11. Serena
Serena
Iwake up the next morning tangled in the softest sheets. The sun slants over the duvet, and I let out a low noise from my throat, and sit up, curls tumbling over my shoulders, tickling my skin.
A moment later, I turn sleepily to look at the other side of the bed. The pillow is dimpled from where Travis’s head rested, but the man himself is gone. When I reach over and slide my palm across the pillowcase, there’s no residual heat.
My mind starts to wake up, and questions start scrolling through it.
What time did he wake up? How did he leave without me hearing him? Did he have somewhere important to go, or did he just feel the need to escape?
Sighing, I fall back against the bed, closing my eyes and seeing, like a flashing montage, everything we did last night. Of course, the sex, but then everything that came after.
Travis had spooned me, drawing lazy circles over my shoulder as he asked me question after question. Many of them—about my parents and how I grew up—I was vague about answering. I told him about my grandmother, but left out the fact that for most of my childhood, I was in foster care.
He didn’t push for more than I was able to give him, and answered every question I asked him. Even told me about his father, a cold man who expected only the best from his oldest son.
“My mom doesn’t like to talk about being with him,” Travis said at some point in the early morning, his voice a warm puff against my back. “But I know it haunts her. I know that sometimes she feels like she wasn’t enough. The fact that he cheated on her.”
“With your brother’s mom?”
“Yes,” Travis said, apparently not bothered by the fact that I already knew part of this story. “I’m pretty sure Bonnie is the only woman Stephen ever really loved.”
Each time we got quiet, I thought we would drift off to sleep.
But then I’d break it, or Travis would ask another question, and the conversation would ramp up again.
It felt like that first exhilarating time at a sleepover, giggling and talking to another girl in private, giddy with the feeling of connection, and staying up way too late.
When I eventually fell asleep, it was because my body took over. I remember Travis tucking my hair over my ear, kissing my temple, the feeling that my eyelids were just too heavy for me to open. The feeling that he was giving me permission to let go, to fall asleep.
That I was safe.
Now, blinking against the sun, I’m exhausted. I can’t imagine how Travis managed to drag himself out of bed earlier than this.
I get to my feet, stretch, and look around the room, thinking maybe he just went out for coffee or breakfast. But his things—the jacket he hung, the suit he carefully folded, his phone and watch—are gone.
He really fucking left me here.
A laugh erupts from my throat, sharp and a little crazed. I shake my head, starting to gather my things, trying not to think about his head between my legs, his body draped over mine, his hands drawing my hips up and against his.
Fuck him. He really left.
It’s not like I was expecting a proposal or anything, but what kind of fucked up is it to sneak out? It would be one thing if last night really was just a hook-up, but it wasn’t. We stayed up all night talking. He made me feel like he wanted to know me.
Maybe I should be embarrassed. The logical voice in my head says that maybe, after two bad encounters with the Oakley boys, I should just retreat back to the house with my roommates and steer clear.
But I don’t want to steer clear. I want a fucking apology.
I get ready in a rage, which is probably why I pull on the dress from last night. I twist my hair into a clip, pull out a few tendrils, and admire myself in the mirror—knowing from the wide, unfocused look in my eyes that I’m being a little crazy—before slamming out of the hotel room.
And this time, I order the fucking Uber.
Surprisingly, my contractor badge lets me scan in to the Onyx building even though it’s Sunday morning. I scan it again for the elevator, thinking that surely I’ll be stopped at some point in the process.
But I make it all the way to the top floor and past Dianne’s empty desk without a single person or door to stop me.
For a second, I pause and look at the little potted cactus with Dianne’s stuff, the framed photos of her kids, before returning to my task and bursting right into Travis Oakley’s office.
Travis stands when I slam through the door, his eyes widening, then trailing down over my body. To anyone else, he might look put-together, well-dressed, but to my eyes, the man looks disheveled.
He looks a little off-balance, like the day hasn’t gone the way he thought it would.
There’s a hint of shadow on his jaw, and some under his eyes that point to the night we shared together.
When he rakes his gaze up and down my body, it’s with a ragged kind of despair and desire that would make me laugh if I wasn’t so angry.
Yeah, the dress was definitely the way to go.
“Serena—”
“What the fuck?” I ask, stalking toward him, camera bouncing against my hip. “You left?”
“I—” he blinks a few times, like it truly never occurred to him that I could have followed him back here. That I might have figured out where he went. Even though this is now the second time that I’ve charged, angrily, into his office.
It occurs to me that I no longer feel angry.
Right now, I’m feeling something completely different. Something simmering in my core, already wanting and ready. Something that’s honestly a little fucked up.
“Serena. This is a bad idea.” Like last time, Travis is standing behind his desk, and I realize with a note of satisfaction that he’s also wearing his suit from the night before.
Surely he could have called someone to bring him a change of clothes?
And yet, here he is, looking bedraggled and a little off-kilter.
I like it. I like that I did it to him.
It’s not like Travis and I know each other well, but from a year of watching him, observing from across crowded rooms and in meetings, then last night—it’s clear to me how much he enjoys being in control.
I think of him firing that security guard the first day I barged in here, and shiver at the show of power. I was completely aroused in that moment, though I tried my best to ignore it.
Moving intentionally, slowly, like a cat stalking prey, I walk closer to him. His eyes shift slowly between dismay, defiance, and desire, a desperate grasping for restraint that makes my core tighten.
“What’s so wrong about bad ideas?” I ask softly, knowing that the sight of me in the dress again makes him want to take it off. I love the weight of his attention, the low simmer of his gaze.
His voice is rough. “You’re my brother’s ex. And a contractor. It was inappropriate?—”
When I reach him, I set a hand on his chest and look up into his face, watching his words fail him at the contact.
His chest is warm, and I can picture what it looks like naked.
Now that I’ve had him undressed, I can’t imagine going the rest of my life only seeing him like this. Closed off. In a buttoned up suit.
“Alex lost all rights when he did what he did,” I murmur, eyes locked on Travis’s throat for a moment, before they flick up to meet his. “I’d understand if you have some sort of bro code. I mean, maybe Alex would never do something like this to you…”
Something in Travis’s expression flashes. Obviously, Alex would do this. He wouldn’t think twice about getting with one of Travis’s ex-girlfriends. And we both know that. Anyone who’s ever met Alex would know that.
“It’s not—clearly, we can’t do this, Serena.”
“I want this,” I say, trailing my hands up over his chest, under his jacket, sliding it off his shoulders until it falls back on his chair.
“Alex is dead to me. And he always said he didn’t really have a family.
So maybe we should do a little less moral policing and a little more letting ourselves enjoy each other’s company. ”
Travis’s breath comes quicker. His mouth presses into a flat line, his body going perfectly still. For a second, I think he might actually shut this down, might actually push me away.
But when I start to unbutton his dress shirt, he mutters, “Fuck it.”
In just a few seconds, I go from standing in front of him to whirling around, my hips leaning into his desk. Apparently, Travis and I are going to be desk-sex people. I don’t have a problem with that.
My entire body is thrumming with happiness, and I realize that I intended for this to happen. Yeah, I was angry that he left me in the hotel room on my own, but my body apparently also wanted more of this.
Travis must hit a button because the blinds over the glass start to lower. It makes me laugh. So fancy, so Travis.
“You really think anyone is going to see us, all the way up here?” I ask, and he reaches around, hand gently wrapping around my throat.
Drawing me up so my back is flush with his front, he whispers in my ear, “Maybe they won’t. But I don’t want to risk anyone getting to see you like this, Serena. You are mine. All mine.”
With that, he kicks my feet apart, pushes me back down onto the desk, and slides a hand from my clit to my entrance, letting out a low noise when he finds me both wet and not wearing panties. I realize that I never did find them the night before.
“Fucking perfect,” he mutters, planting a hand on my back and fucking me with his fingers, teasing me, sliding them through my wetness until I’m writhing and begging him just to fuck me.
I feel wild. Unhinged.
Maybe I’d never realized it before, without something to compare to, but with Alex, I was always holding something back.
Being more vanilla in sex than I really was.
Not asking for what I really wanted. Because if I did, he might realize I wasn’t enough for him.
Or, actually, that I was too much for him.
But with Travis, it’s different. His hand on my throat last night was an invitation to something more than a missionary position, something more than half-hearted blow jobs.
And now, he reaches up, pulling the clip from my hair and lacing his fingers through my hair instead, using his grip as leverage. His pull is sharp but not painful, a strange, biting sensation that only adds to the pleasure of his fingers on my clit.
It’s like being bracketed by him, one hand creating pleasure, the other creating just a taste of pain.
“Oh, fuck,” I hiss, and then immediately hear the fumbling of his belt, then the hard press of his eager cock against my ass. He kneads my ass, rocking against me, before pulling back and slapping just hard enough to sting ever so slightly.
Another thing I’ve never done with anyone before, and certainly not Alex. Another thing that I might have thought would feel silly, stupid—but it’s not the thing itself, it’s the fact that Travis wanted to do it, that he’s behind me, holding me, relishing the control that I’ve given him.
Desire crashes through me, and I feel desperate, needy, so I reach back and grab at his cock, pumping once, twice, before he takes my wrist and pins it to the desk, using his other hand to line himself up at my entrance.
“This is such a bad idea,” I murmur, teasing him, pushing back against his erection. “Remember?”
“I know,” he rasps, before pushing inside me, his hip coming flush with my ass, the pressure and filling sensation nearly enough to drag my orgasm straight up from the depths.
And this time, despite our best efforts, Travis’s massive mahogany desk doesn’t move an inch.