here for over an hour without a single bite on my line while we can hear others shriek in excitement when they catch one on whatever designated spot she gave them.”

  “Exactly. This whole contest was rigged, which is what I figured would happen after going drinking with the boys the other day. Horrible Heather’s man was a little loose-lipped when he finally decided to join us. He kept talking about how she was picking everyone’s fishing spots.” He shrugs. “I may have done some reconnaissance on my morning jogs. I befriended a few locals who fish out here daily.”

  “So, you’re saying . . .”

  “I’m saying she gave you the one place in the entire lake where you have the worst chance of catching a fish. The waterbed here has some kind of algae in it the fish won’t eat, so they don’t bother with the area.”

  “That bitch.”

  “Yep.” He nods. “And according to Dan, she knows which location is affected by it.”

  “It shouldn’t surprise me.”

  “It shouldn’t, but what I’ve done to fix it should.” He looks over his shoulder. “And there he is. Right on time.”

  “Slade?” I say as I rise to my feet when I hear someone whistling on the path that leads to our little beach. “Who’s that?”

  “Impeccable timing,” Slade says to the man as he stands and jogs toward where the cutest little old man appears. He has on a bucket hat covered in hooks and lures and tufts of his gray hair are peeking out beneath its rim. He’s wearing dark green waders and is carrying a large bucket in one hand. “Ed. My man.”

  The two shake hands as water sloshes over the side of the bucket. I stare, my jaw slack with shock because it’s easy enough to assume what’s in that water.

  “Perfect,” Slade says and the two of them laugh over something before Slade pats him on the back and thanks him. Ed grants me a mischievous smile before giving me a mock salute and then turning to go back to wherever he came from.

  “Slade Henderson. Who’s Ed? What is that?”

  He offers me a devilish grin. “Ed is Ed and this is your winning catch.”

  I look into the bucket and squeal at the fish swimming inside it. He’s brown and fat and huge by my fishing standards.

  “How? What? That’s cheating!”

  “Exactly.” He presses a kiss to my lips before swinging the bucket a bit too close to me and making me jump back. “And a little cheating when the game is already rigged won’t hurt anyone.”

  “How in the hell did you . . .” I’m dumbfounded. I point in the direction of where Ed just was. “One of the locals?”

  “Yep.” He looks into the bucket. “I may have stopped to chat a bit with him on my morning runs. We talked fishing. We discussed a mutual acquaintance we know at the hospital. And he was more than willing to help a nice guy like me to win a contest to impress a girl.” He winks at me.

  And if Ed knows Slade was trying to impress a girl, then that means he was talking about me.

  With a random stranger.

  “I told him a bit about what
was going on. He told me a lot about how he may have done a few things to trick his wife into falling for him.” He shakes his head as the cutest smile forms on his lips. “After that, he asked if he could help.”

  “But why?” I ask. Why would that man help Slade, and why would Slade do that for me?

  “Because I didn’t know if you were going to put Heather in her place or not—mind you, this was before I knew you had a secret plan—so I figured I’d help a little. Plus, he didn’t come out of the deal empty handed.”

  “Care to explain?”

  He smiles sheepishly. “I gave him some advice on a medical issue—he really loves his wife—”

  “You prescribed him Viagra?” I sputter.

  “No. That would be unprofessional of me, and I’m already in enough trouble in that department. But I gave him the name of a few specialists I know at the hospital who can most likely help him. In turn, he offered to give me the biggest fish he caught today, so long as I promised not to kill it and then release it after everyone sees it.”

  “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

  “As a heart attack, and you know us cardio guys don’t say that lightly.” He chuckles and leans in. “Now, we just need to scream really loud so everyone knows you caught one.”

  “You’re so bad.”

  “I know, and doesn’t it feel good to be?” He leans forward and presses a chaste and unexpected kiss to my lips. “So let’s scream and make some noise, then I’m going to pick this guy up so you can snap a photo of him—without the bucket in the background, of course—and then we’ll throw him back to live another day.”

  “Are we really doing this?” I ask.

  “Yes, Blakely, we are. She wouldn’t hesitate to do it to you.”

  Blakely

  “That was cooler than cool. You have to know that.”

  Slade is leaning back in the lounge chair and hooks one of his legs under his other and angles his arm behind his head. Those light grayish-blue eyes of his just stare at me.

  “What was?” I ask and take a sip of wine as the smell of meat on the barbecue on the other side of the lodge wafts our way. My stomach growls, but regardless of how hungry I am, I’m soaking in this silence with him.

  “You telling the team that even though you won the contest, you wanted them to share in it too. The offer to take them to dinner will go a long way with them. It’s something a leader does, and I think they’ll remember in the future that it was your win, but you made it about them too. It was admirable of you.”

  “It’s the least I could do considering I didn’t win fair and square.” I shrug. “Besides, we’re a team. We’re supposed to win together and lose together.”

  “And to think you still get a one-on-one mentorship meeting with Heather,” he says sarcastically then snorts. “The look on her face was priceless when she realized you were the winner of her esteemed prize.”

  “It took everything I had not to burst out laughing.”

  Her stilted expression when the counselors posted the pictures on the projector screen and our, er, Ed’s fish, was the biggest by far.

  Her tight smile. Her fake enthusiasm. Her very crafted words as she had to concede her loss to me because, let’s face it, the way she was talking before the proof was posted, you would have thought she had won.

  But she didn’t.

  Score one for the good guys.

  “I truly think she had every intention of winning the contest so the whole one-on-one thing with her for the winner was pure bullshit.”

  “I couldn’t agree more.” I raise my glass up to toast the tip of his bottle of beer. “Thank you. I mean it.”

  He smiles. It’s soft and warm and makes me want to crawl into that small space beside him on his chair.

  “I do believe I’m making progress towards winning our little side bet. She’s coming around. The promotion is in sight.”

  “I don’t know . . . I did tell you satisfaction was a hard thing to measure,” I tease.

  “Then I guess I’ll have to try a little harder,” he says before sitting up and pressing a kiss to my lips.

  When he leans back, when those eyes of his dance with humor, I’m left wondering when exactly this charade we were putting on started feeling like more than just a sexy distraction.

  Because no one was around for that kiss to be needed.

  No one was there to pretend for.

  It’s just him and me and a whole lot of satisfaction left in the balance.

  Slade

  She’s gorgeous.

  Dark hair fanned across the pillow, skin that’s been kissed by the sun contrasting against the white sheets, dark eyelashes against her cheeks, lips that beg to be kissed.

  It’s a snapshot I want to memorize.

  I think of last night. Of her sitting atop me with the moonlight coming through the open blinds. Of the arch of her back. Of the cry of my name. Of the pure exhaustion that tumbled us into sleep soon thereafter.

  She stirs. Her chest rises and falls with each breath, the peaks of her nipples taunting me through the thin cotton covers.

  When I’m with her, it’s so easy to forget the shit going on in my life—the waiting, the wondering, the wanting. Yet, at the same time, if the shit hits the fan and goes against my favor, it would be that much easier because of her.

  Christ.

  She’s a chick. Just a woman. One I’ve known for fewer than two weeks, so why am I thinking shit like that? Why am I wondering what will happen when life gets in the way and endless shifts call again?

  “Good morning.” Her sleep-drugged voice breaks through my thoughts.

  That’s why I’m wondering. That right here. Those green eyes fluttering open. That sleepy smile dragging across her lips. The urge to pull her close to me and just hold on.

  “Morning.”

  “Please tell me you weren’t watching me sleep.”

  “Of course not. You’re a horrid sight to behold. Drooling and snoring and half-open eyes.” I mock shiver. “And you’re still absolutely gorgeous.”

  The flush of her cheeks from the simple comment validates all those thoughts I was just refuting.

  I reach out and put a hand on her knee, which is bent up by my hip, and run my thumb back and forth over the cool fabric of the sheet.

  Silence falls once again, sleep beginning to pull me back into its clutches when she speaks.

  “You talked about fear yesterday.” She clears her throat, and I open my eyes to meet hers, curious where she’s going with this. I give a subtle nod for her to go on. “Before this trip . . . before you, really, I was petrified of losing my job.”

  “Understandable, but besides the obvious, may I ask why?” I squeeze her hip to reassure her. “You have a ton of experience. Any other company would be lucky to have you. You even said other companies have tried to recruit you before . . . so, why the fear?”

  Her sigh is heavy. “Because as much as Paul and I separating was for the best, it still messed me up. He was part of my identity, and with him gone, I think maybe I was lost. My job was the one part of me that I knew without question. I don’t have to fumble around to find Glam Blakely like I’ve been trying to find the new Blakely. My work is the me I understand, and so . . .” She averts her eyes, suddenly lost in that vulnerability I felt yesterday.

  “It makes sense,” I murmur.

  And it does. It even brings to light her sudden insecurity when it comes to Heather. A woman about the same age as the woman her husband replaced her with. Both women are threatened by her in different ways, but only one of them can possibly take the one thing she wants—her promotion.

  “Thank you,” she says, her eyes finding mine again.

  “For?”

  “For being honest with me yesterday. It may not have been what I wanted to hear, but it’s what I needed to hear. I mean, I’ve been so fixated on certain things that I kind of lost my way.” She reaches out and runs a hand over my jawline. I turn my face into it and press a
kiss to her palm.

  “I meant what I said about what I see when I look at you, Blakely. You have a quiet strength you deny and a confidence you downplay. If you only realized how stunning you are . . . watch out world.”

  Her smile is soft, shy, and I slide my arm around her waist and pull her closer. I can’t resist. Her cheek is against my chest, and my chin is on top of her head as we lie with our legs intertwined and assurances unspoken.

  Our bodies fit perfectly together. It’s weird how that happens.

  “Shouldn’t you be getting ready for your first set of meetings?”

  “Yeah,” she says, the heat of her breath hitting my chest, “but I think I’m going to shake some things up today.”

  “You are, are you?”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “A rebel now?” I press a kiss to the top of her head.

  “What can I say? You inspire me.”

  Slade

  “Dr. Schultz. It’s good to hear from you.”

  Breathe, Slade. Fucking, breathe.

  “Thank you for coming in on Monday to answer our questions. The hospital review board needed to hear your voice and put a face to it.”

  “Agreed.” I walk from one side of the shoreline to the other, my phone in hand as I wait for whatever it is that was so important he needed to call me, my goddamn future riding on his next few words.

  “It doesn’t change the outcome—that we still need to wait for her to wake up—but I think they needed to understand that you acted out of concern rather than because you had a God complex.”

  “Thank you for the opportunity, sir.”

  He clears his throat. “I know you’ve been prohibited from checking in on Ivy so I thought you might like an updated status on her condition.”

  His words take me back. “Yes, sir. Of course.”

  “She hasn’t regained consciousness yet, but she is showing signs of improvement. Her vitals are stronger, and she’s reacting to stimuli more so than before. Her doctor is optimistic. She’s a fighter.”

  “That’s good to know. Thank you for updating me.” I run a hand through my hair and just stare out at the water.