Finder's Keeper (25 page)

His brain short circuited for a moment as blood rushed toward his cock in Pavlovian response to the words “Later,” against the skin of her thigh as he peeled her panties down to her ankles. He had her barely putting together coherent sentences. He was determined to keep her mindless—and make her more so.
blow job
, but he mumbled,

“I’m told it’s—oh my—very effective.”

“Sounds great.” He flicked his tongue over her clit and Mia released a ragged keening sound. “How’s that feel?”

“Ungh,” Mia groaned incoherently, spearing her fingers through his hair and pulling him back to her core. He smiled against her skin, and bent to take his sweet time, showing her every trick in his playbook. He found a rhythm and a pressure she liked and milked it, driving her up past the point of thought, taking his cues from the pitch of her breathy moans and startled cries.

She broke hard, shuddering roughly against his tongue, her thigh muscles clenching tight around his shoulders. Chase hummed his approval against her flesh and she went off again, a second tight orgasm ripping through her. As she came down again, she regained the ability to speak, her incoherent cries resolving into a steady chant of “Oh-god-oh-god-oh-god.”

With that litany as accompaniment and encouragement, he crawled up her body, shucked off his boxers, and rolled on the condom he’d grabbed from his wallet earlier. He braced himself above her with straight arms on either side of her shoulders.

Mia’s eyelids fluttered open. She looked up at him, overwhelmed and flushed and so perfectly, dizzily
his.
Her glasses tilted askew on her nose, but he didn’t fix them. He liked the slanting lenses almost as much as the dazed gleam in her eyes—evidence of his conquest.

“You ready for this?” She better fucking be, because his control had about forty seconds before it snapped completely. His cock felt like Satan’s fireplace poker—hot and hard and painful as hell. He told it that it didn’t have much longer to wait.

She frowned up at him, trying to concentrate. God, he loved that frown. “What are you waiting for? Is there something wrong with your apparatus?”

“Damn, I love it when you go all science-y on me,” he growled. He drove into her in a single firm thrust.

Mia gasped and her eyes rolled back, her hands clutching restlessly at his back. “
More
.”

Yes, ma’am.

Someone had set him on fire. Even the soles of his feet were burning, but Chase was determined to make this last. He drew out and plunged home again, then again. Mia’s breathy pants resolved into syllables, words that slowly penetrated his brain.

“Oxytocin…endorphins…phenylethylamine…dopamine…serotonin…
Chase
.”

She climaxed around him as his name joined the list spilling from her lips. Chase thrust once more, releasing himself inside her hot channel, and for one skull-splitting moment everything was perfect.

Too perfect.

Terrifyingly perfect.

Perfection meant loss could be right around the corner.

Chase rolled off her, pulling her with him and tucking her against his chest. She fit his arms like a key in a lock, cuddled close, and he held on for dear life. This slim, too-serious woman could break him like a twig if he let her, but it was too late to walk away now.

Just sex
, he told himself. Just physical release. He could handle it, as long as he ignored the niggling suspicion that Mia Corregianni was already inside his soul.

She stretched beside him, making a low satisfied sound in her throat. “Figures you’d be good at coitus.”

He snorted. “Thank you. What was all that phenyl-whatsit stuff?”

“Was that out loud?” She hid her face against his chest, then took advantage of the position to begin nibbling a path south.

“Out loud. And kinda hot. That big brain of yours is such a turn-on. This list?”

He felt her lips curve against his skin. “Chemicals released in the human body during intercourse.”

He grinned, irrationally smug that his name had made the list. “I knew sex with you would be an education, Mia.”

“You want an education?” She slid down his body. “I have this trick…”

Chapter Twenty-Five

Occam’s Leash

“I need more sex tricks.”

“Mia?” Gina snorted out a laugh. “Hello to you too.”

“I don’t have time for pleasantries. I need more data. He’ll be here any minute.” Or at least he should be.

Mia paced in her living room, pausing periodically to peer out into the rain for Chase. He was late. He’d never been late before. Though he did seem to be the type to be late. Maybe he’d been trying to make a good impression, faking punctuality these last couple weeks and tardiness was what she could expect now that the cow had given him the milk, so to speak.

“So I take it last night went well?”

“When I did the tongue-swirl thingy, his animalistic hindbrain overpowered the language center of his medulla oblongata and he lost the power of speech.”

“That’s great! I think.”

“This was ill-advised. He’s going to expect that level of sexual proficiency from now on. I need more tricks.” Mia paced back to the couch, back to the window. Back and forth. Over and over. She was the Energizer Bunny of nervous wrecks, proving a body in motion would stay in motion.

She couldn’t seem to settle into her own skin.

Last night, after they’d consummated things, he’d been the definition of consideration. He’d walked her out to her car, holding her hand, kissing her goodbye in the parking lot, and watching her drive away before getting into his own car. There’d been a moment, right before she closed the car door, when she could feel him waiting. It would have been so easy to invite him back to her place, but then she’d started wondering why he hadn’t invited her to his place, why they’d never even
been
to his place, since he clearly didn’t live in his brother’s old house, and uncertainty had risen up and swallowed her impulse to invite him over to continue the copulation in the comfort of her own bed.

Where did they stand now, exactly? The sex had seemed like a logical and inevitable step, but now she couldn’t help but wonder if she had somehow fouled her data. And unfortunately, she couldn’t just pretend nothing had happened. She felt as though something had shifted inside her, deep down, on the cellular level, and she couldn’t be certain the change wasn’t visible.

Pacing was a very inefficient use of her time. How was it she always seemed to find herself dithering and pacing and wasting her mental energy when it came to Chase? If he hadn’t told her to reserve Wednesday night for a date, she would still be at the office. There were scans to be analyzed, samples to be processed, and the files for tomorrow’s volunteers to organize. She could be productive, but she was here. Pacing.

And begging her sister to teach her more coital secrets.

“Sex isn’t a skill, sweetie. Well, not just a skill. Just, you know, experiment. You’re good at that. Find what feels good for the two of you.”

“I would need electrodes attached to the pleasure centers of his brain and a monitor of his vital stats to gauge the relative impact of various maneuvers.”

“Or you could just ask him what he likes.”

Mia let her silence speak for her.

“Or not. Look, honey—”

“I don’t like feeling like this.”

“Being into him?”

“I’m sorry. You’re right. My statement was imprecise. I don’t like this feeling of uncertainty. I never felt so unsettled in my sexual relations with Peter.”

“I know you may not want to hear this, but I’m delighted he’s thrown you for a loop. That feeling of uncertainty means you
care
, Meems.”

“I don’t want to be the one who cares more. Psychology and sociology may be soft sciences, but the research clearly states that the person in an interpersonal relationship with the most affection for the other is more inclined to be taken advantage of and manipulated by their emotions.”

Gina snorted. “I somehow doubt you’ll let yourself be manipulated by your emotions. Good sex can’t have changed you that much.”

“He’s late, Gina. Clearly he’s using our first post-coital date as a power play. I’m unaware of the sociological retaliation required to rebalance the scales and make a play to return to alpha status in the relationship.”

“Sweetie, I don’t think you were the alpha in that relationship to begin with.”

“What else would I be? Obviously the coital relationship has changed things. In any pack, even one with a base unit of two—”

“Honey, hold up. You’re going all science nerd on me again. What I got from that was that Chase is late and you’re freaking out. Want a distraction? I have big family gossip.”

“I can’t think about Teresa right now.”

“It isn’t Teresa. It’s Jamie.”

Mia pictured the soft-spoken, petite, curvy brunette who was her cousin on her mother’s side. Distraction achieved. “What’s wrong with Jamie?”

“Why do you assume something’s wrong? Couldn’t it be good gossip?”

“Gossip is statistically more likely to be negative in nature.”

“I intend to argue that later.”

“Because you currently cannot argue it because your news is negative.”

“I will cede that point.”

“So what’s wrong with Jamie?” Mia liked her cousin. Unusually shy for a member of the Corregianni horde, Jamie had always had a smile for Mia, even if she rarely strung two words together. As the watch’s protector only last year, she was also the clan newlywed.

“She’s staying at Aunt Marie’s. Apparently she found suspicious charges on Danny’s credit card—hotels, plane tickets, jewelers…”

“Identity theft. Digital information is never entirely safe—”

“Danny’s having an affair, Mia. Jamie says he’s been acting weird—secretive, working late—and when she confronted him about the charges, he said he hadn’t made them, but Jamie could tell he was lying and the credit card company actually lets you see the signature on the receipts online—how cool is that? I mean it sucks for Jamie, obviously, because the handwriting matches.”

“Adultery.” The word knocked the wind out of Mia. They’d never had even a hint of infidelity in the family in the past, but now that she’d lost the watch…

It was spreading. First Teresa, now Jamie. Who was next? Gina? Would something happen to sweet Marley?

Her heart pounding in her ears, she barely heard Gina talking, rambling about how the aunts were sure it was a misunderstanding, but Joey, Nicky and Mario were planning a leg-breaking mission. Only the thought of their mothers’ hysterics had kept them from already landing in jail on assault charges.

Oh God.
Just what she needed. Her brothers and cousins in jail.

Mia had to find the watch. She couldn’t be selfish and drag her feet just because she wanted more time with Chase. The clock was ticking down. The anniversary party was in a matter of days. Her family’s happy façade was cracking. She’d always believed the Corregianni familial euphoria was just a silly veneer, but to see it tarnished made her chest ache like she’d been kicked by a mule.

No more fooling around. She had to find it. Even if it meant bringing in Gina to do the find with Chase.

“Gina, there’s something I need to tell you. Something big.”

“What is it? You know you can tell me anything, Mia.”

At that instant, Chase’s car finally pulled into the parking lot. A sign from the universe that now was not the time to tell Gina the truth? Did she believe in signs from the universe now? The headlights cut off and Mia’s heart kicked into double time, the watch taking a back seat to the panic of seeing her new sexual partner again. “Oh God, he’s here. Later. I’ll tell you later. I’ve gotta go.” She disconnected the call and tossed her phone on the couch without looking.

Only the rain stopped her from running out to meet him, though she had no idea what she would have said. Instead, she watched him climb out, the rain immediately darkening his blond curls. Even drenched the man was abnormally gorgeous. He bent back into the car, the denim of his jeans stretching lovingly over his gorgeous gluteus as he retrieved something from the front seat. It looked like a wadded-up beach towel, but he cradled it to his chest, hunched over to protect it from the rain as he ran across the parking lot and up her steps.

She threw open the front door as he reached the top. He didn’t slow as he ran into the foyer. Grinning fiercely, he shook droplets of water from his hair as Mia secured the door behind him. When she turned back to him, his lips were there to meet her with a quick, startling kiss, his damp hair chilling her forehead.

He drew back and she frowned repressively, side-stepping around him and wiping away the dampness from her face. “You’re all wet.”

He shrugged. “I’ll dry and so will you. You won’t convince me you didn’t like the greeting.”

“I just don’t see the purpose—”

“Kisses aren’t supposed to have purposes, but that one did. I could see you thinking too hard. Gotta get you out of your head.” The towel wiggled and Chase adjusted his grip, his grin broadening. “Speaking of things to get you thinking with your heart…”

“You can’t think with your heart. It has a very specific purpose—to pump blood. Everything else is just fancy. In fact, studies have shown that emotion is a neural function. Look at how loss of memory can impact emotional relationships.”

“So you don’t want to see your present?”

Mia eyed the towel. “I don’t trust you when you come bearing presents. Especially presents that move.”

A tiny brown nose poked out from a hole in the towel, sniffing and squirming.

“Is it a rat?”

Chase snorted. “Jesus, no, I didn’t bring you a rat. I did a few pro-bono lost dog finds today.”

“And you kept one? Doesn’t that defeat the purpose?”

“One of the family’s other dogs had just had puppies and this little guy seemed to want to come with me, so they gave him to me as a thank you.”

“Why did you bring him here?”

“I couldn’t leave him alone on his first night.” The black nose was followed by a white and reddish-brown muzzle. “And technically my lease doesn’t allow pets.”