by Ginny Glass
“A little. I mean, I like him and think he likes me a lot, too. So this feels a bit strange.”
“Do you want me to hang up, Nora? I will. I don’t want to make you feel anything but good.”
Nora toyed with the edge of her tee shirt. Jarod was real. His kiss, his smile, his face were what she flashed on when James whispered naughty things, titillated her senses. It wasn’t that different from a pornographic movie, right? James was just a disembodied voice at the other end of the phone line. She wasn’t hurting Jarod. She wasn’t breaking any rules or telling any lies.
A secret place admitted she liked how James made her feel—wicked, naughty and a bit reckless. She could stay safe in her little apartment with the crooked bathroom door and still touch the orgasmic stars through him. Maybe Jarod was real but their relationship—if you could call it that at this point—was normal, steady and nonthreatening. James was wild, exciting and so different from anything she ever expected. He had found her research, sought her out, called her. It was a bit of an ego stroke, a feminine thrill to be the object of one man’s sexual devotion.
She drew a breath and stepped out of character. “Talk dirty to me, James.”
A luscious rumble of masculine pleasure rolled like thunder. “Oh, sweetheart, your wish is my command. Where are you?”
“My living room.”
“Go into the bedroom. I want to picture you lying there, waiting for me.”
“Okay.” A saucy gene, unknown to her, chose that minute to manifest. “Want to come with me?”
“Yes. Take me to your bed, sweetheart. Take your clothes off. Let me touch you.”
The coverlet was swirled with ridges that chafed against her ass so she jerked the blankets back and slid down on the cool sheet. Furnace-warmed air blew across her nipples and they pebbled. Her panties were damp when she pulled them off her legs, flinging them in the general direction of the laundry hamper. An excited jiggle in her tummy echoed the pulse inside her pussy.
“I’m ready for you.”
“Did you bring your gift, sweetheart?”
Her fingers tightened around the plastic packaging. “Yes.”
“Open it. There should be batteries included.”
She had to lay the phone down to tear into the clear wrapping. Her hands shook, and she dropped the package of AA batteries twice before she ripped them open. The Silver Bullet warmed to her skin’s temperature in seconds.
“Done. Did you know this thing came with a travel case?”
“Nora, forget the case. I want you to tell me something.”
Light streamed through a crack in the window blind and cut a blazing triangle across her lavender flannel sheets. The strange thought that she needed to change them before Jarod could ever come into her bed sent a heated spiral coursing through her. No, she would not think about Jarod while being naughty with James. It seemed almost like cheating. She shifted down into the pillows, fingering the smooth metal surface of the Bullet.
“What do you want to know?”
“Your fantasy, what you started to write down on the back cover. Finish it for me.”
A sultry smile bowed her mouth. “First, tell me where you are. What are you wearing, James?”
“On the couch and nothing but a smile.” A low hum made her wonder exactly what he was doing and she almost asked. His voice stopped her. “You wrote it was dark. The voice was close but you couldn’t see him. Every once in a while his breath would brush your skin.”
Her eyes slid closed and the longtime fantasy burst to life in vivid sensations. It was James crooning naughty words in her ear but Jarod touching her, kissing her. “Yes. I feel him. I don’t know who he is but somehow I feel safe, know he’d never hurt me. Something touches my shoulder.”
“Touch your shoulder, sweetheart. Lowest setting.”
The egg clicked on with the slightest buzz. Slow, throbbing pulses dragged across her shoulder, dipping into her collarbone and up her throat.
“What touches you? Is it my hands, my mouth?”
“It starts as your fingers, then your tongue…slides down my chest, over the curve of one breast then the other…I want you to pinch my nipples, lick them, but you don’t. You tease everywhere else.”
“All in good time, sweetheart, draw it out. Feel my hands, my mouth. I imagine your skin smells like apples. Tart, crisp, juicy fall apples bursting with sweetness.”
She panted. How could he know that was her favorite scent, her preferred body lotion? A zing of forbidden intimacy washed through her. The egg buzzed along the heavy bottom curve of her breast.
“Nipples, now. First my fingers, then my lips. I want to taste the sugared apple of your breasts. A lick, then a nibble and then all of it, deep and sucking.”
A tremulous breath shuddered as the vibe circled her peak. Her finger slid the speed up one notch higher. For every step of her hottest fantasy, he was there, talking her through it, taking her further, holding her just at the precipice. The egg speed went from low to intense then slid back to moderate.
“God, your skin is like silk. My hands are stroking down your stomach. Run the Bullet around your bellybutton, slow. That’s my tongue, Nora. Trace your hip all the way down, sweetheart. No, I hear you turning it up. Leave it alone, medium setting. I like to take my time.”
Goosebumps erupted along her tummy, the soft vibrations channeling lust through her body, igniting a growing need at her core.
“Go right to your bikini line. Drag the tip just across it. Now up to your navel again.”
“James, please…”
“Shh, let me explore you. Turn it up just a bit. I want to nibble a line straight down your hip to your leg.”
A whimper eked out before she could stop it. James chuckled.
“I’ve got a taste of you and now I’m starving for more. I want you to slide the Bullet across your inner thighs. There and only there.”
She did what he asked, shivering. Her nipples ached with delicious pain, and her wet pussy thumped in empty need.
“Now what?”
“Imagine my fingers there, skimming across the muscles. Back and forth, back and forth. Don’t you dare touch anywhere else.”
She fell into the rhythm of his words, rocked to the low bass of a voice that had no body. He was everywhere, but nowhere. It was deliriously wicked and entirely not enough. Sweat covered her body. “Touch me more.”
“I’m waiting for you. I want your hand over mine. I want you to guide me right where it feels best. Show me how you do it when you’re alone, when no one else is watching.”
Nora slid the tiny vibrator down, slipped it between her drenched folds. “Oh, this is…I’m teasing myself. Barely brushing my…”
“Say it, Nora. Barely brushing what? Show me.”
He echoed her harsh gasp, growled when she said, “My pussy. I start slow, just below my clit, small circles until I can’t take anymore, and then I move up, Oh—oh, James…”
“Do you want to come, sweetheart?”
“Please, yes…with you,” she panted. “I want you to come with me.”
“You will. Come with my tongue on your clit. Turn it to high, and don’t take it away. I want to taste your orgasm. Hurry, Nora, because I’m close.” His ragged breath blasted her ear and she tweaked the speed up. Under the muffled, liquid slosh of the Bullet, she could hear the slick sucking noises as he stroked. The sound charged through her with a lightning bolt. “Come with me. Say my name. Oh, sweet fuck, Nora!”
As if he commanded her body, Nora shuddered and twitched at his frayed cry. Her thighs tensed and her neck arched on the pillow. Stars exploded behind tightly squeezed lids. “Oh…oh…James, yes!”
A loud sated groan reverberated in her ear, echoed by the shift of leather. “Damn, sweetheart, this gets better and better.”
The Bullet snapped off and she rolled to her side, cradling her cheek on her hand. “Tell me you don’t think I’m a slut or anything.”
“No.” The force in that one word soothed
her. “You’re a normal, healthy, intelligent woman with an active imagination. That’s doesn’t make you a slut, it makes you human. And sexy as hell.”
“You’re pretty steamy yourself, James.” Every bone in her body had dissolved and turned to mushy oatmeal. Dry-mouthed and languid, she smiled against the phone. “Call me tomorrow?”
“Sleep well, sweetheart.”
Special Notation*:
This week has been incredible and thrilling and confusing. I have never felt so alive. I have no resolve to step back and examine. I am addicted.
J.R. is something I would wish for on a star but James touches that dark, secret part of myself I’ve never acknowledged.
Is it possible to fall in love with two different men for two very different reasons?
One is smooth, controlled and kisses me until my toes tingle. The other whispers naughty words that vibrate my soul. Both are intelligent and sharp and quick to laugh. I want to tell one my most farfetched dreams and the other my wickedest fantasies.
In my mind, J.R. is James and James is J.R…my boring little life is a soap opera.
Jarod had offered her a bite of his Veal Marsala, and Nora had used her fingers to let him taste her scallops. That was the extent of her recollection of dinner. It had lasted for hours, conversation had never ceased, yet she couldn’t remember a damn thing. She thought there had been wine, could have been talk of his English mother and Southern Baptist father, might have been a discussion on the faculty Christmas party announcement.
The only thing she was sure of was that Jarod kissed like a god.
He’d been late to lunch Friday, courtesy of the Dean of Students. Rather than food, they opted for a couple quiet minutes staring into each other’s eyes and a few hastily stolen pecks before she hurried to her lab. He tucked a note into her lab coat and the beautiful sonnet kept her smiling all day. Saturday she awoke to an e-mail with a ticking countdown, counting the minutes until he saw her. She replied with a flirt, asking him his favorite color. When he saw her, the soft jade knit dress made his eyes sparkle and linger on her visible cleavage.
He’d brought her a rose, a single creamy bloom tipped with the darkest crimson. The restaurant played soothing music in soft jazz notes that wrapped them in a sensual haze of moist heat. After dinner he held her coat and, as she slipped her arms in, he brushed a slow, licking kiss under her ear.
With her hand tucked in the crook of his arm and the heady rose fragrance lulling her, they strolled through the frosty parking lot toward her little car. Not even the nipping air and drunkenly dancing snow flurries cooled the tension between them. He bent to kiss her goodbye and that was it, her mind was obliterated. She lost herself to the velvet glide of his lips, the wet thrust of his tongue, the spicy red wine of his kiss.
Was it possible to crawl inside a man and just melt in his embrace? She wanted to.
Ridged muscles in his back shifted under her hands, which she buried under his jacket. Her coat fell open and the heat of their bodies combined, twisted together into an inferno. Her ass met the freezing car door. Nora’s pulse jerk-started and rushed lust-laden blood through her system. It wasn’t the chilly air that tightened her nipples, it was the hot desire brewing between them. Jarod’s hips pressed into hers and the hard length of his erection skyrocketed her libido. A slick warmth flooded her panties.
His mouth slid down her jaw, nipping until her skin quivered in excitement. Her fingers kneaded up his back then curled. She dragged her nails downward in a slow, deliberate trek. Heat blazed as Jarod groaned against her neck. Nora could taste his hunger when his tongue dove into her mouth. That same unfed need roared in her as his firm palms covered her breasts. Her nipples, already pebbled by the chill, tightened to aching points under the broad caress of his thumbs.
With a gasp Nora arched closer to his touch, thrusting her breasts deeper into his hands. God, he felt so good, made her feel so good. Jarod’s fingertips grazed the edge of her bare skin, where she’d placed the tiny dab of perfume in her cleavage to tease him. That single brush of skin on skin ignited a bonfire. Jarod whispered her name against her lips and slid his fingers under the material.
Despite the arctic bite of the wintry air, his hands were hot and they scalded her in deliciously enticing ways. They left an aching trail of want across the upper curve of her left breast. Not even the scalloped edge of her bra thwarted his touch. He circled her taut nipple, catching it and rolling it between two fingers.
A squeal of tires ripped through the air and Nora stiffened. She’d nearly forgotten they were in the restaurant’s parking lot. Jarod pulled his hand back, sliding it down to cup her waist. Mist streamed from both their mouths when they parted. Hot, gusty breaths were sucked in to cool a fire that threatened to explode. Her heaving chest brushed his.
Jarod swallowed and framed her face in his hands. “I don’t want to let you go yet. Let’s go get a drink or go dancing or find a dark street and fog up the car windows. I’d beg you to come home with me but I know you’d say no and I really can’t handle the rejection right now.”
“You don’t know how tempted I am.”
“Tell me.”
Those two pleading, provocative words shrilled through her with guilt. James said that. “Tell me, sweetheart. Talk dirty to me.” Last night had brought her to another shattering orgasm to his decadent, husky voice. James’s voice, James’s words, Jarod’s face, Jarod’s touch—everything was blurring in her mind. Fragments floated like a kaleidoscope and she couldn’t separate the two. Was she responding now to Jarod or to James?
Shame lanced across her heart and she flinched. “I have to go.”
“Why? It’s the weekend. You’re over eighteen, you won’t turn into a pumpkin.”
“I’m expecting a phone call.”
Jarod jerked. His chocolate-brown eyebrows crashed together and formed dual lines between his eyes. He hadn’t worn his glasses tonight and she missed them. “From who? I mean, it’s kind of late for a phone call. It’s nearly eleven.”
“I know, it’s just…a research friend who’s helping me. He calls every night about this time.”
His jaw went stony. Straightening his shoulders, he stepped back, his body heat leaving hers. He jammed his hands into his pants pockets. The air chilled as cold as the ice in his gaze. “I see. Couldn’t you skip it one night?”
Could she? The image of a scale formed in her brain, one side weighted by the man in front of her, the other with a faceless stranger who knew her most erotic thoughts. The scale bobbed back and forth, up and down, never resting, never choosing one man over the other.
Jarod bristled with jealousy—that was plain to see—but Nora was too torn to pick one over the other. It had been less than a week since both men appeared in her life. She didn’t know what the right path was, which avenue held the truth. James awoke part of her she’d never known existed and it flourished under his silken tone. Jarod thrilled her mind and sped her heart rate. She didn’t know how to choose. So she didn’t.
“What are you doing tomorrow?” The smile on her lips quivered but she kept it in place. “Maybe we could ge—”
“I’m busy tomorrow.”
“Oh.” His brisk rebuff hurt, and her chest twinged sharply. “Okay. Are we still on for lunch Monday?”
Snow twirled down in lacy clusters, settling on his shoulders and hair. Sea-green eyes stared deep into her face and the forced lift to one side of his mouth did nothing to reassure her. “Yeah, Monday.”
Jarod dropped a brief, hard kiss on her lips and strode away, his spine stiff and his mouth pinched. She’d dropped her rose when she’d kissed him and glistening flakes dotted the flower like frozen tears. She bent and picked it up, touching the frosty cream to her lips. It felt like his mouth—slick and soft—and against her lips the petals were as cold as his eyes had been.