Spiral of Bliss 01 Arouse (11 page)

“I’m not frigid or anything,” I added quickly. “I mean, I have a collection of erotica and I… I touch myself… oh, God.”

My face flared with embarrassment.
What the hell am I doing?
I pressed my hands to my cheeks and closed my eyes.

Dean moved close enough that I could smell his delicious mixture of soap and autumn air, and then he closed his hands around my wrists and pulled them away from my face.

I forced my eyes open, my throat aching. Tension still lined his features, as if he knew there was more, but warmth and affection filled his expression. That alone eased some of my rampant fear.

“Olivia.” He skimmed his fingers across my hot cheek. “I want you. I won’t hide that. I can’t. But that’s not the only reason I asked you out.”

“Why did you, then?”

“Because you… you’re different.” He rubbed a lock of my hair between his thumb and forefinger. “I’ve spent most of my life trying too damn hard to prove myself to other people. To surpass their expectations. Or trying to fix things when I failed. But that only meant driving myself harder to succeed.”

Something inside me loosened at his confession. I knew all about presenting a very specific version of yourself to others. No matter how heart-wrenchingly difficult it was.

“I don’t feel like I have to try so hard with you,” Dean said.

“So you’re saying I’m easy?” I lifted an eyebrow skeptically.

A smile tugged at his mouth. “I mean you’re easy to be with. I need to prove myself to you, but in a good way. Because I want to, not because I have to.”

He suddenly looked embarrassed and let go of me. He paced to the windows, his hands shoved into his pockets.

“I don’t think turtles have very interesting lives.”

North’s voice, wry and gravelly, echoed at the back of my mind. Some of my anxiety eased.

Dean was no reclusive turtle. That much was certain. He had an innate self-assurance, a way of moving through the world that I wished I could cultivate. And he was sexually confident, even I could see that, experienced in how to please a woman. He would know exactly what to do.

The question was—did I want him to do it to me?

The answer was—

I gazed at the expanse of Dean’s back, the way he stood with his feet apart, as if he were rooted to the ground. Solid. Secure.

“What about those string figures, professor?” I asked.

“What about them?”

“You said you’d show me how to do them.” I paused. “I’ll bet you carry a piece of string around, don’t you?”

He turned to face me, his eyes sparking with amusement. He dug into the pocket of his jeans and produced a loop of string. With a few maneuvers, he hooked it around his fingers into a familiar pattern and approached me.

“Do you know cat’s cradle?” he asked.

“Believe it or not, I do.” I pinched the X-shaped pattern, pulled it around to the middle, and fastened the string around my fingers.

Dean took the string from the top, looped it to form another pattern, then held out his hands and let me make the next move.

CHAPTER EIGHT

ean came into Jitter Beans often over the next couple of weeks. Every time I saw him, my pulse sped up and bright, happy sparks flew through me. We had dinner, met between classes for lunch or coffee, took walks in the Arboretum.

He didn’t kiss me again in those early days, though he touched me often. Gentle touches—pushing a lock of hair away from my cheek, holding my hand, cupping the back of my neck. The brush of his fingers filled me with a pleasant heat.

The more time I spent with Dean, the more I liked and trusted him. And it wasn’t long before he proved that he was meant to be my hero alone.

“Bears,” he said one afternoon as we walked up State Street after my shift at Jitter Beans.

“No way.” I poked him in the side. “Definitely the Packers. I’d be a terrible Wisconsinite if I weren’t a Packer Backer.”

He scoffed. “Then you must love dancing the polka.”

“Why would I love dancing the polka?”

“It’s the Wisconsin state dance. Since you’re such a loyal Wisconsinite and all.”

I poked him in the side again, harder this time, which made him laugh and reach out to tweak my nose. I decided not to be annoyed since it was so darned cute the way his eyes crinkled at the corners when he laughed.

“How do you even know the Wisconsin state dance if you’re from California?” I asked. “Oh, I forgot. You’re kind of a geek.”

He flashed me a smile. “Got a problem with that?”

“I have a problem with the fact that you prefer the Bears,” I said. “
Star Wars
or
Star Trek
?”

“Trek.”

“We are so incompatible,” I moaned. “Star
Wars
.”

“Lucas jumped the shark with
Episode One
,” Dean said. “
Star Trek
has always had a universal message about justice and a utopian society.”

“
Star Wars
is about the battle between good and evil. What’s more universal than that?”

“
Star Trek
had alien babes in bikinis.”

“You don’t remember Princess Leia’s bikini?”

“Oh, yeah.” He got a glazed, faraway look in his eyes. “Good point.”

“I rest my case. Ben and Jerry’s or Häagen-Dazs?”

“Both.”

“Me too. Except for Chunky Monkey, which is gross.”

“Ah.” Dean gave a sigh of relief. “We have common ground. Tolstoy or Dostoevsky?”

I rolled my eyes. “Whatever, professor.”

Dean winked at me. I smiled back, enjoying the lovely heart flutters spreading warmth through my veins.

He opened the passenger side door for me, then went around to get behind the wheel of his car.

“How was work?” he asked as he headed toward Dayton Street.

I told him about an espresso maker mishap and a couple of irrelevant stories about the customers. We took the elevator to my apartment, which he hadn’t been in since the night of my confession two weeks ago.

“Nice place, by the way,” he remarked as we went inside. “I didn’t notice before. How long have you lived here?”

“Since July.” The rent on the shoebox-sized apartment was more than I could comfortably pay, but it was close to downtown, the university, and Jitter Beans. I’d spent a lot of time at garage and rummage sales looking for inexpensive furnishings, and I was pleased with the way my decorating had turned out.

I’d found some mismatched round tables that I refinished a light honey color and placed alongside my curved sofa. Floating shelves held my books, prints of English gardens lined the walls, and I’d placed lamps strategically to light the corners. Sheer, sage-green curtains softened the utilitarian blinds, and my indoor garden of fifteen plants sat on a multi-tiered stand beneath the window.

Dean touched one of the plants. “You really have a green thumb. What kind are these?”

“Mostly flowers, but there’s a spider ivy on the bottom tier,” I said. “Geraniums, begonias, pentas. I bought a yellow amaryllis last week. I haven’t named it yet.”

“Named it?”

Embarrassment heated my cheeks. “I name all my plants. Svengali, Mrs. Danvers, Cruella de Vil, the White Witch.”

He turned to look at me. “You name your plants after villains?”

“Just a silly thing. A way of turning something bad into something good.” I went toward the kitchen. “Can I get you a soda?”

“Just water, thanks.”

I poured him a glass and returned to the living room. He’d wandered over to examine the books on the shelves. I flushed at the thought that I had some spicy erotica titles tucked in among the textbooks. If he saw them, however, he gave no indication. Or he didn’t mind.

Instead he picked up the small, framed picture of North that I kept on the lower shelf. Nervousness rolled through me suddenly. I’d never talked about North with anyone, not because I didn’t want to but because I’d never had anyone to talk about him
with
.

I’d taken the picture outside North’s workshop and made a bunch of silly faces until he’d finally smiled. His grin showed through his bushy beard, the little braid tied with a red ribbon visible on the right side, and his leathery features squinted against the sun. His long, graying hair was pulled back into a ponytail.

“Your dad?” Dean asked.

“No.” I put the glass on the coffee table and wiped my hands on my skirt. “Just a good friend. Not that kind of friend,” I added when he glanced at me with a hint of a scowl. “The kind of friend who helps you remember which way is up. And who reminds you that sometimes that’s the only direction you can go.”

Dean looked at me, still holding the photo. “You’re lucky to have a friend like that.”

“North was… special.”

“North?”

“Short for Northern Star Richmond.”

“Seriously?”

I smiled. “His parents were hippies.”

Dean put the photo back on the shelf. “So you used to live in California?”

“I traveled there a few times with my mother, then I went back before I started at community college. Lived on a commune.”

“A commune?”

“They’re called other things now. Intentional communities. Cooperative living. But, yeah, it was near Santa Cruz. Twelve Oaks. My mother and I lived there when I was thirteen, then I went back by myself a few years later. I thought I’d just visit for a week or so, but I stayed for a year. North was the guy who ran the place.”

I realized I was opening the door to questions I didn’t want to answer. I gestured to the sofa. “So make yourself at home. I’m just going to take a quick shower and change.”

“Take your time.”

He settled on the sofa and picked up a coffee-table book about the history of literature. I went into my bedroom and closed the door. As I stripped out of my clothes, my heart pounded harder. I was acutely aware that a thin wall separated me from Dean.

Was he remembering that night in his apartment? Was he thinking about kissing me again? Was he thinking about me undressing?

My blood warmed at the speculation. I pushed my underwear off and stood there naked for a moment, staring at my reflection in the mirror on the opposite wall. I didn’t often look at myself naked. My legs were short but well shaped, and I had a curvy, full-breasted body that I was still, at twenty-four, trying to feel comfortable in.

I slid my hands down my waist, which tapered to round hips and my not-quite-flat belly. I tried to imagine Dean’s hands on me, his long fingers sliding across my hipbones and down between my legs.

I shivered and turned away from the mirror. My cheeks warmed. I pulled on a thick robe and ducked into the bathroom. After turning on the shower, I stood under the hot spray and wondered what it would feel like to breach the distance between my imagination and reality.

My very vivid imagination. My very mundane reality.

I wanted to live in the space where the two met. I imagined it as a place of sunlight and green trees where a man and I wanted each other with crackling desire and our bodies fell into pleasure.

I closed my eyes and let the water stream over my face. What if Dean was thinking about me in the shower? What if he was imagining what I looked like naked and wet? I trembled at the thought, almost feeling the heat of his gaze.

A bolt of arousal went through me. I grabbed the soap and lathered up, drawing in a sharp breath when my palms glided over my hard nipples. Pleasure zinged along my nerves. He was
there
. Sitting so close…

I rubbed soapy froth over my belly. The bubbles slipped from my skin. Hot water pounded on my neck and shoulders. I grasped the shower bar and rubbed the soap between my legs, unable to resist pressing a finger into my cleft. A shudder rocked me.
Oh…

Was Dean imagining this right now? Was he thinking about me rubbing soap over my body? Was he picturing me playing with myself, sliding my forefinger over the folds of my sex, pressing my hand against my clit?

I could
see
him standing there, all hot and aroused while he watched me. I could see the burn in his eyes, the flush of his cheekbones, the heaviness of his cock against his trousers.

I pressed one hand to the tiled wall and lowered my head against the spray. I worked my fingers faster, harder, my blood swelling with urgency. His fingers would be adept, expert, his touch precise.

He would know when to slide a finger into me, when to roll his thumb around my clit. He would suck my nipples at the same time, intensifying my arousal, his breath hot.

Oh, I wanted it, wanted to know what it was like, wanted his hands and mouth on me. I saw him clutching my hips, lifting me, pushing his cock between my legs, his eyes filled with desire. I saw myself, pink-flushed and panting, writhing against him, water beading on my breasts, my hair plastered in wet tendrils to my skin.

I imagined what it would feel like, him filling me with one deep thrust as I gripped his shoulders and begged for more. My nerves flared with sparks. I would tighten my inner flesh around his thick shaft, feel his groan rumble against my neck as he pushed inside me again and again, driving us both to the edge of bliss.

He’d talk dirty too, his voice rough in my ear, his fingers digging into my hips.
“Open your pussy for me, Liv… I want to fuck you deep… so deep you’ll still feel it tomorrow… make you come until you scream… ah, you’re tight… so damn good…”

He would thrust slowly at first, then harder, an intense, thorough fucking that would shake my body and wrench his name from my throat as I arched my hips and creamed all over his cock…

A gasp escaped me as I came, clenching my thighs around my rapid fingers, vibrations rolling through me. I shuddered and inhaled a gulp of hot, steam-laced air as the sensations peaked and ebbed. Breathing hard, I absorbed the final quivers as the water began to cool.

I turned the faucet off and stepped out, pressing a towel against my face as my heartbeat slowed. I had no idea how long I’d been in the shower, but likely it was far too long for a “quick shower.” I dried off, shrugged into my robe, and darted back into the bedroom.

Soon
, I silently promised myself as I dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt. Soon I would close the distance between us again. I knew it would be so much better than anything I could imagine.