“Thank you for dinner,” Jill said after he’d paid the bill.
“You’re welcome.”
“Do you need to go home tonight?” she asked, her eyes sparkling.
“I don’t. Luke is at my parents’ for the night.”
“We can go back to my place and relax if you want,” she said, her grin a mile wide.
He knew there was an invitation there but had no plans on RSVPing until he knew he wasn’t going to be the unwanted guest that she wanted to push out the door the minute they were done. “We can do that if you want to.”
“It’s the least I can do for this great dinner you took me to.”
His smile fell. “I don’t want a payment for that.”
Her jaw dropped. “I wasn’t doing it for that. Did you think I was?”
He wasn’t sure which one of them was more insulted right now and he started to laugh. “I’d say we both just put our feet in our mouths.”
She took a deep breath. “Let’s start over. If you don’t have to rush home, why don’t we go back to my place and relax? As much as I love what I’m wearing, I’d like to kick these heels off.”
“I can do that,” he said, standing up and walking over to pull her chair out. “I really don’t want you to feel any pressure for anything at all.”
Even if he was dying to go back to her place. The “no I haven’t dated much” was flashing like the no crossing lights at the train tracks.
“I want you to. I can’t believe we are bumbling this much right now. I’ve got an excuse, but what about you?”
He had no choice but to laugh. He couldn’t remember ever stumbling this much on a date or with a woman in general. “Maybe we can fix it.”
“I hope so. I still want to remember this as my best date ever.”
There was a sincere look in her eyes and a smile on her face so he leaned down and gave her a gentle kiss in the restaurant, then led her out to his SUV.
When they got back to her apartment, she turned and wrapped her arms around his neck the minute he’d shut the door.
“I really want you to take me to bed, but it has nothing to do with the dinner you took me to tonight and everything to do with that last kiss you gave me weeks ago. Do you have any idea how hard it’s been to see you every day and wonder when I could have your mouth on me again?”
“Not nearly as hard as it’s been for me.”
“Kiss me again like that. Show me how hard it’s been.”
She was going to be a little vixen in the bedroom, he could tell right now. So he lowered his head and gave her what she’d asked for. He decided to do what he wanted to do hours ago when he walked in her front door. He brought his hand to the back of her neck and then crushed his mouth on hers like a dehydrated man and a well was overflowing with water just beckoning him forward.
She kissed him back with everything she had, her body plastered to his, her hips grinding against the bulge that started to grow in his pants the minute she invited him in.
They might have stood there making out for hours, or maybe it was five minutes. Time just seemed to stop at that moment and all he felt was her in his arms, her taste on his lips and her need matching his.
She dropped her arms from around his neck, grabbed his hand, and led him through her dark apartment to the back. In her small bedroom, she hit the light on the wall. “I want to see you.”
“I’ve got no problem with that,” he said, reaching for her.
“No. I want to see you now,” she said, her hands going to his tie and undoing it fast. “No dating comes with no sex. It’s been a long time. You lit a fire in me with that kiss weeks ago so I either need some water thrown on me, or you need to build that fire up and show me how high you can take me.”
“The only water that will touch you will be when we shower together tomorrow,” he said standing there while she started to unbutton his shirt.
“Sounds like a plan. Can you back it up?”
She was tossing down a challenge that he hadn’t heard in years. He was damn well going to take her up on it.
He spun her around and unhooked the button at the back of her neck, then lowered the zipper. “I’ve been imagining what is under this dress all night. I need to know now.”
“You’ll be in for a surprise then,” she said when the dress fell to the floor and he found out she had nothing on but her birthday suit.
“Holy shit,” he said, the member in his pants turning to titanium when he got a glimpse of her magnificent ass. He turned her around and took in the sight of the front of her as well, his eyes looking over everything twice, then a third time. He had a fondness for ‘neat and trimmed and barely there.’ “You must have read my mind.”
“Or we like the same things,” she said, reaching for his shirt now. His tie was long gone somewhere in the room and now she was yanking his shirt out of the waist of his pants while he was reaching in his back pocket for his wallet. “I’ve got a whole drawer full.”
He dropped his hand away from his pocket and started to remove his clothes with the help of her eager fingers. Then he picked her up and laid her on the bed, coming down on top of her, just letting their naked bodies touch each other, skin to skin, heat to heat, charging them both up for a night of loving.
Her hips moved up and he knew she wasn’t going to let him draw it out, to play with her, to even look, touch, or taste as much as he wanted. At least not now.
“Get a condom out,” she said, turning her head.
He reached over and opened the drawer, then pulled out a brand new box. “You’re going to make me open it. I better not get a paper cut from the box.”
She laughed. “I bought them for you. Now you know how long it’s really been since I figured the ones I had had expired.”
He leaned back and looked into her eyes. He didn’t see anything but arousal that he was positive was mirroring his own.
“I know we’re both in a hurry, but you wanted this to be the best night ever, so do you trust me to show that to you?”
“I trust you to give me what I want. What I need to feel. What I’m craving so desperately,” she said, her body rubbing against his.
He lowered his head and kissed her again. His tongue going in her mouth, meeting and matching her excitement, her urgency, even her desire. Her nails were now on his back and they were leaving marks. If she was this reactive to kissing, the night was only going to get better for both of them.
He moved down her body, his mouth tasting every part of her he could. He stopped at one rock-hard nipple and pulled it in his mouth, his teeth grazing it and nibbling harder than he meant to. But when her hips slammed into his again, he knew that the sensual creature under him was just fine with all sorts of play.
“Owen, please don’t make me beg for it.”
He’d love to hear her beg and he’d be making her do it later tonight, but for the moment he’d put them both out of their misery.
And when did he ever think of sex as misery? Never. It wasn’t this time either. But he had no words to describe the need he felt at the moment.
Sitting up, he opened the condom and slid it on, his eyes moving to hers, watching her watch him. Then her eyes lowered and stared at the part of him standing proud. “I’m going to be one happy girl,” she said, her eyes glowing.
Okay, she knew exactly what buttons to push to get him to move.
Sliding over her body again, he nudged her legs apart and slid right in. She was wet and tight and pulling him into a vortex of feelings he’d shut his body off from for years.
Sex had always been that before... somewhat shut off from feeling it fully. He always felt good physically during sex, yet he held another part of himself back.
But in more than a year, he’d completely shut down, physically and emotionally. Now he was opening up again and with that came the key to unlock every sensation and nerve ending he’d fought to keep hidden.
He moved in and out of her, feeling pressure below and pressure in his chest. She was breathing heavy, but not much heavier than him.
Her legs came up and wrapped around his hips, her nails digging into his waist and her teeth on his neck. “I can’t tell you how good that feels,” she all but shouted between moans.
“Yes,” he said, which was all he was capable of voicing at the moment.
He was moving faster in her, slamming her back into the bed every time she lifted up. Then she seemed to clamp down around him, shouting out his name and forcing him to empty everything he’d kept bottled up for so long.
It wasn’t just the best night for her, it was for him too, and it’d only just begun.