"The one about whether I intend that we should have a real relationship, or whether I just want us to be casual."
"Oh." Thinking about that distracted her a little, until he began to speak again.
"And my answer to you is that I want both—and more—from you. I want everything from you that you're willing to let me have, and maybe a little that you didn't know you were going to yield to me. I want to cover you in chocolate and lick every bit of it off, then fuck you in the shower afterwards. I want to show you around Paris and bring you off in the Eiffel Tower. I want to go hiking with you, and eat amazing food with you, and stay up all night talking to you then watch the sunrise on the beach. And I want to wear you like a mask until you've come so many times you're begging me to stop. I want to watch you blush when we swim together nude for the first time." He wasn't necessarily sure she hadn't already done that, but he was pretty certain she hadn't, given what he already knew about her unremarkable sex life. "And I want to go to movies with you and watch TV with you, and talk to you about your dreams and your fears while we cuddle, exhausted from making love all night, in our bed together."
He paused and took a breath, then said, in a deliberately, unmistakably dominant way, "But right now, I want you to come for me."
And she did.
He was absolutely amazed by it, but she did. She came hard, mere seconds after he'd told her to, screaming and gasping and groaning. He could see how she must've looked in his head, and it was a very potent image. And before she'd come too far down from the heights, he said, "Again, baby. I want to hear you come for me again."
"Rad, no—" she panted.
"Yes, honey. Do as you're told now. Take as much time as you need. I love hearing you pleasure yourself. It's almost as good as doing it myself. Almost."
Andrea frowned. "But… don't you want me to… to help you?"
"I'm already done, doll."
"You are?"
"Yes. I came when you did. You were just too involved in your own thing—as I wanted you to be—to notice me."
"Oh."
"Again, Andrea." He thoroughly enjoyed the telling way her breath caught at his sternness, as she did the next five times he said it, too.
"No more, no more, no more. Please, Rad." He couldn't see it, but her head was moving back and forth on her pillow, and her hands were no longer touching herself—she was just too damned sensitive to endure any more stimulation.
That chuckle was almost enough to get her to relent, but not quite.
"All right. I'll let you off the hook this time, I suppose."
"Are you trying to off me, or what?" she accused, with no malice whatsoever. She was much too exhausted to summon any kind of emotion whatsoever.
"Absolutely not. I'm trying to get you to agree to be mine." And I don't think I'm doing a very good job of it, he thought, because you still haven't agreed.
He supposed he could drop a truth bomb on her about who he was, but he really didn't want to do that. He wanted to win her by himself. He wanted her to want to be with him because she wanted to be with him, not because she had one eye on his bank account. Although it was an incredible blessing at times, having an obscene amount of money could be a pain in the ass, too, especially with someone who didn't have anywhere near as much as he did.
But he hadn't grown up rich, and he went out of his way to eschew the bubble he could have lived in in order to maintain a lot of friendships with people from his past who were great friends and great people living more ordinary lives.
Which was how he'd found himself in that bar when he did, meeting a woman he was rapidly falling for—much more so than she was falling for him, if at all.
"I thought that kind of phrasing was out of favor."
"Not with me, it isn't."
"So you do have an old-fashioned outlook about some things."
"I suppose. I want you, and I want to know that you're mine and mine alone. I'd like to tether you to me with a gold chain and never let you out of my sight."
Rad wished she'd say something like that about him back to him, but she didn't.
"You're not… worried about how different we are at our cores?"
"Because your husband didn't appreciate you or teach you anything about sex? No."
"Yes, but more than that. I think we're probably pretty far apart on the economic scale. That won't be a problem for you?"
"Not at all." Then he asked a question he wasn't sure he wanted to know the answer to. "Will it be a problem for you?"
"I don't know," she answered honestly. "I've never met anyone with lots of money. My friends are all struggling like I am, living paycheck to paycheck."
"Well, honey, let's not borrow trouble, hmm? Having money is usually seen as something good. Let's go with that, shall we?"
They were both silent for a moment, until she said, "I-I can't give you an answer tonight, Rad. I'm sorry."
"No need to be sorry. I'm just glad to know that you're seriously considering it—"
"I am, I am!"
"And I'm very happy that I got to have phone sex with you, too."
"Thank you. I am, too, believe me."
"You're welcome, lovely. Want me to tuck you in?"
Andrea sat up quickly and regretted it. "Woooh."
"What is it?"
"Just dizzy. I think all my blood is still between my legs."
He smiled at that, but wished he was there to take care of her. "Are you sure you have to get up? You can't just drift off to sleep?"
"No, I can't. I have crap I have to get done for work tomorrow."
"Well, promise me you'll be careful."
"I will."
"And call me—or text me—or send me a carrier pigeon or a smoke signal—I don't care which one—anytime, minx."
"Thank you, Rad. I will."
"Sleep well, honey."
"You, too."
The truth was that he hadn't slept a wink since they'd last talked, not knowing what she was going to say to him on Thursday, but then, he didn't need much more than four or five hours of sleep a night, anyway, so he just worked all night and all day. It wasn't as if he hadn't done it before.
For her part, Andrea finished up what she had to do and fell back into the bed that had a wet spot on the comforter, slipping quickly into a deep, dreamless sleep.
Chapter 5
When she finally called him that Thursday, early evening just after supper, he snatched his phone up like it was a hot stock. The waiting period she had imposed on him was the hardest few days in his life. Parts of him wanted to descend on her and overwhelm her with jewels and cars and vacations until she couldn't possibly say no to him. Other parts of him just wanted to call her and ask her to make up her mind already, so he could either be excruciatingly happy or horribly depressed. Either of those choices would have been preferable to the interminable limbo he'd been living in.
But he managed to refrain from doing any of those things, although it was a close call at a lot of points, especially in the middle of the night, and especially when he'd had a little too much to drink, which was, frankly, a lot of the time.
"Yes? What?"
"Hello to you, too. I thought Brits were sticklers for manners? What happened to all of that Downton Abbey level shit?"
"It died in the nineteen twenties, along with most civilities. I don't give a fuck about courtesies. Answer my damned question, Andrea!"
It was the closest he'd come to yelling at her, although he hadn't raised his voice. Still, he grimaced, probably not the smartest approach, considering what he was asking her to do.
Andy knew she should have taken much more time than he was allowing her to make this decision. And she should have spent the time on the phone with him asking much more pertinent questions about how he conducted relationships and pumping him for as much information about himself as possible, since she really barely knew him. But she'd asked him what seemed most important to her at the time, and she figured she'd learn the rest. She'd
known a ton about Conner before they'd gotten married, and look what that had gotten her.
Mostly, though, she wanted him very badly, and she thought she might even be on the way to developing feelings for him, although it was a much slower process for her, understandably so, than it was for him.
And, for once in her life, she didn't want to do what she thought she ought to do—what everyone else would want her to do, so that she'd be just like them. She wanted some excitement in her life, to live a little, and to do what she wanted to do, however impulsive and impractical that might turn out to be.
She thought it was highly likely that he was going to end up hurting her—badly—somehow, some day. But, even if it only lasted a little while, then she thought she probably would have had a helluva ride.
"Um, yes?"
He felt as if he could breathe for the first time in days.
"Really? You'll give us a go? You're not just having me on?" He knew he sounded weak and needy, but he really hadn't any idea which way she was leaning, and her answer was an enormous relief—even if it was highly tentative at the same time.
"Uh, yes."
Rad did what he'd had her doing the last time they were on the phone and took several deep, calming breaths.
"Y-you don't sound very enthusiastic. I don't mean to look a gift… relationship in the mouth—"
"I'm sorry, if I don't sound like I want to do it, but this was one of the most important decisions I've made in my life, and frankly, I'm not sure it's the right one, even now. I don't trust myself anymore, you see, considering my disastrous marriage. That's why I've been alone for a while, and why I never put myself out there. I was terrified—I am terrified—that I'll screw it up again."
"I understand. I do. And I'll do my level best to make sure you don't regret your decision."
"Thank you. And I'll do the same for you."
"So, can I come over?"
Andrea laughed. "No!"
He was crestfallen. "Why not?" If she didn't know him, she'd think he was a little boy who'd been denied a treat, rather than a very strong, capable, incredibly sexy man.
"Because it's a work night."
He scoffed at that. "It's always a work night!" he winged.
"Uh, yeah. It's a work night five out of seven, I think." She was trying to figure that out while he was still bemoaning his fate.
"Do you want to come over here instead?" he suggested, brightening.
"And you're not going to fuck me all night there, you're saying? Somehow I don't believe that."
"I. Want. You," he grumbled.
"I want you, too, Rad."
That was something, at least. She wasn't very verbally expressive about things like that, and it was a good thing he had that healthy ego she was always teasing him about.
"So, I can have you tomorrow, for the weekend?" he asked, eager to pin her down, in more ways than one.
"Yes, and it's even a three day weekend, so you've got me—uninterrupted—for three days. I'll ask you at the end if you still want to see me."
"Why wouldn't I still want to see you?"
"Well, it's been implied by certain others that I am difficult to be around for any length of time."
"Oh. I never noticed it."
"We were only together for ten hours or so, and we spent ninety-nine percent of it fucking."
"Still." Then it struck him. "Did your husband actually say that to you?"
"Oh yeah. Frequently, usually before he stepped out the door to go God knows where, and see—and do—God knows who."
"Andrea. I'm so, so sorry that some men are such pigs."
"Thank you."
"For the record, I will never do that to you. I have never cheated on any girl I've been with. And if I'm stepping out the door to go somewhere, I want you on my arm, going with me."
She teared up at that. "Rad."
"What, honey?" His voice was soft as kitten fur.
"That was a really lovely thing to say to me."
"Baby, are you crying?"
"Yeah. Sorry."
"No sorries. If I was there, I'd dry your tears and hug you and kiss you and dry those tears, and hold you until you asked me to stop."
"I can't imagine ever wanting you to stop."
Rad preened at that offhand comment.
"That's one of the things I missed so much about how our marriage became. There was no sex, but there was also no physical affection, no compliments, no… nothing nice or pleasant about it. I mean, he wasn't awful to me all the time, but I don't think he even liked me, and he obviously didn't want to be around me. You've complimented more, been more affectionate and generally interested in me in the short time we've known each other, than he was in our entire marriage."
"Well, I'll take that as a huge compliment, because I'm greedy for them from you, but I'm sorry that you were treated so badly, lovely. You didn't deserve it."
He could hear her start to cry again when it had just died down. "What'd I say?"
"You said I didn't deserve it. That's so nice of you!"
"Are you sure you don't want me to come over and hug you? I promise I'll keep my hands to myself and just take care of you. I'll hold you all night while you sleep."
That sounded like Heaven to her. "Oh, Rad, I don't think either of us can keep our hands off each other for longer than it takes to go to the bathroom and back."
He grimaced. "You're right. I hate it, but you're right."
That got a slight, tinkling laugh from her.
"Well, then, let's think about more pleasant things, shall we? How soon can you get to me after work?"
It turned out that, if she brought what she would need for the weekend, which Rad, of course, reassured her would not be a lot of clothes, signed out as soon as the clock struck five, didn't chit chat on the way out, and drove like a maniac, she could make what should have been an hour long trip in about a half an hour.
But when she got there, Andrea had an attack of cold feet, for some reason, sitting in the driveway, in her car, clutching her overnight bag. She didn't regret her decision, really. She just wasn't sure she could go through with it. The sense of adventure and devil-may-care attitude that had driven her to decide to do this was facing the cold hard reality of the fact that she'd agreed to be involved with a man she barely knew.
"Hey, you," Rad greeted, sinking down next to the car, arms crossed over where the window would have been. "You okay?"
Andrea nodded, but she hadn't looked at him yet. "Yeah, I'm fine."
And she made no move to get out of the car, even when he opened the door for her in a gallant gesture.
"Lovely? What's wrong?" He went down on one knee in front of her.
"Nothing."
Oh, dear God, she was starting to cry! She didn't think she'd ever get over the embarrassment. Now, not only was she feeling tentative and unsure of herself, but she was bawling, too.
"Second thoughts?" he deduced in a genius manner, handing her what had to be a very expensive, decorative handkerchief from the breast pocket of his equally expensive suit.
"Not really," she lied. "Well, maybe, a little." She sniffed a bit but never used his handkerchief. "Kinda sorta." She handed it back to him. "Possibly."
He just knelt there, waiting on her patiently.
"Probably." She buried her face in her hands and descended into outright sobs, through which he was able to discern the word, "Definitely."
"Poor baby," he sympathized, unable to watch her crying any longer and reaching into the car to lift her out of it.
She didn't think to tell him that this was yet another first for her. Her ex carrying her over the threshold of their new house didn't count to her. Connor had only taken about two steps with her in his arms before putting her down just inside the foyer.
But Rad had snagged her bag, closed the car door, and strode up the driveway and into his house as if he was just carrying a couple of bags of groceries.
He wanted to bring her into the bedroom,
but decided that was too much temptation, even for him. He could have gone into the living room or the den, but instead, he went to the room in which he was most comfortable—his study—sitting carefully down in his chair to place her on his lap.
Andrea made as if to get up immediately, of course, but he wouldn't let her.
"No, let me hold you. Please." He didn't do or say anything else, but merely did as he'd asked—he held her to him, rubbing her back occasionally and kissing the top of her head, but mostly, he just kept his arms tight around her.
When the storm had passed and she became restless, moving around on him a bit, he loosened his hold a little, but still keeping her on his lap. That's when he gave her a piece of Kleenex, which she did use. She didn't know where his handkerchief had gotten to.
"Are you feeling a little better?"
"Yes, thank you." She sounded much more subdued than he preferred, but he understood her trepidation.
"I'm glad. Do you want to go home?" He asked the question because he knew he had to—he ought to—but he didn't want to.
He was too afraid that she was going to say yes.
And he was right. Parts of her—loud parts of her—wanted her to say yes. But other, quieter parts of her wanted her to stay. "No, I don't think so, if you don't mind."
Rad felt as if a huge weight had been lifted from him for the second time in less than a day. "I always want you near me, Andrea, but even though I wanted to go pluck you out of bed and bring you back here a thousand million times lately, I'm no kidnapper. So I only want you to stay if you want to stay. And it's okay to be apprehensive about the situation, although I hope you know that you don't need to be that way about me. All of this is new to you, and you're a very sensitive soul."
"You're so kind and caring with me. I'm so sorry I got here and started crying all over you."
"No worries, angel. I'm very glad you want to stay, though. I have lots of things planned for us this weekend, but not tonight."
"Not tonight?"
"Yeah, I want you all to myself tonight. One night of that was nowhere near enough for me."
He tipped her chin and kissed her gently, deepening it in a very careful, measured manner, until she was melting against him and couldn't remember why she was so afraid in the first place.
Just One Night Page 7