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He had something up his sleeve. He knew her better than anybody on the planet, knew that when her competitive fervor kicked in there was no holding it back. She shrugged, trying to seem casually interested. “Depends. What did you have in mind?”

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He lit a cigarette and leaned back in his chair, toying with his lighter. “How about a betting game?”

“A betting game? C’mon, Russ; I don’t exactly have much with me to wager here.”

“It’s a simple game with simple rules. Won’t cost you a thing, but I promise you won’t be bored. Interested?”

She sat forward, tempted by the devilish gleam in his eye. He was so doggoned irresistible. “Okay. What’s the game?”

“A wager. Just a little something to brighten our night.” He inhaled half of his cigarette and let the smoke seep slowly out of his mouth. “I’ll bet I can make you come before you can make me come.”

Iris did a quick double-take. She must have heard him wrong.

“Wanna run that by me again?”

“I’ll betcha I can make you—”

“Come? You mean, as in having an orgasm?”

“Yup.” He winked. “You remember those, don’t you?”

She bit her lip, trying to stifle her laughter. It didn’t work.

“You’re out of your freaking mind, Carr.”

“Now, now, stop and think about it. It’ll definitely help pass the rest of the night. By the time I’m done, you won’t know what day it
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is. I promise. It also helps to warm the body and get the circulation going, and effectively puts an end to your celibacy without messy complications. It’s not a relationship. It’s a contest.” He turned the lighter on high and a long, thin finger of flame shot straight up before her. “And since we’re into truth now, I’ll be honest with you if you’ll be honest with yourself. I want sex, Iris. Hot, wet, hard, dirty sex. I want it right here, right now. I’ve been walking around with a hard-on for nearly two days, and I want—no, need—relief. If I don’t get some soon, I may go wandering around the hillsides in search of sheep. And I do remember your reaction in the bedroom. I think you felt somewhat the same. So? How about it?”

Her blood was already stirring, and the fluttering in her stomach was shifting rapidly to her lower extremities. “I don’t know…”

“Think of it as a truce. A truce with honor. Nobody’s wrong, nobody leads or follows, and everybody’s satisfied.” He took another long draw upon his cigarette. “Or are you afraid? Worried that you won’t be able to compete, huh?”

She ran the tip of her finger along the cool rim of the glass, squirming in her chair, unable to keep still. “I’m not a child, Russ.

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You’re not going to goad me into doing this.” Crazy, absolutely nuts.

Sex on a bet? But Lord, how she wanted to. She could get what she wanted from him and easily win this wager. Slowly sipping her champagne, she let it tickle the inside of her mouth before allowing it to slide down her throat and warm her stomach. “When do we start?”

Russ’ eyes narrowed dangerously as he immediately butted his smoke. Reaching down to his waist, he pulled his thick sweater over his head and threw it aside, baring his chest as if issuing a challenge.

“Right now.”

She set her glass aside, eagerly wiggling her toes beneath the table. “Rules?”

“No pain. Shifting positions to your own advantage is permissible, but no restricting your adversary’s efforts.” He smirked wickedly. “And after you lose—after you climax—I still get to satisfy myself, any way I please. Or vice-versa.”

Grasping the bottom of her tee shirt, she removed it with exaggerated slowness, tossing it on top of his and smiling demurely.

“Then let the games begin.”

She felt a surge of confidence mix with her adrenaline as she watched his eyes zero in on her breasts, bare just above the level of
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the table. The cool air against her skin made her nipples pebble, and the hungry look in his eyes made them ache to be touched.

She already had him halfway there. This was one competition she was going to win.

Leaving her seat, she approached him with a kittenish expression. He immediately slid his chair back and reached for her, but she held up a warning finger. “Let’s at least be civilized about this. I’ll help you out of your pants, and then I’ll let you get into mine.

Reasonable?”

Some muffled, incoherent sound escaped his lips as he stood.

Iris coyly unsnapped his jeans and, with agonizing slowness, lowered his zipper. Kneeling before him, she didn’t bother to try hiding her smile of triumph. The bulge that lurked there would burst his seams in another minute. She slid the pants down his legs, lightly licking her lips, fully aware of the effect of having her mouth so close to his expanding excitement. With the lightest of touches, she peeled his briefs away, her heart skipping as his manhood sprang free.

But she did not touch him. Not yet. Temptation was sweet, and she was enjoying this game.

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His hands were already fisted at his sides, and she could hear the grinding of his teeth. “Lift your feet, partner, so I can get these impediments out of the way.”

He held onto the chair for support, his sore knees slow to cooperate, and she swept his clothes aside before standing. “Now do me.”

His fingers were trembling, she noted, as he struggled with the button, then the zipper of her trousers. The loose pants fell easily away, and she stepped out of them without assistance. “Let me,” she whispered when he reached for her panties. “You’ll have trouble bending.” She hooked her fingers into the narrow sides of her underpants and inched them down her long legs, pausing at her calves and turning her back to him so that he could see her bare buttocks sway enticingly as she bent over to ease the lacy barrier away.

Yes, indeed. She had this sucker sewn up, she assured herself as a moan escaped his lips. She faced him again, folding her arms shyly behind her. Goosebumps began to sprout on her skin as she stared at him. Damn, he was a magnificent specimen. Abs you could bounce a quarter off, chest hair you could burrow into, and follow the
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tapering trail all the way down to the goodies. A tingling sensation spread across her abdomen at the sight of his swollen shaft, and she silently ordered herself to maintain control. “So. Here we are.

What—”

Russell scooped her off her feet without wasting a word, depositing her upon the edge of the dining room table and assuming the chair before her. He quickly captured one breast in his mouth while squeezing and thumbing the other, suckling voraciously as she gasped, taken completely off-guard.

His manipulations sent currents of raw, wanton need through her body, and she tried to think through the haze of desire. ‘No restraining the adversary’ he’d said, so she couldn’t make him stop, didn’t want him to. She clung to his shoulders as he persisted, transferring his attentions to one breast and then the other, and oh, it was so good, so good that it never occurred to her to resist, even as he spread her legs and pushed her back onto the table.

With one stiff, teasing finger he traced a trail along the tract of her heat, kissing her so thoroughly, so violently that she could barely breathe. And try as she might, she could not resist that finger, that maddening finger as it lightly delved between the thin folds of her
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flesh, seeking and finding her clit and lightly caressing it as she nearly lurched off the table.

“You like that,” he growled, nibbling upon her neck as his finger relentlessly circled. “Tell me. Tell me how good it feels.”

“Unfair.” She barely managed the word as her body moved with the delicious skill of his hand. “You used superior physical strength to strike first.”

“All’s fair in love.” He kissed his way down the length of her torso, his scant beard as stimulating as his lips. Urging her thighs even farther apart, his soft lips found her portal as his tongue strummed the sensitive nub.

Her back bowed as she whimpered for more, as she felt his smile. “Now this,” he murmured, “is the Food of the Gods.”

All thoughts of resistance were rapidly fading as her body betrayed her. And when his finger slipped inside of her as he gently sucked her clit, she was sure she was lost. Already she could feel the pressure building within her with each sure stroke, could feel her woman’s muscles grasping at his finger, frantic for relief.

Her arms flailed uselessly about, trying to find the edge of the table, to grab something, to hold on to her sanity. When her hand
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made contact with something cold and wet, she started, as if awakening from a dream. In a last, desperate act of will, she seized the champagne glass and sent it flying off the table.

“Russell! Wait, wait!” she panted as it crashed upon the floor.

“The glass. We’ve broken the glass.”

“Damn the glass,” he muttered, drawing her closer to the edge.

“No, no, wait! We…we’re both running around here without shoes, and I’ve already cut my foot, and if you’d just give me…” She mewed as he continued his finger exercise, nearly forgetting what she meant to say, precariously close to surrender. “Just give me a second to pick up the glass. I think there are only two pieces. Just a second.”

He stopped, breathing heavily as he dropped back into the chair and released her. Iris rolled from the tabletop, landing adroitly upon her feet. Carefully avoiding the broken glass, she scampered under the table and crawled over to his chair, grasping his heated rod firmly in her hand.

His legs stiffened in surprise. “What the—”

Iris laughed demonically as she wrapped her fingers around him. He swelled into her hands, his body shuddering as she slowly began to slide her fingers up and down his shaft.

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“Liar!” His voice sounded strangled, and the top of the table rocked above her from the strength of his grip. “Cheat!”

“All’s fair,” she cried triumphantly as she slipped the dark, quivering head into her mouth.

Russell groaned as if in pain as she possessed him, taking him in fully, her lips sliding tantalizingly from root to throbbing hood, over and over. She imagined what it felt like, to be a man, to have some faceless, unseen woman doing you from under a table, shamelessly sucking the molten desire out of you. The idea aroused her even more, and she stroked the iron length of him with both hands as she swirled her tongue around the bulb of his cock, until his fists pounded against the tabletop in agony.

She had him now. He was hers for the taking—that is, if the excitement of giving him a climax didn’t give her one first…

She could taste his sex in her throat as his hips began to pump, and increased her tempo as he rocked helplessly with her. She knew she’d won now; he was close, so close…

But she had forgotten.

She had forgotten that superior physical strength.

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With one massive heave of his shoulders, he overturned the table so that it landed with a loud thud behind her. And before she knew it, he had swept her up from the floor and held her effortlessly by her waist over him, her legs astride, his expression dark with purpose.

Without wasting a word, he firmly lowered her onto him, sliding easily into her wetness, opening her wide and filling her as she dug her nails into his shoulders.

She inhaled the shock as he drove deep, grinding his pelvis against hers, his gaze locked upon her eyes. Lifting her slightly, he slid out of her, only to penetrate again and again, faster and harder.

His hands held firmly onto her buttocks, controlling each and every movement. There was no escape. And her traitorous body urged him on, arching into him as his mouth again captured her breast, undulating against him with each powerful thrust. She locked her jaw, intent on holding off the climax that threatened to overwhelm her, trying to turn her mind to other things, the weather, the power crisis, the broken glass, and only managed to make it worse. The more she tried to resist, the more intense the sensations became, and
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the longer they built up inside of her, the more desperate she became for relief.

He must have been just as close to the edge, she tried to assure herself, must have been just as ready to give in, to explode with the heat, the madness…if only she could hold on, another moment, another thrust, another second, and another, and oh, God, the rippling pressure was overcoming her and she couldn’t stop, couldn’t stop…

She heard her voice cry out, felt herself shiver into nothingness as her vision went white and she quivered against him, holding on to him for dear life.

Iris drifted slowly back, her body still convulsing around him.

There was a sound, a voice in the distance, she imagined, droning on about nothing, and the room still seemed filled with light. His breath was hot and heavy against her bosom as he held her, still straining for control.

“You lose.” His voice was whiskey-hoarse, his hands trembling upon her hips.

She whispered softly, still trembling, still aroused. “Wanna bet?”

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He gathered her into his arms and held her for a moment, until her heart began to beat normally again. “Russell?”

“Mmmm?”

“Russell…I think the lights are back on.”

He was still hard and heavy inside of her, a thin sheen of perspiration glimmering upon his body. “Frankly, my dear…”

Keeping himself locked within her, he strode quickly to the nearest wall, pinning her firmly against it as he impatiently plunged into her again. “I want you to wrap your legs around me,” he muttered. “I want to feel them, long and strong and silky and urging me to push in deeper and deeper, until you can’t tell where I end and you begin. I want to see that you want me. Fuck the game, the lies, the mistakes. I want you to look at me, to let me see your reactions, to let me have you the way I want you, the way I’ve always wanted you, and to love it. The way I’ve always loved you.”