by Ivy Layne
"Exactly," I said, gratified that he got why I was so pissed. "My headphones link up automatically. It should be the spatial mapping causing the problem, not the Bluetooth. We're going to connect a phone with hardwire so we can work on that while I try to debug the app."
I was surprised to realize we were already at Holden's building. Of all the things I'd imagined for our date, a conversation about my work hadn't been one of them. I realized I was a little shallow, expecting that someone as hot and rich as Holden wouldn't have a brain. Given that he owned and ran both a successful nightclub and a gaming company, I should have known better. I watched him do the palm print thing to get the elevator working and said, "I'm guessing you don't have many uninvited guests."
"No, not many. Unless they're family. They show up uninvited all the time."
Guilt hit me as we entered his apartment. I'd looked him up, talked about him with Emily, and now I knew all these personal things about him. It felt invasive and wrong. Suddenly uncomfortable, I stepped away from him and blurted out, "Emily told me who you are. I mean, about your family, and that you own the club and WGC."
Holden shrugged, his mouth tight. "I was going to tell you," he said. "It's not a secret."
"I wasn't trying to pry." Holden looked so uncomfortable, I felt terrible for saying anything. "I'm sorry about your family." I had to stop talking without thinking. I worried that I'd made things worse, but his mouth softened and he said,
"It was a long time ago."
"I'm still sorry."
"So am I. But the rest of my family is pretty tight. We got through it."
I wondered if you could ever really get over such loss, but I managed to keep my mouth shut. Mostly. "I'm sorry I brought it up," I said, "But I didn't like knowing that much about you and not saying anything."
I trailed off when he took my hand and pulled me to him, wrapping his strong arms around my waist as he studied my face with warm, serious eyes.
"You're not like any woman I've dated before," he said. "The women I know would be trying to play me, and you're honest to a fault."
I opened my mouth to say something—I had no idea what, but probably something embarrassing. Holden saved me from myself. His mouth came down on mine, his lips pressing in a gentle kiss before his tongue flicked out, tasting me. My body caught fire. Without thinking, I pressed closer, parting my legs a little, feeling his cock swell behind his jeans.
I reached out my tongue to touch his. The instant we connected, the kiss exploded. His arms tightened, drawing me hard against him. His mouth was hungry, moving against mine in a kiss so blatantly possessive, so claiming, it would have hurt if it hadn't felt so perfect. Just as I was getting my bearings, Holden lifted me. Instinctively, I wrapped my legs around his hips as he carried me to his kitchen.
"I've been staring at my island all day, wishing I'd done this last night." He set me down on the hard surface and said, "Unbutton your jeans."
At his order and the thrill of his hot, dark eyes on me, a rush of wet heat hit between my legs. Normally, I didn't like being told what to do, but when Holden got bossy with me, I loved it. With shaking hands, I unsnapped my jeans. Sitting on the counter, it was impossible to push them down, but I slowly lowered the zipper, loving the way his eyes flared at the rasp of metal. I hooked my thumbs at the waist and waited. I wasn't disappointed.
"Lay back and slide off your jeans," Holden ordered, his voice rough.
I did as he commanded, the marble deliciously cool against my heated skin. Staring up at the high ceiling of Holden's kitchen, I wiggled my hips and pushed both my jeans and my underwear down. When they were far enough, I let gravity do the work, kicking my feet a few times until the fabric hit the floor in a soft thump. I waited, the tension in my belly winding tighter. He was silent, unmoving, and I started to feel exposed.
"Now your shirt. Take it all off."
In my head, I stripped off my shirt and bra in a sexy, graceful tease. I think reality was more of a rushed fumble, but I didn't care. I wanted to be naked for Holden. I needed whatever was going to come next.
Again, he fell silent, and I waited, feeling my pussy getting wetter, my bare nipples drawing tighter, my entire body readying for him. When I felt a finger land on the inside of my right knee, tracing a line up to my pussy, I knew what to do.
With a moan that was half-anticipation and half-pleasure, I opened my legs. The stroke of his tongue, following the path of his finger, was a decadent torture. He was close, so close, to touching me where I needed him the most. I opened my legs wider, inviting him in. He didn't make me wait. His tongue came down flat on my clit, tasting, pressing, dragging a high-pitched sound from my throat.
I'd never really had a man's mouth there before. Not like this. Not one who knew what he was doing. Holden wasn't going to take another lick and move away, saying it tasted funny, or it was his turn. No, Holden was going to put his mouth between my legs and eat me until I came. Just the thought of it cranked the tension inside me a notch tighter.
He traced a finger around my wet, slippery core, murmuring, "So sweet. You have the sweetest pussy, Josephine. I have to taste you before I fuck you."
No argument from me. I think I whispered, "Please, Holden," before he sucked my clit into his mouth and drove one finger inside me. His finger didn't stretch me like his cock, but it was enough to make me feel full, so full. His mouth moved on me, sucking, licking, as he added another finger. I squirmed, wanting to thrust against him, wanting his cock, wanting to more.
He teased me, reading my body, understanding my responses better than I did. Again and again, he brought me right to the edge, leaving me gasping and begging, before backing off. He lifted his head from between my legs, only once, to say,
"Play with your nipples, Josephine."
I'd never touched myself in front of a man before, but there was no way I was going to say no to Holden. Lifting a trembling hand from the cool marble, I traced my fingertips around my tight nipples, shivering at the sweet spark of pleasure.
His tongue licked at me, pressing into my swollen clit, giving me just the right pressure. My hips surged up to his mouth and my fingers pinched, my body falling out of my control and under Holden's.
The orgasm tore through me, and my pussy clamped down on Holden's fingers. He fucked me with them harder, sucking at my clit in strong pulls, dragging out the waves of pleasure until I couldn't breathe.
When I came back to myself, Holden was sitting on one of the stools beside the island, cradling me in his arms. I was dazed from coming so hard, and I lifted my face to him, instinctively seeking his touch. I tasted myself on his lips. Any other time, I would have thought it weird, but at that moment, it felt perfect.
"I really did mean to feed you first," he said when he lifted his head from mine.
"I'd rather you fuck me," I said. Not that I hadn't just had the orgasm of a lifetime, but I could feel his hard cock beneath my ass, and I wanted it inside me. I knew he wanted it too.
"If you insist."
Holden carried me to his bedroom, laid me gently on the sheets, and grabbed a condom from his bedside table. He was naked a second later and between my legs, pressing his thick cock inside my swollen pussy a second after that. I'd thought his fingers had filled me, but nothing was like his cock. The stretch was so much, it was almost pain, and I loved it. I clung to his hips with my thighs and moved into him with every thrust, my fingers clamped on his shoulders.
He didn't last long, but I didn't need him to. I was coming again after only a few minutes, gasping his name as I went wild beneath him. He gave into his orgasm, groaning, "Josephine," then collapsed half on top of me, breathing hard. He rolled over, pulling me with him so I was draped over his chest, his fingertips stroking my back in lazy circles.
Eventually, he said, "If we keep fucking like this, we might kill ourselves. Or starve to death."
"Then let's eat dinner before we have sex again," I said. "Just in case."
"Deal."
<
br /> We lay there a few more minutes, which was a good thing, because I think every muscle in my body was too relaxed to move. I had no idea sex like that even existed, much less had I ever done it multiple times in twenty-four hours. It seemed impossible that exactly a day ago, I was driving Stuart to dinner for our doomed blind date. As awful as that date had been, this date with Holden was winning for the best date in the universe.
Nothing that came after was a letdown. When we finally got up, he cooked an amazing dinner of grilled salmon, asparagus, and apple tarts, though he confessed that it was one of the few dishes he could make and he'd bought the tarts at the bakery down the street. I didn't care. The effort he made called to my heart.
After we ate, we sprawled on his couch to watch a movie, though that lasted fewer than five minutes before I slid to my knees between his legs and sucked his cock. Holden's cock was the first I'd truly wanted in my mouth, and ever since he'd laid me out on the island, I'd been wondering what he would taste like on my tongue. The answer was that he tasted magnificent, salty and male and perfect. I wanted him to come in my mouth, but Holden had other ideas, and before I knew it, he was fucking me again. I didn't complain.
I spent the night, and this time, when I woke, I didn't sneak out. I had a lecture first thing, and I had to get home to change, but I woke Holden before I left. His dark eyes blinked open when I said his name, his arms coming up to pull me on top of him, his sleep-heavy voice whispering, "Josephine." I kissed him longer than I should have before I pulled free.
"I'll call you later," he mumbled into his pillow when I finally went to leave. I leaned down to give him one last kiss on his closed eyelids before racing out the door to class. The weekend had started with a disaster, but it had ended in a dream.
Chapter Seven
Josephine
I floated through my Monday, buoyed on a high of fantastic sex and lack of sleep. Other than checking my phone too often, I tried to put Holden out of my mind and concentrate on school. He didn't call or text all day. By dinner, I put my phone away so I'd stop checking, only to miss his call. I called him back and left a voicemail. I knew it was way too soon to expect daily contact, but I missed him. Annoyed that I was so attached after one date, and afraid I was going to morph into a meme of an overly attached girlfriend, I told myself to chill out and focus on my own life.
For the most part, it worked, though every time my mind drifted to Holden, I swear my nipples perked up, and I had to fight the urge to press my legs together. One weekend, not even forty-eight hours, and he had my body trained. Tuesday passed without a call or a text. By Wednesday morning, I had a hollow feeling in my chest and Emily had stopped asking if he'd called. After a rushed lunch, I headed to the Sonification Lab to meet with my group, resolutely not looking at the bench where I'd seen Holden just a few days before. I ran into Darren just inside the doors and walked up to the lab with him, groaning in annoyance when he asked, "How's Prince Charming?"
"Fine," I answered, not planning to go into the sad detail of my love life with Darren. No way he needed to know that I'd slept with Prince Charming the night we'd met and again on our first date, and now, he wasn't calling. It wasn't exactly an original story. I don't know why I'd thought it was going to be different for me.
"I didn't think he'd be your type," Darren said, an odd intensity in his voice. I looked at him, suddenly uncomfortable. He'd asked me out earlier in the year and I'd turned him down. I'd done it gently, but I hadn't thought dating someone on my project was a good idea. Things could get intense, and bringing a personal relationship into it didn't seem smart. That, and I wasn't attracted to him. At all. He was nice enough, but I liked a guy who showered more than twice a week. I know, my standards were too high.
"I don't think I have a type," I said, trying to end the conversation.
"I guess he's every girl's type," Darren went on, as if I hadn't spoken. "Rich."
"I don't care about that," I protested. "And it's not like there's really anything going on. We only went out once."
"Did you see the paper this morning?" he asked, his voice expectant.
"No, why?"
"Let me see if I can find it," he said, taking his phone out of his pocket and tapping on the screen as he went on, "I never look at this crap, but my roommate's girlfriend loves the Style section, and she left it open this morning." He tapped a few more times, then held the phone up in front of me. "Here."
It was a picture of Holden, his arm around a gorgeous, very busty redhead, smiling down at her with clear affection. The date on the article was the day before. The headline said something about the Winters family and a charity event. I bit my lip, forcing back the stab of pain, and shrugged, pretending a nonchalance I didn't feel.
"We only went out once," I said, using every ounce of self-control I had to hide the nausea turning my stomach inside out. I barely heard Darren as he said,
"Well, you know who he is, right? He's got a different girlfriend every week. He and his cousin are huge players. My roommate's girlfriend couldn't shut up about it. I guess she knows someone who dated him and said he's amazing in bed, but an asshole otherwise. You're better off without him."
"I guess," I said, shrugging again. I would have bet everything that Holden wasn't an asshole. Maybe there was another explanation for the picture. I wasn't going to condemn him based on a picture in the paper. That would be foolish. If he called, I'd let him tell me about the redhead.
If he called.
With each hour that passed, Holden calling was looking less and less likely.
I followed Darren to the lab, ignoring him talking about Holden and his cousin, nodding along like I was listening. I didn't have the energy to tell him to shut up. I was afraid that if I opened my mouth to object to everything he was saying, I would start to cry. I was not going to cry in the middle of lab. I could at least wait until I got home and crawled into bed with a sappy movie and some ice cream.
I headed straight for my workstation and went back to poring over the code I'd written, trying to isolate the bug, while Darren and Angie worked on tweaking the glasses. When Darren asked to use my phone for a test, I handed it over, saying only, "Use the newest version of the app. I updated it when I got here."
I wasn't paying too much attention to what they were doing until I heard Angie shout, "You got it! You got it!" Tearing my eyes from the lines of code on my screen, I watched as my phone connected to the glasses with a wire and began to vibrate in a pattern when Angie turned the glasses until they faced an obstacle. I hadn't found the problem with the Bluetooth, and we were nowhere close to working out the patterns for different obstacles, but the spatial field recognition was working.
Mesmerized by the sight of months of work coming to fruition, I almost forgot my recent heartbreak. Almost. Beneath my excitement every time the phone buzzed, that hollow place in my chest echoed at me, reminding me that I'd lost something I didn't even know I wanted.
I stayed later than the rest of the team, ducking their attempts to get me to join them for a drink. We had a lot to celebrate, but I wasn't in the mood. I spent another hour squinting at the screen until my head was pounding before I gave up and dragged myself home. As much as I loved her, I was grateful Emily wouldn't be there. She had her weekly gaming meet with her team, the one night of the week they put aside their projects and played together. I knew she wouldn't be home until well after I was asleep.
My head throbbed each time my feet hit the pavement. By the time I opened my apartment door, all I wanted was to close my eyes. I dropped my phone and bag in the kitchen and headed straight for bed, peeling off my clothes once I shut my door behind me. As soon as I was down to my t-shirt, I crawled between the covers and let my eyes shut, willing myself to sleep.
Sleep didn't come. Instead, now that I was away from curious eyes, the hollow place in my chest expanded to my stomach, leaving me feeling as if all the happiness had been sucked out of me. Stupidly, I didn't care about our triumph in the lab
. Alone in my bed, I longed for Holden with an intensity that was absurd, considering how little time we'd spent together.
Funny, you'd think it would be the orgasms that would be on my mind. I'd never had sex like that, and I probably never would again. Holden had known my body better than I did, and he'd made every part of me sing for him.
But I didn't miss the sex. Well, I did, but it wasn't what made hot tears seep from beneath my closed eyelids. No, that came from remembering the way his fingertips had traced over my back as we'd lain together in his bed. The way he smelled, woodsy and male. The way he'd understood my problems at the lab and commiserated without trying to solve them for me. The way, aside from my mentioning his family, we'd fit so well together. He'd managed to push every sexual boundary I had, yet make me completely comfortable otherwise.
When I'd left his bed Monday morning, it had never occurred to me that he would blow me off. I was tempted to think there was some comical misunderstanding going on, but he had my number and knew where I lived. Even if that picture of him with the redhead was a mistake, I'd left him a message two days before and he'd never called back. He didn't have amnesia, and if he'd been in some horrible accident, I would have known. It would have been all over the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. I was going to have to face facts. Holden had gotten what he wanted from me. We were over. He wasn't going to call.
As that depressing knowledge sunk in, I began to sob in earnest. Curled up in my quilt, I cried myself to sleep, hoping I'd be able to wash Holden out of my heart with my tears. I had a terrible feeling it wasn't going to be that easy.
Chapter Eight
Holden
I sat at my desk in the back office at Mana, scowling at the accounting program on my screen. Neither of us really enjoyed accounting. Normally our club manager handled the books, but he was on vacation and I was in such a foul mood, Tate had banished me from the club.