by Tracey Ward
“That’s degrading.”
“Sleeping with your harpy ex is degrading, Cam. It’s the truth.”
“Well, whatever it is, Samantha isn’t speaking to me anymore.”
I study his face. It’s hiding so many things, but none of them very well. He’s sad about Samantha. Not just about losing his fuck buddy, but about losing her. He really cares about her. And Eve went and fucked it all up, just the way Eve loves to do.
“Apologize to her,” I tell him gently. “Don’t call her. Don’t give her a chance to tell you no. Find her and apologize until her ears bleed. She’s stubborn but she loves you. You’re one of the few people in this world she can stand. She’ll forgive you eventually.”
“You really think so?”
“I do. I think it’s going to take a lot of groveling. It’s going to get worse before it gets better, but I think it can be done. If you want to.”
He rubs his chest with his palm, soothing the spot where I hit him; the space just above his heart. “Yeah. I want to.”
“Then go find her. Tell her you messed up. Tell her you’re sorry.”
Cam nods, glancing over his shoulder to the other side of the room. Danny is packing up his stuff to leave. Jace is stalling, lingering at the table with notes in his hands. “What about you? What are you going to do?”
My heart hammers in my chest, but I will it to be still. “I’m going home. I’ve got some rehearsing to do, remember?”
“You could stay and do it here. I think if you asked nicely, you’d have some help.”
“Nope.”
“You sure?”
I look at him hard. “Cam.”
“Okay. Okay. Forget I said anything.” He backs away slowly toward the door. “Go home. Get in your sweats. Turn on sad, single lady TV.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Hallmark is not a channel for couples. It’s for women wishing they were in a couple.”
“Joke’s on you. I don’t watch Hallmark. I watch Oxygen.”
“Fuck, that’s even worse.”
“Get out of here!”
“I’m already gone.” He waves to Jace as he heads for the door. “Goodnight, man!”
Jace looks up, nodding in his direction. “’Night, Cam.”
As the door clicks shut behind Cam, my heart skids to a halt. I’m alone with Jace. I should not have let this happen.
I smile at him nervously, edging my way toward the door. “I better get—”
“You’re gonna be gorgeous up there,” he says softly. He tosses the notes on the table he’s leaning against, bracing his hands on the edge under his ass. His eyes are steady on mine, holding me in place. “I wasn’t ready for how graceful you are. I’m used to a totally different kind of skill in a dancer. You’re something else, Greer.”
I breathe slowly, not sure what to say. I finally settle on a simple, “Thank you.”
“You’re going home?”
“Yeah. I have to rehearse.”
“You just did.”
“I need to again.”
“Don’t you ever stop?”
“I want to get it right.”
“You have it.” Jace hoists himself effortlessly up off the table. “You have it down better than anyone.”
“I want it to be perfect.”
“You are perfect.”
I shake my head faintly as he closes the distance between us, one slow step at a time. He gives me all the chances in the world to tell him no. To tell him to stop. To bolt for the door. I consider all of those options, heavily, but nothing happens. I can’t make my mouth or my feet move. I’m mesmerized by the way he walks. The stalk of a predator closing in on its prey.
“Don’t be afraid of me,” he tells me, reading my mind. Or is it my eyes?
“How can I not be?”
“I’m just a guy.”
“No, you’re not,” I laugh breathlessly. “You’re Jace Ryker.”
“That’s just a name.”
I cock my head at him impatiently. “In lights. And on TV. In movie theaters. On billboards. Magazines. Websites.”
“You’re angry,” he points out, slowing his steps in front of me. He stops a few feet away, giving me space. “What are you angry about?”
I sigh, pinching my lips together. “I’m not angry.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, really. I’m… I’m something else. I don’t know. I’m freaked out, I guess.”
“I get that. A lot.”
“Yeah, I bet.”
“I can’t do anything about the billboards or the TV, but—”
“You didn’t call,” I blurt out, feeling stupid. But is it stupid? If he was just any other guy in the world who promised he’d call, wouldn’t I be just as annoyed if he didn’t? Do I have to give him a free pass to be an ass because of who he is?
He frowns. “I know. I’m sorry.”
“Twice. You didn’t call twice.”
“I ditched my phone. I came to see you in person instead.”
“I know, but then you disappeared. You left town out of nowhere.”
“That’s what happens with me. My life happens fast. I was in Cairo three weeks ago. I’m supposed to be in Italy four days after the Washington gig. It can be hard to keep up. Things change fast.”
I pull his phone from my bag, offering it to him with my heart in my throat. “That’s why I can’t keep this. Not even while I’m working with you.”
He doesn’t even look at the phone. “What are you talking about?”
“I can’t keep up. Exactly like you said. So I need you to take this back and we’ll do the show together, and that’s it. Nothing else. No more phone calls. No more compromises.”
Jace looks annoyed. And confused. I don’t think he gets told ‘no’ a lot, but that’s what I’m telling him now. For my own sake, even though it’s gutting me to do it.
“I didn’t call one time,” he argues.
“It’s not just that. It’s your life. It’s all over the place. I’m not good with surprises. I have a hard time with change.”
“Is it surprises or is it people you’re not good with? Because this total retreat feels like a violent reaction to me missing a single phone call.”
I feel my throat close up painfully. “It doesn’t matter.”
“It does to me.” He gestures back and forth, his hand stroking that invisible, magnetic line that lies between us. “I’m not letting you walk away from this because of one little mistake.”
“You can’t make me stay.”
He takes a step closer, towering over me, but it’s not his height that has me shrinking inside. It’s his heat, his scent. His eyes like dark fire that spark something inside me so hot, so urgent, I feel physical pain.
“I’m not going to make you do anything you don’t want to do,” he tells me deeply. “But you don’t want to go.”
“I do.”
“Then go.”
I shake the phone impatiently. “Please, take it.”
“No.”
“Jace, please.”
“No.”
“Fine.” I step back, bending over to drop it gently down on the ground between us. “Have a good night.”
I practically run from the room. I bolt out the door, hurrying to the stairwell. The heavy door pushes back against me like it’s trying to trap me. Like it’s sending me back to him, but I shove it with all my strength and stumble onto the landing. It shuts slowly behind me, the hydraulics wheezing in protest. I hurry down the first flight of steps, intending to run all the way home, but my bag slips from my shoulder. It catches on the railing as I round the first bend, yanking me back. Pulling me roughly to a halt. I let it fall to the ground, my hands flying to my face. It’s flushed hot, angry. I’m breathing hard, my lungs constricting in my chest. Screaming at me to slow down. To breathe. To turn back. To reconsider.
“Fuck,” I gasp into my palms, railing at myself. “What the fuck?”
I f
eel it when I’m not alone anymore. I feel the heft of his eyes on me, impatient and annoyed. That’s when I realize the door never banged shut.
I lower my hands slowly. He’s standing in the doorway one level above me, looking down at me with determination in his eyes and the cell phone in his hand. He breathes deeply, his chest filling, straining against his shirt. I wait for him to argue with me, to tell me to take the fucking phone, but he doesn’t say a word. He only looks at me with that dark intensity in his eyes, and I know what he wants. What he’s saying without speaking a word.
And I want it too. With every breath in my lungs and every beat in my erratic heart, I want it. I want him. That’s the moment my magnet flips. The moment when the push and pull between us becomes all pull. All force and attraction untethered.
He stalks down the stairs quickly. He eats them easily, his eyes on mine, stopping inches from my body. He reaches for my hand without looking. He opens my clenched fingers, puts the cell phone in my palm, and wraps my hand around it.
I’m staring up at him, my mouth open, my breath coming hard and fast. Already desperate and he’s barely touched me. When he does, and I know he will, he’ll ruin me. Body and soul.
He closes that last bit of distance between us. His body runs the length of mine, his dick hard against my stomach, his chest rising and falling in front of my eyes. His hands take my ass. I barely have a chance to wrap my hands around his arms for support when his mouth is on mine, his tongue pushing past my lips. Past my teeth until it’s dancing with mine, licking the roof of my mouth, making me moan and melt in his arms. He holds me up with his strength as he breaks me down with his body.
His fingers grip my ass hard, lifting me off the ground. Spinning me around and pressing me hard up against the cold, stone wall. He lifts me effortlessly, pushing me up high so I’m straddling his waist just under his ribs. So my breasts are right in front of his face. He looks up at me, watching me as I stare down helplessly at him. With one quick tug, he pulls my sports bra down under my breasts. They’re instantly cold, exposed to the air conditioned air and his eyes. To his mouth.
“So fucking beautiful,” he whispers. His breath caresses my nipples, hot like dragon fire on my cold skin. He runs his palm up the side of my breast. Over my chest. Across my shoulder and down my arm, staring at my skin against his. “So soft and small. I could break you, couldn’t I? If I’m not very, very careful.”
I can’t answer. I can hardly breathe. His hand is coming back up my side, under my breast, and then I’m in his hand. The full weight of my breast in his palm. The wet press of his tongue around my nipple.
It’s so dizzying quick the way he strips me bare, inside and out. One swift lick of his tongue across my nipple and I’m gasping. I’m pleading wordlessly, my hands in his hair, my defenses and my fears dropping like water from the edge of a cliff. They pool in the base of my spine, burning hot and needy as he licks a teasing line around my breast slowly, then sucks it firmly into his mouth. My legs tighten around him, hugging him hard as he laps at me. Grinding against his stomach, looking for friction.
He reaches around to my back, pushing between me and the wall. His fingers quickly find the waistband of my pants. He shoves inside, his hot palm groping my bare ass underneath. His long fingers follow the line of my thong to the front where it barely covers me. Where he can easily push it aside, replacing the soft cotton with the calloused tips of his fingers. I meet him with the slick, softness of my center, my entire body turning to liquid.
“Jace,” I whimper desperately.
He moans against my breast, the vibration pulsing through my nipple, down my stomach, and into my core. He pushes against it with his fingers, opening me slowly. Sliding his fingers up and down my channel, spreading the wetness that’s flooding there.
My head falls back, my eyes closing tightly. I’m barely breathing. I’m barely living, and still I’ve never felt more vibrant. More beautiful, more exposed. I’ve never been safer or more afraid in my life. My hands push against his shoulders, holding myself high so he can get inside me. So he can have every single inch of me.
“Tell me to stop and I will,” he whispers against my neck. He nips at my skin, making me jump. “Tell me you can’t handle this.”
His fingers brush my clit. It nearly sends me outside myself; just that one touch. I know right then I can’t go back.
“Don’t stop,” I gasp. “Please, don’t stop.”
He reaches up to take hold of my face, pulling my mouth down to his just as his fingers slide inside me. It’s an invasion I wasn’t ready for, but I welcome it with open arms. I cry out as I cling to him, pulling him closer with my arms and my legs, pleading for all of him. But he doesn’t make a move to undress himself. He keeps his hand inside my pants, thrusting inside me slow and steady as he kisses me.
“More,” I beg shamelessly. I lick his lips, sucking one into my mouth and biting down gently. “I want more.”
“Greedy girl,” he moans against my mouth.
I lift my head back, staring down at him fiercely. “Two fingers or get the fuck out of here.”
Jace smiles crookedly. He pulls my face back down to his, and I think he’s going to ignore me, but then he slides a second finger inside me and I tremble violently.
“Yes,” I groan.
He goes slow and I relax into the feel of him. Trusting him in ways I never have. Never should. I savor the rough push of his fingers inside me, the ticklish feel of his shirt brushing my bare nipples, the delicious glide of his warm tongue inside my mouth. Across my lips. Down my throat.
I can feel the fire burning in my belly. It’s starting to build, my climax coming, and I wish I could push it back. I wish I could live in this moment longer than I’m allowed, but it won’t listen. He won’t listen, his pace increasing as his lips find my breasts again. I’m moaning and bucking in his hand when he kisses my nipples, but when he suddenly bites down gently, flicking my clit with his finger, I’m done for. I fall apart in a shivering, mewling wreck above him.
He holds me hard, his fingers still inside me touching some hidden part of me that sends the fire back into inferno just as it was dying out. I grapple blindly for his face, pulling it up to look at me, to help me ride out the new wave he’s rushing through me.
“Holy shit!” I cry out urgently.
“Don’t fight it,” he tells me firmly. His free hand touches my face, his thumb tracing my quivering lips. “I want you to feel everything. I want to see you feel it.”
I dig my fingers into his neck so hard I’m worried I’ll leave a mark. I don’t care. I can’t care. All I can do is live through this moment where I’m burning alive, dying and crying and clinging to him with everything I have in the world, drowning in a blur of tears that stream from my eyes, softening his face until he looks almost sweet. Tender in a way I couldn’t imagine before.
It’s a moment I’ll never forget.
One I’ll never recover from.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Jace
I can’t remember the last time I got a girl off without worrying about myself. Not that I didn’t want to. Fuck, did I want to. Two weeks later and I’m still wondering how I walked out of that stairwell without sliding inside her. All I can think about is her tits in my face, in my mouth, on my tongue as she clung to me. As she pulled at my body like she was trying to break me. And I would have loved it if she did. But it wasn’t about that. It was about her. It was about getting her hooked on something she was afraid to want. She had to break that barrier she had against me, and once she did, she stopped talking about walking away. And she kept the phone.
We’ve had phone sex eight times in the last two weeks. I want more of her in person, in the flesh, but it’s probably better that I don’t get it. Grant and Sarah are laying off, happy that I’m living single and scandal free. When I close the door to my bedroom, calling it an early night or saying I need time to myself, they think I’m working on a new album. They’re thrille
d. They have no idea I’m burning through my minutes and a bottle of Vaseline on the phone with Greer. I’m about to develop carpal tunnel or terminal blue balls, but I’m not pushing. She’s still nervous, still freaked about me, but she’s warming up. She thaws a little more every time I see her. Every time I follow through on a promise, no matter how small, and I’m proud of every inch she gives me. She gets a little bolder when we talk, and the dirty shit that comes out of her mouth makes me ache like I’m fifteen cruising through my first porno mag.
I’m earning her trust, the her under the stage smiles and shuttered eyes, and she’s smaller than I imagined. More fragile than her lithe, birdlike body made me believe; a beautiful creature curled in on herself, afraid to open up. It makes me nervous and angry, ferociously protective in a way I’ve never felt before. I don’t know what made her this way, but I’d kill it if I could. I’d tear the world apart with my bare hands to make it right for her because when you get a glimpse inside, you can see how absolutely stunning she is. How sweet, dirty, and funny she is. How perfect a person is hiding inside this shell of fear. I’m excited every time I see her. I’m painfully disappointment when I don’t, blind with want when she walks in the room, raw with joy when she laughs with her whole body.
She’s like a refresher course in how to live and I’m an honor student studying her every move. Even when I shouldn’t be.
It’s hard to concentrate at rehearsals. She’s in the mirror behind me, her hair in her face, clinging to her skin soaked in sweat. She’s an amazing dancer, too good for the chorus in some floundering show. I’m watching her move behind me and I wonder what it would be like to always have her there. Could I hire her and bring her with me? Can I keep her?
She smiles at me now, her face flushed from the dance we’ve just finished, and that pink in her cheeks reminds me of the aftermath of her orgasms. Orgasms I gave her. Repeatedly.
I smile back. Not a grin or a smirk, but a smile. A real one. That’s all her. That’s the feeling she gives me; like laughing. A lightness I haven’t felt in years. It’s not something I’m looking forward to giving up in a week when this is all over. I’m looking for ways to draw this out, to keep her around, and I’m actually afraid I won’t be able to find the way to make it happen.