Chapter 60
Sixty
ADDIE
“What would you wear to fuck with Jesse?” I asked, over the phone, as I stared at a wardrobe full of clothes.
“A leopard print bikini,” Clara answered immediately.
“It’s November. Try again.”
“Well, do you want to titillate or do you want him feral?” Clara asked.
True to our word, we had spent the last five days trying to get the other to break our one and only rule.
Every conversation we had was laced with innuendo.
He seemed incapable of watching TV without a hand splayed across my upper thigh.
At any given moment, I would scratch my nails across his scalp, and his eyes would flutter in such a way that I was sure he was going to break.
Yesterday morning, he ‘forgot’ his towel and walked from the bathroom to his room fully naked and very erect at the exact same time I opened my bedroom door to get ready for the day.
Last night, I repaid the favour by making sure that he ‘accidentally’ caught me naked and grinding against a pillow on the brink of coming. On his bed.
Joke was on me for that one, though, because I was the one who almost broke when he pulled himself out and came all over his hand in less than thirty seconds.
I didn’t think either of us could make the other one any more feral at this point. But I was willing to try.
“The second one,” I answered.
“Ooh, fun. Wait, let me go ask Rachel.”
I heard my sister move through her flat and the sound of her door opening before she rapped a familiar beat on Rachel’s door.
“Oh, hey, Blondie, Rach in?”
“She is mostly present and correct.” I heard Rachel’s voice distantly. This was what I missed most when I was living in Montreal. Being a part of all the little moments in a big way.
“Ads wants to activate Eli’s baser tendencies. What should she wear?”
Rachel hummed slowly before she yelped. “Give him nothing but mere suggestion. What about that deep green jumpsuit?”
“The one with no back?” I asked. It also had long sleeves and did wonders for my arse.
“That’s the one. No! The deep red one. With the lace detailing,” Rachel said. I could hear Clara snapping her fingers.
I sighed as I reached for the jumpsuit in question in my wardrobe. “I can’t do that one up without help.”
Harmonising cackles made their way down the phone.
“My sweet, sweet macaroon, that does not sound like a problem. You just get him to wrap that body of yours up,” Clara said.
“If you time it right, you can give him a flash of your underwear, or lack thereof, so he’s fully aware of what is going on under there,” Rachel added.
Now that was a way to gain the upper hand after he had so rudely stolen it from me last night with his little display.
“I’m going to have to bust out the fancy underwear then,” I mused as I removed the jumpsuit from my wardrobe and placed it on the bed.
“I’m still a fan of the lack of, but you do you, I guess, Ads. I take it that everything else is fine and you haven’t fallen into a pit of despair at falling in love?” Rachel asked.
I flopped onto my bed next to the jumpsuit. “I’m in a pit of despair, but it’s not because I admitted that I fell in love with the former bane of my existence. I hit the wall again with my PhD.”
“Bex said that you were making good progress on that?” Clara said.
“I was and now I’m not. I have not written a single word all week. It’s fine, I’m only in a small pit of despair. I can get out of it.”
I hoped. There was a part of me that was experiencing déjà vu over the whole thing. I’d hit the wall before and never quite managed to break through. It was one of the reasons why I was still working on the damn thing after all these years.
“Let yourself ignore it and try not to care so much that you are neglecting it. Something will spark a thought, and before you know it, you’ll be back in the swing of things,” Clara said.
“Spoken like a true writer,” I joked.
“Ads, the book I was working on wouldn’t play ball, and now I am writing a whole different book, like I don’t have a deadline for the first one.
And that is completely ignoring the fact that Jesse was fucking around with an idea, and I think I might have figured out a way to make it hella romantic, so I may become a fantasy girl as well. How’s that for a true writer?”
“Your brain terrifies me,” Rachel said, awe laced in her tone.
“Rach, you are a therapist by day, and Addie teaches; your brains and the way you use them terrify me,” Clara said.
“Yes, we’re all very great. I’ve gotta go. If I’m fucking with him, then I need the timing to be perfect. Thanks for your help. Love you,” I said as I rolled off the bed.
“Love you!” Clara and Rachel cheered as I hung up.
“Hey, Eli, can you come give me a hand?” I called through the crack in my bedroom door within moments of hearing his keys.
I hovered close to the door with my jumpsuit only half on.
As he pushed my bedroom door open, I slipped my arms into the sleeves of the jumpsuit, giving him a hint of side boob and pierced nipple, and pulled it on properly.
I smirked at the guttural sound that escaped Eli as I pulled my braids over one shoulder.
“Could you do the zip up, please?”
One of Eli’s hands settled on my hip, a warm, heavy pressure against me, as his other hand reached for the zip.
His fingertips brushed against my lower back, just above the lacy hem of my knickers.
He removed the hand from my hip, leaving cool air in its wake, gently pinched the material of the jumpsuit together, and slowly pulled the zip up.
His calloused fingers tracing up my spine, along with the zip, made me shiver, and heat pooled low in my stomach.
As the zip reached the top, Eli took a step forward, and I could almost feel him flush against my back.
“All done.” His voice was low, practically a moan in my ear. I shivered again, which brought me into contact with his hard cock against my arse. He huffed out a low sound that I felt in my core.
“Thanks,” I said, sounding equally as affected as him.
Eli cleared his throat and moved away, once again leaving me feeling the cold air in his absence.
“I will see you at the front door.”
I turned around. Eli was against the door, grasping the handle. His gaze was dark as it darted around my body, watching as I moved my braids to fall down my back. His eyes zeroed in on where the hard points of my nipples were pressed against the fabric.
And I’d lost my upper hand once again.
Fuck.
This was going to be a long dinner.