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Chapter 11
Oliver
Watching Holland O’Dell lick salt from the edge of her glass was sheer torture. Every single glimpse of her sweet pink tongue had me imagining it on me, her full lips wrapped around me, her big crystal eyes peering up at me. I tried to keep my eyes off her, though that was difficult, too. I was torn between enjoying the show—which she seemed completely oblivious to—and preserving my dignity. Standing up with a raging erection was not on my list of preferred ways to win a girl’s favor.
I drank my beer in long gulps, forcing myself to keep my eyes down as we sat at the corner table inside the little patio. I had to ask myself what exactly I was doing. There was no doubt in my mind that I wanted Holland. The question was, for what? It was true she’d single-handedly pried me out of the self-destructive rut I’d been in the last several months, and she wasn’t even aware of it. I thought part of the attraction could be the renewed focus on work, one that made me look at my company from a whole different angle, one that had me doing work I was good at, showing me I was actually needed. But my fascination wasn’t held completely by the work. It was her. There was something about Holland that pulled at me, spoke to some part of me that hadn’t heard anything sweet or hopeful in a long time. And that combined with the work? I was becoming addicted.
Despite Holland’s tempting curves, her complete and unfathomable power over me, I wasn’t sure where things could possibly go from here. We might be sitting here having a drink now, but that didn’t change the fact that my life outside this moment was a complete fucking disaster, and I had the mental baggage to prove it. Meeting a beautiful woman wasn’t a solution to having lost track of everything that defined who I was as a person. And burying my dick to the hilt inside her addictive wetness would be an incredible escape from my grief and confusion—but it wouldn’t solve anything, as much as I might like to pretend otherwise.
“You’re thinking deep thoughts again,” she said, her bright eyes on me from across the table.
“All my thoughts are deep,” I quipped.
“Of course they are,” she said, smiling. But her eyes told me she knew I was covering. I wasn’t sure being close to a girl as smart as Holland was a good way to keep secrets. She’d figure them out eventually or convince me to tell her. Speaking of which, I still had to tell her who I was, my involvement with the company. Even though I wasn’t sure where any of this was heading, being less than honest was beginning to feel more and more like lying.
“Holland,” I started, staring at the straw she buried in her margarita and having a totally unwelcome irrational image of my dick buried in her soft pink pussy instead. A flush heated my skin and I dropped her gaze. Fuck, I couldn’t even control my own thoughts, and now my dick was throbbing so painfully it was making it nearly impossible to speak.
“Hale,” she said, her voice mock-serious, mirroring my own.
I risked a look up at her, to see that tongue lap out again to trace the edge of her glass, driving me over the edge. Fuck. The next words I spoke were a surprise, even to me. And the gravelly voice that delivered them barely sounded like my own. “Do you live around here?”
She cocked her head a bit and seemed to be thinking before she answered. “Around the corner.”
I didn’t give any more thought to what I was doing. I just knew that I wanted this girl, in whatever way I could have her. And all of this limbo—this friendship, working relationship, whatever it was—was partially a façade. The truth was I wanted her on a base level. As soon as fucking possible. I stared at her openly, aware that lust was written across my gaze and that she could definitely see it there.
She stared back, evaluating, and then finished her drink and pushed the glass into the middle of the table between us. “Wanna go?” Her voice was a breath, and I could see an answering desire in her eyes.
I’d figure out right and wrong later. For now, all I wanted was this. “Is that okay?” My question couldn’t have been clearer if I’d said, “Wanna go fuck?”
A blush crept over the exposed skin of her chest and high points of color appeared in her cheeks as her eyes darkened. “Yes,” she said.
I shouldered her bag and followed her out to the street, taking her hand as we reached the sidewalk.
“Hale,” she said, sounding as if there was a chance she might change her mind.
I spun her around and pressed her back against the building beside us, holding her there with my thigh between her legs. She gasped and before she could say another word, I bent my head forward and took those pretty lips with my mouth. I tried to be soft, to tease and nuzzle, but when she let out a soft moan and opened her mouth to me, I couldn’t stop myself from deepening the kiss. My body felt like it might explode and my dick was a constant throb against the seam of my pants. I let out a low curse as I pulled myself off of her. I wanted her, but I wasn’t going to force things. I couldn’t just take her against the side of a building. If she was having second thoughts, I needed to let her voice them. And then I might work on changing her mind. I backed off—time to let her come to me.
I didn’t wait long. She fisted the front of my shirt and pulled me down to her mouth again, kissing me roughly for a minute before breaking it off and saying, “Come on,” in a husky voice that had every cell in my body spiking with desire.
I followed Holland in a haze, my body screaming one thing while my mind cautioned something entirely different. It had been my mind I’d listened to for so long now, my mind saying all the horrible things my lawyer didn’t seem capable of articulating. They weren’t even your parents. They might not have even loved you. My mind had told me the most hurtful things I’d heard in the span of my protected life, had turned everything I believed upside down. My body was far more focused, and it was that insistent call I chose to answer as Holland’s taut firm ass swayed ahead of me on the sidewalk, finally turning in to a tall glass-fronted building and guiding me to an elevator.
She turned as the doors slid shut and smiled at me, not a grin, not a self-assured sexy smile, either. A smile that melted my heart, that seemed innocent even as I had an almost guaranteed conviction that I was about to fuck this girl silly. That was Holland, that was part of her attraction—she was open, honest, and completely different from any other woman I’d met. She wasn’t calculating or manipulating. She wasn’t polished to a high shine or handpicked from a crowd of debutantes by my parents. She was just Holland.
“Come on,” she said, her voice breathy as she took my hand and pulled me down a hallway to the right of the elevator.
I followed willingly, letting her guide me, trying to talk myself down a bit. If I succeeded, I might be able to take this as slowly as she deserved. I took a deep breath and followed her through a doorway. Apartment 5E.
“This is home,” she said, and her eyes shuttered as she pulled me inside. Was she embarrassed?
I looked around. It was sparse, but homey. The well-worn couch was covered with a throw blanket that looked homemade, and which led me to wonder if Mama Gi crocheted. There was a small kitchen to one side, and a whitewashed table and two chairs hugged the pony wall between the living room and kitchen. Plants sat on most surfaces, bringing the feeling of life and vibrancy to the otherwise dark and potentially stifling space.
“This is nice, Holland,” I said.
She stood in the middle of her living room, looking around her as if seeing the space for the first time. Her eyes fell on me finally. “I like it better with you in it,” she said, her voice low. The blush that climbed her cheeks told me this was a daring statement for her, and I was not going to make her regret it.
“I like it better this way, too,” I said, crossing the space between us. I wove one hand through her hair and pulled her to my mouth, slipping my tongue through her open lips and teasing gently as she released a tiny moan. I kept an arm behind her and leaned down, sweeping my other arm beneath her legs, and picked her up. I cradled her against my chest for a brief moment and then turned toward the door that could only lead to the bedroom. I toed open the door to find the most feminine room I could imagine, one I would not have chosen for the girl I knew so far. It featured white-painted furniture with curved legs and a wide queen bed with a pillowy comforter made of pink satin—not at all what I would have guessed. A small tattered giraffe sat atop the dresser, looking forlorn and very, very old. But the bedspread in all its ruffled glory really commanded the room. “Pink satin,” I commented. “Maybe I should start calling you duchess.”
“Oh God, please don’t,” she said. “It’s just…it’s the bedroom I never got as a kid. I got it for myself when I could afford to. I know it’s silly. And I just like pink…” she trailed off, letting her hair fall in front of her face as she hid in my arms.
