Sculptor: A Steamy Romance (2 page)

She rests the package down on the nearest surface then takes off while I'm still kneeling, wondering again how the hell she found me, and how the hell she expects me to ever let her go.

I glance at the package, the cum on the floor, my materials for my current project laid out, and the mess on my working table.

No doubt, I have bitten off more than I can chew.

What the hell did I just get myself into?

In more ways than one, I’m fucked.

I
try
to keep my cool as I force my legs to keep moving away from the hunk who made me come for the first time from a man's touch.

My knees are shaking as I bumble toward my gray Aston Martin, and I feel like they’ll give out any second now.

I’m in absolute shock—I can't believe what I just did!

I mean, I can, but I'm still shocked I let things get so far.

None of my pageant training prepared me for a moment such as that; my composure is ruined.

But at least
he
isn’t seeing it.

It’s not just the naughty things that have me shaken—it’s the potential consequences.

What if someone found out? What if someone had walked in while we were going at it?

My life could have been ruined!

If my fiancé finds out what happened, who knows what he'll do.

He's extremely rich and powerful, and part of the reason he’s marrying me is so that he can have
virginal
me.

I'm still technically a virgin, although no one's ever licked me before, but even though it's an arranged marriage, I still cheated and I feel terrible.

Still, I’m glad before I marry that old, withered guy I had one experience with a handsome virile man who sets me on fire.

I’ll move on with my commitment, but at least I’ll have that sweet memory.

Oh, who am I kidding?

I'll never get Derek out of my head now.

I take a deep breath, hoping to walk steadier the last few yards to the car my fiancé gave me.

Derek Carter.

That it was my first crush sitting in that studio—a guy I haven’t seen or heard from in over seven years—is another reason my knees can’t stop shaking.

No matter how many clues I gathered to track the artist known as Dagor down, I never expected him to turn out to be the boy I was in love with since I was nine years old.

The minute I saw him, I knew I was doomed.

I recognized his back tattoo as he sat there shirtless, sculpted and inked, bent over his work, and I suddenly realized my crush on him hadn’t really gone anywhere.

My heart started pounding loudly, echoing in my ears, and all sorts of other body parts started pulsing. I felt alive, heated, and in great danger.

I almost felt like I was a kid again, reduced to a primal response, frozen until I steeled myself to complete what I went there to do.

Before I turned his music off and he turned around, part of me was still in denial that it was him, figuring it had to be a coincidence or something—that maybe he and his team got the same tattoo together, and one of
them
had become the sought-after artist instead, but when he turned to me and those familiar green eyes met mine, it’s a wonder I didn’t collapse then.

He had no idea the power he had over me from that moment on—he could have gotten me to do a lot more than I did.

I crushed on Derek as a tween and straight through my early teens, easy to maintain since he was my brother's best friend and around all the time by then.

I haven't seen him since they stopped hanging out.

He and my brother joined the military while I was in junior high, and at some point, I guess they just grew apart.

Probably since my brother dropped out of military training but Derek stayed.

When it became clear they were no longer friends, I was crushed Derek wouldn’t be stopping by anymore, and as the years passed, I thought I'd never see him again.

And now here is, seven years later—the man behind the Dagor sculptures, and looking even more devastatingly handsome than before.

The fire in Derek’s eyes as he seethed in anger then burned with obvious desire made me wet immediately.

My brain almost stopped working—it’s a wonder I was able to keep my physical composure and not let on how much louder my heartbeats had gotten in my ears, how much my pussy tingled with interest, how desperately I wanted him to finally say he felt the same way about me as I felt about him so many years ago.

I knew our age difference was a big problem back then, but we’re both adults now and I wanted him to welcome me properly.

The way he looked at me at first, I thought he remembered me, but it was soon obvious he didn’t.

The shy girl with the frequently frizzy hair, black-framed glasses and heart eyes? Yeah, I guess I look nothing like that girl anymore.

He has no clue who I am and that’s probably a good thing—I was so pathetically in love with him back then.

At least now I can get more real responses from him; he won’t do that condescending sort of exaggerated niceness to a friend’s younger sister.

He’ll interact with me on a genuine level and see me for who I really am, and I’m not that insecure young girl anymore—although my heart aches for him now more than ever.

Thankfully, it’s a bit of a drive from Derek’s secluded studio—I’ll have time to compose myself again before meeting up with my best friend, Celeste, at a shopping center later.

I definitely have to stop home first and clean up.

And put on a new pair of panties.

I try not to think about what use Derek has for the ones I left behind.

I take another deep breath as I settle in behind the wheel then start the car, getting my bearings and sorting out the navigation.

It’s a good thing Derek got distracted so quickly—he didn’t get to press me about how I found him.

I could tell he was about to grill me about it at first, but other matters quickly became more
pressing
.

I smile to myself at my tiny dirty joke.

* * *

T
he first thing
I do when I get to the shopping center is head to the jewelry story I left my engagement ring in to be cleaned.

Harold would be so mad if he knew where I’d left his precious gift.

I don’t know how much it’s worth exactly, but I’m sure he wouldn’t have recommended I drop it off at any old jewelry store to be polished.

Maybe subconsciously I was hoping someone would lose it or run off with it.

Not that that would actually change anything—I’d still be engaged to Harold, and he’d probably just replace it with firm instructions for taking care of it.

In the end, I’d end up paying for it, one way or another.

I slip the sparkling ring on my finger, hating its presence even more despite its obnoxious beauty.

I check the time.

Celeste will be here any minute now, so I seek out a bench near our designated meeting place to wait.

I’m trying to stop my mind from replaying parts of my encounter with Derek when I suddenly hear a buzz—a text has arrived on my burner phone.

It can only be from Derek since I obtained the phone for just this purpose and he’s the only one with the number.

Just testing, goddess,
the text says, the wording all I need to confirm identity.

Yes, please send your rate,
I type back.

It’s the only piece of information missing for the transaction to be official, and I need to send half the deposit now, the other half due upon completion.

The process of actually wiring the funds to him should be easy enough since my husband-to-be once commissioned his work—the piece I fell in love with in Harold’s mansion is the reason I sought out the artist behind it, after all, knowing a sculpture from such an artist would make the perfect gift for my mom.

The wooden anthropomorphic tree reminded me of her somehow, exuding immense passion, enormous stress, yet immense strength.

I’m still staring at Derek’s text when Celeste finally arrives.

"There you are," she says, bright blue eyes shining, short, curly blond hair bouncing with her excited movements, her cheeks flushed.

Somehow, her round cheeks always seem to be flushed.

"Sorry I'm late,” she says.

She’s always late, but I don’t bother pointing that out.

"No prob! It gave me time to pick up my ring from the cleaners. And to think.”

Her brows come together a little, an extra spark coming to her eyes.

I know she’s sensing the weight of my scandal, but I can’t really talk about what happened earlier today just yet. And certainly not all of it.

“Think about what?” she asks casually, but I know that tone.

She knows something major has gone down, and she is practically salivating.

"I'll tell you later. Come on, let's go find that outfit,” I say as I grab her arm and pull her toward the first store.

I feel sort of bad for her.

Her brother's getting married the same month as me and she's a bridesmaid in both of our weddings, but we're currently shopping for a dress for some
other
wedding for an old high school friend of ours.

She says she's not bothered, but it must suck to feel like everyone's getting married at once while you're still single.

Obviously, I didn't have to help her choose a dress, but we take any opportunity to hang out, and I think she actually appreciates my fashion opinions.

"So I'm thinking blue this time since peach and purple are taken for the other weddings,” she says.

"Sounds good to me! Let's see what we find."

* * *

C
eleste hasn’t let
me totally get away with not sharing what happened today, sliding in a probing question every now and then, but I keep shaking my head or finding a way to smoothly change the subject.

I know it’s killing her—being denied something you know is going to be so juicy can’t be fun, but I haven’t gathered my thoughts yet, and with something like this, I have to be very careful.

I know I’m probably overthinking it, but I figure approaching with caution is best.

I mean, what do I say?

That I ran into my old crush earlier and realized I still have feelings for him?

I know it sounds simple, but I don’t want to hear any opinions on that right now when everything is still so fresh.

Plus I have to get my story together—I don’t want to slip about the identity of Dagor.

The two being one and the same is still a secret, and though Celeste has been my best friend since childhood and has proven herself capable of keeping secrets, I still feel protective of Derek and don’t want to be the one to out him.

I smile at whatever she just said as her dress gets rung up, recognizing I was supposed to respond, but not hearing a word she said for the past minute or so.

I feel bad so I’ll just tell her a little.

Thankfully I haven’t let her in on my plan to get my mom a Dagor sculpture for her birthday yet, so I can just leave that part out and tell her I ran into Derek on my way here.

I start steeling myself to open up as we’re leaving the store, but I choke on my words and freeze in my tracks, my eyes locked straight ahead.

I’m aware of Celeste stopping a few paces in front of me once she realizes I stopped, and she’s now staring at me—or so I assume since my eyes are on the man who had his mouth on my pussy just a few hours earlier, a man who licked me till I climaxed on his face.

"Stella?" Celeste asks, her voice sounding sort of far away.

Her eyes move from my face to the object in the path of my focused eyes.

"Goddess," Derek says in a rumbling voice and with a wide, white-teethed grin that soaks my new panties immediately. "Fancy running into you again."

"What are you doing here?" I ask, practically quaking and embarrassed my voice came out so unsteadily.

"It's a mall,” he says, shrugging his sculpted shoulders. “I’m shopping. Grabbing some art supplies.”

I start wondering if he followed me, but his eyes slide to my ring finger and I immediately want the earth to swallow me.

I feel unreasonably guilty about wearing it, and I start fiddling with it as if it’ll help relieve some of the shame.

He probably wouldn’t have missed it even if I’d been holding my hand behind my back—it’s huge and extra sparkly from being cleaned.

I’ve probably been blinding half the people in my path with it.

“What the hell is this?” Derek asks, indicating my finger, his green eyes flashing.

His voice reminds me of the sort of calm that precedes a storm.