Dating a Metro Man (8 page)

Even this much was damn satisfying, Jenna concluded, starting at last to move slowly. She didn’t want things ending too soon for either of them. Instead, she wanted to keep him inside her, just where he was now. Everything else was a bonus as far as she was concerned.

Her attention was drawn from her thoughts when Seth called her name and clutched her hips tightly. When she repeated the action of rising and falling on him again, Seth held her hips for a couple of heartbeats before letting her repeat it. Finally, she grabbed both his hands and pushed them to the side of his head. Her unbuttoned shirt flapped around her and her bra dangled inside it.

Seth looked at her with raw desire but wasn’t acting on what she saw in his gaze.

“Stop being so nice,” Jenna said fiercely. “This is not the time.
I need you, Seth
.”

Seth met her furious stare without remorse for his actions, his eyes glazed from the pleasure of being inside her while she rode him.

But not wanting to deny Jenna anything this time—their first mutual time, Seth finally let his body actively seek release. In doing so, he used his greater strength and rolled them over until he could surge in and out of her at will. Reversing their previous situation, Seth now held Jenna wrists at her sides as his gaze locked itself to hers.

“Jenna,” Seth whispered, her name a reverent prayer for what they doing. Words of love were on the tip of his tongue, but Seth held those back, knowing for sure now Jenna didn’t want to hear them. He couldn’t risk making her upset again. Not now. Not this time. Instead he told her another kind of truth.

“It’s never been like this with anyone else,” Seth told her, sinking completely into her and pushing deep to emphasize the point. “I’ve never been this hard and aching with a woman before you.”

“Good,” she keened, lifting her hips and closing her eyes. “Seth—please. Don’t hold back.”

Seth groaned and gave in to her demands for release, the ones she made out loud and the silent ones her body was making for her. His hands slid from her wrists to link his fingers with hers. He rocked them both over and over until Jenna screamed his name and he groaned in satisfaction at the same time. When he stopped rocking, she was still straining and vibrating around him.

That’s two, Seth told himself.
Then he
let his weight carefully come to rest on her intimately and felt her heart beating madly against his. He wondered how many more times he could push Jenna over the edge tonight.

“Don’t move and don’t make me let you go yet,” Seth ordered softly, needing to absorb the reality of Jenna’s body compliant and resting beneath his at last. He wanted time to memorize their first real moment of connection and wanted her to want the same. Their breathing was the only noise in the room for several long minutes.

Eventually, Seth turned loose of her hands and rolled them to their sides. This time Jenna didn’t disconnect their bodies or pull away. He wondered what she would think if she knew how much he wanted her still, because it was a shock even to him.

“When do you need to leave,” Seth asked, lifting strands of her hair away from her face and tucking them behind her ear. He kept his voice neutral, but was humbled by how difficult it was not to demand she stay. He was never going to be able to make fun of Casey again, and he owed the man who raised him a huge apology for being disrespectful about his feelings.

“Soon,” Jenna said firmly. “Why?”

“I’m not done with you yet tonight, but I understand if you need to go—or want to go,” Seth told her, watching color bloom in her cheeks. He’d just now noticed the lamp he had left burning was still on.

There hadn’t been a lot of men in Jenna’s sexual experience that ever went a second round, much less a man like Seth who seemed not to have a limit—or at least not one she could find so far. Embarrassment colored her face, but she well knew you couldn’t fix a problem until you knew what kind you had.

“Am I not satisfying you?” Jenna asked, making herself say the words, though they humiliated her. Men had told her she was beautiful, but of the few she had slept with, none had ever praised her skill in bed. It was simply a matter of not knowing, Jenna told herself. She lifted her chin to wait for Seth’s answer, regardless of how humbling it was to think she might be less than proficient from his point of view.

Seth considered the earnestness in Jenna’s expression when he answered with the simple truth he had no wish to hide from her anyway. His ego didn’t need stroking. Other things about him did. He wanted her to want to be the woman who did it more than he wanted anything else.

“Oh, you satisfy me plenty, baby—I’m just backed up with not having sex for a long time. There hasn’t been anyone before you for months, and then—well, there hasn’t been anyone since I met you,” Seth said, smiling at her.

“Seth, it’s been at least eight months since you met me,” Jenna said quietly.

“Yes. Probably about a year and half since I had sex with a woman,” Seth told her, unashamed. “Casey was here long before I met you, and I spent more time with him than I did dating. He missed Susan terribly during those first few months he was here. I didn’t want him to feel more alone by seeing me bring a woman home.”

Jenna reached out a finger and put it on the pulse at the base of his throat. It was calmer now than it had been earlier. Calm was a word she always used condescendingly with Seth. She now knew better. He was patient. He was willing to wait and work for what he wanted. That didn’t seem as bad to her now that she knew he used that approach to everything—including her.

“How long do you think it will take you to catch up?” Jena asked, her throat tight as she choked out the words. She didn’t really want to think of Seth waiting or why he had done so. She wasn’t ready to like him again for being there for Casey and suffering with his cousin through his loss.

“I have no idea, but I’m not an animal. I can wait for next time,” Seth said, laughing and holding her serious gaze. “I just wanted to explain why I don’t seem to be able to get enough of you.”

Jenna separated their bodies then, but she did so nicely. “Is your shower big enough for two people?”

Seth rolled out of bed, removed the condom from himself, and held out a hand to her. “Absolutely.”

They washed themselves and each other, not lingering too long. The shower felt more intimate than everything else they had done so far. They talked little and Seth handed her a large bath sheet afterward that almost touched her ankles.

The woman was at least five foot seven, he thought, but Jenna seemed really petite to him tonight.

When they finally made it back to the bed, Jenna pushed him back on it with one hand. “I know one thing guaranteed to knock you out and make you sleep,” she told him, bending to kiss his knee and up the inside of his thigh.

“Jenna, you don’t have to seduce me. I’m already seduced. You certainly don’t have to—you know what I mean,” Seth said roughly, mind reeling as she continued to explore him with her mouth. “Look—I’m not going to be able to stop you if you keep that up.”

“Good,” Jenna said, “no condom either. I want this without it. After what you told me, I trust you with this. Let me do what I want.”

Seth laughed as she ran her tongue along the other thigh and back up to run it along his hard, aching erection. “You can always do whatever you want with me. I just didn’t want you to think—
Jenna.
” With her mouth moving over him and her hair spilling between his legs, all Seth could say was her name.

When her hands got involved, he grabbed the bed sheets trying to maintain some decorum with her. Not long after, he heard someone calling out in a tortured voice and realized with shock it was him. Still her mouth kept moving even after that until he forgot everything but the woman he was happy to let control him.

When Jenna finally let go and kissed her way up Seth’s body to his mouth, she devilishly plunged her tongue in deep. It pleased her to hear him whimper into her mouth. His compliance was the headiest pleasure she’d had tonight. If there was pride at his slack jaw and blurred gaze, so what? She’d been motivated, and Seth had been fairly easy to please.

Payback, Jenna decided, just payback for the first orgasm Seth had given her. She refused to give any other definition to what she had just done to and for him. She certainly wasn’t going to confess that it had been the first time she’d completed that act with any man, or that she wanted to repeat it with him again.

Drunk on feeling like she was finally in control of at least one thing that happened between them, Jenna quietly acknowledged it was not a sterling character moment for her. But it was a true one for her nature. She was very pleased with herself—and Seth.

“I need to go now,” Jenna whispered against his lips. “Can I come back in a few days?”

“Come any time,” Seth said, lifting his hand to her hair again, wishing he could ask her stay so he could hold her. “I’m going to think of a hundred ways to please you between now and then. You’re obviously better in bed than I am, and I’m very competitive.”

Jenna put her face against his shoulder to stifle her laughter and her pink face. Maybe she had been better than she knew, but it hadn’t mattered until the man beneath her had confirmed it. Her pleasure at the knowledge was going to her head fast and pushing her into wanting to do rash things—like curl up beside him and stay within reach of him.

“Sex is not a competition,” she told him, still unwilling for him to know that it was just him who inspired her.

“No. I guess sex isn’t a competition, but I had plans to give you more orgasms than you gave me. Now we’re even,” Seth said seriously. “I owe you.”

“No, you don’t. We don’t owe each other anything,” Jenna said, pulling away and rolling out of bed to her feet before she could change her mind. “That’s one of the best things about our agreement.”

Jenna dressed in record time, relenting to come back to bed to kiss Seth once more while he looked at her with heavy lidded eyes still full of appreciation. She appreciated him, too.

“Come back anytime,” Seth said, his mouth warm on hers.

“In a few days,” Jenna said, straightening, fighting the inclination she had to climb in beside him. Cuddling was not part of their agreement, and she liked what they had. It suited her. “Sleep.”

“Text me when you get home. I can’t help wanting to know you’re safe. Blame Casey—he made me that way,” Seth told her, using his cousin as an excuse.

“Okay,” Jenna said, sighing. “I’m not going to argue over a simple text. Good night, Seth.”

“Good night,” he said, stroking her cheek before dropping his hand.

Minutes later, he heard the distinct click of the front door latch locking into place and knew Jenna had truly gone. He stared wide-eyed and silent at the ceiling until he heard the phone vibrate on the nightstand some twenty minutes later. Seth looked the message and sighed.

Home safe. Sleep now.

He typed back quickly to make sure she would get his text.

Thanks for texting. Good night.

“I love you,” Seth said to the phone, tossing it back on the nightstand in frustration.

The he closed his eyes and let the first relaxed sleep he’d had in a couple of years take him under.

Jenna was standing at her office window contemplating why in the last two weeks she hadn’t been able to wait more than two days to see Seth, when her boss knocked and came into her office.

“Glad you’re in,” Todd Warren said, smiling smugly at his favorite architect. “It’s not every day I get to make someone’s dreams come true. Today is your lucky day.”

Jenna laughed and walked back to her desk. “Why Todd, you sound almost giddy.”

“Giddy—
giddy
? Yeah, I guess that’s about right. We just got a new fat contract and you were the reason,” Todd said. “Client wants a six-hundred-thousand-dollar house and has allocated one hundred thousand dollars for the lot, which has to be substantial, have some ground around it. Beyond that his list of stipulations is fairly minor. He said to tell you to design the house you wanted to live in yourself and don’t be stingy with your dreams. Apparently, he’s checked out several things you have done and loves your style.”

“His name isn’t Kaiser or Gallagher or—what’s Jim’s other name now? Simpson! It wasn’t Simpson, was it?” Jenna demanded, unable to believe a client had randomly selected her from the limited amount of other residential designing she had done.

Her work for Todd was primarily commercial. She certainly wasn’t famous, but Jenna thought she did have a unique style that she’d been hoping would catch on in time.

When she pulled herself out of her thoughts, Todd was shaking his head. “There is no name. Client wouldn’t identify himself. Deposit was sent electronically from a local bank, but through escrow. His attorney authorized it and will be authorizing all future draws against the work being done. Strange, sure, but the first check still cashed.”

“So a mystery man or woman—” Jenna began.

“Man,” Todd said confidently. “I talked to the attorney, who wouldn’t give the client’s name, but did refer to the client as
he
.”

“Okay, so the mystery man wants me to design
him
the house of
my
dreams?” Jenna said. “Why?”

“Wrong question. Totally wrong question. This is your chance to do what every architect dreams of doing. Bring your dream house to life and make a design portfolio that will sell your work from here on out,” Todd insisted.

“Don’t you get an odd feeling about this?” Jenna insisted back.

“You did the Nolan house during your internship at Jagardi and made the cover of
Architect Digest
,” Todd reminded her. “That’s why I hired you. How is this different? This is another break. Some eccentric dude plucked you out of the architecting ether and wants to let you play with his money. You’re going to give him a show-piece afterward and a story to tell people he invites to dinner. That’s what people with his kind of money to burn want.”

Jenna sighed. “I guess you’re right. I’m obviously not going to turn the chance down, Todd. I just got a weird feeling when you told me, that’s all. It’s the whole mystery-man thing. I’m not opposed to surprises, but am not big on secrets.”