Chapter 1 #2
His hand slides to my jaw, gentle but firm, tilting my face up.
Our eyes lock.
No more banter. No more quips. Just the sound of my pulse roaring in my ears and the heady scent of his cologne making me forget my own damn name.
Then he kisses me.
And holy hell.
It’s not sweet. It’s not soft. It’s the kind of kiss that lights a match and drops it into your ribcage.
His mouth claims mine with a hunger that makes my back arch and my toes curl in their too tight heels. One hand tangles in my hair. The other anchors at my waist, pulling me in until there’s not a breath of space between us.
I kiss him back with the kind of desire that lives in the hollow parts of me. Where logic shuts up and need takes over. Maybe I don’t have anything to lose. Maybe he’s the burning desire and release for a craving I never knew had a cure.
Then I pull back, just barely, breath catching, lips buzzing, heart slamming against my ribs, ready to claw its way out.
“You’re a walking Wall Street cliché,” I pant.
He gives me a dark, satisfied look. “And you’re clearly into poor decisions.”
Before he can smirk again, I grab the lapels of his very expensive suit jacket and yank.
Buttons fly. One bounces off the mirrored wall with a tiny ping! of moral decay.
He doesn’t flinch.
Instead, he growls, a low, dangerous sound that sends a jolt straight between my thighs, and spins me around so fast I gasp, my back slamming against the cool elevator mirror with a thud.
The mirror shudders behind me. His chest crushes into mine. One hand drags down my leg, gripping hard, claiming, hauling it up around his waist. Possession burns in every touch, every breath.
I’m his. Right now, there’s no question.
I suck in a sharp breath.
“What are we doing?” I whisper, half laughing, half melting.
His mouth finds the underside of my jaw, hot and devastating. “Making very poor decisions.”
I groan as his lips trail down my neck, his stubble scraping just enough to make me gasp.
“This elevator has a camera,” I point out.
He lifts his head, eyes hooded and dark. “Then we’d better give them something to talk about.”
Oh hell.
He kisses me with the desperation of a man starved, devouring me as if I’m the only thing keeping him alive. There’s no hesitation, no restraint, just heat, hunger, and hands that claim every inch of me as if they’ve always known where I needed him most.
I claw at his ruined shirt, fingers grazing bare skin, hard muscle, heat. His hands are under my dress, palms sliding up my thighs, finding the edge of my underwear with a sound that’s almost reverent.
“Tell me to stop,” he mutters against my mouth, voice hoarse.
“Not a chance.”
He groans, something inside him snapping loose, and then I’m lifted, pinned higher against the mirror. My dress rides up, gathering at my hips, my legs lock around his waist, and the room tilts with the rush in my head.
Not from fear.
From want.
From the way every inch of my skin is too tight, too hot, too alive.
His mouth is everywhere, jaw, throat, collarbone, like he needs to taste me just to stay grounded. One of his hands fists in my hair, tilting my head back, and I let him. I want him to.
This is insane. I don’t do this. I don’t press myself against mysterious elevator strangers who smell of sin and stare as if they’re burning me into memory.
But I am.
And God, it’s so damn good to stop. To shut off the noise, the constant grind of second-guessing, the twitchy, panicked need to stay three steps ahead in a game I was never meant to win.
Right now? I’m not broke. I’m not stressed. I’m not a girl two weeks from eviction and one sad breakup away from becoming a podcast cautionary tale.
Right now, I’m just wanting.
Craving.
Burning.
His hand skims up my thigh, under my dress, knuckles brushing against the damp lace between my legs.
“Damn,” he rasps. “You’re soaked for me already.”
Heat explodes in my belly. I clutch at his shoulders, digging my nails into muscle, panting against his mouth.
“This is so stupid,” I gasp, even as my hips grind against him.
“Yeah,” he breathes, lips tracing the shell of my ear. “So stop me.”
But I can’t. I won’t.
I want to feel everything.
I want to let go.
His belt clinks open. My heart hammers, wild and frantic, a caged thing crashing against bone.
“Condom,” I gasp.
His hand fumbles into his wallet, fast, practiced, and oh my god that should be a red flag but I don’t care.
The tear of foil.
His mouth finds mine again.
And then, oh god, he’s inside me in one slow, thick, unrelenting push, and I gasp so loudly I might’ve scared a bird off a ledge two floors up.
My head hits the mirror behind me. My back arches. His hand on my ass pulls me closer, deeper.
I moan his name, loud, wrecked, desperate, my breath streaking the glass behind me. My body clamps down, greedy and relentless, as if it’s trying to keep him buried inside forever.
He moves, slow at first. Long, deliberate thrusts that make my eyes roll back and my toes curl in their too-tight heels.
I whimper, clawing at his back, trying to drag him closer even though he’s already buried so deep I can feel him in my soul.
My body is a live wire. Every nerve ending lit up, every inch of me spiraling into chaos.
He kisses me again, rough, consuming, swallowing every reason I ever had for saying no, until there’s nothing left but “yes” and “more” and “please.”
And I let him.
The elevator’s too hot. The air’s too thin. I’ve never been this dizzy from sex or anticipation or the fact that I’m finally doing something reckless and raw and totally unhinged… and I don’t regret it.
Not one second.
I shatter with a sharp cry, orgasm tearing through me. Sudden, brutal, all-consuming. It wracks me from the inside out, nerve-ending deep.
He’s right behind me, groaning into my skin, his thrusts turning frantic before they break apart completely. His body crushes into mine, every muscle straining, as if he’s trying to crawl inside and never leave.
And then it’s quiet.
Only the sound of our ragged breathing and the soft hum of the elevator trying to remember how to be a machine and not a confessional booth of questionable life choices.
I’m still trembling.
Still wrapped around him.
Still not entirely convinced I didn’t hallucinate the entire thing.
His forehead rests against mine
I feel everything at once.
The delicious ache between my thighs.
The wild thrum of my pulse.
The sudden, cold rush of what the hell did I just do?
“Well,” I say hoarsely. “That escalated.”
“You’re insane,” he mutters, but there’s a ghost of a smile on his lips.
“You’re the one with a condom in your wallet,” I shoot back, trying to laugh, even though my legs are barely holding me up and my skin is humming. I might as well be touching a power line.
“You’re the one who tore my shirt open.”
“Touché.”
Ding.
The elevator lurches.
The doors glide open at the worst possible second, slicing through the moment with surgical cruelty, exposing everything I shouldn’t feel.
There’s a security guard standing outside. He looks at us.
I look at Nick.
Nick adjusts his jacket as if this is just another Tuesday.
I want to die.
The guard clears his throat. “Everything… alright in there?”
“Perfectly,” Nick replies, calm as a freaking cucumber martini.
I grab my clutch. My hair’s a rat’s nest. My dress is up around my ribs. I can’t feel my knees.
But somehow, I step out of that elevator with my chin high.
Wrecked. Lit up. Not sorry.
Not yet.
Nick watches me walk ahead, hands in his pockets, clearly a man with no regrets.
I don’t look back.
Not at him. Not at the elevator. Not at the poor security guard who now probably needs hazard pay and therapy.
My heels wobble as I stride down the hallway. I’ve just defiled a mirrored surface with a man whose name I barely know. My heart thunders, my thighs tremble, and my underwear is still halfway down my thighs.
But I keep walking.
Because if I stop, even for a second, the weight of what just happened will crash into me. A freight train of terrible life choices.
I find the bathroom and slam the door, gripping the edge of the marble sink to anchor myself back to reality.
I stare into the mirror. My lipstick is smeared, my hair looks as if it lost a fight with a leaf blower, and my pupils are blown wide, raw proof I just discovered the secrets of the universe through orgasm.
Holy shit.
I just had elevator sex.
With a stranger.
A hot, arrogant, stupidly rich stranger.
Who is absolutely the kind of man who ruins lives and never calls.
I cover my face with both hands and groan. What the hell did I just do?
This was supposed to be one drink. One free canapé. One polite giggle at a man named Chad’s startup pitch before disappearing back into the night with Laura and my dignity intact.
Instead, I went up in flames in a penthouse-bound elevator with a man who smells of sweat, musk, and expensive whiskey.
Okay. Breathe.
No one knows. No one saw. And he doesn’t even have my last name. I don’t have his number. There’s no trail. No receipts. Just heat and memory and the very real possibility that my entire pelvic floor just ascended to the next plane of existence.
I fix my hair. Sort of. Reapply my lipstick with trembling hands. Smooth my dress and pretend I’m not freshly ruined from the inside out.
Then I march out of the bathroom and into the glittering chaos of the rooftop lounge, scanning the crowd for Laura.
My chest’s tight, my pulse ragged. I need to find her. I need something, anything, to keep from splintering apart right here on this polished marble floor.
At least one thing is for certain, I will never have to see that man again.
Thankfully.