Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-one
When Iris returned to their room, Gabe was shirtless, having just changed into his bathing suit.
His physique still struck her breathless.
His sinewy arms and chiseled torso, the way his swim trunks hung tantalizingly low on his hips, with that one vein snaking from beneath his waistband over the taut muscles of his lower abdomen. It was hot in their room.
In contrast, Iris had brought a high-waisted bikini to be more modest with work contacts. Speaking of conservative style, as delicious as Gabe looked, she couldn’t help but notice he was very tattooed for the Hamptons. She hoped this crowd wouldn’t judge him for it.
“Oh! Let’s give Jonathan the gift.” Iris had obsessed over what to bring Jonathan as a host gift and, with the guidance of her most trusted wine merchant, spent more than she ever had on a single bottle of red.
Then she spent the next twenty-four hours obsessing that wine was too banal, until Gabe took pity on her and offered to make a decanter to go with it.
She loved the idea and secretly thought, as a bonus, that it would showcase his glasswork and soften Jonathan to consider Gabe for the lobby piece.
So when Gabe reached into his duffel bag and produced a small, newspaper wrapped object no larger than a grapefruit, she was perplexed. He unwrapped it to reveal a solid glass pyramid, or rhombus, or multisided geometric shape.
Her brow furrowed. “A paperweight?”
“Could be. It’s a prism. A decorative object. This place could use a few.”
“What happened to the decanter?”
“It broke in the annealer, and I didn’t have time to make another. I had some prisms already made. They’re good gifts. I sell out every Christmas.”
“It’s nice, but…it doesn’t make any sense with the wine I brought.”
“Wine doesn’t need anything to make sense, it only needs people who want to get drunk.”
Iris sighed, then summoned a smile. “It’s fine. Thank you. He probably has a decanter anyway.”
—
The house had its own private path down to the shore of Gardiners Bay, and as the others had stayed up by the pool, Iris and Gabe had the beach all to themselves.
She had begun to rub suntan lotion onto her shoulders when the pleasantly nostalgic smell of Coppertone filled her nostrils.
Then she caught herself—would the suntan lotion overpower her perfume?
She closed the bottle cap and handed it to Gabe. “It’s late enough, I don’t need lotion.”
“Yeah, let’s go in the water first.”
What about the ocean ? There’s no way the perfume could survive the salt water. But was Iris really not going to enjoy the sun or water this entire weekend? That’d be ridiculous. Her connection with Gabe was deeper than that by now. And she could always reapply back at the house.
They dived in tandem under the bay’s gentle swells, and once they’d swum beyond the breaking point, they floated easily and held each other while the sun was hazy and low on the shimmering water.
Iris hugged his shoulders from behind. “What’s the deal with Bill and Lindsay?”
“What do you mean?”
“Like how are they a couple?”
“Hot girl dates old rich guy, tale as old as time.”
“But is Bill a rich guy?”
Gabe shrugged, bobbing her in the water. “Sure he is. All the guys out here are.”
She didn’t agree. Bill definitely seemed to care about money, but he didn’t seem as comfortable in this environment as Jonathan, or even Marilyn for that matter. “I don’t know. I think he’s trying to fit in here, but doesn’t.”
“He’s Jonathan’s friend.”
“He’s his connection for the government housing, big difference. I don’t even think Jonathan likes him that much. Jonathan is classy and educated and into art and design. Bill is like a poor man’s idea of a rich man. Complete with the sugar baby.”
“Oh yeah, I’m sure Jonathan has never thrown his money around to get a hot chick into bed.”
“Okay, that’s the second time you called Lindsay hot.”
Gabe chuckled and fell back, dunking them both in the water.
They swam to shore and trudged back to their towels, and flopped beside each other on the sand. Gabe wrapped Iris in a towel and then in his arms as they settled to watch the sunset. Any doubts she had about the weekend melted like the sun into the horizon.
When at last the sun dipped out of sight, she tilted her head back. “We should get showered for dinner.”
Gabe kissed her salty hair. “I have an idea.”
—
Iris giggled as Gabe led her to the outdoor shower by the side of the house. “Is this too obvious? What if somebody sees us? Maybe I should go in first, then you.”
“No one’s around, they’re all up at the pool.”
“What if someone comes and sees four feet at the bottom?”
He wrapped his arms around her waist and whispered into her neck, “Then I’ll lift you up.”
The outdoor shower was a weathered wooden stall stocked with Byredo bath products, a new rainwater showerhead over a flagstone floor, and only the clear lilac sky overhead.
Iris and Gabe crowded in together, giddy.
He kissed her neck and she bit his shoulder.
His skin was like a salted caramel, and she didn’t want him to rinse off before she got a taste.
Even the piquancy of his sweat appealed to her, and as he reached overhead to adjust the sputtering showerhead, Iris kissed a path up the side of his torso to the softness of his underarm.
He pulled the strings on her bikini top and she undid the tie of his board shorts.
Seeing him outside, in daylight, naked and aroused, awakened every inch of her body like the cool breeze on her wet skin.
Their transgression laced her desire. She couldn’t help grinning as he kissed her, and their teeth clicked like pearls.
The shower water was warm by now, and they ducked into the stream together.
They kissed and caressed each other as the water made their skin slick with soap and sunscreen.
Gabe ran his hands up and down her sides, then gripped the soft curves of her hips to spin her around and pulled her backside close.
She leaned into his chest and felt his hardness thump between her thighs, her buttocks, slipping on her soapy body, and she teased him, swishing back and forth like a cat.
He reached one hand around her breasts and slid the other down her stomach.
When his fingers found between her legs wetter than water, he swore in her ear—an exclamation and declaration of exactly what he wanted to do to her.
Iris glanced up toward the house, where the fear of someone seeing them had morphed to thrill, then fantasy.
Unbidden, the image of Jonathan watching them from a window flashed behind her eyes, and then it was Jonathan’s tan arm crossed over her collarbones, his hand making her ache.
The first wave of pleasure made it hard to hold herself up.
She opened her eyes and braced against the wall, her fingernails making fresh yellow scratches in the soft silver teakwood.
She reached for Gabe behind her to return the pleasure—only her hand couldn’t find him.
She turned to face him and saw he’d lost his erection.
Maybe they’d been too focused on her enjoyment, she thought.
Iris took a pump of body wash and sensually sudsed down his arms, his torso, before slipping lower to stroke him.
Gabe gave a soft moan, but his penis rested just as softly in her hand.
Iris wanted to ask what was wrong, but talking seemed more difficult than doing other things with her mouth.
First she kissed him slowly, deeply, like they had all the time in the world, even as her mind was racing.
Then she lowered herself as slinkily as possible in the tight space, not wanting to kneel on the sandy stone but feeling awkward crouching.
She felt anything but sexy, but she was a woman—she could fake it.
She licked him, ignoring the taste of soap, took him into her mouth, coordinated with her hands, and for what felt like the slowest sixty seconds of her life, got absolutely no response while giving a blow job.
“Stop.” He gently pulled her back up to standing. “You’ll hurt your knees.”
Iris couldn’t help but feel embarrassed. “Is there something else I can do?”
He shook his head. “Nothing, it’s just not…I’m in my head, sorry—”
“Don’t apologize.”
Gabe turned toward the shower stream, squeezing his eyes shut and making a sour face into the water’s blast.
“Let me wash your hair.” She could still make this shower a pleasurable, sensual experience. She pumped shampoo into her palm.
“I already got soap into it.”
“Soap and shampoo aren’t the same.”
“They are to me.” Gabe stepped out of the water and shook his head like a dog. He pressed his lips into a smile and gave her a peck. “I’m not fancy like you.”
They do-si-do’ed and Iris took her turn under the water. But no sooner had the cool dollop of shampoo hit her scalp that she saw Gabe tug the towel draped over the stall door and begin to dry off. “You’re going?”
“We’ll leave separately.” He wrapped it around his waist. “Then it won’t be so obvious.”
She frowned as the shampoo lather slid down her face and began to sting her eye.
“It was your idea, remember?”
Iris tilted her head into the water, gratified only by the knowledge that the towel he’d used was covered in sand. “Bring me a fresh towel from our bathroom, will you?”
He grunted an agreement and slipped out the stall door.
The water had turned cold.