Authors: Lauren Gallagher
Tags: #Fiction, #Erotica, #General, #Literary, #Romance, #Erotic Contemporary
enough to keep it from getting too intense, but nowhere near enough to let my
orgasm recede. He kept me going for the longest time, coaxing wave after wave of
unbelievable ecstasy from my clit and G-spot until I begged him to stop.
“Oh, my God,” I murmured as he withdrew his fingers. “That"s amazing.”
He grinned and kissed me lightly. “You"re not the only one with a little magic
in the hands.”
We both laughed. After another gentle kiss, we parted long enough to get rid of
our clothes. Then we got back into bed and turned on our sides, and Austin pulled
the sheet up over us. Facing each other, we didn"t speak for a long time. He watched
his fingers run through my hair, probably oblivious to the fact that the two creases
between his eyebrows may as well have been a neon sign that said I"M THINKING.
“What"s on your mind?” I asked.
He shifted and rested his hand on my arm. “Thinking a little. About why I
came here tonight.”
Something in my stomach flipped. “You wanted a massage?”
He laughed. “Apparently. I just didn"t know it at the time.”
“So, why
did
you come over tonight?” I grinned. “Not that your company"s
unwelcome, of course.”
Austin smiled. “Because I wanted to see you.” He brushed the pad of his thumb
across my cheekbone.
“And you didn"t want to wait until tomorrow?”
I half-expected him to laugh and make a playful comment, but his expression
remained completely serious when he whispered, “I couldn"t wait until tomorrow.”
I swallowed hard and absently trailed my fingers up and down his forearm.
“You…couldn"t?”
“No.” His eyes lost focus for a moment. “I guess I"ve just been doing some
thinking, and after…” He paused. “After this evening, I needed to be with you.”
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“Why?” I raised my eyebrows. “Did something happen?”
“No, no, nothing like that. It was just like any session with any client.” He ran
his fingers through my hair. “That"s just it, actually. I do this all the time, but the
longer you and I do this…” He pursed his lips and his eyes lost focus. Finally, he
took a breath and looked at me again. “You know, there are people who think with
what I do, I"m just giving away something that should be kept between two people.”
He touched my face. “And that couldn"t be further from the truth, honestly.”
“How so?”
Austin moistened his lips and watched his fingers play with a strand of my
hair. “Yeah, I have sex with other women. But there"s… It"s…” He released a
frustrated breath. “It"s just not that simple.” His brow furrowed. I didn"t speak,
instead letting him find the words that eluded him.
Finally, he took a deep breath.
“There"s sex, and there"s…this.” He met my eyes. “Just being with someone
like this. This isn"t something that can be bought or sold, and I couldn"t
manufacture it for someone no matter how much they tried to pay me for it.” He ran
the backs of his fingers down my cheek. “That"s why I"m here tonight. Because I
needed this. And here, with you, is the only place I can get it.” He swallowed hard.
“Or give it.”
My heart pounded. “So, intimacy, then.”
“Yes, intimacy. Exactly.” He moistened his lips again and held my gaze.
“That"s something I only have with you.” Before I could speak, his hand slid from
my face into my hair, and he kissed me.
Austin was the last man in the universe I should have been like this with. No
matter how much I could tune out the rest of the world when we were in bed, that
world still existed beyond the bedroom walls, and there were people in it who
expected him to put out for pay. Those same people would be horrified to know I felt
this way about someone—some
thing
—like him. He was Austin, but he was still
Sabian.
This intimate tenderness had all the makings of a long-term relationship, but
reality held too many cards that simply wouldn"t allow it to happen.
Still, whether it should have been or not, there it was again, that same gentle
but desperate kiss we"d shared on the porch and up against the door, only now it
made sense. Now I understood what he"d been after, and had I been in his shoes, I"d
have driven across town in the middle of the night for it too. Not for
me
, per se, but
for this deep intimacy that couldn"t be bought, sold, forced, or ignored.
And I couldn"t ignore it.
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103
Chapter Fourteen
A week or two later, after a day from hell at my own job, it was my turn to
preface a visit with “I might not be good company.”
Austin wasn"t dissuaded, though. “I promise I"ll make it worth your while,”
he"d said over the phone with that grin in his voice. “
And
I"ll cook for you.” Now, I"d
made some stupid decisions in my life, but passing up an evening of Austin"s
cooking and whatever else would make it worth my while? Not a chance.
So, after a shower, a change of clothes, and a few deep breaths to settle myself
enough to keep any lethal levels of road rage at bay, I drove over to his apartment.
When I walked through his front door, I caught a faint but familiar scent.
Something hot. Burning.
Candles.
The light was on in the living room, and there were no candles in sight, but I
knew that smell. Grinning to myself as I set my purse down, I wondered what he
had up his sleeve.
Austin closed the door and came up behind me, hands on my hips and lips on
my neck. “Just the usual bullshit at work?”
“Yeah, you could say that.”
“I"d rather fix it.” His lips curved into a grin against my skin.
“And I"m sure you"ve thought of just how to do that, haven"t you?”
“I have.” He pulled my jacket over my shoulders, fingertips trailing down my
arms as he pulled it all the way off. He turned away just long enough to hang it up,
then put his arms around my waist and kissed beneath my ear. “And I think you"ll
enjoy it.”
“Of that, I have no doubt,” I murmured.
“Do you want a drink first or everything else I have planned?”
“Hmm,” I said. “Depends on what the drink is and what you have planned.”
“Vodka and whatever I can find to mix with it.” He kissed the side of my neck.
“Or you can take what"s behind door number one.”
“What"s behind door number one?”
The tip of his tongue made a slow circle below my ear. “You have to pick first.”
His lips and voice brushed my skin. “The drink or the mystery prize?”
I shivered. “How about a rain check on the drink?”
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Lauren Gallagher
His fingertips slipped under the back of my shirt. “I was hoping you"d say
that.”
Turning around in his arms, I kissed him. “So what"s behind door number
one?”
“You"ll see.” He gently turned me around again and guided me down the hall,
flicking the living room light off behind us. The entire apartment was dark now
except for a soft amber glow in the bedroom ahead of me. My heart thudded with
every step we took. It didn"t take a genius to figure out that whatever Austin had in
mind, it would—sooner or later—end in sweat and orgasms. That thought alone was
enough to raise my body temperature and negate my entire workday. Curiosity
about what
else
he had planned made me tremble with excitement.
Every light in the bedroom was off, but a half dozen or so candles flickered on
the dresser and nightstand. The comforter and blanket were already pulled back,
the pillows piled neatly on one side of the bed. A bottle of what I assumed to be
massage oil sat beside the candles.
“I was thinking,” he said against the skin beneath my ear as he reached
around to unbutton my blouse, “that you could use a massage.”
Right then and there, I nearly melted. “You don"t mind?”
“Not in the least. Especially not after the one you gave me.” He hooked his
fingers under either side of my shirt and drew it over my shoulders and down my
arms. “I"m guessing you don"t either?”
A breathless laugh did little to mask the shiver that ran up my spine as he
trailed his fingertips down my back. A playful retort was right on the tip of my
tongue but disappeared when my bra loosened and fell down my arms. I held my
breath, expecting his hands over my breasts, but he abruptly broke contact
altogether. Fabric rustled behind me, and when his arms went around me—hands
cupping my breasts as I"d anticipated—his bare chest was hot against my back.
I covered his hands with my own, closing my eyes and letting my head fall
back against his shoulder while he kissed my neck.
“If this is what happens when I have a bad day,” I whispered, “I"ll take
anything my job can dish out.”
“We"ve barely started.” He nipped my shoulder before releasing me. “Let"s get
the rest of these clothes out of the way so I can do what I promised.”
After we"d undressed, he handed me one of the pillows off the bed.
“Lie on your stomach with this under your hips.”
I took it but stopped to kiss him first. His hard cock pressed against my hip,
and I grinned at him. “So is this a massage or foreplay?”
He laughed, drawing his fingertips up my back. “Who says it can"t be both?”
I shivered. He kissed me one last time, then nudged me toward the bed. I did
as he asked, lying with the pillow under my hips, and he ran a hand from the small
of my back to my shoulders.
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105
“I could just look at you like this all night.” His hand drifted back and forth
across my shoulders. “Just looking at you…” A single fingertip traced a line down
the center of my spine “Touching you…” He bent and kissed the back of my neck.
“Thinking about all the ways I"m going to make you come before we"re done.”
All I could do was breathe.
“And I"ll get to that,” he said, his voice dropping as it always did when he was
turned on. “I"ll get to that very, very soon. But first…” He sat up and reached for the
bottle of massage oil on the nightstand. The bottle clicked, then again, and after
he"d set it down, he sat back again, out of my sight, and the hiss of skin brushing
skin gave me goose bumps. I pictured him rubbing his hands together to heat the
oil. My skin tingled at the very thought of warm, oiled hands sliding over my tense
muscles.
The mattress creaked with shifting weight, and I closed my eyes, expecting his
hands at any moment, in any place. When? Where?
What I didn"t expect was the soft, tender kiss on the small of my back, his lips
and breath warm against my skin. I sucked in a breath, exhaling only when he did,
breathing in again when his inhalation cooled the air just above my skin. As he
kissed his way up my back, I was more aware than ever of the contours of my own
spine: the gentle decline from my lower back before it swept up toward my
shoulders, then a subtle downward curve before rising once more to the sensitive
place just beneath my hairline.
Then, without a word, he changed position, sitting over me with his knees on
either side of my hips, and his oiled hands went to work on my muscles.
I barely felt what he did to my back and shoulders. While his hands melted the
tension in my muscles, his erection against the back of my thigh created a whole
different kind of tension. The more he touched me, the more I wanted him to keep
doing it, but the more I ached for his cock.
His hands glided up my back, making slow, firm circles, and every time his
body moved, his hips inched closer to mine. Even as his hands again moved down
my spine, working their way to the small of my back, his hips didn"t retreat at all.
I shivered.
“Cold?” he asked.
“No, far from it.” I moistened my dry lips. “I just really, really like what you"re
doing.”
“You mean this?” His hands left my shoulders and found their place on my
lower back again. “Or this?” His lips touched between my shoulder blades again,
making me close my eyes and whimper softly. I"d never thought of that spot as an
erogenous zone. Maybe it hadn"t been before this moment.
“Everything you"re doing,” I whispered. “I love it.”
“Good,” he breathed against my back before kissing higher, then higher, still
higher, each soft, tender kiss eliciting the same shiver as the last. Maybe the
erogenous zone wasn"t my skin at all, but his lips. A sexual Midas touch.
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His hands moved slowly up my back to my shoulders, just as they had a
moment ago, and every nerve ending tingled as if it"d been dormant all along until
his fingertips brought it to life. When he made a warm, slow circle with the tip of
his tongue at the base of my neck, I shivered. It didn"t matter where or how he