He shouldn’t feel hopeful, he shouldn’t, but this wasn’t a fool’s errand anymore. However it worked out, he knew it was right to tell her.
He shifted closer, his hands tight and swollen and his heart walloping into his ribs. “Will you tell me?”
“You first.”
He had been the one to start this. “What I’m about to say, Cadence? It’s okay to tell me no. It’s okay to shove me off your porch and call me a jerk, and I promise I’ll go and I’ll never say it again or change our relationship at work or anything. Okay?”
Her expression, her posture, was intent, serious. “Got it.”
He inhaled, savoring the rasp in his throat, and then he spat the words out. “When you moved here, I thought you were the prettiest woman I’d ever seen. But now I know that’s wrong. You are, but it’s not only that, not anymore. You have a keen legal mind, but it doesn’t stop you from understanding the politics. People do one or the other, but you’re both, and it makes me want to know what you think about everything. But I want to know how you taste too. This is going to sound crazy—I mean, crazier, this is already crazy—but I think I might…I think I might love you.”
During his speech, Cadence had moved one of her hands to the bottom of her throat. Her eyes were shiny, and she was blinking rapidly.
Oh God, he’d completely screwed up. Of course. He was always doing that. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I was upset, I was lonely, I never should have—”
She crossed the porch in two long strides, rose up on her toes, and kissed him.
CHAPTER 2
Holy hell, Cadence was actually kissing Graham Wilcox. Like his actual hands were in her actual hair cradling her actual face while he laid waste to her heart. Her emotions stood on that line between pleasure and pain, surprise and arousal. She’d given up on this ever happening, and now she was drowning.
She might as well enjoy it. She wrapped her arms around his neck and licked into his mouth, until he was kissing her like she wanted him to: ravenously, his beard scruff abrading her chin.
“You were drinking iced tea,” he whispered as he brushed kisses over her cheekbone, her jawline. “Unsweetened. With mint.”
“Tea that tastes like tea? Uh-huh. You Southerners—”
But he didn’t let her finish.
While he explored every bit of her mouth, she ran a hand down his back. He’d discarded his jacket before showing up at her door TO SAY HE LOVED HER, but he still had on his dress shirt from work. The linen scraped against her palm, and then she buried her hand in the back pocket of his chinos and squeezed. His ass was taut and perfect, just like she knew it would be. She figured she was entitled to grope him; this kiss had been a year in the making and he’d said he might LOVE HER.
Fourteen months prior—though, who was counting?—she’d started a job which she’d felt hopelessly unqualified for. Sure, she’d gone to a name-brand law school and made law review, so she was smart and it wasn’t bragging to know it. But in those first weeks in the General Assembly, she’d spent all her time wondering why in the hell she’d turned down that Manhattan associateship to argue about school spending in a state where people still unironically called her a Yankee.
Then she’d gotten lost looking for a copy machine, the situational humor of which hadn’t been lost on her, and a secretary had foisted her off on Graham, who’d of course solved that and like twelve other problems she had.
Graham knew everyone: all the Democrats, all the Republicans, all the reporters, and all the janitors and groundskeepers. On her second day, when the water cooler had run dry in a shared Democratic office space, Graham had led a parade of interns down to the basement to figure out where the spares were kept and then had hauled them upstairs when the kids couldn’t lift them.
He wore glasses and three-piece suits and he couldn’t seem to remember to shave. He was smart, unpretentious, and funny, and sometimes he looked at her like she was the solution to the out-year Medicare funding problem.
Cadence’s attraction to him hadn’t been instant. It had taken two days to show up, but when it had, she’d started plotting and flirting.
Sure, she hadn’t intended to be here that long, but she wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth. If the universe intended to send her a hot, scruffy nerd to make Richmond more fun, who was she to say no?
The first few months she’d been confident it was going to work, that he felt the same. Every time he walked her home after they’d had dinner or debated policy over drinks, she’d frozen on the porch, fumbling with her bag, willing him to kiss her. Graham, do you want to date me/marry me/pin me to the nearest bed/not necessarily in that order? The words had been in her mouth so many times.
“Do you want to come up?” she’d asked once, but he’d shaken his head regretfully, muttered something about work, and bolted.
So she hadn’t asked again. Getting involved with colleagues was messy and being rejected by them was even worse. She’d waited, certain he would make his own explicit pass soon, but as more of those moments had piled up, she’d accepted he didn’t want her. It had made each of his kindnesses, her jokes, and their obvious compatibility sting, but there wasn’t anything she could do about it.
Over the fall, she’d even gone on a handful of dates trying to get over him. But the next morning, after another disappointment, another “he’s good enough I suppose” meal, Graham would stop by her desk.
“You know where I get the best policy ideas? House minority party committee reports. All the staff do is sit around all day and come up with cool stuff. I mean look at this,” and he’d shove a two-inch stack of paper at her with that almost smile, the one that said, I know you’ll appreciate this too.
And she’d know she hadn’t moved on. There was some spark there she hadn’t, couldn’t, extinguish. She’d even started applying for jobs as far away from here as she could get, because it had become a bit painful and dumb and fraught.
Now they were kissing. Like making out, actually. On her porch.
She had so many questions…why now? What does this mean? Why didn’t we do this sooner?
But with their mouths preoccupied, and their bodies in perfect agreement, she found those details didn’t seem important. He was tall, too tall really, but his hands were certain, and she lost herself in the rhythm of it. In his tenderness, in the vortex into which he was dragging her, finally dragging her, after a year of wanting.
When Graham ground himself against her, this was suddenly way too hot to do in public.
“Come inside,” she panted.
He half shook his head. “I’m torn.”
She set her hands on his shoulders and pulled back. His glasses were askew and fogged. “Torn between the right choice and the wrong one?”
“I should take you to dinner first.”
“You’ve taken me to dinner twenty-five times. There have been fourteen months of foreplay.”
He sputtered with laughter. “Those weren’t dates. I date way better than that.” He paused and fixed his glasses. “No, I don’t, but I want to date better than that with you.”
Why didn’t you say that a year ago? But it wasn’t time for that conversation. Now that she knew he wanted her, had always wanted her, it was time to go to bed.
She leaned close and kissed his neck. “You think the world is ending, and you came here just to kiss me?”
He ran his hands down her back in long, even, caring strokes. “I really like you.”
Love. He’d said love. When they got to the talking portion of the evening, she was going to remind him he’d said love. But for now, she nibbled on his ear lobe. “And that is incommensurate with fucking me?”
His breathing was labored, and the dig of his fingers into her became harsh. “No, but—”
“Do you think I’m smart and interesting?”
“Yes.”
“Are you attracted to me?”
“Yes.”
“Will you still feel the same way in
the morning? If there is, like, a morning?”
“Yes.”
She’d won. Her proposition had been scored, voted on, and signed. It was a done deal, and he knew it.
She stepped out of his arms and opened the front door. “Then come inside.”
His lips were flushed, his hair mussed, and his eyes lust-glazed. He had to be the best-looking man on earth. “I can’t believe you want me.”
How could he be so dense? How could he not know? “Graham, at that bar the week we met, I was practically massaging your arm with my breasts. I have been throwing myself at you for a year.”
He inched forward. “I’m a fucking moron.”
“Yup.”
“Let me make it up to you.” He was kissing her again and that was good enough for her.
Well, almost.
Somehow they closed and locked the door and stumbled into the living room. He fell onto the couch and pushed her shirt up so he could kiss her stomach. She was half straddling him while he dropped needy, wet, devouring kisses over her. Kisses that had her losing her mind and arching against his mouth. Then his head brushed the underside of her breast and arousal shot through her.
“Not here. Bedroom. Condoms.” She was normally articulate, well spoken. And she couldn’t get out a complete sentence at the moment.
“We’ll get there.” He was tonguing her nipples, moving between one and the other, while her fingers dug into his shoulders. Jesus he was good at that. She felt boneless, keyed up, and so, so exposed.
He cupped her through her yoga pants and rubbed right where she needed him. She was embarrassingly ready for him. Whenever she managed to get him upstairs and inside her, she was going to go off like a firecracker on the Fourth of July.
She took a couple steps back on shaky legs. After a few tries, she finally managed to work her shirt all the way off. His gaze was covetous, hot, and she tugged his hand. “Now, please, now.”
He chuckled and came to his feet and they started up the stairs, kissing again. She couldn’t get enough of him, of how he tasted like beer and spices, of how he held her, and of how this felt familiar and surprising at once.
He paused mid-flight. It was dark, and she couldn’t see him clearly.
“You answered the door without a bra.”
“I saw it was you. There wasn’t time.”
He pushed her against the wall, lapped into her mouth, and pressed himself against her. That was a good answer.
She found the buttons on his shirt and began wrenching them apart, needing his skin against hers. He had on an undershirt, but at least she could score her nails up his back and relish his answering gasp.
He lifted her, and she cinched her legs around his waist. That was almost what she wanted. Only a few extra layers of clothing in the way.
A minute later, they fell onto her bed. She helped him remove his glasses and set them on the nightstand, and then they were frantically pulling off the rest of their clothes. He dropped light touches over her, as if he were trying to figure out where she was, but he hadn’t been able to resist caressing her once he’d located her. She’d never felt more desired, more desirable.
He stopped suddenly and flicked on her bedside lamp. “I have to see you.”
The way he looked at her made her feel at once coy and hyperaware. Like she’d never done this. Like they were the first people who’d ever done this. Like they’d rise from this bed changed.
She pulled her hair tie off and shook out her still-damp curls. “Look all you want.” The words sounded confident, even though she felt anything but.
He set a fist on the bed and slowly canted over her. With his free hand, he brushed over her cheeks, her lips, along her neck. He drew a line down her body between her breasts, across her stomach, and into her curls.
“The first time,” he whispered, his fingers searching, “I jerked off thinking about you, I couldn’t look you in the eye at work the next day.”
He found her clit, and he worked achingly tiny circles around it.
She was breathing in time with him. “Uh-huh.”
“It was when we were finishing the omnibus last session. We’d been working late, and I went home and took a shower.”
He abandoned her clit and nudged her thighs apart. He worked two fingers into her and began stroking. He was watching her intently, as if he wanted to memorize every instant of this.
All she could do was nod. That was good. So, so good.
“I kept thinking about that bit of skin below your chin,” he told her. “How I wanted to kiss it.”
His thrusts were deeper now, more certain, and his brown eyes had gone almost black. “How I wanted to bend you over a desk and make love to you.”
She was so damn close she was panting, all of her attention riveted to how his lips moved when he talked.
“I let my imagination go where I hadn’t before, to you, everything about you, and I came harder than I ever had.”
She slammed her eyelids shut, and the sensation washed over her. This was Graham. He was touching her perfectly, relentlessly. He wanted her, he cared about her, he really did. She clenched around his fingers and came in a rush.
He kissed her forehead, her hair, her shoulder, and across her collarbone. “That was better than I imagined.”
She cracked an eye. “Yeah? How do you measure that?”
“I tried using metric, but I had to devise a new system. Did you?” Imagine being with him, he meant.
She should tell him how often in this bed she’d pretended his hands were on her, but substituted hers instead. But there wasn’t enough air, enough space, for that. There would be world enough and time later.
“Yes,” was all she said. She rolled over, dug around in a drawer, and found a condom. “Please make it real.”
This felt inevitable, but she’d thought that forever and it hadn’t happened. She was wanting, ultrasensitive, and almost certain this was going to sting when reality caught up with them. But she wasn’t going to turn down what he was offering.
He rolled the condom on and ran his hand over himself. That tug was at once rough and gentle, and she felt it deep inside her. He watched her for several beats.
They had almost never been together without talking. Maybe they’d kept words between them as protection against their attraction. But as he slid between her thighs and into her, she found they didn’t need them. They didn’t need words as she rose to meet him. As he kissed her neck. As she pressed one heel into the bed, the other into his back. As he lost control and slammed into her with enough force to break her heart open and let him inside.
She whispered his name, almost a confession, when she came again, and he answered, “Cadence, I love you,” as he found his own release. Then he crushed her to him and held her for a long time.
Holy shit. That had been…holy shit.
When he finally relaxed a bit, he propped himself up on his arms and stared down at her, smiling. She reached up and ran her hand over his face. Real. Solid. Here.
After a few minutes, he kissed her forehead and slid regretfully from her. He disposed of the condom in a tissue and then they both settled under the quilt and curled around each other.
“You have smitten in your eyes,” she told him.
“It’s a bit more serious than that.”
Right, he kept saying that. “But you didn’t do anything about it. Actions speak louder than words, Graham. Why didn’t you come up that time I asked?”
“It seemed unprofessional.”
“Okay, but I wasn’t asking you for a one-night stand—and that’s not what you wanted either. If you love me, why wouldn’t you say so?”
She believed his words, it wasn’t a test, but they could have had this, been like this, for a year. There was no reason why they needed the world to be ending to be together.
He gave her a wry smile. “I’m not good enough for you. I’m…a loser.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Y
ou’re brilliant. Much better, smarter than this place. Someday you’re going to leave.”
That was ridiculous. Except, well, she had been thinking about it. She glanced toward her desk. There were applications there, letters, spreadsheets—plans for a life away from Richmond.
“Can you disagree with me?” he asked.
“I might have applied for some jobs.” Her voice sounded tiny. “But I never would have left if you—”
“Which is why I didn’t. I like being here well enough, but you don’t.”
Of all the stupid things to say. She kissed him until he was breathless, then she pulled back. “Yeah, well, I wasn’t kidding either, I have been flagrant with you. Do you know how many people have asked me if we’re together?”
“Probably the same number who’ve ask me.”
“So why aren’t we?”
“I think we—that is, I hope we are. Now.”
Oh, just that easy? He turned her down and then assumed some good, okay amazing, sex sealed the deal? “Is that an offer? If so, I’ll consider it.”
“And probably realize you can do better.”
Graham’s self-deprecation still didn’t make sense, but she could help with that. She cuddled into him. They had years, unless…
She wasn’t actually convinced they were on the brink of nuclear war for all that the president was an idiot. No, while she was glad it had gotten Graham into her bed, too many people were too invested in the world as it was to let the president push the button on a whim. Weren’t they?
Okay, so the president’s aides might not have the authority to stop him, but they could persuade him. Couldn’t they?
Her pulse began to rattle up, overriding how boneless she’d felt. She tried to resettle onto Graham, but the angle felt wrong now, her upper back unable to relax. Maybe he had a point.
“You thought the world was ending, and you came to me?” she whispered.
“Yes.”
“Not like another listen of Beethoven’s Fifth or eating all the carbs in your house?”
“There aren’t many carbs in my house.”
He chose you over carbs. He chose you over everything.
Rogue Desire: A Romance Anthology (The Rogue Series) Page 18