Sound Advice (Sensations Collection #1) (33 page)

Jess moved his mouth down my stomach, kissing a line above my short’s low-cut waist. I sighed and ran my hands over his hair.

“Last chance to stop?”

“No chance,” I responded breathily.

He removed my shorts and panties in one smooth move, scooting off the bed to stand as he did so. My legs separated as if they had a will of their own, inviting him to come closer.

“You are so beautiful,” he growled. He caressed my ankles, sliding his hands to the back of my knees to bend my legs upward. He smoothed his palms down my thighs and rested on my hipbones before reversing the sensual massage. He began again, but pushed me gently up the bed to allow him to crawl between my legs. Instead of rounding to my waist this time, he held my upper thigh with one hand and slid one finger against my center. I moaned loudly and turned my head to the side, closing my eyes.

“Don’t hide from me.” He stopped touching me.

Immediately, I turned my head to look back at him, and he resumed sliding his finger up and down. I was slick and a pressure was building. He was watching his own motion between my legs.

“When Katie wasn’t speaking, and looked away, I didn’t know how she felt,” he whispered. “I learned to read people through their expressions. I need to see your eyes to know how you feel. Inside.”

“Can’t you tell?” I rasped softly.

“I mean, feel. In here.” Jess stopped his sensual caress to touch my chest over my heart then trailed his fingers between my breasts and down my waist to slide inside me. I moaned again.

“What I feel for you is…overwhelming,” I whispered.

“Overwhelming?” Jess smirked. He slid his finger in and out several times before adding another. I whimpered with need and Jess stopped.

“Explain overwhelming.” He resumed his motion.

“Amazing. Confusing. Frustrating. Incredible.” I needed to stop talking. The pressure was intense and I was going to fall hard when it happened. I clenched against his fingers, and he moved his thumb around the sensitive spot at my core. The combination was mind-blowing, and I couldn’t look at him anymore. It was too…overwhelming. I closed my eyes, letting my head fall back, and released as Jess shoved his fingers inside me hard. I moaned again at the sensation that shook my whole body, freeing me. He kept up the rhythm until he sensed me coming down from the high.

He leaned back again and removed his own shorts. He had nothing on underneath and I stared at his deliciously naked body. He rolled a condom down his length, and I thought I might explode again just watching him touch himself. He knelt over me and kissed me hard as I felt the tip of him at my sensitive center. One arm propped him up and the other hand was on my hip. I spread my legs wider, tempting myself with the feel of him against me.

“Emily…” he began, but I leaned up and kissed him, biting his bottom lip and holding on as I pulled back.

“Now,” I demanded, and Jess entered me in one swift motion. He caught me by surprise and I let out a combination gasp and groan.

“Are you okay?” he whispered, and stopped with concern.

“I’m fine. Just…it’s been a while.”

Jess withdrew slightly and slowly pushed forward again. This time I moaned with pleasure. My eyes rolled back for a moment and I felt him everywhere.

“Again,” I whispered and Jess repeated the motion. I closed my eyes and turned my head. Jess stilled and I knew to meet his eyes.

“Say it.”

“Again?” He made the torturous slow motion a second time.

“Again. Again. Again,” I begged, and Jess picked up the pace. I wrapped my legs around his waist, and he lifted one of my thighs, pushing it higher to open me up.

“Emily…this won’t be long. I’ve been wanting you too much, and holding off too long.” He was panting as his pace quickened.

“I’ve wanted you too. Needed you. Oh, God, don’t stop.” Jess exploded with one fierce push into me and his release pulsed inside me, unleashing a second explosion from me as I clenched around him.

JESS AND I dozed across the bed, wrapped around each other. Legs in between legs, an arm draped over my middle, and my fingers caressed his back as he lay next to me on his stomach. A slow exploration began a second round of discovery.

“If I’m only going to have you for now, I don’t want to waste any time,” Jess proclaimed as he kissed every inch of my skin.

I knew the night would end sooner than I wanted, and the lightening of the sky told me morning was coming. I didn’t think Jess was awake as I looked out the window next to the bed at the brightening morning.

“I have to go, but I don’t want to.”

I rolled my head to look at him as he stared at me. I understood better the reason for his intense glares and it made me love him all the more.

“Moreover, I don’t want you to go, but I know you have to,” he added.

I didn’t know how to respond.

“Jess, I…” but he stopped me with a soft kiss.

“Don’t.”

“You don’t even know what I am going to say,” I scolded as I slightly scowled at him.

“For once, I’m afraid of words, Emily. Go back to sleep for a little longer. You have a long drive later.” He rotated his body and pulled me closer as he lay on his back and positioned my leg over his. He had his arm under me and gently nudged my head to rest on his chest. He placed my hand on his abs, and I recognized the position from the night of Nana’s funeral. A night when I knew I didn’t just want him, I needed him. Now the lines between want and need were blurred.
Now.
There was his word. I only had him for now, one night, and that now was over.

I woke with a jolt. I had been dreaming of a little girl in a white summer dress and daisies in her hair, running away from me. The girl was giggling with joy, but I could never catch up to her. I stared at the ceiling to regain my bearings and I knew I was alone in the bed. For a moment I thought I dreamt the whole night, but then I saw the daisy on the pillow next to me. There was no note this time. No official goodbye words spoken. Our bodies had done all the talking.

Always keep your mouth closed when chewing. Chew

slowly and several times in order to digest food properly. Food should be cut into manageable pieces. Never bite off more than you can chew.

“Matters of Manners,” 1954

IT WAS FRIDAY morning and I felt like I was suffering a new disease called culture shock. I attended the conference Thursday morning and made it through the day by having to retell the story of Nana what felt like four million times. People were sympathetic and polite, offering gentle pats on the arm or shoulder, but I was ready to explode if one more person touched me. When I returned to work on Friday, I was surprised at how different wearing my professional work clothes suddenly felt. On Thursday, it was for one day. On Friday, it seemed like a lifetime ago that I had been wearing shorts and flip-flops every day. Back in my high heels, a pencil cut skirt, and crisp white blouse with pearls, I felt like an imposter to myself. This was my normal attire. This was my lifestyle.
This was constricting
.

I kept telling myself the newness of returning home would change. I would begin to feel like my old self. Just give it time. But after a run along the waterfront, I stopped to look out across Lake Michigan from the Chicago side knowing that on the other side of this lake, he could be standing on the beach looking toward me. Of course, I knew that would be ridiculous. I went to a club on Saturday to “celebrate” my return, but a dance club isn’t an intimate radio shop, a crowded street fair, or a beer tent, and I left early. After a Sunday of shopping and laundry, I did start to feel like I had before – alone. I called my sister.

“Rosie, I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.” I closed my eyes and laid my head against the back of the couch in my ninth floor apartment that looked into another building. I was awake at 11:00 p.m. and Rosie was up too, pacing with a fussy new baby.

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t even know what I mean,” I sighed.

“Look, honey, you aren’t making any sense to me right now, but, of course, few things would at the moment.”

I kept my eyes closed.

“I miss them. Is that strange?”

“No. You spent a lot of time with both of them.” I heard the baby gurgle in the background.

“Will it pass?”

“What? Missing them? Maybe. I doubt it. This is different than Nana, Em. She died. We will miss her always, but she’s not coming back. This Jess didn’t die, honey. Think of it like a break-up. It stings at first, but you look and find all the things wrong with the situation and the guy, and voila, you don’t miss him anymore.”

“What if it was Mark?”

“What do you mean Mark? He’s my husband. It’s differ…” Rosie gasped. “Oh. My. God. You love him, don’t you? Did you…did you sleep with him?”

Pause.

“You did,” Rosie squeaked and the baby started to cry again. “Sh, sh, sh,” I heard Rosie say to the baby, but into the phone.

“This sounds like a bad time, Rosie. Should I call you tomorrow?”

“No.” Then “Here,” Rosie said and I knew she had passed the baby to Mark.

“Listen, what are you doing? Rather, what did you do?”

“Isn’t that how this conversation started?”

“Em, what happened?” I explained it all. The weekend activities, the time together, and the kisses. The goodbye, the conversation with Katie, and the night spent with Jess. Well, here I left out a few details.

“I know he wanted me. Something to remember me by forever if he could only have me now, but I don’t know what that means. And I’m the one that seems to be a mess over it.”

“It means something romantic, that’s for sure. Plus you said he understood you had to leave, but I think he wanted you to stay, Em. Could you have stayed? What about Chicago? Your job?”

“My job? Rosie, I’m not exactly doing what I planned to do even if it is a good job. I’m only twenty-three. I never planned to work there forever.”

“What are you saying, Emily?”

“I mean, Chicago is a great place to live, but no place to raise a family.”

“You don’t have a family, Emily. What are you saying?”

“I really could live at Nana’s, right? I could pay you rent to buy it from your half. I could find another job.” My voice was rising with excitement.

“You cannot be serious.”

“I think I might be.”

The baby cried again in the background with a full out wail.

“Emily, I’ve got to go. Don’t do anything yet, okay? Nothing rash. You’re lonely, I get it. Give yourself some more time.”

Easy for Rosie to say
, I thought,
as baby number four yelled for her new mother and a husband was standing close by to emotionally support her.

Everything seemed crystal clear to me until I got a phone call from the rental agent. Nana’s home was rented on a short-term lease from September 1 to April 30. There would be no place for me to go.

Whatever the emotion may be, use your words instead of actions to express your feelings.