The only way I know Evans is because we work together. And even if he went out to a bar, I don’t think either of us would be able to work up the nerve to talk to each other. Not even in a grocery store. He’d probably pick up a potato as I reached for an onion and our fingers would graze. We’d smile at each other, fumble, turn the color of nearby tomatoes, and apologize profusely. Then he’d talk himself out of asking for my number because “Jeez, Evans, don’t be the dick that hits on a girl in the grocery store. She probably gets hit on all the time and she’s just trying to get her produce.”
But I need to push that would-be meet-cute from my head because we were unlucky—or maybe lucky—enough to meet through work and that means this has to end before it starts. So I should take advantage while it lasts.
My door swings open and there’s Evans, offering me a hand out of his car, and I take it, eager for the feel of my hand in his, eager for him to make me forget all this wistful nonsense by burying his head between my legs. He hustles me to the back door and opens it so he can use one hand to cradle my head and ease me onto the seat without bumping my head. The urge to swing my legs inside is strong, but he shakes his head as if he knows exactly what I’m thinking.
“Lean back and spread your legs.”
Those words shouldn’t sound as sexy as they do, but I’m not going to argue. I’m going to do what he says, because I know what this feels like and I want more of it. My garters snap against my thighs as he plucks them off my stockings so he can wrestle my underwear off, and then I’m exposed.
Not only to Evans, but to the open air, to the outside, to, well, really the brick wall that’s only about six feet away, but still. This feels dangerous and thrilling and instead of trying to squash it, I let it wash over me. Let myself steep in the pale glow of streetlights across the parking lot and, yeah, the delirious look on Evans’s face.
He doesn’t waste any time, though, dropping to his knees with an audible thud. I only have a second to worry that his pants are going to need a serious trip to the cleaners before he’s on me. Hands prying my thighs wider, thumbs parting me so he can reach my very core with his…oh, god, with his tongue. Gentle licks over and around my clit before he laps at it in earnest, and then backs away to tease around the edges in a way that makes me grip his hair and half-demand, half-plead, “Evans!”
It could be a hallucination, but I think I feel him laugh from between my thighs, and then he’s taking my clit into his mouth, sucking it and tonguing before sliding his fingers inside me and hitting that—
“Ah!”
My entirely undignified outburst sets him to nibbling, soft bites on that hard little bud of pleasure. When he’s worked me more with his fingers, my pleasure blossoms, starting from that tiny spot and blooming through my pelvis, up to my breasts that are aching to be touched and down to my curling toes.
I’m trying to be quiet, because despite being so turned on by his vision of some of the strip club patrons coming out here to find us and watching what he’s doing to me that I was worried the car was going to combust, the real thing might make me shrivel up and die with embarrassment.
I bite my lip hard in an effort to smother the noises, but there’s only so much teeth can do, and I’m grateful when his hand that’s not still moving inside me slips over my mouth and he says, “Shh, Luce. I’m right here, I’m not going to let you go.”
That wrings a last pulse of climax from me and brings tears to the corners of my eyes because he’s wrong. He will let me go. In a couple of days, even, and the thought swallows some of my bliss. But while I’ve got him here…
I lick his palm because I can’t think of another way to tell him to let go. He laughs as he releases my mouth, quiet now, and says, “Don’t worry. There’s no one here. A few cars drove by, but none of them even slowed down.”
Because why would they? How many people fuck in the parking lot of a strip club? I’m sure even the dancers who add a little extra to their routines after hours are more subtle than doing it in the parking lot.
“We can be done now if you want. I don’t want you to worry. You’re so…”
He leans down, and he might kiss me, but then he doesn’t. I almost tell him to, but that will make the goodbye that’s coming even harder. “I’m so ready for you to fuck me is what I am. I want your cock, Evans. Please. Don’t stop. I want to come again, and I want to do it while you’re in me.”
His eyes go pleasingly wide as he makes a strangled sound deep in his throat. Then he withdraws his fingers and eyes them, slick with my wetness, leans forward, and then licks them. I stare, spellbound, as he leisurely tongues and sucks his own fingers. He does it until there must be no taste of me left and then studies the spit-damp digits.
“I’ve always wanted to do that.” I make what can only be described as a squeaking noise, and he drags his gaze up to mine, his face wondrous. “You taste different on my fingers than right from your skin.”
It is going to be awkward for Evans to explain to SDPD why there’s a dead woman sprawled out in the backseat of his car in a strip club parking lot, especially because I’ve perished from his ridiculously worshipful and earnest dirty talk. This man…
“But right, sorry.” He shakes his head as if to clear it and then starts to fumble with his buckle. “You wanted fucking, and fucking you shall have.”
There’s a peek at the dorky-sweet Evans I like to exchange eye rolls with in the office, but when he’s unzipped his fly and pushed his boxer briefs down to free himself, the look he turns back on me is filthy. And lucky for me, Evans has been rolling prepared since that bare-assed sprint down the hall, and it only takes him a few seconds to score a condom from his pocket, rip the foil that he discards carefully on the seat of the car—because goodness knows, even in the heat of the moment, he wouldn’t want to be a litterbug—and rolls the latex over himself.
He’s so unbelievably big and beautiful, in a way I’d never thought about penises being. Beautiful in a put-that-in-me-right-now kind of way. So I grab his spread-open fly, a hand on each side, and drag him toward me until he almost hits his head on the doorframe. Luckily he ducks in time and settles awkwardly over me.
This is not comfortable, but judging by the way he squeezes his eyes shut, it’s not going to take long either. He levers up, bracketing my head with his forearms as he rests on them, and slowly sinks into me, keeping an eye on me as he does. I so appreciate his caution, and I cant my hips to help. Between the two of us and the slickness of the orgasm I’ve already had, he’s inside me reasonably quickly and starts to thrust, his hips snapping forward and driving me into the seat.
The scenario is hot, but for a second I can’t help thinking of what it might be like to have sex with Evans in a bed. Probably a lot like this but with a higher thread count. Or would he be tamer? More like his everyday Evans-self? Is it this game we play that lets him be wild and dirty?
I’m distracted from my meanderings by Evans’s forehead coming to rest on mine and the way he then turns his head and his stubble scratches against my cheek. He moans in my ear and with whatever breath he can spare from this energetic fuck he’s giving me, says my name. Says it over and over, and I know whenever he says it again in the office, this is what I’m going to hear and I’ll turn bright red. A piece of secret exhibitionism I’ll get to hold onto after this week is over.
He grabs my hip and uses the leverage to push even deeper inside me, and when he comes, I’m ready. The way he says my name as he jerks inside of me, so overcome that he’s lost his rhythm, is enough to drive another climax from my sore and contorted body.
I shouldn’t, but I can’t help how my hands come up to stroke him, run my fingers through his hair and hold him to me until we both stop shaking.
Chapter Sixteen
‡
December 23rd
Evans
After I drop off Lucy at BCG, I go home for a few hours of much-needed shut-eye, a quick shower, and dammit, a shave, because I’ve started
to look like a lumberjack. And not one of those hunky, hipster ones women seem to like. One of those old, scraggly ones that have seen less than their fair share of bathing and a razor blade. One of those crazy ones who goes and tries to live with bears and gets eaten for his trouble. I can tell my state of mind is not all that much better because living with bears doesn’t sound like the worst idea in the world right now. Maybe preferable to having to live out the rest of my days in my office.
As I drive over, all I can think is that I’m so sick of this place. The only reason that even seemed worth getting out of bed for was Lucy. Not India, not this job even, but knowing I’d disappoint and hurt Lucy if I didn’t show up this morning. She’s good, but she can’t handle the rest of the project alone. And I don’t want her to have to. She already stayed later than I did last night.
I would’ve gone in with her, but she waved me off. “I just have this one tiny thing I want to finish, and I need your best tomorrow. Go home and get some rest. I’ll head out in a few minutes.”
I’d wanted to argue with her, but I was drop-dead tired and she was right. Chivalry wasn’t going to make me any less exhausted, but catching some sleep might.
When I walk in the door, the lights over her cube are out, which means she’s still at home. Though my heart sinks because I’d been counting on seeing her face, it’s probably for the best. I can go straight to work and she’ll get some much needed shut-eye.
The walk down the hall to my office is dismal. I leave the lights off because there’s not any need to turn them on since I know exactly where I’m going. When I get there, though, to my windowless box that still makes me proud, I flick on the overheads and crank the AC. I’m going to need all the help I can get staying awake today, and Lucy still hasn’t taught me to use the coffeemaker.
I dump my things to the side of the desk and then drop into my wheelie chair, ready to do battle with this report again. Is it incredibly terrible of me to hope we don’t pull this off and don’t retain the contract? I never want to see this stupid thing again. Even the words municipal bonds send chills through my system. It’s a good thing they don’t tend to come up in conversation anywhere else but here.
When I look down at my desk, expecting to see the spreadsheets and best practice memos I’d left out last night, that’s not what’s there. Instead, there’s a pink Post-It on a manila folder, and I recognize the neat, slopey handwriting on it immediately.
Evans,
I wasn’t sure on the details of your brother’s service or the circumstances of his accident or anything else, but I thought these might be helpful. For him and your parents. But mostly for you.
~L
Flipping through the folder, there are pages upon neatly collated pages describing various programs and services available to veterans: housing, medical, mental health, substance abuse, physical therapy. There must be a hundred documents here, sorted by type of service, neatly clipped together and labeled with more pink Post-Its.
This must have taken Lucy hours. There’s no way she went home last night and especially not “in a few minutes” like she’d said she would. She stayed up and put this together for me. Because of a ten-minute conversation we had at a strip club I brought her to so she could eat chicken wings. I—
My sinuses have started to burn and my eyes start to water, not unlike after I’d sunk my teeth into a few of those wings. Lucy’s kindness has killed me. And perversely, made me pretty fucking angry. Not at her—no, never at Lucy—but at my family.
If a woman who I’ve only been casually friends with in an office setting for a few years and having, um, relations with for only a week can sacrifice hours upon hours of time she doesn’t have to do something like this for me, whereas the only thing my parents and my brother have done the past several years is take and take and make me feel guilty for not giving them more…that’s messed up.
My feelings are all jumbled up in my head, bouncing around in the cotton my skull feels as though it’s filled with, and I have a hard time getting them under control. This is what exhaustion will do to a person. Make them completely unable to respond to a gift—because that’s what this is, even if it doesn’t have a big fat bow on the top—in an appropriate way.
Thank you, dumbass. How about going to tell the best woman in the world thank you?
*
Lucy
“Luce?”
The weight of a warm hand and the gentle low voice make me feel as if I’m still dreaming. It’s a nice dream. One where Evans and I walked out of the office hand in hand, found a taqueria, and had dinner on our way back to his apartment. And when we got there, we made sangria which we took out onto his hypothetical balcony—because I don’t know if Evans has a balcony—and we sipped at it while we watched the sunset. After it had gotten reasonably dark, Evans had gestured for me to stand in front of him at the rail, and while we looked over his neighborhood, even all the way out to where we could see a tiny slice of sea, he pushed up the back of my dress, unzipped his trousers, and fucked me right there. Right in the open, right where anyone could see if they were paying attention, but what probably looked like to most people—if they were even paying attention—a couple snuggling on a balcony and watching the sunset. So much better than that.
And afterward, we’d walked back into his apartment, brushed our teeth over the same sink, and jostled for position when it was time to spit, bonked elbows while we flossed, and then crawled into bed together where he spooned me until I fell asleep. And now he’s waking me up, and maybe, if we have enough time, just maybe…
I roll over, but instead of finding a warm, naked, hopefully turned-on Evans, I meet the floor. By way of Evans. I think.
“Oof!”
Yep, that was Evans, and I’ve crushed him by falling on him after rolling off India’s couch. He’s broken my fall, but I’ve probably broken…all of him. He’s not a big guy and I’m not exactly petite, especially after all those chicken wings last night.
I scramble to get off of him, and we end up tangled in this awkward mass of clothes and blankets and limbs and pillows, and I feel lucky we don’t end up head-butting each other as we free ourselves.
“Oh my god, Evans, I’m so, so sorry. Are you okay? Did I break you?”
He’s sitting on the floor and instead of looking mad or in pain, he’s got this goofy smile on his face. “No, you didn’t break me. I was more surprised than anything, and if you hadn’t started flailing, it might’ve been nice. I’ve never had a woman literally fall for me before.”
His corny pun makes me smile, even as I shake my head and feel my cheeks heat. It would be nice if I could embarrass myself less. Or, at least, less often? Hopefully I didn’t say anything too revealing about the very domestic, romantic, and okay, sure, filthy scene I’d been dreaming about. Or if I did, he didn’t mind.
Even if we have to end this for real in a couple of days, surely hanging on to my fantasies isn’t against the rules?
But before I can get too flustered thinking about it, Evans lays a hand on mine and squeezes.
“I found the research you did for me on my desk. Thank you so much, Lucy. No one’s ever—” He clears his throat, and if the light weren’t so low, I’d believe those were tears gathering at the corner of his eyes, but surely not. “No one’s ever—”
He still can’t say it, and while I’d like to hear whatever it is, I don’t want him to be embarrassed. I know all too well what it feels like to cry in front of people when you don’t mean to.
“You’re welcome. I hope it’s helpful.”
He shakes his head and blinks too fast before taking a deep breath. “Even if nothing comes of this, even if they don’t use any of it…I’ll know you did it, and it’s the nicest thing anyone’s done for me in a long time. So thank you.”
I’ve heard people talk about getting the warm fuzzies, and I’ve never understood what they meant, outside of like a super cute kitten video on YouTube or a baby in a funny hat. I’ve never had a
man give me the warm fuzzies before—all their compliments have seemed seedy or disingenuous or backhanded or something I couldn’t quite figure out but made me uncomfortable nonetheless.
But Evans—this warmth that’s blooming in my chest is unqualified. He’s saying thank you for a nice thing I did that he genuinely appreciates, and it has nothing to do with my looks, nothing to do with wanting to get in my pants. Because he’s already done that, and he hasn’t made me feel lousy about that either. His gratefulness is sincere, and that’s a pretty wonderful feeling.
What is not a great feeling is the panic that floods me when I hear my boss’s voice. “What are you two doing in here, having a slumber party?”
Oh shit.
India’s standing in the doorway, her bag slung over her shoulder and a paper sack in her hand. I’m surprised she’s here this early, but maybe Cris has gone back to Hawaii? She’s wearing jeans and a beaten-to-hell Stanford sweatshirt with her hair piled on top of her head, and I almost don’t recognize her.
“No!”
Oh god, surely a chorus of denials is way more suspicious than just one of us explaining…and explaining what exactly? Her black eyebrow’s arch becomes more severe as she looks between the two of us.
“I slept here last night, and I must’ve forgotten I was on your couch instead of in my bed because I rolled off. Evans heard the thump and came to see what was wrong.”
That’s almost what happened, so it’s not really a lie, right?
India looks back and forth between the two of us, and I get that eerie sensation that with those two different-colored eyes of hers, she can see things that aren’t actually there. Like infrared or ultraviolet or traces of touches or sexual tension arcing between people.
Due South (The Compass series Book 5) Page 16