Chapter 40 Mirrors Might’ve Been Made for This
Sitting in the passenger side of Issac’s car must be one of my top ten favorite pastimes. Especially now. I unabashedly stare at him as he drives, find everything he does sexy. From the way he spins the wheel to how he tilts his head while concentrating on the lyrics of a song. I know what his tongue tastes like, so when he flicks it over his lips and glances at me with his dark shades on, I can’t stop smiling.
“What are you thinking about?”
“Nothing,” I say. “You’ve already got a big enough head from what your followers say about you. You don’t need any more compliments.”
Articles this morning were looking for different ways to praise him. There wasn’t one negative thing in the tabloids about the exhibition. He’s gaining more followers by the minute.
“Do you find me handsome, Laniah Thompson? Irresistible? Sexy?”
“Shut up and drive, Issac Jordan.” His dimples carve out his face when he smiles. I lean over and lick one. He laughs and puts his hand on my thigh, and I spend the rest of the ride with my face in my phone so he can’t tell how good he makes me feel. He’s a tease and I won’t give him the satisfaction. And I need a distraction from the good feelings myself.
Mom called me an hour ago to give me updates on how we’re doing with stocking products and about the discussions she’s made with Sherry on ways to get better advertisement for the shop. I e-sign some documents so Sherry can get started. Then answer Katrina’s text messages about my dress from last night. Because Holy Shit. Wow. Can I borrow it to wear to my second interview? I’ll look like a queen.
She tells how fitting the company felt when she had the first interview with them, but she’s nervous she’s underqualified, though she won’t tell them that.
The job is already yours, I text, then we type it into existence together. We’ll go to New York for a weekend to celebrate soon.
Bridget texts about the exhibition too, saying, Way to make a man drool, my dear. Maybe I’ll be giving you my grandmother’s blue diamond earrings for your wedding, after all.
I blush, imagining me and Issac getting married, then push the wild thought from my head and text, Got the style cues from you. How’s reconciling with Wilma going?
Bridget texts, You’ll be happy to hear the man in room 1010 got kicked out and I didn’t have to get in trouble for harassment.
I’m happy I won’t have to worry about him pressing charges on you, I reply. But don’t ignore me regarding Wilma. She made the first move. I think it was pretty brave.
Are you calling me a chicken?
I break out the best corny line I’ve got and know she’ll be rolling her eyes for days. Even the chicken crossed the road, B.
What if the chicken isn’t exactly the best at articulating how she feels?Bridget replies, and I realize we have this in common.
Sometimes all it takes is a Hi, I text, but she doesn’t write back.
When Issac pulls up to the botanical garden, he reverses into a spot instead of doing it the simpler way, and even though it’s arguably pointless, I find it sexy too. He pulls off his sunglasses. “Do you want to come inside? You can look around the garden if you’d like.”
“I’d like to be anywhere with you, please,” I say, and the honest admission, a hint of pleading for closeness in my voice, surprises even me.
Issac stares at me with the softest expression. Then he leans to kiss my collarbone. “I want that too.”
As we walk up to the garden, I’m astonished by the sun glinting off the floor-to-ceiling windows and creating a slight shimmer above the grass. Memories of the exhibition flash through my mind while we walk hand in hand through the entrance and step into the main greenhouse together. We’re here during off hours so it’s empty save for one person standing across the room, fiddling with some vines.
“That would be management,” Issac says, squeezing my hand before walking toward him.
The garden is just as gorgeous as it was last night but there’s something ethereal about seeing this space with the sun touching the flora below. While Issac converses, I walk around the room, dip my fingers into the fountain, smell the gardenias, trace the lines of creeping fig vines.
Sometime later, I see him walking toward me and realize the manager has gone somewhere.
“When you entered the room last night,” he says, a few feet away now, touching the grapevine above our heads, “there was no one else.”
I imagine a thousand butterflies beating their wings in my belly when Issac looks at me the way he is right now. “Yeah?” I ask, my throat thick with feeling.
“Yeah,” he breathes. “Surrounded by a sea of people, by nature and moonlight, and I’ve still never seen anything more stunning in my life.”
Why did I ask for confirmation? If I don’t keep control over my heart, those butterflies inside of me will carry it right to him. I clear my throat. “Are we alone here?”
It takes him a second to realize what I’m asking. He nods. “The manager is the only one on the grounds right now, but he said he had to go deal with a water issue in the garden outside.”
A thought comes to me, a rush of a feeling. I smile and take a step closer, placing my hand flat on his chest. “Is that all you thought when you first saw me?”
Something hesitant flickers in his eyes, but then he leans forward, mouth brushing the shell of my ear. “I was fantasizing about what it would be like to take your dress off and do ungodly things to you.”
I swallow, voice hoarse with want. “Tell me exactly how you would’ve done it.”
He takes a step back and tilts his head. “Laniah Thompson, my sweet, private Ni, are you trying to seduce me here?”
“You said we’re alone.”
“I can’t promise for how long.”
“Water problems usually take a while,” I say, running my fingers over my collarbone.
He tracks the movement with his eyes, covers his mouth, hides a smile. I think his protectiveness will win; I think my courage will dissolve. But he pulls me to a space filled with dense plant life before pushing on a strap of my dress until it falls off my shoulder.
“I would’ve started like this,” he says, and the raw sound in his throat makes me ache. When he moves on to my other strap, he glances into my eyes for permission, and I place my hand over his to help him push it down.
My slip dress falls to the floor and Issac stands back to see me better. His gaze moves up my body the way it did at the exhibit. This time, the hunger is easier to notice. “After the dress was off, I’d enjoy the sight of you. Your supple breasts, the curve of those hips.”
He swallows, and I reach to touch his Adam’s apple, needing to feel him again, wishing he’d grab my hips and suck my breasts and stop teasing me. He closes his eyes for a few seconds. When he opens them again, it’s easy to tell he’s come undone. He begins to circle me, unfastening the buttons on his shirtsleeve before spinning me around. “Then I’d tell you to watch me enjoying you,” he says, and I stare at us through a mirror that’s still standing after the exhibition. He’s behind me, bending his head and pushing my curls to the side to give him better access to my neck. He brushes his lips over my bare skin, sucks there softly, bites down.
“Vampire,” I sigh, pushing my body into him.
“Can you blame me? You’re beautiful. Look at yourself.”
He unhooks my bra, runs his hands up and down my sides, squeezes my hips, plays with my nipples. We both watch my areolas darken. He hardens against my back. I turn in his arms, touch him through his pants, stroking softly while he moans at the feel of my fingers through the fabric.
“I want you,” I whisper.
He stills my hand, places his forehead against mine, panting a little. “You don’t know how much I want you.”
“So show me.”
He smiles, kisses my mouth, says, “Alright.”
But as Issac leads me through the room, my heart races, suddenly aware of what I’ve asked for, how risky it is. Even standing on the cliffside might be safer than this. The bench he takes me to is surrounded by an arch of flowers, and I think he’ll bend me over it, but he sits me down instead. He’s towering above me, stiff in my face, when I ask if he’ll let me taste him.
“No,” he says. “I’m going to eat your pussy, and you’re going to like it.”
This time, when he drops to his knees, I don’t refuse. When he lifts my legs and plants the first kiss between them, I don’t worry about what my heart is doing. When he uses the flat of his tongue for a slow torturous sweep, I don’t tell him to stop. I forget where we are.
“Shh.” He smiles against my swollen lips. “We should keep quiet.”
“I’ll try,” I tell him.
“Good girl,” he says, before burying his face between my thighs.
I rock my hips, wrap my legs around him, and when he starts to make circles with his tongue, I cry out.
“You’re not being a good girl,” he says, and nips me softly with his teeth.
I pull his hair and he tells me I taste so damn sweet, then makes a wounded sound when I push him away.
Our eyes lock, his glossy. I’m panting, he’s licking his lips.
“What’s wrong?” He glances toward the entryway before focusing on my face. “Scared?”
“I just don’t want to cum that way.”
His lips twitch. “How do you want it?”
I stand up, he does the same. We’re face-to-face when I unbuckle his jeans, push his pants down till they fall to his ankles. His boxers go next. “Sit down,” I tell him.
“Whatever you want,” he says.
I glance at the sun coming through the open ceiling and then at myself in the mirror behind him. With all the flora and light and greenery around my body, I feel like I can float. Issac kisses my navel, then drags me down into his lap. I grind against him at first, both of us groaning. But when he pushes himself inside of me, I cry out, unprepared for how much bigger it would feel in this position. He clamps a hand over my mouth, allowing me to suck and moan and cry into his fingers while adjusting on top of him with slow movements.
“Watch how good we look,” he whispers, and I whimper at his words, knowing he must be watching us in the mirror behind me too.
We are glorious with the sun beating down on our bodies, but when he sucks my breasts and uses my hips to rock me against him, it’s hard to watch anything. And in this moment of pleasure and connectedness, here among ever-growing things, I’ve never felt more alive.