Going the Distance (10 page)

“What?”

“You make me feel about sixteen again.”

She pursed her lips. “I was thinking the same thing. Only I never messed around in boxing gyms in high school.”

“Then you missed out.” And with a gruff motion, he bent his knees, forcing her even tighter against his hips.

His mouth swallowed her gasp. Bossy hands begged her to move as she had been, stroking her desire against his.

She wanted more—their pants gone, so she could feel him against her, discover exactly how he measured up to her fantasies.

Soon the friction overtook him. He lost ownership of their kiss and abandoned the effort, cupping her jaw and pressing their foreheads together. Nose-to-nose, she heard every labored breath, felt those strong hands trembling. Between her thighs, his hips grew restless, making demands—
rougher, faster.

He was so much more
physical
than any guy she'd messed around with. It set her nerves humming even as it banished her inhibitions.

She pulled away, openly enjoying the sight of him. That handsome, flushed face, parted lips. He wanted her. She'd done this to him. She reached between them, tugging at the hem of his shirt. He stripped it off smoothly, but she had no time to admire the results before he was peeling her own top over her head and arms.

She was as soft and pale as Rich was hard and tan, practically a different species. But when she saw how his gaze drank her in...
Angel food cake is soft and pale,
she thought. And Rich looked ready to consume her. A shiver curled her spine as his broad, rough hands grazed her waist. She shut her eyes, feeling her nipples stiffen from the mere promise of his touch.

“Jesus,” he muttered.

She opened her eyes, finding his attention on his hands, palms whispering featherlight up and down her sides.

“You've got the softest skin I ever felt.”

She thanked God for her exfoliating shower gloves. For bothering with lotion that morning, wearing a nice bra and shaving her legs. Clearly, her subconscious had seen this coming.

She studied him. She'd watched this bare torso a zillion times—on TV and online, in person down in the gym. But never like this. She stroked his chest, glad he didn't wax as some fighters did, loving the soft feel of the hair sprinkled there. It blazed a dark trail down the most gorgeous set of abs she'd ever touched, and she wanted to ease his waistband to his thighs and see exactly where it led.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and began moving. He cupped her breasts, tightening her body in a hot wave, spurring her motions.

Between rousing kisses he asked, “How far you wanna take this?”

“I don't know.”

His fingers posed the question a second time, slipping low to fiddle with the closure of her pants. Her silence answered, and she let him free the clasp and lower the zipper. With a few moments' fumbling, he slid them down her thighs and she kicked them away. Before she got settled, he untied the drawstring of his warm-ups and pushed them low on his hips, erection hidden by taut gray cotton.

When he tugged her against him once more, everything felt different. Cool air and worn leather on her bare legs, and the thrilling press of his cock along the soft seam of her sex.

“Rich.”

He closed his hands over her hips, urging her forward and back in tight, slow thrusts. She held his shoulders. She was already wet, the cotton of her panties dragging against him, making the friction feel as sinful as penetration.

“That okay?” he asked, still guiding her motions.

She stammered, “Y-yeah.”

His hands edged higher, following the flex of her waist. “Show me how you like it.”

Lindsey cast aside every lingering scrap of self-consciousness and let her body lead.

She slid her clit along the ridge of his cock until she found the perfect pressure. “Lower the chair.”

He found the lever and the footrest creaked, rising as Rich eased the two of them down. She got her knees where she wanted them, seating herself higher. Now when she pulled back, she felt every inch of him. She shut her eyes and swore through a smile, overwhelmed.

Rich's patience waned. His hands were bossy, urging her movements, hips shifting between her thighs.

She smiled down at him. “Do you need to be on top?”

He cleared his throat and quit fidgeting. “I'm just wound up. I've been wanting this for so long. I'll knock it off.”

“No.” She tugged at his arm. “I like you wound up.”

With a couple more tugs he relented, and they wrestled around so Lindsey was on her back. She held in a grin. Being in control of Rich's big, capable body was a thrill, but having him above her... She stroked his arms as he got his knees braced, and wrapped her legs around his hips.

He cupped her head, owning her with deep, bold kisses. She mourned his mouth when he leaned back, but the disappointment was brief. His thick arms locked beside her waist as his hips began to move, their rhythm echoing up the length of his extraordinary torso.

She was staring. She didn't care. Rich's body, tight with desire and undulating with this basest of labors, was the most exciting thing she'd ever seen. Watching him stirred her arousal as much as the rough stroke of his erection between her legs.

She held his shoulders, his muscles restless against her palms. “Rich.”

“Tell me you thought about this.”

“I did.”
At times when I shouldn't have. Long after I'd decided it was a lost cause.

“I thought about you in every crappy motel I crashed in between here and San Diego.”

Simple flattery or the truth? All those nights she'd conjured him prowling across her covers on his hands and knees...had he been imagining something similar, three thousand miles away? She realized she didn't care if it was a line. She
felt
that desire burning down at her in this strange room, and that was truth enough.

His arms were warm, roped with locked muscle. His cock was just as hard, just as hot, dragging with maddening friction along her lips and clit. The glow leaking from the gym made his skin gleam, reminding her how it shone under the bright lights of an arena.

She snaked her arm between them, and when her hand closed around his erection, he stilled his hips. She rubbed him through his shorts, just to feel it—this one part of the male body that even fighting wasn't crude enough to expose. He began to move, the rhythm of his hips matching her strokes, quickening the contact.

She expected an arrogant remark from this brash man, a rough hand clamped over hers, forcing the touch and asking,
You like that, don't you?
But his only sentiments were excitement and desperation, broadcast in every ragged breath.

This is actually happening.
Rich Estrada was hers, somehow. Hard in her hand and panting with need. Wanting her.

She let him go and cupped his face with both hands, shuddering as he took control of the friction. “You feel so good.”

A tight laugh. “I promise the way I pictured this, I at least got us into a bed.”

“Me, too.”

But reality felt better. Urgent. A little twisted. And she had him just as she'd wanted—above her, in charge, pleasuring her with gruff, powerful strokes, even if those strokes drove him against her, not inside.

She rolled her hips, lengthening every motion, dragging the pleasure out, out, out. Her core gave a hungry squeeze and she imagined how good he'd feel, stripped save for the barest skin of latex, excitement buried deep, her sex slick from how badly she wanted him.

“Rich.”

“Yeah. Come on.” No smooth words of seduction, but so exactly what she wanted to hear in that harsh accent.

Hand on his shoulder, the other arm locked around his waist, she held on for dear life, filling her lungs with his scent, her ears with his low moans and ragged breaths. Reality blurred until the only force in the world was this pull, this hot ache boiling inside her, this man the only person who could end the wanting. Her hips sought the friction, chasing what her sex demanded. He read her cues and gave everything she asked for.

When she came, it was from that—from that sensation of being
given
this pleasure, and from his mastery of his body. Sensation gathered in a knot, drawn tight and hot, fraying and finally coming undone, one snapping thread at a time. She hugged him tight, quaking against the cruel pressure of his cock. As she cried out, he went still, sparing her anything more than his hot weight against her swollen lips through the wet cotton.

Her chest was heaving. She registered her nails biting into his back and released him, embarrassed. “Sorry.”

“Don't be.”

He let her catch her breath, though she felt his desire throb against her with every beat of his heart, his sexuality a living, breathing force.

She stroked his hair. “You...now.”

He started slowly, testing her. Within a minute she was desensitized and he resumed his earlier pace. In the wake of her orgasm, desire built anew, but it was his needs she wanted satisfied. And to see this capable, brazen man rendered helpless, if only for a few seconds.

She memorized the flex of his hips with her palms as her eyes took in that face, strained from something so different than combat...yet the expression so nearly identical. His lids were heavy, but every breath or two, that penetrating gaze broke through.

Who on earth are you?
This man she barely knew, yet whose body felt so right. She held on, watching as he came apart.

“Oh.”
He pressed his cheek to hers, overcome.

With a desperate grunt, he reached between them, pushed his shorts down and freed his cock. She felt the smooth, slick skin of his crown, then heat lashed her belly as he came.

His groans faded, muscles falling slack. Suddenly it was just the two of them, in this dim, silent room, ripe with the smell of sex.

She held his arms, feeling crazed, and saw that frenzy mirrored in those dark eyes.

Rich leaned over the armrest and grabbed his jettisoned shirt, wiping Lindsey's skin.

She studied his gorgeous face while he was distracted.
His breathing's just the same when he's spent from fighting.

Tossing the shirt aside, Rich settled on his forearms, dropping his chest and face to hers. He brushed their lower lips together, back and forth, and laughed, barely more than an exhalation.

She stroked his hair. “Well.”

A proper kiss, then he leaned back, glancing around the room. “This place'll never look the same again.”

A silly wave of pride accompanied his words. Why she should feel surprised, she wasn't sure. He'd told her he'd thought about her. Why shouldn't he remember them fooling around, weeks or months or maybe even years from now? Perhaps every time he set foot in this room.

With a quick, sure motion, Rich flipped them and hauled her sideways on his lap, sitting up as the recliner snapped to attention. He held her under the knees and shoulders, as though he'd just carried her across a threshold. He kissed her mouth, his vibe playful once more. The desperate version of this man was fading, locked away behind the carefree shell.

Had she lost him, just like that?

Needing a distraction, she ran her hand over the squiggly black characters tattooed down his ribs. “What does this say?”

“That's the first thing I learned to say in Thai. It translates to something like, ‘Who do I get to hit next?'”

“You were there a year?”

He nodded, fingertips grazing up and down her arms. “Got my ass handed to me for the first month. Everybody wanted to fight the gigantic American
farang.
Went from being a pretty damn good boxer to getting beat shitless by teenagers who were a foot shorter than me. Most humbling experience of my life.”

“Rich Estrada, humble?”

He kissed her. “Don't tell anybody.”

She touched the ink on his shoulder, slipped her palm down the gulley of his back, where the largest design hid, all these eclectic passport stamps.

But the thought of him leaving again... It made her sad. It also made her feel warm and hungry and possessive. Her chances with this man were limited. Hell, they might amount to no more than this evening. It made her want him with a fierceness she'd never experienced.

His fingers dawdled, playing with her sweat-damp hair, and he kissed her throat. A happy sound hummed through her neck.

She toyed with his hair. “What?”

He met her eyes, smirking. “You thought about me, huh? This past year?”

She blushed. “Yeah. I did.”

“All this time.”

She nodded. She ached for him to return the confession again, cement the mutuality she'd felt earlier, believing this longing had been two-way. But all she got was a smugly cocked eyebrow and a self-satisfied smile. Rich the performer.

Or...or was that other Rich the performer? The one who'd professed ten months' infatuation? Was
this
the real him, this shameless scoundrel not a persona after all?

What had just happened had meant something to her, for better or worse. But to Rich, it was entirely possible it had been nothing more that the latest in a long string of impulsive encounters. She needed to remember what the two of them were, first and foremost—friends. Friends who happened to want desperately to wind up in bed together. A perfectly fine thing to be. No need to get hung up, wishing it could be more.

Only, she so completely
did
wish that.

“It's late,” she said.

“Yeah.”

He let her legs go, and once Lindsey had made it to her feet, he did the same. He cinched his drawstring as she slid her pants up her legs. Unison, good. Let this all look equal. Let him believe she felt as he surely did—checkbox ticked, curiosity satisfied. Let him think this had been simple to her, too. That she wouldn't get a stomachache, waiting to run into him again, having no clue what—if anything—she meant to him.