Chapter 39
chapter
thirty-nine
SHAY
“No panties?” Calder groaned against my neck, weight pressing me into the shelves. Hot at my back. Heavy. Consuming. His touch slid to the inside of my thigh, barely grazing the flesh. Almost ticklish in the tease.
“We’re in public,” I attempted to reason, voice giving way to a sigh.
“Baby.” His words were a hot, whispered growl against my neck. “If you didn’t want me fucking you whenever, wherever, then you shouldn’t have teased me for weeks with photos and notes. I don’t give a fuck what you want anymore.”
I knew if I really didn’t want this, Calder would stop instantly. That safety settled like a pool of molten liquid inside me.
“You can’t touch me here,” I said, voice breathless.
As if to prove me wrong, Calder pressed me deeper into the shelf. The books rattled with the force of him. He pushed my hair to one side, gripping it with the same hand, keeping me in place and pinned.
“I can’t?” Calder laughed darkly against the back of my neck, hand sliding higher up my thigh. “Does your pussy agree with you?”
He dipped a finger inside me, too light, then removed it with a flick. I gasped, swallowing a moan.
“You’re telling me no, but you’re fucking soaked for me.”
Calder did that same move a couple of times, in and out, in and out, never going past the tip of his finger. Always with a flick against my entrance. Just enough to make me clench around the emptiness.
It was somehow both teasing and possessive. Like more than he wanted me to feel him, he wanted me to feel how empty I was without him.
He slid what felt like his middle finger inside me, and I nearly moaned at the fullness, when he pulled it out again with another flick.
Oh. Fuck.
I gripped the spine of a novel, knuckles white. Absently noting it was a clean romance. Ironic.
What is he even doing? He wasn’t inside me, not really. How can just this make me so hot? I squirmed against his hand.
Another flick and I exhaled a frustrated noise. “Just do it.”
“I thought I couldn’t touch you here?” His words heated my neck, and he punctuated the sentence with another flick.
“I…you…please,” was all I managed to get out.
Finally, mercifully, he slid a finger inside me.
I groaned and looked over my shoulder.
“Head forward. Keep looking for a book,” Calder said, the authority in his command sending another ripple of heat through my body.
Look for a book?
I couldn’t fucking think.
“What?” I breathed.
“I expect you to find a few to bring back to your friends.” He slid a second finger inside me and thrust. “So when you read it during book club.” Thrust. “You remember this.” Thrust.
He slid one finger out of my pussy and probed my ass—testing my reaction. I arched my back for him, and he slid his finger in my ass.
My head fell forward, cross-eyed. Holy shit. I felt it everywhere. Stardust lit up my veins like fairy lights. Goose bumps peppered my flesh, candy-flavored and freeze-dried.
“Fuck,” he groaned. “You like that. You love getting your little ass fucked.”
“Only with you.” I froze, realizing what I’d just said.
What it meant.
Calder bit my neck, and I forgot how to think.
With his free hand, Calder flipped my skirt up, baring my ass to anyone who walked by.
I was wildly, uncontrollably turned on by that.
“Fuck,” he groaned, palming my ass.
“People could see,” I said, leaning into his hand.
“They could.” He squeezed, quick and bruising, before thrusting deeper inside me. “They’d see how good your tight ass takes me. You’d let me, wouldn’t you?” he asked, thrusting both fingers inside me at the same time. “You’d let me fuck you in front of the entire fucking store?”
I nodded rapidly, accidentally knocking a book off the shelf.
Getting lost in the fantasy.
Of him taking me while people watched.
A small groan slipped out—
“Be good.” Calder covered my mouth. “Be quiet.” His hand grew wet with my pants as he fucked me harder, rattling the shelves in a way I was sure was obvious.
But with one finger inside my pussy, and another in my ass, I couldn’t think, let alone care.
“Find a book, Shay,” Calder gritted, like he was holding himself back.
My eyes fluttered open, trying to read words that became ancient hieroglyphics as I got my ass and pussy fucked in public.
Tension coiled in my limbs, iron hot, ready to snap.
I was so close—
Calder stopped and slid out of me.
I couldn’t register what was happening. Mind fragmented. A computer program cut off in the middle of a download. Corrupted.
Absolutely aching.
Calder readjusted my skirt over my ass, palming the curve of me, down between my thighs.
He groaned against my neck. “You’re dripping down to your knees.” As if to punctuate his words, he smeared the wetness on the inside of my thighs.
“Why did you stop?” I whined.
Calder spun me around, a devilish arch to his brow. “Did you find a book?”
Before I could answer, Calder pushed his finger into my mouth, shoving the taste of me down my throat.
I swallowed his fingers greedily.
His eyelids drooped, and he slowly pulled his finger out. His hand came above my head, his other to my hip. And we stayed like that. Breathing one breath.
Calder kissed me lightly. Then with a deep inhale, he stood back. He brushed the hair out of my face, adjusted my top, and double-checked my skirt.
He made sure I was all put together after he’d split me apart.
Then he grabbed the stack of books I’d chosen and pressed a hand to my lower back. “Come on, Maniac.”
Calder carried the books to the counter.
I was dazed.
Flushed.
Aching.
Could barely think. I watched Calder hand his credit card to the employee, making small talk about the lack of snow we’d had, as if he hadn’t just brought me to the edge of insanity.
Like I wasn’t dripping.
The cashier placed the books into a few bags, and then Calder’s hand found my lower back again, ushering me outside.
I felt like when I took an edible. The world was fuzzy at the edges. The sky soft. My blood made of marshmallow fluff.
Calder pressed me against his car, grazing his knuckles down my face. “You get the hottest flush on your cheeks.”
He kissed me, closemouthed but crushing. Growling a little against my lips, before pulling away and opening my door.
On the way back, I stole glances at Calder. His profile was illumined in shadow by a blood-orange sunset. An aquiline, slightly crooked nose. Sharp cheekbones resting atop a sharper jaw.
My mind conjured up Calder’s alter ego, Void. I traveled back to the last time we’d met, his gloves inside me. Then I went further back, to our very first meeting.
“What’s up?” Calder asked, and I realized we’d come to a stop outside my apartment. Idling.
“What? Nothing.”
He arched a brow. “You’re doing that thing you do when you want to say something but are holding back.”
I paused. “What thing?”
He nodded at my hand. “You rub the center of your palm with your other hand.”
I immediately stopped, not realizing I was doing that. Also more than a little freaked out that Calder already noticed. I was with Graham for years and he didn’t even remember my favorite ice cream—sesame.
He turned off the car and faced me, concern etching his brow. “Was it too much?”
It took me a moment to realize what he meant.
“What! No. No.” I shook my head. “Not at all.”
Calder opened his mouth as if to speak, then paused, eyes lifting over my head toward my building. His jaw clenched, eyes going dark.
I turned to see what he was looking at when Calder grabbed my chin, pulling my eyes back to his.
He thumbed his lower lip, regarding me. “How many spoons?”
Something had changed. I wasn’t sure what, but the air was heavier. Even though he talked to me, he seemed elsewhere. Distant.
The urge to lie and say I was fine and at a ten was strong. So strong, I almost answered. But then my gaze snagged on the earnest look in his eyes, and I replied honestly.
“Six.”
He nodded to himself, like good. “I don’t want to put you below five. So, what is it?”
“I want you to wear your mask,” I said. “I want you to break in my room again and…” I rubbed my palm, not caring he knew what it meant. “I want you to force me.”
Calder’s eyes darkened. “That requires a lot of spoons.”
I nodded, because, yeah, it did.
He gripped my chin between his thumb and forefinger. “So rest up, Maniac. And I’ll see you Saturday.”