Though Bea’s smile is too bright and too genuine. “Are you hungry?” she asks.
So apparently I’m the only one hungover. “No, thank you. Is it all right if I shower?”
“Of course. You don’t have to ask me that.”
Actually I do, because you’ll soon be the new owner of this hotel. That’s what I should say to her, but I can’t quite bring myself to do it. Because I know that the sooner I say that, the sooner this ends. And she looks so lovely in a silk and lace robe. So lovely in her casual majesty. It makes me want to fall to my knees, to beg her to stay. But anything other than leaving would be a way to tie her down, to make her owe me. I need to give her the hotel, outright, without any strings attached or demands. And then I need to leave. I won’t do to her what Edward did.
“I’ll be back in a few minutes,” I say roughly, because I need a cold shower and approximately ten thousand gallons of coffee before I’m ready to have that conversation.
In the bathroom I find a drawer with a couple unused toothbrushes wrapped in clear plastic, the kind the hotel probably sends up to forgetful travelers. I feel much better after I brush my teeth, but I need a shower. In the end I’m not quite self-flagellant enough to make the water cold. I make it hot instead, standing under the spray and letting it pound away some of the tension.
A sound catches my attention, and then a gust of cool air as the shower door opens.
Bea stands on the marble tile, looking shy and knowing at once in a gold silk robe. A virgin. A siren. I’m not sure my mind will ever wrap itself around her. I’m not sure I’d ever want to. I crave both parts of her, all of her.
“Can I come in?” she asks.
Already my body reacts to her, hardening, turning hot and eager. “There’s nothing I want more, Bea. But I don’t know if I can be gentle right now.”
She tugs on the silk holding her robe together, revealing the glory of her body—pale skin and dusky nipples, high breasts with freckles across the slopes of them. Her belly narrows and then flares out again to hips I long to hold as I pound into her.
Between her legs her hair is a darker color, almost bronze. My cock throbs just looking at her.
The silk pools behind her, and she steps into the shower with me. “Then be rough.”
It’s been so long since I’ve had sex for only myself. Have I ever done that?
Have I ever touched a woman’s breasts only to feel them in my hands? Have I ever sucked her nipples because I love the feel of her? Have I ever slid my fingers through her slit, blunt and greedy, because I needed to feel where my cock would be?
Bea gasps and arches, giving me better access to her pussy. “Whatever you want.”
“Yes,” I mutter, letting the need overtake me. For the first time. This is how she felt that night, being a virgin. It’s the way I feel right now, doing this with her. I push two fingers inside her, slick from her arousal and the hot spray of the shower. “I want this.”
She moans, leaning back against the tile. “Yes.”
“I should prepare you more,” I warn her. “You will feel this later.”
“Make yourself feel good,” she whispers, her eyes an unfathomable sea. She has depths I’ve never explored. Depths I never will explore, because I won’t be here that long.
I’m here now, so I make it count, lifting her up against the tile wall, spreading her thighs wide, and notching my cock against her. My voice comes out as a growl. “Say it again.”
Her head falls back, exposing her throat. “Whatever you want.”
I thrust home, clenching my teeth against the ecstasy of her. She pulses around me, and it feels so good I want to make her do it again. “That’s right,” I say, my lids heavy. “Touch yourself, Bea. Come around my cock. I want to feel you.”
She reaches down, whimpering as she finds her clit. It’s too direct, I think. A little too harsh, touching herself while she’s spread open and slick but I don’t tell her to stop. It feels too good when her pussy grasps my cock like a fist. “Oh my God,” she whispers.
Whatever you want. The words swirl around me in the hot steam, and for the first time I’m free. “Bite me,” I gasp, because that’s something I would not have asked for. I want it now.
She turns her head, making a delicate bite on my arm where I support us against the tile. Her hand moves faster on her clit, and I know she’s close. Close, but I want more. Always more.
“Harder,” I say, my teeth gritted.
She comes with a keening cry, biting down hard enough I see stars. I ride out her climax while her pussy squeezes my cock, and then I lose myself in her. I thrust into her, relentless and burning hot, turning her climax into a second and a third, until they string together in an endless litany, her voice echoing off the tile, her body wet and welcoming around mine.
I take her again and again, long after I should let her rest, only because I want to. Whatever you want, she says, so I pretend we have forever.
Chapter Twenty
We spend the rest of the day making love. I have had plenty of sex in my life—the passionate kind, the animalistic kind. The paid kind. There has been sex in my life but never love.
Which is why I force myself to leave the bed while she sleeps, to dress quietly, to write a note explaining that the deed will be hers. For such a large property it will require a visit to the lawyer to finalize the transfer, but I make it clear—it will be hers, outright. She owes me nothing. In fact, she most likely won’t ever see me again.
Perhaps I could have been gone. I should have been.
Instead I find myself digging through the pantry for a can of tuna. I open it for the cat, who gobbles it almost faster than seems healthy, swallowing whole chunks of fish.
“Where are you going?” Bea stands in the doorway from the bedroom, holding the lace-trimmed sheet around herself like a toga. I suppose she could look nothing less than glorious, her body well-used, her hair even wilder than ever before.
“Home,” I say, though the word is rather generous considering the emptiness of the loft.
She moves farther into the living area. “Oh.”
“It’s for the best,” I say, managing a small smile for her. “I wrote out the details here, but you will be able to stay at L’Etoile. I made sure of that.”
Her brow furrows. “What do you mean?”
It’s only here that I realize the note was an act of cowardice. This woman has the strength to confront her worst fears. I can find some to tell her it won’t be as bad as that. “I hope you continue to push your boundaries. To visit the rooftop garden or other places in Tanglewood. There are pianos all around the city for you. But you won’t be forced to leave.”
“You talked to Edward,” she says, speaking cautiously because I’m sure she knows that if I confronted him a second time there would be no talking.
“I had a third party do it for me. He was convinced it would be in his best interest to sell the hotel. Which means you’re free. You don’t have to leave, except on your own terms.”
A sense of peace flows out from her. “You did that for me?”
“I would do anything for you.” Even leave.