Forbidden Fruit: Volume 1 (15 page)

“Yep. A lawyer. You know Jack McMillan, Emma’s fiancé? He’s my boss. He owns half of Chicago. I’ll figure out a way to get you out of your contract.”

Her face pinched together. I instantly recognized that might not have been the best thing to say. “I don’t want out of my contract. I like my job.”

“I’m not talking about getting you out of your job,” I said softly and closed the distance between us. With one hand, I pulled out the clip in her hair, allowing it to fall down her back and I ran my fingers through it. Just as soft as I remembered. My lips curved up slightly when she let out a low sigh.

“I’m talking about finding a way to be together. I haven’t stopped thinking about you for three weeks. I haven’t been with anyone….anyone in a long time, and the fact that I can’t stop thinking about you? That tells me there’s something to explore further with us. I want it. And I can tell by the way I see your pulse beating like crazy under your skin,” I moved my hand and pressed two fingers at the base of her throat and dropped my voice, “that you want it too.”

“I can’t.”

“You say that a lot.”

That earned me a smile. It was so genuine and so much like the Tabby I first saw three weeks ago that I pressed my lips to hers. It was soft and sweet, and she tasted better than I’d remember. I pulled back even though I didn’t want to, and her smile disappeared. “That’s because I can’t.”

“You done here for the night?” I asked, looking at my watch. It was only seven o’clock. We had time to get the contract bullshit over with and still have time to get in bed.

“What?”

“Are you done for the night?”

She frowned. I didn’t think the question was as confusing as she was making it out to be. I let her have a minute to gather her thoughts.

“Yeah,” she finally answered, her voice shaky and uncertain.

I nodded once. “Good. Meet me at Starbuck’s on Sheffield at eight and we can go over the contract.”

“Marcus,” she said, sounding even more uncertain. “I can’t be seen with you. I could lose my job.”

“Have you thought about me?” Her blush gave her away. So did the way her eyes fell from mine and travelled slowly down my body. “I’ve thought about you. I woke up wanting you and you weren’t there, which pissed me off. But what pissed me off more was that you didn’t leave a number, you didn’t have Harper get a message to me. You just left and all I’ve thought about for the last three weeks is the way your gorgeous accent makes me hard, the way your skin tastes, and the way I am constantly thinking that I’m not done exploring you or getting to know you yet.”

“Wow,” she breathed.

“Yeah, it was a wow kind of night for me, too. And I want to explore that further. But first, I want to have a business meeting with you, a lawyer looking over a contract. There’s nothing wrong with that, is there? Teachers need lawyers sometimes don’t they?”

“I don’t think -”

“I think that sometimes teachers need lawyers. So I want to look over your contract, see what it says about you seeing students’ parents and then we’ll go from there, okay?”

She stared at me. I wasn’t sure what she was thinking. Maybe I had pushed too far.

Then, her chin lifted. It was only once, but I caught it. I also caught the faint pink cheeks as she thought about what I said, and I caught the way her lips curved slowly into a smile. Just a hint of one, but it was there.

“Okay.”

“Okay, then.” I curled my hand into the back of her neck and I pulled her close. I didn’t kiss her, although I wanted to. But I held her for a moment and gave her neck a gentle squeeze before letting go.

“I’ll see you in an hour.”

Chapter Five

Tabby

This was insane. It was the most insane and stupid thing I’d ever done. Which wasn’t true. Dating Chuck was probably the dumbest I’d ever done. Leaving England with him and moving to the States in order to prove my mum wrong about him was asinine.

He showed me who he was four years ago, but I was only nineteen, a freshman at university, and too naïve to see the forest through the trees.

But bundling up in the frigid Chicago winter weather to walk and see Marcus at a coffee shop with my teacher contract and handbook in hand? That was dumb, too. Yet it didn’t stop me from doing it.

Where was Harper when I needed her? The one friend I had who could knock common sense into me. Oh, that’s right. She was squealing with glee – a sound she rarely made – at the idea of me going on a date with one of Dean’s friends. I had finally broken down and called her on my way home. I had gotten out one sentence, “I had sex with Marcus on New Year’s Eve and I think I like him,” before she screamed into my ear so loudly that Dean had cursed in the background and complained of a ruptured ear drum.

Then she relayed what I had just said to her which made Dean laugh. And then I swore her to secrecy while she told me to go for it, and that Marcus was awesome.

So there I was, contract in hand and my other hand on the door to the Starbuck’s where Marcus had asked to meet. Which wasn’t quite true, because he had ordered me to be there, and I had only thought about it for a split second before agreeing. Which was dumb in itself.

Have you thought about me? Because I’ve thought about you…

A shiver snuck its way down my spine, straight to my core. It wasn’t from the below zero wind chills that the Windy City was currently experiencing either. And it was cold outside. Frigid. No, even being bundled in a thick scarf, wool gloves, and my winter coat fit for an Eskimo, I knew that shiver wasn’t from the arctic wind blowing off Lake Michigan. It was Marcus’s words and the way he looked at me with his narrowed eyes that I felt pierce directly into my soul.

My soul? That was stupid. It was sex. Hot sex, granted. But just sex. The fact I hadn’t been able to stop thinking about him, or the fact that I had dreamed of him so many times since that night, waking up with a throbbing core and frustrated that he wasn’t there to help take care of that ache, didn’t matter. Or it shouldn’t.

But it did. Which was why I found myself opening the door to Starbuck’s and scanning the small coffee shop until my eyes zeroed in on the blonde Adonis sitting in a back corner. His hands were wrapped around a coffee mug, his coat draped over the chair next to him, and his eyes were on me.

And the way his eyes stayed on me as I crossed the coffee shop told me he was undressing me, slowly removing an article of clothing with every step I took, until I felt like I was standing naked in the middle of a Starbuck’s packed with over two dozen customers.

“You came,” he said. “I didn’t know if you would.”

I held up the contract in one hand. “I told you I would.”

That was when my nerves hit me. My eyes darted around the coffee shop. And a thousand thoughts and questions jumped into my head at the same time. The main one being: does anyone know I’m on a date with my student’s parent? I suddenly felt as if every eye in the place was glued to my table. “I’m not sure this is smart.”

“I think it’s the smartest thing I’ve ever done.”

“Your job isn’t at risk.”

Marcus unwrapped his fingers from his coffee mug and reached across the table, plucking the file from my hand. “It’s a business meeting, Tabby. There’s no risk here. Sit down while I look this over.”

I shuffled back and forth on my feet and then hitched a thumb toward the counter. “I’m going…I’m just going to get a drink.”

Marcus nodded, but he was already looking over the file I had brought. I frowned, confused at his lack of reaction to me. Finally, when I realized he wasn’t going to look at me, I shrugged and went and helped myself to a Venti Peppermint Mocha. I ordered it to go just in case my ‘business meeting’ didn’t go so well. I also kept my shock to myself when I went to pay for the drink and the barista told me that Marcus had already paid in advance for my drink when he arrived. She smiled and shrugged like it happened all the time.

And by the time I was back in my seat, large mocha cradled in my chilled fingers and doing a good job of warming them, Marcus was sitting at the table, holding a cream coffee mug in his hand with my file shut and pushed to the side of the table.

“That’s a large drink.”

I smiled and took my first mouth-watering sip. “Mm. It’s also delicious.”

“You’re going to be awake all night with a drink that size. I could help you find a way to pass the time.”

My entire body warmed, and it wasn’t from the coffee that I was gripping in my small hands as though my survival depended on that one cup of delicious Mocha.

“It’s decaf,” I lied, and took another sip. “What does the contract say?”

“That you are required to conduct yourself in a manner appropriate and befitting of a public figure in and out of the classroom. You are a role model for the students to follow and any inappropriate relationship or conduct discovered could be grounds for immediate dismissal.”

I sighed. Was it out of relief or sadness? I knew that’s what it said. I had told him earlier.

“What it doesn’t say, is that you are in no way allowed to have a relationship with a student’s parent.” Marcus grinned. It made my stomach feel funny.

“A relationship with a student’s parent would be inappropriate, Marcus. Any parent or other student could claim I show your child favoritism if our relationship – which won’t exist – were discovered.”

“Could,” he shrugged. “But maybe not. Which is why I want you to try this.”

“Try what?”

“Me. And trust me,” he said, leaning forward and dropping his voice to ensure no one overheard him. “While I will most definitely be doing inappropriate things to you, our relationship will not be inappropriate. Nor will it be discovered. You are Logan’s teacher for four more months. I have him half of that time. We can keep it a secret if you want. I won’t even let Emma or Jack know. We don’t have to tell Harper or Dean. And by the time the school’s year done and it’s no longer a concern of yours, then you can tell whoever you want. Or you can continue keeping me a secret.”

My mind flip-flopped over the him doing inappropriate things to me part that it took me minutes, maybe longer, to fully understand the rest of what he said.

And when I finally did understand, I grinned, even though my mind was still spinning. Marcus was irresistible. “You want to be my dirty little secret?”

Shocked flashed across his eyes before his own grin matched mine. “If that’s what it takes.”

“So I don’t have to tell anyone?”

“Nope.”

“And you’re okay with that, really?”

He gave me a look that could only be described as ‘duh’ right before he took my hand. His rubbed his thumb gently across my skin, shooting pleasure spikes up my arm. “For now. Try this, Tabby. One more night, and if you wake up in the morning – because you’re staying until morning this time – and don’t think what we have is worth the risk, then I won’t bother you again.”

I studied him while I thought about it. At worst, I got one more night with Marcus, the only man who had ever taken the time to make sure I had an orgasm. And he did it not once, not twice, but three times. Then I considered if he was worth the risk of me losing my job. Then I thought about how I’d already been considering moving back to England to be closer to home or moving somewhere else after the end of the school year now that Chuck wasn’t in the picture. I could, for the first time in my life, do whatever I wanted. And that do whatever I wanted part held the most appeal to me at the moment.

My body was screaming that it wanted to do Marcus. Just one more night. I could give him that. I could give me that. Maybe I was worried over nothing.

“Just try it, Tabby.”

I must have nodded or acquiesced in some way I didn’t understand because my hand was in his, my scarf, gloves and coat back on, and we were hustling down Sheffield Avenue and hailing a cab before I knew what happened.

“My place or yours?” he asked once we were sitting in the backseat of the cab.

My head felt like it was spinning on a top. It had all happened so fast. “I have a roommate,” I mumbled.

“My place then.” Marcus leaned forward and snapped out his address to the cab driver. His hand held mine through my glove, and once the car was moving, he pulled me closer to him, wrapped an arm around my shoulder, and pressed a kiss to the top of my head. “And this time you’re not leaving.”

Chapter
Si
x

Marcus

I held Tabby’s hand and wrapped an arm around her shoulder, worried that at any moment she would change her mind and demand that the cab driver stop the car and let her out.

She didn’t, though. She also didn’t say much except a few mumbled answers to questions I asked during the ride. I learned she’d only been the States for four years, but other than that, I didn’t get any straight answers about why she came. It worried me. In some distant corner of my mind, I was worried about why this woman, who clearly wanted me, also wanted to fight her attraction to me.

And it worried me that I was so worried about her. How could I possibly care for someone so badly after knowing them for such a short amount of time?

When the car came to a stop outside my building, I ushered her out of the harsh wind, into the elevator, and to my apartment. I expected to offer her a drink, maybe something to eat. What I didn’t expect, as I held her hand and walked her into my apartment, was for Tabby to place her gloved hands on my cheeks and pull me immediately down to her cold, soft lips as soon as the door shut behind us.

But hell if I couldn’t work with it at the same time. I wrapped a hand around her waist and moved the other to the back of her neck before pulling her to me. I stepped back until I was against my door and thrust my tongue into her mouth. Her eager whimper as our tongues met sent a spark of fire straight to my semi-hard cock, hardening it further.

“Tabby,” I whispered against her skin. “What the hell was that?”

“I….I don’t know.”

I laughed against her throat and my lips curved into a smile right before I pressed them to her skin. “I liked it. Liked that you took control. It was hot, Tab.”

“I…” Her words trailed off after another groan of pleasure. My teeth nibbled while my tongue tasted and sucked on the skin behind her ear. Her fingernails dug into my shoulders through my dark grey wool coat.

I had to get closer.

“We’re too overdressed for this,” I said against her shoulder before I pulled back. When I did, her cheeks were flushed and her mouth slightly open. I hid my smile of satisfaction that she was so turned on so quickly and eased her out of her coat, slowly turning her and pulling it off her shoulders. Then I removed my own as she took off her gloves and scarf and laid them gently on a table near the door.

Something changed in Tabby’s expression as she was removing her gloves and coat. An uncertain expression, a slight flickering of her eyelashes and a small bite of her lip. It told me we may be moving too fast. And even if she was here, and wanted this, she needed time to get used to the idea. So I gave it to her, even though every nerve in my body was demanding I finish what we started as soon as we walked into place, and watched as she roamed my small apartment.

An open floor plan where I could be in the kitchen and see the entire living room and dining area. I hadn’t needed much. It was two bedrooms, and one was for Logan. Emma had given me shit for weeks when I had gone completely overboard once I found out about him. Something about Toys R Us vomiting all over his bedroom. I hadn’t cared then and I still didn’t. But I did care about what Tabby thought of my home. I’d hung some artwork on the walls. Black and white prints of Chicago and New York City. They looked good with my dark gray couches and furniture and dark black coffee tables and kitchen tables. My place didn’t have a lot of color, but it was comfortable and looked like a man with a kid lived there. My shelves under the large flat screen held buckets overflowing with video games that Logan and I spent hours playing on the weekends.

“It’s not much,” I told Tabby, giving her space as she wandered through the living room. I helped myself to a couple of beers for us. If she wanted wine, she was out of luck. I cracked open two Sam Adam’s Lights and held one out to her when I met her in the living room.

“It’s nice. A bit drab.” She shrugged and thanked me for the beer.

“I’m a guy with a son. Did you expect flowers and roses all over the place?”

Her eyes flashed for a minute, concern written on her face, before she turned to me. “You and Emma seem like you’re good friends.”

“We are,” I said, cautiously. Suddenly the air grew thick in the room. I had never explained my relationship with Emma to anyone. She looked at me like she wanted a better answer so I gently grabbed her hand and pulled her down next to me on the couch, close enough to me so I could run my fingers through her hair.

“Emma and I dated in college. She got pregnant and we were going to elope.” Tabby’s eyes widened slightly and she looked away from me. I didn’t let her. My thumb and finger gripped her chin and I pulled her back to me. “Shit got crazy for a while. My dad got involved, lied, did a bunch of asshole shit, and I lost Emma. I finished law school, got a job working for Jack, and ran into her one night at his penthouse for a business dinner.” As I told her the story, I felt my throat grow thick and my blood begin to boil with anger. Not at Emma. With my dad. I still felt like a complete asshole for listening to him. I pulled a large swallow from my drink before setting it down while Tabby eyed me warily. “I didn’t know until after the dinner that Emma had Logan. My dad had told me she had an abortion.”

She gasped and the hand not holding her beer rested on my thigh. It was comforting and unexpected. It was also unnecessary. I shook my head, trying to tell her not to pity me. “Anyway,” I said, as if what I just dropped in her lap wasn’t a huge, heavy thing. “I got to meet Logan, we got close, Emma fell in love with Jack.” I shrugged. “And we all lived happily ever after.”

“Why did your dad care?” Out of all the questions she could have asked, that was the last one I wanted to answer.

“You know Senator Whitmore? The man who stepped down from his seat last fall?”

“Yeah….” Her eyes grew as large as my windows. “Oh. That was your dad?”

I nodded. “Yep. And he’s a prick. I don’t want to get into the story, mostly because he isn’t worth talking about, but also because talking about him will kill what I have planned for you.” I stopped and wiggled my eyebrows, making her laugh nervously. Then she chugged her beer. Women who acted like manly men were not sexy. Watching Tabby chug her beer, either because she needed liquid courage to be with me or because she was in a hurry to be with me, that was sexy as fuck. Her throat bobbed and dipped while she swallowed and my erection pressed against my jeans. My brain thought of other things I wanted her to swallow.

“And what’s that?” she breathed out, setting her empty beer down on the table. When she leaned forward, I got a glimpse of the pink lace bra underneath her shirt.

“This.” I yanked her toward me so she fell into my lap, straddling me. Her crotch immediately settled on my erection, and I pressed her hips down on me, hard. “This is what I want.” And then I pressed my lips to hers.

The sound that left her throat went straight to my dick. My hands moved to her ass, cupping her cheeks, but she stopped me when I moved to lift her off me.

“Bedroom,” I told her. “I’m not taking you here and my condoms are in the bedroom.”

Tabby grinned. It was lop-sided, one side higher than the other, and there was a mixture of mischief and lust in her eyes. “We won’t need a condom.”

We wouldn’t? I opened my mouth to ask, but she covered my lips with her fingers and sunk off my lap, straight onto the floor between legs. My head fell back against the couch. Hell, yes.

“Tabby,” I growled like an animal. I wasn’t ashamed of the sound that left my throat while her fingers worked my zipper down and her hands quickly removed my erection from its confined space. It felt like heaven. Her hands were still a bit chilled. The contact of her cold hands on my skin made me push my hips into her hands. And then I couldn’t make another sound as her lips quickly covered the head of my erection and she sucked me into her mouth. With one hand on my shaft, her other hand pushed my jeans down further. I lifted my hips and let her push them down while her tongue licked my dick, concentrating on the sensitive flesh under the tip.

“Shit you’re good at this.”

She hmmed against me. The vibrations rocked me. Holy shit. She sucked my dick like it was her favorite hobby. I rocked my hips while I fought the urge to thrust all the way down her throat. Gagging and vomiting women were not cool. But still, it was hard. She massaged my heavy balls before she pulled off my dick and sucked my balls into her mouth.

“Oh fuck,” I cried, and then her mouth was back on me, sucking me all the way into her throat and bobbing up and down in my lap. Heaven. Nirvana. Best night ever. “I’m going to come,” I warned her, and I hoped she didn’t pull off. A blow job lost half of its fun when a woman didn’t swallow. She made a sound of pleasure and squeezed me harder, her mouth moved faster against me, alternating between deep throating me and working the tip. And when I came, it felt like I released every stress I had ever carried in my entire life straight down her throat.

Shit.
That was amazing.

“Thank you,” she said softly. I opened my eyes and looked at her.

I grinned, realizing I said that amazing part out loud.

I kicked off my jeans and removed my shirt while Tabby watched me. I still wanted her. I picked her up, threw her over my shoulder, and carried her to my room. And after I gave her an orgasm, which based on the sounds flying out of her mouth must have rivaled the one she gave me, I rolled on a condom and gave her two more.

When I woke up with her still wrapped in my arms, I gave her one more.