Chapter 8
Chapter
Eight
It’s Saturday night, and I’ve stationed myself in the backyard on a lounge chair with a blanket, my Kindle, and a glass of wine.
I can’t even hear the doorbell out here, so I figure I’ll be safe if Julian decides to come despite my telling him not to.
I even locked the back gate for some extra insurance.
After night has fallen, I hear a rattling at the gate, like someone is trying to open it. Then it shudders and shakes as I clearly hear someone climbing up the other side.
Shit.
Either Julian is very persistent, or I’m about to have a run-in with a prowler. I set my Kindle down and pull my legs up into the shadowed upper portion of my chair. A dark figure makes it to the top of the gate then swings its legs over and drops to the ground.
“I’m armed,” I say loudly, not moving a muscle. My heart is racing. Please let this not be a criminal.
The figure freezes and turns toward me with arms raised. “Chelsea?”
I sigh in relief. “Julian,” I say dryly. “Have you ever heard of the Make My Day Law?”
He blows out a breath. “Jesus, you scared me.”
“I scared you? You’re the one scaling my fence!” He also made it seem frighteningly easy. I make a mental note to put some of those motion-sensor lights back here.
Julian reaches up to the switch on a string of bulbs overhead and clicks them on. Soft light chases most of the gloom away.
“There you are,” he says, beaming at me as he comes to sit on the lounger next to mine.
His sparkling eyes appear almost black in the warm, low light, and I try not to notice how the short sleeves of his tight T-shirt hug his upper arms.
I give him my best unimpressed look. “Yes, here I am. You managed to find where I was hiding.”
“So you were hiding!” he says accusingly.
“Don’t turn this around on me, mister. You’re the one who broke our agreement and broke into my yard.”
“Yeah,” he says sheepishly.
“And don’t think I don’t know you planned that all along.” I wag my finger at him. “I knew last night that you had every intention of coming back here.”
“Guilty.” He turns those sweet brown eyes my way, and I feel my resolve starting to melt.
“We can’t do anything, Julian. We really can’t, okay? Last night had to be it. Anything more would just make things harder. For both of us.” I have to look away from his handsome face and his shiny black hair and all those muscles.
“Okay.”
I lift a brow. “Okay?”
“Yes, that’s fine with me. I just came over to chat.”
“Chat?”
He grins, and I roll my eyes. He’s got me doing my parrot impression again.
“And what do you want to chat about?” I ask cautiously.
“Well, I wondered if there was a Lesson Two. To follow Lesson One.” His smile is growing.
I frown at him and go to speak, but he cuts me off.
“It doesn’t need to be a hands-on lesson this time. We can just do it—discussion style.”
I cross my arms, taking him in skeptically. “Well,” I say slowly, “there is more I could say. I guess.” I still feel like I can trust his intentions about as far as I can throw him.
“Great! Then we can just sit here and talk. I’ll stay on my chair, and you stay on yours.” He proclaims it confidently with an expression that says, “Easy-peasy lemon squeezy.”
I shrug. “Okay.”
We’ll see how this goes.
“So…” I chew the inside of my cheek as I contemplate what to say. “I think the next most important topic would be… orgasms.”
His head snaps in my direction, his brows high. I hold his gaze and smirk.
Let’s see how easy-peasy you find this, cowboy.
“The male orgasm is… straightforward. It’s pretty easy to figure out how to achieve one, pretty obvious whether or not you’ve had one.” My eyes linger on the bulge in his lap then move back up as I tilt my head.
He scowls playfully, and I let my lips hint at a smile before I continue.
“The female orgasm, on the other hand, is far more mysterious. How to do it, how to know whether you did it, how long it takes to do it. It’s complicated.”
He just watches me, and I’m pleased at his close attention.
“And so, the concept I would introduce to you is called She Comes First.”
He nods lightly.
“There’s a book by that name that I highly recommend.
” I wink. “But that’s not exactly what this lesson is about.
I think that you, as a man, should make every effort to get her off first,” I declare.
“Whether that’s with your hands, a vibrator, or…
your mouth.” I glance at his lips, and heat rushes to my face.
“Did you know that something like eighty percent of women cannot climax from intercourse alone?”
He looks surprised.
“It’s true. In the vast majority of women, the external clitoris needs to be stimulated to get there.”
He frowns, squinting. “So if my partner sounded like she came, but there was only…” He clears his throat.
“Penis-in-vagina sex?”
He nods.
“She probably faked it.”
He sits back. “Wow.”
“Yup,” I say. “You’ve gotta cut them some slack, though. They could be really inexperienced and not even know their own bodies. Or have something going on that makes it difficult to reach climax.”
He watches me intently.
“A woman’s ability to orgasm can be affected by so many factors. Hormones, stress, pressure, all of it can make it harder. So much harder,” I say, regarding him sincerely.
Something flickers over his expression, like mischief. I sharpen my gaze.
“That’s what she said,” he says quietly then purses his lips and watches me, eyes dancing.
I just stare at him for a second, my eyes wide.
Then a laugh bubbles up and out of me. Then another and another, until I’m laughing so hard my sides ache.
Julian just watches me, delight lighting up his face.
It makes no sense—the joke wasn’t that funny.
But the pent-up tension and emotion and stress of the last few days—hell, of the entire summer—had me wound up so tight that my body jumped at the chance to release it all. I can’t stop. And I don’t even want to.
Julian chuckles a little bit with me, but I’ve clearly reached that point of hysteria at which no one else really gets the joke. I don’t care, though, and just keep laughing.
“I was just… going to ask—” I wheeze. “About this topic. Is it… bigger than you expected?” I bust up again, tears starting to run down my cheeks.
Now he does laugh with me, throwing his head back. The sound is throaty and beautiful.
“Yeah, it is,” he says, his eyes glittering. “You really took it… deep.”
We laugh so hard together that we’re both gasping and hooting, hardly able to breathe. After a little while, we settle into that easy stillness that follows a fit of hard laughter.
“Hooo-wheee.” I sigh contentedly, wiping my wet cheeks. “I haven’t laughed like that in forever.”
I look over at Julian, who is watching me with eyes that could light a candle. I cover my face with my hands. “You have got to stop looking at me like that, Julian.”
“I can’t help it. Just when I think you couldn’t be any more gorgeous, you go and do something like that.” He grips the sides of his chair tightly and then relaxes his hands, taking a deep breath.
My heart does a little pitter-pat thing, and my stomach joins the act with some somersaults. I sigh. “I had a feeling this was a bad idea.”
“What?” he asks, affronted. “I’m being good. I’m over here in my chair and haven’t touched you. Not once.”
“No, you’re right, you’re right. But maybe you could stop eye-fucking me?”
He snorts, his eyes flaring. “I can do that.”
“Thank you.” I laugh, shaking my head.