by Kenyon, Toni
The harder he suckled, the harder she scratched. Each time he increased the suction it felt as if she took another layer of skin off his back. He wanted to keep going until she drew blood - scraped her way through flesh to muscle and bone.
Sucking ᴚharder, he felt her arch under his mouth. "Oh, God...no more...enough," she panted.
He released the tormented nipple, shades of purple and red appearing where his mouth had been. His back was on fire.
"I want you to lick me." She ran her fingernail down her stomach, past the golden barbell in her navel; he noticed that the stone in the ball matched the emerald she wore at her throat. "Taste me."
He didn't need asking twice, helping her onto the bench top with the dirty dishes, bottles and glasses pushed swiftly to one side. She’d shaved, except for a small strip of cropped red hair leading to her swollen lips. He ran his tongue down the prickly line until his tongue reached her sweet juice.
Matt tasted her and she wriggled and moaned in response, thrusting herself at his face, perched atop the bench amongst the leftovers. He found himself torn between the desire to have her explode on his face, or to stop what they were doing so he could get inside her. Never good at delaying gratification, with her trembling beneath his mouth he knew she was close. Shit, he was close to coming too. A decision was in order.
He pulled himself away; she groaned in frustration and looked at him as if he'd gone completely mad. He kissed her and she lapped at him, devouring her own juices from his face.
"I want you," he gasped between kisses, "but we need a condom."
"No, don't stop." Her strangled cry was more ammunition than his tortured body needed; he couldn't deny her, couldn't leave her hanging. Working his way back down her sweaty body, he parted her with his thumbs. At the touch of his tongue her trembling began anew. Matt peered up as best he could and she moaned incoherently, grasped his head with one hand and ground him into her.
As she bucked and writhed he felt his own orgasm rumbling deep inside, felt the familiar stirrings in his balls, that aching need for release. If he didn't stop this he'd come all over the floor. There was no way of stopping any of it. He resigned himself and waited for the rush of her orgasm.
Letting go of his head, Tamsen gripped the counter top, caught her breath, arched back and he felt the sudden gush of her climax. Her satisfied growl coupled with the sweet taste of her sent him over the edge. Grasping her thighs and exhaling into her groin, he exploded in a rush all over the kitchen cupboards.
Collapsing to his knees, he heard quiet giggling - not hysterical, but a little loopy sounding. He cast a glance skywards and she was smiling down at him, her face flushed, her eyes shining. She was even more beautiful and he was even more taken with her.
"I've made another mess in your kitchen, haven't I?"
He smiled, lifting himself so he could kiss her just under her navel. "No, I don't believe this was all your doing - I think I have to take responsibility for some of it."
Tamsen's post-coital bubble broke and she had a sudden flash of what she must look like, perched on the countertop in amongst the used plates and cutlery, wearing nothing but her shoes. Color rushed to her cheeks and she knew it had nothing to do with delayed orgasm. The man had a mighty way with his mouth.
Matt backed away, almost awkward, putting some distance between them, globules of come dripping from his rapidly diminishing cock.
"This is typical of me," he stammered. "Not thinking through the consequences of my well-thought-out - not - actions."
The emphasis on the word made her laugh. "Come here." She motioned to the space between her legs, all modesty gone; it really was way too late to be shy.
She wrapped her legs around his waist and placed her index finger over his bruised looking lips and then down to his chin, still sticky with her juices. "Has anyone ever told you you've got an amazing mouth and you know how to use it?"
A light touch of red kissed his cheeks. "And that was only a warm-up. Come shower with me and I'll show you what I can really do."
She shuddered, but what the hell? The night was young, and how much more trouble could she get into, really? "Lead the way, I'm still all yours."
"So, you brazen trollop, what time did you get in last night?"
Gina's assault broke Tamsen's train of thought. She should have been writing her morning sheet, but she sat there, gazing out to sea and thinking of Matt. The touch of his hands and mouth on her skin. "Hmm, what’d ya say?"
"I wanted to know what time you dragged that sorry, and by the look on your face, well-shagged ass home last night?"
Tamsen giggled. "I think it was about quarter to three when I eventually fell into bed. And it wasn't my ass that got shagged." She took a sip of her dandelion tea. "Not that it's any of your business."
"Girlfriend - " Gina lit a cigarette and took a long drag " - if anyone's getting any action around here it's definitely my business." She swigged her coffee and took a bite of the ritual breakfast doughnut. "So spill. From the grin pasted on your face he's built like a horse and you were at it like rabbits all night."
Tamsen smiled. "Ladies don't tell."
"That good? Damn, I was hoping he'd be pencil-prick material and you hated every minute of it."
"Sorry, he's a keeper."
"Come on, let's not get past tag and release at this stage. You've only known him two days."
"Okay, then - " Tamsen chewed thoughtfully on the end of her pen " - a prospective keeper."
"Better." Gina swallowed the last of her coffee. "Well, I’d best be off to the pit-face, see what time yonder Prince Charming stumbles in."
"Hey, Gina."
"Yep?" She stopped at the door.
"Thanks for lending me the Dubby."
"Ah, no probs." Gina waved her hand dismissively. "And if you feel the need to bring lover boy back here I won't be in tonight - I'm off to stay at Cassie's."
"Ooh, sleepover."
"Don't get your hopes up. She's having a few friends around for dinner and I'll be too pissed to drive home, so there won't be any of that, I can assure you."
"Don't drink so much and you never know what'll happen."
"Whatever." Gina headed for the doors. "See ya tomorrow. Don't do anything I wouldn't do."
Tamsen turned her mind to her journal again.
I've mixed feelings about where last night went and where it's taken me. I sit here, the sun's shining off the sea, the dog walkers are doing their usual round of the sand and the gulls do what gulls do. Nothing's changed in the scene before me, but I feel as if I'm looking through different eyes. How can an encounter with someone you barely know touch you in such a deep and personal way?
Tamsen sighed and closed her journal. Her one true friend in life. These pages were the closest she'd ever come to unconditional love.
Matt hadn't made any mention of when he wanted to see her again. Tamsen could already sense needy and obsessive tendencies trying to surface. Gina wasn't going to be home tonight. An opportunity to return the favor and prepare a meal for him, perhaps. Who was she kidding? She was a disaster in the kitchen. She could cook, but it took three days and a water blaster to clean up afterward.
Besides, it wasn't eating she was interested in. Last night had whetted her appetite for the man. She couldn't get enough - just thinking about what his mouth was capable of made her wet.
She shivered. Best be off to work, take her tiny mind off the man before she decided to have herself on the terrace, in full view of the dog-walking brigade.
Matt was besotted. It was the only way he could describe his feelings. He'd slept log-like for a couple of hours after Tamsen left and woken raring and ready to go. Even her bratty receptionist roommate wasn't able to put him off his stride this morning. Gina’s smile had been smug, as if she knew some dirty little secret and might hold it over him, but he didn't care. Nothing would get in the way of him having a great day.
Danni had other ideas.
"Morning boss."
She dropped what looked like a seventy-five-page agreement on his desk. "Tim thought you needed a little bit of reading material to keep you going."
"Shit, Danni, don't suppose there's any chance of saving a few trillion trees by sending these things by email, is there?"
"You know these guys as well as I do. Dragging them kicking and screaming into the 21st century's a mission impossible. Most of them still think a mouse is something we need pest control for."
"No, honestly, I'm serious. Can't we find some way of persuading them to use the technology we spend thousands on?"
She shrugged. "I could try to organize some in-house seminars for the secretaries, but really it's a matter of you working on the fossils at your end. Someone like Tim just doesn't trust the technology. No matter how much I tell him it's okay, he can’t believe if he isn't holding the pages in his hand then it's likely to disappear or be changed, and he'll never be any the wiser."
Matt dropped his head in his hands. "It's like pushing the proverbial uphill with my nose."
"That's lawyers for you - not big on change."
Danni busied herself filing correspondence on the relevant client files while Matt contemplated the huge document on his desk. He was already way behind on a couple of jobs; he just couldn't seem to find any enthusiasm for the work these days. Even after the night he'd just had with Tamsen.
"So was she good?" Danni cut into his wandering thoughts.
"Sorry?"
"The mystery woman you took out for lunch yesterday. You've got one of those I've-been-up-shagging-all-night looks on your face."
He felt his cheeks redden.
"Ha, I knew it."
She pulled up the seat opposite his desk, a vision in black crushed silk with a white lacy camisole under her suit jacket. She had a way of looking feminine and business-like. "So, spill. Who is she?"
"Not telling."
"Matt..." Danni leaned forward and eyed him over the desk.
He knew he was in deep trouble. A woman on a mission, and him clean in her sights. What kind of hell must her husband have gone through when she made the decision he was going to marry her?
"You can tell me now, or we can sit here all day until you do. What's it going to be?"
"I don't have to tell you." A feeble come-back and he knew it, but at least the verbal battle might distract him from obsessing about Tamsen.
"I'm your personal assistant, I need to know what's going on in your life - and besides, I'm not going to tell anyone."
"And you're not going to leave me alone until I tell you."
"Correct, so spill."
"Tamsen."
"Tamsen Parsons. The fishy girl. Gina's friend. That Tamsen?"
He nodded.
"She's not exactly your type."
"What do you mean, my type?"
"Well, she seems a bit hippyish- one of those girls who'd set a metal detector off in the airport. You never know what's lurking under her clothing." She looked at him slyly. "Though you probably do now, don't you?"
Matt felt a sudden, inexplicable need to defend her. "Steady on. You can't judge someone by how they look."
"You've tried telling that to your mother, have you?"
"Leave my mother out of this. And you're not to breathe a word to anyone. It's bad enough the creature on reception knows."
Danni made the universal motion for zipping her lips and went back to her filing. Matt couldn't miss the smug look on her face.
Why did she have to bring his mother up? Danni was right, his mother would not approve. She approved of the vile and poisonous Angie though Matt couldn't wait to get her out of his life - it had been like living with a pit-bull in twinset and pearls. He shivered at the memory. There were days when he couldn't even smile right. It hadn't even occurred to him until he booked into a hotel in a furious rage that he'd walked out of his own home. That's how twisted and distorted his outlook on life had become. He’d vowed never to go there again, and if that meant he had to run a little against the conventional grain, then so be it.
Sod it, he thought. He picked up the phone and dialed Tamsen's cellphone.
"Danni, can you close the door on your way out." His PA knew when he wanted to be alone and obediently closed the door behind her as she vacated his office.
"Hello?"
"Tamsen?"
"Yes."
"Hi, it's Matt." She probably thought he was a complete idiot but it was too late now.
"Hey, I was just thinking about you."
His mood lifted. "Clean thoughts, I hope."
"Utterly filthy. You want to come over to my place tonight and I'll share them with you?"
"I'd like that." More than he cared to admit. "You could give me a hint though."
She giggled. "If I told you what I'd been thinking about you'd never be able to keep your mind on your job."
"I'm having enough trouble after last night, so you can’t do any more damage."
"I was just putting a fish in a new aquarium and it occurred to me you might be fun in water. I've got a rather large sunken spa bath at home and - "
"Stoppit." His mind ran a million miles ahead of the rest of him. "What time do you want me? And I'm warning you now, I'm not bringing trunks."
"Damn and I was planning to take them off with my teeth."
The vision dancing in his head was causing undue straining in his pants. "You don't play fair."
"But you're so much fun."
"How about 7.30 and I'll show you exactly how much fun I really can be."
"Sounds great. I'll look forward to it."
"Oh, so will I." She had no idea how much. A thought crossed his mind. "What about Gina?"
"She's out for the night, so you don't have to worry about the entire office knowing where you are. We've talked and she's going to keep her mouth shut as long as you're nice to her."
"Sounds like bribery to me."
"Yup. You have a problem with that?"
"Suppose not."
"Good. Hey, I'd better go. I'll look forward to seeing all of you later."
Oh, how she turned him on.
Tamsen hung up and found to her horror and surprise she was trembling. She'd spent ages hoping he'd ring while tormenting herself with should-I-shouldn't-I arguments as to whether she should ring him and now they'd spoken she couldn't control the shaking. It was ridiculous. She was breaking all of her own rules. Sex practically on the first date though she’d told Gina it was their third. She'd only just met the man - who was she trying to kid?
Tamsen checked the small charge she'd just released into the aquarium at her local doctor's surgery. "Some days I think it would be nice just to come back as a fish, you know, little fella. Swimming round all day, not a care in the world, being fed on time, everything you could possibly need on tap."
She traced her finger along the glass, reassured when the fish followed it. She loved playing games with her fish. She'd sat for hours like this as a child, escaping into a fantasy world, being the little mermaid swimming with her fish friends. They’d been easier to get along with than the people in her life at the time. She still spent more time talking to animals, plants and trees than she did real people.
After stripping the office battledress and changing into his workout gear, Matt stretched in anticipation of the endorphin rush from the workout to come. Life improved in staggering bounds when you let it, he mused. Work was as bleak as ever, but light had entered the dim darkness of his world in the form of the effervescent Tamsen. How he'd overlooked such a beautiful creature was beyond him. A sparkling gem cast upon the sands of his analytical life, a gift of unprecedented proportions from the gods themselves.
A surprising knock on the front door interrupted his decadent rumination.
"Mother! What are you doing here?"
"I've come to sort you and Angie out. Now hurry up and get my bags from the taxi. I've paid the poor man, but he couldn't get down your dreadful driveway for all that soil and rubbish. It's no wonder A
ngie up and walked out. What are you up to this time?"
"She didn't walk out, Mother - I asked her to leave, remember?" Why did his mother have to choose now to arrive? "And I don't need sorting out," he added as an afterthought.
Matt ran his hands through his hair; it was no use trying to argue anything out with Marguerite when she was in this frame of mind. Like the dutiful son, he headed out to relieve the poor taxi driver. One look at his face confirmed the man's suffering. It was a long drive from the airport.
Two huge suitcases, testament to his mother's inability to travel light, perched precariously on a pile of ponga logs. He so did not need this; he wanted to have a workout and then get to Tamsen.
He hauled the suitcases down the drive and up the stairs, wondering if the guest room was fit for guests. He knew from bitter experience that any suggestion she go to a hotel would fall on deaf ears. He was stuck with her for the duration.
"Okay, Mother, so what have I done to deserve the honor of your company?"
She threw him a look that would have served Medusa well. "You know exactly what you've done, Matthew. You've called off an engagement to possibly the most eligible young lady in the country and I want to know what happened."
In a foul mood, Matt stowed the suitcases in the barely passable guest room and trudged off to the lounge. It was apparent his workout wasn't going to happen; now he fixed his intentions on saving the evening with Tamsen. He sat down heavily on the couch and waited for his mother to join him.
Marguerite was old-school society. Having spent her life supporting his father in his business dealings, all she knew were cocktail parties, dinner parties, and being seen at the right places with the right people. It was a life he had been brought up to emulate and one he saw as devoid of soul. Since his father passed away, Matt felt increasingly responsible for Marguerite. But he drew the line at Angie. As far as he was concerned, he'd narrowly missed marrying his own mother and no way was he going to reconsider, no matter how much pressure was brought to bear.