Chapter 16
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
IVY
How have I not dissolved into a puddle of absolute humiliation by now? I’m shocked that I’m not only okay with Xander watching me work out, but I kind of love it.
He’s watching me with lust. With admiration. Not pity or humor. Okay, there’s a little humor because we’re teasing each other, and the banter is fun.
But I don’t want to freak out or run for the hills, and that’s a huge improvement because my anxiety would never have let Xander see me in these glasses, let alone stay to watch me work out. Especially when what I’m wearing leaves nothing to the imagination.
I’m enjoying the hell out of him. I don’t feel self-conscious at all, and I don’t feel the need to cover myself up.
“I bet you can’t do pull-ups,” I say to him. Okay, so mostly I just want to see him do pull-ups because his shoulders are insane.
“I’m sorry, but did you just lay down the gauntlet, Ms. Ivy?”
“Less talk, more action.”
He lets out a surprised laugh, and then he walks over to the pull-up bar, easily jumps up and executes ten reps, his back flexing deliciously, before gently falling to his uninjured foot.
“Your turn.” His face is so damn smug.
I lift an eyebrow. “Oh, you think I can’t?”
“I didn’t say that.”
I narrow my eyes, walk over to the bar, and the next thing I know, he’s behind me with his hands on my waist to give me a boost up because it’s high.
“Go for it, wildcat.”
I adjust my grip and then pull myself up five times before my arms start to shake, but then he’s behind me again, gripping my thighs, helping me.
“This is cheating,” I grit out.
“No way, this is me helping. You’ve got this. Fuck, your back is awesome, Red.”
I want to smile. I need to squeeze my thighs together, but I manage to concentrate for another five, and then he lets me fall to my feet.
“I, too, like your back.”
He smiles and reaches out to drift his finger down the ball of my shoulder.
“You’re sexy in those glasses.”
Shaking my head, I walk over to the lat pulldown bar and adjust the weight before sitting on the bench.
“I didn’t plan for you to see them. But I also didn’t want to put my contacts in until after my shower.” I pull the bar down, watching my form in the mirror. “I hate working out.”
“You don’t look like you hate it.”
“I mean, I could scowl every second I’m doing it.” I ease the bar back up and then remember that I’m supposed to be putting my patient through his paces right now, so I lead him to the treadmill. “You can do twenty, if you want.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
He steps up and gets the belt moving.
While he’s doing that, I decide to climb on the one next to him and walk while he runs.
“How is the knee today?”
“Feels normal.”
“No twinges? No achiness?”
“Nope, it feels like nothing ever happened.”
I lift an eyebrow, and he smiles at me.
“Yes, I know, it did happen, and I need to be careful.”
“Good.”
The Backstreet Boys are playing through the speakers, and Xander shakes his head.
“What’s up with this music?”
“It’s happy. And pretty easy to move to. But it’s your house, so we can change it to whatever you want.”
“It’s okay,” he says.
“Great because I think Britney Spears is up next.”
“Just kill me, Red.”
“It’s a good one, I promise.”
When “I’m a Slave 4 U” comes on, I sing along and make Xander laugh. And when he’s finished with his jog, we hop off the treadmills and do some stretching.
Once we’ve cooled down and we’re stretched out, I take him to the wall.
“Let me guess.”
He assumes the position, and I smile at him.
“It’s good for the quads and for the joint.”
This time, I grab a thirty-pound weight and set it on his lap.
“This is too light.”
“I can’t move around the fifty pound one.”
He sets the plate aside, snags me by the wrist, and tugs me into his lap.
“There.”
“I’m way too heavy for this.”
This man just grins and buries his face in my neck. “I like having you in my lap, you know.”
“Hmm.”
His lips drift up my jawline, and he nudges my face his way, and then his lips cover mine, and Jesus. He’s so damn good at that, and I can’t help the sounds that I make or the way my entire body comes alive when he touches me.
“Fuck, Red, you’re so damn sexy.”
His hand drifts down my chest and covers my breast, and when he finds the already puckered nipple, he groans.
I’m trying so hard to keep my distance. To be a professional—and I really hate that word—but he makes it so hard.
And he is so hard.
“You’re making me crazy, so if you don’t want me to fuck you here in this gym, I need you to say so now, wildcat. I won’t do anything you don’t want me to do, but I am going out of my mind with wanting you.”
Rather than say anything at all, I deepen the kiss and sink my hands in his hair, and then I’m airborne and Xander’s carrying me through the gym to my desk, where he sets me down and immediately gets to work wiggling my little shorts off.
I manage to tug my sports bra over my head, and then his mouth is on my breast, biting my nipple and making me moan.
“Christ, Xander.”
“Mm.” He moves to the other side and pays it the same attention, but when he starts to kiss down my body, I stop him.
“Whoa.”
“What?” He’s breathing hard as he stares into my eyes. “What’s wrong?”
“I just worked out.”
“Yeah, it was fucking awesome foreplay.”
God, he’s fun.
“I need a shower, Xander. I don’t want you to—”
I bite my lip because I can’t finish that thought, and he narrows his eyes on me as his hand drifts up my inner thigh to my core, making me suck in a breath.
“You don’t want my mouth on this perfect pussy?”
I shake my head. God, he has good hands.
“I don’t care, you know. Not one bit. I can’t wait to taste you. But because this is the first time, and I want you to be perfectly comfortable, we’ll save it for later.”
“A rain check sounds good to me.”
He presses two fingers through my wetness and then pushes them inside, and I lean back on my hands, giving him easier access.
“You’re so fucking wet, baby.” He nibbles my shoulder and over to my ear. “And you’re squeezing the fuck out of my fingers.”
He adds his thumb to my clit, and I cry out because oh my God, I think I’m going to come. How am I going to come this fast?
“You’re responsive,” he whispers. “Fuck, you’re gorgeous. Are you going to come on my hand, wildcat?”
I nod, unable to form words, and he presses against my clit just a little harder, and I lose it. I grip onto his arm, squeezing, as I ride out the most intense climax of my freaking life, and when I’ve come out the other side, breath heaving, he’s smiling down at me.
“We’re gonna do that again.”
“Oh, yay.”
He laughs, and I reach for his shorts, and once they’re down, I blink rapidly, sure that I’m seeing things.
“Did I have such an intense orgasm that I’m hallucinating from the lust of it all?”
He tips my chin up so he can nibble my lips, and then with a growl he licks the seam of my mouth, and I open to him, but I also reach out for his cock because holy shit, this man is pierced.
He has what I think is a Prince Albert. A silver ring that goes right through the tip.
“So, I have a confession,” he murmurs against my lips, sending more zings through my body.
“Okay.”
“That’s new.”
I pull back far enough to look into his deep-green eyes. “What is?”
“The piercing. I got it just a few months before the injury, so what I’m saying is, it’s new. As in, no one has ever taken it for a ride, so to speak.”
Surprise zips through me. “Why?”
“Because, they have to heal. And then I was hurt, and . . .” He chuckles and rests his forehead against mine. “I just haven’t been with anyone in a long while.”
I’m kind of surprised. I never really thought about the women who came and went out of Xander’s life, because that would have been psychological torture, but I just figured he was pretty sexually active.
“I don’t know what to say to that.”
He smiles again.
“You don’t have to say anything, it’s just information. And a confession that I don’t know how it’ll feel, and I likely won’t last long this first time because you’re perfect, sexy as fuck with all of those pretty freckles on display, and I’m dying to be inside you.”
Well, that’s good for the ego.
“Let’s take it for a spin, hockey star.”
His eyes narrow, his pupils blow wide, and then he pauses.
“Protection.”
“I have pregnancy covered, and I haven’t had sex in so long, I might as well be a virgin again.”
He growls and presses the head of his cock against my entrance, and with his mouth on mine, he slowly sinks inside me until he’s seated fully, and I’m pretty sure he’s going to rip me in two.
“Holy God, you’re big.”
And that piercing hits all the right places.
He pulls out just as slowly, and when it brushes over my G-spot, I whimper.
“Bad or good?” he asks.
“So fucking good. Oh my God, it hits my spot, X.” I contract around him as he sinks inside me again, and his jaw tenses. “Don’t go slow.”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
I cup his face, and he turns his head so he can kiss my palm. “You’re not hurting me. Fuck me, Xander.”
That’s all the encouragement he needs because he lays me back on the desk, pulls my hips to the edge, and with one hand anchored on my shoulder and the other on my stomach, he fucks me.
The pace is hard and a little brutal, but God, it feels so good every time he brushes over my spot, and I lift my knees onto his sides just as he moves his hand down so he can brush my clit with his thumb, and I fall over the edge again, my back bowing off the desk, and I cry out as wave after wave of pure euphoria rushes over me.
“Fuck, Red. Fuck, look at you, blushing all over.” He pushes inside me and rocks through his own climax. He kisses my chest, my neck, and my lips and then grins down at me. “I’m taking you to the shower to wash you up so I can eat your pussy. I need breakfast.”
I bark out a laugh and then squeal when he hauls me up into his arms.
“So much for keeping my distance from you.”
He stops short and scowls down at me. “Why the fuck would you do that?”
“Professionalism?”
“Fuck that, and fuck distance. In case you missed it, I can’t keep my hands to myself, and you’re exactly where I want you to be. No more of that. Got it?”
“Got it.”
He kisses me, slow and deep, and then continues on to the stairs.
This is the best day of my life.