“I don’t know,” I admit. “I’ve never done it in front of someone else.” This wasn’t exactly what I pictured when I imagined our first time. When I thought about what I’d do to him as my “welcome back to sex” gift.
But . . . there’s no reason it can’t still be mind-blowing.
“So you want me to—touch myself while you watch?”
He laughs darkly. “As appealing as that sounds, I could do it, too. If it would relax you.”
It conjures an odd mental image at first, but his face is so open, so earnest.
I really want you to come. Tonight.
“Okay,” I say, my heart pounding. “Let’s try it.”
As much as I can, I help him out of his boxer briefs, rubbing my hand along his cock as he sucks in a ragged breath. Russell is naked in my bed and waiting for me to pleasure myself. And . . . I’m deeply, breathlessly turned on.
My hand only starts shaking when I sit back up, palming one of my breasts, pinching at my nipple as I stare down the length of my body. “Should I just . . . start?”
“Whatever makes you the most comfortable,” he says, brushing his fingers across my waist. He’s very clearly ready, but he waits.
So I scoot to the top of the bed and lie down, with him stretched out next to me. It’s not until I let my hand drift between my legs as I’ve done so many times before, only never with an audience, that he wraps a hand around himself. And it’s no longer strange—far from it. I don’t dare break eye contact as he strokes downward, then up to the bead of moisture forming at the tip.
“How is that?” He’s already breathing hard, his question rough like gravel.
“Good,” I manage as I find a rhythm. I’m lying. It’s fucking amazing, and watching him while he’s watching me might be the most intensely sexual thing I’ve ever experienced. I didn’t anticipate the sight of him touching himself being so erotic, but fuck, it is. The image of him with his hand around his dick, the tensing of his jaw and the shuddering of his breaths and the way he grips my ankle like an anchor with his free hand . . . yeah, that’s going to be burned into my brain for a while.
Then he turns his body so he can kiss me, and god, it’s too much, too good. All of my senses are lit the brightest neon. Now that an orgasm feels not only possible but imminent, I let myself loosen up even more, moving my fingers faster. Out of the corner of my eye, I spy a scrap of black lace, and before I can think twice, I reach for it and pass it to him.
He just looks at me as his hand moves up and down, one side of his mouth twitching. But then he takes my lead. First he brings my panties up to his face. Inhales. Then he moves them lower, lower, until he’s thrusting into them, and just watching him is enough to take me over the edge.
“These,” he says, “are so—goddamn—hot. You are so goddamn hot.”
“Russ.” I bite it out on a gasp as I rub my clit with two fingers. The truth is that I’ve never felt this sexy. This powerful.
I get there first, a sweet rush of pleasure, my legs quaking before my body collapses. Then he’s kissing my breasts, my neck, my lips, my eyelids. His cock is firm, solid heat between us, and I realize he’s held back so that I can finish. That knowledge makes me slide my hand between us, desperate to undo him.
“I don’t want you to get messy if you don’t want to,” he pants. I can tell it’s taking all the self-control he has not to let himself go.
“I want to.”
And it only takes a few more pumps of my fist before he groans, hips rocking forward as he paints my breasts with his release, warm and slick.
“God,” he says, still trying to catch his breath. “You are—that was—”
I laugh, dragging my fingers up his back. “Same. Unexpected, but . . . really fucking fantastic.”
He disappears for a moment to clean up, coming back to sweep a damp towel over my skin first and then his.
“The benefits of a studio,” I say as he pulls my body to his. “The bathroom’s only ten feet from the bed. And we have a great view of the kitchen from here.”
He nuzzles his face into my neck. “And yet somehow, I want to stay exactly where we are. Unless it’s already morning.”
I motion to my blackout curtains. “I think it’s nighttime, but you can never be too sure with those.”
“Ah. I was going to ask about those, but my mind was elsewhere.”
I don’t want to forget the way he looks right now, flushed and content, his hair sticking out in a hundred directions. Wrecked in the best possible way.
I realize we have to talk about the difficult things: what we’re going to do at work, what this relationship means. If a relationship is something we both want.
Elodie.
But right now, I just want to savor this.
“Ari,” he says into my hair, his hand resting on my hip. “I really like you.”
“Me too,” I say quietly, and I wish it didn’t feel so terrifying.
20
FORECAST:
Mild discomfort leads to a long-awaited heart-to-heart
WHEN I USED to picture Torrance’s house, I imagined the kind of place in furniture showrooms, sophisticated and spotless. The reality isn’t too far off. Her Dutch Colonial in Madison Park is painted robin’s-egg blue, and everything inside is done in shades of white and cream with warm wood accents. I’m so worried about tracking dirt onto the rugs she tells me she custom-ordered from a Seattle artist that I half wonder if I should have taken off my shoes outside. At least I washed my sling last night.
“Make yourself at home.” Torrance hangs up my coat and gestures to a cream sectional topped with no fewer than a dozen decorative pillows. Next to it is a towering shelf full of succulents. Making myself at home might require becoming a different person entirely. “I’ll be right out with the wine and cashew cheese. Trust me, it’s better than it sounds.”
When she invited me over for a “girls’ night” and told me we would be the only two girls in attendance, I was skeptical. In three years of working for her, Torrance has never expressed a desire to see me outside of work. But then I thought back to the massage, and how she opened up. And how great it felt, even just for a while, that she was listening to me. This whole time, that’s been the goal. I’m just not sure I can accept that it’s happening.
I debate where to rehome the pillows on Torrance’s couch, settling for stacking them in the matching armchair, before sitting down, and—oh. This is a phenomenal couch. Between my therapist’s, my brother’s, and Torrance’s couches, I’m starting to think I need to go furniture shopping. I remove my sling so I can stretch my arm a bit—after physical therapy this afternoon, my elbow’s a little sore.
The arrival of a gorgeous wood charcuterie board snaps me out of my sofa envy, with five kinds of vegan cheese and a marble-handled cheese knife. Cured meats and wedges of grilled bread, green olives and fig jam. It’s a Williams-Sonoma catalog come to life.
“This looks incredible,” I say. “Even the vegan cheese.”
Torrance waves a freshly French-manicured hand. “I love entertaining. Seth and I used to do it all the time, but I don’t do nearly enough of it on my own these days.”