Paige laid out everything she’d need in her bedroom. Strap-on, check. Her favorite dildo to use for anal, check. Condoms, check. And lube, check. Yes, she hated Dick/Carter Joshua Cox with almost every fiber of her being—all the fibers that weren’t involved in the whole lust thing anyhow—but she didn’t want to actually do damage to the guy.

Also, there was the distinct possibility this was all for naught because odds were good she’d let him in on her plans and he’d run screaming. Dudes and their fragile, fragile masculinity, afraid it would be stripped away by having something up their ass. God forbid they be the ones getting penetrated.

There shouldn’t have been butterflies in her stomach at the prospect of getting to be inside Carter Cox. About making him sweat and beg under her, about watching those toned but not ripped biceps flex as he held himself up beneath her while she fucked his ass. This was about revenge, right? It was about making him feel as helpless and used and subjugated as she did so often these days. Make him feel a little afraid.

But no, she wouldn’t hurt him because Paige knew how to peg a man, which was more than she could say about what his kind intended for her. Suppression, humiliation, used for parts. Fucking right she’d take her pleasure from Carter goddamn Cox and his gallingly hot...brain.

It was precisely nine-thirty when her door buzzer went off. She didn’t bother with the intercom but just buzzed him on up. A minute later, there was a knock on the door. Soft, tentative, and Paige almost—almost—felt bad. Was Carter nervous?

She opened the door, expecting to find a leering man. Yeah, she’d clearly thrown him earlier what with giving the back of his skull a good slap, but he’d no doubt have his shit back together almost fifteen hours later. But the Mr. Cox she found on the other side wasn’t what she was expecting.

Not exactly a cocky asshat who’d look at home on K Street, Carter stood there, his hair disheveled and sticking out in a way that shouldn’t have been appealing. His suit was rumpled, his tie was loosened and crooked to boot. Also, he was clutching a cheap bottle of wine, a giant bag of off-brand potato chips, and a box of no-name chocolates. What the hell?

Then his eyes practically fell out of their sockets, and she remembered what she was wearing underneath the plaid flannel robe that was now gaping open; a silky black negligee, thigh high stockings, and fuck-me stilettos. Well, in Paige’s case, really fuck-you stilettos, but they’d get there soon enough. First things first; she really didn’t need her neighbors seeing her like this.

Paige grabbed the elbow of Carter Cox’s suit coat and dragged him and his bizarre payload over the threshold, shutting the door behind him.

“I see you can tell time.”

Carter didn’t respond to her baiting, busy looking around her small living room as he was.

She tapped her shoe, the ball of her foot pattering against the wood. “Do you always make women repeat themselves three times before you answer?”

That got his attention, and he blinked as he turned to her, looking owl-ish. “No. I just…”

* * *

“You just what?”

Holy crap she was beautiful. Like out of control gorgeous. He’d thought she was really pretty in class, the way her hair frizzed out of her ponytail and around her face, and the way her workout clothes showed off her generous shape. But this, even the glimpses he could catch underneath that bathrobe, she was…stupefying. Not that he was always great with the whole words coming out of mouth making sense thing—talking, that’s what that was called—but he could usually answer basic questions.

Also, he wanted to look at her stuff more, find something they had in common he could prepare to talk about next time. If there were a next time. There was a picture of her with Slade Lewis, the former Secretary of HUD, and a few more pictures with other political higher-ups predominantly on the left. She probably worked in government, much like it seemed ninety percent of this town did, and it seemed likely she was a Democrat. But, more time answering her question now and less time figuring out what on earth he was supposed to talk to this woman about when she was so…all the things.

“You, um…” Why did his tongue suddenly feel like it was taking up his whole mouth? Why did he suddenly have no vocabulary? No thought process? Nothing? Maybe it would be better if he just left because there was no way she was going to want to do anything with him now. “You, uh, look nice.”

Nice? Carter mentally smacked his forehead. She didn’t look nice, she looked like every wet dream he’d ever had and some his imagination hadn’t come up with. Fuck. This was not going well. At all. Maybe he could say he needed to use the bathroom and call Jamie?

Over lunch his brother confirmed for Carter that it did indeed sound like the mysterious and super-hot woman from spin class did indeed want to have the sex with him. Unfortunately, Jamie had spent so much of the meal giving him impressed looks with his mouth full or saying shit like “Carter Cox, you sly dog, you. I knew you had it in you,” that they really hadn’t talked about the whole part before the sex. Maybe he could beg Jamie for some pointers while he pretended to take a leak? But it would take too long, and then she’d probably think he was doing something creepy, and he didn’t want her to think that.

No, not her. She must have a name, right? There hadn’t been one on the card she’d slapped against his chest. Just an address, and here he was. The buzzer hadn’t even had a last name, and now he was standing here—

Get it together, Cox.

“Do you have a name?”

Wow his mental forehead was going to be metaphorically sore from all the times he was going to smack it or bang it on a figurative desk. Of course she had a name.

The woman blinked, and he wondered if he’d stumped her. Maybe he wasn’t so bad at this after all. But then her face went hard, the way she looked at him in class, and she tucked a hand inside her robe, placed it on her hip and pressed her elbow outward, making more of what she had on underneath it visible, and shit, he was going to die. Or maybe he was already dead and this was heaven? He had almost gotten hit by that car when he’d been leaving the sad, sad corner store where he’d picked up the chips and chocolate and wine. Stupid work, making him seem inept. Okay, more inept.

“Of course I do. What are you willing to do to get it?”

What was it about that challenge that made him get hard in his trousers? And perhaps a better question to ask of him would have been what would he not be willing to do to get it, because the latter list was certainly shorter.

“What—” And he thought he’d left the stage of his voice cracking behind in high school. Apparently not. Inconveniently, it seemed to only come out when there was the most attractive woman he’d ever seen standing in front of him in lingerie so sexy even he might consider regulating its availability. It was, frankly, a danger to the public. Or perhaps just to his pants, which were feeling awfully damn tight. “What would you like me to do?”

A ghost of a smile widened her mouth, tipped up the edges. “I’d like for you to get on your knees and lick me until I come all over your face. Can you do that?”

It took everything he had to contain the squeak that threatened to rise out of his throat and make an idiot out of him. But he did it. “I don’t know if I can, but I will endeavor to satisfy you.”

That at least was true. He was a hard worker, whatever his other failings might be. And while he did tend to be oblivious to the world around him, when it mattered he could pay attention. Very, very close attention.

While he would never say so out loud because it seemed presumptuous and backward, he fancied that a wash of pink flushed her cheeks and she seemed to hesitate, like maybe she wasn’t standing on totally firm ground here either. But what did he know? Maybe she did this all the time. Maybe he was the latest in a long line of men she’d commanded to go down on her. Which was fine. He was just glad to have a shot.

She finally seemed to get a hold of herself, and she licked her red lips. “That’ll have to do.”

Then she shed her robe, stripped off her panties, and leaned up against the door while pointing a finger at the floor in front of her. Stupidly, he was still holding the things he’d brought, so he had to scramble to find a table to put them on before he could kneel in front of her. But when he did, oh…

She grabbed a hank of his hair and pulled him toward her, hooking a leg over his shoulder and using her heel to nudge him in as well. The smell of her was almost enough to make him embarrass himself. Distinctly feminine, but earthy and musky because it was a part of her body not just anyone was privy to. Suddenly he was jealous of the bike seat she rode three times a week. Being allowed to be this close to her felt like a privilege, a fantasy he hadn’t known he’d had coming true.

The woman hadn’t given him time to get his hands in place, so at first he just licked and sucked at her labia. Being so close to her, having everything about her fill his senses was intoxicating. His dick was heavy and aching in his pants, and his lungs almost hurt from how deeply he was trying to breathe her in. He nibbled at her a bit because it seemed worth a try. After he’d done it, she seemed to like it, so he did it some more while his cock filled impossibly, feeling like it might burst. He tasted her, inhaled her until she tightened her grip on his hair and tugged him back a bit. She didn’t tell him to stop, which he didn’t want to because everything about her was delicious, so he slid his hands up her stockings—holy fuck, her silky, nearly sheer, smooth and sexy as fuck stockings—and then used his thumbs to part her so he could reach, taste, more of her.

She clearly approved because she used his hair to steer him again, directing his face back between her thighs, which frankly was where he belonged. How could he not have known? It seemed so obvious now.

The smell of her was even more powerful here, and it nearly overwhelmed him. But more than smell, he wanted to taste her. He’d gotten hints of it from her skin before and from when he’d managed to insinuate his tongue into the seam of her, but now she was fully open to him and he was going to take advantage. He wanted to feast on her, but was well aware licking her from her entrance to her mound might not be the most pleasurable thing for her. He allowed himself a few broad strokes of his tongue, and then settled in for more detail-oriented work.

Carter was good with detail. He was good with nuance. Mostly with public policy and understanding how byzantine government regulations worked, but such a skill if tweaked would hopefully also lend itself to pleasing a woman. With his mouth. He paid attention to her sounds, the way she rocked up against his mouth, his face, at one point clutching him so hard to her core he almost couldn’t breathe. It would be worth it, to be deprived of oxygen for a few moments to give this woman pleasure, satisfaction, and his cock pulsed with the thought.

Which much to his delight several minutes later, he did. At least he was pretty sure that’s what her barely discernable words melting into cries and the way she shuddered against his mouth and under his hands meant.

He was positive when she let go of his hair, unhooked her leg, and slid down the door with her legs still spread, but with a gorgeous flush pinking her cheeks. Not the same shade she turned after a hard class on the bike, but one that made her look more dazed instead of triumphant. He’d done that. Perhaps even blown her mind a little?

“Paige. My name is Paige. Nicely done, Carter.”