Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
Lesson Three: Aptly named—Third Base.
“So what does third base entail?” Virginia asks on the cab ride from the restaurant.
“What we did the first night we met. That was third base.” I don’t tell her how much I’ve missed touching her intimately, possessively, and with a purpose—to get her off, which gets me off.
“I’ve missed that.” A sigh that’s reminiscent of a girl that has loved before whisks from her lips.
“You missed making out?”
“I’ve missed making out with you.”
I lean over and kiss her because damn she just can’t say things like that without expecting me to touch her in some way. Call me a greedy bastard. What can I say? It’s been too long since I’ve been with a woman.
Actually it’s been weeks, ever since this amazing woman walked into The Hideaway. I feel like I should send her a condolence bouquet now. Hell knows I’m going to need all the strength I can gather to not act like a baby whale discovering it’s blowhole for the first time.
Damn bro. I shake my head at myself. I’m so broken. My humor falls flat at my feet. Even I’m not entertained by my usually amusing self. Maybe tonight will heal both me and my quick wit.
She says, “I love kissing you.”
“I love . . .” Eh, eh, eh. I’m not going there. She smiles as if she knows the slip that almost slid right out of my mouth.
I pay the driver and we get out in front of a modern building surrounded by other more contemporary architecture.
“We’re here.”
“I sort of had you pegged for a brownstone walkup kind of girl.”
She twirls in front of me, the wine going to her head and freeing her spirit.
“I like keeping you guessing.” “That you do, my dear. That you do.” The door is opened for us, and we walk in.
“I can appreciate the modernist approach to real estate and the boom in condos that are sleek with clean lines.” What I won’t go into with her is that this building is so similar to the one I used to live in.
Once I left the hustle and bustle of the city I needed to change everything and that’s when I bought my building.
It was dilapidated and almost condemned for the missing windows and doors.
Four stories of character and old Brooklyn history were almost demolished.
I made the city a deal they couldn’t refuse and took on the project with my contractor who was working on my bar.
After one and a half years of renovations, the first three floors of apartments were done.
The fourth floor—my future residence should be done within the next month if the weather cooperates.
The full floor with private elevator and an entire rooftop terrace will be all mine. Years of hard work and dreams have been sunk into my business and building a better life than I once had. I can appreciate her building with the doorman and amenities, but I don’t miss this lifestyle.
She takes my hand and we walk through the brightly lit lobby to the stainless steel elevators.
Virginia said hello to the doorman when she passed and wished the lobby clerk a good evening.
It’s little things like that, small gestures that say more about the kind of person she is than the louder ploys for attention she thinks she needs to attract the asshole.
The elevator doors open and I swing her inside and pin her to the wall. “How are you still single, Ms. Ryan?”
“You tell me, Mr. Richard.” She glances to the buttons and says, “Twenty-three.”
I hit the button and when the doors close, I run my nose along her neck, taking in her scent.
“You’re beautiful but stubborn, intelligent but with the tiniest bit of naivety.
You’re strong and defiant, sexy, and demure.
” Touching her lips, I lean in and kiss the corners.
“You are a siren wearing an angel’s halo. What am I going to do with you?”
She’s almost breathless, but her hand slides around my neck, and says, “Anything you want.”
My mouth covers hers and our lips part, our tongues engaging. Bending down just enough to find the hem of her dress under her coat, I start slowly, methodically dragging the fabric up with my hand. “I’m going to eat your p—”
The elevator dings and the doors open. We both release a breath as the tension escapes the elevator and we walk off hand in hand. She says, “Hold that thought.”
“I’ll do more than hold it, babe.”
“That’s what I’m counting on, professor.”
“Professor? I like that.” She leads me down a corridor and around a turn. Her apartment is at the end. The key unlocks it and I hold the door while she enters first.
“My Professor of Romance.”
My eyebrows waggle and I run the palm of my hand over the round of her ass. “I had no intentions of romancing you tonight.”
“Want to come inside?”
“Do I ever?”
This time she breaks character and laughs. “You really do have a talent for the sexual innuendoes.”
“I’ve listed it as a skill on my résumé.” The view is great. The city is lit up just outside the large living room windows, reminding me so much of my past.
“I bet you did. Drink? I have a great pinot noir.”
Running my hands through my hair, I can feel my veins twisting to find some of my old self inside. I’m not sure if I should give in or block the feelings from resurfacing. Gentle. I want to be gentle with her and if I let the past seep back in I might not be. “Do you have whiskey?”
She hangs her coat and bag on some hooks by the door. “I bought a bottle of Jack Daniels. I wanted you to feel at home.”
I do. Too much in this environment. “Thanks.”
“You’re the cocktail expert, but can I make it for you?”
“Yes. Thank you,” I reply, looking over at her in the kitchen. “I like mine neat.”
“Is that without ice?”
“Yes.” I walk to the large window. It’s not floor to ceiling like mine, and her apartment is a lot warmer.
It has a very Virginia feel throughout. Music starts to play, Frank Sinatra singing Christmas carols.
I always preferred Dean Martin, myself. He never kowtowed to the establishment.
Ol’ Blue Eyes was good, and damn talented, but Dean held his own while holding a martini in the other hand.
Virginia stands next to me, keeping her eyes forward. “I rented it for the view.” She turns to me. When I look at her, she hands me my drink. “And it’s close to work.”
“Do you like what you do?” I take a heavy sip and watch her over my glass.
Her smile is one I’ve seen a million times when patrons at the bar are asked the same question.
It’s what they do, not who they are. It’s another reason the bar does so well.
They can shed their responsibility and just have a good time.
“I like numbers. I’m that geek who can get lost in the combinatorics of Euler’s equation all afternoon.”
“Yet you picked The Met Fifth Avenue instead of Breuer.”
“I love the geometry of contemporary art, but I find beauty in the ages of art and how it was depicted through the different cultures. Anyway, it’s good to see things outside of your comfort zone.”
“Have you ever been pressed against a window, exposed in ways that leave your soul bare like your body and kissed with so much passion that you can’t and won’t constrain it to only your lips?”
Her mouth is open, her breath deepening. “Good God. Warn a girl.” She’s fanning herself with her hand and turns to look back out the window.
“Answer me.”
From my tone, my expression, she understands the gravity of my question. “No, Hardy. I haven’t. Have you?”
“No, but I want to. I want to take you to that place where you forget that others might see and begin to crave that they do. And if they have never experienced the edge of that blissful abyss, they get a glimpse into what true ecstasy can be.”
Her body is closer, her chest heaving. I can hear her breath. I witness the way she licks her lips. Resting my hand over her heart, I feel the pounding—begging for more. She whispers, “I want that.”
“How badly?”
“Enough to know I’m ready for lesson four.”
Moving my hand to her cheek, I say, “No, you’re not, but you’re ready for me and lesson three.”
I take her drink and mine and set them down on the windowsill. “Do you remember what we did in the office?”
“Everything. I think about it all the time.”
Smiling, I take her left hand in mine and put my other on the curve of her waist. “Dance with me again.”
Her silent permission is enough for us to start moving, our bodies pressed together, and her head leans on my chest. I wrap my arms around her and we sway. Rubbing her back, I close my eyes and appreciate that I’ve been given a chance to hold her.
And to kiss her like this. Leaning back, I find her chin and turn it up to mine. “I want you,” I whisper, and then kiss her, her lips taking to mine as if they should never be apart.
They shouldn’t. That’s a conversation for another day. Lesson three awaits . . .
Letting my hands roam as if she was mine, I grab her ass and squeeze her against me, enough so she can feel how she affects me. Her body starts moving of its own accord. “You want this. I can feel it. I can tell. Your body gives you away. Where’s your mind?”
“On you.”
“Good, baby. So good.” I take a step back. “Sit on the sill.”
“There?” She points to the windowsill behind her. It looks to be wide, like eight inches or so.
“Yes, Virginia. There.”
She holds my gaze for a hard moment before she backs up and sits next to our drinks.
Keeping my voice steady, I use my experience to show her a new side of sex, one where she doesn’t have to feel unsteady about the next step. She can just sit back and enjoy. The pleasure will truly be mine. “I’m thirsty.”
Lifting the glass of whiskey next to her, she starts to raise it but detours and with the little vixen’s eyes on me, she takes a long pull of the amber liquid.
No scrunched face in reaction from the strength of alcohol.
No, not her. She takes it like she loves it, keeping her eyes on me the whole time in challenge.
Then her tongue dips out to lick her lips as she hands the glass to me.
My tongue dips in response, wishing I were licking her lips instead of mine.
I take the glass from her and drink, finishing it.
Reaching forward I set the glass back down on the sill and hold her head, angling it up to me.
I kiss her lips, too tempted to stay away.
Our lips part and our tongues pick up dancing where our bodies left off.
When a little moan is given from her to me, my right hand moves down over her soft skin and I run a fingertip under the top of her dress. “You’re so beautiful.”
“You always say that,” she whispers. With a shaky smile, she touches my neck, her fingers curving around holding me close to her. “You know I’m a sure thing, right? It’s part of the whole plan.”
Plan . . . the damn plan. “I say it because I think it and because you deserve to hear it.” I’m going to make her forget all about that fucking plan.
Kneeling before her, I slide my palms over her knees, her sexy little knees, and part them.
They don’t go far until I start to slide the skirt of her dress higher on her outer thighs.
Breathy with stiff arms holding her in place, she tugs that bottom lip under with her teeth. “I’m going to make you feel so good, V.”
With my eyes latched on hers, I slide my hand up her inner thigh until I reach her paradise, a private haven where she greets me with my name sounding closer to a sin than the moniker my family intended. “Hardy.”
My smirk is fast and quick, opposite of how I plan on touching her. “What is it? What do you want, baby? Tell me.”
Her eyes leave mine when she turns her head to the side, dipping it down in a gesture that comes in the form of an unhealthy helping of disgrace.
I’m just not going to have that. “Look at me.” My hand stops, although still warm against her softness.
“Now.” When she does look at me, I say, “Clear your head. There’s nothing to be embarrassed about between us.
Don’t let demons in that have no place here.
” I rub her temple. “Or here.” Moving my hand to her chest over her heart, I tap.
“Or even here.” I move my other hand, lovingly, gently, caressing her soft folds with the back of my fingers.
“All of you—mind, body, and heart—have to want this, need to feel pleasure instead of shame.”
“This is why I’m still a virgin. If one thing was out of sync and I let any negativity or fear in, it grew.”
“You’re not going to do that with me. You know why?”
“Why?”
“Because you know I’m here for you. You can slow this down. You can tell me to stop, and I will. Anything you want, I want.”“I’ve been called a tease.”
“This is about you overcoming the girl you were in the past and embracing the woman you are now. The woman who lives without regret or fear, who owns her sexuality and who takes what she wants just for the pleasure in it.” I find her clit, her body responding, I ask, “So tell me, Virginia, what do you want?”
“That.” Her answer is pointed. Her eyes full of the lust I feel for her.
“Do you want my hand or do you want my mouth on you?” Her body responds, my hand wet with her desire, and I glide my tongue over my bottom lip waiting for her answer.
Fighting her shyness, her reserved nature when it comes to sex, she takes a deep breath, closes her eyes, and leans her head against the glass, letting her body relax under my touch. “I want your mouth on me, Hardy.”
“Where? Tell me where you want me.”
“I want your mouth on my pussy.”
Green eyes look into mine and she finds that moxie that usually only comes out when she’s feeling sassy. “Take off my panties, Hardy.” My smile is wide and I’m more than happy to assist in getting her naked. Taking them by the lace I slip them down her thighs and over her calves.
Black patent. Red soles. High as the fucking sky heels.
Fucking shoes. Literally. Even if I get her completely naked, these shoes are going to stay on.
She leans back against the glass of the window and I make my move.
Lowering my body, I take her legs one at a time and put them over my shoulders until she’s straddling me.
“Do you know how fucking sexy you look with your legs wrapped around my neck like this?”
“So are you. So very handsome and sexy kneeling between my legs.”
Holy Jack Fucking Daniels! Hearing her call me sexy is hot as Hades. Her fingers slide into my hair and now I pass the power and let her take control.