Can't Hurry Love

by Molly O'Keefe

  His heart broke for her, it really did. She was beautiful and she had no idea.

  And at the same time he wished he had ten minutes alone in a room with her husband before the coward had taken the easy way out.

  “Look at me, Victoria,” he breathed, his arms at his sides, his erection pushing hard against the zipper of his jeans. She had to be blind or innocent not to see how his body was reacting to her.

  Her dropped-jaw look of astonishment, the way her eyes darted from his crotch to the sky over his head, would have made him laugh if he wasn’t sure it would run her off.

  “Trust me. Hell, trust yourself. You’re beautiful. You’re sexy. And I want you like crazy. But … I have to know—”

  She launched herself against him, her arms around his neck, her legs around his waist. Her sweet little tongue in his mouth.

  He laughed before pushing his hands into her hair, holding her still for his kiss, but she wasn’t having any of that. There was no holding this woman still; he fell back against the fence, groaning when the sweet balance of her weight fell against his erection. He arched back hard into her and she gasped.

  He’d never been kissed like this, like he was water and she was dying of thirst, and he felt control slipping from between his fingers.

  “Tori,” he breathed, bending his knees slightly to take her weight so he could slide his hand between them, over the curve of her breast. She shuddered against him, her nipple hard in his fingers, a pebble he rolled with his thumb and forefinger, and she stopped devouring him for long enough to cry out against his lips.

  The T-shirt she wore was a curse, fighting him as he tried to get beneath it to the smooth, hot silk of her skin. He couldn’t get any leverage. Couldn’t hold her and touch her and kiss her all at the same time.

  He pulled back.

  “No.” She kissed him again and he went with it, because she felt so good against him. But then the need to touch her made him crazy again and he lifted her away.

  “We need to …” He shook his head, distracted by her pink lips, the cloudy look in her sapphire eyes.

  “Go inside.”

  Yes! His body roared. Inside! But his head was a little confused. A few steps behind. For some reason, he felt like he should argue.

  “Are you … sure?”

  Looping her arms around his neck, she smiled at him. “You have no idea how sure I am. Hurry, Eli. Before this feeling goes away.”

  He kept his eyes open as she kissed him, looking past her hair as he walked toward the barn, praying for a total lack of gopher holes.

  This was some kind of luck, having Victoria Schulman in his arms, ready to sell him the land across the lake. And he wasn’t a man used to luck. Happiness put an edge on his desire, made it raw and sharp. Painful almost, cutting and hacking at his control.

  His boots scraped on the stone floor of the stable and his eyes were slow to adjust to the sudden darkness. He tripped, righted himself, and turned left to the would-be office, so that he could put her down on the mini-fridge.

  “You better have a condom in here,” she whispered into his ear before taking the lobe in her teeth.

  “Damn it.” He didn’t lift her, just grabbed her hand and pulled her off the fridge and through the stable toward his truck.

  “What …?” She stopped and pointed at the house. “I don’t want to drive anywhere.”

  “Condoms are in my truck.” Her eyebrows rose. “It’s …” The back of his neck itched, his skin shrank down to nothing. “I don’t have women at my house.”

  “So you have them in your truck?” she squealed, pulling against his hand. “You are totally emotionally stunted.”

  “So?”

  This was him. And he couldn’t change it and didn’t want to.

  “That’s so hot to me.”

  She took off for the truck and he had to jog to keep up with her.

  “You’re a little messed up, aren’t you?” he asked, and she laughed.

  “You have no idea.” She yanked open the passenger-seat door and hoisted herself inside, and he ran a hand over the curve of her ass as she climbed in.

  “You should wear jeans more often,” he murmured, admiring her curves. Admiring everything about her—the way her hair poured over her shoulder like a night sky, the way her eyes lit up like stars. The way her smile turned her into a siren.

  “And you should get in here.”

  chapter

  12

  This was her, Victoria Schulman, acting the vixen and she couldn’t believe it. Couldn’t believe how much fun it was. How liberating. This was something that happened to other people. Sex in a truck.

  She licked her lips and he was on her so fast it was like being hit by a linebacker. A train. He filled the cab, pushing her into the fabric and vinyl of the seat. And she loved it. She loved it so much she laughed as he kissed her. She purred and groaned as he slid his hands up under her shirt, pulling it over her head.

  She’d gained some weight and most of it had gone into her breasts and she was very aware of how nice they looked in her white demi-bra. Perhaps, subconsciously, she had picked that bra when she was getting ready to walk over here. But she was happy that he seemed to agree, cupping her breasts with his hands, licking the upper curves.

  Oh Lord, the scruff on his chin scratched her soft skin, and it was so ridiculously manly. So carnal, she felt heat and moisture pool between her legs. Sweat gathered under her hair and she wondered, with a giddy thrill, if they were going to steam up the windows.

  “Do you want to go inside?” He stared down at her breasts as if he were asking them the question.

  “No … ahh!” He bit her nipples. Through her bra. And then he sucked. Hard. And it was as if there were coils between her breasts and her brain and the deep ache between her legs. And as he sucked her those coils glowed red hot.

  I’m going to come, she thought, lost in this storm. Like this. Right now, if only she could open her legs so he could rest that wonderful erection against her. That was all she needed, something hard … right there.

  But he was heavy and she couldn’t move, and a sob rose in her throat.

  “Come on, Eli,” she whispered and he leaned up, resting his weight on his elbows by her ears.

  The smile on his face made her nervous.

  “You need a second?” he asked, blowing a little kiss against the corner of her lips. Struggling, she turned, tried to lure him in for another one of those long, slow soul kisses the man was so wickedly good at. But he was elusive. An elusive devil.

  “You want to slow down?”

  “No.”

  “Ah, speed up?”

  “Yes.” He didn’t do anything. Just stared down at her and she lifted her head to try to kiss him, and when he dodged her she chomped her teeth at him.

  His low laughter rumbled against her chest.

  Fine, she thought and slid her hand between them, until the hard length of him beneath his jeans was in her hand. He groaned, pushing that erection into her palm.

  She squeezed, licked her lips, and he groaned, resting his forehead against hers. “Maybe I need a second,” he whispered.

  “No!”

  All of the sex she’d had over the years—not all that much, but enough—had been on her husband’s schedule. Joel had even decided when they should get pregnant, coming to her like clockwork in the middle of her cycle. How many times had she wished he would linger, taking a minute to make sure she was ready, or that she was having a good time.

  All of those little disappointments and missed opportunities, they all coalesced into a selfish need to have this now. Her way.

  Her fingers undid his fly and slipped into his briefs until she felt his skin, so hot, so soft against hers. The spongy head of his penis jerked against her touch and she felt the small beads of moisture leaking from him.

  “Now.”

  He swore under his breath, pulling something from the glove box, while she tortured both of them with her hands down
his pants, tracing the fragile veins, finding the heavy sac, the wiry pubic hair. Thrilling in all of it. Delighting in him.

  Roughly, he pushed her hands away, shoved his jeans past his hips, and rolled the condom down.

  All of her fantasies crowded her brain, clamoring to be chosen, and she opened her mouth to tell him she wanted to be taken from behind. She’d always thought that would be so sexy, but he, red-faced and barely in control, pushed her legs apart, lifting her thighs around his hips.

  “You want this?”

  She nodded, speechless from the look of him, the wildness of him. Her body rushed to prepare a welcome as he jerked her pants down one leg. She tried to help him, kicking off her shoes, but he didn’t need much help. He was pretty much a one-man sex machine. The windows were past foggy and the smell in the cab was decidedly earthy.

  He licked his hand—oh, so vulgar—and touched her core, his fingers slipping across her wet, hot flesh. He groaned like a man on the rack and then, before she could prepare herself, he thrust inside her.

  She screamed.

  “Oh God, tell me that’s a good scream.” He rested his slippery, sweaty forehead against her breasts. He kissed one nipple, licked it, panting against her skin.

  “So good.” She wiggled her hips, urging him. “Please. I’m so close. I’m so—”

  Those eyes of his were magnetic and she could only stare at him, into him, while he slowly slid out of her and then thrust back in. Harder than before. She could feel him in the back of her throat.

  “Eli—”

  “Shhhh.”

  The truck was so small, a cocoon. He couldn’t move far, but he shifted his hips, thrusting forward and easing back in a slow grinding rhythm that her body adored. Her body ate it up.

  He cupped her head in his hands, his fingers pulling at her hair, the pain an ecstatic counterpoint to the pleasure of her body. His thumbs touched her lips and she opened her teeth to taste him, the salty pad of his thumb, her tongue exploring the coarseness of his skin.

  “Suck,” he breathed.

  Her body contracted at the word, the look in his eyes, so feral. Clinging to control, she opened her mouth to let him in.

  He growled his pleasure, his approval.

  Her body was waking up to every single difference between imagining this man between her legs and the raw reality, between the lonely pleasure she brought herself and the wilderness he was driving her toward. And then, as if she weren’t feeling enough, he leaned down and in time with his next thrust, pulled her nipple into his mouth.

  She exploded. A thousand pieces of Victoria Schulman, like a thousand points of light, ricocheted around the cab of that truck. Her fingernails sank deep into the flesh of his hips as if she had to hold on to him or she’d lose herself in all this pleasure.

  The intensity faded and reality returned in the scratch of the fabric beneath her back, the ends of Eli’s hair dripping sweat down onto her cheek. The heavy rasp of his breath, the pounding of his heart against her chest.

  “You all right?” he asked and she grinned up at him, so alive with pleasure, so alive with … life, she could barely stand it.

  But the hunger wasn’t gone and she was thrilled to still want him, to still feel him hard inside of her. This was her chance to live out every fantasy she’d ever had. He was going to be her own personal boy toy.

  She pushed her hands against his shoulders, shifting her hips to settle him deeper. “Let’s try—”

  “Can’t. Oh. God. Can’t. Next time.” He slipped his hands under her back, curling his palms over her shoulders, holding her in place while he thrust fast and hard into her body.

  Surprised, she braced her hand over her head so she wouldn’t get pushed right into the door. Her lingering pleasure got squashed and while he shook over her, she could only lie there and stare at those foggy windows.

  Missionary position. Her mood turned slightly sour, her pleasure dimming as shades of her former life crept in.

  He groaned against her neck, sucking the skin there, and she pulled away, irritated that she would have to explain a hickey to Celeste.

  And that earthy smell was … well, it was a little gross now.

  She knew in her heart she was being miserly. She’d had that beautiful orgasm. In a truck, of all things! This was the raunchiest thing she’d ever done. It wasn’t his fault she expected some boy-toy antics. He didn’t know.

  But she couldn’t, in the heart of her cooling body, say she wasn’t just a little … disappointed.

  He lifted himself away from her and she smiled brightly at him, which must have tipped him off because his eyes narrowed.

  “What?” he asked.

  “Nothing. That was great.” She nodded. “Gold star.”

  “Gold … what?” He heaved himself to the other side of the truck and she moved her feet just in time so he didn’t get a toe up the bum. She watched, dry-mouthed, as he pulled the condom off and tied a knot in the end.

  “Tidy,” she said in asinine approval.

  With a long, slow breath, he pushed his longish hair back and closed his eyes. He still wore his shirt. After all that, she hadn’t seen him totally naked. Disappointing.

  While he seemed to take a little nap, she curled her legs up against her chest. Without taking her eyes off him, she searched around her ankle for her underwear and jeans and then slipped both up her body.

  He didn’t stir, and biting her lip, she tilted her head to get a better look inside the gap in his jeans, where she could barely see his penis slouched against his leg.

  She wanted to put it in her mouth.

  Joel had loved that in the beginning, but then as time went on, it seemed unnecessary. A too-fancy accessory on a sparse event. And as he was increasingly reluctant to reciprocate, she withheld it as some kind of power maneuver he never seemed aware of.

  But this man, she wanted to lick. She wanted to suck and kiss and find all those places on his body that made him shake and groan.

  He lifted his hips, pulling his pants all the way up, and she jerked her eyes away, only to find him watching her.

  “Gold star?”

  A blush ignited in her cheeks and, awkward to the extreme, she shrugged and looked away, fumbling with the door handle. “I should go. My son—”

  He put his hand over hers, rough and slightly clammy. She resisted the urge to curl her fingers around his, guide those fingers to the small ache that lingered between her legs.

  “You should explain what’s going on in your head.”

  “Nothing. Honestly. That was great.”

  He nodded sagely. “It was. But you seem …”

  “Disappointed.”

  “What?” he howled, yanking his hand away.

  “You asked!” she cried right back.

  “I thought you were going to say uncomfortable, or maybe overwhelmed …”

  “I’m sorry. I am. I’m totally overwhelmed. Let’s just forget it—”

  “Disappointed? You’re kidding, right?” He shifted sideways on the seat and pulled down the back of his jeans, revealing red scratches on his back. Red scratches she had put there. With her fingernails. “You did this to me.”

  He hitched up his pants, flipping his shirt down like an affronted debutante. “You came, Victoria. I know you did. Unless you faked it.” He seemed oddly wounded at the thought and she put her hand against his shoulder.

  His hot, hard shoulder.

  The skin was smooth under that shirt, she could tell. The muscles like a boulder against her fingers.

  “Tori?”

  “I didn’t fake it. I swear. And yes, I came. I really did. It was great. I just … I just … wanted something more. Something …” wicked, raunchy, dirty. “Different.”

  “Like what?”

  All those years of swallowing her preferences and inclinations came back to muzzle her, to crush her with humiliation. Praying he would understand, she shook her head.

  But he just kept watching her. Waiting. This ma
n who made her scream. Who made her crazy.

  “Tori, we can sit here all night.”

  Oh. It was so hot in the truck. Like a sauna. That smelled like sex. And latex. This was ugly. Not exciting at all. And her body prickled with embarrassment at the desire that still smoldered in her belly.

  And she knew, right now, if she didn’t own up to how she was feeling, she would be the one in the wrong. She would be the one pushing aside everything she wanted for no good reason. Just because she was embarrassed. Because she didn’t know how to ask for what she wanted.

  She didn’t want to be that woman anymore. Couldn’t stand to be her anymore.

  There was a crack in the vinyl under her leg and she dug her finger into the foam, concentrating on that instead of on him, so that she could force the words out.

  “I want … I want to have sex against a wall. They do it in movies all the time.”

  “Okay.”

  His easy acceptance kicked open the door. Everything she’d been denied, everything she’d denied herself. It all came roaring out.

  “Yeah. And maybe … maybe I want to be tied up. What’s wrong with that?”

  “Not a thing. I got rope in the barn.”

  “And you. I want to tie you up.”

  “We can discuss that.”

  “And I want you to talk dirty to me.”

  “I think I can come up with something.”

  “And I want to watch porn. Real porn. Not that HBO stuff. And oral sex. Not just for you. Me too.”

  That made him blink, and her brain was cold with all that she’d revealed and she felt more naked than she’d ever been. Her marriage had never seemed more lonely than right now. And she’d never been more ashamed of the fact that she’d been too scared to ask her husband for what she wanted, but she could ask this man, a total stranger, for the fulfillment of her most ridiculous fantasies.

  The corner of his lips lifted in a knowing masculine smile that made every girlish impulse and instinct in her body scream as if The Beatles were coming to town.

  “Is that all?”

  “For … for the moment. I guess.” She wasn’t going to bring up the costumes.