Rescue Me

by Teri Fowler

  Maya palmed the tip and scooped the empty glasses from the table on to a tray and carried them back to Larry. She tossed the ten dollar bill on to the bar and pointed to the tip jar on the back wall by the till, gesturing for him to put the money in it. Larry tried to give it back to her, but she refused.

  "Keep it for the other guys. You'll be able to give them a bonus this Christmas."

  "You won't let me pay you, so at least keep your tips." Larry grabbed her hand, forcing her to meet his gaze. "Please."

  Maya ducked her head, hurt by the concern etched into Larry's face. "I don't need it. I'm a long way from broke. I've had plenty of job offers, Larry. I'm just not sure what I want to do next, or if I even want to stay in LA. I'm getting sick of this town and the people in it, and I swore I would never let it change me, but it has. Until I come to a decision, I would rather hang out with you than sit at home feeling sorry for myself, but if you don't quit clucking over me like some mother hen, I'm gonna have to stop coming here."

  "Sorry." Larry snatched his hand away and picked up the dirty glasses to put them in the dishwasher.

  She'd hurt his feelings, that much was obvious. Maya sat on a spare stool and waited until he looked at her again. "You're my best friend, and you've stuck with me through thick and thin. I swear I'm not shutting you out. It's just I really can't bear to talk about it yet, okay?"

  Larry smiled, and she knew all was forgiven. "It's not me you need to talk to. It's Seth."

  "I'm pretty sure I'm the last person he wants to speak to."

  "Girl. You know that boy's in love with you. Stop your foolishness."

  Maya tensed, ready for another lecture from her friend. She'd told him everything in the week she'd been back, leaving nothing out, not even the awful way she'd treated Seth.

  When she got to the part about catching Seth kissing Alice, Larry had laughed. "So the man took you at your word when you said you didn't want him, and did what you told him he needed to do to win, and now you're upset?"

  When he put it like that, it did sound crazy, even to her. "Okay, but it doesn't matter how I feel about him. I let things go too far and put us both at risk, which is why I resigned without giving my boss a good reason. I can find another job, but he needs that money for his ranch. I couldn't let him throw away a chance like that because of me."

  Larry had nodded, letting her run out of steam and explanations and then told her what he really thought. "You know what I think? I think you're terrified of loving anyone else the way you loved Phil. They're not all alike, Maya."

  Phil had been her first true love, the only man she'd ever completely given herself to. She hadn't known about his cocaine addiction at first, or his shady business dealings, until their lives were intertwined and it was too late. His problems had become her problems, and she’d been left to clean up the physical and emotional mess on her own when he’d died in a drug deal that had gone violently wrong.

  Larry had been right, as usual, but she couldn't handle another painful trip down memory lane. Not right now.

  A few more people walked in to the bar, doubling the usual crowd for a typical Tuesday night in a quiet area of LA. Maya leapt to her feet and grabbed a tray, making her escape by following the customers to their table to take their order.

  By the time she got back to the bar, Larry was damn near hopping from one foot to the other, his face alight with excitement as he gestured for her to hurry over.

  Maya laughed, wondering what juicy bit of gossip he'd managed to uncover that he was dying to tell her. "What's gotten into you?"

  "Table five needs you to take their order."

  "Is that it? That's what's got you so hyped?"

  Larry flapped his hands in the direction of the booth by the wall, telling her to hurry up and not keep them waiting. Maya threw Larry a glance that she hoped let him know how crazy she thought he was and walked towards a booth she could see was empty.

  She spotted a leather travel bag slung in the back of the seat and figured the owner must have gone to the john. She turned to look down the narrow hallway leading to the bathroom and found Seth walking towards her.

  "Hello, Maya." Seth sent her a nervous smile, as if unsure how she would react to the sight of him.

  Maya didn't know how to react. Part of her wanted to fling herself in to his arms and beg him for forgiveness, and the other wanted to give him a hard time over kissing Alice.

  "What are you doing here?"

  "I should have guessed you haven't been watching. Alice and me got voted off."

  "I don't believe you."

  Seth slid in to the booth and gestured for her to sit, too. "Well, it's true."

  Maya sat down opposite him, too far away to give in to the urge to touch him. "But how? You two were so far ahead in the polls, there was no way you could lose a public vote."

  "Ah, but you're not allowing for the Alice factor. She saw to it that we lost."

  "What?"

  Seth told her about Ben catching Alice in a compromising position with a woman and how the plan to kiss him had occurred to her the next day, but she hadn't seen fit to warn him first.

  "Once she realized how I felt about you, she convinced me to find you and tell you what really happened, but you'd already left. After that, she knew how badly I wanted to come find you and figured I wouldn't do that because I'd be letting her down, and she was right. So she fluffed all of our events to make sure we were up for elimination."

  "The public loved you and Alice."

  "But not enough to overlook the fact she is gay."

  "How did they know?"

  "She told them during one of the podcast interviews. She knew they went out live and her comments couldn't be edited before transmission."

  Seth chuckled, confusing the hell out of Maya. She couldn't see what was so funny about both of them missing out on the opportunity of a lifetime. She told him so.

  "Thinking about what she did makes me happy. She's one hell of a woman, and I'm glad to have met her. I know we're gonna be friends for the rest of our lives."

  Maya shrugged. "I'm not sure I'd have such warm feelings about someone who just cost me five million dollars."

  "Some things are more important."

  "Like what?"

  Seth stretched across the table and grabbed one of her hands in his. "Like you."

  Maya couldn't speak. The depth of emotion she could read in his eyes thrilled and scared her at the same time. She couldn't be the reason he lost his inheritance.

  "I love you, Maya."

  She groaned and hid her eyes with her free hand. "I know."

  "That's not exactly the response I was hoping for."

  "I'm sorry. I didn't mean it that way. I meant I know you love me. You told me already."

  Seth shook his head. "When?"

  Maya felt her cheeks grow hot. "When we made love. You said it then."

  He pulled his hand back. "So that's why you left? Because I told you I loved you?"

  "Yes, but not for the reasons you think. I was trying to deny my own feelings by keeping them under control, but I couldn't control you. As much as it scared me to hear you say those words, what scared me more was having to admit to myself I loved you, too. So, when I saw you kissing Alice, I had the excuse I needed to run away."

  "You love me?" Seth got to his feet and slid into the booth beside her.

  Maya nodded, barely able to make out his features through the tears misting her eyes. "Yes, I love you. I can't deny it any more. I'm sorry I hurt you, Seth. There's no excuse for the way I've treated you. I was hurt very badly in the past by someone I loved, and I thought I'd gotten over it. But something Larry said to me tonight made me realize that I've let a past experience change who I am as a person, and I nearly lost you because of it."

  Maya told him about Phil and how she'd always blamed herself for the damage he'd done to her heart and mind both before and after his death.

  "I tried to deny what was happening between us and my feeli
ngs for you, but all I did was hurt us both. I'm so sorry."

  He hugged her and wiped her tears away. "You didn't hurt me, honey. I never dared hope you felt the same way about me as I did about you, but I knew you wanted me, no matter how much you claimed not to."

  Maya laughed, giving him a gentle shove. "There's that Texan ego again, Mr. Coulter."

  Seth leaned closer, pinning her against the back of the booth, his lips millimeters away from hers. "It ain't my ego talking if I'm right."

  She closed the gap between them, clasping his bristled jaw between her palms and kissing him hard. Seth grunted in response and reached behind her to grab her waist as he slid an arm under the back of her knees to lift her into his lap without breaking the kiss.

  Maya felt the hard ridge of his erection pressing against her butt through the thin fabric of her dress. His fingers dug in to the flesh of her back as his tongue slid into her mouth, and he took control of the kiss she'd started. The urge to get him home and naked in her bed made her wriggle off his lap and shove him out of the booth ahead of her.

  Seth let her out and pulled her into his arms. "I'm not about to let you run away again."

  "I'm not running away. I'm just gonna go grab my purse then tell Larry we're leaving."

  "I'm gonna need a minute." Seth flicked his gaze downward, reminding her, as if she needed it, that he had a massive erection.

  Maya giggled. "Can't you hide it with your bag?"

  He grinned. "I guess so, but don't expect me to walk too far."

  They escaped the bar and Larry's attempt to interrogate them about where they were running off to so soon, and climbed in to Maya's white Mercedes SLK. Seth seemed impressed and gave a low whistle.

  "So, you're rich, huh?"

  Maya tensed. "Not in LA terms, but I've been a television executive for about ten years, and it pays very well. Is that a problem?"

  Seth shook his head and settled his weight in the plush leather seat. "As long as you don't expect me to live off your money, not at all."

  "I've been there before, and I can tell you from bitter experience that it doesn't work."

  "Was that one of the reasons you pushed me away?"

  "Oh my God! Is that what you think?" Maya was horrified at the thought. She couldn't blame him though. There wasn't much she hadn't accused him of over the last couple of months.

  "No, but you seemed really obsessed with me winning that prize."

  "Yes, but for your sake, not mine. I know how much your ranch means to you."

  Seth held her gaze for a moment then gave a slow, almost imperceptible nod, and she knew he believed her. Maya gunned the engine to life and pulled out of the parking lot behind the bar.

  Her small home in the hills came in to view minutes later, and she parked in front of the house rather than putting her pride and joy in the garage as she usually would. Maya couldn't wait to get the big sexy cowboy who'd been stroking her cheek, caressing her arm and squeezing her thigh all the way home, into her house.

  "Now this, I can handle." Seth looked up at her unassuming stucco cottage that probably cost a lot more than he thought it did, what with the insane real estate market in LA. "You gonna give me the grand tour?"

  Maya grabbed his hand and pulled him in through the door. "For now, the only room I need you to see is the bedroom."

  Seth dropped his bag on the floor and swung her up into his arms. "Just show me the way."

  Chapter Ten

  Seth had been holding out on her! Maybe it was because he'd been uncertain of his feelings or in the dark about hers, but there was no doubt he'd been holding back. Her dress lay in a heap on the bedroom floor, her underwear had gone God only knew where, and he was inside her before she'd as much as managed to switch on a light

  He held her up against the wall, one hand bunched in her hair, the other grasping at the back of her thigh as he jabbed his huge cock into her sopping wet pussy over and over again. Maya couldn't make a sound, couldn't tell him how fucking amazing he felt inside her. Seth's thrusts stole her breath away when she wanted to tell him how much she loved him and how miserable she'd been without him.

  She was overwhelmed his physical strength and the depth of his passion for her. The impact of being taken so completely by a man of his size and power was like nothing she'd ever experienced before, even with him. When Seth was in love, he proved it with his body as well as his heart. The way he fucked her was desperate with need and almost savage in tempo, and she had no say in whether she came or not.

  Maya found her voice at the moment of climax, screaming out how much she loved him and what he was doing to her. Seth came with a shout of anguish, his voice breaking as he tried to tell her he loved her, too. His movements slowed, and he jerked into her, grazing the tender flesh of her neck with his teeth as he gasped for breath and trembled with exhaustion. Seth sank to his knees, taking her down with him, and curled her into his arms after he took off the used condom and slumped onto his back on the hard, stripped oak floor.

  Maya lay on top of him, her knees pressed against the sides of his torso, her cheek resting on his chest. She listened as his heart stopped racing and his ragged breathing slowed. She felt absolutely boneless and totally spent and hoped he didn't mind bearing her weight because she didn't have the strength to move yet.

  Large hands stroked her hair, face and shoulders with a gentleness she wouldn't have thought him capable of considering the display of brute strength she'd just witnessed.

  Maya turned her face inwards to kiss his chest and taste the sweat bathing his skin. Something brushed against the crease between the cheeks of her ass, and she felt him growing hard again. She wiggled against him, bumping against his erection as she sucked one his nipples into her mouth and flicked at it with her tongue. Seth's hands tightened in her hair, and she raised her hips just enough to let his cock fall against his body so she could slide her clit up and down the length of it.

  He began to jerk and groan beneath her, and she glanced up at his face to see it rigid with tension as he watched her, his teeth biting down on his lip. She smiled and put her mouth back on his flesh as she began the long and tantalizing journey down to his groin.

  Seth parted his thighs, allowing her to slip into the gap so she could kneel between them. Maya's hand closed around the thick shaft of his penis, and her pussy throbbed in anticipation and memory of what his beautiful cock could do to her. It was time Seth learned what she could do for him.

  She held his gaze as she flicked her tongue over her lips to moisten them, and she saw his eyes narrow to thin slits as he sucked in a harsh breath. She lowered her head, letting the tip of his penis rest against the soft pout of her lips. Maya opened her mouth a little more and let him slide inside.

  He jerked beneath her as she increased the tempo and hollowed out her cheeks to suck on him harder. Maya's knuckles grazed the skin of his balls, and he shuddered in response, his hands pulling on her hair.

  Seth started to moan aloud in time with her motions, and she felt him grow and swell inside her mouth, letting her know it wouldn't take much more to make him come. He tried to lift her head, but she slapped his hands away.

  "Maya ... oh, God. I'm gonna come."

  She released his cock for a split second to suck the tip of her finger into her mouth and moisten it with her saliva. Maya took him in again in one long, deep motion and pressed her fingertip against the tight knot of his anus, applying a gentle pressure.

  Seth surged upwards, thrusting into her mouth, forgetting to be careful as his body began to jerk and shudder, and a powerful orgasm tore through him. Maya had a firm grip on his shaft, stopping him from choking her, allowing him the freedom to thrust as hard as he wanted. She felt his penis contract between her lips and then the warmth of his semen exploding into her mouth, hitting the back of her throat in powerful spurts. Maya released him only when his shudders subsided and she was satisfied she'd taken everything he had to give.

  She crawled up to lay at his s
ide, planting a kiss on his open mouth as he gasped for air. He turned to look at her and smiled, dragging a thumb across her lips as if thanking her for what she'd just done.

  "Damn", he said, when he could speak again. "Each time I think it isn't possible for me to come any harder, you go and prove me wrong. Where did you learn to do that?"

  Maya opened her mouth to speak, but he pressed a finger to her lips to stop her.

  "No, don't tell me. I don't want to think about you doing that to anybody else but me."

  She smiled and pulled his hand away. "Larry told me how to do it, one drunken night. He said nobody knows better what pleases a man than another man. You're the first person I've done that to since he taught me how. I guess he was right?"

  Seth rolled on to his back and smiled as his eyelids began to close. "Remind me to buy that man a drink."

  ****

  He watched her walking across the room towards him as she came back from the bathroom a couple of hours later. Hunger and the hard wooden floor had finally forced them apart, and they'd stopped making love to get a drink and have a bite to eat then help each other get clean in the shower. Maya had stayed behind to blow dry her hair while he went through and collapsed into her massive white leather bed.

  Seth was pleased to see she trusted him enough to walk around naked in front of him. She couldn't be in any doubt about how beautiful he thought she was. He'd told her at least ten times in the few hours they'd been together.

  He marveled at the way his dick got hard again, just from the sight of her. He doubted he could love or want her more than he already did, even though they still didn't know each other very well.

  He'd taken a visual inventory of the room while he was waiting for her to finish drying her hair. The bed he was sitting in probably cost as much as his truck, and the house that had seem so modest from the outside was far more impressive inside. Seth didn't know much about interior design, but he was pretty sure the weird bits of sculpture on top of the shiny glass furniture were high end items.

  Maya crawled into bed beside him and snuggled down into the nook of his shoulder, fitting against him so easily, it seemed almost natural to have her there.