Free Me

by Laurelin Paige

  “Not secretive. Anonymous.” He lowered his gaze, seeming to be unsure that I’d like what he had to say next. “Detached.” He raised his eyes again to meet mine. “Is that a deal-breaker for you?”

  It probably should have been. If he wasn’t married, he had to be hiding something else, even though I couldn’t fathom what that might be.

  On the other hand, didn’t I want the same thing? I didn’t want him to know about my life—about my father, about Ben. Maybe he had his own family secrets. Did I really want to demand transparency on his part when he could turn around and demand it of me?

  “No, it’s not a deal breaker,” I said in earnest. “In fact, I think it’s a great idea.”

  “It is, isn’t it?” He leaned closer, his voice just above a whisper. “It’s also really kind of hot. To not know anything about each other except what matters. The things we learn naturally. Through our own discovery.”

  His words were full of innuendo, but as other times when he’d said such things, it didn’t feel sleazy. It felt sensual.

  Also, he was right—the anonymity and mystery was quite a turn on. Which made me even more anxious to get on with the whole set up. “Anything else we need to work out?”

  “Yes. The deets. Are you done with this?” He gestured to my half-eaten quiche.

  Since I’d lost my appetite for anything but skin on skin, I said yes. He took our plates to the dish bin and returned, continuing where he left off as he sat back down. “Here’s what I’m thinking. You get up around what time on Wednesdays? Afternoon? Evening?”

  I was impressed that he’d remembered my schedule was unusual. “Six-ish. Sometimes seven.”

  He nodded as he took in the information. “Perfect. I usually work until around then. Let’s say we meet at seven on Wednesdays at my hotel. Then we’ll plan to spend those nights together. There’s our standing date.”

  “Don’t expect me to sleep. I don’t sleep at night.” I felt stupid as soon as I said it. He already knew.

  “We won’t be sleeping,” he said, his lids heavy. “Also, I rarely sleep. So we’re good.”

  My breathing suddenly felt heavier and my neck warmed. I wanted this. I did. But I was so unused to giving myself things for pleasure, and more, I was not in the habit of trusting other people. This deal with JC, with a man I knew nothing about, took me out of my comfort zone in a big way.

  But my comfort zone was, as Norma implied—as everyone around me implied—a tightly wound cocoon. Surely even the caterpillar had a bit of trepidation before breaking out of his cocoon.

  Besides, we could cancel at any time. It was part of the deal. “Wednesdays, then.”

  “Wednesdays.” He narrowed his eyes. “Is this making you nervous?”

  I shook my head but said, “I’m not sure.”

  “Well. That’s probably a good thing.” He rubbed his hands together as if warming them, or as if he were also a bit apprehensive. “Honestly, I’m a little unsure too. Not about you. Not about this.”

  “Then what about?”

  “Everything else.”

  His vague answer made me want to dig, but I could tell from his expression that he wouldn’t say more. And maybe that was okay. I didn’t want to talk about my reasons for trepidation. This was better. Mystery could be good.

  There was something I thought should be said, though. About me. “Um, JC, about the other day…in the kitchen. I should explain.”

  “No, you most definitely shouldn’t. No life details, remember?”

  I wasn’t planning to tell him about Ben or anything specific, but he had to know that I’d been acting out of character. I didn’t want him to have the wrong idea about what to expect from me. “You need to know I’m not usually like that. I had—”

  “Don’t worry.” He cut me off. “I know. Whatever drove you to act outside yourself that morning is none of my business, and I don’t want to make it my business. I’m grateful I was there. Right place at the right time has never worked out better for me.”

  Funny, I’d been thinking he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. But I smiled, and by now I’d lost count of how many times he’d made me do that. Smiling was also out of my character. Perhaps JC just brought that out in me.

  I took another swallow of my coffee, finishing it off. “All gone,” I said, hoping that would indicate I was ready to go.

  If JC got my hint, he ignored it. “How many men have you been with?”

  I was taken aback. The question was surprising enough, but especially with no lead in to it. “I thought you didn’t want to know anything about me.”

  “I don’t. But this is relevant.”

  Yeah, right. Relevant. Or did he just want to figure out how easy I was going to be to impress in the bedroom.

  I wasn’t usually ashamed about my number of bed partners. JC, however, had infinitely more experience. I knew it without asking, but since he’d put me on the spot, I turned it back on him. “How many woman have you been with?”

  He shook his head dismissively. “That’s not relevant.”

  I snickered. “That’s the kind of answer you give when you’re embarrassed with the truth.”

  “I’m not embarrassed.” He considered for a minute. “You want to know? I’ll tell you, but I don’t know if you’ll like it.”

  I thought about that. How many women would he have to sleep with to give me pause? I couldn’t come up with an exact number, but it occurred to me that whatever that number was, it would lead me to either feel inadequate or overwhelmed. “You’re right. I don’t want to know.”

  He didn’t hide the satisfaction from his face. “But I do want to know how many guys you’ve been with.”

  I let him wait in silence for a few seconds before I gave him what he wanted. “Three.”

  It was JC’s turn to look nervous. “Oh shit. Are you sure you can do this without getting attached?”

  This time I couldn’t ignore his pretension. “Do you have some sort of narcissistic disorder? I’m not going to get attached. For your information, only one of those three men was a boyfriend. One was a drunken night in college. One I banged for fun.”

  His eyes lit up like I’d taken off my shirt. “You banged a guy for fun? We’re further ahead than I assumed.”

  “I did. Judger.” Actually, I’d banged him because the activity had given me a place to hide. An occasional sanctuary from the trial and the emotional effort it took to survive the aftermath of Dad’s arrest. At first, anyway. Then it became a habit.

  “So let me ask this—when’s the last time?”

  “That I got banged? Three days ago. In my club’s kitchen.” I knew what he meant. I was stalling my answer.

  He didn’t even crack a smile. “Before that.”

  “A couple years ago. Maybe three. Or five.” It was more than seven, actually. The last friends with benefits had been before Ben had taken off for the West Coast.

  “Uh-huh.” Like before, I could hear the doubt in his voice. “Why did you stop fucking him? The last one.”

  The last one—Marcus—had been a nice enough guy. He’d been a student at Pace University. We’d never felt the romantic spark for each other. In fact, when we’d first met he’d been crushing on another girl in our Accounting 101 course. I was simply someone to shag while he waited around for her to notice him, and I liked the escapism sex provided.

  Then things changed. “I realized it was easier to get myself off,” I said to JC. “A lot less work, a whole lot less emotion involved.”

  “Then you did get attached.”

  “Not me.”

  It took a moment for him to process that. “He fell for you. And you cut him off.” JC’s expression eased. “Wow. Brutal, Gwen. Brutal.” Yet, he seemed pleased. “Had you set guidelines beforehand? Told him you weren’t interested in more?”

  “We didn’t set guidelines like this, but he knew.” Long before he’d moved his crush on Chelle—was that her name?—to me, I’d told him I only did sex
for fun.

  JC shook his head. “He liked you from the get-go. He probably hoped he’d change your mind about wanting something else through the power of fucking.”

  I would have disagreed, except I’d wondered the same thing. Wondered if Chelle was an excuse to get me to spend time with him in the first place. Now I wondered how JC could be so perceptive. “If he did, it didn’t work. In case you were having any ideas about changing my mind about anything like that.”

  “Um, no. You don’t have to worry about that.” He laced his fingers and cupped them behind his head. “So three priors. And you don’t have a problem with no condoms.”

  It wasn’t a question, but I interjected with an answer. “Oh, no. I do have a problem with that. We’re using condoms.” Even though I’d entertained for a moment the idea of not using them when he’d shown me his clean report, I had since realized the folly in it.

  JC scowled. “We’ve already gone bareback. We can’t go to condoms now. That’s moving in the wrong direction.”

  “It was one time, and it was a mistake. I can’t have sex with someone who’s sleeping around and not use condoms.” I gathered our empty cups and headed to the trashcan.

  “You think I’d sleep around when I’m with you?” JC followed after me, his statement raising the eyebrows of a lady sitting at a nearby table.

  I pushed the cups into the trash and turned to face him. “Isn’t that your M.O.?”

  “No. It’s not.” He was irked. “We do this, I’m with you and no one else.” The sincerity of his statement was evident in his intense expression.

  My chest fluttered. Monogamous sex was what I preferred. Even if I wasn’t interested in romance, I was still a girl. I got insecure and compared myself to others. Sometimes I got jealous.

  But while I wanted it, the question was, why did he? I was leery. “That’s commitment number two in our no commitment deal.”

  “You’re going to be a hard-ass about this, aren’t you?”

  “That’s my M.O., remember?” At least my teasing made him drop the serious expression.

  The sound of a throat clearing made me realize we were still blocking the trash. “Sorry,” I said to the man waiting to get through. I grabbed JC’s shirtsleeve and tugged him back to the table where our jackets still sat waiting for us.

  “Okay, yes,” JC said as soon as we’d sat. “It’s commitment number two. But I think we can both agree that this is an important one.”

  “We could just use condoms.” But the fight was waning in my tone. Even with clean health reports and an IUD, I usually preferred the double protection. But we had already gone condom-free. And if I were truly learning to chill-the-freak-out, then maybe this was a good place to start relaxing my rules.

  There was only one issue keeping me from giving in entirely—could I trust JC to be faithful?

  JC’s persistence also diminished. “We could. I’d prefer not to. Whether we do or not won’t change that I’m only going to be with you.”

  It was weird how I believed him in my heart. He connected with me there, knew how to say things to cause a leap of faith.

  But my head still had doubts. “You’d be willing to have sex only once a week? For however long this goes on?”

  “Yes. I would. For however long this goes.” JC tapped his palm on the table. “And correction, I’d be having sex only one day a week. I guarantee you it will be more than one time.”

  The ball of want in my belly doubled inside. It didn’t matter if my head was convinced anymore—my heart believed him enough to win the ruling. Even if I didn’t say it now, I knew the next time he was inside me he would again be bare. By my choice. Not only because it was the laid-back way to be, but because I wanted him like that. I wanted him that close.

  The realization shook me. Scared me. Thrilled me. “You get to me when you say things like that. You know that, don’t you?”

  “I don’t know it.” He lowered his voice. “Now tell me how.”

  “How what?”

  “How I get to you.” His words were heavy and molten.

  I was paralyzed with heat, captured in his piercing stare. “It…it turns me on.”

  “How exactly?” When I didn’t respond he wrapped his foot around my chair and pulled me closer to the table. Then he leaned in, as if to tell me a secret. “Does it make your heart race? Does your breath feel heavy? Do I make you wet?”

  His breath edged across my ear, but it was his words as much as anything that sent a buzz straight to my core. I wanted to answer. I wanted to tell him, yes, all those things. But my voice was stuck in my throat.

  He turned his head and nuzzled the upper edge of my lobe with his nose. “See, that’s a problem, Gwen. How can I give you what you want if you aren’t able to tell me what that is?” His mouth brushed my skin, and I gasped, waiting for him to lick me, to suck me, to bite me.

  But he didn’t do anything to me. Instead, he sat back, leaving me yearning and keyed up. “We’ll work on that,” he said.

  “This time you can’t convince me that you don’t know exactly what you do to me.”

  “No, this time I can’t.” His smile was slight, like he was appraising his meal. “But I mean it—what you want, you need to ask for. If you asked, I’d get you off right here at this table.”

  “Well, that is not on my list of wants.” Though, now that he’d mentioned it…would I ever be able to do something like that? Let a man touch me, stroke me to orgasm in a public setting? The idea was terrifying.

  And really, really hot.

  Who the hell was this guy? And how the hell had he ended up in my life? “Seriously, JC. Why would you cease your fuck anyone, anytime lifestyle to shag one girl?”

  “There you are assuming again about my lifestyle.”

  “Am I wrong?” The look he gave me said that I wasn’t. It also said that he was serious about changing that. For me.

  I had to know. “Why me?”

  “Maybe you have a magic pussy.”

  “Come on. Unoriginal.” I wasn’t letting him skirt around this one.

  He shrugged. “Sleeping around gets boring. It’s work. I’m tired.”

  “I don’t believe a word of that.”

  “Too bad.” He stood and pulled his coat off the back of his chair.

  Panic surged through me. Was this pushing him too far? Was this the end of the deal or was he signaling it was time to go together? And even if it was the latter, could I give in without finding out this answer?

  No, I couldn’t. I could live without knowing anything else about him but not this. I had to understand this one thing.

  He put his coat on and looked down at me still sitting. With a sigh, he sat back down. He ran a hand through his hair. “I don’t know why, Gwen. But I want to do this with you. Maybe because I like a challenge. Maybe because I can’t stand seeing someone who’s as potentially brilliant as you shine so dully.”

  Maybe I didn’t want his answer after all. “You really need to work on the compliments.”

  He caught my eyes. “Maybe because I know that you don’t put out easily, and I like the way it feels to be the guy who gets you.”

  I melted. I was an ice queen, and with just one line, I felt a layer of cold dripping away. And for a second, I found myself imagining what it would be like to actually get attached to someone like “Just JC.” I imagined that I might be a person who could do just that.

  Then I stopped with that line of thinking. Because if I could get attached, I didn’t want this. And I wanted this. I wanted him to get me. I just had to be clear exactly what was allowed. “Gets me in bed, you mean.”

  “Yes. In bed.” He grinned. “And on counters. And all around town, if I have anything to do with it.” He waited for me to smile before going on. “You’re fun, Gwen. And you don’t know it. I’m looking forward to being the person who shows you that. Also, magic pussy.”

  I laughed now. The real joke was that he already was the only guy to get me. No one else
had ever broken through so many layers of my armor to make me smile so easily, to laugh so quickly.

  And whatever if it scared me. It didn’t mean anything other than that sex with JC was going to be fun. Fun was what I needed.

  So when he asked, “Speaking of magic pussy, do you want to get out of here?” my answer took no thought at all. “Yes. Yes, I do.”

  Chapter Seven

  This time, as we left the café, JC took my hand in his. I was giddier about the gesture than I wanted to be, which I hated. I also hated that we both were wearing gloves. I wanted skin on skin.

  We didn’t have to walk far before we caught a cab. JC gave instructions to the driver to take us to the Four Seasons Hotel. Then he chatted for a few minutes about the traffic and the Mets. After a few minutes, he sat back and removed the glove from my right hand and the glove from his left hand and entwined his fingers through mine.

  The ride was about half an hour—not long considering it was rush hour now. Neither of us talked. We’d said all we needed to at breakfast. With words, anyway. Now we spoke through the juncture of our hands, his thumb caressing across my skin, our fingers squeezing where they were laced. It was active fondling, the pressure increasing and decreasing as our hands clenched and unclenched. With his touch, he told me what was in store for the rest of my body. I could tell exactly how he’d grope me, how he’d massage me, how he’d pump me.

  It was the most erotic foreplay I’d ever experienced. By the time we arrived at our destination, I was aroused and primed for what would happen next.

  I slid out of the cab first while JC paid. He’d paid for breakfast as well. When he joined me on the sidewalk, I said, “I know you have money.” We were at the Four Seasons, after all. “But I can pay for things too.” I didn’t want to offend him—if he was the type of guy who expected to be responsible for the bill then there was no arguing it. I’d met those guys.

  If he wasn’t, then we needed to decide how the expenses would work.

  He scowled at me as he took me by my elbow and steered me through the doors. “I’m sure you can pay for things. That bothers me though. If it’s important to you to pitch in, I’ll try to deal. I don’t want you to feel like you’re being paid for services or anything.”