Chapter 10
Brooke
“I’ve…never…done this…before.” My words come out all chopped up as I pant. Bishop’s fingers are between my legs, which are spread wide.
“That’s not true,” Bishop says with his mouth by my ear. “I’ve gotten you off a few times with my fingers.”
I shake my head, the back of which is pressed into his shoulder. He sits behind me in my bathtub, his erection thick and hard against my back.
Sucking in a huge breath through my nose, I manage to grit out, “I mean…take a bath with a guy before.”
Bishop’s index finger strums my clit, and his other arm is wrapped around me with a huge palm squeezing a breast. His mouth is still by my ear, tickling it with his breath. I’m so close, but he just made me come twice in the bedroom and he’s making me work for this one. Taking his time, fluttering touches that build me up so damn slowly.
“Brooke,” Bishop murmurs, and his voice is so sexy my toes curl. “A bath seemed like the perfect thing to do after you begged me to come on your tits a little bit ago.”
I groan and thrust my pelvis upward. His laugh is wicked in my ear as he keeps giving me his dirty talk and gentle finger. “I was surprised to hear you ask for that. Surprised and delighted. Knowing you’re a dirty girl.”
My head shakes left to right in silent denial, but God…I think he’s right. The words that come out of my mouth are practically foreign to me when Bishop has me all wild and out of control. And I feel like it takes him barely any effort to get me there. Not but fifteen minutes ago, he had me spread-eagled on my bed and was fucking me so deeply and slowly I absolutely fucking lost my mind.
I’d actually begged him to come on me, something I’ve never done before. It was magical watching the transformation on his face go from deep pleasure to harsh need. He moved from slow and deep to hard and fast, and in moments he was pulling out, whipping the condom off, and coming all over my chest.
“Going to let me fuck that mouth at some point?” he asks, voice all low and husky.
“Yes,” I moan without any hesitation. It’s something I’d been thinking about because he has such utter control of me when it comes to sex, for once, or maybe a few times over the next few weeks, I want him at my mercy.
“Going to swallow every bit of me?” he prods, with his words and his finger. His pressure increases on my clit, which is so oversensitized right now the gentle flow of warm bathwater is contributing to my pleasure.
“I will,” I promise him, and that causes a reaction. I can feel his dick jerk against my back and he groans, pressing his lips into my neck.
“Can’t wait for that, baby,” he croons, and starts moving his fingers faster.
Rougher.
I break away and start falling, feeling the orgasm rushing upward to meet me. I try to plant my feet against his ankles for leverage, and when the pleasure erupts and starts to shred me, my hips shoot upward in a demand for more. Bishop sinks his fingers into me; not sure how many, but I feel so full. I can feel myself rippling around them, grabbing them…sucking them in deeper.
“That’s it,” he praises me softly before biting my ear kind of hard.
I like it.
I sag backward onto his body and my head lolls on his shoulder. My hand covers his, keeping him lodged inside of me for a few blissful moments. I feel his lips press against my neck again as he whispers, “I love making you come.”
“This is kind of weird,” I murmur, and Bishop’s arm tightens around me.
We’re spooning.
In my bed.
His voice is heavy and relaxed. “You mean sleeping together?”
“Yeah,” I say as I bring a hand up to stroke the back of his hand, which is splayed across my stomach. “I mean…like we even got semidressed and crawled into bed like adults.”
Bishop chuckles. It felt weird getting into bed naked to go to sleep. I mean, nothing weird about the bath, him getting me off, and then pulling me out to bend me over the sink. But when we dried off and Bishop announced he was staying all night, my first thought was to put on panties and a T-shirt. I’d felt suddenly vulnerable.
He made no comment as he watched me do this, and I was oddly relieved when he slipped on his boxer briefs. God, he looked amazing with all those muscles and just that thin, stretchy fabric covering his goods.
“Is this cool me staying here?” he asked. “It’s not like we need to do it for show.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” I muse out loud. “I mean…if my dad stopped by unexpectedly, that would lend credibility to our story.”
Bishop gives a fake full-body shudder. “Please God, don’t let that happen.”
Laughing, I squeeze his hand, then press it deeper into my belly. His arm tightens around me and I feel oddly secure.
Strange because I was just feeling so vulnerable.
“That was nice of you to talk to Erik’s date tonight,” Bishop says into the darkness. I’ve got my blinds shut tight, as my neighbor’s house sits about twenty feet away, their bedroom directly across from mine. The first week after I’d moved in I got an eyeful of Mr. Crantz walking around naked, and the blinds have been closed ever since.
He feels my shrug, but I add, “She was cool. I’m sure Erik would have liked her had he managed to talk to her.”
The cringe that follows I’m sure he also feels. I didn’t mean for my words to come out so patronizing. Bishop is quiet for a moment and I wait for him to lay into me for judging his teammate, but he merely says, “That’s just Erik. He’s a total playboy and not ready to settle down yet.”
“She told me they had sex in the bathroom of the bar she worked at last night,” I tell him, feeling secure enough to share this with him.
Bishop chuckles. “Yup. And later that night, he left with another woman.”
Before I can process how rotten that is, I blurt out, “You sound almost proud of him.”
“Why? Does that make you jealous?” he says playfully.
“Not in the slightest,” I huff out, and he laughs again, pulling me even deeper into him.
“Don’t worry,” he tells me. “I was a good boy last night.”
“Yeah,” I mumble as I consider the reasons for his good behavior. “It wouldn’t be very helpful for the boys to see you on the prowl when you have a supposed girlfriend you’d been hiding from them.”
Another long moment of silence, and I wait for him to get mad. He brings his hand up and slides his fingers along my jaw. He turns my head so I have to crane over my shoulder to look at him. There’s just the shadowy outline of him, and I have no clue what expression is on his face, but his voice is very gentle.
Very steady.
“There is that…the charade we’re creating, but, Brooke, if I’m fucking you, I’m only fucking you. That’s the way I always roll.”
I’d have expected relief to course through me, but instead a cramp of desire hits me between my legs. It takes everything not to take his hand in mine and push it down my body.
Way down.
I don’t, though, because we’re actually carrying on a conversation, and that’s quite nice too.
“What’s the deal with this merchandising position?” Bishop asks, and that catches me by surprise. He sounds interested in me as a person. “Did you get a raise if you’re working two jobs?”
“No,” I tell him, and then go on to explain. “I’m sort of doing a work-interview with the merchandising director, Sebastian Parr. I’m hoping I impress him enough that he offers me a full-time position and I can leave team services behind. No offense.”
“None taken,” he assures me. “Besides, that’s your background right?”
“Mmmm-hmmmm,” I murmur, feeling the fatigue of the multiple orgasms I had tonight.
Bishop jabs me in the ribs with an index finger, lightly enough it comes off as ticklish. I squirm and let out a laughing yip.
“I need more than that, Brooke,” he chides me as he gathers me back up in his arms and pulls me in tight to his warmth. “College, work history, former boyfriends, funky quirks.”
He wants to know about me?
I mean, I know that was supposedly the theory behind us spending time together, but he actually sounds…interested.
“I’ll start with my career background,” I say as I tuck a hand under my chin. I tell him all about how I got my bachelor’s in fashion merchandising from the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York and had high hopes of becoming a buyer for a major retail store, but instead landed in the magazine world. I found out that it suited me well.
He listens to me patiently as I tell him about my job as the assistant to the editor and that I really did like it a lot, mainly because I had a great boss.
“Will you go back?” he asks.
“Maybe,” I admit into the darkness. “If the position was still available and things weren’t working out here.”
I had not really given this much thought. I’d committed to staying for at least a year to get my dad through the season should he need the support that long. But if he was doing well, and he would be okay without me, my heart is sort of back in New York.
“Did you like living in New York?” he asks.
“Yeah…I liked it a lot too.”
“At least you’ll get to travel there during the season,” I say.
There’s another moment of silence and I wait for his thoughts. I’m starting to realize that Bishop doesn’t make idle conversation.
When his voice comes through in the dark, I’m surprised by the change of subject. “Why did you decide on a one-night stand with me?”
“I’m a modern woman,” I reply, starting to defend my actions. “There’s nothing wrong with casual sex and—”
“No…not why you decided to have a one-night stand,” he says with enough emphasis I realize I missed his meaning. “But why with me? You had other guys hitting on you and more to come, I’m sure.”
“Are you looking at me to stroke your ego?” I tease him.
“When I want you to stroke something, I’ll tell you,” he mutters. “But I think the reason you chose me speaks a lot to the type of woman you are, and I’m curious if my suspicions are right.”
Now that’s interesting and I want to know what those suspicions are. “Because you didn’t presume to know what I wanted. You asked me what you could do to get some conversation rather than just thinking I wanted a drink, or that I wanted attention. Perhaps I was just there for some alone time to have a drink or two to relax after a busy day. You didn’t automatically assume I wanted a one-night stand.”
“No, I didn’t,” he confirms. “But I was hoping.”
That is funny and adorable all at once and I don’t hold back on my laugh. He presses his hand into my belly, as if he’s trying to feel my humor rather than just listen to it.
“You looked like a decent guy, Bishop,” I tell him to further answer his question. I’m no longer laughing, but if he’s as intuitive as I think he is, he can hear the smile in my words. “You looked like you’d treat me well, even if it was for only one night.”
I can feel his smirk somehow. Can actually feel it in the dark in the way his body moves slightly. He confirms I’m right when he points out, “You screamed my name out to the heavens that first night. I totally treated you well.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about,” I mutter.
“Doesn’t matter,” he says dismissively, and then throws me for an absolute loop that has my head spinning. “You think there’s the possibility that we can really just truly enjoy our time with each other over the next few weeks while we perpetrate this scam on your dad and the team?”
“You mean like date for real?” I ask him for clarification, because I think that’s what he’s asking. It feels like a grade school “will you go steady with me” kind of thing.
“Well…not for real,” he begins by explaining, and I’m dropped back down to earth. “I mean, we both know how it will end and that we’re going to break this off without anyone’s feelings getting hurt. But…I’m proposing you and I focus not so much on the pretending aspect but more on the having fun with each other.”
“You mean sex,” I say dryly. Which is fine. I mean…the sex is off-the-charts hot and better than anything I could have ever imagined.
“That’s part of the fun,” he replies just as dryly. “But I’m talking about more. We’ll go out together, and you’ll be traveling with the team, right?”
“That’s the plan,” I tell him. The current director doesn’t like dealing with what he calls “peons” like caterers and hotel staff, so I’m the liaison.
“Good,” he says, and then lays it all out for me. “We have to act like a couple that’s crazy about each other, so let’s have a good time doing it. We already know that we’re perfect for each other in bed and…”
He trails off, as if he doesn’t want to continue his train of thought.
“And?” I prompt.
There’s no moment of silence. No pause while he collects his thoughts. No hesitation. “And you’re really fucking cool, Brooke. I’m thinking this is going to be a fun adventure for both of us.”
“An adventure,” I repeat, testing it out on my lips. Before, it had seemed like a chore or a dreaded job such as cleaning the toilet. But Bishop is proposing we look at the fun side of it, and that’s because, well, I’m not sure, but that’s for another time to discuss. I say it once again, letting the words roll off my tongue without any weight or expectation to them. “An adventure. I like the sound of that.”