Three Hard Lessons (19 page)

“I know, but . . . still.”

Three days left with him, and now one of them had been taken away.

“I understand,” I said, my voice tight. “I’ll see you when you get home.”

There was a soft sigh. “Please don’t wait up for me. I’ll feel even worse if you do.”

I held my tongue from asking if I had anything better to do. “Okay. Hope they get it figured out soon.”

“Me, too.” He paused. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

After the call was over, I fried up the chicken, ate a little, and put it in the comically small refrigerator. I drank one of the beers I’d bought, surfed mindlessly on the Internet for a while, and avoided thinking about him or what next week was going to be like. Probably a lot like this. No, it’d be fucking worse. I hadn’t even thought about the time difference.

One week ago I’d thrown a fit about sleeping arrangements. Now I was alone in his bed, pissed off, wishing he was here. Not just for the sex either, although I had no complaints there. Every day since our safe word discussion he’d edged a little closer to the line I’d asked him to cross.

Sometime later, the bed jostled and woke me.

“You’re awake?” he whispered.

“Yeah.” I rolled over and tossed my arm around him without thought, but the action wasn’t lost on either of us. I didn’t snuggle, I merely allowed him to. Something as simple as this was huge for me. I kept my voice even, but my arm where it was. “What time is it?”

“A little after two.” Dominic drew me in closer so I was tucked beside him. I had a hand on his chest, and beneath my fingertips, his heart raced.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

“I’m fine.”

I didn’t need to see his face, which I couldn’t in the darkened bedroom anyway, to know he was lying. “What is it?”

“Come to work with me tomorrow. You can ride the train during rush hour and get the full experience.”

“Is it bring your girlfriend to work day?” I asked, skeptical.

His heart beat faster. “My what?”

Jesus, what was with me tonight? Who was I turning into? “Shut up, you obviously heard me. All I meant was, is that all right?”

His hand skimmed over my forearm, past my elbow, traveling up to my shoulder. “It’s okay. I’ll give you a quick tour and we’ll stay out of the way. I probably don’t need to be in the office until later anyway.”

The warm hand settled on my jaw, his thumb brushing over my cheek. I was curious to see where he worked. “Okay, sure.”

For the first night since we’d arrived here, there was no sex. Instead he gave me a kiss that was slow and hypnotic. He kissed me like a man with all the time in the world, though we had only two days left. I didn’t just allow this kiss, I liked it. I craved more. I craved being in his strong embrace. His effect over me . . . I was fucking powerless to stop it.

“No,” Dominic said in the shower. “We don’t have time for that.”

Of course I took it as a challenge.

Harsh hands yanked me upright as I tried to kneel. “I’m serious. My cock’s off limits right now.”

“I don’t know,” I gazed down, “sure doesn’t look like he’s closed for business.”

The vibrant blue eyes glinted with lust. “You’ve trained him. Just getting near this shower gets him hard as a rock.”

“You don’t want me to help with that?” I purred through the steamy air. “Don’t you want my lips wrapped around you, sucking you until you’re dry?”

His gaze turned cloudy as he rinsed the last of his shampoo from his hair and I followed the bubbles cascading down his slippery skin.

“Are you already done with your shower?” he asked.

I nodded. We had plenty of time–

He yanked back the shower curtain and forced me from the tub.

“What are you doing?” I yelled. I stood on the rug, drenched and dripping, glaring at him as he yanked the curtain closed, separating us.

“I don’t trust myself with you, devil woman. Go put some clothes on. I’ll be done in a minute.”

My blood boiled while I shivered in the cold.

“Wear a skirt,” came from behind the curtain.

I made a loud noise of frustration and stormed away.

“Are you really that mad because I didn’t let you go down on me?” he asked when we were pulling on shoes at the front door. I’d sipped my coffee in total silence. Hadn’t said a word to him since the shower.

Yeah, I was mad. I only had a few mornings left with him. Why had he denied it? “Maybe I’m worried something’s wrong with you. What guy turns that down?”

He gave me a weird smile. “Maybe the one trying to keep you from falling into a routine. You know, so you don’t get
bored
.”

That just made me more annoyed. I marched beside him toward the station, pulling my jacket tight around me. It was cold and overcast this morning, matching my mood.

“Are you claustrophobic?” Dominic stood beside me as we queued up to board the train. All around us, business people waited, polite and orderly. It was mostly men with briefcases and newspapers tucked under an arm.

“No,” I answered. “Why?”

“They’re going to pack us into the train car. Like, literally. Stay close to me or we’ll end up on opposite sides.”

The train’s light leaped into view and focused as it barreled at us. It slowed to a stop, the doors peeled open, and there was a surge from behind, propelling us forward. I gasped as we compressed with the line of people in front of us, mobbing onto the car where it was already standing room only.

I pivoted in my spot, only to shuffle backward as the wall of people continued to push and thicken. I was pressed up against Dominic, but also the Japanese salarymen around me. Jesus, when were the people going to stop trying to get on? I was crushed against the people around me. At the doors, a pair of conductors pushed at the body parts sticking through the doorway until the doors could finally close.

I could feel the man behind me breathing, I was that tight against him. I looked at the other human sardines around me. No one cared. They stood in total silence. No one on cell phones. No one moved, not that they could, I assumed out of respect. Dominic was right. This was wild. We stood chest to chest and I lifted my gaze to connect with his.

I smiled, wanting him to know I was enjoying this.

He was tired. He’d only gotten three hours of sleep last night. But when he returned the smile, the exhaustion faded from his eyes.

It was a fifteen minute train ride and it delivered us close to the harbor. The salty smell and seabirds announced which way to go, but I put my hand in his anyway. Fuck my rules about getting intimate. It was futile. I was attached, and going to stay attached as long as possible.

There was a small building no larger than a trailer sandwiched between a seemingly endless maze of different colored containers, some towers stacked six high. I ascended the metal stairs behind Dominic while he unlocked the door and pulled the clipboard from the box attached to it.

His office was organized, but also like stepping back into the 1980s. A massive desktop computer. Fax machine. Filing cabinets. Stacks and stacks of paper. The window on one side of the narrow office faced the cranes that loomed over the water’s edge.

I stared at the sad looking office, and I got angry.

“You spend all day here?”

“When I’m not counting inventory.” He scanned the clipboard and set it on the desk.

“This place sucks.”

He laughed. “Yeah, it’s not great. Come on, I’ll show you around.”

We walked through the rows of containers as he described his system for receiving the inventory through customs . . . basically it was a lot of paperwork. It wasn’t the most boring job in the world, but close.

I followed him as we wound deeper and deeper into the container maze. “Where are we going?”

He pulled me to a stop, his eyes shifting left, then right. Hands closed on my hips and urged me around the corner until metal was hard against my back. We were in the shadow of a tall tower, stacked very close to another. Secluded and hidden, but not out of the realm of possibility that someone could wander by. As we’d worked our way to this spot, we’d passed a dock worker, and I could hear forklifts running in the distance.

My pulse quickened when he tugged loose the belt on my wool jacket as if desperate to get inside. His hot mouth claimed mine as he continued to undo the buttons and flung the jacket open. His fingers were under my shirt instantly, gliding over my belly and sliding upward.

“Your hands are freezing!”

He chuckled. “It’s warm in here.”

The cup of my bra was tugged out of his way, and his icy hand closed over my breast, pressing me back into the metal wall.

“Is someone going to catch us?”

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” His mouth roved over mine. “If someone came around the corner and saw me fucking you?”

My body burst into flames with desire. “You’re going to fuck me here?”

The heat of his body left as he pulled back and the expression on his face was immoral. “Only if you’re good. And
quiet
.” His hands balled fistfuls of the maxi skirt I was wearing. “Can you be quiet, Payton?”

I nodded.

“I don’t know if I believe you. Let’s find out.”

He tugged off his outer coat and dropped it to the ground, leaving him in his suit and tie that was like the male equivalent of lingerie. Then, hands pushed up my skirt as he sank to his knees, kneeling on his coat. Cold air hit my knees and thighs where my boots stopped, and I held the skirt for him. He liked having use of his hands, after all.

His fingers hooked under one side of my thong. Dominic used both hands on it, gripping and pulling hard until the elastic stretched beyond capacity and the destroyed underwear fell to my ankles. I stepped out of it eagerly, lust making my knees weak.

I moaned softly as his fingers parted me. I bit my bottom lip when he leaned forward and licked me.

“God, you taste good,” he whispered.

I shivered from his words, not the cold. My hands clenched the skirt tighter, straining against the fabric. Staying quiet was going to be the most difficult thing I’d ever done in my life.

“Is this why you wouldn’t let me go down on you this morning?”

“Ssh.”

I swallowed a breath. His tongue stroked and massaged my clit. Heat swelled and expanded in my chest, strangling my breath.
Quiet,
I whispered to myself. Prove you can do this or he might not give you what you really want, that connection.

He slipped a finger inside me and it felt so fucking good but I made barely a sound.

“Do you want to come?”

He’d programmed me with his words, night after night of it. The starting sequence triggered waves of pleasure deep inside, and anticipation left me breathless. “Yes.”

“Do you
need
to come? Would you do anything for it?”

I was already too frantic to notice the subtle difference. “Yes.” The next thing he said would be the order I was desperate to obey.

His gaze turned up to me, his eyes shockingly blue. “Then, stay with me.”

chapter

SEVENTEEN

My stomach twisted into knots, and this unexpected command threw my brain into chaos. “What?”

Dominic continued to work his finger in and out of me, keeping me right on the edge of the orgasm. There was a crease in his forehead and his expression was uncertain.

“I need another week.” He took a deep breath and his voice plummeted to a hush. “I’m not ready to let you go.”

All this had been calculated. Last night his heart had hammered out of his chest because he was setting this plan into motion. The plan to manipulate me into staying. I should have been upset, but this was a stay of execution.

“Please.” He kissed me softly where the ache for him was unbearable.

I sighed when a second finger speared into me. It filled me with more need until there was room for nothing else. My hand tangled in his hair. Not stopping, just desperate to touch him.