Parker (Rich & Single #2) (5 page)

“Anything else you want?”

She leaned up on one elbow and reached out with the other hand to stroke the length of him. Parker groaned, hips rocking into the touch, and he heard her moan in answer.

“Yeah,” she said. “I want you to fuck me. Hard. No more of that teasing crap, Parker.”

He looked down at her and grinned again. “Come on. I know you like the teasing.”

She glared at him. He didn't back down.

“Fine. I like it.”

He laughed, and stole another kiss. “I knew you did.”

But he was done teasing, too, and he grabbed her by the hips, abruptly tugging her down flat onto her back again.

“Hands above your head.”

Melissa, hair tousled around her face from the sudden change in position, looked up at him from her back, her chest rising and falling with quick little breaths. She lifted her hands above her head and curled them together.

“Good,” Parker said.

He leaned down and licked a slow line up the center of her torso with the tip of his tongue, straying to the side to nip at the curve of her right breast and then pull the nipple into his mouth. She shifted under him like she wanted to lower her arms, and then stilled again. He teased the peaked little bud with his tongue, then caught it gently between his teeth. He tugged a little, and she gasped.

One of his hands moved up, fingers teasing through the curls on her mound. He brushed a fingertip against her clit. Her hips rocked into the touch, but he didn’t give her the pressure that she wanted, just kept up the teasing touch until she moaned.

Parker dropped a kiss into the valley between her breasts, then took the other nipple into his mouth, licking again. Nipped at it gently. She writhed and moaned, hips rocking into his hand. He liked how desperate she was for it already, how needy.

“Fuck me,” she gasped. “Come on, Parker. Please. I want you inside me.”

With one last flick of his tongue against her nipple, Parker sat back. Melissa's eyes, half closed, opened again. Her fingers curled and uncurled against each other. He reached over the edge of the bed and pulled a condom from the pocket of his jeans.

“You want it?” he asked. “You sure, babe?”

“Yes,” she growled, and he laughed.

His hands caught her around the hips, pulling her up so that she rested half in his lap, and then he pressed inside her. She tossed her head back against the blankets with a little scream.

“Like that?”

She didn't answer except to moan.

Parker pulled back, then dragged her up to meet the next thrust. And the next. Damn, she felt good.

He shifted then, further back, and let her legs fall to either side of his thighs, leaning down over her instead. His hands slid up her arms to catch her wrists and pull them open so that one was on either side of her head, and he threaded his fingers through hers, holding them in place as he began moving again. This was faster, harder, making both of them groan.

“Yes,” she hissed, breathless. “Yes. Fuck me harder.”

It was a request he didn't bother teasing about. His hips rocked, filling her up before he slid back and pressed in again. He let his head drop forward so that it rested against her collarbone, and teased at her skin with lips and teeth.

“How close, babe?” His voice sounded as wrecked as hers was.

“Close. Parker. Fuck.”

He let his eyes slide shut, and moved inside her.

An instant later she was shuddering under him, and he followed her. Pleasure exploded through his body, tingling into his limbs and whiting out the world.

“I don't know if my legs will ever work again,” Melissa said after a long moment.

Parker opened his eyes, lifting his head enough that he could look at her. Bliss was written across her face. Her eyes were still closed, a small smile curling the corners of her lips.

“Is that so?” he asked, laying his head down against her chest and letting her have her hands back so that he could wrap his arms around her.

“It is so,” she said.

Laughter spilled out of Parker. “I think that means it was good.”

“Good? I'm pretty sure that was the definition of spectacular. If you're ever lonely some night, call me up. Because I would do this again in about half a heartbeat.”

He pressed his lips to the skin under his mouth. “I'll keep that in mind.”

For a moment longer he lay there, just breathing. One of her hands settled into his hair, toying with the strands. It was good to stay there, let himself be boneless and content, but he wasn't really the snuggling type, and after another minute he made himself move.

“You need a shower?” he asked got off the bed to stand beside it and stretch.

“A shower might not be a bad plan,” she conceded after a moment of looking like she was weighing the pros against the cons of moving.

“I have a really fucking nice shower,” Parker informed her.

She opened her eyes, and he held out a hand. Melissa laid hers in it, and he hauled her upright. With a little bit of grumbling, she swung her legs out over the edge of the bed and stood up, only for her knees to promptly give out, dumping her against his chest. Parker wrapped an arm around her to hold her upright.

“Stupid shoes,” she said, glancing down at them with her lips pressed into a thin line.

“Sit down again. I'll take them off for you.”

She sat, and Parker went to one knee in front of her, lifting the first leg up to set her foot on his thigh, where he could see the tiny little buckles that held the straps in place.

“You sure you're going to be able to do that?” she asked, looking down at him with one eyebrow lifted. Her smile was amused. “I'm not sure I should trust you with them, to be honest.”

Parker tipped his head back a little to look up at her. “I am perfectly capable of unfastening shoes. I'm not a complete Neanderthal.”

He looked down at the shoes again, and wasn't so sure that he did know, after all. Those buckles were really fucking small, and there were more straps than any shoe should ever possibly need to have. Over his head, Melissa laughed.

“There's a zipper in the back,” she said finally, taking pity on him. Or maybe just not wanting her shoes ruined. “Just unzip it.”

Shaking his head, Parker turned her foot enough that he could get his fingers on the zipper, tugging it down and the pulling the shoe off. The other one followed it. Underneath, there were faint red lines on her feet where the shoes had pressed down on the skin.

Parker took one foot in his hands, stroking his thumb firmly along the arch of it. Melissa groaned.

“How the hell are you still single? You’re perfect.”

Working the tension out of the muscles, Parker laughed. “I guess I’m just not interested in finding ‘the one’ right now. I’m happy being single. Sampling the options.”

“Well, if you ever get done sampling, keep in mind that I’m an option.”

Parker set her foot down gently and lifted the other, working his thumb over the tight muscle there, too. “I’ll make sure I write it down,” he said easily. “Shower?”

“I’ll take advantage of that offer while it’s available.”

Instead of giving Melissa the chance to fall again on the way to the shower, Parker scooped her up in his arms and carried her into the bathroom himself while she giggled, her arms wrapped tight around his neck. She was a small weight compared to the ones he was used to lifting, her body warm against his.

In the bathroom, he set her down on a bench that sat against the wall next to the shower, and reached in to turn on the water that sprayed from multiple heads to cover the whole of the tiled space.

“Someday, when I'm a big-name editor hobnobbing with the rich and the famous, I'm going to have a shower like that,” Melissa said, watching him from the bench.

Parker laughed. “I'm going to hold you to that. I'll come find you and ask if you had it installed.”

“Or you could be the person inside sharing it with me,” she said, batting her eyelashes at him teasingly.

Satisfied with the temperature of the water, he grinned and held out a hand to her. “Let's just stick to sharing this one and see where it takes us.”

It wasn't going to take them into coupledom, and if he'd thought that she expected it to with any sort of genuine feeling, he’d have made an excuse and left her to take the shower alone, but it had been clearly obvious that she was teasing. While he was sure she wouldn't have complained if he'd decided that he was looking for something a little more long-term than a one-night stand, he didn't think she was convincing herself anything of the sort was going to happen outside her daydreams.

Melissa took the hand and stood. She was steady on her feet as he tugged her into the shower and up against his body, shutting the door behind them. Water washed warm over their skin, and he reached past her for the soap.

“Why don't you just relax,” he said, “and I'll wash you.”

“Again. Precisely perfect. Someone is going to come along and snatch you up one of these days and I'll be left alone and devastated, forever ruined for other men by my single night in your bed.”

He could hear in her voice the struggle to keep a straight face, and when she looked back over her shoulder at him as she turned, she was obviously hiding a smile.

“Hey, there are plenty of men who are more than willing to wash your back,” Parker said as he lathered up and began stroking his hands down over her shoulders and along the curves of her waist and hips. “Especially if it involves getting you on your back somewhere in that process. Or on top of them. Or—”

“Don't ruin it,” she laughed. “I'm having a fantasy moment. I don't want to think about just how many guys follow me around with their tongues out.”

“Wow. Humble, are we?”

“You're the one who opened that door, Parker.”

It was true enough, and so he just smiled as he worked his way down her back and up again, feeling the muscle move under his hands when she shifted her bodyweight. He went down a little to get her legs, then indulged himself in taking his time with her buttocks. “You run?”

Melissa shifted enough to look over her shoulder at him again. “I guess you really do know your stuff,” she said. “Yeah. I run. Three days a week, at least. Squats, too.”

She wiggled her eyebrows at him like he was supposed to be impressed by that, and Parker laughed. “I can tell.”

“I guess I'm doing something right, then.”

Parker turned her around with a hand on her shoulder, and this time he started at her ankles, slowly straightening up, though he bypassed the space between her thighs completely, instead moving straight to the slight curve of her belly, and then up to cup the weight of her breasts in his hands the way he had in bed, this time working the soap over them while she sighed and let her eyelids fall shut. “Okay. Rinse time.”

She sighed and he took it as a yes.

He turned her into the spray, and the soap slid from her skin and down the drain with the water. She turned again to face him, letting it do the same on her back. Then he pulled her back against him, spinning her as he went, with an arm around her waist, and slipped his fingers between her legs.

“You're really going to start something again?” she asked, in a tone that said she wasn't at all opposed.

Her arms lifted to curl around the back of his neck, fingers linking together.

“You're here. You're hot. I have a quick recovery period.” His fingers kept working, stroking over the lips of her sex until she squirmed against him, and tilted his hips to tip hers into the spray, letting the water run down over her and make her shudder with the added sensation.

“We're going to have to take a whole extra shower if you keep this up,” she said, breathless.

Parker tilted his head down to rest his chin against her shoulder, his cheek pressed to hers, and grinned down at the length of her body on display, his hand between her thighs. He was getting hard again, and he rolled his hips so that his length stroked against her slick, warm skin.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart,” he whispered against her jawline, pausing to press his lips to it while his free hand slid up and down her thigh. “We’ve got all night.”

              In the morning, Parker woke to his legs tangled in the sheets and a body wrapped around his own, one thigh thrown across his legs. Melissa's head rested on his chest, her hair spilling soft and still a little damp over his shoulder. It wasn't a bad way to wake up.

For a moment, he lay there just enjoying the early morning silence and the press of Melissa's form against his own. She'd been an extremely enthusiastic participant in last night's fun, and he was going to be a little sorry to see her go, if he was honest with himself. But not so sorry that he felt the need to consider adjusting his stance on relationships.

That didn't mean he couldn't keep her number in his phone, though. He had every intention of meeting up with her again for another roll in the sheets or two, if she was amenable to the idea. Somehow, looking down at her curled around him with a smile still on her lips, he didn't think she would have any objection. Though he'd need to be careful about letting her get too attached. The friendly joking was one thing. A girl who was looking for something he couldn't give her, and getting hurt in the process, was entirely another. Parker really didn't like hurting people. It was one of the reasons he'd decided not to look for a long-term relationship in the first place. The few he'd had were the sort that ended badly, and in the end he'd given up on them, because he was always going to be more dedicated to his career than to anything else. Most women he met didn't really understand that, and that was okay. But it was a pretty good reason not to be dragging them into something that would end with them crying and him feeling guilty. Better to just avoid all of that completely.

His alarm was going to go off any minute. Lately, he really only needed it after a night that he'd let himself go a little too much, but he always set it, just in case. He was a little surprised he'd woken without it, after how late they'd been up, but then, he always woke up feeling good after a night of great sex.

Unfortunately, the impending alarm and the call of duty that followed meant he was going to have to wake Melissa, who was sleeping so peacefully against his side.

He slid his hand up and down the length of her spine, and turned so that he could settle the other against her hip, thumb rubbing slow circles over the bone. “Hey there,” he said, gently. “Time to wake up, pretty thing.”

She stirred, but didn't quite wake, murmuring something that sounded like a protest against his skin.

“Come on.” Parker shook her a little, still careful. “It's a Thursday. We've both got to go in to work.”

She probably didn't have to go in to work quite as early as he did. But if he was going to give her a ride home, she was going to have to get up with him. If she'd brought her car with her, he could have just left her asleep in bed with the alarm set for whatever time she actually needed to be awake. Next time, probably.

“Melissa. Wake up.”

Her eyelids fluttered, and then she was tipping her head back to look at him, eyebrows drawing together in sleepy confusion. “What time is it?” she asked, voice a little rusty with sleep.

“It's 6:15,” Parker said, glancing over her shoulder at the clock. “I've got to be at work in about forty-five minutes, I need to drop you off.”

She sighed.

“It's not so bad,” Parker said. “At least the sun is already up.” He indicated the light spilling in through the windows with a lazy wave of his hand, and slipped out from under her embrace so that he could start dressing. “In the winter I'm up when it's still totally dark, and it feels completely like night time. Those are the worst mornings.”

“Damn,” she said, sitting half up with her weight on her elbow. “Don't I know it. I'm always up early to run coffee for the higher-ups, so I'm glad that your alarm was set.”

“I usually ask, but we were a little out of it by the time we went to bed last night.”

Or early this morning. A little out of it was a bit of an understatement. But shit, it had been worth it. Melissa laughed like she was thinking the same thing that he was.

“Lucky me, then.” She swung her feet over the edge of the bed, and a moment later she was standing, hunting around the room for the clothes that he'd stripped off her the night before. “I’ve never been late to work before, and I really don’t want to start now.”

“I've still got some time before my first class, but I like to get in well before that, just to make sure everything is running smoothly,” Parker said as he pulled on a pair of athletic shorts. “And I might try to get a workout in myself, though I can do that in the evening just as well. Morning for me always has a little extra bounce in it.”

“I used to go to the gym all the time,” Melissa said. She was fastening her bra. “But then I started this job and I'm just so busy. So I mostly just do a quick run around my neighborhood and a few at home sorts of things. But maybe one of these days when I feel a little less like I'm drowning in a pile of paperwork I'll start looking for a real gym again.”

“You’re always welcome to check out mine,” Parker said. He pulled his shirt over his head and grinned at her. “I’ll give you my number, just in case.”

“Oh, really? Just in case, huh?”

He put on an innocent face Jackson had told him more than once was ‘“Utterly unbelievable, Parker. No one is going to fall for that.’”

“Just in case,” he said again.

She laughed. “Give me a minute to find my purse and I’ll take it down.”

***

Half an hour and one coffee stop later, Parker dropped Melissa off, sending her on her way with a wave and a grin. She blew a teasing kiss at him as she pulled out of the lot, and Parker shook his head and turned the opposite direction down the street, headed for his gym.

When he arrived there was a decent group of regulars spread out through the room, all of them getting their workouts in before they headed off to whatever desk job awaited.

“Dude.” One of the other trainers appeared at his elbow, looking flustered. “I need to—”

Parker's phone rang. “Sorry, Daniel. I need to take this. Just one moment.”

Daniel looked at him a little helplessly, mouth opening like he wanted to say something else, but Parker lifted the phone to his ear.

“This is Parker. What can I do for you?”

“Parker,” a woman's voice said in his ear. “Oh, good. I'm so glad I got a hold of you. I've got a bit of a personal training emergency, and I need to step up our sessions, and maybe see if you can change my meal plan? My husband just surprised me with a cruise for my birthday, and I'm not going without looking my best, so if we can move our timeline forward that would be great.”

Parker tipped the phone away from his mouth and let his breath escape on a quiet sigh before he spoke. “Okay, Mrs. Jacobs. I'm going to have to sit down and talk to you about this at our next appointment, because we're already pushing the limits, and much faster starts to get into territory that really isn't safe, and won't do you much good in the long run. Changing your body is a slow process. Fast change might seem nice in the beginning, but you're way more likely to gain back everything you lost if you're doing it in a rush.”

“I can't wait for three more days. I need to schedule an appointment with you this afternoon.”

“I'll have to take a look at my schedule, Mrs. Jacobs, and see what can be arranged. There's a lot going on lately. Let me do that, and I'll give you a call again a little later.”

There was an annoyed huff of breath from the other end of the line, but Mrs. Jacobs didn't argue, thankfully. He really wasn't ready for a full-on debate with her this early in the morning, and it always was one with Mrs. Jacobs. Her husband was a lawyer and in Parker's opinion she'd watched him in court, and likely argued with him outside of it, a few too many times.

“Probably the soonest we're going to be able to get you on the schedule is tomorrow, but I'll see if there were any cancellations.”

“I suppose that’ll have to do, then. Thank you, Parker. Call me as soon as you know when you can see me; I need to set up my calendar for tomorrow as soon as possible.”

“Will do, Mrs. Jacobs. Have a nice day.” Parker hung up, and ran a hand through his hair.

“What's she want now?” Daniel asked beside him.

The way Parker's eyes rolled upward wasn't entirely voluntary. “Her husband is taking her on a cruise and apparently she wants to move her goals up. But we're already moving about as fast as we're going to move. So she may just have to deal with it.”

Daniel nodded his understanding, and opened his mouth to speak again.

Parker, his eyes moving over the room, almost tripped over his own feet.

Jennifer Leandra was laid out on her back on one of the weight benches, doing incline dumbbell flys in his gym.

What the hell was she doing in his gym, and why hadn't anyone warned him that she was there, for fuck's sake?

He turned to look at Daniel, and realized that was probably exactly what the other trainer had been trying to do.

“What's she doing here?” he hissed, trying to keep the whisper too low for the woman less than twenty feet away to hear. It looked like she had headphones in, so it was likely she couldn't anyway, but he wasn't taking any chances.

“I’ve no clue,” Daniel whispered back. “She just showed up, asking to take a test run of the gym. It wasn't like we could turn her away.”

“No.” Parker sighed. “This day just keeps getting better.”

It had started promisingly, back in the warmth of his own bed with a beautiful woman wrapped around him, but apparently that was a thing of the past.

“You going to brave it now?” Daniel asked. “Or wait?”

That was a good question. Jackson probably would have told him that he should wait, and assess the situation to see whether or not there was a chance for negative publicity to come out of it. But Parker was in his own gym. The place he’d built, some of it with his own hands, and he was not going to let himself be intimidated by some little slip of a brunette just because she wore spandex that showed off every ripple of her muscle. Lots of women he'd had through here wore spandex. Lots of the women he'd taken to bed wore it. He wasn't going to be overcome by workout clothes.

Parker squared his shoulders, and started over toward the bench where Jennifer Leandra was working. As he got closer, he could hear the huff of her breath, going in and out with the rise and fall of the weights. Damn, he wished he'd been able to get a workout in before the day devolved into crazy.

As he approached, Jennifer pulled herself smoothly upright, leaning over to set the weights down. She then sat, perfectly relaxed, with her hands resting on her thighs while she straddled the bench, and waited for him to approach her.

If Parker had thought she was hot in the video, that was nothing to how good she looked in the flesh. She had to be 5’10”, all lean muscle and smooth curves. He’d never wanted to be a weight bench so much in his life.

“Jennifer,” he said, offering his hand. “It’s nice to meet you in person.”

She must not have been at the bench too long. There was no sweat darkening her clothes. Her hand closed around his with a grip as firm as he had expected it to be.

“Parker,” she said. There was no warmth in her voice.

“Why don't you walk with me?” Parker offered. “We can go back to my office and talk.”

She swung one long leg over the bench and stood up, the top of her head even with his shoulder. Definitely tall.

“So,” he said as he started toward the back of the building and his office with her at his heels. “To what do I owe the pleasure of your presence in my gym?”

Jackson wasn't going to be happy. He would have wanted to speak, and to set up their social media strategy before anything got decided. But Parker could always tell her that he needed time to make a decision on whatever she had to say. He did have business partners, after all. Jackson had to be consulted.

“I wanted to speak with you in person,” Jennifer said.

Parker opened the door to his office and stepped back to let her through first. She strode in, glancing around it like nothing there interested her, and dropped into one of the chairs across from his desk. One of her legs crossed over the other, and then she waited, regally, as though she were the one sitting behind the desk and waiting for him, and not the other way around. Parker closed the door, and took his own seat.

“What did you want to speak about?” He thought he knew, but better to ask and have her tell him for sure than to take a guess and be wrong.

“Oh, I'm sure you know already. You must’ve seen the video I made.”

Parker chuckled, leaning back in his seat. “Yes. I saw it. I saw how many views it had, too. Good strategy.”

“I was serious.” She leaned forward a little, hands curled around the ends of the armrests. “I'm calling you out, Parker. I want a challenge.” Jennifer finally smiled, and it wasn't very friendly. “I want a
real
challenge. I'm not sure if you're really up to the task or not, but you seemed the most likely to be, so I picked you.”

That set his own pride prickling a little. He was more than enough of a challenge for anyone. Certainly enough for Jennifer Leandra.