The Mistress Mistake (8 page)

"You're so beautiful." His finger quit
teasing her and pushed inside all the way. Her heartbeat stalled
and then took up a cadence so strong she didn't think she would
live through it. "When you walked inside that restaurant the other
day . . . I thought I'd died and gone to heaven."

Jessica let out a small, keening sound both
from the impact of his words seducing her and from his hand laying
claim to her most intimate place.

And then it hit her. He
was
seducing
her. This was exactly what he'd said would never happen again after
tonight. She'd only ever get to have this the one time.
Right
now.
She felt a tear slide down her cheek as she tried to
remember every word, recall every taste of his lips against
hers.

Her emotions were in turmoil, she was
suddenly so sad from the small taste of heaven she knew she
wouldn't ever experience with him again. Her arousal slipped away
as disappointment took over, but she felt a strong, powerful need
for him to be inside of her anyway. She lifted her hips again and
he took the subtle hint.

He took his hand away from her and moved his
torso between her thighs. Reaching down, he adjusted his position
and moved the broad head of his penis to her opening. He began to
push in. Stopping, he lifted her legs and put them around his hips.
"Hold them there, sweetheart."

She did as he said, and his lips came back to
hers. He pushed into her body at the same time and with the same
strength as his tongue thrust into her mouth. He pulled out the
same way. Stars exploded in her head as she felt his thickness and
length for the first time without pain. It was a pressure, a lot of
pressure, but there was no pain.

She clung to him as they kissed, her legs
wrapped around his hips and her hands clutching his shoulders. He
pushed in and out over and over again. It felt good, so good, but
she knew she wouldn't be able to achieve the peak of pleasure. She
was too emotional for that, and too new to the game, anyway.

But God, it felt good. He touched every space
within her, and his body was so strong and hard over hers and he
felt so good and smelled so awesome that she knew she was in lust.
Just one time. That's all it had taken and she was crushing on him
already. Crushing on him in a big way.

She attempted to clear the thoughts from her
mind as she felt a sudden surge of power coming from him. His
strokes became stronger, his tongue in her mouth became stiffer,
and even in her inexperience, she knew he was about to come.

And she was right.

He growled into her mouth, the sound coming
deep from his diaphragm, and his erection, if possible, became even
harder as he pushed once, twice, three times against her and then
stilled completely, his hands gripping her face.

He stayed like that momentarily until his
head slid to the pillow beside hers and he let his weight down on
her, but moved just enough to the side so he wouldn't smother
her.

She stared at the ceiling, nothing and
everything running through her mind. She hadn't been prepared for
sex. Or at least, she hadn't been prepared for sex with somebody
like him.

Before she could think on it too much, he
lifted his head and kissed her swiftly, just once, on the mouth.
"Are you all right?"

"Yes."

He studied her features, and she guessed he
was okay with what he saw because he gently separated his body from
hers and stood to his feet. It was still broad daylight, and the
sight of his powerful, naked body was both impressive and real. The
sight of him nude made all of this so very real.

He picked up his jeans and strode to the
bathroom while she looked around and found her shirt. She left her
bra where he'd tossed it, and covered up as quickly as she could
with her t-shirt.

Jessica only had about sixty seconds to find
her panties and slip them on before Connor came out of the
bathroom, with his jeans on once again.

She watched him warily as her brain began
running a mile a minute. She had blood on her thighs. She'd seen
it, but only briefly, as she'd slipped her panties on. Had he had
blood on him as well? She didn't have enough nerve to ask, but she
found out anyway.

He pulled on his shirt and sat on the side of
the bed as he put his shoes on. "You bled."

"I'm sorry."

He turned and looked at her, a pained
expression coloring his features. "Look, I've got to go. You going
to be all right?"

"Sure."

"I'll see you tomorrow, okay?"

"Yeah."

He continued to study her. "Do you have
anything to eat, for later?"

"Yes."

"What?"

Her mind raced. Even though she now had the
money he'd given her, she had no transportation to go buy anything.
There was a convenience store about half a mile away, and she could
always walk if she had to. But she did have a few things that she'd
brought with her. "Peanut butter, granola bars, stuff like that.
I'll be fine."

He stayed silent as he picked up her bra from
the floor and handed it to her. "Do you like pizza?"

God, yes, she did. And never got to have any.
Except for the stuff in the university cafeteria that didn't taste
like any pizza she'd ever had before. "Yes."

She sat back against the bed and watched him
pull out his phone and key in a few strokes. He lifted it to his
ear and while it was ringing asked her, "Pepperoni okay?"

"Sure."

The phone was answered and he rattled off the
address and his order while she sat in a daze.

He slipped the phone back in his jeans and
stood to his feet and picked up his keys and wallet. He pulled out
a hundred dollar bill and tossed it on the bedside table, and said,
"For the pizza."

A strong surge of nausea rose to the back of
her throat as he started to walk away. She'd assumed he was going
to stay and eat pizza with her, but evidently, she'd assumed
wrong.

He turned before he walked out the front door
and spoke once again. "I've got a key to this door and I plan on
using it whenever I like. Your key is on the kitchen counter. Keep
the door locked and use the deadbolt at all times, understand?"

"Yes."

The look he gave her was incendiary.
"Remember what I said. I own your sexual life, all of it.
Understand?"

"Yes."

"You answer your phone if I call or text. No
excuses, got that?"

"Yes."

"I'll see you tomorrow." The door closed and
she heard his key as he inserted it and locked the deadbolt from
the outside.

So that was that.

She slid from the bed and went and checked
out the small bathroom more thoroughly. It contained a shower tub
combination, and she turned the water on now for a quick wash.

She toweled herself off with one of only two
towels she owned, and slipped fresh shorts and a t-shirt on.

The doorbell rang and she remembered the
order he'd placed.

After paying and tipping the teenager, she
carried all the stuff to the kitchen and began going through it.
She hadn't paid much attention to him as he'd placed the order, but
evidently, he hadn't wanted her to go hungry.

There were two large pizzas, one thin and one
with a thick crust, as well as a two-liter bottle of Diet Coke. And
much to the delight of her heightened appetite, there was also a
dessert pizza with chocolate dipping sauce. It wasn't exactly a
balanced meal plan, but whether or not Connor realized it, he'd
bought her enough food to last her nearly a week if she froze
it.

As her salivary glands went into sudden
overdrive, Jessica ran her eyes over the feast in front of her.
She'd had a rough day; she'd just given her virginity away to
someone who hadn't wanted it in the least. She had no family and
very few close friends.

She went straight for the dessert pizza and
the chocolate sauce.

****

Late that night, Connor sprawled on his sofa
in his living room as a multitude of memories shot through his
brain in a relentless panorama that wouldn't let up.

A virgin. She'd been a goddamn, one hundred
percent, true to life, virgin. He hadn't even known they existed
anymore. He'd damn sure never experienced one before in his life.
Even his wife hadn't been a virgin when they had first gotten
together. And before that, he'd lived through his high school and
early college years ticking off how many girls he could fuck as he
literally put a check by each one of them in his year book.

And none of them had been virgins.

The truth of it was still rippling through
him in waves of after-shock.

He'd somehow managed to find the only virgin
left in the goddamn city. And where the fuck had he found her? On a
fucking website that promoted sexual arrangements with a financial
foundation, to put it nicely.

It was beyond anything he could ever have
imagined happening.

He should have pulled out of her tight assed
little body and left right then, and to hell with the six-month
lease he'd signed.

But it wasn't the money that had kept him
there.

It was her, goddamnit.

He hadn't been bullshitting her when he'd
told her he thought she was beautiful. She
was
fucking
beautiful. And not beautiful in any hardened way like the previous
women he'd met from the website. And of course, now he knew
why.

She wasn't hardened at all. She was slender
and soft with glossy hair that tumbled past her shoulders in waves
of silk. Her complexion was almost porcelain; every time she'd
blushed it was there for him to see. Her features were delicate;
she had an ethereal beauty that was refined. She was of medium
height, and she was so slender that her body was graceful and
dainty.

He'd told no lie when it had slipped from his
lips that he thought he'd died and gone to heaven. He hadn't meant
to say it, in fact would have never told her so, but suddenly, he'd
been fighting himself; something had crawled up from his soul and
refused to terrorize her anymore than he already had. He'd wanted
her to feel special in that one moment. Even he wasn't so much of
an ass that he could blatantly take a girl's virginity and only
fuck her blind. He'd had to make it more for her. But he needed to
get a grip on that. It absolutely couldn't continue. He
would
let her go. Maybe not after six months as he'd
originally thought, but he couldn't keep her forever. The idea was
too ludicrous to contemplate.

Certainly, she'd told a compelling story of
why she'd ending up resorting to this. The catalyst had been losing
her scholarship, but there was something else that came before
that. Something from her history that made it impossible to
continue her education any way else, something that he didn't know
about.

He didn't think he wanted to know. He
couldn't deny he was curious, but he had to close that part of
himself down and let it go. He couldn't let himself want to know
about her. He didn't want to feel compassion for her or anything
else that resembled anything like it. He had to stick to his guns,
he had to keep reminding himself that he wanted her just for sex,
he didn't need or want a woman in his life for any other
reason.

Everything he'd told her had been true. And
after this one day, this one evening of retrospect, he couldn't
dwell on these feelings any longer.

But he'd let himself have these few minutes
of contemplation.

When he'd met her in the restaurant, he'd
been inordinately relieved with just about everything she'd said.
He knew himself; he would only agree to this kind of arrangement
with a certain kind of woman. And she'd more than ticked off his
requirements, like boxes on an application.

It wasn't only her youthful beauty. But that
had damn sure been the starting point.

It was also her moral values that screamed
through the inappropriateness of the meeting they were having. She
wouldn't do just
anything
for money. She had demands that he
more than agreed with, most of them anyway, and now that he knew
about her total lack of experience, he might not push for anything
more.

He wanted more, no doubt. But this
arrangement was going to be hard enough for her to handle without
having to accommodate his more erotic needs.

One thing at a time. He had to find a happy
medium so they could get along. He'd never find another woman like
her who was willing to do this with him, under his mandate, not in
a million years.

He couldn't scare her off.

But he also couldn't take the chance of
getting emotionally close to her.

Not. Going. To. Happen.

****

At seven o'clock the next evening, Jessica
looked up from the last box she'd been unpacking as she heard her
front door opening. She'd taken her time with all her things, and
organized and decorated to the best of her abilities and with her
limited belongings. She stood to her feet and waited.

Her nerves jangled, thinking of Connor. It
had better be him. If it wasn't, then that meant a stranger was
unlocking her door and that couldn't be good.

But of course, it was Connor. He walked
inside without a glance and turned and bolted the door. He looked
once in her direction and then walked over to the tiny dinette
table and deposited a plastic sack that gave off an aroma that was
making her taste buds go on high alert.

"Chinese." He was direct and to the point, as
he'd been the entire time she'd known him, short though that time
had been.

She answered him in the same manner.
"Thanks."

He also carried two other large sacks, and
she stood back as he strode through to the bathroom and she watched
from the bedroom doorway as he unloaded toilet paper, tissues, wet
wipes, soap and shampoo. She breathed a small sigh of relief. There
had only been the one roll of paper when she moved in, and now she
didn't have to worry about the chore of lugging more on the city
bus. She already had her own toiletries, but everything he bought
would last a while.