“I cannot believe you wore a chicken head,” I said, laughing so hard I almost fell off the barstool.
“Hey, I was three sheets to the wind, okay? And it was our school mascot.”
“Your school mascot was a chicken?”
I could tell that I was starting to edge from tipsy into drunk, and pushed my drink away from me. A pleasant buzz was in my fingertips and my toes, and I wanted to chase that to increase the languid, heavy feeling starting up in my limbs. But if I did that, I’d be in no state to do anything with this gorgeous man next to me.
And if I was actually considering doing anything with him, then I must have been tipsier than I thought.
“My friend’s a psychologist,” I said. “Amanita. She’d probably have a whole list of reasons why the girl wanted you to wear a goddamn chicken mascot head thing.”
I frowned. Starting to lose my power of speech—that was never a good sign.
Asher looked at his own drink, halfway full, and then looked at his watch.
“It’s past ten,” he noted.
We’d been here for nearly three hours, talking, and I hadn’t even realized? I waved to the bartender.
“Could we get some water, please?”
When the water arrived, I gulped it down, wanting to dilute the alcohol in my system. I could make myself a cup of coffee when I got home.
Actually…I looked over at Asher, who was staring at me. Or, rather, my mouth. He’d been doing that all night, generally when he thought I wasn’t looking.
I considered this. A gorgeous man thought I was beautiful, and I’d talked to him for three hours without noticing how much time was passing. That didn’t happen often with men. I think it was that Asher hadn’t tried to outright flirt with me. He was charming and hilarious—as his many college stories had proven—and he was a doctor, so probably good with his hands.
I might not get—okay, most likely wouldn’t get—an orgasm out of this, but I could still have a good time. And, again, three years since my last relationship and a good nine months or so since I’d last even attempted to have sex. It hadn’t gone well, let’s just say.
“I think you’ve got the right idea,” Asher said, drinking his own glass of water. “I don’t want to end the night plastered.”
“I just had a wild bachelorette weekend getaway,” I admitted. “I think I’ve reached my quota of being drunk for at least the next six months.”
“And when you’re drunk, you can’t focus on things,” Asher pointed out, his voice going low and intimate. “I like to remember everything and be fully in the moment.”
“Are you fully in the moment now?” I asked. “With me?”
For the first time, Asher gave me a once-over. Heat flared up inside of me and I had to squeeze my thighs together as his gaze slowly moved over my body. It was like he was peeling off my layers with his gaze and imagining me in his bed.
“Very much so,” he assured me.
I swallowed to try to get some moisture back into my mouth.
“I never do this, but would—would you like to come back to my place?” I asked almost awkwardly.
The smile Asher gave me then was nothing short of predatory, and I felt my underwear start to get wet. He looked like he was going to pin me to the wall, and I wanted that. I’d always liked a man who knew what he was doing and wasn’t afraid to take control.
Suddenly, it was like I had handed the reins over and Asher was in control, leaving me at his mercy. I liked the idea probably more than I should have.
Asher leaned in, ghosting his lips against my cheek.
“I’d like that very much.”
“Thank God your date stood you up,” I blurted out. Damn alcohol.
Asher chuckled, the sound dark and enough to send a shiver of anticipation down my spine.
“Thank God your friend stood you up.”
Oh, yes. I owed Mary a thank you card at the very least for this. Maybe I’d even send a thank-you card to Josh’s mom.
Asher put his card down to pay and then stood up, holding out his hand for me to take.
“I can’t let you pay for my tab,” I protested, starting to pull my wallet out of my purse.
“Jessica, you’re about to give me a fantastic evening,” Asher said. “You’ve given me one already. Let me say thank you.”
“You’re wanting me to let you say thank you for taking you back to my apartment,” I pointed out. “That sounds a lot like a certain profession.”
Asher laughed, sounding startled.
“I’m just trying to be a gentleman, but if it makes you uncomfortable, you are welcome to pay for yourself.”
“No, I’m good—just couldn’t let the opportunity for a joke pass me up.”
I winked at him, wondering internally where this saucy girl had come from and why she wasn’t present when I was out on actual dates. I’d never been comfortable with flirting or teasing a guy, and yet here I was, actually succeeding at it!
Asher paid for both of us and I took his hand, letting him help me up from my seat at the bar. I expected him to let go then, but he just used his grip on my hand to pull me in close, his other hand coming to rest on my hip. I shivered, pinned by his intense gaze.
“Can I admit something?”
I nodded, certain that my voice would crack if I tried to speak.
Asher let go of my hand so that he could tuck some of my hair behind my ear, letting his fingertips trail down the line of my jaw.
“I’ve wanted to touch you like this since the moment I saw you.”
“What about your date?” I asked.
Asher made a face.
“Not to be rude about her or anything, but you are much more my type.”
“The type who actually shows up?” I teased.
“The type that’ll let me do wicked things to her,” Asher replied.
Shockingly, I did not melt into a puddle on the floor, but it was a close call.
“You can’t have been able to tell that just by looking at me.”
“Actually, it was that you were absolutely stunning,” Asher admitted. “The wicked bit was just a guess on my part. And, apparently, an accurate one.”
He winked at me, and I had to reach up and grab his wrist before I did something very stupid like make out with him in the middle of the bar that I frequented. Sally would never let me live it down when she heard about it.
“Let’s get out of here,” I whispered.
Asher’s eyes darkened and he nodded, sliding a hand to the small of my back to guide me out of the bar.
Chapter 5
Jessica
Once the cold night air hit me, I started second guessing myself. What was I thinking? Taking a total stranger back to my apartment? I was 31, not 21; this wasn’t something that I did anymore—not that I’d done much of it to begin with.
But, God, Asher was the hottest man I’d ever seen in my life, and I wanted to climb him like a tree. Even if I wasn’t going to orgasm, the feeling of him pounding into me was going to be almost as good; I just knew it.
“I suppose we should leave the cars,” I told him, remembering the three—or was it four?—drinks he’d just paid for. “Shall we get a cab?”
“Sure. I’ll come get mine in the morning,” Asher said, glancing back at a slate gray BMW parked on the other side of the lot.
He had a really nice car, I noticed—better than I could afford. I wondered what he did—he’d said that he had gone to medical school, but he could be a surgeon or an administrator or anything in between. I guess that profession really did pay off the way people said.
Normally, I didn’t take men back to my apartment, preferring to go to theirs. If I was going to make an idiot of myself or sour the night with my…uh, shortcoming, then I wanted to be able to flee rather than be the one kicking somebody out. My home was my sanctuary and I didn’t like it to be disturbed in that way.
But Asher had been gentle in his flirting, barely doing or saying anything of that
nature, instead just winning me over by being a genuinely funny and charming person. I felt like I could trust him.
We stepped out of the cab about ten minutes later, me leading the way up to my apartment. Asher slid a hand around my waist as we walked and I let myself lean into it. It felt more protective than sexual, or at least it did until we got into the elevator.
He was right there, a solid line of heat against me. I’d felt him watching me as I walked alongside him, tapping in the key code to get into the building and selecting my floor on the elevator.
I turned. “I think you said something about doing wicked things to me?”
Asher’s eyes darkened again and he crowded me up against the wall of the elevator. One of his legs—Jesus Christ, his thick, muscled legs—slid in between mine and pressed up. I gasped, my underwear getting soaked as he started to rock his leg back and forth.
“You mean things like this?” he asked.
I would have at least tried to reply, but then he was kissing me and all words fell away.
I grabbed his jacket, thrusting up into his mouth and down onto his leg, feeling trapped between his wicked tongue as it slid against mine and his firm leg as he kept rocking it up into me. I was starting to regret wearing a dress with a flared skirt to the bar. There was no barrier between his leg and my now-soaking-wet underwear, the damp fabric clinging to me and just adding more sensation that made me press up into Asher’s mouth.
His hands were all over me, sliding up my body, squeezing my hips and my waist and skimming along my breasts, feeling my nipples through the fabric.
“Oh, God,” I groaned. I was writhing on his leg, seeking more of that friction. It wasn’t enough, it was never enough, but God, it felt good all the same. “Asher—”
“Oh, look, the elevator stopped,” Asher noted, pulling back as the doors opened.
I was going to kill him. “Why did you stop?”
“You really want your landlord to get mad at you for having sex in your elevator?” Asher said.
Good point. I hurried out and led him to my front door, unlocking it with shaking hands. I wanted to get out of my clothes and to have him all over me. I wanted to finally see what was underneath the well-cut jeans, the pale green button-up shirt, and the fitted jacket.
The moment we were inside the apartment, Asher pressed up behind me, one of his hands sliding up my inner thigh. My legs felt like jelly and I leaned back against him, grabbing onto his arms as they wrapped around me.
“I…” I started to say, but then his fingers found the edge of my underwear and I lost whatever train of thought I’d had.
“You’re so wet,” Asher murmured, his voice rough and low.
He pressed his hips up against my ass and I could feel the outline of his erection. I ground back against him, rolling my hips, grinning as I felt him grunt in surprise and pleasure.
“I’m getting you onto your bed,” Asher promised, “And then I’m going to make you scream for me.”
Oh, fuck yes, I liked that idea. I loved that idea.
“Please,” I asked, not even sure what I was asking for.
Asher ran a finger lightly over my underwear, and I made a kind of whimpering, wailing sound that I didn’t even know I could make. The teasing, knife-edge feeling of it had my hips arching up, searching for more.
“Anybody ever thought to do that to you before?” Asher asked, doing it again.
I cried out, then moaned into his neck as he started to rub the pad of his finger against my clit, slowly and determinedly.
“I’m guessing not,” Asher noted.
How the hell could he be so composed when I was practically a shaking mess?
I whirled around and grabbed him by his jacket, shoving it off of him and kissing him deeply, nipping a little at his lips. Asher made a noise of surprise and his arms wrapped around my waist, pulling me in close.
I pulled back just long enough to demand, “Take me back to my room and fuck me,” and then went back to kissing him.
“Yes, ma’am,” Asher breathed.
His two large hands slid to my thighs and then, with a slight grunt from him, I felt the ground beneath me vanish. I squealed and clutched at him as I was lifted up, wrapping my legs around his waist to hold on. He’d lifted me just like it was nothing.
“Bedroom?” Asher asked, panting the word into my mouth.
“This way,” I breathed, directing him from the entryway through the living room into my bedroom.
Luckily, I lived in a one-bedroom apartment, so it wasn’t all that difficult to figure out the layout, even if it was dark and he had a writhing brunette in his hands.
Not that I was—okay so I was writhing, a little. But oh my God, anyone would have been writhing when he was curling his tongue in my mouth like that and keeping his hands on my ass so that he could grind it against his cock while he carried me to my bedroom. I wanted his hands and his mouth everywhere. I wanted him inside of me.
Asher deposited me gently on the bed, then pulled back so that he could get his clothes off. Generally, I liked a slower tease when it came to getting clothes off. Building the anticipation usually helped my partners get into the mood, and I could focus on giving them pleasure and try not to worry about my own.
But right now, I was feeling as desperate as Asher was. I didn’t know what it was about him that made me feel so lightheaded with lust, but it felt like I was going to die if I didn’t get my hands and mouth on his bare skin.
I stripped off my dress, underwear, and bra, making a mental note to throw said underwear away the next morning. It was ruined, now.
Asher finished stepping out of his pants, and my jaw went slack again. I’d figured out that he worked out, thanks to his ability to lift me while his eyes were closed, but I still wasn’t expecting how chiseled he was going to be.
“Oh my God, I’m going to lick your abs,” I blurted out.
Dammit, still a little tipsy.
Asher laughed at that, crawling up the bed to settle between my legs and kiss the corner of my mouth. It was oddly sweet.
“You can do whatever you want,” he promised me.
I liked that idea.
I shoved at his shoulders until he rolled over and I could straddle him, bending down to run my mouth over his broad chest and six pack. It was like he was carved from marble, except his skin was so much softer and warmer than marble could ever be.
Slowly, I made my way down his body, savoring every bit of it—the salty taste of his skin, the way he groaned when I lightly bit at his hipbone.
I hadn’t planned on giving him a blowjob, but then, I hadn’t planned on not giving him one, either. I nosed at the hair at the base of his cock, grinning at the rumble in his chest. Like I said, I enjoyed doing this. It was the one place where I was guaranteed to please my partner.
“Feel free to tug on my hair if you want,” I told him, and then I licked a long stripe up the underside of his cock.
Asher swore, loudly, his hands fisting in the sheets.
I grinned. This was intoxicating.
I took the tip of him in my mouth, swirling my tongue around the head before I sank down slowly, as far as I could go. Asher swore again and one of his hands came up to slide into my hair, his fingers getting tangled up in my locks so that he could tug lightly if he wanted to.
I sank down again and again, slowly, keeping the rhythm steady but not speeding up. Every so often, I would pull back to lick up the underside and then tease his slit, which always produced a strangled sound from Asher’s throat. Before long, he was tugging at my hair.
“C’mon,” he groaned. “I don’t want to finish like this; I want to be inside you.”
Now it was my turn to make a strangled noise. “Okay.”
I let Asher turn me so that we were on our sides together, but instead of kissing me, he ducked his head down to suck at my breast. I gasped, and then I was the one threading my fingers through his hair, arching my back to try to get more of my breast into
his mouth as he sucked with just a hint of teeth.
“Asher,” I gasped. I wanted him inside of me so badly. “Asher, please, I want—”
“Eager little thing,” Asher growled, the dark, sinful tone of his voice making a fresh wave of heat pulse through me.
A part of me just wanted to wrap my legs around him and grind mindlessly while he whispered dirty things in my ear, until I was too exhausted to move anymore. Asher took one of my breasts in hand, his thumb swiping over the nipple, then pinched it lightly. I gasped up into his mouth.
“Get inside of me,” I begged. It felt like all of me was on fire. “Please, Asher, I want you inside of me.”
I didn’t care that I wasn’t going to get off, I just wanted to feel the beautiful stretch of him inside me, to feel him filling me up and fucking me until he came. I wanted him to come, wanted to make him lose control. It wasn’t an orgasm, but by God, it would be the next best thing.
Asher reached back down for his pants, pulling a condom out of his wallet. I wanted to make a joke about him planning on getting lucky, but here he was, getting lucky, so I held my tongue.
Asher rolled the condom on, scattering kisses down my neck and over my shoulders while he did it.
“You’re gorgeous,” he whispered, his voice raw. “I want to kiss every inch of you.”
“You can do that.”
Honestly, at that point, he could have told me that he wanted to eat dinner off my stomach and I wouldn’t have even batted an eye.
“After I make you scream,” he reminded me.
His hand slid down to draw a finger through my folds, circling my clit but not touching it quite yet.
“So wet, you’re dripping,” he murmured.
My cheeks started to burn with embarrassment, but Asher sounded genuinely pleased. He slid a finger inside of me and I gasped, almost missing the way his eyes were trained on the spot where his finger moved in and out of me. It was like it entranced him, how my body was taking him in so readily.
“C’mon,” I told him, arching my hips up. “I want, I want…I can take more.”
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