up and took her hands, lacing his fingers through hers and backing her against the wall as he stepped up onto the stair she was on.
He pressed his body against hers, hard and long, perfectly muscular. She started working the buttons on his shirt, popping a few of them off in her haste to get him undressed. He helped with the sleeve cuffs and tossed the shirt down to the bottom of the stairs.
“Oh, yes,” she breathed, running her hands over his bare chest, the crisp hair tickling her palms. “You’re so hot.”
He chuckled. “I could say the same.” He gripped the zipper tab of her dress and tugged it down, letting her dress fall off her body. She hardly had time to think about it, to worry about how she looked to him.
She kicked the dress down to the next stair, still wearing her heels, a strapless bra and a pair of underwear that may as well not exist for all that they covered.
But tonight, she really did feel sexy. She didn’t feel the need to cover herself, to hide anything. And she really didn’t want him hiding anything. She made quick work of his slacks, pushing them down his muscular thighs, her body heating when she looked at him, dressed in nothing more than a pair of tight black boxer briefs that revealed the outline of his erection in tantalizing detail.
She put her hand on him, sliding her palm over his cloth-covered length, reveling in his harsh, indrawn breath.
“Do you know how many times I thought of you?” she asked, the question requiring a whole lot of boldness she hadn’t realized she possessed. “Of touching you. Having my way with you. You’ve kept me up a lot of nights, Zack. Imagining what it would be like if you kissed me.”
“You thought of me?” he asked, his words rough.
“I did.”
He didn’t have to ask why she hadn’t acted on it. Because what would the point have been? They didn’t want the same things. He wanted a loveless marriage, no family. She wanted more. There was still no point to this. No point beyond trying to satisfy the sexual hunger that was burning between them.
And the burning hope in her that she couldn’t quite snuff out that wondered if he could change his mind.
“Do you know what I’ve thought about?” She pushed his underwear down and he kicked them down with the growing pile of clothes on the staircase. She started to kneel down in front of him and he forked his fingers through her hair, halting her for a moment, the sting from the tug on her hair sending a sharp sensation of pleasure through her.
“Careful,” he said. “I’m close.”
“We have all night. I’m not worried. And I’ve had a lot of fantasies about this. You wouldn’t deny me a little fantasy fulfillment, would you?” She leaned forward and flicked the tip of her tongue over the head of his shaft. He sucked in a breath, his hold on her hair tightening again.
She took him into her mouth, loving the taste of him, the power she felt. That she could make his thigh muscles shake, make his hands tremble. He kept one hand in her hair, one on the staircase railing, bracing himself as she continued to explore him.
“Clara … I need … not like this.”
She raised her head, her heart nearly stopping when she saw his face. He had sweat beads on his forehead, the tendons in his neck standing out. He looked like a man who’d been tortured with pleasure.
And she’d been the one doing the torturing.
“I don’t mind.”
“I do. I need to have all of you.”
“Maybe we can make it the rest of the way up the stairs?”
“If we hurry,” he growled.
So she did, walking in front of him, knowing her thong and high heels were making a provocative visual for him. The feeling of confidence she felt, the absolute certainty that he enjoyed looking at her, that, for now at least, she was the woman he desired, was amazing. New.
His bedroom door was open, and she walked inside and sat down on the bed, waiting for him. He stood in the doorway, his eyes hot on her. The lights were off, moonlight filtering through the window. The darkness felt like a cover, made her feel more confident.
“Take everything off,” he bit out.
She undid the front clasp on her bra and was gratified by the sharp rise and fall of his chest as she revealed her breasts to him. She stood and tugged her underwear down her legs, leaving the high heels for last.
“Want to help with these?” she asked, sitting again, holding her foot out.
He smiled and walked over to the bed and knelt in front of her, putting his hands on the curve of her knees, sliding them down her calf, he bent his head down and kissed her ankle as he took one of her shoes off and dropped it onto the carpet.
He did the same with the other one, slow, erotic movements making her shiver all over. And when he leaned in and pressed his mouth between her thighs she nearly came apart with the first stroke of his tongue.
“I’ll confess, I didn’t think about this very much until recently,” he said. “But I haven’t stopped thinking about it since last week. Every night, I dream of you,” he said, his voice rough as he continued to pleasure her with his hands.
“Me, too,” she said, panting, her body on the brink of climax, so close she felt it all through her, tension drawing all of her muscles tight.
Zack stood up, his smile wicked as he looked at her. He leaned over and took a condom from the nightstand. He tore the packet open and rolled a condom onto his length before joining her on the bed.
He put his hands on her thigh and pulled her over him so that her legs were bracketing his and his erection poised at the entranced to her body. Her eyes locked with his, she lowered herself onto him, a low moan climbing in her throat as he filled her.
She gripped his shoulders, enjoying the feeling. Enjoying the moment of being joined with him completely.
She moved slowly at first, trying to find the right rhythm, her confidence increasing as his grip on her hips tightened, as she started to move closer to the edge of climax.
She was saying things, words, about how good it felt, how much she cared about him, but she wasn’t sure what she was saying exactly. She didn’t care. She couldn’t think, she could only feel.
Could only hold on to Zack as her orgasm pushed her over the edge and into an abyss of light and feeling, where there was nothing, no one, except for her and Zack. There was no past, and there was no future. There was only the two of them.
In that world, in that moment, everything could work. Everything was perfect.
The ascent back to reality was slow and fuzzy, and she almost regretted it when it happened. But even reality, his skin hot and sweaty beneath her cheek, his chest hair a little bit scratchy, was pretty near perfect.
She didn’t have the assurance of a future. But for now she had Zack. And she would take him. She felt tears sting her eyes and she squeezed them shut, trying to hold them at bay.
She had him tonight. And it
