Chapter 14
Chris
Imay have exaggerated a slight bit when I told Julia I could cook. I mean, I could cook a little, but if I wasn’t eating out, I mostly ate sandwiches, cereal, or microwave burritos.
“Christina, you need to start eating like a grown-up!”
I could hear my mother’s chastising voice in my head, and it gave me an idea. Opening my phone, I sent a text to my mother asking for help. I could practically feel her giddiness over the phone as she invited me over after work to teach me how to cook something I could serve my fake girlfriend.
As soon as I walked into my childhood home my mother pulled me into a hug, which was weird, because she wasn’t the affectionate one in the family. That was my dad.
“I’m going to teach you how to make a couple of different things today,” she said into my shoulder. “They’re impossible to mess up, even for you.”
I would be offended, but she wasn’t wrong.
“Doing some cooking, huh Chris?” My father called from the couch.
“Yeah.”
“Good luck.”
I could tell by his tone of voice he thought I’d need it.
“So how’s it going with Julia?” Mom asked as she showed me how to make a simple marinade for the chicken breasts.
“Good,” I said. “We haven’t seen too much of each other this week, but she’s coming over for dinner tomorrow.”
“Did you miss her?” Mom asked curiously.
“Yeah, I did.”
It was true too. We’d gone back to not talking or texting, and we rarely ran into each other at work.
I kept thinking and discarding reasons to text her.
Spending the weekend with her had been fun.
Hot sexy fun. But more than that, I’d enjoyed hanging out with her, even when we were sparring.
That was something I never would have thought I’d be saying about Julia Montego.
I wasn’t sure how she’d manipulated – or maybe dared – me into offering to make her dinner, but I was still looking forward to spending time with her.
Hopefully, we’d have dinner together and it would be enough for me to remember how annoying she was and how we had nothing in common.
Moving past this little crush I had on her would be a win for me.
Then again, maybe we could have sex again.
I was not opposed to that at all, even though I knew it was dangerous.
I ended up staying at my parents’ house for several hours, but by the time I was done, I felt fairly confident about my ability to make some roasted chicken breasts and sides. If I got stuck, Mom had also taught me how to make spaghetti with a homemade sauce and garlic bread.
Even better? Mom had purchased extras of all the ingredients, sending me home with everything I needed for both meals.
For some reason I was nervous all day. I told myself it was about the cooking but in reality it was about Julia. I ended up leaving work an hour early to run the vacuum and start marinating the chicken, wanting to leave nothing to chance.
Julia rang the doorbell a few minutes after six. She was wearing ancient jeans with frayed knees that hugged her like a second skin, and a baby blue knit tee shirt that was equally form-fitting. Very girl next door. My mouth watered at the sight of her.
“I’m not wearing any pink today,” she teased as she walked in.
Then she leaned close to my ear and whispered, “Except for my panties.”
And that’s when my own panties got a little damp.
Without thinking, I grabbed her wrist, pulling her towards me. She fell against my body and gave me a smirk.
“Glad to see me?”
“More than I should be.”
I gripped both sides of her face and gave her a kiss that turned immediately hot.
Suddenly everything was forgotten besides the feeling of her body pressed against mine.
We kissed until we were both gasping for air, and when we came up, I realized we were somehow sprawled on the couch. I had no memory of us moving there.
“I want to fuck you,” I growled, trailing kisses down her neck and over one of her clavicles.
“No one’s stopping you,” she gasped.
Then we were tearing each other’s clothes off in a frenzy of movement that eventually landed us on the floor. Thankfully, I didn’t have a coffee table in front of the couch or one of us would have been hurt. As it was, we landed on the floor with a thump that made us both gasp in surprise.
But that was soon forgotten as we rolled around on the floor, hands frantically exploring like we couldn’t get enough of each other’s skin.
I shifted so I had one leg between hers, pushing my toes against the floor as I shifted back and forth, sliding my thigh against her pussy.
“Oh. Yeah. Right there. Chris!” My name came out high-pitched and breathless.
The movement had the additional benefit of adding pressure to my clit as I moved up and down her thigh.
Julia grabbed my hips, helping me grind our bodies against each other, rocking her hips up against me with every stroke.
Despite the fact that this position had always been awkward with every other woman I’d been with, we immediately caught a rhythm that worked.
Our thighs became slick with arousal as we slid them along each other’s cunts, the air filled with the filthy sounds of our bodies moving through the moisture, almost drowning out the rasping of our breath.
We kept moving like we were on a mission, and when Julia started shaking beneath me, I knew she was close.
I lowered my head, clamping my teeth around her collar bone and biting down.
She rewarded me with a sound somewhere between a moan and a squeal, her back arching up to meet me as she found her release.
I loved marking her skin almost as much as I loved watching her come.
Even in the haze of her orgasm she found a way to reach between us, giving one of my nipples a hard pinch that made me cry out right before I succumbed to my own pleasure.
I sagged down on top of her, both of us shaking with aftershocks, my mind empty of everything other than the electrical sensations zinging through my body as if my orgasm had rearranged my nerve endings.
When I finally felt like I could command my muscles to move, I slid off her just enough to remove my weight and shift to the side, resting my head on her chest and an arm and a leg over the top of her to keep her close.
“Fucking A.”
It was all she said. All she needed to say.
A piercing noise split the air, making us both jump.
“What is that?”
“I don’t know,” I said sleepily. “I’m sure it will stop in a minute.”
But the noise continued and it finally penetrated through my addled brain that the sound was the oven timer. I used my oven so infrequently I hadn’t recognized the sound.
“Oh damn it. That’s the oven.”
I pushed to my feet, taking a quick look around for my clothes and heading for the kitchen. I awkwardly stepped back into my jeans on the way, shoving my panties into my pocket, then I pulled on my shirt, realizing too late that I’d left my bra behind.
Julia was a few seconds behind me, coming into the kitchen just as I gave up hunting for my oven mitts and used a dish towel to grab the pan out of the oven.
“Careful,” she said.
I hissed as the heat of the pan penetrated the thin fabric, quickly putting the roasting pan on top of the stove.
“What are we having anyway?” Julia asked.
“Roasted chicken with vegetables and biscuits.”
Julia looked around. “Where are the biscuits?”
I cringed. “Oh crap, they’re still in the fridge. I can cook them now.”
“You actually bake them, but that’s okay, there’s plenty of chicken and vegetables here, we can skip the biscuits. How about if we open the bottle of wine I brought?”
“You brought wine?” I asked in surprise. “Where is it?”
She gave me an impish smile.
“I dropped it in the living room somewhere when you grabbed me and had your way with me.”
“Oops.”
We had a nice dinner, chatting easily in a way that I never would have thought was possible before we spent the weekend together last week.
We were still as different as night and day, polar opposites on almost everything, but somehow that didn’t annoy me the way it used to.
Even our bickering was lighthearted now.
“I have to admit I was wrong,” Julia said as we finished dinner. “You made a fine meal. Clearly you can cook after all.”
I gave her a long look before deciding to be honest.
“I can only cook two things, this and spaghetti,” I admitted. “And my mom taught me how to make both of them last night.”
Julia laughed, but there was no malice in it. “You learned to cook something for me? Really?”
“Yeah.”
“Well you did a great job. This is seriously tasty. But I have to ask, what do you do for dinner when I’m not here?”
I shrugged. “Cereal. Toast. Burritos. Takeout.”
She shook her head. “Maybe I should give you some more cooking lessons.”
“You’d do that?” I asked in surprise.
I’d never been particularly interested in cooking lessons before, but for some reason doing them with Julia sounded like a lot of fun. And I didn’t think she’d have the underlying judgmental attitude that my mother did.
“I like to cook,” she replied, her tone light. “No pressure either way, but if you’d like to have lessons just let me know. I’m glad to help if you want to learn more. Besides, you’re heading towards middle age, you can’t keep living on takeout and convenience food like a college student.”
“You’re channeling my mother right now, right?”
Julia laughed.
“Maybe we could trade cooking lessons for something else,” I suggested.
Stop! The voice in my head was screeching. Don’t say it. It will be a huge mistake!
“What did you have in mind?” Julia asked.
Ignoring the warnings blaring in my brain I responded, “Orgasms.”