Scorch (3 page)

Chelsea enjoyed letting her eyes wander over Daniel. The play of light on his muscles left interesting shadows over his torso—ones she itched to explore. When her scrutiny reached his groin, she couldn’t help the gasp that escaped her. His cock was huge and ready for her. She traced the veins with her gaze as she stared, following them from root to tip. The glistening bead gathered there had her mouth watering. She’d never seen anything so beautiful—or that turned her on as much.

Reaching out, trying to hide the trembling of her hands, she linked her fingers with his and pulled him closer. Chelsea wasn’t a virgin, but she’d never taken the lead before. She’d never felt the need to. But with Daniel, she definitely wanted to. It was as if she couldn’t go another second without feeling him. Tasting him. If she didn’t go for it now, she never would.

She pushed him over to the bed, laid him down on it and crawled over him. Chelsea reveled in the way his breath hitched when she flicked her tongue over his abs, the gooseflesh that followed her hair as it trailed over his skin.

It gave her a thrill. A rush of power she’d never experienced before. She was the one who made him react this way. He groaned when she dipped her tongue into his belly button. Shivered when she raked her nails over his rock-solid thighs.

What would he do if…?

She curled her tongue over the head of his cock before closing her mouth over it. He was salty, tangy. Addictive. Chelsea sucked him deeper, as far as she could manage. Daniel gripped her hair, holding her there for a moment before pulling her back.

“As much as I love what you’re doing. I don’t think I have the control at the moment, and I want to be deep inside you when I come.”

She didn’t have to be told any more. Allowing him to tug her back over him, she loved the feel of his skin as it glided against hers. That alone was more erotic than anything she’d felt with Richard.

He twisted her beneath him and quickly took care of protection before he sank deep into her. Chelsea was the one to hitch her breath this time as he plunged and withdrew only to push deeper with his next thrust. Sensation erupted low in her belly. The heat coursed through her veins as he moved. Clawing him closer, she could feel the pleasure peaking, cresting. And for a crystalline moment, it was as if the world stopped—then it splintered.

Inexorably, he cupped her ass, tilting her in a way that allowed him deeper. Before she came down from her first orgasm, the second hit, rending a cry from her. Daniel joined her seconds later, pressed deep within her.

Chelsea stared up at him, half in awe and half in a dazed panic. While it had been the most amazing thing she’d experienced in memory, they hardly knew each other. It definitely wasn’t her usual MO. What must he think of her?

She vaguely wondered if she had tensed up or otherwise given him some sort of signal, because he raised his head right then, his dark eyes sated and riveted to hers. “Stop.”

“Stop what?”

“Thinking so hard. We just had incredible sex. You shouldn’t be so tense again already.”

The part where he described the sex as incredible made her heart buoy a little but the word ‘tense’ only made her muscles bunch more. “That’s how you see me? Tense?”

He rolled, taking her with him. “Look. I heard about what you’ve been going through. I know what your ex did to you. If you weren’t a little stressed out after all that, I wouldn’t think you were human. I’m just glad that you could let go, at least for a little while.” He ran his hand deliberately down her side to sweep over her ass and pull her close.

There was no doubt from what she could feel that his interest was renewing. “Now, why don’t we see if we can make you let go a little longer this time?”

“Think you can make that happen?” Chelsea wound her arms around his neck and arched herself against him.

He returned the teasing smile she gave him as he nodded. “I guess you want me to prove I can, don’t you?”

Daniel’s hair was tousled and his chin was dark with stubble. His gorgeous dark eyes were hooded, but they sparkled with promise. He would prove it, all right.

She settled back. “Please do.”

He sat back with a smile and cracked his knuckles as if he was about to go into a fight. “Well, I’m not one to back down from a challenge.”

Laughing, she dragged him back down to her. She never would have imagined that the quiet, stern head chef she’d come to know would be so different outside of the kitchen. Or so good in bed.

Daniel ran his hand over her, tracing patterns over her skin as he lowered his head to taste her breast. He curled his tongue around her nipple, drawing it between his lips and sucking. The groan he uttered shot straight to the growing ache between her thighs.

“If I could replicate your taste, I would make a fortune.”

Chelsea giggled. “I doubt Cara would give you the go-ahead for that.”

He arched an eyebrow at her. “I don’t know. We’re talking a lot of delicious potential here.” He licked her nipple again. “And I’m guessing, here…” Daniel slipped his fingers into her only to withdraw them and bring them to his mouth for a taste. He closed his eyes for a second before he met her gaze and smiled. “I was right.”

Chelsea watched, mesmerized as he licked his fingers clean. That was the dirtiest and hottest thing she’d ever witnessed and she hadn’t even known that could be a turn-on. What else had she been missing out on?

When he sidled down her body and settled between her thighs, she tensed a little. It wasn’t like she’d never had anyone go down on her before. Richard had a few times, but he had hardly made an impression.

Daniel glided his hand up the outside of her thigh comfortingly. “Relax.”

She did her best to ease the tightness in her legs and she did manage, somewhat. Chelsea propped herself up on her elbows to watch him.

“You have the prettiest pussy I’ve ever seen.”

Heat climbed to her cheeks. Before she could think up a reply to that, he dropped lower and she felt his lips graze her folds gently, reverently. An instant before the hot, velvet sensation of his tongue replaced them.

He ran the tip up and down, teasing her, coaxing more of her juices to flow. Then he blew a jet of air, chilling her, before quickly closing his lips over her clit and sucking. Over and over he repeated the pattern until Chelsea clawed at the bed and arched beneath him.

Just as she was about to explode, Daniel pulled back. He quickly replaced the condom with a new one and slid over and into her in one smooth movement.

“I need to be inside you again when you come.” He thrust deeply, almost savagely, into her as he sought to catch up to her.

Chelsea fell apart. The sensations exploded, ricocheting through her as he joined her with a deep groan.

For a long while they lay in a tangle of limbs as they caught their breaths.

Daniel kept on his elbows, sparing her most of his weight. Brushing her hair out of her eyes he asked, “How did I do?”

“Ask me again when I can see straight.”

Chuckling, he withdrew and took care of the condom before wrapping himself around her.

It was the last thing she was aware of before drifting into the abyss of sleep.

Chapter Three

A few days later, Chelsea stared at her bare walls and sighed as she talked to Cara for the second time in as many hours. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. You just concentrate on you and that man of yours.” She hung up and smiled at the darkly handsome man whose long limbs tangled with her own. “Cara worries way too much about…everything.”

Daniel grinned. “Maybe if you told her about us, she wouldn’t worry about you too.”

“I will, eventually.” If what they had didn’t burn out. At the moment, she was content that they were the only ones privy to the knowledge. Chelsea wasn’t interested in having other people dissecting her life any more than they already had. What she and Daniel had was between them and she liked it that way.

“You think she knew I was here?”

“If she did, I’d never have gotten her off the phone.” She stretched languidly, enjoying the feel of his solid body against hers. “She’s been going on and on about how I need to get over myself and find someone to have fun with. She’s mentioned you as a possible fling more than a few times.”

He chuckled. “So that’s all I am? A fling?”

Of course, that’s what it was. A niggling voice at the back of her mind reminded her that they’d been all over each other for several days now. But there had never been any discussion about anything further in advance of the next night. And why would there be? It wasn’t as if they were in a long-term relationship. She changed the subject with a shrug. “We should get out of here. Cara’s going to be gone a little while longer and she’s trusting me with the restaurant.”

If he noticed her evasion, he didn’t say anything. Instead, he levered himself out of bed to stand proudly naked before her.

For a long moment, she could only stare at his magnificent body.

“Keep looking at me like that and we’re never going to get out of here.” With a smirk, he leaned in, slowly parting her lips with his own.

Chelsea let him, enjoying the way he lazily plundered her mouth. It was several long, breathless minutes before she pushed him off. Getting carried away was too easy to do with him. “Come on. I’m not letting Cara down.”

He let out a long breath. “You know she won’t stop being your friend if you miss one smudge or a napkin isn’t folded to perfection, right?”

Daniel knew what she worried about, he just didn’t understand that she had been the one to abandon her friends once before. She wasn’t going to let them down again—any of them.

Instead of a reply, she just gave him a withering glance. “You want the shower first?”

His smile was back. Tugging her against him, he brushed his lips against hers, as well as more interesting parts of his anatomy. “Why don’t we save some time and get in together?”

How could she say no to that, even with the flawed logic? She took his hand and led him to the tiny bathroom and equally cozy shower.
Oh, how the mighty have fallen.
She ignored the sneering voice in her head that sounded suspiciously like her mother, and turned on the shower, hard and hot. It was much more fun to focus on the man who was sliding his slick hands over her.

And not on the past.

The water sluiced over them. Chelsea drew back to watch it ripple over the hard angles of his body. She’d gotten to know it very well over the past few days, but she still didn’t tire of exploring him.

He quickly donned a miraculously produced condom, hooked one hand under her knee and hitched her leg around his hips, thrusting into her, hard and deep, in one swift move.

Orgasm hit her in a long, hot wave. For a guy she’d been sleeping with for only a few days, he certainly knew how to play her body like a master musician would an instrument. Her body still humming, she hopped up and wrapped her other leg around him to seat him even deeper.

He turned around, pressing her into the cold wall, but she didn’t care. It gave Daniel more leverage. With nowhere to go, it left Chelsea no choice but to take all of him. Each thrust reached a spot she’d never known existed and sent pleasure radiating through her.

When his fingers found her clit and teased her in tandem with his thrusts, Chelsea had no hope of holding back. He rode out her orgasm until she sagged against him.

Chelsea had hoped for nothing more than a one-night stand. Only that night was so blisteringly hot they had to have a second night—and a third. Then it had just become what it was. Mind-blowing sex at night and acting like they barely knew each other during the day. As far as relationships went, it wasn’t the most conventional, but it was exactly what she needed right now.

“Stop thinking so much.” Daniel’s husky voice dragged her back to the incredible sensations he ignited in her body.

“Why don’t you make me?” She dared him with her grin.

“I thought you wanted to get to the restaurant?” He ground his hips against her, eliciting a gasp. He goaded her for an answer by doing it again. Slower. Deeper.

Restaurant? What restaurant? She didn’t give a damn about anything else but him and the pleasure he was able to coax out of her again and again. Chelsea shut him up by clawing her hands in his hair and dragging his mouth to hers.

Daniel resumed the hard, driving pace again, building her up for another shattering orgasm. But just as she was about to come, he withdrew.

“Daniel…”

“We’re in here to get clean, aren’t we?”

Clean? She was seconds away from another knee-wobbling orgasm and he wanted to get clean? Her retort was cut off by his biting kiss.

When he pulled back, he had the body wash in one hand and her net body scrubber in the other. He quickly worked the pouf until rich foam engulfed his hand and slid down his arm.

Daniel smirked at her as he ran it down the side of her neck, over her collarbone and circled one aching breast, leaving a soapy trail. He did the same to the other, slowly, surely. The fact that they had to be at the restaurant soon didn’t seem to worry him, as he determinedly painted her skin with white.

He covered her belly and each thigh before rubbing the rough net between her legs. The sensation of it over her clit sent tremors skittering through her, weakening her knees.

Holding her up, Daniel continued the sensual torture. The sensation was too much. The mixture of the slick foam, the roughness of the net and the gentle pressure melded to create an exquisite orgasm that wracked Chelsea as she came again with a stuttering cry.

Before she could recover, she found herself turned to face the wall. Daniel pressed into her from behind, his grip tight on her hips as he slowly filled her. Daniel started a slow pace that soon quickened until the force of his thrusts was almost bruising.

Chelsea pushed back into his strokes, wanting more. Being utterly possessed by Daniel was better than anything she could imagine.

She came again just as his rhythm broke and his thrusts turned shallow. He gripped her hips as he pushed himself into her as deeply as he could and sagged against her with a groan.