He cupped her chin in his hand. “Yeah, just like that. I’m a winner.”
“What should I give you for a prize?” she asked.
“You,” he said. “You’re all I want.”
“Then you can have me.”
He took her in his arms and turned her, pressing her back to the side of the hot tub. Her legs were wrapped around his hips and his arms around her lower back. He lifted her up so that her breasts were out of the water, and as soon as the cold winter’s night air touched her skin, her nipples hardened. Ian lowered his head and licked the water off the center of her chest. His took both her breasts in his hands and lightly squeezed them as his tongue tickled the sensitive skin of her neck and chest. She was warm from the waist down and covered in delicious goose bumps from the waist up. When he took one of her nipples in his hot mouth, she flinched from the shock of pleasure. Her breasts were so sensitive in the cool air and every touch and every lick she felt all the way to her back and down into her hips. Weightless as she was in the water, it was easy to lie back with her legs around Ian and her back arched to the sky as he sucked her nipples and rolled his tongue around them. First one, then the other, then back again. Over and over he lavished them with attention with his mouth and his tongue. He caught her mouth in a sudden hard kiss. He cupped her with his large hands again, squeezing them harder this time, pinching her nipples, rolling them between his fingers and thumbs while she moaned into his mouth. His cock was brutally hard against her thigh. She wanted it inside her so much her pussy throbbed.
“I need to be inside you,” he said, pressing his chest to her breasts. She loved his chest, his hard flat stomach. She would never get enough of his body.
“Then come inside me.”
“Can I?”
“You know you can.”
“You know what I mean.” He licked her from the tip of her shoulder to her ear, nibbling her sensitive skin with his teeth. “You’re my girlfriend now. We’re committed. I want to act like it.”
“You want to come in me.”
“Will you let me?”
“Have you been tested recently?” she asked, putting her hands on his shoulders. She needed breathing room.
“Yes. You?”
“Right after we slept together,” she said. Ian raised his eyebrow at her. “What? Don’t take it personally. You can’t be too careful.”
“I’ll try not to. What do you say?”
“You’re in charge,” she said.
“Not with something like this. You tell me.”
Having sex without a condom was serious relationship business. She had an IUD and wasn’t worried about getting pregnant. And if Ian was okay and she knew she was...
“If it’s too soon,” he said, “no pressure. It’s just, condoms and hot tubs don’t really mix. Not that I’ve tried.”
“You’ve tried,” she said. Ian nodded. “Is that why you want to?”
“No,” he said. “That’s not why.”
“Why?”
“You never make anything easy, do you?”
“No, I don’t. Tell me why.”
Ian rested his forehead against hers. His hands held her by the waist. They were so close they were breathing the same air.
“Because I want to, because I want to be closer to you, because I want you to feel like I’m serious about being with you. And because I don’t want anything standing between us and you seem to think there is. I promise, nothing’s going to come between us except what you want between us.”
Flash shivered and it wasn’t from the cool night air.
“I don’t want anything between us,” she said. She lifted her wet hands and slicked his hair back from his face. She wanted to see his eyes. They were burning blue like the hottest part of a flame. His lips were slightly parted. He was breathing hard and so was she.
“Neither do I. But if it’s too soon—”
“It’s not too soon.”
“Because if it is too soon—”
“I’m in love with you, Ian, and I have been for a long time. It’s not too soon.”
Ian’s eyes flashed with surprise.
“You’re what?”
“I’m in love with you and I have been for a long time.”
“How long?” He sounded so surprised she almost laughed except now wasn’t the time for that. “I know you said you wanted me from the day I started at work, but that’s not...that’s not love.”
“Since that night in June. Six months. That’s why—”
“That’s why it hurt you so much when I had to break it off with you.”
“That’s why,” she said. “I had a crush on you at work, that’s all. You were sexy and I liked you, wanted you. But I didn’t let myself have strong feelings for you until that night. I hadn’t planned on it. I wasn’t gunning for you. I never thought in a million years anything would really happen with us other than work flirting. We went back to your place and we had crazy sex and then you asked me to spend the night, which I didn’t expect. I woke up at about 4:00 am and thought I should probably just sneak out. I tried and you woke up and caught me. You remember?”
“I remember.”
“And you pulled me back into bed with you and you kissed me senseless and then you got on top of me and got inside me again and when you pushed in you said my name. You said—”
“Veronica.”
She closed her eyes and remembered that moment he entered her, the way her name had fallen from his lips like he’d been holding his breath, and when he exhaled, it was her name that he breathed. He’d never said her name before—only Flash, never Veronica. She’d forgotten he’d known her real name and then to hear him say it in that breathless desperate way while he was penetrating her, it was like he’d cut her open all the way to her heart.
“The way you said it like it was a magic word or something, like you were asking me for something or begging me for something or praying for something, but it got to me. It was just about sex before then. And when you said my name, my real name, then it was real.”
“It was real,” Ian said. “It was the most real night I’d ever spent with anyone.”
“I’m telling you this because you said you didn’t want anything between us. Now that I’ve told you there’s one less thing between us.”
Ian ran his hands up and down her sides, over her breasts, over her chest, over her neck and up to her face.
“Veronica...” he whispered.
“I’m here.”
“I wasn’t saying it to you,” he said. “I was saying it for me.”
“I love you, Ian.”
“Flash—”
“I want you to take me to bed and do everything you want to do to me,” she said. “And I don’t want anything between us. Okay?”
Ian kissed her forehead and it hurt almost as much as when he called her by her name.
“Okay, Veronica. Nothing between us. Not ever again.”
9
FLASH WAITED IN the hot tub while Ian found towels for them both. She nearly screamed in shock when her hot bare foot touched ice cold snow, but she managed to make it into the house without passing out from sudden-onset hypothermia. Ian toweled himself off quickly and roughly, then wrapped the towel around his waist. Then he helped her dry off, rubbing the soft white towel up and down her naked legs while she dried her hair. When they were in the house again, warm and mostly dry, he kissed her once on the lips and said, “I have to cover the tub and turn it off. You go up to my bed and warm up. I’ll be there soon.”
“Anything you say, boss,” she said as she pulled the towel tight around her and headed up to his third-floor bedroom.
She sat on the edge of his bed and waited. It made her smile to see that he’d lit the first and second candle i
n his menorah earlier this evening. The flame had gone out but she could tell from the solidified white wax that he’d let them burn a long time. Ian was a good man. Only a good man would light that candle because lighting that candle honored both her, since she’d made the menorah, and his mother, since that was who Flash had made it for. She hadn’t been here at sunset. Ian had done it alone, on his own initiative. It meant everything to her that he’d lit that candle. She wasn’t even Jewish, and she felt blessed by it.
And now he knew she was in love with him. She couldn’t quite believe she’d told him. She hadn’t planned to tell him, not unless or until he’d told her first. But she could tell it hadn’t been easy for him to ask if he could be inside her without a condom. He’d taken a risk by doing that. She couldn’t let him be the only person in this relationship willing to take a risk. Now she’d done it. He hadn’t said he loved her back and that was fine. She didn’t want him to, not yet, not until she was sure she’d believe him when he said it. But she knew it was okay. He’d been surprised to learn she loved him but not angry or apologetic. She didn’t need him to say it back to her, not when he said her name like that.
“Veronica?”
Yes, just like that.
She looked up and saw Ian standing in the doorway, still wearing the towel wrapped around his waist.
“I’m here,” she said. He stepped into the dark room illuminated by nothing but the little bit of moonlight reflecting off the snow in the evergreen branches.
“You warm yet?” He stepped in front of her and she leaned against him, her cheek against his stomach.
“Getting there. This helps,” she said as he ran his hands all over her back and shoulders.
“What else would help?” he asked as he ran one hand through her hair, slicking it back. She’d never dated a guy who had the same length hair she did. Maybe they could go to the same barber. The thought made her smile. Ian made her smile. She smiled now as he took his towel off and tossed it to the corner of the room.
“That helps,” she said, looking up at him. “That definitely helps.”
“What about this?” He moved to stand between her knees, nudging her thighs apart with his legs. Then he dropped to his knees and pulled her hips to the edge of the bed.
“Warmer,” she said.
He kissed her neck.
“Warmer...” She sighed.
He licked her right nipple.
“Warmer...”
He sucked her nipple into his mouth, gently but deeply.
“Very warm...”
He pressed a long kiss onto her quivering stomach. Then he turned his attention to her left hip where he bit into her lightly and sucked her skin for a long time. When he pulled back he’d left a love bite the size of a quarter on her body.
“Marking my territory,” he said. She held on to his shoulders as he did it again on her right hip and again on the soft underside of her left breast. He left another red and purple bite on her chest under her collarbone and a last one on her right thigh as big as two quarters. The bites hurt and she loved it, loved to watch him leave imprints of his mouth all over her.
“How warm are you now?” he asked.
“Not warm,” she said. “Hot.”
“Hot is good. Burning up is better.” He pushed her onto her back and dragged her legs over his shoulders. He opened her up with his fingers, spreading her folds wide. He licked her slowly from the base of her vagina to her clitoris and Flash shivered and moaned. He did it again, even slower this time, even deeper. She could feel her body opening up to him, growing wet inside, growing hotter. She needed him inside her—the sooner, the better.
“Ian?”
“Yes?” He flicked his tongue over her clitoris again.
“Could you do me one little favor?” she asked.
“Name it.”
“Put your cock inside me.”
She saw his eyebrow twitch.
“Say ‘please and thank you’ and I’ll consider it.”
“You’re going to make me beg?”
“No. I’m going to make you ask for my cock very nicely. Like a lady.”
“I won’t do it.” Flash Redding did not beg for cock.
“Fine. I’ll just be down here eating your beautiful pussy until you learn some manners.”
He spread her wider and pushed his tongue inside her again. He licked her and licked her and licked her until she was writhing on the bed under his mouth, unable to lay still, unable to stay silent. He’d bring her close to orgasm and then back off by pausing to kiss her thighs and hips again. When her heavy breaths softened he started again, lapping at her clitoris and all around it until she was in agony from the need to come.
And still Ian wouldn’t let her orgasm. As her whole body clenched, right at the edge of climax, Ian pulled back again.
“Well?” he asked from between her thighs. “Do you have anything to say to me?”
“Will you please put your cock in me?” Then she added a second “please” for good measure.
“I will. But only because you asked nicely.” He took her legs off his shoulders and stood up. He was fully erect again—halfway between stage three and stage four. Good to see she wasn’t the only one about ready to burst around here.
“Get back on the bed,” he said as he stood up. She scooted back and started to turn over onto her stomach. “No, on your back.”
She looked over her shoulder at him. He crawled across the bed to her. They’d never had sex with her on her back before, always on her stomach or on her hands and knees or like last night, bent over at the waist with her leaning against the wall. He liked entering her from behind and she liked it, too, for the simple reason it made her feel dirtier.
Slowly she eased down onto her back as Ian knelt between her open thighs.
“Still cold?” he asked as he stroked her thigh with his fingertips.
“No. Burning up.”
“You’re shivering.”
“You made me almost come three times and pulled back. You’re lucky I haven’t passed out yet.”
“If you’d minded your manners I wouldn’t have had to teach you a lesson. I run a tight ship around here. No insubordination allowed.”
“I’ll be good from now on,” she said. “Lesson learned.”
“That’s what I like to hear. I don’t ask for perfection, just improvement.”
He lay on top of her and she wrapped her arms around his neck.
“I like you,” she said.
“I know. You told me that in the hot tub.”
“I told you I loved you. I didn’t tell you I liked you.”
“You told me two days ago you didn’t like me.”
“You’ve grown on me.”
Ian smiled as he settled in on top of her. Flash opened her legs and lifted her hips for him.
“I like that you like me,” he said. “I like that almost as much as I like that you love me. I like you, too.” He reached between their bodies and notched the tip of his cock at the entrance of her body, but didn’t go in yet. “Can you tell?”
She nodded slowly, panting, “I can tell.”
He rocked his hips, his cock sliding through her swollen folds. Still he didn’t enter her. He seemed intent on dragging this out as long as possible, delaying the inevitable. He was torturing her, and she loved it.
She moved with him, lifting her hips against him. He was as hard as she was wet. The muscles in her back knitted up with the sweet terrible tension. Ian put his hands on either side of her and rose up over her so that only their pelvises were touching. He rocked his hips again, another time, a third.
“Ian?”
“Yeah?”
“Please?”
He looked in her eyes without smiling, without speak
ing. Intense eye contact in bed usually made her a little nervous. It did now, too, except it also made her ache in the sweetest ways. This was real, her relationship with Ian. It was real and serious and was about to get much more serious. He tilted his hips and pushed the tip inside her. She inhaled and grasped the sheets between her fingers. Slowly he slid all the way in, filling her, stretching her, opening her, taking her, having her.
“Veronica...” He whispered her name as he penetrated her fully. When he was in, all the way, so was she. In lust, in love and in for good.
He lowered himself on top of her again, stretching out on her—face to face, chest to chest, hips to hips, eye to eye.
“How does it feel?” she asked as he pumped his hips again.
“Incredible.”
“Tell me,” she said. “Please? You made me do it.”
“You really want to know what your pussy feels like on my cock?”
“Yes.”
“That’s asking a lot of a man when his cock is inside your pussy.”
“You made me do it,” she repeated. He laughed softly.
“True. It’s, ah...hard to explain. The first couple of thrusts are the best, especially if you’ve been hard for a long time before going in, like I have been all night. It makes your eyes roll back in your head, which I know isn’t sexy, but fuck, it feels so good you can’t help it.”
“It is sexy when you do it. I like seeing you enjoy my body.”
“You have no idea how much I enjoy your body. You’re really wet right now and hot. A hot wet pussy sort of feels like that soft smooth part of your mouth right inside of your cheek. You know, except tighter and there’s no teeth.”
“Tighter?”
“You’re clenching me again. I can really feel it. It’s not quite like being squeezed by a hand but sort of. You have this one muscle that I can feel when your pussy contracts. It’s like a finger squeezing instead of a whole hand.” He held up his hand and crooked his finger to demonstrate.
She concentrated and clenched her vaginal muscles around him. Ian flinched.
“Yes,” he said. “Just like that. And...” He paused to catch his breath. “It kind of feels like you’re pulling me in deeper when you do that.”
One Hot December (Mills & Boon Blaze) (Men at Work, Book 3) Page 13