Total pages in book: 54
Estimated words: 49393 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 247(@200wpm)___ 198(@250wpm)___ 165(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 49393 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 247(@200wpm)___ 198(@250wpm)___ 165(@300wpm)
I made myself lift my head and set her back on her feet. I took a step back, then another. As much as I wanted to consume her, wipe out every fear and bad memory with my touch, she had to make this decision, not me. I wiped my mouth on the back of my hand, paced over to the other side of my desk and braced my hands on it, head down as I drew in a ragged breath. I took a drink of water. Then I composed myself enough to face her without raw arousal in my face.
“Would you like a drink?” I asked, acting civilized when I felt like roaring and ripping off our clothes.
She shook her head, hair tumbling out of her topknot from my roaming hands. Her clothes were disheveled—also my handiwork, and her lips bright pink and swollen. She looked delectable and it wasn’t easy to keep myself where I stood with the desk between us.
“I don’t want water, Eli,” she said. “I want you to lock the door.”
A heart-pounding rush rolled through me as I followed her directions without ever taking my eyes off her. She held my gaze with eyes full of affection and desire, so lovely that even her smile seemed to fill something aching inside me.
“I locked the door,” I said.
“Will you come sit here with me?” she said, “Like we did the other day? When you were playing with my hair, and then you held me.”
“You’ve got some specific stage direction here,” said wryly.
“I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it I was emotional and scared and it wasn’t a good time to make a big change like that, but I want what I want. Timing has never been my strong suit. Let’s just see what happens.”
“Not to ruin the surprise but I can tell you what happens. Unless you plan to tie me down, which I’m also not against if it’s what you’re into,” I said with a grin.
I couldn’t keep from grinning. Because there was a sweetness in this moment where we hung on the precipice, anticipation that was its own delicious agony.
There was so much to say, but I, who prided myself on my IQ, my education, my vocabulary, was at a loss for words. I sat on the couch in my office beside her. She was tucked in the corner with her shoes off, her feet curled under her as she had been the day before. I leaned back, arms along the back of the cushions. I tipped my head back and shut my eyes, listening, breathing in the watermelon shampoo and cinnamon gum smell of her. Waiting, not relaxed but coiled and ready as any predator in the brush, I let her come to me.
First the soft rustle of fabric as she changed position, next the physical dip of the cushion beneath me shifting with her movement. Then some primal sense detected her approach, maybe her heat signature disturbing the air or the lifting of the hairs on my arms. I flexed my hand, and I could already feel her smooth skin beneath my palm, her hair twisted in my fingers, could see her face transformed in ecstasy as though it were stamped on the dark behind my eyelids. Every sense was awake to her, and I who had wanted to consume her was instead consumed, as Jasmine herself blocked out everything else in my awareness.
If she had been any other woman, I would have expected to open my eyes and find her straddling my lap, perhaps with her shirt removed already, a naughty smile on her face that told me she was ready for a ride. But this was Jasmine. My old friend. The person who scheduled my days and reminded me when I had an eye appointment, who had placed her warm hand on my back last May when I heard that a friend from the Navy died in a car accident. She was the one who roasted me mercilessly and still made it clear she respected me, who trusted me to be with her and hear her truth when she was scared about Chris’s reappearance.
This was Jasmine. I felt the warmth of her settle against my leg and the pressure of her cheek on my thigh as she lay down with her head in my lap. My body went rigid at the contact, at the trust and pure consent in that pose. I opened my eyes and my body instinctively curved toward her. I unclipped her topknot and let it unwind in my palm, then soothed her scalp with my fingertips. I savored the silken strands between my fingers as I combed them through her hair. She hummed a little, enjoying it, and that sound alone made me harden even more. I wondered how long I’d last at this, with her head in my lap and my cock jerking in anticipation.