She settled into the chair at her desk, taking another look around the room. “Speaking of things that are familiar, Kari has to go to a conference in Orlando. She asked me if I wanted to join her. Would you be cool with it if she flew into Miami and I drove up and back with her? It’s next week.”
I sat on the other side of the desk, like I was her client. As if I’d paid for her and I could have my way with her. My mouth watered at the thought of climbing under the desk, easing her shorts down, listening to her screams echoing off the freshly painted walls, ringing out onto the sidewalk, when I brought her to climax. I’d use nothing but my tongue and my hands to hold her thighs apart. I could practically feel her ripping at my hair and my shoulders when she smiled back at me, like she knew what was on my mind. But Claudia was in the front room, and we were open for business. It would be all I could think about until I had a chance to make it reality.
Fuck it. We’d both had plenty of practice staying quiet at Leah’s house.
“A little road trip? Yeah, go. That will be fun,” I said. Leah had been so wound up and worried about everything since we got here, she needed to relax. I got up and locked the office door.
“Thank you.” She furrowed her brow when I leaned over the desk, grinning at her. “What’s up?” she asked.
“Take your shorts off.”
Her mouth dropped. “Jagger, we’re at work.” The protest was undermined by her unbuttoning her shorts and lowering her fly. When her hands landed on her waistband she stopped and flicked her gaze up to me.
“I know where we are.” I had to catch my breath after the wall of heat reached me. “How long did you think we could keep our hands off each other, working so closely together? After the three hours we worked together on the show, you practically attacked me when we got back to the bed and breakfast.”
“Oh, I attacked you? I remember it a little differently, since I’m the one who had to go downstairs and face the music with a soaking wet bra.” She shimmied out of her shorts, and I was going to have to do the same when I watched her hook her panties down her thighs. They swung from her finger. “Kinda like these. Out of commission for the rest of the day.”
She got up, bare from the waist down, and dropped them on my desk. I was going to frigging explode. That wasn’t part of the plan. She smirked at me. “I’ll just leave them here. In case you need inspiration while I’m gone.”
“I will.” I backed her against the desk. I’d meant to do this while she sat in her chair, but like every other plan I’d had for her, her body made me lose all control. “I’ll create some amazing stuff, thinking about what I did to you in this very spot.”
Leah gripped the desk, squeezing her eyes closed when I reached between her legs. My fingers moved easily, and she was ready for whatever came next. I cupped her chin with my other hand, meeting her in a kiss. Our lips moved with the same forbidden and frantic pace as my fingers.
“I don’t know how long I’m gonna stay standing.” Her eyelids fluttered open. She was drunk with desire.
“I won’t let you fall.” My lips moved against her cheek, and she moaned, letting her head fall back. She steadied herself against the desk and I fell to my knees. It was where I belonged in front of her. She’d changed my life and made my dreams come true. It wouldn’t be fair if she knew what an advantage she had over me.
Especially as her thighs trembled under my grip.
A cry escaped her lips when my tongue made contact with her pussy. She laughed, sliding down a bit when she let go of the desk to clap her hand over her mouth. I kept my promise and caught her, trapping her in place. Trusting me to keep my word, she did one of my favorite fucking things, tangling her fingers in my hair while I licked and sucked her clit.
There was something to the keeping quiet thing that I hadn’t realized I missed since we didn’t have to worry about it at my house—our house. We had to articulate through movement. The tug of my hair, the gyration of her hips were the only way she could tell me she liked what I was doing. It made everything so much more intense, to be deprived of the most basic form of communication.
Leah pulled my hair hard and gasped. I’d already known she was close to climax, her muscles were going crazy. She bowed forward, gripping my shoulders for balance as I helped her finish.
I lowered her to the floor, kissing anything I could reach until we were face to face. Leah was greedy, taking everything back from my lips. She grabbed my cock, and the noise that came out of me when she ran her hand over my hard shaft under the fabric sounded something like growl.
“I think I miss you already,” she said, unzipping my jeans. All it took was her hand on my stomach to knock me back. I propped myself up on my elbows, because there was no better view in the world than watching Leah suck my dick. And it wasn’t about what she was doing to me—it was how she did it. They way she’d look up at me with a shy smile as she ran her fingers over my balls, and the way her sigh vibrated against my skin when she put my cock in her mouth. I could hardly control myself, but that was the best part.
It didn’t take me long to come. Leah knew exactly what I liked. I’d always worried about that being boring, but it was anything but. I’d finally found the person who made me complete, and it was the best thing that had ever happened to me.
**
There was so much going on. Babies, business . . . Leah and I had only talked about the wedding in passing. I needed to show her I was serious about it. It didn’t fucking matter who was there, to me anyway. I just wanted to share it with her.
“I need your help,” I confessed to Claudia once Leah and Kari headed to Orlando. Kari had been distant, the few hours that she was here, insisting on staying in a hotel. It surprised me, for someone who’d gone out of her way to spend time with Leah, but I didn’t have time to try to figure her out.
“What’s up?” Claudia loved having the design company spring up around her. She was a painter, and Leah had designed a seating area around her collection. Two of paintings sold immediately, and Claudia would follow Leah anywhere after that. I knew the feeling. One of my photographs sold since we’d put the furniture in the gallery, too. It completely changed the vibe of the space. I’d always known I’d need something else to help the gallery survive, never thinking for a second it would be Leah.
“Leah and I are getting married.” I couldn’t hold my grin when Claudia squealed. “It won’t be anything big. She’s been so busy getting this place up and running I want to get things settled. I think she’d like that.”
Claudia didn’t need to know all of our dirty laundry. She was the first regular coworker I’d had since my part time jobs in high school. I’d kept my distance from her, but she’d warmed up to Leah so much that I was pretty sure that wasn’t the right approach.
“Yeah, I think she would, too. You guys are such a cute couple. Gives me hope. What are you thinking for the wedding?”
She had no idea how refreshing it was to hear that. After Kari’s snub and Zach acting like . . . Zach, I didn’t see why Leah wanted to invite anyone to the wedding. Except for her folks and Raven, who’d probably treat it like a hostage situation. If she ever recovered from the shock of becoming a big sister.
“Something beachy and tropical. Not a big resort, because that’s not our speed. A little out of the way place no one knows about. I see us all cooking on the beach and watching the sun set.”
“Smart. My sister just got married. It was her day.” Claudia rolled her eyes. “Four hundred people came. My parents spent more in one day than I did on four years of college. My sister said she wanted to feel like a princess. I told her she was twenty-seven years old and has two kids, she needed to get over it. It was a year of drama and fighting. I got kicked out of the wedding party twice. Too bad it didn’t stick.”
I laughed. “Sounds like your sister is friends with some of the people we know.”
Claudia cringed. “Whatever you do, don’t invite them. What about one of the little islands in th
e Keys? Some of them have private cottages and they’re still pretty tropical. I paint down there sometimes. There’s wild flowers everywhere, and the colors are so intense.”
Perfect. “Can you write down some of the suggestions for me?” All the time I’d spent exploring I never paid attention to anything that was still flourishing. If Leah wanted to get married at a defunct warehouse or a crumbling church, I had tons of suggestions.
Knowing Leah, she’d probably love it.
“Have you ever noticed any abandoned properties while you’re down there?” I asked.
She wrinkled her nose in confusion, but then she remembered who she was talking to. “I wasn’t looking for them, but there’s got to be. At the very least, some old fishing huts.”
It gave me a perfect idea. I’d investigate it soon, but before I did anything else, I had to get a ring.
Chapter Seventeen
Leah
I hated how easy it was to lie to Jagger. And even worse, how he didn’t think to question me. Like I’d never betray him or go behind his back. I saw how he’d let himself get hurt so easily, so completely. This was a man who wanted to be loved, no matter what the cost.
It was for a good cause, I told myself, as Kari drove north on the interstate in her rented convertible. “I get one of these every time I come down here. It’s so worth it. It’s already gray and dreary in DC. All the leaves fell off the trees. But here, it’s like summer didn’t get the memo that it’s supposed to be over,” she yelled over the whipping wind.
“I won’t miss winter. I still need to convince my folks to come down for Christmas.” My mother thought the idea was scandalous. According to her, Christmas was supposed to be spent in a cold climate. Like being snowed in was a badge of honor. No thank you.
“Yeah. No repeats of last year.” Kari shook her head. I could barely see her face, she’d settled into the convertible life, with a sixties-style hair scarf and giant sunglasses.
“Yeah. I won’t set foot in Rich’s house ever again, especially after I take all his money in this lawsuit.” Rich had lured my family to his house last Christmas under the false pretense that his mother was sick. Instead, his new wife Shelly and her best friend Beth had figured out a way to hire Jagger and tell everyone we knew that I’d hired a male escort. “Although, walking in there with Jagger would be pretty sweet. Especially when he’s my husband.”
Kari slammed on the breaks. If I hadn’t been wearing my seatbelt, I would’ve gone flying onto the highway. “When he’s what?”
“My husband. We’re getting married.” Oh shit, I forgot to tell her. And from the look on her face, I wasn’t sure congratulations were in order. “Come on, it’s not that shocking. We’re having a baby. That’s way more permanent.”
“You can’t drop it into casual conversation like that. Like you’re asking for a glass of wine or something. ‘I’m inviting my parents down for Christmas and I’m getting married.’”
“Don’t tease me with wine.” I made a face at her and she burst out laughing. I missed sangria so much. “I meant to tell you, but you were too busy trying to debunk Jagger’s story about his estranged son.”
Kari didn’t answer me right away. “I know I can be a bitch sometimes. A lot of the time. It’s my way of looking out for you. I don’t have a gentle touch like you do. And I worry that you trust too easily.”
I sighed. “Jagger’s given me no reason not to trust him. I’m the one sneaking around behind his back, and I feel like shit about it. He wanted to know why you didn’t come to dinner with us last night. I couldn’t tell him because you were busy gathering last minute intel for our covert operation. Instead, I said you had to get things ready for your non-existent convention.” Another lie. They piled up quickly. It would make it harder to believe that I was doing this for him if I ever had to come clean.
Besides the fact he asked me not to do this. I really was no better than Kim Crowe. Funny how thin the line between the two of us was. She’d probably thought she was doing the right thing, too.
“How do you want to handle this when we get there?” Kari gestured to the GPS. “As long as we don’t hit traffic, we should arrive around the time school gets out. That’s probably our best chance to catch a glimpse of him, since kids don’t play outside anymore.”
I had a little more than three hours to think about it. “We’ll drive through the neighborhood and see what we can see.” We didn’t have too many options. “I’ve never sought out someone before. Feels a little stalkerish. Especially since he’s ten.”
“I’m not sure exactly what you want to accomplish. We go nowhere near the kid. That’s out of the question. What will you do if you see Kim?”
I sighed and tried to picture the scenario. In my head, I gave her a piece of my mind. Made her crumble like she’d done to Jagger. Somehow it fixed everything for everyone. But in reality, my track record with confrontation was piss poor. “I’d love to tell her she broke Jagger’s heart. I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t be news to her. But it would be stupid to say anything. So I hope to see some evidence of her being a decent human being. A good mom. Because if she treats everyone in her life the way she treated Jagger . . .” I shook my head.
“I think that’s realistic. A well-kept house and yard, a car that’s not up on blocks, and a happy-looking kid. That’s the most we can hope for. I understand why you couldn’t leave this alone. I got on a plane to join you because I couldn’t leave it alone. I think our main goal should be to not make anything worse than it already is.”
On paper, that sounded easy. But if I came face to face with that woman, I had no idea what would happen. “Deal.”
**
It wasn’t a bad neighborhood at all. A nice subdivision with a lot of houses that looked like one another. Kari did a couple laps around through the knotted streets and the whole thing made me dizzy.
“That’s it, coming up on the left.” She pointed to a modest, Mediterranean-style house with a sedan in the driveway. “I’m not going to slow down because I don’t want to draw any attention. I’ll do a couple rounds, and maybe we can find a place to get out. Take a power walk.”
Like I could feel my legs. “Is that considered strenuous exercise?”
“Possibly. It can be a stroll, if that’s better for you.” Kari slowed down, right in front of Kim’s house, but she was looking at me. “Is everything okay?”
“Yeah. Keep going.” I took a long swig of my water, which was stupid, because I’d have to knock on Kim’s door and ask for the bathroom. “My placenta settled at the bottom of my uterus. I can’t do anything too stressful—“
“Is the baby okay?”
“As far as I know.” The fear of the unknown was never more real than when someone asked me that question.
She raised an eyebrow. “Would this have been helpful information to have last week?”
I sighed. “Yeah. The doctor said nothing strenuous.”
“Does that mean no sex? This is precisely why I’ll adopt if I ever decide it’s time to be a mother. I don’t want things getting bent out of shape down there.”
All the color drained from Kari’s face when I nodded. “Pelvic rest until further notice. It doesn’t mean no sex, just no trespassing.” If I didn’t have a sense of humor about this, I’d explode. “So we’ve been getting creative . . . ”
The color was back, along with a sly smile. “How’s that going?” she asked.
The neighborhood had a park in the middle, and Kari parked in one of the spaces in front of it. A couple of young moms with little kids gathered around the jungle gym. I squinted at them, looking for any clues. I wasn’t close enough to make out details, if I even knew what I was looking for.
“Amazing, believe it or not. We can’t rely on the basics, so we have to be inventive. And we’ve made it sort of a game, trying to surprise each other with what we come up with.” This would be the first night since I moved to Miami that I wouldn’t be sleeping with Jagger. My soul rumbled w
ith an intense craving that would demand to be satisfied the minute I laid eyes on him. “And since I’m horny as hell, we have a lot of chances to figure out what works and what doesn’t.”
“At least you didn’t have to stop cold turkey.” Kari smoothed out her hair as she started walking.
I’d given up on my hair after four hours of having it whipped around at high speed. I tucked it under a hat and finger-combed the curls that stuck out. “Why? Because you think Jagger will go back to escorting?”
She rolled her eyes. “No. Because I wouldn’t want to go seven or eight months without sex. And as hard as I am on Jagger, he is sexy. No one deserves the torture of having to look but not touch for that long.”
“Been there, done that. I wonder if Rich and I would’ve fared better if we had sex a little more often.” I was quiet, thinking about it.
“Possibly. But you were so ready to come out of your cocoon with that relationship. You needed to fly. Even if you did have a better physical relationship with him, he was never enough for you, Leah. I can’t imagine you still living with him, that life. I hated that fake smile you used to plaster on your face. I wanted to shake you and wake you up from your coma.”
“I wish you did,” I said. Her words stuck with me. “It just sucks that all those shitty things had to happen to both me and Jagger for us to find each other.”
“You wouldn’t appreciate what you have if they didn’t happen.” Kari slowed as we approached Kim’s house, fiddling with her phone.
“What are you doing?” I asked. She might have some information that she wanted to check. But I knew Kari, and it was seldom that simple.
“Not sure.” Her head was on a swivel. “I figured I should have it at the ready.”
My heart pounded. “Are you taking pictures?”
“Maybe. If there’s something we need to make a record of. The yard doesn’t give us any clues. But it doesn’t scream that any kids live here, either.”
Ties That Bind (The Escort, #3) Page 11