by Cathryn Fox
“They like you,” she says.
“Well, I’m pretty sure they knew what we were doing all night. Not sure if you’re okay with that or not. When they saw me I dodged them. I didn’t want to do or say anything that would make you uncomfortable.”
Her eyes soften when she looks at me, her gratitude evident. “They’re the ones who told me to go for it with you.”
“Oh yeah.”
She reaches out, puts her hand on mine, and the softness of her skin messes with my thought process. “I don’t sleep around, Tate. This,” she says and glances around the room, “was my very first one-night stand.”
“Oh.” Okay, so I didn’t expect that. Then again, is it the truth? I study her face, find nothing in it to tell me she’s lying, but a good con is hard to read.
“Not that there is anything wrong with a woman having many different partners. We should own our sexuality. As long as she’s sensible and safe, it’s okay to have sexual freedom.”
Curious to know more about her, I ask, “If you feel that way, then why is this the first time for you?”
She goes quiet, and looks down at her food, giving me the sense that she’s trying to choose her words carefully. Last night she was open and honest, but the lawyer in me senses that in the light of day she’s hiding something. Just like Granddad was. I should come right out and ask her about him, and why he’s signing half his estate over to her. So why don’t I? Because I can’t risk messing this up before I’ve learned anything useful at all. For now, I have to keep going.
“I’ve just...been busy with other things in my life,” she says, a vague answer, which confirms my suspicions. “What about you, Tate? You said you didn’t have great role models in your life. Tell me more about yourself.” She picks up a slice of bacon and nibbles on it.
This time it’s me who is choosing their words carefully. “Let’s just say, the women in my life turned out to be different than I thought they were.”
“I’m sorry.” A log in the fire crackles and she smiles. “How long do you have this chalet?”
“The entire week.” Not a lie. I dig into my food, hungrier than I thought. No surprise, really. I haven’t had a night like last night in...ever. I mean, sure, I’ve had sex before, plenty of it. But come to think of it, I’ve been so busy setting up my own practice and worried about Granddad that it’s been months. That’s probably why last night was so incredible.
Her eyes light up. “Winterfest starts tomorrow. I hear a lot of the proceeds go to the local hospitals, with each event donating to a different department. I think that’s wonderful.” She takes another sip of coffee, looks at me over the rim. “Are you taking part in any of the festivities?”
“Probably. Staff usually are involved. I’m sure Henry will let me know what he needs.”
“Henry.”
“My manager at the bar.” She crinkles her nose. “What?”
“You like working here?” I nod. I always liked working here when I was younger, but that’s not what she’s really asking. She’s asking if I have any higher aspirations. Summer Love would never settle for a simple bartender. Another clue that she’s a gold digger? My stomach twists at that thought, because the more I’m around her, the more I get the sense that she’s not that girl.
“I like it,” I say.
“I can see the allure. Do you miss the States?”
Just then my cell phone rings. Saved by the fucking bell. Praying it’s Granddad, I pull it from my pocket and check the display. Shit, it’s my new receptionist, Helen. She’s been going over candidates for the law firm. I’m in need of a junior partner. “Excuse me for a minute. I have to take this.” I step into the privacy of the bedroom and answer the call. When I’m done, I walk back into the main room and catch Summer texting. She sets her phone down and smiles up at me.
“Everything okay?”
No. Nothing is okay, but being here with her like this, locking the outside world out for a few hours, makes everything better.
I am so fucked.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Summer
I SIP THE STRAWBERRY daiquiri in front of me, my body on hyperdrive, unable to stop staring at the hot bartender as he takes orders a few feet away from me. I shift in my seat, my stubble-abraded body stinging in the most glorious ways. My muscles hurt as I move, but I love the reminder as well as the finger bruises I discovered on my hips this morning.
Two girls sidle up to the bar and take a seat. Tate turns his attention to them, and out of nowhere, a wave of jealously surges inside me when one of the pretty ski bunnies leans into Tate and whispers something in his ear. He laughs, and she slides a napkin across the counter. No doubt her room number. Tate accepts it and shoves it into his back pocket. I have no idea if he plans to meet up with her or not, and I truthfully shouldn’t care. I mean, come on, I’ve only had sex with the man once. Okay, well maybe it was more like four times—but all in the course of one night, which means I have no claim to him, no right to feel jealous.
This is just sex, Summer. Don’t go mixing it with emotion.
“So, how was he?” Cara asks, and nibbles on her straw.
“I don’t kiss and tell,” I say, and give her a coy smile.
“We don’t want to know how he kisses. We want to know how he was in bed,” Amber pipes in. “How big was his cock?”
I laugh and shake my head. “That is none of your business.”
Amber blinks long lashes over pleading eyes. “Come on, Summer. I’d tell you, and since I’m currently going through a dry spell, give me something. You can’t have sex with the hottest guy around and not share a few details.”
“Okay, fine. We went to his chalet—”
“He has a chalet?” Amber crinkles her nose and I follow her gaze, take in Tate once again. He’s dressed in a black button-up work shirt and jeans, his hair falling in his eyes as he reaches for something under the bar. He stands again, and despite the fact that he’s not in a tie, he smooths his hand over his chest, in typical James fashion. Such a funny thing that Tate would have the same gesture as my patient. I think about that for a moment, notice the way he carries himself, like a man of great authority. If it weren’t for the too longish hair and bartending job, one could easily mistake him for a man who comes from means. I’m just glad he’s not. I doubt I’d be able to connect with him the same way if he was—the only rich guy I’ve found myself able to trust is James.
“How can he afford a chalet?” Cara asks, pulling my thoughts back.
“He has a friend who’s out of town and lent it to him.”
“How fortunate that it fell on the same week we’re here.”
“Very fortunate,” I say. “But I do have a whole penthouse suite to myself. We could have gone there. Then again, it probably wouldn’t look good if he was caught sneaking out of my room every morning. They probably have rules about staff fraternizing with the guests.”
Amber’s eyes light up, catching on to the one thing I was sure she would. “So this wasn’t just a one-night stand?”
“I think I’d like to make it a one-week stand?” I say, my body remembering all the ways he touched me with his hands, his mouth, his magnificent cock.
“Yes,” Amber says, and does a fist pump. It catches Tate’s eyes and he looks our way. I give him a smile and he grins back.
“You so deserve a week of fun and hot, dirty sex.”
“Who said it was dirty?”
Amber laughs. “I saw the way you were walking this morning.”
“Ohmigod, Amber,” I say, shaking my head.
“What does Tate think about a weeklong fling?”
“I don’t know, actually. After breakfast this morning, he had to get ready for work, and I spent the day on the slopes with you girls, so we never really talked about it.” I sip my drink and look at my friends. “Besides, it’s not ta
lking I want to do with him.”
“Talking is overrated,” Amber says, and we all laugh.
I steal another glance at Tate, but then my view is blocked when a man steps up to our table.
“How’s it going?” he says, a slight slur to his voice as he glances at us. “Can I buy you ladies a drink?”
I hold up my half-empty glass. “Already have one, thanks.”
He frowns, and checks in with the other girls, and after we all decline him, he gestures with the beer in his hand to where he’s sitting with a group of guys. They’re all leering at us, and it makes my skin crawl. “If you change your mind, I’m over there. I’m Bill, by the way.”
“Thanks, Bill,” I say, never one to be outwardly rude, even to a drunk guy trying to pick me up. Bill stumbles back toward his friends, and suddenly Tate is at our table.
“Everything okay here?” he asks, his eyes landing on mine.
“Everything is great.”
He gestures with a jerk of his thumb. “You need me to take care of that guy?”
It’s ridiculous how the feminine side of me reacts to his protectiveness. “We already did,” I say. “But I appreciate the offer.”
He nods, the muscles along his jaw tense. If I didn’t know better I’d say he was jealous, about to start pounding his chest and intimidating all the other men in the bar. But that can’t be right. We’ve only had one night of sex, which I’m hoping to rectify shortly.
His eyes flicker to our drink glasses. “I’m just about to go on break, but I was wondering if I could get you ladies anything else?”
As a matter of fact, you can.
“How about another round of drinks,” I say, and put my hand on his arm. He takes a breath, and I love the effect I have on him. No man has ever reacted to me like this before. Then again, maybe they have and maybe I ignored it because none of those men were Tate.
“Sure thing,” he says on a rasp. I pull my bottom lip between my teeth to stop myself from grinning; but when he turns and I glance at my friends, they’re shaking their heads.
Cara fans herself. “I was pretty sure he was about to take Bill down caveman-style.”
“The tension between you two is off the charts,” Amber adds.
“And I plan to do something about that.” I glance at the bar, watch Tate make our drinks. He hands them over to a female server, and his eyes meet mine before he disappears down a long staff-only hallway—off-limits to patrons. Am I going to let that stop me? Hell no. “You two wouldn’t mind excusing me for a minute, would you?”
“A minute? It had better be more like thirty,” Amber says, and gives me a suggestive wink.
I climb from my chair and adjust the clip in my hair, piling it high on my head, the way I always do to keep it off my face. As I make my way toward the hall, my heart pounds harder. I can’t believe I’m in a bar, in the Swiss Alps, about to have sex in some back room with a bartender. This is so not like me, but holy hell, I’ve never done anything so brazen, so exciting, in my entire life. I walk by some storage room just as a door opens. I jump, fearing my seduction has been foiled and I’ll get kicked out of the place for trespassing, when Tate emerges.
His head rears back, and his eyes widen when they land on me. “Summer,” he says as he smooths one hand over his chest again while the other flicks the storage room light off. He glances left, then right. “What are you...”
His words fall off when I give his chest a little shove, sending him back into the storage room, and follow him in. I shut the door, push him against the wall and go up on my toes to kiss him.
“Holy fuck,” he murmurs.
“Exactly,” I say, letting my eyes adjust to the dark. For a brief moment, he stiffens, like he’s having second thoughts. “I want you, Tate. Right here, right now.”
His body softens, well, all except for one part, and his hands slide around my back to capture my ass. He tugs me hard against his erection, and I let loose a little whimper of need. I deepen the kiss, and he moans into my mouth. What we’re doing is risky and inappropriate, but I don’t care. I want this. I want him.
“I’ve been thinking about your cock all day,” I whisper into his mouth, as my hands rake through his hair.
“You want my cock again?” he asks, his voice changing tone, dropping an octave.
“I’ve never stopped wanting it,” I say, bolder than I ever have been before.
“When I was behind that bar, saw you sitting there all hot and sexy, all I could think about was putting my tongue inside your hot pussy again, and tasting your sweetness.”
Oh God!
My entire body quakes, and in the light coming from under the door, I catch his grin. Yeah, he knows how much I love his brand of dirty talk.
“You like the idea of that, Summer?”
“Yes,” I say.
“Then you’ll let me fuck you with my tongue, feast on you and make you come?”
“Yes...please...”
He growls, low and deep, like an animal ready to attack. “Will you let me do anything else I want to do to you, right here in this storage room, where we could get caught at a moment’s notice?”
I’m not sure if it’s the risk of getting caught that makes this a hundred times hotter and dirtier, or hearing how he’s going to fuck me with his tongue, feast on me. Either way, I’m shaking all over, and eager for him to do just that.
“Yes, but I want your cock in my mouth again.”
As if my words unleashed the beast inside him, he tears into my jeans, and the hiss of my zipper cuts through the room. Am I really going to have dirty sex with Tate in a public place. Hell yeah!
His lips devour mine, then move to my neck. “You are the sexiest woman I’ve ever met,” he says, as he presses hot, openmouthed kisses to my flesh. I tug at him, tear at the buttons on his shirt, wanting my hands on his magnificent body. Buttons pop, scattering on the floor, in my haste to get my hands on him.
“Sorry,” I murmur.
Not sorry.
“I have another,” he says, dipping his fingers into the front of my jeans as I shove his shirt from his shoulders. I lean into him, press my lips to his chest and breathe in his scent. It wraps around me, and hijacks my thoughts. The pad of his finger circles my swollen clit, and I cry out in sexual frustration, eager for him to slide it inside me.
“Tate.”
“Yeah,” he murmurs.
“Touch me.”
“I am touching you,” he says, teasing me with slow small circles that come close but never quite hit their mark. “And I have to say, I love finding you wet like this. Christ, you’re dripping all over my hand.”
I clench his shirt in my fists, and buck forward, but he continues to tease me with those damn barely there touches.
“I can’t wait to get my mouth on you again. You’re going to taste so fucking good.” His finger swirls, slides along my folds, then finally dips into my quaking sex before he centers it on my clit. I whimper, move against him. A needy girl not afraid to show him what his touch does to my body.
“Please, Tate, I want to come all over you.”
“You’ll come. You’ll come so fucking hard, Summer, you won’t be able to walk out of here. But when I leave this room, I want your scent all over my fingers and cock. I want your sweet aroma to linger on my skin when I’m back at the bar, thinking about all the things I’m going to do to you tonight when I get off.” He chuckles against my flesh, and then his throat makes a grinding sound when he swallows. “You know, I was so goddamn thirsty tonight.” His mouth nuzzles my ear, his hot words vibrating through me and taking me to a place I’ve never been before. “Water wouldn’t even quench my thirst, but I know what will.” He turns me, puts a hand on my stomach and presses me against the wall. Then he sinks to his knees. I move my hips, eager to get out of my pants.
“Stay
still,” he commands in a rough voice, and I stop rocking. I take deep shallow breaths and blink in the dimly lit room, as he takes charge of my pleasure—and I let him. The rustle of my jeans reaches my ears as he hooks his fingers through the belt loops of my pants and tugs them down my legs, taking my thong with them.
He nuzzles my sex, his breath like fire on my skin as he breathes me in. “So fucking perfect,” he murmurs, then takes one of my legs, lifts it and places it on one of the shelving units beside me. I stand before him, back against the wall, pants somewhere on the floor, my pussy spread wide-open, his for the taking. We’re in the dark, but I never felt so bare, so exposed...so worshiped.
He touches me with his finger. “So hot and wet and needy,” he murmurs. “Exactly how I like you.” He leans in and licks me, a long, languid slide from bottom to top.
“Yes,” I cry out, louder than I should. I grip his hair and curl my hips into him. “Fuck me with your tongue,” I say rawly—maybe his brazen words are rubbing off on me. He laps at me, slow and gentle at first but then his tongue stiffens, whips my clit, until I’m writhing against his mouth. “That is so goood.”
He treats my clit to a good lashing. I cry out and he pushes his tongue inside me. I quake around him, so damn close to release it’s insane. Delirious with need, I buck against his face as he greedily eats at me. He jabs his tongue in and out of my hot core, his thumb pressing against my lust-inflamed clit. I toss my head from side to side, barely able to get air in my lungs.
He thrusts a finger inside me, his mouth and fingers changing position, and when my muscles slacken, grow weak, I hold his hair tighter. He softens his tongue, presses it flat against my clit as his fingers probe deeper. God, that feels incredible. I moan, my throat too tight to pass words.
“I wish I could see you better. I love the look on your face when you come for me,” he says, and just like that my body gives in to the pleasure. I stand on boneless legs and suck in a wheezing breath as I clench hard around him, drawing his finger deeper into my body. I concentrate on the pulses of pleasure, as my release drips down his hand and my thighs, hotter, wetter than I’d been the night before.