by Anne Calhoun
“Keep talking.”
“Why?”
“Because you need to learn what works for you. Don’t rely on the man to take care of you. Know what you want and how to ask for it.” His scythe-smile flashed in the filtered sunlight. “Because it makes me really, really hot when a woman talks dirty in bed.”
She blinked. He tucked a pillow under her head, then left a trail of kisses down her breastbone to her waistband. “Lift,” he commanded.
The slight angle allowed her to watch him unfasten button and zipper, then slide the skirt down to toss it to the floor. He settled between her parted legs, blue eyes holding hers as he skated his palms up calves to knees to inner thighs. Vulnerability melded with desire, and she kept her legs as closed as she could with a big, broad-shouldered man kneeling between them.
“You said no to this the first night.”
She nodded.
He loomed over her, dark hair, lust-dark eyes, scruff on his jaw, broad, tanned shoulders gilded by the weak sunlight pushing through the blinds, and without any movement at all she tightened again. He worked his big, rough hands under her bottom to curve around her hips. One palm flattened on her belly. The fingers of the other hand stroked her mound before he bent forward to press an openmouthed kiss to the top of her folds. “Say yes this time.”
“I’m not sure I’m going to like that,” she said.
“It’s intimate,” he murmured, hot breath against her sex, his stubble ever so slightly grazing awakening nerve endings. “More intimate than sex. Sometimes it’s easier for a woman to get off this way. Close your eyes.”
She did as he said. Her awareness of touch heightened. Sweat slicked her thighs where his shoulders held her open and where his palm lay against her belly, just above her mound. The fingers of his other hand curled around her hip. After a moment a slow stream of air blew gently against the top of her sex. She tensed. It stopped, but that faint pressure hinted at something more. When she relaxed again her thighs relaxed a little more. Her inner folds parted, the sensation heightened without the visual distraction of his dark face between her legs. The next time he blew gently, the air flowed over her clit.
Her breathing shallowed, and her hips tilted ever so slightly. Not enough. “Ben,” she whispered.
“Say, lick my clit.”
Her clit fluttered at the words as warm breath whispered against needy flesh. “Lick my clit,” she said.
“Look at me and say it.”
She opened her eyes to find him studying her. A shocking heat flashed from her nipples to low in her belly. “Lick my clit, Ben.”
He was smiling when he pressed his open mouth to her sex. His tongue slowly circled her clit, sending heat streaming through her veins. The slick, smooth pressure was easier to take than his rough fingertips. She learned as he explored. One side was more sensitive than the other, and steady circles around the increasingly distended nub tightened her muscles. The pleasure ebbed with the cessation of contact, and she moaned and lifted her hips.
When she opened her eyes again, he said, “Still think you’re not going to like this?”
“Don’t stop.”
He widened her legs with his shoulders, then used his tongue and very, very gently, his teeth until she was gasping. The build to orgasm still startled her, so demanding, so shockingly powerful. She gripped the pillow behind her head with one hand, threaded her fingers through Ben’s hair with the other, and lifted her hips to his mouth. Gasping little breaths tripped into the still, quiet air, then she stopped breathing entirely. Then the wave crashed over her, pushing her deep into the void.
The rasp of palm over stubble brought her back into the room. She opened her eyes to find Ben wiping moisture from his jaw. Her moisture. “Kiss me,” she said without thinking. When he hesitated, she said it again. “Kiss me. I want to taste that.”
Chapter Eight
How in the name of sweet baby Jesus had this woman stayed a virgin for so long?
Broad damned daylight, she was naked in his bed, legs splayed for him, the sex flush still pink on her cheeks and throat. Ten minutes ago she didn’t want him to go down on her. Now she wanted to know how she tasted?
This wasn’t going according to plan. His cock hung heavy and rigid between his legs, balls tight to his body because talking dirty did turn him on. Rachel Hill talking dirty made him hard enough to pound nails. Her peremptory tone also did it for him, not quite a command but definitely leaving no room for him to refuse.
“Yes, ma’am,” he said, and crawled up her body, using his knees to keep her thighs spread. Make her feel the emptiness, the need. Don’t hold back, and toss your expectations about delicate sensibilities out the window. He nuzzled into her jaw, let her smell the musk clinging to his chin and lips, then brushed his mouth over hers. Her tongue flicked out to lick first his upper, then his lower lip, and somehow she’d rewired his brain so the touch of her lips against his mouth sent five thousand volts straight to his cock. He let out a soft little groan but stayed poised above her while she nibbled and sucked and licked, torturing himself until she wrapped one leg, then the other, around his to pull him down to her. She worked her hands under his elastic waistband and gripped his hips, pulling him closer.
“How do you like me now?” he said. Even to his own ears the words sounded rough, like she’d abraded his throat with sandpaper.
“Very, very well,” she said.
“Gonna trust me to know what you need?”
“Maybe,” she said.
She flattened her palms on his hipbones, one hand on either side of his erection, and eased his shorts down. The only thought left in his brain was how badly he wanted to hear Rachel Hill ask him to fuck her.
He sat back and opened the nightstand drawer to grab a box of condoms. “They teach you about safe sex at that church you went to?”
“Only that safe sex is married sex,” she said.
Jesus fucking Christ.
He tore one condom from the strip, handed it to her, then shoved his shorts down and off. A muscle jumped in his jaw as he pushed back onto his heels, his knees spread wide. “First safe sex lesson. The guy always wears a condom. Always. Guys will use every line in the book to go bareback. It’s non-negotiable until you see test results from a doctor.”
She opened the packet and withdrew the condom. “I know,” she said as she studied it. “I read up on safe sex before we went out on our date.”
So there was a limit to the stupid risks she’d take. She’d buy a stranger at an auction, but know enough to make him use a condom. In some fucked-up way that passed for a plan. “Put that on me.”
She slid him a look under her lashes, but settled on her knees in front of him, then rested the rolled-up condom on top of his shaft.
“Like this,” he said, turning it over to show her how it unrolled.
His hand guided hers as she sheathed him all the way to the base, then turned her wrist so her hand cupped his testicles, gently squeezing until he showed her exactly how much pressure they could take, and the sensitive patch behind them. His breathing stuttered, then he wrapped his arm around her hips and bore her back onto the bed. Braced on his elbows he aligned their bodies from hips to chest, lowered himself between her thighs, and nudged into place.
He was looking in her eyes as, slow and steady, he pushed in until his hips were seated against hers, taking care not to abrade her overstimulated clit. Her inner walls adjusted in increments, muscles tightening, then softening to cling to his length. She adjusted under him and he lifted enough to let her move, but remained firmly embedded inside her.
“You okay?”
“Of course,” she said. “It’s not like this is my first time.”
The unexpected flash of humor made him smile. She blinked, then smiled back. His heart gave an odd thump. In that moment he wanted to kiss her cur
ved lips, so he did; slow, hot, sliding kiss after kiss, all the while buried deep inside her, unmoving. She lifted her hips, but he just kept kissing her until she writhed under him.
“Ben,” she whispered when his mouth slid along her jaw to her ear.
“What?” he murmured. “Tell me what you want.”
“It’s a little ridiculous, if you think about it,” she said distractedly.
He had to agree. Thanks to the job, he’d seen more than his share of porn. He’d had more than his share of sex, multiple partners, in front of every reflective surface you could imagine. Yes, it looked ridiculous, spread legs, hunched bodies, breasts bouncing, hips thrusting. The noises. It was ridiculous, until it transformed into something else. Something intimate. Hot.
“What is?” he asked, playing along as he pulled out, then slid back in. Keep it slow, but inexorable. Pitch his hips forward and glide into soft, clinging, slick flesh. He’d never thought about it before, but there was something hot and dark in that possession. Something as erotic as the taste of her juices on his tongue.
“You,” she blurted.
This time his smile was slow and knowing, mirroring the withdrawal and thrust. “You mean my cock.”
Heat rushed up her neck, into her face. “Yes.”
“Say it.”
The command held a compelling undertone but her upbringing held firm. “You want me to say your . . . your . . . is ridiculous?”
He withdrew again, then slid back inside, studying her face as he did. “No,” he said easily. “Just say cock.”
“I don’t use language like that.”
He paused as if he were going to pull out, but then didn’t. Ensnared in need, she moaned and squirmed again. “Try ride me. Pound into me. Make me scream. Or go for the one that means all three. Try fuck me.”
“No,” she said. “Why are we having a conversation while we’re doing this, anyway?”
As he withdrew he bent his head to her ear and murmured, “Come on, Rachel. You know it turns me on.”
To tempt her he stroked in again, then paused. Her toes curled, her pussy clenched around him. The scent of steamy, electric risk filled the air, and he could almost see her glowing, like he was standing outside during an electrical storm, and her response—I want to but—died in her throat as it closed.
“Oh,” she said faintly. “Oh.”
“We’re having the conversation . . . look at me, Rachel.” Her eyes opened partway, the lids dragged down by the undertow now swirling in her body. “We’re having this conversation because if you can talk this much, I’m not doing it right.”
The rhythm was the same, slow and steady, making her feel every inch of his shaft sliding back and forth, but now he’d found the right angle so each stroke slid over sensitive nerves inside and out. Her eyes lapsed into soft focus, then closed. He could do it, make her say the words, but for now it was enough to teach her how desire grew, transformed into need. He noted the way her fingers tightened around his biceps and her toes curled, how her legs drew up and her heels dug into the backs of his thighs, opening her even more.
“Good?” he asked.
“Yes.” The word came out as a whimper, though, high-pitched and breathy.
Each stroke of his shaft into her body heightened the contrasts, how soft and slick and swollen she was around his hard length, the way each thrust both drew his orgasm up his shaft and sent pleasure coursing back into his body when he bottomed out inside her. He bent his head so his morning scruff rasped over her heated cheek, and his mouth found hers, lips barely brushing hers, soft gusts of air marking his breathing before his tongue touched hers.
Her eyes opened. The look in the languid, pale brown irises sent heat and light into spaces left too long in cold and dark.
Ben stopped abruptly.
“Don’t . . . Why did you stop?”
No light, no heat, no tenderness. If she wasn’t going to play along, make it sexy and hot and dirty, then he’d do it. He sat back on his heels and tugged on her hand to help her into a sitting position. “Because we’ve done that before, and there are a dozen different ways to do this. Turn around.”
She went to her knees and gave him her back. He snugged up close behind her, his erection sliding against her bottom until he smoothed his palms up her inner thighs to open her, then urged her up, guided her back, and slid back inside her.
“Oh,” she said again. “Oh my.”
The benefits to this position were many. He lifted both hands to her face, sliding rough palms along her cheekbones to gather her hair, sending it streaming over one shoulder. Then he smoothed his hands up her throat, under her jaw, tipping her head back to his shoulder before he cupped her breasts and gently pinched her nipples. She tightened around him and swiveled her hips on his erection.
“That’s right,” he said, as if she’d spoken. In a way, she had. One hand stayed at her breast while the other lifted to her mouth. The tip of his middle finger slipped between her lips and she licked it. Then that hand skimmed over her soft belly, between her legs, to circle her clit.
“You do it,” he murmured in her ear.
She began to tip her hips back and forth, using the powerful feedback loop to refine her movements until she found exactly the right angle to rub the hot spot inside her against his shaft. He grunted and wrapped his free arm around her ribs, holding her hard against him because the way she writhed dropped him straight back to reptile brain.
The heat was building again, flaring hotter and higher than before. Apparently she didn’t know what to do with her hands. They lifted, searching for something to cling to before one settled on his nape and the other on the forearm flexed like a steel band against her ribs. As the pleasure built she spread her knees, opening to him, and he shifted as well, slid a little deeper.
It was surrender and possession all at once. She couldn’t break his grip but she also held him deep inside her, and he didn’t want to think about that.
“Work for it, Rachel,” he said, and matched his circling fingertip to the swiveling motion of her hips. She glowed, gasping, striving for something that seemed as impossible to attain as it was to do without.
And then it broke over her. Her body arched in his arms, breathy, astonished cries escaping her lips as the tight convulsions rhythmically gripped his shaft. He pulled out and thrust back in, the motions subtle and shallow, intended to keep him on the edge while drawing out her orgasm.
She was gripping his arm and neck so hard she’d dug her blunt nails into the skin. “I’m sorry,” she said.
“So am I,” he said.
Before she could ask him what he meant, he tightened his grip at her waist to hold her close, then braced his other hand on the bed and tipped her face-first into the sheets. Her hair tumbled over her face, buried in her forearms. He hunched over her and powered in, hips slapping against her ass. He’d done this the porn star way before, one hand on her tailbone as he watched his cock disappear into his partner’s soft female flesh. But this time wasn’t about yeah baby you like that? This was about the sheer, deep need to bury himself in Rachel Hill.
He was out of his mind. That was his last thought before orgasm blasted through him like a freight train, obliterating his mind. He shoved deep inside her, grinding against her hips, shaft throbbing as he jetted into her.
A soft little sigh eddied into the bed. The muscles in his arms and hands trembled as they relaxed, and his legs weren’t exactly steady as he withdrew from her body and went into the bathroom. Out of the corner of his eye he saw her ease down on her side and close her eyes.
This should have been simple. Teach a virgin what she needed to know about sex so she seemed experienced. He splashed water on his face, then looked in the mirror as he dried off. If you knew what to look for, he looked as shell-shocked as Rachel. If you didn’t know—
and Rachel didn’t—he looked like he always did. Square jaw, blue eyes, blank face. Some guys learned that look on the streets. He’d learned it long before he applied to the Academy. Just like Sam did, in fact.
Eventually, Rachel would look like this, too, like Juliette and Steve and everyone else he knew. If she were a good student. She’d learn to say and move and do what men expected, to make sure she knew what she liked and knew how to get it.
Back in the bedroom she still lay in a ball on the bed. He bent down and started separating clothes into two piles. Her white cotton panties. His black shorts. Her skirt. She pushed herself into a sitting position and followed his lead, tugging on panties, then skirt before claiming her bra and her blouse from the floor on the other side of the bed.
“What do I say afterward?” she asked as she buttoned her blouse. “Thanks?”
The offhand remark startled a laugh from him. “Depends on how good the service was,” he returned.
Another silence. He never minded girls spending the night, having no desire to send a woman back onto the streets at three in the morning, too sleepy to drive defensively against the drunks and the teens. Telling a woman she could stay when he was awake was a completely different story.
“I should go,” she said.
Yes, she should. No, she shouldn’t.
He didn’t move, his elbows and body blocking most of the door. The scent of sex and sweat rose from her skin, heightening that uniquely Rachel scent. “Want to do this again next Sunday?”
Her hair slid over her shoulder when she looked up at him, so she reached back and coiled the heavy mass, then twisted the coil into a knot at the nape of her neck. She slipped her feet into her flats and stepped toward the doorway only to come up short when he stayed where he was.
“Only if you answer my question,” she said.
He frowned. “What question?”
“Why did you text me?”
He really didn’t like why. “Because someone’s got to teach you what you need to know.” And there wasn’t much that made him hot anymore.