by Louise Bay
I rolled my eyes. “I don’t want to get myself fired here but I’m telling you, I didn’t mean it as a compliment.”
He shrugged. “Maybe I took it as one. Well, not that I’m ridiculous—that’s just patently not true. But the fact that you’d call me so. I appreciate it.”
“You like people calling you names?”
“Not people. You. And not names—just the truth.”
I didn’t know what to say. The way he said it suggested that I was . . . special somehow. “You like me telling you the truth?”
He nodded, looking pained by the confession.
“I’m sorry she got into the accident, Gabriel. I should have told you sooner that I didn’t like the setup there.”
“It’s not your fault. You weren’t in charge. And if you hadn’t been there—if you hadn’t gone in after her . . .” He closed his eyes and inhaled sharply as if he were trying to bear the pain of even the thought that something worse would have happened.
“They should have had a lifeguard on duty—someone who wasn’t involved with the class who was just watching over everything.”
“I guess you fulfilled that role.”
“I’m just pleased I got to her. And she’s fine.” I smoothed my hand over his, trying to reassure him. “Will you let me take her swimming? Just the two of us. I can teach her. She’ll have my complete attention.”
He glanced at my hand over his. I was making him feel uncomfortable. When I pulled my hand away, he said, “No.” Then slid his fingers between mine. A wave of release pushed through my body and I exhaled.
This.
This was what I’d needed from him.
I’d needed him to touch me.
“I know I’m being overprotective,” he said, his thumb stroking the palm of my hand, setting off tiny firecrackers in my underwear. “I just worry.”
“I know,” I said, half surprised anything came out when I’d tried to speak. I’d expected his touch to take my words away.
We sat in silence for long moments, me getting pulled closer to him with every rhythmic stroke of his thumb. “I shouldn’t be touching you.”
“I know,” I replied.
“We shouldn’t be holding hands,” he said.
I nodded. “I don’t want you to stop.”
“I know,” he said with such confidence that if I’d been on my feet, my knees would have disintegrated and I would have fallen. “I’ve tried to stay away.”
My heartbeat rammed on my ribcage like a freight train. He’d wanted me?
With this confession, he slid his hand from mine and shoved his fingers through his hair. “It’s not right. For a million different reasons.”
Nothing he was saying wasn’t true. He was one of Dexter’s oldest friends and my employer. He was a father and a serious lawyer, as Hollie loved to remind me. I was . . . just starting out.
But I wanted him.
And now he’d touched me, I knew I couldn’t even pretend I didn’t.
He pushed his chair out from under the table and stood. Was he leaving? Was he about to disappear behind that locked door?
I stood up too, trying to find the words to ask him to stay. To tell him all the reasons why he shouldn’t kiss me would be there tomorrow, but for tonight we could just put them to one side. We could forget about everything for one kiss.
“I should go,” he said.
Of course, he was going to pull down the shutters and retreat into his bat cave. What could I say to make him stay? Before I thought of the words, he stalked around the table, took my head in his hands, and pressed his lips to mine. My entire body buzzed as if his kiss conveyed life-giving energy, hot and urgent. I slid my hands up his arms and finally got to feel the hardness of his muscles that I’d seen moving under his dress shirts and semi-exposed by his tees. His skin was as hot as lava and the low moans he was making as he kissed me made every part of me vibrate. I wasn’t sure I wouldn’t climax right there from just a kiss.
I pushed a little on his chest, concerned I was about to be overwhelmed.
“You want me to stop?” he asked.
“You need to give me a minute,” I said, trying to float back down to earth, but it was difficult when I was so close to him and my lips still hummed with the feel of him. “I never know what I’m going to get with you. One minute you’re telling me how it’s a terrible idea to be near me and then you’re kissing me.”
“I’m capricious.” It was a statement rather than a question.
“You are. But you can’t kiss me like that and change your mind. I’m resilient but not unbreakable. Don’t shut me out again.”
He nodded and cupped my face in his hands. “I’m sorry. I won’t do it again.” His gaze was determined and focused and fixed on me, and I believed him.
Eleven
Gabriel
As soon as I’d touched her, I knew I was sunk.
For days now, I’d had to rehearse all the reasons I shouldn’t make her mine over and over in my head, like a mantra. Hoping that somehow, they would sink in and neutralize the urge I had to press my hands, my lips, my body against hers.
But my mantra was silent now. I couldn’t focus on anything but her. The feel of her, soft and precious under my fingers. Her scent, warm and inviting. Her large brown eyes, looking at me as if I had all the answers.
My need for her had developed over the months like fine wine, and all the fantasies I’d had of her funneled into this one moment.
She tasted just as sweet as I imagined. I groaned as I pulled my mouth away, wanting to revel in the feel of her lips against mine for days.
“Gabriel,” she whispered, smoothing her hand up my chest.
How I’d longed for her touch. Even my name sounded better on her lips than from the mouth of any other. I pulled her closer to me, not ready to let go yet, enjoying the way she molded to me.
I pushed my knee between her legs and she gasped as if I’d lit her on fire.
“Gabriel,” she said again, more urgently this time.
I brushed her chin with my thumb and then kissed her again, my dick growing harder by the second. I felt like a kid, unable to shift my focus and keep myself under control. I’d wanted her for so long. Since she moved in a month ago. Since I first laid eyes on her over a year ago. It felt like forever. I’d never just looked at a woman and had an urgent need to touch before Autumn. It was as if she existed on a slightly different plain to anyone else, or she’d cast some kind of spell over me.
She wrapped her hand around my neck and twisted her hips slightly, which pushed her against my leg. She moaned, soft and throaty.
This couldn’t happen. I couldn’t let this woman hump my thigh when I knew I could make her come much harder with my fingers, my tongue, my cock.
She pulled back from our kiss. “Oh God,” she said. “I’m dry humping your leg.” She laughed at herself, never afraid to be exactly who she was.
Didn’t she realize? Everything she did was utterly intoxicating. If only she hadn’t been wearing jeans. I wanted her wet pussy streaking the denim on my legs.
I stroked up her back. “Are you wet, Autumn?”
It was the first time I’d ever seen her shocked, but I was done holding back.
“Between your legs.” I dipped my hand between her thighs. “Underneath your jeans. Tell me.”
She nodded.
I wasn’t sure whether or not it was lust or relief that chased through me. Relief that she wanted me. That this was happening. Or perhaps the reprieve of my red, raw hands now I’d finally conceded the tug of war I’d been fighting so hard to win. Defeat had been inevitable. If I’d had any chance at victory, it had slipped from my fingers the first night she spent under my roof. I’d lain in bed with my dick in my hand, imagining how she’d feel under my fingers, between my teeth, and surrounding my cock.
“Show me.”
She held my gaze and without looking away, she undid her trousers and pulled them down over her bottom.
&n
bsp; I tensed my jaw as she held her underwear away from her, giving me space to see her sweet pussy.
“I’m not sure that’s quite wet enough,” I said, pushing my fingers into her underwear and between her folds.
“Oh God,” she said, unsteady on her feet, grasping at my arms.
I leaned her back onto the table as I explored her. Christ, I couldn’t wait to taste her. Couldn’t wait to coat my cock in her soaked pussy.
With my free hand, I pushed off her underwear as I worked around her clit, stroking and pushing before delving into her with two fingers.
“Shit,” she cried out, and I put my mouth on hers to cover her sounds. I curled my fingers into her, pushing and pulling, circling and pressing, trying to take some of the heat out of my cock, trying to calm myself as much as satisfy her. “Gabriel. I’m. Stop. Gabriel. You’re going to make me come.”
I stilled. “You want me to stop?” I asked, smirking at her. I knew the answer, but I was going to make her say it.
She couldn’t catch her breath. “No. Well, yes. I’m going to come so quickly if you don’t.”
I pushed back into her, feeling her tense around me. “I know,” I whispered. “And you’ve wanted this for so long, haven’t you?” I asked, stroking her between her folds, around her clit, delving deep. “You’ve wanted me to feel you, to touch you like this, to make you come?”
“Yes, Gabriel.” Her confession brought her to the brink, and she began to shudder. I slid my free hand over her mouth to muffle her cries and I held her gently as she floated down, free of weeks of pent-up frustration.
Her cries had only ratcheted up my need and I pulled off my t-shirt, wiping my hand on it before discarding it and working on my jeans.
“Well, that should be illegal,” she said, hazy-eyed and pointing at my chest.
“What?” I glanced down.
“You know. All the muscles and stuff. I’ve never even seen you work out.”
“It’s all the manual labor,” I replied. She laughed but I wasn’t joking. The planing and polishing. The lifting and sanding. It was all the exercise anyone needed.
“This is my favorite outfit you have,” she said, unbuttoning her blouse like we were in a race to see who could undress first.
Her confession made me grin. I liked the idea that she noticed what I wore, noticed my body. Why did she like it?
“You only wear it when you’re about to disappear into your secret dungeon.” She shrugged off her top and started untangling her trousers from where they’d pooled around her ankles.
I paused before pulling off my jeans. “My what?” With a nod of her head, she indicated the door of my workshop. “My workshop?”
“What do you do in there?”
“Stuff you do in a workshop,” I said. She stood before me in just her underwear. “God, you’re beautiful, Autumn. So bloody beautiful.”
She reached for me and pulled at my neck and I dipped to kiss her. There was no going back now. I was careering down a one-way street with no way out. I’d vowed never to touch another woman after Penelope left. And of all the people I broke that vow for, it shouldn’t have been for a woman who was so much younger, was my best friend’s future sister-in-law and my daughter’s nanny. But this pull I had toward Autumn was stronger than every objection that existed.
“Turn around and bend over,” I said. I wanted to see her beautiful skin against the rough oak of the table. The oak I’d sanded and oiled and given new life to. I wanted every part of me to possess her. She lay forward, the dark strands of her hair falling onto the wood as if she were wrapping herself over it.
She looked like a goddess. I kneeled, peeling her underwear off and down her legs, catching a glimpse of her plump, reddened pussy, shimmering for me. “Beautiful,” I said, admiring her, pushing my thumb inside her. Unable to be so close without having a taste, I leaned forward and pressed my tongue against her.
Her nails scraped against the wood and her knees buckled. She was sweet—like amber honey— and her pussy quivered on my tongue like it was so close to climax it just needed the slightest touch.
Later.
I stood and pressed her firmly against the table. “Hold on.”
She did as I asked and gripped the edges of the table while I rolled on a condom and took position behind her. I took a final look at her, spread out like a feast for me. Legs weak, pussy wet, breath heavy. It was just how I’d pictured her a thousand times, but so much better. Because tonight, it would be her cunt and not my hand that my cock got to push into.
I growled and grabbed her hips, holding her in place. “Are you ready?”
“Please,” she whimpered.
I inhaled at her plea and summoned up strength to continue.
In one swift movement, I pushed in, right up to the hilt. I fought against my need to close my eyes at the tightness because I couldn’t deprive myself of the sight of her. Her luscious bottom that I stood behind. The smooth, pale white of her back. The tumble of black locks. She was gorgeous and now I was inside of her, just where I’d longed to be since I’d seen her that first time.
I spanned my hand across her back and pulled out, dragging a groan from her, and then thrust forward. Did I ever think it would be like this? That her skin would feel like silk? That my cock would feel so good filling her up? I leaned over her so my chest was flat against her back, just to feel more of her—I wanted to be surrounded and consumed by this moment.
Shifting up again, I began my rhythm. Slow and relentless, just like the desire I’d had for her for all these months. It felt so fucking perfect that I couldn’t believe I’d made it this long. If it had been inevitable, why had I not given in sooner and enjoyed this moment months ago? “I’ve been wanting this for so long,” I choked out. “I’ve needed to plow into you and show you how good it could be.”
She pushed back against me, sending me farther into her if that was even possible. She screamed into her folded arms. “So deep.”
I increased the pace, needing her to understand how desperate she’d made me all this time.
“Please. Gabriel. You’re. Please. Yes. Please. Please.”
The begging was more than I could have ever hoped for. She was always so sure of herself and now this was my chance to make her sure of me.
“You want more?” I pressed again and again. “You think you can handle it?”
I reached around under her and pressed my fingers into her folds. She was gone on a single touch.
Another victory. But I wasn’t going to stop.
I slowed as her body shuddered with her second orgasm, then pulled out completely, making her whimper before moving her heavy, slow limbs so she was facing me. I lifted her onto the table and opened her legs.
I wasn’t sure what was going to happen after tonight. I couldn’t think about it now. I just had to make the most out of every second I had her right now. I unsnapped her bra and discarded it on the floor. Her breasts were perfect. Firm and large and so fucking soft. I weighed them in my hands and then took her nipples between my thumb and forefinger, giving them a short pinch, making her yelp, and then I pushed into her again. She covered her own mouth as she groaned, her head tipped back as if helpless.
“You’re mine tonight.” And I was going to claim what was mine in every way possible.
“Yes,” she whispered, something so reverent in her tone that I had to stop and look at her. “Yours,” she said, sweeping her finger over my eyebrow and down my cheek.
She shifted, pulling me out of the trance she’d put me in with a single word, and I kissed her rough and hard before lifting her up and moving to the nearest seat. I sat down so she was astride me and looked up at her.
So fucking beautiful.
I smoothed my hands around the curve of her arse and lifted her slightly, then pulled her down on my straining cock. As I was about to start moving her, she took over, raising and lowering herself over me.
“It’s even deeper like this,” she panted. “How?
”
I brought my hands up to explore her breasts, rolling her nipples between my thumb and fingers, tightening my hold then releasing her if it interrupted her pace.
“It’s so good,” she said.
“You like my cock,” I replied. “I knew you would.”
She moaned and slowed, tightening around me. But I wasn’t ready to let her come again. Not yet. I stood, her legs wrapped around me. I strode across the kitchen and leaned her up against the wall.
I slammed into her over and over, pinning her to the spot. I fucked and fucked and fucked as if I’d been deprived of water for weeks and was finally able to drink.
“Oh God, Gabriel,” she cried.
“You’re going to have to be quiet,” I said through a series of grunts. “I’m going to make you come so, so hard, Autumn.” I thrust into her again as if to make my point. “But you’re going to have to be quiet.”
Her head fell to my shoulder and as I continued to fuck and fuck, she cried out into my skin, the vibrations from her moans reverberating over my sweat-sheened skin in a sheet of pleasure.
From underneath her, my fingers found her folds and barely a touch sent her spiraling yet again.
I wasn’t going to withstand her contracting around my cock this time. I’d held on for so long. So many weeks.
“Autumn,” I cried out. Every drop that I thrust up into her was a part of me. I was giving her everything. My abstinence, my composure, my self-control.
In a few moments, I’d taken a hammer to everything I’d carefully constructed over the past three years.
I’d ripped up the rule book for Autumn.
I’d have to deal with the consequences tomorrow.
Twelve
Autumn
My limbs were stone-heavy and I wasn’t sure I’d ever have the energy to walk again. Sex with Gabriel had been . . . I knew it would be good. I just hadn’t expected it to be so completely life changing. And I hadn’t expected him to be so filthy. I’d loved it.
“Do you concede at Monopoly?” he asked, fastening his jeans.