Come Alive (The Cityscape 2)

I quivered and ducked backward, hoisting myself onto the counter. I wrapped my legs around him and pulled him to the sink. “Your turn,” I said, taking the hairdryer.

He inhaled appreciatively when I stuck my fingers in his hair, which was really only damp. He kissed my nose.

“Now, now,” I scolded. “I take blow jobs very seriously. No one goes to bed with wet hair tonight.”

He laughed with his whole body, and I secured him closer, locking my feet against his lower back. We were level now, and his eyes watched me closely; I could feel them even though I kept my focus on his silken hair. Once I’d finished, I set the blow dryer on the sink and styled his hair away from his eyes. My own hair was messy, but it didn’t matter. How could it be bad when he’d fixed it himself?

He pulled on my towel so it fell open. His eyes closed, and he leaned in to inhale deeply, as if committing my smell to memory. He placed a kiss on the underside of my jaw. Curious hands explored me, touching wherever he could reach. I flinched when he passed over my scar.

His eyes dropped to my lap, and he gripped my thighs. “You taste so good,” he uttered, licking his lips. My face burned in response. He pulled me in for a hug, and his finger trailed goose bumps down my spine. “Did you eat tonight?”

“Hmm?”

“Did you eat? Aren’t you hungry?”

“I’m fine,” I sighed into his neck. “And I should go. It’s late.”

He stepped away, and I shivered instantly. My face distorted as I looked at him. “I’m so cold without you.”

“I’m sorry, baby,” he said softly. “It is cold tonight.”

I shook my head. “All the time. I’ve been cold since that night. I can’t get warm.”

“It’s probably all the goddamn weight you lost,” he scolded. “This is unhealthy. What happened to the girl I took for burgers a few months ago?”

“She was lost,” I said, my voice hitching as I looked at him.

He embraced me again. “If it were up to me, you’d never be cold.”

“I know,” I said, because I thought I did. I thought I believed that he really did want more from me, but it terrified me when he said it.

“I’ll take you home,” he said, pulling back. “But for the love of God, Olivia, please let me make you something to eat.”

“How?”

“We had an event up here last night. There are some leftovers.”

“Will you be shirtless?” I asked, knocking my heels against the cupboard underneath me. My mouth formed into a circle. “You’re blushing.”

“No, I’m not. If those are your conditions, then fine, I accept.”

I blinked at him and hopped off the counter. “All right,” I said, shrugging my robe back on.

“Can I put underwear on?”

“Hmm . . .” I closed one eye as I thought, and he laughed.

I went to leave, but he pulled me backward and into his arms. With my back to his front, he leaned into my hair and murmured, “How’s that for a reflection?”

I looked up at the mirror. He made me beautiful. Together, we were beautiful; a puzzle with only two pieces. I shifted my eyes to his and nodded. He held my stare a moment and let me go with a kiss on the cheek.

I snuggled into the warmth of my robe as I wandered to the kitchen while he changed. “Are there plates?” I called.

He appeared, tutting at me. “I’ll prepare it.”

“I don’t mind.”

“Go on, and let me make you something to eat.” He furrowed his brow at the contents of the refrigerator. “There isn’t much, but I’ll come up with something.”

I propped my chin in my hand and watched him navigate the kitchen. “Do you like to cook?”

“No. I usually eat out or my housekeeper makes something a couple times a week.”

It was my turn to tsk. “You do need a woman in your life.”

He answered with a grunt, but I was comforted that there was at least one thing he wasn’t proficient in. I smiled like a schoolgirl as I watched, enjoying the view of his spectacular, ridged torso and taut ass. His muscles were hard but not bulky, and they became more defined as he moved. I was tempted to run my tongue over them appreciatively. Once, after he stuck something in the microwave, he stole away for a chaste kiss on the lips.

He set down two plates of day-old hors d'oeuvres and pulled his chair to the corner of the table so we were close. “Next time you’ll be topless, right?” he teased.

I forced a laugh, but I had caught his slip. Next time. “However you’ll have me,” I responded, deliberately gulping down the nagging guilt.

His eyes darkened with the dilation of his pupils. He reached out and slipped his hand in my robe, tugging it open slightly to reveal my breast. “I’ll have you any way I can, until you beg me to stop.”

At his touch, I sighed and wilted against my chair. If he were mine, I would have told him that I’d never ask him to stop. That he could take me any way he needed me. His fingers grazed over my nipple and under the curve of my breast. I arched toward him as his hand dropped behind me, caressing my lower back and sliding over my ribs. He pressed my waist and his thumb ran over my scar. His eyes burned when he said, “Tell me.”

CHAPTER 16

HE WANTED ME TO OPEN for him again, and he had a way of making me. But didn’t he understand that it made everything harder? I sighed heavily. “The best way I know how to deal with it is to forget, David.”

“The best way or the only way?”

I smirked at him. He grabbed the seat of my chair and pulled me to him in one quick jerk. With a firm hand under my jaw, he thumbed my cheek and then kissed the corner of my lips.

“Even when you smirk, you have the prettiest mouth I’ve ever seen.” His breath was hot on my skin as he said, “I think about it all the time.”

My heart stopped, and I was sure I’d blown a circuit. “All the time?” I exhaled.

“All the time. To see your mouth wrapped around my cock earlier is something I will never forget.”

My nipples tingled and tightened. I swallowed. His mouth brushed over my skin, and he pressed a lingering kiss on my temple. When he drew back, he maintained contact with a hand over my hair.

“You’re safe with me,” he said quietly, and I scrambled after his mood shift. After a beat, and without removing his hand, he said, “Forget about the scar. Tell me about growing up in Dallas.”

“What?” I breathed.

“I don’t get much time with you, indulge me.”

I waited for my heart to calm while he stroked my hair. “I was a happy kid,” I said. He nodded encouragingly, so after I dipped a buffalo wing in blue cheese dressing and took a bite, I continued. “That’s how I remember it anyway. We lived in a nice home, which actually had a white fence.” I smiled. “Gretchen and her brother John were my best friends. They lived around the corner.”

“What were you like as a little girl?”

I dropped my eyes. Why was I telling him this? What was the point in learning about each other? It could only lead to more pain.

“Hey,” he whispered, and I looked up again. “What were you like?”

I closed my eyes and the memory began to seep in – the memory of the girl I was before the divorce. It was a place I rarely let myself go. “I was alive.”

There was a hint of concern on his face when I opened my eyes again. “Alive?” he asked.

“I was always doing something. John would tease me about being a chatterbox, and when I wasn’t talking, I was making up stories or games. I wrote everything in journals. I always had a pad of paper with me.”

David’s forehead creased with a deep ‘V’. “I thought you didn’t like writing.”

I searched my brain, trying to remember when I had said that. “I used to. A lot. A teacher told my parents that I had a knack for creative writing and grammar skills above average for my age. My mom wrote for our local paper and had published a few books before I was born. Sometimes she ha

d two or three novels in the works, and as soon as I was old enough, she would have me sit and edit them. When I told her I liked writing and not editing, she would make this face and tell me that I didn’t have what it took to be an author. Editing was what I should focus on.

“Anyway, regardless, Gretchen and I started an unofficial school newspaper. I would write short little articles, sometimes about our classmates, sometimes fiction, and she would illustrate it.” I blinked a few times and took a sip of water. “My dad would photocopy it, and we’d pass it out every couple weeks or so. John called us nerds, but he always stole a copy.”

“Did you ever think, as you got older, about writing your own book?”