For the rest of the night, however, I felt him, even when he was engaged with his friends and not even looking over. I felt him. And I couldn’t get the look of sadness in his eyes out of my head.
Aidan had lost so much in such a short time, and back then we’d connected because I understood that like no one else had.
I was afraid of losing who I’d become—someone I liked, someone I respected—if I started a relationship with a man who had, unwittingly, made me question my self-worth with regard to his affection. But I was also afraid for Aidan. And I wondered if he needed someone to talk to.
I still cared too much.
Forgetting it was April, I made the stupid decision to trust that the sun was out and it was an unseasonably warm spring evening. Having stayed at the university library to work, I made my way to the theater the following week dressed only in ballet flats, a summer dress, and a cardigan. As I left the library and walked onto The Meadows, I saw the dark clouds roll overhead in warning.
“Please don’t rain,” I murmured under my breath.
But my pleading fell on deaf ears.
The rain lashed down in diagonal sheets that battered and plastered my hair and clothes to my skin. Shrieks erupted as park-goers got caught in the downpour, and I lifted my bag to cover my head and started to run toward Gilmore Place.
My shoes slipped on the slick sidewalk, and I cursed as I narrowly avoided face-planting in the middle of the road. Stalled by traffic lights on the corner of Leven and Home Street, I ignored the sympathetic smile of a driver as she passed and catcalls of the guys in the car behind her as they drove by.
I glanced down at myself, flushing at the way my clothes molded to my body.
Brilliant.
There was no use hoping that Aidan wouldn’t be at rehearsal to see me like this. Although he hadn’t turned up at the pub on my next shift, he had promised to see me at rehearsal, and on Monday, he was there. To flirt with me. Charm me. And generally piss off Quentin and Amanda (who was not too thrilled about Aidan’s focused attention). Though it was annoying, the other half of me, as we all knew, was a weakling who loved his attention.
I eventually got across the street and ran down Gilmore, splashing dirty puddle water up my bare legs.
I pushed at the doors to the building, expecting them to swing open, and grunted when they resisted. Grabbing the oversized doorknobs, I shoved again.
Nothing.
I rattled them.
Nothing.
What the ever loving …
Shivering, I ducked under the tiny overhang of the building and looked up and down the street for signs of my fellow company members.
No one.
Sighing in exasperation, I rummaged through my bag, digging past papers and books, to find my phone. I flicked through my messages for any explanation of why the theater doors were locked when it was time to start the damn rehearsals. Nothing.
Cursing, I hit call on Quentin’s name.
“What?” he answered on the third ring.
“Where is everyone?” I said without preamble. “The doors to the building are locked.”
“You’re at rehearsals?” he asked, sounding as irritated as I felt. “Terence, you were supposed to text everyone!”
“I did text everyone!” I heard Terence’s distant yell.
“Well, you didn’t text Nora, you wretch!”
“I did text Nora!”
“He didn’t text me.” My teeth started to chatter. “What’s going on?”
“I broke my bloody foot last night.”
Concern distracted me from the cold. “How?”
“Terence left a shoe on the stairs. Suffice it to say he’s now my personal go-fetch boy. Anyway, I’m in a little of bit of pain, so I moved rehearsals to Saturday midday, much to everyone’s disgruntlement. Very kind. Our cast and crew, I mean. Very concerned. That was sarcasm. They were mewling villains, the whole lot of them.”
“I hope you’re okay.”
“Of course, you do, Nora, you’re a sweetheart. Sorry, Terence is such a complete and utter wanker sometimes. I hope you didn’t get caught in the downpour.”
“No, I’m fine,” I lied. “Feel better. See you Saturday.”
We hung up, and I wrapped my arms around myself, praying a taxi would appear so I wouldn’t have to run out into the deluge again. I shivered and shook like a wet dog, feeling miserable and sorry for myself, when a dark green Range Rover turned down the street and stopped outside the building.
The window rolled down on the passenger side and Aidan’s face appeared. “Get in!” he yelled through the rain.
My heart pounded so hard in my chest, I couldn’t move much less react to his sudden appearance.
“Nora, get in!” This time he sounded annoyed and it broke me out of my stupor. Whether I’d decided I’d rather be in his company than catch the flu, or if it was merely an excuse to be near him without feeling like I was betraying myself, I didn’t know.
I gripped my bag and flew down the steps toward his SUV.
Warmth suffused me as I bundled into the passenger seat and closed the door. He had the heating turned all the way up.
“Your seats,” I said, avoiding looking him in the eye.
“Like I give a fuck about my seats right now. You’re soaked.”
“Just a little.” My teeth chattered. “Or a lot.”
Cursing under his breath, he took off back into traffic. “You didn’t get the text that rehearsal was moved?”
“Apparently, I was the only one.”
“Well, thank God I was on my way home from the studio and decided to swing by in case someone didn’t get the memo.”
“Yeah, good thinking.” I still couldn’t look at him. “New car?”
“Aye.”
I sat quietly, shivering, as he drove to Fountainbridge. “I don’t suppose you could drop me off at my place?”
“By the time we get there, you could fall ill,” he said impatiently.
Worry gnawed at me as he parked in the garage beneath his building and hopped out of the car to come around to my side. “Aidan, I’m fine,” I said as he opened the door and held his hand out to me.
When he refused to move out of the way, I had no choice but to take his hand.
The sound of him drawing in a sharp breath brought my head up.
And his eyes were on my body and the way the dress stuck to me, leaving little to the imagination.
I flushed and tried to draw my cardigan closed.
Aidan grabbed my hand and looked away, but I saw the flush of red high on his cheeks.
My nipples were already hard from the cold and the wet, and now my breasts felt swollen, high, and tight.
Run, Nora, run!
I didn’t run. I let Aidan lead me silently into the elevator. Once inside I let go of his hand as gently as possible, not wanting to hurt his feelings.
“You can take a hot shower while I find some dry clothes of mine that’ll do while I put your dress in the dryer.” He stared stonily ahead.
“That’s kind of you,” I said.
We sounded like strangers.
But the electricity between us in that elevator crackled and sparked so much, I was shocked my hair didn’t frizz.
When the elevator door opened, we both moved to leave first, and I ended up walking into his side, my breasts pressed up against him. Aidan winced as if in pain and gripped my biceps a little too tightly as he removed me from his person before I could remove myself.
“I was going to open the door,” he explained.
For a moment, I looked up at him, the blood rushing so hot inside of me, I could feel my rationale and common sense flying out the window. Whatever he saw in my expression opened the lock he’d had on his desire, and it blazed at me from his eyes.
“Door,” I whispered, reminding him.
He nodded, his features strained with tension, as he marched out of the elevator and across the hall.
As soon as I walke
d into his apartment I felt winded, like someone had kicked me in the gut. It was almost as if by crossing the threshold, I’d been hurtled back in time eighteen months ago. A dining table and chairs were now set up where the small music studio had been, but otherwise, it was the same.
My eyes flew to Aidan who had stopped and turned when I’d halted to take in the space. His longing matched my own when our gazes connected. He was remembering too.
I remembered how much I loved him.
Needed him.
Wanted to crawl so deep inside him, we wouldn’t be able to tell each other apart.
And right then, with lust pumping through my veins and tears of the past in my eyes, those feelings weren’t ducking for cover.
They were consuming.
Aidan cleared his throat. “The shower in the master suite is more powerful. You can use that. There are clean towels in there. Leave your …” he looked away, “clothes outside the bathroom door and I’ll stick them in the dryer while you shower. I’ll put a dry T-shirt or something outside for you.”
Somehow, I nodded. Somehow, I slipped off my ballet flats so as not to traipse my muddy footprints across his floors. Somehow, I walked past him and down the hall. But the farther my cold, bare feet took me, the more wrong it felt to be parted from him.
My body felt tight, wanton, and dissatisfied with the distance.
More than dissatisfied.
Uncooperative with the distance.
Looking back on it, I don’t know what came over me.
I think I was exhausted with fighting something that I longed for.
Entering his bedroom, that tight, coiling sensation of need in the pit of my stomach worsened. The room smelled of him, and he hadn’t made his bed that morning. The vision of him sprawled there, naked, caused a flip low and hungry in my belly.
I walked over to the bathroom and pushed open the door. The shower cubicle was much bigger than the one in the family bathroom out in the hall, and I shivered, looking forward to feeling the hot water sluice over me. But I wanted more than that. I didn’t have the words or the power to use the words, still afraid of saying them out loud.
I stripped out of my clothes in the threshold of the bathroom and left them on the floor.
I kept the door open.
Wide open.
I reached into the shower and switched it on, waited for the hot water to come on, and stepped inside, closing the glass cubicle door behind me. When I turned around, I could see right out into the bedroom.
My heart pounded. Thud. Thud. Thud. Thud Thud. Thud Thud Thud. Thud Thud Thud Thud Thud. Faster and harder.
Then my breath caught as Aidan came into my line of sight. He gave me his profile at first, and I could see the little frown between his brows. Then he tensed, and I knew he’d caught sight of me in his peripheral. When he turned, first his eyes went to my pile of clothing on the floor and then slowly, they rose. They dragged up my body.
I washed my breasts and shivered as Aidan watched me.
Finally, our eyes met.
His so fierce with need, I felt my legs wobble.
Still, I continued, using his shampoo and conditioner to wash my hair, and I luxuriated in the way he was hypnotized by my breasts as they bounced with the movement.
His erection pushed against the zipper on his jeans and I grew slick between my legs.
Once I was clean, my skin hot from the water and arousal, I turned off the shower, squeezed the water out of my hair, and stepped out. The cold air prickled over my skin, making me shiver, making my nipples bead into tight buds.
And Aidan drank in every inch of me.
Goosebumps broke out all over my skin at his perusal.
I didn’t feel insecure or too young anymore.
I felt bold and needy and desired.
“Aidan,” I whispered.
Everything he wanted to hear was in that one word, and suddenly, he was unbuttoning his shirt. Relief moved through me. I wouldn’t be forced to say the words I couldn’t, but I was going to get what I wanted anyway.
I watched as he undressed, his eyes never leaving me, and a little whimper escaped me when his hard cock was revealed, straining toward his belly, hot, throbbing, and desperate for me.
I did that.
Me.
“Get on the bed, Pixie. And spread your legs.”
His hoarse demand might as well have been his tongue on my clit for the way my body responded. Limbs shaking with desire, I walked by him, torturously close, and climbed onto his bed, giving him an eyeful of my ass before I turned around and lay on my back.
A spike of vulnerability, of nerves, halted me from opening my legs.
“Legs. Now.”
I bit my lips on a smile. “No please?”
“I’m grappling to take this slow, Pixie,” he admitted.
I opened my legs.
He appeared, approaching the bed, and I felt a rush of wet as he looked at me there, hunger on his face. Unexpectedly, he didn’t take what I was offering. He crawled over my body and hands braced on the mattress on either side of my head, he looked down at me.
“Aidan?”
“Are you really here, Pixie?”
Not sure if that question was loaded with more than those simple words, I reached up to cup his cheek in my hand, rubbing my thumb over the bristle there like I used to. “Let’s forget everything else and just have this. I feel like I might shake apart if you don’t come inside me.”
“Fuck,” he groaned and bent his head to take my mouth. The kiss was impatiently hard. I moved my lips beneath his, our tongues stroking one another in deep tangles that mimicked what our bodies wanted to do. My hips tilted toward his in want.
I gripped Aidan’s waist as the kiss grew rough and breathless; I whimpered again as his hips moved against mine and his erection skated, teased across my belly. He released my mouth only for his lips to whisper across my chin, down my jaw, like he couldn’t rest easy until they had touched everywhere. He kissed his way down my body, his mouth hot, hungry, and I held on, caressing his muscled back, sliding my hands up toward his shoulder blades and into his hair as he moved downward.
When the Saharan heat of his mouth closed around my right nipple, my hips slammed against his in reaction. My thighs gripped him as I urged him closer, my back arching for more as he first licked me and then sucked hard, all the while pinching my other nipple between his forefinger and thumb.
I felt a wet rush between my legs.
He lifted his head, his eyes forest green as he undulated against me, his cock between my legs now, kissing my throbbing heat. “More, wee Pixie, or straight to the finale?”
As much as I longed for it, I wanted him to have what he wanted. “You know you want to torture me, you bastard,” I groaned, needy. “So why ask?”
His laughter rumbled against me, and I squeezed my eyes closed because the sound elicited so much more than sexual desire.
“Open your eyes.”
I did.
Satisfied, he dipped his head again, licking, teasing, and torturing my other nipple now. I felt the coil of tension tighten in my lower belly.
“Aidan,” I panted hard, clutching his head in my hands as he circled his tongue around my areola. “I need you.”
He moved, sliding down my body, his lips trailing open-mouthed kisses down my stomach as his hands cupped and shaped my breasts on his descent. I shivered at the touch of his tongue across my navel and sighed happily as he pressed my thighs open.
Aidan settled between my legs, and his calloused, beautiful hand glided along the inside of my thigh until I felt his fingers slide inside me.
“Oh God …” I threw my head back at the sensation, never having reacted to this act quite so explosively before. It felt like I was already seconds from coming.
How could that be?
My reaction brought Aidan’s eyes up to my face. They were intense, the mischief gone and replaced by ferocious sexual intent. His fingers slipped out of me and the
n back in. My hips pushed against them, trying to catch rhythm.
“You’re soaked, Pixie,” he said, his voice thick, guttural. “Drenched. Are you always like this? Or is this just for me?”
“Just for you,” I bit out, truthfully. “Only you do this to me.”
He bared his teeth, satisfaction slicing harshly across his face, and I swear the potent masculinity of him made my belly squeeze deep and low, giving him more of my wet.
Aidan dipped his head again. His fingers slipped out of me but before I could bemoan the loss, he parted my labia and my hips nearly came off the bed at the feel of his tongue on me.
Finally.
He circled my clit, teasing it, pressing it … and then he sucked it.
I cried out, unable to control how loud my response was, reeling as my orgasm started building in me. My thighs automatically closed on him, wanting to draw his mouth deeper into me, and at the scratch of his stubble against my skin, lust took over entirely. My hips surged against him, trying to ride his mouth as he thrust his tongue into my channel before licking it back up to my clit. Then he sucked.
The tension inside of me burst apart so hard, my head slammed back on the mattress and my eyes rolled. I also screamed.
I’d never screamed during climax.
But there was no holding it back as my inner muscles pulsed in hard wave after hard wave. And still he continued to lick me through it until I was writhing against his mouth, my fingers curled into the bedding beneath me.
It faded into aftershocks and my limbs grew so heavy, my legs collapsed against his side as he drew himself up to stare down at me.
I didn’t know why he was looking at me in wonder.
I was the one in awe.
When he pulled back and got off the bed, I whined—actually whined!—“Where are you going?”
Aidan didn’t say anything. I heard some rustling, and then he was back, crawling
up my body. He straddled me, his impressive erection standing to attention, and he watched me watch him as he ripped the condom wrapper with his teeth and rolled it onto his dick.
His big hand coasted up my torso and despite the fact that I’d been drained of energy seconds ago, I arched my back into his touch. Heat shot through me from the inside out as he squeezed my right breast with one hand while his other hand slid between my legs. I jolted, my clit overly sensitive.