ShamelesslyTaken (2 page)

Something inside him melted away. He forgot why he was here. She was all he could think about. He took the kiss deeper, teasing her with his tongue along the seam of her mouth and then she parted her lips. Just like before, her taste overshadowed all else, except this time it wasn’t nerves that spilled into him, but a dark, hunger for more.

He licked slowly inside her mouth until she let out a breathless moan. This wasn’t enough. An urgency gripped him to take them faster, harder to the end. He tried to ignore that call, but then she squeezed his cock through his jeans. He broke the kiss, trying to find his bearings and not lose it. He’d come, and that would be worse than what happened years ago.

“We don’t fumble this time,” he said, still rewriting the past and living this history.

He let go of her waist, searching for the answer to fill in the next part of the story. He flattened his palm on her stomach, caressing her as he reached lower. Slipping his fingers through her pussy lips, Chris tested her arousal. She was soaking wet.

“We tear at each other’s clothes.” His breath panted out. “You’re wet. So wet when I first touch you.” He slicked the tip of his finger and circled her clit. So swollen. “That first time is fast and hard.”

“Yes. Slow. Later.” She unzipped his pants. Another second and her fingers traced the outline of his cock through the cotton’s fabric.

His stomach tightened as her light touches became light strokes. He swirled his finger around the swollen nub faster and captured her mouth again. No more words were needed. She wasn’t nervous anymore. Her hand slipped between the band of his boxer-briefs. Warm. Soft. His groan rasped out.

It had been…too long. She cupped his balls before focusing her attention on his shaft. His teeth gritted while he fought the need to let her stroke him until he came. He tightened his fist in her hair and exposed her neck to his mouth.

Her hand stilled.

He stole that opportunity, flicking his finger faster over her clit, each suck on her neck harder.

He felt in tune to her every subtle movement and knew she was so close. When her hips gyrated along with the rhythm of his hand he broke away from her neck to kiss her. He wanted to swallow her moans, to revel in the exquisite pleasure she felt when her climax took over.

Her hips arched forward, stiffened and she cried out in release.
Yes. Yes
. “You are beautiful.” His voice sounded raspy.

Chris’s cock thickened even more at the sounds she made, how much wetter she soaked his finger. He couldn’t think much less remember a time when grief twisted his heart. This is what he’d fantasized about—bringing a woman to climax. This was so much better because it was Layla. He felt whole, and the sensation washed over him. Maybe this time he could see this through.

He let go of her hair to grasp her hips. “Legs. Around my waist. Now.”

“Fast. Hard.
Yes
.”

Amazing. His cock was painfully erect and he could share a laugh with her. Chris lifted her, his palms curving to her ass. They both sighed when she tightened her legs around his waist, rubbing against his cock. She held his gaze as she settled against him. Dark brown. Her irises were a deep, rich brown. He hadn’t forgotten that, but the simple fact hadn’t crossed his mind in years. He remembered the full brunt of that pull now.

Why did one awkward grope convince him to only be her friend, a study partner? Didn’t matter, because now the wet heat of her sex teased his, slicking the underside of his shaft. She ground her hips against his. Chris held her mesmerizing gaze, shifted so the next time she slid down, she’d… Yes. Just like that. He shut his eyes.

“You feel so damn good,” he murmured.

Chris just wanted to…His hips jerked forward on their own accord. Her ass slapped against his pelvis. Such a raw, primitive noise. He bent a little at the knees and repeated the thrusts so the sound of his heavy breathing, her moans, and that beautiful clap of skin on skin filled the room.

Her fingers were clasped behind his head. He opened his eyes. He didn’t want to be lost alone. Not when he was here with her—Layla. Her face was flushed, her lips parted, and her head tilted back. Her soft, panting moans gripped him.

If he could ever suspend a moment this would be one. One of many, but he wasn’t concerned about the others now. Not while her head was thrown back, her pussy already starting to squeeze tighter, grow wetter. Everything aligned and fixed on that squeeze, that pull. His balls drew up. Not fucking now.

“Chris,” she moaned.

His fingers gripped her hips and his thrusts went deeper. “Layla…fuck. Come. Now.”

Her body went taut against him, but he continued to pound into her. He gritted his teeth but a guttural noise still broke through his lips. Heat bloomed in his chest, his balls and up his spine. Fuck. His toes had curled into the carpet. He pumped once, twice and came. Whatever blood had been left in his head drained and he staggered.

A few seconds ticked by, and he could feel the sting of her high heels against his back. His legs had a nice sex-tremble working its way up from his knees to his thighs.

Amazing, really, he could laugh. He hadn’t felt that light in over a year. He glanced down at Layla. She bit the side of her lip and laughed too.

“Please tell me that was a fumble, Chris.”

He laughed harder, resting his head on hers. Technically, he had been out of practice. He grinned. “That was a clumsy grope in the dark.”

FIREWORKS

When Layla had imagined what would happen at the hotel, eating while sitting on the floor surrounded by pillows and being
somewhat
covered by a sheet definitely wasn’t what she’d envisioned. Barely eight in the evening when he walked into the room, they’d decided to stay up and watch the fireworks kiss the sky at midnight.

“Shelly does what now?” she asked him.

His arm rested over the couch’s cushion and his legs stretched forward. He wasn’t modest about his body. He sat naked on the floor, eating. He hadn’t participated in sports back in college, but he hadn’t been a slouch either. It served him well now as evidenced by his stomach’s muscular ridges. His legs looked like he played soccer or some other sport that required daily squats. Naked, the man was a work of hard, lickable planes.

What the hell were they talking about again?

“She teaches preschool.” He grabbed a shrimp from the cocktail tray, inspected it in the dim light, and bit it off right near the tail.

“She was such a bitch. Now she teaches little impressionable kids? I fear for our future.”

He snorted. “Me too.” He crossed his arms. “But you’re teaching adults
Hamlet
. How is that?”

She shrugged. “I love being able to see that spark in someone’s eyes. You know how it was in high school. You didn’t care about that stuff, but when an adult falls in love with
Hamlet
or
The Awakening
, it’s different.” She sat up, securing the sheet with one hand. The carpet’s fibers had started to dig into her elbow. “Almost like falling in love for the first time, except it’s better because that love gets past all your cynical safeguards.”

Chris shrugged. “I can see your point, unless you start waxing poetic about
Moby Dick
.”

She picked up one of the cloth napkins and tossed it at him. “I’m not that bad. Plus, I hate that book.”

She reached for a shrimp, unsure how far she could push. She had no illusions they’d leave this hotel together. Did some part of her hope they did? Yeah. Wouldn’t that be romantic and a bit sappy? The idea appealed to her, but one night didn’t change the years they’d spent apart.

Still, there was an itch between her shoulder blade. “You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to,” she started.

“What happened to my wife?” His voice grew darker than the night outside.

Instead of confirming, she waited to see what he’d say next. If he brought up one of their other classmates, she’d let the question go. But she wanted him to answer. Almost needed him to.

Chris sighed, unfolding his arms to ball his fist at his sides. “Sandra died a year ago. Overdosed on prescription meds. We could never have kids and then she started bleeding like crazy every month. Then every day. Nothing worked. They performed a hysterectomy and that had complications. She had a shitload of pain afterward, but I didn’t know…I never suspected she’d become addicted to the meds.”

She taught adult education. She’d heard that story plenty of times. She knew how a person’s life could be derailed, how hard they hid their addiction, how deep that hole was to climb out. How hard that must be to watch a family member spiral out of control like that. Her heart broke for him.

They’d graduated and she assumed they’d somehow stay in touch, but life, as always, happened. When he did cross her mind, she’d always smiled.

What would she do now, when they walked away after tonight? The night was far from over and she didn’t have to think about that yet.

She pushed the plate closer to him, her appetite suddenly gone. “What time is it? I don’t want to miss the fireworks.”

He reached to his left and dragged his pants over to him. After a second of digging he pulled out his cell phone. The light illuminated his face. By now, most men would have looked like one wink from dozing off. Chris just looked rumpled. He looked sexy.

“Twenty minutes ’till a new year.” He glanced at her. “What?”

She must have been looking at him like the cartoons of old where the other person turns into a piece of meat and they are starving.

“It’s just…” She chuckled. “You’re sitting there naked, looking cocky.” She thought about it. “Now that I think about that the only thing that’s truly changed about this scenario between us is you’re naked.”

“I was not that bad.” He paused. “Okay, I always needed less studying than you.”

She pffted, but knew it was the truth. “All you had to do was remember a bunch of ones and zeroes.”

His face blanked of any emotion, but she caught the lighthearted humor in his eyes. It wasn’t there when he’d walked in, and she tried not to get any satisfaction from that, but it was hard.

“I,” he said, “can hack into the Pentagon.”

She snorted before grabbing the ends of the sheet. “My heart can’t stop fluttering. You can hack into the Pentagon. Excuse me. I teach people to love books. Do you know how hard that is? Have you ever tried to read
The Scarlet Letter
? I have. Over fifty times. Attempting it does in fact make me feel like I’m being pressed slowly between rocks.”

He rose, stalling Layla’s intended excursion to the balcony. The man was all long, lean muscular limbs. Tanned and bitable. He made her laugh. Oh. Somehow, all those years in college, she’d ignored the obvious hot factor with him. Now that seemed all she could process.

She shook her head, trying to get her mind out of the gutter. He hadn’t made another attempt to get her into bed. Not that they’d made it into one yet. There were years between college and now, but she knew him. He wouldn’t be here if he didn’t feel like he needed to be. He didn’t feel secure or safe to have an affair wherever he lived. He’d rather have sex with a stranger. Maybe now she was out of his system, but was he out of hers?

No.

She felt like there should never be an end. Of course she did. The first man to show interest in her while she was on the rebound, and here she was, already wrapping the
circumstance
in bows. Typical. She gave herself her a mental kick.

She played it nonchalant and said, “I’ve never been to New Orleans. You?”

He picked up an armless chair from in front of the cherry wood desk and started to drag it toward the French doors. Seeing his plan she jogged to the doors to whip them open. They’d come from California. The southern regions at that. It got cold there, and she’d heard New Orleans could beat its lowest temperatures by several degrees. Standing out in the winter, in the sheet, she could barely feel the chill. Her blood still sang from their earlier tumble.

She glanced over her shoulder to see him, but he’d disappeared into the bathroom. He’d set the chair down right at the edge of the doors, situating it partly in and out the hotel room. She leaned over the rail and looked out to see if anyone else was outside this late. A few people walked the grounds. In the shadows she could see other couples on their balconies.

She smelled him before she heard him plop into the chair. Facing him, she saw that his gaze was fixed on her butt. The sheet covered everything but she suspected he didn’t need much to get his imagination going. “Have I turned you into an ass man?”

He hadn’t belted the robe. She could plainly see the answer to her question. He offered her white fluffy looking house shoes. “I think you know. Put these on. I hear the fireworks can last about thirty minutes.”

“We’re going to freeze to death.” She took the shoes. He’d only brought the one chair. It was a safe assumption that he wanted her to settle on his lap.

“That’s why you’ll share your sheet, and we’ll do like survivalists do.”

She sat with her back to him and leaned into his warmth. “What’s that?”

“Get naked and cuddle.” He peeled the sheet from around her and tucked them into the chair.

He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her closer. His chest was solid but warm. His cock pressed against her back.

Be brave? Be wanton? She inhaled, letting go of the trepidation. This was why she was here. Who she was here
did
matter. It really did, but that shouldn’t stop her. She shifted until his cock arched between her legs. His breathing deepened, but he didn’t speak.

She didn’t want to compare, but she couldn’t help it. Raphael had never been with her like this. His cheating wasn’t her fault, but she could say with honesty that they had intimacy issues well before she caught him with his pants around his ankles. Maybe that had been the underlying problem. They looked good on paper. They liked the same things, held similar beliefs, but would he have come to this hotel to put a little extra spice in their relationship? Would he have taken that kind of leap, for them to be adventurous and naughty?