* * * *
Her bladder was close to bursting and her head pounded as if she’d spent the night on a bender. On automatic pilot, she pushed away the plush comforter and slid her legs over the edge of the bed. When her feet touched down on the luxurious carpet, her senses flooded back in a hurry.
Where the hell was she?
She swung her gaze around the room, taking in the decoration. The ivory colored walls, heavy damask draperies and a mahogany armoire were unfamiliar. The groaning man who struggled to sit up brought a smile to her face, though.
“Do you know you snore?” he asked while stifling a yawn. His eyes widened before a pillow hit him squarely in the face.
“I do not!”
Jesse shrugged. “If you say so, but I’m the one who listened to it for most of the night.”
His hair stuck out to the side again. His eyes were a little bloodshot, too. Neither of them could have gotten much sleep, and it showed on him. Although, even with uncharacteristic five o’clock shadow, he was just as handsome as ever. Absolutely adorable. Hell, she adored him.
As for her, maybe she’d avoid the mirror and hope she fared better, although she doubted it. Her body ached in places she didn’t know existed, and she felt like curling up under the covers again. On top of that, Eden didn’t want to question how they’d ended up here, wherever here was, because being alone with Jesse was the last thing she expected.
For now, nature called. Ignoring him, she plodded into the adjacent bathroom, shutting the door behind her. After a quick glance around the room large enough to hold half of her apartment and with décor that put most art galleries to shame, she made use of the facilities.
After washing her hands, she opened a package containing a toothbrush and toothpaste and used them to wash away some of the sleep. Still feeling grimy, she decided to take a quick shower before facing him.
The double-showerhead was heavenly. It rained down perfectly soothing droplets of water that washed away the fatigue creeping through her bones. In the hypnotic drum, she reflected on the man waiting for her beyond the bathroom door.
Eden washed quickly because she wanted to confront Jesse and find out what was going on. She’d been certain he no longer wanted to see her. What had changed his mind? Then again, when all was said and done, did she really care?
The shower curtain suddenly flew open and she whirled to face the man who plagued her thoughts. Jesse stood in the nude, his gaze trailing from her feet, up her body until he met her eyes. Based on the lust written all over his face and stance, she’d been plaguing his thoughts too.
The green slits of his narrowed eyes gave her reason to pause. Deep beneath the lust of his gaze, a hint of anger still simmered. Was this now to be a repeat of what happened yesterday in his office? Would he take her roughly again? Take out his anger on her body while she gratefully and wantonly accepted it? She’d been so certain in her pleasure of seeing him when she woke up that she didn’t have a chance to process the true meaning behind it—the why of the situation. Now, for the first time since she met him, she was nervous about being alone with him.
“Move over,” he grunted.
She raised her eyebrows. Those certainly hadn’t been the first words she expected out of his mouth. Something in his manner made her drop the snarky reply poised on her lips. Instead, she pushed the curtain further to the side. When she started to step down, his arm shot out, effectively blocking her path.
“Stay where you are.”
Her spine stiffened of its own accord, but her feet somehow managed to obey. Apparently, they knew a ticking time bomb when confronted with it.
Jesse stepped under the spray of the water and turned his face into it. A groan that sounded eerily like hers a few minutes ago escaped from him as tension melted out of him. She would know. It was exactly how she’d felt.
As he soaped his body, she tried not to follow the path of his hands, but instead focus on the where, when and especially why of the situation. But, she couldn’t help notice that he’d missed a spot beneath his pectoral. She could just reach out and splay her hand over the hard contours there, help him out…
No. Focus on something else.
She’d betrayed him in the worst possible way, and here they were, alone in a shower together in a fancy hotel. Alone. Where no one knew where she was. Not at his house with neighbors as witnesses. They were some place where they could be anonymous.
Oh, hell.
He was going to kill her. It wasn’t like she didn’t have it coming.
She almost screamed when he turned to face her. Her heart settled down when his words sank in. “Do my back?”
Despite immediately feeling foolish, her hands trembled as she ran them over his tanned skin. Trails of soapy bubbles followed her movements, the muscles of his back tensing and flexing as if her very touch scalded him. Eden continued to rub until he hummed a soft moan. Jesse tensed again almost immediately. As if he didn’t want her to know how she affected him. He faced her.
“Your turn,” he whispered.
This was the same man who blindfolded her in his bedroom. The same one who trusted her with bringing his business from the brink of destruction. The same one who, despite everything they’d been through in a few short days, held her heart.
He guided her in the large shower. He even braced her hands against the tile walls. The sensation of his fingers as he swept her hair over a shoulder hinted at some of the tenderness that still existed between them. When he massaged soap over her back, she curled into his touch.
Heavenly.
* * * *
As soon as she had closed the bathroom door, Jesse chastised himself for being too eager. He was like a teenager on his first date. All he could think about was whether or not they’d make it past first base.
Now, as he ran the soap over her soft skin, he marveled. He wanted so much to be with her. Even now, he tested every limit of his self-control. The urge to throw her against the wall, and pump himself inside of her over and over again until they were both too spent to stand ate at him. He envied the water’s ability to travel all over her satiny brown skin. All he could do was follow its trail with his fingertips.
She arched her back and he throbbed painfully.
Jesus. He could just slide right in. She would be ready for him. He knew she would.
He slid soapy hands over the fleshy globes of her ass and probed her slick heat.
Fuck. So ready.
“Jesse?”
The way she said his name, so unsure, made him smile. He didn’t respond, just continued to explore. First one finger, then another. Up to one knuckle and then two. He pushed into her warm sheath, searching for the sweet spot that made her tremble.
“Jes…Jesse?”
He leaned closer, pressing his mouth next to her ear. “I only counted four the first time and I don’t renege on deals. Ever.” Finding the spot, he curled his fingers into it with slow, sensual intensity. “We’d better start counting all over again. Five orgasms, right, beautiful?”
Eden’s answering moan echoed off the tiles. He clamped down on the soft flesh of her neck with his teeth and moved his fingers harder and faster. Her hands searched the wall for purchase, scrambling for something to clasp onto. Her body vibrated beneath him as she groaned out his name repeatedly.
Then he did pull his fingers out only to slide his cock in until his pelvis pressed against her ass. The water beating down on his back and her keening cries spurred him to pump into her again and again. She rotated her hips against him, meeting him thrust for thrust. Her head fell back against him as he continued to drive himself into her heat. The way her pussy grasped him like a fist opening and closing around him matched the rhythmic beat of his heart.
The shuddering gasps. The way she said his name in the heat of passion. The hungry cries of "Oh God!" All of those noises almost made him forget himself inside of her. Still, he wanted more.
Jesse slammed into her one more time, stopping onl
y when he’d bottomed out. Her pussy pulsed around his cock, producing a groan from him as he tried to calm his boiling blood. Swiftly, he pulled out and forced her back against the wall. He hooked her lean thigh over his arm and slid back in, eliciting another low moan from her and a throaty growl from him.
“Look at me,” he murmured. Her eyes snapped open, then unfocused as he rolled his hips. He would have none of that. His voice hardened. “Look. At. Me.”
She did and the rich, dark coffee of her eyes riveted him. For a moment, the pulsing spray of warm water was forgotten. Beneath his palm, the cool tile that he leaned on for support vanished. Even the sultry mist swirling around them disappeared. Time stood still and in that moment, all he knew was Eden.
Her irresistible lips drew him in. His eyes still fixed on hers, he pressed his mouth over hers, a burst of mint assaulting his senses. As their lips met, her fingers gripped him painfully. Her pussy began to spasm. The base of his cock tightened and he prayed for a reprieve. Just a little bit longer, so he could tilt her all the way over the edge, too.
Gritting his teeth, he pushed harder, faster. Every nerve ending he possessed seemed to terminate at the head of his cock where she squeezed with increasingly frantic rhythm. Just before his body succumbed to the torment, Eden trembled and then stiffened. He drank down the scream that immediately escaped from her, his cock pounding voraciously into her depths.
A flare of heat and a rush of moisture from her pussy was his undoing.
All that he was poured into her. Even if he wanted to, he couldn’t stop the pulse after sizzling pulse of his cum. Driven by some primal need, he panted out her name, grasping her thighs tightly, driving himself over and over. He couldn’t stop. Couldn’t fucking stop the waves of pleasure ebbing and flowing over him. Where his ecstasy ended and hers began, he couldn’t tell. At last, during the hazy thought he might very well happily die from sensory overload, she drained the last of his essence.
By the time his shaky limbs obeyed his commands again, he had relaxed his hold on her thighs. His hips continued their slow roll though, his semi-erect cock still buried between her thighs. Eden looked at him with wonder in her eyes and a sly smile on her face. Jesse returned the grin.
He was just getting started.
Chapter Twelve
Only a miracle would get her legs back in proper working order. She was sure of it.
They’d probably used up enough hot water during the multiple trysts in the shower to run a few households for a month. That didn’t stop him from dragging her onto the bed for another round, taking her once on the lounge chair and then making her scream with exhilarating fear as he pounded into her later in front of the open sliding glass window.
Back on the bed again, Jesse trailed his fingers over her back, stopping only when he reached the crack of her ass. She slapped him playfully away. “Don’t even think about it, bub.”
He snorted out a laugh. “Don’t worry. I think you broke it.”
Lord, but that made two of them.
With a giggle, she turned to reach for her food, dipped a French fry into some ketchup, and contentedly munched on the room service delivery. The pause gave her a minute to mull over the events, even though they brought a blush to her face. Despite his obvious, renewed affection for her, she couldn’t help but wonder what brought about the change.
The bed dipped as he reached for a fry from her plate. The heat of his stare as he chewed forced her to look in his direction. She cocked her head and smiled. “What?”
“You tell me,” he said. “What?”
There didn’t seem to be much point in putting it off any longer. Curiosity made her itch. “Why are we here?” she asked softly. “Yesterday, I thought…well, I don’t know what I thought. But this wasn’t it.”
He rolled over onto his back and stared at the ceiling. Almost of its own volition, her gaze traveled over his chest and abdomen, sneaking down for another look at the column of flesh that titillated her. His heavy sigh brought her attention back to his face.
“The long and short of it is that I wanted to wake up next to you, Eden.” A heavy hand raked through his hair. His gaze flickered to her before seeking the comfort of the ceiling again. “And I asked myself if I had to do this weekend over again, from start to finish, just how it played out, would I? I thought hard about that. I can’t remember the last time something or someone came before my business, Eden. I really can’t.”
She reached out to him, and stroked her hand across his cheek. He turned into the touch to press his lips against her palm. When he pulled away, he said, “I probably won’t be very good at this relationship thing, but I want to seek my comfort in you, not in financial data and business deals. I want to see where this can go, if you’ll let me.”
“If I’ll let you? Jesse—I don’t deserve a second chance from you. God knows I want it, but I don’t deserve it.”
“Believe me, you do.”
Her heart fluttered as a new silence between them spread. What the hell was she thinking? He wanted a relationship with her and she was talking him out of it. Nice move.
Finally, he chuckled.
Suspicious, Eden narrowed her eyes at him. “What?”
He glanced at her, the smile still on his face. “I’m just thinking about the look on the staff’s faces when I brought you here last night. You were out cold and I had to tip them like crazy to let us in without registering first.”
“I’ve had about four hours sleep total in the last three days!” She shrieked as he suddenly grasped her around the waist, pulling her to his side. The plate of remaining fries tumbled to the floor with a loud clunk.
“And why, beautiful one, have you had so little sleep?” His voice grew husky, and the look she came to know so well bloomed in his hooded eyes. When he reached down to stroke himself, her eyes widened.
“You said it was broken!”
He leered. “I lied.”
* * * *
Jesse rifled through his wallet again, his eyebrows furrowed. Roughly one hundred and twenty dollars remained. Odd. That was a few hundred short. He must have been going through his cash faster than he realized.
He laid a ten dollar bill on the counter and waited for the barista to finish making his coffee. With a deep inhale of the heady atmosphere, he recounted the tasks awaiting him at the office before he would be able to knock off and head home. If he planned it just right, there would be time for a quick shower and shave before he had to pick up Eden for dinner and a movie.
He couldn’t wait to see her.
Occasionally, he marveled over the fact their relationship hadn’t gone stale in the months they’d been together. Even more surprising was that she put up with him during those first few weeks when he lost track of time, stayed late at the office and more often than not, ruined their plans. She accepted his workaholic habits with grace, which made him try that much harder to break them.
They talked often, as if she wanted to be sure he had no reason to ever doubt her again. And he didn’t. It seemed she held some unspoken rule with herself to stay away from his office despite his protests to the contrary. He argued the unfeasibility of staying away, but she never took the bait. Eden just gave him another patient smile.
She didn’t know it, but he had plans for her and his desk again.
He could be patient too.
In those few times his anger flared—whether directed at her or if she was just a convenient target—she gave as good as she got. It didn’t happen often, which was almost a shame. The make-up sex left him grinning for a week.
Their relationship certainly had its highs and lows, which was just fine by him.
As the cashier handed him the steaming cup, he pushed the ten forward. His BlackBerry chirruped and seeing who it was from, he turned from the counter.
“Sir,” the cashier called, “your change!”
“Keep it,” he tossed over his shoulder.
He glanced at his surroundings and chose a seat in t
he corner, where his back could press against a wall. His lips twitched as he read.
Hedonisticfem: Busy?
After taking a sip of the sultry liquid, he typed a quick reply.
J_Englund: Never too busy for you.
His heartbeat quickened as the image of her face flashed in his memory. Such a beautiful woman. He could watch her do nothing but smile and never grow tired of it.
Hedonisticfem: Good.
A long pause separated her next message. He waited patiently, taking in sips of coffee in between glances at the other patrons.
Hedonisticfem: I’ve stolen $300 from u. What r u willing 2 do 2 get it back?
His mouth curved into a smile before he began to softly laugh out loud. Her price might be coming down, but her demand would remain the same. He didn’t have to think too long or hard about it, though.
To meet her needs would be his pleasure.
THE END
www.deecarney.com
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dee Carney began writing short stories in middle school, but did not attempt completion of a novel until almost ten years later—which, despite good intentions, she never finished. Almost ten years later, she challenged herself to begin writing again, and her love for storytelling was rekindled. Now, Dee is a best-selling, award-winning author who lives at home in Georgia with her husband, two dogs, and a cat. When not writing, Dee is usually curled up on the couch with a good book!
Dee writes under two names. To learn more about all of Dee’s books, please visit her on the Web at www.deecarney.com.
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The Price of Pleasure Page 7