Wonderland

by Bridget Midway

  “Remember I told you I made junior manager?”

  “Yes.” He tried not to look at how the water lapped at her breasts and how the impressions of her nipples were visible through her suit.

  “Well, I got a great opportunity to go to a conference.”

  “When?”

  She bent her knees and lowered into the water until it was at her chin. “This week.”

  Was she leaving already? “Where?”

  “Denver, but it got canceled.” She looked down into the water then stood again. “I didn’t want to go to my parents’ home in Florida yet, so I came here instead.”

  “Why?”

  “You know my mom. All my sisters and my brother are spoused and babyed-up. I just didn’t want the drama. Besides, I was just home on Thanksgiving, so they’re not missing me.”

  She stared out the side window to the snow-covered outside pool.

  He didn’t believe that for a moment. He knew Ryanne loved her family. As the oldest, she’d let any of her siblings tag along with her wherever she went. Which meant their marital and child status was only part of it. The next question was even harder for him to ask.

  Lifting his hand, he grabbed one of her braids and gave her a slight tug until she turned and looked at him. “Okay, that sort of answers my question. Isn’t there some guy in your life that you could have taken home to meet your family?”

  Fuck, what are you thinking, Carson? What if she says yes?

  “No.” The one word came out soft, like a caress.

  Stepping closer, he asked, “Does that mean there’s no man in your life?”

  “No.” There it was again.

  “No heartbreak you’re trying to mend or get over?” Using her braids, he pulled her closer until her breasts were pressed against his chest.

  “Nothing like that for me, Carson, but what about you? Is there some woman pining away for you?”

  “Not at all. My last relationship ended about a year ago, and I doubt if she’s weeping over me.”

  “Sounds like a heartbreak story.” Her gaze searched his.

  “There’s only one thing that would break my heart.”

  She inhaled deeply; her nipples grazed his chest. “What’s that?”

  Wrapping an arm around her, he pressed her flush against him, lifting her feet from the bottom of the pool. “Not kissing you.”

  He didn’t wait for her to approve or give her permission; all day her mouth had been teasing him. It had teased him all his life, if he was honest, and at this moment he was going to take what he’d wanted for so long. He seized her mouth. Not in a sweet and tender kiss like he would have given her the summer following their freshmen year. No, this was a kiss from a man to a woman. Pure desire and aching need.

  Holy North Pole! Ryanne had never been bowled over by a kiss, but that was what Carson’s mouth was doing to her. She’d known he was going to kiss her. The tension around them had been building all day. However, she was expecting him to give her a gentle kiss, maybe coax her mouth open and allow her to ease into this new territory with him. But, hell and firecrackers, that was not what he was doing.

  No, Carson was taking her mouth by storm. Kissing her deeply as if he had been a starved man before this and her mouth was his sustenance. His tongue swept from one side to the other, circling her tongue and demanding she join him in the passionate kiss.

  She did. Without hesitation. She may not have been expecting a kiss that would curl her toes and cream-coat the seat of her matronly bathing suit, but that was what she got. One of his hands palmed the back of her head, keeping her from moving away from him—not that she even considered it—while the other hand stayed under the water and slipped lower to palm her ass.

  Oh, hell, he was grinding his cock against her. Hard and urgent through his swim trunks, he was pressing firmly between her legs and grinding his shaft over her clit.

  If the floor had been under her feet, she would have felt it shift, but instead her world tilted at an unbelievable angle. All of her senses now pointed due north, aiming directly at her center of gravity: Carson Rodman. In one kiss, he was becoming her everything, the commander of her desire. She could feel her orgasm building. Could feel it tighten her core, causing her body to tremble. And yet he never stopped kissing her.

  Needing more, hungering for the climax just out of reach, she lifted one of her legs high up on his hip. Parting her thighs and giving him better access, she didn’t care how wanton it made her appear. She wanted and needed what he could give her at the moment.

  Taking his cue from her, he widened his stance and moved his hand lower so that he was caressing her sex from behind, through her suit, as he rotated his hips and ground the side of his shaft against her, circling her clit.

  Before she could even think about what was coming, bright lights flashed behind her eyelids and spasms racked her body.

  Pulling his mouth away, he egged her on, incited her pleasure even more. “That’s it, sugar-lips, keep coming.”

  Explosions continued to rocket through her.

  “Let me feel all that wet heat.” He licked the water from her chin to the side of her neck as he maneuvered his hand past the edge of her suit and stroked her sex.

  “Ahh,” she moaned. Her body was on fire, but still she yearned for more.

  “Damn, you’re slippery and swollen all over.” His fingers stroked the lips of her sex. “Wrap your other leg around me. Let’s see if we can make you come again.”

  Again? She wasn’t sure if she’d ever stopped. Obeying, she wrapped her arms and legs around him. He buried two fingers inside her, pressing deep.

  She screamed out her pleasure and creamed around his digits. It had been so long since she’d been with anyone, and feeling Carson’s thick fingers pumping inside her, not her own slender touch, was her undoing.

  “Shit, you’re even tighter around me as you come. Damn, give me some more, sugar-lips.” He took her mouth, swallowing her cries as he finger-fucked her.

  She bucked against him, and his hard cock still stroked her clit. The sensations she felt inside and out were gloriously erotic.

  The water waved around them as he carried them with urgency to the edge. His lips moved from her mouth to her chin, down her neck, and over the tops of her breasts through her high-neck bathing suit.

  “I want you, Ryanne…I’ve wanted you...”

  “Yes.” She sighed, not considering anything but that moment with Carson.

  He grabbed a strap and began to pull it down. “So long…so long. I need—”

  “Oops, sorry to interrupt.” Laughter erupted around them.

  Ryanne turned and looked over her shoulder as a group of ten came rushing into the pool area and stopped as they saw her and Carson. It wouldn’t take a wild guess to determine what she and Carson were doing. What they were about to do more of.

  “Fuck it all to hell,” Carson growled, his voice strained with need.

  The same need her body was still reeling from.

  He raised her strap back onto her shoulder. She was grateful he hadn’t managed to get it down over her aching breasts. That would have been even more embarrassing than him caught with his hand in the underwater cookie jar.

  Damn. Damn. Damn. What was I thinking? She shoved away from him. Not looking at Carson or the group now jumping into the water around them, she straightened the bottom of her suit as she headed toward the shallow end steps.

  “Ryanne.” He moved quickly and grabbed her hand.

  “Look… I need to go.” She pulled her hand away and saw the dark gray color of his eyes—desire. Don’t look at me that way.

  “I can come with you.” He took steps to follow her.

  “No. Um, no. I need to wash my hair.” She rubbed her hand over her braids, knowing they were a barely restrained mess. “You know it will take me over an hour to get it back into a presentable style.” She walked backwards until her feet hit the first step.

  “Where you going, loverboy?”
A blonde splashed water at Carson’s back.

  He ignored the woman and took another step toward Ryanne.

  “Stay. I need to go. I’ll probably see you at dinner.” Without watching to see what Carson did, she raced toward the door, briefly taking a moment to grab her key card, sneakers, and the terrycloth robe she had worn down.

  The cold air of the hallway hit her like a blast. Her teeth started chattering and she drew the robe tighter around her. She knew she should have dried off better and used the heated room in the pool area to warm up a little before she left, but that would have kept her around Carson even more and she couldn’t trust herself around him.

  What were you thinking? She asked herself repeatedly as she decided it was best to take the fire exit stairs up to her floor instead of risking Carson following her up in the elevator. Or worse, run into Phillip and have to explain where Carson was.

  Shaking her head, she took the steps two at a time. This was not her. That had not been Ryanne McCall in that pool with him. She was not a spontaneous person. Not when it came to sex. Trips and vacations, yes, because she loved to travel and get away. But sexually, she thought everything out. Planned it all out.

  Even losing her virginity in her sophomore year, she’d orchestrated that event too. She’d dated a guy for most of the year, and a month before the spring semester ended she had set a date to lose her virginity.

  The guy was nice, sweet, and thoughtful. He ended up being their graduating class’s valedictorian. She stayed away from jocks and frat boys, keeping to intellectuals. She and Jim didn’t make it beyond the fall of their junior year, but had remained friends.

  Now this. Since she ran into Carson that morning, she hadn’t been the same. She didn’t recognize herself. She needed to think about this.

  Yes, she may have come to the singles getaway thinking she might connect with a guy, possibly someone she would feel comfortable with after a week to sleep with, even if it wasn’t going to go any further. But she never expected to run into someone she knew. Someone she liked. Someone she had deep feelings for. Carson was a factor she hadn’t prepared for.

  He had come here with Phillip to the singles holiday getaway to find multiple women and get laid. Hell, Phillip was getting laid, all over the damn place. Maybe even Carson was doing the same, just being more discreet.

  He told you he didn’t have sex with Lanie.

  That’s just one woman. She argued back and forth with herself. Ryanne entered her room and bolted the top latch behind her.

  If she let things go further with him, she would become too involved, possibly end up hurt and have to look over her shoulder wherever she went in the city she loved. She had to consider this situation fully.

  Chapter Seven

  Ryanne heard the banging late on her door. It sounded as if a pack of zebras were kicking it. Turning her head, she stared at the door, considering whether or not to answer it. Maybe it was just a rowdy group of drunken guests terrorizing anyone they could.

  “Rye!” The banging continued.

  She could have sworn she heard someone call her name. That didn’t make sense; there were only two people here who knew her, and a handful of ladies she’d met the night before. She couldn’t see them coming for her at this hour.

  After she’d washed, dried, and spent more than thirty minutes flat-ironing her hair, she’d sent a message to the desk clerk asking her to notify Carson that she was not coming down for dinner. She’d lied and said she was unwell. She knew she was avoiding him, but she needed the distance to put things back into perspective. Carson had always been her friend throughout her childhood. Nothing more.

  Before she left for college, she knew she’d developed very deep feelings for him, but they’d never been remotely reciprocated by him, except when they’d said good-bye and she’d almost kissed him. However, her mother had saved her from that mistake. Now, there was no one to save her from this folly but herself. The best way she’d decided to do that was by keeping a reasonable distance away from Carson and only seeing him within a group.

  Her door rattled again. Shaking her head, she realized whoever was on the other side was not going away. Tossing her blanket off her legs, laying her book down on the cushion, she then set her glass of wine, from the bottle she had ordered with her room service meal, on the table and padded toward the door.

  Looking through the peephole she saw that it was not a group of drunken revelers but one reveler: Carson. Leaning her head against the back of the door, she sighed. She’d thought to escape him at least until tomorrow, but evidently she wasn’t going to be so fortunate.

  “Rye!” he called out again.

  Pulling the door open, she stared at the gorgeous man as every sensation she’d felt in his arms in the pool came raining down on her under the perusal of his gray eyes.

  “Hi, sugar-lips…” He seemed to bump into the doorjamb more than lean against it as he smiled.

  “Carson, what are you doing here?” She clutched the edge of the door in her hand.

  “What am I doing here? Ha!” He wagged a finger at her, as if he were trying to figure out a puzzle. “What are you still doing here?”

  “I didn’t want to be bothered. Didn’t you get my message?”

  He pushed away from the jamb and stepped toward her, placing one of his hands on the wall and the other on the door, caging her in. Nervous butterflies took flight in her stomach. She tried to ignore the excitement of being near him again and feeling his warm breath caress her face. The piquant scent of alcohol tainted his breath, intoxicating her.

  Zeroing in on the alcohol, she said, “You’re drunk.”

  He lowered his lips to the corner of her mouth and placed tiny kisses along her cheek toward her ear. The opposite direction she thought he was going. Desired him to go.

  “Yes. I am.” His chuckle was broken and slightly off. “You shouldn’t leave me unsupervised around Phillip.”

  She pressed her back firmly against the wall, trying to keep some distance between them. “Phillip is a bad influence.”

  “Hey!” He leaned back and squinted one eye at her. ”We were celebrating. And for the record, Karri was a bad influence on you, too.”

  Laughing, she had to agree. “That was only in high school. She’s different now.”

  “Reformed?”

  “Nope.Married.”

  “Ahhhh. That explains why she’s not here with you.”

  “What were you all celebrating?”

  “Hmm. Who’s got a celebration? Oh, Phillip! Hmm. Don’t know what.” He squeezed both his eyes tight and tilted his head back, thinking. “Nope. Can’t recall.”

  She shook her head. “Figures.”

  He dropped his head and buried it in the side of her neck. “Damn, sugar-lips, you smell so good. Like cotton candy and cinnamon and…something else…”

  He smelled good too. A clean, sporty scent with an underlying robust spiciness she loved. She pushed the thought away. Ignore it.

  He made a loud sniffing sound. “Something Ryanne.” He wiggled and cheered as if he’d just discovered the secret to the world’s existence.

  His murmurings sent vibrations along her skin. Pushing him away, she ducked underneath his arm. “Okay, you’re really drunk. I think that it’s best you go to bed and sleep this night off.”

  “That’s a great idea.” However, instead of turning and heading out the door and down the hall as she expected, he marched further into her suite.

  “Hey, Carson, wrong way.” She let the door swing closed behind her. Its slam echoed around the room.

  “You have wine!” He grabbed the bottle from the table and plopped down on the couch.

  “You stay away from that.” She snatched it from him. “You don’t need any more, trust me.” Walking to the kitchenette, she placed it on the counter away from his reach, then returned to the living room.

  “His lips touched my breasts. I could feel my heart pounding rapidly. He was close to my nipple. Not touchi
ng it yet, but I wanted him to—”

  Racing across the room, she plucked her romance novel out of his hands.

  He glanced at his hands, turning them over repeatedly, as if the book had disappeared by magic.

  She aimed a finger and a double-eyed squint at him. “No touching things that don’t belong to you.”

  “That mean you too, Ryanne?” His eyes were glazed over from the alcohol he’d consumed, but no less dark and intense, the color of new steel.

  Yes!her mind screamed. No! her body countered.

  “I don’t think this is the right time for this discussion.” She sat on the other end of the couch, away from him. “You should sleep.”

  “But I want to talk.” He sank deeper into the couch, leaning his head against the back.

  She looked at him. “About what?”

  He stared back at her. “Us.”

  Glancing away, she gazed into the small gas fireplace, watching the blaze. She wanted to pick up her wine and take a heavy swallow and consume the rest of it still lingering in the glass, but she figured Carson had drank enough alcohol for them both.

  “There’s nothing to discuss.” She turned her head and stared back down the couch at him. “We’re friends. Period.”

  “Is that it?”

  She swallowed. “Yes.”

  “Then why did we almost kiss years ago?”

  He knew. She waved her hand dismissively. “Just two friends saying good-bye. We’d known each other most of our lives. My first memory involves you…and a Tonka truck.”

  “You stole my Tonka truck out of my yard.”

  She laughed. “Then you shouldn’t leave your toys lying around.” She recalled the memory fondly. Her family had just moved into the neighborhood; she was four. “Just friends.”

  “The pool. Was that friendly?”

  Hell no. She saw the recognition of desire in his eyes; he knew it too. “That was a mistake. Spur of the moment. It’s the singles atmosphere. Too much sex in the air.”