Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
Savannah…
Oh, holy hell. I hadn’t expected any of that, and as I lay there, chest heaving, body still twitching from his glorious and not entirely unwelcome assault on it, I couldn’t help the suffusion of glow that rose up in me to meet his praise.
I couldn’t believe we’d just done that – in a restaurant, no less! I was terrified that someone out there had heard me, but I just couldn’t bring myself to worry about it just yet, as he took my hands and helped me to sit up.
“Take your time,” he urged.
His cock tented the front of his slacks, and I swallowed hard and tried very hard not to look, as much as I tried not to think about how much I really wanted it right this minute.
God, how I hoped that he would let it out, and slide it into me – but I was sure that was just the raging hormones thrust up to the surface by the burst of light that was the afterglow settling into my very bones.
“You good?” he asked me quietly, pressing the glass with the remainder of his bourbon into my hand. I swallowed it gratefully, hoping that it would do something, anything, to settle my jangling nervous system.
I nodded mutely.
He bent down and picked up my purse and the jeweler’s bag with my belongings in it, holding it out to me.
I took them and clutched them to my chest. He bent once more and held up my scrap of panties, making deliberate eye contact with me, before he stuffed them in his pocket.
“The bill and gratuity are paid,” he said. “When you’re ready, we’ll depart.”
“And go where?” I asked, breathy.
“For a walk,” he said with a slightly cruel smirk. “I don’t know about you, but back to my place sounds good. I’ve only just begun my fun.”
“I-I don’t know how I feel,” I said truthfully, trembling. He braced his hands on either side of my hips and leaned in, his lips by my ear. I could smell myself lightly perfuming his beard, and I really didn’t know how I felt about that.
“Not what you expected?” he asked softly.
“No,” I confessed.
He got closer, and promised with all darkness intended, “It’s only just begun and it can and will be so much better.”
I swallowed hard, my libido just about throwing a goddamned parade, while my mind quailed from the thought in dismay.
I didn’t know if I was prepared to go any further than this with him. The thought positively terrified me, to be completely honest.
I tried to sort through the tangle and static of the sensations running through me, my better judgment, and my innermost dark thoughts and feelings urging me to take the risk.
He already was the best sex I’d ever had, hands down… but the problem I had was that I was completely unsure if I could keep things compartmentalized at just sex.
Fuck!
Girl, it’s not like you have a choice, I reminded myself and slipped to the floor from the table, with a clack of my heels.
I set aside my purse and the jeweler’s bag, and huffed a breath, pulling down my skirt and smoothing it in place, ensuring nothing was hitched or stuck anywhere.
Because that was all I would need, was to go downstairs past all those people who may or may not know what we’d been up to up here and give them a show to go along with whatever little audio drama they’d been subjected to over their dinners.
I ran fingers through my curls and huffed an intrepid breath before hanging my purse over my shoulder and taking up the small bag with all the individual little boxes, including the parts of the box that’d contained my watch.
He picked up the ornate classic skeleton key and put the other hand on my back, pushing me a little ahead of him as we went for the door. I stopped and stood aside as he got the key in the old lock and opened it up, a man on the other side stepping aside for us.
He’d been standing guard, I guess, and I blushed furiously and tried like hell not to make any sort of eye contact with anyone as Corbett-fucking-Prescott guided me to the top of the stairs.
I stared resolutely at my feet, watching my footing as we descended and went all the way out through the front door and into the sultry Savannah night.
I swallowed hard and let Corbett take my hand. He led me through the throngs of people waiting outside, along the sidewalk, and to the corner, where we turned to leave the crowd behind.
He slowed his pace and looped my arm through his, resting my hand at his wrist, and covering it with his other hand.
It was an old-fashioned, gentlemanly gesture that I let him perform, even though it felt as though it was just to keep me from pulling away or making a run for it.
We didn’t speak on our stroll, and I just followed his lead, hoping that at the end of our walk, I would be allowed to just get in my car and go… although that hope was barely a glimmer on the horizon.
“Are you always so…” I groped for the right word that wouldn’t come off too insulting, but he went ahead and said it for me.
“Depraved?” he asked, simply.
“Um, yes,” I said, and could feel the color creeping up on me as it had so many times since I’d set foot in that private dining room.
“Worse, typically,” he said nonchalantly with a one-shouldered shrug. “I would put your hands to any of these garden fences if I could, and bone you where we stood if I thought I could get away with it.”
I very nearly swallowed my tongue.
“I would very much so rather not catch a public indecency charge or wind up on some sex offender registry, if it’s all the same to you.”
“Oh, I understand completely,” he said. “Modern laws on such things do tend to take the fun out of just about everything.”
“You’re outrageous.” The accusation, or rather condemnation, was out of my mouth before I could stop it.
“Why, thank you,” he said with a wicked sort of grin that said he really did take that as a compliment.
Add insufferable, too, I thought to myself, but I didn’t exactly want to push my luck by saying it out loud.
“How much farther is it?” I asked quietly, just a little further down the sidewalk.
“Uh, just a block, maybe a block and a half,” he said. I used his arm to steady myself and kicked off my shoes, bending to scoop them up to hold in my hand along with my jewelry.
“Surely you don’t intend to walk the rest of the way barefoot,” he said with an incredulous chuckle.
I shrugged my shoulders. “I’ve been in these heels all day and my feet are killing me,” I said. “It’s only a block to a block and a half. We’re going slow. I’ll watch where I step.”
He looked at me as though I had done or said something equally crazy, and I stared back at him, mollified.
“You’ll lay me out on a dining room table in the middle of a restaurant to eat my pussy, but me walking the rest of the way to your house barefoot is crazy?”
“On these streets? Yes,” he said.
“Then give me a piggyback ride,” I said boldly.
He laughed at that, and I do mean really laughed and said, “You have some surprises to you, Savannah Kittridge.” With zero preamble, he crouched down for me to get on his back.
I laughed and called his bluff, but he picked me up with ease in our nice clothes and just kept heading in that direction.
We were both giggling and laughing until we very nearly wheezed at the way some people smiled and pointed, laughing at our antics.
It wasn’t much more than a block more, and we were stopping on Charlton Street in front of a fairly non-descript door set into the brick face of the building, a low-hanging porch with wrought ironwork over our heads.
He carefully set me on my feet on the mat out front and took out his keys.
“And they say chivalry is dead,” I joked. He smiled slightly and turned the key in the lock.
“Don’t expect me to put my jacket into a puddle for you,” he said. “My Italian suits are where I draw the line.”
“Noted,” I said, and he gestured that I should go before him.
I slipped inside, and he stepped in after me, shutting the door and throwing the lock. I didn’t know what to do with myself, so I simply stood still and waited for some kind of indication of what he would like. It was awkward, but by the same token, it was his house.
“Dinner was wonderful,” I said. “Um, thank you again.”
I was trying like hell to say my goodbyes, but he wasn’t going to let me out of things that easily. He took my purse and bag from my hands, led me into the living room, switched on a lamp, and set them down on one end of the expensive leather couch.
“You’re not getting away that easily,” he murmured, and I swallowed hard. “Take off your dress,” he said, and the heat in his gaze very nearly burned me.
I pursed my lips, and he cocked his head. My face flamed, and I said, “I’d rather not if it’s all the same.” I twisted my hands together nervously in front of myself, and he smirked.
“Need a little bit of what I gave you last week to loosen you up?” he asked.
“What? No!”
“Surely you haven’t had enough.” He arched one brow as though challenging me, and I felt myself straighten.
“There is such a thing as too much of a good thing,” I countered.
He chuckled, and it was a dark sound.
“Tell you what… I’ll give you some grace and a head start. Go upstairs. I’m sure you remember which room is mine. Take off your dress, take a shower if you’d like, but, Bright Eyes, you’re not leaving until I’ve buried my cock inside you and made you come, screaming my name.”
I stood frozen, eyes locked with his, unable to move.
“Those are your choices,” he said. “Either get naked right here, right now, or get naked upstairs. Either way, you’re getting naked and I’m getting what I want.”
He was dead serious, and I thought back to what he’d said at dinner – about it being my choice to make this as pleasant or unpleasant as I wanted. I stood up a little straighter and said, “Give me twenty minutes to freshen up.”
“You have ten, now go,” he said, looking at his watch.
Oh, shit.
I didn’t waste any time. I went upstairs, padding quietly through his home, and feeling like a ghost of myself.