Feverish (Bullet #3) (18 page)

She joined him back on the bed and straddled
him. She’d already ripped the package open and had the condom in
hand. He watched her as she held the tip of it with one hand and
rolled it down over his cock with the other. Even though the condom
seemed to muffle some of the overall feeling, he didn’t lose the
sensation of her fingers rolling it down. He was ready.

But as she positioned herself over him, ready
to slide him inside her, he licked his finger and moved it into
position before she’d been able to move. He glided his finger along
her slit until he found her clit, and he swirled it around with his
finger. She closed her eyes and took in a deep breath, almost
paralyzed by his touch. “Just stay right there,” he urged, letting
his finger make her his slave. She rested the bottom of her hands
on his pecs so that her fingertips stretched up toward his
shoulders, and she dug her nails in as the pleasure increased.
“That’s it.” He didn’t need to rewet his finger because her own
moisture kept his motion smooth. It wasn’t long before she was
crying out, unaware that her nails were tearing into his flesh, but
he didn’t care. That he could make her so unable to control herself
to even know what was happening around her made him satisfied. Her
knees pressed into his hips, and he thought he’d have to wait a few
moments for her to regain her bearings, but instead she took him
inside in one swift motion, just lifting herself up, twirling her
hips a little to position him right, and then she slammed down into
him.

Oh, God.
He sucked in a deep breath.
There was nothing like this feeling, and he didn’t want it to end.
He could feel the build, and he would explode at any moment, when
he didn’t feel like fighting it anymore. Emily began moaning again,
her orgasm continuing, and he forced himself to not let go, to hang
on for dear life. It wasn’t until she was past her next crescendo
that he allowed himself to release, to let it all go. His eyes were
closed, but he could see her just the same, and he let that vision
etch itself into his mind since this was the end.

Chapter Eighteen

EMILY TOOK IN a deep breath, not wanting to
open her eyes. Part of her wanted to sleep all day.

Then she felt Clay’s arm draped around
her.

Oh, yeah.

This was gonna be hard. They seemed so
compatible in bed. It was going to be difficult to just walk away
and go back to the way things were.

She couldn’t believe that had been
her
stupid idea.

She really couldn’t take it back now.

So she sat up, gently taking his arm off of
her body and laying it on his side, but that was all it took for
him to stir. He muttered, “What time is it?”

She glanced over at the alarm clock on the
nightstand on the other side of the bed. “Seven forty-five.”

He sprang up into a sitting position. “Shit.
You gotta get out of here.”

She couldn’t help the look that crossed her
face, and she didn’t know if it was confusion, anger, or both.
“What? Why?”

“Mary’s gonna be here any minute.”

She was going to say “So?” but then she
realized the gravity of the situation. They couldn’t just go back
to the way things had been if Mary were to find out what had
happened. The woman was overprotective of her boss, and she’d
likely read Emily the riot act. She might even consider talking
Clay into firing her. Emily had always suspected she hadn’t been
Mary’s first pick, even though the woman had treated her well.
Still, Mary’s loyalty was to Clay, as it should have been. She
would probably have several choice words for Clay as well. Mary
didn’t hesitate to lecture Clay when she felt it wouldn’t just fall
on deaf ears. So Emily took a deep breath, got her bearings, and
slid off the bed.

It might have been a big bed, but she never
would have known it. Clay had been next to her all night long,
holding her close.

She tried to clear her head. Not good.

She spotted her panties on the side of the
bed and followed her eyes to her bra and then tank top. She’d left
her shoes in her room last night, so she was fine there. She
bunched them all to her chest and then smiled at Clay. “See
ya.”

He grinned back and nodded his chin, tucking
his hands behind his head, his elbows forming vees on both sides.
She darted through the house.

Well, the panic made the
breakup
much
easier than it could have been. She went in her room and closed the
door. Normally, by this time on Monday, she was already heading
into the office, so she needed to get in the shower and get a move
on. That way, Mary wouldn’t suspect anything.

She grabbed a robe and almost ran to the
bathroom. Once she got in the shower, she relaxed a little and took
her time shampooing her hair. When she finally stepped out several
minutes later, she was almost sad that she couldn’t smell Clay on
her anymore. She liked his smell.

As she patted herself dry, she heard Mary in
the kitchen. She was hollering at Clay, not out of anger—Emily
could tell that much. Mary was raising her voice so she could be
heard. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised you’re getting up earlier
and earlier. I’m just not used to it.” Based on the quality of the
woman’s voice, Emily could tell she’d moved to the living room or
maybe even the hallway.

And then Emily felt a chill zip down her
spine.

Shit.
Her clothes were still strewn
all over the music room, and that was one of the first places Mary
cleaned because it was far away from Clay’s room. Even though Clay
got up earlier nowadays, Mary hadn’t changed her habits. Emily
needed to get her ass in there immediately and pick up her shit.
She threw on her robe and wrapped the towel around her hair. She
peeked out of the bathroom door and saw that the coast was clear,
so she ran down the hall and into the music room. She again felt
immense relief to find the room empty.

It didn’t seem like less than twenty-four
hours ago. It seemed like so much longer that she’d lost her
clothes in this room. And she and Clay might have agreed to go back
to
business as usual
, but things felt different. She hoped
she hadn’t ruined everything. She saw his t-shirt on the floor and
figured Mary wouldn’t think anything about that. After all, they’d
joked once or twice about what a slob Clay was. But, one after the
other, she picked up all of her clothes. She’d lost them all in
that one room, so that was easy. She started walking toward the
door and then figured she’d better grab Clay’s shirt. She could
take it and throw it in the dirty clothes later. As she made her
way to the door, she heard Mary walking down the hall, talking to
Clay.
Shit. Shit, shit, shit.

Her mind raced through possible cover
stories. She ran over to Clay’s unorganized stacks of CDs and
started looking through them. She heard Mary enter the room and
pretended not to hear her. “I’ve considered organizing those stupid
things for him.”

Emily hoped her laugh seemed genuine. “I was
thinking about that myself. I wanted to find something new to
listen to, but it’s such a mess, I got distracted.” Inside, she was
giving herself a high five. She wasn’t out of the woods yet, but
close. And since she hadn’t had any dirty clothes in the bathroom,
it would just look like she’d stopped by before heading to her
room. To make it as convincing as possible, she grabbed a Thousand
Foot Krutch CD and then turned as though her mission were
accomplished.
God, please don’t ask anything.

Mary didn’t ask a single question, but as
Emily got closer to her and the door, Mary said, “You probably
shouldn’t be traipsing around the house like that. Just…trust me.
You know I love Clay, but you don’t want to be giving that man any
ideas.”

Too late.

Emily smiled and said, “You’re right.
Thanks.” And she hurried out of there.

Once she was in her room, she slumped on her
bed. She’d had enough emotional baloney for the past twenty-four
hours to last her quite a while. She sat there a few minutes and
then stood so she could put her dirty clothes in her hamper. She
hung onto his shirt and brought it to her nose, breathing it in.
Then she shook her head. How the hell had that happened?

She knew Clay was never the kind of guy she’d
be serious about, so why was she feeling so weird about him? Her
dad had reminded her of that when he’d texted. She’d called him
back last night. When Bryce hadn’t been able to reach her, he’d
called her dad. Dirty trick. There was no way she was going to talk
to Bryce, no matter what her dad said, and then she told her dad
she was not going to talk to him about Bryce either. End of story.
Her dad wound up saying, “I don’t expect you to tell me what the
problem is. I just promised to pass on a message. Bryce said he’s
very sorry.”

She didn’t say anything. She didn’t want her
father knowing about her love life. She didn’t want him to know
that Bryce was screwing around on her, and she certainly didn’t
want him to know about her revenge sex. She also didn’t want him to
know she even had regular sex. He had to know, of course, but dear
old dad was old-fashioned, and she didn’t want to be bold about
it.

She felt a little pissed that Bryce had tried
to manipulate her through her father, but it didn’t escape her
notice that she wasn’t nearly as upset as she should have been.

* * *

So he was awake, but Clay still didn’t feel
like getting his ass out of bed. He could smell her on his pillow,
and even though he knew they were acting normal today, he wanted to
just bask a few more minutes before moving on.

Her skirt was on the bed under the covers.
That was another problem. It didn’t matter where he would wind up
putting it; until it was back in Emily’s possession, Mary had the
potential to find it.

He grabbed the pillow she’d laid her head on
all night and rested his head on it, and the next thing he knew,
Mary was chatting at him. “I thought you were getting out of
bed.”

He startled awake. He hadn’t realized he’d
fallen back asleep, but he’d just been lying there, so he wasn’t
surprised. “I’m wearing nothing but my birthday suit under here,
Mary. Maybe if I felt like I could get out of bed…”

She glared at him. It was playful, but he
knew she meant it too, because all he’d had to do was ask. “Let me
finish emptying your trash, and then I’ll shut the door behind me.”
After a few seconds, she said with emphasis, “
Master.
” She
walked in the bathroom.

He chuckled and raised his voice so she could
hear him. “I like the way that sounds. Do I have to pay you extra
to keep calling me that?”

She walked back in the room and crossed to
the door that led to the rest of the house. “I don’t think you have
enough money for that.”

He was still laughing when the door closed.
So…back to normal. He could do that. First was to get his ass in
the shower and continue doing all the things he normally did. He
took the skirt with him, because he didn’t want the damn thing out
of his sight. He didn’t know if Mary had ever seen Emily wearing it
before, but women remembered shit like that. He wasn’t gonna let
himself get busted.

After his shower, he threw on a pair of jeans
and combed out his hair, brushed his teeth, all the normal things
he did every morning, and then he looked around his room, trying to
figure out where to put the damn skirt. He couldn’t put it in a
dresser drawer or in his closet, because Mary would be in them. He
couldn’t leave it in the bed, because she would definitely make it
when he left the room. She might change the sheets too. He couldn’t
remember if Mary did that on Mondays.

After looking all around the room, he finally
decided to put the skirt in the nightstand drawer where he kept his
condoms. He was pretty sure Mary avoided that drawer like the
plague for multiple reasons. One was the condom stash but two was
the occasional toy he’d stash in there. Just to be safe, though, he
wadded up the little cotton thing and tucked it in the back.

He could smell coffee, so he headed to the
kitchen. He was satisfied he’d covered their tracks.

Fuck.
Except for the music room. For
all he knew, Mary had already been in there cleaning and, if so,
the jig was up. As he passed the kitchen, he saw the basement door
open, so he knew she was doing laundry. That meant he’d be able to
sneak off to the music room unnoticed. He hightailed it down the
hall. He passed the office, not even noticing Emily was in there,
but he heard her. Her voice was strained. “Clay!”

He would come back. First, the music room.
But when he went in there, the clothes were already gone.
Fuck.
Mary already knew. So…either she’d found out when he’d
been in the shower, or she was cool with it. Or both. But he highly
doubted it. He needed to prepare for the fallout.

He walked out of the room and back down the
hall, shoulders drooping a little. He could
not
afford to
lose Mary. She’d put up with a stream of tramps, but he knew she’d
be über pissed if she knew he and Emily had been together. He just
knew it.

He got near the office, already having
forgotten that Emily had called him. As he passed the door again,
she said, “Clay!”

He looked over and decided to see what she
needed. He should probably warn her too. “Yeah?”

She wiggled her index finger at him, inviting
him to come closer. When he got to the desk, she lowered her voice.
“I got the clothes out of the music room before Mary got
there.”

Clay felt a crashing wave of relief wash over
his entire body. “Great. Thanks.” He almost wanted to say he
loved her
for that, but considering the state of things,
that would be a stupid thing to let slip. It wasn’t true. He really
dug her and, after having given it a lot more thought, would enjoy
nothing more than spending more time with her, but love? Nope.