by Haley Travis
My hands seemed to be all over her body at once, examining every silky inch of her flesh.
Devouring the other nipple, I murmured, “You’re delicious, sweetheart. May I touch you everywhere?”
Pausing, I straightened up to look into her eyes. Tana bit that perfect lip for a second before nodding. There was no hesitation in her gaze, only curiosity and lust.
I kissed her almost roughly, the feeling of her giving herself to me completely overpowering. I was lost in the moment, my only thought to please her, and make her squeal for me.
Although I already felt like Tana was my girl, there was something about giving a woman an orgasm for the first time that mentally sealed the deal for me. If she could be comfortable enough around me to allow that, then we were truly together.
I slid one hand into the back of her hair, gripping it gently as I tipped her chin up, kissing down her throat as my other hand slipped into her panties. A full-body shudder twitched t hrough her, then she gasped.
“Relax,” I murmured against her skin. “You have no idea how much I need to feel you come.”
As my fingertips skimmed along her most delicate skin, I felt a weird surge of pride at how wet she was. Slipping through her folds, I found the magic button, feeling her start to tremble the second I touched it.
Tilting her lips back to mine, I kissed her hard and deep, just on the edge of rough. Her hips began to wriggle against my hand, as I found the pressure and rhythm that really made her begin to shake.
Tana’s twitching became steadier, as I muffled her soft moans. As I felt her muscles begin to clench, I pulled back to look into her eyes.
“I need to feel you,” I murmured. She nodded once before gasping, a tiny squeal delighting my ears as she came against my fingers, moaning, shaking like a leaf.
“Oh!” she gasped, her curvy frame completely consumed by her climax.
As she caught her breath, I slipped my finger lower, teasing just around her inner lips before bringing my hand up to taste her juices.
“You’re so sexy,” I said, slowly licking my fingers while she stared open-mouthed. “Next time I’m going to spread your thighs open and devour you.”
Nodding slowly, Tana’s saucy smile made my heart feel tight.
Fastening just a few buttons on her dress, I said, “I’m falling for you so hard, sweetheart. But that can wait for another day.”
Taking her hand, I led her to the bedroom. Pulling off my jeans, I got into bed in my t-shirt and shorts, holding the covers open for her. Tana snuggled in beside me, curling right up against my chest as she was before. She fell asleep almost instantly, her breath a soft purr.
I had to wonder if I was really the first man to touch her like that. Whether I was the first man to make her come.
There was no doubt in my mind that she was the one. She was almost too perfect for me. Sweetness and light, and completely open.
She felt so natural wrapped in my arms that I almost didn’t want to fall asleep for fear I’d miss a single moment of it.
CHAPTER SIX
* Tana *
I don’t think I’d ever slept so deeply in my life. There was something about Tyler that was just so accepting. It felt like he was interested in every single part of me, and didn’t judge me at all. True feelings were growing here already.
It didn’t make sense, falling for each other so fast, but I had nothing to compare it to.
As daylight began to stream through the window, I cracked one eye open to make sure I wasn’t still dreaming. Yet there was no way I was going to leave the cozy nook of his arms anytime soon.
I was still reeling from the way he had seemed so casual about introducing me to his friends. He already made it clear that we were clicking together better than any other relationship he never had.
It was a lot to take in.
Staring at his handsome profile as he breathed slow and deep, sending warm air across my shoulder, I hoped that I could be enough for him. I hoped that he didn’t get sick of me after a month, or think that I was too quiet.
Whenever I thought like that, Megan was always quick to remind me that I had excellent visual taste, was hard working, and an organizational wizard. Those were great things at work, but I didn’t know how it would translate into good girlfriend material.
My fingers began to nervously twitch as I remembered my biggest fear. What would he do if he found out that I was related to the man who was causing him grief at work?
Slowly sneaking out from his embrace, I went to the washroom, scrubbed my face, and finger-combed my hair as well as I could.
Luckily, Tyler was quite organized, and I had to wonder if he designed all of the cabinetry himself. The space really did need a bit more color though, and I shook my head, realizing I was mentally redecorating already.
I easily found everything in the kitchen to make coffee. Once I had a few sips, I checked my phone to see that Megan still hadn’t sent me a text this weekend. But that wasn’t a surprise. Since she was a bit of a party girl, I knew there would be no way she would be up before noon on a Sunday.
She needed to hear about Friday night’s terrible date. Brad was a friend of Megan’s older brother Kevin. He’d always seemed nice, so she thought he would be a perfect easy test date for me.
It was oddly amusing to me that I finally had my own slightly outrageous Saturday night story to share with her, as soon as she finally sent a message.
Megan was the other receptionist and assistant at the first optometrist office I had worked at when I finished college. But when the doctor retired, we both had to get new jobs and went our separate ways. Luckily, we remained friends and still hung out quite often.
I didn’t have a lot of people I was close with, so even though our in-person meetups were sporadic, it was nice to always have someone to text. My two best friends from school had taken off when they met their boyfriends, which had crushed me at the time. I didn’t think it would take that much energy to maintain a casual friendship, but they just weren’t interested anymore.
I had a deep feeling that Tyler and I would be texting all the time, from now on.
Digging around his kitchen, I searched for something to make a fun brunch. I made bagel pizzas with chopped vegetables and a little tomato sauce and cheese, opening the oven to check on them just as I heard Tyler in the doorway.
“Damn, girl, look at you,” he laughed. “I nod off for a few hours, and you completely take over.”
His huge grin made me giggle. He kept his distance until I took the baking sheet out of the oven, placing it on top of the stove.
The second it was safe, he pulled me into his arms, giving me a kiss so passionate it instantly made my inner thighs tingle.
The second his lips left mine and he gazed into my eyes, I knew. He was the one. He was going to be my first. And I was looking forward to it more than I could have ever imagined.
“Sweetheart, please tell me – did I go too far last night?”
I instantly shook my head. “No. Not at all.”
Tyler held me against his chest, breathing a loud sigh of relief down my back, making us both laugh. “Good. You make me feel so warm and comfortable that I always want to be that for you.”
It was as if my insides were melting as much as the cheese on our brunch. Everything about him was so wonderful. He was focused on caring for me very attentively, which I wasn’t used to.
I had Tyler sit down so that I could serve him, and he was amused that I was taking over in his own kitchen. All through our coffee and brunch, we chatted so easily that it felt like we’d known each other for weeks.
It was nice to hear how close he was with his uncle, who seemed to be training Tyler to step in and take over the business one day. But when he commented on how he admired his uncle for running an extremely honest business, I felt a little twinge of regret that my father didn’t behave the same way.
Since we both had errands to run in the afternoon, Tyler drove me home, leaving m
e with a kiss goodbye that felt like it was going to alter my breathing for at least an hour.
How on earth could anyone kiss with so much passion for just a moment in the front seat of a car?
As I puttered around my apartment and the neighborhood, picking up groceries and doing some house cleaning, I kept bursting into giggles. I suddenly had a boyfriend. An incredible man who seemed to really like me.
I knew that my feelings for Tyler were incredibly intense, and there was no way I could muffle them or slow them down. Our relationship was charging full steam ahead, as if it had a mind of its own.
As I had a light dinner, I realized I couldn’t wait to talk to Megan for advice. Tyler was so wonderful that I needed to do absolutely everything in my power to be the best possible girlfriend for him.
Digging through last year’s day planner, I found a note where I had jotted down Megan’s number last year when my old phone had been drying out in a bag of rice. Thank goodness I had a backup list.
I quickly sent her a text, and she called me back right away.
“Tana! I thought you were going to text me and let me know how your date went on Friday?”
“I did text you. It was absolutely horrible.”
“Oh no, I’m so sorry, sweetie. What happened?”
“He tried to get me drunk, and wouldn’t stop touching my shoulder, my knee, just really getting in my space.”
“Dammit,” Megan muttered. “I’m so sorry. I’ve sort of known Brad for years, and Kevin assured me he was a nice guy.”
Megan’s older brother Kevin was sometimes a bit of a jerk when it came to women, but I didn’t want to mention that to her if she didn’t see it. It stood to reason that his friends might be the same.
“So, did you take off on him?” Megan asked.
“No – I sent you a text begging for help, telling you where I was.”
“That’s weird, I didn’t get it.”
I laughed. “I know. I had to get a new phone last week, and I sent the text to a wrong number. Less than five minutes later, this huge gorgeous guy came charging in to escort me out of there.”
“What?” Megan exclaimed.
“Yeah, he’s apparently the knight in shining armor type, and couldn’t stand the thought of a woman being harassed in his neighborhood.”
“Aww,” Megan sighed. “That’s adorable.” She paused for a second. “Wait – so what happened with the new guy?”
“Tyler.” I was sure that she could hear me grinning. “He’s amazing, and I guess we’re sort of dating now.”
“Holy shit,” Megan breathed. “You met him Friday night, and you’re already sort of a thing?”
“We had a really incredible date last night,” I said.
She lowered her voice. “Sweetie, did you finally get laid?”
“Shush,” I giggled. “Not exactly. Let’s not talk about that.”
“Hell yes, we are talking about this,” Megan said, and I could hear her walking to a different room and closing the door. “So you didn’t sleep with him?”
“We slept, but there were clothes on.”
I pictured Megan nodding, twirling her hair around her left finger like she did when she was thinking. “Sometimes it’s really amazing to just snuggle a guy. I get it.”
“And you know, that whole thing about us only knowing each other for a day.”
“You’re already in love with him. I can hear in your voice,” she said with that slightly know-it-all tone that was both familiar and annoying.
“I have, shall we say...huge feelings. Yes. But we’ll see what happens.”
“Well, at least I won’t be fixing you up on any more crappy dates,” Megan laughed. “Seriously, Tana, I’m really sorry about that.”
“It’s not your fault, and I appreciate you trying. Just maybe don’t bother anymore.”
She laughed, then I asked her about work, and we got lost in conversation for a good twenty minutes. Then we made plans to get together for coffee soon.
“Are you going to see your new sweetie this week?” she asked.
“I think I’m supposed to wait for Tyler to call and ask me out again, right?”
“Your voice changes when you say his name,” she giggled. “You are completely gone for this guy. Yes, he’s going to call you, and it’s going to be amazing.”
“Thanks. Talk to you later.”
I went to sleep wishing that I had Tyler’s arms around me. He made everything feel so safe. More real, somehow. As I drifted off, my last thoughts were hoping that he’d stay with me, no matter what. I’d never had someone in my life who stayed for good.
CHAPTER SEVEN
* Tyler *
Even though I had been working extremely hard the last few days, I couldn’t stop grinning to myself. Having Tana as my girl was like having an anchor to happiness, somehow. No. Less heavy. More like a happiness reminder at all times.
No matter how many things went wrong, I could just grab my phone and send a message to the sweetest, prettiest girl in the world. And she was mine.
Yesterday morning when she had asked me how my day was going, I sent a photo of a piece of wood filler panel that had arrived chipped, with my finger pointing at the nasty spot.
She sent back a photo of just her eyes wearing gigantic bright blue old lady glasses.
When I had complained about being knee-deep in paperwork, sitting in a corner with my laptop on my knees trying to make sense of my uncle’s mangled job quotes, she sent a ten-second video of her pink nails clacking away at her keyboard.
Although it was completely adorable, it made me realize something else. She must have had a coworker hold her phone to shoot the video. Which meant that she probably had to explain what she was doing, which meant that she was already telling people about me.
Yeah, it was sort of tiny and ridiculous, but it still made me smile.
Knowing that she was right there kept me calm as I dug through Uncle John’s files. To call him unorganized would be a monumental understatement. A lot of people were great with a hammer, but lousy with filing. But I wish he would have let me onto his server years ago so that I could have set up a system for him.
I certainly wasn’t a computer expert by any stretch, but titling folders by the name of the job and client, and filing things by date was relatively easy.
Overall, the work we did was fairly straight forward. Construction management companies would have fancy condos designed, and hire us to do the cabinetry. If the property was brand new, the new owners would have picked what finishes they wanted. If the condo was being flipped, either the next owner, or the management team would pick new finishes.
There were many small pieces, from the finishes to the hardware to the styles. Fairly straightforward. But in small spaces, with larger appliances and people trying to maximize every single inch, these simple jobs had to be done perfectly.
Which is why I didn’t understand why John was so ramped up about getting new business.
We already had as much as we could handle. We had seven teams, sometimes all of us working in one building. There was plenty of overtime to go around. Everyone was fairly paid, and got along well, for the most part.
Realizing that I hadn’t taken a look at the company income in a while, I went to the financials folder to take a peek. It was password-protected now. That didn’t make sense, since John and I were the only ones with access to this server.
Two years ago when John had really started grooming me to take charge someday, he had gone through all of the financial information with me, to make sure I knew where everything was, and how everything worked.
I studied carefully, needing him to be proud of me.
Although I didn’t want to even think about it, if anything ever happened to John, I would step in and run the place, and ensure that everyone kept their jobs.
Uncle John must have been in his late sixties, and was starting to slow down just a bit. He was still working, but would leave some of the heavi
er lifting to the younger guys. He always made an excuse, like having to take a call, but I noticed what he was up to.
I would have thought that he’d pass the accounting on to me soon, or at least hire a bookkeeper. But he was fussy about doing all of that himself. He’d shown me some of it, then seemed to think better of it and taken it all back.
I thought about asking him for the password, wondering if perhaps he had done it by accident, and just hadn’t told me the code yet.
That would have to wait though, as I proofread a couple of emails, sending quotes out to potential new clients.