by Andrews, Amy
His cock perked up. Not too exhausted, after all.
“You were gone a while,” she said. The satisfied look on her face told him she knew she was the reason he’d stayed out for so long.
He didn’t bother to answer as he crossed into the kitchen. Shower. Beer. Bed.
She smiled as he ignored her. “You look like you could do with a rubdown after such a long workout.”
Doyle’s step faltered at her faux-innocent inquiry, the suppressed laughter in her voice irritating suddenly. Maybe she did need that spanking after all. But he kept on walking.
Do not pass Sal. Do not collect whatever she is offering.
He’d never been more grateful in his life to reach his bedroom, and he sagged against the back of the door for a moment or two. He was tired, he was pissed off, he was frustrated. He was going to hurt everywhere in the morning from his punishing run. As if the constant ache in his balls wasn’t enough to contend with.
And Sal was sitting out there, probably with not a stitch on under that gown, looking cool as a cucumber. Running the plays, calling the shots, and yanking his chain.
Well screw it. Two could play at that game.
If she could play dirty, why the hell couldn’t he? He knew she wanted him as much as he wanted her, so maybe what she needed was a taste of her own medicine.
Without giving it any more thought, Doyle stripped out of his clothes and yanked open his door, forcing himself to whistle as he headed to the kitchen for a beer.
And a spot of revenge.
Of course, ideally not having an erection would be the way to play this, but beggars couldn’t be choosers. This was what she did to him. And this was what she was missing out on. She might as well see it in all its glory.
Sal glanced at him as he entered the kitchen. He suppressed a grin as she stood in alarm and her eyes grew to the size of saucers as she stared at his cock. “Shit, Doyle…what are you doing?”
He shrugged as he opened the fridge door, cutting off her view. “Just getting a beer.”
Not even a blast of freezing air killed his erection. But he didn’t linger, grabbing a bottle and shutting the door.
Her gaze dropped back to his erection immediately. “I thought you were having a shower.”
Doyle cracked the lid. “I think I can manage to drink beer and wash myself at the same time.” Then he put the bottle to his lips and, standing tall and proud, he tipped his head back and drank half of the cold ale in one hit.
He could feel the heat of her gaze, like a laser, on his cock as it bobbed out in front of him taut and primed, aching for her touch, aching to be inside her.
“That’s better,” he said, after he was done and lifted the beer to her in mock salute. Then, with as much nonchalance and swagger as he could manage considering his heart was belting along at a rate of knots, he turned and walked out of the kitchen.
Doyle waited till he got into the bathroom before he allowed himself a chuckle. The look on her face, the heat in her eyes, the way she all but licked her lips, had made the stunt so worth it.
Teach her to play with fire.
He threw back the rest of the beer and placed the bottle on the vanity as he stepped into the shower cubicle and shut the door behind him. He turned on the tap, not putting any hot into the mix, hoping he could dampen his erection with a blast of cold water rather than the old-fashioned way with his hand.
He’d promised himself when Sal had thrown down that little challenge he wouldn’t resort to wanking to get through it. Which was probably why her every touch had been excruciating. He hadn’t gone this long without sexual release since he’d discovered the joy of masturbation at twelve.
But he wanted that payoff when she finally cracked. He wanted the added stimulus of having waited for it. And as tempting as it was, as excruciating as it was to not do something about it, every day he got through without it would make the eventual reward all the sweeter.
Providing he didn’t blow his load the second he was inside her…
Doyle shut his eyes and ducked his head under the water, smiling to himself. Prior to tonight he’d secretly figured he was the one who was going to crack first. But now he wasn’t so sure. There had been very definite strain in Sal’s expression, like the denial was driving her a little crazy, too.
He didn’t think for a moment she would be abstaining from a little self-loving, but the fact that she was clearly frustrated just now gave him hope.
Doyle startled as the shower door suddenly opened.
Sal.
Standing there shrugging the gown off her shoulders, naked in front of him like he knew she would be underneath the black satin.
Fuck. There went his cock again.
“Sal,” he warned, his heart hammering again, electricity humming through the large veins in his neck, his belly, his groin, innervating every cell with a jittery excitement. “No. Not doing this.”
Sal stepped inside the cubicle.
“No,” he repeated. She stepped closer; he took a step back, his butt landing against freezing cold tiles.
The spray from the shower washed onto the left side of her neck and ran down that half of her body. She didn’t flinch at the cold, although her nipples did scrunch into tight, hard berries.
Water droplets flicked into her hair.
She placed her hand on his chest and his skin leaped at her touch. “No.”
“It isn’t sex,” she said, droplets on her mouth now, her tongue swiping them off, “I promise. It’s just a little…” She dropped to her knees and spray wet her hair, ran over her breasts, and clung to her eyelashes as she looked up at him, her mouth inches from the tight, hard drum of his cock.
Doyle’s worry about premature ejaculation suddenly seemed quite founded.
“…just a little release.”
He looked down at her, his body thrumming with need. “Jesus, Sal.”
She sank back on her haunches and blinked up at him, wet and wanton and sexy as hell. “I’ll leave if that’s what you want.”
Doyle could feel his resistance crumbling. He knew he should tell her to leave—send her on her way. But she looked so damned good on her knees, her intentions clear, he struggled to remember why he was holding out in the first place when he already knew how good that mouth felt clamped around his cock.
He wasn’t sure how long they stood there, him backed up against the tiles, her below him watching, waiting, water dripping off them, pooling in her lap. But after a while she rose on her knees again and reached for his cock. He gasped at the firm, sure way she handled him, grabbing him right around the middle.
“I owe you one anyway, remember?” she said, her lips so very close.
Doyle was about to tell her she didn’t. He’d already told her there was no quid pro quo in sexual favors, but he didn’t even get the first word out. Clearly impatient waiting for his permission, she took things into her own hands and slid her hot, wet mouth on him.
Doyle’s groan was torn from the deepest part of him. He grabbed the wall beside him for support as she almost brought him to his knees.
“Fuck,” he gasped as her tongue swirled around and around his head, her hand holding him captive, stroking gently up and down, her other hand cupping his balls.
“Fuck,” he muttered again, his head falling back, his eyes rolling back as she dropped her hand and took him right to the back of her throat before easing off then taking him again, taking as much of him as she could before easing off all the way back to his head, swirling her tongue around it, then plunging down the length of him again.
Doyle’s pulse was erratic and he could barely breathe as he surrendered himself to the pleasure, forgetting about the whys and the wherefores and letting her mouth take him where he so desperately wanted to go. He’d yielded to her will from the second she’d grabbed his cock—there seemed little point in denying himself the outcome he so craved.
And to see her like this, pleasuring him with her mouth, was a magnificent sigh
t. Her head bobbing back and forth, back and forth, not stopping, not relenting to change tack, just sucking hard and hot, her hands cupping, kneading, squeezing his balls in perfect rhythm.
The fibers in his belly and his buttocks tightened with every wet slide of her mouth, and Doyle knew it wouldn’t be long before she pushed him over the edge with the relentless drive of her lips.
The first ripple hit seconds later, his quads tightening even as they trembled at the effort to hold himself upright against the onslaught of such intense gathering pleasure. One ripple became two. Two became three until suddenly they were hitting him faster. Harder.
Doyle flung his head back against the tiles. “Jesus, Sal, you’re making me come,” he groaned, pumping his hips now in time to her movements, unable to stop as the pressure inside his balls suddenly released and he came with an intense ferocity that consumed him, turned him inside out, took him apart.
And she didn’t let go; she stayed with him, her mouth continuing its relentless bob, milking him right to the end till he was spent and limp and barely able to hold himself up.
He was still recovering, his heart still thumping crazily at all his pulse points, his head back against the tiles, his eyes closed when she stood a minute later. He opened his eyes. Her hair was drenched, water ran all over her, her mouth was red and plump from her ministrations, and he wanted to kiss her there very badly.
If only he could move.
She didn’t say a thing, just opened the shower door and stepped out.
“Sal.”
She turned to look at him, but he had no idea what to say. Her hair dripped and water still beaded and ran in rivulets down her body. Her nipples were tight and hard. She looked like a water nymph.
She smiled at him. “I’m going to be in my bedroom,” she said. “Masturbating.”
Doyle groaned and shut his eyes at the image, knowing once he recovered he was so going to want him some of that. But when he opened them again, she was gone.
His quads refused to hold him any longer, and he slid down the wall to the ground, the cold, hard press of the tiles on his butt bringing him a healthy dose of reality.
He had to hand it to Sal—the woman knew how to play dirty, but he had to remember she was playing. He’d been the beneficiary and he certainly wasn’t complaining, but if he blinked now, then anything they had would be on her terms, and he didn’t need to be familiar with them to know how badly they’d suck.
So he wasn’t going into her bedroom to help her with the masturbation thing. He was going to stay in here on the moral high ground and ignore how wobbly it was, considering she’d just thoroughly debauched him and he’d let her.
What he was going to do was tell her they were even. They were one-all and that was it.
Just as soon as he could physically get up.
Chapter Thirteen
Another week of pushing each other’s buttons followed. Sal hadn’t expected Doyle to walk naked into the kitchen that night, but it had been a challenge she hadn’t been able to resist. And she’d been so certain Doyle would get right out of the shower and follow her into her bedroom, but she’d totally underestimated his determination.
That was okay. Despite his we’re even now speech, she was actually enjoying the chase with him. She’d never really had to chase anyone, and it was a novelty that turned out to be very distracting as the date of the anniversary grew nearer. She’d spent the last six years strictly regimenting her time so there weren’t a lot of spare moments to think about things she didn’t want to think about.
But these last two weeks had proved rather stimulating, giving her head free rein to invent new ways to tease and tantalize. And sleep hadn’t been an issue. She’d gone to bed with the low hum of sexual energy rocking her to sleep and erotic dreams keeping her there.
Dreams she’d rejected only a few weeks ago, but now she looked forward to every night. Dreams that kept the other dreams—the gut-wrenching, heartbreaking ones—at bay.
Doyle had certainly upped the stakes. He’d clearly decided to fight fire with fire, and their evenings together were always interesting. He’d stopped wearing a shirt around the apartment altogether, and no matter what she did, she couldn’t anesthetize herself against the sight. His huge shoulders and the light growth of black hair covering his pecs and abs were her catnip. She wanted to gnaw on those huge round joints, and she barely contained herself from licking his pecs as he walked by, which he did an inordinate amount of times, always brushing tantalizingly close.
But that was okay, she’d taken to wearing just her underwear around the house—they were no worse than a bikini, after all. Although she had gone out and deliberately bought some really sexy stuff. The last time she’d bought sexy lingerie had been for Ben, and she’d thought it would be a bit of a moment for her, but when she went to the shops, it just wasn’t. It was Doyle’s face she’d pictured as she made her selections.
Lucky November was proving to be quite hot. And the lingerie was certainly causing a mini freaking heat wave in her apartment.
The first time she’d walked out in the champagne matching set, her nipples clearly visible, she thought Doyle’s jaw was going to shatter. It was about then he started taking his shirt off.
She wondered how long it would take them till they were down to just walking around naked.
She wasn’t sure who was going to emerge from this as the eventual victor; all she knew was that the sex was going to be un-freaking-believable. And ultimately they’d both be winners.
…
A few days later, Sal sensed things were coming to a head with Doyle. They were both irritable and on edge. Something had to give.
Gemma looked at both of them as they’d had a tense conversation in front of a client over who was going to see the next patient in the queue, a cat called Molly. Gemma had smiled at Molly’s perplexed owner, who was looking back and forth at both of them like she was sitting center court at Wimbledon with a large bucket of popcorn.
“Excuse us, Mrs. Arnold,” she’d said as she dragged them both into Sal’s office.
“Okay,” she said, folding her arms and glaring at both of them. “Please understand that I say this with all the respect that is due to my elders and employers. Either kill each other or just get naked and do the wild thing already. You’re scaring the animals.”
Sal gawked at her. “Gemma!”
If anyone else had been so impudent, Sal would have sacked them on the spot. But Gemma didn’t look like she was about to be put off by Sal’s outrage.
“Do you think we’re all stupid out there? We’re suffocating in the mega-shit-ton cloud of pheromones you two are pumping out. Do it. Don’t do it. But don’t bring it here.”
Then she stormed out, the door slamming behind her.
Sal looked at Doyle, who was lounging against the edge of her desk, his long tanned legs sticking out casually in front of him. “You heard her,” she said. “Gemma says we should do it.”
“Gemma’s twenty-one.”
Sal shrugged. “She’s mature for her age.”
He shot her a sardonic smile. “Dinner tonight. Say…seven? A nice restaurant, posh food?”
She glared at him. “In your dreams.”
He laughed. “Oh no. There is nothing posh about what I’m eating in my dreams.”
Sal’s sex clenched. It actually freaking clenched! What the fuck? She was two steps away from being a seedy porn queen.
“You’re a pervert,” she shot back.
He laughed some more. “Guilty as charged.”
Things south of her waistband clenched again and she strode to the door as she thought about getting to know every perverted inch of him.
What the fuck was wrong with her?
“I’m going out tonight,” she said. Even though she wasn’t. She just couldn’t stand another night at home with him. Without a shirt. She’d ring a girlfriend. Drink fruity cocktails. Flirt with men.
“Okay,” he said as she opened t
he door. “I’ll be at home. Waiting…”
Sal didn’t stick around to hear what he’d be waiting for—she already knew. His low, rumbly chuckle followed her out the door.
…
A few hours later, it became apparent that she would not be having a girls’ night out. A distressed Mrs. Carney walked through the doors just before close carrying a drooling Boxer.
“He can’t move his back legs,” she wailed at Doyle, her hatless head the truest indicator of the seriousness of the situation.
Doyle swooped in and relieved the birdlike woman of the hefty bundle. She looked at him. “I think it’s a tick.”
Mrs. Carney sagged after she’d been relieved of her burden and Sal, hovering nearby, was there for her to lean on.
“Have you found it?” he asked.
She shook her head. “I looked but there’s nowhere obvious. Will he be all right?”
“We’ll do all we can,” Sal assured, as Doyle strode ahead with a lethargic Boxer and she sent a swift prayer up to whichever gods might be on duty this afternoon. She wasn’t sure whether that would help or not, given her less-than-amiable relationship with religion, but Boxer was an old dog and his diabetes was a comorbidity he didn’t need in the face of an envenomation, so she’d take what she could get.
Sal worked in tandem with Doyle once they were in the treatment room. He looked for the source and she did a quick assessment. Boxer’s back legs were useless, he had a cough, and his breathing was labored when she listened to his chest.
His patient brown gaze held such faith it stabbed Sal right through the heart.
“Got it,” Doyle said suddenly, pulling the tiny creature from under his collar and holding it up to the light.
Mrs. Carney, sitting off to the side on a stool, fanned herself. “Oh, dear,” she fretted. “It’s all my fault. I’ve been taking him for a walk on that bush track at the back of the retirement village trying to get him to lose some weight.”