“Let’s put these nice clean sheets to good use,” he murmured against her ear.
She laughed, the sound filling him with light. “Ben, it’s two o’clock in the afternoon.”
“So? No one’s here. What else are we going to do with our time?”
“I still have to figure out which book would make the best musical.”
His back clenched. His kisses went from slow and deep to hard and demanding. His fingertips dug into her sides. His heart raced, and the pulsing desire making his jeans uncomfortably tight withered.
“This is more important.” He pulled her closer, nudging her arms up so that he could peel her shirt and sweater off over her head.
“Okay, you win,” she sighed, shaking her arms to help her shirt and sweater drop to the floor. “Something tells me you will always win.”
The flash in her eyes told a different story. She reached for his shirt, undoing the buttons with deft fingers, then pushing it off his shoulders. He worked at his belt and his jeans, unable to get out of them fast enough. Was this him winning? No, more like her having her way with him. Maybe that’s why he liked it so much.
They paused the heat long enough for both of them to get out of their clothes and for Ben to fetch one of the dwindling supply of condoms from his suitcase. He didn’t want to think about why he hadn’t moved them to the bureau, or even put some in her room, since they’d been sleeping there as much as here. Maybe Jo would pick up on it, call him out, and see the light.
Of course, he could fix the whole thing, end his pain and hers, by calling a time out and explaining every last piece of what was going on behind the scenes.
“You know how I said I’d never had a one-night stand before meeting you in the coffee shop?” she asked from the bed. She’d climbed atop the fresh sheets and knelt with her knees spread. His pulse ratcheted higher.
“Yes,” he answered slowly, stalking up to the side of the bed, condom in hand, heart bleeding.
She flickered an eyebrow and peeked down at his crotch. “You know what else I’ve never done?”
Before he could venture a guess, she reached for him. Her hands closing around his staff and balls was so perfect that he gasped and leaned closer to her. She stroked with the right amount of tension, making him harder by the second.
“You did that the other night,” he said with strangled intensity.
She laughed, low in her throat. “No, not this. Lay down.”
He started shaking, but did what she said. They slid together across the blank canvas of the bed. He tried to pull her close while balanced on his side, but she nudged him to his back, then straddled his legs.
“You were on top the other night too,” he pointed out, breathless, panic rising.
Her playful laugh as she spread her hands across his chest, teasing his nipples, then dragging her fingertips and nails across his belly and abdomen sent panic and lust rushing through him like an ocean current. His heart continued to pound with something far deeper than exertion. He needed her. Needed her, and she would leave as soon as she learned the truth.
“I’m a bona fide romance novelist, and I’ve never in my life done this before.”
She scooped her hand around his cock, drawing her fingers up its length and holding him straight up. Then she bent forward, a laugh fluttering in her throat, and took his tip into her mouth.
Ben’s body jolted, and it was all he could do not to arch up off the bed, pushing deeper into her throat. She was tentative, but determined, inching down and down, as if daring herself to swallow him as deeply as possible. He made fists in the loose top sheet, but couldn’t stop the growl of pleasure that her exploration raised in him. He felt her tongue caress the sensitive underside of him, the friction unbearably beautiful as she pulled up, then took a breath.
“I don’t actually know if I’m doing it right,” she whispered, panting, eyes sparkling. “I’m only going off of what I’ve read here.”
“You’re fine,” he squeaked, about three octaves higher than usual.
She laughed, then bent once more, licking him like an ice cream cone before testing how deep she could take him again.
Ben closed his eyes, jaw tight with the twin fists of pleasure and fear. He’d lost track of the number of times a woman had given him a BJ, thinking it would help them get a part or a recommendation. He’d be lying if he said he hadn’t liked it. He’d also be lying if he said that every woman who’d done this for him had enjoyed it. But simply laying there, letting Jo swallow him because she wanted to, was enough to drive him out of his mind for good.
Shoe’s on the other foot now, eh, Benjamin?
Even that bitter thought didn’t last. Jo found her rhythm, drawing him in and out, her body tense with concentration as she braced herself between his thighs. The heat and tension of orgasm was already sneaking up on him, but rather than giving in to it, he found himself thinking whether she would want him to come in her throat so she could describe that in some book later, or whether he should stop so she could have her turn.
He was thinking during sex. The world was coming to an end.
“Stop, stop,” he gasped at last, planting his hands on her shoulders to stop her from going down again.
“Am I doing it wrong?”
The earnestness of her question just about killed him. “You’re doing it very, very right.”
She burst into a smile, straightening and reaching for the condom. “Got it.”
Without waiting for him to catch his breath, she tore open the condom, tossed aside the wrapper, and rolled it onto him. Again, nothing he hadn’t had a woman do to him before, but with Jo, every movement, ever passionate peek at him, every twitch of her body as she made love to him, was so different from anything he’d ever experienced before that he felt like he was falling. She finished with the condom, then stretched her warm, supple body—her curves a little curvier, her movements a little less certain than other women—up over his. She wriggled her hips, hand slipping between them, searching to guide him into her.
It was too much. With a surge, he flipped their positions, nestled her firmly on the bottom. He leaned down to kiss her, his hands planted firmly by her shoulders. Still, he didn’t feel like he had control. He was always the one in control, always the one who could bestow blessings while the woman was the one who needed something from him. He always took what he wanted, but now what he wanted was to be someone else, to be hers.
Instead of giving back what she’d given to him, he nudged her legs apart and plunged into her without preamble. Even then, Jo gasped and hummed as if that was exactly what she’d wanted him to do all along. She wrapped her arms around him, digging her nails into his backside and urging him to take more. He did, setting what he considered a punishing pace. The slap of skin against skin and the heady friction of him inside of her, claiming what he wanted, did more to make him feel a part of her than master over her. He was already close to the edge from her explorations, and in no time, he rocketed straight over that cliff.
He didn’t usually make noise when he came, but the sound that ripped out of him when his body exploded into heated pleasure was something between a moan of ecstasy and a cry for help. He didn’t want to stop moving in her, even after the burst wrung itself out and the liquid feeling of completeness settled over him. That too was like nothing he usually felt. His heart was molten, his arms needed her inside of them. He collapsed to her side, already wanting her again, though he didn’t think his body could handle it.
He didn’t think his heart could either.
It wouldn’t work. He was too tainted by the things he’d done, the things people wanted him to do now. It was textbook cliché to stay away from a woman he loved because he could only hurt her. Jo would probably rail at him for being unoriginal and—
He loved her. His mind backed up through the slush of thoughts that had hit him. Love. Him. Her.
He opened his eyes and sucked in a breath, not realizing that he’d drifted off. Jo
lay curled against his side, her breathing regular, but not enough to be asleep.
“I think I should probably find another place to stay,” he muttered.
It was a delayed reaction, but she went stiff. “What?”
She pushed herself up on one arm, staring down at him, brow dropping to a frown.
“I’ve taken advantage of you long enough.”
He winced. He’d meant to say he’d taken advantage of her hospitality too long.
“What?” She repeated, sharper.
“With everything falling apart the way it is with me, I think it would be better if we had a little distance between us, you know?”
She gaped at him, then closed her mouth and huffed. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she mumbled, not meant for him. She pushed herself away, then rolled off the bed and stood, stooping to swipe her clothes off the floor. “Men,” she continued to huff.
She gathered her things, then marched for the door, still naked, slamming it behind her.
Ben flopped back against the sheets, which now smelled of musk and heat as well as lavender. He let his arms and legs rest heavily against them in a helpless posture. With a twist of his head, he glanced to the drawer that held the Pollard’s contract. His offer to leave was feeble. It did nothing to negate the existence of that contract or to protect her.
He sighed, rubbing his hands over his face. He couldn’t even manage to break up with Jo for her own protection without it falling apart. God only knew what she thought of him now.
Chapter Sixteen
“I wouldn’t worry about it too much,” Jenny Mercer advised Jo as she stomped through her kitchen the next day. “Yvonne, is this the right way to do this?” She slid her laptop across the table to Yvonne, who was tapping away on her own computer. As Yvonne studied Jenny’s screen, she went on. “You should have seen the way Simon was when we first got together.”
“Oh?” Jo didn’t particularly want to be having this conversation with a woman she’d only known for a couple of weeks, but Jenny was just so damn likable that the whole mess had come out in one pop as soon as her new friend had asked, “What’s bothering you?” five minutes after showing up.
“Well, Simon gave me the best night of my life, got me pregnant in the process, then bailed the next day, so….” Saucy as she was, Jenny gave Jo as sympathetic a look as she was going to get.
Jo slammed the coffee filter into place and turned on the machine.
“You’re heading in the right direction.” Yvonne slid Jenny’s computer back in front of her. “Watch out for the changes Kylie wants to make to the standard language on page three.”
In spite of herself, a tickle of interest peaked in Jo at the brief exchange. Yvonne had taken Jenny on in her talent agency about a year ago, and since Jenny was still learning the intricate business, the writer in Jo wanted to tag along in case there was a story there.
Not that the story she had splattered all over the walls of her own house wasn’t an interesting one. Or the one she should be concentrating on.
“Leaving because he had things he needed to work on is one thing,” Jo sighed, referring to what Jenny had told her about Simon earlier. “Up and telling me he thinks he should live somewhere else while we’re still in bed together?” She lowered her voice to a whisper at the last words. “That’s weak.”
Jenny shook her head. “Classic male fear response.” Her businesslike stare at her computer shifted to a bright grin when she turned to Jo. “Sounds like you’re on the right track with Ben.”
Jo snorted. She regretted how loud of a noise she’d made when one of the assistants poked her head into the room and held a finger to her lips. Sure enough, the action of filming in the living room had softened to a hush, which meant cameras were rolling.
“If I’m on the right track, then why is he acting like I’m yesterday’s news?” Jo asked in a whisper.
“Because he’s falling in love and doesn’t have a clue what to do about it?” Jenny suggested in an equally cautious whisper.
“Oh, he’s scared all right,” Yvonne added, more as if talking to herself than anything else. Her gaze was intent on her computer screen, the glow giving her face a pale hue.
Jo leaned against the kitchen counter, crossed her arms, and chewed one of her nails. She wasn’t sure what to make of the advice of either women. Yes, Ben wasn’t quite right. And in spite of his post-love making declaration the day before, he’d stayed exactly where he was. Nearly literally. She’d stomped into her room, taken a shower, threw on clean clothes, then gone downstairs to see if she could make heads or tails of the pile of work on the coffee table. Ben didn’t so much as thump in his room until the sun came down and she was making crab cakes and roasted vegetables for dinner. Then he’d had the gall to sit there and talk to her as if nothing was wrong. Without ever looking directly at her.
She shook her head and pushed away from the counter. “I can’t think about this right now. I need to get to work figuring out how to break a book down into a play.”
After hours of debate, she’d picked one of her Regency novels—Captive Sunrise—to try to mash into the form of a musical. She’d told Ben as much last night, but all the support he had to offer was cautioning her not to rush into anything and to wait until Diane called back. This over something that was his damn idea.
“Don’t do any work for the Pollards without a signed contract that has been thoroughly inspected by a lawyer in your hands in triplicate,” Yvonne said, still not looking up from her computer.
Jo stopped her flight from the room. “Why not?”
“Because those two have games within games, and if you’re not used to dealing with them, they’ll win.”
Something about her words was too close to the hesitance Ben had had last night. Jo sighed and threw out her hands.
“First Diane tells me that the books I’ve been writing aren’t resonating with readers and I should try something else. So what do I get? Writer’s block. Can’t write a word. She tells me I should experiment with something new. So what happens? Ben comes along and suggests I adapt a book into a play. But no, now he’s pulling his support from that, and everyone else is hemming and hawing too. Then Charles tells me that he thinks I should talk to the Second Chances writers about scripts and try to get a union card, but when I call them up, what do I get? Join the union, show us an example of your writing, and we’ll consider taking a meeting.”
Yvonne’s eyes snapped up from her computer screen at the mention of Second Chances, and she straightened. She didn’t get a chance to say anything.
“Quiet in here.” The same assistant who had shushed them a minute before gave her a nasty look.
“Charles wants you to talk to join the writers’ union?” Yvonne ignored the furious assistant.
“Yes, for all the good it will do.”
“I can take care of that,” Yvonne said.
“Quiet, please,” Ben hollered from the living room. He’d been in a temper since people started arriving early in the morning for filming. It wasn’t an improvement over his sullen silence the night before.
Jo stared at the doorway to the living room. The assistant shrunk as if she’d been scolded. Jo was halfway through rolling her eyes when her phone rang.
“Now what?”
She pulled her phone out of her back pocket. Diane. Hope whipped through her. She tapped to answer the call, marching for the pantry.
“Diane. I’ve been waiting forever for you to call me back.”
Jenny and Yvonne kept an eye on her as she ducked around the corner and into the pantry.
“Oh my gosh, Jo, I’m so excited.” That much was clear from the breathlessness in Diane’s voice.
“Thank God someone is.” Finally, something was going to go in the right direction.
“I just got off the phone with Frost Square.” Jo blinked. It wasn’t the direction she expected the call to go. “Best news ever. They’ve decided to pass on your optioned book after all.”
Jo’s heart skipped a beat. “What?” A wave of dizziness forced her to lean against the shelves.
“It’s perfect. I played hardball with them over the advance, you see. I said ten thousand wasn’t nearly enough. They were willing to go up to a hundred thousand, but I held firm at a million.”
“Wait, what?” A hundred thousand would have been more than enough. It would have been a dream come true. She could have kept writing the books she wanted to write and been able to save the house. “Why didn’t you take it?” The question came out at far too high a volume.
“Why?” Diane was incredulous. “Because the Pollards are offering you twenty percent of the box office for a musical of one of your books. No one, and I mean no one, gets that kind of a percentage.”
“If no one gets that kind of a percentage, then why are they giving it to me?” Maybe Ben was right for her to hold off on this.
“I believe in you, Jo. I know you can do this. I’ve been dying to see exposure like this for our industry. Can you imagine how this will affect the rest of your career? The industry in general? It will be incredible.”
“But you said the deal they’re offering is impossible.”
“We’ll make it possible. You should talk to Jett and Ashton sometime, Jo. They’re amazing. They’re visionaries. They explained that I will get a cut of the money, of course, but you’ll end up with the lion’s share of the credit and the reward.”
“You turned down a reasonable offer from Frost Square for a book I actually want to write over a conversation with the Pollards?”
“They need you to focus all of your time and efforts into this, so they agreed that being tied down to a publishing contract would only hurt you right now. You’re free, free to do whatever you want.”
Catch a Falling Star (Second Chances Book 3) Page 21