Don’t Deny Me: Part Three (6 page)

“Hey, Alice,” Mick said before she could disconnect.

Alice sat back. “Hmmm?”

“I bought you a new faucet.”

She looked confused. “For what?”

“The one in the kitchen is leaking. I can replace it for you.” Mick leaned a little closer to the computer screen.

Alice blinked. “Sure. Okay. That would be great.”

“And I was thinking, next weekend, I could take your car to get the tires rotated.” Surely that, he thought, would let her know what he felt.

“Sure … if you want to.” She gave him a curious look. “Anything else?”

“Do you need anything else?”

She shook her head. “No. I guess I don’t.”

“‘Night, Alice,” he told her, and then the screen went dark.

* * *

I fixed your faucet.

—Mick to Alice

* * *

Long summer days led to dark summer nights. If she had to pick a favorite season, Alice would’ve chosen autumn, after the summer’s heat had faded and before winter’s frigid snows. Sweater weather, that’s what Alice liked, but today was more like “strip yourself down to skin and then to bone, if you can” kind of weather.

It reminded her of the summer she and Mick had met. Scorching in more ways than one. The blazing temperatures that had peaked at noon dropped so slowly after that it had made little difference. It was like being baked in a pizza oven, waves of rolling, shimmering heat making the cars in the parking lot shimmer. In the five minutes it took to get her from her car to the door of the restaurant, Alice thought she might pass out.

Inside the restaurant she went to the hostess stand to see if Mick had already arrived. He hadn’t, of course, which gave her mouth a sour twist. Irrational to be annoyed and she knew it, because he’d likely been stuck in traffic, which was always worse coming from his direction this time of day. Still, when fifteen minutes passed while she waited on a sticky vinyl seat with sweat dripping down her spine, it got harder and harder not to let it get to her. She fanned her face with a takeout menu, which did little good, and considered going to sit at the bar so she could at least get a glass of ice water before she melted.

He was always late.

Always.

“Last-minute Mick,” she wanted to call him. Typically, she hadn’t been able to pin him down to any specific plans for the weekend, though she’d asked him three times what he might want to do. This morning he’d called her unexpectedly after she’d already arrived at work. He’d asked her to meet him tonight for dinner, on a Tuesday, and it was such a rare occasion that she’d jumped at the chance even though it meant rearranging the plans she’d made to run some errands.

One of these days she was going to tell him no. Let him suffer. Except she knew she probably never would, because even though it made her crazy not to know what was going on, she’d never yet been able to pass up the opportunity to be with him, no matter how inconvenient or last minute.

Finally, he was there, pulling off his sunglasses as he came through the front doors and finding her at once. Grinning, he came to kiss her. “You’re early.”

Alice bit her tongue and kissed him instead of snapping at him. Too hot, too hungry. She was on her way to Crankytown on the Raging Bitch Express, and she knew it. “I’m not.”

“You look great. Nice dress,” Mick said as though he knew he needed to mollify her.

Or maybe, Alice told herself once they’d been seated at last, he really liked her dress. With a drink and a breadstick in her belly and more food on the way, her annoyance was rapidly fading, thank God. She didn’t want to ruin the night by fighting. Not even if it meant being able to make up.

“What’s that smile for?” Mick asked.

Alice touched her mouth for a second, unaware she’d been smiling. “Nothing. Just glad to be here with you.”

“I was thinking, you want to go to the batting cages after this? Go-karts?” Mick dipped his breadstick into the small pool of olive oil he’d poured onto his bread plate and swirled it around before biting off the end of it.

Alice laughed. “Seriously?”

“Well … yeah.” Mick paused, brow furrowed. He licked the oil from his lips, a gesture that normally would have snagged her gaze, but only made her wish he’d used a napkin now. “You don’t like that?”

“I do like it. I love go-karts and I suck at batting, but I like it, sure. It’s just that I’m totally not dressed for it tonight. And it’s like, a million degrees outside.”

“What’s wrong with what you have on?” Mick looked perplexed, though he’d eyed her outfit up and down earlier and even said he’d liked it, so Alice couldn’t begin to think why on earth he’d be confused. She drank to keep herself from making a snarky comment. Mick sat back in his seat. “Don’t you have anything to change into?”

It was Alice’s turn to look perplexed. “Not for go-karts. I have my gym bag, but I’m not wearing dirty shorts and a T-shirt out in public.”

“Oh. Well. That sucks.” Mick frowned. “Too bad. I thought it would be fun.”

“It would have been fun. I wish I’d known sooner. Say, maybe this morning before I left for work, or last night, even better. Then I could’ve been prepared.” Alice frowned, too.

Mick’s mouth thinned further. “How was I supposed to know?”

“I don’t know, Mick,” she said snidely, “maybe you could’ve planned it?”

Fortunately, the server arrived with their food, preventing Alice from going into full-bore bitch mode. She cut into her steak with vehemence, though, stabbing a little too hard. She looked up to see Mick glaring.

“If you have something to say to me,” he told her, “I wish you’d just say it instead of simmering about it.”

Alice took a long, deep breath, ready to let fly … and then took another breath, instead. This was not worth an argument that would ruin their night. Let it go, she told herself. Let it go.

“I’m fine. Just starving.” To prove her point she forked a bite of steak into her mouth and chewed.

It was good steak, too, and she didn’t have to feign her appreciation. With more food in her stomach and another drink, too, it was much easier to relax. Mick had her laughing in minutes the way he almost always did, even when she didn’t want to.

He watched her with shining eyes. “You have such a great laugh.”

“Hee hee, ha ha, ho ho ho.” Alice waved a hand.

“You do,” Mick insisted. “I like it when I make you laugh.”

“It’s better than making me cry,” Alice said.

She hadn’t meant it to sound serious, but Mick took her hand. His thumb caressed the back of it. Then he pulled it closer and kissed her knuckles.

“I never want to make you cry, Alice.”

Unexpected tears sparked behind her eyes. Damn emotions. Too many feels. He was so good at poking them out of her, even when he wasn’t trying.

She squeezed his hand. “That’s good to know.”

She wanted to kiss him all over his face right then, her desire so strong it was as fierce and physical a hunger as any she’d ever had for food. He must’ve seen it on her face, because his expression shifted into something hungry, too. His thumb moved against her skin in steady, relentless circles.

“I have a better idea of what we can do after dinner,” Alice said. “And the best part is, I don’t need to change my clothes first.”

She did need a shower, though, which she insisted on as soon as they got to her place. Not alone, though, she told him with a grin over her shoulder, as she kicked off her shoes and headed for the bathroom. Mick didn’t waste a second.

“Cold!” he shouted when he stepped in.

“Crybaby.” Alice adjusted the temperature from chilly to lukewarm and sighed with pleasure as she tipped her face into the spray. “It’s too hot out for a hot shower.”

“You’re crazy,” Mick muttered, stepped back out of the spray. “It’s freezing!”

Alice laughed and turned to splash him a little, laughing again when he yelped. “C’mere. I’ll warm you up.”

“Now that’s what I’m talking about.” Mick let her pull him closer.

Belly to belly, thighs to thighs. Water sluiced over them both as she pushed on her toes to kiss his mouth. His hands smoothed over her slick skin. She moved against him, delighted at the rise of his cock between them.

“I love touching you,” she told him.

Her hands moved down his back to the curve of his ass to cup it. She pressed him closer to her. His tongue slid inside her mouth as his hands buried in her hair, and when he moved to nibble at her jaw and throat, Alice broke out in gooseflesh that had nothing to do with the water temperature.

Mick gave an appreciative sigh and bent to take her erect nipple in his lips. He suckled gently, making her shiver again. His hands roamed her back and hips before grabbing her ass to grind her against him.

With a look over her shoulder, Mick found her washcloth and added some shower gel, making sure to suds the cloth before smoothing it over her body. Breasts, belly, legs, back. His fingers delved between her legs, and Alice gave a small, choking cry. He looked at her, his gaze steady and unrelenting as he slipped a finger inside her. Then another. His thumb pressed her clit.

Alice dug her fingernails into Mick’s shoulders. “Oh …”

When he went to his knees in front of her, she let out another low cry. Mick pushed her gently to sit on the shower’s molded seat. He spread her thighs and bent his head between them. His mouth found her clit with the same determination and ease his thumb had a few minutes before.

His hands kept her from sliding off the seat. His mouth worked on her flesh. Nibbling, teasing strokes of his lips and tongue. Every so often he’d shift to the side to let the water from the shower spatter onto her pussy—never hard or direct enough to send her over the edge. All she could do was shake, her muscles tensing and releasing. Pleasure building.

Mick went down on her like it was Judgment Day and the only way to get into heaven was by making her come.

With a moan, Alice gave herself over to the ecstasy. It lasted and lasted, and because she hadn’t turned the water very hot, it was a long time before it started to run cold. By that time she was wrung out from mini-climaxes, until finally Mick stopped teasing her. The flat of his tongue worked on her clit, and he slipped two fingers inside her to curl upward.

Alice came so hard she wouldn’t have been surprised if the world really had ended. The final orgasm left her spent and shuddering. Mick eased his fingers free of her clutching pussy and kissed her clit. Then her belly. Finally, her mouth.

“It’s freaking cold in here,” he said. “Can we please get out now?”

* * *

I was always that kid who touched the hot stove just to make sure it would still burn me, even if I’d already blistered my fingers on it a bunch of times before. A lesson learned easily isn’t learned well, that’s what my dad always said, and I guess I took him to heart. Somewhere along the way, though, I figured out what my dad really meant by that. It wasn’t that you should keep touching that hot stove to prove that it’s still going to burn you. What he meant was that it’s easy to keep on touching that stove because it’s always going to remind you that it burns; what’s much harder is reminding yourself that you don’t need proof if you’ve already learned your lesson.

—Alice to Mick, unsent

* * *

“Here, honey, get warmed up,” Alice said sympathetically as she handed him a thick terrycloth robe and used a towel to wrap around her hair.

He hadn’t minded the cool water so much when he was on his knees in front of her, his mouth on her heated flesh, but toward the end the spray had become frigid. Like needles. His back still stung from it, but drying off now, all he could do was grin.

“That’s a self-satisfied smile,” Alice noted.

Mick took the towel she handed him to scrub dry his hair. “I love making you come.”

“Mmmm.” She came up behind him, still naked, and slipped a hand into the folds of the robe. “I like it when you make me come.”

Her fingers found his half-hard cock, and she murmured in delight as she moved around to his front. It took only a stroke or two to get him erect again—eating her pussy in the shower had been sweetly torturous because he’d needed to keep both hands on her to make sure she didn’t slip off the seat. He’d been unable to stroke himself at the same time.

Now Alice’s fingertips found the slick, clear bead of pre-come and spread it around the head of his cock. Muscles in his belly and thighs tensed. His dick throbbed, then jerked in her hand when she let her fingertip smooth down the divot below the head.

Eyes never leaving his, Alice brought her finger to her lips and sucked it gently. The sight of her cleaning that slick fluid off her own skin made him almost finish right there—but Alice wasn’t finished with him. Taking his cock in her hand and walking backward, she led him to her bedroom, smiling wickedly the entire time.

There she pushed him back onto the bed. The robe fell open. She climbed up next to him and, without warning, engulfed his cock in her mouth. All the way down to his belly, her lips brushing his skin. Her hand cupped his balls, stroking, before moving up to circle the shaft as she slid her mouth off him.

Perfect. Almost too good; he wasn’t going to be able to hold out for long. When she shifted to put her pussy back on his mouth, her lips and tongue still working their magic on his cock, Mick groaned. The muffled noise of his pleasure against her pussy made her laugh, and though he was too far gone to do anything but moan, the sound of her glee pushed him harder to the edge.

He loved making her laugh, he loved making her come. He loved everything about this woman, he thought in that last incoherent moment before the only thing he could think about was exploding. He’d teased her forever before letting her finally orgasm, but Alice was kinder to him than that. She was going to finish him within minutes.

He wanted to make love to her, be inside her, but he couldn’t make himself move. His tongue slid along her slick folds and found the hardness of her clit. She cried out when he flicked it—shit, he wanted to make her come again. He wanted her bucking and writhing and covering his face with her desire, but he didn’t think he could last long enough to get her off again.