Chapter 54
FIFTY-FOUR
Derek watched Reese sprawled across the bed, shoes kicked off, her dinner spread out in front of her across the bedspread. After finding out there were no chicken wings on the menu, Reese had ordered crayfish, after determining from the room service employee that crayfish was really lobster.
As he ate his own orange roughy, going over his daily food allowance from the Bureau by about fifty percent, he said, “That cost almost fifty bucks. How the hell can you afford that?”
She licked her fingers. “Well, I really can’t. Delco would pay for it if I submitted an expense report, but you know that makes me feel guilty. Like spending someone else’s money, you know? Since Delco has basically stolen from people. So I’m just using my credit card.”
He was a little worried about her financial circumstances, but there was nothing less romantic than asking a woman what was in her bank account. Well, actually, he could think of a lot less romantic things, but that wasn’t the point.
“Yeah, me too.” He wasn’t worried about his own credit card bill. Since his divorce, he hadn’t spent a lot of money and he was doing alright.
“How many times am I going to get to eat lobster in Auckland, New Zealand, you know?”
“I’m guessing this is the one and only for me.”
“Me, too. I’m pretty much broke. If I can’t get a job from this story, I might be forced to live with my dad or something.” She shuddered, showing her feelings on giving up her apartment.
Now was his chance. He should say something about her moving back in with him. Dropping his fork, he wiped his mouth on the napkin and chewed quickly. He went over to the bed, perching next to her awkwardly. Christ, he wasn’t any good at blabbering out his feelings.
Reese looked at him suspiciously. “Don’t even think about taking a bite of my lobster. You have your own food.”
“I don’t want your food. I just want to…look at you.” Oh, now that was poetic. Derek mentally kicked himself in the ass Reese liked to grab so much.
Her eyebrow went up. “Should I do something? Make faces? Sing? Blow bubbles in my wine?”
Knowing he probably looked like a stalker, wild-eyed and weird, he couldn’t stop himself from reaching for her hair and sliding a hand across it. “Don’t be a smart-ass. I just think you’re beautiful.”
“Thanks.”
Reese was on her stomach, stretched out, arms propped up with her elbows.
She slipped her fingers into her mouth again, licking off stray butter with long flicks of her wet tongue.
Derek felt his cock harden, and he dropped his fingers down a little, across her graceful neck, to her back where the zipper of her dress was waiting for him.
“Oh, no. I know that look. But I’m still eating. You’ll have to wait.”
Not a chance. He bent forward and kissed the bare spot of her back, right above the neck of her dress, inhaling her light scent. “Is that payback for in the stairwell when I put you off?”
“It’s because I’m still hungry, but now that you mention it, that’s a good reason, too.”
“Just keep eating.” She was fine the way she was. He just wanted to touch her. Moving lower, he dug into the muscles of her lower back, massaging with upward strokes.
Reese made a little groaning sound, her mouth wrapped around a forkful of lobster.
“Lobster and a massage at the same time. I just might have an orgasm.”
“If that’s what you want.” Still kneading the small of her back, he ran his hand along the firmness of her curved behind, massaging while his thumb darted closer and closer to her center.
The fork fell on the bed and Reese’s head rolled forward.
He moved both hands onto her ass, swallowing hard as he covered her, splaying across her completely with his palms, pressing gently.
At the rounded under curve of each cheek, he slid a finger along, going between her thighs, pulling the shimmery fabric of her dress taut, brushing against her mound from the back through the layers of clothing.
He felt no urgency, no rush to get her clothes off, no immediate need to bury himself in her.
He wanted to savor her, the touch, the smell, the taste.
Moving down to her thighs, he continued to massage, leaning forward and running his tongue down her back until he reached her zipper.
Taking it in his teeth, he pulled, resting his hands on her waist, while Reese sucked in her breath.
The zipper stopped right above the curve of her behind, disappointing him.
He wanted to dip his tongue down between her cheeks and make her squirm.
Instead, he concentrated on easing her dress off her shoulders, down to her elbows, baring her back to him.
He undid her bra, and made long deep strokes across her smooth skin with his hands, wishing they weren’t so rough and scratchy.
Then he remembered the scented lotion Reese always carried around with her. Her purse was lying on the desk and he stood up, adjusting his cock inside the khaki pants Reese had made fun of. She might hate the pants, but it hadn’t stopped her from wanting him in a stairwell.
Reese whimpered, falling forward onto the bed, her face inches from the tray with her dinner on it. “That was cruel.”
“I’m coming back.”
“Oh.” She shoved the tray back to the other side of the bed. “Good.”
Derek turned her purse over on the desk, dumping the contents. Sorting past a toothbrush in a case, a tampon, and a subway swipe card, he finally found the little squeeze tube of lotion with a purple lid. Unscrewing it, he took a whiff.
“Blueberry and vanilla.” Sweet and delicious, like her.
When he turned back around, Reese was watching him with a soft smile. “Are you going to rub my feet, too?”
“Sure.” Squirting the lotion in his hands, he rubbed them together to warm it up, then picked up her foot. He massaged the arch of her foot, working the lotion into her skin while she sighed in approval.
Her feet were the same creamy fair color as the rest of her, her toes long and thin. When he went between her toes with his slick fingers, she stiffened.
“That tickles!”
Since he didn’t want her laughing, he moved away without a word, working up her ankle, around her knee, up her thigh, getting more lotion when his hands dried.
The smell of the berries clouded around her, and her head was tucked into her arms as she gave a random soft moan.
When he reached her skirt, he dropped down and started with the other foot.
He had meant to tell her he was in love with her, was on the verge of spitting it out when her stomach had growled by the harbor. Derek didn’t know if he could make his tongue unstick from the roof of his mouth long enough to tell her now. She was so gorgeous that he didn’t know where to start.
This time when he steadily climbed up her thigh, instead of stopping at her skirt, he went past it to her sleeves, which were down by her elbows. Tugging a little to let her know his plan, he said, “Lift your stomach, Reese.”
She did, languidly, looking relaxed and in the early stages of arousal. She sank back into the bed when he took the dress past her hips and down her long legs until it was off. Her panties went next.
Reese sucked in her breath, lifting her perfectly rounded ass several inches in the air so he could slide the panties off. His fingers trembled, his mouth went dry, his cock protested at being corralled in his pants.
The view Down Under was fucking fabulous in Derek’s mind.
Her bra had fallen half down her arms, but for the most part she was deliciously naked. He filled his hands with more lotion and went for her inner thighs, working over her cheeks, sliding down between her legs, the slick sound of lotion on skin making him grit his teeth.
He was so close to her. All he needed to do was lift her behind a little and he could slide inside her, her face still down on the bed. But he held on to his control, loosening the muscles of her back with deep strokes, before nudging her hip.
“Roll over.”
With a sigh, she did, leaving the bra behind and stretching her arms over her head, eyes half closed. “This feels so good.”
It looked good, too. He devoured her visually, taking in every inch of her heated flesh, the arch of her neck and the graceful slope of shoulders. Her round breasts rising and following with her slow steady breathing and her rosy nipples reaching towards him.
The dip in at her waist, the lush curve of her hips, the dimple of her belly button, and the soft folds that hid her from him.
And he started all over again, from the bottom, moving up inch by erotic inch, giving attention to every muscle, every spot, spreading her legs wider as he went to accommodate himself between her knees. Her moans were coming faster, her breath shakier, her thighs clenching.
Still, he went back to the lotion bottle again and again, running his thumbs along her panty line, nudging her wider and wider apart for him, his mouth close enough to her that he could smell her desire intermixed with the vanilla and blueberry.
So close that he could feel the heat pulsing from her, feel the tautness of her thigh muscles, see the moisture that gave away her desire.
His hands slowed, his eyes fixated, his mouth ached to press against her, but he only blew out his hot breath on her, then moved past to her belly. Reese let out a cry of dismay.
He rubbed her arms, her shoulders, her neck, then her breasts, taking her in his hands, rolling his fingers across her, covering her everywhere but her nipples, which he carefully avoided.
Reese was limp, her gasps of pleasure settling into a steady rhythm, releasing one right after the other each time he moved his hands on her.
Goose bumps danced across her flesh as he cupped the side of her breast, coming achingly close to her nipple.
She tried to turn, to force contact, but he evaded her and took his hands off her completely.
As she whimpered, he yanked off his shirt, nearly removing the top layer of skin from his face as well, since he hadn’t bothered to unbutton the shirt.
Undoing his pants, he leaned forward and without touching her anywhere, closed his mouth over the very tip of her nipple and sucked, savoring the sweet taste.
When her hand tried to push his mouth down, and her breasts arched up, he pulled back, enjoying himself with this touch and tease foreplay.
Ditching his pants, he swiped a condom from his wallet before letting them drop.
Then he bent and repeated the suckle on the other nipple, Reese jerking forward, her head twisting left and right.
Moving out of her reach, he got the condom on and drank in the sight of her. She couldn’t be any more spread than she was, and she looked inviting, desperate, drunk from desire, her lower lip swollen from where her teeth had ripped into it.
Her hand lifted up, like she was pleading with him to come back. Her eyes were unfocused. He rubbed his thumb across her clit. “Is that what you want?”
“No.” Her head went back and forth.
Derek lowered his head between her thighs, resting on his elbows. He could only hold out another minute, she smelled so sweet, looked so hungry, that sixty seconds was probably pushing his limit. But he urged her apart, baring her slick pussy to him.
He buried his mouth in her, eating her with little bites and sucks and licks, wondering if he could come just from loving her like this.
Her knees slammed into his head as she jerked and cried out.
When he felt she was losing control, Derek stopped, hovering in front of her, licking her taste off his lips.
“Is that what you wanted?”
“Yes. No.”
Her hand closed around him as she rose in a half sitting position to reach him. He stifled a moan.
“I want this.”
Taking her hand off him before he ended the party early, Derek pushed her back to the bed, holding her hands up over her head.
Then he sank into her, so ready, so tight, that he couldn’t prevent himself from calling out, “Reese. ”
If it was possible to die from pleasure, Reese knew someone should start planning her funeral.
She was lost, limp, taking Knight stroke after stroke, unable to even move against him, so sensitive and swollen and ripped with pleasure. Her mind was empty, her body was engorged, her eyes unable to stay open, her arms over her head, abandoned.
Knight’s finger ran over her lip and she kissed him, pulling him into her mouth, sucking lightly.
“Open your eyes, Reese.”
The raspy command had her forcing her lids apart, struggling to focus up on him, his body still deep inside hers, moving slower now, languorously. He moved the finger she had gotten wet down to her nipple and brushed across her.
Shuddering, she met his gaze, feeling the buildup reaching its peak, her inner thighs trembling, ready to free-fall into ecstasy.
“Reese,” he said, locking those double fudge eyes onto hers, “I’m in love with you.”
He thrust hard into her, and the breath rushed out of her from shock and his weight. Before she could think, she ran her hand along his cheek, overwhelmed with emotion. “I love you, too.”
His mouth covered hers, tongue plunging into her with an all-consuming kiss and she felt him come inside her, his arms around her head, caging her into his passion. She followed him, crying out into his mouth as her orgasm overtook her in rapturous shudders.
Reese saw the future and it didn’t hold double dates in Brooklyn with her brother.