“My experience? I doubt it. My fantasies, though…” Cal looks me over again, more hastily this time, as if plotting out a course. “Annie,” he says in that same pleading tone as before.
I slide my hand back into his hair and urge his head down. “Then listen to your fantasies,” I whisper into his ear. “I promise I’ll tell you if I want you to stop.”
He moves away a few inches to stare deep into my eyes, then nods slowly. As he reaches behind me and lowers the zipper on my dress, his mouth leisurely explores the area between my neck and shoulder as more skin is revealed. I reach back and unhook my bra to help speed up the process, and we work together to drag everything down my arms. The store is kept at sixty-nine degrees (nice), which is just chilly enough to send a shiver through me as Cal takes a minute to appreciate everything he’s uncovered.
He leans in and kisses me again, one hand cupping the nape of my neck in a way that feels softly, deliciously possessive. “Lie down,” he whispers against my lips, easing me backward. The wood of the counter is cool against my back, but I’m assuming some of that is just because of the contrast with the rest of my body, which is on fire. Yet I somehow manage to get even hotter as Cal’s mouth covers one nipple while his thumb brushes over the other.
“This is good?” he asks, looking up in response to the unwitting sound I let out.
“Oh, yes. I like that a lot,” I respond, squeezing his bicep as he switches sides.
After he has me squirming, my shoulder blades digging into the wood surface, he stands up straight and takes hold of my upper thighs. This time, he doesn’t stop at the hem of my dress, but slides the fabric up, up, up until it joins the top part pooling around my waist. He hooks his fingers into the waistband of my floral-print silky underwear. I lift my hips to allow him to slide them down my legs, where he maneuvers them over my yellow suede heels before they’re flung aside, joining his coat. I lay there atop the counter, my legs dangling over the edge, naked except for my shoes and the dress scrunched up around my middle like the world’s least effective life preserver. In fact, I feel on the verge of drowning as I let my knees fall open in response to his touch, exposing even more of me.
“My god.This,” Cal says, his grip on my hips inadvertently tightening in response to the view. “This is what I’ve been thinking about every single day. This is why you can’t sit on my counter, Annie. Because when you do, I imaginethisand the thought completely wrecks me. I can think of nothing else for hours.”
“Really? You’ve been thinking about me?” I ask.
He lets out a humorless laugh as he parts me with his thumb and runs it through the wetness gathered there. “Only all the fucking time,” he says. His thumb glides up and down, sending delicious tingles shooting through my body whenever he brushes closer to the spot where I want him most. Finally he settles there, pressing gently. “Here?”
“Yes, or maybe…to the left just a tiny—oh god, yes, there,” I confirm on a strangled exhale.
Cal is a man who has been trained extensively to handle delicate things with both intention and care. That is abundantly, wonderfully obvious in the way he touches me. He observes my responses to each of his movements, to each variation of pressure, with the same deliberation in his eyes I’ve seen when he’s valuing antiques. As if he intends to make my pleasure another thing in which he has expertise. And my god is he a quick study. When he slides two fingers inside me, it takes almost no time at all for him to find the right angle. I’m already getting so close…
Which is why when he stops, I can’t restrain an embarrassing sob.
“Cal, why—” I start, but before I can ask him if everything is all right, he’s taking my shoes off, tossing them to the ground. “What are you…?” My question trails off again as he positions my feet flat atop the counter, spreading me open even wider for him.
“I know. Sorry,” he says. “But I need to…need to know how you…” Without finishing the thought, he braces himself by grabbing my knees and buries his face between my legs. We both make a desperate sound in response to the first broad sweep of his tongue. I reach for his hair, instinctively scrambling to keep him there.
“Perfect, yes, that’s perfect,” I manage to get out.
I’m already close again when he pulls back to take a deep breath, and the pause in the pleasure allows me to get a single thought in. “Wait,” I say. “The front door. Did we lock it?”
Cal glances up, and it’s such a titillating sight to have his eyes meet mine, my hand fisting his hair while my thighs frame his head. “Maybe,” he says. “Don’t know. But no way in hell I’m about to stop and go check right now.”
“What if someone doesn’t realize we’re closed and walks in?” I ask.
“Then I guess they’ll get to watch you come,” he says simply before lowering his mouth to me again.
And within seconds, I do.
Catoctin, Maryland— September 1908
Her name cameto her as an echo in a dream, somewhere just out of reach.
“Ora.”
It was clearer this time, and her eyes sprung open to find John on his knees beside her, his face over hers.
“Oh. Hello,” she said, stretching her arms above her head.
“I went to find you at the inn, but Mrs. Kingston said you had not yet returned. It was getting late and I worried that you might have injured yourself or—”
“All is well,” Ora said too brightly as she moved to sit up, forcing him to move backward. “You needn’t have come out here on my account.”
“Of course I did.” John paused, lips pressed hard together as if deliberating on something. He looked down at the ground, then back up to her. “I know I have not done a very good job of demonstrating it since your arrival, but you are precious to me, Ora.” Her eyes widened at the confession, but John’s lingered onher mouth. The tip of his tongue briefly skimmed the corner of his lip, and his next words came out quietly, as if sharing his deepest secret. “I don’t think I would be able to live with myself if any misfortune were to befall you. Especially due to my own actions or inactions. So I came here to—”
She leaned forward and pressed her lips to his, cutting off whatever he was going to say he came here to do. Because Ora had plans of her own; his would just have to wait until she was finished with him. He kissed her back without hesitation, as if it was what he had wanted all along, taking her face in his hands. The warmth of his palms was a welcome sensation against her cold skin and the heat of his mouth against hers removed the chill from the rest of her body as it came alive to the sensation.
