“You.” Her eyes darkened, a sensual haze beginning to burn in their depths. “What’s your name?”
“Gina.”
“I like it. Gina, would you like to come back upstairs with me?”
She glanced around at a group of women behind her. Some were staring, their mouths hanging open, while others nodded their heads enthusiastically.
“I’d love to.”
I nodded to the bartender to get his attention and made it clear he should wipe out her tab. After she said good-bye to her friends, I led her back up the stairs and got her to relax on the couch.
I’d learned a long time ago that a woman was more likely to go home with you if you made a small effort to get to know her. You didn’t really have to care, just give off the appearance that you did. According to one woman, as she stormed from my house, it made women feel less cheap for going home with a man they just met when you knew something about them. She went on to scream and yell in the street that I’d made her feel just like that.
When I had a pretty good feeling that Gina would come home with me if asked, I placed my drink on the table and put on my most charming smile and invited her back to my place.
The minute we stepped through the door, I led her to the sunken living room and the sofa closest to the recessed bar. Instantly the night with Tess came rushing to the front of my mind.
It was obvious from the way Gina had carried herself, that she’d had enough to drink at the bar. Yet none of that stopped me from getting her another. The warning bells should have rung loud and clear in my head.
They didn’t.
Everything was as it should be. Halfway through her glass, I placed it on the table and cupped her face in my hands. I took her lips, molding mine to hers. The taste of grape lingered there, its taste familiar and sharp. Deeper and deeper the kiss became. My dick hardened instantly. I remembered the feel of her wrapped around me and couldn’t wait to be there again.
Or I thought I did.
I broke the kiss and trailed my lips down her jaw to her neck. In the heat of the moment, I nipped at the soft skin there and whispered, “God, you’re so sexy, Tess.”
She shoved me away. “Who the fuck is Tess?”
“No one important.” I said, reaching for her, hoping we could pick up where we left off. In reality, I knew there was no way that was happening. I’d fucked up.
“Apparently, neither am I.” She scooped up her stuff and headed for the door.
Never in my life had a woman stormed from my home so fast—not even when I’d thrown them out after sex. Usually they begged me to let them stay. This time she was out my door without a glance back.
I tried to convince myself that while it had never been a problem before, having two women with the same hair color, one right after the other, had become an issue.
Always one to learn from my mistakes, the next night I decided on a blonde. No possible resemblance to the object of my unwanted obsession.
And still I managed to fuck it up.
Since she didn’t look like Tess, my unneeded subconscious decide to come out to play, comparing every move she made Tess. The way her hands wrapped around my dick, or how her tongue plunged into my mouth.
Every moved felt forced. I didn’t want to fuck her, but I was determined to prove to myself—well, to my dick—that my need for Tess was ridiculous. So I did it. I fucked her. But not one part of me felt satisfied.
It felt wrong. I sent her packing, just like a did to every other woman who I had between my sheets. Every other woman besides Tess.
Whatever caused it, I was determined to work it out of my system. I went out again the next night and watched another blonde, but didn’t bother bringing anyone home. Not one of them got me hard. Enough was enough. Getting her out of my system by sleeping with other women hadn’t worked.
After knocking back at least a quarter of a bottle of scotch, I realized the only way I was going to purge the woman from my system was to fuck her until I’d had enough. Only then would things be able to go back to the way they had been before.
And all of that led me back to Rock Bottom.
I sat in the office, adjusting myself every so often. It was the first time I’d been hard in days. And I was hard—painfully so.
Tess happened to be there when I arrived. Her ass perfect in the little black shorts. All day I’d tried to figure out the best way to convince her that my idea was the perfect solution. My eyes snapped up at the heavy pounding on my door.
“Miller, get out here.”
It was Tess. What I wanted couldn’t be that easy, surely? Or perhaps the universe had decided it had had enough of using me as a fucktoy and it was complying with my master plan.
“Come in.”