Corporate Fire: Corporate Romance Book 1 (9 page)

Royce stepped out, reading aloud something from the label of the medicine bottle he'd found, but stopped walking and talking when he saw her and said, “What's up? I'll get you anything you need.”

He looked perfect in his sincerity. All hint of annoyance from earlier was gone.

She couldn't get her words out. She'd never offered before, though she'd done it a few times when a man had gotten beyond date ten point five with her and asked for it.

“What's wrong?” he asked when she didn't say anything.

Grace cleared her throat and jutted out her chin. “The relationship is off balance.”

What seemed like an obvious statement to her, made him squint and say, “Off balance? What are you talking about?”

She hid her nerves behind her matter of fact tone. “Our physical relationship. You made me feel amazing. I want to give you oral sex and hopefully make you feel amazing as well.”

Royce gaped. She squeezed the bedspread in her hands while she waited for his reply—worried he'd decide she was too nuts to pursue any further.

He set the bottle of pills and a glass of water on the nightstand and swung his leg behind her and out next to her bad one as he sat down on the bed between her and the headboard. When he wrapped his arms around her and pressed his chest against her back, he caused a quiver of delight throughout her body. “Grace,” he whispered in her ear, “we agreed we weren't making love tonight.”

She placed her arms over his and said, “I'm not talking about making love.”

His lips were on her ear, heightening the intimacy between them. “You don't owe me anything, and I would hate to take that from you as some sort of tit for tat.”

“It's more than that.” These things were so fucking hard to explain, especially since he was nuzzling her neck now. “In that moment when I—climaxed, I felt vulnerable and free all at the same time. I need to know that you can let your guard down and be completely uninhibited like I was.”

He continued to kiss her neck down to her shoulder. “What about your leg?”

Her stomach lurched. Was he saying yes? She wanted him to, but all the techniques she'd read about fled her mind. “My leg's not bad. I'm too distracted by what I want to share with you to notice it much.”

He hugged her and moaned. “It's only our second date.” He grazed his fingertips up her arm and hooked one under the strap of her camisole. His other arm held her tighter, and she could feel his cock turgid against the small of her back.

Grace leaned her head against his shoulder. They should have intercourse, but they'd already agreed to save that. “I had no specific rule about--”

“Blow jobs?”

“Right,” was the only word she could get out as her body soaked in the pleasure of his attentions.

“If you do that to me, we're done with your rules. We'll navigate this relationship together.” His finger pulled down the strap of her shirt before he slipped his hand underneath the material and cupped her breast.

Freedom. How strange that she was relieved about losing the control the rules gave her. Navigate together. She wanted that. She wanted to be a couple with Royce—a real couple. Grace placed her hand over the one that held her breast and pressed down. “Is that a yes, then?”

“Yes,” he whispered in her ear before gently biting her lobe. In one swift move, he lifted her shirt over her head and off her arms, tossing it aside. His hands massaged her breasts, making her press against his chest. He kissed her behind her ear and down her neck, pausing to suck gently. One of his hands slid down and underneath her shorts. She caught her breath and tensed her body.

He whispered, “Come for me again, Grace.”

“But then--”

“No. We're not playing even-Steven.” His finger pressed below her hair, gliding easily over her moist folds. She gave a gasp, torn between wanting to come again and wanting to give him pleasure.

He said, “Besides, you have the upper hand in this relationship. I will always be trying to make up for the layoff while you never have to make up for anything. Come for me.”

His finger slid over folds and straight into her. Reflexively she squeezed her legs together.

He was inside her.

Not in the love-making way, but still, they were one. She wanted more.

“Deeper,” she said and arched her back.

He pushed in further until his thumb rubbed at her clit. His other hand toyed with her nipple, making her skin thrill all over. He said, “Let yourself go again.” His thumb circled in her folds. The tension and desire climbed and climbed until he pressed his thumb down in just the right spot. The orgasm rippled through her body with more intensity than the one earlier in the night. She was sure she said something unintelligible, but she didn't care. He kept the pressure up and pushed his finger in even further until she writhed again in even more pleasure.

He said, “I wish my dick was inside you right now. Even to my fingers you feel incredible. You're so sensual.” He pinched her nipple—not too hard—just enough to make her moan.

“I'm not,” she said, panting. Her back was damp with sweat. She hadn't realized how hot he made her. “I've only ever been this way with you.” She caught her breath again as he pushed a second finger inside her.

“If you're trying to make me harder than I've been with any other woman, it's working. I must taste you.” He pulled his fingers out of her and out of her shorts and sucked them clean.

She gave a little gasp, shocked. Everything he did made her feel closer to him.

He moaned when he was done and whispered with his lips on her ear, “Next time I'm eating you out.”

She hadn't intended him to give her all that pleasure. The time was now for her to return some. “Let me lick you.”

He slid off the bed and kissed her while he kicked off his shoes.

Her hands came up and loosened his belt before unbuttoning and unzipping his pants. He pulled the waistband of his fitted boxers over his cock, and Grace tugged them with his pants down to his knees.

She had to take a moment to stare at his engorged cock. She froze for a moment—paralyzed by her desire to please him. Nothing she had read came to mind. He started to say something, but she didn't want to hear it if it was going to be telling her she didn't have to do this.

She'd wing it.

Leaning on her hands, she licked his shaft starting at the base and slowly sliding her tongue up to the tip, swirling her tongue around the top. This seemed right. Snatches of techniques flowed through her mind.

Royce combed his fingers through her hair. That seemed like a good sign. She pulled back and lowered her head so she could flick her tongue on his scrotum right between his balls. He moaned and gripped her head.

Unfortunately, pain shot through her leg right at that moment. She pulled back. “I'm sorry. I need to lean against the headboard.”

He staggered as she scooted back on the bed. “If you're in too much pain--”

No way was she stopping now. “Come here,” she commanded.

He kicked off his pants, underwear and socks and pulled off his t-shirt. “If what you need is me completely under your control, you have me.” He climbed on the bed and straddled her with his knees on the mattress.

She couldn't help but grin at the word “control.” She grabbed his ass with one hand and his shaft with the other, taking his cock into her mouth.

He fell towards the headboard with his hands hitting the wall above her. She swirled her tongue around his tip before pulling him in deeper. He panted, “I'm not going to last very long like this.”

Anxious to bring him all the pleasure he'd given to her, she put her other hand on his ass and pushed him to the back of her mouth.

Spasms of release shook him as semen spurted into her mouth. She placed her hands at the base of his shaft and reveled that they were one again and that she'd succeeded in bringing him to orgasm. She waited till he was done before she pulled her mouth off and swallowed. He collapsed to the side.

“Grace, that was incredible,” he murmured. He placed his hand on her stomach.

Nervous now that the moment had passed, she asked, “Did I do it right?”

“Do it right? I'm beginning to wonder if you're secretly an Internet porn star and having me on about all your reservations.”

Her face burned. “What? No, really. This is so unlike me. I searched the Internet to find out how to do it right because I know the few times I've done it, it was nothing special.”

Royce pulled himself up so that he was with her on the pillow. He kissed her tenderly and said, “I was just teasing you about being an Internet porn star. That was the best blow job I've ever had. Even though you didn't have to, you should feel that you've evened everything out. Honestly, I still owe you.”

She sighed in contentment. “Then could you hand me my pills and water? I don't think I can take this pain anymore.”

11| Panic

Grace relished the cuddle time with Royce. Usually after giving oral sex she had to brush her teeth for five minutes, and though they hadn't had intercourse, he'd been inside her, which meant a bath. But none of those crazy compulsions hit her. To her further surprise he seemed perfectly happy to hold her in his arms under the covers after she'd taken her pain meds. He nuzzled her and whispered how good he felt while Grace tried to push her thoughts through the pain and return the compliments. She must have sounded strained because he said, “Hush. Go to sleep if you can.”

The meds slipped through her body and softened the ache in her leg enough that she relaxed and eventually fell asleep. Her dreams were troubled—a mix of the fall that had broken her leg and Royce disappearing. She'd wake enough to feel assured by his arm across her body and then drift off into the same disconcerting scenes.

The last time she pulled out of a dream to seek Royce’s touch, his arm was gone. She turned her head and sought out his hand with hers, but the pillow and mattress were empty.

Her throat tightened.

She was being silly. She hadn't asked him to spend the night with her—she'd just assumed.

Morning light seeped through the closed curtains. She turned to the clock, and 7:03 glared back at her. Maybe he'd gone skiing and hadn't wanted to wake her. He probably left a note.

She pushed herself up and almost laid back down again. Her leg throbbed more than it had even yesterday. She forced herself to sit back against the headboard and take in the room. She saw no object of his—no watch, no phone, no telling sign that he planned on coming back. Even all the dishes from dinner were gone as if it'd never happened.

The more she tried to talk herself down, the more her breathing quickened.

He wouldn't just leave. Guys don't sit through a medical exam with a girl just to get laid. Well maybe they would, but he didn’t know at the time that he’d get laid.

Inhale. Exhale. Hold.

He'd had multiple opportunities to fuck her, and he hadn't taken them. She'd practically had to beg him to let her go down on him.

Inhale. Exhale. Hold.

Maybe that was his con—make a woman think it was all her idea to offer herself to him.

In one clear moment of thought, she realized she was being crazy. She'd just call him. She grabbed her phone off the nightstand, unlocked it and dropped it to the bed. She had no idea how to contact him. No phone number, no email, no nothing.

Surely he left a note.

She hopped out of bed and crutched all around the room, and even the bathroom, looking for some sign that he'd be back. Nothing.

Her leg hurt like a bitch. Her heart thumped in fear. She made her way back to the bed and pulled her good leg up to her chest. She laid her head on her knee and forgot all of the wonderful things he'd said to her and remembered only the things she'd done wrong.

She'd told him about her childhood and her OCD. She'd called his job crappy. She'd probably been terrible at giving oral sex. He didn't even want to stick around to seduce her further because she was sure the first round had been horrible for him.

A small part of her brain demanded that she give him time to return. Maybe he'd gone out for breakfast and intended on coming back. She focused on that one hope as she'd taught herself to focus on more pressing problems than whatever she was obsessed about.

She slid her good leg down and hopped to the bathroom to do her morning routine, but instead of a bath, she gave herself another washcloth wipe down.

Afterwards, still dressed in her pajamas because she didn't want to sort through her suitcase, she felt refreshed. But her heart fell when she saw that it was after 7:30 and Royce still wasn't there.

She turned back to the bed, and her stomach twisted. For the first time she realized her app books and extra phone were sitting on the corner of the bed. Had he gone through them? Had he tried to unlock her phone? That was none of his damn business.

Her laptop case was still zipped shut, but he'd cleared out the dishes without her waking up. Maybe he'd been in there too.

Her head spun. She flopped down to the bed. More time. She needed to give him more time. He was going to come back.

She found the remote control on the nightstand and turned the TV on. Unable to concentrate for more than a minute at a time, she kept clicking through the channels. Her thoughts were on Royce the whole time, trying to convince herself that she hadn't been wrong to become intimate with him.

She turned to the clock. It was after 8:00. He'd been gone over an hour now with no sign of returning.

Her eyes fell on the Suduko book he'd given to her, the one sign he had been there. She retrieved a pencil from the drawer and started to work it. 8:15. 8:20. 8:30.

Her phone rang. She grabbed it and saw Jill’s name. She slid her finger across to unlock it.

“Jill?” she said in a quivering voice.

“Grace! Thank God. I thought you'd slit your wrists. Are you okay?”

Her spirit crashed with the simple question. How could she have possibly thought a man who fired people for a living was sincere when he said that he was falling in love? “I, I've done something bad. I don't know what to do.” She felt like a little girl having to confess something to her parents. But this was far worse than a B on an exam.