Phoenix Rising was completely different. Nobody seemed to be judging anyone else. Jessa could see several other people casting appreciative glances at the construction worker and the woman riding his cock. There was no judgment in their gazes, only arousal.
That didn’t make any of it right. You couldn’t spend your whole life flaunting the rules of decent society, could you?
Alex moved back toward the bar, leaving Jessa alone with her twisted thoughts. One part of her wanted to revel in the thought of limitless freedom. Freedom from the obsessive calorie counting and self-loathing that made Jessa feel dowdy and undesirable. Freedom to do and say whatever she wanted, to be the woman she was before convention forced her to grow up. The other part of her brain was convinced there was no such thing.
“Phoenix Rising isn’t just a name.”
Jessa whipped around. She’d been so involved in her inner turmoil that she hadn’t even heard Connor approach. She considered his statement. “I assumed the name has something to do with the anything-goes atmosphere.”
“No.”
Jessa stared up into his face. Connor’s limitless black eyes beckoned, the depths gleaming like shards of obsidian in the dim overhead lighting. Her breath nearly caught in her throat.
The hint of a smile pulled up one corner of his generous mouth. “Haven’t you ever felt it Jessa?”
“Felt what?” His proximity was making it difficult for her to remember exactly what they were discussing.
His hands clamped on her hips. A rush of heat flooded Jessa’s pussy. She ceased paying attention to anything in the room but Connor. Her breath was coming in pants. He leaned down until his mouth was pressed against the shell of her ear. “As if everything you ever were is burned away, until nothing remains but ashes.”
Jessa gasped, his words sending her body up in flames of desire.
“But before the wind can scatter those ashes, you’re reborn, given a second chance to be the person you were meant to be from the very beginning.”
His words drifted through the haze of pleasure, touching her very soul. Every inhibition and insecurity crumbled. Nineteen years of proper conditioning burned away in the heat of Connor’s onslaught. Only the two of them remained.
Mindless with desire, Jessa’s hands found Connor’s arms as she told him without words what she needed.
His fingers flexed into the flesh of her hips. Her nipples puckered, peaking beneath her shirt as a fresh rush of cream soaked her panties. Jessa’s mind struggled to grasp what Connor was suggesting, but her body wanted nothing more than to respond to his touch.
Connor stabbed his hands beneath the waistband of her slacks and cupped her ass. Jessa’s body pressed against his, her pelvis cradling his massive erection as Connor groaned and bucked his hips.
“God Jessa, you’re so fucking soft.”
“You’re not,” she whispered reverently.
“I need you, Jessa. I need your cunt wrapped around my cock.”
The molten desire in Connor’s explicit words made her squirm against him. Jessa’s hands fluttered against his sides a she tried to decide what to do next. But desire quickly overrode caution, and Jessa yanked his shirt from his pants. Sliding her hands beneath it, she reveled in the feel of the satin smooth skin covering Connor’s rippling abdominals.
Reality kicked in when the cool leather of a barstool made contact with Jessa’s suddenly and inexplicably naked backside. A little freedom was a wonderful thing, but Jessa had to draw the line somewhere. She couldn’t understand why this man seemed to be able to wipe away her inhibitions and good sense with a kiss and a touch. But he had. And Jessa had to stop it.
“No, Connor.”
“No?”
The velvet-wrapped gravel of his deep voice called forth another hot wave of lust. Jessa’s womb clenched in anticipation. “We can’t do this here.”
“Why not?”
He hadn’t stopped touching her. Connor’s big hands pushed her slacks past her knees until they pooled with the shoes lying on the floor.
Those were her shoes. How did he get her shoes off without her noticing?
Connor nudged her back and pressed his full lips to her jaw. His hot tongue traced fire down the column of her throat to her collarbone. Jessa’s mouth opened involuntarily in a soundless struggle for breath. She couldn’t stop. Her body wanted to react, consequences be damned. Their iron wills dueled for supremacy as Jessa battled him fiercely, trying desperately to make him stop, and managing to fan the flames higher, instead.
She finally managed to pull away. “No!”
Connor’s response was to pull her blouse over her head and toss it aside. He roughly palmed her breasts through the thin white cotton of her sensible bra. Jessa’s next protest died a quiet death as her head lolled back.