Would I lie to you? By Charles and Eddie plays in the background.

The chilled out guitar filters through the iPod jack in the middle of the kitchen table, the gentle drums competing against the banging of the mixing bowl as Dash whisks the cake batter.

“Would I lie to you, baby? Would I lie to you?” he sings along.

Tessa shakes her head at him, which only makes him shake his ass in response. “You’re ridiculous.”

“You’re sexy.”

She sticks her tongue out at him because that’s the only way to avoid blushing at the matter-of-fact way that he says it.

They’ve nearly trashed the kitchen with their attempts to make a cake. Dash had shooed Sersha and Harper out and immediately started pulling bowls and ingredients out of the fridge. Tessa had briefly supervised until he’d tried to smash an egg directly into the cake mix and she’d been forced to step in. Then he’d set up the iPod and started twirling her around, completely distracting her. She tried to put him to work, but it was like wrangling a cat into a basket.

“You’re going to spill it.” Dash tries to lick the spoon, and she quickly covers his mouth. “Don’t you dare.”

Dash gives her a cheeky wink, but instead of licking her hand like she would expect one of her brothers to do, Dash slides the bowl onto the table and takes her hand, spinning her around. He takes her hip, scoops her up and holds her bridal style. Tessa throws her head back and laughs as he shakes his ass with her in his arms.

The song changes and Little Mix’s ‘Love Me Like You’ starts. Dash drops Tessa to the ground and twirls her again, before settling both of his hands on her hips and pressing his chest against hers.

“Having fun?” he asks.

Tessa nods, grinning. It’s warm in his arms, and the first thing she thinks is that she doesn’t ever want to leave, but she knows she has to eventually. For one thing, they’re going to need to make this cake together. For another, they’re in the middle of a kitchen where anyone can walk in at any time. Tommy and Slate had disappeared with Mikayla after their bathroom incident, and Logan and the girls could walk in at any time.

Feeling Dash pressed against her does feel good. She can feel him everywhere, and she can imagine him all over her. Especially after the amount of times they’ve exchanged ideas and plans. With how close they are, Tessa can feel the heavy bulge between his legs.

Holy shit! That thing seriously deserves a fucking postcode, she thinks.

But you got that nasty. And that’s what I want. Tessa realizes that she’s singing out loud, and Dash is watching her lips like he did with the spoon covered in chocolate cake batter. Tessa is hyper aware of his body. The way his hands reflexively clutch at her hips. The way his Adam’s apple bobs when he looks at her. And she feels herself starting to heat all over.

“Hey Tess…” he says, then he swallows and closes his mouth like he’s changed his mind.

“Yeah?” Tessa prompts.

There’s something going on behind his eyes. Something that, on anyone else, she would have called nerves. But that can’t be right because Dash doesn’t get nervous. Dash doesn’t hesitate to flirt, to send pics, to demand that she touch herself and tell him how it feels. He doesn’t hesitate to say what’s on his mind and make sure that she’s enjoying it. So why would he be nervous now? When it’s just the two of them. Two friends making a cake while cheesy pop music plays on the iPod?

He wants to impress you, a voice that sounds suspiciously like Logan’s floats through her mind.

Achievement unlocked, she thinks.

He dips his head down to press against her forehead, and Tessa’s eyes flutter closed. She tilts her head up just a little bit, inviting the kiss she hopes is coming, but Dash seems content to just rest there.

“I’m so glad you’re here,” he says, his voice nearly lost to the music.

“So am I.”

“I never thought I’d really get to meet you,” he continues. It’s as though he hadn’t even heard her, and when she opens her eyes, she can see him staring at her earnestly like he wants her to understand something unsaid. “And you’re… way better than I thought you would be. Like, way better.”

She reaches up to put her hands on his jaw and feels the sharp intake of his breath when his chest moves against hers. “Likewise,” she says.

“It’s… no, that’s not even close to it. You’re just—”

Tessa cuts him off by pressing their lips together.

It’s a sudden, impulsive decision, but at the same time, she feels as though she’s been waiting for this from the moment he’d sent her that picture. It’s the culmination of five months of texting, of several days of flirting, of half a day spent talking and learning each other in the comfort of his home, surrounded by the people he loves the most.

Dash immediately responds to the kiss. He pulls her hips closer and brings his arms up, caressing her ass and up her back so he’s half-hugging her, holding her in his strong arms with his shoulders broad enough to completely envelop her. Tessa has never felt so completely warm and safe in a kiss. It’s as though his arms have created a wall between her and the world, and there’s nothing that can get to her as long as she doesn’t break the kiss.

Not that she would want to. Because while his arms are pulling her closer, his tongue and lips are expertly making her shiver. Dash used to brag that he could make her fall apart—that he could ruin her for all other men—and now that he’s got her in his arms Tessa is starting to understand that his words may not be as exaggerated as she’d thought that they were when he’d first said it.

Tessa pushes herself as close to him as she can get, running her hands over his strong jaw before wrapping her arms around his neck and practically leaping up to wrap her legs around his hips. He holds her easily, not even bothering to try and put her on the table. He doesn’t need to. She grinds down on the bulge in his pants and feels him groan beneath her.

It isn’t until the song changes again, and she can hear their heavy breathing and the smacking of their lips in the silence of the kitchen, that Tessa realizes that she’s making out with her best friend in the middle of his family’s kitchen.

She pulls away—reluctantly—and breathes into his mouth for a moment.

“Can we take this somewhere else?” she asks.

Dash nods. They’re too close, so she can’t see his face, but when she goes to pull away, he holds her right where she is. Instead of putting her down so they can walk, he turns toward the door with her still in his arms, walking out of the kitchen. Tessa presses her forehead to his, desperate to feel the safety she’s come to associate with him when they pass through the living room because she doesn’t want to see whether someone is sitting in there—her boss, Logan, or the girls. That would be mortifying.

He carries her upstairs to a door along a tiny hallway. He doesn’t even fumble with the doorknob, and just as the door is swinging open Tessa’s mind registers just how well-practiced he is at this.

How many women has Dash carried through his house?

Probably a lot.

This is most likely a normal Saturday for him.

Tessa feels a pang of jealousy, then accepts it. She is kissing Dash.

She is finally kissing her dorky D.

She knows that she’s not the first, and she’s not going to be the last. He’s her friend first, and that’s important, but she’d be a fool to think that this is love. To think that he’s going to suddenly change would be completely irrational. But she can enjoy this, at least. She can be his best friend and enjoy his fun, dark, playful side at the same time.

When he finally drops her onto a bed, she takes a moment to look around. She can’t smother her grin—the room is a massive nerd cave. There’s so many different posters on the walls for various fandoms that she can’t even tell what color the wall is. And so many bobble heads and figurines on the shelves that she wonders where he even puts his clothes. The bed she’s on is a huge king with gray sheets that feel soft, but not unnecessarily so. There’s a desk against the wall absolutely covered in books with complicated titles on the spines, and stacked ten high and fifteen deep. She can see at least three different guitars from where she lays—two acoustics and one electric—as well as an amp beside the bedside table.

Tessa realizes that she’s been staring around the room too long. She looks up to see Dash looking down at her, watching her. That hesitant flicker is back in his eyes again. Tessa wants to reach out and draw him in, but she wonders if that’s even what he wants. Maybe he’d brought her up here on a whim, and now that he has her here, he’s not entirely sure if he wants to do what their kiss had clearly been promising.

So she smiles, relaxing her shoulders and body to show him that it’s okay. She sits up on the bed and slowly opens her legs inviting him in.

Something in his posture, changes. He smiles slyly and reaches for her hand, stepping between her legs and dipping down to kiss her again.

“Do you want a drink?” he asks, muttering against her lips.

“It’s… a little early, isn’t it?”

“Time is a construct,” he replies.

Tessa wonders if he needs a little liquid courage. That doesn’t seem like Dash. But she nods, because that’s clearly what he’s expecting, and maybe this is a way to divert attention from the fact that they’re in his bedroom for the first time since he’d sent her that picture five months ago. This moment has been building up between them for a while.

Dash leans over her, and for a second Tessa thinks that he’s pressing her into the bed. But he’s reaching over her head to the shelf on the wall, pulling a bottle of whiskey down.

She raises her eyebrow at him. “Do you have glasses?”

Dash smirks. There’s something, almost well-practiced about it. Tessa isn’t sure if she can put her finger on it, but it doesn’t feel the same as the genuine smirks and smiles she’s gotten used to seeing on his face since they met properly.

“Don’t need them.” He puts a hand on her shoulder and gently presses her onto the bed. “I’ll need to take your shirt off, though.”

It sounds like he’s reciting a script. Like he’s done this a hundred times before, and maybe he has. Maybe this is his signature move. Maybe this is what he does with all the girls that he takes into his bedroom. Tessa chooses not to be disappointed about that. Sure, there’s a tiny part of her that would have liked to be special. But now, in this moment, she just wants to give in to this obsessive, adoration she feels for him.

Tessa allows herself to be pushed onto the bed. Dash rips her shirt over her shoulders, and she lets it go willingly, feeling the cool air raise goosebumps on her skin. Leaning back, Dash stares down at her with his eyes scanning like he’s trying to memorize her, and that touch of uncertainty returns to his face. But when she reaches for his shirt, he shifts back and pushes her hand away.

“No, don’t,” he says slowly, hovering right in her space with an animalistic gleam to his eyes. “I’m not that easy, Tess. I want to play a little, first.”

Tessa wants to disobey, whimper, do something, but she’s almost dumbstruck by the sight of him leering down at her with such a darkness that it makes her freeze. He unscrews the bottle. His eyes never leaving hers, then lets a splash of whiskey trail down her stomach.

Before Tessa can gasp at the cool liquid, he’s following it with his tongue, lapping at her skin and humming. Tessa shivers for an entirely new reason. Her mind supplies her with the texts and the calls that they’ve shared, where he would describe exactly what he would do with her if he had her in front of him. He’d never mentioned whiskey before. But the way he’s making her feel right now like she’s a ball of liquid fire that he can’t wait to dive into, is intoxicating.

“Dash,” she says. His name is the only thing on her mind right now.

He finishes licking up the last of the whiskey and leans up to kiss her, sharing the taste of the burning liquid. When he breaks the kiss, he hums contentedly and leans his head against hers.

“Yes, Tess?”

“Please take your pants off. Like now.”

Not the most risqué thing she’s ever said to him, but it makes his breath hitch, and she sees darkness flash through his eyes again. He pulls away from her infinitesimally. Then his face morphs back into the smirk that makes her think that he’s planned this in a little too much detail.

“Like I said, baby, I’m not easy. Besides, this is more fun. Don’t you think?”

He splashes the whiskey onto her chest, and Tessa hisses at the cold contact. She feels it seeping into her bra, and she wonders why he hasn’t tried to take it off yet. But then she realizes that he’s too busy licking her clean to worry about it. Some of the whiskey pools in her collarbone, and he kisses along the bone when he’s done cleaning her off.

Tessa wraps her legs around his hips, pulling him closer so she can grind against him. She feels him warm and hard. The feeling of that pressure against her pussy and his hot, ragged breath against her skin makes her whine.

“Dash—”

“Tess,” he says sternly, “Good things come to those who wait, baby. And trust me when I say good things.”

I want the good things now.

Tessa groans as he leans over to kiss her again, sharing more of the amber liquid. He pours a little into the hollow of her throat and breaks the kiss briefly to dip down and take the shot.

It is at this moment that Tessa realizes how utterly powerless she is here. Not that he would force her—she doesn’t need to be forced. In this moment, she would do anything, say anything, be anything, if he wanted her to. This is completely new to her. She’s never felt so painfully desperate and so obsessive. And the fact that Dash has gone all dark and erotic, the fact that he’s become this entirely new person when she’s taken her shirt off, only adds the fuel to her burning need.

Dash leans back onto his knees and stares her down, his eyes dark enough to look almost black. Instead of getting scared, it makes Tessa bare her throat in submission.

Dash’s hand scoops her up, and she feels herself turning so that she’s on her front with her back displayed. Before Tessa can do anything, she feels the cool liquid pouring onto the small of her back, and she remains perfectly still while she waits for the delicious warmth of Dash’s tongue to follow it. Sure enough, he slowly licks, leaving a trail of burning need hitting her insides, running the tip of his tongue over the edge of her lace bottoms before biting her hip.

If he can make her throb with need with just his tongue on her back, imagine what he would do to her if he put it in other places…

Tessa wants to turn around, wants to demand that he fucks her all the way into tomorrow. In the past, she’s always been a demanding lover. Mostly because she knew that the men she was with wouldn’t know how to please her. But this time, it’s pretty clear that she doesn’t need to give directions. And even if she did, with Dash in this dark, bossy mood, there’s no guarantee that he would even take the directions she gave him.

She’s completely powerless. And she loves it.

Dash tucks his arm around her waist, pulls her up so that her back is flush against his chest, shifting his legs beneath her so she’s straddling him and she can feel the hard lines of him beneath her pussy. She’s starting to feel even more desperate as she grinds down.

“Don’t,” he hisses

She shudders and stops, forcing herself to keep her throbbing lower half still as Dash drops a few splashes of whiskey down her front, chasing it with his lips, sucking as he goes.

“Dash…”

Four years of college with an English major, and that’s the only word she’s capable of saying. Dash doesn’t seem to mind. In fact, he seems to like it. He runs his hand over her stomach and then down to run his fingertips under the edge of her lace underwear. Tessa leans her head back and feels herself spiral just from the carnal surge of wanting him. Needing him

“Get on your back, Tess.”

She does what he says without hesitating.

Powerless.

He presses her into the mattress and wraps her hair around his wrist. Suddenly, he pulls on her hair before dipping his head down and biting her neck with a deep groan escaping his chest. Tessa wants to run her nails down his back, his arms, anything. But he hasn’t told her to, and it seems without his permission she can’t do anything. It’s like he’s tapped into the part of her brain that controls her limbs, and now she can only move when he asks her to.

She knew that sex with Dash would be something special, but she hadn’t thought that it would consume her so completely.

Dash licks at the edge of her panties, and she shivers. She thinks that she might be pushed over the edge by the warmth of his tongue alone. Then he looks up at her with heavy-lidded eyes, and Tessa can’t speak.

“You smell like you want to be fucked. I think we’re about ready.”

Ready for what? She wants to ask. Instead, she just nods and hopes to every deity she can think of that it involves him taking his pants off.

Before Dash can speak again, someone knocks on the door and the pair of them pause. They don’t freeze because they’re not teenagers, fucking while their parents are in the house, but because it feels like a bucket of ice water has been splashed over them bringing each of them back to reality.

“We’re fucking busy,” Dash roars over his shoulder.

Tessa snorts, and he grins down at her. In that moment, the dark dominant side she’d gotten from him is gone, and he’s back to being her Dash again. They’re sharing a joke like they always do. The fact that she’s sticky with whiskey and shirtless in his bed doesn’t change that.

Tommy’s voice comes through the door. “Yeah. Are you guys gonna finish this cake or can I eat the batter?”

Dash frowns and looks over at the door, pulling away briefly from Tessa. “Dude, are you high?”

“Maybe…”

Dash sighs. Then he looks down at Tessa. “I really want to punch him right now,” he says.

Tessa sighs too. Her body had been heating up, and she thinks that in a few more seconds she would have been beyond the point of no return. It would have been harder to stop if he had finally gotten his shirt off too. Dash’s actions have gotten her all hot and bothered, and it’s annoying that they’ve been interrupted right before the good part. But as it is, if they’re going to stop, now’s the time.

“Tommy, we are baking the cake,” Tessa says.

“Okay, but, like… when will the cake be baked?”

Dash wipes a hand over his face and turns to open the door, giving Tessa a few moments to put her shirt on. He screws the lid back onto the whiskey. Then he opens the door and says, “Hold on, we’re coming.”

“I wish,” Tessa mutters under her breath as she follows him out of the bedroom.

Tessa wakes up curled up in the blankets and beanbags in the game room, with Sersha on one side of her, Mikayla on the other, and Harper hanging off of the edge of the couch behind them. Tessa turns her head a little so that she can see the television. It’s stuck on the menu screen for Dirty Dancing. Tessa vaguely remembers watching up until the scene where Baby got the money from her father. She must have fallen asleep after that.

Beside her, Mikayla snuffles a little. She looks adorable in her blue pajamas, so different from her usual attire, and her hair up in a loose bun.

Tessa had been surprised when the three other women had piled into the games room downstairs and dragged her into their cuddle pile as well.

“We’ve got popcorn and a movie,” Harper had said, patting the spot next to her, and snuggling up next to Mikayla. “The boys are doing music stuff, I think?”

“Shouldn’t you be helping?” Tessa had asked Sersha.

Sersha shrugs. “It’s movie night. Tommy can manage without me.”

So they fell together, first watching Flashdance, then switching to Fame and Dirty Dancing. The women had fallen asleep one by one. Mikayla had started snoring sometime during Fame, while Sersha and Harper had lasted through the first half an hour of Dirty Dancing.

Tessa was glad to have some company on her first night in the brownstone, even if it hadn’t been the company she would have preferred. Tessa’s still frustrated from earlier.

Speaking of… she glances at her phone, pulling it out of the pocket of her pajama pants.

 

D: i was gunna join u but u seemd 2 cozy

 

Tessa purses her lips and types.

 

Tessa: Wish you had. You look like you like a good spooner.

D: ur not wrong there ;)

Tessa: How long do you think it would have taken you to get bored with Fame?

D: excuse u thats our jam

D: wish we hadnt been intrupted earlier

 

Tessa feels her breath stutter in her chest as she reads his words.

 

Tessa: Yeah, me too.

D: u want to no what i would have done if we hadnt been intruptd

Tessa: Not while I’m surrounded by the girls, I don’t.

D: u sayin u cant control urself

Tessa: I know exactly how quickly this can turn in your favor, Dash. I’m not about to let you seduce me in a room full of girls I’ve just met.

D: get up and go to the bathroom

 

Tessa blinks at the screen, reading the instructions again. It seems like less of an instruction and more like an order, but she finds herself following it regardless. She removes herself from the blankets, making sure not to wake either of the girls beside her. She has a pretty good idea of what Dash has up his sleeve, and she doesn’t know how she could explain what she’s going to do if any of the others wakes up.

There’s a small bathroom on the opposite side of the room. It looks like it was put in by someone who was only about thirty percent sure of what they were doing. Probably shoved in as an afterthought because the guys didn’t like going upstairs to pee in-between their gaming marathons.

There’s a mirror, a sink, and a toilet in the corner.

“Okay,” she mutters while closing and locking the door behind herself.

She takes a moment to look at her mess of bedhead and types quickly into her phone.

 

Tessa: Okay, I’m in the bathroom.

D: Strip down

 

Tessa does as he says, stripping off her pajamas.

 

D: take a picture and show me

 

Tessa raises her phone so it’s angled up to the mirror, taking a picture of her whole body, and sending it to him before she can change her mind. A small voice in her head tells her that he could be sharing this with the other boys, but she dismisses it.

It takes a moment for his reply to come.

 

D: gorgeous

D: now make a video of running ur hand over ur body

 

She does it. She does everything he tells her, following order after order as he describes what she must do. Tessa can feel herself getting hotter and hotter as she reads his texts, enjoying the sense of danger she feels when she thinks of the girls in the other room.

 

D: if we hadnt been intrupted today i would have licked u all over

D: imagine that ur hand is my tongue

Tessa: Fuck, Dash…

D: Can you feel me tasting you all over?

 

Tessa doesn’t even realize that he’s asking a question, at first. Her breath is coming in shorter and shorter gasps. Tessa quickly types back.

 

Tessa: Yessss.

D: i no how to take care of u baby

D: use ur thum on ur clit and dip a finger in

 

Tessa is starting to feel herself getting close.

All of a sudden she receives a photo of Dash’s long, thick cock, fully erect and leaking. She recognizes his hand clutched around it, and he’s clearly moving it from the slight blur.

Before she can enjoy the sight of it, she gets another message.

 

D: take a video of u coming

D: i want to see u fall apart tess

 

Tessa can’t help the shuddering groan that escapes her lips when she finally feels herself clench around her fingers. After a couple of seconds poised in the flood of pleasure, she leans back against the door, gasping, and sends the video.

There’s a few minutes before he replies.

He’s probably watched it once or twice.

Finally, she receives another text.

 

D: Fuckkkkkk

D: I want to see you taste urself baby

 

She can’t cover up the groan, but she can muffle it so that the other girls in the games room don’t hear her.

Finally, when she’s done licking her finger, she stops recording before sliding down the door, so she’s sitting naked on the tile floor. She sends the video. By the time she gets a reply, she’s finally starting to get her breathing under control. There’s a picture of Dash’s cock, still pink and half-hard, clearly having just climaxed himself if the mess on his thigh is anything to go by.

 

D: next time i get the chance im gonna make u fkn scream

 

Tessa feels a giddy smile curling over her lips. Dash had gotten a bit dominant in a couple of their sessions before, but this is the first time that she can imagine his face while she’s touching herself. It feels good. It had made her channel her own pleasure a little easier, and it was sexy as hell to imagine the way his lips might have moved to give her those orders. The sound of his voice had been playing in her mind while she’d been working over her body.

 

Tessa: I can’t wait :*

D: :* goodnight gorgeous

Tessa: Night, D.

 

But it takes a few more minutes before Tessa’s legs work well enough for her to get up and put her clothes back on.