Her hair fanned out around her head. Her lips parted and her chest rose and fell in quick successions. The longer I looked, the longer I cupped her curves, the rosier her skin became beneath my touch. I smoothed my hand down the curve of her hip, down between her legs. She arched her back and dug her nails into the backs of my arms.
“Julian,” she moaned.
I nudged her legs apart with my knee and watched her green eyes squeeze shut.
“Are you nervous?” I asked, curious about her reaction.
She scrunched the bed sheets in her hand, opened her eyes, and stared up at the ceiling.
“A little bit. It’s just been a while and the last time I did this, it was dark and I was a little drunk and he definitely didn’t touch me the way you’re touching me.”
I smiled and scanned down her body, watching my finger slip higher up her inner thigh.
“Like this?” I asked.
She squirmed beneath my touch and kept a tight hold on the sheets. “I’m about to spontaneously combust if you don’t…”
I smirked. “Do what?”
She pushed up onto her elbows and her gaze flitted back and forth between my eyes.
“Julian Lefray, please put me out of my misery. Do you realize how long I’ve waited for this?”
I laughed and pressed my hand to the center of her chest, pushing her onto her back.
“I’ve waited just as long, Jo, but you have to relax. You have the most beautiful body I’ve ever seen. Just let me touch you.”
She groaned and let her body fall back onto the bed. I gripped her hips and pushed her up higher on the bed. Her head hit the pillows and she watched me with a curious stare.
I scooted down and skimmed my hand down across her chest and stomach until I could grip her thighs and spread her legs even wider.
“Oh, Jesus,” she whispered, throwing her arm over her eyes.
“Jo, relax,” I whispered, pressing one hand to her stomach to hold her on the bed and using the other to keep her legs open. If I was about to put my mouth between her legs, I didn’t want her to buck up and break my nose.
“Okay. Okay,” she said, taking a calming breath. “I’m relaxed, I promise.”
Liar. Her body was still humming with nervous energy, but I loved the way she felt. She was so easy to touch, so full of beautiful curves that I’d been fantasizing about for the last few months. I was mesmerized by every part of her. The soft skin over her hip bones, the dip of her belly button, the arch of her back as I dragged my hand up her thigh and then pressed a finger inside of her.
Her lips parted and I gave her a second to still, then I followed the path of my finger with my mouth.
There was no point in waiting for her to remain still. Jo laughed and talked the whole way through the night. Every time I pushed her a little further, she’d slink back and make a joke, trying to lighten the moment.
She watched me with curious eyes as I slipped off my pants and boxer briefs. It was the first time she’d stayed silent the entire night. I crawled back on top of her and kissed up her chest, over the swell of her breasts, and up the side of her neck.
“I’m not nervous anymore,” she whispered as she wound her fingers through my hair. “I want this so badly.”
I leaned back to catch her eyes and we stared at each other in silence. If I stopped then, Monday morning wouldn’t be any less awkward. We’d already gone so far. I’d already seen every inch of her skin and I’d already heard a symphony of moans from her supple lips. No amount of time could erase those memories. I knew that, but as I slipped inside of her and she shook beneath me, I realized there was so much left hanging between us. She was completely open to me. For once, there were no pretenses or expectations. She wasn’t pushing me away and I wasn’t pretending that she was just a friend. No more playful, witty flirtation. Just lust, distilled.
Josephine
He took his time with me, winding his fingers through mine and pushing them out to the sides. He ground his hips against mine, watching and studying my reactions so he could discover what really drove me mad. I must have been so easy to read, because he could do no wrong. When he skimmed the tops of my breasts, I squeezed his hands tighter. When he caught my earlobe between his teeth, I moaned softly against his cheek. When I came apart beneath him, my whole body shook. My eyes squeezed shut and my nails dug into his skin so hard I was sure I’d draw blood.
In that moment…
I knew I was his.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Josephine
Monday morning was monumental for two reasons.
First, we had to decide which architecture firm to hire for Lorena’s new offices. This was a big deal and would ultimately shape the entire design of her store.
Second, there was the little fact that Julian and I had made love on Saturday night and now we were going to have to work together. No biggie.
I woke up early on Monday, stood in front of my mirror, and applied a thin layer of makeup—mascara to hide my nervous eyes, red lipstick to give me false confidence. The entire time I got ready, I replayed the previous day and contemplated how easy it’d been to wake up in Julian’s bed.
“Dude, you’re basically crushing me right now,” I said, pushing him off of me at the crack of dawn.
Julian was a cuddler, a suffocating cuddler. I woke up with half of his body on top of my mine. I was practically suffocating and when I rolled over, my lungs thanked me for the extra air.
“Mmm…again,” he murmured, still half-asleep. His hand found my left boob and I rolled my eyes.
“You don’t get sex before I get breakfast. Now get up and let’s go find a bagel.”
“You’re so high maintenance.” He laughed, rolling over and stretching his arms above his head.
HELLO, NAKED JULIAN.
The man was all toned, tan skin and six-pack abs. I wanted to lick him from his toes to his forehead, but more than that, I wanted a bagel and some damn cream cheese.
“C’mon, c’mon, c’mon. I’m hungry.”
He groaned and threw the blankets off, and my eyes bulged out of my head a little bit. The man needed to warn people before he just stripped down like that. I was momentarily dumbstruck as I took in the contour of his abs and the curve of everything that lay below.
“Jo, my eyes are up here,” he joked.
My face turned the color of a Cherry Icee and I promptly turned away from him to examine his hotel closet.
“I’m stealing a t-shirt and then I’m going to leave this apartment to hunt down food. My stomach is eating itself as we speak.”
Julian’s hand wrapped around my waist and then he pulled me back against his chest. His palm splayed out on my stomach and then he inched lower. My stomach dipped and my knees buckled. Traitorous body.
“Nope. No,” I said, resisting the temptation to give in to his pursuit. “If that hand moves any lower, I’m going to karate chop you.”
It moved lower and my body betrayed me. My stomach was like, “Meh, I can wait to eat,” and my girly parts were like, “HELL YEAH, this is a great idea.” And that’s the story of how Julian banged me on the floor of his closet with his suits and ties judging us from above.
Our breakfast turned into a stroll through Central Park and then a lunch. I eventually made an excuse about having to do laundry (yeah, right) and cleaning (ha ha) and we parted ways after a breath-stealing kiss.
As soon as I stepped away from him and walked to the subway, the last twenty-four hours started to set in. The same parts of my brain that had pushed me to sleep with Julian were now firing off insecurities and worries at a pace of 1000 thoughts per second. Were you sexy enough? Did you make enough sexy sounds? Did you make too many sexy sounds, thus coming across as a crazy porn star? Did giving him a blowjob seem cool and hot or just plain desperate? Did you come across too needy or were you cool and casual?
Cool New York girls can have sex without emotions. They are confident and strong. They don’t second-g
uess their decisions and they don’t question what a man wants. YES. That’s me! I’m cool and confident!
I walked a little quicker to the subway after that with my head held high and my shoulders pushed back. I could have broken out into a choreographed dance routine if only I’d had backup dancers with me.
Unfortunately, that confidence had dwindled sometime during my various REM cycles because by Monday morning, my take-no-shit attitude was gone.
After I finished getting ready, and stuffed a breakfast bar and an apple into my purse, I opened my laptop to check my email. I had fifteen minutes to spare before I needed to head to Julian’s hotel, and I definitely didn’t want to show up early.
I hadn’t had time to check my email over the weekend, and it definitely showed. My inbox was overflowing with emails from my bank and various spam coupons that I never got around to unsubscribing from. A few emails stood out. The subject lines all pertained to the Marc Jacobs fashion show or interview requests. I kept scrolling, losing count of how many there were. ABC News, The Today Show, Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, and People Magazine were at the top of my inbox. My first instinct was to assume that all of the emails were from spam accounts. How could they not be? There could not have been an email from Vogue sitting in my inbox.
My hand shook as I hovered my mouse over the subject line. By the time it finished loading, I thought my heart was going to beat out of my chest. I checked the email address to confirm it wasn’t something like VogueMagazineEditorISwe
[email protected]. Nope. The email was from
[email protected].
Holy shit.
I scrolled down and started to read, trying to remain as calm as possible.
Dear Ms. Keller,
My name is Elizabeth Hope and I’m the Social Media Team Leader here at Vogue. First of all, congratulations on your runway debut last week. You were quite the talk of the show afterward. I’m sure you’ve seen the news around the Internet since then, but I wanted to reach out and contact you personally. Vogue has been looking to hire an in-house blogger, someone to expand our readership to a younger generation. Our ideal candidate would be a fresh face, someone new to the fashion scene, and someone willing to team up with Vogue to expand our readership—
I zoned out after that. Straight up spaced out in the middle of my apartment. I think my brain short-circuited midway through her email. I backtracked and reread what she’d typed. I was the talk of the show? News on the Internet? Truth be told, I hadn’t checked my blog, YouTube, or Twitter since Saturday morning. Julian had been quite the distraction…
I paused midway through her email and pulled YouTube to check my notifications. Last I’d seen, I had somewhere around ten thousand subscribers. Now? Well over two hundred thousand. What the fuck? In twenty-four hours? My hand shook as I refreshed the website, just to confirm my eyes weren’t deceiving me. Nope. No error. My Twitter was the same and when I went to check the hits on my blog, I had thousands upon thousands of new readers.
How?
How had these readers found me so quickly?
I went back to Twitter and searched my tags. The culprit for my stardom wasn’t hard to find. One particular photo from the fashion show had spread like wildfire. It was a photo of me standing at the end of the runway with my hand on my hip and a devious smile on my lips. I looked far sexier than I ever had before, owing to the lighting and dress, I’m sure. Marc Jacobs had posted the photo first and after that every major fashion magazine had reposted it with #FashionWorldsCinderella. Apparently someone had leaked the fact that I wasn’t actually a model, and people everywhere had found my story endearing, so much so that Vogue was now offering me a job.
The chime of another incoming email pulled me out of my thoughts and my eyes scanned to the clock on my microwave. Shit. I was going to be late. I closed my laptop and ran to grab my purse on shaky legs. I didn’t have time to finish reading Elizabeth’s email, but I already knew that my life was about to change. Interview requests? A possible position working with Vogue as an in-house blogger? This had been my dream for as long as I could remember. I wanted to be a fashion blogger and I wanted to make enough money blogging that I didn’t need to moonlight as a janitor.
I still hadn’t fully processed the sharp turn of events in my life when I knocked on Julian’s hotel door fifteen minutes later.
“Coming!” a female voice sang from the other side of the door.
I let my hand fall back by my side and stared at the hotel room number, completely confused. Why was there a woman answering Julian’s door less than twenty-four hours after we’d had sex?
So help me god.
Chapter Forty
Josephine
The door to Julian’s hotel opened wide and I was met with a bright smile and white-blonde hair twisted into a polished bun.
Julian’s sister was standing on the other side of the door and my heart was no longer in danger of pounding out of my chest. Jeez, my organs couldn’t take much more excitement this early in the morning.
“Cinderella!” She beamed, stepping forward to boop me on the nose with an imaginary wand.
“Lorena, it’s so good to see you,” I said as I hugged her before scanning down to get a good look at her outfit. I was used to seeing her in casual clothes, but now that she was out of rehab and back in the real world, she looked far more glamorous with a slight bohemian edge. Her arms were covered in bangles and she had a gold tribal-inspired statement necklace laying against her simple white dress. Her Valentino heels were so beautiful that I had to clasp my hands together to stop myself from bending down and stealing them right off her feet.
“It’s good to see you too. Did Julian tell you I’d be working with you guys starting today?”
I shook my head. “He didn’t, but I should have realized you would be.”
Speak of the devil…
Julian stepped out of his bedroom freshly-shaven with wet hair and a devilish smile. He was putting the finishing touches on his red tie and conjuring up memories that I wished I wasn’t thinking about right in front of his sister.
“Morning Jo,” he said, coming closer and bending to kiss my cheek.
I inhaled his cologne before he stepped away and pushed aside the wave of desire that came with it.
“Ah, are you a cheek kisser now, Julian? When did you become such a European dandy?” Lorena asked, glancing back and forth between us.
“Jo has a way of bringing out the gentleman in me,” he said with a wide smile.
I grunted. “Do not believe that, Lorena. Just last week we went out for lunch and he almost let the restaurant’s door slam shut on me.”
Julian held up his hands. “No! I thought you’d stopped to look at magazines a ways back, so I didn’t hold it open. Not to mention, the door was really heavy.”
I laughed and shook my head.
“Is this what it’s going to be like to work with you two? How do you even manage to get anything done?” she questioned.
“Usually we institute quiet time,” I offered. “We aren’t allowed to talk until we’ve checked off at least three items on our to-do lists.”
It sounded like a joke, but it was true. If Julian and I had it our way, we’d distract each other with photos of dogs and YouTube videos all day. Obviously things would change now that Lorena was back. We’d have to adjust to a third person and something told me Lorena wouldn’t care for dancing cat videos as much as Julian and I did.
When I strolled farther into his hotel room, I saw that Lorena had already set up shop at my normal spot on the big couch. Julian’s laptop was across from her, which meant I was left with the hotel desk. This wasn’t a bad thing—in fact most normal people work from desks—it was just that I knew I wouldn’t get away with sneaking my normal glances at Julian all day. Things were already changing.
Lorena took her seat at the couch and jumped right into work. Her enthusiasm was infectious and I knew she’d been waiting months to finally get back to her company. We had a final meeting with a d
esign team in the afternoon and I needed to finish a few things before then.
I opened my laptop and laid out my pen, phone, and notepad in a neat row. The setup wasn’t as comfortable as the couch, but it would do. I had a view of Central Park right out the window. Sure, I’d have preferred my standard view of Julian, but maybe the new setup would help my productivity.
My computer was still booting up when Julian held a warm cup of coffee out in front of me. I hadn’t even heard him approach; I’d been too lost in the craziness of the morning. I reached out to take it from him and then he squeezed my shoulder, a small gesture of reassurance.
“Thank you,” I said over my shoulder.
He gave me a knowing smile and then headed back to his spot on the couch. If Lorena noticed the exchange, she didn’t say anything about it.
“Jo! You have to give me all the details about Saturday night. I’ve seen your photo everywhere this morning! You’re seriously famous now,” Lorena said, clapping her hands in excitement.
I glanced over to Julian and he smiled.
“By all means, tell her about the fashion show or we’ll never get any work done today.” I laughed and proceeded to give her every juicy detail of the show. After all, I could tell her the insanity of the first half of my night without including the details of what happened after. With her brother. In this very hotel room.
She’d pestered me with questions, but I didn’t mind. It was mid-morning by the time Julian heavily suggested we actually start to work, but even then, I had to promise to tell her more during lunch.
By the time we’d all settled down to work, I had too many conflicting thoughts swirling around my head to actually focus. I couldn’t even decide what should take top priority: the fact that Vogue had emailed me about a job or the fact that I wanted to jump Julian’s bones at that very moment.