Chapter 22 I’m Unprincipled and Ruthless
I’M UNPRINCIPLED AND RUTHLESS
Ideal date?
Bridget: Here we go again…
Cole: I’d pick her up, and we’d go for a drink at the wine bar next door to my favorite bistro, then dinner. Don’t mess with success.
Bridget: I love an all-day date. We’d drive up the coast a little way and stroll along the beach. We’d drink margaritas and eat fish tacos from the diviest beach bar we could find. Then we’d come back and snuggle on my sofa. Too bad I don’t have time to do that anymore.
COLE
As if it required great effort, Bridget slowly lifted her head. Her pupils were huge, and her eyelids drooped. “I don’t know that I have another one in me. Give me a minute, and I’ll go down on you.”
I kissed her glistening forehead. “Of course you can have another orgasm. Maybe two or three.” My mind spun with possibilities. “You’re the most energetic adult I know.”
Her groan played right into my fantasies. “I don’t feel energetic.”
“It’s okay. I’ll do all the work.” Gently, I rolled to the side and arranged her on her back. I sat up and tugged off my shirt. Then I stood, hissing as I eased the zipper over my throbbing dick. I dropped my jeans and underwear to the floor. “Let me know if you’re too tir—”
When I glanced up, she was staring, open-mouthed, at my erection. She licked her lips. “That’s pretty impressive, Mr. Campion. I think I’m recovered.”
I couldn’t help the smile that lifted one corner of my mouth. “Stop me if I—”
“Yeah, yeah, if you do something I don’t like. Come here.”
“Don’t be bossy.” I kneeled on the bed and prowled toward her.
She propped herself up on her elbows. “What if I tell you to fuck my mouth?”
My balls tightened, and I stopped my forward progress. “Fuck, Bridget. The filthy words on your sweet lips.” I shook my head.
“What, you can dish it out, but you can’t take it? Or don’t you like a woman who takes charge?”
I wasn’t sure if I liked a woman to be in charge. I’d never dated anyone who wanted it. But I liked Bridget, a lot more than I had a week ago, and I was ready to go off before she’d even touched me.
I sat back on my heels and pressed the base of my cock to get myself back under control. “Sweetheart, if you touch me with your mouth, it’s game over. I want to come inside you, if that’s okay.”
She stared again at my dick. “You have a condom?”
“Right.” I reached back to the nightstand, opened the drawer, and pulled out the gift shop bag. I shook out the box of condoms and the small bottle of lube between us.
Her eyes widened. “You shopped at the gift store? That must’ve cost you fifty bucks!”
“Eh, it was twenty thousand colón. Who knows how much that is?”
Her jaw firmed. “You’re a finance guy. You know the exchange rate down to the penny.”
I’d never admit she was right. “Should we keep arguing about overpriced prophylactics, or should I put this on and make you come again?”
“The latter.” She bit her lip.
I was so on edge that my fingers shook when I ripped open the box of condoms. I picked one up, tore open the wrapper, and rolled it on. While I did that, Bridget gathered the scattered packets and the ruined box and set them on the table on her side of the bed.
“Lube?” I asked.
“Please.”
With my fingers trembling, it took me a minute to puncture the safety seal.
Finally, I squirted lube into my hand and rubbed it over the condom.
Fuck, I wouldn’t last long. But if I gave Bridget her climax first, she might not care.
“Spread your legs and show me that pretty pussy.” I squeezed more lube onto my palm.
Her face and chest went pink, but she did as I asked. I smoothed the lube over her labia, then dipped inside and curled my finger up, tapping and searching. She squirmed against my hand and moaned. I set my lubed-up palm over her mons and her clit and lightly rubbed a circle.
“Yes, Cole. Like that.” She collapsed back onto the pillow.
I watched her as I rubbed and tapped again. Her chest rose and fell quickly, the breath panting out between her soft lips. She was so beautiful with her normally pale skin flushed and her dark hair fanned out over the white pillowcase. Her back arched, and the tips of her small breasts were rosy.
For a second, I crowed over my luck to have this woman in my bed.
But that was a dangerous thought. She was right about this being a bad idea.
We couldn’t compete for the CEO job while we were sleeping together.
I thrust all those thoughts aside and imagined she was someone I’d picked up on the beach with no HR dilemma, no ethical conundrum, no messy feelings to get in the way.
She was a beautiful woman, and we were about to fuck.
Her breath stuttered, and she let out a cry. I was glad she was noisy in bed. It was the best feedback I’d gotten all year. When she stopped pulsing around my finger, I pulled it out and positioned myself between her legs. I set the head of my cock at her entrance. “Ready?”
“Jesus, yes.” Her smile was the most enchanting thing I’d seen on this trip, and I’d seen goddamn orchids growing out of trees in the rainforest.
“Open your eyes.”
“What?” She blinked her blue eyes open, and her focus on me felt better than any victory.
“Watch me.” I nudged the head inside her. “I wish you could see how your pussy is taking my dick.”
Her small hand landed lightly on my stomach and traced down my hip. “I’ve got a pretty good view, too.”
All those hours in the gym felt worth it when she admired my body. I pulled my hips back and thrust forward again, going a little deeper.
She arched her back, tipped up her chin, and closed her eyes. “God.” Before I could say a word, she opened them again.
“Good girl.” I leaned down to kiss her.
She buried her fingers in my hair and held me to her. I nudged further inside her. Although the lube made it an easy glide, she was tight.
She dragged her lips along my jaw to my ear. “Give it to me, Cole. I want it all,” she whispered.
With a groan, I thrust all the way inside until my hips met hers. The way she tightened around me was heaven, and the urge to fuck her with everything I had was so strong I could barely grit out the word, “Okay?”
“Yes, oh my God.” She raked her fingernails down my back.
Restraint left me. I pushed up on my arms to get the leverage I needed to pull back and slam forward.
I was close, so close. But I was also stubborn.
I licked my thumb and set it on her clit.
Fortunately, that was all it took to set off pulses inside her, and she cried out, high-pitched like the hawks we’d heard on the river.
The bed creaked as I thrust twice more. Finally, relief flooded me and I grunted as I came.
She was still squeezing around me, and my orgasm seemed to go on forever.
I never wanted it to stop. And I never wanted to stop touching this woman.
Now I wished she’d close her eyes. I struggled to master my expression so she wouldn’t see too much.
When her flutters ended, I pulled out, kissed her forehead, and strode to the bathroom.
After I’d disposed of the condom and washed my hands and face, I glared at myself in the mirror.
Those aren’t feelings you’re developing.
It’s hormones. Pull it together. You have to work with her next week.
I set my mouth in a cocky smirk, or the best facsimile I could manage after the most explosive sex of my life and sauntered back out to the bedroom.
My smirk melted when I found her with the blanket pulled up to her chin. Adorable.
I lay down beside her and turned to face her. She held up the edge of the blanket, and I scooted closer so it covered us both.
“That was…” She bit her lip.
“Yeah,” I said. I couldn’t bring myself to say we shouldn’t do it again. It was true, but now wasn’t the time to have that conversation. Not with the uncertain furrow between her eyebrows. “Amazing.”
The line on her forehead smoothed out. “Mm-hmm.” She touched my cheek, then ran her finger down my neck to my chest, twirling a finger in my chest hair. “You spend time in the gym, huh?”
“Yeah.” I inhaled to puff out my chest under her touch. “I lift, I climb, and I run.”
“It shows.” Her fingers moved to my side, then to the line at my hip. “What are these called? I don’t see them often enough to remember.”
I tightened my belly. “Inguinal crease.”
“I like it.” She traced the line. “You look like art.”
“So do you.” I set my palm on her hip. Those tight skirts at the office that had teased me relentlessly hadn’t lied. Bridget’s body wasn’t muscular like mine, but it had strength that matched her personality. Her curves were slight, but they felt good under my palms.
“I have wrinkles.” She put her hands over her face. I reached up to pull her hands away and held them, scanning. I’d just taken a breath to tell her I liked everything I saw when she said, “And don’t tell me they’re lines of experience like my friend Savannah says.”
“They’re part of you.” I brought her knuckles to my lips and kissed them. “They’re beautiful too.”
She was silent for a few seconds. “You don’t need to use a line on me after you’ve had your dick inside me.”
I tightened my hold on her hands. “Sweetheart, it’s not a line. You’re stunning, inside and out. I learned that on this trip.”
“Jesus, why do you have to say things like that?” Her cheeks went pinker.
“Because it’s true. And you may think I’m unprincipled and ruthless, but I’m not a liar.”
Her eyes searched mine as if she could find the truth if she looked hard enough. “You keep calling me sweetheart.”
“Do you hate it?” I rubbed her knuckles with my thumbs.
“No. But it won’t fly in the office.” Her lips curved up. Almost immediately, her smile faltered. “In fact, none of this is going to work when we go back home.”
I should’ve been relieved she saw this the same way I did. I should’ve agreed, fed her a line about making the most of the weekend, flipped her over, and fucked her again.
But something irrational and primal within me had claimed her, and it won the battle for my mouth.
“Sweetheart, we’ll be great together. We’ll be partners who understand each other and the burdens of the job.
I won’t complain about you working too much because I’ll be working just as hard.
We won’t make unreasonable demands of each other. It’ll be perfect.” Just like you.
She bit her lip again and stared off over my shoulder for a minute like she was imagining it too. Then she met my gaze. “Maybe if we weren’t competing for the same job. But that’s our reality, and this can’t be a part of it. This is over as soon as we get on the plane home.”
I set our clasped hands over the part of my chest that twinged. “Okay.” I kissed her forehead and tucked her head under my chin. “Let’s take a nap.”
I listened to her breathing even out in sleep, and when I closed my eyes, I dreamed of returning to my condo with my suitcase. I opened my closet door, and instead of my row of oxfords, wingtips, and brogues, a lineup of Bridget’s sky-high heels in every color filled my shelf.
I wasn’t even mad about it.