Joy Ride

She narrows her eyes at me. “Fine. Don’t tell me. Lick me instead.”

“Oh, I intend to. But first,” I drop my face to her neck, lick a path to her ear, and whisper, “so much more than I’ve ever wanted anyone.” Then I meet her eyes and I go serious for a moment. No teasing. No playing. “It’s more than just physical. You know that. I want you because I’m so fucking crazy for you.”

“I could listen to you say that all night. Preferably after I think about how often you used to say I drove you crazy with my attitude.”

“And for that, I’m going to take my sweet time.”

“No.” Her voice turns desperate. “Please, Max. Don’t tease me. Please just make me come.”

I let go of her knees, drop a kiss to her nose, and return to the sweet paradise between her thighs.

I moan as I taste her. She moans, too. And I do as she asked. I don’t tease her. I kiss her pussy the way I kiss her lips. With hunger. With need. With a bone-deep desire to consume this woman.

She writhes and moves beneath my mouth as I open her legs wider. She wraps them around my head, rocking into my face, grabbing at my hair. “God, it’s so good. So much better than last night,” she cries out as she bucks up into me.

The image of her getting off alone in her bed twenty-four hours ago flashes before my eyes. I picture her fucking herself with her fingers to thoughts of me. That image makes me harder, makes me go faster, makes me even greedier to bring her all the pleasure in the world.

And I’m pretty sure I do, because she curls her fingers around my head and cries out in ecstasy. She pants and moans and jams her hands in my hair as she comes so damn hard on my lips.

Then I crawl up her body and lower myself to her. Fuck. This feels so fucking good.

She wraps her arms around me as she breathes hard, coming down from her orgasm. “I’m on the pill. Are you safe?”

I nod. “Completely.”

“Then get your gigantic dick inside me. I want to know what it feels like when you f—” But she stops herself. She’s not a girl who swears. The monkey curse was borne of that moment. Her expression turns softer. Her eyes more vulnerable. “Make love to me, Max.”

My heart squeezes. It feels like it can barely fit inside my chest. This woman who once seemed to hate me is now letting me in. She’s letting me have her—heart, mind, and body. I want to take care of her, and treat her like the gift that she is.

“I will, baby,” I say, as I nudge her legs wider and wedge myself between them. I rub the head of my dick against her, and she stretches her neck, moaning my name. Her back bows, and I’m not even inside her.

I burn with lust.

I push forward, sinking into her. When I’m all the way in, a shudder wracks my body. Our eyes meet. It’s intense and almost too much—this connection I feel with her. The way she gazes at me. How her eyes blaze with more than heat, more than desire. It’s like looking into a mirror because everything I see in her eyes, I feel as well. This woman I’ve wanted for years and fought with for weeks is finally beneath me in bed, her arms wrapped around my neck, her legs hooked around my waist. And she’s fucking crazy for me, too.

“I must have been really good in a past life to have you now,” I say as I start to move inside her.

“Maybe you were a monkey,” she says in a purr that’s somehow still sexy despite what she’s saying. But maybe that’s part of why I’m crazy for her. Because she says things like that in the heat of the moment, because she calls me an idiot before I screw her on a car, because she sings to me when I tell her I’m into her.

“Lucky monkey. Lucky guy,” I say, as I swivel my hips and thrust. Her lips fall open. Her back arches.

And I fuck her. And I make love to her. And I have her.

For the first time, it doesn’t feel like we’re hiding truths from each other. For the first time, I know we’re both all in, and that it won’t stop at tonight. I hope it won’t stop for a long, long time.

“Feels so fucking good,” I rasp out as I reach a hand to her hip, hiking one leg up higher.

“So good,” she moans, pressing her hands against my back, bringing me closer, even closer, so the full weight of my body settles onto her. I move to my elbows, but then she takes my right hand and slides her fingers through mine. And hell, if I wasn’t already falling in deep, that does it for me.

I’m barely aware of where we are, except that we’re all tangled together—arms, legs, limbs, sweat, and heat. And like that, I fuck her while holding her hand, our fingers tightening together as she nears the edge. She flies first, crying out my name as she comes. I follow her there with a long, low groan that doesn’t seem to stop.

At last, I move off her, but I don’t let go. I pull her close to me, spooning her the way she likes it. “For the record, that wasn’t monkey sex. Next time it will be, though.”

“Funny thing, Max. I like all kinds with you. Non-monkey sex and monkey sex.”

“Good. Because you’re going to get a lot of both.”

Tomorrow we can figure out the details. Tomorrow we can hash out how this whole thing works with business and secrets and deals.

Tonight, I just want to be at peace with the woman who tattooed her name on my arm, and deep in my heart.

44

On the train back to Manhattan, Henley invites me over for dinner.

At last, I’ll get to see her place.

“I make the most incredible mac and cheese from scratch. You’ll pretty much never want another woman ever again once you have my mac and cheese,” she says, tapping her fingers against my chest.

“So mac and cheese is your closing sales pitch, basically?”

“Absolutely,” she says with a confident nod. “I told you—I’m an excellent girlfriend. Mac and cheese is one part of an awesome whole.” She gestures to her purple dress and red scarf, same outfit as yesterday. “But obviously, I’m going to change before you come over tonight.”

We both showered this morning at the B&B, and by shower, I mean a spectacular blow job that stopped short of the finish line so it could turn into a screw against the tiled wall as water streamed down her sexy back. And then, there was soap and shampoo and all that jazz.

But neither one of us was prepared for last night’s sleepover, so we’re both in the same clothes as yesterday, though Henley told me she brought along a change of panties, figuring she would need it. Obviously, she needed it. As the train chugs into New York, heading for Grand Central, I check the time. We’ll arrive in twenty-five minutes, and that makes me even more aware of another countdown clock.

The one that ticks to the talk. Sooner or later, we need to discuss how this is going to work. I need to tell her about Creswell’s interest in having me do more work for his network shows. It only feels fair to tell her, even though it might upset her. But that’s part of what we’ll have to sort through. As I think on what to say, she peers at her phone for the first time in a while, and it occurs to me that she’s cut back in that department during the last several hours, and I couldn’t be happier.

She’s been happier. She’s been less tense. Though, let’s be honest, multiple orgasms probably do that to her, too. But as she scans her messages, a harsh sigh sounds. She purses her lips and stares out the window.

“Hey. Is that your business deal?” I ask, rubbing her knee.