by Max Monroe
“I think we’re all set,” Nick answered. “Thanks.”
As our waitress walked toward the kitchen, he wrapped his arm around my shoulder and tucked me in close to his side. “You look beautiful tonight, Char.”
I smiled. “So do you.”
“Isn’t it amazing what a good hangover can do for your skin complexion?” he teased, and I giggled.
“Oh, don’t be so dramatic. There’s no way your hangover was that bad.”
He raised his brow. “Trust me, it was bad. I would’ve canceled surgeries if I’d had an OR schedule today.”
“Sheesh,” I muttered. “I guess that means we need to work on making your drinking game strong.”
“Hell no.” He laughed and shook his head in two determined side-to-side motions. “I’ll stay alcohol-free, thank you very much.”
“If it makes you feel any better, my morning started out a little rough, too.”
“I guess that does make me feel a little better. It also enlightens me to the fact that you aren’t ashamed to lie for your own amusement.” He shook his head and did his best to change his voice to that of a woman. “Oh, I’m fine. Hungover? Ha-ha-ha. No, sir. I have the blood of a goddess and the heartiness of a god.”
I laughed and covered my mouth with two fingers when the rolling waves refused to stop. “I’m sorry I told you I was fine when you were suffering.” I cleared my throat and bumped up the volume on my faux melancholy. “I only puked twelve times,” I lied again, and his eyes widened in concern.
“Shit. Seriously?”
“No.” I grinned. He discreetly pinched the side of my ass in retaliation. “Actually, I only woke up with a little bit of a headache,” I admitted. “Nothing some ibuprofen wasn’t able to solve.”
“So, if you’re measuring on the same scale as I am, I guess your first proclamation of fine wasn’t so off base. I woke up feeling like I’d attempted my own brain surgery without anesthetic.”
“Eeek.” I grimaced at the metaphor. “Sorry I made you drink last night.”
“Don’t be,” he said. “I haven’t had that much fun in a long fucking time.”
I searched his eyes and smiled at the truth and honesty that lay behind his gaze. “Me either.”
Nick brushed a piece of hair behind my ear and leaned forward, his lips painting barely there, shiver-inducing kisses up and down my neck.
Goose bumps pebbled my skin, and a soft sigh left my lips. “That feels good.”
“It does.”
“Yeah, it does feel good,” I responded. “Really good.”
“That wasn’t a question, Char.” Nick’s eyes met mine, but his lips stayed busy on my skin. “I’m finding that kissing you is my new favorite thing.”
Mine too.
Cripes, if he kept this up, I’d have to tell Harry we needed a rain check.
Just as Suzy Q carried a tray of food toward our booth, Nick placed one final kiss to my shoulder before straightening up in his seat.
My mouth turned down into a little pout of its own accord. When it came to Nick, I seemed to have this incessant craving for more from him. More touches, more kisses, more attention. Just, more.
I silently wondered if I’d been a cat in a past life or something. Lord knows, if he offered to pet me right now, I’d be in his lap and purring my excitement without a second thought.
He brushed his index finger across my mouth. “I think we’re going to need to finish what we started, after we eat, at my place. Sound good?”
Oh my God, yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! my brain, and most likely, my vagina shouted. My mouth did a better job of playing it cool. “That sounds perfect.”
Dinner with Charlotte had been equal parts enjoyable and fucking maddening.
I’d enjoyed the easy flow of our conversation, the riotous sound of her laugh—even the Frisco melt and fries I’d washed down with an ice-cold milk shake—but the intense urge to strip her naked and kiss her senseless made my skin crawl with a tinge of early-stage insanity.
I’d spent the majority of our meal fixated on the seductive way her plush, full lips moved whenever she said something or smiled or laughed, and every time she crossed or uncrossed her legs, my balls grew heavier with need.
Mesmerizing eyes, soft, glowing skin, long, svelte legs with a firm, curvaceous ass, and lush, rounded hips I couldn’t stop thinking about wrapping my hands around again—Charlotte Hollis was beautiful, everywhere.
It took every inkling of willpower to keep my gawking to a minimum.
But my hourglass of patience had run out, and thankfully, we had finally made it back to my place.
With the intense need to feel her—everywhere—front and center, my hands tingled as I yanked at the hem of Charlotte’s skirt and pushed her into the wall right inside the front door of my apartment.
Inhibited by our bodies no more, we kissed like our lives depended on it, and I kicked the door shut with a hard slam. It rang out painfully and cut sharp arrows into the following silence.
Through panting breaths and subdued groans, Charlotte offered her throat to me brazenly, daring me to get in there and take my time.
I did so without complaint, almost drowning in her intoxicating smell and warmth. Her body was pliant, helpful even, curving into the bulk of mine and working to get closer. I felt like a man starved for anything and everything related to her.
She was a buffet of all of my favorite things, and I wanted to taste and devour it all.
It wasn’t that I hadn’t had any sexual contact in years, or that I considered myself some kind of candidate for celibacy, but the truth was, I scarcely prioritized it. Between work and Lexi, my schedule was nearly full to the brim, and if I was going to add in anything else, it was going to be more time with my daughter.
But Charlotte’s flushed skin screamed I was an idiot, because this—this was worth prioritizing.
“Nick,” she moaned, yanking at the short hair at the back of my head almost viciously. My mouth left the skin of her throat without choice, and my eyes moved up to meet hers.
“What?” I whispered. What did she need, what did she want, what could I do to make her burn? I wanted the answers to all of my questions at once, and I got the feeling she sensed it.
Her irises darkened to the midnight that outlined them as she demanded, “Kiss me.”
Both hands to her jaw, my fingertips tangled into the loose hair at her shoulders and flexed as I slammed my mouth against hers.
It was a war between us, her lips advancing on mine until I forced their retreat. She was so brazen, so bold in every encounter I’d had with her, and I wanted control of this. I wanted to own every square millimeter of her peachy flesh and then work my way inside until I’d discovered every taste.
The chocolate milk shakes we’d had with dinner lingered and itched against my lips as I licked and sucked it off hers, and a gasp gave me the freedom I needed to spear my tongue inside.
She welcomed it with her own, tangling the two in a dance that made my grip on her jaw tighten and the air in my stomach lift.
She tasted even sweeter than the milk shake and whipped cream combined, a dessert so loaded with sugar it should be illegal.
I groaned, almost a growl, and she pushed into my body to wrap her arms around my shoulders tightly.
Stomach to mine, she pressed herself to me and lifted a leg, cocking it at the knee to get closer.
I was focused, living in her mouth, but the pull of her hands in my hair made me realize I needed to find a new location and quick.
She was light, taking some of her weight in her own arms as I slid my hands from her jaw, down the sides of her body to her hips and lifted.
As her thighs clenched my hips, her hands regained some freedom, and they didn’t waste it. She dove into the top of my shirt, two buttons undone on purpose, and made getting the rest undone the most immediate purpose of her own.
I chuckled at her hurry, but she didn’t take offense. If anything, it egged her on to go fa
ster.
I pulled at the already lifted hem of her skirt, yanking it higher and smoothing my hands over the bare cheeks of her round ass. It felt perfect in my hands, meaty and thick and every bit womanly. Awareness shocked me as she ground herself against me and forced my eyes closed for nearly an entire second.
“Fuck.”
“Yes,” she whispered eagerly. “Let’s.”
Unbidden and completely unwarranted, Lexi’s recent words jumped into my head. I was seconds from divulging the completely inappropriate, ill-timed line of my thoughts when my dick took control and threatened death by dismemberment if I ruined this for us. He must have been imagining how that conversation would have gone just as I was.
“What? Why are you laughing as you touch my vagina?”
“I’m sorry,” I apologized. “I’m just remembering something my daughter said.”
“Wow. Thinking of your daughter as you touch my vagina. I’m not sure this is improving very much.”
“No, no. It’s just…she was there, when you called me last week, and she said something about how most male-female relationships end in sex—”
“How old is your daughter again?”
“Almost ten.”
“I’m not sure what to think about that.”
Christ. This imaginary conversation just got worse and worse. I immediately swallowed my laugh and focused on the feel of her hot arousal on my fingers as I pulled her G-string to the side and dipped two into her pussy and spread the wetness up to her clit.
She shivered and craned her neck forward, her lips seating themselves desperately against my throat as she moaned.
“Yeah,” I encouraged. “Feel good?”
“Mmm,” she groaned, so hotly I thought I might lose every ounce of control.
“Good Christ, Charlotte.”
“Please touch me,” she begged. “Touch me and don’t stop.”
Fuuuck.
I didn’t have the patience to make it to the bedroom. No, it was fucking gone, officially impossible to make it there. It might have been thirty steps away, but it may as well have been across the goddamn Sahara.
Carefully, I sank to my knees with Charlotte in my arms and lowered her back to the plush rug of my living room.
She skimmed her hands over my bare chest, having finally wrested the last button free and scratched at the surface with her fingernails as she stopped on my pecs.
Her supple breasts were doing their best to escape her top now that she was lying down, and I did my best not to let them go unnoticed. Her skin tasted almost exactly how she smelled, like sweet lavender and soothing night air. I’d never tasted anything like it, like her.
She reached up and pulled the neck of her shirt down and under each swell to give me better access.
“Nick?” she called, her word a keening cry as I sucked a nipple into my mouth and pulled.
“Yeah?” I asked after releasing her. I nipped at the skin all around the now wet flesh while I waited for her response.
“I’m a virgin.”
Time stopped as I tried to make sense of those three words and find a way to make my heart start beating again all at once. I didn’t know if I had the power to subconsciously defibrillate, but I sure as hell hoped so.
Her eyes were wide and pleading as I searched them for something to say, some way to move forward, and then she started to shake as she dissolved into laughter.
“Oh my God, I’m kidding. Your face, though.” She pointed at it. “It’s something I’ll remember forever.”
“Christ, woman. Why would you do that to me?”
She smiled then, sweetly. Heartfelt. Soft. “Because I’m not a virgin. I’m all for foreplay, but I’m fucking primed and ready, and you seem hesitant to stick your dick in me.”
For the first time in three years, I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t question. I didn’t second-guess.
I unbuttoned my pants, pulled down the zipper, yanked an emergency condom out of my wallet—because getting inside of Charlotte was an emergency if I’d ever heard of one—rolled it on, and sank slowly inside her.
Every inch deeper was an inch more of right, and an inch closer to fixing something inside me I didn’t even know I had broken.
We both moaned as the base of my cock settled against her skin, the entirety of me surrounded by the entirety of her.
God, she felt so good, fucking heavenly, wrapped around me.
I don’t think I ever want to leave.
Strong arms tightened around me as I slowly fluttered my lashes open. The warmth of Nick’s cheek pressed against my back was a welcomed sensation as my brain sluggishly slid out of dreamland and into reality.
Once I could focus my gaze, I glanced at the clock on his nightstand, and my eyes widened in surprise when I saw it was already a little after nine.
Holy hell, I must have slept like a rock.
I honestly couldn’t remember the last time I’d slept in past seven. It had to have been years at this point. Like, college or high school. At least a fucking decade. Ever since I’d started working for CMI, my days generally started at six a.m. sharp.
Still savoring his embrace, I pushed my legs straight out, flexing my ankle and pointing my toes, and stretched the creaks out of my muscles.
Maybe it was because of the orgasms or maybe it was all related to the man lying beside me, but holy hell, I’d slept well last night, like a little baby swaddled up in a warm blanket.
Or, in my case, like an adult, and very naked, Charlotte wrapped up in an equally adult and naked Nick.
Yeah, I definitely like the idea of that.
“Mmm,” Nick moaned softly into my ear and tightened his arms around me. “This is a nice way to wake up.” The sleepy sound of his voice urged a smile onto my lips.
“I’m certainly not opposed,” I whispered, and a raspy chuckle left his lips.
“Well, that’s good news. If you were, I fear I’d be having an entirely different conversation and it’d be with a nice police officer down at the precinct.” He pressed a soft kiss to my shoulder as I smiled at his slightly dark humor and sank deeper into his embrace. “What time is it?”
“After nine.”
“Damn,” he said softly. “I can’t remember the last time I slept in like this.”
I guessed I wasn’t the only who usually rose before the sun.
“Me either.”
His hands skirted across my skin, until they apparently found what they were searching for and stopped at my breasts, wrapping around the pliant flesh and squeezing gently. “I’d like to make a rule.”
I giggled, at his words and at the fact that he was literally giving me a morning wake-up call via boob grabbing. “A rule?” I questioned. “And what would that rule entail?”
“Anytime you sleep over, you’re not allowed to wear clothes to bed,” he whispered hotly into my ear, and he punctuated that statement by pressing himself against the bare skin of my ass. He was hard. Thick. Fucking perfect.
“And does that same rule apply to you?”
“Only if you want it to. I don’t make the rules for me. You do,” he answered.
“Oh, believe me, I definitely want it to.”
“Fan-fucking-tastic,” Nick agreed with a smile in his voice, and I giggled again. “All right, I guess it’s time for me to get my lazy ass out of bed and make us some coffee, huh?”
“That would be pretty awesome. In fact, consider it the next rule.”
He chuckled softly as he sat up on the edge of the bed and got to his feet.
Instantly, I missed the warmth of his presence against my skin.
“And what exactly will you be doing while I’m making coffee?” he asked, and I stretched out onto my back with a giant smile covering my lips.
“Probably lie here and continue to be lazy.”
“Well, at least you’re honest, huh?” He winked and stretched his arms above his head. All the while, I gawked at his muscular, and deliciously naked, body without shame.<
br />
He should always be naked. All the fucking time.
Before he could pull a pair of boxer briefs out of his closet, I demanded, “Stop what you’re doing. I have another rule.
“Another one? Three rules within as many minutes is kind of pushing it.
“It’s not really a third rule,” I argued smartly. “It’s more of an addendum to the naked rule. A rule 1A, if you will.”
Nick’s gaze met mine, and he quirked a brow.
“You’re not allowed to wear clothes when we’re at your place alone.”
“All day long? No clothes?”
I nodded. “Uh-huh.”
“Does this rule 1A apply to all such rules and to both of our places of residence?”
I rolled my eyes. “Yes, I will be naked as well, here and at my own apartment. Hell, I might uphold the rule even when you’re not around. Bras are a form of Satan anyway.”
He smiled. “Deal.”
I sat up in his bed and held out my hand. “Now, let’s shake on it.”
He laughed and took my hand for a quick shake, and then, apparently, that wasn’t enough, and he moved both hands toward my body and assaulted my skin with tickling brushes of his fingertips.
“Shit!” I shouted as I shivered and tried my damnedest to squirm out of his reach. “I have another addition to the naked rule!”
A smirk kissed his lips. “Nuh-uh,” he refuted and tickled me some more. “We already shook on it. The deal is done, sweetheart.”
“Oh my God! Stop!” I said through a fit of obnoxious laughter. “I hate being tickled!”
His smile grew wider by the second. “You hate this?” he questioned, and his fingers continued their assault. “But you’re smiling and laughing? I’m so confused by this reaction.”
“Nick!” I squealed. “Stop it!”
“Okay… okay…” he finally agreed and removed his maddening fingers from my body while I stayed on my back, breathing heavily and staring up at him with a scowl.
But my scowl didn’t faze him; Nick chuckled softly as he leaned forward and pressed a soft kiss to my forehead. “I’ll make the coffee. Naked. While you stay in the bed. Naked. Sound good?”