by Alexis Daria
“My mother got pregnant when she was sixteen. Swore she was going to marry the guy—who was older, and a loser, by all accounts—so her mother sent her from Puerto Rico to New York. I was born there, and grew up with my great-grandparents and my mother, all in a two-bedroom apartment.”
“Where did you sleep?”
“A section of the living room.”
“When I moved here—to America—I shared a room with Nik, who was still a baby, and my two cousins.”
She shrugged. “Whatever it takes, right? But look where you are now.”
“You, too.”
She snorted. “We both know I’m here out of desperation. I can’t even get my shit together enough to manage my own living situation. Without Gina, I’m a fucking mess.”
She was retreating again. Her shoulders hunched, her eyebrows drawn together in a scowl. He wanted to help her, to take away the stress in her posture and her voice. He was good with money. He could help her, teach her.
But first, he wanted her to relax. With him.
The second she put the lid on the pot, he swept her into a dance again. They danced between sips of wine and taking turns at the stove. When the food was ready, they opened a second bottle of red, made their plates, and ate standing up, dancing between bites.
“What are we eating?” he asked, spinning her close.
“Sancocho—it’s like stew. Arroz con gandules—rice with green pigeon peas. And plátanos maduros—sweet fried plantains. Like you said, it’s comfort food.”
He pressed a kiss to her hair. “Well, I feel comforted.”
She laughed and leaned against him. “Damn it, Macho.”
“What?” He tipped her chin up, forcing her to look at him.
Her voice trembled. “Why can’t I ever say no to you?”
It was what he’d been waiting for. Natasha, soft and pliant in his arms. Her thoughts only on him, not on her money troubles, or her past, or her job. She’d opened up to him tonight, told him more about her life than she ever had before. It left him with more questions, and an even deeper desire to know her. But now wasn’t the time to follow those threads.
Now was the time for seduction.
Her face was already lifted toward his. Her lips parted, her eyes on his. Her tongue darted out, swiped against that full lower lip.
With a groan, he closed the distance and kissed her.
14
Sweet Jesus. Dimitri’s knees locked to absorb the impact. Would he ever be prepared for her kiss?
Natasha tasted like wine and spices, her mouth hot and ravenous under his. He cupped her face to hold her to him, then backed up until the edge of the granite counter hit his ass. Her slim fingers gripped the waistband of his jeans, sliding under fabric. He groaned, hardening as the backs of her nails teased his skin.
Touch her. He had to touch her. Needed to. He skimmed his hands down her body, and then brought them up again, to pull off her tank top. Underneath, she wore a lacy black bra.
He broke the kiss to run his fingertips along the frilly edges of the cups where they met her skin. “Is this new?”
“Uh-huh.” Eyes heavy-lidded and full of heat, she grabbed the back of his neck to draw him down for another kiss.
Natasha kissed like she was drowning, like he was the only one who could save her. She kissed with fire and bite, and a hint of desperation. Her kiss hooked him in every time. For a man who needed to be needed, it made him want to give her everything he had and more.
Sex was the only way she’d take it. Even now, she was only here in his kitchen because she had nowhere else to go.
He’d change that, though. He’d show her how it could be between them if she stayed.
“We shouldn’t,” she whispered against his mouth.
What the fuck? Yes, they should. He nipped at her chin, trailed his lips down the long, strong column of her neck and sucked at the delicate skin. “Why not?”
She slipped out of his arms. He reached for her, but she wasn’t going away. Instead, she slid down his body to kneel at his feet. Dimitri tipped his head back and groaned. His pants and boxers were down around his thighs in a matter of seconds. When it came to blow jobs, Natasha didn’t waste time, and he loved her for it.
Shit. Love? Too much. She was too goddamned much.
“New rule at the show.” Her breath puffed against his thigh, making the skin tingle, as she stroked his dick along her soft cheek.
“What show?” She was killing him. His brain was fried. What were they talking about?
“The Dance Off.” She licked along his length, curling her tongue around the head, and he gulped for air. Before he could ask her to elaborate, she sucked him into her mouth, and he didn’t care anymore.
Her cheeks hollowed out as she moved her mouth up and down his cock, using her hand to pump the base. He unclipped her hair and sank his hands into the riotous mass of spirals. Sensation zinged through him, his skin prickling, and he flexed his legs to keep his knees from buckling. This was going too fast, like always. If they didn’t slow down, he was going to prop her up on the kitchen counter and take her here and now.
“Tasha,” he panted out. “Kroshka.”
“Mmm?” She looked up at him, mouth full, his dick making one of her cheeks poke out. So fucking sexy.
He gave a shaky laugh and stroked her face. “Bedroom.”
Her gaze dropped to the floor and she slid him out of her mouth. “We shouldn’t.”
There were those words again. He hauled her up from the floor and pulled her in for a searing kiss.
“We should,” he whispered hotly against her mouth, and kissed her again, losing himself in the soft fullness of her lips.
When he pulled back and looked her in the eye, she nodded.
In that moment, they were closer than they’d ever been before. Vulnerability shone in her eyes, or maybe he was only seeing his own reflected there. Either way, he took a chance. “Because you can’t say no to me?”
Another nod, and she closed her eyes.
“Why, Tasha?”
Her reply was a mumbled, “I don’t know.”
He was too fired up to question her further. With a muttered curse, he kicked off his shoes and pants, leaving them on the kitchen floor. He grabbed the wine bottle and threw an arm around Natasha’s waist, hustling her into the bedroom.
They made quick work of their remaining clothing, then tumbled naked into his bed, kissing and drinking directly from the wine bottle until it was empty.
“This is a bad idea,” Natasha said as he leaned away to set the bottle on the nightstand.
“Stop saying that.” He scowled at her and crawled between her legs, pressing her into the pillows. “Sex is always a great idea.”
She propped herself up on her elbows to look at him. “They’re cracking down on backstage hookups.”
“We’re not backstage right now.”
It was solid logic, but from her glare, it was clear she disagreed. He tried again. “Hasn’t that always been an unspoken rule?”
“Yes, but now it’s been spoken out loud by my producer. If they find out I’m staying here . . . it won’t look good.” Her finely arched brows drew together, and he wanted to smooth them. He tried logic again.
“That never stopped you before.”
Her eyes went wide and her mouth flattened into a thin line. With me, he meant, but she shot her retort at him before he could explain.
“It never stopped you, either!”
He narrowed his eyes. Yeah, it was true for him, too, but he had a bone to pick with her about the previous season. Maybe it was all the wine coursing through him, but now seemed like a great time to bring it up.
Running his hand up her strong thighs, he settled his thumb into the sensitive spot below her hip bone, where leg met torso. “You fucked Jackson García.”
She tossed her hair, but he didn’t miss the sharp intake of breath when his thumb rubbed gently, circling closer to her pussy. “You fucked Lauren
D’Angelo,” she shot back.
He lowered his head and teased the curve of her inner thigh with the tip of his tongue. “She thought it would help her get better scores.”
Her hips rocked as his mouth drew closer to her core. “Did it?”
He raised his head. “Did she win?”
“No.” She scowled and shoved his head back down into her lap.
Smothering a grin, he parted her folds with his thumbs and gazed openly at her. The attention made her squirm with anticipation, as it always did.
“Besides,” he said, leaning in. “It was only a blow job. And only once. She bit me.” He nipped her inner thigh with his teeth.
Natasha’s head fell back and she let out an unsteady chuckle. “Aww, but you like a little biting sometimes.”
Only when you do it, he wanted to say. Instead, he admitted, “Not that hard. And not where she did it.”
And then he stroked her clit with his tongue and she didn’t ask any more questions.
Dimitri wasn’t done, though. He had more he wanted to say, but he needed her pliant and gasping, desperate. He licked her seam, driving his tongue inside her, savoring her taste and her high-pitched little moans. He circled her clit with his tongue and teased her entrance with his fingers, but he didn’t give her the penetration he knew she wanted, and held back on letting her shatter.
When she was gasping and sobbing, her nails scrabbling at his shoulders in desperate need, he sheathed himself in a condom and moved up her body, notching himself against her.
She wriggled beneath him, arching and trying to take him in, but he held her hips down. He had questions he wanted answered.
“Macho,” she whispered, the closest she would ever come to begging.
He kissed her hard, nearly losing the battle of wills when she sucked on his tongue. He pulled back and demanded, “Why did you fuck Jackson?”
She shook her head, curls spilling out across the pillow, the sweet scent of figs threatening to overwhelm his resolve. “Why do you care?”
He slipped an arm beneath her and cupped the back of her neck. “Why, Tasha?”
When she didn’t answer, he flexed his hips, teasing her. She moaned and clutched his ass, trying to pull him into her.
“Tell me.” With her breasts pressed to his chest and her hot little body under his, his control was hanging by a thread. He had no right to ask. He’d had his fair share of women who weren’t her, and he knew she’d fucked other men. But Jackson had been the most recent that he knew of, and the most often on his radar. “I was coming to the club that night to see you. When I got there, you were leaving with him. Why?”
With a groan, she finally cried out, “Because he wasn’t you.”
He blinked.
“Are you happy?” She glared fiercely. “He wasn’t you. He was uncomplicated and easy and . . . goddammit, he never made me feel like this. Never.”
Dimitri’s heart leaped. “Like what? Feel like what?”
“Like I’m going to fucking explode if you don’t fuck me! Do it already. Dimitri, for the love of god, just put your fucking cock inside me and fuck me hard!”
With a powerful surge of his hips, he slammed into her.
She squeezed her eyes shut. “God, yes!”
They fucked until she was screaming his name and he was grinding his teeth to keep from coming. Then he pulled out and flipped over.
“Your turn,” he said. “Climb on.”
“We shouldn’t be doing this.” She panted, crawling over him. “I’m gonna lose my job.”
He rolled his eyes. Again with this. He wasn’t going to be able to convince her they were meant for each other if she was worrying about the stupid Dance Off.
“Stop thinking.” He lifted her by the hips and drove into her. She moaned and arched to take him deeper. “Ride me.”
She dug her nails into his chest, hard enough to leave marks, and took up the pounding rhythm.
Her long, lean body rose above him, skin dewy with sweat, cheeks flushed. Her hair was loose, the dark curls falling over her bouncing breasts and down her back. The scent of ginger surrounded him, and the way she bit her lower lip as she rode his cock captivated his attention.
She took his breath away. Having her here, in his home, in his bed . . . it was all he wanted. When she left . . .
If she left. He had to figure out a way to show her she had a place here. Asking about Jackson and making vague statements that could be about other women weren’t going to help his case.
If he wanted her to stay, he had to put his heart on the line. For her, he could do it.
But not tonight. Tonight, he had her right where he wanted her, and he’d already pushed enough.
He slid his hands up her torso and caressed her breasts, teasing the nipples with his thumbs, savoring her sigh of pleasure. He dropped one hand to where their bodies joined and repeated the motion on her clit.
“Yes,” she said on a gasp. “Yes, touch me, god, so close . . .”
When her pussy squeezed him, when her body shuddered, when her cries rang through the room, he let go of his control.
He squeezed his eyes shut as he came, but she was with him. Blanketing his body with hers, clutching his shoulders in her strong hands, lips teasing his earlobe as she whispered his name.
“Macho . . .”
He wrapped his arms around her. It was the perfect moment. If he had the guts, he’d ask her to stay, to live with him.
Silence settled around them.
He sighed, limbs leaden with exhaustion, alcohol, and disappointment. He didn’t have the strength to ask her. When he’d asked Juliette the same thing, she’d laughed. Her words still haunted him.
You didn’t think any of this was real, did you?
He’d vowed that night never to let himself get blindsided like that again. As much as he wanted Natasha, as much as his feelings for her were the real deal, her own were less clear. And until he was sure about her, he couldn’t put himself out there like that again.
Couldn’t put his heart out there like that again.
She stirred. “We should clean up.”
“Sure.”
He opened his arms and let her go.
15
In the grand scheme of things, waking up hungover in Dimitri’s bed wasn’t the biggest tragedy. After all, she’d done it plenty of times before.
Despite the pressure in her temples and general queasiness, Natasha couldn’t bring herself to regret the sex. Sex with Dimitri was always amazing. His rough and demanding demeanor masked attentiveness and a single-minded devotion to her pleasure. He always made sure she came first, usually multiple times. So, no, she never regretted having sex with him.
Still, they probably shouldn’t have done it a second time. But she’d gotten cold in the middle of the night and snuggled closer to him. And then he’d rolled over to pull her close, which was nice. She was all set to go back to sleep, warm and cozy, when his lips found her nipple. And then somehow her pussy found his dick, and they were at it again.
When her alarm went off in the kitchen, she leaped from the bed and muttered a prayer of thanks that the phone’s volume had been turned on. Dimitri murmured and tried to pull her back into bed, but she found the strength to evade him.
That was about as far as her good sense went, because she was halfway through her shower before she realized she was in Dimitri’s bathroom instead of her own down the hall, using Dimitri’s shampoo instead of her own.
Fucking great. She was going to smell like him all day. She might as well dig out one of his many half-full bottles of the no-longer-manufactured Archangel by Rogelio cologne and roll around in it. But then he’d spend the rest of the day obsessively searching for more online, and she didn’t want to do that to him.
It was a nice smell, though, she had to admit. Both on his skin and when it rubbed off on hers.
When she dashed through his bedroom in a towel, he rolled over in the bed. “Where are you going?” he mumbled
sleepily.
“Work.” The hangover made it impossible to keep the bite out of her tone. She clutched the towel to her breasts in a tight grip. “I have work, Dimitri. Every day.”
He blinked at her from the bed, his expression soft and sleepy. “I don’t understand why you work so hard. Just come back to bed.”
Her body went numb, stunned by his carelessness. It took a few tries to get the words out. “Are you serious?”
He shrugged his broad shoulders. “You’ve got a good gig on the show—”
“Dimitri, you of all people should understand. Our lives and careers didn’t start off that differently. Or did you forget what it was like in the beginning?”
He sat up and opened his mouth, but she held up a hand. “Forget it. I’m running late. See you later.”
She ran from the room and down the hall to her own.
Carajo. No, not her room. The guest room.
She didn’t see him again as she left the house, speeding through traffic on the 10 to get to her first job, an early morning pole-dancing workout class.
From there, she had a packed day. Spin class, three back-to-back yoga classes, and an after-school ballet program guest-teaching gig with twenty teenage girls.
By the time she got to her five thirty “Soulsa” class—a workout that combined salsa dance and cardio—her head pounded, her feet dragged, and she was thoroughly sick of LA traffic.
California had a lot of advantages over New York City. Driving wasn’t one of them. Days like this, she missed the subway, even though she’d seen more than her fair share of crazy shit there.
But the ladies who showed up to this class looked to her to perk them up after a full day of working in various offices around the city, and they paid well to work with a celebrity instructor at a fancy gym. Better than some of her other gigs, anyway.
Natasha chowed down on yet another protein bar—her fourth that day—as the women filed in from the locker room. She waved and smiled, even though all she wanted to do was curl up on the floor and sleep.
She checked her phone one last time before plugging it into the sound system.