Chapter Fourteen Grant
Chapter Fourteen
Grant
“This is the second-best thing my wife let me eat today.” Chase tipped his head back and groaned, chewing his medium-rare steak slathered in chimichurri.
My balls were purple at this point.
I’d had longer dry spells than this, but never when the subject of my desire shared a roof with me. And never when said subject of my desire (rightfully) exercised her right not to wear a bra at home.
Layla looked more gorgeous than ever tonight.
She’d washed her green hair dye back to its normal dark brunette and trimmed it to this new haircut with lots of bouncy layers.
She was draped in a yellow flowery dress.
Her tits understood the pregnancy assignment and were fuller than ever, and she sported the tiniest baby bump only I could detect if I stared really hard.
Which I did.
All the damn time.
I couldn’t stop myself. It was honestly a cry for help at this point.
“Is he having a stroke?” Chase pointed at me with a forkful of steak. “Or has he just joined civilization and didn’t get the memo that staring at his girlfriend all night is bad form?”
“I’m not his girlfriend.” Layla popped a piece of (thankfully cooked) chicken into her mouth. “And it’s totally normal to space out sometimes. Especially when you talk about giving your wife oral. Not everyone wants the details.”
Chase rolled his eyes in my periphery, waving her off. “You have sex together. Have a baby together. Live together. If it walks, looks, and quacks like a duck . . .”
“It can still be a goose,” Layla said. “I dare you to claim you can tell the difference between the two.”
“We need to change the subject,” Maddie announced, and her elbow found my ribs. Her not-so-subtle way to tell me to stop ogling her best friend. “We’re making our guests uncomfortable.”
The rest of the dinner was spent talking about babies and parenthood and the stock market.
I contributed very little to the conversation, mainly in the form of humming, clearing my throat, and agreeing with whatever Chase said without actually listening to him.
I sincerely hoped he wasn’t in the throes of another rant about how Midwesterners cramped us, native Manhattanite’s style.
Since Maddie did the cooking, Chase, Layla, and I did the cleaning.
I manned the sink, washing the dishes, while Layla stood next to me, barefoot, and wiped them with a towel.
Chase was cleaning the table in the dining room.
He was taking a suspiciously long time, and I had a feeling he’d orchestrated this in a way that would ensure Layla and I had some time alone.
“Do you ever wonder what it would’ve been like if I didn’t get pregnant?
” Layla pierced the silence between us. While the quiet was comfortable, my raging hard-on was not.
I couldn’t believe I didn’t get to touch her when she was at her hottest, carrying my child.
If God did exist, He obviously loathed me.
“How do you mean?” I said, staying focused on the plate I was rinsing.
“If I didn’t get pregnant, you’d have probably met someone else soon enough and had a baby with her. Don’t you think about it sometimes?” she mused. “About falling in love like in a Hallmark film? Ticking all the boxes the way guys like you do. Engagement, wedding, honeymoon, baby?”
“Guys like me?” I bucked at the description.
“Traditionalists.”
“I’m not a traditionalist,” I said, realizing that, depending on what she considered conformity, I probably was.
I definitely adhered to doctrines practiced by tradition.
“And anyway, I never think about life in terms of what could’ve been.
I like to think about what’s possible. It’s both more exciting and more pragmatic. ”
“And what do you feel is possible?” She smirked as she ran the towel over one of the Blacks’ glazed stoneware plates.
“You.” I flicked the faucet to turn it off, then rolled my shirtsleeves down. “Us. That’s still a possibility I’m holding on to. And while I don’t believe in fate, and soulmates, I do believe that we end up exactly where we’re supposed to be. There’s a reason we were brought together in this.”
She put the plate down, her gaze still holding mine.
We were shoulder to shoulder. Something sparked between us.
A live wire that fused us together, sizzling into an inferno.
The tension was everywhere. In the air. In every atom of our bodies.
Searing the floors, and the walls, and every object in the room.
My stare dropped to her lips. They were slightly parted.
I wanted to kiss her. I thought she wanted to kiss me too.
But I couldn’t be too sure, and I didn’t want to mess up the trust we’d built over the last few weeks.
I’d worked hard on making sure she felt right at home in my apartment. I didn’t want to throw it all away by misreading this moment.
I was ready to step back and bash my head against the wall to calm myself down when I noticed Layla rising to her tiptoes, leaning into me.
My breath hitched. It was happening. Her sweet, pink mouth that I’d been missing angled itself toward mine.
I stayed put, letting her lead the way. Her lips were almost touching mine.
The delicious taste of her mouth was within reach . . .
“Settle this for me, lovebirds. Maddie says I can’t pull off a goatee—” Chase burst from the dining room and into the open-plan kitchen.
Layla gasped, immediately pulling back.
I was going to kill my best friend.
And I was going to make it look like an unfortunate, albeit extremely gory, accident.
The audacity of that asshole.
“No one can pull off a goatee!” Maddie chased after him from the dining room, tossing her hands in the air. As soon as they saw Layla, me, and my seven-foot erection between us, they froze in their spots.
Madison’s eyes bounced between us comically. They were as big as the salad bowl I’d just washed. “I’m sorry. Were we interrupting something?”
Oh, only the most monumental moment of my life. No biggie.
“No. You’re fine. All done.” Layla gestured to the spotless kitchen and the washed dishes stacked neatly by the sink. “Thanks so much for having us.”
“Hey, Grant.” Chase rubbed his knuckles along his jawline, his hawkish stare bouncing between us. “Can you do me a favor and bring my cigar box from my office?”
I squinted, ready to knock every single tooth in his mouth out, including the wisdom ones that had never even popped. “No, I cannot. You have legs. Go get it yourself.”
“He can’t,” Maddie piped up, twisting her fingers nervously. She was a good person, but a terrible liar. I didn’t know where this was going. I just knew they were being weird. “I forbid him to enter the office after six thirty in the evening.”
I arched an eyebrow. “Really, now?”
“Not even to take something and leave?” Layla appeared to be just as skeptical. “Hot damn. I knew he was whipped, but this is honestly impressive even by Chase Black standards.”
“What can I say?” Chase drawled wryly. “Happy wife, happy life. So, can you go get me that cigar box or what?”
I shook my head, exasperated. “Fine. Where is it?”
“Somewhere in there. You’ll find it. Layla told Maddie you know both where the clit and the G-spot are. I have every faith in you.”
“Oh my God!” and “Chase!” were screamed simultaneously while I tramped my way to my best friend’s office.
Once in his mahogany office, I rummaged around his cabinets and drawers.
I couldn’t find the cigar box anywhere. It pissed me off that he’d sent me on an errand in the first place.
The only reason I was playing along was to give myself time to take a breather from my moment with Layla and maybe give my blood a chance to redistribute itself from my cock to other organs in my body.
After five minutes of looking and not finding the cigar box, I headed out of the room and collided with another body.
Layla.
She was walking into the office just as I was exiting it.
“Oops, sorry. Maddie sent me as reinforcement to help you out.”
“It’s not there. I checked everywhere.”
“How weird.” She frowned.
“What the . . .” I reached above my head to wave off something that was tickling my forehead. I looked up. It was mistletoe.
“What in the world is mistletoe doing here?” Layla echoed my thoughts. “It’s June.”
“Sorry, I don’t make the rules.” I grinned innocently, everything finally clicking together.
“You know.” Layla looked at me, then at the mistletoe again. “I’m half Jewish. I don’t think I’ve ever mentioned that. I’m kind of wishy-washy about Christmas.”
My heart sank. If she didn’t want to kiss me, I definitely didn’t want to force her.
I nodded. “Understood.”
“You sure?”
“Yes. I don’t want you to feel pressured to do anything. Ever. You don’t have to kiss me now. Or next year. Or the next decade. It still wouldn’t change how I feel about you.”
I’d just stepped sideways, about to march to the living room and bite Chase’s head off, when Layla snatched my elbow and pulled me back.
I turned around, surprised, and before I could register what was happening, her lips were on mine, her fingers were buried in my hair, and she was on her toes now, straining to reach me, to kiss me, to taste me.
I grabbed the back of her thighs in pure muscle memory instincts, hoisting her to wrap her legs around me as I kissed the living hell out of her under the mistletoe.
Her back was pressed against the doorframe.
Her breasts were flush against my chest, and I could feel her nipples hardening between the fabric of our clothes.
I groaned into her mouth, lightheaded with need.
This kiss packed inside itself at least a hundred kisses. All the kisses we’d wanted to give one another and hadn’t over the past few weeks.
The kiss that should’ve happened the day Jessica was at my apartment.
The kiss that should’ve happened during our last ultrasound.
The kiss that should’ve happened when we watched Love Actually and we got to the two porn actors (my favorite part of the film, obviously).
The good night kisses and the good morning kisses, and the kisses just because, and the kisses that said I’m glad you’re here and I’m so excited we’re doing this together and Your ass looks fucking amazing in this dress.
We kissed and we kissed and we kissed, like the world was ending right after that kiss and we never wanted to die.
There was tongue-stroking and lip-nibbling and sighs and pants and moans and giggles.
And a desperation I couldn’t fully explain.
Like this was much more than just a kiss.
I ground my cock into her center through our clothes, and my eyes rolled inside their sockets. It felt that good.
Layla broke free from our kiss, trailing her hot mouth down my neck, and every single fiber in my body was on fire.
She unfastened my slacks, fumbling with my zipper between us, and the thought of stopping this because we were at our friends’ house ran through my head for exactly half a second before I decided Chase could take one for the team.
Still, I needed to be the greenest flag in the carnival, so of course I had to make sure she wanted this.
“Baby . . .”
“What’s the worst that can happen?” she murmured into my skin. “I’m already pregnant.”
I carried her from the doorway, using the back of my foot to shut the door closed. I perched Layla on the edge of Chase’s office desk, panting, while her mouth was still exploring my throat and shoulder.
There was no time to get undressed. No need, either, since I nudged her panties to one side and grabbed the back of her knees, pulling her to meet me halfway.
The first second my cock was inside her I genuinely feared I was going to cry.
So wet. So warm. So fantastically good.
Don’t you dare come. You’re going to make it good for her.
But it’d been too long.
After a few moments of stillness, Layla nuzzled her nose in my shoulder. “Is there a reason you aren’t moving?”
“Too scared it won’t last,” I grunted.
She chuckled against my flesh, her throaty laugh telling me she found it adorable, not embarrassing. “We’ll do a rerun when we get home.”
That was enough to give me the strength and power to pull through. As soon as I started moving into her, I knew I was done for.
She owned me.
Every single piece of me.
And I didn’t want any of it back.
She arched her back as I thrust into her, and we met halfway, panting and grunting. Each time I pressed home, the desk moved half an inch, scraping the floor.
As a result of divine intervention, and no doubt thanks to my good karma, I managed to make her come before I found my own release.
I felt her tight little body squeezing and spasming around my dick, and the shudder that rippled through her, head to toe.
Only then did I allow myself to empty inside her. The feeling was incredible.
It took us another full minute to catch our breaths as we leaned into each other. My forehead was sweaty, and I was pretty sure Chase was going to burn down the desk we’d used. Likely the entire apartment.
Layla pulled back and grinned shyly at me, and I gently lowered her from the desk to the floor, unable to rip my gaze from hers.
“I think we did our part honoring the mistletoe tradition.” She was still panting, her hands bracketing my face.
“You think?” I swallowed hard. “I’m afraid Santa will blacklist us from presents for inappropriate behavior, but no regrets there.”
She wobbled to the door and opened it while I tucked myself in and caught up with her step.
“Would you look at this. It’s a Christmas miracle,” Maddie fussed from the living room. We both turned to look at her. She was standing there with her diabolical husband, clutching her chest with a dreamy sigh.
“It’s literally June,” Layla said, scowling. “That mistletoe had no business being there.”
“I was feeling festive. Sue me.” Maddie shrugged.
“And he was feeling cunning.” I pointed at Chase.
“Yeah?” my best friend scoffed. “Something tells me my complaint box is still going to be empty at the end of the night. I did you a huge favor. I’ll take my thank-you in the form of evacuating yourself from my apartment and buying me a new desk.”
They were being extremely understanding about this. More than I’d ever be. Then again, Chase knew the stakes I had in this matter. “Send me the model, and I’ll buy you another one.”
“You wish. I’m upgrading to something more expensive this time,” Chase said with a devious laugh. “Now, leave. My turn to make my wife moan.”
Layla and I left holding hands and spent the rest of the night making up for lost kissing time.
And more . . .