The Foxe & the Hound

“Madeleine? I’m not going to kiss you again.”

I blink my eyes open. “You’re not?”

I sound upset about it.

“No,” he says, tucking a few strands of hair behind my ear.

Oh, what perfect torture. I could write off our past indiscretions as unsolicited attacks, but if I ask him to kiss me now, there’s no shirking my half of the responsibility.

“Maybe just a short one?” I offer. “Your mom is waiting for us in the kitchen.”

He laughs at my justification, like a short kiss is hardly a kiss at all. Then he steps back and releases me.

“Show me the master closet.”

What about our kiss? I want to ask. Did he not like my compromise?

“Madeleine, show me,” he says again, and this time I catch the insistent tone, the subtle desire he’s barely keeping under wraps.

I play along as he ushers me toward the walk-in closet to our left.

“It’s one of the largest ones I’ve seen. There are…”

My sentence drifts off as the closet door closes and locks behind me. We’re draped in darkness, and I think Adam is going to reach up and turn on the light, but his hands find my hips instead.

“Go on.”

“What?”

“Tell me about the closet.”

I laugh. “I can’t see my papers anymore.”

He squeezes my hip, and with his other hand, he takes my papers and drops them to the floor. “You’ve seen it before. Tell me what you remember.”

“Oh…um…”

He steps closer and my brain starts to scramble. Is he going to kiss me?

“There are built-ins for shoes and folded clothes…”

His mouth finds my cheek and I inhale sharply.

“What about the folded clothes?” he asks, and though I can’t see his face, there’s no mistaking the amusement in his tone.

“They’re plenty of drawers for them…”

My voice is fading. I can’t concentrate with his mouth so close to mine. His hand hooks around the nape of my neck and he tilts my head back. I shiver when his fingers weave into my hair.

My eyes flutter closed and he steps closer, sliding right up against me until our bodies meld together like matching puzzle pieces. When I press up onto my toes, our hips meet, and his hands find my waist, keeping me there. My chest brushes his and he takes my earlobe between his teeth. I claw at his shirt, suddenly impatient for more.

“Do you want me to kiss you, Madeleine?” he whispers against my ear.

I nod, but he does nothing.

“Tell me,” he says.

My hands grip his biceps. “Kiss me.”

In that instant, his lips find mine and he kisses me like he intends to leave a mark. He bites, drags, and sucks the life right out of me. It’s passionate and heated—kissing that feels more like fucking. His name is in the air, moaned by someone who sounds a lot like me. His hand is in my hair, my shirt, my bra. There’s no slow lead-in, no polite invitations or barriers crossed over weeks of polite foreplay. I feel crazy, and then his palm is on my breast and I don’t feel crazy anymore. I feel alive in the dark closet as we sink down onto the carpet.

Adam is over me, holding his weight up just enough for my lungs to expand a little, but not nearly enough to fill them. I can’t draw a full breath, and his hips are rolling over mine and my fingers are digging into his shoulders, ensuring that he doesn’t back off even one inch. I don’t want air; I want the kiss Adam is delivering to my stomach. I want the feeling of my silk blouse sliding up and over my head. We barely fumble in the darkness, our movements intuitive.

We were moving fast last week, but in this closet, it’s as if all bets are off. We’re frenzied and wild. Shirts are flying and pants are getting unzipped. His mouth is on my breast. My nipple. He bites down and I arch off the ground.

“Adam.”

He moves his mouth to the other side, bestowing the same soft kiss, hard bite combination on my other breast. My nipples are so sensitive and he takes advantage, rolling his tongue over them until I’m near tears.

I’m aware of how wrong this is, of how unethical it is to have sex in a client’s closet.

“We can’t, Adam, not here—”

“Yes, here,” he bites back, enraged by the idea of stopping. His hand shoves my skirt up to my hips. Our clothes are crumpled around us. The carpet is scratchy against my back, my shoulders, my bare thighs. His hand digs into my flesh, feeling every inch that he’s claiming. Minutes tick away like seconds, and then Adam finds the soft center of my underwear and brushes it aside without an invitation.

I don’t recognize myself. I don’t know this woman lying in a dark closet letting a man brush his thumb across her most intimate area. Reality slips away. I’m nothing but a bundle of nerves and firing synapses as Adam drags his finger up and down between my spread thighs. He doesn’t have to hold me down or spread me wider; I do everything for him—with pleasure.