Chapter 2
Two hours later, I’m being pressed into Sam’s mattress while he nips at my earlobe, hands roaming all over. I feel a pleasantly warm buzz simmering under my skin.
“You’re so hot.”
He sucks on the spot just below my ear, and I arch up in response, pushing my chest into his waiting palm.
Humming my appreciation, I let him palm my tits. His thumb grazes over my nipples through the fabric of my dress and bra, pebbling them into hard peaks between the jewelry caging them. Tilting my head to the side, my eyes close as he works down my throat, licking and sucking. Heat surges up my spine, hips bucking against his.
Hard and heavy at my hip, his cock seems a reasonable size from what I can feel. I bite my lip at the thought of him filling me up. He rocks against me, his thigh pressed between my legs. The pressure is enough to make my clit throb deliciously.
Sam sucks my nipple through my dress, his tongue making a wet spot on the material as he flicks it. Before I can begin to enjoy it, he’s working down the rest of my body and dragging my dress up toward my hips.
His dark eyes glance up at me and he smirks, his fingers passing gently over my thigh to the front of my panties. “You wet for me? Gonna eat your pussy like a starving man on a deserted island.”
My eyebrows furrow just a little, but I tilt my head back as my lips part, sucking in a breath as he pulls my underwear to the side and licks a bold line up the center of my pussy. He spreads me open with one hand, his other curling under my thigh to hold me up to his mouth.
He licks up the length of my seam before flicking around my clit incessantly, with no rhythm and varying pressure.
I reach down to his head, fingers passing through the short hairs of his buzz cut. I sigh; there’s nothing to grab onto and guide him how I’d like.
“A little harder…” I rock my hips up against his mouth.
He grunts, holding me down against the bed to prevent me from chasing his tongue.
A pathetic little whine makes it way past my lips, my chest stuttering out a breath as his tongue circles around my clit a little more firmly.
“Yes, yes, yes,” I chant happily, my arm thrown over my eyes as I bite my lip.
Only a minute or so passes and he seems to lose the rhythm again, growing lazy in his strokes and he huffs against me through his nostrils.
Is he bored? Or just impatient?
I’m not even fucking close—my orgasm is a dull ache only beginning to form, partly due to his own inattentiveness and little warm up.
Honestly, as much as I hate to say it, it isn’t worth the trouble. Funny how the clitoris has eight thousand nerve endings and he can barely find a single one.
“Mmm, need you inside me.” I arch my back, tensing my thighs under his hold. “Now,” I pant out for extra measure. Hopefully, I don’t sound like a dog in heat. Or maybe that’s sexy. I don’t even know what’s happening anymore. But maybe I should have been an actress in another life.
Sam pulls back from my pussy with an obnoxious, over the top, wet slurping sound, his lips letting go of my clit. He makes a show of wiping his chin before climbing back up my body. “When you beg so pretty like that, how can I resist?”
I somehow resist the urge to roll my eyes, hiking the skirt of my dress past my hips, pushing him far enough away to pull it up over my head and fling it away. I unclip my bra and pull it off as he drags my underwear down, slingshotting them across the room with a smirk. They land on the already crooked lampshade of the floor lamp in the corner of his room.
“Three points.” He wiggles his eyebrows up and down.
I kind of want to punch him.
He shucks his pants and boxers both in one go, kicking them down his legs and yanking his shirt over his head. Leaning back in, his hands spread my legs wider, wedging himself in and pressing down against me immediately. His cock is hot and heavy, slipping against the lips of my pussy.
My hands fly to his chest to hold him off for a moment as panic floods my chest, my heart beating in a staccato rhythm. “Condom,” I demand.
Confusion passes over his face as he leans back.
Lifting up onto my elbows, I shake my head. “I don’t do sex without a condom.”
“Progressive,” Sam grumbles under his breath, leaning over me to reach into his nightstand drawer. He pulls back with a foil packet, ripping it open and rolling it on.
There is no way I’m letting dudes on Tinder put their dick inside me without a condom.
He raises his eyebrows at me mockingly. “Happy now, princess?”
My nose scrunches up. “Don’t—” I shake my head, swallowing down what I want to say. I can tell the kind of guy he is now—someone who doesn’t really like the word no, or any variation of it. “Yeah, thanks.” Tilting my head up to the ceiling, I breathe out a sigh as I place my hands on his shoulders, suddenly wanting to get this over with.
My words seem to soothe him enough. His arms scoop under my thighs to angle my hips as he slots himself up against me.
“Gonna fuck you so hard, Emily. You’ll be screaming my name.”
I don’t even have the will to correct him. It simply isn’t worth it.
“Oh, I’m sure.”
Five minutes later, he’s sweating above me, panting as his breath huffs across my neck. His hips begin to stutter in their rhythm and I grind up against him, desperate for some friction on my clit. Unwinding my arms from his shoulders, I slide a hand down between our bodies to help ease the way.
“Woah, woah, woah—what are you doing?” Sam pants, hovering as he stills his hips. There’s an incredulous look on his face, and the air feels stifling under the change in his tone.
Blinking up at him, I try to read the expression on his face without squinting. “Getting off?”
He looks affronted as he recoils. “Am I not good enough for you?”
“Would you rather do it for me?”
He snorts, eyes rolling dramatically. “No. I mean, why do you need to do that at all?”
Wanting to laugh but holding it in, I can’t help the dumbfounded look that filters across my face. “Do most of your partners come by penetration alone, Sam?”
“Yeah, always.”
I smile at him, so saccharine my teeth ache all over again. “Ah, well, that’s the problem. I’m clearly not normal and can’t go the hands-free route. I need some actual clit stimulation.”
A large part of me feels bad for his other partners and the many fake orgasms that he must have encountered, only proving to inflate his ego. Unfortunately for us both, I don’t have the time or will to teach him something that would benefit the next girl. A caveman to a changed man takes more than one session, and I don’t plan on ever seeing him again.
He seems to bristle before thrusting forward particularly hard, as if to drive home his supposed skills. “Well, that sucks for you, I guess.”
Lifting my hips, I hum, fingers pressing in and circling my clit. It alleviates that desperate ache, and my eyes flutter closed with my head tipping back into the mattress. “It definitely, definitely sucks, ah—” My breath catches, my orgasm finally beginning to thrum to life in my blood.
For someone who normally cares a whole lot of what other people think about them, I decidedly don’t care at all what he thinks of me as I touch myself beneath him.
The whole thing only lasts another couple of minutes with me finishing just after him. Nothing grand or exciting.
After he rolls off me onto his back, he pulls the condom off like it’s a worm he doesn’t want to touch. Once he’s rid of it, he throws an arm over his eyes and sinks into the bed, breathing deep.
I lay there for a moment before he starts to snore. Bringing my hands up to rub down my face, I cover my mouth, lest I let out the laugh that’s been building for the last half hour. Instead I sigh and glance over at him, watching the rise and fall of his chest.
He really is pretty. It’s such a shame.
Waiting another couple breaths, I roll off the bed and swing up to my feet. I tiptoe around the room collecting my underwear—which aren't even damp—and my dress before putting them back on along with my wedges. I step into the hallway and close his bedroom door with a soft click behind me.
Finding his bathroom, I use the toilet. After washing my hands, I look at myself in the mirror. My hair hardly even looks mussed, only a few misplaced hairs at the back of my head from being against the mattress. I run my fingers through the strands and fix my bangs. My roots look darker than normal under his LED lights. Pulling the hair tie off my wrist, I pull my hair up into a tight ponytail and run my hand down the side of my neck and sigh.
Not that I really care, because it’s Sam fucking Paris, but he didn’t even left a mark. I can’t feel where his hands were on my thighs, his teeth against my skin, his hips pressed against my own—can’t feel any of it. Part of me whines with disappointment.
Shaking my head, I open his medicine cabinet: razor, shaving cream, four different types of obnoxious cologne, Tylenol, Tums, contact lenses, mouthwash…how boring.
I head to his kitchen and collect my purse from where I dropped it on the counter on the way in. Opening his fridge, I cringe at the fact that there’s nothing inside. Clearly, this man has money considering he’s living in a one bedroom in Soho, but it’s screaming mommy and daddy’s money. I take a bottle of water from his fridge before leaving the apartment.
I should have robbed him blind.
The door locks behind me when I pull it closed. At least I don’t have to worry about some serial killer walking into his apartment and having an easy go of him. I’d feel bad watching that on the news, after all.
It’s not even 11 p.m. when I check the time on my phone.
As I step out of the apartment lobby and into the chill of the night air, it dawns on me that I’ve forgotten my cardigan. My favorite cardigan. Closing my eyes, I hesitate in the middle of the sidewalk.
Nope, not doing it. Not going back.
Shaking my head, I throw my purse over my shoulder. Winding my arms around myself, I make my way down the block before stopping to sit on the curb underneath the streetlight. I check my phone, waiting for the Lyft I reluctantly ordered in the elevator. Leaning forward against my knees, I watch the cars pass while trying to keep track of my surroundings.
Why is every date the same? When I try to be picky, it doesn’t work because I’m too particular. When I don’t put a whole lot of thought into it, things still turn out the same.
My stomach rumbles, and I can’t help but think of how Cora’s date might be going and what kind of food they’re eating. My mouth waters just thinking about it. If I could, I would hex Sam Paris into the next fucking realm for hogging our singular order of cheese fries. Let alone the disappointing sex.
The numbers in my bank account are dwindling with the hefty sum of my loan payments and a medical bill that keeps looming over my head from years ago. I’m still living on ramen noodles and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches two years out of college.
Living with Cora is great because I wouldn’t be able to survive without her. I would literally be homeless. Returning home to my parents is not an option. But she’s always pushing things on me: food, clothes, Lyft fare—Oh, this my treat…Don’t worry about this one, cousin, there’s always next time—except that she keeps saying the same things the next time it comes up again.
I’m tired of being a charity case.
Though Cora would claim it isn’t like that—always saying that we’re family and we have to stick together—there’s still something that makes me feel like shit about it. I don’t like handouts. I don’t like feeling helpless. I don’t like feeling like a burden.
Even though she’s the only other family who didn’t turn their back on me, who didn’t decide to pretend like I just didn’t exist anymore, she can’t be my crutch forever.
My hands start to shake. I clench them into tight fists until I feel the sharp sting of my fingernails in my palms. It hurts so deeply, I feel it in my chest. Pulling my hands up, I stare down at my palms as my fingers uncurl. Scattered lines of dozens of little, silver half-moons of raised skin in my palms stare up at me along with the newly, red-indented skin from the fresh press of my fingernails. I rub them over my knees furiously, like that’ll get rid of the scars, too.
A car pulls up, a Lyft sign proudly on display. I confirm with the driver and then slide into the backseat. We sit in a silence that I don’t mind on the drive home. I lean against the door and press my forehead against the window, a low sigh trudging out of my throat as I watch the traffic and streetlights pass.
When I pull up my phone, the screen lights my face in the dark. I hope the driver can’t see just how tired I suddenly feel in his rearview mirror.
Tapping on my conversation thread with Cora, I hesitate as the keyboard pops up on screen. There are red sirens blaring in my mind, about a thousand possible reasons why this is a bad idea, but all it takes is one good one for me to press send on the message.
| So what’s this about Fred’s business partner?