Aiden’s apartment overlooked the ball park.

Surrounded by new condominiums and almost-high-rises, his building was old school with a dodgy elevator that slowly took me to the sixth floor. It wasn’t glamorous or new but it was clean with high ceilings and huge trim along the ceiling. I walked down the somewhat gloomy corridor to 6C and knocked, listening as his footsteps came nearer and nearer. I sucked in a breath and once again asked myself what the fuck I was doing here.

He opened the door and I remembered why I was there. He was so sexy in old jeans and a faded Red Hot Chili Peppers t-shirt. He grabbed for me, his fingers closing around my wrist and dragging me inside.

Aiden’s fingers were buried in my hair, his grip holding me still as he kissed me. It was hungry and wet and I looped my own fingers into his waistband, loving the feel of his heated skin against my own. He moved backwards, ramming me against the wall with his body and trapping me there with his heated bulk while I struggled. Not trying to get away but to get closer, clothes-off-him-buried-deep-inside-me closer.

Suddenly Aiden pulled back, breaking off the kiss. He stared down at me, smiling and shaking his head as if to clear it of the fog of lust enveloping us.

“I didn’t think you’d actually come.”

“Aiden,” I gasped, stuttering in and out with my ragged breaths and I tried to bring him back against me. I could feel the chill of the loss of his body heat and I missed him.

“I like it when you call me Aiden.” He kissed me hard and fast. “Too much. Fuck.”

He clasped my hand, pulling me through his apartment towards two large glass-paned doors leading to a huge open patio. I tugged back at him, urging him to slow down so that I could take a look at where he lived. It was small, one bedroom visible through an open door off the living area. An exposed brick wall with a large flat screen mounted on it and comfortable leather sofas covered in a deep brown angled to create a seating area in the midst of the hardwood floors. The kitchen was marked off by an island, four barstools pulled up for seating.

I liked it. It was warm and lived-in and no-nonsense like the guy standing next to me.

“It’s not much inside but I chose it for the view,” he said, resuming his leading me out through the double doors and outside. The night was balmy, summer heat and humidity enveloping me as soon as I stepped out but I didn’t notice. He was right. The view was fucking awesome.

“Are you kidding me?” I asked, rushing to the edge of the patio to look over a block and a half and right into the ballfield at Nationals Park. The lights were on, casting a harsh white glow on everything around it. We’d need binoculars to see everything on the field in detail but you could hear it all. The announcers, the music, the cheers of the crowd. “This is amazing.”

Aiden eased up behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist pulling me close as he pressed a kiss to my bare shoulder. He laughed when I spied a pair of binoculars, picked them up and pressed them against my eyes. A man was on first and another on third. I smiled at him over my shoulder.

“So, you like my place?” He asked, his voice low and teasing against my skin. “Worth putting up with me to see the view?”

“I’ll keep fucking you until the season is over for this view,” I joked, squirming away when he tickled my sides. I lowered the binoculars, turning to face him. “If you give me a hot dog, I’ll stay the night.”

I stilled, watching him closely to see if I’d taken it too far by inviting myself to stay, He made me comfortable and I forgot that this was weird, not my usual situation and I didn’t know what he really wanted from all of this besides sex. Starting out as a murder suspect was unusual and I didn’t know where to go from here. It was a couple of seconds before he moved, chuckling softly as he pressed a kiss to my temple.

“Well, lucky me.” He released me and moved towards a grill nestled against the opposite wall. Aiden lifted the lid and displayed several hot dogs, their grilled perfection resting on the metal slats. “I promised you food, a game and a beer.”

He dropped the lid and leaned over, pulling an ice-slick bottle from a cooler at his feet. His face was smug, triumphant and I had to laugh out loud. I took the beer he offered and took a sip of the cool liquid before peeking over his shoulder to give a significant look at the hot dogs.

“Feed me, please,” I said, turning back to look at the game. I decided to clear up my confusion. Why function in the dark when I could shed some light on this situation. “So, I have to know. I this a date where we actually talk to each other or is the food and the game just a pretense for fucking?”

I watched him out of the corner of my eye. He had his back to me, working on the grill but he paused for the briefest moment before answering.

“You’re pretty direct, Doc.”

I turned back to the view, needing to get all of this straight before we moved on to the rest of the evening. “You know my life, Detective and I know you don’t approve. Just trying to see where I stand.”

Aiden turned to face, his expression serious. Too serious for a summer night full of sultry promise.

“I don’t get you but it doesn’t mean that I don’t want you. And I like you,” he said, a smile teasing his lips. “And I think you’re the one who said that you like to like the people you fuck.” He shrugged. “So do I.”

Okay, so that was a green light to commence the usual date get-to-know-you chat.

“How long have you lived here?” I asked.

“Since my divorce. A year ago.” Aiden came up beside me, a hot dog on a paper plate with chips. It was smothered in ketchup, mustard and relish. My mouth watered and I took the plate from him. “I figured you’d like it fully loaded.”

“I do,” I said, taking a bite and looking back at the game for a few moments, waiting for him to return to my side to ask him more questions. “Why did you get divorced?”

“She left me for someone else. It wasn’t my idea but I accepted it and moved on.” His voice was even but I could sense the residual of hurt in his words. I took another bite, waiting him out to see if he would continue. He took a sip of his beer and let out a long sigh. “My job has long hours. Erratic hours. She was alone a lot.”

“So, you don’t blame her?”

He huffed out a sound, it wasn’t a laugh but I couldn’t place exactly what it was. “I blame her for not being honest with me. I blame her for cheating on me. I do understand what led her to do it.”

“Understanding is the first step to forgiveness,” I ventured, trying to feel out where he was in all of this. It was partly the psychiatrist but it was also the woman. I didn’t want to keep walking into a situation where I was fighting the ghost of woman he still loved.

He gave me an odd look, one I had no hope of deciphering. “I don’t think forgiveness is in the cards. Cheating, dishonesty.” He shook his head before looking back at the game. “That’s too far for me to forgive or tolerate.”

I didn’t know what to say. I could rattle out all my therapy guidance about forgiveness being the only way to move on but I wasn’t thinking about him as a patient. This was personal.

“I don’t share very well,” he said, lifting the beer to his mouth and taking a long swallow.

“That could make ‘us’ really hard.”

“Yeah. I realize that.”

The silence between us wasn’t awkward but it wasn’t comfortable either. I struggled to find some way to move it on. When he shifted behind me and slipped his arm around my waist, I let the heat simmer between us and melt away the tension.

He rubbed his fingers across my stomach, tiny circles that widened and then contracted smaller with every few cycles. It was enticing and delicious but it wasn’t satisfying. I squirmed against him, leaning over to expose my neck to his kisses as we watched the game unfolding below us on the field.

“So, how did you become a baseball fan?” He asked, leaning around to look at me. “Or are you just a Nats fan?”

I shook my head, smiling at the memories his question brought to mind. “My dad is the world’s biggest baseball fan. The Mets or the Yankees, whatever game he could get tickets to, we went.”

“Is he still alive?”

“My dad? Oh yeah, my folks live in Florida now. The American dream, right?” I traced my fingernail along his palm, following his lifeline along the most sensitive part. He twitched and closed his fingers over mine, raising my hand to his lips. His tender kiss on each fingertip was distracting but I kept going. “Where else could an immigrant cab driver and a school teacher send their daughter to an Ivy-League school and move to Naples when they retire?”

“Yeah? They must be proud of you.”

“What about your parents? Are you from around here?”

He nodded and then we both watched the field as the home team scored a run and the crowd screamed their heads off. I jumped around, shimmying my hips in a victory dance while Aiden laughed and played it cool, taking a long swallow from his beer bottle. When I moved closer, he dragged me to him, this time chest-to-chest as he leaned against the half-wall overlooking the park. I looped my arms around his neck, pressing a soft kiss to his mouth. He tasted of beer and summer and I allowed myself a temporary deepening of the connection with a swipe of my tongue inside before pulling away to look up at him.

“So, local boy or transplant?”

“Local. I grew up in Vienna. My dad still works for the county. My mom sells real estate and spoils my sister’s kids.”

“Uncle Aiden?”

“Yeah, Uncle Aiden. I take them out for tattoos and picking up women.”

“You do not.”

“I’ll never tell.” He stared down at me, his large hands gripping my hips, pulling me up against the hardening bulge in his jeans. I sucked in a breath, leaning into the spike of arousal that shot up my spine and arched my back into Aiden’s searching hands.

I moved in closer, running my hands over his chest, gathering his t-shirt by the hem and tugging it up. He let go of me, lifting his arms and allowing me to remove his shirt. I tossed it to the side and kissed along his collarbone, across his chest.

“You know, Bryce Harper is my favorite Nats player,” I said moving away from him, playfully dodging his grasp as he reached for me. I reached up, sliding one thin strap of my sundress off my shoulder and then the other. “Did you know they have underwear with his number on it?”

He swallowed, watching my progress as I slid the other sundress strap down and off my body.

“They do?”

“They really do,” I said, easing the top of my dress down, exposing my breasts to his gaze and to the air of the night. My nipples hardened and I ran a fingertip over one and then the other, arching into the pleasure radiating from the lazy tug and pinch. Aiden eased off the wall, taking a step towards me but I shook my head and he stopped with a groan of frustration that made me smile. “I bought a pair and I wear them whenever I attend a game. I bought them for luck.”

I hooked the top edge of the dress and pulled it all the way down, letting the it pool on the deck underneath my feet. I stepped out of the circle of fabric, kicking off my flip-flops at the same time. Aiden’s eyes roamed all over my body, his gaze hungry. One of his hands drifted down his torso and rubbed his length through his jeans, tugging and pulling on his hard, long cock.

“Maybe I should be more clear,” I said running my own hand down my belly and into the panties printed on the front with the number thirty-four. I eased my fingers into my slit, unsurprised to find that I was wet. “When I wear these, it means that someone is going to get lucky.”

“Fuck, you’re such a little tease,” Aiden growled as he advanced on me. I backed up, slowly and deliberately until I could ease myself down on a large futon couch, positioned in front of the large bank of windows of his apartment. I looked up at him, rubbing my clit underneath the fabric of my underwear, doing nothing to hide it. He watched my movements, licking his lips as his eyes roamed, his stare hungry.

“A tease doesn’t let you have what’s on offer. You can have it if you want it.”

That’s all it took and he was on top of me, his tongue in my mouth, harsh and brutal. I opened to him, crying out when his fingers joined my own underneath my panties. He pushed inside me, pumping slowly in time with the thrust of his tongue in my mouth. I bucked and the panties ripped and I cried out again, gasping into his kiss when he tugged the shards of fabric off my body.

Aiden pulled back, his expression dark and stormy, ravenous. “We can go inside if you want.”

He glanced over his shoulder and at the surrounding building, windows everywhere and all of them potentially filled with voyeuristic neighbors. A thrill ran through me in a shiver and I shook my head.

“No. Let them watch. I don’t care.”

“Fuck yeah,” he said, diving back down for my mouth but detouring at the last minute for my neck and then further down. His kisses were wet, the trail raising goosebumps on my flesh, my nipples also hard under the touch of his fingers. A pinch, a tug and I was wetter with each pulse of electricity from my breast to my clit.

Aiden slid lower, shoving my legs open, exposing me to his gaze. He ran a finger down my slit, placing it in his mouth for a long sucking, pull before burying his face between my legs and licking up and down my wet, swollen flesh.

I arched up when his teeth grazed my clit but he pushed me back down with a firm palm against my chest. He teased my nipple, squeezed my breast while he sucked and nibbled and devoured my sex. I cried out, my orgasm so close I could taste its metallic glint on my tongue.

“Such a sweet pussy. I could eat you all day and night.” Another long swipe of his tongue along the length of my slit and then he left me wanting and begging again when he pulled away. “Can’t get the taste of you coming off my mind. Give it to me again, baby. Please.”

His ragged begging did me in and when he took my clit in his mouth again I obeyed. Long and wrenching, it was blinding bright behind my eyes and made me cry out until my voice was raw with it. My muscles aching from the tension of it. My cheeks wet from the release of it.

And then there was Aiden. Broad and heavy, draped as a solid blanket across my body as he took my mouth again, stealing my breath and making my head reel with the pleasure of it.

“Sweet. Sweet.” He murmured against my skin as he rained kisses along my jaw and my cheeks. “You sweet, dirty girl. Let me fuck you.”

“Yes.”

What other answer was there? I’d worn my lucky panties.