Tara

When I woke up, he wasn’t in bed with me. I blinked at the window along the wall, showing the sun rising just over the horizon through dirty, cracked glass. My internal clock never failed to wake me up at goddamn dawn even on a Saturday.

And now I had to do the walk of shame home in a tight tank top, tiny skirt and my boots. Ugh. Hadn’t thought about that last night as I’d been laser-focused on getting into the pants of the dark-eyed man. Lance.

It took me a moment to recognize a rhythmic scraping sound coming from somewhere in the room. I flopped onto my back, then propped myself up on my elbows.

Lance sat with his back to me at his long workbench, wearing only his jeans. The sheet previously covering his tools sat in a heap in the corner. His arms were moving—forward, back, forward, back. After a moment, I realized the sound was sandpaper. He was sanding something by hand. Smoke wafted above his head, and I caught the scent of a burning cigarette. Cigarette, coffee, and sawdust. That was the smell of Lance.

I wasn’t quite sure where my clothes were, but his boots had been plunked near the end of the bed. I wasn’t about to walk around here barefoot, so I scooted to the end of the bed and slipped my feet into the large, worn boots. I wrapped the sheet around my body before I clunked across the platform, not bothering to hide that I was awake. He didn’t look up, not until I came to stand beside him.

His cigarette dangled from his mouth, needing to be ashed, and a mug of black coffee sat beside him as he sanded what looked to be a wooden table leg. All around him were bits of furniture, as well as a circular saw, a router, and various other tools. Hardware was organized in little plastic drawers, and a memory crept into my head like fog—my brother’s room, his LEGOs sorted by color and shape in a plastic organizer. That time I accidentally tipped it over, and he didn’t get mad, only tightened his jaw and spent hours fixing what I screwed up. Funny how the roles were reversed later.

Lance glanced at me, his gaze dipping down to where I clutched his sheet at my chest, then down to my bare legs and his boots. His gaze held there for a minute before he focused back on his sanding job. The cigarette in his mouth twitched, dropping ash on his jeans, which he ignored. “There’s coffee. Don’t got fancy creamer and shit, but there’s milk in the fridge.”

I didn’t take milk in my coffee, but I pretended I did just to see what was in his refrigerator. Because I was a nosy bitch. Too bad there wasn’t anything exciting. A styrofoam egg carton, some Chinese takeout containers, and a few energy drinks.

With one hand clutching the sheet to my chest—I still hadn’t located my damn clothes—I poured my coffee into a mug that looked like it was an ancient artifact. The rim was chipped and there was a crack on the handle that had been glued. The side read CHAMP in faded block letters.

I clomped back over to him, not really caring how ridiculous I looked or sounded in his boots. I really should find my clothes and get the walk of shame over with, but I wasn’t going to pass up coffee, and Lance didn’t seem in a hurry to kick me out. I couldn’t ignore the fact that I was curious about him. What kind of man lived on the outskirts of town all alone in a rundown warehouse making furniture? The muscles in his shoulders rippled as he sanded the chair leg, and sue me, but it was damn hard to look away.

He didn’t have a hat on now, and I could see he was in desperate need of a haircut. The front strands of his dark hair hung in his eyes and he blinked them away with a scowl.

I leaned against the table, mug in hand. He cut his eyes to me, and his gaze stopped on the mug. I didn’t miss his short inhale. I looked at the mug again, wondering if I missed something. “It okay if I use this one?”

“Yup.” He took a sip out of his own mug and grimaced.

I pressed the backs of my fingers to his mug. Cool to the touch. I picked it up, dumped out the cold contents and refilled it. When I returned to place his newly hot mug of coffee next to him, he was glaring at me.

“What?”

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“I’m aware of that. I did it anyway.”

He was still glaring. “Look, this is not a thing I do, this morning after—”

I groaned and rolled my eyes. “Look, this isn’t a thing I do either. Don’t act like I’m changing the rules all of a sudden because I refilled your coffee mug. I’m still out of here as soon as I find my clothes, and you don’t have to see me again, okay? Unless you want me to just take the sheet and head on out. Like I give a fuck.”

His nostrils flared, and I waited him out, sipping from my scalding hot coffee. I’d walk out with this sheet, but I wanted coffee first. He’d brought me to his place. Not a motel. His place. So I wasn’t here for him acting like I was some big imposition into his life.

He gestured behind me. “Your clothes are folded on that chair over there.” His eyes flicked to my mug. “But finish your coffee first.”

I took another sip to show him I was going to go ahead and do just that, then hopped up onto the edge of the table near where he was working. I swung my legs, his large boots still on my feet, sheet wrapped around me. His lips curled into a half-smile before he took a drag on his cigarette and stuck the butt into an empty beer can. He blew the smoke out of the corner of his mouth, still watching me.

“So you build furniture?” I asked.

“I do.”

“Is that your job?”

He waited a beat before answering. “It is.”

In the morning light, I eyed the table and chairs in his kitchen. “Did you make those?”

“Yup.”

They were gorgeous, smooth and stained a dark brown. I ached to trace the wood grain with my fingers. “They’re beautiful.”

When I turned to him, his one eyebrow was raised. “You really want to talk about furniture?”

“What do you want to talk about? The weather? Politics? How cereal is a perfectly acceptable dinner option?”

The rumble in his chest was a soft chuckle. He found me amusing, which was my comfort zone. I wasn’t typically a girl who had the opportunity for nights like last night. I was the one guys laughed with and drank a beer with, but I wasn’t usually the girl those men took home for a one-night stand. I wasn’t gorgeous with long legs and a flat stomach. I was short and curvy. I did have great tits though.

And then my mind was back to last night, his face between my legs, his mouth on my nipples, the way he pulled my hair…

I took my last gulp of coffee, and it burned the whole way down. I slammed the mug on the table. When our eyes met, I felt like he could see what I was thinking. And maybe it was written all over my face, in the flush of my cheeks. He stood up from his chair, moved his tools to the work bench, and then washed his hands. He returned to my side and took a sip of his coffee, still watching me.

“You done your coffee?” he asked.

Oh, right. That was my cue to get up, to get dressed, to get the hell out of here and go home. Away from Lance and his tattoos and his furniture and his handfuls of ashes. I had no idea how he got here, why he had an old mug that read CHAMP that made his breath catch. And I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. Loss followed this man like a gray cloud, and I’d done enough running from my own.

But yet I didn’t get up, caught in the snare of his gaze and the heat of his body. The denim of his jeans brushed my bare calf.

“Yes,” I said, my voice hoarse. “I’m finished. Thank you.”

He put down his mug and wrapped his fingers around my leg above his boot. He didn’t take his eyes off me, and I couldn’t look away, like an invisible magnet was keeping me in place. His hand rose up my leg, and when he reached the back of my knee, he yanked me forward. I yelped as my body slid until my ass was at the edge of the table.

I still held the sheet at my chest in a white-knuckled grip, even as his hand moved higher, higher. By the slight curve of his lips, I could tell he knew what he’d find there. Maybe it was my breathing, or my dilated pupils, but we both knew I was wet already, just like we both knew he was hard in his jeans.

“I like you in my boots.” His voice was a growl. He laid his palm against my hot, wet flesh, and I sucked in a breath. His gaze dropped and so did mine, to where his hand disappeared beneath the sheet between my legs, where he was now running a blunt finger through my folds. I couldn’t hold back the small whimper in my throat, and he pressed against me closer, the bulge in his pants brushing my thigh.

“Beautiful,” he said. “This was what you wanted, wasn’t it baby?”

“Fuck, yes,” I said. When his thumb brushed my clit, I moaned, and he plunged two fingers inside of me. I gasped and reached down, gripping his wrist with both of my hands while he finger-fucked me. The sheet fell to my waist, and I didn’t bother trying to keep it up. Not while I sat on his table with his fingers plunging in an out of me, owning me, while we were surrounded by sawdust and the bitter scent of coffee.

He laid his forehead against my temple and worked me, molded me, cut me and sanded me like I was one of his masterpieces.

His other hand cupped the side of my neck, and his thumb pressed against the corner of my mouth. I was out of my mind now, chasing the orgasm that was surging inside of me like a tidal wave.

“Open,” he whispered.

I didn’t know what. My legs? My mouth? I spread my legs wider and parted my lips. He slotted his hips between my legs just as his thumb dipped into my mouth. I moaned around his finger, sucking and tonguing it, while his hot breath misted over my face. He didn’t take his gaze off my mouth, his eyes like black pools surrounded by white. “You’re so close, and I want to see it.” His voice was like another hand caressing my skin. “Want to hear how good I make you feel.”

I moaned as I sucked on his thumb harder, and his fingers didn’t let up. My inner thighs were coated with my wetness, soaking the sheet beneath me. His fingers curled, and my eyes fell shut as the orgasm crashed into me. I was bowled over, knocked under, my body at his mercy as I shuddered and shook, speared on his fingers.

When I blinked my eyes open, his hand was on my neck, the other caressing the wetness on my thighs gently. I was panting, tits heaving, hair a mess, not caring that I was sitting there uncovered on his table. He’d utterly reshaped me.

His gaze fell to my lips, wet with saliva and swollen from his thumb. In my post-orgasmic bliss, a thought rattled around in my head. Other than that quick kiss at the bar, he hadn’t kissed me again since he brought me home. Not a real one, mouth-to-mouth. I barely knew what his lips felt like on mine.

I thought he’d do it then. He was so close, inches away. Maybe centimeters. He could close the distance and kiss me. Did I want it? Did he want it? His heated gaze seared me, and I watched as his tongue darted out of his mouth to lick at the corner of his lips. His weight shifted, and his erection nudged my thigh. I reached for the fly of his jeans, but in the next second, the heat of his body and his stare was gone.

I stared at him, blinking hard as I tried to understand what was going on. He was backing away from me, his gaze shuttered, his head shaking slightly so that his hair fell in his eyes. I let my hands drop into my lap. “Let me—”

“I’m good,” he said curtly, which was ridiculous because it looked like his dick was going to bust through the seams.

“But—”

Those eyes that had been so amused then aroused only moments ago were now hard. Blank. His jaw clenched before his words tumbled out of his mouth like glass shards. “You got coffee and you got off. That’s why you were still sticking around this morning, right? So now you can leave.”

For a few stunned seconds, my brain didn’t know how to react. Then on the heels of that awesome orgasm, anger rushed through me. Last night, he’d been honest and straightforward, so I’d let my guard drop. Now he was throwing me into a game I hadn’t volunteered to play. “I’m sorry was that… a fuck to get me to leave?” I didn’t even bother to cover up as I hopped off the table, leaving the sheet behind. Fuck it. “Did you really just finger me to get me to walk out your door? You know that a simple request would have been perfectly sufficient. It’s called communication. It’s called ‘Hey Tara, got shit to do today, mind leaving?’ I would have said, ‘oh of course, Lance. I’ll be going then.’”

He didn’t react. Just stood there with his hands on his hips. Those hands that had previously been inside me.

I kicked off his boots, flinging them at him, but missing, because boot kicking wasn’t something I practiced. He didn’t move to pick them up, and I stomped over to where my clothes were, pulling on my skirt, tank top and boots in record time, not bothering with the thong that he’d stretched to hell.

When I turned around to yell at him, he was throwing up the garage door. I walked toward him, and he lit up a cigarette, not bothering to look at me. Well, that was it, then. He didn’t care, he just wanted me to leave. I swallowed the hurt, angry at myself I cared enough to be hurt. I wouldn’t have to see him again after this. Just leave, Tara. Just get gone.

But because I had a big mouth, I had one last parting shot. “Your coffee wasn’t even that good, by the way. And I hope your balls hurt all goddamn day.”

That was my dramatic exit before I proceeded with my walk of shame back home to my apartment as the sun rose.