UPDATE: Since this story was
originally published, I have been fortunate enough to sell
a revised (but still HAWT!) version of this story for professional publication.
Thank you so much to
everyone who has supported this story in the year and a half since its original
issue here, and to everyone
who has recommended it. I have had to take the original story down, but
the revised version
is now available from
Linden Bay Romance. Below is the cover image, linked to the book
and an excerpt of the new version for your enjoyment. I hope you will
enjoy that version
as much as you have this one.
Blessings, Sadbhyl
Lindy
poked disinterestedly at her salad, letting her companions’ conversation flow
over her. Jade and Cara were good
friends, but their lives were so different from hers that sometimes she
couldn’t help wondering why they were even acquaintances.
They both had careers of their own, Jade as a software designer and Cara
as an interior decorator. They both
were mothers of young children, with all the boasts and complaints that went
along with that. They both had
lives of their own.
Lindy
just had Gabriel.
As
though reading Lindy’s mind, Jade turned to her.
“So, where is Gabriel taking you for your anniversary this year?
It was Tahiti last year, wasn’t it?”
Lindy
nodded, nibbling half-heartedly at her lunch.
“This year we’re just going to Aruba.
He can’t be gone from work too long, so we can’t go far.”
“Kathleen
Fallon just went to Aruba,” Cara said, sipping at her iced tea.
Jade
rolled her eyes. “Who’d she go
with this time?”
Cara
grinned. “Not the same person she
came back with.”
Lindy
drifted out of the conversation again as her friends fell into their favorite
hobby of discussing Kathleen Fallon’s indiscretions. She actually liked Kath,
but she didn’t want to get into an argument with them. She saw them little
enough as it was.
That’s
when she noticed him.
He
was sitting a few tables away, a coffee and the New Yorker on the table in front
of him. But he was paying no
attention to either, his intense gaze instead locked on her.
He was handsome in an almost feminine way, high cheeks and black, wavy
hair emphasizing his pale eyes.
Disconcerted,
she glanced quickly away, trying to focus on the conversation at her table.
But whenever her eyes flicked back, which they did often now, he was
still watching her.
His
attention made her feel uneasy, but she couldn’t stop looking his way. What was he doing? What
was he thinking?
He
waited until he was sure he had her attention before allowing his
eyes to scan slowly up and down her body before meeting her own again,
his lower lip caught between his teeth. Lindy spun back to the table, blushing
furiously. Okay, she knew what he
was thinking.
She
was just working up the courage to look back and see what this forward man was
doing now when Jade and Cara startled her by pushing away from the table and
starting to get up. “Wait!” she
protested. “Where are you
going?”
They
both looked at her in confusion. “Shopping,
remember?” Cara said with her usual impatience.
“You needed new shoes to go with your dress for the party on
Wednesday?”
Jade
looked more concerned. “Are you
alright?”
“I’m
fine. I just . . .” Lindy
floundered until she saw a waiter go by with the dessert tray.
“I want dessert first. You
don’t mind, do you?”
“Oh!”
Cara dropped back into her chair. “This
place has the chocolate cake everyone says is better than sex.”
Lindy
and Jade laughed, and Jade sat back down. “Well,
if you think its better than sex, it must be good,” Jade teased.
“I’m in.”
“Great!”
Lindy flagged down their server and ordered three slices of the ganache
cake, aware of the good looking stranger still studying her.
Cara
was right, the pastry was to die for. Lindy
couldn’t help moaning softly as the first taste of it hit her tongue.
“Oh my god, that’s the best thing ever!”
She
didn’t hear her friends’ noises of agreement, for at that moment she glanced
over at her admirer. His playful
expression was gone, replaced with an erotic fervor that heated through her.
Feeling
suddenly brazen, she lifted another forkful to her mouth, slowly closing her
lips over it to slide it off the tines, making a show of her tongue as she
cleaned all the chocolate carefully from the fork.
His eyes never moved as he watched her with darker intensity.
And
then suddenly his own tongue flashed out to run slowly over the contours of his
lips in sensual promise.
Lindy’s
fork clattered to her plate as the sensation she hadn’t been able to name
before burst forth as full blown arousal. He
noticed her reaction, grinning ferally at the power he knew he had over her now.
She
pushed quickly away from the table, startling her companions.
“I have to go to the ladies room,” she muttered faintly.
“I’ll be right back.”
If
they acknowledged her departure, she wasn’t aware of it.
She
managed not to race to the restroom. It
was a single unit, so she was justified in throwing the lock behind her before
leaning against the door and looking at herself in the mirror for the first
time. She was shocked at what she
saw. That couldn’t be her, face
flushed and eyes wide and dilated. She
knew it was reaction to him, to a complete stranger who had never even said
hello to her. What was wrong with
her?
The
soft knock on the door sent a flood of excitement through her again. Lindy waited for the woman’s query she knew wasn’t
coming. Her body knew who was on
the other side of the door, moisture soaking her panties and dampening her
thighs, preparing her.
Unable
to stop herself, she reached out and unlocked the door.
He
opened the door and quickly slipped in, closing it behind him silently so as not
to draw attention. She stood
frozen, her breath already coming more quickly as she read his arousal in the
darkness of his cobalt eyes and the bulging line of his trousers. The knowledge that he wanted her as much as she wanted him
electrified her.
When
he reached out to wrap his hand around the back of her neck and draw her closer,
her mouth was already open to welcome his kiss.
She
had never been unfaithful to Gabriel. She
just didn’t have casual sex, had even waited for marriage to give up her
virginity, as unfashionable as that may have been.
None of that mattered with this man.
He pushed her back against the door, his hands already working the
buttons on her blouse as he kissed her hungrily. She responded with eager abandon, her tongue toying with his
as her hands skirted over his back and into his hair. Nothing in the world mattered except this man’s hungry
mouth, his eager hands exploring, the feel of his erection pressing into her.
It wasn’t enough. She needed to feel more of him, all of him. . . .