“Close, Jake. I’m so close.”
She rocked against me, her wetness coating my cock. Then she tipped her hips, wedging the head of my cock at her opening. I felt the first flutters of her orgasm as she lowered herself onto me, sheathing me fully inside her. Elena cried out as her cunt pulsed around me, and I held on for dear life.
When she started to move, I lost whatever battle I’d been waging. Gripping her hips tight enough to leave marks, I drove up into her. I pulled her to me with every thrust, sinking deeper inside her, filling her until I felt her breath catch.
“That’s it, baby. Come for me again. I need to feel your sweet pussy milking my cock as you come for me.”
I kept up a steady rhythm, gritting my teeth as I thrust into her, desperate to hold back until I took her over the edge one more time. I slid a hand between us, dragging my finger through her slick heat before stroking her clit. It took moments for her second climax to start, the muscles of her sex vising my cock. Her orgasm set off mine and I followed her, thrusting up as she met me on every stroke until I filled her, pulsing inside her.
23
“Wow.” Straddling Jake with his cock still inside me, I collapsed against his chest.
I’d move—get cleaned up—in a minute, but for now I needed to rest my cheek against his chest, listening to the beat of his heart as he held me in his arms.
“Exactly,” he said, sounding slightly breathless.
I may have ridden him, but he’d still done most of the work, bringing me to orgasm twice before he claimed his own. I stayed still, feeling our combined heart rates return to something closer to normal while he stroked my back with long, firm touches. When I couldn’t put it off a moment longer, I climbed off his lap and made a mad dash for the bathroom.
I cleaned up, drying my hands on the new hand towel as I checked my reflection in the mirror. The waves I’d styled my hair into when I’d figured out what to wear to play girlfriend had turned into a sex-mussed mess. The little bit of makeup I’d put on for the night had mostly vanished. I looked well fucked and nothing like the carefully constructed image I normally projected.
Jake had seen me at my worst, something I had no intention of revisiting, but I knew when he said I was beautiful, he meantit. Not the Elena who spent twenty minutes in front of the mirror making sure her make-up didn’t look like make-up. This Elena. The one who slurped noodles, watched movies snuggled on the couch, and then made love with a man who seemed to be breaking out of the box I’d put him in.
I didn’t know what to do about it, but I wanted a chance to figure it out.
Jake, dressed in his boxers, his bare chest practically begging for my touch, wore the satisfied expression of a man who’d gotten exactly what he wanted. He watched as I made a much more sedate walk back to the sofa, and his expression shifted to something hungrier. I was pretty sure I was supposed to want him less after the sex, but that didn’t seem to be the case. I reached for my panties before I did something crazy, like climb on his lap again.
“Do you have to go?” he asked, as I reached for my bra and dress. “You’re welcome to spend the night.”
We’d slept together before but that had been an act of necessity, not a clear-headed choice. If we did it this time, it would mean something. Like maybe the playing girlfriend thing wasn’t all play.
I wanted to. I opened my mouth to say yes and remembered the meeting I’d scheduled for barely past dawn to go over the last details for Ford’s party.
“I can’t,” I said, my feelings deepening when I saw the disappointment on his face. “I really want to, but I’ve got an early commitment I can’t get out of.”
I debated cancelling. The choice was between sleeping, warm and safe, wrapped in Jake’s arms or going back to my cold dark townhouse alone. I knew which one I preferred, but I kept buttoning my dress, determined to be smart about this. Whatever that meant. I didn’t jump into relationships. Not without doing the research and all the calculations. My timewith Jake was never supposed to be any of that. If we were changing the rules—clearly we were changing them; they’d already changed—I wanted time to think about it and decide what it meant.
I pushed aside the movie scene that popped into my head where the heroine called the hero a coward for not risking his feelings and stepped into my sandals.
My home was as dark and cold as I’d expected. Jake had walked me down to my car, not pressuring me to stay, just tempting me with the way he kissed me and pulled me against him, tucking my head under his chin and holding me like I was important to him. I’d driven the short distance from his place to mine, wondering the whole way if I’d made a mistake.
Walking into my organized within an inch of its life entryway wasn’t doing much to convince me I’d made the right choice. It didn’t matter. I wasn’t changing my mind now. Not just because I didn’t want to cancel on my friends. It didn’t make a person a coward for wanting to think things through. I wasn’t in my twenties anymore. I couldn’t just take a chance on something because it felt good. Because I wanted it. I needed to plan better than that.
Too ramped up to sleep, I locked the door behind me and went to the kitchen. When I’d bought the dilapidated almost to the point of unlivable townhouse, my mother had been equal parts impressed that I could buy the place on my own and confused that I’d managed to do it without the help of a man. Walking out of the closing with the keys in my hand gave me the most sense of security I’d had up to that point. I owned a home. One that wasn’t dependent upon how I looked or what a man thought of me. One that had been frighteningly neglected andgrubby to the point of requiring a tetanus booster to enter. But it was mine. I’d spent the time between my other projects tackling the remodel until the house became my home and studio.
I reached into the printer’s bookshelf-style cabinets and pulled down my favorite bowl-shaped, thick white ceramic mug. I grabbed the canister of cocoa from its spot on the coffee bar and an extra dark, palm-sized wheel of Mexican chocolate. I splurged on the chocolate based on the idea that if I was going to allow myself a treat, it should be worth it. My normal café au lait wouldn’t help settle my mind or let me sleep, but a cup of hot chocolate and a book might do the trick. At least reading would keep me from thinking about why I chose not to spend the night with Jake despite how much I wanted to.
I poured oatmilk into a pan and set it to heat on my ILVE gas stove, chosen as much for its looks as its function. I could make cocoa in the microwave, but the ritual of stirring it while it heated on the stove helped relax me even before I got to the chocolate. I stirred in the cocoa powder and grated in a bit of the chocolate before sprinkling a bit of cayenne into the pan and ladling the hot chocolate into my mug. Giving the pan a quick rinse, I put it in the dishwasher and glanced around the kitchen to make sure nothing was out of place. Because I only had control over my appearance growing up and sometimes not even that, having control of my environment mattered to me. It wouldn’t bother a lot of people—Jake wouldn’t even notice—but my days went better if my space looked the way I expected. Not in an OCD way, at least, I didn’t think so. More in a tended-to way.
Thankfully, my dress didn’t need to be dry-cleaned. I dropped it and my lingerie into the hamper in my bedroom, before finishing my night-time skin care ritual and putting on pajamas. I climbed into bed under the pale-blush sheets from Doucette’s, identical except in color to the ones covering Jake’sbed. I’d just reached for my mug and e-reader when my phone buzzed with an incoming text.
JAKE
Thank you for tonight. I didn’t want to wait until after you fell asleep to say it. For the sex, and also the other stuff.
I smiled to myself. I loved Jake’sthank you for the sextexts, and I loved that this one was different.
ME
