Chapter Eight
When daylight slipped in through the crack between the drapes, Nate opened his eyes and, of course, found the bed next to him empty. The shower was running.
He glanced at the clock. Only a little after six. With the long days, sunup came a bit after five thirty. Désirée had to get up stupid early to get in there before he awoke. And they were supposed to be on vacation.
Time to put Operation Devious into action.
After their conversation the day before, he’d decided enough with the bullshit. He’d told her about his divorce—something he scarcely allowed himself to think about. He’d bared his psyche to her, more or less, and she was still hiding. After she’d fallen asleep and the scientists had killed the monster, the simplest plan to get her to expose her true self hit him. So obvious, he should have thought of it as soon as they’d arrived. But he’d come up with it now, and he’d act.
He threw back the covers and got up. His morning wood had already grown into a full-on erection even after the sex in the middle of the night. He pushed his pajama bottoms down over it, making himself naked and ready for maneuvers. All he needed was a condom, so he grabbed one out of the side table drawer and went to the bathroom door.
When he opened it, steam hit him in the face, and the gleaming fixtures were surrounded by fog. He let himself in and closed the door quietly behind him. Then he tiptoed toward the glass shower stall.
She was facing away from him, arching her body under the spray. In this make-believe world of swirling mist, she might have been a water nymph. Only she’d be a Botticelli, not a stick figure from a fashion magazine. What an ass and thighs. She probably thought she was overweight.
Water nymphs lured men to their doom, didn’t they? Mythology. She wouldn’t do anything like that, but she’d probably be pretty pissed when she discovered he’d snuck in on her shower. He’d have to make it up to her with an orgasm. Or two. Or three.
He had to stop himself from whistling as he opened the stall door and joined her.
She shrieked and spun around to face him. He must have scared the daylights out of her.
“I didn’t mean to startle you,” he said.
“What are you doing?” Her voice hadn’t gone down a lot in volume.
“Taking a shower with my lover,” he said. “It’s the environmentally conscious thing to do.”
“Get out.”
Okay, he’d expected a negative reaction but not quite this strenuous. “Calm down. It’s not that big a deal.”
“You’re not supposed to see me.”
“I see you all the time. I fuck you all the time.”
“It’s not the same.”
“All right, Désirée.” Good Lord, why was this so hard. “Is that your real name?”
“It is.”
No progress there. “This is ridiculous. We’ve been having sex for days. It’s time I saw you the way you really are under that coat of paint.”
“You don’t want to.”
“Oh, but I do.” He advanced on her by a few steps.
She backed up toward the wall. “You don’t.”
He kept right up with her, setting the condom on a shelf as he went. “I do.”
Could this get any more first grade? She had to have noticed his boner. She had to realize he was looking at her and he did want her.
Finally, she hit the wall and couldn’t back up any farther. With her trapped, he could take her face between his palms and tip it up to study it.
She was the same woman he’d watched in Sufficient Grounds. At the time, he’d realized she had a wicked sexual imagination that turned him on. Now he’d learned she followed that with an incredible response, which made her even hotter than his fantasies about her. To be fair, he hadn’t appreciated her beauty until it had come dolled up in makeup and tight clothes. Now he could enjoy it unembellished by anything but her true nature.
Her eyes were still deep and blue, surrounded by thick black lashes. Her nose still turned up on the end, which gave her an air of mischief. And her lips were full. Tempting like sweet fruit.
“You’re beautiful,” he whispered.
“You don’t mean that.”
“Why wouldn’t I mean it?”
“Come on, Nate,” she said. “Go out and let me get ready on my own.”
“And waste this boner you’ve given me?”
“We can make love when I come out.”
“We’ll do it right now.”
She huffed. “You’re impossible.”
“Haven’t you ever had sex in the shower before?” he asked. “Where’s your adventurous nature?”
“In my makeup case.”
“Nuh-huh.” He lifted her chin and kissed her briefly. “I’ve already seen you as the Good Lord made you. I like what I see. My erection should tell you that.”
She didn’t say anything for a few seconds. Pondering the complete truth of what he’d said, no doubt. As she thought, the shower spray warmed them both, filling the small space with steam. Hot and wet. Exactly how he’d make her if she’d just relax.
Finally, she stepped into his embrace, running her arms around him and up his back. “You are an astonishing hunk of man.”
He held her for a moment, his cock pressed against her belly. “Do tell.”
“Your wife was a fool.”
“Probably.”
“No probably about it.” She slid her hand between their bodies and wrapped her fingers around his shaft.
She had a wicked way with his cock, and she could get him from start to highly aroused in seconds. But he was in no rush this morning. So he eased her away from him. “First I’m going to clean you as no one has ever done before.”
She gave him a nasty smile. “You think I’m dirty.”
“I know it.” He found the tube of shower gel and a ball of nylon netting. Perfect for stimulating the skin. When he squirted some of the gel onto the ball, a scent of flowers surrounded them. It lathered up, and he moved her hair to the side to scrub her shoulders.
She helped by gathering up her hair into her hand and holding it on the top of her head, baring her neck. On their first day here, she’d reacted so strongly to a nibble at the base of her throat, so he repeated the caress. The soap’s perfume penetrated his brain, and he’d likely think of her and this moment when he detected a similar scent in the future.
He continued nibbling, all the way up her neck to her ear. Sure enough, she let out a soft ahhh and wobbled against him. Excited, and he’d hardly started.
He put the nylon net thing back into the soap dish and filled his hand with the gel. Reaching around, he cupped her breasts and tugged gently at the nipples. With a whimper, she leaned against him for support. She made the ultimate toy with pleasure buttons everywhere. He’d have to catalogue them some day—tell her every single spot on her body that turned her on and how best to stimulate them. A nibble here, a tug there, a rub in the ultimate spot between her legs, and she’d give him the sweetest orgasms, complete with a whimpering cry that told him he’d done it right. And then, he could plunge his aching cock into her and make her come again.
But he was getting ahead of himself. He got the nylon netting again, soaped it up, and rubbed it over her ribs and to her belly. Close to her mound now, he could easily slide his fingers between her pussy lips and find her clit. She’d be thinking about that, and he’d let her. He’d do a lot more before he’d give her the orgasm, so she could get good and hot before he’d touched her.
He went back to her rear, this time scrubbing her down to her butt. “You have a glorious ass.”
“Thank you, sir.”
He washed each globe separately. “I wake up in the night snuggled up to it, and my cock gets hard.”
“You could wake me up, too.”
“Like I did last night,” she said.
“Actually, I woke you up.
“Sleepy sex,” he said. “Like in your column.”
Now he knelt so he could wash her legs—again, one at a time. From her butt-cheek all the way over her thigh and calf and then up to her pussy. Again, he didn’t brush against the really interesting parts, but let her anticipate. He repeated the process on her other leg, lingering at her thigh on the way up.
She spread her legs to give him access and reached upward and grasped the shower fixture. Unsteady, was she? He smiled. She still wasn’t getting what she wanted. Not for a little while.
“I think you’re clean now,” he said.
“Are you sure?”
He rose and nipped at her shoulder. “Mmm, clean.”
“You didn’t get to the dirtiest part,” she said.
“The dirtiest part of you is your mind,” he said. “And I don’t want to clean that up.”
She let out a wicked laugh. “I don’t know why you’re being so difficult this morning.”
“I guess I am.” He lathered his fingers and brought them down to her pussy. Close to her clit but not touching it. He worked the gel into a froth and spread it onto her lips. Moaning, she arched backward, seeking contact where she most needed it. By now, her breathing had turned ragged, the sound mixing with the hiss of the shower. She was getting close, and he’d be cruel not to make her come soon.
A wicked thought occurred to him. The showerhead was one of those handheld things currently hanging from a fixture on the wall. It might have some interesting settings other than the simple spray it was sending out.
And yes, when he took it down and fiddled with the dial, he got a hard pulse of water. Just enough to make the little lady crazy.
He guided her back against him, holding her firmly with an arm around her ribs. As he lowered the showerhead, she didn’t seem to catch on immediately, so he spread her legs and placed it where the spray would pound against her pussy.
She gasped. “Oh, God.”
“Just rinsing you off.”
“Oh…oh…wow.” She used one hand to spread her pussy lips and tilted her pelvis toward the spray. So he brought it closer, right next to her clit. Her body did a shimmy, and she’d closed her eyes in concentration. Already, her chest had turned the lovely rose of high arousal—not from the heat of the shower but from the heat he’d generated inside her.
“Don’t tease me,” she whispered.
“Not on your life.”
“This is so fucking good.”
Her arousal became contagious, and he wouldn’t wait long to bury himself inside her and fuck her until they both screamed. Any minute now she’d snap, and once he’d given her a while to recover, they could do another round. Something else creative while the water sluiced over both of them.
“Don’t stop, don’tstop!” she cried, and then her body stiffened as she came. She shouted, and her voice bounced off the tiles. He kept the showerhead where it was to give her the last second of maximum pleasure and didn’t move it until she’d sagged against him, moaning.
Still supporting her, he fumbled until he’d returned the showerhead to its fixture on the wall, and then he simply held her as her breathing returned to normal. Taking his time in having sex with this woman was its own reward. She gave so much of herself when she climaxed. That part of her, at least, was honest. If only he could touch her when they weren’t making love.
Finally, she reached up and stroked the side of his face. “Can I hire you to be in my shower every morning?”
“If the pay is right.”
“I’d make sure it is.”
They were joking, of course. This would all end in a few days. Only what would they do then? He wouldn’t go back to pretending not to know who she was in the coffee shop. But he wasn’t about to change his rule about long-term commitments. He’d thought Mallory was the perfect woman for him, and she’d only brought him heartache.
“Why don’t I start paying you right now?” she said.
“What did you have in mind?”
“Lathering me up worked,” she said. “Let’s see if it does for you.”
She could work him into a lather, all right. She didn’t need soap and a shower for that. But when she squirted shower gel into her hands and started on him, she gave getting washed a whole new meaning. She gazed at him as if were some kind of work of art as she ran her palms over his pecs and then to his ribs. She paused to circle one of his nipples with her tongue while she used her thumb on the other one. He’d never thought those particularly sensitive, but she found new nerve endings somehow, and soon his eyes had drifted half-closed in pleasure. She didn’t go for his cock, making him wait as he’d done to her. Fine with him. He could stay in this shower all day with her if she wanted. Until their skin had wrinkled and the maid wondered why she couldn’t come in to clean up.
Instead, she went around him and started massaging his back. She had tremendous strength in her small fingers, working the muscles and undoing kinks he hadn’t realized he had. This alone was a sensual experience, and his cock throbbed as his excitement grew.
“Your ass is amazing, too,” she said. “I’ll bet women stare at it all day and you don’t even notice.”
“I’m glad you noticed it.” And right now he was really glad she loved it enough to keep massaging the flesh. His sac sat below and between his cheeks, and right now, his balls were tightening as the pressure grew inside him. He’d release all that pent-up energy in orgasm. He only had to figure out the best way to make it good for both of them.
As he’d done, she knelt and rubbed the gel into his legs, even going to far as to run her fingers under the arches of his feet. Who would have thought those could be erogenous? His toes curled with pleasure, and if he’d been a cat, he’d be purring.
“Back’s done,” she said. “Now I’ll finish your front.”
She said the words innocently enough, but they both knew she’d already done his chest and his legs. That only left his pelvis and his rock-hard erection that was already primed to come. How did she do this to him? He always maintained control until he’d given himself permission to climax. Even with Mallory, he remained sane until the last moments. With Désirée, he was a green kid again, ready to spout off the moment she touched him.
Still, he allowed her to fill her palms with more gel, walk around him, and go down on her knees again, this time with her face near his cock.
“The very best part of your body,” she said as she took his shaft between her hands and stroked it. “Some people think the penis is ugly, but I find it fascinating.”
Which brought up the question of exactly how many she’d seen. And how many she’d gotten on bended knee to worship. But with the slick gel feeling like her hot, wet pussy, he’d have to get jealous later. He could hardly start an argument while she was taking him apart with her hands.
“As big as you are, you still seem to swell when I touch you.”
He sucked in a breath. “God, lady…”
She chuckled as her hands kept pumping his shaft and squeezing the tip on the upswing. “Who’s being tortured now?”
He probably had done something like this to her a few moments before—make her crave release and also make her wait. He clenched his teeth and did his best to measure his breathing. Anything to keep from going off this minute and ending the fun.
Now that the shower had rinsed the gel off his cock, she took the tip into her mouth and sucked. In a heartbeat, he went from aroused to out of his fucking mind. He took it for as long as he could until he’d almost lost control.
“Stop,” he shouted. “If I’m not inside you in ten seconds, I’m going to break something.”
She released him and started to rise, so he reached down to help her up. A second or two saved there.
“The condom,” he ordered.
She found it on the shelf, tore open the packet, and unfolded the latex over his cock—much more quickly than his shaking hands could have managed. With that taken care of, he guided her hands up to the shower fixture. “Hold on to that.”
She didn’t question, thank God, but did as he’d ordered. Reaching around to her butt, he hoisted her up. She caught his meaning and wrapped her legs around his pelvis. Finally, he could position the head of his cock at her entrance and drive himself inside.
Shit, he’d probably been rough with her. He’d apologize later because he could not stop. With no gentle first moves, he thrust into her hard and fast, obeying the commands of his body. All the fancy brain areas had blipped out, leaving nothing but the primal urge to possess her.
Maybe this was the cell level. Who could tell? But he’d never fucked like this before—driven as if something were inside him that had to get out. Their bodies slapped against each other as he continued, and she kept her legs tight around him so as to pull him as deep as she possibly could. She gasped and moaned as he thrust—pure pleasure sounds. As deeply moved as he was. As needy. He only had to wring the prize from her. An orgasm as powerful as the one that built inside him.
“Fuck, yes,” she shouted. “Yes, yes.”
He grasped her hips, pushing and pushing. Right down to the root of his cock. He could not get deep enough even though he had no more to give. He’d reached the ultimate—perfect sex. It’d all end in a minute, but that’d be perfect, too.
“Now,” she screamed. Her signal she’d arrived and he should keep giving her everything he had. When her pussy walls clamped down on him, he snapped. Blinded, he continued slamming into her as the climax tightened in his balls and then rushed through him. He roared as the semen streamed out of him, as her spasms milked his cock. For just a second, it felt as if it would never stop, and they’d stay this way forever.
It did end, of course, and he managed to remain standing. Still holding her hips while he pressed his face against the shower wall. Breath returned slowly, and her muscles did the afterglow fluttering thing. More proof he’d satisfied her. Maybe not three orgasms as he’d imagined, but that last one had to count as one and a half.
Eventually, he had to sink to the floor before his legs gave out. He held her as they went down together, and she ended up sitting on his lap while he leaned against the tiles. The shower kept pelting them, but now it felt like angel kisses.
“Oh, my,” she said after a bit.
“No shit.”
Her head beneath his, she tipped up her face to plant a kiss on the underside of his chin. “I have honestly never fucked like that.”
His chest got all warm inside. Pride at his skill as a lover, but maybe more. “You inspire me.”
She nuzzled closer, and he wrapped his arms tighter around her. Wanting to possess her again? With the sex, that made sense, so maybe it was okay with the after-moments. Lord knew he felt right sitting on the floor of a shower stall holding her.
“Good thing the hotel has unlimited hot water,” she said.
“Yeah. A cold shower right now would ruin the mood.”
She stretched out one leg and rubbed at her calf as if it had cramped. Maybe it had. They’d been pretty strenuous. He might discover stiff muscles he hadn’t known he had.
“I might put this encounter in a column, but no one would believe me.”
Column. Were they back to business already? He’d nearly killed himself to take them to the next plateau, and she was talking about her column.
“I wouldn’t call that an encounter exactly,” he said.
She screwed up her face. “You’re right. I’ll have to think up a new term. Maybe Super-Fuck or Mind-Destroyer. What do you think?”
“I think I’ve had enough of water in my eyes.” He got up and turned off the shower and got rid of the condom.
She stared up at him. “Are you pissed?”
He ran his hand over his face. “No, I’m not pissed.”
She rose, too. “But you are. We were having wonderful afterglow, and now you’re upset.”
“It wasn’t afterglow.”
Her face fell. “It wasn’t?”
“Désirée…” He wrapped his arms around her again. “Do you have another name? This one sounds like an actress.”
“Désirée is my real name.” She didn’t say anything else for a few seconds, but she did rest against him. “Friends call me Rae.”
Glory hallelujah. Progress finally. After how many days and how much sex? He’d take it.
“We were afterglowing.” He might have been glowing too much for his own good given that he was not going to get involved with her. “Then you started talking about your work again.”
“It’s what I do, Nate.”
“It’s not what you do with me. Not all the time.” He took her face between his palms and kissed her. “And we’re going to discuss this right now.”