by Leanne Davis
He lifted his face off her chest and swung her body closer to his as he kissed her, and stuck his tongue deep into her mouth. He quickly, deftly, undid her jeans and pushed them off her as far as he could reach. She half pushed with her hands and half kicked them off all the while their lips stayed connected and kissing. His hands trailed from her waist down to the gentle swell of her butt. He groaned this time. It was so perfect. It was soft and small. He squeezed a cheek gently in his fingertips. His hand could cup the entire half. She wore lace covered panties. He slid his hand lower and he could feel the heat of her through the material, and it nearly scalded his hands. She was wet as she was warm. His dick suddenly sprang to painful awareness that was far beyond the simple need to have sex. It was more. So much more. Yet, he couldn’t explain why.
Her legs trembled as she opened them to his seeking hands. His arms trapped her against him and each of his hands took a side of her butt and lifted her right up against him. She was in his arms then, against his body, and all that wet heat was directly over his dick and nearly burning him through his jeans. He slid his lips off hers and down her chest again as her head fell back with a groan and his mouth again caught a nipple. She was small and light and easy to manhandle. What’s more, she seemed to like the manhandling. He stepped forward until his bed bumped his legs and he could slowly lay her down as he still kissed her breasts, licked them, bathed them in his hot mouth. She squirmed and moaned under him. Her hands fell to the bedspread and clutched it in her fists. He kissed her down to her small torso, to her stomach, to the wet heat still covered in lace. He blew his hot breath on her and she responded by jerking her hips towards his mouth. He hooked a finger through the side of her panties and tugged to remove the delicate material. He slid it down her legs in a slow, sensual brush. He shut his eyes and took in a breath to slow his suddenly panting heart. Holy shit. She was hot. And beautiful. Delicate and slim. She was the only woman who had ever made his damn heart feel different, not just his dick.
He opened his eyes to find her looking down her body, watching him. He took a breath and let his gaze wonder fully over her until his gaze once again met hers.
She then... barely opened her legs. It was a small movement of her knees that he had to be right there to notice. His breath caught. He really couldn’t believe she really wanted this, and with him.
He set his hand to her upper thigh. Her breath caught and her body jerked in anticipation. He trailed his fingers along the silky skin inside her thigh. She shut her eyes and tilted her head back. Her legs parted another inch. He could see her. He stared at her. His heart felt like it was about to stop in his chest. Was anything sweeter than Christine offering herself to him?
He leaned forward and kissed where his fingers had touched. She sighed deeply, with longing. He slid both his hands up her thighs and pushed them gently open until her knees fell to the bed and she was open and bare and as vulnerable as she could be to him. He felt her twisting her head and clutching at the bedspread.
He slid his fingertips gently over her. They were wet from one soft touch. She nearly screamed as she flung a hand over her eyes in agony. “Oh my God! Please. Do something,” she finally groaned.
He smiled against her thigh where his lips rested, kissing her. He grunted in answer as his lips traveled up her inner thighs, his breath hot over her, his fingers still touching her, but nothing more. She pressed her hips up off the bed. Seeking pressure. He slid his hands under her and lifted her up and put his tongue on her. She jerked and groaned as her toes curled on the bed. She flipped her head back and forth in obvious mindlessness that soon had her panting and moaning as his tongue and lips were on and in her until she finally was screaming above him and coming under him.
He pressed his face into her stomach as he felt her body nearly convulsing under him. God, she was hot and beautiful and sensuous and so much more than he ever dreamed. She finally opened her eyes and blinked several times as if placing where she was. He chuckled at her funny reaction. She tilted her head down until she met his gaze and finally, she smiled back and he felt his heart seem to flip over in his chest. He turned back to her warm skin, now covered in a light sheen of sweat and pressed a kiss to her stomach, then crawled up towards her head.
Her hands came to his chest then, pushing at his shirt. He helped her discard it. Her gaze started at his neck and slid down over him. She reached two hands up and touched his shoulders, running her fingers down his arms, and back up to run over his collarbone and down the center of his chest.
“Wow.”
“Wow, what?” he asked as he leaned in to kiss her neck.
“Wow, what you did to me. Wow, what you look like. Wow, look at those muscles... take your pick.”
He couldn’t stop touching her, stroking her, holding her everywhere. Her intermittent sighs and moans only inflamed his passion more and made his need for her that much more immediate.
She giggled as he nuzzled her neck and his tongue touched her ear. Her hands came to his belt.
“You’d better not be giggling about that.”
She pulled her head back to meet his gaze. “It’s not another wow?”
He shook his head and slowly smiled. “Oh, that’s a wow. But no giggling in bed. It doesn’t do much for a guy.”
Her knuckled dipped down and pressed into him. He groaned in near pain. “Keep doing that and you will not be giggling.”
She did it again. He narrowed his eyes. “I guess you don’t follow the rules, huh?”
She licked her lips as she smiled up at him. “Never. No. I really don’t.”
He returned her smile. “I like that about you.”
She rolled over nearer to him and started working on his belt and jeans. She finally got them undone. He lifted his hips to let her pull everything off. Her small fingers trailed up his legs as she came closer to him. She ran them lightly over him and he had to close his eyes and grit his teeth to concentrate on not simply coming in her hand. Did she have any idea what she had already done to him?
“‘Wow’ works.”
He opened his eyes to glance at her, and then thought better of it and closed his eyes again. She was kneeled right beside him, his dick in her little hands and her hair trailing all down her back and naked breasts. So, no, he couldn’t look at her without almost coming too. His mind went to white fuzz. “What?”
“Wow. Works here too.”
He smiled, but said through gritted teeth, “Could you stop commenting on it, and do something to it?”
“Something like...” He could hear the teasing in her voice.
“Like ‘Oh my God! Please. Do something’ would work.”
She didn’t answer, but he felt her mouth, wet and hot, the next instant. She licked him and sucked him until he was grasping the bedspread and pressing his hips into her. “Holy fuck...” he whispered, pretty sure he was about to die or go to heaven.
She lifted her face off him. He groaned at the loss of her mouth.
“Condom?” she whispered, all kidding gone from her voice.
He stretched his arm to fumble with his nightstand until he found it and brought it to her. “Here.”
She took it, ripped it open, and put it on him as he lifted her body and slid her on to him. Her gaze met and held his as he entered her. She finally leaned down and kissed him deeply on the mouth, holding still, letting herself get used to him. With a groan he lifted his hips into her. She groaned in response. She lifted herself off him and then back down slowly, prolonging it, torturing him. Until he suddenly flipped her over, brushed the hair off her face as he cupped her face to kiss her as he pushed into her, hard and long, over and over and over again, until she was writhing beneath him and clasping his butt to her as her body came while he was still tightly in her.
When he finally came it was to Christine screaming out his name.
****
Jason woke up to find morning sunlight filling the bedroom. He rolled onto his back, thinking for a second about why
he felt so content, almost happy.
Christine.
He looked over to where she should be next to him. But she wasn’t there. He bolted up and looked around. Nothing. He listened and heard just the familiar silence of his house. He got up, heedless of being naked, and stalked to the front door and yanked it open. Her car was gone. He slammed the door shut, swearing. She had left. She had left without a word to him. Why?
Thoughts started to swirl through his head. Had she regretted last night? Obviously, by her reaction. Leaving without a word was something he would do, not her.
He’d slept awhile with her curled next to him, his arm wrapped around her waist, her head tucked under his chin. She had felt soft, warm, small. Her hair smelled good, some faint peachy smell that tickled at his nose. They hadn’t said a word after. He’d rolled down next to her and wrapped her tightly in his arms and she’d snuggled into him as naturally as if they’d done it a thousand times. She hadn’t seemed upset. She’d seemed content, even at ease.
So why had she left like this?
He hadn’t really thought ahead to what the morning would bring. He hadn’t planned for last night to happen.
He supposed if she’d been there it would have been a little awkward. But with her, he didn’t think he’d have minded. In fact, the more he thought about it, the more pissed he got. After all they’d gone through to get around to having sex, she’d left him without a word. Her message seemed loud and clear: she’d made a mistake. A mistake he’d told her from the start that he would be for her.
Since the first time he’d met her, there had been the underlying factor that she was engaged to his brother. And although he’d made her doubt her earlier decisions, she’d obviously realized her mistakes.
He sat down deflated on the edge of the bed. He had known, hadn’t he, always, that he’d never really been in the running for Christine Andrews.
Chapter Thirteen
Christine parked her car kitty-corner to her apartment. She could see Jason talking with someone in the reception area of Kelso’s Garage. The lights from the office made him stand out as if a spotlight was pointed on him. Her heart skipped a beat. What exactly was she supposed to do with this situation? Ignore him? Pretend nothing happened? Go talk to him?
It had been a couple days and she’d heard nothing from Jason. She pulled into her apartment and parked. She gathered her things and raced up the stairs into her apartment. Once in, she chided herself for acting like a middle school kid with a crush. She would have to seek Jason out; there was no question about that. He’d ignore her until his last breath if given the chance. And here she was, giving him that chance.
She turned and dashed back down the stairs and around the garage, stopping up short just before the door of the office. She looked in the glass and smoothed her hair as she checked her outfit.
Jason had just taken off the coveralls he worked in. He had on blue jeans and a t-shirt. Her heart hammered as she looked at him. She was nervous to talk to him. But whatever this was between them, it was definitely not over.
Squaring her shoulders, she decided she was not going to let him push her away. With what little confidence she felt she opened the door, blinking at the bright fluorescent lights. Jason was bent over behind the counter, his back to her.
Bill looked up at her and seemed unperturbed to find her there. “Christine, hello.”
“Hi, Bill,” she said, not looking at Bill, but at Jason as he stiffened and took a second longer than necessary to straighten and turn towards her.
“Well, how’s the apartment? Any problems?” Bill said, either oblivious to the heat that crackled between her and Jason, or just wasn’t bothered by it.
“It’s great, no problems at all. I’m glad you let me rent it,” she said. She still hadn’t spared a glance at Bill. She was staring blatantly at Jason. He turned his head to break eye contact.
“Well, good. Did you need something?”
“Yes, to speak with Jason.”
“Oh, well, then I’ll leave you alone,” Bill answered jovially as he walked into his office, shutting the door behind him.
Jason looked longingly after Bill, shuffling his feet.
“I think ‘hello’ is what you’re looking for.”
“What do you want?”
Had she really been naked and in this man’s arms not even forty-eight hours ago? He probably showed more warmth towards any random customer at the garage than he was to her.
“Don’t you think we should talk?”
He shrugged.
She sighed, “Could you at least try and not be like this?”
“You’re the one who left.”
“Yes,” she said. “I had to get home and change for work. You were still asleep.”
He nodded, expression cold. “Don’t worry, I got your message loud and clear.”
“Message? How could you get my message when I didn’t even know I was trying to send one? And besides, everything has changed between us.”
“Changed what? Who my brother is? Who you’re engaged to? Or half-engaged to, because I don’t think even you know the answer to that. But no. Nothing has changed.”
She heard the words and felt like he had socked her in the gut. Really, what had she expected? Jason to... what? Take her in his arms and say that he loved her? Say that he wanted to be with her? Say that he even liked her? Yeah right, not today, she realized. He was angry at her for leaving as she had, and angry at himself for sleeping with her. And angry that she had ever even been engaged to his brother.
“So, that’s it between us?”
He didn’t answer her question.
“What did you expect? That I would never talk to you again?”
“No. I expected to talk to you eventually.”
She almost laughed; he said it so seriously. He looked down at her with little expression in his eyes and still said nothing.
“Come off it, quit acting like this. You know why I left. You know what the other night meant to me. It meant something to you too, I know it did.”
He shrugged and crossed his arms over his chest. “Yeah, it meant something.”
“But?”
“But that’s it.”
“That’s it? What does that mean?”
“You’re confused right now, conflicted about who and what you want. You know that I’m not who you belong with. I’m not willing to be part of a contest for you with Trent. He can have you; hell, he’s never not had you, except for one night.”
She looked up into his face, looking for something that conflicted with the words coming from his mouth. Did he really believe she was that shallow, that she was just using him as an excuse to relieve her boredom or break up her engagement?
He had to have some idea that she was in love with him. He had to. Jason was afraid of commitment and of her. He was looking for just such an excuse to let him run from her and this thing between them.
He was right, of course; she was going through something. And that something was him. So what if she’d made some life-changing decisions in the span of time since she’d met him. Why did he have the right to assume she was making mistakes? Or that she didn’t know what she wanted?
And if she believed him, her life would be simplified. Trent wanted her. Jason didn’t. According to Jason it was that simple. Only it wasn’t. Because her feelings, about Jason, about the situation, were far from that cut and dried.
“You don’t even want to talk about it?”
“No.”
“I see. Then I have no conflict. There is nothing between us. We were just what? A fluke?”
“No, what happened had been coming on since we met.”
“So, the other night was us just scratching some kind of itch? That’s what you think about me? What you feel about me?”
He didn’t answer.
Her jaw dropped. “That is really what you think?”
“Yeah, that’s what I think.”
“You want to completely igno
re us?”
“There is no us. You seem to be forgetting who’s been engaged to someone else.”
“No, I’ve never forgotten it. That’s why I—”
“Why what? Why you never, fully broke up with Trent? Does he have a clue that sorting things out includes sleeping with me?”
“Why are you trying to punish me for something you were just as involved in? You were there too. You knew the circumstances.”
“So did you.”
“Which makes me what?”
He shook his head. “You’ll wake up one day and find all of this—your apartment, your job, doubting your engagement—has all been a mistake. But the biggest of those mistakes will be me. If you tell Trent and dump him, what do you think we’re going to have? Do you think we’re going to live happily ever after and all that? No way. Not with me. So if you’re looking for an excuse to change your life, find it with someone else.”
“You’re scared of how you feel about me. You’re scared I’ll hurt you. And you’re using Trent as a cop-out so you don’t have to deal with me.”
“Bullshit. Even if we were different and there was no Trent, even then it wouldn’t work out. Get a clue. You and I were never an option.”