Ecstasy (A Contemporary Romance) (4 page)

“Thanks so much for offering to work with me,
Charlie,” she'd said.

He'd said, “You know what? I think we’re both
going to get a lot out of this.” But then as he realized how smarmy
he sounded, he backpedaled. “What I mean is there’s nothing more
enlightening than trying to teach another person what you already
know. It’s a good chance for me to see if I actually know what I’m
talking about, or if I’ve just been faking my way through my last
eight books.”

Belatedly, Charlie realized he was going on
and on about utter nonsense so he added, “Does that make
sense?”

His palms got slick and sweaty on the handset
of his cordless phone as he waited for her response.

Clearly trying to put him at ease, she said,
“I know exactly what you mean, Charlie. And by the way, I’ve been
thinking we should probably be upfront about things.”

“What things?” Charlie asked, so suddenly
nervous his heart was going clackity-click and he could swear he
heard a heavy metal soundtrack in his head.

“I want you to know that you don’t need to
worry about the vocabulary you use when we’re talking about work. I
know you’re a complete gentleman and that everything we do during
our lessons is purely professional.” She cleared her throat and
then added, “Even if we do happen to deal with things like dildos
and kinky sex in our books.”

Charlie forced a chuckle, but inwardly he
felt like the world’s biggest scum. Sure, his intentions were
honorable. He was going to teach Candace how to write great
erotica. But he couldn’t deny the fact that in the privacy of his
imagination he had already devised twenty different ways he wanted
to make Candace scream with pleasure.

But no matter how strongly he felt about her,
he had decided to put the lid on his desire until their mentoring
sessions were through—jumping her bones during their lessons would
be a complete betrayal of her trust. He only hoped it didn’t kill
him in the meantime.

“Good,” he’d said. “I’m glad we are being
completely upfront about everything right from the start. I knew
you were the right person to work with.”

“Frankly, I was afraid that Sheba Queen of
the Sluts wouldn’t have left you in one piece by the time she was
done with you. I had no choice but to save you by offering up
myself.”

Charlie let himself savor the vision of
Candace tied and bound to an altar, naked and gleaming, in
sacrifice for him, before he said, “I appreciate that. More than
you know.”

“So, what’s on the agenda?” she asked him,
and just like that his entire body broke out in a sweat as he
unfolded the piece of paper he’d written their lesson plan on.

Trying to keep his voice light, he said,
“I’ve broken our mentoring sessions into five different lessons.
Lesson one will be how to set a romantic scene.”

“That sounds great. I love the way you paint
pictures with words in your books.”

“Thanks,” he’d said, and then swallowed
loudly as he prepared to continue spelling out his list of lessons.
Lesson one was the easy one, and he knew things were only going to
get harder from here. Especially if the rock-hard bulge in his
pants was any indication.

“Let’s see, for lesson two I thought we’d
work on varying positions.” He had to pause, clear his throat. “I
mean, we’ll take a look at...uh, you know study the different ways
that...”

Suddenly he couldn’t think of any way to
rephrase the sentence that wouldn’t sound like he planned on
screwing her brains out the minute she walked through his door.

Thankfully, she reminded him in a gentle
voice, “Charlie, you’ve got to stop worrying about offending
me.”

“Okay,” he said, but his trepidation must
have been clear in his voice, because she said, “Say fuck ten times
to me.”

“Huh?”

“Just say it,” she demanded.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,
fuck, fuck, fuck.”

“Good. Now say, ‘I want to lick your juicy
pussy.’”

Charlie choked on an intake of breath, but he
did as she asked. He repeated, “I want to lick your juicy pussy.”
Even as he imagined how amazing she would taste, he braced himself
for her disgust, expecting her to say, “You’re scum and I never
want to talk to you again.”

“Feel better now?”

He took a moment to gauge his feelings and
realized, much to his surprise, that his palms were dry again and
his heart rate had returned to near-normal. Candace, in her sly
way, had forced him over the hump of his anxieties. Yet again, he
was impressed by what a clever little piece of work this delectable
woman was.

“Thanks for that.” He was glad to laugh. “You
definitely have a knack for dialogue. And now that I’ve decided to
stop being such an idiot, here are the rest of my lesson plans.” He
spoke quickly and didn’t pause between lessons. “Lesson three –
using toys. Lesson four – the joy of sex in exciting locations.
Lesson five – how to use role playing to really up the ante.”

He knew if he gave himself even a second to
think about her reaction he’d start to make an even bigger ass of
himself than he already had, so he barreled ahead. “So, how about
we start next Saturday at my house on Lombard? Noon?”

“Great,” she’d said and hung up as soon as he
gave her his address.

Now here he was, on the big day, with noon
quickly approaching. Through great force of will, Charlie stopped
banging his head on the door, stopped torturing himself with
thoughts of what a dweeb Candace must think he was, picked up the
box of rose petals and walked into his guest bedroom to finish
preparing the classroom.

Charlie had decided the best way to teach
Candace how to set a romantic scene was to show her one in real
life. He knew, however, that using his master bedroom for any of
these lessons was a very bad idea. As it was, in the past seven
days he had beaten off to the picture of her he had in his head so
many times while lying in his bed and while showering, as soon as
he walked into his master bedroom it was practically a reflex for
him to reach for his cock and start pumping it in his hand.

Standing in the doorway of his large guest
room, he surveyed the space with a critical eye. He had draped the
four-poster queen-sized bed with Indian silk. In his writer’s mind,
he could see two lovers deep within their own world, sheathed in
the exotic fabric.

He had covered the mattress in red plush
velvet, and underneath the luxurious cover, he had put red satin
sheets. To top it off, a dozen pillows fought for space near the
head of the bed.

Charlie had never been particularly
interested in interior design—although he felt that he had done a
nice job with making his house a comfortable and cozy reflection of
himself—but as he went from store to store in Union Square, as he
ran his fingers lightly over the fabrics, he realized that he was,
in fact, greatly enjoying himself.

His enjoyment, he thought ruefully, may have
sprung from his intense desire to see Candace wrapped in the silks,
velvets, and satins he purchased.

Or, more to the point, his even more intense
desire to
unwrap
her.

He tried to shake the image of Candace naked
with her legs spread wide open before him, begging for him to ram
his cock inside her. He needed to focus on the task at hand.

He had draped the windows with shimmering
translucent red fabric, shot through with gold thread. Then he’d
brought light back into the room with candles of varying sizes and
colors, which he had placed on every possible surface.

On the bare wood floor in front of the
rock-framed fireplace he had laid a chenille rug. It felt so good
to the touch in the store he couldn’t resist buying it. If Candace
lay face down on the rug and rubbed her breasts across it slowly,
what would the soft fabric feel like brushing against her
nipples?

The rose petals were the final touch.
Checking his watch and noting it was a quarter to twelve, he bent
down, opened the large box and reached into the mass of flower
petals.

To his great satisfaction the scent of the
roses wasn’t overpowering. As he had hoped, the flowers lent an
alluring air of sweetness to the room.

When the box was empty and rose petals
beautifully littered the room, he started a fire in the fireplace
and then painstakingly lit each of the candles. The room had a
sensual vibe and fairly glowed with romance, just as he had hoped
it would.

The doorbell rang, jolting him out of his
pleasant trance. His palms went damp again and he half-laughed,
half-groaned at how ridiculous he was being. All he and Candace
were going to do was look at the bedroom, study its romantic
elements, and then do a writing exercise using it as the setting
for a story.

No big deal.

Charlie walked down the hall towards the
front door and told himself to pretend he was working with Steve
Holt. Why should he be nervous? They were just a couple of writers
doing research for their craft.

He opened the door and all of his good
intentions came crashing down upon him.

He instantly took in her smell, the pulse
moving under the soft skin on her neck, the way the breeze was
moving the tips of her red, curly hair around on the tops of her
luscious breasts. An image of her pubic hair, red and curly and
moist with her come and his saliva, popped into his head.

He was in deep, deep trouble.

By the time he remembered to say, “Hi, come
on in,” he had no idea how much time had gone by since he’d opened
the door. Thirty seconds? Five minutes? Time was a blur.

How could he treat her like one of the guys
when she was a walking, breathing orgasm waiting to happen?

* * *

Candace walked into Charlie’s foyer and tried
not to betray her nervousness by giggling, babbling, or checking to
see if her hair was out of place. Instead, she plastered a big
smile on her face and squeezed past Charlie and through his front
door. He hadn’t moved aside very much to let her into his house,
but she had to admit she didn’t mind rubbing up against him, not
one bit.

He was just as gorgeous as he had been at the
conference, with the highlights in his blond hair picking up the
sunlight, that streamed in through the windows. She took in the
snug fit of his well-worn jeans. She couldn’t keep her eyes from
straying to the light brown chest hair that peeked out through his
long-sleeve shirt. Salivating at the thought of seeing his
chest—which she knew she’d never get a glimpse of in this lifetime,
but a girl could dream, couldn’t she?—Candace wished he had left a
couple more buttons undone.

Charlie’s bare feet were the icing on the
cake. Candace had never seen such sexy feet before. She had never
even known feet could be sexy. Until now. His feet were tan, with
well-manicured toenails and a light dusting of hair. Suddenly, she
saw herself naked and ready for him, straddling his big toe
and…

No! Candace stopped herself from taking her
daydream any further. What was happening to her, she wondered, as
she swallowed past her dry tongue. Everything she saw made her
think about Charlie’s cock and fingers and tongue.

Her mind was turning into an X-rated
pay-per-view channel.

Trying to force her thoughts away from the
incredibly dirty things she wanted to do to each and every part of
Charlie’s body, she tuned into the details of his house.

It was crazy, but Candace felt that Charlie
was even more potent, even more intoxicating when he was within the
walls of his private environment. His home, like the man himself,
was masculine and yet warm all at the same time.

“So,” she said in a bright voice to break the
awkward silence, “this is your house, huh?”

As the words left her mouth, Candace turned
pink and had to fight the urge to run out of his front door, down
his steps and back into her car. Could she have sounded any more
like an idiot?

Charlie’s eyes seemed to refocus in on her
and he said, “Yup. Sure is. Glad you could come.”

“It was my pleasure.”

He smiled at her and she melted under his
gaze. She knew she had a serious case of hero worship, but this was
worse than she had bargained for.
Don’t make a pass at him under
any circumstances
, she told herself in a firm inner voice.
He’s your teacher, and you should be grateful that he is taking
any time out of his busy and illustrious schedule for you
, she
added with a flourish.

She noted he looked a little uncomfortable as
he said, “I’ve set up a classroom of sorts for us. It’s down the
hall.” But when he comfortably added, as if she were a buddy from
his baseball league, “Let me pour you a glass of chardonnay,” she
decided his discomfort was just a figment of her imagination.

Her mind was playing tricks on her. More
likely than not she was projecting her own uneasiness onto him.

She followed him into his kitchen. “You have
a beautiful home.”

He turned to smile at her as he uncorked a
bottle of white wine. “Thanks. It’s a big change from my last
one.”

“How so?”

Candace hoped her question didn’t seem like
she was prying, although she acknowledged that she definitely was.
By the time their lessons were through, she wanted to know
everything she possibly could about Charlie Gibson. She was already
tucking all the little details of his clothes and his furnishings
away into her memory for safekeeping and leisurely review on lonely
nights. Who knew, she might even buy herself her own personal dildo
if she was feeling really brave.

“I got to design this house from the ground
up. And I, uh, didn’t have anyone telling me she hated my ideas
this time around.”

He handed her the wine glass and said,
“That’s probably a whole heck of a lot more than you wanted to
know, isn’t it?”