The sight makes my heart tick up a notch, telling me it’s ready for more of this.
“Mmm.” Chris makes a sound that goes straight to my clit as he tastes me. “I’m going to look forward to tasting more of this tonight,” he says, releasing me. I catch myself on the bathroom sink, weak from his attention. He smirks at me, like he knows exactly what he did to me and enjoyed every second of it.
He opens the door and heads out in to the main room, and I hear his voice calling back to me as he walks away. “Oh, and Scarlett,” he says. “Leave your hair down.”
7
Scarlett
Dinner is torture.
Don’t get me wrong, the food is delicious—an Italian restaurant that I’d never be able to afford on my salary. The conversation isn’t half bad either. Chelsea Miller from Colson Foods is a fun person to talk to and has a lot of personality. If she lived in Seattle, I imagine that we’d be friends.
No, the torture comes from the fact that every move Chris makes I can feel. There’s something between us now, something that’s unsettled and raring for us to finish. Though he makes conversation with Chelsea, his eyes almost never leave me. I can feel them watching my every move. When I make eye contact with him, he smiles a tiny smile, one that lets me know he’s remembering how I came apart on his hand.
And he touches me. His hand on the small of my back as we enter the restaurant. Brushing my shoulder as he pulls out a chair for me. On my hand as he makes a point in conversation. On my thigh under the table, inching upward. It’s all I can do to keep from blushing, because I know what each of those touches means. Every one is meant to remind me of what he said, of what’s coming when we make it back to that hotel room and there’s nothing stopping us from tearing each other apart.
This is such thin ice we’re walking on, and yet, I don’t think either of us would care very much if we drowned. There’s something here, and neither of us is going to turn away until we explore it. I try to focus on Chelsea, on giving her the attention that she deserves, but it’s proving more difficult that I thought.
Turns out Colson Foods was Chris’s first client with Ellison. He put them on the map with a cute campaign that anthropomorphized Colson’s products and the videos went viral—just like Colson’s market share. Ever since then, his name has been on everyone’s lips, including mine. But Chelsea is the one that convinced Colson to go with Ellison in the first place. They were skeptical about the cutesy commercials and wanted something more straight-forward. She pushed until they gave, and it’s a good thing that they did. I guess that Chris owes a lot to her, which is why she gets the honor of a one-on-one dinner. Or it would be one-on-one if I weren’t here.
I feel a brush of his fingers under the tablecloth again and I look over to find him grinning. That kind of smile entirely transforms his face, going from brooding and sexy to boyish and charming. But before I can really think about which side of him I like better, Chelsea asks, “So, Scarlett. I haven’t seen you on any trips with Chris before. How’d you land that gig?”
“Bad shrimp,” I say, trying to contain my laughter.
“What?”
I take a sip of wine. “There was a platter of bad shrimp at the New Year’s party. I hate seafood—always have, so it wasn’t on my list of things to try. But most people in Seattle can’t get enough. So half the company was sick with food poisoning, including the three people who directly outrank me and would have been chosen first.”
Chelsea laughs, a deep booming laugh that sounds almost strange coming from a woman. But it’s so sincere that you can’t help but laughing along with her. “That’s one hell of a stroke of luck.”
“It’s definitely something like that,” I say, smiling into my glass.
There’s another brush on my thigh, and my fingers tighten on the stem of my glass, because this one is higher than the others. I send Chris a quick warning glare, and all he does is raise an eyebrow. I straighten my spine, determined to keep my face cool and impassive, not responding to him. The last thing I want is Chelsea getting wind of something happening between us under the table.
“How are you liking New York?” she asks me.
Chris’s hand creeps higher. “I haven’t seen much of it, to be honest,” I say. “Plus, it’s a lot colder than I was expecting.”
“Yeah, it’s been a pretty bad winter. Last year was far more mild.”
I nod my head and I take a sip of wine to cover my anxiety. Chris has reached my mound, his fingers gently pushing through my dress, stimulating my clit and getting me far too aroused to be in a restaurant like this.
Chelsea engages Chris in something minute about their current negotiations, and his hand disappears. I stifle a sigh of relief. I want his hands on me too much. If he keeps touching me, I’m afraid that I’m going to give something away. I know that some people love it, but exhibitionism really isn’t my style. I would much rather just be seen by the one person I want. I know that Chris sees me. Now we just have to wait until we’re alone.
It takes another hour of small talk and small touches for dinner to wind down. Finally, we’re ready to go, and my body is so keyed up that I’m ready to pull Chris into the first dark corner we see and make him fuck me. But on the way out to the restaurant, he’s a perfect gentleman. He takes my arm as we say our goodbyes to Chelsea, and he helps me into the cab so I can avoid stepping into the slush. He tells the cab driver the address of the hotel, and that’s that. I turn towards him, ready to pounce on him. That’s what people in the movies do, right? They maul each other in the back of a taxi until they get back to the hotel and rip each other’s clothes off. But Chris stops me.
He pulls me against his side locking me to him with one arm and pulling up my dress with the other. Again that teasing touch finds me, and I stifle a moan. “You’re going to kill me,” I whisper.
“On the contrary,” he says against my ear. “Did you know that the French used to call the orgasm le petit mort, or the little death? No, Scarlett. I’m not going to kill you. I’m going to make you have many, many little deaths.” His fingers press through my panties against my clit, and I squirm in my seat, wanting to get closer to him but also not wanting the cab driver to have any clue as to what we’re doing. The way he’s touching me, it’s gentle, calm, and insistent. It tells me he’s not afraid to take his time, that he knows exactly what he wants and he’s going to get it. It’s exactly the way he is at Ellison, only this is ten times hotter.
The pressure he’s using on my clit is soft and pulsing, and it’s making me wet. I can feel the way the fabric of my panties is dampening, and I know that he can too. His lips press my ear again. “I’m not sure if I expressed this earlier, but you are so utterly hot,” he says. “From the second you walked in that door yesterday my cock was hard, wanting you. And now I can’t wait to have all of you.”
He presses against me more insistently, and my back arches. “How long until we’re there?” I ask.
“Not long.”
The rest of the cab ride is lost in a haze of touching. Chris’s hand feels like it’s everywhere. His fingers sweep down the insides of my thighs, only to rush back and tease me beneath my panties. Suddenly they’re at my breasts, feeling the way my nipples stand at attention under the fabric of my clothes, and then back to my clit to draw tiny circles that have my hips trusting against his hold on me. I’m going to combust. The cab driver pulls over in front of the hotel, and I gasp in relief. Chris pulls my dress down and pays the driver, and we rush inside. He takes me by the hand, pulling me along.
There is no frenzied make-out session in the elevator, no falling against the walls of the hallway as we make our way to the room. There is only the firm steadiness of his hand, the iron in his grip leaving no room to doubt that he’s going to make good on all of the promises he made. The door seems to loom in front of me as he opens it. I want this so badly, I’m almost afraid for it to start.
The door closes and we’re left in the half-light of the room. We left a couple of lamps on, and the lights of the city are streaming in through the window. The dimness feels sensual and dangerous, like anything could happen. Chris takes his coat off and drops it to the floor, pushes mine off my shoulders and watches it fall. “I’ve been watching you in that dress all night and it’s been driving me crazy,” he says. “Now I want to see you out of it.”
I walk past him towards the center of the room, stepping out of my heels as I go. I can feel his eyes on me as I turn, shimmying the straps off my shoulders and pushing the dress down my body. I watch his eyes follow it as it falls into a puddle on the floor. “Your turn,” I say.
His suit jacket comes off, and unlike earlier when I barely had a chance to look at him, this time, as he unbuttons his shirt, I get the chance to drink him in. The lean lines of his muscles are highlighted in the dim room, and the sparse trail of hair that trails from his chest to his stomach leads my eyes straight to where I want it to go—across his delicious abs and down to where his cock is once again begging for attention.