The Unblocked Collection (18 page)

“It is,” she agreed. “And to clarify: wine is my drink of choice, but a cold beer once in a while is great, too.”

“Good to know.”

“There are a lot of things you don’t know, Mr. Block.”

“I don’t doubt that.” I glanced down to read the menu, but still felt her gaze on me. I chose what I wanted to order and peered at her again. We caught eyes briefly before she looked at her menu. “Don’t look away on my account.” Her cautious stare returned. “I don’t plan on looking anywhere but at you tonight.” She began to play with the chunk of hair that was resting over her shoulder.

The waitress delivered our drinks and stayed long enough to take our dinner order. Frankie had gulped a quarter of her beer before the waitress left our table. She wiped the foam from her lip and said, “So…we were talking about professional boundaries.”

“Were we?”

“It was two minutes ago. You’ve forgotten already?”

“No. I didn’t forget.” Her nipples were hard, poking through her shirt, taunting the hell out of me. “I just didn’t think that was the topic.”

“Well,” she bit her lip and released it, “it will be now.”

“I thought you’d want to take a break from the heavy talk.”

“And what would make you think I needed a break?”

She squirmed in her seat. I could tell my eyes were too much for her. She wasn’t used to my intensity, my hunger…and she hadn’t even gotten a real taste of it yet. “Intuition.”

She took another sip. “Maybe we can just move on. Please?”

She’d learn soon that she wouldn’t be determining the direction of that. “We’re looking for the same thing, Frankie. You want to represent my building, and I don’t want anyone but you to sell the units.”

“Why do I get the feeling that isn’t the whole deal?”

“Because there’s something I want from you in addition to being my agent.”

“What would that be?” She glanced to her side to make sure no one was passing, as if she knew what I was about to say.

“I want your pussy.”

She blushed immediately. “Derek—”

I didn’t hold back. “I have to know what it feels like to have my dick completely buried in your wetness, to hear how loud I can get you to scream my name when I fuck you, to know how your juices taste on my tongue when I lick you to a squirting orgasm.”

She wrapped her hands around the frosty mug and squeezed. I’d noticed her wrist when we were in the SUV, but now it gleamed under the light and caught my attention again. She was wearing the bracelet, the one I’d requested her to wear during our last meeting. She wore it again tonight without me asking.

She wore it for me.

I reached forward and brushed my fingertips over her wrist. It was delicate, soft…the perfect size to grip between my teeth. She didn’t pull away, and I didn’t expect her to. She shivered from my touch instead, and her mouth opened. I could almost picture her legs spreading under the table.

“Frankie…”

She hesitated, looked away from me toward the bar and down at our hands before answering. “What?” It came out in a whisper.

“Tell me,” I insisted. “Tell me you want this, too.”

Her eyes glistened as she stared back at me.

FRANKIE

I COULD BARELY PROCESS
what Derek had just said. No man had ever been so forward with me, telling me in detail the things he wanted to do to my body. And my body had never responded quite like this…aside from last night, when his hands had been all over me. I thought about the desires he’d just expressed in no uncertain terms and wondered how it would feel if he actually carried through with them. There was enough pulsing and tingling and longing running through me to make me want to reach across the table, grab his delicious face and kiss him as hard as I could.

But then what—a sexual relationship…with a client? That was counter to everything I believed in, and everything Jordan International stood for. I was reminded yet again of Reed’s accusations at the gala, and how he had compared me to Julia. But I couldn’t forget how, before coming to this restaurant and after the hangover had mellowed, I had masturbated in the shower, with Derek’s face staring back behind my closed lids.

I couldn’t explain my attraction to him.

And I couldn’t explain why my need for him persisted despite my fear of what would happen if I ever gave in. Thankfully, the last bit of self-control I held onto stopped me from reaching for him. I wasn’t sure how long it would hold out. But I knew before I gave him an answer, I needed a few of my own.

“What made you choose blue flowers for Brea?” I asked, referring to the bouquet he had sent to the office during our contract negotiations.

His fingers left my wrist and came to rest on top of the table, finally allowing me to take a deep breath again. “Will found Brea’s social media profile. She listed blue as her favorite color.”

“And what made you choose pink for me?” I wasn’t on social media except for the profiles Brea managed, which were all work related. He had no way of knowing anything personal about me from an internet search. Whatever he knew beyond my professional profile he’d either dug out of someone, or he’d known intuitively.

Only his eyes moved, narrowing as his stare deepened. I hated that I couldn’t get a read on him, and yet he seemed to see right into me. “You remind me of a piece of wood I carved when I was younger.”

I laughed, which was a nice relief from the throbbing that consumed my body. “I remind you of a piece of wood? How flattering.”

“It was pink ivory. One of the rarest materials in the world.”

Derek and I had never discussed his love for using wood in his design aesthetic, but I saw it everywhere—in his architecture, in the accents throughout his building, even in his company logo. The fact that I reminded him of something he valued that much should have been a major compliment. But it was more confusing than anything.

“So you know about my relationship with Reed, obviously. He and I still work together, closely, and…” Despite how long ago we’d broken up and the way Derek was making me feel at that very moment, the memory of what happened with Reed still shook me. “I can’t go there again with someone I do business with.”

“I’m not asking you to.”

“Then what
are
you asking?” I drank down the rest of my beer, hoping the waitress would notice my empty glass and bring me another. It would be something to break the tension, at least. His eyes pierced mine, and a shudder traveled past my chest to the fluttering bud between my legs. He didn’t have to answer; from the look he gave me, I knew exactly what he was asking for. “Just my body…” I said it more for my benefit than for his.

He nodded.

Brea and I had discussed Derek a few days prior to the gala, before anything had happened between us. She knew how uneasy I was about starting a relationship again—especially a heavy one. She’d told me to keep things simple, “
Sex-only simple…you need to sample whatever he’s willing to give you, and then just keep on sampling it again and again. And again. That’s something you don’t pass up. Like ever.”

He was giving me that chance.

But was it a risk I was willing to take?

“Another one?” the waitress asked, holding my glass in her hand. I hadn’t realized she was standing next to our table.

“Yes,” we both replied.

She laughed…neither of us joined her. Our eyes were fixed on one another, my steely gray to his electric blue. The need to have him was building in me, crackling along each nerve. My body pounded with desire as lust consumed me, ate at me. A craving so intense, I wasn’t sure I could control it one minute more.

It made my decision for me.

But we’d ordered another round of drinks, and our meals would be arriving soon. We couldn’t leave now. If I was going to make it through this dinner, I had to change the subject.

I sat as tall as I could, took a deep breath, and crossed my legs. I couldn’t stop the tingling between them, but I could smother it a little with my thigh, at least. “Regarding Timber Towers,” I said, watching his confusion appear as I circled back to business. “I’d like to stage one of the units as soon as it’s done and use it as a model. Preferably a penthouse, so that I can show my buyers.” He knew the importance of having a model—all builders knew that—and we might have even discussed it in the past, but it was the first thought that came to me.

“Would you now?” His fingers brushed through his beard, then his hand disappeared under the table. The tiniest smile crossed his lips. It only increased my arousal.

Still, I pushed on, fighting myself for control. “Absolutely. The designer who decorated your sales office has impeccable taste, but I’d like you to meet the one I use. I’ll bring her by next week so she can get a feel for the space and start working up some sketches.”

“If that’s what you want.”

“It is. It should take her about a week…to get…all the furnishings in…” My words trailed off as I thought about his last statement. “What is it that
you
want?”

His face betrayed no emotion. “This.”

I gasped as I felt his hand on the outside of my knee. His fingertips gently traced the top of my shin and circled up toward my inner thigh.

My attention was drawn to sound at our table. I realized my eyes had been closed, and I’d been holding my breath…and the waitress was now dropping off our beers. His fingers had put me in some sort of trance, pulling me out of everything that was happening around me to focus solely on the sensation of his touch.

Control
, I reminded myself.
Maintain control.

I lifted the new mug from the table, took a sip, and pushed his fingers away. “As I was saying, it should take a week for the furnishings to come in and then we can set up…” His hand was back, wedged between my knees, trying to coax them open. “Derek, I—”

He leaned forward, his gaze narrowing, intensifying. “We can either talk about your plans for decorating the model, all of which you can email to me in the morning and most of which I’m going to say yes to anyway…or you can open your legs and let me finger-fuck you and make you come inside this restaurant. Which do you prefer?”

My mouth opened…and nothing came out of it.

“That’s what I thought.” His hand pushed a little harder and my knees fell apart. “Spread them farther. Now.”

I didn’t know how the simplicity of his fingers crawling over my pants could turn me on this much, but I could feel my wetness seeping onto my panties. It was going to leave a wet spot on the cushion beneath me, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

He undid the button and zipper of my skinny jeans as I glanced casually around the room to make sure no one was watching. The idea of those unwelcomed eyes only made me tremble with greater desire. We were in the back corner, in a dimly-lit space. Our waitress was the only person who would be walking by, and her presence hadn’t stopped Derek from touching me. I had a feeling nothing would stop him, not even onlookers.

For all I knew, it had been part of his plan all along.

I lifted my hips and wiggled the waist of my jeans down a few inches, enough for his hand to fit. His fingers ran along the lacy edge of my panties, grazing my sensitive skin as they went. I pushed back against the cushion of the booth in anticipation of where he would touch me next.

“Look at me,” he demanded.

Slowly, my gaze found his face, the one that had starred in my nightly sex dreams. They were more than dreams; they were full-fledged fantasies, complete with imagined foreplay and exploration, and a build to the most overwhelming orgasm. Now it was about to happen for real. And I wanted it to. What little fight I’d had in me earlier was gone. The yearning was stronger than anything I’d felt before.

“
Fuck
,” we both said as he slipped under my panties.

His mouth opened and his tongue rested flat on the inside of his lip. I wondered if he would be giving me that next, if I could handle the intensity of his licking for more than a few seconds.

“This is all I’ve been thinking about,” he said, his fingers hovering directly over my clit. “This tight, wet, delicious pussy that I need to devour.”

“Mine…” I said it as if it were an honor to be beneath his touch.

“No, Frankie. It’s
mine
,” he growled. “And when something is mine, it gets all my attention. I worship it.”

“Derek…”

“Do you want my attention? Do you want me to worship your sweet little cunt?”

“
Yesssss
…” It came out on hurried breath as his thumb slid between my lips and rubbed my clit. He circled and circled, again and again as a finger dipped inside me.

My back arched as I gripped the table with both hands. His touch was even more skillful and more confident than I had expected. He knew exactly what speed to use to finger-fuck me, how deep to plunge, how fast to rotate around my bud. He had barely started, and already I could feel the build. The passion that spread through me was powerful. My eyes closed, my breathing became labored. My body was turning numb except for the spots he was caressing. I had no idea if anyone was watching us. It didn’t matter. All that existed was Derek’s touch, driving me so close to the edge of pleasure.