Naked (15 page)

I glanced at the screen of my laptop and sighed. “If I could get this damn file to upload, I’d be there in a heartbeat.”

“Then we’ll have to get that file uploaded.” A smile slid over his mouth, into his eyes, making him a pirate. Sly and sexy, his hair just a little tousled in such a way it made me think about him rolling around in a bed. Or sinking my fingers deep into it, and pulling.

“Give me a few minutes to try again, okay?”

“Sure.”

He didn’t ask me if it was okay to look around, he just wandered the big room taking a peek at anything and everything. I kept an eye on him while I tweaked the file specs one last time and started another upload. I didn’t have anything in here I didn’t want him to see, no secrets, but I still felt a little strange about him helping himself to the stacks of thick, spiral-bound photo albums in which I kept copies of all my favorite shots.

He pulled one from the pile and took it to the chair by the front windows. The chair he’d been in before. He sat, fingers flipping through the pages. I was probably the only one of us who got tingly.

“Yes! Thank God!” I cried a minute later when the browser window showed the message “upload complete.”

I typed quickly, entering the client’s order information and checking everything one last time. I stabbed the enter key and twirled around in my chair with a loud “woo hoo!”

Alex looked up from the album, but I was already off my chair and doing a little victory dance. He stuck a finger in his place to watch me. I didn’t feel stupid, even though he was laughing.

“Boom boom boom.” I shook my butt, turned and shook it some more. Jumped around a little.

“Let’s go back to my room?”

I stopped, hands on my hips. “I thought you were going to take me for all the chocolate I could eat.”

Alex got up, put the album on the chair and snagged my wrist to pull me close. Right up against him. He wasn’t naked, but might as well have been by the way my body reacted. He anchored my hips. We danced a little, more slowly than I’d done on my own. Less rump shaking, more slow grinding.

“You’re a good dancer,” I said.

“I know.”

I swatted his shoulder, but when I tried to push him away he laughed and kept me pressed tight against him. “You’re supposed to tell me I’m a good dancer, too.”

“Oh, believe me, I was checking out those fine moves.”

“Maybe we can go dancing sometime.” I settled back into
the slow circling, our feet moving half an inch at a time. Sort of like being at the prom without the cheesy music or wrist corsages, and with more full-frontal contact.

“Any good places to dance around here?”

I let my hands drift down to his fine, hard ass, which I squeezed. “Sure. In Harrisburg.”

“Not in Annville.” Alex laughed and bumped his crotch against mine. “What a shocker.”

I squeezed his butt harder. “Hey. I thought you said you were going to like being a small-town boy.”

One of his hands slid up to center between my shoulders. Before I knew it, he’d dipped me so low my locks brushed the floor, but even though it took me completely by surprise, I never once felt he might drop me. Alex kept me there for a moment before pulling me back up into his arms.

“Was I serious about that?”

“I don’t know, Alex. Were you?”

He pursed his lips and gave his head a thoughtful shake. “It sounds like the kind of thing a guy says to impress a beautiful landlord into letting him take a lease on an apartment.”

“And here I thought you weren’t a liar.”

We stopped dancing, stood still. I had my favorite chunk-heeled boots on, so I could look almost right in his eyes. I felt his hands on my waist, his body all along the rest of me. We’d stopped dancing but it still felt as if we were spinning, fast and faster.

“Small-town boy it is, then.”

My tongue dipped into the tiny well in the center of my bottom lip, wetting it. Offering it. His gaze fell there, watching, and his own lips parted. There was nothing small-town about the kiss he slid across my mouth.

My phone rang on the table. Sarah’s ring tone, the dance beat of a popular techno song. Reluctantly, I pulled away to answer it. Alex chased me the whole way, so I was laughing when I took the call.

“What the hell is going on?” Sarah asked.

“Oh…nothing. What’s up?”

“‘Nothing’ sounds like someone’s got a hand in your panties.”

“Umm…” I wriggled away from Alex kissing my collarbone, only to turn and have him nuzzle the back of my neck, instead. “No.”

Sarah gave a derisive snort. “Uh-huh. Tell Alex I said hi. Or, hey, girlfriend.”

“As if.” I’d have given her a harder time but hey, I was distracted.

“Does he go down on you?”

“What?”

“See, I always figured gay dudes could get it up for a woman, but actually eating pussy was something different. I mean, putting your dick in something warm and wet seems like a no-brainer, right? But actually going pearl diving…”

“Is there a point to this conversation?” I managed finally to wriggle away from Alex’s groping hands and teasing tongue, and even got a few steps out of reach.

He grinned, unashamed.

“Aside from my sudden, desperate need to dissect whether or not a dude can do a good job eating pussy if he’s not really that into the chick, or if he can fake it till he feels it, or what? Other than that?”

“Yes, other than your sudden, twisted need to discuss oral sex. Was there a point?”

Alex had gone back to the album by the window, though he looked over at me when I mentioned oral sex. I turned so I didn’t have to see his face.

I checked the progress of my order, had the e-mail to show it had gone through, and started closing all my browser windows. A few more messages had come in to my business e-mail and a few to my personal—but those were Connex notifications, nothing important I needed to look at now. I started shutting down my computer. Alex hadn’t said what time we should leave, but I needed a shower and a change of clothes, and by the way we’d been fooling around earlier, I thought it might take me longer than usual.

“Actually, no.”

Sarah’s answer gave me pause. “No? Are you serious? You called me up to ask me about guys eating pussy?”

That definitely drew his attention. I pantomimed asking him what time we needed to leave. Eleven. I had a couple hours before then, which should’ve been plenty of time…if we didn’t end up making out or fucking.

“Yes,” Sarah said.

I closed the lid of my laptop and sat in the twirly chair to talk to her. “What about it?”

“What do you think about it?”

“I’m a fan, obviously.”

Sarah laughed. “Hell, yes. Who’s not?”

“What’s going on with you?”

“I just…Say I’m taking a survey.”

I didn’t believe a word of it. “Uh-huh.”

“So, what do you think? Can a guy perform adequate and/or exemplary cunnilingus on a woman he’s not attracted to?”

“What the—” I cracked up laughing, certain she had to be
putting me on. “Adequate and exemplary cunnilingus? Are you kidding me?”

“I’m serious, Liv.” She sounded serious.

I rocked in my chair and put my feet up on the desk. “Guys can fuck anything. I’m convinced of it.”

“Not fuck. Eat out. I know they can stick their dicks in any hole and get off.” Sarah sounded a little more sour than she normally did. “But…cunt eating. Dining at the Y. Muff-diving. Gorging on the hairy burrito.”

“Ew,” I muttered. “Gross.”

“Can they? Do you think?”

I shot a cautious look at Alex, who no longer seemed to be listening. He’d moved on to another of my albums and was flipping pages, his expression engrossed and thoughtful.

“Do you mean just gay guys?” I kept my voice low, my back turned.

“No. Straight guys, too.”

“Hmm.” Patrick had never gone down on me. Disgruntled at the memory, I said, “I guess so. Why not? Why couldn’t they?”

“That’s what I thought, too.” Sarah sounded unexpectedly defeated. She paused, then asked in a smaller voice, “Do you think it turns them on?”

“Sarah, sweetie. Is something going on you want to talk to me about?”

She sighed. “I met someone, that’s all.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing.” Her laugh sounded more normal this time. “I mean, nothing. Dude’s a dud.”

“Ah.”

“Well, anyway, I’ll let you go. I just wondered what you
thought about all that. I’ve got some other people to call and ask.”

“Are you for real?”

“Girl, you know it’s true.”

I groaned. “Don’t start quoting Milli Vanilli tunes to me, please…”

Too late. She was already singing. I laughed. Sarah singing early nineties pop songs was always good for a chuckle.

“I’ll be by this week sometime to help with the studio if you want,” she said. “Have fun with Ahhhlex.”

“We’re going to Chocolate Fest.”

“I hate you.”

“You don’t hate me,” I told her. “You love me.”

“And yet, I don’t think I could eat your pussy,” Sarah said, so matter-of-factly she might have been reciting the times tables. “Not even if you paid me.”

“Good Lord, why would I pay you to go down on me?” I had to wipe my eyes from tears of laughter.

“Ding, ding! Survey says…! Because…hell, I don’t know why, either. Goodbye, fool.”

“For a Jewish white girl from the suburbs of Philly, you do a mean impression of Mr. T.”

“Liv, I am blacker than you are,” Sarah said. “Peace out, Girl Scout.”

“Bye.”

I thumbed off the call and turned. Alex, silhouetted in the window, didn’t move. I reached for my camera and took a quick shot. Then he shifted, coming out of the light and into focus.

“Let me guess. Sarah.”

“Yeah. Smile.” I held up the camera and watched him move closer. “Too close!”

I got a picture of his eyeball, blurred, and that was it. I showed him in the view screen. “Ah, there’s one for the fridge.”

“It’s better than the one where I have a bowl cut and a striped turtleneck on.”

“When was that taken?” I teased. “Last year?”

Alex curled his lip. “Ha-ha, second grade. I told my mother it didn’t match my brown corduroy flare-leg pants, but she didn’t listen.”

“Oh, the trauma.”

His gaze shifted for a second before a hard smile split his mouth. “Yeah. I guess if that was the worst of it, I’d be a lucky guy.”

He said the words lightly, but they felt heavy. I put my camera on the table and took his face in my hands. I kissed him. Not hard, not sexy. Just…sweet.

“I’m sure you looked hot even in a pair of cords and a striped turtleneck.”

He raised a brow. “Of course I did. I was the hottest boy in second grade. And third. And fourth—”

I put a finger over his mouth. “I’m sure.”

He smiled and kissed my finger. “That was a long time ago.”

“Yeah?” We were moving again, not quite dancing, but swaying. It seemed we couldn’t touch each other without turning it into something sexy. “How long? How old are you?”

“How old are
you?
”

“I’m twenty-eight.” I had a strange thought. “You’re older than that, right?”

He laughed ruefully. “Christ. Yes. I am.”

“You don’t look it.”

He pulled a face. “Gee, thanks. Thank God I spent all that money on Botox and pancake makeup.”

“You don’t use Botox.” I touched the feathered lines, very faint, at the corners of his eyes. “And I don’t see any makeup.”

His sexy smile sent tingles down to my toes. “Not today.”

It wouldn’t have surprised me to know he wore makeup. Or women’s clothes. My circle of male acquaintances had been so gay-centrically skewed for such a long time I was more shocked by men who knew more about fantasy football than
Fantasy Island.

I could’ve said something then, but again I held back. “Too bad. Guyliner’s hot.”

“Pffft. Guyliner. Is that like a manpurse, or moobs? Bromance?”

We laughed together. I liked the way he held me, not too hard or soft. Not as if he was trying to keep me. More like he knew I had no plans of getting away.

“We should get going,” I murmured into his mouth. “I still need to change.”

“What, out of this exquisite fashion statement?” He looked down at my nightgown and ratty cardigan, my knee-high leather boots.

I let him kiss me a few more times. “C’mon, I’ll be late. That phone call set me back a good twenty minutes.”

“Sounded important,” he said offhandedly.

“She was taking a survey about if I thought men could orally please a woman if they’re not into her.”

He blinked, then laughed. “What? Why?”

I shrugged. “With Sarah, who knows.”

“Yes,” he said after a second. “Absolutely.”

I gave him a look. “You sure about that?”

“Not from personal experience,” Alex said. “But yeah. I’d say definitely. A man can do a lot of things for sex with a lot of people he’s not really into.”

I made another face and pulled away a little. This time, he let me go. When I turned to fuss with my laptop and camera, my phone, Alex stayed quiet. I didn’t want to think about the things a man would do to get off, even at the expense of someone else.

“Olivia.”

I didn’t turn. “Hmm?”

Alex took my shoulder and turned me until my butt bumped my desk. He put a hand between my thighs. Parted them. He didn’t look away from my eyes as he did it, or when he stepped between my legs. Or when he lifted the hem of my nightie an inch on my naked thighs.

I drew in a breath.

He smiled. He looked down, then, to his hands. “I got a hard-on the first time I saw these boots.”

“New Year’s Eve,” I found the voice to say, though it came out weak and hoarse and full of longing.

“No.” He shook his head. “The first time I saw you, you had these boots on. The Chrismukkah party. Patrick’s house.”

I’d worn the boots to that party, but not the next morning when we’d met in the kitchen. I let him push me back against the table. Let him push my nightgown up to my hips. “But why didn’t you—”

“Hmm?” His question hummed over my thigh.

If he’d seen me then, if my boots had turned him on, if he’d wanted me that way, why had he gone outside to get head from Evan? I didn’t want to ask. I didn’t want to know.