Breaking All Her Rules (6 page)

He poured a glass of wine for her, and handed it over. “Where do you eat?” he asked.

“The couch,” she said. “That’s what the coffee table is for. But this place is the size of a goldfish bowl so I find less furniture is better.”

They took their plates into the living room and he sat on the couch. She eyeballed it, and the little wedge of space left for her. David hadn’t taken up so much space, that was for sure.

She let out a breath and sat down next to him, their thighs touching.

“So tell me about the previous sex, which was bad,” he said.

“Uh...not bad. Just...not remarkable. I had a boyfriend in college who was young. You know what I mean by that.”

“Fast?”

“Very.”

“And after that?”

“Two years of celibacy, followed by David. Who I was with for five years. I lived with him for a while. Which I think was kind of the beginning of the end. He was like a fixture, and so was I. And you stop looking at fixtures, especially when you’re busy. And you?”

He took a bite of his rice and looked away. “Before you, I hadn’t had sex in six years.”

Chapter Six

Well, damn. So, he’d confessed
that
. Something about this little velvet couch must have been reminiscent of a psych office. Not that he’d ever been to one. Though, some, like his manager, would argue he should go. Deal with his issues. His grief.

But he didn’t want to. His grief was his blanket and without it...without it he would be exposed.

Though, grief was a damned itchy blanket.

Even so, he was attached.

“You...what?” She blinked rapidly, dark lashes fluttering with the movement.

“Are you asking for me to elaborate or to repeat the statement?”

“Elaborate, please. I was under the impression you just went through a divorce. Though, if you hadn’t had sex in six years, I can see why the divorce was necessary.”

He shook his head. “I got divorced six years ago. Or rather, my wife left me six years ago, I’m not really sure when the thing was finalized. I just signed papers. Neither of us did much. She didn’t want the house. We didn’t have any...kids to fight over.” That always pulled him up. Saying he didn’t have kids.

He didn’t. But he still felt like a father. He still loved a little girl with everything in him, even though she wasn’t here.

“It was an easy divorce,” he said, because that much was true. There hadn’t been any glue holding him and Stephanie together in the end.

He didn’t blame her for it. She wanted to leave their house, leave the town. He didn’t. She wanted to run from the memories, he wanted to live in them. And in the end, it had meant she’d needed to run from him. He couldn’t be angry at her for that.

“Oh...I...I’m sorry. I mean...good for an easy divorce, but...I’m sorry.”

He looked down at his food, a ball of hard, heavy emotion settling in his chest. The worst thing was, now he felt like he had to talk about it. Because pretending Tally hadn’t been a part of everything was...it wasn’t fair. He didn’t want to act like she didn’t exist. But he didn’t like talking about her, either.

So he wouldn’t. Not now.

He set his plate down on the pretty little side table. “Suddenly, I’m not so hungry for food,” he said.

“But we just...not a half hour ago we...”

“Come on, Grace. I just told you. Six years.” He picked up his wineglass and knocked back the remaining contents. He needed it. He needed to forget.

He needed
her
.

“Where’s your bedroom?” he asked.

“Down the hall.”

He stood up and she did, too, then he scooped her up into his arms. She squeaked and wrapped her arms around his neck. She was so small, so light. He kind of liked it. Because it made him feel strong. And because he knew he could lift her up and move her around easily. For sex in interesting ways. He was a simple man. At least, he would prefer to be. Sex and beer. He could deal with that.

Maybe that had been half his problem for the past few years. Beer and sadness. Not beer and sex. He was changing that.

He was changing it now.

He charged down the hall, holding her close to his chest. “That door!” she said, gesturing to the one near the end of the hall.

He pushed it open with his shoulder and brought them inside, putting her down on the center of the bed. He stripped his clothes off as quickly as possible. “This is becoming a habit when you’re around,” he said. “Why did I even bother to get dressed?”

“You would have emotionally scarred the delivery guy.”

“Is my body that hideous?” he asked.

She laughed. “
Hideous
is not the word I’d use.”

“What is?” he asked, arching a brow.

“Jaw-dropping. Sexy. An ode to classic masculinity.”

“Stop it, Gracie, you’ll make me blush. Now take off your dress.”

She obeyed, revealing herself to him slowly. Inch by tantalizing inch. “How about, cowboy? What do you see?”

“I’m an artist, you know,” he said, feeling like a jerk for saying it in even a semiserious manner. “So I’m an expert on art and the like.”

“Are you?”

“I am. So I know a little something about fine pieces. About beauty.” He got down on the bed beside her, tracing her curves, shaping her body with the palms of his hands like she was clay. “You are a masterpiece.”

He pressed a kiss to her stomach, then lower, spreading her thighs and burying his face between them. He would never get enough of this. Of her.

Grace thought she was headed for an early, pleasure-induced death. Wasn’t that what the French called orgasm anyway? A little death? Clearly, no French person had ever slept with Zack Camden.

An orgasm from him was destruction. It leveled everything in its path. Had changed everything inside of her. And he was about to do it again. She wanted to stop him. And she wanted to urge him on.

She gripped his hair, and he gripped her legs, tugging them up over his shoulders as he deepened his tasting of her.

He changed their positions, moved up her body and kissed her lips. She could taste her own arousal on his lips.

“Ah, damn. Left the condoms in the kitchen,” he said.

“I have, like, one or two in the drawer there, I bet. Though, sadly, they aren’t ribbed.”

“You liked it ribbed?”

She smiled. “I did.”

He reached to the left and opened up her bedside drawer. And a somewhat horrifying thought occurred to her.

“Oh! Wait...” she said.

And it was too late.

“Oh...” he said.

“Sorry. I should...have...gotten them.” She wasn’t going to get blushy over a vibrator. Obviously she had one. She was a single woman, with needs and stuff.

He should expect that she had one. He probably had lube by his bed to facilitate handiwork.

Even so, she was embarrassed. She was not one of those women who went to parties where there were sex toys. Not one of those women who let their friends in on how successful their new vibrator purchase was. Though, she had one of those friends. She kept silent while that friend talked and made subtle notes about what she’d recommended. Which was how she’d ended up with her most personal of battery-operated devices.

But as with everything else in her life, she kept her personal indulgences—meaning sexy toys—to herself. Because it just didn’t seem like something she needed people to know about.

He took out the two stray condoms—condoms that were left over from when she’d actually had a man living here—and kept his eyes on her very blue, very realistically shaped, vibrator.

“It’s a personal massager,” she said.

“Uh-huh.”

“You can buy a whole set. Lots of different body-part options. Hands, et cetera. Thought this one might be perfect for getting in that hard-to-reach place between my...shoulder blades.”

“I believe you,” he said. “But I would like to investigate further.” His eyes met hers. “Do I have your permission?”

“What?”

“Toys are meant to be played with, Grace.”

Her heart hammered, hard and steady, heat flooding her face. Well, so much for keeping this private. But suddenly, she didn’t want to. Suddenly, it wasn’t embarrassment flooding her with heat. “I would have thought some guys would be intimidated by bringing another penis into the bedroom.”

“That little thing?” he asked, and admittedly, it was smaller than he was. “Nah.”

“Sure...I guess...whatever makes you happy.”

“I intend to make you happy,” he said. He took the blue phallus out of the drawer and her stomach tightened. She didn’t know why seeing him hold it was hot, but it was. She’d given up questioning this thing with him. She was ready to just embrace it.

She was having a sexual awakening at thirty. Twelve years and two partners after her virginity had been lost.

She’d love to claim it was because she knew herself better now, but that wasn’t it at all. Because it she hadn’t ended up switching phones with him they wouldn’t be here. She would have found another guy similar to her exes, she was sure. Another soft, well-dressed, well-spoken business-oriented type.

It would have never occurred to her that someone so rough, so different from her, would be the man who lit her fire higher than anyone who’d come before him.

“Do you know what you’re doing with that thing?” she asked, the question coming out breathless and thin.

A smiled curved his lips. “I think I can figure it out. Open up for me.”

She opened her mouth and he pressed the tip of the toy to her bottom lip. She curled her tongue around the head, and he groaned, pushing it in farther. She closed her lips around it and he pushed it in slowly, gently, then pulled it back out.

“You’re damn good at that,” he said, drawing it gently out of her mouth. “Need to make sure it’s good and wet for you.” His eyes never left hers, the deep, suggestive timbre of his voice shivering through her.

“I’m good and wet for you,” she said.

He swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. “Lick it for me.”

It was so absurd, and so dirty. And she did it. Because it turned her on to watch his face as she ran her tongue over the soft rubber.

He pulled the toy away from her, then moved it down between her thighs, sliding it over her sensitive bundle of nerves, the rippled surface sending a flood of sensation through her. Then he twisted the base, turning it on, the addition of gentle vibration nearly sending her over the edge.

She’d used this alone, sure, but it was different with Zack controlling the movements. She couldn’t anticipate what would happen next, where he would move, if he would apply pressure or take some away.

“More?” he asked.

She bit her lip and nodded, and he twisted the base again, amping up the speed and intensity. He slid it through her slick folds, before dipping the tip inside. She gasped, gripping his arm as he pushed the vibrator in deeper.

“So wet,” he said. “You’re ready for me, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Not yet,” he said.

He pushed the vibrator further inside of her, then leaned in and ran his tongue over her clit. She bucked against him, and he moved the toy and his tongue in rhythm together, pushing her up over the edge. Her orgasm crashed through her body, her internal muscles squeezing tight, and she forked her fingers through his hair, tugging hard, forcing his head down harder between her thighs as she rode out her orgasm.

He chuckled, then pulled away from her, vibrator still in hand. “Now it’s my turn,” he said. “Put the condom on me.”

She sat up and tore the condom open, wrapping her hand around his thick arousal and squeezing gently before rolling the latex on.

He put the head of the vibrator on her clit, the base resting on her stomach, then entered her slowly, the combination of Zack and the vibrations almost enough to make her come again, not two minutes after she already had.

It was nearly too much.

He thrust hard into her, pushing the head of the rubber toy roughly against her. She turned her head into his shoulder and bit him, hard, trying to hold back the flood of near unendurable pleasure that was rioting through her.

“Zack,” she whispered. “Zack.”

“That’s it, Gracie,” he said. No one had ever called her that. No one but him. “Come for me, baby.” And no one had ever said anything like that to her before. No one. Only Zack.

The ferocity of his movements increased, all control lost completely. And then she let go of hers. Swallowed by pleasure, almost overwhelmed by the release that tore its way through her body.

A short, low growl escaped Zack’s lips as he came, hard, his whole body shaking as his orgasm hit home, his erection pulsing inside of her.

He collapsed against her, breathing heavily, the vibrator still buzzing between their bodies. He laughed, rubbing his sweat-slicked forehead against her cheek, before kissing her lightly. Then he rolled to the side, his arm flung over his face.

“Dear Lord,” he said. “You need some kind of a disclaimer.”

“I think that’s my line.” She picked up the vibrator and turned it off, chucking it toward the foot of the bed. She’d take care of it later.

“I don’t think I was ready for the likes of you, Grace Song,” he said, rolling out of bed. “And now I have condom issues to see to.”

“See to them,” she said, waving her hand.

She laid on her back on the bed, staring at the ceiling. Not thinking or moving. Then Zack came back into the room, hovering over her.

“You’re blocking my ceiling spot,” she said.

He smiled. “Too bad.” Then he lay down beside her with the subtlety of an earthquake.

“Gah!” she shrieked, popping up off the mattress.

He chuckled and put his hand on her stomach, tracing a shapeless pattern over her skin. “Something wrong?”

“No.”

“I’m tired,” he said. “Can I sleep here with you?”

“You have that gigantic suite,” she mumbled.

“You said a bad word, Grace,” he said.

She felt her face heat. “So I did.”

“Yeah, but my suite is empty,” he said, pulling her close. “I don’t want to go back to an empty suite. I’m so sick of empty rooms.”

“I bet,” she said, putting her hand over his forearm. She hesitated. She shouldn’t ask him about his past. Shouldn’t ask him about his wife. But she wanted to know. “What happened with your wife?”

He took a deep breath, his chest pressing into her back. “We ended up in a different life than we were supposed to be in. And...in the end we changed too much. Or the world changed too much and we didn’t change enough. Hell, I don’t know. But I remember looking at her one day and realizing it was the first time I’d really done that in months. That’s some stupid stuff.”

“But the divorce was...”

“Very mutual. We were done,” he said, shifting against her, his chin resting on her shoulder. “You make vows, you know. And you think you know what they all mean. Richer and poorer, sickness and health. And you think, yeah, sure, if my wife is sick, I’ll take care of her. If we’re ever broken, we’ll stick together. But...they don’t cover some things.”

He paused, and when he spoke again, his voice was rough. “Do you really want to know about me, Gracie?”

“Yes,” she said. “And if you want me to, I’ll forget it in the morning.”

She felt him nod. “Okay. You can imagine a lot of bumps in the road, but I don’t think anyone ever...I don’t think anyone imagines what losing a child might do to them. I know we didn’t.”