“Your tee-shirt is stained too.”
He glanced at the front of his shirt. “Let’s call this a major win for you for making me laugh so hard.”
I mimed making a check mark on a scorecard, feeling pretty good about the way power was flowing these days. I was the one steering the ship. Then, I sucked in a breath as he removed his tee-shirt. All my anger slinked away, all my hurt crept out quietly. I was left only with the one thing that had never been far away for the last five years – desire for him.
I stared and I didn’t try to play it cool. He was hot, and I wanted to enjoy the view. His chest was broad and firm, his arms strong, and his stomach as flat as the earth was rumored to be before Columbus discovered the truth. There was the slightest trace of hair running from his belly button to the waistband of his jeans, disappearing beneath his clothes suggestively. He reached for a fresh tee-shirt in the closet, and a crisp, clean button-down too.
Fuck it.
Fuck the act. Fuck the cool girl routine.
So much for my plan to be tough, to be civil, to be immune to his charms. I threw that playbook out the window and started writing a new one – one that was filled with payoff. This was the real starting over, because he’d called me pretty, he’d remembered my coffee drink, he’d told me he was glad to see me. This wasn’t one-sided and I was going to take what I wanted most right now. To be touched. To be kissed.
I removed my bulletproof vest, and spoke my mind. “Come here.”
He walked to the back of the couch and leaned down, his face inches from me.
“Hi,” he said softly.
“Hi.”
“Can I?” he asked, and then reached a hand into my hair, letting my dark brown strands fall through his fingers. I leaned into his hand, like a cat, as my answer. I wouldn’t be surprised if I had started purring.
“Kat,” he said in a hungry voice.
I looked into his eyes, those crisp green eyes that drew me in. “I need you to kiss me now,” I said, as if it were a command.
“Consider it done.”
I closed my eyes as his lips brushed mine with a softness, tenderness and eagerness all wrapped up in one. I felt as if the whole office, the factory, the city was gone. There was nothing else but this kiss and I melted into him, as I had with all our kisses five years ago. But then, there was something new, something less innocent, as the kiss shifted into another gear. The way his lips suddenly crushed mine was feverish. It was frenzied, and it was electric, and full of need. I needed to feel him. I needed to touch him. I explored his arms, traversing the shape and size of his forearms and the strength in them, and then outlining the sharp contours of his flexed biceps, until I returned to his chest, then down to his belly, so trim and tight that I longed to touch and trace and hold onto his perfectly cut waist all through the day and the night.
He stopped, moving to the door, locking it this time, then returning to the couch with me.
“We can’t go all the way. Not even close,” I said, holding up my hand as a stop sign to sex.
“I’m good with that. But we don’t have much time for anything.”
“Do you want to stop then?”
He shook his head, and nodded to the bulge in his jeans. “Hell no.”
He wanted me as much as I wanted him. But did he like me too? Or was I just the girl who was hot for him and so, why not? A part of me knew better. A part of me knew I should pull back the reins. But there was a bigger part of me in that moment that didn’t care. Because my body had no questions and no qualms. Inside all I felt was the weight of five pent-up years of missing him. My mind was a jumble, a mixed-up mess of hurt and want, but I didn’t know how to sort out the crazy rush of thoughts, and frankly, I didn’t want to. I was burning for him, so I let my body lead me on.
I touched his soft, thick hair that I’d missed running my hands through, then traced the back of his neck in a way that made him groan. Bryan’s hands drifted lower, down to my waist, and I didn’t stop him. I wanted his hands everywhere. All over me. He shifted me over, pulling me on top of him so I could feel how hard he was through his jeans. I straddled him on the couch, my knees on either side of his hips, our clothes still all the way on, my flowy skirt spread across his thighs.
I began to move my hips barely, subtly, with my bikini underwear and his jeans forming a layered barricade between our bodies. I closed my eyes again, kissing him, grinding against him, feeling like I was in high school again, where having clothes on doesn’t stop you from getting off. His hands slipped underneath my top and made their way to my br**sts, and the way he touched me with such tenderness and such desire made me gasp.
My lips fell away from him and I buried my face in the crook of his neck. The temperature in me soared as I pulled his taut chest to me, thrilling at the feel of his body rubbing against mine. His hands dipped under my skirt, touching the back of my thighs in a way that made me race even more. He hadn’t even gotten into my panties and I was already so close.
“It’s not going to take me long,” I told him.
“Nothing would make me happier than to make you come,” he said, and then managed to slide a hand between my legs. The slightest touch was all I needed. I moved my hips as his fingers hit just the right spot. I pressed myself against his hand, moving up and down, as I moaned in the lowest voice possible in his ear. “Bryan, it feels so good.”
“Kat, you have no idea…”
He layered kisses on my neck as I kept up the rhythm I needed. He gripped my waist firmly, keeping my body close, making sure I would make it all the way. Then I bit my lip as the intensity tore through me. There was no just about, no almost, no close but no cigar. I pressed my mouth to his shoulder to muffle my sounds, then collapsed onto his chest. We remained quiet for a moment, only the sounds of machines far away flickering in the background.