Chapter 19
Chapter Nineteen
A fter eating half the corned beef sandwich and all the pickles, I wrapped up the other half and stuck it in the employee fridge. I labeled it “for anyone who wants it” hoping Grace might eat it, but I was acting like enough of a pussy. If she didn’t want the damn sandwich, she didn’t have to eat it.
Maybe she didn’t like deli meat. Maybe she’d become a vegetarian in the last week.
Maybe I needed to jerk off until all this ridiculousness I was spouting drained out of my mind.
I buried myself in work until dinnertime came and went. It was hours past dark the next time I looked up from my schematics and stretched my neck. My eyes were starting to blur, and I needed to clear my head.
At least my other head had taken a temporary break. Thank fuck. I hadn’t been this perpetually horny since high school. Probably not even then, since I’d always had control of my impulses.
If I didn’t want to be attracted to a woman, I ignored the feeling until it dissipated.
Why that had yet to work with Grace, I didn’t know.
I rose and bent at the waist to stretch out my back. My ergonomic, extremely high-end desk chair wasn’t getting the job done today. Perhaps I’d look into getting a new one someday, when I had time.
Right now, I needed to take a walk. The coffee I’d been mainlining all afternoon had done a number on me. My muscles were jangling, my heart racing, my blood pounding under my skin. It was as if I was in a flight-or-fight situation instead of feeling the natural effects of sitting for so many hours in a row.
I walked past Grace’s desk. Her computer was dark, her chair tucked in. She must’ve gone. She’d probably left sometime ago. Only workaholics like me regularly lived at their desk. And she had another job, one that suited her far more than this one.
She wasn’t meant to be stuck in an office. Not with her kind of eye. She had the sort of talent that deserved to be nurtured, not squandered on spreadsheets and ordering supplies.
Even if she was only working for me for some secret reason only she knew. I would never believe for a moment that her arrival the day I’d been hiring an assistant had been coincidental. She knew who I was, and my connection to her grandmother. She had to.
One way or another, I would find out all that she knew.
I continued down the silent hallway, passing by Jack’s assistant’s darkened office. Jack nor his assistant kept the kind of hours I did.
I didn’t blame them.
On the contrary, I quite liked being the only one working late on a regular basis. When I was alone, it was easier to think.
Easier to be .
In silence, my designs had room to grow. The ones I continued to sketch even as I told myself that the company focused on function rather than style. The artistic side of me had never quite died, much like my fascination with Grace. I’d used it to build my company, and now I used it in secret. As if drawing beautiful things that weren’t strictly functionary was somehow taboo.
For the man I showed to the world, it was.
I pushed open the bathroom door. And stopped.
Grace was at the sinks, her leg propped up on the lip. She was doing something to her hose and cursing a blue streak under her breath. My eyebrows rose at the colorful language until my gaze darted down the long expanse of leg revealed by her actions.
Fuck, she was wearing garters. Lacy-top hose and garters.
I was a dead man.
“Goddammit, stupid clip.” She pitched the offending item and lifted her head, blinking owlishly as if she’d just realized she wasn’t alone. How she hadn’t heard the door, I didn’t know. But goddamn, that clip.
Blessed clip.
Her lower lip trembled. Yet she maintained the pose that left her gorgeous leg on display. “What are you doing here?”
Inexplicably, I started to smile. “This is the bathroom, is it not?”
“You should have your own bathroom. You shouldn’t even be here. It’s Friday night. Don’t you ever date like normal people?”
I did have my own bathroom. Not that she needed to know that. A man was allowed to stretch his legs now and then, wasn’t he?
This particular woman definitely was. And what legs they were.
I lifted a brow. “You’re a fine one to talk.”
“Actually, I’m on my way out.”
“So, you do have a date then.” I didn’t think she did, but I wanted—needed—to hear her say it. “Is that why you’re doing a last-minute repair on your hose?”
“It didn’t work.” She started to drop her leg, but I stilled her by raising a hand and bending to pick up her discarded paper clip. She’d mangled it a bit, but when I stepped closer to examine the lacy tops of her hose, I could see where one of the hooks had snapped. I pried the clip apart, reshaping it, and slipped it between her warm, smooth skin, the frilly top of the hose and the band, fashioning it into a kind of hook. “If you don’t move too much,” I murmured, fixated on the creamy perfection of her supple thigh, “it’ll hold.”
“I have to walk to the train.”
“At this time of night?” I didn’t know what time it was, exactly, just that she shouldn’t be out strolling alone. Not because she couldn’t take care of herself, but because I wanted to ensure she reached her apartment safely.
If that made me an overprotective bastard—well, at least one of those terms fit.
“Not all of us have chauffeur-driven limousines.”
I ignored her snark. “When you’re ready to leave, I’ll drive you.”
She jerked her leg away from me and let her foot fall heavily to the floor. “I’m fine to get home myself. Now if you’ll excuse me—” She started to brush past me, and I reached out to grab her arm. My fingers closed around her wrist, and she lifted her hand to my chest, ostensibly to push me away. Instead, her fingers dug into my shirt, and she dragged me closer, her mouth dangerously close to mine despite our height difference. Those razor blade heels gave her more of an advantage than she’d had the last time we were together, and she used it, hauling my face down to hers. “One more thing. You don’t get to say a damn thing about what I do or don’t do. If I want to ride the train naked, that is my choice, and you have no say in it.”
It took everything I possessed not to fist my hand in her hair and pull her insolent mouth to mine. “Oh, you think not?”
“I know not.” She started to relinquish her hold on me, but my fingers only tightened on her wrist as I turned her toward the sink. “I said I’m leaving,” she added shakily.
“So, who’s stopping you?”
“You’re blocking my path.”
Deliberately, I took a step back and gestured toward the door. “So go.”
Wary blue-green eyes met mine before she pushed off the sink. With her first step, there was a metallic plink on the floor. The clip had come free.
“Goddammit.”
“Such a mouth on you.” I bent to grab the clip again and pivoted to slip up her skirt. She didn’t move as I pushed the fabric higher and came face to face with those gorgeous thighs again, clad in that narrow band of lace attached to her garter. Or mostly attached. I pulled the clip apart once more and slipped my finger into the garter, holding it away from her toned flesh as I tried to make the clip hold. She trembled as I let the band snap back. “No sharp movements,” I reminded her, sparing her a quick glance.
Her heavy-lidded look was my undoing.
Hell, who was I kidding? Everything about her undid me—from the tendrils of blond hair clinging to her flushed forehead, the derisive curl to her lips, the defiant tilt of her chin.
Those sexy eyes that demanded I do her bidding, even if her mind—and her mouth—said something entirely different.
For a humming moment, she stared down at me as if I was bent low for a whole different reason. One I craved so much that my cock throbbed in the confines of my trousers.
“What about the mouth you have on you?” she whispered.
I didn’t know if that was her idea of a retort or a come-on, but right then, I didn’t care. I was crouched at eye level with her pussy, barely covered by the thin black skirt and her current excuse for panties. It would only take the slightest nudge to push up the fabric to see if she wanted me as much as I wanted her.
I’d be able to see—and smell—the truth.
But I didn’t dare inhale right now. If I took one whiff of her, I’d lose all semblance of control. As it was, I was on the edge.
I backed up and rose, slowly, well aware of her gaze devouring me. “You’re not walking alone to the train.”
Just let her try to defy me.
To give me a reason to bend her over this sink and exert my will in a way that would make her scream with pleasure.
“Try to stop me.” She took a step toward the door, then another, letting out a yelp when I leaned forward to plant my hand on the door above her head to hold it closed.
“Looks like you’re stopped,” I murmured, brushing my nose against her hair and lower to the curve of her neck and shoulder where her scent was strongest. Her nerves spiked the aroma of lilacs until it was intoxicating. “Unless you want to run…”
I almost expected her to. Hell, frightening her away—and possibly risking a sexual harassment suit—was better than succumbing to this madness between us once again. The only consolation was that we were in the one camera-free zone on company property, but it wouldn’t take much imagination to look at the footage and deduce why we’d both been in the bathroom for so long.
This wasn’t me. I wasn’t some hormonally driven horndog who couldn’t keep his dick in his pants. She brought something out in me, and I wasn’t sure I liked it.
“And if I don’t?” Before I could process her words, she turned, still pinned between me and the door. “Are you going to try to fuck some sense into me?”
The word fuck coming from her pretty pink mouth sounded so filthy. Hot as hell. Just like she was, all annoyance and indignation and good girl beauty. An irresistible combination.
I fisted a handful of her wavy blond hair and tipped back her head, exposing her throat. I was tired of talking. She drew words out of me too, where I normally lapsed into silence as easily as I breathed.
With her, there seemed to be no end to what I wanted to say.
Now there was only one thing I wanted.
The soaked slit between her thighs.
She expected me to kiss her. I could tell from her accelerated breathing, from the flare of her pupils. But I wasn’t going to comply. Not when diving between those trembling lips would drive me insane.
I released her hair and scooped her up, smothering her sound of surprise by pressing her mouth to my shoulder as I carted her to the sink. She bit me through my suit coat and shirt, and I would’ve grinned if not for the brutal jerk of my cock at the pinch of her teeth. I set her down and gripped her throat, rubbing my thumb over the wild beat of her pulse as I held her head lightly against the mirror.
She glared at me, arousal and anger firing in equal measure in her sea-colored eyes and wrapped her legs around my waist. The movement hiked up her skirt so that all I had to do was yank aside the insubstantial scrap of panties guarding her pussy. Her eyes widened at my brusque movement, but the irritation in them didn’t subside. Neither did my hold on her throat as I moved closer to rub my pants-covered cock against the heat between her legs.
“Fuck.”
She blinked at my low curse. “Thanks for the warning.”
I didn’t want to laugh. It wasn’t the time for it. I had my hand around her throat, for God’s sake, and she had her legs wound around my hips. Her center was hot enough to sear me through my pants, and burying myself inside her was an imperative at this point.
But there were other considerations.
“I don’t have a condom.”
She tilted her head then pried something out of her bra. She slapped the packet in my hand and shrugged at my doubletake. “After the first time, I figured I’d better be prepared.”
“So, you thought it’d happen again?”
“What do you think these were all about?” She turned her foot and dragged her heel down the back of my thigh. “Only exceptionally good sex is worth being tortured for twelve hours a day.”
So many responses flooded my mind at once that I went with the most prudent one. I unzipped my pants.
“Uh-uh.” She gripped my wrist, holding my hand against my straining cock while I gritted my teeth. “I gave you something, you give me something. Tit for tat.”
“I was trying to.”
Her smile came and went before I could enjoy it. Then she was flicking open my cuffs and shoving up my sleeve, a sigh escaping her as she revealed my tattoo. The swirls of sepia ink made up the thick rope that circled the anchor as it climbed up my arm, were as much a part of me as my skin at this point. I rarely even remembered the tattoo was there. But from the way her eyes were eating me up, I might as well have had my fingers on her clit.
Speaking of…
I relinquished my hold on her throat and slipped my hand between her thighs, skimming the pads of my fingers along the sensitive skin above her garters. She stopped rolling up my sleeve and just gripped my arm, digging in her nails as I drew my thumb down her swollen seam.
If I’d had any doubt she was into me, into this , the wetness under my touch told me otherwise.
I didn’t waste time on exploration. Not here. We were in the company bathroom, and from the flush blossoming on her throat and cheeks, she was as ready to fuck as I was. She just needed relief. The same release I’d been aching for since the moment I’d withdrawn from her sweet pussy days ago.
Weeks now.
I slid two fingers into her and swallowed a groan at the tight heat that closed around me. Goddamn, she was on the verge too. She threw back her head against the glass, not even seeming to care that it must’ve hurt. One hand gripped my inked forearm and the other grabbed onto the edge of the sink as she parted her legs, giving me room to give her the kind of rough fingering I’d avoided the first time we were together.
Then, we’d had time. Hours to fill with nothing but learning each other’s reactions. Now, it was a matter of making her explode against my hand before she did the same around my cock.
Driving deeper, I nudged her back against the mirror, pressing my cheek to hers so that I could hear every delicious sound she made. Every ragged inhale, those desperate little whimpers, the moans that broke from her throat like she simply couldn’t contain them anymore. A quick nip of her lower lip had her eyes opening again, her lids lifting slowly as if it was too difficult for her to raise them.
“I want you to watch me fuck you. Eyes on mine the whole time, or I stop.”
She nodded and I rewarded her by slipping another finger into her, tilting her hips back so I could have more access. I worked her hard, so crazed to get inside her that I didn’t worry about finesse. She needed to come, so I could feel her do it again around my dick—even if it was with that damnable piece of latex between us. The harder I flexed my hand, the deeper she dug her nails into my forearm. I’d wear her branding too now, amidst my ink.
Pity it wouldn’t last.
When her quivering around my fingers turned into a full-fledged shudder, I caught her moan with my mouth. I couldn’t help it. Tasting the hit of caffeine and sugar on her tongue from her soda while she drenched my palm made me dizzy.
I couldn’t get enough. I sucked on her tongue even as her clenching pussy pulled at my fingers. Tight, hot, relentless.
Before she’d even finished coming, I drew my hand away and grabbed the condom she’d given me. Thank God for not-so-small favors. I undid my pants the rest of the way and tugged out my length. Slowly, I slicked the latex on my erection with fingers that were still wet from her, allowing her to see the streaks of dampness on my flesh.
I wanted her to suck them off my cock, to taste us mixed together, but it couldn’t happen. Not here, where she would have to kneel on a floor too many other feet had trod upon.
The vestibule had been different. It was cleaned spotless on a nightly basis because it was the first thing people saw upon entering the building. But a bathroom…something about it seemed sordid, and not in an erotic way.
If I hadn’t been so incensed to have her, I never would’ve taken her there.
Next time, it would be different.
Even as the declaration registered, I cut it off. There would be no next time .
There couldn’t be. There shouldn’t even have been this time, never mind another.
“Please,” she breathed, and I gripped my cock, shaking off the thoughts that had no place taking root.
I cupped my hand around her hip, hauling her closer so I could take another longer sip from her mouth. She wound herself around me, and I rubbed the head against her pussy, absorbing the noises she made like air.
The relief that came from knowing she was nearly as desperate as I was, made me too rough with her as I tilted her toward me and slammed home. So rough that she cried out and I couldn’t even try to stifle the sound.
Then she was tugging apart buttons on my shirt to get to my skin, her movements jerky and uncoordinated. She didn’t bother with my tie this time and instead went upward from the bottom. Halfway up, she stopped and gripped my sides, digging in and yanking me toward her so that I bottomed out inside of her snug pussy.
So fucking deep.
I groaned and she pressed her face to my throat, licking my Adam’s apple and making my balls tighten to the point of pain. Damn, she felt good. Every place where our skin made contact felt like heaven.
I couldn’t get deep enough this way, but I needed to see her face as I fucked her. Watching her in the mirror wouldn’t be enough. I had to know this same crazy thing was happening to her too, that I wasn’t caught up in it alone.
I’d been alone for too goddamn long.
Cupping her face, I pressed my lips to hers and reveled in the sensation of her gripping me inside and out. The bite of her nails, the suction of her pussy. She surrounded me in warmth, in something I strained toward even as I knew I shouldn’t allow myself to get this close. I usually fucked women bent over something, facing away from me. Not always, but I definitely didn’t seek out intimacy.
Part of why I loved to watch was because then no one was watching me.
“Blake.” Her saying my name sounded like a benediction. Not Mr. Carson. Not sir . In this space, I was Blake.
And she was Grace.
I owed her that, the honesty of saying her name. Even if it burned my throat as I rasped it against her temple. “Grace.” When she shook around me, her walls fisting me one last time before she let go, I said it again as my hips battered hers.
I didn’t even have to think about fucking her now. It had become automatic. “Come for me now, Grace.”
She buried her face in my chest, and I pressed my mouth against her hair, absorbing the smell of lilacs and the equally arousing scent of us, together. I’d never imagined doing anything like this in the company I’d built, and now I’d done it twice.
With her. Only with her.
She clamped down on me, vising tight, and I muffled my shout into her hair as I followed her and emptied myself into the condom. She wasn’t the only one shuddering. I was too. I only realized it when her soft voice cut through the fog in my head and the feeling of her small hands curling around my waist finally broke through the haze.
“It’s okay. Shh, Blake. It’s okay.”
I wanted to burrow into her, to hold on like nothing could ever separate us. But I wasn’t a fanciful man. I’d turned my art into an empire, because art for the sake of beauty alone was meaningless. I’d taught myself that so long ago that I almost couldn’t remember when I’d believed otherwise.
Almost.
But Grace did. The ocean-tinted eyes shining up at me under a fringe of curling blond hair, believed in things I couldn’t allow myself.
The trust and hope in her expression was what shut me down. What had me untangling myself from her and backing away.
Not because it was too much, but because I wasn’t enough.
I stripped off the condom and disposed of it and zipped myself back into my pants. Yet again, I’d kept most of my clothes on.
This time, she had too.
Something else I could regret. Later. First, I had to end this moment before she realized that I was laughably out of my depth.
“I’ll wait for you to get ready,” I said, stepping back.
Every step I put between us felt like a chasm.
“For what? Oh, yes, back on that again.” She shook her head and hopped off the sink. She’d lost one of her heels and she slipped it back on while straightening her clothes.
Somehow what we’d done had barely caused a wrinkle in her skirt or a hair out of place.
It was like that tornado in a bottle I’d made for a school science fair as a kid. In that small space, chaos reigned. Outside it, the air was still, the landscape undisturbed.
I might still be trying to regain my breath, and my tie might be tight enough to choke me, but Grace was already on her way back to normal. And I’d better catch up quick unless I wanted her to know the effect she had on me.
She was my tornado, and the glass walls were so fucking close to shattering.
“Ten minutes, Ms. Copeland.” The words tangled together until I had to practically spit them out. It seemed wrong to call her anything but Grace when her skin was still flushed from what we’d done. “Don’t keep me waiting.”
I turned away, but not before I glimpsed the pure malice that crossed her face. I opened the door and closed it behind me just as something heavy thunked against the door.
Her shoe, maybe. Had to be her shoe.
Oddly, her impulsive action made me smile. She wasn’t quite so unaffected, after all.
I scraped a hand down the back of my neck, collecting the perspiration drying there. My clothes were sticking to me after our exertions.
I needed a shower, long and cold.
And I needed to jerk off under the spray to the memory of her fisting my dick, her soft golden hair clinging to my lips as we ground ourselves into each other.
I started down the hall to my office and glanced at my arm. The cuff was still dangling open, revealing part of my tattoo. Woven through the pattern of thick sepia ink were about a half dozen angry red crescent moons from her nails.
She’d marked me in more ways than one.