"So if I can avoid touching her for six years I won't be a pervert? Thanks, that's helpful."
"I'm saying it all evens up in the next few years so why delay the gratification now?"
"I'm no morality expert, but I don't think that's right."
Across the bar the guy Lydia's playing darts with stands behind her and places one hand on her hip and another over the hand holding the dart. Her dart-throwing skills are fine so it's a lame-ass move on his part.
I wonder if she'll kiss him. I wonder if she'll offer him more.
I wonder why in the fuck I care.
I wonder if I'm having some kind of goddamn midlife crisis. It defies all reasonable logic. Why do I need to touch this particular girl? What does it matter? There are no fewer than ten women at Double Diamonds who would go home with me tonight—women who have gone home with me in the past. Women I pay money to so I can kick them out five minutes after I come.
Women who don't look at me as if they might expect better out of me.
Fuck.
"We should go," I murmur, but I'm still watching Lydia.
"Yup," Canon agrees, but he makes no move to get up. He doesn't even take his eyes off the game playing on one of the bar TV's.
She must feel me beside her before she sees me because she turns a moment before I take her hand in mine. Her eyes widen in surprise, her lashes fluttering against her cheeks as she quickly blinks. Her lips part, come together again as a smile breaks out. She flushes, the color high on her cheeks, and there's that look again. Expectation. God help me, she looks at me with hope.
What am I doing?
She has to tilt her head back to look at me because I'm standing on top of her, with her soft hand enveloped in my own larger, rougher one. I squeeze and her breathing increases, her eyes sparkling, a look of raw anticipation on her face.
"Rhys?" she asks, and hearing my name on her lips makes my pulse kick up and my cock harden.
I don't respond, instead giving her hand a tug and moving us towards Brady's office. The moment we clear the doorway I'm on her, a tangle of lips and tongue and a fistful of hair.
Until Brady's chair scrapes across the floor. Lydia breaks away from me with a squeak.
"Again with my office. I'll see myself out," Brady mutters as he passes us, the door clicking shut behind him.
I laugh and Lydia blushes.
"Who's the guy?"
"Who?" She blinks at me in utter confusion and I'm gratified that she can't remember a man she was talking to two minutes ago.
"Darts," I remind her and she looks down at her hand where she's still clutching the darts for her turn. She opens her palm and stares at them, then back to me.
"Josh?" she answers, but she says it like a question, like she's possibly already forgotten his name. Good girl. "Just a guy from my apartment complex. We met him at the pool today."
She's gotten some sun today, I note, a sprinkling of freckles covering her nose and cheeks, and I'm annoyed at the idea of stupid Josh seeing her wet and covered in a scrap of fabric.
"We have a pool at the hotel," I tell her.
"Yeah, and I have a pool at my apartment complex," she replies with a small laugh, as if we're simply comparing amenities, her eyes searching my face for some clue as to what I'm on about.
I don't know, so I kiss her instead. I take the darts from her and toss them in the direction of Brady's desk.
I kiss her again and she leans in closer, placing her hands on my chest. Her touch is light, shy? But her lips are eager. Her lips are pliant and soft and sweet. Her kisses feel like a preview to what sex would feel like with her. Hungry. Intimate. Exploratory.
I walk us backwards towards the couch, saying a silent prayer of thanks to Brady for having the foresight to have a couch in his office. She lands on my chest, her body soft and light on top of mine, but it's her eyes that interest me. They widen, as if she's surprised at where she's found herself, which she should not be after propositioning me just yesterday. But perhaps that's not normal behavior for her. Perhaps there's something about me specifically that makes her do things outside of her norm.
I find I like that idea.
The look of surprise lasts only a second, replaced with a slow smile that spreads across her entire face. If I thought she was pretty before, it's nothing compared to this moment. Her tongue peeks out to wet her lips and then she ducks her head, a tiny giggle escaping before she looks up again. She peeks at me from underneath her lashes and there's a spark of excitement in her eyes now, her hands sliding up my chest, her fingers splaying outwards in exploration, the tips massaging like a very happy kitten.
And then she flexes her hips.
God help me, she flexes her hips. A tiny rolling motion pushing her pelvis against my thigh, seeking friction, seeking more. I slide my hand over her hip to palm her ass and she does it again. Harder this time, more deliberate, yet I don't think she's aware she's doing it at all. Her hands are busy feeling my chest through the fabric of my shirt and her eyes are busy examining the places she follows with a kiss. My neck. My right eyebrow. My left earlobe. She pauses there, pulling my flesh between her teeth with a gentle tug before following it with a swipe of her tongue.
Another flex of her hips.
I place my hand over hers and slide it lower until I clear the hem of my shirt and slide it under, placing her hand on my bare stomach. Her eyes move to mine, again with that brief look of surprise followed by a widening of her eyes and her trademark enthusiastic smile.
She raises herself off of my chest enough to shove my shirt halfway up my chest, and in the same movement she spreads her legs. Spreads them so that she's straddled my right thigh. The movement causes her skirt to bunch up around her hips so the only thing separating her from my leg is her panties.
Cotton. I can feel that much under my hand. I trail my fingertip along the seam around her thigh and the edge of her panties and she shivers, then smiles, biting her lip mid-smile. It makes the skin on her nose scrunch up, the freckles from her afternoon in the sun an adorable bunch.
Another flex of her hips.
I can feel the heat of her pussy through my pants and it's fucking unreal. It's unreal because my pants are still on. What the actual fuck is happening right now? Are we… dry-humping? Is this grown woman—too young for me, yes, but grown all the same—rubbing one out on my leg?
Her lips part on a gasp, her hair a pile of tumbling strands surrounding her face. Some of it is stuck to her lips so I reach up and pull it free, tucking it behind her ear. My fingers linger, tracing the shell of her ear, down the side of her neck, across her clavicle. She smiles and grinds herself against my leg, both palms resting on my bare chest for balance.
I don't think I've dry-humped since I got my driver's license, so it's been… a while.
And yet I'm hard. Painfully hard watching her rock back and forth on my leg. Shocked my dick is still in my pants, but hard.
I drop my hands to her thighs, bare with her skirt bunched around her waist. Her skin is soft and smooth under my palms and touching her like this feels better than it should. Better than anything I've felt in a really long time.
Her eyes dart down to where my hands are stroking her skin. She must like what she sees because she licks her lips and when her eyes find mine again they're eager. Expectant and wide-eyed and the most lovely shade of green, the kind of green usually associated with a forest or an Irish festival. The shade of green reserved for men who give a fuck about noting such a detail. They're flirtatious and inquisitive and so sweetly interested in what she's looking at. Which is me.