Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
H e crouched in front of me and slipped those amazing hands under my skirt. My chest heaved as if I’d run a mile—which I can’t do easily, thanks—and I couldn’t take my eyes off of him.
That luscious dark hair had fallen forward and transformed his angular, too-serious face into someone younger.
Hungrier.
With the devil in his eyes.
Fallen angel, anyone?
Surely my knees were going to dissolve right then and there.
But no, not yet.
When his fingertips glided up and behind my knees, trailing fire up the backs of my thighs, that’s when all the muscle and bone dissolved.
Thank God the glass was behind me, or I would have fallen to the floor.
He tugged my hips away from the glass enough to grip my ass. The streetlamps were directly behind me, throwing most of him into shadow.
Already on the verge of panting, I tipped back my head and let out a strangled moan as his hot breath seared through my skirt. He looked up at me, his eyes glittering between those sinful dark locks.
He watched me unflinchingly. As if he was going to miss something important.
When he found the edge of my panties, I shuddered. This was how sex was supposed to be. This delicious anticipation between the wanting and the act.
This is what I’d been missing all of my life.
Blake.
Why did it have to be this man?
Slowly, he followed the lace edge just under my navel. I sucked back a breath that sounded suspiciously like a sob.
Anticipation melted into something so much larger. Want, lust, and attraction were chemical.
This seemed as if it was so much more than that. A full frontal assault on the senses.
Unforgettable.
Elemental.
Illogical.
The one man who should’ve never had this kind of connection with me was going to destroy me—body and mind.
And I was going to let him.
Hell, I was about to beg him to.
Because I wanted to feel something. To know I was alive and present in this world. That I wasn’t only my art and the girl clinging to the past.
I was wanted.
By this man.
Even for just a moment in this glass prison of his making.
Fingertips branded my skin as he slowly dragged my panties down until they tangled on my boots. In my head, I wanted to gracefully flick them off, but the reality of my personal situation had my ass superglued to the glass in terror.
What if I did this wrong?
Would he know immediately that I was two bumbling steps away from being a virgin?
What if he called a halt to this then and there?
Patiently, he drew them down and lifted each of my feet before tossing the pearl gray lace on top of my sweater. He leisurely drew up my skirt, gathering the flimsy cotton with his fingers inch by inch.
All the while his thumbs trailed a lazy path along my inner thighs.
No words.
Barely any breath.
Burning intent infused his every touch, his watchful gaze, the silence of the vestibule—and all of it ratcheted up my anxiety.
As the air kissed the tops of my thighs, I lifted my hands to my chest.
“Don’t cover yourself.” His voice was sandpaper over silk. “I want to see you. I want to see everything.”
And he was still wearing his suit.
“What if I want to see too?”
His arched an eyebrow. “All right.” He shrugged out of his suit jacket. My skirt fell back down to shield me, and his eyes went hot. “Pull it up.”
I lowered my arms and twisted my shaky fingers into the slinky material.
“Like this?” Swallowing hard, I tugged my skirt up an inch.
“More.” He jerked at his tie, but he didn’t take it off.
“I want more.” My voice shook, but I steeled myself.
If this was my one and only night with him, I wanted everything.
He flicked open a button near his throat. The stark lines of his collarbone and strong, corded neck left my mouth dry. He moved the tie a little more and another flash of ink teased out of the white cotton.
He stood. “The zipper, Ms. Copeland.”
I tipped my chin up to meet his gaze. “Seems unfair that I’m naked, and you’re clothed.”
“I took off my jacket.”
That was it?
There was so much more of him to see.
He crowded into me and planted his feet on either side of my boots until I was utterly surrounded. My breath stalled, but I didn’t break eye contact. He grazed his hand along the front of my belly to the little zipper at my side. The rasp of teeth opening seemed so loud
He eased my skirt down my hips. It hung in place for a moment, thanks to the curve of my ass. He tucked his fingertips into the space where the material parted, leaving a rush of goosebumps in his wake before the skirt gave up and pooled around my ankles.
He encircled my wrists, his pupils dilating in reaction.
I moved into him. The silk blend of his vest whispered over one breast, and the crisp cotton of his shirt teased along the other.
I wasn’t sure what to do. Being an active participant in seduction was new.
At a loss, I drew my calf up his leg. His slacks were the kind of material that designers sweated over. Soft, strong, textured, and cut to accentuate every line of his long legs.
He nudged me back against the glass, and lifted my hands over my head, braceleting both of mine with one of his long-fingered hands. He slid his cheek against mine until his lips brushed my ear. “From the moment you walked into my office, I wanted you like this.”
I trembled. Was I supposed to say something after that kind of statement? Did he think this was a foregone conclusion?
He angled down and dragged his lips along my jawline, my chin, and then finally, each corner of my lips.
Because he was so much taller than me, the light struck his face completely.
No shadows to hide behind.
Wild need and granite control stormed through his eyes. The gold fire and green calm were at war.
I wanted him to break .
Just like he’d broken me so completely.
Seemingly without effort.
I struggled against his hold. “You wanted this? Or you want me ? Would any girl do for this fantasy, Mr. Carson?”
The muscle in his jaw jumped.
He lined up our lips until there was only breath between us. “It’s you. It’s always been you.”
Always?
The question didn’t have a chance to take root in my consciousness. It drifted away under the power of his kiss.
Desperation slipped out from under his shields and devoured me. I tried to hold onto sanity and my own slice of reserves, but he swept me up into the maelstrom of unguarded passion.
Suddenly, he spun me around, and my breasts kissed the glass instead of his warm body.
I cried out in response. I was overheated, and the cool surface was a jolt to my system.
I was stretched out, my wrists still pinned above me. His long fingers were gentle, but firm.
An unbreakable tether to reality.
“Blake,” I whispered.
Mr. Carson was upstairs in the gray glass box of an office. Right now, he was Blake.
Could he feel that too?
He drew in a harsh breath, and I could actually feel his heart slamming through his clothes and into my back. His chest heaved just enough for me to know that his control might not be as complete as I’d originally thought.
I liked the idea that I could do that to him. That there was something within me that could push at him.
Maybe even that could make him strain at the cords that bound him just as he pushed so inexorably at mine.
Desire echoed in my throbbing nipples against the glass. Then lower, where I was so wet and needy.
Between my thighs—the only place he hadn’t touched.
I moved restlessly, my ass rubbing across the front placket of his pants. He was hard and…substantial. I couldn’t tell exactly how substantial, because he wouldn’t let me touch him.
Never mind look at him.
Not just the surface, but all of him.
The entire package.
I flexed my fingers, twisting my hands until they were crossed at the wrist, and I could touch something. The cuff of his shirt, the dusting of hair along his wrist, the side of his hand. I was starving for his skin.
All the while, my backside moved against him until he brought his other hand down to my hip. “Do you want this over before it’s begun?” His voice was all but a rumble in my ear.
Hadn’t we started hours ago? It felt like it.
“Is this one of those dominant things?”
He pressed his forehead to my shoulder and buried his face against my neck. “Are you truly this innocent?”
“No.” I didn’t really know what else to say on that one.
That I still had the ability to speak at all was shocking enough.
His hand slid lower to dip along the seam where my thigh met my ass. He brushed the curls above my center.
No slick girl tending for me. Then again, it wasn’t as if I had much of a sex life to speak of.
“So wet. Is this for me?”
My eyes crossed. Barely a touch and he expected me to reply to him? “You’ve been teasing me forever. What do you think?”
He huffed out a breath that could have been a laugh. “Your mouth is probably half of why I hired you.” His tongue lashed over the lobe of my ear, and I closed my eyes against the rioting sensations. “I must be insane.”
“Or we’re sharing a mental break.”
“Maybe we are,” he said with a low groan.
I echoed that sentiment when he buzzed across the triangle of hair above my slit once more.
“Open. Let me in.”
He was every sin I never knew I wanted.
“You want this. Don’t pretend you don’t. At least here we can be honest.”
I tried to grasp just what that meant, but my legs and my body had different ideas. I turned my heels just a little and widened my stance. His long fingers grazed over the apex of my thighs and sank into my heat.
I hissed at the sounds. Wet didn’t cover it.
Embarrassment raced up my spine and flushed my neck to my cheeks. I tried to arch away from him, but he gripped my wrists tighter, stretching me taller until my breasts and ribs were one with the glass.
Until everything was strung tight. I closed my eyes, tripping over my breath and nerves in the same moment. I wanted this, but could I live with the memory? Knowing that it was Blake who would be the one to show me what true passion was?
Would I ever sleep again?
Or would I relive this moment over and over?
He pinned me to the window, his watch clicking against glass as his fingers slowly glided in and out of me.
“Open your eyes, Ms. Copeland.”
How did he know they were closed? I dragged my eyelids up and stiffened. A flood of people were coming out of the hotel next door. Everyone seemed to be in a dress or suit.
“So many people.” He tucked his fingers deeper inside of me, and his palm rubbed against my clit. “If they only knew what we were doing. That you’re spread out for me, clinging to this glass. So fucking wet for me.”
My breath tripped out of my chest. No one reacted. They went on with their lives as if there was nothing going on a few steps away from them.
A woman linked fingers with a man. She laughed up at him, then she looked over her shoulder. She nodded our way and dragged the man away from the group roaming the streets. He didn’t seem to want to go with her until she went up on her toes and said something in his ear.
Blake’s bearded jaw buzzed along my neck. “Is she pulling him away to do what we’re doing?” He kissed and sipped his way down my throat and shoulder. “Will she lift her skirt for him like you did for me?”
I tried to pay attention to the couple outside the glass. They were drunk and laughing, drifting toward the building. They went deeper into the shadows along the side of the vestibule. My gaze followed them.
He pressed her up against the glass not five feet from us. The man’s fingers gripped the corner as he spread sloppy kisses down her neck.
“Do you like to watch?”
I shook my head. I’d never wanted to watch before, but it was oddly fascinating to see what they did. All the while, Blake kept pulsing against my clit. He’d stopped plunging inside me.
Instead, he stayed there—filling me up.
Shallowly.
Not nearly enough pressure.
What would it be like with him inside, not just his fingers?
I moaned and shifted until his cock lined up with the cleft of my ass. He hissed against my neck as we both watched. I missed his verbal play-by-play.
The fact that I wanted to hear it again made my belly twist and my heartbeat pound between my ears.
Outside, the man fumbled with her dress and panties as she went at his buckle like she’d never opened one before. They were laughing the entire time. I couldn’t hear them, but their expressions were full of fun.
So much different than us behind the glass.
This wasn’t fun. More like fun’s exact opposite.
It was overwhelming and brain-erasing. It was every bad idea I’d ever had magnified by a thousand percent.
But I wanted it.
More than sense.
More than breath.
More than the guilt sure to find me in the morning.
If only he’d stop the teasing. The girl outside was definitely getting more than just that.
I rested my forehead against the glass and whimpered as he stopped those delicious little pulses.
“Don’t want to watch anymore, Ms. Copeland?”
“Watch what they’re doing?” I found my air and my voice. Strengthening my words so they didn’t sound like little puffs of air. “No. I want you to do that—only better—and stop teasing me.”
In my periphery, I glimpsed the woman outside throw back her head, and the man pumped his hips twice more before they collapsed against each other.
“And you better not be done that fast.”