Читать книгу Sweet and Sinful - Jodi Lynn Copeland - Страница 7

“Sounds like someone used the stall with the vibrating toilet seat,” Candy observed when Courtney returned to her cubicle.

Breathing heavy with her excitement over what had gone down with Blaine, Courtney sank onto her office chair and laughed out loud.

Though she’d been sitting across the hall from Candy since coming to work for Pinnacle two years ago, Courtney had known little more than the woman’s name, that her lively personality made her a superior public relations specialist, and that she had more men at her beck and call than Courtney had met in her entire life.

Witnessing the intense gleam of satisfaction those men left in Candy’s eyes on a daily basis had been one of the many reasons Courtney finally said to hell with her upbringing-induced reservations. That gleam was the precise reason she sought out Candy’s help in getting in touch with her inner vixen. They still didn’t hang out much beyond working hours, but now she knew Candy had a delightfully warped sense of humor and a fierce loyalty to those lucky enough to call her friend.

Courtney kicked a heel against the gray Berber carpet, sending her chair spinning around until she faced Candy’s cubicle. Her smile came as quickly and naughtily now as it had when Blaine intuited she should drop by his house tonight for sex. There’d been a second there where she thought she’d read his invitation wrong, that he wasn’t as attracted to her new look as she’d been attracted to him from the day they met. The impatient way he eyed her up when he suggested she stop by his office instead of waiting until tonight trumped any misgivings.

He wanted her.

If it weren’t for needing to wrap up that proposal and her planned date with another man, she would spend the hour after lunch and then several hours after work tonight showing him exactly how much she wanted him.

There would be another chance. Soon, if the hungry ache he stirred in her pussy had a say. “I’m still getting used to the whole feminine power thing.”

A knowing smile curved Candy’s lips and edged into her brown eyes. “Who is he?”

“Blaine,” she said loudly enough to be heard but not overheard.

“Hate to break it to you, doll, but you could have had him long ago, even without working the feminine power angle.”

Candy’s assured tone pricked a hole in Courtney’s bliss bubble. She knew about Blaine’s reputation for getting around, but she thought he was at least as discerning about the women he slept with as she was with the men she did. “He’s that easy?”

“No. But he has always had a thing for you.”

Always? As in, even back when she’d been wearing her conservative clothing and living in fear of speaking her mind beyond from a professional standpoint? “Yeah, right.”

Candy placed a hand over her heart, covering almost more of her left breast than her turquoise silk halter top did. “Swear to God. He checks out your ass every opportunity he gets.”

“He’s been doing this since I started working here?”

“Yep.”

Not possible. Not having seen the women on Blaine’s arm at various company events. Not one of them had looked average. They were all stunning. All confident. All every bit the sex diva Courtney had become. “Are you trying to boost my confidence?”

“Hell, no. You’re doing a rocking job working the assertive, hot-bodied hoochie angle all on your own. Next time you’re around Blaine, give him an opening to look at your ass and I guarantee he’ll take it without a single bit of encouragement.”

The kitchen door swished inward behind him, and Blaine cursed under his breath. Throwing a spur-of-the-moment party, a day after returning home from an extended leave, had been a stupid-ass move. Not only did he have to spend two hours after work shopping for food and drinks, but he was still suffering from jet lag. It was barely after eight and he was exhausted.

With his back to the door, he leaned his elbows against the edge of the sink and stared out the window at the guests milling about his treed-in, half-acre backyard. The short end of an L-shaped, black and gray marble-topped counter separated him from whoever was behind him. Between the partial blockage and his stance, hopefully the person would take a hint and leave him to his alone time.

“Blaine.” Courtney’s voice came out a mix of surprise and delight.

Just like that he wasn’t tired anymore. Just like that he was anxious as hell to entertain.

“Courtney. It’s good to see you.” He spoke as he turned around, and then realized how big of an understatement the words were.

Standing a foot inside the doorway, she wore the sheer thigh-high stockings with the sexy black pinstripe she’d had on at the office. The green, off-the-shoulder top and black skirt were gone. Chain-link silver earrings dangled from her ears to nearly brush her bare shoulders, and a hot pink, spaghetti strap sheath dress clung to the swell of her breasts, the material coasting down her trim sides and shapely hips to end an inch before her stockings began. His fingers tingled with the prospect of touching the tanned skin revealed there.

“I’ve been here a while.” The surprise was gone from her voice, the delight now paired with the raw sensuality he felt calling to him this morning.

Blaine traveled his attention back up her body to find her gaze as assessing as his own. He hadn’t had time to change out of the blue jeans and casual off-white shirt he’d worn to work, before guests started arriving at his house. The heat sizzling in Courtney’s eyes and tipping her hot pink lips up at the corners suggested she approved of his appearance all the same.

She lifted the red plastic glass in her hand. “I didn’t realize the kitchen was off limits. My drink got warm while I was visiting, so I was trying to track down some ice.”

He smiled over the irony. Ice had been his excuse for retreating to the sanctity of his kitchen. More specifically, refilling the ice bucket from the snack table in the living room for the exact purpose that had brought her here.

Crossing to the counter, he grabbed the steel ice bucket and went to the refrigerator. “It’s not off limits,” he assured her as he pulled open the freezer-side door. Frosty air rushed out to greet him. With the way his internal temperature shot up at the sight of Courtney in that barely legal dress, the chilly blast was welcome.

“So you weren’t trying to escape by hiding out in here?”

He glanced over at her as he filled the ice bucket. He didn’t know a lot about her, outside of the fact that she was damned good at her job, but that question had sounded incredibly astute. “Know a thing or two about escape?”

Hesitation passed through her eyes for an instant. Then she gave him a smile that was pure feline. “You know as well as I do some people don’t get the concept of no strings.”

Blaine’s body forgot all about the freezer’s calming effect with the sexual intimation. His cock stirred against his zipper. He definitely knew all about strings and he knew right now he wanted to tug down the two thin ones keeping her dress in place.

Shutting the freezer door, he crossed to where she stood. His first thought at seeing her this morning was that she looked just like Candy, minus the hairstyle. Within touching distance, he could see the differences went well beyond their hair. Courtney’s legs were longer and her breasts, while still plentiful, smaller. Her face was smaller, as well. Her mouth wider and her eyes more round. The combination of her facial features managed to make her look both sweet and sinful at once.

And had him damned anxious to take advantage of proximity.

Traveling his gaze suggestively along her body, he gave her the opening to do so instead. “Take what you want.”

Courtney’s throat made a catching sound as she eyed first the ice bucket in the crook of one of his arms and then the growing bulge at the front of his jeans. Her eyes lifted to meet his. With a knowing grin, he silently dared her to reach out and fill up her hands.

She did. With ice.

Disappointment sailed through him as she plunked three small chunks of ice into her glass. With a murmured, “Thanks,” she started to turn toward the door.

No way was he letting her walk away that easily. Not when the air between them radiated with sexual heat and energy. Not when her nipples were pushing hard at the front of her dress, making his mouth hungry and it clear she wore no bra.

“Stay.” Blaine spoke the word with an edge of demand. Just as he’d been accurate about her naughty thoughts, he had a gut feeling she would be the type who liked to be told what to do when it came to sex. Just as she would want to have her own turn at being the dominant one.

His mind roaming with kinky demands, he backed the few feet to the table, and set the ice bucket on top. He patted the table’s black lacquered surface. “Have a seat. You wanted to hear how things went in Iraq.”

Indecision warred in her eyes as she glanced from him to the door and back again. For a moment he entertained the idea her new look was all for show, then he recalled she was on a date. The guy was undoubtedly out in the living room, his presence giving her reason to hesitate.

Before he could offer up further encouragement, Courtney’s back and forth glances came to a halt. Eagerness took over her expression as she sashayed over on spiked silver heels and set her glass on the table. With a provocative wiggle of her hips, she slid onto the table and balanced her heels on the front edge of a chair. “It had to be scorching hot.”

“Sweltering,” Blaine agreed with a nod. As was his blood as he appreciated the way her short hem rode up with her position, nearly exposing her panties. If she wore any. “Dry heat, but that doesn’t make it any less potent.”

Her hand shot out, reaching toward him. The thought she was ready to touch was enough to have his breath jerking in and his dick pearling with pre-cum.

Her fingers spread but failed to make contact as her eyes trained on his right arm. “Did you do some of the building work yourself?”

Muscles contracted in his arm reflexively. “I helped out, yeah.”

“It shows.”

She’d all but purred the words, sounding as strung out with desire as he felt. That being the case, he flexed the biceps in his right arm a second time. Appreciation shimmered in her eyes and her fingers formed into a fist as if she had to contain them.

He let out a rough laugh. “You’re allowed to touch.”

Her tongue came out, dabbing at her lower lip. “I’m good.”

“I bet you are.”

Courtney’s gaze flicked to his. Humor meshed with arousal, telling him she hadn’t missed the way he purposefully misunderstood her. The question was, what would she do about it?

A handful of seconds ticked past as they stared at one another. She looking ready to do him. He waiting for her to follow through on her dirty thoughts for once.

This time she didn’t disappointment. This time she reclined back on an elbow far enough to reach the ice bucket and then straightened again with an ice cube wedged between her right thumb and forefinger.

Pupils dilating, she sucked the cube between her bright pink lips—sensuously, slowly—and then traveled it downward. Along the slim column of her neck, past her collarbone. Into the vee of her cleavage exposed above the top edge of her dress. “So in this heat,” she asked in a breathy voice, “there wasn’t even a little moisture?”

Blaine’s body throbbed with her tone. Again with her intent, as she moved the ice cube lower, down her torso to caress it along the inside of a bare thigh above the band of her stocking.

Her question registered then. She was asking if he’d slept with anyone while abroad. Generally, he would never go months without sex. In Iraq, neither his high-risk location nor his priorities had left time or room for pleasure. The bulk of each day had been spent focusing on building the wastewater infrastructure, and the bulk of each night doing his best to shut out the sporadic bursts of distant gunfire and explosions to sleep off the wearing effects of the exhausting work and even more exhausting heat.

That celibacy streak played hell on him now, making his shaft pulse for release. “Not one bit of wetness,” he admitted tightly.

“That’s hard to believe.” Her fingers worked the ice cube farther up her thigh, almost to the point of disappearing beneath the hem of her dress. “You were away a long time.”

“I heard there was a lot of moisture here while I was gone.”

“Some.” The cube pushed higher, and then out of sight. Courtney’s breathing picked up. “There could be more.”

“Later tonight?” he asked, not bothering to hide his hopefulness.

“Or now.”

She didn’t bother to hide her hopefulness either. It came through loud and clear and sexy as hell as her upper body inclined toward him. Her free hand finally touched down on his arm, grabbing hold and jerking him against her.

He tipped his head back with the move, caught sight of her flushed face. Then her mouth was there, her lips soft yet hungry against his, urgent, taking. Demanding.

Hell, yes. She was everything he’d imagined and more.

Lashing his tongue with hers, he pulled aside the chair her feet balanced on and moved between her legs. Hot flesh cradled his hips. Her inner thighs squeezed around him.

Blaine’s pulse spiked with the carnal move, and he gave his hands over to their urge to roam.

One hand filled with the warmth of her thigh encased in silk while the other moved beneath the hem of her dress and found her fingers flicking the edge of the ice cube against her sex through her panties. He’d wondered if she would have any on, and he was damned glad to learn that she did. It made taking the ice cube from her and pulling the panties aside to slip the cube inside the lips of her pussy that much sweeter.

Courtney’s hips surged forward with the frosty contact against her warm folds. She gripped his forearms and whimpered into his mouth. He swallowed the sound with his lips, kissing her harder, deeper, tasting vodka and white-hot female as he worked the ice along the swollen pearl of her clit and into her body until the cube was melted. He filled her sheath with two fingers then, his own sex throbbing with each delectable hug of hers.

Pulling back from her mouth, he nudged aside her short hair and a dangling earring to nuzzle at her neck. The ecstatic moan that tore from her lips had him placing his mouth back on hers fast. Obviously her neck was a serious pleasure zone. And obviously he was more of a gentleman than he’d ever realized to remember they weren’t truly alone and would be even less so if she kept up with the moaning. Next time she could make all the noise she wanted.

There would be a next time. Soon, if he had his way.

Tonight they’d already pushed their luck, behaving this way in his kitchen while being essentially surrounded by colleagues. His release would have to wait. Hers was seconds away.

Blaine focused on delivering her to a fast finish, drawing out the rhythm of his fingers as he moved them within her. Playing on the icy hot sensations he could guess were shooting through her body. Stroking her clit to the point of explosion.

Climax tore through her in a rushing wave evident in the tremble of her legs and the clenching of her pussy. Hot cream soaked his fingers.

Courtney’s mouth jerked from his. “Oh, God—yes!”

With an inward laugh over her enthusiasm, he clamped his lips back tight to hers and filled her mouth with his tongue, kissing her silent until the last of the orgasm was drained from her body.

Slipping his hand from beneath her skirt, he moved back a step. She looked the picture of sexual fulfillment, reclined on her elbows with her long dark lashes masking her eyes and her puffy lips parted a half inch and panting for air. It was a pose he could happily appreciate for hours. But not one he was willing to share with their coworkers. “Much as I love a vocal lover, your scream should have the kitchen filling up in about five seconds.”

“I didn’t scream,” she said languidly. “I shouted.”

“Whatever. I liked it.” The hem of her dress had gotten pushed up with his fingering and her panties were still dragged to the side, exposing her glistening pink labia past trimmed brown pubic hair. Definitely his kind of nice. “All of it. Well worth the wait.”

She sat up abruptly, destroying his stellar view as her skirt fell back around her thighs. Her eyes opened to reveal hazy blue-green. “How long have you—”

The swishing of the kitchen door cut her off. “Courtney,” a male voice said from behind Blaine. “There you are. I thought you got bored and took off.”

Courtney’s gaze zipped past Blaine, and the passion died from her eyes in a heartbeat. She shot off the edge of the table. “Nope. Just getting some.” She stumbled over the words, quickly adding, “Ice, that is. My drink got warm.” Reaching back, she flashed Blaine an uneasy smile as she scooped her drink off the table. “Thanks. Really.”

“My pleasure. You need more, you know where to get it.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Her smile going sensual, she sent a wink to the guy at the door.

Or rather guys, Blaine discovered as he swiveled around to find an unfamiliar, tall blond man accompanied by Jake and Randy Dobson, a mechanical engineer at Pinnacle. In his mid-thirties and garbed in pineapple-patterned swim trunks and a white tank shirt, Randy was the antithesis of the stereotypical think-inside-the-box engineer. He took his premature balding about as serious as anything else.

“Hey, guys.” Courtney nodded at their coworkers as she made her way over to her date. “Looking good as always.” She took the blond by the arm and her smile grew suggestive. “You look like you should be taking me out dancing.”

The idea that she would soon be pressed up against the blond on a dance floor ate at Blaine’s gut, but only because he was still hard from being pressed up against her himself. Still, the idea didn’t agitate him nearly enough to stop him from checking out her ass as she led the guy out of the kitchen.

The door fell closed, obliterating his view. He looked over at Jake and Randy to find their attention had been directed in the same place as his own. Obviously, they were wifeless tonight, or confident their spouses were nowhere nearby.

Randy met his eyes, a shit-eating grin forming on his mouth. “Was it as good for you as it was for her?”

Blaine bit back a grunt. Lying wasn’t his strong suit, but he was still going to try. “I hate to ruin your fun but, like she said, she just came in to get ice. We talked about my work overseas and the heat over there. That’s it.”

Snorting, Jake crossed to the refrigerator and helped himself to a bottle of beer. “Bullshit.”

Randy backed up the field guy’s theory. “Yeah, right, man. But, hey, since when do you lie about sex?”

“I’m not lying. We didn’t fuck. Christ, she was only in here five minutes. Ten tops.”

Jake unscrewed the cap off his beer and pulled back a long drink before saying dryly, “Next you gonna try to convince us Sex on the Beach gives off that realistic of a smell?”

Damn, he’d known his rock-solid state was fairly obvious, but he hadn’t considered the smell.

Going to the refrigerator, Blaine used the cool air to calm his body while he transferred bottles of beer from the cases on the floor onto the fridge’s lower shelves.

“If you’re thinking about getting serious,” Jake continued soberly, “you might want to take some friendly advice and remember what I said. She’s after no-strings pleasure for a while, but she already has her sights set on one man for the long run.”

“Yeah,” Randy piped in, for once sounding serious himself, “and I heard he doesn’t work for Pinnacle, so that leaves you SOL, buddy.”

“Looks like you stroked somebody the right way.” Stabbing a bite of taco salad from a plastic takeout container, Candy nodded past Courtney’s shoulder.

Courtney’s belly tightened as she set her tuna-salad croissant on her plate on the table and slowly turned in her chair. She half expected Blaine to be standing behind her, ready for a second round of ice play, his devilishly taunting smile making his thoughts clear to every one of the two-dozen-plus employees in Pinnacle’s lunchroom.

Or maybe that was half hoping, Courtney realized, given her displeasure at finding not Blaine but Sherry, the front-desk admin, waiting for her.

She noted the woman was smiling then and that in her hands was a nearly foot-long, thin red box with a gilded ribbon wrapped around it.

“For me?” The words came out sounding pathetically hopeful, as was the glee rocketing through her, but Courtney couldn’t help it. Despite her revamped attitude toward life and sex, she’d never gotten a gift from an admirer. Not even on Valentine’s Day. Not even from her lone boyfriend, a guy she’d dated in college for almost a year before realizing he was more boringly average and reserved than she had been at the time.

Sherry nodded. “I left the front desk long enough to send a fax, and when I came back this box was waiting with your name on it.”

Thirty seconds passed where Courtney did little more than sit and grin, and Candy encouraged, “Open it already. You’re starving your coworkers.”

A glance around the room backed up Candy’s words. Most everyone in the place was waiting to see what she’d gotten.

Courtney quit with the idiotic grinning, took the box from Sherry, and untied the ribbon. Lifting the lid had the strains of “Always On My Mind” filling the lunchroom. The lyrics were loud enough to chase heat into her cheeks, a reaction she generally reserved for those times when her date walked in on her climaxing for another man.

The heat arrowed downward, bringing to life a lusty ache in her core. She hadn’t seen Blaine since leaving his kitchen with her panties still damp four nights ago. First, it had been the weekend, and then he’d been working in the field on a road job.

Was this gift from him? Had he really been hot for her long before her transformation, the way Candy had implied and the way his comment on her being worth the wait seemed to suggest?

Since she vowed not to let herself get wrapped up in one man so soon and since Blaine was a known no-strings kind of guy, Courtney forgot about the questions to focus on the gift. She pulled aside a thin red sheet of tissue paper and a dozen rosebud-shaped dark chocolates winked at her.

Candy let out a low whistle. “Nice. Not that cost is the point, but those sell for close to fifty.”

Holy cow. Whoever her admirer was, he obviously had money to burn. Courtney did a quick check for a card or anything else that might hint at the sender. Finding nothing, she set the box on the table. “In that case, I’ll forget about eating them.”

Candy looked stricken. “You will not. They’re laced with imported liquor and beyond awesome, or so I’ve been told. Eat one for me, if not for yourself.”

Courtney had been raised to save dessert for last, to ensure her body got all the nutrients it needed before being filled with fat. But then, she’d also been raised to believe her body was a temple only her husband deserved the right to worship. Saying to hell with the whole temple concept had left her feeling incredibly good. Saying to hell with saving dessert for last was bound to not only taste incredibly good but would make Candy happy, since her coworker had a cocoa allergy and couldn’t eat chocolate.

“All right. For you.” Courtney lifted a rosebud from the box, thinking it should be gilded itself for the price. She popped the candy into her mouth. Scrumptious rich dark chocolate exploded over her taste buds. Eliciting an unconscious moan, she bit into the candy’s center and liquor filled her mouth.

Strong liquor. Burning strong. Gagging strong.

She sucked in a breath in an effort to cool the burn. The liquor spread, coating the back of her mouth. Leaving her tongue feeling heavy, thick. Cottony.

Attempting to move her tongue had the unchewed portion of the candy sliding back, filling her throat. Stealing the air from her lungs.

Courtney’s eyes bulged with the sickening awareness she couldn’t breathe. Panic clawed at her from the inside out.

Oh, God! Her first admirer gift was going to kill her!

Slapping a hand at her fiercely pounding chest, she silently begged Candy for help. Her coworker was on the other side of the table and, by the time she realized Courtney was choking, it was too late. Someone else was already there, helping her.

A hard body pressed against her from behind. Strong arms slid around her waist. One fisted hand wrapped around another against her stomach, jerking solidly upward.

Once.

Twice.

Gasps filled the lunchroom as the half-eaten candy flew from Courtney’s mouth and landed on the next table over. Sweet air cruised into her mouth and down to her lungs on a whooshing breath. Tears pricked at her eyes, blurring her vision.

Praise the saints.

Her tongue still felt leaden, coated with the horribly strong liquor. But she could breathe. She was going to live.

Pulling in deep breaths, she wiped the stinging tears from her eyes. Her vision cleared to reveal everyone in the lunch room watching her. Not yet sure she was ready to speak, she gave a small smile and a wave to show them she was all right.

Candy stood at the other side of the table. The usual sass and vitality was gone from her brown eyes, replaced with horrified concern. “Jesus, you scared the crap out of me. Are you okay?”

Courtney cleared her throat. Finding it a little tender but not painfully so, she attempted a response. “Yeah. I—”

“You sure?” It was Blaine’s voice asking the question, his warm breath whispering next to her ear.

Delightfully life-confirming shivers skated along her neck. A different kind of awareness gripped her as she looked at the arms still wrapped around her middle, the intimately familiar hands, and realized he was the one who’d potentially saved her life.

So many ways she would love to thank him. With her mouth. With her body. Since they were once again surrounded by coworkers, she just said, “I’m sure. So you can release me.”

The press of his body left hers. His arms slid from around her. Ruing the loss, she turned to offer an appreciative smile.

While he was no longer holding her, he was still close. Too close not to savor the way the slate gray T-shirt molded to his chest, the damp material calling out the mouthwateringly work-honed muscles in his upper arms while suggesting he’d been working under the summer sun all morning. Too close not to let her gaze wander down to the tauntingly snug fit of his well-worn jeans. And too close not to appreciate the almost-black stubble dusting his angular jawline and the glistening skin above his upper lip as her attention drifted slowly back up.

Damn, he looked good fresh from the field. Sweaty and unshaven. The overlong bangs of his thick, dark hair hanging at an angle, nearly caressing his right eyebrow. Like she should take him back to his office and see if she couldn’t get him sweatier yet.

Behind her, Candy gave a discreet cough.

Courtney’s thoughts zipped back to the present, to the fact that she was grinning like a fool again. Well, geez, the guy had probably saved her life, what did people expect if not a little hero worship? Okay, and a little horny drooling.

“Looks like I owe you another thanks,” she finally got out. “The liquor was stronger than I thought it would be.” Truthfully, the candies were downright nasty, but given their cost, she would withhold her judgment. Beside, maybe others would like them.

Grabbing the box off the table, she held it out to Blaine. “Want one?”

He eyed the chocolates skeptically. “Not if they’re going to kill me.”

She waved the box around the lunchroom. “Anyone else?”

Apparently deciding she was okay, several people had returned to work. Those who remained declined the offer. Courtney set the box back on the table as she slid onto her chair. She grabbed her water bottle and guzzled a long drink in the hopes of getting the revolting taste of the liquor out of her mouth and making her tongue feel normal in the process.

Blaine moved to stand at the head of the table. He tucked his hands into the back pockets of his jeans and watched her drink through narrowed navy blue eyes. “Sure you’re all right?”

Courtney set the bottle down, considering his tone and stance. He seemed every bit as concerned as Candy. Possibly more so.

Had the chocolates been from him and was he now feeling guilty over her reaction to them? The answer was totally irrelevant, and still she was dying to know. “I’m fine. Aren’t you supposed to be working in the field?”

“Keeping tabs on my schedule?”

“I needed a dollar figure for a job and knew you could rattle it off the top of your head much faster than I could look it up. You weren’t in your office so I checked the sign-out sheet.” Total fabrication, but lying was far better than admitting she wanted to see how he would behave around her after the incident in his kitchen.

The concern left his eyes. “I was on a job site. Things were running smoothly, so I came back to the office to finish up some paperwork. Speaking of which, I should get to it.” With a parting nod to her and Candy, Blaine headed for the lunchroom door.

Courtney sighed as she watched him walk away. Given his indifference toward her once she assured him she could breathe normally, their actions Friday night had left him unfazed. She’d been just another woman he’d brought pleasure. Now, he was back to business as usual. While she was left to ogle his ass and wonder if there was still a chance Candy had been accurate about his supposed time-and-again urges to ogle Courtney’s own.