Chapter 20
WITHOUT ASKING PERMISSION
“My feet actually hurt,” London said hours later. “I’m ready to cry defeat.”
“We’ve been walking for hours,” he said. “I’m not sure I’ve ever walked so much in one day.”
“It was fun though. I’m glad you shared it with me. I’m hungry again too.”
He looked at his watch. “We can get dinner soon. Nothing fancy, no reason to change.”
“We can do that. Are you sure I’m not keeping you from work?”
“There is always something to do, but I’d rather be doing this.”
“Aw, me too.”
She needed to hear that.
That she wasn’t putting herself out there for a man only to have him doubt her intentions.
She’d had that happen one too many times in her life, which kept her from going back for more.
It almost kept her from pursuing him, but then she told herself it wouldn’t hurt to see where things went.
And not sleeping last night over a worked up body told her they could go well!
“Do you want to get off your feet for a bit before dinner?” he asked.
“We can. We aren’t that far from your place, are we? I feel as if we got turned around, but I’m positive we are closer to yours than mine.”
“We are. About five blocks.”
“Then let me see where you live. Unless you’re a slob. Nah,” she said, shaking her head, her ponytail swaying about. It was easier to put it up today and throw some minimal makeup on. She didn’t like to be fussy about those things on the weekend. “If anything, you’re a neat freak.”
“I don’t think so,” he said.
“That you’re neat or that you’re a slob?”
“I’m not a slob. But not so neat that my eyes twitch if you move the toothpaste away from my toothbrush.”
They’d see about that.
When they got to his building, he nodded to the doorman, she sent the young man a smile and moved in.
“Our doorman is much older and likes to chat daily if we don’t walk by fast. I know it’s rude, but I don’t have the time.”
“Because you’re late half the time,” he said.
“Guilty. Is that going to be a problem?”
“Not for me. Not unless it causes us to miss things. If it’s just you rushing to be on time, that’s on you.”
“That’s normally the case.”
They got to the ninth floor, got off the elevator—he was about halfway up in the building—then made their way to his door. Number three, his phone went up to the door and it unlocked.
“Come in. It’s smaller than your place.”
“But works for you. And we rent, you own, right? We don’t have a fancy lock that our phone takes care of.”
“I do own it. I have for five years.” They moved past a door. “Utility room and storage in there. It’s a nice feature to have, not that I have a lot of things.”
“You come across as an efficient person.”
“That sounds more like an insult than a compliment.”
“Could go both ways,” she said, laughing.
They walked right into a small foyer that the utility room was off of, then moved to the kitchen. L-shape with a bar and what looked to be a few stools on the other side.
More modern than their apartment and she wondered if he’d had work done in here or not.
It was light, bright, modern, and full of whites and grays. Spotless too. It wasn’t as if he was expecting company, but there wasn’t clutter on the counters. Nothing but a fancy coffeemaker in the corner.
There was a four-person round table past the stools, then the living room with one big window bringing in the only light to the space.
A couch, two chairs, a TV on the wall and a coffee table in the center.
“My room and the bathroom are through there.”
She popped her head into the doorway, saw a small hall.
One door in front of her with accordion doors.
She’d bet anything it was his washer and dryer.
A door to the left was his bedroom with a king-sized bed, another large window and a small desk close by.
The door on the right had to be his closet, but it was shut.
“It’s a good space.”
“Not as big as yours.”
“But we rent, so much different, and we needed it sharing a space. Two bedrooms weren’t enough; it had to have two baths.”
“I could have gotten a second bath, but there was no reason. It’s not like I have guests often.”
And probably would have added another five hundred thousand easily to the price ticket for that.
She moved into his kitchen, opened his fridge and snagged out a bottle of water. He only grinned at her, then took it out of her hand, so she got herself another.
She wasn’t usually the type to make herself at home in a man’s space. Especially not this quickly. But there was something about Spencer that tugged comfort out of her without asking permission.
She brushed past him on her way to the couch, dropped onto the cushions, and kicked off her sneakers with zero grace.
Her toes wiggled inside her socks, stretching them with relief.
She was this close to peeling them off too, but even she had limits.
Bare feet might cross the line into too comfortable.
Not that he hadn’t already seen her in far less.
The memory of those two nights in a shared room, shared air, and shared proximity, blazed through her body again, the heat curling low and immediate and making her sweat in more places than appropriate to speak.
God. Had it really only been a few days?
It felt like forever and like five minutes ago all at once.
She twisted the cap off her drink and took a long, unladylike swig just as Spencer lowered himself onto the couch beside her.
Close. Too close. His presence pressed into her space, warm and solid, making her muscles tighten with the awareness that she was all too familiar had been lacking in her life.
Uncomfortable…but only in the absolute best way possible.
“Problem?” he asked, his eyes holding hers steady.
She shook her head now, finished swallowing, then let him take the bottle out of her hand and set it down.
That same hand rested on her thigh, teasing the skin, his thumb running over the goosebumps forming. A contradiction to the heat in her body.
She plastered a smirk on her face and pretended her pulse wasn’t already thudding. “Are you done thinking?”
“I’ll always be someone who has to think,” he murmured, leaning in until his breath caressed her lips. “I just needed another taste of you.”
Another shiver rolled through her. She lifted her arms over her head in a lazy stretch, then let them fall around his neck, pulling him in without pretending otherwise.
He moved closer, his mouth brushing hers once. Soft and testing before his lips parted. She matched him instantly, no hesitation, no slow wind-up. Nothing.
This kiss wasn’t meant for caution. It wasn’t made to simmer.
It launched straight into full throttle. Heat, hunger, and the kind of intensity that dared them both to hold on and not break apart under the force of it.
His hands found her waist, his fingers sliding beneath the hem of her shirt like he’d been thinking about it all night. Maybe he had. Maybe she wasn’t the only one replaying every almost-touch, every lingering look, every moment that should have been nothing but somehow felt like everything.
She shifted and straddled his lap before she could talk herself out of it. His breath hitched in a quiet, controlled sound, but she heard it. Felt it. And the pleasure bolted through her, hot and electric, that she was the one who might make him lose that unflappable control.
His hands tightened on her hips. “London…” he warned, or maybe pleaded.
She didn’t give him time to decide which.
Her lips traveled along his jaw, her voice a low whisper against his skin. “You think too much. Let me help with that.”
His laugh was rough and dragged out of him like he couldn’t stop it. “You’re impossible.”
“And you’re still talking,” she teased, biting lightly at his neck before pulling back to meet his eyes. “Kinda ruining the mood.”
Something shifted in his expression then. The restraint snapping, or maybe his intention was sharpening. Whatever it was, it lit him up in a way that made her breath catch.
He cupped the back of her head and kissed her again. Deeper this time, firmer, like he’d finally made up his mind.
She melted into it, into him, into the heat that had been simmering between them since the moment they’d been stupidly forced to share a hotel room. This was what they’d both been dancing around, what they’d both been pretending wasn’t building.
And now that it was here, now that it was real, she wasn’t sure she wanted to slow down.
She broke the kiss just long enough to whisper against his lips, “Are you still good?”
He smiled dark, slow, and devastating.
“I’m great,” he said, his mouth landing on hers, his hand on her waist and sliding inside the elastic, then inching down further.
She adjusted to open more for him. To let him touch her the way she’d been dying to be touched by a man.
His hand turned, and his fingers moved under her cotton bikinis, his palm against her pelvis before the tips of his fingers were a breath away from her swollen bud. From her wet heat.
She deepened the kiss, not wanting anything to break this spell. Anything to stop what he’d started.
He got the hint loud and clear, proceeded forward between her damp lips, the moan almost torn from her mouth.
He slid further down, gently touching her, rubbing her sensitive tissue. Working her up and making her want to sing.
Her legs parted more, his hand moved lower, then before she knew what he was about, two fingers slammed inside of her.
“Ohhh,” she moaned, her head back, her fingers gripping his shoulders to hang on tight.
He was thrusting in and out, playing her body like he was a master musician.
She lifted her eyes, saw his gaze on her face, watching, waiting, planning on making her come undone.
Her eyelids lowered as if they were the last sands of an hourglass and running out of time. She couldn’t focus on his handsome face. She just wanted to feel what she’d been craving for weeks.
Not just what she thought started at the hotel, but from the first time she’d met him.
Her nails dug tighter with the speed of his movements.
“That’s it, London,” he breathed against her lips. “Let it out. All over me. All over my fingers.”
His voice was low, gentle, and seductive.
The type of man with patience to do this all night.
She didn’t have all night in her though. She had about three seconds and if he moved just right.
Yep, just like that.
She was exploding all over his fingers as he’d roughly commanded her to do.
Every pulse between her legs was felt in her core, in her chest, escaping in tiny gasps out her parted lips.
Until there was nothing else left to give.
Nothing else left to feel other than depleted exhaustion.
She sagged against his chest. Just a minute. That was all she needed.
She’d get her second wind, and then they could continue.
But he shifted her on the couch and moved back, her eyes snapping open.
“What are you doing?”
“Trying to cool down,” he said, reaching for the cold water and taking a healthy sip.
“No reason to cool down. We are just getting started.”
He lifted an eyebrow. “Are you on birth control?”
“No.”
“And I don’t have any condoms in the place. So I need to cool down.”
“Fuck that,” she said. Her eyes dropped to his dick straining at his shorts. “Two can play the same game.”
“You don’t need to.”
“And you didn’t need to get me off. It’s the polite thing. Tit for tat.”
He laughed at her as if she were joking. She wasn’t. She couldn’t. Because she needed to see what was in his shorts. What she’d been imagining in her mind.
“I’m good.”
“Nope. You’re not. And even if you say you are, I’m not. I’m not a tease and I really want to. So shut up and let me go.” The last words came out firmer than she’d planned. His grin stayed in place, but he put the water bottle down and didn’t shift away.
She moved her fingers to the button of his shorts, undid them quickly, parted them and tugged them down over his hips while he lifted.
Oh yeah. That was what she was talking about.
Long. Firm. Strong.
Her fingertips grazed over the tip and down the side, his cock bouncing with the feathery touch.
She really wished one of them had a condom. The fact he didn’t said everything she needed to know without words. That he wasn’t a player. He wasn’t always as prepared as he’d come off.
She gripped his dick. He wasn’t gentle with her, she wasn’t going to be with him.
Gentle wasn’t in her nature. He’d learn that if he didn’t already know.
She was positive he did.
Her fist was stroking him, her thumb brushing across the tip on the way up, gathering moisture, then spreading it on the way down.
A tiny moan escaped his lips. She wanted more than that little noise.
A lot more.
She jerked him hard, she went faster. Her eyes were locked on his face, his gaze matching hers.
The blue of his eyes had intensified. It was full of heat, just like her hand was full of him.
“That’s it,” she said, trying to do what he’d done to her. “Come all over me.”
His eyes shut, the noises coming out sounded more like pain, though she knew it was pleasure as he came all over her fingers and hand. She didn’t stop until she knew he was done. Until nothing else dribbled from the top.
His body sagged against the back of the couch just as hers had when she was finished.
She let go of him and stood, went to get some paper towels and brought them back.
“You’re going to need to change your shorts before dinner. You’re messier than me.”
He reached for the roll of towels. “You can win this round, but next time I’ll be more prepared.”