Page 77 of Work with Me

She didn’t reply, but one corner of her mouth tugged up.

I sat on my hands, but she hadn’t said anything about my eyes. I catalogued each part of her I wanted to touch, to taste: the curve of her neck, the soft swell of her breasts hidden behind her button-up—I gulped—shirt, those thighs that’d teased me when she wore her cut-off sweatpants. The insides of her ankles.

When she pulled up in front of my building, I was ready to leap across the console and maul her. Instead, I bounded out of the car and circled to open her door.

She swiveled her long legs out of the car and planted her shoes—the red power slingbacks she wore when Cooper was in town—on the pavement. I held out a hand, and she placed her palm on it and levered up.

Her face was inches from mine. Cooper couldn’t see us here. So I kissed her, pulling her against me and letting her feel my desperate arousal, pouring my new feelings—whatever they were—into the kiss.

Finally, she pushed against my chest and laughed breathlessly. “Let’s take this inside.”

I had to have set a land speed record between her car and my front door. I dropped the key on the first attempt but managed to unlock the door on the second. I pushed it open, flicked on the light, and let her precede me through.

The second the door closed, I pressed her up against it, pinning her hands on either side of her head. I kissed her neck, her jaw, the vee of her collarbone revealed by her button-down shirt. Her skin tasted like heaven, and I wanted to devour every inch. I nosed inside her shirt to flick my tongue along the upper swell of her breast. I needed more—more skin, more taste, more of the soft sounds she made when I sucked the tendon between her neck and her shoulder.

“Jackson,” she gasped. “Stop.”

I froze and released her hands. I backed away half a step so I could see her face. “Stop?” Had I hurt her? Or was she having second thoughts?

“I need to call home first. Check on Noah.”

“Right.” She had responsibilities. I hoped it didn’t mean she’d lost interest.

“Meet you in your bedroom in ten minutes?”

“Fuck, yes.” I bounded off to my bathroom, where I brushed my teeth and took the world’s fastest shower. Then I padded into the bedroom, pulled the unopened box of condoms out of the bedside drawer, and set them on top of the table. Casting my gaze over the rest of the room, I cringed. The bed was unmade, and there were clothes everywhere. How much more time did I have?

I scooped up the clothes and jogged toward the closet. Sliding open the door, I chucked them all onto the floor. On the top shelf was an unopened package of sheets, the spare set I’d never used. Yes, I had washed my sheets in the five months I’d lived in the apartment—I wasn’t a monster—but I’d always put the freshly laundered ones back on the bed. I ripped open the package, found the fitted sheet and two pillowcases, and replaced what was on the bed. I balled up the dirty sheets and tossed them on top of the pile of clothes and slid the closet door shut. I kicked the comforter into the corner of the room.

Had I used up Alicia’s ten minutes? She hadn’t changed her mind, had she? I tugged on a clean pair of sweatpants and walked back down the hall to the living room.

She was sitting on my sofa, staring at her phone. “Hey.”

“Everything okay?” I sat next to her and put a gentling hand on her back.

“Yeah, it’s good. I—I don’t do this a lot. I mean, with a partner.” Her cheeks went red.

All the blood rushed out of my brain and straight into my groin at the thought of her touching herself, using a toy on herself. Damn, I wish I’d thought to buy a vibrator. It would’ve been a good way to ease into it. And then, of course, I thought of easing my way into Alicia, and my sweatpants hid nothing about how I felt about that.

I kissed her gently on the lips. “We can go as slow as you want, baby. We don’t even have to fuck. I can just hold you. Would you let me do that?”

She tugged away. “Do you think that’s what I want? That I don’t want sex because I’m—I’m frigid?”

“No, baby.” Fuck, I’d fucked up the one other thing I was good at—fucking. “I think you’re gorgeous and sexy. And all I want is to make you feel good.” I touched her jaw lightly, and when she didn’t pull back, I cupped her face in my hand. I kissed her again, less gently this time, trying to communicate, in a way I couldn’t with my clumsy words, what I felt for her.

When she gasped for breath, I kissed her cheekbone, her throat, the place I’d found at the side of her neck last time. When she moaned, I grinned. Maybe I wouldn’t fuck this up.

I lifted her onto my lap and leaned back to let her take the lead, spreading my arms along the back of the sofa. She stared at my bare chest for a moment and then reached out a finger to catch one of the drops that had run from my damp hair onto my neck. She smeared the wetness over my left nipple, raising it to a peak. Electricity ran straight to my groin. I hadn’t thought I could get any harder. I’d been wrong. I gripped the cushions to keep myself from ripping off her blouse.

“I think I’d rather we both make each other feel good.” And she shifted so she rubbed her ass against my dick.

I threw my head back to keep from tossing her onto the couch and shoving a hand up her skirt. I’d decided to follow her lead, and if she wanted to tease me, I’d let her.

She stood, and I missed the weight of her, the brush of her hip against me. Then her fingers tangled with mine. “Let’s take this to the bedroom.”

I was up in a flash, leading her down the hall to my hastily cleaned bedroom. I sprawled on the center of the bed and waited for her to make the next move.

She knelt on the side of the bed. Then she prowled on her hands and knees to me, letting her skirt lift higher and higher as she approached. Finally, she lifted her skirt enough to straddle my hips.

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