“Yeah,” I agree. “But not today.”
“Not today. I’ll talk to you soon?”
; I nod, even though she can’t see me. “You will. I love you, Mom.”
“Love you.”
There’s an awed silence when I hang up the phone. I look at Sally. “That went better than I expected.”
“You mean what you said? That you’re happy? That we could be happy?”
I pull her across the bed toward me, and into my lap. “I do,” I say. “I thought that because we just met that there was no way that it could be true. That I would be just like my father if I was in love with someone so soon. But I can’t deny it anymore. I am very much falling for you, Sally Landing.”
She turns pink, and I kiss her, savoring the way she still tastes of chocolate and the way she turns sweet and melted against my body.
“Me too,” she says.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
I roll us back onto the bed. “I didn’t take just one day off from work,” I tell her. “I took three, and I intend to spend those days getting to know everything about you and every part of you.”
She laughs. “Not leaving the bed?”
“Not leaving the bed.”
“I’m going to need some clothes sooner or later.”
I raise an eyebrow. “That’s a problem for later. For the conceivable future, you’re not going to need any clothing.”
“Is that so,” Sally smirks at me. “Why?”
I run my hand down her side and that smirk fades into a look of lust. That’s a look that I could get used to on her face. “Because I plan on starting on the very long list of things that we have to do together. And each thing is dirtier than the last.”
She bites her lip and arches her hips into mine. “Okay.”
Epilogue
Sally
One Year Later
Valentine’s Day
The dress I’m wearing is gorgeous, though I’m not exactly sure why I’m wearing it. Despite my best efforts, Eric hasn’t fully embraced Valentine’s Day. I’ve accepted that he’s not ever going to love it the way I do, and that’s okay. He’s still agreed to celebrate with me, and I agreed that I wouldn’t subject him to a giant party. So the message asking me to come home wearing something nice is a little surprising.
I turn my key into the elevator and feel it lift towards the top of the building. We’ve been living together for six months now, and there’s no end in sight. I’ve never felt as lucky as I do now looking back at the day I met Bianca. I’m half-way convinced that it was Cupid that yanked that chocolate cart out from under me, simply so that I could save her life, and then meet the love of my life.
And he is the love of my life. There’s no question about that.
The elevator doors open on our living room, and I freeze. Our entire apartment is filled with candles, every surface covered, and in the middle of the space is a table covered in ingredients for banana splits, all in separate bowls, just like it was served to us at The Empire Room a year ago.
And next to the table, standing in a tuxedo, is Eric. I shake my head as I walk toward him, trying to look at everything at once. “Eric, what the hell is going on?”
He smiles. “Happy Valentine’s Day.”
“But you hate Valentine’s.”
“I don’t hate it,” he says, pulling me in for a kiss. “Not anymore.”
I smile up at him, wrapping my arms around his waist. “You did all this?”
“I did.” He’s grinning. “And I asked you to dress up because I am fully prepared to take you out for a fancy dinner on the town for this day that you love. But before that, I wanted to talk to you about something.”
“Okay,” I say, eyeing the table. Everything looks delicious.
And then I feel Eric pulling away from me and I’m confused because it feels like he’s pulling down. I look at him, and my mind doesn’t register the position. Why is he on his—
Oh. My. God.
Eric is on one knee in front of me and my mouth has dropped open. “Eric…”
“Sally,” he says, smiling. “I will never forget when you first walked into my office. I’d never seen anyone like you, and it was like I had been struck by lightning. You weren’t anything I expected, and I was falling in love with you before I even realized it.”
There are tears in my eyes, and I’m trying to blink them away because I don’t want to miss a single second of this.
“This past year has been the happiest of my life, and I love you.”
“I love you too,” I say, though it’s quiet because I’m not in control of my voice.
“I don’t ever want to be apart from you.” He pulls out a box from the inside pocket of his tux, and opens it. Inside is a beautiful ring, sparkling diamonds in a swirling formation with a filigree silver band. It’s absolutely perfect. And even if there were no ring at all, I wouldn’t care. “Will you marry me?”
I’m nodding before he even asks the question. “Yes, of course I will yes.”
Eric slips the ring on my finger and kisses me, standing so that he’s holding me close, my toes barely touching the ground. I kiss him back, showing him exactly how much I want this and want him and how happy I am. “I never want to be apart from you either,” I say tearfully. And then I slap his arm. “You did all this without me knowing.”
“I’m very stealthy,” he says, kissing my nose. “But I’m glad you were surprised.”
“I mean, yeah,” I say. “I had no idea. I thought the dress might be for dinner or something, but not this.”
“Speaking of dinner,” he glances at his watch, “we have reservations.”
“Or,” I say, “we don’t have to.”
He looks at my face, searching. “You don’t want to go?”
“I wouldn’t mind going to dinner,” I smirk, “but there’s perfectly good food here, and I would hate for that to go to waste.”
We never did recreate that night with chocolate. We kept meaning to, and then we always found ourselves falling into bed without making it to the chocolate. This is an opportunity. I spread my hands across his chest and start undoing buttons.
Eric laughs. “I did have an entire plan in place before I brought you home to ravish you.”
“Any problem with ravishing me now?”
He grins. “Absolutely not.”
He helps me strip him down, and he’s naked before I am. I reach over and dip my finger in the chocolate sauce and spread it across one of his nipples before slowly licking it off. He groans. “Definitely, definitely don’t have a problem with this.”
I laugh, flicking my eyes up to his. “You know, after dinner last year, you taught me how to treat your cock and you called it a lollipop.”
His eyes are dark with arousal. “I remember.”
“We’ve never actually done the whole lollipop thing.”
“Sally,” Eric grips my arms, “are you asking me to cover my cock in chocolate so that—”
“So that I can suck it off and make you come? Yes, that is exactly what I’m asking.”
A slow, sultry smile grows on his face. “Your wish is my command.”
I take the time to strip out of my dress while he does what I ask, leaving on my underwear, one of the sets that he loves. When he turns and sees me on my knees in purple lace, the look on his face turns from amusement to pure hunger. And then he’s there, and I’m catching dripping chocolate on my tongue.
“Mmm.” I make the sound as I grab him and lick his shaft, cleaning the chocolate from his skin diligently and thoroughly. I’ve learned a lot in the last year, and I don’t need any guidance anymore on how to give him pleasure. But this is a step above.
The sugar rush from the chocolate and the feel of his hands in my hair whilst I plunge down onto his shaft makes me wet. I’ve always loved doing this, ever since the first time when he took control and told me exactly what he wanted. In fact, he doesn’t let me do it as much as I offer.
I move down, releasing his cock for a moment to tease his balls and take care of the left over chocolate that’s dripped there
. I suck one and then the other, soft and hard, rotating the pressure in the way I know drives him absolutely crazy.
“Sally,” he says, but no more, because I take him straight to the back of my throat and his words are lost in a groan.
I hum, letting him feel the vibration and everything about him is taut, ready, it won’t take long for me to make him come.
“Sally,” he says again, guiding my mouth away from him. “Not yet.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Why not?”
Grabbing the bowl of chocolate from the table and kneeling down to meet me, he dips his finger in it and traces it over my breasts. “Because I want to be in you tonight. Really in you.”
I grasp his meaning. We’ve recently spoken about going without condoms, and this feels like a good time to make that change. “Yes,” I breathe.
He gets rid of my bra and then I’m lying on the floor, watching him drizzle chocolate over my skin. His mouth soon follows, licking away the sweetness, making me moan because just like he promised me almost exactly a year ago, my new fiancé has superb tongue skills.
He takes my nipples one by one and teases them until I’m arching off the floor. It’s a sign that he’s willing to take his time, and I love it because I know that I’m in for a world of pleasure tonight, and hate it because that also means that he has no problem drawing out that pleasure until I beg.
My panties are gone now, and the warm, sticky feeling of chocolate spreads down across my skin, and Eric’s mouth seals over my clit, licking away the sweetness and taking me higher, closer to the edge.
“I didn’t think that you could taste better,” Eric says roughly. “But baby you and chocolate are one damn good mixture.”
“Mmm,” is the only response I have.
Eric’s mouth is between my legs until I’m squirming on the floor and there is certainly no chocolate left to be found.
He stretches up to kiss me, and I let him. He knows that I like it when I can taste myself, that it makes me wet and aching and wanting him. And then I gasp because he thrusts into my pussy in one brutal stroke, and it’s so familiar and so different without a condom.