“This is me.” He shifted into park and looked over at her. She wasn’t asking to be taken straight back to Elixir, so he supposed this was happening.
The about-to-get-laid part of him strutted around dancing the zembekiko. It was about boisterous enough to drown out the voice noting that she wasn’t so interested in his ‘let’s date and start a relationship’ overtures.
But she hadn’t ruled it out. Also, he was about to get laid.
Entering the condo, she said the same thing as everyone else. “Wow, your kitchen is huge.”
“You hungry?”
She pivoted to look at him. “Hungry for something huge?”
Gods, her every syllable was full of lascivious intent. Not enough a/c in the house to keep him cool now. He stripped off his shirt, kicked off his shoes. She dropped her bag on his sofa and wrapped her arms around his shoulders.
He hadn’t spent the weeks apart overestimating the effect of her mouth on his. It was as luscious and encompassing as he’d remembered. Maybe more so. He tightened his hold on her, brought their bodies flush. Hitched her up a bit to ride on his thigh.
“Better give me the rest of the tour fast, or we’ll be screwing on your island before you know it.”
“Are you trying to end things early? Do you know how many pie crusts I roll out on that countertop? No naked flesh on the island, please.”
She laughed, which made for some excellent undulating contact between their torsos, and he set about removing her top. “Well, aren’t you precious? I’d let you fuck me on my kitchen counters.”
“Sure. You say that now. Next time you’re dicing carrots for dinner, you think about this conversation and get back to me.” His mind was blown. She was wearing a lace bra the color of green apples, and her skin glowed, and her nipples were riveting. It was a lot to process and still speak coherently, and he was impressed with his ability to put together a logical sentence in the face of so damn much beauty.
“Carrots?”
“Potatoes? Onions? I don’t know what you dice.”
“Please stop talking about food and show me your bedroom.”
Like he could walk straight, hard as she’d gotten him. He peeled his hands from her ass, detached his lips from her neck. “Bedroom. Tour. Right.”
“Don’t tell me—this is the living room, that’s the dining room, and the kitchen is the huge, sterile pride of your life.” Okay, so it was a self-explanatory space. She sure did relish lifting her chin to grin at him, though.
“You’re terribly easy to get along with. Not a single challenging molecule to you.”
“Are you judging me?”
He took her hand and led her down the short hallway, pointing as they went. “Andres’s room, bathroom, and here’s the master. And no, I’m not. I like your directness, and also you’re really sexy. The bra is delicious.”
“I didn’t wear it for you.”
“Never said you did.” He shucked off his jeans and socks.
She stopped unzipping her shorts and ran her palm over his bulge. He throbbed at her touch. “Okay. I lied. I thought you might like it.”
He pushed down her shorts, lifted her to wrap her legs around his hips as she kicked free of them. It brought his cock to her center, her breasts within reach of his mouth. Rachel reached back to unhook the bra, which thrust her that much closer. He stumbled towards the bed, too caught up sucking at the tight whorls of her nipple to be aware of things strewn in his path. The bed wasn’t far, and they bounced onto it, landing with momentum that slid him along her body.
She yanked the bra off and tossed it aside, and he sat up, straddling her waist, loving the view of her flushed and open and eager between his legs. Loving even more the way she went straight for his erection, peeling down his boxers so she could wrap her fingers around his girth. Licking her lips as she stroked him.
Damn, he was a lucky man.
“How much time do I have?”
She squeezed. He moaned. She bit her lip, acting like she was considering the question. “Oh, I guess you have time to get through with me.”
He reversed them, propping her up and tugging her hips forward so he could nuzzle at her core.
After that, it was all limbs sliding and plenty of panting and all his nakedness touching all of hers. She ended up straddling him again, gripping his headboard, as he licked and explored and massaged and sucked her clit until she came. Crying out his praises, her pleasure, his name. The way she vibrated above him had his hips bucking in the air, ready to sink into her.
She grabbed a condom from the side table and pressed his shoulders down, kissing his jaw and neck and taking a bite at his chest that served to ensure his cock was rigid with need. All he wanted was to pump into this amazing, ferocious woman and find his release. He held it together while she smoothed the sheath over his length, but as soon as she set him free, he rolled them onto their sides and lifted her thigh over his hip so he could thrust in deep. Her eyes widened and he had no choice but to bracket her cheeks with his palms and kiss her, tender and triumphant at the same time.
Her arms roved his back and his ass as he pulsed into her, each thrust driving them each a little higher, winding them a little tighter. He slid a hand to her pelvis, fingers gripping to anchor them together, thumb straying back to her clit to pick up the circular rhythm that made her moans high and desperate and keen with need.
His own need was overpowering. It took staring into her eyes, stroking back her sweat-damp hair, forcing himself to realize she was on the edge of another orgasm to give him the strength to hold off until he earned the high of her shattering around him. And she was close. He could wait, because she was close, and her breasts pressed close against his chest, and her clit was wet and wide, and she threw her head back and panted out his name, and she came.
And she came, and his cock was buried deep and intimate inside her. And she came, and her muscles pulsed tight around him. And she came, and his balls pulled up tighter as she gripped him. And she came, and he came, their pleasure sounding around them.
His head crash-landed on his pillow, his arms tangled slack with hers. They both panted for so long, drifting on the bliss, and every time she opened her eyes, she laughed to find him watching her, and when he opened his, the bright joy of her sprawled flushed and sated beside him sent shivers up his spine.
“Hi,” she almost-whispered.
“Hey.”
“Hey.”
He aimed to form a full sentence. “How’re you?”
“Mmm.”
“Not a bad answer,” he said, smoothing her hair off her forehead. Every deity help him but she was beguiling.
“Not a bad fuck,” she said, and seemed to crack herself up. The laughter jarred their legs into a bigger tangle. He pulled her up tight against him, unwilling to lose the connection just yet. She played with his hair, sobering a little, and he took his chance.
“So can I take you for that coffee tomorrow?”
“Theo.”
“Rachel,” he said right back, but teasing instead of scolding. “It’s coffee. I’m not saying we should go announce our relationship to Sergei and the world.”
“Jesus, I hope not.”
Ouch. Her words, the way she jerked away from him. The wild look in her eyes. “Okay, okay. I said I wasn’t about to announce it.”
“Well, hell, Theo. I know Depy suspects something, but this isn’t—you’re not—I’m not looking for a boyfriend, okay? I’ve had a ton of fun.”
“That much I noticed.”
“Don’t be a smart-ass while you’re still half-hard inside me.”
He squeezed his eyes shut. Faced her again. “Okay. Fair point.”
Sighing, she pat at his chest in a way more patronizing than erotic. “You have clean towels? I should shower before we head back.”
He nodded and together they disentangled.
It wasn’t until they scooted to the edge of the bed that he noticed the broken condom.
They were overlapping echoes. Carbon copied racing pulses and wild looks and swiping at messes as if their hands could undo what their bodies had done.
“What the ever loving fuck?” she asked.
He asked, “How the hell?”
“This is so wrong,” she said.
He said, “I can’t believe this.”
By the time they’d showered and dried and dressed, they were moving almost in slow motion, though she at least felt like her brain was on double-speed. She joined him on his sofa. He had a little fenced yard, all landscape paths and containers and a patio set and a little pool. They stared out at it.
“I need to get back.”
He nodded. She saw the motion in her peripheral, and it somehow helped restore her balance.
She swallowed, and he leapt up to fetch her a glass of water, as well as one for himself. “Thanks.”
“Sure.”
He dropped his head to the back of the sofa, and it triggered her slump. She let the cushions encompass her.
“Okay, so first off, I’m clean. I know I told you that before, but in case you need. I don’t know. Reminding. Reassurance. I can go get a screening, though.”
His words removed another barrier to her drawing a deep breath. “Okay. That’s fine. I—me, too.”
When she looked at him, the furrows in his brow smoothed and he exhaled slow, almost smiling. “Right. Yeah, thanks, that’s good. We’re good there.”
She nodded. Ran her fingers up and down the cool ridges of the water glass.
“So I’ll drop you back to get Hannah, and swing by a drug store. Let me know when you’ve got her to bed, and I’ll bring over emergency contraception.”
She nodded some more. It was a sensible plan. It made sense. It was the fix they needed.
“Have you taken it before?”
“No. Have you?”
He chuffed out a laugh.
“I meant have you bought it before? Been with someone who needed it?”
“Oh. No. I have seen it on the shelf. I know what to get. I’m sorry, I should have asked. You don’t already have a pill at home or anything, right?”
She shook her head. “Nope. Never needed it. I’d knock on wood, but it’s too late for that now.”
Theo leaned her way, wrapped an arm around her. “No making jokes about wood now. Too soon.”
“That wasn’t what I meant.”
“I know. I’m off-kilter. So, listen. From what I know, the over the counter is fine, since we’re getting it right away. But if you’d rather get the prescription, I can go the pharmacy for you once you talk to your doctor.”
“I work at a hospital.” She forced the wry note into her voice, but only so she wouldn’t burrow into his shoulder. “We have pharmacies on site.”
“Right. Sure. Of course.” His head shook once, swift. “Off-kilter. Is your pharmacy better for you?”
“No.” She stood away from his dangerous comfort and warmth. “I’d rather take it tonight.”
He snagged his keys from the table by the door. She put their glasses on his precious kitchen countertop. It wasn’t until they were pulling back into Elixir’s parking lot that he disrupted her trance with a curse. “Fucking Sergei.”
His eyes were narrowed, and she got suspicious. “What does he have to do with it?”
He put the car in park, gripped the steering wheel. Let out a long sigh. “It’s not him. I’m throwing blame away from myself and that’s the first place it stuck.”
All the hard-earned chill that came with having a plan fizzled out. “Because without him you’d not have met me?”
Whip-fast, he shook his head. “Fuck no. That’s worth thanking him for, except it would be questionable at best and sexist as hell at worst. It’s the condoms.”
“Sergei gave you condoms?”
“No. Well, yes, but not just me. He keeps a stash of them for employees to grab. Or whoever.” Even in the near-darkness he must have seen her reaction. “It’s not as sketchy as it sounds. We’re not condoning whatever. Sex at work. He says it’s better to have them around, in case people make. You know. Hasty decisions.”
“Like we did.”
Theo thumped his head on the steering wheel. “It wasn’t. Well, yes, it was. I wanted it, but if I’d planned better....”
“Better?”
“Planned more carefully,” he amended. “If I’d gone about asking you out a little more gracefully, maybe I’d have remembered to buy some condoms of my own.”
“And instead you took from my ex-husband’s clearly dodgy supply.”
He closed his eyes.
Damn and hellfire. She hadn’t questioned their origin beforehand. It was on them both. She reached across the console to pat his shoulder. Breathed herself towards calm, ordered thinking. “Okay, look. It’ll take me an hour maybe to get her down. See you after that?”
When he leaned in to kiss her, she leaned in return. Kissed him back. And then she hustled out of his car, because she was only sure about one thing: her need to grab her daughter and retreat to the safe, familiar territory of home.